A missing gem containing the secrets of the universe becomes a cause célèbre when the nearest solar system powers intervene in planet Earth's future. Included in the effort to obtain the ruby known as the Serpent's Last Secret is Earth's twenty-first-century time traveler John Pelletier; the giant mole Murdock (first minister of Mars); Earth physicist Prof. Whitfield; and the sorcerer Vorelis, who, with his two lovely daughters, presides over a fragment of the lost continent of Mu. Written with humor and wit, the novel comes to a stunning conclusion when the nearest solar system powers gather on Mars sixteen thousand years ago in a last ditch effort to save twenty-second-century planet Earth and their own worlds too.