Green Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson [197]
The next segment, Phaistos, had its floor nearly filled by a long shallow pond, where the canal that coursed slowly down from Zakros widened. Underwater lights at one end of the pond turned its water into a strange sparkling dark crystal, and she could see a group of people splashing about in it, their bodies gleaming in the lit water, disappearing into the dark. Amphibious creatures, salamanders. . . . Once, very long ago on Earth, there had been water animals that had crawled up gasping onto the shore. They must have had some pretty serious policy debates, Nadia thought sleepily, down in that ocean. To emerge or not to emerge, how to emerge, when to emerge. . . . Sound of distant laughter, the stars packing the jagged skylights. . . .
She turned and walked down a staircase to the tunnel floor, then back to Zakros, on the paths and streetgrass, following the canal, thinking in scattered darting images. Back at their suite she lay on her bed and fell asleep instantly, dreaming at dawn of dolphins swimming through the air.
3
But in the midst of that dream she was awakened roughly by Maya, who said in Russian, “There’s some Terrans here. Americans.”
“Terrans,” Nadia repeated. And was afraid.
She dressed and went out to see. It was true; Art was standing with a small group of Terrans, men and women her own size, and apparently about her own age, unsteady on their feet as they craned their necks, looking at the great cylindrical chamber in amazement. Art was trying to introduce them and explain them at the same time, which was giving even his motor-mouth some difficulty. “I invited them, yes, well, I didn’t know— hi, Nadia— this is my old boss, William Fort.”
“Speak of the devil,” Nadia said, and shook the man’s hand. He had a strong grip; a bald snub-nosed man, tanned and wrinkled, with a pleasant vague expression.
“— They just arrived, the Bogdanovists brought them in. I invited Mr. Fort some while ago, but never heard back from him and didn’t know he was going to come. I’m quite surprised and pleased of course.”
“You invited him?” Maya said.
“Yes you see he’s very interested in helping us that’s the thing.”
Maya was glaring, not at Art but at Nadia. “I told you he was a spy,” she said in Russian.
“Yes you did,” Nadia said, then spoke to Fort in English. “Welcome to Mars.”
“I’m happy to be here,” Fort said. And it looked like he meant it; he was grinning goofily, as if too pleased to keep a straight face. His companions did not seem as sure; there were about a dozen of them, both young and old, and some were smiling, but many looked disoriented and cautious.
After an awkward few minutes Nadia took Fort and his little group of associates over to the Zakros guest quarters, and when Ariadne arrived, they assigned the visitors rooms. What else could they do? The news had already gone the length of Dorsa Brevia and back, and as people came down to Zakros their faces expressed displeasure as much as curiosity— but there the visitors were, after all, leaders of one of the biggest transnationals, and apparently alone, and without tracking devices on them, or so the Sabishiians had declared. One had to do something with them.
Nadia got the Swiss to call a general meeting at the lunch hour, and then she invited the new guests to freshen up in their rooms and afterward speak at the meeting. The Terrans accepted the invitation gratefully, the uncertain ones among them looking reassured. Fort himself seemed to be already composing a speech in his mind.
Back outside the Zakros guest quarters, Art was facing a whole crowd of upset people. “What