The Ruins of Mars (The Ruins of Mars Trilogy Book 1) (28 page)

     
Braun cut in, breaking Harrison’s line of attack.

      “
Transmission from Dr. Floyd, Captain.”

      “
Play it,” ordered Tatyana, letting Aguilar’s hand slip from hers.

     
In the upper-left corner of the screen, James Floyd’s blotchy face appeared, eyes burning with suppressed intensity.

      “
Captain, I’m looking at the CT scan of the Mars ruin grid that Assad just sent me. I’m guessing you probably are too, so I won’t bother explaining what needs to be done here. I want you to greenlight Assad’s idea to get down in those caves ASAP. Digging up the ruins just took the back burner here, Vodevski. This will get us results much quicker, and, trust me, given the tone of some of our biggest financial backers, we need results. I await your reply, but you have my orders. Make it happen.”

     
Grinning, Harrison arched his eyebrows.

      “
If it’s alright with you,” he said. “I already have a team ready to go on your word.”

Raising the stones

     
Unable to keep track of the erratic passage of time, the brothers Remus and Romulus found themselves witnesses to the foundation of a new civilization. A decade, maybe more, had passed since their first encounter with the people of Mars, and, now, far in the north, they surveyed with lucid and dreamlike intrigue a growing metropolis.

     
In the glow of the midday sun, hundreds of purple-skinned Martian men and women moved about the bustling dirt streets of their expanding township. Situated on the shores of a half-moon-shaped lake, the developing city lay at the foothills of the mountains surrounding Atun in what was commonly called the Valley of the Lakes. Some distance to the east, the mists of mighty waterfalls painted the skies with rainbow bands as their cascading waves spilled over the edge of a deep canyon. A system of rivers and lakes fed into one another as the glaciers, which capped the surrounding mountains, shed their cover in the heat of the summer air. Between the village and the stretching canyon was the construction site of the great temple. Bodies worked to dig out, carve and shape the surrounding glacier rocks as rays of golden sunlight sparkled off the flecks of iron ore in the dusty air.

     
In time, their numbers had grown, as word of the new society spread like brushfires to the villages that lived in the east and west. Streams of nomadic peoples and distant tribes filtered in day after day, bringing with them new customs and acquired knowledge, adding to the pool of information, which fueled the growth of the new nation. Fresh huts were constructed almost daily to accommodate the endless influx of immigrating people, and a tented market grew steadily in the center of the town, showcasing the wares of the cultures that comprised the expanding community.

     
Early on, a council of leaders had formed between the chiefs of the eight founding tribes, acting as the law that now ruled over the citizens of the Crescent Lake City. At its head was Teo, cheiftess of the southern river tribe and confidant to the wise and aged Olo. Working diligently, they had bound together the previously fractured tribes of the southern planes, forming a new nation that they called The Peoples of the Great Lakes.

     
Children ran and played amongst the hundreds of huts that now surrounded the crescent lake, and many people busied themselves not with the construction of Olo’s temple, but with the task of digging irrigation ditches, and the cultivation of the surrounding plant and animal life. Fruit trees and other edible plants were uprooted and replanted nearer to the town, so that the people could tend to them and produce larger yields. Fishing became regulated and measured to prevent over-netting and wastefulness. Stone walls were raised around the perimeters of the farms to keep out scavenging animals, drawn in from the desert by the smells of garbage and cooking fires. Hunters set out into the marshes and grasslands, not spearing the adult prey they normally stalked but, instead, snatching the babes from their nests and burrows. Squealing and bleating, the young animals were spirited away to wooden pens where they were fattened and bred and slaughtered with ease. A new society was taking its first infantile steps, and it all centered around the raising of Olo’s great monoliths. Without this tribute to the Great Spirits, no tribe would ever dare to live this close to the vengeful Atun.

     
Having leveled the ground and cleared the site of its massive glacier rocks, the temple builders now dug deep holes, which circled out in three radial spokes. Working in shifts, they removed buckets of sand and rock from the deep wells, casting them aside to be mixed with water and mashed into clay for new huts. Chipping with fire-hardened stone axes and chisels, the builders shaped long pillars out of the porous glacier rock and decorated them with carvings and colorful paint. When they were completed, the pillars were slid down into the deep wells, then hoisted to standing positions with ropes and wedges. Clay and gravel were then dumped in around the base and allowed to harden into cement anchors. In the years since undertaking their holy task, the builders had raised eight such pillars, moving outwards from a center stone like the blades of a pinwheel.

     
As the brothers Remus and Romulus watched the landscape and its inhabitants evolve around them, they noticed deep changes within their own beings as well. Abandoning their analytically rigid approach to learning, they instead soaked up every new sight, sound and sensation with which they came into contact. With every passing day, with every passing moment, they drifted further from the memory of what their lives had been like before the signal. Glitches in reality and leaps in time became less noticeable: sometimes appearing as nothing more than a momentary wrinkle. Though neither brother fully understood the rhythm of their schizophrenic existence, they felt no alarm. They felt no fear. They simply followed the path before them, knowing from somewhere in the depths of their souls that the ultimate truth would reveal itself, one way or another, when the time was right.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

1478 feet—
Sol 26

     
Cutting through the thin Martian air like a fat white bird of prey, Lander 1 skimmed the rusty desert on its way to the rim of the Valles Marineris. Inside the rattling flyer were the pressure-suited bodies of Harrison, Marshall, William and Liu. Strapped in tightly, the four explorers listened to a message from James Floyd, Mission Director as it played in their helmets’ speakers.

      “
Okay, Assad,” came the crackle of Floyd’s voice. “While this is your gig, I’m putting Marshall in charge. He’s got more experience with EVA than you do. If he feels like the situation is too dangerous and pulls the plug, then I want all three of you back up the line without so much as a peep. That said, the consortium of universities, which, might I add, paid for your ticket, wants results. They’ve practically been battering down my door, so, once you’re in there, take lots of pictures. Good luck. Over and out.”

     
Chuckling, Liu’s lyrical voice echoed through Harrison’s helmet.

      “
Yeah, Assad. Take pictures.”

     
From the cockpit, Marshall turned his head.

      “
Yeah, Assad.”

     
Snapping his fingers, Harrison tried to put on a frightened face.

      “
Oh, no. You’d better stop at Rite Aid. I think I forgot to grab film for the camera.”

      “
I saw one at the last exit,” piped William whimsically.

     
Twenty minutes later, Marshall brought the Lander down some ten meters from the gaping rim of Mars’s magnificent canyon. Running a suit-pressurization check, he then cycled the air out of the Lander and opened the hatch. Filing to the opening, the four explorers lined up to check each other’s survival packs and equipment belts.

      “
You first, boss man,” Marshall laughed, pointing to Harrison.

     
Leaping down from the craft one by one, the explorers kicked up puffs of dust as they landed on the rocky ground. Setting off towards the canyon, Harrison engaged his Augmented Vision and brought up the cave-system grid. Showing the mouth of the cave about seven meters to the left, he trotted towards the glowing mark.

      “
Hey, no running by the pool!” shouted Marshall as he unloaded climbing harnesses from the Lander’s open storage hatch.

     
Slowing, Harrison stepped carefully to the rim of the canyon, then gazed out across the unimaginably deep gash, which cut its way thousands of kilometers across the face of Mars. Walking up to stand next to him, Liu tentatively peered over the edge at the distant floor, more than six kilometers below.

      “
That would be quite a fall,” she whispered. “I wonder how long it would take to hit the bottom.”

      “
Three minutes and thirty-six seconds,” replied Braun, unannounced, in their helmets.

     
Exhaling, Harrison bit his lip.

      “
Plenty of time to get your affairs in order before you go splat.”

      “
Oh, don’t talk like that!” chastised Liu. “I’ll be up here the whole time watching your lines. Plus, the winches and cables on each harness are rated to three times your weight on Earth. You’ll be fine.”

      “
Yeah, but the entrance to the cave is like fifteen hundred feet down the face of the cliff. That’s a long ways to just dangle around, you know.”

      “
Actually, Harrison,” interrupted Braun. “The distance to the cave's entrance in the standard measurement system is only one thousand, four hundred and seventy-eight feet from the top of the rim.”

      “
See,” giggled Liu. “Fourteen hundred, seventy-eight feet. No big deal. Also, don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone that you used standard.”

      “
Thanks,” muttered Harrison.

The temple

     
Running a ghosted hand across the carved figure of a water snake, Remus admired the delicate workmanship. Twelve monoliths towered like painted trees in the slanting fire of the early sun. Arranged in rows of four, the curving lines of carved pillars spiraled out from the three corners of short, flat, triangular center stone, which stood adorned with a clay pot of burning herbs. Sitting atop it with his legs folded under himself in a lotus position, Romulus meditated as he had watched Olo do on countless occasions. Having only been raised the evening before, the final pillar still glistened in places where the colorful paint that filled the lines of its relieved carvings had yet to fully dry.

     
Moving through the carefully arranged rows, Remus took in the stony images, which swarmed around him. Carvings of insects, birds and animals wrapped themselves around every monolith while twisting rivers of bright blue paint wove their way through the captured chaos of depicted life. Capped like the jagged peaks of the mountains to the north, each pillar bore a sharpened point of white and red. True to Olo’s original design, these stones, these monolithic pillars, were indeed mountains. Mountains raised by the hands of men.

Rappelling—
Sol 26

     
With his back to the crooked gash of the Valles Marineris, Harrison Raheem Assad took a deep breath and watched the others as they prepared to descend. A short ways to the left, Marshall adjusted the straps of his harness, pulling them tight with violent downward jerks while William, face obscured by the glinting blue tint of his visor, slung a huge black duffel sack over his right shoulder. Near the Lander’s nose, Liu bent low as she checked the titanium carabineers of the three harnesses, anchored securely to the craft’s hull.

      “
You’re all good,” she said, turning to face the three men. “You can begin when you’re ready.”

      “
Alright,” barked Marshall. “Let’s time our descents thirty seconds apart. I’ll go first, then Harrison, and, Will, you can bring up the rear. Got the lift-base kit?”

      “
Got it,” replied William, jabbing a thumb at his back where the heavy-looking duffel sack hung.

      “
Okay,” nodded Marshall. “Everybody ready?”

      “
Ready,” echoed Harrison and William in unison.

     
Flexing his knees, Marshall deftly lowered himself over the jagged edge of the canyon rim, then brought his feet up and pushed himself into a horizontal standing position. Testing the tension of his line, he took a few tentative steps backwards, his suit CPU interfacing with the climbing harness to spool the cable out as needed. Looking up at William, Liu and Harrison as they peeked over the rim at him, Marshall dipped his helmeted head.

      “
Here goes. Start the thirty-second countdown now.”

     
With that, he leaned back, gave a little hop and dropped three meters before his feet reconnected with the canyon wall. In the thin air of the Martian morning, the zip of Marshall’s spinning winch, and the crunch of his boots as they struck the cliff face, were all but silent. Projected on the inside of his helmet glass, Harrison watched with a strange and growing calm as the numbers of his thirty-second countdown melted away. Climbing carefully over the ledge as Marshall had done, he prepared himself for the nearly four-hundred-and-sixty-meter rappel to the entrance of the cave system.

     
With a soft tone, Braun spoke in his ears.

      “
You may begin your descent now.”

     
Exhaling, as if released from all control, Harrison shoved off the wall and felt himself drop like a feather. The sensation was far different than he had expected, and in that elongated second after his feet left the canyon’s side, a rush of absolute elation surged through his raw and worried nerves. Instead of feeling gravity's barbed hooks tearing him down, he was surprised to notice that, in his lightened capacity, he drifted rather than fell. With a whine, the winch at his chest tightened, and his freefall was cut short. Swinging in towards the canyon wall, he put his feet out and lightly pushed off as they made contact. Free again, he slid down another few meters and repeated the motion. Above him and to the right, he saw William take his first leap, hanging in the air impossibly long before arcing in to meet the cliff face.

     
In his ears, Marshall gave a war whoop, clearly exhilarated.

      “
This has got to be a fucking record, man!” he shouted. “I seriously doubt if anyone has ever done a rappel this long.”

     
Laughing, Harrison jumped off the wall and spooled out another three meters of cable.

      “
Ralph, we’re on Mars. Everything we do is a fucking record!”

     
Coming in towards the canyon wall, Harrison was distracted by his jubilant mood and did not notice a crack in the facade. Landing awkwardly, he twisted and lost his balance. Unable to stop himself, he slammed into the rock and bounced off, arcing far out with his arms and legs flailing. Swearing with cold terror, he struggled to bring his feet up as he raced back towards the hard red wall, but it was too late. His body crunched painfully as he connected, and the visor of his helmet banged against the rock with a hard whack. Swinging out again, he twisted himself around with instinctive reflexes, somehow regaining his balance. Coming in fast, he pushed his feet out and stopped himself from bashing into the cliff for a third time. Heart pounding, ears ringing, he crouched, suspended nearly six kilometers above the ground.

      “
Harrison,” spoke Braun, his voice calm yet stern. “Please don’t do that again.”

     
From below, Marshall was peering up at him, hands clasping his taut line.

      “
You okay?”

      “
Yeah,” muttered Harrison, his voice shaky and wavering. “I’m fine. My face shield didn’t crack.”

     
Above him, William had stopped and was looking over his shoulder.

      “
Do you need help? I can get to you if you need.”

      “
No, I’m alright,” assured Harrison. “I just lost my footing.”

      “
Never,” Liu cut in, her tone thin and shrill. “Do that again.”

      “
Indeed,” interjected Braun gravely.

     
From then on, the three explorers moved down the face of the canyon with decided care. Several times, cracks and overhangs slowed their journey. Yet, in less than an hour, Marshall had reached the mouth of the cave. The opening was nearly ten meters tall and almost as wide. Shaped like a capital D turned on the flat of its back, the mouth resembled in many ways the caves of Earth. Gone, however, were the needle-like teeth of the stalactites and stalagmites, for there was no dripping water with which to form them.

     
Taking manual control of his winch, Marshall hummed tunelessly as he lowered himself through open space like a white spider sliding down the silky tendril of a web. Stopping a few feet from the lip of the cave, he unsheathed a grappling gun, and, taking careful aim, fired a barbed bolt into the solid rock of the dusty floor. Clipping the gun to a chest-mounted bracket, he interfaced the pistol’s winch with his suit’s CPU and reeled himself in. Feet on the ground, he disconnected the grappling gun from its bolt and put it away. Removing his harness, he clipped it to the anchored bolt and stretched his back with feline relish.

     
Minutes later, Harrison dangled freely at the mouth of the cave, a mere sixty centimeters out from the bottom lip. Marshall took hold of his outstretched hand and pulled, steadying him as he too planted his boots on the solid floor.

      “
That—” panted Harrison, rubbing his lower back “—Was scary as shit.”

      “
Once Will gets here,” Marshall said, helping Harrison out of his harness. “We’ll set up the scaffolding for the base of the lift. That should make things a lot easier.”

     
Nodding, Harrison put a hand on Marshall’s shoulder, squeezing it tightly.

      “
A lift will be nice. Very nice.”

     
Moments later, William dropped into the window of the open cave and descended his line to the bottom. Marshall and Harrison grabbed his arms and swung him in, puffs of dust blossoming around his boots as they touched down on the floor. While Marshall helped the German disconnect his harness, Harrison walked a little ways into the yawning recesses of the cave. Smooth sloping walls rose up to meet above him in a steeple, and several large boulders littered the dusty floor, guardians of the secrets that hid in the darkness.

      “
This thing is huge!” he shouted, his voice booming painfully inside the confines of his helmet.

     
Wanting to penetrate the darkness that loomed at the back of the cave, Harrison engaged his Augmented Vision and selected the same setting he and Marshall had used during their emergency EVA. As the blue glow of x-ray-enhanced vision pinged out, he saw the tunnel continue some fifteen meters before the edge of his range dissolved the picture into muddy blackness. Suddenly, with a surprising series of rapid flashes, a grid of measurements overlapped the opening into the tunnel at the rear of the cave.