Blue Hope: (Book 2) (Red Hope) Page 5

  The policeman shook his head and said, “Could be. We think it was more than Houston though, but we don’t know what’s going on.”

  The policeman inspected the driver’s license carefully and raised his eyebrows, realizing who she was.

  “Are you the wife of Adam Alston?”

  “Yes I am. We were down there in some temporary housing, but we got up here as fast as we could.”

  “Well, okay. Your husband is our hometown hero,” he said happily, almost ignoring the total hell that today had brought. “Okay, as I said, we don’t know exactly what’s going on.”

  The policeman handed back her license and continued.

  “All we know so far is a nuke struck Houston and hundreds of smaller bombs hit our power plants and communication centers up here. So, the power’s out and phone lines are dead.”

  “What about the cellphones?”

  “Hah, check your signal. Those are dead, too. The cell tower backup generators ran out of juice a few hours ago.”

  “Is it nationwide?”

  “Um, we think it’s planetwide.”

  “Oh no…” she trailed off.

  “Obviously you live here, so I’m going to let you pass. Drive carefully. We’ve got police all around keeping the peace.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Connie said.

  “Ma’am, do you own a weapon?”

  She briefly looked at his bloodstained shirt and then back at his face.

  “Yes, of course. This is Texas, right?” she laughed. “We have a shotgun that we keep locked up.”

  Then she added the detail, “Mossberg brand. I think it’s an antique.”

  “Do you know how to operate it?”

  “Yes, we’ve taken it to my mom’s farm a few times to shoot clay pigeons. She lives north of here.”

  “Okay, well make sure it is readily accessible by you,” he looked toward the back seat before continuing, “and not accessible by the little ones. Remember, 911 isn’t working right now. Drive safe. If you need help, you’ll have to drive yourself.”

  Connie eased away from the police stop and drove down the empty streets of Wanigas. The roads themselves looked normal, but residents were outside sitting in their yards cooling off, realizing that the invention of air conditioning is the only thing that made Texas habitable.

  Kids were spraying each other with water – thankfully water towers work on gravity so at least the town still had water pressure for the time being, until the tower tank emptied.

  After a few lazy turns, she pulled into her neighborhood and realized that she’d never seen it cast in total darkness before. Not a single streetlight was lit. The only illumination was from the occasional flashlight beam from fellow resident’s yards. After two stop signs, she turned onto her street and eased into the driveway of their aging ranch house.

  Instinctively she pushed the button on the garage door opener. Nothing happened. Connie laughed. She got out of her car, looked around and sighed.

  “What a mess we’re in,” she whispered.

  Normally at this time of evening, the air was filled with the cacophony of home air conditioners kicking on, but it was utterly silent tonight. Each of her footsteps clopped loudly. Her keys were as loud as a bell.

  Connie walked up to the front door of the house and unlocked it. After opening the door, she once again instinctively tried to turn on the light. Nothing. Again, she laughed at how ingrained the expectation was.

  She walked back to the car and saw that Cody was awake. She picked up Catie and directed Cody into the house.

  Connie paused to hear the wind blowing through the magnolia trees and the occasional searing caw of the Grackle birds.

  A simple smile overtook her. One word was on Connie’s mind:

  Home.

  CHAPTER 9

  Astronaut landing site near Mount Sharp

  Mars

  Every morning the shadow of Mount Sharp retreats from the plains of Mars, pooling in the ancient riverbeds and hiding beneath the exposed bedrock cliffs. Ironically named for the Roman god of war, this red dusty ball was defenseless against the ravages of time and solar radiation.

  As the Sun rose, the vanishing shadows uncovered many new things that were invasive to the Red Planet – all of which were sent here by mankind.

  The Curiosity Rover had been brought back to life when the visiting astronauts refreshed the radioactive power source that drove the vehicle. However, it fell dead again several days ago when it stopped receiving commands from NASA. Dusty whirlwinds flowed in and around the stone pyramid structure built as a memorial by the ancient Martian society before they perished. This was the same building that had seen the struggle of two astronauts and the death of Keller Murch.

  The most important site on Mars was a flat region just a few kilometers away near Mount Sharp where two roundish spacecraft sat huddled together. The largest one, endearingly called the Big Turtle, was a permanent craft that acted as the long-term living quarters for the first crew to ever set foot on the Red Planet. It was roughly 30 feet in diameter, painted a mixture of black and white colors. It was filled with simple things like beds and a kitchen. It also had the complex things — scientific equipment that had only been partially used so far.

  Outside the Big Turtle was a ground transportation craft light-heartedly nicknamed The Golf Cart – the astronauts used it to drive back and forth to the pyramid structure. At the moment it was broken and unusable. Just a few feet away on the ground was a makeshift grave, dug for the bodies of Keller Murch and another crewmember, Molly Hemphill, who had died recently from asphyxiation. Things were not going well on Mars.

  Only two crewmembers were left: Captain Adam Alston and the paleontologist cosmonaut named Yeva Turoskova.

  An elevated hallway connected the Big Turtle to the smaller craft, dubbed the Little Turtle, that was used to bring the crew to Mars. During their six-week long journey, all four of them were cooped up in this smaller ship. It was also meant to be their lifeboat home to Earth.

  The Turtle moniker for both ships came from the geodesic-domed roofs covered with faceted solar panels.

  Days ago all communications to and from NASA suddenly stopped. Professional and frightened, the remaining crew carried out their task lists including an early attempt at terraforming – ultimately leading to the formation of elevated air pressure, clouds, and brief rain showers. However, reality was setting in. Temporary losses of communication happened from time to time, but one this long could only mean something more serious had happened on Earth.

  After much deliberation, the crew decided to return home immediately.

  Captain Adam Alston’s last external journey would be a final walk-around examination of the Little Turtle. He exited the ship and walked down the ramp, stomping into the dusty ground cover before ducking under the elevated tunnel which connected the two ships together.

  Laying on the ground were the flattened parachutes used during their descent to the surface of Mars. Their original planned use was for the return re-entry to Earth. However, during the Mars approach, the Little Turtle wasn’t slowing down enough, so Adam made the executive decision to use them here instead – hoping they could be repacked. He studied their condition and they weren’t too bad, mainly just dirty. He walked along each chute, knocking the built-up muck from them. After cleaning them off, he thought to himself, I think they’ll work fine.

  Adam straightened up the parachutes and refolded them, much like one folds up a tent after camping. First he folded them into halves, then half again until he had long folded mounds of material. Finally, he rolled each one up and wrapped the cables around the outside like strings around a sleeping bag.

  Adam grabbed hold of the external ladder on the side of Little Turtle and climbed up to the roof, stepping on the rigid structure to avoid the fragile solar panels that covered the roof. One by one, he pulled the wrapped bundles up to the roof. He stuffed the first parachute into one of the roof containers, shutting th
e hatch cover to seal it in. Adam moved over to the other containers, holding on to the tall long-range antenna for more support.

  When he was done, Adam looked around, surveying the area and all they had accomplished during their short stay. He looked at the last page of the checklist, but didn’t see the single bullet-point that had been page-breaked to the back of the next page.

  The wind was something new – a result of their experiment with short-term terraforming. Up until a few days ago, the thin Martian breeze was too light to feel. Now, after the terraforming experiment, a stronger wind blew by. It caused the checklist Adam had clipped to his suit to come loose, the last page flying away in the breeze.

  Only Adam didn’t notice. He clambered down the ladder and breathed a sigh of relief at being done. He scanned the sun-drenched red horizon – a view he could never forget. Adam turned, walked up the ramp and back into the airlock in the Big Turtle.

  For the next hour, Yeva and Adam moved the remaining food, water and other supplies from the Big Turtle over to the Little Turtle. All that was left when they were done was the final checklist for interior preparation.

  The other supplies comprised several hundred pounds of Martian rocks — the return trip to Earth would not be empty handed. In addition to those rocks, traveling with them back to Earth in the Little Turtle were many priceless items such as core samples and a black cube, the latter being a gift of sorts from the ancient Martians themselves.

  Despite the fact that the cube was strapped to a bulkhead for the trip home, it may have been the most important find on this mission, maybe even in human history. It was a small black metallic cube roughly five inches on all sides and it didn’t seem to be affected by gravity. Lift it into the air and it would maintain its position. Push it slightly and it would glide sideways (or up) forever. Curiously, it was always warm. The possible technological breakthroughs were endless.

  Soon, both the rocks and the crew would be leaving Mars for the long journey back to Earth.

  The return process was very straight forward – in theory. The Little Turtle would ignite its main engines for 45 seconds, pushing the capsule up and out of the Martian atmosphere until it reached sufficient speed to orbit the Red Planet.

  The Little Turtle sat silently with the crew strapped into their seats. The billowing wind sent swirls of dust from the edges of the Turtle spaceships. With a “pop” heard by the crew, the connector hallway fell off the Little Turtle and retracted, dragging it’s sad end along the Martian ground.

  The countdown started. Eventually it reached the exciting end:

  Three…

  Two…

  One…

  Instantly, four rocket flames exploded from the bottom of the Little Turtle. Being very lightweight, it started lifting immediately and rose two meters from the ground. The vehicle stopped abruptly and swayed from side to side. The harsh thrusting rocket fire seared the ground beneath.

  “The grounding cable!” yelled Adam. He’d forgot to remove the grounding cable that the Little Turtle had shot into the bedrock to keep static electricity from building up on the ship. Now the cable that protected them from getting shocked was preventing them from leaving Mars.

  In his excitement to leave Mars, the grounding cable was the one bullet-point on the checklist that Adam failed to see.

  Mars would not let go of the astronauts – it was hungry for two more bodies. Adam unbuckled himself and hopped onto the controls of the small remote-controlled rover that was still down on the surface.

  He manipulated the control sticks on the remote control transmitter.

  Near the edge of the landing site, a small rover vehicle came barreling toward the Little Turtle. It hopped and swayed as it gained speed, heading straight for the underside of the Little Turtle – obviously being steered by Adam. The rover slammed into and through the grounding cable, releasing the bucking beast from its Martian doom. Like a cheetah unleashed, the Little Turtle rocketed upward at blinding speed. Adam was immediately thrown against the floor of the ship.

  The violent lurching toppled the long-range antenna which used to tower above the geodesic roof of the Little Turtle. As it fell, it ripped away some of the solar panels and careened past the porthole windows, striking even more fear into the astronauts. Even if the problems on Earth were fixed, the astronauts’ long-range communications options were just eliminated. They would be flying in silence all the way home.

  The ascent continued at breakneck speed. With the antenna and some of the solar panels gone, Little Turtle was experiencing uneven aerodynamic forces. The Martian atmosphere was thin for sure, but at their speed, it caused the ship to start vibrating. And shaking. And shimmying. The anti-gravity cube broke loose from its straps and began bouncing around the cabin, seemingly unaware of the extreme acceleration the ship was undergoing. It slammed into a small cabinet painted with warning stripes, knocking the door open. Inside the cabinet were little bottles of poison, to be used by the crew if they found themselves in a situation where all was lost. As the anti-gravity cube knocked open the cabinet door, it also smashed open two of those bottles. The contents sprayed everywhere, filling the cabin with a red fog.

  The shaking continued. Yeva saw the escape hatch door starting to buckle. To her horror, with a loud screech, the door launched off into the void of space.

  All of the air rushed out of the cabin. With the sudden loss of air pressure, the water bags exploded, creating a cascade of ice crystals streaming out of the open hatch.

  The engines stopped. The ship was in orbit – a temporary status until the booster rocket pushed them for a while, followed by the MM10 motors kicking in to slowly push them back to Earth. Checklist pages and ice crystals floated effortlessly out the escape hatch hole. Inside the ship were a stunned astronaut named Adam and a stunned cosmonaut named Yeva.

  She was bleeding from her nose inside her pressure suit helmet.

  “Yeva, can you hear me?” Adam yelled.

  She nodded her head. The blood blobs floated around inside her helmet, getting stuck in her hair. Adam had to get the ship’s environment restored before her blood fouled the breathing apparatus inside her pressure suit.

  Their main problem was the gaping hole where the escape hatch door used to be. It was ominously large, roughly two feet in diameter. Adam looked around inside the ship frantically. He didn’t see anything that would make a good strong cover.

  “Yeva, I’ve gotta find something to cover the opening. Try not to move, okay?”

  She gave him the thumbs up signal. A glob of blood floated right in front of her forehead.

  Adam looked frantically for anything large enough to cover the hatch door opening. The locker doors? They were as tall as him. He floated over and quickly studied how they folded open like an accordion. The doors hung from roller tracks that appeared to be relatively weak. Adam wondered if they could be pulled from the track if he worked hard enough. He wedged his boot behind the cabinet and yanked.

  Nothing happened.

  He wedged both boots this time and pulled with all his strength.

  The doors ripped from the roller rails and wobbled back and forth like spindly sheet metal.

  “Finally!” Adam cheered. “Some good luck.”

  He repeated this action on the other two cabinets, harvesting twelve long slender doors. Adam stacked four of them together side by side and wrapped a blanket around them. He floated over to the escape hatch door.

  “Think! Think! Think!” he said out loud.

  Adam put another blanket over the opening as best he could, then stacked four of the cabinet doors over it. The moment he turned away, the contraption started to float apart.

  “Yeva, I know I said don’t move, but I have to hold these in place while you try to pressurize the ship. Can you float slowly over to the environmental control panel and crank up the pressure?”

  “Yes,” she said sparingly.

  Yeva manipulated her pressure suit over to the environmental control
panel while Adam re-assembled the door stack.

  “Slowly now, just enough air to hold this in place,” Adam explained.

  Yeva turned the valves to allow pressure from the storage tanks into the spaceship interior. They heard a creaking sound and saw the panels over the escape hatch starting to bow outward.

  Hold, baby, hold, Adam thought to himself.

  Crunch!

  The single layer of door panels buckled and blew out the door opening. Adam grabbed onto a wall bulkhead just in time to not get sucked out himself.

  “Damn, that was close. I’ll try two layers of panels. That’s all we got left.”

  Adam floated back to the sleeping bay, picked up another blanket and went back to the hatch opening. He put the blanket over it and then stacked two layers of the sheet metal doors over it, interlocking their edges to make it stronger.

  “Okay, let’s try that again,” Adam said. He circled his hand in the air to signal Yeva to crank up the pressure again.

  Yeva slowly turned the valve this time. The panels barely creaked. She halted the valve to examine the situation.

  Adam gave her a thumbs-up.

  Yeva started increasing the pressure valve again. “We’re at 8 psi right now. Almost ready to breath.”

  She continued increasing pressure. The doors bowed out even more with a severe creaking sound.

  “Something is wrong, Adam. I keep opening the pressure valve, but the cabin isn’t maintaining pressure. The blankets must be a terrible seal. We may be done for.”

  “Not yet,” Adam declared. “We’ll figure some way to make it airtight.”

  Adam had to seal where the blankets were getting smashed against the door frame opening. He floated over to the kitchen and searched through the food box for something that could work as a sealant. He saw the bags of liquid steak and pulled two out. They were frozen hard as rock.

  Adam put them in the microwave.

  “Can you believe our survival relies on a TV dinner?” Adam quipped to help Yeva’s mood.