Chap 10

BACK AROUND FIRE

The weird tableau of three people in spacesuits around a campfire on Mars.

"You still think we had any business coming to Mars? Screwing with stuff? Trying to spread life? You think maybe God's teaching us some hard-ass lesson?" Ianto asks.

Tosh just makes some kind of weird gulping noise and turns away. They let her be.

"God?" Owen snarks, "You talked to Doc too much on the trip over. I don't mean to burst your bubble, but God's the retreat of the ignorant, the weak and the hopeless."

"I bet you don't believe in Santa. And you're no fun at all at Christmas." Ianto hurls back,"Not everything gets an explanation you can write down as a formula."

"Mate, I'm a scientist. A geneticist, as good as they come. I write code, just like a hacker. Four elements, A.G.T.P., in different orders, back the genome. And your kidneys work or you grow a sixth finger. I line up unconscious atoms and they give rise to conscious beings. It's like if I stacked up a bunch of rocks in the right order and they become a dog. I do that. I chose when, I chose where, I chose how many fingers. I just don't hold with mystical explanations for science, with organized religion, buildings with different symbols on 'em. You spot God, you lemme know. Till then, I put my trust in my three Ph.D's." Owen spouts, "But I think life's an amazing thing. And I believe that when you get it you should grab it with both hands and live as much of it as you can. Which is why I am not happy about losing it on this damn ugly planet."

Owen shuts his eyes.

Ianto sighs as he looks up at the night sky and remembers his last alone moment with the captain.

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*********************FLASHBACK*******************

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Ianto comes in to the grooming quarters. His timing, depending how you look at it, is very good or very bad. Jack steps out of the shower. To dry off. It's too late for Ianto to stop or recoup. He has to tough it out and try to act like an adult. Jack sees his discomfort. He's amused.

"It's okay. I had a brother." Jack assures him.

I have two brothers." Ianto gives in and glances down, "Neither of them were this fine."

Then he blushes and Jack has a moment of clarity. He's not the only one who feels something here.

"The only way this works, is if we both make believe it doesn't matter." Jack offers.

"I tried. I really tried." Ianto whispers as they make eye contact, "Maybe I should go fix something."

"Maybe you should." Jack laughs as Ianto hesitates, leaves. .

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Ianto's half filled with regret, half annoyed with himself. Sighs, shuts his eyes, and tries to get some sleep.

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Place is ragged at Mission Control. Coffee on the workstations, techs as unshaven and beat as the crew on Mars.

"All right, people, we bought ourselves another eighteen hours in orbit. The crew's burning pretty much what we've got on the surface so they don't freeze solid. So whatever we can come up with..." Rhys looks to Gwen.

She sees his grief appearing and continues his train of thought, "...has got to work before the sun sets again tomorrow and they freeze to death anyhow."

"What else is on Mars?" Rhys shakes it off.

"Rocks." Andy says from the science table, "Sand."

"The janitor just built a radio out of a fifty-year-old Rover mission. Now, what else is on Mars?" Rhys demands angrily.

Mars maps come up on all their PIMs. There are things on the surface. Marked with various symbols. Leftovers from other missions.

"We sent a dozen probes even before the biologics started up. Eight were return missions." Andy mutters.

"And they're back." Yvonne throws up her hands.

"There's a Viking lander..." someone calls out.

"2,200 kilometres away." Andy shoots them down.

Silence. They all stare at the PIMs. And then Rhys turns to a nearby TECH "S.Y.F."

He stares at him with confusion. "Slap your forehead?"

"We're not the only people who sent stuff to Mars." Rhys answers as he toggles switches, other overlays come up on the maps. New colours. New symbols.

"The Twenties were nothing but unmanned sample return missions," Gwen says with hope as she sees where her partner is going with this, "Everyone wanted to bring back a bucket of Mars rocks."

They find something near the Hab.

"There was Euro-Malaysian sample return mission 2018." Rhys points to something with hope.

"Checking..." Andy mutters as he slams a keyboard furiously.

"It blew up on attempted return." Yvonne says softly, already knowing the answer.

Looking further afield, they find something else.

"It ain't close, but there's an Uzbecki S.R.M. that failed to launch." Andy offers with a groan, "An Uzbecki probe from 2032."

"Is it viable? Can we get plans?" Rhys demands.

"It was built at the Cosmos factory in Gagarin in 2031." Andy is reading quickly, his eyes scanning his screen, "The factory closed eight years later. And then it burnt down."

"All right, that's the end of that." And then Andy spots a detail that means something to him. "It was designed by Aleksandr Ivanovich Borokovski. He was the last of the greats in the Russian space program."

"Is he still alive?" Rhys asks, Andy's PIM flickers madly as he mutters at it.

"There's no closing date on his bio." Andy confirms, "He'd be in his seventies."

"Find him." Rhys yells, "Somebody get on the line to Kazakhstan."

"This is insanity. A thirty-year-old lander built in a factory that doesn't exist anymore." Gwen says softly but Rhys bats her away.

"Found him!" Andy yells, "He emigrated. He runs a deli in Brooklyn."

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An hour later there is a low hum of conversation, a bunch of the workstations are vacant, techs sleeping in cots nearby. BOROKOVSKI, in his best suit, 20 years old, comes in led by two NASA flunkies. Unhooks his filtration mask. Vindicated.

"All right, I am Borokovski." He growls "I am here."

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They hear a sound out in the darkness. Something metal on rock.

Ianto whistles.

Myfanwy whistles back. A moment later, she walks into the firelight.

"Way to get here, sweetie." Ianto laughs with joy. "How you doing?"

He looks her over with his suit-light. "Kinda banged up, huh? She seems a little outta whack. Let's check you out... On your back."

She obeys. Puts her limbs in the air.

"Processor's damaged." Ianto mutters, "She still navigate for us until she breaks down for good."

"We wait 'til she breaks down, that drone'll crash. Let's yank her Mars positioning system now" Owen demands and one of her legs twitches.

"But that'd be killing her." Ianto argues.

"Want me to pull the plug?" Owen offers, and what happens next happens very fast... Myfanwy slams him with the arm nearest him. The force of the blow knocks him ten feet. With her two back legs, Myfanwy grabs Owen. Squeezes him. Looks like she's gonna squeeze the life out of him... Then uses her legs to throw him. A very long way. He lands hard and crumples. Another arm already has Tosh pincered by the wrist. Twists it. Forces her to the ground in pain. The way a martial artist would.

Ianto madly punches buttons on his sleeve unit. "Myf, stop! don't hurt him!" And hey, she stops. Withdraws her arm. And moves off into the darkness.

Ianto goes to help Tosh. Owen stumbles back, terrified. "What's going on?"

"She's in military mode. The crash must've flipped her back... Help me get her to the fire."

"Why'd she turn on us?" Tosh asks as she blinks.

"We tried to take her eyes. That made us the enemy." Ianto snapped.

"You can't override her?"

"I tried." Ianto groaned, "She won't respond."