Lost in the Red Hills of Mars Read online

  Uji appeared. Its eyes looked straight ahead as if looking through Celine.

  “Uji, open the door, please,” Celine said in a pleading tone.

  “You are ill,” it replied, sounding abnormally machine-like. “You are very ill.”

  CHAPTER 2

  What’s in the Metal Mirror

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  Celine dropped her hands to her sides and pinched her shoulders back. “I don’t feel sick.”

  Uji did not respond. Instead, it flashed on and off like lights during a fire drill.

  “I’m checking my vitals,” she said as she touched the palm-size screen on the panel next to the door.

  Numbers appeared on the screen. Celine squinted and leaned in closer.

  “My temperature is thirty-seven degrees Celsius.” She double-checked the monitor. “All of my vitals are normal…Uji, I am not sick!” Uji continued to be unresponsive, and its image flickered as if it were in an emotional panic.

  Celine directed her attention to the locked door and began pounding on it.

  “Help! Somebody, please help me!” She stopped pounding and listened for any sound outside.

  “I can’t hear a thing,” she said in disappointment. “Uji, I’m not ill. You have to let me out of here.”

  The hologram faded away.

  Celine rushed to her computer, and the screen lit up. “Call Mom,” she said.

  After a moment, Celine heard Uji’s voice. “She did not answer.”

  “Call her again,” Celine said. After a few moments, Uji’s voice repeated. “She did not answer.”

  Celine flopped down onto the lower bunk. “I am not calling Morg. I’d rather stay in here all day then call him. Where are those doctors? They should know I’m locked in here by now.”

  Celine popped up from the bed. “Maybe the lock is broken!”

  She headed for the panel.

  As she passed the polished mirror, she caught a glimpse of herself and was startled to see that her eyes were glowing yellow. She swerved back toward the door and pulled on its frame. The door would not move. “Brighter light,” she commanded, and instantly the dim room was brightly lit.

  Uji reappeared. “Your heart rate has increased. You are ill.” Uji disappeared.

  Celine could hear her heart thumping as she inched her way across the cold floor and peered into the mirror. She squinted and then leaned in toward the mirror.

  “What just happened? My eyes are…” She paused and examined her eyes from different angles. “Normal?”

  With her arms wrapped around her chest and stomach, she eased back onto the family stool.

  “OK, maybe the monitor is right…maybe I am sick.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  “I can’t believe it took thirty-three hours to get here,” Alex Rittenhouse, the fifteen-year-old heartthrob from Earth, told his father. “Why didn’t we teleport?”

  Mr. Rittenhouse glared at his son with lips held so tightly they looked like a single line.

  “Boy, didn’t I tell you the situation here?” he asked. “This colony has been draining our family’s finances since my father started this project years before you were a cell in a petri dish.”

  Alex flinched.

  “I know that it needs work,” Mr. Rittenhouse continued. He leaned back into his well-padded seat. “But I’m not putting in any more credit until it starts bringing in a profit. Quality teleportation requires investment, Junior.”

  “Sorry I asked,” Alex mumbled and then stared silently out the small porthole of his father’s spaceship. Thin white clouds of ice crystals prevented him from seeing the Martian surface, yet he continued to look through the porthole, blinking his long lashes over hazel brown eyes.

  Most of the passengers had gotten up from their seats and were stretching or roaming about. Alex remained seated and continued to stare out the window, but he tilted his left ear toward his father’s conversation with Stan, one of his father’s personal protectors.

  “I can’t continue to invest credits into this Martian colony,” Alex heard his father say. “My investors are going to cash in their stocks and force me into bankruptcy!”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Alex saw Stan nod sympathetically.

  “There is a Porta down there in the Compound.” Mr. Rittenhouse nodded toward one of the portholes. “But it can’t transport anyone outside the Compound. And do you know how much money it would cost me to put in one of those fancy Teleportas that Junior wants?” He motioned toward Alex.

  Alex shook his head as he watched his father complain.

  “Dad, please,” Alex said and sucked his teeth.

  “Well, look who’s rejoined the living,” Mr. Rittenhouse said regarding Alex. “I was just telling the boys about the Porta at the Compound.”

  “I know. I heard you,” Alex said, and he turned his head back to the porthole to stare at the white clouds below.

  “So if you want to see that planet, you’ll have to walk or do some climbing. The Mav is off-limits. You hear that, Junior?”

  Alex continued to stare out the porthole.

  “It’s for the scientists when they’re on their expeditions. Not for some kid to take a joy ride. Besides, there are plenty of hills down there. You could walk faster than a Mav in those hills.” Mr. Rittenhouse paused to get a second wind. “Most don’t look any worse than those Himalayas. You remember the Himalayas?”

  “The Himalayas?” Stan asked.

  “Dad, Stan didn’t go with us to the Himalayas.”

  “That’s right. He didn’t. Well, we really enjoyed those mountains. Didn’t we, son?” Mr. Rittenhouse turned to face his protectors. “My boy’s a great climber, you know. He was a real man’s man out there…not like that sissy actor he plays every day on that stupid reality show.”

  Alex jumped up from his seat with his fist raised.

  Mr. Rittenhouse’s eyes widened, and he leaned back.

  “I am sick of your insults, Dad!” Alex said. “Everyone here knows I’m your clone. If there’s anything wrong with me, blame yourself.”

  “Come here, Alex, and sit with us,” said one of the Marsologists, Amirra, trying to calm him.

  Mr. Rittenhouse stared at Alex’s raised hand. “You need to go sit down, son,” he said with calm authority.

  Alex uncoiled his fist and dropped his hand to his side, but he remained standing eye-to-eye with his father. He was nearly six feet tall, almost as tall as his dad. “I don’t understand you,” Alex said.

  Alex looked at Stan through glassy red eyes. “You like my show, don’t you, Stan?”

  “Yes, Alex. I like your show,” Stan replied sheepishly.

  “How about you, Jerry?” Alex asked the Marsologist who was sitting next to Amirra, his wife.

  “Sit with us, Alex,” Amirra pleaded. “This is not the right time to talk with your father about this.”

  “Amirra is right, Alex,” Jerry said. “You’re exhausted. You haven’t slept in over thirty hours. Here.” Jerry patted the empty seat next to him. “Sit here, have some dried chicken, and rest.”

  Alex bit his lip. He knew Amirra and Jerry Gregory were worried that his father would lose his temper. Reluctantly, Alex ambled over to the Gregorys’ lounge area and flopped down into the seat next to Jerry. Alex swallowed, exhaled loudly, and rubbed his hands as he stared out the porthole. Though his eyes were red, he did not cry. “I’m not hungry,” he mumbled.

  Suddenly, the ship penetrated the planet’s atmosphere, and rays of pink and violet hues radiated through the ship.

  “Look at that sky!” Amirra said. “Wow! Unbelievable!”

  Everyone rushed to a porthole or shifted in their seat to get a look at the Martian sky, a mixture of blues, pinks, and violets with slithers of white clouds.

  “Look down there!” Jerry said, pointing to the flat, dusty Martian terrain. “That area reminds me of Death Valley. Look at that volcano! It must be Olympus Mons!”

  Alex’s eyes widen as he gazed at the larg
est volcano in the galaxy. “Amazing,” he muttered.

  “Yes, it is,” Jerry said and smiled at Alex. “We plan to study it up close. We might even reactivate it and give this planet some warmth.” Jerry studied Alex’s face.

  “What do you think of that?”

  “That would make a great adventure story for my show,” Alex said proudly.

  Alex watched his father tap the personal Com he wore on his wrist and then walk toward the apex of the ship. Mr. Rittenhouse had a scowl on his face.

  “Quiet! You fools!” Mr. Rittenhouse said, interrupting everyone’s childish chatter. “Can’t you see I have an important call?” Alex noticed his father’s eyes narrow as he looked at him.

  Alex’s strong hands covered his mouth and chin, hiding his grin.

  The bewildered passengers—the two scientists, the three personal protectors, and the ship’s navigator—became as silent as dormant robots.

  “Well. I knew that was coming. Dad always has a way of making others feel small,” Alex mumbled, and then he chuckled quietly.

  Finally the ship touched down on the dusty planet. Everyone except the navigator squeezed himself into lightweight radiation suits and then adjusted his Graviton boots to Martian gravity. After putting on their oxygen packs and helmets, and turning on their voice amplifiers, they lined up in front of the transporter. When Mr. Rittenhouse keyed in his password on the panel next to the transporter, the door slid open, and they all crammed in.

  “Surface,” Mr. Rittenhouse commanded once the door was shut. In a nanosecond, the transporter had dropped fifteen feet to the surface. “Door open,” he said. The door slid open, and everyone, except Mr. Rittenhouse, stretched his neck to see the surface. He stood back with a wide smile on his face. “Alex,” he said, “I’ll let you do the honors.”

  Alex raised his eyebrows. “Sure,” he said and stomped onto the surface, causing a puff of red dust to rise above his knees. “This stuff is like talcum powder.”

  “Watch it,” his dad said as he stepped onto the surface followed by his entourage.

  “Follow me,” Mr. Rittenhouse said as he walked past Alex. “The Amin and doctors are waiting for us on the other side.”

  Alex stepped out of his dad’s path and got in line with the other passengers.

  Flat, barren lands nearly covered the Compound, which in reality was the spaceship that had brought the first hundred colonists to Mars. It had been transformed into a three-story underground working and living quarter for the colonists. Just beyond the Compound, the lands were dotted with hundreds of ash-gray boulders of hardened lava and a sprinkle of small gray rocks. In the distance, Alex could see rusty red hills.

  “I wonder what it will be like to climb those hills,” he said.

  “Behave yourself, and you might get a chance to find out. I bought climbing gear,” his father said.

  Alex bit his lip. “Sure, Dad.”

  “Quiet, Admin is speaking,” Mr. Rittenhouse said.

  In his headphones, Alex could hear his cousin, Admin Sandra Rittenhouse, speaking to his father.

  “Welcome to Mars, Mr. Alex Rittenhouse: the both of you,” she said and then chuckled. Alex noticed she emphasized the word “you,” making reference to the cloning. He frowned.

  “The medical team will be waiting for you at the rear exit,” Admin continued. “You’ll be spending twenty-four hours in the isolation chamber. The cook—ahem—the chef will provide you with rations and distilled water.”

  “Rations? Did she say rations?” Alex muttered to himself with a perplexed scowl. “Dad won’t tolerate that.”

  “I brought my own food, Sandra. You know I don’t eat anything from the printer. I have all that I need on my ship. I’ll have Stan bring it in, as we need it. We have enough food to last at least a year. And I have ten water bottles.”

  “Ten?”

  “Yes, I’ll give a few out as gifts.”

  “Gifts?”

  “One is for you, Sandra.”

  “Thank you! I’ve heard about them. Do you know how they work exactly?”

  “No, Sandra. All I care about is that it keeps making water.”

  “Dad,” Alex said, interrupting his father’s conversation. “I thought we would only be here for a month.”

  “Alex, you’re not a part of this conversation,” Mr. Rittenhouse said.

  “I don’t want to stay on this outback of a planet for a year,” Alex mumbled as he followed his dad into the Compound.

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  Most of the colonists were in the commons when Mr. Rittenhouse’s spaceship landed. Abbie Voltaire was there as well, watching the landing of the Stellar. A huge screen, typically used for entertainment, was providing a clear image of all the action happening outside the Compound.

  Abbie watched the screen in wide-eyed amazement. “That Stellar is no ordinary ship. What a beauty! Look at that V shape,” she said to her friend, Hannah.

  Hannah nodded but didn’t take her eyes off the screen. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  The ship glided in quietly and hovered before releasing long spidery legs onto the surface.

  “I wonder what other technologies we’re missing out on since we’ve become full-time residents of Mars?” Abbie said.

  Hannah chuckled but didn’t take her eyes off the screen.

  Most of the hundred colonists applauded when the ship’s legs touched down and the engine turned off. Abbie did not. “Nothing but the best for our CEO,” she said. Her lips curled into a soft smile.

  “Hush, Abbie. You’re spoiling it,” Hannah said.

  One of the colonists yelled, “I’m first to tour it.” Hannah chimed in, “Me, too.”

  “You are such a typical Martian,” Abbie said, first rolling her eyes, then chuckling. She stopped watching the screen and began searching the commons.

  “I don’t see Celine,” she said. “I know she wouldn’t want to miss this.” Abbie looked down at the personal Com on her wrist.

  “Celine has called me. Twice.” Abbie pushed the recall key for her quarters and was relieved to hear Celine’s voice. “Celine, why aren’t you in the commons?”

  “Mom! Uji won’t let me out of here! It says I’m ill! I tried calling you.”

  “Honey, I’m so sorry. I didn’t notice the vibrations. I am on my way.” Abbie made her way through the cluster of colonists. She waved to Hannah as she entered her corridor.

  Celine stayed on the line. “Are you OK?” Abbie asked.

  “I don’t know! Where are the doctors? Mom, get me out of here!”

  “Stay calm. I’m almost there.” Abbie walked quickly to her quarters, afraid of the attention she would draw by running. What if she’s sick? What if Celine was quarantined?

  When she finally reached Celine’s quarters, Abbie noticed that the door button was blinking red. She jabbed her finger at the button multiple times, but it continued blinking. The door remained shut. She spoke into her personal Com. “Celine, I can’t unlock the door.”

  “Where are the doctors, Mom?” Celine asked impatiently.

  “With Mr. Rittenhouse and his entourage. Give me a minute to call Dr. Duke, all right?”

  Abbie tapped the small Com on her wrist and said, “Call Dr. Duke.” She heard static. “His Com must be turned off,” she muttered. She got the same results after calling Dr. Baylor. She pushed the intercom button next to the blinking red light.

  “Celine, they’re not answering. I’ll have to go find one of the doctors. I won’t take long. You’ll be OK.”

  “Hurry, Mom. I want to get out of here.”

  Though she wanted to run, Abbie walked back to the commons. “If Celine is sick, only the doctors and Morg need to know it,” she whispered to herself.

  She looked for Morg in the crowd of excited colonists. If anyone in the crowd could help her reach a doctor, it would be him. She found her future husband standing near the Porta. She rushed over to inform him about Celine.

  “I need to speak with D
r. Duke. Celine might be ill,” she said in a hushed tone.

  Without a word to her, Morg took his personal Com from his side pocket. It was much different from the one she wore on her wrist, larger and more complicated.

  “We have a code red in cell ten,” he mumbled into the Com. “Give me Dr. Baylor. The baby is ill.” He listened through a hearing device implanted in his right ear.

  Abbie crossed her arms.

  “Dr. Baylor is on her way to her office,” he said to Abbie.

  “I told you I wanted Dr. Duke.”

  “Dr. Duke is too busy right now. Go back to your cell and wait.” Then he folded his arms in front of his broad chest.

  Abbie stood there for a moment with her mouth opened. Then she pressed her lips together tightly, turned her back to Morg, and stomped out of the commons. Though she was relieved that help was on the way, she was irritated with the disrespect her fiancé had just shown her.

  As soon as she reached her quarters, she went straight to her intercom.

  “Celine? I am here,” she said. “Doctor Baylor will be contacting you soon.”

  “Mom, leave the intercom on.”

  Abbie pushed a button on the panel. “It’s on, Celine. Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

  Abbie leaned back against the wall next to her door; her arms were wrapped around her body like a supporting hug. She replayed the conversation that went on between her and Morg in the commons. “I don’t understand him. He acted like he didn’t even care.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  Celine sat still on her bunk. “Mom, are you still there?”

  “Yes.”

  Suddenly a holographic image of Dr. Baylor appeared in the room with Celine.

  “Oh! You startled me,” Celine cried.

  “Celine, is the doctor with you?” Abbie asked.

  “Yes, Mother.”

  “Ah, there you are,” Dr. Baylor finally said when Celine’s visual was clear in the infirmary.

  Dr. Baylor’s hologram was incredibly realistic, and she had short hair like most of the men on the colony as well as a muscular face.

  “Come down from there,” she said to Celine. “I know you can hear and see me.”