The Martian Viking (5 page)

He was enveloped in a hissing spray of disinfectant. As he gagged, he heard Olivier's voice, speaking for all the nations of the Earth, sentence him to space service. The buffers abraded his skin and pushed him forward as the next two unfortunates entered the dock behind him.

Alderdice emerged just a few seconds after Johnsmith. His sentencing partner, an enormously fat woman whose jiggling, steatopygial buttocks resembled nothing so much as oatmeal, was herded off to some unknown destination, while Alderdice was shoved by the buffers toward Johnsmith. The two men were forced onto a conveyor belt flanked by more buffers. By the time they were dumped unceremoniously in a small chamber bathed in purplish UV, Johnsmith felt as though his skin had been rubbed raw.

Olivier's voice instructed them to leave the UV chamber after a couple of minutes. They entered a long, narrow room with benches lining the extended walls. Felicia Burst sat, still naked, on a bench about a third of the way from the door.

Johnsmith joined her, and even though she glared at him, he had the distinct impression that she was relieved to have him join her after the preceding ordeal.

Alderdice sat down next to Johnsmith. The three Triple-S inductees waited in silence for some time. At last Felicia said, "Where the hell are the rest of them?"

"You mean the others who were queued up?" Johnsmith said.

"They were sent to different parts of the building," Alderdice offered. "Possibly for screening, or tests, or . . .something."

Felicia stared straight ahead, as if she hadn't heard Alderdice speak. "There's something weird about this," she said.

A door in the far end of the narrow room opened. A woman stepped in, wearing a formfitting uniform of red and white stripes. Her helmet was electric blue, with glowing stars that winked on and off as she spoke. Her bland good looks and perfectly cadenced speech suggested to Johnsmith that she was actually an android. Her words were punctuated by slapping a swagger stick against the nearest bench. Handing them three paper overall outfits, she introduced herself.

"I'm Captain Vuh," she said. "I've been assigned to initiate you into the space service. Please put on these overalls and follow me."

They dressed and stepped onto a ramp complete with an accordion-shaped plastic covering that led into the interior of a bus. They sat down with Captain Vuh and the bus whooshed off to the spaceport.

Johnsmith looked longingly at the city flying by, as the captain spoke: "Many people see space service as an onerous duty, but we think you'll find that this will be the most rewarding time of your life."

"Right," said Felicia Burst sarcastically.

"Important work is accomplished in space that simply cannot be done on Earth," she said. "Alloys are mixed in zero gravity, or in the moon's lower gravity, that cannot be mixed on Earth. Minerals are found there that are in short supply on our mother planet, or have never existed at all. Industry that would pollute our atmosphere is now transacted offworld, making it possible for us to clean up our environment, a dream that has been postponed for a century."

Johnsmith tuned out the android's speech. He'd heard it all before, in high school when the kids who weren't cut out for any real careers were being conditioned to accept their unhappy lot.

The bus went underground, and Johnsmith was grateful for the cessation of images flying past the window. It only depressed him to see the city for this one final time.

Slowing, the bus began to climb up into the spaceport as Captain Vuh finished her speech: "In a few moments we'll be in sight of the shuttle that will take you to a colony where a ship will be waiting to take you to Mars."

What she didn't mention, Johnsmith thought bitterly, was that they would merely be part of the cargo on the shuttle, not really passengers. He looked out the window as they emerged into the sulfurous light, huge rockets standing around them in rows like cemetery stones. They headed straight for one, a graceful, thrusting shape bound to its gantry by a skein of pipes and ducts that leaked liquid hydrogen vapor onto the cracked concrete pad. Glancing at Felicia and Alderdice, he was about to speak when he realized that they were both staring at Captain Vuh in astonishment. It was only then that he realized what she had just told them.

They were going to Mars.

CAPTAIN VUH DIDN'T stay with them for long. She had been designed to initiate draftees facing lunar service, and so her spiel had really been almost meaningless. Not that Johnsmith had paid much attention to what she'd been saying, anyway. Nevertheless, she'd ridden with them up in the elevator and helped them strap in. After wishing them a safe journey, she left them alone with the two-person crew. Ignored by the professional spacers, they had a few minutes before liftoff, and their destination was the sole topic of conversation.

"Now we know why we were separated from the rest," Johnsmith mused. "But why us?"

"I'll tell you why
I'm
going to Mars," Felicia said. "They want me as far away from this corrupt world as they can get me. They know that I'm a threat to the status quo."

"You know," Alderdice said to her, "it seems to me that I've heard of you before."

"As a revolutionist, no doubt," Felicia said. But there was an odd expression on her face, as if she were covering something up. "Maybe they circulated some wanted posters in your office, or something."

"No, I don't think so." Alderdice was watching her closely now, his neck craning awkwardly.

"It doesn't matter," Johnsmith said. "The three of us are all in the same boat now."

"Or the same shuttle, at least," Alderdice added pleasantly. "And it seems as though things are not working out as badly as we had feared."

It was true. Mars was the cushiest duty the Triple-S had to offer. Growing plants, with the long range plan of terraforming the dried-up planet, was the chief business of the involuntary colonists stationed there. There were other tasks, of course, but these were either technical or service-and-support jobs that were filled by volunteers. The position that would almost certainly fall to the three of them would be Johnny Appleseed . . .or John
smith
Appleseed, in his case. Alderdice had been quite right; it could have been a whole lot worse.

The pilot, a red-faced man with a broken nose, turned to them. "We'll have liftoff in a couple minutes," he said, settling into his chair. "Brace yourselves back there."

Johnsmith wasn't quite sure how to brace himself anymore than he was already braced. He thought of classic videos from the pre-space era, invariably depicting centrifugal force that distorted the features of those fearless pioneers into the unknown. He would have felt so much better if this job actually did require heroism. From what he could see, it was just a routine flight to a space station, and another routine flight to a dead planet, where they would live out their lives in servitude to the world government.

A thunderous roar welled up from below and the ship trembled around them. It was frightening, and yet exhilarating. Johnsmith could feel his heart pounding, as gravity attempted to hold him down to the planet that he was about to leave forever. The force created nothing more than a minor discomfort. Still, as he felt himself rising from the Earth, he
could
almost imagine that they were embarking on a heroic quest. It was a foolish notion, but what harm could it do now?

They passed through the clouds and were outside the Earth's atmosphere in what seemed like just a few seconds, though it must have been longer than that. The gravitational force relaxed and then vanished altogether.

Johnsmith peered through the narrow aperture leading to the cockpit, trying to see out the window over the pilot's console, while the shuttle eased into orbit around the Earth.

The co-pilot, a bald woman who looked every bit as tough as the ship's captain, said, "You can unstrap yourselves and move around, so long as you don't try to come forward of the bulkhead separating the passengers' cabin from the cockpit."

Johnsmith fumbled with his straps until he was free. The buoyancy of his body under zero-G surprised him, even though he expected it. As he flailed around over his companions' heads, he reflected that you never quite understand something until you've experienced it.

"This is terrific!" he said, allowing himself to express the enthusiasm he was now feeling. "I never thought I'd get to ride in a spaceship!"

"You looking forward to being a prisoner of the state?" Felicia asked in a tone of biting sarcasm.

"Every cloud has a silver lining," Alderdice said philosophically. "If he wants to enjoy the journey, there's no reason to spoil it for him. After all, there's little enough to look forward to at the end of the trip."

Johnsmith said nothing. Instead, he tried to float close enough to look out at the stars. He finally got hold of the headrest on Felicia's chair and propelled his body forward. He caught himself before he collided with the bulkhead, and then crept along until he could see out past the two-person crew.

It was a spectacular sight, no doubt about it. The stars seemed much bigger, and were considerably brighter than he had imagined. Of course, he'd rarely seen them at all, living in the city, but every once in a while the miasma had thinned sufficiently to get a glimpse of them. They had never looked anything like this, though. Gazing at them in their pristine splendor, he could almost believe in Ronindella's God.

The co-pilot turned around. "I thought I said you're not to come in here," she said.

Johnsmith started to protest his innocence, until he became aware that his head, shoulders, and part of his torso had drifted into the cockpit while he was stargazing.

"Sorry," he said, pushing himself back.

"We'll have to report you for this," the pilot said, without even turning to see who it was.

For a few minutes, Johnsmith had almost forgotten that he was nothing more than a glorified convict. The pilot's laconic phrasing had reminded him of that fact efficiently and mercilessly. He retreated to the safety of the passengers' cabin.

The trip out to the station was uneventful. The pilot told them to take good care of their pressure suits, because they'd bring them to Mars with them. Johnsmith couldn't see much as they docked, but he managed to get into his suit without assistance. The curlicue clouds of Earth seemed to be above him as he crossed through a clear, plastic tube leading to the torus. He realized that this was just an effect of the shuttle's position relative to the planet, but it was nonetheless disconcerting for that. He remembered a video of
Alice in Wonderland
he'd seen as a kid. This morning, like Alice, he'd awakened knowing who he was, but he'd been through so many changes since then that he couldn't be sure anymore.

He glanced over his shoulder before the airlock door shut. There was the shuttle, hanging like a flatiron against a black velvet backdrop. The door clanged shut, the lock was pressurized, and they climbed out of their suits. Bulky and awkward as they were, Johnsmith was glad he'd only had to wear one for a few minutes. That wouldn't be the case on Mars, of course. Every time he went outside, he'd have to wear one. That was something he didn't look forward to in the least.

The inside door opened, and they looked out onto what at first glance appeared to be a tropical paradise. This was the station's botanical garden, which covered a good deal of the wheel's interior. The manufacturing of oxygen was of paramount importance here. Whatever other business went on wouldn't last long otherwise.

Another Captain Vuh was waiting for them on a curving expanse of emerald grass.

"Hello," she said. "I'm going to help you through the transition to your new home. I'll show you where you're going to be staying here at the station, and take you to your ship in the morning."

The shuttle's two-person crew, who had come ashore with them, walked away in the middle of Captain Vuh's welcoming speech, leaving Johnsmith, Felicia, and Alderdice alone with her. She beckoned for them to follow her, and led them along a path through the garden. Johnsmith noticed that people paid little or no attention to them as they walked past. Well, it really shouldn't have been surprising; they must have seen prisoners shuffling through here every day.

Captain Vuh, chattering continually about the great service they were about to provide for humankind, showed them to an apartment located on the outside of the torus. A polarized window allowed them to look out at the stars or at Earth, depending on the time they happened to be watching. There were three bunks along the curved inner wall. The place had an antiseptic odor.

"Some dinner will be brought to you in a few minutes," Captain Vuh said. "If there are any questions, I'll take them now."

Nobody said anything.

"Very good! I'll leave you for now. If there's anything you need, just punch the green button on the phone over there in the corner. I'll see you in eight hours."

A robot brought their food, and Johnsmith ate greedily. So did Alderdice, but Johnsmith noticed that Felicia hardly touched hers. And she was already so thin!

Johnsmith didn't feel much like sleeping. And, it seemed that Alderdice didn't, either. Long after Felicia had retired, the two men conversed in low tones. The room was palely lit by a blue night light.

"I guess it was my husband leaving that started me on the downhill slope," Alderdice said. "I just couldn't seem to pay as much attention to the job anymore."

"That's what happened to me, too," Johnsmith commiserated. "Except that it was my wife, not my husband."

Alderdice smiled sadly. "All the same, in the end. Of course, you have children."

"Just one child, actually."

"Well, Lon and I thought about it. But we couldn't decide who would bear the child. I think our mutual selfishness began to destroy the marriage at that point."

"Don't be too hard on yourself," Johnsmith said, but he was hardly thinking of Alderdice's problems. Ever since the mention of Smitty, he'd been wondering what would become of the boy. His boy.