Even The Rocks Would Cry Out

DATE: Year 308-B, Sol 437

LOCATION: Valles Marineris (Phobos Orbital Authority)

The settlement clung to the edge of the cliff, held together by metal and dirty glass. Below it, the Valles Marineris canyon system opened up the planet’s crust, four thousand kilometers long and deep enough to swallow an atmosphere.

Anchored near the center of the canyon, where Phobos passed every shift, rising from the dark floor and shooting into the clouds was the Elevator.

The Elevator itself was technically invisible, being a thread of diamond-nanotube composite. But it was surrounded by various support wires and warning lights, not all of which functioned anymore, but none that anyone would dare to remove and making the whole thing come crashing down. No one really knew how these old things worked anymore.

The Trappist rover docked at the Coprates Chasma settlement’s airlock, a small service entry for the canyon miners.

-It’s Palm Sunday, the monk explained to Murray as the rover approached a small neighborhood at the edge of the settlement.

-Would you like to come with us?

-We don't have time for church services, Murray argued. The MTC patrols shift in an hour.

-The MTC patrols are always shifting. Patience. You can stay in the rover if you’d like. There is a foodery nearby as well. I don’t recommend rushing ahead when you’re so close. Patience.

Murray sighed, grabbing her bag and the box of tea. She signaled Clara to follow.

They walked through the settlement. It was a shantytown of pressurized yurts and container homes. Today, the narrow streets were lined with miners holding strips of green plastic.

They reached the chapel. It was a converted storage silo, the roof painted with a faded crucifix.

Inside, it was packed. Dwellers, miners, and mechanics stood in the rows. Incense or something mimicking it burned.

Clara had learned a little about the Church, one of the few things that actually survived from Old Earth, and weren’t New Earth constructions wearing the skins of the things they killed, like the MTC.

But few people in West Mars were believers. Many of the Old Earth religions, such as they were when they settled off-planet, had seen the Rip as an eschatological event that had left them behind.

Doomed religious expeditions to Earth continued for decades after post-Rip scientific expeditions were written off as impossible. Nothing was coming back.

New cults emerged, and some grew into religions. The one on Mercury briefly grew into an interplanetary empire.

The church had more members in the Qaddafi territory than on WMR, and even more on the Belt. Desperation brought people to God, and the church offered a God older than any other, with a living son who would return.

Murray looked at Clara. She’d probably have been raised in the church if she’d survived with her family. She took her by the hand and followed the monks into the chapel.

The Trappists offered Murray and the girls seats in the back and then went to the front and disappeared behind a partition to meet with the local priest.

-This is a real church, Clara asked Murray in a hushed tone.

-It is, Murray answered. Your parents probably went to one like it.

Clara closed her eyes and thought about her brother.

Sometime later the service started. The priest emerged from the partition, in a red robe, followed in procession by several monks, including the two who’d brought Clara and Murray to Valles Marineris.

The priest sprinkled the smallest amount of water from a plastic bottle. Clara watched, fascinated.

As the priest passed them, he paused. He could smell the tea box in Murray’s hands. He squeezed Clara’s hand gently before continuing.

The service lasted half an hour, prayers and readings. Singing was rare in settlements this small.

The monks returned to Murray and Clara with the priest in tow. He looked at Clara’s leg braces. He looked at the MTC patrol drones buzzing outside the silo’s window.

-The monks tell me you’re trying to get off the planet, the priest said to Murray. The undercroft is sealed. The old passages are gone, but we have one.

The monk looked at Murray. Patience pays off, he said with his facial expression.

Murray nodded. The monk signaled for them to follow. She grabbed Clara’s hand and followed the monk past the partition and into the sacristy.

A man was waiting for them. He was huge, taking off his deacon’s robe to reveal a grease-stained jumpsuit.

-This way, the man grunted.

The deacon mechanic led them out the back of the chapel and down a narrow alleyway that ended at the settlement’s waste disposal cliff.

He pointed to a rusted grate set into the rock face.

-That’s the intake for the Elevator’s cooling system. It runs all the way down to the anchor on the canyon floor.

He handed Murray a magnetic keycard.

-Don't touch the rails. You’ll fry.

-Thank you, Murray said, handing him a single brick of tea.

Thomas looked at the brick like it was gold, then tucked it into his jumpsuit.

-Godspeed.

Murray swiped the card. The grate hissed open and they climbed inside.

The maintenance tunnel was a vertical drop, lined with ladders and pipes. The heat was intense. The Elevator cars were zipping up and down the main ribbon somewhere in the darkness, generating waves of friction.

They climbed down for an hour, descending into Valles Marineris. The settlement above disappeared, replaced by the darkness of the canyon.

-Here, Murray panted, stopping at a platform cut into the rock.

A junction box marked MTC SECURE RELAY – NODE 74 blinked on the wall.

-This is the hardline, Murray said. It carries the signal from the Elevator to the satellites.

She unscrewed the panel. Her hands were shaking from the climb. She clamped her datapad onto the fiber-optics.

-Searching for the Sparrow, she muttered.

The screen filled with static, then resolved into a list of transponder echoes.

-I see them, Clara said, pointing. Drifting not that far from Venus. They almost made it, she said, dejected.

Murray frowned. A red window popped up on the screen.

-What is that? Clara asked.

-MTC command channel, Murray said. It’s an intercept order.

She read the text out loud.

-Commander Doremus. Target Mighty Sparrow. Authorization to engage upon atmospheric entry. No survivors.

-He’s going to kill them, Clara whispered.

-Not if they have a shield code, Murray said.

She pulled the old data-chip from her pocket.

-This code tells the Venusian defense grid that Phoenix is a friend. Sometimes the WMR has everything. If the Warlords haven't hacked the whole system, the automated guns will ignore him.

She slotted the chip and the junction box hummed. A siren began to wail in the shaft above them.

-Silent alarm, Murray cursed. They detected the tap.

-Did it go through?

STATUS: TRANSMITTING... 90%...

-Come on, Murray urged.

TRANSFER COMPLETE.

-Got it, she said, yanking the pad free. -Now we—

A spotlight blinded them from above. An MTC drone hovered in the shaft, its railgun spinning up.

-Halt! a mechanical voice boomed. Authorized personnel only.

-Run!, Murray yelled.

She grabbed Clara and ran toward the coolant discharge chute, picking up and dropping her into the tube feet first.

-Think of it like a slide.

-Whoopie, Clara yelled, letting herself be a child. She’d read about amusement parks in old Earth history but never imagined getting to go down a slide this steep.

-Children, Murray muttered as she climbed into the tube after.

Murray looked at the drone, then at the tea box in her hand. There were still three bricks left.

She threw the heavy wooden box at the drone. It smashed into the rotor, shattering.

Thousands of dollars worth of tea bricks exploded into a cloud of brown dust. The drone sputtered and crashed into the wall.

Murray jumped into the chute after Clara, bracing her body for the long descent and what her suit wouldn’t handle.

They slid through the twisting metal guts of the canyon wall, spitting out onto a pile of gravel near the canyon floor, kilometers below.

Clara coughed, wiping sludge from her visor. High above, the lights of the settlement were like stars.

Murray sat up, groaning. She checked her datapad.

MESSAGE SENT.

She looked at the girl and smiled weakly, grabbing a rock and turning it in her hand.

-The rocks would cry out if they could, she said, repeating something she’d heard in the service before throwing the rock away and grabbing Clara’s hand.

-Let’s go.