Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry

Stealing the Oceans: Humanity
Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year
Epic When a Mysterious Force
Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry
By Rick Doble
Copyright © 2013 Rick Doble
All rights reserved.
This document contains the same text as the eBook with this ISBN: 978-1-304-21403-4
COVER & PHOTO CREDITS: The cover image is a still screen grab from a NOAA video, Touring the Ocean Bottom, as are all of the rest of
the images in this eBook. This shot of the Atlantic Ocean floor shows Iceland at the top right with the Atlantic Ocean seafloor below and
Greenland to the left, with the underwater 'cliffs' , ledges and basins next to Greenland. (NOAA)
Permission is granted to reviewers, students and others who cite this work
to quote up to 200 words,as long as the title of the book and the author are credited.
This eBook is dedicated to Clinton Brooks.
Without his encouragement and his understanding of the forces involved in my story,
I would never have written this eBook.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART 1: FALLING SEA-LEVELS...................2
PART 2: THE CITY UNDER THE DOME..............33
PART 3: OVERVIEW OF GREENLAND CLIFFS.........62
PART 4: THE CHIP.............................67
PART 5: FROM THE CITY DIRECTORY..............105
APPENDIX.....................................140
AFTERWARD....................................147
Stealing the Oceans Rick Doble Page 1

PART 1:
FALLING SEA-LEVELS

Ocean Levels Appear To Be Falling
The Nautical News Blog
Afterthoughts Section
News Notes
2222-02-02 (2222 February 2)
For the fifth year, since 2217, a small yet discernible decrease in the ocean levels has
been detected. The drop is about half a centimeter per year. This is particularly noteworthy
because it is the first time that ocean levels have fallen since the middle of the 19th century.
When we queried several oceanic scientists, none could give us a reason. Stay tuned.

Reasons For The Oceans' Fall
Proposal For A Student Paper On The Falling Ocean Levels:
2280 January 17
When the sea-levels began to fall starting in 2217 and continuing for the next 20 years,
several theories were put forward as to its cause:
== that the slightly increasing distance of the moon's orbit had affected the oceans
== that the human consumption of desalinated water was making a dent
== that measurements had not been that accurate until recently and so it just appeared that
there was a decrease in the sea-levels
Eventually two theories seemed the most likely:
One camp believed that a different type of spreading of the ocean floor by the tectonic
plates was causing a small decrease in the sea-level. A second camp thought that the
magnetic poles were in the process of reversing which affected the sea-levels.
Two scientists, Dr. Ralph Kilkenspire and Dr. Frederick Aspen, who had been rivals since
graduate school, made the falling sea-levels their cause celebre and championed their own
theories while lampooning the other's. Fueled as much by their dislike of each other as the
falling ocean levels, these scientists spent the rest of their lives working to get their particular
theory accepted. Dying within a month of each other in 2277, they left the scientific world in
turmoil as the dilemma had never been resolved.
To this day, the ocean levels continue to fall, but no satisfactory theory has been put
forward to explain this phenomena or to refute the two theories.

Mapping The Ocean Floor
News Release
Detailed Mapping of the Ocean Floor Topography Funded by UNOA
United Nations Oceanic Administration
2281-09-14 (2281-September-14)
The United Nations Oceanic Administration (UNOA) announced that it has agreed to fund
a 20 year project to map the topography of the Earth's ocean floor -- the bathymetry of the
seafloor -- in fine detail. The project should be finished by the start of the new century around
2300 with maps and data available soon after.
The UNOA decided that this mapping was necessary since the scientific community was
unable to find the cause for the continuing steady but slightly accelerating fall in sea-levels.
Two different competing theories have never been resolved satisfactorily, yet the ocean levels
continue to recede.
"We know much more about the surface of Mars than we do about the surface of the sea
floor," said Dr. Albert Jakko, head administrator of UNOA. "It is time that we correct this gap in
our knowledge, since life on Earth is dependent on the oceans."
While satellite maps of the oceans have been available for centuries, the old resolution of
1/2 kilometer is not nearly accurate enough. The new study will have a resolution 10,000
times higher than previous studies.
Using a combination of highly coordinated state-of-the-art satellites, ROV submarines
equipped with cameras, sonar and GPS, coordinated with surface craft using seismic
reflection survey techniques, the goal of the study will be to create a comprehensive 3D map.
This study will not only detail the geological features of all underwater aspects of the oceans,
but also their composition, water temperature, currents, salinity, and marine life both micro
and macro. Special attention will be paid to underwater volcanoes and tectonic plates as
these two aspects have been singled out by the scientific community in explanations about
the fall of world sea-levels.

The Black Dot
The Atmosphere News Blog
News Notes
2322 March 15
For the last five years a satellite has recorded a tiny black dot in the mesosphere. While
not unusual in itself, what is odd is that it has remained fixed above the Pacific Ocean since it
was first discovered and has essentially not moved. In the last year other satellites have been
employed to observe it as well. Scientists hope that viewing it from several angles will reveal
its nature.
The black dot is so small, it is possible that it has been there for a number of years and
only now has just been noticed. Further study is required.

The Atmosphere News Blog
News Notes
2332 March 15
10 years ago on this date we reported that satellites had noted a tiny black dot in the
mesosphere that had remained stationary for 5 years. Now 10 years later, this spot still
remains unchanged and our knowledge of it is no better, even when aided by the latest and
most sensitive satellites.
If it were a weather phenomena as some have suggested, scientists would have expected
it to change considerably over this time period. No other possible explanations, however,
have been put forward. The black dot does put out a small amount of radiation which makes it
even more unusual.
We hope that a graduate student(s) might take this on as a subject for their independent
study.

Hole In The Sky Goes Viral
2374 Year
In 2351, Carlos Fuentes, who was getting his graduate degree in Atmospheric Science,
decided to make the black dot the subject for his thesis. He put together all the existing
information, cross referenced it and added the few fuzzy low resolution photos taken many
kilometers away and greatly enlarged. What emerged was a featureless round black dot
1/1000 of a millimeter. Stumped he put his research together into a video, renamed the black
dot, the Hole In The Sky, and posted it on YouTube, asking people to send in their ideas about
what the dot could be.
He received a number of responses:
== that it was a temporary phenomena that was created by a alignment of the sun and Earth
with a certain kind of solar wind
== that it was a kind of weather pattern, a micro-tornado
== that a combination of gravity, magnetic forces, sun, planets, and cosmic rays was the
cause
Then, to his surprise, the video went viral and people were suddenly intrigued. The phrase
'Hole In The Sky' struck a cord and people used it to express a contemporary anxiety that had
not been named. "Some days, I feel like I just might fly through that Hole In The Sky," a
depressed woman tweeted not wanting to cope with her daily life.
Songs were written:
That Hole In The Sky
is like the hole in my heart
when you left me
high in the sky
I am thinking of you
when you left me
what can I do
thinking of you
I want to drive through
that Hole In The Sky
and forget you
but here I am
stuck on Earth
with a hole in my heart
and you've left me
Two large street murals in New York and L.A. used the Hole In The Sky as their central
theme with light beaming down from that point. This spawned a number of t-shirts with this
beaming light design that became wildly popular in 2398 until the turn of the century.

Jumbo Passenger Jet Goes Down
Breaking News Report
WORLD NEWS NETWORK (WNN)
Mysterious Airline Collision and Crash in the Middle of the Pacific Ocean
2411 September 21
A Qantas passenger jet from Sydney to Guam has just crashed and sank
about 200 kilometers from Guam only minutes before it was to land. The
accident occurred in mid-air and appeared to be a collision although
there were no planes or obstacles in that area.
The surviving passengers told a strange story. The jumbo jet was flying
over the Pacific, in known territory with maximum visibility when it hit
something in the middle of the air. Some passengers said they saw a
wing cut in two, almost like a buzz saw had sliced through it. They
watched as most of the wing fell to the ocean and the plane lurched the
other way and crashed into the Pacific.
Surprisingly a few were able to get out and into life boats before the
fuselage sank. Unfortunately the wing that detached from the aircraft and
the plane's body sank to the ocean floor, which in this case was the
Marianas Trench, the deepest part of the ocean. It was a place where the
wreckage could not be recovered.
Officials are at a loss to explain the reason for the seeming collision, but
in any case all airlines have been routed far around the location of the
accident.
World News Network (WNN) will post more information as it becomes
available.

Astronauts Inspect The Hole In The Sky
2467 Year
Astronauts Mikhail and Andre were chosen to inspect the Hole In The Sky. Both had
decades of experience repairing satellites and working on the space station along with
multiple degrees in science and engineering.
This job was a bit tricky as the Hole In The Sky was located in the mesosphere, too high
for weather balloons and air craft and too low for orbiting satellites to measure in fine detail.
Instead it took a decade to design a spacecraft that could both reach the hole and also
hover (in a manner of speaking), staying in close proximity while the astronauts were tethered
yet still in the Earth's gravitational pull.
The joke, Mikhail and Andre told each other, was that they were just like a ball that had
been bounced too high, but eventually would fall down to Earth.
Yet Mikhail and Andre were excited and eager to accomplish the mission. Most aspects of
space travel close to the Earth and moon were well known. However, this was not. They
would be the first to explore this new realm.
Equipped with specially designed glasses that could 'see' in virtually the entire
electromagnetic spectrum, known as EMS-Glasses, they also had state-of-the-art displays to
help their investigation. The glasses could be tuned like an old radio station to any frequency
or put on automatic, and then a false color simulated image would appear on a virtual screen
in front of their eyes. In addition they could snap photos, take GPS coordinates and add their
comments. This data would all be sent to observers at Ground Control who could then make
suggestions in real time about how to examine the Hole In The Sky.
The mission was so complex, that the World Organization For Space -- that combined
NASA and other countries' space agencies -- decided it should be done in several stages. Not
unlike the early Apollo Space missions, the Meso-Ship as it was known, made a trial run to
the mesosphere to see if it could hover properly and stay in one position. After succeeding,
the two astronauts and a pilot then went up to the mesosphere again and tested that the two
astronauts could exit and reenter the craft.
Once having overcome these two hurdles, the mission was on track for its ultimate goal, to
examine the Hole In The Sky in depth -- hands-on so to speak -- with sophisticated equipment
guided by human eyes.
The day of the mission was clear and dry. Within an hour Mikhail and Andre were in
position. Tethering themselves to the Meso-Ship, they zeroed in on the Hole In The Sky,
which could only be pin-pointed with information from satellites.
Circling the hole, they tuned in different frequencies on their EMS-Glasses until Andre's
display lit up with quantum thermal radiation. It was particularly odd that the source of the
radiation went far beyond the Hole In The Sky itself, ten meters in fact, when it completely
disappeared and the radiation dropped to zero.

Sending back a flood of information to Ground Control, their supervisor asked them if they
could move any closer. Mikhail objected saying that he thought that they should be especially
careful. Andre disagreed and came within 10 meters of the hole.
It was at this point that his glasses in infra-red indicated that a kind of tail protruded from
the hole in the direction of the Earth. It was like a long straight tail on a kite, he thought. This
was unexpected. Moving even closer, he let his automatic frequency searcher take over to
see which part of the spectrum might show up. The signals he was receiving were small but
clear. It appeared that a tiny thread came out from the hole and continued down as far as he
could monitor toward the Earth.
And it was at this point Mikhail heard a deafening scream. He looked up to see Andre
writhing as blood flew from his space suit. His arm had been cut in half and the suit's pressure
was gone. In a matter of seconds Andre was dead.

Identifying The Cause
Dr. Lodlow had been studying the problem for 25 years. It was like a jigsaw puzzle. But he
now, at last, felt that he had all of the pieces, or at least enough of them to get a sense of the
big picture. But what it was still alluded him.
So far the oceans had fallen about 7 meters and that rate was accelerating.
Was the drop in ocean levels related to the Hole In The Sky? Perhaps it was a micro-tornado
of water molecules that was being sucked up and spewed out above the
atmosphere? That seemed unlikely plus no instrument saw water coming out at the other end
where it should be, if that theory were correct.
He concluded that the Hole In The Sky had all the earmarks of an Einsteinian anomaly; it
spewed out quantum radiation in the right frequencies and amounts and then those readings
went to zero within ten meters.
The pace of the oceans' fall was extremely regular although geometric in progression. Yet
the total amount of water appeared to be about the same each year. He was quite sure that
due to the wide expanse of the world's shorelines, the measured vertical fall of water was
minimal at first and then increased rapidly as the basin that held the world's oceans became
smaller. It was like draining a large bathtub that was wider at the top and narrow at the
bottom.
"What could it be?" he wondered as he walked around the village green of his small New
England town. He tried to think of examples that were similar: a water pump, a siphon, an
electric current through a wire.
That night in his dreams he saw a 200 liter container of water on a ledge with a hose in it
that feed a smaller container on the ground driven by siphoning. It was not a very interesting
dream as it repeated all through the night -- water being pulled from the one high up to the
one below by the force of gravity, once the flow had been started.
The next night he dreamt of drilling for water -- of a huge rig that was punching a hole in
the Earth until water gushed out.
On one of his afternoon walks he thought about the two dreams, suspecting that the
answer was in there somewhere.
And then it hit him. Later he would say it was like a slap that he actually felt, so strong that
he had to sit down on a bench and catch his breath.
He thought of the Sherlock Holmes' axiom: "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever
remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”
And there it was. The improbable of improbable answers. The water disappeared beyond
the Hole In The Sky because it went 'underground' in a sense, it went into a wormhole. As a
leading expert on Einsteinian physics, he knew that a thread of water, just one molecule thick
could work very efficiently with a wormhole and not require vast amounts of energy.

The small container, that was receiving the siphoned water, was another planet
somewhere in the universe. The other planet, in a sense, was drilling for water, and when it
came across it, simply found a way to pump it back. And while, theoretically the wormhole
could go anywhere, he knew from his studies that it was probably in the Milky Way.
As he told his daughter later that night, the mix of emotions at that moment was
overwhelming: on the one hand he had mastered a problem that no one else could solve
which would make him one of the most famous people in the world; on the other hand the
Earth was being robbed of its most precious resource -- as almost all planets did not have
water -- and the Earth's environment would be changed forever and human beings might not
survive.
The conclusions were so startling, he told no one except his daughter -- and spent 2 years
checking and rechecking his data, plus adding new information as it became available. But
each step only confirmed this horrible truth.
After two years he released his findings to a top secret panel of experts who were asked
to test his hypothesis. Appearing before the committee, he said, "This is one case, where I
fervently hope that I am wrong -- so please prove me to be incorrect."
Yet each expert in the end, did agree that Dr.Lodlow had found the answer, no matter how
unpleasant.

Rogue Reporter
Dave Smith hated his name. There were thousands of Dave Smiths, no hundreds of
thousands. He wanted to make a name for himself, to stand out. So he waited for that one
news story he could scoop, that would make his chosen name of D. Arnold Smith be
remembered for years to come.
Like most good reporters he had a nose for news. When he got to know Dr. Frankin
Lodlow's daughter, he could sense that he was onto something. Her father was one of the
most famous oceanographic scientists with additional degrees in quantum physics and
relativity. Dating his daughter, he overheard a flurry of video-conferences and saw a number
of express mail packages come to the Lodlow house.
He knew enough to surmise that Dr. Ludlow was working on the pesky problem of the
oceans' fall, a fall which was accelerating every year and starting to become a major concern.
In 2222 when the fall was first reported, it did not seem that significant, about half a
centimeter a year, but now the fall was up to 3 centimeters a year.
So D. Arnold Smith hung around and waited for an opportunity to present itself. It took
months, but eventually Dr. Lodlow began to trust him. He took Dave into his confidence. "I am
pleased you and my daughter get along so well," he said, "so what I am going to tell you is in
the strictest confidence." Dave nodded. "Nothing you see or hear at our house is to be shared
or repeated to anyone. Agreed?" Dave nodded again.
What Dr. Lodlow did not know was that he had thrown red meat to a hungry dog. D. Arnold
Smith now knew he was onto something and so again he bided his time.
Just as he had hoped, one afternoon, Dr. Lodlow rushed off, and his daughter was in town
-- and Lodlow's computer was still on which it never was. Using his reporter's instincts he
quickly found what Dr. Lodlow had been hiding: that the oceans were being stolen by another
civilization in the galaxy through a wormhole. And that the mysterious Hole In The Sky and
laser-like saw blade that had cut an astronaut's arm and the wing off of an airplane was a
stream of water, molecule by molecule, leaving the Earth.
Yet even Dave Smith had to sit down when confronted with this news. It was mind
boggling, fantastic, and it would make him one of the most famous reporters of all time.
Quickly he sent a copy of the original report to himself. Then he made some excuse to
Lodlow's daughter when she returned and rushed back to his apartment.
And there it was on his computer. Like a diamond, a gold nugget, the holy grail, he had
what he had been looking for.
Yet he was still a professional reporter -- so he spent the next week making sure that this
was not just a preliminary report, or a speculative report or an unsubstantiated report. Instead
he found that its various findings had been verified by a number of independent scientists and
research groups. Checking, of course, took some doing as he could not admit that he had the
key report. So he checked that each separate finding within the report had been
substantiated, not letting on that he was aware of the report's conclusion.

Then for 24 hours after he was certain, he could not bring himself to release what he had
found, not sure what the consequences would be. Yet after sleeping on it, he had made up his
mind. The name of D. Arnold Smith would be famous.
Contacting a fellow reporter at WNN cable news network, he asked a number of what ifs.
The reporter became increasingly interested. Finally Dave Smith talked with some higher-ups
at the network and then emailed them Lodlow's original document.
Within hours the network gave it a green light and the story aired.

Breaking News
Breaking News
WORLD NEWS NETWORK (WNN)
Secret Report Reveals Reason for Falling Sea-Levels
2492 MARCH 15
WNN has confirmed that Dr. Frankin Lodlow in a secret report has
determined the reasons for the oceans' fall. Dr. Lodlow's report is based
on 10 years of the most recent and accurate data. He is the leading
expert in sea-level research.
What we are about to report sounds fantastic, yet it has been verified by
scientists, researchers, labs and satellites around the world.
An alien civilization is siphoning water from our oceans in a single
stream, molecule by molecule, from the Marianas Trench in the Pacific
Ocean up to the mesosphere where the water is being sucked into a
wormhole.
Dr. Ludlow believes the civilization is probably in the Milky Way and also
that the alien civilization is not malevolent. By this he means it was
simply looking for worlds with water, drilling for water in a sense within
the galaxy, and just happened to come across our planet, not knowing
that human civilization inhabited the Earth.

Disbelief
The WNN report was at first ridiculed. Saturday Night Live even did a skit. Yet this did not
stop reporters from camping outside of Dr. Lodlow's house.
Not used to this kind of attention or publicity, Dr. Lodlow simply clammed up. But that only
led to more questions.
Next the press moved on to the various labs and scientists who had confirmed Dr.
Lodlow's findings. They too were silent.
After a week of soul searching, Dr. Lodlow decided he had to face the music. He did,
however, lay down some ground rules. There would be no live TV or even radio coverage. On
a cold windy day in late March, he stood outside his house and spoke.
"We were still in the process of verifying my findings when, without my knowledge, my
report was released to WNN. I had kept the report secret because I both needed further
verification and also time to prepare the public, if the report did turn out to be true. All the
governments that I consulted insisted on this course of action."
He paused and the press for once was silent without demanding that their questions be
answered -- all waiting for the other shoe to drop. When he looked up, no one was sure if it
were snow that had melted on his cheeks or if it were tears, but instead of speaking he
scanned the audience in front of him and slowly looked every single reporter directly in the
eyes.
At last clearing his throat, he began, "The report is true. What WNN stated was accurate
as far as we can ascertain. I asked all my fellow scientists to disprove what I might have
found -- because I did not want it to be true. But no one has been able to -- and every piece of
additional evidence only confirms our conclusion."
The reporters did not speak -- as Dr. Lodlow felt the weight of what he had told them
descend and now weigh on their shoulders as it had weighed on his.
For a full two minutes no one said a word. Finally Lodlow himself had to say, "I'm sure you
have a number of questions." Like waking from a dream, reporters slowly delved into the
depths of what Lodlow's findings meant.
But he kept it simple. He would not speculate on the future of the Earth, only what he had
confirmed -- other than to say that a computer model needed to be built immediately. This
model could predict where and how much water would be left given that the Marianas Trench,
the deepest part of the oceans, was the point where the water was being drained.
After an hour, one by one, the reporters drifted away. It was like birds who had gathered
and who were now moving on, he thought. He had given them plenty to feed their networks.

The northern Atlantic Ocean floor.

Aftermath
2500-2600 Years
The confirmation of the Lodlow Findings, as it now became known, was reported around
the world. While information from the report was widely aired and the talking heads had much
to say, the response from the public was surprisingly muted. It was the kind of silence when
people were really paying attention. Some reporters were -- frankly -- scared.
Then odd things began to happen. Across the world, thousands of teenage flash mobs
descended on small stores and cleaned them out in a matter of minutes. At the same time a
spike in the number of suicides was reported worldwide.
A father took his mother, father, wife, five chidden and his sister to a cabin on the Gulf of
Mexico whose shoreline was quickly receding. Then he shot each one in his family before
killing himself. On his Facebook page, he posted, "I do not want those I love to have to live in
a world with no oceans." This story was reported across the globe and like a dam breaking, it
was as if he had spoken for everyone.
First a block here and a block there was set on fire in Cairo, in Berlin, in Rio de Janeiro, in
Sydney, in Shanghai, in Chicago. Then the fire spread to small towns where this kind of thing
had never happened.
But worse was to come. A year after the Lodlow Findings, an entire small town in Montana
took poison. This one event shocked the world as it was not a cult, the people were of many
different religions, ethnic groups, and of mixed social backgrounds. It was an illness that
spread like a wildfire jumping from country to country, from town to town.
Yet the path of this plague was spotty at times, even with moments of reflection.
Spontaneously statues of the god of the oceans, the Greek Poseidon and the Roman
Neptune, began to appear. People brought offerings; some prayed. A few groups camped out
surrounding the statue as they played music, drank wine and spent the night.
And then it would begin again, like a wave coming from the ocean itself, spreading across
each continent. It was like a beached whale gasping, flailing, uttering its deep penetrating
sounds, yet because it was not in water, its cry was dry and high pitched.
"Was this the end?" many people asked. And for quite a few, even though it would be
hundreds of years before the oceans were gone, the answer was yes.

The edge of eastern North America on the left, the Atlantic Ocean floor on the right.

Requiem
2522 Year
That night on television Claude DeWitt watched more cities burn: LA, Miami, Houston,
Detroit, DC, Boston. Outside his window in the distance he could see fire lighting the sky; like
a wave it was coming toward him and he might get swallowed by its force. And there were
more mass suicides: people who died hoping they would be taken by a space ship, people
who were tired of the struggle, people who did not know how to mourn.
He turned off the TV, buried his head in his hands and began to moan and then
uncontrollably to weep, weep for the people, weep for the Earth, weep for the end that was
coming.
And then he heard it. Clear as a bell, he would say later, with a bit of humor in this dark
time. He heard Debussy's La Mer. It was as though a voice sang to him. It was all there in La
Mer: the sound of the ocean, the birds, the bells, the fog, the waves, the calm, the turmoil.
But he would compose much more than that. He would find sounds of water falls, sea
gulls, seals, surf breaking, rain, storms, wind plus his own music. He would sample La Mer,
mix in the environmental world and add a layer of his own with a chorus. He would call it,
Requiem for the Earth.
"I cannot stop them from burning their cities or killing themselves, but maybe I can get
them to pause for a while and feel what they have lost -- and mourn -- they have forgotten
how to mourn. I will give them a place where they can mourn."
So that night he began. He did not know if it would take a week or a year, but he began.
Six months later in the orchestra shell on the shore of the Charles River in Boston, where
most of the water was gone, he conducted his first performance.
Halfway through he heard a sound that he had not put in his work; it was the audience
weeping. Instinctively he softened the sound of the orchestra so that it played with the sound
of their tears.
After that he conducted his work in Barcelona, Rio de Janeiro, San Francisco, Athens,
Shanghai, Sydney, Moscow, Stonehenge and the Pyramids. And at every performance at
about the same time, they wept.
For the rest of his life, for forty years, he was on tour. Gradually the burning and the
suicides slowed and the questions about "what do we do next?" began to be asked. He did
not know if the Requiem caused this, but he felt it was a part of the healing process -- of
thinking about continuing, rather than thinking about ending.

The New Normal
As the oceans continued to retreat, a kind of order, a 'new normal' began to emerge.
Suicides occurred regularly but few seemed to care. Rashes of looting were often ignored by
police. A block on fire here and a block on fire there did not get much attention.
In an incident that would have been headline news a decade earlier, 186 people hired a
large private skydiving plane and then jumped to their deaths, apparently not caring if they
landed on innocent people. "It was as if the heavens were raining bodies," said a resident of
the small town of Landon, Michigan looking up at a corpse that had cut a hole into her roof,
arms and legs reaching out from the opening, as if up to the sky.
"It's like limbo," a blogger wrote, as though everyone were waiting for something else
catastrophic to happen.
The total fall of the oceans was hundreds of years away, but of course the weather was
gradually changing to a dessert climate. Food was becoming scarce. Water and greenhouses
were protected by armed guards.
The wealthy hid behind gated communities and turned on their air conditioners.
Teens could not be persuaded to stay in school and instead congregated in roaming
gangs that drifted across continents.
Colleges closed except for those few with courses in Oceanography. And many of college
age constructed handmade boats that they then sailed over the disappearing oceans,
unconcerned that they might not survive. No amount of pleading from parents seemed to
matter. Yet with global cell phone service, most did stay in touch -- one even in the middle of a
hurricane as his 7 meter ship was going down and his body never recovered.
Gangs in some towns and vigilantes in others took control of block areas -- with check
points and turf battles. Many cities declared marshal law but found that with limited funds and
with the tax base shrinking, it was virtually impossible to maintain.
Government officials thought they knew what they had to do. They would have to restore a
sense of the future. The future had become a barrier; instead of something people looked
forward to, it was now like a wall that they could not climb. The future was a death sentence.
Governments looked for ways to tell their people that they had a future, that beyond the
loss of the oceans there was another world and that the Earth was still their home.

Report On The Fallen Sea-Level
Transcript of the oral report by the
UN Special Committee on the Worldwide Sea-Level Decline
2542-02-02 (2542 February 2)
CHAIRMAN GURGEF:
This report is the first comprehensive assessment of the nature and impact of the worldwide
sea-level decline. While the news is not good, one might say tragic, there are actually some
positive developments and recommendations. Here is an overview of what we found -- please
read the full report, with detailed data about each finding, on our website.
FIRST: The assessment by Dr. Frankin Lodlow 50 years ago appears to be accurate. Another
civilization is sucking our oceans dry, molecule by molecule, in an unbroken and rapidly
moving thread. The bottom of this thread is in the Marianas Trench in the Pacific. Since this is
the deepest spot of the oceans, it is virtually certain that the thread will be able to drain the
bulk of the water in the oceans as water will flow to that lowest point. The top of the thread is
at the location that was called the "Hole in the Sky." Beyond this point the water disappears
and cannot be traced by any of our instruments. We believe the water is being feed into a
wormhole and going to another planet, probably in the Milky Way Galaxy. We suspect that
this civilization is unaware that their actions are impacting inhabitants of the Earth -- they are
simply, in a sense, drilling for water, and finding it wherever it is available.
SECOND: Every effort to break the thread and to stop the flow of water has failed. It appears
that the thread has a kind of intelligence so that it rebuilds itself after it is disrupted. We have
used nuclear explosions at the Hole In The Sky itself and in the Marianas Trench where the
water is being drained off. We have experimented with a combination of lasers to focus and
cut the molecular stream of water in a number of ways. We have tried affecting it with our
most powerful magnets. Nothing has worked.
Now for the more positive aspects of our report:
THIRD: Because it is draining the oceans at a molecular level, we believe it will take over five
hundred years to significantly draw down the sea-level -- which means that human beings
have more than enough time to prepare for the new environment that will be on this Earth.
However, this new environment will be like a dessert such as Death Valley, where the
temperatures will be between 50-65 degrees Celsius or 120-150 degrees Fahrenheit during
the hottest part of the day.
FOURTH: While the vast majority of the water on Earth will be gone, there will be many
holding pockets, both large and small from one end of the Earth to another. Water will pool in
basins, valleys, and trenches on the sea bottom, for example. With the right technology and
stewardship, this water should be enough to sustain human beings and our newly formed
civilizations indefinitely. We also believe that some large areas could be contained and
prevented from draining by building a dam or series of dams.

FIFTH: In an odd quirk of fate, we here on Earth already have developed a sophisticated
technology which if redesigned could accommodate this new environment.
SIXTH: The old saying "it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good" holds true in this
situation. There will actually be a number of benefits to this new environment: the weather will
be more predictable since it was clouds and wind from the oceans that were responsible for
most storms. Solar energy will be extremely reliable, since there will be no clouds blocking the
sun.
This concludes an overview of our report. Please go to our website for the full text.

Initial Stop Gap Planning
UNITED NATIONS WORLD GOVERNMENT REPORT
ON OCEAN AND WATER RESTORATION
2582-02-02 (2582 February 02)
The newly formed United Nations World Government has developed a comprehensive
plan to secure water resources and provide a new stable environment for the people of the
Earth.
#1. Large areas of water that are already fairly well contained, such as the Great Lakes in
the United States and the Caspian Sea will be secured using a variety of methods to prevent
evaporation and drainage. Both of these areas are especially valuable as the Great Lakes
contains fresh water and the Caspian water has a low salinity.
#2. Large bodies of water that can be enclosed with manmade constructions will be
designed. These include the Mediterranean and also the Baltic Sea, the Red Sea, the Persian
Gulf, the Black Sea and Hudson Bay. Other areas could be candidates for projects such the
Caribbean where both the northern and southern areas form natural enclosures, as well as
the area between Japan, Korea and China.
#3. Although most of the oceans may be gone in another 500 years, there will still be large
pockets of water left in pools on the sea bed. It is imperative that we utilize these natural
'ponds' to greatest advantage. We can start planning now for the best way to use this
resource. We believe, for example, that there will be a large basin of water left over in the
Arctic around which a city could be built.
#4. The governments of the world have pledged to find new materials and new
technologies to deal with the Earth that no longer has an environment driven by the oceans.
The governments will fund new designs for efficient use of water, new greenhouses that are
more productive and new cities that are built for the 'post-ocean' world.

Both the northern and southern parts of the Caribbean form natural enclosures.

Massive Dams & Movable Cities
How the World Coped With the Falling Sea-Levels
A Student Report by Roger Branch
World Journalism 214
Arctic City University
2971 May 05
While it took over twenty years to build, Europeans were able to construct a dam at the
Straits of Gibraltar, the largest project ever accomplished by human beings.
It drew on ideas from the early 20th century Atlantropa project put together by German
architect Herman Sorgel. Sorgel's original plan was designed to drain the Mediterranean to
reveal new farm lands in the seafloor. Yet in an odd twist of fate, his considerable research
accurately mapped out the new shoreline -- now that the oceans had fallen -- and his
research became essential for the survival of countries surrounding the Mediterranean.
Following that example other colossal dam projects to contain the Baltic, Black Sea, Red
Sea and Persian Gulf waters began around 2600 and took altogether one hundred years to
complete. Yet with the best of intentions, governments soon realized that the falling oceans
required much more than simply trapping water.
With much of the world changing to a desert climate, millions of people became nomads
who moved across national boarders in search of green areas. To cope with this new reality,
citizens of Europe, North Africa and West Russia were given electronic Citizen Cards which
allowed them to move freely within this mega-state. It was a confederation that attempted to
define and secure its borders by building an extensive electric fence. National armies were
disbanded and instead a combined rapid response armed forces was developed to deal with
the continuing tensions between nomadic peoples and permanent populations.
While the dams plugged up large bodies of water, it did not solve the problem of
evaporation which, with increasing temperatures, was becoming a major problem, not the
least of which was the increased salinity of the water.
Established cities coped with the rising temperatures by trying to retrofit. Massive arrays of
solar panels were erected over Rome, Paris, Istanbul, Cairo, and Prague which both shaded
the towns and also provided electricity for air conditioners.
But by the end of the 2700 when much of the rain had stopped, Black Blizzards began to
engulf the Earth.
Proceeded by huge flocks of screaming birds, dust storms turned day into night, reaching
as high as the clouds. In the next 100 years thousands of storms swept across China,
Europe, Africa and North & South America with winds sometimes faster than a hurricane. By
the end of the century thick dust -- known as black snow -- had swallowed up towns, burying
crops, animals, people, highways, airports and choking railway lines in dunes and drifts that
reached three stories high.

"It was like a giant army of ghosts," a mother in Atlanta, Georgia said after she had herded
her children into a closet. "The dust clouds rolled unchecked, marching like Sherman's March
to the Sea."
With swirling dry black particles came intense static electricity that paralyzed cell phones
and all communications; it shut down power stations and shorted automobiles, creating lines
of frozen traffic on interstate highways that were then buried in dust. Lightning reached down
to the tops of buildings and started waves of fires.
Many were suffocated. Similar to the residents of Pompeii in Roman times, the dust was
like a powdered lava that caught and killed people where they stood. Eventually millions lay
under the drifts -- where they decayed, as no one was able to locate them and bury them.
Virtually everyone took to wearing breathing masks and goggles. Nevertheless dust
pneumonia from the fine silt, known as the “brown plague,” affected millions, especially
children. In addition disease spores carried by winds caused a rash of epidemics.
But worse was to come. The storms became more frequent and were often followed by
oceans of grasshoppers who ate any vegetation that was still alive. In an hour all leaves were
stripped off of trees, and plants and gardens had been devoured.
In the path of these storms hundreds of millions died each decade and untold millions
committed suicide rather than struggle with a force they could never tame. In the course of
300 years, the Earth's population dropped from 7 billion to about 500 million. While many died
from storms, starvation and disease, many others did not have children and life expectancy
plummeted to 40 years.
By 2850 oceans had fallen 64 meters since the first initial report in 2222. This uncovered
much of the world's continental shelf such as on the eastern side of North and South America,
the western shore of Europe and the South China Sea. Yet one population seemed to thrive
under these new conditions. Gypsies, who understood the nomadic lifestyle, moved
effortlessly along the exposed shelf off of western Europe, traveling with photovoltaic
desalination trucks. They harvested seafood and vegetation that grew on the changing shore
-- and then moved on when conditions shifted.
Inspired by the Gypsies, an inventor by the name of Cyrus Ledbetter in the U.S. thought
he knew how to make the best of things. He designed a system he called Movable Cities --
some essential city services extended themselves onto the continental shelf where shallow
underwater land had been exposed. There food and water could be found on the edge of the
receding oceans. About once every hundred years, as the oceans continued to fall, these
services would reach further down the slope to be next to the water. To protect against dust
storms, he mapped out an extensive layered series of tall sand fences along with lightning-rod
type towers that grounded the static electricity. He believed this would make the dust fall and
trap it, shielding his cities. He calculated that his plan could help humans survive for the next
three hundred years -- when other ideas might take shape.
While not perfect -- it was a workable solution. Small cities in the United States at first tried
this such as Charleston, South Carolina; later, Boston, Baltimore, and Miami followed.
Toward the last 75 years of the millennium the population of the Earth gravitated to the
North Pole, where water had pooled in massive natural basins. Combining the governments

of the United States, Canada and East Russia -- this area became known as Arctic City. The
breakthrough that solidified the establishment of Arctic City was new technology which tapped
into the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and used heat from a recently discovered series of hydrothermal
vents to produce electricity. This sprawling city held 80 million people. It was a town that had
grown spontaneously since dust storms were rare, the temperatures were moderate and
water was plentiful.
In addition a number of much smaller cities sprang up, many based on the various ideas
of their founders -- experimental communities and cities were designed with the hope that a
better answer might be found to living in this new environment.
Closer view of the southern half of the Caribbean above South America where there is a natural enclosure.

Jon Ericsson's Vision
2988 Year
Walking up the hill in his native Iceland, architect and engineer Jon Ericsson felt the same
hopeless that everyone felt. As the sun set early in the winter, he looked up at the sky and
saw stars beginning to peek through the dome of the night. "Is our destiny in the stars," he
wondered, "instead of here on Earth?"
Sitting on an icy rock he looked down at the lights in his small city that were reflected in
the snow. By some odd quirk of nature, Iceland still had snow in the winter, he thought. It
looked so peaceful now -- but in several hundred years it would all be gone. Not in his lifetime
surely, but soon enough.
Later, what happened, would be hard to describe. He was not sure if it was because he
was tired, because he was sad and tears had filled his eyes, or if it was a trick of the fading
twilight, or light from the snow bouncing up and hitting an atmospheric anomaly -- but in any
case, he thought he saw a dome covering the town.
And the feeling was euphoric. The dome was comforting, protecting; it sheltered the
people yet echoed the sky; it enclosed them without trapping them. It allowed them to breathe
while protecting them from the outside.
That night he dreamt he was looking up at the ceiling of the planetarium he had seen as a
boy -- the bowl of the sky as the speaker had called it.
A direct descendent of the Swedish inventor John Ericsson, Jon had grown up knowing a
lot about circles and globes. His famous ancestor had invented the rotating gun turret for the
US Union's Civil War ship Monitor and he had also vastly improved the screw propeller for
ships. There was something magical about the circle.
He found himself looking at photos of domed buildings: the Pantheon in Rome, the Hagia
Sophia in Istanbul, the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow, The
Taj Mahal in Agra India and even prehistoric huts with domed roofs.
The dome was universal, he found and then added to himself, "both structurally strong
and deeply symbolic."
Like a swell in the ocean inevitably moving to the shore, weeks and months of thought
broke like a wave on the beach. He knew the dome was the answer -- in part at least -- it was
a shelter from the storm, a world within a world. "So our fate is not to go the stars but to carve
out a life here on Earth,"
With the oceans receding, there would need to be a new faith. Jon believed that humanity
could rise again and pass through the crucible of ecological disaster, to be reborn through
invention. Only this time instead of inventions for war as his famous ancestor had done, they
would be for a new society, a new world.

While the idea of a circular domed city had been around for hundreds of years and had
become a staple in science fiction stories, no large scale domed city had ever been built. Jon
knew that it was finally time. The technology at the end of the 3rd millennium was now so
advanced, a moderately sized domed city could be designed which could last indefinitely into
the future.
Moreover, as an architect, he thought he could design a completely sustainable city that
could exist independently and not need food or energy or water from the outside.
As Buckminster Fuller had explained a thousand years earlier, a dome cuts energy costs
by 90% because its one surface is in contact with the outside air rather than the various
exterior walls of hundreds of building that make a total combined surface ten times larger.
And a domed city could be a wonderful place to live, he thought, since people could walk
to work, sit in a park, visit outdoor concerts all year round without worrying about the weather.
Neither rain or storms or wind or even hot or cold temperatures -- since the city temp would
always be set by a thermostat so to speak -- would interfere with human activities. And such
an open structure might spawn a very different society -- a more open society, one with fewer
restrictions, because those who lived in the city would have fewer barriers in their daily lives.
As an architect he liked to dream, but as an engineer he had to be practical. So he asked
himself the hard questions. But the answer still came up, "Yes."
The one critical question, of course, was about water. Could a recycling system be
designed that would result in a zero net loss of water? Again a closed dome with a grey water
recycling system and state-of-the-art greenhouse cultivation should work.
Like an old weaver -- he had photos of his grandmother weaving in the 19th century -- he
imagined how the threads of modern technology could fit. He then wove them together to
bring his city to life: struts that could support kilometer spans, light strong transparent
covering material, efficient solar cells, smart city monitoring, self-guided compact electric cars,
hydroponic gardening, cell phone networks. It all added up and came together. It all made
sense.
Going back to Fuller's design, he decided that a 3 kilometer diameter was just the right
size for the first such city. People would be close together but with the right design not feel
confined.
He would launch it as an independent corporation. It would have few rules. It would be a
city where everyone could walk, where pedestrians would have the right of way -- and
because of this people would mingle and meet -- rather than be separated and insulated in
their cars. It might even be a better world -- a world of art and ideas, of community, of people
sharing their lives.
He studied maps of the ocean floor and came across the perfect location. It was almost as
if he could see it. The dome would be like a shining city on an ocean ledge next to Greenland.
The city would be situated next to a large basin that held water left over from the oceans. The
plateau was like a cliff that looked across over at Iceland and down to what had been the
bottom of the Atlantic.

There human civilization would begin again, maybe even learning from its mistakes.
He would call his world: Greenland Cliffs.
The Earth without oceans.

PART 2:
THE CITY UNDER THE DOME
NOTE: In the following story,
the city itself is as important as the characters. You might want to read:
PART 3:
BRIEF OVERVIEW OF GREENLAND CLIFFS
and/or the section entitled
FROM THE CITY DIRECTORY
before you read the rest of the story.
I have left this decision up to you, the reader.

Arriving
At the peak of the Maglev virtual highway, he could see the dome of Greenland Cliffs, a
bright white spot in the shadow light of the setting sun. Like falling down a roller coaster, his
capsule picked up speed to 500 km/h as it slid down the arc. The dome grew larger and more
transparent as he approached. Now he could see inside: the buildings, the parks, the roads,
the high spire at the center of the dome. It was like a tent he thought, maybe a big circus tent
with a city underneath it. Ten minutes later his capsule was entering the air locks and landing
him at 'the port of entry'.
Efficiently his capsule passed through each lock smoothly and just as easily he walked
through the horseshoe passages that verified his identity by reading the chip in his arm and
approving the reason for his visit. At the last entry station he was quickly tested for STDs and
then given a paper-thin GPS ankle bracelet and a standard city wrist-phone -- required for
every visitor.
Outside in the waiting room was the city official assigned to meet him. Wearing an open
shirt and shorts, Patrick thought, "They certainly are informal here." Loosening his cravat, he
walked up to Michael, whose photo had just appeared on his wrist-phone, and shook his
hand.
"Welcome to Greenland Cliffs," Michael said. "Sorry to get you up so early. Let me buy you
some breakfast." Grabbing a self-guided buggy (SGB), Michael showed Patrick how to get
into the passenger seat while he punched their destination on the map. "We call each of these
buggies an egg on wheels," Michael laughed. "They are so compact there is barely room for
luggage." Gliding down the clean streets at 15 km per hour, Patrick could not help but be
impressed, but then that is what city officials always tried to do to him, impress him.
Mike took him to the Tropical Cafe, just off the City Center -- a slightly humid greenhouse
with large trees and bushes and even birds near the treetops. It almost took Patrick's breath
away.
The breakfast-bot rolled up to their table. Mike motioned to Pat, "Get anything you want,
it's on the city's tab." He wanted a cappuccino, scrambled eggs and toast. "That's neo-coffee,
you know," Mike added and Pat nodded. Mike then repeated the order to the bot plus his own
order of neo-coffee and a croissant -- then verified it with the printout on his wrist-phone and
pushed the go button.
"After getting a couple of scrambled orders," Mike laughed, "I've learned to always check
with the copy on my wrist-phone. Sometimes the bot's voice recognition is a bit off." Three
minutes later the hot food appeared on the bot's tray. Mike grabbed each dish and put in on
their table.
"My god," said Pat, "The coffee tastes like coffee and the eggs taste like eggs."
"We grow quite a few spices here that no one else does. And we can do wonders with
algae and seaweed," Mike explained with a smile.
Patrick could not help but ask, "Doesn't this greenhouse use up some of your water?"

"Well, we thought it might at first, but actually we've learned to keep 99.9% of the
moisture. And the plants help with air quality by processing carbon dioxide plus green leaves
do wonders for people's moods."
Pat sat back in his chair and looked up. He could see birds circling just below the
greenhouse 'glass', and above it the clear dome of the city, and beyond that some stars in the
cloudless dry sky that now encircled the Earth. It almost made him forget that the oceans --
which he had only heard about and seen movies of -- were gone and that it was his fate, and
that of his generation and all future generations, to come to terms with this alien world.

Tour Of The City
"How hot does it get here?" Pat felt compelled to ask -- everyone always asked that
question sooner or later.
"It's not too bad, in the summer it's usually around 50 degrees Celsius in the day -- kind of
like Death Valley Desert in the old days. We are high up in the northern latitude on the edge of
Greenland, so we don't get the full blast of the sun. I've heard many towns south of us have to
deal with 65 degrees."
"Yes, that's right, -- it's not an exaggeration. I've been to places like that. So how do you
keep your cool," he joked.
"Oh, the usual way I guess. We use a second clear skin under the dome with a gap of
about 2 meters between them which we've found helps a lot. We have the most efficient light
sensitive variable tinting built into the dome, so it filters out 90% of the light during the day and
is completely transparent at night. We use thin film solar photovoltaic cells that are embedded
in the dome covering material. And we are on a night schedule in the summer months -- we
found that helps to keep the temperatures and the energy use down."
"Any trouble with the populous?"
Mike winced a bit, but tried not to show it. These higher up corporate types often referred
to the citizens of a town like children they had to corral.
"We do the minimum to keep everything moving smoothly. We find that works best. Of
course it helps being a small town of about 60k. So we do the basics -- everyone has to wear
a GPS bracelet and carry their wrist-phone with them. We have cameras on each corner and
in every public building so if needed we can follow anyone throughout the entire city from
street to street. And we have a state-of-the-art virtual police force who can respond in a
minute or less. Later in your visit I'll show you how that works."
Pat listened carefully, but took all of this with a grain of salt. These city officials always
tried to make it sound like their towns ran effortlessly. But he was willing to keep an open
mind.
"As you know, I came here primarily because of The Chip. But at the same time, I want to
get a comprehensive overview of how your city works. It has the lowest crime rate of all the
towns in the North Atlantic Federation of Small Cities and also the longest life expectancy.
Plus you've been doing it longer than any other city, about 400 years, and to boot you have
complete data going almost back that far."
Mike knew enough to simply listen at this point. When someone from the outside was
saying good things about his town, he did not want to interrupt.
"So if possible," Pat continued, "I would like to hit all the high points before we get to the
really serious stuff about how to proceed with The Chip."
"Well then," Mike said getting up, "I have a lot to show you. We'd better get on the road,"
he added with a laugh. Pat did not quite understand but followed as Mike took them to a

central vator-station and got on a vator that lifted them up to the Sky Road, forty meters
above the ground.
"We love our Sky Road," Mike said, "it was not in the original plans, but you can walk
north-south and east-west the full length of the village ten stories in the air -- we find it gives
people a new perspective, an openness they would not have if they only saw the city and its
landscape from ground level."
"In the darkness of night, like now, you can see the stars and the moon clearly from the
Sky Road, as we use special directional lighting at ground level that points down to the streets
and barely lights the top of the dome. Nevertheless, at street level you can see quite well at
night and from here, as you can see, there is enough light to make things out ."
Looking down and over the sides of the Sky Road, Mike pointed out the city's main
features, "At the center of the dome is a square, 2 kilometers by 2 kilometers. This is where
buildings, apartments, the city hall, schools and so on are located. Beyond this central square
are leftover half round areas that go out to the edge of the circular dome. We call them
quadrants and they are located north, south, east and west. When the city was in the planning
stages, no one could figure out the best way to use them, but then it became obvious -- use
them for parks, play grounds, things like that"
Mike and Pat walked about half a kilometer to the back of the dome where the apartment
buildings were located. Looking down, Pat could see a checkerboard pattern with spots of
green visible throughout and some patches of green that were much bigger where large cube
areas intersected.
"We used models from other cities like the quartiers of Paris to create neighborhoods that
were both enclosed and also open to each other. So each Apartment Complex surrounds a
courtyard but is also part of a group of four complexes with a multilevel atrium in the middle.
These atriums have a park, cafe, general store, arcade and a pool. Four Apartment Groups
are part of a Super-Group with an even larger atrium in the middle. You can see this easily as
we walk above," Mike explained.
"Those spots of green you see everywhere are Norfolk Island Pines. They turned out to be
the ideal tree for our dome environment. They do okay in the subdued light of the winter and
the tinted light of the summer -- and they even help to keep the humidity at a constant level.
We don't let them get more that 3 meters tall. We like them so much we put them on the city
crest -- and see them as a symbol for the town."
"At the back of the dome is Half-Moon Park which is very large, 160 old fashioned acres,
and takes up the entire west quadrant. We designed it after Central Park in Old New York
City. It is so large you might believe you are in the world before the oceans -- we find this park
and parks through out the town are essential to people's sense of well being."
They walked back to the center of the Sky Road where a spire reached to the highest
point in the dome. "That, of course, is City Hall. We put it in the exact middle so that public
safety officials would be equidistant from all corners and could reach everyone quickly if
needed."
"But there is even more to see up here," Mike added.

He took Pat up a spiral ramp to Sky High Park which was another twenty meters above
the Sky Road. "If you want a bird's eye view, so to speak, you can get it from here." Mike said
as he motioned with his hands, "You can see the entire layout both inside and out." Mike
pointed to the large quadrant parks, the set of buildings that housed the Institute For Urban
Order and the Perimeter Road that ran next to the outer edge of the dome. Then he pointed
outside and behind to the small separate factory dome and the greenhouses plus the
aquaculture and desalination area. Last he motioned toward the large natural basin that held
the water left over from the oceans' fall. It was the reason for the town locating at Greenland
Cliffs.
Pat, being a hands-on person, wanted to see some things up close. So they took a SGB
into the greenhouses, then rode over to the blimp cargo area next to the factory.
"These blimps deliver parts and also ship out completed virtual-skeletons which we
assemble here in our factory and which is our main hardware export. The blimps are tied into
the roadless trucking network that developed in the post-ocean era. And, of course, they bring
in a number of other goods from the outside that we need here to keep our city running."
Pat looked a bit puzzled. "Don't worry," Mike added, "I'll show you a lot more about the
virtual-skeletons as we move along."
Next they were driven by a SGB to the salt water basin and aquaculture tanks. Kilometers
wide and long, the natural basin -- which had been called a valley when it lay under the
Atlantic Ocean -- was the city's water source. Standing beside the basin, Mike stretched out
his arms to indicate its huge size. "Our water use is 99.9% efficient, so we have enough water
here for the next 1000 years. We believe that over time we can do even better and also that
we can discover new water sources. So we do not see any reason why we cannot be here
indefinitely."
"How about evaporation?" Pat felt compelled to ask.
"That was a problem at first, but we solved it with a weave of interlocking force-shields that
over time have turned out to be quite efficient, just like putting a plastic cover over it."
As evening approached they took a break at one of the many cafes in the Arts Quadrant, a
spot that allowed a view of the deep empty cavern, the ocean floor, where the Atlantic had
once been.
"In our usual dry clear air, people can often see hundreds of kilometers. While that seems
hard to believe, we are about four kilometers above the seafloor which gives us an incredible
view," Mike explained.
Pat walked to the edge of the dome and looked out through the transparent covering. Lit
by the full moon, the peaks and valleys that had once been underwater stretched as far as he
could see. They shown like stalagmites at the bottom of a cave, often smooth and rounded,
shaped as much by the action of water as by land and wind.

Visiting A C-Girl
Exhausted, Pat left for his hotel -- a square 2.5 meter room that he was not anxious to
spend much time in.
He checked his wrist-phone for holographic hookers. Greenland Cliffs being a center of
touchable interactive holography, he could have just about any flavor he wanted at half the
price of a flesh&blood girl. But somehow he just wasn't in the mood.
So he went to the 'cell girls' section. One cute one was within close walking distance, so
he called her. They switched to Skype and flirted for a moment before he asked,
"Can I come over -- now?"
"Yes," she laughed without hesitation.
And in minutes he was at her apartment which was not in a segregated 'red light' district
like most other towns. Before he could knock, she opened the door. It was a welcome he
would replay later many times once back at Arctic City thousands of miles away when this
backwater town seemed like a dream.
Ushering him in like an old friend, she handed him a glass of wine and guided him to a
couch. Not beautiful but striking, her light complexion shone out from under her long black
hair. She wore a thin oriental bathrobe that barely covered a thinner negligee. And he had a
weakness for chicks in bathrobes.
"Sounds like you are from out of town?" she asked.
Surprised she wanted to talk, he sipped his wine, then, "I'm from Arctic City here on
business." (That ought to impress her, he thought.) And it worked.
"I've never been to Arctic City, but I've seen pictures, movies..."
"It's big, noisy, not under a dome."
"Tell you what, before we get to know each other, can we get our business out of the way,
so we can relax?"
"Sure."
"Here's what I do, look at it on your cell."
Pat scrolled through her menu and decided he ought to start slow. "I'd like a #1, for
starters." He clicked his choice and sent her the cash.
"Tell you what," she said, "lets go sit on the patio."
She picked up their glasses and took them to a table that looked out over the courtyard
and across at the other apartments and patios that encircled it. She pushed a button which
seemed to do nothing.
"We have no windows here and curtains are a nuisance but we can turn on a privacy
force-shield. It's like a one way mirror; we can see out, but people can't see in."

Almost imperceptibly she guided Pat to a chair and sat across from him. "So Arctic City...
Tell me more."
"Everything moves too fast, everyone wants to get ahead, all the headquarters of the
major corporations are there..."
Without him realizing it, she had come over next to his chair. He gasped a bit as she undid
his shirt, next his pants. He looked out over the patio. She pulled down his underwear. Was it
possible people could not see. Soon his thoughts were quite different as she stroked him to
new heights and then he was flying through the dome -- above it, it seemed, light as air.
Later lying in his cramped hotel bed, still smelling her perfume on his skin, he thought,
"This town is so relaxed, even the cell girls -- she was like the girl next door, comfortable --
just what I needed."

The Cities Of The Post-Ocean World
On The Cities Of The Post-Ocean World
Term Paper Proposal
Political Science 203: Contemporary World Cultures
Arctic City University
Alexander Vronsky
3417 October 19
With the fall of the oceans, established cultures disintegrated and instead the peoples of
the world put their efforts into simply surviving.
This meant that the peoples of each geographic area had to make the best of what they
had. Today after hundreds of years of struggle, the world has succeeded in building a new
civilization on Earth. Each location has found a different solution, yet together they now form
the new world order.
In Europe, the successful containment of the Mediterranean, Baltic and Black Sea
supplied ample water for an established population. However, the rising temperatures and
droughts plus the massive dust storms created a situation worse than the Black Plague in the
14th Century -- killing more than 80%. Some people along the edges of the waters resorted to
living in caves as their ancestors had done 50,000 years earlier. Many others retreated to the
catacombs of old which protected them from both the heat and the storms. As a result
catacombs in Paris, Rome, London, Naples, Granada, Odessa, Vienna and Alexandria along
with existing networks of tunnels and mines have now become city centers.
The Great Lakes area in the United States held the largest area of fresh water in the world
and for a time was quite wealthy as water sold for ten times the price of gasoline. Yet as the
towns and cities in North America died out and became covered in dust, this income was
short lived. Eventually the Great Lakes region became a source for Arctic City after a pipe line
was built. Then most of the people who had lived near the Great Lakes moved and invested
their money in Arctic City which as a result has today become the most prosperous and
progressive metropolis on the planet.
Across the globe massive areas of water were captured either in natural pockets or by
dam projects. As a result cities developed in locations where this was successful. For
example, China, Japan and Korea succeeded in trapping a large basin of seawater between
them that evolved into The Asian Federation. They used their skills with algae, seaweed, fish,
and marine life to build a successful aquaculture.
In addition there were plans for several hundred small experimental cities around the
globe that used a mixture of technologies to deal with the environment at specific locations.
Today there are now, for example, domed cities and underground cities; in addition there are
a number of above ground cities on the ocean floor that have taken advantage of natural
conditions such as shading or geothermal energy.

Lost in all of this are the untold millions of nomadic peoples who are now roaming the
planet and who live a primitive existence. At the same time they employ high-tech devices
such as photovoltaic desalination equipment. It is estimated that a third of the Earth's
surviving population lives in this manner, yet very little is known about them in the established
cities of the world.
And of course, no proposed paper would be complete without highlighting Arctic City.
Founded at what had once been a forbidden land, the North Pole, the warming temperatures
created the ideal climate for the new environment. Free of dust storms, temperate, with huge
natural basins that trapped large areas of the oceans, it had all the right elements for a
thriving city. When it was able to generate electricity from the thermal vents and volcanoes of
the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and then pumped water from the Great Lakes, the stage was set for
this great city to come of age.
Arctic City is now the crown jewel for the world's new environment and has set the
standard, thriving in a world with no oceans. The millions of people who live here enjoy a
pleasant and fruitful life, and the city looks forward to further progress that will benefit
everyone.
Around the year 3000 the cities began to establish new highways and methods of
communication. The virtual Maglev highway was implemented by a consortium of major cities.
The V-highway, as it became known, today provides an inexpensive way to weave together
the hundreds of separated urban centers, so that fast efficient travel to just about any part of
the world is now possible without having to build a physical road. In addition it solved the
problem of roads being covered by dust and of finding a way to navigate across the ocean
floor.
Next a full complement of high-tech satellites were put into orbit that, today as we speak,
provide state-of-the-art high-speed communications along with interactive holographic-video-conferencing
which removes the need for many travel trips and allows daily coordination
between distant parts of the globe.
In short the world rebuilt itself on a new model and now is poised to enter its own rebirth:
the Renaissance of the 4th millennium.

The Smart-City Intelligent Operations Center
The next morning several hours after the sun had set, Pat met Mike at the entrance to the
Smart-City Intelligent Operations Center.
Standing at the doorway, Mike held Pat back and said, "This is the core. The IOC operates
24/7. It never sleeps. It is the heartbeat of the city. And it also is why we are a one company
town; we know more about Urban Order than anyone on the planet."
Then Mike ushered Pat through three horseshoe threat detecting arches and three identity
checks.
"Wow, you sure don't take any chances."
"We can't afford to, the city could collapse without it -- even though we have a complete
duplicate backup center, just in case. And, BTW, what you see here is not to be talked about
to anyone except authorized personnel."
That said Mike guided Pat into a darkened round room that lay hidden in the middle of City
Hall. "It looks like a War Room from an old movie," Pat thought as he walked into the center.
Mike, coughed a bit, and all the officers turned around. "Hi everyone, this is Pat Joyner, he
is visiting from Arctic City -- he is with the North Atlantic Federation of Small Cities. He has full
security clearance, so you can tell him anything." Each officer waved to Pat and Pat waved in
return as they quickly turned their attention back to their work stations.
12 police in bright finely sequined uniforms stood before screens -- the room mimicking
the geometry of the dome. Each display pointed in the direction of a city section. On every
screen swarms of bright dots pulled together and then flew apart.
"Each dot is a person's GPS coordinates in real time," Mike whispered. They looked like a
flock of birds Pat had seen pictures of, birds migrating over the oceans.
Next to every third officer was another worker in a colored uniform: one in green, another
in yellow, still another in orange and the last one in purple. Each monitored a screen that
looked similar to that of the police.
Mike whispered to Pat, "The green official keeps track of the charging or the load on the
nanotube electrical storage. He also monitors CO2 levels, air pressure, temperature and
water pressure throughout the entire city complex."
"The yellow officer keeps watch on apartments which includes all the automatic bots in
every room, the crane in the middle of each complex plus the vator-lifts that take residents to
their porches."
"The orange is for medical emergencies and fire, although more than half of fire alarms
can be put out by sprinklers or by the crane at the center of each Apartment Complex as it
can automatically reach into each room and spray fire retardant."
"The last one, the purple one, monitors all the mobile bots: the food-bots, the self-guided
buggies, the street-cleaning-bot, the food-bot-train from the greenhouses and the toilet-bot-

train from the composting area. Plus he monitors the signal strength of the GPS system, the
wrist-phone, the Internet, and the smart wireless charging signal. He also has the power to
shut down any bots if they malfunction."
Pat could not help but marvel at the fine tuning. Here was the entire city distilled into one
room coupled with a method for responding quickly.

The IOC In Action
Suddenly a screen popped. A moving circle enclosed a small group of dots and above it
another screen zoomed in using full photographic mode that tracked this group. Flicking each
person's face on the screen with her index finger, the officer brought up the Citizen's Quick
Record (CQR) of each member, which displayed an overview of points on their Citizens Cards
and a list of past infractions -- along with a lifelong rating for each person. "If I want I can tap
the CQR and get a detailed past history including medical records, education and
employment," the officer pointed out.
But in this case they were kids just horsing around -- nothing serious. Although it could
have been a fight. "The algorithm lights up when there is a 10% chance of an altercation --
leaving it to the person in charge -- that's me -- to decide," she added.
The policewoman turned to Pat, "It may not look like it, but we can tell a lot by the way
people move. We can, for example, tell when they are intoxicated or becoming violent or
having sex. We have two GPS points: one on the wrist-phone and one on the ankle bracelet
-- and with these two points we can infer a lot about their behavior. But we never let the
citizens know that. We don't want people looking over their shoulders."
She continued, "Our system has prevented a number of sexual encounters between an
adult and a child, for example. Our algorithm is designed to learn each citizen's individual way
of moving -- so it can tell when an adult is just a child's friend -- but it also can flag when it
thinks an adult might be touching a kid in an inappropriate way. Naturally it is up to the officer
of the moment to make that determination."
"While we call it GPS from the old days, it's really dome positioning. It's much more
sensitive and faster than even the best old GPS -- as a wrist-phone and bracelet can be read
accurately with a change of only 6 centimeters ten times a second."
"Also you might wonder what the bright orange points are. These are people who are on
probation. We keep a special eye on them, so that they don't continue their dysfunctional
behavior."
Across the room, another screen popped. The top photo screen zoomed in on a man who
was talking loudly and raising his arm above a woman. His wrist-phone flashed an orange
light and a loud voice over the phone said, "Stop, do not move, an officer will be with you in a
moment." Then seemingly out of nowhere a policeman rolled up.
Mike nudged Pat, "Pay close attention, this is where the rubber meets the road, as they
used to say."
Pat looked at the screen but even more at the officer in charge. The policeman in the IOC
had stepped onto a platform where he was moving his arms and speaking as the officer on
the street. On another screen the policeman could see what his avatar, the virtual officer on
the ground, was seeing.

"This is our specialty," Mike glowed, "This is a Virtual-Skeleton-Officer, we call him a VS-officer.
His realtime image is transmitted from the sequin-sensors on his uniform to the LED
pixels on the robotic skeleton. On the street he appears to be a real police officer."
"It looked to me like you were just about to hit this woman," the VS-officer said to the tall
thin man on the street.
"No, I'm sorry it looked like that, I was just being emphatic."
"But you also raised your arm."
"I was trying to make a point."
"You know, of course, that we have a recording of this and can play it back." The tall man
retreated a bit. "And what do you say about this," the VS-officer asked the small young
woman.
"He was about to hit me, or shove me, I'm sure."
"But it did not come to that?" the officer continued.
"No, because you got here so quickly."
Turning to the man, the VS-officer said, "I'll tell you what. I don't like the look of this, but
nothing happened. I am going to put 3 points on your Citizen Card which won't cost you
anything, if you don't have any more points on your card."
The man gasped, "But I already have 3 points."
"Well, then it will cost you -- and it will be deducted automatically from your pay. Now is
there anything else I can do for you?"
"But that's not fair," the man insisted. "I didn't do anything. And I'll be paying for those
points for the next year. And if I get many more points, I could be on probation."
"Tell you what," the VS-officer said with a sly smile. "I will do something."
The man relaxed.
"I will add 3 more points because you insist on arguing with me. Now is there anything
else I can do for you?" the VS-officer repeated in his sweetest tone.
"No," replied the man, "I'm sorry, I should not have argued with you." He bowed his head a
bit and stepped back.
The VS-officer then rolled away toward a door that had just opened in the outside corner
of a building. The deactivated VS-officer, now only a skeleton frame with unlit LEDs, glided
into a closet and the door slid shut.
Back in the IOC, the policeman, moved from the platform to his chair. He turned to Pat,
"You got to see the real thing. Not a major confrontation of course, but real nonetheless. I can
project myself onto a Virtual-Skeleton-Officer and appear to be like a flesh&blood person on
the street. And what citizens are seeing is actually me, in real time, but it is also my projection.
I can do anything from here I could do on the ground, except maybe get knifed," he laughed.
"We have at least one VS-officer in a closet on the corner of each block. This means we can

react almost immediately to any situation. And responding rapidly with quick punishment
takes care of 90% of the situations."
The director of the IOC, added, "And we can run an entire city of 60,000 with less than 100
police, fire and ambulance officials. So while it ensures safety, it also saves the citizens
money."
Pat, of course, knew about all this in theory, but had never seen it in the flesh. But then
that was why Greenland Cliffs was the leader and was able to create an entire industry
around its experience.

Board Meeting At The Institute For Urban Order
Leaving the IOC, Pat stepped out from City Hall on the tenth story and onto the Sky Road,
where he walked up to the Sky High Cafe for lunch.
"These whirlwind visits, sure take a toll," he thought.
After a shrimp burger on biscuits made of green banana flour and several cups of neo-coffee
he was ready for the next round -- the reason for this trip.
Pat walked the Sky Road to the vator-station that dropped him down in front of the ground
floor entrance to the Institute For Urban Order. After introducing himself to the receptionist, he
was guided into a board room. There he met with the president, a vice-president, two heads
of departments and Michael who represented the city.
With everyone in the room, Pat began his presentation:
"As you know, your main industry here at Greenland Cliffs is research and the creation of
urban order. Your domed town has been around a long time and because it is small it serves
as a good model for more small domed cities on Earth and also for space exploration. We
believe that both colonies on planets and asteroids could be based on your model as well as
large space ships that might have to travel for decades.
"We think that the basic problems dealing with human survival have -- for the most part --
been solved. So the real problems are going to be psychological -- how to encourage people
to get along, work together, cooperate, not get on each others nerves. I think about the first
biosphere experiment way back in the 2Oth century, as we learned in school -- it ended not
because of a technical problem, but because people were fighting.
"I must say I am very impressed with the relaxed atmosphere of this town. And the thought
that went into it -- giving people a means of expression and even a sense of beauty while at
the same time keeping firm control. It is for this reason that we think you are most qualified to
work with these psychological factors. And that is the reason for my coming here."
Pat paused and then became quite serious.
"What I am going to say next is private information, which you are sworn not reveal to
anyone except in conversations with another authorized official. No one else. Is that clear?"
Pat scanned the room, looking at each person and all nodded their heads.
"As some of you know, the North Atlantic Federation of Small Cities would like to extend
and build on your success by working on a long term project, we call simply The Chip,
although the technical name is the Comprehensive Monitoring Chip (CMC). The head office
would like you to start thinking about implanting a chip that can read activity in the body, a
chip that is very similar to what is being used right now such as in my arm," he held out his
arm to demonstrate, "but it would give us more information."
"This new chip will provide advantages over the older system of monitoring that you are
currently using with GPS bracelets and wrist-phones. For example, a number of vital-sign
monitors can be implemented which will lead to longer and healthier lives. In the event of an

emergency a nurse-bot will be able to read this chip instantly and provide accurate and rapid
treatment. The Chip will also provide early warning alerts for clogged arteries, heart attack
and stroke, just to mention a few of the health benefits."
"The Chip may even go further -- it could, for example, read some brain activity and
coordinate that with health monitoring."
Pat again scanned the faces of his audience to see what kind of reaction he was getting.
The city officials were carefully digesting what he said.
"This is a long term project which will require research, thought, testing and may not come
about for twenty or even forty years. It will be divided into a number of sections which can be
designed separately and then put together as the design progresses."
"Bottom line: I think this will be the biggest project ever given to the Institute For Urban
Order and if successful should make you the premier supplier of monitoring equipment."
The president cleared her throat, which she always did before speaking at a meeting. "We
appreciate being offered this project, but there are many... many different aspects which will
have to be integrated. There even is the chance that if done wrong it could affect a person's
health in a negative way. And no one has ever tried to tie brain activity and vital signs all
together to come up with a reading that is accurate."
Pat was prepared for this. "I don't disagree." He stopped for a second. "In fact, I very much
agree -- as I have been saying these exact same things to my superiors. However, this project
will take decades and if we work together, we will have plenty of time to determine just what it
is that we can and cannot do."
The president scanned the faces of her employees. "If we can have continual input into
the design then, yes, we would like to work on The Chip as you call it." She looked back at
her employees and they all nodded in agreement.
Pat nodded his head also, "I think that this is the best way to proceed and, in fact, is what I
recommended before I left Arctic City."
At that point the president got up, "Well, I think we are done here. Go back to your Arctic
City, get a firm agreement, and we'll start work."
Suddenly everyone smiled, hand shakes were exchanged and Pat's meeting that he had
dreaded was over.

Flying
After the meeting at the Institute, Mike looked at Pat and could read the slight signs of
strain on his face. As the sun began to rise, Mike guided Pat out of the office building and
toward the Arts Quadrant. "Pat, I have one more thing to show you and then you are on your
own."
In the evening as the sun was coming up, they grabbed a SGB and headed toward the
front of the dome near the cliff. After passing through an air lock and putting on oxygen
masks, they walked the half kilometer in a comfortable 32 C degree temperature (90 F) to
stand on the platform overlooking the chasm below. What Pat did not expect to see was a
flock of large birds, hovering, diving, swooping, falling down almost to the bottom and then
suddenly being swept up above him.
"Hang gliders," Mike said. "We let the dare devils express themselves; it's better than
using their energy in a destructive way. The experienced ones can ride the hot drafts for
hours. And they are wonderful to watch."
Pat looked out and just as suddenly he was with them, falling though the air, heading
toward the bottom, yet at the last moment pulling up and taken to the heights.
Later he wondered whether was it the c-girl or the hang gliders -- but now it was in his
blood. Small domed towns did not like outsiders, especially ones they had not monitored
since an early age, but he would do what he could to break those rules.
Using the lookout telescope he zoomed in on Iceland, the valley next to it that was once
known as The Straits of Greenland, and deep down to the ridges in the Atlantic Ocean floor.

Brochure: The Institute For Urban Order
Institute For Urban Order
Greenland Cliffs
"Where government meets the people."
A complete solution to keeping track
of your citizens and improving their quality of life.
The IUO offers software, hardware, a combination
and custom configurations to suit your needs.
We have been doing this the longest in the post-ocean era.
MONITORING
We offer total services to monitor your populous, such as GPS coordinates of each person
in real time. This data can be saved indefinitely in a highly compressed format so that
decades of information does not take up valuable hard drive space.
Our sophisticated algorithms can spot trouble from subtle movements in the GPS tracking.
Our system is also designed to learn the unique movements that apply to your particular city
and to each individual citizen in your town.
If your city has never embarked on this type of monitoring before, we have a plan that
slowly acclimates your citizenry to the idea. By stressing the benefits most cities have been
able to equip each person with a GPS bracelet in a relatively short period of time.
Once outfitted and fully functioning, traffic accidents can be cut by 80%, response to
health emergencies can only take a few minutes, parents can be assured that their children
are safe, and serious crime can be reduced to less that .05%.
Combined with a system of wrist-phones, city-wide cameras and virtual police (see below),
our unique style of GPS monitoring can be used to reduce the size of your police force by
75%.
POLICE SERVICES
Our 5th generation virtual police force means that an officer can be on the scene in a
matter of minutes. With a virtual police force, an officer projects his/her image onto a 3D
image of him/herself (the avatar) and interacts with the citizens, all the while sitting at his/her
desk at police headquarters.
We offer two kinds of Virtual Officers:
A Virtual-Skeleton-Officer (VS-officer), equipped with a camera, microphone, speaker,
Internet connection and a cloak of high definition LEDs, can go just about anywhere and
handle almost all situations. The officer, in this case, projects his/her image into the LEDs

making a high resolution virtual person. Furthermore that same skeleton can be used for a
virtual nurse or other City Official.
In addition another type of virtual officer, a Virtual Holographic Officer (VH-officer), can
handle many situations in combination with city-wide cameras and directional microphones
and speakers.
THE COMPLETE SOLUTION
A comprehensive GPS monitoring system combined with a virtual police force can prevent
most altercations from occurring. Our sophisticated GPS algorithms have a 90% success rate
of identifying problematic situations.
When a potential situation does occur, coordinated city cameras can kick in and the officer
in charge at police headquarters is immediately alerted. He/she can then determine what
response is needed.
If a possible situation occurs in a private residence, we have a system that will turn on a
video recorder in that location to monitor the occurrence. If a problem arises, a virtual officer
in skeleton mode can respond in minutes.
GET IN TOUCH
We can show you what we offer with a holographic-video-conferencing call or you can
come visit us here at Greenland Cliffs. We are proud of our city where we use all of our
services every single day in real time. Come see for yourself.

Running Into Mariana
The next afternoon wandering around the theater district he saw her. He knew that she
saw him, but pretended not -- so he would not be embarrassed, he guessed.
"Mariana, is that you?" he asked, coming up from behind. She turned and her smile was
brighter than the moon. "Can I buy you a cup of coffee?"
"No," she said and he felt his stomach collapsing. "But you can buy me a glass of neo-hard-
cider. It's the Festival of Autumn's Equal Night."
He had almost forgotten. The equinox had become a big deal in the post-ocean era.
"Sure, lead the way." Then, "What do you call it here?"
"Equal Night for short, since everyone knows what season it is -- but officially it's the
Festival of Autumn's Equal Night."
They walked together comfortably, he thought, almost like old lovers.
"It's a three day celebration because the days stay the same for three days and at the end
we go to a day schedule, since there is so little light in the winter. Some people prefer this
winter mode more than the summer, since we have daylight in the middle of the day."
Three neo-hard-ciders later plus an eel filet sandwich and the dome began to glow. "What
do you do for fun," he wanted to know.
"There are movies."
"Oh, I must have missed them."
They took their time walking to the theaters, even though they could have grabbed the
titles and schedules from their cells. They passed elaborate arrangements of LED/flicker-lights
that were everywhere: in the windows, on the edge of the sidewalk, on tables, in SGBs.
Later Pat decided that time had stopped, not the arrow of clock time of course, but that he
and Mariana had reached a plateau of time.
Walking along the edge of the dome, Pat realized that this part of the walkway was
designed after an old fashioned esplanade -- as hundreds of people streamed by them in a
line. But tonight the citizens were in costume, mostly Greek gods.
It appeared that Neptune was the favorite, followed by Zeus with thunderbolts. The women
chose Persephone, goddess of the underworld and autumn and winter, along with Demeter,
goddess of the harvest, but the favorite was Athena, the patron goddess of Greenland Cliffs,
the goddess of wisdom.
"Hard to explain," Mariana said, answering Pat's unasked question. "The Greek thing has
always been part of the city -- we see ourselves as Athens reborn and feel that Athena is
protecting us. Athena is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and
justice, mathematics, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, and skill. We look to her for
guidance."

Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry

Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (17)

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (9)

Similar to Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry

Similar to Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry (20)

More from Rick Doble

More from Rick Doble (10)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Stealing the Oceans: Humanity Struggles for Survival in This 1000 Year Epic When a Mysterious Force Threatens to Drain the Oceans Dry