The Attempt (The Martian Manifesto Book 1) (31 page)

As the former Pegasus astronauts pulled up to the colony habitat modules in the rover and bulldozer, Roy spoke over the radio to those riding in the transport. “Grant, let Sam and me go in first. We can prepare the group inside for the news, and then you can dock the MMTV to the hab port and let everyone in.”

“Sounds good to me, Roy. We’ll be right behind you.”

Soon, Roy and Sam were through the airlock. They climbed up the ladder and into the main central module. All of the Called were sitting eating dinner. “Hi gang,” Roy said. “Got a place setting for us? You seem to be shy a few folks.”  Everyone turned and stared at the duo in surprise.

Celia jumped up from her seat. “What have you done with Brother Jacobs? He’s not here,” she screeched.

“Us? We didn’t do anything to him,” Sam replied. “As the saying goes, he was hoisted by his own petard.”

Just then, Bonnie and her girls appeared
as they finished ascending the ladder. Sue leaped from her seat and ran over, hugging them. “Oh, I was so worried about you. I’m so glad you came back safe.”

“You,” Celia shrilled
, pointing an accusing finger at Bonnie. “We know that Brother Jacobs went out to save your hide when you stole the spacesuits and wandered off like idiots. What happened to him?”

Bonnie proceeded to explain the events that had occurred to everyone’s shock and amazement. The NASA astronauts added pertinent details, and even Julong chimed in with his experiences. When the narration had finished,
everyone sat in stunned silence trying to absorb what they had heard.

Celia
was the first to break the silence. “Well, that means that my husband George is now our leader. And he will make me First Platinum, won’t you, George?”

George
contemplated for a minute before speaking. “You know, I was never comfortable with this whole hierarchy business. And after hearing about ‘Masters’ and how Brother Jacobs deceived us, I don’t think it’s right having a virtual dictatorship. I propose we have a vote, and there is one person here who has displayed the type of common sense we need going forward. I nominate Sue to lead us.”

Bonnie quickly added, “I second that!”

“Let’s have a show of hands,” George continued, putting his hand on Celia’s shoulder and forcing her to sit. “How many think I should lead?” A few hands, mostly Celia’s friends, went up. “How many vote for Sue?” A majority of the hands rose up. “Well, Sue, the job is yours, if you’ll have it,” George stated.

Sue demurred, “I might not be the best choice; I don’t really have any experience.”

“You have the experience of saving me and my girls, and that’s good enough for me,” Bonnie said emphatically. As other voices urged Sue to take the position, she finally agreed to take on the leadership mantle.

“Alright, as my first agenda item, I say that we need to
work together in harmony with the NASA team and the Chinese/Korean contingent,” Sue said.

Julong
added, “I agree. We here should form a Martian federation which will decide what is best for all of us without home world interference. Whatever we discover should be for our benefit as well as freely available to the people of Earth.”

“An excellent suggestion,”
Brad said. “We should create a Martian Manifesto. Even Elliot can be part of it. I’ll write it up for all of us to sign, and then we can communicate it to Earth. They may not like it, but they’ll have no choice.”

“And I’m going to write a strongly worded summary of the events here and transmit i
t to the media back home,” Grant added. “There will be no more secret agendas.”

After a few more exchanges of words, the NASA astronauts started to say their goodbyes.
Charles and Julong were eager to get to the NASA base and to begin studying Elliott. The others were exhausted and wanted this long and harrowing day to end.

Charles walked over to say
goodbye to Bonnie. “Do you mind if I come visit sometime?” he shyly asked.

“Of course, Charlie,” she responded. “
I would love that.” Then with a more serious face, she said, “Just don’t come by too soon. I have a lot I need to process. I’ve lost a baby and a husband all in two days.”  When she saw the dejected look on Charlie’s face, she added. “But you know, now that I’m a seasoned surface traveler, I just might even surprise you by popping by when the time is right.” She stood on her tiptoes, and gave the astronaut a kiss on the cheek. Charles, in surprise, stood there with a dazed look.

“C’mon lover
boy,” Grant said, grabbing Charles by the arm. “The fun and games are over. You have some homework to do with Elliot.”

Paul Finkelstein lay
on his bunk, his back to the jail cell door. “This is so unfair,” he mumbled. “I never hacked into any government systems to get that video of the astronauts fighting the Reptilians on Mars. I can’t believe they arrested me just when I finally had some decent money!”

Behind him, he heard
keys rattling at his cell door. Paul turned over and saw the guard unlocking the door. “It’s your lucky day, son,” the guard said. “All charges have been dropped. You’re free to go.”

“Really? What happened?”
Paul asked in a hushed voice.

“Apparently they checked your computer, and discovered that you d
idn’t really hack into the government systems. They tracked the IP addresses of your emails, and found out that the video came from the Chinese. In fact, you’re something of a hero. They caught all of these Asian spies that had infiltrated NASA only as a result of your posting the alien attack video.” As the guard opened the cell door and beckoned to Paul, he added, “You better prepare yourself. There’s a huge crowd outside.”

Paul walked out of the prison and blinked in the bright sunlight. A throng of p
aparazzi were snapping photos. Multiple microphones were thrust into his face, and a cacophony of voices bombarded him with questions.

“Mr. Finkelstein, what do you have to say now that the aliens are
proven to be real?”

“Mr. Finkelstein, did you know
that people are calling you a hero? There’s talk of giving you the Congressional Medal of Honor. What do you think of that?”

“Mr. Finkelstein, the consortium on Mars seems to be holding, and they say they are working with alien technology for the benefit of all mankind. Are you planning on contacting them?
”

“Mr. Finkelstein, we
understand that your lawyer obtained for you a one million dollar settlement for your false arrest. What are you going to do now?”

Paul said the first thing that popped into his mind.
“I think I’m going to go on my first real vacation,” he replied in a daze.

# # #

Paul hurtled along the road on the rented scooter, the wind whipping his hair.
“What a glorious morning here in the Galapagos Islands,”
he thought.
“It’s my first day, and I can’t decide whether to visit the Charles Darwin Research Station or head to Tortuga Bay.”

Distracted with his thoughts, Paul did not see the g
iant tortoise in the road as he careened around a turn. His scooter went up over the shell of the creature, sending him flying through the air. With a mighty crash, the scooter hit a tree, but luckily Paul fell sideways into some bushes which broke his fall. After a few moments of confusion, he managed to rise and dust himself off.

Paul looked around and
saw the tortoise disappear into the brush on the other side of the road. “Reptilian,” he hissed at the retreating creature. Ducking down into a crouch, he snuck across the road to follow the beast. Soon, the tortoise was traversing a beach and heading for the ocean. Paul continued to follow it.

“I’ve never seen such a huge turtle before,”
he mused.
“It must have been created through DNA modification by the Reptilians.”
Sneaking along behind the creature, Paul felt the sand suddenly give way. “A trap!” he screamed. Paul did not realize that he had fallen into a hole where the tortoise had laid its eggs.

In his frantic efforts to escape, Paul caused the sand to cave i
n around him. A second later, a huge wave washed in from the ocean, swamping him. He felt himself sink deeper into the sand. “Help!” he sputtered. He sank even further and another wave covered his head.
“I can’t believe it is going to end like this,”
he thought. In a final act of defiance, he stuck his hand up high out of the water with his middle finger extended.
“Damn you, Reptilians!”
he thought.

And at that moment, a firm hand grabbed Paul by the wrist and pulled him free
. He fell onto his back on the sand, coughing out the salty water, and looked up. A young woman was standing there looking down at him. She was dressed all in purple. She was sporting purple eye shadow and purple lipstick, and she even had a purple streak in her hair.

“
Dude, what are you doing out here?” she said. “I saw you leave the road as I was driving by.”

“Who are you?” Paul gasped, out of breath.
“My name’s Paul.”

“My name’s Celestia.
Were you following that tortoise?” she asked as she looked out at the ocean.

“Yes, I’m sure it’
s the result of an alien experiment,” Paul coughed. “The aliens have been visiting Earth since the dawn of mankind, you know. There’s tons of proof.”

“
No Dude, you have it all wrong,” Celestia replied. “Unexplained things weren’t caused by aliens. It was the Atlanteans! I’ve made a study of it. The explanation for a lot of ancient artifacts is that the people of Atlantis created them.”

Celestia reached down and helped Paul stand. She looked at him earnestly. “
Seriously, you should come with me to see. I’m going to go see the Moai on Easter Island next.”

“Those
giant head statues?” Paul asked.

“Yes. T
he ancients said that they walked to their spots on the beach. But it could only have been done by the anti-gravity rays of the Atlanteans, the same way that they helped the Egyptians lift the pyramid blocks. Then I’m going to go to Machu Picchu in Peru to see the Temple of the Sun. C’mon, follow me. It’ll be fun.”

Star struck with this young woman, Paul walked next to her as they crossed the beach. “Can we go to
Puma Punku in Bolivia after that? I’ve always wanted to see the huge stone blocks there. They say that the aliens helped the ancient people lift them.”

“No,
Dude! I told you it was the Atlanteans and their anti-gravity rays!”

“Where do you think they got the anti-gravity rays? From the aliens!”
he retorted.

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous Paul,” Celestia snorted.

“Well, I guess maybe we can agree to disagree,” Paul replied with a grin.

“
You know,” Celestia said frowning at him, “you really should be wearing purple if you’re going to be travelling with me. Purple is the color of travelers; it gives you protection. I think I have a spare purple shirt I can loan you in the car.”

As Paul walked along with the young woman, a smile played upon his features. He reached over, and held hands with
Celestia thinking,
“Yes siree, these aliens definitely were the best thing that ever happened to me.”

THE EN
D

Thank you for taking the time to read my novel. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did writing it. I have been a fan of science fiction since I was a child, and have always been a lover of sci-fi movies of all types.

One of my friends and author, Ricky Sides, recently urged me to write a space opera novel. At around that same time, I was writing science fiction book reviews for the National Space Society web site, which you can find at http://www.nss.org/books.

I realized that I was having a difficult time finding near future
space novels that included recent space development activities. I decided to write a story which would include many of these endeavors. Examples include Bigelow which has, as of this writing, already tested space hotel modules in Earth orbit, Planetary Resources which is planning on mining asteroids for metals and water, the Mars One initiative which is trying to create a small colony on Mars, Virgin Galactic’s ship which will take tourists into space from Spaceport America in New Mexico, and Buzz Aldrin’s idea for a Mars Cycler. My own contribution to this would be that the cycler was a hollowed out asteroid that used the Bigelow hotel modules.

As I thought about a plot for my
novel, I was heavily influenced by the science fiction movies of my childhood, such as
The Thing from Another World,
Forbidden Planet
and even
The Crawling Eye.
All of these included a monstrous alien of some type, and I was determined to create a very different one.

Although it is highly unlikely that we will be able to create a space plane that can fly to a landing upon Mars due to its thin atmosphere, I
have always enjoyed piloting stories. When I was in my twenties I took lessons and received my pilot’s license. Thus I envisioned a crisis in my novel which would require the astronauts to hand-fly a winged spaceship. I had heard about skip reentries which were done by the Russians and programmed into the Apollo craft, and so I wanted to bring that into the novel in a unique way. All inaccuracies, and I am sure there are many, are all my own.

Although I am not very active on social media, you can find out more about me at
http://www.amazon.com/author/boblee
and
http://www.google.com/+BobLee333
.

Stop by on Goodreads at
https://www.goodreads.com/boblee333
and let me know what you thought of my novel and what you would like to see in book two
of
The Martian Manifesto
series. If you enjoyed my quirky sense of humor in this story, you might also like the novel I co-wrote with my friend, John Altson, called
The Id from Eden
.
It is a satanic techno-thriller and available on Amazon and CreateSpace.

Thank you again for taking the time to read my story. If you have a few moments, please
consider giving it a review on Amazon.

Bob Lee

July, 2014