The Martyr of Mars
Mars had changed since I’d last been here, it had changed a lot. Ten years in, folks had still been shuffling hurriedly from shack to shack, fully insulated, hydrators clutched greedily to their faces. It had been a hell-hole, the Botany Bay of near space exploration, with the added irony that some of our best minds had actually chosen to come here rather than having been condemned to rot here.
Yet they rotted anyway. Mars sapped life, there were no two ways about it. Those guys had to be extra brilliant to achieve some of the things they did during their cruelly curtailed and wretched existences.
And me? The pioneer, amongst the very first, and one of the very few to make the trip back home. And now, the first to return.
My journey back to Earth had in itself been an experiment. Or perhaps you could say it had been an exercise in public relations, a way to win over the masses. “Just look at this man, this prime example of humankind. He has gone there, has pushed the boundary, and now has returned amongst us. Look at him, look how radiant he is, how vibrant!”
Mars has that effect, the pigmentation is inescapable. No matter how insulated you are, no matter how well protected. That healthy Martian glow! The biology boys were still trying to work out the reason why, thirty years later, let alone categorize the many different ways that this world was trying to kill us, and succeeding.
But, let’s face it, this was always kept somewhat under wraps. It wasn’t where the people on The Hill back home wanted the focus to be. ‘Life and hope’ instead of ‘death and despair’, that had to be the message. And they had ridden to political victory on the back of it. All that was left for them to do was to stick to their promises and to abandon their morals. To start shipping people en-masse. They were heralded as saviours of the race, elevated to idol status, as was I, the miracle spaceman.
And so they came. They didn’t have much choice, obviously, those that still clung onto rudimentary health whilst existing in daily squalor. They could stay put in the time bomb that was their current existence or they could accept the graciously offered one way tickets. No choice at all really, especially considering the marketing campaigns that they were continually bombarded with.
And now I’m here again and yes, things have definitely moved on. The town that they had never named (how optimistic was that?) was gone. In its place, only this time higher up the plateau, was a City, named after one of our great political heroes. Previously, the settlement had resembled an entrenched army on the brink of an eradicating defeat. Now however, the new domes gave the impression of actual habitation, showed the signs of routine, day to day life. This was still very much survival on the brink, but it was an improvement. Apart from the fact that the amount of bodies here far outweighed the ideal area of habitable space, and there had apparently been some horrendous backlog with the necessary resources from home.
But something else had changed, and changed quickly, as is very often the case when religious fervour takes hold. I had been in transit for a little over nine months and had experienced nought but sweet dreams. When I had boarded the shuttle at Kennedy the ‘casts from Mars were reporting political stability. There had been churches of various denominations here from almost the very beginning but the larger elements of them had done something not possible on Earth in thousands of years. They had unified, amalgamated. The harsh alien conditions had apparently been the catalyst, as well as the journey here itself. In reflection, you had to agree that events of biblical proportions had taken place and these people were living it, so how could they be denied, these New Revisionists? And so, they had entered the political arena, small that it was, and swept aside all competition on a wave of people power: people who were desperate to believe in some kind of future for themselves and their families, desperate enough to believe in anything. After all, there could be no going back for them. I had been amongst the privileged few in that regard.
However, I had returned, and the greeting I received was, to say the least, surprising. To be hailed as a religious icon, to be worshipped by these colonials was as unexpected as it was discomforting. I had neither revelled in it nor encouraged it, but events had gone far beyond my own control, public feeling had reached a fever pitch.
……………..
As I sit here now, the hydrator tightly held to my nose and mouth, my eyes on fire and my limbs numb, the thinnest of insulant suits affording little in the way of protection, I bear them no malice. I pity them, find myself worrying about them. The hydrator stifles my laugh. I am thinking of them as my children, like a good martyr should. They left me on the mountain three hours ago, but not to die. To hear the voice of God, I think, and then to return to them miraculously. And after that? Who knows, deliver them to the promised land most likely.
I am concerned about what they will do when I do not arise from the dead, walk out of this coldest of deserts. I hope they find a way to cling on, to move things forward somehow, and that all this will not be in vain. That there will have been some purpose in my existence and, just maybe, in my death also.
Yet they rotted anyway. Mars sapped life, there were no two ways about it. Those guys had to be extra brilliant to achieve some of the things they did during their cruelly curtailed and wretched existences.
And me? The pioneer, amongst the very first, and one of the very few to make the trip back home. And now, the first to return.
My journey back to Earth had in itself been an experiment. Or perhaps you could say it had been an exercise in public relations, a way to win over the masses. “Just look at this man, this prime example of humankind. He has gone there, has pushed the boundary, and now has returned amongst us. Look at him, look how radiant he is, how vibrant!”
Mars has that effect, the pigmentation is inescapable. No matter how insulated you are, no matter how well protected. That healthy Martian glow! The biology boys were still trying to work out the reason why, thirty years later, let alone categorize the many different ways that this world was trying to kill us, and succeeding.
But, let’s face it, this was always kept somewhat under wraps. It wasn’t where the people on The Hill back home wanted the focus to be. ‘Life and hope’ instead of ‘death and despair’, that had to be the message. And they had ridden to political victory on the back of it. All that was left for them to do was to stick to their promises and to abandon their morals. To start shipping people en-masse. They were heralded as saviours of the race, elevated to idol status, as was I, the miracle spaceman.
And so they came. They didn’t have much choice, obviously, those that still clung onto rudimentary health whilst existing in daily squalor. They could stay put in the time bomb that was their current existence or they could accept the graciously offered one way tickets. No choice at all really, especially considering the marketing campaigns that they were continually bombarded with.
And now I’m here again and yes, things have definitely moved on. The town that they had never named (how optimistic was that?) was gone. In its place, only this time higher up the plateau, was a City, named after one of our great political heroes. Previously, the settlement had resembled an entrenched army on the brink of an eradicating defeat. Now however, the new domes gave the impression of actual habitation, showed the signs of routine, day to day life. This was still very much survival on the brink, but it was an improvement. Apart from the fact that the amount of bodies here far outweighed the ideal area of habitable space, and there had apparently been some horrendous backlog with the necessary resources from home.
But something else had changed, and changed quickly, as is very often the case when religious fervour takes hold. I had been in transit for a little over nine months and had experienced nought but sweet dreams. When I had boarded the shuttle at Kennedy the ‘casts from Mars were reporting political stability. There had been churches of various denominations here from almost the very beginning but the larger elements of them had done something not possible on Earth in thousands of years. They had unified, amalgamated. The harsh alien conditions had apparently been the catalyst, as well as the journey here itself. In reflection, you had to agree that events of biblical proportions had taken place and these people were living it, so how could they be denied, these New Revisionists? And so, they had entered the political arena, small that it was, and swept aside all competition on a wave of people power: people who were desperate to believe in some kind of future for themselves and their families, desperate enough to believe in anything. After all, there could be no going back for them. I had been amongst the privileged few in that regard.
However, I had returned, and the greeting I received was, to say the least, surprising. To be hailed as a religious icon, to be worshipped by these colonials was as unexpected as it was discomforting. I had neither revelled in it nor encouraged it, but events had gone far beyond my own control, public feeling had reached a fever pitch.
……………..
As I sit here now, the hydrator tightly held to my nose and mouth, my eyes on fire and my limbs numb, the thinnest of insulant suits affording little in the way of protection, I bear them no malice. I pity them, find myself worrying about them. The hydrator stifles my laugh. I am thinking of them as my children, like a good martyr should. They left me on the mountain three hours ago, but not to die. To hear the voice of God, I think, and then to return to them miraculously. And after that? Who knows, deliver them to the promised land most likely.
I am concerned about what they will do when I do not arise from the dead, walk out of this coldest of deserts. I hope they find a way to cling on, to move things forward somehow, and that all this will not be in vain. That there will have been some purpose in my existence and, just maybe, in my death also.
