“You really think you’ll get any rest during this race?” she asked.
“Have to. No way we can both stay awake and alert for two whole days,” he replied.
As far as she could see he’d made only minor modifications to the frame and running gear of the bike and thereby stayed within the design parameters that had been set for the racers.
Taylor’d also “borrowed” a precise inertial navigation instrument from JBI. It would provide them with a detailed picture of their precise location on the mountain. The inertial was accurate to within a half-meter and designed to withstand the intense beatings as the ships were tossed about by Jupiter’s fierce storms. He doubted that a little vibration from the Mars bike would affect it at all.
Using the photo-maps, Surra and he had programmed the unit for every centimeter of the route they intended to follow. They would know exactly where they were even if they couldn’t see where they were going. Of course, there was nothing that could obscure their vision, so they would never have to exercise that option.
Surra proved that she had the best route and had shown him the details on her map back in her room. She knew a few things about the old lady that wouldn’t show up in the photos. He would never have thought about the small craters caused by millennia of meteor bombardments on Olympus’s flanks, nor the hair-thin cracks that were still wide enough to catch a wheel were they to enter on a shallow angle. But she knew how to steer clear of these minor obstacles.
The path that she wanted to follow appeared foolish and frightening at first. She wanted them to leave Chu San’s route and traverse a set of rimae to the southeast. The width and depth of those deep cracks would convince the others that they should swing to the north and west. That would take them on a long time-and distance-wasting switchback. If Taylor’s bike could make it through the shallow fissure, as Surra swore they could, they would save considerable time.
“I’ll trust your judgment,” he’d agreed cautiously as he squinted at the map. “But if I die you’re going to have to deal with grandpa!”
“Got the balls to drive like a bat out of hell down the biggest mountain in the Solar System but can’t deal with your own grandfather!” she said incredulously. “You’re a wonder, Taylor; a blooming wonder.”
“You haven’t met JB,” Taylor warned. “He’s a rough old coot who’d sooner die than admit he’s wrong on anything. He’s intimidated me ever since I can remember.”
He hesitated, wondering just how much to let her know about his family. “Getting out from under gramps is why I’m doing this.” he started to explain but, when he saw her raise an eyebrow, he stopped. “Forget it. That’s my problem, not yours.”
“Yeah, I got my own problems to worry about,” Surra replied.
“Does it have anything to do with why they call you Jinx?” he asked innocently.
“Mind your own business, kid.” Surra snapped.
“Magnificent, isn’t it?” Surra had said the previous evening as she stood beside him at the lip of the plateau.
Taylor had been staring to the southeast. “I thought we’d see the tips of the three sisters,” he indicated their direction with a sweep of his hand. “I didn’t realize that they’d be below the horizon.”
Surra laughed. “We’re nearly thirty kilometers up, kid; completely out of the atmosphere. At this height the horizon’s only five hundred kilometers away. Does that figure sound familiar?” She tried to keep the teasing note out of her voice.
Taylor screwed up his face, as if he were trying to figure out the joke. “That’s half the diameter of Mons,” he said at last.
“Right, and that’s why you can’t see the peaks of Archaeus, Arisa, and Pavonis—from here all you can see is Olympus Mons herself. Ain’t nothing but mountain down there—she’s a big one, all right.”
She let that soak in for a while and then hit him on the shoulder of his suit. “That’s enough sight-seeing. We need to get the bike ready for the run tomorrow.” Without waiting to see if he was following she headed for the blister they’d erected earlier.
Surra removed her helmet once they had the blister pressurized. It was easier to work that way. She left the rest of the suit on for protection against the bone-chilling cold of outer space. Olympus hadn’t been active for a few million years and there was no way they could gather any warmth from the vacuum surrounding her peak. The only place they could shed the suits completely was inside Bottomos station.
The research facility had originally been equipped for a staff of twenty and was now cramped with the fifty-odd racers, officials, and well-wishers that had squeezed into it for the race. With only a few square meters apiece the crowd tried to make the best of the situation; some sat talking quietly, others busied themselves by painstakingly going over their suits and gear, and some were just trying to get as much sleep as they could before the start of the race. Although there was an air of good-natured, shared competitiveness, most of the old Mars hands were very pointedly avoiding her.
“Why aren’t they talking to you?” Taylor asked. “Is it that jinx thing again?”
“Did you major in Asshole 101 in engineering school, Taylor?” she barked angrily.
“What did I say? All I wanted to know was why your friends weren’t talking to you.” Taylor looked all of his twenty-eight years, dewy-eyed and innocent.
Surra debated telling him about Gaspar, but held off. Too damn many ears close by to hear, too many who might chime in with their own interpretation of events that night she’d put the curse on his downhill run. Too many who’d just as soon toss her out the lock as let her in the race.
“Maybe I’ve got bad breath,” she told him.
At that point Jack Fleth came through the lock with a big-arsed grin on his face. He glared at her and then hastened to the far end of the station.
She and Gaspar, her partner, had tangled with Fleth over who had rights to the water meteor they’d found at Petera. They’d won, but not without a brutal fight that made the lawyers rich and both of them poorer.
Fleth was canal scum, the worse of a rough bunch of rogue prospectors who’d sooner steal a claim than stake one themselves. Rumor had it that he’d had a few too many claims in places where people had caught the vacuum disease. Nothing concrete, just enough suspicion to make people uncomfortable.
You took precautions when Fleth was about.
“I’m going to check on the bike,” she said casually. It was as good an excuse as any to get away from Taylor’s innocent and hurtful questions. She suited up and cycled through the lock.
The blister looked untouched, but then everyone up here knew how to operate a vacuum zipper, so that was no assurance. She opened the closure and went inside.
A quick examination of the bike showed nothing obviously wrong. The locks Taylor had put on the hatches were still closed and, for the first time, she regretted calling him foolish for bringing them. The tires looked all right, not that you could harm the fat, metal mesh doughnuts. They were built to take the punishment of the sharp Martian rocks.
There was a barely noticeable coating of silvery dust on one of the struts that hadn’t been there a few hours earlier, when she had adjusted the steering cable. She wiped the dust with her glove and examined the residue on the tips. It was definitely metallic, but from where? She looked about.
There, right at the point where the steering cable entered the housing, was a bright line. She placed one foot on a strut, stepped up, and looked closer.