First Steps (Founding of the Federation) (48 page)

"The
shuttle or SSTO as we call it is designed to carry six people down at
a time, and two up with replacement fuel and supplies. So we can move
people down with new cargo, and the Mars colony can resupply and
refuel the Hudson at the same time." He smiled. "We're
getting to Mars much faster than we did in the first few launches, we
should be getting there in fifty days, instead of the usual one
eighty. But we can use the plasma ferries to go to Mars any time we
want it just takes longer for opposition transits." Betsy
frowned. He caught her look and subtle head shake. "Okay, I know
I am getting a little technical, sorry for that. I hope it answers
your question." He smiled.

"Hopefully
you and many of your friends will get a chance to ride in one of
these craft in the future." He nodded to Betsy who cut the feed.

"Well,
that went well," Bruce Treadwell commented from his perch above
Luigi.

Luigi
chuckled. "Yeah." He caught a drink bulb floating nearby
and took a sip from the straw.

"You
didn't mention the micro gravity or that the superconductors protect
us from radiation," Bruce reminded him with a smile.

Luigi
chuckled. "A little at a time. The whole ferry is a bit much for
people to take in."

He
watched as Mary floated in, over corrected, and Bruce caught her.
"Just the way it should be," Bruce murmured as he held her.
“An angel,” he teased.

She
blushed. "I'll never get over this, I feel like a chipmunk,"
she replied. Luigi chuckled.

"You’re
the cutest chipmunk of the crew," Bruce murmured.

"Oh
you’re just saying that," she gurgled with laughter.

"Yeah,
but I know you like it," he teased.

She
nodded with another laugh then turned to Luigi. "So next is the
SSTO?"

He
nodded. "Yeah." He nodded to Betsy as he hit the play
button. Betsy started filming as a young mocha colored girl with a
corn crow hairdo started to burble about the shuttle.

"She
looks Jamaican! Remember when I had my hair done like that in the
islands?" Mary gasped. Bruce shushed her.

Luigi
chuckled. "Hello Mocumba, my name is Luigi Irons. I am going to
introduce you to Australian Lieutenant Commander Brian Dagle; he is
our chief pilot and will be flying the SSTO down to the Mars colony."
Luigi waved to a young brunette with a crew cut.

The
young man floated into the field of view of the camera. "Hello
Mocumba, my name is Brian. I am pleased to meet you and the other
mates watching this. Now, we're going to explore the SSTO."

From
out of the camera view an SSTO model came floating into the shot in
front of Brian like a paper airplane. He caught it with a grin.
"Okay, this is a model of the SSTO. Notice it has a triangular
shape and looks like the Space shuttle. The design may look familiar
to some of you; it is a redesign of the X-33 Venture star SSTO. It
has these two rudders on the back to steer it left and right."

He
pointed. "And these two winglets on the sides to give it
additional lift and to allow us to control the craft in atmosphere."
He pantomimed coming in at an angle. "Now unlike the old Space
Shuttle and the Venture star project, this craft doesn't have an
exterior cargo bay. It has a cargo hold that is linked to the
airlocks here, and here." He pointed out the docking ports on
the top and side.

"The
one on the top is so the craft can dock with the station; the one on
the side is so we can get in and out on the ground." He smiled
as he spun the craft around so its rear faced the camera. "Now
this is the engine. It is a linear aero spike engine. It uses a lot
less fuel and parts then the old bell engines we have been using for
the past sixty odd years."

He
smiled. "In space the thrust comes straight out. But in
atmosphere the pressure wave formed by the craft pushes the thrust
down against this ceramic coated curved deck here. That makes it much
more efficient." He smiled. "Now, the Venture Star and
space shuttle were designed to land like a plane, but take off like a
rocket. We're going to do things a bit differently. This craft is
going to land like a plane, but it will take off like a British STOL
craft. That means we're going to go off a ski jump."

Luigi
used the remote to key in the CGI sequence. It played out on a split
screen. "Now, like a rocket plane or normal jet, we'll taxi and
start to take off, but when we get to the end of the runway we will
go up this ski jump and then throttle up to max power. That will
allow us to get into orbit." Brian smiled politely. He wasn't
sure how much of this the kids could absorb.

"We
can take six people and cargo down with us, and two up with fuel and
supplies. The SSTO has already been stocked with cargo for its flight
out here, so all we have to do is climb aboard. Once we get down, we
will unload and refuel her, check her over then fly her back up to
the station for the next load of people and gear." Brian nodded
to Luigi. "I believe Luigi stole some of my thunder by
explaining how each time we come back up, we will bring back fuel and
supplies for the return journey back to Earth." Luigi smiled.
"It will take about twelve round trips to get the Hudson fully
restocked with fuel, food, parts, and air,” Brian said.

"The
people on Mars have been building the space port, with the ramp for
us. They finished it a few days ago, and they are now working on
making giant storage cylinders so we can store fuel." Brian spun
the SSTO model so it turned wing over wing slowly. "If you want
to know more about that, ask your teacher to contact the colony
through mission control."

Brian
waved. "Thanks for listening and have a good day in school."
Betsy cut the feed. "That was easy." Brian chuckled. "I'm
glad we rehearsed it before though." He pulled out a drinking
bulb and took a sip. "All that talking makes me thirsty. Who's
next?" he asked as he looked around.

"I
believe we have some questions on eating and drinking in space, and a
question on going to the bathroom in space. Any volunteers?"
Luigi asked looking up from his tablet. Betsy chuckled as no one
answered.

"Insert
cricket sound here," she said snickering. That got a laugh.

...*...*...*...*...

Wanda
hefted the camera up to shoulder level and smiled at Mario. "Are
you ready for you close up Mister Deevil?"

He
chuckled. "Right. Let's get this over with." He sat on the
corner of the counter and nodded as she turned the camera on and
pointed it. "Good morning from Mars. My name for those of you
who don't know, is Mario Irons. Today we're answering a question from
Molly Greenwood of Temecula California who writes; Dear Mario, how do
you make things on Mars?"

Mario
looked up from the tablet and smiled. "I'm glad you asked that
question Molly." He waved to the vault. "Right now we're
inside the vault; we'll get to that in a minute. Many of the things
we use and live in, the Habs, vehicles, and equipment, were made by
men and women on Earth in factories. They were paid to make the
equipment we use to keep us alive." He smiled. "Now, we
also have equipment that lets us make things as well." Mario
moved aside to expose his Reprap. "This is a generation six
Reprap. It makes things with plastic like this." Mario held up a
plastic vase. "Or this." He put the vase down and picked up
a plastic spoon. "Or many of the things you see on this table."
He waved his hand over it. Wanda panned over the table, then back to
Mario.

"We
can make a lot of plastic things with this machine. We also have a
brick maker that makes bricks." He smiled. "We've used the
bricks to make this vault, and other things too." He tapped the
counter, and then tapped the walls. "When we brought the
equipment to make the plastic, we made this resin to seal the
bricks." He tapped the translucent resin on the wall. "We
can now make more things like ceramics." He went over to the
coffee machine and poured himself a cup of coffee. He saluted the
camera with the mug and then took a sip.

"This
coffee machine and the coffee cup were made entirely here on Mars.
Well, with the exception of some of the electronics." He
chuckled. "Right now we can't make electronics, or really
sophisticated things. That is still on your end." He nodded to
the camera. "We can work with small amounts of metal and glass
too." He took another sip of coffee, then set the mug down and
picked up a block of glass.

"This
is a glass brick, used in making things here. We can make shower
stalls which are walls of glass." He smiled. "We're looking
forward to this; we can now make windows in the vaults so we can let
in more light." Wanda held up a hand counting down. "Right,
now that concludes this chapter of ask Mario. Catch Wanda later today
when she gives you a tour of the greenhouse. Have a good day in
school." Mario waved. Wanda shut the camera down and grinned.
"How'd I do?" he asked.

"Not
bad. No way you'll get an Emmy, but not bad," she smiled. He
chuckled.

...*...*...*...*...

Wanda
sniffed at a flower then looked up. Mario was pleased that he got the
shot, tightening in on the flower, then out to see his lovely wife
sniffing it. "Welcome to the greenhouse," Wanda smiled.
"Well actually, this is one of six we now have. This is our
first greenhouse, and is a bit old and worn." She waved to the
plastic.

"As
you can see, the dust from outside has sandblasted the outside of the
plastic until it is barely translucent. We will eventually have to
abandon this and the other greenhouses because of this. The
sandblasting will eventually weaken the plastic until it ruptures
like an over ripe watermelon." She smiled as she used her hand
to mime an explosion. "But hopefully that won’t happen for
another year so we can harvest these beauties then recycle the
equipment." She waved to the pots. "Here we have
strawberries. On the left is the dwarf wheat and corn." Mario
panned the camera to cover each plant species, and then back to his
wife.

"The
other greenhouses grow other foods; we have one dedicated to
vegetables. We even have fruit trees growing in the gallery atrium,"
she said and then smiled. "Part of our problem with our plants
is that everything has to be pollinated by hand. Unfortunately we
don't have bees or other pollinators to do the work so it has to be
done by hand. Let me show you how we do that."

She
held up a plastic rod. "On the tip of this is pollen from
another plant. We dip it in a little bag of pollen we have, and then
touch the stamen of each flower blossom. Hopefully the pollen will
stick and we will have germination." She smiled. "Now, I
happen to be a geologist that means a rock expert, so I am not fully
up to speed on plants. Check with your teacher or the Internet for
more information," she said and then smiled again.

"My
husband Mario is working on brick atrium greenhouses where we may be
able to release insects to help us pollinate and care for the
plants."

Mario
swiveled the camera around to face himself. "It's a work in
progress folks, and it is going to take a while. The underground
designs use
way
too much power." He smiled then swiveled
the camera back to his wife who sighed.

"Okay,
moving on, let's go check out the hydroponics section. We have an
entire greenhouse producing things in water! Above the hydroponics is
Aeroponics, which has the plant growing in air! No soil, no water,
nothing!" She grinned. "Come on, follow me." She moved
out the lock and down the corridor. Mario followed.

Base expansion:

"There
she is, right on queue." Joyce looked up at the bright light in
the sky.

"Nice.
Looks like it will land about a click away." Mario nodded. The
dust was almost gone, but it left a slight haze in the upper
atmosphere. Interestingly the temperature had gone down for the first
year, before it had started to warm up.

According
to the read outs it was four degrees C above normal. Even though he
hated to admit it, perhaps his brother had done the right thing. Not
that he intended to tell him that until after he was done throttling
his scrawny neck he thought. He chuckled silently to himself and
looked up, shielding his visor with his hand. "What am I doing?"
He used his free hand to lower his sun visor. "Better." He
watched as the lander came down.

"Come
on baby, don't fail me now," Joyce murmured.

"As
long as half the cargo is intact, I am happy," Mario murmured.
It was much nicer going outside to watch a landing. Screw Mission
control. He just wished he had a lawn chair and a decent beer right
about now. One cargo lander down, one to go, then the SSTO.

"I'm
greedy, I want it all," Joyce returned, eyes locked on the
distant ship.

He
chuckled. "You just want the building materials so we can finish
the vaults."

She
smiled. "To right I do."

 ...*...*...*...*...

"We've
cleared you a landing site little bro, going to be interesting
landing there though." Mario watched the link.

"It
is nice to not have such a long time lag." Luigi responded a
moment later.

Mario
chuckled. "Yeah. See you tomorrow." He cut the feed. "So
we're all ready?" He looked over to Wanda and Joyce.

"Yeah,
I can't wait to get my hands on that bird. Much better than trying to
fly a tuna can." She smiled happily.

Mario
chuckled. "Well, if it makes you happy..."

...*...*...*...*...

The
SSTO flared out and came in nose high. "Don't bang up, please
don't bang up," Mario prayed. This was one craft they seriously
needed in one piece. They were going to have to baby this bird for
decades. The rear wheels touched the ground with a puff of dust. The
nose came down and puffed as it touched the duracrete. "We have
touchdown. Just roll it out, you’ve got the room," Mario
called triumphantly over the comm.