Robert Reed - The Children's Crusade

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The Children's Crusade

by Robert Reed

If one tallies weekly allowances, part-time employment, birthday and holiday gifts, as well as

limited trusts, the children of the world wield an annual income approaching one trillion NA

dollars. Because parents and an assortment of social service organizations supply most of their

basic needs, that income can be considered discretionary. Discretionary income always possesses

an impact far beyond its apparent value. And even more important, children are more open than

adults when it comes to radical changes in spending habits, and in their view of the greater world.

Please note: We have ignored all income generated through gambling, prostitution, the sale of

drugs and stolen merchandise, or currency pilfered from a parent's misplaced wallet.

We need to conspicuously avoid all questionable sources of revenue … at least for the present …

—Crusade memo, confidential

· · · · ·

The pregnancy couldn't have been easier, and then suddenly, it couldn't have been worse.

We were still a couple weeks away from Hanna's due date. By chance, I didn't have an afternoon class,

which was why I drove her to the doctor's office. The check-up was supposed to be entirely routine. Her

OB was a little gray-haired woman with an easy smile and an autodoc aide. The doctor's eyes were

flying down a list of numbers—the nearly instantaneous test results derived from a drop of blood and a

sip of amniotic fluid. It was the autodoc who actually touched Hanna, probing her belly with pressure and

sound, an elaborate and beautiful and utterly confusing three-dimensional image blooming in the room's

web-window. I've never been sure which professional found the abnormality. Doctors and their aides

have always used hidden signals. Even when both of them were human, one would glance at the other in

a certain way, giving the warning, and the parents would see none of it, blissfully unaware that their lives

were about to collapse.

Some things never change.

It was our doctor who said, "Hanna," with the mildest of voices. Then showing the barest smile, she

asked, "By any chance, did you have a cold last week?"

My wife was in her late forties. A career woman and single for much of her life, she delayed menopause

so that we could attempt a child. This girl. Our spare bedroom was already set up as a nursery, and two

baby showers had produced a mountain of gifts. That's one of the merits of waiting to procreate to the

last possible moment; you have plenty of friends and grateful relatives with money to spend on your

unborn child. And as I mentioned, it had been a wondrously easy pregnancy. Hanna has never been a

person who suffers pain well or relishes watching her body deformed beyond all recognition. But save for

some minor aches and the persistent heartburn, it had been a golden eight-plus months, and that's

probably why Hanna didn't hear anything alarming in that very simple question.

"A cold?" she said. Then she glanced in my direction, shrugging. "Just a little one. There and gone in a

couple days. Wasn't it, Wes?"

I looked at our doctor.

I said, "Just a few sniffles."

"Well," our doctor replied. Then she glanced at her aide, the two of them conversing on some private

channel.

Finally, almost grudgingly, Hanna grew worried, taking a deep breath and staring down at her

enormously swollen belly.

Seeing her concern, I felt a little more at ease.

Someone had to be.

Then our doctor put on a confident face, and a lifetime of experience was brought to bear. "Well," she

said again, her voice acquiring a motherly poise. "There is a chance, just a chance, that this bug wasn't a

cold virus. And since the baby could be in some danger—"

"Oh, God," Hanna whimpered.

"I think we need to consider a C-section. Just to be very much on the safe side."

"God," my wife moaned.

My temporary sense of wellbeing was obliterated. With a gasp, I asked, "What virus? What chance?"

"A C-section?" Hanna blurted. "God, when?"

The doctor looked only at her. "Now," she answered. And then with an authoritarian nod of the head,

she added, "And we really should do it here."

"Not at the hospital?" Hanna muttered.

"Time is critical," the doctor cautioned. "If this happens to be a strain of the Irrawaddy—"

"Oh, shit—"

"I know. It sounds bad. But even if that bug is the culprit, you're so far along in the pregnancy, and you

have a girl, and the girls seem to weather this disease better than the boys—"

"What chance?" I blurted. "What are we talking about here?"

The autodoc supplied my answer. With a smooth voice and a wet-nurse's software, it told me, "The odds

of infection are approximately one in two. And if it was the Irrawaddy virus, the odds of damage to a

thirty-nine week fetus are less than three in eleven."

Our doctor would have preferred to deliver that news. Even in my panic, I noticed the bristling in her

body language. But she kept her poise. Without faltering, she set her hand on my wife's hand. I think that

was the first time during the visit that she actually touched Hanna. And with a reassuring music, she said,

"We're going to do our best. For you and for your daughter."

About that next thirty minutes, I remember everything.

There was a purposeful sprint by nurses and autodocs as well as our doctor and her two human partners.

The largest examination room was transformed into a surgical suite, every surface sterilized with bursts of

ionized radiation and withering desiccants. Hanna was plied with tubes and fed cocktails of medicines

and microsensors. Needing something to do, I sent a web-flash to family and friends, carefully

downplaying my worsening fears. And then I was wrapped inside a newly made gown and cap and led

into the suite, finding Hanna already laid out on a table with her arms spread wide and tied down at the

wrists. Some kind of medical crucifixion was in progress. She was sliced open, a tidy hole at her waist

rimmed with burnt blood and bright white fat. I could smell the blood. I overheard the doctor warning

Hanna about some impending pressure. And all the while, the autodoc worked over her, those clean

sleek limbs moving with an astonishing speed and a perfect, seamless grace.

Thirty seconds later, my daughter was born.

With a nod to custom, our doctor was allowed to cut the cord.

Then both professionals worked with my daughter, stealing bits of skin and blood for tests, and in

another few moments—a few hours, it felt like—they decided that Hanna's cold had been a cold and

nothing more.

The autodoc began gluing my wife back together, and with a congratulatory smile, the doctor handed my

baby to me. Veronica, named after her mother's mother. I had just enough time to show the screaming

baby to Hanna, and then the ambulance arrived, flying the three of us to a hospital room where we could

start coming to terms with the changes in our lives.

Veronica slept hard for hours, swaddled tight in a little blanket infused with helpful bacteria and proven

antibodies. Hanna drifted into a shallow sleep, leaving me alone. I was holding my child, and the room's

web-window was wandering on its own, searching for items that might interest me, and there was this

odd little news item about a fifteen-year-old boy in France—a bright and handsome young man blessed

with rich parents and a flair for public speaking. Standing in a mostly empty auditorium, Philippe Rule was

announcing the launch of some kind of private space program.

It involved Mars, I halfway heard.

But honestly, I wasn't paying attention. I was too busy holding my happy, healthy daughter, watching her

eyes twitch as she dreamed her secret dreams.

· · · · ·

Three times in the last twenty years, the great dream of humanity has been attempted:

A manned mission to Mars.

The Americans were first, and by some measures, they had the greatest success. Seven astronauts

completed the voyage, only to discover that their lander was inoperative. Repairs were attempted

while in Martian orbit, but with the launch window closing and limited supplies on hand, the

mission had to be canceled. An American flag was dropped on Olympus Mons, pledges were made

to return soon, and after several months in deep space, and a string of catastrophic mechanical

failures, three of the original crew returned home alive.

Four years later, the European Union sent nineteen astronauts inside a pair of elaborate mother

ships. One of the mission's twin landers exploded during its descent, but the other lander managed

to reach the surface. Photographs made from orbit show a squat, bug-like machine tilted at an

unnatural angle, its landing gear mired in an unmapped briny seepage. At least one of its crew

managed to climb out of the airlock, crossing a hundred meters of the Martian surface. Then she

sat on a windswept boulder and opened the faceplate, letting her life boil away.

The Chinese mission was the most expensive, and ambitious, and in the end, it was the most

frustrating. The nuclear-powered rocket was intended to solve the difficulties of past missions.

The voyage to Mars would consume only two weeks. With the added thrust, a wealth of supplies

and spare parts could be carried along, and the inevitable problems of muscle and bone atrophy

would be avoided. Depending on circumstances, the crew would stay on Mars for as long or as

briefly as needed, exploring various sites while building the first structures in a permanent

settlement.

Unfortunately, the ship that held so much promise survived only sixty-five minutes. A flaw in the

reaction chamber triggered a catastrophic series of accidents, culminating in that brief, awful

flash that lit up our night sky.

Since that tragedy, no nation or group of nations has found the courage, much less the money, to

attempt a fourth mission.

This is wrong.

These countries, and the adults who lead them, are cowards.

Mars is out there. Mars is waiting, and we know it. It is a new world, and it is wonderfully empty,

and you want to go there. I know that's what you want. You dream about walking in its red dust,

and exploring its dry riverbeds, and building castles out of its red rock, and hunting for alien

fossils. Or better still, you want to find living Martians hiding in some deep canyon or under the

floor of an old sea …

I know you.

You want to do what your parents couldn't do.

Help me! Together, let's do this one great thing! If you give me just a little money … a week's

allowance, or what the tooth fairy leaves under your pillow tonight … then maybe you will be one

of the lucky ones chosen for the next mission!

The mission that succeeds!

—Philippe Rule, from the announcement

· · · · ·

I love my little sister, but it's hard to imagine us as sharing parents. We don't look alike—she is a wispy

blonde while I am stocky and dark. Our interests and temperaments have always been different. And in

most ways, we don't think alike. Both of us married for love, but it was a foregone conclusion that Iris'

spouse would have money. Where Hanna and I have a comfortable little home, Iris needs two enormous

houses, plus a brigade of AI servants to keep both homes pretty and clean. Instead of having one child

late in life, Iris started early, producing five of the rascals. Being a parent is everything to my sister: She

hovers over her babies and babies her children as they grow older. Every birthday is a daylong

celebration, and every holiday is a golden opportunity to spoil her children while flaunting her husband's

wealth. By contrast, I've always forgotten birthdays, and Christmas is an insufferable burden. I don't

approve of outrageous gifts. Yet with a distinct and embarrassing selfishness, I wish she would send

some of her wealth my way.

She is my only sister, and how can anything be easy between us?

I love my nephews and nieces, but according to Iris, I have never shown the proper interest in them.

Tom was her middle-born—an undersized kid with a bright, overly serious manner and a real talent for

getting whatever he wanted. When he was eight years old, he decided that he wanted money for

Christmas. Nothing but. He pushed hard for months, pleading and arguing, and begging, and generally

making his parents miserable. And even when they surrendered, his demands didn't stop.

"He won't accept even one present," his mother complained to me. "Not from anyone. He says he'll

throw any package into the fire."

"Give him fireworks," was my snappy advice.

Iris put her arms around herself, and shuddered.

Then with a more serious tone, I offered, "Cash is good. I always liked getting it when we were kids."

"I didn't," my sister snarled.

In secret, I was admiring the boy's good sense. His mother's gifts tended towards the fancy and the lame,

and after a day of fitful abuse, the new toys usually ended up inside some cavernous closet, forgotten.

"This is our deal," Iris continued. "Every relative puts money into a common account, and Tom buys

himself something. A real gift."

It was Christmas Eve. Hanna and I had flown into town that afternoon, bringing our baby girl. "So you

want me to throw in a few dollars?"

Iris blinked, and a tension revealed itself. She looked thinner than normal, nervous and pretty in equal

measures. As if in pain, she winced, and then with a stiff voice, she admitted, "He really likes you."

"Tom does?"

"He adores you, a little bit."

I always thought the kid was high-strung and spoiled. But everybody likes to hear that someone adores

him.

"I told him you'd help. Help him pick a real gift."

I halfway laughed. "Okay. I don't understand any of this."

"This is part of our deal. We aren't going to let him just throw his money away on something stupid."

"'His money,'" I quoted.

Iris missed my point.

So I told her, "You're not negotiating with the Teamsters here. This is an eight-year-old child. Your

child."

Iris was four years my junior. But there were moments when she looked older than me, her youthful

beauty tested by childbirth and the burdens that followed. Her face had a paleness, brown eyes rimmed

with blood. I saw the cumulative wear and tear. For an instant, I almost felt sorry for her. But then she

looked at Veronica sitting in her bouncy seat, purring and blabbering. And with a cold menace, my sister

warned me, "You wait, Wes. Wait. You think you know things, but you'll see how hard kids can be."

I nearly said an honest word or two. But a lingering pity kept me quiet.

Iris decided to smile, using her own brand of begging. "I want your help. Would you do this one favor for

me?"

Grudgingly, I shrugged my shoulders, and with a whiff of genuine pain, I muttered, "Why not?"

· · · · ·

It was a very peculiar Christmas. Four children and an assortment of adults sat at the center of a

cavernous living room, tearing open dozens of brightly colored packages, and in the midst of that

relentless greed sat one little boy, nothing in his hand but a small Season's Greetings card and a piece of

paper on which nothing was written but an account number and two passwords. Yet the boy was the

happiest soul there. Even while his siblings built mountains out of the shredded paper and luminescent

ribbons, my nephew clung to his single gift, grinning with the pure and virtuous pleasure of a genuine

believer.

Once the gift-grab was finished, he approached me, whispering, "Uncle Wes? Can we go now?"

"Sure," I purred.

The family web-room was at the back of the house. With an unconscious ease, Tom took us to a popular

mall. A thousand toyshops lined themselves up before us. But he hesitated. Turning abruptly, he spotted

his mother watching from the hallway. "Go away!" he shouted. "You told me I could do this myself!

Leave us alone!"

I will never let a child of mine talk that way to any adult. But honestly, I felt a shrill little pleasure watching

my sister slink away, vanishing inside the illusion of a candy factory.

Tom turned to me and smiled. With a bottled up joy, he admitted, "I want to go to Mars."

I didn't understand, and I said so.

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TheChildren'sCrusadebyRobertReedIfonetalliesweeklyallowances,part-timeemployment,birthdayandholidaygifts,aswellaslimitedtrusts,thechildrenoftheworldwieldanannualincomeapproachingonetrillionNAdollars.Becauseparentsandanassortmentofsocialserviceorganizationssupplymostoftheirbasicneeds,thatincomecanbec...

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Robert Reed - The Children's Crusade

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