Chapter 2: The Dream Pursued
"How long will you be staying here on Mars, Mr. Brubaker?"
Quaid watched the customs clerk examine the forged I.D. card and forcibly calmed his breathing. "Two weeks."
"Bringing in any fruits or vegetables?"
Overcoming the self-destructive urge to again say two weeks, Quaid replied. "No. Nothing to declare."
The clerk nodded, ran the I.D. through a read/re-write device and handed it back. "Enjoy you stay here on Mars, Mr. Brubaker."
"Thank you."
Quaid left customs and caught a cab to the Mars Hilton. He gave his Brubaker I.D. to the deck clerk, who fed it into the verifier.
"Would you like the same suite?"
"Oh definitely."
The clerk finished the check in and then commented, "It seems you left something in our safe."
"Would you get it for me please?"
The clerk put his own thumb on a biometric verification unit and waited. Quaid's on thumbprint brought a happy beep. The lockbox emerged from the counter behind the clerk.
Quaid knew even before he opened the lockbox that it would contain a single page of folded paper. He knew it would be a hand-drawn flyer for a sex bar called "The Last Resort." There would be a men's-room-style drawing of a naked woman on one side and on the back, a hand-written scrawl in his own handwriting saying: "For a good time call Melina." He unfolded the page to find he was correct.
Okay, if he'd never before been to Mars, and if his Recall trip had just been a dream created from his own subconscious, then how had he correctly guessed the contents of this lockbox?
He couldn't have.
This could mean only one thing. He was not Quaid. He was Hauser. Cohaagen had wiped Hauser's memory, dumped him on Earth with a fake wife and a brainful of false memories as part of an elaborate plot to find Kuato, the psychic mutant behind the rebellion. And so here Quaid was back on Mars, following along the planned path in a way that would make Spinoza himself climb out of his ancient grave and applaud Quaid's lack of free will.
He turned away from the desk and gazed hopelessly out the window. He realized that he was looking at the pinkish-red sky of Mars. That sky should be blue.