Defying Mars (Saving Mars Series-2) (26 page)

“Guess I’ll find out,” replied Pavel.

He wandered up the set of stairs leading outside. The old woman sat just outside the entrance, chewing a pipe and blowing smoke rings to the night sky.

“Is it okay if I take a bit of a walk?” asked Pavel.

She gazed at him. “I’m to notify the Shirff if you don’t return,” was all she had to say.

Pavel nodded and strode out and away from the small streaks of light leaking from the dwellings. He raised his eyes to the heavens, searching the east-west arc of sun and planets until he found Mars. The red planet glowed a faint yellow, approaching the months when the two worlds would be farthest apart. Pavel had told himself not to hope for Jessamyn’s return when the planets drew near once again. He had repeated it often. But he hoped and ached and dreamed anyway.

He squatted, lowering himself onto the desert floor, still slightly warm, a memory of the day’s heat. Running his hands through the sand—cooler on top, warmer below—he remembered the night he’d spent at Jessamyn’s side. She would understand Yucca better than he did, fit in better. His weeks in the desert had fed a small flame inside him, a twinkling of an idea, half-glimpsed. He’d learned that another sort of community was possible. Camaraderie existed among these people who lived each day uncertain whether or not their most basic needs would be met. They needed one another. And they knew it.

It made him sad, in a way he didn’t understand. Now that he knew he might be expelled from Yucca, he admitted he’d felt more at home living here in a hole in the ground than he’d ever felt with his aunt, in her well-appointed mansion. Of all the treasures and trinkets in his aunt’s palace, Zussman’s smile was the only thing he wished he could see again, a black cup of kávé the only luxury he missed.

He stretched out along the sand, looking up. The moon had not yet risen. Overhead, the stars glimmered, small fires hung in the sky, multitudinous in this land so far from city lights. He wondered if the Marsian sky looked more like this one. Would Mars’s shallower atmosphere make the stars glow brighter? Seem nearer? He hoped so. And then he hoped Jessamyn might be looking to the faintly blue twinkle of Earth in her sky, thinking of him.

“Fool,” he murmured, rising to go to back inside.

The old woman with the pipe greeted him as he returned. “Shirff says as you can stay, boy.” With that she stood and left.

Slipping into his borrowed bed, Pavel felt almost content. He knew he should have been content. An hour ago, all he’d wanted was permission to stay. To help, in some small way, the home world of the girl with red hair. But now all he could think of was the whisper of the silk she’d worn, the warmth of her breath as his mouth found hers, the curve of her smile as she pulled away.

33

CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH

Just minutes after she’d sunk into low-oxygen-induced sleep, a loud noise blared from the ship’s system.

Not the Cratercoustics,
Jessamyn decided as she sat up.

But it was a noise she recognized. Something she’d been trained to respond to since her earliest school years. Without thinking, she smashed the share mask over her nose and mouth and pulled the suit’s cylinder pin. Oxygen began flowing and Jess realized she had a massive headache.

Which the siren wasn’t helping. The warning from the
Red Galleon
that oxygen levels had tapered below human tolerances was designed to be attention-grabbing as well as (apparently) loud enough to wake the dead.

“I get it, I get it!” she moaned.

Jess struggled into Cavanaugh’s suit, challenging because her limbs felt uncooperative. She sat, simply breathing, for a full minute before she stood to address the irritating noise.

As Jess shuffled to the bridge, ship’s wafers upon multiple surfaces flashed the deadly warning, instructing her to seek emergency oxygen immediately.

It took her several agonizing minutes to pass herself off as the ship’s commanding officer
and
first officer in order to turn the alarm off.

Only now, as she turned into the rations room, did she realize she’d missed the opportunity to dine one last time upon regular ration bars prior to suiting up. Sighing, she reached into a cupboard from which she collected one of the squashy packets that combined wet and dry ration into a single …
slimy
concoction.

When she’d been younger she’d begged her granddad for one of the special interplanetary pilot’s emergency rations. He’d mussed her hair and muttered, “
Be careful what you wish for, Jessie
.” He’d also refused her request. As she slurped the concoction down, Jess realized he’d done her a favor.

“
Vile
,” she mumbled to the empty ship.

Her vile morning rations consumed, Jessamyn made her way down to the ship’s belly, eager to investigate the escape pods in search of fuel. The pods rested upon their emergency hatch exits. She tapped the wafer embedded on the outer wall of one small craft. It informed her that the pod was functioning nominally and held a full reserve of rocket fuel.

She smiled. “Brilliant, Pilot Jaarda,” she said aloud. “Brilliant!”

Brilliance aside, she wasn’t sure how to pull fuel from the pods. She spent a frustrating two hours skimming wafer manuals. The portion of the guide devoted to fueling the pods from the ship was painstakingly detailed. It called to mind the launch and landing checklists compiled for her by MCC, which in turn reminded her that creating her own entry, descent, and landing checklist would be wise. At last, she landed upon a discussion of the procedure in question and began to move fuel into the
Galleon
’s tanks.

After the first transfer, she journeyed up to the bridge, hopeful that the fuel transfer had rid her of the “insufficient fuel” warning.

It hadn’t.

And the activity of stairs made oxygen rush to her helmet. “Just great,” she said, closing her eyes tight and slowing her breathing. “It’s not like I really
need
the suit to last a full day or anything.” She left the bridge vowing to move at a more sedate pace and to stay below-decks until all the transfers were complete.

When she came to empty the fifth pod, she paused. If she had to actually
use
the pod in an emergency, it would be easier to maneuver with working thrust rockets. Cursing Cavanaugh and his fuel-wasting tellurium, she scowled at the final pod, hands on her hips.

And then she shook her head and addressed the
Red Galleon
. “If I can’t land you safely, my beauty, what’s the point?” She gave the orders to evacuate fuel from the final pod.

Making her way back to the bridge, Jess was frustrated to see no change to the “insufficient fuel” message. A chill ran along her spine. Perhaps she shouldn’t have pulled fuel from the final pod. She thought about it for a long hard minute but decided in the end that she’d made a choice she could live with. Not giving the
Galleon
every possible chance? That was something she couldn’t live with.

She searched the ship’s database for the entry, descent, and landing plan she’d used on her first trip to Earth. She had nowhere
near
enough fuel to follow those protocols, but she planned out a few variations to a conventional landing that might just get her and her ship down safely.

She’d just completed her EDL list when the
Galleon
’s “low oxygen” warnings began to blare once more. This time hacking in as the ship’s commander didn’t seem to help. Frustrated and tired, Jessamyn tried the dubious course of reasoning aloud with her ship.

“Yes, my beauty, I understand that you are worried about the air quality right now,” she said. “But see? I’m wearing a suit. I’m good. Really.”

In what struck Jessamyn as either remarkably friendly on the
Galleon
’s part or else very eerie indeed, the alarm abruptly ceased. She waited for several minutes to see if it was really done, and decided, eyes drooping, that she could risk going to bed.

The next morning, Jessamyn woke early and simply lay curled in her sleep nest in Ethan’s room. Breathing in the oxygen-rich air of the suit, she realized she ought to make provision for making certain she would always awaken
before
and not
after
each suit’s oxygen supply ran out. A few scheduled alarms later, she made her first transfer suit-to-suit. She could use her old suit’s emergency share-mask to maintain a steady flow of clean oxygen. However, the procedure seemed clumsy and she decided to simply take off her helmet and suit, risking a minute without oxygen.

The stench of putrefying organisms was overpowering.

Next time she’d use the share mask.

Three more days passed with three more suit transfers. Smith turned out to have narrower shoulders than Jessamyn and wearing her suit made Jess feel as if someone were squeezing her shoulders all day.

Another day and another suit and at last it was day sixty-five—her touchdown day. Her EDL was ready. The blue planet hurtled toward her at a terrifying speed. Would the
Galleon
deliver her safely or become her coffin? A shiver ran through her. Then she threw her shoulders back and made her way to the ship’s helm.

Somewhere upon that planet traced with green and gold, blue and white, her brother sheltered with Pavel.

“Come on, then,” she shouted. “I’m here and I’m coming in fast!”

34

IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE

Lucca Brezhnaya did not appreciate interruptions. Or being awoken in the middle of the night. Or unwelcome news.

As Vladim, the bearer of an urgent piece of intelligence, was all too aware.

Fortunately, the Chancellor was in Mexico City at present and could not assault him over a vid-channel. At least, he’d never heard of such an assault having occurred. Also, he knew that to withhold this information would result in something much worse than whatever would result from delivering it.

“Madam Chancellor,” he said in greeting. He kept his voice soft in a way he imagined might be less offensive to one shaken from slumber by her butler. That had been fun, convincing the butler to wake the Chancellor.

“Speak up,” said Lucca. “If it’s important enough to justify waking me, I’d better be able to hear it!”

“It would appear your orders to monitor the skies for illegal traffic were well-advised,” replied Vladim.

Lucca scowled. Of course her orders were well-advised. What sort of dolt was she speaking with? “What are you telling me? Has there been a breach of the three hundred kilometer ban? Is there a ship on its way to Mars?”

“No, Madam Chancellor. It would appear a ship is coming our way
from
Mars.”

A moment’s stunned silence.

Then Lucca’s eyes flew wide. “
From
Mars?” This was impossible. Never, never,
never
, had she imagined anyone coming
from
the Martian colony. It was overwhelming news. Shocking news. It was impossible. “How many ships?”

“A single vessel only.”

That was something, at least. A ship on its own was less likely to wage war. But it could still do significant damage, she had no doubt. “What is its heading?”

“Well …” Vladim hesitated. “It is headed to Earth. We will not know
where
on Earth until the ship makes its final descent or settles into orbit.”

Lucca had already flown from her bed and was halfway dressed as she gave her orders. “I want
excessive force
flying cover over the capitol at once.” She heard the order delivered. “What is the soonest this ship could touch down based on present trajectory?”

“We have less than an hour, Madam Chancellor.”

She pulled on a pair of heeled boots. “What location would their current path indicate?” She was certain it would be Budapest. Perhaps it was fortunate her campaigning had called her away to Mexico City.

“North America, the far west, probably above the 45th parallel,” replied Vladim.

North America? That was … unexpected. That could hardly be the ship’s true destination.

“Are special ops airborne yet?” asked Lucca.

There was a brief pause, murmurs Lucca couldn’t make out.

“Yes, Madam Chancellor. They will begin flying cover patterns momentarily.”

“What do we have in the Pacific, just in case?” Lucca asked.

“There’s a regular hoverbase in Seattle,” said Vladim. “Or for special ops, there’s Pearl Harbor.”

Lucca frowned. “Ready the hovercraft, but I want special forces from Pearl Harbor as well. Excessive force. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, Madam Chancellor. Right away, Madam Chancellor.”

She heard the barked commands in the background this time.

“I want the Martian ship shot down,” she continued. “I want any Martians shot on sight. Anyone who appears to be expecting them or offering assistance, I want kept
alive
. Is that clear?”

“Aye-aye, Madam Chancellor.”

“Has the Viceroy been told of this situation?” asked Lucca.

“No, Madam Chancellor. We knew you would wish to be informed first.”

She smiled. Technically the Viceroy was her superior, but she’d always run the show. In any case, the Viceroy’s influence had been slipping, slipping, slipping of late. Time on the campaign trail had made that evident. Perhaps it was time for her to take the reins of power in
name
as well as in
fact.
She’d waited long enough, finding it more convenient to run things behind the scenes as the second
-
in-command. But perhaps it was time. Perhaps.

“This information is to be kept classified for the present,” said Lucca.

Her all-hours chauffeur was drinking kávé and watching a vid feed.

“Charles, the closest military base at once,” she called.

How could it have happened like this? Lucca had been wrong. Very wrong. She’d been so certain the activity regarding Mars had been initiated by her own citizenry. To find out Martians were coming here? It was shocking. Would they tell Earth’s citizens what they knew about irregularities in the Re-body Program? That would require an enormous media-spin on her part. But, no, Lucca decided. The Martians must have kept silent on that count thus far. Rumors would be spreading like wildfire if the colonists had divulged her secret.