Battleground Mars by Eric Schneider Page A

than I can spare, but that’s all. Don’t push for more, because I’d be criminally negligent to let you have it.”
    “I could tell you where to find more air,” the Chief Engineer said. “Enough for you to complete the rescue mission and have some to spare for Doc Price.”
    They all looked at him in amazement. “Dan, you’ve been holding out on us! Where is it?” Fechter exclaimed.
    “I only just remembered. You remember the Eastern Star, the ship that crashed in the Huygens Crater?”
    They all remembered the crash, because it had been a severe setback to the whole program. Some said that it should have been shut down. The Eastern Star had just delivered a new party of miners and taken off the old crew, together with their valuable stocks of trevanium for the return journey. How it happened had been argued ever since, some said they were greedy and overloaded the ship. Others said it was a simple malfunction, a few insisted it was the result of a Tauron attack. The ship had lifted off as normal. When it reached a height of about ten miles something had gone wrong, the engines had failed and the ship plummeted back down to disappear into the Huygens Crater, a few miles south of the Schiaparelli Crater. Miraculously, the hull survived relatively intact, probably due to their frantic efforts to restart the engines. But all hands had perished, their bodies had been retrieved and they were sent back to Earth on the next transport.
    “Is there any air on the ship we could salvage?” Rahm asked.
    Weathers shook his head. “They retrieved the bottles of air and everything else of value, but they left the portable air scrubbers for some unknown reason. I believe there are about fifty of them in the ship’s emergency locker. You know that each portable scrubber has its own air reserve, I would guess those units would kit out your mission and help us out too when you get back here.”
    “That’s what we’ll do. It’s on the way to the Tyrrenha Plateau, it couldn’t be better. Jacques, we have to go and do this, you know that.”
    He nodded. “I know, it breaks every rule, but I’m not going to stop you. If you can bring back those portable units it’ll make the whole trip worthwhile.”
    “Bringing back DeVries’s people will do that, Jacques.”
    “Yes, you’re right, of course, Rahm.”
    “Keep that little bastard Tobin Ryles of my back, would you.”
    He grinned. He’s not so bad, but yeah, I’ll tell him to back off. You’re leaving now?”
    “Right away. Saul, would you assemble the crew in the garage, suit up and make sure we have every weapon we can carry.”
    “On my way.”
    They watched the big toolpusher left the office. Rahm turned to the manager.
    “What’s the latest word from the crew out there?”
    For answer he got a blank look. “You mean you haven’t heard from them?”
    Fechter shook his head. “Not for a couple of hours, no. The last message said that they were well dug in and defending themselves from about thirty Taurons. The enemy is well armed and they’ve blocked their only exit, they’re trapped in a narrow valley. Their power cells were hit in the initial attack and they’re running low on power, but otherwise they’re ok.”
    “Air?”
    “They said about eight hours.”
    “That was two hours ago, Jacques. Now there are six hours left and it’ll take us four hours to get to the Eastern Star and pick up the portable air scrubbers, an hour to get them out of the crater and another hour to get to the Tyrrenha Plateau. If anything goes wrong those poor bastards are finished.”
    “You’d better make sure that nothing goes wrong then. I know you can do it, Rahm. Bring them home.”
    He nodded curtly and left.

    Tyrrenha Plateau, Mars
    He stood in full view of their guns, daring them to shoot. He’d staged the ambush with cunning. They came down this valley and set up their drilling rig. While they were busy he’d brought in a line of their unpowered transport