Chapter 4: A battle alongside a Dog
I woke up with the morning rays of the sun shining upon my face. The place in which I had slept was only occupied by the woman, who contrary to what I imagined, still slept peacefully in their respective silks.
I looked around the room and found that the huge dog like creature from yesterday still sat in the same spot, not having moved a muscles, quietly observing me. Seeing him stare at me so intently made me a bit uncomfortable, but it also ignited a sense of curiousness. This strange creature was evidently placed here to stop me from escaping; but to what extent would it go to stop me?
Well, there seemed only one way to find out. I did not know at what point my thought process had turned out as so. Perhaps it was John Carter that was affecting me or Damien Smith that was. But honestly speaking, I did not think this change was a bad one at all. I even liked it to some extent.
I slowly gained my feet, and seeing me do that, the dog like creature also did the same. I moved towards the entrance of the hall which was right next to the Martian dog.
To my surprise, he backed away from the door and let me pass through. I was confused by it's behaviour.
'Is it not here to stop me from escaping?' I thought to myself but moved out of the building anyway.
The dog followed me with vigor. I was beginning to think that the dog was just here to protect me from harm and so, I wanted to test to what extent it would go.
As I moved to the edge of the city, the dog began making strange noises and moved in front of me, most likely trying to stop me from leaving.
Seeing this made me smirk. I pumped strength into my legs and jumped with all my might. I looked down while in mid air. I had expected that the dog would not be able to follow me, given it's fat body and the fact that he stood on 10 legs that were closely huddled together.
But the sheer speed this creature of strange morphology was displaying at this exact moment baffled me to the core. His speed was easily on par with a bullet train. Okay that might be exaggerating a bit but that doesn't change the fact that the dog is fast. Like this creature is the very definition of a fast running land animal. It was not only the speed that was shocking, it was the acceleration. The time it took to achieve that speed was less than a second, easily making it the fastest living creature that I know of.
A part of me wanted to sit down and analyze the extent of its speeding abilities but too bad that it was chasing me. With its jaws agape and all of its hundreds of teeth showing, it painted a disturbing picture that made me not want to be caught by this Martian Dog.
I landed onto the ground just seconds before the creature had actually caught up to me and jumped again. The creature continued to follow me without stop, evidently amazed at my impressive display of agility that surpassed its own.
'I wonder how fast I would be without jumping?' I thought to myself as I continued to jump, far above the reach of the jaws of the beast.
When I was quite some distance away, I turned around 180 degrees in the air and upon landing, I leapt in the opposite direction, once again going towards the city. I could just keep jumping and eventually escape, but I had little knowledge of the types of creatures that inhabited Mars, if there were anything other than the green Martians to begin with that is.
The Martian Dog immediately turned around with the same frightening speed and did not slow down in the slightest at my sudden change in direction.
We were again at the base of the city and as the beast came tearing after me I jumped upwards towards a window that overlooked the valley about 10 meters off the ground.
Balancing myself on the little space that being on the 'stool' of this strange window like fissure provided me, I looked down towards the shocked animal below.
But before I could even begin to enjoy myself in watching its confused and shocked face, I was grabbed from the back of the head.
Not even a second after, I was dragged in the room and thrown violently away into the air.
The world spun around in my eyes as my head began to hurt a bit, not doubt being the result of that crushing grip from earlier. With the feeling of weightlessness that I had gotten so used to upon Mars, came the feeling of being slammed upon the ground. Pain. A sharp pain on the side of my body creeped its way up my spine as I landed, nay, fell upon the cold hard floor.
I was disoriented, but not for long. I had gotten as used to being weightless as much as falling down upon the ground. Wasting no time, I pulled myself off of the ground and regained my balance.
And what I saw was unlike any creature that I had seen upon Mars, in fact, this creature seemed to resemble a gorilla of an ape from Earth.
The creature, like all the other Martian Creatures I had seen, was colossal in size and shape and held no visible hair on it's body except for its head.
It stood at a height of about 4 meters and it held one pair of legs and one pair of arms, and also an intermediary pair of limbs that could be used as both arms or legs. Its eyes were close together and non-protruding; the ears were high set, but more laterally located than those of the Martians, while the snout and teeth were strikingly like those of an African gorilla.
This creature that seemed more Earth-like than anything I had seen since arriving here charged at me with a murderous intent, most likely hoping to crush me under it.
I, being too engrossed in trying to understand what strange manner of creature this was, was hit directly in the chest with its strong looking legs.
I was once again upon the ground, this time upon my back and found myself unable to move; courtesy of the white ape like creature pinning me under its gargantuan feet.
The white ape like creature gesticulated at some answering creature behind me. This creature, which was evidently its mate came forward from the darkness, holding a large stone stick upon its shoulders.
My eyes widened in horror and my face lost its color once I understood what this would mean for me. And so, using all the strength I could muster I made one mighty effort. I grabbed a hold of the giant foot that pinned me down to the ground and tried to lift it away.
And my efforts bore fruit. The huge weight that rested upon my chest was lifted and then thrown into the air about half a meter. The giant white ape was thrown away at some distance, causing it to fall upon its head.
The second one, seeing me throw away its companion was enraged. With a jump, the ape leapt towards me and swung the stone stick at me.
"Ah for fuck's sake!" I cursed out, and holding my arms in front of my head - towards which the attack was directed to - I blocked the mighty blow with nothing but my arms.
Pain. A searing hot pain made itself known to me as my arms stopped the weapon in its tracks, preventing any further harm that could be done.
And once again, a feeling of weightlessness was upon me. I had been flung across the room with that attack. I quickly maneuvered my body mid-air and gracefully landed upon my feet.
I jumped back towards the walls and took support against them. Then I held out my fists in front of my figure and prepared for a battle.
The ape that I had thrown regained its footing and with a mighty roar, it charged right at me, its mate following closely behind with the stone stick in hand.
But before they could reach me, a hurling mass of closely held legs tore through the closed doors and onto the chest of one of my assailants. The one with the stick moved out of the way as if it had already seen this Martian abomination making its way towards them.
I used this momentary distraction of the ape to jump right at it and throw a devastating punch to its right jaw. My fist connected with the hideous face of the white ape and then, without a sound the ape was sent into the air. Upon landing, the body of the beast trembled and then, it went limp. I looked down towards my fist and was in utter disbelief. I had known that my strength had been increased but never in my dreams did I even imagine such an increment. The muscles of these beasts that were unlike what I had ever seen even among those of my captors; the tall and imposing stature they adopted, the sheer ferocity they displayed when they took sight of me, all these factors deeply contrasted with the lack of any struggle before its death by my hand.
But I didn't have time to dwell on these matters. For I was broken out of my thoughts from noises behind me, those of an intense struggle.
I looked behind me to see the most intense battle between beasts that I had ever witnessed in my life. The sheer strength, agility and blind aggression displayed by these two Martian creatures before me could simply not be compared by anything of Earthly knowledge.
The Martian dog, my guardian, had the advantage. He had locked his fangs deep into the chest of the white ape that drew blood out of it. But the white ape was not without fight. his two pair of upper appendages had locked the throat of my beast in a firm grip which pulled him away from its chest.
Both of them rolled upon the floor, with not even a single sound that told of pain escaping their mouths.
I was so shocked by this sight that I almost failed to notice the eyes of my dog bulging out of their sockets and drops of blood beginning to ooze out from his eyes.
Upon seeing this, I quickly sprang into action and grabbing a hold of the stone stick that the other white ape used as a weapon, I hit the head of the ape. Which promptly popped like a watermelon, leading to a gory shower of brainmatter.
As I delivered the final blow, a laugh rang out behind me. I turned around to see Tars Tarkas, Sola and two or three more green martian warriors, all equipped and ready to go to war. Sola must have realized my absence and alerted Tars Tarkas of it, who immediately set out of find me.
But how they came to this pace specifically was beyond me. As I locked eyes with them, I was greeted with a grand applause, no doubt for my victory against the white apes and the display of strength.
Sola, who was accompanying the search party for reasons I could not tell, was the only one of the Martians whose face had not been twisted in laughter as I battled for survival against the giant white creatures. She, on the contrary, seemed to be worried for my safety and, as soon as I had finished the monster, rushed to me and carefully examined my body for possible wounds or injuries. Satisfying herself that I had come off unscathed she smiled quietly, and, taking my hand, made her way towards the door of the chamber.
Tars Tarkas and the other green martians were standing close to the martian beast that I had rescued and one of them turned to address me in the same language that I could not understand. Then, as if realizing that I could not understand them, he turned towards Tars, who signaled them something to do.
But when the martian warrior pressed his gun onto the head of the dog, I sprang forward and struck up his arm. The bullet striking the wooden casing of the window exploded, blowing a hole completely through the wood and masonry.
I then knelt down beside the fearsome-looking thing, and raising it to its feet motioned for it to follow me. The looks of surprise which my actions elicited from the Martians confused me, but I did not dwell upon it. The warrior whose gun I had struck up looked enquiringly at Tars, but the latter signed that I be left to my own devices, and so we returned to the plaza with my great beast following close at heel, and Sola grasping me tightly by the arm.
On this day, I realized that I had actually made my first two friends on the God of War. A green Martian woman who held compassion and feelings of love in complete contrast to her fellow kin, and a hideous creature with many teeth and legs that I came to refer to as my own somewhere in between the battle.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone