Humans and Pokémon are colonising Mars, but good people aren't the only ones with their eyes on this new world.
The first spaceflight of the Ares program launched 49 years ago. So far, the red planet hasn't been kind. Without spacesuits, few Pokémon...
The group were startled and a little unsettled when Rudolph greeted them as soon as they stepped out of the airlock. Was he watching them? He wasn't. He was there to speak to an Interplanetary Police officer, Jin's cousin Altair, who just returned from the cemetery and now wanted a list – and the DNA tests to back it up – of everyone who left Ironville in the past three months.
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Jin wasn't close to Altair, even though their mothers were best friends. They had little in common. Jin always wanted to be an astronaut and scientist. Altair always wanted to be an International Police officer. He was quiet, aloof and found Jin's endless energy irritating. He never voiced any interest in space, so it surprised Jin that he actually agreed to go to Mars when he was only 20.
Then again, he wasn't employed by the Ares program. He would probably get the chance to go home. No-one with families on Earth wanted to do it regardless. Altair was one of many young officers who were offered generous wages if they went. Like Caroline, who had been there for 12 years, he didn't wear a bulky Ares spacesuit but a sleek Interplanetary Police one.
As usual, his cold demeanour put Jin off speaking to him, but he wanted to. He knew he had to be a decent man. His parents were Pokémon Rangers. He wanted to ask what Altair knew and if he could pry any information from Damson, but he didn't because Rudolph was there.
They parked the rovers at the gate and took the metro into town. Nyx noticed that many of the commuters – airport staff, guards changing shift, scientists returning from underground labs and the farms dotted around Ironville – read similar books to that one the eavesdropping woman in the café read:
Ares: Mankind's Greatest Warriors for Mankind's Greatest Challenge Cities of Dreams: Ironville, Mars MARS: From Wasteland to Utopia Skyscrapers on Mars: A History of Ironville
Callerya snorted when she saw the last one. Ironville's towers were hardly skyscrapers by Earth's standards. Thalassa agreed. It was incredible that anything at all was built on Mars, but at what cost? Nyx certainly agreed with that after what she saw in the canyon, but her thoughts wandered elsewhere. She could understand people on Earth reading those books. Why would people on Mars read them? Some looked old enough to know the entire history of Ironville because they had been there the whole time. They couldn't all be plants to make enthusiasm seem more rampant than it was. Nyx recognised one of the guards. She knew he actually worked at the gate. He was the one who did test Firmino on his way back in.
Were they desperately convincing themselves that they loved life on Mars? Nyx was sure some were. She understood. They were stuck there, so they had to find some happiness, somehow. She also wondered, however, if others seriously believed their lives were wonderful because they were quietly brainwashed to believe it. Their enthusiasm reminded Nyx of a Cipher recruitment video, where every face in the crowd – with free dental care as long as they served maniacs in their quest for world domination – flashed smiles so shiny they blinded the most impressionable viewers to the greater shadows that came with such dazzling light. Although they repeated everything their Admins said like Chatot, they fervently believed it all.
