A Mars Odyssey Read online

  ‘’Alright, follow me, friends!’’ said Jiang Min before opening the inner door of the airlock giving access to the forward carrousel. Once his whole group was inside that airlock, he secured the inner door and checked on an indicator panel that the forward carrousel was effectively pressurized and that its air was breathable. Only then did he open the outer door, which swung inside the airlock, and set foot on the narrow platform adjacent to the edge of the top level deck of the forward carrousel, also known as the Promenade Deck. Looking left and right, he saw the apparently endless floor of the Promenade Deck, which curved gently upward on both sides along the circumference of a circle with a radius of 65 meters. That deck was a full seven meter-wide and its ceiling stood over four meter-high, giving it a very generous internal volume compared to that of even orbital space stations. There were however three additional decks under this one, while another, similar carrousel stood on the other side of an airtight wall separating the two carrousels. Keiko Minegumi smiled with contentment as she eyed the vast carrousel space.

  ‘’This is great! Such vast spaces should do wonders for the morale of the future crew of the FRIENDSHIP. And to be able to travel as well while feeling close to one G of artificial gravity along the whole trip to Mars will prevent so many health issues.’’

  ‘’Those were exactly the reasons that pushed our respective space program managers into requiring that this ship have contra-rotating carrousels, Keiko.’’ said Min. ‘’However, those carrousels won’t start to rotate by themselves, so let’s get to work! Keiko, Roberto, you come with me down the left side. Benjamin and Omar, you go down the right side. Remember, we have a total of eight braking clamps to disengage on both sides. We will meet again here once we complete our tour around this carrousel.’’

  On their part, Mark Dempsey and Denise Wattling went down the communication tube all the way to the central axis core section, which contained the most vital systems of the spaceship deep within its bowels and well protected against the most penetrating radiations. They again had to open an airtight door before exiting the tube and entering the core section, carefully closing it back before proceeding further: in space, safety rules, while sometimes appearing to be inflexible, always had a clear purpose and one only ignored them at their peril. Securing back every airtight door you went through was possibly one of the most primordial of those safety rules. Using their magnetic soles to walk along the surfaces of the compartments they went through, the pair soon arrived at a section surrounded by a water-filled jacket. That section, which contained the command and control systems of the spaceship, was also meant to act as an ultimate anti-radiation citadel for the crew in the case of abnormally powerful solar storms or cosmic ray shower. Even the access hatch to that section had its own water jacket, making it distinctly heavier than the other airtight doors in the ship. Going through that hatch and closing it, the two astronauts then floated to the airtight door of the command center proper and entered that compartment, which was filled with work stations, status display screens, computers and padded seats. Mark Dempsey went first to the work station reserved for the duty engineer and strapped himself in its seat, while Denise Wattling went to the communications station. The first thing Mark did was to check on the auxiliary power systems, to see if all the solar energy panels of the spaceship had properly deployed once the disk section had attained parking orbit. To his satisfaction, all of the solar panels, along with the multiple radiator panels, had deployed correctly.

  ‘’Excellent! Even without the nuclear power plant online, we already have enough juice to light up the inside of the ship. Let there be light!’’

  Throwing in succession a series of switches, he was rewarded by the main ceiling lamps of the compartment lighting up. Throwing another series of switches turned on the ventilation and air recycling system of the central core section.

  ‘’It is now safe to open our visors, Denise.’’

  ‘’Thanks! On my part, I am in audio and visual communication with the other members of the team. I am now switching on the internal and external surveillance cameras of the ship.’’

  Mark was about to ask a question to Denise when the instruments on his work station registered a sudden and massive surge in electrical power on the main circuits. That prompted him to call Viktor Ponichnikov, who had gone to the main reactor plant with Max Kruger.

  ‘’Hey, Viktor! That was some fast work!’’

  ‘’Hell,’’ replied the Russian nuclear engineer, ‘’I only had to throw a few switches and power breakers! No need to praise me for so little.’’

  ‘’Alright then, I will say instead that you simply did your usual, barely adequate work, Viktor.’’

  The noise that the Russian made in response made Mark and Denise laugh briefly. With plenty of electrical power now at hand, Mark next contacted Jiang Min and his team.

  ‘’Min, this is Mark. How are you doing in the carrousels?’’

  ‘’We have taken off up to now five of the rotating brakes of the forward carrousel. I will call you back when both carrousels will be ready for rotation. By the way, thanks for the extra lights and powers.’’

  ‘’Thank Viktor for that!’’

  Mark and Denise then concentrated on running a long, extensive checklist of systems, making sure that the powerful vibrations caused at launch had not disconnected some wires or shaken some equipment loose. They were still going down their checklist when Min called back twenty minutes later.

  ‘’Mark, this is Min! All the rotating brakes have now been released. We are ready to start the rotation of the carrousels.’’

  ‘’Excellent! Just brace yourselves at first, in case of some glitch.’’

  ‘’We are all strapped into seats on the top deck main promenade, Mark. You may go ahead now.’’

  ‘’Understood! Powering up the magnetic cushions and rotation motors now!’’

  Mark watched like a hawk the various indicators connected to the rotating carrousels as he very gradually powered them up. His biggest fear was that the strong vibrations at launch would have deformed the rings or their running tracks, thus making useless a vital part of the ship. To his relief, everything seemed to be working smoothly at first.

  ‘’Min, how are things sounding and feeling out there?’’

  ‘’I can hear the soft humming of the magnetic motors and I also can feel a growing sensation of gravity here. Keep going!’’

  Encouraged by those words, Mark continued to gradually augment the rotation speed of the carrousels, until they attained their normal operating speed of 3.7 revolutions per minute.

  ‘’How’s that now, Min?’’

  ‘’I can tell you that we are now feeling a centrifugal force of 0.84 G here on the Promenade Deck of the forward carrousel. Ben, how are things in the aft carrousel?’’

  Benjamin Weiss answered Min nearly at once on the radio.

  ‘’Our carrousel is also rotating smoothly, with a local felt centrifugal force of 0.84 G. Me and Omar will now go configure the inside of our carrousel for rotating status.’’

  ‘’Acknowledged! I will do the same here with Keiko and Roberto.’’ replied Min.

  ‘’Great work, all of you!’’ said Mark on the radio. ‘’And that includes you, Viktor! You may now go to your assigned cabins and get out of your spacesuits before continuing your work: it will make your jobs a lot easier to be in light internal suits.’’

  Mark next looked at Denise, still sitting at the communications station.

  ‘’You may go to your designated cabin now and take off your spacesuit before coming back here. I will man the communications with Vandenberg in the meantime.’’

  ‘’Thanks, Mark! I will make it quick.’’

  The tall blonde ex-fighter pilot got up from her padded seat and floated out of the command center, then went to the circulation tube connecting the core section with the third quadrant of the disk section. Denise chose to continue floating w
hile negotiating the tube for fifty meters, as she loved to go around in zero gravity. Then transferring into the forward carrousel, she walked part of its top deck circumference, going to the secondary staircase leading down to the portion of the second deck where her assigned cabin was situated. Along the way, she couldn’t help admire and appreciate the décor of the Main Promenade: everything had been done to provide the crew of the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP with an environment that would do the utmost to make them forget that they were actually in a spaceship on a trip away from Earth. Ultra-large, Super High Definition 3-D displays made to look like windows giving views to the outside, showed a variety of beautiful Earth sceneries, complete with appropriate soundtracks of wind blowing and birds singing. The displayed videos were actually films recorded in situ on Earth and covering in real time over a year of constant filming, adding a touch of seasonal changes to the reality of the scenery displayed. The furniture along the promenade, while made with lightweight materials, had been designed to look like old-fashioned furniture instead of the techno look too common on orbital space stations. Denise actually passed by displays showing the city of Paris at night, as would have been seen from one of the observation decks of the famous Eiffel Tower, as she approached the stairwell that was her destination. Those views of Paris also were quite appropriately displayed in the area occupied on the Promenade Deck by the bar-lounge of the ship, with soft accordion music reminiscent of the 1920s piped out by an overhead speaker. Further on the Promenade Deck, Denise could see the area of the crew cafeteria, which had been made to look like the inside of a classic road-side American dinner restaurant, complete with partitioned booths with tables and padded benches, while the display screens in that section showed the panorama of a Midwest prairie, with a busy highway running by the dinner.

  ‘’This is as close to a dream spaceship as I will ever see.’’ Said Denise to herself as she went down the stairs leading to the second deck, where individual crew cabins were. Her own cabin, numbered 047, shared a bathroom with the adjacent Cabin 048 and was situated only ten meters from the foot of the staircase leading up to the Promenade Deck. Pushing open the sliding door of her cabin, Denise stood for a moment in the doorway while eyeing her personal accommodations. Her cabin was actually configured like a mini-suite, with a small lounge with a sofa, work desk and wall entertainment unit next to the entrance. Crossing the lounge in four wide steps, she entered the adjacent bedroom, a compact affair containing a fairly large bed with storage drawers underneath, a clothes closet with storage shelves and an airtight compartment with a solid door meant to act as an emergency refuge in case of a sudden, catastrophic decompression. That emergency compartment also acted as a storage locker for one spacesuit, something that allowed Denise to get out of her own custom-fitted spacesuit. Now wearing a two-piece internal ship outfit and a pair of soft slippers with magnetic soles, she took out of one of the drawers under her bed the large personal effects bag that had been stored there before the launch of the disk section and that contained her spare clothes, personal things and hygiene kit that would help her spend the next two months aboard the spaceship. She then used a couple of minutes to distribute her things between her bedroom closet, the drawers of her lounge’s work desk and the small cabinet reserved for her use inside the common bathroom she would share with Keiko Minegumi, the assigned occupant of Cabin 048. That bathroom was small but it did contain a standard flush toilet, a sink and counter and a shower stall, plus a padded bench to sit down, plus wall hooks for towels. The toilet and sink were meant to be used only when the carrousels were rotating and providing artificial gravity, but a zero gravity toilet stall was situated thirty meters down the hallway, in case of a malfunction of the carrousels. If that ever happened, then a safety cover would automatically slide in place over her flush toilet and sink, preventing their use. The last touch that Denise put to her cabin before leaving it was to hang from a pre-installed wall hook a framed picture of her parents. At the age of 38, she still was not married and had no children, as she had concentrated her life on her career as a fighter pilot first, then on her second career as an astronaut. In this, Denise was far from being an oddity in NASA’s Astronaut Corps. Once she was satisfied that everything in her cabin was in order, she left to return to the command center and replace Mark Dempsey there.

  07:13 (GMT)

  Crew cafeteria, Promenade Deck of the forward carrousel

  The nine astronauts joined back together at the crew cafeteria for breakfast, or for whatever kind of meal their stomach felt like having, as the official ship time, synchronized with the Greenwich Meridian, was eight hours ahead of the local time at Vandenberg Space Base, from where their light shuttle had taken off. While the cafeteria of the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP was equipped to serve a wide variety of food, either fresh, freeze-dried or out of tin cans, its pantry and cold room was presently mostly empty, as the disk section had to be as light as possible initially for its launch into orbit. However, a couple of tons of foodstuff and beverages had been stored aboard prior to launch, so that Dempsey’s team could have something to eat during their two month-long stay. Heavy shuttles would come later to fill the storage rooms of the ship, bring to orbit the remaining sections of the FRIENDSHIP and fill its fuel tanks.

  Denise finally decided to go for a supper menu after reviewing the list of rations available and selected Chicken à la King with rice for her meal, along with a glass of fresh milk. Ripping open the two pouches containing the two main components of her meal and pouring their content in a deep, partitioned plastic food tray, she then put the tray inside one of the microwave ovens lining one of the service counters of the cafeteria, heating her food before grabbing her tray and glass of milk and walking to one of the booths of the cafeteria. Seeing Mark Dempsey already sitting in a booth and eating with Viktor Ponichnikov, she decided to join them and went to their booth, stopping beside it and smiling to the two male occupants.

  ‘’Would you guys mind if I sit at your table?’’

  Viktor gave her an amused smile on hearing her question.

  ‘’And why would we refuse to eat with one of the only two women aboard, and a pretty blonde at that?’’

  ‘’Ha! I smell an ulterior motive in your answer, Viktor.’’

  ‘’Well, I am a nuclear engineer and I like to plan things in advance. That goes both on and off work for me. Please sit, Denise.’’

  Denise put her tray, utensils and glass down on the table before sitting next to Mark Dempsey, facing Viktor. A quick look told her that the Russian had gone for a supper of Beef Stroganoff, while Mark had selected a steak with mashed potatoes.

  ‘’I see that you guys went for substantial meals, rather than for breakfast menus.’’

  ‘’Hey, we did work hard and accomplished a lot in the last few hours.’’ replied Mark, a 43 year-old systems engineer who had built a successful private career for himself before a NASA recruiter had convinced him to join the space agency. ‘’And we still have lots left to do, so why stay hungry? After all, the ship’s gymnasium is well equipped and we could burn there any excess calories that we eat.’’

  ‘’You know that there is a nicely equipped sauna and baths section next to the gymnasium, right?’’ said Viktor while looking with a malicious expression at Denise. ‘’There are also massage tables and even bubble baths there.’’

  ‘’Hum, you definitely have ulterior motives, Viktor…but I would be happy to sink into a hot tub with you and the rest of the gang tonight.’’

  That made the Russian rub his hands together, while glee showed on his face.

  ‘’Yes! The more people, the merrier!’’

  ‘’Please excuse him, Denise.’’ cut in Mark with a smirk. ‘’They found him somewhere deep in Siberia, so he is somewhat lacking in social skills.’’

  ‘’That’s alright with me, Mark: I appreciate lonely, sex-starved men from deep in the woods and snow.’’

  Keiko Minegumi and Roberto Calderon, who wer
e eating at the booth across the aisle from their booth, obviously heard that and gave falsely indignant looks at Denise.

  ‘’Denise! I didn’t know that you were like that!’’ exclaimed the Spaniard before lowering his voice and adding in a conspiratorial tone. ‘’Can we join you in the hot tub tonight?’’

  ‘’Only if Keiko comes in as well.’’ replied Denise, straight-faced, before bursting into a giggle. ‘’God, this really sounds risqué, isn’t it?’’

  ‘’The more risqué, the better!’’ said Viktor. ‘’Hey, our respective space agencies have been too hypocritical and prudish for too long on the subject of sex in space, so why not push the envelope a bit now? With the incredible facilities aboard this ship and its artificial gravity environment, most of the old excuses to ban sex in space no longer hold water.’’

  Keiko Minegumi, a pretty, 36 year-old computer scientist, bent towards Viktor while pointing an accusing index at him.

  ‘’I heard that some unspeakable things happened in orbit years back, aboard your MIR space station, Viktor. You wouldn’t know anything about that, by chance?’’

  The jovial Russian put on a falsely offended expression at that question.

  ‘’Me? Why would I know anything about those space sex experiments?’’

  That declaration made the whole group break out in laughter. Holding her own laughter with difficulty, Denise shook an index at the Russian.

  ‘’Viktor, you are a real pervert!’’

  ‘’And a proud one at that! This however leaves an existential question to answer.’’

  His four companions looked at each other with confusion, until Roberto asked Viktor about it.

  ‘’And what would that question be, by chance?’’

  ‘’Simple: do we bathe together tonight with or without bathing suits?’’ replied the grinning Russian, winking twice. A concert of ‘OOOHH’ then came from the four other members of their team, who had been eating in nearby booths and had been listening with widening grins to the exchange. Denise then answered Viktor while keeping a straight face.