Zitharta

How terrifying it would be if such an object were to loom above the White House, its gigantic hull casting a deep, dark shadow, its jet-engines droning with an ear-shattering noise and its tentacles quivering in anticipation of grabbing up some hapless humans. Thankfully though, the Zitharta is not an alien spaceship coming to invade Earth, but a small, harmless aquatic animal, only as tall as a thumb!

The zitharta is an enigmatic arezoan, for a long time wrongfully classified within the waste-basket taxon “Brachiostoma”, solely due to its tentacles. By the looks alone it is apparent that this animal’s anatomy is a world apart from most other arezoans. Its body consists of a main mantle, somewhat shaped like a professional bicycle helmet worn at the Tour de France. It is what holds all the internal organs and is supported by a siliceous endoskeleton, not unlike a glass sponge. At the front is a frilled mouth with two fan-like tendrils, which the zitharta uses to capture food particles and small prey out of the water. Above the mouth is a three-rowed series of small ocelli, each one coming with its own eyelid, which sometimes configurate into amusing expressions.

Most conspicuous about the zitharta is of course its “mast”, a long, rod-like appendage that grows underneath the mantle. The “mast” is supported by a sturdy biosilicon rod and hinged at its upper end. On it grow ten pairs of little tube-organs, which, through peristaltic pumping, can create a continuous and coordinated water-flow. This form of jet-propulsion, perhaps the most complex so far encountered in the solar system, is the main method of locomotion of this animal. The two fleshy fins at the bottom end of the “mast” seem to mainly function as steering rudders. An air-filled bladder inside the mantle allows for changes in buoyancy.

Zitharta live in very deep caverns and subglacial lakes of the southern hemisphere, whose waters stay liquid all year round, thanks to the planet’s remaining interior heat. In these very dark environments, they help themselves with a large skin-patch on the posterio-dorsal mantle which houses bioluminescent symbionts. With these biolights the zitharta can navigate their way through the dark waters while also attracting small planktonic organisms.

This is as far as our knowledge on these animals goes. On a drying Mars, these aquatic, subterranean creatures are exceedingly rare and difficult to observe. We do not know, for example, what they do during times of seasonal anoxia, though metabolic strategies similar to other cave-dwellers seem quite likely. We also do not know how they reproduce or what other animals prey on them. Finally, there remains the question of their aforementioned phylogenetic status. After the break-up of Brachiostoma, zitharta have become notorious problematica. They possess a U-shaped gut, with the cloaca emerging right below the feeding tentacles, which has prompted some researchers to place them close to the Antitremata, but the usage of biosilicon is virtually unknown in said phylum and there are other glaring differences. The discovery of the closely related githarta and zotharta beneath the northern polar caps has also not helped the matter, as they still closely resemble the zitharta. Nonetheless, the growing amount of taxa has made some researchers more comfortable with classifying these organisms within their own, distinct phylum Trabsozoa. Micropaleontologists have found the distinctive rods of trabsozoans in ancient chert deposits, indicating that these lifeforms could have already existed when Mars still had oceans.

Happy Holidays from Mars!

A good time is coming, I wish it were here

The very best time in the whole of the year.

I’m counting each day on my tendrils and stumps,

The weeks that must pass before Mars’ approaching comes.

Then, when the first green mists begin to come down,

And the heat ray burns sharp and the sky is torn down,

I’ll not mind the screams, though my ear it numbs,

For it brings the time nearer when our invasion comes.

Drain them we shall, blood will stain their filthy soil

While in our breeding facilities their children toil.

Fractarian trees our red weed will generate,

Which with their skulls we shall decorate.

These primitive cattle will cry their last hurrah,

When they hear us scream only:

Aloowog

Though Mars has its fair share of beautiful and elegant creatures, a great lot is downright hideous and somewhat malevolent in appearance. The aloowog is no exception, resembling an unholy combination of a malignant toad and a ravenous locust.

The aloowog is the largest member of the gryllopodidae, a family of cricket-like archaeocephalian onychognaths whose third leg pair has adapted towards jumping high and far with the help of Mars’ gravity. Though, there is some recent discussion around this group actually being polyphyletic. The decoupling of the cranium and jaws in the aloowog is stronger than in its relatives and it has an unusual, inflated, almost squishy appearance. This masks a quite slender skeleton underneath, which, as in anurans on Earth, completely lacks rib bones, but offers a lot of space for six large lung-sacs. These the aloowog uses to broadcast its calls far and wide across the shrublands. The sound is often described by astronauts as a faint “aloo-aloo”, giving the Martian its name. Unlike a frog, its skin is dry and keratinous and, though wrinkly, the smooth texture and pinkish colour gives it an unnervingly human quality.

Living in various temperate areas around the planet, fully grown aloowogs are capable predators of various microfauna. The mandibles, derived from ancient hands, have a large, jointed, but hidden arm skeleton behind them that allows the mouth to open with an impressively large gape. Thanks to this they can swallow much of their prey whole. Sometimes though, aloowogs seem to prefer eating their food slowly and methodically, often by starting with the head, as this poor Yrp had to find out.

Aloowogs differ in another aspect from other gryllopods. The majority of the family gives birth to fully developed young which resemble the adults, but the aloowog reproduces in a seemingly more primitive manner. During the inundation season, two aloowogs mate and externally fertilize aquatic eggs, which they lay into the temporary streams and ponds that form. These hatch into larvae which have to metamorphose into the adult form.

Aloowog larvae are nicknamed aloopoles and differ drastically from the adults. They hatch with strongly developed hindlimbs with extended webbing, with which they propel themselves like backswimmer bugs. The other limb pairs are still missing. Out of the later breathing holes sprout gills, the tail has a fluke and the skin is much tighter, making the body more streamlined. Especially apparent through this is the chelicerous mouth detached from the cranium, used to feed on various small semi-aquatic animals the aloopoles share their habitat with. Fascinatingly, the anatomy of the aloopoles has some superifical resemblance to that of the fossil Tyralloidea, a successful group of marine archaeocephalians that went extinct at the end of the Thermozoic Era. Some of these fossil organisms could reach plesiosaurian dimensions, which is reflected in the names of famous taxa like Elasmorallus, whose magnificent 12-metre long skeleton graces the main hall of the American Museum of Natural History. Some have proposed that this resemblance might hint at a deeper connection between tyralloids and modern gryllopods, but convergent evolution seems a more likely explanation. The rail-like swimming method with long paddle-limbs, instead of a fish-like undulation, has evolved a curious number of times independently among various Martians, including many groups that were not even secondarily aquatic. The exact reasons for this phenomenon are still speculated upon, though a leading hypothesis is that the lower gravity affects water physics in such a way that this method of swimming becomes more viable than on Earth.

Aloopoles do not remain long in this antediluvian form, as they develop front legs quite quickly. As soon as they are then able to walk and breathe on dry ground, the body inflates to its adult, rounded state. The webbing on the hindlimbs becomes reduced, as they transform from paddles into jumping legs. Due to relying on open bodies of water for their reproduction, aloowogs are much more vulnerable to climatic changes than other shrubland organisms, especially on such a dried-out planet. The prospect of future urban stations on Mars redirecting much of the glacial meltwater for their own needs could seriously threaten their populations. I therefore implore the readers, especially those positively inclined towards colonialism and terraforming, to perhaps show some sympathy towards this and other Martians, for, as unfriendly as they may look, they are but innocent animals and alive just like us. After already devastating our own world, what right do we have to invade another and rape its natural treasures? If Man truly is wise, he would do best to come to Mars only as a visitor, not as a violator. We may be alone in this solar system with our power and intelligence, but if higher powers do exist in the greater beyond, they might not judge us favourably, should we succumb to our selfish and unnecessary excesses.