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Sparx, v. 1, issue 6, February 1948
Page 11
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DEATH BY NORMAN SCHLECTER The radar wave dropped through the swirling Martian mists, struck a surface, rebounded, and returned to the ship. Deep within the master computer a scanner analyzed the wave front, compared it with a theoretical pattern, and broke a circuit. Bells jangled. In the control room Joe looked at me. "Something's screwy." he said, thinking out loud. "Shouldn't be anything under that sandstorm but desert. Some kind of complex structure down there. Want to investigate?" "Sure," I told him casually. I wasn't impressed by the possibilities for mystery. Probably only a deserted oasis and pilgrims' shelter. Now was I interested during the descent, as Joe steered us through the tornado of fine particles that rained on the hull. It was only when a sudden lull came, and we saw the city below us, that I knew fear. What was it? It was old, and it was broken; sand lay in great drifts in the street, and where there had been towers there were now shattered stumps. But the architecture...where had I seen those patterns? Somewhere, sometime. I had gazed on such a city. I felt the dim stirrings of pseudo-memory and a cold touch of panic. It was Joe who knew, "Old Martian, by the Gods of the Great Canal!" he yelled. He shook me in his excitement. "The Old Race! The ones who built the canals! Must be one of their cities. This is..." He stopped suddenly as he remembered. I knew he had momentarily forgotten my Martian ancestry; I was humanoid enough to make it slip his mind most of the time. Tongue-tied, he flushed and looked away. So that was it. Of course I had seen those streets before -- seen them when they were new and unbroken -- but through the eyes of the Martian race consciousness. The cultural psych men had explained it, but I had never paid any attention. Until now -- until the sight of that sand-shrouded citadel had jarred my memory-patterns into life. I studied the city. It was not old; it was senescent. It brooded in the haze, as the rushing sand that had hidden it for centuries tore by above us. We were at the storm center, the dead area where no air moves. Joe got out the portable cameras. "Don't mind, do you?" he asked apologetically, as he began adjusting his equipment. He was plainly worried about how to behave in this unexpected diplomatic crisis. I grinned. "Why should I? As they say about that new rocket fuel, I'm ninety-nine and forty-four one-hundredths per cent pure. Don't start thinking of me as a..." ((Turn page, please)) 11
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DEATH BY NORMAN SCHLECTER The radar wave dropped through the swirling Martian mists, struck a surface, rebounded, and returned to the ship. Deep within the master computer a scanner analyzed the wave front, compared it with a theoretical pattern, and broke a circuit. Bells jangled. In the control room Joe looked at me. "Something's screwy." he said, thinking out loud. "Shouldn't be anything under that sandstorm but desert. Some kind of complex structure down there. Want to investigate?" "Sure," I told him casually. I wasn't impressed by the possibilities for mystery. Probably only a deserted oasis and pilgrims' shelter. Now was I interested during the descent, as Joe steered us through the tornado of fine particles that rained on the hull. It was only when a sudden lull came, and we saw the city below us, that I knew fear. What was it? It was old, and it was broken; sand lay in great drifts in the street, and where there had been towers there were now shattered stumps. But the architecture...where had I seen those patterns? Somewhere, sometime. I had gazed on such a city. I felt the dim stirrings of pseudo-memory and a cold touch of panic. It was Joe who knew, "Old Martian, by the Gods of the Great Canal!" he yelled. He shook me in his excitement. "The Old Race! The ones who built the canals! Must be one of their cities. This is..." He stopped suddenly as he remembered. I knew he had momentarily forgotten my Martian ancestry; I was humanoid enough to make it slip his mind most of the time. Tongue-tied, he flushed and looked away. So that was it. Of course I had seen those streets before -- seen them when they were new and unbroken -- but through the eyes of the Martian race consciousness. The cultural psych men had explained it, but I had never paid any attention. Until now -- until the sight of that sand-shrouded citadel had jarred my memory-patterns into life. I studied the city. It was not old; it was senescent. It brooded in the haze, as the rushing sand that had hidden it for centuries tore by above us. We were at the storm center, the dead area where no air moves. Joe got out the portable cameras. "Don't mind, do you?" he asked apologetically, as he began adjusting his equipment. He was plainly worried about how to behave in this unexpected diplomatic crisis. I grinned. "Why should I? As they say about that new rocket fuel, I'm ninety-nine and forty-four one-hundredths per cent pure. Don't start thinking of me as a..." ((Turn page, please)) 11
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