by: Rick Johnson 
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
RikJohnson@juno.com
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Florina was watching me pump iron. I hated to do this but after more than a Martian year on Barsoom, the lighter Martian gravity was robbing my bones of calcium at an alarming rate. And despite the calcium pills I took daily, if I didn’t overstress myself regularly, I’d end up as weak and frail as any Red Man. On Barsoom, that wouldn’t be much of a problem but it would mean that I’d be stuck here forever, never returning to Earth for fear the increased gravity would kill me instantly.
When I was a fat kid, my father tried to make a man of me by forcing me to pump iron but that was a useless endeavor and, again, he was disappointed in his only son. For an Arizona cowboy who had joined the Marines at fifteen during World War II and had also fought in Korea and Vietnam, I can see why he thought so little of me. Now, ten years later, I am a soldier-spy on another planet and no longer human. I fought in wars that made the worst Earth did look like a mud-wrestling match and I couldn’t even say, “Dad, I’m a man and a soldier now, can’t you be proud of me finally?” because he had died a century and a half ago. Doesn’t life just kick you in the teeth sometimes?
“My Lord, you push yourself too much. You should be kinder to yourself,” my slave commented. She always worried about me and unlike most other master-slave relationships, I saw in her more a friend and lover than property.
I hated owning Florina. I recall talking to one drop-dead gorgeous woman from Texas once. She was ‘Daughters of the Confederacy’, ‘Daughters of Texas’, ‘Daughters of the American Revolution’ and her family had been in America long before there had been an America and I was just an Irish immigrant desperate for even her smile. She told me that black people were better off as slaves and enjoyed the experience. I told her that when Henry got tired of we Irish fighting British rule, he turned the country over to Cromwell who solved the ‘Irish problem’ by sending wagons through the streets and grabbing any Irish they could, tossing them into a cage then putting that cage onto a boat to sell the Irish to America as slaves. Mothers and children simply vanished to leave their families starving because they had been taken and sold as slaves to her ancestors. She didn’t believe me because to her only black people were slaves but to us, more than 20% of Ireland ended up sold in chains to America.
And now I was one of those hated owners of humanity.
“It’s the only way we can be together,” she said for the hundredth time. “We are a country ruled by custom. Were I free, my family would forbid us to marry and they would destroy any egg I laid for fear the hatchling would have a…” she trailed off so I finished it for her, “A tail. I know, this is the best decision we could make but still, I can’t help but think that my uncle said that the path to damnation begins with a single step and I wonder if this is that step.”
She pulled me up and held me, “My Loving Master, on your world any Barsoomian Red Woman would be stoned and imprisoned for wearing what we see as modest attire. Our ways are different and as you said once, ‘When in Rome do as the Romans do’ so here, try to be as a Red Man. Own me and love me and worry about tomorrow, tomorrow.”
“My dear,” I sighed, “But I’m not a Red man.”
“Neither are you any longer a Jasoomian, but you wear the harness of a Red Man, you live in a Red Man’s city and you serve a Red Jed so is it so hard to love me as does a Red Man?” She kissed me then and as always, the argument ended for neither of us had been able to solve this problem. How could I, an altered human from Earth be with a free Red Woman? I went back to my pumping iron. So long as my bones ached, I needed to do this.
I had grasped the bar with my tarsial feet and was doing leg lifts when I was summoned to my king.
Entering, I approached the throne, bowed and greeted him as usual, “Hail Gan Kanar, Jed of Ardane, Master of the Northern Toonolian Marshes…” and so on. I didn’t even think of the words anymore, I had said them so often.
Normally he bade me to rise and approach quickly, but this time he kept me there longer and that began to worry me. Finally he said ‘rise’ and when I approached he simply stared. He had seen me a hundred times over the past year and aside from the first when he examined me in detail, he had ignored my anatomical additions. This time I could see him staring at my pointed ears, my eye slits and antennae then down to my feet and tail and hands. The Barsoomian harness leaves little to the imagination being little more than a g-string with a lot of belts to hold my weapons and gear so I had a lot of skin showing.
Finally, “Know you of Ras Thavas, the Surgeon?”
“Yes, Majesty. He lives in a fortress near Toonol doing his medical practice.” He was more like a mad scientist than a surgeon.
“Recently, he has been robbed. Papers, experiments and occasionally a slave. Nothing of any military use but irritating anyway. He has been unable to find the criminal and sent word to the Jeddak for help. My Jeddak has heard of you and has directed me to send you to the Tower of Ras Thavas to find this thief and see why he steals. You may be gone for some time so take your belongings and slave and leave immediately.” He then turned away and ignored me so I left.
“Pack everything, we are moving to the Tower of Ras Thavas for awhile.” I said to Florina.
“Ras Thavas! The man is insane. He does things that even those Demons who changed you wouldn’t do. We should run away this time My Lord.”
Ras Thavas was a medical genius but also a bit unhinged. He was well over a thousand years old and had long ago perfected Brain transplants though his efforts at cloning people was a disaster. He was obsessed with experimentation and would have been at home in an old B-movie with lightening and torch-bearing peasants though Ras Thavas would probably create his own hunch-backed assistant. I would have to sleep with a barred door again around him. “I’ll consider your advice,” I told her as we packed.
She left to return with a number of male slaves to carry my gear to the roof where my flier was stored. It was a gift from the Jed for one of my other missions and he had never taken it back so I had no ill will against Gan Kanar who had treated me very well. Compared to my former owners in Iraq or the Demons, Gan Kanar was a model employer, giving me title, comfortable apartments, weapons, an aircraft, Florina and a decent pay for my services. The fact that he habitually sent me into danger with no back-up or support was nothing that he didn’t do to any of his other warriors. So I didn’t like the idea of deserting the man. I’d look this situation over and if Ras Thavas had designs on me, I’d deal with that later.
My flyer was small but had a cabin which was barely large enough for a bunk and some supplies. Fortunately, I didn’t own much and Florina wasn’t allowed to own anything (she kept my gifts to her in a box under my bed) so what I had was stored on the deck of the cabin. I just hoped I wouldn’t have to sleep outside. I had made a few air tanks and a pump which I had mounted to the flier for when I needed to fly high (Florina could breathe comfortably on the top of Mount Everest) but I needed help breathing if we topped a tall building. But still I preferred to fly low. It scared Florina to see the trees passing beneath at our speed but I felt better breathing and risking a collision, though I flew much higher than it looked.
It took a couple of hours to reach Toonol, time enough to join the Mile-High club only I couldn’t get that high without suffocating so we sat and talked instead. Once at Toonol, I adjusted our course to bypass the city and seek the Tower, which was southeast of the city, and within a few more minutes, we saw the place in the distance. Ras Thavas had certaintly improved and expanded the place as I saw a small town surrounding the actual fortress.
I immediately slowed for any aircraft approaching a city on Barsoom would have artillery trained on it. Then a small flier approached and hailed us, “What is your business in Thavas City?” the padwar called.
“I am Jason Obrien, Lord Innis, sent by Gan Kanar, Jed of Ardane to help Ras Thavas find his thief.” I replied. They came close enough for the fliers to almost touch then he recognized my features and color and directed me to the tower. Unlike all other cities, hangers for fliers here were on the ground for though Ras Thavas had many enemies, there were but few who would stage a military invasion this close to Toonol and so he had no need for high walls and could build outward.
I circled then landed in an open space and as I exited the flier, a guard approached and looked over my papers and orders. He then ordered slaves to carry my belongings and led me to my apartment which was no different from my original ones in Ardane. I had heard that Ras Thavas treated nobles like commoners and commoners like slaves. He got away with that attitude only because his skills were so valued he could do almost anything he wished.
I settled in and after directing Florina to make us as comfortable as possible, I left to speak to the Mastermind of Mars.
Ras Thavas was said to be over a thousand years old, some said he was deathless. He was said to have nothing but contempt for all ranks and refused to bow to even the Jeddak, treating all with disdain. A man like that had power and wasn’t afraid to use it so what I saw was not what I expected. Somehow I expected to see a wizend old man on a throne surrounded by young beauties. Instead I was taken to a study cluttered with books, papers and jars with various small animals and human organs. The Mastermind, himself, was sitting with his back to me making notes and never looked up as I was introduced.
I waited for a moment to be noticed for we were now alone then I spoke, “Ras Thavis, I am Jason Obrien. I was sent her to help you find your thief. Is there anything you can tell me that would help?”
“Yamdor will tell you what you need to know.”
“As you wish Ras Thavas,” I said and turned to leave.
“Wait!” he commanded. “You don’t sound like a… By Issis, you aren’t a Red Man after all. I forgot that Gan Kanar had an alien for a spy. Come closer.”
I had a bad feeling about this as I turned. The man facing me was no ancient but a warrior with a perfect body and looking to be about my age of 25 or so. But with Red Men, that could mean he was 50 or 800. I remembered stories that as Ras Thavas aged or was injured, he would transplant his brain into a new body. Obviously the stories were true.
He muttered as he examined me, poking and prodding, “basically human, internal organs are mostly Jasoomian, interesting variations,” then he commanded, “Come with me!” and left the room without looking back. Yamdor, his assistant joined us and we visited a laboratory where Ras Thavas bade me sit as he examined my hand in detail, then my tail, ears, eyes and antennae, all the while muttering as Yamdor took notes.
“You are definitely Jasoomian. Your internal organs are the same as John Carter and Vad Varo and the other Jasoomians I have examined. But someone changed you, made you better. Their techniques were amazing. I see no scar tissue at all. It’s as if you were hatched this way. I’d love to…” I jumped from the table with hand on revolver and said, “Ras Thavas, I am here to seek your thief, not be vivisected in the name of science.”
“Thief, bah! A few trinkets when compared to what I can learn from you.” He said as I moved to keep my back to a wall and both Red Men in sight.
“Ask what you will but the hand that touches me falls to the floor.” I insisted. I was getting desperate now and wished that I had listened to Florina. Images of every mad-scientist movie I ever saw began to have meaning about now. I used to laugh at how stupid the heroes were to enter that castle and I did exactly the same thing.
Ras Thavas then motioned and Yamdor stood back and relaxed. “Very well, I suppose I must be satisfied with this. How did you become as you are?”
“About four years ago I was a normal Jasoomian when a star-ship landed and I was taken by an alien race called Demons. The seemed to have a habit of abducting people and experimenting on them to see if they would be useful. Me, they decided to turn into a worker for their ships. So they changed my feet to allow me to grasp projections in zero-gravity, added a tail as a third hand, gave me vision to see in the dark and so on. Every time I fell asleep, they took me and did something so you can understand that I am somewhat leery of you, considering your reputation.” I explained, my hand still on my revolver and my tail twitching in nervousness.
Ras Thavas stared as if he were looking completely through me, which it happened he was, and said, “Very well, I promised John Carter that I’d work for the good of people so consider this a promise, speak to me daily about yourself and these Demons and you will be unharmed by me.”
“And this safety extends to all your people so I won’t have to worry that someone will open me up under your direction?”
He laughed, “You are a cautious one. And more than a bit paranoid. But yes, I agree. You may remain here in safety and leave safely whenever you wish. Now about these Demons. Where may I find them?”
“You don’t want to. You may think you do but they come when they wish and leave the same way. To a Demon the Swarm is the only thing that matters and they gladly sacrifice individuals to save the Swarm. They see us the same way, as individuals to be sacrificed to help the Swarm.”
Ras Thavas thought and said, “A fascinating race with many good qualities. I should like to meet with them someday.” Well, Ras Thavas never went to sleep normal then woke up with a tail stuck onto his ass. It took me weeks to learn how to sit with the thing. I could see him thinking and planning so I excused myself and asked to meet with Yamdor later to discuss my real mission.
As soon as I was in my room, I locked the door. And checked the locks. “My Lord?” Florina showed real concern.
“I feel like I’m having flashbacks. You were right. Ras Thavas has designs on me. What a twist, usually the mad scientist wants the beautiful woman for his experiments. But he promised us safety so we may be able to trust him for awhile. What did you learn from the other slaves?”
“He is as insane as I thought. He promised John Carter that he’d work for the betterment of mankind but defines that in his own way. This city is a medical school but he keeps his greatest secrets to himself. He also allows anyone to live here without question and because of that they are loyal to him alone.”
“And the missing items?”
“They have been noticed for weeks. Mostly papers and records then medical specimens and now people.”
“Is there any pattern to all this?”
“I don’t know, My Lord. Slaves are willing to talk to other slaves but they cannot say what they do not know.”
I removed my weapons belts and hung them on the wall then sat on my bed and patted my lap. Florins fell into it and wrapped her arms around me so I could kiss her. “My dear, you make my job so much easier. We do as usual. You question the slaves and draw them out for no free man notices a slave or cares what they see. I will do the same to the rest and we compare observations.” She was nuzzling my neck by this time and whispered into my ear as she bit my lobes, “Have you any theories?”
“None yet.” Then I lost track of what I was about to say.
Later, much later I buckled my weapons to my hips and sought Yamdor to ask about the crimes. He was busy doing something medical so talked as he worked.
“How long have these crimes been happening?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Ras Thavas is always putting things down and moving onto another project. We assumed that he simply misplaced them again. We first became aware less than a month ago. Last week we asked for help from the Jeddak and you were sent.”
“Is there a pattern? Such as where things were stolen, what time of the day or night, what specific objects or value?”
“No. We never notice anything is missing until we need it and it is anything of a medical nature. Wait, I made a list and noticed that there was a large number of cloning notes missing. Ras Thavas tried to clone people about a hundred years ago but that was a disaster and the navy of Helium had to burn the city of Morbius and a lot of marsh to stop the result. He also tried to clone Malagors as a cheap means to carry his clones into battle. That was more successful as he worked on their eggs to produce multiple hatchings but the young are so small and weak they required special care to survive. Recently he has returned to that idea and I noticed that much of his research notes and specimens are missing. Plus, two of the people he tried to clone are missing too. At first I thought they had run away but now I wonder if they were stolen.”
I noticed that despite Yamdor’s appearance of work, he was watching me carefully. “Yamdor, did Ras Thavas tell you to spy on me?”
“Yes.” I suppose he wasn’t ordered to lie about it. “Now that you are here, Ras Thavas is thinking about improving the Red Man body. He tried grafting animal and human parts in the past but found that unsuccessful, now he is wondering if there is a way to improve the race by modifications such as your Demons did to you.”
I was getting nervous again. “I remind you that by his own words, I am safe until I leave.”
“So long as you speak to him daily,” he replied. I hate lawyers.
“Will you please show me where you think the missing items and people were?”
For the next zode or so he showed me around, explaining where he believed the items were and I saw no pattern. If I were a thief, which I am not. I was a pirate and treasure hunter and terrorist but not a thief. I would have been hard pressed to steal from some of these locations. How could someone steal a vat the size of a bucket in broad daylight from a busy laboratory in broad daylight and smuggle it outside unseen? An inside job? But the people at every crime were different and none had vanished afterwards. They needed a detective here, not a spy.
Finally it got dark and I visited the dining area where I had my usual bland meal and vitamins for a lot of the Barsoomian foods didn’t agree with me at all. I looked over my notes and saw no real pattern other than Yamdor was probably right. Someone was interested in cloning. The Demons had done that to the first humans abducted shortly after the Norman conquest. The original abductees were too few in number, so they flushed egg and sperm and created hundreds of babies with scrambled DNA to be raised by the humans they had taken. It prevented extinction in a race that was too limited in genetic material. The Kris had refused this as ‘unholy’ so by the time the Kris wars had ended, the Kris were already almost extinct from inbreeding.
But Demons knew more about anything than any Earthly or Barsoomian scientist could dream of. They had fifty million years to play around so they’d not care about Ras Thavas’ work which they’d see as primitive and clumsy. Considering that when they grafted my tail on, or grew it while I was asleep, it worked perfectly. I could feel it and move it and it even had a fingerprint on the tip. I only had to get used to the thing. Also Demons wouldn’t steal anything. If they wanted it, they’d simply scoop the entire tower up, take what they wanted and dump the Red Men on some planet to live or die alone. That’s why the only living things on Hell are cockroaches. The Kris nuked the planet for three days and turned the surface into radioactive dust a half mile thick and somehow the roaches that hitchhiked with the original English managed to survive.
No, I didn’t think it was an inside job and it wasn’t any extra-terrestrial race I knew of so it must be local. But who would be interested in cloning?
I settled in for the night, watching the marsh with Florina under my furs as we discussed what we knew. There was no clue that I could think of. Maybe had I read some of my mother’s detective novels I’d be better prepared for this.
Finally we went to bed and as I fell sleep holding her, it occurred to me that Ras Thavas promised me safety, not Florina. He could hold her to force me to submit if he wished. And with such an unpleasant thought I fell asleep.
I woke up the next morning with breakfast by the bed. As usual, she had woken up first and fetched me breakfast so I could eat while she picked up and readied my harness and gear for the day. I remembered coming to an important realization before I feel asleep but couldn’t remember what it was. Well, doubtless I’d remember when the time came. So when I finished eating and cleaned up, I kissed her goodbye and went to work again.
I was in conversation with Ras Thavas, me seeking answers to the crimes and he seeking clues to my modifications when my antennae picked up a strong magnetic field nearby. Now this was remarkable as Barsoon has such a weak magnetic field that most Earthly compass’ wouldn’t work there and Ras Thavas had nothing in his laboratory that would generate such a field. It wasn't there then it was. I looked around and saw the door open which was unusual but not unknown for the Mastermind would often forget to close it unless he wanted privacy. Then I felt the field in a corner near a bookshelf that possessed no significant mass of steel. When I looked away I thought I saw something there but when I looked back, nothing.
As I talked about my hands in detail, I walked over to the door and closed it and secretly slipped the lock, then returned, “I’m sorry Ras Thavas, some of your questions are personal and I’d like as few people as possible to know about them.” I acted nervous as he examined the bones in my hands, noting that the right and left sides were almost mirrored, as if the middle finger to the wrist were a center-line and they simply flipped the skeleton over. In truth, my outer thumb was a bit smaller than my original one. As he was poking and prodding my hands, feeling muscles and tendons and such, I acted nervous and scanned the area and noticed that there was an area where I felt the magnetic field that glowed a bit warmer that the surrounding area.
Deciding to experiment, I stared directly at that place and after a moment, it moved to the side. As if someone had been concealed there but wished to move to a new position. As the heat source moved, the books shimmered as if I were looking through disturbed air. Someone was there and cloaked. And compared to Demon Cloaks, this was effective but primitive for it took a second for light to settle in when he moved. Also I noticed that the curvature wasn’t perfect. Now that I knew what to look for, I could see the books behind the man were distorted as if through poorly glazed window.
I jumped from the table and slammed our secret observer against the wall as hard as I could. Then I grappled with him and felt a fist strike my stomach. I whipped my tail around until I felt legs, wrapped and pulled as I pushed and we went down with me on top. Then, figuring that Ras Thavas could bring the man back, I pulled my dagger and drove it into the center of what was beneath me.
Ras Thavas wasn’t stupid and knew instantly that I was grappling with an invisible enemy and called for assistance. By the time Yamdor had arrived with two guards, it was over. He knelt beside me and we felt our enemy as if it were totally dark. “Some sort of suit that covers his entire body, even his head.” He commented.
I felt around, using my antennae more than my fingers and found a switch which caused the body to become partially visible. A punch shook it and it shimmered into view. He was wearing what appeared to be a space-suit of unknown design. Ras Thavas had never seen one but I’d worn many so recognized the air tanks, helmet, gloves and all. What I didn’t recognize was that the suit was covered with wiring that was attached to a power source that when I returned the switch to it’s on position, caused the entire suit to become magnetically charged. A moment later, he faded from view as a number of small canisters opened and sprayed something which clung to it’s surface. I turned the suit off and rubbed the suit to discover, “The suit is covered with dust or fine sand. See how where I wipe, he becomes visible. The sand must be light refractive and contain a great deal of iron. He magnetizes the suit and sprays this dust which clings to the suit as iron filings to a magnet. Then when the suit looses power, the dust falls or is blown off. Ras Thavas, have you heard anything like this?”
He replied, “Yes, During the Morgor Wars, the Morgors of Sassoom used such a device to render their ships invisible. But a suit like this is unknown.”
“Well,” I added. “Now we know how your items were stolen. Let us remove the helmet and see who is doing this.” It turned easily with no locks and when I pulled it off, we saw not a Morgor but a Red man. This was interesting. “Perhaps he stole this suit during the war?”
Ras Thavas commanded his men to strip the body and take it to his medical laboratory, “Once I repair the damage you caused, we’ll have our answers.”
He attached tubes to the jugglers of the body then started a machine that pumped preserving fluid into the body and blood out. Within a minute, the wound had turned the consistency of soft gelatin and after stripping to his waist and scrubbing his upper body, he began. The external would was a simple knife wound but inside was a mess. As he struggled beneath me my blade and moved around and done considerable damage to lung and arteries, though his heart was untouched.
I quickly got bored with the procedure and turned to the suit. It looked functional and aside from the invisibility device, was completely normal, though obviously of foreign make. It wouldn’t take much to repair the dagger hole though adjusting it for my hands, feet and tail would take some hard work.
I also found a pouch that contained nothing visible. But when I reached in I felt metallic cloth. It was strange holding an invisible blanket and I could see through it as if I were holding nothing. I passed my tail behind, touched it and still all was well, until I wrapped it around my hand. Then with all parts covered on both sides, I faded away. This could be useful so I rolled it up and placed it back into it’s pouch, intending to take it later. This did answer the question of how he got the stolen items from their locations. He simply wrapped them in the cloak and carried them out.
Finally Ras Thavas replaced the preserving fluid with the man’s blood and woke him up. “You cannot move because I severed the nerves from your brain that control your arms and legs. I may repair that damage too if you answer my questions well.” He said to the man who simply lay there in silence.
I was holding the helmet and asked, “Where did you get this? Who do you work for? Why steal information on cloning?” but each question elicited naught but a glare.
“Let me, you are too gentle,” Ras Thavas said. “Guards, in the pits is a sith, bring it here at once. I think we will start with replacing his arms and legs with the limbs of an insect. I presume you will want to be awake and observe your transformation. Yamdor, take careful notes for science.” Then with still nothing said, he began to prepare his surgical instruments.
The two guards brought in a wasp the size of a bull and even in the low Martian gravity, I couldn’t see how it flew, but fly it did. Entire sections of it’s exo-skeleton had been removed and lay over the openings for Ras Thavas had been busy with the thing. The Mastermind had removed one of the things many legs and lay it next to the table upon which his victim lay and even had made the first incision when the man screamed, “STOP! In the name of Issis stop! I’ll tell you everything!’ he began to babble on until we placed a hand over his mouth.
“Answer my questions and more,” I said. He looked at the insect and began, “I am Kanton, a poor panthan from Zor. I was out searching for work when a number of Morgors came from nowhere and surrounded me. I was captured and brought into their invisible ship where another Red man awaited. He told me that I was now a slave of the Morgors and if I served them well, they’d pay me well but if I betrayed them, they’d make me suffer.” I noted that the doors were locked and scanned the area with every sense the Demons had enhanced and given but so far as I could tell, we were alone.
The man continued with no prompting for he knew that Ras Thavas was more than willing to carry out his threat. “I wasn’t taught their language but my unnamed contact gave me this suit and told me what to steal from this place. I took what I was told and gave it to the Morgors. Please let me go, I’ll go away and vanish forever.”
“The man is a fool and a coward, his only use is to science. Yamdor, hold his arm for me,” The Surgeon directed.
“Hold please,” I asked. “Kanton, where is this Morgor ship, how many are they, why do they want cloning materials? You know what unasked questions to answer, I suggest that you begin quickly.”
“I take the items nightly to a place nearby and wait. They have a device that can detect my suit and I enter the ship, give them what I took and the suit and they pay me for my services and leave me in Toonol. Later they call for me and I repeat the process.” He was near hysterical for Yamdor had not bothered to release his arm nor had the Surgeon released his instruments.
A few more questions gave me enough details to formulate a plan and when done, I suggested that the man may still be useful to us so Ras Thavas replaced his knives and touched the button to return the man to a state of suspension. “The experiment would have been interesting,” he said with unfeigned regret.
“Ras Thavas,” I asked. “Can these men be trusted?”
“Quite, for they know that if I even think they are talking, they will wish they had thrown themselves headfirst to a banth for fear of what I would do to them.”
“Then we must plan. I need your best swordsman and best snipers. Please tell me about the Morgors for I remember the name only and no details.”
We sat in his study, after ensuring that we were alone and he explained, “The Morgors are a race of human-like beings from the next planet out. We call it Sassoom, they call it Garobus (I called it Jupiter). Their skin is transparent as are their organs so if they stand before a light, they appear to be but skeletons with faint organs floating in place. They had long ago conquered their own world and enslaved their neighbors so turned their eyes upon the face of Barsoom and a hundred years ago they invaded us. We fought back valiently but were loosing until no more Morgors arrived. With no replacements, we were able to destroy all that remained, capturing their ships and building our own to take the fight to their homeworld where we learned how close we had come to extinction.
“The Savator slaves of the Morgors took the opportunity to revolt and killed and destroyed as much as they could. It was this revolt that prevented the Morgors from supporting their war on Barsoom. And our astronomers saw a huge fleet of Morgor ships leave Sassoom for deep space. Why they chose to leave the system rather than use that fleet to conquer us is a mystery for the fleet had at least a half-million vessels and probably twice that number. But leave they did. No one has heard aught from them for the last century until today.”
I pondered this. Interplanetary war was usually a fleet in orbit dropping nukes onto the enemy world until they were too battered to fight, then moving on to return to conquer the survivors later. Battles in space were fought at distances of hundreds of thousands of miles using missiles teleported to a range where they couldn’t be stopped. This using space ships as nothing more than troop barges was new to me. It smacked of a pirate attitude, not a military one.
Ras Thavas explained away my concerns, “The Morgors are a military people and glory in war and killing. This warfare you describe is a horror. The Morgors like to see who they are killing because to them, fighting is more important than conquest. They have more than enough people to waste and care not how many die so long as they can fight.”
“Then here is my plan,” and I explained it carefully.
We couldn’t do anything that night but the next morning we visited the pick-up area and used a compass I built to detect the magnetic fields of the Morgor ship. If the needle moved, there was a ship nearby. It was simple and very effective and Ras Thavas had many made and scattered about the city. Then we dug pits, settled in and waited.
When the needles signaled a ship, Ras Thavas’ greatest swordsman walked out wearing the invisibility suit and waited. Soon a door opened in the air and a Red Man called for Kanton. He approached slowly to give us time to move underground to the ship’s location and then as he stepped into the Morgor ship, he pulled his contact out and leapt inside with drawn sword and revolver. We followed and managed to get myself and a few others inside before the ship left the surface. Once inside it was a brutal fight. The Morgors could easily have destroyed us with pistol fire from cover but insisted on attacking with swords and with swords we met them. Two of my men cut a path and I ran to the flight deck where I faced the pilot and crew who turned to face me. I wasn’t an excellent swordsman but a year of lessons had turned me into a good one, and they were slow in the Martian gravity for Sassoom had a high rotation and so they were used to a much lower gravity. So with my superior Earthly muscles and Demon enhanced speed and strength, I needed little skill as I could easily knock their blades away and kill them. My men had a similar advantage and although outnumbered, they managed to take the ship.
By then I and another Red Man had taken the pilots seat and began to figure out the Morgor controls. We were some distance away and rising fast before we closed the outer hatch and slow our ascent. Then we played with the controls for awhile, noting the drive, speed and gravity and atmospheric controls and eventually flew back to the Tower of Ras Thavas where we landed away from the other fliers to keep our find a secret. The ship was stored in a hanger and all magnetic fields disengaged so our compasses could detect any magnetic fields that would indicate another ship or suit and Ras Thavas had the bodies taken to his lab for dissection and examination.
As for me, I had an idea. I still needed to report to London for I was unable to find a Gridley radio anywhere in Toonol or Ardane and the Stargate that brought me to Barsoom was one-way so this ship could be the solution to many of my problems.
I was looking it over with Florina when Ras Thavas approached. “I have sent word to your Jed asking him that you remain here for the time being in case others arrive. We will question the Morgors at our leasure and see what this craft has to tell us.”
“Ras Thavas,” I began. “May I have this ship as payment for my services to you?”
“I have no interest in mechanical things. It is yours.” He offered then he left the two of us alone.
“My Lord, why do you want such a thing?” Florina asked.
I looked at her and holding her hands, said, “I am dying here. You know it, Ras Thavas knows it. He can do much but your gravity is weakening my bones and muscles, you thin cold air is making me sick with pneumonia and your foods are poisoning me. I see why so few Jasoomians who come here survive. I must leave if I am to live. We both knew this time would come so…” I couldn’t finish so we stood there holding each other.
Daily we examined the ship and questioned the Morgors and their Red Man servants. Ras Thavas had Kanton’s apartments emptied and brought here as well as the other Red Men who served the Morgors. Although I disagreed with his methods, even the Morgors broke and talked. None knew where the fleet had gone or even if it would return. The Savators had virtually exterminated the Morgor race on Jupiter and they believed that if they could create hormads as did Ras Thavas once, they could re-conquer. Or, by cloning, increase their numbers, for Morgor women had always been few in number and most had died in the rebellions, killed by their Savator slaves. The Morgors under our control were the only ones who were likely to come here though.
Over the next month I finalized my plans. I had a suit adjusted to my anatomy and I also took medical lessons from Ras Thavas. The ship, I examined carefully and had the air tanks purged a dozen times until the stink of ammonia-methane was gone for despite the fact that the Morgors breathed oxygen, they did add a generous amount of ammonia and methane to their air. I also figured out how to adjust the gravity to Earth-normal for I would have to do that slowly on the trip to Earth to give my bones and muscles a chance to re-adapt to what I felt was normal. Plus, increasing air pressure and temperature and changing the lighting from the red that the Morgors found normal to that of the sun was important. In short I had to adjust every facet of the ship to slowly increase over the three weeks Ras Thavas felt it would take for me to return to normal.
Making these adjustments took a month easily but that time also included collecting supplies, flushing toxins from the Barsoomian food so I could eat them easily, spending time with Florina and so on.
One day, Ras Thavas took me aside and said, “You have kept your part of our bargain and worked hard to keep us safe from this threat. So I will tell you this. You cannot take Florina with you.”
“Why not?” I asked dreading the answer for that is exactly what I planned to do.
“Your body was created for Jasoom, it’s air and gravity and temperature as was Florina’s body created for Barsoom. For you, coming here is dangerous but doable. And returning to Jasoom is simply a matter of re-adjusting your body to what you call normal. But for her, it would be impossible. She simply cannot grow strong enough to survive your world. I’m sorry.” And for the first time I saw real regret in his voice.
I was thinking fast and irrationally here, “Then, can you take a tissue sample from me, clone her a body and transplant her brain?”
“I thought of that myself and have been working to that goal but I am years away from success. I may be able to clone you and can easily place her brain within but the nerves wouldn’t match for despite our outward similarities, our brains are different and I’d have to locate every one of a thousand nerves, find where they went and move them to a new location. What would be a simple two zode operation would take days. Then the clone. I don’t know if the clone would be Jasoomian or this Weir you are now. I might be able to make it female but it wouldn’t look like her but like you. I will keep working but expect little success for years.” He explained it too easily.
I returned to our room and told her the bad news. She took it better than I did and said, “I knew this time would come. I had hoped I could go with you for your world would accept us easier than does mine. Give me my night before you return me to Amhor and leave.”
I didn’t tell her that when I returned looking as a Weir instead of a human, I couldn’t be certain my own reception would be friendly so I gave her what she wanted and more. I scrubbed her back, rubbed her feet, did all that I could to make her feel loved so she would know how much I cared for her and later, when we slept, I woke up to hear her crying in a corner. I simply rolled over and cried myself. My father would have been disgusted with that but I didn’t care.
It was time. Ras Thavas promised to keep working to this goal and so I lifted off in my new space-ship and we flew to Amhor in silence. She refused to remove her collar on the flight and I granted her that dignity until we arrived at her city. Then, she asked me to remove her collar and when I did so, she left the flight deck as I talked to the Amhor navy, explaining that I was in the service of Toonol and returning one of their women to her family. They led me to a hanger and there I was surrounded by armed soldiers as I opened the hatch to allow them to enter.
I didn’t recognize Florina as she came forward dressed as a Free Red Woman, so much had her harness and walk changed. She held her hand to me and I knelt and kissed it as she said, “Lord Innis, thank you for all the respect and courtesy you have shown me and for returning me to my city. Know that you will always be welcome in my home. Please have a safe and pleasant journey to your own home.” Then she turned and with two soldiers carrying her belongings, the gifts I had given her and the money we had taken from the Morgor servants, she left without a backward glance.
I watched her through the viewport as she turned and waved but I could only kiss my fingers and touch them to the port, then leave. It would be a long and very lonely trip home and I missed her so much already.
To contact me or to request topics to be covered, send to RikJohnson@juno.com
by: Rick Johnson
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
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