A YJA moment - The Martians (Part Two)

Mars has a long history, most of which is barely understood.  Its believed that the planet served as either a colony or outpost by a highly advanced civilization.  There are ruins on the planet that are impossibly old, and there are artifacts with technology far in advance of anything even modern Martians can achieve.

During the 19th Century, the planet Mars was known by its inhabitants by another name: Barsoom.  In that world were many different species of beings, each antagonistic with each other.  The four-armed reptilian Tharks warred constantly with the Red Martians, near-humans who had settled into a series of city-states such as Helium and Zodanga. The Red nations themselves held rivalries and fought with each other over resources and land.

During this period the Malacandrans, the beings we know today as Martians, were dominated by their White Martian minority.  They hid in subterranean cities, using their shapeshifting and psychic powers to manipulate the other species in order to prevent them from accidentally discovering their civilization.

Enter John Carter of Earth.  The former American Confederate soldier was hiding in a cave when he accidentally activated an Ancient teleportation relic, which transported him to Barsoom.  There he encountered the Tharks, Red Martians, and the mysterious White Martians which all were in conflict.  He brokered peace between the peoples of Barsoom and became a leader in Helium.

Years after Carter left for the final time, a calamity struck the planet.  Unbeknownst to the other nations, another species dwelled on Barsoom.  It was a race of scavengers who had been defeated by the Ancients and had hidden in secret pockets throughout the planet in order to hide while their systems healed themselves.  Modern scholars would name them Cydonians, after the "face" which marked one of their largest vaults.

In 1898 the Cydonians awoke, bursting out of their stasis-tombs like locusts and swept across Mars.  The city-states of the Red Martians and the Thark enclaves quickly fell to the highly advanced intruders and soon the remains of their civilizations were picked clean for useful materials, minerals, and bio-matter.

The Cydonians then left for Earth, where they would attack London, only to fall to a biological weapon dropped on them by a member of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.  With the intruders defeated and the threat to Mars over, the White and Green Martians emerged from their hidden cities and claimed the planet for themselves.

As a footnote: Few people know that in 1885, John Carter and Deja Thoris signed a peace treaty with United States President Andrew Jackson.  Part of the agreement was granting Earth land on Barsoom to set up an embassy, something that wouldn't happen until almost 140 years later.  But that is another story for another day.