The Mongo Machine - Chapter 4

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

May 24, 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 04

The bomber’s red cabin light turned everything to blood and shadow. Carter tugged at his harness and eyed the big black and green diamond stitched dead centre on the stranger’s chest. The man had arrived at the airfield wearing an old-fashioned leather skullcap-style flight helmet and goggles, though he arrived by jeep. He wore the least military outfit Carter had ever seen: a red, skin-tight shirt with the strange diamond, green jodhpurs and shiny, black, knee-high boots, all topped off with a black cape lined with bright yellow fabric that hung to his mid-thigh. Despite the garish costume, he was waved through the airfield checkpoints and shown aboard their Lancaster as if he belonged.

According to Colonel May, the man had trained at Camp X. Carter didn’t recognize him, but that could mean he had been there before Carter arrived. May explained that the man, code-named Spy Smasher, was a specialist in counterintelligence. Apparently the outlandish style was meant to conceal his identity. It certainly drew the eye, thought Carter.

“You ever worry that thing makes a better target than a fashion statement?”

Spy Smasher grinned under his goggles. “That’s the idea. Steel mesh and silk weave. Stop a .38 cold.” He tapped the diamond with a gloved knuckle. “Helmet’d barely stop a tennis ball. Chest’ll take what counts. I want them shooting here, not here.” He rapped the helmet with his fist for emphasis.

Carter snorted. “So you’re bulletproof everywhere but the brain.”

“The idea is not to get shot at all,” Spy Smasher said. They had been flying for a couple of hours, the Lancaster was hollowed out and stuffed with a huge fuel tank in its bomb bay for range. He eyed the red light of the jump bulb before finishing, “But if the fur flies, I keep my head down like everybody else.”

“So why the cape?” shouted Crash Corrigan over the roar of the engines.

“The human eye is drawn to movement,” explained the strangely dressed operative. “This flapping flag has taken a whole mag of bullets meant for me.”

“Don’t give the army any ideas,” scoffed Buck Rogers chucking a thumb over his shoulder at Wilma Deering who was leaning over the shoulder of the radio operator. “They’ve already got us bringing along the ladies’ auxiliary. If they make a get up like that the new olive drab, I’m sticking to civvies.”

Carter, Buck Rogers, Crash Corrigan and Wilma Deering sat in the cramped quarters of the Lancaster on makeshift seating. Hop Harrigan, the mission’s jump master, watched the clock, checking against his clipboard and wrist-watch every few minutes. The jump light flashed green and Harrigan gave Spy Smasher a nod.

The cape was strapped under the parachute pack. He stood and clipped his line to a ring near the improvised jump door. Air hissed all around the jerry-rigged foam seal and had since takeoff. When Harrigan pulled the latch, everything in the cabin took a gust of wind but the crew had been prepared and everything was secured. Nothing but Spy Smasher went out the hatch and into the night. Harrigan watched the white silk blossom and then slammed the door closed. He called an all clear to the pilot and the plane banked left as the engine note changed. They climbed.

“Hop, tell our wing walkers we’re two hours out. Once we level off, start the prep,” came a calm confident voice over the loudspeaker.

“Hey, that’s Midnight,” said Wilma Deering with delight.

“You know our cabbie?” asked Corrigan.

“Yeah, that’s Jim Albright, call-sign ‘Captain Midnight.’”

“I’ve heard of him,” said Buck Rogers. “Got the name for some rescue he pulled off back in ’42.”

Hop Harrigan grinned and added, “He dropped a crate in a farmer’s field in occupied France and got me and half a dozen of my crew out of a dust up. Tossed a Jerry like a medicine ball. Arms like a couple of howitzers.”

“And a great dancer,” added Wilma with a dreamy smile.

“You guys know he can hear you through that,” said Carter, pointing at Harrigan’s headset and the microphone it held.

“Oh, I’m well aware,” said Deering.

“Nice to have you aboard again, Colonel,” came a chuckle over the loudspeaker.

“Too bad there’s no Glenn Miller on the box, Jim,” she answered. “Not a lot of rugs to cut where we’re heading.”

“Yeah, they made me take the phonograph out to save weight,” joked Midnight.

The engine noise deepened as Captain Midnight applied more power and drove the Lancaster past its operational ceiling, into purely theoretical territory. Oxygen canisters were passed around and the skeleton crew grew quiet as their mission objective neared. Everyone knew that what came next was anything but business as usual.

An hour later, the cabin light again changed from red to green. This time, Hop Harrigan did not give anyone a nod, but climbed the ladder to the hatch that had been installed over the opening that normally led to the mid-upper turret. The Plexiglas turret housing, the gunner’s seat and twin guns had also been removed, leaving just a hole beneath the hatch, easily accessible. Despite the bomber flying at close to 30,000 feet, Harrigan shoved the hatch open. Double checking his oxygen mask, he climbed up and out of the cabin and onto the fuselage.

John Carter followed him up and out. Crash Corrigan was next, then Wilma Deering. Buck Rogers brought up the rear. The five made their way hand over hand up the fuselage until they reached the wings. One by one, Harrigan helped them to drop from the fuselage onto the wings, two to a side. The wind tore at every stitch of loose clothing, but they were well prepared for that, everything tucked and belted down. Only pant legs and a few wisps of Wilma’s long hair moved more than a few inches in the gale.

Beneath each wing hung two black experimental glider pods. The pilots clipped in, their harnesses tethered to the new rings. They’d practiced this stunt a dozen times over Camp X, but not at this altitude, this speed, or in this darkness.

Harrigan crouched, braced against the wind, watching the four pilots ease themselves back and over the trailing edges of the wings. If one of them fouled the flaps or the ailerons with their lines, he was ready to crawl out and clear the mechanism. His orders were to cut a pilot free if the risky manoeuvre endangered the airframe, a detail he hadn’t shared with his charges. He was relieved to see that all four sets of lines lay clear of any of the wing’s control surfaces as the four figures dropped from sight.

Each pilot now hung, whipped by the wind that flowed past the wing. Handles had been hastily installed and with great effort, each pilot was able to pull themselves toward the glider pods that waited for them. Their harnesses were designed to hook easily into the rigging that was built into the experimental pods. Within a few minutes, all four pilots gave the radio signal to indicate they were latched in and ready to drop. Harrigan was reeling in the harnesses they had left on the right-hand wing. He had been pulling up the first one on the left-hand wing seconds after Rogers had disconnected from it.

Captain Midnight didn’t wait for Harrigan’s re-entry into the fuselage to give the signal. As soon as he indicated the last harness was reeled in, he punched the release button. The four pods dropped cleanly off the wings and a second later, the Lancaster was turning for Scotland, their part in the mission complete. All that remained was returning their stripped down, unarmed bomber safely to base. Through six hundred miles of enemy territory.

Behind and below, four pairs of fragile black wings snapped open, catching the bitterly cold air at the edge of Norwegian airspace.

Chapter 05 is here!