"Kill all Martians," the orders read. "They
are savages, and have no rights." But Special
Investigator Barry Williams and Princess
Deisanocta had other plans--plans that would
bring destruction to the despoilers by
releasing an age-old justice from the Crypts.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Summer 1945.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Barry Williams watched the last sunshine lance across the red sands of
the Martian Desert. The sun dropped abruptly behind the flat horizon.
With the black curtain of night, the usual sharp chill came to the thin
Martian atmosphere.
The cold bit into Williams through the warm ore-seeker's outfit he'd
adopted for this venture. He laughed suddenly, realizing why he noticed
the cold. His body was tense, rigid. Unconsciously he was crouching,
waiting, eyes narrowed, one heavily-gloved hand on his ray gun.
With the laugh, Barry relaxed, although his sharp blue eyes never
ceased their wary sweep over the rolling sands. His hand dropped from
the weapon. It would be useless anyway against the deadly white mist,
for which he waited.
That it would come, Barry never doubted. It was known and dreaded by
Earthmen in every Terrestrial Center on the red planet. In the past few
weeks, Earthmen had disappeared, vanishing for the last time into the
Martian night. Whispers said the white mist, the pale nemesis, sucked
the life from them.
Only once had Earthmen seen the mist and lived to tell of it. A
spaceship, beating toward one of the Centers on a night flight from
a desert camp, had passed over a pale patch on the red sand. Its
occupants, in their haste did not stop to investigate. Only later,
telling of the strange sight, did they realize it had been mist--on a
planet too arid for water vapor. Only then did they remember seeing
an Earthman making his way on foot toward the same Center, within the
patch.
Barry Williams' searching glance covered the terrain once more. Deimos,
the smaller moon, was already high. The larger, swifter Phobos was
rapidly overhauling its companion. Under their light, the scene was
clear. But it was so every night on Mars, yet Earthmen who ventured
into the desert at night died! Barry waited.
He waited as had the occupants of that Center for the man to come in
and tell the story of that strange light patch against the red sand.
In the morning a searching party brought in his body. The story would
never be told by him.
Nor by any other Earthman, it seemed. Later, a spaceship again sighted
the mist, and radioed that it was landing to investigate. Again,
Earthmen, now frightened and grim, waited through the Martian night.
Once more, a daylight searching party found only the dead.
"Ain't fer human understandin'," one superstitious miner whispered in
awed tones. "Twenty year I bin on this cursed planet--nor ever heerd
the like o' this."
"It's clear enough for me," answered a pink-cheeked youngster up to
Mars to make a fortune in rich ore dust. "I stay off the desert at
night. Only the miserable Martians can live out there then."
"Justice from the Crypt," a third muttered, quoting the threat of an
old Martian, dying from wounds he'd received fighting Earthmen. "It's
like from the grave--this mist, the way it creeps from the sand white
and ghosty!"
That was the spirit Barry Williams, special investigator for the
Terrestrial Bureau of Martian Affairs, found when he arrived. Behind
the fear were rumors, dead bodies, nothing more. At first, he'd blamed
superstition and the natural hazards of work in the desert. But now he
was here in the desert at night, waiting.
* * * * *
It wasn't for this he'd been sent to Mars, Barry told himself
half-angrily. His mission here was important. But this threat to all
Terrestrials on Mars was ominous. There were no government agencies
to deal with the threat here. Mars was just a frontier where untold
riches lay for the taking beneath some of the red sand.
The sullen, cowed Martians, working at the bigger mines, or following
their nomadic courses across the desert no longer attempted an
organized government. Despite their great majority in numbers, the
Martians played no part in running the planet. How they must be
rejoicing now, Barry thought, as death stalked their conquerors, death
striking from the desert in the night.
Suddenly, Williams felt an icy tingle course through his blood. His
hand dropped again to his ray gun, tore it from the holster. He stood
erect, fighting an urge to crouch low against the danger.
Along the crest of the sand-swell before him, something was rising.
Bright moonlight shimmered as the rays broke against a pale barrier.
To the right, the left, behind him, it was the same. The white mist was
rising, surrounding him. Escape was cut off. Even to reach his nearby
spaceship was impossible without cutting through. Barry tried to relax.
There was nothing to do but wait.
He remembered the words of the old Martian desert wanderer to whom he'd
spoken. This man had once been a chieftain, before the conquest of Mars
by Earth. His keen black eyes had bored into Barry.
"If you wish the answer," he'd advised, "go into the desert at night.
_You_ are different--_you_ may return. I can tell you no more."
Thicker grew the mist. A silver blanket, wrapping closer and closer
about Barry Williams. The moons and the barren landscape were blotted
out. All perspective vanished. High above, a tiny patch of stars was
visible--perhaps for the last time to Williams.
He gripped the ray gun tighter. The strange white blanket touched his
skin now--seemed to press against him with a great weight. He raised
the gun grimly, then a picture flashed into his mind.
One of the bodies that had come out of the desert had been shown him.
The dead fingers still gripped a ray gun. They had crushed against the
trigger for a long time--until the badly overheated weapon had at last
burned out, charring the unfeeling hand that had held it. But the power
that had brought oblivion had stood up against the ray.
With a grim smile, Barry replaced his weapon. The blanket was tight
around him now. He could see nothing. His limbs grew numb under
overpowering lethargy. His lungs labored, sucking in the mist.
Consciousness wavered. He reeled, stiffly. His muscles hardened, his
braced feet sinking deep into the sand.
Before his glazing eyes, a strange picture formed in the mist. A
beautiful Martian maiden, tall, slim, majestic--veiled in silver mesh.
On her lovely features was a look of stern judgment.
* * * * *
Was it fancy, or did the chanting of voices ring in
his ears, muffled weirdly by the shroud about him?
"Day--ees--a--nocta----Day--ees--a--nocta."
[Illustration: _Williams waited, seeing her come through
the mists._]
The picture, the sounds faded. At last his knees sagged. He pitched
face downward into the red sand.
For what seemed a long time, Barry Williams floated in darkness. Then,
to a tiny corner of his mind, consciousness returned. He fought to
retain it. The mist, he realized dimly, did not harm the body--it
paralyzed. While he could think, the battle was not lost. He called
upon the deep reserves of his mind.
Suddenly he was aware of sand digging painfully into the skin of his
face--the first physical sensation he'd know since he slumped forward
into oblivion. Hands tugged at his body, and the sting of the sand was
gone from his nostrils. He had been rolled over onto his back.
Wild hope surged through Barry. He struggled against the leaden weight
on his eyelids--without success. His muscles did not respond. He tried
to move an arm--a leg--a finger. It was no use. Slowly, he realized
what had happened.
Some power ruled his mind--had overcome it while he was unconscious.
For some reason, he had been _allowed_ to regain a very limited
consciousness--just so much and no more! Perhaps he would learn the
answer to this mystery. Why had the white mist not destroyed him?
A murmur of voices beat against his ears. He'd been given back his
hearing! The voices were low, soft. They spoke in a language foreign
to him--Martian he guessed. Words faded away. There was a moment's
silence, then the chant he had heard before.
Above Barry, a voice spoke to him in inter-planetary Esperanto:
"Son of Earth, you are not as the other Earthmen who come here to rob
this unhappy planet, and slay its children."
The voice was that of a woman, clear, musical, unutterably
sweet--pathetically sad. It paused; spoke again. A new note crept into
the words, ringing, thrilling:
"Go your way--leave in peace, but travel far from this planet. The Mist
of Mars will destroy all those who remain to despoil and murder here."
Williams felt consciousness slipping from him once more. He struggled
to speak. He must speak! These people must be told of his mission here!
But his lips would not move. Struggle was useless. Feeling was gone
from his body. The last sound he heard was the voice of a man, deep and
full:
"Heed the warning of the Mother of Mist. This once you have been
spared."