Rolling Thunder Read Free

going flat out.
    “Your mother sends her love. I … I love you, too. Hurry home.”
    I was already consulting the train schedules while I pulled Rosinante into her slip at the dock and hit the ground running. I ran as fast as the relentless gravity would allow, up Pomeroy toward my apartment. With the heat of the day waning, there were a few people here and there on the street, and I got a few stares. Actually, more than a few. It wasn’t until I was getting into the elevator that I realized I had forgotten to put my bathing suit back on.
    Earthies, you are so weird. I hope you enjoyed the show.

2

    WHEN I BOARDED the maglev for Los Angeles a few minutes later, everyone on the train turned to stare at me. Not all at once, but as I moved down the car I created a wave of turning eyeballs. This time it wasn’t because of showing too much skin, nor was it my stunning beauty, nor my height. (I lied about the six-foot-two business; I’m six-four. As for the beauty, I’m not Miss Red Planet, but the face doesn’t stop clocks and the body is within acceptable parameters.) No, this time it was the uniform.
    Mars is the Red Planet, right? So our flag, our spaceships, and pretty much everything else associated with government just has to be red. If you want my opinion, I’d tell you that the human eye can distinguish millions of shades, and there’s no crime in using one of them that doesn’t fall into the short end of the spectrum now and then.
    That’s not the problem. I can wear red, I look good in red, with my blond hair and fair complexion. The little red beret in particular is quite fetching on me. But whatever you call it, the uniform is bright and loud. Those are two things I prefer not to be when I go out in public on Earth.
    See, a lot of Earthies don’t like us very much.
    So there I was in full-dress ceremonial uniform, two inches taller in my shiny black boots, a great leggy cardinal if you’re being charitable, a grotesque gawky flamingo if you’re not, moving down a row of people whose glances varied from freak-show interest to glaring dislike. Orders were that we were to “show the flag” when traveling. I wish whoever had written that policy was on the train with me as I tried to make myself small. Showing the flag is one thing. Wearing it is beyond the call of duty.
    I found an empty seat and tried to lift the small bag I’d packed into the overhead rack. It didn’t contain much, just stuff I’d tossed in that I couldn’t do without and a couple changes of clothes. Even so, the Earth gravity defeated me on the first try. A guy in the seat in front of me jumped up to help. I had a good seven inches on him, but he tossed the bag into the rack easily, then wanted to sit beside me. I cooled him off politely. As soon as I was settled, two college guys from Cal Poly tried hitting on me, and I frosted them with a gaze I’d been working on in the mirror. It also didn’t hurt when I shifted a bit to bring my sidearm more prominently into view. That was also policy: Never appear in uniform without your weapon. Nothing like a loaded Glock in a leather holster to put a little respect into overeager frat boys.
    IT WAS THE express train, so we stopped only in Santa Barbara and Ventura and some dreadful place in the San Fernando Valley before pulling into the downtown transit center in the City of Angels.
    The Transit Center is vast, and underground. I had no trouble finding the right platform, having lived most of my life without exterior reference points, but by the time I made it there I was wishing I’d swallowed my pride and taken the handicapped tram. My boots were pinching my toes, and the gravity threatened to collapse my arches.
    Soon I was on the nonstop maglev to the Area 51 spaceport, and for the first time I saw some other red uniforms. I felt like a dying woman staggering out of the desert to an oasis as I joined them, two girls and a guy, all jaygees like me, and we spent the short trip