Captain Barnaby and Lieutenant Teajun stood
at the brink of that vast stone amphitheater,
staring wonderingly down at half-an-acre of
gadget. This glittering mass of million-year
clockwork was the Machine ... and soon it was
to judge them for their crime against Mars!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories November 1950.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Klaggchallak, his fur nose-flaps pulled tight against his nostrils,stumbled up to the gleaming pinnacle of steel that seemed to offershelter against the night. He felt a dust-storm gathering in thewest, and knew that not even the tough skin of a Martian priest couldwithstand the angry whippings of sand lashed up by the wind-warlocks ofthe desert.
The old priest drew a tiny, folded mal-skin tent from his back-pack.Without haste, for he knew that the elder gods of Mars were watchinghis safety, Klaggchallak pitched the tent against the west stabilizerof the rocket, drawing the tough hide down to form a floor-flap andfastening it to the steel of the stabilizer with tough mal-hoof glue,which would hold fast in the fiercest winds of Mars. He looked for thesun and found it low in the evening sky, then crawled leisurely intothe yurt, pulling the door-flap down after him and gluing it to thefloor. He had for himself a secure cocoon into which the sand-devilscould not force their probing fingers. Before he slept, the oldpriest fingered his beads, reciting his evening invocation to variousbenevolent and protective gods.
The falling sun threw a dancing star against the hull of the shipstanding tall in its tail-chocks. A bewildering wail, the banshee-callof "Danger; ship jetting off!" sounded; but Klaggchallak slept on,hearing through his dreams only the howling of the wind.
Sixty seconds later, as prescribed in the General Regulations of theExtraterrestrial Service, a second sound began, that most fearful ofnoises, the sirening of the rocket exhaust. The Martian in his skintent wakened and felt fear gnaw at his bones; fear induced by subsonictremors from the rocket blast. Klaggchallak reached for his beads asthe heat soaked into his thick, wrinkled skin.
In a moment the floor sagged beneath him. With the mal-skin pouchdangling ridiculously from its tail assembly, the EXTS rocket Vulcanrose with great gentleness from its tail-chocks, pushed up on itsspraying jets.
Four seconds later the ship was a ruby flame above the low hills. Eightseconds later a charred bipod, a bifurcated cinder, tumbled down fromspace to strike near the jetoff field, where the Vulcan's tail-chocksglowed dull red and the blackened ground smoldered. A moment later abracelet of blast-welded beads tumbled down from the sky, falling nearthe carbon hulk that a few seconds before had been Klaggchallak, aMartian priest great in wisdom and in honor among his people.
Captain Jan Barnaby and Lieutenant Kim Teajun of the ExtraterrestrialService stood before the Board of Inquiry at Denver, D. F. ThePresident of the Board, a Chief Commander's star-on-silver gleaming athis right collar point, opened the proceedings:
"The military rocket Vulcan, EXTS light cruiser, is accused bythe Martian authorities of causing the death of one Klaggchallak, apriest. They further claim that the death of Klaggchallak was causedby criminal negligence on the part of the pilot and co-pilot of therocket, Captain Jan Barnaby and Lieutenant Kim Teajun, respectively.Such neglect being within the definition of murder in the Martian legalcode, the