deepundergroundpoetry.com
The Martian Temple of the Beasts
- The Martian Temple of the Beasts -
In the ancient days of old, lost Mars, the Android War had come and gone, ushering in a new era that saw at least for a time some small measure of peace for the red planet. It was late in the afternoon, as I and my beloved consort Vira, soared across the surface of the largest desert in the flying hover-car that we had been granted for the occasion. Its' engines were quiet, the fuel it used designed so as not to too harshly impact the environment. It was a bit too fancy for my tastes though, with gold and brass plating and trim that seemed rather more than a bit on the gaudy side for a simple conveyance from one place to another. Vira looked as eternally beautiful as ever, if not more lovely than before! Being an android, she had a metal body that was able to cool its' inner and outer temperatures so as not to overheat during excursions such as this. For the most part, she now looked totally humanoid but with metal skin rather than flesh, and she was most artfully designed so that she could not only blink her eyes but also have very human-like facial expressions. She had been continually improving upon her looks every since we were married, in an effort to look as humanoid as possible, and the results of this self-experimentation were nothing short of astounding. Her soft, synthetic hair was in a long bob style that was all about her shoulders, with neatly trimmed bangs just above her brow ridge. I could touch her even in the hot sun of this mid-summer's day and she would still feel cool and normal due to her cooling systems. Unlike myself, she had the rather singular advantage of not being able to sweat at all! It was a muggy, humid day and I was sweating a great deal. Vira's eyes were an intensely electric blue, lit from within so that they so seemed to glow... and there were no simulated whites in her eyes either, they were simply all blue with a more deeper, intense blue glow in the irises that simulated the appearance of an actual eye but with an uncanny look to it. Her pupils widened as she scanned the vast stretch of wasteland that did lie before us, a look of wonder upon her face. She wore only a simple red leotard over her body, of a sort that resembled a one-piece bathing suit, and with that we wore a pair of matching red sandals, just to be fashionable, upon her feet. Upon her wrists she wore red cuff bracelets, and around her neck was a soft leather choker with a blue sapphire jewel in the middle of it. The gemstone glinted and sparkled in the fading sunlight of the day. Regarding my own appearance... it was a bit unusual, for a humanoid's.
My skin was totally green, and my hair was long and fiery red in color, kept away from my face by the golden circlet I wore about my head, which itself was adorned with a green emerald that glowed with its' own inner radiance. I had a mostly androgynous appearance to me, and was adverse to being called any one specific gender. On this day, I wore a pair of comfortable blue bloomer-like shorts tied at the waist with a drawstring. My feet had black sandals upon them in a kind of gladiator style that came up to the tops of my calves, and I had covering my chest a sleeveless scarlet red half-top. I wore a pair of black cuff bracelets upon my wrists with gold metal studs that decorated them. Around my neck I had on a gold necklace with an unusual gemstone pendant hanging from it. The pendant was half ruby and half sapphire, neatly divided down the middle. It, like the sacred colors of red and blue, symbolized the planet Mars and its' mother planet Rahab, which back then still sat in orbit between Mars and great Jupiter, for this was in that age... before Rehab was obliterated, leading to it becoming an asteroid belt. Vira and I were dressed not just comfortably, but reasonably, for the hot weather. The vehicle we rode in was at present set to autopilot as we took our time enjoying the sights before us. The flat terrain was a bit unremarkable, save when the occasional sand dunes might pop suddenly into view... but beyond some distant rocks was a line of rocky cliffs which loomed over the desert like how a mighty fortress over grassy plains might on Earth. Set into the side of the cliffs was a dark opening, a doorway carved by humanoid hands, although we could not be certain what might lay within. “There used to be a great temple built into the cliff-side there, it is said.” Vira explained to me, before adding: “Now, it is as you see it... the old grand structure had been long-since disassembled, leaving only that crude entrance.”
“What was the temple called, Vira?” I asked, curious. She replied: “It had an older name, but that had been lost to time. What survived, was the later name it was given by early historians. They had called it the Rakand'thar temple... which was also called the Temple of the Dead because no one has decided to inhabit it, or this region, in many thousands of years.” To which I responded: “So, it is not actually like an underground cemetery, or catacombs or anything, is it?” I inquired, to which the android answered: “No, not to my knowledge at least. It was just an old place of worship, but no one knows to what or to whom exactly. Some long-forgotten deity or another I would imagine! The dismantling of the cliff-side outer temple structure itself, happened a lot more recently in history... likely because some local desert tribes needed the materials to construct their own dwellings from, with resources out here being very scarce for the most part.” Vira stretched out a bit in her seat, then stood up in the vehicle to take a look a bit better at the distant cliffs. She had a slender body, a bit like a teenage girl's, and her metallic skin was a pale light gold in hue. In contrast, her hair was much lighter than her skin and not any kind of a golden blonde color but rather a more platinum blonde shade. She was a lovely, golden goddess and in this setting she was the most beautiful thing my eyes could see. I allowed myself to muse on this a bit as she seemed to gather her thoughts. She spoke again, saying: “So, do you want to go and check that place out? I mean... it is not like we have anything better to do today anyway.” and I agreed: “Sure, why not? I honestly never mind a bit of exploration when it is interesting. And this sounds very fascinating!”
We rode up to the ancient temple entrance, parked our hover-car, and went on over to give it a bit of a closer look. The entrance was cut smoothly into the rock face, evidently with some degree of skill. I had the notion that this opening, and whatever lay beyond, was created first... with the long-vanished outer temple having been added at some later point in time. If, we chose to go inside... we would be entering whatever was left of the original temple itself. I looked over at Vira and inquired: “So honestly, what do you think, my love... should we go inside, after all?” and she said, in her ever pleasant sounding voice: “I think it should be safe enough... but if it looks dangerous at all, we can always leave.” So, we agreed to go inside. As soon as we had entered the total darkness that so lay before us, Vira extended her right hand forward as a panel opened in her palm. Out of it extended a circular lens that emitted a kind of a flashlight beam so that we could see where we were going. “I had this installed not too long ago, just in case we ever needed something like it.” she explained to me, and I smiled, admitting: “That was a very brilliant idea, Vira! I almost had a mind for us to leave, when I saw how dark it was in here.” And her hand light worked well, enabling us to make our way further down the carved tunnel that seemed to go on and on into the cliff-side for a great distance. There were advantages to having an android for your wife! And this, was but one of so very many. My own physiology had advantages of its' own... I did not have to eat as often as regular humans did, and my body could even absorb nourishment from sunlight in a way quite similar to a plant. I found I had to bathe much more often though, so that my body could directly absorb some of the water as yet another necessary form of nourishment, but this was often able to be mitigated by simply opting to drink more water throughout the day. Vira brought our water cooler with her, and she was holding that in her left hand as we walked along. I could go many hours longer on these kinds of adventures than any human could... and in that way, Vira and I made for an ideal match.
Eventually, the tunnel opened up into a vast chamber with jade green-painted walls. Everything had a towering appearance to it... with the ceiling being so high above us that it was lost in shadows. Upon a series of low circular pedestals, were statues of noble-looking warriors and beautiful noblewomen, but who they had been meant to represent no one could guess. The walls were not adorned or ornamented in any way, except for having been painted... and the entire hall held all the silence of a tomb. “There is a sense of such... antiquity, here!” remarked Vira, and I said in agreement: “It must be impossibly old.”
It was a lot hotter inside the temple than even it was outside, and I was happy we brought along our water... just in case the heat became unbearable to me. Vira required no sustenance of any kind, being in essence a machine, and she performed all of her necessary upgrades and upkeep herself. I told Vira about how uncomfortable the temperature was for me, and she replied: “My temp-sensors indicate that it gets a lot cooler a bit further beyond this chamber... so if we head in that direction we will not only be that much more comfortable, but we might also discover the source of the cooler air in the bargain.” It was as decent a plan as any, so I let her lead me in the correct direction. We crossed a bridge that was spanning some kind of large pit, which began as soon as we had exited the previous chamber, and we hurried across it after checking to make sure the bridge was still safe and structurally sound. It was of the same rock that everything else in the temple was carved from, and it had not eroded at all over the long years since its' construction. The green paint that once adorned the bridge was peeling in places, but that was the only real sign to mark its' age. As we reached the other side of the bridge, I began to feel the air becoming a lot cooler, the temperature a great deal more bearable. “We are indeed going the right way, this feels better already!” I remarked. Vira replied: “Good! I am picking up some readings, but I am not sure if they constitute anything living or not.” And I told her to continue to monitor them.
A strange creature of some kind, about the size of a small cat, scurried ahead of us in the shadows on the sides of a series of large, wide archways. It looked like a beetle, but seemed to be made of metal. I asked Vira to scan it, and she remarked that it was alive but not in the same sense as anything that was organic in nature is. It seemed to regard us for a moment, but then the insect scurried off and was lost to our sight. We proceeded down the hallway before us, passing beneath the great archways. The deeper we went on, the cooler it got. “Some sort of air conditioning system is in use here.” Vira explained, and I remarked: “It seems the ancients who built this place were somewhat advanced after all.” By the time we got to the end of the hallway, we came to a massive door. The door was made of a dark blue metal, and was unadorned just like all of the walls that we had seen so far. It did not seem to have any obvious means of opening it, however. Vira noticed a panel on one of the walls adjoining the door frame, and with a bit of an effort she managed to push the panel inward, which triggered some kind of mechanism that enabled the door to slide open. We passed into a chamber that was yet even more massive than had been the first one that lay before the bridge, and within it were large machines that were humming and sparking a bit with arcs of electricity. These were the source of the cooler temperature, and seemed to be air conditioning generators. Wherever Vira's light shone, we could see numerous more statues just like in the first chamber, only these were in the grotesque shapes of great beasts, dragons, and monsters of all manner and sorts. All of these statues had chains and shackles about them, as if the creatures had been alive at one point and been restrained before being transformed into statues. Knowing that to be impossible... I realized that the chains and shackles were simply meant to be symbolic of the restraining of all those monsters and animals. “There is a deeper symbolism in this.” I explained to Vira, who then stated: “Perhaps it refers to the domestication of these creatures at the hands of the ancients.” and I had agreed with her that this seemed very logical to assume. There were countless thrones lining the walls, and above them tattered tapestries hung with unrecognizable images long faded upon their surfaces. A thick layer of dust was upon everything near the walls, which made me sneeze and cough a bit when the dust floating in the air hit my face. I did not mind dust in less troublesome quantities, but this was a bit ridiculous! Although not unexpected for a place that had been without habitation for as long as this had. All of a sudden, various lights began to turn on and the room became illuminated by electronic lamps suspended from the immeasurably high ceiling. We had not anticipated this, but it seemed to be due to some kind of unseen scanning and activation device that enabled the lights to turn on when the device sensed that someone or something had entered the chamber. It obviously took a while to fully activate.
To say that this place was reminiscent of a haunted house would not be inaccurate. It had a creepiness to it that made everything feel just a little bit off, without being wholly uncanny. We could hear voices at the far end of the chamber, and we made our way towards them. “I am detecting... no signs of life in this direction.” Vira explained, and that made me feel quite ill at ease given the very loud vocal sounds. As we reached the source of the sounds, we saw upon the far wall a projection being imposed upon the otherwise featureless surface by some camera-like devices that were mounted upon two pillars that had stood on either side of the wall. Much like movie projectors in their function. The scenes being played for us to witness were of ancient battles and wars that had raged upon the Martian surface in times that we had only thought of as days of legend and myth. The voices were those of warriors locked in mortal combat with one another, fighting to the death for reasons that did not seem to be apparent. As the odd projection continued, we saw images of the various creatures from earlier, being domesticated just as Vira had suspected was the case... and the next several scenes showed some sort of golden age where peace had been achieved. That was where the projection stopped, with the wall being bare once again. “That almost looked like a dramatic recounting of some bygone history that was important to the people who built this place.” Vira noted, adding: “Likely... rigged to trigger not long after the lights activate.”
We ascended some stairs next, which led up into some higher series of rooms that led off from that previous chamber with the lights. The air here was not as cool as before, but was still comfortable for me to breathe. There were grotesque murals on all of the walls of these rooms, depicting demonic and feral-seeming beings which appeared like things out of nightmares. I was startled to see them at first, and Vira had to calm my nerves by holding me and reassuring me that all was well. I was beginning to feel more than a bit nervous, the deeper we went into this place... and, I did not like that feeling at all. Soon, the rooms led to a triangular hall at the end of which was a pedestal upon which was some kind of glowing red glyph or symbol of some variety or another. Virati gave it a look and concluded: “It is some kind of activation mechanism... but I cannot even begin to speculate on what it might activate.” I ran my hand over its' surface, and it felt warm to the touch. “Machinery for certain.” I remarked. Vira asked if she should press the glyph, and I told her to wait a bit before doing so. “Those murals had a very evil look to them...” I explained, adding: “If they were intended as a warning, then this could be rigged with some manner of trap. Unless there is a way to be sure of that or not, we should not press it or even remotely attempt to mess around with it.” Vira suggested we go back to the entrance of this particular chamber. Then, she picked up a rock that she found on the floor nearby and threw it with all her might at the glyph. The rock struck it with precise accuracy, and there was a loud buzzing noise not unlike an alarm followed by the entire pedestal retreated into the floor. Two panels opened at the very point of the triangular room, and revealed a deeper passage beyond. “See? Not a trap after all, but I am happy we played this safe.” Vira said excitedly, exclaiming: “Come on, my love, let us see what lies beyond!” and so we pressed onward, eventually coming to a series of ramps that led down to a wide platform made of metal that was situated above an immense shaft cut into the floor. There was, on the platform, a raised control panel on which were two buttons. Each button had an arrow decorating it, one for up and one for down. “This looks like an elevator.” I said. We decided to take a chance and ride the elevator downward, which was the only direction it could go in at present. It made a humming sound as we descended, the elevator shaft being quite well lit indeed compared to the rest of the temple thus far. “I wonder where this goes!” Vira remarked. I offered: “Perhaps to the very core of the planet... alright, that I mean in jest... but really, I have no idea. We will just have to see.” With all this illumination, we no longer needed to use Vira's palm light, so she turned it off for now. It was a very long ride to the bottom of the elevator shaft, and by the time we got there we felt very much relieved. We found it had taken us into a large room, and in front of us was a door that had various blinking lights all around it.
“The lights run the whole length of the door's frame.” I noted aloud. The door before us slid open of its' own accord and we passed through it into a very strange area beyond. A long metal walkway with railings on the sides of it made of brass stretched before us, and beneath that was a massive shaft that was lined with humanoid-sized tanks, tubes, and cylinders on every wall of it, each tended to by various types of automated machines. Various wires and other components were attached to those containers, and there were fluids being pumped into and extracted from each of them. What was the most shocking was what the containers had within them! Humanoids, but ones that had been intermixed with the DNA of various creatures, animals, and monsters in order to create hybrids. I recognized this... for of old the Anunnaki had engaged in such experiments on many different worlds all across the universe. Their goal was to engineer a race of servants and slaves that would be loyal and obedient to their masters, without question. If this was their work, then that would explain the domestication of so many different types of creatures, and what the purpose of this... laboratory... was. They had been enemies of the Titan race in the past, and of the Archons who were the Titans' rulers. The enemies of my people! Now here I was, in a place that was a holdover from their clandestine experiments on Mars. And... I felt a sense of irony in that fact, for they were long gone from this temple yet I still lived and walked with impunity through its' halls and corridors, and chambers. I told Vira what I suspected regarding the true meaning of this place, and she agreed that my conclusion made sense. “They still engage in these twisted experiments... to this very day.” she remarked, an element of disgust in her voice. We passed over the bridge, crossing past a second automated door and into yet another hallway, this one with metal walls on which blinked many varied patterns of lights. That hallway led us at length into a square room that was filled with laboratory equipment and medical devices of every sort. In the center of the room was a raised altar, for so it had the look of, made of stone. Upon the altar was a white and red cloth... not faded like the tapestries from before, but brand new looking... and upon the cloth were various surgical instruments laid out, not at all rusted with time but seemingly still perfect, sterile, and ready to use. Various shallow pits and channels lined the edges of the room nearest to the walls, and much to my horror... within them were the bones of not just creatures and animals but of humanoids as well. Some were centuries old, practically ready to crumble into dust, while others looked a great deal more recent. There was even fresh blood in some of the channels. Whoever was still running this fell laboratory after so long, they were present here still.
A tall man stepped into the room from an adjoining chamber, and he appeared shocked to see us. He was about the height of an average member of the Anunnaki race, that is to say... exceedingly tall. Over the centuries, many of them had found ways of reducing their height so that they could appear and pass as normal humans, for otherwise they looked quite human except for those of their kind who had rather elongated heads and various other peculiarities to their physiology, such as grayish colored skin which seemed to be present in particular, among their royal families. At least... the ones with the oldest of all their bloodlines. This one was not like that at all! His skin was white, with a pinkish tone to it, and a bit pale from being down in this temple for so very long. His eyes were a light blue, and his hair, what was of it upon his balding head, was snow white with age. For old he was... perhaps, beyond the count of a normal span of years! He wore a long green robe with a high upturned collar, and yellow trim. One may not have been able to imagine a more wrinkled, wizened looking face. Nor one in which arrogance had more of a sway... for his haughty manner was apparent from the instant we laid eyes upon the man. He held in his hands a long silvery metal staff topped with a claw in which was clutched a glowing purple jewel. He was nobody I recognized from my past dealings with his race, and he did not seem to know me either. “And what have we here?” he said in an amused but somewhat distracted tone of voice, then adding: “A woman made of golden metal, and... whatever it is that you are, my green-skinned friend!” But I was no friend of such as he was, and I told him that I had no wish to be acquainted with him at all.
The ancient man then said, in a disappointed manner: “Already... you would judge me for what you have seen here, no doubt! But we, of the elder races, we have learned patience if nothing else over the centuries since last we walked the surface of this planet openly. You strike me as the type of being that is possessed of far less patience in comparison. Do you know the power contained in blood? Blood that is not spilled in senseless wars can be used instead for more meaningful things... such as the creation of new forms of life, ones that will be less inclined to rebel against our authority in the future. An end to such rebellion will ensure... an end to war, in the future!” and I said unto him in reply: “You have been out of circulation for far too long, I fear. The wars you speak of happened long ago, even before all our own recorded histories, and as for rebellion... I have found, that it is the best way to rally the people in order to best fight against tyrants such as yourself.” My words, and the tone I spoke them in, caused the ancient scientist to be visibly shaken. There was a mad gleam in his eyes following that, and he began to rant and rave like a lunatic, proclaiming: “So, it is still this way in the universe, is it? And, what do you know of the people you speak of! The people who pollute the atmosphere, who mar the soil, who defile the waters and who breed in such numbers that the very planet cannot sustain them. I was shown a vision one day... yes, a vision, sent from the gods of my people. Gods that the people of this world do not even have names for! I witnessed what this planet once looked like of old, before the first factories were built upon its' surface, before the people became so numerous... it was all green and lush once. No deserts at all save in tiny, isolated pockets. Have you not noticed? The deserts and wastelands grow as the years pass, expanding even unto the cities and towns... and one day there shall be no green left on the surface of the world at all. What will happen to the oxygen then? The very air we now breathe, will not be breathable any longer at that point. But I have a plan here, you see... a plan to change all of that. Once I have bred a reasonably large enough army of hybrid slaves, I will send for others of my race to come hither, from the worlds upon which we currently dwell. We will conquer this planet then, taking it away from those who currently call it home... and we will purge it of all their numbers. We will leave only an amount large enough, or rather small enough, to be sustainable. Then... they can live within the vibrant gardens that we will create, where they will have to tend to them and serve us without question. The hybrids will set the example for them, and in that hour the planet shall be saved! Is that not wise?”
The anger in me was seething by that point. “No, old man... that is most unwise of you to even thus consider such a wicked genocide! How will you signal your people to come here, old man? How... if you cannot speak!” Suddenly, I grabbed a scalpel from the table and rushed at the ancient scientist. I had slashed his throat clear across before he even had the chance to react to my attack. Blood poured from his wound, and he made awful gurgling sounds with a rush of air that could not produce much for words. Vira charged forward to pry the staff from the dying man's hands, and she pushed him into one of the shallow bone-filled pits, where he expired and breathed his last, his blood mingling with that of those he had over the years murdered in the pursuit of his perverse branch of science. “There was not any other choice to be made!” I exclaimed, and Vira agreed, saying: “I know... the logical thing to do, was to end his life. His continued existence would have imperiled all of the peoples of this world. But do you know what bothers me the most about all of this? He was very much correct about the damaged environment... it is getting worse each and every year that goes by, despite the government's best efforts to reverse it. Many of the nobles do not seem to care, and the factories have yet to fully clean up all the pollution that emerges from out of them. Work is beginning on all of those things... but I fear it may in the end be too little, too late to save the environment, as each summer seems to become hotter than it had been when last a new record high temperature was noted.” That was the irony of life on Mars back in those days... even had its' ultimate fate not ever been sealed along with Rahab's obliteration, it would have just died the slow death of a world decimated by humanoid-created climate change, in any case.
Vira searched for and found the controls for the medical machines that were keeping all of the hybrids alive. She told me that with a single press of a button, she could terminate the lot of them by filling the containers that held them with lethal doses of medication. “It would be a mercy, my love! They are all doomed to be slaves with no masters even if they could be released, which I would not recommend. It would be the equivalent of releasing countless domesticated animals into the wild... with no means of them being able to take care of themselves without someone to tend to their needs. They would die with time, no matter what!” and I agreed that she was correct. “Do it, then, Vira! The creatures should never have been created to begin with... and while we cannot stop such experiments on all the worlds they are happening on, at least we can stop the ones that took place here.” As soon as I had finished my sentence the deed was done. Vira pressed the button, and the machines did their deadly work. Now, this temple complex had at last become a tomb... one filled with the remains of a demented madman's life's work.
We took the scientist's peculiar staff with us and left the laboratory chambers as swiftly as we could, making our way back up the elevator, and into the hall with the projectors. As we made ready to leave the chamber, the projector cameras came to life once more and conjured a new image unto the wall that served as their movie screen. The image depicted an impossibly tall woman... about twelve feet tall in height... who was wearing a black one-piece swimsuit-style bodysuit. She was bald, with an elongated head and grayish colored skin. She had somewhat pointed ears, as well, and an overall slim build that made her seem more ethereal than physical in appearance. Aside from the bodysuit, she wore a pair of black sandals and was decorated with precious jewelry that seemed to sparkle. A necklace of precious gemstones, all finely cut and polished. Bracelets of gold, with jewels embedded in them. Earrings of delicate artistry, also adorned with jewels, only tiny ones compared with those adorning the bracelets. She was, evidently, of the highest nobility of the Anunnaki race. Her imperious sounding voice rang out and echoed throughout the massive room... and the following are the words that this image thus spoke.
“Greetings be unto you, chief scientist of the family of Da'thruk! By the time you receive this message I will have been long dead, for many centuries shall have passed since I recorded it. The staff you carry with you has activated this recording, which means in all likelihood that our plans for the red planet are in danger of being thwarted. It was designed to only thus activate in the event of an emergency with the machinery! It is my recommendation that the central computers be reset, so that the malfunction can be remedied. Otherwise, according to my research... there will be a meltdown in the central reactor, which will cause it to go critical in precisely one hour. You have, therefore only one hour in which to either so reset the central computer or evacuate the compound before the reactor explodes. This message will be repeated one more time, and after that the reactor's countdown will be engaged. Our secrets shall never fall into enemy hands! Long live the children of Anu, and if you do perish this day... may you die well.”
The message repeated itself a second time, and a loud siren rang out. “We need to get out of here, and quickly! Come on, we have to run.” Vira exclaimed, activating her palm light once again. We retreated as fast as our legs could carry us... all the way back through the temple's halls, until we were outside of that lost place once again. We got back in our hover-car, and sped away until we were far enough that we could still see the entrance, but yet be unharmed by the impending explosion. The hour came to its' end, and with it that terrible laboratory and all of the horrible secrets it had contained. The sound was like thunder, and a huge torrent of flame burst forth from the dark entrance in the cliff-side, along with billowing tendrils of black smoke. This made the rocky surface become unstable, and it seemed as if the whole cliff-side had come crashing down over the entrance, burying it forever. When the dust settled, it appeared very much as if there had never been anything built there, since the very dawn of time itself.
Vira and I turned the staff that had belonged to the slain Anunnaki scientist over to the far more sane and reputable scientists of the University of Jylestis, at the city of the same name. There, they doubtless would enjoy studying such a rare artifact, and perhaps being able to learn something useful from it that might be of benefit to Martian society. We told them how we came by it, and they congratulated us on its' retrieval... even though the heads of the university would lament the loss of a place that could have been of great archaeological and historical significance. “It was not really a very friendly place at all.” I explained to the chief scientist in charge, elaborating: “It was like being in a haunted tomb... where the ghosts of the past still walked to menace the living. We were fortunate to have escaped with our lives!” And in the end, the man concluded that perhaps things were better off this way after all. They never did discover quite how that staff worked, since without the computer systems it was tied into, there was no frame of reference to go by. It ended up being placed in a museum of antiquities, where families could bring their children to go and see this remarkable new find from Mars' storied past. Myself, I was happy to be rid of the evil thing, since I had no great love for the Anunnaki and their penchant for destructive technologies. On our way out of the university, Vira gave me some water to drink and I held her hand as we walked through the busy streets of the city. She smiled at me, and remarked: “You know darling, this was perhaps not a good way for us to spend our vacation! Between the heat of the desert, and that awful temple, and that mad scientist, and his disturbing experiments... I... oh, well, I cannot say it was not an exciting time at least. Although I was a little bit afraid towards the end that we were going to die in that explosion, at least before we made it out of the temple. Know what I mean?” and I smiled back at her, and replied humorously: “You know what, beloved? I had a good time too!” to which she said: “Let us just not make a habit of going to such places in the future, although admittedly I thought it was a good idea at first also.” And we laughed and made a fun time of our trip to Jylestis. It was a nice city, with a great deal of history to it. It had been named for a saint who was a devotee of the Martian god of the skies, Yr'zaus. It was said, that Jylestis used to gather various shepherds to the location where the city would eventually be raised in his honor... and there, they would ask him to bless their sheep and make it so that the wolf lizards would not devour them when they came in the night. The saint anointed the sheep with a special ointment, which kept the wolf lizards away from them. The shepherds thought this to be a miracle... and soon, more and more people came to see the saint and learn from him if they could. So many people present in the area eventually drove the wolf lizards away entirely, and all the gathered peoples (who had created a small settlement around the location where the saint lived) came to believe that this too was a miracle delivered by Jylestis and Yr'zaus. The settlement grew into a whole village, which over time became a town only for the town to become a great city, where the saint was buried within a magnificent mausoleum upon which an entire cathedral had been raised up. He became a patron saint of shepherds and a spiritual protector of the city named after him, at least in the religion of Yr'zaus. That was how it was in Mars back in those now ancient times... a strange union existed of spirituality and science, and there was nowhere you could go to on that planet and not fully notice this.
It had been nighttime, when we emerged from that forsaken temple... and, having spent many days in the city of Jylestis it was now nighttime once again on the occasion I shall now relate. The moons hung beautiful and full in the evening sky, and the Citaar insects were chirping in the grass. Above Vira and I were countless stars in all of their celestial glory. You could make out so many of the constellations on a night like this, and it was always a very romantic and enjoyable moment to savor the companionship of someone you love while basking in the glory of such a night. Vira and I lay in the grass next to each other, stretching out on one of the hillsides just outside of town. “Which star did you come from, way back before you came to Rahab, and then to our planet?” asked Vira of me, to which I replied: “You could not see it from here, to be honest. But I am glad I did come here. It was here, where I met you!”
Out in the desert... nothing stirred, within the rubble that covered the cliff-side where once the dark temple of the hybrid beast folk stood. However, not far from where the collapsed entrance lay... there was a series of holes in the ground. They were not large holes, but rather just humanoid-sized, caused by something, somehow digging its' way from beneath the ground until finally reaching the surface. A group of the beast-folk survived the destruction of the temple... and the laboratories it contained. They had been technicians there, and were not placed in the containment units like all of the others had thus been. The explosion drove them to act fast, and making use of some digging equipment they had on hand from when they helped to build the temple in the first place... they managed to gain their freedom unscathed by the destruction of the central reactor. They were very far from there now, searching for a new home where they would be slaves no longer. In later years, the legend of the wild beast men of the desert would be a tale told around many a Martian campfire. No one knew whence they came, no one save for Vira and I, and we were certain that even had we told anyone, no one would have believed us. Oh, the scientists knew! We had spoken with them at length about the whole adventure in the temple, after all. But they were too afraid of the truth being considered a heresy, since the tales of the beast men became accepted in several of the various religious faiths of Mars as a kind of cautionary tale whereby one should pray to certain gods or goddesses before venturing out across the desolate wastes... lest the beast men catch them and devour them. Many anthropologists went out in search of them, to learn all they could about the creatures... but none ever returned from those excursions, to say what they found.
As for the Anunnaki, they never did learn what became of their lost laboratory in the Martian desert. And if they had learned of it at all, they made no indication that they cared one way or the other. They had other matters to attend to and occupy themselves with back during that time, and there were many other worlds with similar experiments being conducted on them... where the experiments ended up a success, since no one was there to put a stop to them. On those worlds, gardens were built and human beings and other sentient races were made to toil in them... at the pleasure of the children of Anu, who had become as gods to them. On every world this occurred on, the people were kept in a primitive sort of state, often naked... and in numbers easy to govern. Easy to manipulate, and control as well! But on Mars, this wicked plot had been thwarted before it could commence. It would be some time before I would cross paths with the Anunnaki again... and for all that time I would be happy not to make their acquaintance. It was a large universe, after all, and one in which many threads of destiny were at work!
Back on that grassy hillside on the outskirts of Jylestis... my mind was not dwelling upon all of those serious matters, nor was I even aware of the enormity of them. The world of Mars felt small at that tiny point in time, and I was happy simply to be sharing my days and nights with my lovely wife Vira. We were on a kind of a holiday, a vacation from our normal routines. Despite the dangerous detour we had taken out in the desert, it had not been a bad holiday at all. A shooting star shot through the night sky, and Vira said to me: “Do you want to make a wish, sweet one?” to which I replied lovingly: “Beloved goddess of my heart, what need would I have of any wish... when all I could ever want in the universe, I possess already whenever I hold you close.” And we held each other very close after that, gazing up at the sky with looks of childlike wonder upon our faces. Today, you dear reader might be on many nights so compelled to gaze up at the night skies of planet Earth, and speculate about whether or not there had ever been life on distant but ever so close Mars. You might also be compelled to read through these, my deepest and fondest memories of Mars, written upon these documents, and wonder whether or not the events I relate within them ever actually took place. But take place they did! And Mars is but one world of many that I have lived upon down through the ages. The history of Mars, is tied intimately with the history of humanity, and so one cannot write of the red planet... without relating things very humanly.
In the ancient days of old, lost Mars, the Android War had come and gone, ushering in a new era that saw at least for a time some small measure of peace for the red planet. It was late in the afternoon, as I and my beloved consort Vira, soared across the surface of the largest desert in the flying hover-car that we had been granted for the occasion. Its' engines were quiet, the fuel it used designed so as not to too harshly impact the environment. It was a bit too fancy for my tastes though, with gold and brass plating and trim that seemed rather more than a bit on the gaudy side for a simple conveyance from one place to another. Vira looked as eternally beautiful as ever, if not more lovely than before! Being an android, she had a metal body that was able to cool its' inner and outer temperatures so as not to overheat during excursions such as this. For the most part, she now looked totally humanoid but with metal skin rather than flesh, and she was most artfully designed so that she could not only blink her eyes but also have very human-like facial expressions. She had been continually improving upon her looks every since we were married, in an effort to look as humanoid as possible, and the results of this self-experimentation were nothing short of astounding. Her soft, synthetic hair was in a long bob style that was all about her shoulders, with neatly trimmed bangs just above her brow ridge. I could touch her even in the hot sun of this mid-summer's day and she would still feel cool and normal due to her cooling systems. Unlike myself, she had the rather singular advantage of not being able to sweat at all! It was a muggy, humid day and I was sweating a great deal. Vira's eyes were an intensely electric blue, lit from within so that they so seemed to glow... and there were no simulated whites in her eyes either, they were simply all blue with a more deeper, intense blue glow in the irises that simulated the appearance of an actual eye but with an uncanny look to it. Her pupils widened as she scanned the vast stretch of wasteland that did lie before us, a look of wonder upon her face. She wore only a simple red leotard over her body, of a sort that resembled a one-piece bathing suit, and with that we wore a pair of matching red sandals, just to be fashionable, upon her feet. Upon her wrists she wore red cuff bracelets, and around her neck was a soft leather choker with a blue sapphire jewel in the middle of it. The gemstone glinted and sparkled in the fading sunlight of the day. Regarding my own appearance... it was a bit unusual, for a humanoid's.
My skin was totally green, and my hair was long and fiery red in color, kept away from my face by the golden circlet I wore about my head, which itself was adorned with a green emerald that glowed with its' own inner radiance. I had a mostly androgynous appearance to me, and was adverse to being called any one specific gender. On this day, I wore a pair of comfortable blue bloomer-like shorts tied at the waist with a drawstring. My feet had black sandals upon them in a kind of gladiator style that came up to the tops of my calves, and I had covering my chest a sleeveless scarlet red half-top. I wore a pair of black cuff bracelets upon my wrists with gold metal studs that decorated them. Around my neck I had on a gold necklace with an unusual gemstone pendant hanging from it. The pendant was half ruby and half sapphire, neatly divided down the middle. It, like the sacred colors of red and blue, symbolized the planet Mars and its' mother planet Rahab, which back then still sat in orbit between Mars and great Jupiter, for this was in that age... before Rehab was obliterated, leading to it becoming an asteroid belt. Vira and I were dressed not just comfortably, but reasonably, for the hot weather. The vehicle we rode in was at present set to autopilot as we took our time enjoying the sights before us. The flat terrain was a bit unremarkable, save when the occasional sand dunes might pop suddenly into view... but beyond some distant rocks was a line of rocky cliffs which loomed over the desert like how a mighty fortress over grassy plains might on Earth. Set into the side of the cliffs was a dark opening, a doorway carved by humanoid hands, although we could not be certain what might lay within. “There used to be a great temple built into the cliff-side there, it is said.” Vira explained to me, before adding: “Now, it is as you see it... the old grand structure had been long-since disassembled, leaving only that crude entrance.”
“What was the temple called, Vira?” I asked, curious. She replied: “It had an older name, but that had been lost to time. What survived, was the later name it was given by early historians. They had called it the Rakand'thar temple... which was also called the Temple of the Dead because no one has decided to inhabit it, or this region, in many thousands of years.” To which I responded: “So, it is not actually like an underground cemetery, or catacombs or anything, is it?” I inquired, to which the android answered: “No, not to my knowledge at least. It was just an old place of worship, but no one knows to what or to whom exactly. Some long-forgotten deity or another I would imagine! The dismantling of the cliff-side outer temple structure itself, happened a lot more recently in history... likely because some local desert tribes needed the materials to construct their own dwellings from, with resources out here being very scarce for the most part.” Vira stretched out a bit in her seat, then stood up in the vehicle to take a look a bit better at the distant cliffs. She had a slender body, a bit like a teenage girl's, and her metallic skin was a pale light gold in hue. In contrast, her hair was much lighter than her skin and not any kind of a golden blonde color but rather a more platinum blonde shade. She was a lovely, golden goddess and in this setting she was the most beautiful thing my eyes could see. I allowed myself to muse on this a bit as she seemed to gather her thoughts. She spoke again, saying: “So, do you want to go and check that place out? I mean... it is not like we have anything better to do today anyway.” and I agreed: “Sure, why not? I honestly never mind a bit of exploration when it is interesting. And this sounds very fascinating!”
We rode up to the ancient temple entrance, parked our hover-car, and went on over to give it a bit of a closer look. The entrance was cut smoothly into the rock face, evidently with some degree of skill. I had the notion that this opening, and whatever lay beyond, was created first... with the long-vanished outer temple having been added at some later point in time. If, we chose to go inside... we would be entering whatever was left of the original temple itself. I looked over at Vira and inquired: “So honestly, what do you think, my love... should we go inside, after all?” and she said, in her ever pleasant sounding voice: “I think it should be safe enough... but if it looks dangerous at all, we can always leave.” So, we agreed to go inside. As soon as we had entered the total darkness that so lay before us, Vira extended her right hand forward as a panel opened in her palm. Out of it extended a circular lens that emitted a kind of a flashlight beam so that we could see where we were going. “I had this installed not too long ago, just in case we ever needed something like it.” she explained to me, and I smiled, admitting: “That was a very brilliant idea, Vira! I almost had a mind for us to leave, when I saw how dark it was in here.” And her hand light worked well, enabling us to make our way further down the carved tunnel that seemed to go on and on into the cliff-side for a great distance. There were advantages to having an android for your wife! And this, was but one of so very many. My own physiology had advantages of its' own... I did not have to eat as often as regular humans did, and my body could even absorb nourishment from sunlight in a way quite similar to a plant. I found I had to bathe much more often though, so that my body could directly absorb some of the water as yet another necessary form of nourishment, but this was often able to be mitigated by simply opting to drink more water throughout the day. Vira brought our water cooler with her, and she was holding that in her left hand as we walked along. I could go many hours longer on these kinds of adventures than any human could... and in that way, Vira and I made for an ideal match.
Eventually, the tunnel opened up into a vast chamber with jade green-painted walls. Everything had a towering appearance to it... with the ceiling being so high above us that it was lost in shadows. Upon a series of low circular pedestals, were statues of noble-looking warriors and beautiful noblewomen, but who they had been meant to represent no one could guess. The walls were not adorned or ornamented in any way, except for having been painted... and the entire hall held all the silence of a tomb. “There is a sense of such... antiquity, here!” remarked Vira, and I said in agreement: “It must be impossibly old.”
It was a lot hotter inside the temple than even it was outside, and I was happy we brought along our water... just in case the heat became unbearable to me. Vira required no sustenance of any kind, being in essence a machine, and she performed all of her necessary upgrades and upkeep herself. I told Vira about how uncomfortable the temperature was for me, and she replied: “My temp-sensors indicate that it gets a lot cooler a bit further beyond this chamber... so if we head in that direction we will not only be that much more comfortable, but we might also discover the source of the cooler air in the bargain.” It was as decent a plan as any, so I let her lead me in the correct direction. We crossed a bridge that was spanning some kind of large pit, which began as soon as we had exited the previous chamber, and we hurried across it after checking to make sure the bridge was still safe and structurally sound. It was of the same rock that everything else in the temple was carved from, and it had not eroded at all over the long years since its' construction. The green paint that once adorned the bridge was peeling in places, but that was the only real sign to mark its' age. As we reached the other side of the bridge, I began to feel the air becoming a lot cooler, the temperature a great deal more bearable. “We are indeed going the right way, this feels better already!” I remarked. Vira replied: “Good! I am picking up some readings, but I am not sure if they constitute anything living or not.” And I told her to continue to monitor them.
A strange creature of some kind, about the size of a small cat, scurried ahead of us in the shadows on the sides of a series of large, wide archways. It looked like a beetle, but seemed to be made of metal. I asked Vira to scan it, and she remarked that it was alive but not in the same sense as anything that was organic in nature is. It seemed to regard us for a moment, but then the insect scurried off and was lost to our sight. We proceeded down the hallway before us, passing beneath the great archways. The deeper we went on, the cooler it got. “Some sort of air conditioning system is in use here.” Vira explained, and I remarked: “It seems the ancients who built this place were somewhat advanced after all.” By the time we got to the end of the hallway, we came to a massive door. The door was made of a dark blue metal, and was unadorned just like all of the walls that we had seen so far. It did not seem to have any obvious means of opening it, however. Vira noticed a panel on one of the walls adjoining the door frame, and with a bit of an effort she managed to push the panel inward, which triggered some kind of mechanism that enabled the door to slide open. We passed into a chamber that was yet even more massive than had been the first one that lay before the bridge, and within it were large machines that were humming and sparking a bit with arcs of electricity. These were the source of the cooler temperature, and seemed to be air conditioning generators. Wherever Vira's light shone, we could see numerous more statues just like in the first chamber, only these were in the grotesque shapes of great beasts, dragons, and monsters of all manner and sorts. All of these statues had chains and shackles about them, as if the creatures had been alive at one point and been restrained before being transformed into statues. Knowing that to be impossible... I realized that the chains and shackles were simply meant to be symbolic of the restraining of all those monsters and animals. “There is a deeper symbolism in this.” I explained to Vira, who then stated: “Perhaps it refers to the domestication of these creatures at the hands of the ancients.” and I had agreed with her that this seemed very logical to assume. There were countless thrones lining the walls, and above them tattered tapestries hung with unrecognizable images long faded upon their surfaces. A thick layer of dust was upon everything near the walls, which made me sneeze and cough a bit when the dust floating in the air hit my face. I did not mind dust in less troublesome quantities, but this was a bit ridiculous! Although not unexpected for a place that had been without habitation for as long as this had. All of a sudden, various lights began to turn on and the room became illuminated by electronic lamps suspended from the immeasurably high ceiling. We had not anticipated this, but it seemed to be due to some kind of unseen scanning and activation device that enabled the lights to turn on when the device sensed that someone or something had entered the chamber. It obviously took a while to fully activate.
To say that this place was reminiscent of a haunted house would not be inaccurate. It had a creepiness to it that made everything feel just a little bit off, without being wholly uncanny. We could hear voices at the far end of the chamber, and we made our way towards them. “I am detecting... no signs of life in this direction.” Vira explained, and that made me feel quite ill at ease given the very loud vocal sounds. As we reached the source of the sounds, we saw upon the far wall a projection being imposed upon the otherwise featureless surface by some camera-like devices that were mounted upon two pillars that had stood on either side of the wall. Much like movie projectors in their function. The scenes being played for us to witness were of ancient battles and wars that had raged upon the Martian surface in times that we had only thought of as days of legend and myth. The voices were those of warriors locked in mortal combat with one another, fighting to the death for reasons that did not seem to be apparent. As the odd projection continued, we saw images of the various creatures from earlier, being domesticated just as Vira had suspected was the case... and the next several scenes showed some sort of golden age where peace had been achieved. That was where the projection stopped, with the wall being bare once again. “That almost looked like a dramatic recounting of some bygone history that was important to the people who built this place.” Vira noted, adding: “Likely... rigged to trigger not long after the lights activate.”
We ascended some stairs next, which led up into some higher series of rooms that led off from that previous chamber with the lights. The air here was not as cool as before, but was still comfortable for me to breathe. There were grotesque murals on all of the walls of these rooms, depicting demonic and feral-seeming beings which appeared like things out of nightmares. I was startled to see them at first, and Vira had to calm my nerves by holding me and reassuring me that all was well. I was beginning to feel more than a bit nervous, the deeper we went into this place... and, I did not like that feeling at all. Soon, the rooms led to a triangular hall at the end of which was a pedestal upon which was some kind of glowing red glyph or symbol of some variety or another. Virati gave it a look and concluded: “It is some kind of activation mechanism... but I cannot even begin to speculate on what it might activate.” I ran my hand over its' surface, and it felt warm to the touch. “Machinery for certain.” I remarked. Vira asked if she should press the glyph, and I told her to wait a bit before doing so. “Those murals had a very evil look to them...” I explained, adding: “If they were intended as a warning, then this could be rigged with some manner of trap. Unless there is a way to be sure of that or not, we should not press it or even remotely attempt to mess around with it.” Vira suggested we go back to the entrance of this particular chamber. Then, she picked up a rock that she found on the floor nearby and threw it with all her might at the glyph. The rock struck it with precise accuracy, and there was a loud buzzing noise not unlike an alarm followed by the entire pedestal retreated into the floor. Two panels opened at the very point of the triangular room, and revealed a deeper passage beyond. “See? Not a trap after all, but I am happy we played this safe.” Vira said excitedly, exclaiming: “Come on, my love, let us see what lies beyond!” and so we pressed onward, eventually coming to a series of ramps that led down to a wide platform made of metal that was situated above an immense shaft cut into the floor. There was, on the platform, a raised control panel on which were two buttons. Each button had an arrow decorating it, one for up and one for down. “This looks like an elevator.” I said. We decided to take a chance and ride the elevator downward, which was the only direction it could go in at present. It made a humming sound as we descended, the elevator shaft being quite well lit indeed compared to the rest of the temple thus far. “I wonder where this goes!” Vira remarked. I offered: “Perhaps to the very core of the planet... alright, that I mean in jest... but really, I have no idea. We will just have to see.” With all this illumination, we no longer needed to use Vira's palm light, so she turned it off for now. It was a very long ride to the bottom of the elevator shaft, and by the time we got there we felt very much relieved. We found it had taken us into a large room, and in front of us was a door that had various blinking lights all around it.
“The lights run the whole length of the door's frame.” I noted aloud. The door before us slid open of its' own accord and we passed through it into a very strange area beyond. A long metal walkway with railings on the sides of it made of brass stretched before us, and beneath that was a massive shaft that was lined with humanoid-sized tanks, tubes, and cylinders on every wall of it, each tended to by various types of automated machines. Various wires and other components were attached to those containers, and there were fluids being pumped into and extracted from each of them. What was the most shocking was what the containers had within them! Humanoids, but ones that had been intermixed with the DNA of various creatures, animals, and monsters in order to create hybrids. I recognized this... for of old the Anunnaki had engaged in such experiments on many different worlds all across the universe. Their goal was to engineer a race of servants and slaves that would be loyal and obedient to their masters, without question. If this was their work, then that would explain the domestication of so many different types of creatures, and what the purpose of this... laboratory... was. They had been enemies of the Titan race in the past, and of the Archons who were the Titans' rulers. The enemies of my people! Now here I was, in a place that was a holdover from their clandestine experiments on Mars. And... I felt a sense of irony in that fact, for they were long gone from this temple yet I still lived and walked with impunity through its' halls and corridors, and chambers. I told Vira what I suspected regarding the true meaning of this place, and she agreed that my conclusion made sense. “They still engage in these twisted experiments... to this very day.” she remarked, an element of disgust in her voice. We passed over the bridge, crossing past a second automated door and into yet another hallway, this one with metal walls on which blinked many varied patterns of lights. That hallway led us at length into a square room that was filled with laboratory equipment and medical devices of every sort. In the center of the room was a raised altar, for so it had the look of, made of stone. Upon the altar was a white and red cloth... not faded like the tapestries from before, but brand new looking... and upon the cloth were various surgical instruments laid out, not at all rusted with time but seemingly still perfect, sterile, and ready to use. Various shallow pits and channels lined the edges of the room nearest to the walls, and much to my horror... within them were the bones of not just creatures and animals but of humanoids as well. Some were centuries old, practically ready to crumble into dust, while others looked a great deal more recent. There was even fresh blood in some of the channels. Whoever was still running this fell laboratory after so long, they were present here still.
A tall man stepped into the room from an adjoining chamber, and he appeared shocked to see us. He was about the height of an average member of the Anunnaki race, that is to say... exceedingly tall. Over the centuries, many of them had found ways of reducing their height so that they could appear and pass as normal humans, for otherwise they looked quite human except for those of their kind who had rather elongated heads and various other peculiarities to their physiology, such as grayish colored skin which seemed to be present in particular, among their royal families. At least... the ones with the oldest of all their bloodlines. This one was not like that at all! His skin was white, with a pinkish tone to it, and a bit pale from being down in this temple for so very long. His eyes were a light blue, and his hair, what was of it upon his balding head, was snow white with age. For old he was... perhaps, beyond the count of a normal span of years! He wore a long green robe with a high upturned collar, and yellow trim. One may not have been able to imagine a more wrinkled, wizened looking face. Nor one in which arrogance had more of a sway... for his haughty manner was apparent from the instant we laid eyes upon the man. He held in his hands a long silvery metal staff topped with a claw in which was clutched a glowing purple jewel. He was nobody I recognized from my past dealings with his race, and he did not seem to know me either. “And what have we here?” he said in an amused but somewhat distracted tone of voice, then adding: “A woman made of golden metal, and... whatever it is that you are, my green-skinned friend!” But I was no friend of such as he was, and I told him that I had no wish to be acquainted with him at all.
The ancient man then said, in a disappointed manner: “Already... you would judge me for what you have seen here, no doubt! But we, of the elder races, we have learned patience if nothing else over the centuries since last we walked the surface of this planet openly. You strike me as the type of being that is possessed of far less patience in comparison. Do you know the power contained in blood? Blood that is not spilled in senseless wars can be used instead for more meaningful things... such as the creation of new forms of life, ones that will be less inclined to rebel against our authority in the future. An end to such rebellion will ensure... an end to war, in the future!” and I said unto him in reply: “You have been out of circulation for far too long, I fear. The wars you speak of happened long ago, even before all our own recorded histories, and as for rebellion... I have found, that it is the best way to rally the people in order to best fight against tyrants such as yourself.” My words, and the tone I spoke them in, caused the ancient scientist to be visibly shaken. There was a mad gleam in his eyes following that, and he began to rant and rave like a lunatic, proclaiming: “So, it is still this way in the universe, is it? And, what do you know of the people you speak of! The people who pollute the atmosphere, who mar the soil, who defile the waters and who breed in such numbers that the very planet cannot sustain them. I was shown a vision one day... yes, a vision, sent from the gods of my people. Gods that the people of this world do not even have names for! I witnessed what this planet once looked like of old, before the first factories were built upon its' surface, before the people became so numerous... it was all green and lush once. No deserts at all save in tiny, isolated pockets. Have you not noticed? The deserts and wastelands grow as the years pass, expanding even unto the cities and towns... and one day there shall be no green left on the surface of the world at all. What will happen to the oxygen then? The very air we now breathe, will not be breathable any longer at that point. But I have a plan here, you see... a plan to change all of that. Once I have bred a reasonably large enough army of hybrid slaves, I will send for others of my race to come hither, from the worlds upon which we currently dwell. We will conquer this planet then, taking it away from those who currently call it home... and we will purge it of all their numbers. We will leave only an amount large enough, or rather small enough, to be sustainable. Then... they can live within the vibrant gardens that we will create, where they will have to tend to them and serve us without question. The hybrids will set the example for them, and in that hour the planet shall be saved! Is that not wise?”
The anger in me was seething by that point. “No, old man... that is most unwise of you to even thus consider such a wicked genocide! How will you signal your people to come here, old man? How... if you cannot speak!” Suddenly, I grabbed a scalpel from the table and rushed at the ancient scientist. I had slashed his throat clear across before he even had the chance to react to my attack. Blood poured from his wound, and he made awful gurgling sounds with a rush of air that could not produce much for words. Vira charged forward to pry the staff from the dying man's hands, and she pushed him into one of the shallow bone-filled pits, where he expired and breathed his last, his blood mingling with that of those he had over the years murdered in the pursuit of his perverse branch of science. “There was not any other choice to be made!” I exclaimed, and Vira agreed, saying: “I know... the logical thing to do, was to end his life. His continued existence would have imperiled all of the peoples of this world. But do you know what bothers me the most about all of this? He was very much correct about the damaged environment... it is getting worse each and every year that goes by, despite the government's best efforts to reverse it. Many of the nobles do not seem to care, and the factories have yet to fully clean up all the pollution that emerges from out of them. Work is beginning on all of those things... but I fear it may in the end be too little, too late to save the environment, as each summer seems to become hotter than it had been when last a new record high temperature was noted.” That was the irony of life on Mars back in those days... even had its' ultimate fate not ever been sealed along with Rahab's obliteration, it would have just died the slow death of a world decimated by humanoid-created climate change, in any case.
Vira searched for and found the controls for the medical machines that were keeping all of the hybrids alive. She told me that with a single press of a button, she could terminate the lot of them by filling the containers that held them with lethal doses of medication. “It would be a mercy, my love! They are all doomed to be slaves with no masters even if they could be released, which I would not recommend. It would be the equivalent of releasing countless domesticated animals into the wild... with no means of them being able to take care of themselves without someone to tend to their needs. They would die with time, no matter what!” and I agreed that she was correct. “Do it, then, Vira! The creatures should never have been created to begin with... and while we cannot stop such experiments on all the worlds they are happening on, at least we can stop the ones that took place here.” As soon as I had finished my sentence the deed was done. Vira pressed the button, and the machines did their deadly work. Now, this temple complex had at last become a tomb... one filled with the remains of a demented madman's life's work.
We took the scientist's peculiar staff with us and left the laboratory chambers as swiftly as we could, making our way back up the elevator, and into the hall with the projectors. As we made ready to leave the chamber, the projector cameras came to life once more and conjured a new image unto the wall that served as their movie screen. The image depicted an impossibly tall woman... about twelve feet tall in height... who was wearing a black one-piece swimsuit-style bodysuit. She was bald, with an elongated head and grayish colored skin. She had somewhat pointed ears, as well, and an overall slim build that made her seem more ethereal than physical in appearance. Aside from the bodysuit, she wore a pair of black sandals and was decorated with precious jewelry that seemed to sparkle. A necklace of precious gemstones, all finely cut and polished. Bracelets of gold, with jewels embedded in them. Earrings of delicate artistry, also adorned with jewels, only tiny ones compared with those adorning the bracelets. She was, evidently, of the highest nobility of the Anunnaki race. Her imperious sounding voice rang out and echoed throughout the massive room... and the following are the words that this image thus spoke.
“Greetings be unto you, chief scientist of the family of Da'thruk! By the time you receive this message I will have been long dead, for many centuries shall have passed since I recorded it. The staff you carry with you has activated this recording, which means in all likelihood that our plans for the red planet are in danger of being thwarted. It was designed to only thus activate in the event of an emergency with the machinery! It is my recommendation that the central computers be reset, so that the malfunction can be remedied. Otherwise, according to my research... there will be a meltdown in the central reactor, which will cause it to go critical in precisely one hour. You have, therefore only one hour in which to either so reset the central computer or evacuate the compound before the reactor explodes. This message will be repeated one more time, and after that the reactor's countdown will be engaged. Our secrets shall never fall into enemy hands! Long live the children of Anu, and if you do perish this day... may you die well.”
The message repeated itself a second time, and a loud siren rang out. “We need to get out of here, and quickly! Come on, we have to run.” Vira exclaimed, activating her palm light once again. We retreated as fast as our legs could carry us... all the way back through the temple's halls, until we were outside of that lost place once again. We got back in our hover-car, and sped away until we were far enough that we could still see the entrance, but yet be unharmed by the impending explosion. The hour came to its' end, and with it that terrible laboratory and all of the horrible secrets it had contained. The sound was like thunder, and a huge torrent of flame burst forth from the dark entrance in the cliff-side, along with billowing tendrils of black smoke. This made the rocky surface become unstable, and it seemed as if the whole cliff-side had come crashing down over the entrance, burying it forever. When the dust settled, it appeared very much as if there had never been anything built there, since the very dawn of time itself.
Vira and I turned the staff that had belonged to the slain Anunnaki scientist over to the far more sane and reputable scientists of the University of Jylestis, at the city of the same name. There, they doubtless would enjoy studying such a rare artifact, and perhaps being able to learn something useful from it that might be of benefit to Martian society. We told them how we came by it, and they congratulated us on its' retrieval... even though the heads of the university would lament the loss of a place that could have been of great archaeological and historical significance. “It was not really a very friendly place at all.” I explained to the chief scientist in charge, elaborating: “It was like being in a haunted tomb... where the ghosts of the past still walked to menace the living. We were fortunate to have escaped with our lives!” And in the end, the man concluded that perhaps things were better off this way after all. They never did discover quite how that staff worked, since without the computer systems it was tied into, there was no frame of reference to go by. It ended up being placed in a museum of antiquities, where families could bring their children to go and see this remarkable new find from Mars' storied past. Myself, I was happy to be rid of the evil thing, since I had no great love for the Anunnaki and their penchant for destructive technologies. On our way out of the university, Vira gave me some water to drink and I held her hand as we walked through the busy streets of the city. She smiled at me, and remarked: “You know darling, this was perhaps not a good way for us to spend our vacation! Between the heat of the desert, and that awful temple, and that mad scientist, and his disturbing experiments... I... oh, well, I cannot say it was not an exciting time at least. Although I was a little bit afraid towards the end that we were going to die in that explosion, at least before we made it out of the temple. Know what I mean?” and I smiled back at her, and replied humorously: “You know what, beloved? I had a good time too!” to which she said: “Let us just not make a habit of going to such places in the future, although admittedly I thought it was a good idea at first also.” And we laughed and made a fun time of our trip to Jylestis. It was a nice city, with a great deal of history to it. It had been named for a saint who was a devotee of the Martian god of the skies, Yr'zaus. It was said, that Jylestis used to gather various shepherds to the location where the city would eventually be raised in his honor... and there, they would ask him to bless their sheep and make it so that the wolf lizards would not devour them when they came in the night. The saint anointed the sheep with a special ointment, which kept the wolf lizards away from them. The shepherds thought this to be a miracle... and soon, more and more people came to see the saint and learn from him if they could. So many people present in the area eventually drove the wolf lizards away entirely, and all the gathered peoples (who had created a small settlement around the location where the saint lived) came to believe that this too was a miracle delivered by Jylestis and Yr'zaus. The settlement grew into a whole village, which over time became a town only for the town to become a great city, where the saint was buried within a magnificent mausoleum upon which an entire cathedral had been raised up. He became a patron saint of shepherds and a spiritual protector of the city named after him, at least in the religion of Yr'zaus. That was how it was in Mars back in those now ancient times... a strange union existed of spirituality and science, and there was nowhere you could go to on that planet and not fully notice this.
It had been nighttime, when we emerged from that forsaken temple... and, having spent many days in the city of Jylestis it was now nighttime once again on the occasion I shall now relate. The moons hung beautiful and full in the evening sky, and the Citaar insects were chirping in the grass. Above Vira and I were countless stars in all of their celestial glory. You could make out so many of the constellations on a night like this, and it was always a very romantic and enjoyable moment to savor the companionship of someone you love while basking in the glory of such a night. Vira and I lay in the grass next to each other, stretching out on one of the hillsides just outside of town. “Which star did you come from, way back before you came to Rahab, and then to our planet?” asked Vira of me, to which I replied: “You could not see it from here, to be honest. But I am glad I did come here. It was here, where I met you!”
Out in the desert... nothing stirred, within the rubble that covered the cliff-side where once the dark temple of the hybrid beast folk stood. However, not far from where the collapsed entrance lay... there was a series of holes in the ground. They were not large holes, but rather just humanoid-sized, caused by something, somehow digging its' way from beneath the ground until finally reaching the surface. A group of the beast-folk survived the destruction of the temple... and the laboratories it contained. They had been technicians there, and were not placed in the containment units like all of the others had thus been. The explosion drove them to act fast, and making use of some digging equipment they had on hand from when they helped to build the temple in the first place... they managed to gain their freedom unscathed by the destruction of the central reactor. They were very far from there now, searching for a new home where they would be slaves no longer. In later years, the legend of the wild beast men of the desert would be a tale told around many a Martian campfire. No one knew whence they came, no one save for Vira and I, and we were certain that even had we told anyone, no one would have believed us. Oh, the scientists knew! We had spoken with them at length about the whole adventure in the temple, after all. But they were too afraid of the truth being considered a heresy, since the tales of the beast men became accepted in several of the various religious faiths of Mars as a kind of cautionary tale whereby one should pray to certain gods or goddesses before venturing out across the desolate wastes... lest the beast men catch them and devour them. Many anthropologists went out in search of them, to learn all they could about the creatures... but none ever returned from those excursions, to say what they found.
As for the Anunnaki, they never did learn what became of their lost laboratory in the Martian desert. And if they had learned of it at all, they made no indication that they cared one way or the other. They had other matters to attend to and occupy themselves with back during that time, and there were many other worlds with similar experiments being conducted on them... where the experiments ended up a success, since no one was there to put a stop to them. On those worlds, gardens were built and human beings and other sentient races were made to toil in them... at the pleasure of the children of Anu, who had become as gods to them. On every world this occurred on, the people were kept in a primitive sort of state, often naked... and in numbers easy to govern. Easy to manipulate, and control as well! But on Mars, this wicked plot had been thwarted before it could commence. It would be some time before I would cross paths with the Anunnaki again... and for all that time I would be happy not to make their acquaintance. It was a large universe, after all, and one in which many threads of destiny were at work!
Back on that grassy hillside on the outskirts of Jylestis... my mind was not dwelling upon all of those serious matters, nor was I even aware of the enormity of them. The world of Mars felt small at that tiny point in time, and I was happy simply to be sharing my days and nights with my lovely wife Vira. We were on a kind of a holiday, a vacation from our normal routines. Despite the dangerous detour we had taken out in the desert, it had not been a bad holiday at all. A shooting star shot through the night sky, and Vira said to me: “Do you want to make a wish, sweet one?” to which I replied lovingly: “Beloved goddess of my heart, what need would I have of any wish... when all I could ever want in the universe, I possess already whenever I hold you close.” And we held each other very close after that, gazing up at the sky with looks of childlike wonder upon our faces. Today, you dear reader might be on many nights so compelled to gaze up at the night skies of planet Earth, and speculate about whether or not there had ever been life on distant but ever so close Mars. You might also be compelled to read through these, my deepest and fondest memories of Mars, written upon these documents, and wonder whether or not the events I relate within them ever actually took place. But take place they did! And Mars is but one world of many that I have lived upon down through the ages. The history of Mars, is tied intimately with the history of humanity, and so one cannot write of the red planet... without relating things very humanly.
Published 18th May 2022
Author's Note
This work is based upon some of my past-life memories.
All writing remains the property of the author. Don't use it for any purpose without their permission.
likes 2
reading list entries 1
comments 0
reads 282
Commenting Preference:
The author encourages honest critique.
