Climbing Olympus

Chetwynd popped into the doorway and slapped his palm twice against the frame of the airlock, “Let’s go!” then slipped into the foremost seat of the cramped lander. He would pilot them down to the surface while Rubens and his copilot remained in orbit, “minding the store,” as they called it.

Tam, Shen, and Ogawa crowded into their seats up front with Keefer. Ogawa giggled nervously, flicking his eyes from side to side, but Tam shushed him. Keefer ducked his head and followed them into the lander, where the sounds were muffled. The other eight buckled into the rear seats in the lander’s passenger bay.

“Right on,” Rubens said as he closed the hatch. “Smooth sailing. Come see me when you all get back to Earth in a few years.”

“Get prepped, ladies and gentlemen,” Chetwynd said to the complement of passengers, then remembered to add, “if you please.”

Keefer was out of the loop at this point, more a mascot than a leader. The others knew their tasks, and he let them do their jobs. Keefer heaved a sympathetic sigh for Captain Rubens: he had spent four months in a cramped ship with the man and had not realized the captain’s desire to set foot on Mars. But then, Keefer had been frequently told by Gina—his son Allan’s mother—that he had a “clueless streak in him a mile wide.” He just didn’t notice when other people had hidden problems. Why couldn’t they just come out and say so when something was bothering them? It exasperated him. Had everyone but him noticed Captain Rubens’s deep desire? Probably.

Maybe Keefer could see to it that they named a Martian mountain after Captain Rubens or something.

With the chatter of operations going on around him, Keefer strapped himself into the descent chair, then closed his eyes, taking measured breaths of the stale, metallic air they had been breathing for the past four months.

With a sudden lurch, the reaction springs disconnected the lander from the slowly spinning main craft, and the velocity differential carried the two vessels apart. Keefer took shallow breaths of anticipation as they began to drop toward Mars.

The lander touched down with a gentle kiss of its pads on the packed rusty surface, concrete made from Martian sand and dust. With a noiseless whistle, Chetwynd lifted gloved hands from the control panels and let out a comical sigh of relief. “Okay, chaps, my work is all done.”

Sitting in the lander’s VIP seat, Keefer took over and spoke into the voice pickup. “Touchdown on schedule, on target, thank you very much. Lowell Base, go ahead and send the rover vehicle for us.”

While Chetwynd went through the twenty-minute-long shutdown and arrival procedure, scratching his bristly reddish hair with one hand, the other eleven people on board fitted each other into environment suits. The passengers double-checked every fastening and seal, though this gentler Mars would actually let them live a few minutes if their suits were breached.

Tam Smith helped Keefer mount his air-regenerator backpack and snap his helmet into place, and he did the same for her. “We’re on Mars,” he said with an astonished smile. “We’re really here.”

She laughed and flipped down his faceplate for him. “Better close your helmet, if you’re going to keep grinning like a little kid.”

“Hey, I’m the commissioner,” he said through the speakerpatch, “I’m supposed to be enthusiastic about our work here. Just doing my job.”

All prepped, he flexed his fingers in the thin gloves. Implanted heater wires kept the suit warm throughout, in preparation for the biting perpetual cold of Mars. The suit seemed so flimsy, so lightweight, so comfortable compared with the constant-pressure suits he had worn during some of the early training exercises. He wanted to run and jump and play on this new world he had helped make.

Maybe when nobody was looking. …

Glancing out the tiny viewport, trying to keep out of Chetwynd’s way, Keefer could see how the red soil around the base had been churned and packed by the many rover tracks and construction activities. The loose, microfine debris had been blown away by landings and lift-offs from various vehicles. Humans had been true strangers on Mars little more than a decade ago, but now the fifty base inhabitants had turned the area into a pioneer town.

“Company coming,” he said as he noticed the billows of red dust stirred up by the approaching rover. “Everybody get ready. Please remember all the precautions.”

Ogawa and Shen nodded gravely. The others simply mumbled unintelligibly through their faceplates. “Thanks, Dad,” Tam said.

After Chetwynd finished the shutdown procedures and mothballed the equipment, he donned his own environment suit. Then, with a silent puff of wind that made the slick suits balloon in the suddenly lowered pressure, he exhausted the lander’s contained air before popping the hatch. The ship would remain vacant here on the pad for more than two weeks before Commissioner Dycek and the other old-timers climbed aboard for their return trip to Earth.

Below, a suited figure gestured them toward the waiting rover vehicle, which looked like a motor home that had run over a giant porcupine. The undertreads of articulated legs let the vehicle scuttle over rough terrain, adjusting to the uneven landscape like a souped-up sea urchin. The rover had plenty of computer equipment on board, a mobile encampment—much different from the stripped-down buggy the first Mars explorers had driven. Keefer doubted the big rovers were as much fun, though.

In pairs, the dozen passengers descended to the surface. Keefer waited as Chetwynd and Tam stood on the hydraulic lift platform that lowered them with agonizing slowness. When his turn came Keefer was tempted to jump down and raise some dust in the one-third gravity, but he supposed he had to set a good example for his people.

Like a regiment, they marched across the hard red concrete to the waiting rover, standing in line once more as they entered the vehicle through the sphincter airlock, working their way through the self-sealing membrane, again in pairs. Finally, when the entire group stood with barely contained excitement inside the pressurized rover, they clicked up their faceplates. Keefer smelled the bitter metallic tang of air contaminated with iron oxide dust, so strong that it made the back of his tongue taste flat.

Their driver turned around to show a chubby face of honey-brown skin and huge beetling eyebrows. His dark hair was streaked with wiry white strands, like lines in black scratchboard. “Welcome, my friends. I am Dr. Beludi al-Somak, one of the meteorologists at Lowell Base.”

Before saying anything else, al-Somak turned the rover in a wide circle and trundled toward the black rocks of a steep ridge. The sea-urchin legs made the floor of the rover vibrate with an odd miniature-stampede sensation. Al-Somak headed for a cluster of dusty metal balloons snuggled up against the fractured ridge, in the lee of the prevailing winds.

“I hope you had a fine trip down,” al-Somak said. “We will have a busy week as we give you tours and establish a new working routine. As always, there is too much work, and we are delighted to have fresh helpers. You each have colleagues here, coworkers to take you under their wing.” He heaved a huge sigh. “Unfortunately I see by your dossiers that none of you has studied meteorology, so Dr. Evrani and I will have no rest. Pity.”

Keefer leaned forward in the seat as the rover continued toward the modules. “Tell me, Dr. al-Somak, will Commissioner Dycek be waiting to greet us at the base? I tried to raise her several times from the orbiter, but I never managed to get through.”

Al-Somak gave a troubled sigh. “I believe she will be there, but beyond that I cannot tell you. She is upset about your arrival, Commissioner Keefer. She does not wish to return to Earth, and you are here to take her place.”

Keefer nodded, feeling his stomach knot. He had feared something like this might be the case. “Thank you for being so candid with me. I’m sorry to hear that, but I didn’t make the decision. Dr. Dycek has been here for ten years. The regulations—”

Al-Somak raised a wide hand. “You do not need to make excuses to me, Commisioner Keefer. It is Rachel who needs to be convinced that you will not bury her work.”

In truth, Keefer had little interest in Dycek’s dva project. It had been shocking in its time, yes, but ultimately just a sidelight on the transformation of Mars. Keefer was an expert in extraterrestrial geology and terraforming processes. He had analyzed the paths of the long-term plan, tweaking, exploring possibilities as new data came available. The original scheme was based on some very broad assumptions, some of which proved too conservative, some too optimistic.

Keefer struggled to assemble a quick reply. “Well, perhaps we can straighten this out quickly.”

Al-Somak blinked his deep black eyes. “I doubt it. Dr. Dycek has been convincing herself of it for too long.”

Al-Somak brightened the tone of his voice as he changed the conversation, looking at some of the other passengers. “Ms. Smith,” he said, turning to Tam with a solicitous smile, “you are scheduled to begin work in the greenhouse dome tomorrow. Several of you others have a tour set up with Dr. Vickery to see the solar arrays we have mounted up on the Spine, including you, Commissioner Keefer. No rest for anybody, I’m afraid.”

Keefer, his mind still whirling from what al-Somak had told him about Dr. Dycek, tried to sound compassionate. “Shouldn’t we try to get acclimated a little bit before jumping right into the routine? Give our team a chance to stretch our legs. We’ve been cooped up for four months on the flight over here—”

“The tour cannot wait, Commissioner,” al-Somak said. “In fact, had you been a day or so later we would not have allowed you to land. Seasonal dust storms, spring and fall, you see. The weather satellites show a large storm approaching our latitude in the next day or so. The type of thing that makes a meteorologist go into absolute ecstasy.” He smiled. “But I fear it would not be wise to have anybody wandering around in it.”

Al-Somak keyed instructions to the rover’s AI pilot program and brought them into a cavelike shelter hollowed out of the cliff, where refueling and recharging pumps stood waiting to connect to the long-range rovers and the putt-putt service vehicle.

Keefer noticed that al-Somak’s lips were chapped from the dry air. Taking a tip from one of the other returning mission specialists, Keefer had brought along two small cases of lip balm—the type of thing everyone needed, but no one thought to requisition on the heavy interorbital transports. Distributing the packs of lip balm could be one way for him to win approval among the people he would have to supervise.

As they drove toward Lowell Base, Keefer recalled what he knew about the camp, feeling as if he knew every corner of it without ever having been there: the placement of the modules with the recreational facilities, exercise arenas, geological laboratories, meteorology shacks, sick bay, med labs, greenhouse tent, satellite uplink, and living quarters. During the tedium of the voyage to Mars, Keefer had spent time familiarizing himself with the workings of all five human bases on the planet.

The new arrivals resealed their suits as al-Somak fastened his helmet again and depressurized the rover. Emerging first from the rover’s sphincter airlock, al-Somak led the group through a larger two-stage airlock into the Lowell Base changing area. The new arrivals knew the entire desuiting procedure without further coaching. The Egyptian meteorologist acted like a busybody, moving from person to person, pointing out small empty lockers for stowing equipment. The buzzing sounds of hand-held vacuums blended with excited conversation. Tam sneezed, and Ogawa couldn’t stop coughing for several minutes.

“You will get used to the dust,” al-Somak said, bowing his head as if in apology.

“Welcome to paradise,” Keefer said, stretching high enough to rub his fingertips on the cold, smooth ceiling of the inflatable module. His skin crackled from the sudden, intense chill, and he felt light and tall and ready for a long physical workout. He wanted to jog ten kilometers.

Before they had finished dressing in warm all-purpose jumpsuits, the inner door opened and a slim woman stepped through. She had iron-gray hair and an opaque expression, as if an invisible polarized mask covered her face. She glanced at the group, then fixed her gaze on Keefer.

“Commissioner Dycek?” he asked, trying to smile warmly as he moved forward to extend a hand. He nearly lost his balance by overextending himself in the low gravity.

“Welcome to Mars, Mr. Keefer,” Dycek said, brushing his hand in a brief, noncommittal grip. She gave him a false, pained smile, holding herself rigid. “Would you like to hand me my orders now?”

Keefer remained calm, finishing the task of stacking his suit components in a vacant cubicle. “No, but I would like to have a word with you in private, Commissioner Dycek.”

She took him to an empty rec room and sealed the door behind them. Someone had left a videogame to play itself on the flatscreen. A Ping-Pong table had been pushed against the curved wall; one of the white balls—weighted, in a futile gesture to compensate for the lower gravity—had fallen to the floor. The smell of garlic and olive oil clung around the hot plate in the small snack area.

Keefer felt his stomach tighten with sour anticipation. His first day on a challenging assignment, and already he had a problem. He didn’t want to be Dycek’s adversary; he just wanted to be friendly, to make a smooth transition. But he had dealt with UNSA bureaucracy before, and no doubt they had given Dycek double-talk and deliberately vague reasons for her transfer. She had been left to stew for four months, knowing Keefer was on his way to take her place. What a way to run an important project!

“Please, I’m not your enemy,” he said. “I’m sorry about—”

Dycek turned and crossed her arms over her chest. She was a good seven or eight years older than Keefer, and they had been hard years. Her face seemed bleached with weariness. Her bright, granite-gray eyes moved back and forth as if she were trapped. She tried unsuccessfully to strangle the bitterness in her voice.