Empress of Mars

by Kage Baker

  Alice blotted tears and accepted it gratefully. Beside her, Mona gazed at the heap of pictures—receiving blankets, bassinet, more woolly jumpers—and squeaked, “Oh, I can't wait to have a baby of my own!”

  “Yes you can, my girl,” Mary told her, standing to one side with Mr. De Wit, who seemed rather stunned.

  “I can't imagine what my neighbors will think when all this stuff starts arriving,” he said, giggling weakly. “I've been a bachelor so many years...”

  “They'll get over it,” said Alice, and blew her nose. “Oh, Eli, darling, look! An Itsy Witsy Play Set with a slide and a sandbox!”

  “That's from me,” said Mary, somewhat stiffly. “If the little thing has to grow up on Earth, at least she'll be able to play outdoors.”

  There was a sizzling moment wherein Alice glared at her mother, and Mr. Morton broke the silence by clearing his throat.

  “I, er, I hope you won't mind—I prepared something.” He stepped forward and offered Alice a text plaquette. “In honor of your name being Alice, I thought it would be nice—there's this marvelous old book, proscribed of course, but I recorded as much as I could remember of the poems—perhaps she'll like them...”

  Alice thumbed the switch and the screen lit up, and there was Mr. Morton in miniature, wringing his hands as he said: “Ahem! Jabberwocky. By Lewis Carroll. ‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimbal in the wade...”

  “My, is it in Old English?” Alice inquired politely. “How nice, Mr. Morton!”

  “Well, it—”

  “This is from me.” Manco stepped forward, and drew from his coat a little figurine, cast from the most delicately rose-colored grit he could find. The Virgen de Guadalupe smiled demurely down at the businesslike little seraph who held her aloft on a crescent moon. “The Good Mother will look after her. You'll see.”

  “It's lovely! Oh, but I hope it doesn't get confiscated going through Earth customs,” Alice cried.

  “Just point to the crescent horns and tell ‘em it's Isis,” Mary advised.

  Chiring stepped forward and laid a black cube on the table.

  “This is a holoalbum,” he said. “Candid shots of the whole family and a visual essay on the Martian landscape, you see? So she'll know where she's from. She'll also get a lifetime subscription to the Kathmandu Post.”

  “That's very thoughtful,” said Alice, not knowing what else to say. “Thank you, Chiring.”

  “Ma'am? There's somebody in the airlock,” said Mr. Morton.

  “That'll be Lulu and Jeannemarie from the clan, I expect,” said Rowan.

  It wasn't.

  “Ma'am.” Matelot stood stiffly, twisting his air mask in his hands. Padraig Moylan and Gwil Evans flanked him, staring at the floor.

  “What's this, gentlemen?” said Mary.

  Matelot cleared his throat and looked from one to the other of his companions, clearly hoping one of them would speak. When neither showed any evidence of opening their mouths for the rest of eternity, he cleared his throat again and said:

  “Himself sends word to say that, er, he's been made an offer he can't refuse to drop our appeal against eviction. And that even if he could refuse it, the clan has voted to accept.”

  “But there's still Celtic Energy Systems, my dears,” said Mary, into the thunderous silence that had fallen.

  “Well, that's not piped up to anything yet, you know ... but it's not that, Ma'am,” said Matelot, looking up into Mary's eyes and looking away quickly. He gulped for air and went on: “Areco wants the fruit of our labors. The ironworks and the cattle sheds and fields and all. Areco's buying ‘em for a princely sum and giving us a golden rocket back to Earth, plus company shares. Every one of us rich enough to retire and live like gentry the rest of our lives. And so Himself sends you four thousand punts Celtic as compensation for Finn's fields and hopes you will consider emigration as well.”

  Padraig Moylan extended a banking plaquette in a trembling hand.

  The silence went on and on. Was anyone breathing? After a moment Mary reached out and took the plaquette. She glanced at it before looking back at the clansmen.

  “I see,” she said.

  “And we'll just be going, then,” said Matelot. Mary's voice hit him like an iron bar as she said:

  “Is he selling all the fixtures?”

  “What?” said Matelot weakly.

  “I want to buy all your antigrav units,” said Mary, handing the plaquette back. “I want them in my house by tomorrow morning. And I'll make a preemptive bid, look you, for your last harvest. Go now and tell him so.”

  “Yes'm,” said Matelot, and collided with his fellow clansmen as they all three attempted to get out the airlock at once.

  When they had gone, Mary sank down on a settle. The rest of her household stared at her. Nobody said anything until Rowan came and crouched beside her.

  “Mum, it doesn't matter. Maybe Areco will make us an offer too—”

  “We're not waiting to see,” said Mary.

  “You're going back to Earth?” asked Alice, too shocked for triumph. Mr. De Wit shook his head in silence, a sick expression in his eyes.

  “I am not,” said Mary. “I said I won't be driven out and I meant it.”

  “Good for you!” cried Mr. Morton, and blanched as everyone turned to stare at him. Then he drew a breath and said: “She's right! We—we don't need the clan. We've got our pumping station and all that land up there. We can make a new place! Our own settlement, for people like us. We've already got plans for the theaters. We can expand into a hotel and restaurant and—who knows what else?” He spread out his hands in general appeal.

  “Where are we going to get the people?” asked Manco.

  “Well, er—you can advertise in the Kathmandu Post, can't you?” Mr. Morton turned to Chiring. “Tell the Sherpas all about the great job opportunities now being offered at, ah, Griffith Energy Systems! Tell them we're making a wonderful place up here where people will be free and there'll be Art and exciting adventure and, and no corporate bad guys running their lives!”

  Chiring had already pulled out his jotpad before Mr. Morton had stammered to his conclusion, and was busily making notes.

  “I think we can get Earth's attention,” he said.

  Alice sighed, gazing at her mother. She looked down at the bright pictures scattered at her feet.

  “We'll stay and give you all the help we can,” she said. “Won't we, Eli?”

  “No.” Mary got to her feet. “You're going back to Earth. No sense wasting perfectly good tickets. You can be my agents there. I'll be buying a lot of things for the new place; I want them shipped properly. And Mr. De Wit can handle all of the thousand lawsuits I plan to file much more effectively if he's on Earth, can't you, Mr. De Wit?”

  Mr. De Wit bowed slightly. “Your servant, Madam.” He coughed. “I think it might be worth your while to inquire whether Polieos is interested in buying shares in Griffith Energy Systems.”

  “I will, by Goddess!” Mary began to pace. She swung one arm at her available complement of men. “You lot go over to the clan now and start collecting those antigrav units. If the old bastard won't sell, tell him we're just borrowing them, but collected they must be.”

  “Yes, Mama.” Manco picked up a crowbar and looked significantly at Chiring, Morton and De Wit. They headed all together for the airlock.

  “Girls, start packing. Everything's to be closed down and strapped in. Disconnect everything except Three Tank. Mona, you go out to the Ice Depot and let the Haulers know I'm giving away beer tonight.”

  “Right away, Mum!” Mona grabbed her air mask.

  As Alice and Rowan hurried away to pack, Mary strode into her kitchen.

  “Did you hear all that?” she called. There was a rustle from the shadows in the pantry. Finally the Heretic sidled into sight.

  “Yes,” she said, blinking.

  “Will it work, do you think? Can we tell them all to go to hell and start our own place?” Mary demande
d.

  The Heretic just shrugged, drooping forward like an empty garment; then it was as though someone had seized her by the back of the neck and jerked her upright. She fixed a blazing red eye on Mary, and in a brassy voice cried:

  "For the finest in Martian hospitality, the tourist has only one real choice: Ares’ premiere hotel The Empress of Mars in Mars Two, founded by turn-of-the-century pioneer Mary Griffith and still managed by her family today. Enjoy five-star cuisine in the Empress's unique Mitsubishi Room, or discover the delights of a low-gravity hot spring sauna!”

  Mary blinked. “Mars Two, is it to be? As good a name as any, I suppose. That's a grand picture of the future, but a little practical advice would be appreciated.”

  The strange voice took on a new intonation, sounded sly:

  "All-seeing Zeus is lustful, can never be trusted; His son has a golden skull. But Ares loves a fighter."

  “I don't hold with gods,” said Mary stiffly. “Especially not a god of war.”

  Someone else smiled, using the Heretic's face. It was profoundly unsettling.

  "All life has to fight to live. There's more to it than spears and empty rhetoric; she who struggles bravely has His attention."

  Mary backed out of the kitchen, averting her eyes from the red grin.

  “Then watch me, whoever you are, because I'm going to give Areco one hell of a fight,” she muttered. “And if my cook's still in there, tell her to get to work. I'm throwing a party tonight.”

  * * * *

  By the time the sullen day dawned, the Haulers were still drunk enough to be enthusiastic.

  “Jack the whole thing up on ag units, yeah!” roared the Brick. “Brilliant!”

  His fellow Haulers howled their agreement.

  “And just sort of walk it up the slope a ways, we thought,” said Mary. “So it'll be on my claim, see.”

  “No, no, no, babe—” a Hauler named Tiny Reg swayed over her like a cliff about to fall. “See, that'll never work. See. Too much tail wind. Get yer arse blowed down to Valles Marinerisisis. You nona let—wanna let us—”

  “Tow my house all the way up there?” asked Mary artlessly. “Oh, I couldn't ask!”

  “Hell yeah!” said the Brick. “Just hook it up an’ go!”

  “Fink I got my glacier chains inna cabover,” said a Hauler named Alf, rising from a settle abruptly and falling with a crash that sent a bow wave of spilled beer over Mary's boots. When his friends had picked him up, he wiped Phobos Porter from his face and grinned obligingly. “Jus’ nip out an’ see, shall I?”

  “Oh, sir, how very kind,” said Mary. She put out an arm and arrested Mr. Morton's flight, for he had been in the process of running to refill mugs from a pitcher. “Can we do it?” she demanded of him sotto voce. “You understand these things. Will the house take the stresses, without cracking like half an eggshell?”

  “Er—” Mr. Morton blinked, stared around him for the first time with professional eyes. “Well—it will if we brace the interior cantilevers. We'd need, ah, telescoping struts—which we haven't got, but—’

  “Where can we get them?”

  “They're all in the construction storage shed on the Base...” Mr. Morton's voice trailed off. He looked down at the pitcher he was carrying. Lifting it to his mouth, he drank the last pint it contained and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I know the code to get the shed door open,” he said.

  “Do you?” Mary watched him closely. His spine was stiffening. He put down the pitcher, flexed his long arms.

  “Yes, I do,” he said. “I'll just go off and see an oppressive corporate monolithic evil entity about a dog, shall I?”

  “I think that would be a good idea,” said Mary. Mr. Morton strode to the airlock, put on his mask, and paused as though to utter a dramatic exit line; then realized he should have delivered it before putting his mask on. He saluted instead, with a stiff perfect British salute, and marched away down the Tube.

  “Mum?”

  Mary turned and beheld Alice, swathed extravagantly for the trip Outside. Mr. De Wit stood beside her, a carry-on in each hand and under either arm.

  “The tickets say to get there three hours before flight time for processing,” said Alice hesitantly.

  “So you'd best go now,” said Mary. Alice burst into tears and flung her arms around her mother's neck.

  “I'm sorry I haven't been a good daughter,” cried Alice. “And now I'm going to feel like a deserter too!”

  “No, dearest, of course you're not a deserter,” said Mary automatically, patting her on the arm. She looked over Alice's shoulder at Mr. De Wit. “You're going to go away with this nice man and bear me a lovely granddaughter, see, and perhaps someday I'll come visit you in my diamond-encrusted planet shuttle, yes?”

  “I hope so,” said Alice, straightening up, for her back ached. Mother and daughter looked at one another across all the resentments, the dislike, the grudges, the eternal intractable issues of their lives. What else was there to say?

  “I love you, Mum,” said Alice at last.

  “I love you too,” said Mary. She went to Mr. De Wit and stood on tiptoe to kiss him, for which he bent down.

  “If you desert her, I'll hunt you down and kill you with my two hands,” she murmured in his ear. He grinned.

  They went away through the airlock, just as Alf the Hauler came in. Beer had frozen on his clothing and he was bleeding from his nostrils, but he seemed not to have noticed.

  “Got a couple fousand meters of chain!” he announced. “'Nough to move bloody shrackin’ Antartarctica!”

  “You silly boy, did you go out without your air?” Mary scolded gently. “Rowan, bring a wet face flannel for our Alf. Where are your keys, dear?”

  Smiling like a broken pumpkin, Alf held them up. Mary confiscated them and passed them to Manco, who masked up before ducking outside to back Alf's hauler into position.

  “You can hold yer breff out dere, you know,” said Alf proudly if muffledly, as Mary cleaned him up. “S'really easy once you get used to it.”

  “I'm sure it is, love. Have another beer and sit still for a bit,” Mary told him, and turned to Rowan. “What's happening now?”

  “Uncle Brick and the others are putting the ag-units in place,” said Rowan. “Is it time to disconnect Three Tank yet?”

  “Not yet. They'll want a drink before they go up the slope,” Mary replied.

  “But, Mum, they're drunk!” Rowan protested.

  “Can you think of a better way to get them to do it?” Mary snapped. “What chance have we got, unless they think it's a mad lark they came up with themselves? I'll get this house on my claim any damned way I can. Pour another round!”

  * * * *

  Alice was reclining in her compartment, adjusting to the artificial gravity and staring up at the monitor above the couch. It was showing only old-fashioned flat images from the live camera mounted above the shuttleport; but the views were something to occupy her attention in the gray cubespace, and the litany of Last time I'll ever have to look at this was soothing her terrors.

  Suddenly something on the screen moved, and the image became surreal, impossible: there out beyond the Settlement a dome was rising, as though a hill had decided to walk. Alice cried out. Eliphal was beside her immediately, though she had had the impression he had been off seeing about their menu selections for the flight.

  “What's the matter?” he asked, taking her hand in both his own.

  “Where did you come from?” she asked him, bewildered. “Look out there! She's actually talked them into it!”

  Clearly free now, the Empress of Mars was crawling up the slope from the Settlement Base like a gigantic snail, ponderous, of immense dignity, tugged along inexorably by no less than three freighters on separate leads of chain, each one sending up its own pink cloud of dust from roaring jets. Eliphal watched it and thought of a Monty Python sketch, imagined a Strauss waltz playing somewhere.

  “Of course she's done it, Alice.” H
ow assured his voice was, and yet a little sad. “Your mother will found a city up there, on beer and rebellion. It'll be a remarkable success. You'll see, my dear.”

  “You really think so?” She stared into his eyes, unsettled by the expression there. He was the kindest man she had ever met, but sometimes she felt as though she were a small lost animal he'd picked up and taken home. She turned her eyes back to the monitor. “I guess we should have stayed to help her, shouldn't we?”

  “No!” He put his arms around her. “You'll come home to Earth. I'll keep you safe, you and the little girl. I promised your mother.”

  “Oh, Earth...” Alice thought of green hills, and blue skies, and a blue sea breaking on a white beach ... and her mother, and her mother's problems, finally subtracted from her life. She closed her eyes, burying her face in Eliphal's shoulder. His beard smelled of cinnamon and myrrh.

  * * * *

  “Looks like a huge mobile tit!” whooped the Brick peering into his rear monitor as he yanked back on the throttle.

  “But it's leaking, Mum,” fretted Mona, watching the vapor plumes emerge and dissipate instantly wherever they appeared, over every unplastered crack and vent. “Are we going to have any air at all once we get it up there?”

  “We can wear our masks indoors the first few days,” Mary told her, not taking her eyes off the monitor. “Wear extra thermals. Whatever we have to do. Hush, girl.”

  In Alf's cab, Chiring was muttering into a mike, aiming his cam at the monitor for lack of a window.

  “Chiring Skousen, your News Martian, here! What you're seeing is an epic journey, ladies and gentlemen, a heroic gesture in defiance of oppression.” He paused, reflected on the number of seats the NeoMaoists had won in the last Nepali parliamentary election, and went on: “The valiant working classes have risen in aid of one woman's brave stand against injustice, while the technocrats cower in their opulent shelters! Yes, the underpaid laborers of Mars still believe in such seemingly-outmoded concepts as gallantry, chivalry and courage.”