As I came to know her mind as well as her voluptuous body, I found her constantly inquiring, eternally interested, and rarely bored. I saw her turn the near-rape by a torch tech into an hour-long lecture by him on the delicate balances that must be maintained in the magnetic bottle so that it works and so that they can open one end of the bottle and let out bits of the sun contained within. She left him glowing, proud of himself, very flattered that she was interested, and a little surprised at himself that his erection had gone away.
The more I knew of Nova the more there was to know.
What greater praise is there?
6
Despite difficulties we all survived, except the crewman who lost the duel, which was played up beyond belief in the vidpress on Earth. The rather plain nurse was dubbed The Temptress in White and given other lurid titles and became infamous and sought after. The Balboa went into docking orbit and the shuttle came over from Phobos and took us down to Ares Center, the “capital” of Mars. The disk of Mars was a great tawny-red, brown, and slate globe and the only sign of life was Elizabeth II in parking orbit nearby. As we came down we could see the rectangular green fields around Polecanal, then the smudge of Grabrock and Northaxe. Over the pole, down the Rille, Grandcanal City was a dot on the night horizon as we settled down toward Ares Center.
Dawn on Mars.
Thin cold air, thin enough still to require airmasks and bottles despite the years of terraforming, cold enough, even in this “summer,” to necessitate warmsuits. Great long rolling sandy stretches, with the soft ellipses of ancient craters and the abrasive grit of the sand getting into everything.
Dawn on Mars.
The rosy light was soft on the side of the shuttle. The last of the passengers disembarked and went beyond the pink cement wall until the ship had lifted off to go back for the cargo. “Come on,” Nova said, “this way.”
We huddled against the blowing sand caused by the ship’s takeoff and angled across to the fusion-powered carrier that awaited us. A big-chested man in a patched blue warmsuit took one look and jumped off to embrace Nova warmly.
“Nova! Damned if you haven’t grown up to be the most beautiful thing I ever—!” He saw me, obviously with her and just as obviously annoyed. He looked from me to her and back again, his face friendly but ready to go either way.
“Johann, this is Diego Braddock. Johann Tarielovich. He’s a sort of . . . uncle.”
The big man hugged her to him and grinned at me. “Any man a girl calls an uncle will never be anything but a friend, I’m sorry to say.”
He stuck out a hand, then drew it back and pulled off a glove. I took it, my fingers chilly, and found him carved from icerock.
His eyes went quickly from my face to hers, again scanning for information. Then he grunted, nodded wisely, then shook his head.
“Come on, doch, climb aboard before we freeze these cleanboots!”
“Dvígat, dvígat!” he snapped at the last two aboard. “Move!” He hopped into the seat and motioned Nova next to him. I sat in the back, next to a Marine who was already cursing his assignment, oblivious to the wonders of being on another planet.
On another planet.
On Mars.
I grinned to myself and scanned the horizon for John Carter as we bumped over the road toward the bubble complex of Ares Center, thinking that those first explorers had not forgotten the heritage of their youth. Since a few things had been named by astronomers, some were named for what happened, like Touchdown, where the first ship landed. Some were named for the way they looked, like Redrock and Mano Rojo and Icemountain. One place was optimistically named because someplace on this planet had to be named that, but so far Marsport was a tiny outpost with only a small landing field.
Pride of discovery had made early explorers pretty well ignore the fancy Latin names like Mare Hadtriacum and Syrtis Major and Amazonis and just use those labels they thought they had a right to affix. Wells.
Bradbury, where they discovered the great Star Palace.
Grandcanal City, which had no canal.
Burroughs, with some of the finest relics and walls yet found. The Rille, Grabrock, and Northaxe, where they found that most ancient of archaeological finds.
In a range of mountains named after John Carter what could you call the first mine of rare crimson diamonds but the Dejah Thoris?
Arlington Burl, who had been on the Balboa with us, had named his twin mines Enyo, goddess of battle, and Eris, goddess of discord, who have been described as sister, mother, wife, and daughter of Ares. His sons, Phobos and Deimos, gods of tumult and terror, fly overhead. But too much fantasy can blind you to reality. A hard bump threw me against Pelf, who had not annoyed me especially on the trip once I became involved with Nova. He grinned, and shoved me back helpfully. I nodded my thanks and squinted against the dust toward the domes and towers of Ares Center ahead. Newly manufactured air from the fusion torch’s mass accelerator poured out of the stack, creating a permanent wind that flowed away in every direction, spreading the new atmosphere over the planet. But my mind was not on the terraforming project, but that nagging concern about Pelf that I couldn’t shake. I still felt that Pelf was spying on me, but perhaps he spied on everyone. I have grown used to being spied on, directly and indirectly, electronically and by computer-directed dossiers that are supposed to predict my future performance by past records. I have grown used to it but I have never liked it. I had erected a wall between us a month long and higher than he could jump. I was hoping it would hold.
We trundled into the long, segmented zome and I noticed how skillful they had gotten with the sand-silicon sprayfoamed over the complex of balloon structures. The lock cycled and we went on into the oldest dome, now chipped and discolored, but kept serviceable. Johann pulled up to the largest structure in the center of the dome, a four-story building of rosy blocks of fused sand. Most of the older buildings were built in a similar fashion.
“Here you are,” he said, killing the engine. “I’ll go back out and fetch your cargo when they land it,” he added. Several men in worn warmsuits and one in a shiny new one came out of the building and approached us. Some were known by my fellow passengers and there was a general conversation, hubbub, chaos, and party. Nova was snatched away and wondered at and kissed and hugged and lusted after and passed from one man to another or snatched away with good natured desire to be marveled over.