Mars

"Exactly. That will mean the end of the Mars Project. There will be no return mission."

" ’Tis a thorny problem."

The chief controller stared out the window at the falling snow. "It’s too bad we can’t keep them all on Mars permanently."

The Scotsman smiled grimly.

By the time Jamie awoke it was fully light. Ivshenko was up in the cockpit; Vosnesensky had already suited up and gone through the airlock to winch himself across the treacherous lake of sand to the mired rover. It was the grating buzz of the winch motor that had pulled Jamie up from his sleep.

Once he realized Jamie was awake, Reed brought him a tray of hot breakfast with six gelatinous capsules resting beside a plastic cup filled with orange juice.

"Reed’s recipe for recovering your health," the Englishman said when Jamie looked up at him questioningly. "Enough vitamins to lift a horse into orbit."

Jamie still felt weak and aching, but better than the day before. He realized that it was not his physical symptoms that had eased; rather, the terrible fear he had kept bottled up within him was gone. The body will heal, he knew, once the mind has been convinced that healing is possible. The real agony is in the mind, always.

He took a deep breath. The pain in his chest was gone. The turmoil in his mind had cleared away, too. Everything looked different, clearer than he had ever seen it before. As if he had looked at the world through a veil. Until now.

For the first time in his life Jamie felt an i

"I want to thank you again, Tony…"

Reed’s brows knit together. "There’s been enough of that. I’d prefer that you drop the subject, if you don’t mind."

Jamie sat up and accepted the tray from Reed’s hands. "Where’s Mikhail?" he asked.

"Off to help your stranded comrades."

"By himself? Is he strong enough?"

"He got seven solid hours of sleep," said Reed. "He feels much better this morning. The vitamins are taking effect in him."

Ivshenko called back to them from the cockpit, "Mikhail has made it to their rover. He is helping Co

"I’d better get into mine," Reed muttered. "I’m assigned to greeting our guests at the airlock hatch."

"I’ll help," said Jamie.

"You rest," Reed said firmly. "You’ve done enough. We can handle the remainder."

Reed went back to the airlock. Jamie gulped down his reconstituted eggs and lemon-laced tea, then made his way forward. Ivshenko gri

Through the bulbous canopy Jamie could see the winch line stretching tautly to the mired rover, on the far side of the dust-drowned crater.

"Co

"What about Joa

"Dr. Malater is apparently too sick to get out of her bunk without help. Dr. Brumado seems somewhat better than that, but not much."

"Maybe I ought to go back there and help them."

"You stay here," Ivshenko said firmly. "Mikhail Andreivitch gave strict orders. He will get the job done."

Jamie felt his body tense with something between frustration and guilt. He wanted to be helping, to be active, not sitting like a spectator. But a part of his mind told him, You’re in no shape to go outside again. You’ve done your share. You can’t do it all. Let the others help. The tension eased away.

Reluctantly, he accepted the situation and sat there in the cockpit, listening to the chatter among the people in the other rover. Joa

Vosnesensky abruptly dumped the problem in Jamie’s lap. "Waterman, you are the scientific leader. What do you recommend?"

Ivshenko glanced across the cramped cockpit to Jamie.

"The reason we came all this way was to see if life exists here," Jamie said. "Can’t you attach the cases to the cable and send them here along with the people?"

A long pause, then Vosnesensky muttered, "Very well."

"Thank you," Joa

The rover’s exterior camera was aimed forward, along the taut cable that stretched between the two vehicles, and cranked up to maximum magnification. In the display screen set into the center of the control panel Jamie saw the half-buried rover’s airlock hatch swing open. There stood Joa

"We are ready," Jamie heard in his earphone. "Start the winch."

The motor began whining. Joa

Joa

She’s all right, Jamie said to himself. She just doesn’t know how to hang on properly. She’s forgotten what they showed us in training about riding the safety cable out of the shuttle if there’s a malfunction on the launch pad. She’ll be okay.

Still, it seemed like an hour before he heard the airlock hatch sigh open behind him. Jamie twisted in the cockpit seat to see Joa

Jamie pulled himself out of his seat and stumbled aft toward her, surprised at how weak he still was.

"Can you take care of her?" Reed’s voice was muffled from inside his helmet. "The sample cases are on their way and Mikhail’s already yelling at me to take them off the cable."

"Sure, I’ll take her," Jamie said, his voice shaking.

He helped Joa

"I think I can manage the rest," Joa

Jamie sagged down onto the bench beside her, then turned her halfway around so he could reach her backpack.

"I’ll help you."

"I was afraid… you had died out there."

"So was I."

"It was a very brave thing you did."

He tried to laugh. It came out more like a groan. "Bravery is the other side of fear, I guess. I was afraid we were all going to die."

"You saved us. You saved me."