Starship Endurance has landed on the plain of Arcadia Planitia. Ninety-eight days of transit. Fifteen humans per ship. Six Starships. A planet that had been waiting for them for three billion years.
David and Stella discover their new home. Before them, the foundations of a half-buried city: hexagonal alveoli, a biodome, pressurized airlocks, Optimus robots that have been digging for three years without rest to prepare the ground.
First Martian year. Build. Survive 6 millibars of outside atmosphere, –80 degrees winter nights, cosmic radiation striking through the void. Light the first Kilopower reactors. Cast the first Martian metal ingot. Grow the first loaf of bread. Map the silence.
And learn to live together. When air, water, and light depend on an iron-willed commander, on a network of silent humanoids, and on a fragile supply chain coming from a planet three months away by spacecraft, community becomes a foundation.
From Sol 1 to Sol 365 of Arcadia, the immersive and meticulous account of a colony taking root.
An anticipation novel grounded in official sources, from NASA to SpaceX. Book 2 of a tetralogy.