CONDEMNED TO THE FUTURE

Chapter 2.

  The soles of the boots had definitely "morphed." That's what they'd called molecular changes in rheo materials that caused the macro-shape alteration. Now he no longer slid on the ochre volcanic rock, weathered glasslike after nearly a billion years. The boots must be newtech rheo also, able to adjust to the environment on their own. The sole lugs now felt stickier. Another great extravagance in a simple item, unless...something about how the morphing was sensed and controlled... Another ghost memory flitted by and escaped.

Now he wished he'd taken a little time at the top to climb around behind his former prison and scope the terrain, or rather "marain." He could've confirmed his location by seeing the huge crater bowl and the tops of the three giant volcanic cones of the Tharsis Montes a kiloklic to the southeast.

Anyway, he was now heading down roughly west, with the late sun shining on his chest but still not charging his grav belt enough. His ravine was also becoming easier to scale. He let a tiny part of his mind monitor the crabwise climb downward and the rest consider the bigger picture. He had no goal, other than to get warmer and find food before the pack's gave out. His future lay in just how far forward he'd been sent by means of the impeded animation. His punishment.

Ha, ha! He might never know why, but he was alive and still young biologically, and he felt the same driving ambition as in that last membit at the Repository, that same pride in his true nature. It was a hunger that never died, reawakened with his body, and growing with an energy that made his feet fidget whenever he sat still to rest more than a few seconds. Restless leg syndrome? LOL

Whatever had happened, he could and would finish on top of the constantly randomized, insane, ego-driven heap that norms always made of their society's power structure. Obviously, he had tried this before—-and failed. Surely the true basis of his punishment. Yet he couldn't recall any specific details of the "crimes" involved. Didn't matter. The winners always did this to the losers, even norms of the same kind, to lessen guilt and vaunt their own egos. Add being truly different, as he was, and it was not strange he'd been condemned to the future.

What was surprising was they'd let him live at all. Someone, or thing, had intervened. The Great Voice? He felt certain he was recovering more rapidly from the reawakening than any norm could have, already fit for this climb, planning his next move. Only proper; further proof of his innate superiority and adaptability.

But he still had to deep-breathe up here. Straddling feet flat on snow-crusted outcrops, he peed and twisted to look back up the ravine's vee. The top was now out of sight, and the cloud layer nearly dissipated. But he was still so high that the land below continued to spread away from the mountain's huge curving base without visible detail. Even through the binocs it became just blue-greener and showed only a few sparkling waterways netting what had to be an equatorial-type rainforest. No cities or any artificial constructions at all. After the accidental thaw norms had started, the budding rainforest had been restricted to east of this arid upland plateau.

How could it be here? The air, now thicker and much warmer, gave a clue. To create enough oxygen and nitrogen to flood Mars's atmosphere to this great an altitude at this density would require quite a bioengineering feat. Especially since the planet's gravity precluded total retention of such Earthlike pressure. Air molecules at the top of this atmosphere would be continually breaking free and flying off into space. So, there would have to be continual replacement as well. A large fully functioning rainforest would figure heavily into such a successful terraform cycle.

Even so, it couldn't stop Mars's axial-tilt refreeze after only 600 of its years. It was quite likely he'd been asleep less than that time. Or else, the whole planet would now be as humans had first seen it soon after telescopes had been invented. Of course, it could be much further ahead, into the next thaw or so, but his jaunty mood pushed that aside easily. After all, it all looked so familiar. Now it was getting too dark to see. The tiny cool sun was about 15 degrees above the horizon.