People of Mars

by Rita Carla Francesca Monticelli

  The idea of telling Dennis what she had seen flashed through her mind for a moment; she could warn him against what was happening behind his back. Life at Station Alpha would’ve become hell, but it would’ve been amusing to give Hassan a hard time. Anna smiled with malice just thinking about it.

  5

  The rover proceeded lazily at a steady twenty-five kilometres-per-hour, as it crossed the monotony of Lunae Planum. After travelling for four hours in a row, in complete and utter silence, Hassan felt wrapped by a sense of drowsiness. His eyelids were becoming heavy. A sudden jerk woke him from his lethargy.

  He turned to look at the woman beside him, as if he was ensuring she was still there, still alive. Since they had left, she hadn’t spoken a single word. She had kept on staring at the horizon with an expression of content contemplation.

  Hassan shifted his gaze to follow hers. He had never ventured into that sector of the planum before. Although at first sight the desert might seem all the same, the more he’d watched it day by day, the more he’d learnt to notice the slight differences, to recognise the white rocks emerging from the reddish terrain. The light of the sun, already high in the sky, made them shine with a rude beauty. That place, so desolate, held a dark appeal in his soul. He missed Earth, but at the same time, he realised that Mars was becoming a part of him.

  Another look at Anna, who hadn’t moved from her position. His sleepiness was back and the glare from the salmon-coloured sky was just worsening it. He reached out to grab a bottle of water and sipped it; he needed much more than that to stay awake.

  He turned on the augmented reality on the top of the windshield and he recalled the enlarged picture of the environmental bacterium, whose cytoplasm was adorned with tiny, azure spots. In vain, he was looking for a plausible explanation for that phenomenon.

  “I want to show you something.” The first words from Anna since their departure.

  The woman moved her hand on the control panel and another picture appeared beside the first. It looked similar, except that the structure containing the crystals was rod-shaped and featured a less sharp outline.

  “What’s this?”

  “It’s a magnification of a regolith sample taken from the crack. I was studying this one under the microscope before Robert broke the other vial. It may be a fossil bacterium; what d’you think?”

  Determining if that image in front of them was really a fossil bacterium was not easy, because what remained of the original microorganism was no more than a trace in the rock. No biological matter remained that would confirm those kind of theories, just inorganic substances, which might be the result of the presence of life in the remote past. There was no certainty, just suppositions. In the past century, there was a debate about the finding of what was believed to be fossil nanobacteria on the HAL 84001 meteorite coming from Mars, which had been found in Antarctica. The enthusiasm had driven several scientists and even the then-president of the United States, Bill Clinton, to state they had found a proof of extraterrestrial life. However, subsequent studies had highlighted that the structures seen at electronic microscope levels were due to normal chemical, non-biological phenomena.

  “At first I thought the beryllium crystal formations were the result of a subsequent mineralisation,” Anna explained. “But now, by comparing them with the picture of the environmental bacterium, I’m not that certain.”

  “Living Earth bacterium and what is presumed to be fossil Martian bacterium, both accumulating microcrystals.” Hassan swallowed another sip of water to clear his head. “Why would two microorganisms separated by hundreds of millions of years and kilometres, generated by completely distinct evolution processes, have the same reaction to an external element?”

  Anna shook her head. “Indeed, it doesn’t make much sense. Besides, they are different in shape, size. The odds that they have the same chemical affinity are zero. I would understand it, if it was a simpler element.”

  “Unless the crystal is just a vehicle for something else we don’t see,” Hassan commented. He didn’t share her ambition to find life on Mars at all. He wasn’t sure if it would be a good thing.

  “Perhaps we’ll learn more from today’s samples.” Anna pointed at the change in the terrain being outlined in front of them. The augmented reality reported a distance of little more than five hundred metres to the location she had visited with Robert two days earlier. “We are almost there.”

  The previous tracks of the rover were still there. They were driving on them. Those marks had somehow crystallised and would remain for a very long time. The strong winds hadn’t been able to lift enough dust to cover all of them.

  “But I don’t kid myself. There’s a lot of work to do, we are too few and our equipment is insufficient. The arrival of the new Isis will bring some improvement, but to get some definite answers we need much more. For instance, the ESA’s exobiology laboratory in Paris.”

  Hassan was parking the rover on the edge of the dry riverbed as he listened to her.

  “It’ll be nice to go back there.”

  At that statement, he braked abruptly and turned to her.

  Anna chuckled to herself. “This time I might even learn some French.” Then her face darkened.

  “Do you want to get on the return spacecraft?” He couldn’t conceal his disbelief.

  “Yes,” she replied, determined. She moved to the back of the vehicle to wear her suit.

  He started doing the same. “Why? Are you already sick and tired of Mars?” He feared her answer.

  “I’m sick and tired, but not of Mars.” She didn’t so much as spare him a glance and went back to her seat. “Ready?”

  “Ready,” he said in a huff.

  “I’m activating the depressurisation.”

  He heard a puff, then the air started to go out. The process lasted for a few seconds.

  “Depressurisation completed,” the on-board computer announced.

  Closing his gloved hand in a tight fist, Hassan hit the opening button and the hatchback rose. He jumped down and took out the corer. He would’ve been faster if she had helped him, but Anna was intent on reviewing the data from the previous sortie.

  He slammed the hatchback, making the whole rover vibrate.

  She let a sigh escape her lips. Finally alone, at least for a few minutes. By moving her fingers, she enlarged the image on the windshield. It indicated the exact location of the previous sampling on a photo provided by one of the orbiters, an observation satellite orbiting in a dynamic way compared to the planet’s rotation. She followed the crack on the ground for most of its length, looking for a spot wide enough for the sampler to collect some material from deep down.

  All of a sudden, there was a slight disturbance in the augmented reality and the yellow LED of the radio came on, as if there was an incoming transmission. But she could not hear anything. Anna raised the volume of the loudspeaker, with no result. Then she turned on the transceiver.

  “This is Rover Two. Station Alpha, are you calling us?”

  Dead silence. She couldn’t even hear the usual background static. The LED was still on, as if somebody was transmitting a message with no sound.

  “Hassan?”

  She looked around, but couldn’t see him. He must have descended into the riverbed, out of her sight.

  “Computer, show me the incoming transmission on the screen.”

  A window materialised, and a diagram representing high frequency sound waves appeared; they exceeded the human audibility threshold. That was why she couldn’t hear anything.

  Seized by a flash of inspiration, she turned on the connection to the Mars Positioning System, the small experimental satellite network extending for most of Lunae Planum southward up to the edge of Valles Marineris. Although it was a wide mesh network, it was very useful to locate a rover’s position, thanks to its transponder, and had an accuracy of about one and half kilometres. That was more than enough given that, in the rust-coloured unchanging nothingness, those metal veh
icles were easily discernable from huge distances and the horizon was beyond three kilometres, in the flat terrain.

  With the help of the on-board computer, she tried to reconfigure the system, to see whether she might be able to use it to identify the origin of the transmission. Since the atmosphere was so rarefied, radio waves on Mars passed through it with a certain ease and reached the nearest satellites without any problem, even when the transmission power wasn’t high. The precision in the identification of the source, however, wouldn’t be comparable to that of transponders, but it was worth trying.

  “Come on, come on.”

  The LED had started blinking rhythmically. The transmission was going on and off, as if it was following a pattern.

  A bump on the windshield gave her a start.

  “So, are you going to sit there all comfy or are you going to get out and give me a hand?” Hassan’s voice resounded clear inside her helmet. Then the yellow LED went out, and she could hear the classic background noise.

  “Shit.”

  “Is that supposed to be your answer?”

  “I’m coming, one moment!” she shouted, gesturing with her hand.

  “Transmission located,” the computer’s unstressed voice sentenced. A map appeared on the screen, within it a series of concentric circles outlined an area covering part of Ophir Planum and extending into the canyon. Each one of them indicated a different probability that the signal source was included in it.

  Almost feeling hypnotised, she lingered on the image for some seconds more.

  Bent over and precariously balanced, with her arm inserted in the crack, she checked on the augmented reality the sampling manoeuvre of the device she was holding. The ground was being shaken by rhythmic vibrations caused by the activation of the corer. About ten metres from her, it was driving a one-metre pipe into the Martian regolith. Her fingers hurt and she was afraid the sampler might slip at any moment. It was tied to her suit with a safety lanyard, but there was a risk she would damage it and the spare one was many hours journey away at Station Alpha.

  From her position she couldn’t see the rover, parked higher on the edge of the dry riverbed, and if she turned her back on Hassan, who was operating the corer, she had the overwhelming sensation of being alone in the desert, surrounded by boundless spaces cluttered with dust and rocks. The very thought of it terrified her, while at the same time made her feel in accord with the inhospitable environment.

  She would’ve given anything to push herself further. Who knew what caused that radio transmission? Was it really coming from Valles Marineris? To her regret, she realised she hadn’t recorded it. If she could have analysed it with the station computer, perhaps she would’ve found something more about its origin. She would’ve liked to talk to someone about it straight away, but she wasn’t certain she would be believed. They would blame the solar wind or something else. Yet the MPS had located it somewhere near the canyons. Or perhaps inside them. What was down there? She resolved to check it out. Maybe it was an automatic message from some old apparatus sent by NASA or the Chinese space agency, from who knew how long earlier. Perhaps it was still working and sending out environmental data. The scientist inside her was looking for a plausible explanation for what she had seen and not heard.

  A gust of wind lifted a little vortex before her eyes. For a moment, she thought she could see an azure reflection in the tiny particles lifted by the disturbance. Then the sunlight grew faint and the weak warmth on her face faded with it. A shadow stretched in front of her. Turning her head, she saw Hassan beside her. The discharge of adrenaline made her slip on a side, and a second later she found herself sitting on the ground. She had to apply all her self-control to avoid losing her grip on the sampler. Confused, she shifted her gaze to the corer, which had finally quietened, and then again to the man, who seemed to be ignoring her completely. He had done that on purpose, to frighten her; she had no doubt.

  A beep informed her that the sampling was complete. She raised her arm, which had grown numb, she extracted the sample vial, and inserted it into the collection box that was positioned by the edge of the crack. Then she bent sideways to drag herself on her knees.

  He hadn’t even tried to help her. He had done nothing but walk around her.

  “I’m done with the corer. How far have you got with it?” While speaking, he kept his head facing straight ahead, as if he was scrutinising an imprecise point at the horizon. He surely was checking the data coming from the apparatus, in his helmet’s augmented reality. He gestured, as if he was dragging something. The corer motor could be heard in the distance as it started moving towards them. Peeping out from the small bay located on its back were four pipes with thin but very resistant walls. Inside each of them there was a core containing a record of the ground’s layering.

  Without replying to him, Anna closed the box. Her action was clear: she was done, too. She looked at the riverbed, which stretched into the distance. She was considering whether or not to proceed further, to collect more samples where the crack was even wider.

  She stood up, but while doing so she suffered a slight dizziness. She had remained too long in that uncomfortable position. As she had risen to her feet too quickly, her blood pressure had dropped. The Martian landscape became brighter, enhancing the wild beauty of the place. The edges of the ancient torrent showed deep grooves, sign of a runoff that had occurred in the remote past. They reflected an intense light, which seemed even stronger, as it hit her dilated pupils. She almost thought she could see the water, hear its sound. Enchanted, Anna smiled. Her ears were buzzing, her eyes hurt. She tried to place a hand on her head, but it bumped against her helmet. She was staggering. Reluctantly, she leaned against Hassan’s arm. Finally, he turned to look at her. The sunlight reflected on his visor, preventing her from seeing his face. He might have been anybody in a suit and helmet; there was nothing familiar about him. That was more disquieting than the immense, lethal desert where they were. But that sense of the unknown did not frighten Anna; rather it let surface a distant emotion, the one she’d felt many years earlier when watching science fiction films at the movies. The difference now was that she was seeing for real.

  “Everything alright?” She heard Hassan’s voice resounding in her earphones.

  “Wouldn’t you like to see what’s beyond the horizon?”

  A sound similar to a grunt reached Anna’s ears.

  “I have the feeling I’ve been here all my life, but at the same time I don’t know Mars at all. I’d like to see Valles Marineris.”

  He remained silent. Better, she could pretend he was someone else, an unknown being without a face.

  Now that she was standing, Anna could catch sight of the front of the rover. Who knew what the distance to the canyons from their position was? They were further south, in the opposite direction of Station Alpha.

  “We aren’t here for tourism.”

  Anna snorted. Obviously, he wouldn’t understand.

  “But we’re explorers,” she stated, resolute. “We should be able to venture further afield. We linger on a tiny area, while maybe a bit up ahead there is something wonderful waiting for us.”

  “Like a kilometre-deep cliff: really wonderful.”

  “You are so devoid of …” She stopped, searching the right word. “Poetic sensitivity.”

  He laughed in his irritating way.

  “I’m talking seriously. We could take the rover and go there.”

  “It’d take almost a day and then we wouldn’t have enough air for the return journey.” He said so in a superior tone. It was evident he wasn’t taking her seriously.

  “The air would be enough if I went alone,” she challenged him.

  Silence.

  Now she was a little sorry she couldn’t see his expression. It would’ve been amusing, as she wasn’t joking at all.

  “The crack widens a lot over there; it’ll be at least one metre.” He had changed the subject. “Who knows how deep it may be?”

&nbs
p; What was he getting at?

  Anna felt a sense of oppression in the middle of her chest, like a bad presentiment. She felt overrun by a sudden agitation as she recalled the one beside her wasn’t an ordinary astronaut. It was Hassan.

  “If you fell in there, I couldn’t do anything to save you.”

  Her heart accelerated. Her breath failed her. Robert had accused the man of trying to kill him outside Station Alpha, not twenty-four hours earlier. And now she was over one hundred kilometres from their base, alone with him.

  “Nobody could blame me for your death.”

  Anna backed off. The helmet without a face, lit by the sun, was scrutinising her. She stepped back and looked at the rover. She could get there in a few seconds, but she had to climb on that steep terrain.

  When she turned again to Hassan, she found he was just a single step away. Without further hesitation, she whirled and ran. Her movements were awkward in the suit, she risked slipping any moment. It’d be sufficient for her to reach the rover and lock the doors. Then she would be safe.

  She scrambled up the slope, using her hands and feet. When she arrived at the top the vehicle, her salvation, was a few paces from her. With a last effort, she projected herself forward and extended her arms to reach the side door. As she touched it with her fingers, she was pushed from behind with some strength. Her helmet bumped against the metal. Her head turned in an abrupt movement which, together with her oxygen’s debit due to the run, disoriented her. She turned, at the same time placing her arms in front of her for defence, and waited.

  But nothing happened.

  Breathless, she lowered her hands and found herself face to face with Hassan. She could see him well now. His expression was furious.

  “What’s the fucking matter with you?!” he inveighed against her. “You might have fallen, ripped your suit apart.”

  She watched him, incredulous. Was it possible he was joking earlier?