Warrior of Two Worlds
I
My senses came to me slowly and somehow shyly, as if not sure of their way or welcome. I felt first—pressure on my brow and chest, as if I lay face downward; then the tug and buffet of a strong, probing wind, insistent but not cold, upon my naked skin. Closing my hands, I felt them dig into coarse dirt. I turned my face downwind and opened my eyes. There was little to see, so thick was the dust cloud around me. Words formed themselves on my thick tongue, words that must have been spoken by so many reviving unfortunates through the ages:
“Where am I?”
And at once there was an answer:
“You lie upon the world Dondromogon.”
I knew the language of that answer, but where it came from—above, beneath, or indeed within me—I could not say. I lifted a hand, and knuckled dust from my eyes.
“How did I get here?” I demanded of the speaker.
“It was ordered—by the Masters of the Worlds—that you should be brought from your own home planet, called Earth in the System of the star called Sun. Do you remember Earth?”
And I did not know whether I remembered or not. Vague matters stirred deep in me, but I could not for certain say they were memories. I asked yet again:
“Who am I?”
The voice had a note of triumph. “You do not know that. It is as well, for this will be a birth and beginning of your destined leadership on Dondromogon.”
“Destined—leadership—” I began to repeat, and fell silent. I had need to think. The voice was telling me that I had been snatched from worlds away, for a specified purpose here on whatever windswept planet Dondromogon might be. “Birth and beginning—destined leadership—” Fantastic! And yet, for all I could say to the contrary, unvarnishedly true.
“Dondromogon?” I mumbled. “The name is strange to me.”
“It is a world the size of your native one,” came words of information. “Around a star it spins, light-years away from the world of your birth. One face of Dondromogon ever looks to the light and heat, wherefore its metals run in glowing seas. The other face is ever away in cold darkness, with its air freezing into solid chunks. But because Dondromogon wavers on its axis, there are two lunes of its surface which from time to time shift from night to day. These are habitable.”
My eyes were tight shut against the dust, but they saw in imagination such a planet—one-half incandescent, one-half pitchy black. From pole to pole on opposite sides ran the two twilight zones, widest at the equators like the outer rind of two slices of melon. Of course, such areas, between the hot and cold hemispheres, would be buffeted by mighty gales … the voice was to be heard again:
“War is fought between the two strips of habitable ground. War, unceasing, bitter, with no quarter asked, given or expected. Dondromogon was found and settled long ago, by adventurers from afar. Now come invaders, to reap the benefits of discovery and toil.” A pause. “You find that thought unpleasant? You wish to right that wrong?”
“Anyone would wish that,” I replied. “But how—”
“You are going to ask how you were brought here. That is the mystery of the Masters.” The voice became grand. “Suffice it that you were needed, and that the time was ripe. There is a proper time, like a proper place, for each thing and each happening. Now, go to your destiny.”
I rose on my knees, shielding my face from the buffeting wind by lifting a forearm. Somewhere through the murky clouds showed a dim blocky silhouette, a building of sorts.
The voice spoke no more. I had not the time to wonder about it. I got to my feet, bent double to keep from being blown over, and staggered toward the promised haven.
I reached it, groped along until I found a door. There was no latch, handle or entry button, and I pounded heavily on the massive panels. The door opened from within, and I was blown inside, to fall sprawling.
I struck my forehead upon a floor of stone or concrete, and so was half-stunned, but still I could distinguish something like the sound of agitated voices. Then I felt myself grasped, by both shoulders, and drawn roughly erect. The touch restored my senses, and I wrenched myself violently free.
What had seized me? That was my first wonder. On this strange world called Dondromogon, what manner of intelligent life bade defiance to heat and cold and storm, and built these stout structures, and now laid hands—were they hands indeed?—upon me? I swung around, setting my back to a solid wall.
My first glance showed me that my companions were creatures like myself—two-legged, fair-skinned men, shorter and slighter than I, but clad in metal-faced garments and wearing weapons in their girdles. I saw that each bore a swordlike device with a curved guard, set in a narrow sheath as long as my arm. Each also had a shorter weapon, with a curved stock to fit the palm of the hand, borne snugly in a holster. With such arms I had a faint sense of familiarity.
“Who are you, and where are you from?” said one of the two, a broad-faced middle-aged fellow. “Don’t lie any more than you can help.”
I felt a stirring of the hair on my neck, but kept my voice mild and level: “Why should I lie?
