“Good Lord, I dunno.”
“You just think about it. That’s all I am saying.”
“They’d maybe throw us in prison.”
“You know who runs Earthside? Not laws—no, just lawyers. And those Axy can provide.”
“For the boys who bring home the bacon.”
“Right. With Marshroom sauce.” Raoul chuckled.
“I… I really dunno…”
“Look, we’re tired—”
“And drunk on cheap tequila.”
“Best tequila there is.”
“That’s the best? Whoosh.”
“Look, point is, you sleep on it. We talk some more tomorrow.”
“I…okay.”
Scraping chairs. Closing doors.
Julia looked at Viktor. He got up and silently closed the door, securing it with the lever that would make a good vacuum seal if necessary.
“My God,” she said. “What…?”
“Drunk talk. It may go no farther than this.”
“But if it does—”
“I will stop it.”
“How?”
“I do not know, but there are tricks.”
“What tricks?”
“Captain tricks.”
“Like?”
“Raoul did not think anyone would take a gun to Mars.”
31
JANUARY 30, 2018
JULIA BRACED HERSELF BEFORE ENTERING THE COMMON AREA FOR BREAKFAST.
She felt as if she were walking on eggs. Not only unsure of what Marc and Raoul would be like, but suddenly aware of the camera. She and Viktor had agreed that, as a fallback, she would claim “lingering effects” from the near-vacuum run for her hoarse voice. Best thing would be to talk as little as possible. That she was prepared to do.
Viktor and Raoul were already at the table, reading their electronic newspapers and trading items of interest. She was momentarily startled to see Raoul drinking his coffee from one of the generic plastic mugs before remembering that his special ceramic one was gone. He appeared tense and withdrawn, as he had since the engine test failure.
The psychological support team had insisted that the crew receive daily news summaries from Earth to reduce their feelings of alienation. This was in addition to the mission-relevant news summaries prepared for them by Axelrod’s communications people.
So each had picked a newspaper, and the features they wanted to see. Raoul got the Los Angeles Times, with augmented coverage of South American soccer. Viktor read the London Times, and was deeply into European geopolitics and soccer. He and Raoul had spent most of the time they were fixing the ERV happily comparing and arguing soccer minutiae.
Marc stuck with the Dallas Times, the paper of his birthplace. He followed most traditional American sports, especially volleyball, of which he had an encyclopedic knowledge. Only a minor knee injury at a critical time in college had turned him away from a pro career in the game. Julia had found it was possible to be utterly bored in conversation with Marc if he got going on stats, spiking versus blocking, and arcane rule changes. But he was a bright and well-read scientist, so she tried to keep their conversations on a professional level. Still, she genuinely liked Marc. He seemed to be a more cautious version of her much-missed brother Bill.
Julia had opted for the Sydney Morning Herald. It was partly a lark, to see the world again through Aussie eyes, and it helped her keep in touch with Harry and Robbie in Adelaide. It carried a diffuse piece about her—pride of Aussies, on Mars!—the life discovery, and endless speculations. This one had not made it into her “filtered” personal news summary. There were probably thousands like it, long on imagination, short on information.
She cleared her throat and tried a tentative “Morning.” It came out as a croak. Raoul looked up with a frown and stared at her.
She tried a smile and a half shrug, and went over to make herself some tea. Glancing furtively at the camera, she was relieved to see that its little ruby light was dark. Makes sense. At some point last night, Raoul and Marc must’ve turned it off. She wondered briefly how much of their conversation had been beamed Earthside before they remembered about that ever-roving eye. The psych team would be busy this morning if anything had gotten through. In any case, it was a lucky break for her.
Julia made her tea and gratefully slurped the hot liquid down her aching throat. She sat at the table and scanned the comics.
Recently Viktor had been following closely two minor brush wars being put down by the German army. Despite the traditional Russo-German enmity, he approved heartily of their role as the policeman of the New Europe. “Let ’em pay the price of being big shots,” was how he put it.
Julia managed a few grunts at appropriate moments in their onesided conversation, and picked away at her crossword puzzle. The painkillers and tea began to kick in. She started to feel human.
When Marc finally appeared, unshaven and bleary-eyed, Raoul and Viktor were well into their second coffees. This was normally a very pleasant time for the crew. For all of these highly motivated people, the morning was an optimistic time. With plans for the day, and energy levels high, they would trade funny bits from their respective newspapers. Julia hoped desperately today would be the same.
