by Henry Hasse
“Keep down!” Clint yelled at Ruth. Then it was coming at them, half rearing. Clint caught a glimpse of the yellowish underside of the thing’s body. He planted the thorn firmly against the tree bole, swung the end up. It caught the beast in mid air, and Clint felt the thorn splinter. Then he was hugging the ground, pulling Ruth away from the thrashing bulk. For several minutes screams rent the air. At last the reptilian creature righted itself and sped into the desert, with the thorn dangling in its neck.
“And there goes our food!” Clint was bitter.
Ruth came wearily to her feet. “You—you would have eaten it?”
“I don’t know. You were going to eat that,” he accused, indicating the poisonous pulp.
“I’m sorry. Well keep going.”
“If we can get up to that higher ground, we’ll have a view. We might spot the Terra!”
Armed with two more of the giant thorns, they continued. The ground rose higher, barren and rocky. They came upon more of the twisted trees but there was no other growth. Several times the reptilian beasts prowled near, and the two Earth people crouched against rocks with their weapons held in readiness.
“I was wrong,” Clint said at last in utter weariness. Look!” The desert stretched below them, but those strange shadows still danced, obscuring the vision. “Must be caused by magnetic currents. We can’t stay here, it’s getting too dangerous. We wouldn’t last the night through!”
They stumbled back to the desert. Their only hope of survival lay in finding the Terra! They knew it now, and Dhaarj had known it well. Ruth moved aimlessly, trusting Clint’s direction. He put out a hand to help her occasionally when she stumbled, but soon he did not even do that.
Clint himself stumbled and went to his knees and felt too weak to rise. Why struggle further, he thought. They had lost! Without so much as a sigh of despair, he sank down where he was, caressing the cool sand, and let sleep and weariness take him.
In the radiance of his imperial chamber Dhaarj gave a gesture of impatience. These prattling Earth creatures who presumed to speak of Survival! He clicked off the trans-telector, sank back upon his cushions, munched upon a delicate fruit, and telepathed his servants to come and prepare for his evening ablutions.
Clint’s sleep-drugged mind was slow to respond. He was lying face down, he knew that. And he ought to get up. If he didn’t get up he would die.
Moaning in protest, he slowly rolled himself over. The sun slapped him hard across the eyes. Dazedly he shook his head, and challenged with every fiber of his being a mental monotone that persisted in his brain:
Survival. Survival is the greatest force . . . hunger is part of Survival . . . hunger and thirst must be appeased. And he knew that once again Dhaarj’s probing mental power was at work.
Ruth stirred and looked at him with dazed, red-rimmed eyes. She too had felt the message.
“Don’t be frightened,” Clint rasped. “It’s just the test. Remember? It has to do with Dhaarj and our emotions. We can outlast him!”
“I—I can’t think clearly.”
It startled him. The girl was far more gone than he had supposed! A vague resentment stirred in him as he pulled himself up and staggered on. He was aware that the girl followed, moaning piteously as if she had expected him to help her. The sun climbed higher, hot and dry. And now the pounding refrain, survival is greatest, was gone. It was no longer needed. He was thinking of nothing but survival.
As if from a great distance he heard a voice: “Clint . . . I’m getting awfully weak—” And through blurring eyes he saw the girl collapse.
Leave her there, Earthman. YOU go on. The weak must die, the strong survive. Leave her there, and survive...
“Damn you!” Clint cried aloud. It was directed partly at Dhaarj, partly at the girl. He ignored the reiterated command. He crouched, stumbled, forced the girl to her feet and dragged her along despite her moaning protests.
And then it was . . . then . . . that he saw the Terra!
Far across the sands the gleaming ship rose, gathered speed, then skimmed away to the left where it settled again out of sight.
Clint stared, babbling incoherently. He gathered his strength and half ran, half stumbled in the direction of the disappearing Terra. Then he remembered the girl.
Leave her, Earthman. Leave her, and you can reach the ship!
Clint ignored the mental monotone. Once more he pulled Ruth up, forced her along. An hour later he again sighted the Terra, smooth and shimmering below the slope of a far away dune. “We’re winning!”, he babbled through the delirium that washed his brain. And as he stumbled forward, Ruth a dead weight against him, the spaceship rose once more to skim away in a new direction.
It was then that Clint collapsed. He glared at the girl. He could have made it if it weren’t for her! The shred of pity he had felt was gone. Dhaarj was right! If it weren’t for this weakling creature at his side—
He urged her on to greater effort, but now she was beyond all understanding. Almost, Clint was ready to leave her there, to admit that Dhaarj was right, that Survival was greatest, that the weak must perish. Almost! Because out of a great well of stubbornness he still clung to a half-forgotten idea. They must win! They!
Weakly, through feverish turmoil, through waves of nausea and a hunger that encompassed the universe, Clint pursued his course.
“It is time,” Dhaarj decided then. “The real experiment must begin. What is this figment they call love? We shall see!” he thought grimly.
Do not move the ship again, he flashed the command to his technicians far out in the desert. Proceed with the final step. Then he summoned his scientists, that they too might see the final outcome on the imperial trans-telector screen . . .
Clint’s mind no longer distinguished between the real and the unreal. Thought of the Terra, and Dhaarj, and something called an experiment, were gone as if they had never been. He knew only that for some time he had not moved, and hunger and thirst were coiled snakes within him that twisted and turned and sank sharp fangs into his flesh.
And now a thought was trying to penetrate. It was damnably irritating! It wouldn’t let him rest!
Food, the thought said. Food and drink. You are hungry when you need not be. There is food and drink for the taking. But you must hurry! It is near, very near. You must hurry!
He rolled over weakly and saw a great gleaming hull scarcely fifty yards away.
Food. You can eat. But you must hurry before the other one— Then he saw the food and drink. It was on the sands just beneath the great hull. A plate of food and a tiny jug of water. He saw, too, why he must hurry.
Some distance ahead was the other one. The other one! The woman, trying to reach the precious substance first! A great red mist of rage overwhelmed him.
He crawled, frantically. A gnawing anguish, gave him strength. He would not be robbed! The food and water was his! Had it not been promised to him? He felt he was not gaining. The one ahead of him turned her head once and glared at him through red-rimmed eyes, then increased her pace. Something very like a snarl came from his throat. He was superior! He must get there first! Faster, he urged himself.
Now he could see the tempting morsels of food, hardly enough for one! He sobbed with longing as he pulled himself forward. With animal cunning he calculated the distance. There was no longer any sound from the female one. He sensed that she was weakening fast . . .
Atop his throne Dhaarj watched with profound interest, huge eyes aglitter, his perceptive faculties vibrant. “Wait,” he told himself. “Wait until they reach the food. We shall see then what this figment of theirs means as compared to Survival!”
He had overtaken the other. He was but a few feet from the tempting food. His lips drew back in a snarl, but the female one gathered her strength for a last desperate lunge. Their hands fumbled, clawing for the food.
The tiny jug of water tumbled, spilling into the dust. A rich brown loaf crumbled and went scattering. The aroma seemed to drive the male
one to further madness. There was scarcely food for one! He must kill her first! He fumbled for her throat, found it soft beneath his hands. His fingers curved, tightened.
“Clint . . .” The word was followed by a moan. Again, “Clint . . .” as if that were the only thing she could remember or had ever known.
His hands hesitated. She stirred feebly, and there came another word. “Earth . . .” He felt the vibration of it through his fingers, along every fiber until it crashed upon his consciousness. Some of the madness left his eyes, the fingers loosened and he seemed to feel . . . he seemed to feel . . . something vague and stirring and strange. He became aware that she was trying to sit up, trying to speak other words.
“Clint . . . I tried to remember . . .” That seemed too much for her, and she fell back.
But it was enough. A sort of strength and sanity was returning to him now. He began to sob. He fumbled, found what little water was left and made her drink it, very slowly. Then he fed her, tiny morsels at a time, watching her swallow them with difficulty. Forgotten was his own immense hunger.
“You must eat too!”
But he shook his head stubbornly. “No! It was I who was weak, who forgot. You remembered! You proved the test!” Not until he saw the brightening color of her eyes did he begin to eat—and then very little. He came slowly to his feet, raised face and fists to the Martian sky.
“Not afraid, not afraid!” he cried for the benefit of Dhaarj. “Not afraid of you, or your planet, or your thought-potential! Not afraid of what you can do to us! Not afraid of you and your unemotional kind! For we are complete entities and you are not—and you will never understand!”
Together then, as strength returned, they staggered into the waiting lock of the spaceship.
Dhaarj sat dazed. His eight sprawling limbs were still taut with surprise. A frown wrinkled his immense puzzled forehead, but that was as nothing compared to the wonder in his brilliant black eyes. For a long time Dhaarj sat without moving, and not one of his scientists dared speak.
At last Dhaarj rose slowly, ponderously, from his great opalescent cushion. The others stared. In ten years this was the first time the Dhaarj had been known to rise!
Well, he thundered mentally, you have seen! What are you waiting for? Go out to that spaceship at once! See that it is properly provisioned and recharted for Earth on robot-control. I promised them that, and they shall have it!
Yes, your Illustriousness! the Head Scientist exclaimed, and sent workers to fulfill the command.
Dhaarj still stood there upon four of his limbs. His antennae were vibrant with amazement. This thing they call love, he murmured mentally. The greatest force—greater even than Survival! I still do not understand! He surveyed those around him, these greatest scientists of his realm.
Your Effulgence, the Head Scientist began. If I may be so bold—
Quiet! Dhaarj thundered in the sixth mental potential. I know what you are thinking! That now we have space travel. That we can take their secret and use it! Well, we will not—because we have a greater problem . . .
The Head Scientist winced. He knew what was coming. His eight limbs sprawled ignominiously as he tried to move backward to the door.
Dhaarj balanced himself on four of his limbs, pointed at the other four imperiously. I give you Love! he exclaimed. You will study it, you will experiment, you will reduce it to the essentials! You will analyze its component elements! You will report to me! I command you to study it—yes, for ten thousand years!
The End
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Don't Come to Mars!
by Henry Hasse
(with Emil Petaja, uncredited)
Fantastic Adventures April 1950
Short Story - 4546 words
When this famous scientist looked up from his bed and saw himself walking out the door, he knew why man must never make a trip to Mars!
Dr. Wesley Rahm stirred restlessly in the semi-dark of his bedroom. He shivered, but it was not entirely from the early March chill. He had just had a vividly terrifying dream.
He struggled desperately on that vague borderline between consciousness and sleep. A scientific part of his mind told him that this was no dream. Something lurked at the far end of the room, something that filled him with such terror that he could not cry out!
With a last prodigious effort he was wide awake.
Panic flooded him like a cold wave from the sea . . . and then he knew . . .
He must get back to his body!
Through the dim dawn-light he saw his own body standing over by the door. It faced him. It smiled at him. There could be no mistaking that tall slight figure dressed in his own clothes, the steel-gray eyes, the square face and pointed golden beard.
Dr. Rahm saw his body turn away. Awkwardly, it raised a hand to open the door. It looked down at the two arms with a most peculiar expression, and then walked out of the room with deliberate, ungainly steps.
Dr. Wesley Rahm, in his bed, tried to cry out. He couldn’t. The voice rose high and emerged as a peculiar whistling wheeze. That frightened him, and he did not try it again.
He watched his body totter across the hallway, clutch at the railing and disappear down the stairs . . . .
This is not me, the thought rose above his panic. At least, it cannot be the physical me! His scientific interest returned. Reaching to toss the coverlet aside, he saw a sleek, slate-black appendage, an utterly outlandish tentacle! He moved clumsily from the bed. He stood up on stumpy elephantine legs. His body was twice as large as any man’s, and it possessed nine of the appendages in varying lengths.
He made his way awkwardly to a mirror and steeled himself against the sight. The head was a triangular blob fringed with waving filaments whose use he could not determine. Two sight organs were protruding and bulbous. In place of nose and mouth he saw a circular set of tiny, gill-like slits. He waved the tentacles helplessly. Someone or something has stolen my body! But why, why? And why my body, instead of my mind?
Dr. Rahm put his mind to the problem. He felt sure that this must concern his recent experiments with the interplanet rocket fuel! Twice already the Government had tried to land rockets on the moon, with disastrous results. Dr. Rahm had worked for months on an entirely new type of fuel, and felt that he was very near the goal. No one except himself and Dr. Lawton, his assistant, knew the true nature of the work being conducted in his laboratories outside of town. But now, with his own body wandering somewhere under the spell of an alien intellect . . . .
Whoever or whatever it is, it cannot get very far. I must notify the authorities!
There came a light step in the hall, and before he could move, his elderly housekeeper pushed into the room with his breakfast tray.
“Fine morning, Doctor!” Without looking in his direction she went about arranging his breakfast on the little table. Dr. Rahm felt his alien body stiffen. He tried to move stealthily toward the bathroom. But he wasn’t accustomed to so many limbs, and they made a sound against the wall.
Mrs. Stringer turned. She saw him. The coffee-pot clattered to the floor. Her eyes became distended vortices of horror and she whimpered once, like a little dog that is hurt. Then her bony legs carried her from the room, and shriek after shriek accompanied her flight down the hall.
The police came with amazing speed. Dr. Rahm well realized his danger, knew that they might kill him in their idiotic excitement. But the numerous appendages hampered him, especially on the stairway. The police met him on the front lawn.
“Good lord,” Sergeant Mulhany whispered, falling back a step. “She wasn’t lying! There it is! Look at that thing.”
One of the policemen drew his gun, but Mulhany stopped him just in time. “Don’t kill it, you fool, or we may never learn what happened! I think this thing’s intelligent. What have you done with Dr. Rahm!” he cried, staying well away from the alien hulk.
“I am Dr. Rahm!” the Doctor tried to say. “My body has been stolen by—by whatever
mind belongs to this body!” But he could not even create semi-human words with the alien vocal chords, and only the weird whistling sounds emerged.
With some repugnance four policemen laid hands on him, half dragged him out to the street and into the police car.
“You fools!” Rahm tried to say. “Where are you taking me? Get in touch with Dr. Lawton, my assistant! He’ll know what to do!”
But they couldn’t understand him, and the strange sounds made matters worse. “Be mighty careful, boys,” one of the policemen said, “I read something once in a weird magazine, about one of these things. By using its mental powers it could blast—”
“Adams, shut up!” Mulhany said.
“What do you suppose the thing really is?”
“Search me,” Mulhany scratched his head, “Maybe something Dr. Rahm created in his lab, and then it destroyed him. I read that in a story, too,” he added.
They arrived at the station-house and thrust the tentacled monster into a barred room. They stood on the outside, surveying him helplessly, at a loss what to do next Rahm surged against the door and raged at their stupidity.
“Reporters?” someone suggested.
“Yeah, why not. We’ll make the headlines! Phone the zoo, too.”
“No, no!” Rahm tried to scream. “You clumsy fools, listen to me!” It was then, with the vehement thoughts, that he felt the fringe of filaments atop his head quiver. Suddenly it dawned on him. Those filaments might be a medium for telepathy!
Dr. Lawton! he thought intensely. Lawton, my assistant! Find him! Bring him here! He felt his mind reel with the effort, but he continued to send the thought with all the power he could command. He felt that he wasn’t getting through; but suddenly one of the men frowned and clapped a big fist into his palm.