Martians Never Die

Martians Never Die by Lucius Daniel - It was a wonderful bodyguard: no bark, no bite, no sting ... just conversion of the enemy! At three-fifteen, a young man walked into the circular brick building and took a flattened package of cigarettes from his shirt pocket. "Mr. Stern?" he asked, throwing away the empty package. Stern looked with hard eyes at the youthful reporter. He recognized the type. "So they're sending around cubs now," he said. "I'm no cub—I've been on the paper a whole year," the reporter protested, and then stopped, realizing his annoyance had betrayed him. "Only a year. The first time they sent their best man." "This ain't the first time," said the young man, assuming a bored look. "It's the fourth time, and next year I don't think anybody will come at all. Why should they?" "Why, because they might be able to make it," Beryl spoke up. "Something must have happened before." Stern watched the reporter drink in Beryl's loveliness. "Well, Mrs. Curtis," the young man said, "everyone has it figured out that Dr. Curtis got stuck in the fourth dimension, or else lost, or died, maybe. Even Einstein can't work out the stellar currents your husband was depending on." "It's very simple," replied Beryl, "but I can't explain it intelligibly. I wish you could have talked to Dr. Curtis." "Why is it that we have to come out here just once a year to wait for him? Is that how the fourth dimension works?" "It's the only time when the stellar currents permit the trip back to Earth. And it's not the fourth dimension! Clyde was always irritated when anyone would talk about his traveling to Mars in the fourth dimension." "It's interdimensional," Stern put in.