The God Mars Book One: CROATOAN (18 page)

“The Ecos had ‘won’ in a way. Even though their old
leadership had stepped down in light of the tragedy, opportunists
were quick to exploit their legacy. Governments could not operate
effectively, there was so little trust in anyone’s motivations.
Large corporations were demonized, as was the science that drove
their research. It was very much like a modern witch hunt, a new
Inquisition. Nano and DNA science became evil, dangerous, against
nature and God. Even what good the research did in terms of cures
for terminal diseases or ending hunger and pollution were vilified.
Can you imagine that? Having a cure for cancer, a new food source,
a way to clean the poisons out of the air and water, and being
afraid to let anyone use them? Prosecuting them if they tried?

“It was like the whole world tried to turn time back
before the technological age. It was almost a religious fanaticism:
Mankind tried to do without toys, tried to live simpler, tried to
atone for their sins. Their intent was good, but driven by fear and
rage it became devastating. It’s taken them decades to begin to
embrace nano-science again, and they are doing so very gingerly.
They still have not managed to dare turning their eyes back to
space, especially not to send any human into the void again. To do
so would be like digging up our graves.”

We all sit in silence as Paul goes back to his
coffee—Tru has refilled his cup, her hand unsteady. No one speaks
again for an uncomfortably long time.

“It was not a case of no one coming, Colonel Burke,”
Paul eventually tries. “They sent probes, and loads upon loads of
supplies, all funded by charities. Drops still happen every few
months even to this day, like rituals of leaving gifts of food for
dead ancestors. But by the time Earth even remotely recovered from
the global backlash of the Martian tragedy, they found they had no
real means to get back here even if they weren’t terrified of the
idea.”

“You said they sent probes?” Rick wants to know.

“Yes, doctor. Even the humanitarian drops were
equipped with transmitters and sensors to look for survivors. But
every one of them failed without sending a single promising message
back, and Earth assumed the worse: nano-contamination, or Disc
attack.”

“But it wasn’t either one of those?” I probe.

“No, Colonel. It was plain sabotage, simple human
violence. By the time the probes and drops did start arriving, the
survivors had been well-established in their own fears. They hid
from the probes, and when they had opportunity, they disabled them.
And further: they made sure that nothing they did could be seen
from space—hiding from the sky is the law of every survivor
culture. They took the food and supplies from the drops, but made
sure to destroy any transmitters that might reveal their activity.
They were happy to take the supplies—there is a market in trading
‘delicacies’ from Earth—but they saw the drops as bait in a kind of
trap.

“Can you imagine what it was like for them?” Paul
defends when we look like we’re not convinced. “To fight so hard
just for the basic necessities of life? To breathe? To have water
and food and heat? And all the while being afraid to call for
rescue—even being seen—because you are afraid of what would come
instead? Knowing you could never go home?”

“You ETE seemed to have had a fairly plush time of
it,” Matthew accuses.

“We did not withhold our bounty, Colonel,” Paul tells
him icily. “We invested ourselves completely into providing air,
water, fuel. Repairing and maintaining the Feed Lines. Reaching out
to any in need. But the survivors were not what they had been
before the Apocalypse. The spirit of cooperative survival you had
known—that same spirit Colonel Ram exploited to restore the peace
between the Corporations and the Ecos on-planet—and you are still
quite legendary for that throughout the valleys, Colonel Ram—they
call you ‘The Peacemaker’ like they called Moses ‘The
Lawgiver’—that spirit was quickly replaced. Humans revert to
violent competition when resources are limited, and fear of your
own kind becomes the rule of the land. They became militant,
tribal, fighting each other over what little there was in terms of
food, shelter, weapons… Scavenging. Preying on weaker groups.
Raiding from each other. Killing.”

He trails off. Fingers his coffee cup.

“You said there was trade,” Tru wants to know. Paul
gives her almost a frown.

“Trade is possible only between factions of similar
strength. Balance is critical. It is too tempting for a stronger
group to pillage a weaker one, even after all these years.”

“And Earth hasn’t sent a
single
manned
mission?” Anton cuts in to confront the glaring inconsistency.

“As I said, the probes and drop transmitters either
found nothing because the survivors made it a point to remain
unfound, or they mysteriously stopped transmitting shortly after
arrival. That only served to reinforce Earth’s fears of the worst.
So while select dedicated groups continued to fund the unmanned
‘humanitarian’ missions, all manned missions were called off, then
were banned by the Quarantine.”

“Then what about the Lancer?” I ask him before anyone
else can accuse. “That ship that showed up empty last week? It
wasn’t crewed?”

“It was crewed,” Paul admits after a tense pause,
pain coming through his voice. “And I apologize: I should have
clarified that there were no ‘official’ missions, and the ones that
were not public knowledge were also certainly not intended as
rescue. It was likely an illegal profiteering mission—we managed to
track a small number of these throughout the years—struggling
corporations or rogue government agencies would covertly break
Quarantine to attempt to study and perhaps harvest what they hoped
was viable nanotech. Apparently there is still a black market for
secret military technology and nano-medicine for the very wealthy.
Not that there also weren’t holdouts who attempted honest rescue
flights—but the craft you have in your bay is both too expensive
and too heavily armed to have been funded by a radical
charity.”

“You were aware of its arrival?” Lisa asks him.

“We observed the Lancer approaching the wreckage of
Tranquility Colony almost twenty-five years ago. Tranquility now
consists of only one of its original three domes above ground, and
that one is shattered. It is, however, teeming with wild growth
from the original experimental gardens—the most likely source of
the plant life you have been trying to cultivate.”

“There’s more of that?” Ryder interrupts him. He
smiles at her.

“Much more, Doctor. Spread from Tranquility and Pax,
taking root anywhere there is water and warmth. Seeds travel with
the winds and with the traveling Nomads. The wild growth plays
havoc on our feed lines. You actually sit in a fairly arid part of
Melas. There are plains of scrub thriving throughout the valleys,
and deep chasms to the East in Coprates that have become veritable
jungles.”

“And the Lancer?” Matthew reminds him.

“Tranquility’s plant life likely drew them there—it
is
visible from orbit,” Paul darkens again. “But what they
could not expect was the particular viciousness of the tribe that
defends the ruin. Their ship likely flew off and hid itself as an
emergency protocol when they did not return from their sampling
foray. The ship’s simple AI probably mistook your transmitter
signal for a retrieval call.”

“And these ‘tribes’ you keep mentioning?” I ask
him.

“Life will out, Colonel,” his smile goes somewhat
sad. “They have managed. They have bred—most of their current
number have never known Earth except in stories, and all those
stories end with Earth as the great enemy, the world-burner. Now,
the tribes all have their own cultures, their own means. We tried
to keep up relations—some groups still live quite well in the heat
shadows of our Stations—but many we have had to distance. We have
certain advantages, you see—and I do not speak of what our
researchers have wrought from the nanotech experiments we
preserved. Our Stations are all inaccessible because of their
altitude, and fear has prevented more aggressive attacks.”

“Fear?” I ask before Matthew can.

“All groups recognize that the Stations are life
itself, Colonel. As long as we provide that life, no one will risk
attacking us. And there are some who have come to realize what we
have become. Having lost understanding of their own ancestors’
research, they fear what we are. They call us ‘Eternals.’ Wizards
and spirits. The Muslim Nomads call us
Jinni
. We do not
actively dispel this illusion. It serves. It allows us to continue
to provide what we do, and to occasionally intercede in the
conflicts of the tribes when the delicate balance of power between
them is disturbed—though this latter activity is frowned upon more
and more by our Elder Council.”

“And are we just another ‘tribe’ to intercede with?”
I want to know.

“No, Colonel Ram.” He looks me dead in the eyes. “You
are not a part of this new world. You are the past. And you are the
future. There are many who would be afraid of you, because of what
you mean.”

“And what, exactly, do we ‘mean’?” Matthew blurts out
before I can keep control of the conversation. But Paul just
resumes his patient, inscrutable smile.

“You mean that Earth will be coming back.”

Chapter 5:
Dissenting Opinions

Paul Stilson continued his dialogue, answering any
and all questions put to him with apparent candor. He maintained
his palpable urgency throughout, giving the underlying impression
that time—suddenly now after the fifty years we’d been sleeping—was
of the essence. This didn’t help to improve Matthew’s trust.

“Was it you that tampered with our Hiber-Sleep
systems?” Ryder asks before Matthew can put the question to him in
a more prosecutorial tone.

“I maintained your systems,” he is careful in wording
his confession. “I sought only to ensure your health and
safety.”

“By extending our sleep for
fifty
years?”
Halley takes a turn at him.

“That was not my decision,” he tells her levelly. “In
fact, I do not personally possess the knowledge necessary to
enhance your hibernation systems.”

“Your Council of Elders?” I try. He nods.

“I had been looking for your base for several years,
using the excuse of geological surveying to pursue my unauthorized
‘hobby’, but I did not expect to find you all still in hibernation.
Upon discovering you, I reported your status immediately. I had
hoped my Elders would rush to revive you, but there was long
deliberation, and I was ordered to keep my knowledge of you secret
even from the rest of our people. Days passed. I began to doubt the
wisdom of telling the Council about you, despite the fact that my
own father is an Elder. Then they ordered me to leave your base and
not return.”

“But you did,” I prod him. He gives me a bit of a
sheepish grin.

“In time,” he admits. “And I kept returning in
secret. But after a number of years, your systems were at risk of
failing.”

“The system would have simply revived us,” Halley
tells him.

“No, doctor,” he corrects her, his voice tense.
“Something had been done to your systems to prevent that—I only
became aware of it as I came to study your technology during my
visits.”

“Sabotage?” I want to know. I catch Matthew’s gaze,
and he gives me a look to say he isn’t buying a word of this.

“I don’t think so, Colonel. It appeared that someone
simply wanted to ensure you did not wake on your own, so the
failsafe was disabled. I do not know enough about your systems to
know if this was done before or after I discovered you, so I did
not know whether I should bring this information to the Council.
But as your time came close to running out, I dared approach the
Council again and admitted my continuing visits. I expected
censure, but received only silence, as again there was cloistered
deliberation. Then, instead of restricting me, they gave me
detailed instructions for modifying your systems to extend your
sleep safely.”

“But not to wake us,” Matthew grumbles.

“I was not about to risk all of your lives by
attempting to revive you myself,” Paul calmly insists. “As I told
you: I’m a geologist, not a physician. And they only gave me
instructions to accomplish one specific task.”

“But we did wake up,” Halley presses the conclusion.
“Was that you?”

“The instructions I was provided restored your
failsafe, but reset it to the newly extended parameters of your
system. And when I returned home, I did find myself more closely
monitored, my movements restricted. Still, I managed to find my way
back here a few more times over the decades. Honestly, I did not
expect to find you awake when I came this time—I must have
miscalculated the dates. I’ve spent the last week camped in the
desert, just trying to consider how to approach you.”

Matthew can’t help rolling his eyes, but he keeps his
mouth shut.

“What about Colonel Copeland?” Halley blurts out.
“Our commanding officer—he stayed awake while the rest of us went
down. We’ve seen no sign of him.”

Paul seems to brood on that, then shakes his
head.

“I’m sorry. It was already more than a decade after
the Apocalypse when I first found you. In my curiosity, I explored
your facility thoroughly. I did not see any sign that anyone else
had been active—the dust was undisturbed, the only tracks my own.
But neither did I find any human remains.”

The guards are changed out (the relief is still
wearing HA suits) and a break is called to allow for the basic
necessities of the human body. Paul is offered the nearest toilet
without overly-invasive escort, but he politely declines (even
though he’s had several cups of coffee).