Losing Mars

by Peter Cawdron

  “I can see why he unclipped.”

  My fingers punch at my computer and release the tension on the winch, dialing it back to twenty pounds. There’s still some drag, but I’m free to make my way toward the broken wing.

  Suddenly, I slip. From my perspective, there’s no reason why. My legs simply shoot out from beneath me and I find myself landing on my ass in the loose gravel and sliding toward the cliff. Chunks of dry ice tumble over the edge. I scramble with my hands, pushing at the rocks with my boots, frantically trying to slow my motion. The tension on the wire brings me to a halt. Rubble slides past, disappearing over the ledge and into the canyon.

  “Subsurface ice.”

  I sit still for a moment, catching my breath, with my legs out in front of me, just a few feet from the drop. With trembling fingers, I check the vision on my wrist pad, trying to stay professional.

  “I—I can see where Scott went over. About five meters to my right, over by the third engine. He must have been trying to attach his line to the anchor point on the basket.”

  I turn, wanting to get back to my feet, but my spacesuit makes everything difficult. The weight of the life support unit on my back shifts my center of gravity. When standing, it’s easy to compensate for the bulky weight of the backpack by leaning forward, but going from sitting to kneeling demands twisting to one side. My gloved fingers disappear into the broken scoria and loose bits of gravel. What should be simple is cumbersome and clumsy. I’m breathing heavily.

  The steel panel dragging along beside me gets tangled in my line. It’s more of a hazard than help, so I pull the release, leaving it lying on the rocks while I right myself.

  Dust swirls around me, disturbed by my motion. I’m disoriented, unsure where the edge of the cliff is. My mind plays tricks on me. Mentally, I can hear Jen pleading with me, yelling at me to slow down even though she’s entirely quiet. Back at base, she’ll be biting her lip, but I can imagine what she’d say and she’s right. I’m moving too fast, but it’s hard to fight an overwhelming sense of panic. I feel as though I have to rush, that I’m in danger of slipping again. Scott is depending on me. If I can just get to my feet.

  “Too—close.”

  Hedy’s voice is calm. “Easy.”

  “Got to get up.”

  I stand. Rocks cascade toward me, rushing to fill the void where I was sitting. Flecks of dry ice cling to them, giving the underside the appearance of broken bits of seashell. This region of the cliff is hidden in the shade, beyond the feeble reach of the Sun, allowing subsurface carbon dioxide to remain frozen for most of the year.

  Having accumulated over hundreds of millions of years, the loose shale around me has piled up to form a slope. Any sudden movement could trigger a rockslide. My breathing is labored. I wade forward. Tiny stones pelt my legs, shifting from higher up on the pile. I push with my boots, shuffling through the stones, wanting to reach through to the solid regolith beneath, but it’s as though I’m balancing on thousands of tiny ballbearings. I slip, and suddenly I’m falling, toppling backwards, tumbling over the edge of the cliff.

  The Eos Chaos flashes past, appearing upside down for a fraction of a second. I strike madly at my wrist pad, frantically trying to engage the brake on the winch. My harness tightens as the cable goes taut and I swing wildly, colliding with the cliff beneath the ledge.

  Rocks and stones pelt my helmet, cascading over my suit and falling to the next landing. I can barely hear the call over the radio.

  “Get him up. Get him out of there.”

  I slide sideways as the wire naturally straightens under my weight, swinging me back in line with the rover. The tension in the line increases. They’re trying to reel me in, but I’m caught beneath an outcrop.

  With dust swirling around me, I try to override the winch command, punching at my wrist pad, but the steel cable continues to tighten. My helmet collides with the cliff face, jarring my head. The steel cable pins me against the underside of the ledge. Rocks continue to cascade down from above.

  “Let me go!” I call out, but Hedy’s yelling over the top of me, saying, “Bring him back!”

  They don’t understand. With all the dust swirling around they can’t see me from the boomer. I find myself being dragged along the underside of the rocks by the winch cable. Scratches line my visor. Cracks appear in the outer layer of glass. The tension increases as the winch strains to pull me free. I yell over the sound of the rocks falling around me.

  “You’re killing me. Back it off.”

  There’s no answer.

  “Can’t breathe.”

  There’s nothing else to be done. I have no choice.

  I yank at the quick release by my waist. My gloved fingers fumble with the lever and it comes free. Immediately, I fall, plunging down the cliff face, colliding with rocky outcrops.

  I try to slow my descent, grabbing for the cliff, but that motion sends me cascading head over heels. The base of the cliff looms below, dark and moody. I crash into the debris covering the next landing, sinking into the shale and rocks. Stones continue to cascade down from above, slowly burying me.

  I look up to see a dark shadow racing toward me. The aluminum side panel from the rover plunges through the thin Martian air like the blade of a guillotine. Most of my body is pinned by the falling debris, but I can still twist my shoulders. I wrench myself to one side as the board slices into the rubble inches from my head. It falls on my backpack as rocks continue to pelt my helmet, slowly burying me.

  “Cory! Cory?”

  Blood drips from my forehead onto the inside of my glass visor, running down in front of my eyes. The spotlights on my helmet come on in the darkness. Light seeps between the rocks burying me.

  “Cory. Please!”

  “C—Cory Anderson here. Coming to you live from the Eos Chaos. Boy, is this place living up to its name.”

  A little humor is the easiest way to convey that I’m okay. Four limbs intact. No suit breaches—yet. Battered and bruised but nothing broken. It’s amazing how much can be said without actually saying anything of substance. No one asks if I’m okay because the answer is obvious. No, I’m not. But I’m alive. I’m able to function, but I’m far from okay. Dumb questions are reserved for dumb movies.

  The lack of response from Shepard base tells me they can see me moving around, probably using the thermal camera on the boomer. Given how close the boomer is, if I had a leak, they’d see a heat bloom coming from my suit. My life support telemetry is more revealing than anything I can tell them. Rather than stating the obvious, they’re giving me some breathing space. In the background, they’ll be trying to figure out the next steps, discussing any options that might have been overlooked, exploring every possible way of providing assistance. Silence here means frantic activity back there.

  I dig with my hands, clearing the rubble from around my helmet. Slowly, I back out of the rocks, pushing crushed flint, bits of shale and sandstone away from my body. The backboard lies innocently beside me.

  “Cable had me pinned beneath a ledge. Had to hit the quick release.”

  Sheepishly, Hedy responds. “We’ll figure out how to get the cable back down to you.”

  “Copy that.”

  I get to my feet, still buried up to my knees, and grab the steel panel. Dust clings to my helmet. I brush it away, looking carefully at the cracks, knowing that if the glass breaks, I’ll be dead in seconds.

  “Scott is six meters to your right.”

  “Copy that.”

  “We’re still trying to figure out how we can help you.”

  “Copy that.”

  I hope the repetition in my replies speaks loudly. I’m in pain but pushing on. For now, I need to focus on Scott. Hedy, Jen and Lisa are in the best position to figure out how to conduct the extraction, so I leave that to them. Sue is borderline catatonic so I’m not expecting much from her.

  Battered and bruised, I make my way to Scott. The wing of the downed boomer slipped during the rockslide and is sticki
ng out over the ledge above me, threatening to topple onto us. I only hope the collapsed balloon lying on the plateau acts as an anchor.

  My ribs hurt. A trickle of blood runs down around the side of my face, but already I can feel the blood coagulating, closing the wound on my forehead. I wade through the loose rocks, shifting my legs rather than trying to step over the fine dust and rubble. In one third Earth’s gravity, it’s like powdered snow. Progress is slow, exhausting, but shuffling minimizes the amount of debris shifting with my motion. I kneel beside Scott’s helmet and begin clearing away the rocks.

  Like an angel sitting on my shoulder, Jen whispers in my ear.

  “Being unconscious, we have to assume the worst. I’ll need you to clear the rocks around him and get him on that backboard. Try to keep him straight. You need to minimize movement in case there’s damage to his spinal cord.”

  “Understood.”

  I position the battered aluminum panel beside Scott and begin shifting rubble from his body, exposing more and more of his suit.

  “Can you get a little closer to his helmet?”

  I pan slowly, knowing Jen is trying to decipher clues in the shaky camera images. She talks me through what she can see, walking me through what’s important.

  “No blood. Eyes in the back of his head. Saliva dripping from his lips. No sign of active convulsions. Patient is unconscious and unresponsive, lying on his right side. Recommend you remove his backpack and switch life-support to the auxiliary port on his chest so you can get him on the stretcher.”

  “Copy that.”

  I sink up to my knees in loose scoria.

  “I don’t know how well you can see this, but it’s a bit like playing in the ball pit at McDonalds down here.”

  I plunge my arms into the loose dirt, feeling for the umbilical cord leading from Scott’s backpack to his suit. Once I’ve got a firm grip, I release the clips on his pack and twist the umbilical connector.

  “Initiating shutdown.”

  The connections on our environmental suits are mechanical rather than electronic, relying on pressure differentials. By twisting the locking nut and releasing the pressure, the valves on either side of the cord lock under the sudden change. A small burst of air escapes into the Martian atmosphere, kicking up dust as I shift from the main port on the back of Scott’s suit to an auxiliary port on his chest.

  “Purging the lines.”

  I clear a one-way valve, blowing out any dust as I reconnect his gas lines, circulating air within his suit. With thick gloves on, it’s difficult to hook up the electrical wiring beside the valve.

  “Powering up.”

  “Copy that, Cory. Telemetry confirmed.”

  With Scott’s life-support hooked up to a port sitting just below his ribs, I pull the pack out of the rubble and, using a carabiner, clip it onto the front of his suit. The umbilical is only two feet in length, but it’s enough to give me some room to work with. Stones slide in to fill the gap, tumbling into the hole as I rest the pack on the slope beside him.

  I position the aluminum panel like the guillotine blade it almost was for me, lining it up with his back, running from his helmet at one end to his ass at the other. Gently, I rock back and forth, using a sawing motion to ease the panel down through the rubble until it’s effectively buried beside him.

  “This is harder than it looks.”

  “You’re doing great, babe.”

  Jen’s not following protocol, but I appreciate the vote of confidence. I push several straps in beside the board, leaving the loose ends lying on the rocks, and carefully crawl around in front of Scott. With each step, loose stones shift, threatening to carry us both over the next edge. The slope is threatening to slide, so I take my time. No rush.

  “Okay. I’m ready to reposition him. Shifting him onto the board.”

  I push my hands into the shale, digging under Scott and grabbing the bottom of the board. The weight of the rocks makes it hard but as I lift the loose stones fall away. As I right my fallen companion, I’m careful to avoid having Scott slide to one side. It takes almost a minute to right him, and my muscles are burning from the exertion, but I shift him from lying on his side half-buried in rubble to lying on his back on the aluminum tray.

  Scott groans. His eyes flicker.

  “Hey, welcome to Mars. Weather forecast’s a cool negative eighty, with clear skies and absolutely no chance of rain.”

  I smile, trying to put him at ease. He starts to reach for me, but his gloved hand barely moves.

  “Stay nice and still, buddy. We’ll have you out of here in no time.”

  He nods. Sweat drips from my forehead, stinging my eyes and mixing with the blood sticking to the side of my face.

  I’m more than a little worried I’m not hearing much from Shepard. “Tell me you guys have a plan to get us out of here.”

  “Working on it.”

  I drop to my knees beside Scott and reach over him, wrapping the straps around him.

  “Be sure to secure his helmet. Try to immobilize his neck. We need to keep pressure off his spinal cord.”

  “Copy that.”

  After fixing the strapping in place, I join our harnesses together, clipping a two foot section of cord onto my waist. Whatever happens now, we’re in this together.

  Hedy’s voice is quiet and reassuring.

  “Susan’s retrieved the cable and is hooking it up to the science package on the boomer. Lisa’s going to fly the end of the cable down to you.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  I sit on the loose rubble, resting my gloved hand on Scott’s torn spacesuit.

  “Hang in there. Not long now.”

  Scott mumbles something. He’s stressed and somewhat anxious but appears coherent. He can hear me, but can’t transmit.

  “Help is on the way.”

  He grimaces in pain.

  “Easy, buddy.”

  There’s nothing more I can do for him. I’ve ensured his body is straight, strapping his legs, torso and arms to the aluminum board. He’s in agony. I can see him working with his breathing, taking a deep breath in through the nose and releasing slowly out through his mouth as he tries to manage his pain. His eyes stare out at the Eos Chaos. I follow his gaze, taking in the gullies and valleys winding between buttes as we await the boomer.

  Mars is a contradiction. Physically, it’s small, being closer in size to the Moon than Earth, but everything’s big. Sheer cliffs thousands of feet high. Biggest volcano in the solar system. Biggest canyon. Biggest floodplain. Biggest crater. It’s almost like there’s some sibling rivalry going on at an interplanetary level. Earth got life. Mars got jealous.

  Sitting here, I feel the energy drain from my muscles as the cold seeps through my suit. On Earth, people joke about island time being lazy. Martian time is even more chill. Apart from the occasional meteor impact and the wind slowly eroding the landscape, causing the odd landslide every millennia or so, nothing much happens on Mars. Visit Earth two hundred million years ago during the late Triassic and the planet was undergoing yet another mass extinction. Volcanos spewed methane in colossal amounts, wiping out half of all the species on the planet. Dinosaurs somehow survived, roaming in herds that numbered tens of thousands, trampling what would one day become North America. Mammals began branching off from reptiles, but for the dinosaurs they were little more than a curious food source. The land was squeezed into one vast supercontinent. But Mars? Mars looked pretty much as it does today. Eos Chaos was just as still, its eroded hills just as bald. The distant sun caused dust devils to curl their way across the landscape. This planet is a time capsule. If Homo sapiens hadn’t arisen, the ledge I’m sitting on would have remained largely undisturbed for at least another two hundred million years.

  Hedy speaks through the tiny speakers in my snoopy cap, snapping me back to the present.

  “We’ve got a boomer inbound to you. Sit tight.”

  “Copy that.”

  I’m not going anywhere. I try to
look up, but the rim of my helmet restricts my vision and I end up looking at the machined aluminum and bloodstained padding within my helmet. Slowly, a boomerang swings out over the canyon, maneuvering as it approaches. A thin cable reaches back to the rover. The vast balloon blots out the sun. A probe lowers from the basket, bringing the cable down.

  “Ten meters.”

  I stand, checking both my harness and Scott’s. I have to be careful as just the slightest motion has Scott sliding forward toward the edge of the cliff. In essence, I’m strapped to a loose sled lying on the side of a steep slope. Not good. I grip the carabiner on my harness, ready to clip onto the cable. The probe edges toward me.

  “Five meters.”

  Susan comes on the channel, talking over the top of Hedy. “You’re too close.”

  “You’re not close enough,” I reply, stretching out my arm, desperately trying to avoid the temptation to reach too far, already feeling rocks shifting beneath my boots yet again.

  Hedy is firm. “Susan, stay off comms.”

  “Too close.”

  “Two meters.”

  Susan’s voice is panicked. “You’re far too close.”

  I start to say something, annoyed by her constant interruptions. “Sue, just—” I’m frustrated. Angry. What is her problem? Why is she whining? Just leave us alone. Let us get out of here.

  “Cory, please.”

  Susan is upset. Why the hell would she interrupt the rescue? I think back to her frail state on the plateau and I’m tempted to be dismissive of her, but that wouldn’t be honest. She may have been reduced to tears by what happened to her husband, but she’s still a highly trained astronaut. She’s spent a decade working toward this mission. Dismissing her is not smart. She’s in shock. She’s struggling to articulate her thoughts, but I’ve spent years trusting her judgment on a variety of mission activities. It would be petulant to ignore her now, and it’s then I realize—Susan’s the only one with a clear view. Hedy and Jen are watching us from the perspective of the boomer. I’m looking out at the valley, watching the probe as it descends from the equipment bay on the boomer, but my helmet limits how much I can look up. Susan may not be able to see me, but she’s the only one that can see the boomer itself.