Planet Icarus. Athens Science Museum. Five Decades Ago.
Tectonic Plates of Earth: Pangaea. Icarus was modeled on this era of Earth 200 million years ago.
⠀⠀“Mom, nothing happens when I press the buttons.”
⠀⠀“This museum display is turned off, dear. It's meant to show how the tectonic plates of Earth move. Remember, Earth came first, our Icarus is the copy.”
Coal and Oil: The majority of Lignin → Coal on Earth occurred during the Carboniferous period, 300-360 million years ago. Icarus skipped this period and went right to the Terraforming era, balancing cyanobacteria with specific decomposer organisms like fungi and bacteria to catalyze the planetary ecosystem. While on Earth, the carbon mass of kerogen dwarfs the total organic content of all extant life by a factor of 10,000, on Icarus, this ratio is possibly as low as 100. Given the lowered Kerogen → Oil availability, petrochemical derivatives are rare here.
⠀⠀“Mom, do we have to look at this one? It’s boring!”
Continent of Gaea (Present day): Icarus was designed to replicate Earth, but without a clear understanding of tectonic plate movement. Notice that Italy and Greece, familiar names on both planets, are situated at the center.
Continent of Gaea, Icarus [https://i.imgur.com/CD3B5J9.jpg]
⠀⠀“Mom, this one works!” The young colt excitedly slammed the Reverse button, sending the globe back in time. Continents on the planet moved 200 million years in one minute. Then the island nation of Poland fell off the globe, exposing sparking circuitry.
⠀⠀“We should move away from this one, dear.”
⠀⠀Ignoring his mother's cautionary words, the impulsive colt hit the Forward button. The continents began their geologic ballet, led astray by off-kilter gears. His mother scooped him up and hurried him over to the Gondwana exhibit, where she set him down beside his twin brother. As the planet model groaned in protest, museum staff hurriedly rushed in to witness the spectacle of the jamming display.
Planet Icarus: Gondwana. One of Icarus’s three supercontinents. On Earth, this fragmented into Australia, Antarctica, Africa and South America 180 million years ago. Here on Icarus, portions of Africa and South America split away. Amusingly, on Earth, the ancient continent was named by an Icarus agent, Dr. Suess.
Continent of Gondwana, Icarus [https://i.imgur.com/dXsrDMJ.jpg]
⠀⠀The colt pointed at the name. “The Cat in the Hat guy! I like those books.”
⠀⠀Mom corrected him. “No, no, that’s Dr. Seuss, the author. A century ago, on Earth, there was a geologist named Dr. Eduard Suess. Two entirely different people.” She pointed at the Suess biography with a hoof. Behind her, the museum staff attending the malfunctioning globe cast suspicious glances toward her group.
⠀⠀“Can we see something with Greece?” asked the twin.
⠀⠀“Yes, dear, that’s in the next room.”
⠀⠀“Is Greece the same on both planets?”
⠀⠀“Yes, mostly. Both have cities we've visited like Athens, Megalopolis, Tripoli, Corinth, and Pelion. What we call Lerna Springs here is known as Argos on Earth. There’s a side by side exhibit of differences. For example, Earth has a lot more roads and cars.”
⠀⠀“What are cars?”
⠀⠀“I’ve explained them! There’s an exhibit over there that explains them more! You said it was boring!”
⠀⠀The colt spared a glance at the kid-unfriendly Oil display, then resumed his hunt for buttons to press.
Earth. Randolph AFB Enlisted Barracks. Five Decades Ago. 26,000 Light Years from Icarus.
⠀⠀Crickets swarmed the South Texas base with a beautiful water tower. A cricket pheromone-based paint coated two areas, an aircraft hanger and the barracks. As the hangar filled floor-to-ceiling, airpersons waded through a foot of bugs and used brooms to gain safe access to their rooms.
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⠀⠀One airman, the colt's Earthself, attached a dot matrix printer to his TRS-80. He'd written out dozens of versions of his centaur character sheet to fit various role-playing games. For the first time in his life, he pressed a PRINT button. A bug-phobic airperson screaming in terror with every cricket-crunching step did not dampen his smile at all.
⠀⠀An hour later, he met with friends at the relatively bug-free base rec center for a night of gaming where they could express themselves through storied fantasies of magical worlds and creatures existing in a time where the problems of Earth itself would seem distant.
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FIFTY YEARS LATER
⠀⠀In the Great Unconformity, starting 0.7 aeons ago, the Snowball Earth era erased 0.2 aeons of strata. The chronicles of lost things are vast, encompassing vanquished civilizations, creatures doomed to extinction and the whispers of silent films. What happens if fifty years of a human life gets stripped away? This is for posterity, so be honest—it’s akin to shaking away the layers of experience accrued over decades of journeying through life's labyrinth.
⠀⠀The Forest of Knowledge provides succulent fruit for the Planet of Lost Things.
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Earth.
⠀⠀An old math guy and veteran pulled a vacuum from a closet packed with papers and suitcases. For decades, he'd intended to sort through all the old character sheets and correspondence. As his dog noisily abhorred the vacuum, he had to smile. For the last time as a human, he clicked an ON switch.
⠀⠀Navigating past the detritus of his life, he sucked up the last week of dog hair as the dog danced and barked around him. He pondered how much his equitaur character might shed if he existed.
⠀⠀Of the 161,051 people dying that day, he’d be one of the 117,649 successful otherworld transfers.
Planet Icarus. Megalopolis: 2km. Tripoli: 26km.
⠀⠀Beneath a cart labeled LERNA SPRINGS BOTTLING, Non Sequitur, an equitaur with the head of a horse and the body of a man, sprawled supine on his long back. A pre-recorded voice message triggered. "Morning me, mind your nose. It’s time to Press The Button."
⠀⠀Groggy and disoriented, he slammed his head against the underside of the cart. Summoning his eye-screen blearily, he tried to find the button, only to be met with a stern computerized warning. "User must be in a standing position to execute this action."
⠀⠀Non Sequitur rolled to his four hooves and surveyed his surroundings for the elusive button. It wasn't on the cart, the pear tree, or the road sign. The vast graveyard hinted warmer, then he spotted the glowing red button towards the estate where he’d delivered water. Attempting to press it, he was met with another buzz. “Location name required before you may press the button.”
⠀⠀“The Necropolis Cecropolis of Megalopolis. It’s a knife factory.” Upon recognizing his precise location, the virtual button turned green. Non promptly pressed it. He rubbed his nose and chuckled.
⠀⠀“Advance message.” Recalling a task, he flipped the vinyl magnet from BOTTLING to LIBRARY.
⠀⠀“Last night, we delivered spring water to the Cecrops Chops estate. We side-tripped into town to replace a damaged case with a fresh one. Flip the magnetic label. You’ll deliver the four crates of books to the bookshop when it opens in a half hour.” As the recording went on, Non checked his body for dirt, especially the white feathering around his hooves and forearms. He broke his fast with a meal of oatmeal garnished with pear slices and raisins.
⠀⠀“We’re booked at the Specialty livery stable in Athens tonight. The Athens Book Fair starts tomorrow. Have a serendipitous day, me. Good luck with the skullduggery.”
⠀⠀“Thanks, me,” Non responded as his recording ended. He checked the local news for any signs of magnetic storms, then double-checked his field compass before opening a Faraday box housing recently modified archaic relics. The Canterbury Tales, a signed masterpiece, and The Master Key, a rare Baum original, each harbored a sophisticated fusion of antiquity and technology. Carefully examining the covers for any trace of the micro-cameras, Non found them expertly concealed, then activated the surveillance devices. He checked each camera on his eye-screen implant. Then he allowed an update from his Earthself to get zapped into his mind, a usual morning chore.
MEMORY UPDATE: PILLS. TEA. GROCERIES DELIVERED. LOTS OF RAIN. HAIRCUT AND SHOWER. CHOP ONION, CARROT AND CELERY FOR MIREPOIX. ADD TO TILING DATABASE. STREAM MUPPET SHOW. TYCHO BARKING AT THE VACUUM. UNCLOG THE VACUUM.
⠀⠀During the update, the equitaur brushed himself, tossing fluff to the birds. “Mirepoix would be great.”
⠀⠀He hitched himself and hauled the payload towards the morning sunrise. Would Miss Dap, the owlish bookshop owner, bring either book up to her office?
⠀⠀One of her many churlish posts amused him:
⠀⠀“Nobody likes prologues.”