Dead on Mars

Fourth sol of being trapped on Mars.

There was still no sign of Earth.

“Good morning… Mr. Tang Yue,” Mai Dong greeted Tang Yue weakly. Her face was pale and her hair was disheveled.

“Good morning.” Tang Yue wore pants and had draped a blanket over him. He looked like an elderly monk meditating on the chair. In front of him were a meal tray and a cup of water. Today’s breakfast was canned peaches and compressed biscuits, as well as a hundred milliliters of water. The canned peaches contained plenty of water, so Tang Yue could manage with the water rations.

He had attempted the challenge of only using 190 milliliters of water to wash up, but without any surprise, he had failed. He even had toothpaste stuck to his front teeth.

From the looks of it, 200 milliliters was the limit.

“You don’t look good. Didn’t you sleep well last night?”

“Hungry.” The woman stared at the food on Tang Yue’s table. The food looked as though it was inches from her, as though she could reach out and touch it. It gave her yearnings to stuff her head into the screen.

“I’m starving—” Mai Dong’s eyes emitted a ravenous glint as she let out a miserable cry. “I— am— really— really— hungry—!”

Tang Yue jumped in fright.

“I want to eat everything I lay my eyes on.” The woman banged her head on the screen. “Mr. Tang Yue, Mr. Cat, if you aren’t sending the supplies any time soon, I’ll start eating the space station…”

“We’ll send it over tomorrow! Tomorrow!”

Tang Yue stuffed all the food into his mouth in no time flat, finished his water, and jumped up to don the Radiant Armor.

Running off midway, Tang Yue turned around and faced the camera, shouting, “Miss Mai Dong, do not eat the space station. If you bite a hole in the space station, everything will be over!”

Tomcat hung on the ladder to the lander as it began inspecting the Ascent Vehicle’s rocket.

The Ascent Vehicle’s rocket was critical.

Whether Eagle could successfully be launched into orbit and docked with the United Space Station depended on the success of the ascent phase. The lander’s ascent phase used two-stage rockets. The first stage comprised of two Raptor 3C combustion chamber engines, with a total of four nozzles. They could provide more than 120 tonnes of thrust.

The first-stage engine was the main driving force that would send the lander into orbit.

Tomcat meticulously checked the status of the rocket’s engines. It knew very well that a life was at stake. Since the Descent Vehicle’s rockets couldn’t be used, things didn’t matter if they were damaged by what it did. However, the Ascent Vehicle’s rocket was what brought life. It was the lady on the space station’s only hope. If anything happened to it, everything would be over.

The Ascent Vehicle used Raptor 3C rockets while the Descent Vehicle used Raptor 3D rockets, both products of the same line up from SpaceX. The only difference was their model numbers. From their design structure to the assembly process, everything was rather similar. Yesterday, Tomcat’s removal of the Descent Vehicle’s engine was to fully understand the control system of the Raptor rockets. It was done in preparation for the inspection of the Ascent Vehicle today.

All kinds of tools hung over Tomcat’s body, ranging from an ultrasonic fault detector to an X-ray machine. Inch by inch, it inspected Eagle, like a dutiful and responsible doctor.

The main structure of the lander’s Ascent Vehicle was two massive reservoir heads. They contained dozens of tonnes of liquid oxygen and methane which were used as a propellant for the engine.

Liquid oxygen and methane are low-temperature propellants. Liquid oxygen has a boiling point of 90 K, which is –183°C. As for methane, it has a slightly higher boiling point at 110 K or –163°C. Under atmospheric pressure, they would immediately boil and turn to gas. It was a problem storing such low-temperature propellants for extended periods of time. After all, missions on Mars typically exceeded a year or two.

Storage of liquid oxygen and methane was easily resolved while in flight since the temperature in space is very low. As long as one took note of not being hit by direct sunlight, the temperature was basically maintained below the propellants’ boiling point.

However, Mars doesn’t have such conditions. The average temperature on Mars is –60°C, reaching as low as –80°C. But in summer, the sunlight is sufficient to raise the temperature to almost 0°C.

This temperature would be considered extremely low for humans, but it wouldn’t be able to maintain oxygen and methane in their liquid state.

Therefore, the engineers had to work hard to ensure that the reservoir’s temperature was below the propellants’ boiling point. The Eagle’s propellant reservoir was a huge aluminum alloy can, but this can’s inner walls used many layers of polyisocyanurate foam, along with a TVS (Thermodynamic Vent System). The TVS was like a refrigeration system. It could maintain the propellant temperatures inside the reservoir below their boiling points.

Even so, liquid oxygen and methane would constantly evaporate; therefore, the Eagle’s propellant basically reduced slowly with time. Typically, once the propellant’s volume reached below a red line, the expedition team had to immediately embark on their return.

“Tomcat, how’s the situation on your side?”

Tang Yue pulled out the cart from the garage. He was beginning to move the goods.

Tomcat had packed more than ten crates of food for Mai Dong. These crates added up to more than a ton. Tang Yue still had other things to do in the afternoon, so moving the crates would take him all the way into the evening.

“A-okay.”

Tomcat’s eyes stared at the fault detector’s indicator. The lander’s main structure couldn’t afford any cracks, air pockets, or crumbling seals. If the propellant reservoir had any cracks, the outcome would be disastrous from the leaking of liquid oxygen and methane.

The fault detector indicated stable waveforms, implying that the reflected ultrasounds were regular. The Eagle’s internal structure remained flat, smooth, and stable.

“The propellant reservoir, OK?”

Tomcat put down the fault detector and heaved a sigh of relief.

“Is the reservoir fine?” Tang Yue asked.

“I can’t guarantee that it’s completely without problems.” Tomcat shook its head. “It’s not like we can dismantle the entire spacecraft. Under present circumstances, our checks are rather limited. I can’t be sure that there are no problems in the places we can’t reach.”

“What can we do then?”

“Trust in them,” Tomcat said. “Trust in those people on Earth, trust that their designs won’t create troubles.”

“Holy sh*t.” Tang Yue shook his head. “You want to let me believe in those people with the least bit of integrity in this world? Do you know those people at Jiuquan still haven’t repaid me for the meals I bought? If I were to die on Mars, would that mean that they don’t have to repay me… Ahhh!”

“What’s wrong with you?”

“F*ck, I’m stuck! I’m stuck inside the airlock!”

Tomcat looked over and, indeed, it saw a wriggling ass outside the airlock.

“Come help me!” Tang Yue shouted. “Tomcat!”

Tomcat lowered the ladder and walked over before giving Tang Yue’s ass a hard kick.

“Damn it!”