Welcome Aboard Air Marineris

A couple of hours after Klara had dismissed Bee from her office to continue discussions with me, he had circled to the cafeteria for a bite. Then he had ridden up in our new elevator to Mars Mining’s offices up top with his greasy spoils. And one for each of the others, including me, which I picked up before heading to him. He was sitting in his little cubby and had opened a construction routine to consider how we would need to change our offices. We would require that to allow us to supervise our explosively expanded activities. I had placed him at the front, beside me. He had the same screened view over the Valley from the cams at the top of the cliff, showing the scene on the other side of the wall near his office. Like me, he chose an overview across the canyon towards the towering cliffs on the other side. He, too, loved our mountain aerie even more than the view of the valley floor you got down below.

He had his spread of the schedule, and several status chains, opened on his displayscreen. Notwithstanding the considerable capabilities of his fon to ’cast data, external hardware was still the medium of choice over the biological computers that were our fons. They would always have limitations the hardware did not have. With hardware, you could pause in mid task on a screen to cover an almost unlimited number of separate operations and then bring any of them up with a word. It would always have better resolution than the ’cast, easier to read and easier to recognize patterns. When you were doing serious, concentrated work on a problem, it was always easier on a screen. For Bee, used to the old ways, it was no contest.

It was certain that they would not be sending more people to us for our work for a while. There was no one else immediately available except me, him, and our assistant scheduler, Lou Mazzini. Chantelle was otherwise engaged. We would just need to do more with less. We could install more screens. And we would need some more preconfigured AI assistants from Linh, our IT guru. Linh would be pleased at the task. She was always looking to do new things. It might have been true that a person of her capabilities was wasted in the custodial tasks that were her main responsibility. But she was good to have around.

She had proven the value of having a person of superior abilities many times in our association with her, always coming up with just the thing we needed. Bee thought that a semi-intelligent, specialized planning assistant would be child’s play for her. We would need something that could analyze the incoming data and flag areas of concern for us so that we could handle everything that we would be getting from the extraction, processing, manufacturing, and assembling operations. They would let us control the progression from production to placement of the appliances that would constitute one of the longest continuous integrated transport systems ever conceived. Certainly, the longest in over a century. Moreover, none of the others had been built on a virgin world that required creation of every material constituent.

Bee was setting up the task list to follow as I walked in and sat down in his side chair. I made myself comfortable, crossing my legs and settling for what promised to be an extended interview with him. I wrinkle my brow when I have something serious to discuss. He knew he needed to listen when I was like that. I was in big sister mode. He paused his screen and turned to me:

“Did I say too much when I was suggesting my side trips, Sis?”

I could see from his expression that he was uncertain about speaking up to Klara. I can be a stickler for procedure, I admit it. With me, it was a fair enough question. I just gave him the point. That seemed to relieve him.

“Don’t even think about it Bee. You inspired Klara to consider something neither of us had thought of. But you didn’t go nearly far enough. You reminded us that this could well be one of those critical times in history, and we almost missed it because we were so taken by the job right in front of us. Even though she is the Director for Starward, she took our part without hesitation. I suppose that’s the disadvantage of having resident directors. People have an unfortunate tendency to go native, and side with their neighbors. That’s us. I almost pity the plutocrats of Starward. Everything they do hastens their own departure. What choice do they have but to develop their properties? When they do, however, human nature being as it is, the inhabitants of those properties fall in league on the other side. And the better they do their job, the faster we feel our oats. Mars is reaching self-sufficiency. When they have finished helping us with our building, we won’t really need them.

“Oh, I don’t think we will steal their property, like most independence movements do. Everyone I know wants to pay them off and give them a fair return. But continual rule? Not in the cards. You pointed out that we are on the other side of the gravity well. It is steeper and wider than any mountain range or ocean was on Earth, and its power is more decisive. It inhibits shooting stuff up here drastically. They can’t really get at us from down there except at horrendous expense, and we can stop them from up here ever so easily. Our common interest ties everyone on this side of that wall together. And soon there will be tens of thousands more of us. That’s what Klara sees. In view of what’s happening down there recently, having us independent probably wouldn’t be a bad idea for them either. In the long run, much cheaper for them. They’re going to need the money for themselves, sooner rather than later. They’ve already been cutting back on scientific development down there. I don’t know who decided that they didn’t need research, but I know they will come to regret that economy.

“Klara wants to set up a planetary alliance, but she wants to do it slowly and without fuss. No point in letting them see us coming. They could get testy, even though it’s to their advantage too. The first step is to make you a trade delegate for her, just like a consular official in the old days. You will choose someone on the Moon to act as part time delegate when you leave. She has already contacted Dembe Masiko, the new Director of the LSA, and started to lay the groundwork. You know well they have a council there now, and their Director will naturally bring them in. It makes sense to involve the community. She wants to duplicate the council here. She will appoint them pro tem until elections. She also wants to add to your authority by appointing you a counsellor. This is the perfect time to justify such a move, with all the extra work we are going to need to do and the community involvement we require. Starward may get nervous when they see us spreading the authority around, but they can’t really say anything about it. We’re doing it to enable their objectives, we will say. And the community activists will all be unpaid. What businessperson could resist that?

“You will go to LEO and see Director Bryce there and do the same thing. That will piss them off again, but then what can they say? We will already have involved the Moon by that time. Is there any reason to leave LEO out? I am sure Earth would rather have us competing with one another and jealously feuding, but it’s not going to be that way. Our local markets are just not big enough to justify economics of scale, or the investment, at this stage. We can’t see that any of the strategic conditions is going to change. They have been talking about building a space elevator on Earth forever, but no-one has made the material discoveries to make that possible yet, and considering their abandonment of research, that may never happen. I’m not going to hold my breath on that. They haven’t even built a skyhook, and that is possible now. Getting reaction mass in space for reusable orbiters is the best they have been able to do under the privations they have had to endure. That has reduced costs a bit, but it still costs a bundle to get stuff up here, and it will never be economic for bulk products. For good or ill, we are on our own out here in any case. And any projection of force, forget it.

“It is very unlikely that either Starward or the UN will realize what we are doing until our efforts are well under way, but you are not to go down to Earth even if they offer it. I know your family is still there and I am sure you would love to see them. It would not be a wise move for us, and it wouldn’t be wise for you. You could become a source of conflict, and we don’t want that. And even though you are used to forty percent gravity, full gee would probably cripple you, especially at your age. You would need rehab for an extensive period, and you would attract unwanted attention to us. Don’t do it. When you are in LEO, you will be close to them. Virtual meetings will have to be enough. Sorry, Boris, but that’s the way it must be.”

“Don’t worry, Mo. Being able to talk to them without a transmission delay will be treat enough for me. I know I can’t go home. And I know my wanderings are certain to attract the kind of attention that would be counterproductive. There is another risk factor too - you wouldn’t think of it because you weren’t there. Remember, that I am still infamous as the crusading Moon sheriff and the string of murders that we suppressed when I was there and here too. That’s a factor that would make me noteworthy on the nets of the Earth. You don’t need a celebrity like me. No, I don’t want to go there. Coming back might be a permanent problem too. They could easily invent health reasons to prevent my return.

“Bee, there’s also something historic about all this. You might think that this mission you are going on is going to be seen as totally innocuous, that it is nothing more than a human resources run with a little selling on the side. But you must be aware that it’s not just that. It has elements of something else. If we are honest, those elements could be seen as sedition and treason by the essentially colonial entities that control us. The past offers perspective on how that works.

“The United States, your country, took over English assets in America after their revolution, and the French took over France from the aristocrats after theirs. In many other times, in many other countries, the same thing took place and each time the change in government accompanied the looting of assets. Maybe those assets were of questionable provenance, but they were nominally someone else’s property. The losing parties were always sore about it. They called it a crime, and from their point of view it was.

“I don’t think Starward will have a different name for it, even though we don’t propose to cheat them of their property. They will expect the same result is in store, no matter what we say, because why should it be different this time? And you will be an agent of that change they can reach out and touch. It may put you and yours in danger. That’s one of the reasons we don’t want them to know, and why we want you to be very discrete about what you share. They may suspect anyway, and we know they have tried to kill you before for much lesser reasons. We don’t want it to become a habit. We have been wondering what to do about it. We can’t come with you, and bodyguards would only wave a red flag.

“We went to Linh with this problem. As usual, she has come up with an ingenious solution. I love that girl. She solved our murders almost single handedly. She has come up with another tool that will probably save you if you ever get into danger. It is a stream of consciousness monitor that records everything external you experience. It uses the tools for reverse ’cast and recording on your fon, but with a difference. It operates like a parasite application stealing the data from your fon’s sensors but running in the cloud. It is almost undetectable on your fon. It doesn’t hog resources and there is no icon on the screen to show it’s running. The data is run through an AI programme that Linh had dreamed up for a research paper at university. It analyzes your data and triggers a routine when a specified event occurs.

“It alarms when it detects offensive measures being taken against you. It also runs an emergency notification. That advises the aggressor that everything is being recorded and demands the aggressors halt the action. It will sound like the voice of the Lord. They will think we are somehow watching in real time. Since, like your fon, it relies on ATP from your body, it cannot be turned off. At least while you are alive, old man. It even records when you are asleep. We don’t think Starward would harm you if we announced the vid would be streamed all over the nets immediately.

In Earth space, that would not be more than three seconds. They wouldn’t like that kind of exposure. We have planned for a link on the Moon. No need to tell you where. Better you don’t know. There is the usual limitation in transmission latency to us here, of course. The transmission time is unavoidable. But we don’t need to confirm that. Technical miracles happen. We hope the announcement will protect you. We are never going to be able to do anything effective after twenty minutes anyway. It would all be done before we even knew of it. We hope the illusion is convincing. It’s good, but not perfect. It might cut into your private life. If we had a way of instant transmission, we wouldn’t need the AI, but that just can’t be done.

“I need to apologize to you about our field test, though. A bit presumptuous, I admit, but we have been intruding on your privacy running it for the past hour, and it works perfectly. You are a very clean boy. Now I need to ask you again. This changes the rules, so are you still interested? You are assuming the role of a revolutionary, and if our fears prove out there will be no pity for you.”

Bee’s expression had an expectant, attentive look to it. He didn’t look discouraged. This was raising the bar all right. From engineer of cross-world transit to revolutionary in a step. He was tearing as I spoke. He’s my tough guy. He liked the idea as much as I did. That’s how he shows it.

“Mo, I’m happy to join. You know how I am. I thought I was getting beyond great things. My chances of staying alive a little while longer are good. I have had so much luck so far. They can’t kill me.”

I reached out and planted my arms on his shoulders, shaking him.

“Don’t you dare clown about that again, Boris Levski. I need you to do the job and come back to me. Do you understand? Maybe I should have shook harder and set off the alarm. Maybe the voice from the fon would have been more convincing. I’m feeling bad enough having to send you. Don’t go off on a manly tear and get yourself hurt. No heroics, Bee.”

He saw that he had gone too far. He was shamefaced. His lips pursed. He could only say “Sorry, Mo, bad joke.”