First Landing

by Robert Zubrin

  Craig Holloway left the courtroom to the catcalls of disappointed multitudes. It was horrible to be the object of popular rage and scorn, but at least the pretrial hearing had turned out well. Put simply, the government didn’t have enough evidence to hold him.

  The citizens of Houston were rude, though—very rude. Holloway winced as he passed several holding a noose. “You’ll hang, Holloway!” But despite their verbal ferocity, no one in the crowd made any attempt at physical assault. Against his expectations, Holloway made it to his electrocycle in one piece.

  Negotiating the usual set of detours caused by downtown Houston’s endless road construction, Holloway rode on to Interstate 45 and headed south toward his home in Clear Lake. Quiet and clean, the electrocycle was dwarfed in size, sound, and odor by the surrounding traffic, but its iron-ion battery could move it at sixty for ten hours. A devout ecogoth, Holloway would drive nothing else. It was his contribution to saving the Earth.

  The situation was laughable. Half the people at Mission Control believed he had dumped the ERV propellant, but they couldn’t prove a thing because they had no idea how he’d done it. When it came to computational literacy, NASA was a joke.

  Holloway recalled the story of how in 1997, the space agency had finally upgraded the space-shuttle computers to IBM 386’s, thereby making the organization only eight years behind the average technology available at Radio Shack. They were even further behind today.

  The idiots had examined his transmission for fuel-dumping instructions. Of course they had found none. As if he’d be dumb enough to do it by attaching an executable code to E-mail.

  In his younger days, Holloway had been a serious recreational hacker and he still liked to keep his hand in. Self-erasing nano-encryption was an elementary technique for transmitting hidden programs. Apparently the self-described “techno-wizards” at Mission Control had not even heard of it. What a bunch of bozos!

  And those nitwits presumed to gamble with the fate of the Earth. Not one of them cared a whit about the fact that the success of their precious mission could cause a global pandemic. Not one of them bothered to think for a minute about the ecological devastation that would ensue if the biotech industry ever got its hands on Martian DNA and started playing some of the Frankenplant crop-engineering games that Rebecca Sherman was already talking about.

  Rebecca Sherman—now there was a piece of work. She pretended to be so enlightened, and so concerned about the welfare of the planet. Years ago, during the Desert War, they had both briefly been members of the Houston Peace Coalition. Yet her ideas of people adopting the role of agents of environmental improvement by spreading life were clearly nothing other than unreconstructed humanism. He had once offered to show her the errors of her ways by asking her out on a private date, where their differences could be worked out in a comfortable and intimate setting. But she had just laughed at him.

  So much for NASA’s enlightened intellectual.

  Mason, Rollins, and the rest could eat crow. And as for the delightful crew of Bombs-Away Townsend, Saint Guenevere, “Hoss Cartwright” Johnson, Manifest Destiny McGee, and Rebecca the Ice Princess, they could sign their advertising endorsement contracts from Mars.

  The Earth would do just fine without them.

  CHAPTER 14

  OPHIR PLANUM

  APRIL 22, 2012 19:30 MLT

  DINNERTIME ON MARS. A tired-looking crew sat down to eat, and as they stared at their meager rations, Rebecca entered the galley carrying a small tray of fresh greens with a few small radishes. “Here it is, folks. Our first harvest. Get ready for Thanksgiving dinner.”

  Luke regarded the tray with contempt. “Now that is what I call one pretty little salad bar. Pretty little, that is.”

  “Maybe you’d prefer one pretty little punch in the mouth,” Rebecca retorted. “Do you have any idea how hard I worked to raise these things?”

  Townsend gave the time-out signal. “That’s enough. We’re all working hard. Dr. Sherman, what’s the projected greenhouse yield rate?”

  Rebecca managed to calm herself. “Actually, much better than I ever expected. We’ve packed it to the gills with racks and maxed out the possible rates of nutrient, water, and power flows. I don’t see how any further improvements are possible. But with the cycle we have going now, the greenhouse will soon be functioning at a level that would allow it to support three people indefinitely.”

  “Which three did you have in mind?” Gwen glared at the biologist.

  There was a moment of shocked silence in the galley.

  Townsend cleared his throat. “That remark was uncalled for, Major. If we can maintain these yields, then by combining the greenhouse output with short rationing of the Beagle’s supplies, we can last until a resupply ship makes it out in late 2016.”

  Gwen was unconvinced. “If a resupply ship is sent out in 2016.”

  Townsend slammed his fist down on the table. “It will be.”

  “You don’t know that, Colonel,” Luke stated in a matter-of-fact drawl.

  “No, I don’t, but I believe it. We’ve all got to believe it.” The mission commander looked around the room, fighting hard to suppress his own feeling of inner hysteria. “We can’t give up hope. We can make it if we don’t give up hope, and if we don’t start tearing each other up.”

  Observing how Townsend’s insistence was having the opposite of the intended effect, McGee wisely changed the subject. “Those radishes look awfully good, Rebecca. Mind if I try one?”

  Gratified to have at least one appreciative customer, she smiled. “One, Kevin. Just one. There’s one for each of us, unless of course Dr. Johnson here doesn’t care to partake of this humble fare.”

  The geologist had spent the last several minutes staring at Rebecca’s greens, and as small as they were, their freshness had overcome his resistance. “No, no, I’ll do my part.” He hastily snatched his portion.

  Though they ate slowly, it did not take long to consume the meager amounts. Still, Townsend realized that the first harvest on Mars needed to be regarded as an event of some significance. This really is our Thanksgiving dinner, he thought. Let’s treat it that way.

  Pretending to be full, he patted his belly, which two months of hard digging had transformed into a washboard that would have been applauded by any Air Force fitness instructor. “Well, that was excellent. Why don’t we celebrate our first harvest a little? Professor, would you mind singing us one of your songs?”

  McGee was surprised at such a request from Colonel Townsend, but felt that a celebration was in order, too. “Okay.”

  Gwen’s eyes were suddenly filled with longing. “Make it something about home.”

  It took McGee only a moment to retrieve the undersized guitar from his berth. Seating himself, he strummed a few chords to tune his instrument. “All right, Gwen, here’s to home.” He began to sing softly:

  Oh, Shenandoah, I long to hear you.

  Away, you rolling river.

  Oh, Shenandoah, I can’t get near you.

  Away, away, I’m bound away

  Across the wide Missouri.

  As McGee strummed on, tears began to form in the corners of the major’s eyes. Noting the effect the song was having on her, Luke decided to join in, leaning closer to the flight mechanic. “I’ll take it from here.

  Shenandoah, I love your daughter.

  Away, you rolling river.

  I’ll take her across the yellow water.

  Away, away, I’m bound away

  Across the wide Missouri.

  The lusty way Luke sang made Gwen blush a bit. She rewarded the Texan geologist with her smile and attention, yet her eyes kept straying back to McGee, who softly continued his accompaniment on the guitar.

  OPHIR PLANUM

  MAY 26, 2012 18:15 MLT

  The television screen showed thousands of people, hundreds of thousands, filling New York’s Central Park with banners and green crosses. From the bandstand, opposition presidential candidate Senator Matt Fa
irchild raved to the cheering multitudes, saying exactly what they wanted to hear.

  As Gwen watched in disgust, the pandering politician raised his hands with double V for victory signs to exult in the roaring approval of his supporters. Mercifully, the video clip ended and was followed by a newscaster at his desk addressing other events.

  McGee turned from the newscast to pull the mission commander aside. “Colonel, I have bad news from my political friend in the White House. A secret poll conducted by the Administration shows things heading full-speed toward a loss in November. If that happens, our chance of a rescue flight drops to nil.”

  Townsend nodded. “Still, it’s not over until—”

  “Damnation!” Gwen shouted, suddenly interrupting them all.

  Startled by the outburst, the colonel turned to her. “What happened?”

  “The Braves lost again.”

  McGee exchanged a significant glance with Townsend. “Colonel, deep inside, every member of this crew knows no relief is coming, so they’re all beginning to withdraw. I’ve seen this before, in the Arctic. Gwen’s slipping into fantasy. Rebecca’s gone silent, walling herself off from the rest of the crew.”

  Townsend frowned. “Doesn’t sound too healthy.”

  Rebecca, who had just emerged from the lab, overheard the remark. “Healthy! I’ll tell you what would be healthy. We should stop marking time and start thinking of a way to get ourselves out of this mess.”

  The colonel regarded her coolly. “And how would you recommend we do that, Doctor?”

  Rebecca’s eyes were filled with fire. “We’re currently producing a lot more water than we need for the greenhouse. I say we electrolyze the excess and start making rocket fuel! Let’s get home by ourselves.”

  Townsend shook his head. “I’ve looked into that. At our current rate of water extraction, if we used the excess as propellant feedstock, it would take a decade to produce enough fuel to drive the ERV home. Rescue is certainly more likely by then. We’re better off keeping the water as a reserve for our consumable stock.”

  “No we’re not. McGee may be playing amateur shrink, but his points are on the mark. This crew is cracking up. There’s no way we’ll last ten years, or even four. We’ve got to fight our way out of here, Colonel—this year, or it’s all over.”

  “I admire your spirit, Doctor, but what you’re suggesting is impossible. We’d have to up our water production rate by ten times.”

  “Five and a half times,” Rebecca corrected. “Half of our current extraction is going to the greenhouse.”

  Townsend looked at her. In the past, Rebecca’s appearance had always been immaculate, her manner calm, her logic impeccable. Now her hair was uncombed, her clothes unkempt. Perhaps her mind was even unbalanced. Cracking up indeed. He began to answer slowly. “Five and a half times, then. It’s still imp—”

  “No it’s not!” She placed both of her fists on the table and leaned over to look the colonel in the eye. “Our current rate is based upon one two-man, six-hour digging shift per day. If we go to two two-person shifts, each twelve hours long, we’d have four times the soil throughput.”

  “Still not enough.”

  “It could be,” Luke mused, coming into the discussion. “The deeper soil is likely to have greater moisture content than the stuff we’ve been shoveling.”

  “Precisely!” Rebecca welcomed this support from an unexpected quarter.

  “But we still don’t have the manpower to sustain even that level of effort.”

  Taking offense, Rebecca walked several steps from the table and then whirled around to face Townsend again. “Manpower? There are five of us here, Colonel. We can all dig.”

  Oh shit, Townsend thought, here comes another feminist tirade. He gave her a condescending smile. “Dr. Sherman, I’m sure you have your modern theories about the roles of men and women, but even in the face of death there are certain values worth defending.”

  “Screw your values, Colonel,” Gwen interjected unexpectedly. “I don’t want to die.”

  “Major, I’m just trying to make clear that . . .”

  “You’re a gentleman and a jackass.” Gwen was unstoppable. “Look, you may be half a watermelon taller than me, sir, but I’m a miner’s daughter, and I’ve done more hard work in my time than you or anyone in your family has done for the past hundred years. I can out-dig you any day of the week. The professor, too.”

  Townsend had to smile. “Okay, perhaps you can. But Dr. Sherman? I doubt she has ever used a pick and shovel in her entire life.”

  “I learn fast,” Rebecca said firmly.

  “Do you realize what you’re talking about, Doctor? Long, grueling hours of hard physical labor, day after day, week after week.”

  “I can take it. I’m sitting here with the most important scientific discovery in human history, and I’m going to get back to Earth to present it, or I’ll know the reason why.”

  The colonel turned to the muscular mission geologist. “Luke, where do you stand?”

  “With the ladies, of course.”

  “Professor?”

  McGee rubbed his chin. “I’m reminded of other expeditions that were stranded in remote locations, Shackleton’s 1914 attempt on the South Pole, for example—”

  Townsend cut him off. “Bottom line, McGee, your vote.”

  “I think Rebecca’s right.” McGee’s voice was level. “We’ll save ourselves or no one will. It may be futile, Colonel, but I’m game.”

  They’ve just volunteered to quadruple their workload, Townsend thought. Looking over his crew, he felt a warm glow of pride. Maybe this bunch of prima donnas has the Right Stuff, after all. He cleared his throat and summoned his command voice. “In that case, I’ll make it unanimous. We start tomorrow, two duty shifts every day, each twelve hours, with one person, rotated daily, assigned to light duty around the greenhouse and Hab. That’ll give each of us a day off from hard labor one day in five. . . .”

  OPHIR PLANUM

  MAY 27, 2012 07:00 MLT

  The sun had been up barely an hour when Rebecca and Luke reached their digging site.

  Rebecca gripped her shovel and tried to fight the sinking feeling inside her. She hated hard physical labor and had generally managed to avoid it all her life. There had been one exception: Devon Island in the summer of 2000. She had been there to be part of the initial crew of the Mars Society’s Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station. However, when the crane sent in to build the station was destroyed in a failed paradrop, and the professional construction crew had deserted, the scientists were left to their own resources. They had rallied and, together with some Inuit youth who hired on, and some unsuspecting journalists who were pressed into service upon arrival, had managed to get the station built using brute-force ancient Roman construction techniques. It had been horrible, dangerous labor, involving fourteen-hour workdays in the high Arctic, but its success was critical for the cause, and Rebecca had pitched in as part of the team. The memory of that adventure gave her strength; it had given her the courage to become an astronaut.

  But she had been twenty-eight then, and as tough as the Flashline construction work had been, it had only lasted a few weeks. Now, because of her own big mouth, here she was, at the bottom of an ancient Martian pond basin, preparing to dig—and do nothing but dig, all day, nearly every day, for the next year. The bleak prospect filled her with dread. Intellectually, she knew it had to be done, and she had managed to convince the others. But now the reality confronted her. She stared down at the barely moist dirt in dismay. Somehow, she couldn’t move.

  Luke Johnson held his gloved hands in front of his helmet and pretended to spit on each one. Then he thrust his shovel deep into the ground and heaved a huge lump of dirt into the trailer. Then another, and another. At last, he paused. “Well, little lady, care to get started?”

  The redneck bastard, thought Rebecca. He knows what I’m feeling. He thinks I’m not up to this. She dug her shovel into the ground and lifted it. Her l
oad was tiny compared to the geologist’s, but it seemed heavy to her, even in the low gravity. She walked two steps to dump it into the trailer, losing most of it along the way. It was a pathetic first effort, and she knew it. Without looking, she could sense the malicious grin on Luke’s face. She dug another scoop, larger than the first, and managed to get most of it in the cart. There. She looked at Luke in triumph.

  The muscular geologist acknowledged her effort and started shoveling again, throwing load after load into the cart with the smooth flowing motion of a practiced ditch digger. Rebecca had no choice but to try to imitate him.

  She shoveled for what seemed like an eternity. After a while her hip muscles started to ache. When do we break? How long have we been doing this? She looked at her chronometer. The answer came with a shock: forty-three minutes.

  Another five hours, seventeen minutes, until lunch. Her body told her it was impossible. But cold Reason argued the contrary: For the past five thousand years, most humans have labored this way. If they could do it, I can do it.

  Somehow she made it to lunch, though her every muscle was demanding that she stop. By the end of the day, she was numb beyond aching. But she kept moving, her limbs driven more by spirit than body.

  Back at the Hab, she silently ate the briefest of dinners and collapsed into her bunk. Then, seemingly in seconds, her alarm rang.

  It was dawn, and time to dig again.

  OPHIR PLANUM

  JUNE 3, 2012 16:20 MLT

  Rebecca moved about the greenhouse, stiff limbs turning her previously graceful walk into a semi-stagger. All around her, plants bloomed, their odors filling the air; while not exactly fragrant, it still told the good news of the exuberance of life.

  As she transferred seedlings from their beds to the intermediate growth bin, the doctor felt her spirits rise a little. Eight days since the full-scale digging effort had commenced, this was her second greenhouse break-day. During her first day off, she’d been too numb to do more than stumble through the motions. While still dog-tired, her head had now cleared enough so she could begin to take stock of the situation.