Chapter One: Dearly Beloved

April 20th [SAME YEAR]

Mohammed knew that aside from the thousand-or-so people gathered before him, watching him intently, there were probably going to be at least a billion more watching the feed of this event when it reached Earth in about 13 minutes. He was amazed that he wasn’t in the least bit nervous. He straightened his shoulders a bit beneath his black-and-red robe of office, cleared his throat, and began—the way these things should begin, he thought.

Aloud he said: “Dearly beloved, we are gathered here…” He paused for dramatic effect before continuing, “in the Great Hall of the newly incorporated Independent Nation of Mars—”

He had barely gotten the word out when a roar of approval escaped from a thousand throats in the tightly packed hall. It took an entire minute for the rough-hewn red rock walls to stop reverberating.

Mohammed glanced to his right at Jeanne Romano, one of the brides at this wedding. She was a wisp of a woman, well over six feet but barely weighing anything. It seemed a stiff breeze would fling her away, and her exotically pale skin and blonde hair made her seem almost more like an angelic apparition than a flesh-and-blood human. She was resplendent in a dress of filmy white gauze that only added to her ethereal appearance. The roar from the audience had made her cheeks blush a dusky pink, or maybe that was just her being a “blushing bride.” Mohammed couldn’t tell.

He glanced at the other participant in this wedding. Anita Terrado was practically the opposite of Jeanne in every way. An Earthie, she was just under five and a half feet tall but easily outweighed her bride-to-be. She was stocky, solidly built, and very well developed in the hips and chest. Her skin was dark, and her black hair was shaved a uniform one-centimeter in length. She was dressed in her most formal of military formals, pleats and seams pressed to razor sharpness. On her face was plastered a wide smile of giddy anticipation.

Mohammed thought to himself, These are perhaps two of the most beautiful women I have ever seen.

The two women had met when they were both assigned to this mission under Mohammed. They were both highly regarded in their individual fields—Jeanne at only 27 years old with her doctorates in economics, political science, and also in medicine (“Just for fun” she would say about that one) had been in charge of setting up the governmental structure of the Independent Nation of Mars, turning a fledgling colony into a full-fledged, self-governing system of checks and balances. Anita, a Lieutenant Commander, also happened to be an engineering savant and one of the system’s foremost experts on underground infrastructure and planning. Mohammed had been the head of the entire endeavor and along with his assistant, Junior Justice Dante Escobar, had been in charge of setting up a proper law and justice system for the new nation.

After more than two years of intense work El Concilio Independiente de la Seguridad (CIS) of Luna had declared Mars to be a fully independent nation with all rights of legislative representation and CIS support, and had officially welcomed it to the Union at 0600 that morning, April 20th. As thanks to Mohammed, Jeanne, Anita, Dante, and the rest of the team, a ceremony was immediately held wherein they were the first people granted citizenship by the new Martian government. And now, the very same evening, Martian citizen Mohammed was conducting the first-ever wedding of two Martian citizens, Jeanne and Anita.

As the noise from the crowd finally died down he cleared his throat again. “As I was saying, we are gathered here to join these two women in matrimony.”

Mohammed proceeded slowly through the 20-minute ceremony, metering his words out carefully and with the dignity befitting a Senior Justice. Finally he came upon, “Then by the power invested in me…” and paused again for effect before raising his bass voice and booming, “by the Independent Nation of Mars—”

Again a hoarse roar of support shot up from the crowd, and Mohammed allowed himself to step back and smile as he watched the people—his fellow Martian citizens—voice their joy. When he could hear himself over the crowd he stepped forward again and proclaimed, “I now pronounce this marriage legal and binding. Ladies, you may kiss your brides.”

Anita fairly leapt up into her wife’s arms, and surprisingly Jeanne held her aloft as they embraced in their first married kiss and the crowd again mightily voiced its hearty approval.

---

After the receiving line, after the wedding reception, after his hand had been shaken so many times he thought it might cramp and become completely useless, in the wee hours of the morning Mohammed slipped away from the celebrations and found himself walking alone through the manmade corridors of Mars, only the third colony outside of old Earth to incorporate as a nation. The first, Luna, hardly counted anymore since the CIS had moved the governing body of the Union there after all that trouble with The Great Benjamin “Grandpa” Ishida’s grandson so long ago. The second, Ukiyo-e, was basically just an inhabited asteroid with a meager permanent population under 2,000.

But this was Mars. This was a whole world away from Earth. Already the population was nearing the 10,000 mark, and Ukiyo-e had just two weeks ago passed by its closest approach to Mars and deposited nearly a thousand new colonists from Earth and Luna. There will be no more colonists of Mars, Mohammed realized. No longer colonists, from now on the people who come here will be immigrants. And he, Mohammed Little, had been at the forefront of making it happen. Everything he had and his team had done had been history in the making. Until just a few days ago it hadn’t felt that way; it felt to Mohammed as though he were just doing a very difficult job to the best of his ability. But then the excitement of the absolute enormity of what they were accomplishing gradually began to seep in to the fringes of his mind.

He let his hand fall on the rough-hewn red rock wall of the corridor. It was rough for aesthetic purposes; the nanagents used in tunneling were perfectly capable of producing smooth walls. But the people of Mars had wanted the craggy appearance of hand-worked rock walls as a reminder that this nation had been carved out of an inhospitable planet and made to thrive. And now that his work was done Mohammed realized that he would find it hard to leave when his ship blasted off in just three days. Three days! He had become a citizen of the Independent Nation of Mars more than just ceremonially; over the last two years he had become a Martian. He did not relish the idea of leaving this place and stepping into the history books. But after today there would be very few people alive who didn’t know his name.

Mohammed sighed. He was un Juez Menor, and he and his team were needed back at El Concilio Lunar de la Justicia. Having just become one of the most famous men in the solar system, there would by necessity be a seemingly endless stream of press coverage about Mohammed. Already they were calling him “The Man who Built Mars,” which was entirely unfair. He had a very important interview to conduct tomorrow; journalists from all over the Union had been allowed to send questions. The interview itself would be conducted by Juan Gustav Antonio de Almieda, the “Voice of Mars.” The 13-minute delay seemed a blessing to Mohammed. The journalists would have to be content with whatever responses he gave; they couldn’t very well interrupt him.

Mohammed pulled away from the wall and began slowly walking down the corridor again. Habitually he reached up to his forehead and flipped his Visera down over his eyes. Instantly his personal icons spread out in three dimensions around the edges of his Campo de la Visión (CdlV). His mensajero icon indicated more than 20,000 unsolicited messages. Mohammed groaned. Fame had taken hold on him already.

His instantáneo icon was indicating that someone he knew was trying to talk to him live. He command-thought, Instantaneo:ID. Several microscopic quantum-computer chips implanted just below his scalp interpreted his brainwaves and agreed on what he thought. They relayed the signal to the Visera receptor clipped to Mohammed’s ear.

The icon immediately became active and displayed the name of the caller. Mohammed smiled and command-though to the icon, Answer:standard.

A translucent cube appeared in Mohammed’s CdlV, like a fish tank floating about half a meter in front of him. It filled with the life-sized face of Junior Justice Dante Escobar. His lean face was flushed and his dark eyes looked suspiciously inebriated. His long dark hair flew about his head like black fire. It had apparently fallen out of the meter-long braid that usually flowed down Dante’s back. Or perhaps Dante had set it loose on purpose. An exaggerated grin was plastered across his jaw—a grin that at times seemed permanently implanted. In any case he was obviously drunk.

Dante’s slurred voice seemed to come out of the tank. In reality the sound was produced by microscopic speakers implanted in Mohammed’s ears that only he could hear. “Cap’n Mo! Where’d ya go, buddy?”

“Dante,” Mohammed said, “please tell me you took off your robe before you started drinking. Oops, hold on.”

The instantaneo icon indicated that someone else wanted to talk to Mohammed. He command-thought, ID, and the icon indicated that it was Hector Rico Ramirez, the pilot of the Artemis. Mohammed answered it. Another tank appeared in Mohammed’s CdlV next to Dante’s tank. Hector’s worried—and sober—face filled it. “Captain,” he said, “sorry to bother you, but Dante’s gone and gotten himself pretty well drunk, and he was going on about calling you, and now I can’t seem to find him in here, and he’s not answering his instantaneo.”

“Don’t worry, Hector,” Mohammed said. “Here.” He command-thought Hector’s tank to attach itself to Dante’s.

“Dante!” Hector cried out. “I told you not to bother Mohammed!”
“Oh, he likes it,” Dante giggled.

“Don’t worry, Mo,” Hector said. “He went off-duty and took his robes off hours ago.”

“Well, that’s good,” Mohammed said. “You should probably get him back to his apartment and stick his hand in the medbox, or else he’ll be sore tomorrow.”

Dante frowned, “But I don’t wanna go home! This’s a party!” He leaned in and carefully slurred his words. “A party. Don’t you understand?”

Hector’s eyes were darting all over. “Ah, there he is,” he said, and then to Mohammed: “I’ve found him. He’s off in that corner.”

“Good. I’ll see you two later today.”

“Sorry about him, Mo,” Hector smiled and shrugged helplessly.

Mohammed chuckled. “That’s alright, Hector.”

Dante raised a finger in front of his face. “Well, I’m not sorry.”

“Good night, Dante,” Mohammed said. “Get some sleep.” He reached out a finger and poked the tanks. More microscopic quantum computer chips in his fingers relayed their position relative to each other and Mohammed’s Visera, which quickly realized that Mohammed’s fingers were in the “select” position, and his hand was in the proper place to indicate the tanks. Mohammed made a closed-fist gesture, which the Visera recognized as “close,” and Hector and Dante both disappeared from Mohammed’s CdlV.

Mohammed glanced at his hand. Before the command-thought process had been put into public circulation fifteen years ago, that was the way you interfaced with your Visera: hand gestures. Mohammed still fell back on it out of habit. It came more naturally to him than the command-thought frame of mind; he’d lived for more than twenty-five years poking and grabbing at the air in front of him. There was even a virtual keyboard program on which people actually used to type. Mohammed had finally taken that out of his net five years ago. He reflected on how the younger generation, like Dante and Hector, had only known the poke method for a decade or so, and then switched over to the command-thought mindset while they were still young. To them, command-thought was as natural as flexing a muscle; the Visera to them was just another part of the body.

Mohammed shook his head. Dante was like two different people. On duty he was an absolutely professional and inviolate Justice, the very model of what a proper Justice should be. Off duty he was the class clown, the giver and receiver of every joke in any room he entered. It was like he could flip a switch in his brain. Hector, on the other hand, had an embarrassed yet happy air about him, as if he were always witnessing things he really shouldn’t be privy to but didn’t really mind all that much.

Mohammed turned his attention back to his mensajero icon. He didn’t want to dig through that mess to see if there were anything important. He absently poked his Ppav icon. Ppav—PPAV: Programa Personalizado del Ayudante de la Visera . This was another way to interface with your Visor. Instead of having to dig through your Visor system to try to find what you were looking for yourself, you could activate a program that generated a rendered character that you could command to do the dirty work for you. Thousands upon thousands of Ppavs existed, from rendered human faces and cartoon characters, to talking vehicles and inanimate objects, to abstract designs and swirls of light. There were even pornographic Ppavs for those who were so inclined, and the creative could design their own.

A small black sphere, about the size of a tennis ball, whirled itself into existence in the middle of Mohammed’s CdlV. “Good morning, Mohammed,” a smooth, calm voice seemed to emanate from it.

“Good morning, Marble,” Mohammed said aloud. “Could you see if there are any important messages?”

“Certainly,” Marble replied. It’s smooth black surface rippled for a moment. “Here’s a message from El Juez Supremo <The Supreme Justice>. Would you like to view it?”

Mohammed command-thought, Ppav:yes.

Instantly a translucent tank appeared in Mohammed’s CdlV and filled with the grave, elderly face of [CHARACTER NAME], the head of the Concilio de la Justicia, the Justice’s representative on the CIS, the “Last Word of the Law,” the “Final Gavel,” the Supreme Justice of the Union. Marble meanwhile unobtrusively rolled to a corner of Mohammed’s CdlV.

“El Juez Mayor Little,” [NAME] intoned formally. “I have just seen the feed of the wedding. That was a beautiful service you performed. You are to be congratulated; you and your entire team there. You have accomplished what no one has ever before accomplished. You have brought another planet into the great Union.”

Suddenly [NAME] chuckled and leaned back, and the grave sincerity seemed to shed off him like a heavy coat in the summer. He smiled and instantly looked for all effects to be someone’s kindly, simple uncle. Certainly not one of the six most powerful men alive.

“Now then,” he said in a warm, friendly tone. “Seriously, Mohammed, you’ve done something special, and that was a great wedding. Wish I could have been there. But you guys deserve some sort of reward for all your hard work. So here’s what I’m gonna do.

“We just got a call from El Juez Principal <Chief Justice> Furtado of Ukiyo-e. Seems some scientist or somebody in that rock has stumbled upon something that poses a big security risk for the Union. A dot-big security risk. Furtado doesn’t know what to do about it. Heck, there’s only him and his Junior Justice up there for those 2,000 people in that rock. They’re not really equipped to handle major security operations. This is too big for them.

“So how’d you like a nice, long vacation, Mohammed? In three days you, Dante, Jeanne and Anita are gonna burn to Ukiyo-e instead of burning the long way back to Luna. It’ll take you three days to catch that asteroid; I’ve got the flight plan here. Ukiyo-e is basically just starting its orbit out from Luna, so it’ll be eighteen or nineteen months before it swings back around here. You’re gonna take this security situation off of Furtado’s hands so he and his assistant can concentrate on doing justice for their community.

“Listen, Mohammed, this should really be a piece of cake for you and Dante. I’m ordering you to spend a year and a half in one of the most beautiful communities mankind has ever created. Hey, listen, give me a call when you wake up in the morning and I’ll send you over the official assignment and everything. G’night, Mohammed. Seriously, you should be proud.” He winked and disappeared from Mohammed’s CdlV.

Mohammed glanced at Marble. The Visera recognized the positioning and focus of Mohammed’s eyes as doing so. Marble rippled and rolled back to the middle of the CdlV.

Mohammed command-thought, Marble: Remind me to answer this message when I wake.

“Later today?” Marble asked. “Or tomorrow?”

Marble: Today, the 21st.

“Yes sir,” Marble answered and discreetly set up the reminder.

Mohammed flipped his Visera up onto his forehead. 18 months in Ukiyo-e! 18 months far away from the prying press of Luna and Earth! 18 months away from the endless stream of congratulatory functions and dignitaries wanting to shake his hand. 18 months of peace and quiet in the idyllic small community inside that asteroid. By the time they all got back to Luna the furor would have most likely completely died down and he could simply slip back into his place at the Concilio de la Justica without any unnecessary fanfare.

Mohammed was surprised to find himself actually excited at the thought of leaving his dearly beloved Mars. He was going on vacation.

Next: Chapter Two: The Floating World