The Art of War by David Wingrove Read Free Book Online

fourteen degrees and rising. Deep shadow lay like the surface of a fathomless sea to the east, tracing the lips of huge escarpments, while to the north and west the sun’s first rays picked out the frozen slopes and wind-scoured mouths of ancient craters. Through the centre of this landscape ran a massive pipeline, dissecting the plain from north to south: a smooth vein of polished white against the brown-red terrain.
    For a time the plain was still and silent. Then, from the south, came the sound of an approaching craft, the dull roar of its engines carried faintly on the thin atmosphere. A moment later it drew nearer, following the pipeline. Feng Shou Pumping Station was up ahead, in the distance – a small oasis in the billion-year sterility of the Martian desert – discernible even at this range from the faint spiral curve of cloud that placed a blue-white smudge amidst the perfect pinkness of the sky.
    The report had come in less than an hour ago: an unconfirmed message that an unauthorized craft had been challenged and brought down in the Sea of Divine Kings, eighty li north-west of Feng Shou Station. There was no more than that, but Karr, trusting to instinct, had commissioned a Security craft at once, speeding north from Tian Men K’ou City to investigate.
    Karr stared down through the dark filter of the cockpit’s screen at the rugged terrain below, conscious that, after eight months of scouring this tiny planet for some sign of the man, he might at last be nearing the end of his search.
    At first he had thought this a dreadful place. The bitter cold, the thin, unnatural atmosphere, the closeness of the horizon, the all-pervading redness of the place. He had felt quite ill those first few weeks, despite the enjoyable sensation of shedding more than 60 per cent of his body weight to Mars’s much lower surface gravity. The Han Security officer who had been his host had told him it was quite natural to feel that way: it took some while to acclimatize to Mars. But he had wondered briefly whether this cold, inhospitable planet might not be his final resting place. Now, however, he felt sad that it was coming to an end. He had grown to love the austere magnificence of Mars. Eight months. It was little more than a season here.
    As the craft drew nearer he ordered the pilot to circle the station from two li out.
    The five huge chimneys of the atmosphere generator dominated the tiny settlement, belching huge clouds of oxygen-rich air into the thin and frigid atmosphere. Beneath them the sprawl of settlement buildings was swathed in green – hardy mosses that could survive the extreme temperatures of the Martian night. Further out, the red sands were rimed with ice that formed a wide, uneven ring of whiteness about the station. The generator itself was deep beneath the surface, its taproots reaching down towards the core of the planet to draw their energy. Like thirty other such generators scattered about the planet’s surface, it had been pumping oxygen into the skies of Mars for more than one hundred and fifty years. Even so, it would be centuries yet before Mars had a proper atmosphere again.
    Karr made a full circle of the settlement, studying the scene. There were four transports parked to the east of the pipeline, in an open space between some low buildings. At first, in the half-light, they had seemed to form one single, indistinct shape – a complexity of shadows – but through the resolution of field glasses he could make out individual markings. One was a craft belonging to the settlement, another two Security craft from out of Kang Kua in the north. The fourth was unmarked. A small, four-man flier, the design unlike anything he had seen before on Mars.
    He leaned forward and tapped out that day’s security code, then sat back, waiting. In a moment it came back, suitably amended, followed by an update.
    Karr gave himself a moment to digest the information, then nodded to himself. ‘Okay. Set her down half