Bar on Mars

The Mysterious Bar

There was no predicting that we were going to be here, or even any 'what ifs'. To the upper echelon of society, it was a given reality. They were going to make it happen, no matter the cost. But when they accomplished this, everyone was happy. Everyone was proud. Of course they were, who wouldn't be? That was the trick question, there were always people who weren't going to be happy. One of those people, being me. Blue collar worker, or at least that's what I've found that we've been called. A terraformer on mars. While I wasn't born on Earth, a lot of the culture was taken from there to here. Enough to make me somehow get homesick for a planet that I wasn't born on. Not like there was any way for me to go back, I was signed up for this job upon the day of my birth and the social standing of my family in the colony that was set up oh so many years ago on this red barren hellscape of a planet. 

Couldn't even deny this fate, just happened, couldn't get out of it. So I just accepted it. Became part of my life rather quickly, so I didn't bother trying to step out of line. Other people did. Never saw them again. I can only assume they were sent to the bigger settlements than this mining town out in the middle of nowhere. But what do I know, I'm just a terraformer. Not much there to learn or accept, I just am one. Just a terraformer. One that attends a bar that's the most common social spot in the little mining town we live in, called The Periodic Table. Fancy name, the drinks were watered down, the company was less than pleasant, but it was better than literally nothing out here in the barren landscape of this hellhole planet.

The bartender already knew my name, Johnsin, as did the musician that played for most of the workers that attended the bar, named Lilith. She was a welcome sight each time, being the poster girl for the bar for all the attendees, including myself. The bar was about as barren as it could be, but that could be blamed on the new 'reformants' in town, also known as the damn military. Don't know why they're here, but all I knew is that the bar was now much quieter, just myself, the bartender, and Lilith. The bartender's expression conveyed what I had been thinking as well, an older grizzled face that was laced with kindness and careful thought, but now bristled with worry and irritation. The military occupation in the town scared off any drinkers at the bar in fear of getting caught out after curfew or even sent to jail for being a bit too drunk one night, so business was tight and trickled fewer people within the walls. Not even the beautiful sight of Lilith could entice as many patrons into the bar like she used to, not while the ones in blue were out and about. All for that governor that placed them there, for some form of keeping us safe from whatever is out in the mines when we're terraforming. They call him a saint, I, for one, call him a tyrant. The bartender agrees with me, and I think Lilith does too, almost impossible to tell what she's thinking anyways, so I stopped bothering after a while when none of my looks were returned with the same intentions. Protecting us from something we don't even know is there, could be fake, could be real. They say it's real, so everyone believes him. No one believes us down here. That's why I drink, to try and at least dull that reality and think for myself. The bartender, bless his heart, was the one that consoled me through a few times where I had thought that jumping into one of the pits created from our mining equipment was actually a bad ideas instead of a good one, not from a cost effective clean up crew standpoint, but from a caring grandfather's standpoint instead. He always seemed to enjoy life, and talking about it too. His eyes lit up if I ever asked if he knew what plants were like, and being the man he was, would go on and on about something called flowers and butterflies and bees, all of which I had only seen in books a long time ago. But I always wondered how he knew of plants like that so vividly, if he was too young to have been on Earth and gone to Mars without being born in the red hellscape. 

Although whenever I thought about that, the bartender always seemed to slide me another drink, and we'd go back to talking about plants. About how what we're doing would lead to plants being grown on the surface of Mars like back on Earth. But once again, I doubted him being on Earth, and once again, I was given another drink and we carried on. The few times we strayed off course he brought up religion, something that we out on Mars found to be as useless as dirt, but he still believed in it with all his heart. I wanted to feel like that as well, enjoy talking about something, enjoy being able to believe in something other than machines. But I never could, still stuck in the job of being a terraformer even if it were against my will. I even said to the bartender with Lilith nearby that sometimes, just sometimes, when mining, I feel sad for some odd reason. Nothing is there to make me sad, yet whenever we dig deeper, I get a knot in my chest. As if something is being hurt, like a lost animal, or a puppy. Neither could explain why, and I wanted to know the answer. So I asked as much as I could from the bartender, and he couldn't give me my answers, nor could Lilith. But when I had planned to leave, Lilith did however, stop me before I could. Offered me another job. I had the strength to join it, whatever it was, and from her words, I was smart enough to join as well, having put together that something was being hurt during the terraforming. I didn't even know what she was talking about half the time, but I somehow was understanding. It was blurry all up until the point where I agreed, and when I turned to ask the bartender about it, no one was there. And when I looked back towards Lilith, she wasn't there either. I assumed I just couldn't see them, but then I looked around. The bar was gone, and I was standing in one of the many different sites that the company I had worked for used for their terraforming. But I was near one of the many pits that some called bottomless due to how deep they went, and that if you fell in, no one could get out. Although something willed me to walk towards the edge, where I found something I would never imagine in the red soil of the red planet.

A shot glass, filled with my favorite drink, and a flower on the rim.