The Long Mars (7 page)

Up there too was Roberta Golding, the very young, very slim, evidently very smart and now pretty famous young woman who had rocketed from internship to a place in the President’s kitchen cabinet in the space of a few years. Golding, as it happened, had once gone out with the Chinese on their own far-East expedition, as a western student on some kind of scholarship programme. She’d been only fifteen at the time, a rung in the ladder for her spectacular subsequent career. In fact Golding had worked with Maggie’s XO, Nathan Boss, advising on the planning of the new expedition to be launched today. Maggie supposed Golding had earned her place on the platform.

Surrounding the party was the usual apparatus of presidential security, including drone aircraft buzzing overhead, and marines stationed around the podium, heavily armed, watchful, some of them sporadically stepping into neighbouring worlds to keep a check on any threat coming from that invisible direction. Further out, a perimeter of police, military and civilian security kept the crowds at a respectable distance from the action. But these crowds were nothing like the numbers you’d once have got in Datum Washington, DC, Maggie thought, on such a day. They were mostly dressed in clothes befitting a still-young colonial city, coveralls and practical overcoats rather than suits, home-made moccasins and boots rather than patent leather shoes. And there were many, many little kids in their number. Since Yellowstone, indeed long before that great dividing line in history, the populations of the stepwise Americas had been booming, and now Cowley’s own policies with handouts and tax breaks were encouraging bigger families yet.

And beyond that the scattered sprawl of this new Madison spread away. The wide avenues and open development allowed Maggie a view all the way to the lakes that defined the geography of Madison on all the stepwise worlds, calm, ice white rimmed by blue, glittering in the low January sun. Within the framework of the sparse, elegant, very modern city planning bequeathed by this stepwise community’s original founders, smart new establishments that catered for the recent influx of politicos and staffers sat side by side with more practical enterprises, such as stables for your
horse
, not a hundred yards from the Capitol itself. It was nothing like the clutter of the Datum original before the nuke. But it was a beguiling mix of American traditions old and new.

Nobody begrudged Brian Cowley a Constitution-bending FDR-style third term. The consensus seemed to be that whatever the murky processes that had first propelled Brian Cowley to office back in 2036 – at the head of his destructive, divisive, ‘Humanity First’ anti-stepper movement – he’d stepped up to the plate when the supervolcano had gone up during his innings. Continuity in what was still an ongoing crisis had to be a good strategy, there was no alternative candidate right now who would obviously do a better job – and everybody could see how much the burden was taking out of Cowley himself, who was ageing before everybody’s eyes, live on TV. In fact his unofficial election slogan had been ‘It’s hurting me more than it’s hurting you.’

But with his background as a bar-room barnstormer, he did like to put on a performance.

Joe Mackenzie grumbled to Maggie now, as they waited in the gathering crowd, ‘What’s the man going to do, wait until we all pass out?’

‘Don’t exaggerate, Mac. The whole thing is a show. This expedition of the
Armstrong
and the
Cernan
, I mean. And damned expensive. We’ve had to wait for years to do this, while we all worked on the Yellowstone recovery. You can’t blame Cowley for milking the moment, that’s the whole point of it for him.’

‘Hmm,’ Mac grunted sceptically. He glanced around at the crews of the two craft in Maggie’s small squadron, his expression sour. ‘Some expedition.’

Maggie saw her people through his eyes: the Navy crew, the squads of marines adding some muscle. In there was Captain Ed Cutler, whom every man and woman in Maggie’s old command had once seen run nutso in Valhalla. There was the small Chinese contingent in their oddly ill-fitting uniforms, a non-negotiable offering of friendship, cooperation and so forth that had been part of the deal that had delivered the advanced Chinese stepper technologies for the US Navy’s newest ships.

And there were the trolls, three of them, a small family, wearing the armband stripes that designated them as co-opted members of Maggie’s crew. They were visibly unhappy to be stuck in a Low Earth, a world crowded with humanity’s stink and suffused with the peculiar mental pressure that generally kept trolls away from dense human populations – yet here they were, and Maggie allowed herself to be pleased by their loyalty.

But Joe Mackenzie appreciated little of this. Approaching sixty, Mac, a veteran of too many years in inner-city emergency departments and battlefield medicine, had become a walking, talking definition of cynicism, Maggie thought – even if there was nobody else she’d sooner have at her side on this first expedition of
Armstrong
and
Cernan
. And now his expression was stony.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Maggie said.

‘Do you?’

‘“What a damn circus.”’

‘That’s the polite version.’

‘Mac, this mission is kind of – complicated. We carry a freight of symbolism. The overt purpose of it is to go further stepwise than any ship before us, even those Chinese ships before Yellowstone. But the deeper meaning is that we’ll be a visible demonstration of the recovery of America – we’ll show that Americans can do more than just shovel ash. Mac, we’ll go down in history.’

‘Or in flames.’

‘And you’ll be there to salve the wounds as always.’

‘Look, Maggie, I know I’m a crusty old bastard. But as far as I’m concerned all this American-destiny stuff is a lot of hooey. Cowley’s only true objective for this trip is just as it was when we went out in the
Franklin
, all those years ago, when Valhalla was boiling up to rebel. To project federal power across the Aegis. To remind those uppity colonials and combers out there who’s boss. And as far as
I’m
concerned, our only worthwhile mission objective is to find what became of the crew of the
Armstrong I
.’

‘Fair enough. Glad to have you aboard anyhow. Oh, by the way, I’m bringing the cat.’

He flared. ‘God dammit, Maggie, why don’t you just stick pins in my eyes?’

Suddenly, shadows from the sky striped across the square.

Maggie tipped up her head to see, and shielded her eyes. Precisely at noon, three airships had appeared above their heads.

The two brand new Navy craft, the USS
Neil A
.
Armstrong II
, and the USS
Eugene A. Cernan
, were whales in the sky. Their predecessors, including Maggie’s own old command the
Franklin
, based on Long-Mississippi commercial twain technology, had been a little smaller than the venerable
Hindenburg
. The new
Armstrong
, like its sister, was nearly half as long again, topping out at more than a thousand feet from stem to stern, not counting a protruding comms antenna and massive tail planes mounted with compact jet engines. The crew liked to brag about how that great envelope could swallow the old
Franklin
whole, though that wasn’t quite true. But, with
Cernan
, the ship had taken the record for the largest flying machine ever constructed from the old
Hindenburg
. Mac had counselled Maggie not to boast too loudly about that, because after all the
Hindenburg
had been bankrolled by the Nazi party, and ultimately had crashed and burned . . . Maggie had pored over the engineering details as the ships had been designed and constructed, like a kid in a toy store. Now her heart swelled with pride that two such magnificent ships were hers to command.

And between the Navy ships, stepping in at precisely the same moment in a neat bit of synchronization, was a smaller ship but just as sturdy-looking, its hull painted white and blue with a proud presidential seal emblazoned on its flanks and tail fins. Popularly known as Navy One, this twain was the President’s own dedicated craft, heavily defended and bristling with armour and, it was rumoured, luxuriously appointed within.

Now, with a hum of powerful engines, a soft downwash of air and some neat navigation, Navy One descended towards the Capitol building, and a hatch in the base of the gondola opened up to allow a staircase to extend smoothly to the stage.

With secret service agents front and back, the unmistakable form of Brian Cowley came down the ramp. The band struck up ‘Hail to the Chief’, there were good-natured cheers from the gawking crowd out beyond the perimeter, and Cowley worked his way along the line of dignitaries with handshakes. He was an overweight man in a crumpled suit.

Mac grunted. ‘Look at him with Douglas Black. Jeez, that’s not a handshake, that’s a transfer of DNA. Get a room, Mr President.’

‘Now, now, Mac. Scuttlebutt is that Black bankrolled the building of these ships, the whole damn expedition. You can’t begrudge him his moment in the spotlight.’

‘Yeah, but he probably bankrolled the spotlight too . . .’

At last Cowley stepped up to the microphone, and grinned at the gathering before him. ‘My fellow Americans, and people of the planet Earth –
all
the planet Earths . . .’

He had always had the easy, graceful command of a natural orator – well, his whole career had been predicated on that one skill – and as his gaze swept over her, Maggie felt herself swell with pride, just a little. Asshole the man might once have been, and might still be, but he was the President, the office was always greater than any one man – and since Yellowstone Cowley had demonstrated that there had been far worse incumbents before him.

Now Cowley looked up at the new vessels, hovering above the Capitol. ‘Beautiful new ships, aren’t they? The product of American technical ingenuity, and the generosity of our own people and our partners from overseas.’ He pointed. ‘
Neil Armstrong. Eugene Cernan
. I’m sure you all grew up knowing the first of those names. But what of the second? I bet you looked it up before you came out here today.’ A ripple of laughter. ‘So you see, the names are kind of fitting. And I want you to think of the mission I’m launching today as being a Project Apollo for our generation. This is
our
moon shot – and let me tell you, it’s a hell of a lot cheaper!’

After his reward of a little more laughter, he referred back to earlier heroes of exploration: Lewis and Clark, who in the early nineteenth century, under instructions from President Jefferson, had mounted an expedition to survey the peoples and resources of the vast territories acquired by a young America from Napoleon in the Louisiana Purchase, and to establish a route to the Pacific coast. Now, like Lewis and Clark, Captain Maggie Kauffman would lead her ships West, out into the far stepwise reaches of the Long Earth, exploring the footprints of America, mapping, making contact, laying claim.

Mac growled, ‘During the re-election campaign he was Roosevelt. Now he’s Jefferson. Thinks big, doesn’t he?’

‘They go to see what’s out there,’ Cowley said ringingly. ‘They will go, not two million steps like Joshua Valienté fifteen years ago, not
twenty
million like the great Chinese mission of discovery five years ago – their target is
two hundred
million Earths, and more. They will map, they will log, they will study, and they will plant the flag. They go to find out
who
’s out there. And they go to extend America as far as the footprint of this great nation can be said to exist.
And
, if it’s humanly possible, they will bring home the lost crew of the
Neil Armstrong I
, lost all these years . . .’

Cheers and whoops.

Mac grunted sourly. ‘This from the man who used to claim stepping folk were either demons sent by the devil or a species of subhuman.’

‘We all make mistakes,’ Maggie whispered back with a grin.

Now Cowley was growing more reflective. ‘Our nation has suffered a great blow. We all know that; only the very youngest among us cannot remember the time of plenty before Yellowstone, which we compare to the deprivation of the present. Well, recover we will, as the might and resources of the new worlds of the Long Earth come to the aid of the old . . .’

He was battling to be heard now over the predictable cheers.

‘This is a time of recovery from disaster. But it is also a time of coming together, of a rebuilding of strength. A time that will be remembered as long as humanity survives. I say to you young people gathered before me: go out in these great Arks of the sky. Go out into the new worlds God has given us. Go out there, and found a new America!’

Even the military crew, supposedly still at attention, broke out into cheers and hat-hurling now. And—

‘Why, Mac. I’ll swear that’s a tear on your grizzled cheek.’

‘He’s just a soapbox Joe. But, damn, he’s good.’

6

I
N THE EARLY DAYS
of the cruise into the Long Earth stepwise West from the Datum, Maggie gave her crews time for a final shakedown of the new ships by running at a leisurely one step per second, no faster than commercial twains.

And Maggie got a lot of self-indulgent pleasure in accompanying Harry Ryan, her chief engineer, on his inspection tours.

The crew persisted in calling the
Armstrong
’s habitable compartment the ‘gondola’, but in fact instead of being suspended below the ship’s main body as in older designs, the crew compartment of this craft was entirely contained
inside
the lift envelope, a slab two decks deep built into the forward half of the central plane of the ship, surrounded by the huge lifting sacs. The intention of this internalized architecture was streamlining, and the
Armstrong
was a sleek bird as a result. But it was also a tough bird; the lower hull, with its loading bays, holds and ground operations bays, was plated by Kevlar armour against attack from below, a tough sheet studded with ports for sensors and weapons.