Tracy's face shriveled as if his scowl could ward off the stench of Mars. When would he get used to it? Never. That's when. He imagined that the worst of the gust blew beneath him as he sat atop his new steed.
They followed the industrial bullet train railway out of Tharsis, the train that carried the ore shipments and crude oils that the quarry shipped out to the refineries and factories. Tracy looked at the bright side. The hard work of cutting a path across Mars was already done for him. So, he and his steeder traveled parallel with the train tracks.
Tracy kept the horse at a trot for now. A panel atop his cybernetic hand opened projecting a holoscreen. Tracy identified the steed's operating system and synced to it. It took a few moments but soon he had access to all of the steed speeders schematics, dials, and digital displays. A semicircle speedometer showed they were at the low end of the steed's capability. A bar showed the kinetic energy being stored in real time, and if he selected it, the bar gave him a countdown of how much time he had until a full kinetic charge.
He swiped the holoscreen to a stats screen. Here he viewed things such as the steeds current temperament, the level of bonding between the two of them, and the horse's endurance. The other screens showed things like a countdown until the next suggested tune up, a slightly outdated map of the Martian territory settlements, along with some hardware provided with the steeder itself.
As interesting as all of those settings were, he yanked his head up and observed his surroundings.
As with the way into town, the sights leaving Tharsis were much the same. Tattered thin modular buildings covered in red dust huddled together, forming the town proper. The town itself butted up against Olympus Mons, the dormant volcano mountain. Long conveyor belts stood over the tops of mounds of quarried gravel piles, like herds of metal giraffes vomiting up rock streams.
While the irrigation ran mostly underground, large water towers perched at strategic points around the town, supplying water to Tharsis itself, as well as the farms which enveloped it. Farmers gathered grain in the near endless fields of rye, a sea of beige rocked by waves of bread-colored cereal grain. Here and there the metallic sheen of a bot laborer caught the sun beams as they swiped with their sickle hands and scythe arms. In other fields cattle herds grazed behind barbed fences, their jaws chewing in circular fashion, unaware that they were bovine planetary colonizers, a simple and incredible testament that the terraforming of Mars worked, more or less.
Tracy eased back in the saddleseat, which he admitted was quite comfortable. He smiled. He'd actually gotten a killer deal. Public perception was everything. Simply because people thought these steeders were goofy meant that they had dropped considerably in value over the years, but that did not mean Ford had pulled any stops when it came to the features available. Tracy let out a deep laugh and the steed whinnied in return.
"I might actually enjoy aspects of this trip."
They reached the edge of Tharsis and entered the wild. The terrain contorted underfoot, growing jagged, composed of shattered slabs of shale. Nothing but open red country all around as far as could be seen. And it would be that way all the way to New Oklahoma.
An industrial train shot past them, whipping Tracy's duster into a frenzy, traveling to that very city settlement, no doubt.
Tracy knew Leroux well enough to deduce Roy's location when the Sheriff's eyes slipped in that direction. Several centuries ago, the surface of Mars had been split into quadrangles, massive rectangles of land that together made up the entire surface of the red planet. It was a way to standardize the sections of Mars so everyone could refer to the same locations. Some of those quadrangle names remained in use to this day. Some even kept the name of the whole quadrangle as their settlement name, like Tharsis. Others kept the name, regulating it to mean the county-state, but gave their settlement an additional name.
The settlement of New Oklahoma resided smack dab in the middle of the Phoenicis quadrangle. From what Tracy gathered, each county-state had its own sheriff, judge, and governor. Noke'la, as the locals called it, was a big settlement. If Mars had a capitol, that was it. Many of the immigrants from Earth made Noke'la their first and last destination when fleeing from Earth. And a booming, bustling town was just the place Roy Rothspalt was likely to garner a cult following.
Tracy and his steeder traveled much of the day caught up in the ever-present wail of the Martian winds in the distance. As they trotted on and on, the wailing wind almost sounded like a chorus, a lament of Mars herself. It was as if the planet rejected any effort to rejuvenate it. Barely revived, it was dying again, and was resolved to do so. The steeder's clomping didn't break the wordless ballad of Mars, but instead provided the eerie unending notes a steady beating tempo that haunted his ears.
On and on they trod. The sun seemed to follow them for a time, moving from straight overhead, then sinking, and now perching just above the horizon in the west, thankfully behind Tracy and the steeder.
A rusted Tesla tower rose up into view from between two parting hillsides, a web composed of metal and coils. The thing still thrummed with life, though not operating at full capacity. The vibrations reverberated in Tracy's metal arm. The wailing buzz of the tower rang in his ears. Alone, it appeared otherworldly, ancient. Fitting for an alien planet. Tracy steered clear of the bygone relic. Zealots had claimed the broken tower, transforming it into a venerable sanctuary, an electrified temple of worship to the now deified Tesla. If the electric apostles even caught wind he was from Earth, there was no telling if they'd hail him as a prophet, or slay him as a sacrifice on their AC altar. Tracy pressed on.
[https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1012604009468661781/1016418507187048468/DFO8922_background_art_of_Barsoom_key_visuals_by_Francois_Schui_8465c815-cde0-492f-8e58-542cbbdde2ec.png?width=408&height=612]
Occasionally another industrial train would fly down the track, blowing a frigid breeze across the back of Tracy's neck.
Every so often he'd glimpse a black tailed jack rabbit, a roving triangle-eared Fennec fox, or a slithering Chuckwalla lizard. He recalled that during phase four of the terraforming process, they'd introduced a whole slew of animal types, many from the Gobi Desert in Mongolia, the coldest inhabited desert on Earth. Later, other mammals, reptiles, insectoids, avians, and even some amphibians like the red spotted toad were transferred. It amazed him how much life had taken to Mars, adapting as if they had been natives all along. But no aliens. If there were any, he would have seen them by now, he reckoned.
"I guess all that Martian alien crap was truther propaganda," he muttered to himself.
Back on Earth, whether or not aliens existed on Mars was a source of heated controversy. Media and the scientific community at large insisted that this was post-war Martian propaganda bent on enticing explorers to abandon Earth and start an adventurous life on Mars, all to bolster the Martian economy. Hogwash Burroughsian tales, if you asked Tracy.
Tracy blasted a jumping tarantula that skittered too close to him. A roadrunner zipped by the steeder, the spider's twitching spindle legs protruding from her beak. Tracy glowered.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
The steeder never tired, never thirsted, but carried on, step after step, as full of energy as when he left Tharsis earlier that day.
While patting his steeder, he opened a hidden compartment and was pleased to find goggles, a helmet, and a small respirator. He disregarded the helmet, but donned the other two. He was also happy to find the goggles had a mini heads-up-display, and though small, monitored his own heart rate, body temperature, as well as the current Martian temperature. Readings from the respirator showed the current oxygen percentage in the atmosphere being pumped out by the oxygen plants, and displayed it as a percentage of levels needed to sustain human life. The decreased air pressure reminded Tracy of the elevations of Arizona's higher mountain ranges. That explained why he was short of breath.
A warning alarm blipped across the HUD and he pulled the steed to a halt.
A crevasse split the ground in front of him.
He followed the fissure from where he rested as far out as he could see. The crack in the planet's surface stretched across the horizon, splintering into thousands of branches, weaving every which way, encompassing the entire lay of the land before Tracy. Good thing the steeder's operating system had sensors. He could have come dangerously close to the edge had he not been warned.
He brought up the holoscreen again and swiped to the map screen. A dot represented his steeder. In front of them lay the Noctis Labyrinthus, a canyon that scarred Mars like a patch of dried, cracked skin. Planetoid eczema. He kicked his horse into a trot, moving parallel along the edge. When he felt he was close enough, he stopped, dismounted, and stretched his sore legs a bit before peering over.
For as wide as the fissure stretched, it plummeted just as deep through the planet's layers. An array of stone sediments lay stacked atop one another, much like the Grand Canyon, except the entire canyon back on Earth could fit in this Martian mega-chasm. The crack ran so deep, the sunlight could not even penetrate the darkened depths.
"Well, boy," said Tracy to the steeder, "Now's as good a time as ever to relieve myself."
Tracy chuckled with boyish mischief as he sent a stream over the edge, an action not at all befitting a man his age.
Just as he wrapped things up, a gust blew his hat off, over the edge. Without thinking, his hand snatched it out of the open air, thrusting his center of balance forward.
Vertigo smacked Tracy, causing him to teeter. His knees buckled and he stumbled. His breath caught in his throat as the edge rushed up to meet his face. Tracy swallowed the pain of the impact as his fingers clawed for an anchor. Rocks sliced his natural hand, but his cybernetic limb found a handhold. All of his weight hung over the precipice, tugging on his metal arm. His flesh arm waved in circles as he tried to find his balance. A shadow fell across his face.
His steeder knelt on the ledge, putting the exhaust pipe within reach. Was the horse really that intelligent? He hadn't given it much thought. Didn't matter now. He grabbed hold of the edge with both hands. Then, with a heave, Tracy swung his metal hand up and grasped the pipe, or tried to. His hand slipped on the first and second attempt. Nervous desperation dried his mouth. His eyelids shut tight. One more look down and he was a goner. With a final heave his arm shot up and grasped the exhaust. His aim was true. The steeder neighed and dug its hooves in, pulling him forward. Once he cleared the ledge, he lay there for a time, catching his breath.
"Wheweee. That was foolish," he said to the metal horse. His chest heaved up and down. "I'm not usually afraid of heights, but the depth of that canyon... sure makes a man feel insignificant."
Relief flooded through him, from his toes to his ears. In fact his ears picked up a new noise. He got to his feet and dusted himself off. His eyes came face to face with the robotic eye orb of the steeder. It held his hat in its metal jaw. Intelligence glistened behind that eye. "My, you're as smart as any flesh horse I ever rode."
He ran his fingers through his hair and donned his hat.
The horse knickered.
"Guess I owe you some appreciation. Thanks." Tracy patted it with as much affection as a man could pat a living metal beast. A notification pinged from the steeder operating system.
Bonding level increased 25% .
Tracy smiled.
"Wish I had a sugar cube, but I reckon that wouldn't mean much to a living contraption. Sorry bud."
The noise that drew him to his feet persisted. The wind wailed in the distance.
He turned away from the canyon, looking back towards Tharsis. A rolling sandstorm heading his way masked the settlement. But as he gazed on that storm trying to judge how fast it moved, sleek man-made shapes erupted from the plume of cloud sand.
The goggles zoomed in. The HUD's target system blipped to life. Six brackets framed three moving objects. Speeders with armed men inside. Even with the zoom-in feature, their faces were too far away to make out. But he recognized Leroux's two deputies. Sure as salt and pepper. One seemed to be missing a few cogs upstairs, Crag, if his memory served him correctly. The other, Russ, the sleek man with wide-set eyes, was as friendly as a rattlesnake, and if Tracy's gut was right, his arms could spring-draw his guns just as fast as a viper lashing out, fangs first. He'd give special heed to that fella.
"So that's how you're going to play it, eh Leroux? I thought we were friends."
Well, he wasn't going to shoot them from this distance. Not first anyways. They might just be coming to wish him farewell. Yeah right.
He whipped out his double action seven shot revolvers and cracked the guns in half. One gun held seven rounds. The other only four. He drew three bullets from the gun belt running across his chest and dropped them in the heptagonal cylinder. With the flick of his wrist he snapped the seven shooters back into place.
Still, he'd not shoot until he confirmed their intentions to do him harm. And if so, God have mercy on their Martian souls.
"What do you think, boy? Can we outrun 'em?"
The steeder pawed the ground.