On Mars Pathfinder (The Mike Lane Stories Book 1) Read Free Page A

from exertion against the pressure suit itself. Thankfully I’d be using a mechanical Activity Suit on Mars. Developed by MIT, the Activity Suit was going to be much easier to use. However, for now, I was in the real space suit that was provided to us almost last-minute by NASA, and had to get moving. I say almost last-minute because to this day, each and every NASA space suit is custom-made and hand stitched by a small company in the Mojave desert. They did, however, deliver mine in record time.
    Powering up the suit environmental system, and getting all nominal readings, I floated into the smallish airlock on the Jalopy, then shut and sealed the inner hatch. The depressurization was about ninety seconds. I took a deep breath of anticipation, and then I opened the outer hatch.
    I stood there in the open hatch, just taking a moment. I was a Pathfinder. I was an Explorer. I was travelling through space and going to a new planet. I was alone. After years of training and months of travel, now, at this moment, about to take my first step into the void: I felt like I was finally a real, honest to goodness astronaut. I laughed quietly; I was giddy like a school boy with a new toy rocket ship.
    I looked all around the hatch opening. I could see beautiful Mars in full rise just above the horizon line. I looked down to see distant stars with a lot of nothingness in between them. My tether was securely attached to the airlock’s inner anchor point, my tool bag was clipped to my utility belt, and I was ready to go. Holding on to the frame of the hatch, I lifted a foot to step out into the void, and had to stop. I had to suppress the urge to vomit. I knew I was safe, I knew I wasn’t going to “fall”; but somewhere in my brain, the animal instinct that preserves most of us from acquiring a Darwin Award kicked in. I took another moment, breathing deeply a few times while still taking in the splendour before me, and then decided to fool my brain. I turned around, facing the interior of the smallish airlock, holding the door frame. Then I just let go and hung there, floating in the open hatch.
    I gave a little toot on the manoeuvring jets on my space suit, and flipped upside down slowly. Now Mars appeared below the horizon and suddenly, I didn’t feel ill any more. I manoeuvred out about four feet, turned to the right (which was aft now that I was turned around and relatively upside down), and then another little burst on the manoeuvring jets sent me back to the solar wing which was about fifteen feet from the hatch.
    I looked down into the cradle-well for the manual release on the solar wing armature, grabbed it and pushed it. Sticking up perpendicular to the cradle, it had to be moved all the way down flush with the cradle to disengage the locking mechanism that would allow me to fold up the wing manually. Of course, it wouldn’t budge. I tried again. No movement at all.
    I had tools for nuts, bolts and prying things open; but nothing to lever another lever. “ Well, wasn’t this a pickle ,” I thought to myself. I can’t leave the wing extended. I was already four hours into my orbit time, and only had about sixty-eight hours remaining until descent. While I wasn’t in a rush, I wasn’t going to dilly-dally either. I put one hand on the frame of the wing-well opening, and swung my body around. I grabbed the frame with my other hand and then swung my body, foot first, down towards the locking mechanism. If you can’t turn it or force it … then kick it! The darn thing didn’t even pretend to move.
    I repeated this about a dozen times. At some point I started giggling. I knew the exterior wing camera would be trained on me, and in eighteen minutes the live feed would start reaching Flight Control. I knew I would be a sight to see: the astronaut on his multimillion dollar space ship, on a spacewalk, trying to kick a lever closed. To make it even funnier, would be the audio of me grunting and groaning with every kick and