Oudwi could almost hear oblivion calling to him. He looked up – down? – at the once red planet that hung in the sky. He was nearly of age and would soon be shipped off to his assignment below … above. Across. Across the void, across the long black river that separated the two celestial bodies. He had never really been curious about life over there; he had never really been curious about anything.

Oudwi had done well enough in his studies – what little they were allowed to study. Most of what they were taught directly related to their upcoming life of servitude, and even those classes were limited to what the Unders showed aptitude for at a young age. Math and accounting for the Numbers, strength training and tools for the Labors, hygiene, and cleaning for the Domestics and so on.

Like all of the Unders, Oudwi had been double classed – he was an Archivist and Game Piece, a fighter in the Haver’s violent sporting events. Everyone was given one intellectual and one physical specialty. This was done for purposes of efficiency – if something happened so one duty could not be performed, then the slaves could be used in another capacity. Once a slave’s usefulness was complete, they were then culled, either in the Arenas or directly into the recyclers.

New Earth – Old Mars – had completed the terraforming process just over a millennia before; the people could not afford to let potential nutrients for the soil go to waste. There was not much waste on NE; humanity learned the lessons of environmental destruction long before, and it had been a hard lesson to learn. Old Earth was now a desolate wasteland, uninhabitable and stripped of all worth. There was talk of using the same terraforming process to reshape the old planet, but, so far, none had thought the cost to undertake the project to be worth it.

The Mars Project had been a last-ditch effort at saving humanity, a feat of engineering unparalleled in human history. From what little Oudwi learned, and he had learned some history in order to fulfill his archival duties, he knew that both Mount Pallas and Vesta were never a part of the original Martian landscape. Using rocketry and nuclear strikes, each of the former asteroids were settled onto the surface of the planet in opposite hemispheres. Only one third of each of the former asteroids rose above the planetary surface; the old earth engineers were trying anything they could to increase the mass of the planet in order to increase gravity. While it succeeded to a small extent, ensuring that Mars' orbit didn't change was an even greater engineering boondoggle.

The Great Martian Ocean was the next step in getting the planet ready for habitation. Using a combination of inter-system ice and as much ocean water as could be viably cleaned and transported, a massive planetary salt-water ocean had been formed. There were giant freshwater lakes established as well, and polar ice caps brought from the interplanetary ice-fields. For years, all human and animal waste products had been collected in vast quantities to be jettisoned to the new world to aid in creating a more fertile home. Sections of forests and jungles were transported en masse in gargantuan vessels, as were animals, insects, and human monuments.

Looking out towards the planet, Oudwi could see Olympus Mons. It was the only thing left untouched by the terraforming project, surrounded by a massive wall of aluminum oxynitride - transparent aluminum, a ceramic composed of aluminum, oxygen and nitrogen. It had been decided by those in charge of terraforming that it needed to be protected; preserved for further scientific study. Some atmosphere seeped in, but it was as protected as it could be. There were entrances to the Olympus Mons Preserve, but those were heavily guarded; only scientists and researchers with special permits could enter the park.

It was a rescue, a rescue of humanity an admission that they had failed in protecting the planet that birthed them. The final and most difficult piece of the terraforming project was the Lunar Relocation Program. Climatologists, oceanographers, and planetologists argued the necessity of relocating Earth’s moon to a Martian orbit to help ensure a significant tidal relationship between the two bodies. There were many who argued against it, citing Mars’ own moons, citing the cost in terms of engineering and of human life, but in the end it came down to nostalgia – those making the journey wanted the moon in the sky to remind them of where they came from.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

The moon became a ferry, a starliner that transported the bulk of what was left of humanity across months of space. It had not been a particularly luxurious voyage, nor had it been a safe one. It was estimated that between twenty-five and thirty percent of people were lost in accidents, exposure to radiation, starvation and rioting. A new class system developed, as is bound to happen in human history, where the haves are supported by the have nots. The thing the haves - those who came to be known as the Havers - had was safe space. The families and corporations and government officials that had contributed the most (money, resources, political capital, and all manner of other things) were given spaces in the larger, human made caves and tunnels. The bigger the contributions, the larger the cavern system

These tunnels and cavern systems afforded a great deal of protection against solar winds, radioactivity, and the occasional battering of the surface by space debris. The least fortunate of the human survivors lived on or near the surface in flimsy biohabitats that were prove to power failures, collapse and destruction due to outside forces.

Using the Moon as a vessel, with its embedded engines, the journey took just over three years. In that time, the new hierarchy was solidified. The preliminary colonists, the people who had arrived years earlier than the lifeboat in order to complete the terraforming, they tried to fight the change in democratic ideals. Their voices were drowned out by the enormous arriving population. They fought, many died. They were offered new, revered places in the archaic political system. Some took those offers. Others did not, preferring to take over the smaller continent they dubbed New Australia.

While Oudwi could see the large island, he did not know its name. The Unders were never told anything about New Australia; they were only told it was a place of death. The slaves were only ever taught about the main continent, Panmavors.

"Cha lookin' at, Oldie?" the voice came from behind him, and might have given him a start had the back of Oudwi's mind not registered a presence entering the observation deck.

"Just, y'know, the Island. And Olympus. And wondering what family I'm being sold to. How about you, Lyitem?"

Oudwi's old friend and sparring partner shrugged. "I dunno. Just wandering, I guess. Was down at the arena practicin'."

Of course you were, thought Oudwi. That's about all he ever did. The Maesters had been hard pressed to find a second class for Lyitem. Fiercely loyal, Oudwi's creche-mate was also built for all things physical and not much beyond. He was to be sold as a gladiator/warden - he would either be in an arena or a peacekeeper.

"So, O, your sis take the deal or neg?" Lyitem sked. His manner was too relaxed; Oudwi knew his friend had loved his twin sister since the creche.

"Oh, yur, she's gonna take it. She's always talked bout being free, and always wanted to find a way to do it. The Farm is her way out." Oudwi glanced at his old friend whose shoulders slumped a little.

"At least she'll be free, right, O?"

The Farm was the breeding ground for the Havers. Mars had, indeed been inhabited, inhabited by a bacterium that wreaked havoc on the reproductive systems of any human that was infected by it. The disease was easily spread, hard to detect. There were no outward symptoms, just the loss of all possible reproduction within a few weeks of landing on the planet. No cure or vaccine had been found; it only ever affected humans, but it was in the soil, the plants, and the animals around the globe.

Those who had never been to New Earth - the slaves born and bred on the Moon - were unaffected. No massive outbreaks of benign uterine fibroids, no mutated, ineffectual sperm. The reproductive systems of the Unders were fine. While there were artificial means of growing babies in rows of machines, the wealthiest of the Havers wanted their children grown in human incubators. The Haver's stem cells would be reconfigured to eggs and sperm; once fertilized, the eggs would be implanted into the slaves.

Women who worked on the Farm did so willingly. There was no rape, no coercion - it was all a simple scientific procedure with a successful implantation rate of close to 90%. Once per earth year, the Farmer would produce an offspring, then their time would be spent nurturing the child for the remainder of that year. When the child was three months old, it would be introduced to the parents and taken to New Earth.

After twenty cycles, the Farmer would be given her freedom. She would be placed in the lowest caste, given a small home and a stipend which she could supplement if she wished. From that point forward, she would be free of all duties and would never have to live as a slave again. If she wished to have a child, she could do so either through applying for space in the Uterine Pods or she could spend a twenty-first cycle and have her own to take with her.

Oudwi knew Ellis, his twin sister, was going to volunteer for the Farm.