No Way

21

[Transcript of briefing given by NASA press secretary, Houston TX 3/5/2049 21:00CT]

Lucy finally gave the order to abandon the outpost just before sunset. The wind, as insubstantial as it was, was throwing material against the taut skin of the hab and making it thrum like a bass. The sound resonated in their guts, to the point where some of the astronauts started complaining of nausea.

Fan examined those affected, but there was nothing he could do to stop the noise. That it was also stupidly hot inside didn’t help either. That was very much against Frank’s expectations, as he thought they’d be freezing their asses off as nightfall approached. Yun explained that the dust transferred energy in the form of heat when it hit the hab walls: the more dust, the more heat.

Those weren’t the only two factors persuading Lucy down. Even though they’d parked the buggies on the sheltered side, they’d still taken the brunt of six hours in a storm. If grit was going to get into the wheel hubs, or the controls, or abrade cables and weaken joints, today was going to be the day.

There was the lack of air, water, sanitation, and food too. The situation was impossible. She hung on for as long as she could, then pulled them out.

The floor of the hab was red with dust from where it had fallen off their suits. They knocked more off climbing back into them: it would all need cleaning out before it could function as a scientific station again.

Lucy instructed them all to swap out their life supports for fresh ones for the descent. Just in case they had to walk some of the way. It was sensible, but it also underlined the state they’d let themselves get into. They shouldn’t have been there. If it hadn’t been for Jim, they wouldn’t have been.

“Lance? You know the way better than the rest of us. Take us back.”

Last in, first out. Frank hugged his old life support pack and walked into the airlock. Someone came in behind him, and Frank nudged the cycle button with his elbow. The pump chugged. Slowly. The batteries were low, but everyone behind him knew how to vent the locks manually.

It was like walking out into a… back when he was a kid, someone had had an old-style TV, that worked on broadcast, not digital. The cable had come out of the box, and the screen had filled with static, a moving, hissing storm of black and white. That, only in black and red. Just the other side of his faceplate.

He put his pack down before even leaving the confines of the airlock and dialed up his lights to maximum, then edged out onto the platform. He could see the edges of things. They came and went.

“This is bad,” he said. “Stay together.”

He turned round and pushed his helmet against that of the astronaut behind him. Isla. She looked absolutely fucking terrified. Maybe he did too. He nodded to her and repeated his warning. She nodded back.

He faced front and worked his way down the steps, remembering to turn right at the bottom, and around to the lee side of the hab. Visibility was marginally better: he could actually see the shapes of the front of the buggies. He went around the other side, and stood in the shelter of the wheel.

“I’ll climb up. Pass me the packs when I’m there.”

He dropped his again and went hand over hand back into the red static. It was evil stuff. He wiped his faceplate, turning his back to the storm, and took the proffered life support packs, ratcheting them down with straps.

A third was handed up, and he was traveling with Fan again. He fixed the last pack in place, and swept the driver’s seat as clear as he could of debris before sitting in it.

The control screen was all but invisible. He wiped the dust to one side, and pushed at the on switch.

A heart-stopping moment when nothing happened, then: lights. The old girl really didn’t like the weather, and neither did he.

The last pair of suits went by, on their way to the second buggy. He checked the watts left in the fuel cell, ran the calculations in his head, and decided it was going to be enough. Just. But if it was as bad at the bottom of the mountain as it was at the top, then they weren’t going to be recharging them any time soon.

The chassis rocked and settled as he gained passengers, and there was a moment when they were all ready, just sitting in the humming, spitting darkness, waiting for someone to say something.

“Lucy?”

“Copy that. Roll out.”

Frank turned the front lights to the max, and eased away. The full—it was wrong to call it force—effect of the storm enveloped him. The lights, normally bright enough to turn night into day, seemed to get no further than just in front of him, and precious little reached the ground. Did he know the way to the Santa Clara? Everything familiar had been obliterated. He could get them close. That would have to do.

So: round in front of the hab, turn north-west. Travel for fifteen hundred yards, and hope.

He set the counter, brought up the virtual compass, and crawled forward. The counter ticked over, the numbers becoming indistinct. He dragged his fingers across his faceplate. And again. He ran across the rims of craters he couldn’t see and would normally avoid. The suspension in the wheels responded sluggishly, adding vibrations to the slow lurching of the frame.

Fifteen hundred and two. He stopped, staring out into the ever-shifting wall of red. He couldn’t focus on it. He couldn’t focus through it.

“Hold up,” he said. “I need to find the entrance.” He unbuckled himself and pulled himself upright. “One of you needs to drive.”

Isla spoke. “I’ll do it.”

Frank climbed down, and, with one hand on the side, walked to the back.

“OK. Release the winch. Run it free.”

He pulled on the cable, then fed it behind first the back wheel, then the front wheel, so that it went directly under the buggy, to the front. He looped it around the frame. Then he fixed the heavy hitch to his waist belt and started walking.

One hundred and fifty feet, minus the fifteen for the length of the chassis. He’d gone thirty when he shuffled round, and he could just about see the pale circles of the headlights. He walked on until the cable went taut behind him.

“Isla? Dead slow. Follow the wire.”

“Copy that.”

The cable went slack, and Frank advanced ahead of it. His suit lights were almost useless. They illuminated the dust, not what was beyond it. He was going by feel. In a spacesuit. What the hell was he doing? It had gone from guesswork to blind chance. The valley was somewhere. And the only way he was going to find it was if he blundered into it.

“Isla? Hold up.”

“Roger.”

He took up the slack again, then swung right on the end of it. Nothing but the usual variation in the ground. He swung left, and in a couple of steps found himself stumbling and trying to keep his feet. With no horizon, he slipped, and fell on his knees. He must have made a sound, because Isla was immediately in his ears.

“Lance? Report. Lance?”

“I’m OK. Give me a second.”

He pushed himself upright. Was this it? It was impossible to tell. It could just be a deeper crater, but there weren’t really any near the top of the valley. Unless he was completely off course. He crabbed on the end of the cable. Definitely downhill in that direction.

“Isla? I want you to go forward again, and give it twenty degrees to the left. Go ten yards, then stop.”

“Copy.”

His waist belt relaxed, and he pulled in the excess wire, looping it over his arm. He walked forward, and the dust-load seemed to lessen. It was more blowing over him, not around him. There was a rise ahead and behind him, but not to his left, and, crucially, not to his right either, and that seemed to be lower. He paid out more cable, and suddenly, yes: there were fading, multiple tire tracks right under his feet. He’d found the Santa Clara. Goddammit, if anything deserved cracking open a cold one, it was this, and the base was dry. He’d have to make do with a cup of lukewarm coffee instead.

“OK. We’re good. Forward one twenty, and watch for the lip.”

He unclipped the hitch, but kept hold of it in his hands, then retreated to the far side of the valley. It wouldn’t be irony to get run over by the buggy, but sheer stupidity—on his part. After what seemed an age, the moons of the buggy lights waxed over the edge of the river bank.

“Isla? Hold it.”

She braked abruptly.

“Reel in the winch, and when you’ve done that, turn your wheels maybe thirty degrees to the right. The drop is right in front of you.”

“I can’t see you.”

“It doesn’t matter. Dead slow. Fan, put some weight on the back axle.”

There was a pause, and the buggy nudged forward in a series of stutters, until the front wheels started to crumble the brittle edge of the slope.

“Forward. You’ve hit it straight on. Just let it go.”

She did. She took the brakes off and the buggy rolled into the valley bottom. She steered to the right, presumably having spotted Frank’s suit lights in the clearer air.

The second buggy appeared, and he guided it down. Lucy was a pilot. She was good at this, better than probably even Frank, and she even had the wisdom to know when she wasn’t at the top of her game. Which was more than Marcy had ever done.

They were all there. All six of them, when it should have been seven. He climbed back onto the first buggy, and threaded his legs through the lattice behind the driver’s seat, and next to Fan.

“Don’t you want to drive?”

Truth be told, that would have been fine. He could have swapped places with Isla, and driven them all home. But walking through that red-black haze had scrambled something inside. He could see it when he closed his eyes as if it had got into his head, moving, always moving. The valley protected them from the worst that was happening bare feet above their heads, so that it was merely as bad as a smoke-choked room, rather than a living, breathing swarm of dust.

She’d be safe. It would give him a moment. A pause. He was going to rely on her, rather than think there was no one else to do it.

“Lance?”

“If you’re up to it, then I’d appreciate the lift home.”

“Roger that,” she said.

In the clearer air, where the headlights actually had an impact, they could go more quickly. Even as the valley broadened, the walls got higher, and it seemed to make some difference to be heading north, moving out of the storm. By the time they broached the throat of the valley and spilled out onto the Heights, the worst—the very worst—was behind and above them.

It didn’t mean that there wasn’t a ton of crap falling on the base. The sky-turned satellite dish was an immediate worry, and Yun hurried inside to turn it and face it away from the main direction of the wind. Sand and dust had drifted everywhere, forming ripples and dunes that squeaked underfoot like new snow.

Frank went to inspect the solar panels. Since they’d not been able to detect the sun, they hadn’t turned, but at least they weren’t horizontal, so hadn’t accumulated a vast load. He spent ten minutes pushing the worst of the dust off the black glass surfaces with the square of parachute canopy that was usually kept tied to the frame, but he didn’t think they’d be picking up much sun tomorrow. Or maybe even the day after.

“Lance?”

He kept wiping. “Lucy?”

“I’m right behind you.”

He stopped and turned.

“Come on in. We’re done for the day.”

“I’ve still got a checklist I need to work through.”

“Lance. I’m not losing someone else. I want you to come in.”

“You didn’t lose Jim, and no one blames you for that.” And Jim may still be alive. But Frank didn’t say that because he didn’t know one way or the other. He didn’t even know if it was possible.

“All the same, he’s gone.” The haze, the rain of dust and sand, thickened between them, then faded away again. “I know I can’t make you. But I need to know that everyone is safe inside, and that they’re not going out again until morning. Sunset was an hour ago, and it’s still above freezing out here. We’re going to be fine tonight.”

“We’re going to have to start turning shit off, and sooner rather than later. You know that, right?”

“Yun and Fan have already started. You’re not on your own any more, Lance. You can just come on in.”

She was right. It had been a hell of a day. He was beat. And the dust. The goddamn dust.

“Sure. Why not? We can check everything in the morning, right?”

“Of course we can.”

He tied the parachute nylon back onto the frame and trooped after her, past the familiar shadows of the end of the med lab, and Command/Control, to the cross-hab airlock. They climbed the steps, and suddenly she was hitting him, slapping him all over.

“Hey. Hey! What you doing?”

“Getting the worst of the dust off before we go inside.” She looked at him quizzically, at his raised arms and his defensive stance. “Did you think I was—You did. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She put her hands up and backed away from him, as far as she could go on the narrow platform. He looked at his own hands, his gauntlets curled into fists, his shoulder pulling back and getting ready to punch through.

He had no idea of what to do or say. There was nothing that could convince her that she hadn’t seen what she so clearly had.

“Just. Just unexpected. You surprised me.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again. “I ought to have said something first. Asked permission.”

He hadn’t actually struck her. That was some measure of how tired, how utterly confused he was. At any other time, he would have instinctively pushed her away, hard, and then followed through with whatever came to hand.

“It’s. It’s OK. Yes. Some warning.” He steadied himself. “OK. You can do it now.”

She—initially wary—finished beating the dust away from his soft fabric coverings, then presented herself for reciprocal treatment. They’d learned this in training. Standard Operating Procedure. It was normal for them in high-dust situations. No one meant anything by it, it was just a way of extending the life of the suits, and keeping dirt out of the base.

They cycled in the airlock together, and racked their life support along with the others. Frank hung up his suit on the hanger, and picked up his overalls.

Everyone else seemed to have dispersed, doing chores, turning off equipment, checking systems. Some of those things would have been Frank’s job. But they were doing it for him. Instead of him. Who was he kidding? They could run the base without him, even with a man down.

“If, if you don’t need me for anything, I’m going to grab a shower.”

“Lance? I made the wrong call. I didn’t follow the book. None of us did. The others should have pulled me up on it. You dug us out of a hole. And I’m grateful.”

She stood there, in her one-piece long johns, and she looked broken. He had nothing to offer her.

“That’s… fine,” he said. “I mean, what else am I supposed to do? This is all we’ve got, right? We’ve got to look after each other.”

She nodded. “You’re a good man, Lance Brack.”

No. No, really, he wasn’t. He wasn’t even Lance Brack.

“Sure.” He turned on his heel before a confession came to his lips.

He headed through to the crew hab and grabbed his towel, then pulled the folding door shut behind him in the shower. He rested his forehead against the cool of the partition and closed his eyes. Dust. All he could see was dust.

He hit the valves, turning the water on as hot as he dared, and stripped in the tiny cubicle before stepping into the scalding stream. Heat. Light. Water. He’d had his fill of Mars for the moment. Maybe it would be better in the morning. Maybe he was broken too. Maybe they all were.

He’d had worse days than this. After witnessing, and being a party to, all of that death, he’d somehow managed to hold it together, alone, on Mars. He was still here. He had no idea where that strength had come from, but he knew damn straight that he was now running on empty.

Thoughts of going home, seeing his son again. Thoughts of sticking it to XO. Notions of hope, or revenge, of simply getting off this rock. They’d gone. Everything gone.

The folding door to the cubicle flapped open.

“Goddammit. Give me a minute.”

It closed again, but he was suddenly aware that there was someone in there, the other side of the curtain. Then in with him, under the water, pressed against him, arms around him, head against his shoulder.

He had no idea what to do. He probably had known once. He’d unlearned it. Like so many things.

She held him tight, and slowly, slowly he allowed himself to put his own arms around her, his fingertips pressing into her wet, so very pale, skin.

How long they stood like that, he didn’t know. Just that when Isla had gone again, slipping out behind the curtain as silently as she’d slipped in, he couldn’t work out if it had been real, or just a dream.