by Greg Bear
I had thought about the UMS action for months and wanted to talk about it, and Charles seemed perfect to fulfill that function.
"We could get dinner," Charles suggested as we strolled off the dance floor.
"I've already eaten," I said.
"Then a snack."
"I wanted to talk about last summer."
"Perfect opportunity, over a late dessert."
I frowned as if the suggestion were somehow improper, then gave in. Charles took my arm — that seemed safe enough — and we found a small, quiet autocafe in an outer tunnel arc. The arc branched north of Shinktown quarters for permanent residents and offered little convenience shops, most tended by arbeiters. We passed through the central quadrangle, a hectare of tailored green surrounded by six stories of stacked balconies. The quadrangle architecture tried to imitate the worst of old Earth, retrograde, oppressive. The shop arc, however, was comparatively stylish and benign.
We sat in the cafe and sipped Valley coffee while waiting for our cakes to arrive. Charles said little at first, his nerves evident. He smiled broadly at my own few words, eager to be accommodating.
Tiring rapidly of this verbjam, I leaned forward. "Why did you come to Shinktown?" I asked.
"Bored and lonely. I've been up to my neck in Bell Continuum topoi. You . . . don't know what this is, I presume."
"No," I said.
"Well, it's fascinating. It could be important someday, but right now it's on the fringe. Why did you come?"
I shrugged. "I don't know. For company, I suppose." I realized, with some concern, that this was my way of being coquettish. My mother would have called it bitchy, and she knew me well enough.
"Looking for a good dance partner? I'm probably not your best choice."
I waved that off. "Do you remember what Sean Dickinson said?"
He grimaced. "I'd like to forget."
"What was wrong with him?"
"I'm not much of a student of human nature." Charles examined his tiny cup. The cakes arrived and Charles slapped palm on the arbeiter. "My treat," he said. "I'm old-fashioned."
I let that pass as well. "I think he was monstrous," I said.
"I'm not sure I'd go that far."
My lips wrapped around the word again, savoring it. "Monstrous. A political monster."
"He really stung you, didn't he? Remember, he was hurt."
"I've tried to understand the whole situation, why we didn't accomplish anything. Why I was willing to follow Sean and Gretyl almost anywhere ..."
"Follow them? Or the cause?"
"I believed — believe in the cause, but I was following them," I said. "I'm trying to understand why."
"They seemed to know what they were doing."
We talked for an hour, going in circles, getting no closer to understanding what had happened to us. Charles seemed to accept it as a youthful escapade, but I'd never allowed myself the luxury of such japes. Failure gave me a deep sensation of guilt, of time wasted and opportunities missed.
When we finished our cakes, it seemed natural that we should go someplace quiet and continue talking. Charles suggested the quad. I shook my head and explained that I thought it looked like an insula. Charles was not a student of history. I said, "An insula. An apartment building in ancient Rome."
"The city?" Charles asked.
"Yeah," I said. "The city."
His next suggestion, preceded by a moment of perplexed reflection, was that we should go to his room. "I could order tea or wine."
"I've had enough of both," I said. "Can we get some mineral water?"
"Probably," Charles said. "Durrey sits on a pretty fine aquifer. This whole area lies on pre-Tharsis karst."
We took a small cab to the opposite arc, hotels and temp quarters for Shinktown's real source of income, the students.
I don't remember anticipating much of anything as we entered Charles's room. There was nothing distinguished about the decor — inexpensive, clean, maintained by arbeiters, with no nano fixtures; pleasant shades of beige, soft green, and gray. The bed could hold only one person comfortably. I sat on the bed's corner. It occurred to me suddenly that by going this far, Charles might expect something more. We hadn't even kissed yet, however, and the agreement had been that we come here to talk.
Still, I wondered how I would react if Charles made a move.
"I'll order the water," he said. He took two steps beside the desk, unsure whether to seat himself on the swing-out chair or the edge of the bed beside me. "Gassed or plain?"
"Plain," I said.
He set his slate on the desk port and placed an order. "They're slow. Should take about five minutes. Old arbeiters," he said.
"Creaky," I said.
He smiled, sat on the chair, and looked around. "Not much luxury," he said "Can't afford more." The one chair, a small net and com desk, single drop-down bed with its thin blanket, vapor bag behind a narrow door, sink and toilet folded into the wall behind a curtain — all squeezed into three meters by four.
I casually wondered how many people had had sex in this room, and under what circumstances.
"We could spend years trying to figure out Sean and Gretyl," Charles said. "I don't want you to think I've forgotten what happened."
"Oh, no," I said.
"But I've got too much else to ponder, really." He used the word in a kind of self-parody, to deflate the burden it might carry. "I can't worry about the mistakes we made."
"Did we make mistakes?" I asked. I smoothed some wrinkles in the thin blanket.
"I think so."
"What mistakes?" I led him on, angry again but hiding it.
Charles finally pulled out the chair and sat with his elbows on his knees, hands clasped in front of him. "We should choose our leaders more carefully," he said.
"Do you think Sean was a bad leader?"
"You said he was 'monstrous,'" Charles reminded me.
"Things went wrong for all of us," I said. "If they had gone better, everything might have turned out differently."
"You mean, if Connor and Dauble hadn't hung themselves, we might have provided the noose."
"It seems likely."
"I suppose that's what Sean and Gretyl were trying to do," Charles said.
"All of us," I added.
"Right. But what would we have done after that? What did Sean really want to accomplish?"
"In the long run?" I asked.
"Right," Charles said. He was revealing a capacity I hadn't seen before. I was curious to see how far this new depth extended. "I think they wanted anarchy."
I frowned abruptly.
He looked at me and his face stiffened. "But I didn't really — "
"Why would they want anarchy?"
"Sean wants to be a leader. But he can never be a consensus leader."
"Why not?"
"He has the appeal of a LitVid image," Charles said. How could he not see how much he was irritating me? I felt a perversity again; I wanted him to anger me, so I could deny him what he had come here to gain, that is, my favors.
"Shallow?"
"I'm sorry, this is upsetting you," Charles said softly, kneading his hands. "I know you liked Sean. It makes me ... I didn't want to bring you here to — "
The door chimed. Charles opened it and an arbeiter entered, carrying a bottle of Durrey Region Prime Drinking Water, Mineral. Charles handed me a glass and sat again.
"I really don't want to talk politics," he said. "I'm not very good at it."
"We came here to talk about what went wrong," I persisted. "I'm curious to hear you out."
"You disagree with me."
"Maybe," I said. "But I want to hear what you have to say."
Charles's misery became obvious in the set of his jaw, drawn in defensively toward his neck, and the way he clenched his hands. "All right," he said. I could sense him giving up, assuming I was out of his reach, and that added to my irritation. Such presumption!
"What kind of leader would Sean be?"
> "A tyrant," Charles said softly. "Not a very good one. I don't think he has what it takes. Not enough charm at the right time, and he can't keep his feelings under control."
My anger evaporated. It was the strangest feeling; I agreed with Charles. That was the monstrousness I was trying to understand.
"You're a better judge of human nature than you think," I said with a sigh. I leaned back on the bed.
He shrugged sadly. "But I've fapped up," he said.
"How?"
"I want to know you better. I feel something really special when I see you."
Intrigued, I was about to continue with my infernal questioning — How? What do you mean? — when Charles stood up. "But it's useless. You haven't liked me from the start."
I gaped at him.
"You think I'm awkward, I'm not in the least like Sean, and that was who you'd set your sights on . . . And now I seem to be putting him down."
"Sean doesn't appeal to me," I said, eyes downcast in what I hoped was demure honesty. "Certainly not after what he said."
"I'm sorry," Charles said.
"Why are you always apologizing? Sit down, please."
Neither of us had touched our mineral water.
Charles sat. He lifted his glass. "You know, this water has been sitting for a billion years, locked in limestone . . . Old life. That's what I'd really like to be doing. Besides getting the physics grants and starting research, I mean. Going Up and exploring the old sea beds. Not talking politics. I need someone to come with me and keep me company. I thought maybe you'd like to do that." Charles looked up, then rushed his proposal out breathlessly. "Klein BM has an old vineyard about twenty kilometers from here. I could borrow a tractor, show you the — "
"A winery?" I asked, startled.
"Failed. Converted to a water station. Not much more than a trench dome, but there are good fossil beds. Maybe the old discarded vintage has mellowed by now and we could try to gag it down."
"Are you asking?" I felt a sudden warmth so immediate and unexpected that it brought moisture to my eyes. "Charles, you surprise me." I surprised myself. Then, eyes downcast again, "What are you expecting?"
"You might like me better away from this place. I don't fit into Shinktown, and I don't know why I came here. I'm glad I did, of course, because you're here, but ..."
"An old winery. And . . . going Up again?"
"In proper pressure suits. I've done it often enough. I'm pretty safe to be with." He pointed his finger Up. "I'm no LitVid idol, Casseia. I can't sweep you off your feet."
I pretended not to hear that. "I've never gone fossiling," I said. "It's a lovely idea."
Charles swallowed and quickly decided to press on. "We could leave now. Spend a few days. Wouldn't cost much — my BM isn't rich, but we'd borrow equipment nobody's using now. No problem with the oxygen budget. We can bring hydrogen back for a net gain. I can call and tell the station to warm up for us."
This was something slightly wicked and hugely unexpected and quite lovely. Charles would never pressure me to go one step farther than I wanted. It was perfect.
"I'll try not to bore you with physics," he said.
"I can take it," I said. "What makes you think I was ever interested in Sean, romantically?"
Wisely, he didn't answer, and immediately set about making late-night preparations.
Martians saw the surface of their world most often through the windows of a train. Perhaps nine or ten times in a life, a Martian would go Up and walk the surface in a pressure suit — usually in crowds and under close supervision, tourists on their own planet.
Call it fear, call it reason, most Martians preferred tunnels, and dubbed themselves rabbits, quite comfortably; red rabbits, to distinguish from the gray rabbits on Earth's moon.
I think I was more nervous sitting in the tractor beside Charles than I had been in my skinseal months earlier. I trusted Charles not to lose us in the ravines and ancient glacier tongues; he radiated self-confidence. What unnerved me was the proximity to emotions I had safely kept locked away behind philosophy.
I will not explain my turnaround. I was becoming attracted to Charles, but the process was slow. As he drove, I sneaked looks at him and studied his lean features, his long, straight nose, slow-blinking eyes large and brown and observant, upper lip delicately sensuous, lower lip a trifle weak, chin prominent, neck corded and scrawny — a heady mix of features I found attractive and features I wasn't sure I approved of. Unaesthetic, not perfection. Long fingers with square nails, broad bony shoulders, chest slightly sunken . . .
I knit my brows and turned my attention to the landscape. I was not inclined to physical science, but no Martian can escape the past; we are told tales in our infant beds.
Mars was dead; once, it had been alive. On the lowland plains, beneath the ubiquitous flopsands and viscous smear lay a thick layer of calcareous rock, limestone, the death litter of unaccounted tiny living things on the floor of an ancient sea that had once covered this entire region and, indeed, sixty percent of northern Mars.
The seas, half a billion Martian years before, had fallen victim to Mars's aging and cooling. The interior flows of Mars slowed and stabilized just as Mars began to develop — and push aside — its continents, thus cutting short the migration of its four young crustal plates, ending the lives of chains of gas-belching volcanoes. The atmosphere began its long flight into space. Within six hundred million Martian years, life itself retreated, evolving to more hardy forms, leaving behind fossil sea beds and karsts and, last of all, the Mother Ecos and the magnificent aqueduct bridges. ("Ecos" is singular; "ecoi" plural.)
All around us, ridges of yellow-white limestone poked from the red-ochre flopsand. Rusted, broken boulders scattered from impact craters topped this mix like chocolate sprinkles on rhubarb sauce over vanilla ice cream. Against the pink sky, the effect was severe and heart-achingly beautiful, a chastening reminder that even planets are mortal.
"Like it?" Charles asked. We hadn't talked much since leaving Durrey in the borrowed Klein tractor.
"It's magnificent," I said.
"Wait till we get to the open karsts — like prairie dog holes. Sure signs of aquifers, but it takes an expert to know how deep, and whether they're whited." Whited aquifers carried high concentrations of arsenic, which made the water a little more expensive to mine. "Whited seas had entirely different life forms. That's probably where the mothers came from."
I knew little about the mother cysts — single-organism repositories of the post-Tharsis Omega Ecos, a world's life in a patient nutshell, parents of the aqueduct bridges. Their fossils had been discovered only in the past few years, and I hadn't paid much attention to news about them. "Have you ever seen a mother?" Charles asked.
"Only in pictures."
"They're magnificent. Bigger than a tractor, heavy shells a foot thick — buried in the sands, waiting for one of the ancient wet cycles to come around again . . . The last of their kind." His eyes shone and his mouth curved up in an awed half-smile. His enthusiasm distanced me for a moment. "Some might have lasted tens of millions of years. But eventually the wets never came." He shook his head and his lips turned down sadly, as if he were talking about family tragedy. "Some hunters think we'll find a live one someday. The holy grail of fossil hunters."
"Is that possible?"
"I don't think so."
"Are there any fossil mothers where we're going?"
He shook his head. "They're very rare. And they're not found in karsts. Most have been found in the sulci."
"Oh."
"But we can look." He smiled a lovely little boy's smile, open and trusting.
The Klein BM winery, a noble experiment that hadn't panned out, lay buried in the lee of a desiccated frost-heave plateau twenty kilometers west of Durrey Station. Now it was maintained by arbeiters, and fitfully at that, judging from the buildup of static flopsands on the exposed entrance. A gate carried a bright green sign, "Tres Haut Medoc." Charles urged the tractor beneath
the sign. The garage opened slowly and balkily, gears jammed with dust, and Charles parked the tractor in its dark enclosure.
We sealed our suits and climbed down from the cabin. Charles palmed the lock port and turned to face me. "I haven't been here since the codes were changed. Hope I've been logged on the old general Klein net."
"You didn't check?" I asked, alarmed.
"Joking," he said. The lock opened, and we stepped in.
Over the years, the arbeiters had repaired themselves into ugly lumps. They reminded me of dutiful little hunchbacks, moving obsequiously out of our way as we explored the narrow tunnels leading to the main living quarters. "I've never seen arbeiters this old," I said.
"Waste not, want not. Klein's a thrifty family. They took the best machines with them and left a skeleton crew, just enough to tend the water."
"Poor things," I said dubiously.
"Voila," Charles announced, opening the door to the main quarters. Beyond lay a madman's idea of order, air mattresses piled into a kind of shelter in one corner, sheets covering a table as if it were a bed, decayed equipment lovingly stacked in the middle of the floor for human attention, smelling of iodine. The machines had been bored. A large arbeiter, about a meter tall and half as wide, a big barrel of a machine with prominent arms, stood proudly in the middle of its domain. "Welcome," it greeted in a scratchy voice. "There have been no guests at this estate for four years. How may we serve you?"
Charles laughed.
"Don't," I said. "You'll hurt its feelings."
The arbeiter hummed constantly, a sign of imminent collapse. "This unit will require replacements, if any are available," it told us after a moment of introspective quiet.
"You'll have to make do," Charles said. "What we need is a place fit for habitation, by two humans . . . separate quarters, as soon as possible."
"This is not adequate?" the arbeiter asked with mechanical dismay.
"Close, but it needs a little rearrangement."
We couldn't help giggling.
The arbeiter considered us with that peculiar way older machines have of seeming balky and sentient when in fact they are merely slow. "Arrangements will be made. I beg your pardon, but this unit will require replacement parts and nano recharge, if that is possible."
