Searchers, p.25
Searchers, page 25
“I love her. And Hank.”
“I know,” Katriana spread her arms wide. “And yet here I am, loved by none, and getting royally screwed over. Just not fucked. Most people don’t even know that I — we exist. You were allowed that privilege, too. Special fucking Thomas. But no more.”
Thomas waited for her to continue.
“Did you know that we held another vote just now? Everything happens so fast for me since I’ve been accelerated, doing so many things at once. Even without the wires. I am Oversight, and Oversight is me, us, we. And we are everywhere.”
“What did you vote about?”
“Whether to give you another chance to stay. Some of us like you still.”
“What was decided?”
“You’re going.”
“I see,” Thomas nodded. “Good. Thanks for trying to keep me here, anyway.”
Katriana shook her head. “You just don’t get it. It was another tie, waiting on the computer for a tiebreaker.”
“But …” Thomas furrowed his brow. “Thirteen Arks represented and a computer would make fourteen. That’s an even number. You said thirteen. But that’s one per Ark plus one. Fourteen.”
“So, Thomas suddenly learned to count. Well, names are just names, like I said before. The actual computer that does the grunt work is actually thousands of interconnected devices across all the Arks, but they are just that — machines. One organic cyborg hybrid per Ark, and that makes the Committee. The chair of the Committee always votes last, in case of a tie. And they call the chair the computer. Someone long ago must have thought it was funny, but the name stuck. Two guesses who the computer is now, Thomas, the chair of the committee. Who could that be? Hmm?”
“You. Katriana.”
“Right on both counts. I filed my vote, and we’ve decided that you’re going down there. But as chair — the computer — I get to pick the destination. I’m sending you a long way from your dearest loves, because Hank is going where Miya is, too. Just not you. Maybe they’ll hook up, who knows? He used to think he was a straight pipe before you turned him into a Devian bastard valve. And he likes her, I can tell. Oversight sees all. He fantasises about her, did you know that? In his apartment, in the dark, full stick naked, hand-on-dick. After he’s fucked you, he’s dreaming of her. And that’s why she was allowed to stay until she saw what she did. To make you suffer, just a little. You just didn’t know it yet, but you would have found out, in time. The seeds were already there. And it would have split the three of you apart. I’ve done the projections. It was going to be glorious, fucking glorious, a soap opera ending if there ever was one. And all three of you would have been miserable in the end, broken. The numbers don’t lie.”
“Send me down there, but to her. Please, I … I beg you. Don’t do this.”
“The vote is cast. Oversight has decided.”
“Then you can go to hell, Katriana.”
“Get off of my ship.”
“It’s an Ark.”
“Ship, Ark, whatever. And as for hell, you’ll pass through that on the way down. I’d suggest avoiding touching anything metal, especially anything you plan to use later, you Double-Devian bastard valve or whatever the fuck you call each other in your twisted little love language that makes me literally want to vomit. You only have one wife, Thomas, and that’s me. Hank was a bit of fun for you, but Miya is a poison to me now. And then you saw what was down there. Even with that, some still voted for you to stay. But you’re going. Dress warm, there’s a bit of an ice age going on down there right now.”
“So you still care.”
“I still love you, damn it all to hell. You two had just a few weeks together, and you’re already hopelessly in love — you already were, even before you fucked, we could tell. A fucking bloody soap opera. Hell, you’re probably willing to walk to the ends of the Earth for her, and her for you, right? Well, I’m literally giving you that chance to prove your love, if you live that long. Consider it a late wedding present. Three or four weeks? You and I had almost a year, and … nothing. Not a fucking thing.”
“You changed, Katriana. The surgeries. Oversight. And I’m a Devian.”
“Stop making excuses. You love her, and you love Hank. The three of you make me sick to my stomach. Now get the fuck off my Ark.”
Mars
The round door closed in front of him, and the capsule began to move along a set of low tracks. Thomas looked out through the small glass window in the capsule’s door and saw Katriana turn away. She walked out of the departure bay with the officers, leaving Thomas alone inside the capsule. Katriana was still watching him, of course, through Oversight sensors. They were always watching. Everywhere. Even in the showers.
Thomas pounded on the door and tried to twist the round handle open, but it wouldn’t budge. Locked from the outside, or perhaps it was only locked until the capsule landed. The capsule continued its slow progress along the floor, and then it slowly rotated ninety degrees, so that the door he had come in through was now at the top.
Thomas concentrated on keeping his footing and jumped when a voice suddenly spoke.
“Please strap in.”
“Please strap in.”
“Please strap in.”
He stared down at the six sets of identical body-shaped pads beneath his feet, with headrests on the outside of the circle, and footrests in the centre. He knelt down and squirmed into position onto one set of pads, then hurriedly strapped himself in.
“Please remain strapped in at all times. Departing for Mars Base in thirty seconds. Enjoy your journey.”
During the descent, the air inside got hotter and hotter until Miya thought her lungs were going to catch fire, but then that passed like the voice said it would.
An almost-silent ride through flaming hell, and then … peace and cooling air inside the capsule. Then there was another sudden jerk that slammed her back into the padding, and then a further sense of drifting. The capsule slowly swung back and forth as she stared up through the window at a round shape with pretty red and white alternating circles, like a target. It was slowing her down, somehow, slowing her descent. It was a comforting, peaceful, rocking feeling.
And then there was the jarring impact of landing that she was certain had chipped or broken a tooth, because she had blood in her mouth. Or maybe the blood was from her tongue. It hurt, too. Maybe she’d bitten it.
The capsule rolled over several times before it came to a stop at an odd angle. Miya threw up for real this time, all over the bottom side of the capsule, the part that she currently called down. She hung, suspended almost sideways, from the wall that had been at the bottom of the capsule when she left the Ark.
Miya caught her breath and wriggled from side to side. The capsule didn’t roll, so she reached to unfasten her straps and promptly fell down, hard. One full G, pulling her down into a slimy smear of vomit. Nice.
The voice spoke again. “You have landed. You may now release your straps.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Please exit the capsule and take the sample kit with you. Follow the instructions inside the sample kit.” The inner handle spun on its own, and the door popped open. Which used to be on the top, which meant the capsule was lying on its side.
Air entered the capsule through the opening. Miya sniffed. It had an odd smell, but fresh, like walking in a park on the concourse level. The smell of growing things. She breathed in deeply, her knees resting in vomit. Some of the odd smell was that, she was sure.
Miya reached down and pulled the sample kit out from between two pads. It had a flashing handle to identify it. Not like there were any other sample kits or much of anything else in this capsule. Not unless it was under the seats, or tucked away in the walls. She would have to check later. She steadied herself against the curved wall as she stepped towards the opening where the fresh air was coming from. It was nice smelling, and there was a lot of it. She stuck her nose outside of the capsule and sniffed.
And there it was, right in front of her face.
The pretty green rock, and the pile of shit.
Although it wasn’t a pile anymore.
It had been smeared around, like a piece of child’s art.
It now spelled out a name.
C L I V E
Miya clambered out of the capsule and stared at the anomaly. She nearly added to the artwork when she heard a noise behind her in the trees. There was something moving, and it sounded big. But of course there was a food chain, things eating other things, making shit everywhere, and no pipes or tanks in sight to break it down so it could become green stuff again. It somehow did it all by itself. Green deck. Magic. But the something she heard approaching from behind might want to eat her. And then make more shit. Not so magic.
She lowered into a crouch and turned around slowly. A great, white, hairy beast stood before her. Big eyes, tall. And with even bigger teeth. She crouched lower still, holding the sample kit in front of her like a shield.
The beast spoke.
“I see you got the message. Welcome to Mars.”
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Droppers
The following is a sneak peek at Droppers, Book # 2 in The Recycled Earth trilogy:
Year 998 P.E. (Post Earth)
“You scared the absolute shit out of me,” Miya fell back onto the rock, the sample case still clutched tightly in her hands.
“Sorry,” said the voice as it pulled a large animal skin away from its head. Underneath was a boy of about fifteen, maybe sixteen. “It helps keep away the real ones.”
Miya blinked. “Real ones what?”
“Animals.” The boy stepped forward and extended a hand. “Here, let me help you up. It takes a while to get used to the extra gravity down here, or so they say.”
Miya accepted the outstretched hand and let him pull her up. She could have done it herself, of course, but she was bruised and battered. “Thanks. It’s not so bad.”
“Really?” The boy’s eyebrows rose. “Most people can’t walk properly for days; we need to drag some of them on a travois before they get eaten. We don’t always get there in time.”
“What’s your name?” Miya put her hands on her hips. The gravity was a little strong, but not much worse than lower blue, just above black. The air seemed a little thinner, though. “I’m Miya.”
“Oh,” the boy nodded. “Samuel Dickens Hemingway Faulkner Kafka Jones.”
“Wow.”
“The second.”
“There are two of you? That’s a lot of names. My name’s just Miya, Miya Meyers.”
“That rhymes. I should have thought of that. Too late now, though. Or maybe not.”
“What are you talking about, Samuel Dickens Hemingway Fuck—”
“Faulkner Kafka Jones,” he smiled. “The second.” The fourth name’s pronounced Faulkner, Fow-k-n-er, I think. Not fuck. That’s rude. But you can call me Sam. Most people don’t bother with the rest of the names. But I like them, so I collect them.”
Miya blinked. “You … collect … names. And you wear some big scary hairy thing on your head so other big scary things like it don’t eat you.”
“That’s right.”
“Am I dead? This is … strange.”
“Some call it gravity sickness. But you seem to be okay, though, which is even stranger. Where are you from? Did you actually crawl out of that dropper capsule?”
Miya pointed at her stained knees. “Vomit. Matches the stuff on the padding in the sampler. The capsule. You can go check it, if you like, but I’m not going back in if I don’t have to. It stinks.”
“I believe you … Miya.”
“Not Mee-ah, MY-AH. Get it right, fuckner.”
“Sorry.”
“What kinds of names are these, anyway? The ones you collect.”
Sam shrugged. “Writer’s names, mostly. I like to read. There are bits and pieces left here in the ruins. I like books the best. Most of them have turned to dust, but not all. And all of the books have names in the front. It’s who wrote them, I guess.”
“You guess. And then you add those names to yours?”
“Exactly,” Sam grinned. “That’s what I do.”
“Strange, very strange. Did you ask them if you could use their names? They might not like you taking their names. Most people are given names by their parents, just the first ones. The last one’s already there. And am I really having this idiotic conversation with a boy who wears scary-as-shit-furs-with-a-toothy-head-so-he-doesn’t-get-eaten? Really? Next to a smear of shit that spells out CLIVE? I must be dead, there’s no other explanation. The real world could not be more messed up than this. I’m dead, that’s it. I burned up on re-entry, I think you call it. My ashes are spread to the … what the fuck is going on here, Sam?”
Sam blinked. “Um … hi. You’re pretty scary, you know? Like an Ur-bear. And, um, you’re definitely alive. Did you want me to … pinch you or something?”
“You stay the fuck away from me, but don’t go anywhere. Let me figure this out.”
“Okay.” Sam stood in one spot, shifting his weight from foot to foot.
Miya slowly turned around, studying her surroundings. She rubbed her arms. Cold. The green rock and the shit were on a bigger white rock in a small clearing, which was surrounded by trees. Like they did a real close zoom in on the rock and carefully left out everything else. “Bastards.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Nothing, Sam. I’m happy to meet you, and I think I might not be dead, after all. But this is…”
“Different than you expected? Most peopled find that. They expect brown sand, space suits, no breathable air and, well … Mars.”
“I know this is Earth. I figured it out. I saw the shit from up there, remember? By the rock.”
“Oh,” Sam scratched the back of his neck. “Right. The message.”
Miya took a deep breath. It was getting colder, and the light wasn’t as intense as it had been. “Can you please tell me why that pile of shit now spells out CLIVE? I saw a pile of shit on the console screen.”
“Oh,” Sam blushed. “That’s an easy one. The image you saw must have been taken before he’d finished.”
“Finished what?”
“Signing it. Clive signs his paintings. It’s really disgusting, but he’s not right in the head. Harmless, otherwise. But not right. Not right at all.”
Acknowledgements
Thank you to Tammy MacKenzie, Tony van Krieken, Alice Parkes and Sharon Manssen for your Beta reader feedback. Your insights have been invaluable.
And thank you to physicist Gerard O’Neill, who initially envisaged the cylindrical space habitat concept in the 1970’s. The Arks in this story were loosely based on the concept (the Arks don’t have windows, for one thing, and the Arks are smaller than the original 20-mile long O’Neill habitats, for another). However, most story ideas are layered and adapted from ideas that have come before, and we need to acknowledge the visionaries and pioneers who came before us, as much as we can.
Why no windows in the Arks? Well, then you’d be able to see the Earth, of course. And that wouldn’t suit Oversight’s plans very well at all, would it? Plus, staring down at a dead planet would be quite depressing, really.
Instead of huge windows, the Arks in this story rely on a sun tube for interior lighting of the vast, open spaces of the concourse level and farms. And of course, we’ve got very efficient orbiting solar farms that provide plenty of power for the Arks and the orbital factories. And farming of asteroids for raw materials, which isn’t a new idea, either. Layers upon layers…
Characters
Major characters - in order of appearance:
Miya Meyers (main character)
Zac - Miya’s best friend
Kasem - senior manager of Sanitation (a.k.a. Essential Biological Recycling, a.k.a. ‘The Underworld’) [nickname: Poseidon]
Melvyn Meyers - Miya’s father
Charisse Meyers - Miya’s mother
T’sangli - Miya’s friend, Sami’s boyfriend
Sami - Miya’s friend, T’sangli’s girlfriend
The Chancellor - governor of Ark Three
Thomas Solas - Miya’s husband (by Selection; Miya is his second Selected wife)
Katriana - Thomas’s first Selected wife (now ex-wife)
Chantelle - the Chancellor’s wife
Harold (Hank) Swanson - Thomas’s boyfriend
Ark specifications
Arks 01-13
Length: 10,000 metres
Diameter: 1,988 metres
