"Daughter of Mars"

So, back in the present of 2999 - Grace Pillow stalked the sewers of Big Dig, wearing a ragged brown cloak, raygun in hand, the intellectual stubbornness and arrogance of a college sophomore still in mind. She thought about Zipper Chute and the Dime Boys, those raves they went to, and got mad. Most things made her mad nowadays.

It wasn’t because Zipper had friends. No. Not at all. It was because a nice girl like Zipper was an automaton, warped by the madness of the coming fourth millennium where meaning had no meaning.

People still littered, see. They just didn’t care about leaving trash because robots picked up after them. People still overate, but self-burning calories solved that problem too. No need to go outside, because you could see it all on the Hypernet, and it’s not like there was much outside anyway, what with the whole planet covered in A-Polymer, and the whole Solar System (soon the Milky Way?) next on the list. No need to learn how to read, because your Implant read to you; no need to learn how to love, because alternative intelligences were always there for you; no need to learn civic duty, since systems automated society for you; no need to do anything, since everything was done for you; no need to be a person, because humanity no longer had need of them…

Grace came from Mars, the red dunes burned forever into her psyche. The terra-forming of the planet began in seven isolated spots domed by artificial atmospheres, creating Earth-like conditions with blue seas, green grass. These firmaments continue to expand each day, little by little, until one day all of Mars will be transformed into a second Earth. When the colonization of Mars is complete, it truly would be like Earth, since there would be no more work left to do.

Grace’s family was heavily involved in the terra-forming of Ramble Station, serving as top officials there. Their company held a lucrative contract as the primary producers of A-Polymer for Ramble. From their penthouse in the clouds, young Grace watched the expansion of Man in real time - bio-domes on the frontier, mass-production of robots, the growing spread of kaleidoscopic A-Polymer across the planet, drowning out the crimson sands. They were champions of the conquest of Mars, and conquest aptly fits a planet named like that, don’t you think?

It hurt her to see the planet change. Quiet deserts, distant mesas, a perpetual black sky dotted with infinite stars, beauty that simply exists for no reason beyond existence - that was the Mars Grace grew up on. But Ramble expanded, and A-Polymer covered up her childhood. The earliest settlers who worked alongside the robots now adopted an Earthling lifestyle of doing nothing, the kids already hooked on Five-Sense-Experiences, ignorant of the red sands and the imagery of blood and the heart it called to mind.

In her adolescence, Grace intended for her book to rank among the Great Human Novels, and serve as a wake-up call for a sleepwalking humanity. But that would be tough…for a number of reasons. However - Grace Pillow, who drifted and observed and maybe spoke aloud only five words in the past six months, knew that the year 3000 would be upon us soon, and something must be done to save us from a fourth millennium where we slept with no dreams.

Remember Eden’s Apple? That sigma tale about Jackson Mississippi and ol’ Doc Rooney? Grace recommended it to Zipper back in high school because she genuinely enjoyed it. But as Grace kept reading, and re-reading it, underlining, taking notes, writing blog posts, dissertations, ten-hour video essays - she started noticing things, which made her plan things, things she couldn’t do alone, so she needed to grow a following, whether it was through the handful of true apostles that actually followed her on the Hypernet, or unwitting pawns, such as Joe Weeze and the Polymermen…

She gave Joe a copy of Eden’s Apple back in 2996 hoping he’d become a follower, and if not, that he’d grow curious and find something very particular about that book. He did. It was why she was in the sewers now, combing through the murky waters beneath Big Dig, through thousands of years of construction, until she finally came across her target.

It was an old colonial street - she could feel the cobblestone beneath her neo-rubber boots. At some point during the past millennium, it had been converted into a sewer system, with an X-Polymer roof colored like storm clouds, since that was the only color X-Polymer came in. Squat houses lined the street, their roofs built into the X-Polymer ceiling, red bricks worn away to a similar gray color. A dull blue lighting covered the street, thanks to the efforts of squatters and those in the underground (heh) scene wanting to get away from it all. You can’t really get away from society, though, when there was a convenience store down here, elevators to the surface. But Grace came the long way, just in case the Polymermen grew suspicious.

Grace approached a door labeled POLYMERMEN HQ. She supposed her opposition to their name must’ve also bore fruit.

Several knocks.

“Blokes, I think our delivery’s here,” came a muffled voice from inside. When Joe Weeze opened the door, he studied her for a moment. They swapped a few brain-flashes.

“Ah, Grace Pillow,” he recalled. He thought about it. “Usually drones deliver for us-”

“No delivery,” Grace interrupted. “Rango invited me here. Can I come in?”

“Uh, sure, sure. Mind the gap and all, we haven’t cleaned in a few days, or weeks maybe…”

Joe let her inside. An old lamp doused the crowded living room with its faded beige walls in dull yellow light. Walrus Jackson and Slow Dogwaddle sat on a ratty couch, deep in one of them Five-Sense Experiences from Neo-Neon Tokyo. Both of them wore wired nets; bakelite circles covered four points on their heads. A hologram projector displayed the game so onlookers could watch.

“Walrus-kun, Slow-kun,” said a wide-eyed Japanimation girl named Hikari, a high school setting projected around the entire living room. “The Obon festival is tomorrow. Would you…eto…want to go with Natsuki-chan and I?”

          A) “We’d love to."

          B) “Four’s a crowd, the three of us should be fine.”

          C) “Sorry, but we’re both kind of busy already…”

          D) “Sure, but only one of us is free that night, and that one is…”

“Choose B, dig?” Walrus said. “Hee-hoo, haha, you know.”

“Giggity-diggity,” answered Slow, both of ‘em brain-flashing B.

“Right on,” said Grace, eyebrow raised.

Joe just chuckled, handed Grace a beer, and sprawled out on his back on another raggedy couch. “Did Rango brain-flash you? ‘Course not, he was always a bit daft, that one. He’s out right now volunteering as a toxic-rat-catcher. Forgot the plutonium, ‘course, but the flamethrower should be enough.”

Grace nodded. “That’s fine. I’ll wait around.”

She leaned against a wall, letting the lie about Rango settle in, watching the Obon festival projection, finishing her beer. When they got to the goldfish game, and both Walrus and Slow took either arm of Hikari to show her how to scoop, the blush reaching Hikari’s eyes, Grace decided to quit fooling around.

“Joe,” she said. “I saw your Hypernet post the other day. About that time capsule you found.”

Joe Weeze held a beer can just with his mouth, leaned back, glug-glug and all, then smiled as he spat away the empty can. “Oh yeah, it's pretty neat-o. Let me show ya.”

Grace smiled serenely.

Joe returned from a spare room a moment later with a black tube dated 2025. Grace’s heart skipped a beat at the sight, and she almost turned as red as Hikari on the screen. Grace followed him to the kitchen, where he pushed away empty beer cans and snack wrappers and set the tube down. A prominent gray lock prevented either of them from reaching inside.

“This lock’s good, love,” Joe said. “Rango tried the plutonium and flamethrower on it, but no dice.”

“It’s a super-hardened version of micro-synthetic polyethylene,” Grace explained, her voice barely above a whisper, since excitement threatened to overtake it.

“Come again, dear?”

“The main component of A-Polymer,” she continued. “But what most people don’t know is that it’s also the main component of X-Polymer. And what nobody knows is that Jackson Mississippi and Doc Rooney were interns on the micro-synthetic polyethylene project while studying at Cushing College.”

Joe whistled. “Makes sense, I ‘spose. Jackson and the Doc hid the capsule, so no surprise they’d use their own substance to lock it tight.”

“Did you get the time capsule location from Eden’s Apple?”

Joe grinned. “Rango noticed. Doc Rooney laid it on thick with time and medicine capsules while departing Boston Common. The lads and I went out and explored the sewers for a few weeks until we finally found the cavern it’s now in. We did a bit of digging, and bob’s your uncle - we found a time capsule. Pretty groovy, eh?”

“Groovy indeed,” Grace mumbled, enthralled by the twenty-second of the twenty-four time capsules secretly laid out in Eden’s Apple. She opened her jacket and unholstered the raygun.

Joe took a step back. “Careful, love. Guns aren’t street legal. Or legal in general, I guess…” But then he understood. “Ah, you can use the raygun to melt away the lock-”

Grace pointed the gun at his mop-covered head. Joe swallowed and took a step back.

“I’ll be taking this,” Grace merely said, a single strand of black hair falling down her forehead.

“Should’ve known you were lying. Rango don’t ever invite girls over.” Sweat dripped down Joe. “So is this about that thing between us?”

Grace raised an eyebrow. “What thing?”

“Sorry, Grace, but I only have one love. I respect and feel flattered by your feelings for me. But my true love is across the sea, that doe-eyed girl in Neo-Neon Tokyo, Azuki Nadeshiko…”

A scoff. “If you love your cartoon girls so much, go put on the headset with your fellas.”

A frown. “Azuki Nadeshiko is flesh and blood, that perpetual sad smile on her lips…”

Grace scowled at the thought. She picked up the capsule and started back-pedaling towards the front door.

Joe swallowed and spoke up. “F-F-Fellas, uh, could you come into the kitchen? We, uh, got a situation.”

Grace tightened her trigger finger, but couldn’t bring herself to shoot as he spoke, even with the raygun set to stun.

“A cockroach?” Walrus called back. “Rango can take care of it later.”

“I need help now!” Joe yelled out.

“Flat is justice!” Slow answered.

“You twat, that has no relation to what I’m saying-”

Grace kicked open the door and backed out of the house. Before she turned and started sprinting down the cobblestone, the last sights of the f/k/a Polymermen were a startled Joe Weeze, giggity-diggity Walrus and Slow, and a flustered kimono-clad Hikari baring a pale shoulder under the moonlight on a quiet beach, midnight waves lapping at the shore.