Chapter 4

Earth, August 2, 2161
Thundering Water Space Force Base

The NSS Overmeyer landed at Thundering Waters SFB after a relaxing haul from Mars to Earth. There were several Martian VIPs aboard and it was actually a fun trip, and The Scrapper simply kept her mouth closed, her ears opened and learned enough to be able to blackmail half of Mars’ parliament. She stepped off the shuttle and suddenly felt something; it felt like it was artificially hot, and she began sweating. “What is with this climate?”

“It’s a hot day and the humidity is up, ma’am,” said one of the three marines who escorted her on the entire flight. The Marine sergeant was kind of cute and came very close to becoming very lucky, but he kept his distance from her.

After being led past customs, she was led to local transportation, and they hopped into a Marine transport. Huge tires, open sides that can be covered with armor, and no ascetics whatsoever. As soon as they got out of the base’s main gate, the driver, a young corporal, said, “Who wants to see the falls?”

Thinking that ‘the falls’ was a comic routine or a circus act, The Scrapper said, “I do,” along with the other two marines. And with that, they were off ... the wings unfolded, and the Marine ALS/APC (Air Land Sea Armored Personnel Carrier) began clawing for altitude and was soon passing over a wooded area that the driver said was a city before the war.

The Scrapper gasped when they shot out over a wide, deep, fast-running river. The Scrapper was in shock at seeing all the water in the Niagara River. She was incapable of dreaming about how much water there was. Every minute, more water rushed past her than was available on all of Mars. And soon they were over the falls. “A million gallons of water every second go over the falls,” said the marine driver.

“A million?” gasped The Scrapper.

“Well ... eight hundred thousand gallons,” said the driver as he flew through the mist that was rising over the falls. The cool moist air filled the marine vehicle, and The Scrapper found that her skin was covered with moisture, more moisture than a Martian normally uses to bathe with.

The seat restraints snapped The Scrapper back into her seat and the APC dove to the surface of the Niagara River and raced along just above the surface of the rapids. Canyon walls on either side of them flashed past. Remains of ancient power plants crumbled, and portions of old bridges extended over the canyon. “This part of the area got hit pretty hard during the war,” said the corporal who was driving.

“War?” asked The Scrapper.

“World War Four? It was in all the papers.” She deserved that. The seventy-fifth anniversary of the destruction of the Widdershins Monarchy and their vassal states was just last year, where they hung King Newton in effigy to crown the ceremony. While the war didn’t break out in the fledgling colonies on Mars and Luna, it cut off the flow of supplies and hundreds starved to death. “Let’s take the colonel home,” said the Marine Sergeant, sitting next to The Scrapper.

Colonel?

Earth, August 2, 2161 Thundering Water SFB, Deep Space Monitoring Station 09

“There it is again,” said the Marine Gunnery Sergeant at the desk of Deep Space Monitoring Station Nine.

“The same signature?” asked the duty officer. Thundering Waters Space Force Base was primarily a deep space monitoring station, and DSMS 9 was at the heart of the action. Every now and then, the streak of something burning brilliantly in space flared up, and there was no explanation for it. Things burn up in space all the time, but these recent flares were different. They were all in the same area and were all parallel to each other, but that wasn’t the weirdest part.

“Spectro-chemical analysis shows that it was steel, Martian steel from the Deimos foundry, just like the others.”

“Location?” asked the Lieutenant as he typed furiously.

“Close to the previous flares. Kuiper Belt at about fifteen degrees past TDC.” Kuiper Belt TDC (Top Dead Center) was the reference point for navigating the Kuiper Belt, a belt of dust and rock that surrounds the solar system. TDC is in an imaginary direct line between the sun and Cereus.

“Who would be burning Martian steel way out there?”

“Sir,” said Marine Gunnery Sergeant Dunlap, “I think I found something.”

“What do you have Marcy?”

“Sir, I tracked trajectory back and Flare Anomaly 03 traces right back to the wreck of the Adira Dolenz on the estimated day of the wreck.”

“Are you saying that someone shot the Adira Dolenz from way out there?”

“No sir,” said the young spaceman. She spun around in her wheelchair and said, “my guess would be an ultra-high-speed projectile that burned up out there.”