Blue Mars Read Free Page A

argued in the same language, and
understood each other. But that had been so long ago she couldn’t even remember
when exactly it was. In Antarctica? Somewhere. But not on Mars.
    “You know,” Sax said in a conversational tone, again very
un-Sax-like but in a different way, “it wasn’t the Red militia that caused the
Transitional Authority to evacuate Burroughs and the rest of the planet. If
guerrillas had been the only factor then the Terrans would have gone after us,
and they might well have succeeded. But those mass demonstrations in the tents
made it clear that almost everyone on the planet was against them. That’s what
governments fear the most; mass protests in the cities. Hundreds of thousands
of people going into the streets to reject the current system. That’s what
Nirgal means when he says political power comes out of the look in people’s
eye. And not out of the end of a gun.”
    “And so?” Ann said.
    Sax gestured at the people in the warehouse. “They’re all greens.”
    The others continued debating. Sax watched her like a bird.
    Ann got up and walked out of the meeting, into the strangely
unbusy streets of east Pavonis. Here and there militia bands held posts on
street corners, keeping an eye to the south, toward Sheffield and the cable
terminal. Happy, hopeful, serious young natives. There on one corner a group
was in an animated discussion, and as Ann passed them a young woman, her face
utterly intent, flushed with passionate conviction, cried out “You can’t just
do what you want!”
    Ann walked on. As she walked she felt more and more uneasy,
without knowing why. This is how people change— in little quantum jumps when
struck by outer events—no intention, no plan. Someone says “the look in
people’s eye,” and the phrase is suddenly conjoined with an image: a face
glowing with passionate conviction, another phrase: you can’t just do what you
want! And so it occurred to her (the look on that young woman’s face!) that it
was not just the cable’s fate they were deciding—not just “should the cable
come down,” but “how do we decide things?” That was the critical postrevolutionary
question, perhaps more important than any single issue being debated, even the
fate of the cable. Up until now, most people in the underground had operated by
a working method which said if we don’t agree with you we will fight you. That
attitude was what had gotten people into the underground in the first place,
Ann included. And once used to that method, it was hard to get away from it.
After all, they had just proved that it worked. And so there was the
inclination to continue to use it. She felt that herself.
    But political power ... say it did come out of the look in
people’s eye. You could fight forever, but if people weren’t behind you. . . .
     
    Ann continued to think about that as she drove down into
Sheffield, having decided to skip the farce of the afternoon strategy session
in east Pavonis. She wanted to have a look at the seat of the action.
    It was curious how little seemed to have changed in the day-to-day
life of Sheffield. People still went to work, ate in restaurants, talked on the
grass of the parks, gathered in the public spaces in this most crowded of tent
towns. The shops and restaurants were jammed. Most businesses in Sheffield had
belonged to the metanats, and now people read on their screens long arguments
over what to do—what the employees’ new relationship to their old owners should
be— where they should buy their raw materials, where they should sell—whose
regulations they ought to obey, whose taxes they ought to pay. All very
confusing, as the screen debates and the nightly news vids and the wrist nets
indicated.
    The plaza devoted to the food market, however, looked as it always
had. Most food was grown and distributed by co-ops; ag networks were in place,
the greenhouses on Pavonis were still producing, and so in the market things
ran as usual, goods