There were many about the palace who shared their opinions with me, none of which I desired to hear. Scribes and historians, poets, astronomers, psychologists, educators, nobles of every rank, warlords and even slaves whispered their views on the subject. I shunned them all in favor of the companionship of my fellow soldiers. Among them, I was but a warrior of Helium — the only rank I desired, and the only position I’d ever been taught to endure.

The transfer of an heir to the throne is a reverant, tradition- bound process in Helium. Precise protocols have been observed throughout the ages. Moros Tar's sudden departure threw the Empire into chaos.

Though the the people were ready to immediately proclaim me Jeddak, it was not so simple a thing -- especially since Moros Tar made no formal declaration of his intent to step down from the throne. His grief must have been greater than I could have suspected. I heard murmurings that perhaps his mind had become unbalanced by the loss of his heir and Jeddara in so short a span. My mother had been killed the year before in a Ptarthian raid upon the capital.

Moros Tar's eyes had looked southward, to Dor. There were his Jeddara, my mother, and now his eldest son, my brother.

And there, too, was the Jeddak's weary heart.

Truth to tell, despite the reverence that still held in those days for the pilgrimage upon the bosom of Iss, I cared not to see my father take that final voyage. He was, after all, my father. And no man could ever return from Dor. Not even a jeddak.

I thought his act selfish. While my father had lost a princess and son, I had lost a mother and brother. Now, I had lost a father -- and Helium had lost its Jeddak. Who bore the greatest sorrow?

War still raged between Helium and Ptarth, and so concerns of the heart had to wait for later contemplation. I took command of the Navy, and left the details of accession to the nobles who cared much more about such things than I. To me, victory was what mattered. And vengeance for Mors Kajak's death. Silently, I thought to redeem myself for my failure at Flemster.

A Ptarthian fleet was massing to the east, and it was there that I cast my attention. Aboard my flagship, I took the battle directly to the enemy, as has ever been the way of Helium.

A week of uninterrupted naval warfare filled the skies over that barren stretch of land. Our ships coursed back and forth, north and south -- but never did the invaders approach closer than a thousand haads of the capital.

We had all but routed the enemy, when a small detachment of Ptarthian ships broke off from the main group. By their course, I determined that no good could come from this development, as it appeared they were attempting to bypass our fleet and make way for the twin cities. My flagship and several others of the task force pursued, leaving the balance of the Heliumetic fleet to mop up what was left of the battle.

From the bow of the lead enemy vessel broke the colors of the Prince of Ptarth, and almost immediately she began firing upon my flagship. I gave the order to hoist my own device and return fire.

And thus began a long, running battle. Eventually, my flagship and the Prince of Ptarth's vessel became isolated -- flying ever eastward, and firing almost constantly upon one another. We'd long ago lost contact with other ships of our respective fleets.

After one particularly horrific volley, I saw the enemy ship begin to list. Fire broke out upon her deck, and men scrambled to repair what appeared to be massive damage. From the sides of the reeling behemoth were launched hundreds of one-man fliers. Once clear, the smaller ships raced headlong in our direction, firing all the way.

I could not help but admire their tenacity as we mowed them down with more powerful and precise guns.

But a few did get through our raking fire. I gave the order to launch several squads of one-man fliers, to engage them directly. I swung to a craft as well. A prince of Helium does not send his men into combat. He leads them.

My craft twisted and turned upon the enemy, and a score went down before my fire ere I was struck by an opposing projectile. But that one shot was enough to spell disaster.

It exploded on the low windshield that buffered the racing wind, and sent a strip of skeel crashing across my brow -- a glancing, yet effective blow. I was knocked backward, senseless, upon the speed lever of my machine.

When I woke, I found myself hurtling at incredible speed close to the bed of an unfamiliar sea bottom.

Pulling myself up, I could see no craft of either fleet. It had been morning when the battle began, but now it was late afternoon. That my craft avoided disaster during those long hours as it raced unguided is a matter of pure chance.

But now, a low structure suddenly loomed in my path. I barely had time to pull the nose of my flier up the fraction of a degree necessary to avoid calamity. As I shot past the structure's roof, I glanced over my shoulder to see what strange object it could be that lay out here in the desolate wastes of a dead sea bottom. The sight that met my eyes brought a chill to my soul.

On the far side of the low building were a thousand green men. The beasts and chariots of a caravan were scattered about the encampment. Most of the barbaric warriors, shouting and pushing, seemed to be swarmed about a deep pit, not far from the structure I'd nearly run headlong into. As I shot by in my mad flight, the wind shrieking past the bow of my trim ship, their heads turned as one to follow my trajectory. A whoop of recognition went up from the savage horde, and as I jammed the speed lever to its final notch I heard their rifles belch at me.

The famed accuracy of the green man's rifle is no myth, and I was struck almost as soon as I recognized my peril. My buoyancy tanks ruptured in a dozen places and my motor was ripped nearly from the one-man flier's hull. Miraculously, but no doubt intentionally, I was not struck by their pellets. My craft plunged Barsoomward, and I crashed none too softly in one of those scattered pockets where the ochre moss is deep and plush — which saved me from being mangled in the wreckage.

Dazed, but not seriously hurt, I leaped to my feet as the green men bore down upon me. My sword flashed from its scabbard and I prepared to take on an entire horde, alone.

I hacked at the foremost, slicing an arm from the middle shoulder of one and disemboweling another. Incredibly, none of the towering green men raised a weapon against me. Instead, they overpowered me by sheer numbers and bore me to the ground, helpless beneath their great weight and size.

I'd accounted for a half-dozen before I was carried off in the direction from which they'd come.

Lofted above their heads, I was taken back toward the low building — which I recognized now in tumbling glimpses as an incubator used by the green hordes, larger than those I'd encountered elsewhere on Barsoom, but of essentially the same design. The savages had not confiscated my weapons, though I could make no use of them. A dozen rough hands clutched me tightly. Before I could guess their intent, I'd been tossed heavily into the pit and landed on my back on the hard clay at its bottom — a drop of about twenty of your Jasoomian "feet."

As I rose slowly to my own feet, momentarily stunned by the impact, I saw that another red man already occupied this roughly- hewn arena. A roar went up from the green men encircled above as I looked over my fellow prisoner. He was resting on one knee, the point of his sword in the ground. He leaned on the pommel to steady himself. The red man was covered in blood, his flesh torn in a hundred places. He looked half-dead, breathing in great gasps.

"If they expect us to fight, warrior, they'll be disappointed," I said under my breath, glancing up at the contorted green faces. "I'll not raise my blade against one who so obviously has no power to harm me."

He shook his head, gesturing weakly about us. I noticed then the bodies piled about the pit. Young green ones, scarcely out of the shell; miniatures of the monsters above, hacked to pieces — presumably by the sword of this red man.

"Two days," the warrior grunted. "Possibly three. I've lost count. No sleep. No food or water. But they keep coming."

The sea of hideous faces above parted and others replaced them at the rim of the pit. Without preamble, a half-dozen green hatchlings were dumped over the side as precariously as I had been.

Four feet tall, the young were more head than body. But their scrawny appearance was deceiving.

Green Barsoomians emerge from the shell even more ferocious than their hideous sires, guided by a heredity instinct devoted to one thing: destruction of whatever they encounter. More often than not, the hatchlings use four of their six limbs for locomotion, and thus possess an uncanny, lightning-like speed. If they see a thing, their only thought is to attack it. I'd heard tell of hatchlings falling upon the green women assigned to rear them in their formative months and rending them limb from limb — an occurrence that is the height of hilarity among other members of the horde.

It was such as these that I faced — mindless, deadly things, visions of horror incarnate.

The infants, if one may call them that, landed all about me. I had no time for further discussion with my fellow captive. Nearly as soon as the hatchlings touched the red clay, they began looking wildly about with their large, protuding eyes. Spying one or the other of us, they leaped insanely in our direction with tearing fingers, goring tusks and distended jaws. It was madness, the way the little creatures swarmed about, tearing at my flesh! Fresh from the incubator, stark naked, the inhuman terrors had no speech or sentient thought — only a craving to wreak havoc with whatever lay in their path, whether myself, the red man or each other.

Drawing my blade, I slashed to left and right — wreaking an unholy havoc of my own amongst the hissing demons. Uproarious laughter descended from all sides of the pit. I clove the head clean off one of the hatchlings and it flew into the chest of another, knocking the thing backwards. The guffaws from above were like to have drowned me.

The red man, I could see, had barely the strength left to lift his sword, so I made my way to a position directly in front of him and did what I could to keep the tiny horde at bay. It was no easy task, for as soon as I dispatched a few of the things, more would be flung downward to take their places.

Madness!

The grim scene played itself out for zodes. When darkeness fell, the green men brought torches to light the battle. I fought through the night, beneath that flickering glare, till morning broke. With each swing of my sword I felt more admiration for the red man behind me who had endured this insanity for three days without interlude. I had no time to wonder why the green men were throwing their young to a frightful slaughter. I was preoccupied with preventing my own slaughter and that of the man at my back.

In their haste, the green men sometimes tossed still- unhatched eggs along with the squirming man-things; they burst on the ground in a purplish slime, which covered me from head to foot. Had I not been so preoccupied, the whole affair would have nauseated me.

A dozen creatures tumbled into the pit directly in front of me.

Shaking themselves momentarily, they soon discovered me and leaped in my direction. One of the monstrosities ripped at my jugular with its tusks; another clawed at my leg; and a third had managed to attach itself to my back.

More came at me, taking advantage of the opening created by their fellow hatchlings. Soon, the entire tiny horde was clinging and swarming about me.

I could make no use of my sword in those tight quarters. Stumbling blindly forward, I tore at the creatures' maddening grip.

Then I slipped in embryonic ooze, and went down on my knees in the hard-packed clay.

The balance of the dozen hatchlings swarmed over my crumpled form. I felt their tusks and teeth and claw-like fingers rending every part of my body. I sank lower, unable to stand, thinking:

"A horrible death..."