Somewhere in the upper atmosphere of the Northern Hemisphere, Summer-March 5, 2202:
Dear Sekou,
I made it! I made it! I'm on a rocket plane.
The last week has been exciting enough to keep me from feeling sick very much. I wrote down the numbers for the travel tickets my mother reserved for us and put them in my school bag. I took my books out of the bag and hid them in the bottom of my closet. Then I packed some clothes and seeds for trade in the bag.
Do they teach you about Martian history like we learn about Earth history? I feel awful that you know so little about your home planet. We'll have to discuss this when I become rich and pay your way to Mars.
I'm going to do that, you know.
The biggest difficulty was not the tickets, or even ID. My passport was in the databanks just like Mother's. So, since I was using my own ticket, I could travel without Mother.
It was almost like Dad knew what I was planning. Mother has stopped involving me in the sol-to-sol operation of the greenhouse or the naked environment plants, or even consulting me in the care of my own little plots. Dad is, of course, more considerate; he keeps up the pretense that I have a future on Mars. But yestersol he took Mother into the old middle-pressure greenhouse (the little one they built when they first arrived here) and got her involved in a long discussion. I tiptoed away, grabbed the bag I had packed, and off I went.
No, I didn't go hiking off in an environment suit like some crash victim. I stole the rover and drove it to Polaris, to the launch station.
I programmed it to come back to the homestead, of course. And I left a nice note, so they won't think I was kidnapped.
Mother will never be able to trace me. I didn't go to Equatorial City.
I'm on the rocket plane to Sagan City.
The launch area was pretty exciting. I was so surprised at how adult they treated me, as if I knew all the safety procedures, which of course I do--in theory. I mean, I study these things in school. The rocket plane is launched on a precise arc to land at its destination. When it gets there, it deploys parachutes to brake, and then the wings extend to guide it to the landing field.
I'm excited about the landing. It'll be night when we get there, and I'll be able to see all the city lights. The launch was impressive; lots of noise and acceleration, but not much view because we gained altitude too fast for much of a view of Borealopolis.
Ares Vallis will look different from how it would have looked to Pathfinder. The area is still a flood plane, of course, with rocks from all over. Before the landing, according to stuff I looked up when I got interested in Sojourner, all the scientists were arguing over whether it was a flood plain, or whether the pattern was from a volcanic eruption. Of course they learned right away when the pictures came back that it was from flooding. Which made Mars much more interesting to those old Earthlings who never considered anything interesting unless it was like Earth--wet.
I'm on my way.
)
Vastitas Borealis, Mars--Summer-January 31, 2202: Diary of Kapera Smythe, a six-year-old girl battling leukemia. Kapera begins recording her diary on an ancient wrist computer when she discovers her parents are arranging cancer treatment for her at an Earth Orbit hospital. Because of the enormous expense, Kapera knows the family can only afford one-way passage for two--she and her mother would never see father, or Mars, again. Kapera, however, has a different plan: to run away to Sagan City at Ares Vallis and find the one thing on Mars that will make them wealthy ... the missing Sojourner rover from Earth's 1997 Pathfinder mission.
