Girl on Mars

by Jack McDonald Burnett

  # # #

  Jeffrey wouldn’t let up on Conn. Now that she was their guest on a more permanent basis, he wanted her to commit to his cause. Be his muscle. But Conn told him again what she’d told him before: her responsibility was to get the astronauts home. They weren’t home. Jeffrey would always say that he understood, but would bring it up again when they next met.

  It didn’t take long for the astronauts to appreciate the scope of their problems.

  “So many parts to replace,” Izzy told Conn, after the Dyna-Tech astronauts completed a formal inventory. “Almost nothing we can improvise. We’ll use what we can off your vehicle, and Daniels and I are going to hoof it out to Cole Heist’s lander and see if we can scavenge some parts from it.” It was good, problem-solving thinking, but the likelihood of compatibility between the Dyna-Tech lander and half a sixteen-year-old NASA vehicle was low. Dyna-Tech’s vehicle was state-of-the-art, while the NASA lander’s design was many years old before it even lifted off. “Then all we have to worry about is whether the thing’s structural integrity has been compromised, so we don't break apart on liftoff.”

  Conn and Ryan huddled up with Daniels underground and got a list of everything he would need. It was a long list, but at least some of it could be cannibalized from Yars’ Revenge.

  Conn and Ryan worked for two days taking Yars’ Revenge apart and gathering parts for use on the the Dyna-Tech lander. Izzy and Daniels spent those two days doing the same thing from the NASA lander, considerably farther away. Compatibility was one issue, but so was the condition of the parts after being out in the wind and dust for sixteen years. Not to mention that Cole Heist was killed when half the lander melted on entry into the Martian atmosphere.

  The astronauts compared notes. The last time, Daniels threw up his arms and stalked away. They just weren’t going to be able to salvage enough to get the lander back in shape and its ascent engines working.

  With that decision made, Dyna-Tech ordered Sergei back to Earth.

  “There goes our ride,” Daniels said, with customary delicacy.

  “Your ride,” Izzy said quietly. Izzy had been slated to use the portal to get back to the space station, Daniels to return to the command module and ride home with Sergei. Dyna-Tech wanted its two spacecraft back.

  Izzy put on as tough a front as Daniels’, but Conn caught her crying in the lavatory of the small suite the women shared underground.

  It was bigger than the room Conn had awakened in, the one with Cole Heist’s pressure suit. It didn’t seem to Conn to be as big as what she had seen of Stu’s dwelling. It had two cots, a portable screen partition for privacy—the women didn’t set theirs up between their beds, like the men did theirs—footlockers, a small desk and two chairs, and a separate modular lavatory and storage closet. Plenty of room to be comfortable in while they waited for portal parts from Earth. The walls were stone and looked like a combination of a natural formation and an artificial carve-out. Ryan’s and Daniels’ room was a copy of theirs.

  Water was rationed, but not as strictly as Conn would have thought. Their toilet used water. (Conn didn’t want to think about whether the toilet water was ever recycled into something potable.) The vegetables were sometimes boiled in water. It was all they drank. They used a gritty powder to clean themselves in lieu of a shower, though.

  What would doom them was the food.

  Conn volunteered to try some first, after their rations from the landers ran out. Daniels, for one, was all too happy to let her. She got some vegetables down and kept them down, at least for a time. They all ate, relieved that Sidereal fare was edible. Ryan bested them all by trying the meat first—an animal that looked somewhat like a chicken, both when alive and when on a plate. It all went down easily enough. That evening was no fun, though. Conn’s abdominal distress took her breath away. The others felt the same. They expelled almost all they had eaten as waste. The food was as useful to humans as the Aphelial food had been to Conn and Yongpo in the brig.

  Despite the distress, they all volunteered to try new Sidereal fare to see if anything was absorbed and nourished them, but nothing seemed to. After a few days they all felt logy and dizzy and hungry.

  For a few days after they concluded that the lander couldn’t be fixed, they took turns going outside to catch up with Ginny and Earth. NASA planned a launch in two months of a capsule filled with portal parts, enough to build a whole new one. Dyna-Tech would foot most of the bill for the mission.

  As the days went by, the public grew less excited about there being Martians and more concerned about the stranded astronauts. Ginny recorded each astronaut saying hello to their families and friends and that they were fine and thanking the people of Earth for their support. The feeds ate it up. Conn added to hers, “Yongpo, congratulations, your tech definitely works, and it’s not your fault we’re stuck here.” Conn knew her friend would blame himself, after Conn had bet her and her astronauts’ lives that the portal technology would work as advertised.

  On his second turn outside, Ryan told Ginny about the food issue. Conn had not wanted Ginny, and therefore her people on Earth, and therefore everybody, to know about it until they came up with a solution, but she hadn’t communicated that clearly to Ryan. Conn went out after Ryan came back in to explain that the Sidereals were working with them and they would find something nutritious, or find some inedible source of vitamins and infuse their food with it, or get used to the diet, which she didn’t actually believe would happen. The feeds reported what she said, but by then the story was already Astronauts Starving to Death on Mars.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The Martian Sky

  July 19 - 20, 2039

  The day had come for Ginny to land the Adventure and go home. Conn and Ryan came to the surface to be with her as best they could. Otherwise she was really on her own—with radio messages taking ten minutes to get home, replies ten minutes to get back, instant interaction was impossible.

  “Conn, Ryan, I'm sorry. We came here together and we should be going home the same way,” Ginny said to them, muting her communications with Earth to say goodbye.

  “Don't worry about us,” Conn said. “Just land safely.”

  “There’s no one I would have wanted to share this adventure with more than you two,” Ryan said. “Both of you.” He blushed as Conn regarded him.

  “Thank you for staying as long as you could,” Conn said. “We won't be too far behind.” Her voice caught a little at the end. She hoped Ginny hadn’t noticed.

  Communications were turned back on. Conn and Ryan caught her up on their last twenty-four hours and Ginny relayed how experts suggested they find edible food in an alien ecosystem. It didn’t take long: nobody seemed to know what to do. Plans for the uncrewed capsule that would arrive in six and a half months were proceeding, but Conn had no confidence they could last that long. The world held its breath, waiting for a miracle or for the astronauts to die. Once Ginny was gone, they would be cut off from Earth. Perhaps it was for the best.

  Ginny vocalized each step in her landing sequence. Conn sent messages of encouragement when there was a lull, practically exhausting herself with the effort after days without nutrients.

  The spacecraft dropped onto the surface of the tiny moon with what sounded like a huge commotion over the radio, but Ginny brightly reported her success afterward. Phobos had so little gravity that Dyna-Tech astronauts had to have weighted boots to be able to work safely and not achieve escape velocity with a brisk walk. Ginny carried packs full of loose equipment slung on each shoulder to help weigh her down, but she still was very careful shuffling to the portal.

  With a final goodbye, Ginny stepped through the portal, and presumably arrived on the Dyna-Tech space station a moment later.

  # # #

  The next day, there was no longer any reason to go out daily to talk to Ginny, but Conn talked Izzy into going out for a mental health walk.

  Conn was seeing stars flashing in her field of vision by then, but refused
to give in to her weakness and hunger as long as the others needed her support. She was grateful for the one-third gravity. Her limbs felt heavy, but then moving them was easy.

  “They’re still going ahead with the capsule full of equipment,” Conn told Izzy.

  Izzy was shaking, though Conn couldn't tell if it was from hunger or from stress. “It's too bad we won't be there,” she said bitterly. “I'm trying, but it's getting harder and harder to pretend we're ever going home again.”

  They continued to talk, on a private frequency, about life, their dashed hopes and dreams, their anger and their fear. Crying with a breathing bubble on was a nightmare, but that didn’t stop them. By then, having no way to recharge their O2 tanks, they were using equipment meant for the skinny Sidereals, so the bubbles were a tighter fit than they were used to. Still no way to wipe eyes or noses, though.

  # # #

  They were sitting on a rock watching the sun go down when Conn saw three drones leap into the light Martian air and head in their direction, fast.

  “The hell?” Izzy said. Conn rose.

  Her heart fluttered, and she felt dizzy. She and Izzy were in no shape to be superwomen and wreck three attacking drones with their bare hands.

  Why would the Sidereals be sending drones after them now?

  A burst of light erupted from the lead drone. Conn flinched and instinctively ducked her head. But the shot went well over their heads. The two trailing drones spread out left and right of the lead drone and fired as well. The three rose and raced toward something behind the women.

  Conn looked that way. A speck in the sky was getting bigger. The drones were hurrying toward it, shooting all the way.

  “What is that?” Izzy said.

  As they watched the speck grew and resolved itself into a vehicle of some kind, waggling and dipping to avoid being shot. When the drones got close enough, the women saw them shudder and drop, rendered inert somehow. More shots erupted from the opposite direction: more drones, these not as anxious to get close to the vehicle.

  The vehicle dodged and dove and climbed, all in a hail of drone fire. It was coming at them, fast. They heard a whoosh and it sped up. Trying to get close enough to the drones to take them out, Conn supposed.

  As the vehicle passed overhead, it became clear that it was shaped like a 1950s artist’s conception of a rocketship, silver, bulging in the middle and tapering off at the ends, with three great fins on its tail.

  “Holy sh—” Conn exclaimed, just as it was roaring over their heads. The astronauts turned to follow it. More drones shuddered and dropped out of the sky.

  “What?” Izzy said.

  “Come on,” Conn said. She started back toward the Sidereal caverns at a dead run. “We need to get the others.”

  # # #

  Conn almost skidded by the door to Ryan and Daniels’ suite. “Guys!” she panted. Her chest hurt. She had to pause to breathe a few deep breaths. “Suit up. We have to go.”

  She ignored their protests and questions. Izzy contributed to them, but Conn ignored her, too. She felt like she should seek Jeffrey out, but they didn’t have time. Or maybe they did: suiting up wasn’t as simple as throwing on a breathing bubble. They had borrowed two sets of tanks and bubbles from their hosts to rotate among the four of them, and Conn and Izzy were wearing them.

  “Does anybody have any air left in their tanks? Your tanks, I mean, the ones that belong to us.”

  Daniels had gone to borrow, or more likely commandeer, two more sets of gear, but Ryan said he had fifteen to twenty minutes of air. “More like ten to fifteen for me, but yeah,” Izzy said.

  That’s what Conn had, too; maybe closer to ten. She wished Daniels hadn’t run off so she could confirm with him. She would get his gear, and he could tell her he was out of air when she saw him.

  A lot still had to happen. Would fifteen minutes be enough? It would have to be. “Izzy, go find Daniels. Ryan, help me get our equipment. Are they still storing it in the same place?”

  They were, with no guard now. And Ryan had a key. Conn threw the door open and stalked around the small room (or large closet) until she came upon their gear. She wasn’t sure she and Ryan could each carry two sets of bubbles and tanks. They weren’t that heavy in the Martian gravity, but they were bulky. Then Izzy and Daniels showed up. The four of them each took their gear and began to strap and snap it on.

  “You’ve got us a ride.” Daniels said more than asked.

  Conn reddened. “Let’s just go. We have to flag him down and convince him to take us home.”

  “So you don’t have us a ride,” Daniels sighed.

  “This isn’t, I’m sorry to ask, but this isn’t you being woozy from hunger, is it?” Ryan said. “Izzy, what did you see?”

  “I saw a vehicle. A spacecraft. It was getting shot at.”

  They were all in their gear, so they hustled toward the exit to the surface, carrying their breathing bubbles.

  “It’s a Pelorian spacecraft,” Conn growled.

  “We’re at war with the Pelorians,” Daniels pointed out.

  The caves rumbled and shuddered. The astronauts looked at one another.

  “Stay and starve if that’s what you want to do,” Conn snapped.

  “What’s a Pelorian spacecraft doing here?” Ryan asked.

  “That’s a good question,” Izzy said, red in the face from hurrying so much. “Drones were trying to shoot it down. I think we know now what Stu meant when he said their history with the Pelorians is complicated.”

  “Why didn’t you get him to land before you came back in to get us?” Ryan asked.

  “Remember how I said they were getting shot at?” Izzy said. “I don’t think it’s particularly safe for it to land here.”

  “So this Pelorian,” Daniels said, huffing, “whom we have to convince to land in hostile territory and take us back to Earth, more hostile territory for them, by the way, might already be wreckage by the time we get out there.”

  “I don’t know,” Izzy said. “The drones weren’t faring well.”

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s Pelorian,” Conn nearly shrieked, “or human, or Aphelial, or from Krypton. It’s a way home.” No one had anything to say to that, though Daniels tsked. The caves rumbled again, the ground beneath them vibrating.

  “What is that?”

  They hurried through the first airlock door, with nobody behind them to seal it from the settlement side. Conn hoped that was just a safety precaution. They put their bubbles on. The airlock matched the pressure on the Martian surface, and they went outside. The weak Martian wind pushed feebly at them. The sun had almost set.

  Conn scanned the skies. The others did, too, none finding evidence of the distinctive Pelorian “rocketship.”

  “We have to get out in the open,” Conn told them. “Hurry.” She led them toward what she thought she remembered was a relatively clear, flat spot.

  Ryan spotted it first. The Pelorian emerged from behind the gentle slope above the Sidereal settlement. It grew in their sight as it approached, the fins just coming into focus. Skirting the hill, it dropped something from its belly. It exploded on impact, kicking red rock and soil high up into the air. Bursts of bright light erupted from the hill, the Sidereals returning fire.

  The Pelorian spacecraft was bombing them.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  A Ride

  July 20 - August 5, 2039

  “Come on,” Daniels said. “Let’s get back inside before we run out of air.”

  Ryan and Izzy seemed to think this was sensible, despite the fact that they were going underground into a complex that appeared to be under attack. They did have a far better chance of surviving with the Sidereals than they did if they remained on the surface another fifteen minutes. They fell in behind Daniels, and the three started to march away.

  Conn watched the Pelorian spacecraft get closer. The sun peeked out just over the horizon behind it, and Conn had to shade her eyes.

  “Conn, come on!” Iz
zy said.

  Instead of following, Conn raised her arms and waved them back and forth, like the top half of a series of jumping jacks. The “rocketship” buzzed her, low to the ground, close enough that Conn could see scorch marks and gouges on its skin. It passed by, and Conn deflated. But then the spacecraft made a tight loop and came back the same way. Conn waved again. The spacecraft passed overhead. It might have been Conn’s imagination, but it seemed to be going slower.

  Izzy came over to convince Conn to leave the surface. But the women watched the spacecraft turn in another tight loop and, more slowly, come back again.

  “They’re going to land, aren’t they?” Izzy said. She jumped and clapped.

  “Daniels, Ryan, get over here now!” Conn said as Izzy did her own jumping jacks in the direction of the vehicle.

  The men arrived as the spacecraft turned vertical, fins down, and settled onto the Martian soil. It stood ten-plus meters high, and fifty meters away: it had landed on the other side of a hill situated between it and the Sidereal guns. The last of the sun gleamed off its metallic surface.

  “I’ve got a pretty persistent alarm here,” Daniels said. Conn’s had gone off, too. They would be out of air soon.

  The astronauts double-timed it in the direction of the “rocketship.” As they did, a hatch opened in the spacecraft about three meters off the ground and a ladder descended.

  At about this time, the drones reappeared. Emboldened by a stationary target, Conn mused. The oxygen alarm her O2 tanks were sounding inside her breathing bubble was driving her crazy.

  The ground in front of Conn erupted with a shower of dirt and rock, and she had to careen into Izzy to get out of the way. That made Izzy stumble. Daniels held up to give her a hand, but Conn waved him off and helped Izzy up. More explosions around them. The drones weren’t firing on the spacecraft anymore.