The God Mars Book One: CROATOAN (38 page)

He tries to keep up his cool appearance, but I can
see his eyes shifting. I wonder if he’s remembering his defeats by
the PK, who did not have aircraft and automated batteries.

“Earth will be returning, Farouk,” Abbas breaks the
silence, trying to take the conversation in a better direction.
“You call this man a corporate dog, but he does not stand for
them—you know that from history. He has indeed hunted those that
his infidel masters call ‘terrorists,’ but he also turned on those
same masters when they threatened innocent lives, putting his own
life at risk. I will be standing with him when Earth comes.”

“And what will happen then?” Farouk challenges. “What
will your good friend do against the might of Earth if they turn on
you? Make another speech?”

“Earth will do one of two things,” I tell him. “They
will try to reach out to those they feel they’ve abandoned here—I
expect that will be their first instinct. But if they are met with
violence—and I expect they will be, given what I’ve seen—then they
will try to take control of the situation by force. And while I
expect you could stand against them for a time—perhaps many
years—it will be costly, and life here is hard enough. Would you be
the one to start this cycle of murder, Farouk? Are your petty
aspirations worth a war you cannot control?”

“There are easily a dozen tribes that would start
such a war, even if I do not,” Farouk returns. “But my people—and
yours, Abbas—will be killed along with all the rest. Abbas,
Hassim—do either of you actually believe Earth will embrace you?
That they will not simply see you as pathetic scavengers and seek
to erase our way of life in the name of ‘rescuing’ us? And do so
with guns and bombs when we don’t happily comply?”

“I will make Earth understand your way of life, to
value and preserve it,” I try to reassure.

“And if the corporate colonial rush comes again?”
Farouk criticizes. “When the corrupt and powerful demand our lands
so they can reap their precious profits? When they send men like
this to kill our families if we do not bow down?”

“Then we need to be united against them,” Abbas says
it before I can. “We need to show them that we are a civilization
to be reckoned with, not violent beasts.”

“Your senile friend thinks he is Lawrence of Arabia,”
Farouk ridicules.

“T.E. Lawrence didn’t do the British—or the West—any
favors by uniting the Bedouins,” I remind him, shaking off the
insult. I feel Hassim shuffle his feet in the dirt next to me. He
lowers his head and grins under his mask.

“We need their bases, Abbas,” Farouk tries. “It is
the only way we can stand against them when they come.”

“A pair of tactical bunker-busters dropped from orbit
would eliminate that argument,” I tell him. “And you just being
there would be all the excuse they would need.”

“You are actually trying to convince us that you want
their base for all our sakes?” Hassim takes a more direct
challenge.

“If he had any hope of that, he wouldn’t have opened
with his petty claim of trespassing,” I add. Farouk looks like he’s
about to boil in his looted armor.

“You said that there were two things Earth might do?”
Abbas refocuses the conversation. I take a deep breath, grind my
own boots into the dirt.

“If they come fearing contamination, they will be
even more aggressive,” I warn. “They will not tolerate
any
resistance. Their mercy will be tempered by the fear that none of
us can be saved anyway. That is why we need to be standing ready to
receive them, so that they can see we are not some contagious
threat.”

“And be ready to run if they aren’t convinced,”
Farouk grumbles. “This is a deadly kind of foolishness, my
brothers. You are dealing with the Devil.”

“Why do you say this?” Abbas takes offense for
me.

“Because
we
will not be the reason Earth tries
to burn us again.” His eyes lock mine and glare accusingly. “You
know this too, Colonel Ram, yet you fail to address it: It will be
your Jinni friends that doom us. How will your Earth embrace them,
when they see what they have become?”

We stand together and watch while Farouk’s delegation
walks back to their line.

“I apologize for this, friend Ram,” Abbas offers. “We
have only wasted our cylinders.”

“Do not apologize for Farouk,” Hassim bites. “The
Colonel spoke true. Farouk is a dog who cares for nothing but his
own profit. He only seeks the means to prey on all of us.”

“Apologies are unnecessary,” I tell Abbas. “It was
important to meet Farouk. Or important that he met me. Hopefully
we’ve come to some kind of understanding.”

“It will not deter him from attacking you,” Hassim
warns.

“I know. But I’m hoping what I told him will spread
through his men, that they’ll come to realize how easily he’ll
sacrifice them to increase his own power.”

“That is not enough to sow dissent,” Hassim counters.
“His people know how ruthless he is. But that same
ruthlessness—combined with his intelligence—is what wins them lands
and prizes.”

“Even despite his defeat by the PK?”

“He is quite the politician,” Abbas appraises. “He
sold his stubbornness as resolve, his stupidity as bravery, his
callous sacrifices as a righteous cause of honor and God’s
will.”

“But he is a bad general,” Hassim counters, a bit of
his wry grin coming back.

“He called the Shinkyo leader by name,” I change the
subject. “Daimyo Hatsumi. How would he know that if the Shinkyo are
so secretive?”

“One story is that his Zauba’a is Shinkyo, or half
Shinkyo,” Abbas answers. “Perhaps an exile. If what you suspect is
right—that the Shinkyo kill those that fail—there may be some that
chose flight rather than falling on their swords.”

“But the term ‘daimyo’ refers to a feudal lord,” I
tell him. “A daimyo controls his lands, his estate, his own army,
but the title implies that he defers to a higher authority—an
emperor or Shogun. If Hatsumi saw himself as the absolute ruler of
his people, I’d think he would have given himself a more auspicious
title. Who could the Shinkyo be serving?”

“Maybe he is simply being humble,” Abbas tries, the
alternative being too disturbing to consider easily.

The lines of the three Nomad tribes fade into the
desert in their respective directions. We top off our oxygen
canisters at the tap, then hike back to the Lancer, which
Lieutenant Smith has already spun up for launch.

“Regretting making me take you along?” I question Tru
when she doesn’t say anything on the walk back.

“Wouldn’t have missed it,” she smiles under her mask.
“You’re sexy when you’re scary, though I’m thinking I should be
glad I didn’t actually have to face you in a colony siege. Much
nicer to be standing next to you, but I figure I’ve made that clear
already.”

Rios stays quiet all the way back to base, then
marches his team of troopers to dust-off and armor-racking as soon
as we’ve touched down. I consider going to talk to him, but decide
instead to give him time, let him soothe his pain in the routine of
his duties.

After my own dust-off, I change into PT gear and head
straight to the centrifuges even though I’m not scheduled again
until later this evening. When a slot comes open, I climb into my
assigned standing cell, clip into the safety harness, and plug into
MAI’s vitals monitors. Each centrifuge holds three-dozen personnel
at capacity, so it takes a few minutes to get everyone hooked in.
Then I wait for the spinner to start moving. The sensation is
initially disorienting, but then I feel my feet press into the cell
floor, and my body begins to become heavier. And then everything
starts to ache: not just the bones and the joints, but I can feel
the pull on my muscles, my organs, my skin. I watch the counter—it
hasn’t even reached .75G yet, but that’s still almost twice the
surface gravity I walk around in the rest of the time. I feel the
beginnings of dizziness as my heart works to keep the blood flowing
against the artificial gravity. My fingers and feet tingle. I
imagine the nanobuilders that Halley injects us with weekly—far
less “intelligent” than the ETE nanites, only capable of shuttling
essential calcium and other nutrients back into depleted bone
tissue—gearing up as the bones themselves complain of the strain.
There’s a slight vibration I can feel coming through the floor of
my cell, something that was found to passively encourage the bones
to fight decalcification.

At .82G I begin to sweat. I start moving my feet,
shifting my weight, working my muscles against the pull, running
through the standard routine. When I get tired, I work my
shoulders, my arms, my neck, then rotate back to legwork. By the
time MAI stabilizes us at 1G, I’m marching in place, but I feel
like I’ve been climbing a mountain. My leg muscles burn, my back
aches, my lungs feel like the air’s gone thin. The clock starts
counting down: fifteen minutes to go at this pressure.

Though the meeting with Farouk went just about as
badly as I’d expected, I can’t help but feel frustrated, especially
as we get closer to a real possibility of calling Earth. I feel
like I’ve gone back in time instead of forward—Farouk’s comparing
me to T.E. Lawrence was truer than he realized.

Abbas explained to me why the most dominant Nomad
tribes in Melas are direct descendants of the UME colonies of
Baraka and Uqba: while the other colonists tried desperately to
cling to their failing sites—or sought to build new ones—the UME
came from the cultures that embraced the desert wastes on
Earth—thriving where others could not—so doing the same on Mars
seemed only appropriate.

Baraka and Uqba were founded out in the open bowl of
the Melas valley, far away from their nearest “competitors” that
clung closer to the ridge-lines in hopes of yielding better water
and mineral resources. The UME engineers and geologists sought to
go deep, to try to reap what might be buried where it was likely
the last of the ancient free water drained into the planet. Down
deep, there might be greater water resources, more precious metals,
even sign of ancient life. When these projects reaped no greater
rewards than any of the other colonies, they adapted: they raced to
develop nanotech factories (though many of the established
corporations claimed they’d used industrial espionage to copy
existing research), driven by a belief that it was God’s own will
that His Faithful would come to dominate this world where they
failed to on Earth.

To allay the suspicion and outright hostility of the
other corporate endeavors, the UME also shifted their focus to
exploiting their physical location: so centrally located in regard
to the most booming colonies, they had ideal real estate for
providing inter-colony trade, transportation, and for supporting
deep-valley expeditions. The UME quickly became the go-to colonies
for bridging the vastness of Melas, and became indispensable in the
great land rush.

Only three minutes gone off the clock—my legs begin
to feel numb. I ease off my pace. The cell feeds me recycled water,
keeps me hydrated.

Beyond the open deserts of central Melas, Abbas tells
me, are other peoples we have yet to meet. Some the UME-descended
Nomads have driven back, others cling close to their original
colony sites. I doubt I’ll do any better with those tribes than I
have with Farouk or the Shinkyo, but I hold out hope for meeting
more like Abbas. But even if they are like Abbas, there will still
likely be bloodshed when we meet them. And if we have yet to shed
more blood fighting Farouk and the Shinkyo, we will have made our
reputation as Unmakers.

Five minutes gone. Pacing gets me my wind back, but
now my joints are popping. Old man. I’m an old man.

I didn’t tell Abbas about our plans to call out
within three months, to set up a transmitter in Candor. I had meant
to—it was one of the things I’d wanted to accomplish during the
“summit.” I know he would have warned me about the PK and the
Zodangans. Again. And I know he would have offered me whatever
support he could. But calling Earth—helping us might turn his own
people against him.

But
not
telling him… I find I’m too used to
keeping secrets, duty or not.

Old man. I pump my muscles harder, go outside of the
established spin routine, start shadow-boxing—fighting the air,
fighting my harness, fighting the artificial gravity. I push until
I start seeing spots. Slow down. Breathe. Drink. Then start in
again.

I miss being just another gun in the fight. Matthew
was wrong. I’m no diplomat. I can barely bring myself to do what
should be my first duty: call my superiors and report, even if it
means relief for my own command. Because I
am
afraid.

MAI checks in on me. I realize I’ve punched the steel
wall of my cell, possibly more than once. One of my knuckles is
bleeding. I don’t feel it.

“I’m fine, MAI. Just slipped…”

Old man.

And my enemies are young men.

Seven minutes gone. I’m not even half way done.

20 September, 2115:

I don’t even realize anything is amiss, not even when
my eyes focus on hers.

I wonder for an instant if that saved my life: that
not jumping up in a start and going for my gun—just laying here
like the sight of her in my room is not at all unexpected—keeps her
from showing me why she has the reputation she does.

Zauba’a Ghaddar.

“Good morning…” I tell her. No demands, no questions
about how she got in here or why she did so. I move slowly, no
threat, just trying to wake up like it’s any other morning. I don’t
even pull my blanket off to let me move more freely—I just shift to
sitting a little more up on my pillows. Give my eyes more time to
focus, to take in my situation. Get breathing. Get my blood
flowing. Warm my muscles up without looking like that’s what I’m
trying to do.