Next morning, I felt a lot better. I started to give in to excitement. I’d been chosen – did it really matter why? I had to take it as a massive compliment, there was no other way to take it. And best of all, most unbelievably best of all, I was actually going to Earth.

Earth!

Catti was absolutely right, I needed to relax, and enjoy it.

Getting into Pioneer School was a great achievement, but the crowning glory for any student was to be selected for one of the Earth missions. So few ever were. A handful of students got to tag along on each of the three yearly missions organised by the Cardiff SSO: the interDome Scientific Survey Organisation. The missions tried to find out more about the motherplanet and our ancestors, the Earth humans who wiped themselves out centuries ago in a cataclysmic war. There was a lot we didn’t know about this ‘War for Earth’ and there were no impartial eyewitness accounts. Only certain cities on Mars had SSOs and Cardiff’s was one of the biggest and best respected. If you went to Pioneer School, it was taken for granted that one day you would get a job there.

Everything was actually pretty fantastic! The day before, it hadn’t even occurred to me that getting chosen meant no more dreaded tests and grades. For the next six months, I wouldn’t even be at school. Students picked for the missions received full-time training at the impressive SSO Headquarters in Thornhill. Then of course there was the three months’ flight to Earth, six months on Earth and three months’ return flight. By the time I returned I’d be so skilled up, the work wouldn’t seem half so difficult, and in any case that was all so far off in the future, it wasn’t worth worrying about. Even if I continued to do badly at school when I got back, would they honestly be able to kick out a student who’d been on an Earth mission? No, so why worry? All my prayers had been answered at once.

A message appeared on my tile as I was eating breakfast, telling me I was expected that morning at the SSO Headquarters. Tiles are skin-thin computers which we all have permanently bonded onto the palms of our non-dominant hands at the age of six. Within the hour, I was heading north on Skyrail.

The SSO building rose out of the ground like a hill, its swooping sections of roof covered in neatly clipped grass where the workers played golf in their free time. The building has its very own Skyrail station and I felt important disembarking with a bunch of brainy-looking scientists, straight into the enormous round main concourse, all bright white and greys with splashes of acid-bright colour here and there.

For the first time I gazed around the concourse and saw groups of scientists holding meetings about the vast floorspace. Overhead there hung a huge silver ellipsoid, like a flattish onion, with complex work reflected on the translucent computer walls. Four escalators rose up to it with a continual stream of scientists going up and down, dressed in their grey padded tunics with the red dragon SSO logo. There were also escalators to the gyms and spacecraft simulators on the upper floors.

I had no idea where to report, so it was almost a relief to spot Robeen Bowen-Owen standing by herself, looking equally lost in the milling crowd.

‘Hello,’ I said.

Robeen turned around and her mouth stretched a little at the corners. ‘I’m not sure where to go,’ she said. ‘Oh, congratulations, by the way. I haven’t had the chance to say well done to you. The four of us have done well.’ Her voice was flat. It wasn’t particularly kind of her to say what she’d just said, it was just what was expected of impeccably behaved Pioneer students.

‘Thanks, Robeen, you too. I’m delighted for you.’ I smiled weakly past her into thin air, but couldn’t help noticing the sidelong glance she gave me, and the ever-so-slight dismissive sigh.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder. We turned to meet the gleaming smile of a scientist only a little older than us. She was carrying some dark blue tunics over her arm.

‘Greetings,’ she said. ‘I’m Grace Hassan. I’m the student link officer here at SSO. You must be…’ she consulted her tile ‘…Robeen, and you’re Bree. The boys are upstairs already and I was just fetching these.’ She patted the tunics. ‘Shall we go on up?’ She led the way to one of the escalators at the side of the concourse.

Nisien and Halley were sitting on a sofa on the second-floor balcony looking out over the concourse. Robeen and I sat on the sofa opposite. Grace activated blue curtain walls which slid around us, enclosing us in a small soundproof room. She took a pen from her pocket and drew a rectangle on the wall, which instantly turned into a darker blue screen. She wrote:

EARTH EXPEDITION

LAUNCH DATE 2 FEBRUARY (B)3016

‘First of all, take one of these.’ Grace passed each of us a tunic. ‘You can put them on straight away if you like. It’s important you feel you belong here as soon as possible.’

The blue tunics were emblazoned with the SSO logo and mine fitted perfectly. For the first time I noticed that the eye of the dragon was actually a small, glittering Earth ringed with clouds. I felt a flutter of excitement. Little by little I really was starting to believe I belonged on the mission after all. It was becoming real.

‘You may not have been aware of it, but you’ve come through a very rigorous selection process,’ Grace continued. She was more serious now, down to business. ‘For months your teachers have been watching you closely, making notes, discussing your aptitudes. They only select students of the highest capabilities who they also feel will be able to cope with … certain new information about the motherplanet, information which here at the SSO we feel it is better the general public are … not made aware of. Some people just wouldn’t be able to cope with it, you see. Even though our ancestors have lived on Mars for so many generations, there is still this link to the Earth … up here.’ Grace tapped her forehead with a perfectly manicured nail and looked round, making eye contact with us all. ‘Are you okay with that? Okay for me to continue?’

I wanted to pinch myself to see if I was dreaming. Grace was clearly about to impart very serious, classified information. Did I deserve to hear this?

Nisien cleared his throat. He was another ultra-serious type but more vocal than Robeen. ‘If our professors believe we are ready for such knowledge, I’m pretty confident we can handle it,’ he said.

‘Great,’ said Grace. She scrolled a little on her tile and on the dark blue screen appeared an image of Cardiff Castle with the animal wall in the foreground. ‘You all know this place?’

We nodded. ‘Of course,’ said Robeen.

‘It’s a beautiful building,’ Grace continued. ‘And, of course, our Dome was a very different place when it was built here, life was just getting started. We sometimes forget what a big step it was to relocate to another planet. A lot of customs from Earth were imported, like the names of our months although our months are in two parts – February (A) and (B) for example – because a year is twice as long on Mars as it is on Earth. Familiar structures like the Castle made the settlers feel at home too. It’s a little known fact that they’re not full size. That’s right!’ She registered our surprise. ‘The ancient landmarks we know and love are only three quarters the size of the originals back on Earth. They always have been a very important link to the motherplanet.’

Grace sighed and scrolled about on her tile again. The original image was replaced with another. Robeen, sitting to the right of me, gasped. I couldn’t immediately make out what I was looking at.

‘Quite a shock, isn’t it?’ said Grace. She paused to let us absorb the picture, before carrying on. ‘This is the Castle on Earth, as it was six years ago. If any changes have occurred since, it can only have been further deterioration, but I haven’t any more recent pictures. You can probably see for yourselves why we don’t make this public.’

The Castle in the picture was barely recognisable. The top of the clock tower was missing. Heaps of rubble lay on wet, marshy ground. The walls were laced with holes and the animal wall had gone. Scrubby bushes were growing in the rubble and high up in the dilapidated walls.

Nisien cleared his throat. ‘A lot of people wouldn’t be able to cope with this,’ he said. ‘I can absolutely see why you don’t tell everyone.’

‘And you appreciate that you mustn’t say anything public about it either?’ said Grace. ‘We have to tell you because you’re obviously going to see it for yourselves.’

‘Naturally we won’t say anything, not even to our families.’ Nisien looked around us all as though he were some kind of spokesperson.

‘It’s really important,’ said Grace.

I managed to nod.

‘Believe me, people wouldn’t want to know,’ she continued. ‘And what’s the point in upsetting them? What’s the point of undermining their sense of who they are and where they come from? Great efforts have always been made to keep our society as happy and free from strife as possible. We don’t want to make the same mistakes humans did on Earth and we don’t want any general panic. That’s why we keep findings like these quiet. Missions from other SSOs have made similar unfortunate discoveries: the Golden Gate Bridge has collapsed, there’s very little left of the Sydney Opera House, I could go on…’

I piped up. ‘But … what about the Museum?’

It was unthinkable that the place I loved most in the world, the place I had always dreamed about visiting – although up until yesterday I’d never imagined I would – might be a sorry wreck.

‘The Museum has fared better than many other landmarks.’ Consulting her tile, Grace brought up an image of the original on Earth. She couldn’t keep a weariness out of her voice. ‘It isn’t deteriorating as rapidly, maybe because of its sturdy shape.’

I breathed a sigh of relief, then caught Nisien’s eye and wished I hadn’t. I didn’t want to show weakness.

The building on the screen, once called the National Museum of Wales, was clearly still my Museum, the one I loved so very much, even though the stone was badly discoloured and flowering bushes and creepers had taken root between the cracks in the walls, even though it stood in a lake of mud. The familiar statues were still on top with their harps and helmets and hammers. It was still in one piece and it was still my Museum.

Grace wrote something new on the screen: the word ‘PURPOSE’ which she underlined.

‘So,’ she said briskly, ‘moving on, what is the actual purpose of these surveys we conduct every three years? Any ideas?’

‘To find out about what happened in the War for Earth.’ Robeen just managed to jump in before Nisien. Grace wrote down what she said, word for word.

‘Yes, we’re still trying to understand our warlike ancestors and you are there to assist the archaeologists dedicated to finding out more. What else?’

‘To prepare for recolonisation?’ said Nisien.

Grace wrote down what he’d said.

‘Let me show you something,’ she said. Up on the screen appeared what I knew from Professor Coro’s lessons was a dragonfly. Compared to the size of the tree it hovered over, the insect looked enormous.

‘This,’ said Grace, with a sharp intake of breath, ‘is a dragomansk. Something else the public don’t know about and wouldn’t want to. What I’m about to tell you is also not for public consumption, is that clear?’ She looked around and we all nodded again. As she talked, she called up a series of pictures of the dome-eyed dragomansk, which began to look more and more sinister. A close-up of the face of a dead one showed powerful, serrated mandibles.

‘They were originally developed as a medium-grade weapon by Earth humans centuries ago. Further development during the War for Earth turned them into the most fearsome killing machine. The dragomansk’s biology and its role as a weapon are completely synthesised.’ Grace spotted the perplexed look on my face. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll learn a lot more about that in training, but it’s important you grasp this first: the whole reason for their existence, its entire purpose, is to kill humans, although they will eat any animal to fuel their short lives. They are ferocious breeders and have become the dominant species on Earth, overwhelmingly the dominant species. Basically, they’re all over the place. They have hampered the success of all SSO missions. We’ve tried just about everything we can think of to eradicate them, but haven’t succeeded … as yet. Here you’ll be trained to deal with these creatures, mainly how to stay out of their way, to be honest. Don’t worry – we have effective weapons which we’ll teach you how to use.’

Don’t worry? The four of us stared at one another.

‘You’ve done remarkably well to keep all this quiet,’ said Nisien.

‘The general public don’t want to know. They really don’t. I know it’s a lot for you to take in.’ She smiled. ‘I remember the first time I was told. But as students who have been chosen for this mission, you should be able to cope with the knowledge. Ready for something else?’

I wasn’t at all sure, but I wasn’t about to admit it. Grace wrote another word: ‘RESOURCES’ then highlighted it by drawing a box around it, a livid yellow box.

‘Resources,’ she said. ‘As we’ve just seen, the Earth is in ruins. It may have deteriorated to the point where it could not possibly sustain great numbers of humans any more. We are beginning to think that recolonisation may be impossible. Somehow, the Martian race will have to be made to accept it.’ She frowned and I wondered if she wished she’d phrased the last bit differently.

‘Yet there remain Earth’s vast and vital resources,’ she continued. ‘Listen: we need to start thinking of Earth more as a store cupboard we can use to extend our magnificent colonisation projects, both on our own world and out across the solar system, to the moons of Jupiter or Saturn. Expansion is, after all, our Great Quest and Purpose. One of the reasons for conducting these surveys is, in actual fact, to detect and map the location of these resources: previously undetected gas, heavy metals, oil. In fifteen to twenty years’ time, all the archaeology will be over. We’ll have found out all we’re ever likely to and we’ll also have the technology to start bringing back much, much larger amounts of these resources. All our best brains have been dedicated to this over the past few years.’

‘So Earth will carry on deteriorating?’ I blurted out, stupidly. Even though I understood what she’d said, I couldn’t quite believe it.

Grace smiled to suggest she appreciated my finer feelings, but her smile fell away quickly. ‘The government realises it will take time for our people on Mars to accept this. We appreciate all the motherplanet has given us and all she continues to give us, but what we need most of all are these vital resources, to make progress in the right direction. You’ll come to see this for yourselves. It may take a thousand years before the mining is over or it may take ten thousand, nobody really knows. But we must continue to progress or as a species we’re lost. Our Great Quest and Purpose is common to all…’

‘…and all act as one.’ Although I saluted with the others, it was with a heavy heart.

On the platform, I thought about our Great Quest and Purpose. I’d grown up swearing allegiance to it, same as everyone else I knew, but we’d also been raised to believe that recolonisation of Earth was a fundamental part of the plan. On the other hand, if Earth was in as much of a state as Grace had described, perhaps it was best to take what it had left to give and move on? The thought still made me very uncomfortable.

‘Are you okay?’ Halley was waiting for the same train as me. Robeen and Nisien had left for different platforms. I hadn’t noticed him and his question shook me.

‘Oh … of course.’ I couldn’t show any weakness.

Halley smiled. ‘It’s been quite a day,’ he said. ‘I can’t quite believe that exercise programme they’re going to put us through, starting first thing tomorrow.’

I just stopped myself rolling my eyes. Halley was one of the fittest athletes in the school. ‘Oh, I’m sure you’ll cope fine.’

The train pulled up and we got in. It was far from full but without asking Halley dropped into the seat next to mine. I’d never spoken to him at school but he wasn’t like Robeen and Nisien. Halley was very bright but he was also chatty and a bit of a joker, although during Grace’s talk he’d been the quietest, which had surprised me.

‘Quite a few revelations,’ he whispered. ‘You know, about the landmarks on Earth. It’s no wonder they’ve been keeping that quiet. Shocker.’

‘Yes,’ I said, before lowering my own voice to a whisper. ‘I’m glad the Museum’s not too bad.’

‘…for now,’ whispered Halley in return. ‘I probably shouldn’t say it, but we’re very lucky to have got onto this expedition. Once the archaeology’s over in a few years, will there be any more Pioneer School missions? Will there be any point? If we can’t recolonise, all we’ll be doing is sucking everything out of the ground and bringing it home. The Earth’s going to end up just a hollow shell.’ Not that he’d ever seen a shell, of course, unless he’d visited the Museum.

I glanced around. ‘You’re right, you probably shouldn’t be saying that,’ I whispered.

Halley looked stung. To make peace with him, I carried on, ‘I always knew Earth was in a pretty bad way, but nothing like what we’ve learnt today. You’re right: I think we’re all in shock.’

‘And the dragomansk?’ Halley whistled and shook his head. ‘I mean, sure it’s dangerous, a top-grade killing machine but … it’s kind of amazing as well, you have to admit.’

‘I suppose, if you like that kind of thing.’

Halley laughed. The train pulled up at Cathays station and he stood up.

‘See you tomorrow, then.’ For a moment, his eyes looked desperately sad, but he gave me a cute, lopsided smile before leaving and I decided I liked him.

An extra bonus of the mission was that we were let out of our SSO training an hour earlier than at school. When the train pulled up at Roath Station, I decided not to get off. My mother worked at the local energy plant on Thursdays and nobody would be home yet, so I kept my seat and carried on to the central terminus.

In the middle of the frantic city centre, the Museum always appears cool and calm, set apart on its shady green mound. I knew from old pictures that the Earth Museum was part of a complex of buildings. Our Museum stands alone, splendid in its bleached stone magnificence. To think, on Earth it was even bigger! I was never sure what I felt when I stood in front of it: some sort of uplifting yet unsettling sense that it was all out there, everything I didn’t know yet, a lot perhaps I’d never know. Why did it feel good to feel so small and insignificant? Not good perhaps, but … compelling. Perhaps the best word for what I felt is awestruck.

That afternoon, I climbed the steps and entered through the great bronze doors with their spiky flower heads. In the cool marble hall, I could have climbed either set of stairs to the upper galleries, but as usual, I headed straight on through the double doors, to Origins of Earth. Here I could lose myself for hours, though I rarely had time to do so. Sometimes I would sit in the dark and watch the looping presentations describe the rise and decline of the motherplanet and the earliest history of our first pioneers. The exhibits I loved best were the ancient rocks, minerals and fossils that had actually been brought from the Earth Museum. I loved the sounds of the names: ammonite, trilobite, Jurassic, Cambrian, Ordovician… I’d wander around saying them over and over to myself, as long as no one else was about.

My visit that day was different because I kept thinking about Grace’s presentation. Halley was right: we were tremendously lucky to be going on what would probably be one of the last archaeological expeditions to Earth. Surely I was the luckiest of all to have sneaked on to it, almost like a stowaway. When I thought about the four of us: brainy Robeen, brainy and pushy Nisien, sporty Halley, I couldn’t come up with any impressive adjective for my own name.

Why had they chosen me?

But I couldn’t start thinking that way again, I had to try and stay positive. Although Grace’s presentation had shocked us all, this was still the biggest chance of my life. Professor Eisenhaur must have spotted my talent for Empathy and I’d been selected to add balance to the group. That’s why I’d been chosen, surely…