Classical: MARS: Book 3 of MARS Read online

  Classical:

  MARS

  Matthew Ellis

  ©2016 Watermelon Mountain

  Albuquerque, NM

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, businesses, and events either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any actual person, place, thing or event is purely coincidental.

  Classical: MARS

  Published by Watermelon Mountain

  ©2016 Matthew Ellis

  ISBN 978-1505798623

  Printed In USA

  First Edition

  Cover Art: Vicente Alirez

  Cover Photos Courtesy NASA

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be disseminated in any way without the express, signed written consent of the author. Creative Commons and Fair Use excepted up to 10 percent.

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that the author has not been compensated for this work. The book has been declared “Unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and the author will not receive any compensation for this “stripped book.”

  For my mother, who pushed me to do what I love.

  Also by Matthew Ellis:

  Tornado Mountain

  MARS: Renaissance (book 1 of MARS)

  MARS: Baroque Revolution (book 2 of MARS)

  Among the Stars

  Revenge

  When the rich man heard about it

  He decided not to sit.

  He made it a point to make a plan

  To become again the man

  He wouldn’t just sit by

  And watch his control die.

  He’d make a play

  To regain his grip on the day.

  The power was once his

  It could be again.

  He wants to be the wiz

  But now he’s in a pen.

  He’ll get out

  And regain all his clout.

  Section VII:

  Discoveries

  Chapter One

  Rich’s New Plan

  General Rich wasn’t happy with the Treaty of Luna, but he had to abide by its terms. However, he didn’t have to be happy about it, and he was determined to undermine the Martian colony.

  “I still have my mole on Mars. I should give him a call.”

  He dialed the number and waited for the signal to reach Notah on Mars. The delay, which could be nine to sixteen minutes, drove him crazy every time he had to contact anyone on Mars.

  “I hope he hasn’t double crossed me. If he has, there’ll be hell to pay.”

  Notah answered, “What can I do for you General?”

  General Rich replied, “I hope you haven’t been too comfortable for the past two years.”

  Notah said, “It’s only been a little over a year on our side. Anyway, I don’t think you called me for the sole purpose of threatening me. What do you need?”

  Rich answered, “I’m going to do something, and I need to make sure you don’t allow the Martians to know what I’m doing.”

  Notah asked, “So you’re going to subvert the colony from Earth?”

  Rich replied, “That’s the plan. I know the idea will fail because it’s bad. I’m just going to speed up the process a little bit.”

  Notah said, “What do you plan to do?”

  General Rich told him the plan, and they went over the details for a while. Notah agreed to continue helping Rich.

  As soon as he finished with Notah, General Rich’s phone rang.

  “Who the hell’s bothering me now?”

  He picked up the phone and said, “This is General Rich.”

  Kathryn Wiley said, “I need your help, General. I’m with Bank of America. We have a problem in New Mexico.”

  Rich said, “Oh, you’re the company my son works for now. What’s the problem?”

  Kathryn said, “I don’t have the particulars, so I’m going to let my partner, Kevin Jones, tell you the situation.”

  Rich asked, “Is that who I think it is?”

  Kathryn replied, “Who do you think it is?”

  Rich answered, I think it’s Kathy Jones’ father.”

  Kathryn said, “He is her father, but he’s disowned her and has no contact with her anymore.”

  Rich said, “Still, I’m not sure I can trust a man whose daughter is my enemy’s wife.”

  Kathryn said, “I assure you, he has nothing to do with the Martian Republic or its leadership.”

  Rich said, “Okay, put him on the line.”

  Kathryn said, “Unfortunately, he’s not with me. He’s at our field office in Albuquerque. I’ll have him call you shortly.”

  Rich angrily said, “You do know I’m very busy. I don’t have time to deal with playing ‘phone tag’, especially if it involves my son.”

  Kathryn apologetically said, “I’m sorry, General, but I had to get your attention before we present you with our request.”

  Rich said, “You have my attention, now don’t try my patience by making me wait for the information too long. If this involves my son and you’re holding back information, I’ll bankrupt you.”

  Kathryn said, “We would never dream of making you angry. Your son has made it very clear who you are and what you can do. It’s garnered him some clout within the company.”

  The banks controlled most of the flow of money, but they couldn’t maintain control without the military’s support. Therefore, the bankers were very careful to make the military leaders happy, especially General Rich.

  Rich said, “I look forward to Kevin’s phone call later on today.”

  He hung up the phone and spun around in his chair to look at his calendar.

  “Don’t these people realize I don’t have time to help them with bullshit? Whatever this Kevin person wants had better be important. If it involves my son and I’m kept waiting for information, I’m going to hurt someone.”

  The phone rang a few minutes later.

  Kevin said, “Hello, General Rich. I’m sorry to cut into your busy day, but I think helping us will be beneficial to both of us.”

  Rich asked, “And how is helping you going to benefit me? The way I see it, the only way helping you helps me is if it involves my son.”

  Kevin said, “There’s a problem that does, indeed involve your son. My daughter is probably also involved.”

  Rich snapped, “Your daughter’s on my shit list. I don’t give a shit about her. Is my son okay?”

  Kevin thought, “I haven’t talked to Kathy in years, but I still love her. This guy’s a fuckin’ asshole.”

  Kevin replied, “He’s fine, but his partner was killed while serving an eviction to some people who were bound and determined to be degenerates.”

  Rich thought about it, and decided to listen to Kathy’s father.

  Rich asked, “What can I do to help you?”

  Kevin replied, “Maybe we can help each other.”

  Rich said, “I’m listening.”

  Kevin said, “It seems that the fugitives went to Mars. We think they’re hiding from us there. They may have sought asylum with the Martian Republic.”

  Rich was intrigued. He saw a way to subvert the Martians in secret.

  Rich said, “So, what’s your plan?”

  Kevin replied, “We need you to send a team to Mars to retrieve them and bring them back to Earth to stand trial.”

  Rich asked, “How does that help me?”

  Kevin explained his plan to the General for the next two hours. It involved subverting the Martians on several fronts, which made General Rich happy.

  Rich said, “That’s a wonderful plan. You get your assets back, and I get to plant the seeds of
doubt among the Martian people.”

  Kevin said, “I thought you might like this plan. I understand you have a mole working for you on Mars.”

  Rich replied, “I do, but I’m not willing to share that information with you.”

  Kevin said, “Don’t forget that we’re the ones who set you up with his services.”

  Rich snapped, “Don’t forget that your daughter is married to their leader.”

  Kevin cried, “My daughter has been disowned. You know we keep tabs on Notah, right?”

  Rich asked, “Do you know something about Notah that we don’t know?”

  Kevin said, “We know everything you know.”

  Rich said, “Okay, if you already know, then there’s no reason to hide the information.”

  Kevin said, “I think you should involve him in the mission as much as possible. It’ll be good to have someone who can control the situation from the inside.”

  Rich said, “I was planning on that already.”

  Kevin said, “It looks like you’re a few steps ahead of me, so I’ll let you start working.”

  Rich hung up the phone and started working on the new mission.

  “Now to have a three-hour conversation that only has six sentences”

  Notah asked, “What else can I do for you, General?”

  Rich answered, “Well, first you can tell me if you know of a technology being developed to shorten this maddening delay in communications from Earth to Mars.”

  Notah said, “Unfortunately, as Scout keeps saying, ‘This is not Star Trek.’ There’s no way to shorten that delay, and sub-space communication doesn’t exist yet.”

  Rich said, “We need to work on that. I intend to make that research a priority.”

  Rich explained the bankers’ plan to Notah, and Notah agreed to do everything he could to help the mission.

  Rich finished, “Your work is appreciated, and your reward will be waiting for you upon your return to Earth. Just don’t double cross me.”

  Notah said, “I understand.”

  The transmission ended, and General Rich felt very eager to get started with the mission.

  Notah felt torn.

  Chapter Two

  Refugees

  Michael Cain, Elaine Bates, and Andres Baca barely escaped from the guard ships on Earth’s lunar base. They hoped they’d be safe once they left the authority of Earth’s governments.

  Michael said, “Looks like we just passed DeNoPE’s border. The treaty with the Martians doesn’t let them go toward Mars without express permission.”

  Elaine said, “I’m still not letting my guard down. They’ve been known to ignore rules and treaties in the past.”

  Michael said, “I’m not saying we should let our guard down, but we can probably focus on getting to Mars and hiding.”

  Andres said, “This plan is half baked as fuck. How are we going to survive on Mars once we get there?”

  Michael replied, “We have food and seeds with us. The planet’s not dead anymore. There’s breathable air, flowing water, and I know of some shelters that are away from the Martian cities.”

  Elaine asked, “But what if we get sick or hurt?”

  Michael replied, “We have some medical supplies, but the Martian cities have hospitals if we need them.”

  Andres said, “Yeah, right. If we go to the hospital, they’ll turn us in to the DeNoPE authorities.”

  Michael said, “You don’t know that.”

  Andres said, “Yes, I do. The treaty between Earth and Mars forces both sides to turn in criminals to the other side if found, and the Martians aren’t liars like DeNoPE.”

  Elaine said, “We’re going to have to be very careful not to get sick or hurt.”

  Michael said, “Fortunately, there are no germs in space, and there are very few on Mars.”

  Elaine said, “But there’s a billion ways to get injured in both places.

  Michael said, “We have enough to worry about without worrying about things that might happen.”

  Elaine said, “We have enough to worry about with the three-month trip through space.”

  Andres said, “I thought it was going to take seven months to get there.”

  Michael said, “I procured one of the faster engines for the ship. It’s amazing how fast these things can go now. Some of the cargo ships can make it in three weeks.”

  Andres said, “It would’ve been better to stowaway on one of those. We wouldn’t have to worry about half of the crap we’ve already dealt with.”

  Michael replied, “But we would’ve had a heap of new troubles once we got to Mars. This way is better from here forward.”

  Andres argued, “How is it better? We have to live like fugitives when we arrive.”

  Elaine said, “This is going to be hard enough without your negativity. Can you stick a cork in it for the next few months?”

  Andres said, “Whatever, bitch! If you hadn’t lost your job, we wouldn’t be in this situation.”

  Elaine snapped, “It’s not like I lost my job for doing anything wrong. They replaced me with legal slaves.”

  Andres said, “There’s no such thing. Slavery is illegal everywhere on Earth.”

  Elaine said, “But it’s not illegal to pay people low wages and make them pay “dues,” and “rent” for the housing they’re forced to live in. It amounts to the equivalent of slavery.”

  Michael snapped, “Shut the fuck up, both of you. It doesn’t fucking matter whose fault it is, and we can’t change anything. Just deal with what we’re doing now.”

  For the next six weeks, they flew through space in their salvaged probe launcher. The quarters were cramped, but tolerable. However, the fighting continued on a daily basis. Michael tried to keep himself busy, but Andres and Elaine were constantly dragging him into their arguments.

  Michael thought, “I wish I could escape from those two. They’re both in denial that they’re in love, but we need each other to survive.”

  Once Mars came into view, they had to be sure to steer clear of the Martian defenses. The satellites had been upgraded since the end of the war with Earth.

  Elaine asked, “How many satellites are there?”

  Michael replied, “I think they have six. There’s the original three, and they’ve added three more since the end of the war.”

  Andres, “So, we need to avoid all six? That might be difficult.”

  Michael said, “Not really. Only three of them can track us. The others are used for communications and energy transmission.”

  Elaine asked, “How do we know which ones are which?”

  Michael said, “The red ones are the ones we need to avoid. They’re painted a very obvious red.”

  Elaine said, “I hope it’s that easy.”

  They spent the next four days altering their course to avoid detection. It made Andres uneasy, but that wasn’t hard to do.

  Andres said, “It’s going to take forever to get to the surface if we have to alter course every few hours.”

  Elaine sarcastically said, “Would you rather get down there quickly and be caught?”

  Andres replied, “I didn’t want to do any of this. I want to go back to my comfortable life on Earth.”

  Elaine said, “We were constantly struggling, how the hell was that comfortable?”

  Andres snapped, “It was better than this fugitive bullshit.”

  Michael barked, “I told both of you to knock it off. This is hard enough without dealing with your constant bickering.”

  They stopped fighting and returned to their duties. Elaine located the landing spot where the Allied Earth forces had set up during the war. She set a course and headed down to the planet’s surface.

  Chapter Three

  Baby!

  Kathy ran into the living room. Scout was sitting on the couch, watching the news. Kathy was holding a pink stick in her hand.

  Scout asked, “What’s that?”

  Kathy said, “You know what it is. You were with me when
I got it.”

  Scout said, “Oh, the test stick. I didn’t know you’d already done it. I thought we were going to take that test together.”

  Kathy said, “I was going to wait for you, but I just couldn’t wait any longer.”

  Scout stood and walked toward his wife.

  Scout said, “Well, you came running in here, so I assume it’s a good result.”

  Kathy said, “I’m pregnant with your daughter.”

  Scout asked, “How do you know it’s a girl?”

  Kathy replied, “The test knows the gender, too. It says I’m 4 weeks along, and have a girl in me.”

  Scout threw his arms around Kathy.

  Scout said, “It’s amazing what we’ve been able to accomplish. Back on Earth, the tests weren’t worth anything until the sixth week. Now we know the gender, too. That was unheard of on Earth.”

  Kathy said, “Not to mention the date of conception within a week. I’m due in 36 weeks.”

  Scout commented, “I was beginning to think no one wanted to raise children here.”

  Kathy sarcastically replied, “Maybe they didn’t like your misogynistic attitude.”

  Scout said, “I told you, that wasn’t misogyny. It’s just pragmatism. How many people have you heard saying this?”

  Kathy answered, “No one lately. I’m just playing the devil’s advocate. I’ve heard that some people just want to make sure this experiment’s going to work.”

  Scout snapped, “Why wouldn’t it work? We spent years terraforming the planet in preparation for colonization. We lost a lot of good people in a war to break free from Earth’s corporate oppression. You think we’ll still fail?”