Sorry for the lateness, I'm back in class, now, and my pace has slowed. Thank you to Opal Girl, Tikatue, Darkhelmet, Barb, Varda's Servant, Agent Five and I'mpekable for allthe comments and prodding. Really, I'm getting there. As for the general SF question, I think it has to do with drama, and distances. Anyone at our level would still be poking around in their own solar system, not playing welcome wagon. In order for us to be contacted by an interstellar civilization, the message would have to have traveled a loooong time, or they'd have to have superior technology. But, I could be wrong. And, hey! Looks like we've got a tenth planet.
43
On Earth, after the deep, universal thrill of the first televised 'Mars walk', there was confusion, and growing concern. One moment, they'd had full contact with the crew and lander, the next moment, none at all.
There 'd been no indication of trouble, just a brief burst of unintelligible speech (which several engineers and secretaries in the Houston and Ohio Centerswere working to decipher), and then utter, complete comm blackout.
The families were being reassured by their contact persons, the press was receiving no more than was good for them, and back at Mission Control, every effort was being made to raise Ares III.
Tracy Island, the office-
Jeff Tracy stared numbly at the 'talking heads' who speculated like mad on the 'Mars Landing: Special Report' broadcast. On the other screen, their live 'conference call' feed to Endurance had broken up into ominous, hissing snow.
"They're heeeeere...," Alan joked nervously, earning himself a blistering look from the usually sweet-natured Virgil. The big young man pushed roughly past his youngest brother to sit beside Grandma Tracy, who'd gone terribly pale. Jeff cleared his throat.
"Comm problems are a fact of life out there," he said to the gathered family (less Gordon, calling in from Madrid, sort of; honestly, the young swimmer didn't seem quite himself, but no one had time to worry about it, just then).
"...We must have lost contact twenty times, on Apollo 19."
Jeff's voice sounded flat and strange, even to him. He didn't bother trying to smile. Just picked up his phone and began dialing the Johnson Space Center Director's private line. Meanwhile, Brains tried the entangled particle method, but got no more satisfaction than NASA had.
The others..., Scott and Virgil, Grandma, Alan and TinTin, Gennine and Kyrano..., simply listened to silence and static, waiting along with the rest of the world for some sort of response.
Then, Hackenbacker received an unexpected call, from a pale, clearly agitated, Fermat.
Mars, Ares III Base Camp-
In his prime, Pete McCord had been capable of an 83 mile-an-hour fastball. He was older now, and his pitch didn't have quite the same snap to it (especially in a heavy 'hard suit'), but it was still more than fierce enough to get his point across. The mission commander's rock flew straight and true, shattering the delicate lenses of the Gemini Probe's cameras, then bouncing down at an angle to crack a bunch of shiny black solar cells.
'Blinded', the robot half trampled John, who'd collapsed to the rocky surface like a dropped toy. The Apollo probe was swinging around now, its sampling arms unfolding like those of a giant preying mantis.
People sometimes asked him, after a dogfight, or a particularly rough mission,
"Pete, were you scared?"
...and he'd respond...,
"Hell, yeah, I was scared! Afterward."
McCord never felt fear at the moment that things were happening, because A: there wasn't time, and B: panic could get you killed.
Just then, his primary goal was to disable the second probe and pull Tracy out of danger, and he allowed himself no other thoughts. Speed was critical, and, though he'd lost the element of surprise, weapons there were, aplenty.
The probe's four sampling arms were reaching for the unconscious astronaut's face plate and hose connections. Obviously, it meant to finish him.
Pete grabbed another chunk of basalt, hauled back as far as he could, and threw. Not for the cameras, this time; it might be expecting that. Instead, Pete aimed for the exposed servomotors that controlled the robot's arms.
His footing wasn't good. Loose, stony sand wasn't the same as a red-clay pitcher's mound (but not too different from that far-off Florida beach). The rock crossed the distance, perhaps speeded by prayer, entirely crushing a main gear and snapping three teeth off of another.
The murderous probe was still moving, however, and still capable of grinding John Tracy into the rocks like a brittle-shelled insect. It had to be stopped.
The tiny sun was close to setting behind towering cliffs, and sudden, tea-colored twilight swept the sky with venomous speed. Darkness, just what they didn't need.
Pete hurled himself forward, not quite certain what he meant to do next. Fortunately, he wasn't alone. Endurance's running lights cut on, and her Meteor Defense System's pulse laser flashed, reducing the Apollo probe's 'head' region to molten slag with a loud, sizzling 'bang!'
At nearly the same instant, the main airlock slammed open, and a big, suited figure leapt forth, armed with a crow bar and laser drill. Fromits size, Roger Thorpe.
The MDS reoriented itself, its wicked-looking ruby tube swinging over to aim at the blind, lumbering Gemini probe. The MDS and Roger's laser drill fired almost simultaneously. Two more sharp, lightning-like cracks split the Martian night.
Ruby and emerald pulses, precisely targeted, dissected the rampaging probe. Its two halves shuddered to a halt, still flailing the rock abrasion tool, then froze, just as suddenly and completely as if someone had flipped a switch.
Endurance's running lights brightened, and a sudden hemisphere of warmth blossomed in the night's cupped palm. The wind picked up. In the soft gleam of the ship's lighting, the American flag streamed and snapped toward the west, looking like a banner on Everest.
Roger hurried forward, but the mission commander signaled him to stand fast, and keep his weapons ready. Then, in a tearing hurry, but forced to be careful, Pete started for his fallen crewmate. Breath raggedly loud in his own helmet,he hoped desperatelyfor a rescue, rather than just a recovery.
To his everlasting sorrow, McCord know what explosive decompression looked like. He'd seen shattered glass jetting from a compromised helmet, the fog of sublimating water and escaping gas, followed by a man's unprotected flesh swelling out through the broken faceplate. Thirty seconds at most, his partner 'd had, and Pete simply hadn't got there in time.
McCord pushed the unwanted visuals out of his head, together with those of a long-gone afternoon in Kansas, back on Earth; Liddie and Lucinda in the kitchen, laughing and chattering as they cleaned up..., Jeff mixing vodka martinis at the wet bar..., the two young boys, Scott and John, sitting on Pete's lap (his own child, Stephanie, hadn't been born, yet) while they watched the Apollo 18 launch coverage on TV.
Somehow shoving everything else aside, Pete worked the problem. Tracy lay face down, arms out-flung, perfectly still. The commander crouched down beside him, took careful hold, and turned the young man over.
Tracy's faceplate was sandy, and appeared to have sustained a large, horizontal crack, but the transparent, interior film seemed to have held. Otherwise, there would have been a mixture of water vapor, gas and blood hissing through the cracked glass. Pete had reason to know.
High on the left side of Tracy's chest armor, the status panel blinked out a series of amber warnings. Amber, not red.
Still without comm, McCord signaled Roger forward. The Marine thudded up, threading a hasty path between the blasted hulks of two silent, emptied probes. Together, he and Pete lifted their wounded friend, and got him back to the ship.