THE GHOSTS OF MARS

While she waited out the Mars entry countdown, Ally closed her eyes and thought about the trip out, especially the last few weeks.  NASA had spent a year testing crew candidates.  They were especially looking for compatibility.  Many people had been switched out until they got the right group that seemed to work together well.

Ally’s report said she was the most easy-going of the candidates of a congenial group.

Two weeks out from Mars, however, things seem to be falling apart. Ally was working on preparing her plants for Mars to see if they would grow in Martian soil.  Rodrigo, the expedition’s vet, came up behind her and said in a gruff voice, “This is my time, lady.”

“No, it’s still mine, Pedro,” Ally answered in an angry voice.

Rodrigo spun her chair around, which weightless, caused her to fly into him.  He pulled his arm back as if to hit her.  Just then the deputy commander floated into the bay.

“Hold it right there, fella!”  She yelled in her command voice, “unless you want to be reported to the Captain.  Do you read me?”

“Yes, Ma’m” said Rodrigo cooling down.

This kind of thing was going on all over the ship.  Soon word got to the Captain who had been known as a “go along to get along” kind of guy.  He called an all hands meeting at which he read the riot act to the crew.

“I’m ashamed of you.  If this behavior continues, I’ll have to report it to NASA and the perpetrators will face punishment when we get back to Earth.”

When she opened her eyes, Ally was still angry while she waited to begin their decent to Red Planet.  But the moment they hit the atmosphere, the emotion left her and was replaced by another.  She tried to identify it.  Happiness? No, though, she was happy after the long trip and approaching its end. This was something else which she had experienced before.  Now she knew; she remembered.  After her first deployment, coming home and there was her mother on the poach with her arms open.  Her mom said, “Welcome home .”  That was it; Ally felt welcomed.  

The landing in the large crater was perfect. They quickly began their work.  Ally learned the whole crew had a new emotion which showed itself in their approach to the building of the base.  This was accomplished quicker than NASA had planned.  Ally’s plants thrived in the Martian soil, surprisingly.  Rodrigo’s animals took to the low gravity.

In two weeks, Ally was the only crew member who hadn’t been able to hunt around the crater.

She got up her nerve to ask the Captain for permission to take the Marsmobile out.

The Captain asked, “Where do you want to go?”

“Up on the ridge.  I’d get a great view of the whole crater from there and maybe spot something we’ve missed down here.” she answered.

The Captain, like the whole crew, was in a good mood.  Maybe it was the progress they’d made.

“Ok, but be careful and report in regularly.”

An hour later, Ally was ready to start the Marsmobile; but first she had to contact the communications unit which served as the base’s dispatcher.

“Mobile to Comm”

“Mobile to Comm”

“Comm to Mobile.  Read you loud and clear.  Ally, where are you headed to?” Chang, this hour’s communicator, asked in his sing-songy voice.  Because it was rather boring work and everyone wanted to go about their own research, the comms were changed every hour.

“I’m going to explore that cave up on the rim which the helicopter discovered the other day,” she told him.

“Didn’t Fritz our geologist say that was a lava tube?” Chang said.

“Yeah, but you know me, I have to see for myself,” Ally replied.

“Ok, but you know the rules.  Check in every hour.” repeating the Captain’s standing orders.

“Right,” Ally answered obediently.

“Comm over and out”

Ally set the coordinates for the cave and told the computer, “begin trip.”

She had been riding for an hour and just before she was to check-in, Ally found something truly unusual for Mars – a bright blue rock.  It really stood out against the red Martian sand.

She stopped the mobile and stared at it for a while on the monitor.  Then she called base and got Lesley, the English engineer.

“Les, you won’t believe what I just found.  A blue rock!  I’ll send you an image.”

Waiting for her to receive it, Ally extended the mobile’s mechanical arm and grabbed it. The arm checked its radiation level.  There was none.  She would have to wait until she got back to base to determine if there were any microbes.

“Base to mobile.  Ally, we got your image.  If everything is OK, put it in the bin and bring it back.  We’ll all be excited to examine it.”

“Will do.  Over”

Ally said to the computer, “continue to the cave.”  Unless there was some message it wished to impart, the computer never answered back.

She got to the base of the rim with no other discoveries.  The mobile continued up the slope until they reached the rim of the crater.  Ally put on her Mars suit and left the mobile.  She walked to the edge of the crater.  She could see the whole thing; members of the crew walking around the plain checking their experiments. Someone was using a ground penetrating radar. “There’s something way down there, maybe 3000 feet below the ground which covers this whole crater.” Our geologist had said.   “Maybe a city?”

She could see the base itself covered to protect it from radiation.  She looked up  and saw one of  Mars two moons cross the sky.  She knew two of the crew were circling it.

Ally tried to remember what one of the early astronauts had said about Earth’s  Moon.  Something like “lovely desolation”.  That’s the way she was feeling about Mars.  Then she looked for Earth where everyone she had ever known was.

Breaking her silence was a message: “Base to Mobile.  Urgent.”

 She recognized the meteorologist’s South African accente.

“Mobile to base.  What’s up?” Ally asked.

“There’s a large sandstorm coming.  We advise you to seek shelter.”

“The only shelter I see is the cave which I haven’t explored yet.”

“Enter it now and wait until the storm has blown over.”

“Will do and thanks for the heads up.  Over.”

“Enter the cave,” she commanded the computer.

The computer turned the mobile to the left and proceeded into the cave. Ally had been just in time as the storm cloud blocked the entrance to the cave.  Even with the interior lighting, she could not see anything outside the vehicle.

As it was getting late, she decided to spend the night in the cave.  The mobile was as much an RV as an exploration vehicle with a kitchen, a frig, a microwave and even a TV.  Whoever had stacked the DVs had been a fan of 1960’s TV space shows.  She had “My Favorite Martian”, “Lost in Space” and “Mork and Mindy”.  But not “Star Trek”!

Ally made dinner and settled into a night of comedy.  She soon got tired and decided to turn in.  The mobile even had a fold out bed.

She soon fell asleep.  She knew she was dreaming but she felt someone was with her.  He stepped out of the dreamy dark.  He was six feet tall with blond hair and blue eyes.

The first words he said to Ally were, “My names is Charlie.  How do you do?”

Ally should have been scared but she wasn’t.  “I’m doing well, thank you,” she replied.

 Charlie said, “That’s not my real name.  I know you couldn’t pronounce it, so Charlie will do.  I’m what you would call a Martian.”

Ally didn’t know what to say.  Was this a dream?

Charlie answered as if he could read her thoughts (which maybe he could), “I’ve been delegated to give you a tour of our planet the way it used to be and a short history of how we came to be the way we are.  Is this all right with you?”

What could an explorer say except, “Yes.”

Charlie changed his form.  He was black and thin.  His eyes were at a slant not horizontal like hers.  He had two arms and legs all of which appeared to end in tentacles.

The dreamy darkness changed to red, and she was on a beach.  Martians were swimming in the red water.

Charlie said, “This is what the crater where your base is used  to look like.”

The scene changed again to what must be a street.  There were ground vehicles, but they didn’t appear to have any wheels or other means of movement.  They just glided along.

They entered a building through doors which were slanted like the Martians.  The Martians inside were doing something but what she had no idea.

Ally and Charlie were back in the darkness.

“That gave you some idea what life was like at the best of times,” said Charlie.  “When the water dried up, we built a great city here.  It got buried by the sand many, many years ago.”

“What we didn’t know,” he continued, “was that the solar wind was ever so slowly ripping off our atmosphere.  When we realized it, we went underground and built our civilization there.  But this didn’t last.  Eventually we developed into pure intellects, minds without bodies, except in dreams.”

His story continued.  The Martians could talk to each other and cause things to move.  They had no need of buildings or anything, but they couldn’t leave the plantrt.  They became lonely until a few months ago when the Earth supply rockets arrived and then shortly after (by Mars time) the Earthlings.  There had been other beings who had passed time on Mars and moved on.  The Martians were overjoyed to find the Earthlings intended to stay.

“In fact,” said Ally, “we’re going to terraform the planet.”   She said a mental “Oops!” hoping it didn’t get him mad.

But no, Charlie said, “That’s great.  Bringing life back to the planet.  It’s what we’ve been waiting for these many years.”

“We saw you found that blue rock.”  Ally knew then that the Martians had been closely watching them.

Charlie went on, “It’s a rare rock.  Generally, We give them to special friends.  Take it as a ‘Welcome to Mars gift’ “

All Ally could say was, “Thank you and I’ll find it a place of honor at the base.”

Ally was awoken by “Base to mobile.  Base to mobile.”  It was Chang.

“Mobile to base.  Good morning.”

Chang said, “As you may have noticed, the storm’s over.  Time to come back.”

“I’ll need a little more time here to explore the cave.”

“Ok”, he answered reluctantly.

When she had dressed in her Mars suit, she left the mobile.  She was amazed to see stars.  No they weren’t stars but jet black rocks with white stones embedded in them.  She chiseled out a few samples and put them in the bin. Ally would find out when they were analyzed, they were “fusion stones”.  When you heated or electrified them, you got out more heat or electricity than you’d put in. 

Getting back to base, Ally didn’t tell anyone about Charlie. (Had it been a dream after all?)  But other crew members began to have dreams and make discoveries based on them: unusual rocks, skeletons of unknown animals, even one of a Martian.

Ally spent many nights with Charlie in her dreams exploring that city.  He explained ancient Martian culture to her.  Some of which she even understood. The Martians didn’t have any word for sadness or anger.  They were happy all the time, it seemed. He asked her about Earth.  And he didn’t understand differences between people and war.  They became good friends.  Ally regreted each morning when she had to wake up.

Her plants blossomed as did she.  Other members of the crew began to notice how happy she seemed and industrious. 

In the years ahead, Mars developed.  Due to the Earthlings, clouds formed and rain fell. The craters filled.  An ozone ring protected the planet from solar radiation.  Colonists arrived with their families and the sound of children’s laughter was heard on the red planet for the first time in millennia.  When each person entered the Martian atmosphere, he felt welcomed and soon happy.  Mars’ image changed from the God of War to the Happiest Place in the Solar System.  When terraforming was completed, Mars was being described as a Garden of Eden with plants everywhere.

Ally never returned to Earth.  She had found her home.  When she died, Ally joined her family and friends in dreams and became one of the Ghosts of Mars.