Free Moving Mars by Greg Bear Page B

explored the narrow tunnels leading to the main living quarters. Ive never seen arbeiters this old, I said.
    Waste not, want not. Kleins a thrifty family. They took the best machines with them and left a skeleton crew, just enough to tend the water.
    Poor things, I said dubiously.
    Voila, Charles announced, opening the door to the main quarters. Beyond lay a madmans idea of order, air mattresses piled into a kind of shelter in one corner, sheets covering a table as if it were a bed, decayed equipment lovingly stacked in the middle of the floor for human attention, smelling of iodine. The machines had been bored. A large arbeiter, about a meter tall and half as wide, a big barrel of a machine with prominent arms, stood proudly in the middle of its domain. Welcome, it greeted in a scratchy voice. There have been no guests at this estate for four years. How may we serve you?
    Charles laughed.
    Dont, I said. Youll hurt its feelings.
    The arbeiter hummed constantly, a sign of imminent collapse. This unit will require replacements, if any are available, it told us after a moment of introspective quiet.
    Youll have to make do, Charles said. What we need is a place fit for habitation, by two humans separate quarters, as soon as possible.
    This is not adequate? the arbeiter asked with mechanical dismay.
    Close, but it needs a little rearrangement.
    We couldnt help giggling.
    The arbeiter considered us with that peculiar way older machines have of seeming balky and sentient when in fact they are merely slow. Arrangements will be made. I beg your pardon, but this unit will require replacement parts and nano recharge, if that is possible.
    Four hours later, with the living quarters in reasonable shape and our provisions for several days stored and logged in with the arbeiters, Charles and I stopped our rushing about and faced each other. Charles glanced away first, pretending to critically examine the interior furnishings. Looks like a bunkhouse, he said.
    Its fine, I said.
    Well, its not luxury.
    I didnt expect it to be.
    I came here once when I was ten, with my dad, Charles said, rubbing his hands nervously on his pants. A kind of getaway for a couple of days while traveling from Amnesia to Jefferson, through Durrey Klein holdings intrude into the old Erskine BM lands here. I dont know how that happened.
    Another moment of uneasy silence. Clearly, Charles did not know how to begin, nor what was expected; neither did I, but as the female in this pairing, it was not my responsibility to initiate, and I did not want to try.
    Shall we see the winery? he inquired suddenly, holding out his hand.
    I took the hand and we began our formal tour of TrHaut Mc.
    Charles was disarmingly nervous. Disarming, because I had to say little and do nothing but follow him; he gave a gentle, constant commentary on things Martian, most of which I knew. His voice was soothing even as he ran through technical details. In time, I listened more to the tone than the content, enjoying the masculine music of fact laid upon fact, an architecture to shield us for the moment against being alone together.
    Ninety percent or more of any Martian station lay underground. Pressurization requirements and protection against radiation flux through the thin atmosphere made this the most economical method of construction. Some attempts had been made in the first ten years to push high-rises and multi-story uplooks through the dirt, but Mars had been settled on a shoestring. Buried or bermed construction was much cheaper. Heat exchangers, sensors, pokeups, entrances and exits, a few low buildings, broke the surface, but even now we remained, by and large, troglodytes.
    Half of the aquifers on Mars were solidmineral aquifersand half liquid. Solid aquifers came in many varieties. Some were permafrosts and heaves, which produced hummocky terrain. Some ice domes on Mars were ten kilometers across, but nearly all heaves had long since lost the water that produced them. The evaporated