The Paradise Factory

by Jim Keen

  Dina Brekeridge, number seventeen of the “Hundred First” Martian settlers, Erebus Montes, Mars, 2051

  “We underestimated them. Who knew a bunch of scientists would be so clever?”

  General Sisko, Colonial Marines press briefing, Mars, 2052

  The stimulant comedown was as brutal as Alice feared, muscles shaking with fatigue, throat slick with a sour aftertaste. She ignored the pain and pushed on through the tunnels, looking for a way up. It was cold and dark, the round steel walls dimly lit by red emergency packs epoxied to the ceiling. She was running on automatic, with plans that amounted to nothing more than to get higher, try to find Mike, call in a Hopper. Outside, things had seemed simpler; inside her claustrophobia returned, fueled by deadening exhaustion. The weight of the Bridge was a tactile presence, oil and metal in her mouth. The urge to succumb to blind panic, run, get out, pushed against her like an invisible hand. Only her bloody-minded stubbornness kept her upright and moving.

  That and the kid. Now she had responsibilities that went beyond the professional requirements of her job. Red had no chance down here alone. They’d be dragging his body from the Hudson’s fish nets within days, use his corpse for fuel in the city furnaces.

  “Suit, still have Mike’s location?”

  She squeezed through another tight corner, the space crisscrossed by hundreds of power and data cables wrapped together in clear tape.

  “Of course. I would say if we lost touch,” Suit sniffed back.

  “But no map, huh?”

  “I’m a Series-Three smart-system. Conjuring information from the ether is beyond my skill set.”

  “So no map, then.”

  “None. Besides, look at this place. I bet no one has any idea how to get from one end to the other anymore. Any initial organizing principal has been long since lost.”

  The tunnel funneled sound toward them. The high-pitched hiss of Alice’s tinnitus was complemented by rumbling machinery that clunked and chewed, along with what could have been gunfire. Tension crept up from her stomach, bunching her shoulders.

  She shook her head.

  This was familiar. She’d been in here before.

  But had she?

  She knew where she was.

  But did she?

  Beyond a certain threshold, pain did weird things to the brain, spawning alternate realities for the consciousness to hide inside, a pocket of calm in a world of agony. Alice had fallen into one on Mars, the fugue state a refuge from her injuries. She’d climbed out over time, drugs and therapy the ladder.

  But what if she was still there, in that fugue, in that fire, burning? Nothing like the Bridge existed when she’d first lived in New York. Was this feverish, fairy-tale architecture the imagining of a dying mind?

  She stopped. Red ran into her back with an oof.

  Remember your therapy, remember the notes in your pocket. There were no post-its on Mars. Remember your apartment here, how you’ve plastered it with those yellow squares, each one telling you this is real. Sure, that means you can't bring anyone home, let them see how you live, but that’s a small price to pay to anchor your life.

  (What if someone made you face your illness? You can’t, can you?)

  Focus on the notes, feel them in your jacket. You are here, this is real. Take one out—never mind the kid. Stick it on the tunnel walls. Could you do that if you’re dead, dying?

  “What is it?” Red said, his voice quiet. Water dripped in the background. “See someone?”

  Alice ignored him, took the yellow pad from her pocket. Her hands shook. There, on the cover in her fine script, This Is Reality. She peeled it off, stuck it onto the curved wall where it fluttered in the ever-present breeze. She looked back over her shoulder, Red’s ridiculous rooster tail of a haircut in her way.

  This wasn’t Mars. That had been worse, much, much worse.

  MARTIAN INDEPENDENT REPUBLIC, 2052

  Alice landed, bounced, came to rest upside down, face pressing against something cold and smooth. Her neck was twisted sideways, shoulder muscles trembling under the load, pain building along her spine. Hot blood thudded in her head, each beat accompanied by a jagged spike of agony. At first all she could hear was a roaring hiss, then the crackling of fire and the popping of burning munitions grew loud.

  The dark stench of scorched metal and burning meat filled her mouth, her nostrils.

  Alice tried to open her eyes but couldn’t, the impact foam still covering her face. The ejection seat had squirted the oxygenated foam down her throat to prevent internal injury. As she struggled, it melted to leave a sickly residue tasting of laboratories and solvents.

  Alice spat and saliva dripped up her cheeks. She tried to twist her head but found herself wedged against something too heavy to move. The ejection seat’s frame and straps gripped like a straitjacket, making it hard to breathe. The final layer melted from her eyes and she opened them, wincing in the pale light. Her face was pressed against the boulevard’s smooth, gray concrete. It shook under her, a deep explosion somewhere below. There was a high-pitched hiss of escaping gas, and the unmistakable whoosh of incoming orbital missile fire. She tried to move, couldn’t.

  The impact was deafening, the shockwave lifting and tossing her away like a leaf. She tumbled, up, down, light, dark, came to rest on her side.

  That was better—her now-free hands searched for the harness clip. It stuck at first, the ceramic bent, then undid with a click. She scrambled out of the seat. Her balance was off, Martian gravity less than half that of Earth’s. Blood trickled under her helmet and down her face. The boulevard was wide, its outer edge boarded by the lake, the inner a ten-foot-tall wall capped by the Parliament building’s metal roof.

  Alice rose to a crouch, groaning in pain, and ran to the wall. She unslung and assembled her gun as she looked around. Where was everyone? There was nothing apart from the empty street and burning forest. The flames were louder, heat on her skin, smoke in her eyes and mouth. The dome had resealed itself, the central hexagon traced with yellow lines as its smart tech rebonded. The panel beside it had two small holes in its center: needle missiles fired from the Fucker. They wouldn’t have done that unless things had really gone to shit. For the first time Alice considered the possibility that all three drop-ships had come down. Smoke collected above her, thick and black, curling and twisting with the rising heat.

  She checked her comms gear. Her visor was long gone, and her helmet gave nothing but garbled chatter, its smart-systems wrecked by whatever weapon had taken out the It’s Been A Long Week. She looked back; the wall curved from sight. There was no sign of her ship, but the crackle of burning munitions came from ahead. She chewed her lip, made a decision and moved forward in a low crouch, every few seconds stopping and checking around her.

  Nothing.

  She wanted to call out, shout, but bit down on her tongue. She’d been alone most of her life, but, for the first time, the Marines made her part of a team. She would locate her ship, find any survivors, and work out a way to fulfill her mission.

  She inched forward, gun ready, trying to get used to the lower gravity. The crackle of small explosions and the smell of burning metal grew. Further around the dome, she saw marks on the concrete boulevard. Light at first, a thin white scratch that grew as she moved forward. The scratch became a gouge, a tear, the color shifting from white, to gray, then black. It was the impact line of something moving fast. She abandoned her crouch and jogged forward, scanning for IEDs.

  Nothing.

  Then she saw it. The Long Week had come out of its fall, but too late. At the end of the impact line was a crater in the hard surface. She couldn’t see inside, but thick black smoke poured upward, and the yellow flash and crackle of burning ordnance popped from inside. Splintered composite panels surrounded the hole like scattered confetti. She saw one, then two bodies crumpled into bundles of shattered bones. She ran to the first. It was Miller, his neck broken, blank eyes open to the stars. She placed his head back with care
and ran to the next body. This was better: Reynolds was breathing but unconscious. Alice stripped the ejection seat from the woman, ignored her broken legs, and raised her in a fireman’s lift. Reynolds weighed under half her Earth amount, but her mass remained the same. Alice stumbled, adjusting, then ran back to the wall and laid the Marine against the stone. The leg breaks weren’t the only damage. Reynolds stomach was swollen and hard, her skin pale. Alice took out an anesthetic stick and stabbed it into the woman’s neck. It discharged with a low hiss. Alice was about to head back to the crater when Reynolds grabbed her.

  “Yu?”

  “Hey, Reynolds. You’re alive, just need to hang in there, okay? I’ve got to check the rest of the ship.”

  “What hit us?”

  “No idea. Something new, a better EMP, not sure. Take this.”

  Alice handed Reynolds her reserve pistol, then set off for the downed craft. The inferno intensified as she approached. The ship had caught fully now, its thick plastic walls burning with a choking smoke that made Alice drop and crawl to the crater’s edge. The aircraft was pulverized beyond recognition. Structural spars stuck upward like broken tree trunks, bright silver components visible through orange flames. Every so often, a red camouflage panel curled up and sublimed as she watched. There was no way anyone was still alive in there, but Alice had to be sure. She rose, ready to inch into the fire, when there was another explosion. Hot shrapnel sizzled against her body armor, and the shockwave flipped her over to face the dark sky.

  A flare twinkled above her, distant and cold.

  “Incoming—” she screamed and rolled into a ball, hands over her helmet as the needle missiles slashed into the lake. The ground lifted and flicked her upward in a devastating ka-thump. She smacked down on her side, saw billowing clouds of steam shoot skyward from the water. The ground shook again, and a deep hiss penetrated the roaring in her ears. The lake rippled, shuddered, then drained away into an open crack in the dome’s foundations. More steam billowed upward, huge clouds that swirled and mixed with the roiling smoke. It started to rain in hot, black drops that splattered over the concrete and drenched her. The foul liquid stung her eyes, found every crack in her armor. Bitter oil filled her mouth, the smell of charred pork seared her nostrils.

  Alice rolled to her front and then rose into a crouch. The hiss of escaping steam and crackle of the burning ship was deafening. She couldn’t see the containment vessel from where she squatted, so scuttled around the lip of the crater, keeping as close to the ground as she could. The wreckage was clearer from the other side. The vessel had split like an egg, its walls showing only three ejection holes. The rest were sealed. The Marines on board had been unable to get out.

  Alice kneeled, put her hand on the hot concrete and threw up.

  She tried her comms gear again, but got nothing but garbled feedback. She pulled a targeting beacon from her belt, clicked the activation button, peeled the glue strip and stuck it to the crater’s side. The Fucker wouldn’t send its last drop ship down here, not with some new weapon on the loose, but she didn’t know what else to do.

  She ran back to Reynolds.

  The woman was dead.

  NEW YORK, 2055

  “Alice, what is it?” There was an edge of hysteria in Red’s voice.

  She shook herself, focused on his pale white face, the thin features pulled into a frown, and forced the terrible memories aside. Her body shivered, slick with sweat, fear a bitter tang in her mouth. She closed her eyes, imagined the claustrophobia as heat in her lungs, and blew it out and away. Doing this in her veteran therapy sessions had been embarrassing, now it gave some small relief.

  “I’m not at my best in small spaces.”

  A hand grabbed hers in the dim light, held on tight, anchoring her.

  “Thanks, kid. Okay, time to go.”

  They continued to the end of the duct. A six-foot-tall mesh grille was bolted over an array of fist-sized fans that shrieked as they pushed noxious air outward. The smell of hot plastic and stale antiseptic was strong; Alice recognized it from somewhere. Hospital? Mars? She didn’t want to know, forced it away, her brush with the past all too fresh in her mind.

  A metal ladder led to a maintenance door in the ceiling. She scaled and lifted the hatch an inch. The corridor that greeted her looked like the inside of a submarine designed for three-foot-tall people; packed full of pipes and cables, it shimmered with heat. Alice nodded down at Red, put a finger to her lips, and beckoned for him to follow. As he started up, she slipped through and squatted in the stale heat.

  “Suit?”

  “Still have a track but there’s a lot of weird interference.”

  She checked her wrist display. What next? Red’s question about what she was doing here had struck a nerve. He’d been right—weren’t cops supposed to look after their own? What was the point of being one otherwise? Since their jacking, her whole mission had been compromised by the leaden weight of keeping her job. When had she changed so much? As a runner, a Marine, the lives of her team members meant as much as her own. She’d risked herself over and again to save her family; now she was looking for a pay cheque to heal her ribs, cover the rent, rather than to save her partner. What if Mike had obeyed orders and left her the countless times she’d screwed up?

  No.

  She forced herself to stop the spiral. Lose focus in here, she’d become just another name etched into the NYPD’s wall of honorable fallen.

  She could still make it out of here and keep her job, save Mike, but she needed a plan.

  It was time to talk to Red.

  14

  “Manhattan’s bridges are no-go zones for citizen and police alike. Only capitalism can fix that. You hear me, Silicon Valley? Big pharma? Bioweapon start-ups? You can do anything you want, to anyone you want, as long as you stay within set confines and pay your taxes.”

  New York City Mayor Jonathon Thornley, speech to Wall Street CEOs, NY, USA, 2053

  “Smart clothing will allow us to reduce boots on the ground lowering engagement costs. Also, as the clothing is more durable than the human component, it can be reused when the original wearer is end-of-life.”

  Pentagon Report, “War in the Age of Sentient Machines,”

  President of the United States, 2053

  Conroy took a sip of chilled water, ice clinking in the glass. His headache remained, a low throb at the base of his skull that spiked when he nodded at the screen. “Their progress is remarkable when you consider everything. Look at the boy. What is it about the letter that makes him so desperate to deliver? He’s nothing but a bad attitude in a big jacket. Tell me, Michael, what would you do with him?”

  “Short or long term?” Squire said.

  “Long term, of course. The largest challenge I face as an employer of young people is their ignorance of timescales. So many fail to appreciate significant change requires years of effort. I ask again, what would you do if you had him for, say, the next five years?”

  Conroy watched Squire with a strong sense of love and frustration. They were opposites in so many ways; Conroy short and squat like a weight lifter, Squire tall and elegant like a nineteen-fifties movie star. Squire sat across the table dressed in mismatched clothing, sunflowers bobbing like slow-motion sparks behind him. One-Eye stood at Conroy’s shoulder. They needed no further protection; military-grade drones hovered with quiet determination. A screen showed grainy security-cam footage of Alice and Red talking. There was no audio, Alice’s escape having taken out One-Eye’s aerostat.

  “You’ve met my children many times, Patsy,” Squire said. Conroy nodded. “You know what being a father teaches you?”

  “Evidently not.”

  “Your life means nothing in the end.”

  “Are you saying this boy’s life is worth more than your own?”

  “No, I’m saying the older I get, the less important my wishes become.”

  “I don’t believe you think that, but we digress and time grows short. Answer my question.
”

  Squire turned back to the screen, frowned, chewed the tip of his index finger. “The boy has a style of his own, doesn’t look to be a follower. That shows individuality combined with the stubbornness to stand apart. I can’t tell intelligence levels from here, but the detail and care taken to paint his jacket suggests curiosity and patience. That being the case, we have a creative, smart, stubborn boy used to looking after himself. I would try to protect that aspect while reintegrating him with society. Not school—I doubt how relevant that would be. A local gang, perhaps, one where I could keep an eye on him.”

  “A runner?”

  “No.” Squire paused. “Maybe supervision, give him a mail route to organize, see how he adapts to deadlines and responsibilities.”

  “And how would you integrate him into your home?”

  “What are you getting at? I understand I’ve upset you, but—” Squire stopped as Conroy raised a finger to his lips. He changed tack. “Susan is my oldest.”

  “Ten?”

  “Eleven, crazy as that is. I’d let her supervise him.”

  “Not Peter?”

  “No, Peter’s too shy. He’d be influenced by the kid’s dress sense.”

  “So the interaction with this boy would change your family, as well as the other way around.”

  Squire shrugged, not liking where this was headed. “You’re twisting my words here.”

  “Indulge me.”

  “Okay. A family, in the traditional sense, is a self-contained unit. Self-referencing systems tend toward their own rules and regulations. They can be hard and insular—say religious doctrine—or soft, where they embrace the world and trust their values will sustain.”

  “How does your own self-contained system, your family, interact with others?”

  “Well, you can’t live on your own, especially these days, right?” Squire gave a dry laugh that dropped dead on the floor.