KILLER PLANET

Pink-stained clouds overshadowed the sun over the solar panels of Port Nickel’s mansions, next to one of the satellite ports of the UMS[2] central station, located on the outskirts of Titanium City. The summer sun radiated over a clear sky, scarcely spotted by two distant clouds. A black swan flew smoothly, landing on an open lawn. Some yards ahead, a group of about four hundred people talked and drank around a stepped pool designed like a nine-pointed star. Dressed in a wedding gown, Anaximandra, a slim 27-year-old blonde with a prominent double chin and bulging eyes, watched the contrast between the white, black and gray color of the guests’ outfits and the vivid colors of the Martian sunset.

Fabio Saint-André, a 34-year-old Latin Saturn man with tanned skin and aquiline eyes, one meter and eighty tall, approached him. Her honey-colored eyes were sweet and attractive. They hugged and kissed on his cheeks, expressing an emotion that raised an eyebrow from the crowd. She wondered whether her generation’s preference for mourning nuances was primarily due to the prevailing denial, among the media, of pain and unhappiness as essential components of their daily life.

34-years old Fabio Saint-André, a 5’10”-height tanned skin Latin-Saturn man, approached her, taking her out from her reverie. Fabio’s honey-colored eyes were piercing, albeit softened by long curved lashes. They both hugged and kissed on his cheeks, expressing an emotion that raised some eyebrows from the phlegmatic crowd.

“I knew you would come!” Anaximandra exclaimed with a condescending smile. “Did you like the hotel I reserved for you?

“You shouldn’t have paid for it!” Fabio said in an apologetic tone. “We feel so ashamed!”

“Don’t be silly,” Anaximandra replied. “You don’t know how pleased I am that you came”.

Fabio’s gray cashmere scarf, over his neat Neptunian cloth suit, and his protruding aquiline nose, gave him an air of dandy among the crowd.

Standing behind him, resembling one of Milo’s Greek goddesses, a slender, green-eyed, prominent, and sharp-nosed blonde-haired lady of about 27 years, dressed in a off-white silk gown decorated with pearls, approached Anaximandra and Fabio with complacency. A Nikon camera hung from her neck.

“Martha!” Fabio exclaimed.

On a sudden impulse, the newly arrived nymph turned around and raised the camera’s viewfinder toward her eyes, capturing, in fast-paced sequences, pics of those watching them. Some of the guests, visibly upset, turned their backs on her with an annoyed look. Suddenly, his lens was obstructed by the wrinkled skin of an old bald man. It was Frank, the ancient butler of the house.

“Champagne?” Frank asked, offering a tray full of foaming cups.

“Thanks,” Martha answered, taking a cup.

“I’m sorry to interrupt your photographic session,” Frank said with Martian sarcasm.

Martha wondered which guest may have felt more uncomfortable for her shots. The lady with the cheesy hat that preserved two mummified doves, or the gentleman that was flirting with the waitress? She turned around and smiled at Anaximandra and Fabio just as the mansion’s electric lights came on in all their splendor. Anaximandra and Fabio’s faces shrank at the glare of two powerful pink overhead lights.

“My dear Fabio!” Anaximandra said, “I’m so delighted you made it all the way from Saturn.”

Anaximandra looked at Martha with a sense of expectation.

“I’m sorry!” Fabio stuttered. “This is Martha, my wife.”

Anaximandra nodded slowly, in a gesture of dubious acceptance.

“You are already married,” she said. “Why didn’t you invite me?”

“I did,” Fabio replied. “You apologized because you had a shareholders’ conference, if I remember rightly.”

Martha assented with a smile.

“Of course! I’m so silly. I’m so sorry I couldn’t come to your wedding.”

“Never mind,” Martha said in a conciliatory tone. “We sent the invitations too late.”

Anaximandra’s dark blue eyes perused Martha’s body cheekily. Her face became meditative for a moment, as if invoking experiences of a happier time. Then she confronted Fabio’s eyes with sudden energy, smiling condescendingly from ear to ear.

“Five earthly years is a long time,” Anaximandra shrank her mouth giggling.

Martha fell silent for fear of adding an embarrassing comment. “She still loves my husband,” she inferred

“Now we both will be married,” Fabio said, concluding the impasse, “I’m anxious to congratulate the groom.”

Martha moved discretely aside to take a cup of champagne.

“What for?” asked Anaximandra. “You could have married a tycoon’s daughter instead.”

“You went to Neptune with Regina,” Fabio said.

“A perverse and manipulative spinster who envied our happiness. She offered me a contract to assist her in a silly project. Now I regret it.”

“Don’t put the blame on her,” said Fabio. “An adult who follows a perfidious person in his perfidy is never innocent. You broke my heart leaving me alone, and, sure, you know by now that those wounds never heal.”

Martha had to listen to listen to that brief conversation. He felt each sentence like a slap in the face, but before he could accurately react Anaximandra’s soft hand on his arm.

Martha overheard Anaximandra’s words. They felt like a slap on her face, but before she could react she felt Anaximandra’s gentle hand on her arm.

“How did you like your University in Saturn?” she asked, “Fabio has written to me a lot about you via cosmomail.”

“I’m glad I got my degree,” Martha smiled. “I just finished my one-year internship with the Saturn government.”

“I can’t imagine the sacrifices and sleepless nights you have gone through,” Anaximandra said as her smile vanished from her face. “Is it true that you both intend to move to Mars for good?”

Martha smiled with a sparkle of surprise in her eyes.

“Martha found a job in a Titanium City-based consulting company,” Fabio answered.

“Did she?” Anaximandra asked.

“We are quite surprised as well,” Martha assented, lowering her head. “Believe me.”

“I believe you,” Anaximandra smiled in a patronizing tone. “That’s for sure an outcome of universalization. And I supposed you, Fabio, are going to open a detective bureau, as you did in Mercury.”

Fabio drank the content of his cup and scooped another from a waitress’s tray as she walked by.

“If given the chance, we will, Anaximandra,” he said. “I came because I was hired to work as a University Professor.”

“Of Venusian language?” Anaximandra asked. “Where?”

“Professor of Acting,” Fabio corrected her. “I studied Dramatic Arts at Saturn University City.”

“Of course,” Anaximandra agreed. “Theater and cinema are so similar. You’ll excuse me if I give you a piece of advice, though.!

“Please ...” Fabio stuttered.

“The Martian Bureau of Investigation urgently requires people like you. We have too many assassins walking around in sheep’s clothes.”

Just then a fox crossed the lawn in the last rays of sunset. Martha watched the bleeding fowl under its jaws.

“We are already used to sending the sick and desperate to jail,” Martha intervened.

Anaximandra opened her mouth, puzzled by the unsolicited comment.

“I beg you…” Fabio said. “Don’t take Martha’s remarks too seriously.”

“Now I understand why you referred to Martha as your pythoness,” Anaximandra asked without hiding an air of contempt.

A middle-age man, wearing a hat, and a young fellow approached them, escorted by Frank.

“Thanks, Frank,” the middle-age man said as he gave him his hat.

“Sir Max Weyden,” Anaximandra said, introducing him to Fabio and Martha, “and this is Severus Urwin. Mister Fabio Saint-André and his wife, Martha.”

Severus and Martha exchanged smiles as Sir Max and Fabio shook hands.

“Enchanté!” Severus said to Martha in a perfectly-pronounced Neptunian.

“How was your dematerialization from Mercury?” asked Sir Weyden.

“We actually come from Saturn,” Fabio replied.

“Fabio just testified in a trial,” Anaximandra intervened.

“Did you?” asked Sir Weyden with a hint of skepticism.

“We did,” Fabio answered. “Martha was hired to gather evidence against a man accused of murdering his second wife.”

Severus broke out in a fit of hilarity.

“I suppose those Quakers intend to murder him in return!” he said to Sir Weyden, seeking somehow his approval.

Sir Weyden frowned coldly at him.

“Actually, Martha proved his innocence,” Fabio said.

“You see,” Martha said, “we are also private investigators.”

Severus nodded his head, in an effort to excuse his previous expression.

“Are you a lawyer?” asked Severus to Martha.

“I have just developed an instinctive sympathy for victims, Mister Urwin.”

Severus looked naughtily at her. Anaximandra returned his gesture with a smile.

“Severus and I studied dentistry at Titanium University,” said a shrill female voice behind him.

“Guillermina!” Severus exclaimed.

45-year-old red-haired busty Guillermina and her sister, 66-year-old bonny white-hair Mrs. Grave, approached them.

“Anaximandra!” Mrs. Grave exclaimed. “Max! How are you, Severus?”

Severus puffed looking at the blue sky.

“Mostly enjoying this placid evening,” he said.

“Great to see you,” Max replied, scratching his aquiline nose. “Are you still leaving your Neptunian guest locked outside your home, Mrs. Grave?”

Severus laughed heartily.

Mrs. Grave looked at him offended.

“Doctor Philippeis blaming me for all the awful illnesses he has developed while living in this country! It offends our sense of justice. He has gone so far as to ask me to pay for his medical bills!”

She recounted how, on a cold winter day, Monsieur Philippe, a slender and bald 55-year-old man, tried in vain to open the front door of her pension. According to one of her neighbors, he stepped back from the door and screamed out at the windows.

“If you locked him outside on a winter day,” Severus retorted, “you must assume the responsibility. You were lucky he didn’t get pneumonia.”

“It was snowing,” Mrs. Grave nodded, accommodating a mummified owl on her hat. “The windows were closed. But, as I see, that Neptist[3] is not well-suited to our weather conditions.

“Doctor Philip coughed and screamed for over an hour,” said Severuso, “without any willing caritative soul able to open his inn’s front door.”

“It sounds pretty awful,” Max intervened with sarcasm.

“I know,” Mrs. Grave accepted, “but you should know, I’ve never left a creature outside my house in 35 years of uninterrupted work.”

“One of my most beloved songwriters,” said Martha, “was Henry Purcell. He always had access to his house, until, one certain night, shortly after his 36th birthday, his wife locked and secured his home’s main door.” A week later the angelic Purcell died.

A tense silence fell for several seconds.

“Oh!” Mrs. Grave exclaimed haughtily. “Are you a foreigner?”

“I’m a human being,” Martha smiled, “just as you.”

“And a Neptunian,” Mrs. Grave replied.

Sir Weyden chuckled impatiently.

“I’m no kidding!” Martha exclaimed. “I’m certain that we both will bleed if we cut our hand with the same knife. Also, that we both will catch pneumonia if we spend two hours out in the open fields during a Martian winter.”

“Mrs. Grave suffered a heart attack last week,” Sir Weyden said in an apologetic mood.

“This weather is extraordinary,” Guillermina said, smiling suddenly. “It’s sunny, but the breeze announces a storm. And you know the old Martian proverb: wedding with rain, marriage with tears.”

“How much I’d like to be superstitious like you,” Martha quipped.

“Are you an atheist?” Guillermina asked.

“No,” said Martha, “I am a Catholic.”

“I don’t believe in omens,” Anaximandra chimed in. “It rained quite a lot during our last wedding celebration.”

“It’s true,” said Severus, “but the wedding between Nefertiti and your father was rather discreet. Yours is more like an amusement fair. I understand that this is how your husband loved her. I hope you are not offended by my comment, Sir Weyden.”

“Anaximandra and I value transparency,” Sir Weyden chuckled. “I have no problem accepting that this wedding is celebrated according to my whims. We are honest to our friends.”

“Like the kind life-rendering pelican?” Fabio asked.

“How wonderful!” Martha exclaimed. “My husband quotes Shakespeare in every single conversation.”

Severus applauded and the audience emulated him. Fabio raised his cup.

“We must appreciate mother earth for what she left us before her sacrifice,” he said, “life, history, science, literature, arts, and spirituality.”

“I totally agree!” Sir Weyden celebrated. “Cheers!

The concurrence made a toast and drank. Frank refilled the cups in the act.

“Now that we have something in common,” said Fabio, “may I ask you, how many times have you been married?”

“Four,” Sir Max Weyden replied automatically, without showing any sign of distress.

“A remarkable record,” Fabio nodded. “Is Anaximandra your fifth fiancée, then?”

“I believe so,” he replied coldly.

Anaximandra suddenly took Fabio’s arm, leading him aside as she smiled.

“Monsieur Saint-André is an old acquaintance of ours,” she apologized. “He once helped us settle a family dispute when we were on Holidays in Mercury.

“Oh!” Guillermina exclaimed, examining Fabio’s suit. “Sir Weyden owns a country house near Vulcan City. I love Mercury’s beaches.”

“Do you love beaches?” Martha asked. “Or rather, Sir Weyden’s generosity and company?”

Sir Weyden laughed heartily. Mrs. Grave and Guillermina looked at Martha with uneasiness.

“Neptunian maidens have a unique sense of humor,” he said.

“How did you like Mars, Mister Saint-André?” Mrs. Grave asked Fabio.

“I love all planets,” he replied. “The greenery and coldness of northern Mars are inspiring to any writer. By the way, Miss Guillermina, congratulations on the sale of your house.”

Guillermina widened her eyes in an expression of surprise.

“Have we seen each other before?

“This morning, in front of a restaurant. You came out of a small house for sale. A married couple followed you.”

Guillermina raised her eyebrows.

“Are you used to meddling in other people’s lives, Mister Saint-André?”

“Guillermina,” Anaximandra exclaimed, “please.”

“Let him impress us with his rationality,” said Severus. “After all, he’s a private detective.”

Sir Weyden clapped three times displaying a conciliatory smile.

“You have an admirable memory, M. Saint-André.”

“Saint-André?” Mrs. Grave exclaimed, rolling her eyes. “Are you also a Neptunian? A Venusian-looking Neptunian?”

“You are not the first person to be surprised by my dark complexion, Mrs. Grave. I was born in Vulcan City.”

“Anaximandra!” Guillermina looked at Sir Weyden in surprise. “Since we are talking about Venusians, could you introduce us to Hernan Sousa?”

“The soccer star who conquered our poor Cleopatra?” Severus asked. “That’s a promise I already got from the bride.”

Anaximandra laughed heartily and turned away, followed by Severus and Mrs. Grave.

“This mansion is quite adequate for these festivities,” Fabio said in a distracted tone.

“What do you do for a living, Monsieur Saint-André?” Sir Weyden asked inquisitorial.

“You see,” Fabio reflected for a while; “I translate books from Venusian, Saturnian, or Neptunian into Martian.”

“No wonder,” Sir Weyden replied scornfully. “I import Saturn products. My business relationship with that young planet is quite profitable.”

“I have no doubt that Anaximandra will help you increase that wealth,” Fabio commented.

“You are a very intelligent young man,” agreed Sir Weyden. “I guess you traffic drugs from Venus.”

“No, I don’t,” answered Fabio. “Only the scum believes that all Venusians are terrorists and organ traffickers. In fact there are only about 7.000 criminals there, out of 50 million Venusians.”

“This weather is extraordinary, Indeed,” Guillermina said, suddenly smiling.

“What great news!” Martha said with sarcasm. “No one has told me!”

On Sir Weyden’s mansion’s terrace, 26-year-old Cleopatra, a slender girl than Anaximandra, and 31-year-old Hernan, a tall African-Latino sportsman, walked along a swimming pool, next to a wooden fence.

“They have always preferred your sister,” Hernan argued. “Didn’t you see the gravimotor they bought for Anaximandra’s wedding?”

“We’ll get another,” Cleopatra replied. “My step-mother promised me an equal share for our wedding.”

“Right,” Hernan nodded upset. “And what about the Cottage?”

“That was a gift from Lord Halifax.”

“Ah! Lord Halifax. That old bastard removed you from his will. He should have considered your future. Sir Weyden is a gold digger. I don’t have any interest, whatsoever, in your family’s investments. You know that.”

“Quit your job with the soccer club. Let’s go to Minos city, Hernan!”

“A soccer player is a nobody in Saturn,” Hernan snapped at her.

Cleopatra sighed and fixed her gaze on Fabio, who stood up on the other side of the swimming pool.

Nearby, 75-year old Mister Cancerbero was rubbing his shoulders with Mrs. Nefertiti Gloucester, 35. Cancerbero bore a facial deformity that obliged him to nod his head every time he spoke. In spite of her severe outlook, Nefertiti was still an attractive woman. She seemed to be ready to scold anyone who approached her. Seated beside her, 70-year-old Lord Gloucester was reading a newspaper.

“Did he sign the contract?” Nefertiti asked.

“All the papers are in order,” Cancerbero answered.

“Good job!” Nefertiti said.

She walked to Lord Gloucester, dragging her long silky red dress.

“At this pace we’ll be able to print the degenetization brochures before the end of the year,” she said to her husband.

Lord Gloucester raised his eyes and fixed his gaze, first on Nefertiti, and then on Fabio, who was strolling near the pool.

“Darling!” she scolded him.

“I’m sorry,” Lord Gloucester said, “Cleopatra has invited an exceptional character.”

Nefertiti looked around and discovered Fabio’s silhouette.

“Who is he?” she asked. “What a handsome man!”

“Fabio Saint-André,” Lord Gloucester answered. “He worked previously for me as a private detective. The diamond affair. Didn’t I tell you?”

“Yes,” Nefertiti recoiled, “I’ve heard something about it. Now I remember! Where is he from?”

“From Venus or Mercury, I’m not sure…”

Cleopatra and Hernan approached them.

“You bought a splendid dress, Cleopatra, “Nefertiti said, “was it another of your presents, Mister Sousa?”

“My father paid for it, Nefertiti,” Cleopatra answered. “Did you forget to check his accounts this morning?”

“I did,” Nefertiti answered smiling.

“Nefertiti has asked you a kind question, Cleopatra,” Lord Gloucester said. “Be patient with us today, please.”

“Congratulations on your last victory, Mister Sousa,” Nefertiti said.

“Did you receive the game tickets on time?” Hernan asked.

“I’m afraid we couldn’t get them,” Nefertiti said, “but I read an enthusiastic article about you.”

As people circulated, Anaximandra grabbed Fabio’s arm. She guided him into the mansion, and from there to a hallway before a bathroom. Her hands closed the door. Fabio was about to say something, but she stopped him by placing her finger over his mouth. She slid his hand over her torso and felt her manly limb.

“For old time’s sake?” the bride asked.

“I don’t want to be part of a scandal,” Fabio replied, pushing her away gently.

And sliding his body to her side, he entered the mansion. Anaximandra walked away in the opposite direction into the garden. Fabio sighed with relief and picked up the newspaper that Lord Gloucester read minutes ago. He leafed through it and stopped at an article that captured his attention:

“THE SECRET SECRET OF MOLOCH”

There is a building in Titanium City that we all know is cursed. It has been empty for almost a decade, they murmur. For many a century it was, in fact, an organ cultivation clinic, which flourished under the auspices of corrupt authorities. Genetic engineering has been banned in the universe since the Orionense invasion, but the demand for healthy organs by elderly millionaires who live up to two hundred years, keeps it afloat.

Others rumor that the empty building is actually a Temple of Moloch, ancient god of the Phoenicians, Carthaginians and Syrians, who demands the sacrifice of fetuses in exchange for earthly favors. During the age of spiritual obscurantism, the relationship between science and witchcraft of the metallic plates of prenatal procedures was denied. They were the angelical Orions who revealed to all humanity the magnitude of the sacrifice of babies in exchange for earthly favors.

The entire universe was seized with chills when the Orions broadcast videos where the highest rulers of the 31th century confessed that they had come to power by sacrificing unborn babies to hellish entities. The horror literature of the golden age had already broached the subject. In Ira Levin’s novel Rosemary’s Baby, the failed husband gets a promotion by ceding his wife’s womb to Satan.

Under Louis XIV, his mistress, Madame de Montespan, was associated with witchcraft rituals. The Prefect of Police discovered that the King’s concubine had conjured the demon by sacrificing a nine-month-old fetus; in return, Moloch would guarantee the king’s love to her until her senescence.

Psychology indicates that women and men who get degenetizised suffer from delusions and depression, as their nervous system deteriorates. In an era in which it has been determined that an embryo is a legal citizen after its 16th day of existence, it’s strange to find out that there are societies on Mars that degenetize well-formed embryos. On a planet that guarantees the life and care of the newly begotten, unwanted by their hosts or parents, the existence of these societies shows cruelty, absurdity or illegality.

This week judge Nancy Newman denounced the judgment given by the Constitutional Court, in which they allowed the existence of degenetizing societies on Mars. In it, a woman had sued a judge who had not authorized her degenetization after twenty-five days, that is, after three days before the embryo’s matrization. That judge’s flimsy argument was based on the concept of a doctor named Philippe, who asserted that any embryo could be imperfect in the universe. That woman chose to get degenetized on the grounds that she “could ″ bore a blind or paralyzed son. The Supreme Court, without debating or investigating the case, ordered her immediate degenetization, which was immediately carried out by one of the six degenetezising communities that we support on Mars. Judge Newman made no secret of her bewilderment at her colleagues’ decision. We are the only planet in the universe that allows degenetizations until matrization, and the only one where a whole Court gives more importance to the doubt of a dubious doctor than to the universal concept furnished by the smartest minds in the universe.

Such judgement was, as Newman put it between the lines, a license for purifying euthanasia, a cruel message to our disabled population.

Fabio saw through the window the elite of Titanium City and decided it was time to return to the party.