Rebecca murmured sotto voce to McGee, "About time he noticed."
Embarrassed by his outburst, Townsend said, "Oh well, there goes my chance for rhetorical immortality. Why don't each of you go before the camera and make your own speech? Major, you first."
Gwen took a step forward and then turned to face McGee's camera.
"This is Major Guenevere Llewellyn, the first woman to set foot on another planet. God created the planets and the Earth, and has now seen fit to show us, His chosen creatures, some of His handiwork. The heavens tell the glory of God, says the Good Book, and this place shows the wonder of His work. Let us give thanks to God for bringing us safely here and pray that we prove ourselves worthy to be the instruments of His divine plan, whatever that may be."
As Gwen concluded her speech, she glanced momentarily at Rebecca. Townsend noticed the gesture. Was she trying to get a rise out of the secular biologist? "Dr. Sherman," he intervened, "your turn."
Rebecca took a deep breath. "We came here from an ecosphere teeming with ten million species of life. We have journeyed to our seemingly barren sister planet in hopes of discovering life that once was, or perhaps life that never quite began. If Mars has life, either in fossil form or still existing, this will strongly suggest that life must abound in the universe, and that the billions of stars we see on a clear night may mark the home systems of lush worlds too numerous to count, which harbor species and civilizations too diverse even to catalog. Knowing they exist, the human race can find its place among them, as true citizens of our galaxy.
"But if we find no clue of life here, then we ourselves must become the first Martians. Here, we shall replicate the terrestrial biosphere and help Mother Gaia herself give birth to a second living world."
Townsend smiled, but felt inwardly annoyed at the deliberate mention of a pagan goddess, sure to irk Major Llewellyn. Sherman's scientific rationalist pose had already caused enough friction with the other woman. The doctor might be a famous genius, but apparently lacked something in the common-sense department. Why doesn't anyone on this mission besides me ever think about maintaining group cohesiveness? "Well said," he pronounced thinly.
Inside her helmet Gwen whispered, "For a flake."
Luke Johnson scooped a soil sample into a screw-cap vial and then advanced to take his turn before the camera. "From the surface, a geologist can find truth. From orbit, this planet resembled our Moon, but from this perspective, Mars is clearly different. There are obvious water erosion features, yet it's totally dry now. With no hydrological cycle, the whole surface is fossilized as it was three billion years ago." The geologist paused for a moment, then startled everyone with his shout. "I've never seen anything like this in Texas. Yeeeehah!"
"Ride 'em cowboy," Rebecca commented to herself. "Apparently not only Mars is fossilized."
Townsend turned to the professor. "Any words from our historian?"
McGee walked a few paces, and then turned to face the tripod-mounted camera. "We who are here today are fulfilling what has been a dream of humankind since before the dawn of history. The drive to explore has always been fundamental to the human psyche. It has taken us out of Africa, across rivers, mountains, deserts, and oceans. New lands have always given rise to new cultures, and human civilization has grown and become enriched. But always, before the reality, must come the dream.
"It is the dreamers, not the explorers, who are the greatest heroes of progress, because they can see with their minds what the rest of us can only see with our eyes. A century ago one dreamer who led us to Mars was Percival Lowell, a scientist who thought he saw canals spanning this planet, bringing water from its poles to a thirsty civilization.
"Our cameras looking down from orbit showed no canals, no civilization. But standing here today, I think I can dimly see what Lowell saw—there will be canals here someday. Cities will rise, proud towering cities, perhaps with names like those Edgar Rice Burroughs coined in his wonderful, imaginative novels: Helium, Ptarth, Manator.
"Perhaps in the future some John Carter from Earth will come here to find love in the eyes of a Dejah Thoris, his beautiful Martian princess, and sing her praises under the hurtling moons of Mars. Stranger things have come to pass. For ourselves, who have yet to face the rigors of mankind's first five hundred days on this still cold and desert planet, I can only hope that we do as well as Lowell's explorers did: ‘We were not frostbitten for life, nor did we have to be rescued by a search party. We lived not unlike civilized beings during it all, and we actually brought back some of the information we went out to acquire.'
"Thank you Lowell, and Burroughs, for bringing us here; thanks to all the dreamers. Humanity owes its new world to you."
Luke touched his helmet to Gwen's and whispered, "And thank your partner on the White House staff for sticking us with you." He rolled his eyes. "To think we gave up our chemist for this blabbermouth."
Gwen didn't respond. Sure, the professor might be a bit loose around the edges, but there were worse sorts.
"Since that concludes the landing ceremony," Townsend declared crisply, "I suggest we all return to the ship. We have much to prepare before exploration operations can commence."
As they trooped back to the Hab module, Rebecca commented to McGee, "The American flag on Mars. What an anachronism."
Gwen overheard. That got her mad. "Now there's a fine example of modern liberal thinking," she fumed. "Sometimes I wonder where they find people like you."
Townsend observed the interchange, but said nothing. He would definitely have to keep his eyes on those two.
The hard work went on for hours as the crew unpacked the exploration gear from the Beagle. First they brought the pressurized rover out of the lower deck cargo compartment. Powered by a methane-oxygen combustion engine, the vehicle was designed to range as far as three hundred miles from the base at travel speeds of up to twenty-five miles per hour over the rough Martian terrain.
Then came the reserve-power solar panels and the inflatable experimental greenhouse. The unloading job wasn't easy. At three-eighths of normal gravity, each person was able to carry significantly heavier loads, but the inertia of each object was the same as on Earth. Most of the real work was done by Townsend, Luke, and Gwen. McGee's injured shoulder slowed him down considerably, and Rebecca was not a heavy lifter. But all five pitched in as best they could, and by evening the job was done.
Townsend surveyed the scene with some satisfaction. Boldly emblazoned with its flag-waving Snoopy mascot symbol, the Beagle would now serve as their base of operations, and as their home for the next five hundred days. Indeed, with the module's flying career over, the crew had already stopped referring to her as a "ship" and instead called her the Hab, a 38-ton living-module that resembled a huge drum twenty-seven feet in diameter and ceiling sixteen feet high. With two decks and a total floor area of 1,100 square feet, the Hab was large enough to comfortably accommodate the crew of five.
During the outbound flight, the lower deck had been crammed with cargo, and only the upper floor, divided into staterooms and function rooms, had been available as living space. Now that the unloading was complete, a significant part of the lower deck space would become available for human activity, providing the crew with a small workshop.
The added space also provided easy maintenance access to all systems necessary for surface operations. The Hab's closed-loop life-support system was capable of recycling oxygen and water, but successful, fully autonomous operation of such complex units for a year and a half was doubtful. However, with hands-on support to fix problems as they developed—especially with a mechanic as able as Gwen—the system could be considered nearly bulletproof.