Mars, The Bringer Of War

by George P. Saunders

  The disintegration continued on a forward course, the steel skin of the airplane and its powerful skeleton peeling away from the two main support beams like an onion. People howled in terror, clawing at air for something to hang onto, as they were dragged into the unimaginable void of the slipstream. Their descent to the icy waters below would last only a few minutes, but the foreknowledge of death would seem like an eternity, their perishing moans the only parachutes of hope and safety they would have until the inevitable crashdown miles below.

  The airplane slowly unraveled itself, as it assumed an increasingly steep vertical dive. The coach section of the 747 was all but obliterated; men and women clung to anything that wasn’t peeling away into the night, but their efforts were only momentarily successful. The pull of kinetic energy eventually sucked everything, flesh and steel, into oblivion. Barry’s parents, still strapped in, were sucked out in tandem through the gaping maw of the airplane’s rear, along with Hilary, the first level flight attendant, a girl who dreamed of retiring on a warm island someplace in the South Pacific. She could not have imagined that hers would be an unmarked grave someplace in the raging Pacific Ocean, with a nightmare journey preceding that would end in freezing pitch darkness.

  The only part of the airplane that had yet to be lethally effected by the blast were the most forward sections of First Class -- the nose cone - and the hump of the plane above, Business Class. There was also the Flight Deck.

  John Mars screamed into his mike, breathing into an oxygen mask, fighting for control he knew he cold never hope to recover.

  “May Day, May Day, Flight 399, we are going down, repeat going down. Our position --”

  Suddenly, some panels to his right sparked and blasted outwards; shards of metal and hot fire hit him in the face and shoulder. He screamed, then looked to his right. Jennifer was slumped forward, a gaping maw of red on her forehead. Behind her, Bob Peoples’ twisted body was charred almost black; he had been electrocuted from a massive overload at his control station when the airplane was hit. Actually, overloading was not the issue – the wiring in the flight deck had gone through an instant metastasis of atypical burn-out.

  Amazingly, Chase Ravers pulled himself into the cockpit, screaming above the wind and creak and grind of an airplane about to self-destruct.

  “What the fuck hit us?” he screamed.

  John Mars shook his head but did not waste time on an answer. He was checking his controls. The panels were all dark, and this told him immediately that his airplane had ceased to exist.

  And then a light appeared, blinding in intensity. So bright was it, that Mars had to cover his eyes, releasing his hold on the flight stick. Not that it would have made a difference; his ability to control or fly the jet had been neutralized with the impact of the Sel warhead.

  The light was followed by sound. A horrible, high-pitched sound that tore into his mind like a hot knife through butter. The agony was brief, and was mercifully replaced by blackness a second later.

  The Sel attack ship deployed a tow beam, which enveloped the gnarled remains of the 747. It also brought the craft to a dead stop, from 500 miles per hour to zero in less than a second. Oxygen and gravity were suffused through the holding beam, preserving life on the flying wreck that John Mars piloted. Humans had died in the past few minutes, but the Sels were not particularly distressed by this fact; had John Mars been a victim, however, their mission would have been deemed a tragic failure. As it was, John Mars lived. Somewhere in the forward section of the 747.

  As the Sel ship ascended through the upper atmosphere, it began the simple task of breaking down the molecular structure of the airplane and reconstituting it again. The whole process would take less than a minute.

  In that minute, John Mars and the survivors of flight 399 slept. A sleep with dreams. The Sel Builders understood the nature of dreams well; they had conquered a galaxy through mind control and sheer force. They would do so again, beginning here, now, with the dream world of John Mars.

  He was known simply as the Controller, the head of all that was, the one to whom all others deferred. He had promulgated the invasion task force, conceptualized in a single thought, an encompassing vision that touched simultaneously the entire Sel population. He was on board this flagship invasion vessel, here and now, to personally oversee the Great Experiment with this new galaxy’s first discovered life form, Homo Sapiens.

  The Controller was both corporeal and ether, a composite being of pure energy and matter, existing bi-locally on a number of dimensions. This current dimension, of the three involving spatial depth, volume and distance, would not work for Dream Manipulation. To function in that environment, transformation and transition were necessary dualities the Controller effortlessly manipulated. The Controller had used such techniques to conquer a thousand other races in the Home Galaxy; it would now utilize the same methods to begin conquest of the Milky Way, starting with John Mars and all of humanity.

  The Sel race as a whole owed its relative immortality to the Controller, perhaps the oldest recorded Sel in existence. He was ageless, mysterious, the Sel version of the Almighty to humans. Sels had no barometer for human moral criteria such as Good or Evil, Right or Wrong. They thought in terms of action, decisive or otherwise. Action was the key to existence, to survival, and the Sels never allowed conscious (they would have found the concept superfluous to survival in general, and impractical) to dictate the necessity for decision. If it benefited Sel entirety, the needed action was taken, notwithstanding possible injury to other races or entities. The concept of individuality and the blessedness of singularity were also incongruous dualities to the Sel nature. Sels worked as a group, for the group, and towards preservation thereof; this was all that mattered, all that had ever mattered since the dawn of Sel creation.

  That creation alone was presumably understood by only one: The Controller. He was the Ancient One, the primary Shape and Matter Shifter. He could go where other Sels could not; see things other Sels were blind to, accomplish singular tasks Sels could only understand in terms of completion as a collective. The Controller was God … or the closest thing the Sels understood God to be. This last concept was difficult unto itself, because it was presumed by the Sels that once, a long time ago, their ancestors had probably created the known Universe!

  The Controller knew better, of course, but did not clutter up the works of lesser minds (his race, that is) with such lofty and esoteric contemplations. Sel work ethic, technology and ethos had flourished through the aeons due to the intensity of focus and age-old indoctrination. Things worked well the way they were; always had, always would.

  There were, of course, anomalous thought patterns in a very few of the Sel collective. There always had been, and with the closest thing to irritation the Controller would ever feel, there always would be. Best an all seeing entity like the Controller could do was simply eradicate incidents of “singular” thought whenever it occurred (or would occur).

  The Controller anticipated such radical incidents to naturally conspire against his will once this new galaxy was invaded. He would have to weed out the revolutionaries, those who would oppose his vast and indomitable will. There would not be many, there never were. Still, some was enough. A few.

  And a few could be problematic.

  That had no bearing, really, on the new life form known as John Mars. Important now was understanding the creature’s conscious and subconscious motivations. It would begin with that thing known as Mind … and work its way outward. In this way, the Controller would understand everything about Mars and the human race to which he belonged.

  If the Controller logically assumed that John Mars was representative of the superior human condition, it also assumed that once comprehending and vanquishing the mind of such a stellar specimen, then that which allowed John Mars to function so effectively in the material dimension could also be subjugated fully.

  Was this morally correct? Was this good? Was this not a violation of any being’s
, any consciousness’ rights according to all universal laws of decency?

  Who cares, the Controller would have responded, had it understood the subtextual layers of human moral consciousness. It was a necessary function that would ultimately serve all that did matter in this universe -- Sel advancement and perpetuation.

  Thus, the Controller analyzed Mind in John Mars and began, unhesitatingly, the invasive trek though his consciousness and that most intimate, vulnerable essence of the one human being that had ever challenged and vanquished Sel interest.

  FOUR

  OUTBOUND

  John Mars found himself on a desert floor, staring up at a blazing sky, with only one sun. His sun, the sun of Earth. He blinked, sand and tears of pain battling for supremacy in his eyeballs. He recognized the terrain instantly, even before he recognized the soldiers on the far hill, firing at him with automatic machine guns.

  He was in Iraq in 1992, away from NASA on special assignment. He had resented the mission. But now – he couldn’t remember why he was here. As a combat officer, he had survived, barely, Desert Storm, Nicaragua, Panama and various other conflicts while with Shadow Division. War had swept through his life, swelling large, like an aneurysm, the size of a county, leaving behind a shattered soul, resilient and hopeful despite the experience of so much horror. He could remember every detail of every battle.

  Why not now?

  The soldiers he was now watching were part of Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guard. Next to him were DeLorenzo, his First Lieutenant and Rico, his sergeant; flanking him were the rest of the kids, grunts who had been assigned to him on this mission. Familiar ghosts of a distant past.

  He remembered now why, a long time ago, he was in Iraq. Special Mission. That was it. Something special that required the talents of one time Shadow Division’s leader, John Mars, to be whisked away from NASA … if only for a little while.

  But again, this was yesterday, the distant past, a thousand yesterdays buried beneath sands more dense than this ancient desert. Why did he come back here, in the world of dreams and shadows? What was really happening in the present?

  He couldn’t remember. Something had just transpired in the future (in the present?); something that had caused him to shift consciousness. He was back here now, and here was terribly goddamned real. More real than any dream he’d had before.

  “Colonel, those dirt-fucks are gonna use Anthrax on us, just as sure as snake shit,” Rico was snarling, as he looked the Republican Guard regulars continue to fire in their direction. “That bunker is loaded with the stuff.”

  “That’s why we’re here, son,” Mars heard himself saying, automatically, and suddenly, he remembered what that ‘special mission’ had been. The Iraqis had one bunker, hidden, off the beaten track, and within that bunker, there was indeed a hefty supply of Anthrax and N1, a deadly nerve agent. The Intel had come in seventy two hours earlier, along with the assurances from the Iraqi underground within Saddam’s circle, that Hussein would be utilizing this arsenal once the American offensive into Iraqi territory began in earnest.

  This could never happen.

  Thus, Special Tactical called in Colonel John Mars to “wrap things up” quick here in southern Iraq. Again, Mars racked his memory – his past consciousness – as to what he had ultimately planned in order to neutralize the chemical bunker.

  Something was wrong. This was real, it felt real. Yet it had already happened. This was a dream. Some kind of shell-shocked phantasm from a grizzly past.

  The Iraqi soldiers suddenly began to charge. A dozen of them. No, more. John Mars yelled at his men. “Fire at will.”

  And then he saw that neither he, nor his men, had weapons. They just looked at him, blank phantoms, expressionless.

  He then looked at the enemy soldiers, advancing on him. He should have been afraid. Yes, terror should have been the flooding emotion at the moment.

  John Mars made an instant, subconscious (and conscious) decision: I won’t be afraid. Reason: This is a dream, an illusion, unreal.

  The enemy soldiers suddenly turned into monsters: half scorpion, half men, twenty foot long tails, replete with stingers and spitting venom, all approaching. The monsters growled and hissed.

  John Mars held his ground. He chanced a look to his men. They were gone. Vanished.

  Just a dream, a nightmare. Not real.

  John Mars closed his eyes, as the screams and hisses became deafening.

  Well. Interesting stuff, the Controller noted to itself. The creature is exceptionally self-aware and not easily fooled or manipulated. Already challenging, insomuch as ninety percent of the other races in the Home Galaxy had been mentally, easily malleable.

  Not so, this creature. Perhaps, it came as no surprise to the Controller. It remembered that John Mars had fought and destroyed one of the Explorer Probes on the small moon orbiting the blue world of other humans. No small feat.

  The Controller felt as if he were jumping the gun a bit. Perhaps a little more observation was required. Old ways, old techniques of Control may not apply here, in this new galaxy, among these new races.

  An infinitely pragmatic intelligence, the Controller remained in the subconscious of John Mars, but as an observer only.

  The desert disappeared. So did the soldiers and/or the monsters with tails. The growls ceased, and the hisses abruptly terminated.

  Blackness. Nothing.

  Perhaps he was dead.

  No. There would be no thought, no conjecture. At least as far as he knew.

  Light suddenly invaded his senses, and a face flickered into focus.

  Anna reached out to him and touched his cheek. She was deathly pale and he wanted to touch her, but he was unable to do so. When he looked down, he saw that he had no arms or legs. Or even a body. When he looked up, Anna was gone.

  “Help me,” Anna said. “I’m cold.”

  The appearance of Anna caused him to shudder himself, to feel real fear and almost physical pain.

  He snapped awake. Someone was touching him. He grabbed a hand and jerked its owner forward.

  “It’s just me, Captain Mars,” a very frightened Barry Newman said in a hoarse whisper.

  Mars stared at the boy for a second. Barry was shaking with fear and there were tears on his cheek. Mars turned to his right. Jennifer was unconscious, slumped over her controls, blood flowing freely from her head. He then looked at Bob Peoples, a half black, half white figure, steaming with the aftermath of instant electrocution. The stench of burning flesh brought Mars back instantly to reality.

  “I think he’s dead, sir,” Barry said, his voice choking.

  Mars didn’t need to verify the obvious. He put a tingling hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Help me up.”

  Barry pulled at Mars’ other arm, which helped the big man free himself from some twisted control paneling that had partially trapped his legs.

  “I don’t think we’re in the air anymore,” Barry said.

  John Mars composed himself and leaned forward. The cockpit windows were smashed, and as he licked his lip, he tasted blood and small fragments of glass. Outside -- wherever outside was -- appeared black and forbidding. Once every few seconds, a red light from high above flickered across the blackness. The steam and smoke from seared CRT wires and electrodes obscured any further detail of the outside environment.

  Crashed? Is that what happened? But where? John was trying to fathom what had happened to his airplane, but nothing logical immediately leaped to mind.

  “Just where the fuck are we?” Ravers said from behind him.

  Mars turned, and saw his former friend and boss holding his head, shaking it free of cobwebs. Raver’s cheek was bleeding, but otherwise, he seemed undamaged. Mars didn’t waste time trying to formulate an answer as to what had happened -- or was currently happening; old instincts were kicking in. He moved. And fast. Jennifer was next to him, bleeding copiously. He leaned over felt for a pulse on her neck. She was still alive. Barely. He picked her up and motioned Barry to
exit the cockpit.

  In the Business Class section -- what remained of it -- sparks from cabin lighting hissed and flickered ominously. Wes Simpson was the only one standing, looking around, trying to determine who was injured or dead. He glanced at Lisa.

  “You okay, Jersey?”

  Old Dr. Maynard glared at Simpson, answering for his daughter: “Does it look like we’re okay, sir?” Does it look like any of us are okay?”

  Lisa nodded, trying to smile, failing miserably.

  Simpson was about to answer Lisa’s father when he heard a sound directly behind him. It was Brenda, the flight attendant. She was trying to stand, but with the first and second effort, a moan of pain escaped her.

  “Slow there, ma’am,” Wes said, helping her up.

  Two seats forward, Paul and Edna Casey were pulling out of their stupor as well. Miraculously, Edna had somehow still retained a grip on her shot glass. She glared at it contemptuously.

  “Jesus. What do they put in these things?”

  Mars passed Edna and lowered Jennifer to a three seat row. Lisa had seen him carrying the co-pilot, and now moved forward.

  “I’m a doctor,” she said.

  Mars just nodded, and let Lisa proceed with a cursory examination. He took in the upper section of his airplane, shaking his head in disbelief.

  We were blown out of the sky. We should all be dead. But we’re not. Doesn’t make sense...

  “Brenda?” he called out.

  Brenda, still holding on to Wes Simpson for support, nodded.

  “We’re okay back here. Did we crash?”

  “If we crashed, we wouldn’t be here talking,” Mars said matter of factly.

  Barry stepped up next to Mars, and looked at the big man hopefully. “My parents are down in Coach, Captain. Can we check on them?”