Rogue Martian Squirrels

By Erik Ga Bean

Failed rocket scientist, Doug, suddenly finds himself at the centre of the global effort to land the first man on Mars - all because of an idea he once had about squirrels.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Erik Ga Bean
• Release date: Dec 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781311202246

Erik Ga Bean

Science fiction fan, astronomy enthusiast and IT professional Erik Ga Bean lives in the English county of Hertfordshire with his wife Helen and his growing collection of carnivorous plants. As well as being an author, he is a keen narrowboater and a leading light in the Stevenage Plus social group.

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Rogue Martian Squirrels

By Erik Ga Bean

Published by Erik Ga Bean at Smashwords

Copyright 2013 Erik Ga Bean

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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To my wonderful wife Helen.

Chapter 1

By the middle of the twenty-first century the second space race was well underway. The four main industrialised powers had competitively performed increasingly elaborate feats, both in Earth orbit and on the Moon. The next objective was to land the first people on Mars.

Flying to Mars was not an easy thing to do. The orbital race of the planets around the sun meant that launch windows only opened every couple of years. Even then it took about nine months to get to Mars, was necessary to wait over a year before a return journey could be made and then this would take another nine months.

The consensus view was that an expedition to Mars would require three craft. The first of these would be unmanned. It would need to arrive a couple of years in advance of the people and spend the time automatically producing rocket fuel for the return journey from the limited supply of Martian water.

The third craft, containing the crew, could only safely be sent to Mars once it was confirmed that the first lander had produced a full tank of fuel for the return journey. It was also necessary to know that the second unmanned ship, packed with the supplies required to sustain the crew during their time on the surface, was also in place.

In addition to the established dangers of space travel around the Earth, the journey to Mars brought with it greater risks. There was the psychological strain of the isolation as well as the radiation risk from unpredictable solar flares.

Ideally three launch windows would be used, with successive craft sent in each. As Doug sat in his office idly flicking through the internet news pages, two of the main industrialised powers already had landers generating fuel on the Martian surface. These were both soon to be joined by supply ships when the upcoming launch window opened. The other two powers, one of which had failed to land a fuel generator two years earlier, were about to simultaneously send both fuel and supply missions. If all went well the manned race to Mars would be won in a couple more years.

The progress of the various competing Mars lander programs were of interest to Doug as he was the head of a space agency. His did not belong to any of the four main industrialised powers. After repeatedly graduating with a series of impressive degrees in space and rocket science, he had unsuccessfully applied to work in a couple of the main space agencies. He had eventually landed the top job at the space agency of a small country. Whilst he had always been vaguely aware of the small nation's existence, he had looked its precise location up on a map as part of his interview preparation.

Initially Doug had enjoyed his job establishing the agency. He had hand-picked both of his fellow rocket scientists, Sam and Yan, as well as all five of the support staff. It was only after they were all in place that the true limitation of the budget really struck them. They could not afford to build a rocket large enough to launch a single person into Earth orbit. Sending people to Mars was a very long way out of reach.

Many other small nations had decided to cling on to the coat tails of their regional power, hoping that the tiny piece of help that they could offer would reflect a fraction of the glory in their direction. Doug suggested this approach to his political masters but they rejected the idea. His agency was to go it alone, making the very best of its limited means.

The three rocket scientists designed a series of space craft that they would very much like to build more than just the models of. They officially requested extra budgets for this mission and that mission. There were press conferences and officials were briefed. The only thing that they succeeded in doing was bringing a set of toy space craft to market.

The profits from the toy venture were seen by the government as evidence of exactly the sort of creative thinking that was expected from rocket scientists. They were seen by the rocket scientists as not coming close to being even a drop in the required funding ocean.

Chapter 2

One day, while filling his time idly surfing the internet, Doug stumbled upon a news story that gave him an idea. A local zoo had been given approximately three dozen super intelligent squirrels. The genetically enhanced Eastern Grey Squirrels had been rescued following a raid on an unlicensed animal testing laboratory.