5
Declaration
Sunsol they had a celebration like nothing they had had before, with turkey, chicken, rabbit, and tilapia; all four of their meat sources were drawn on. Will spent much of a sol preparing the bread, brown rice, and pasta; since they were out of bread, that meant baking a full two week supply (which Madhu helped to do). For dessert, in addition to strawberry shortcake, they split nine ways the very first orange to be picked on Mars, a special treat for Will, Ethel, and Shinji, who hadn’t had a fresh orange in four and a half years. After supper everyone who could perform with a musical instrument did so and they all sang a few songs, including the Mars version of This Land is Our Land that they had invented a year earlier. The song had started as a joke, but looking at his tiny son, Will realized the song had a deeper meaning for him now.
The next morning, Madhu took over child care; the first time someone else had responsibility for Marshall. Will and Ethel sent a series of videomails to lawyers to handle a simple but rather vexing problem: who would issue a birth certificate for Marshall.
“I apologize that NASA assigned this task to me; I’m really not sure why, I don’t know the relevant law,” Joyce Hastings assured them. “But then, I’m not sure any of the lawyers on staff have the expertise, either. I’ve consulted with several experts, and they’ve all assured me the matter should be simple. But the same experts have come back to me with caveats; Aurorae Outpost is not a United States possession; it is not a U.S. military base; the analogy that the Commander is like a sea captain works for marrying people, but might not for signing a birth certificate; etc. So I’m afraid we need a few more days—or weeks—to resolve the matter. I’ll have to get back to you when I have more solid information for you. Bye.”
Ethel turned to Will. “That’s not helpful! This is a ridiculous situation. I can get Marshall E.U. citizenship; you can get him American citizenship; but everyone says we need a birth certificate as a starting point!”
“I know.” Will sighed. “Of course, there’s no rush. Marshall won’t be applying for work or even for school for some time.”
“But I would like this resolved,” said Ethel, raising her voice. “It just makes me more depressed, Will. I don’t know why I’ve felt depressed on and off for the last week, but I have. I have this beautiful, joyful baby, and I feel depressed about it. I sometimes think I’m a bad mother.” She covered her eyes and began to cry.
Will was surprised by her reaction. He came over and put his arm around her back. “Don’t worry, we’ll get this resolved. If nothing else, as Commander I can take on the authority to issue a birth certificate, especially if everyone else here agrees to it. Who will dispute that? Have you talked to Shinji about this depression?”
She nodded. “This sol. He has various medications, but they’ll all end up in my milk, so I can’t take them. If we had baby formula I could, but that won’t arrive for three months. Madhu has whipped up some simulated milk from soybeans and vitamins, but we can only use that as a supplement because it isn’t balanced.”
“No, it can’t be, I’m sure.”
She sniffled. “I’m pulling myself together now.”
“What do you think is causing this depression? Do you feel torn from your career?”
“Yes, some, but I worked my way through that months ago. This is post-partum depression, Will. It doesn’t need a rational cause.”
“Okay. I’m here for you, don’t forget that.” He put his arm around her more tightly.
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Even though Ethel was in no danger and the excitement was over, no one wanted to leave the outpost on an expedition. Rather, they wanted to stay around and get to know the new resident. Anticipating that possibility, Will scheduled the next month to focus on clearing a usable road up Little Colorado Canyon to the top of the escarpment. It was something that three vehicles, equipped with bulldozer blades, could accomplish, especially with the judicious use of explosives and a lot of hard work in pressure suits with a pickaxe.
It was hard and dangerous work, for a ranger could tip over or get damaged in the process. It took them four sols of hard struggle to push sand and gravel over the shifting rocks on the talus slope at the base of the escarpment and create a solid road bed that the vehicles could drive on. They took advantage of Mars’s average daily temperature of about forty degrees below zero to freeze parts of the roadbed in place; ice was hard as concrete at that temperature.
The talus slope was one of the hardest stretches to complete. The rest of the twelve-kilometer route would take at least thirty working sols to build, using all three vehicles and four personnel. After six sols, they had penetrated 300 meters past the talus slope up the mouth of the canyon. The first week had shown good progress.
But when Will got home after a hard sols’ work—one of his first away from the Outpost, for usually he only spent half a sol on the road—he found Ethel more depressed than ever. “Joyce Hastings called again, and she still has no concrete plan for proceeding. The legal memoranda she’s beginning to receive all contradict each other.”
“She should be finding a way to make this work, rather than finding problems,” said Will. “I wonder whether we should pay a lawyer ourselves to pursue this, rather than relying on the agency.”
“I can ask a friend whom he’d recommend, but he’d recommend people in Edinburgh. Will, I think the easiest thing to do is issue a birth certificate yourself. It’ll be a good bargaining chip and may force the issue.”
“I can do one better that that. I was explaining the situation to Érico and Paul this morning and they felt we should sign a piece of paper—all nine of us—declaring ourselves legal residents of Mars by virtue of our long time here and our plans to stay at least two more years. As legal residents, we can declare our intention to establish a civil authority; not a national government or anything like that, but the equivalent of a village council. It’s not clear it will hold up in court because of international treaties about sovereignty over the moon and other astronomical bodies.”
“The treaties never were designed for a time when people actually lived on those bodies. At least not families with babies,” exclaimed Ethel. “I think that’s a good idea.”
“I’ll raise the matter after dinner.” Will looked at his watch. It was just about time for dinner, so they picked up Marshall and headed to Habitat 3. Madhu had whipped up pasta left over from the big meal; they had been eating leftovers ever since. Afterward there was a big pot of mint tea, since the coffee and regular tea had run out a month earlier and the greenhouses had plenty of mint. Will rose and asked for everyone’s attention. “I thought I’d give everyone an update about the effort to get Marshall a birth certificate. So far, no one has determined how such a certificate can be issued. The red tape is beginning to drive us crazy, so I’m thinking very seriously about an alternative that was proposed to me this morning: that all of us should declare the existence of a human settlement on Mars and assert, as residents of that settlement, our collective right to issue birth, marriage, and death certificates, and other certificates as needed by us. I suppose the declaration would also have to state how and by whom such certificates would be issued; probably the easiest statement to make is the Commander of the outpost would have that authority.”
He looked at the others, and no one said anything right away. Then Carmen said “My mother has been worried about the legality of my marriage. I remember when Érico and I talked to Sebastian before the ceremony, he said that as far as he knew, he could marry us.”
“Yes, that is true,” agreed Will. “But apparently the authority to marry does not include the authority to grant a certificate of marriage. So our marriages, also, have a funny legal status. But if we made the declaration retrospective, we could solve that problem.”
“But surely, no one on Earth will question your marriages,” said Roger. “After all, videos of some parts were broadcast. It’s an established fact that the ceremonies took place with the consent of both parties. So I wouldn’t worry too much. You could go to any court on Earth and get a court order to issue you certificates.”
“But who wants to go through that hassle?” asked Ethel. “Especially for Marshall. He deserves some respect.”
“What you’re calling for is a pretty big step,” replied Roger. “It’s not a declaration of independence or anything, but it could be taken by NASA or other agencies as a challenge to their authority.”
“Then they should issue Marshall a birth certificate,” replied Ethel.
“I’m not going to sign a declaration to set up some sort of civil government,” asserted Roger. “It’s ridiculous. This isn’t the wild west. It isn’t clear we have the legal authority to do it, either. In the United States an area on the frontier couldn’t declare itself a town; it had to apply to the territorial legislature for recognition as such.”
“We could always make a declaration and apply for such recognition as well,” said Érico. The idea had excited his imagination. “If no one knows who would make such a recognition, maybe it’s time to figure out who would. Because this isn’t just a base on the moon, with the workers changing every six months.”
“I’ll keep asking,” said Will, looking at Roger. “Maybe we need some patience. Eventually a solution can be found, I’m sure.”
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Work on the road up Little Colorado continued every sol. Several ancient landslides blocked the canyon completely with a tangled mass of boulders; bulldozing a route up, over, and back down the deposits was arduous and slow. But by the end of a month of work, when Marshall was a month old, they had managed to work their way three quarters of the way up the canyon. Ten more sols of effort would extend the route to the rim.
Normally, at that point, Will would have called off the effort so that they could mount another expedition to the eastern side of Aurorae. The route could be finished during the last few weeks before Columbus 2 arrived. But three factors forced a change in plans: first, everyone involved in building the road wanted to finish it; second, support for a geological expedition to the rim and the highlands around it was growing in Houston and at the outpost; and third, the nine of them didn’t want to get split up while a hot issue like Marshall’s birth certificate was being discussed.
Because the issue got promoted to a higher level, and that complicated it even more. Everyone agreed that a United States governmental authority could issue a certificate, but the European Space Agency objected on the grounds that the child had a parent who was a citizen of the European Union, and therefore a European institution should also have theoretical authority to issue a birth certificate, since Mars was not under the jurisdiction of a particular national government. Others argued that a United Nations agency—perhaps the High Commission for Refugees—should issue a certificate of some sort. The idea of establishing a Mars Commission was resurrected by France and some other nations, notably Brazil. The media got involved and members of the Mars Exploration Society proposed dozens of impractical utopian solutions. Through it all, the nine adults at Aurorae Outpost said nothing to journalists.
“Hold onto your hat, Will,” Heather said to him one morning, in a videomail. “I just got a call from Armando. Congress is so mad at NASA for dithering with expensive rockets and shuttles while Dr. Swift built a cheap one, they’re set to punish the agency by lopping a billion from its fiscal 2026 allocation. It would come from the EELV budget; the idea is to force NASA to lease space on the Swift next year, then buy one in ’27 if it proves reliable enough to man-rate. NASA has responded in private by threatening to send no crew on Columbus 4 at all if the budget is reduced. It’s not clear they could stop the French and others, of course, so it’s possible Columbus 4 will go with a reduced crew and no Americans. NASA also is threatening to mothball Shackleton. Needless to say, we will threaten privately to leak this rumor immediately. It would cause considerable embarrassment. Thought you should know. Bye.”
Will hit reply right away. “Thanks for letting me know; I think. Now I have to worry about something I can’t change. Obviously, we have to stay out of this fight. Or maybe not. Let me know if there are any calls I can make to Senators asking them ‘to maintain America’s commitment to Mars.’ I suppose that would be safe. Bye.”
But Heather never called him back to ask for support, so Will did nothing. He stayed focused on their efforts to clear the Little Colorado Trail instead. Finally, on March 11, the road broke through to the top of the escarpment. The ramp was narrow and precarious. It would require five or six sols of widening, which was easy to do now that they reached the top because they could bulldoze heaps of reg down the ramp to improve it, then pour water on the material to freeze it hard and bury it to make the ice permanent; they jokingly called the instant result Martian concrete. Every sol the two rangers had each hauled two tonnes of water up the route and stopped to spread it in areas needing strength, and the few hours of work every sol had improved the route considerably.
“Since Route 1 is to circle Mars around the equator and we’ve already cleared a long stretch of it along the floor of the Mariner Valleys, I guess this will be called Route 3,” said Will after they had finished their celebratory dinner that night.
“I like ‘Little Colorado Trail,” replied Érico. “It’s descriptive. Since we still don’t know whether it’ll become some other longer route, I don’t think we should give it a number.”
“I’m not sure we should use numbers at all,” furthered Roger. “The term trail reminds me of the ‘Oregon Trail’ and the ‘Santa Fe Trail’ and the other dirt tracks that opened the western United States to settlement. I think we should call our Mars-circling route the ‘Circumnavigational Trail.’”
“I like that,” commented Érico.
“That does have a ring; I like it, too,” replied Will. “If the Circumnavigational runs along the bottom of the Mariner Valleys, the route along the top could be called the North Escarpment Trail. But never mind about the name. The logical thing to do now that we have the road up the Little Colorado is to set out on a six week expedition westward along the escarpment edge; that will take the trail to Gangis and toward Echus Chasma.”
“Actually, we may have to clear the Circumnavigational along the escarpment top, because there’s no guarantee we can build a road from Noctis Labyrinthus up to the Tharsis Plateau,” said Roger. “I was looking at the possible routes last week. The Mars Exploration Society’s volunteers have done a good job of laying out possibilities. But all the possibilities are risky and require a lot of explosives. I’d push a route up Noctis Labyrinthus to the end, some time. But it may be easiest completing the road from the top of the cliffs downward in a few years when we have more specialized equipment.”
“This was a pretty dangerous project,” agreed Paul. “I’m glad we did it, but in retrospect, knowing how hard it was, I’m not sure we should have tackled it.”
“I agree,” said Will. “Fortunately, improvements will now be easy. Every time a vehicle goes up the road, it can haul up water and reinforce some section. I don’t see a need to continue full-time work on the Little Colorado Trail, and I agree with that name. What does everyone think about a new expedition? Based on our rotation, Carmen would be in charge.”
“Let’s do it,” agreed Érico, looking at Carmen.
“I’d like to go,” said Paul.
Roger nodded his support as well.
“Of course, Ethel and I will be staying here,” noted Will. “This would be a five-person expedition. Madhu, would you stay or go?”
“Oh, I’ll stay here. With only four people to feed every sol, I’ll have a lot of time to work on the greenhouses. We’ve doubled the amount of soil in the last year; once the next five greenhouses arrive, we’ll be in the position to set them up right away. I’m looking forward to that task.”
“Don’t consign us to eating just dehydrated rations,” Roger protested gently.
“Oh, the Sunwing will drop you fresh food periodically,” replied Madhu. “I’ll have time to prepare it, don’t worry.”
“Where does the birth certificate mess stand?” asked Érico.
Will shook his head. “Messier than ever. It’s become a political football. I actually got advice from one lawyer that Ethel and I should sue.”
“But he wanted the job, of course, and proposed a hefty fee,” added Ethel.
“I think it’s time to reconsider a declaration of civil authority,” exclaimed Érico. He looked at Roger. “Think of the advantages. Marriage and birth certificates will be simple. If we ever have any deaths or divorces, we’ll have a mechanism to handle them also.”
“The lawyers looking at the option, however, noted disadvantages,” said Will. “A civil authority would have implied responsibilities as well, such as education, health, and safety, responsibilities that overlap with the space agency. It would have the implied right to levy taxes, though in practice that won’t be necessary. It would also have to have an official area of jurisdiction, and I doubt we could claim the entire planet.”
“So, we define these matters,” replied Érico. “We could declare the entire adult population the legislature and the officially appointed the Commander as the executive. We could officially turn education, health, and safety over to NASA, or to ESA or another space agency, for that matter.”
“We could declare a boundary, too; say, all land within 500 kilometers of Face Rock,” said Madhu. She looked at Roger as well.
“One advantage of a boundary like 500 kilometers is that there could not be set up a second, national outpost nearby,” noted Shinji. “I am very uncomfortable about the Chinese Station at Shackleton, which is so close to the Lunar Commission’s station that the two are connected together by pressure tunnel. There should be one station at Shackleton, not two.”
“Rather than trying to figure out a five hundred kilometer radius, it’d be easier to use latitude and longitude lines,” suggested Érico. “This outpost’s jurisdiction could extend over everything from the equator to 15 south, and between 30 and 45 degrees longitude.”
“I think that is better,” agreed Will. “But be aware that we will make a lot of enemies on Earth if we do this, and a lot of those enemies will be in our space agencies and national governments.”
Érico looked at Roger. “I gather this decision should be unanimous, also.”
Roger looked back at Érico. “I have no objection,” Roger finally said, quietly. “I withdraw all the objections I raised last month.”
There was surprised silence in the room. Roger looked at his friends and nervousness flickered across his face. Finally he spoke. “You see, Madhu and I have been talking a lot about our future, over the last month. We’ve decided that, if the good Lord favors us, we’ll start a family here as well, just like Will and Ethel. That probably means we’re committing ourselves to stay here about eighteen more years. That’s a long time, and when you think about a residency of that length of time, your perspective changes. I had thought I’d return to Earth and continue to visit the moon periodically while also doing geological research at various locations on the Earth as well. But that will be difficult if we have a family, and we’ve always wanted to have a family. I’ve already visited all seven continents on Earth over almost twenty years, including my university years, and spent parts of five years on the moon. Twenty years on Mars is a nice complement to that. And it occurs to me that we should be able to bargain for Sabbaticals periodically, so we have time to write. Life here does not have to be a constant stream of ten hour work sols, six sols a week. So, in consideration of all that, and how cute Marshall is, Madhu and I have reoriented our priorities.”
“How marvelous,” replied Ethel. She leaned over and kissed Madhu on the cheek. “Congratulations, dear. It’ll be fun to raise our children together.”
“I agree.” Will extended his hand to Roger, who smiled and shook it.
“Well, is it unanimous that we will declare a civil authority here?” asked Érico.
Will looked around. No one objected. “I think it’s a great idea,” said Monika, who had said very little about the matter. “All of this is making me think more long term as well. There’s a lot for me to do here for decades as well.”
“Maybe I should plan to stay for a long time, after all,” added Shinji. “All of you have become very good friends.”
Will felt growing excitement as he looked around the room. “Shall I draw up a document for us to discuss, then? I can have something ready by tomorrow night.”
“Yes,” agreed Érico, and the others nodded as well.
---------------------------
Will slept little that night. What had started as a silly idea was now deadly serious and historic. But at the same time, Will had to remind himself that this was not the Continental Congress and the document he had to draw up was not the equivalent of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution. It was much simpler and shorter, for a much more limited purpose. It was not even clear it was laying the foundation of the United States of Mars, or anything like it. Rather, it was solving a simple legal problem: who had the right to write birth certificates for children born on Mars.
Nevertheless, it was hard to avoid grand language and ideals when drafting something. Will went on the web—with the Earth still close to opposition, items downloaded in a mere eight minutes—and looked at various examples. He gave everyone the result in paper form after dinner the next evening. Carmen read it aloud:
The Aurorae Declaration
We, the residents of Aurorae Outpost,
Recognizing the need for civil authority to handle various matters, such as: certification of marriages, births, deaths, divorces, and other life events of importance; adjudication of disputes; drawing up ordinances to regular behavior for the common good; providing for common needs, such as education, health, safety, and the necessities of life; regulating businesses; and recognizing transfer of ownership of property;
Do hereby agree to establish a civic authority for the Borough of Aurorae, defining the jurisdiction of said authority as covering all residents and territory located between the equator and 15 degrees south latitude and between 30 and 45 degrees west longitude.
Specific actions of said civic authority will be defined and authorized by a majority vote of all residents over eighteen years of age and carried out by such officers as designated by the adult residents.
Modifications to the powers granted in this declaration must be made by a vote of three quarters of all residents.
Signed by all residents of Aurorae this twelfth sol of March, 2025 AG
“That’s it?” asked Érico, after a moment of silence when everyone reviewed and contemplated the language.
Will nodded. “It’s short and simple, for now. We can add to it as needed later. It doesn’t even name a mayor, for example. It occurred to me that birth certificates are not usually signed by a mayor, so we can designate a clerk in a separate resolution to do that. And if someone here dies, God forbid, a death certificate needs to be signed by a medical officer.”
“But you have a lot of other things here, as well; passing ordinances, regulating businesses, recognizing ownership of land,” said Roger, suspiciously. “Why do we need those?”
“That list was given to me by a Scottish lawyer,” said Ethel. “Those are things municipalities often do.”
“And they are things we might do soon, as well,” added Will. “Roger, you and Madhu may be staying here twenty years; until one or more children grow up. Same for Ethel and I. We’ve already stayed here longer than NASA expected. I don’t know why we couldn’t go to half time as members of the astronaut corps and open a business here. I could see people doing that very soon, so the civic authority has to have responsibility to regulate businesses.”
“That’s true; I see.”
“No taxation, though,” said Érico. “Shouldn’t that be in here?”
“I was thinking we could always add that later. It seemed potentially controversial.”
“And recognizing ownership of land isn’t?” asked Roger. “That flies in the face of international treaties!”
“The text says ‘transfer of ownership of property’; I suppose that means someone might buy an old ranger from NASA, and our village government would grant a certificate of title,” said Monika.
“That’s what it does mean, but it could also refer to ownership of land,” said Will. “What I had in mind was not that the civic authority could grant ownership of land to individuals. The authority does not claim to own the land, and since no one owns it, no one can give it to someone else. We would have to declare the right to assign ownership of the land in a separate document, or assert the right to assign ‘user rights’ to land without actually assigning ownership, or we would have to be given the right to assign ownership by another body, such as the United Nations.
“But having said that, I hope we can acquire the right to assign ownership to land. If I’m going to stay here twenty years, I’d like to own a piece of land. Why shouldn’t we have a right to do so? The international space treaties are over fifty years old, are ambiguous, have not been signed by all parties, and are under fire. They will be modified some day.”
Paul whistled. “Even so, Will, that’s playing with fire.”
Will shook his head. “No, I don’t think we are. Let’s keep separate what the document means from what it might mean in the future. As I said, right now the declaration gives the civic authority the right to recognize transfer of ownership of property, but it does not grant the right to assign ownership of something no one owns.”
“But if we acquire that right, we could sell land to Mars enthusiasts,” said Érico. “There are thousands of Mars enthusiasts who probably would be thrilled to buy a piece of Mars. Land is only valuable near a settlement, too; otherwise no one can get to it or exploit its resources. We would never need to tax the residents here; we could raise plenty from land sales!”
“Land with a view is valuable, too,” added Ethel. “And now that we have the Little Colorado Trail finished, the entire top of the escarpment is accessible.”
“I’d say, take out the property transfer provisions or put in the tax provision,” said Roger. “Might as well add the tax provision. It only affects residents or property owners.”
“Okay,” said Will, very surprised. He wasn’t even sure there would be support for the declaration, let alone a desire to strengthen it. He turned to his attaché and added “raising revenue through taxation and other fees” to the text right before “recognizing transfer of ownership of property.”
“Why ‘borough’?” asked Roger.
“We could use township, county, or some other term, but it struck me as useful because of its ambiguity. Some cities, like New York, have boroughs. Alaska has boroughs instead of counties. And it isn’t clear which Aurorae would be.”
“With an area of about 750,000 square kilometers, it’d be a big township,” commented Érico.
“Did you run this by a lawyer?” asked Carmen.
“Yes, a respected lawyer in Edinburgh. I emailed it to him last night, he suggested a few changes, we made the changes and sent it back to him, and he said they worked fine.”
“I’m in favor,” said Shinji. “I don’t know how long I’m going to stay here, but I think Mars needs this. This isn’t the moon; we will always be a lot more isolated, and as we now can see, children can be born here. This is a world that will be settled, not just visited.”
“The moon’s only permanent residents will be the dead,” quipped Madhu. It was a longstanding joke, because a commercial company crashed cremated remains into the moon for a fee.
“Perhaps this outpost is like Jamestown,” added Roger. “Or any of the other tiny European hamlets that dotted the Americas in the 1500s and early 1600s. It was almost two hundred years from the founding of Jamestown to the Declaration of American Independence. Maybe we’re a century or two from the creation of some sort of nation here on Mars. Maybe this place will have several nations. But I agree that we can and probably should take this step.”
“I think we should take this step for the sake of the moon, too,” said Will. “Shackleton now has up to thirty-six people. Who says children won’t be born there, some day, and who says there won’t be permanent residents? I suspect the gravity problem is solvable; weights slipped inside special pockets seem to help a lot. The population there can only grow. LeMonnier Station in Mare Serenitatis has been authorized for next year, and the Aristarchus Highway is slated to be improved as far as the projected Equator Highway, so that automated water trucks can drive to LeMonnier. The moon already has three thousand kilometers of dirt tracks; why shouldn’t they sell land to moon enthusiasts along it? In another decade or two, flights to the moon will be routine enough and cheap enough for prominent scientists to take their families with them for a few months. I bet there will be kids on the moon in a decade or two. The Lunar Commission should get its act together and plan accordingly.”
“But let’s not do this as a political statement, Will,” replied Shinji. “I would caution against that. It may be counterproductive.”
‘This whole thing may prove counterproductive,” replied Monika. “That’s my worry. But I think we should take the chance. It’s strange to say this, but I’m beginning to really like this place! I think it needs a prototype civic authority. The birth certificate mess only highlights the problem.”
“Who are we going to ask to serve as recorder, to sign a birth certificate?” asked Érico.
“Wait!” exclaimed Will. “Are we going to approve this declaration? Is there a motion?”
“I move we approve the Aurorae Declaration,” said Érico eagerly.
“Second,” added Ethel.
“All those in favor?” asked Will. Everyone raised their hands. “Good. No one is opposed. The record should indicate that; but who will serve as recorder?”
“I nominate Érico, because of his enthusiasm,” said Roger.
Érico smiled at the endorsement of his sometime-nemesis. “I second,” added Shinji.
“Discussion? Other names?” asked Will. After a pause, he said, “All those in favor?” Everyone raised their hands. “Okay, Érico, you have to craft some minutes and send them to all of us.”
“And I move we authorize Érico to issue certificates of birth and marriage,” added Ethel.
“I’ll second that,” said Will. “Discussion? All those in favor?” Everyone raised their hands. “Well, my friends, Aurorae Borough now has a fledging government!”