Martian Dictator Read online

  Martian Dictator

  By Øyvind Harding

  Prologue

  Contrary to popular belief, human flesh does not taste like chicken. The common chicken is a domesticated fowl, more specifically a member of the red junglefowl family. The flesh is light pink, with little or no blood flowing when cut in a high-yield area such as the breast. When cooked, the meat turns white, and it is important not to overdo it so as not to dry it out. Humans, on the other hand, are large mammals. The flesh closely resembles that of a cow, mostly due to the high myoglobin count in the muscles. The taste has been described as close to pork, but personally I found it more akin to veal. A good, fully developed veal.

  And it was the best damn piece of meat I’d ever had.

  ◆◆◆

  Dr. Anna Stokes took in the view with a certain amount of fatalism. The Billionaire, looking for all the world like he knew what he was doing. The scientist, standing idly at his side, eyes staring into infinity, not daring to even so much as glance at the hissing plate next to him. Nadia, vomiting loudly in the corner. The rest, transfixed on the scene in front of them, displaying expressions that ranged from wild disbelief to hatred or confusion, to that of those who might be joining Nadia in a heartbeat if they stopped to think about what was happening. And hunger. Above all, hunger. Hunger at the sight of fresh meat. Hunger at the smell of that huge, delicious slab of flesh slowly sizzling in the pan. Hunger and disgust and denial, all wrapped up in a conflict of emotions so strong that most couldn’t do any more than just watch and wait. Wait and see what would happen when it was done.

  ◆◆◆

  It was done. No more delays. No more speeches. No more stone-cold looks, manipulations, fists swung in anger or just plain ignoring the situation. Just me, the late Captain Reinholts, a small part of him anyway, and a steak that would have made any chef in Texas nod his approval. My stomach growled impatiently. I started to cut. Wells fainted.

  ◆◆◆

  The little scientist, Roger Wells, keeled over as the Billionaire started to cut. Nobody was close enough to catch him, and he thumped unceremoniously face-first onto the table in front of him and slid sideways down to the floor. Anna would have liked to check on him, but the moment had her in its meaty grip. The knife and the fork, the smell, the stares, and the inhumanity of it all. And the necessity. She knew it was necessary, she knew that it had to be done, and she knew she would not have been strong enough to do it. But she had been strong enough to do the calculations. Oh, she had done them willingly enough, knowing all the while what the numbers would tell her. She had known, and thanked whatever gods may have been listening that she didn’t have to take any action based on that knowledge. The calories from the canned goods and the crops would not be enough. Not yet. They needed more. And she had known what had to be done even before he had approached her with his questions.

  ◆◆◆

  The knife sliced through the meat with ease. In a single, fluid motion I skewered it with the fork and brought it to my mouth. And chewed. No delays, no hesitation. Hesitation could be fatal. I could have stopped to think about what I was doing, I could have listened to the voices screaming in my head, I could have stopped the hand, the knife or the fork. Or worse, somebody else might have. My grip on the situation was a feeble thing, held together by nothing more than the appearance of knowing what I was doing and a willingness to plunge ahead knowing that I did not. Deal with what’s in front of you, plan for what’s ahead, and forget what’s behind. The mantra I adopted while building my fortune served me well now. The meat was as tender as my brain told me it would be, the taste was akin to heaven and beyond, and I almost joined Nadia in the corner. Focus on what’s in front of you. A steak. Nothing more than a steak. Food, nutrition, survival. Power. Forget what it had been before. I had done what none of them would have. I had done what none of them could have even thought of. Left to their own devices they would have died, every single one of them. They were sheep, cattle—nothing! I was their survival, their god, their everything and their future.

  And they hated me for it.

  ◆◆◆

  Anna hated him. Even as he saved them, even as he did what none of them had dared to think of. She hated him with a passion she would not have thought herself capable of. It was a funny thing, if eating another human being could be considered funny. It was undeniable that what he was doing had to be done in order for them to survive. The other option would have been to kill off half of the crew to make the food last longer. But that would have meant more work for the rest, higher requirements for acquiring nutrition, and fewer personnel in case of an emergency. Everything was an emergency these days. And, you know, the whole murder issue. She giggled. And caught herself immediately, but not fast enough not to attract glances from those around her. They knew about her condition, so she wasn’t worried about letting the mask slip once in a while. But she did worry about her own mental state. Locked in close quarters for months on end, with a dwindling source of food, constant danger and no hope for respite, rescue or any other good thing starting with the letter ‘R’ (raisins, raspberries, rice, roast, ragu, ribs). Ribs. A bit too close to what was happening. Her mouth watered, and she nearly joined Nadia in the corner.

  ◆◆◆

  My delusions of grandeur lasted until the food hit my stomach. Not “the Captain,” not “Andrew Reinholts,” not “that delicious piece of human flesh.” Food. Nutrition. Proteins. That was all. I looked up and found Dr. Anna Stokes looking back. I did the tour of the room with my eyes, looking each and every one of them straight in the eye. No backing down. All of them would do it, or it would end right here, right now. Nadia was the first to come forward, straightening from her crouch in the corner and wiping vomit from her chin as she came. Always figured her for a strong one. I cut another piece from the steak.

  ◆◆◆

  Anna was about to take the plunge forward when a shadow passed her by on her right side. Nadia. She was close enough that the blonde hair brushed Anna's shoulder as the woman swept by. No other way to describe it: sweeping. That woman was on a mission, vomit in the corner all but forgotten. Anna would have to collect it later, they couldn’t waste that much nutrition. Nadia reached the table, looked Him straight in the eye, grabbed the fork and skewered the piece He had just cut. Not breaking stride, she turned to face the room, put the meat in her mouth, chewed twice and swallowed. She had tears in her eyes from all the vomiting earlier, but their color was solid steel. Anna had not figured Nadia for a strong one, but in that moment, she was an Amazon. Steel-blue eyes, blond hair, her back straight and tall, beautiful as the sun and radiating just as much heat and passion. She would not die, not that one. Not this day. The red sand glinted outside the pressurized window, and the dust started to rise.

  One by one they all came forward and ate the flesh, and left their souls behind.

  1. The Scientist

  The tenderloin is usually considered the choicest piece of an animal. It derives from the iliopsoas muscle, which does very little work in an animal such as the cow. It extends from the spine and down to the upper part of the back leg, and in human beings it connects with the pelvis as well. In quadrupeds, this mechanism leaves the muscle with very little protective fat, mostly because it is not needed, thus rendering it tender and easily stretched. In bipeds, however, the muscle serves a critical function in keeping the spine in the classic S shape that is needed for shock absorption as well as the art of walking. The muscle consists of two pieces: a tail end and a butt end. The diameter is greatest right in the middle, but the quality of the meat is excellent throughout its entire length. The midsection is favored for steaks, but that is mostly due to the consistency of size in this part. The tail end is best suited for di
shes where size is not necessarily important for the presentation of the meal, such as beef stroganoff. All of these reasons combine to make the tenderloin a very choice piece of meat, and any chef worth his salt would choose this over any other part of an animal.

  I cut myself a second piece and contemplated the words of the man in front of me.

  “You want me to fund an expedition to Mars.” I did not make it a question.

  Roger Wells fidgeted before me. He was very clearly out of his natural habitat, and the carnivores present were making his limbic system jittery. The fight-or-flight response has been hardwired into every human being since before memory began, and it does not take much to set it off. The restaurant in upper Manhattan where I had agreed to meet him was evidently enough for the small scientist. Not that I blamed him, it was a popular meeting place for people like me, where deals were made, money changed hands, and more crimes were committed with a shake of the hand than in the entire Bronx in a month. In short, people who preyed on lesser mammals.

  “Well, umm, yes. Yes, I do. Not by yourself obviously, but your contribution would be greatly appreciated. Your vision in regards to the Icarus array proves that you are a man of the future, a man that cares about the possibilities that space can offer the human race. To have your support would make a world of difference to the various institutions who are currently sitting on the fence.”

  I chewed over his choice of words along with the steak. The speech had the slightly hurried tone of a rehearsed delivery, and he was obviously setting up his sales pitch by appealing to my well-known love for putting my money into space ventures. Or rather, a single space venture. Icarus was the reason for my newfound fortune, and as with many love stories, it had all started with a little ray of sunshine.

  The Icarus Solar Relay project had burned the shadows from the wall of our cave and forced us to see the truth; this could be no longer. We could no longer dig for coal. We could no longer pump the oil. We could not burn our forests or poison our seas without consequence.

  And we were too late.

  For two and a half centuries we had burned, drilled, and pumped with reckless abandon. We had ignored the signs, we had pulled the wool over our own eyes, and we had left the decisions for our children. Then one morning we had awakened and discovered that we were the children. We were the ones who had to clean up after the party. We were the ones who had to take the hard road, make the hard decisions. But the road had been laid, the decisions were taken decades ago, and the destination was close at hand. And finally, too late to do anything but shake our collective heads, we all had seen the end of the line. We had seen where the road led. And we had not liked what we saw.

  The Icarus was to be our savior, our redeemer, our path away from the beaten road. A million panels, all measuring one square meter, were placed in geostationary orbit with a crown of emitters relaying all that power back to Earth by microwave. Manufactured in record time using only the best of the best and shipped by the ton to Cape Canaveral. Russian astronauts, NASA shuttles, European environmental science, Chinese production facilities, stocks up for sale to the public. We all chipped in. Well, most of us did. Which turned out to be the mother of all fuckups. Those left out, those left behind, they who were not included in that global homecoming, they did not like the prospects of what they saw. If energy were to be free, who would stand to gain? Would everybody get to be a part of this global alliance? Would there be enough energy to go around? No? Who would get theirs first? The US? The Europeans, the Chinese and the Russians? Would you still buy our oil, our coal and our natural gas? No? Fuck this.

  The coordinated sanctions from the third world countries hit the developed economies like a train wreck. No more free grain from the African highlands. No crude oil flowing from the Saudis. No opium from the Afghan steppes to be used in the production of pain medication and happy-pills. No class 1 steel from India. Whole countries went bankrupt, entire lines of work disappeared overnight. The Icarus project had been suspended indefinitely while a new global system for distribution of the promised energy was ironed out, and all the while the economy had suffered.

  And I had seen it all coming.

  ◆◆◆

  He wrung his hands under the table so that the Billionaire wouldn’t see it. He was more nervous than he would have liked to admit, there was something about this place that made his stomach itch. The way the waiters moved between the tables, always there, but never intruding. The way the guests moved and talked, subtle hand gestures and glances that were as much part of the conversation as the actual words spoken. He was so far out of his league that he might as well have skipped trying to dress up for the occasion. Nothing he owned or could have bought would have made him fit in with this pack. But there was no backing out now. Alea iacta est and so forth. He was here for money, a rather large amount of it. If he did not get it soon, the entire expedition would have to be scrapped, and everything he had put down in the project would be lost. Everything would have been for nothing. All the money he had earned for the past twenty years, the hours, the endless meetings, the setbacks and the minor victories. And the major ones, like when they had managed to land the unmanned shuttles on the surface almost according to plan four years ago.

  All wasted.

  “And what, exactly, are these possibilities that you are offering me?”

  The Billionaire took a bite out of his steak, and a little drop of blood trickled halfway down his chin before he deftly caught it with the corner of a napkin. He appeared to be fascinated by the little speck, and Roger quickly forged ahead before he lost his would-be benefactor’s attention altogether.

  “Well, you know, when the original colonization project failed to launch, we were left without any major sponsors. Even though most of the equipment already had been shipped out, we couldn’t do anything about the launch windows. After that there was nothing we could do, and the project was put on hold. We are approaching another optimal launch orbit, and all we really need is the proper funding to equip our shuttles with the latest shielding. Just imagine! You could be the first commercial actor with a foothold on Mars! With the Icarus technology you could be the sole energy supplier to a whole new society!”

  The man seemed to be more focused on the meat in front of him than on Roger’s words, and he made no reply. Roger started to sweat, something he had begun to do lately whenever he had his back against the wall. These days he always carried an extra shirt in his briefcase wherever he went. His back had been more or less firmly stuck to the infamous wall for more than two years now, and so far, nobody had happened by to pry him loose. He tried in vain to keep himself from fidgeting, desperate not to appear too eager.

  A small smile traversed the face of the Billionaire as he turned his attention from the meal and back to Roger again. He felt the sweat starting to form on his forehead, and he repressed a shudder. It almost seemed as if the man was enjoying himself. Maybe this was it, maybe this was the day he had been waiting for.

  “If you would care to take a look at the numbers I’ve prepared for you, you can see that it would be rather easy to turn a tremendous profit given the equipment already on site. If I may so bold to say it, you would be making a killing.”

  Roger finished his prepared speech and sat back, tremendously relieved that the man in front of him still seemed to be paying attention, still seemed to be considering his words. This could still end with the sweet taste of victory, and not the bitter flavor of defeat. If the funding could be secured here and now, Mars Two would be a reality, and he would no longer have to endure these humiliating meetings to scrounge for funding and goodwill. He would be home free, working on his life project and living the dream.

  He would be on Mars.

  ◆◆◆

  I had to admit I was enjoying myself. I had long since decided what my course of action would be; I would buy out the other contractors, and I would fund his entire expedition. After all, I had decided long before he even called me asking for a
meeting. Not that I would let him in on it for quite a while yet, or at all, but on the whole, I was thoroughly enjoying the moment. And the meal. The steak was cooked to perfection—crisp and brown surface, light pink straight through, and a perfect amount of resistance when cut.

  I cut myself another piece and admired the quality of the knife the restaurant had provided. For the past five years I had worked with various martial arts masters, and they had all shunned the knife. For the life of me, I could not understand why. The knife was an excellent tool, as well as a formidable weapon. A man armed with a knife always has the upper hand when facing off against an opponent without one, and a man with a gun always has the upper hand when fighting a man without a firearm. Barring any shenanigans involving fighting in extremely close quarters, you do not bring a knife to a gunfight. Neither do you bring your fists to a knife fight nor your fork to an all-you-can-eat soup contest. The right tools for the task, at the right time.

  The right tool for the job at hand was clearly Dr. Roger Wells. With light-brown hair going gray at the temples, bald at the top and thin at the edges, Dr. Wells was certainly not an alpha male. He seemed well mannered enough, but his arms were thin, his legs were emaciated, and his face looked as though he were constantly sucking his cheeks in. His skin held the pale tone of somebody who rarely saw, or even noticed, the sun, and his eyes jittered from side to side as though seeking the nearest refuge. In short, he looked like easy prey, and the beast was out prowling.

  But he was also the golden goose, and you do not slaughter the golden goose. You keep her well fed, you shelter and nurture her, and you let her know exactly who the boss is. You let her know that she cannot run off to the neighbor and lay her sweet, golden eggs in a cozier nest. There are no cozier nests than the one under your own roof. You keep her on a tight leash, and you never let her know just how tight that noose fits around her scrawny neck.