“We have to keep Mars open. We have to fight for that, and you have to be part of it. We need you more than anyone else. You were the one that had the greatest impact during our visit to Earth; in essence you’re the most important Martian in Terran history, because of that visit. They still write books and articles about what you do, did you know that? There’s a feral movement getting very strong in North America and Australia, and growing everywhere. The Turtle Island people have almost entirely reorganized the American west, it’s scores of feral co-ops now. They’re listening to you. And it’s the same here. I’ve been doing what I can, we just fought them in the election campaign for the whole length of the Grand Canal. And I tried to counter Jackie a bit. That worked a little, I think, but it’s bigger than Jackie. She’s gone to Irishka, and of course it makes sense for the Reds to oppose immigration, they think that will help protect their precious rocks. So Free Mars and the Reds may be in the same camp for the first time, because of this issue. They’ll be very hard to beat. But if they aren’t. . . .”

Nirgal nodded. He took her point. She could have kissed him. She squeezed him across the shoulders, leaned over and kissed his cheek, nuzzled his neck. “I love you, Nirgal.”

“And I love you,” he said with an easy laugh, looking a bit surprised. “But look, I don’t want to get involved in a political campaign. No, listen— I agree that it’s important, and I agree we should keep Mars open, and help Earth out through the population surge. That’s what I’ve always said, that’s what I told them when we were there. But I won’t get into the political institutions. I can’t. I’ll make my contribution the way I did before, do you understand? I cover a lot of ground, I see a lot of people. I’ll talk to them. I’ll start giving talks to meetings again. I’ll do what I can at that level.”

Maya nodded. “That would be great, Nirgal. That’s the level we need to reach anyway.”

Sax cleared his throat. “Nirgal, have you ever met the mathematician Bao?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Ah.”

Sax slumped back into his reverie. Maya talked for a while about the problems she and Michel had discussed that day— how immigration worked as a time machine, bringing up little islands of the past into the present. “That was John’s worry too, and now it’s happening.”

Nirgal nodded. “We have to have faith in the areophany. And in the constitution. They have to live by it once they’re here, the government should insist on that.”

“Yes. But the people, the natives I mean. . . .”