Moving Mars (47 page)

Phobos winked into existence, a crescent rising nine or ten degrees above the horizon. After a few measurements by Lieh, we confirmed that Phobos was back in its proper orbit.

The scary dog was home, apparently none the worse for its journey.

I did not drink my champagne. Thanking the governor, I handed her my glass, and Dandy escorted me quickly from the center. No time to linger

Lieh made connections with new satcoms and showed me LitVid reaction throughout the Triple. I watched and listened silently, beyond numbness and into frozen isolation.

I hadnt heard of Ilya since the Freezethe name assigned by Martian LitVids to the brief war.

Around the Triple, the sense of outrage against Earth had flared, subsided, and flared anew, into a call for general boycotts by all space resource providers. That wasnt practical Earth had stockpiled resources for several years, as a hedge against market fluctuations. But the political repercussions would be serious.

Engineers in asteroid cities descended in close floating ranks on Terrie consulates, demanding explanations for the aggression.

The Moon, predictably, tried to keep a low profile. But even on the Moon, independent nets bristled with fearful, angry calls for resignations, investigations, recall plebiscites. A few independent Lunar BMs expressed solidarity with the beleaguered Federal Republic of Mars. I could feel the fear echoing across the Solar System, especially in the vulnerable Belts. Nobody in the Triple could trust the old Mother now.

Finally, the President of the United States of the Western Hemisphere asked for an investigation into the causes of the conflict. We must understand what happened here, and discover who took it upon themselves to give these orders, and do these things, he concluded, in order to avoid even worse disasters in the future.

Look to your own house, I murmured. I trusted nothing spoken by Terrie politicians.

This is very interesting, Lieh said, placing her slate before me. She had worked her way through several layers to a small and exclusive Terrie advisement net called Lumen. She didnt tell me how shed accessed such a subscriptionMars had its penetrators and seekers after forbidden knowledge, and no doubt Point One had recruited many of the best. This went out to subscribers about six hours ago.

A handsome elderly woman with weary, wrinkled features and an immaculately tailored green suit sat stiffly in flat image, talking and calling up text reports from around Earth. At first glance, the program seemed dull and old-fashioned even by Martian standards. But I forced myself to listen to what was being said.

No nation or alliance has taken responsibility for starting the action against Mars, and no pundit has given an adequate explanation for why any authority would do so. The calls for plebiscite judgment, absent any clear perpetrators, worries this observer a great deal I think we are dealing, yet again, with gray eminences who have sealed themselves away from plebiscites, above even the alliances, and I look for them in the merged minds who ride the greatest and most secure Thinkers, those which oversee Earths estate and financial situation. Arising from the old system of national surveillance established in the United States over a century and a half ago, once limited to oversight alone, these merged mindsrumored but never confirmedhave become the greatest processors of data in human history.

With the transfer of space defense to the alliances, they may not be limited to advisement now; they may have decided to wield power. If so, then our subscribers may wish to withdraw from all dataflux markets for the next few months or even years. Something is moving bigger than mere individuals can withstand.

Even in the exhaustion, I shivered. Have you heard of them? I asked Lieh.

Only as silly rumors, Lieh said. But this is an expensive advisement net. Maybe thirty thousand legal subscribers. Supposedly, rash or silly statements are never made here.

A small group mind, I said softly. Above the common herd. Sending orders down through alliances, through nations. Who, most likely?

Heads of GEWA, Lieh suggested. They have control of Solar System defense.

Dandy shifted in his seat. Ive seen and heard enough scary stuff for one lifetime, he said.

Unofficially, Mars was on wartime footing, and by the rules of the constitution, acting as President until Ti Sandras return, I had extraordinary powers

But even my extraordinary powers could not extend to Cailetet. We had to treat it as a sovereign foreign nation; we could declare war, of sorts, and we would, but it would be a war of finance. I worried about Stan and hoped that he was using all of his considerable intelligence to keep himself and his family safe.

Damage reports came rapidly now. Station by station, region by region, lists of dead, missing, accounts of damages, requests for emergency aid, all crowded the restored channels. Point One transferred the calls to the government net, and Lieh drew them from the legislative and presidential channel, condensing and editing.

So little was known about some regions, still. Dataflow had not been re-established everywhere; some thinkers in key positions had apparently died and could not be brought up again.

Mars was screaming in pain; I suddenly specked hearing the collected information as one voice. I shied from that quickly. I could not afford such grim inspiration now.

On the shuttle flight to Many Hills, I tried to rest, but couldnt close my eyes for more than minutes at a time. Unexpectedly, I started feeling my enhancement again, and began calculating the adjustments necessary to move a mass the size of Phobos. I visualized in multiple layers of equations the functions which described transfer of co-responsibility for conservation of these quantities to a larger system The entire galaxy. Nobody would miss it. We had become thieves in a vast treasure house.

I murmured aloud some of the enhancements activities.

Dandy came into the darkened cabin with my dinner. Excuse me? he asked.

My muse, I said. Im possessed by physics.

Oh, he said. What does physics tell you?

I just shook my head. Im not hungry, I said.

Tarekh says if you dont eat hes bound by duty to force-feed you. He smiled thinly and set the tray down before me. I picked at the food for a while, ate a few bites, and returned to my efforts to sleep.

I must have succeeded for a short while, for Dandy and Lieh stood before me suddenly. Lieh shook my arm gently. Madame Vice President, she said, its official. Shes alive.

I stared up at her, muzzy and confused.

Ti Sandra is alive. Weve had it confirmed.

Thank you, I said.

I have a message from the President, Lieh continued.

Shes been injured, Dandy said. They have her in recovery at a secret location.

I took my slate, touched it to Liehs, and they left me alone while I listened to Ti Sandra. My eyes filled with tears when I saw her face; I could barely discern the support equipment around her. She did not seem in pain, but her eyes lacked focus and that clued me. Her nervous system was under nano control.

Little sister Cassie, she began. Her lips stuck together for a moment, muffling her words. Someone gave her a sip from a cup of water. Drops glistened on her lips. I am so grateful that you carried this horrible burden the past week. Our little trick nearly turned true. We had a real shuttle crash on the slopes of Pavonis Mons. Special targeting for me. Paul is dead.

My tears spilled over then, and my entire chest gave a sharp lurch. I felt as if my body might suddenly fail, my heart give out. I moaned.

Dandy looked in briefly, then closed the door again.

Ive lost half my body, they say. My big, lovely body. Ill recover. Were growing new stuff right now. But no thinker controls, no computer controlsjust twenty human doctors round the clock. I feel so greedy, taking so much when so many others are injured But they wont let me near anything that could do any more harm. I dont feel any grief right now, my dear. I wont for a long time, they say.

Cassie, I told Charles and Stephen to do it, right after my accident, before I was put completely under. I hope I was in my right mind. It does accelerate things, doesnt it? I asked, and they assured me they were ready. There was danger, but it could be done. Now its done, and you must let them know how grateful we all are. Theres so much more to do, though.

You must act for me a while longer. Youre more than my crutch now, Cassie, You must be me as well as yourself. I cant think as well as I should.

I wanted so much to collapse into being a little girl, irresponsible and protected by others. Worse, a feeling of absolute dread had rooted itself. I turned off the slate, halting Ti Sandra in mid-statement, and almost screamed for Lieh to come in. She came through the door, face white, and kneeled beside my seat.

Find Ilya, I demanded, grabbing the back of her neck.

Were trying, Lieh said. Weve been searching since dataflow started coming back.

Please just find him and tell me!

She nodded, squeezed my arm, and left the cabin again.

Ti Sandra resumed at my touch. think we have very little time now to put together a consensus. Elections are impossible. The Republic is still under threat, perhaps a greater threat than ever before. This Solar System is fatal. Its fatal for Mars. Ask Charles to explain. Everything is out of balance. We have used fear to fight the effects of terror. Listen: were lambs, you and I. Were expendable for the greater good.

I dont mean our lives, honey. I mean our souls.

The research center at Melas Dorsa had been abandoned at the beginning of the Freeze. Charles and Stephen Leander had departed in the Mercury; the others had been brought out by tractor, with as much equipment as could be salvaged. Pictures of the site confirmed the wisdom of keeping the Olympians on the move: the remains of all tunnels, the grounds of the station itself, had been uprooted as if by thousands of burrowing insects or moles.

Locusts. Earth denied planting them, so we broadcast evidence of their use across the Triple, another part of the war of nerves. Tarekh Firkazzie and Lieh suggested we consider Mars as forever bugged, that all future planning allow for the emergence of hidden warbeiters. We would never be able to sweep the planet completely.

Firkazzie had grimly surveyed the remains of the Melas Dorsa laboratory and decided that it could never be occupied again. We had to locate a new site for an even bigger laboratory, to house an even bigger research effort.

From orbit, Charles suggested the site for a new laboratory. He remembered his fathers search ten years past for ice lenses not quite sufficient to support large stations. Such a lens existed beneath Kaibab in Ophir Planum, the remains of a shallow dusted lake from a quarter of a billion Martian years past. It was unlikely, it was in a desolate and difficult land, it was far from any other station, and there was little chance of encountering locusts.

In just twenty-four hours, architectural nano delivered and activated by a squadron of shuttles made a solid, moderately comfortable preliminary structure, a hideaway near the edge of the plateau. For the time being, a few dozen people could stay there in seclusion. Later, the site could be expanded for the larger effort.

Charles and Stephen Leander returned from Phobos, bringing the Mercury down under cover of a thin dust storm from Sinai. A few hectares of crushed and flattened lava served as a rough landing pad.

My shuttle landed at Kaibab hours after the Mercurys arrival. The terrain was hellishsharp-edged rills and ancient pocked high-silica lava flows, every edge a knife, all depressions filled with purple vitreous oxidizing rouge. These were badlands indeed, worse than anything I had ever seen humans inhabit on Mars.

Following Lieh and Dandy, I stepped out of the shuttle lock and squeezed under the low tube seal. I saw Leander and Nehemiah Royce first. Then I turned and saw Charles. He stood at the end of the ramp. Gray surgical nano marked parts of his head and neck. He smiled and extended his hand. I shook it firmly and enfolded it with my other hand.

Its good to see you, Madam President, he said.

Im not President any more, thank God, I said.

Charles shrugged. You have the power, he said. Thats what counts. He gestured for me to lead the way.

As I passed Lieh, I grabbed her arm again and stared at her. Ilya was still missing.

Well find him, she said. Hes all right, Im sure of it.

I ignored the reassurance. Tough as nails, I thought. Winston Churchill in the Blitz. Remember. Tough as nails.

The tweaker had been removed from the Mercury and sat on a bench in one corner of a cramped tunnel. I quickly looked over the zero-temp chamber with its gray, squat force disorder pumps, the Martian-made QL thinker and interpreter, cables, power supply.

Leander had arranged for tea and cakes to be served on a low table nearby. We sat on thick pillow cushions from the Republic shuttle. Besides Charles and Leander, only two other Olympians were present: Nehemiah Royce and Amy Vico-Persoff. Point One had dictated that for the duration of the emergency, no more than four Olympians be in one place at one time. The others were being housed at Tharsis Research University, under tight security.

How much does it all weigh? I asked Leander as Charles poured the tea.

About four hundred kilograms, Leander said. We pared it down considerably in the last version. Most of the weight is in the pumps.

So tell me, I said, crossing my legs and warming my hands on the cup.

Charles poured his cup last and kneeled on his pillow. He glanced at me, I smiled, and his eyes darted away as if in shyness. He focused on the table and cakes. We guessed what was happening right away. So did Ti Sandra. The words seemed to come with difficulty. I stared at Charles as if feeding a new hunger, feeling a mix of awe and intense affection.

Ti Sandra instructed us to get to Phobos any way we could, with the tweaker, and take a trip.

She knew you were ready to do this? I asked. I didnt.

She guessed, or she just made a wild request We certainly werent ready for so much, so soon. We fueled the Mercury, moved everything we could on board. The most difficult part was guaranteeing a clean power supply for the pumps. We managed that. We were ready for take-off twelve hours after the Freeze began.