One Way To Mars

Chapter 18

Fingers lightly stroked Foreman'sface and he smiled.

'That's nice,' he said and openedhis eyes. 'Monkley!'

He was disappointed to find hewas the only human in the room, in fact, when he checked, the onlyhuman in the base. Monkley handed him a cup of coffee.

'Thanks, pal.'

'Andy happy.'

'Are you kidding? Me, spendingthe night with the hottest woman this side of the galaxy? Oh. Yeah.'

Stuck on the bathroom door hefound a note. “Not keen on beards. See you tonight, Susan.”

'Can't argue with that, Monkley.Time for a shave.'

It took longer than usual, butthe beard was gone. 'She's right. Much better. Then women usually areright about most things.'

After breakfast, they tidied up.'I was thinking. It could be interesting, taking a look at thedrilling operation. I don't think they'll mind.'

Foreman wasn't surprised to findthe buggy gone. It was only a half hour walk up the ramp to the ship.The ship was deserted, the back of it opened up from where thedriller and associated equipment was stored. The driller was gone andhuge tracks in the soft sand pointed the way. The buggy was parked bythe ship, the drilling team using the driller for transportation.Foreman got in the buggy as did Monkley. They followed the tracks fora half hour and came to the site. Like the Moonstruck, the drillerwas an impressive piece of equipment. Behind it was a trailer stackedwith drill tubes, with its own winch crane for manoeuvrings the pipesinto place. Foreman and Monkley ventured closer. The driller wasalready grinding its way through the Martian ground. Mitchum saw themand held out his hand to stop them, then he walked over to them.

'Morning,' said Foreman.

'Andy. Morning, Monkley. Look,Andy. Don't take this personally, but this is a work site. Ourinsurance only covers authorised drillers. If there was anaccident...'

'Sorry, Mike. I should havefigured it out myself.'

'Hey. No worries. If you moveaway a little, say to that dune over there, I'll let you watch. Thistime only though, okay?'

'Fair enough. Thanks, Mike. Comeon, Monkley.'

Feeling a little stupid andembarrassed, Foreman led Monkley to the designated dune and sat ontop of it. They had quite a good view of the action. He couldn't tellwho was who in their suits, as he watched the efficient way the teamworked together. The massive driller was fed tubes via the crane,which were manually connected to the preceding tubes. The drillerturned the tubes and the industrial diamond drill bit chewedinexorably through the rock, so slowly, it seemed no progress wasbeing made at all. It took nearly two hours before the next tubesection was attached.

'Well. I think we get the generalidea, pal. Come on.'

They returned to the buggy andleft it where they had found it by the ship. Then they walked back tothe base.