Secrets of the Antiwave

PART 2 | Chapter 9: Betraying our Planet

The cafeteria was dead.

We mutilated its carcass, pilfering freeze-dried tomatoes and radish-flavoured paste. Two months later, we ran out. The supermarket became our Jerusalem, the appliance store was our Mecca, and Stevenson, McGregor and I were the emaciated pilgrims, carrying back hundreds of cans of synthesised muck, wading through the angry crowds. The muck was disgusting, nauseating, it tasted like triply-digested dirt, but it was all that we could afford.

Jupiter's moons had swallowed our savings. And we had left were the credits in our pockets. Luckily, Stevenson always harboured a disdain for 'capitalist machinations', he had stored several year's worth of earnings under his mattress... Everyone else rejoiced, but I was blown away. No one ever told me that my meagre pay had been the highest salary on the team...

Stevenson's savings were just enough to get by. Just enough to purchase more muck, and whatever cheap components we could cannibalise into stone-age equipment. We afforded ourselves one luxury, though: the songs. Grainy and distorted on our pitiful setup, the magic still remained. On sweltering days when Mars reverted to a savage, fiery hell, on days when sandstorms filtered through our motionless fans, and it felt like were getting nowhere with our incremental findings -- the songs reminded us of why we were here, why our work was so important.

I finally became a permanent resident at the SMO. Not in Rutherford's dorm room -- that would feel wrong -- but in a spare, forgotten chamber between Stevenson and Mitra. With the domestic automatons gone, I had to be the axle-pillars and the hydro-rovers, the ceiling rails and the scuttlebots. The rest of the scientists (except for Winthrop) helped me whenever they could, but they were clearly preoccupied with their work, they needed me to keep the SMO intact.

* * *

October 2087, autumn leaves of peeling paint gathered in the SMO. Outside was Martian Winter. By now, every citizen in the Territories wanted to know why the journalist-who-wouldn't-write and two white beards with legs were lugging parcels of food into a facility that was visibly rotting. Fear and poverty were the kindling, conspiracy theories were the igniting spark, and the news networks simply had to fan the fire. They were the only corporations to turn a profit during the MFC.

The team and I became the evil baron, holed up in our malevolent castle. People supposed that we were orchestrating vile experiments while the rest of the world starved. Of course our plans were nefarious, for why else would we be so secretive? Why would I have stopped talking to the public? Perhaps I was being held captive? Perhaps I was holding every scientist captive. Some news reporters went as far as to claim that the SMO facility was the true instigator of the MFC.

Anti-SMO organisations were formed and reformed: Grey Peace, Stop the Wave, and many, many more... They defaced the facility's exterior with hateful slogans and caricatures, throwing rocks at whoever exited the gate. Meanwhile, the Jovian War raged on; Mars began optional enlistment. Strangely enough, the crowds of 'planetary activists' only grew larger in size. If they were ready to 'die for Mars', who was leaving on the military convoys?

It came to the point where Jackson, Lopez and DeVille had to physically plough through the roaring crowd, Stevenson and McGregor held the flanks, and I was met with a million black and beady microphones, belonging to the hungry spiders who felt a twitching on their web. Their vocal chords were rusty nails set against a dinner-plate chalkboard. One year into the war, there were no delusions of respect, unbiased coverage, and professional standards. People were furious, furious at everything they could blame.

'How does it feel to betray your planet, Mr. Wells?'

'Is it true that you're using human test subjects?'

'I'm your very last article you mentioned 'big changes ahead'. Were you aware the MFC was going to happen?'

'De-mo-li-tion! De-mo-li-tion! De-mo-li-tion!'

'Hey you! Issac Wells! Fuck you!

'Mr. Wells! Mr. Wells! Why do you hate Mars?'

I knew I couldn't say a thing. The reporters knew, too. We were wading through a sea of red-eyed rats. The slightest opening in our mouths and they'd crawl in to eat us from the inside out.

One day, a young boy ran up to the three of us, they were maybe thirteen or fourteen. The spiders and rats all hushed, if only for a moment.

The boy looked at me with teary eyes and said, 'I used to believe in you.'

He threw a badge at me. I caught: It was the SMO logo, the kind I used to give out. The boy ran off weeping and the parted sea returned with twice the fury. We barely made it back to the gates alive.

That night, I heard Stevenson crying in his room.