As Pal hovered the craft over this monumental canyon, Sue gasped in awe, “Six miles deep!”

“Look!” Blue shouted. “Hey guys, look, over on the opposite rim. It looks like the top of a huge vent-stack.”

The captain frowned, “It appears that we may have stumbled on to something here.”

“Well now, no-uh stuff,” spouted Tom. “Albeit spooky, does everyone realize what this means?”

Dr. Bill released tension, “Yeah, proceed with caution!”

“Very well. Pal, drop our ship slowly down this cliff face,” the captain ordered. “Now Art, play the resonance imager on the cliff wall to discern any hollow spots within.”

The imager followed a path about five miles down the cliff wall when Arthur shouted, “Eureka, this imager shows extensive cavities deep inside the cliff. But there is no sign of an entrance.”

Marking the location, they maneuvered several miles in each direction, looking for evidence of a landslide or covert entrance.

“No luck. There is an S turn to our right, let’s look for a rear entrance,” suggested Harry.

As Pal settled the craft five miles down the rear wall, they discovered a hollow indentation, covered by overhanging rock, revealing a mile long shelf.

Blue expounded, “Why, that looks like it was designed as an interior landing port.”

Humorously, Harry instructed Pal, “Ease in there, find the information booth and ask directions.”

Stunned, Pal (the robot-pilot) answered, “Sir?”

“Just hover in so we can have a look-see.”

As the craft eased into the eerily lighted indentation, Pal moved closer to a wall covered by a clear glass-like material. Inside a ‘lobby’, in the dim light, there appeared to be a console.

Blue concentrated a bright beam of light on the console, “By the various hieroglyphic type markings and universal control features, it looks like it is meant to attempt communication with alien cultures … bypassing language.”


After lunch, the apprehensive crew donned their spacesuits.

Sue wondered, “Okay, how do we get in? Did anyone bring a glass cutter?”

Captain Harry smirked, “I have an old canceled credit card.”

Tom said, “Some entrances require voice, eye and palm ID. Is there a safe cracker on board?”

Voila! A glasslike panel slid open and an energy depleted lighting system flickered on.

Dr. Bill asked the stunned group, “How does one change underwear inside of a spacesuit?”

A click sounded as they approached and a sensor activated a large illuminated, rectangular, green colored button.

Dr. Bill jibed, “We are being analyzed. They’ve already found out that Art’s driving license has expired.”

Blue grinned, as she touched the glowing button.

They heard a static crackling sound and then, “Our device file has tentatively identified you as friendly visitors from planet Earth.”

“When our planet was a mere three billion years old, we realized that Mars was deteriorating faster than natural evolution could compensate. Life giving elements, as meager as they were when our planet was young, were being further depleted by low gravity, allowing them to be lost into outer space.”

“As our protective atmosphere thinned, ultra-violet radiation wreaked havoc on all life forms. Heat loss increased alarmingly, making our planet very cold. Watching our people becoming functionally impaired caused our scientists to escalate their genetic programs and to develop adaptation to an underground environment.”

“Physical living conditions, even underground, became impossible eventually. The scientists genetically developed a semi-spiritual state of existence capable of integrating itself inside of physical beings on other planets, until acclimated.”

“Various planets, including Earth, were picked as future homes. Genetics were manipulated to allow for present and future evolution, mutations and natural selection to take place on the new planets.”

“Because Earth had undergone several devastating extinctions, our people didn’t have much to work with and must have had to merge into a low order primate type. This resulted in many millions of years to evolve back into our original state. Sadly, our time was running out, so the seed ship returned and the bulk of our people were sent to other planets.”

“It appears that you have evolved back to as we were, although slowly, but to a satisfactory conclusion. Welcome back home to your home planet."

“You Earthlings have but to look into a mirror to see how proud we were at one time. It’s your planet again. How is it in your vernacular? Oh yes. Good luck.”

The crew was mesmerized in spellbound fascination in the deafening silence.

Sue sighed, “This leaves me ‘neak in the wees’. And just think how we are ruining our planet Earth with a population of six point seven billion people.”

The outspoken Dr. Bill said, “I have a hypothetical. That archive module said that they were manipulating genetics millions of years ago, right? They were able to enter into living creatures’ bodies and to live inside of them, rrr-right? Then, they sent some of these rewired Martians to our Earth, right? Now, does that mean that we, when we were still chimps, were genetically altered and/or entered before we even came down out of the trees?”

Tom exploded, “Bill, did you have to express it, you know, just that way. Like,”

Sue whined, “Just the same, I don’t care how you say it, I just don’t like the idea of a recycled Martian crawling around inside of me. So there!”

Dr. Bill candidly smirked, “I wonder what we would look like now if those Martians had picked something other than the chimpanzee and dolphin to get chummy with?”

The captain couldn’t resist, “That statement is material for ‘what if’ our ancestors had continued to cruise through the tree limbs, instead of bruising their limbs trudging the savanna? Maybe evolution might have given us wings instead of legs.”

Tom quipped, “Now how would the Wright Brothers have handled that?”

“It surely would have played havoc with Henry Ford's dream,” mused Dr. Bill.

Helen dubiously ventured, "Maybe our trouble is human vanity; we would probably believe Darwin's ideas if we were not repelled by his reference to monkeys."