by S. J. Morden
He retrieved the pipe, remounted the cover, and repressurized the hab.
So there was no way that the workshop had accidentally decompressed. Someone had done it deliberately. The only question was, had Zeus done it to himself, or had someone done it to him?
The mask was on the floor, next to the airlock. The blood that was left in the crevices had dried hard into them, and Frank spent some time scrubbing it out with a black square of parachute. The mask itself was more or less unmodified firefighter’s equipment, working off a pure oxygen tank at the same five psi the habs did. He checked it over without really knowing what he was looking for. Zeus, because of his experience on oil rigs, would have been the expert on this. Frank would have to pull the user manual to check the specifications, but he was pretty certain it wouldn’t work as breathing apparatus at Mars pressure.
He’d done all he could. He still had his actual work to do, tightening bolts and shaking things down, and he’d better get on with that, because he was still on the clock.
He wasn’t going to concentrate, though. The whole situation worried at him. It was more than not wanting to be responsible—though that was a big part of it. Frank needed to know if it was another suicide, because if it wasn’t, they were all in danger.
He picked up the mask, and trudged back to the cross-hab. On his way over, he heard a growl of thunder, and stopped to watch a line of sparks and soot draw itself across the sky. It started in the far east, and arced towards the south. As the incoming object slowed, it grew less obvious to Frank’s eye, and when it disappeared altogether, he turned and climbed up the steps to the airlock, his feet heavy but silent on the metalwork.
Brack was waiting for him, casually leaning against the greenhouse entrance as if one of his team hadn’t just died.
“So what did you find?” Brack pushed himself off the doorway and scooped up the mask. He peered into it, going as far as to sniff it.
“That the hab’s sound. It doesn’t leak. But it can be made to leak if you deliberately sabotage the safeties.” Frank racked his life support and dragged his suit over to the hangers. He swapped it with his overalls.
Behind him, Brack let the mask dangle on its straps. “So what are you saying, boy?”
“Either Zeus deliberately overrode the safeties, or someone else did. It wasn’t accidental.” He started to get dressed, facing the wall.
Brack looked over Frank’s shoulder. “Shut the fuck up, and come with me.”
Frank pulled the overalls up to his waist and gathered the arms around his front.
He walked through to the med hab, and found himself dragged in and slammed against one of the partition walls. The hand at his neck tightened. Brack was right in his face, standing on tiptoe.
“Now you listen here. You better be absolutely one hundred per cent sure about this or so help me God I’m shoving you out that airlock and watching you burn through the little window.”
“The hab is airtight. Pressure stayed up all night.” Frank didn’t struggle, even though he was increasingly uncomfortable. “There’s nothing wrong with it.”
Brack let go, and wiped his palm against Frank’s chest. “So how did you prove that?”
“You can play with the manual valves in the airlock, so that it vents the whole hab outside. It’s difficult and it takes a long time to deflate. The other way is at the pump: you can break the seals from the outside and get the hab to a dangerous pressure in a quarter-hour. Just jam something in the vent.”
“Could he have done it himself?”
“Sure. Same way I did it. But then he wouldn’t have been alive to tidy up afterwards.” That was it. That was what had been bothering him all along. “When I got there, the airlock was normal. I didn’t go round the back to where the pump inlet is, but I was still able to use it to pressurize the hab the same day.”
“Tell me. Tell me straight.”
“Someone depressurized the workshop. They might not have known Zeus was in there. They might not have cared. Maybe they did it deliberately, but didn’t mean to scare him so much that he climbed into the airlock without his suit. Maybe they did want to kill him. Maybe they thought the scuba gear would be enough so he could save himself. Whatever, whoever, they were smart enough to cover their tracks.” Frank’s gaze wandered over to the boxes of medical supplies. “Maybe they drugged him first. Or they knew he was taking drugs, and took advantage of that.”
“Christ almighty, Kittridge. You bunch of lazy, useless fuckups. If it wasn’t bad enough to die in an accident, and commit suicide, now you’re starting on each other.”
“We both know someone’s been in the drugs cabinet. But only you know who that is, right?”
“Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t. I might have exaggerated a little on how close an eye I can keep on you so as to keep you in line.”
“Goddammit, Brack, either you know or you don’t.”
Brack pressed himself forward again, into Frank’s face. “Watch your mouth, Kittridge. Remember I’m the one in a Mars base with four potential murderers.”
Frank, half-naked and consciously vulnerable, couldn’t escape Brack’s closeness. “I know I didn’t do it.”
“You crossed the line once before. Easier to do the second time around.”
“I didn’t do it. Zeus was—” Frank stopped.
“What? He was what? Were you going to say ‘he was my friend’?” Frank could feel Brack’s breath against his skin. “People like you don’t have friends. You got the Mark of Cain, boy.”
“I didn’t kill him.”
“So which one of you did?” Brack turned away, stalking along the length of the med bay and back. “Little Demetrius wouldn’t say boo to a goose. Nature-boy doesn’t leave his Garden of Eden. The pervert? Hell, OK. I’d buy that. He’s got cause to be outside, and he’s a little bitch about his precious power consumption.”
Frank seized the opportunity to feed his arms into his sleeves and jerk his overall up to his shoulders. “The spacesuits have got trackers on, right? Can you use those?”
“When you go out looking for cargo drops, what’s your resolution?”
“What’s my resolution?” He frowned. “I … maybe a hundred yards or so?”
“That covers the whole base. You can be anywhere inside or outside, and it just registers as ‘here’. You’re going to have to try harder than that, Kittridge.”
“I’m going to have to try harder?”
“I thought we had a deal where you said you’d be my eyes and ears. Don’t you go backing out on me now. Not now the shit’s getting real.”
“Can we at least tell whose suits were used?”
Brack slung Zeus’s breathing mask onto the racking. “This isn’t a police state. This whole thing, this whole enterprise, it works on trust. There aren’t the systems here to keep tabs on everyone all the time, because that’s not in the contract. This is supposed to be a working scientific base, not the wing of a Supermax. Trust, Kittridge. Forget what I said about keeping tabs on you all. I have to trust you, God help me. And if this base ain’t right by the time NASA gets here, it’s my ass on the line, not yours.”
“Do you want me to find out who did this or not?”
“Do you want to know what I’ll do to the man when we do?” asked Brack. “We ain’t got a prison cell up here. You tap someone for murder, there’s only one sentence. We’re going to have us a spacing.”
“I’d better be certain, then.”
“Boy, you have to do better than that. Cast-iron, copper-bottomed, one hundred per cent certified proof. I’m not calling home to tell XO I’ve wasted one of their valuable assets because he looked at you funny.” Brack jabbed him in the chest with a rigid finger. “Do this right or don’t do it at all.”
Then he checked and double-checked that no one else was listening in.
“You want that flight home? You make damn sure they don’t get wind of this. Not a word. Not a whisper. Got that?”
“I got it.”
>
“Good. Now get out of here and act normal.” Brack grabbed him and pushed him stumbling out of the med bay.
Frank took a moment to compose himself, and then finished zipping up the front of his overalls.
“You OK?” Declan was passing through, staring mostly at his tablet.
“Fine. Mostly.”
“Did you find anything?”
“Out at the workshop?” Frank had racked his life support. The oxygen tank he’d placed on top of the recharger earlier had gone. He frowned. “No. Nothing.”
“Does that mean we can use the workshop again or not?”
“I’ve talked to Brack. It’s up to him. As far as I’m concerned, the hab’s safe.” He checked the separate cylinder bay, and there it was, charged up. If there’d been any evidence of tampering, he’d lost the opportunity to find it.
“So …”
“I don’t know, Declan. It’s like Marcy, it’s like Alice. It’s just one of those things.”
“OK, OK.” He paused and looked down at his screen. “Doesn’t seem likely to be just one of those things, though.”
“It wasn’t the hab that killed him. That’s all I know. I didn’t screw up.”
“So who did?”
Frank slid on his ship slippers, and straightened up. “Maybe Zeus did. Maybe he did something stupid and he died. He’s not around to ask now, so all I got is guesswork and spit. If you’ve got anything, records of things he turned on and off, then that might give us some answers.”
“Why not?” Declan nodded. “I’ll look into it.”
Frank found himself lying easily. It wasn’t what he wanted to do, but he’d been told to do it. Any stress in his voice would be understood as something else. He watched Declan as he walked away, wondering if it had been him, wondering about the timings, about everything. He didn’t seem that concerned, as if he knew the answers already.
For that matter, Zero could have picked up his suit and life support from the rack, dressed in the greenhouse, and left through the rear of the hab. No one would have seen him creep around the back of the workshop with a length of pipe, temporarily disconnected from the hydroponics.
The cameras, though. They would have spotted something, wouldn’t they? Even though they were there to watch for fires, their feeds could still be accessed by someone in the control hab. Were there recordings?
He didn’t know. He’d have to go and ask Dee.
22
[transcript of audio file #7907 2/10/2035 1000MT Xenosystems Operations boardroom, 65th floor, Tower of Light, Denver CO]
PL: Come on in, Bruno. Take a seat.
BT: Thank you, sir.
PL: You know to call me Paul by now, Bruno. Drink?
BT: Yes. Just a tonic water for me. I’m sorry, Paul. I respect you more than anyone alive. It’s only natural I call you “sir”.
PL: Well now. I hope I can somehow repay the level of trust you place in me.
BT: You owe me nothing, Paul, and I owe you everything. I mean that sincerely. I’d be nowhere without you.
PL: I’m sure that’s not true. A man of your obvious talents and dedication would have been an asset to any corporation. We were lucky enough to bring you into the Xenosystems fold early on, and your rise through management has been nothing but appropriately meteoric.
BT: The company is my family, sir. I’ve dedicated myself to its well-being since I joined. I’m one hundred per cent loyal. I’d do anything for you.
PL: You even came in on a Saturday, for which I’m grateful. I have a favor to ask of you. It’s a big one, and I want you to consider it carefully.
BT: I’m listening.
PL: I’ve had my eye on you for a while now, and you have qualities I appreciate. You’re not afraid of making difficult decisions, and you get the job done on time and under budget. Do you think you’re ready for the challenge of your life? It’ll take your best years from you, but I guarantee that when you’re done, you’ll be able to do literally anything.
BT: I’d like to think I was equal to any challenge you could set me, Paul.
PL: I’m looking to put you in charge of the Mars contract. Oh, there are people who are possibly more experienced and longer serving, and they probably expect that they’ll be offered it. I know they expect they’ll be offered it. But they’re older, and more cautious, and more bureaucratic. I want someone who’s quick on their feet and who’ll still be around in, say, fifteen years’ time, rather than eyeing up a retirement ranch in Oregon or a private island somewhere halfway through. What do you say, Bruno? Can you help me out here?
BT: Sir. Paul. I’d be honored.
PL: Good. I didn’t think I’d misjudged you.
[glasses clink]
BT: To Xenosystems Operations.
PL: To Mars.
[End of transcript]
They didn’t keep recordings, not from the spacesuits, not from the fire control cameras. They didn’t have the computer storage space for it. Brack was right: the base had been designed to be a place for scientific research and planetary exploration. No one had envisaged there’d be a need to watch the crew for a potential saboteur in their midst.
Dee did, however, show him how the fire control worked. The ceiling cameras weren’t normal cameras, but infrared ones, tuned to spot for high heat sources that might trigger ignition in the oxygen-rich atmosphere. The background was almost uniformly black, and the crew pale ghosts washing across the screen. The only real contrast was offered in the greenhouse: the areas under the growing lights and the fish tanks. The hot water storage, held in a drum on the second floor, was insulated enough to appear merely dark gray.
There was no way anyone could be identified through their image.
And to think, Frank had been worried about being spied on.
“Who was your second?”
Dee left the screen on a five-second cycle, even though the camera software continuously monitored everything. “Alice. That didn’t work out so well.”
Frank watched the black and gray picture on the screen. “Just hope none of us gets sick. We can always radio home, get a doctor to talk to us. And when the NASA guys are here, they’ll have a medic with them, right? Someone to look after them on the journey: they don’t get frozen like we did.”
“There was one guy I read about once. Russian. He was the camp doctor in a base at the South Pole, and he got appendicitis.” Dee made a slicing motion on his abdomen. “He had to operate on himself. No anesthetic. He had people hold up mirrors so he could see inside himself and do it that way. That’s just extreme.”
“That’s the kind of thing I could have imagined Alice doing. She was a tough old lady. Still don’t know why she did it.” Frank reached across Dee and dabbed at the cameras. “Why did we install one in the workshop? There’s no risk of a fire in there.”
“It was in the specifications. One for every hab section, upper and lower floor.”
“So you can tell from here where everyone is, just not who everyone is.” Frank looked for the ghosts. Zero was in the greenhouse. There was him and Dee in Control. Declan was in the yard.
“I guess so. But we’re just piggybacking the fire-detection software. None of this was designed for us.”
“And there are still no cameras outside at all?”
“No.” Dee frowned. “Why would there be?”
“I don’t know. I’m just used to being watched, and I thought I was.”
“If you’d have asked sooner, I would have told you sooner.”
“Zero knows?”
“Sure. Told him when I put the cameras in the greenhouse. He said I was working for the Man, and I explained that they weren’t watching him, just looking out for fires.”
“Well, don’t I feel the idiot now?” Frank leaned back and looked around. Control didn’t have much hardware, but it did have redundancy. It was one of the few places that had more than what it strictly needed. All the cameras, all the other environmental sensors, fed into a series of bl
ack boxes. The radio traffic was logged there, and one station was set aside for video messages, with a camera facing the chair, and a mic and headset combo still in a cellophane pocket on the desk.
There were screens, too, flat ones that were of a new generation to what he remembered from life outside: as thin as a sheet of plastic, just stuck into a frame like a picture. They consumed power, so were currently dead. Dee sat at the only one that was active.
“So what can you do from here?”
“Do? Pretty much everything. I’ve got read-outs from all the habs: those get logged and transmitted. I’ve got read-outs from us—”
“Hold up. You’ve got access to our medical implants?”
Dee tapped through the menus on the screen.
“So this is Zero. This is Declan. This is me. And this, this is you.”
Frank placed his hand on his chest as he watched the lines cross the screen. His heart rate. His breathing rate. His body temperature. His blood pressure and something called pO2.
“How does it collect this stuff?”
“Wireless. Same way the tablets work.”
“I mean if we’re in our suits.”
“Gets picked up by the suit and broadcast back here.”
“Well, damn.” Then a thought. “Does Brack have one?”
“If he does, it’s not on this system. It’s just the four of us. For now.” Dee tapped a couple more keys. Marcy: no signal. Alice: no signal. Zeus: no signal. He clicked off that screen. “So this is the electrics—this is what Declan looks at for most of the day. Red is higher power consumption, blue is less. The greenhouse takes most, but when we go and heat up food in the kitchen, that goes reddish too, or when we need to turn the satellite dish or recharge the buggies. You know. Total consumption is here, and what we make goes in here. Batteries are on a separate screen. Then we’ve got the same for water and air.”
“But you can’t start and stop things from here.”
“Sure you can. All the automatic systems. You can reset them, change the levels, turn stuff on and off. It’s not difficult, but I mean, why would you want to? I leave all that shit well alone. All I’m doing is bundling up the daily reports and transmitting them to Earth. I keep them all for a rolling seven days in case the files get corrupted and I have to resend, but that’s all we can hold. Then I overwrite them with the day eight data. I’ve written a script to do all that automatically. It’s no big deal.”
