The Man Who Sold Mars

by K Anderson Yancy

  * * * * *

  Then that terrible fire happened, that I’d been warned about when I was eight, bringing cataclysmic but not irreparable damage and I knew the sirens would be on Mars waiting for me.

  * * * * *

  I worked long, long hours to make the repairs from the fire and after a particularly tiring day I lay in my bed while Tot and Selena narrated Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol to me.

  Tot read, “I don't mind calling on you to believe that Scrooge was ready for a good broad field of strange appearances, and that nothing between a baby and rhinoceros would have astonished him very much.”

  And Selena, “Now, being prepared for almost anything,”

  “He was not by any means prepared for nothing;”

  “and, consequently,”

  “when the Bell struck One,”

  “and no shape appeared,”

  “he was taken with a violent fit of trembling.”

  “Arrrrgggggh!” I felt an incredibly sharp pain on my right side that in an instant became unbearable.

  Alarmed, Tot and Selena asked, “What Is it?”

  In unbelieving, escalating pain, I threw up. “Appendicitis at worse, kidney stone at best.”

  I walked, crawled, lunged to the infirmary. There I hit the button which flooded the operating chamber with antiseptic gas. I grabbed a PDA keyed in appendectomy and it gave me the numbers identifying the instruments I would need and their location. Once the surgical chamber was filled with the gas, an instant later exhaust fans whirred to life, whirring the gas throughout, and then sucking it out. In a flash, the room was filled with breathing air, a light indicated it was habitable and the door opened.

  Having the tools, I opened the door, entered and bolted the Wireless Autonomous Surgical Robot (WASR) in place. I pulled out the surgical tools and placed them on the surgical bed’s magnetized surgical instrument platform so that the magnets locked.

  Having everything, I hit the com button and saw the surgeon was there along with my friends and her colleagues.

  Yumana, the original surgeon scheduled for this flight, stood in front of my friends in the surgical center. “So you think you might have appendicitis.”

  “Either that or one of those alien things is trying to launch through my side.”

  She grinned. “Let’s have the robot run an ultrasound. I removed my suit, and tied it off around an object in the room so that it would not float away in the event we lost power to the artificial gravity generator, and climbed into a harness with large open areas and magnetized regions to hold surgical devices, and then lay on the surgical table. The robot responding from a signal from Earth performed an ultrasound on my lower right abdominal region and side and the doctor looking at the information transmitted to her frowned without end. Announcing the findings, she said, “It’s not an Alien, but it definitely wants out. We also have a bit of a problem.”

  I looked at her even more worried.

  “It’s not with you. It’s with the tools. You are so far out that the latency signal delay is too great for me to adequately control the surgical robot from here. Its movements will be too jerky. You have two options, allow the robot to perform autonomously or take a local anesthesia and perform the surgery yourself as I guide you through it.

  “If I let the robot do it, I’ll be a case study and a first regardless of whether it’s successful.”

  “Yes.”

  I was damned if I did or didn’t.

  “OK. I’ll do it.”

  “You’re in a lot of pain can you concentrate?”

  “I don’t have a choice.”

  While she talked me through the local anesthesia procedures I was performing on myself and I started an IV drip with antibiotics, additional anesthetics, . . . I thought back on what I’d learned during training on something I thought I would never have to do.

  The appendix is a narrow, small, finger-shaped portion of the large intestine that generally hangs down from the right side of the abdomen. Appendicitis occurs when the interior of the appendix becomes filled with something that caused it to swell such as mucus, stool or parasites. The appendix becomes irritated and inflamed. Rupture or perforation occurs as holes develop in the walls of the appendix, allowing stool, mucus , and other substances to leak through and get inside the abdomen. An infection inside the abdomen known as peritonitis occurs when the appendix perforates.

  Peritonitis is an inflammation of the peritoneum, the thin membrane that lines the abdominal wall and covers most of the organs of the body. Peritonitis might sound minor, but thanks to modern antibiotics it wouldn’t kill me, but make me spend the next week or so wishing I was dead.

  I had no doubt my appendix was going to perforate and explode like a nuke and I needed to get it out before that happened.

  Still reviewing, I remembered the laparoscopic appendectomy surgical technique was minimally invasive involving making tiny cuts in the abdomen and inserting a miniature camera and surgical instruments. As many as three to four incisions were made. It used a telescopic rod lens system that was usually connected to a video camera. Also attached was a fiber optic cable system connected to a “cold light source either halogen or xenon to illuminate the operative field.

  During the procedure the abdomen was essentially blown up like a balloon, insufflated, elevating the abdominal wall above the internal organs like a dome. The gas used was CO2, which is common to the human body and can be absorbed by tissue and removed by the respiratory system. It was also non-flammable because electrosurgical devices were commonly used in laparoscopic procedures.

  Instruments: graspers, scissors, clip applier, etc. . . were introduced into the abdomen through trocars, hollow tubes with a seal to keep the CO2 from leaking out. This was a great procedure for space because it kept the blood in. An open procedure could have blood floating about and getting in the way in zero gravity.

  Anesthetized I was feeling better. Not much, but . . . and the real test was to come. The difference between theory and practice.

  We began by pressurizing my abdominal cavity to 15 millimeters to insufflate my abdomen and form the operating theater to remove the appendix.

  I inserted the camera through my, umbilicus, belly button, and I made two 5 millimeter ports for insertion of the long instruments and placed the trocars in each.

  Then the real fun began.

  The appendicular artery runs in a layer of fat called the meter appendix and I sealed it with heat from a biopredic diathermic. On the monitor I watched the flesh sizzle like fat on burning charcoal, as the device heated by electrical current cauterized the artery. Believe me that is not one of my more pleasant memories.

  The artery was then divided, in English it was cut, using scissors.

  The appendix was attached to the first part of the large bowel colon, also known as the caecum. The meter appendix was divided all the way down the base of the appendix where it met the caecum.

  I then lassoed the appendix with an end loop, which is a surgical device employing a slipknot and placed at the base of the appendix and tightened. It was then divided with scissors. Again, in English cut. I then continued the process with two further endoloops. One slightly above the first and the other above the second at a significantly greater distance. The appendix was then divided, cut, between the second and third endoloops.

  A stream of puss indicated the acute inflammation that was present. More would have discharged had it perforated.

  The area of the discharge was then thoroughly irrigated by warm saline and then it was suctioned out.

  I also thoroughly irrigated the pelvis area, containing the bladder, sigmoid colon, small bowel and iliac artery and vein.

  I replaced the 10 mm camera in the umbilicus with a 5 mm camera in one of the other ports to allow extraction of the appendix through the umbilicus once it was placed into an endocatch bag.

  I closed the wound and checked my IV drip with antibiotics and anesthetic.

  Yumana grinned.
“Congratulations Dr. Young. We completed this procedure in 22 minutes. On Earth it’s usually 20 to 30 minutes for an experienced physician.”

  Not at all in a celebratory mood I said, “Yeeeeeaaaaaaahhhh. I think I was significantly more motivated than those physicians. I’m a little freaked and traumatized so . . .” I never completed the sentence, I blacked out.

  Tired, I came to seeing everyone watching me with awe.

  George said, “Welcome back Rip Van Winkel.”

  I turned my head towards the clock and saw the time. “Only 12 minutes have passed.”

  George smiled, “And a day. You did not move from that spot we were worried.”

  I glanced back at the clock. I had lost a day and my IV was empty.

  I waved to Selena and Tot, “Hey babes.” Sad and tearing they waved back.

  “Hey, Selena.”

  ”Yes.”

  “If you spend a million hours in labor. It will never compare to this.”

  I laughed and my friends joined me.

  Hemmingson said, “Your new handle is Jason.”

  I smiled. “After the unstoppable monster in those Friday The 13th movies.” I grinned broader.

  I got up placed four IV bottles on the rack, inserted medications within them, connected one to me and space weary grinned at my friends, while I reached to turn off the com button. “Thanks, but I can hardly keep my eyes open. I’m turning off —“

  They chorused, “No!” So I left the camera on and slept under the watchful eyes of my friends.

  * * * * *

  Later, I lay on my bed watching Tot and Selena read to me the end of Jules Verne’s The Mysterious Island.

  Selena read, “There, to conclude, all were happy, united in the present as they had been in the past;”

  Then Tot, “but never could they forget that island upon which they had arrived poor and friendless,”

  “that island which, during four years had supplied all their wants,”

  “and of which there remained but a fragment of granite washed by the waves of the Pacific”

  “the tomb of him who had borne the name of”

  “Captain”

  “Nemo.”

  “The”

  “End”

  Tot looked at Selena and joked, “Why did we pick this book?”

  “Because it sounds like something he would do.”

  They laughed.

  Tot asked, “Did you like it?”

  “Yes, very much. I especially loved the narrators.”

  They blushed.

  Tot grinned, “When you get back we aren’t letting you go anywhere alone.”

  “Really?”

  Selena said, “Really.”

  “Good because I don’t want to go anywhere alone. I’m done.”

  I blew them a kiss and they blew kisses back.

  I glanced at the clock. “It’s getting late and I don’t know what traffic on my commute to work is going to be like. The two looked so sad. “But if you two don’t mind staying up a little longer?”

  Like school girls, they jumped up and ran to a book case replacing their The Mysterious Island with another.

  They climbed onto the bed and held up their volumes of Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss.

  “Thank you. These have been some of my favorites from youth.”

  Selena opened her book, “We know.”

  Tot opened hers too, “It’s these books that set you down that path mister.” Then in her Russian dialect she said, “Our baby will not read such things.”

  Selena playfully said, “No. No. No. Hopefully something normal like Playboy.”

  I laughed. “Maybe in some private moments with dad, I’ll acquaint our babies with Monsieur Verne, Herr Wyss and Mister Swift.”

  The two playfully rolled their eyes at me then Tot started them reading.

  “For many days we had been tempest-tossed.”

  “Six times had the darkness closed over a wild and terrific scene,”

  “and returning light as often brought but renewed distress,”

  “for the raging storm increased in fury until on the seventh day all hope was lost.”

  I smiled at them. “I love you.”

  They blushed and Selena started them reading.

  “We were driven completely out of our course;”

  “no conjecture could be formed as to our whereabouts.”

  “The crew had lost heart,”

  “and were utterly exhausted by incessant labour.”

  * * * * *

  After so many close calls with death, my friends all became guardian angles and had cameras and com centers in their homes and offices.

  * * * * *

  I was performing maintenance on a device while Hemmingson filled me in on history.

  “No, they never got Sadam Husein. It was one of his doubles. DNA & Finger prints didn’t match. Ever here any discussion of that?

  “No.”

  “That’s why. But, they had to kill “Sadam Hussein”. No WMD’s. No Sadam. Somebody had to be the bad guy. And, it was one of his poor doubles.”

  * * * * *

  Kevin showed me the phenomenal progress he’d made on Young Sea Resources.

  “Stephen you’re going to love this.”

  Kevin I love what you did, but I think we need to sell it off.

  “What?! . . . NO!”

  “I was thinking, FSeR. Fay Sea Resources.”

  He grinned, “Sounds like a plan to me.”

  * * * * *

  I’d just secured form launching a long range probe and listened to Hemmingson on baseball.

  “Of course baseball is fixed. Why do you think a team that is historically horrendous becomes a dynasty the moment they want the city to buy them a stadium? All the owners know the drill. Private profit at public expense. Fixed. Fixed. Fixed.”

  * * * * *

  Six months after I departed, the US and its coalition launched in the Stolen Prometheus. Their transit was going to be longer because of the relationship of the two planets when they arrived, but they were worried that the second YSR mission to Mars would launch before them and beat them there, hence they punished the crew with a lengthier transit.

  And to add insult to injury, they renamed the Stolen Prometheus, The Stephen Young, allegedly after me the first man to set out for Mars. But in reality it was an amazing act of disinformation for the ages. Because in some point in our future, people would believe that I and the ship were on the same mission and the ship was theirs. In the nightly broadcast that showed our progress, they’d stopped using my name to track my ship once the stolen Stephen Young was launched and started using the ships’ names, which I actually liked better, because Patricia & Catherine became a constant memorial in the eyes of the public, but the governments’ rationale behind it bothered me.

  It was an act of dishonoring me through honoring me and usurping all our hard effort again. This time for free. Because they were using the historical nature of my launch and mission in naming the ship, there was no misappropriation of personality and thus not actionable by a court of law.

  George, Selena, Tot, Kevin, Gardner and Hemmingson were invited to the renaming ceremony where the usurpers gave fine speeches on “cooperation”.

  Selena even spoke on behalf of YSR accepting the honor on my behalf and the enterprises.

  Hemmingson and I talked about it and he started to deal with the matter, but I told him there was no way to tell who did it as an honor and who did it in spite. With a grin, he said “I know how.” and disconnected before I could say, “Don’t!”

  * * * * *

  While I provided preventive maintenance to a fire damaged Mars Lander, Hemmingson filled me in on the oil and automotive industry.

  “The automotive and aviation industries are actually owned by the petroleum industry through interlocking and shell companies. Cars are just petroleum consumption devices. Look at it. As large as the automotive industry is, why have they not pur
chased the petroleum companies and kept fuel prices low so that they can sell more cars? Or the airlines to fill more seats? There’s more profitability in fuel, hence the tail wags the dog.

  * * * * *

  “Semet Stellar Resources? I don’t like it. It conjures up pictures of dreary mining towns like Wheeling West Virginia run by guys named Potter in It’s AN UnWonderful Life and then when you look at the moon. My God, NO.” He thought about it for a moment then smiled. “Now, Semet Stellar Resorts I love. By the way, you won’t believe how much Playboy has offered to manage a lunar resort. Unbelievable. I’m going to be the new Hugh, the heir apparent.”

  “I see Hemmingson is contagious.” I laughed.

  “You should talk”

  We both laughed.

  “Stephen, do you think the U.N. will be mad if we have one of those playboy bunny’s in orbit above the moon.”

  “Yes they would. Very mad.”

  “Hummmh. That grant only covered the atmosphere.”

  “Gardner no.“

  “If I have some darkened lunar features shaped like a bunny."

  “No, Gardner.“

  “I got to go.”

  “Gardner—“

  * * * * *

  Hemmingson took me on a picnic with his princessas both very near the end of their pregnancies along with their dogs.

  “I made this plate up special for you. All good things. No tongue.”

  “Thanks. This is the first time I’ve been outside since I launched.”

  “You’re welcome. I should have done this sooner.”

  “The picnic?”

  “Domestic life. I stopped drinking when I found out. I’m going to be a good dad.”

  “I know.”

  “You know they’re going to have twins.”

  “Yeah. Tot and Selena told me. You’re all taking Lamaze classes together.”

  “My first child is going to be four. Girls at that. If that’s not karma coming back to bite me on the behind, what is? But it’s a good thing. A very good thing.