The Ruins of Mars: Waking Titan (The Ruins of Mars Trilogy) by Dylan James Quarles Read Free Book Online

feet, Julian looked out the window at his beloved ship. White and clean, the immense vessel was the largest object to have ever been launched from Earth orbit. The slightly tapered nose and gently curving middle section gave Braun a truly whale-like appearance as it swam through its orbit around Mars.
    Catching the glint from the distant sun, Julian shifted his gaze to the straight lines of small black domes that dotted the hull of Braun like barnacles. An application of his own design, the domes housed the delicate lenses of the Laser Defense System, an invention that had saved the crew once before. Counting back from the nose of the ship to just before the lip of the window, he guessed that Lander 2 must be hovering directly above the dome that was cracked.
    Alerted to the problem the evening before by Braun, Julian had convinced the captain to let him go EVA to replace the damaged dome. Not only did he hate the idea of something on his ship being broken, but he also knew that without every laser in the defense network operational, their chances of surviving another meteor strike would dramatically lessen.
    “I’m opening the hatch,” said Braun, pulling Julian back to the moment.
    Rotating his seat one-hundred-eighty degrees, the Frenchman turned to face the exit hatch as it unlocked and swung silently outward on automated hinges. With only the sound of his own breathing in his ears, he watched a section of ceiling paneling retract to reveal a narrow cubby.
    Unfolding from within the space like a freshly hatched insect, the segmented arm of a triple-barreled grappling turret dropped down in front of the open hatch and took aim at Braun. Resembling the body of a miniaturized anti-aircraft gun, the turret spun its barrels, cycling through its options for anchoring the Lander to the ship below. As the final barrel came around, the turret grew still, a small yellow balloon no bigger than a grapefruit protruding from the end.
    “I have a lock,” Braun reported. “I will fire on your order.”
    Exchanging looks, the two men nodded to each other.
    “Fire,” said Aguilar
    Without a sound, the grappling gun shot its yellow-tipped projectile at a handhold on the hull of Braun, three meters to the right of the cracked laser dome.
    Filled with granulated silica sand, the balloon tip of the grappling hook could form around any shape with ease. Once contact was made, pumps would instantly suck the air out of the balloon, freezing the sand within around whatever object it had come into contact with. The process was called jamming transition and it effectively turned the loosely packed granulated silica into a solid.
    In a demonstration three years before, Julian had seen a NASA tech fire this very s ame grappling hook at a quarter-sized target over 25 meters away and successfully establish a solid anchor.
    “Contact,” announced Braun. “Proceed to the next phase when ready.”
                  Carefully releasing the safety belts that held him to his chair, Julian drifted up a little then pushed off and made his way to the open hatch.
    Repositioning itself until it was back in its ceiling niche, the turret rotated until its cable spool was all that remained visible.
    Taking a safety line from his belt, Julian clipped its metal carabineer over the taut anchor line and tested the connection. Satisfied, he braced himself in the open hatch and spoke to the emptiness of space.
    “Okay, Joey. I’m going. Be ready to send down the payload when I ask.”
    “Roger roger,” said Aguilar, his voice slipping into a pilot’s drawl.
    With the cable grasped firmly in his gloved fists, Julian glanced around the Lander’s cabin, nodded to his friend, and then swung his weightless body out into space. Though he knew it was only his imagination, the blanket of endless black felt like a frozen ocean that locked the distant stars in a prison of ice, smothering their weak light until they succumbed to the cold and burnt