The Epiphany : Part 1

The path was narrow and riddled with cracks. The color of ash, it was hemmed in on either side by towering cliffs of the same muted stone. Only nine feet separated the edifices, which stood too tall for their apices to be seen from the ground. Contoured with bulges and depressions, whatever shapes they once depicted had been eroded by eons of unrelenting wind.

All was silent — save for the rhythmic patter of footsteps. A woman, wearing a skintight suit of synthetic fibers, made her way through the ravine. Rising to her chin, the suit insulated her slender, athletic frame from the frigid environment. The lower portion of her face was covered by a carbon fiber mask that filtered out the malignant elements of the caustic air, but left the exposed skin around her eyes numb and edged with frost.

Glossy and formerly midnight black, the suit and mask had taken on a ruddy sheen after their time beneath what faint orange sunlight managed to pierce the dark sky. Streaked by lightning and resounding with crashing thunder, the gnashing, roiling maelstrom unleashed an unceasing tempest across the dust-choked planet.

From where she stood, she could see nothing but clouds and the walls of the restrictive canyon. Her piercing jade green eyes, which initially poured over the alien terrain in rapt fascination, were now fixed ahead with unwavering focus.