Humming a song from Old Earth, Isaiah hit the warp button, and gently faded down the images on the giant observation screens. There were howls of annoyance and disappointment from the passengers, but that was life. Isaiah really wanted to get out of there.
Had the surviving bandits on the surface of the planet been watching the sky, they would have seen a brief green and purple flash in the sky, as the
China
sparked out of existence from the Kajaani system. But the men weren't looking. They were feverishly trying to repair their ship. They figured it wouldn't take much longer, and then they would take off, get back into orbit, and wreak furious revenge upon the bounty hunters who had duped them.
Seventeen seconds later, the sun exploded.
LOVELESS
Mars was low-rent. With uncountable worlds among trillions of suns, there were plenty of Earth-like atmospheres to be had. If you didn't mind losing a few creature comforts on the lawless frontier, there was a myriad of worlds to choose from. But as far as the Sol system went, there was the blue-green jewel of Earth itself, and the other rocks in the system never quite made the grade.
The only people who made a big deal about the Sol system as a whole were tour operators who wanted to milk their marks for as much as they could. "See the rings of Saturn!" they would proclaim, when far more impressive orbital adornments could be found near Spica. "Explore the Jovian moons!" they cried, as if anyone gave a sneck - Sirius Beta had
three
gas giants with a dozen moons each, many of which had breathable atmospheres. And Mars was even worse. Copywriters struggled to come up with decent slogans to entice the gullible. "Come see the red planet!" they would say, as if there weren't a dozen redder planets elsewhere, and more interesting-looking purple ones. Surprisingly, a few geek tourists were tempted by "Hey, come and laugh at a failed terraforming exercise." but not all that many.
Mars was cheap. Mars was the place from where ships warped out if they couldn't afford docking fees for Earth. Mars was where the bucket-shop spacelines dumped you if you didn't read the small print about their bargain offers from Sirius to Sol, marooning travellers a few million miles from their planned destination, and forcing them to pony up for a shuttle that cost so much they might as well have flown with Spiral Corp in the first place.
It was a loveless world. It was Terra's unlucky sister, the plain one, the wallflower; the planet without a real atmosphere or any nice beaches. Lowell City's buildings consisted of a prefab spread of fast-food franchises and gift shops, feeding a lifestyle of late-night arrivals, last-minute souvenir purchases, and sordid encounters. It was where people went to have operations they didn't want to talk about. It had a bunch of banks that held money Terran police would like to ask questions about. For all these reasons and more, it was a place where "stuff" tended to happen.
Jealous lovers got into fights, bar room brawls broke out between businessmen and gangsters, movie stars checked in for rehab and came out with new noses and tighter chins. Mars was a place to hide, and a place to look for trouble.
Today, it was also a sight for some very sore eyes.
The
Sherman
and the
China
set down on neighbouring launchpads on the outskirts of town, amid a cluster of outside-broadcast vans.
Before the red dust had even settled, the Boy was running down the steps and across to the other ship. He pushed past the journalists and waiting ambulances, running through the growing crowd of survivors from the
China
. All he could hear was the piercing scream of the ship as its motors cycled down into rest mode.
"Dad," he called, seeing Isaiah's chair being set down at the base of the steps.
Isaiah chuckled and held out his open arms. The Boy ran to him and engulfed the wizened old man in his embrace, bent almost double to reach him, but happy nonetheless. Neither of them paid much heed to the biting cold, or the thin air that forced them to gasp, exultant, for breath.
Squid and Blarg were more interested in the waiting journalists who were eager to know the exact story behind the daring passenger action on the
China
. They carted the unconscious form of Dr Malcolm down the steps, pausing only to flash grins at the cameras. Dr Malcolm added to the entertainment value of the moment by coming woozily to his senses, allowing Blarg to grab him by the scruff of his neck and propel him towards the waiting camera lenses. Since Malcolm was still in his bulky environmental gear, he looked far heavier and menacing than he really was. His glasses had fallen off somewhere inside the ship, and his forehead was clammy with sweat that glared in the lights. Malcolm squinted into the amassed lamps and protruding microphones, trying to turn his face away from the lights.
"Here he is," beamed Blarg proudly. "Tuka himself. Caught in the act."
A flurry of questions erupted from the reporters, though Johnny didn't catch any of them from his location.
"Yes!" shouted Squid at the waiting cameras. "Yes, it was a tough call, but I knew I had to do what I had to do."
"And so did I," added Blarg, yelling above the noise. Before long, the two bounty hunters were shepherding their press pack away from the landing pad, pulling along a fat, roiling caterpillar of newsmen and camerabots, in search of better sound and a nice background image of the ships. A lone Tammerfortian, highly incongruous this far from home, keened a lone dirge into a camera, reporting the one hundred per cent casualty rate on the
China
of her fellow bird-people for an audience back home.
Johnny watched Squid and Blarg disappearing out of the corner of his eye with their arrestee in tow. Police vehicles and MBI cars were already pulling up at the landing site, ready to hustle Malcolm to the station for questioning. As a suspected leader of the pirates, the bounty on him was going to be high, especially if he really did turn out to be Tuka. But Johnny didn't do press, and he didn't do media. The last thing he needed was his face plastered all over the networks. It would only take one holoheuristic search of "Alpha, Johnny", to reveal that his real identity was that of "Kreelman, John", and that was the last thing he needed. It would have been unwelcome attention both for him and the woman in the stasis booth, who was now going by the name of-
"Webster!" shouted Nigel to the paramedics. "I'm Nigel Webster. This is her."
Several ambulances waited by the landing area, bobbing gently as the Martian breeze nudged their gravity fields. Several were already surrounded by knots of confused passengers, eagerly dosing up on cures for shock, trauma, minor cuts and bruises. A fair number had already self-medicated by drinking themselves insensate in the free bar - Johnny saw several popping hangover cures while they huddled in their silver-foil emergency capes.
Wulf took the lowermost end of the stasis tube. Johnny and Nigel held it at the top of the steps while Wulf carefully edged backwards onto the Lowell City asphalt.
"Mister Webster," called a paramedic. "So glad you could make it!" He was one of two men in white and matching crew cuts standing close by, eagerly waiting to become useful.
"What is with der Webster?" hissed Wulf, straining with the effort of handling half the heavy, coffin-like container.
"This close to Earth," said Nigel, "I'm not a Less."
"Snecking-A," said Johnny.
"The Webster passport won't get me offworld again, but it'll get me in," said Nigel. His voice rose suddenly as he was forced to hang onto more of the stasis chamber, Wulf's feet now backing away a little too fast across the flat ground.
Johnny was too busy watching his feet to pay much attention to what was going on around him. The engine noise was still deafening and the dust was getting into his nose. He wished he'd thought ahead and wrapped a kerchief around his mouth before disembarking. The thin Martian atmosphere forced his lungs to take great, uncharacteristic gulps, and he was inhaling red sand along with the air. It didn't help that his hands were aching from the weight of the chamber.
"You okay there?" asked Nigel.
"She ain't heavy," said Johnny.
"I hate Mars," said Wulf, craning his neck to see how much further they had to go. "It gives me der red bogies."
"Hey," laughed Nigel. "You're talking about my new home."
"You think?" said Johnny.
"For the foreseeable future," smiled Nigel. "Moving around is too damn difficult."
Johnny grinned as they reached the bottom step and their load was horizontal again. He looked around for the ambulance.
A red light sat on the roof of the vehicle, sending a powerful, bloody glow in Johnny's direction every second and a half. It was a squat, thin-looking thing that reminded Johnny of a white hearse, and it had large radiator fins protruding from its side. Its repulsor field was so jacked that the ground underneath it seemed to shimmer and crawl, shot through with swirls of agitated red dust. It was built for speed. The two crew cut men in white were jogging over to them now, steadily narrowing the distance between them.
"Who are these guys?" breathed Johnny.
"They're from the clinic," said Nigel, happily.
"Mr Webster," said the first of the men. "This way, please." He nodded politely at Johnny and Wulf. He was young, barely out of medical college. He seemed nice, exuding the charm of medical professionals who had not yet been disillusioned by his job. His fellow paramedic grabbed one of the forward handles to help take the load off the struggling Viking. As he did so, he began to tug the stasis chamber towards the souped-up ambulance waiting beside the others.
"What's with the souped-up vehicle?" asked Johnny.
"Time's tight," laughed the lead paramedic. "We got the fastest crate. But don't worry, sir, we still have..." he looked at his watch and checked it against the data panel on Ruth's chamber, "oh, maybe twenty-five minutes to get her to Carter. And even then, there's no guarantee she will give birth immediately."
"Good," Nigel and Wulf exclaimed in unison. They looked at each other and grinned enthusiastically, pleased that it was all coming to an end.
"No," said Johnny, as they slid the stasis chamber into the car. "Wait."
The lead paramedic turned to look at him, compliant but agitated.
"Sir," he said, "we really don't have much time."
"The gene-splicing unit is in Lowell," said Johnny. "It's in the city hospital." He pointed at a long white building in the distance. "I can see it from here."
Wulf followed Johnny's arm. Sure enough, he saw a giant red cross rotating on the roof of the building Johnny was pointing at.
The other paramedic clambered into the driver's seat, slamming his door shut behind him. His associate looked quizzically at Nigel.
"We're not going to the city hospital," said Nigel. "These gentleman are from a new facility."
"You betcha," said the lead paramedic. "We've only been around for-"
"What new facility?" asked Johnny. "Where are you taking her?"
The other paramedic walked at a measured pace around to the front passenger side door. He spoke as he walked, polite, but really in a hurry.
"We're with the GR unit," he said, yanking his door open. "Are you family, sir? Because if you are-"
"You snecking bet I'm family!" yelled Johnny. "What the hell does GR stand for, anyway?"
Nigel climbed into the rear side passenger door. "Sorry, Johnny," he said.
"Genetic Re-Alignment," said the paramedic. He saw the white, empty eyes of the man standing by the car, and if the guy was family, well, then that explained a whole lot about Mr Webster's problem. He pulled a card from his top pocket and handed it to Johnny.
"No room and we've gotta run," he said. "But come and see us."
Johnny stared at the card, open-mouthed, reading between the lines of their careful terminology of re-advantaging and potential augmentation. The word that really hit home was "normalisation".
"Holy sneck," he snarled.
"What is it?" said Wulf, squinting at the tiny print on the card.
"What can I say, my friend," said the paramedic with a smile. "We can't do much for you, but your kids could have a chance."
"What is he meaning?" asked Wulf. "Your kids?"
The souped-up ambulance engine churned into life with a throaty roar that settled almost immediately into a caged purr. The driver spun the wheel with practised ease and slowly began to manouevre through the crowd of former passengers and mundane medics.
Johnny grabbed at Nigel's window.
"The baby!" he shouted. "It isn't snecking ill at all."
"Depends on what you mean by ill, Johnny," said Nigel, carefully.
"The baby's snecking fine," said Johnny.
"That's a matter of opinion," said Nigel angrily. "Ruth wants this! She wants our kid to have a chance!"
"A chance at what?"
"At a normal life," said Nigel.
Johnny pulled his gun, pointing it through the window. "Stop the car," he said.
The driver looked over at him sadly. His fellow paramedic nodded and gestured for him to drive on.
"Stop the snecking car," said Johnny, forced now to jog alongside the vehicle as it reached the road.
"What? You're gonna shoot me now?" called Nigel, through the window. "You're not gonna shoot me."
"You lied to me," said Johnny.
"Nothing personal," said Nigel. "Really, you're a great guy, Johnny. But don't you wish
you
had had a better chance?"
"Ruthie wouldn't do this," said Johnny. "She wouldn't do this."
"We can talk about this later, okay?" said Nigel, putting on a kindly face, even as he hit the button to raise the window glass. He pointed towards the hospital, ahead of the car, his eyebrows raised in a conciliatory fashion. He pointed down at the address on the card, looking into Johnny's eyes for some sign of acknowledgement. But all he saw was white rage.
The ambulance motor kicked in and it shot off along the straight road like a red and white dragster.
"You snecked me over!" yelled Johnny. "You lied to me!" But he was shouting at the red Martian desert, and at a distant plume of dust and exhaust vapour.