Alex Faraway And The Last Martian: Alex Faraway, #1

By G.F. Brynn

'Alex Faraway' is an illustrated, near-future sci-fi series which involves the cyclical destruction and renewal of life and civilization on Mars when it is visited by a rogue "Planet X" at ten thousand year intervals. The gravity of the mysterious deep-space object disrupts the orbit of Mars to either one that is closer to or farther away from the sun each time. After each epoch, the climate on Mars changes to become either warmer or colder, depending on how the orbit is affected. Set against this is the story of Alex Faraway who lives with his mother in an isolated farmhouse near an abandoned scrapyard.  Alex has made an old barn into a workshop where he invents all manner of robots and machines by salvaging parts from the scrapyard. One day he hopes to finish his own spaceship and fly away to find his missing father whom he feels, intuitively, is no longer on Earth. When Alex is twelve, he is awakened one night after hearing and seeing strange sounds and lights coming from the scrapyard.  When he investigates, he encounters an advanced, winged robot with unusual powers. Alex befriends the creature and follows it into the scrapyard where he discovers a new, secret world of adventure, and orphaned alien girl from the past.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Deep Sky Stories
• Release date: Jul 26, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393782926

G.F. Brynn

G.F. Brynn saw the Apollo moon missions as a kid and was enthralled by the limitless possibilities of space travel, robotics and invention. He grew up reading exciting science-fiction by Arther C. Clarke, Isaac  Asimov, Edgar Rice Burroughs and the like where unique worlds and beings were written into weird, society-changing stories like ‘Stranger in a Strange Land’ at one end of the spectrum as well as fast-paced adventure like the ‘John Carter, Warlord of Mars‘ at the other.  He also liked to tinker for hours on end and build unique mechanical models and robots which fired his imagination to no end. He dreamt of creating all manner of extravagant machines and inventions of his own one day. His later college years involved learning electrical theory, heavy duty mechanics and hydraulics.  He learned to fly small aircraft and as well, and so, what he gained from those many and varied experiences are concepts that could be drawn directly from when writing about the spaceships, inventions and robots in this youthful space-adventure series. G.F. lives in Canada with his wife and little dog, and has two grown kids who are off and away following their own worthy life-paths now, thankfully.

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Copyright © 2014 – 2024-*.  Written and Illustrated by Gerald Brynelson - (G. F. Brynn)

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Created and Printed in Canada by Deep Sky Stories & Illustrations.

First Printing, 2014

Series Title Change From {Alex The Inventor} to {Alex Faraway}:  2024.02.25

Deep Sky Stories Inc. ©

www.deepskystories.com

For Carolyn, who has my undying love and affection,

Ryan and Jessica, who, as crazy youngsters, inspired me to start writing again.

And, a special thanks to my mom who taught me to never give up.

*****

Table of Contents

Prelude to a Mystery

Chapter 1.  Big Ben and the Boy

Chapter 2.  A Little Something in the Night

Chapter 3.  What Transpired in the Scrapyard

Chapter 4.  Late For School and Teaching the Teacher

Chapter 5.  Follow the Leader

Chapter 6.  Dart the Defender

Chapter 7.  The Stranger He Knew

Chapter 8.  Triangle Trap

Chapter 9.  Down the Glass Tunnel

Chapter 10. What the Biosphere Revealed

Chapter 11. Unpleasant Discoveries

Chapter 12. Belated Truth and Secret Nobility

Chapter 13. The Fallen Stars and Alex’s Exam

Chapter 14. Converging Paths

Chapter 15. Circle of Death and the Battle Begins

Chapter 16. Luss Power and Big Ben’s Last Rumble

Chapter 17. When Halden Left

A Glossary of Terms, Both Real and Imagined

Bibliography and Blueprints

Definitions of unique symbols in the story:

((…words here…)):  Words spoken telepathically.

<<…words here…>>:  Words spoken by a robot.

Prelude to a Mystery…

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Step-by-step, two shadowy figures inched and edged their way down an ancient, strangely silent, spiral stairwell leading down a dark shaft far underground.  Breathing in that dark, cold place was difficult – not for lack of air or because of the icy coldness, but because of the wall that closed in on the woman’s left and the dark, chill abyss that fell sharply away on her right.  And the stone steps were crumbling, ancient and oh so narrow...  The old woman’s breaths came in short, shallow gasps as she fought back panic and descended further down the stone steps.  The circle of daylight far above her was slowly shrinking away with each step down and she now doubted the wisdom of their venture.  The steps they tread upon were most unusual, even unnatural, in this of all places.  They had already crossed the two hundred yard mark, she was certain, and still there was no end to the depth of well as they edged their way down the spiraling steps.  The man behind her had been the first to find the shaft entrance and had rushed back to the desert shelter to tell her – full of excitement.  Yet that had not been the first of their astounding discoveries that day.  The high canyon walls cast long, frigid shadows where they had arrived only a few short days previously; so much the better to shelter them from other prying, spying eyes.

     Come quickly, he had said excitedly, there’s an underground entrance among the palace ruins!  It had, indeed, been the fallen pillars and collapsed walls of an ancient stone palace that they’d discovered nearby on the valley floor; a most unnatural find in that frozen desert wasteland.

     Now, as the old woman edged her way down those stone steps into the subterranean gloom, her helmet lamp flickered in a most disquieting fashion, not helping her growing anxieties in the least.  She hesitated.  One misstep and a horrifying death-fall into the abyss awaited her.  The lamp returned to its full brightness though, so, on they went.  Their journey thus far had been a disaster – for her especially – despite their otherwise safe arrival and construction of their precious warm shelter.  Her life would never be the same though because of the injury that had befallen her only two days before.  A life-time ago, it could well be said, and she paused, shut her eyes tight and stiffened her chin as a wave of vertigo washed over her amid the shocking recollection of what had happened to her.  How stiff and old she felt now…  Oh, God, get a-hold of yourself, she growled fiercely to herself.  There was now no turning back from what had happened – so be it!  And so, she carried on edging cautiously down into the dark unknown.

     Presently, her gloved hand brushed against an unusually deep hole in the curved sandstone wall and she paused to examine it with her lamp.  The hole was actually a deep scar, a pit made by some kind of bullet or other projectile, and as they descended, the pits increased in number as if to mark where a battle of some kind had once raged.  Soon, other more unusual burn marks were also noticed.  These were quite different from the bullet holes.  The scars made by the other weapon were deeper and resembled the cross-cut lines of a whip-lash.  And the wounds left in the sandstone glittered brightly.  The intense heat from that other weapon had seared the sandstone and changed it into glass.  Suddenly, a body appeared in her lamplight and the woman gasped and stood stalk-still.  The man behind her very nearly bulled her over, so abruptly did she stop.  But, the body which lay before them was not of a human or even an animal – it was of a machine, a robot of some kind – yet it was of a kind they both recognized at once.  The dead, beetle-y eyes, as though from an unusually large insect, gazed up at them with a cold, wicked stare as if to wish death upon them too.  With a small, trembling cry, the woman nudged the odious creature with the toe of her boot and it quickly vanished down the ink blackness of the well.  Only brief moments passed before a loud clatter was heard where the body landed at the bottom.  The woman breathed a sigh of relief.

     Not far now, she said over her shoulder.  Regaining some of her customary composure, she lead onward until, finally, they stood again on firm ground.

     Rust red sand of the ages lay knee-deep on the floor of the shaft but soon dwindled to a thin and scattered dusting the farther they walked into a vast chamber far below the palace ruins.  More of the same stiff, cat-sized metal bodies lay heaped in the sand all around them and scattered haphazardly farther inside the larger open space beyond the shaft.  The chamber that they now wandered in was so wide and deep that it swallowed even their bright helmet lamps in its black, cavernous shadow.  The man wisely placed a beacon at the shaft entrance to ensure they could readily find their way back.  They both placed more beacons as their exploration expanded and soon a veiled illumination marked their progress and revealed the true dimensions of that otherworldly, subterranean labyrinth.  Ponderous, stone pillars joined one and all by uncounted sturdy archways reached up, up into the gloom to support a ceiling so high it couldn’t be seen.  Rich, decorative gold inlay glittered on every pillar, too, in memorizing serpentine patterns without end as to dazzle their eyes.  Yet, even upon those pillars and nearby walls, the pockmarks and deep slashes of that long-ago battle had vandalized their inlaid beauty.  Still further on, they found other stairwells that lead either back to the surface or beckoned them down farther into yet deeper catacombs where they dared not go.  The wonder of the place and the palace above was staggering…and disquieting, because of the place, itself, where the ruins stood.

     Presently, the two rounded a sharp corner where a long, narrow hall lead toward what must have been another room at the far end.  But at the end of the hall was also a large pile of rocks and rubble, which had fallen from a cave-in long ago, blocking their way and also sealing off that room forever.  But, all the more strange were the footprints left in the thin layer of sand which the stillness of those frozen depths had preserved as if they had been made just moments before.  They were pad-prints with large claws as though from a panther.  But this panther had walked upright like a man, and its paw-prints lead into that sealed, mysterious room.  The creature, whatever it was, had entered that room but had never left it.  The woman shuddered and backed away from that dark, narrow tunnel.  Better not to know whatever it was that lay buried within that old, dusty room...

     Oh God, what was this whole place – who or what had lived here thousands of years in the past?  For it must have been millennia ago – all the geological signs in the area strongly indicated that this desert plain that they’d arrived in was a dry riverbed of immense proportions.  Thousands of years ago, a super-Amazonian river as wide as an ocean had thundered through this valley and would have taken months to reach its end.  Such a river would have had monstrous proportions.  The climate of that ancient era would have been much warmer as well, since the present sub-arctic temperatures would surely freeze such a river now, and so, the age of this subterranean cathedral and the ruins above was just as old too.

     Abruptly, a tremor shook the ground causing dust and pebbles to rain down on the explorers.  Their helmets protected them from the worst of the debris. 

     This way – run! the woman yelled, and together, they stumbled to the shelter of a nearby arch.  They waited there until the ground stopped shaking and the dust settled.  When they were able to see through the haze of the dust again, they noticed that several of the beacons left behind them had been extinguished by the debris.  Much of the way back was again lost in thick shadows.  In a panic, the man cried out and made to run back toward the remaining beacons.  Stop! the woman shouted.  Calm down.  Listen.  What was that?  It was a very faint tapping or slapping sound.  The woman cocked an ear, trying to locate where the sound came from.  Where…?  Tap.  Tap.  There it was.  Very faint.  Coming from another room just beyond the arch they were under.  Then, another sound, like a musical wind-chime, rang softly, and a faint glow emanated from the room.  Cautiously, eyes wide and alert, the pair made their way toward the glow.  The wind-chime rose in volume and the ghostly glow grew brighter, then, subsided.  The musical notes faded as well, and, as the woman peered round the bend and into the room, she saw the glow, quite small and dim, as though from a child’s nightlight, illuminating the chamber from an alcove on her left.  Creeping forward, as silent as thieves, the two crossed the threshold.  Hsst!  There’s that sound again, she whispered.  Shining her lamp into the far corner, the woman saw a row of boxes or, maybe, coffins.

     Watch it, the man warned as his partner stumbled again upon another body, but this time, it was mummified human remains lying dry and covered in that same layer of red sand and dust.  From its form and some of the tattered remains of its clothing, the human had been a man.  Whoever he had been, he was united in death with one of those cat-sized insect-bots.  His powerful hands had gouged into the robot’s eyes while that creature had strangled the man with whip-like coils that snaked tightly around his neck.  It was a stark and terrible tableau; a still scene of a vicious, eternal death-struggle which echoed in one’s imagination.

     Slap!  Tap.  Tap-slap.  Again, that sound – as though someone else was in the room with them.  It was coming from one of those odd looking boxes.  There were four altogether; two larger and two smaller, set side-by-side in a row against the far wall.  As she stepped further into the room, the woman’s lamplight reflected off two statues covered in that ever-present red sand and dust.  The statues had the appearance of quite larger insectoids than those others that lay scattered about all through the darkened cathedral.  They were longer too, with tapered tails and long, folded wings.  The statuette pair stood shoulder-to-shoulder and on long, jointed, metal legs which bristled with deadly looking thorny claws.  They had the air and appearance of Guardians who watched over this strangest of tombs.

     Tap.  Tap.  Slap!  The two yelled – startled by that now louder sound that broke suddenly and sharply through the silent stillness.  The woman’s lamp flickered dangerously low as well.

     Damn-it, she hissed, and she rapped her helmet angrily.  She jerked her lamp over to the boxes again.  Gathering her courage, she advanced toward them while the man edged away, unnerved.

     What the hell are you doing, he whispered harshly.

     "Sh – she answered back, as alert as a cat.  Her heart pounding in her throat, she made straight for the last coffin in the row, for she was now certain that that was what they were.  It was one of the pair of smaller ones.  Oddly, the coffin before the end one was open and empty.  A heavy glass lid was tilted up to reveal its dust-covered interior.  Turning back to the last one, she started rubbing away the dust on its window.  A small, brown face was barely visible inside.  The woman leaned closer, peering into the coffin, her helmet lamp shining through the dust.  Slap!  A small hand with little animal claws appeared suddenly against the glass and the woman jumped back, eyes wide and staring with shocked amazement!

     Somebody’s in there, she said, "I think…I think it’s a child or –

     Watch out! the man yelled.  Out of the corner of his eye he saw sudden movement just behind them.  Something hissed viciously, arched its back and flared large, black wings.  And two pairs of bright eyes flashed and flared hot, terrifying menace.  The Guardians were alive!  And the cold rock walls closed tightly in upon them as though to suffocate.

     But, that was not the end of them though, and the years that followed unfolded in a most peculiar and unusual fashion for all who encountered each other, in that small, red room, in those later years of the 21st Century.  And quite the most unusual matter of all was that nothing of the aforementioned misadventure even happened here.

May the most dangerous adventures await those more than brave enough to seek them.

- G. F. Brynn

Story Map

Chapter 1.  Big Ben and the Boy

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    A blue-white light as bright as the sun flashed blindingly in the gloom of the evening.  A

__________

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whistling snap accompanied it, along with the low crackle of high-voltage electricity.  Big Ben moved and worked slowly but with great power.   Again and again the glaring star of searing light flashed and crackled, with molten hot drops popping away from it to glance off mighty arms or the heavy pieces of sheet metal that he easily held in each hand.  Nothing matched his brawn, his tireless steel muscles as he held the two fifty pound steel plates at the proper angle while his third, welder arm moved delicately along the thin gap between them. Slowly and precisely it moved, fusing the two heavy, shaped pieces together with its super-heated voltage which arced off the long, melting stick of a welding rod.  There seemed to be a boy, a child actually, who was hunkered down in Big Ben's middle and following every move that he made with his mighty steel arms.  This was rather odd for the monster to accept, but he grudgingly allowed the boy to remain there while he carried on with his task at hand.  Every so often, Big Ben stopped working, even though he would rather not, and the boy would stop too and get out of his large, metal belly and walk over to a workbench where he bent over paper plans of some sort.  Big Ben waited, patient and still, with the two heavy metal plates clamped firmly in his vice-hands.  The boy was rather thin and gangly, perhaps twelve years old, with longish brown hair falling over his eyes as he read over some technical blue­prints which lay before him.  Big Ben allowed this behavior to continue, with the boy hopping in and out of him at regular intervals to check a measurement or mutter to himself about a wiring connection.  At every move he made, Big Ben felt the thin lad manipulate small, flexible hand controls within him, and push foot-pedals as well.  This was slightly worrisome for Big Ben; could it be that the small, weakling of a boy was actually causing him to move? 

Big Ben's silent question went unanswered though, while his powerful hydraulic arms worked tirelessly on.  A noisy, clattering

pump kept the black fluid that was his life-blood flowing strongly through high-pressure hydraulic lines.  They ran through his massive arms like rubbery veins, with the pressurized blood filling each piston cylinder at the proper time in order that an arm could move and bend to pick up another heavy object.  Big Ben never grew weary of his work; in fact he could continue indefinitely, being a robot.  The boy within him did seem to be tiring though, so Big Ben slowed his movements courteously so the lad could keep up with him.  A small pile of short, spent welding rods had collected on the cement floor of the workshop, along with rusty pieces of discarded scrap-iron and welding slag-beads.  It seemed that the day had long since ended yet still the young boy and Big Ben labored on.  Finally, his mighty arms dropped, limply at his side and the huge robot wondered why he couldn't lift them, not even as much as a twitch.  A soft weeping sound seemed to be coming from inside him and Big Ben sat there listening, dumbly, not knowing what to make of the strange sound.  The boy stumbled out of Big Ben and shuffled slowly over to the workbench, but this time he slumped down on a little wooden stool and lay with his head in his arms over the musty, wrinkled blueprints.  Quietly he rested there, still weeping softly.  A single word came faintly back to Big Ben where he stood stiff and still in the deepening shadows of night-fall.

     Dad, the boy sighed, oh dad, why did you have to go away... Then all was truly silent in the workshop save for the boy’s soft, deep breathing as he fell asleep there.  Not too long afterward, the door to the shed creaked open and another person entered.  Big Ben stood guard nearby but he felt that nothing needed to be feared from the intruder.  The larger person gently took the boy in her arms and kissed his tired, weary little brow.

     There, there, Alex, she whispered, that’s enough work for today, son.  The single, bare light bulb went out as the workshop door clattered shut for the night and Big Ben, the large, powerful construction-bot stood silent and dumb, arms hanging at his sides while outside, crickets filled the still country night with their communal song.  The machine that he and the lad were working on was the strangest looking thing Big Ben had yet seen in his many years of duty.  A teardrop-shaped vehicle of some sort was slowly taking form in the boy's workshop, and it had a single pilot's seat in the round of the teardrop.  It was truly a sleek looking craft, built for extreme velocity both in and out of the atmosphere.  Puzzling, thought the silently waiting robot.  He had sat rusting and abandoned deep in the junk and trash of the scrapyard until being found by the boy who generously repaired Big Ben so he could see duty again in his aged, advanced years.  The young human was clearly an inventive sort, with an assortment of various other fascinating devices and machines in his shop.  Yet this particular craft which sat half-finished seemed to command a keener concentration from the boy than had his other ingenious projects.  The cricket-songs continued through the quiet autumn night in a soft, undisturbed chorus and Big Ben remained where he had been left for the day.  He was, in reality, not much more than simple-minded bulldozer yet his dim perceptions and massive machine pride blinded him to the fact that the boy, not he, was the actual controller of his actions.  The crickets droned on until the witching hour approached, then one-by-one they fell silent till all became quiet outside. A mild night wind restlessly rustled the lazy branches of the surrounding trees and tangled underbrush which hid the boy’s home from the scrapyard beyond the fence. An uneasy silence hung over the countryside which, it seemed, would not allow the night to complete its dark hours toward the dawn until something significant was begun.  Or, perhaps, finished...

The silence remained so for another half hour until a new sound interrupted all else and drifted to the robot on the cool night air.  The sound was like that of a small bell being tapped by silver and it came from not far away - out in the scrapyard, just outside the workshop door.  It was where Big Ben and his little companion went in search of new parts and pieces to the machine they were building.  Another sound from much farther away, replied to the clear notes of the tiny bell but with a high-pitched, Zeeeee…!  Suddenly, a furtive scuttling of little legs was heard just outside the door and Big Ben, for all his power, tensed once more in the dark corner.  Legs, the little scavenger-robot that the boy had built himself, sat beside Big Ben in sleep-mode and unaware of what was

happening.  All was silent again for a few more moments.  Then, quite suddenly, there was a vicious exchange of small, sharp explosions and for a brief second the darkness was replaced by a bright blue flash of light that penetrated through the cracks in the walls of the workshop.  Something had hunted and something else had died just outside that door, and, from somewhere far away in the scrapyard, a child gave a triumphant cry as a warrior from long ages past would have after defeating a sworn enemy. As midnight approached, something among the stars shining down on the small town of Delta, moved ever so slightly, and it was not a star.

The Strangers Arrive…

Every community, no matter how small or boring, has at one time or other had some strange tale for the local town-folk to tell each other or to newcomers.  Even people just passing through and stopping for a cup of coffee at the local diner might overhear some such urban myths or tall tales coming from the booth just behind them.  The small farming town of Delta was no different than any other, except for one very striking difference:  the tall tale actually did happen...or so the locals said.  And they claim it happened not so very long ago... 

The story began, oddly enough, with the arrival in Delta-Town of several very large tractor-trailers.  They arrived in a convoy of six trucks and were all painted dark gray, as if to hide them better in the night.  The trucks came out of the darkness and all rumbled to a stop in front of Rosie's Diner, the only place in town that was still open that late.  The few