Mia raised a hand to stop him. “Sorry, Zack, maybe that was a little harsh of me. Look, I’m sure you’re probably top of the class for whatever. But if for some inexplicable reason we get into a situation, then it will be me looking after you. No offense.”
Zack said nothing for a moment before finally realizing that he was not going to win an argument with Mia Sorelli. “That’s okay,” he finally said. “In fact, it’s kind of a relief. I don’t know how long I could have kept up the pretense.” Zack slumped down in his seat and relaxed.
Mia gave a laugh. “Ha, I think you and me are going to get along just fine.”
They sat for a while in silence, waiting for the waiter to bring the coffee.
“Must be short-staffed here,” Zack finally said as he pointed to the wall to one side of Mia. “They haven’t cleaned off the graffiti yet.”
Mia glanced around a little absent-mindedly, wondering what Zack was on about. Sure enough, the side wall of the cafe was covered in scratches and badly rendered motifs. It seemed that people had been using walls as a canvas ever since humanity had learned how to make a mark, and Jezero City was no exception.
“Normally they clean that stuff off as soon as it appears,” Zack continued. Mia considered that he might be planning to hunt down the perpetrators of this heinous crime. “But it looks like they haven’t gotten around to it yet.”
“Lot of catching up to do. Lot of places just trying to get by at the moment,” Mia replied as one particular scrawl caught her eye. It was in bold red paint, signed with a little X, like a kiss.
“Our sol will fall.” She turned back to look at Zack. “I’ve seen that one around a few places. Any idea what it means?”
The coffee arrived. Zack took a sip. “It means our day will come. It’s Xenonist propaganda. You can tell from the X.”
Mia was tempted to look around again, but resisted. “How come you know that? Are you into all that stuff?”
Zack nearly spat his coffee out. “No way, they’re really just a cult.”
“I thought they were simply followers of the great Xenon Hybrid?”
Zack’s face screwed up in disgust. “Maybe they were at some point. Now they’re just a bunch of weirdos with an unhealthy obsession.”
“So how come you know so much about them?”
“They have one of their clearing houses right across from where I live. I’ve been following them for a while.”
“Really?” Mia leaned back in her seat and relaxed a little. Zack may be completely useless as a bodyguard, but at least he seemed chatty, and actually quite easygoing. He would make better company over the next few sols than talking to service droids. “So, what goes on in this clearing house?” she prompted.
Zack’s body language began to soften. Here was an area he had some knowledge of, and he seemed happy to share it with Mia. Clearly he was more of a nerd than a hard-ass. Better suited to investigation and analysis than knocking heads together.
“Anyone who wants to visit Xenon’s enclave up north must be vetted first. They have a clearing house, here in Jezero. People go in, get checked out, and then are transported up to Xenon’s outpost.”
“Seems eminently sensible to me. He’s still technically the head-of-state. Wouldn’t be good for some crazy to try and take a pop at him.”
“Yeah, of course, but…” He trailed off. “Ah…I’m sure you’re not interested in my theories.”
“Theories?” Mia prompted again.
“Doesn’t matter.” He waved a dismissive hand.
“Don’t go all shy on me now, Zack. Just when things were getting interesting. Go on, tell me more. We’ve got lots of time to kill.”
Zack gave her a considered look, clearly wondering how much to say. He gave a quick glance around, then sat forward. “Back during the Great Storm, there was little or no activity at this clearing house. No unnecessary travel and all that. But over the last few months, activity has been increasing, a lot of coming and going. Not unusual in and of itself, yet…there’s something going on. Can’t quite put my finger on it, it’s just some odd activity and weird coincidences.”
“Like what?” Mia found herself becoming more intrigued.
He cocked his head. “Weird stuff. Don’t know if it means anything, but…” He paused for a beat as he thought. “I have a direct view of the place from my window, so I get to see a lot of the activity. A few weeks ago, I spotted a strange-looking guy leaving and getting into a ground car. No big deal, you might say, but a few minutes later the very same guy came out of the building again, which doesn’t make any sense.
“I reckoned it must be an identical twin and thought no more about. Then, a sol or two later, I saw two women leave. Both were identical. Another set of twins? What are the chances of that? As you can imagine, this got me intrigued, so I, eh…kept a closer eye on the people entering and leaving, and I’m now pretty convinced we have a very high incidence of identical twins here in Jezero.”
Mia thought about this for a moment. “That is a bit weird, alright.”
“The other thing is, a month or so ago I couldn’t sleep so I got up and sat in my usual spot beside the window, when I noticed they were taking delivery of a number of large crates. Again, no big deal, but why the middle of the night? Over the course of that week, they had deliveries coming every night. And it looked to me that they were trying to be very quiet about it.”
“Interesting,” Mia agreed. “What do you think is going on?”
Zack shook his head. “No idea, but it’s odd. Strange people, strange deliveries, and all this Xenonist graffiti showing up all at the same time.”
“Hmmm…could be the seeds of a good conspiracy theory,” Mia offered.
Zack gave a sigh and said nothing.
“Wait a minute…” Mia raised an index finger at him. “You went to the department with this, didn’t you?”
Zack stared into his coffee cup.
“And they laughed you out of the place. In fact, they probably gave you me to look after as punishment.”
Zack looked up at her a little sheepishly. “Something like that.”
Mia gave him a long, considered look. “Maybe you and I should go a take a deeper look at these guys.”
Zack’s face brightened.
“Maybe, as a Mars envoy, I want to go see Xenon before I leave for Earth. In which case, we should pay this clearing house a visit, poke them a bit, do some sneaking around, and see what reaction we get?”
“You mean…actually go in there?” Zack’s face brightened even further.
“That’s exactly what I mean.” Mia wasn’t sure, but she thought she heard Zack gulp.
7
The Brandon Waystation
Jann woke to a nudge from Nills. “We’re almost at the waystation. It’s just a few kilometers away.” Nills pointed ahead.
She shifted in her seat, sat up, and looked out the rover’s windshield. It was pitch black outside, the vast panoply of dazzling stars overhead providing little in the way of illumination, only serving to demarcate the silhouette of the horizon. The lights from the rover punched through the darkness and afforded them a small window on the road ahead.
Soon they began to pick out the halo from the illumination around the waystation. A vague outline of the facility began to materialize. It was sizable, and as they drew closer, Jann could see it was comprised of several domed structures with two long docking bays for rovers, like wings reaching out on either side of the complex. Most of the ports were unoccupied.
“Looks quiet,” she said. “Still, we’ll need to be careful in there and not give ourselves away. We should try and pass ourselves off as a couple of random travelers.”
Nills nodded. “Well, I need to eat some food, I’m starving. We can return to the rover after, and get some rest before pushing on.”
Jann glanced around at the rough, utilitarian interior. “Yeah, a little uncomfortable in here, not much in the way of creature comforts. Maybe we could get a
module, get some proper rest, and freshen up.”
“I thought we’re pressed for time?” said Nills.
“Yes, we are. But we still need to be sharp. Better to get some real sleep while we can.”
“Okay, but there’s always the possibility of running into someone traveling to or from Xenon’s enclave. If this enterprise of yours is based on the element of surprise, then we don’t want to be recognized, and then for some conscientious follower to tip off the enclave that we’re on our way up there.”
“Just keep our interaction to an absolute minimum,” Jann said, sounding a little tired.
“We have been allocated docking bay B7, just over there,” Gizmo interjected, as it pointed out a vacant area along the left-hand docking wing of the facility.
“Okay, Gizmo. Can you take us in, and make sure you don’t transfer any data that might identify us once we connect.”
“Certainly.”
The rover adjusted its speed and direction as the droid maneuvered it in toward the docking bay. Dust kicked up from the rover’s wheels, clouding over the lights illuminating the bay as Gizmo reversed the machine into position. There was a thump followed by a series of alerts flashing up on the cockpit dash.
“Secure connection established, pressure equalized,” Gizmo said, detaching its interface and moving out of the cockpit.
Jann was already standing beside the airlock. A scarf covered her mouth and nose, and the hood of her cloak obscured most of her face. Nills followed. “Gizmo, come. You may as well join us.”
“Maybe Gizmo should stay here?” said Jann. “It might attract attention.”
“I doubt it. You’ll see more weirdness in this place than a medieval circus. It’ll be fine.”
They moved through the airlock and into a dimly lit, deserted corridor, which brought them out into a wide, circular common area. A clump of tables with seating occupied the central area—none of which seemed to match. Some were old industrial units, others repurposed rover and shuttle seating. Around the circumference of this space, vending stations and information portals blinked and flashed for the customers’ attention. Several corridors led off to other sectors of the facility. The lighting was subdued, yet Jann could make out a few knots of people and droids, some eating, some resting, others utilizing the vending stations.
They walked over to one with a brightly illuminated noodle sign, Djinn Ramen–100% Bio-Engineered, and after a few moments managed to extract something that approximated food. Jann poked a spork into a steaming bowl of ramen in an attempt to identify its ingredients. They took a seat in a darkened section—as far away from any of the other diners as possible.
“Looks quiet enough,” said Nills as he scanned the area. “If we’re going to stay the night here, then we will need to book a module with a fake ID. Fortunately, I came prepared.” He whipped out an ID chip with the flourish of a magician. “Something I made earlier.”
“You know that’s illegal,” said Jann with a look of mock disapproval.
Nills winked. “I won’t tell if you don’t. Gizmo?” The droid tilted its head in his direction. “Scan this ID, and use it for one of the booking portals here to get us an accommodation module. Make sure it’s on the surface, nothing subterranean…and the best they have. Okay?”
A ruby red ribbon of light flashed from Gizmo’s sensor array as the droid read the information from the ID chip. Then it moved off to execute the request.
“Don’t look now, but over to your right are two people that may have taken an interest in us,” Jann said in between mouthfuls of ramen.
Nills didn’t look; he just kept eating. “Oh?”
“They have those dark-red cloaks that the Xenonists sometimes wear.”
“Then we should probably hurry up. It’s not outside the bounds of possibility that we might be recognized.”
Jann had only taken a few more mouthfuls before she sensed a shadow being cast over their table. She looked up to see one of the cloaked figures standing beside them.
“Pardon me for interrupting your food, but my colleague and I were wondering if you are traveling north and might have room for two pilgrims?”
Nills waved a hand. “No, we’re, eh…not going north. We’re heading for Bauford, over to the west. Now if you don’t mind, we’re both very tired after many hours of travel.”
“My apologies. Sorry for troubling you.” The figure took a step back.
“That’s okay,” Nills said with a nod.
The pilgrim bowed, but instead of leaving, he focused his attention on Jann. “Forgive me, but you look remarkably like Dr. Jann Malbec.”
Jann caught a glance from Nills. Had they just been rumbled? She gave a short laugh. “Ha, I get that all the time. But no. Sorry to disappoint.”
Nills gave a gesture to suggest to the pilgrim that it was time to get lost.
He bowed again, more formally this time, and moved away.
“Do you think he bought it?” Jann whispered.
“Let’s hope so. But it might be best to get out of sight in case anyone else gets nosy.” Nills lifted his head and looked around. “Now, where’s Gizmo got to?”
“Here,” the droid said as it approached their table. “I have obtained an accommodation module as requested.” Then it lowered the amplitude of its voice, almost to a whisper. “I have also secured the IDs of all the other guests at this establishment. For no other reason than because I could.” It gestured with one of its appendages.
Nills raised an eyebrow. “Very good. A little over and above the call of duty, Gizmo. But good work nonetheless.” He nodded to Jann. “Ready?”
“Yeah, let’s get out of here.”
They cleared up their food trash, and Gizmo led the way to their room for the night.
Jann couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned, and after an hour or so she simply gave up trying. So instead, she got up, made herself some tea, and sat by the large viewing window looking out onto the nighttime landscape. She flicked through the guest list that Gizmo had downloaded onto her slate, trying to find the guy who had recognized her earlier.
She didn’t get a good look at him, so it wasn’t so easy, but after eliminating all guests that were clearly not pilgrims, she had narrowed it down to just a handful. Yet, there was one face that looked vaguely familiar to her, even if the name didn’t ring any bells—John Richards. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she thought she had met this person before, but where and in what context, she couldn’t remember.
She sighed, took a sip of tea, and put the slate away. Maybe she was just being paranoid. There was no reason to think he really did twig who she was. And even if he did, so what. He would probably think nothing of it, considering that Nills had let it be known they were heading for the Bauford Research Station. She was just a little rattled by it, nothing more. Jann finished her tea, gave a sigh, and satisfied herself that it was absolutely nothing to worry about.
8
The Order of Xenon
Kim Han-su, prioress of the Order of Xenon in Jezero City, stood before a large wall monitor in her otherwise spartan quarters and studied a series of grainy images that cascaded across the display. They showed two people and their droid partaking in a hasty meal in the Brandon waystation some eight hundred kilometers north of Jezero. But as she studied the images, the key question in Han-su’s mind was whether the woman in the image was, or was not, Dr. Jann Malbec.
It had been brought to her attention by an acolyte en route to the Order’s primary enclave farther north, in the Plains of Utopia. Sometime in the past, this particular acolyte had been an associate of Malbec’s, and as such recognized her. But it had been at least a decade since he had any interaction with her, so he couldn’t be one-hundred percent sure. However, when he approached her, the woman claimed that she was not Malbec. Which could be true, but then again, she could be lying—in which case, this only added to the mystery. Was it really her? And if so, what was she was doing there, and why was she traveling incogn
ito?
What convinced the acolyte to forward this information to his superior was the fact that the man traveling with her looked remarkably like Nills Langthorp. Even their droid had similarities to one they had both been known to utilize—one that had been stolen from the science museum very recently. If this was indeed Malbec and Langthorp, then it raised a considerable number of questions in Han-su’s mind—along with a rising sense of panic.
Malbec had not been seen in public for quite some time. During the Great Storm, she had taken a backseat in the affairs of the colony. Most thought she had simply gone into retirement, leaving the workings of the colony to others. Yet here she was, in an isolated waystation, traveling with none other than Nills Langthorp. What the hell was she up to?
The waystation in question was at the crossroads of a number of industrial and research facilities that existed around that region of Mars. But most of the traffic utilizing it was either traveling to or from the Order’s primary enclave. Was Malbec on her way up there? She and Langthorp were old friends of Xenon’s, so it was not outside the bounds of possibility.
Kim Han-su gave a deep sigh and resigned herself to the unenviable task of passing this information further up the line, and that meant calling Argon Noble, abbot of the enclave and current leader of the entire Order. She reached out and gestured at the screen to initiate the call and transmit the report along with the image files. A few moments later, a 3D holographic avatar of Argon blossomed into life above the holo-table.
“Prioress Han-su, this is concerning news that you send. It seems we now have to contend with the very real possibility of Dr. Jann Malbec and Nills Langthorp paying an unannounced visit to our enclave—no doubt their intention is to meet Xenon Hybrid. This, as you can imagine, is not what we need right now.
“And while I commend you for bringing this to my attention, I might add that it’s as a direct consequence of your failed attempt on the Earth-bound spaceship. Malbec knows something and is coming to snoop around—of this I am certain.” The avatar flicked and bristled as if it was operating in sympathy with the Abbot’s thinly veiled anger.
Plains of Utopia: Colony Six Mars Page 4
