Blur. When Z thought back on Day One of the crew's press tour, most of the day's events spun past as if captured by a camera being swung in a circle around her head. To go from years of isolation directly into that onslaught of attention was a shock to the senses. Z had no idea they would meet such a reaction back on Earth. The others were equally surprised. It was exciting enough to be invited to the White House, but the sight from the roto-copter of hundreds of thousands of people lining Pennsylvania Avenue was both electrifying, and intimidating. Patrick, sensitive to the impact of the attention on the crew, had kept an eye on each of them. There had been problems with past crews adjusting to far less celebrity.
Once the copter touched down, Patrick stood them in order down the aisle—Nasri, Kani, Tanaka, Dunlap, and Walsh. That was how they would exit for the press. “Wave to the cameras,” Patrick counseled. “Heads up, look around, look at the White House. Have fun. That's an order from NASA.” He patted each one on the back as they stepped out into the sunshine, there to be greeted for the first of many times by the press corps. Only a few steps from the helicopter, Z stopped and the crew grouped together before continuing toward the White House.
After the medal ceremony with the president and vice president and members of Congress, they headed to a waiting motorcade that would take them to the Air and Space Museum to dedicate exhibit space for the Mars Habitat 3 mission. With every step along the path from the Rose Garden to the autons, Z took note of people's expressions—ranging from happiness, to honor, to self-aggrandizement—each person unconsciously signaling their feelings about being there, at that moment, watching the most famous crew in space exploration pass them only an arm's length away.
Blur—not just of face after face, but of emotion after emotion, both from the people she encountered and from inside herself. Z reminded herself that their most important duty was to act like the astronauts the people came to see. So she tried to reflect warmth back at each smiling, happy face. It was a lot to take in, meaning so much to so many people. It seemed to Z that it wasn't enough to breeze past everyone, waving from the auton. Neither was it practical to wade into the crowd to really thank them for their support. But Z realized that it was important to make a gesture, so as the auton turned onto the final stretch of road leading to the Museum, she asked the AI to stop and she swung her legs over the side of the vehicle and jumped to the ground. Signaling to her crewmates behind her to do the same, she walked to the edge of the street, shook hands, signed autographs and let people take selfies for the two remaining blocks leading to the Museum.
As Patrick watched the crew members zig-zagging from one side of the street to the other, he reflected on the amalgamation that had begun years ago. It was fitting that they arrived on foot, as a team, he thought. We'd picked them well.
The jet left Washington by three, headed to New York. The crew was festive, chattering like teenagers about the parade and the presidential honors. The plane flight had been donated by a subcontractor for the next mission. The plane's interior was a study in opulence—soft leather seats, plush carpet, wood paneling, and panoramic windows. The attendant set down a linen table cloth when she brought the champagne and a snack. Patrick sat in a work area at the front, receiving a briefing from the New York City police on the next day's schedule, beginning with the public motorcade.
Z stood on the periphery as Patrick listened to the briefing and took notes. Further back in the plane, Dunlap was loudly telling a story about his madcap experience meeting the last president. Colin and Ellis were laughing; Noriko sat across the aisle, reading her tablet and looking out the window.
They'd made it, Z told herself. Mission accomplished, as they say. She had returned everyone safely to Earth along with artifacts from the most valuable discovery in history. Not bad for a day's work. But it was only a day’s work, and not deserving of the pandemonium exhibited by the crowd. Patrick finished his conference call and looked up at Z, who was still gazing down the plane at her crew.
“You okay?”
“Yes, I am. Still not sure I'm the person in this body, right now.”
“It's an adjustment, being back.”
“More than I ever thought. Strange things happened on Mars, Pat. It was a strange dream that’s now been replaced by another strange dream.” She swept her hand out at the interior of the plane. “All this.”
Patrick smiled. “I'm sure it feels like a serial hallucination. But it was no dream. You did it. What’s more, you were faced with an extraordinary challenge and you met it head-on. That’s why you are a commander. Pat yourself on the back, kiddo. Everything you will experience in the next few days is something you earned.”
“I don’t want this to become more important than Mars, Pat. I’m not finished there, yet.”
Patrick was taken aback. He had heard other astronauts voice a desire for another mission, but there was a tone to Z’s statement that was declaration, not request.
...
Two days later, the crew was led through the lobby of their Houston hotel toward the air conditioned tube that stretched to the air conditioned mini-bus. Their handler stood at the tube entrance as they passed through. "You don't want to step outside today," he cautioned. “You’d probably die.” He said Houston was experiencing a freak heat wave for this time of year and the temperature was 138 degrees at noon, with high humidity that made it even more dangerous. With that combination, he cautioned, 10 minutes outside might cause you to pass-out. As they boarded the bus to the Astrodome, Colin sidled next to Z.
“Freak heat wave. Not so freak, as far as I know. This happens all the time. And I thought Southern California was too hot.”
The parade through New York's city center would not be duplicated in Houston. The city had become a giant asphalt and glass heat island. The only reason it functioned was that it had become a hamster house of air conditioned passageways between buildings. That was how they kept people alive. It was also how Houston tried to hold onto the semblance of a business center, against the northward migration of corporate headquarters. Johnson Space Center was no more than a museum at this point, but the connection to the space program was still a point of such civic pride that NASA was obliged to tip their hat to history and arrange a visit. Their public welcome would span the Astrodome and NRX Stadium—two air-conditioned bubbles filled with a combined attendance of well over 150,000 Houstonites.
The bus pulled into the loading dock beneath the Astrodome, and Z and the crew debarked. The loading dock reminded Z of the Terminal, though not as large. The transition from cavernous space into small corridors lined with rooms also triggered memories of the Martian city.
The production assistant led them to an elevator and, when they were inside, pressed a button but did not accompany them. When the doors opened, the crew entered a sky box lounge overlooking the packed former stadium. All heads turned toward them as they were greeted by the assistant to the mayor, who led them across the room. A man in a light grey suit, who Z recognized from the news, walked over to greet them.
He extended his hand. “I'm Joseph Crowley, Joe Crowley, Senator to this lovely state. And you are Elizabeth Nasri, I assume. Congratulations on your mission, Commander. Welcome to Houston. My staff will get you drinks and food before you go down to the carts. And this is the crew,” he said, looking past Z. He greeted each of the other crew members, warmly complimenting them. Staffers returned with trays of food and drink, then Crowley led them over to the windows to take-in the enormous crowd.
Z looked out the window and pondered her change of circumstance. This was not the world that she had left, three-plus years ago. Even with the notoriety from her preceding space missions, she had been a mostly anonymous citizen, threading through a quilt of ordinary, unremarkable experiences. She had assumed that coming home would give her some reunion with the patchwork of normalcy. But this was far different. Beyond the sky box windows was a congregation, there to worship space, America, Mars, exploration—so many things. There were more people at this event than had ever lived in the Martian city.
She turned to Crowley, “You said, Senator, that we'd be taken down to cars. What is planned?”
He grinned broadly, “Oh. You're in for a treat. It's a little thing we do, here in Houston. You're going to experience an indoor parade. You just sit in the cart as if you are being driven down the street. But you'll be riding around the stadium. We'll run you on a few laps... orbits, then you go over to the other dome and do the same thing. Then you'll get out of the car and I'll introduce you and you'll each say a few words. You got your speeches, right?”
“Yes. Pat took care of us, ” Z replied. Looking at the Senator, she noticed the customary American flag lapel pin, the Senatorial pin, and a third pin. “What's that pin on your lapel? Is it a medal?”
The Senator looked down and fingered the red-orange, microphotograph pin. “It's a Marked pin. I got tested and turns out that I'm descended from your friends on Mars. Marked people are my constituents, too, so I wear this pin to show I represent all the people of the State.” He pointed at it. “This is a picture of Mars!”
Z cocked her head quizzically, “So if you test positive for the variant, they send you a pin?”
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“Nooo. You have to buy that through the store. You have to use your Telmara test number to get one.” He took Z by the shoulder and pointed her around the room. “Here, look around. See? That person, over there. And those two by the bar. They all have pins. I've never been a member of a golf club with people so happy to wear a membership pin! Heck, it's crazy but it does give you something to talk about.”
The mayor's assistant interrupted the conversation to retrieve the crew and take them to their carts. Dunlap had been watching Z’s absorption of the unfamiliar situation and stepped over to her, smiling. He had done this before. “You're going to love this. It's like a ride at Disneyland.”
Z arched an eyebrow, skeptically. “When I was a kid, some of those rides scared me.”
They descended to the parade level where they boarded the carts. Each sat in their own electric parade float. The steel doors rolled-up and the carts glided out into the darkened arena. Then spotlights splashed onto them and the audience erupted, cameras lit-up and music played, while images of space and Mars washed across giant screens. Z could hear the cheering but couldn’t see the faces of the crowd in the darkness beyond her prescribed path, so she smiled and waved to imagined admirers she recalled from the two other parades she had been through. Then, after three orbits, the cars entered a tunnel, glowing with soft light. The doors rolled closed behind them.
Dunlap let out a whoop and they glided down the transition tunnel linking the Astrodome to the NRX Stadium. “Get ready everyone!”
The cars reached the end of the tunnel, doors again rolled-up, and they entered another constellation of camera lights, more music, more cheering, and more imaginary people in the darkness. Three more orbits to go, thought Z, then re-entry.
From the arena, they were taken to a reception with another group of local dignitaries. They were there for only twenty minutes—enough time to meet the city leadership—then led into a second, smaller reception room. There, every lapel had a red dot pin, every necklace a red dot amulet—each Mars pin unique to the wearer, read by a receiver at the door and tracked to a photo ID, and a contribution to the Senator’s campaign committee.
Z and Dunlap were the first through the door. Dunlap barged ahead while Z stopped a moment at the scanner. The greeter smiled and waved her in.
“Ha! Got you!” said Dunlap when she caught up. “You have to get used to it, Z. For the rest of your life, you’ll never have to wait for someone to clear you.”
Noriko, next behind Z and Dunlap, quietly took in the scene. The crowd was way more diverse than she had expected; usually the more exclusive the reception, the more people were excluded. There were clearly those people with a mission and those who were happy just to be there. She could see the power brokers and socialites in position at the center of the gilt and crystal ballroom. Around the edges were floes of people just enjoying the event. But this was definitely more than a group of fans.
Z heard a commotion behind her and turned. A man at the door had his hand on Patrick's chest and was pushing him firmly back out of the room into the hallway. Z excused herself and rushed to the door, where a state trooper was staring-down Patrick while the communications officer tried his best to communicate that he was part of the guest group.
Next to the trooper was an event planner, pointing at Patrick. “You have no pin.”
“What?”
Pointing his thumb over his shoulder into the reception, he emphasized, “This is for Marked people. They want to meet the crew without interruptions. No pin. No entry.”
Patrick lifted his lapel to show his NASA pin. “I have this one. It counts for something.”
The trooper pushed Patrick’s hand down, “You can buy those anywhere. Let me see some ID.”
Z stepped nearer the group. “Stop!” she ordered. The trooper and event planner looked her way in anger then, seeing who had barked at them, relaxed and started their explanation.
Z interrupted them. “This man is the NASA Communications Director for my mission.”
The planner tried to explain her off. “We were just asking for his credentials.”
“It's how you were doing it. You don't accost someone just because they aren't wearing your stupid little pin.” She took Patrick by the arm, “Now, he's coming with me. And you two are staying as far away from us as possible.”
As they walked back into the reception room, they ran face-on into Senator Crowley, who smiled graciously and looked past them toward the hallway. “Were the bouncers trying to throw you out of the club?”
Z turned and pointed at the door watchers. “Big mistake. They were detaining this man, here,” now pointing at Patrick, “NASA’s Communications Director for my mission” now pointing at the red dot on the Senator’s jacket, “just because he wasn’t wearing one of your pins.”
The Senator shook his head in embarrassment. “I’m sorry, Commander. It was our fault not to prepare them better. My people told them ‘absolutely no one enters without a pin.’ They were just following orders. I apologize.”
“But I don’t have a pin. No one’s stopping me.”
“You don’t need a pin. Everyone knows you’re Marked.”
Z furrowed her brow. The Senator’s statement, or rather its implications, had come completely out of left field. “Excuse me, Senator. I want to take a moment with Patrick, here, to prepare my thoughts for our introduction. I assume that’s next?”
“Yes, that’s why I came to get you. The others are near the platform.”
“I’ll be there, right away,” she smiled.
When the Senator was out of earshot, Z faced Patrick. “What’s this about?” she whispered.
“I’m sorry, Z. I would have prepped you, but to be honest we didn’t think this would be a big deal for anyone. When we discovered you had the variant we put it out as a way of explaining why none of the other crew could use the headpieces. We didn’t want nut cases saying you were some genetically-engineered android. That was it. End of story. And I didn’t know this reception was only for Marked people,” he added, with air quotes. “On my itinerary it just said Senator’s Reception. So that’s all I know.”
Z sighed. “Okay. But we’ll have to talk this through, later. I want to know if this is going to be a problem for me.”
“You? Z? I saw you flex your muscles to rescue me back there. No one’s going to mess with you.” Patrick smiled, Z smiled back, and they walked together to the crew standing by the small platform in the corner.
Z joined the crew while Patrick stood back in the crowd. Her arrival had been the signal for the Senator to take the stage. The crowd chuckled through his opening and then he began to summarize the mission’s accomplishments—intelligent civilization discovered, ruins of a magnificent city, mysterious new technology, plans for a permanent colony—it all bubbled through Z’s brain while she considered this unexpected aspect of coming home. She identified her role in the mission as commander, spokesperson, explorer, and… lucky, no more than that. She looked at the faces of the crowd while the Senator introduced each of the crew members. Surprisingly, many guests were watching her, and not the stage. When the fourth crew member, Noriko, was introduced, Z prepared for her introduction. It didn’t come. The Senator asked each astronaut about their favorite memory of the mission, then what surprised them the most. Dunlap got the biggest laugh when he replied that being underground all the time was his biggest surprise. Noriko was brief and formal, Ellis was military, Colin waxed the most scientific of anyone. The crowd laughed and applauded politely. Z laughed to herself, “Maybe they’ll forget me, standing over here.”
The Senator graciously thanked the crew and then made his final introduction. “Well, that was a lot of fun, talking with the Mars Habitat crew. What a great team.” He led another round of applause, then he looked out into the audience. “I know that deep in our hearts—deep in our genes, for that matter—we are all part Martian, here.”
“You bet!” came a boisterous response.
“And we’re all here to meet and celebrate one of us, an explorer and commander who has actually seen our ancestors and tried to fathom their secrets and share them with us, on Earth. I’m honored to introduce the sole person who has worn a Martian crown, who has seen through Martian eyes and who can bring our culture to life on Earth: Commander Elizabeth Nasri.”
The room lit up. A hundred guests sounded the applause of a thousand. Z rolled her eyes to the crew as she passed. Colin blurted, “No pressure, Commander.” Z shook hands with Senator Crowley, took the microphone and turned to the audience. She paused. No matter where she looked, all she saw were the red dot pins.
“It was actually more of a tiara than a crown,” she quipped. The audience laughed. She began the remarks that were becoming easier and easier to deliver with repetition. “Thank you. The crew and I are still getting used to people’s reaction to our mission. You see, we had no idea …” and the words kept tumbling out—a reflection, a joke, credit to the crew, thanks to NASA. As she spoke, and smiled, she watched the audience. With all eyes on her, it was easy for her to reach into the person behind the gaze. There, she saw that same tell she noticed in some of the staff when leaving the White House: an expression of self-aggrandizement and entitlement. The people she saw as she brought her brief talk to a close did not care about the mission or the crew. They had come to claim their special membership, to affirm they could be in a room from which most were excluded.
The evening concluded with a smile and a wave and a photograph of the crew, on stage; then, off to the hotel and a quick night cap to calm down from all the attention. The next morning, everyone was ferried to the airport for a hypersonic jump to Mexico City. From Mexico City, they jumped to Tokyo, Sidney, New Delhi, Rome, Paris, London, and Berlin.
Pat did his best to shield them from the objectification of celebrity. He had seen reentry burn-out in crews before, and had included a psychiatrist in the entourage to monitor their assimilation into a manic lifestyle on Earth. Despite his efforts at keeping the crew on an even keel, he was battling the forces of very powerful people, at each stop, who demanded their share of the spotlight.
Time and again, the spotlight illuminated the spread of the red dot pin. The crew members started calculating the percentage of Marked people in any reception and noting clusters around specific leaders and power brokers. They gave a special award to the person who seemed to most obsessively covet Z. It had begun as a game to distract them from the relentless pressure, but they soon realized they were collecting information that was too anomalous not to be brought to the attention of the Secret Service.
Ultimately though, mercy was bestowed on them by the speed of the transport, which had shot them around the globe in ten days and returned them to LAX, bedraggled and exhausted. As the jet taxied to the private terminal and everyone gathered their things, Patrick stood at the front of first class and gave them something they had not experienced in four years: a week off.