On a well-settled Mars, the five major city Council regimes
struggle to meld into a stable, working government. Embracing an official
Unified Faith In Humanity, the Councils are teetering on the verge of pogrom
directed against Christians, Molesters, Jews, Rapists, Buddhists, Murderers,
Muslims, Thieves, Hindu, Embezzlers and Artificial Humans – anyone who
threatens the official Faith and the consolidating power of the Councils. It
makes good sense, right – get rid of religion and Human divisiveness on a
societal level will disappear? An instrument of such a pogrom might just be a
Roman holiday...To see the rest of the chapters, go to SCIENCE FICTION: Martian Holiday on
the right and scroll to the bottom for the first story. If you’d like to read
it from beginning to end (70,000+ words as of now), drop me a line and I’ll
send you the unedited version.
Judas didn’t say anything for some time. “So? I reiterate
my question, ‘How does that affect the Church’?”
“If we come forward with evidence that Humans
aren’t alone in the universe – and our faith doesn’t go to pieces – the witness
will bring more into the arms of Christ. If the Unified Faith in Humanity
either attempts to suppress us by increasing the efforts of the pogrom, we
aren’t any worse off than we’ve ever been. But if we lead people to a new
understanding of our place in the universe and are seen to embrace it, the
UniFiH can’t exactly crush us AND celebrate the discovery. Besides, I think God
is leading me to gather the evidence.” Paolo Marcillon paused, waited, then
said, “I also believe that other Christians have other pieces of evidence
pointing to the same thing. I think God is preparing the Church to lead Mars.”
Judas stared at him. His mouth opened once and no
sound came out. Finally he managed, “You have got to be kidding.”
Paolo shook his head. “God’s people have been
messengers before…”
“Not like this! You’re talking about taking on the
whole of Martian society!”
“There are people who are sympathetic without being
Christians – people who might pause before they execute people who think
differently.”
Judas snorted. “You’re talking about Burroughs
Dome, here. A stronghold of the Unified Faith in Humanity.” He scowled.
“Besides, what’s us finding out we’re not alone in the universe got to do with
anything?”
Paolo pursed his lips and said shortly, “I guess
it’s a tenet of the Faith – that if aliens are more advanced than us
technologically than us, they’d be more ethically advanced than us as well…”
“That worked real well for Australia’s First Nation
peoples, didn’t it?”
“Australia?” Paolo said.
“The seventh continent on Earth. When ‘technologically
advanced’ Europeans came into contact with the less technologically dependent
First Australians, they were definitely NOT more ethically advanced.”
“Really?”
Judas nodded. “Not by a long shot. In fact the
complexity of their justifications for just about anything illegal or horrific
are legendary. I don’t know how your average UniFiH,” he said it like “you-neh-fee”,
“would willingly swallow that model when the evidence on Earth – and the Moon –
clearly point to evidence supporting otherwise.”
Paolo looked at him for long time before he finally
said, “The fact is that the artifacts are going to leak out into public
knowledge eventually. I just saw the Stele myself, and the way they view the
characters on them is the same way I discovered that my artifact was covered
with markings.”
“What did you find?”
“A satellite.”
“So some of these extraterrestrials wrote in metal
on satellites and some wrote on stones – like the Ten Commandments?”
Paolo nodded slowly.
“That doesn’t make any sense!”
“I thought of one way it might.”
Judas frowned, clearly trying to parse what Paolo
was certain of. “I don’t see it.”
Paolo hesitated. He was going to have to speak up
sometime. Saying it out loud to one man would only risk a bloody nose rather
than speaking to a group and risking a lynching. He said, “The satellite came
first, probably scanning Mars for landing sites and that kind of thing, some
sort of survey.”
“Why would they turn around and write on rocks?”
“Because it was all they had left after they were
marooned here, doomed to die.”
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