The God Mars Book Three: The Devil You Are Read Online Free

godlike at all.
     
    I make the lower foothills in a few more hours. The
sun has moved west over Tithonium and Ius. The winds begin their
tidal shift back eastward, putting them at my back.
    I’ve been daydreaming all this time, filling in the
details of my other life. I remember that we did nothing good with
our gifts. We stopped caring about the planet as we stopped caring
about ourselves. Art and literature dumbed-down to childlike crap,
easily produced and more easily dismissed as our attention spans
decayed (and one would think an immortal would have a long
attention span). Everything was about distraction and
entertainment. More than half of the population simply disappeared
into virtual worlds, their now-perfect bodies in eternal stasis,
while the rest did a garish job of making their fantasies into
reality. The world became a collection of absurd amusement parks
dedicated to every imaginable extreme behavior. There were, after
all, no physical consequences.
    Even crime became a pointless issue: No one could be
hurt by assault, no one could be murdered. In fact, the experience
of victimhood was actually sought by some, just to have any thrill
at all. (And unpleasant memories, unwanted traumas, could simply be
erased.) Property crimes were equally meaningless when anyone could
make anything they wanted at will. So what was once a social plague
became another form of entertainment. (I remember when early video
games about committing violent crimes were the subject of
controversy. Now it was a consensual reality: Hurt me. Kill me.
Rape me.)
    Our bodies had become valueless in their eternity,
and everything else followed.
    I try to remember how long it took. Only a few years,
I think. Maybe a decade. My sense of time was another casualty of
our “evolution”.
    I look down at my plain black armor, remember I had
no taste for gaudy excess, and maybe that was my saving grace: I
appreciated the simple things. Even the experience of this long
walk through a monochrome desert.
    I realize none of the Martian dust is sticking to
me.
    I also eventually realize I haven’t had anything to
eat or drink since before that battle that killed me. More gauges
in my head appear to report varying levels of depletion in
“energy”, “oxygenation” and “hydration”, but my “bioframe” is
“nominal”.
    I wonder if I can even be considered to be alive
anymore.
    Answering a more practical question, my eyes do their
HUD trick again and pick out what I know is a tapsite on an ETE
feedline in the distance, not far off my course. I change my
direction of travel accordingly.
     
    I reach the tapsite by sunset. I still have not seen
sign of any activity on the surface, but I know how skilled the
Nomads are at hiding, digging in to the terrain. And I expect I
make a disturbing sight: Black armor and no mask, taking a
leisurely stroll across the open waste.
    My internal gauges tell me it’s already dipping below
freezing, which also registers as an increased power drain. My new
eyes have no problem with the fading light, and I find the tap
easily enough.
    The ground around it is well-trodden, and there are
items left behind, both trash and gestures of Nomad hospitality
mandates. In the latter category I find a few usable O2 and water
cylinders, and a survival blanket. Amongst the trash I find a
broken “rebreather” unit—one of the portable air recyclers favored
by the Knights—looking like it’s seen multiple repair attempts. Not
discarded in the sand, it’s been left hanging near the taps,
perhaps for more skillful hands to try restoring.
    I use one of the canteens to draw fresh water from
the corresponding line. It’s already near ice-cold, and tastes of
metals, but provides soothing refreshment (and my hydration levels
start rising back toward green). I take the time to fill an O2
cylinder, only to find a slow leak. But then, holding the cylinder
and thinking about it, I watch the seals repair.
    Testing the phenomenon, I try