My mother once advised me never to go to the supermarket when I was hungry. I guess I should have listened, considering I have just purchased aisle twelve.

Chapter 57

Don't Ask Me; I Only Just Got Here

The expandable heat shield deployed right on time as the landing pod approached the upper layer of the thin Martian atmosphere. As usual it was a bumpy ride but worth the effort, when the all eight landing rockets fired bringing the capsule to rest in a soft landing five hundred meters from the nearest base entrance.

"Have you got everything well hidden?" Ruth asked.

"I sewed the memory chips into the inner lining of my bag" Jarred replied "No one will find them."

A few minutes later, a small rover linked up its access tube with the pods hatch and the returning couple were soon on their way back inside the base. They normally did not mind all the medical checks and debriefing as it was all part of returning home after spending so much time in space. During the check up, Ruth kept the medical staff distracted with a made up story of strange symptoms experienced during her last transit to Earth, giving Jarred a chance to hack into the office computer. He discovered April and Saffron were both taking part in a grief counselling session, starting in one hour and forty minutes; this would give him the time he needed to get a very important job done.

The debrief took longer than was usual, mainly due to all the strange and tragic occurrences during their last flight to Earth and subsequent stay on the Orbit Station, so the Kindermans eventually asked for a 24 hour break from proceedings to get resettled and get some rest before proceeding. However when their request was granted they did not go to their home, but instead made straight for the Dias residence. While still in orbit, Jarred had altered the electronic key to his own home and downloaded Luis's house codes from his family file. Eventually the file would be updated to remove Luis and Abigail from the system, but he felt sure nobody would enact the update as long as they were still coping with Luis's apparent death, and he was right.

"If anyone comes towards the door, I'll just knock casually as if I were looking for April" Ruth said.

"And when you do, I'll run around the room in a 'Scooby Doo' style of blind panic" Jarred replied.

"Just hide in a cupboard or something" Ruth sighed.

"You think of everything" Jarred smiled.

"Not everything" Ruth admitted "Sometimes I don't think about Aardvarks."

"You shouldn't be so careless" Jarred grinned as the door slid open and he slid inside.

The strange banter helped both of them to relax a little. Stress had been building up for Jarred and Ruth ever since they had intercepted the first message from Earth. When he thought about what he was doing, Jarred felt like he walking into the middle of a tigers cage, covered in bbq sauce with a sprig of parsley on his head.

While Ruth paced up and down the dimly lit passage with only the White Breasted Nuthatch of Fearful Concern for company, Jarred got straight to work on clearing the room. Although he had no real reason to believe there would be any covert listening devices, he decided it would be best to verify the fact before moving on to the integrated systems. Jarred had to admit he knew very little about the Deep Council beyond their name and existence, so he did not know if their intentions were sinister or benign. His opinion about them started to downhill when the electrical transmission scanner in his hand went off and he found the first bug in the room.

It was built into the wall so Jarred could not remove it without making its discovery obvious. So instead he set up a soundwave deflector in front of the listening device to prevent it from picking up any future conversations in the room. He stepped back when he was finished and considered the position of the device and the area it would cover before going to the opposite side of the room. Sure enough there was a second bug positioned to pick up anyone talking in the kitchenette area as well. With another sound deflector set up in front of it, Jarred then went to work on the integrated computer comms system.

He felt sure there would be listening devices in every other room but as his time was limited, making the living room safe was his first priority. With the monitor screen removed, Jarred quickly cut the wires to the camera and microphone before reconnecting them through a remote electronic switch. With the last of the essential tasks done, all he and Ruth had to do now was to wait for April to return.

It was hot in the back of the truck, not to mention uncomfortable and the condition of the road did not help much either. Professor Adisa sat opposite the man he had once trusted and glared into his eyes. To his disgust and annoyance, Henry just smiled back as they bounced down the rough track.

"Henry Dias?" Linton said at last.

"That's right... and in case you're wondering, yes I am Blues grandfather but no, I'm not a spy."

"Then what are you?" the Professor asked bluntly.

"Merely a concerned father and grandfather" Henry explained. "Back when this whole Mars business started, there were all kinds of people involved with initial planning. There were people like you Linton, who firmly believed only the right people should be sent off planet. People with both physical health and the necessary skills needed to give humanity the best chance of survival if the Earth were destroyed. Then there were others who also firmly believed only the right people should be sent, but from a very different, class based perspective. Some wanted to save themselves and others wanted to save their children. I found myself in a very different camp because although my wife and I desperately wanted to save our young son Luis, we did not have the right connections with the people in power to guarantee it would happen. But then I was asked to be one of the senior biological researchers in low gravity plant growth."

"April Haddock did a lot of her early study in that field" the Professor realised "so you used her position as a Mars candidate to get your son on the list."

"You are looking too far ahead Linton; Luis was only a school boy at the time. Yes it is true I tried to get him on the Mars list, but my request was flatly refused. Eventually though after much arguing about what an asset I would be for the project here on Earth, I threatened not to take the biological research position unless Luis was given a chance to make the Mars list; eventually the people in charge made me a counter offer."

"I get the strangest feeling I will not like the sound of this counter offer" Linton noted.

"I dare say you won't" Henry agreed "One of the biggest obstacles to the whole Mars Colony was people like me who would only help in exchange for an interplanetary ticket. What they really wanted more people like you, who would devote their lives to the project with no strings attached. So they said to me, if I would regularly give convincing speeches to my colleagues and students about the noble sacrifice we were making for the future of humanity, Luis would be guided into a career guaranteeing he would end up on Mars."

"You hypocrite" Linton hissed.

"Maybe so Professor, but to paraphrase the old saying; before you cast the first stone, remember you were not completely without sin either."

"That doesn't make any sense; and besides, I never made any such demands" Professor Adisa protested.

"True, but you did use your position to move your family from your home in Jamaica where the risk from tsunami was much greater, to Germany where you could also put your adult children on a Mars based work program."

"But I did not make it a condition of my cooperation" Linton protested "I knew there was only a one in a million chance either of them would be chosen to go."

"How many friends and colleagues did you leave behind in Jamaica though?" Henry suggested accusingly.

"I can't be held responsible for everyone; you're being ridiculous" Linton shrugged.

"I know what I did was wrong, but I would have done almost anything to save my boy; even disown him."

"Disown him? Now what are you talking about?" Linton looked confused.

"Even in the early days of the Mars plan, years before the first construction robots were sent, somebody worked out that it would not take long before the list of Mars Candidates would surely be scrutinised to see if it was being manipulated to include a little bit of nepotism. For the wealthy and powerful, this meant sending their children away to be raised elsewhere with new names; so when they ended up on a ship to Mars, no connection could be made with their parents. But since I was just a nobody in the eyes of the world, it was me who had to go; and so the Colombian scientist Henry Dias was reportedly killed in an accident on his way to take up his post, and was replaced by a man from Indonesia named Henry Deming, who just happened to look and sound just like the late Doctor Dias."

"I can't believe you could do such a thing" the Professor shook his head in despair.

"It wasn't something I just came up with one fine day, thing just changed... slowly... one step leading to another and before you realise what's happening, your wife is kissing you goodbye in the middle of the night and preparing to tell your son, his father had died in a plane crash. Back then I couldn't be sure he would ever make it to Mars anyway, but I had to try."

"I would never consider doing anything along those lines" Linton sighed.

"Maybe not my old friend, but many tears later when Luis had grown up and become an MTV pilot, you definitely benefited from my deception" Henry smirked in a very annoying way.

"What are you talking about Henry?"

"When we were working on the prototypes for the first hydroponic units, there was a young girl who had become like a daughter to you after the loss of your own family."

"Yes yes April; get on with your story."

"You accused me of using her to get my son on the Mars list Linton, but actually it was the other way around."

Henry's revelation sounded absurd, but it really made Professor Adisa sit up and take notice.

"Luis may have been an engineer/pilot, but just like all Mars candidates he had to have training in all other fields including plant biology. Just before he arrived with the other trainees hoping to be chosen for Mars, I was given a secret list of all the young men and women who had already made the list, and April's name was not on it. The note attached instructed me to put all the people on the list into the same classes, where it was hoped a few relationships would develop before they left the Earth. Knowing April was trying to make the cut and knowing you were doing your best to help her, I made her one of the instructors in the same class as the successful Mars candidates, as a favour to you."

"Are you trying to tell me Luis and April had an arranged marriage?" Linton asked in amazement.

"Of course not" Henry laughed "None of the couples formed here were arranged, but future Mars colonists were given many opportunities to socialise with each other while still in training. You and April thought she had the same chance to be chosen as all the others, but when I found out she was NOT going to Mars, I gave her a secret second chance. Little did I know, it would be my own son who was instantly drawn to her. I know it is no justification for what I'd done and the lies I'd told, but if I had been as honest and above board as you, April would still be on Earth, she would never have met Luis and their children would have never been born."

"Considering how much we all love Blue, maybe it is some kind of justification after all" Linton admitted, although he was still very disappointed in his old friend.

Blue meanwhile was lying on his bunk contemplating something that had been troubling him since the day he had discovered it. He could sense the motion of the gravity wheel as it turned, but it didn't feel too bad. If he had tried to watch the Earth below out of the window, as it turned strange cartwheels in space, it would surely make him feel nauseous.

"Penny for your thoughts" Abigail used the old conversation starter, even though she had never seen any kind of coin in her entire life.

"I was just thinking about a book I read recently" he replied.

"What was it about?" Abigail asked.

Blue did not answer straight away and since having a brother was still quite a new experience for Abigail, she wasn't sure why he was so quiet. After a few seconds, she realised he was simply collecting his thoughts; but when he spoke again, he said something very surprising.

"Did you know we're descended from dragon riding Vikings?"

"Okay, I admit it" Abigail replied "I did not expect you to say that!"

As I continue in my attempts to get fit, it's possible I may have come across the ultimate form of exercise. It's a cross between a lunge and a crunch; it's called lunch.