Colin Taber - RED - Burning Skies

Reassured, he reached for his own helmet and broke the seal.

The air was icy cold.

She asked, “Are you okay?”

He nodded. “Yes, just surprised.”

“There’s three barriers up there. Because of the dim light, they’re hard to see. The highest barrier is netting to catch small rocks, but anything really big will just punch through. That can’t be helped. The other two barriers are the same, one just a backup, and they are both transparent inflatables that have been filled with a special gel that sets clear. We had some robo units brick in around the airlocks at each end and then placed the transparents before filling them and allowing them to set and create our bubble of breathable air.”

Wei looked around, feeling more comfortable to not just be free of his helmet, but have the space explained. “And life support? You’ve got some units working in here?”

“Yes, just one to maintain it, and a backup as well.” She indicated the back of the space, where the shadows were deep.

He could see the silhouettes of the machines.

Ghost continued, “The whole space is designed to accommodate small groups of people for short terms. You couldn’t keep fifty people in here for a week. Life support would not be able to keep up.”

In spite of the gloom, he could see stacks of salvaged equipment lined up and another airlock ahead, although it remained dark.

She watched where his gaze went and began to give him a series of answers for the questions she figured he’d ask. “The supplies are strictly survival. There’s ration packs, some comms gear, water, some plant stuff, and extra suits. It’s all pretty basic.”

He asked, “Plant stuff?”

“Not greenery, just basic modules we’ve salvaged from factory units. These include the life support machinery that milks water and oxygen from the regolith.”

Wei understood, but his eyes went to the next airlock. He noticed a black bloom painted on the door. It was just an icon, a lotus with two leaves, nothing more.

She shook her head. “Don’t go in there. Ideally not even suited.”

“Why, what is it?”

“None of this breathable air, for starters. You’ll actually be back outside.”

“It’s just a back door?”

“Not really; the space in there is also sealed, but with Martian atmosphere. It’s full of hazardous material. I’m serious, don’t go in there, as it will kill you.”

“Radiation?”

Her gaze tightened on him as she assessed him. “And worse. Just leave it.”

He nodded. Turning from the airlock, he said, “So, how long do we stay here?”

“We’ll sleep through today and the coming night. Tomorrow at dawn, we leave for home. So, Sanctuary might not be luxury, but there’s air beds, water, food, and room to stretch and exercise. There’s even some sponges you can use to wash yourself down with.”

Yong was at his workstation when the alert came in. It was nothing profound, but he had been watching for it.

The hub drone that had gone out to Base Five Two had returned. As it had, it automatically checked in with Mars Command One, and then went to sleep. He got up and told a colleague. “It’s all quiet here and my report run is done. I’m just going to take a break to stretch my legs. I’ll be back in ten minutes, and relay comms via my headset.”

His colleague nodded.

They all took what opportunity they could for physical activity, as they fought to maintain their muscle density, even though they’d never be returning to Earth. The wastage here was nothing like in zero-G or on the Moon, but it was still noticeable over time.

“Buzz me if I’m needed,” he added, and then left.

Yong went first to the toilet, but then made his way down to the Guangchang. The huge corridor, a tunnel that formed the spine of their base, was wide with a high ceiling. The space had been tunneled out by robots a few years ago, prior to the base expanding to two hundred and fifty people, and ran along the side of the mountain. Soon, when the civilian colonists started to arrive, the space would be used as a place for public assembly and as a market. Eventually, when the need for secrecy was removed, one side of the tunnel would be cut out to the mountainside and glassed in so the whole one-hundred-meter-long chamber could be lit by daylight and have elevated views across the Martian landscape. For now, though, in spite of such grand plans, the Guangchang was used by the resident crew for running and storage.

He put on a jog to loosen up his legs as he ran down its length. At the back of his mind, he knew there would be a camera watching from the shadows.

The Guangchang was not just the biggest pressurized space by volume on Mars Command One, but also formed a shortcut between the elevated guts of the base, which had been tunneled into a series of small craters in a high mountain valley, and the hangars, which were built into a large cave that met the plane at the mountain’s feet. One hangar was for airborne vessels, mostly drones these days, as airships were now prohibited due to their size and the risk of them being picked up by rival orbiters. The other hangar was for rovers and people on foot.

Even after all this time, activity on the surface was restricted. It was as if the longer Beijing Command had been able to maintain the secret of the growing Chinese presence on Mars, the more determined they were to keep it intact. At the same time, there was an acknowledged inevitability of being discovered. All it would take would be a broken-down rover or a failed surface excursion, or the tracks of a vehicle. Even a drone was big enough to spot if an orbiter held good equipment and was fully functional.

Hence the hacking and compromising of not just software and data, but also the destruction of platforms that were deemed too good to allow to continue to operate. Such matters were simple enough to look after usually with a microwave or kinetic blast from a Chinese orbiter. The attacks made it look like the target had suffered a catastrophic system failure. Many of the orbiters were old enough that such failures were written off as expected due to age.

For now though, Yong headed for the hangar that dealt with the drones.

The drone had already come in, landing in an automated airlock that then cycled through and opened the internal door so the unit could enter the base. The hangar here was quiet, with only one other person working their way through a maintenance program on the drones, hubs, balloons, and airships that Mars Command One held in its inventory.

Of all of the vehicles, only the airships could carry people, and they had been grounded because of doubts as to whether the cabins of the craft were robust enough to stand the rigors of pressurized flight. Yong wasn’t aware of any incidents, but he had heard they had all been grounded ten years ago. There were also concerns about how easy they would be for a foreign orbiter to detect them when inflated.

Yong hurried over to the drone runway, which was actually just a long desk that the drones landed on when returning.

The hub was there.

The tech in the background called out, “Do you need help?”

“No, I’m fine. I just needed to check on the hub that’s just come in.”

“I’ll get to it in a minute. I’m just finishing up on this one.”

“No, it’s okay. We just wanted to scan it. It was observing the blast over Base Five Two, so I just need to get some rad readings on it,” Yong said as he positioned himself so his back was blocking the camera view of what he was about to do.

The tech chuckled. “Health and safety and all that?”

“I suppose, not that it’s ever seemed to be an issue before.”