In addition to turning the roof into a giant cheese grater, she laid a very simple zero-power refraction enchantment on the panels; any light, from any direction, that hits the glass gets transmitted through and directed straight down on whatever part of the panel is directly below.
Let me tell you, it makes the panels look freaky as hell. They're not totally black, because a lot of light gets reflected off the original solar panels, and much of that escapes back out the pyramids normally. But any light coming, for example, from the sky or from landmarks behind the pyramids gets sucked down inside them. So when you look at `em, all you see is a distorted reflection of the solar cells, plus a little bit of glare reflected off those cells. And that glare is never anyplace you'd expect to see glare, like on the tops or edges of the pyramids. Very Uncanny Valley of the Kings.
Then we drove back to the Hab. On the way back one of the crystals broke, and we had to replace it with a spare, using the last of the batteries we got from the cave. After seeing the damage, Starlight says she might be able to repair them en route, and if they can't be repaired, we'll bring enough crystal on the Schiaparelli trip to replace about one-third of them. But for now, we wanted to go with all original installation for the test.
Now, why are we going to all this trouble? Simple. Before, each solar panel had two square meters of surface area. With the new crystal bubbles, they have a surface area of 2.8 square meters each.
Now, it's not perfect. At early and late hours of the day you're still dealing with a shallow angle of attack on the solar panels which reduces their effectiveness. But the slightly higher profile of the pyramids catches more of that light, sooner and later, than before... and from about 0930 to 1500 hours Mars time, when the sun is shining down on the entire surface of the pyramids all at once, we'll get as much as a forty percent boost to our recharge power— in theory.
Today we tested the theory. Net result, averaging out recharge rates over the day: 120% power gain on the altered panels, in round numbers, over what we had. Hence seventy-one and a bit kilometers, plus full batteries long before sunset.
It's not all clear gain. Power consumption per kilometer is up, because we added about a ton and a half of material to the top of the trailer. Even stretched thin, quartz weighs a LOT. But we still have a significant power surplus now. With this boost we could technically start a little later, drive a bit longer, and still have a full battery. And if we get into serious trouble, we might need that. But I'd prefer to stick with seventy or seventy-one kilometers per day and just enjoy having more power than we need. With that in mind, we're still going to pre-bake all our potatoes and keep an eye on power consumption.
Margins are nice to have. In the time we've been stuck here on Mars, we've had margins and not had margins, and it's a lot more fun to not have to worry quite so much about everything going to shit and all of us dying because we just had to have one fresh baked potato.
MISSION LOG — SOL 424
Back at the Hab. None of the pyramids broke on the two-day shakedown.
The next time we take out the Whinnybago, it'll be when we leave the Hab for the last time. Testing is done. All that's left is to load this puppy up, cross our fingers, and hope nothing goes wrong.
Author's Notes:
Buffer is one and a bit, as I try to push forward.
For reasons why my energy is down, check my latest blog entry.
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Sol 426
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AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE — MISSION DAY 434
ARES III SOL 426
The speakers hissed and popped with noise, but the voice that came with the noise came out clear and distinct. "Friendship, this is Hermes, voice comms check. Friendship, Hermes on voice comms check, over."
Mark nodded to Fireball, who switched Amicitas's transmitter on and said, "Hermes, Friendship. Lotta noise, but we hear you. Stand by for Mark."
The human grinned, adjusted his borrowed pony headset and said, "Good to hear your voice, Martinez! I've been practicing my Morse code, but I guess it won't be needed. Over."
Fireball switched his own headset over to the magic comms. "Friendship confirms voice contact," he said. "Report reply sent at 11:14 hours."
Cherry Berry's voice replied, "Copy that, Fireball. Report sent over Pathfinder chat. Let us know when you and Mark are done."
"Will do." Fireball switched back to the ship radio, then leaned back against his flight couch. "Well," he said, "got nine minutes wait for reply. What ya gonna say?"
"What would you say, in the same place?" Mark said. "If you could actually hear the voices of your people back home?"
"Easy. `I quit.'" Fireball growled softly, continuing, "I had enough space for lifetime. I crashed on launch and lived. Been stuck in orbit and lived. Looks like I'm gonna live after crash and been stuck in whole other universe. Think someone giving me a hint." He smirked a reptilian smirk and added, "Gonna go out on top of the game."
"Can't argue with that," Mark said. "Once I get back to Earth, I'm never going up again. Not that it's likely NASA would ever give me another flight, but if they did, I'd turn them down."
"Why?" Fireball asked. "My lord, she say, you astronaut now, do what I say. But you... word... you asked for this."
"Yeah, I volunteered," Mark said. "And don't get me wrong. I loved every minute of being an astronaut, up to the moment I got stranded here. After that, not so much."
"What's to like about astronaut?" Fireball asked. "It's mostly boring, except for total scary parts."
"Are you kidding?" Mark asked. "It's, like, the greatest adventure ever. You get to experience zero-G. You get to see things almost nobody ever gets to see, first-hand. Whatever science you're interested in, you're instantly on the cutting edge of it. And you get the knowledge that everything you do is this incredible privilege, something that only a tiny lucky few people will ever get to experience." He shrugged and added, "The pay's pretty shitty, though."
Fireball snorted. "Dragons don't do adventure," he said. "Dragons are adventure for other people." He couldn't suppress a chortle as he remembered a line from what was still his favorite of all the Earth books NASA had sent up. "Dragons make you late for dinner."
"I thought dragons made you dinner, period."
"Never!" Calculated pause. "Well, hardly ever."
Mark laughed. Score one for Fireball.
"Seriously," Fireball continued, "we not monsters like hydra or chimera or manticore. People leave our hoard alone, we leave them alone. We like nice, quiet life. No trouble. And flying rocket is nothing but noise and trouble."
"Are you kidding?" Mark said. "Yeah, it's scary, but it's also the most exhilarating experience of my life! Riding into space on top of the biggest controlled explosion ever devised by the mind of man!"
"But you never do it again?"
"Nope. Not once I'm home." Mark sighed. "I'm glad I visited Mars, but being stranded here taught me how much I took little things like breathable air, not dying if I step outside, and food that isn't a goddamn potato for granted. Let new Ares missions come back here. I'll cheer them on from my comfy chair, in a house with open windows, eating nachos and drinking coffee." The human shook his head and muttered, "Fuck, but I miss coffee."
"Just thought," Fireball said. "Coffee. Dragons don't get coffee. Never drank it until dragon program folded into changeling program."
"So, what?" Mark asked. "Are you saying you can't get coffee without being an astronaut?"
"I don't know how make coffee. Not without wall-plug coffee pot."
The admission embarrassed Fireball enough that he was grateful that the voice on the radio prevented Mark from delivering whatever rejoinder he'd been about to make. But once the words sank in, he was less grateful: "Friendship, Hermes, we read you clear, but your mikes are set to vox. Repeat, your mikes are set to vox and we're hearing everything you say. And recording it for posterity. Over."
Mark gave the dragon a Look.
"Oops," Fireball said, and switched the transmitter off. Then he remembered that Hermes had signed over to them, reactivated the transmitter, and said, "Friendship copies vox."
"And for the record," Mark said hurriedly, "although I firmly believe other people should have the chance that was cut short for me on Sol 6, I will happily work with NASA in whatever capacity they believe I can best advance the cause of the human exploration and colonization of space. Talk to you later, Friendship out."
Fireball didn't need the neck-chopping movement Mark made with a hand to switch the transmitter off properly this time. "Walk back much?" he asked with a grin.
"Hey, those people are holding my back pay for the last year and a half," Mark said. "Granted I probably owe them every penny for what they're spending to rescue me, but I have to live on something when I get home!"
Fireball's eyes widened. "And Dragonlord has my hoard!" he gasped. "All my stuff!"
"Yeah. So maybe we should wait to quit until we actually get home?"
"Oooooooh, yeah," Fireball agreed.
"And after someone teaches you how to make coffee."
"Yeah."
Author's Notes:
Adding to the buffer a little bit at a time. I should have two full (short) chapters in the can before I go to bed tonight, and I'll try to get a little writing done tomorrow morning before I leave for Dallas.
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Sol 429
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AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE — MISSION DAY 437
ARES III SOL 429
"Cherry, look at this!"
Cherry Berry paused in her work on the cherry tree next down the row. That work consisted of little more than walking around the trunk as much as possible and thinking happy thoughts at the trunk and roots, but that was just how earth pony magic worked— or, at least, it was all she knew. "What is it, Mark?"
Mark had grasped one of the lower branches of the cherry tree at the top of the row and pulled it down for easier view. "Look at these buds!" he said.
"Yes, I know, Mark," Cherry said. "The fresh leaves should sprout in about three weeks, I think." She'd actually had to work a little to make the trees take as much of a nap as they had. Insofar as trees could feel, they felt happy and full of pep. They were impatient to wake up again and resume growing. Rest time was over, and the sheer number of buds suggested there would be a bumper crop of fresh-grown, low-toxin sweet leaves for tea-making just as they were ready to depart.
"No, no!" Mark said. "Look at these buds! See anything different?" He pointed his finger to the clusters of buds out towards the very whip-end of the branch.
Cherry Berry looked. At the moment they just appeared to be buds and— no, wait. These were larger than the leaf buds. A lot larger, although any bud on a cherry tree was going to be tiny. "Are those flower buds?" she asked.
"Can't be anything else!" Mark grinned. "I actually did a project as part of one of my undergraduate botany courses, going out to Jackson Park every day and monitoring the cherry trees from dormancy to first bud to full bloom. This is exactly what I remember cherry flower buds looking like!"
"That's wonderful!"
"That's impossible!" Mark said, still grinning. "These trees are too young, there hasn't been enough cold weather inside the cave, it's the wrong time entirely— there's every reason in the world why this shouldn't be happening, but it's happening!"
"Well, of course it's happening because-" Cherry's elation vanished, replaced by a sinking feeling in her tummy. "It's because the trees know we're leaving," she said. "I think they want to say goodbye."
Mark raised an eyebrow. "Do trees actually think, where you come from?" he asked.
"Hard to say," Cherry Berry said. "They don't think like ponies, that's for sure. But they do have feelings, and they know a little what's going on around them. And I think they might hear me a bit, the same way I hear them. The same way most earth ponies hear plants, if they learn to listen."
"So earth ponies aren't hobbits," Mark chuckled. "They're ents."
"Ha, ha," Cherry Berry said, sarcastic. "Look, I can believe the trees are thankful for the care we give them, can't I?"
"Sure, sure," Mark said in a placating tone. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make fun of you."
"Good." Cherry stroked a hoof down the tree trunk. "I really wish we could take them with us," she said. "All the way home, I mean. I never grew a tree from seed to adulthood before."
"Look at it this way," Mark said. "We brought life to a lifeless world and gave it a fighting chance. That's more than most people get where I come from— animal or plant."
"I know," Cherry sighed. "But the first trees I saw all the way through. I'd like to have even just one so I could show-"
Not far above Cherry's head, something went fwoomp. A few seconds later, it also went crack.
A branch about five hoofwidths long settled almost silently to the ground between Cherry and Mark, covered with fresh green leaves.
Mark looked at Cherry. "Did you just do that?" he asked.
"No," Cherry answered, shaken. "At least not... I didn't mean to. I don't know how..."
They stared at the fallen, leaf-covered branch for a long moment.
"The mister!" Cherry shouted. "Take off the cap, it'll hold water for it to soak in until the roots grow out!"
"Need to find some wire!" Mark shouted back. "If the leaves get into the water, the plant might drown! Cherry trees don't do well with too much water!"
"I'll find the wire! You have thumbs, you take care of the mister bottle!"
"Right!"
They rushed off to different parts of the cave, looking for the things they needed, while the stick spread its newborn leaves to catch the magic crystal sunlight.
Author's Notes:
Finished off tomorrow's chapter before I left home, which is good, because that's the only writing time I've had today.
Speaking of time... it's about bedtime. Still a TON of prep due tomorrow...
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Sol 432
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AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE — MISSION DAY 440
ARES III SOL 432
Starlight Glimmer looked at the alfalfa growing in the cave. For some reason, today it smelled nicer than she remembered it ever smelling before.
Starlight had been raised by somewhat overprotective (and overbearing) parents in a well-to-do home in a unicorn settlement. She'd been brought up believing that grazing, like an ordinary, homeless nopony, was Just Not Done. You ate your hay from a bowl or in a casserole like civilized ponies did. But back home, if she'd smelled a hay field smelling as sweet and rich as the scent wafting off the little patch of cave soil now, she would have been tempted to take a few bites.
