Stranded on Mars: LightSpeed Pioneers (Super Science Showcase Adventures #1)

By Charlotte Hathaway, Lee Fanning and Mind's Eye Creative

In the future, the LightSpeed Pioneers is the ultimate training program for the next generation of astronauts! Join teenaged Centauri Squad

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wonder Mill Cosmos
• Release date: May 30, 2022
• ISBN: 9781949561968

Book preview

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Published by Wonder Mill Cosmos 2022.

LightSpeed Pioneers: Stranded on Mars Copyright © 2020 Wonder Mill Cosmos.

All Rights Reserved. Published in the United States by Wonder Mill Cosmos. No part of this story may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

For information: wondermillcosmos.com.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Illustrations by Mind’s Eye Creative

Original Character Design by Chris Brothers

LightSpeed Pioneers Logo designed by Chris Brothers

All other logos designed by Andrew Persoff

Articles by Wilson Toney; Edited by Liv Salma

Produced, Designed & Edited by Lee Fanning

superscienceshowcase.com

wondermillcosmos.com

Printed in the United States of America

Second Edition 2022

1

THE NEAR FUTURE.

MARTIAN DUST EVENT: DAY 148.

Winds whip across the desolate surface of Mars, stirring the scarlet earth. A pair of lights—eyes—beacon from inside the dust cloud. Machinery wheezes with effort as a robotic silhouette emerges, heaving itself along. Its treads struggle defiantly as it trundles across the barren ground towards a rock formation. Long-necked and fitted with solar panels that flap out from its base, the rover Vitality IV is determined to complete its mission. To fulfill its fate.

Gyro arms and electronic sensors slither above the soil. Scrubbers drag away clusters of dust and ice from solar panels, but it doesn’t make a difference. The cloud of dust that swallows the rover blocks any light that might fuel it. Inside the machine’s mind’s eye—an internal graphical interface and display—red warning text flashes:

9% Energy Reserves.

Vitality carries on regardless, busying itself with analysis, inspecting the densely packed contents of the rock formation.

Energy reserves under 10%, declares a robotic voice inside the machine that once spoke to Vitality’s human caretakers back home, but now serves little purpose. Those caretakers haven’t been in contact in weeks.

Immediate recharge recommended, the voice continues, just the same.

There’s nowhere Vitality can recharge, though. All it can do is hope (if a robot can hope) that its scrubbers can keep the ice off its solar panels long enough to generate enough power to continue with the task at hand. A crooked, metallic apparatus emerges from a docked compartment above the machine’s glowing eyes, cracking through an icy sheen as it rises formed over Vitality’s hull. A laser sparks out from its tip. It’s a flicker at first, then steadies in consistency until its job is finished. Vitality prods the burnt hole in the stone it has just made with a spidery arm. Its mind’s eye flashes the soil analysis.

Calcium. Magnesium sulfate. Kieserite, intones the robotic voice. Bassanite. Sodium sulfate anhydrous.

The usual suspects, Vitality would think (if a robot could think). Another dig. Another failure.

Suddenly, the analysis is interrupted. A lone graphic fills the internal screen, back lit in blue: an illustration of a microorganism.

Singularity. Potential microbial life detected, drones the voice, although it would sound excited if it could. This could be what Vitality has been searching for: life on Mars. This could be its fate.

A timer graphic appears.

Confirmation pending, the voice says.

Vitality waits as its timer ticks down. Static interference fizzes, distorts, irritates—and then is gone. The blue microorganism graphic flashes on the screen again.

Life confirmed, announces the voice, attempting analysis transmission to Mission Control.

Ever patient, Vitality continues to wait as the transmission beams out across space, its first time in weeks trying to contact Earth.

Transmission failure, the voice announces as Vitality’s mind’s eye washes red. Last successful communication 39 days, 76 hours, 14 minutes, 27 seconds.

Vitality’s eyes seem to lower in disappointment. The sun is still muted in the clouds above, and dust begins to fall like snow. The scrubbers on Vitality’s solar panels again leap into action, but they scrape and struggle to fight against the ice build-up. An extended range transmitter rises above Vitality’s hull as the robot wheels out from the rock formation, angling towards the muted sun. That little extra solar power could make all the difference in keeping Vitality alive long enough to make the transmission to Earth. Under its base, leg clamps protrude, bore into the soil, and lock. Its solar flaps extend forward and stretch outward, as the rest of its form is balanced upended.

Transmission failure, the voice declares without emotion.

Vitality is undeterred. Operational lights systematically turn off around the rover’s hull. It can still save energy, although transmission at this stage appears more