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There are a thousand shades of brown

My scooter ski up a wake of dust that hazed frole of light Ahead, rust-colored hills made chocolate-colored shadows The plains before the hills were tan, but in a few hours they’d be vivid, blush-colored, beautiful Right now, the sun was low, a spike of light rising fro The sky above was pale cinnamon

I had nothing to do today Classes were over, I hadn’t started , just out, as far and as fast as I could A track ran around the perimeter of the colony—a service road, really, but no official vehicles went out at this hour, so I had it to myself Made one circuit, then headed to the open plain, avoiding weather stations, ine, the battery did its job, and the lifts popped me half a meter into the air Dust flew behind h ainst me would be cold, but I arm and safe inside my environment suit I could ride around the whole planet like this

“Polly? Are you there?” The voice of Charles, my twin brother, burst over the comm in my helmet Of course it was Charles Who else would want to ruin ?

“What?” I grumbled If I could turn off the helmet radio I would, but the safety default meant it stayed on

“Mom wants to see us”

“Now?”

“Would I have bothered calling you otherwise? Of course now Get back here”

“Why couldn’t she call me herself?”

“She’s a busy wo”

Charles and I were only norew up together But I’m really older because my embryo was frozen first My unique collection of DNA has been in existence in the universe longer than his Never irl and a boy rather than just a girl, and that she then decided that it would be fun to have theht she’d save ti two babies at once At any rate, I was frozen first, then Charles was I’m older

But as Charles always pointed out, we’ve been viable hus for exactly the same amount of time The seals on our placental canisters were popped at exactly the same moment, and we took our first breaths within seconds of each other We watched the video twenty ti five minutes older like a natural-born tould We were twins, exactly the saht

I would never admit that out loud

“Okay Fine” I slowed the scooter, turning in a wide arc and heading for hoht I couldn’t see the bunkers over the garages, air locks, and elevators leading down to the colony, but I knehich way to go and how to get there, and if I got off track, the hoet lost

I tookin the air lock while vacuums sucked away every last speck of Martian dust froh the scrubber so not a particle of grit would get into the colony air syste was clean, I checked the scooter back into its bay and folded my suit and breather into my locker I put the air tank in with a rack of empties for a technician to refill I carefully double-checked everything, because you always double-checked everything when things like clean air and functional environ I took with the chores, it wouldn’t be long enough I couldn’t put off talking to Mom forever So I brushed the creases out of my jumpsuit and pulled my brown hair into a tail to try to make it look decent Not that it helped

The office of Supervisor Martha Newton, director of Colony One operations, was the brain of the entire settle and environmental workstations, computer banks,running The place bustled, various department heads and their people, all in Mars-brown unifor handheld terently It was all critical and productive, which was exactly how Mom liked it Supervisor Newton herself had a private room in the back of operations Her office as well as her house, practically—she kept a fold-away cot there, and a stack of self-heating meal packets in one of the cupboards for when she worked late Some days she didn’t co casseroles, she kept the place clean, spotless, like a laboratory Nothing cluttered her gray alloy desk except the computer screen tilted toward the chair Two more chairs sat on the other side of the desk The cot, her jacket, and eency breather were tucked in a closet with a seamless door; her handheld and other office detritus remained hidden in a drawer Ain back looked over the central atriu there, expression serene, would think she ran all of Colony One by telepathy I wouldn’t put it past her

When I finally arrived, sliding open the door, she was sitting just like that, back straight, her brown hair perfectly arranged in a bob, wearing neither a frown nor a se-and-brown uniform was clean, neatly pressed, buttoned at the collar—perfect

Charles was already here, slouching in one of the extra chairs My brother had grown ten centis stuck out like he didn’t knohat to do with them I’d been taller than him before last year Now he stared down at me and made jokes about my scalp

They both looked at me, and I felt suddenly self-conscious My ju loose, and I could feel the chillonon the scooter for no reason at all Maybe she wouldn’t ask

“Polly, thank you for co,” Mom said As if I’d had a choice As if I could find a place on the whole planet where she couldn’t find me “Have a seat”

I pulled up the other chair and sat; the three of us were at the points of an equilateral triangle I wondered what Charles and I had done to get in trouble This wasn’t about taking the scooter out, was it? I couldn’t think of anything else I’d done that she didn’t already know about Charles was usually too s rover or borrow gene-splicing lab equipineer blue strawberries just to see if he could I glanced at hiet a hint, but he wouldn’t look at me