Vagabonds

by Hao Jingfang

  “On the day of Richard Sloan’s accident, Homeward Bound contacted UPC to explain that there was an emergency and asked UPC to grant a temporary, onetime license to the software. UPC refused, fearful that the temporary license might be hacked to enable the unauthorized use of the software indefinitely. Richard Sloan tried to call UPC during those fifty-one hours but was unable to reach a decision-maker. Initially my great-grandfather thought it was because low-level employees at UPC failed to escalate his issue properly, but later, as he attacked the executive officer of Homeward Bound to avenge his wife, the executive told him that his call had in fact been transferred to Phillip Lyde, the president of UPC, but Lyde personally issued the directive not to grant the temporary license.

  “But why did Lyde do such a thing? It turned out that my great-grandfather was employed by SG Siliconics, a chipmaker and UPC’s biggest competitor. UPC and SG Siliconics were locked in a heated battle over a particular large customer, and my great-grandfather, whose specialty was mining and refining, had been surveying the area behind Angela Bluff for a potential site for a new mine. There’s probably no way to ever find definitive proof of the detailed commercial interests and private emotions behind this incident, but the executive officer told my great-grandfather that Lyde said on the phone, ‘The baby isn’t my problem, but my shareholders will never allow me to jeopardize three hundred billion euros.’ Consumed by rage, my great-grandfather let the UPC executive go and went after Phillip Lyde instead.”

  “That is complicated,” said Anka.

  “You haven’t heard the most complicated part yet,” said Luoying. She had memorized practically everything she had read in the Registry. She had never devoted as much effort to memorizing anything in her life. “One week after Richard Sloan committed murder and became a fugitive, he was captured. But one week after that, he was rescued and made into the leader of the rebel alliance.”

  “What’s the rebel alliance?”

  “That’s the predecessor to the Martian Freedom Fighters.”

  “What kind of people were they?”

  “Just ordinary people. Pilots, engineers, scientists. They came from all the Martian bases.”

  Anka silently pondered what Luoying had said.

  She went on. “There was a great deal of controversy about this part, and I couldn’t read all the material or memorize it. All kinds of reasons were proffered for the war, and these debates filled many pages in both my grandfather’s and great-grandfather’s files.”

  Anka nodded. “I imagine that the war didn’t erupt by chance. The unfortunate events surrounding your grandfather’s birth might be accidents, but the rebel alliance didn’t arise because of that. My feeling is that they had been waiting for a triggering event.”

  “I think that’s right,” said Luoying. “But I still can’t figure out how the accident was connected to the war that erupted right after.”

  “Let me see …” Anka looked deep in thought. “I think there are two important clues: one is the competition between UPC and SG Siliconics, and the other is the IP dispute between Homeward Bound and UPC. Given the importance of the central archive to Mars, it seems that the latter was more likely the reason. Or maybe both were involved.”

  “Maybe. But do you think these two causes are enough to lead to war? I just can’t see how commercial or IP disputes can lead to war—a war that killed so many.”

  “It’s very hard to understand such large historical events from our position.”

  Luoying was seized by a sudden wave of emotion. She had been trying hard to describe the events dispassionately, to be objective, but grief overwhelmed her at that moment. “I hate asking these questions. To think that my great-grandmother died in such a horrible way … I wish I could be like everyone else, focused only on home and family, but I can’t. I have to ask the big questions, to pursue the truth. I have to know whether what my great-grandfather did was right. Why did he lead everyone to build this new world? Was his rebellion right?”

  Anka put an arm around her shoulders and caressed her hair. “I don’t know about the new world or the old, but I do know it was wrong to leave two people and their newborn in the dust storm. Your great-grandfather did what he felt he had to do. The war that came after wasn’t something a single man could have controlled.”

  He kissed her forehead, and as she gazed into his lake-like irises, tears spilled from her eyes. She leaned against his shoulders, lost to the tides of her emotions. She could see, in her mind’s eye, that looming cliff with its rough red surface standing in the howling wind. The swirling dust and sand was like a mask that had been peeled off and shattered into a million fragments, covering the sun, devoid of all concern and restraint, attacking every life in sight with a naked, savage will. The fragments were like an army in which the only soul was collective, and the vortex of dust and sand surrounded the abandoned ship. Inside, two people, still ignorant of what fate held in store for them, leaned together, as she and Anka were doing now, keeping each other warm with body heat, still trusting in false hope, enduring cold, hunger, and the pangs of labor, supported by the sweet expectation of a newborn and the warm anticipation of rescue, telling each other that everything would be all right to disguise their rising anxiety, pushing the diminishing supply of food and water to the partner, knowing nothing of the tumultuous changes to come. That was the pair’s final shared moment of mutual reliance.

  Luoying’s vision blurred. She refused to sob, and the tears swirled in her eyes until they finally returned to the depth of her heart.

  She sat up and looked expectantly at Anka. “Do you think we can go visit the site of the crash?”

  “I don’t know.” Anka hesitated before continuing. “We can ask Runge’s mining group to see if there’s still a mine out there.”

  “Does your squadron fly there?”

  “No. All our training is limited to north of the cliffs.”

  “Can’t you fly there on your own?”

  “That will be hard.”

  “Because of regulations?”

  “Only partly.” Anka shook his head. “The technical challenge is a much bigger problem.”

  As he continued to explain, his long, bony fingers flitted through the air, imitating different types of aircraft.

  “It’s not hard to obtain a flight permit,” he said. “But even the smallest ship I can get to is about the size of five tube train cars.” His fingers sketched out the shape of a long loaf of bread. “We’ll need at least three trained crew members, two to pilot the ship and one to oversee the engine. Also, something like that has to fly close to the ground and probably can’t climb over the mountains.”

  “Why does it have to fly close to the ground?”

  “These ships rely on ground effects to achieve lift. They can’t go too high.”

  “What about shuttles?”

  Anka shook his head. “They’re completely different. A space shuttle is essentially a rocket, not an aircraft. The larger shuttles are restricted to flying official missions such as visits to Deimos. Also, the pilot isn’t completely in control of a shuttle. Shuttles depend on ground control and guidance, and are only semiautonomous. As for the smaller atmospheric shuttles …”

  Luoying waited, but Anka seemed to hesitate, unsure how to continue.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Luoying.

  “The smaller shuttles are actually fighters,” said Anka. His tone was still even, but there was a trace of a bitter smile at the corners of his mouth. “They rely on omnidirectional jets for propulsion. Piloted by a single person, they are very nimble and effective. I can certainly take mine out on private missions … except the one Fitz assigned to me is broken. I can’t repair it yet because I lack the replacement parts.”

  “Why did you get assigned a broken fighter?”

  “He claimed that he wanted me to demonstrate what I’ve learned on Earth,” said Anka with a laugh. “The real reason is the argument I had with him. When I returned, I was supposed to get
one that was in good condition, but after that night I got one that couldn’t fly. I’m tired of fighting, so I’m still thinking of a way to fix it.”

  “How can he treat you like that?” asked Luoying. “You should file a complaint. It’s not fair.”

  “Not fair? Nothing is ever fair.”

  “Then you haven’t flown since you’ve been back?”

  “No. I’ve been serving as a mechanic.”

  “Didn’t you learn to fix aircraft on Earth? Maybe you can just do the same thing.”

  “It’s not that easy,” said Anka. “Aircraft on Earth generate lift from the atmosphere. Lift is directly proportional to the dynamic pressure, one half of pressure times velocity squared. Since the Martian atmospheric pressure is only about one percent of the pressure on Earth, while the gravity is around thirty-eight percent, the same aircraft from Earth essentially must fly about six times as fast to stay aloft on Mars. That translates to a velocity of thousands of kilometers per hour, which is unsustainable without special materials. Since our aircraft don’t rely on the atmosphere to generate lift, they require much more power and higher energy conversion efficiency from the engines, which are far more complex than the ones on Earth. Even if I could learn everything I need to, I can’t fix some of the valves and components by hand.”

  Luoying sighed, looking at Anka sympathetically. “You know, I’m beginning to miss that old junker of yours.”

  Anka laughed and gazed warmly into her eyes. “I told you so. And you wouldn’t believe me at the time.”

  Anka had taken Luoying flying on Earth. It was unlike any of the flying taxis Luoying had taken. Anka had acquired a retired old fighter and removed all the weapons systems and other extraneous structures until it was basically a flying engine that he could pilot around for fun. Though the airplane rode turbulence about as well as a fifty-year-old donkey, it could achieve much higher altitudes than ordinary private aircraft.

  As soon as Luoying landed, she threw up. Anka laughed while she berated him for not warning her about what to expect. He told her that she would miss that plane someday, but she was adamant that such a day would never come. “Never” turned out not to be so long.

  She still remembered that dusk. Her stomach roiled as though there were a storm inside, but her heart was shaking with astonished pleasure. She had never seen clouds like that, as bright and colorful as rainbows, stretching from beneath the airplane’s wings to the horizon. The gigantic setting sun glowed an orange-red in the distance, while the puffy clouds were lit up from within, billowing in every hue. The transition between the colors was seamless, from white to gold to crimson to deep purple, and the whole sight was as magnificent as a sacred church or temple. Once in a while, blue sky peeked out from between the colorful cloud patches.

  Sitting before her in the pilot’s seat, Anka pointed out various sights outside the canopy. She clutched him from behind tightly, leaning against his shoulder, so excited that she felt she couldn’t breathe.

  Such beautiful clouds on that day, she thought. I’ll never see clouds like that again. There were no clouds on Mars, so even if she were to fly again, she wouldn’t see anything like it. The occasion on which Anka had taken her turned out to be the only time. They had flown once and only once.

  Abruptly, Anka reached out to caress her forehead. “Don’t pine after something you can’t have. If I could fly, I would have done so long before now.”

  Luoying looked at him with a heavy heart. She knew he was telling the truth. He loved flying far more than she did, and if he told her he couldn’t fly his broken fighter, then that was final. Anka was sitting on the bench in the Registry hall with a relaxed posture, one hand on the back of the seat behind her, the other resting in his lap. But she could see the defiance beneath his smile, a defiance that made her sad. She didn’t know what to say to him.

  She tried to change the topic instead. “I also found a medal. In the Registry, I mean.”

  “What sort of medal?”

  “It belonged to my great-grandfather. Do you remember the medals they gave out to our heroes during the war?”

  “Yes. There’s an eagle on it—a desert eagle.”

  “That’s right. But it wasn’t until today that I learned that the desert eagle wasn’t the original design by my great-grandfather. The desert eagle came into use only later in the war, after the other leaders of the rebel alliance decided on a change.”

  “So what was your great-grandfather’s original design?”

  “An apple.”

  “What?” Anka blurted, almost laughing.

  “Yes, an apple.” She held out her hand and opened her fingers. “See?”

  Anka picked up the tiny copper-colored medal and admired it.

  “There wasn’t a lot of explanation in his file,” said Luoying. “I don’t know why Richard Sloan picked this design.”

  “It’s a bit …” Anka paused, searching for the right word. “… unusual.”

  “What came to your mind as soon as you saw it?”

  “Paris and the pageant of goddesses.”

  “Possible.” Luoying nodded. “As a metaphor for the origin of the war? Using the bloody fields of Troy to comment on the present?” She paused and looked down at her own hand. “That wasn’t what I was thinking. My immediate reaction was another story.”

  “Which one?”

  “Eden.”

  “You think … the apple is a metaphor for mankind’s rebellion against God?”

  “No,” said Luoying softly. “I wasn’t thinking of anything grand like that. I can’t tell you if Earth was meant to represent Eden, and the meaning behind Mars’s rebellion. But I thought of a man looking at the woman next to him, silently saying in his heart, ‘For you, I’m willing to fall.’ ”

  Anka said nothing, but his arm tightened around Luoying’s shoulders.

  “My grandfather lost his mother,” Luoying continued in her low voice. “My father lost his mother, and I lost mine. Maybe all the women in my family have to die young—”

  “Don’t be silly,” Anka broke in. “During the war years, almost a third of our people died. It’s nothing out of the ordinary.”

  “But maybe it’s my fate.”

  “No! These are unfortunate coincidences, that’s all. There’s no fate.”

  Luoying looked at Anka, who appeared to be unusually serious. Something caught in her throat, and she felt fragile. She didn’t know why she was saying such pessimistic things, but she felt that after learning the tragic history of her family, she could imagine only a tragic future to achieve some measure of balance in her mind. She felt absolutely exhausted, unable to move forward, helpless. Against the irresistible tide of fate, an individual’s struggles were useless. It was so simple to wipe out a life, as easy as wind blowing away dust. She sobbed against Anka’s shoulder. Without saying anything, he held her, supporting her back with his steady arm.

  For a long time they sat next to each other on the bench in a corner of the magnificent empty hall. Towering bronze statues stretched before them in two rows, like living gods gazing down at them, perpetual enigmas between the thick gray columns. The hall stretched far into the distance, where Greek letters spelled out FATE, POETRY, and WISDOM. Silence enveloped the hall, devoid of the signs of any other person.

  ROCK

  When she was discharged, Luoying didn’t think she would be returning to the hospital for a while. But at the Registry she had read something about Dr. Reini, an episode in Reini’s past that he hadn’t told her. She decided to go ask him about it.

  Two days after she left the place, she once again pushed open the hospital doors. She cared about this episode not only because it was the reason Reini became a doctor but also because it had to do with Hans Sloan. In fact, the event was the key that linked them. Because of it, Reini chose to specialize in neurology and ended up treating her. Because of it, Reini came to know Hans and won his friendship and trust, therefore receiving the privilege of accessing the R
egistry of Files. Because of this connection, her grandfather entrusted her to Reini, and Reini gave her the power to see the files. Everything depended on this occurrence in the past.

  And it turned out to be an error. Luoying found the situation worth pondering. Whose error was it? She couldn’t say. There was apparently no villain, but Reini had been harmed and lost much in life.

  Luoying read Reini’s file. As a young man, he had studied in the labs of many systems, ranging from the machine center to the Classical Philosophy Atelier, until he picked biomimetic engineering as his concentration at eighteen and, thereafter, at age twenty, entered the production lab of the biomimetic engineering center, where he studied animals and machines, their structures and locomotion.

  The third year after he joined the lab, a mining vehicle suffered an accident: a biomimetic quarry machine exploded and burned up during trials. Though there were no casualties, the damage to equipment was considerable. The investigators combed through the burned and broken remains slowly until they isolated the cause of the incident to an electrical leak in a sensor subsystem. Due to the extensive fire that melted many of the components, it was not an easy investigation, and the precise cause—a design flaw, a production error, or a mistake during assembly—could not be determined.

  As always happened after every major accident, despite the uncertainties, a committee was formed to hold those responsible accountable. After three days of detailed testimony from dozens at all levels of the system, and another three days of discussions between the Boule investigative committee and the consul, the final result was announced: only Reini would be punished.

  “How did they determine it was your fault?” asked Luoying.