Red Ground

Red Ground



         Amy woke at 5:59am.  Four seconds later, the alarm went off, accompanied by an inhuman voice, repeating its message like a mantra: “It’s 6:00am, Amy; time to wake up.  It’s 6:00am, Amy; time to wake up.  It’s 6:00am, Amy…”  She reached up and slammed it off, thinking to herself: I wish they hadn’t told it my name.

         As soon as the alarm stopped, the voice started up again with a different message.  “Today is Thursday.  Mission date 731.  The temperature in Washington D.C. is 22.7 degrees Celsius.  The temperature outside the base is currently minus 17.3 degrees Celsius.  The temperature inside the base is currently 3.1 degrees Celsius.  During the last 22 hours, we record no snow.  Message end.”

         One of Amy’s socks had come off in the night, and she hunted under the blankets for it before subjecting her feet to the cement floor.  Yesterday she had discovered that one of the others had broken his toe some unknown number of days earlier—he hadn’t told anyone because he hadn’t noticed.  Of course, they had been warned about the cold, and she knew all about the effects cold could have on the body.  Still, that one took her by surprise.  Back in med school she never would have believed it.

         Finally she forced herself up and began her preparations for the day.  She stripped off her upper layer, known affectionately as pajamas, and immediately replaced it with the work clothes she had lain out the night before, on the empty bed next to hers.  Then, without even a once-necessary glance in the mirror, she pulled her hair into its customary braid and pinned it up in her customary manner.  Next to the door, her coat and day-bag hung from a peg labeled “Amy’s.”  She had not bothered to take the label down, even though it had been almost six months since another person had even set foot in this room.  With one foot out the door, she paused, turned—her eyes held the picture on her bedside table, of herself and Henry, and of course Lucy.  That was the day she took Lucy to the carousel.  She wondered if Lucy still remembered it; perhaps she would ask her at their next Link.

         The other three were already in the common area, two at the table and one at the stove.  She was just about to look at the duty roster when David cut her off.

         “It’s your turn to do stripping.  And don’t even try to get out of it—Rodney skipped his last turn.”  He pushed an empty mug at her and motioned for her to sit down.  “We’re meeting with the engineers today, by the way.  No use trying to get out of that either.”

         “I don’t mind the engineers so much,” she said as she sat down.  “They’re optimists.”

         She watched George stir pink powder into the metal water pitcher.  The powder was labeled “Strawberry Lemonade” with a cheerful cartoon of reddish lemons frolicking under the words.  It had been a long time since Amy had seen plants growing wild, instead of inside the planned grid of the Greenhouse, but still she doubted that lemons frolicked very often.

         “I don’t suppose any of the engineers have hacked the others to pieces, have they?” she asked David.

         “I don’t think so.  Why?”

         “I was just wondering if I’d finally have some work to do.”

         Rodney grunted at her in protest.

         “Sorry Rodney.  I just don’t consider setting bones to be much of a challenge.”

         George came around the table and ladled a thick porridge into each of their bowls, then gave them their flavor packets.  Amy poured the entire contents of her packet over her bowl and began to stir.

         “Hey Amy,” George said as he sat down with them.  “What do you think the biologists do with their month off?”

         “The same thing we do, I imagine.”

         “Yes, I suppose.  It’s just—”

         “‘To insure unbiased observation,’ remember?”

         “Of course.”

         Amy was about to let the matter go, when a thought struck her.  “Why do you ask me, anyway?  Anybody could venture a guess.”

         “Oh, come on, Amy,” Rodney muttered through a porridge-obscured sneer.  “Everybody knows you’re SS.”

         A brief silence followed his words.  David sent Rodney a quelling look.

         “That’s a little dramatic,” Amy scoffed.  “And I’m not.  I don’t know any more than you do, Rodney.  Well, maybe a little more than you.”

         “Let’s be nice, shall we?” said David.  He still had not looked up from his paper.

         “I think I’ll be getting to work now,” Amy answered and stood up.  “Oh, yes.  My alarm reports no snow.”

         David nodded.  “No snow all around.”

         Amy did not bother to meet his words.  Instead, she picked up her bag and headed down another hallway, in the direction of the cargo bay.  The cargo bay was their main, and only used, exit, so she had to pass through three hydraulic doors—all requiring ID—just to get to it.  Fortunately, nobody ever went outside except to do the stripping.  If they ever had to go to one of the other two bases or the Greenhouse, they used the tunnels.

         Making sure to zip her outer layer all the way up, Amy passed through the last door into the bay.  She had to use a Jumper to get outside and do the stripping, and since Rodney has skipped his last turn, she had to make sure the Jumper was in working order first.  She dragged the rolling work station over to Jumper One, lay back on the dolly, and pushed herself under.

         She had been at it only fifteen minutes when an angry buzzing sounded above her head.  Pulling herself up again, she walked over to the interface and pushed the button.  The voice of her alarm greeted her:

         “Amy, the time is now 7:00am.  This is your scheduled Link-In session.  Please find the nearest Link-In station and file your weekly Update and Observations report.  You may use the rest of your hour on personal matters.  Message end.”

         “I don’t know why you say the whole thing every time,” Amy answered it, shaking her head wearily as she picked up her bag.  I’ve only heard it 730 times before.”  And now I’m talking to the damn alarm clock, she noted to herself, though she doubted she would include that in next week’s report.

         The nearest Link station was just inside the first set of hydraulic doors.  She settled into the cubicle and slid the inner door closed, using her ID to lock it.  Nobody was allowed to interrupt anybody’s Link, and failure to lock oneself inside would result in immediate dismissal from the project.  Still, sometimes she wondered if anyone would actually bother to come out this far just to fire her.  But she didn’t quite want to test it.

         As she sat down on the bench, the entire wall opposite her roared to life.  Translucent shapes formed in the background and moved forward, as if they intended to touch her face.  She waved her hand through the company insignia, then punched out her 8-digit code in midair.  A few moments later, a slot in the wall opened up, and she dropped her data chip inside it.  An insubstantial keyboard formed before her, under the words “Any last thoughts?”  She typed the same words she always did: “In the last 20 hours, we record no snow.”

         The keyboard faded away and the slot in the wall disappeared with a small hissing sound.  The wall remained lit, and a new message appeared:  “Would you like to Link?”  She hit “Yes,” then “Last ID Code Entered,” and waited for the connection to form.

         This part usually took about ten minutes.  She leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes.  In two years, Henry had not missed a single Link check-in.  Before she left, she had told him that once a week was all they would get, but that he also did not need to feel beholden to her in any way.  She knew well the path she had chosen, and he did not need to feel responsible for her emotional well-being.  Besides, Henry was her best friend, but even she had to admit that his defining characteristic was laziness.  And yet—two years in, and she hadn’t gone a week without seeing him.  Perhaps it helped that he didn’t have to leave his house to do it.

         She imagined what his morning would have been like so far.  It was about 6 hours later where he was, so he might be finishing up lunch right about now.  That was hard to say, of course: he didn’t live on a base—his movements were his own.  She imagined him stirring around ten, the Arizona sun burning the empty white bed beside him.  She imagined he might find a note from his wife—saying she couldn’t rouse herself to wake him when he looked so peaceful, but she wanted him to have a very good day.  Then, if Lucy wasn’t awake yet, he might go for a swim before his orange juice and eggs.

         Breakfast was the worst part of her little daydream.  She could almost imagine the taste of real juice, the smell of cooking grease.  She could almost remember real food, and the real threat of clogged arteries.  More than anything, she missed the unhealthy foods and the ability to choose them.

         She didn’t mind the bit about the wife.  True, she didn’t get alone with Alaina: Alaina was rich, a businessman, spent an awful lot of time discussing mergers.  Amy had her fill of businessmen at fundraisers, and had no need for them in her personal life.  But she had overcome that small prejudice for Henry’s sake, and because his marriage to her had produced Lucy, who was possibly the best child Amy had ever met.  And, besides, coming up here had all but eliminated her personal contact with Alaina.

         She imagined again the sizzling grease—the promise of bovine lactation instead of a dry soy powder—

         “Amy?”  Henry’s voice asked.  Amy opened her eyes.

         The screen had turned into Henry’s living room: floor-to-ceiling windows revealing a burning desert, the outer corner of their monstrous backyard pool, a patch of planted turf that Henry had replaced every few months instead of watering it, and a few fluorescent flamingos hammered into the dirt.

         “Good morning.”  It was almost painful, looking at all that warmth.  Twelve hours until it was her allotted shower time.

         “Good afternoon, really,” Henry replied.  “You just missed Lucy, she’s going to the park with her mom.  Yeah, Alaina finally got a day off.  I was surprised too.”

         “Surprised is certainly a word for it.”

         “They’re gonna be out all day, so she told me I could order some lunch on Credits.  I was thinking I’d go fancy and order fish—did you say something?  I think this connection might be bad.”

         “She keeps you like a dog.”  Amy wondered what a flamingo would look like out on the surface here.  Like a cheap joke, she imagined.  Some things didn’t change.

         “I like dogs,” Henry answered.  Good.  If he didn’t take her bait, then things were going well.

         “We can’t do anything about the connection, anyway.  You know I can only make one Link per session.”

         “I know.  I should just be impressed, anyway, right?  I can’t even calculate how far away you are.  Technology is—I mean, I know you say that it’s morning there, but I don’t even know what that looks like.  It’s hard to imagine anywhere else having a morning—”

         “It’s only hard to imagine if you think you’re the center of the universe.”

         “Well, naturally.”  He fumbled with something in his hands—it looked like a slate.  He was probably ordering his meal.  “So, have you had any snow?”

         “No, have you?”

         He dropped the slate.  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to be flippant.”

         She pushed past it.  “So, what did you have for breakfast this morning?”

         “You don’t want to know.”

         “Then why did I ask?”

         “Alright, fine, but I warned you.”  He paused for dramatic effect.  “I had pancakes…and bacon.”

         “Bacon.”  Of course.  Well, she had asked.  She asked every time.  “Alright.  So.  How’s Lucy doing in school?”

         They passed the rest of their allotted time talking about Lucy’s obvious and impressive progress.  Henry was convinced that her career would be at least as impressive as Amy’s had been, though Amy told him that he might wait until she turned nine to start pressuring her into joining the Corps.  Less than an hour later, she was back in the bay.  She finished up her repairs, climbed up into the Jumper, and strapped herself in.  After pulling three different levers in sequence to turn the Jumper on, she let it warm up exactly eight minutes, then pushed the button that opened up the cargo bay doors.  Finally, she brought the control lever forward and began to glide on out.

         Underneath her the red ground stretched level in all directions, not unlike the Arizona desert she had come from.  Four large shapes emerged from the land: three oblong arched structures circling one giant dome.  The Greenhouse.  No doubt George and Rodney were in there now, collecting samples and monitoring machines, while David contacted the engineers and asked them to begin filing their pre-contact paperwork.  When Amy had first told Henry about her assignment, she had done her best to make it sound glamorous.  The Corps had too: children all over the Earth had been taught to worship them like heroes, had been told that they were saving humanity.  At her last fundraiser, Amy had raised a glass and shouted “To the Future!” along with everyone else.  The difference was that even then she had known the truth: saving humanity would be about as glamorous as office work.

         She landed the Jumper next to Base Two and turned on the claw.  Stripping, she knew, would become a thing of the past as soon as they could walk outside without the suits.  Until then, she would just have to make do.  And wait for the first sign of snow.