Luke regarded the tray with contempt. "Now that is what I call one pretty little salad bar. Pretty little, that is."
"Maybe you'd prefer one pretty little punch in the mouth," Rebecca retorted. "Do you have any idea how hard I worked to raise these things?"
Townsend gave the time-out signal. "That's enough. We're all working hard. Dr. Sherman, what's the projected greenhouse yield rate?"
Rebecca managed to calm herself. "Actually, much better than I ever expected. We've packed it to the gills with racks and maxed out the possible rates of nutrient, water, and power flows. I don't see how any further improvements are possible. But with the cycle we have going now, the greenhouse will soon be functioning at a level that would allow it to support three people indefinitely."
"Which three did you have in mind?" Gwen glared at the biologist.
There was a moment of shocked silence in the galley.
Townsend cleared his throat. "That remark was uncalled for, Major. If we can maintain these yields, then by combining the greenhouse output with short rationing of the Beagle's supplies, we can last until a resupply ship makes it out in late 2016."
Gwen was unconvinced. "If a resupply ship is sent out in 2016."
Townsend slammed his fist down on the table. "It will be."
"You don't know that, Colonel," Luke stated in a matter-of-fact drawl.
"No, I don't, but I believe it. We've all got to believe it." The mission commander looked around the room, fighting hard to suppress his own feeling of inner hysteria. "We can't give up hope. We can make it if we don't give up hope, and if we don't start tearing each other up."
Observing how Townsend's insistence was having the opposite of the intended effect, McGee wisely changed the subject. "Those radishes look awfully good, Rebecca. Mind if I try one?"
Gratified to have at least one appreciative customer, she smiled. "One, Kevin. Just one. There's one for each of us, unless of course Dr. Johnson here doesn't care to partake of this humble fare."
The geologist had spent the last several minutes staring at Rebecca's greens, and as small as they were, their freshness had overcome his resistance. "No, no, I'll do my part." He hastily snatched his portion.
Though they ate slowly, it did not take long to consume the meager amounts. Still, Townsend realized that the first harvest on Mars needed to be regarded as an event of some significance. This really is our Thanksgiving dinner, he thought. Let's treat it that way.
Pretending to be full, he patted his belly, which two months of hard digging had transformed into a washboard that would have been applauded by any Air Force fitness instructor. "Well, that was excellent. Why don't we celebrate our first harvest a little? Professor, would you mind singing us one of your songs?"
McGee was surprised at such a request from Colonel Townsend, but felt that a celebration was in order, too. "Okay."
Gwen's eyes were suddenly filled with longing. "Make it something about home."
It took McGee only a moment to retrieve the undersized guitar from his berth. Seating himself, he strummed a few chords to tune his instrument. "All right, Gwen, here's to home." He began to sing softly:
Oh, Shenandoah, I long to hear you. Away, you rolling river. Oh, Shenandoah, I can't get near you. Away, away, I'm bound away Across the wide Missouri.
As McGee strummed on, tears began to form in the corners of the major's eyes. Noting the effect the song was having on her, Luke decided to join in, leaning closer to the flight mechanic. "I'll take it from here.
Shenandoah, I love your daughter. Away, you rolling river. I'll take her across the yellow water. Away, away, I'm bound away Across the wide Missouri.
The lusty way Luke sang made Gwen blush a bit. She rewarded the Texan geologist with her smile and attention, yet her eyes kept straying back to McGee, who softly continued his accompaniment on the guitar.
OPHIR PLANUM
MAY 26, 2012 18:15 MLT
The television screen showed thousands of people, hundreds of thousands, filling New York's Central Park with banners and green crosses. From the bandstand, opposition presidential candidate Senator Matt Fairchild raved to the cheering multitudes, saying exactly what they wanted to hear.
As Gwen watched in disgust, the pandering politician raised his hands with double V for victory signs to exult in the roaring approval of his supporters. Mercifully, the video clip ended and was followed by a newscaster at his desk addressing other events.
McGee turned from the newscast to pull the mission commander aside. "Colonel, I have bad news from my political friend in the White House. A secret poll conducted by the Administration shows things heading full-speed toward a loss in November. If that happens, our chance of a rescue flight drops to nil."
Townsend nodded. "Still, it's not over until—"
"Damnation!" Gwen shouted, suddenly interrupting them all.
Startled by the outburst, the colonel turned to her. "What happened?"
"The Braves lost again."
McGee exchanged a significant glance with Townsend. "Colonel, deep inside, every member of this crew knows no relief is coming, so they're all beginning to withdraw. I've seen this before, in the Arctic. Gwen's slipping into fantasy. Rebecca's gone silent, walling herself off from the rest of the crew."
Townsend frowned. "Doesn't sound too healthy."
Rebecca, who had just emerged from the lab, overheard the remark. "Healthy! I'll tell you what would be healthy. We should stop marking time and start thinking of a way to get ourselves out of this mess."
The colonel regarded her coolly. "And how would you recommend we do that, Doctor?"
Rebecca's eyes were filled with fire. "We're currently producing a lot more water than we need for the greenhouse. I say we electrolyze the excess and start making rocket fuel! Let's get home by ourselves."
Townsend shook his head. "I've looked into that. At our current rate of water extraction, if we used the excess as propellant feedstock, it would take a decade to produce enough fuel to drive the ERV home. Rescue is certainly more likely by then. We're better off keeping the water as a reserve for our consumable stock."
"No we're not. McGee may be playing amateur shrink, but his points are on the mark. This crew is cracking up. There's no way we'll last ten years, or even four. We've got to fight our way out of here, Colonel—this year, or it's all over."
"I admire your spirit, Doctor, but what you're suggesting is impossible. We'd have to up our water production rate by ten times."
"Five and a half times," Rebecca corrected. "Half of our current extraction is going to the greenhouse."
Townsend looked at her. In the past, Rebecca's appearance had always been immaculate, her manner calm, her logic impeccable. Now her hair was uncombed, her clothes unkempt. Perhaps her mind was even unbalanced. Cracking up indeed. He began to answer slowly. "Five and a half times, then. It's still imp—"
"No it's not!" She placed both of her fists on the table and leaned over to look the colonel in the eye. "Our current rate is based upon one two-man, six-hour digging shift per day. If we go to two two-person shifts, each twelve hours long, we'd have four times the soil throughput."
"Still not enough."
"It could be," Luke mused, coming into the discussion. "The deeper soil is likely to have greater moisture content than the stuff we've been shoveling."
"Precisely!" Rebecca welcomed this support from an unexpected quarter.