3
Birthday
The asteroid 2020BJ looked like Phobos, Deimos, and the two other asteroids humans had explored: rolling, bouldery, lightly covered by dust, and gray. Pete Theodoulos, Ruhullah Islami, and the rest of the geological team were just completing their seven hour exploration of the north polar crater aptly called “Santa Claus.” As they stepped inside the Apollonaris shuttle, applause broke out in the Great Room. The dozen residents of Mars who had been watching were proud of the accomplishments of their future colleagues.
“It’s not a very impressive place, but every datapoint helps us understand the history of the solar system,” commented Charles Vickers, their expert on meteorites.
“I’m impressed that you had so many ideas for them,” replied Kevin.
“I see far more meteorites here than I ever would on Earth!”
“And this visit helps us protect the Earth from these things,” added Lal. “Not to mention Mars; I suppose some day this world will need an asteroid shield as well.”
“That’s planning ahead,” said Kevin. “It’ll be centuries before people are spread out enough here to need an asteroid shield.”
“On the other hand, a shield here can try things a shield for Earth can’t; there are no cities of millions to incinerate if you make a mistake,” commented Charles.
“But right now we can’t get more nuclear power, so our growth is limited,” noted Kevin. He sounded a bit bitter; he was one of their two nuclear engineers, after all.
“We could manage with solar power and underground storage of heat and propellants for dust storm season,” replied Lal. “The combination should be as reliable as nukes.”
“I suppose,” said Kevin, skeptically.
“Or we can wait for another Republican to get in the White House,” commented Charles. He glanced at his watch; it was 11:30. “Half an hour before curfew,” he added. Will Elliott had finally put a closing time on the great room; people had been socializing all night. “I’m heading for bed. Good night.” Charles rose from the table and headed out.
With the end of the transmission, others left as well. Jennie rose from her table across the room, put her used tea cup in the dishwasher in the kitchen, then walked across the room to head to her room. Her pregnancy was beginning to show. Kevin followed her across the room with his eyes, contemplating the symbolic meaning of her shape to him. She glanced at him resentfully; she knew he was watching.
Lal saw the incident. He reached over and put his hand on Kevin’s. “It’s not easy. My brother’s divorced; he went through hell.”
“Lal, it’s not that bad for me; I wanted to be free of her, and now I am. I’m sleeping better than I have in two years.”
“For a few months.”
“I know. I’ll have to figure out how to be a father and avoid the mother. This place isn’t very big.”
“And neither of you have jobs that take you in the field.”
“I suggested to her that we get two places, one for the baby and whichever spouse is watching him, and one for the other one. She said no, the baby was living with her.”
“What did you say?”
“Well, I don’t want the minute-by-minute hassle of a baby anyway. But Jenny gets drained emotionally by the child care center. I don’t know how she’ll have the energy for our baby and all those kids.”
“Yes, including Anna.” Lal was referring to Lisa and Karol’s baby, born three months earlier; she was now in day care during the mornings. “I’m sure Jenny will take a maternity leave; if I were her, I’d take the entire six months coming to her!”
“But that’s in dispute, too. The six months are to be split between us and I want some of it as well.”
“Isn’t Martha arbitrating?”
“Yes, and she’s pretty fair. But now she’s pregnant, too, so she has less time and energy, and I wonder how fair she can be.”
“Another baby coming?” Lal paused to count. “That’s number seven!”
“Mars isn’t doing badly, ironically enough.” Kevin poked Lal. “You watch out, it’s contagious.”
“I hope it is! Radha wants at least two.”
“Oh, you found that out?”
“Yes, we’re now in email contact daily, in spite of her parents’ warnings.”
“Why would they warn her against contact with her future husband?”
“Oh, they’re quite right, Kevin. In our culture, traditionally when a marriage is arranged, the bride and groom are not in touch at all until the wedding. Of course, that’s less and less common nowadays. But my friends with arranged marriages have lower divorce rates than my friends who supposedly got married for love.”
Kevin laughed. “That’s bizarre!” He looked around; he had been so loud the privacy of their conversation had been disturbed.
Lal smiled knowingly. “No, it isn’t bizarre at all. It makes perfect sense. You see, my friends who think they got married for love went into the marriage with all sorts of expectations. But in an arranged marriage, you have no expectations and have to make it work.”
“No expectations and no reason to expect it’ll work!”
“As I said, it has worked better than the marriages of my friends who chose their mates themselves.”
“But now, I guess, you know her some.”
“Yes, we do know each other some, so I suppose now we have expectations and dreams.”
“How did this marriage get arranged, anyway?”
“When Radha was selected to come to Mars, her parents complained to her that she was unmarried and she said there was really nothing that could be done. So they did a little research and figured out that I was unmarried, and contacted my parents about arranging a marriage. That was unusual; customarily the groom’s family initiates the wedding plans. My parents contacted me about the matter, since I was far from home, and I said, ‘why not’?”
“So you’ll only have yourself to blame, Lal my friend.”
Lal shrugged. “Brothers and sisters learned to love each other, usually very much, and they are often opposite in terms of personality. Part of the reason is because they’re stuck with each other; they can’t divorce each other. People have an immense capacity to love.” He saw Kevin’s surprise. “I’m sorry, my friend; I wasn’t commenting on your divorce, I was speaking in generalities.”
“That’s okay.” Kevin looked down at the table. “A lot of people have been offering me their unsolicited advice, over the last three months, in spite of Elliott’s comments.”
“The Commander’s position has been controversial among some of us, here.” Lal hesitated. “Can I speak frankly, Kevin?”
“Of course.”
“You Americans are very individualistic; you have a strong sense of personal rights. Some people would say Americans are prickly about it. But the rest of the world is more family and community oriented. The rights of the individual are balanced differently against the rights of the group.”
“Mars is a pretty individualistic place.”
“Not necessarily! Some of us here very much disagree with Will’s intervention. We all should have the right to talk to each other about each other’s behaviors. If Eammon and Irina set out to have a good, big Catholic family—as Eammon has boasted they will—shouldn’t we have the right to comment whether we want to devote resources to support four, or six, or eight kids? But it follows if we have the right to comment to them about the matter, they have the right to ignore us. I’d prefer that the line be drawn there. Let Eammon complain to you about your divorce; and let you ignore him if you choose.”
“Hum. I see.”
“Actually, I’d prefer a bit more community involvement than that; but a divorce is hard to forbid. And you guys really did try to make it work. The community did its part via Martha.” Lal drained the last bit of mint tea from his cup. “Well, that’s it for me. Sunrise comes pretty early.”
“I’d better get to bed, too. I’m glad you’re back, Lal. I missed our late-night chats.”
“I did, too. But Elysium was pretty interesting. Volcanoes, floods, mineral zones, massive eolian deposits and eroded areas; not to mention the fumerole we found, with the surrounding chimney of ice.”
“Still active; quite a coup for geology.”
“And a blow for exobiology.” He shrugged. “Maybe this place is dead after all.”
“It’s a shame, but it means we can revive it.”
“We already have. The snow deposits near Nirgal have terrestrial bacteria in them.”
“I heard. Now we have to figure out whether the contamination came from us, from a space probe decades ago that wasn’t sterilized properly, or from a meteorite blasted off the Earth.”
“Tomorrow,” replied Lal, with a sleepy smile on his face.
--------------------------------
Will was always amazed by the amount of time his duties as commander took. He was slated to spend 70% of his week on administration, but he usually found himself squeezing hours out of his evenings and weekends to complete essential tasks. In the last four years a rhythm of work had been established that kept him involved in almost every aspect of Mars exploration. But it meant spending hours reading minutes, watching video digests of meetings, interacting with the heads of every department in the Mars Commission, and speaking daily with Commissioner Morgan.
That morning—May 15, 2029—he had received a videomail from Louisa Turner, the Commission’s director of public relations. She looked animated and was wearing impeccable makeup that made her look younger than her 55 years. “Good sol, Will. Did you get a chance to review the publicity themes for the next three months? I’m attaching a text file of the updated version. June’s is eobiology; we changed it because of the discovery of terrestrial bacteria in Nirgal’s snows. If there’s less hope of life currently on Mars, we need to emphasize the importance of the study of “dawn life”; this is the Earth’s eobiology as well, after all. The discovery of biological precursors in the lower Noachian shales can be made quite exciting, and Enlai’s a pretty good communicator, so I want to feature him in at least two interviews. The discovery of a new species—anything at all—would help. We need a hook to hang the theme on. Anything announced at the conference would be too old, though.
“July’s theme might as well build on eobiology and transition to August’s, so we’re proposing to feature the shift from horticulture to ecology. Again, there are some pretty photogenic specialists up there to do the interviews. August’s theme has to be the arrival of Columbus 5; that’s been a constant for months. We’ve been making good progress updating the contingency plans for loss of a shuttle or ITV, though. I’ve penciled you in for the standard late July briefing date.
“Any comments? I know you wanted a theme of exploration, but it makes more sense to concentrate on biological matters right now. We’re updating our exploration materials so they can be used quickly if we need to shift the theme. Let me know what you think. Bye.”
Will pushed reply. “Good sol, Louisa. Thanks for the update; I’ll scan it this morning. Eobiology’s an excellent theme for June and I agree that we should shift to it. So July’s theme is logical as well. Our typical briefing date of the 25th of the month at 1 p.m. is fine. Bye.” He hurried through the response quickly because an emergency icon began to flash red in the corner of his attaché’s screen. He pressed on it; “emergency on Columbus 5” appeared on his screen. He jumped out of his seat and hurried into the bridge, which was unstaffed at the time. The central screen already had the details; Ruhullah Islami’s space suit was losing pressure fast. The audio and video from the team exploring 2020BJ was already being broadcast.
“I’ve got it, Ruhullah!” exclaimed Peter Theodoulos. “I’ve got it!” He was slapping something onto his colleague’s leg. But the pressure drop was not slowing very much.
“Negative effect,” said Ruhullah grimly. His voice sounded pained. Apparently he had ripped his suit on something sharp, which was almost impossible to do; suits were tough.
“Then let’s go. Hold the patch on,” said Peter. “Come on, Ruhullah.”
“Acknowledged.” The voice was weak. Theodoulos grabbed his colleague and hooked the two of them together, then fired his manuevering jets. Both of them took off from the surface pretty quickly. Theodoulos turned them and fired the jets again, heading them toward the shuttle about a kilometer away.
And the pressure in the suit kept dropping, though slowly now. Will watched it drop to 0.10 atmospheres, which with pure oxygen was marginal.
“Keep talking,” said Pete.
“I’m okay.”
“Keep talking.”
“I can hear you!” Ruhullah raised his voice, but he was beginning to gasp for air.
“Count, Ruhullah!”
“Yek, do, se, chahar. . .” He began to count in Persian. “Five, six, haft, hast. . .”
“English!”
“Nine, ten. . .” He hesitated, then kept counting while the two men flew through space toward the shuttle. Pete kept his focus on the airlock and added speed, then as they approached he began to slow them, while Ruhullah continued to count, less and less coherently all the time. It was a thirty-second flight to the shuttle; a record, and a violation of all the rules.
They floated toward the airlock and the crew at the shuttle was already there, ready to grab them and pull them inside. They reached out and snared both men, then the four of them more or less tumbled into the airlock. The door closed and the emergency air flood began.
“You’re okay, Ruhullah,” said Pete.
“I am?” The man replied, unable to understand the situation clearly.
“Phew!” said Will involuntarily. The pressure in the spacesuit was already increasing. There was nothing Mars could do; Columbus 5 was still tens of millions of kilometers away. While the mission was slightly closer to Mars than the Earth, the bulk of the data was being transmitted to Houston; Mars was receiving less than a fifth of the total.
Will dug up the communicator number of Columbus 5’s bridge and tapped it into his attaché. “Congratulations, guys, for a quick and successful rescue. If we can do anything here on Mars, let us know. I’m scrambling the medical personnel.” And as soon as Will said that he transmitted an “orange alert” to sickbay. They would automatically tap into the emergency condition being displayed in the bridge and know what the situation was.
-------------------------
The rest of the morning and half the afternoon focused on the emergency. Even though there was little Mars could do, it had to drop everything just in case its assistance was needed. Meanwhile, the reporters were sending their questions and expressing their usual skepticism about spaceflight and Mars exploration. Will was kept busy by that as well.
As a result, when he arrived at the Great Room for supper he was tired. He was utterly surprised when everyone soon rose and sang happy birthday to him. Out came the cake—no candles because of the fire hazard—and he had to cut it for everyone. “Speech, speech!” said several as the cake was distributed.
“Speech?” replied Will. “What do you want me to say? I’m forty-three this sol; nothing special about that date. I don’t feel any wiser, in fact I had completely forgotten it was my birthday from shortly after breakfast until just minutes ago! If there’s any wisdom that has been proved, it’s that we need a regular bridge officer, instead of rotating the task among six of us. But I suppose I do have this tidbit to share: I want to thank all of you for being my friends. I can’t say we’re a perfect team, as much as wish I could claim that. But we don’t do badly together, and we’re learning. So, thank you for everything.”
Everyone applauded and began to eat their cake. Will smiled in spite of his fatigue. “Is Ruhullah still resting?” he asked Shinji, when he had the chance.
“Last I heard, yes. He needs a few sols rest, but he’ll be fine.”
“I sent him a message expressing our concern and our thoughts for his speedy recovery, but he hasn’t replied yet.”
“Give him a sol or two.”
“I’ll ask Pete, also. The Columbus 5 people really performed this sol.”
“They did, it was quite impressive. They’re pretty young on average, too.”
“And it didn’t matter. We’re getting some good people.”
“Definitely.”
Will headed back to his table to eat his cake. Marshall was eating his piece enthusiastically and asking for more; it was clear that sugar, fatigue, and excitement were a bad combination. “I had better take him home,” Ethel said.
“Okay, I’ll stay here with Lizzie a while longer.”
Ethel nodded. She squeezed his arm affectionately; she could see the fatigue and stress in his face as well. Then she took Marshall upstairs to bed.
Will hurriedly ate his supper and cake, and helped Lizzie do the same. Then he carried the little girl upstairs as well. She fell asleep in his arms; she was very tired. He awakened her to brush her teeth and get her into her nightgown, then laid her in her bed.
When he came out of Lizzie’s bedroom, Ethel was seated on the couch in their little living room. He smiled and sat with her.
“A birthday from hell,” she observed.
“Yes, I’m afraid it was. But it could have been worse. No one died, after all, and we now know that nickel-iron meteorite can shatter into razor-sharp pieces. I’ve never seen such a thing before, but I’ll be sure to watch for it.”
“It’s amazing that he brushed into such a thing.”
“I hope he’s alright. I sent him a message, but he hasn’t replied yet.”
“Are you worried about it?”
“Well, yes. His first name ‘Ruhullah,’ according to his biography, was given to him when he was born in 1982 in honor of Ayatollah Ruhullah Khomeini. All reports indicate he’s a good Shi’i Muslim; and no doubt he knows I’m a Bahá'í.”
“But that should make no difference.”
“Well, I hope it doesn’t.”
“Understandable. Speaking of Bahá'í, I have a little gift to give you.” Ethel reached down and picked up a piece of paper and handed it to him. He looked at it. “What is it?. . . . Oh! Does this mean. . .”
“That I’ve decided to become a Bahá'í, like you and Marshall. It’s a declaration card.”
“So I see! What a surprise! You never asked me a question or anything; are you sure you’re ready?”
“Oh, yes. I was talking to Molly and read a lot as well. It’s not like I’m giving up Christ or Christianity, after all; Bahá'ís accept Jesus Christ as a divine messenger and Christianity as a divinely revealed religion. I suppose I accept Jesus more than I did before.”
“That’s true. So, how will we enroll you?”
“Molly said she’d talk to her local spiritual assembly there in Stamford, and take care of it. She suggested I send them an email about why I’m becoming a Bahá'í.”
“That would work.” Will smiled.
“Welcome to the Bahá'í family, my dear.” And he kissed her.
© 2004 Robert H. Stockman