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awe
of the symmetrical formation, the love of rock hard under her bottom. Her feet
hung over the edge of the bench, she kicked her heels against basalt; she could
throw a pebble and it would fall five thousand meters. But she couldn’t
concentrate. She couldn’t feel it. Petrification. So numb, for so long. . ..
She sniffed, shook her head, pulled her feet in over the edge. Walked back up
to her rover.

 
     
     
     
     
    She dreamed of the long run-out. The landslide was rolling across the floor of Melas Chasma, about
to strike her. Everything visible with surreal clarity. Again she remembered
Simon, again she groaned and got off the little dike, going through the
motions, appeasing a dead man inside her, feeling awful. The ground was
vibrating—
    She woke, by her own volition she thought—escaping, running
away—but there was a hand, pulling hard on her arm.
    “Ann, Ann, Ann.”
    It was Nadia. Another surprise. Ann struggled up, disoriented.
“Where are we?”
    “Pavonis, Ann. The revolution. I came over and woke you because a
fight has broken out between Kasei’s Reds and the greens in Sheffield.”
    The present rolled over her like the landslide in her dream. She
jerked out of Nadia’s grasp, groped for her shirt. “Wasn’t my rover locked?”
    “I broke in.”
    “Ah.” Ann stood up, still foggy, getting more annoyed the more she
understood the situation. “Now what happened?”
    “They launched missiles at the cable.”
    “They did!” Another jolt, further clearing away the fog. “And?”
    “It didn’t work. The cable’s defense systems shot them down.
They’ve got a lot of hardware up there now, and they’re happy to be able to use
it at last. But now the Reds are moving into Sheffield from the west, firing
more rockets, and the UN forces on Clarke are bombing the first launch sites,
over on Ascraeus, and they’re threatening to bomb every armed force down here.
This is just what they wanted. And the Reds think it’s going to be like
Burroughs, obviously, they’re trying to force the action. So I came to you.
Look, Ann, I know we’ve been fighting a lot. I haven’t been very, you know,
patient, but look, this is just too much. Everything could fall apart at the
last minute—the UN could decide the situation here is anarchy, and come up from
Earth and try to take over again.”
    “Where are they?” Ann croaked. She pulled on pants, went to the
bathroom. Nadia followed her right in. This too was a surprise; in Underbill it
might have been normal between them, but it had been a long long time since
Nadia had followed her into a bathroom talking obsessively while Ann washed her
face and sat down and peed. “They’re still based in Lastflow, but now they’ve
cut the rim piste and the one to Cairo, and they’re fighting in west Sheffield,
and around the Socket. Reds fighting greens.”
    “Yes yes.”
    “So will you talk to the Reds, will you stop them?”
    A sudden fury swept through Ann. “You drove them to this,” she
shouted in Nadia’s face, causing Nadia to crash back into the door. Ann got up
and took a step toward Nadia and yanked her pants up, shouting still: “You and
your smug stupid terraforming, it’s all green green green green, with never a
hint of compromise! It’s just as much your fault as theirs, since they have no
hope!”
    “Maybe so,” Nadia said mulishly. Clearly she didn’t care about
that, it was the past and didn’t matter; she waved it aside and would not be
swerved from her point: “But will you try?”
    Ann stared at her stubborn old friend, at this moment almost
youthful with fear, utterly focused and alive.
    “I’ll do what I can,” Ann said grimly. “But from what you say,
it’s already too late.”
     
    *       *         *
     
    It was indeed too late. The rover camp Ann had been staying in was
deserted, and when she got on the wrist and called around, she got no answers.
So she left Nadia and the rest of them stewing in the east