"One Small Step For Man..."

The parade came down 0 Block, deep in the heart of Chicagoland.

Thousands of men and women in polymer work fatigues marched in lockstep down the avenue, all smiles. These were the victors of Gliese 570, the most recent battle in the War on Nothing. Millions cheered them on, from the sidewalks, from the hundred-story buildings on either side of the street, everyone throwing red-white-and-blue confetti from their windows, setting off similarly-colored fireworks from the rooftops. Flutes and battledrums played loud and methodical, just like the advancing footsteps of the parade, their song an old tune called "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" from a nation that was the first to reach to stars, but now long-gone, a melody filled with relief at returning home in one piece, filled with patriotism for winning the battle.

Most of the victors held pie-guns resting on their right shoulders, while others carried the spoils of war. One space-cruiser crew held up a 12,000 karat diamond, reflecting the glint of the bright morning sunlight; a platoon of deck apes held up the locust-drone MAAS-MECHTEK-LOCUST-X12M34R21 (affectionately known as “Loc”) who recorded the highest recovery rate of bauxite during the harvesting. A place of honor near the front of the parade was reserved for the bridge bunnies of the Abrams A. Asskicker, the flagship of flotilla commander Lawrence. The crowd looked on proudly as Billy Sodenholzer and his batman Haraguchi Arimoto marched with flagpoles, banners fluttering in the breeze, a screaming eagle across a field of blue. This wasn't just any eagle, but the eagle of Apollo 11, the symbol of Man's bravery, the first time he defeated the Laws of Nature, in pursuit of his destiny...

Neil Armstrong would be proud of how far humanity progressed in the following millennium - at least, that’s how the crowd felt. Lawrence’s civilian supporters, dressed in their own polymer work fatigues, spread down the parade route, many with flags of their own. These Polymermen cried into their bullhorns, “One Small Step For Man!”

From children on the sidewalks to mothers in the windows to drunkards on the rooftops, to the hundreds of thousands of young men everywhere, the crowd answered as one - “One Giant Leap For Mankind!”

When thinking of the deep space adventures, the conquest of the universe, the pride of being an Earthling and therefore exceptional since this was where the whole thing started - “One Small Step For Man!”

“One Giant Leap For Mankind!”

Amadeus Lawrence himself stood on a grand stage about halfway through the parade route. His polymer fatigues were decorated with medals and ribbons from previous victories, a shiny new one for Gliese 570 now joining them. His hand remained in perpetual salute as his crews passed down below him on the street. When those in the parade marched past the podium, they snapped to attention, heads turning right, faces stoic. Drums thundered, flags fluttered, self-worth swelled.

“One Giant Leap For Mankind!”

Up on the 53rd floor of a parking garage, Grace Pillow watched the procession with bored eyes, idle fingers dancing along the A-Polymer railing. She couldn’t help but notice all the couples in the crowd while she was up there by herself. But you didn’t want to be down there, because they didn’t get it either. For every screaming eagle, there was a sign saying “No More Martian Pranksters” or “Down With Do-Nothings”. One rooftop burned an effigy of a little green man, old symbol of Martians, as they shot confetti down below.

The 53rd floor was nearly empty, just Grace and the time capsule, but then a self-driving unmarked van crawled alongside her. The driver-bot kept the engine running, two humanoid war-bots in suits and shades emerged to provide security, and then Captain Nixon of the Asskicker stepped out. He saw the time capsule and grinned.

“Could’ve sworn I saw you down there,” Grace said.

Nixon shrugged. “I had a robot duplicate take my place in the march. Never cared for things like this.”

“And Lawrence?”

“No robo-duplicate for him. He’s down there in the flesh. He lives for things like this.”

Grace tilted her head. “What do you live for, then?”

Nixon smirked. “Power.”

Grace thought about it. “As good of a reason as any, I suppose.”

Nixon stood alongside her, gazing at the endless parade. “Kajanas on Mars opposes the War on Nothing. Says it’s wasteful, unregulated, lacks oversight. That won’t do. If President Vice-President and the supercomputers won’t remove him, then we’ll need to do it ourselves. With Lawrence as Earth Manager and myself as Mars Manager, we can continue the War on Nothing forever.”

“Removing him won’t be easy.”

“Just look at this crowd,” Nixon answered. “You think when push comes to shove, they won’t rise to the challenge? The prank war will continue to escalate. Right now it’s just limited to mutual hatred between Lawrence and Kajanas. The two kings. But once we can expand the prank war to the people…Churchill once said the wars of the people will be more terrible than those of kings.”

Grace’s fingers kept dancing along the railing. “You don’t think Mars has the same kinds of crowds?”

Nixon scoffed. “Martians don’t have the same sort of history, pageantry, and bravery we do. One Earthling is worth ten Martians. And besides, nothing whips up public fervor better than using old symbols to make people think they’re worth a nickel. These people, they sit around idly, nothing going on in their lives…all we have to do is hand them a flag and tell ‘em as long you got that flag, and the other guy doesn’t, then you got Something worth fighting for.”

How cynical, supposed Grace.

He patted her on the back. “And besides, you’re our ace in the hole, right?”

Grace frowned and slipped away, putting the time capsule between her and Nixon. “Not me. The time capsules are. Here’s twenty-three of twenty-four.”

She kicked the capsule across the asphalt to him. A security-bot scooped up the capsule, opened it for Nixon. He nodded in approval; the bot took the capsule back to the van. “Pleasure doing business with you, Grace.”

“Wait,” she said, stepping forward. “The agreement is still on, right? I find the last capsule, and then you free my father, right?”

There’s a reason why Grace grew up on Mars but went to high school on Earth.

Nixon made an exaggerated show of thinking about it. “Well, that was the agreement…but he was arrested for planetary fraud, we’d have to pull some major strings to get him out…and we did already give you a military-grade Brain Implant…”

Grace narrowed her eyes. Obviously, she couldn’t scare Nixon. But the twenty-fourth time capsule would be the last piece of leverage she had in the handshake agreement between Grace and Lawrence - find twenty-four time capsules with twenty-four pieces of an old formula split between them. Lawrence and Nixon would then use the formula to complete a “Project Pi” that would ensure their domination over Mars in the prank war they intended to escalate. In return, Grace’s father would be freed from his life sentence in a maximum-security prison on a Jupiter trojan.

“Relax, Grace, we’ll free your father.” Nixon appeared jovial as he waved goodbye. As he got into the van, he glanced back. “Do you know where the last time capsule is held?”

Grace nodded.

Nixon waited for her to spill the secret, but she didn’t, so he grinned and closed the door. The van sped off, leaving Grace to the sound of flutes and drums drifting up from the below.

It was off to Starlight Cafe.