Olympus Mons (17 page)

“¡Seguro!”
was Aguilar whispered endorsement.

He said it with such enthusiasm I didn't have the heart to tell him to talk American.

***

The days dragged past treadmill fashion, and not a dribble of aqua pura leaked from the pipeline. The holding tanks at the base of Olympus Rupes stayed bone dry, too, and the level of the pitiful few thousand gallons in Burroughs' twin reservoirs sank hourly, decimeter by decimeter. Scheiermann and the council continued to conscientiously ignore Jesperson's repeated warnings and pleas to invoke strict water rationing and recycle everything up to and including liquid waste. Aside from direct human and agricultural consumption, liters of water are sacrificed to humidify the considerable volume of dry, pressurized air circulated in Burroughs.

In one of the only bright spots, Jesperson's recruitment program took a pair of giant strides, with one of the acquisitions partly due to my persuasive powers. I helped change the thinking of Black-like-me, who believe it or not became our next convert, though to be honest bringing the ornery glassblower into our foot-sloggin' cadre resulted from my sly jiggery-pokery, not persuasion. Clive, Cleve or Clyde is subtle as a brick wall, and owns a skull twice as thick and hard to penetrate. Halfhearted greetings and salutations died fast on the afternoon I barged into the glassworks and hit him with an unvarnished line of blarney. “Say, tell me, Blood. You figure on livin' to a ripe old age?”

He looked up from the blowover he'd just cracked off
—
a little thin-walled bubble glassblowers form above the mold to make it easier to remove the finished item
—
and glowered at me. “What're you mumbling about, Barnes?”

“Just wondered,” I said, trying to keep it casual, “how long you figure to stick around.”

There was no comeback, but his glower upped from force two to force three.

“Hey!” I said, snapping my fingers, “Something occurred to me that just might be of concern to you. After working all day long in this sweatbox, I'll bet you cotton to downing a stein or two of brew much like the rest of us, right?”

The glower subsided a notch, giving way to a suspicious gleam in his dark eyes.

“Tough to say for sure,” I added, “but soon now it's liable to get real thirsty hereabouts. S'pose you'll be able to make it through a workday when there's no hope of wettin' your beak afterward?”

Hinting at a beer drought didn't revive the glower, it brought into view a set of bared ivories and the red glare of a rabid wolf. “Barnes, you been hangin' out too long with that mouthy white bread partner of yours. It's turned you into a trash-talkin' fool same as him.”

“Thanks, Blood. I take that as a compliment.”

“Take it any way you want, long as you take it outta my sight. Got a hunch you're about to spout crazy-in-the-head talk about climbin' the miserable damn volcano.”

“Matter of fact, it's why I looked you up.”

“Matter of fact it's a purely damfool notion,” he said extra-loudly, “and you know it well as me. Nobody, nohow ever be able t'climb that gawdawful mountain.”

I shrugged. “You could be right. Catch is, if my skinny white bread pal can't figure out a way to get us up there and do the fixin,' real soon now not a single liter of beer will be flowing hereabouts. No glassblowin' will be gettin' done, either.”

“At last night's meeting,” growled Black-like-me, coming a step closer, “they told us the big shots back home were getting set to put things right.”

“And you honest-to-God bought into
that
line of bullshit?”

Eyes slitted, he swelled up all puffy-faced, stuck his stubbled chin way too close to my forehead and said, “A damsight more'n I buy into the volcano climbin' crap you and the loudmouth whitey you run with keep spreadin' around. Talking about volcano climbin' is one thing, doin' the deed's something else again.”

I backed off a hair, doing a soft-shoe-shuffle out of harm's way. “Hope you won't get sore if I argue, Blood. Y'see, I'm dead certain Jesperson's peddling the straight skinny. The smoke he's putting out is a tiny puff compared to the greasy smudge those U.N. big shots are blowing our way. Instead of getting sore at me for telling it like it is, think about it, and think
hard
f'Chrissake! Even if the homeworld miracle workers decide to ship out a crew bound for Mars first thing tomorrow morning, it'll take E-months just to get here, let alone do whatever they've a mind to do about fixing the aqueduct. The bare-assed truth is as plain as plain gets, Blood: there's no time left for whatever the U.N. honchos maybe have in mind to do. No way can we keep breathing when our own council's bought into a stall this size.”

“Sez you,” he scoffed.

“Hey,” I told him, pretending to be offended while doing a faster soft-shoe, backaway shuffle, “ain't talking just to hear myself, Blood. I'm giving you the straight skinny. We either figure out how to climb the volcano and do a fix, or we all die dead. Got it?”

I could almost hear my words of wisdom click-clacking around in his woolly head like loose marbles. “‘Kay,” he said after a long silence, “I hear you, maybe go along part way with what you been sayin.' Trouble is, I've seen those cliffs more ‘n once. They're more'n just sky-high, they run damn near straight up. How's your whitey pal figure to haul his ass and some other's up there, let alone climb on a whole lot farther to do the fixin'?”

It was the question I'd been hoping for. Probably sounding like a mynah bird on steroids, I started throwing the lessons my partner'd taught me helter-skelter, and ended up, by explaining his notion about using the hoist system to get an upside jump on the escarpment.

“Horseshit!” The glassblower minces few words, and the notion to revive a three-decade-old winch-and-cable system stuck fast in his craw. “That stuff's been out in the open forever. By now it's a machinery junkpile, not fit to do diddly squat.”

“You could be right,” I admitted. “Then again, maybe not. The condition of that gear is anybody's guess. That's why we're heading out to have a gander at it, figure out what shape it's in. For the sake of arguing, let's say the winch and cable stuff may be close enough to being useful to get the job done. How'd you like to come along, help us find out?”

He sniffed, thought it over, said, “Too busy,” and turned away to pick up his blowpipe. The absence of a scowl told me his thinkmeat was working overtime.

“Fair enough, Blood.” I was ready to ootch out of the glassworks and let him stew about it by his lonesome. “One thing more,” I said in parting. “If you're dead set against coming along, do me a small favor. When Art pulls down the beer engine's handle and nothing comes out, promise you won't come crying to me, okay?”

That barb
really
pissed him off. His special scowl came back full force, and I came within an ace of getting belted through the glassworks shed's partition. “Ain't no helper by trade!” he hissed through a broken front tooth. “Take your black ass out of here, Barnes. I got work to do.”

“Your call, Blood.” I quickfooted it away from the glassworks, happy to still be all of one piece. “Too damn hot in here anyhow,” I called back. “Makes you sorta . . . thirsty.”

“Hold it!” he yelled, catching me in mid-stride. “When're you headin' out?”

I gave him back his scowl, plus modest interest. “First light tomorrow.”

“Who all's going?”

“Jesperson, me, and Gimpy if we can pry him loose from his chores.”

He nodded, no longer scowling. “Gimp's the onliest one I'd trust to judge whether that stuff's anywhere near fit to work proper. South Tunnel?”

“Uh-uh, North.” The question told me he'd swallowed the bait hook, line and shish-kabob. “If you've a mind to come along, catch us at daybreak in the airlock.”

“Why North when it's a straighter shot from South Tunnel?”

“Search me. It's Jesperson's show. Decided to join us?”

Acting put-upon, he grumbled, “Ain't sayin' yes, ain't sayin' no. Don't hold up on my account. Damn you, Barnes! You've got me all curious-minded.”

“Good to hear, Blood.”

Not many hours later, the lazily efficient maintenance honcho himself agreed to join our ranks. Until then, he and his grunts had shown no mercy, ragging us, poking fun at our lah-de-dah! foot-foot-slog-sloggin' yo-yo drills up ‘n down the ringwall trail. Conscientious work-dodger Gimp may be, but with a good head on his shoulders; the same can be said for most of his grunts, specially Red, his fire-headed straw boss. Gimpy knows how to listen, evaluate what he hears, and separate the worthy goods from the chaff. Hearing the council's “all's well” song and dance way too often had helped convert him to the gospel according to St. Jesperson. He also sweet-talked Red and another of his grunts into signing on.

***

At first light the next morning I slid out of bed slow-like, washed up in the john and changed pack-batteries. After swallowing a cupful of warm water and a slice of Soya toast, I slipped out the front door quiet-like, trying not to wake Lorna or the boy.

With dawn coming on, the Burroughs complex was deserted, peaceful. Glow panels spotted along the walkways lit the way. The roof-shield hadn't yet begun turning translucent to let in the arching halo of light barely touching the horizon. No one was up and about except me and Max, the neighbor's dog. The mutt spotted me and its head lifted. Getting his paws under him, Max rose up swaying the fiberglass saddlebags holding the pack-batteries that kept him alive, and offered a tail-wag greeting that got him petted and his ears rubbed.

In the airlock service area outside North Tunnel, I lifted my vacuum gear from the rack where I'd parked it, arranged the suit's clumsy, hard-to-handle torso and legs halves, slung the rigs over my shoulder and tucked the ovoid headpiece under my left arm. I had to turn sideways to tote my very own personal life support system through a narrow slit in the big airlock chamber's separated doors.

The deserted loading dock made me wish I'd stayed in the sack a while longer. I plopped down my vacuum gear next to Crawler Two, then plopped down next to it, my mind a blank. Minutes later two items of interest showed up, letting me know I hadn't gotten there ahead of anyone else after all, and also threw light on Jesperson's reason for insisting that we depart from North Tunnel. He ushered Gimpy out of the “Smoker's Lounge” alcove where I'd first spotted that awful bad word Jess ordered me to strike from my limited vocabulary. The work-dodging maintenance guru's limp had shrunk maybe sixty percent; head lowered, he was listening to a major word spill coming from Jesperson, who was exercising his hard-sell talents like a carny barker, trying to convince Gimpy the smart move would be to skip work and come with us to inspect the hoist system.

Jess spotted me lolling on the dock, and shut up suddenlike.

His expression stuck halfway twixt unhappy and cowed, Gimpy reacted to the silence by calling, “Hear you know all about the scary password in there, Barnes.”

“Guilty as charged. I was maybe the first to spot it.”

“Uh-huh.” Gimp's expression swung away from cowed, canted more toward unhappy. “What d'you make of the, uh . . . lost colony rigamarole?”

“Having every Marsrat go tits-up,” I told him, “wouldn't be a good idea. Can't just roll over, stick our feet in the air and throw in the towel. Not without putting up one helluva fight.”

Gimpy's sober nod told me I'd scored.

Jesperson had liked it, too. His approving nod warmed me. “Let's get trucking, Barney. Can you unplug the charge cables?”

“Sure.” I dropped to my knees at the edge of the loading dock, reached down and unjacked the paired electrical connectors. Whenever the beasts are parked, our fuel-cell-powered crawlers plug into facilities power to make sure the backup batteries stay full-charged. The jacketed, spring-loaded cables retracted into an oblong recess. I snapped the cover shut, collected my vacuum gear and ducked into the vehicle through the small airlock chamber. In the act of cycling shut the outer hatch, I saw Black-like-me hustle through the big lock's separated doors. He was lugging his Day-Glo orange pressure-suit in one gorilla hand.

“Morning.” I stepped aside to admit him into Cee Two. “Glad you came.”

A barely audible grunt was his response. Unable to stow his vacuum gear in the starboard locker crammed full with the two other p-suits, he stuffed his gaudy orange rig alongside mine in the portside utility locker, opened a foldbunk, sagged into it and closed his eyes.

The sprawled glassblower made me wonder if it might've been a mistake to sweet-talk him into joining our motley crew. Looking back from the co-driver seat next to Jesperson, his eyebrows elevated in a silent question, Gimpy hooked a thumb aft toward the overlarge figure overspilling a foldbunk. I said nothing, and Gimp shrugged.

Jesperson was busy energizing the crawler, preparing to get underway. Redundant, fail-safe interlocks guarantee that both of the big chamber's doors can never be opened at the same time, and he had to wait for the telltale light to wink amber before tapping a command into the utility airlock's remote controller.

Cee Two trundled away from the loading dock, then halted again facing the outer doors to let the pumps finish scavenging the warmed, humidified air. As internal lock pressure dropped, the telltale turned from green to yellow, then amber, and finally to red as internal pressure matched the measly six hundred-plus pascals or so outside. The egress doors rumbled apart, and Cee Two crept out of North Tunnel at slow march.

The route from Burroughs to Olympic Base is a well-beaten path across a trackless, unmarked, unremarkable wilderness. Depending on the capricious winds, the ruts a crawler makes are obliterated by blowing dust and sand in days, hours, or minutes. There is no road to follow, or a need for one. Any half-asleep bo can drive a crawler over the beaten track to the escarpment by keeping the beast on a more or less constant heading, and take care skirting the larger boulders, several depressions and an occasional lava hardpan terrace or upthrust.