The Homestead

by G R Higginbotham

  Moses thought about that for a minute before replying. “If the problem were a normal malfunction of age, why were they dipping into the algae fields before they terminated? Wouldn’t that indicate a preexisting programming error? They weren’t supposed to be down there to begin with.”

  “That’s true, but these things are always unpredictable. We can never tell how any machine is going to go out. Maybe the algae bath was just a precursor to a final programming failure. Who knows? The important thing is that we’ve managed to keep it out of the water supply since Adrie and I puzzled that part of it out together.” Moses was almost totally certain that Irfan had very little to do with any solution. “Now you guys just need to find out how to get that stuff out of the airway filtration system. Which, by the way, will be much more difficult. The water is self-contained. Once those spore things are atomized they go everywhere. I’m glad that’s not my department.”

  Moses stood, still not happy with Irfan’s answer of things just happening how they happen. But he did have a better grasp on the situation as a whole.

  “Thank you for meeting with me, Irfan. It was really very helpful. And I’d love to catch a cricket game sometime, but you’ll have to explain how it works.”

  Somehow, his grin got bigger. “I’ve been an avid studier of the game my whole life, and I’m still not sure I understand it completely!” With a loud belly laugh, Irfan thumped Moses on the back. They agreed to set a time aside for cricket, and shook hands for what felt like too long as they both walked to the hallway. He was beginning to wonder what they added to the water here on Mars. Friends were distant things he only occasionally glimpsed while living on Earth. Now he had the beginning of several friendships in just six months on this planet. Perhaps the diminished gravity had changed his personality. No matter.

  Moses began to wonder how many times he could visit the Petersen farm plot without being greeted with a shotgun. Even though there were no weapons on Mars, he felt like Harold would somehow fabricate one just to get rid of him.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The now familiar grove of fruit trees and germinating crops was empty. The sun had passed the point that allowed direct light to flow down from the light-magnifying pyramid piercing the planet’s surface. The resulting drop in external temperature was compensated for by hab-wide heat pumps that made the whole system habitable. The forced heated air was the closest feeling to windy conditions that could be experienced inside any of the Martian terraforming facilities. Moses knew from his discussions with Harold Petersen that the simulated wind was just strong enough to assist with pollination of plants that grew near each other, and perhaps even a little bit between levels, but wasn’t enough on its own to assure minimal levels of agricultural viability.

  After his conversation with Irfan, Moses worried about what else might be traveling the air of Homestead IV. Or traveling in the lungs of its inhabitants.

  One more thing to add to his list of urgent priorities. Solve two murders. Find his missing investigating partner before harm came to her, if it hadn’t already. Report said killer to someone who could and would do something about it. And now prevent the entire living population of this habitat from premature death by respiratory infiltration. No sweat.

  He knocked on the door of the Petersen home, but there was no response. Perhaps Harold was in the hive. He pressed the button that would signal throughout the residence and waited. That, too, failed to yield results. Harold Petersen was possibly the most unstable person in the habitat. He could potentially be responsible for the deaths of two people already. Was he now attempting to take out the entire facility with widespread toxins through the ventilation system? Moses wondered if it was worth the risk of encountering Harold inside when he wasn’t wanted. Would he be punished for entering someone’s home against their wishes?

  And then he remembered Harold Petersen’s age. He could always claim he was concerned when there was no answer and the door was unlocked. He could argue that he had a professional obligation to ensure the health and well-being of everyone living inside the facility, and that obligation compelled him to enter the home without invitation. What choice did he really have? Of course he should go in and make sure that the older gentleman wasn’t injured or so sick he couldn’t respond to the caller at his door.

  That course of thought took less than a second. He had already abused his medical privileges once tonight, what difference would one more time make? Upon entering, he found an empty house. The door to the beehive was open. Moses Truman lowered himself down the ladder into the inner sanctum of the robots that had been causing so much trouble. It was equally unoccupied.

  Moses took the opportunity to look around the command center. Harold had not let him inspect much while giving his grand tour. There were bins filled with bee parts, bins with assembled bees awaiting programming and release, banks of screens that were displaying the data of all active pollinators, and a few work stations scattered around the room. Each had a different focus, as indicated by the screens at each station. One was dedicated to general programming, allowing the user to tweak the focus of the entire swarm to specific regions or even types of plants that were ripe for pollination. One workstation was set aside for assembly. It enabled the operator to program specific adaptations for a definable number of robots, presumably allowing for the control of specificity in the tiny machines that Moses found surprising given their general overall purpose. How different would you want them to be? The last workstation was tucked away in the corner of the room, and seemed to be tracking data on which bees were “dying” and needed to be rerouted to the hive for recycling before they were helpless to come back. He knew their lifespans were limited, and was curious to find out how often they had to be rebuilt, and for what reasons.

  He sat down to scroll through some of the information when he was disturbed by a tiny, high-pitched tinging sound coming from within the closed doors in the cabinet to the right of the workstation. When he opened the door to the cabinet, he found a receptacle with defunct bees. Was there one that was still hanging on, trying to fly out? He studied the container for some time looking for signs of movement, but found none. He pulled one out and placed it beside the workstation when a light came on the table underneath the robot he had just placed down. Immediately, the display unit at the workstation gave a summary of the bees functional life. It gave the date of activation, the levels this pollinator frequented, the types of plant it was programmed to focus on, and where it was recovered by the facility’s salvage and cleaning bots.

  So the cleaning bots recovered stranded pollinators and sent them through some sort of pressurized tube system into this bin.

  His line of thought was disturbed when he heard the approach of someone on the floor above. He quickly returned the bee to the bin and the display back to its automated data scroll. Moses stood up and pushed in the rolling stool just as Harold Petersen’s legs came into view, descending the ladder.

  This should be interesting.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  “What the hell are you doing in here?” Harold’s question was more of an exclamation of surprise, and Moses didn’t feel like he was really looking for a response.

  He replied anyway.

  “Looking for you, sir. I was just about to give up on you when you came in.” He continued with his planned response that had occurred to him at the doorway of the man’s house. “I was worried when the door was unlocked and you didn’t answer the bell.” He attempted to wear a concerned expression, but wasn’t sure how well he was pulling it off.

  “Shit.” As always, the older man’s eloquence was descriptive yet colorful.

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  “I was in the bathroom. I can’t answer the door covered in shit.” Not even a hint of a smile permeated the weathered face. His volume increased. “You are not welcome in here without me.” He indicated the beehive. “There’s sensitive . . . equipment in here that can be easily disturbed.” H
e began working his way around the room checking each workstation to make sure everything was functioning correctly. Or hadn’t been tampered with. Moses couldn’t tell for sure which was the real reason for the old farmer’s frantic manhandling of the delicate machines, but was grateful he had managed to return things to their previous condition before Harold Petersen made it down the ladder.

  “While I’ve got you,” he grinned, “I have a couple of questions for you. There is a bit of a situation I might need your assistance with.” Harold sat down in a rolling chair, carefully grabbing both armrests before alighting on the cushion.

  “Shoot. You’ve got me for ten minutes. I’ve got things to do around here. You should have more important things to do, too.”

  “Well, sir, I seem to have misplaced someone who was helping me. Rebecca Martinez was on her way here yesterday evening. I was wondering if she ever made it to your place?” Moses raised his eyebrows to convey a total lack of suspicion. The way Harold was agitated called for gentle questioning. It wouldn’t do any good to find Rebecca by being abducted or killed by the same man - if she was abducted or killed at all. Best not to mention such things without adequate reason.

  “Who’s that?” The wrinkled expression of sheer lack of caring almost made him give up right then. There was no way he could find her in this facility without someone on his side to help him.

  “She is the young lady, the Martian one, who helps with orientation of new homesteaders. Wears a gray uniform?” He noticed that he had stopped exhaling in anticipation of an answer, and forced himself to jettison the built-up carbon dioxide from his lungs.

  “Oh, that nice Mexican girl that always wears tight pants.”

  Moses closed his eyes for a few seconds to prevent the urge to roll them or show disgust. Normally it wouldn’t be something he would hide after a comment like that, but he did still need to get some information out of this man. Was that answer designed to provoke? Was he trying to get a rise out of Moses, watching him squirm, all the while knowing where Rebecca was? Or was it just an ignorant response from an uncouth old man, angry at the world? It would take some probing to find out.

  “Yes, sir. That’s her. Was she around here yesterday?” He maintained his composure, remembering to exhale.

  “She was around for a short minute. She asked me a few questions but left with her friends.”

  “First, can you tell me what she was asking you about?” He wanted to find her, but he had other things to discover as well.

  “I guess she got Adrie’s logs, and was asking about some of the stuff she wrote right before she got sick. Said she figured Adrie was writing for herself, and not to help other people know what was going on.”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, she had mentioned in those logs about going all over the homestead to track down some problem with the pollinator robots. The Martinez girl was asking if I knew what places she went to, because I guess she wasn’t too specific in those logs. I told her that other than the vats down at the bottom, I don’t know what other specific places she looked.”

  “Is that all she asked?”

  Harold considered quietly to himself before answering. “She wanted to know what I thought about Adrie’s search. Not that it was any of her damned business. But I told her I didn’t like it much. That she was upsetting the balance around the place, and that if she kept it up they might kick us both out of here for messing around in other departments and delaying the project.” Petersen kept going, so Moses just shut up and let him speak, not wanting to cause him to reflect on what he was saying. “We had some mighty big fights over it. I slept outside in the hammock more than a few nights because of it. It made me so angry.

  “She just kept poking around, asking people questions and messing with their workstations. She thought somebody somewhere had cloned one of our programming computers from the beehive here, and was controlling some of the bees. Ridiculous, if you ask me. Some people got really mad at her for messing around in their systems and slowing down their employees. Thank God we only had robots instead of workers on the farm, or she would have turned them onto her search, too.

  “I got so damned mad at her for causing trouble I could hardly see straight. We worked hard to get here, and I wasn’t about to let some silly obsession about those damned bees get us removed.”

  It was here that Moses saw Harold finally realize that he had strung together more than a few coherent sentences. That was when he clammed up. There would be no more help from Harold Petersen on that line of questioning. Time to shift gears: “Do you remember who came to get Rebecca?”

  “Just more of those gray suits. I can’t tell them apart.” Petersen looked like he wanted to spit up bile. Moses couldn’t tell if it was from discussing ICE workers or from the tail end of his dealings with Adrie. Either way, he was getting angrier by the moment. It might be a good time to make an exit.

  “Do you know maybe which direction they went? Up or down? Anything would be helpful.” He held out hope for any indication of where they took her.

  “Hell, boy. I don’t know.”

  “Did it look like she was happy to see them?”

  “I wasn’t watching when they took her.”

  Moses mumbled a thanks as he got up and walked away from the farmer as quickly as he could without looking like he was running. Why would ICE be conducting their own search for Rebecca when they were the ones who took her? Either they had a rogue operative keeping secrets, or they were trying to cover their tracks by faking a search.

  Chapter 13

  Moses spent the next few hours contemplating his next moves. While he thought, he wandered from floor to floor looking over the railings all over Homestead IV. Sometimes he would look down into the vast square base of the facility, watching the water’s constant movement, provoked by the agitators that prevented stagnancy. Sometimes he would look upward, trying to see stars through the pyramid of specialized clear solar panels that somehow both captured sunlight as well as allowing it to pass through into the man-made world below it. He also knew that there were diverters, mirrors that redirected the sunlight and magnifying its essential light to permeate some of the more sheltered areas of the facility.

  The Martian day was fortunately close to Earth days in duration, allowing for easier transition to life on a new planet. But the light was not nearly as luminous, having traveled so much farther to reach the fourth planet than its blue neighbor. The technological breakthroughs that the earth community achieved to make Martian terraforming possible, and even more so to allow civilian colonization prior to the completion of the changes to Mars’ atmosphere, were truly astounding.

  They were now well into the night. Some stars managed to shine down through the canopy of glass. Points of light shining down from the heavens. Bright enough to permeate the facility’s constructs, but only visible from the relative center of the habitat near the railings. On the surface of the planet the stars were glorious, plentiful and bright in their varying shades and intensities. They shone down on a rust-colored terrain that would soon become life-supporting. People had managed to modify the atmosphere enough to support some desiccates even now. Soon would come other plants, and then animals that didn’t need shelter to survive in the thin air. And eventually the apex of animalia, mankind would roam freely across the surface of a once-magnificent and dead landscape. They would bring life to the red planet.

  And yet, even here among the red mountains and canyons of Mars, humanity managed to disappoint. At least two murders and now one possible abduction in one habitat. No, not possible, Moses was certain. They now had Rebecca and would kill her if he couldn’t find her. But he also had to rush the investigation. He was operating on borrowed time until ICE and their leadership learned of his digging around. Once they did they would definitely end his search, and possibly his time on Mars. If they were the perpetrators of the trouble, they may just kill him. It would be simple to replace him.

  But with that line of thought, th
e murder investigation and the disappearance of Rebecca were one and the same. His search for the truth about Adrie and Epps would lead him to those who had Rebecca Martinez. The only option was to continue.

  It was getting late but Moses had no choice except to continue. Time wasted now was time that would end in Rebecca’s death. He had been wanting to get back down to the algae labs for some time now. There was no time like the present. He needed to speak to Idleman, but she would probably be gone. Whoever was on duty would have to suffice.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Moses knew something was wrong in the main mycophycology level as soon as the doors of the lift opened. He was prepared for the assaulting odor that burned his nostrils all the way up to his eyes and always permeated these floors, but it still took his breath away. But he wasn’t prepared for the disarray he discovered instead of the normal orderly research lab. Workstations were ruined, desks toppled, and tablets scattered. Someone’s feet lay sticking out from underneath one pile of debris, one foot contained in a pale blue shoe while the other was stockinged.

  Moses rushed over to the mess to help uncover the person underneath. As he removed heavy partitions and other detritus from the pile, the woman prone under the rubble began to shift and moan. He could see that her clothes, not an ICE gray but muted blues that complemented the lone shoe, were torn. One arm was broken near the wrist. Blood flowed freely from her mouth and nose. Stephanie Idleman would live, but would need some time to recover.