Chap 9
"If they can breathe, can we live there?" Gwen turns to Yvonne.
"No. Ninety percent of the algae's gone. It's some kind of freak anomaly. Mars is a dying planet. Just like Earth." She shakes her head.
"They're breathing. It coulda worked. Dammit, it coulda worked..." Rhys wonders softly.
"It doesn't matter. They're going to die tonight anyhow. In an hour, the sun sets on Mars. It's going to be minus 140. They cannot survive in the open. They're going to die." Yvonne barks. Yow. Everyone shuts up. It's ugly but true.
"She's right. You can walk across the South Pole, long as you stay moving and you're wearing insulating clothing - the suits'll work - you can stay warm. But once they stop moving, without shelter, they're gonna die." Another scientist agrees.
"His orbit could degrade at any time. He could auger in and burn while they chat about old times and freeze to death. It's a waste. We should just bring her home." Gwen refers to their Vessel still waiting to return with her information to provide answers.
Rhys doesn't love it, but "We can get a free return trajectory now. He's got enough food and water to bring one person back."
"You're not wrong." Gwen nods.
"Commander, this is Mission Control." Rhys returns to the mic.
"No."
"Sir?"
"I'm not stupid, Rhys, I know what the question is. I'd ask it if I was there. And the answer is no. So let's move on" Jack snarls down the comm link.
After giving them a moment to settle, Jack continues voicing his decision, "By my calculations, if I ditch my reserve tank now and commit to a three-second apogee burn, I stabilize my orbit for another eighteen hours. I'd like someone to check the numbers as my apogee's in seven minutes."
Rhys has to grin. It's gonna drive him crazy and it's exactly what he'd do. Before any of them can bitch and whine "Come on, people, you heard the man, let's get on it."
The techs begin calculating madly.
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The crew is coming down a rise toward the Hab. Carrying the radio. Walking back quickly. Sun is flat over the horizon. Shadows are long, already getting cold. You can see their breath.
"There's some concern at Mission Control. About the weather." Jack is talking to them.
"It's gonna rain?" Ianto deadpans, comically scanning the clouds.
"It's gonna get a little chilly." Jack huffs with amusement. He is really getting to like this guy.
"I could see that. It's dropped about fifty degrees in the last half hour. We figure a hundred below fairly soon." Tosh agrees.
Jack is doing his best to keep the tone light. But he's gotta know whether or not he thinks he's gonna live or die.
"It would have been nice to be in the Hab. And there ain't no other motel to check into." Ianto snarks and Jack smiles softly.
"You have a plan?" Jack asks softly, "Any thoughts on how you might...stay alive?"
They're back at the Hab now. We can't quite tell what's going on, but Owen and Tosh are busy doing something noisy and furious in the background as Ianto scans the horizon. Crashing, bashing, breaking. Owen flicks open an entrenching tool. Thumbs a button, edge whizzes by like a tiny chain saw. Chews through something and...
"Yeah..." Ianto grimaces as he glances to his left, "Kinda."
Behind Ianto is a whoooosh of flame as Owen gets the debris he's piled in the middle of the Hab to light. He's got stacks of additional fuel nearby.
"We're gonna have a 75 million dollar campfire." Ianto crows as he turns at the sound of the small explosion.
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The sun sets. First sunset on Mars man has seen. Red upon red upon red. Fire burns behind them. Sky turns black. Fast. A billion stars. And then a meteorite begins to fall. It's huge. It's red. It explodes.
"What the hell was that?" Ianto sits up from the rock he was leaning against with shock.
"He ditched the 'B' tank. He must be figuring there's an even chance we'll live through the night." Tosh says softly as she settles against Ianto's side for warmth and Owen shuffles in behind her.
The Torchwood lights up and burns for three long seconds. And off.
Jack checks the gauges. Eight litres was burned. "Hell, what's eight litres? "
"It'll either save their lives or I've screwed up getting home and I'll spend the next three hundred years circling this planet." Jack mutters then stops and laughs, "Talking to myself, first sign of madness,"
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Owen pokes at the flames. They're spread out and low. Flickering yellow and blue. "I think we'll make it through. There's so little O2, this is gonna burn real slow."
Ianto picks up a piece of scrap, about to feed it into the flames, then stops, examines it by the light of the fire. It looks like someone took a rasp to it. He gets up, turns on a suit light and looks over the remaining ribs of the structure. "What happened to this place? Everything but the titanium supports were just chewed up. Could a dust storm've done this?"
"No prevailing pattern to the damage. I don't know what could've done it." Tosh answers.
Nor does it matter right now. They sit back around the fire and relish the warmth. Out in the darkness, past a rise, something catches Ianto's eye. A flash, a reflection. Of the fire? On what? And then it's gone. He doesn't bother to mention it. Writes it off.
Behind a hill, Myfanwy crouches in the dark. Pops up again, looks over, sees the three crew and the fire. Lowers back down - you'd swear she was thinking - then silently ambles away.