I pushed myself to fly at top speed and overtook him. With great effort, I got him into a chokehold and stopped him midair.

Martians with advanced mental powers such as Z'Onn and I could easily adopt many forms. His favorite was a parody of the uni-form of the Martian Elite Police, with magenta-red skin, a black cape, and yellow eyes. I held his magenta form tightly as I stated the Martian Doctrine of Detainment and readied him for processing by my fellow policemen.

He suddenly turned into something that looked like to Y'thurl the Owl Demon, a creature from Martian legend. I had to let him go to avoid being impaled on the spikes that covered his body. His spiky wings flapped as he attempted to get away.

I was an elite shape changer as well. I quickly turned into a giant, sticky protoplasmic creature from Mars' prehistory that instantly enveloped Z'Orr. As soon as he was trapped, I turned into a Red Living Stone and held him deep within me.

Our collective weight caused us to drop quickly to the street below. The hardened sand of the street gave way and formed a huge pit as we struck the ground. We were apparently near the Elite Police Station, because I could sense the telepathic signatures of my partners approaching. Soon I could hear cheers from my fellow Police when they saw I had captured Z'Orr.

Z'Orr and I regained our Martian Elite Police forms. Z'Orr had been weakened from the fall somewhat, while I was able to stand and remove a pair of energy binders from my belt.

I heard a collective click of my comrades' laser pistols as they pointed them at Z'Orr to hold him captive.

All of a sudden, a bright flashing vortex appeared in the sky. It was so bright that we had to block our eyes from it, but I was brave enough to venture a look. Upon closer examination, the vortex appeared to be almost like a tunnel, with a pathway clearly visible in between the bright flashes of light.

Z'Onn Z'Orr saw this as his chance to escape. He wrestled free of my grip, and flew up out of the sandpit into the sky, toward the vortex. Amid the alarmed shouts of my fellow Police, I soared up after him. They fired stun bolts at Z'Orr, but he did not stop racing for the vortex's entrance.

Z'Orr entered the vortex before I did. When I entered it, I felt myself being pulled forward through space, faster than I had ever traveled before. The energy of the vortex was so strong that after a few minutes I stopped fighting it, and let it pull me on to its final destination.

I had some time to think as I let myself be pulled through the vortex. Z'Onn Z'Orr had killed many of my friends, and my entire family, and so it was with little regret that I faced the prospect of never going back to Mars again.

A rude voice yelled at me in a language I did not understand. I stood up slowly, weakened by my trip through the vortex. The three beings had pale pinkish skin that offended me with its ugliness, but so did the person who was trying to protect me.

At the last moment, he shoved me aside as the three attackers pulled out primitive pellet pistols and shot him until he lay near-death on the cold, hard ground. Instinctively, I lashed out at them with my Martian heat-vision, setting the clothing of one of them afire. The three ran away, cowed by my appearance and my powers.

I was left with my dying protector. He kept saying one word, "Marcia," over and over as he slipped away into death's embrace. I tried to find something to stanch the flow of blood from his projectile wounds, but it was too late.

This man had perished in my defense. Not being able to speak his language, I had no way of finding his family, or this "Marcia," if they existed. I needed to find out what he meant by that word, but I did not have a lot of time. As his life faded away, I used my telepathic powers to see into his mind, and to attempt to learn the structure of his guttural, harsh language before he died and all would be closed to me.

I ended the telepathic link with a slight understanding of this planet's language, but I soon realized that I should take his body away from this place. It was a Martian custom to bestow the Desert Death of Honor upon renowned warriors, as those who had died without fear could not fear the fiery desert ceremony, and H'ronmeer's fiery embrace.

So I rolled up his body with his coat and my cape, and soared into the sky. If this world were anything like my own, there would be a desert close by.

Finally I arrived at a sandy area where I could perform the ceremony. As I prepared his body for it, I thought of one last gift I could give this stranger who had saved my life. I knew already that I was very different from the people on this world, and they would never accept me, especially in any of the normal forms we Martians took.

For a time, it would be best to take on John Jones' form as a disguise. So before I lit his corpse afire, I used my shape-changing powers to mimic his appearance exactly.

With one blast of my Martian vision, his corpse took light. It was said that the bravest caught fire the fastest, because their souls were most worthy of going to the afterworld. I stood for a while, as night fell, and his remains burned down to embers in the desert.

Although his intellect was inferior to mine (there were some cases he had left unsolved that I figured out in a few minutes), there were some flashes of brilliance here and there in his work. I was saddened somewhat by the fact that the man who had died saving my life was so good at his craft. I would have to work to do him justice if I were to continue in this identity.

I was frustrated, however, by the fact that there were no insta-communicators anywhere. We used them extensively on Mars. They were of many sizes, and included a screen upon which you could see someone who was communicating with you, as well as obtain information from the planetwide Mars Source. All I could find in John Jones' office was a primitive digital number machine that could only do the simplest equations. I would have to remedy this situation if I were to not be bored to tears. I would have to get the components to make my own insta-communicator.

I found a place called a "Pawn Shop," where I was able to get rid of some useless trinkets that John had lying around his office for the return of crinkle paper, which the people of this planet used as money. I obtained enough "cash" to purchase a very primitive machine similar to an insta-communicator. Upon dissecting this machine, I found some processor components and circuits that were actually quite useful.

"Hello, stranger!"

I turned and saw a female human with long yellow hair tied into braids. From what I had learned about this planet so far, she would have been considered "foxy." From the paper-based images John Jones had around, I could tell that this was "Marcia." She wore a light green tunic and magenta slacks. Her shoes had enormous heels that raised her height about 4 inches.

"Marcia?"

"Yes, that's my name." She giggled a little bit.

"You haven't come by for a few days, John." She came in and walked close to my desk. "I was beginning to wonder if you were mad or something." She gave me an inquisitive look.

I did not know that I was supposed to regularly visit this woman. I made a mental note of this fact, so that I could perpetuate my disguise.

"No, I'm not mad."

"Well, good." She smiled, and for a moment, I saw across the differences between our species to where she was actually attractive, for a human. "Wanna pick me up for lunch tomorrow?"

"Of course. Where should I 'pick you up'?" These humans used so many slang phrases that it was hard to keep up with the true meanings of their words.

"You sure are acting freaky, John." She put her hand on my forehead. "Pick me up from work, silly! You know, the nuclear power plant!"

"Oh, yes. Of course. Noon is when you have lunch?"

"Yes, 'noon is when I have lunch', Mr. Freak." She gave me a confused look as she walked to the door. "See you tomorrow, sweetie."

As she left, I marveled that this world had not moved beyond nuclear power. We had used the same means of powering various devices, but a disaster had prompted our development of a safer form of energy. Hopefully the nuclear disaster that occurred on Mars would not happen on this planet, too.

It was hard to figure out how to treat Marcia. She was somewhat similar to Martian women, in that she was extremely intelligent, and challenging. But there was an urge to distinguish herself from everyone else that I couldn't relate to.

Z'Onn Z'Orr was such a criminal on Mars because of his selfishness. There was plenty of crime on Mars, but for the most part, my people took great pride mostly in what they gave to the common good, not on what they achieved for themselves. My telepathy allowed me to sense in Marcia both great tension against the way things were, and a little bit of distrust for me.

"John! How are you, sweetie?" she asked as I opened the passenger door for her. At that moment, I felt a telepathic presence that I had not felt in a long time. At that same moment, the general alarm for the nuclear plant sounded.

"What's going on?" Marcia asked. "Is it a meltdown or something?"

The workers around the plant entrance were alarmed, but they had emergency procedures that they followed quite well.

Marcia began to panic. "Oh, my God! My friends are all in there! If it explodes.."

"If it explodes, we will all die," I said. The choice was before me. If I chose to take Marcia and run away, I would keep my identity safe. If I chose to use my Martian powers, I would reveal who I really was, but I could save hundreds of lives. I would not let the nuclear disaster that had taken place on Mars take place here.

"Marcia, drive my car to a safe place," I ordered. "I'm going to see what the problem is." At that, I shapeshifted into the form I wore when I was a Martian Elite Policeman.

Marcia was shocked. "Who? What are you?"

"It doesn't matter now. John Jones gave his life for me, and I chose to honor his sacrifice by walking amongst you humans as him. He was a lucky man." I put my hand on her shoulder, then lifted off into the sky to fly toward the plant entrance.

The guard was puzzled to see someone like me, but the alarm was clearly occupying him.

"I'm here to help," I said. "Where is the alarm coming from?"

The guard looked at me in surprise, then showed me a map of the facility, with a light where the alarm had originated.

"I don't get it," he said. "That area is just Dr. Erdel's office. There's no equipment or radioactive materials there, except when he's tinkering with something."

"Perhaps he is in trouble," I remarked. I read the map of the facility on the security guard's desk. I would have to remember the precise location of Dr. Erdel's office, if I were to help him. His office was three floors down from the lobby, and the fastest way down there would be to phase through the floors. Hopefully I would not phase into anything solid when I reached my destination.

I turned myself intangible and began to 'walk' down through the solid concrete, down to the third sub-basement where Dr. Erdel's office was.

I heard a familiar voice booming from the office.

"You will tell me the secret of the vortex, little man! No matter what alarm you sound, no one will be able to save you from my power!"

I raced to the office, and looked inside to see a very frightened Dr. Erdel, and my enemy, Z'Onn Z'Orr. He was as surprised to see me as I was to see him.

"Found me at last, have you, J'Onzz?" he asked. "You will be of little help to this frail man after I am done with you!"

I got ready to blast him with my Martian vision, but something was preventing me from using it. Z'Orr laughed, and prepared to blast me to pieces with his own Martian vision.

He was about to torture some manner of secret out of a small, gray-haired scientist with large glasses.

I was trying to capture him as I had been unable to do on Mars, but I was suddenly unable to fight him. As hard as I tried, I could not use my Martian vision, or any of my other powers, on Z'Orr.

But he was still able to use his powers, to deadly effect. I dodged just in time as a blast impacted into the wall.

"Ah, J'Onn J'Onzz. Somehow, I knew you would come here, to interfere with my plans."

He turned his fist into a huge spiky ball and swung it at me. It missed me by an inch and made a dent in the wall.

"My eternal foe, on Earth as well as on Mars! You don't even know why you came here, do you?"

He tore a metal bar from the wall and cracked me across the chest with it.

I fell back against the opposing wall. If my Martian powers had been at full strength, that blow would not have hurt me. But in this weakened state, I could ill afford another hit like that one.

"I've been on this Earth as long as you have. But I came directly to Dr. Erdel here, while you went off to have your little adventures. I first arrived on Earth in Erdel's laboratory . . . after I tortured him just a little, he explained how we were brought here."

The poor old man looked like he had been tortured. I saw burn marks and bruises on his face. Only a savage like Z'Orr would injure such a nice old man, and H'Ronmeer only knew to what kinds of tortures Z'Orr had subjected Dr. Erdel.

"Yes, I'm responsible for you two being here," Erdel said.

"This inferior human created a vortex that reached across time and space to open a hole on Mars that we were able to enter." Z'Orr pointed disdainfully at the Doctor. "Because he's just a human, he did it by accident. But I have been putting his 'genius' to good use!

Dr. Erdel shrank into the corner as Z'Orr boasted.

"Dr. Erdel has been working on some useful inventions for me . . . Bring my weapon out, cur!"

Erdel obediently opened one of his file drawers and pulled out a small weapon that I recognized from my Martian Elite Police training. I wondered what other tools of destruction were hidden in Erdel's laboratory.

"A particle beam generator!"

"Yes . . . and this is just the prototype, J'Onzz. This human dog was intelligent enough to follow my directions on how to build one. With this, and with the other weapons he has built for me, along with the power to travel through time and space, I will be unstoppable." His eyes glowed with power and greed. "I'll go back to Mars, and get my old associates together, and, armed with these weapons, we'll rule this planet!"

Z'Orr thought for a moment, and then smiled. "I'd ask you to help me rule these foolish humans, but we were never friends on Mars, so why should we be friends here?"

The general alarm kept sounding throughout the nuclear plant. I knew that the plant security forces, if not the Army, would be along soon, if they weren't already here.

"Now to use this particle beam generator on those fools who would think to stop me!" Z'Orr shoved me out of the way, and then went out of the door of Erdel's office, and flew up the stairs to attack the oncoming security forces.

As he left, I could feel my Martian powers returning. How could he weaken me just by his presence? I would have to find this out before I could stop him.

"Are you all right?" Dr. Erdel asked.

"I should be asking you that question. How long has he had you under his power?"

"Since he appeared one day, a couple of months ago." Erdel adjusted his glasses, and collected himself, so he could tell the story properly. "I was conducting a vortex experiment, as a way of harnessing nuclear energy for long-distance space travel. If I could open up a gateway on Earth, and use nuclear energy to tear open an exit on another world, I could revolutionize space travel.

"But my experiment had awful results. Right after I opened up the vortex, he came." Erdel shuddered at the thought of Z'Onn Z'Orr. "He came in a flash of light, all of a sudden. He grabbed me in his strong arms, and very nearly killed me the moment he met me! But he saw that I was a scientist, and that kept him from hurting me more. He said that he would have use for me."

Erdel pulled himself out of his story and turned his attention back to me. "But I didn't mean to tear you away from your world, wherever it is."

"You didn't tear us away, Dr. Erdel. Z'Orr was fleeing me when he went into the vortex. I was an officer in the Martian Elite Police, and Z'Orr was evading arrest. I followed him into the vortex . . . so neither of us really got here by accident."

Time was running out. If Z'Orr had his way, this nuclear power plant would either become a slaughterhouse for anyone who stood in his way, or, worse, a burning, radioactive disaster. The disaster of N'Orr Ridge on Mars quickly came to mind.

Dr. Erdel clutched at my cape. "Can you stop that man, before he takes over the Earth?" Dr. Erdel asked nervously. "I would hate to have to spend the rest of my days inventing things for him . . . Oh, the things he threatened to do to me if I failed to make weapons for him!"

"I'll try to stop him!" I said. "See if you can find a way out of here. If I'm not able to stop Z'Orr, he may decide he wants to destroy this entire nuclear plant. But I'll do my best."

I opened the door, and flew up the stairs after Z'Orr.

Marcia was inside the building, and I could tell from her thoughts that she was in a measure of distress.

I landed on the stairs, and had to stop for a moment and concentrate on her thoughts, to see if she was in danger. It was my duty, as the person for whom John Jones had died, to make sure that Marcia did not come to harm.

I made mental contact with Marcia. She, along with a number of scientists, was trying to stabilize a control rod structure that had been shaken by Z'Orr's mounting attack on the nuclear plant. The scientists who were left were doing what they can, and Marcia was doing a good job of helping them. She had been trained by Dr. Erdel, among others, so the power plant was in good hands, as far as she was concerned. If I didn't break the mental link immediately, I might accidentally distract her from her work, with potentially disastrous results.

It was best to leave Marcia to her work now, and for me to go after the source of the chaos, Z'Onn Z'Orr.

I had to approach him carefully, in case my powers faded away while I was fighting him.

I could see that a large group of security guards were trying to resist Z'Orr's onslaught. The bullets from their weapons bounced off his invulnerable skin. The guards were even firing high-caliber weapons at him, to no effect.

"We don't have anything that can stop him!" said one of the guards. Their ranks were shrinking as Z'Orr mercilessly picked them off with his Martian vision. Men turned into piles of ashes as he blasted them.

"It'll be at least a half an hour before we can get the National Guard here!" commanded the guard captain. "Shoot him with whatever ya got!"

As I neared Z'Orr, I could feel my powers weakening. Something on him was weakening my powers, and it wasn't telepathic.

He turned on the particle beam generator and sent a blast rippling through the security guards' ranks. Five of them were vaporized instantly. He energized the beam for another deadly blast.

I was soaring toward Z'Orr. I didn't care that my powers would be fading away; if I soared fast enough, the force of my impact against him would be enough to do him some damage.

He turned to face me just as I smashed into his chest. There was a momentary pain such as I had never felt before, but this soon faded.

"That . . . was quite a clever gambit, J'Onzz. You managed to shatter the pendant that was draining your powers. Ultimately ineffective, though, since I now hold your life in my hands. And I'm going to take that life, right now.."

I blasted him in the eyes with my Martian vision. He clutched his eyes and I punched him in the face before he had time to recover. I had the advantage for a moment, but the two of us were still equally matched in power. Z'Orr would fight back, eventually, and I feared what would result.

At that moment a vortex opened up behind where Z'Orr was standing. The pull of the vortex was irresistible, and it took all of Z'Orr's strength to hold himself back. I held on to one of the columns in the room. The remaining security guards fled and hid behind desks to avoid its inexorable pull.

Z'Onn Z'Orr saw Dr. Erdel coming into view.

"You did this! Disobedient cur! For this insubordination, you will die!" Even as the vortex pulled him in, he blasted Erdel full in the chest with his Martian vision.

I let go of my hold on the column, and shape changed my arms so they grew to ten-foot length. The vortex began to pull me forward, but I was still able to push Z'Orr in. Z'Orr disappeared into the vortex and I withdrew my arms, and flew away from the vortex, just in time.

Dr. Erdel slumped against the wall. "It worked!" he exclaimed as loudly as he could manage. But he had a smoking hole in his chest where Z'Orr's Martian vision had burned him through. He fell to the floor, and some of the security guards gathered around him. One of only guard captains who was left alive after Z'Orr's assault ordered two of his subordinates to contact the plant's medical staff to help Dr. Erdel.

Dr. Erdel motioned to me with a hand that was losing life by the second. "My friend . . . I . . . recreated the vortex so that it would have an opening . . . but no end point . . . so there's no way out . . . " Erdel tried to explain what he had accomplished, between gasps and wheezes. "Z'Onn Z'Orr should be trapped within it for the rest of his days."

Suddenly, Marcia appeared. "I would have come to see you earlier, but they needed me in my area. Z'Onn Z'Orr destabilized a control rod structure during his first attack, but after he moved on to attack the security guards, we were able to get in there and fix it. The plant is operating normally, thanks to J'Onn, and to you, Dr. Erdel."

"Thanks to you as well, Marcia . . . " Erdel gasped. "I'm so proud of you . . . "

I, too, felt much admiration for Marcia at this moment. She was both the vivacious, energetic woman that I had gotten to know over the past couple of months and a budding scientist, all at once. In this, she was a kindred spirit.

It was too bad that she, and me, and Dr. Erdel had not met under different circumstances. My heart saddened as I thought of the interesting conversations, or the inventions, that a group such as we could have shared. But this was not to be.

"Oh . . . Dr. Erdel, please don't die!" Marcia sobbed, holding the old man's head in her hands.

"Goodbye, Marcia . . . keep up the good work. Goodbye, green stranger," he said, clutching my hand. "Thank you for freeing me from the slavery that would have been my life, if Z'Orr had been allowed to rule the world . . . now I can rest in . . . "

And at that moment, Dr. Erdel died. After all that fighting, the only sound then was that of Marcia's sobs echoing off the cold linoleum of the floor.

I felt that Z'Onn Z'Orr deserved his fate, for what he had done both on Mars and on Earth. It was better for him to be forever trapped between worlds than to be brought to justice-better for such a vile being as Z'Orr was to never have contact with another living creature again.

Unfortunately, Dr. Erdel, the only one who could ever free him or send me back home was now dead, so I was trapped on this world. He was the only one who knew the secrets of the vortex technology, which was seized by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and as far as Marcia or I could figure out, confiscated by the Defense Department. I hoped that the humans would not want to use Erdel's technology for war, as Z'Orr had hoped to use it.

Marcia was very kind to me, but she loved John Jones, even though he was gone. Now that she knew that the real John Jones was dead, she wanted to see if she could rebuild her life without him. This would mean less contact with me, but it would have been too much to ask her to extend her love of John Jones to me. We would be friends, and I would come and help her if she needed me, but we would remain nothing more than friends. I would continue using the identity of John Jones, when it was necessary. He did not have much of a family beyond Marcia, so his appearance here or there would not cause concern. Marcia told me to look out for the forces of Deadly Ernest, a powerful crimelord with operations both in Canada and the West Coast. Deadly Ernest's forces were responsible for the real John Jones' death, and if they saw me in his form, they would come after me, too.

Although there were now no other Martians left on this planet, there were others who used their special abilities to protect people, as I had done. I had heard about the exploits of the JSA, and other groups of superheroes. They had accepted supernatural beings and those from radically different cultures into their ranks as equals. I would have to seek other heroes out, and perhaps together we could understand one another.

It was reported that there were more superbeings in New York City than on the West Coast -- perhaps I would find my way there, and join up with some of them.

I would have to make the best of my situation, alone as I was on this strange world. I hoped that I would not be alone for long.