together, on how the Marsmat used sulfur for energy.
“Nothing much to do,” the woman chatted on. “I’m a sexile for the next few hours.”
“Uh, what?”
“Exiled for sex. My roomie has a guy in.”
“Uh, oh.” At first Julia blinked, affronted at this sudden bolt of intimate detail. Then she realized that this was another effect of living in a tight little base, however grand the views were outside. Unavoidably, formal hierarchy dissolved under the rub of informal daily life. See the commander daily slurping coffee and washing dishes, and pretty soon he doesn’t look like the leader anymore. Even legends did scut work—or should.
The woman started happily chattering, and her talk went in Julia’s ear and out the other. Only when the other woman started to notice did she make an attempt to respond. Julia was busy realizing how out of touch with the younger staff she was. Could Praknor be right? Time to hang it up?
Praknor tried to put her foot down over their excursion, eyes flashing. “No, it’s ridiculous.”
“Axelrod said we are to recover package,” Viktor said.
“You can barely walk!”
“I’ll do the walking,” Julia said. “The route is along one of our standard drives, and I can do the driving, too.”
“It’s twenty-three kilometers—”
“We leave at dawn, back in plenty of time.”
Praknor sat very still. “I believe we must define just who is now in charge here.”
Julia said in a deliberately conversational tone, “Well, I hardly think it’s a dichotomous choice. Still, no need getting our knickers in a twist when we can defer to Earthside on this one, eh?”
Earthside would be very surprised to be asked; tight control of excursions had faded away years ago. But she was counting on the fact that Praknor was so green she didn’t know what the routine was.
Viktor picked this up. “And can talk to staff, too.”
Praknor sputtered, but Viktor’s intuition proved right. The staff would support the venerable Marsnauts, not a fresh manager who hardly had her Earthside smell worn off.
Julia sent a long message to the Consortium, and Praknor wrote one even longer. Off these went. Experience proved the rule: Earthside dithered for hours. Praknor got distracted with work. Nudge nudge, wink—
So they went. It helped that everybody was talking about the new results from the Pluto expedition, and a bit distracted. Nobody asked questions. The ISA discovery of a biosphere there had electrified them all. Julia had no idea what to think about the Pluto reports. The biology seemed impossible. But then, so had the news that the solar system’s bow shock was moving inward. She had long before learned to let the outer world go on, without her attention. She put aside everything and focused on the task at hand—always, on risky Mars, a good idea.
Going out, Julia noticed how much of the landscape was now rutted and marked by the ever-busy humans. She could see the towers of their water-drilling fields in the distance. Some pingos nearby were thoroughly excavated, both for bio-signatures in the deep ice deposits and for geological data; then the ice was harvested, leaving holes yawning like mouths. Not far from them was the crumpled descent package.
This was yet another miracle of design. Hardly the size of a coffee table, the smart, carbon-fiber shell had survived the blistering plunge by flying itself. Stubby wings let it use the infalling energy to bank and lift, gaining the time to locate Gusev. Viktor insisted on parking only meters away, so she had a very short walk. The announced reason for this flight was some vital small parts for a malfed pressure control system, and they were indeed most of the payload mass. But when she lifted the parts out, there was a cylinder at the back. On it in big stenciled letters was FOR JULIA AND VIKTOR ONLY . In Axelrod’s hand.
She got it back into the rover, and inside was a rolled-up letter. “It’s so like Axelrod to send an
“Nothing much to do,” the woman chatted on. “I’m a sexile for the next few hours.”
“Uh, what?”
“Exiled for sex. My roomie has a guy in.”
“Uh, oh.” At first Julia blinked, affronted at this sudden bolt of intimate detail. Then she realized that this was another effect of living in a tight little base, however grand the views were outside. Unavoidably, formal hierarchy dissolved under the rub of informal daily life. See the commander daily slurping coffee and washing dishes, and pretty soon he doesn’t look like the leader anymore. Even legends did scut work—or should.
The woman started happily chattering, and her talk went in Julia’s ear and out the other. Only when the other woman started to notice did she make an attempt to respond. Julia was busy realizing how out of touch with the younger staff she was. Could Praknor be right? Time to hang it up?
Praknor tried to put her foot down over their excursion, eyes flashing. “No, it’s ridiculous.”
“Axelrod said we are to recover package,” Viktor said.
“You can barely walk!”
“I’ll do the walking,” Julia said. “The route is along one of our standard drives, and I can do the driving, too.”
“It’s twenty-three kilometers—”
“We leave at dawn, back in plenty of time.”
Praknor sat very still. “I believe we must define just who is now in charge here.”
Julia said in a deliberately conversational tone, “Well, I hardly think it’s a dichotomous choice. Still, no need getting our knickers in a twist when we can defer to Earthside on this one, eh?”
Earthside would be very surprised to be asked; tight control of excursions had faded away years ago. But she was counting on the fact that Praknor was so green she didn’t know what the routine was.
Viktor picked this up. “And can talk to staff, too.”
Praknor sputtered, but Viktor’s intuition proved right. The staff would support the venerable Marsnauts, not a fresh manager who hardly had her Earthside smell worn off.
Julia sent a long message to the Consortium, and Praknor wrote one even longer. Off these went. Experience proved the rule: Earthside dithered for hours. Praknor got distracted with work. Nudge nudge, wink—
So they went. It helped that everybody was talking about the new results from the Pluto expedition, and a bit distracted. Nobody asked questions. The ISA discovery of a biosphere there had electrified them all. Julia had no idea what to think about the Pluto reports. The biology seemed impossible. But then, so had the news that the solar system’s bow shock was moving inward. She had long before learned to let the outer world go on, without her attention. She put aside everything and focused on the task at hand—always, on risky Mars, a good idea.
Going out, Julia noticed how much of the landscape was now rutted and marked by the ever-busy humans. She could see the towers of their water-drilling fields in the distance. Some pingos nearby were thoroughly excavated, both for bio-signatures in the deep ice deposits and for geological data; then the ice was harvested, leaving holes yawning like mouths. Not far from them was the crumpled descent package.
This was yet another miracle of design. Hardly the size of a coffee table, the smart, carbon-fiber shell had survived the blistering plunge by flying itself. Stubby wings let it use the infalling energy to bank and lift, gaining the time to locate Gusev. Viktor insisted on parking only meters away, so she had a very short walk. The announced reason for this flight was some vital small parts for a malfed pressure control system, and they were indeed most of the payload mass. But when she lifted the parts out, there was a cylinder at the back. On it in big stenciled letters was FOR JULIA AND VIKTOR ONLY . In Axelrod’s hand.
She got it back into the rover, and inside was a rolled-up letter. “It’s so like Axelrod to send an
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