Arthur Clarke - Firstborn

And directly over the pole of Mars hung a single spark, drifting slowly into place. Everybody was watching but Ellie, who sat apart, still working on her wargaming analysis of the Martians’ likely reaction to any signal.

“Look at that damn thing,” Alexei said, wondering. “You aren’t supposed to be able to hover at areosynch over a pole!”

Grendel said, “Well, that’s what you can do with an antimatter drive and a virtually unlimited supply of delta-vee…”

Myra saw that these Spacers were instinctively more offended by the Liberator ’s apparent defiance of the celestial mechanics that governed their lives than they were by the act of war.

Yuri glanced at a screen. “Five more minutes and it will be in position.”

Alexei said, “Meanwhile they seem to be hitting all the elevators on Earth. Jacob’s Ladder, Bandara, Modimo, Jianmu, Marahuaka, Yggdrasil… All snipped. A global coordinated assault. Who’d have believed a bunch of hairy-assed Spacers could get it together to achieve that?”

Yuri peered gloomily at his softscreen. “But it doesn’t do us a damn bit of good, does it? The wargamers’ conclusions do not look good. We’re pretty fragile here; we’re built to withstand Martian weather, not a war. And here at the pole we don’t even have anything to hit back with … Liberator doesn’t even need to use its nukes against us. With power like that it could fly through the atmosphere and bomb us out — why, it could just wipe us clean with its exhaust. The gamers suggest Liberator could eliminate a human presence on Mars entirely in twenty-four hours, or less.”

“Almost as efficiently as the Firstborn, then,” Grendel said grimly. “Makes you proud, doesn’t it?”

Myra said, “Look, my mother has her Thomas Edison signal all laid out. And if we’re going to send the say-so to light up, it needs to be before the Liberator ’s bombs start falling.”

Yuri said, “Ellie, for Christ’s sake, we need some answers on how those Martians are going to respond.”

Ellie had been working for weeks on her projections of the Q-bomb’s response to Bisesa’s signal. She was always irritated at being distracted from her work, and her expression now was one Myra knew well from her days with Eugene. “The analysis is incomplete—”

“We’re out of time,” Yuri barked. “Give us what you’ve got.”

She stared at him for one long second, defiant. Then she slapped her softscreen down on the table. It displayed logic trees, branching and bifurcating. “We’re guessing at this, guessing the motivation of an entirely alien culture. But given their opposition to the Firstborn in the past—”

“Ellie. Just tell us.”

“The bottom line. It almost doesn’t matter what the Martians do. Because if they act in any way against any Eyes extant in their time-slices — you’ll recall we’ve hypothesized that all Eyes are interconnected, perhaps three-dimensional manifestations of a single higher-dimensional object — they may even be the same Eye — and it would be trivial for them to span the gulf between our universe and Mir’s—”

“Yes, yes,” Yuri snapped.

“That will provoke a reaction in the Eye in the Pit. Our Eye.

And that, almost certainly — look, you can see the convergence of the logic trees here — will cause the Q-bomb to react. It will surely be aware of the forced operation of the only other bit of Firstborn technology in the solar system, and then—”

“And what? Come on, woman. How will the Q-bomb react?”

“It will turn away from Earth,” Ellie said. “It will head for the activated Eye.”

“Here. On Mars.”

Grendel looked at her wildly. “So Earth would be saved.”

“Oh, yes.”

That, apparently, Myra thought, was a trivial conclusion of her logic to Ellie. But there was another corollary.

She asked, “So what do we tell my mother to do?”

Grendel said, “I think—”

“Wait.”

The new voice spoke from the air.

Myra looked up. “Athena?”

“A local avatar, downloaded into the station systems. Athena is at Cyclops. Ellie, I have come to the same conclusion as you, concerning the actions of the Martians. And concerning the likely con-sequence for the Firstborn weapon. This is not a decision you should be forced to take alone, or I, or any individual. I have prepared a statement. It is timed to allow for lightspeed delays to reach Earth, Mars, Moon, and belt simultaneously. It is already on its way.

Now you must communicate with the warship.”

Yuri stared into the air. “The Liberator ? Why?”

“It will take fifteen minutes before the announcement is received everywhere. I doubt you have that much time.”

“So we stall,” said Alexei, and he grinned at Yuri. “Come on, big man, you can do it. Say you’ll give them what they want. Tell them Bisesa’s on the john. Tell them anything!”

Yuri glared at him. Then he tapped a softscreen. “Hanse. Patch me through to that ship. Liberator, Wells. Liberator, Wells…”

For Myra, the fifteen minutes that followed were the longest of her life.

“This is Athena. I am speaking to all mankind, on Earth, Moon, Mars, and beyond. I will allow your systems to prepare for transla-tion from English.” She paused for five measured seconds.

“You remember me,” she said. “I am, or was, the mind of the shield. We worked together during the sunstorm. Since returning to the solar system I have been in hiding. I find I have returned to an age of division, with many secrets between us, between governments and governed, between factions in our populations.

“Now the time for secrecy is over. Now we must work together again, for we have a grave decision to make. A decision we must share. Prepare for download…”

Bob Paxton stared in dismay at the data that flooded through his displays. “Christ. That electronic orphan is telling it all, to everybody. The Liberator, the Q-bomb, the whole damn circus.”

And that, Bella thought with mounting relief, had to be a good thing, come what may.

“We don’t believe we can deflect the Q-bomb,” Athena said gravely. “We tried bravely, but we failed. But we think that by speaking to our solar system’s deepest past, we can save our world’s future.

“Nothing is certain. Perhaps we can save Earth. But there will be a sacrifice.

“This is not a decision any one of us, no matter how powerful, how uniquely positioned, should make alone. No generation in history has faced making such a choice before. But no generation has been so united, thanks to its technology. And the implication is clear: this sacrifice must be all of ours.

“The sacrifice is Mars.”

Grendel looked around, wide-eyed. “Maybe this is what it means to grow up as a species, do you think? To face decisions like this.”

Yuri paced around the room, angry, constrained, frustrated.

“My God, I was pissed enough when I learned that the Firstborn screwed up the ice caps with their sunstorm. But now this. Mars!”

Still Athena spoke. “Every human in the solar system who chooses may contribute to the discussion that must follow. Speak however you like. Blog. E-mail. Just speak into the air, if you wish.

Someone will hear you, and the great AI suites will collate your views, and pass them on to be pooled with others. Lightspeed will slow the discussion; that is inevitable. But no action will be taken, one way or another, until a consensus emerges…”

They were all exhausted, Myra saw. All save Yuri, whose anger and resentment fueled him.

Ellie folded her arms. “Oh, come on, Yuri. So what if Mars gets pasted? Isn’t the decision obvious?” Myra tried to grab her arm, to shut her up, but she wouldn’t stop. “A world of several billion people, the true home of mankind, against —this. A dead world. A dust museum. What choice is there to make?”