Trapped - Mars Born Book One (3 page)

Chapter Three

I
clicked my light off. No point in wasting power. Without our lamps we could see very little other than a few glints on our suit helmets, and the crack of light above us. My body ached. Now that the adrenaline had died down, my arms and legs felt like stone, and each spot I had banged in the fall and numerous failed jumps screamed at me, warning of the bruises that would form.

  This would be a dumb way to die.
I thought and tried to keep my breath calm.

  In reality, probably only 20 or 30 minutes passed as we sat in the darkness, lit only by the crack we had fallen through. It felt like hours, though. I turned my face to our tiny slice of sky and closed my eyes. Geometric patterns formed and danced against my eyelids. I used to do it all the time when I was a child. It was a way to distract myself. Sometimes, very rarely I would see little sparks of light. Bryn told me they were bits of stars that exploded millions of years ago. I liked that explanation, and would “search for supernovas” every day. Eventually, it became my tool to calm myself, or deal with big emotions.

  The light disappeared. My eyes flew open. A form peered over the edge at us. Rumer!

  Thank goodness!
I clicked my radio on to thank her, but saw her tap her own helmet and shake her head. Then she signed, “The radio is still dead, dummy,” I couldn’t see her stick her tongue out, but I didn’t need to see to know, “Now let’s get you out of there!”

  I leapt to my feet, relief pouring through me.

  “Emory,” Taavi’s voice interrupted my excitement.

  I looked at him, and he gave me an apologetic wince and pointed at his ankle.

  I nodded and signed up to Rumer, “His foot is hurt.”

  “Okay, let me pull you out, then we’ll go get rope,” she crouched by the opening, placed her gloved hand on a large rock for support and reached out to me so I could grab her hand. I could probably make it, judging from my previous attempts.

  I gave Taavi the closest thing to a smile I could muster, and clicked my light back on, “We’ll be right back with help!” Then I took a step back and jumped.

  I missed.

  “Red Ares!” I cursed and got ready to try again. This time Rumer pressed herself down just a bit farther. I had to make it this time. I closed my eyes and took three deep breaths, then opened them, stepped and leapt.

  I felt her hand close around my wrist. But, in the same moment I fell backwards. Rumer and the rock she had been supporting herself on crashed after me. Instinctively, I grabbed for anything I could, but once again found myself flat on my back staring at the now salmon colored sky.

  “Rumer! Rumer, are you okay!” I shouted, before remembering her radio was broken. I scrambled to my feet, and smashed heads with her as she did the same. I fell back confused from the impact.

  She stood first and offered me a hand. I started to take it then looked up from her hand to her face. My heart stopped. There was a crack. There was crack in her faceplate. Panicked, I reached for her arm to check her gauges. The needle for pressure was dropping.

  “Your suit!”

  She pulled her arm back and squinted at the gauges. Her mouth formed a curse.

  “Help me find the leak!” she signed, there was a jerkiness to her hands.

  Oh, God. They had told us horror stories about ripped suits our whole lives. Every Mars Born had nightmares about them. And now it had happened, in a hole where no-one knew we were.
What are we going to do?

  Rumer spread her arms and stood trembling as I circled her. The suit didn’t look more damaged than Taavi’s or mine, but it had to be there. On my second pass I spotted it. There! On her arm. It was obvious once I saw it. It must have happened when she threw her arms out to stop her fall. Old Earth instincts kicking in.

  I grabbed it and squeezed as tightly as I could. Then looked back to the gauges on her other arm.

  Ares! We didn’t have long. Half an hour if we were lucky.

  Okay. Think Emory!

  Rumer looked up at the entrance above us. The crack in her faceplate caught the light,  like the line of lava that once flowed and made our prison.

  “The patch kit,” she signed, and pushed my hand out of the way to replace it with her own.

  Everything was happening too fast. I pulled out the little box from one of her suit’s pockets and clicked it open. Shit, that wasn’t going to be enough, we were going to have use mine as well.

  Between the two kits I was able to cover the tear. She covered the patch with her hand just in case. Neither measure would probably stop the leak, the pressure difference would eventually win, but at least it would slow it. Her faceplate on the other hand...

  “Taavi, we patched the leak, but Rumer’s helmet is cracked. I know you’re in pain, but if we don’t get out soon…” I couldn’t finish that sentence. I didn’t want to even think it. My shaking wouldn’t stop.
How are we going to get out?

  Taavi stood slowly, and grimaced as he put weight on his right side, “I’m sorry,” he signed.

  I didn’t want to look at either of them. I couldn’t look them in the eyes, “We know jumping doesn’t work. So what are we going to do?”

  Rumer looked at her gauges again then tapped her shoulders vigorously. With one hand she signed, “climb.” It was awkward, but I understood.

  “I don’t think we can reach, even if we stood on someone’s shoulders.”

  In the corner of my vision, Taavi was crying, even though it was too soft to here over the radio. He sat down on the rock that had fallen in with us.

  Of course! “Get up!” I nearly pushed him off the rock in excitement and shoved it to the wall. We were in luck that it was volcanic, and mostly made of pumice, so I could push it.

  “I’ll climb out on Rumer’s shoulders while she stands on this!” I said to the other two, “Taavi, I know it will hurt, but I need you cover the leak while I climb out, and then let her climb out on your shoulders.”

  I looked at Rumer. Had the crack grown? She bent down so I could climb on to her shoulders, then stood up and stepped onto the rock. As soon as she was stable, I stood up on her shoulders and reached.

  I could just barely get my hands over the ledge. But it was enough. I knew it would hurt her, but pushed down and jumped anyway, managing to use the momentum to get one elbow above the ledge, and then the rest of my body.

  Once up, the sun now uncomfortably light in comparison to the darkness of the pit, I lay on my stomach and stretched my arms out for Rumer.

  We couldn’t let this try be a repeat. I didn’t know how much time we really had, but the threat of the glass shattering was enough to make it clear this would be the only chance. If Rumer fell again the faceplate might give way entirely.

  Rumer’s hand caught mine and as I pulled her up. I heard Taavi cry out over the radio.

  She was up. Ares! We got her out.

  “I promise we will be right back! I promise,” I called down over the radio, and pulled Rumer to her feet.

  She had already covered the leak with her hand again. I didn’t know how effective that really would be, but there wasn’t time to check.

  “Come on, hurry!” I signed then put my own hand over hers as well.

  We walked, half ran back towards the HabRov. Every step I dreaded feeling the world drop out from below me again. We needed to be careful now that we knew there might be pits in the lava field, but we needed to get her inside.

  At last we came to the HabRov. I fumbled with the hatch, pulling it open with a sudden release. We pushed inside, the door sliding shut behind us, and ran across the room to airlock.

  Once inside we whipped our helmets off and fell into each other’s arms. Laughing and crying. My sister, oh my sister was okay.

  “How did you find us?”

  “I was so scared, Emory. Did you really think I won’t notice you leaving? I was watching you from upstairs. You were just standing there and then I looked away for only a minute, and you just disappeared! I couldn’t find you on the sensors. So I came looking,” she squeezed me, “I was so worried about you!”

  “Me!? You almost died!” Then I remembered Taavi, “I’ve got to go back for him!”

  How the hell was I going to get him out without a repeat? If I fell again, there would be no rescue.

  Rumer opened up a compartment next to the first-aid kit on the wall and pulled out a laminated booklet. She flipped through a few page and then handed it to me, “There, in the bay in compartment E are cords for towing.” She laughed, “We are going to need them anyway to tow the kid’s dumb plane.”

  When I reemerged from the HabRov I was carrying a box full of thick cords and connectors.

  I kept calling out over the radio to let him know I was coming, even though I was fairly sure he couldn’t hear me. At least it made me feel better, less like I had abandoned him. That last cry of his as Rumer pushed off of his shoulders kept replaying in my head.

  Rumer was watching me from the Hab’s communications center. But it didn’t feel any better knowing she was watching. She couldn’t take the vehicle into the field, and even if she could, without a working suit there would be nothing she could do to help.

  “Taavi!’ I poked my head over the entrance.

  There was just darkness. Oh no! What if he fainted?

  A light flicked on and I saw his face, that over-sized grin peering up at me.

  “You came back! I guess you forgive me?”

  Forgive him? Huh?

  I threw one of the cords down, “Will you be able to climb on this? Or do we have to tie you to it?”

  “I’ll try!”

  He latched on and began to pull so quickly I had to jump to catch my side of the line. Wow, he was fast.

  And then there he was, standing on the surface of Mars with me.

  I laughed and hugged him.

  “I’m sorry, Emory.”

  “Why do you keep saying that?”

  “Because you think that this is all my fault?”

  “No,” I shook my head, “Anyway, it takes two to tango. Come on. I’m done with adventure for today,” then looked at his leg, and bit my lip. I had no idea how it was going to be under the suit, “Come on. We have still got to get you inside.”

Chapter Four

I
n the HabRov, Rumer had already pulled out one of the beds. Mine, to be precise. Hers was folded and tucked neatly away. We helped Taavi to sit on it and then pulled off his suit and under suit, leaving just his grays.

  It was most definitely broken. I could see the deformation even with the massive swelling. He let us tend to it the best we could, even with our fairly rudimentary equipment. Every person raised in Cradle is taught basic first aid, especially in our cohort because one of our two mentors was the head doctor. What I wouldn’t have done to have her there at that moment.

  When we got back to a settlement, we’d be able to print him a cast, but in the meantime we splinted it and tried to make him as comfortable as possible.

  We gave him pain medication and watched him drop into sleep. Then we stripped our own suits off. Jeez, those bruises weren’t going to look good in a few hours. There wasn’t much we could do for them, but they weren’t much of a threat either.

  “I found his plane.”

  “Yeah?” I asked, walking to the kitchenette for water.

  “Yep. And Bryn sent us a message.”

  I waited.

  “Turns out that a kid, only seven and half orbits old, stole a plane to go adventuring,” Rumer began, “They were tracking it and lost contact in this area, “ she paused.

  Only seven and a half m-years! That’s only 14 earth years!
I thought, shocked. Rumer was right, he
was
just a kid.

  “They are hoping we can find him,” she finished and looked at the sleeping Taavi.

  Things certainly made a lot more sense now, I admitted to myself. “What did you tell her?”

  “Nothing yet.”

  Was I missing something? Why hadn’t she reported that we found him? Our mission would be doubly successful then. Except for my whole almost getting us all killed bit...

   “Tell them the truth, Rumer. It’s my fault after all. Not yours. You told us not to.”

  She hugged me, and I could feel more of those damn happy tears from earlier threatening to escape, “No you dummy. There is no reason for anyone to know you are such an idiot who doesn’t listen to her ‘oh-so-wise’ sister,” she pulled away, “But on a serious note, if they know they might not let us back out here on our own for a long while.”

  And you don’t want them to know you didn’t have the situation under control,
I added silently.

  “Plus,” she continued, “let’s not get the kid in more trouble than he already is. They’ll be happy to know he’s okay, but I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes. I’ll contact Cradle and then we’ll get the plane. Apparently it’s pretty small. It’s a miracle he was able to make it this far without refueling.“

  When we finished hooking the tiny plane to the HabRov, we scrambled back through the airlock, and Rumer began to remove the suit she had borrowed from Taavi. He wasn’t thrilled to learn that we were taking him back to Cradle to be picked up by someone from Aurora, but he agreed not to tell anyone about our fiasco. Our story for the ripped suit and his broken ankle was that they happened while we were hitching the plane to the HabRov. We all agreed it was better for our ongoing freedom if people didn’t know we had gone running on the surface in the dark. Not that Taavi would be likely to have a lot of freedom in the near future. I actually felt pretty bad for him.

  It wasn’t even midday yet. All things considered we hadn’t lost more than a few hours. But, guilt pounded at me. I had risked my sister’s life and almost ruined her first mission in command. Maybe there was still time to make it up to her. “Do you want to drive?” I asked Rumer, “I could get to work on backing up that data. I’m sure we can square it away before getting home.”