The Mercury Rebellion Read online

  “There’s what, 1018 kilograms of water in these craters? Has no one ever thought of exporting it?”

  “Well, all the polar craters belong to Wrightstuff, Inc. And exporting water from Mercury wouldn’t be cost-effective. NEO water traders hop from rock to rock, extract H2O with thermal energy, export it to Luna, Midway, the Earth orbitals. They’ve priced the Belt out of the market. Razor-thin margins.”

  Elfrida knew about the NEO water traders. They’d achieved every immigrant’s dream of de facto independence. Are there any unclaimed NEOs left? Could we find one for the UNVRP community?

  The lateral shaft opened out into a cavern forested with square-sided pillars. Vlajkovic drove between them. “Room and pillar mining,” he shouted, as another frug-rock track came on the stereo. “Wide spaces between the pillars; one-third Earth’s gravity, you don’t need that much material to hold up the roof. But these pillars are made of ice, so they’re not that strong. One failure, everyone down here is dead.”

  “Is there anyone down here?”

  “No. Just these guys.”

  Chrome flashed in the headlights. Mining bots attacked the ice face with cutter heads. Scrambling on six or eight legs, they loaded the rubble onto motorized trolleys, which were articulated to snake between the pillars.

  “Suit up,” Vlajkovic told her.

  Elfrida worked her legs into the EVA suit that had been stowed behind her seat. She strained to close it over her bulky sweatshirt, and put her helmet on. “Comms check,” Vlajkovic said.

  “Copy.”

  “We’re out of range of the wifi network, so we’re dependent on our suit radios. You have an emergency beacon, manually triggered from your wrist display. See it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Let’s go. Watch out for flying ice chunks.”

  The warning was timely. As Elfrida jumped out of the rover’s airlock, a chunk the size of her head came skidding across the ice. “Sorry! Sorry!” squeaked a mining bot, crabbing past her to retrieve the chunk.

  For hours they explored the mine. When you had seen one room full of ice pillars, you’d seen them all. Elfrida hid her boredom. She understood that Vlajkovic was showing her what they had here, how much work they’d put into developing this crater … how fickle it would be to just abandon everything. But she already agreed with him.

  Tired out from walking, she sat down on a heap of rubble at the foot of yet another ice face. “Mike? I’m sorry, but it won’t do any good to appeal to my better nature. Not that I haven’t got one. Smile. But it’s out of my control, don’t you understand? It’s not my decision.”

  She had told him about her orders. Of course she had. CLASSIFIED be damned. How was she expected to come up with a plan for resettling 1000-plus people without help?

  “Laugh!” he said. “Get up. I know it’s a long walk, but we’re almost there.”

  Huh? Elfrida got up and followed him.

  They came to another lateral shaft. Half of its width was taken up by a conveyor belt. An articulated trolley arrived at the same time they did. It raised its rear end like a caterpillar and poured ice chunks onto the conveyor belt.

  “Now we get to ride.” Vlajkovic hopped onto the belt. Elfrida scrambled after him. “This belt takes the mine’s output up to the water refinery on the surface. We’re not going all the way, though …”

  Ten minutes later, he signalled her to get off.

  The conveyor belt angled upwards. A smaller tunnel doglegged off. They walked that way for a couple of hundred meters, until they reached an airlock. Inside the chamber, Vlajkovic took off his helmet and gestured for her to do likewise.

  The valve on the other end opened on a brightly lit passage.

  Elfrida screamed.

  A machine-gun was pointing at her face.

  ix.

  Cydney grunted blissfully and slid deeper into the steaming water.

  The Rivendell Spa—left over from the Hotel Mercury era—offered only basic treatments. But compared to a hut in a village infested with fleas and rats, this was a little corner of paradise.

  A masseur knelt behind Cydney, dressed as an elf. He drove expert knuckles into Cydney’s shoulders.

  On the other side of the pool, Angelica Lin relaxed in the hands of another masseuse. Cydney had paid for them to have the spa to themselves this morning. After their bath, they would enjoy a micro-facelift, followed by a mani-pedi, and finally a blow-out and styling.

  They had already bonded during their depilation session, and were chatting easily about their shared interests.

  “Mork Rapp?” Cydney scoffed. “Give me a break. Stricter recycling laws? Is that what he thinks the voters want? He hasn’t a chance in hell.”

  “He’ll drop out,” Angelica said. “He’s just using this campaign to raise his profile. Same goes for Pyls O. Mani and the NEO colonies’ candidate, that Patel woman. Hasselblatter, I’m not so sure about.”

  “He’s on the President’s Advisory Council.”

  “Yes, and if he won the UNVRP directorship, he’d have to quit the PAC as well as the Space Corps. That would be a demotion, in terms of raw power.” Angelica shook her head. “I can’t see why he’s standing at all … unless the President ordered him to.”

  “Right. But even the President can’t buy him a good favorability rating. He’s polling in the low single digits. Who does that leave? Dr. Ulysses Seth.”

  Angelica’s husky laugh rippled across the water. “It’s early days yet,” she said. “Someone else might declare.”

  Her face shone, damp. With her make-up off, it was easy to see that she’d had a lot of cosmetic surgery. Cydney didn’t think any less of her for it. You did what you had to do to sell your brand.

  ★

  Elfrida shrank back into the airlock, trembling with fear.

  “Oh, it’s you, Mike,” said a voice like ice being crushed in a blender. The machine-gun pointing at Elfrida’s nose did not waver. “Who’s this?”

  “My new gofer. Doug knows about her,” Vlajkovic said.

  “Oh, OK.” The sentry had a face like a patchwork of beef jerky. Sunglasses hid his eyes. His biceps were the size of Elfrida’s thighs. Were this Earth, with Earth’s gravity, the gun on his shoulder would have had to be vehicle-mounted. In fact, were this Earth, the gun would have been illegal.

  He lowered it and smiled at her. “Howdy, ma’am. Didn’t scare you too bad, did I? Welcome to the United States of America.”

  “Uh?”

  “We ain’t got much in the way of immigration procedures. I’m it.” He guffawed. “You wanna freshen up? That’s a long-ass walk.”

  Elfrida tried to sort it out in her head. They had driven about 10 kilometers to the mine. Underground, she’d gotten turned around, had had no idea which direction they were walking. It was now clear that they’d covered another five kilometers on foot, to end up at Wrightstuff. Inc.’s new hab beneath the central peak of Mt. Gotham.

  Too late, she remembered Lal Subramaniam’s words. Vlajkovic is in the pay of the Americans. I’m certain of it.

  Vlajkovic said, “We’ll just go straight up, if that’s OK with you, Rob. I think Doug is waiting for us.”

  “Sure! Y’all go ahead. Have a nice day now.”

  “Is he for real?” Elfrida hissed, scurrying down the corridor after Vlajkovic.

  “He wouldn’t have shot you, if that’s what you mean.”

  “No, I mean ‘Welcome to the United States of America.’ What’s that about?”

  Vlajkovic gave her an amused look. “There speaks a good little UN citizen.”

  Elfrida flushed. She didn’t want to admit that her question had been a basic one: what is/was/had been the United States of America?

  Her new Unicorn Tears® contacts had an encyclopedia, so she could look things up even with no network connection. The information was pitched at ten-year-olds, but accurate as far as it went. She read fast, the text overlaid on service corridors and warning signs. (Vlajkovic seemed to know hi
s way around.)

  “‘The United States of America,’” she muttered aloud, “‘was a federal republic consisting of 67 states and a federal district. It existed from 1776 to 2170.’ But this is just a map of North America, minus Canada.”

  “It was a sovereign nation between those dates. The Wrightstuff people are kinda nostalgic about it.” Vlajkovic pushed an elevator button.

  “My unicorn says it was the richest country on Earth. A pioneer of space colonization. Wow.”

  They got into the elevator.

  “Elfrida,” Vlajkovic said, “while we’re here, just keep quiet about your unicorn, OK? They’ve got an imaginary country; you’ve got an imaginary friend … I feel like we’re at a party, and I’m the only one not simming.” He shook his head.

  The elevator went up … and up. A display showed, not floor numbers, but altitude, measured from the floor of the crater. 0 meters. 200. 300. Elfrida swallowed. Her ears popped. “Mike, I need an explanation here. What are we doing? Who’s that guy you mentioned, Doug? Help me out.”

  “There’s nothing to explain.”

  “If there’s nothing to explain, why didn’t we drive here on the surface?”

  “Because I don’t want to explain to Dr. Seth. All right? Now I’m in your hands.” He gave her a strained smile. He wasn’t being dramatic. He was deadly serious. “I appreciate that you told me about the evacuation schedule. You didn’t have to do that. But you did, you took me into your confidence. So I’m doing the same.”

  400 meters. 450. They were going up and up inside Mt. Gotham.

  “This is something to do with money, isn’t it? Drugs, black tech. That tunnel is a smuggling route. Mike, I’m kind of shocked. I didn’t think you were in on that racket.”

  500 meters above the floor of the crater. The elevator stopped. Technicians in white printable scrubs ushered them into a clinic-style setting.

  “Decontamination,” Vlajkovic said. “Just trust me, OK? Doug will explain everything.”

  “This way, sir, ma’am. If you wouldn’t mind removing your clothes.”

  Elfrida was familiar with this process. Isolated habitats could be devastated by the introduction of new organisms. She handed her clothes over, to be bathed in X-rays strong enough to kill any mites or bugs that might have come along for the ride, and took a microbead shower. Billions of minute polymer beads pelted her, stripping every trace of dirt off her skin. She kept her eyes closed and her fingers in her ears—it really sucked when the microbeads got in your ears. As it was, she’d have dry skin for days.

  Dressed again, they walked out of the decon clinic into a parking-lot.

  It felt like she’d been teleported back to Earth. Four Hyundais with tinted windows sat on a square of regocrete in the middle of a field. Cows—real cows, albeit a bit spindly—grazed on genuine, lush grass.

  Elfrida raised her gaze. More fields. Crops, nearing the harvest phase of a growing cycle. A scattering of ranch-style houses.

  The breeze smelled like the communal toilets in the R&D village. The downside of organic farming was manure.

  Even the sunlight felt real. The only giveaway was the absence of shadows. Elfrida squinted up. UV lights, marching in a row across the ceiling of a really, really big cavern. They’d nailed the spectrum—trickier than you’d think.

  “Told you it was luxe,” Vlajkovic said.

  Elfrida rallied. “Looks like a zillion asteroid habitats I’ve seen. They always go for the pastoral ideal. I wonder why? There are so many lifestyle concepts that don’t involve livestock. Not to mention the cost of importing or manufacturing soil. God … there must be a million tons of the stuff out there …”

  “A hundred and twenty thousand tons, actually,” said a voice behind them.

  A man got out of one of the parked cars. He leaned on the open door, smiling into the sunlight.

  “What’s the point of money, if you don’t buy dreams with it?”

  He sauntered towards them, sticking out a hand. Vlajkovic shook it, and after a second’s hesitation, Elfrida did, too.

  Uniformed men and women in sunglasses eased out of the other cars. Guns glinted in their hands.

  “Nice to meet you, Ms. Goto. I’m Doug Wright.”

  “President Wright,” Vlajkovic clarified with a sycophantic titter.

  “Am I supposed to curtsey, or something?” Elfrida folded her arms, ruffled from the shock of having guns aimed at her, again.

  Doug laughed—a high, scratchy hee-haw! that made him suddenly seem nicer. He was tall and paunchy, in his forties. Like everyone else here, he had a melanin-challenged complexion and non-black hair. He removed his sunglasses and focused hazel eyes on her. “Oh hell, no, Ms. Goto. I don’t expect deference from the UN. That battle was fought, and lost, a century back. What you see now is just a hab in a rock, no better than a thousand others, as you rightly point out. But we’re kinda proud of it.” He smiled wryly. Elfrida decided that he was actually quite nice. “‘Sides, I think you and I share an interest, isn’t that right?”

  “We do?”

  “It’s an honor to meet a heroine in the world of terraforming.”

  ★

  Face-lifted, manicured, and blow-dried, Cydney and Angelica sauntered back to the spa reception area. “Please,” Cydney said, putting her hand over Angelica’s. “I’ve got this.” She flicked a wireless payment to the elf at reception. “I’m starving. They could have given us some nibbles. How cheap can you get?” The elf glared at her for that comment, not that she cared.

  “It was lovely,” Angelica said. “I feel like a new woman.”

  They went out onto the L1 mezzanine. Cydney felt as if she were about to burst with the news she’d learnt. Angelica Lin would be standing in the election!

  Of course, Cydney had to keep quiet about it until Angelica declared her candidacy, but Angelica had promised to give her the scoop when the time came.

  Her brain bubbled with ideas. She could prepare a documentary about Angelica … a soundtrack ... a biographical montage …

  “I’m hungry, too,” Angelica said. “Shall we do lunch?”

  She waved at the Mercury Café, the one and only place in this grotty old hab where you could get real food that wasn’t bulked out with nutriblocks.

  “Sure!” Cydney said. “But I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

  “Please. I don’t know anyone else here. They all keep me at arm’s length with fake sympathy. I’m really glad …”

  “Ugh. My feeling is, I know you know I’m really sorry for your loss. So talking about it would be just …”

  “Exactly.” Angelica’s eyes misted over. Cydney impulsively hugged her.

  “So!” Angelica freed herself from Cydney’s hug. “Let’s go eat hydroponic salads. There was something else I wanted to talk to you about, too …”

  ★

  “Soon as I heard you were on Mercury, I asked Mike to invite you over for a visit,” President Doug explained. “I sure am glad you obliged.”

  Elfrida did not say that Vlajkovic had tricked her into coming here. The electric Hyundai glided through the fields. Corn grew thick and tall on either side of the road. With the windows down, the smell of toilets filled the car. They passed a girl in muddy jeans driving a herd of cows. Doug called out a greeting. No other human beings were visible in the fields.

  “There aren’t very many people here?” Elfrida said.

  The maze of service tunnels downstairs, and the well-equipped decontamination room, had implied a big hab. This indoor farm was huge, all right, but it seemed to be woefully underpopulated.

  “Mercury’s a planet, not an asteroid,” Doug said. “On a planet, you can spread out as far as your money’ll take you.”

  The convoy turned onto a narrower road lined with trees. To Elfrida’s surprise, these were not fruit trees gengineered to yield without seasonal cues, but rhododendrons and magnolia. She was quiet, thinking about the ironies of space colonization. Space was the bigges
t thing in the universe, and yet most people living out here had no room to swing a cat. It could be crazy-making, as her experience with asteroid squatters proved. This looked much more sustainable. She felt a budding admiration for Wrightstuff, Inc. They were obviously investing in Mercury for the long term.

  “Here we are!” The car pulled up at the edge of a lawn rainbowed by sprinklers. President Doug jumped out with the loose-jointed grace of the spaceborn. “Welcome to the White House.”

  The two-storey Cape Cod rambled beneath trees taller than they would ever grow on Earth. A flag flew from the gable end. Elfrida’s unicorn told her that this was the Stars and Stripes, the flag of the former USA.

  As President Doug led them around the outside of the house, a rat scuttled across their path. Before Elfrida even saw properly what it was, a gunshot shattered the quiet. The rat disintegrated.

  “Rattus rattus,” President Doug sighed, holstering his pistol. “Talk about bringing your troubles with you.”

  “So you’ve got a rat problem, too,” Elfrida said, giggling.

  “Building an ecology in space isn’t easy. Fine if you’re going with a turnkey agricultural solution for a sterile environment. We’re operating on a different scale, in terms of biodiversity as well as yield. We’re reinventing the wheel in some respects, but we’re making a lot of exciting discoveries along the way.”

  They reached a neatly trimmed lawn. A jug of lemonade sat on a bleached wooden table with matching chairs. Sunglasses flashed in the thickets—Doug’s security detail.

  “Here’s to terraforming,” Doug said, clinking his glass of lemonade against theirs. “Also known as failure-proofing for Homo sapiens.”

  “Hear, hear,” Elfrida said. It was a joy to meet someone who thought like her on this topic. People were so down on terraforming nowadays.

  Over the next couple of hours, Doug showed her diagrams, computer models, and artist’s impressions on a table-top screen. Wrightstuff, Inc. had sixteen habs like this one at Mercury’s north and south poles. Peaks had been hollowed out and crater floors tunneled under, combining water mining with excavation of living space. This was not terraforming per se, but paraterraforming. Nesting on a grand scale.