Zed Marsh stared into the mirror, waiting for the woman to appear on the other side.
His mother, Ana Marsh, sat to his left. She turned toward him and adjusted the collar of his crimson shirt without comment.
Zed’s father, Ed Marsh, shifted in his seat to his son’s right. He cocked his head slightly as he cleared his throat.
Ana shot a glance his way. Ed noticed it and became still.
At that moment, their reflections disappeared, and a striking middle-aged woman in ripped jeans and a suit vest materialized on the other side. The Marshes found themselves looking through a digital window into an immaculate studio.
Zed recognized the woman instantly. Di was one of the most popular news and entertainment streamers around. Zed didn’t follow current events closely, but he was struck by the surreal feeling one gets in the presence of a celebrity.
To Di’s left, Zed could see a studio audience of several hundred people and felt nauseous. He knew he was just looking through a glorified 3D screen, but his sudden stage fright felt very real.
“Ladies and gentlemen, give my next guests a warm round of applause and welcome to our studio, the Martians… I mean, the Marshes!”
The audience dutifully laughed and applauded as Di flopped down on the loveseat next to another woman whom Zed didn’t recognize.
“Now, as you can see, the Marshes are here with us remotely.”
Zed knew that to the audience and Di, it looked as if they were sitting on a couch in the studio, their bodies fading away below the waist.
“Dr. Marsh, can you tell us why we’re unable to enjoy your actual presence this evening?”
Zed’s mother straightened and raised her chin, the way she did whenever she gave Zed a lecture in response to a question.
“Well, as you can imagine, we have to be extremely careful about the stowaways we carry with us on a trip like the one we’re about to make. If we were to bring a disease with us that we didn’t have supplies on hand to treat, the results could be devastating for the colony.”
Di leaned in, half-turning toward the audience. “So, like, if you got bitten by a zombie at T minus 6, that would be a problem, I take it?”
Zed’s mother blinked twice and gave a closed-lipped smile.
“Yes, definitely not what we’re hoping for,” she said.
“Now, before I get to this young man between you, let me ask you this, Ed,” Di leaned in as if sharing a secret. “Is it true that you will be working on the systems that, well, turn feces into food?”
The audience laughed, but Zed could see them leaning in, genuinely curious to hear his answer.
“That is correct, Di. We’ve come a long way on Mars, but using every resource available will always be important, especially as the colony tries to be as self-sufficient as possible. Nothing gets wasted, even our waste. Every little shi—uh—bit helps, right?”
Di bobbed her head as the audience clapped.
“Well, Ed, I’m glad to know that at least I would have one thing to contribute.”
Di jumped off the couch and knelt in front of Zed’s projection as if he were a small child.
“Zed, Zed, Zed. Can you believe that in just a few short months, you will be standing on another planet? How does it feel to know you’re about to be the youngest person to ever set foot on Mars?” Di asked earnestly.
The audience broke out into sustained applause.
Zed felt a rush of heat in his face. Why in the world had he agreed to do this? He could barely get through giving a speech in a small class setting. Why did he think he would be okay saying anything at all with a few hundred eyes staring at him from the audience and millions more from the cameras? He’d hoped the remote interview would feel disconnected enough to avoid the twisting knot that was starting to form in his gut, but the immersion of the telepresence mirror was doing its job a little too well.
“Uh, cool, I guess,” Zed half-mumbled. He wasn’t trying to mumble; he just found that his lips had turned to stiff rubber the moment he needed them.
The audience chuckled as Di raised an eyebrow.
“If going to Mars is ‘cool,’” Di gave an exaggerated shrug, “then I’d like to see what it would take to really blow your socks off.”
Zed gave a crooked half-smile.
“No, I get that it’s a big deal and all. It’s just been the goal for so long. With all the training and work my parents have put in for years to get to this point, it just feels kind of normal now that it’s here, ya know?”
Di nodded sympathetically.
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“Well, you might see it as normal, but I wouldn’t sell yourself short if I were you. ‘Hi, I’m Zed, the youngest person to set foot on Mars’ seems like it’d make a pretty decent pick-up line, no?”
Zed smiled and looked down at his hands.
“Can’t say I’ve tried that, but I’ll take your word for it.”
Di continued, “While you will be the youngest, you won’t be the only teen, correct?”
Zed nodded and smiled weakly, happy to have an excuse to talk about something other than himself.
“Yeah, Miranda and George Ens will be making the trip with us, thankfully.”
“Happy to not be the only kid on the planet, I take it?”
Zed shuddered at the thought. With all the moving he’d done growing up, making friends had been nearly impossible. Miranda and George’s father, Jacob, had been on the same training track as his parents. That meant that for the last few years, he’d had two friends who were more or less always around and could relate to him more than the random kids at the dozen or so different schools he’d attended over the years.
“Yeah, the thought of being stuck on a planet with nothing but other adults is…” Zed scrunched his nose in disgust.
Di put a hand on her heart in solidarity.
“On the downside, though, if there’s any mischief in Inauguration, I’m guessing you three will forever be the chief suspects.”
Zed smiled and shrugged in agreement.
“I actually have someone here who wanted to meet you, Zed.”
Di gestured to the woman beside her on the couch. Zed realized he was so inward-focused and nervous about the audience that he hadn’t actually taken a good look at her.
She appeared to be in her mid-fifties, maybe sixties, with pale skin and a buzzed head covered with a quarter-inch of gray stubble. The black suit she wore had the slightest hint of a blue shine. To Zed, it felt somehow retro, like the kind of style he might have seen in a period piece movie set at the turn of the last century.
“Marshes, while her face isn’t familiar to most, I’m sure her name needs no introduction. I’d like you to meet Jarra Gunnardóttir.”
The three of them sat in stunned silence for a moment. There wasn’t a person alive who didn’t know the name, but that face had changed somewhat since the last time anyone had seen her publicly.
Di continued with enthusiasm.
“We’ve been so incredibly honored to have you on, Jarra. Thank you again for the privilege of choosing our humble show for your first interview in, what, twenty years?”
Jarra bobbed her head as if weighing her words carefully.
“Not at all, Di,” she said in a surprisingly soft voice that held just a hint of an accent. She turned her gaze to the Marshes and focused on Zed.
He had never more clearly understood the old idiom about a deer caught in headlights. Jarra’s freakishly pale blue eyes felt like they were scanning his soul. Zed tried not to squirm.
If Di was a celebrity, Jarra was closer to a figure straight out of legend. She had more or less saved the world with her tech and then vanished from the spotlight, content to run her business empire from the seclusion of her home in Iceland.
“I’d like to take just a moment, Jarra, on behalf of myself and everyone watching, to thank you for your work and contributions to humanity during the Three Hell Thirties. I know I wouldn’t be here today if not for you. Your medical advancements saved my mother when she was infected with the Wormwood virus before I was even born.”
Zed thought Di might tear up for a second, but her quivering smile quickly returned to its usual radiance.
“Enough about the past! Jarra, what does the future look like for the Marshes? I know you’ve developed a significant portion of the tech that allows a colony on Mars to exist, right down to the radiation meds that enable someone like young Zed here to make the trip with minimal risk.”
Jarra glanced at Di, but her eyes quickly returned to Zed as she spoke.
“The colony of Inauguration is, quite simply, the culmination of my life’s work. As you alluded to before, the Three Hells taught us all a valuable lesson about the fragility of our species. Inauguration is our first real hope of finding the next rung on the ladder to the cosmos.”
As Jarra spoke, her words built in excitement and energy, and she became more still, like a calm before the storm.
“Yes, I’ve heard rumblings you talk about this in the book you’re about to release, correct?”
Jarra nodded at Di. Di continued.
“But I also heard that you believe that aliens or some power left us, uh, breadcrumbs to the stars. Some kind of trail for humanity to follow?”
Di said this in her lighthearted way, but Zed could see some hesitation in her body language.
Jarra nodded again.
“That is more or less correct. Much like the tree in the Garden of Eden was meant to elevate Homo sapiens, I believe similar places exist. Places of progress that will give us just what we need to take our next steps—more rungs on a ladder to the stars, if you will.”
Di gave an awkward chuckle.
“Which tree are you referring to, Jarra? The tree of life or the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?”
The audience joined in with a smattering of uncertain laughter.
Jarra smiled but didn’t respond. She instead gestured to Zed with both arms, palms up, like someone holding their arms out to a child who is taking their first tentative steps.
“The boy here represents an important part of humanity’s journey forward. I am pleased to see this day come. Godspeed, Zed.”
“Uh, thanks,” was all Zed’s dry mouth managed to mumble.
Di stood and turned toward the audience. She cleared her throat and sped through her words, anxious to move the conversation along.
“Well, I’m afraid that’s all the time we have for our stream today, folks. My thanks to Jarra and the Marshes for taking the time to be with us. Remember, you can watch live tomorrow as Zed and his family launch on their long road trip to the red planet. If you think your family has a tough time with road trips, imagine one that lasts months! I’m Di, and you’ve been a lovely audience. Good night!”
Di, Jarra, and the audience faded until Zed was once again looking at his reflection in the mirror.
His parents did what they always did after any kind of social engagement: They started bickering. Whatever the point of contention was tonight, Zed wasn’t sure. He just sat there, lost in his own stunned thoughts.
He couldn’t have imagined that anything could consume his thoughts more than the launch tomorrow. Then again, he never imagined in his most self-aggrandizing fantasies that he’d actually have a conversation with Jarra Gunnardóttir!
Sure, the bit about magic trees and ladders to space was a bit odd, but hey, she’d pretty much saved the human race, so she was entitled to a few trillionaire eccentricities.
Zed made his way to the bed in what was his room for the week. He flung a quiet, “Good night,” in their general direction. It went unanswered. Some people used white noise machines to fall asleep. Zed’s white noise was the muffled sound of his parents’ angry voices humming through the walls.
Tonight, it didn’t matter. All the years of sacrifice they’d made, all the moving, all the missed opportunities would finally pay off tomorrow. Tomorrow, life could finally start, even if it was on Mars. Zed had to believe that.