Meanwhile, less than twenty meters away, another person was pushing forward as well, just as intent — if not more — to position herself close to Laura Whiting. That person was Belinda Creek and she had watched the news broadcast of Whiting meeting with the agricultural workers earlier this morning because it had pre-empted her soap operas. She had seethed with hatred as she'd gazed upon the face of the person she blamed for all of her recent woes. Laura Whiting had started this so-called revolution, putting an end to the lifestyle she'd grown up with. Laura Whiting had seduced her husband into military service to support her revolution, changing him from the man who would give her a child and a larger apartment to a man who had divorced her, who had turned her in to the police for profiteering, who had contemptuously thrown her away like a piece of garbage. And then the booze and the cigarettes — Belinda's main focus in life — had dried up because of Laura Whiting's revolution, leaving her twisting and seizing on her bed, sending her through the hell of withdrawal, nearly killing her. And now Laura Whiting had done the most hated thing of all. She had secured a fresh booze supply for Mars, had secured high-grade tobacco, but she was denying it to Belinda just because she didn't want to get a job! That was the cruelest, most vicious thing she'd ever imagined. Belinda couldn't even get marijuana anymore, all because of that cursed welfare reform law Laura Whiting had come up with.
She pushed forward, not gaining ground as quickly as Lisa and Horishito but moving relentlessly closer all the same. Finally she got to within ten meters, was able to see that hated face in person for the first time. Her resolve solidified as the fury surged through her. Until this moment she had not really been sure she was going to carry through with her plans. Now she was sure. Laura Whiting had to die. She had to die for everything she'd done to Belinda's ordered and structured life.
She felt the cheap pistol that was in her pocket, reassuring herself it was still there. She checked to make sure the safety was off. She then pulled her hand out of her pocket so she would not arouse suspicions. She pushed on again. A line of people had formed before Whiting, their purpose to shake her hand and say a few words to her. Belinda pushed herself into the line and began to move with it. She was thirty people back, moving forward at an average of one person every fifteen seconds.
Lisa and Horishito had managed to work themselves to within sight of Laura by this point. They stood hand in hand on the forward edge of the surging crowd, their eyes tracking over everyone within ten meters of the Governor. There were just too many people for them to give any one person more than a cursory examination. Both of them looked at Belinda Creek, but neither lingered on her for more than a second. Neither had time to notice the way her eyes were flitting back and forth, the way her teeth were chewing nervously on her lower lip, the way she was wringing her hands over and over, trying to keep them from reaching into her pocket prematurely.
"This is a fuckin' joke," Horishito said. "There are too many people here. How in the hell are we supposed to do anything? What are we even looking for?"
"Her luck has held this long," Lisa said. "Hopefully it'll hold through today as well."
"Fuckin' aye," Horishito said, looking at his PC to get the time. It was 1130. "Boarding for the train has already started. She'll probably wrap this shit up in another minute or two."
Laura Whiting was, in fact, planning to wrap this shit up even as they spoke. She had shaken hundreds of hands, talked to hundreds of people, been hugged and mobbed and even kissed a few times. She was weary and knew it was time to get on the train and hopefully catch an hour or so of sleep on the trip to Proctor. She had actually opened her mouth to tell the crowd that she was sorry for not talking to all of them but she had to go. And then she spotted the woman in the handshake line. She was a dirty blonde, her hair unwashed, her eyes bloodshot, her nose with the scattering of burst capillaries that denoted a chronic alcoholic. Laura did notice the flitting of the eyes, the wringing of the hands, the nervous, determined look on her face. She also noticed the slight bulge in the woman's right pocket — a bulge that could have been a make-up case or a PC or a marijuana case. Laura suspected, however, that it was neither of these things. She suspected it was a gun. She decided to stay a bit longer, smiling at the next person in line, receiving his thanks and his gratitude graciously, just as she'd received everyone else's.
The woman moved closer, person-by-person, her eyes locked looking everywhere but at Laura's face, her posture becoming more and more tense. Finally she was the next in line. Laura talked to the person in front of her, accepted a kiss on the cheek, and then wished him a good day. She told him to vote for independence. He promised her that he would. The man stepped to the side, allowing the woman to step forward. Her eyes were now locked onto Laura's face, a mask of hatred plainly showing now. Her hand dropped into her right pocket.
Laura smiled at her. "You're doing your planet a great service," she said. "And you don't even realize it."
The woman actually paused, confusion furrowing her brow as she tried to digest these words. Laura actually feared for a second that she wasn't going to go through with it. But then the hatred came back. The woman opened her mouth. "I got your fuckin' revolution right here, you cunt!" she yelled. The hand came out of her pocket. There was a gun in it.
The gunshots were shockingly loud on the crowded platform. Belinda had time to fire three times before the shocked bystanders surrounding her tackled her to the ground and stomped on her wrist, forcing the gun from her hand. All three of the hyper-velocity, hollow-point bullets struck Laura Whiting in her unprotected torso. They tore through her flesh, one ripping a hole in her ascending aorta, one destroying her left lung, the last exploding her liver and her hepatic artery. She staggered two steps backward and collapsed, the smile still on her face.
"Motherfucker!" Lisa Wong screamed, her own gun instantly in her hand. She rushed forward, pushing members of the crowd aside until she was kneeling next to the fallen governor.
Laura Whiting's eyes were still open. She was still aware. She looked at those around her and then, loudly and plainly, she said: "Keep Mars free, people. Keep Mars free."
She took a few more ragged breaths and then she faded. By the time the first dip-hoes got there four minutes later, she was dead.
No less than a dozen people heard her final words. Every one of these people reported these words to the MarsGroup reporters who wanted to know every last detail from every last witness. These words were broadcast across the shocked and mourning planet in every possible medium. They appeared on MarsGroup news sites, were told by weeping anchors during news shows, were repeated person to person.
"'Keep Mars free, people, '" General Jackson quoted as he cried for his friend during a press conference just twelve hours after her death. "'Keep Mars free.' With her very last breath in this life, she spoke those words plainly and for all to hear. That was her dying wish, her dying decree to the people of this planet. I don't think I have to tell anyone what she meant by that."
But Jack Strough thought that he needed to tell everyone what she meant. "It seems obvious to me," he opined — with a straight face no less — "that our revered governor, a woman we all respected deeply and loved passionately, in her dying moment, realized that a negotiated peace is the only way we can truly keep Mars free. That is the only explanation for why she uttered those dying words. One seriously doubts that a woman dying of multiple internal hemorrhages would have wasted the last of her energy telling us to 'Free Mars, people... ' if it did not indicate a sudden and perhaps divinely inspired reversal of her previously stated position on the matter — a position that she was, in fact, out campaigning for at the time of her death."