Larue moved his hands through his hair slowly. “What do you think of all this?”

“I think that we need to be careful, Monsieur. We have no proof that NASA is trying to hide anything, and moreover, we have no reason to believe that they would have a motive for hiding anything in the first place. NASA is a scientific agency, and they do not have a political or ideological agenda.” He chewed his bottom lip nervously.

“Everyone has an agenda, Martin, even NASA. Especially NASA.”

“I am still looking, Monsieur. There is no smoke without fire, certainly.  But this is like looking for a fire without smoke.” He sighed. “I will keep looking, though.”

Larue stopped looking out of the window and turned his head to his aide. “Martin,” he checked his watch. “In one hour and twenty minutes, the MLP will be detaching from Clarke and entering the atmosphere of Mars. If they are going to slip up, it will be down there, away from the controlled environment of the spaceship.”

Martín looked at his watch quickly. It was already happening. “I’ll have all my ears to the ground, Monsieur.”

Chapter 24

Richardson, Marchenko and Montreaux reclined in their bucket seats in the MLP, strapped down by four thick belts over their shoulders and round their waists connected by a large metal buckle that nested comfortably on top of their breastbones. Their legs were supported by foam padding that extended from the bottom of each of the chairs.  It looked like a busy dentist’s surgery, and the patients were nervous.

The single empty chair stood out like a sore thumb.

“It’s been good knowing you all,” Jane half-joked.

“Let’s hope the computer gets it right this time.” Marchenko was deadly serious.

“Danny, please!”

“Sorry, Jane. I am sure everything will be fine. The nanostations are not allowed in here.”

“Captain Marchenko, please refrain from that subject, it is totally inappropriate,” Montreaux warned.

“It’s OK Yves, he’s only kidding,” said Jane.

The Russian bent his head sideways to look at her. “No I am not,” he said, before grinning.

“Ten seconds to launch,” advised the computer.

“Good luck, everyone,” Montreaux said, gripping his arm rests tightly. “Good job so far, let’s make sure we finish it off well down there and get home in one piece.”

Dr Richardson and Captain Marchenko nodded their agreement.

“Four… Three … Two … One … Launch! ”

They all tensed for the expected jolt that they had experienced in training simulations. It was the moment they had been waiting for ever since they had first floated into the Clarke nearly four months earlier.

A light thud was all they heard. The MLP barely moved.

After the initial shock of the anti-climax had worn off, Montreaux checked his instruments carefully. Had the release mechanism failed?

All of a sudden, they heard the lateral boosters of the MLP releasing jets of compressed air into space. The landing craft was now being manoeuvred into a trajectory that would take it into the Martian atmosphere.

“We have left the Clarke,” Dr Richardson said in disbelief. “I hardly noticed!”

“We are in a declining orbit, entry in twelve more revolutions,” Marchenko confirmed.

Montreaux looked at the control panel in front of him. Millions of calculations a second were being performed by the MLP’s on board computer, which would control every aspect of the landing.

As their decreasing orbit drew them closer and closer to the planet, there was nothing they could do but watch and hope.

Half an hour later, the MLP shaved the outer reaches of Mars’ thin atmosphere and gently forced its way through. The trajectory had been calculated to the last millimetre, to ensure that their entry was successful.  A few degrees out either way would have resulted in the craft either disintegrating, a bright shooting star against the Martian sky, or bouncing off the atmosphere and into the depths of space.

The underside of the MLP was coated in ceramic heat resistant tiles that would have been quite happy sitting on the surface of the Sun. As the friction of the air against the tiles grew, they began to glow white hot. The heat caused the passing gas of the atmosphere to combust, shooting yellow and blue flames several metres long up above the leading edge of the MLP as it cut deeper and deeper into the Martian atmosphere.

Inside the landing craft, the tranquillity of space had been brutally cast aside as everything began vibrating wildly, jostling the three astronauts against the bucket-sides of their chairs. A combination of forces assaulted them: the downwards force of returning gravity, a third of Earth’s but still a feeling they had not experienced for a long time, coupled with the upwards force of the plummeting craft, pulling them towards the ceiling.

And then that returning sense of direction. There was an up, and a down.  There was most definitely a down.

“Aaaahhhh!” cried Dr Richardson.

“You’ve done this before on Earth!” Montreaux shouted above the noise.

“I haven’t fallen from anywhere for nearly half a year!” she screamed.

Marchenko managed to reach over and put his hand on hers as she gripped her armrest firmly. “We will make it, Jane, trust me.” He tried to laugh but the air was being forced out of his lungs, resulting in a strange scoff. “The chutes were designed in Russia!”

She released her grip and took his hand thankfully.

“We’re almost through!” Montreaux shouted, reading from the instrument panel.

As suddenly as it had begun, the shaking and roaring of the passing atmosphere outside stopped. It was replaced by a gentle hissing, and the occasional shake.

“We are in the skies of Mars!” Marchenko cheered. “Nearly time for our Russian chutes to deploy.”

They sat in silence for several long, anxious moments before Dr Richardson could wait no more.

“How long?” she cried.

“Thirty-six seconds” Marchenko replied instantly.

They all counted it down in their heads.

Montreaux reached zero and continued down well into the minuses.  He had reached minus fifteen, and was about to mention that fact, when a sharp jerk crushed him against the padding of his chair. The MLP listed backwards and forwards, so that he had the sensation that his chair was alternating between being on the ceiling and on the floor

“The swinging will stop shortly,” Danny reassured them. “It is our momentum carrying us through, we are like a clock’s pendulum, hanging from the chutes above us.” He was obviously proud that the parachutes had deployed as planned, while the others just looked relieved.

The MLP’s on-board computer was already plotting the ground beneath them, mapping every square metre of the surface as it went. As it approached the vicinity of Hellas Basin, it closed in on its homing signal, and small motors began winding in and out the parachutes on each edge of the MLP, guiding it towards its destination.

“Virtually no cross winds,” Montreaux marvelled at their timing. “We’re sailing down perfectly, with a bit of luck we’ll be within a few hundred yards of the target.”

A control panel in front of them began to beep repeatedly. Leaning closer, he read the display and tensed.

“Two hundred metres to touchdown,” he said matter-of-factly.

The beeping increased in frequency as they descended.

“One Fifty.”

“Our Father, who art in Heaven…” Jane began to say under her breath.

“I thought you were a scientist?” Danny joked, squeezing her hand.

She smiled and continued her prayer. “… hallowed be thy name…”

“One Ten.”

“…Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done…”

“Ninety.”

“…On Earth as it is in Heaven.” She stopped. She didn’t know the rest of the words from memory. “Shit!” she cursed herself for forgetting.