"The Return" by Frances Monro

The Return

By

Frances Monro

For Ray Bradbury

High summer on Mars when the temperature rises almost to the freezing point of water. The sun is a pale star high in the pale white sky, the landscape a barren, relentless rust red, low tired hills above the endless plains. A man and a girl climb the hill, their boots scuffing the dust, causing the rocks to shift in the loose powdery soil.

The man is elderly, tanned skin stretched across his thin frame, hair white, his pale blue eyes clear and intelligent, taking in everything. He wears an ancient pressure suit, torn and stained, with breathing mask and air tank. She is slim and beautiful, eternally youthful. She wears a pretty yellow sundress, no pressure suit, no air tank, no mask, a pair of boots the only concession to the rough terrain. A thin wind blows across the plains and stirs the dust fitfully, tugging at her dress. 

She laughs. “Master, we made it! Look, you can see the entire settlement from here!”

“Yes Faith, give me a moment to catch my breath.”

The girl stands shading her eyes with her hands as she looks out over the settlement on the plain below, taking in the tumbled, sand blasted building, the broken tanks and rockets, broken down vehicles, the greenhouse beneath it’s sand scoured dome, the single spot of vital greenery on dead, dusty red planet. The only movement is the wind.

“Yes… You can see it all from here. It’s not much to show for thirty years of work, is is it Faith? Soon I will be gone too and all of this will be one with the empty stone cities of the Martians.”

“Don’t say that Master! Please don’t! You’re not going anywhere, I won’t let you!”

The man embraces her. “Hush, Faith, hush. You were always my proudest creation, you know that. But even you cannot overcome time. The time of Mars is ending. Perhaps we should have known that from the beginning. Perhaps the time for Mars ended when the canals dried up and the cities died, a million years ago.”

“Oh Master please don’t speak of such things. I don’t like it when you say things like that. It frightens me.”

“It’s alright, Faith, it’s alright. I’m tired, that’s all.” He smiles at her to reassure her. “Let the last man on Mars have his moment of self pity. Humor me, dear.”

“Yes Master,” she gazes at him, glass eyes brimming with mechanical concern. She looks out over the settlement once more, trying to understand what has upset him, and failing, robot eyes unable to see what isn’t there. Her programming balances rules and commandments and she smiles at him and asks, “Master? Will you tell me a story?”

The old man laughs and smiles back at her. “Yes Faith, what story would you like to hear?”

“Tell me about the Martians! And the canals and the cities! And the settlement, tell me about the settlement!”

“Alright… Alright Faith. Sit down, here on this rock with me and I’ll tell you. The Martians, well… You remember when we went to see the cities, yes? They’ve been gone for a million years. I guess we’ll never know them now – there’s no Rosetta stone for Martian and any digital records evaporated millennia ago.”

“The cities are very pretty.”

“Yes they are, aren’t they? And the bridges. The only reason the cities are still there after millennia of dust storms is because the Martians made them out of diamond. Everything else has long ago become dust. Everything except those beautiful, mysterious, shining, empty cities. To walk through them it’s as if they were built yesterday, and they’re just waiting for the builders to return.”

“Will the Martians ever return, Master?”

“No, of course not, dear, they’re long ago dead.”

“Oh.”

There is a moment’s silence, a thin freezing wind playing across the hilltop.

“What about the settlement Master? Tell me the story of the settlement.”

“You know the story, Faith.”

“Please Master, please tell me again.”

“Oh very well. We came here with such high hopes. Such grand dreams. We were going to explore Mars. Settle a new world, terraforming! Imagine that! We were going to make an entire new world for ourselves.”

“Oh, you were so brave Master!”

“Yes. We were brave. Brave and fine and young. Nothing seemed impossible to us then. There was nothing here when we arrived, just this plain, these rocks, this dust, these red hills… When we landed, the ships shining white in the sunlight, it was a fine sight Faith, I wish you could have been here to see it. What plans we had! How we built! How we worked, green houses, dormitories, communication arrays. And science, exploration - Bacteria, Life on Mars! Canals, Cities! Oh Faith you cannot imagine the excitement of those days!”

The old man’s face transformed with passion and energy, for a moment he seems young again, but it fades. “Ah… but it was not to be. There were troubles back on Earth. Climate change, economic collapse. Wars. The second expedition was cancelled. The supply ships stopped coming. Things became impossible, unsustainable. We held a meeting.”

“And decided to leave?”

“Yes, there was no alternative, really. A few of us decided to remain behind, hoping that one day the ships would come again. The rest packed into the return ships and left. We kept in contact by radio, they made it back safely, though what happened to them after that I don’t know – the world was in turmoil.”

“And you were left here all alone.”

“Not quite alone, Faith, there were five of us, to start with. But… we couldn’t keep it up. Gradually the base ran down, except for the essentials, the hydroponics dome, maintenance. It was not enough. The loneliness, the purposelessness, led to despair. Someone made a still and we all got drunk… for days. There was.. damage.. equipment was broken, lost… crops died… That’s when we realized that it was the end. We cannibalized the freighters and the landers and cobbled together one last return ship. At the last moment I refused to go.”

“It was a death trap, really, Faith. And I couldn’t face of another two years locked in a tin can with them… I couldn’t face it. So I ordered them to leave and then I got drunk.

Very drunk. When I woke up I dismantled the still. I couldn’t find them, the big antennae was damaged in a dust storm, but I tried, I couldn’t contact them. Maybe it was equipment failure, everything was patched together, damaged. I hope that they made it, I really do. But I guess I’ll never know.”

“And then you built me.”

“Yes I did Faith. Indeed I did. I had never realized how lonely it would be by myself. The crushing loneliness of having nothing to do, no-one to talk to, no movement, no voice, no life… There was nothing else to do, and I had always been good with my hands. We had all kinds of equipment – computers and robots – just lying around going to waste. We had planned to send them out, to explore and terraform, but in the end those dreams came to nothing… Well that’s not true, those dreams became you.”

“Yes Master, you made me, and I am glad that you did!”

“I’m glad too, Faith, I’m sure you’ve saved me from going mad a dozen times over the years, and you have become more than just a machine to me. You are quite remarkable, even back on Earth I believe they would think so. If anyone is left back there.”

“Thank you Master. I’m glad that you are pleased with me. You made me to keep you company and make you happy.”

“A job you do very well Faith, you know…”

But the robot girl is distracted, standing and pointing at the sky. “Look Master, a shooting star! And another!” A streak of vapor crosses the pale cold sky above, followed by a second, and a third.

“Those aren’t meteors, Faith. They’re… ships. They’re ships!”

They watch in awe as the great silver ships descend, vapor streaming from their tails as they set down softly beside the broken, tumbledown remains of the settlement. Great silver rockets towering over the desert, shining in the pale sun of Mars.

“The Martians!” Faith cried, jumping and dancing with excitement. “They’ve come back! The Martians have come back!”

“No Faith, they’re not Martians,” the man says, shading his eyes and watching the suited figures emerging from the ships. “They’re men. From Earth. They’ve finally come” It’s impossible to tell from his tone if he’s pleased at this late, unlooked for return.

Faith is excited, jumping and waving. “Oh they’re men! From Earth! How exciting! Aren’t you pleased, Master? Do you think they’ll like me?”

The man smiles tiredly. “I’m sure they’ll like you, Faith. They’ll be… astonished by you. I know that I am, constantly.”

“Oh, thank you Master! Shall we go and meet them? Oh I feel excited! And shy! New people from the sky! Oh brave new world that has such people in it!”

The man chuckles. “You’ve been reading my books again, haven’t you? Oh brave new world… Appropriate enough, I suppose. Very well, let’s go and greet this brave new world of yours, Faith.”

She slips her hand into his and together they walk slowly down the hill to greet the returning Martians.

The End