Joyce shook her head. "Doesn't have the fuel range for up and back. Fuel tanks are too small. No, ballistic flights, up, coast, and then down." She shrugged.
"Coast, you mean fall," Wanda asked looking nervous. No, she was definitely not getting in this thing.
"He brought nylon parachutes too for emergencies," Tess teased.
"Don't expect me on that thing," Wanda said shaking her head. Mario chuckled. "Or you either if you know what's good for you bub."
He looked up. "It's safe, or at least as safe as we can make it!" He gave her a hurt look. She shook her head.
"No!"
He sighed. "I'm waiting for the awe but honey..." Joyce stage whispered to Tess.
Tess chuckled. "I go, is no big deal."
Joyce shook her head. "First test flight is all me, I am only risking my own neck not a mom's," she said firmly. Tess looked guilty. "Hey I'm an engineer too remember? Anything happens I will fix it, or die trying," Joyce joked.
Mario winced. "Poor choice of words Joyce." He gave Wanda a look. She shook her head.
"It can take a crew of three, an open rover, and maybe some light cargo to almost anywhere in the hemisphere. A lot further if we go light on the cargo," Joyce said, changing the subject. She patted the side of the craft. "We've got two of them actually, well, when Mario and Tess finally finish this one and get started on the other," she growled. Mario stuck his tongue out at her. Joyce smiled.
...*...*...*...*...
"You want to what?" Bob asked in disbelief over the vid net. Mario chuckled. "Luigi, you want to throw away a ton of potential capital to get the asteroid conglomerate to drop rocks on you? Are you nuts?" Bob asked, not sure if he was going to drop of a heart attack or a stroke.
Betsy grinned. "I could have told him that and saved us all a lot of headaches," she said smugly. Luigi pinched her. "You'll pay for that mate," she replied with a growl, eyes flashing.
Mario shook his head mournfully. "Typical little brother, taking on more than he can handle," he said. Luigi glared.
"It's all part of the plan. We drop three more good sized rocks, and maybe three to four snow balls and the climate will shift. Doctor Asanti believes it can shift the temp up by four degrees C each, just like the first rock did. We believe will start out gassing the CO two and starting a greenhouse reaction. We can turn have liquid water on the surface in under thirty years. Terraform it to a near breathable atmosphere in under one hundred fifty..." Luigi started to wave until his wife caught him and kissed him to shut him up.
When she let him up she stared into his eyes. "We believe you Hon, but it is a lot to take all at once. And a bit scary to point a gun at our own heads."
Mario nodded. "Yeah, the last impact did mess us up. Playing Russian roulette is not a fun party game bro, eventually someone gets hurt,” Mario sighed. “If the reactors shut down as planned and we have dust storms as bad or worse, there goes the solar power. That leaves the ethylene generators," he said and waved.
Tess nodded. "Da. Is not good. We scale back reactors now, down to eighty percent increase life by another two years, but still not good if have no power at all," She finished shaking her head.
Luigi sighed. "Then we'll have to make more. Geothermal is possible, but it is a finite resource. We were studying building wind turbines..." Luigi stopped when he saw Mario and Tess shaking their heads. "What? It'll work, and you can make them here on Mars!"
Mario sighed. "It's not that it is the dust. The dust gets everywhere and gums them up. The alternator's magnetic fields sucks dust in like a vacuum. The ones you sent are a royal pain, we have to clean them weekly to get them to work, and they are working at maybe twenty percent efficiency compared to Earth," Mario explained. Luigi sobered.
"Okay so, maybe we need to think of something else," Luigi said and sat back deflated.
Mario chuckled. "Wonder boy finally got some sense knocked into him. Glad Betsy and Nathaniel are starting to do it," he said. Betsy smiled then grinned at Wanda. "Yeah yeah, I know, Wanda has had the same effect on me," Mario chuckled. Wanda smiled.
...*...*...*...*...
"Latisha is back on the list, I am getting regular e-mails from her. She wants to return bad," Joyce chuckled. "It seems she's tired of the parades and the bubble wrap."
Luigi looked at her confused. "Bubble wrap?"
She nodded. "Yeah, like Commander Bower? He hasn't flown again since they got home. He said he feels like John Glenn, first American to orbit, then bubble wrapped so nothing could damage him," she sighed.
He nodded. "Yeah I can see that from both sides."
She shook her head ruefully. "It is hell on a pilot. Being grounded because you did good?" She shook her head again. "His wife and daughter love him, but they said he is starting to hit the sauce. Not being able to fly is starting to eat him alive. Some big wigs wanted him to run for office, he didn't want it," she sighed. "I wish we could get him back here."
Luigi nodded. "I'll talk to Zubrin, but I don't know what good it will do," he said. She sighed again and closed her eyes.
...*...*...*...*...
Luigi looked into the camera. "Folks the biggest thing to learn from this is us." He waved to the assembled people. "We are representatives of almost every branch of humanity. Black, white, Indian, Muslim, Jew, it doesn't matter to us in the least." He tapped his chest. "What matters is here." He tapped his head. "And here." He held out his hands. "These have changed a world, changed two worlds. We are inviting you to do the same. If we can do it here, in the hardest place man has ever called home, then I bet you can learn from it. We hope you do." He nodded to Tess, Sergei and little Piotr. "For their sakes if for no other." The camera tightened in on little Piotr playing with a model of the SSTO. Little Nathanial watched avidly. "For their future."
...*...*...*...*...
"My, we've got quite a stable of cars now," Wanda commented as she looked around. The colony now had four open rovers, Whinny their first enclosed rover, four long range enclosed rovers including the one the Treadwells left behind, two tractors, one general purpose bobcat, a crane, and a small four wheeled dozer.
"When do you think we'll get a Porsche or motorcycle?" Joyce teased. “Or a batmobile?”
Wanda chuckled. "Never if I have my say. Motorcycles give me hives," she shuddered.
"What's wrong?" Mario asked coming up behind her. "Nothing, just talking about the vehicles," Wanda replied turning to see him. She smiled.
"I see you two gave up on the dirigible." She nodded to the deflating craft.
Joyce glanced at the thing. "Yeah, it could only take one or two people, and was too much of a hassle to fly. We're going to stow it, maybe someday we can try it again," Joyce sighed. The dirigible was a clear case of too soon.
"Hey, it was good idea, just one before it's time," Luigi assured them. One of the biggest problems was the fear of a solar event while in flight. Well, that and a rupture.
Mario chuckled. "Yeah well, the hopper is a better idea. I wish it was a NIMF though," he growled looking over to the craft.
"NIMF? Dare I ask?" Wanda looked from one Iron to another.
"Nuclear Indigenous Martian Fueled. Think of it as a nuclear powered hopper. It sucks in air, compresses it into a tank, then uses a micro nuclear power plant to ignite it to create thrust," Luigi explained. "Bob Zubrin came up with the idea back in his Lockheed days. It is a donkey as he called it, able to live off the land and still carry crew and cargo all over the planet."
Wanda nodded. "But we couldn't get it off the drawing board. Greens had a fit. We ended up doing some horse trading with it to get the construction equipment sent," Luigi finished with a sigh.
"Ah. Well, I have to agree with them. I'm not too keen about a nuclear powered craft. One failure and we not only have contamination, we get one heck of a PR black eye," Wanda replied.
"Yeah, there was that too. But we have the plans, so maybe someday when people get their heads out of their butts...” Joyce sighed.
Mario chuckled. "Don't count on it." He shook his head.
"It's not nice to pop a woman's dreams," Joyce grumped good naturally. Luigi chuckled.
...*...*...*...*...
"Did you hear about the funding? Congress is already fighting over it. The Helium hasn't even landed and it was sold to a conglomerate of energy companies. They're even trying to buy the gas platform and Santa Maria." Benny told Luigi. Helium 3 had been added to the stock exchange. It was now more valuable than any other thing in the world.
Luigi groaned. "Yeah, I heard. Zubrin sent me an e-mail a few days ago. They appropriated the money budgeted for future flights to pay down the national dept. I hate it, but okay. Still sucks though. We busted our balls getting that thing through congress and into space, and they yank our funding when we make it pay for itself and everything else," he sighed, clearly frustrated and annoyed.
"That's politics for you," Benny sighed shaking his head.
"So are you two going back on the return flight?" Mario asked handing each of them a glass.
"No. Sue and I talked it over. We want to stay. The kids are all in college now, they don't need us. We'd like to visit them of course, especially when Mary has our first grandchild," Benny replied.
Luigi nodded. "Yeah, we can try." He shrugged. "The next flight may be the last unless Zubrin can work it with the other nations to fund us."
Mario grimaced. "Fat chance, with the tsunami, Earthquakes and war going on in Africa..." he sighed and shook his head. The Earth was turning its attention inward once more.
"Damn, I bet they will all want to come here to get away from the nonsense!" Benny laughed.
Luigi and Mario looked alarmed. "No thanks! They'll just bring their crap here! No, if they want to come okay, but leave that crap behind. We have enough to worry about," he said firmly rubbing his back. "Well, you and Sue make twenty pioneer settlers. Not bad," Luigi smiled. "I wish Bob could come out here, but I doubt his ticker could handle the lift off," he said and then grimaced. Of all the people on the Earth who deserved it, Bob, Newman, and Bruce McKenzie deserved to come. They after all had paved the way for Luigi and Mario to make it happen.
"I doubt his wife and family would let him anyway," Benny chuckled.
"Twenty one settlers, I'm staying too." Billy the kid came over and pointed his cup to the empty chair. "This seat taken?" he asked.
Mario smiled and waved to it. "It's all yours."
The young man sat. "I never in my wildest dreams really thought we would do it." He shook his head. "And yet here we are on Mars." He held up his cup. "To the pioneering spirit. Long may it thrive!" he said. The others joined in the toast.
"MARIO! LUIGI! COME HERE YOU GOTTA SEE THIS!" The boys looked up, set their cups down and ran. The others followed. They found Tess excitedly holding a pair of rocks. Wanda and the others were hopping up and down.
"What? What is it?" he demanded. Betsy grinned, hugging her husband. Wanda was teary eyed. She grabbed Mario's hand.
"Well first there's this," Wanda said. She waved to Tess who turned the rocks so they could see through the plastic. Inside was a dark shape embedded in the rock.
"Is that what I think it is?" Luigi asked excited. His eyes were round with wonder. He reached for it then clenched his fingers, afraid it would crumble if he touched it.
"Yeah. A fossil. An honest to go FOSSIL!" Tess was exuberant and almost dropped the trophy. Hastily she set it down. "We find in gully. Sadnire did. It sat in storage till we crack open." She mimed the action. Wanda nodded. The others were babbling incoherently, staring at the prize.
"Okay, so if that is the first what's the second piece of news," Mario asked looking at his wife a little dazed.
"Honey, I'm pregnant," Wanda said softly, staring at him as tears began to flow. He looked at her tear stricken face for a long heart shaking moment. Then he kissed her tears streaming down his own face. He felt his brother and sister in law pat them as he crushed his wife to his chest. She sobbed happily, mouth enveloping his.
"We get to see past life and new life, all in one day," Luigi murmured. Betsy hugged herself to his side. He stroked her hair and their sons.
"Yeah, but it's the new life that matters to me." Mario kissed his wife again and then hugged her ecstatic.
The End
· Appendixes and references:
My blog:
http://www.cyberforge3d.blogspot.com/
The following were some of the web based material I accessed and used as reference material in the writing of this book. My thanks to the makers of these sites for providing the information. Any misinterpretation or mistake is mine not theirs.
Mars:
http://www.marssociety.org/portal
http://desert.marssociety.org/
http://www.marshome.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploration_of_Mars
http://www.google.com/mars/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_Mars
http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,153186,00.html?wh=wh
http://enterpriseforum.mit.edu/network/broadcasts/200509/newman.pdf
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1245
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_for_Less
http://www.newmars.com/forums/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympus_Mons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Zubrin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraforming_of_Mars
http://ares.jsc.nasa.gov/HumanExplore/Exploration/EXLibrary/docs/MarsRef/addendum/A3.htm
Space in general:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TOPAZ_nuclear_reactor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variable_specific_impulse_magnetoplasma_rocket
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigelow_Aerospace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energia
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/enginelist.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_X-38
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-stage-to-orbit
Making things:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Situ_Resource_Utilization
http://www.reprap.org/wiki/WebHome
http://www.thingiverse.com/
Misc:
http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=A00394
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/43650/title/Sun_entering_weakest_cycle_since_1928
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilapia
http://www.aquaculture.co.il/Technology/Tilapia_Shrimp.html
Recommended reading:
The Mars series by Kim Stanley Robinson (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars)
Jack Williamson's Beachhead
John Varley's Thunder series (Red Thunder, Red Lightening)
Dr Zubrin's books:
First Landing
The Case for Mars
Entering Space
On Mars 1
On Mars 2
How to live on Mars
Mining the Sky by John S. Lewis
Welcome to Moonbase by Ben Bova
All rights are reserved by their respective authors. Thank you for the inspiration
First Steps (Founding of the Federation) Page 41
