Dead on Mars

Chapter 43 - Sol Five, Nostalgia Became a Tiny Spacecraft
Tang Yue donned the Radiant Armor, opened the hatch to the airlock, and set up the antenna, despite the strong winds.

“Antenna setup complete,” Tang Yue reported with a heavy voice.

“Commencing signal scan.” Tomcat’s voice followed immediately. It was sitting in front of the work desk, all the computer screens in front of it lit up. At that moment, Kunlun Station was Mission Control. The computer systems were the latest HP workstations, especially customized editions for Mars missions. They had powerful processors and were great at handling data.

The loss of connection with the Eagle one minute after its launch was clearly a result of the weather. The radio waves were barely able to break through the interference when the Kunlun Station was situated in a low-pressure zone, but when the sand containing lots of electric charges blanketed the station again, the Eagle’s communications succumbed to the environment.

The lander’s vertical flight was already over. Flying vertically allowed it to pass through the atmosphere’s densest troposphere. This height was approximately twenty kilometers, and past that height, the Eagle would begin changing direction.

Tomcat forced itself to keep calm.

In any launch, losing communications was a terrifying matter. With millions of kilometers between them, even electromagnetic waves that moved at the speed of light needed to take several seconds. Amidst the vast and endless pitch-black deep space, if one didn’t proactively emit a signal, it was almost impossible for anyone to find them. That invisible, incorporeal, and extremely frail signal was the only thread that connected the spacecraft to the surface like a kite’s string. Therefore, losing communications at times was equivalent to having the spacecraft go completely missing.

The communications channel’s prolonged silence made it appear dead. In humanity’s past hundred years of space exploration, such silence had appeared several times. Everyone sitting before the communications systems would find their hearts in their mouths, but after every silence was an, “I have been out of the hatch, I’m feeling good1 .”

Kunlun Station remained scanning for the signal.

Tang Yue played the role of the antenna’s human servo as he slowly adjusted the direction of the antenna.

Seconds ticked down on the clock.

The second minute after the lander’s launch was about to end. According to predictions from the Kunlun Station’s systems, the lander’s speed had already reached 2,000 m/s, if nothing had gone wrong. It was equivalent to Mach 6, and it would have achieved a height of 130 kilometers.

But, of all things, Tomcat was unable to contact the lander.

Without Kunlun Station monitoring the Eagle from below, who knew what the brat would do in space.

In the event the Eagle’s computer suddenly went crazy and felt that the predetermined trajectory was too boring and unable to showcase its potent vigor, deciding to attempt a three and a half 360° rotation…

The outcome was inconceivable.

Signal… Signal… Signal! Tomcat clenched its teeth. Damn it, give me some signal! The real-time data on the computer was still from a minute ago. These numbers hadn’t been updated in a minute.

“Tomcat, any news?” Tang Yue asked.

“No.”

Tang Yue sighed. “Children are all like that. Once they grow up, they leave the family, going so far away that parents can’t reach them. They don’t even write back.”

Tomcat was taken aback. Tang Yue’s tone made it sound as if he had brought up a child before. His voice even had a baffling sense of melancholy.

“I’m the perfect example.”

Tomcat was taken aback before realizing that Tang Yue was talking about himself.

“Back when I saw the Eagle’s launch, it gave me such a feeling… The parent-child relationship just means that it is fate that has brought both of us together for this particular lifetime and the relationship entails continual episodes of watching it leave as you gaze intensely at their receding backs.” Tang Yue began changing the poem by Lung Ying-Tai. “I stand at the doorstep of Kunlun Station and watch it disappear at the peak of the atmosphere. Not only that, it uses its back view to tell you: Don’t follow me.”

“Follow? Can you?” Tomcat shook its head. “If you have what it takes, impress me.”

Ever since Tang Yue learned of the Earth’s disappearance, his bearing increasingly took on that of a melancholic poet. For no apparent reason, he would say words that left one baffled. It made Tomcat worried that this man would top himself one day.

“Tomcat, you have spent so many years on Mars without returning to Earth. Don’t you have any thoughts of home?” Tang Yue asked. “For example, in Yu Guanzhong’s Nostalgia… Then I was a grown-up, Nostalgia became a tiny spacecraft: ‘Here am I, and there… my Earth.’”

“Thoughts of home? Why? Having memories of the assembly line at the factory?”

At times, Tomcat was rather impressed with Tang Yue.

Even though Tang Yue didn’t show his sorrow, he wasn’t truly a sensitive person. True poets would probably have chosen to commit suicide the moment Earth vanished, to immolate himself for the billions of lives lost. In an even greater form of artistic expression, he might infuse Kunlun Station with pure oxygen before setting it on fire, yelling, “My name is Tang Yue, king of kings; Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

However, Tang Yue never had such thoughts. He continued eating and sleeping as he should, without meeting Marx while yelling Shelley’s poems. This guy’s state of mind far exceeded Tomcat’s expectations. Tomcat glanced at the wind speed indicator. The present wind speed was 38 m/s. On Earth, such wind speeds were enough to blow off a roof.

However, Tang Yue was there mumbling about how children wouldn’t return when they were adults or Yu Guanzhong’s Nostalgia.

Was he someone with fine sentiments or was he just nuts?

150 seconds after the lander’s launch.

Tomcat was still unable to contact the Eagle.

According to normal protocol, the lander would enter parking orbit 200 seconds after launch. At the same time, it would detach the first-stage rockets. That was the first step into entering orbit. From the launch to the rendezvous, the Eagle needed to take three steps. One of them was to enter parking orbit.

Parking orbit was a rather flat ellipse with the periapsis being 150 kilometers and the apoapsis 350 kilometers.

The Eagle would remain in parking orbit as it awaited an opportunity. Once it came, it would accelerate at the point of apoapsis, escaping the parking orbit and enter a parabolic trajectory to switch orbits.

Therefore, being able to enter the parking orbit was of utmost importance. If it failed to reach the specified orbit height, the subsequent flight needed to be redesigned. In a worse situation with the orbit height being too low, the lander might once again fall into the atmosphere and vaporize.

Tomcat looked at the timer.

160 seconds after the lander’s launch. It was about 220 kilometers above the surface.

There were still another forty seconds before the first-stage rockets were detached.

“Rotate the antenna east! About 30 degrees!” Tomcat shouted.

“I’m adjusting it!” Tang Yue slowly rotated the antenna. “How’s the kid?”

“No idea…” Tomcat replied. “You’d better pray that it entered orbit, or your child will likely die outside!”

170 seconds after the lander’s launch. It was about 250 kilometers above the surface.

There were less than thirty seconds before the first-stage rockets were detached.