If you can't find the truth where you are, where do you expect to find it? — Pilgrim’s Canticle, Book of the Way, 452 AFC
The year was 2035. After decades of delays, disasters, and debate, humanity finally set foot on Mars. The world watched as Odyssey One, the first manned mission, landed in the Aonia Terra region. Captain Elena Ruiz and Commander Tariq Singh made history with every step they took.
Their mission was simple: explore, collect samples, and establish a permanent habitat.
But on Day 3, the scanners picked up something strange.
A heat signature—faint, pulsing—deep underground, far from any known volcanic activity.
They followed it to a cave.
Inside, the air was unnaturally still. Dust hung motionless in the beam of their lights.
Deeper in, their flashlights caught something half-buried in red soil: a human skeleton, slumped against the stone. The suit it wore was unfamiliar. The fabric, brittle with age. The helmet, cracked and clouded.
Not NASA. Not ESA. Not any known program.
Above the body, crudely carved into the rock:
“They were already here.”
The cave grew colder.
Outside, something stirred in the dust.
