Mission Mars

by Janet L. Cannon

  A back breaking and bouncing hour later, they finally arrived at the initial dig site. It was a surreal moment after so much planning. Blinking several times, April slid off the seat, collecting all the bits and pieces that fell out of her pockets. Deacon all but jumped out of the vehicle, pulled out a handheld digital tablet containing all their research, plot points, and dig notes and flashed her wide a grin. “Show time, baby!”

  Bit by bit they manually plotted the grid from the tablet onto the surrounding landscape using the holoscopes, flags, and laser lines. The computer projected the coordinates along each side. Then, they painstakingly walked over the site three times to sight any surface debris. Nothing but rocks.

  As they were finishing their last sweep, April noticed the light had already faded behind them. Her face flushed with a mixture of frustration and regret. Her mother had always told her, “One day, your stubbornness will one day be the death of you.” Maybe today was the day. Not if I have anything to say about it, she thought to herself. She sipped from the water tube in her survival suit and fell back into routine.

  In the waning light, they started with section A1. The first layers of surface were always the easiest on Earth. On Mars, though, it was significantly different. Here, loose, fine regolith, which renewed itself every few hours, was like excavating solid concrete. April and Deacon only got twenty centimeters before Deacon had to use the laser cutters. Not ideal for any possible precious finds, but necessary if they were going to get anywhere at all.

  Once night fell, they packed up the necessary equipment, activated the beacons so they could find everything covered in dust the next day, and headed back for the ship.

  Back in their barracks, April’s frustration at finding nothing on day one was softened by the sight of Deacon’s organisational and decorating skills. Even in the small berth for two, he’d been able to use a few brightly coloured cushions and rugs to soften the sterile, white carbon fibre walls. A few photos of friends and family to remind them of what they were striving to protect hung on the wall above the bed. She hugged him, feeling the warmth of his body against hers. “You’re awesome. The most amazing husband a woman could ask for.”

  “Mmmm, well tell me something I don’t know, woman.”

  She pushed him away. “You get to write the report and use the shower second for that remark.”

  He clicked his tongue, wriggled his eyebrows at her. “No problem, but I get to see you undress first.”

  April frowned, but after a few seconds she was returning his smile.

  She grabbed a towel and backed her way into the small but efficient bathroom that held an ionic shower, basin, and toilet. April closed her eyes and imagined needles of hot water stinging her skin, instead of the rush of sanitised air that rushed over her. Her skin tingled nonetheless, sensitive from the long period of sleep and a long day’s work. A faint odour tainted the air. A scent she couldn’t quite put her finger on: an artificial aroma, maybe fake vanilla.

  Her body ached for the warmth of the sun, the kiss of a summer breeze, the smell of the ocean. The pain of realisation rose deep from her belly. Never again would they see Earth, except from this barren place. Their future.

  As Deacon took his turn in the shower, April ate her rations, then slipped into the bed. The cotton sheets rubbed against her skin, still tingling from the shower. Her body was exhausted, but her mind was still too wound up to sleep. Her thoughts turned to her grandmother. April regretted yet again not learning to knit. But it had pained her to see the old woman wrap her gnarled hands around the stiff, pointed sticks. April tried to push those thoughts aside. Too, too late now. Besides, there was no yarn on Mars.

  Finished with his shower, Deacon slipped into bed behind her and wrapped his naked body around hers. The tension in her body receded as he kissed her shoulder, her neck, her ear. April, exhausted but excited by his touch, turned and embraced her husband. Moving together, they released each other’s tensions, a well-oiled machine.

  Afterward, she contently drifted off to sleep in his arms, dreaming of blue seas, clear skies, and picnics by the lake. Ella’s laugh echoing in the distance.

  They repeated the pattern in the days that followed. Utilising their best stratigraphic skills, April and Deacon repetitively sifted through dirt, peeling back time, revealing each layer of rock and sand, opening up Mars’ dirty little secrets. After utilising every flicker of daylight possible, they returned to the mother ship, checked their rover in with Lieutenant Whitman, and returned to their barracks. They systematically refueled and cleaned their weary bodies, rested, and collated the daily reports. It left no time or energy to socialize with the other colonists. Besides, April, and even Deacon would struggle to find anything in common with biologists, geneticists, architects, or the military.

  The makeshift lab covered one bench, including equipment they brought. Each day, they tested every rock and soil sample, searching for any possible life form or fossil. Every day the results were the same. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

  “Argh. Deacon, what if we’re wrong? What if all this was for no reason?”

  “No. We’re not wrong. I am never wrong, remember?” He pulled one rock out of the machine and placed another in.

  “But we haven’t found anything at all. Not even a smidgeon.”

  He turned, and for the first time since they’d met, his face tightened in anger. It frightened her. “We. Are. Not. Wrong.” The machine beeped another negative. Deacon pulled the rock out and repeated the procedure. “We just haven’t found the right dig site yet. Mars is a big place.” April was sure that if nothing else, the beeping may drive her mad.

  The machine beeped another negative. His teeth clenched, Deacon placed a different rock in the scanner.

  Three hot, dust-filled weeks later they reached the deepest level of digging they could without using the excavator equipment. April had seen enough shades of red and black sand to last her the rest of her life. In Grid C, ten layers down lay an assortment of fossil-like rocks. Without thought, April dug her gloved fingers into the ground, levering out a hand-sized porous stone. Contained within was a definite shape of a snail-type creature. The samples that followed also held different types of small life forms encased in stone. April tingled from head to toe as each sample was loaded into the rover. Proof of life. They’d found proof of life on Mars. Could other forms of life—aliens—have lived alongside these creatures? If so, were they still alive here somewhere? Could they help humanity survive?

  Deacon reached for April’s hand. She squeezed it, grinning at him like a little kid. For the first time since they’d arrived on Mars, their excitement was palpable. Adrenaline pumped through her body like a drug.

  That night neither of them could sleep. They spent the night testing sample after sample and finding each one contained traces of organic material. April fidgeted when she sat, wriggled when she lay. She could not stand still. Deacon typed reports like a madman, dissecting and comparing samples until the bag was empty.

  “Well?” April asked, pacing around the bed.

  Deacon scratched his head. “This is going to sound crazy, but the DNA patterns aren’t what we expected at all. It’s strange.”

  She sat beside him and grabbed his arm. “Sentient snails?”

  He snorted. “No. Not like that. I mean … I expected it to be … alien. Different. But this is not that either. All the samples are clones—or near clones—of species we have on Earth. Or have had at different times in history.” He shook his head. “It doesn’t make sense.” Deacon leaned over and kissed her full on the lips. “I need time to think about this. And I do my best thinking naked,” he mumbled as he pulled her top over her head. She was anxious for answers, concerned with the turn of events, but she still laughed and reciprocated his advances fuelled by a new-found hope.

  The alarm on her wrist vibrated. With a fresh rush of energy, the two dressed for another day on the dig site.

  Using a blower, they drove off the layers of di
rt that had resettled on top of the site. Using the trowel to edge around the fossils, they uncovered at least twenty more different types before having to change to a mech digger.

  The sound of metal hitting metal rang in her ears as happily as a church bell to a preacher. But patience had never been one of April’s virtues, so she and Deacon manually excavated around edges of the dig, metre by metre, revealing what looked strangely like metal. Deacon swept his broom back and forth, creating a red tornado. What looked like Cuneiform, or some related language, started forming on one side of the metal panel. April and Deacon stared at each other, mouths agape.

  “What is that?” April mumbled.

  “It looks like some sort of metal plate, maybe adamantium. But how?” Deacon turned the plate over again and again, as if that would somehow explain how it got there. The new metal had only been used on Earth since the thirtieth century. It had been named after a fictional metal in a classic Marvel movie series back when people cared about such things.

  “There must be more where that came from.”

  “Some rogue agency had to have sent scouts to Mars years before our colonies got here. Maybe they dropped it?” Deacon rubbed over the Sumerian-like letters with his gloved hands.

  “But why would it be this deep? Why under all the other fossils dated thousands of years ago?” She stared at her husband, who didn’t immediately return her gaze. When he did, his brow was furrowed, his full mouth cinched in a tight line.

  Deacon picked up the piece and tossed it into the back of the rover. “It has to be alien tech. It just has to be. There has to be someone … something … out there who can help us. Right?”

  From inside her helmet, April smiled at him, trying to appear encouraging, but this time, she wasn’t sure he was right.

  Their discovery could be bigger and more complicated than either of them realised. They’d come seeking alien life and a possible ally. But what had they found instead?

  The onboard lab confirmed what they already knew: the material was a former commonly-used metal included in past NASA missions.

  “How did this get on Mars?” April demanded for the fifth time in five minutes.

  “I don’t know.” His hands shaking, Deacon almost dropped the tablet before he examined the embedded letters, swiped it, then compared it with the ancient script on the screen.

  “It’s worn on all the edges, so it’s hard to tell what size—”

  “I said, I don’t know!” Deacon shook, his voice deep. April recoiled at his retort. She took a step back and watched his shoulders drop. “I’m sorry. It’s just that I don’t have enough old text data here to translate it. This isn’t something I anticipated. It’s possible there may not be anyone around who can still translate it. We’re going to have to send this information back to Earth and hope for the best.”

  April hugged her arms. Yes, they’d found something amazing, but somehow she knew this wasn’t the great discovery that would grant them notoriety and put them in the good graces of everyone back home. In fact, she feared it could mean something terrifying.

  Deacon called Lieutenant Whitman to their barracks.

  When the man arrived, his eyes were bloodshot and his face drooped. He listened in silence while Deacon showed him the samples and told him the rest of the story. Whitman’s face was blank. Emotionless, he said, “I’ll send in holo-pics and get back to you. As of now, we’re on lockdown.”

  Deacon stepped forward. “What? Not now? Not when we’ve finally found something!”

  The lieutenant held up a hand. “Sit tight, until you hear from me. No one but me. Understand? And don’t leave your quarters.”

  April and Deacon stared at each other, then at the lieutenant. “It’s not just you. The entire colony will be contained. I can’t say anything more. “As the lieutenant headed to the door, he stopped and turned, “Oh, and your food will be brought to you.” Once outside, the man punched the button. The door closed behind him.

  Two days later, April and Deacon took turns pacing in the doorway of their lab, while the other finished the last soil and fossil samples. All their calls to their friends had been blocked. In fact, all their communications to Earth had been shut off. Time seemed to stutter. Once or twice, when April looked at the digital readout, she was sure that time had spun backwards.

  As the hours turned to days, April’s sanity diminished. She could not stand to see the same walls for another moment. Her nerves felt raw and her muscles pulled tight as violin strings. She was sure every time she moved, some part of her would snap. Her mind raced, her stomach gurgled, bile burned at the back of her throat. When would they let them out? What was going on? What was so important about that piece of metal?

  Two weeks after first handing the information to Whitman, the man returned and handed the piece back to Deacon. “Let’s sit,” he said.

  They all sat in silence for a minute. Whitman wiped his face with a hand. April’s stomach lurched. She already knew she wasn’t going to like what he was going to say.

  “Central Archives sent the holo of your metallic curiosity to the New Federation Security Association.” He held up his hand to stop their protests midstream.” It’s protocol in these situations.”

  “Can you at least tell us the results?” she begged, rising from her chair, which nearly tipped over in response.

  “Right up until ten minutes ago, when we got this message,” he held up his tablet, “I would not have told you. But now, Earth’s security protocols will no longer make any difference.” Whitman hesitated and choked on his words, “Everyone … everyone … we don’t have people on Earth to worry about anymore.”

  Tears in the eyes such a formidable man shocked April. His moment of weakness ignited a burning fire in April’s chest. The bile threatened to burn its way up her oesophagus. She fell heavily back onto her chair, the weight, though slight, was enough to push it backwards.

  “Two weeks ago we received word that tensions between New Korea and Russia were heating up. New Korea infiltrated the Russian government’s net. Russia retaliated. They injected a virus into the New Korean banks, which collasped. Things escalated. Suicide bombers, troop build ups.” Whitman ran his fingers through the dirty brown scruff on his head. “Yesterday, they reached the boiling point. Russia launched a top-secret biological weapon. In two days, what was left of the civilised world was wiped out. Everyone annihilated, including the Russians.

  April’s breathing grew erratic, her chest heaved, sweet, salty tears ran down her face as the realisation hit her. They were all gone. All of them.

  Even the problems she had with her parents did not ease the pain of their loss. April sobbed. And little Ella, her brown hair in a tangle of curls around her face. Her chubby fingers squishing in play dough or paint. Terrorising the family dog. Deacon’s mother and father, Lord, so many people who weren’t even in the second phase of colonisation. If only she had bought her grandmother’s wool. Something more than the little she had. I thought there would be time.

  “There are only 150 people on the next shuttle,” Whitman continued. “And, the launch window was accelerated to the point not all safety protocols could be followed. They launched it only minutes after the weapon was released.” April gasped.

  Deacon cleared his throat. “So, we won’t know until they get here if they’re infected.”

  “If they’re alive at all. In six months, we’ll know.”

  Deacon fingered the lettering on the piece of metal. “What about this? What did you find out?”

  Whitman laughed, short and without mirth. “I wouldn’t have believed it, except I minored in ancient history in college. Before the brain trust got blown to bits, they speculated that the language is pre-Sumerian. Meaning the earliest known written language came from some other language—cuneiform. They speculate that at some time in our ancient past, humans must have lived on Mars, ruined it, then moved to Earth. Ironic, huh?”

  April touched the metal plate. “But what does it s
ay?”

  Whitman pulled out a bottle of rum from a pack and poured three glasses. “As close as they can figure, ‘Dust Echo’. Whatever that means.” He offered each a glass and they took it.

  Long into the night, the bottle of rum lubricated the conversations, which flowed easily from one subject to the next. Reminiscing about the smells and colours of spices in busy markets, bright red apples that were so fresh the juice ran down your chin, and steak seared over an open wood fire. They spoke of blue skies, white clouds, and cleansing rains. It was as if the end of Earth acted like some kind of truth serum, ensuring they spilt long-held secrets until there were no more. Thankfully, the rum would help them forget most of it. April’s eyes stung.

  Except there was the ship. A ship full of potentially sick colonists, heading their way. Earth was gone. No more supplies would be coming. And they would have to make do with what they had here.

  One time, a long time ago, they’d done this before. And if they survived, they would probably do it all again. History had a way of repeating itself.

  THE CAVE IN ARSIA MONS

  Andrew Fraknoi

  The emergency team brought Ciotti back in a pressurized ground-car, hydrated and fed him, and, as soon as it was humane, turned him over to Mars Office—with their compliments. Until they knew whether he was going to be treated as hero or a criminal, no department wanted him on their books.

  Of the officers on duty that week, Investigator Ted Forrest turned out to have the most experience with deviants and loners. And the chief trusted him “to keep his damn mouth shut,” as he put it.

  That’s how Forrest came to be one of the first to hear what Ciotti had found in that cave, and why for now, it was considered classified material. Forrest’s task was to read the file, interview the man, figure out what part of his story was true, and what part was invention.