I was born on Mars in the year 3088, long after humanity had colonized the

planet. For those of us  born here, Earth was a phantom. Mars was the sole reality of our lives—our only home. My name is Liam, and I have spent most of my life inside a dome—an island of life surrounded by death.

     Beyond the energy walls of the domes, Mars lay before us, silent and terrifying, with its rust-hued canyons, crimson sunsets, and toxic soil. A docile beast that could kill for a single mistake. My journey on Mars will soon end on Jupiter's moon Europa. I will cease to exist. It couldn't have been otherwise.

     The beginning, however, was Tabitha. A small settlement at the mouth of a

grand canyon. A transparent dome from which one could gaze upon the vastness of the Martian sky. I lived in Tabitha until I was ten. I remember the short walks outside the dome in my walker suit; the Martian sand slipping through my gloved hands; the low gravity that sent me floating upward when I jumped; my untamed hair drifting around my face with each leap. During those moments, no one my age was ever around. The person standing at my side was not my mother. My mother never left the house.  The person who held my hand as I walked the streets of Tabitha was a slender, fragile man in his forties, with wavy blond hair that reached his shoulders. The people of Tabitha approached him with respect, bowing when they saw him or stepping out of his path to greet him. Those who spoke to him were careful to keep their distance. I remember him visiting our home often. Each time he visited, he brought books under his arm and toys in his hand. He would give them to me with a radiant smile. He had told me his name was Allan Bell, but the people of Tabitha called him by another name: The Prophet.

     "The Prophet" Allan Bell was not my father. My mother had told me this so

many times that I never called him 'Father' when Allan called me 'my son'—a phrase that was  perhaps just an innocent habit. My mother's stern expression kept the word unspoken, caught on the tip of my tongue. ​As a child, I asked my mother many questions about Allan. The veiled answers revealed little about who he was.

     "If Allan is not my father, then why does he care for me?" I remember asking.

     "He is an orphan, like you," my mother would say. "He came here from a place

very far away. It's natural that he feels a bond with you."  

     And when I asked where we came from, or who my father was, she always gave

the same reply:  "I will tell you when you are older."

     The Prophet Allan Bell, however, was quite eager to talk about himself. When

my mother wasn't with us, especially when we went for our walks, he would share small pieces of his life with me.

     “I married young on Earth and followed my wife here.”  

     “Coming to Mars was purely for her sake. But she died in an accident on the

way to Tabitha, leaving me behind."

     “Years ago, I lived far from here, in Central Dome. The authorities there tried to pin a crime on me that I didn't commit. It was quite ridiculous,really. Around that time, the young leader of Tabitha invited me to live among them. So, I left Central Dome behind and came here.”

     Our conversations went like this, but he never told me what crime he was accused of. Sometimes I would tell my mother about them, and she would, at times, sigh quietly and shake her head, or mutter something angrily to herself, too low to be heard. She never showed open hostility toward Allan, but between them, there was a tension whose cause I didn't understand, but whose presence I could feel.

     Allan's reputation as a prophet meant little inside our small house. In the time he spent with us, he would read me books, teach me lessons, and when he ran out of things to do with me, he would help my mother. I loved to watch him repair things around the house, whistle while preparing our meals, or drift into a light sleep on the sofa. In those moments, I would imagine he was my father. My mother spoke very little with Allan. Most of the time, she would sit in the armchair by the narrow, rectangular window and gaze at the color-shifting Martian sky, without looking at us, as if no one else was in the house. Sometimes she would sit up straighter in her seat and listen to our conversations in silence, but after a while, she would withdraw to her room, leaving us alone. One time when the three of us were together, Allan asked me a curious question. I still remember it clearly.

     "Do you know what a prophet's duty is, Liam?"

     "I know. He answers people's questions."

     "How did you learn that?"

     "Isn't that what you do?"

     "I can't answer every question, but you're right. I answer some of the important ones."

     "Do you give the right answers?"

     "A prophet must give the right answers, always."

     "Could I be a prophet too?"

     Allan laughed aloud. For a moment, he turned in his chair and looked toward my mother, who was sitting by the window. My mother remained seated without saying a word, though watching us intently. Unable to break the stubborn silence, Allan turned back to me.

     “Let me tell you how I became a prophet. Years ago, I had a different job on Mars. My work required me to go often to an observation dome at the summit of a massive volcano, Elysium Mons.”

     “What was your job, Allan?” It was my mother. Allan’s eyebrows rose and for a moment stayed like that. His face soon relaxed, his familiar smile returned.

     “My job was to watch the Martian skies in silence and contemplate. On paper, I

was an astrophysicist. My wife had arranged the job for me, using her influence. I was on my own, and no one interfered with my work. The truth is, I could have kept that job for as long as my wife wished. I was introverted in those days, I wasn’t much for socializing. I wanted to distance myself from other people on Mars, and I saw the observation dome as a kind of refuge. For years, I would climb the mountain early each morning to go to the observatory.” He tried to look into my mother’s eyes as he spoke. After her question, he had sat up straighter in his chair, twisting awkwardly to face us both.​​

     "Didn't your wife miss you?" I asked. Allan turned his gaze to the floor. After a moment, he looked back at me.

     "My wife was a very busy person. She had many responsibilities, was pulled in many directions. I wasn't angry with her about it; she supported me whenever I needed her. But her attention was spread thin. All I had left was the observation dome. However, after what happened to me, that changed considerably."

     My mother shrugged and turned her gaze back to the window. Uncomfortable

with her indifference, I asked Allan another question.

     "Did you decide to become a prophet, Allan?"

     "Of course not. It's not something you can become just by wanting it, Liam.

That's what I'm trying to explain. What happened to me in the observation dome when I was thirty-six years old, a month after my birthday, is what started it all."

     “What happened to you? Did you have an accident?” my mother asked, without turning around, continuing to stare at the sky as it shifted from orange to a soft purple. She had asked her question with a detached air, as if she wasn’t curious about the answer. Allan took a deep breath, a mournful expression flickered across his face, but as soon as he began to speak, his smile returned.

     "At the summit of the mountain, while monitoring the skies, I picked up an unusual radio signal coming from Europa. I routed the signal through to the observatory's speakers. I wanted to hear it. As the sound filled the dome, I felt a sharp pain in my stomach. At the same time, my muscles began to seize; it was as if an unseen hand had gripped me. The sound kept echoing until a mysterious image appeared."

     "Is the story over?"

"No."

"Then continue. We are listening."

     Allan slowly rose to his feet. He turned toward the door, his body eclipsing the lamplight.

     "I can leave if you wish, Mara. It's getting dark, and I've been with you for a long time. I think I've been a nuisance."

     "After your story…"

     Before my mother could finish, Allan began to speak. His face lit up with excitement, but his gaze was not on us. It was as if he were speaking to an invisible presence.

     "Thousands, perhaps millions, of spheres of light floated in the air,  their light pulsing like a heartbeat as they filled the observatory.  They were everywhere: on my desk, inside the cupboards, in a closed drawer, in the lens of the telescope, inside my clothes, in my pockets, on my skin, even in my hair.  The spheres suddenly increased their brightness, their light merging until only an uninterrupted whiteness remained. I lost my sense of up and down, forward and back."

     Allan's familiar, thin voice had begun to thicken and deepen. It was as if another person were speaking through his mouth. I saw that my mother was staring at him. He seemed to have grown taller, as if we had all shrunk before him.

     "In the whiteness, I realized my body had disappeared. I was nothing but a gaze—disembodied, seeing without form. My thoughts seemed distant, echoing, as if I were listening to them rather than thinking them. Something else was strange.  I couldn't understand the flow of time. Everything was compressed into a single moment, or that single moment was everything. Then I heard a woman's voice. 'I will help you parse more information,' she said. The moment she spoke, the whiteness began to dissipate.  I regained my sense of direction and realized I was in a bare-walled, unfurnished, pure white room. I had my body again, but no clothes.  I saw two green eyes open in the white wall. Then I realized that a woman with white skin, camouflaged against the white wall, was standing directly before me. She approached me, emerging from within the wall, but she was not walking; she glided through the air. She drew near until she was a hand's breadth away, and then she rose vertically toward the ceiling with slow grace."

     The room seemed to darken. Had the lamp gone out? I could see Allan's silhouette in the darkness, but not his face. His voice grew even louder. He was practically shouting.

     "I have a message for you, she said. Her voice rang inside my head, as if she were speaking from within me. The moment she fell silent, the room was filled with light radiating from her body and then she spoke again. 'Everything in your universe was created in the mind of Eowin, and Eowin will reveal himself to you.' She paused. Waited. And then suddenly, everything was plunged into absolute darkness. I could no longer hear my thoughts, and then I must have fainted. When I opened my eyes, I was back in the observatory."

     The light in the room came back on, and I could see Allan again. Under the lamplight, he looked like  himself once more; his thin, tall body, his hunched posture, his fragile, sensitive manner—they had all returned. My mother spoke in almost a whisper. "Then you understood you were a prophet?"

     Allan chuckled softly. "To be honest, I understood none of it. I was drenched in sweat but shivering with cold. I descended the mountain and returned home, every muscle aching, feeling as though I'd been physically assaulted. Unexpectedly, I found my wife at home. She was never home at that hour. She was surprised to see me. As I paced the living room, I kept repeating, 'I must have lost my mind.' My wife was a sensitive woman. She waited in silence until I was too exhausted to pace. I told her what I had experienced. When I told her, 'Eowin, who created the universe in his mind, will reveal himself to me,' she embraced me. I saw excitement, passion, and a religious ecstasy in her eyes. She kissed my hands. In that moment, I understood I had been given the duty of a prophet. Though doubts filled my mind afterward, I could not interpret the mystical experience I'd had in any other way. Eowin, maybe not in his entirety but in fragments, would reveal himself to me, and I would tell people of him. This was my duty."

     I believed him.

     Even my mother must have realized he possessed the power to affect people.

     After that day, Allan told my mother and me many things about himself. He told us about his childhood, of being orphaned, and of the lonelinessof his youth. My mother and I would debate the truth of these stories. This routine continued nearly every day until I was ten. Then my mother—lonely and unhappy—mysteriously disappeared.​​​​​