Teylon: Signing away his (Earth bound) life, and starting his adventure Teylon retraced the path down the track he had made, heading back towards the park's administrative centre. Hey, my leg is no longer aching. Not even the slightest. I hadn't realised that death had such health benefits! He felt fine. And, more importantly- I've just died and been reincarnated, but for only a limited amount of time. And I'm perfectly sane. Not even the slightest bit panicked. Amazing. He was just passing an old couple, maybe in their eighties, walking towards him, hand in hand. And as they went past, a vivid, detailed, lucid image exploded across his consciousness: Teylon’s Soul Reading of: The Old Couple The woman, as an seventeen-year-old teenager, walking hand in hand with that same man, along this very track, laughing at some shared joke. The man as a twenty year old, holding his first-born son, while the woman, now his wife, looked on, beaming with pride. Teylon: After a stumble or two, he was able to keep walking without falling over. Bloody hell, that must be the soul reading. I'd forgotten about that bit. This really is amazing. Let's try that again! But the next dozen people he passed produced no reactions what so ever. Huh? Is it a once off thingy... No, wait, think about it. I'm supposed to fix some great evil on Mars. But if I can read every soul I meet down here on Earth, then, then, well, I will be bound to find the occasional evilness right here, right? And, apparently, the angels are not allowed to intervene in every case. I suppose it's like they have a quota. And the proportion of that quota that is allocated to me is only to do with the Mars situation. Hmm, so the souls that I can read now are going to be purely for practice? He was now moving through the garden beds that surrounded the administration centre, and just ahead was a teenage boy, headphones on, leaning against a wall. OK, if it's for practice only, what say I make an act of will and peek at that boy's soul? Hopefully he's not planning any great evil... Teylon’s Soul Reading of: The Teenage Boy Another vivid image: The boy, picking up his mobile, and, hand trembling slightly, dialled a number. "Hello? This is Elainette. "Ah, h-hello, this is - ah - Nelton, ah, I don't suppose you might, you know, like to meet me at the park, like, tomorrow..." A short silence. "Sure! What time shall we make it?" Teylon: Oh shucks, the great teenage romance, starting soon at a park near you. At that point in time, a teenage girl came hurrying around the corner, saw the boy, and went up to him. "Hello Nelton, sorry I'm late, you've been waiting long?" He took off his headphones. "Nyah; just got here myself." Teylon’s Soul Reading of: The Teenage Boy Another image: The boy, talking to himself earlier that day. "I can't risk getting there late, so I must be early. Say quarter of an hour? But the bus might be delayed. Better make it half an hour. But what if I take the wrong path at the park and loose my way? Better make it three quarters of an hour." Teylon: Teylon clapped a hand over his mouth to hide the sudden grin, and walked past them. So that's how a mere mortal like me can comprehend a soul. A short series of images, complete with audio track, is given. Presumably carefully selected by Esmeralda to convey whatever information she wants to convey. He got to his car, got out his mobile and looked up the Mars recruitment agency. And, an hour later, he was there. It was in the last unit of a row of twenty factory units. In fact, the Mars recruitment agency shared the same space as a forklift training centre office. One side of the factory door was a picture of the planet Mars, with the message 'Immigrate to Mars! Enquire within for the possibilities!'. While the other had a picture of a forklift machine and the message 'Learn a profitable trade! Become a forklift driver!" Gee, Both choices look equally attractive, I wonder which one I should go for? Inside was brightly lit from skylights. And somewhat warm, obviously neither company could afford any but the cheapest of air conditioners. There was a queue of half a dozen people waiting to be served at the forklift counter. On the other side of the room was a lady sitting at a desk, reading a newspaper, with no one else around. Well, how about we try the Mars option? No waiting required! He suddenly had an unpleasant little thought What if Esmeralda dislikes my levity... Nyah, be sensible, she said it herself, she's only interested in my actions and my moral choices. He reached the desk, dragged out the chair and sat down. The lady looked up in surprise, put the paper down, rapidly composed herself to look professional, and smiled at him. "What can I do for you, sir?" "I would like to immigrate to Mars. As soon as possible, please." "Oh, ah, certainly." She gave him a rapid up and down look over. He could, even without any soul reading, see her take into account his age and appearance, and drawing certain conclusions. "Well, that is very good. But there are some requirements, and, well, it is an unfortunate fact that the older you are the stricter the requirements are..." He had a pretty good idea where this was going. Mars worked on the principle of indentured immigration. If you were young and healthy, you could immigrate for free, and expect the right to live at the location of your choice on Mars, as long as you found a job and worked at it. You could not leave and go back to Earth until you had lived for a decade or so, and saved enough money to buy your passage back. If you were not so young or not so healthy, well, you could tip the balance in your favour by providing money, or by providing rare skills and abilities. The more of either you provided, the more rights you could obtain. Teylon, at fifty, was definitely in the too old range to be given anywhere near a free passage. And his current attire of T-shirt and jeans didn't give any hints of high professional skills, either. "I don't suppose you have professional level skills in some field or other?" said the lady, very hopefully. Yeah, I sure do. But I don't think they will appreciate them. "No, but I am willing to pay my way." The lady looked interested. So Teylon pulled out his mobile, accessed the appropriate bank account, and showed the lady the account balance. She opened her eyes in astonishment. "Ah, yes, yes, you can certainly afford the fare. How much exactly it might cost is up to what sort of work you are able and willing to do, and what sort of accommodation you might like to live in and where. So, if I may ask, how much are you thinking of allocating?" "All of it." Now she was really interested. Teylon’s Soul Reading of: The Recruitment Lady Another vivid image: That morning she had dragged herself out of bed. Groggy from lack of sleep due to the baby crying all night, but she had no choice. She had to get him to the baby sitter, get herself presentable, and then get herself to the office. "Damn that man for dumping me. And where am I going to find enough money to pay for these ridiculously high baby sitter fees? I wish some wealthy geezer would buy his way to a Mars penthouse, the extra commission will do wonders..." Teylon: So, she is paid a commission as well as a probably meagre wage? Looks like I've made her day! The next half hour was a busy one for both of them. He filled out forms, and signed forms, and was given forms to be filled out by his lawyer and his accountant. He also found out when he was leaving. Seven days time. Oh. That soon. But, well, considering. He signed the last form. He had a twenty-four hour grace period. He could cancel, or he could arrange his affairs, transfer the money over, and get back here the same time, tomorrow. And, as he had been scribbling his way through the papers, his mind had also been, almost subconsciously, aware of his surroundings. Like, for example, the youth behind him at the forklift counter, taking the money for training courses. His mind had idly ticked off six people applying. Six sets of rustling of papers as they signed their forms (but nowhere as many has he had to). Five sets of chings as the cash register was opened and closed... Five? Only five? Teylon collected the last of the forms, got up, shook hands with the happy Mars immigration officer, and walked out. As he did so, he casually glanced around. At the forklift counter. At the youth staffing that counter. At the corners of the ceiling. No vivid angel provided images occurred. He's running a racket of some sort. Keeping the last paid amount in his hand until all of the customers have left, then pocketing it himself. But apparently, it's none of my business. He casually glanced at the display showing a list of forklift courses, and their prices. Gods above! That much for a mere three-day course! Ah, I see, it's sponsored by the government, who pays 80%. So, the company is ripping off the tax payers, and that youth is ripping of the company. The company deserves to be scammed. He had been interested in seeing the not quite hidden security cameras in the ceiling. Very well camouflaged, but visible if you knew what to look for. I don't like that kid's chances. He left. The same time the following day, he returned. Carrying several pieces of signed paper, and various printouts. At the immigration desk sat the lady, looking very pleased to see him back. And standing beside her was a official looking man in a suit. The lady processed the paper work, then the man got out his mobile and started entering some details. While Teylon was waiting, the lady volunteered some information. "Yesterday afternoon after you left was terrible; the police came in and arrested that youth that was running the forklift counter." "They did?" "Yeah, apparently he was caught on camera pinching some fee money. I didn't even know there were security cameras here." "Ah, so that explains why it is a different person this time." The man in the suit finished his verifications. "Well, sir, all of that has gone well, would you like to follow me now?" They drove off, to the airport. Teylon had his passport in his pocket, and had been carrying a (small) suitcase. He was bundled into a plane and was off to the Mars spaceport, half way round the world. He was due to do an intensive five day course on how to live on Mars, before being blasted up into space in a frail aluminium can sitting on top of a couple thousand tons of highly inflammable fuel. He was not looking forward to it.

Teylon: Thinking about Narrative Causality Teylon was two weeks into his trip to Mars. He was also in his very own sleeping quarters on the spaceship taking him. A very small sleeping quarters. Just wide and high enough, and long enough, to fit his bed. Lying on it, he could turn over, or hold his hands in front of him to operate the entertainment console. It had a hatch at the end, which could be closed to provide privacy, or opened for access, or left open to prevent claustrophobia. He checked the time. 3:00am. Sigh. No point in getting up, I'll just get in the road of the people who are normally awake on this shift. He looked at the entertainment console, and at a whim tapped in a few commands and brought up the Ship Status page. Days to go: 15 That was the important detail. He casually scrolled though the other bits of information, and one caught his eye. Current Pilot: Tracey That's right, I saw her at the boarding induction. She looked to be only about fifteen years old; your typical skinny teenager with, for some reason, hair dyed bright green. The other four pilots are only a little older. When he had first heard that the ship's pilots needed chaperones he was - perturbed. To think that he was trusting kids to get him safely to Mars took some getting used to. But, apparently, they were good at what they did. Which was to push the multi thousand-ton space ship along, without using anything more than the power of their minds. Esp powers are amazing. When they first appeared twenty or so years ago, they certainly revolutionised space travel. Having never been to Mars before, he had never directly observed esp powers being used. At least that was something to look forward to. He checked the time: 3:15am. Sigh. So how the hell did I get to be in this situation in the first place. Oh yeah, I remember... At least I'm not motion sick. Everyone took their medications religiously. They all wanted to remain healthy, in spite of spending a month weightless. Sure wasn't particularly difficult terminating my old life. In fact, he was quite pleased with himself over that one. Just goes to show the virtue of not tying oneself down with relationships. I was able to pack up and leave without any fuss at all. This came at a good time, too. Just after I finished my most recent job. The best one I have ever done. And now I have to somehow make connections and gather around me a group of people and lead them to, what, conqueror the evilness at the heart of Mars society? How do I do that!? And, Narrative Causality? That's what Esmeralda had said. Narrative Causality. He reached back in his memory, to his high school days, to his English Literature teacher giving a lecture. "Consider a typical novel. The author has maybe 80,000 words or more to get across his story, and to do so in a way that the reader will keep turning the pages to the very last. So he can't waste even one of those words." "Now, in real life, most things that happen are purely by chance. You meet someone, you never see them again. You spend an hour worrying over some problem, the problem never re-occurs. Things just happen; it is only in retrospect that we manage to construct a coherent personal history, by cherry picking fragments out of our memories and stringing them together to tell our story to ourselves." "In a novel, the author is skipping over all of the messy superfluous details and is arriving directly at the coherent story stage. Everything in the novel is there for a purpose, in the right order, showing just the right descriptions and thoughts and actions. Leading the reader on a journey, hopefully an agreeable one, with a well defined start, middle and end." "So, for example, in the very first chapter the author might describe a person, in the process of doing something or other. The author is setting up the plot, starting the journey. There is no way that that person is going to be any other than one of the main characters. The author will throw in a few details just to add some colour to the opening scene. Count on it, some if not all of those details will be foreshadowing things that will be coming up later in the novel. Then, maybe, the author will introduce another character, and give a few details about their life. Naturally, these details will also feed into the plot. In a well constructed novel it is guaranteed that the reader will come to know these two characters very well, and they will carry the novel's plot right through to the end." "This is Narrative Causality. In a story, everything happens for a purpose. Unlike, sadly, in real life." Ah yes, I remember. So, as I randomly stumble around in my new life - Every time someone says hello to me, there is a good chance that they will be important? Hmm. But what about where I live? So far, there has been no accidental but significant indication of where I should go... On the other hand, Esmeralda definitely implied it was related to esp powers. He remembered that he had seen a wiki page listing the main cities on Mars. He reached out to the console screen. Yep, that's right. Verdant City, the dome with all of their higher education institutes, and half of their schools. The place with the highest concentration of espers, and, what's more, the place where expectant mothers go to get their embryos implanted with an esp power. Certainly sounds like a possibility. Hello Esmeralda? Is this choice OK? There was no reply. OK, Verdant it is. Hmm, and nobody knows what, exactly, the implantation involves. Or even where it is preformed. He checked the time: 3:29am. Blegh.

Teylon: Judging (with a capital J) his first subject The next morning he sent off an email saying where he wanted to live. Then he made himself presentable and showed up at the mess hall. Naturally, it was small and crowded. And the fact that everyone was floating around in the weightlessness made it seem even more cramped. Not to mention chaotic. Teylon found his assigned seat, which was a small table wedged into an irregular shaped alcove in the wall. Space ships are cramped and sometimes the internal rooms had to be odd shapes to accommodate the machinery of the ship. The crewmember that supervised the hall clapped her hands. She looked to her right at Teylon and to her left at the bigger table. "Please, would everyone remain in your seat! Otherwise I will never be able to get through to serve your food." Teylon made sure to plant his butt firmly on his seat. The velcro on his pants joined up the matching velcro on the chair, and he was held in place. As he was given his bottle, the bloke who was assigned to sit opposite him at the tiny table groaned and looked pained. Teylon had no trouble in interpreting this gesture. "Yeah, sucking one's morning milk and cereal out of a plastic bottle is no fun at all, is it?" "Man, you can say that again! What I would give for a decent slice of toast with fried bacon and tomato!" He was in his late twenties, and looked like a retired sports person. Fit and athletic, with a friendly smile. He seemed to be moderately popular with the ladies. Not that Teylon was the slightest bit envious, of course. While we consume our breakfast from a squeezy bottle, how about I get in some more soul reading practice? He had been reading the souls, strictly for practice, of those around him with somewhat erratic diligence. Erratic because it felt like an invasion of privacy, and also because Esmeralda seemed to have firm ideas about when and who he could read. Often she did not grant his request, but sometimes she would give him a reading even when he was not expecting it. So he had only accumulated ten readings so far. OK, how about letting me read the soul of this bloke? Teylon’s Soul Reading of: The Bloke In vivid technicolour, complete with sounds, not to mention the feel of the ground under him and the wind rustling his coat: He was crouching over a parapet, looking across, through a high-powered telephoto lens. A open top black car slowly drove across his view of view, with his target sitting in the passenger seat. The view of the target was partially obscured by a thronging mob of high school students. When the cross hairs bracketed the target, he squeezed the trigger of the high-powered rifle. He was not sure about the hit. He fired three more times. Some of the students had gone down, the bodyguards were scrambling, trying to locate him. His target was falling, collapsing over the side of the car. There was another clear view. He fired twice again. Yes, the target was clearly hit. Time to go. He was now in a new location, an office somewhere, having a talk with someone in an expensive suit. "Well, man, your offer comes at a very fortuitous time. That last hit I made really stirred up a hornet's nest, and they just haven't given up their search for me." "Yes, you not only got their president, but you also managed to kill four students. Who were the children of four of the most powerful people in their country." "Just my bad luck, I suppose. But, why on Earth, or maybe I should say on Mars, do your people need an assassin?" "Sorry, I'm not allowed to explain any further. But, as the population of Mars has exploded due to the introduction of esp powers, there is always someone who is annoying those in power..." Teylon: Teylon dropped his squeezy bottle. Which remained right where he released it, floating and beginning to tumble in the air conditioning breeze. No one else appeared to be paying any attention to his actions. Not only did he get the images and sounds, but he also got the feelings and emotions of the man. Completely cold. Completely indifferent to the kids, and the man, that he killed. Not an ounce of empathy. My God, I feel nauseous. The nausea faded. He looked around. Still no one was taking the slightest attention. Not even the assassin himself. Strange. Maybe this is also Esmeralda's doing? Give me some time to get my act together? Well, it's blindingly clear what I'm supposed to do in this case, isn't it? He looked in the face of the man opposite him. Who at last seemed to take some notice. If I'm going to Judge him, at least look him in the eye. This is difficult. Gulp. Esmeralda, ah, on my own free will I request He took a deep breath. Judgement... The man's body lurched and then folded up, still stuck to his chair by the seat of his pants. The man's soul straightened up, looked around in puzzlement, then screamed as a terrifying figure swept in, six metre white wings flaring, grabbed him by the throat and dragged him away. Oh shit, that was Esmeralda, wasn't it? A very angry Esmeralda. So that's what she looks like when she is really angry. Memo to self. Never, ever, piss off an Angel of Death. It was a long long day for Teylon and the officers on the space ship. But at last the initial investigation into the circumstances surrounding the sudden and mysterious death of a passenger wound down to its conclusion of - Death Due to Unknown Causes. The captain was happy to sign off and let the Martian police worry about it. Teylon was happy to weightlessly glide into his sleeping capsule and close the hatch. An assassin. Hired by someone on Mars. Looks like this shit is real, and getting realer. By three o'clock in the morning, not having slept a wink, he was coming to some unfortunate conclusions. There is no way I will be able to casually waltz into Verdant and set up shop unnoticed. I am well and truly on the radar of anyone in power. They might not have a clue as to what, if anything, I actually represent, but they will know that they should keep me in sight. Furthermore, this can only be by Esmeralda's design. And with that reassuring little thought, he at last managed to drift off to sleep, and for once managed to sleep a solid eight hours without waking up in the middle of it. Although he did end up missing breakfast.

Teylon: Getting off his backside The view from his luxury apartment, ten stories up from the ground, was drop dead gorgeous. The living area had a wide window, looking out across the floor of the Verdant City area. A wide loop of the Euphrates river was visible to his left, as is swung around his tower before continuing in its perpetual circular journey around the inside perimeter of the dome. It was currently morning, and the sunlight sparkled off the small waves, and highlighted the little sailboats doing their best to catch the gentle breeze. In the distance, beyond the river, the ground swept outwards and upwards slightly to join the walls of the dome. The ground was covered in trees, dotted here and there with buildings, plus playing fields and open parks. Along the base of the wall were enormous fans, a hundred metres high, that provided the breeze to push the sailboats along. And also to aerate the entire dome and help control the weather. To his right was the city centre. A collection of buildings and pedestrian ways. The buildings were not very high, most of their volume was below ground. Further back was the industrial area. The really heavy-duty factories had their own domes, but the light industries tended to congregate in the domes where the people lived, since that is where they got their employees from. Teylon was eating his breakfast. Milk and cereal, with toast and fried eggs. This time it was real food. Although he still had not gotten used to the lighter than normal gravity. When he had first arrived at the surface he had been issued with a lightweight fashionably designed helmet. Huh. I don't need to wear a trainee helmet, like some kid learning to ride a scooter! I'm sure I can avoid slamming my head into door sills. I'm an adult, after all! Three such incidents later, including one where he genuinely felt he might have given himself concussion (he didn't), he gave in. It's only supposed to be for a month or so, until one's reflexes get used to things. But he still felt self conscious when going out. He was currently wondering what the next step should be. He got up, cleaned up his breakfast stuff, and sat on his couch, looking out at the view. He was thinking that he could have gotten a much more expensive place, larger, higher up, with more rooms. But why bother? I'm here for a set task. And when it's finished... Or I could have gotten a smaller one, not this four bedroom moderately luxurious suite. Nyah, I might as well enjoy some of life's finer pleasures while I'm at it. Hmm, OK, let's do some more reading about the Mars, shall we? The immigration system sounds as good a place as any. Sometime later. So, the indentured immigrants work under a starting debt. With compound interest. Regular interest and capital payments are extracted via the normal taxation system. At least the interest rate isn't too high. So what happens if you get behind, I wonder? Hmm, you're expected not to get behind. So, what if you die? Huh? If you are part of a family unit, your family is burdened with the remaining debt. That sounds a bit harsh. So if some poor kid's parents are killed in an accident, that kid has to work off all the debt? After a short search, he gave up trying to find what happens in the case of bankruptcies. I'm sure they have some method of wiping the slate clean. Whatever. Teylon had a university education in economics, and also qualifications in accounting and commerce. Which was put to very good use during his professional career. It also meant that he was naturally curious about how the Mars economic system worked, and it meant that he had an instinctive feel for such matters. But right now, he felt he needed to get off his backside and do something proactive. With my financial resources, I don't have to do a lick of work for the rest of my life here. Even if it is probably going to be very short. But if I don't get out and do something Esmeralda will get impatient and make it even shorter. He got out. It was now mid afternoon, as Teylon strolled through the city centre. Frankly, he was a little disappointed. He had travelled fifty million kilometres to end up in this city, and what was that in front of him? That extremely famous hamburger franchise. Admittedly, it was selling buns made from a special strain of wheat that was ideally suited for the weak Martian sunlight. The meat was totally artificial (although there were cattle on Mars) and Teylon wasn't sure he wanted to know what chemical processes went into the making of the tomato sauce. Well, humans are humans. And with light speed communications between the two planets, it is inevitable that we will continue to share major components of our cultures. It appeared to be the end of the school day, as there were a lot of students going by, in groups and in pairs or by themselves. It is the educational city, after all. He wandered around, and ended up at the boundary between the city centre and the light industrial area. Hello, there's dark lane ways between the factories. With security cameras, but there are ways and means of negating them... No, no, I'm not here to do another job. Wait, actually, I'm sort of here precisely to do another job, aren't I? Another job to benefit society by bringing down the high and mighty who have become corrupt, to level the playing field for the normal folks who have been taken advantage off... Hey, I'm not speaking to anyone, so I don't need to go into my spiel. Not that it's not true, of course. After wandering around aimlessly for a while, there was an interruption. "Ooh, look, a brand new immie!" Two pre-teenage boys were looking at him. They hurriedly glanced away as he looked back with a mid level stare. They made haste to leave, while pretending not to take any notice of him. I suppose I'm fair game at the moment. Now, where am I? Let's see, I'm still in the boundary between the city centre and the industrial area, and, ah, I'm right in front of the 'Neighbour Watch Centre #77. It had a glass door, plus a half height wide window. Just inside the window was a counter, and at right angles to the counter was an office desk. Right, so you can walk in the door, or just tap on the window, and the counter person can open it to have a chat. Nobody was at the counter at the present. However, there was a very interesting poster stuck on one side of the window. A recruitment poster, advertising part time neighbour watch positions. No experience necessary, paid by the hour. The hourly rate is pretty pathetic. I can only see students or retired people being interested... And what am I, if not retired? Narrative Causality It's a big emphatic hint. He walked in the door, and pressed the customer service button.