The Friendly Robot Conspiracy

By Lloyd Martin

Based on what we have now, and what is in development; no super-heroes, death rays or figments of a favoured imagination - the Laws of Physics are sacrosanct.
"... the appearance of a man in t-shirt and jeans on the outside of the spacecraft is alarming, so he tends to stay inside." I repeat - The Laws of Physics are sacrosanct.
Mary-Jo and Ash begin a space-walk, but it does not last long - he sees something that did not come from Earth. Then she is stranded in space. Stuart goes to her rescue but has he got everything he needs? No navigation equipment, not even a properly constructed spacecraft - in fact not even a spacecraft; just a rocket engine and some frame-work.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lloyd Martin
• Release date: Aug 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005760373

Lloyd Martin

Worked for BAe for 20 years on Lightning (XN726), Canberra (Venezuela), Jaguar, Tornado. Went to be professional artist specialising in military aircraft. Finished work to nurse wife, during which time I began writing the first series of books: the Coniston Fowler trilogy. Since then I have written a trilogy of novellas about mans first landing on Mars, and a set of books of a James Bond type.

Book preview

Conspiracy of the Friendly Robots

Part one of the

THRONES OF MARS

series

By

Lloyd R Martin

Chapters

Preface

Chapter One F-2D echoes

Chapter Two Introducing ‘Phoenix’

Chapter Three Instruction

Chapter Four Sail Power

Chapter Five Gravity

Chapter Six Days Off

Chapter Seven Robots

Chapter Eight Water

Chapter Nine Confinement

Chapter Ten Clues

Chapter 11 All at Sea

Chapter 12 Orion

Chapter 13 Handover

Chapter 14 Alien

They could have had the moon for less,

and the Asteroid Belt too.

Euclideus was still a guess,

Or see Europa blue.

Prologue

This story uses only what is available today; or will be developed from what we have now.

Some say that we cannot go to Mars using the systems we now use.

We can – and we will.

Read on and see how it is not only possible, but easier than landing on the moon with 1950’s technology.

Only the will is needed.

The astronauts and cosmonauts on the Orion Program thought they alone were building a spaceship that could go to Mars and back - when they began working on it they found that they were not alone. The ship they were constructing was now being designed by minds much bigger than theirs.

Then two astronauts on a routine spacewalk discover something completely alien; something that did not come from Earth.

The appearance of a man working on the outside of the spaceship without a spacesuit can be alarming, so he tends to stay inside.

I reiterate;

This story uses only what is available today; or will be developed from what we have now.

There are no fantasies, no death rays, superheroes, or machines defying the laws of physics.

If you want an answer to these paradoxes - read on.

… … … … … …

Chapter One

F-2D echoes

Two men in casual NASA uniform stood in the Texas sunshine.

Behind them was deep, deep blackness.

The inside of the cavernous exhaust of a gigantic F2D rocket engine echoed to the sounds of their voices.

Preston Ashton was an old hand (by astronaut terms) at space work.

‘I’m not sure about getting too involved here.’

His natural expression was of warm welcoming affability. His dark eyes had long ago taken on an inverted crescent shape from so much smiling. His hair was now premature grey, but plentiful and thick. Originally from New York State, Ash moved to Texas via many postings with the USAF. During his early years he had visited every island in the northern Hemisphere. Because of all his travelling Ash had lost any trace of a New York accent.

Jake Jensen was a tall native of Texas, he still had the Texas drawl so typical of people from the Lone Star State, but he seldom wore the trade-mark Stetson.

He managed to get to the ISS on one of the last Space Shuttle flights before it was retired.

As they walked by a row of massive rocket engines Jake said,

‘Michelle you mean?’

‘Yes.’

‘I could be going to Mars at the end of this. And, at the moment, it is a one-way trip.’

‘You are only one on a short list of a couple hundred, Ash. Do you think they are sending an ark?’

Ash smiled as he said,

‘And then there are the risks involved; this is dangerous work.’

Jake stopped and turned to face Ash,

‘Jeeze, Ash. This is not like you – don’t go being a pessimist on me in your old age.’

‘No, no. It’s just that in the military we always knew that in periods of high danger it doesn’t help to get too close to anyone.’

‘Let’s be realistic here, Ash.’ He held out his hand ‘You have only a 1 in 200 chance of being on this mission.’

‘You are wrong there, Jake.’ Ash shook his head gently, ‘We are looking at sending six or eight people to Mars. That brings my odds down to less than 25 to one.’

‘How do you get it to be less than 25/1?’

‘I have been told that there will be equal places on the mission. The split I have seen is two Americans, a Ukrainian, a Russian, two Chinese, one European and one Japanese.’

‘Where did you get that from?’

‘Never you mind.’ Ash used a finger to emphasise his message. ‘My point is that with so many Russians and Chinese on the list they still only get two places each.’

‘Do we really need so many Russians on this mission? Yes, they have been very useful with their launch facilities in the past. But now we have the whole system back on US soil.’

Ash had already been to the Russian Gagarin Cosmonaut training facility at Star City, then out to the International Space Station via the Baikonur launch facility in Kazakhstan.

He paused before replying,

‘We have been working on this project for nearly four years now. Early on we found that it was going to be almost impossible to do this whole thing on our own. The main problem was likely to be the length of time it is going to take to develop the required hardware. Given that during such a long period of time we would be having changes of Government, ups and downs in the economy and other worldly problems to contend with, it is very probable that the space program would be hit with funding issues.’

‘We did the Apollo missions on our own.’

‘That was small beer compared with what we are attempting today. For a start they are still working on a one-way trip; they have still ain’t found a way to get anyone back here.’ He looked at Jake, who knew all too well that the astronauts on this mission had all signed on for a one-way trip.

Ash continued,

‘So we came up with a scheme that gave us security in knowing that the program cannot be cancelled, or cut back - international collaboration. On the face of it, it looks like countries around the world putting together their resources and expertise with a common aim. Yes, we all benefit from collaboration with each other, we always have. But this is not actually the main objective this time. The contracts and agreements reached during the preparation phase of this program were specifically designed to prevent any contributing country from pulling out. The whole program is massively expensive. We have taken on some expensive programs in the past, most of them we dare not tell the politicians how much they were going to cost when we first proposed them.’ He looked at the rows of flags fluttering in the wind as they passed, ‘This time it was different. We couldn’t devise a number, then halve it, like we did in the past. Simply because there was no way we could even guess how much this project was going to cost. So we thought of a number and used that as the lock-in penalty clause to prevent any signatory of the project to keep them on board. Then we worked out how much it is going to cost for each separate stage of the operation; and put that forward like a hire-purchase deal. Put simply, it is cheaper to continue than to leave.’ Ash was surprised that Jake did not know all this already,- ‘This does not mean that we have a blank chequebook. We cannot arrive at the end of the program with a shortfall. Our aim is to put men (and women) on Mars. If