“What’s the status of your battery system?”
O’Connor scanned the digital readouts on the control panel. “Down to one-third of nominal. The solar panels are recharging ’em.”
A pause. Roebuck looked away, and they could hear voices muttering in the background. “All right,” said the communicator at last. “We’re getting your telemetry. We’ll get back to you in an hour or so.”
“We need a lift out of here,” O’Connor said.
Another few moments of silence. “That might not be possible right away. We’ve got other problems, too. You guys weren’t the only ones hit by the meteor shower. We’ve taken some damage here. The garden’s been wiped out and E-1 has two casualties.”
Excursion 1 was at the flank of Olympus Mons, the tallest mountain in the solar system.
“Our first priority has to be to get those people from E-1 back here for medical treatment.”
“Yeah. Of course.”
“Give us a couple of hours to sort things out. We’ll call you back at noon, our time. Sit tight.”
O’Connor glanced at the morose faces of his two teammates, then replied, “We’ll wait for your call.”
“What the hell else can we do?” Bernstein grumbled.
Clicking off the video link, O’Connor said, “We can get back to work.”
Faiyum tried to shrug inside his suit. “I like your first suggestion better. Let’s eat.”
With their helmets off, the faint traces of body odors became noticeable. Munching on an energy bar, Faiyum said, “A Catholic, a Muslim, and a Jew were showering together in a YMCA. . .”
“You mean a YMHA,” said Bernstein.
“How would a Muslim get into either one?” O’Connor wondered.
“It’s in the States,” Faiyum explained. “They let anybody in.”
“Not women.”
“You guys have no sense of humor.” Faiyum popped the last morsel of the energy bar into his mouth.
“This,” Bernstein countered, “coming from a man who was named after a depression.”
“El-Faiyum is below sea level,” Faiyum admitted easily, “but it’s the garden spot of Egypt. Has been for more than three thousand years.”
“Maybe it was the garden of Eden,” O’Connor suggested.
“No, that was in Israel,” said Bernstein.
“Was it?”
“It certainly wasn’t here,” Faiyum said, gazing out the windshield at the bleak, cold Martian desert.
“It’s going to go down near a hundred below again tonight,” Bernstein said.
“The batteries will keep the heaters going,” said O’Connor.
“All night?”
“Long enough. Then we’ll recharge ’em when the sun comes up.”
“That won’t work forever,” Bernstein muttered.
“We’ll be okay for a day or two.”
“Yeah, but the nights. A hundred below zero. The batteries will crap out pretty soon.”
Tightly, O’Connor repeated, “We’ll be okay for a day or two.”
“From your mouth to God’s ear,” Bernstein said fervently.
Faiyum looked at the control panel’s digital clock. “Another three hours before Tithonium calls.”
Reaching for his helmet, O’Connor said, “Well, we’d better go out and do what we came here to do.”
“Haul up the ice core,” said Bernstein, displeasure clear on his lean, harsh face.
“That’s why we’re here,” Faiyum said. He didn’t look any happier than Bernstein. “Slave labor.”
Putting on a false heartiness, O’Connor said, “Hey, you guys are the geologists. I thought you were happy to drill down that deep.”
“Overjoyed,” said Bernstein. “And here on Mars we’re doing areology, not geology.”
