Rebels of the Red Planet

by Charles L. Fontenay

  12

  The two Dark Kensingtons and Happy Thurbelow walked along one of thepathways between the vats, Happy trailing a bit behind. Somewhere nearthem, they knew, Shadow accompanied them.

  The place was dim, with the moist dimness of a swamp. The source of thelight that filtered through the faint mist and seemed to permeate theair was not discernible, and the roof of this underground world was lostin the darkness above them. The placid surface of the water gleamedvaguely in the vats they passed, and the pale-green tangle of vegetationrose above and around them, sometimes drooping over the paths likeskinny arms that sought to detain them.

  "What I don't understand," said Dark the younger, "is that our memoriescoincide exactly, up to a point which you say is a time twenty-fiveyears ago. My memories are just as genuine as you say yours are; theyaren't something someone told me, but real memories of things thathappened to me, things I felt and did. If they're both genuine sets ofmemories, how can it be explained? Are we the same person, who wassomehow split into two distinct individuals?"

  "I can only guess at the explanation, but I have a theory," answered OldBeard. "You are much younger than I am. I would estimate that you'retwenty-five years younger than I am. My memories are consecutive andcomplete: I remember not only the earlier things you say you remember,but the events of these past twenty-five years, without a break. You sayyou suffered a period of amnesia, and your next consecutive memory is ofbeing with Martians in the Icaria Desert."

  "That would appear to give you an advantage in claiming to be the realDark Kensington," agreed Dark with a smile. "But, if you are, who am I?How is it that I remember being Dark Kensington?"

  "It's entirely possible that, for some reason, my earlier memories weregrafted onto you as your own," replied Old Beard. "I don't know how thiswould be done, perhaps through very deep and extensive hypnosis. TheMartians, as well as we can tell anything about them at all, are expertsin such mental fields, a relic of the ancient science they're legendedto have had when their civilizations covered Mars.

  "I worked with Martians very closely for long periods during the earlydays of the rebellion--the Phoenix, as you say they call it now--andthey may very well have recorded my memory pattern through some means Idon't know anything about and for reasons I can't imagine."

  "That sounds reasonable," conceded Dark. "But that still leavesunanswered the questions: Who am I, and what's happened to my memoriesof the past twenty-five years?"

  "I'm afraid I can't answer that," replied Old Beard.

  In the dimness ahead of them, they discerned a group of nude Toughsapproaching, swaggering down the path. They turned aside and found arecess in the vegetation in which they could wait until the Toughspassed and went on their way. The Toughs were aggressive, andinsensately brutal, and a meeting with them could only mean trouble.

  "Happy's explained the situation here, as well as he could, but I'mafraid it wasn't a very adequate explanation," said Dark as they huddledin the shadowed recess. "Could you tell me more about it, and explainhow you happen to be here?"

  "Happy is very intelligent, for a Jelly, but none of the Jellies areexceptionally bright," answered Old Beard, with a touch of affection inhis voice. "I'll outline it to you as briefly as I can.

  "As your memories--or transplanted memories--indicate, I was one of agroup of Martian colonists who joined forces to work at what, at first,appeared to be a theoretical and fantastic project: the development ofthe ability to live under natural Martian conditions, without dependenceon the regular importation of extremely expensive imports from Earth. Asyou know, this project very shortly began to lose its fantasticqualities and appear to be definitely within the realm of possiblerealization.

  "Because of the differing background and orientation of those of us whoattempted this project, two approaches were adopted. One, based onadvancing terrestrial research into the field of extrasensoryperception, was aimed at developing telepathic and telekinetic powers sothat food, oxygen, machinery and other essentials could be teleporteddirectly from Earth into the martian domes without dependence on thespacelines. The other, based on more orthodox science, was aimed atgenetic development of a human type that could live _without_ theseimportations, on native Martian food and in the Martian atmosphere.

  "As you know, the government banned these experiments and we retreatedinto the desert to carry them on despite the ban. From what you tell meof the extent of your memories, what you do not know is the reasonbehind the ban, which we discovered--or, at least, I did--only after wehad been betrayed and the government had raided and broken up ourexperimental colony.

  "The spacelines, as one might have guessed, were responsible. They sawthat the success of the experiments would destroy their lucrativebusiness. These spacelines, led by the Mars Corporation, which laterabsorbed the others and gained a monopoly, brought political pressure tobear and got the project banned.

  "I had heard reports that a great many of my colleagues escaped andformed a rebel organization that carried on the work secretly andillegally, but I was never able to learn details of it until you cameand told me of the activities in which you have been engaged. You see, Ihaven't been out of these caves in a quarter of a century."

  Shadow appeared at the recess to report to them that the Toughs hadpassed on. How he did it, Dark was unable to determine surely, for hecould hear no words spoken. Either Shadow communicated by subtlegestures or by tones beyond Dark's powers of hearing, but both Old Beardand Happy seemed to understand him readily.

  "How do you happen to be here, Old Beard?" asked Dark as they left therecess and resumed their progress down the walkways.

  "I was captured when the government broke up the experimental groups,"answered Old Beard. "I was the leader of the section of the experimentsdealing with extrasensory perception, and, instead of executing me atonce, they tried to persuade me to continue this work for the governmentalong specific lines and under supervision. I refused, because I knewthat anything I helped them develop would not be used for the benefit ofthe Martian colonists, but for greater profits for the spacelines.

  "At last I was able to escape into these underground caverns where theygrow food plants hydroponically and sell them to supplement the produceof the dome farms and the gardens in the dome cities. These caverns areextensive and, with the friendship and help of the Jellies, I've evadeddiscovery for twenty-five years."

  "Just who and what are the Jellies?" asked Dark. "I haven't been able toget a very satisfactory answer to that question from Happy."

  "They're human experimental animals," answered Old Beard. "Theterrestrial food plants grown hydroponically and sold in the dome citiesactually are a supplemental sideline to the real purpose of this place.Marscorp is conducting its own experiments here, with a crew of expertgeneticists.

  "What Marscorp is trying to do is to breed native Martian plants, thatwill grow in the open lowlands without expensive oxygenation andirrigation, that are not poisonous to humans and can be used for food.At the same time, they're approaching the problem from the other side,and the Jellies are men and women whose glandular structure has beenaltered in an effort to make their physiology more receptive to nativeMartian vegetation. If they succeed, of course, Marscorp has just ascomplete a monopoly over such a food supply as it does over imports fromEarth, but at considerably less expense."

  "And the Toughs?"

  "They're human experimental animals, too, based on a different type ofglandular alteration. They're neither as docile nor as intelligent asthe Jellies, so they can't be used for slave labour as the Jellies can.About the only way they're ever used is as occasional goon squads toterrorize the Jellies and keep them in line."

  "You've been here twenty-five years and have never been able to escape?"asked Dark incredulously.

  "This place isn't guarded," replied Old Beard, with a wry smile. "Theydon't have to guard it. All they have to guard are the supply room wherethe marsuits are kept and the motor pool of groundcars. This place is inthe middle of the
Desert of Candor, and no one can live in the Martiandesert without oxygen."

  They came now to one of the walls of the underground cavern, and OldBeard led them suddenly into a fissure that was well concealed from thewalkways by a tangled screen of vegetation. They stumbled along a narrowpassageway for a few feet, and emerged into a rude shaft, around thewalls of which a roughly-chiseled and steep stairway led upward intopitch darkness. Here Old Beard halted.

  "When I told you there's no way of escape here, it was not that Ihaven't tried many times," he said to Dark.

  "This shaft leads up into the walls of the structure above--above,although it is still underground--and I have been up there often atnight. It has long been my hope that I might be able to get a marsuit ora groundcar and make my escape, but they are kept locked up and alwaysguarded, against the Jellies and the Toughs.

  "I want to take you up and give you an idea of the place now, and laterperhaps you will have some ideas to contribute. Happy and Shadow willstay down here until we get back."

  Old Beard mounted the steep steps slowly, and Dark followed at hisheels. Although the bottom of the "well" was lighted with the same dimlight as that which spread throughout the entire underground area, therewas no light at all higher up, and they had to feel their way carefullylest they fall off the narrow steps.

  At the top, Old Beard stopped and Dark bumped sharply into him.

  "I'm going to move down the space between the walls," Old Beardwhispered. "Hold onto my hand and follow me. But don't say anything ormake any more noise than you can help, because anyone beyond the wallmay be able to hear you."

  They moved ahead. The way was very narrow, very dark and very difficult,and frequently was choked with ventilator pipes or tangles of wiring.They had gone some forty or fifty feet, when Old Beard stopped.

  By Old Beard's movements, Dark knew he was working at something. Then asection of ventilator pipe came away from a ventilator grill, and faintlight illuminated the space in which they crouched. In this dimness, OldBeard gestured to Dark to look through the ventilator.

  Peering out, Dark saw that they were near the ceiling of a large,high-ceilinged room. In it, under glaring lights, a group of half adozen white-clad men were working with knives and other instruments onthe body of a man, either anaesthetized or dead, which lay on a surgicaltable.

  Old Beard put his face against the grill next to Dark's, and the two menwatched the scene below for a few moments. Then one of the men aroundthe table raised his head, revealing a thin face, with watery blue eyesand a straggly goatee.

  The two men inside the wall gasped as one man.

  "_Father!_"

  The single loud word was torn from Dark's throat without his volition,without his actually realizing he had spoken.

  The heads of the men in the room jerked up at the cry, and they lookedaround and at each other, with puzzled expressions. Old Beard clapped afirm hand over Dark's mouth and hissed in his ear:

  "Fool! Let's get out of here!"

  As quietly as possible, they made their way back. Through the ventilatorbehind them came the murmur of querulous voices.

  When they had climbed back down the stairs and, with Happy and Shadow,made their way back through the fissure, Old Beard fixed penetratingeyes on Dark and said:

  "I told you to keep quiet up there! What was that exclamation allabout?"

  "It's something very strange," murmured Dark, his face thoughtful andbemused. "But you evidently recognized that man, too. Who is he?"

  "Yes, I know him very well," answered Old Beard, with deep bitterness inhis tone. "That's Goat Hennessey. But that's the first time I've seenhim in twenty-five years. He must have just come here recently."

  "Goat Hennessey? I heard of him when I was in Mars City."

  "Goat Hennessey was one of my most trusted friends," said Old Beard. "Ifyou bear my earlier memories, I'm surprised you didn't recognize him asGoat Hennessey, too."

  "I recognized him as someone else," said Dark in a low voice.

  "We worked together," went on Old Beard. "I was a leader in the effortto solve our problem through extrasensory perception, and he was themajor scientist in the group attempting to solve it by genetic change.We worked together and we went into the desert together with the otherswhen the government banned our experiments.

  "But Goat was the man who sold out. He betrayed us to thegovernment--for what price I don't know. And when government agentsraided us and broke up our organization and captured me, Goat Hennesseykidnapped my young and pregnant wife, and I never saw her again.

  "I'm glad Goat Hennessey is here, because now I can get to him. And whenI can reach him, I'm going to kill him. I'd like to kill him as slowlyand painfully as he killed the heart inside of me!"

  As Old Beard spoke these last words, his face was tense, his fistsclenched and a somber fire burned in his pale eyes. Then, slowly, thefire died out and he turned his eyes, once more cool and rational, alittle quizzical, on Dark.

  "Didn't you call him 'father'?" he asked.

  "Yes," said Dark in a low voice. "But I'd rather not talk about it rightnow."

  He looked at Old Beard, and seemed to be ridding himself, with aneffort, of a deep introversion.

  "There's one thing that I've remembered as a result of seeing GoatHennessey," said Dark in a firmer voice. "This place isn't too far froma place in the Xanthe Desert where Goat conducted some significantexperiments. If he left any of his records there--and I'm thinking ofsome in particular--they might go a long way toward solving the problemwe've all be working on for so long. So now I know what to do next: I'mgoing to Ultra Vires."

  Old Beard smiled sadly.

  "Have you forgotten we can't get out of this place?" he reminded. "Wecan't get at either the marsuits or the groundcars."

  It was Dark's turn to smile.

  "I believe you said there aren't any guards on the airlocks to stop onefrom walking out at night?" he said.

  "That's true, but--"

  "There's something you don't know," continued Dark. "You were wonderingat the basis of the regenerative power that permitted me to revive hereafter being shot in the stomach with a heatgun. I don't know what it is,but whatever it is, it's something that also permits me to live withoutoxygen.

  "Happy can testify that I was fully alive and conscious underwater. Idiscovered, before I was shot, that I can operate just as well outside,in the Martian atmosphere, without a helmet. And that's why Goat'srecords may solve our problem.

  "So tonight I'll leave this place and go to Ultra Vires. If there areany marsuits and groundcars left there, I'll come back here with them,and you and Happy and Shadow can escape with me. If not, you may have towait a while longer.

  "But I'll be back!"