Mortal Remains

by Christopher Evans

  Tunde had slept through the interplanetary leg of his flight and was ready to get on with business. His company, Vesta Variations, supplied hers with custom-grown bioforms—everything from surveyor hounds to armour-plated borers. Marea left him with the line managers who were better equipped to explain the difficulties their extractors were experiencing with the gastro-smelting of certain lanthanide ores currently in great demand. There were limits to even her tolerance, and the attraction of watching behemoths excrete gleaming nodules of neodymium had long waned.

  Marea had been on duty since dawn that morning, and her work was over for the day. But she had arranged to have dinner with Tunde in Bellona that evening—he was on a short visit, and she wanted to make the most of him—so she went to the recreation dome and sat in a masseur for an hour. Afterwards she checked her locker to ensure that the womb remained safe inside the holdall where she had hidden it.

  As before, the womb was warm to the touch and apparently quite vital. For three days she had hoarded it and pondered over its self-sustaining nature. She could only guess at how developed it was: five months, perhaps, in comparison with an ordinary umbilical womb. How did the embryo obtain oxygen and food for its development? She had never seen anything like it, but she daren’t make any enquiries for fear of arousing suspicion.

  Two colleagues were coming down the corridor. She hastily returned the womb to the locker. Ever since the crash at Snake Vale there had been politia everywhere, conducting searches in the city and countryside alike. There was no official explanation, but Marea was positive it had to be connected with the womb; they knew it had survived, and they wanted it. What for? She hadn’t the faintest notion. All she knew was that she had to protect it, keep it safe.

  She asked a console beside the levelator to call home. Presently its optic flashed into life, showing Salih seated at the kitchen table.

  “How is he?” she asked immediately.

  “Bilious,” Salih replied, looking pained. “But the fever’s passed.”

  “Tell him to go out for a walk. Get some air.”

  “He was asking for bindweed tea.”

  “Why doesn’t he get it himself?”

  Salih appeared taken aback. “What are you so angry about, Marea?”

  “Nothing.” She was impatient with the trivialities of their relationship—especially with Tunde in town. “I’m going to be late. I have to take a client to dinner.”

  “What time will you be back?”

  She suppressed a sigh. “When you see me.”

  She heard Yuri’s voice, demonstrative and wheedling. Salih gave him his attention for a moment, then turned back to Marea.

  “Yuri was wondering if you’d bring him home some dispepsin, if it’s not too much trouble.”

  Salih’s tone was perfectly reasonable, but to Marea it was like an accusation, a moral obligation.

  “Can’t you get it from the store?”

  “He prefers the brand they sell in Omnimed.”

  “Don’t count on it,” she said. “End call.”

  The optic went grey. When Marea did not move or speak, it shuffled over to its usual place in an alcove.

  She took the gravlev back into town and sat in a park. The city busied itself around her, workers boarding serpentines, cleaners munching debris from disposall chutes. Lights came on in window slits, holograms shimmered into life, green beetles emerged from flagstone cracks and crawled over her boots, denizens of the city’s nooks and crannies with agendas wholly unhuman.

  A passing console stopped to announce a public vote on the question of funding for an experimental centre where children would be gathered together on a daily basis to learn from tutors rather than getting their education at home. Marea listened briefly to the summary of the issues, then voted against the proposal. She paged the news. Most of it was routine Martian affairs with no mention of the womb, though one item from the Uranian ecosphere featured the grisly suicide of a woman who had inexplicably gone berserk in her compartment in Umbriel East, mutilating her living chamber before hurling herself out of the window. It was hard to credit, unnerving to dwell upon. Imagine going mad. Imagine killing yourself. The whole thing was disgustingly primitive.

  Across the square was one of the city’s shrines, a tiered dome of roserock and mirrored plass topped by a silver needle jutting to the heavens. Inside there were several levels ringed with booths. Bored-looking intercessors patrolled the balconies or sat with visitors at whorlwood tables in the central concourse.

  Marea entered a booth on the second level, locking the door behind her and sitting down at the Noosphere interface. It comprised a white neural hood laced with biocircuitry that coiled into the prayer terminal with its hand sockets and touchpad controls.

  She pulled the hood down and focused on the icon, a swirling kaleidoscopic crystal. She tried to empty her mind, to concentrate wholly on herself and her identity as Marea Elodaris, twenty-six standard years old, a native of Bellona City on Mars, shipment facilitator for Marineris Metal Conglomerates. She filled her mind with as much of the pure essence of herself as she could. And she felt the Noosphere begin to stir, to reach out the warm dark folds of its vast communality towards her.

  As always, she sensed Takti, her maternal grandmother, most strongly. She was a wry and mischievous woman who had raised her after her parents emigrated to Ganymede with their new quins when she was two years old. Her grandmother had died and been absorbed into the Noosphere five years before, and she greeted Marea with her customary warmth and pleasure. But there were others, too—great-grandparents and their ancestors on both sides of the family, much of her whole lineage stretching right back to the distant days when the Solar System was first settled and the Noosphere established. Most she had never known except through the Noosphere, but they had become friends and counsellors to her, confidants who offered their own wisdom and that of the billions who had entered the Noosphere on death. They spoke to her not in words but in a flood of moods and emotions that enriched her own understanding and calmed the anxieties of the physical life which they had now transcended.

  There were people who communed with the Noosphere every day, some for days on end, but Marea was not one of them. She rationed her visits, fearful of the dependency that often characterized the Devout. Today, however, she was in pressing need of her ancestors’ guidance. As the multiplicity of their personalities jostled in her mind, she opened herself fully, reliving the morning of the mothership’s death fall and everything that had flowed from it. What was she to do with the womb? Was the security clampdown in the valley connected with it?

  She expected a calm and calming response from Takti and the host, and was taken aback when they responded with unease and even agitation. They confirmed with urgency that to possess the womb was to be in great danger. The womb was important, though her ancestors could not make clear to her why. There was a faction in the physical world that wished to acquire it and would stop at nothing to do so. Her very life might be in danger. Yet to surrender the womb to the authorities would also be to draw unwelcome attention to herself and court a different kind of danger. The responsibility was not hers. She must relieve herself of it.

  Marea raised the hood, breaking the connection. The entire emotional tone of the response had startled her, even though it had merely confirmed her own suspicions. And she was not simply shocked, but also irritated. Takti, whose presence always overpowered that of all the others, seemed almost disapproving in her unease. Marea felt a little like a precocious child being scolded by censorious parents for being too forward. She left the booth and hurried out of the shrine, avoiding the eyes of any intercessors.

  Almost an hour had passed since she had entered the booth: time often sped by when she communed with the Noosphere. She drove back to the recreation dome.

  With some trepidation she approached her locker, certain she would find it empty, ransacked or surrounded by politia who would arrest her on sight. But the womb was in the holdall, warm
and alive. Closing up the bag, she heaved it over her shoulder, shut the locker and left.

  As she was heading down the corridor, a console paged her. Its optic winked on to show Tunde.

  “Marea,” he said, “I’m sorry, but I’m not going to be able to make dinner.”

  She did not try to hide her disappointment.

  “We’ve got a real problem with the extractors. One of them’s died, and I’m trying to arrange immediate freight back to Venus.”

  “Where are you?”

  “At the terminus. I may be here all night.” He shrugged helplessly. “The wheels of bureaucracy …”

  “Damn.” The holdall was heavy in her hands. She did not know what to do with it, or with herself. “Have you eaten?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  “I’ll come over. Be with you in half an hour.”

  She ended the call before he had the chance to protest.

  The terminus was on the far side of the city, an octagon of interconnected runways and control tower mushrooms. Tunde was sitting outside a sterile room in one of the off-planet warehouses.

  “You look terminally bored,” Marea said to him.

  The pun was feeble. His only response was to shake his head wearily.

  “How long have you been here?”

  “Hours. I’m waiting for customs to OK the carcass.”

  Through the door window, Marea could see a trio of customs people inspecting the dead extractor. It was a calf rather than fully grown, but it filled the chamber. It had been laid on a huge slab, its ample belly lasered open to reveal the organoceramic digestive tract. Fortunately the blood had been drained from the beast, and Marea was just about able to bear the sight of undigested ore in its stomach and lumps of slag in a slit portion of the lower intestine. One of the officials was running a bioscanner over the innards.

  “They’re checking it for bugs,” Tunde said. “They’ll only let it through when they’re satisfied it’s clean.”

  “Do you have to wait here?”

  “I stayed on hand in case anything cropped up.”

  “Come on. Let’s go and eat.”

  In fact eating was the last thing on her mind, but she was restless and wanted to get as far away as possible from any sort of officialdom.

  They rode the levelator up to the restaurant.

  “What’s in the bag?” Tunde enquired.

  “Don’t ask.”

  He scrutinized her with a mixture of interest and suspicion.

  “It’s not a bomb,” she said defensively.

  He smiled. “You say the nicest things.”

  The restaurant had a surprisingly varied menu, and Tunde insisted she try the oolaga soup, a regional Venusian speciality. Marea dutifully spooned her way through the dish, thinking as she did so that she preferred protein spirals when they didn’t wriggle in the mouth.

  Tunde showed her holos of his son and two daughters at play in the Lavinia theme park. Neither of them personally knew one another’s families, but that was part of the fun. They bantered and flirted with one another as was their custom, though this had a serious edge. If she had met Tunde before she married, and if he had been a free man … well, it was foolish to speculate, really. They had met one another too late and had to settle for the kind of close friendship that neither of them could allow to slide into something more intimate for fear of ruining everything.

  Marea sipped her frostwine. It was then Tunde told her that this was to be his last visit to Mars for the foreseeable future.

  “I’m moving from product development to home sales.” He sounded apologetic. “It’s a sideways move. Sideways and slightly downwards, I suppose, but I asked for it. The kids are growing up, and I’m missing a lot of them with all this travelling.”

  It made sense: he had always doted on his children.

  “I’ll miss you,” she said.

  “Likewise.” He stared at her across the table, suddenly very serious. “What’s up, Marea? You look worried half to death.”

  “I’m hoping I can keep the oolaga down.”

  He didn’t smile, just kept staring at her.

  It was all she needed—a show of real concern. She proceeded to pour out the whole story, as she had done to the Noosphere but now bringing it right up to date. Tunde listened without comment until she stopped talking.

  “And it’s here?” he said. “In the bag under the table?”

  She nodded, checking for the umpteenth time that no one nearby was listening to them.

  “Has anyone else checked it out?”

  She shook her head.

  “I still don’t understand why you think someone wants to harm it.”

  “I can’t explain it. It’s an overpowering feeling, a certainty. My ancestors felt the same, don’t forget. I’ve got to get rid of it, Tunde, but make sure it’s safe with whoever it’s passed on to.”

  Tunde looked out the window as an interworld sicklewing took off along a runway, phosphor-nodules twinkling in the dark.

  “I think I may know someone,” he said.

  Marea had been half hoping for this; at the same time she knew what a wrench it would be to surrender the womb to anyone else.

  “Who?” she said.

  “Someone on Venus.”

  “You’d sneak it back there?”

  “I’d have to. And it would take the heat off you, wouldn’t it?”

  “But how? They’re searching everyone and everything. You’d never get it through customs.”

  He winked at her. “Maybe I won’t have to carry it.”

  • • •

  A light speared into my eyes, making me close them instantly. I did not dare open them again; I merely lay there, too limp to move. My insides felt as if they had been liquefied.

  I could hear sounds, someone talking, but it was distant, muffled. I tried to concentrate and listen without opening my eyes, without letting them know I was awake. But it was like being under water; I couldn’t make out anything. All I knew was that there were two different voices.

  Presently they diminished and drifted away as I sank down again.

  • • •

  It was past midnight by the time they returned to the freight terminal. The customs people had gone, leaving behind a console which informed them that the extractor was cleared for export on condition that its insides were sealed for transit. A plasm-welder had been provided for this purpose.

  “Excellent,” Tunde said.

  He dismissed the console. When it was gone, he picked up the welding torch and turned to Marea.

  “Give me the womb. We’ll put it somewhere where no one’ll find it.”

  Marea felt as if he had somehow seized the initiative from her. He was confident, assertive and wouldn’t say what he intended to do with the womb beyond showing it to a trusted colleague who would be in a better position to establish where it had come from and what it contained. Marea wanted more, but Tunde insisted she simply had to trust him; the more she knew, the more danger she would be in.

  She knew she really had no choice. The womb did not belong to her, and she could not guarantee its safekeeping.

  Tunde switched on the welder. She realized what he intended with a combination of delight and disgust.

  “It’ll be perfectly safe,” he assured her. “Packaged, protected, hidden from prying eyes.”

  “I’m not sure I like the idea, Tunde.”

  “It’s the only way. Otherwise it’ll show on the bioform registers.”

  Gently she removed the womb from the holdall. She wanted to keep it for herself. But that would be foolishness, madness, not to mention a continuing betrayal of both her husbands.

  Tunde was waiting. With great reluctance, and an even greater sense of ceremony, she handed over the womb. He tucked it under his arm as if it were a ball.

  “I’ll need you to stand watch outside,” he said softly, “to make sure we’re not disturbed.”

  Again she hesitated. Then she turned and we
nt outside.

  After it was over Tunde took her to the chamber he had rented for the night at the terminus. Though they both knew that this was perhaps the last time they would see one another in the flesh, there was some final barrier of reticence which neither of them was quite willing to breach. Instead they spent the night talking as a dust storm blew up outside. When dawn finally broke and it was time for Marea to leave, Tunde kissed her chastely on the cheek and wished her every happiness in the future.

  “Keep it safe, won’t you?” she whispered urgently.

  He nodded. “I promise.”

  “Will you let me know what’s happened to it?”

  “Count on it.”

  Marea drove home slowly through the storm, grit blasting her windscreen and tinkling in the exhaust outlets. She stuck to the gravity trails to minimize the effects of the cross-winds.

  The storm had died away by the time she turned up the main track towards home. The houses were venting dust from their insides while parasol trees unfurled their silver leaves to the morning.

  As she descended into the hollow, she saw her own house collapsed like a punctured ball. Yuri lay face down in the gaping doormouth.

  She leapt out of the gravlev and raced over to him. There was frozen blood in his nostrils and ears, and his body was quite cold. A metal dart was embedded in the base of his skull.

  She found Salih in the bedchamber, sitting in an armchair cradling the womb. His eyes were open, and relief washed through her. Then she saw the puncture in his neck where the dart had gone in.

  The womb-sac was below room temperature, but alive. Marea unplugged the umbilical from Salih’s navel. Tears were streaming down her cheeks. She slit the belly of her tunic and slotted the valve into place. Within seconds she felt her body responding to the foetus’s demands, dormant hormones surging into her bloodstream, a rush of vital fluids that made her giddy.

  She teetered outside. None of their neighbours had noticed anything. Of course houses did sometimes implode, she knew that, but this was no accident of nature. Whoever had engineered it must have come stealthily during the night, under cover of the storm. They had assassinated both her husbands.