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0079.10.19 Amador City was first developed in 0033, to provide a stable central capital for the then booming enterprise that was the Martian colonies. At first people thought that Mars would be just as inhabited as the moon, and a much more reasonable option for mineral collection as the asteroid belt. However, peoples hopes and dreams do not always come to fruition, and neither did the Martian colonies. It was found that the quality of ore mined on Mars was less than that of the asteroid belt, and the dangerous and often volatile nature of Mars' atmosphere, coupled with the booming industry of Helium 3 production removing the difficulties in moving to the Asteroid Belt to mine, removed a lot of the incentive for being on Mars. Development was halted only nine years after it began, with the existing Martian colonies barely producing enough commercial goods to keep themselves in business. The final colony, Fairbank, was a small weather station and rest stop for interplanetary craft, housing only one hundred thousand people on the moon of Phobos. Amador City's population, officially one million and unofficially nearly two, was actually enough to make it look like a real city, comparable with the rest of the urban areas of the Earth Sphere. Hardliners for Martian independance didn't like Amador, they claimed that it was too developed, wasn't really Mars. The claim went that the people in small towns like New Carson City or Whitewash were real Martians, and those in Amador City didn't really understand them. To an extent this was true, there was a very small population of upper and middle class beaurocrats dwelling in Amador, but this group amounted to less than one percent of the cities total population, and less than one percent of those could really consider themselves rich. What upper class people there were were almost all either Federation, or JDEG. The majority of Amadors population lived at the very lowest levels of the city, and much like anywhere else on Mars, they were miners. The city was built inside of the volcano of Olympus Mons, mostly to keep out of the wind. One of the repeated problems affecting Mars' mining operations were the dust storms. There were three kinds of day on Mars. On a good day, the Martian landscape resembled that of the frozen Siberian tundra without any snow. Temperatures were just barely below freezing, uncomfortable but livable. Sometimes adventurous young men would go out on a day like this with nothing but an oxygen mask and a winter coat. On a cold day, going outside with that sort of equipment would mean freezing to death in under an hour, the temperature at night could drop to lows never before seen on Earth outside an ice age. On a windy day, dust would pick up in land based tornadoes and hurricanes, destroying mineshafts and grinding the flesh off of workers. Amador City solved the problem of weather by being built high into the mountain and above the dust storms, something that it was only fortunate enough to be able to do because of location. The other cities on Mars were generally exposed or semi-exposed to the elements, and miners often had to work outside of the enclosed domes. Being built into a mountain, Amador started out sprawling and flat, and gradually became thinner and thinner as you went up. It wasn't designed like a Lunar colony, which actually imitates a city with large parks and open areas, but instead was designed with a honeycomb structure, much like the Jovian colonies would be many years later. The only relatively homely areas were on the very top levels, where the administrative beaurocrats from the Federation, affectionately called Tories by the miners, did as much as they could to stay away from the people of the lower levels. Amador City had fifteen levels. The fourth level contained the Cosmoport, and actually opened out onto the surface, not quite a third of the ways up Olympus Mons, and just above the height of where a duststorm could travel. It contained the huge upward curving railing that made up the Cosmoport. A Cosmoport was a much simpler and older Federation design of spaceport, built off of the original models at Baikonour and California Base. Without a close inspection they looked mostly like an unfinished rollercoaster, starting low and curving up and up till at the end they were going straight into the sky. Mars' Cosmoport was rarely used, a large freighter coming once a month to deliver supplies and leaving two days later with ore to be distributed throughout the Earth Sphere. Next to the Cosmoport was the small EF garrison base, jutting out of the mountain at one point but actually contained inside the fourth level of the city. A small but orderly barracks was kept, with a tiny airfield. The garrisons military might wasn't much, but considering what means the rest of the planet had to rebel it was enough. The primary weapons of the garrison were the Type 50 and the Fanfan, designed more for taking out an armored car than anything else. A few Type 61's were kept in good condition in case of emergency, and a Dish and two Tin Cods, modified to carry additional fuel, were used to carry out inspections of mining colonies. The commander of the Garrison, and de facto ruler of Mars, was Colonal MacAllister. He was famous for his knack in the Earth Federation of getting things done and making projects that shouldn't work successful. However, he was also famous for doing this at the expense of everything around him. In 0050 he had been condemned at a military tribunal for raping a twelve year old girl, but rather than be discharged, the Earth Federation decided that his talents would be useful in Amador, and his deficiencies would be out of site. He was sent to replace Colonal Parn, who had recently died of a heart attack. Parn had been nearly as bad as MacAllister would be, and his death was followed by a little over a month of unrest and protests in the mines. MacAllister had quickly solved this problem after assuming command. Now, twenty nine years after his reassignment, MacAllister was getting older, but was not tired of Mars in the least. Sitting behind his large, hickory desk, he mused over how much fun it was to be in control of an entire planet. The bald, tall, slightly overweight man put on his old EF Army cap and pressed the button on his intercom. "Angel, could you come in please." MacAllisters secretary, Angel, was a fourteen year old girl who had been orphaned to the garrison proper. Her parents had both been shipped off to the prison-mine of Stillwater two years ago, for crimes that she still had not had explained to her. She was a budding young flower, maturing quickly in body and unfortunately also in mind. She came in and closed the door behind her, a short skirt and tight military blouse covering her growing bosom. She had only started her period six months ago, and still remembered how much MacAllister had beaten her when he had found out. She looked down at the floor and asked him what he needed, and he told her to come closer. Closing her eyes, the young girl put her hands behind her back and walked over to the desk, the garrison commander smiling as he moved a hand inside her shirt, slowly grabbing and fondling the young womans breasts. He wasn't looking at her, and couldn't have noticed or cared as she began to cry silently, tear after tear going down her face. She knew full well how the rest of her day, the rest of her life, would play out. As MacAllister looked up at the ceiling, ignoring his toy and thinking of his wife back on level one for a change, the intercom flashed again. "Sir, we have a message from Fairbanks long range radio. That Martian Independance Organization group, ARES, they're back. Word has it yesterday there was an incident on Equity Return last night. I have a speech that ARES leader broadcasted before the battle on file if you want it." MacAllister bared his teeth, squeezing down fiercely and pounding on the table. The muffled whimper coming from Angel satiated his sour demeanor for the moment, it was what he kept her around for. "No need, I'm very familiar with that piece of trash Keller. Tell the 4th infantry brigade they're going on vacation in New Carson City. Bring me Kellers family." |