Prototype for Mars: Bringer of War

(Originally titled “Something Spacey [v4.0]”)

By C. Elliot Ritter

Author’s Note: I wrote this story around May 1997, years before I devised my current version of the Mars: Bringer of War.

Greg stared across the endless red plain. On the other side of the horizon was a small supply bunker. Actually, it was one of the original landing craft sent to Mars in the earlier part of the twenty-first century buried into the soil and fortified with a Kevlar cage. It had been producing air and water since it landed from the oxygen in the carbon dioxide and the well it drilled upon landing. There might also be a greenhouse nearby, if the sand storms hadn't knocked it down. He turned to see if his companion, Deborah, was still with him. She had kept up with him without missing a step. She was a Felidae Model IV bio-android. Essentially a 1.75 meter tall, feline Deborah drew genes from humans, tigers, and the felius domesticus. The Felidae was originally a pleasure android, but during the Inter-Solar War, the Free Martian Alliance converted them from pleasure to combat and forced them into service. She was Greg’s only companion on this trip.

"Keepin' up?” Greg said into the microphone in the headset of his pressurized armor.

"Yeah. Check your air by the way,” She said in a purring voice.

“Just did, I’m half full,” He said taking another look at the meter. The forty kilograms of gear that he was carrying bogged him down but he wasn’t about to show it. He was attempting to impress Deborah and looking like a weak human wouldn’t fit in his schedule. The Model IV he remembered was the intermediate step between combat and pleasure. They had claws and sharp teeth but their overall outward appearance was not changed. She had orange, yellow fur and yellow eyes with diamond pupils, and to many individuals, such as Greg, she was a beautiful exotic.

“Same here it should be more than enough,” she responded instinctively scanning the terrain. Silence set in for another few minutes then Deborah spoke after pressing her helmet to Greg’s as not to use the radio. “Get down,” she said. Greg fell flat to the ground. She pointed into the distance. On the opposite side of a ridge to their left, Greg saw the glint of glass. He shouldered his rifle and looked through the sight. There was definitely someone there. He transmitted the IFF code and received a return code that was an Alliance code but wrong for the interrogation he sent.

Deborah pressed her helmet against his again and said, “He’s not Alliance, he appears to be Terran.”

“The IFF’s off but it’s still Alliance.” he spoke looking directly into her slitted yellow eyes. Before Deborah could respond a beam of coherent light hit Greg’s back and burned a hole into the one of the air tanks. A brief explosion resulted and Greg had the breath knocked out of him from the concussion. He gasped for breath and checked his air meter. It displayed that tank one was gone and tank two was leaking.

Deborah returned fire with her laser and through the thermographic display in her scope; she saw that the Terran sniper had a one centimeter by one-meter hole burned through him. She looked at Greg.

“How are ya’ doin’,” she said checking Greg’s suit. He signaled a zero with his hand. “Great! Hold on a second,” She detached an auxiliary hose and attached it to the port on Greg’s suit. Greg gasped as the air rushed to fill his suit.

“It’s only about another twenty kilcks to the bunker,” Deborah said after a few seconds.

“How long until we get there?” Greg asked.

“About an hour and a half,” She said looking grimly at the air meter.

“How much air?”

“A little less then you need,” Deborah said calmly.

“What do you mean?” screamed Greg.

“I had enough to get there with another hour and a half to spare but if I share it with you it cuts it to about an hour fifteen.” she replied in a matter-of-fact voice.

“Well let’s get moving or we’ll never reach it,” he said getting up and dusting the red powder from his suit.

They walked for an hour, updating their progress from a satellite. The red geodesic appeared on the horizon. Greg looked at the display on Deborah’s arm and it showed both of her tanks in the red. They continued toward it. After a few more minutes, a shrill beep sounded in Deborah’s helmet when they were about two kilometers away from the bunker.

“The air’s out,” Deborah said grimly the first real emotion in her voice since they noticed the air problem.

“Okay, the suit holds ten minutes of air but I’ll pass out before then from oxygen deprivation. You have a better tolerance for lack of oxygen then I do. I’d give you the full ten minutes before you lose conciseness. Its 2,137 meters away, can you make it?” Greg said aiming the range finder of his rifle at the bunker.

“Maybe,” she said, “depends on how fast we move.”

“Okay, when I pass out, pick me up and run. It’ll use up the oh-two faster but we’ll get there sooner,” Greg said knowing it probably wouldn’t work.

“Gotcha,” she replied and began quickening her pace. Greg almost had to jog to keep up with her prowling pace. After about five minutes, Greg slowed then collapsed. The last thing he saw is the Martian sky.

“Greg, Gregory,” said a voice he looked up to see the features common to the Felidae series artificial bio-constructs.

“Am I happy to see you,” Greg said with a slight smile on his lips. Around them were all the comforts of home. A cramped room with the walls covered with drawers and cabinets. An access tunnel led down through the bottom of the bunker into an underground matrix of tunnels used by both the Martians and Terrans to wage war. They had oxygen in them however. Directly under them Deborah pointed out was a tunnel that led to where they really needed to go, the Power Assisted Personal Armor or PAPA storage formerly for the Terrans but as of two days ago it was for the Free Martian Alliance.

He looked at her and smiled a large grin, “We got ‘em now!” Greg said and Deborah agreed with a nod. Thanks to their efforts, they would now have two experienced PAPA drivers to help wage the war on the Terrans, and win.