The city of Rothrock turned out to be full of future wonders that men of my day would never have dared to dream. In between observations and examinations, I got to see the modern marvels that this society managed to have in spite of the fact that it was really besieged and in the middle of a wilderness. They'd worked out a lot of extraordinary inventions, and they weren't all used for warfare either, but to make everyday living better too.

Of course, I was a curiosity to them, and the feeling was pretty much mutual. I wanted to know a lot about how people had changed and what problems had been licked through the use of new sciences, but I had to wait until they had more answers from me. While this was going on, I learned about one particular wonder.

Have you ever heard of a Gypsy fortune teller with a crystal ball? How about a mystical soothsayer who could see the unknown? Well, I never put a lot of stock in that kind of thing, so I was extra surprised to find that they had the real thing in the year 501,879!

I found it out first hand because the authorities in the city of Rothrock were very curious about the details of my story, so they sent me to a Mind Oracle. The told me the fellow was mighty old, one of the oldest men in the city, although you'd never know it to look at him. He was a healthy, youthful looking elf like most of the citizenry, a half-caste of homosapien and the humanoid alien races from throughout the Selenium empire that had joined our cause so long ago.

The Mind Oracle had me in a circular room with dim lights and benches all around, in a chair in the center. He said the idea was to get me into a partial trance to help my memory without any distractions.

He asked me a lot of things about my last day in the 19th century, but he had me go into the most detail when I came to the part about the elves in the sasquatch costumes. In fact, he brought me a pen and a piece of paper and had me draw the figures exactly as I'd seen them.

Now, my memory is about as unreliable as the next man's, but with the help of the Mind Oracle's trance, I could see the moment in time over again, clear and frozen.

When I'd finished the drawing I was pretty surprised at how well it turned out. “Well, I'll be hogtied, that's got to be my best work!”

The Mind Oracle turned the paper on the table top and nodded “I would hardly have believed this had you not been in a trance, Cylas.”

“You mean about me drawing so well?”

“No, I understand you are quite the artist. I mean about this subject with the eyepatch. You've only been among us for a few short days, so it probably hasn't dawned on you that you've drawn Loh Nala.”

“Who's she?”

The Mind Oracle smiled “He is a hero out of the legends of Selenium. In a mythic prehistoric age, he fought of the Satellite Lords and dealt them a defeat that set them back for ages, saving this world and many like it. Most scholars had considered him to be purely a myth with no historical basis, but this puts things in a different light!”

“Well, that sounds pretty special.”

“You are easily my most special subject, Cylas. Minds of your age worked in a completely different way, I really had to rack my brain to put you under hypnosis at first. It's so rare to get a challenge.”

“Thanks... I think?”

When the Mind Oracle let me go at last, I found Tando waiting for me outside. The whole introduction to this new place had been a little rough, but he had been a brick throughout and stuck by me. He always had a big smile and a hug whenever I saw him, today was no different.

“Cylas!” he said. “How was your session with the oracle?”

“Fine, I think,” I said, “seems like I helped solve a mystery about some ancient legend.”

“If anybody can, you're the man to do it.”

I noticed he had his war uniform on, although men of my day would hardly have called it a uniform, so I asked him about it.

“Oh!” Tando said, clearly having almost forgotten. “Yes, we'd better get yours for you too. Our squad has been called into action.” He began to lead me away towards the rocket port, through the massive unbroken marble streets.

“What is it, The Satellite Lords attacking?”

“Well, we might have some trouble from them, but it's actually a missing man we're going after.”

“Is he somebody important?”

“He's a soldier, named Novom. He was on an expedition far to the East and he ran away from the party. His squad mates took heavy fire and couldn't recover him.”

“So, we're gonna arrest him for deserting?”

“No, nothing like that. Soldiering has changed a lot since your day. It's very dangerous in the wilds between our cities, we want to try and save him, if he's still alive.”

Over the last few days many of the changes to the world and society had stunned me, but this was a big one. “You mean he won't be in trouble for deserting his squad in combat?”

“Well, we don't encourage that kind of thing, but his running away might mean something other than a betrayal or an act of cowardice. We have found that men are a lot more complicated than we once thought. Often times people do things and are confused themselves as to why they behaved as they did.”

“I'll have to take your word for it. One thing's sure, the world has come a long way...”