Shaan opened his eyes. At once, he was amazed. He had not expected to open them again, ever. It was impossible that he should.
He was cold. The cold of death? No. He wouldn't be feeling that.
He was in utter blackness, with a fragrant, woodsy aroma in his nostrils. He was lying flat on his stomach, on a surface that was not soft, but springy.
Had he been rescued? Was he in a hospital somewhere? In a dome?
He moved his fingers. They clutched chill, moldy sod.
But he was breathing. The air was sweet and keen, like the air of a terrestrial mountain top. He was alive.
He pulled his knees under him slowly and sat up. His bare head struck a flimsy, rustling barrier and thrust through. The air rushed from his lungs and he gasped in the thin, icy-cold Martian air. He had a single glimpse of jewelled stars in a velvet sky before he threw himself prone beneath the foliage again.
He lay there, recovering his breath. Slowly, realization came to him.
He was under the canopy formed by the foliage of myriads of canal sage plants. The leaves formed a tightly packed roof 18 inches above the ground. Perhaps the plants did store oxygen in their hollow stems. But they trapped it beneath the solid cover of their foliage, too, forming a thin layer of breathable atmosphere along the surface of the canal.