Out
A series about Mars
by Daniel
E. Machado
Chapter 2
"Wait, Mommy! Wait!"
The brightly lit cavern suddenly turns
into one huge slow moving obstacle course as Roselene watches her mother’s
blue jumper and thick blonde ponytail disappear through a tall girdered
entrance. The small girl rushes around stacks of boxes and luggage, dashing
through the legs of hurried and overburdened adults before finally bounding
through the main corridor's jumbled entrance. Her mother waits just inside.
"I told you to pay attention."
Blade kneels down next to her daughter. "Sweety, I know this is tough for
you, and I don’t expect you to stop being a little girl or anything, but
you’ve got to start
paying attention. Now, try to keep up
with me; Okay? If you start falling behind just tell me,
and I'll wait."
"Okay, Mommy. But, I just… "
"What's this? An excuse?"
Blade’s eyes go wide, her head tilting off to one side. "You know what
they say about excuses don’t you?"
"Oh, Mommy! That's gross!" Roselene
only heard the joke once, but once had been enough. After her mother had
explained to her that: Excuses were like assholes because everyone
has one, and they all stink. Blade started calling Roselene fartbreath
every time she started to make an excuses. It wasn’t funny.
"Do you still have your pass?" Blade
asks, her face a ridged mask.
"Yes." Roselene returns a solemn nod.
"Let’s see it then." A small smile
breaks through Blade’s stony expression at Roselene’s total seriousness.
The tiny girl produces a thin strip of blue plastic; on one side a small
static holo reflects her face above her name in bold letters, the other
side shows an overview of the personal files inside. The big blue Personal
ID data-point looks large in Roselene’s tiny hand as she shows it to her
mother; picture side up and data-point out, as if Blade were going to actually
read it.
"What's your name?"
"Roselene Rain DeSilva."
"How old are you?"
"Four-Es. But, I'll be two-and-a-half
Ms on Mars."
"Who's your guardian, and how can
I find her?"
"My mommy is Blade DeSilva, and you
can find her at Atlantis Corp."
Blade’s smile broadens into a beam.
"I told them you were smarter than
any six year-old they got. You're smarter than most kids seven Es. But,
right now you and I have got to be extra extra
careful. Okay? If we don’t start paying real close attention to what we
do, they could still ground us. And, Mommy’s company has been bending all
sorts of rules to get us up on this ship. So, remember: pay attention.
Okay?"
Blade tucks Roselene’s ID back into her vest, then unnecessarily straightens
the girl’s clothes as mothers have done for millennia.
"Once we get up on the Flying
Jib and underway you have my permission to be the biggest little
stinker in the whole wide world for one whole a day. Maybe even two." Roselene
looks unhappy, but convinced.
"Now, come on. Let’s go."
Picking up her briefcase and duffel
Blade continues down the crowded corridor. Roselene hitches her small backpack
of personal positions up onto her shoulders and follows.
Roselene feels proud to be going to
Mars. That is, if proud is really the right word. Roselene knows her mother
is excited. Mommy’s been planing this trip for as long as she can remember.
And, all of her friends at the learning center think she’s like totally
stellar because all the really good sites always run Mars archives, and
her teachers are always talking about how the Immigration is so good for
everybody, and how Martian teraformation means that people will always
be alive in the Solar system.
Proud might not be the
right word, but Roselene knows she likes being treated special
because she’s going out on a spaceship to Mars.
Reaching up to take hold of a lashing
strap dangling from her mother’s duffel, Roselene finally feels safe enough
to take another look around at the busy terminal, its clamoring crush of
people and the bright lights and busy noise.
Having to watch both her Mommy and
Grandma cry at the Olive Drive tube terminal had been bad enough, but looking
up to discover herself standing alone in this bright cavern of busy echoes
has convinced Roselene that she never wants to lose sight
of her mommy again.
Roselene finds it extremely odd that
they should build a spaceship station so far underground. Mommy says it
has something to do with "safety". Most of the publics along the corridor
display a broad flat concrete desert thick with tall triangular shaped
spaceships on tiny legs. The spaceships don't look dangerous at all, more
like the toys she plays with at the learning center.
The ride out to Edwards Interorbital
in the tube had been just like one of Roselene's shopping trips with her
Grandma. Only this time instead of getting out at the Sherman Oaks Galleria,
Roselene steps out into a great big room full of all kinds of people, and
all
of them in a big hurry. She can't really tell how far down below the desert
they were, but they must be way way down deep because the terminal's dome
looks even bigger than the Galleria’s main enclosure, and she's seen some
displays of it from the sky. Its really really big.
At a tall blue counter just slightly
taller than Roselene's nose a man in a blue jumper just like her mommy’s
tells them both to go to someplace that has a bunch of numbers and letters.
Then they take all their stuff down through this long thin corridor into
this regular size door where they both have to stand in a line with a whole
bunch of other people dressed just like her mom and wait. And wait. And
wait.
Out of boredom Roselene asks her Mother
if she can do her next reading lesson on Blade’s handtablet, even though
she's fairly sure Miss Thomas will never see it. But, to her surprise,
after completing her assignment – well ahead of the curve as usual – Ms
Thomas’ image frames up onto Roselene's display.
"I just knew you wouldn’t miss a lesson
just because you were running off to explore Mars."
Roselene sees the other kids in her
class start to get up out of their places, leaving behind their toys and
games to come listen around Ms. Thomas.
"How’s our brave little Space Pioneer
today?"
"Okay, I guess." Roselene suddenly
feels embarrassed, the volume on the handtablet is up and all the grownups
standing in line are looking at her. She concentrates Ms Thomas' image.
"We have to stand in line a lot. And it’s kind of noisy sometimes. And,
really really big."
"Well, we should let you get back
to your studies." Ms Thomas senses the child’s discomfort. "We just wanted
to let you know that we’ll still be checking up your studies until you
log in with your next instructor. Okay, Miss Roselene?"
"Okay, Ms Thomas."
"And, post us. Every day if you can.
The kids here are all very interested in your trip. You’re the very first
Space Pioneer some of us know."
"I will, Ms Thomas."
"Bye, Roselene." Her teacher
waves with a smile. Roselene's classmates jump up all around Ms Thomas,
chirping their own good-byes before the livelink breaks. Roselene looks
around at all the grownups quietly watching her; her mommy watching them
with a small proud smile. Roselene looks back down at her mother's handtablet
then jumps it to a math game.
When they finally stand front of line
this lady in a white jumper asks Roselene how old she is, and then to say
her ABCs. Roselene secretly wants to say them backwards, but she promised
Mommy not to show off. After that the lady holds up several big cards with
different words on them. She knows most of the little ones with only four
or five letters, and even one with ten letters – restaurant -- but only
because her grandma taught her how to read it on shopping trips.
Then the lady in the white jumper
takes their pictures, scans both their palm prints, and then takes a blood
test. Roselene hates the blood tests. They don’t really hurt, but they
leave an itchy spot on your skin, and sometimes they bleed.
Then Roselene and her mommy go in
to see the doctors. Lately Roselene has seen far to many doctors. It seems
every time her mother took her anywhere, it was to see another doctor.
After undressing Blade and Roselene
both put on green smocks, then an older girl in a white jumper takes Roselene
by the hand down the hall into a separate room. This use to bother Roselene
at first, but not so much any more.
The medical aide sets Roselene up
on the examination table then slides her around to lay her head on a thin
green pillow. With practiced ease the child presses the soles of her feet
down onto upright foot pads then spreads her ten tiny fingers out across
the hand sensors' cool chrome. Roselene always finds the brightly colored
holos of her insides fascinating. Her lungs flash across the technician’s
displays.
"Can I see my heart?" She asks. At
first the technician looks surprised, but then smiles in the face of the
girl’s honest curiosity. "I like to watch my heart move."
"Here, see how your blood goes through
your lungs?" The technician's hand moves through the air changing the perspective
on both the display's view and subject matter. "Now, take a deep breath."
Roselene pulls a deep draw of air,
delighting as pink waves of glittered corpuscles rush through her heart
then out into her lungs. The corpuscles swirl out through tiny nodes, change
color, and then return.
"Well, you certainly seem healthy
enough." The technician waves his hand to close his display. "In several
different ways."
After getting dress, Blade takes a
download from the lady at the reception desk, smiling as she walks her
daughter out of the medical facility.
"I told them." Blade beams down at
Roselene's report. "Apparent age; six-and-a-half to seven Es. Probability
of long-term difficulty; 5% +-10!" Roselene suddenly finds herself up in
her mother’s arms, twirled about while being hugged and kissed. "I told
them!"
"Mommy, stop!" Roselene
pushes away. Only recently discovering public embarrassment, the concept
seems to have made a deep impression on the girl. Despite the protest Blade
hugs her daughter once again before setting her down.
"Yes." Blade smiles. "We must be professionals,
mustn’t we. Come on, let’s go find quarters and get rid of all this junk."
Blade and Roselene quickly make their
way out through the tunnel maze, past much of the same territory they'd
spent most the day slowly covering. At a passage marked with sweeping chrome
arches her mommy stops. Several rows of short luggage rollers sit to one
side of the entrance. Blade drops her duffel and briefcase onto one.
"Put your pack up here, Sweety." Blade
helps Roselene off with her pack then places it next to her things on the
cart. Inserting her data-point into the cart’s handle Blade presses in
her thumb to the reader and their luggage slowly rolls away through the
chrome arches. Blade guides Roselene up to the gateway's security station.
"Put your ID in and show your hand."
Roselene knows the drill. The small
girl deftly whips out her ID, slipping it into the datapoint as she presses
her small hand against the glass plate mounted above. The light blinks
green and Roselene walks through the archway. Blade follows after the light
blinks green for her.
They had just stepped over to their
luggage roller when a large lady with short dark hair wearing a navy-blue
TransOrbital jumper walks up as if in a great hurry. The lady is about
Grandma’s age, but nowhere near a friendly.
"Excuse me," The lady says looking
down at her handtablet. "But, I believe there’s been some sort of mistake.
Are you Blade Ann DeSilva?"
Roselene’s mother nods.
"And this is your daughter Roselene
Rain."
"Yes," Blade smiles back. "If you’ll
read my Notes Directory under Official Corporate Exemptions you’ll find
her 1492A. We just came from Medical. She passed her Apparenticy Test at
6.5 to 7Es."
The lady frowns down at her handtablet,
Blade’s ID sticking out its datapoint on top. Then the lady grumbles something
to herself and pulls the ID out and hands it back.
"All right, go on. But, you want a
bit of advice, Miss? Watch out for this kind of crap in future. I just
spent fifteen Es out on Mars before coming in. Mars shows no pity for rule
breakers out there. You ain’t in Kansas anymore, Toto."
"Oildale." Roselene defiantly peeps.
"Whatever." The lady squints sternly
at the child. "Dead is still dead!"
Then up at Blade.
"And, stop bending the rules. Rules
break real easy out on Mars."
The mean lady turns and rushes away,
as if still in some great hurry.
"Come on, Sweety. One more stop to
go." Blade straps on her duffel then takes hold of Roselene’s hand as they
head off in search of the Atlantic Corp’s Transient Quarters Office.