Champion of Mars

by Guy Haley

  His chin smashed down onto the suit’s gorget; he bit his tongue, and blood flooded his mouth. His skidded across the floor on his front, his chest plate snagging on broken stone.

  Dust rolled up the tube. Debris pattered down.

  Strong arms were tugging at him. “John Holland! John Holland! Please stand, stand now!”

  Cybele was heaving at him. Her mind was riding no android he’d seen before. Metal, no plastic, curved and cast in ostentatious patterns.

  “Get up, help me!” The machine was uncharacteristically emotional. “Commander Vasco and Director Orson are dead! Please, please help me!”

  She pulled him to his knees with machine-born strength, but when he looked up, he was looking at a being that was only part mechanical. Her head was of flesh, bonded at the neck to a robot body. Her expression of dismay was all too human, a helmet enclosing it from the thin Martian atmosphere.

  “What the...?”

  There was an electric buzz in his ears, boring its way into the centre of his brain. He clamped his eyes shut. When he opened them, he was alone again. Pain stabbed at him. He rolled onto his back, clutching at his leg. A metal spar had gone through his thigh. Blood stained the suit round the wound, overpainted with lime green auto-sealant, hardening in the thin air. He checked his physical status on his visor: his blood pressure and heart rate were stable. At least he wasn’t going to bleed to death, filling his suit with his own blood.

  The hurt receded as his suit dispensed a painkiller.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he said, clutching his leg and rolling on his back like a flipped tortoise. “I’m fucking alive.” He laughed in relief and sat up. A noise sounded behind him, like footsteps, light. Bare feet.

  Turning in the suit with an injured leg was difficult, and his view of the world was reduced to a crack between the ground and the side of his helmet.

  He was sure he saw a blue-skinned girl, cloaked in the clouds of dust.

  He blinked. The figure changed. The footsteps changed.

  Marching toward him with mechanical implacability came Cybele’s sheath.

  “Dr Holland,” she said, with her inhuman calm. Her hydraulics murmured as she came to a stop. “I am here to take you back to Ascraeus Base.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  A Young Boy Comes of Age

  Third Cycle of the Vashtena Priesthood

  “I DON’T KNOW, Opa. What if I turn out to have been a lunatic, or a criminal? I’d not want to know that, I really wouldn’t.” A month. There was only a month between the comfort of the present, that place Krisseos had lived all his life and that it seemed would never end, and the time he would have to board the barge and make the journey to Kemyonseet.

  ‘Now’ could not last forever. He’d been changing all the time, but to think that this was it; that his childhood was over. Snap! A click of the fingers, a sweep of a second. Gone. In Kemyonseet, he’d stand among the others who shared his birthday, and make the decision to remember or not. In the way of the young, he’d waited until the fear of it had almost crippled him before blurting out to his opa that he was frightened. Relief warred with shame at his cowardice. He almost wished he hadn’t brought it up.

  The old man set his net down on the hot rock, neatly laying his cordage spool and netting needle beside it. Whenever his opa was about to ask Krisseos something he would find hard to answer, he’d set aside whatever he was doing and stare hard at him. Krisseos braced himself for that stare. Opa’s skin was old and as wrinkled as a discarded sack, shrivelled by a century of work on the shores of the Berren sea, that shallow tongue of the Kryse Ocean that washes deep into Taertiz. But his eyes; they were bright as quartz, and twice as sharp.

  “In every life? Do you think it possible?” Opa had the habit of asking questions he knew full well the answer to. Krisseos found it infuriating, in that way adolescents find all guidance infuriating, although like many adolescents he grudgingly recognised it as useful even if he would never say, and today he bit back his rebukes. He had, after all, broached the subject.

  “It is possible,” Krisseos insisted. He followed his opa’s lead and set aside his own net.

  Opa clucked his tongue and smiled, a deeper crease in a face made of creases. “But it’s not very likely, is it?” he said.

  “It is possible,” said Krisseos. His voice came close to a whine.

  “You are uncomfortable discussing this.”

  Krisseos nodded, his face burned.

  “This will not be a comfort to you now, my boy, but as you get older, Krisseos, you will find less cause for embarrassment. There is no need to be ashamed of discussing what upsets you. Everyone is frightened sometimes. And one of those times is often the remembering.”

  “You don’t understand,” said Krisseos.

  “But I do. We all do. We who are older than you have been through it all: childhood, adolescence, the remembering. Youth thinks age forgets, but it does not. You simply learn that such things are common to all, and nothing at all to worry about. We who have loved do not fret over a kiss, we who have raised a child do not fret over the future. As in everything, every one of us has to decide whether or not to undergo their remembering. There is no shame in choosing not to do so, no matter what your friends at Eksad market might have said to you. No matter how hard they brag, make out that they are sure they are great warriors or statesmen or lovers, or whoever else they say, they simply do not know. Unaided remembering is far too rare for that. They brag and tease only to hide their own fears, and they choose to tease those who they think are more fearful than they. It is all posture and nonsense. They are just as worried as everyone else. The remembering of lives once lived is terrifying, not because of what we might have been, but because it can change who you are now. And who wants to throw his self away? To remember other mothers and fathers, other brothers and sisters? It brings a fear that it will lessen those we love. Is that not the case?”

  Krisseos nodded. He dared not speak, his throat was tight and his eyes full of tears. His opa’s words helped his fear, but not his embarrassment. He squirmed like a landed fish.

  “I thought so.” Opa laid an old, sinewy hand upon Krisseos’ shoulder. “Listen to me. How you are, how you feel, that is not diminished one jot by remembering who you once were. You will always be you, and I will always love you, no matter who you might have been, even a lunatic or criminal! That is not who you are now. But still, it is not a choice lightly undertaken, and there is no shame in deciding not to remember and to live as you are now. There is no right or wrong way. Do you understand?”

  Krisseos nodded again. Opa sat back, apparently satisfied. He took up his nets.

  “Good, good. Now, these nets will not mend themselves. Fetch me some water. It is a hot day, and I am thirsty.”

  THERE WERE STILL two weeks to go until Krisseos’ remembering when the machine came. Machines were an uncommon sight, so far out from the big cities of the canyon lands; even Opa had seen only three in his lifetime. The stories he told of them had always had enraptured Krisseos.

  “Where is this place?”

  That was the first thing Krisseos heard the machine say. He was up on the slatted floor of the loft at the back of the shop, hanging one of their spare sails out to dry, ready for repairs. The question wasn’t an unusual one. Their village was tiny, more of a hamlet, forty souls all told. Mostly old, like Opa. There was something about the voice that made him peer down. The angle was poor, and Krisseos could only see a sliver of the outside through the open shop front. His opa, his back to Krisseos, responded to the stranger.

  “This is Barrafee. Not many have heard of it, and few come, but those that do rarely leave. Best natural harbour on the Berren.”

  “It is a pleasant spot, certainly,” said the voice. “But I will not be staying long.” Reflected sunlight bounced round the shop. Krisseos was seized by a certainty. He scrambled down the ladder to the floor and made his way to the counter at the shop’s open front.

  A mach
ine, here, outside, in his village. A gynoid, exaggerated female curves in plates of gleaming metal, its face an expressive living alloy. Its workings were partly visible, corded polymer muscles and steel-encased tubing exposed at the joints of its limbs and neck. It glittered in the sun, causing Krisseos to scrunch up his eyes.

  “I seek to go on to where the chatter of the Great Library is weaker still. I want to be alone for a while.” The gynoid had a pleasant voice, her gestures friendly and open.

  “Nothing wrong in that,” said his opa. “Nor is it unusual.”

  “I am not the first?”

  “No. Others have been here. No doubt you want to prepare yourself for a trek into the wilderness? You’re in luck. There’s nothing north, west or east of here for hundreds of kilometres.”

  The gynoid gave a small smile. “I thought myself more original. First, I require rest and replenishment. I note your fusion plant. Might I gain access?”

  “Pull in a few nets for me and we’ll see what we can do. We don’t have much cause for power; I’ve got a stack of allowance credit I’ll never use. I can pay you with that. I’m Vardamensku, by the way, Varka, if you prefer. My kin’s about somewhere. Krisseos! Krisse... Oh, there you are. What are you doing, skulking about behind me? You’ll frighten me to death one of these days. This is...”

  “A machine!” he blurted. His opa’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Is this the way I raised you?”

  The gynoid laughed. He felt his cheeks burn.

  “Well, yes,” said the gynoid. Her face broke into a broader smile. Despite his embarrassment, Krisseos could not take his eyes off her. She was beautiful. “But I do also have a name. I am Kaibele.” She held out her hand, and Krisseos took it. It was hot from the sun and vibrated with the work of the mechanisms within.

  “Krisseos,” he said, his tongue mangling his own name.

  “Very pleased to meet you, Krisseos,” she said. “We will be working together for a couple of weeks?” She addressed this to his opa, who nodded in affirmation. “Marvellous!”

  “Good,” said Opa. “Now take yourself off to the plant, tell the spirit that I sent you. It keeps tally of who’s allowed what around here. It’s the closest thing we have to a mayor. It’ll probably be ecstatic to see you, it’s the only one of your kind we have here. Get yourself charged up and be back here tomorrow morning before sun up, although if you desire you can join us for supper. Either way, no later than sun up. That little blue boat there, down by the second jetty.” He pointed to where their boat rested on the pebbles of the beach. “You see it?”

  “Yes. No later than sun up. Goodbye, sir. Goodbye, Krisseos.”

  She waved one long, beautiful arm, turned and went up the hill, through the low, whitewashed houses toward the fusion plant on the edge of town.

  “What’s she doing here?” whispered Krisseos, hanging out of the shop to watch her. Across the street, others peered out of their windows as the machine strode by.

  “I have no idea, my son. They come from time to time, offering to work the boats for a week, or a year, or a decade. I’ve not seen many, there’s little congress with the Second World here, but then many people come to this village precisely because of its disconnection, to live simpler lives. As paradoxical as it sounds,” Opa said, “I reckon the spirits sometimes wish to do the same.

  “Hey!” Opa hauled him in by his belt. “Hey! Are you listening to me?” The old man playfully cuffed his head. “She’s quite a sight, isn’t she? Be careful, I’ve known men go mad with longing because of them. Krisseos? Krisseos, do you understand?”

  “Yes, Opa.”

  “Good. Don’t get too attached. They always move on, always.”

  THE MACHINE DID not join them for supper.

  Krisseos found it hard to sleep, his head full of thoughts of her. The night went slowly, and the dawn was welcome. First the true dawn, as the distant sun crept up out of the ocean. Second came the mirror dawn, as artificial satellites caught light that would have sped off into space and redirected it onto the surface of the planet. The second lighting was a sudden affair, snapping the night off instantly, and so was timed so as not to pre-empt the rising sun. Krisseos watched bright coins of light trace their way across the distant highlands to his west. Barrafee went from gloom to full day back to gloom as another mirror sun tracked its captured sunlight across the face of the planet, warming Mars for the comfort of men.

  His opa had given him this room because it faced into the dawn, partly for the spectacle, he said, and mostly to get him out of bed in the mornings, a tactic that bore only partial success. But today, before the full constellation of mirrors was ablaze in the sky, Krisseos was up and washed, ready for the day’s work. Downstairs, his opa had left the breakfast sacks for him to carry down the hill, along with a pair of skins, one for wine and one for water. He grabbed them up and headed off to the quay.

  “Ho there, sleepy head!” called his opa, in rare good spirits. “You are late. Before sun up, I said.”

  Krisseos waved at the sky where one by one bright points of light flashed into full illumination. “And so it is, not all the suns are yet lit.”

  “Pah!” was all Opa could manage.

  “Good morning Krisseos,” said the machine Kaibele. Both it and the old man sat on the boat’s gunwales. Mars’ tides were strong, and the boat had floated up off the pebbles to bob level with the jetty.

  For a split second, Krisseos’ brain jammed. No, he said to himself. No, not today. I refuse to be a stammering child. Not in front of her. “Morning,” replied Krisseos. He managed to smile. It got easier the longer he held the machine’s gaze.

  “Humph, you look different today. Less like the cat got your tongue.”

  “I feel different, Opa,” he said. He did, in truth; less burdened. His interest in the machine overcame his shyness. “Shall we get going?”

  “Aye,” said Opa, facing out to sea. “Tide’s turning, and will not wait on us.”

  Krisseos mimed along with his opa’s words to Kaibele. The machine smiled.

  Opa turned back to him and made his way to the rear. “Come on! Unhitch the lines, or we’ll spend our day sat in this boat on the beach rather than fishing.” He shook his head as he took his place at the tiller.

  Krisseos pushed the boat off the rough jetty with a boat hook. Carefully he rowed by those boats still in the harbour, coming to life at the hands of sleepy crews. The other villagers shouted out to them as they sculled past, good natured boasts and jibes. All were fond of Krisseos. He was the only youth in the village.

  When they rounded the harbour mole helping Barrafee Point close the cove to the open sea, Krisseos shipped the oars and began to unfurl the sails. The machine joined him, her hands expert and sure on the rigging. The canvas billowed out, a fair following wind pushing them out to join the vanguard of Barrafee’s small fishing fleet.

  The sky was clear, and the sun was hot on his skin. Kittiwakes skimmed the low swell in the wake of the boat.

  A thought suddenly occurred to him.

  “Machine, can you swim?”

  “Master Krisseos,” said the machine solemnly, “I cannot float.”

  They both laughed. At the rear of the boat, Krisseos’ opa shook his head, and hoped the boy remembered what he had said to him.

  The next fortnight passed quickly and easily. The machine was slender but strong, able to haul up nets with a speed Krisseos could not match. She was likewise an accomplished sailor. At her urging, the old man decided to take a break, allowing Krisseos and Kaibele out in their smack alone. About time, both the old and young man thought, if for slightly different reasons.

  Vardamensku’s trepidation about Krisseos’ attraction to the machine did not recede, but he was forced to admit she had brought the youth out of himself. His blushes became less frequent, his mood more even. Confidence blossomed in the boy, doubly so when Varka acquiesced to him taking the boat out alone.

  He wished at that moment that he had allow
ed him to do it earlier. Krisseos was becoming a man. For years, he had been hurrying him along, and now he realised that soon the boy would be gone altogether, and that – for all he had said to Krisseos – gave him cause for sorrow.

  At the very least, it appeared that he had ceased to worry about the remembering quite so much. All men have to have their heart broken at least once, he thought. That’s just the way of things. Why not by a machine?

  Still he worried.

  IT WAS THE night before Krisseos would leave the village for the remembering. His party was over, and they were alone. Himeks Moon stood huge in the sky, raising knives of white light from the ripples in the harbour. Further out, past the mole, the white tops hushed; the world breathing, Kaibele had said.

  Kaibele and Krisseos sat on the end of an old jetty, out away to the western end of the harbour, which Barrafee’s small river had long since filled with silt, making the water too shallow for the fishing boats. By Krisseos lay a skin of wine, a present from his opa. The old man had hoped to spend this last night of Krisseos’ ignorance with him, when he was still just the boy he had raised, before some other man looked out through his eyes and saw him differently, but he understood the passions of the young, for he had been young many times himself.

  “There are no houses out by the far end of the harbour now,” Krisseos was saying. “But you can see the bases of walls where the cottages used to be.” He gestured behind them up the hill, to where squares of white poked through the tough maquis like the teeth of dead giants. “I wonder, are they empty because the people moved to the east of the village when this part of the harbour silted up? Or was the town much bigger once? There are empty houses three streets up from us, but Opa says sometimes they will be full, and sometimes not. People come and go. It’s frustrating. Perhaps after the remembering I will know. If I take the remembering.” The shallow water was clear as air, fish whitened by moonlight flying beneath the soles of his feet. “Do you know if Barrafee was bigger once? It must be glorious to remember everything you ever did, back over time, back to the beginning.”