Rachel DycekSighing and blinking, Rachel forced herself to keep moving, afraid she might freeze into a statue inside the rover. She had to continue her journey, to lumber back toward the base even in the storm. It felt good to have another towering goal, though. She fought harder, stretching mental and emotional muscles that had atrophied over the past few years.
During the rover’s several hours of motionlessness while Cora gave birth, dust had piled up like red talcum powder around Percival’s base. The vehicle strained on its telescoping legs, rocking back and forth and cranking the methane engines into overdrive to break free of the avalanche rubble piled around it. The rocks and dust soughed down the armored sides, crumbling beneath the strain as the great machine stirred.
Gasping, to
