Offworld by Robin Parrish Page A

blood was on his tongue,
and he felt sore all over.
    His arm sluggishly responded to his command to turn on his
internal .helmet light. The dim fluorescent didn't provide much help.
Next he activated the bright beam attached to one arm of .his space
suit. He couldn't have much power left in the suit, but without getting
a look at where he was, there was no chance of escape. Or rescue.
    Ground.
    He was lying on the ground. That wasn't really a surprise.
    But what ground? Where?

    And why was the ground so smooth?
    Very carefully, Burke raised himself to a seated position, resting
on his knees. He used the beam to scan the immediate area and saw
that the ground was indeed hard and very smooth. Almost polished
in appearance.
    He shined the beam straight up and could see the hole that hed
fallen through. It had to be over thirty feet away; he was lucky not
to have broken anything. He turned the light o fbr a moment and
gazed up through the small hole directly above. Even in the darkness
he couldn't make out any stars.
    Had he really only fallen thirty feet?
    He brought the beam back to l fe, tracing it slowly down the walls
on either side of this odd cave. At least he supposed it was a cave.
What else could it be?
    The walls were as smooth as the ground. The ground and the
walls weren't perfectly even-there were sizable bumps and grooves
carved into them. But even these had the rounded off appearance
of something that had been buffed or polished. There wasn't a sharp
edge to be, jbund.
    The one truly positive thing he could say about this place was that
it was considerably warmer down here than it was on the nighttime
surface above. Though that was odd.
    Slowly, he stood. Checked the time. A little over an hour of oxygen
remained in his suit.
    Well, if they couldn't pick up my signal before, they'll never
hear it now.
    I'm dead. Rest in peace, Christopher Burke.
    When the flashlight's beam receded into the distance just ahead,
he realized this was no cave.
    It was a tunnel.
    Of course! The answer came to him in a burst of insight. A lava
tube ...
    Scientists had speculated for decades that empty lava tubes might stretch beneath the Martian surface, perhaps evidence of ancient
volcanic activity. Photographic verification decades ago seemed to
confirm it, but he and his crew hadn't had a chance to huntfbr any
of the elusive chambers yet.

    I've just proven they exist!
    And ... no one ... will ever know.
    He scowled.
    Three cheers for me.
JULY 6, 2033
DAY TWO
    Trisha awoke with great reluctance. Foggy and disoriented, she
found herself in a strange bed and a strange room, listening to
a strange song that had started playing by itself. She glanced at
the clock beside the bed, which, like much of the decor in this
tiny bedroom, was pink in color. It featured a holographic stream
projected a few inches into the air above it, where a tiny pair of
teen movie stars were singing and dancing on an invisible stage,
to some insipidly cheerful pop tune about sunshine and "the best
part of the day."
    She sat up and turned the ridiculous thing off. Ten o'clock in
the morning. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept that
late.
    Standing up, Trisha gazed in a mirror attached to the inside of
the bedroom door. She barely recognized the all-but-dead person
who looked back at her. Her hair was hanging down around her
shoulders, instead of pulled back in her customary ponytail. She
felt creases under her eyes that betrayed the crying she'd done both
before falling asleep and after.
    And she was sore. So terribly sore.
    I'm off my routine. That's all. Need to get some good food, a little
exercise. It'll make all the difference.

    Trisha did her morning stretches, starting with her legs and working up to her arms, shoulders, and finally the neck. Everything was
stiffer than it had been in a long time, but even this routine seemed
an annoyance. Why bother keeping up a strict, disciplined lifestyle
if