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Agrees that Reading is Fundamental
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 Re: Contest #14, Change the Ending War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells, can be read as straight science fiction, but some have commented that there is an underlying message in the book as well. Wells was a bit of a social activist who had some strong feelings on war and imperialism. A comparison could be made between the ravaging Martians, and Britain’s own imperial excursions into less developed countries. The message is subtle in this work, but in other writings Wells has been more direct, and at times used satire and irony to get his point across. If he had rewritten the ending, perhaps it might have gone like this…..
……..as I made my way back along the north coast of Kent, past ruined shops and abandoned carts, and the refugee swollen towns of Maidstone, Chatham, and Gravesend, I could feel a subtle, yet palpable excitement building. It originated, I am sure, with the release of tension, and the feeling of surety of survival that was now spreading rapidly across England.
I paused about two miles or so east of Gravesend, at a makeshift pub by the roadside, little more than some large planks laid over barrels, with a tarpaulin hastily fixed into place over them. My last few shillings were spread out on the bar, meager yet acceptable tender in rough times. The offered brandy I downed Texan style, that is, all at once, so much was the discontent of my nervous fiber.
It was while contemplating the bottom of my glass, and also my return to London, that I met a young Captain of the 5th Royal Yorkshire Horse Artillery. He had the dour expression, but also the steady emission of self-confidence endemic in those northern people. Despite a recent looking scar on his forehead, and a soot-blackened uniform, he seemed sociable enough.
“Aye sir, he said, the way is open to London. The fighting machines is down sir, yes they are, as far north as Edinburgh, and all the way to Land’s End, as far as we can tell. The lad’s have got the telegraph working as far as Nottingham, and they are working on more tonight. And the Martians….they is bird food, yes sir, bird food right enough. Now I wish I could tell yer sir that it was my guns that had some decisive part in the outcome I relay to yer. But truth is, as near as we can tell, it’s natural causes. Can I refill yer glass? No, no sir, not to worry, I’ve still a few coppers to my name. Crawled out of them machines, puked out this green liquid, and went to their maker, right there on the spot. All over the country. The doc’s are still deliberating, and tryin’ to make sense of it all. Now if yer be set to go into London tonight, sir, I’ve a mind to lend yer my spare revolver.”
I looked over the roof of our makeshift tavern, and spotted a crow. It looked as though it had a bit of red and grey flesh in its beak.
London was alive again, with horse-carts hauling brick and rubble from the destroyed sections, shop keepers setting out their signs, and impromptu markets springing up, the barrowboys and fishwives shouting and exclaiming their wares to passersby. Fires were burning here and there, with knots of people standing around them, keeping warm in the chill October evening. A group of ten or twelve young men stormed by, faces set, intent on some mission, several of them carrying clubs.
A small group ahead seemed in particularly animated discourse, with raised voices and flailing hands. As I came closer I could see a paperboy making a good trade, handing out newssheets left and right.
The young ruffian was shouting out as he went: “Martin’s ain’t dead! Machines is spotted in America and Egypt! Royal’s is in ‘iding!” I grabbed him firmly by the collar asked what this was all about- it was reprehensible that he should be spreading rumors at a time like this, with the nation in such a compromised state. “But it’s true sir,” he squealed, “the Times office is a buzzin’, and me gov’ ain’t ‘alf mad, isn’t ‘e, with the clacker a goin’ all night, and the stories pourin’ in!” He struggled from my grasp and scuttled towards a dingy alleyway.
My heart started to pound in my ears when I picked up a page that had fallen from his hold. The lured headline read: No Peace Yet, in large print. Underneath was a story quoting a certain Dr W.R. Sterling, head of the recently composed Royal Coroner’s Commission, charged with investigating the mass death of the Martians, and more broadly, of estimating our current strategic status in respect to the invasion.
My reading was interrupted briefly by a paving stone whizzing past my head, and the paperboy shouting “Bloody toff’!”, before disappearing down the alleyway. I lamented sadly that the current turmoil seemed to be sufficient to cause some to loose a sense of their social station.
Dr Sterling was quoted as saying that he had the utmost regret to report that the fatality of the Martin invaders was not total. In this, he said, the epidemic the creatures experienced followed human historical precedent. Even with the worst plagues suffered by humanity, there have always been some survivors. For some reason, the constitutions of these individuals is able to bear up to the infection, and indeed not be troubled at all by consequent exposures to that same agent. In the case of the Martians, new to this world and all its flora and fauna, the impact was extreme. The commission believes they were infected by multiple bacteriological agents, and the mortality rate was very high. At the present time however they are estimating that between one and five percent of the invaders have survived. Some now have been spotted attempting to salvage fighting machines and other material that have not been impounded or destroyed by military authorities.
My hand reached out for support, and found a brick wall, slippery with the drizzling rain that had recently begun. My heart had settled itself somewhat, and I lifted the paper to read more, but the light was fading rapidly. The Martian tripod machines had been seen near the Suez Canal. Perhaps with now limited resources, they were concentrating themselves at the most strategic points, control of which would be most to their advantage. If they had indeed picked Suez, then they had certainly done their homework. That waterway was a chokepoint that could play havoc with the world’s trade. There were also stories about aid reaching England from the continent, and the royal family having been evacuated to an undisclosed location in Wales, and attempts by scientists to analyze the Martian weapons, apparently unsuccessfully. I dropped the paper on to the muddy sidewalk as the light failed me.
“Oy there gov’, the lad’s an me ‘ere ‘ave been admirin’ yer silver watch there, ‘aven’t we?. A right looker it iz. Why don’t yer hand it over this way, so’s we can get a proper look?” A small band of tough’s had emerged from a pile of broken brick down the street. The spokesman was a shabby looking sort, wool cap pulled over his eyes, grubby clothes, and what looked like a military issue web belt around his waist. One man was carrying a club. The man who spoke had the look in his eye, I fancy, like that of a wolf that had just spotted a deer with a broken leg. I straightened up, put my hand into my jacket, and removed the army issue revolver that my artillery captain had so fortunately lent me. I displayed it in a fashion that left no room for doubt about what would transpire over the next minute or so, if they were to be so impudent as to press their demands. The group warily carried on, making a wide circuit around my position, and moving on down the street.
Such was my reintroduction to London after the invasion.
I am happy to report, in my humble scribblings here, which I hope might be of some use to future generations trying to make sense of these tumultuous events, that I have been able to relocate myself in my prior home, which has sustained only minor damage. I have also had word from my wife, who is now safely billeted in Newcastle with family. It seems somewhat odd now to sit in the garden, with the robins and jays, and the last of the autumn leaves, and record the horrendous events of this time. There is little about to remind me of the recent desperate conflict, aside from a pronounced black scar, about one hundred yards long, that progresses across the common behind my house, and blackens both the side and roof of the post office and also Mr. Brown’s dry goods store, the result of a distant heat ray expenditure from a Martian fighting machine.
Order was slowly returning to England, and some that had tried to exploit the anarchy to their own gain, such as the type previously recorded, were now finding the heavy hand of the law upon them. Capsules continued to fall, albeit in much smaller numbers now. They seemed to concentrate at important industrial or transportation hubs. Suez has been mentioned, but also targeted were the manufacturing centers in the new world such as Chicago and New York, also Singapore and Panama. What was certain regarding the Martians was that however they were dealing with the plagues that beset them, their numbers were vastly reduced. Although they were still committing much mayhem, they had only been able to hold relatively small areas of ground. The situation now was beginning to look like a destructive and costly stalemate, a war of attrition that would likely bleed us white over time. It was against this background, and also in some measure I am sure due to my role in negotiating the Anglo-German treaty of 1890, and also mediating in the Somaliland agreement of 1900, that I was ejected from my haven in Kensington. I was called upon to participate in what must certainly stand as one of the most singular events in human history.
What I had expected, after receipt of a telegram from my old colleague at the foreign office J.S. Summerfield, was a meeting in the ministry offices in Westminster. An overstuffed chair, a glass of port, time to catch up on old times while he filled his pipe. After which, a thorough briefing on the matter at hand would follow. Times being as they were, this was not to transpire.
Instead I found myself onboard the HMS Lion, a frigate packed with an odd assortment of characters, and making ready to sail immediately from Deptford. A full briefing would have to wait until we reached our destination in Egypt; during the voyage our team, as I believe I could now call it, did have access to some background preparatory notes. What was clear was this: some sort of communication with the invading creatures had been initiated. What might flow from this, and even what form this took, was unknown to us at the time. Indeed it exceeded one’s imaginings what form of interchange was possible at all with such inhuman entities.
It seemed that all possible preparations had been made for the event that further linkage should prove fruitful. Our small commission had been thrown together at short notice, but hopefully included members with enough expertise in fields that may prove critical to the coming encounter. Principles included the noted anthropologist James Fraser, and also a certain Dr. Joseph Lister, who had made extensive studies in the field of germ infection. It was felt that there was a slight possibility that the Martian’s experience could be reversed; that is, humanity might suffer a dire fate from exposure to previously unknown infectious agents brought by the invaders. It was hoped that the doctor would take the forefront in any plans to displace such a threat. There was also a rather obscure linguist from Oxford, a true academic type, apparently with a singular command of foreign languages. I remember that he depended upon very thick eyeglasses, and also perpetually wore the most inappropriate dress at dinner. Unfortunately, I remember little else, including his name. Diplomatic and military representation was invested in Maj. General Douglas Haig, myself, and two secretaries. There were several other assistants present, along with a marine guard of seven individuals.
I can remember Maj. Gen. Haig pacing the deck, smoking quantities of cigars, and ruminating on the caliber of gun, and the rate of fire, or the masses of infantry that might prove effective in subduing the tripod machines. He seemed to me a simplistic man, and also one with the most unappealing personal affectations. Dr Lister I credit with being an intelligent man, and certainly a credit to his profession. His tales of surgery during meal times I found however to be quite unrestrained and unsuitable. He also had the most curious habit of forever urging hand washing upon all and sundry who crossed his path, which I took to be a personal eccentricity. Fraser was a rum enough fellow, for a Scotsman, and he possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of many of the world’s cultures. He was very keen to have a chance to examine what would surely be the most exotic species of his career.
“It canna’ be no other way”, he confided to me, over cigars and port in the officer’s wardroom one evening. “The creatures have gone the route o’ science an’ industry, an’ in no wee measure. That they could ha’ a language and mathematics entirely dissimilar to ours is unlikely in the extreme.” He poked his cigar at me to emphasize his point. “I ken we’ve followed parallel paths, tho’ gey different in some aspects, isnae doubt. But aye, we will make contact, na ye’ fret laddie.”
We were approaching Alexandria harbor, the Mediterranean a deep blue, and the sky brilliant white under a hot sun. We were close enough at this point to make out some of the buildings along shore; a dusky sand color brilliant in the sun, and a long spit guarding the harbor mouth. A fresh south-south-east wind was blowing, and we were riding a moderate swell. An old tar standing out on the portside bow coiling rope spotted it first.
“There she be Cap’n! Martian tripod, three miles dead ahead!” There was a general rush forward as passengers and crew crowded railings. At this distance the device was little more than glinting sunlight, although it’s dreaded triangular shape was starting to become apparent. It waded deeper into the water, with tentacles held high, roughly in our direction, and making surprisingly rapid progress. Those few on board that had not yet seen this spectacle either let out gasps of disbelief, or froze in rigid postures, eyes locked on to the sight. The device was undoubtedly mechanical, but moved with an ease and speed that defied common logic.
The captain had sounded general quarters, and slowed the ship to about three knots, and turned to starboard. Sailors flew about, pulling tarps off guns, and closing watertight hatches. The Martian was now well offshore, into deeper water, and was encountering the influence of the swell. It seemed somehow unnerved at this point, whether from the rocking motion of the swell, or an unexpected sensation of deep water, one could not discern. It backed slightly, turned about forty-five degrees, and then followed a course that took it closer to shore, albeit still in our general direction. The captain ordered full speed, and we made a dash for the harbor entrance, black smoke pouring out our funnel, as the tripod, glinting in the sunlight, easily closed more than half the distance between us.
Alexandria harbor is defined by two sand spits on its eastern and western sides. The alien device was making its way along the eastern one, toward the harbor mouth, as we attempted to make a run through it. It seemed certain to me that we were in range of its heat ray weapon, now clearly visible and pointed directly at the ship; although at any minute now, due to the curvature of the coast, we would find ourselves obscured from its view. White water sprayed from the bow, and we ploughed ahead, boilers thumping, and gun crews ramming shells into the twelve pounders fore and aft. We shot past the lighthouse, and the gun emplacements on the spit, and into Alexandria harbor, out of sight of the tripod, without feeling the scorching effect of the heat ray weapon. I heard a sailor on the gun mounting below me exhale: “Blimey mate, we’s earnin’ our grog today, ain’t we now?”
The harbor was more devoid of shipping than I would have imagined. There were some native dhows present, a French light cruiser, and the masts of some brigs were visible beyond some warehouses. Most military forces had pulled far back from the area, after the destruction of HMS Dreadnought and Prince of Wales. The canal was being given a wide birth, and Cairo was essentially being left to its own devices. The tripod machines ranged far across the Sinai and into the Nile Delta area, although the one we encountered was far west of their usual limits, and may have withdrawn due to a fear of overextension.
The object of our odyssey lay in a military compound, approximately twelve miles west of Cairo, in a shuttered warehouse, guarded by two full battalions of the Coldstream Guards. Upon making my initial observation, I must report this- and also at this point caution the overly sensitive reader.
The creature looked no less like a gigantic spider, the mass of a rather large Holstein cow, laying flat on a pile of straw. Its rubbery mass seemed somewhat flattened by gravity, its eight legs splayed out flat, extending a good eight or ten feet each, their ends twitching and curling in an agitated manor. A slight steam rose above the gray mass in the heated atmosphere, and the smell given off reminded me of the inside of a barn on a rainy day, mixed with an unidentifiable and disquieting chemical either. Yellowish eyes, implanted low on the beings torso, regarded us closely. I remember a army doctor being present, along with two very nervous looking guardsmen with pale faces and sidelong glances, and scraps of paper and wood laying about.
Captain Smyth-Woolcot of the Guards provided us with the full background that we had awaited upon. He had discovered the creature while on patrol east of Cairo. At first he was quite take aback, as it was very unusual to spot one of the Martians very far from their machinery. They had taken up firing positions, and indeed an agitated private had fired off a round by mistake, before Smyth-Woolcot ordered a halt. Something had seemed out of the ordinary, and on examining the beast with an eye-glass, a most singular scene presented itself. The Martian was holding up an old piece of packing crate, wrapped in three tentacles, with letters crudely printed on it.
Events flowed very swiftly after this. It soon became clear that a most extraordinary opportunity had presented itself, and one that might prove the salvation of mankind. Contact had been made with the alien creatures, but not in a way that had been envisaged. Our team had been assembled in hast to make the utmost of this occasion. The expression that the quick thinking captain had seen on the packing crate was “apastat”. One might consider this a shocking development in itself, but the effect must certainly be heightened by the fact that the initial communication was by way of, if not exactly English, at least Earthly symbols.
The creature had been seized and brought to its present location, were it had been producing further dispatches on scraps of paper, with the aid of a large cylinder of charcoal. Some of these were unintelligible, others seemed to have some meaning, although the intent remained obscure. The thing seemed to have no verbal apparatus, nor did human speech have any great effect on it.
Our team set to work, as one thing was clear: there was an attempt to communicate by at least one of the alien species, and it behooved us to make full value of what ever may come of this. Fraser by now was in his element, squatting down with his notepad, and eagerly devouring each new production coming from the creature. He spent most of the following days and nights in the warehouse, along with the Oxford man, attempting to decipher the scribblings being presented them.
“Bloody nonsense”, General Haig opinioned as I entered the warehouse one night, “manpower is what is needed, we should have our forces doubled in size and in place by now, instead of playing schoolhouse with this abomination!” He flicked a spent cigar into the sand and continued pacing. Fraser was down on one knee, holding a piece of paper with symbols on it up to the Martian’s cool and impenetrable gaze. The Oxford man was leafing through a reference book of some sort, and Lister was taking a swab from the creature’s skin, and placing it in a glass jar. Some thought had been given to the brutes’ essential needs, and consequently several dead chickens, and also some rodents had been presented to it, which it made use of in the most appalling fashion. The remains were now scattered about in front of it. I left them to their efforts. “Aye…. it kens m’ meanin’, isnae doubt!” I heard Fraser exclaim as I exited the door.
To a degree, I could understand the general’s disquiet. Cairo was a shambles, with dozens of fires burning. Most of the population had been evacuated south along the Nile in the weeks that we had been engaged here, and what was left of the city was in extreme disarray, and accessible only under heavy guard. The canal was now clogged with innumerable sunken ships, and Port Said was a charred ruin. And the news from further a field was no more encouraging.
I was finishing off some tinned beef and bread one night, in company with Haig and the marine sergeant, when Fraser smashed open the door and exclaimed to us, red faced, “I have it! I have it!” “Steady on old chap.” I counseled, as he knocked over a wine decanter on the table. “Apostate!” He shouted in my face, as bits of spittle ran down his chin, his eyes livid. The sergeant grasped him firmly by the arm, stopping his headlong advance. I feared the worst- that one of Lister’s misgivings had come to pass, and Fraser had contracted some extra-terrestrial disease that now affected his mind as well as body.
“Nae, nae, apostate- defector, turncoat; its what t’ creature was tryn’ t’ get across in its limited way, when he was spotted! He is doin’ the Judas, an wants t’ swap military secrets for his safety.” General Haig’s attention was now riveted on to Fraser. “It seems as if the being either has little confidence in its fellow’s currant posture here, after the plague an’ all, and with few new cylinders arrivin’ - or it ha’ done the dirty in some sense wi’ its own kind, and is now on the run. I dunna ha’ a good sense yet, but I suspect a little o’ both. Y’see, the Martians always assumed victory; there ain’t no gun to fire ‘em back to Mars. Its sink or swim here, and our friend o’r t’ the warehouse means to swim in style- after payn’ ‘is dues, of course.”
Fraser relayed a few more facts that he had been able to glean. This was no doubt expedited by the apparent realization that the creature belonged to what we might consider military intelligence. Its role had been to study humanity and its methods to the greatest degree possible, in order to better prepare the conquest. That is why it had some rudimentary knowledge of language, something it reported was a great mystery to its fellows, along with many of our other behaviors, of which little more was thought than we might consider of an ant nest. And it now, for whatever reason, saw a much more advantageous future away from its fellows. It held the belief that by feeding us morsels of knowledge, critically of their weapons, it could assure itself a comfortable existence here on the planet. Fraser also thought that the creature had informed him that what were considered the lower classes of its society made up in the first wave of invaders, and these were considered somewhat expendable. As events had played out, many of those at home were now reluctant to make the long traverse themselves, if Fraser’s interpretation of our informant was correct.
And so our consultant was installed at Aldershot barracks, where it instructed, in roundabout fashion, with the help of a team assembled by Fraser, on the principles, production, and workings of various Martian devices, most crucially the heat ray weapon. Many of these devices were not hard to understand in principle, although the materials and processes used would have certainly been beyond our current state of industry and science.
I need hardly inform the reader of the momentous relief evident in the final turning of the tide in this conflict, and the eventual victory, facilitated in no small measure by the events described here. The final pockets of our extra-terrestrial tormentors were dispatched in due course, and to date no new cylinders have intruded themselves on our planet.
It was a triumph that validated the integrity of our species, and the highest principles of justice, freedom, and humanity. And indeed, as future readers must certainly be aware, the new weapons produced from this travail have proved instrumental in subduing many of the lesser races, and drawing them up into the embrace of the empire, and hence the benefits of British culture and civilization. The loss of life so ensued must surely be more than counter-balanced against the blessings of being injected into a modern industrial system, along with its advanced science, and elevated moral framework.
Our Martian advisor was eventually removed from Aldershot and placed in Kew Gardens, were it essentially held court for visiting scientists and diplomats, for the next eighteen months. It indicated, through Fraser’s staff, that its species had no use for names. It did acquire, by way of a witty subaltern in the Household Calvary, the handle of J.I.- short for Judas Iscariot, which subsequently gained traction in the popular press. A specially constructed facility was made for it, cooled by ice, which seemed to better agree with its constitution. It seemed content with a basically mundane diet of whole chicken, supplemented by the occasional side of pork, blood and other renderings, and fishmeal. Inexplicably, it also developed a taste for French chardonnay, particularly the older vintages, which it consumed from a large metal tub, aided by a bamboo tube.
Its explanations of alien society were certainly informative, but lacked in entirety anything that might be considered of moral value, spiritual merit, or even wit, in comparison with human standards. Most of its scribblings conveyed an admirable knowledge of science and its uses, but seemed to lack the attributes of empathy for others, or of any desire to understand those foreign to them.
It is with some irony that the medical commission delivered its verdict on the Martian’s cause of death. It was thought that the long-term effects of living in an environment with considerably greater gravitation than what was previously known had a distinctly deleterious effect on certain internal organs of the being. The stress of being so burdened, it is thought, terminated its life at a point much shorter than what would otherwise have been the case. This brings to the imagination what use the invaders would have made of this planet, if they had prevailed.
It is at this point that I will end my chronology of the momentous events of this time in history, and my modest role in observing a crucial segment. To future readers who desire a fuller account of this time, I suggest a study of the archives of the London Times, and also the London Illustrated News. The British Museum, of course, holds a wealth of information, not least of which is the preserved body of J.I., still on display in a glass case. I understand that its appearance still has the power to precipitate sleepless nights among the young and impressionable that come to view it.
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"I suspect that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose"
— JBS Haldane
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