“The Class IV environment suit is not intended for prolonged use on planetary surfaces. Such use constitutes an abuse of said suit and serves to nullify all warranties offered by the manufacturer.”

A sticker found in the right armpit of each Jiffy Corp Class IV environment suit

Someone slapped my face. I felt my head rock back and forth. It hurt and, worse than that, forced me up out of the nice black hole where I’d been hiding. I made a conscious decision to hurt the person who was hurting me, gathered my energy, and reached for their throat. Or would have, if my arms had been free.

Someone laughed, a deep grunting sound, not unlike that made by primates in the zoo.

That made me really angry, angry enough to open my eyes and squint up into the harsh white light. It came from a ceiling-mounted fixture and served to silhouette my tormentor. I couldn’t see his features, but the outline was big. Bigger than I am. He saw my eyes open and nodded his satisfaction. “So. sleeping beauty awakes. Time to rise and shine, sweet cakes. We’re going for a little hike.”

I heard a series of clicks and felt the restraints drop away. The blob withdrew and I forced myself to sit. I had what felt like a hangover and decided the knockout gas was to blame. The ambush! Sasha! Where was she? My head throbbed as I looked around. It seemed as though I was inside some sort of cylindrical vehicle, an impression that was confirmed when it hit a bump and the back of my head bounced off a heavily padded bulkhead.

A corridor ran the length of whatever it was that I was in. It was filled with half-dressed men and women. They swore when the vehicle rocked from side to side and struggled to don what looked like space suits. Almost all of them had the whipcord-thin look of people teetering on the edge of starvation. Some eyed me with open hostility. The rest seemed determined to ignore me.

My tormentor reappeared. He was big, black, and completely bald. It was supposed to look intimidating and did. He had a wedge-shaped torso, thick arms, and legs like tree trunks. I put my plans for mayhem on temporary hold. He nodded as if endorsing my decision.

“That’s right, sweet cakes. Get the lay of the land before you try me on. It’s nice to have a mule with a little bit of common sense for a change. Now get your big white ass down off that bunk and suit up.”

Discretion seemed the better part of valor, so I slid off the bunk. My landing was feather-light and served to remind me of the planet’s rather iffy gravity. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and turned just in time to catch a loosely tied bundle. It was a suit similar to the one I had worn in orbit. I shook it out and managed to slide inside without making a complete fool of myself. I didn’t know why that mattered, just that it did, especially with the black guy looking on.

The truth was that I didn’t like him, but still wanted his approval, kind of like a recruit hates the DI’s guts but wants his or her respect. A bit perverse perhaps, but very much in line with my need for authority figures, and the occasional bit of guidance. Which isn’t to say that I wouldn’t deck the bastard if I thought I could get away with it and doing so suited my purposes. Confused? Hey, join the party.

I checked the seals on my suit and tried to figure out where they had taken me and why. What had happened to the Trans-Solar goons, anyway? Not to mention the homicidal greenies. And Sasha? Was she a prisoner like me? Or lying dead in a meat locker?

Then I saw her, a reed-thin woman with stubblelike hair, piercing blue eyes, and a ruler-straight mouth. The kind that never smiles. She had sealed her suit but left the face plate open and was killing me with her eyes. Or trying to, anyway. There was something familiar about her, as though we had met before, and recently at that. On the shuttle? In the terminal? Yes, I thought I remembered a frightened face, a gun, and a dart whirring past my head.

Yeah, she’d been there, and, even more importantly, she understood what was happening. I had already taken a step in the woman’s direction when a hand fell on my shoulder. It was the black guy again. “Wrong direction, sweet cakes. The lock is towards the ass end of this kidney-buster. Follow the mule in front of you.”

I turned in the proper direction. The guy in front of me had “Screw you!” spray-painted across the sand-blasted surface of his oxy box. It seemed like the perfect sentiment.

The vehicle braked to a jerky halt, failed to throw any of us to the deck, and vibrated in frustration. The line shuffled forward and I followed. It soon became apparent that the lock held five people at a time, so there were a number of pauses while we cycled through. I had seen no sign of guards other than the black man, so I made plans to run. A quick check assured me that he was seven people back, well clear of the group I would share the lock with, and apparently uninterested in my activities. Good. Once clear of the lock, I would have about five minutes to disappear.

The lock cycled open, my group entered, and immediately sealed their face plates. I did the same and took the opportunity to run one last check on my suit. Unlike the one I had worn in orbit, this baby was new. So new that the chemical smell made my sinuses hurt. Because I planned to escape, the suit’s six-hour air supply, four quarts of water, and two days’ worth of emergency rations took on added importance. I was still in the process of wishing that I had more of everything when the lock cycled open.

The exterior landscape had a reddish tint to it and was thick with man-sized rocks and boulders: a barrier that might or might not explain why we were about to take a “little hike.” Wind-driven sand peppered our suits and rattled across our helmets. I decided that I liked Mars less with each passing moment.

I followed the others away from the vehicle and turned to get the lay of the land. It was then that I gave up all hope of escape. No wonder the black guy was so relaxed. Outside of the long, tank-shaped vehicle, and the tracks left in its wake, there was not a single sign of civilization for as far as the eye could see. Six hours worth of air wouldn’t begin to get me where I needed to go. I pulled a three-sixty.

A rock-strewn plain stretched off towards what my suit informed me was the south. Hundreds of dry gullies cut the west into an eye-numbing maze of channels and banks. Rocks, boulders, and ragged-looking hills marched off to the north, where they terminated at the base of the most amazing sight that I’d ever seen.

According to the video I had watched aboard the shuttle, Olympus Mons towers fifteen miles above the equivalent of sea level, making it a full-grown giant when compared to the relatively puny Mt. Everest, which stands little more than five miles high. Not to mention the fact that Olympus Mons boasts a caldera that is forty-five miles across and a base that would extend from the Montreal Urboplex all the way to what’s left of the Big Apple.

But no set of statistics could possibly do justice to the out-and-out magnificence of what I saw. Olympus Mons was nothing less than a brooding presence, squatting there like an ancient monument, measuring everything against its own enormous bulk.

As for the land to the east, well, it wasn’t any better, consisting as it did of a rock face fronted by a jumble of sharp-edged boulders. I noticed that while some of my companions were scoping things out, most were oblivious to their surroundings, as if they’d seen it all before or just didn’t care. They stood in clusters, their helmets pressed together for private conversations, or just staring at the ground.

The lock opened and the last group shuffled out. An indicator light appeared inside my helmet, and the black man’s voice filled my ears. He had a stylized “X” painted on the front of his otherwise unadorned suit. I tried to see through the polarized face plate but couldn’t.