Invasion! Earth vs. The Aliens

by Robert Reginald

  He hesitated.

  “Well, it’s like this,” he said. “We have to invent a way where men can survive, a place that’s safe enough to raise our children. The tame ones are already dead: they’re big, beautiful, rich, stupid—and dead! None of that means shit now. Problem is, those of us who’re left could turn savage. So, we need to move underground where they can’t find us. I’ve been thinkin’ for weeks about the sewers. Of course, there’re those who’ll think that’s a fate worse than death, so to speak, but right beneath our feet are hundreds and hundreds of miles of drainpipes, and just a few days’ rain will wash Old ’Frisco clean, leavin’ them sweet and empty and ready for use. The main sewers are big enough for all of us. Then there’re the cellars, the vaults, even the BART tunnels. See? All we need are people like us: able-bodied, clean-minded, right-thinkin’, hard-hittin’ men. We’re not going to include just anyone who drifts through the door, so to speak.

  “Those who’re chosen—and those who choose to remain—will have to follow orders. There’s gotta be a structure if we’re goin’ to survive. I’ll be one of the officers, of course. We also need able-bodied, clean-minded, good-lookin’ women for mothers and teachers and wives. No silly sluts and ‘socies’ here. Life is becoming real again, and the useless ones will have to go, my friend, yes they will. They’re all goin’ to die anyways, don’t you see? So they ought to be willin’ to die for the rest of us. It’s a sort of disloyalty, after all, to not help the human race survive. And they can’t really be happy in this kind of world. Dyin’s not so hard; anyone can do it. It’s the whiners that make it look bad.

  “We’ll gather together in the underground places, the hidden places. Our headquarters will be ’Frisco. If we keep our eyes and ears open, we might even be able to come out in the open when the Martians are busy. Play baseball, maybe. That’s how we’ll save the human race. But savin’ the race is nothing in itself. As I said, we have to save our knowledge and somehow add to it if we’re going to live. That’s where men like you come in. There’re books that need to be preserved. We have to establish safe spots way, way down deep, and get all the good books moved there—not the novels or the poetry, but the how-to stuff, the technology books, the science books. That’s where you come in, friend. You can help us. We have to go to the Public Library, even to Stanford and Berkeley, and pick out the good things, the ones we really need. We gotta keep it up, we gotta learn more. We gotta watch the Martians and their machines and learn from them.

  “Some of us will be trained as spies. Hell, when it’s all workin’, maybe even I’ll volunteer. And the thing is, we have to leave the Martians alone. We don’t challenge them, we don’t steal from them, we don’t let them see us. If we get in their way, they’ll clean us all out. We gotta show them we mean no harm. Yeah, yeah, I know, that’s hard. But they’re intelligent, and they won’t hunt us down if they have everythin’ they want, if they think we’re just harmless rats.”

  The Guardsman paused and laid a brown-burnt hand on my arm, looking into my eyes.

  “You know, we might be able to cheat a bit. Think about this: four or five of their fightin’-machines suddenly start off, sting-rays blazing right and left, and not a Martian among ’em. Not a Martian in them, either, but men, red-blooded men who’ve learned how to operate the things. Fancy drivin’ one of those, firing its stinger everywhere! Wow! It wouldn’t matter if you were smashed to smithereens yourself. I reckon the Martians’d open their big beautiful baby blues at that!”—Martian eyes were invariably black—“Can’t you just see ’em? Can’t you just see ’em scurryin’ and hurryin’ and puffin’ and blowin’ and hootin’ to themselves? ‘Something must be out of whack,’ they’d yell. ‘Somethin’s gone screwy again!’ And swish, swish, bang, bang, rattle, crash, boom, just as they’re tryin’ to get things going again, here comes the sting-ray mowin’ ’em all down. Yeah, I can see it as clearly as night turns into day.”

  For awhile the imagination of the man, and the sense of certainty and courage he conveyed, completely dominated my reason. I believed in both his forecast of human destiny and in the practicality of his scheme; and anyone who thinks me overly susceptible or startlingly foolish should put himself in my position, crouching fearfully in the rose bushes and listening to this torrent of words, all the while being distracted by fear over our situation.

  We talked like this through the early morning hours, and later crept out of the park and hurried as quickly as we could to the house on Nob Hill where he’d made his lair, not far from the hotel I’d stayed in the previous night. His hidey-hole was actually located in the basement of the place, and when I saw the work he’d supposedly expended—it was just a pit ten feet deep, through which he intended to access the main sewer—I had my first inkling of the gulf between his dreams and his abilities. I could have dug the damned thing myself in a day.

  But I still believed in him enough to work with him all that morning until noon. We had a shovel and a garden rake, and we stashed the dirt we removed upstairs by the kitchen stove. Then we broke for lunch, washing down a can of vegetable soup with a bottle of Château Saint-Bérnardine Pinot Noir ’77 filched from a neighbor’s wine rack. As we resumed our work, I turned his project over again in my mind, and presently a few doubts began to rise; but I continued to labor all that morning, just because it felt good to have something to do. After an hour I began to speculate on the distance one had to go before the sewer was reached, and the possibility of missing it altogether. I suddenly wondered why we should have to dig this tunnel at all when we could have just opened one of the manholes in the street. Before I could pose the question, though, the Guardsman stopped working.

  “We’re doin’ pretty well here,” he noted, putting down his spade. “But I’m gettin’ tired, so let’s take a look-see upstairs.”

  I wanted to continue, so he picked up his shovel again, and then I had another thought.

  “Where’s the rest of your company?” I asked.

  “Uh, uh, well, they’re all, uh, out on patrol, yeah, they’re out patrollin’. I’m expectin’ one of them to report back before nightfall. Private Lambe. He should be here soon.”

  “Why were you up in the park, instead of working here?”

  “Well, see, I was, uh, I just needed the air, ’cause it gets real hot and stuffy down in the basement, particularly when you’ve been workin’ at it a long time. I was on my way back when I spotted you.”

  “But why isn’t the hole any bigger?”

  “Well, uh, you can’t work all the time,” he said—and then I saw him for what he was. He hesitated again, then put his spade aside. “You know, we really ought to check the roof,” he said, “because if any of those damn machines are around, they might hear us workin’ and catch us unawares.”

  I no longer bothered to object. So we went upstairs and stood on a ladder that loomed out of a trap door on the roof. No aliens were visible anywhere. We ventured out onto the tiles, and slipped down under the shelter of the chimney.

  A tree obscured part of Nob Hill, but we could still see the Bay spread out below us, and on the shore a bubbly mass of red weed poking up its hair. Some of the red creeper had swarmed up the trees a few blocks away; the branches of the earthly growth were dying or dead, with brown, shriveled leaves poking out from amidst the purple flower clusters (I realized after the fact that some of the trees may have already dropped their leaves for the winter). Neither of the alien plants had gained much of a foothold on the hill. In the few places where there were open areas, I could see the usual complement of garden shrubs rising out of private patios and plots, green and brilliant in the evening light. In the distance smoke was rising; a blue haze hid the northern hills towards Marin County.

  Mayer began telling me about the folks still living in the city.

  “One night last week,” he said, “some fools got the lights workin’ again with a generator, and there was one block of Market Street all lit up, crowded with tattooed, ragged dopers and drunk
s, men and women dancin’ and shoutin’ till dawn. A guy who was there told me all about it. When the sun came up, they suddenly saw a fightin’-machine standin’ over them. Christ knows how long it’d been there. Must’ve given them a real turn. The buggers came down the road, and picked up a hundred or more people who were too stoned or pissed to run away. Hope they made the Marshies sick.”

  Then he started back on his ideas again. He spoke so eloquently about the possibility of capturing a fighting-machine that I half-believed him. But I was beginning to understand something about the man. The emphasis that he placed on doing nothing defined his true spirit. I noted that there was now no question of him personally capturing and directing the great and glorious machinery that would save all mankind, oh no. He would just organize the effort. Sometimes he called himself “Captain” and once “Colonel.” He’d been just a Private in the National Guard, but in his own mind, he’d advanced in rank through the deaths of his comrades-in-arms.

  After a bit we retired to the basement again. Neither of us was disposed to resuming work, so when he suggested dinner, I readily agreed. He suddenly became very voluble, and when we’d feasted on some sardines and canned crab and asparagus, he fetched two bottles of excellent whiskey and a couple of cigars. I declined the latter, but shared the drinks, while his optimism continued to glow with the same fierce fire that highlighted the tip of his smoke whenever he puffed on it. A self-satisfied grin was etched in crimson on his face. He now regarded my appearance as a godsend.

  “You know, I’ve got some pot down in the cellar,” he said.

  “‘Candy’s dandy, but liquor’s quicker’.”

  “Well, I’m in charge today, so weed it is! We’ve a lot of work before us, my friend! So let’s rest our feet and gather the roses while we may.”

  “Ye rosebuds,” I said, making a circular motion with my hands.

  “What?”

  After he “liberated” his stash and lit up a hand-rolled toke, he pulled out a tarot deck and insisted on trying the cards. He taught me tarot poker, and after dividing San Francisco between us, I taking the northern side and he the south, we played for control of the neighborhoods, money no longer having any value here. I know this sounds foolish, but I found the game and the several others that we played quite refreshing. Perhaps they helped divert my mind from the trauma I’d experienced during the preceding month.

  So, with our species dancing on the edge of extinction, and with no clear idea of what to do about it, we sat there all evening pursuing the chance shuffle of these painted pasteboards, playing the “joker” with absolutely unmitigated delight. Afterwards he showed me the meaning of the cards, and then I beat him three times in a row at chess. When darkness fell, we took the risk of lighting a candle.

  Then we ate again, an unexpected luxury, dividing up a canned turkey. Mayer lit his second cigar. He was no longer the energetic utopian whom I’d encountered that morning. He was still optimistic, of course, but this was a more thoughtful optimism generated by a full stomach. I remember that he toasted my health in a gesture that moved me to tears. I realized then how much I’d missed ordinary human company. I went upstairs to look at the lights he’d mentioned earlier, the lights that blazed out so greenly in the west along the edge of Golden Gate Park.

  I stared across the rolling hills of San Francisco, looking in vain for any sign of the Martians. The northern part of the city was already shrouded in ebon; the fires on the other side of the Bay glowed red, and now and then an orange-tinged tongue of flame flashed up into the deep, blue-black night. The rest of the city was dark. Then I perceived a strange, flickering light, a pale, violet-purple will-o’-the-wisp. For a time I couldn’t imagine what it might be, before realizing that it had to be the red weed. My long dormant sense of wonder, my realization of the proportion of things, stirred once again. I glanced up at Mars itself, hanging red and ugly and mean in the night sky, glowing in the west, and then gazed long and earnestly into the darkness.

  I remained there a very long time, looking out upon that eerie vista, wondering at the changes that I’d experienced. As I relived my recent days, suddenly I felt nauseated. I flung the dregs of my drink off the roof, and would have crashed the glass too if I hadn’t been afraid of making a noise. I realized the utter folly of believing the Guardsman’s nonsense. I’d been a traitor to my wife and to my own kind, and I was filled with remorse and despair. I resolved to leave this undisciplined dreamer of great things to his drink and gluttony, and to head towards downtown San Francisco. There, it seemed to me, I had the best chance of learning what the Martians and my fellow men were doing.

  I was still standing on the roof when the moon began to rise, blinking its lone sullen eye at me, judging me for the fool that I’d become—and the fool that I still remain.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  DEAD-FRANCISCO

  Make no mistake, stranger:

  San Francisco is West as all hell.

  —Bernard De Voto

  Alex Smith, 23 Bi-January, Mars Year i

  San Francisco, California, Planet Earth

  I left the Guardsman at first light, despite his protestations, saying that I still had important things to do. The red weed now flourished everywhere, in the city drains and the sewers and the gardens and even in the streets, choking out the other vegetation wherever it spawned; but its fronds were already showing patches of gray-white, a sign of the disease that eventually destroyed most of it without any aid from mankind.

  Near a BART station I found a man lying by the side of the street. He was covered with a dusting of the Black Death ash. He still lived, but was helplessly, hopelessly drunk. I could get nothing out of him but curses and inarticulate grunts. I would have helped him, but he didn’t want my help. He didn’t want anyone’s help. He just wanted to die.

  The inert dust also enshrouded Market Street from the Embarcadero to the Financial District. The city streets in downtown San Francisco were horribly still, particularly in contrast with what I remembered of them. I found some dinner rolls sealed in bags in a small bakery—sour, hard, and moldy, but still passable. As I walked through the downtown the roads became clearer, and then I passed a block of offices that were still smoldering. Maybe one of the refugees had overturned a candle or let a fire get out of control. The crackling sound was almost a relief against the utter silence of “Dead-Francisco.” It was as if someone had draped the entire city in funereal shrouds.

  The rust of the Black Death was everywhere, covering wrecked and abandoned automobiles, trolley and cable cars, trucks and vans, and hundreds of human bodies—corpses lying every which way in grotesque positions, all in various stages of decomposition. I finally learned to ignore the pervasive odor of death—I had to. I saw a dozen corpses strewn up a one-block side street; they’d obviously been dead for many days. I paid them no more attention than the buildings themselves. They made no difference anymore. The powder had softened their outlines, but it didn’t keep off the flies. One or two of the bodies had been worked over by dogs, and several others had been picked clean by the all-pervasive murders of crows.

  Where the dust was absent, it almost seemed as if the city had been closed for some public holiday, perhaps the Fourth of July or the Gay Pride Parade. Many of the stores had been locked before being abandoned. The houses and apartments and condominiums were also shut tight, and most places seemed utterly deserted, at least by any living people. If survivors were lurking there—and surely there must have been some—they were hiding themselves very well indeed. I realized then how much the underlying rumble of civilization means to us. The background noise is part of our modern world. Now it was gone, and the ruins of Dead-Francisco had become silent in tribute to those who’d fashioned them.

  Scavengers had systematically gutted out the retailers, usually focusing on the food shops, delis, cafés, and liquor stores. I saw that a jeweler’s glass front window had been broken into, but either the thief had been disturbed in the robbery or had tho
ught better of his act, because a number of gold chains and a Rolex were scattered about on the pavement. I didn’t bother with them: they meant nothing to me in the new reality. Time and gold were no longer factors in my philosophy.

  Further on I saw a tattered young woman slumped in a heap on a doorstep, one hand dangling idly over her knee, the wrist gashed open; it had bled a rusty brown stain down her rusty brown dress. A smashed crack pipe still blazed a trail of deceit across the pavement, pointing out the folly of her ways. She might have been asleep, but for the flies and ants and beetles already at work upon her flesh. I didn’t bother with her either.

  The further I penetrated into San Francisco, the worse the stillness became; it was not so much the emptiness of death and destruction that bothered me as the hush of suspense or expectation. At any time, now or in the near future, the destruction that had already singed and scarred and seared this great metropolis might fall again among these quaint old offices and houses and shops, leaving them naught but smoking ruins. This was a city condemned and derelict. This was Dead-Francisco in all its empty, ugly reality.

  I lived here now.

  Near the Civic Center the streets were miraculously clear again, both of dead bodies and of the Black Death. It was here that I heard the weird howling tune of the Martians. I became aware of it almost imperceptibly as I strolled through the streets, this sad, sobbing song of two long notes with a half-catch in the middle:

  “Ool-lah, ool-lah, ool-lah, ooool-laaah-ha.”

  This mournful dirge repeated itself over and over again, as if God Himself was crying terrible tears over the ash heap of mankind. When I passed the streets that ran towards the west, it blared again, but the intervening houses and buildings seemed to deaden the sound, as it faded in and out, in and out. I continued down Market Street to the U.S. Mint, wondering why no one’d bothered to force open its doors. Food was a more valuable currency in Dead-Francisco.