The Solar Sea (15 page)

"It looks more like an asteroid than a moon."

"They think it was an asteroid, at one time. It got too close and Mars captured it.” As he spoke, Lisa leaned in close. Surrendering to fate, he kissed her by the light of the silvery moon.

The night before the landing, Myra found it virtually impossible to sleep. She tossed and turned until about two in the morning. She woke up, frantic, afraid she'd overslept only to discover it was just a little before three. With a deep breath, she lay down and tried not to count the minutes until her six o'clock wake-up time. Somewhere before morning, she finally did drift off to sleep.

When her alarm rang, Myra was surprised how rested she felt given that she'd had so little sleep. She threw back the blankets, padded to the shower, got dressed, and went to the galley to meet the rest of the landing party.

She found Dr. Nagamine already in the kitchen, drinking coffee and making notes in a journal. She filled a cup and joined him. Soon after, the others arrived. Jefferson's veneer of professional calm barely concealed sheer joy. Neb O'Connell and Lisa Henry looked like star-struck teenagers about to embark on the greatest adventures of their lives. Vanda Berko plodded into the kitchen, looked around and said, “Where the hell is MacDonald with our chow?"

Angus MacDonald showed up a few minutes later and assembled a large breakfast of eggs, potatoes, sausage, fruit, toast, and juice.

"I don't know if I could eat all that,” said Myra, aghast at the size of the breakfast that was laid before her.

"I want us to have a large breakfast,” said Jefferson. “It's going to be a busy day."

"Won't do me any good if I lose it on the way down,” complained Myra.

"I have some motion sickness pills.” Lisa patted a pocket on the arm of her coveralls.

After eating, the team of six made their way to the launch bay that contained the Mars lander. The sleek craft was painted metallic red. The name
Ares III
had been stenciled on the side. After suiting up in their survival gear, Jefferson opened the hatch and the crew boarded the shuttle. Once again, the captain found himself sitting next to Dr. Nagamine.

"Jefferson to command and control,” called the captain. “Requesting permission to launch this bird."

"Stand by,” came the voice of Natalie Freeman. “We're opening the bay doors and Pilot is setting up the counterthrust maneuvers."

The shuttle bay door opened in front of them, revealing the red planet ahead. Once the door was fully open, Freeman's voice came over the intercom again. “
Ares III,
you're clear to launch."

Captain Jefferson carefully pulled the joystick back and applied thrust, taking the small shuttle-lander out of the bay. He maneuvered slowly away from the ship, both getting the feel of the controls after six months away from them and making sure they didn't collide with the ship. Once fully clear, he called C-and-C. “We're heading down."

"See you in eighteen hours,” said Freeman.

Dr. Nagamine shook his head. “It's so different from the Earth, so lifeless."

"I think it's like coming home.” Jefferson grinned broadly. He pushed the joystick forward and began the descent to the surface. Crossing the terminator to the night side of the planet, he gently brought the shuttle into the atmosphere. Even so, the tiny ship rocked and bounced violently and the stars outside the window vanished, replaced by a raging inferno. Myra nearly did get sick, but a pill from Lisa helped calm her stomach.

Jefferson took the lander down over Utopia Planitia, a great plain in the Northern Martian hemisphere. Traveling eastward, the shuttle crossed from night to day and the sky turned a dull red around them. Below, they could see miles and miles of rust-red sand. There were few mountains, and individual rocks were still too far away to be distinguished. Lisa caught sight of the sun looking far too small on the horizon.

"That's where the
Viking 2
Lander touched down one hundred years ago,” explained Dr. Nagamine pointing toward the ground.

As the sky brightened from a dull red to a soft pink, Jefferson continued to lower the shuttle's altitude as they crossed over the Amazonis Planitia. They were able to make out more surface details.

"Except for the color, it almost looks like White Sands National Monument, back in New Mexico,” said Neb O'Connell.

Myra grinned. “If there were some cactus, it might even look like Arizona."

"Like I said.” Nagamine snorted. “Lifeless.” Then he turned in his chair and faced the others, a broad grin forming. “But that's the mystery, isn't it? Why does Earth have life but this planet is barren?” He reached into the equipment rack, pulled out a camera, and took snapshots of the surface below.

The land rose beneath the shuttle as though it were coming up to meet them. The slope was so gentle that Vanda Berko first thought they were coming in for a landing. However, she noticed Jefferson was pulling back on the stick, causing the shuttle to lift slightly. At the same time, he slowed the thrusters. Low over the ground by this time, they came to a place where the land just dropped away. Below, a few gauzy white clouds barely concealed land that looked like great waves frozen in time. As they continued on, Neb noticed the waves of rock formed concentric circles that were miles in diameter. It was as though someone had thrown a rock into the middle of a still pond and it had frozen instantly, preserving the ripples for eternity.

At last, the shuttle came to another wall of rock. Flying beyond it, Jefferson sought a place to land. He found a smooth area and set the shuttle down. As soon as he killed the engines, he turned around and smiled. “Welcome to Mars, my friends, make sure your suit heaters are on. It's brisk out there, even for Mars, only forty below zero.” With that, he unbuckled his harness, retrieved his helmet, latched it, and made sure the oxygen and heating units functioned properly. He watched as the others did the same.

Once he was sure they were ready, Jefferson opened the hatch and stepped down the stairs toward the Martian surface. He stopped on the last step, his right foot hovering a few inches from the Martian soil. “I feel like I should say something momentous.” He thought for a moment, then looked at the others. “Because it's there.” With that, Jonathan Jefferson stepped down onto the Martian surface.

The others followed him down the stairs.

"Because it's where?” asked Myra. “I know we talked about Sir Edmund Hillary and how different Olympus Mons would be from Everest, but I still thought it would be more ... well ... dramatic."

Dr. Nagamine took Myra's gauntleted hand and helped her balance as she stepped onto the soft red soil. She looked into his helmet and saw he was beaming. “I've dreamed of coming here since I was a boy. I even designed a space probe to come here, but could never get it funded. They said the landing system was too complicated."

Myra looked out over the terrain that gently sloped upward toward the cliff they had flown over. Turning around to face the other side of the shuttle, she saw the land gently sloped away. “Why? I see now how gentle the slope is. It doesn't seem like it would be difficult to land a probe here. The captain made it look easy."

"The landing is much easier for a human pilot who can adjust for variables than it would be for a robotic probe.” Nagamine pointed downhill. “Slight as the incline is if a probe tumbled on landing, it could keep going for some distance, causing much damage.” He led Myra uphill, toward the top of the cliff. “And there are other hazards.... “Together they looked over the cliff and saw the great concentric circles of jagged rock below them. “Landing down there would be a problem."

"Welcome to Mount Olympus,” said Jefferson as he joined them.

Myra looked first one direction, then the other, following the cliff with her gaze as far as she was able. She could tell it gently curved around, as though it might form a great circle. She looked across the way and tried to see the first cliff they passed, but it was too far away. “Is this really a caldera? I've never seen anything like it!"

"Yes,” said Nagamine. “All of that down there used to be molten lava.” He pointed to the giant pond ripple frozen in time.

"We're at 69,844 feet above the surface of Mars,” said Jefferson. “What I wouldn't give to actually have time to climb this mountain."

Myra turned and walked a short distance back toward the shuttle. She looked at the gentle downslope beyond. “Well, it doesn't look like it would be a very rigorous climb. Just a long walk."

"A long walk, indeed.” Dr. Nagamine followed her gaze. “From here to the base of the mountain would be like walking from Dallas, Texas to New Orleans, Louisiana."

Neb O'Connell and Lisa Henry walked along the edge of the caldera. Both of them took photographs and measured the atmosphere. Sunlight glinted off something small, embedded in the ground. Neb stopped short. His eyes narrowed and he stepped over to it. “Give me a hand."

Lisa held out her hand, helping Neb bend low. He dug something out of the sand and stood up, showing it to Lisa. It was a polished, silver disk, about the size of a half-dollar.

"Is that writing?” asked Lisa.

Neb held the disk up and examined it carefully. “I believe it may be, but it's not any language I recognize.” He toggled his suit radio, so he broadcast to the entire landing party. “I think we might have found something."

The two walked back toward the landing site. Dr. Nagamine had collected rock samples to take back for examination. Vanda helped Myra set up a small telescope to take photos down in the caldera. Jefferson walked along the caldera's rim, in the opposite direction of Neb and Lisa, but started back as soon as he heard the broadcast message.

The entire group had converged around Neb and his find when Jefferson returned. Myra looked up at him. “Did either of the
Ares
missions ever come up here to Olympus Mons?"

"No, we landed in the south,” explained Jefferson, “near the lowest point on Mars, in Hellas Planitia.
Ares I
landed over in Chryse Planitia, between the
Viking I
and
Mars Pathfinder
sites. They actually found the remains of
Viking
."

Myra passed the metal disk to Jefferson. “Any idea what this could be? We've certainly been sending enough junk up here to Mars. Do you suppose this came from a probe?"

Jefferson took the disk and flipped it over a couple of times. “It looks like a token or a coin, nothing really practical to be on a probe. Certainly nothing I recognize from an American probe.” He handed the disk to Vanda Berko. “Does this look Russian or Soviet to you?"

Vanda—who had grown up and went to university in Russia before immigrating to the United States to work for Quinn Corp—took a closer look at the disk. She shook her head. “The writing's not Cyrillic or any other Eastern alphabet that I'm aware of. Doesn't even look like any runes I've seen.” She passed the disk back to Myra.

"What do you think?” asked Jefferson looking at Myra. “Was that created by intelligent life?"

"I think so,” she said. “The bigger question is whether the intelligent life that made this came from Earth or someplace else.” She looked at Lisa. “Where did you find this?"

Lisa and Neb led the rest of the landing party to the place where they had found the disk. Myra took a photograph of the area, then knelt down and examined it. After a moment, she carefully dug into the rust-colored soil. Finally, she shook her head. “I don't think there are any others."

Vanda Berko looked around. “I don't see any signs that a craft has been here,” she said. “At least not in the recent past."

"Well, the weather up here can be rather rough at times,” commented Jefferson off-handedly.

"I think it may get rough here sooner than we'd like,” said Dr. Nagamine, looking out across the caldera.

Dark storm clouds had built up in the northwest. Ahead of the clouds, red dust billowed from the ground, kicked up by high winds. A bolt of lightning crackled.

Jefferson looked at the watch mounted in his gauntlet. “We need to get moving soon, anyway. I think we'll have to solve the mystery of that coin when we get back to the ship. Let's gather up the gear and get back aboard the shuttle. If we lift within fifteen minutes, we'll still have time for a little more sightseeing."

Myra quickly stashed the coin in one of the pockets of her suit, then followed the others back to the shuttle. As they gathered their gear, the wind blew, lifting the fine red dust from the ground, making it difficult to see. Once everything was aboard, Jefferson ascended the steps. He nearly toppled over as a gust of wind lifted one side of the shuttle off the ground.

The storm was moving dangerously fast. Inside the shuttle, he fell into his chair. Without removing his helmet, he started the launch sequence and buckled his harness. With just a quick check to make sure the others were ready, he fired the thrusters and lifted the shuttle, fighting the joystick to keep the ship steady in the turbulent air ahead of the storm. The crew of the shuttle was jostled violently from side to side. Neb cried out when his head struck the window. Vanda did a quick check to make sure he was fine, then checked the window.

Jefferson turned the shuttle, so they were flying southeast, away from the storm. After a few minutes, the air settled down and flight smoothed out. The ground below the shuttle fell away as they left Olympus Mons behind. Continuing on their course, two mountains, almost as impressive as the one they just left, rose on either side. “That would be Pavonis to the south,” said Dr. Nagamine. “And that would be Ascraeus to the north."

The shuttle continued over the plains for a few minutes more. Jefferson lowered the shuttle's altitude, so it was only about a thousand feet above the ground, then slowed the shuttle. Without warning, the ground fell away. Jefferson turned the shuttle to follow the cliff they just passed over. Without thinking about it, Myra unbuckled her harness and stood up, peering out of the shuttle's window. “I think I see another cliff, way over there.” She pointed. Then she looked down as best she could. “Where are we? I think I may see a bottom down there."