Ghost kept her eyes on where she was driving, but said, “Good morning.”
“How long have I slept?”
“Nearly two hours.”
“Where are we going?”
“For now, far enough away to be safe from their cleanup operation.”
“What if they send a crew? You should take me back. I should be there. I can help them.”
She shook her head. “We talked about this. They’re not sending a crew. How could they? Think about it; they’re trying to maintain the illusion that we’re not here. Sending ten rovers over with six people in each to spend three days tidying up is going to leave a highway for NASA’s orbiter to pick up instead.”
“They have airships,” Wei suggested.
“They’ve been grounded for years. Besides, for the mess the meteors made of your landers, they’ll need heavy equipment. They probably have some of that back at Mars Command, but they just couldn’t get it there in time.”
“I can’t believe they’re going to nuke it.”
“It’s low kiloton. The order has already been given.”
“And the Americans won’t spot that?”
She took her gaze off the path ahead for a moment and glanced at him. “If they do, it will be suggested it is just another meteor impact. Think of it. A nuke will vaporize all the evidence of the base, while also rearranging the surface with a fresh coating of rock and dust once the molten component cools down. There won’t even be a set of tire marks left, not even from us, thanks to our scrubbers.”
He looked down into the crater, to where one impact lay just off the center. Even from here, perhaps eight kilometers away, he could see bits of white that marked the wreckage of the landers.
She put a hand to his shoulder for a moment and gave it a squeeze. “It’s all gone, and the only way you’re going to survive for now is with me.” She paused and chuckled, before adding, “Don’t fight it. You’re as good as a Renegade!”
He found her touch reassuring, but to have his only option going renegade spelled out to him like that made him uncomfortable. “No, I’m not.”
She took her hand away and turned back to watching where she was going. “I’m going to get us as far away as I can before we both can catch up on some sleep. I had to drive through all of last night to pick you up.”
“How did you know?”
She turned the rover, heading away from the crater’s edge and leaving it behind. “I told you, we listen in on the comms. Initially we saw it as a salvage opportunity, but also a chance to collect some survivors.” She paused and softened her voice, “I’m sorry that you’ve lost the rest of your squad brothers.”
“So, where will we sleep?”
“In the rover, but I know somewhere we can collect some supplies and get cover at the same time. We’ll be there by sunset.”
He thought on that, and on how long she had already been driving, concentrating on a road that didn’t exist. Ahead, outside of the windshield, was nothing but Martian vista with no obvious path to follow. “How do you know where to go?”
“It’s mapped for me, but I’ve also been this way before.”
“More salvage missions?”
“Yes, something like that.”
“Are you alright to keep going? Do you need to stop and rest yourself?”
“I’ve taken some stims and set some alerts if I drift off course. We’ll both know if they sound. I should be alright until we hit tonight’s campsite.”
“Okay.”
“Really, just get some sleep.”
“How much food and water do you carry?”
“Enough, just. We’ve got four more days in the rover before we get to your new home.”
“What is this new home? Is it a lander or a habitat?”
“It’s a habitat. A big one. We’ve been working on it since we left the mission a decade ago. Initially it was bare survival stuff, and it still is at its core, but the more established it becomes, the more parts of it look after itself.”
“You mean ecosystems within a biosphere?”
“Yes. We’re beyond just surviving in it, so now we’re working on expanding it and building backups.”
“How big is it?”
“Big enough for more people than we have, but it is not huge. We have plans, though, so we’re already building other segments and independent sections so that we’re building in redundancy. We don’t want to put it at risk of single incidents, whether breaches or pathogens.”
“Segments? Is it a lava tube?”
“The first parts are, but we’ve spread to some other caverns. You’ll see.”
“It is all so tenuous. How do you manage it, though? You can’t salvage everything you need from the Mars Command bases.”
“We don’t need to. You’ll see.”
“So you keep saying.”
“Wei, just sleep now and be glad you’re alive.”
The landscape lit up, suddenly illuminated by something unleashed far behind them.
Wei cried out and tried to turn around in his seat to see what had happened.
Ghost brought the rover around so they could look out the windshield before coming to a stop.
In the distance, from over the orange horizon, a mushroom cloud rolled up into the sky. They both looked on, Wei in horror, Ghost in fascination.
She said, “There’s your cleanup operation.”
He was shaking his head. “They would have killed me.”
“Mission protocols and all that. Someone in Beijing would have made the decision and pushed the button. It’s nothing personal.”
The blast wave hit them, stirring up a haze of tan dust and making the rover rock gently on its suspension.
She said, “Get some sleep. Some of the road is a bit rough, so you’ll wake up again before we hit our camping site.”
He nodded and tried, but his thoughts were full of his friend Shan, his body now vaporized or buried under the ruin of the lava tube. And thoughts of Shan, the man who had saved Wei’s life, also triggered a darker memory.
Of Dog.
Dog standing there waiting for him.
Chapter 20
Houxing MingLing Yi (Mars Command One), Mars
Yong and Commander Tung watched with the rest of the command crew as their hub drone relayed the feed of the nuclear detonation and rising mushroom cloud.
Base Five Two was gone.
Commander Tung said, “Well, that’s done for now. Anyone who has been working twelve hours or more needs to get some sleep.”
Exhausted looks and nods were exchanged amongst the drained crew.
Multiple shifts were on at the moment, so those who had worked through the last of the previous day and night now rose to have a break. As Tung turned to go to his office, Yong also got up and followed him.
His officer quietly asked, “Commander, what about the drone?”
Tung stopped and leaned close to him, glancing at the nearest cameras, trying to keep his voice down, but also his lips obscured so no lip-reading algorithm could work out what he would say. “We were lucky to find the tracks. Set the hub to keep following on autopilot mode. Cut the data feed link and set it to return when it loses the trail or registers no movement for twelve hours. We’ll review the data it collects when it gets back. For now, just don’t draw attention to it.”
Yong nodded, but he wanted more. Nervously, he asked, “Who has taken him?”
His commander was already shaking his head. “Don’t ask.”
The officer stood there needing more.
Tung put his hands on Yong’s shoulders and patted them, trying to look like he was consoling an officer upset at having lost the last survivor of Base Five Two. Under the motion, he leaned in close again and looked down, so his face was again obscured. “You know who probably got him as well as I do.”