by Jim Melanson
Mission Control: Earlier
Ernst sat back in his chair and scratched his head. He was a quiet and mousy little man that had worked for Interpol for years as a tech investigator. Short, a bit dumpy, with graying hair and glasses, he had an incredibly sharp eye and mind for details. He also had an eidetic memory, making him both a value and a curse as an intelligence agent. When the Mars mission was in its planning stage, he accepted a job offer from the ESA for a very special assignment. Being old enough to retire from Interpol, but young enough for a new career, he took the retirement package offered by Interpol and then increased his income significantly with his new posting. No one at the Corporation really knew what Ernst did, except for a small handful of people. Everyone initially thought he was just the ESA representative. Only four people in the program knew that he really worked for the Bundesnachrichtendienst, the German foreign intelligence directorate. Even the ESA didn’t know about that. The Germans had been very good to the Mars colony program, so Jayden just accepted the presence of him and his team of spooks. There were three, working in shifts.
Ostensibly though, he was the ESA representative, who did work for the ESA (hey, three pay cheques, take it if you can get it), independently monitoring the mission for efficacy. His presence in Mission Control was simple and easy to explain. His workstation, in the forward corner of the room was angled so that no one could look over his shoulder and see what was on his screens. The screens also had angle blocking filters hanging over them. You had to be viewing the screens almost perfectly perpendicular to see anything on them. A few commented that he seemed to have a lot of monitors and equipment for someone simply there as a token presence. Anyone who pushed the questioning though would find themselves in the Mission Director’s office getting dressed down about making inquiries on things that didn’t concern them.
In reality, most had figured out that Ernst was a spook. They just weren’t sure exactly what his tools of spooking were with the Mars colonization, or who exactly he was a spook for. They simply surmised he was an intelligence gatherer, and since he was there in the room, it had to be okay with the brass upstairs. If it was okay with them, it was okay for everyone.
Ernst had total task control over Jalopy-Sat. That infuriated the U.S. Air Force who had basically paid for over half of the damn thing - but they didn’t push too hard. They had someone who could assume total control and lock out everyone else if the particular need arose; the particular need that caused them to do everything they did to get it in orbit around Mars. As far as Hans was aware, Mike was the only other person with control over Jalopy-Sat.
Ernst could retask the satellite, as well as access its telemetry, sensors, imaging capabilities, and its other more specialized capabilities. Other capabilities that made him a very useful friend as far as those on the surface of Mars should be concerned. The only thing he could not do, the only thing that really cheesed him off, was he could not override commands to Jalopy-Sat that came from Mars’ surface. Those commands had been given priority. He and the ESA had argued against it, but they lost the argument. However, Ernst didn’t think that would ever be something to worry about (he was wrong), at least for several more years until there was a larger colony presence (he was wrong again).
At this moment, he was scratching his head because of the tracker camera being activated. The Jalopy-Sat Mars facing tracker camera would automatically activate when something was moving more than 500 metres from the colony site. It had the algorithms and data feeds from the other camera, so it was very good at distinguishing between windblown ground matter and something moving under power. The tracker camera was focused on a 5 kilometre square area over the ice field, just a few kilometres from the Habitat site. Ernst had been zooming in and zooming out, panning, scrolling and doing whatever he could to the available raw image feed, to find what held the tracking software’s interest. Whenever he followed the tracker zoom itself (the built in process that zoomed right in on what was being tracked), all he saw was frozen ice. Like Carrie and Arno, he could only manipulate the image/video, as he was looking at it, over eighteen minutes old. Even Ernst couldn’t manipulate the cameras live. Any retasking of the cameras would take over thirty-six minutes to show him the results.
He looked up and across the room. Carrie was at her station, and he thought about piping the feed over to her computer. She had much better resolution on her monitors, and her software may be able to figure out what it was that the tracker camera was targeting. Perhaps he just needed to have her come look at his monitor rather than share the feed, share the power. Having her do this though, would be letting her in on a secret that very few shared so far.
Ernst knew just about everything about everyone who worked in this room, regardless of their shift cycle. He knew that Carrie was divorced: that she spoke Romansh, German, English and French; she had two young sons; she lived comfortably but not ostentatiously; she had won prizes for her Streudel at the local fair; she had one parent living in the same town as her; she had one brother who lived in England. He also knew that she and Mike had a “fling” a year before he departed, and that they were still close as friends. Hans and Jayden both seemed to hold her in high regard, so Ernst finally made up his mind. He picked up the phone, dialed her desk phone and waving his hand at her as she answered he asked her, “Können Sie hier bitte kommen, Frauline Oolsen?”
Bolt Upright
I sat bolt upright in the makeshift bed on the conference table. It sounded like someone was knocking on the Habitat wall, outside. As my eyes focused to the room, which was still light in the Martian summer’s midnight sun of this latitude, I started to relax. It must have been part of a dream. I smiled sheepishly and laughed a bit at myself. I was about to lay down when I realized I had to pee. Uh-oh.
Of course there was a bathroom. The bathroom was almost fully functional, having been powered up and tested as part of the preparatory post planet fall procedures. It just needed the water system primed now that I had the umbilical feeds connected. However, the bathroom was in the L-Hab. I was in the W-Hab. I had not connected the breezeway. Connecting the breezeway was an hour long process provided everything lined up, and I didn’t have to go outside to manually force things into place. The sense of urgency about making No. 1 increased. It wasn’t going to wait an hour. I looked around. Nothing was unpacked, even if it were, there wouldn’t be any empty pop bottles. Some relief then came in the form of a stroke of brilliance. I hoped off the table, and quickly went down the spiral staircase and into the airlock. I stepped into my Activity Suit from the Lander; I hadn’t unpacked the day-to-day one yet. I then hooked up the urinal catheter and found blessed release as a small smile and quiet, “ahhhhhh” escaped my lips. I was almost done, standing there half dressed in my Activity Suit, making wee-wee when the knocking sound came again. Right behind me, right at the airlock outer door. I almost jumped right out of my skin as I spun my head around, half expecting to see a space suited figure in the portal; half expecting to see something dragged out of the dark corners of my imagination, recalled from childhood nightmares. It was at this moment I decided that I would take my K-Bar everywhere with me. I remembered I had left it lying on the conference table. I was standing there in my long johns and t-shirt. I was too far from the corner to retrieve one of the weapons I had stowed. Yup, I was feeling pretty vulnerable at that moment.
Looking towards the outer airlock hatch, I could see there was nothing on the other side of the portal except the view of the Martian landscape beyond it. I heard the knock once more, loud, right below the airlock hatch, like someone was standing on the ground trying to get my attention. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me. I hurriedly got out of the catheter and Activity Suit, pulled up my long johns and hightailed it back up the spiral staircase. I was going out of my mind trying to figure out what the sound was. It simply could not be someone knocking. I was the only person on Mars. A quick look through the o
uter hatch portal before fleeing the lower level had not revealed anything, so I was headed for the camera interface at the COM station. At least I didn’t feel quite as exposed as I did standing in the airlock. Of course, I realized I was still half asleep, and that my thought processes weren’t quite in the realm of cogitando aperte at the moment, but still, it was a very queer situation to say the least.
I went to the COM panel and activated the camera control icon. I then selected the exterior airlock camera, the one that is aimed straight down outside the airlock. I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. It certainly explained the knocking sound. I walked over to the forward portal of the upper level, and looked out over the ground in front of both Habitats. I leaned against the wall and started laughing. I seemed to be doing a lot of laughing on Mars. As I was laughing at the source of the knocking, I remembered there was a camera in the airlock. I thought about the infamous space turd video. Oh man, why does everybody have to see me going to the bathroom. I smiled with chagrin, especially at how I had reacted to the knocking sound.
I looked back at the COM panel video feed of the nacelle skirting that was blowing around. I flipped screens on the COM panel and checked the weather data. The winds were gusting at 70 km/hour. One of the nacelle skirting sections that I had decided to leave until morning had been blown around in the wind. It had landed at the foot of the airlock and got hooked up in the airlock ladder. The knocking sound was the piece of metal banging against the top of the ladder, near the point it connected to the Habitat. Sleep would have to wait. That skirting had to be secured so that it would not blow too far away for me to retrieve, and so that it would not damage something critical. It would be another four hours before I got back to sleep again.
This job wasn’t hard; it was just hard because I was so physically fatigued. This whole idea of gravity, I realized, was definitely for the birds. Only three of the panels had blown around in the wind, and they hadn’t blown far. I had to drag them into position, and then use my body as a brace to hold them while I used the universal wrench, still no charge on the battery, to replace the bolts. I did have one close call going to pick up the fourth panel, the one on top of the pile that had not blown around. As I was approaching it, a strong gust of wind picked up the far edge and sent it tumbling straight at me. Man oh man, I’ve never jumped so fast in my life, not even in Terran gravity. John Carter would have been proud. Lesson learned. When picking up deadly hunks of metal in a windstorm on an alien planet, approach them from upwind, not downwind.
After the nacelle skirting panels were all back in place, I returned to the airlock and this time I dug out, unwrapped and plugged in the charger for the universal wrench. I climbed back upstairs, hopped back on the conference table, rolled over, and was almost instantly asleep again.
Mission Control: 18 Minutes, 22 Seconds Later
Everyone had heard the knocking/banging sound and saw Mike’s sleeping figure suddenly sit bolt upright. Everything went quiet, techs huddled around telemetry feeds, Arno panned and zoomed cameras. He very quickly found out what was making the banging noise, looked over his shoulder at Hans, gave him thumbs up; then transferred the exterior airlock feed to the big screen. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Then they realized that Mike hadn’t seen the image. Things got interesting because Mike jumped off the table and ran down the spiral staircase. They all watched intently to see the reaction when he found out it was one of the pieces of skirting. Arno switched to the airlock camera, and everyone watched with amusement, expecting him to run to the portal in the airlock hatch. Instead he put both feet in the Activity Suit as someone muttered, “Look out the window!”
There was a collective gasp as Mike whipped down his long johns and everyone had a view of his bare ass while he starting fiddling with the catheter tube. Everyone was still holding their breath when they heard, “Ahhhhhhhh….” over the speakers. The meteorological tech stood up and announced, “Full moon over Mars!” He sat down quickly to Hans’ withering glare.
Honestly, no work got done at all for the next few minutes. The laughter was almost deafening. Two techs actually fell out of their chairs they were laughing so hard. Three cups of coffee got spilled on the floor. Two people had to leave the room to catch their breath. Even the ever serious Ernst, the ESA spook, had tears running down his face. Hans Gohs’ face had gone from pink, to red, to what was a pretty scary hue of aubergine. Those around him stopped laughing and tip-toed away. Finally he roared in frustration, threw his headset on the desk in front of him, and clomped out of the room. No one had thought, yet again, to pause the internet feed.
Arno had seen Hans reaction and seen him leave. Poor Hans, he thought to himself. It would be a miracle if Mike didn’t make the man stroke out. Twenty minutes later the whole video from waking up to the spin-around-in-terror-staring-at-the-airlock-portal was re-cut and being distributed with the sound of the “Ma-Na, Ma-Na” song dubbed in. They never did find out who did it.
Foo-Fighter
The next day wasn’t supposed to be filled with activity for me. The plan was for plenty of rest to be able to further acclimate back to a gravity environment. So much for the best laid plans of men, and mice. After waking up and having some water and my last meal replacement bar that I had in my duffel, I connected the Habitats.
The active and passive breezeways had both outer and inner doors but once the breezeway was extended, the outer door could not close again. In the most extreme conditions I could retract the breezeway to close the outer door, but that was an unlikely scenario. The breezeway was airtight but could not function as an exterior airlock. I powered up the active breezeway’s standalone system in the W-Hab, and did a handshake with the system in the L-Hab. Everything was in order so I commenced the five step sequence to connect the two Habitats, which I was now starting to think of as buildings, instead of what they technically were, spaceships; or more precisely, fairly complicated cargo containers.
First, open the outer doors. There was a small portal in the breezeway inner airlock door and light immediately streamed through. I had unpacked and initialized a desktop computer and now held up my tablet PC, which I had finally paired with the COM Panel. I had one camera from each Hab aimed at the breezeway points and watched the process. The W-Hab outer hatch settled inward, and then lowered into the wall of the Habitat below the breezeway. I then triggered the same process in the L-Hab’s outer door, receiving both telemetry and visual confirmation through the camera. After a quick double check of alignment, I went ahead and crossed my fingers, then extended the breezeway. I heard support screws retracting underneath the breezeway entrance ramp, and then heard the whine of giant servomechanisms extending the breezeway. The four sided and solidly built breezeway tunnel was my only path between the two Habitats that did not require an Activity Suit and an airlock. Watching the cameras on my laptop with occasional glances through the portal, it took ten minutes for the breezeway to extend the 86 centimetres to the other Habitats passive breezeway connection receptacle. Taking my time with the walk had paid off. The breezeway slipped right into the open hatch on the L-Hab perfectly. The servos stopped whirring, and I heard the support screws under the ramp re-engaging. I ran the processes then, to first secure and create an airtight seal on the L-Hab passive breezeway entrance. I then repeated this with the W-Hab active breezeway entrance. All totaled, thirty minutes. Before opening the hatches, I took a few minutes with my tablet PC to run integrity check on both the Breezeway and the L-Hab. I pressurized the Breezeway and then waited another fifteen minutes, per procedure. At the end of the waiting period, there was no variance in the breezeway pressure so I was good to go. I released the locking mechanism on the interior breezeway hatch at my end, and then spun the arm that would allow the hatch to open. It swung inward, as there was very little available room in the breezeway.
The breezeway was mighty darn cold, but it would warm up soon enough. It got its atmosphere and temperature from the ambient environment in both Habitats
by leaving the doors at each end ajar. At night time, or if everyone (future crew) left the Habitat, or there was a severe weather condition, then the doors at each end had to be sealed (a good procedure to follow). I walked through the hatch, gingerly stepping and testing my weight on the breezeway. There was no bounce or give to the floor. I hopped up and down a few times in the middle, and everything was solid as a rock; thanks mostly to the low Martian gravity, as well as the exquisite design and construction. Gotta love those German engineers. I approached the inner hatch on the L-Hab end, peered through the portal, and then swung the arm to open the door. It swung open inward as well.
Stepping into the upper level of the L-Hab, I looked around. Toilet and shower, mech room, storage, kitchen, and table and chairs (still needing unwrapping) with auxiliary COM panel over the table. There was a couch and sitting area, a workstation, book cases and storage cabinets, recessed lighting, and carpeting on the floors; all the comforts of an austere hotel room. As both Habs were only twenty-five feet in diameter, slightly less inside, things would certainly be cozy. No worries, it would feel like home soon enough. I went down the spiral staircase to where the sleeping quarters were located.
