NEWS CONFERENCE
DARRYL C. TRUMBALL WAS NOT ACCUSTOMED TO THE GLARE of publicity. He preferred to remain in the background and let his hirelings and puppets face the public.
But as the first “ordinary” person to go to Mars, he had become a celebrity. Now, a scant four days before the backup mission was scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral, he found himself sharing a long table with four young archeologists and two astronauts, staring out at a sea of reporters and photographers who filled the auditorium to overflowing.
Like his crewmates, Trumball wore coral-red coveralls bearing the stylish logo of the Second Mars Expedition over his heart. He was of course older than any of them, older than any two of them put together, almost. But he was slim and hard and fit. No one knew the fear that chilled his blood; no one could hear how his heart thundered in his chest when he thought of actually climbing into that flying bomb and riding it all the way to distant, freezing, dangerous Mars.
“Why isn’t this mission called the Third Expedition?” a reporter was shouting from the floor.
“This is a backup mission for the Second Expedition,” explained the senior astronaut, an old hand at fielding inane questions.
“We’re going specifically to explore the ancient building that’s been discovered in the cliffs of the Grand Canyon of Mars,” said the chief archeologist, all of forty years old.
“What about the Third Expedition?” another reporter asked.
“Will there be a Third Expedition?”
Everyone along the table turned to Trumball. “Yes,” he assured them all smoothly. “There will be a Third Mars Expedition.”
“When?”
“How soon?”
“We are working out the details,” Trumball said.
“What about other kinds of flights to Mars?” a woman asked. “When will we be able to take vacations there?”
A slight snickering laugh tittered through the news people.
But Trumball answered the planted question, “That’s why I’m going along with the scientists. I want to show the world that ordinary people can go to Mars, can see for themselves the glories of the vanished Martian civilization, walk where the Martians walked, reach the peak of the tallest mountain in the solar system, explore the longest, widest, deepest Grand Canyon of them all.”
Several of the archeologists looked dismayed, but no one dared to contradict Trumball.
“Why you, sir?” asked a bald, portly reporter from the last row of the auditorium. “Why do you have to go yourself? Couldn’t someone—er, of less prominence, be sent instead?”
Trumball smiled patiently. “You mean why would an old fart like me want to go?”
Everyone laughed.
“I want to show that even someone of my age can make the trip easily, and enjoy it.” He paused, made certain the news people were hanging on his next words, then went on, “But remember, older men than I have gone into space, starting with Senator Glenn, nearly forty years ago.”
“But, all the way to Mars?”
“Yes,” Trumball said, still keeping his smile in place. “All the way to Mars. I’ll be the first of millions of ordinary men and women to go there.”
Besides, he added silently, there’s money to be made up there, and I’m going to make damned certain nobody screws me out of it.