Mary Anonymous by Bryce Walton

Name: Mary Anonymous
Author: Bryce Walton

Bryce Walton's "Mary Anonymous" opens ten miles outside New Washington, where Major-General Engstrand, Lt. Colonel Morgenson, and Major Schauffer wait in a duralium observation tower for the launch of a rocket loaded with three tons of G-Agent, a weapon meant to sterilize all life on Mars in retaliation for the ongoing interspatial war. Professor Michelson, the exhausted scientist who has spent forty years first fighting the Eurasians and then the Martians, confirms the G-Agent is loaded and gives the order to proceed. The men drink a toast, reflecting on how the war with Mars produced total human unity — no saboteurs or spies have ever struck at Earth's war effort, since no human identifies with the alien enemy. Michelson declines to watch the launch, saying he is tired and wants to return home to Lake House, to Mary, the little girl who keeps him company in his old age. He says she stayed behind because she felt unwell. In truth, Mary was never at Lake House. She stowed away in Michelson's helio and is now inside his office at the Foundation, suffering headaches from Martian "directives" — coercive wave-transmitted commands that punish any hint of resistance with pain. She retrieves a hidden capsule of G-Agent she secretly collected over months and drops it down a ventilator shaft, set to detonate in thirty minutes and kill everyone in the building. She also arms herself with a neutron beam gun concealed in her hat's sling. Internal narration reveals Mary's nature: she is incapable of love due to a lifetime of painful experiments — brain surgery, cellular manipulation — that destroyed that capacity, and she has been made into an instrument by unnamed others via the Martian directives. She believes that completing her mission (destroying the Foundation and the rocket) will finally free her from the coercive pain. Fleeing through the halls, she kills a friendly guard who recognizes her, then reaches the ground floor amid a rocket-crash alarm, killing Jonothan — a guard who had shown her affection — and others when they try to disarm her. She steals a helio, encountering a civilian clerk who, believing himself hallucinating from overusing "neuro-tabs," leaps to his death from the aircraft. Mary then shoots down the rocket carrying the G-Agent, causing it to curve back over New Washington instead of reaching Mars, guaranteeing it will contaminate the Earth's own population. She notes she feels no more directives from the Martian rocket and wonders if she is now free. Pursued by guards in helios and on foot, she crashes her own stolen helio in a forest, injuring her leg and side. She kills a guard who finds her, then flees through the trees pursued by an expanding search net of men, dogs, lights, and detectors. Badly wounded and unable to run further, she crawls the long distance back to Lake House, driven by a longing for Michelson's love and comfort. At Lake House, she overhears Michelson on the radio with Engstrand, who explains the "official" theory: that Martians altered one of Earth's own experimental chimpanzees, implanting or enhancing its intelligence, and sent it back to sabotage the Foundation from within — this chimp being what everyone believes "Mary" to be. Engstrand insists she must be captured alive for study, not killed. Michelson agrees to hold her if she appears. When Mary crawls through the open door, wounded and unable to speak, Michelson recognizes her and, following orders, prepares a hypodermic and calls for guards and medics rather than comforting her. Mary, unable to explain that her intelligence is not Martian in nature but rather her own capacity developed to its fullest — and that she is "more like them" than they know — can only clutch his hand and think his name as she is wheeled toward the laboratory, back into the cycle of experimentation, anticipating it will never end. The text concludes here.

By Bryce Walton · First published 1986 · Genre: Science Fiction, Adventure, Mystery · 8,561 words

First lines

_There wasn't one person on all of Earth to even suspect. No worry about security, saboteurs or spies in this interspatial war with Mars. Earth was firmly united this time. that is, of course, if you just happened to overlook Mary -- the sweetest, most incongruous little girl ever to hang around a launching site._

Ten miles out of New Washington the duralium observation tower was a slim needle stuck in the ground. Three officers of the UN High Command waited at the top of it, within view of the rocket. They waited for zero hour. They were Major-General Engstrand, Lt. Colonel Morgenson, and Major Schauffer.

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Mary Anonymous is listed on Textopian as a novel by Bryce Walton, dated 1986 CE.

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Work type: Novel
Author: Bryce Walton
Date: 1986 CE
Language: English
Genres: Science Fiction, Adventure, Mystery
Length: 8,561 words
Structure: 1 section, 196 paragraphs
Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)

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Genres

Science Fiction — The novel falls under this genre as it portrays a future society with advanced technology and the implications of living in such a society.
Adventure — The protagonist embarks on an adventurous journey, with numerous thrilling sequences adding to the suspense of the story.
Mystery — Several elements of mystery are present in the story, particularly as the main character uncovers the truths about her society.