GWC '24 #1: A Martian Fairy Tale

When humans terraformed Mars, they turned a desolate planet into a thriving world. But what they didn’t know was that they had awakened another civilization that had been there all along....

This is my first entry into the Gibberish Writing Competition, judged by

Scoot

and

Sara Dietz

. Thanks so much for all you do! This is a three-part competition, so be on the look out for the next two over the coming weeks.

When humans terraformed Mars, they turned a desolate planet into a thriving world, at least the part under the dome. And people came – whole families – hoping to make a new civilization for themselves on a new planet. But what they didn’t know was that, in doing so, they had awakened another civilization that had been there all along…

Image by WikiImages from Pixabay.

Penelope hated trying to do her math homework on the tablet. Actually, she hated most things about living on Mars, from the weird food to the lack of paper. Sure the scientists had tried to make it feel like Earth, but Penelope still ached for the comforts of home. She missed the tree-covered hills and the trips to the beach, and she was never going to be convinced that chicken of the woods mushrooms were really as good as chicken nuggets. On top of it all, she was having to learn algebra without even the comfort of a satisfying pink eraser to remove her multitude of mistakes.

She knew she should be grateful; electronics were expensive out here on the last frontier, but she got so overwhelmed with all the newness. With another heavy sigh, Penelope tossed her tablet to the foot of her bed and turned toward the window that was cracked open to let in the afternoon breeze. To her utter surprise, she found herself staring into a little blue face. For a moment, she just sat there and stared. She had gotten used to the desolate red hills beyond the dome and the two tiny moons in the sky, but she had never seen any living creature other than those brought from Earth. Before she could do anything else, the creature bared its pointy teeth at her beneath a shock of black hair and, in a blur, snatched her tablet off the bed.

Penelope tried to grab the tablet back, but the creature leaned out the window out of her reach, its arm seeming to stretch longer than possible. He let out a maniacal cackle, clearly elated to be able to taunt her. With a loud raspberry, he jumped to the ground and scurried away. Anger boiling up, Penelope pulled on her shoes and climbed through the window after the creature. I have to get my tablet back! My mom will kill me if I lose that, she thought as her feet pounded across the yard.

Jumping over the fence, Penelope followed the creature out of the settlement. The sagebrush scratched at her legs as Penelope rushed forward. Even with her running flat out, the creature was pulling ahead, dodging around and under the sharp branches, bounding off rocks. Lungs aching, Penelope pushed herself all the harder. Each pounding step only brought her more misery, never any closer to her goal.

Even through her exertion, she began to worry that they were nearing the dome. She’d never liked living so close to the void of space, and she sincerely hoped that the little man couldn’t somehow get out there; then her tablet would be gone for good. To her equal horror, he instead veered to the left toward the crater right at the edge of the colony. Only scientists were supposed to go in there to do research. And with good reason: the ten-story drop was either vertical or strewn with loose pebbles and huge boulders. Why did they have to put the colony on the edge of a crater? No science is worth this, Penelope thought, putting on a fresh burst of speed in the vain hope of heading the little guy off before he reached the rim.

There were several clear meters before the drop off, and in the flat, Penelope’s longer legs finally came to her aid. She had closed the gap to within a couple of arm lengths when the little blue man stopped right on the rim, turned, and stuck out his shockingly orange tongue before leaping backwards cackling into the abyss.

Penelope pulled up short then crept to the edge, straining her neck out to see where the little nuisance had gone. Bouncing like a spring from rock to rock, his body seeming to compress and stretch, speeding him away into what felt like oblivion. He may as well be all the way back in Indiana as easily as I can get him now, Penelope thought.

But looking again at the slope itself, she saw that this particular area was not as steep as some of the others. It also had more large rocks that she could use to steady herself against the treacherous gravel. This is quite possibly the stupidest thing I have ever done, but I am not going to let some Martian just laugh right in my face, Penelope thought. With a deep breath, and against every rule that had been drilled into her since arriving on this crazy planet, she slowly began to slide down the slope, aiming for the nearest boulder. The pebbles and fine Martian sand slid like marbles under her shoes, giving her more speed than she had intended and sending her crashing into the rock.

Again and again she slid from rock to rock, barely maintaining control and receiving not a few more bruises and scrapes. All the while, she kept one eye on that infuriating imp lest he disappear for good. Finally, he stopped, standing triumphant on top of a particularly large rock. Penelope realized that, if she was daring enough, she could make it there in one long slide. The tablet glinted at her in the sunlight, the prize at the end of this catastrophe.

Steeling herself, she began one more slide, realizing almost at once that she had made a mistake. The pebbles here were a little larger, sending her feet in opposite directions while carrying her thundering toward the mountainous boulder. She was knocked flat on her back from the impact, and was greeted with a trilling victory song from the creature before he disappeared completely. Despair flooded her as she stared up into the slowly darkening sky, her head swimming from the collision.

She pulled herself to her feet and carefully maneuvered around the boulder hoping she might still find the creature. When she got to the other side, however, she was pretty sure she must have indeed suffered some severe head trauma. At the base of the far side of the rock was a large opening that led underground.

Penelope hesitated, checking over her shoulder that the creature wasn’t actually ping-ponging on down the crater. It was one thing to follow a thief through the brush, even over the rim, but no one would be able to find her if she went into this cave. Just as she was about to decide that the tablet really wasn’t worth all of this, she heard the taunting laugh of the little blue guy float up from below. This planet is so weird, but I’m not going to let it get the best of me, she thought and plunged into the darkness.

Almost immediately, she realized that it wasn’t really dark at all. Along the top and bottom edges of the smoothed tunnel walls hung glowing crystals, giving a faint but sustaining light in the gloom. Soon her eyes had adjusted enough that she could see the little creature running ahead with an overlong loping stride. Immediately, she sprinted after it, hoping to catch it in the narrow tunnel. The little guy was quite tricky, however, taking first one tunnel then another, clearly trying to lose Penelope.

She kept up with him admirably until she came out of yet another passage to find it empty. She stopped to catch her breath and listen for the creature, but her attention was completely diverted when she saw the mosaic on the wall. A floor to ceiling picture depicted what looked like a king and queen on thrones under a sunny sky, but they were like no monarchs that Penelope had ever seen in history books. They had rusty red skin that looked like rocks and seemed quite large compared to the others in the picture. Penelope could see more of the blue creatures clustered around the bottom of the thrones while white wisps stood to the sides. The air above their heads was filled with flying creatures so small that Penelope couldn’t clearly make them out from the ground. These are people, Penelope thought. These are the people of this world, and we’ve come and taken their place.

A scuffling noise down the left passage brought Penelope back to her senses, and she scurried off in pursuit. Looking right and left down every passage, she finally caught a glimpse of blue disappearing around a far corner. She ran after it once more, whipping around the corner and then pulling to a sudden stop. The red dust at her feet rose in a little puff, slightly obscuring a most disturbing sight – a rather large group of the blue creatures all looking malevolently back at her.

Penelope started to back away and realized in a panic that she had no idea how to get out of here. She was trapped in a maze with a horde of angry, sharp-toothed little men. She considered running anyway since being lost seemed preferable to being attacked, but the memory of the strange bounding strides made her realize they could probably catch her anyway.

“Look, I didn’t mean anything by it,” she started to say, “You can just keep the tablet. I’ll just be going now…”

The front of the mob pressed forward, slowly advancing as Penelope backed toward the adjoining tunnel. With a war screech, they leapt toward her, their springy legs propelling them farther and faster than Penelope could have anticipated. She crouched into a ball on the floor, trying to protect her head from the onslaught.

But it never came. With a rumble and a rush of wind over her head, Penelope heard dozens of little feet speeding away amid clatters and screeches. Cautiously, she peeked out from under her arms. Standing over her was a giant rocky creature, as red as the rusty dirt of Mars itself. With surprising gentleness, he helped Penelope to her feet.

With a voice like a muted avalanche, he asked, “Are you hurt?”

Penelope just gaped. “You know how to speak English?”

A smile glacially arranged itself on the weathered face. “Yes, my child,” he said, “We have been listening to you since you came and have learned your language. Come, we should go. Is this yours?” He handed her the tablet, now with a jagged crack across the screen.

“Yes, unfortunately,” Penelope answered and followed this new oddity back through the tunnels. After walking a few minutes in silence, she asked, “Are you the king?”

The creature let out an earthquake of a laugh. “No, but we Wiri are usually the kings of Mars. In these days, though, there is no king, not since the Reawakening.” In response to Penelope’s blank look, he went on, “When Mars died, we all went into hibernation. Well, all of the enlightened creatures did anyway, the Wiri, the Gnargnyl that you unfortunately ran into, and others. Since your people arrived, we have woken up, to quite an interesting new world, I must say.”

Penelope was burning with questions, but didn’t know where to start. They walked on in silence, coming out into the twilight of the crater. The gentle giant lowered his hand for Penelope to climb onto, and with a few solid steps they were soon back up by the rim.

“Your world seems so amazing! Can I come back,” asked Penelope as she was finally set back on solid ground.

The creature let out of a low rumble of contemplation. “I don’t think that would be for the best. As you can see, my world is not so safe as yours right now. But I don’t doubt that we will meet again some day.” And with that, he tromped into the gloom, out of Penelope’s world and back to his own.

Penelope knew that she was in for a heap of trouble when her parents saw the cracked tablet, but she was surprisingly upbeat as she attempted to navigate home through the sagebrush without further injuries. This planet might be weird, but for the first time it was the kind of weird that Penelope liked.

Word Count: 2063