by wasilij
*Anthill: Fluctuating Minds* is a hard sci-fi thriller set on Mars. Conceived as a trilogy. Classically divided into three acts. The present text is Act I. The pivot of this story is people. Some plain. Others splendid. Some weak. Others strong. Most somewhere in between. And yet they all live in a world that, like ours, balances between utopia and total annihilation. Only farther away. Deeper beneath the surface. Enclosed in cities, tunnels, rings, and systems larger than any single human being. And all of them must submit to circumstance.To origin. To politics. To technology. To gravity. To the decisions of others. To what had long been set in motion before they understood that they had become part of it.Only with extraordinary effort can one defy those circumstances. At a high price.Some pay it sooner. Others later.*Anthill* was inspired, among others, by *The Expanse*, *Metro 2033*, *Judge Dredd*, *Neuromancer*, and *Solaris*: by hard future logic, underground societies, institutional violence, cyberpunk decay, and quiet estrangement.
