Old Mars

The inner door with its glossy surface slid aside to reveal an arched passageway in the foamed stone. That gave onto an inner courtyard about a hundred yards across. The air was blissfully damp—about like Palm Springs or Bakersfield—and smelled faintly of rock, growth, and things like marjoram and heather and others that had no names on Earth. The pavement was ornamental, a hard, fossil-rich, pale limestone that was replaced every few centuries. Little of it could be seen beneath the vegetation that covered the planters, rose up the slender fretwork pillars that supported the arcaded balconies that overlooked the court, and hung in colored sheets from the carved-stone screens. It wasn’t quite a closed system like a spaceship, but fairly close.

“I extend formal and impersonally polite greetings to the lineage and residents,” she said quietly in fluent Demotic. “This is my professional associate, denominated Thomas, casual/intimate form Tom, lineage designation Beckworth. He will be residing with me for some time as is contractually permitted by my lease.”

That took all of ten words and a couple of modifiers, in Martian. Half a dozen people looked up from chores or narrow books that hinged at the top or games of atanj, gave a brief inclination of the head, then ignored her, which was reasonably courteous; none of them were wearing their robes, or much of anything else.

“We’re on the second floor,” she said, leading the way.

“Nobody seems particularly interested in us,” Beckworth said.

“They’ve seen Terrans before,” Sally said, with a shrug.

“There are only a couple of hundred of us on Mars. I’d have thought we’d attract more attention. A Martian sure as shit would in Oakland!”

“They’re not like us, Tom. That’s the point.”

The door to her suite opened its eye and looked at her, the S-shaped pupil swelling. She met the gaze, letting it scan her and her companion. It blinked acknowledgment and there was a dull click as the muscle retracted the ceramic dead bolt.

They racked their sword belts and he looked at her pictures with interest. There was one of her parents, one of the winery they ran in Napa, and a couple of her siblings and nieces and nephews and one of a cat she’d owned, or vice versa, in university.

The apartment was large, several thousand square feet, paradisical after you got used to spaceships or space habitats or that habitat-on-Mars called Kennedy Base. The furniture was mostly built into the substance of the walls and floor, with silky or furry native blankets and rugs folded on top, some stirring a little as they sensed the Terrans’ body warmth. The extra two degrees tended to confuse them.

Homelike, in a sort of chilly detached alien way, she thought, and went on aloud:

“There’s a bed niche over there, let’s sling your duffle.”

“Where’s the bathroom?”

“That way. Wait until you make the acquaintance of the Zar-tu-Kan style of bidet,” she added, and grinned at his wince.

“When do we eat?”

“I’ll whip us up a stir-fry,” she said.

“Martians make stir-fries?” Beckworth said, surprised.

“No, I just like stir-fries.”

“Want me to lend a hand?”

“You’re not going anywhere near my cooking gear,” she said. “It took years to get everything just right.”

As they stowed his modest baggage, Beckworth said quietly: “What’s with the canid?”

“Satemcan? He’s … ah, he’s a very helpful gofer. Especially out in the field. His food doesn’t cost much.”

He raised an ironic eyebrow, and she went on reluctantly, in a lower tone: “And yeah, a bit of a rescue thing. He’s got … problems. He was lucky not to get needled and stuffed in the digester long ago.”

“So much for the cold-blooded, ruthless puppy-rescuing Old Mars Hand,” he said, grinning wide and white.

Sally raised one arm, made a fist, and elevated her middle finger as she went back to the kitchen nook.

“Rooz, the meat vegans can eat,” she called as she sliced and stirred, and Beckworth joined in the laugh as he set out two flat-bottomed globes of essence on the table and pushed in the straws.

Martians regarded the idea of killing a domestic animal to get meat from it as hopelessly inefficient. The tembst-modified bird-dinosaur-whatevers the rooz came from grew flaps of boneless meat where their remote ancestors’ wings or forelimbs had been, and they regrew when sliced off.

“And it does taste like chicken,” Beckworth said.

She put the fry-up aside for a moment in an insulated bowl and poured batter into the wok, swirling it and then peeling out a half dozen tough but fluffy pancakelike rounds of vaguely breadlike stuff in succession.

“More like veal, this variety, and there’s this spice that tastes a bit like lemon and chilies—” she began.

Satemcan whined, his ears coming up and nose pointing toward the door.