A Butterscotch Sky Ch. 03

Aly looked peaceful in her sling, her relaxed arms weightlessly floating in front of her. She seemed so vulnerable, yet I knew the strength she possessed.

I turned my head ninety degrees and saw Shizuka hovering in her own nest. Quiet Ayani, my boisterous friend's⁠—well, he said they considered themselves to be sworn to each other, so my friend's wife had her back to me. I understood his interest in and connection to her. Simi disliked being classified as an analytical, but Ayani-san was his perfect match in ability.

"Aly?" I whispered into her ear so as not to awaken Shizuka. "Aly, my love, wake up."

Her eyes slowly opened. The smile of deep recognition comforted my hidden nerves.

"Sean."

"I love you," I said quietly before I kissed her lips. "Beyond any doubt, I love you, Aly."

"I love you, too." I barely heard her words over the subtle hiss of the ventilation system. Her smile broadened, and her dimples appeared. "Attach near me, please?"

I unclipped the carabiners which secured my sling to the bulkhead and reattached them to hers. I slipped myself in, and she further secured me in her arms.

That moment … that very moment was when I understood what Simi said earlier. The physical attraction didn't matter. I knew beyond any shadow of any doubt that I loved the woman who held me in her arms.

"My dolzhny pozhenit'sya ," I quietly repeated the words she'd said during our prep for the mission.

"You say yes now?" she whispered with a catch in her breath.

"I do, my love," I answered just as softly. "I believe in true public ceremonies, but I swear a bond to you now if you choose to be with me."

"Da . I adore you, my love. I want you as my husband."

Our light kisses were quiet and soft as we cuddled weightlessly in the comfortably cool compartment.

Sol 7, Mission Time: 22:17

The fuel transfer EVAs, thankfully, were accomplished according to practiced plans. When the tasks were completed, I eased our ship to a safe distance from R1, took precise range measurements as I had for R2, and sent the data to Central so they could send autonomous guidance to the resupply modules for their landings.

Aly and I agreed our best chance of success would be for CM to delay their deorbits and landings until we'd investigated the base because we wouldn't want their arrivals to alert whoever might be on the ground that we might follow.

They certainly agreed with our suggestion and advised us that our own reentry and arrival window would be when the Martian sun was nearing the horizon as viewed from the hab, which would help obscure Orion in the glare.

The next sol, and after we'd suited up for landing, we observed a moment of silence. We then strapped into our seats.

"Twenty-two mission minutes... mark ," I said, advising the crew of the countdown to deorbit burn.

"Commanders," Simi spoke abruptly, "our backup emergency parachutes are made of Korbalon fiber, yes?"

"That is correct," Aly responded.

"I suggest, as soon as we land, we manually deploy them."

I asked, "Why fire them if we land successfully?"

He replied, "Bang bang?"

"What is it you know, Sean?" Aly asked.

"Simi has a point. If there are humans alive down there, and they are hostile, they will certainly come our way if our landing is observed. They may try to use ballistic weapons. The last thing we need are stray bullets puncturing the hull."

"The material is ballistically impenetrable, but it is very thin and does not absorb kinetic energy. The hull would still be deformed from the impacts, even if not punctured," Specialist Ljuba interjected.

Specialist Ayani added, "Aerodynamic stability will not be affected by hull distortions. It is of no concern here unlike it would be on Earth launch."

"We will be missing our nose cone, though," Irenka added.

"It is not important in the Martian atmosphere. It is much less dense than Earth. However, we would have no emergency parachutes if needed when landing on Earth."

"None of that matters if we do not have enough fuel to leave Mars orbit," I said.

Everyone was quiet for a few moments. The crew was doing what the crew did best. Postulating, discussing, considering, and thinking.

"How can we deploy them manually? They're ten meters that way," Irenka asked.

"Countdown, Sean?" Cedric asked anxiously.

"Fourteen minutes," I answered.

I could hear the commotion as Cedric hurriedly disconnected his harnesses and propelled himself over our heads. He opened and passed through two hatches to the furthest bulkhead at the nose of the ship. Using his strength alone, he struggled to forcibly disengage a service panel.

"Twelve minutes, Cedric!" I yelled.

"Stand by!" he spoke back, still wiggling the recalcitrant two hundred-centimeter-square of material.

"Ten!" My heart rate was elevating. I could feel it.

"Got it!" he said with victory.

Given my position, I couldn't see him stow the metal panel.

"Commander Emerson, give me your passcode!" he demanded as he maneuvered to the weapons lockbox.

"Eight minutes, Cedric! What the hell are you doing?" I yelled.

"Remember rule three from the first day we trained with stuns?"

I instantly recalled the mantra: Never discharge a pulsed EM weapon in the direction of any unshielded explosive .

"Delta four echo x-ray!" I answered, hoping Cedric hadn't lost his mind and was about to knock us all unconscious.

With a stun attached to his suit by a lanyard, he propelled himself through the gap with such a high velocity I thought he was going to land in ship's stores and fetch himself a refreshing beverage. Instead, he grabbed a handhold which angled his trajectory into his seat.

He grappled furiously with his harness, settling in fully when there was only two minutes left on the count.

"Showoff  ," I grunted as Orion's rockets fired in the deorbit burn.

Aly panted, "Six minutes until high-G deceleration for landing."

"Atmospheric interface," Irenka advised a minute later.

"Acknowledged," Aly responded.

It seems odd to twiddle thumbs when one is hurtling through thin air at four kilometers per second, but that was what I was doing. I was responsible for monitoring the reentry on the displays, but it really didn't matter. The ship was in complete control of itself, and there was nothing any of us could do to alter our fates.

"Retropropulsion in ten … nine … eight …" Aly counted.

Six seconds later, we began engaging our core muscles in g-strain for the next twenty seconds, knowing that as soon as the intense forces ceased, we'd be in contact with the ground, or … dead.

"Cedric, do it!" Alyonka commanded as soon as the engines shut down.

He unlatched himself from his seat, stretched toward the center of the command ring, pointed the stun toward the nose of our craft, and pulled its trigger. Even though I was fully encased in my suit, I could hear the explosion.

Being the only person on our crew with significant tactical training during her tour in the Czech Army, Irenka volunteered to lead the next phase of our arrival.

"Pegs have deployed," Shizuka said, referring to the forty-centimeter shafts which automatically extended from the craft, parallel to the ground. They'd be our primary means of descending to the surface or climbing back to the main hatch once there.

"Great fucking luck!" Cedric shouted as he opened the ship's main door.

I thought he was being sarcastic until Irenka ordered, "Quickly! Grab it! Hurry !"

Irenka took the edge of a parachute from him and descended with it down the ladder-like rungs. My brain attempted to calculate the odds that one of the parachutes would have alighted perfectly across the nose of our ship to a position where Cedric and Irenka could drag it down to the bottom.

"Showoff  !" I declared to him once more.

"Stop chatter," Irenka ordered from below. "Commanders, complete shutdown checklist as quickly as possible. We may have visitors in less than five minutes if retropropulsion phase was observed. Issue stuns to everyone and bring one for me."

I moved to the locker and withdrew the remaining weapons. Everyone affixed them to their suits, and we began disembarking. Simi first, then me, Aly, and Shizuka.

Orion One was reasonably well-covered in the Korbalon fiber chute.

"Alyonka, Siemen, follow me. We will go to the south rise of the hill. Sean, Cedric, Shizuka, go to the north. Remember, stuns have no ballistic drop. Set them for highest intensity, narrowest field, and the range will be one hundred meters. Discharge with sights at center of mass. Aim point is the upper torso. We have only eight discharges per unit until energy is depleted."

We all acknowledged her instructions.

My group of three walked as briskly as we could while still conserving oxygen, then spread out with ten to twenty meters between us.

"Orion accelerometers reporting impact shocks," Aly advised through the radio link.

"One stunned!" Simi shouted. "Shooter is down."

"How many do you see?" Irenka calmly asked.

"Only the one. I don't know where he came from."

"Orion is continue reports of more," said Aly, her fluency once again slipping with stress.

"Maintain posit⁠—Hovno ! One more down!" yelped Irenka.

"I pinged a third!" I radioed after zapping another person rushing our position from behind a rise.

The comms went silent for at least a minute.

"Check in!" Irenka ordered.

"Sabratova," Aly responded immediately.

"Emerson!" I followed.

"Hamilton!"

"Reinoud!"

Several seconds elapsed.

"Ayani, respond," Irenka ordered.

There was silence.

"Shizuka, respond!" Specialist Ljuba commanded once again.

"Comma⁠—Alyonka! Help me!" Cedric cried. "She's down!"

Running in one-third gravity is more difficult than one might think. The variable buoyancy pools at CM simulate reduced gravity, but they don't simulate the complete lack of drag. I stumbled and almost fell several times as I ran to Ayani's position.

I saw Cedric sifting dirt over Ayani's prone body, dusting her with it, watching for⁠—There ! He found it! There was a two-centimeter tear in her suit, and the escaping air was blowing away the dust. I was already anticipating the need for one, so I searched the utility pocket of my pants to remove a seal. Removing its backing with gloved hands was frustrating, but it finally peeled away. I covered the hole and smoothed it into place, hoping like hell it would do its job.

I observed her suit swell as its atmospheric concentrator repressurized it.

"Breathe," I whimpered. "You have oxyg⁠—breathe , Shizuka! Please !"

"Alyonka!" I radioed, "The hole is sealed, but she's bleeding! What do I do?!"

"I am coming," she responded, panting with exertion.

"Her suit was breached at her left shoulder, directly under the Japanese flag patch."

"Apply pressure! Use your boot if you must! I am almost there!"

I did as I was instructed, but blood was pooling in her helmet's transparent visor.

I saw dust kick up as Aly and Irenka loped to us. Simi arrived from the opposite direction.

"Help her!" Simi cried out. "Alyonka, please help her!"

"Give me distance," she commanded.

She fiddled with the control pad on Ayani's wrist. I could tell from her eyes' movements she was using her helmet's HUD to assess Ayani's biomedical status.

After several moments, she touched my boot. I removed it from Shizuka's shoulder.

Aly stood from her crouch and stared straight at me. "She is dead," she softly said.

"No," Simi whimpered. "No. God no!"

"Her injury was not survivable. Her suit was depressurized too long. It accelerated the loss of blood. Her lungs … too much damage."

I don't know if I heard or felt it first, but the force knocked me off balance and I stumbled forward.

"Mother fucker !" Cedric shouted.

He leveled his stun nearly straight at me and I felt the thump of its glancing field. It wasn't a direct-enough discharge to have an effect other than knocking the wind out of me.

Or that's what I thought was happening until the alerts flashed on my HUD and in my ears.

I couldn't draw a breath. There wasn't any air to breathe. My training kicked in, and I opened my airway so my lungs wouldn't burst under the pressure differential. I couldn't speak. I couldn't call out that my concentrator had malfunctioned.

I raised my hands up to my helmet's neck and gripped it, hoping someone could see what I was signaling as my ears began to painfully pop.

As quickly as it happened, it was over.

"Sean, I have you," I heard Aly's voice through the ringing in my right ear.

I heard nothing in my left.

"You're on my buddy line. Please stay still," she said, paying out the full two-meter-long Kevlar-jacketed transfer conduit she'd connected from her own concentrator to the auxiliary port on my suit.

I groaned my acknowledgment, watching Simi slowly walking toward the unconscious individual who'd shot me in the back. At point-blank distance, he discharged his stun directly to the head of the person. I saw the body convulse briefly.

"Simi!" I shouted. "You'll kill him!"

"Jag kan bara hoppas ," he coldly said before firing once again. He kicked the prone form with brutal force.

"Siemen, stop !" Alyonka commanded.

Once he'd regained his senses, Simi returned, knelt to the ground near Shizuka, took her hands and folded her arms across her chest. Holding them in his, he leaned forward until their visors met.

"Min kärlek ," he began speaking in sobs, "vila tills vi ser varandra i efterlivet. Min tysta, vackra Shizuka, vår union är trasig, men jag kommer aldrig att glömma dig ."

I don't know if he simply forgot to disable his short-range, or if he intended for us all to hear him. I understood only a few of the words, but his weakened voice conveyed the entirety of his anguish.

"Commander Emerson," Aly said, "Go unicast."

"Sean," she whispered after I switched the communications mode to the one which would allow us to communicate privately.

"This got out of hand very quickly," I said, forcing myself to swallow my own grief.

"Da ! We cannot depend on Siemen right now. He is impulsive, and we still do not have a full understanding of our situation."

"Listen to me, Aly. Give him a little slack, a little compassion. You may not know this, but they were recently bonded."

Her silence conveyed her shock.

"I knew they were close, but⁠—It is more than tragic. I do understand. But we must maintain our current advantage."

"Do you see our heavy rover anywhere on your HUD?" I asked, surveying my half of the horizon.

"Yes, it is there." She pointed. "Approximately two hundred meters distant."

"Four capsules located by us and Central, which implies twelve humans. Two deceased seen from orbit. We have disabled four here, and we presume that our craft launched with six aboard."

"Yes. This means, if we are correct, we have secured the area."

"Yeah. Our luck has run out. Did Return Four land with passengers in addition to those that were in the capsules?"

"These are good questions," Aly agreed. "We must remain alert."

"We need to return to the ship and send a status report to Central."

"I agree. Returning to broadcast," she said, tapping her control pad.

"Everyone, go back inside Orion," Aly commanded.

"I must stay with Shizuka," Simi answered in an eerily calm tone. "I am not leaving her alone."

Aly and I looked at each other.

"No, Simi. You're going aboard," Irenka said, dropping her commanding tone completely. "I can hear via the comm from down here. I will watch over our friend and stay on guard in case we have more … visitors. There is no reason for both of us to remain. Go on up," she said, offering her hand to help him stand.

"Whose stun has the most charge?" she asked.

Alyonka traded hers with Irenka. Simi reluctantly did as he was told. Once everyone was aboard, I collected the stuns. The status indicator on Simi's indicated it had been completely drained. I placed them in the lockbox so they could recharge.

"Everyone, please take a moment of silence," I suggested.

After one minute, the discussions began. Everyone talked over one another until my frustration hit a peak. There was lots of talking, but no exchange of information.

"This isn't getting us anywhere!" I shouted above the din.

The craft went silent.

"First things first. Check status. Our ship took a number of hits."

Every few moments, one of the three would make a comment, most of which were good at bolstering my hope the ship remained serviceable.

"Commander, it does appear the Hyper-D system is damaged. Everything checks out except for two of the cameras," Cedric said.

"Good, but I don't think it's of any consequence. They're all but useless down here anyway."

"Commander?" Irenka called through the comm.

"Go ahead," I responded.

"I have found damage to one of the leg actuator hydraulics."

"Which one?" Simi asked.

"Number five."

"It shows green here," Siemen said, "The damage must be on the line which currently isn't pressurized. The line that retracts it."

I shrugged in my confusion.

"It means it can't retract during launch," he explained. "Drag won't be an issue, but leaving one leg extended will change the center of mass and will affect guidance."

"What if none of them are retracted?" Aly asked.

I sensed everyone shift their gazes to the seat which should have held the one person who would know best, but it was vacant.

"We'll check with Central," I said as I turned my seat to face my main console.

On the virtual keyboard, I began to draft a message.

Specialist Shizuka Ayani was killed by one of four unknown individuals which attacked our landing site with projectile weapons. Her suit was penetrated and she was mortally wounded.

Of four attackers, one is presumed dead due to multiple close-range, high-intensity, narrow field stuns to the head. Other three

"Irenka, what is the status of the three other people?"

"I stunned again one that began to stir. I have disarmed them, of course. Each was carrying a carbine as well as a tactical knife."

… individuals are currently incapacitated.

Orion One is draped with an emergency descent parachute. The material appears to have protected the hull from the projectiles but allowed damage to two of the Hyper-D cameras and #5 leg strut hydraulic line. May prevent retraction during launch.

Status of habitat is still unknown. Rover is visible two hundred meters away, condition unknown. Condition or location of the two deceased individuals observed from orbit, unknown.

REQUIRE: Protocol for handling of Specialist Ayani's remains. Protocol for handling of deceased unknown's remains. Protocol for managing unknowns still living. Changes to ascent profile for Orion One re:extended leg(s).

"Irenka, status?" I asked.

"Unchanged."

"Do you see identifying marks on the individuals?"

"No, sir. No patches or markings of any sort. Not even names."

"It's going to get dark soon. Are you secure?"

"Yes, sir. I've switched the EV suit's helmet camera to infrared, though I will need relief and power pack recharge within thirty minutes."

"Carry on, Irenka," Aly added.

No visible marks or badges to indicate who these people are.