- Tate -
Tate stepped closer to the man called Zeus. "Explain yourself. What are you?" To hell with the NASA protocols they'd been given on the outside chance of meeting little green men; this was no alien! For that matter, even the fact that he could hear and talk through his suit made no sense.
Zeus smiled. "Build me a temple, if you've forgotten, and you'll begin to learn again." To Fianna he said, "I wouldn't mind explaining to you though, my dear. Shall we?"
Fianna stammered something but Zeus took her arm and leaned close to her ear saying, "To Noctis Labyrinthus, the Labyrinth of Night."
"Let go of her!" said Tate. Fianna struggled and broke free, but Zeus grabbed her again by both arms and before anyone could speak, he and Fianna were gone. Impossibly thick air currents buffeted Tate's suit, making him stumble and coating his faceplate with red dust.
Tate stood alone on the slope of Mount Olympus, watching dust swirl around him in time with the static in his radio. Greek columns of spotless marble marked the edges of the fountain where open water burbled. Up the gentle incline, other patches of garden became visible.
Calling Fianna's name, Tate ranged back and forth searching until his air began to run low. "Marcus Tate to Athena Base, do you copy?"
Static.
Tate rushed back to the glider and flew towards base. His heart beat slower when he soared over the peaks surrounding home and found its domes and tin-can landers still there. A few people moved about or operated robots. Again he radioed.
"Avery here. Want something?"
"I've never been so glad to hear you, Avery. Fianna's missing. Zeus took her."
Long rows of greenhouses passed by beneath the glider. Avery said, "You know I don't like jokes. Get down here, airstrip two. We just had some radio glitch Boss Sands wants you to fix."
Tate nudged the control stick and brought the glider home in the slow motion Mars gave to everything, feeling impatient to land and throttle Avery. "What did you do, walk away for a beer instead of watching the video feed? He took her! You saw it!"
"What the hell you talking about?"
The instant Tate landed he pulled on his i-glasses and had the lenses display the archived video of their encounter with Zeus. Except much of it was blank, and there was no Greek god. But it couldn't be his memory -- Fianna had vanished! He sealed his helmet, climbed out of the glider, and walked into base.
Neon lights hummed in Tate's ears. He hurried through the air-sprayers that swept dust from his suit, and tromped down halls in search of someone to talk to.
Avery's long, pale face appeared on his i-glass lenses, saying, "Where's Fianna?"
"We've got to find her. I think she's --"
"She's what?" asked Commander Sands, not flinching as Tate nearly collided with him in the hallway. Sands probably stood taller than anyone else on Mars, but then the colonists had been chosen for small size and the man was probably only average for Earth.
"Commander!" Tate said. "Something's wrong with the video feed. We've lost the footage of this entity, this Zeus."
Sands gave a generous grin. "Are you feeling all right, Tate? Where's Fianna?"
This man didn't understand either! "She's gone! Zeus kidnapped her and took her to Noctis Labyrinthus!"
"All right, we'll deal with that right away." Sands threw one arm over Tate's shoulder and steered him down the hall, towards sick bay.
"Listen to me. She's missing."
"I hear you," Tate said, forgetting to maintain his grin. He muttered into a microphone in his computer, "I need a search and rescue party and the shrink, this instant."
#
Technically Tate was locked alone in sickbay, not a cell, and technically he'd been invited there for medical reasons rather than suspected murder. All that the others seemed to know was that Fianna was missing, had last been seen with Tate, and was now at minus one hour's air. Nothing Tate could show proved that an amorous Greek god had kidnapped her. The search party had no reason to believe she'd been spirited away to Noctis Labyrinthus so many miles away, and had gone to Olympus Mons instead. At least they'd probably find the gardens and fountain, and know something was extremely wrong on Mars.
Tate wandered sickbay, fiddling with medical equipment and computers and proving to himself once again that the door was locked. He swore. He needed to get out and find Fianna, and the others all thought he'd gone mad! Maybe Avery could hack the door, if he were so inclined. And what had Zeus said? Build him a shrine to learn again? If it really were Zeus out there, maybe the other gods of the Greek pantheon had come too, and might be contacted if Tate could find a way.
He thought back to what little he knew of that old-time religion: Zeus had a wife and was a rapist (Tate shuddered); even abstract forces like Rumor and Hunger had gods, and humans who meddled with the immortals tended either to join them or be otherwise transformed. The only rule he could recall about these gods' powers was that no god could directly undo the work of another.
Tate sighed, searched the room for a computer and whatever else he could find, and came up with a plan.
[Ovid's Metamorphoses]
