“I agree with the calculations,” Raoul said. “Cutting it a little close for comfort, launching that early, but—”
“Wow! Headed for home.” Marc beamed as they closed the elevator door and started up.
“We not discuss this at lunch,” Viktor said, looking at each of them in turn.
“No launch at lunch, check,” Marc said happily.
“We are here to find out what we can,” Viktor said carefully.
“I don’t want to be here at all,” Raoul said.
“Take a break from repairs,” Viktor said. “Good for spirit.”
“Think they’ll have spirits?” Marc was still bubbling from the news.
“We’re not out of alcohol yet,” Julia said.
It was somehow Viktor-like to tell Marc the news just before entering the critical discussions with the Airbus crew. He had a theory, maybe typically Russian, that people worked best when they were responding to a quick challenge. Or maybe he just occasionally liked to jerk people’s chains; nobody’s perfect.
“Yeah, but after launch, we’ll want to celebrate,” Marc said. “We should save our own, drink theirs.”
“After lunch, somebody’s got to drive back,” Raoul said.
“So who’s the designated driver?” Marc grinned.
“No drinking for anyone,” Viktor said. “Still work to be done in this day. And I want no loose tongues inside.”
They all nodded, though Marc was still grinning maniacally. The Airbus lock was small and they showered down their suits using the one hose. She was first into the living quarters. Chen greeted them with plum wine again. She got hers before Viktor was in the room, and the others politely took their glasses but didn’t sip any. She downed hers, though Viktor frowned. She gave him an impish smile. Marc saw it and took a sip himself. Discipline was breaking down all over the place.
“We have a little lunch laid out,” Chen said, ushering them into the tiny dining area. No food was visible. “First, however—”
He led them into the staging bay. There Gerda and Claudine stood proudly beside—
“Trailblazer!” The 2009 rover/prospector craft stood there, showing the wear that almost a decade of service had inflicted upon it. Julia automatically bent down and touched it.
It had roved over a lot of Gusev Crater after its 2009 landing, helping make the case for human exploration there. When they arrived, it was still serviceable. She had steered it herself, from inside the hab, on further excursions, until it had broken down near the northern crater rim sixty kilometers away. They had left it there, since Raoul did not have adequate repair parts, and the dune buggy could do many of Trail-blazer’s tasks now.
“We ran across it,” Gerda said, “and thought to take it home.”
“To repair?” Raoul asked, puzzled.
“No, to have as keepsake,” Claudine said.
Julia frowned. “To take it back to Earth?”
“A collector has paid for its return,” Gerda said.
“You’re going to haul it all that way…” Viktor shook his head in wonder. “They must be crazy back there.”
Chen stroked Trailblazer’s badly pitted solar panels. “We can also learn much about weathering conditions here.”
“You’ll have plenty of time to do that,” Marc said sardonically.
Chen blinked, his lips thinning under pressure. “Not so much as you.”
Julia had worked with Chen enough to read his subtle moods. “You’ll spend your time on biology? With only three of you—”
“No,” Chen said, turning to her. “Though I wish to discuss that in detail with you. I have brought different laboratory apparatus, some specially designed in light of your findings here. Particularly I shall study the fossil cells, and try to find many more.”
Julia carefully did not give anything away in her face. It was going to be unbearably exacting to talk shop with Chen when she had a greenhouse of the real stuff—and could not breathe a word of it. Aaaargh! “That will help fill in the history of life here.”
“We spent our first days collecting samples, some short-range drilling,” Gerda said. “Your reports were correct. The labor is difficult in the suits.”
“Wait’ll you get calluses where you never expected them,” Marc said to Claudine. “Those suits are murder.”
“I would appreciate instruction in avoiding that,” Claudine said, her voice softening.
“We expect to circumnavigate Gusev Crater in perhaps a week,” Chen said. “We shall be taking drill samples every ten kilometers from the walls.”
“You’ve seen my topo maps, right?” Marc said. “Space your holes between mine, we’ll get a better sample grid.”
Viktor was still studying Trailblazer, frowning. “We can map out complementary methods, cooperation, yes.”
“In our stay here we can expect, in sixty days, only to augment your pioneering—”
“Sixty?” Viktor demanded quickly.
“We shall launch at the very end of the return window.”