“Then you are no longer President of this Republic, even if you… even if you might legally…” Words failed him.
“I take this upon my own shoulders,” I said.
“You order our suicide!” Wachsler cried.
Dandy Breaker, sitting at the back, had had enough. He rose, hand held high, and I gave him permission to speak with a nod. “I might point out the strict legality, under the laws of the Republic, of President Majumdar’s position. This is an emergency. The only defensive course of action open to us is retreat. At her instruction, I have declared a state of martial law and broadcast it over Mars.”
“Nobody can hear or object!” Wachsler said, tears of rage rolling down his cheeks. His hands moved like two birds, up and down, fingers fluttering. “My God, this is the most horrifying kind of tyranny.”
“I take responsibility,” I said. My voice sounded dull and hollow, even in my own ears.
“Madam President,” Leander said, “perhaps we should take an informal vote. Just to be certain.”
“We should discuss the option of declaring war,” Hergesheimer said. “What they’re doing is an outrage, and we should defend ourselves, if not with a moon, then by using conversion on their cities, their lands!”
“No,” I said. “That is not an option, if we have any other choice. We do.” I had long ago taken my own personal stand against striking back at Earth. “If anyone wishes to depose me, or petition for my ouster at this time, or do whatever the law allows… or doesn’t allow… let it be done now, and hurry, please.”
I wondered whether we were going to lose all control, whether I had pushed too hard and spoken too strongly. Leander was about to speak when the floor of the auditorium shook. Aelita called up a series of images from the cameras atop the station. The horrid gray curtain unfurled over northern Kaibab, whirling debris clearly visible in the electric blue corona, dust churning at its feet.
“It’s on the plateau, about fifty kilometers away,” Aelita said.
All in the auditorium watched, some weeping. Several jumped from their seats and fled.
“The rest is simply fear,” I said. “We know. For us there are no corners to be backed into… unless we give in to our fear. Then we will die. Let us do what we built Preamble to do.”
Charles entered the auditorium from the main lab space, moving slowly and uncertainly. His presence seemed to spook the staff members in the first two rows of seats. They drew their knees up and away from him, staring like frightened children.
“QL is ready,” he said. “The interpreter is ready. So am I.”
The image of our coming doom hung over us at several points around the auditorium. The floor vibrated as if pounded by a herd of huge animals. Charles stared at the images, then said, barely audible, “It’s a one-in-a-trillion conversion. If they ramp it by a factor of ten, and they can, they could take the entire plateau at once.”
“Let’s do it,” I said. I could barely make myself heard above the horrendous rockborne howl of matter coming to pieces.
Dandy walked stiffly down the side aisle. “Madam President,” he boomed, his formality absurd under the circumstances, “You must give a direct and unambiguous order.”
“By authority of the office of President, I order that we immediately move Mars to the chosen orbit around the New System.”
“It doesn’t even have a name!” Wachsler cried.
“Order so recorded,” Dandy shouted, holding up his slate. He glared at the audience, daring anyone to voice another challenge.
Wachsler shook his head, speechless. Hergesheimer collapsed in his seat, mumbling unheard.
Charles turned and left the auditorium. Leander and I followed. Most of the staffers in the auditorium stayed in their seats or moved closer to the separating glass wall, like observers at an old-fashioned execution.
Charles sat on the edge of a couch beside the main tweaker. “I’ll need some help with these,” he said, lifting one hand to point to the larger array of optic cables. Stephen and I helped him attach the cables, and Charles lay back on the couch. “I’ll be the only one in the loop to the QL,” he said. “But others can observe. It would be easier if I can talk with people while it’s happening. I’ll feel more real. And if those people are seeing some of what’s happening, with me…”
“I’ll observe,” I said.
Charles pointed to a smaller couch on the other side of the thinker platform. “I hope you’ll be comfortable,” he said.
I sat on the couch. “Do I need… ?” I pointed to the cables attached to the base of his neck.
“No. No feedback required. Standard image projection, or immersion. Immersion should really be something.”
I swallowed. “Immersion, then.”
“I appreciate this, Casseia,” Charles said. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes, Adam’s apple bobbing on his throat, jaw clenching, relaxing.
“Least I can do,” I said.
“It’s our only choice,” Charles said. “We have to leave. I know that. You’ve made a courageous decision.”
I followed Leander with my eyes as he prepared for my immersion. A few narrow bands around my head, projectors from a modified slate, a few slim optical connections between slate and interpreter, and I experienced a comfortable floating sensation, neural chitchat in the far background.
I glanced around, nervous at even these few constraints. The room smelled cold and metallic and seemed absurdly large for the apparatus; an echoing cavern with lights focused on the tweaker, force disorder pumps, refrigerators… One director, one backup — Tamara Kwang, with her own nimbus of cables and connectors — and one observer.
Leander finished checking all connections and stood to one side, arms folded.
“Mars is a big body,” Charles said. “We have to reference more orthonormal bases for each descriptor, exponentially more for descriptors that superposit. That means storing some results in the unused descriptors within the tweaker. That’s easier in a larger tweaker.”
“The danger is no greater than before — less, probably,” Leander said. “But the director’s job is more difficult. He has to be more congruent with the QL to keep those extra descriptors in tune with the overall goal.”
“And?”
“The interpreter still gets in the way. Charles will have to be more direct. Straight through to the QL.”
Again the howl of converted matter shook the floor. Dandy left the auditorium and stood beside Stephen. “We’re going to lose the station through blast effects if we don’t go now,“ he said.
Dandy avoided looking at Charles as if he were indecent or sacred and forbidden.
“We’ll do it in three,” Charles said. “Just to be extra cautious. First, we’ll advance along Mars’s orbital path fifty million kilometers. If there’s any doubt about the next step, we’ll leave it there.”
“They’ll find us again, finish the job,” Tamara Kwang said softly, self-consciously touching her cables. Drops of sweat beaded her face even in the chill.
“There won’t be any doubt,” Charles said. “The next step will put us about three trillion kilometers from the New System. We’ll get our bearings and make the next jump.”
“We can’t stay in deep space for more than a few minutes,” Hergesheimer said. I had not seen him come into the lab, but he stood a few meters from the tweaker, hands in his pockets, hair thoroughly tousled. “If we stay in deep space for more than a few minutes, Mars will experience extreme weather changes.”
Faoud Abdi entered, followed by two assistants. “I have checked the damage,” Abdi said, “and we have only ten percent of our Mars surface trackers linked through transponders. The rest are gone or we can’t reach them. I believe we can still get a feel for what is happening to the planet, but of course… there is no way to tell others what to expect. There will also be more severe areological effects if we do not enter a comparable solar tide situation quickly. And the same side must be turned toward the new sun. This is very important.”