by Pat Mills
"Enough!" cowled Hammerstein.
"Of course, I wouldn't really describe myself as 'cy' or 'bi' or 'tri,'" said Blackblood, ignoring him. "Although I help out when they're busy."
He would have gone into appalling detail, but was interrupted by a news flash. Images of the tripods attacking Viking City appeared in a hologram in front of the Warriors. Their heat rays were destroying everything in their path. The rows of pyramids that stretched out like a vast Native Indian reservation of wigwams to the horizon were turned into blackened husks. People were fleeing the city in their thousands, their millions even. Their vehicles choked the road. In their panic, smaller juggernauts tried to undertake bigger juggernauts with disastrous results. Behemeks hurtled forward to defend the city and for a short while there was a ghostly hush as they took on the war machines. But their guns had no impact on the Martians' armour, and the heat rays retaliated, cutting through the Behemeks' armour, exploding the ordnance within.
And once again there came that terrible, triumphant cry, "Ullllaaaaaaaa!"
Deadlock realised just how far Medusa had suckered, rather than succoured, the colonists of her world. Up till now, she had made a series of relatively minor attacks on the extra-martials: the meteorite attacks, the Clone Cowboys, reanimating the dead and so on, while she waited for a response to her demands for change. But all the time she was still proceeding with her ultimate solution to the problem of these beings from her sister planet Gaia.
As the humans fled Viking City, Deadlock also found himself repeating the War of the Worlds. Once again, from the viewpoint of Medusa.
"Never before in the history of Mars, had such a mass of humans moved and suffered together. Streaming fugitives, each dot a human agony of terror and physical distress. This was no disciplined march: it was a stampede, gigantic and terrible, without order and without a goal. Six million people unarmed and unprovisioned, driven headlong. It was the beginning of the rout of civilisation.
"Of the massacre of mankind."
The ABC Warriors watched the scene intently and with increasing horror. Or rather Hammerstein, Deadlock, Joe and Mongrol watched with increasing horror.
Mek-Quake and Blackblood's reactions were more ambivalent. The tripods reminded Blackblood of the "Daddy Long Legs" war machines he had once fought in the jungle. This was when he was known as "Big Daddy" and had carried out a number of massacres of innocent civilians with his infamous Straw Dogs. "Happy days," he murmured quietly to himself. Clearly the tripods had similar objectives.
Mek-Quake was lost in thought and said nothing. But something about the tripods was causing him concern.
In Viking City, thousands of citizens were drawn up into the tentacles of some of the Tripods. With a stupidity that surpassed even Mek-Quake's, some humans made ludicrous remarks such as "W-what are they?" or "They're killing everyone!" Such was the state of shock they were in.
Hatches in the cockpits opened and they were dragged, struggling and screaming inside where the Martians were waiting to drink their blood. Tubes dangling from their maws were inserted into the humans.
Steelhorn's command tripod directed the savage onslaught. Once he had been a friend of humanity, but that was an eternity ago. His prime directive now was to ensure Mars died. Human life was an abomination to him. He was not the Steelhorn the ABC Warriors once knew and admired. He was alien to them. He was the mouthpiece of Medusa and nothing more.
"To the Martians and not to humans is the future ordained!" Steelhorn called to his army.
"Ullllaaaaaaaa!" replied the Martians.
Deadlock communicated telepathically with Medusa, pleading for their lives, and begging her to show mercy.
Her answer was uncompromising. Mercy? Why should I show mercy to these unpleasant bipeds who stand vertically with two stalks at the bottom of their trunks which they perambulate upon?
"Because they are scared. They don't want to die like you. Haven't you heard their cries?"
Yes, she replied thoughtfully. I have listened to their sounds of 'Heeelp' and 'Merceeeeee!' and 'Oh, biol!' and 'Sweet Gaia!'. As well as other strange sounds like 'king hell!' These peculiar hootings invariably precede feeding. They have no modulation and are, I believe, in no sense a language, but merely the expiration of air, prior to the pipettes being inserted into them.
"Your Martians are drinking their blood! That is barbarism!" exclaimed Deadlock.
Is it? replied Medusa. The human method of food consumption is itself a primitive and unpleasant process, involving the production of waste matter. Unlike our own hygienic method: we feed off the fresh living blood of humans. And inject it into our own veins.
"Ullllaaaaaa!" chorused the tripods in agreement.
With mounting disgust, Hammerstein, Joe, Deadlock and Mongrol saw some of the Martians dropping down from their tripods, like spiders on threads. They were squatting over puddles of human flesh, and drinking blood. They cried "Aloo! Aloo!" as they sucked up the liquid from the goo.
You recognise the inspiration for my plans, Deadlock? continued the planetary consciousness. Can you complain if I use human imagination against humans? I thank Mr Wells with all my heart.
"There must be another way, Medusa," insisted Deadlock as the Warriors' jet approached the carnage of Viking. "A way you can accommodate humans on your world."
Of course, Medusa replied. Humans have a new place in the Martian food chain.
On the plate.
The robot wizard could see there was no reasoning with her.
Know, at last, Deadlock: I will win the War of the Worlds!
As the War of the Worlds looked a foregone conclusion, a War of the Words was about to begin.
Mek-Quake, in humanoid mode while inside the jet, turned to the other Warriors. "Mek-Quake, he has been thinking."
"Careful," said Hammerstein.
"He does not like this word 'Ullllaaaaaa!' It is not a good word for Mek-Quake. Why the Martians say this? He does not think this is right."
"Mek-Quake, you don't think if it's good enough for Mr H G Wells, it should be good enough for Medusa?"
"But why they say word which Mek-Quake not understand?"
"Because they like this word, Mek-Quake. Because they are Martians. It is the word Martians use. It is their equivalent of Big Jobs!"
"But it not make sense."
"No. But neither do you, Mek-Quake."
"But this word - it is not very good."
"Well, that is a matter for them. And, before you bring it up, I have also heard them say 'Aloo! Aloo!'. Which I don't think is their way of saying 'Hello'."
Blackblood interrupted them. "So what do you think the Martians should be saying?"
"Mek-Quake don't know."
"And why is that?"
"Hrrrr. Because Mek-Quake is stupid."
"And how do we solve that problem?"
"You give me a daily upgrade."
It was Blackblood's turn. Mek-Quake leaned down towards him and Blackblood forked two fingers and viciously poked them in Mek-Quake's face screen.
"Is that better?"
"Yehhhh! Thank you, Blackblood."
Below them, Viking's Sojourner Airport was in flames as the tripods rampaged across it, destroying all the aircraft on the tarmac with their heat rays.
Setting their jet on remote control, the ABC Warriors "torced up" and prepared to jump out and do battle with the war machines.
"Okay, let's increase the peace," said Hammerstein. They leapt out into the maelstrom. As they fell through the air, their hip torcs slowed their descent. They exchanged a few words before the combat began.
Perhaps they were to be their final words, because the tripods were clearly the greatest threat they had ever faced. They had no way of knowing if their armour could withstand their heat rays.
"It's time to finally take sides," said Deadlock.
"Yes, we have no choice now," said Blackblood, "If Medusa wants total war, she's got it."
"I thought the Red Death wo
uld be an end to it," pondered Mongrol.
"But it's not over," added Hammerstein.
"It's not over for any of us," said Joe Pineapples.
"Let's burn a large one," said Mek-Quake.
THE WAR WILL CONTINUE IN BOOK TWO:
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINES
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Pat Mills
Pat Mills began his long career as a sub-editor on DC Thomson's romance comics, but soon found a calling at 2000 AD, where he created Sláine, The ABC Warriors, Nemesis the Warlock and countless other strips. Also renowned for his early work on Judge Dredd, his current work includes the best-selling graphic novel Requiem: Vampire Knight.
Alan Mitchell
From a very young age Alan Mitchell was obsessed with SF, first encountering it on TV by way of Dr Who, Star Trek and a host of other shows in the 60s and 70s. His other love was for SF novels and comics: Ray Bradbury, Phillip K Dick, Harlan Ellison, Poe, Hope Hodgson, Lovecraft and Clarke Ashton Smith being his principle loves. He has several projects in the pipeline, which he's been told he's not allowed to speak about. But more novels will follow in a solo capacity as well as a TV project and comics.