Blue Mars(29)

She smiled her brief smile and hauled him up out of his cave, pulling so hard on his left wrist that his bones creaked painfully.

“Ow!” he said.

Out in the wind the cold was like death itself. Hiroko pulled his left arm over her shoulder, and, still holding hard to his wrist just above the wristpad, she led him past the low escarpment and right into the teeth of the gale.

“My rover is near,” he mumbled, leaning hard on her and trying to move his legs fast enough to make steady plants of the foot. So good to see her again. A solid little person, very powerful as always.

“It’s over here,” she said through her loudspeaker. “You were pretty close.”

“How did you find me?”

“We were tracking you as you came down Arsia. Then today when the storm hit I checked you out, and saw you were out of your rover. After that I came out to see how you were doing.”

“Thanks.”

“You have to be careful in storms.”

Then they were standing before his rover. She let go of his wrist, and it throbbed painfully. She bonked her face-plate against his goggles. “Go on in,” she said.

He climbed carefully up the steps to the rover’s lock door; opened it; fell inside. He turned clumsily to make room for Hiroko, but she wasn’t in the door. He leaned back out into the wind, looked around. No sight of her. It was dusk; the snow now looked black. “Hiroko!” he cried.

No answer.

He closed the lock door, suddenly frightened. Oxygen deprivation— He pumped the lock, fell through the inside door into the little changing room. It was shockingly warm, the air a steamy blast. He plucked ineffectively at his clothes, made no progress. He went at it more methodically. Goggles and face mask off. They were coated with ice. Ah— possibly his air supply had been restricted by ice in the tube between tank and mask. He sucked in several deep breaths, then sat still through another bout of nausea. Pulled off his hood, unzipped the suit. It was almost more than he could do to get his boots off. Then the suit. His underclothes were cold and clammy. His hands were burning as if on fire. It was a good sign, proof that he was not substantially frostbitten; nevertheless it was agony.

His whole skin began to buzz with the same inflamed pain. What caused that, return of blood to capillaries? Return of sensation to chilled nerves? Whatever it was, it hurt almost unbearably. “Ow!”

He was in excellent spirits. It was not just that he had been spared from death, which was nice; but that Hiroko was alive. Hiroko was alive! It was incredibly good news. Many of his friends had assumed all along that she and her group had slipped away from the assault on Sabishii, moving through that town’s mound maze back out into their system of hidden refuges; but Sax had never been sure. There was no evidence to support the idea. And there were elements in the security forces perfectly capable of murdering a group of dissidents and disposing of their bodies. This, Sax had thought, was probably what had happened. But he had kept this opinion to himself, and reserved judgment. There had been no way of knowing for sure.

But now he knew. He had stumbled into Hiroko’s path, and she had rescued him from death by freezing, or asphyxiation, whichever came first. The sight of her cheery, somehow impersonal face— her brown eyes— the feel of her body supporting him— her hand clamped over his wrist . . . he would have a bruise because of that. Perhaps even a sprain. He flexed his hand, and the pain in his wrist brought tears to his eyes, it made him laugh. Hiroko!

After a time the fiery return of sensation to his skin banked down. Though his hands felt bloated and raw, and he did not have proper control of his muscles, or his thoughts, he was basically getting back to normal. Or something like normal.

“Sax! Sax! Where are you? Answer us, Sax!”

“Ah. Hello there. I’m back in my car.”

“You found it? You left your snow cave?”

“Yes. I— I saw my car, in the distance, through a break in the snow.”

They were happy to hear it.

He sat there, barely listening to them babble, wondering why he had spontaneously lied. Somehow he was not comfortable telling them about Hiroko. He assumed that she would want to stay concealed; perhaps that was it. Covering for her. . . .

He assured his associates that he was all right, and got off the phone. He pulled a chair into the kitchen and sat on it. Warmed soup and drank it in loud slurps, scalding his tongue. Frostbitten, scalded, shaky— slightly nauseous— once weeping— mostly stunned— despite all this, he was very, very happy. Sobered by the close call, of course, and embarrassed or even ashamed at his ineptitude, staying out, getting lost and so on— all very sobering indeed— and yet still he was happy. He had survived, and even better, so had Hiroko. Meaning no doubt that all of her group had survived with her, including the half dozen of the First Hundred who had been with her from the beginning, Iwao, Gene, Rya, Raul, Ellen, Evgenia. . . . Sax ran a bath and sat in the warm water, adding hotter water slowly as his body core warmed; and he kept returning to that wonderful realization. A miracle— well not a miracle of course— but it had that quality, of unexpected and undeserved joy.