The Experiment

It was the year 2066, and equality for all race and genders had been achieved. It was yet another hot, bleary day on Mars with strong winds and no rain forecast in sight for another three hundred years. Alyse Mandrin sighed, as she slipped on her Oxy-Breathe outfit that was bright green. Oxy-Breathe was one of the most popular brands in the universe, beating Nike and Gucci when it was first developed. Oxy-Breathe made it possible to breathe inside of a suit on Mars, as it had a chemical that could slow down your heart rate so you did not need so much oxygen when moving throughout your everyday tasks, no matter if it were outside or inside. It still provided oxygen at the end of every minute to make sure civilians were getting oxygen which helps human’s brains function properly. If someone still had trouble breathing in their Oxy-Breathe outfit, they could push a button on the suit and an air bubble would wrap around their mouth and nose.

Alyse liked the green because it reminded her of her time on Earth when she visited the planet on a science field-trip in middle school. Even though she had to wear an oxygen mask, she remembered seeing a bunch of brown and gray everywhere, and then one small tree that still had yet to grow. It’s bark was brown, like everything else, but its leaves were the purest green Alyse had ever seen. It wasn’t artificial or superficial in any way, and when Alyse looked at the green leaves, she felt more connected to the planet where her family’s origins were then anything else.

Allyen, her older brother, had a blue suit and he said it reminded him of their parents’ stations in the blue area of the government, but Alyse knew the truth because the siblings told each other everything. Allyen had the blue suit because it reminded him of the one blue ocean he saw on Earth on the same field-trip from middle school.

As Alyse made her way to her lab, she couldn’t help but imagine Earth when it was covered in green and blue. Alyse and Allyen’s parents were among the first recorded generation to live a full life on Mars. The generation before them, all the grandparents, had been pioneers on Mars and not many people from that generation lived to tell the story today.

Alyse tied her apron around her back as she slipped on gloves. She didn’t have a technical or professional job in the Mars government yet, even though everyone her age already had one. There wasn’t one day that went by that her parents didn’t remind her of this. But she wasn’t regretting it. After all, if she didn’t make a change, who would?

She quickly walked over to a faucet and filled up a jug of water. Then, walking through the aisles, she poured the water over the plants in their designated sections. Then, once all the plants had gotten their fill, she turned on their overhead lights so they could get the sunlight they needed to perform photosynthesis. Instead of using soil from Earth for the plants to rest in, Alyse was testing to see if the plants could survive in the Mars soil by themselves.

So far, she hadn’t had much luck and she was losing at least ten plants a day. She felt this loss in the very depth of her soul, for losing plants to her was almost equivalent to if Allyen or her parents died.

She knew there was a way for the plants to live in the soil, she just had to find the right way. After all, she had majored in biology and that was a huge step toward reaching her goal and dream of being a biologist.

The reason her “job” that she created for herself was considered taboo was because people on Mars felt that scientists and biologists were not needed because they weren’t going to wear out the planet or run out of materials, so why did they need a scientist or a biologist to solve or fix anything for them?

Alyse sighed. People could truly be unfair to her at times. Whenever she tried to sit with people other than her family, they’d clear out as if she was the plague. Even her family seemed embarrassed to sit with her sometimes. She tried to keep her head up and move on, but now she was basically friendless and nearly without family by her side because of her job.

The thing is, the people on Mars are just the descendants of the people from Earth, and they think they will never run out of supplies or materials and they think they have a never-ending supply of oxygen.

Alyse knew the truth. The Oxy-Breathe company had approached her, begging for her to create a solution to their limited oxygen supply. And she had agreed. The government thought she was just doing the job for the sake of it, which she was, but she was also doing it to help Oxy-Breathe and normal civilians who relied on the company just as much as she herself did. Even though the normal civilians disliked her, she knew she had to be selfless in order to find a solution.

As Alyse watered another decaying plant, she heard the sound of footsteps coming toward her lab. She ignored the knock on the lab door as she wrote down her observations of the plant.

It was probably their leader on Mars, coming back to tell her what she is doing as her “job” isn’t a real career and she needs to join the government.

Needless to say, when she heard Allyen’s voice calling out to her, she was rather startled. The shock quickly turned into confusion.

She carefully set down her Oxy-Pad, a device that runs on the massive amount of carbon dioxide in the Mars atmosphere.

Alyse rushed to open the door, as her brother never visits her during his 25-hour days, for that is when work occurs. “Yes?” Alyse inquired toward Allyen as he stepped through the open door. He looked at her, and without hesitation, hurriedly shut the door behind them.

“You’re in danger,” Allyen said.

“I’m always in danger,” Alyse replied, picking her Oxy-Pad back up again. “This is nothing new.”

“No, you’re in the kind of danger where your life it on the line,” Allyen told her.

“Yes, I know. You really think the people don’t tell me they’re going to kill me whenever I try to sit with them?”

“ALYSE! LISTEN TO ME!” Allyen yelled at her. Alyse almost dropped the Oxy-Pad. Allyen never yelled at her.

“Okay, I’m listening,” she said shakily.

“The government thinks that by working your own job, you will inspire other people to break away from working at the government so they can start doing their own jobs too. Several people have already mentioned to me that they wish they could be like you. Well, the government got wind of it, and they want to eliminate you. They’re coming any minute now,” Allyen said all in one breath.

Alyse felt all the blood drain from her face. “But I am not bothering anyone! People don’t even like me! How could they think it’s my fault?”

“I don’t know, but you should go into hiding. I know some really good hiding spots that the government doesn’t know about, because I work in the agricultural and engineering branch and no other government official works there.”

Alyse suddenly felt a bubble of anger rise to the front of her mind. “No! I’m needed! I cannot just leave!”

Allyen looked really confused. “What do you mean you’re needed? Your life is on the line, I think whoever needs you can wait if they care.”

Alyse realized that she would have to tell Allyen about the agreement with Oxy-Breathe, because he didn’t know how desperately her services were needed.

“Look, people do need me. Oxy-Breathe doesn’t want people to know that, so they secretly approached me with a request to find a way to produce oxygen through plants here on Mars. Just like how it used to be produced on Earth. And the deadline Oxy-Breathe gave me is starting to grow closer, and I haven’t found anything. If I don’t have oxygen by the time the deadline rolls around, there will be no more oxygen for people to breathe in their suits,” Alyse explained to him, not meeting his eyes.

She knew they were supposed to tell each other everything, but this was a big secret she had kept from him on behalf of Oxy-Breathe’s pleading to keep everything under wraps. Allyen stared at her. He hadn’t said anything for a few minutes, and Alyse was starting to get worried she’d put him in a permanent state of shock.

“Say something,” Alyse said, “Anything.”

“Have you tried using chemicals to manipulate the plants DNA into thinking it is evolving?” Allyen asked her, as he stared at a blooming bunch of tulips that had been put in normal, Earth soil.

“No. I’ve tried to avoid chemicals so everything can happen naturally, but the plants have resisted every attempt at Mars soil. Every plant I put in Mars soil dies within a few days time,” Alyse responded, surprised that Allyen was perfectly fine with what she was doing. “Maybe you should use a chemical that isn’t very dangerous to the atmosphere or Mars at all. Try using the chemical that Oxy-Breathe puts into their suits that makes it so humans do not need a lot of oxygen when they are in them. You should try injecting that chemical into the plants. Because Mars is already hot and sunny, you can put the plants outside for a minute each day, and they will get their natural sunlight. And you can use the regular Mars soil because by then it won’t make a different if you are feeding it nutrient rich water. I can give you the nutrients. We collect them in the branch I work in,” Allyen said.

“And I can collect water from space by using an evaporation net, which collects water that had been evaporated,” Alyse said, as she contributed her knowledge and research as well.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she couldn’t have done it by herself, becaue her and Allyen have always been a team. She has advised Allyen on his line of work, because it is very similar to hers, and he does the same for her.

A sudden sharp rap on the door jolted Alyse out of her line of thought. She looked at Allyen in panic and he mouthed: “Go” to her.

Alyse ran around the back of her lab, trying to find somewhere to hide, while the door was contiously rapped. She was almost out of hope for a hiding place when she remember that the door to the pantry where she kept her plants, was almost completely invisible to the naked eye.

She climbed in the pantry and shut the door just as she heard Allyen say: “Who is it?”

“The High Order of Government Offiicials would like to have an audience with Alyse Mandrin to discuss her line of work,” a woman’s voice said from behind the door.

“She is out right now. I’m afraid I cannot help you,” Allyen said.

“Oh, it is no problem. Instead we will just take you to speak and serve in her place,” the woman’s voice became clear as she somehow opened the locked door.

“You have no right to touch me,” Allyen said, “If you do, everyone will hear about the High Order’s cruelty from me.” “

No, they won’t,” the woman laughed. “Because you’ll be dead.”

“Stop!” Allyen shouted. “Don’t you touch me!” Alyse heard something click from behind the pantry door, and she immediately recognized the sound of electronic handcuffs. She heard Allyen fighting his way out of the woman’s grasp, only to hear popping sound that sounded like something was being injected through a neeedle.

Then suddenly, as soon as the woman and the noise had come, it was gone. Alyse waited five more minutes before stepping out of the pamtry, to find all of her plants destroyed and a note on the ground that said: “We have your brother. He has had to be tranquilized and drugged for the time being. If you do not co-operate with us, he will be killed.”

Alyse felt the fear pulse through her and the anger rise in her. She looked at her dead plants in the lab and couldn’t stop a scream of rage that ripped out of her throat from deep inside her soul.

Alyse pocketed the note and left to go find Allyen and the High Order of Government Officials. She found them in the only court room on the base twenty minutes later.

“Your charges include going behind the government to follow your dreams, badly influencing others, suspected ordered murder, and many more,” a High Order of Government Official said, stating all of the charges against Alyse. The official was a man, and he seemed to be glowering at Allyen.

Allyen shook his head, seeming to clear the fuzziness the tranquilizing has caused. “Just because she wants to do her own thing and people find that inspiring doesn’t mean you have to charge her with felonies and misdemeanors. The fact that I beat up the lady that was assigned to get me does not impact Alyse’s charges at all. She can’t order me to murder anyone because I am my own person and because she would never want someone to die,” Allyen said.

Alyse was standing to the side of the room where she knew the High Order couldn’t see her, and she crept up into a back room in th court. Once there she found a button that matched with the chair Allyen was sitting in. Quickly she pressed it and could visibly see his handcuffs unlock from where she was standing. He kept his hands behind his back as the High Order continued talking. She saw Allyen rub his bruised wrists tenderly as if they really hurt him.

Then, the anticipated moment finally came. Allyen took off, grabbed his special space gun made of materials from the Agricultural and Engineering department and pointed it at the High Order of Government Officials.

Alyse ran out of the back room in case something were to happen to Allyen.

“Never threaten my sister again,” he said. “Or I might just use this. It is dumb that you expect her to be working on the government when it isn’t even a law that she has to work there.”

The High Order of Government Officials started murmuring to themselves.

“He is correct,” an official said to another.

“He might hurt us if we are not careful,” said another official.

“It isn’t a bad thing that the girl is working with the plants is it?” a third official questioned.

“ENOUGH!” screamed the male official that read off Alyse’s charges to Allyen the first time around. “This is nonsense! Alyse is clearly the one at fault and she will be punsihed by death for it!”

A series of collective gasps were heard around him.

“You’re just going to kill the girl?” an official asked in shock.

“You don’t even have evidence she is in the wrong!” Allyen shouted. “Maybe she is actually doing us all a favor and helping us, but you wouldn’t know because you are too busy sticking your head in the mud!”

“NONSENSE!” roared the male officer. “That is the final decision of the High Court of Government Officials!”

“No it is not,” said an official.

“I object to that decision,” said another.

“Me too!”

“Me three!”

A female official calmly walked from the jury where everyone was shouting at each other. She made her way to Allyen and held out her hand. He hesitantly gave it to her.

She powered it up and aimed.

The aggressive male official that was trying to charge Alyse with everything in existence, was quickly turned a splat of liquid before everyone’s eyes.

The room was so silent, the silence was heard.

“I have the right to kill him, for in our original rules for the High Order of Government Officials, it says that anyone restricting or oppressing people in a way that isn’t right can be subject to removal from the High Order, or punished. He was punished because he has been breaking these rules forever and we voted recently to have him punished. I don’t think he would have given up and would have gone behind our backs to make both of your lives a living hell. He has done it before after all,” the female official said. She walked back up to see if she could bring tranquility back to the jury.

Alyse felt a little relief knowing she could be at ease now in her lab without having to worry about being killed. She glanced at Allyen, and was surprised to find his face scrunched up with a stormy expression.

“What is it?” She whispered to him.

“It doesn’t make any sense. The lady who came to get me said the whole entire High Order was asking for you. Not just one official. Doesn’t the murder seem a little elaborate too? Like there is a hidden meaning to it?” Allyen asked her.

Alyse pondered this. “You’re right. It actually seems more like a warning to stay in line.”

Allyen nodded in agreement. “We should get out of here. Lord only knows what they’ll do to us. Since they had the nerve to handcuff me just to bait you here.”

The two siblings slowly backed away from the startled jury.

“Where are you going?” the female official from before asked them from her place on the jury. The other jury members turned to look at the siblings.

“W-well we just figured that since this whole ordeal is over, we should get back to our work,” Alyse responded.

“That isn’t how it works. We all called you here for a reason. Sit down,” the female official ordered Alyse.

Alyse sat down without thinking and suddenly felt cool metal wrapping around her wrists. Huh? Alyse thought, confused. She thought everything was done with since the male official was dead. So why was she being handcuffed?

“See, the reason the other official had to be killed,” the female offical was saying, “was because we didn’t agree with him.”

“Oh?” Alyse laughed nervously.

“You see he just wanted you to be let off easy and be killed. That is not the way things are done here. His points of view are too Earthen to even be considered. Here on Mars, you are tortured until you decide to change,” the female official said as she examined her nails, looking rather bored. It seemed to Alyse, that she had done this many times before.

Alyse felt panic rush through her veins.

“WHAT?” shouted Allyen from her side.

The female official made a face at Allyen’s outburst. “Someone get rid of her annoying brother.”

“What should we do with him, Madam?” another official asked her.

Clearly, this woman holds an important place in the High Order, Alyse thought.

Alyse looked at the female official with fear as the official’s face contorted into an expression of brilliance and happiness. “Restrain him. We will make him watch her suffer the torture,” the female official said.

“No! Get off of me!” Allyen yelled as he pushed himself out of the officials grasps and toward Alyse. It took three male officials to hold him still.

Alyse watched with an empty expression as the female official, Madam, took her time walking to Alyse. Since Alyse was still in handcuffs, she had no way to escape.

“I don’t think you’ve seen the full power of electric handcuffs,” Madam said.

Alyse peered curiously at Madam’s hand, which held some sort of carbon powered remote in it. Madam pressed a button on the remote and Alyse felt a searing pain start from her wrists and spread through her body. Alyse whimpered in agony.

“STOP!” Allyen yelled at Madam. “She doesn’t deserve this! She didn’t do anything wrong!”

“Oh, but she did,” Madam replied to Allyen. “Anymore talk from you and you’re dead.”

Allyen struggled to escape the three male officials holding him down.

Madam turned back to Alyse, looking mildly happy. “For your brother’s outburst, I will be putting the pain level up to the highest it can go.”

“Please, don’t. I don’t think I can handle it,” Alyse pleaded.

“Too bad,” Madam said as she went to press the button.

Just then, the doors to the courtroom burst open.

Madam turned to look at who had come in.

“Mom! Dad!” Allyen yelled from where he was restrained.

Alyse felt tears of relief flow from eyes.

“I demand to know what is going on right now,” their mother said. “Why are my two children unable to leave? They are being forcibly restrained. That is against the law!”

“Actually it is the law, but you don’t know that because you are not on the High Order. It does not matter if these two are your children, they broke the law.”

“No they didn’t,” their father said. “I know the rulebook back to front. I work in the Scribes and Writing Department. So does my wife. I know the rules and so does she. She’s right, you are breaking the law. And if you do not cooperate with us, there will be some serious problems.”

“You think you can threaten me? You two and who? You have no power over me,” Madam sneered.

As Madam took a step toward Alyse's parents, the courtroom doors burst open once again.

Alyse and Allyen watched in shock as every single person on the Mars government filed into the courtoom.

“They might not have much, but together, all of us have way more power than the High Order could ever dream of. You can’t hurt us. After all, this planet is supposed to be a democracy. That is what all the Earthen leaders agreed on before they sent the first pioneers here,” A woman was saying at the front of the crowd. Alyse recognized her as one of the workers from the Scribes and Writing Department.

As soon as the High Order saw the extent of the amount of people who were against them, they released Allyen and Alyse from their restraints.

“We will be holding a meeting as a community and we will decide what to do with you all. The power belongs to us, the people,” Another citizen was saying next to the woman.

Alyse and Allyen walked back to their parents.

“Thank you,” Alyse said to her parents. “I know you don’t support my choice of career. But you still defended me. That means so much. Thank you”

“I think I could get used to your line or work but you have to promise to make sure not to get in any situations like this again, okay?” Her mother asked, halfheartedly joking.

“Okay,” Alyse said with a small smile. Finally, Alyse thought. I finally have the freedom to be me.