The Mongo Machine - Chapter 2

John Carter. Buck Rogers. Crash Corrigan. Three Warriors. Out of Time.

May 10, 2026

This short story officially launched my House of Entropy and put sci-fi pulp front and center in the Public Domain Super Heroes universe. From this story, the novels The Metropolis of Mongo, The Marine Moon of Mongo and the forthcoming The Martian Monsters of Mongo were born.

A new chapter will go live every Sunday at 12:00 AM EST. I will update the links on each chapter at that time to point to the next installment in the story.

There is also an index page here if you lose track.

I hope you enjoy it!

CHAPTER 02

“I think he’ll put you on report for this,” suggested Rogers.

“I think he’ll shoot you for this,” offered Carter.

For his part, Crash Corrigan just laughed and drove the nail home. The full-page pencil drawing of Little Orphan Annie was actually very well done, right down to an extra touch of red on Annie’s signature red locks. One of Corrigan’s talents was drawing and he had knocked out the sketch while they were stowing their gear from the exercise. Nailing it to Wally’s billet in honour of his newly red hair was not actually likely to get Corrigan shot, but Carter wouldn’t be surprised if he wound up peeling every potato in the camp tonight.

The caption read, “Little Orphan Wally.”

As they walked casually away, bright laughter erupted behind them as a couple of female trainees jogged past the barracks and caught sight of the cartoon. Carter still hadn’t gotten used to seeing women training for war, but he had to admit, every woman in the camp was a formidable soldier in her own right. Camp X only recruited the best, if not always the conventional.

“Worth it,” shouted Corrigan, raising his arms in triumph.

The three men strolled through the camp, waving greetings to fellow trainees, and trainers alike. Camp X was designed on a new model, one that eschewed military protocol, with every facet of every day designed to work the military out of soldiers. Those who graduated from the program were destined for covert assignments behind enemy lines. Military reflexes like salutes and parade march lockstep were useless to such operatives. Experienced soldiers could recognize their peers from their bearing, so everyone in Camp X walked in loose groups, hands in pockets or waving cheerily, unlearning their military rigidity.

Corrigan and Rogers took to it like ducks to particularly inviting water. For Carter, it was more like being thrown into the Atlantic in January. Of course, Bill and Wally had actually thrown him into the Atlantic in January and he’d survived that. Slouching on a stroll was actually a lot harder for him than survival training.

“He’ll know it was you,” chuckled Buck Rogers as he turned a in circle to watch a lovely blonde walk by. She watched him back, amused. Everyone around them was wearing civilian clothes. Even the trainers dressed like tradesmen rather than soldiers, another attempt to break the military routine. “You did that cartoon of Hitler getting his...”

“We know what Hitler was getting, Rogers,” interrupted Carter with a glare. These two were generally harmless, but little good would come of letting them run rampant. He cracked the whip every so often, just enough to get their attention. The camp might encourage them to shed military discipline for their operations, but Carter was still the senior officer in this trio. “We’re late for the briefing.”

“Another ‘hurry up and wait,’” groused Corrigan.

“Yeah,” added Rogers. “If your machine works, we can’t let them turn it on.”

“It works,” said John Carter. “Too damned well.”

“So you’ve said,” replied Corrigan with an elbow to Rogers’ ribs. “Dejah Thoris. The doll with the big...”

“Army,” finished Carter, coldly.

“Tell me again,” asked Rogers, “how all that figures? It still sounds like dihedral oil to me.”

“It’s not ‘dihedral oil’ at all. It’s as real as you and me. The Germans have a device, that they call ‘Die Glocke.’ I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” growled John Carter. “Somehow, don’t ask me how, it opens a door to...”

“Another planet,” scoffed Corrigan.

“Barsoom,” intoned Carter. He couldn’t blame the other two for their skepticism. If he hadn’t lived it, he wouldn’t believe his story either. Certainly no one had believed him in the days after the mission that had resulted in his incredible journey.

“So, you get roped into a secret mission in the last hours of the war,” recounted Corrigan. “You’d have been what, nineteen?”

“Seventeen,” corrected Carter. “I lied about my age to get into the fight. Sons of Virginia love a good scrap.”

“And you roll into a little German town and wind up...”

“Not quite ‘roll into,’ but yes, we found ‘Die Glocke’ in a German village. I don’t know if they built it or found it. It was deep in a mine. We thought we’d found a secret cache of gold that the Kaiser was hoarding for his escape if the war went against him.” Carter shook his head at the memory. “A huge, humming, spinning machine that made my teeth itch was not at all what we expected.”

“So you roll into this mine...”

“Chased in, actually. The mission went pear-shaped, we were spotted and a running fight drove us into that God forsaken mine. We were absolutely stuffed. No chance we escape.”

The trio was close to the main building now. Their pace had slowed as Carter recounted his strange tale. Though they’d heard it before, Rogers and Corrigan knew that their mission, if it ever got approval to launch, could depend on any one detail of Carter’s recollections, so they were an attentive audience.

“The chamber with the...machine...” Carter paused, uncomfortable in his reverie. “There was one entrance, no way out. We made our last stand. There were five of us. Two at the door, three reloading, rotating as we ran dry.”

The other two nodded, easily picturing the grim, practical setup. Warriors, bound by the knowledge that death was an ever present companion to their profession.

“I was the extra man in my last rotation. Frozen stiff, exhausted, low on ammo, scared for my life. I leaned back on the machine. It was warm and I was cold. Next thing I know...”

“Barsoom,” said Buck Rogers.

“Barsoom,” confirmed Carter.

“And you’ve been trying to get back there ever since,” said Crash Corrigan with a sly smile.

John Carter simply opened the door and held it for the other two before following them inside.

Chapter 03 will go live on May 10 at 12:00AM EST