The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  There was a lot of work for an able-bodied young man to do, after all: milking the cows, mucking out their stalls, spreading muck along the rows of sugar beets and soybeans. There was cleaning the canals, repairing the vizio panels that kept out the Martian climate, working in the methane plant. There was work from before the dim sun rose every morning until after the little dim moons rose at night. The work didn’t stop for holidays, and it didn’t stop if you got sick or got old or had an accident and were hurt.

  The work had to be done, because if the MAC worked hard enough, they could turn Mars into another Earth; only one without injustice, corruption, or poverty. Every MAC child was supposed to dream of that wonderful day, and do his or her part to make it arrive.

  But Ford liked to steal out of the shelter at night, and look up through the vizio at the foot of Mons Olympus, where its city shone out across the long miles of darkness. That was where he wanted to be! It was full of lights. The high-beam lights of the big freighters rocketed along the High Road toward it, roaring out of the dark and cold, and if you watched you could see them coming and going from the city all night. They came back from the far poles of the world, and went out there again.

  The Haulers drove them. The Haulers were the men and women who rode the High Road through the storms, through the harsh dry places nobody else dared to go, but they went because they were brave. Ford had heard lots of stories about them. Ford’s dad said Haulers were all scum, and half of them were criminals. They got drunk, they fought, they made huge sums in hazard pay and gambled it away or spent it on rich food. They had adventures. Ford thought he’d like to have an adventure someday.

  As he grew up, though, he began to realize that this wasn’t very likely to happen.

  * * * *

  “Will you be taking Blatchford?” asked his mum, as she shaved his head.

  Ford nearly jumped up in his seat, he was so startled. But the habit of long years kept him still, and he only peered desperately into the mirror to see his dad’s face before the reply. Yes please, yes please, yes please!

  His dad hesitated a moment, distracted from bad temper.

  “I suppose so,” he said. “Time he saw for himself what it’s like up there.”

  “I’ll pack you another lunch, then,” said his mum. She wiped the razor and dried Ford’s scalp with the towel. “There you go, dear. Your turn, Baxine.”

  Ford got up as his little sister slid into his place, and turned to face his dad. He was all on fire with questions he wanted to ask, but he knew it wasn’t a good idea to make much noise when his dad was in a bad mood. He sidled up to his older brother Sam, who was sitting by the door looking sullen.

  “Never been up there,” he said. “What’s it like, eh?”

  Sam smiled a little.

  “You’ll see. There’s this place called the Blue Room, right? Everything’s blue in there, with holos of the Sea of Earth, and lakes too. I remember lakes! And they play sounds from Earth like rain—“

  “You shut your face,” said his dad. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, talking like that to a kid.”

  Sam turned a venomous look on their dad.

  “Don’t start,” said their mum, sounding more tired than angry. “Just go and do what you’ve got to do.”

  Ford sat quietly beside Sam until it was time to go, when they all three pulled on their stocking caps and face masks, slid on their packs, and went skulking up the Tube.

  They skulked because visiting Mons Olympus was frowned upon. There was no need to go up there, or so the Council said; everything a good member of the Collective might need could be found in the MAC store, and if it couldn’t, then you probably didn’t need it, and certainly shouldn’t want it.

  The problem was that the MAC store didn’t carry boots in Sam’s size. Ford’s dad had tried to order them, but there was endless paperwork to fill out, and the store clerk had looked at Sam as though it was his fault for having such big feet, as though a good member of the Collective would have sawed off a few toes to make himself fit the boots the MAC store stocked.

  But Prashant’s up in Mons Olympus carried all sizes, so every time Sam wore out a pair of boots, that was where Ford’s dad had to go.

  As though to make up for the shame of it, he lectured Ford the whole way up the mountain, while Sam stalked along beside them in resentful silence.

  “This’ll be an education for you, Blatchford, yes indeed. You’ll get to see thieves and drunks and fat cats living off the sweat of others. Everything we left Earth to get away from! Shops full of vanities to make you weak. Eating places full of poisons. It’s a right cesspool, that’s what it is.”

  “What’ll happen to it when we turn Mars into a paradise?” asked Ford.

  “Oh, it’ll be gone by then,” said his dad. “It’ll collapse under its own rotting weight, you mark my words.”

  “I reckon I’ll have to go home to Earth to buy boots then, won’t I?” muttered Sam.

  “Shut up, you ungrateful lout,” said his dad.

  They came out under the old Settlement dome, where the Areco offices and the MAC store were, as well as the spaceport and the Ephesian Church. This was the farthest Ford had ever been from home, and up until today the most exotic place he had ever seen. There was a faint sweet incense wafting out from the Church, and the sound of chanting. Ford’s dad hurried them past the Ephesian Tea Room with a disdainful sniff, ignoring the signs that invited wayfarers in for a hot meal and edifying brochures about the Goddess.

  “Ignorance and superstition, that is,” he told Ford. “Another thing we left behind when we came here, but you can see it’s still putting out its tentacles, trying to control the minds of the people.”

  He almost ran them past the MAC store, and they were panting for breath as they ducked up the Tube that led to Mons Olympus.

  Ford stared around. The Tube here was much wider, and much better maintained, than where it ran by his parents’ allotment. The vizio used was a more expensive kind, for one thing: it was almost as transparent as water. Ford could now see clearly across the mountainside, the wide cinnamon-colored waste of rocks and sand. He gazed up at Mons Olympus, struck with awe at its sheer looming size. He turned and looked back on the lowlands, and for the first time saw the green expanse of the Long Acres that had been his whole world until now, stretching out in domed lines to the horizon. He walked backwards a while, gaping, until he stumbled and his dad caught him.

  “It’s hard to look away from, isn’t it?” said his dad. “Don’t worry. We’ll be going home soon enough.”

  “Soon enough,” Sam echoed in a melancholy sort of way.

  Once past the airlock from the spaceport, the Tube became crowded, with suited strangers pushing past them, dragging baggage, or walking slow and staring as hard as Ford was staring: he realized they must be immigrants from Earth, getting their first glimpse of a new world.

  But Ford got his new world when he stepped through the last airlock and looked into Commerce Square.

  “Oh…” he said.

  Even by daylight, it glittered and shone. Along the main street was a double line of actual trees, like on Earth; there was a green and park-like place immediately to the left, where real flowers grew. Ford thought he recognized roses, from the images in his lessons. Their scent hung in the air like music. There were other good smells, from spicy foods cooking in a dozen little stalls and wagons along the Square, and big stores breathing out a perfume of expensive wares.

  And there were people! More people, and more kinds of people, than Ford had even known existed. There were Sherpa contract laborers and Incan construction workers, speaking to one another in languages Ford couldn’t understand. There were hawkers selling souvenirs and cheap nanoprocessors from handcarts. There were Ephesian missionaries talking earnestly to thin people in ragged clothes.

  There were Haulers—Ford knew them at once, big men and women in their psuits, and their heads were covered in long hair and the men had beards. Some h
ad tattooed faces. All had bloodshot eyes. They talked loudly and laughed a lot, and they looked as though they didn’t care what anyone thought of them at all. Ford’s dad scowled at them.

  “Bloody lunatics,” he told Ford. “Most of ‘em were in Hospital on Earth, did you know that, Blatchford? Certifiable. The only ones Areco could find who were reckless enough for that kind of work. Exploitation, I call it.”

  Sam muttered something. Their dad turned on him.

  “What did you say, Samuel?” he demanded.

  “I said we’re at the shop, all right?” said Sam, pointing at the neon sign.

  Ford gasped as they went in, as the warmed air and flowery scent wrapped around him. It was nothing like the MAC store, which had rows of empty shelves, and what merchandise was there, was dusty; everything here looked clean and new. He didn’t even know what most of it was for. Sleek, pretty people smiled from behind the counters.

  He smiled back at them, until he passed a counter and came face to face with three men skulking along—skinny scarecrows with shaven heads, with canal mud on their boots. He blushed scarlet to realize he was looking into a mirror. Was he that gawky person between his dad and Sam? Did his ears really stick out like that? Ford pulled his cap down, so mortified he wanted to run all the way back down the mountain.

  But he kept his eyes on the back of his dad’s coat instead, following until they came to the Footwear Department. There he was diverted by the hundreds and hundreds of shoes on the walls, apparently floating in space, turning so he could see them better. They were every color there was, and they were clearly never designed to be worn while shoveling muck out of the cowsheds.

  He came close and peered at them, as his dad and Sam argued with one of the beautiful people, until he saw the big-eyed boy staring back at him from beyond the dancing shoes. Another mirror; did he really have his mouth hanging open like that? And, oh, look at his nose, pinched red by the cold, and look at those watery blue eyes all rimmed in red, and those gangling big hands with the red chapped knuckles!

  Ford turned around, wishing he could escape from himself. There were his dad and Sam, and they looked just like him, except his dad was old. Was he, Ford, going to look just like that, when he was somebody’s dad? How mean and small his dad looked, trying to sound posh as he talked to the clerk:

  “Look, we don’t want this fancy trim and we don’t want your shiny brass, thank you very much, we just want plain decent waders the lad can do a day’s honest work in! Now, you can understand that much, can’t you?”

  “I like the brass buckles, Dad,” said Sam.

  “Well, you don’t need ‘em—they’re only a vanity,” said their dad. Sam shut his mouth like a box.

  Ford stood by, cringing inside, as more boots were brought, until at last a pair was found that was plain and cheap enough to suit their dad. More embarrassment followed then, as their dad pulled out a wad of MAC scrip and tried to pay with it, before remembering that scrip could only be used at the MAC store. Worse still, he then pulled out a wrinkly handful of Martian paper money. Both Ford and Sam saw the salesclerks exchange looks; what kind of people didn’t have credit accounts? Sam tried to save face by being sarcastic.

  “We’re all in the Stone Age down the hill, you know,” he said loudly, accepting the wrapped boots and tucking them under his arm. “I reckon we’ll get around to having banks one of these centuries.”

  “Banks are corrupt institutions,” said their dad like a shot, rounding on him. “How’d you get so tall without learning anything, eh? What have I told—“

  “Sam?” A girl’s voice stopped him. Ford turned in astonishment and saw one of the beautiful clerks hurrying toward them, smiling as though she meant it. “Sam, where were you last week? We missed you at the party—I wanted to show you my new…” She faltered to a stop, looking from Sam to their dad and Ford. Ford felt his heart jump when she looked at him. She had silver-gold hair, and wore makeup, and smelled sweet.

  “I… er… Is this your family? How nice to meet you—“ she began lamely, but their dad cut her off.

  “Who’s this painted cobweb, then?” he demanded of Sam. Sam’s face turned red.

  “Don’t you talk that way about her! Her name is Galadriel, and—it so happens we’re dating, not that it’s any of your business.”

  “You’re what!” Outraged, their dad clenched his knobby fists. “So you’ve been sneaking up here at night to live the high life, have you? No wonder you’re no bloody use in the mornings! MAC girls not good enough for you? Fat lot of use a little mannequin like that’s going to be when you settle down! Can she drive a tractor, eh?”

  Sam threw down the boots. “Got a wire for you, Dad,” he shouted. “I’m not settling down on Mars! I hate Mars, I’ve hated it since the day you dragged me up here, and the minute I come of age, I’m off back to Earth! Get it?”

  Sam leaving? Ford felt a double shock, of sadness and betrayal. Who’d tell him stories if Sam left?

  “You self-centered great twerp!” their dad shouted back. “Of all the ungrateful—when the MAC’s fed you and clothed you all these years—Just going to walk out on your duty, are you?”

  Galadriel was backing away into the crowd, looking as though she wished she were invisible, and Ford wished he could be invisible too. People all over the store had stopped what they were doing to turn and stare.

  “I never asked to join the MAC, you know,” said Sam. “Nobody’s ever given a thought to what I wanted at all!”

  “That’s because there are a few more important things in the world than what one snotty-nosed brat wants for himself!”

  “Well, I’m telling you now, Dad—if you think I’m going to live my life doing the same boring thing every day until I get old like you, you’re sadly mistaken!”

  “Am I then?” Their dad jumped up and grabbed Sam by the ear, wringing tight. “I’ll sort you out—“

  Sam, grimacing in pain, socked their dad. Ford bit his knuckles, terrified. Their dad staggered back, his eyes wide and furious.

  “Right, that’s it! You’re no son of mine, do you hear me? You’re disowned! The Collective doesn’t need a lazy, backsliding traitor like you!”

  “Don’t you call me a traitor!” said Sam. He put his head down and ran at their dad, and their dad jumped up and butted heads with him. Sam’s nose gushed blood. They fell to the ground, punching each other. Sam was sobbing in anger.

  Ford backed away from them. He was frightened and miserable, but there was a third emotion beginning to float up into his consciousness: a certain sense of wonder. Could Sam really stop being his father’s son? Was it really possible just to become somebody else, to drop all the obligations and duties of your old life and step into a new life? Who would he, Ford, be, if he had the chance to be somebody else?

  Did he have to be that red-nosed farm boy with muddy boots?

  People were gathering around, watching the fight with amusement and disgust. Someone shouted, “You can’t take the MAC anyplace nice, can you?” Ford’s ears burned with humiliation.

  Then someone else shouted, “Here come Mother’s Boys!”

  Startled, Ford looked up and saw several big men in Security uniforms making their way through the crowd. Security!

  The police are a bunch of brutes, his dad had told him. They like nothing better than to beat the daylights out of the likes of you and me, son!

  Ford’s nerve broke. He turned and fled, weaving and dodging his way through the crowd until he got outside the shop, and then he ran for his life.

  He had no idea where he was going, but he soon found himself in a street that wasn’t nearly as elegant as the promenade. It was an industrial district, dirty and shabby, with factory workers and energy plant techs hurrying to and fro. If the promenade with its gardens was the fancy case of Mons Olympus, this was its circuit board, where the real works were. Feeling less out of place, Ford slowed to a walk and caught his breath. He wandered on, staring around him.

  He w
atched for a long moment through the open door of a machine shop, where a pair of mechanics were repairing a quaddy. Their welding tools shot out fiery-bright stars that bounced harmlessly to the ground. There were two other men watching too, though as the minutes dragged by they began watching Ford instead. Finally they stepped close to him, smiling.

  “Hey, Collective. You play cards?” said one of them.

  “No,” said Ford.

  “That’s okay,” said the other. “This is an easy game.” He opened his coat and Ford saw that he had a kind of box strapped to his chest. It had the word NEBULIZER painted on it, but when the man pressed a button, the front of the box swung down and open like a tray. The other man pulled a handful of cards from his back pocket.