The Martian
based upon the Third Prize ($15.00) Winning Plot of the Interplanetary
Plot Contest won by Allen Glasser, 1610 University Ave., New York
By A. R. Hilliard and Allen Glasser
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Wonder Stories
Quarterly Winter 1932. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
[Illustration: The water was evaporated by the ever-shining sun until
there was none left for the thirsty plants. Every year more workers died
in misery.]
* * * * *
[Illustration: ALLEN GLASSER who furnished the plot]
[Illustration:A. ROWLEY HILLIARD who wrote the story]
Many writers of science fiction, who have not given the matter much
thought, assume that a man of intelligence from one planet would
meet a cordial and sympathetic welcome on another world. It is
assumed that people are everywhere educated, curious about other
worlds and other cultures, and eager to help a visitor from an
alien race.
Unfortunately there is no assurance that such is the case. Even
were the members of another race, on another world possessed of
education, there would be bound to be among them low and brutish
elements. And if a stranger from another world, dazed by new
conditions and unable to make his wants known, were to fall into
their hands his fate might not be happy.
We have read no story that pictures with such clarity and insight
the experiences of a man on another world than his own, than does
this present story. With the basis of a splendid plot Mr. Hilliard
has worked up a simply marvelous story.
* * * * *
The rolling, yellow sand reflected the heat of the sun in little,
shimmering waves. It reflected the sun's light blindingly throughout all
its visible expanse, with the exception of one spot where lay a circular
shadow. In the great steely-blue dome of the sky there were no clouds.
The shadow, although not large, was very dark and distinct. The curved,
even line of its circumference was precisely drawn.
In the air was a persistent rattle of sound--a series of closely spaced
explosions, ever rising in intensity.
Suddenly a small, uneven shadow detached itself from the circular one;
and floated swiftly across the sand. The rattling sound increased to a
tremendous booming roar, and the large shadow began to fade. At the same
time, the smaller one grew steadily darker.
High above the sand, a man was falling--much too swiftly.
The surface of the sand had been shaped into hills by the prevailing
winds. These long, ridge-like hills, or dunes, were convex and gradual
in slope on their windward sides, but on their lee sides they were
concave, and very steep.
It was near the top of one of these steep slopes that the man landed.
His frail legs and body crumpled under the weight of his head; he
pitched forward, and half rolled, half slid to the bottom where he came
to rest more gently, the target of a small avalanche of sand.
Immediately, he began to struggle; and, failing in his attempts to
rise, stretched his slim arms skyward and uttered a sharp, squealing
cry, painfully prolonged. Far above him a spherical object rapidly
diminished in size. Fixedly he watched the sunlight glinting on its
polished grey sides; watched it shrink to a tiny ball, a point, and
then--nothing. He was alone.
The pressure was horrible. He buried his head in the hot sand, and
clapped his ears in a vain attempt to ease the throbbing pain. They must
have underestimated the weight of the Toonian atmosphere if they had
expected him to live long here! It did not hurt his body, but his head
was being crushed. He knew that he would soon die--and was glad. This
wild, senseless punishment would be at an end.
He opened his eyes again, and stared in growing fascination and wonder
at the great arched blue dome above him. Gradually the spectacle of this
weirdly beautiful canopy occupied his whole attention. It was like a
soft curtain of light blue material hiding the blackness of the sky and
the gleaming stars;--yet the sun shone through. For a moment he forgot
his loneliness, his pain, in rapt contemplation of the immense
perfection above him--but only for a moment. Then the explanation came
to him. That beautiful blue was the heavy atmosphere of Toon, which was
slowly crushing him to death! He closed his eyes.
The heat was terrific, but not as intense as he had expected. Toon was
nearer the Sun than was his own world--millions of miles nearer; yet he
was not badly burnt, and this puzzled him. The explanation must again
lie in the heavy atmosphere--serving as insulation, he finally
decided.... He didn't care.
He felt strangely detached. What signifies life--or death--to a tiny
being separated by fifty million miles from any of its kind? Deposited
on this strange planet, he had no hopes of survival; his only emotion
was astonishment that he had lived a moment.
He struggled to remove the parachute that had been so inadequate in
easing his fall. Movement--even the raising of an arm was serious
effort. He was glued to the ground by the tremendous gravitational pull
of a planet so much greater in size than his own. He relaxed.
Why struggle? With the passing of hope, all incentive to effort passes
also. He felt no distress at the thought of death. Life, not death,
would be freakish in this great wasteland.
And he was past anger now. What they had done to him they had done
through hate and fear. Only hate and fear could conceive of so fantastic
a torture for a fellow being. There was no satisfaction now in the
knowledge that they had feared him; nor did he care about their hate....
They had won. They would have their way, and all the people of the Loten
would suffer in consequence....
Loten! A wave of sick loneliness swept over him.... A point in the sky,
obscured by a weird curtain of blue--his home!
* * * * *
Certainly, no man had ever suffered thus! A surge of self-pity welled up
within him. Certainly no being had ever been forced to long for the
world--the globe which gave it birth! This horror was reserved for him
alone....
He clenched his fists. Reason returned to rescue him from emotion. Loten
did not exist for him. He was outside of the world--a tiny flame of
consciousness in space. And what did that amount to, after all, he asked
himself.... What, but Death?...
For a long time he lay there in the sand, quite motionless.
The sun was sinking. Its blazing heat was abating somewhat; its face was
large, and red. For miles, across the surface of the sand, the shadows
of the dunes were stretching out.... And out of the sunset a tiny speck
of black appeared.
Where he lay the man heard the sound of it--a steady drone, or buzz. At
first it did not catch his attention, its inception was so gradual; but
soon it became a roar, and he opened his eyes with a start. He had heard
no sound since the departure of the space ship--had expected none. An
uneasy excitement gripped him. He strained his eyes upward....
Suddenly, over the dune against which he lay, there shot a something,
roaring thunderously. He cowered down, stunned by the terrific sound of
it; but he watched it with wide eyes, as it moved across the sky.
It was T-shaped; with the cross-piece going before. Beneath it hung two
wheels. It gleamed metallically.
Without attempting to rise, he howled shrilly, time after time, catching
his breath in gasps--while the thing moved steadily away.
Following an undeviating line, it left him far behind, diminished to a
speck, and disappeared. The sound of it lingered when he could see it no
longer.
His breath came quickly, spasmodically, through parted lips; his throat
was tight, and his heart pounded. The staggering surprise of what he had
seen and heard left him incapable of thought. His mind was a racing
turmoil of questions. His contentment, his resignation were
gone--destroyed in a moment; and in their place rose a great uneasiness.
The return of Hope, to a man who has definitely put it away from him, is
a joy closely akin to pain in its intensity. His whole body shook as he
struggled with the sand, attempting to rise.
He had seen a machine, he knew. It could not have been an animal. It was
not alive, and it was made of metal.... A machine meant reasoning
beings. There must be reasoning beings on Toon--where Loten's scientists
had argued that they could not be! And machines that travelled through
space! Perhaps....
As the new possibilities of his situation burst upon him, his
homesickness returned a thousandfold; and he knew that he could rest no
longer--could not wait in the sand for death. He must struggle--he must
strive, until the end came--because there was a chance!
Immediately, his mind became purposeful, and he took stock of his
position. He knew that the whole of Toon was not like this great stretch
of sand. Thousands of years of observation of the bright planet had
convinced the scientists of the Loten that it bore vegetation--and
probably animal life of some sort....
But rational beings! His astonishment re-asserted itself. Five thousand
years of systematic signalling had brought no response, and the project
had lately been abandoned. Yet....
He shook his head, and returned to his problem. He must not waste time
now.
He had food enough in his stomach to last three days at least, and he
would not need water for even longer. He suddenly realized, with
enormous satisfaction, that the pain in his head was considerably less
than at first. Perhaps his system would be able to adjust itself to the
atmospheric pressure....
The great question was where--and how--to go. He must go somewhere. Only
motion would satisfy his craving for accomplishment of some sort. He
would get no help on this great, sterile plain. He had no guarantee that
another of the flying machines would come near him, and even if it did
there was not much hope of attracting its attention. No, he must
move....
He decided to follow in the direction the machine had taken. Its
destination might be near-by--or it might be thousands of miles away.
The probability seemed to be in favor of the former hypothesis, because
the machine had been moving so very slowly.... Anyway, it was a chance!
Pulling his legs up under him, he made another determined attempt to
rise; and finally succeeded in standing erect. But it made his legs ache
terribly; and when he tried a step he slipped, falling back with a
jarring thud.
He would have to crawl.
* * * * *
Ridding himself of the parachute, and with no further hesitation, he set
out, crawling slowly and laboriously, keeping the sun at his back.
The heat was less oppressive now. The sun had sunk to a point where its
rays were no hotter than at midday on his Loten; and he marvelled at the
similarity of the two climates. He had seen none of the water vapors
that astronomers described as almost constantly enveloping Toon.
Toon--what he had seen of it--seemed to be as dry as the Loten, if not
more so.
He climbed the long, gradual slope of a dune; and, after surveying the
endless stretch of sand which met his view at the top, slid down the
steep side, and crawled doggedly on.
Night was falling. The blue dome above him steadily darkened until it
began to take on the appearance of his own native sky.
He was dead tired within an hour. He lay still for a time, breathing
deeply--marshalling his strength. He was in excellent physical
condition, but here his body was so heavy that the slightest motion was
a strain. Soon, however, his eager spirit drove him onward.
At the end of another hour, happening to raise his head, he uttered an
involuntary cry. Points of light glimmered in the sky.... So he was to
see the stars after all!--though only at night, it seemed. He was
relieved. In the back of his mind had been the ever-growing certainty
that he would not be able to keep a direct course. He rested again, and
picked out certain designs that would be helpful as guides.
He wondered if one of them were Loten. They were very dim and they
blinked strangely; and their arrangement was meaningless to him. He
fixed upon one of them--the brightest--and imagined that it might be
_his_ world--where his friends were, and his enemies; where his wives
grieved for him perhaps; where his children laughed and played; where he
might one day return....
He crawled along through the sand.
It was not really dark--only twilight. He wondered if this were night on
Toon. It must be. Almost directly ahead of him--just a little to the
right--was a radiance close to the horizon. It puzzled him. Soon it was
spreading over the sky--a pale, ghostly light. Then a bright point
appeared--a line; it grew. He stared in abject wonder while a great,
white disk mounted into the sky, illuminating the scene around.
He rested a while, and watched it. It was Toon's satellite. It could be
nothing else. But beside it the two luminaries of his own world were as
pygmies. He was still watching it, fascinated, when he resumed his
journey.
CHAPTER II.
Signs of Life
All through the night he travelled; and into the rising sun. The noonday
heat forced him to take a prolonged rest, but he fought on as soon as
possible; and sunset found him crawling weakly onward. The cool of night
revived him somewhat. He knew that the strain under which he labored
would hasten his time of sleep, and that worried him. Even now, he was
often in a semi-conscious state. Still, he could not stop.
When the sun rose again, it shone through trees; and far across the
yellow sand his tired eyes saw green hills. The sight invigorated
him--spurred him on to stronger efforts. Soon after midday he lay
panting in the shade of trees.
The trees astonished him. They towered above him, fully five times as
high as any he had ever seen. Their stems were of enormous girth--rough
and hard to the touch. There seemed to be something moving in their
heavy foliage, far above him, and he heard faint, sharp whistling
sounds. He looked around uneasily.
The size of the trees worried him. If there were animal life, it might
be proportionately large. He shuddered. The desert, although
uncomfortable, had had one advantage: he had been alone there.
Still, it was not loneliness that he was seeking, he thought grimly.
Obviously, he....
He stiffened. He had been staring abstractedly at the coarse grass which
grew thickly around him. Now his eyes became focussed upon a movement
there--not three feet away. The grass was waving strangely, in a
peculiar, uneven line; and he caught sight of something slim and green,
that was not the grass. His throat contracted painfully. The thing did
not seem to move, yet it was coming nearer. Whenever he caught sight of
a part of its body, it appeared stationary; yet the waving of the grass
was closer, and ever closer. It was very close now....
Suddenly his power of locomotion returned. He rolled over backward, and
scrambled along the ground to a tree. Grasping the rough trunk, he
pulled himself erect; and held himself in that position, panting.
He could see the thing more plainly now. It was like a long, green whip
in the grass. Its forepart was raised in the air, and terminated in a
triangular head, with two bright eyes whose steady, unwinking stare made
him tremble weakly. With an effort he took his eyes from the creature;
and, pushing himself away from the tree, ran desperately, as far as his
legs would carry him. When he fell, he continued to crawl--farther, and
ever farther into the green woods.
He wondered if all creatures crawled in this world of Toon. Perhaps the
great gravitational pull made erect postures impossible.
For a long time he climbed steadily, threading his way through the
underbrush, skirting fallen trees. He felt increasingly drowsy. His
sleep period would come soon, he knew. He could not stave it off much
longer. And when he had slept, he must eat....
He came to level ground. Ahead was an opening in the trees, where a wide
ledge of stone was revealed. Out upon this he crawled, and gazed at the
scene that opened out below. Miles of waving tree tops met his view; but
what held his attention was a strip of silver cutting the green.
He felt a warm glow of satisfaction. Water, in his mind, was closely
associated with organization, transportation facilities, reasoning
beings....
Yet he must be wary. He had no idea what sort of beings they might be.
This might be a canal, but it was strangely irregular in its course. At
least he was making progress....
A peculiar, ringing sound came from the trees below. It was utterly
unfamiliar to him. Nerving himself, he determined to discover what it
was. He climbed down from the stone, and began the journey down the
hill.
As he progressed the sound became louder, and others were added. He was
puzzled by a low, intermittent muttering. It made him vaguely uneasy,
and with every moment his agitation increased. The muttering was now
very definitely spaced into irregular but continuous tones.
And he knew that he was listening to a conversation.
He was frightened. Now that he was so near to what he had been seeking,
his courage left him; and he lay trembling, flat on the ground, awed by
the booming voices of the creatures.
They must be very large, he thought, to utter such deep tones.
He had lain there for perhaps five minutes, when, suddenly, there came a
rending crash; and, peering ahead, he saw the green top of a tree sway
violently, sink, and disappear from sight. At the same time there came a
louder cry, followed by the blending of two thunderous voices, speaking
simultaneously.... Then a heavy thud, and another cry....
* * * * *
He crawled cautiously forward. He reached the fallen tree. Its trunk was
suspended above the ground by the projection of a number of its large
branches. He peered beneath it.
Directly before him, in a small clearing, two creatures were struggling
together. They stood erect upon their huge legs, using their crudely
bulky arms and hands to strike and tug at each other. They were
tremendous in size--fully three times human stature; yet their heads
were smaller than men's. Their erect posture gave them a weirdly
half-human look, which was belied by the brutal savagery of their
aspects. Their brows were low; their heads were covered with long hair;
and in their gaping mouths he saw rows of sharp, white fangs. Their
skin, instead of being golden, was a dirty grey in color, and was
covered with short curling hair or fur.
But he could see very little of their bodies, because--and this sight
seemed to him the strangest of all--they were almost entirely covered
with cloth. This woven material was brown in color, and shaped to hang
close to their bodies, even over the arms and legs. He lay very still,
watching the titanic struggle with ever growing wonder.
They appeared to be evenly matched. Once, one of them was hurled heavily
to the ground, but he leaped effortlessly to his feet. Both of them
grunted and uttered sharp exclamations at intervals. They tramped back
and forth, tearing up the grass, crushing down the small bushes.
They must greatly hate each other, he thought--or perhaps it was natural
for them to fight like this. Now one of them was tiring--the smaller.
Its movements were slower, and it stepped almost constantly backward.
Suddenly from its bulbous nose spurted a red stream. He shuddered. The
sight of these two strangely man-like creatures beating and tearing at
one another sickened him.
The larger creature was pressing its advantage, advancing upon the other
with cruel, flailing blows. Suddenly the smaller one crumpled to the
ground, and lay still. The other turned away. It seemed satisfied. It
grasped an object which was leaning against a tree--a cutting tool
apparently, consisting of an edged block of metal attached to a long
handle of wood; and without a backward glance at its fallen foe, made
off through the trees.
The creature on the ground was alive. He could see the rise and fall of
its breathing under the cloth covering of its breast. But the bright,
red blood was still running out of the nose. It had lost an astonishing
amount; and he feared that, unassisted, it would soon die. He must try
to help.
With wildly beating heart, he crawled under the tree trunk and out into
the clearing.
As he moved through the grass, he made a slight rustling sound, which
the creature heard. It turned its head, and stared directly at him. He
stopped fearfully....
The creature uttered a loud cry, and scrambled to its feet. He raised
one hand, attempting a friendly gesture; but the creature, after
watching him for a moment with wide eyes, bounded swiftly away into the
woods. He heard the thumping and crashing of its passage through the
underbrush long after it had disappeared from sight.
His first sensation was one of immense relief. He had been desperately
afraid.
Evidently the thing had been afraid of him, too. And that was
surprising.... Clearly, these could not be the reasoning things that had
built the flying machine he had seen. His relief was quickly followed by
disappointment. For a moment he had imagined that his first objective
had been reached. Now he realized that he might be as far from it as
ever. Toon was immense. Probably, now, he was in a country inhabited by
inferior beings--beings that would be constantly hostile and dangerous
to him. If that were so, his quest would end here, he knew. Sleep could
not be warded off any longer. He could not protect himself. Soon he
must eat--and there was no food.
He crawled into the bushes; and lay down, lonely and sick. He would stay
here. This was failure--and the end. But he was not sorry for having
tried....
Above him the sky was not blue, now; but a strange, dead grey. Nowhere
could he see the sun. The wind sighed mournfully in the trees.
He slept.