A Priest of Mars

By

Allen Martin Bair

2014

 

Sometime In the Mid Fifty-Sixth Century

 

The boy ran through the green wheat fields as fast as he could. The red soil was damp from recent rains and stuck to his black hide boots clogging up the tread. It was the second crop of the growing season and was just past midsummer in the Martian month of Quadrestas. The day had been warmer than most. It had reached almost 28 degrees centigrade. It would have otherwise been a great day for him. Instead, it felt as though his world had ended.

 

He was small for a Martian boy of three, just under a meter and a half. He had his mother's light brown, almost blond hair and the pale, white skin which tended to characterize native Martians, though not all. He wore plain lightweight green denim pants—his mother always said they matched his eyes—and a similar brown shirt. An Earther would have considered him too thin to be healthy, but Earthers usually thought all Martians looked like they were starving.

 

The boy didn't care where he was going as long as he got away from the deceptively small, dome shaped red brick and stone house. It was his house. His face was streaked with tears in the afternoon light. Behind him, a large hairy dog ran after barking furiously as it tried to catch up to its young master. But the boy was beyond caring at this point in time.

 

When he felt like he couldn't run anymore he just fell down. The wheat wasn't really tall enough yet to hide him much if at all, it didn't look much different from just tall grass, but he didn't want to be seen right now. He didn't want anyone to find him or try to comfort him. He didn't want anyone to run their fingers through his pale brown hair or give him a hug. None of it would matter anymore.

 

“Stupid Earth.” He said in the midst of his tears. “Stupid, stupid Earth.”

 

He looked up into the sky. He knew he couldn't find it during the day. All he could see was Deimos and Phobos racing one another through the sky. “Stupid Earth, only has one moon.” He looked up anyway and shouted his fury at the world millions of miles away. The world that still thought it could do whatever it wanted with Martians' lives even a thousand years after Autonomy. How far in the past could a people be stuck? “Stupid Earth!” He shouted. “Stupid Earthers!” He wanted to say stronger things. He wanted to pile on as much abuse as possible at the people who were taking Tomas away from him and his mother.

 

The dog caught up to him and barked a continuous torrent of rebuke at him for running off. It was a hairy white and brown beast, bred for Mars' earlier days of colder climate and thinner air. “Shut up, Moxie.” Jovan told him. “It's not your dad they're taking from you.”

 

That wasn't quite accurate. Tomas wasn't actually Jovan's father, but he had stayed with him and his mom at their farmstead for so long that he was the closest thing he had. For as long as he could remember, Tomas had been there for them. He had been there for him. Driving the tractor with Jovan in his lap. Taking him out on walks. He was only supposed to be the farm manager, but he had become so much more in the last year and a half. He had known him for half his life.

 

“Jovan!” He heard a woman's voice in the distance. He didn't want to answer. It didn't matter, he knew she could still see him. “Stupid Earth.” He said again. “No one needs them. We don't need them.”

 

He could hear light footsteps behind him, trying to be more careful of the young wheat than he was. It didn't sound like she had her boots on like she normally would out in the fields. “Jovan?” She asked again.

 

“Stupid Earth.” He said again. “I hate Earth, Mom. It's a stupid place full of dumb people who think that the whole solar system spins around them. It's year isn't even long enough, and it can't even make enough food for itself. Why does he want to go back there?” At least Mars had a proper six hundred and sixty eight day year. No wonder Earth couldn't grow enough food to feed itself! It barely had any time at all to grow anything!

 

Her slanted eyes were filled with tears as Jovan looked up into his mother's face. She wiped her face with her hand, and answered. “He doesn't have a choice sweetheart. God knows I want him to stay, but he just can't. We all lose if he does. Tomas more than anyone.”

 

“It's not fair. Why'd they have to tell him to go back now?” He asked.

 

“Because if he doesn't do it now, he won't ever be able to.” She said. Her long, light brown hair had fallen out of the neat bun she normally held it in. She wore a similar work shirt and pants to Jovan. She wasn't very old herself, being only a little past twelve years. Tomas always teased her about how someone was going to come and arrest him for having an inappropriate relationship with a twelve year old. Of course on Mars he wasn't much older than fifteen, and she would tell him he wasn't out of puberty yet either. She laughed softly as more tears came.

 

Her husband had died in a tractor accident not long after Jovan had been born. He had been a good Martian man; a farmer like all of his family before him. The farmstead had been his. It was left to him by his own father, and it had been passed to him down through so many generations they thought it had been an original land claim after Autonomy. He had never wanted to do anything else, and she hadn't wanted to do anything else with anyone else. She had been raised not far, just a few kilometers away from her husband and had gone to the same local school. It was a smaller farming community like many in the wheat-cropping regions near equatorial Mars. They were raised so close that they might as well have been family. Getting married had just made it official in some sense.

 

Tomas had come along a year and a half after Jovan was born. He was also a good man, and a good farmer. He was shorter than most of the Martian men from whom he stood out with his black hair, and darker, almost brown skin. He came from a province of Earth called Mexico, and had been assigned as the farm's company representative and manager. Earth based distributing companies wouldn't do business with local Martian farmers unless they had personal representatives, Earther representatives, overseeing the production and shipment.

 

No Martian could understand why, after so many centuries, Earth didn't think they could manage their own affairs or even grow crops for export without someone from Earth overseeing every aspect of it. Mars was the breadbasket of the solar system, and had been self-supporting and self-sustaining for over a millennium before it began supporting Earth itself as well as the other colonies. It felt insulting to the independent minded Martians, especially when they felt they could get along just find without them and had been able to since ancient times. Tomas actually understood this resentment. He said it was something to do with his own Mexican people's history.

 

He was exotic, romantic, and kind and she was lonely, and he took an immediately liking to the little boy calling him “Jovanito,” although he kept pronouncing it like “Hovanito.” They had talked occasionally of marriage, but they both knew it was impossible. Marriage meant he would stay forever, and she would lose the contract with the Earth company. They didn't look kindly on local businesses that tried to co-opt their personnel as they saw it. Trying to get contracts to supply the outer colonies when an Earth company had black-balled you was next to impossible. It seemed like those colonies were still under the impression that Earth was still some bright and shining jewel in space that could do no wrong, even if they'd never been there and couldn't ever go there. She'd have to cut the prices so low to get buyers that they wouldn't be able to survive the next season.

 

Tomas wouldn't do that to her and her son, and as much as he had come to love her, Jovan, and even Mars, he was still an Earther. If he pushed it and tried to stay longer, Earth would revoke his citizenship and all rights thereof, and wouldn't let him come back. It was a population control policy they had instituted after Martian Autonomy and the establishment of the outer colonies. If you went off world for more than three Earth standard years you stayed off world as a colonist. What made it worse is that stranded Earthers weren't always welcomed by the colonies they found themselves in. Few colonies could support the extra population. These people tended to become persona non grata without any rights. On Mars, because of their own immigration controls and a Mars first policy, a stranded Earther had no real protections and could find himself repatriated to an Earth orbit station where he would be penniless, jobless, and planetless. Citizenship was possible, but difficult and expensive. As much as he enjoyed the slower, simpler pace of Mars, there were real and severe consequences for him if he tried to stay past his deadline.

 

This real world nightmare was killing her as she wrapped her arms around herself. She shouldn't have ever allowed herself to fall in love with an Earther. It was a stupid mistake on her part, she told herself and she was just as angry at herself for allowing this to happen as she was at anything else in particular. She wanted to hug someone, something, and her small son just wasn't obliging her yet. “He stayed too long as it is. He doesn't even know if they'll let him set foot on Earth anymore, and if they don't...”

 

“So, then he should stay here!” He shouted. It made perfect sense to him.

 

“He's got to follow the rules, Jovan. If he stays he loses his job and his planet, and we lose the contract. If he goes back now he still might be able to go home, and even come back some day, and we'll be able to still sell grain through his company.” She said, trying to explain to him and even convince herself that it was for the best.

 

“Stupid Earth company.” Jovan said, digging his hands into the red earth beneath him.

 

His mother knelt down next to him and agreed. “Stupid Earth company.” She said. On impulse he then thrust himself into her arms and held on tight. She let out a gasp of air, and then held on to him just as tightly. They sat there in the field holding one another as the moons passed overhead and the sun headed for the horizon.

 

* * *

 

Jovan didn't go with his mother to Tharsis City to see Tomas off at the spaceport. Tomas' shuttle was supposed to be leaving the next morning and it was a long drive by groundcar. She had arranged things with another farming family not far from their own farmstead, about a couple of kilometers or so down the main highway. She and Tomas had left about midmorning, and she was going to be gone until the following night. Tomas had to make sure Earth customs authorities on Mars would allow him to board the shuttle. Jovan not-so-secretly hoped they wouldn't.

 

It wasn't the first time she had left him with the Borats when she needed to go into the city, and they were good people too. Aunt Millie and Uncle Kelmo were an aging couple of about thirty, and their own kids had already grown and moved out. Uncle Kelmo was originally from Xanthe province, and had the mocha colored skin and darker brown hair which that province's people were known for. He and his family had moved to Agroppidum when he was just a kid himself. Aunt Millie was much darker colored. Jovan always wondered what province of Mars had people so dark. When Jovan's own father had passed away they sort of adopted his mother and him as family and looked out for them from time to time. They hadn't always trusted or approved of “that Earther” that Jovan's mother “hung out with” as they put it, but they knew he had been good to them otherwise.

 

Their house was a lot like Jovan's. It was made of good red Martian brick and stone raised up into a one-story dome that only looked like it could hold a single large room, or maybe two small ones. The small dome was misleading, because most of the house went below ground by two more stories creating a large and comfortable family home. Almost all the Martian homes and buildings were built “downwards” rather than upwards like the pictures of Earth buildings—yet another reason why Earth was stupid—he had seen. It was a holdover from the earlier colonial days of past centuries when the artificial magnetosphere still hadn't been worked out yet and radiation exposure from solar wind and flares was a real threat. It was safer to be underground most of the time back then, and more comforting to the Martian psyche now.

 

Unlike Jovan's house, they had real wood paneling. Even now it was rare to have real wood anything, much less have whole rooms overlaid in it, even the floors. Forests on Mars were protected by strict conservations laws because of the oxygen they generated for the whole planet, and any wood which was allowed to be taken from them was terribly expensive. Only designated wood farms could be harvested for wood, and there weren't many of them. You didn't just build ordinary things like furniture or wall paneling out of wood. He didn't know how Uncle Kelmo could have afforded so much of it, or what he did to acquire it, but he thought maybe Aunt Millie and he were a lot more rich than they let on. Of course they also ranched buffalo as well as grew wheat for most of their lives, so they probably were.

 

He took a deep breath as he sat on the green carpeted floor in their living room. Their house always smelled exotic and a little spicy to him, but it was a good smell. In front of him was a video display that had a football game on. Two teams of men kicking a traditional black and white ball around a green carpeted indoor arena. He wasn't a big fan of football, but Uncle Kelmo didn't miss a single game during the season. It was one of the things that Tomas and he could get along about. Jovan tried to be interested in it, but he just couldn't. Uncle Kelmo was sitting near him in his favorite buffalo leather easy chair cheering on his favorite team, the Tharsis City Tigers, even though it didn't change anything about the game. Jovan couldn't figure it out.

 

“Uncle Kelmo?” Jovan asked him.

 

“Yes, Jovaniko.” The old man responded. He always called him “Jovaniko” which he was told one time meant “little Jovan.” It was a lot like what Tomas always called him.

 

“Why do you yell at the referee when he can't hear you?” The small boy continued.

 

“So he knows he got it wrong.” Uncle Kelmo responded without any further comment. Jovan had caught Aunt Millie rolling her eyes and stifling a laugh. The football game continued and Uncle Kelmo continued to loudly try and explain to the referees on the screen who couldn't hear him how wrong their calls were.

 

“Can I go play outside?” Jovan asked.

 

“No, Jovaniko, it's too dark now.” Uncle Kelmo answered.

 

“Is there something else I can do?” He asked.

 

“You don't like football?” Uncle Kelmo asked, as though he couldn't believe such a thing were possible.

 

“Not right now, Uncle Kelmo.” It was true. He didn't right now. It only reminded him of Tomas.

 

Aunt Millie came into the living room from the kitchen. “Maybe you can help me in the kitchen, Jovan.” She offered. Her skin was an unusually dark color for a native Martian, but Jovan always thought it made her look more pretty and special. “I'm making some apple pie.” She said sweetly, trying to tempt him. She knew how, too. Apple pie was his favorite. Especially Aunt Millie's apple pie because the apples came from her own trees, and she even threw in cinnamon which was a rarity in their little community.

 

“Ok.” He said, getting up and coming into the kitchen.

 

He sat down on a plastic stool at the red stone table. Aunt Millie put some washed green apples in front of him with a small sharp knife and told him to slice them up really good. He set to work cutting them as carefully as he could. He'd cut himself once with a knife like this pretty bad. Tomas had taken care of him then, closing his cut with first-aid glue, and then telling stories of his own childhood on Earth. At the time, it didn't sound that much different from Mars and it didn't sound so bad. When he had been afraid of picking up the knife again, Tomas had shown him how to use it right, and then worked with him until he was comfortable with it.

 

“I miss him, Aunt Millie.” Jovan said. “I miss Tomas.” He didn't know why he just blurted it out over apples, but he couldn't keep it in much longer.

 

“I know, Jovan.” Aunt Millie said. Her hands were covered in flour as she worked the dough into a pie crust. “And there's nothing wrong with missing people. The good Lord knows I miss some people terribly.” She said as she punished the dough for its defiance.

 

“It's not fair.” He said.

 

“No, it isn't. But that's the way life is. It's not going to be fair to you. And the truth is, you don't always want it to.” She said as she kneeded the mass in front of her.

 

“What do you mean?” He asked.

 

“God doesn't always give us what we deserve, Jovan. He gives us what we need, but you don't want Him to always give us what's fair. Otherwise none of us would be here, because none of us deserve anything good.” She answered him, thoughtfully.

 

“Huh?” He didn't understand, and told her so.

 

“You will in time. It's hard now, but you'll understand in time.” She said. She then added, “It's true. Kelmo and I didn't approve of your mom's affection for that Earther. But in most ways he treated her and you right, and as much as we might hate to admit it, that's more than many men would have, even good Martian men. Under other circumstances,” she let out a sigh, “I wish he could have stayed too, for yours and your mother's sake if nothing else.”

 

“Stupid Earth.” Jovan said. It had become his favorite saying and running theme now for the past week.

 

Aunt Millie didn't say anything to that, but the little smirk she gave told him that she agreed in some way.

 

* * *

 

His mother returned and life went back to something akin to normal. Except of course the man who had taken the place of a father in Jovan's life was now millions of miles away. Earth customs had betrayed Jovan and let Tomas on the shuttle. They received a message from him from some place called Mexico City telling them that he had made it. It must have been terribly expensive for him to send, his mother had told him. Interplanetary messages usually were, and his was a video message which lasted for more than fifteen minutes.

 

The Earth company, Agrosolar, had appointed another farm manager to take his place, a woman this time. She looked old enough to be his mom's mother with her short silver hair, but she had kind gray eyes and an easy smile. It took a week for her to get really used to walking normally with Mars' gravity, and it was funny to see her try as she had to hold on to things to keep herself from bouncing too far. She also had trouble with judging how heavy something was. Earthers were always stronger than native Martians but it more often worked against them than for them. Watching her drink a morning cup of sassafras tea was like watching an exercise in focus and concentration as she moved the mug like it was in slow motion so that she didn't jerk it too fast and splash the hot liquid all over herself. She was nice enough, and she got a long really well with his mom, but he still didn't like her. He had decided he wouldn't no matter how nice she was. He still had to be polite, but that didn't mean he had to like her. She had taken Tomas' job and he would never forgive her for that.

 

The wheat in the fields grew longer that summer as it began to near Autumn and harvest. The full school seasons would be starting again and not just the occasional week or two of maintenance review during the growing season. He would be entering the second grade when it started again and he wasn't looking forward to it. The summertime tutors which came around to check on his review lessons had told him about pre-algebra and it looked complicated.

 

And something was getting weird about his mom. Jovan started noticing that his mother was getting, well... fatter. At first he thought it was just that she was wearing tighter clothes, but then she started wearing stretch-pants and more loose-fitting clothes and her stomach continued to expand. She was eating a lot more too, and wanting some pretty weird and exotic stuff to boot.

 

She was also a lot more moody, and threw up a lot in the mornings. He knew she had cried a lot after Tomas had left, but this was something else entirely. He caught her talking one time to Cathy, the new manager, in their dining room like she was a long lost friend. Mom! He thought. How could you! He didn't say anything, but he felt betrayed for Tomas' sake. He was going to move closer to tell her so, but then he caught a little bit of their conversation.

 

“Does Tomas know, Miria?” Cathy asked her. “Have you sent a message to him?”

 

“No.” His mother replied. “I know him. It will tear him up. He'll want to be on the first transport back and that might kill both him and his job.” Jovan's mom had told him that Tomas had a hard time readjusting to Earth's environment and had been very sick for a while.

 

But his mom knew something that might bring Tomas back? And she wasn't telling him? What was she thinking? He was about to confront her with this too, and then he heard them talking about him.

 

“Does your son know?” Cathy asked her. “It's going to be a big change for him.”

 

“No,” she replied. “I haven't told anyone except you. But I can't keep it hidden much anymore. I'm already into my second trimester.”

 

“Well, my dear, I'm not going to judge...” Cathy started to say but she was cut off in midsentence.

 

Jovan couldn't take it anymore. He rushed into the dining room and confronted the two very surprised women. “What is it you're not telling me, Mom? What's a trimester? Is that what's making you sick? Is the second one bad? Can you get out of it? What do you know that could bring back Tomas? Why haven't you told him?” The questions came running out of his mouth rapid-fire.

 

His mother and Cathy were stunned into silence. Good, he thought. They deserved it for keeping things from him.

 

His mother spoke up first, and her voice sounded hurt. She sniffed a little, and it was then he could see that she had been crying again. He instantly felt horrible. “Jovan, I... I have something to tell you.” She said trying to smile. Her long hair had fallen out of its bun again.

 

“I'm sorry, Mom.” Jovan said. “I didn't mean to make you cry.” He didn't know what else to say.

 

“No, sweetheart, it wasn't you. You didn't do anything.” She said, smiling a little more at that.

 

“What was it then?” He asked. “What's happening?”

 

She looked like she was searching for the words to tell him. She then said, “Jovan, you're going to have a sister.”

 

“Okay.” He said. Then asked “Where are we getting her from?” Where did one get sisters from? And why couldn't he get a brother instead?

 

His mother shyly pointed at her expanding stomach and said, “From here, sweetheart. I'm going to have a baby. The doctor says she's going to come in about six months.”

 

* * *

 

The fact of her pregnancy spread through the little farming community as Jovan went back to school. His mother spent a lot more time talking to Cathy, and when she wasn't talking to Cathy or trying to run the farm she was spending time talking with Aunt Millie. Girls always seemed to talk a lot to each other, and grownup girls seemed to do it even more, he thought.

 

Some of the other adults who had previously at least been somewhat friendly now wouldn't talk to her and had this disgusted look in their eyes that Jovan couldn't understand. What was the big deal? He thought. It was just a baby. These were more often then not the good “Church People,” that is, the people that went to the Agroppidum's church every Sunday.

 

The only church in the town was Martian Orthodox. It was highly unusual on Mars, because it wasn't just the only church in town, but it was the only religious house of worship in the town. Unlike the rest of Mars, the town and surrounding region of Agroppidum was unique in that it was almost entirely Martian Orthodox Christian, and it was a rare sight to see the peaceful Tao-Buddhist temples or stately Salaam-Islamic Mosques which dominated the towns and cities of the other provinces.

 

He and his mom had been to the church on occasion. His parents had even had him baptized there just after he was born. It was usually boring and he was glad it wasn't more than two or three times a year. That was almost more than he could take as it was. That the regular Church People had stopped talking to them much... well, he wasn't sure there was a downside there. They always seemed a little stuck up to begin with.

 

The other kids at school were a different matter. He didn't care if the adults talked to him and his mom or not, but the other kids talked to him whether he wanted them to or not. Especially Bili Farkas who was one of the Church People's kids, and was a full head taller than him, but was somehow still taking all the same classes Jovan was. Bili always seemed to know how to say the wrong thing at the wrong time.

 

At recess, he came over on the playground and began pushing Jovan when the teacher wasn't looking.

 

“Hey Jovan!” Bili said.

 

Jovan stumbled backwards a bit. Bili could be a bit intimidating when he wanted to be, and it was clear that that he wanted to be. Jovan felt he really didn't need this today or deserve it. It had been his third day of Pre-Algebra and he was ready to hide his data tablet under a rock and then jump really hard on the rock.

 

“What Bili?” Jovan said. Ignoring him was out of the question when he was half a meter in front of you.

 

“Sorry to hear about your mom.” The bigger kid said, obviously not sorry at all from the smile on his face. “Sorry she got herself knocked up by a stupid Earther!” Bili was obviously pleased with his insult and he continued. “I guess that means you're going to have a mutant half breed for a brother, huh?”

 

Other kids on the playground started to circle them. Some of them joined in Bili's taunt, while others, especially the girls, kept begging Jovan to walk away and go tell a teacher. But that would mean that Jovan would have to back down, and three and a half year old boys didn't back down. He was practically a man already, he had convinced himself, and he would have to respond as one.

 

Bili was laughing hard enough at his own perceived humor that he didn't see Jovan's fist flying at him until he felt it connect with his face and heard a sickening crack. The next thing he knew he heard someone crying, two people crying out from pain. Then he realized one of those two people was him as tears were flowing down his cheeks.

 

Jovan was holding his hand and crying as well. The teachers, all women, were rushing over to find out what had happened. Jovan's hand was turning black and blue, and Bili's eye was sympathetically following it with it's own shades of brown, violet, and blue. “I think it's broken...” He heard one of the teachers say. “We're going to have to call their mothers.” Another one said. “As if Miria doesn't have enough to worry about right now.” The first one said.

 

They hurried Jovan, still cradling his hand, and Bili, still holding his eye, to the nurse's office at the school where she set to work scanning Jovan's hand and Bili's eye.

 

“Well,” She looked up from her hand scanner, “Your eye's going to be fine in a couple of days.” She addressed Bili. “I'll give you something for the pain and swelling and send you back to class.”

 

Turning to Jovan, she said, “I'm going to have to call your mother, Jovan. You broke a bone in your hand. Nothing too serious, I can mend it, but you know the rules.” She then said, “The headmaster's already said you're going to be suspended for the rest of the day and possibly tomorrow.”

 

“But that's not fair!” Jovan protested. “He shoved me first and called my new sister a mutant half-breed boy!”

 

“Rules are rules, and they apply whether they're fair or not, Jovan, or whether the teachers are looking or not.” She said. “And you could have really hurt that boy, maybe even blinded him if you had hit him just a little harder in the wrong spot. How fair would that have been to Bili?”

 

Plenty fair, he thought, but didn't say.

 

“Here,” she brought out another device and slowly passed it over his hand. It began to itch and that made it hurt even more.

 

“Ow! That hurts worse!” Jovan cried out.

 

“I can't give you anything for the pain until the bone is mended. It messes up the process.” The nurse said unsympathetically. “Maybe it'll make you think twice before taking a swing at someone again. She finished her torture healing in another minute which seemed like an agonizing eternity to Jovan. “There, now I can give you something for the pain.” She handed him a couple of pills and a glass of water. He took them and the water and the pain and swelling subsided in just a few minutes.

 

The nurse disappeared into the next room while she tried to call his mother. He couldn't hear anything about the conversation, but he imagined it wasn't going well. His mom would be mad. He was sure of it. He was going to get it and get it hard when he got home. The longer the call took, the worse he imagined his punishment to be.

 

The nurse came back into the room and told him, “I couldn't get a hold of your mother, so Millie Borat's going to come and get you.”

 

Great, he thought. Let's let the whole world know that he got suspended from school. Aunt Millie would be just as disappointed in him, maybe even more so.

 

It took another half an hour for Aunt Millie to come and get him in her ground car and take him back to their place where he could then wait for his mother to come and retrieve him. Aunt Millie didn't say anything much when she came to collect him, and the ride to their place was silent. Aunt Millie must have been really mad at him, he thought.

 

He collected his dignity and got out of the ground car just as silent as Aunt Millie and walked into their house without a word. He went into their living room and sat down, waiting for the lecture which he assumed was to follow. She had to be so silent because she was saving it all up for when they got home.

 

Uncle Kelmo wasn't there, at least not in the living room. Aunt Millie came in and sat down in her own easy chair which was right next to Uncle Kelmo's. No one sat in Uncle Kelmo's chair but him.

 

She looked at Jovan square in the eye and asked him, “What happened?” It was her no nonsense, don't-even-try-and-lie-to-me voice.

 

So, Jovan told her matter of factly. When he was done, she sat back in her chair, then a grin began to break out over her face and she said, “Good. The boy had it coming.”

 

Jovan's jaw fell open so far he thought it was going to hit the floor.

 

“Don't look so surprised, Jovan. That boy's had it coming for a while and everyone knows it.” She said matter of factly. “His parents ought to know better, but they spoil the boy and fill his head with thinking they're better than everyone else. I don't want you going and thinking punching people is the way to solve your problems, but it's about time someone knocked some sense into him.”

 

When Jovan recovered from his shock, he asked, “So you're not mad?”

 

“No, Jovan, I'm not mad. You probably should have handled it better, but you were defending your mom and baby sister who hasn't even been born yet. I think your dad, and even Tomas would have been proud of you. I know I am.” She said.

 

That made him feel a lot better, suspension or no suspension. “Why are people acting so mean to my mom and me?” He asked.

 

“Because your mom's having a baby without being married.” She didn't evade the question, but continued in her matter of fact tone. “I'm sorry, but I guess you're going to have to learn about these things a lot sooner than you should have to. There are some people who think it's wrong to have baby without being married.”

 

“Is it?” Jovan asked.

 

She looked at him long and hard, weighing her answer. “I don't think it's the best thing, no. But there are worse things that could happen. Your mom loves you, and she's going to love this baby, and that's really what matters more.”

 

“Is it worse because Tomas is the baby's dad?” Jovan asked. “Because he's an Earther?”

 

“Some people think it is.” She answered. “But it's not the baby's fault. It's not your fault. And it's none of their damn business.”

 

“It would have been better if Tomas had stayed and married my mom.” Jovan said.

 

“Maybe. Maybe not.” Aunt Millie said.

 

“What do you mean?” The boy asked.

 

“It would have been better if everyone knew he could have stayed. But there was no guarantee of that. Oh sure, it would have caused havoc, but we could have helped your mom get back on her feet after the Earth company dropped them. But Earthers who want to stay don't always get to. I was lucky. Kelmo fought like the devil himself to make them let me stay.” She said.

 

It took some time before it sank in what she had just revealed to him. “You were an Earther, Aunt Millie?” He asked, stunned.

 

“A long time ago, though I've been here long enough that the only Earther part of me that's left is my skin. I worked for one of those Earth companies too, except mine went out of business and left me here on Mars. I was working here when it was Kelmo's parents' farm at the time. He and I were already sweet on each other and I didn't have much family to go back to. The Mars Immigration Authority wanted to deport me back to Earth, but Kelmo went and married me and then dared them to come and try and take me away.” She laughed at the memory. “They sent warning after warning and Kelmo sent them back with his own warnings. They finally gave up and left us alone. Mars Colonial Authority has less of a say than they think they do out here in the provinces.”

 

“Do you ever miss Earth, Aunt Millie?” He asked.

 

“Sure, sometimes. But you always miss your first home at least sometimes.” She said.

 

* * *

 

His mother came to pick him up later that evening. She had been at the doctor's office in the nearby town of Agroppidum. She talked to Aunt Millie and then took him home. She didn't say anything about the fight or his suspension except that he would be staying home with her tomorrow, and they could put the time to good use. She didn't elaborate on what “good use” meant.

 

24 Earth Standard Years Later

 

Jovan looked out the window from his seat aboard the Gray Lines hyperspace passenger transport. All he could see were streaks of rainbow colored light which he had been told were stars moving through the doppler effect at the apparent faster than light speeds with which the vessel was moving.

 

It was his first time traveling off world, and he found the effect unsettling but he couldn't take his eyes away from the window. Next to him asleep was another passenger who was by her appearance, like him, from Mars. She was pale-skinned, and had platinum blond hair. She wore a blue woolen, ankle-length dress. Her upswept slanted eyes gave her wheat-cropping origins away. And although he was sure he didn't know her personally, she had the familiar look of someone from his own home province of Agroterra. In her arms, also asleep, was an infant boy about twelve months old.

 

They hadn't talked much. She had been polite, but stand-offish, and only returned to her seat next to him when the shuttle was going through its “night-cycle”. He assumed she spent most of her time on board in one of the passenger lounges or dining areas. She hadn't even offered her name.

 

He wasn't sure, but he thought it might have had something to do with the black clothes and white collar which marked him as a Martian Orthodox priest. He had, in fact, only recently been ordained three weeks prior after spending his six years—twelve or so Earth standard years, he had to keep reminding himself of the time keeping which the interstellar world tended to rely on—in seminary.

 

The Martian Orthodox Church was the only recognized Christian religion on Mars, although not for lack of trying. In the centuries of original colonization, in the last phases of terraforming, there had been many different denominations of Church tradition stretching thousands of Earth standard years in the past. None of them had been the majority faith on Mars, but they were all too often the most divisive. The Mars Colonial Authority, while wanting to be as accommodating to personal religious faith as possible as was in their charter, also had to think about the stability of the colony settlements. After decades of infighting, proselytizing, and even some terrorist activity, the MCA took it upon themselves to bring all the different denominational leaders to the table with an ultimatum. They were either to settle their differences and live peaceably, or their congregations and practices would be banned from Mars and repatriated to Earth or Earth orbit stations.

 

To be sure, there were several groups who refused to cooperate in any capacity, and Mars authorities made good on their threat, revoking their rights as Mars colonial citizens and exiling them off planet. But the majority seemed to have more sense. There had always been a plea for unity among the fractured divisions of the Christian Church, and it turned out that being on Mars, away from the traditional Earth based centers of religious power gave them all a new perspective. They found that they weren't really Eastern Orthodox, or Roman Catholic, or Anglican, or Lutheran anymore. If nothing else the liturgical calendar which had always divided the Orthodox and Catholic couldn't be a factor any longer. How do you fight over the date of Easter when the planet you're on doesn't even have the same number of days and months that the liturgical calendar was based on? Once that point of division had been swept away, they began to find a lot more. It became the first true Ecumenical Council in almost three thousand Earth standard years, and it happened on Mars. Of course the Earth based Church authorities were horrified, but what did that matter anymore? At least on Mars, the Christian Church became One Church once more. Ironically, the Earth based denominations excommunicated those clergy who took part, and the Martian Orthodox Church was born. It became one more way in which the Mars colonists were slowly breaking free of Earth's grasp.

 

They were already four days out from his homeworld and in transit to the fifth planet of the Gliese 581 system. Jovan silently wondered what a young mother might be doing traveling to Gliese five. It wasn't the most hospitable of worlds. The gravity was crushing, and the government there could be unstable due to religious extremism. He himself was going as a part of the Martian Church's mission to promote cooperation and tolerance among the different religious factions which appeared to be only nominally Christian.

 

He could see a resemblance to his mother in the pretty young woman. His mother would have been stand-offish with him in his clerical garb too. It had been a long time since she had set foot in the church in their home town. Well before his sister had been born. He had hurt her, he knew, when he had joined the Church and went off to study for the priesthood. She wouldn't stop him, or try to. He had been a man and had to make his own decisions, but it didn't mean that she had to like it. She ultimately respected his decision, and he left on cordial, if not warm terms.

 

It had been a tense, late winter day, he remembered. He had started to pack. His mother had run out of her arguments against him going, and had finally given in.

 

“So, this is your decision?” She had asked him, angry tears welling up yet again, but refusing to let them fall.

 

“It's what I promised God, Mom.” He had responded.

 

She had snorted in disgust, but only said, “Well, I suppose there have to be some good priests out there somewhere. I hope you'll be one of them.”

 

“Me too.” He had said.

 

That had been their last real face to face talk before he left the next morning to board the ground shuttle bound for Tharsis City. From there he would transfer to an air transit shuttle to Olympia City in Olympia Terra, and then onward by ground car up to the monastery at the lower elevations of Olympus Mons, the highest mountain in the solar system. Miria, his mother, wouldn't drive him to the little shuttle station in town. Instead, the farm manager at the time, Jenni, another older woman, was asked to take him. He hadn't returned home since.

 

The stars outside his viewport continued to streak by him. Then he heard a bang. And then another one. And then a storm of bangs and pops cascaded through the shuttle. Then, pain as blood began to seep through his black clothes, and then people began screaming. The young woman next to him was startled awake and began to panic.

 

Smoke. The smoke filled the passenger cabin. People were screaming. Jovan tried to comfort the young, blond mother with her infant the best he could, and it wasn't going well. They were unharmed but terrified. The rest of the cabin was in chaos as people were strapped into their seats with blood floating up from open gashes, or burns. Some passengers had been forcefully released from their restraints and were floating lifeless. The gravity plating had failed.

 

A dark wet splotch was spreading over his own clothes, but he couldn't think about that just then. He had to help in some way. He was talking to the young mother, trying to reassure her, but her eyes kept being drawn to the blood which was seeping through the shoulders of his coat and his midsection. And then he began to get very sleepy. He couldn't keep his eyes open. The last thing he remembered was hearing a number of thumps as though heavy objects were hitting the floor.

 

* * *

 

“Mercy 2843... Mercy 2843, please respond!” The pilot of the vessel pleaded with his comm system. His head hurt. A dull throbbing ache pulsed behind his eyes and radiated all the way through. He had to get through. He had to get his ship, his responsibility, to safety. “God, please help us.” He whispered. He wasn't a particularly religious man, but right now was not a time to argue with the Almighty.

 

The bulky passenger transport he piloted tumbled in all the wrong directions over its axes as it hurtled out of control towards the ever enlarging white speck the functioning sensors told him was an interstellar hospice station. These stations dotted the space along the hyperspace transit routes and were often the only refuge for any spacefarer. They treated and served any damaged vessel or injured person, and were beholden to no planetary authority but were governed by their own collective administration. No one, not even pirates violated the sanctuary of a hospice station because they were everyone's last resort.

 

“Mercy 2843... Mercy 2843, please respond!” I'm begging you, he thought. Respond or we're all dead. The station which his remaining sensors had identified had become his one last hope for salvation for himself and his passengers.

 

“This is Mercy 2843, we have you on sensors. Reduce your speed on approach to station.” A friendly but firm woman's voice responded. Hope! He dared to hope again!

 

“Mercy 2843, this is Grey Lines Transport ship 3173. We have suffered heavy damage and have critically injured passengers and possible fatalities on board. Half of our thrusters are inoperable. Fusion pulse engines are unresponsive. Hyperspace generators are dead.” He tried to maintain his air of professionalism even in these circumstances, but then he then asked directly, “Can you catch us?” It seemed as though all of time and space hung on the answer to that question.

 

“Affirmative, Grey Lines 3173. Relinquish control of remaining systems and shut down all remaining thrusters and engines.” The faceless voice responded with more of an urgency.

 

The pilot's eyes misted. “God, thank you.” He whispered. In a few minutes they would be safe aboard the station. He hit the manual controls to cut power to all of his remaining thrusters, and watched his computer's control screens and boards as they flickered and surrendered to the control of the Hospice Station. After the attack on his ship, it all seemed hopeless until his sensors mercifully picked up the gleaming white station on his trajectory. He didn't know if it was the hand of God or sheer luck, but he counted it as a miracle nonetheless and continued to silently thank whatever Supreme Being might be out there profusely.

 

From the bridge viewport, he could see the slowing image of the massive station and knew that his own ship was slowing down from a power outside of its own as it came nearer. The Mercy station resembled a spinning gyro top. The central disk of the gyro was thirty kilometers in diameter and one kilometer deep. Running through the center of the disk were the main spires which connected to smaller disks on either side of the main. The stations were mostly populated by medical androids and a mechanical crew which was overseen by a much smaller complement of human doctors and administrators. This far out in deep space they were often the only welcoming sign of human presence.

 

“Grey Lines 3173, we have you in a tractor field. Prepare for emergency docking in landing bay 4. Emergency Med Techs will be standing by.” The woman's voice spoke over the comm.

 

He swore he would kiss the owner of that voice if he ever got the chance. “Thank you, Mercy 2843.” He said. He held up his hand to his forehead where it began to throb and pulled it away. It was wet with blood, his own. “I might need a little patching up too.” He remarked into the comm.

 

“Understood.” The station's voice said. “What happened to you?” She asked.

 

“Pirates, I think.” The pilot responded. “I didn't see them. They didn't get aboard, but they tried to tear us apart nonetheless.” Pirates were a real concern this far out from the core worlds of the Sol system, and the encounters could be merciless depending on the mood the Pirates were in. Judging by the attack, he guessed this lot hadn't been in a very good mood.

 

A clang and a slight bump told him his ship was inside the landing bay and at rest, safely secured.

 

“So noted. Grey Lines 3173, you are secured. Please open your boarding hatches and doors. As a reminder, weapons are not permitted on Mercy Hospice Stations and will be rendered inoperative or confiscated and destroyed on sight. Welcome to Mercy Station 2843 St. John's Hospice. A courier packet has been dispatched to Grey Lines Corporation, Marenostrum, Mars to notify them of your situation.” The woman's voice told him.

 

“Thank you, again, Mercy.” The pilot spoke into the com. He flipped a few switches to open the external doors of the ship. He then looked down at himself. All things considered, he wasn't in horrible shape. As far as he could tell, it was just the cut on his head. He moved to stand. His legs tried to support him, but then collapsed underneath him. “Oh!” He hit the floor with a thud. The artificial gravity here was about half of standard normal, which was a little more than he was used to. “Damn. My legs are shaky, and I'm too heavy.”

 

Just then the seal on the bridge door was broken and it opened up to admit two Med Techs. “There, on the floor.” The one told the other, pointing out the pilot to his companion. They rushed to his side and began checking his vital signs. “Alive. Get him on a gurney and up to the ER.”

 

Alive, he thought. What a good thing to be.

 

* * *

 

Jovan began blinking his eyes open, and found himself staring at a strange, white ceiling. The young mother, the infant, the floating bodies, and even the passenger cabin were all gone. He could feel a firm cushion under his back and the weight of gravity, not straps, was holding him there. He was lying down on a bed. He tried to lift an arm and felt like he had a stack of books holding it down. Gravity. More gravity than he was used to. His arm lifted with effort and then dropped back down hard. Muscles aren't used to it, he thought.

 

He turned his head from one side to the other and saw he was in a room, but he wasn't alone. Next to him was a gray haired man with the distinctive slanted eyed, pale skinned, and pale haired Martian features of the Arabia Terra region of his own world.

 

His mind was fuzzy. He didn't remember seeing the man in the cabin, but he was familiar. Yes, this was the pilot. He had met him upon boarding the outbound flight to his mission station. There was no one else in the room with them that he could see.

 

He felt almost twice as heavy as he was used to as he tried to sit up. “How do people in higher gravity worlds do this?” He said to himself. His body really wanted to remain on the cushion underneath him and related this to him in no uncertain terms.

 

The walls around him were white as he managed to prop himself up on his arms, and there were computer screens spitting out lines of indecipherable data all around him. Strange, unfamiliar machines surrounded the perimeter of the room. Tubes and little coins with small antennae had been attached to various places on his arms.

 

He looked at himself. He was wearing a hospital gown instead of the black attire which had almost become a part of his skin. This made him feel oddly naked, even though the gown covered him with a fair degree of modesty. He felt his shoulder, and though there was some pain, he couldn't feel any obvious wound.

 

“Where am I?” He asked in Amerikish aloud to no one in particular. It wasn't his native tongue, but it was the de facto interstellar language and he had learned to become very fluent. His roommate was asleep next to him, at least he hoped he was asleep and not something worse.

 

“You are at Mercy Station 2843 St. John's Hospice, Father.” One of the machines in the corner came to life and unfolded to reveal a reasonable though bleached white plastic facsimile of a friendly human face, arms, and torso attached to a more mechanized and functional looking pair of legs. The head was completely bald. The machine took a few steps towards his bed and looked at him with kind, expressive, dark blue eyes. The effect was both reassuring and unsettling. “How do you feel?” The voice, also speaking in Amerikish, was young and female, and made him feel even more uncomfortable dressed only in the hospital gown.

 

“Heavy,” was his first response. “Otherwise my shoulder hurts a little.”

 

“Heavy? Of course. What is your planet of origin?” The kind plastic woman asked.

 

“Mars.” He responded. So, she couldn't pick out his accent.

 

“Mars. And do you know your roommate's planet of origin?” She asked. He couldn't think of the machine as anything other than a she.

 

“He looks like he's from Mars, too, I would guess.” The man's features were obvious to him, and would be to anyone else having come from the fourth planet out.

 

“Of course. Adjusting room gravity to thirty eight percent Earth standard, Mars normal.” She said kindly.

 

The pressure lifted off of him and he felt he could even breathe a little easier. “Thank you.” He said. “That's much better.”

 

“You're welcome. Just remember that the rest of the station is currently set to fifty percent Earth standard gravity if you choose to leave your room.” She told him. “You will need to use extra caution.”

“I'll remember that.” He certainly would. He'd feel like he was slowly being pulled to the floor every time he stepped outside his room. “And what's your name?”

 

“My designation is Medical Android 354, my human coworkers call me “Nurse Mia.” Nurse Mia replied.

 

“Mia. That's a nice name. I had a friend once when I was a boy with that name. I like it.” He said. And it was true. “Do you mind if I call you Mia?” He asked.

 

“Not at all, Father.” She said. He would have sworn that her voice sounded delighted at the prospect, machine or not. “May I inquire as to your full name?”

 

“Don't you have my passenger records?” He asked, confused. Of course, they didn't know he was from Mars, either. They should have had that information in the ship's computer storage.

 

“I'm sorry,” and she truly sounded that way. “The transport's computers were badly damaged, and the gravity plating was offline when your shuttle was brought in. We weren't able to retrieve any passenger information, and our sensors were unable to detect and adjust for the shuttle's gravity.”

 

“Jovan.” He said. “Jovan Chin.”

 

“Father Jovan Chin of Mars, then?” Nurse Mia asked for a confirmation.

 

“Yes, from the Olympus Mons Martian Orthodox Community in Olympia Terra.” He said. “They'll want to know what has happened to me.” A thought then struck him, he hadn't reported. “How long have I been here?”

 

“Seven standard days.” She said matter of factly.

 

Seven days! He thought. His superiors would have to be very worried. He was supposed to have sent a message back to them reporting that he had arrived at the colony mission by now.

 

“I need to report to my superiors and to my destination and let them know what has happened.” He said, wanting to swing his legs around to stand on the floor.

 

“Where was your destination?” She asked.

 

“Gliese Five.” He said, using the common term.

 

“You should be getting used to more gravity then, not less.” She said. “Gliese Five is twice Earth standard.” She then added. “Do you still intend to continue on?”

 

“That depends on whether or not I can get a message to my superiors and what they tell me.” He answered.

 

“Of course. If you intend to go on, then we will add gravitational introduction to your therapy, I am certain.” She told him.

 

“Shouldn't that be done on planet?” He has expected to spend a full month getting heavier and heavier in a gravity adjustment pod as his body slowly adapted to the change.

 

“We have the capability here, and then we can arranger transfer in a shuttle with the proper gravity requirements if you like.” She said helpfully. “There are many other passengers who have requested to continue to their destination, and have already begun gravity therapy.”

 

“Thank you. Is there a message station I can use?” He asked.

 

“I can record your message and have it transmitted to the next shuttles outbound to Mars and Gliese Five.” She said. “Whenever you're ready.”

 

He spent the next five minutes explaining his situation to the kind, white plastic android nurse named Mia and asked for further instructions. He was careful to make the message generic so that it could go to both Mars and his mission station on Gliese Five. When he was finished she said, “Now, it really would be best if you lie back and rest. Are you hungry?”

 

“Yes, I think.” He wasn't sure. It had been a week, he should have been hungry, shouldn't he have?

 

“I've just requested some fruit flavored gelatin, and water to drink. Your stomach and intestinal tract was badly damaged and had to be repaired. Your seven day immobilization was necessary to allow your internal organs to heal properly. You've been on intra-veinous nutrient supplements since you arrived. It will take a little time for your stomach to process heavier food again.” She said. “Can I do anything else for you?”

 

“No, thank you.” He told her.

 

“I will be waiting at my station if you need anything more.” She said. She then walked backward into the corner where she had come from and folded herself back into the unassuming white plastic and metal device he had first glanced over.

 

“Of course.” He said.

 

* * *

 

After his gelatin and water his stomach rebelled a little, but then settled down to the point where he could sleep again, and he did.

 

As soon as he closed his eyes he could see wide green fields of the hardy but unripened wheat crop which thrived on his terraformed homeworld. The sky was clear, the air was clean, and it felt just the right temperature of cool as he wandered from his mother's red brick and stone farm house to explore. He was three years old again. Not three Earth standard years, but three proper Martian years. The boy felt a bit of pride at that. Neither he nor his mother needed Earth or anything that Earth had to offer including its calendar which had absolutely no meaning on their planet. His planet.

 

The sun was shining as brightly as it ever did, and he could feel the crisp cool breeze clipping at his face. Earth's growing seasons were so short and their land so bad they couldn't even produce enough food for themselves, the boy thought smugly. He went running through the green fields feeling nothing but pride at his heritage.

 

Jovan's eyes snapped open. He was back in the white hospital room. He could hear the voice of Nurse Mia speaking with another person. He turned his head in the direction of the conversation. It was his roommate. He had finally woken up.

 

The conversation was fairly similar to the one which he had held with the friendly android. He politely kept out of it. Although he was certain that Nurse Mia knew he was awake, she made no attempt at including or addressing him and he figured it was probably for the best. The android was programmed to be friendly and helpful, so he knew it wasn't an attempt at being rude. He could also respect the need for med tech-patient confidentiality.

 

When she finally reversed herself back into her corner. He sat up on his arms again and looked over at his former pilot. “Greetings.” He said in his native Martian dialect.

 

The old man responded in kind, he then asked in the same dialect, “you're from Mars, too?” His accent was a thick and urbanized. He was definitely from Arabia Terra, near the Great Northern Sea. He had only been there once, but it was so distinctive that you didn't forget it.

 

“My mother had a farmstead out in equatorial Agroterra. The closest thing to a city near our house was a little town called Agroppidum.” Jovan replied. “But, the last several years, I've lived on Olympus Mons. You're from Arabia Terra, am I right?” Jovan asked. “Your accent sounds like you're straight out of Marenostrum.”

 

“You have a good ear my friend. Yes, I grew up in the 'city near the sea.' I still have an apartment there when I'm on planet.” The pilot confirmed for him using the name given to his home by a folk singer many years back. He then asked, “Have you ever seen it? The sea, I mean; on planet and not just from orbit?”

 

“Once, a long time ago.” Jovan said. “I was seven years old, and it was endless. It was magnificent.” He had fond memories of that day. “My mother had business there with some grain buyers from Earth and I had the chance to see it on my own for a short time.”

 

“It must have been a site to see for a young man.” Then thinking of the very cosmopolitan nature of the city he asked good naturedly, “I hope you didn't get yourself into too much trouble there. Some of the girls can be very friendly, if you know what I mean.” He said this last with a wink.

 

Jovan smiled, but said nothing more. He knew the man wasn't trying to be offensive or even necessarily crude.

 

“My name's Mikhail. Mikhail Shoto.” He tried to reach out an arm to shake hands, then thought better of it for the distance.

 

“I wouldn't have guessed a wheat-cropper from your accent.” He then added, “Olympus Mons is harsh country. What are you doing up there?”

 

“I recently completed my studies for the priesthood.” Jovan answered. It had only been a few weeks since his full ordination from the diaconate into the priesthood.

 

“Oh, the monastery, right.” The pilot answered. A look of surprise and then guilt spread over the man's face. “Oh, I am sorry, Father, I didn't mean...”

 

“Don't worry about it, Mikhail.” Jovan said. “I was a young man, and human, and being such can be tempted just as anybody else.” He then added with a smile, “For the record, I didn't. But it wasn't for lack of trying as a seven year old young man.”

 

Mikhail looked a little alarmed, and then smiled easy. “Yes, we men do try to get into trouble at that age don't we?”

 

“Yes, we certainly do.” Jovan replied, remembering. “It's good to meet you. My name is Jovan. Jovan Chin.” He said.

 

 

 

Mercy Station 2843 – One Week After the Accident

 

Jovan sat at a white plastic table in the hospice station cafeteria eating his supper and watching the unblinking stars of space. His stomach had been healing well, and he was enjoying a real apple pie, or at least a reasonably quantum replicated facsimile of one, for the first time in a while. They even included a scoop of vanilla ice cream with his desert.

 

The medical androids and real, human doctors had pronounced him well enough to travel now, but he was still waiting on an answer from his superiors and from Gliese Five as to when he would be able to continue his travel. He had been putting off the gravitational adjustment therapy until he received word, but as kind as the people on the station were, he couldn't remain there forever. While the stations operated on charity, and did their best to not charge for their services, once you were declared fit to travel they did tend to encourage you to move on.

 

Though his original clothing had been ruined, the station had replicated the priest's habit he had been wearing. He now wore that instead of the medical gown he had been given when he had first been brought aboard. It was a long black tunic worn over black trousers. His white plastic collar was clearly visible as was a thin, deep red cross embroidered into the left side of the chest, the emblem of the Martian Orthodox Church. As he had become more mobile, he had been donating his time to visiting the other patients who came on board the station, something which many seemed to appreciate.

 

“May I join you, Father?” A familiar voice asked him politely in his native tongue. Jovan looked up and saw Mikhail carrying a tray of food. He too had been unable to leave the station yet. Jovan gestured to the empty seat next to him.

 

“Thanks.” He said. “Any word yet?”

 

“No. You?” Jovan responded.

 

“No. It's taking forever. The transit shuttle wasn't a totally lost cause, but it will still cost a lost to retrieve it from this far out and haul it back to the shipyards in Mars orbit. I'm guessing they're going to make me wait and then ride back in the tractor hauler.” Mikhail said. “Then I'm probably going to get hammered by the bosses when I get back. You know what the station mechanics are telling me hit us?”

 

“No, what?” Jovan asked.

 

“Micro-meteorites. They say the hull is full of tiny impact holes like someone took an ancient solid pellet machine gun and shot it up all the way through it.” The pilot told him. “We were decompressing and didn't even know it. The mechanics couldn't explain why any of us survived.”

 

Jovan thought of the damage Nurse Mia said had been done to his midsection and grimaced. “Not pirates then.” Jovan said finally as he took another bite of his pie and ice cream.

 

“Nope. Just maniacal space rocks trying to kill us.” Mikhail said, disgusted as though pirates would have been the preferable menace. “We must have run into the little buggers when I dropped out of hyperspace to take sensor readings and make course corrections. There's no way I could have known they were there. I didn't even have time to bring the magshields online.”

 

“At least we're alive.” Jovan said. “There's something to be thankful for.” The truth is that he wasn't sure what to say. It was both disturbing and encouraging to think that they should have all died before they ever reached the station.

 

A young woman approached the table where they were eating and talking. She wore a light blue coat made of a heavier denim fabric over a button down white shirt, and blue denim slacks. In her arms she held a twelve month old infant, not even a year. She had long blond hair held up in a bun and was tall and thin. Her cheekbones were high and her eyes slanted.

 

“Greetings.” Jovan said in Martian, recognizing her as the young mother he had sat next to. She couldn't have been more than ten or eleven years old, he guessed.

 

“Greetings, Father.” She replied, cautiously. So he was right. Her rural accent, reminding him so much of home, betrayed her own wheat cropper origins. “I wanted to see how you were doing, and to thank you for trying to comfort us during the accident.” She smiled.

 

“Of course, won't you sit down?” Jovan said, gesturing to a third empty chair at the round table the two men had been sitting at.

 

“Thank you.” She said as Mikhail got up and pulled out the chair for her. She placed her baby on her lap where the infant sat still sleeping against her chest. “This is Bili.” She said with a smile. “He was named after his father.” She said, a hint of loneliness in her voice.

 

“Greetings, Bili.” Jovan said, remembering another, much less adorable boy by that name. “My name is Jovan. Jovan Chin. And this is our incredible pilot, Mikhail Shoto.”

 

“Neither incredible, nor much of a pilot for now, I'm afraid.” Mikhail said as he sampled his vegetable buffalo stew. “I probably won't be doing much flying until my bosses straighten out their paperwork.”

 

“My friends call me Janna. Janna Wong. I'm from Agroppidum in Agroterra.” She said in a friendly manner.

 

“Wong.” Jovan said, “I knew of a Janna Wong.” He was trying to remember the name. It had been many years since he had been home, but he had known of a Wong family, and they had had a four year old girl when he left to study on Olympus Mons six years past. “The Wongs lived over on the north side of the town, right? Gilli Wong, the livestock vet?”

 

“Yes, that's right.” Her voice sounded a little pained at his mention. “That was my dad. How did you know?” She asked, surprised.

 

“My family's farm was a few kilometers to the south of town, though I haven't been home for a long while. My mom's Miria Chin. My sister's name is Tama.”

 

“Oh really?” She perked up and said almost excitedly. “You're Tama's brother? She was my dad's assistant for the last two years before she went on to university.” She spoke almost glowingly. “She was a lot of fun, almost like a big sister to me. She mentioned you on occasion.”

 

She was? She did? Jovan thought. He didn't know that. He had tried to keep up with his mother and sister, but the messages tended to be few and far between over the last few years. He knew Tama had gone to the university in Tharsis City to study vet medicine, but that was all his mother had said in her last message. He began to feel guilty that he knew less about what was happening with his family than a total stranger did.

 

“So, where are you heading on to?” Mikhail asked her.

 

“I don't know, back home now I guess.” She said sadly.

 

“Back home? Why? Where were you headed?” The pilot asked.

 

“We were going to Gliese Five to be a part of the colony where Bili's father is, but I just got word over the news net that Gliese Five has closed its ports to all new colonists. Something about a new government coming to power and terrorist threats. We've been in gravitational therapy for the last few days, but now there's no reason to continue it until we get word it's safe to go on. If we're just going home then it will just cause more problems.” She said sadly.

 

“Did you say they've closed themselves off from all new colonists?” Jovan asked, confused. “They just did it today?”

 

“Yes.” Then, realization hit. “Was that your final destination, too?”

 

“Yes, I was supposed to be part of the Church mission there. We were just setting up a new diocese in the capital.” He answered. “Did the news say how long Gliese Five would be closed off?”

 

“No.” She said, sympathetically. “So, what do you do now?” She asked.

 

“I don't know. I was still waiting on word from my superiors for when I would be able to continue on.” Jovan replied.

 

“I guess I'll be heading back home in a few days. That's when the next transit shuttle comes through. Gray Lines is honoring all of the Gliese bound travelers fares with a free return ticket in light of the circumstances.” She said.

 

“Are they now?” Mikhail asked. “That's very generous of them.” And it was. He hadn't heard of his company being so generous before even in bad circumstances like this. He wondered what it boded for his future.

 

“Are they saying why they were being so generous?” He asked her.

 

She was silent, and then an apologetic look came over her face. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything.”

 

“And why is that?” He pressed her again.

 

She looked frustrated, but then relented and said, “They were claiming it was their own pilot's fault that the accident happened.”

 

“Oh, joy.” Mikhail let out an exasperated sigh. “There goes my career.”

 

* * *

 

The three Martians agreed to have lunch together again. Being mostly healed now, they had each been assigned temporary guest quarters until they would be departing again. It was a welcome feeling to have familiar faces and to converse in their own language. Most of the other passengers had only been in transit from Mars and were themselves either from Earth or from Earth's moon colonies. They were friendly enough, but never seemed to want to socialize much with them. The station's own human occupants were rarely seen by those they treated, and never in a casual setting.

 

“Well, I got the news this morning. I'm out of a job.” Mikhail told the other two over a ham and rye sandwich.”

 

“Oh, I'm so sorry, Mikhail.” Janna told him.

 

“What did they say?” Jovan asked. He had gotten his own response that morning as well, and was a bit depressed because of it.

 

“The insurance company is counting the shuttle as a total loss. I guess it's cheaper than having to tow it all the way back and repair all those little pellet holes. Instead, they're donating the scrap to the station as raw materials and writing it off as a charity donation.” He then added. “And they fired me. They claimed that it was my fault I didn't have the magshields online. Forget the fact you can't run in hyperspace with them active, or that the sensors that could have told me about the rocks we got hit with also don't function while in hyperspace, which is the only reason we had to drop out of it for a few minutes.” He was on the verge of yelling, and then checked himself. “I'm sorry, I don't mean to take it out on you all.” He then asked Jovan, “Did you hear from Olympus Mons?”

 

Jovan took a deep breath and then sighed. “Yes.” He said dejectedly. “In light of the current political situation on Gliese Five, they've ordered me to return home to Agroppidum until they can place me with another assignment. There's no available room at the monastery, and no assignment I can take there or in Olympia City.” He took a bite of his own sandwich and said after chewing and swallowing, “I'm to return on the shuttle the day after tomorrow and return there immediately.”

 

“Yes, well Janna it looks like you'll have both of us for company on the return shuttle, except I've got to pay my own way back.” Mikhail said.

 

Janna said nothing but ate her salad, though the look on her face was pleased. Bili sat in a high chair attempting to paint his face with mashed potatoes.

 

After lunch, Mikhail excused him and left Janna and Jovan alone in the cafeteria to talk and look at the stars. Little Bili had woken up and his mother was pointing out all the stars to him. In the distance from the station a swirl of dazzling colors could be seen in the vastness of space. It was an awe-inspiring sight.

 

“It's beautiful, don't you think?” Janna asked Jovan.

 

“Yes, it is. The artistry of God is amazing. It's why I chose to eat at this table.” Jovan answered. “I'm just sorry your husband couldn't be here with us to enjoy it.”

 

“He's not my husband.” Janna said quietly.

 

“I'm sorry?” Jovan said, thinking he had heard wrong.

 

“Bili's not my husband. Not yet anyway. We were going to get married on Gliese Five after the baby and I adjusted.” Janna said.

 

“Oh. I see.” Jovan said, not sure of what else to say.

 

She continued, feeling like she needed to explain further, especially to a priest. “He and I started seeing each other a year ago back home and then, well we went a little too far, and people started talking. Gliese opened up to new colonists and neither of us wanted to stay in the community any more so he went ahead of me just after little Bili was born to get everything all set up. We always intended on getting married.”

 

“I didn't say anything about it. I understand more than you think.” He said, remembering his mother and sister. “I have a good idea of how hard people back home can be on unmarried mothers.”

 

She flinched at that. He noticed. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you.” He said hurriedly.

 

“It's okay. I just... I've never thought of myself as an unmarried mother. Bili was always there for us, we just don't share his last name yet.” She said.

 

“I'm worried for him.” She continued. “He's there with all that trouble happening now. He's a good man, but sometimes he lets his feelings override his common sense.”

 

“We all do that sometimes.” Jovan said. “I'm sure he'll be just fine.”

 

* * *

 

The transit shuttle came in and docked early that morning. It wasn't scheduled to leave until the next day but it was common for the pilots to come in a day early, refuel and rest up before taking off again. It brought messages and news with it.

 

Mikhail and Jovan met for breakfast that morning, but Janna did not show.

 

“Have you seen Janna this morning?” Jovan asked Mikhail.

 

“No, have you?” The older man replied over pancakes and scrambled eggs, or something which resembled them anyway.

 

“No.” Jovan said. Then, changing subjects, he said, “Did you get your travel arrangements taken care of?”

 

“Yes,” he said. “The company was gracious enough to already book me on the shuttle and is still giving me the discounted passenger rate, at least until I get back to Mars. After that, I'm on my own. I'm not sure what I'm going to do now. I'm over thirty years old, and I've been flying one craft or another for most of those. No one's going to want me now, no matter what my record.”

 

“It's a tough situation.” Jovan agreed. “Do you have any retirement saved up yet?”

 

“A little bit, but not enough to get me through in the long term.” Mikhail said.

 

Jovan thought for a minute, then said, “Do you know how to drive a ground hauler?”

 

“Is it much different than a regular ground car?” Mikhail asked. “Doesn't go any faster than forty kph does it?”

 

“No faster than thirty.” Jovan reassured him. “Can't take the chance with all the weight. And no, it's really not any different. No special licensing or anything, at least not back home with the grain and livestock hauling. I don't know about the mining or chemical production haulers, but farm hauling is pretty straightforward.”

 

“Well, I'd consider it. You have something in mind?” Mikhail asked.

 

“Maybe. Agrosolar doesn't like it, but my mother always uses local, independent drivers to run her shipments to Tharsis City. She owns the haulers, though, not the company so they don't get a say in it. It probably doesn't pay as much as running an interstellar transit, but it's something.” Jovan explained. “Since I'm going home anyway, I can ask her about it.” He then added, “Rent's usually pretty cheap around Agroppidum, too; at least compared with Marenostrum, that is.”

 

“I'd appreciate that, thank you.” Mikhail said. “At my age, maybe a change from the big city is what I need.”

 

After breakfast, Jovan made his own voluntary rounds to the patients on the station. There seemed to be an influx of patients coming in from Gliese with severe trauma, though no one would or could tell him what had happened. He spent a long time giving last rights to an older man who had suffered so badly even the advanced medicine of the station could do nothing but make him comfortable. Jovan sat with him until he stopped breathing and the medical scanners reported that his brain functions had ceased. After that he returned to his own room to pray and meditate. The scene had disturbed him badly.

 

Some time before lunch, there was a beep from his room's doorbell. “Come.” He said aloud, turning towards the portal, and the door slid open.

 

In the doorway stood Janna. Her eyes were streaked with tears. Little Bili was crying inconsolably in her arms. “Jovan?” She said through her misery.

 

“Janna? What's wrong?” Jovan asked, forgetting about the way she used his first name. It wasn't important.

 

“Can I come in?” She asked, sobbing.

 

“Yes, of course.” He said, and she stepped through the doorway and sat down on a padded chair next to the bed he had been using. He came and sat down on the bed across from her.

 

“It's Bili.” She managed to say.

 

“Is something wrong with him? Have the doctors said something?” Jovan said, looking at the baby worriedly.

 

“No. No... Little Bili's fine. No it's Bili. My Bili.” She said.

 

“Oh.” He said. “Have you gotten news?” It was a dumb thing to say. Of course she had, but he didn't know what else to ask.”

 

She merely nodded. “There was an explosion...” She managed to get before she started to sob again. The baby started to shriek, and Jovan carefully took him from his mother and tried to soothe him as best he could while Janna buried her face in her hands.

 

When she could compose herself a little she continued. “I heard from someone who had been on the orbital station and had been transferred here. Someone who knew him. Some terrorist set off a bomb. And Bili...” Grief filled her voice. “Bili was in that part of the station... and they didn't bring him here.” She finally managed to get out.

 

“Where did they take him?” Jovan asked, concerned.

 

“They didn't take him anywhere. There wasn't anything left for them to take from anyone in that part of the station.” She finished.

 

His mind and heart filled with the full import of what she was telling him.

 

“Oh, I'm so, so sorry Janna.” He said. He didn't know if this was the same Bili Farkas whom he had gotten into a fight with as a kid or not, but it didn't matter. His own eyes misted with tears for her sake, and for her son's. “You're sure he didn't survive?” He asked.

 

She just nodded her head, as the tears continued. He hugged the little boy whom he now knew would, much like his own life, grow up without knowing a father.

 

“Would you hold me, Father?” She asked, sniffling.

 

He said nothing, but didn't hesitate. She was one of his own people, like family. He wasn't going to turn a cold shoulder to family, no matter what it might look like. He opened up one of his arms, and she came to sit on the bed next to him, burying her face in his shoulder. And there the three of them sat in shared grief as he tried to comfort mother and child.

 

Three days later, Mars

 

Jovan and Janna rode in the long, enclosed, six-wheeled ground transit shuttle as it made its way quickly along the black paved Martian highway. It was funny, Jovan thought to himself, how “quick” to a Martian was sluglike to Earthers. When he was a boy, he was told by Tomas of ground cars that could race like the wind at almost two hundred kilometers per hour, and maglev trains in their vacuum sealed tubes that could approach the speed of sound. “Earth is twice the size of Mars so everyone has to go really fast to get anywhere,” Tomas had told him. The speed limit for this shuttle was thirty kilometers per hour. It made for a long, lazy trip from the city through the countryside.

 

Jovan was happy to be back in normal Martian time. Time on the Mercy station always seemed to move way too fast because they used the Earth Standard second instead of the slightly longer Martian one with which he was familiar. Time wasn't meant to just fly by like that. It felt unnatural.

 

Mikhail took an air transit back to his apartment in Marenostrum to consolidate all of his assets and see where he stood. Jovan promised to talk to his mother, Miria about driving agro haulers, and the old pilot seemed to be taking it seriously.

 

Janna sat next to Jovan, little Bili asleep on her lap. She stared out at the woods as they began to give way to the fields of the wheat cropping region. “Almost home.” She whispered sadly.

 

“Yes.” Jovan said. He was worried for her. He wasn't sure what else to say to her. Agroppidum was still a couple of hours away, and the ride had been mostly silent and sullen from the spaceport for the last six. He didn't blame her, and he couldn't. He wasn't looking forward to his own homecoming either, though not for the same reasons.

 

The majestic towering conifer trees thinned out and gave way to golden white fields of wheat just about to be harvested. It would be the last harvest of the season before they dug in for the six month winter, which was not nearly as harsh here as it was farther north. But the temperatures here could get down well below freezing for months at a time regardless during the winter. He wondered if he would be home for long enough to see it fully freeze. That could still be several months away.

 

He glanced at Janna and he boy again. He now remembered the Janna Wong he knew. She had been a curious, bright, and mischevous tomboy who always managed to convince her father to take her with her on vet calls. She had grown up into a very pretty girl, he thought.

 

“No.” He threw the brakes on that thought. “That's not a thought I should be having.” He silently told himself.

 

“Did you say something, Father?” Janna wiped her cheek with her free hand and turned to look at him, trying to smile.

 

“Just talking to myself.” Jovan answered.

 

“Good conversation?” She asked, joking.

 

“No. I'm afraid I'm boring even to myself.” He replied.

Her smile got a little bigger at that.

 

The long ride home continued. To make things a little easier, the transit shuttles screened videos for the passengers. It wasn't anything too fancy, it was just one screen that everyone had to strain to see, but it helped to pass the time. The last video of the ride before they reached Agroppidum was a cheesy romance between a love struck farm girl and a rich Earther that couldn't remain on Mars and couldn't take her with him. What made it worse was that the Earther was married, and the farm girl was pregnant. Jovan found it very uncomfortable while Janna didn't pay much attention to it at all but continued to stare out the window long after night fell and all that could be seen were the stars overhead and Phobos' and Deimos' familiar presences as they raced each other through the night sky.

 

It was close to nine when the shuttle pulled into town and unloaded its tired and travel worn passengers. There weren't many by that point in time as the small farming community was the last stop on its route. The driver would spend the night in the tiny apartment in the cabin of his vehicle and then start back the next day, making all the same stops to pick up and drop off people. Jovan wondered if the ground shuttle wouldn't be another avenue of employment Mikhail could explore.

 

Jovan had only his small suitcase with him. The priests of his community didn't carry much in the way of personal possessions. But Janna had not only her own suitcase, but also one for the baby, as well as a travel crib, and she barely had a free hand to carry even one of them.

 

“Here, let me help you, Janna.” Jovan offered. “Where is your ride?” He asked.

 

“I'm sure someone will be along shortly.” She said, non-commitally.

 

“Isn't your dad, or a friend coming to get you?” He asked.

 

“I don't know.” She said quietly. “I called and left a message for my girlfriend Alli, but she never called me back.”

 

“What about your parents?” He asked.

 

“They're not going to come.” She said. He could hear the quiet pain behind those words.

 

“They don't know you've come home?” He asked.

 

“They wouldn't care if we did.” She said matter of factly. “They threw me out when they found out I was pregnant.” A tear streaked down her face again. “They've never bothered to even see Bili. They're 'good' Church People you know.” She said resentfully. Then as if noticing his black clothes and white collar for the first time she looked shocked at what she had just said and then said, “I'm sorry, Father! I didn't mean...”

 

“It's alright.” Jovan said. “I know exactly what you meant.”

 

A few minutes later a tall, thin middle aged woman of twenty four or so approached them. “Jovan?” She asked. Her light brown hair, streaked with silver, was held up in tight bun

 

Jovan knew her voice very well as he turned to greet her. “Mom?” He asked.

 

His mother approached them quickly and embraced her adult son in a warm hug. “Oh, its good to see you!” She said. “Its been so long.” Her eyes misted over. “Six years is a long time.”

 

“Seminary is demanding, Mom. Once you begin, they don't let you just leave.” He told her. It was true, but it wasn't the only reason he hadn't attempted to visit his childhood home.

 

“And you couldn't try to come and see me before heading out twenty light years away?” She said accusingly.

 

“There wasn't time.” That wasn't entirely true. He could have made time if he had wanted. As it occurred to him now, it wouldn't have changed the result in the slightest. It just would have spared him the critical injuries and the hospital stay.

 

Miria then turned to the young woman standing shyly near her son. “Janna? Janna Wong? What brought you back here? I had heard you had gone to the Gliese colonies.” She looked at both her son and the mother and child as though assessing them, trying to reconcile all the facts and images she had at hand and coming up with nonsense for answers.

 

“There was an accident, Mrs. Chin.” Janna said, not sure of how much more to say.

 

“It's the reason why we have both come home, actually.” Jovan took up the story and began to try and explain what had happened, ending with, “Janna needs a place to stay for a while, Mom.”

 

Miria didn't hesitate. “Of course, you and Bili can have Tama's old room for now. I know she won't mind, you and her used to be so close. She's away at university and who knows when she'll pass by this way again. We'll figure out something more long term if and when we have to. I won't let you or your boy bunk on someone's couch. No ma'am. You're coming home with us.” Then she addressed Jovan and said, “Well, don't just stand there. Get the lady's bags.” Then she turned back to a stunned Janna and her baby, put her arm around her shoulders and together the two walked towards her ground car leaving Jovan to carry all the luggage. Oddly enough, he didn't mind. He gave a half smile as he began to try and figure out how to carry all of it in one trip.

 

Jovan couldn't get in much on the conversation in the old ground car as his mother drove them back to the farmstead house. It was a warmer early autumn night so his mother drove the vehicle with the roof retracted and it was open to the stars. Little Bili was awake and shrieked with absolute delighted at the open air and the bouncing of the car as it moved off onto the gravel and dirt roads which led to the old house.

 

“Not much has changed. We've got a new farm manager, but of course you probably figured that out.” Miria raised her voice so that her son could hear her from the back seat. “Nice young woman from someplace on Earth called British Columbia. She keeps telling me how much our 'little planet' reminds her of home.” She chuckled at the thought, as though anywhere on Mars could remind an Earther of anywhere on the third planet from the Sun.

 

“Are they still giving you a hard time about using local drivers for your ground haulers?” Jovan asked in an unassuming manner.

 

“No, they gave up trying to convince me to use their drivers a long time ago. Its been a lot more peaceful with Agrosolar's corporate headquarters since.” She said.

 

Jovan filed that information away for later. He then asked, “How are Aunt Millie and Uncle Kelmo?”

 

“They're doing well. They're not as young as they used to be, but they're still running their own farm and they've still got a few hundred head of buffalo which they sell to the restaurants in Marenostrum. They stopped trying to sell the meat offworld, even though they get a better price for it. Too much paperwork to wade through with the different agroministries in the different colonies. And Mars has its own billion or so people to feed, too.” She explained.

 

“They're probably right.” Jovan affirmed. There were hundreds of human colonies, not including the orbital and non-orbital space stations, now scattered throughout not only their own solar system, but on the hundreds of habitable worlds within reach of hyperspace capable transport and cargo vessels. Many like Mars had the arable land and right environment—sometimes, like Mars, with a little help—to support their own populations, but many more were dependent on interstellar trade and markets to survive, at least until their own terraforming attempts took hold. Most of them were autonomous of Earth and governed their own affairs.

 

“Oh, I started something new this year.” Miria said. “I started a herd of wool-sheep.”

 

“Why? That's a lot of work for very little return.” Jovan asked, surprised. He knew of several farmers when he was growing up that tried to produce wool for sale and barely broke even for all the work they put into it.

 

“Seriously? The price on natural fibers has gone into orbit since the all-natural craze kicked in on Earth last winter. You know how it is, something becomes popular on Earth and it spreads to the outer colonies and pretty soon you can't sell enough of it. Cotton too, but I don't want to take away from the food production. Too many have already gone down that road with mixed results. Cotton doesn't want to grow well here. Not the right environment.” She said. “Speaking of which, Janna honey? You still any good with ruminants? I've got about fifty that need constant attention it seems, and I seem to remember you knowing just as much as your dad about any livestock you saw.”

 

“Sheep are pretty easy, Mrs. Chin.” Janna said.

 

“Ok. You're hired. After we get you settled in, I've got a bunch of sheep who would love to meet you. Just tell me the kind of supplies you'll need and I'll get them for you.” Miria said.

 

“Are you giving me a job?” Janna asked.

 

“Well, I figure if you're going to be staying with me and I get to play with little Bili there all the time, then I need to find something for you to do, too.” The older woman said with a wink.

 

Janna didn't know what to say. Her eyes, already red and nearly dry from the constant tears which wanted to flow somehow found enough moisture to mist up again.

 

They arrived at the house and every got out of the car. Miria helped Janna into the house while Jovan was stuck with the luggage again and he willingly obliged. As he pulled the portable baby's crib out of the trunk, his mother came back out and looked at him severely.

 

“You're not going to hurt that girl.” Miria said to her son with as much gravity as she could muster.

 

Jovan was taken aback. “Huh?” He had no idea where that had come from.

 

“She's made some mistakes in her life, but you're not going to come into this house with those black clothes and collar and make her feel worthless because of them, am I clear?” She went on.

 

Jovan was incensed, though he knew he shouldn't be. This wasn't fair. “Mom, you know me better than that.”

 

“Do I?” She asked. “You barely write or call for six years, and then the only reason you come home is because of a terrorist coup on some colony twenty light years away.” She said accusingly. “I don't care what is or is not between us, but you're going to show that girl nothing but compassion. Do you understand?”

 

“I brought her here, didn't I, Mom? I didn't just let her go.” He said, trying to defend himself.

 

“I brought her here.” Miria corrected him. “And I would have done it whether or not you were standing there. Remember that before you bring the Church into it.” She practically spat the word “Church.”

 

“I realize that, Mom.” He said. “I just wanted her to be okay.”

 

Miria studied her son for several minutes in silence, looking into his eyes. “Alright then.” She finally said, the fire behind her eyes finally abated a little. “Come on inside before you get cold. Do you have anything else to wear besides those fancy Church clothes?”

 

He hadn't thought about it. “Uh... No. No I don't.”

 

“Well, let me see what I can come up with.” She said as she picked up Janna's suitcase and led him into the house. “Unless you want to be doing chores in them.”

 

* * *

 

The next day he made a call to his superiors on Olympus Mons informing them that he had arrived in Agroppidum. They then directed him to serve under the local parish priest for the time being until another assignment opened up. After the chores his mother had given him for the morning, he borrowed the ground car to make contact with him, to which she reluctantly agreed.

 

Father Degan Jahl had been the parish priest at St. Theresa of Calcutta's Martian Orthodox Church in Agroppidum for as long as Jovan could remember. He was a balding older man of forty and, as Jovan could remember, was very conservative and strict. To be honest, he wasn't looking forward to working with him, but this was his assignment for the time being.

 

He arrived at the church building and went inside. Unlike most of the native Martian buildings, the church building stood out. Instead of the domed underground or semi-underground structures which characterized Martian architecture, the church was constructed of stone upwards and was laid out like a cross. It had expensive stained glass windows outlined in wood (real wood!), and even a bell tower. Everything about it seemed, well... alien to this world as though it refused to acknowledge anything had changed when the faith had come to Mars from Earth except its location. Even the monastic community on Olympus Mons had been a little more adapting to the realities of the world around them than St. Theresa's.

 

Upon entry into the church he dipped his fingers into the small dish of baptismal water by the door and crossed himself, then entered and genuflected when he entered the sanctuary and came within sight of the altar. The smell of the incense from the Masses came gingerly to his nostrils and he inhaled deeply. It was a welcome, familiar scent which allowed him to escape once more from the outside world back into a holy place. It was in the holy that had provided the refuge and place to grow so many years before.

 

The church had rows of rose colored, carved stone benches with reasonably comfortable padding. There was about a meter of space in-between the pews to accommodate both the padded stone kneelers, which had been carved as one piece to the rear supports of the pews, and a halfway decent walking space for each row. In front of the pews stood the carved stone altar covered in the white altar cloths and green vestments signifying ordinary time of the Martian liturgical calendar. A gold chalice and paten, covered carefully with the white cloths of their use crowned the altar. Behind the altar hung a real wood and pewter crucifix which Jovan knew had been imported from Earth at great expense by the parishioners.

 

The early afternoon sunlight found its way through the stained glass and spilled a rainbow of colors across the pews in a breathtaking display. This was where he belonged, he felt in his heart. Right here, at the altar serving my Lord, he thought to himself. This is where he truly felt at home, regardless of which church it was.

 

“Father Jovan!” An old balding man addressed him as he came out of a side room.

 

“Father Degan.” Jovan said politely, not certain as to what he should expect. His relationship with the older priest had been complicated from the start, but he had been kind enough to help him enter the religious life on Olympus Mons and begin seminary.

 

“I hear you're to be with us through the Christmas season.” Degan said. It was a statement, not a question. Did he know something that Jovan didn't?

 

“I'm here until another assignment opens up.” Jovan replied, nearly panicking on the inside. “I wasn't told how long it would be.” It was almost Duautumn and Martian Christmas, the twenty-fifth of Hexember, was still almost ten months away, and the season lasted through four Sundays, after eight Sundays of Advent. He didn't want to stay in Agroppidum any longer than he had to.

 

“Don't be in such a rush to go off again,” the old man said in a kind fashion, patting his arm. “We've got a lot of catching up to do, and I could really use the help here. I'm past forty and I'm not as young as I used to be.” He started to walk slowly and held his hand on Jovan's back to lead him off towards the side of the sanctuary. There they entered a side chamber which opened onto the small rectory which had been Father Degan's home for nearly twenty five years.

 

Inside the rectory the old man led Jovan to a table where he invited Jovan to sit while he made some sassafras tea. Sassafras trees grew well in the Martian climate, whereas black teas and coffees came at a premium because of the special greenhouse requirements for growing the coffee and tea plants. As a result, sassafras was more popular among the local population as the hot beverage of choice. Jovan had only tried coffee once as an exotic treat when he was younger in the resort city of Marenostrum and hadn't cared for it at all.

 

After he boiled the sassafras roots and the tea was ready, Degan set out some honey and buffalo milk and poured Jovan and himself generous cups of the hot beverage, for which Jovan thanked him. He then sat himself down to continue talking.

 

“So, how may I serve here?” Jovan asked.

 

“Well,” the old priest began, “we can start with Sunday morning Mass. The congregation is big enough now to where we really should be having two Masses, but I couldn't ever do that by myself. If you'll be willing to say a late morning Mass, and I'll take the early risers, that would help out tremendously. I'll be wanting to see your homilies of course before you preach them.”

 

Jovan was a little uneasy at that. “I can give you some notes that I use to prepare, but I don't always know what exactly what I'm going to say until I get to the pulpit.”

 

“That'll be fine. I just want to make sure we're on the same page. I've spent twenty five good Martian years protecting this congregation from corrupting influences and I just want to be sure that what is preached here is in complete harmony with our Faith.” Degan explained.

 

“Do you expect me to not be in complete harmony with the Orthodox Faith?” Jovan asked, confused and a little offended.

 

“Oh, no. No, not at all. But after some of the things I've been hearing from some of the younger priests coming from the parishes in Tharsis City, it makes me worry. We don't have any right going and changing the Faith to make things easier on us, and I worry that kind of thinking will creep in here as well.” Father Degan said with all sincerity.

 

“I hope I never give you anything to worry about.” Jovan said.

 

“I'm sure you won't.” Father Degan replied. “You know, I know Bishop Gilga pretty well.” Bishop Gilga was the senior clergy overseeing the seminary at Olympus Mons. “He and I studied together at Olympus Mons.” He said. “He's a good friend.”

 

“Oh?” Jovan asked.

 

“He said you were one of his best students and said you wouldn't disappoint me. That's very high praise coming from him.” Degan said, appraising the young man in front of him. “You've come a long way from when you were a young man, considering.”

 

Jovan's insides began to turn to ice as he tried to find a polite way to excuse himself before the conversation took a path he didn't want it to go. “Thank you, Father. I really should be going now. I'm staying at the old farmstead, and my mother has me running this way and that to make up for it.”

 

“That's not a problem, Jovan.” Degan replied. “I'd have you stay here in the rectory, but I just don't have the spare bedroom to give you.” That wasn't entirely true. There were two other rooms that had been originally set aside for additional clergy, but Father Degan had converted one into a private study, and another into a personal library before Jovan had been born.

 

“Well, thank you anyways and I will see you this Sunday morning.” Jovan said, getting up.

 

“We need to talk about catechism classes as well. There's a lady teaching them now—I don't know if you know her, it's a Mrs. Kini—but she doesn't really have the knowledge base for it. Once you get settled in, I'm thinking about having you take over those as well.” Degan said.

 

“When would you want me to start?” He asked, standing at the table. He would need to meet with the woman and find out where she was at in the teaching, and working something out with her.

 

“Well, we'll talk about that on Sunday.” Degan said. “Go and keep your mother happy.” He said this last with a smile, but his tone didn't sound as though he was joking. “Oh, one more thing.” The old man added. “Are you attached to anyone?”

 

“I'm sorry?” Jovan asked, not understanding.

 

“Are you attached to anyone?” The old man asked again. “You've been ordained, and you're free to pursue a personal relationship and marriage if you want.”

 

“No. No, I haven't had the time yet.” Jovan responded.

 

“Good.” Degan replied. “It causes too much of a distraction to the work. You know back on Earth several millennia ago they forbade the priesthood to marry. I've often wondered whether or not the Orthodox Council on Mars made the right decision in not doing the same.” He said in all seriousness.

 

“I don't think that will be a problem for now, Father.” Jovan replied.

 

“Glad to hear it.Well, I'll see you Sunday then, have a blessed day, Father Jovan.” The old man said, making the sign of the cross in the air in front of him with two fingers extended towards the younger man. Jovan made the sign of the cross as well and then left.

 

* * *

 

Supper that evening wasn't as tense as Jovan had expected it to be. He, Janna, his mother, and the farm manager were sitting at the dining room table. It was a large circular plain stone table with eight matching chairs, carved more for function rather than form.

 

The farm manager, a younger Earther woman named Laren, entertained his mother, Janna, and he with her attempts at describing her home province of British Columbia on Earth. She had only arrived a few weeks prior to Jovan's homecoming. She was still trying to justify why she thought it was so similar to Mars.

 

“I'm serious!” Laren kept saying. Her Martian was decent but there was a decided accent which they all found funny. “There are forests for as far as the eye can see, and it can get just as cold during the winter as it gets here. Sometimes even colder.”

 

“Forests of concrete, you mean.” Janna teased her. “And steel, and monstrous cities all under a wonderful gray sky.”

 

“No, not in B.C.” She said, using the Amerikish acronym for her home. “It's one of the last truly wild and unpopulated regions in North America. And right next door in Alberta there are still wheat fields. Historically, there used to be fields as far as the eye could see, just like here.”

 

The Martians around the table just couldn't believe it. They'd seen too many videos of Earth and the hundreds of kilometers of cities, several of them partially submerged from ecological catastrophe, as well as the seemingly endless deserts. Eventually Laren just gave up, and had to be satisfied with the truth as she saw it. Eventually the conversation turned to Martian sights and places. The idea of million residents in a city almost completely underground completely amazed her.

 

“How does everyone breathe down there?” She asked.

 

“During colonization most of the structures were built downwards, and plant life was brought in along with artificial air scrubbers and circulation machines. We had to learn about it in Secondary School. Don't you incorporate vegetation into your buildings?” Janna asked.

 

“No. Well, there's plants for decoration, but that's all.” Laren replied. She then took notice of the dining room as if for the first time. There were plants everywhere, but no pots. Where were they growing from? She wondered, and then it hit her.

 

“Oh wow. Your houseplants are growing out of the walls aren't they?” She then realized that the overhead lighting was white light, like sunlight.

 

“Where else are they supposed to grow from?” Miria asked in all seriousness.

 

After dinner, Miria and the farm manager went to bed and Jovan and Janna were left in the dining room to talk on their own while Janna continued to try and get Bili to finish some applesauce with a baby-spoon.

 

“You mother is really great. I can't believe all of this. I never imagined anyone here would welcome me like this after... after Bili.” Janna said.

 

“Mom's a very caring person. She hates to see anyone or anything mistreated.” He said, and then thought but didn't say, especially by Church People. He took a sip of the sassafras tea he had been nursing.

 

“You can't imagine what it was like. I was so scared when I found out I was pregnant. My parents gave me a week to find somewhere else to live, and I haven't seen them since. Bili was already on his own, so I went to live with him. But it only got worse instead of better. He started getting harrassed at his job. The people from St. Theresa's kept telling him that he was going to hell, and that our baby would be damned for eternity because we weren't married. I'd never seen anything like it from them.” She said. “They were my friends one day, and by the end of the week I couldn't go anywhere without being called a whore.”

 

“I'm so sorry.” Jovan said.

 

“It's not your fault. You weren't there. We tried to make things right and get married in the Church, but Father Degan wouldn't let us without us living apart for twelve months and taking marriage classes with him. I had nowhere else to go but to live with Bili, and then the baby was born. He wouldn't budge no matter what, and trying to get a civil marriage wouldn't have changed anything because the Church wouldn't have recognized it, would they have?”

 

Jovan hated the answer. “No.” He said as though something foul had found its way into his mouth. “No, they wouldn't have.”

 

“Would you have done it, Jovan?” She asked. “Would you have married me? I mean, us?”

 

In a heartbeat. He thought. But he said, “I'm not Father Degan, I wasn't there. But from what you've told me I honestly don't see any reason why he didn't. It's not written anywhere in canon law that you have to live apart before you're married in the Church.”

 

“So why did he do that to us?” She asked, looking him straight in the eyes, fire behind her green eyes. “Why did he make us feel like we had nowhere on Mars to go?”

 

He could hear the double edge of pain and anger in her voice. He was at a loss for what to say. Nothing seemed to be appropriate because he knew... He knew that if Father Degan hadn't been so hardened, if he hadn't have imposed his own rules as though they were law then Bili would still be here for her and little Bili would still have a father. “I don't know” didn't quite cover it and it disgusted him.

 

“It's not what Jesus Christ taught.” He said quietly.

 

“What isn't?” She said, her anger flaring up as though she expected him to turn on her too.

 

“Treating people this way.” He said. “The Lord taught us to love one another as He loved us. And He also said it was better for someone to have a huge rock bound around his neck and be thrown into the deepest part of the sea than for that person to cause someone to stumble. Loving one another is the most important command, the most important theme in the Holy Scriptures.”

 

The anger in her eyes faded away and she turned to little Bili to start wiping his face down. The boy had fallen asleep cheek first into his little dish of applesauce. “I've read the Scriptures you know.” She said to him. “I've read the entire New Testament. The Gospels and the letters. I couldn't make any sense of the Apocalypse.”

 

He smirked. “Then you're doing better than most. Normally a parish priest throws up praises and alleluias when one of his flock reads even the Gospel of Matthew on their own.”

 

She gave a small smile. “I know what Jesus taught, Jovan. I know it really well. I read His words again and again that entire year before we left for Gliese Five. I wanted to understand why my family and friends were being so hateful to me. And then I came to realize something that I had never known before.”

 

“What was that?” Jovan asked.

 

She looked at him, and the turned her eyes downward and focused again on her baby as she pulled him out of his high chair, still sound asleep.

 

“I realized that either Father Degan doesn't know what Jesus taught, or he doesn't care. And if he doesn't care about what Jesus taught, then he's not really a priest of Jesus, is he?” She said.

 

Arguments flew through his mind and on to the tip of his tongue, but he bit them all back. He didn't want to hurt Janna any more by explaining the finer points of the theology of holy orders. And the truth was that it didn't matter anyway. The damage was done. There was nothing he could say or do that would ever bring her back into the fold of the Church's congregation, and he had doubts that it would even be the best thing for her. I can be a priest of Jesus Christ for her, at least. He thought to himself.

 

“Oh, look at you my little man.” She said to Bili as he nuzzled in her arms against her shoulder. “Mama's got to put you to bed, doesn't she?”

 

“I've got to get to bed too.” Jovan stood up and said, draining his now cold cup of tea.

 

“Thank you Jovan.” Janna told him.

 

“For what?” He asked, looking at the table as he set his cup back down.

 

“For listening and not trying to defend him. For bringing us here and giving us a new chance. For letting me cry on your shoulder. Just... for everything.” Janna said. She leaned in to give him a kiss on the cheek, and he turned his head at just that moment to face her and their lips met quite by accident.

 

Janna drew back immediately and put her hand over her mouth in surprise. “Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to... Oh,” She kept saying, and then a laugh escaped her mouth.

 

It took Jovan completely by surprise. He had never actually been kissed by a girl before. Not on the lips, at least. “Oh. Uh... it's okay. Not a problem. Um. No harm done I'm pretty sure.” He stammered a little.

 

“Um... well then. Good night.” Janna said. Then she hurried downstairs to her bedroom leaving Jovan standing in the dining room trying to understand what just happened and how to respond. Ten minutes later as he finally willed his body to follow her downstairs to his own room, he sat on his bed still trying to understand.

 

It was an accident. He knew that. She had intended a friendly peck on the cheek. A thank you, nothing more. So why was he feeling something from it? And what was he feeling? He didn't know. The real question was, did he want to?

 

A Month and a Half Later

 

It was the beginning of Quadrautumn and the leaves on the fruit trees in the little orchard on the property were finally changing colors from their vivid green to the red, yellow, gold, and brown of fall. They hadn't actually started dying and falling from the trees yet. They wouldn't do that for yet another month or more.

 

It was a Tuesday, and Miria had Jovan out among the apple and pear trees collecting the remaining fruit which had fallen to the ground. She didn't like the fruit just sitting there rotting, and didn't want the seeds germinating on the ground on their own. He wore plain brown and dark green woolen work pants and tunic pulled over lighter undergarments. It had been a long time since he had worn anything else but his clerical clothes that he felt uncomfortable at wearing the ordinary work clothing. He did not, however, have a choice. It was either this, or ruin his clerics.

 

Jovan had talked with his mother a few days after his and Janna's arrival about Mikhail's situation. Because it was at the end of harvest season, she wouldn't have any hauling work available until after the beginning of the year and the middle of spring, Quadrivernalis, at the earliest, and that was twelve months away, but some greenhouse crop growers who were good friends of hers would be hauling through the winter. Like her, they preferred to use local Martian drivers. They weren't located there in Agroterra but were based closer to him in Xanthe Province. She would put in a call to them and have them contact Mikhail.

 

He had taken over the late morning Mass at St. Theresa's on Sundays, and had been working with Mrs. Kini on taking over the new round of catechism classes. The older woman wasn't very happy with being relieved of her charge, but she didn't choose to argue with Jovan. Much, that is. The classes were on Saturdays.

 

Jovan was using a rake to drag the fallen fruit over to the bucket he was using. Most of it was pretty far gone, but on occasion there was a good apple or a good pear that was just asking to be eaten by someone. These he set apart in a different basket for the table in the house. It was getting to be just about time for lunch anyway.

 

“Catch!” A pear came whizzing at him following the feminine voice. He turned just in time to see it hit him in the shoulder. “Ow!” He said, rubbing his shoulder in semi-mock pain.

 

“Oops, looks like you're going to have to be faster than that!” Janna teased him.

 

“You could have warned me a little sooner.” Jovan told her with a smile as he bent down to pick up the impromptu missile.

 

“Where's the fun in that?” She said.

 

“How're the sheep this morning?” he asked. “Still white and fluffy?”

 

“They're fine.” She chuckled. “I'm just glad she's not raising them for meat production. I like getting sleep on occasion.” She had taken the job Miria had given her very seriously. Raising livestock on Mars could be a tricky proposition. They were genetically modified to overproduce muscle mass to compensate for Mars' two fifths of the gravity they originally came from. As a result, they had to be watched over nearly constantly for any signs of genetic aberration or defect.

 

In order for them to produce the right amount of meat, or in this case wool, they had to be given the right blend of nutritional supplements, and feed blends as well. A farm veterinarian on Mars could be a complicated and challenging occupation, especially as the modified animals could have the same muscle mass they would have had on Earth but in Martian gravity. Because of the Martian's own inherent frailty in comparison, livestock handlers have to use robotic exoskeletal suits to protect themselves from the animal's “enhanced” strength and speed.

 

“Well, Mom said she hadn't seem them doing so well as after you took over their care. Apparently the company vet she was using didn't really know what he was doing with Martian livestock. At least, according to Mom.” He put the pear, which was obviously well past any ability to be eaten, in the rubbish pile, and then felt a little guilty about it.

 

“Maybe he should have worn an exo-suit.” Janna joked, although it was probably true. Earther vets typically didn't think to take the proper precautions with the enhanced livestock.

 

She wore similar clothes to Jovan, and had her hair tied up in the bun she usually kept it in, just like his mother did. Her face had light streaks of something brown he hoped was dirt. She didn't wear any makeup, most farm women didn't except on rare special occasions, but it didn't matter, at least not to him. “So, are you almost ready for lunch? I'm starving.” She said. “And I want to see my Bili. I haven't seen him since your mother took him from me after breakfast this morning.”

 

“Yes, I can work on this more after lunch. But I wouldn't hold my breath on getting the baby back from Mom any time soon. I think she's enjoying playing grandmother far too much.” Jovan teased as he set his rake against the side of a tree. He picked up the basket of decent fruit and joined her.

 

“So, how are things going at the church?” Janna asked him delicately as they walked towards the house together. It was a subject she had studiously avoided until now.

 

“Well, I guess.” He said. He wasn't sure how much he should say, and was surprised that she brought up the church at all. She normally avoided the topic of St. Theresa's when they talked. “Mrs. Kini's seems to think I'm finally ready to take over the catechism classes.” He said with a smile.

 

Janna chuckled at that. “I'm surprised,” she said, “that she would let anyone take those classes from her. She's taught them ruthlessly for the last five years.”

 

“Well, maybe it has something to do with me being a priest. Apparently, I know at least as much as she does about the teaching of the Church.” He said. “So, she thinks I'm at least somewhat qualified to take over.”

 

She became serious then and asked timidly, “Has anyone said anything about me? I mean, about my coming back without Bili? Has anyone asked about him or what happened?”

 

“No.” He said. “No, and I haven't volunteered anything. I don't think anyone outside of our farmstead knows you're even back. Or if they do, they're not saying anything about it around me.” She hadn't left the farm since they arrived and hadn't shown any inclination to get back in touch with anyone, even her friend Alli who never showed to pick her up from the shuttle station. Come to think of it, he didn't even know who Alli was, he realized. He didn't know anyone in town with that name and it wasn't that large of a town.

 

“Not even my dad?” She asked, hurt creeping into her voice.

 

“He hasn't been there that I've seen, but I think he goes to Father Degan's earlier Mass.” He answered carefully. Jovan hadn't actually been trying to find him either, but it was true that he hadn't seen the town veterinarian at all during Mass on Sundays. He had assumed that the man attended the early morning Mass.

 

“Oh.” She said, a little down.

 

Seeing her disappointment, he said, “I didn't think you wanted me to tell anyone.” He didn't want all of the hurt and pain she had experienced before to start up again. He didn't know if he could take it.

 

“Oh, well I never said anything like that, did I?” It was obvious that he had read her wishes in the right way, because her tone of voice said she wasn't really upset by it either.

 

“No, but after everything that happened, well... I just didn't think you wanted it to start up again too soon.” He said.

 

“Have you seen Bili's mother at all?” The baby's father's parents had been regular members of St. Theresa's for a long time, but only his mother was left after Bili's father passed away from an illness.

 

“Father Degan mentioned to me that she moved out of town just after we arrived, and almost right after getting the news about Bili, but no one seems to know where she went.” He said. “I didn't bring it up, he did.”

 

“That's too bad. She was a really sweet person.” Janna said sadly. “She didn't shun us like everyone else did.”

 

They walked a little further in silence. Then Janna asked out of the blue, “Are you allowed to get married?”

 

“I'm sorry, what?” He said, so surprised that he nearly dropped the basket of apples and pears he was carrying.

 

“Never mind.” She said quickly. Her cheeks grew rose colored.

 

“No, it's okay. Um... yes. We're allowed to get married after we've finished our priestly formation and have been ordained. They just don't allow romantic relationships or marriage during seminary because of the distraction it causes.” He answered. “Why do you ask?”

 

“I was just wondering.” She said. “Has anyone at the church caught your eye?” She asked.

 

Now his cheeks were getting a little rosy, he knew. “Uh... no. No, I haven't really even had time to think about it, and Father Degan frowns on the possibility.”

 

“Of course he does.” She said, annoyed.

 

They reached the house and when they reached the dining room, Jovan set the basket of fruit in the middle of the table. Miria and the farm manager were already in the kitchen just finishing up with a large bowl of leafy greens, vegetables, and spicy smelling ground meat tossed into a salad that Laren kept insisting that they all had to try.

 

The baby was playing in a playpen within Miria's easy reach, and Janna immediately went over and picked up her son saying, “How's my little Bili? Mommy missed you today!” She balanced him on her hip and then looking at the bowl of salad she said, “Wow, that looks expensive! What's the occasion?”

 

“It's not that bad!” Laren said defensively with a smile. “I used all native Martian produce, and I brought the spices from home in my personal effects. I had to substitute buffalo for beef, but it tastes just about the same. It's called a 'taco salad'. It's an ancient dish originally from the southwestern part of North America. I thought you'd like to try something a little spicy for a change?” She ended this last statement as a question, and Jovan could see that she really wanted them to like it and enjoy it. She also wanted them to like her, he knew. She really didn't need to worry about that, he thought.

 

“I'm sure it's great.” Jovan said. “It smells wonderful.” He added.

 

Janna looked at him sideways, then caught on. “Yes, we just have to try it!” She said, a little too enthusiastically, but Laren didn't seem to notice.

 

A smile of relief spread over the farm manager's face. “Oh, good!” She said.

 

They set the table and put the bowl of salad next to the basket of fruit. Janna set up the high chair next to her own, and opened a can of mashed peas and put them on a plate in front of little Bili, then took her own chair next to Jovan's. Then they all sat down to eat. Laren took a larger bowl of salad, while the other three took about half as much, trying to be as polite as they could. Because of the cost of growing the spices in the green houses similar to coffee and tea plants, spicy foods were a rarity among the farming families who were used to growing and raising their own food independent of any local grocer or market.

 

Jovan took a bite, and was pleasantly surprised to find it was actually quite tasty, and Laren had gone easier on the spices than he had first thought. Looks of approval appeared on Janna's and Miria's face too. “Wow, this is really good! Thank you, Laren.” Miria said. The other two Martians around the table agreed, and also complemented her skills with food.

 

“I wish I could take the credit, but it was my grandmother's recipe.” Laren said modestly, though her smile said the praise was very welcome.

 

Just then the doorbell rang out, and Miria looked up in surprise. “Now who could that be?” She asked, looking at the the other three.

 

“I wasn't expecting anyone.” Jovan said. Laren and Janna also denied any knowledge.

 

The doorbell rang again, and Miria got up from the table to get the door. She walked over to the front doorway and opened it.

 

There on the doorstep stood a slightly shorter, darker skinned man with thinning gray hair. He was somewhere between twenty-five and thirty years old, and looked oddly familiar.

 

“Miria?” The man asked with an accent she hadn't heard for twelve years, but there had been only one man who had pronounced her name like that, and it had always given her a little thrill or a tingle every time he did.

 

“Tomas?” She gasped, not believing who she was seeing. She brought her hand to her mouth.

 

“Miria, I don't know if you even want to see me now.” He began. He had rehearsed this speech a thousand times, and now it was time to say it for real. “I don't know why you stopped sending your messages, but I never stopped thinking about you or Jovanito.” He pronounced it “Hovanito” like he always had before. “I knew I had made a mistake in leaving, almost as soon as I reached Earth...”

 

“No... No you didn't. You had to...” She started to say.

 

He continued, “I would have quit the company and gotten back on the next shuttle, but I couldn't. The company doesn't pay for gravity therapy for returning farm managers, and I thought maybe I could tough it out on my own. But I had stayed on Mars too long. I stepped off the shuttle onto Earth and my legs gave way almost at once. My organs and skeleton began to fail not long after. It almost killed me when I stepped back into Earth's gravity. I sent my only message to you from a hospital bed. I spent a long time, years, just recovering, and the company had to put me on permanent disability. I could finally walk again on my own a couple of years after I returned, I wanted to come back, to be with you and your son, but the company put me behind a desk in Anchorage and wouldn't allow me to return as a farm manager. I was finally able to retire from Agrosolar with enough of a pension to immigrate four Earth years ago, I fought with Martian immigration for all of those four years. I waited and waited, and two months ago they finally let me immigrate again on my own as a new colonist. I've been in Tharsis City for the last month trying to think of a way to come back and talk to you after this long. I'm on Mars now for good. I'm not going back to Earth. I had to voluntarily give up my Earth citizenship to be here. I'll understand if you don't want me around after so long, but I just wanted to let you know...”

 

His speech was cut short as the middle aged woman grabbed him and thrust her lips against his. “Be quiet.” She said when she finally pulled away. “Be quiet, and just hold me.”

 

“Mom?” Jovan asked from the dining room. “Mom, who is it?”

 

“Jovan, come here.” Miria shouted. “Just come here.”

 

Jovan got up and moved towards the door, “What is it?” He asked again, and then saw the stranger at the door holding his mother, “Mom?” He asked.

 

“Jovanito?” The stranger asked, in a very familiar voice. A voice at one time he would have given anything to hear again.

 

“Tomas?” He asked, his eyes misting over.

 

“Yes, Jovanito. It is Tomas.” The man said.

 

Jovan moved slowly towards the older man and his mother made room as Tomas opened his arms to include the taller man. Jovan moved into his open arm and wrapped his own arms around both his mother and Tomas and the three of them just stood there in each other's embrace.

 

After what seemed like forever, Miria pulled away, wiped her eyes and asked Tomas, “Are you hungry? Have you had lunch?” The questions seemed absurdly polite.

 

“No, I haven't eaten yet.” He responded. And they both began to chuckle a little, tears still in their eyes.

 

“There's food on the table, and you need to come inside with us.” She then said. Jovan and Miria then pulled Tomas into the house before he might have had any chance to say no, and led him into the dining room, where Laren and Janna were still sitting, completely puzzled as to what was happening.

 

The older man's eyes were wet with tears as they led him to the table where they sat him down, and Jovan set an extra place setting next to Miria's seat. The older man sat down as if in a dream as Jovan took the liberty of dishing some of Laren's exotic taco salad onto his plate. “Thank you, Jovanito.” He managed to say. Miria and Jovan then returned to their own seats at the table.

 

The other two women were still at a loss as to who this new stranger was, and why Miria and Jovan were taking such tender care with him. Janna looked questioningly at Jovan, and when she finally caught his eye, he said, “Janna, Laren, this is Tomas.”

 

Realization then covered Janna's face, as it was a story that both Jovan and Miria had told her several times, and her hand flew to her mouth in surprise. “Oh...” She managed to say.

 

Laren, oblivious to the family's history, stood up and extended her hand to the man in a friendly fashion, “Hi, I'm Laren Janis, the farm manager.”

 

Tomas took her hand delicately, as a gentleman might, and said, “Tomas. Tomas Rodrigo.”

 

“You're from Earth?” Laren then said in surprise. “From Mexico, right? Your name and your accent... I had a grandmother who was from Mexico.”

 

“Yes. I grew up in Mexico City.” Tomas replied. “But for now I am renting an apartment in Tharsis City.” He picked up his fork, and started in on the salad gingerly. “This is very good.” He said.

 

“Thank you!” Laren said with delight. “That's high praise coming from a true Mexican.”

 

“You made this? I am impressed.” He said again. “It is a very rare thing to find good Southwestern food on Mars.”

 

Laren beamed. The others smiled, but suppressed their chuckles.

 

“So what brings you out here to Agroppidum?” Laren asked innocently.

 

“I needed to find my family again.” Tomas said plainly, looking first to his side at Miria who smiled and placed her hand on his, and then to Jovan. “I had lost touch with them many years ago.”

 

“Oh, really? You have family on Mars? Do they live here in town?” Laren said, taking another bite of her salad.

 

Before Tomas had a chance to try and reply, Miria spoke up to try and spare him any more of an awkward explanation, “Tomas was forced to leave us when Jovan was still a boy. We have a lot of catching up to do.”

 

Laren then looked at Miria and Tomas and light dawned, “Oh... I'm sorry, I didn't realize...” She said apologetically.

 

“No. It's alright. I've spent a long time trying to come back; trying to come home.” Tomas said graciously. “I am just happy to be here right now.” He picked up his fork and took another bite of food. He then noticed the baby in the high chair sitting next to Janna, who was in turn sitting next to Jovan. He then said, “Jovanito, you have become a papa?” He said smiling.

 

Jovan nearly choked on the bite of food he had just taken himself. “What?” He said. Janna's cheeks turned cherry red. “Oh, no...” She began to deny it.

 

“No. No... Janna and Bili...” Jovan started to try to explain, and then became completely unsure as to how much to say, and then found himself just stammering.

 

Miria came to their rescue. “Janna is our new livestock veterinarian. The baby's father died over a month ago in a space station accident.”

 

“Yes, that's right.” Jovan said, still trying to clear his throat. Janna nodded, and then mouthed a “thank you” to Miria, who nodded ever so slightly.

 

“Oh.” Tomas said, unsure as to what all the fuss was about. “You have livestock now?” He then asked Miria. “You never used to.”

 

Miria then went on to tell him about her small wool producing venture, and how well Janna had been taking care of them. She then went on to describe all the other changes to the farm, and the community. Tomas listened quietly as he ate. After lunch, Miria led Tomas out to see the farm just the two of them saying, “We have a lot to talk about.” Tomas agreed.

 

* * *

 

The following Saturday, Jovan was at St. Theresa's preparing his homily for the next day's Mass. He had just finished teaching his first catechism class to ten easily distracted four year olds, and was relieved for the time on his own. It was the first chance he had gotten to really try and process everything which had happened that week. His mother had told Tomas about Jovan's sister as they had been out touring the farmstead. He had apparently taken it well, and wanted to meet her as soon as he could. They had come back from that walk making plans for the future.

 

Jovan was happy. He couldn't quite sort out all of his feelings, but he was happy. He knew that at least. The last few days since Tomas' return had been some of the best in his life, he felt. No one could replace the years of separation. Everyone knew that. But at least they would have the time now to try and heal as a family.

 

“I hear that your mother's old farm manager has returned.” An elderly voice interrupted Jovan's thoughts.

 

Jovan looked up from the homily he hadn't been able to concentrate on anyway towards the doorway where the thin, frail form of Father Degan stood. The old man walked slowly into the small classroom to face Jovan and then found a chair to sit down in.

 

“Yes, he came to see us on Wednesday.” Jovan confirmed for him. He then began to get a little worried as he wasn't sure which direction this conversation would go.

 

“Oh? I hear he hasn't left yet either.” Degan said. “I don't suppose he is trying to get his old job back?” There was just an edge of sarcasm in his voice that began to rankle Jovan.

 

“He was like my father, growing up. We're all happy he's come home.” Jovan said, a little bit of steel creeping into his voice.

 

“An Earther come home on Mars. I see.” Degan said. A bit of a frown creeping over his face. “So, I assume then that he'll be staying with you and your mother again? Along with the Wong girl and her baby?” Degan looked at Jovan accusingly.

 

“I don't yet know what all the plans are, he has an apartment in Tharsis for the moment, but eventually, yes. We all assume that.” Jovan said stiffly. He ignored the comment about Janna, though it surprised him. Father Degan hadn't let on before that he knew about Janna being there.

 

“You've been spending a lot of time with her, haven't you?” The old man pressed. “You do know what kind of a girl she is, don't you?”

 

Anger rose up in Jovan. “As a matter of fact I do.” He said tersely. He wanted to add, “do you?” But thought better of it. A better question was how the old man knew about her when she hadn't left the farmstead since she returned.

 

“Then you must know it isn't appropriate for you, as a priest, to be socializing with her. You have work here to do. God's work. People might begin to talk, and it could hurt your credibility among the faithful.” Degan told him. “I want to be able to give the Bishop a good report when he moves you on to your permanent assignment.”

 

Jovan felt a cold, sick feeling in his stomach as the implications of what the old man was saying played out in his mind. “I understand.” He said cooly.

 

“Good.” Degan said, standing up. “A girl like that will probably just go and get herself pregnant again anyway. You don't need to be associated with that.” He turned to go, saying as he left, “Have a blessed rest of the day.”

 

Jovan couldn't return the sentiment. He couldn't say anything at all.

 

The Following Monday

 

Miria and Tomas had taken the ground car and left for Tharsis City earlier the day before, while Jovan was celebrating Mass, leaving Laren, Janna and he there on their own for the time being. Miria hadn't said when they would be back, but Laren, Janna and Jovan had all assured her they would keep the farm running like clockwork for as long as they needed to in her absence.

 

It had been decided that Tomas would move his remaining belongings from his small apartment back out to the farm, but he and Jovan's mother had “other things to attend to first.” Although they didn't elaborate on what those things were, no one remaining behind inquired. Jovan thought he already had a pretty good guess, and Janna was smiling as though she knew a secret and wasn't telling. Jovan knew for a fact his mother had called Tama, his sister on Saturday evening.

 

This morning, Jovan was watching little Bili while Janna tended to the sheep. It was his first time watching the little boy alone, and Janna had left him a list of instructions which nearly comprised a whole manual. He tried playing with him on the floor, watching a few videos with him, and walking him around the farm in his arms, showing him the different trees, the fields, and then coming to the sheep enclosure where the boy's mother was in her protective exo-suit, though he tried to remain at a discreet distance, near the equipment storage so as not to disturb her or make her think anything was wrong. Little Bili was asleep on his shoulder by that point in time, anyway. So Jovan just watched her silently with the boy in his arms, thinking through Degan's warning as she worked in the sleek yet powerful metallic suit which encased most of her body.

 

What difference did it make whether or not he socialized with Janna? He kept asking himself. He knew what it could look like if he were living alone and then had brought them into his home. That kind of scenario, he knew, was forbidden by canon law, but this was him living in his mother's house, and Janna just happened to be the live-in livestock specialist, something that wasn't completely unheard of, not out here.

 

She was a friend. Yes, she was becoming a very good friend, and yes there had been that one accidental kiss, but still, she was just a friend and someone he had felt the need to comfort and be kind to in her hour of need. And besides, he wasn't forbidden from having a romantic relationship—not that he was at the moment—or from marriage anymore. That was just Father Degan's misguided preference, and there was nothing in canon law which stipulated that one's immediate superiors had any control over who one might marry as long as she was baptized and confirmed Martian Orthodox, and, if it should so happen that way, Janna was.

 

What disturbed him more, as he watched her inspect her charges, was how much Father Degan's threat disturbed him. He and Janna had become good friends in the short time he had gotten to know her. Very good friends, he realized. It was something he hadn't allowed himself to think about much, but as he watched her he realized how much he would feel the loss if he could never spend time with her again. He couldn't reconcile that with his own future plans which hinged upon leaving Agroppidum, Father Degan, his mother, and... Janna.

 

His own future plans, he wondered about those now too. Six weeks ago, he would have given almost anything to not have had to return home at all. Now? He wasn't so certain of his path anymore. Now, his mother and Tomas were together again. Tomas! Tomas was home and things began to feel somewhat right again for the first time in a long time. And then there was... Janna. The truth is that he looked forward to seeing her each day. He felt a reluctance to leave now. Something had definitely changed in him, and he didn't know what to think of it.

 

He turned to head back to the house when he heard her voice and it both pained and delighted him. “He must really like you, Jovan.” She said. She was right behind him. How had she come up behind him so fast without his knowing? The exo-suits were relatively quiet, but they weren't noiseless.

 

“I'm sorry, I didn't want for us to disturb you while you worked.” Jovan said.

 

“Oh, don't you dare take him back yet. I don't usually get to see him in the mornings like this.” She said, taking the sleeping boy. “Oh, he's so light in this suit! He's been getting so heavy when I've been taking him in the afternoons.” She said, as he came to rest against her metallic shoulder. “I weighed him last night, and he's already up to four kilograms. Did you give him a snack yet?” She asked.

 

“No, not yet. I was going to give him some pudding after he woke up.” He said, distractedly.

 

“Give him a cookie instead, it will help with his teething.” She replied.

 

“Got it.” He said. “Anything else?”

 

“Is everything okay?” She asked timidly. “You seem a little distracted. Ever since you came home on Saturday, you've been a little distant.” She handed Bili back to him and then, standing in front of the equipment storage, began disengaging from the exo-suit, the back of which opened as she stepped back out and down revealing her regular blue denim pants and shirt which was her normal manner of dress. She then reached for Bili to take him back from Jovan. “There's my big heavy boy.” She said, kissing him on the top of his head. Once free of its operator, the exosuit piloted itself back into its charging nook in the storage shed.

 

“It's well... It's just...” He didn't know how to explain, and he didn't want to just shrug off the question. It wouldn't help anything.

 

“What?” She said, hugging Bili just a little tighter, worry creeping over her face. “Is it about Tomas and your mom? I thought you were ecstatic about his coming back.”

 

“What? No! I mean, yes.” Jovan sputtered. “I mean, it's wonderful about Tomas coming back. It's one of the best things which has happened to us in a long time. No, it's not Tomas, it's...”

 

“What then? Did I do something wrong?” She asked.

 

“No. No.” He said. There was no use trying to avoid it, it seemed.

 

“Father Degan knows you're back, and that you're staying here.” He said, trying to explain.

 

“Oh.” She said quietly.

 

“He wanted me to stop 'socializing' with you, and threatened to make things difficult for me with the Bishop if I don't.” It all came tumbling out of his mouth before he could find a way to say it in a better, easier way. One which wouldn't make her feel bad and which wouldn't make St. Theresa's head priest sound like a controlling monster.

 

Angry tears formed in her eyes. “Do you want to?” She asked. “Stop 'socializing' with me, I mean? Is he going to tell you whether or not you can 'socialize' with Tomas or your mother next?”

 

“No.” He became very quiet. “No, I don't want to stop seeing you, or being with you.” He said this so tenderly, that all the anger disappeared from her expression.

 

“Really?” She asked. “You don't?” She said hopefully.

 

“No. I don't.” He said. “I don't want to ever stop.” He couldn't even stop himself from saying it, and the words were out before he had a chance to even think about what he was saying.

 

“What about little Bili?” She asked, tears coming to her eyes again, but for very different reasons.

 

“I don't want to stop seeing him either.” Jovan said.

 

“Oh.” She responded.

 

“Do you want to stop seeing me?” Jovan asked. “If I've been too forward, or... or...”

 

He wasn't allowed to finish the thought when she blurted out, “God, no!” And she grabbed the back of his head with her one free arm and pulled his mouth to hers in a long and passionate kiss, one which surprised and shocked him, but he then freely gave himself to wrapping his own arms around her and her son.

 

When their lips finally parted, she looked into his eyes and asked, “So then what do we do?”

 

“I don't know.” He said, and that was the honest truth. He didn't know what to do now. He hadn't planned for this, and had no idea what the next steps should be.

 

“Little Bili's going to need a father. A real father.” Jovan finally said.

 

“Are you applying for the job?” She asked. Her eyes sparkled, radiant with a joy he hadn't ever seen in her before.

 

“I guess I am.” He answered in good humor. “What do you think my chances are?”

 

“I don't know, why don't we ask the boss?” She said, and then placed little Bili back into his arms. The little boy opened his eyes sleepily to look into Jovan's face, and then he laid his head on the man's shoulder and went back to sleep.

 

“I guess that's settled then. It looks like you're hired.” She said, and then drew him close again for another kiss.

 

* * *

 

His first action later that day, after she and he had a much longer talk, was to send a carefully worded formal text message to Bishop Gilga on Olympus Mons requesting the permission to marry Janna Wong, a baptized and confirmed member of the Martian Orthodox Church. Such requests had to be made in text format when being sent over Mars' Internet. While marriage wasn't forbidden to him, and Father Degan certainly didn't have a say being of technically equal rank within the Church, his Bishop was another matter altogether. Although it was a rare case when a Bishop denied a request for marriage. The circumstances had to be severe.

 

There wasn't a question of asking Father Degan to marry them or even mentioning it to him until after he received the Bishop's response, they both knew, even though that would have been the proper course of action as he was the head priest for their town. As a result, he had also asked for permission to be married in a different parish. This would raise more than a few eyebrows, Jovan knew. He explained it as a difference of opinion with the rector of St. Theresa and prayed, foolishly he admitted to himself, it would be enough that his Bishop wouldn't inquire further. The worst case scenario he could think of was that his superiors would contact Father Degan for more information because it had been a relatively short amount of time that he had been home, and being a priest's wife wasn't something to be entered into lightly.

 

He knew it would be days at the very least before he received a response. Bishop Gilga always took the time to carefully consider every request before he responded. It could be maddening sometimes, but it also meant that he considered as many aspects of the request as possible. Jovan had always known his Bishop to be a fair and godly man.

 

After the message had been sent, there wasn't much more that he could do over the next few days but wait and pray. He was both overjoyed, and terrified at what the future held for them. Janna continued her job looking after the needs of the sheep, and Jovan looked after Bili. He also began shadowing Laren as she made her own rounds checking on the fields, and testing their chemical compositions as the autumnal months dragged on. She made notes as to which fields would need chemical fertilizers, and which ones were doing well without them. She also checked the network of irrigation pipes to ensure they were properly winterized and made ready for the oncoming long cold months of winter which they would be experiencing.

 

“You know you don't have to do that until at least the end of Pentautumn, right?” Jovan asked her during one of these times after lunch. Bili was with his mother in the house.

 

“It's already the middle of fall, and I don't want your mother's pipes to freeze and burst.” Laren said.

 

“This is your first winter on Mars, isn't it?” Jovan asked, already knowing the answer. “It doesn't usually get that cold until the beginning of Hexautumn, and then only at night for a couple of hours. You're a couple of months ahead of the game.”

 

Laren looked at him, and said, “Well, better a couple of months ahead of schedule than behind.”

 

“True.” He said.

 

“So what does everyone normally do during the winters here?” She asked. “I can't imagine it would be a lot of fun cooped up inside for six months at a stretch.”

 

“It's not so bad. The house is pretty well insulated against the cold, being mostly underground, and we get a pretty good snowfall here on occasion. A lot of folks try cross country skiing across the fields when we get a good snowfall. Crater Lake freezes solid and doesn't thaw out until Vernalis. People go ice skating and play hockey all winter.” Jovan told her.

 

“And you people keep telling me Mars is nothing like Canada!” She teased.

 

“Huh? What do you mean?” He asked, confused. “They do those things on Earth?”

 

Laren rolled her eyes. “Martians.” She said. She continued checking the pipes. She then said conspiratorially, “So I hear there might be wedding bells in your future.”

 

“What? Where did you hear that?” He hadn't told anyone except for the message he had sent off to Olympus Mons.

 

“Oh, girls talk.” She said lightly. “I think it's great, Jovan. I always thought you two would make a great couple, and I think you'll make a wonderful dad for Bili.” She added in all seriousness.

 

“Oh, thanks.” A sudden thought then occurred to him and he asked, “You haven't told anyone else, have you?”

 

“Why? It's not a secret is it?” She asked, not understanding the problem. “Mrs. Jung asks about you on occasion when I see her at the market in town. She asked about you and Janna yesterday morning when I went into town and I was so excited for you after Janna told me I sort of let it slip.”

 

Jovan felt like he had just had the wind knocked out of him. Hali Jung was one of the older members of St. Theresa's congregation. She was a notorious gossip, not malicious but there was no piece of information you could tell her that wouldn't be all over town by the end of the day. She was a more reliable source of the latest local news than the news feeds. But the worst part of it was that he knew that she frequently had tea with Father Degan.

 

His faced turned ashen and Laren must have noticed. “Are you okay? That wasn't really a problem was it? She's always so sweet, and she really seemed concerned about the both of you.”

 

He didn't answer. He couldn't. Father Degan would know. He would know before Jovan got his response from Olympus Mons. Jovan didn't know what would happen now. He managed to choke out, “I'm not feeling too well. I need to go back inside the house.” He left her standing next to the pipes in total confusion. He didn't look back to see the concern on her face, or hear her asking what she did wrong.

 

* * *

 

The ax really began to fall on Friday. Up until Friday Jovan felt like a pendulum which kept swinging between joy and panic as he spent his evenings opening up to Janna, and they spent time just being together, and then spent the rest of his days waiting for either the response from Olympus Mons or an irate Father Degan reproaching him, or both.

 

His response from Olympus Mons came on Friday morning. It was simple and direct and shattered any hopes he might have had. It read, “To Father Jovan Chin of Agroppidum. Regarding your request to marry Janna Wong, also of Agroppidum, we have requested further information from the rector at St. Theresa's Parish which is your current assignment. We have discovered he was unaware of the request for permission to marry. He should have been the first person you consulted. Upon further inquiry it was discovered that Janna Wong is not a member of the Church in good standing and has not attended Mass or been a part of the parish life for almost a full year. Further, there is some question which the rector raised as to the moral character of your proposed fiancee. As you know, it is important that the wife of a priest must be able to support her husband in all things in his ministry, and must herself be an example of faith and virtue. Finally, I have been informed that you are currently living in the same residence with this woman, something which is clearly in violation of the priestly code of conduct, and is a poor example to set for the faithful. This is something you should know without me having to inform you. At this point in time, I cannot grant permission for this marriage. Furthermore, I order you to cease your cohabitation with Janna Wong and to change your residence to the parish rectory where you should have been in residence to begin with. I have sent this order to the rector so that he may prepare proper accommodations for you. You are suspended from active service until you make confession with Father Degan Jahl, and comply with these orders. Signed, his excellency Archbishop Gilga, Archdiocese of Olympus Mons.”

 

It was five o'clock in the morning, Jovan was alone in his bedroom just after he had finished his morning prayers and meditation when he read the message. He did so another three times as he sat at the desk facing the computer's screen. He was stunned. He couldn't move. He couldn't even think. How had everything gone so very wrong? “God, why is this happening?” He asked aloud, though in a whisper. “I promised to serve You. I promised to give up everything for what You wanted me to do. What did I do wrong?” His eyes began to water, but no tears fell. Not yet.

 

He couldn't ask why Bishop Gilga was being so unreasonable. He knew the answer. Gilga had told him as much. He talked to Father Degan, and Father Degan was an old friend of his whom he trusted. He contemplated trying to compose a response explaining the truth, and trying to untwist the lies which Father Degan had spun for him. He wanted to explain the truth, and make him see. But the more he tried to word the letter in his mind, the more he realized that Bishop Gilga would only take it as confirmation of what he had already been told, and that Jovan had fallen into a sinful relationship which he was trying to justify. It didn't matter that he hadn't.

 

No, if he wanted to clear himself with his Bishop, he would have to comply with his requests. He would have to play the game, and then submit a letter explaining the truth. But how would that go over with Janna? He wondered. Not well, he knew. It would hurt her. It would be necessary if he had any hope of salvaging his ministry, but it would still hurt her needlessly. And how could he truly be a priest of Jesus Christ if he was willing to hurt someone he loved dearly to protect that priesthood? And he did love her. He knew that. He loved her enough to want to protect her from ever being hurt again.

 

Is that what Jesus would do? Is that what He taught? Did the Apostles, two and a half thousand years ago, did they have anyone so unreasonably self-righteous as Father Degan to contend with and make their lives and the lives of their loved ones miserable? Did the Fathers after them? He was pretty sure they did from what he had read, though he couldn't think of any examples just then.

 

“How can I be a priest of Jesus Christ and comply with this order?” He asked God aloud. “How can I be a priest of the Martian Orthodox Church and not comply with this order?” He asked again. No answers came.

 

As the time passed, he realized that Janna would probably have breakfast on the table by now. She and Laren had chosen to take turns preparing meals throughout the day, a fact for which he had been grateful because he couldn't cook a meal if his life depended on it. He would need to go and eat, and to tell her. He would need to talk to her. No matter what he did or said, she would be hurt again at the cruel self-righteousness of Father Degan, and it would be because of him.

 

He stood up from the desk at which he had been seated, and almost mechanically made his way upstairs to the dining room where, sure enough Janna was there, preparing a breakfast of chicken eggs, pancakes, and bacon. He leaned against the side of the doorway and watched her. Little Bili was already in his high chair working on some wheat mash. It was probably flavored with apples and cinnamon, he thought. He could hear her singing. It was a happy tune. She was beautiful and glowing as she made everythng ready for the three adults still in the house. Would she still be after he told her?

 

She spotted him. “What are you doing over there?” She asked with a shy smile.

 

“Just watching you.” He answered, trying to smile.

 

“See anything you like then?” She asked playfully.

 

“The pancakes look pretty good.” He responded, trying to joke. She picked one up and threw it at him. It hit him in the chest and would have fallen to the floor but he caught it. It was warm, but not hot, and he took a bite out of it. “It needs syrup and butter.” He said.

 

She glared at him in mock seriousness, then said, “Well, then get over here and get some. Breakfast won't stay warm forever.” He started towards the table. She had just set the plate of pancakes on the table when she turned to kiss Jovan. Then went to get a pitcher of apple juice to put on the table. It looked like a small feast.

 

“How many people are we expecting for breakfast?” He asked.

 

“Is it too much?” She stopped and asked. “I wanted it to be a nice breakfast.”

 

“It is.” He assured her. What was he going to say? What was he going to do? He was in a no-win situation. He sat down and began to put food on his plate, but didn't take much. His appetite was completely gone.

 

“I got a message this morning.” She said. “From your mother.”

 

“Oh?” He asked. “How're she and Tomas? Did they visit Tama?”

 

“Yes,” she said, “It sounds like it went really well.” She sat down at the table in between Bili and Jovan and started putting food on her own plate. “She said they'll be back later this evening. Tomas didn't bring much with him to Mars, so there wasn't that much to load up.”

 

“Well, that's good.” He said as he mechanically took a bite of egg. It had gone a little cold.

 

“They got married, Jovan. They took an air transit shuttle to Marenostrum and got married there.” She said.

 

“Oh.” He said. “I wish they would have told us so we could have been there.” It would have only been appropriate, but Jovan understood why they did it this way. It would have only started the rumor mills again, and marriage would only strengthen Tomas' immigration status. His mother had him back, and she wasn't about to let him go again. He didn't disagree.

 

“Did you tell her about us?” He asked.

 

“Oh, I did that days ago. She hasn't mentioned it yet, though in her responses.” Janna sounded worried. “Don't you think she would approve? I mean, of me?”

 

“Between the two of us, you're not the one who needs her approval.” He answered.

 

Just then Laren came up and into the dining room. “Good morning!” She said cheerily. Jovan welcomed her presence just then. The conversation had drifted dangerously close to his own message this morning. The one which would break Janna's heart. The one which he couldn't tell her.

 

Soon, after breakfast they would separate off into their respective chores, and it would give him time to think, time to figure out how he was going to tell her, and time to figure out what would happen next.

 

* * *

 

Janna was with the sheep when the old man came to the Chin farmstead unannounced. Jovan had been looking after little Bili in the house, watching an educational cartoon when the doorbell rang out. He hefted the boy onto his hip, paused the video and went upstairs to answer the door.

 

The door slid open, and on the front porch stood the aging form of Father Degan in his black clerics and white collar. His face was twisted in anger, and it looked as if a storm brewed behind his eyes. “How dare you.” He began the conversation. “How dare you do this. Shacking up with that Wong whore and then having the audacity to ask the Bishop permission to marry her. You're even taking care of her bastard like some common nanny. Have you lost your senses?”

 

Jovan's hands curled into fists as he struggled to keep himself from hitting the older man as he hit Bili Farkas so many years ago. He remained silent, grating his teeth.

 

“Did you really think I wouldn't find out? You should have told me about this 'relationship'.” He spat the word “relationship” at Jovan. “Instead, I had to find out from Bishop Gilga himself! Then I receive orders to prepare a room for you in the rectory!” His voice raised. “Do you really believe I want you in my rectory, much less my parish after this?!”

 

“You don't really know Janna,” Jovan managed to say in a nearly civil tone, “if you really think so little of her.”

 

“Don't give me that. I baptized her! I watched her grow up and then throw away all that promise. I can see with my own eyes the evidence of what kind of woman she became sitting in your arms!” He shouted. “And you! You threw away everything for this, this whore?”

 

Don't. Jovan told himself. It's just a word. Keep your hands down where they are. “I haven't thrown anything away.” He said. “Neither she, nor I, have sinned in any way, nor have I broken my vows.” He said evenly.

 

“My rectory is for righteous, devoted priests. If you expect to stay there, you had better be prepared to prove that you are one.” Degan told him.

 

“And how would I do that?” He didn't know how much longer he could control his anger.

 

“Get rid of that whore and her bastard, and never see them again! Come and make confession, and then we'll see whether or not you continue to serve my congregation.” Degan said.

 

“I see.” Jovan said seething, not able to restrain himself for much longer. “Thank you for making your position perfectly clear. Good bye, Father Degan.” He then closed the door on the old man, and returned downstairs with Bili to the living room, and unpaused the video. He collapsed with the little boy on the cushioned couch, his hands balling and unballing in a fury he fought to rein in.

 

There was nothing he could do now. He was being backed into a corner, and was being given only two options; Janna, or the Church. “Lord Jesus Christ, how did it come to this?” He asked silently. Three months ago, he was a newly ordained priest about to head to his first mission assignment. He had been the top of his class academically. He had always had a good relationship with his superiors and instructors. Gliese Five was supposed to be his life's commitment to the work of the Lord. What happened? Micro-meteorites that tore into a shuttle by random coincidence? A bomb on a space station that had nothing to do with him? A terrorist attack and government coup that also had nothing to do with him? Did these things explain why his superiors would now no longer listen to him or believe him?

 

What was Degan's vendetta against Janna? It went far past anything rational as far as Jovan was concerned. Was this the kind of malicious vomit that he spewed at the Church People of his youth about his mother and Tomas? Jovan felt his head begin to spin.

 

He had promised that he would sacrifice anything for the Lord. He had made that promise many years before. Was he really being asked to sacrifice Janna and Bili? To cast them aside?

 

He needed to speak with someone. Another priest, one who actually understood what that meant, as he now knew for certain Degan Jahl didn't. He would have tried to talk with his Bishop or one of his instructors from Olympus Mons, but he doubted any of them would hear him out at this point.

 

 

Later That Day

 

It had been a very long time since Jovan had set foot in Millie and Kelmo Borat's house, and yet all the sights and smells and sounds were exactly the same. Aunt Millie and Uncle Kelmo had aged well, although he could tell they were beginning to slow down a bit. Kelmo had begun to let his own farm managers take over more and more of the day to day operations. Millie spent more time sitting down. But besides that, they were still very much the people he remembered and loved.

 

He sat at the table in Millie's kitchen. A fresh baked apple pie lay on the table in front of him. The oven was still taking its time to cool down. He had taken them a little by surprise that afternoon when he came over, but they greeted him with open arms, and after Kelmo sat back down for his football match, Millie had brought him back to the kitchen where they worked on the apple pie starting from scratch just like they used to.

 

As they worked, he had told her everything which had happened to him on Olympus Mons right up to a week ago, including his recent relationship with Janna. Aunt Millie listened intently to his story, and clapped her hands together in joy when he told her of his engagement to her. Then he started in on that morning's developments. Her smile shrank as the look on her face turned to anger at the Bishop's response, and then very nearly rage at Degan Jahl's uncalled for visit.

 

She laid a knife on the table next to the pie, readying for slicing, and then in a very quiet and controlled voice, she asked, “Did you tell Janna about this yet?”

 

“No.”He responded.

 

“So what are you going to do?” She asked in the same controlled voice.

 

“I don't know.” He answered. Her quiet controlled voice, he knew, could be the prelude to an explosion that no one in their right mind wanted to see, but he didn't know how to prevent it this time.

 

“You don't know.” She repeated. “You don't know?” Her voice began to raise.

 

“If I do what they want, I lose Janna and Bili. If I don't, I lose everything.” He replied.

 

“Everything? Are you kidding me? Sounds to me like you lose a bunch of pompous self-righteous superiors starting with that horse's ass of a priest Degan!” She nearly shouted. “If you do comply with them you'll lose more than just Janna, you'll lose your mother, Tomas, your home! That's everything. You'll also lose us because we won't want anything to do with you either!”

 

Jovan's heart sank. “What do I do? I promised God I would sacrifice whatever He asked me to to serve His will.” He asked sadly.

 

“You are not sacrificing that girl or that little boy! He's going to need a father, and you of all people know about a boy needing a father, Jovan!” Her voice was raising now to a full shout, and he wondered how long it would be before Kelmo could hear her through the ceiling of the living room.

 

“But how can I serve God if I am thrown out of the Church?” He answered her.

 

“What kind of a God does your Church worship if he demands that you hurt everyone else around you, and especially that girl, just to 'serve' Him? That's not the God I've read about in the Scriptures.” She responded.

 

“No, it's not.” He quietly agreed.

 

“Your mom always intended for you to have the farmstead, did she tell you that?” Millie asked him.

 

“No, she never did.” He responded, surprised.

 

“That's why she argued with you so much about you going off to be a priest. Tama didn't really want it, at least not all of it. She always wanted to be a veterinarian, but she couldn't wait to get out of here and go to university in the city. She didn't want you to go and leave your father's farmstead. You know it's been in your family for almost a thousand years don't you? And then you just walked away from it!” There was frustration and pain on her face too.

 

“I just wanted to do the right thing.” He said weakly.

 

“Then 'do' the right thing, Jovan! It's really not that hard! Marry that girl! Be a father to the boy! Stay on that farmstead and teach Bili to farm too. Be a good man.” She sounded incredulous that the answer could be so hard for him.

 

“I want to, Aunt Millie!” His voice began to raise in frustration. “But I've already taken my vows, sacred vows, to obey my Bishop. As much as I may want to be with Janna and Bili it doesn't change the fact.”

 

“Even if he's wrong? Even if his decisions are based on lies? You can't reason with him? If he's unwilling to listen, this Bishop of yours is as big of a horse's ass as Degan is.” She challenged him.

 

“It doesn't matter.” He said, defeated. “Jesus said that anyone who loves family or friends more than Him isn't worthy of being His disciple.”

 

“The Scriptures also say that anyone who doesn't love doesn't know God because God is love.” Millie threw back at him. “I can read them just like you.” She then added, “Do you really think Degan knows God just because he's a priest?”

 

She took up the knife and began to carve up the pie on the table viciously, and Jovan began to feel sorry for it. He wondered if Aunt Millie was imagining Degan's head there instead, and then put the thought out of his mind. Millie couldn't have weighed more than four kilos, but she could easily frighten a grown man twice her size when she became enraged with a knife in her hands.

 

Satisfied that the pie was properly dead and dissected she pulled three plates from her cupboard and carefully pulled a slice onto each with a wide bladed knife. She then took one of the plates, and a fork downstairs to Kelmo and returned. She looked a little calmer when she came back into the kitchen and sat down with her own small plate of pie.

 

“I can tell you what to do, but I can't make up your mind for you. I wish to heaven I could, Jovan. It seems pretty clear to me, but then I'm not a priest. I wish there was one with some sense that you could talk to, but I don't know of any.” She said calmly. “It's the reason Kelmo and I don't go to church.”

 

“The moral state of the celebrant doesn't have any effect on the efficacy of the Sacrament for those partaking.” Jovan said as if by rote.

 

“Tell that to Janna and Bili.” Aunt Millie replied. “It may not affect things in the mystical high and mighty places, but it sure has an impact on the real people here on the ground.”

 

He couldn't find an argument for that, and he started in on his own pie.

 

“You're going to need to say something before tomorrow morning.” She said.

 

“Tomorrow morning?” He questioned.

 

“Everyone's going to wonder why you're not at the church teaching that catechism class you told me about.” She then added, “And if we both know Father Degan, his version of you and Janna will be the topic of his Sunday homily.”

 

Jovan put his fork down and pushed the plate away from him. He wasn't hungry anymore.

 

* * *

 

Jovan walked back to the farmstead. Aunt Millie had sent the remains of the apple pie with him in a plastic container. The walk between the two houses always took around three quarters of an hour when he was carrying something. And this time he was carrying more than just the apple pie with him. He had precisely between the time he left Millie and Kelmo's house to the time they all went to bed tonight to determine what form the rest of his life would take. And no matter what, it would never be the same.

 

If he left Janna and Bili, and went crawling on his knees to Father Degan, he would alienate everyone who had been family to him, but he might salvage his calling to holy orders and eventually continue on in ministry elsewhere, away from Father Degan and everyone else. He would completely sacrifice everyone he loved for his calling, and wasn't that what Jesus said was necessary?

 

If he chose to marry Janna, it would have to be a civil marriage, outside of the Church. There would be no going back. No continued ministry, at least not for a long, long time if ever. He would be sacrificing everything he had wanted to do with his life to settle down and be a farmer. But it wouldn't end there, because he would also bring down the wrath of Degan and the rest of St. Theresa's congregation on him and Janna. They would be ostracized from a large portion of the town, just like she and Bili had. But, Bili would have a father, and Janna would have a husband.

 

So, as he walked through the barren fields, the choice came down to this he realized, “Do I sacrifice my future, or Janna's?” As it became that simple for him, he realized the truth of what Millie had said. “What would Jesus do?” He asked himself. “What did Jesus do?” He asked again, comprehending as he asked. It was a contradiction. It was a paradox. A strange, absurd, wonderful paradox that the thing he was really being asked to sacrifice in order to be a disciple wasn't Janna, Bili, or any human relationship, but his own plans and expectations for the future. It was the harder choice, he realized.

 

Overhead, Deimos had been alone in the sky for most of his walk back, but Phobos rose quickly to join its mate in the sky. A shooting star streaked through the upper atmosphere, and he began to wonder how he had ever contemplated leaving Mars to begin with.

 

He reached their house and went inside. His mother and Tomas still hadn't returned, but the sun hadn't gone down yet, and it wasn't fully evening. Both Janna and Laren were in the kitchen preparing supper for the three of them. Bili was in his playpen watching them intently, fascinated with their movements.

 

Jovan walked into the kitchen and embraced Janna fiercely picking her up off her feet and twirling her in the air. He kissed her passionately, which she returned in kind. “Hello yourself.” She said when she was able.

 

“I choose you.” He told her. “I choose you, Janna.”

 

“Okay.” She said confused. “I thought we already had that covered.”

 

“Laren, can I steal her from the kitchen for a minute?” Jovan asked.

 

“Sure, but only just. She's the real brains behind supper tonight.” Laren said.

 

He took Janna downstairs to the living room and began to open up, telling her about the Bishop's message this morning, Degan's visit, and his conversation with Aunt Millie. He then said again, “I choose you, Janna. I choose you and Bili, no matter what it costs me. I won't hurt you, and I'm not leaving you.”

 

Janna fell stunned backwards to sit on the couch behind her. Jovan couldn't tell all the emotions which she was trying to sort through. It looked as though one second she wanted to punch something, and another she wanted to cry, and still another she wanted to cry for joy. Tears came to her eyes and began streaming down her cheeks. “Really?” She finally said.

 

“Really.” He repeated.

 

“We can't get married here, or even in the Church.” She said. “You're okay with that?” She asked timidly.

 

“Are you?” He asked back.

 

“Yes.” She stood up and embraced him, nuzzling her face into his shoulder. “Yes.” She repeated.

 

He held her in his arms for several minutes before she looked up and said, “Oh, I need to go and finish in the kitchen!” She wiped her eyes with her palms quickly, and then rushed back upstairs. “I'm sorry, Laren!” He could hear her saying apologetically.

 

* * *

 

Supper was good. Janna had fixed a sizable buffalo meat pie, enough for five people. They had all thought that his mother and Tomas would have been home by suppertime, but it wasn't until an hour past that his mother's ground car pulled in, and the two entered the house to warm embraces. Tomas and Jovan went to unload the car of their luggage, and Jovan was a little surprised to find a small trailer which he didn't recognize attached behind the car.

 

“I brought everything I owned from Earth, or at least everything they would let me bring, Jovanito.” Tomas told him when he saw Jovan looking at it. “Like I told your mother, I'm not going back this time.” He then extended his left hand to show Jovan the band of gold which encircled his ring finger. “Your mom and I have made it official, now. Now, I really am your dad. It is far too late to really be that now, I suppose.” Tomas said this last part sadly, the regret bleeding into his voice.

 

Jovan embraced the older man warmly, and told him, “No, it it isn't.”

 

The two then began to unload the luggage bags. “The trailer will wait until morning. We are in no hurry.” Tomas said.

 

In no hurry. He wasn't going anywhere and no one would make him. That sounded good, better than good to Jovan. “No, we're in no hurry.” He agreed.

 

They brought the bags into the house and downstairs into his mother's bedroom. “Their” bedroom, Jovan corrected himself. Then they returned upstairs to the living room where Janna and Laren were sitting admiring the gold and diamond band encircling Miria's ring finger. Jovan's mother held out her left hand for Jovan to see the diamond encrusted gold ring. It reflected the light in bursts of tiny rainbow colors.

 

“Definitely better late than never.” Jovan said to himself.

 

“Looks like Tomas has set the bar pretty high, Jovan.” Laren teased conspiratorially. “You're going to have to go all out for Janna's ring, aren't you?”

 

“Janna's ring?” Miria asked, looking first at Janna and then to Jovan. “What does she mean, Janna's ring?”

 

The room went quiet. Janna looked at Miria, confused and worried. “I sent you a message days ago. Jovan and I have decided to get married.”

 

“I haven't had a chance to check my messages since I sent my last one about us.” She said, her pitch rising. “When did this happen?”

 

“Monday.” Jovan answered. “We decided on it Monday.”

 

Miria kept looking between Jovan and Janna. “You don't seriously expect Father Degan to marry the two of you, do you?” Her voice was panicked, and filled with worry.

 

“Why wouldn't he...?” Laren began to ask, not understanding the problem, but Jovan cut her off.

 

“We don't. We never did.” He said.

 

“And your 'superiors' are okay with this?” Miria asked her son.

 

“It doesn't matter anymore.” Jovan replied.

 

“It doesn't?” Miria asked, confused. “Since when?”

 

“Since this morning. We're going to get married in a civil service. The Church isn't going to be a factor.” Jovan answered.

 

“Really?” Miria asked again in disbelief.

 

“Really.” Janna answered this time.

 

“So, you are going to be Bili's papa, after all.” Tomas said, clapping Jovan lightly on the back, though it was still hard enough to nearly knock the wind out of Jovan.

 

“Yes,” He said gasping a little, “Yes, I am.” He coughed.

 

“Good.” Tomas said. “Little boys need their papas, Jovanito.” He then repeated himself quietly, and thoughtful. “Little boys need their papas.”

 

* * *

After Laren had gone to bed, and Tomas and Miria had gone off to unpack and get ready for the night, Janna and Jovan were once again in the living room by themselves. She had already put Bili to bed in his crib downstairs and had returned upstairs to sit with him. They held hands quietly, as Janna rested her head on his shoulder.

 

“Would you really give up your calling, your priesthood, and everything you've worked for just for me?” Janna asked him.

 

“I think I already have.” Jovan replied.

 

She raised her head up and looked at him with a serious, yet loving expression. She held his hands and said, “I don't want you to. Not if there's any way possible.”

 

“I don't think there's any way...” He started to say.

 

“You need to explain to Bishop Gilga what Degan Jahl has been doing. He needs to know that he's been lied to.” She said. “It's not fair to him otherwise. I want you to try one more time.”

 

Jovan was stunned, and didn't know what to say.

 

“If God called you to be a priest, than you're still supposed to be a priest, right?” She asked.

 

“Yes, but...” Jovan started to say, and then she put her fingers on his mouth and silenced him.

 

She then continued, “I don't want to be the reason you disobeyed God or walked away from what He called you to. I don't like what Father Degan's done to this church or this town or me or you, but as far as I'm concerned, he doesn't represent God or even the Church, or what's best about the Church anyway. You need to try at least one more time.”

 

Wow. He thought. “Are you sure?” He asked.

 

“I'm positive.” She answered.

 

“Okay. I will.” He told her.

 

“Good.” She said, then she lowered her head back onto his shoulder and closed her eyes, leaving him to stare off into space while his mind raced.

 

* * *

 

“To his immanence, Bishop Mesho Gilga, Greetings. It is my belief that Father Degan Jahl has misinformed you about the circumstances surrounding Janna Wong's and my relationship due to his own prejudice against her and the unfortunate circumstances surrounding the birth of her son, and against clerical marriage in general, something which the Church has permitted since its inception following Martian autonomy. What he may not have informed you of is that he refused to marry her and her son's father based on a requirement of the two living apart for one year, a circumstance which was made impossible by her parents disownment of her at his encouragement. To my knowledge, there is no such requirement in the canon laws of the Church. As to our living arrangements, Janna has been residing at my mother's farmstead house because she is employed here as her livestock specialist. I am living at my mother's farmstead house because there was no room initially in the rectory at St. Theresa's Parish in Agroppidum, and Father Jahl has not been inclined to make room there either before our engagement, or especially after. I assure you, there has been no inappropriate or sinful contact between myself and her. I am sincerely asking you to reconsider your decision, and allow me to marry Janna Wong within the Church outside of St. Theresa's parish, and Father Jahl's jurisdiction. Sincerely, Father Jovan Chin. ”

 

Jovan finished his text message after saying good night to Janna, and everyone else had gone to bed. He sent it electronically from the computer access at his desk in his bedroom. He knew Janna was right, although it blew his mind when she told him to do it. She never stopped amazing him.

 

It was a last ditch attempt he knew to salvage and reconcile his calling to ministry and his marriage to Janna. He sat staring thoughtfully at the lights of the holographic computer display which emanated from ports embedded into the desk for several minutes before he shut it down and it disappeared into the air.

 

He had already made his choice. He knew more or less what he would do if the bishop still said no, but if there was any way he could avoid it, he would. A civil service was perfectly legal, and such marriages were generally recognized by the Church in the case of couples joining the Church together, or even members who didn't generally attend much, like his mother had been before she became pregnant with his sister. But it wouldn't be acceptable for him to be married as a priest by anyone else other than another priest or a bishop. He knew it was wishful thinking at this point. It seemed like Degan had poisoned the bishop's opinion against him so badly that he didn't know if it could be recovered.

 

He got up from his desk and turned to sit on his bed. Janna was right, he thought. These two things shouldn't conflict. He began to pray, “God, I know you're the One who called me into the priesthood. You showed me what a priest could be, and what the Church could be. All I've wanted was to be that person. Now, Janna and Bili also need me to be something more. In your mercy, please make it possible for me to do both. I ask this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” He made the sign of the cross as he finished.

 

 

The Next Day

 

Jovan didn't show up on Saturday morning for the Catechism classes. Instead the children were horrified to find their old taskmaster Mrs. Kini returned like some vengeful wraith in her glory. When asked, she would not tell them what had happened to the nice young priest who had been teaching them, only that he wouldn't be there anymore. Those children who paid attention were quite disturbed to see a small grin on her lips as she said it. There were a lot of children who paid attention.

 

Jovan found himself instead going over farm management details at the dining room table with Laren and Tomas, and wishing he was back teaching the kids much as the kids were desperately wishing he was the one teaching them. Janna and Bili were with Miria as Miria looked over Janna's work with her livestock.

 

Tomas was a wealth of experience and knowledge about not only the management of Miria's farmstead, but also the inner workings and practices of the Agrosolar company and its clients. Both Jovan and Laren learned things about Agrosolar which they weren't certain that they wanted to know.

 

“That's criminal!” Laren practically shouted. “I had no idea!” She truly looked a little scared at the prospect.

 

“Well, its true.” Tomas said, disgusted that he had been a part of it. “The company monopolizes as much of the Mars grain as possible so it can dictate what it pays for it to the farmers, and then resells it to the Earth food processors at ten times what it's really worth. They do the same with all the other foodstuffs they buy from here.”

 

“How do they get away with that?” Laren asked, shocked.

 

“It's not something that they tell just anyone, and Martians don't have many other options if they want to sell off world. They drove all the other large interplanetary distributors out of business, and the small companies are only allowed to exist to make it look like they've got competition. As soon as a company starts picking up more business, Agrosolar starts bullying their customers to bring them back into line. And Earthers don't have many other options if they want to eat.” Tomas said, matter of factly. “Food produced on planet in Canada, Greenland, and Siberia is almost as expensive as Mars imports for eight billion mouths to feed. Until Venus terraforming is ready for grain and livestock—which it won't be for another hundred years standard—Mars is the only other local world capable of producing large amounts of food.” Tomas explained.

 

“What about the other colonies outside of the Solar System?” Jovan asked. He really didn't know much about how interplanetary or interstellar trade worked.

 

“They're only reachable by hyperspace. The company could import from there, and there's always a running discussion about doing so, but it comes down to cost. It costs more in fuel resources to haul that much mass through hyperspace. It would eat into Agrosolar's profits if they started trying to import to Earth from twenty light years away instead of in system.”

 

“What happens to those people who can't afford Agrosolar's prices?” Jovan asked.

 

“They starve, Jovanito.” Tomas said sadly. “And the Earth Authority does nothing to prevent it because Earth can't support the population it has.”

 

“I didn't realize.” Laren said, shocked. “I always thought there was something available for the poor, the way the E.A. always talks.”

 

“Everyone in the agricultural regions does.” Tomas said. “The E.A. strictly limits the populations there so they have more space for food production. No one is allowed to migrate into those regions except on food production business, and once you leave for any other reason, you can't go back. In reality, they only thing they'll pay for the poor is a one-way cheap seat on a transit shuttle outbound for someplace that isn't Earth.” He then added sadly, “Earth is collapsing under its own weight of people.”

 

Laren looked sick. She was from agricultural Canada where she had always had enough food and things never seemed that bad.

 

“I knew Earth could be pushy, but I didn't realize how ruthless they could be.” Jovan said.

 

“What else can they do, Jovanito? There are only so many resources to go around. The one who controls those resources controls Earth and its colonies.” Tomas said. “Right now, where the food resources are concerned—and they would harvest Mars' trees for lumber if the MCA would let them—that one is Agrosolar, and they are milking it for all they can. The plans are already in place to milk the Venus colony when it can produce more than its own needs.”

 

Just then, a holographic computer display emitted from a section of wall near the table, and a soft, friendly female voice asked, “Jovan has an incoming text message. Would you like to take it here, Jovan?”

 

“No, thank you. Put it up in my bedroom. I'll be there in a minute.” Jovan replied, and the display disappeared. Jovan got up to go downstairs.

 

“Expecting something important?” Laren asked.

 

“Yes. I'll be right back.” He said uncertainly. He hadn't expected to get an answer from Olympus Mons this quickly, and not on a Saturday.

 

He went downstairs to his bedroom and the holographic display was already brightly shining from its emitters in the desk. He sat down and the previously fuzzy screen came into sharp focus as he looked directly at it. There in front of him was in fact a single message in his inbox, but it wasn't from Bishop Gilga's office.

 

“Bishop Shar?” Jovan asked into the air as he touched the holographic screen and opened the message on the display. Narso Shar had been the bishop of Xanthe Province, and had until seminary kept up in correspondence with Jovan for several years. As far as Jovan knew, he had retired before Jovan had been ordained.

 

“To Father Jovan Chin, Greetings and a belated congratulations on your ordination. I am sorry it has been so long since we've corresponded. I wanted to write and catch up with how you are doing. For my part, I finally discovered that I was getting old. Too old in fact to run a diocese, even one as small as ours. I have retired from actively serving as the Presiding Bishop of Xanthe Province and now only serve in an advisory capacity. I spoke with Bishop Gilga of the Offworld Apostolate not long ago and he told me some pretty tall tales about you, not all of them good. I want to hear your side of it. Sincerely, Narso Shar, Bishop Emeritus of Xanthe Province.”

 

Bishop Shar had always been a good friend to Jovan, even and especially before he entered the Church. He had helped him through some pretty difficult spots. If anyone would understand and be able to advise him, it would be Narso Shar.

 

Jovan then started to compose a longer message, explaining what had happened, and leaving no detail out. Then, about a half an hour later he finished and sent it off as a reply to his older friend, wondering what would come of it. He then went back upstairs to Laren and Tomas.

 

* * *

 

Later that evening, after Bili had been put to bed, Jovan and Janna were sitting up alone talking and spending time with one another. Another message came through, and this time Jovan had it put through to where they were in the living room.

 

The holographic display came up on the wall and Jovan stood up to touch it, opening the message. It was from Bishop Shar again.

 

“Father Jovan Chin, I read your last message and spoke again with Bishop Gilga privately. You won't be receiving another reply from him. Instead, I want you to do two things. Request a letter of release from Gilga, and then you and your family, especially your fiancee, come and see me here in Marenostrum. Don't bother saying anything more to Father Jahl. I'll explain when you're all here. Sincerely, Narso Shar, Bishop Emeritus of Xanthe Province.”

 

“Who is Narso Shar?” Janna asked, “And why does he want all of us to come to Marenostrum?”

 

“Narso is the man who really led me to follow Jesus Christ into the Church. I first met him when my mom and I had to go there for her to renegotiate our contract with Agrisolar. I had gotten myself into some trouble with this eco-pagan Xanthan group I fell in with and he rescued me from it, took me to his own home and took care of me while we waited to be able to get a hold of my mom. He was the first priest of any kind I had known who didn't condemn me for getting into trouble or making mistakes. He showed me what a priest should be, and was my inspiration for joining the Church's priesthood.” Jovan explained. “I don't know what he's got in mind for all of us. I kept up with him through text messages, but I haven't seen him in eight years.” Trying to reassure her, and to some extant himself, he said. “He's not like Degan. If anything, he wants to help.”

 

Janna thought this through, and then said, “Do you think you can convince your mom to come to see a bishop? Especially after telling her that the Church wasn't going to be a factor anymore?”

 

“I don't know, to be honest. She knows who he is. She's met him before, and she knows we wrote to each other.” He answered. “I just wish he had explained a little more so that I'd have more to tell her.”

 

“What's a 'letter of release'?” Janna asked.

 

“A letter of release is a formal granting of permission to be released from a bishop's authority. Technically speaking, once a person is ordained as a priest, they can't ever lose their ordination no matter what happens, but without the oversight of a bishop, they don't possess their own authority to celebrate the Sacraments within the geographical boundaries of a provincial diocese. If they do, it would be tantamount to setting up their own rival Church and causing a division like what happened on Earth.” Jovan explained. “Once confirmed as a Christian schismatic, Mars Colonial Authority would step in at that point and deport the offending priest offworld.”

 

“That sounds pretty harsh.” Janna commented.

 

“It's our own fault.” He said. “It's one of the oldest laws in Martian planetary legislation, but Christians brought it on themselves when they nearly destroyed the stability of the Mars colony in its infancy almost a thousand years ago. It's also the reason why 'missionaries' from Earth are deported immediately when they're discovered and arrested. No other religious group has such tight controls placed on it, except for us.”

 

“Are you going to ask for a letter of release?” She asked.

 

“If Narso thinks it's a good idea, then yes. I trust him.” He answered. “And I think we should trust him to go to Marenostrum.”

 

“Okay. I trust you, Jovan. And if you trust this bishop, then I will too.” Janna told him.

 

* * *

 

“But I thought you said the Church wasn't going to be a factor anymore.” Miria said, exasperated with her son. “And now you want us all to fly out to Marenostrum because this bishop of the Church says it's a good idea? When is this going to stop?”

 

Jovan had tried to broach the subject that Sunday morning after breakfast. “This is Narso Shar, remember, Mom. When I was seven and we spent that week in Marenostrum? The man who helped me out? He's a retired Bishop. He doesn't approve of what Degan Jahl is doing. He's always tried to help before.”

 

“I know you don't want to just abandon your faith, Jovan. I understand that, and I even respect it. I was raised Martian Orthodox. Your father and I baptized you in the Church just like we were. I realize it's not the faith that's the problem, but it's the people who are making the decisions about that faith and if you're not careful they'll use you and burn you so badly that they'll be nothing left. There's a good reason why yours is the only faith that is regulated by law on this planet. On the whole planet, Jovan.” Miria said, bitterness in her voice.

 

“My faith.” Jovan said, trying to come to grips with the implications of what she had said.

 

“Yes, your faith. Not mine.” Miria said a little more forcefully. “I believed in Jesus Christ, Jovan. I believed in the man who said and taught what he did thousands of years ago. I still do. But I don't believe in a religion which destroys people out of sheer vindictive spite, people like Janna and myself. The only ones on this planet that seem to understand and at least try to practice what Jesus taught are the Tao-Buddhists, because it's almost the same thing as the original Buddha did.”

 

Janna, who had been present during this exchange, stood up from where she had been sitting and went to stand next to Jovan. She put her hand into his and said, “It's my faith too, Miria. God knows I've been hurt by this Church and by Degan Jahl. If it weren't for them Bili wouldn't have died on that station waiting to get out of quarantine. But just because those who are supposed to represent the faith are warped and twisted doesn't mean the faith itself is. I want to go with Jovan to see how Narso Shar can help us. And I want you and Tomas to come with us.”

 

“She is right, Miria.” Tomas walked in. He had been standing at the top of the stairs unnoticed by those in the room listening to the debate. “On my home planet, there have been many, many corrupt religious leaders who have done unspeakable things in God's name. But that is their fault, not God's, and they will have to answer to Him for it. Back home in Mexico City, we had several priests come and go at Our Lady of Guadalupe's Catholic parish. Some of them were even worse than this Degan Jahl sounds. But many of them were kind men who truly loved everyone around them and tried to live what they preached everyday even when it cost them dearly. You can't judge this man in Marenostrum by the priest here in Agroppidum. I want to go and hear him out too.” He then took Miria's hand in his own and said, “This is important to Jovanito. We should at least go and hear the man out. If I am not mistaken, Jovanito can't get into much worse trouble with his Church. It seems to me that this bishop can only help things. And if not, well, then it can't get much worse. Besides, with all of us there, Janna and Jovanito can be married while we are there regardless of what happens with the Church. And if this man can smooth things over so Jovanito can stay a priest, so much the better. We can only gain by going.”

 

Miria looked at Tomas, then to Janna and Jovan, and back to Tomas. She seemed to relax a bit and said, “It was a long time ago, but I do remember him. He was a really nice man, almost like many of the Tao-Buddhist lamas I've met. Alright, do what you need to do Jovan, and we'll make the travel arrangements. Laren can hold down the farmstead for a few days. How long do you think we'll need?”

 

“I don't know, he didn't say. At least few days, I would imagine. It'll take at least that long to get the letter of release from Bishop Gilga, and probably longer because it has to be on a permanent physical medium like carbon paper. It can't just be sent electronically.”

 

“Alright, tell him that we'll wait until this letter comes, and then we'll go.” Miria said.

 

* * *

 

Jovan sent the formal request electronically the next day and then waited as life around the farmstead went on. Janna continued in her exosuit with the sheep. Miria took Bili again during those times and Jovan was left to wait and wonder. He and Janna continued to spend their time together when the demands of the farm allowed. No further word was heard from St. Theresa's or Father Jahl, and they counted it as a blessing. Neither did they attempt to contact anyone from the parish in Agroppidum.

 

The letter of release came swiftly, more swiftly than he had thought it would. Bishop Gilga would have had to have already had it prepared for it to have come all the way from Olympus Mons. It came by way of ground parcel delivery about a week later.

 

“Well, that's that.” Jovan said to himself as he stood on the doorstep in the cooler quadrautumn weather and opened the parcel, looking at the black, carbon fiber sheet of paper. The lettering was of a silver color in the formal Martian ideographic written language, as opposed to the syllabic writing which was used for everyday business transactions and correspondence. It was the written language into which the Holy Scriptures had been rendered. The black paper carried such a weight of finality to him. It was composed of carbon microfibers and was nearly indestructible. It was as permanent a medium for a document as could be physically made by human beings.

 

He was released, but it wasn't a feeling of release. It was a feeling of deep loss, like an important part of him had been suddenly ripped away. He felt a deep, almost physical pain in his chest, and it forced him to sit down on the doorstep and just try and breathe. The black piece of paper could be a double edged knife, he realized as well. On the one hand, it severed him from being able to practice the vocation for which he had studied for so long within the Church. But on the other hand, in releasing him from the bishop's authority, Gilga had no say in whom he married or how, and neither did Jahl.

 

When he had steadied himself, he stood up and went back inside, closing the door to the chill.

 

* * *

 

They made their preparations and the four of them left by groundcar for the long drive to Tharsis City, and to fly from there to Marenostrum by air transit. Ironically, the flight to Marenostrum would take less than half the time it took to drive between Agroppidum and Tharsis City, even though the provincial capital was only a few hundred kilometers from the farming community and Marenostrum was almost two thousand kilometers away from Tharsis.

 

The flight was also more comfortable for everyone. Miria's ground car was small by most standards. It was a six wheeled, closed top, three speed, manual transmission, fuel cell powered model originally only meant to seat four passengers at the most, with a small bed in the rear for cargo. Fitting in a restraint seat for Bili meant Jovan and Janna being squished on either side of it. The flight cabin of the small economy air transit shuttle was luxuriously spacious by comparison. There was even a complementary in-flight holomovie and dinner for the three hour trip.

 

Janna sat near the window, and was the first one to see Marenostrum as the aircraft approached. “That's it?” She asked, disappointed. “I thought it was supposed to be at least a couple of million people. It looks almost smaller than home.” What she was seeing was a few square kilometers of individual single story buildings connected by a small network of black carbon-crete roads interspersed with various kinds of evergreen trees which blended into the nearby forest which stretched on into the distance. The smallish town was located next to a huge water shipping port, though it seemed mostly still because ice had already formed on the water of the sea next to it due to the approach of winter. Next to the seaport was a huge landing strip and control facility obviously capable of handling aircraft four and five times the size of the small twenty passenger shuttle they were on. It seemed totally incongruous with the tiny little forest town she could see out her window.

 

“That's only the surface structures and the seaport.” Jovan said. “The surface structures only serve as the entryways into the city, you can't actually see the whole city itself. Remember, Marenostrum is one of the oldest cities on Mars, started before the magnetic field was fully in place back when they built almost everything underground to protect the people from radiation bombardment. It also helps to keep the city warm and comfortable even in the dead of winter this far north. It runs for kilometers straight down into the crust and spreads out for at least a hundred kilometers in diameter. The cave system is all supported by carbon-tube reinforcements to prevent any kind of collapse no matter how much or how deep they dig, but I think they've reached the point where they can't dig any deeper safely, and they have to expand outward instead of downward. Narso told me about it when I was here before.” He explained. “Don't worry, you won't be disappointed. There's this main cavern that was converted into a tropical biosphere garden park a thousand years ago. It's absolutely beautiful. Then there's all the shops, and businesses, amusement parks, casinos, and resorts, as well as the local residences, all carved out of the bedrock and interconnected with pedestrian tunnels, escalators, hydraulic lifts, and vacuum magtrains. I would probably still be lost in there if he hadn't found me.”

 

“Oh.” She said in response. “Are there really two million people in there?”

 

“I don't know, but if it's still like it was when I was seven, then I'd guess at least that number and probably another million on top of it. Plus, you have all the tourists coming in year round.” He said.

 

“Wow.” She said.

 

“There are even a lot of people in Marenostrum who've never seen the sun, but have lived all their lives underground.” He added. “It's something of a status symbol among the older, wealthier families in the city.”

 

“You're making that up!” Janna laughed and playfully hit him.

 

“I'm not!” He protested. “You wait and see.” His mind briefly went back to a middle aged couple with their noses in the air calling him a “sun-soaked surface waif” many years before. By the wrinkle in their faces, it seemed to be the worst possible thing they could think of anyone being.

 

“I can't imagine living all my life without seeing the sun, any sun, much less liking it that way.” She said.

 

“Neither can I.” He agreed.

 

The shuttle landed and they picked up their luggage and went through Marenostrum customs screening, which they all remarked as weird because they had only moved from one province to another, not from one planet to another. They were told that it had something to do with protecting the delicate underground ecosystem from surface contamination. From there they followed the arriving crowds down large escalators to the station for the magtrains which would take them into the various neighborhoods and districts of the massive city.

 

They caught magtrain 31-B into the resort district where they had booked three rooms for Miria and Tomas, Janna and Bili, and Jovan at a small resort hotel that prided itself on being the economical alternative to the larger and better known chains. It was situated within easy walking distance of the Biosphere Garden Cavern and its modest amenities were still more luxurious than anything Janna or Jovan had ever experienced.

 

Upon getting their individual room passcodes, Miria told them sincerely, “I hope you both enjoy it. This is the hotel where Tomas and I stayed recently to get married ourselves. It's not the fanciest, but I've worked on a good relationship with the owners over the years when I've needed to come here for the Agrosolar contract. They'll let us stay here on an open ended basis for up to two weeks if we need it.”

 

“I don't remember staying here when I was a kid. It was a different hotel, wasn't it?” Jovan asked.

 

“That was when you were just into puberty. I met the owners a couple of years later, after you had already left.” Miria explained.

 

It was in the later evening by the time they all settled into their respective rooms. Jovan had already said goodnight to Janna and Bili and was preparing for bed himself. His room may not have been the fanciest in Marenostrum, but it was far more than he was used to. It was much larger than his bedroom at home, and had its own spacious bathroom and water based shower. The opposite wall from the doorway had a large, two dimensional screen that depicted different live scenes from around Marenostrum like a window, though he was certain that there was no way it could actually be one. Upon further examination he discovered that the screen could be manipulated to display entertainment or news broadcasts. There was also a stone desk with standard holoscreen emitters for a computer terminal. Like most Martian dwellings, various green plants grew out of the walls giving off a light perfumed fragrance. The overhead lighting was correspondingly artificial sunlight. The room was carpeted with soft but resilient living grass. Jutting out from another wall was a stone fountain carved to look like a small natural spring or waterfall. He was sure it was somehow tied into the watering of the flora in the room. He wondered what Janna's room would look like, though he was sure it was similar. He was certain that before this trip was over, he would be sharing it with her.

 

He would soon be sharing it with her as husband and wife. How had all this come about? He wondered. A little over two months ago, he had only vaguely known who Janna Wong was, and now he had as much as openly defied his bishop and thrown away his vocation for her and her son. “What am I doing?” He wondered aloud. It wasn't a hard question to answer. He was doing the right thing. He was certain of it. But the enormity, the magnitude of the sudden changes in his life were staggering.

 

When he was in seminary, he had heard the odd rumor or story about priests like himself. They were never, however, made out to be the hero of the story, quite the opposite. They were always the traitors, even if they weren't actually called as much. All of his classmates knew they were the examples not to follow, and now here he was, to all appearances following the same path.

 

“Priests like me.” He said aloud. Was he still a priest now that he had been released? Sacred theology and tradition said yes, although he was no longer authorized to say Mass or perform any of the Sacraments anywhere. How does one remain a priest if he cannot legally do the things that mark what a priest is? Of what good is the Grace of Holy Orders if those orders cannot be practiced? For the foreseeable future he would be a farmer. A farmer with Holy Orders, but still a practicing farmer and nothing more. What were the last six years in Seminary about then anyway?

 

Jovan lay down on his bed and the lights in the room dimmed to something approximating silvery Earth moonlight. Why the hotel should make that choice for their night lighting was beyond him. “Maybe it has something to do with the Earth tourists.” He whispered as he closed his eyes, intending to sleep.

 

But no sleep would come. The next day they would be meeting Narso Shar again face to face for the first time in eight years, and Jovan would learn what his fate within the Church would be. It felt like he would be facing the Judgment Seat. He had tried to convince himself that he didn't care what happened, but that wasn't true. He held Bishop Shar's opinion very highly, and he wanted to spare Janna any more pain, though he was certain that the older man would be nothing but truly kind.

 

“Why did you bring us here?” He asked into the silvery lit room.

 

The Next Day

 

The four of them and little Bili met with Bishop Narso Shar in the late morning before lunch at his small home in Marenostrum. Like most of the other “houses” in the city, it was carved from and into the solid rock of underground Mars and reinforced with carbon tubing. It was closer to the surface than their hotel was, which Jovan found a little strange. Those homes and businesses which were closer to the surface were usually the seedier parts of the city.

 

The home itself was spartan and simple. He had a few furnishings in his living room, a bookcase carved into a wall with carbon paper books lining it from top to bottom, a desk, a table, a couch for visitors, and not much else. He had a small screen mounted into a wall, similar to the one in Jovan's hotel room. It was currently displaying the day's headlines from around Mars.

 

They were all sitting in his living room on his couch as he finished preparing their tea. He was a shorter man, around Tomas' height. He was bald with only wisps of white hair adorning the sides of his head, and a full, white beard which hid much of his neck from view. His fingers and hands were thin and bony, and his clothes tended to hang off his small frame. In spite of his frail appearance, much more so than when Jovan had first met him, his eyes were full of life and fire. He turned those eyes to them as he set down his tea pot and spoke.

 

“I am sorry for not explaining any further in my messages.” He began. “But it was necessary for me to be a little cryptic.”

 

“Why?” Janna asked.

 

“Why indeed, my dear.” He responded. “It seems Jovan's actions have caused no small amount of unease among the Church superiors at Olympus Mons. We have to be as careful as we can. They're not looking at this as a simple misunderstanding, or even a simple act of disobedience. Father Jahl has them all walking on eggshells with whispers of schism.”

 

“What?!” Jovan nearly choked on the hot brown liquid he had just took a sip of. “That's insane!”

 

“Of course it is. The problem is that Degan Jahl isn't far from insane himself. That's problem number one. Problem number two is that he is close personal friends with most of the presiding bishops of the Church, all of whom are normally good, reasonable, compassionate men; and all of whom trust his judgment implicitly.”

 

“Why? He's controlling, and almost demonic in his vindictiveness. He's done more to drive people away from the Church in our town than anyone else.” Janna said.

 

Narso looked sad and thoughtful as he sat down in a small chair facing them. “He wasn't always that way. There was a time when we were all in seminary that he was a powerful and charismatic evangelist for the Church. He had been one of the most trustworthy and compassionate men I knew. Most of the bishops still see him that way. They don't know what happened to him.”

 

“What did happen to him?” This time it was Miria who asked the question.

 

“He had been in a relationship with a young woman before entering seminary. As Jovan knows very well, we must take vows of chastity and celibacy upon entering seminary until we receive the full Holy Orders of the priesthood. His love promised to wait for him the whole six years of formation. Suffice it to say that she didn't. He returned home from Olympus Mons to find her unwed and pregnant with another man's child. Being the kind of man he was at the time, he chose to marry her and raise the child as his own. At first, it went well as they settled in to the parish at Agroppidum. The child, a little girl, was born and they seemed happy. Then about a year or so later he is gone from town to deliver last rites to a member of the parish who was dying who lived a great distance from town. He wasn't expected home that night, but he decided to push through and returned home in the middle of the night to find his wife in their bed with another man. His wife left and took her daughter with her.”

 

“Why haven't I ever heard that story before?” Miria asked. “I've lived in Agroppidum all of my life, and I've never heard of Degan Jahl ever being married, much less any of this.”

 

“I doubt it's something he wanted shared with the rest of the town. This all happened some twenty five years ago, before any of you were born. I only know about it because he and I kept in contact for a time after seminary. We were roommates there, you see. He was like a brother to me. I don't think he ever recovered from the betrayal he felt. From the trouble he's caused your town, it sounds like he still hasn't.”

 

“So then, what do we do? Leave the Church?” Jovan asked. “It sounds like that's our option if he's got the whole hierarchy wired in this way.”

 

“No. At least, not if I have anything to say about it.” Narso told him.

 

“What do you mean? How can you help?” Jovan asked.

 

“Did you get the letter of release from Gilga?” Narso asked. When Jovan nodded, the old man said, “Show it to me.”

 

Jovan pulled the black letter out from a pocket in the light woolen jacket he wore and handed it to Narso who scanned the silvery text. “Good.” He pronounced. “We can go ahead then.”

 

“Go ahead with what?” Jovan asked.

 

“I can do two things that will ultimately help the two of you out. The first is that I will marry you within the Church regardless of whatever else happens.” Narso said.

 

Janna's eyes lit up with joy as he said this, “Really?” She asked.

 

“Really.” Narso said. “There is simply no good reason to deny the marriage, and every good reason to perform it. And a marriage performed by a presiding bishop, even a retired one, must be recognized as legal, sacred, and valid by everyone within the Church. Even Degan Jahl can't deny that.”

 

Janna brought her hand to her mouth, and her eyes began to water with tears.

 

“It's the least I can do for you, my dear, after everything he, and by extension the Church, has put you through.” Narso said. “The second thing I can do, if you're willing Jovan, is I can incardinate you and bring you under my own episcopal authority as one of my priests.”

 

“But you're retired.” Jovan said. “How does that work?”

 

“I may be retired,” Narso said, “but I am still a bishop regardless, and I still retain my ecclesiastical powers should I choose to exercise them. I can bring you under my authority and give you the authority to celebrate the Sacraments among your own family, just not with anyone else. This will allow all of you to receive the Sacraments again, if you should so choose, regardless of Father Jahl. Degan Jahl is just as old as I am. There will come a time soon when he will no longer be able to pastor the parish there in Agroppidum and his own body will force him to retire. My plan is for you to lay low until this happens in a few years. I will make certain you have all the documentation you need in carbon paper hard copy so that, even if anything happens to me, once Father Jahl is no longer a factor you can go to the Church superiors on Olympus Mons and re-present your case without his influence, and you will be able to do it as a legally functioning priest in good standing with his governing bishop.”

 

“Did you speak to Bishop Gilga about this?” Jovan asked him.

 

“He and I went back and forth quite a bit about it, yes. In the end, I vouched for you that you wouldn't cause any trouble within the rest of the Church. He agreed to let you go and incardinate with me as long as you didn't disrupt the community at St. Theresa's, or bring any unwanted attention to yourself from the MCA authorities.” Narso said.

 

“What about the Bishop of Agroterra? Does he know?” Jovan asked.

 

“Bishop Janos? I think it would be best if you kept your head down with him. He is one of Degan's former junior priests, like you were supposed to be. He idolizes the man. The last I spoke with him, he was still singing Jahl's praises, and still couldn't understand why he hadn't been elevated to Bishop. This was several years ago, but I don't expect that to have changed. Stay on your farm. Don't bring any attention to yourself until Degan Jahl isn't there anymore, and then go directly to our superiors on Olympus Mons to make your case.” Narso was adamant as he explained this.

 

“It sounds like a good plan, Jovanito. And a better deal than you'll get from anyone else.” Tomas said, turning his head to Jovan and speaking up.

 

“How do we proceed then?” Jovan asked.

 

“Go to the city administration building after you leave here and get your marriage license. We can perform the wedding ceremony tomorrow, if you like, in the city cathedral.” Narso told him.

 

“Married in the cathedral!” Janna gave a little cry of surprise. “But that would take months and months of reservations and would be terribly expensive!”

 

“Being a bishop, even a retired one, does have its privileges.” Narso said. He then looked at Jovan and explained, “This coming Saturday evening, my successor is holding an ordination Mass. I have already spoken with him, and he has agreed to allow us to take part and formally incardinate you under my authority. Of course, if anything happens to me, you would revert to his authority. You do understand this?”

 

“Yes, I understand.” Jovan said.

 

“Good. Then I believe we all have work to do and preparations to make. It seems we all have a busy week ahead of us.” Narso said.

 

* * *

 

The Cathedral of the Holy Apostles in Marenostrum wasn't like the parish church in Agroppidum. Like most buildings in the underground city, it was basically a cavern or series of caverns carved out of the rock and shored up with carbon tubing to prevent collapse. It also, ironically, wasn't nearly as large as the parish church. Whereas Agroppidum and Agroterra in general tended to have a majority population of Martian Orthodox, they were the exception on Mars, rather than the rule.

 

Nevertheless, the main sanctuary of the Bishop's Seat of the Province of Xanthe was capable of seating two or three hundred people comfortably in real wooden pews which had been imported at great expense from Earth, as had the Altar, and the Bishop's actual seat or throne. The Sanctuary was decorated with beautiful wooden and marble icons and statuary of Saints and Biblical scenes all around the circumference of the rounded chamber. It was lit overhead by artificial sun lamps which were the main source of lighting in the city and kept the green grass which covered the floor, and the perennial flowers which grew throughout the chamber green and growing.

 

The altar and palance lay at the center of the chamber, with the pews all arranged in a series of concentric rings around it. Off to one side of the altar was the baptismal font which was, as part of the initial excavation of the chamber, carved into the floor and rock wall of the Sanctuary. A fountain of water continuously fell as a waterfall from near the ceiling into the baptismal pool, and then from there ran through channels into piping which allowed it to flow through smaller channels in the room watering the grass carpeting and perfumed flowers. Around the perimeter of the wall grew carefully cultivated frankincense trees which constantly lent their natural scent to the Sanctuary and only added to the feeling of holiness which permeated the room.

 

On any given day, a hundred tourists would be in the cathedral to take pictures and see the expensive and exotic looking furnishings of the room. On this day, those tourists were treated to a rare wedding. Weddings themselves were not uncommon within the cathedral, but the wedding of a member of the clergy was something different.

 

The wedding Mass for a priest wasn't much different from a normal wedding Mass, except that the liturgy involved included additional vows for the woman to take as she joined him in the ministry and mission of the Church. While holding no officially ordained position, it had long been recognized that the wives of the clergy were often ministering in an unofficial capacity teaching, advising, and counseling the women and children of the Church, and could often be just as involved if not more so than their husbands. As a result, they too were required to join their husbands in the priestly vows of obedience, voluntary poverty, and chaste, though not celibate, conduct.

 

The two who took those vows now did so in front of his imminence former Presiding Bishop Narso Shar. The man, Father Jovan Chin, stood in front of the bishop dressed in a formal priestly cassock and white collar. To his left hand stood a middle aged man in his finest dress suit, Mikhail Shoto, whom he had contacted prior to their arriving in the city, and who happened to be in town in between his freight hauling jobs which Jovan's mother Miria had set him up with. Mikhail had felt extremely honored to be asked to be Jovan's best man, and stood with pride next to the younger man he had met several months prior out in deep space.

 

To Jovan's right hand stood Janna Wong as an absolute vision of beauty incarnate, at least Jovan thought so. She was a young blond woman in a full length, snow white dress and veil which had been brought by Miria from her farmstead home and which she had worn on her own, first wedding day before Jovan had been born. It fit the young woman perfectly.

 

Janna's eyes were misted over with tears of joy as they recited their vows together at the prompting of the bishop who was resplendent in his full white vestments and miter. Jovan's face radiated happiness. To Janna's right hand stood Miria as her matron of honor, and to Mikhail's left hand stood Tomas holding a wonder-filled infant Bili. Tomas was dressed in his finest suit, and a smaller, infant's version of the suit was purchased for Bili to wear.

 

To the tourists in the pews, most of whom had never seen a Christian service of any kind, it was a thing of quiet pageantry and splendor to see, and all respected the sanctity of the matter even as they chose to witness and quietly celebrate with the couple being wed. It was even more unusual in that alongside the Bishop celebrating the wedding, there was yet another bishop in similar vestments standing next to him and participating in the celebration of the Holy Eucharist, not that many of the tourists understood what was going on during that part. None of them understood that this was a wedding which the bride couldn't have even dreamed of or hoped for just a month prior.

 

But the clergy participating understood it all too well, which was why both bishops were con-celebrating the Sacrament. They tried to understand to the best of their ability how much pain a member of the Church, on of their own, had caused this young woman and their own younger brother priest's family and this was the best way they could think of to make it as right as they could. As a result, the current Presiding Bishop, a middle aged man with a dark brown beard and kind, joyous eyes had cleared his schedule for that Tuesday afternoon to join his predecessor in solemnizing the couple's vows. He could not change the past, but he could at least give his own seal to righting this wrong which had been inflicted upon them.

 

After the wedding, a great dinner was held at the Northern Seas restaurant for the wedding party and the celebrants, where they all dined on northern Martian crab, also at the expense of the Church. The bishops would not permit the wedding party to pay one Martian penny for either the use of the sanctuary, their services, or the wedding dinner. “It is our wedding gift to you, daughter.” The younger of the two bishops told the bride, who seemed to have no end of good tears that day. “Thank you. Thank you for everything.” She replied.

 

After the dinner, Jovan vacated his own hotel room to stay with Janna in hers, while Miria and Tomas took little Bili and his crib into theirs. There the two newly married came together for the first time as a man and his wife, unashamed and guiltless before both God and men.

 

* * *

 

The next morning, Jovan and Janna found themselves as man and wife strolling along a railed path through the Biosphere Gardens. Little Bili was with them in a rented stroller as they saw all the wonders which the engineered underground tropical ecosystem had to offer. The Gardens were an attempt by terraformers to replicate the look and feel of the original tropical ecosystems in the Southeast Asian, South American and African environments on Earth before the deforestation and urbanization overtook them, blending different, complementary and compatible flora and fauna into something unique unto its own. There were several waterfalls and artificial rivers. Monkeys of different kinds leapt through trees. Different feline predators could be glimpsed occasionally as they moved through the leafy foliage near the path. The temperature within the tightly controlled Biosphere was much warmer than the constantly controlled city temperature of eighteen degrees centigrade. It was also much more humid, and Janna, Jovan, and Bili were treated to a fine sheen of sweat all over their bodies.

 

Janna was dressed in much lighter clothing than she would normally wear even in the long Martian summers, a light cotton skirt, sleeveless top, and sandals. Jovan wore a light short sleeve tunic and shorts. Little Bili felt much cooler than either of them opting for just his diaper.

 

Janna pointed out a dabble of orange and black near the railing of the path, barely visible through the foliage to Jovan. “Look, there's a tiger I think.” She said.

 

“I think you're right.” He said. The dabble of orange and black disappeared a second later. “Can you imagine that these animals once roamed freely and wild on Earth, without any genetic conditioning to keep them from harming humans?”

 

“That would terrify me, Jovan.” She answered.

 

“So, what do you think of the gardens?” He asked. He had only been there once before, and it was everything he remembered.

 

“I think it's absolutely beautiful. If only all of Mars could be like this. Oh, Jovan I wish we could stay here in these gardens forever, and not have to go back home and hide from everyone.” She said wishfully.

 

“I could do without the constant sweating myself.” He replied.

 

She hit him playfully. “You know what I mean.”

 

He came up behind her and put his arms around her as they watched small monkeys eating some kind of fruit that had fallen to the ground. “I do.” He said gently. “But what would Mom do without you and Bili? She'd be heartbroken.”

 

She laughed musically. “Thank you, Jovan.” She said to him.

 

“For what?” He asked.

 

“For everything. For not just leaving me and Bili. For not giving in to Degan Jahl. For marrying me. For trying to make things right. For not letting Bili grow up without a father. For bringing the Church back to me. For everything. You don't know how much you mean to me. How much all this means to me.” Her voice began to break up as the tears began to flow again.

 

“Hey.” He said, taking his hand and gently raising her chin so that he could see into her watery eyes. He kissed her gently and fully on her lips. They were soft and a bit sweet after their breakfast. As he pulled away he said, “I'm not going to leave you, ever.”

 

They continued walking through the gardens, holding each other's hands and marveling at the sights which hadn't been seen in nature even on Earth for millennia.

 

* * *

 

That Saturday evening, a week of wonder and joy culminated in the ordination Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Apostles in Marenostrum. Jovan, Janna, Miria, and Tomas had already joined Narso there once again privately that morning to baptize and chrismate little Bili as Bili Chin.

 

The pews were filled with members of the cathedral parish and a few tourists who managed to find places to sit or stand. There were five new priests which took Holy Orders that evening under the current presiding bishop, and one current priest, standing in white vestments after the others were done who renewed his priestly vows and recited his acceptance to the ancient creeds of the Church which predated even the ancient Martian Orthodox faith; creeds which had been recited and accepted since the very founding of the Christian faith.

 

Janna, Bili, Miria, and Tomas looked on as Jovan once again swore obedience, poverty, and chaste conduct to an elderly bishop of the Church. Then, as the Mass continued, he took his place with the other priests in concelebrating and sanctifying the Holy Eucharist.

 

Jovan felt right just then; whole and complete, as though everything in the world had finally been restored to its proper order. He didn't realize how out of balance the world had seemed until just then. As he took a ciborium to help distribute the hosts to the congregation with his fellow priests he noticed not just one, but three familiar figures join the lines of parishinors to receive holy communion. Janna, with Bili in her arms came directly up to him with one hand extended, eyes downcast. “The Body of Christ.” Jovan intoned, in that instant no longer her husband or friend, but a channel of Grace and the Lord Jesus Christ. Janna accepted and consumed the host reverently. Jovan then placed a small wedge of a host carefully into Bili's mouth who accepted it and worked it between his small new teeth. Wordlessly, Janna returned with her son to the pew where she had been sitting.

 

Jovan risked a quick glance around and saw his mother and stepfather in line with Bishop Narso. They approached the older man, and instead of offering a blessing, as Jovan had expected, they extended their hands to receive and the older man gave them each a host which they both reverently consumed. He felt his own eyes mist over as he returned to his task at hand.

 

After the Mass, the four adults walked back to their hotel. Bili was asleep on Jovan's shoulder, and Jovan was perfectly content to let his little son remain there all the way back to their hotel. It had been a glorious, wonderful week as far as he was concerned. They would remain for one more day to attend services the next morning and then travel back to Agroppidum the next day on Monday.

 

As they reached their hotel and their respective rooms, Miria pulled her son aside, hugging him and saying, “Thank you, Jovan.”

 

“For what, Mom?” He asked, surprised.

 

“For bringing us here. I took communion, you know.” She said.

 

“I know, Mom. I saw.” He said.

 

“I spoke with Narso privately while you and Janna were exploring Marenostrum this week. I made confession with him.” She told him. “You were right, Jovan. You, Janna, and Tomas were right about him. I've spent so many years being angry because of one man and his followers. Narso showed me that Degan Jahl doesn't represent what the Church really is... and so did you. So thank you.” She said, and then disappeared with Tomas into their room, leaving Jovan standing there speechless.