Complete short fiction, p.67
Complete Short Fiction, page 67
And yet.... Despite watching this battle over and over again, despite watching the events leading up to it—as recorded and narrated by the Republicans themselves!—he really can’t work out what they were rebelling against. Their grievances seem trivial: limitations in the type and quantity of free goods they received? The increase of regional representatives from six to nine, when they had asked for eleven? The central issue seemed to be something about breathable air, but this made no sense, because even then the air was breathable over sixty percent of the Martian surface, including all of the territory claimed by the Republicans, and the free goods they received included whole train cars full of compressed oxygen, to use for whatever they liked.
Wyatt has spent half his life on the American frontier, among the armed and the restless—some of them veterans and lingering sympathizers of the Confederacy, others just pioneers with a love of novelty or a distrust of authority—and yet these people, these Martian Republicans strike him as extremists. Spoiling for a fight, on any excuse at all.
He watches them fracture the dome at Hellas Centrale. Backs the stim up, watches it again. Shrinks himself to get a better view, and watches it a third time. The six major gates—called “vehicular airlocks”—all detonate within moments of each other, and over the Southeast Approach the dome is instantly spiderwebbed with cracks. Two big triangular pieces break loose, rising for a moment and then falling slowly in the Martian gravity. But they’re heavy, and they have a long way to fall, so they hit the ground like oversized locomotives, smashing shops and houses and the people sleeping inside them. A triumph for the Great Republican Strike Brigades.
Then the dust settles, and Wyatt speeds up the stim. From high up nothing much seems to happen for a while. The Republican troops have won by sheer astonishment, shaking the monarchists out of their beds, seizing buildings, fax machines and other important locations, then digging in and waiting.
They never stood a chance. They hold their positions for four and a half hours, before the Royal Constabulary puts a stop to it. Not even soldiers; police! Raining from the sky like hailstones, in something like airtight, armored diving suits. The actual battle is brief, even though the Constabulary seems at pains to bring in their suspects alive and intact, and without collateral damage.
Wyatt has watched these men (and women!) up close: not grim, not hostile, not nervous or whipped up into a state of high emotion like the rebels they’re arresting. Just serious, efficient, professional, barely sweating inside their bubble helmets. You, that way. The two of you, follow me. The closest thing Wyatt has ever seen to them are the private security guards Wells Fargo used to hire to guard their coaches and train cars, back in the days when it wasn’t safe to travel.
But those Fargo men were at least minimally afraid of getting shot, whereas the Royal Constabulary seem utterly fearless. True, their armor can absorb an amazing amount of damage—they’re knocked over by impacts and explosions but get right back up again, time after time! But a few lucky Republican shots punch through and then explode, THUMP THUMP THUMP, spattering the insides with gore and leaving the suits—still mostly intact—to teeter over like papier mâché statues in the light gravity. The other Constables ignore this, moving on with their jobs like nothing’s happened at all.
What’s more, these few Constables are the only casualties in this particular engagement; every single rebel is captured and led away in chains. This is meaningful, because even though it happened half a century ago and half a world away, a lot of the miners in Dawes Crater City still seem to have Republican sympathies, and a vague but reflexive ire against all things royal. Which includes the leases and licenses held by the mining company. It doesn’t help for Wyatt to takes sides—he needs everyone on his side—but he can’t help wondering, if he were there, whether he’d’ve been fighting alongside the monarchists.
Sighing, he turns the stim off. He’s not going to watch this one anymore. It’s depressing, and he’s already learned about as much as he’s going to. As he takes off the stim cap and struggles out of the pod, he’s surprised to find someone there waiting for him.
Or rather, surprised by who it is: a woman in a crisp, sky blue uniform, with a cap as white as noontime clouds.
“Hello,” he says.
To his surprise, she holds out her hand for him to shake. “Good afternoon, Mr. Earp. I’m Captain Gonzales. Is this a bad time? Your associate said I could find you here.”
He takes the hand. “I was beginning to think nobody knew what a handshake was anymore. Are you some kind of historian?”
“Protocol specialist,” she corrects.
“Huh. Thirty years of school for that?”
She frowns. “No.” And then, sensing that’s not quite enough, “Law Enforcement is a ten year study program, and you have to pick an elective. It was a while ago.”
And that’s all she seems to want to say about it.
Sighing, he escorts her out onto the street. Fuzzy probably won’t mind if they chat in his waiting room, but it seems a little rude.
“All right,” he says, “what can I do for you?”
“Well, the Provincial Authority has heard about you, and this area is under my jurisdiction, and I thought it would be good for us to meet informally, before the governor decides to order me to do it. It’s an interesting approach, I’ll say that much for Tom Clady. High points for novelty. How would you say things are going here?”
“Rather well, I think. I don’t really know what it was like before, but I’d say we have things running smoother now.”
“I’m inclined to agree. Incident reports are down sharply, and well below expectation for a community of this type.”
“Well, good.”
It’s a beautiful day except for the wind—Martian high summer, which is about like late fall in Arizona. The sky is purple, streaked with cirrus clouds, and the sun is warm but not hot. It didn’t take Wyatt very long to abandon his hat here; it never rains, and the threat of sunburn is minimal. However, he does wear a scarf and wraparound eyeglasses, because the winds are unpredictable, and they carry a fine, stinging grit that he can’t seem to get used to. Some places are like that: bad soil that won’t grow anything, won’t stay put, and burns in the eyes and nose.
Captain Gonzales is wearing heavy glasses as well; they seem to be part of the uniform. Her nose and mouth, however, are exposed to the dust, and she doesn’t seem particularly bothered by it.
“I’ve gotten some assault complaints about you that I’m going to overlook,” she tells him.
“All right.”
“Fact is, we’d be just as rough if we got called in here again. At least as rough, because it’ll keep the Constabulary out of Dawes Crater.”
“Yeah, I guess people don’t love them too much here.”
She shrugs beside him as they walk. “Some don’t. That’s not really the point. The Queendom wants its mining communities productive, but it also expects adherence to certain cultural norms. We sound ignorant to them, and we don’t hold our cups correctly if you see what I mean. That creates an inherent friction that we can’t simply wish away. When you get right down to it, the Constables don’t like Mars any more than Mars likes them.”
Wyatt laughs. “People here in Dawes Crater say the same thing about the Provincial Authority.”
“Yes, well, that’s not surprising. Everyone likes to look down on someone, and no one likes to be looked down upon. But I do like what I hear about you, Mr. Earp; people chafe less against hyperlocal enforcement, and your resurrectant status puts you outside every hierarchy and power structure. Whitecaps don’t live here, and we wouldn’t be welcome if we did, and resident security has no official power, so why should people listen? It’s only the fear of losing their jobs that keeps the workers even marginally in line. But a crack across the mouth works wonders, doesn’t it? And yes, people need distractions as well. I understand you’re building a boxing stadium?”
The town is small enough that Wyatt can simply point to it, or at least the corner of it that’s visible between buildings. “Doesn’t look like much yet. We’re financing it out of our own pockets, and doing the labor ourselves, so it comes together a little bit at a time. We’re building a worship node as well, the First Church of Dawes Crater. With our own hands.”
“That’s good!” she says. “That enforces the notion that the security detachment is part of the community, not something externally imposed.”
“Really?” Wyatt says, sarcastically. “I never considered it.”
“Funny, sir,” she tells him, in a smooth, professional voice that betrays neither amusement nor irritation. It’s a rebuke wrapped in a compliment wrapped in a cloak of unconcern, and it’s really quite clever of her, like something Bat Masterson might’ve said. He can imagine that line putting all kinds of mischief to rest.
“So you’re here to rub up against our success,” he says. “If we’re doing the right thing, and you’re spending time here casually, then it must mean you’re doing the right thing as well.”
“Perceptive,” she tells him in the same tone of voice, “but I think it helps you as well. If people see us together, then it raises your profile in their minds. Makes you look more official, less like a museum exhibit.”
“Or it contaminates me,” he says, “but fair enough. I appreciate your intentions.”
“At any rate, we have common interests, and regardless of appearances I believe it’s important for the two of us to have a good working relationship. That’s something I never had with Tomasa. Part of his problem is, he’s allergic to the politics. But if I do have to fax a squad of whitecaps into town, it helps to have someone to report to besides the mine managers. Or just making arrests with no cooperation at all, which believe me, has happened.”
“Okay, okay. Let’s have a good working relationship.”
“Excellent!” she says. “Would you like to join me for dinner?”
This takes Wyatt by surprise, and his first impulse is that he needs to say no, or at least check with Lita about it. But that’s wrong, or out of date, because Lita has barely spoken to him in over a week.
He still wants to believe something more is going to happen there, not so much for his own sake, as for what it says about Lita herself. There were women who acted that way in his day, but they were not well thought of, and they rarely thrived. But things are different here; “Martian relationships tend to be short and shallow,” Clady has told him. And: “Women are as free as men, Wyatt. They have been forever, since before there were fax machines. Since before there were people on Mars!”
Wyatt pulls his scarf up higher, shutting out the stinging dust. Reminds himself that in this time and place, a man and woman can have dinner together without it meaning anything at all. In fact, it might be better if he simply thinks of her as a man; in voice and manner she bears little resemblance to the women of his time anyway.
He starts laughing.
“Mr. Earp?” she asks, because it is a little strange, what he’s doing.
He answers, “I’d be pleased to join you for dinner, Captain, but I’ll admit I’m at a loss, because if you were a man I might just take a swing at you right now!”
She frowns. “I think that would be quite inappropriate, sir, regardless of my gender. And let me further caution you, that the lowest grade of Whitecaps could kick in the teeth of the best mine security any day of the week.”
“Well,” he admits, “So could my mother.”
Although the cafeteria can technically serve any food ever dreamed up by man, the sheer number of people that need to be fed there means the place needs to be efficient. At any given time, the choices are limited to three entrees, three side dishes, three desserts, and eight beverages. Furthermore, the faxes in the dormitories are equipped with “governors” that limit them to a fairly narrow range of snack foods, because otherwise the hallways would be crowded with people always trying to get their own special meal. Even in the private homes of the wealthy—generally built around a central fax machine that serves multiple household functions, and is well stocked with all the “elements” needed to make stuff—meals and ambience are limited by the time and imagination of the inhabitants.
And thus, there is a place for restaurants in the economy of Dawes Crater City. There are two of them, and Gonzales selects the least expensive—a move Wyatt approves of. The Crater Bistro is dim and cozy, just slightly shabby, with real candles on the tables and real soot stains on the ceiling. In spite of the captain’s sky-blue uniform, there are enough other customers here that they can feel somewhat anonymous. A few of them shoot suspicious glares in her direction, but they mostly have business of their own to attend to, or else why go out at all? Here a couple is quarreling, there a group of friends or co-workers are having a pointed discussion about repair work on something called a “cliff steamer.” Nobody is really paying attention.
So, Wyatt and Gonzales (her first name is Elizabeth) eat and talk for an hour—not about law enforcement or (thank God) the falsity of memory. Instead, she tells him about her family. It’s small, like everyone else’s, but it seems every bit as convoluted as the families of Wyatt’s own time, and rather more hilarious. There’s the mother who meddles too much in her daughter’s life, the father who meddles too little and seems always confused, the four grandparents always doling out money and presents as though she were a little girl. And then there are the step-parents. The mother and father are divorced and remarried (or “repartnered” which amounts to the same thing), but bewilderingly, so are the grandparents. All four! So there being only one child and a couple of cousins, the family is nevertheless about a dozen strong, with all the intrigue and complication that implies.
“So I told step-granny I just can’t look the other way,” Gonzales is saying, “and I really will arrest her if it happens again. I mean, honestly: celebrity stalking, at her age! She used a telescope to hologram his apartment.”
Getting the gist of all that, Wyatt chuckles. “I hope it’s at least a good celebrity.”
“Oh, but it isn’t. It’s some awful sales telebard not half her age, singing about soap! Grandfather is furious about it, but what can he do?”
They laugh some more, and when the bill arrives, Gonzales picks it up. “Business expense,” she says cryptically. “Interdepartmental liaison.”
The Bistro has an old-fashioned door—the kind that swings open and slams shut, like doors ought to—and as the two of them are getting up from their table it bangs open, admitting a howling blast of wind and dust.
“Ugh,” she says. “The weather is turning. Just our luck.”
Outside, there appears to be a fight brewing. Two men facing off on the street corner, shouting and waving their fists, with a crowd of ten or twelve looking on to see how it turns out. But the wind is fierce, and the men are having a hard time hearing one another.
“. . . blocky arse weed . . . it again.”
“What?”
“I said . . . arse weed . . . .”
“I can’t hear you!”
Wyatt steps between them, touching each man on the arm. “Why don’t we all get inside and talk about this tomorrow?”
“What?”
“INSIDE! TALK TOMORROW!”
“OKAY!”
So the fighters separate, and the crowd melts away into the storm. Nature usually has the upper hand, but it’s only at times like this that people notice.
“I NEED TO HEAD BACK TO THE ASSAYER’S OFFICE!” Captain Gonzales tells him.
“OKAY! I’LL WALK YOU THERE!”
This is easier said than done; the walk is less than half a kilometer (Wyatt measures distance in kilometers now, apparently), but it’s against the wind. This is not like the winds of Earth; not quite. It isn’t strong enough to bowl you over, strong enough so you really have to lean into it. But it’s cold, and it carries a lot more dust than any wind Wyatt’s ever seen, and that makes it just as hard to march against. People have warned him about the dust storms of Mars, and he can see now what they’re talking about: it feels like he’s burning, or being picked apart by icy bugs. He pulls his scarf up to the very bottom of his goggles, while Gonzales covers her face with one gloved hand, holding the other ahead of her for balance.
Visibility drops to twenty meters, then five, then essentially zero. The two of them bounce between one sidewalk and the other, unable to hold a line down the street. Wyatt tries calling out to her again, but he can’t even hear himself. After five minutes of this, he’s about ready to walk uninvited into the nearest building, or break in if he has to. But Gonzales has found the right doorway—the words REGIONAL and ASSAYER intermittently visible through the dust—and she waves a hand so the door will curl aside for them.
For a moment, Wyatt can’t see anything at all. Then the doorway clears, revealing the interior air of improbable clarity. They step inside, with little dust tornadoes whirling around them, and then the door closes and it’s a different world entirely. A quiet world. Wyatt stomps his feet, shaking off the grit, but can barely hear a thing.
“Well, hello,” Lita says from behind her lab counter. It sounds like she’s about five times farther away than she really is. She looks intrigued.
Gonzales is businesslike: “Ma’am, is the fax machine clear? I’ve got to get back to Sabeeta.”
“It’s clear, but the transmitter’s not working,” Lita replies. “The red light just came on. Actually, it’s flickering on and off, but I would not advise you risk it.”
“Static discharge?”
“No. No, not at all. Why would you think that?”
“Can’t you reroute to a collapsiter on the other side of the planet? I’m on duty, and I need to treat this as a potential emergency.”
