Robert Thomas Dunlap picked up a tool chest and walked past row after row of wire, strung between sensors protruding from the ground. He headed toward 3A, an igloo-shaped temporary shelter, opened the outer door and stepped into the airlock. Two minutes later, after the air filtration and electrostatic charge had removed the coarse dust, he entered the Hab.
Inside, Colin squinted at his computer screen while he made adjustments to the grid.
Dunlap looked over Colin’s shoulder and stroked his short beard. “Have you kicked-it on yet?” he asked.
“Nope. Tested and ready, though. I thought I'd wait until you got in before I started.”
“So, if something went wrong, I’d have to go back outside to fix it.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Well, let her rip. I can’t wait to see what this thing really is.”
“Yeah, well you do remember that it may take a little time to fine-tune the sensors for the materials that are down there.” Colin tapped the screen. “All right. Here goes. Coming your way, Commander.” On screen was a display of the sensor grid on top of a ghosted relief of the surface. For what seemed like a very long second the display was inactive, then the screen filled with a detailed 3D image of the subsurface. In that moment, many questions were answered. The higher resolution of the ground scanner revealed precise definitions of blocks and domes connected by tunnels.
Back at Mars Hab 3, Z studied the image, scrolling along an artery, zooming in on what was a clear outline of a large shape with ghosted shapes inside. “It's simply unbelievable. The amount of detail gives us a lot to work with.”
Colin added, “And Z, that's just the first scan. Let me tweak the settings and I can probably get you better definition and some clarity on materials. That'll take about 30.”
“Okay, you get on that and let's regroup in about 30 minutes to discuss.”
...
World Media had ambition to match the grandiosity of its name. Scrappy, irreverent and perfectly willing to break any rule, its founders had built the network with a trick of technology that leveraged abandoned local television broadcast frequencies for expanded reach. Originally their business plan had relied on scale: broader reach attracted more advertisers. But their inattention to programming quality cost them viewership until a young programming executive reversed the attrition with a string of wildly successful shows. Her method blended culture with content; offering programming that created buzz, then reporting on the buzz, then analyzing the show in order to provide insights that could guide people’s lives. Usually viewers were led to private affinity networks where loyalists, as they were called, could connect their lives, real and virtual, with others who were similarly infatuated and purchase products that helped them mirror the lifestyles of the characters in the programming.
Triche was the master of the strategy, and its continued success positioned her as the most valuable asset of the network. Distant, calculating, and formal, she had not hesitated to install herself at the top of the World Media pyramid and dare others not to genuflect. Her office took up nearly an entire floor of the headquarters skyscraper and was designed to be a vast, minimalist wasteland that took visitors the better part of a minute to traverse, leaving them nothing on which to focus attention except the vanishing point of Triche at work behind her marble slab desk. The visitor of the moment was used to the walk; it was her elegantly attired, platinum-skinned, robot assistant which, on arrival, sat neatly on the couch, crossed its legs at the knee and waited for Triche to speak.
Triche studied the video of Patrick’s press conference. She paused on the image of the discovery and stared at it for a moment. Then she began dictating to her assistant, who sat motionless, recording everything.
“We need to move on Mars quickly. NASA expects everyone to wait for them to tell us the story. We're not waiting for NASA. They're not qualified to manage the greatest discovery in history. World is going to monetize every facet of this story.
“First, get a graphics team working to enhance their scan and look for clues we can embellish. Start on a speculative piece: How did these people live? Here's what we can tell from the cityscape.
“Back that up with a Discovery Forum. Feed it with commentary from our science team and some alien visitor-types and get our loyalists to add their opinions. Recruit some extra scientists and astronauts and support them as much as possible with renderings, diagrams, maps and videos to make their theories more vivid.
“Find out who represents the astronauts on Mars and buy rights to their stories.
“Pressure those involved at NASA. Catch them off-guard. Get them to make statements that can be storified. If they slip up, make it look like they are hiding something.
“And merchandize—shirts, caps, accessories—pithiness about Mars and Martians.”
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
...
MESSAGE: Annie Dixxon PM to Commander Nasri CC: NASA Information Office
Still trying to keep ahead of the buzz, down here. Every waking second that there is no news from Mars is a second that is being filled with conjecture. The plan for the moment is to release recordings in almost boring detail about the mission. You have an okay from Sharp to record as much as possible, so we'd like you to set cameras in all the key spots and on helmets to create a record.
MESSAGE: Elizabeth Nasri to Annie Dixxon PM CC: NASA Information Office
I'll place cameras to follow the investigation, but I'm concerned that the video be fully screened before you release it to the public. The scans raise more questions than they answer. That means there are a lot of spit wads flying around, up here. For example, after the last scan, we picked up an echo... or maybe a weak transmission. We can't tell yet. And so, we're guessing—and some of the ideas come right out of comic books—so I'm not sure we want those statements getting out in public. It will be taken out of context and used to make us look silly, you can bet on that.
Nasri
The first surface scan had been a revelation, but once the soundings were fine-tuned they revealed even more astounding detail. Not only could the team see caverns and tunnels, they could see structures within the caverns. There was no longer any doubt that they were viewing a part of a small city beneath the ground. But now they had to repeat the process over and over to map the entire cityscape. Six times along each axis. A thirty-six scan field, each consisting of 100 sensor points, equaling 3,600 total points. Focusing only on the most dense groupings of structures, it was still just a portion of Cupid's original scan.
The most time-consuming step was placement and alignment of the sensors. It took three hours to complete a scan with two astronauts working in the field while a third calibrated the sensors in 3A. Then they took two hours to recharge batteries and oxygen and worn-out bodies before laying down another grid.
...
Back on Earth, a pale, neat woman from the archaeology team stood at a touch screen table and zoomed out on an image, allowing the assembled experts to take in the scope of the new world they had found. “This is the map as it exists today,” she began. “It details nearly a third of Cupid's initial scan of the area. The city is beneath the lava tube and spreads out pretty evenly to both sides.” Then she spun the map and pointed to branches off the lava tube. “These appear to be ramps leading to the lower level. Assuming there was commerce... and I'm assuming that a city of that size would develop an economy...”
Annie Dixxon added, “There was a substantial economy. We've sent Cupid to continue mapping along the lava tube and we've already discovered a second settlement.”
The archaeologist continued, “So the tube is a major artery. Then these ramps would be surrounded by manufacturing, warehousing, materials processing. Near them, probably these smaller spaces would be business and maybe government.” Then she zoomed in on an area at the edge of the scan. “Notice that these areas on the periphery don't have independent connections to the lava tube. They can only connect through the lattice of intra-urban tunnels. These are probably residences.”
NASA’s administrator, Dan Sharp, who had been quietly listening, led the conversation to a bigger question. “We have an advanced civilization, here, capable of tunnelling, creating an atmosphere, growing food, building outposts; so they have existed on Mars for a million years, if they evolved at the same rate as humans. The question is: how could they have evolved underground?”
The archaeologist responded, “We're only assuming for the moment that the inhabitants of this city were/are native to the planet. We don't know that for sure. They could be from somewhere else.”
An engineer cut in, “Hold it. You just used the present tense.”
“Well, we can't rule-out that this is a living culture; if not here, somewhere on the planet.”
Patrick reacted immediately. “But we haven't picked-up any signs of life in our scans,” he said, swiveling his chair to face the others. “And if we're running a mapping operation right on top of them, surely they'd know about it and check us out.”
“Or shoo us away,” Sharp added.
Dixxon tried to steer the conversation back to an action plan. “We have experiment packages on board that can detect biologic signatures. We can place a sensor to analyze the atmosphere in the tube. The gasses we find will tell us something. I'll have the team deploy it within the lava tube.”
...
Back at Mars Hab, Z watched the transcripts of the meetings with some measure of annoyance. Deploy experiment packages? Look for biologics? She messaged back to the Administrator: If we send the crew down into the lava tubes, we’re going to know, way before the sensors, whether there's a living culture down there. Let’s use a drone. She hit send and closed the program.
On Earth, Sharp read Nasri’s message. He held his hand up to interrupt the discussion, which had gone on too long, in his opinion. “Nasri’s weighed-in,” he said. “If there’s life, there, it’s going to be pretty obvious once we send anything underground. Send in a drone, not an experiment. I say, go with Nasri.”
MESSAGE: Annie Dixxon PM to Elizabeth Nasri CC: NASA Information Office
Discussions today about the layout of the city. You already know of the concern that these may not be ruins and there may be living inhabitants. We have adopted your plan to send a drone. Avoid any other contact.
MESSAGE: Elizabeth Nasri to Annie Dixxon PM CC: NASA Information Office
Glad we are not being asked to send humans into a dark, possibly inhabited cavern. It's important for everyone to remember how few options we have for defending ourselves in any type of a confrontation. Not that anyone could have anticipated this situation, but the end result is that we have no defense but rock hammers. As I wrote to the Admin, my plan is to get in, observe and get out.
Nasri
MESSAGE: Annie Dixxon PM to Elizabeth Nasri CC: NASA Information Office
Understood. Will have your back.