“Where can you get the sodium and chlorine?” Anson retorted. “Not out of the regolith.”

Doug smiled a little. “Out of the reprocessors. Recycle the garbage.”

Anson made a sour face.

“Could we really get along for months without importing anything from Earth?” Joanna asked.

“Maybe a year,” Anson said. “If you don’t mind eating your soyburgers without mustard.”

Brudnoy flexed his gnarled fingers. “Aren’t you glad that I insisted on planting onions and garlic, along with my flowers?”

“Do you have any jalapeno peppers out at the farm?” Anson asked.

Brudnoy shook his head.

“A year,” Joanna mused. “This ought to be settled long before that.”

“One way or another,” said Brudnoy morosely.

“Pharmaceuticals might be a problem,” Doug said, turning to the wall screen on his right. With the laser he changed the display from a camera view of the empty rocket launching pads to an inventory of the base’s pharmaceutical supplies. “We’ve been bringing them up on a monthly schedule. Got a…” he studied the display screen briefly, “…three-month supply on hand.”

“Maybe we can use nanomachines instead,” Joanna suggested. It was an open secret that her youthful appearance was due to nanotherapy that tightened sagging muscles and kept her skin tone smooth.

“I can talk to Cardenas about that,” Anson replied.

“And Professor Zimmerman,” Doug said.

’You talk to Zimmerman,” she snapped. “He always tries to bully me.”

Brudnoy volunteered, I’ll see Zimmerman.”

“You?”

With a guilty smile, the Russian said, “He and I have been working on a little project together: using nanomachines to make beer.”

“Lev!” Joanna glared at her husband.

Brudnoy raised a placating hand. “Don’t worry. So far, we’ve accomplished less than nothing. The stuff is so bad not even Zimmerman will drink it.”