Invaders of Earth

by Groff Conklin

Now I look down the harbor. All manner of boats, overloaded with fleeing population, pulling out from docks.

  (Sound of boat whistles)

  Streets are all jammed. Noise in crowds like New Year’s Eve in city. Wait a minute— Enemy now in sight above the Palisades. Five great machines. First one is crossing river. I can see it from here, wading the Hudson like a man wading through a brook— A bulletin’s handed me—Martian cylinders are falling all over the country. One outside Buffalo, one in Chicago, St. Louis—seems to be timed and spaced — Now the first machine reaches the shore. He stands watching, looking over the city. His steel, cowlish head is even with the skyscrapers. He waits for the others. They rise like a line of new towers on the city’s west side— Now they’re lifting their metal hands. This is the end now. Smoke comes out—black smoke, drifting over the city. People in the streets see it now. They’re running toward the East River—thousands of them, dropping in like rats. Now the smoke’s spreading faster. It’s reached Times Square. People trying to run away from it, but it’s no use. They’re falling like flies. Now the smoke’s crossing Sixth Avenue— Fifth Avenue— a hundred yards away— it’s fifty feet—

  operator four: 2X2L calling CQ— 2X2L calling CQ— 2X2L calling CQ— New York— Isn’t there anyone on the air ? Isn’t there anyone— 2X2L—

  ~ * ~

  II

  pierson: As I set down these notes on paper, I’m obsessed by the thought that I may be the last living man on Earth. I have been hiding in this empty house near Grovers Mill—a small island of daylight cut off by the black smoke from the rest of the world. All that happened before the arrival of these monstrous creatures in the world now seems part of another life—a life that has no continuity with the present, furtive existence of the lonely derelict who pencils these words on the back of some astronomical notes bearing the signature of Richard Pierson. I look down at my blackened hands, my torn shoes, my tattered clothes, and I try to connect them with a professor who lives at Princeton and who, on the night of October 30, glimpsed through his telescope an orange splash of light on a distant planet. My wife, my colleagues, my students, my books, my observatory, my—my world—where are they ? Did they ever exist? Am I Richard Pierson? What day is it? Do days exist without calendars? Does time pass when there are no human hands left to wind the clocks ? In writing down my daily life I tell myself I shall preserve human history between the dark covers of this little book that was meant to record the movements of the stars. But to write I must live, and to live I must eat— I find moldy bread in the kitchen, and an orange not too spoiled to swallow. I keep watch at the window. From time to time I catch sight of a Martian above the black smoke.

  The smoke still holds the house in its black coil—But at length there is a hissing sound and suddenly I see a Martian mounted on his machine, spraying the air with a jet of steam, as if to dissipate the smoke. I watch in a corner as his huge metal legs nearly brush against the house. Exhausted by terror, I fall asleep.

  It’s morning. Sun streams in the window. The black cloud of gas has lifted, and the scorched meadows to the north look as though a black snowstorm had passed over them. I venture from the house. I make my way to a road. No traffic. Here and there a wrecked car, baggage overturned, a blackened skeleton. I push on north. For some reason I feel safer trailing these monsters than running away from them. And I keep a careful watch. I have seen the Martians feed. Should one of their machines appear over the top of trees, I am ready to fling myself flat on the earth. I come to a chestnut tree. October, chestnuts are ripe. I fill my pockets. I must keep alive. Two days I wander in a vague northerly direction through a desolate world. Finally I notice a living creature— a small red squirrel in a beech tree. I stare at him and wonder. He stares back at me. I believe at that moment the animal and I shared the same emotion—the joy of finding another living being— I push on north. I find dead cows in a brackish field. Beyond, the charred ruins of a dairy. The silo remains standing guard over the wasteland like a lighthouse deserted by the sea. Astride the silo perches a weathercock. The arrow points north.

  Next day I came to a city vaguely familiar in its contours, yet its buildings strangely dwarfed and leveled off as if a giant had sliced off its highest towers with a capricious sweep of his hand. I reached the outskirts. I found Newark, undemolished, but humbled by some whim of the advancing Martians. Presently, with an odd feeling of being watched, I caught sight of something crouching in a doorway. I made a step toward it, and it rose up and became a man—a man, armed with a large knife.

  stranger: Stop—Where did you come from?

  pierson: I come from—many places. A long time ago from Princeton.

  stranger: Princeton, huh? That’s near Grovers Mill!

  pierson: Yes.

  stranger: Grovers Mill— (Laughs as at a great joke) There’s no food here. This is my country—all this end of town down to the river. There’s only food for one—Which way are you going?

  pierson: I don’t know. I guess I’m looking for—for people.

  stranger: (nervously) What was that? Did you hear something just then?

  pierson: Only a bird—a live bird!

  stranger: You get to know that birds have shadows these days— Say, we’re in the open here. Let’s crawl into this doorway and talk.

  pierson : Have you seen any Martians ?

  stranger: They’ve gone over to New York. At night the sky is alive with their lights. Just as if people were still living in it. By daylight you can’t see them. Five days ago a couple of them carried something big across the flats from the airport. I believe they’re learning how to fly.

  pierson: Fly!

  stranger: Yeah, fly.

  pierson: Then it’s all over with humanity. Stranger, there’s still you and I. Two of us left.

  stranger: They got themselves in solid; they wrecked the greatest country in the world. Those-green stars, they’re probably falling somewhere every night. They’ve only lost one machine. There isn’t anything to do. We’re done. We’re licked.

  pierson: Where were you? You’re in uniform.

  stranger: What’s left of it. I was in the militia—National Guard. That’s good! Wasn’t any war any more than there’s war between men and ants.

  pierson: And we’re eatable ants. I found that out. What will they do to us?

  stranger: I’ve thought it all out. Right now we’re caught as we’re wanted. The Martian only has to go a few miles to get a crowd on the run. But they won’t keep doing that. They’ll begin catching us systematic like—keeping the best and storing us in cages and things. They haven’t begun on us yet!

  pierson: Not begun!

  stranger: Not begun. All that’s happened so far is because we don’t have sense enough to keep quiet—bothering them with guns and such stuff and losing our heads and rushing off in crowds. Now instead of our rushing around blind, we’ve got to fix ourselves up according to the way things are now. Cities, nations, civilization, progress—

  pierson: But if that’s so, what is there to live for?

  stranger: There won’t be any more concerts for a million years or so, and no nice little dinners at restaurants. If it’s amusement you’re after, I guess the game’s up.

  pierson: And what is there left?

  stranger: Life—that’s what! I want to live. And so do you! We’re not going to be exterminated. And I don’t mean to be caught, either, and tamed, and fattened, and bred like an ox.

  pierson : What are you going to do ?

  stranger: I’m going on—right under their feet. I gotta plan. We men, as men, are finished. We don’t know enough. We gotta learn plenty before we’ve got a chance. And we’ve got to live and keep free while we learn. I’ve thought it all out, see.

  pierson: Tell me the rest.

  stranger: Well, it isn’t all of us that are made for wild beasts, and that’s what it’s got to be. That’s why I watched you. All these little office workers that used to live in these houses—they’d be
no good. They haven’t any stuff to ‘em. They just used to run off to work. I’ve seen hundreds of ‘em, running wild to catch their commuters’ train in the morning for fear that they’d get canned if they didn’t; running back at night afraid they won’t be in time for dinner. Lives insured and a little invested in case of accidents. And on Sundays, worried about the hereafter. The Martians will be a godsend for these guys. Nice roomy cages, good food, careful breeding, no worries. After a week or so chasing about the fields on empty stomachs, they’ll come and be glad to be caught.

  pierson: You’ve thought it all out, haven’t you?

  stranger: You bet I have! And that isn’t all. These Martians will make pets of some of them, train ‘em to do tricks. Who knows? Get sentimental over the pet boy who grew up and had to be killed. And some, maybe, they’ll train to hunt us.

  pierson: No, that’s impossible. No human being—

  stranger: Yes, they will. There’s men who’ll do it, gladly. If one of them ever comes after me—

  pierson: In the meantime, you and I and others like us—where are we to live when the Martians own the Earth ?

  stranger: I’ve got it all figured out. We’ll live underground. I’ve been thinking about the sewers. Under New York are miles and miles of ‘em. The main ones are big enough for anybody. Then there’s cellars, vaults, underground storerooms, railway tunnels, subways. You begin to see, eh? And we’ll get a bunch of strong men together. No weak ones, that rubbish, out.

  pierson: And you meant me to go?

  stranger: Well, I gave you a chance, didn’t I?

  pierson: We won’t quarrel about that. Go on.

  stranger: And we’ve got to make safe places for us to stay in, see, and get all the books we can—science books. That’s where men like you come in, see? We’ll raid the museums, we’ll even spy on the Martians. It may not be so much we have to learn before—just imagine this: Four of five of their own fighting machines suddenly start off—heat-rays right and left and not a Martian in ‘em. Not a Martian in ‘em! But men—men who have learned the way how. It may even be in our time. Gee! Imagine having one of them lovely things with its heat-ray wide and free! We’d turn it on Martians, we’d turn it on men. We’d bring everybody down to their knees.

  pierson: That’s your plan?

  stranger: You and me and a few more of us, we’d own the world.

  pierson: I see.

  stranger: Say, what’s the matter? Where are you going?

  pierson: Not to your world. Good-by, stranger. . . . After parting with the artilleryman, I came at last to the Holland Tunnel. I entered that silent tube anxious to know the fate of the great city on the other side of the Hudson. Cautiously I came out of the tunnel and made my way up Canal Street.

  I reached Fourteenth Street, and there again were black powder and several bodies, and an evil, ominous smell from the gratings of the cellars of some of the houses. I wandered up through the Thirties and Forties; I stood alone on Times Square. I caught sight of a lean dog running down Seventh Avenue with a piece of dark-brown meat in his jaws, and a pack of starving mongrels at his heels. He made a wide circle around me, as though he feared I might prove a fresh competitor. I walked up Broadway in the direction of that strange powder—past silent shop windows, displaying their mute wares to empty sidewalks— past the Capitol Theater, silent, dark—past a shooting-gallery, where a row of empty guns faced an arrested line of wooden ducks. Near Columbus Circle I noticed models of 1939 motorcars in the showrooms facing empty streets. From over the top of the General Motors Building I watched a flock of black birds circling in the sky. I hurried on. Suddenly, I caught sight of the hood of a Martian machine, standing somewhere in Central Park, gleaming in the late afternoon sun. An insane idea! I rushed recklessly across Columbus Circle and into the Park. I climbed a small hill above the pond at Sixtieth Street. From there I could see, standing in a silent row along the Mall, nineteen of those great metal Titans, their cowls empty, their steel arms hanging listlessly by their sides. I looked in vain for the monsters that inhabit those machines.

  Suddenly, my eyes were attracted to the immense flock of black birds that hovered directly below me. They circled to the ground, and there before my eyes, stark and silent, lay the Martians, with the hungry birds pecking and tearing brown shreds of flesh from their dead bodies. Later, when their bodies were examined in laboratories, it was found that they were killed by the putrefactive and disease bacteria against which their systems were unprepared—slain, after all Man’s defenses had failed, by the humblest thing that God in His wisdom put upon this Earth.

  Before the cylinder fell, there was a general persuasion that through all the deep of space no life existed beyond the petty surface of our minute sphere. Now we see farther. Dim and wonderful is the vision I have conjured up in my mind of life spreading slowly from this little seedbed of the Solar System throughout the inanimate vastness of sidereal space. But that is a remote dream. It may be that the destruction of the Martians is only a reprieve. To them, and not to us, is the future ordained, perhaps.

  Strange it now seems to sit in my peaceful study at Princeton writing down the last chapter of the record begun at a deserted farm in Grovers Mill. Strange to see from my window the university spires dim and blue through an April haze. Strange to watch children playing in the streets. Strange to see young people strolling on the green, where the new spring grass heals the last black scars of a bruised Earth. Strange to watch the sightseers enter the museum where the disassembled parts of a Martian machine are kept on public view. Strange when I recall the time I first saw it, bright and clean-cut, hard and silent, under the dawn of that last great day.

  <>

  ~ * ~

  Mildred Clingerman

  MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO

  Here, on the other hand, is an invasion story so quiet, so unmelodramatic, and so unassuming that at first sight it seems almost mousy— until you reach the ending. Now, under ordinary circumstances the trick ending is not a particularly desirable fictional technique; too often it is only a bad pun or something of that nature. In this instance, however, the trick is so convincing and the interaction between human and aliens is based on such sympathetic understanding that the combination is hard to resist. A bit short on science-fiction background, the story nevertheless has a science-fiction theme—in this case a charming one.

  This story, the first one published by the authoress, was called to the Editor’s attention by Anthony Boucher some months before it appeared in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.

  ~ * ~

  Mrs. Chriswell’s little roadster came to a shuddering halt. Here was the perfect spot. Only one sagging wire fence to step over and not a cow in sight. Mrs. Chriswell was terrified of cows, and if the truth were told, only a little less afraid of her daughter-in-law, Clara. It was all Clara’s idea that her mother-in-law should now be lurking in meadows peering at birds. Clara had been delighted with the birdwatching idea, but frankly, Mrs. Chriswell was bored with birds. They flew so much. And as for their colours, it was useless for her to speculate. Mrs. Chriswell was one of those rare women who are quite, quite colour-blind.

  “But, Clara,” Mrs. Chriswell had pleaded, “what’s the point if I can’t tell what colour they are?”

  “Well, but, darling,” Clara had said crisply, “how much cleverer if you get to know them just from the distinctive markings!”

  Mrs. Chriswell, sighing a little as she recalled the firm look of Clara’s chin, manoeuvred herself and her burdens over the sagging wire fence. She successfully juggled the binoculars, the heavy bird book, and her purse, and thought how ghastly it was at sixty to be considered so useless that she must be provided with harmless occupations to keep her out of the way.

  Since Mr. Chriswell’s death she had moved in with her son and his wife to face a life of enforced idleness. The servants resented her presence in the kitchen, so cooking was out. Clara and the snooty nursemaid would brook no interfe
rence with the nursery routine, so Mrs. Chriswell had virtually nothing to do. Even her crocheted doilies disappeared magically soon after their presentation to Clara and the modern furniture.

  Mrs. Chriswell shifted the heavy bird book and considered rebelling. The sun was hot and her load was heavy. As she toiled on across the field she thought she saw the glint of sun on water. She would sit and crochet in the shade nearby and remove the big straw cartwheel hat Clara termed “just the thing.”

  Arrived at the trees, Mrs. Chriswell dropped her burdens and flung the hat willy-nilly. Ugly, ridiculous thing. She glanced around for the water she thought she’d seen, but there was no sign of it. She leaned back against a tree trunk and sighed blissfully. A little breeze had sprung up and was cooling the damp tendrils on her forehead. She opened her big purse and scrambled through the muddle of contents for her crochet hook and the ball of thread attached to a half-finished doily. In her search she came across the snapshots of her granddaughters - in colour, they were, but unfortunately Mrs. Chriswell saw them only in various shades of grey. The breeze was getting stronger now, very pleasant, but the dratted old cartwheel monstrosity was rolling merrily down the slight grade to the tangle of berry bushes a few yards away. Well, it would catch on the brambles. But it didn’t. The wind flirted it right around the bushes, and the hat disappeared.