Mars Descent (Cladespace Book 2)

by Corey Ostman

  “I understand why you’d need heat,” she said, “but why do you have breathable air?”

  “Excellent air, at that,” Richard added.

  “Will the carbon dioxide we’re all pumping into your dome cause any problem?” Raj asked.

  “Please,” Planar said, raising one hand, “it is all very simple. Most of the equipment on the Essex was designed for a human standard atmosphere, including its citizens. We modified Essex life support in order to adapt it for its new home.”

  Richard nodded. “What about the heat?”

  “We divert enough from the geyser field to keep a constant temperature,” Planar said.

  A message from Raj flashed on Anna’s ptenda: The life support isn’t just a holdover from the Essex. Did you notice Planar’s skin?

  Anna fingered her ptenda: Yes. Metarm as a nano-mesh. Used for human surgery and only flexible around standard temperature and pressure.

  Planar looked from Raj to Anna, but didn’t immediately speak. She watched his eyes. Almost human, she thought. She could have sworn she saw anxiety, or exasperation, cross his face.

  “If you all would just be patient, I can tell you more, or, if not myself, find others who know more.”

  The airlock opened. Anna stepped outside, blinking in the bright light, stronger than Martian noon. They stood inside a massive dome—not quite as large as Elysium, but nearly so—and it wasn’t transparent, but a brilliant blue. Like all of the pictures of Earth sky.

  The group was silent, looking around. There were dozens of buildings in the dome. Most of them were cubical, though she saw other angular shapes, and a few that had more organic forms. The buildings were differing shades of orange, not dissimilar from the gravel where the Scout had landed. They were connected, not by a Cartesian grid, but by meandering pathways, as if following the contours of gentle hillsides where none were present.

  But where was the infrastructure? Anna couldn’t see any signs of electrical distribution, nor any of the trappings of life support systems. If they weren’t using machines, she would have expected to see more green, like the vast plant-buildings of Elysium Planitia.

  We were expecting a wrecked ship, she thought, not a newly minted civilization.

  “It reminds me of adobe back home,” Raj said. He looked around. “Staggering.”

  But where were the others? Planar had mentioned over a hundred robots, but she heard no movement, nor voices. There were no twofers in sight. The city seemed empty.

  Planar continued. “Just, if you please, stay with me while in the city, at least until we meet—”

  A sound. Like a wailing siren interrupted.

  Planar’s eyes darted to his right.

  “Uh, what was that?” Raj asked. The sound still reverberated under the dome.

  “A twofer?” said Anna.

  Planar shook his head. “No, we do not make such sounds. But perhaps the acoustics of the dome—”

  “Shh!” Anna cocked her head. There it was again. This time it had the fullness of words.

  “Somebody’s shouting!” exclaimed Raj.

  “It came from there,” Mazz said, pointing at a cluster of buildings.

  Anna watched Planar’s eyes drift in the same direction, linger, and then dart back to her. She clenched her jaw.

  “Let’s go,” she said, walking briskly.

  Planar caught up quickly. She had the distinct feeling that he was trying to speed up and get in front.

  “Which building is that?” Richard asked from behind.

  “It is our Chamber of Assessment. Where we gather to make collective decisions,” Planar said.

  “Those inside are meeting to assess someone?” Raj asked.

  “Quint.” Anna said, feeling adrenaline in her fingertips.

  Planar twitched. “I am uncertain,” he said. “But I believe this is the man who piloted Quint Brown to Essex City.”

  “You let them inside your city?” Raj exclaimed.

  “We let you inside,” Planar noted.

  “We’re not murderers!” Anna said.

  “And you’re not on trial,” countered Planar.

  “Is that why you let him in? Because you knew what he was? Somehow I don’t think so,” Anna said.

  “He offered to help us.”

  Anna stopped and searched Planar’s face. Did the twofer realize how ridiculous his statement sounded? Quint helping robots?

  “Planar, you’ve been had.”

  “I agree,” Planar murmured.

  Another scream hit and the sound raced down Anna’s spine. It was so close, so plaintive.

  “Quint! Help me!”

  “I’m going in there,” said Anna, rushing up the stairs. Planar took two quick steps and stood in front of her.

  “Please, you must—” He started anxiously, then his voice calmed. “You must not enter. The Chamber of Assessment is only for us. For citizens.”

  “Why would the robots meet in one place? They’re all connected, aren’t they?” Raj asked.

  “It is our custom. A vestige from before we were linked,” Planar responded.

  “And it is our custom to help,” said Anna. She walked around Planar, following the ramp up and into a rust-colored cube of a building.

  It was dark. Raj reached out to clasp her hand. She took it, grateful for his enhanced optics while her eyes adjusted to the dim light. In a few moments she could see they were standing behind a large seating area facing a dais. Twofers occupied seats, even the ones a meter in front of where she and Raj stood. Nobody turned around to look at them.

  The platform was lit. In the light sat twelve twofers on high-back chairs. A thirteenth stood at the center of the group. All were dressed in white jumpers resembling uniforms worn by cruiser personnel from years past. The assembly reminded Anna of a dome council, but with more overt majesty. Humans often desired the rule of kings. What use it provided to robots was beyond her comprehension.

  Nobody spoke. Not the thirteen twofers. Not the audience. But there was the sound of torment in the room. To the far left of the platform stood a man, sobbing, head and torso slumped. His arms were behind his back. Restrained. A twofer stood nearby with an arm behind the prisoner’s back. Anna blinked. The twofer looked female. It had long hair and a slighter, rounded figure.

  On second glance, Anna noticed other female renditions in the audience, and among those on the dais. Some of the females sported breast-like structures under their clothing. Wider hips. Hair variations. And Anna saw some of the males actually simulated facial hair. There was no twofer androgynous default here. Even the ones without an obvious binary gender had blended characteristics rather than none. They have deliberately chosen to perform gender in a physical way, she realized. Why?

  Raj moved closer to her as they kept to the shadows in the back of the room.

  “Maybe we should leave,” Raj whispered.

  “How do you suggest…” Anna began, then trailed off into silence as the twofer at the center of the dais raised her right hand and turned toward the sobbing man.

  “Robert Crusp, you have attempted to destroy Essex City, and today we assess your fate.”

  Chapter 34

  Quint sucked his left cheek between his molars and bit down. Yes, he had been cautioned not to injure himself during gene therapy. But he needed to stop his vestigial phasewave tremors, and pain was the surest method. His right cheek had given him enough control to nearly make it back to his ship. Now his left cheek would see him through the hatch.

  He clenched his jaw, pinching his eyes shut, feeling tears pool and trickle down his cheeks.

  Better.

  He stood up and looked ahead, his balance wobbly. It was dark. Negative for heat sources. He blinked through the helmet menu and turned on his visor lights. The shimmering waypoint of his ship winked ahead.

  Quint figured he had an hour to spare while Donner and the others were distracted with twofer town. Long enough to patch himself up. Then he’d circle back to do his dama
ge.

  A few more steps brought Quint alongside his ship. He entered an access code and the small rear hatch opened. The hold was empty now, but it would soon be filled with thorium.

  Quint pulled the safecase from his belt and popped its latches. A purple light glowed from within. Inside was the horrific wonder of Essex City, stolen and ready to use, an abomination to destroy an abomination. Microscopic artificial life created by twofers. Pawns.

  Quint self-consciously touched his glove to the back of his suit collar. Inside, his neck was still sore. The twofers had been surprised by his suggestion, but they had dutifully performed the injection. He now had pawns in the base of his skull, and with them, he could modify the pawns in the safecase. The aposti loathed technology as a rule, but modification for victory was necessary. He would get the filth removed soon.

  As the lid rose, a tenuous cloud flowed from the safecase and hovered in front of Quint’s helmet. The cloud looked like a small purple sandstorm, with its shifting light and tiny arcs of lightning white.

  Bring your energy there, he thought at the pawns, pointing to the cargo hold. “Begin now.”

  He knew he didn’t need to speak nor point, as his skull implant would provide the link, but instinct proved difficult to suppress.

  The purple cloud shifted and swirled through the cargo area, circling the hold and then regrouping above the ship.

  Begin now.

  The purple haze dissipated, and he was alone with his ship. Soon the pawns would return with thorium and he could leave this place, destroying at the same time nearly the whole of the Martian twofer plague. People would learn to do work for themselves again.

  An irritating orange light blinked inside his helmet. He turned his attention to his visor. Loafer L-1R412 telemetry streamed in. The drone had awakened from stasis early. Malfunction? It should have targeted its weapons on Donner and then performed a self-destruct.

  Quint blinked through his visor menu, selecting the loafer’s command and control address.

  “L-1R412, halt and open port five.”

  Quint ran through his files to retrieve the loafer’s program, then stopped. The loafer hadn’t halted.

  “I told you, L-1R412, halt and open port—”

  He dropped to the ground as a phasewave blast erupted from the loafer and dissipated along the conductive surface of his ship.

  “L-1R412, L-1R412, stop!”

  Quint scrambled behind the ship. The loafer whizzed past, arching over the cave. Had the loafer stayed low, Quint could have hidden behind the ship, tried to change its programmed target, but he knew now he wouldn’t have time. He needed to destroy the drone before it killed him.

  The loafer was now two meters above the ground, but Quint’s ship was close enough to the wall to prevent a clean shot. So the loafer took a series of dirty shots at the cavern wall. Shards of stone erupted overhead. Pebbles ticked the top of his helmet.

  Quint circled, keeping as much metal between him and the loafer as possible. He saw the ripple of another phasewave blast as electrical arcs zipped down the fuselage toward his hiding place. He kept a few centimeters between himself and the hull so that the phasewave charge couldn’t use the ship as a conductor to his pressure suit.

  The loafer was making another pass, increasing its altitude. It would soon be high enough to target him no matter where he was. He needed a steady shot, but could only risk touching the ship between loafer blasts. Quint rested his right arm against the ship’s vertical stabilizer and aimed his phasewave. The loafer flew right into his sights.

  “No match for a human,” he smirked.

  A shot from the loafer tore the weapon from Quint’s hands in an agony of electricity. He fell back with a shout, away from the ship. With hands still spasming from the blast, he fumbled for anything that would help him. There. A rock.

  Quint’s eyes locked on the red circuit egg in the loafer’s torso. He raised his hand. It shook. He knew he’d only have one chance. He waited for the loafer to rotate for its next shot.

  But to his surprise, the loafer paused.

  Quint waited. His heart pounded in his skull. Nothing happened.

  “What are you waiting for!” he shouted.

  The loafer shimmered, a streak of purple widening near the circuit egg. Then, as Quint watched, pawns began to envelop the loafer. Its phasewave cannon twitched, unable to lock onto a target. A purple cloud surrounded the machine.

  Quint lowered his hand. He hadn’t consciously thought of using pawns against the loafer, but his implant must have conveyed his fear nonetheless. The pawns had acted in his defense. They were tearing the loafer apart.

  Quint watched as the broken machine spun and crashed to the ground.

  Chapter 35

  Grace banged on the airlock with the butt of her P86. The clang echoed down the empty tunnel.

  “Hey!” she shouted. She didn’t have time for this. Quint was out there, and she didn’t think the loafer would do more than stall him. She needed to find out why he was here, needed to contact the Scout and warn them. This was a damned stupid time for her engineers to go off chasing shiny things.

  “I don’t think that’s going to get us in,” Tim said.

  “Fine,” said Grace, glowering. “You found the hidden door, so what’s your plan?”

  “I think I can guess the combination for you. See that keypad?”

  “Yeah.” Grace flipped it open.

  Tim settled at her feet. “Try and keep up.”

  “Will I need four paws for this?”

  Tim snorted. “Ready?”

  “Ready.”

  “One. Seven. Two. Two. Zero. One. Eight. Nine. Zero. Five. One. Alpha. Two. Three. Three. Zero. Seven. Gamma. Two. Nine. Alpha. Six. Six. One. Four. Omega. Four. Five. Nine. Rho. Two. Three. Four. Zero. Zero.”

  She kept pace with his instructions. When he stopped, she turned to him, her finger still poised over the panel. “That was a guess?”

  “Tí tákhiston? Noûs. Dià pantòs gàr trékhei,” Tim said.

  “What?”

  “You pressed the correct buttons. I thought you knew Greek.”

  “Greek letters. Why would a protector need to know Greek?”

  “Khalepà tà kalá.”

  “Do I want to know what that means?”

  “You could learn Greek.” Tim cocked his head and let his blue tongue loll out.

  Grace grumbled and pressed UNLOCK.

  They entered the airlock and waited for pressure. Soon the inner access panel winked green. Grace clicked off her helmet and breathed in the air. Nice.

  “Ready, Tim?”

  Tim barked an affirmative.

  “And UNLOCK,” Grace said, pressing the large button.

  The door opened and Grace glimpsed a beautiful sky and buildings of clay. She took one step forward but stopped as she heard a yelp in her dot.

  “What is it?”

  Tim did not immediately answer and Grace turned to look at him. His blue tongue hung low and was retracting slowly. He was processing.

  “Grace. When you opened the hatch. Voices.” Tim panted. “Many voices. All at once. The door must have been blocking the signal from within. I’m trying—”

  Grace knelt beside him. “Is there anything I can do, Tim?”

  “Trying to—isolate. Too many.” Tim sounded panicked.

  A pair of twofers approached and stood at attention. Grace rose, a cautionary hand on her phasewave. One twofer looked similar to Planar: nearly two meters tall, with short black hair, red eyes, and a pale green complexion. The other was female. Female. Grace stared. She hadn’t realized how much robots were made to resemble men until she met one that didn’t. The female robot was shorter and rounder, with brown hair fixed in a complex geometric form. Both wore unadorned gray.

  The taller one stooped down to get nearer to the PodPooch.

  “The Tim! We welcome you to Essex City.”

  “Filters…” Tim faltered.

  “Where are our
friends?” Grace said.

  The female twofer pointed to a group of buildings. Then she, too, knelt before the PodPooch.

  “The Tim, will you allow us to escort you?” she asked.

  Tim said nothing. Grace cleared her throat.

  “Tim is experiencing—”

  “Nothing! Nothing,” Tim said finally, retracting his tongue. “I can manage now.”

  The twofers rose and escorted Tim and Grace to a large, rusty cube of a building. As they walked, Grace looked around her. The blue ceiling and bright light made this the closest to Earth she’d seen since she landed on Mars. While many of the buildings were square, they complemented one another. None seemed situated as an afterthought. The paths followed contours in the ground, so the whole of the city seemed natural. It was quiet, too. Relaxing.

  Tim was pensive as they walked up a ramp to the cube-building’s doors. Once there, the escorts stopped and gestured for Grace and Tim to enter. Apparently the twofers weren’t going in.

  Grace looked down at Tim. “Are you…?”

  “Fine.”

  Grace shrugged. “All right then. Let’s see if they have a red carpet for you.”

  She opened the doors. Once her eyes adjusted, she was surprised to see Raj, Anna, Richard, Mazz, and Planar right there, as if they had just walked in. They faced away, toward a stage-like structure in the center of the room. There was a meeting going on and—was that a sobbing man on the dais? She peered closer. It wasn’t Quint. She heard the man moan. His hands were behind his back. He was in pain.

  “What the hell’s going on here!” she yelled.

  The people on the stage and the entire audience turned their heads in unison. Grace swallowed. They weren’t people. They were all twofers. Their eyes locked on her and stared. So many. Seconds passed as everybody remained motionless, save for the prisoner on the stage, his body language and struggle betraying him as human.

  Grace edged toward her team, shooting a glance at Raj.

  “I should have anticipated,” began one of the female twofers on the dais. Her voice was measured and forceful, not lithe and rhythmic like Planar’s. “Should have known that the curiosity and determination of your kind would lead you to our home.”