Ravers was running backwards, unable to keep his eyes off the extraordinary machine only thirty feet away and bearing down on them hard. He yelled to Mars: “What is it?”
“My imaginary alien,” Mars yelled back, even now unable to resist rubbing the fact into Ravers’ face.
Marine lieutenant Drakes was carrying an elderly woman, who was still unconscious. Ravers moved to pick up one of the young newlyweds, the girl, who was semi-conscious from bloodloss. Brenda and Barry together moved the only other remaining injured individual, the man named Drummond.
What Mars fully expected to transpire, suddenly came inexorably to pass.
The robot scorpion began to fire green laser bolts at his people. The first blast immolated Drummond, knocking Brenda and Barry ten feet on either side of him. They rolled, stunned and disoriented. Mars was certain that they would be his next victims, being the closest targets. But the robot scorpion ignored them, and in fact, didn’t even offer a token attack. It’s sights were aimed for Lieutenant Drakes.
Another blast was released. Drakes screamed as the old woman he carried exploded in his arms. The dissolution of flesh and bone was so instantaneous that not a drop touched Drakes. He was, however, sent flying by the force of impact.
The next blast hit the young woman Ravers was carrying. He rolled, cursing. The young man who was her husband, badly hurt, but able to rise on one knee from his position screamed out defiantly. The robot turned on him, and blasted him out of existence as well.
Mars put together an immediate pattern.
It’s picking off the wounded. Only the wounded.
He looked down at his co-pilot. Jennifer was still unconscious, but Mars knew that she would be the robot’s next acquired target. He turned and ran, looking to his right and left for someplace to hide, anything at all that could be used as cover. He could hear the robot clop, clopping behind him.
A blast illuminated the darkness.
And Jennifer sizzled into a light beam of death. Mars felt himself flying and landing hard on the ground. He screamed into the darkness, then found himself staring into the face of the scorpion, which now angled low and only a foot away from where he lay.
“You sonofabitch!” Mars yelled without further thought, brought back his fist and slammed it into the metallic face. The blow twisted the machine-bug’s face sharply to the left and something sparked within its mechanical eyes. Damage, the sparks told Mars. Minimal, perhaps ... but the blow felt good to deliver.
Like a sleepy dog, finished with the thrill of dinner, the robot scorpion now lurched itself around and scanned the remaining survivors of Flight 399. It had all but ignored the substantial blow delivered by Mars, as if perhaps it had been caressed by its master rather than assaulted by an alien adversary.
Ravers was yelling like a madman. “Everyone, stay cool, no sudden moves. It’s gonna be okay!!”
Mars listened to Ravers and a strange impulse to laugh exploded within his chest. It’s gonna be okay. People had been vaporized, there was a palpable stench of death and electrified flesh in the air; next thing he thought Ravers would be telling folks was that this smell was simply the newest scent from Yves Saint Laurent. It galled Mars’ bullshit barometer that Ravers was still trying to be politic. Even now. Here, God knows how the fuck far any of them were from anything that remotely demanded political expediency.
Mars suddenly realized that only the wounded or elderly had been killed. The deduction gave Mars very little comfort. Whoever had built the robots were weeding his people out, culling them for strength and ... and what? For what purpose?
The robot scorpion lumbered off into the darkness. A giant finished feeding for the moment. It suddenly stopped, as it regarded old Dr. Maynard limping out of the darkness. All heads turned toward him. The robot remained frozen where it stood. Mars knew it was thinking, assessing ... formulating the answer to an equation. An equation, once solved, would equal only two possibilities: life or death.
“Run, doctor!” Mars yelled. He began to sprint toward the old man.
But the robot scorpion was faster. It angled a leg and sent a light beam toward Maynard. The old man didn’t even blink, nor did he scream, as his body burst into a hundred trillion pulverized atoms. Mars dived a second before Maynard evaporated into thin air. He hit the ground hard, and could again smell the strange mixture of electrified ozone and scorched flesh.
Lisa Maynard's screams pierced the air.
The robot scorpion clumped off into the darkness, finished for now in weeding out the old and infirm among this visiting patch of humanity.
The thing that had taken on the form of Barry watched the action with fascination. It was the Controller -- a Sel hybrid of both flesh and electromagnetic energy. Thus, it could assume any shape, any form, and share the perception of that acquired shape and form with relative incorruptibility. For instance, it’s point of view of what had transpired was seen in triplicate, versus through a single imaging sense, such as human eyesight. The Sel imposter viewed the world in much the same way a bee or ant could -- with multiple perceptions. A human being would have found this kind of sensorial augmentation confusing, disorienting, irritating. The Sel Controller found it exhilarating.
The humans had a will to survive that was ferocious, unexpected and tantalizing. They would make excellent subjects for the experiment to come on the Home World. More primitive than the Sels in almost every way, Mars and his people were not held in contempt by the Controller, or even the Sel collective; reason for this lack of prejudice was only because the Sels could never imagine that any other life form was more superior to themselves. As such, they accepted the immutable fact that they were virtual Gods.
The Barry-morph – what the Controller had become -- focused on John Mars. He was their leader; the great Warrior that had drawn the Sel flagship from out of the intergalactic void to investigate the destruction of one of its explorer robots. He was the one that clearly galvanized the others to fight for survival. He was the equivalent to the Controller, on a fantastically reduced microcosm -- an indomitable force around which others gathered and clung, like insects to a lamp. The Controller lifted both its hands up and analyzed them briefly. Assuming the shape of the boy had been simple, instantaneous. The language banks of the human child were downloaded with astonishing effortlessness. If the Controller so desired, it could communicate extensively with the humans. For the moment, however, the oldest Sel in cosmic creation was content to merely observe. Again. Besides, communication with such a clearly inferior lifeform was rudimentary and unnecessary. Watching the beasts hold intercourse among themselves -- particularly concerning their own survival ... well, this was by far more enthralling.
Some inquisitive, highly ranked Sels politely explored the Collector’s peripheral consciousness – that part of its indomitable mind that it allowed to interface with the Sel collective as a whole.
Would you share the sensation of humanity with us, Controller? The pain? The pleasure? The fear?
They were questions from children, curious about a new toy.
In time, the Controller responded.
They are afraid.
Yes, the Controller confirmed.
Yet at least one is prepared to do battle, maybe more.
Yes. The one they call Mars … he is their Controller. He is their Strength. He fights, they fight.
Let us come closer.
In time, the Controller replied, which meant tacitly, no one could do anything until he gave the action thoughts to the collective.
When?
Patience.
The probing Sels backed off. They knew just how far to push with their Controller. To insist further would be discourteous.
John Mars approached the Barry-morph and spoke: “You okay, kid?”
The Controller digested the query and made an appropriate response.
“Sure.”
The Controller was capable of mindreading and telepathy, without the aid of a contact-shunt, and thus w
as able to discern that the warrior Mars was again planning, strategizing, free-associating. Only through the Dream State could the Controller know Mind completely, intimately; on this conscious plane … there were limitations. So be it. This makes things … sporting.
The Controller did something that was purely human and which it did completely subconsciously. It did so with thoughts of admiration for John Mars.
The Controller smiled.
Behind Barry, Wes Simpson approached Lisa Maynard, who had moved off by herself to cry for her murdered father.
“I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am,” he said softly. Simpson knew it was a wholly inadequate offering, but it was the best he could come up with under the circumstances.
Lisa turned and offered a small, sad smile in return. “Don’t be, Mr. Simpson. I have the feeling we will be joining him soon.”
“Naw, don’t say that,” Wes said. “This rodeo in the sky, or wherever, it ain’t over yet. Trust me on that, Jersey.”
She sniffed and gave a small smile. But the smile slowly turned into a sob. Simpson reached out to her and held her close to him. “Let it out, Jersey, let it out.”
Ravers approached Mars, who turned to him, frowning.
“That monstrosity was identical to the one that killed my crew on the moon.”
Ravers sighed, looked down. “Well, it’s a little late, but I guess you were right.”
Mars ignored the off-handed apology. It didn’t matter that he had been proven correct. People were dying around him again. He found this fact intolerable to the extreme.
“There must be a way out of this place,” Mars mumbled.
Paul Casey was again on the warpath. “You’re the captain. How do you propose to get us home?”
Edna was sitting cross-legged on the ground. She looked up at Casey, and yanked at his trouser leg. “Sit down, Paul, and be quiet, before you convince everyone aside from myself that you’re an idiot.”
“Shut up, Edna,” Casey snapped at her.
Wes Simpson stepped up to Casey and shoved a finger into his face. “I’m getting pretty sick of your mouth, pal. I don’t care if she’s your wife or your maid -- we horsewhip boys like you for talking to a lady like that.”
Casey didn’t back down. “Push off, cowboy.”
Simpson grabbed Casey by the collar of his jacket, and Casey pulled back a fist as if to slug the bigger man. Mars found himself making comparisons to a terrier about to take on a Pit Bull. It was time to end this now. Casey found his arm arrested mid-punch. He turned and stared into the eyes of Mars.
“This isn’t helping,” Mars said quietly.
Simpson froze for an instant, then relaxed. Casey pulled his arm out of Mars’ grasp and brushed past Simpson.
“Nothing is helping,” he muttered.
Simpson decided that the fight with Casey was simply not worth further energy. Besides, it looked to him like the Captain was not going to tolerate any further bickering.
“Well, I have a suggestion,” Simpson said. “I think we should find a way to negotiate with -- well, with whatever is holding us here against our will.”
“If I may interject, sir,” Myoga said, stepping forward, “it would be reasonable to assume that our captors are clearly not interest in negotiation.”
“More like our extermination,” Mars concluded.
“I would say it goes beyond mere genocide. The builders of this vessel -- and we must assume, the creators of those robotic monsters -- have the power to destroy us at any time. They have decided to selectively liquidate only some of us. Specifically, those of us who were injured, or of an elderly disposition.”
Myoga deliberately refused to look at Lisa with this last statement. He moved on quickly. “No, I submit we are being kept alive for another reason.”
Ravers turned to Myoga, interested. “Like what?”
Myoga shrugged, then looked around at the survivors. “Perhaps, for breeding purposes. You will note that, barring the boy, there are an equal number of males and females remaining of reproductive capability.”
Lisa was shaking her head, her tears momentarily forgotten. “Slavery. Or ... even experimentation. If I were them -- studying us -- our biological response to stimuli -- yes, I would attempt to perpetuate the species as well.”
Casey stepped forward, this latest line of conversation further upsetting him. “Are you listening to yourselves? You’re hypothesizing on whether or not we’re a bunch of lab rats. Meanwhile, that mechanical nightmare is out there someplace and who knows when it might come back to finish up the job of killing us?”
Lieutenant Drakes nodded his agreement. “This fella has a point, Captain. We can’t just sit here and wait for that big old toaster oven on six legs to come back and fry us at leisure.”
“Agreed,” Mars said. “So, this is what --”
And then the strange lights disappeared. Blackness descended over all of them, an unearthly blackness filled only with the distant droning of ship engines.
Light reappeared ... but it was starlight, not artificial light. John Mars took in the view that surrounded them all. A billion points of twinkling incandescence dotted around and above them. It was as if this holding place had suddenly been transformed into a giant, indoor planetarium.
“Oh, my,” Myoga said softly.
The stars suddenly moved -- or rather, a few select stars moved against the canopy of a billion others. Two of the stars enlarged and one in particular formed a familiar shape.
“That’s Earth, isn’t it?” Edna Casey asked no one in particular.
“Yes,” John Mars replied. “And that must be us.”
He pointed at the smaller object pulling away from Earth. As the stars continued to move and rotate around the two principal points of Earth and “us”, a terrifying picture was forming in each person’s mind. A picture of indelible and irrevocable truth.
“Incredible,” Myoga again said. “If this is an accurate depiction of our travel speed -- then we are crossing parsecs at velocities exceeding those of light. There,” he pointed at a star cluster to the far right, “that is Proxima Centauri, part of the trinary group of Alpha A and Beta Centauri. And over there, Barnard’s star. See --”
He stopped as the canopy of star, the new star map, in fact, formed yet another image which left no room for misinterpretation. The spiral arm of the Milky Way -- the one in which Earth’s only sun, Sol, occupied swirled into full view.
“Us” ... the spaceship that was carrying Mars and his terrified crew ... was moving out of the galaxy and in to the void between star clusters.
“It’s – a kind of roadmap,” Ravers said. “Jesus, it’s showing our travel route out of the galaxy.”
“Why?” Lisa asked.
“Courtesy, perhaps,” Myoga said. “And to let us know one other thing.”
“What would that be?” Casey asked.
John Mars knew the answer to that question in the bottom of his soul: “That none of us will ever see home again.”
For five minutes, John Mars and what remained of his passengers and crew, watched as the ship they believed they were being held prisoner within depart the Milky Way. Myoga occasionally offered some statistical commentary. He had revised their actual flight speed (in theory) to roughly a thousand times the speed of light with an attendant apology for the very rough first guess of a mere 186,000 miles per second.
A thousand times the speed of light, Mars repeated the figure continuously in his mind. The velocity was unfathomable. None of them, particularly Mars, doubted that they were not on some kind of extraterrestrial spaceship. What had transpired in the span of the past twenty minutes made any kind of denial in this regard obsolete. Mars tried to delve deep inside himself, to savor some momentary satisfaction, even joy, that his wildest dream had come true; that he was traveling to the stars. But the realization that so many had died because of this bizarre intervention of fate or warlike aliens destroyed any semblance of exhilaration.
Ravers m
oved close to Mars and began to whisper. “I’ve been thinking.”
Mars just glanced at him, his main focus of interest still on the starchart -- and the trajectory of the spaceship he was certain they were aboard approach the outer boundaries of Earth’s galaxy.
“I’ve been thinking,” Ravers continued, “how odd it is that the same alien robot that attacked you on the moon just happened to find you a year later, in a moving aircraft. I find that coincidental, to say the least.”
“Nothing coincidental about it,” Mars said.
“Really,” Ravers said. “Explain it to me, then.”
“These things -- aliens, if you will -- they found a way to track me. I think any species that can master intergalactic travel would not have great difficulty in finding a measly human being like myself on a planet of only six billion people.”
Ravers snorted, still not convinced – or so the snort seemed to say. “But why?”
“If I have the opportunity, I’ll ask. That is, when and if, we ever meet our invisible hosts.”
A few feet from Mars and Ravers, Edna had somehow retained hold of her purse, and she now dug deep within and produced a small silver flask. She uncapped the top and took a quick shot of lifesaving Cognac. Casey glanced at her wretchedly, then at her flask.
“It’s gratifying to see that interstellar abduction hasn’t interfered with your alcoholism.”
Edna turned to him and sighed. “Paul. You bastard. We’re hundreds of light years from home. For all we know, we’re being saved for some kind of alien bouillabaisse. Do you suppose, just this once, you could say one nice thing to me?”
Casey held her gaze, then shifted restlessly from one foot to the other. “I don’t like this waiting. If there’s anything I’ve learned in the courtroom, every situation is give and take. Compromise. Plea bargain, that’s the name of the game --”
“Did you ever love me, Paul?” Edna interrupted quietly.
Mars, The Bringer Of War Page 12
