Sleepers Of Mars
- Автор: Уиндем Джон Паркс Лукас Бейнон Харрис
- Год: 1977
- Язык: английский
- Год: Coronet Books/Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
- ISBN: 0340173262
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «Sleepers Of Mars». Краткое содержание книги:
Of course, we are now well used to the idea of Man On The Moon, we have become blasé as to the possibilities of inter-planetary travel. But imagine two expeditions to Mars, one British, the other Russian, both in the process of discovering a mechanical race, invented and produced by the Martians as they believe their specie to be dying.
The other four novellas in this collection give further evidence of John Wyndham’s genius at invention, characterisation and sense of movement.
At the sound of three sharp whistle blasts, each pole-bearer snapped into sudden action. The weapons were tilted horizontally, the left hands tugging smartly at the strings, and the pins fell free. The cordon closed with levelled staves, in the manner of old-time pikemen.
They took three paces, and then a sharp crackling ran around the line as the bulbous wooden heads were snapped away, to begin their slow journey to the wreck. The men of the cordon sprinted for cover, dropping their shortened pole as they went. For a full half-minute, David and the sergeant continued to watch the uncanny progress of the flock of destructive balls, slowly and silently converging. Then, they too, thought of shelter and made for the hut.
The meagre light from two grimy windows enabled David to inspect the place. Such furnishings as had occupied it had long since been removed. Only a few sagging shelves were left; a broken axe-shaft and remnants of other tools lay about, with a few dribbled paint cans and other rubbish not worth the labour of removal. He sat himself down on a pile of leaves in one corner. The sergeant came and joined him. Their heads bent together over a large, business-like watch of the latter’s.
‘Still a minute to go.’
As if in prompt contradiction came a muffled, double thud, quickly followed by a third. The sergeant shook a disapproving head. Bad workmanship—luckily it didn’t matter a great deal in the present circumstances. Increasingly tense, they watched the second hand crawling towards the main burst. It came fifteen seconds before it was due. First a crash, and then, right on top of it, a stunning roar, as though the premature explosion of one bomb had fired the rest.
Instinctively, they clapped their hands over their ears, while great waves of sound sent the windows tumbling into fragments. They were battered and swirled around, as the aerial breakers surged over them. A patter of scattered debris rained overhead, and a violent thud caused the entire structure to tremble. Dislodged dirt rattled down, and closely following it came the slither of something falling from the sloping roof. It landed with a soggy thump outside the door.
David grinned. ‘I’ll bet that was a part of the brute,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘If it gets over that little meal, it’ll–’
He stopped suddenly. Somewhere near at hand had risen a scream of fear, a scream mounting in agony till it stopped with a suggestive suddenness. The two looked at each other in consternation. That scream could only mean one thing—something had gone wrong, and the danger was not past. The sergeant opened his mouth to speak, but was silenced by another tearing scream, closer than the first.
For some minutes after that, the air rang with anguished cries. David clapped his hands back over his ears to shut out the sounds of torment. He darted a glance at the sergeant, and could see that his face was pale and grimly strained; he was rising in the manner of one who feels that he should act, but does not know what course to take. He stepped towards the door, but David was swifter; he rushed past him and stood barring the way.
‘No,’ he cried. ‘Give me that stick first.’
Wonderingly, the other picked it up and handed it to him. David pulled the door an inch or two ajar, and thrust the stick downward through the slit. There was a swift crunch, and he withdrew it, appreciably shorter.
‘You see?’ He pointed to the unmistakable marks of teeth at the end of the stick.
The sergeant took it from him; and then he, too, thrust it at the crack—higher up than before. He struck smartly downwards. Two feet from the ground, it hit an obstruction and broke off short in his hand. He looked at David.
‘We could easily jump over it,’ he suggested.
‘And land on another one, perhaps.’ David shook his head, and paused for a moment before adding: ‘Now we’re in a hell of a mess! That bomb idea was a complete flop—the danger’s been scattered all over the place.’
Another cry of pain from the surrounding trees. A rattle of rapid fire began in the distance. A moment later, a section of the door’s bottom edge snapped off and began to float away, hastily, they slammed it shut and slid the bolt.
We’ll have to get out of here pretty soon,’ muttered the Sergeant.
They gazed speculatively out of the shattered windows. The sunlight filtered down through the branches to fall on ground which looked bare, but … David turned his attention to the cobwebby space overhead. Safety, for a while at least, seemed to lie up there. With the other’s help, he grasped a roof truss and swung himself up. The boarding proved to be in very bad condition, so that he was able, by standing on the beam, to kick a hole through the rotting roof.
Shortly afterwards, the two men sat side by side on the coping, staring through the deserted wood. There was not a man in sight. Far away to the right, they could still hear spasmodic shooting and an occasional cry. David gave a hail, but it brought no answer—there had been too many cries. The firing was slackening now, and he wondered whether the fact indicated escape or defeat.
‘I guess we’ll have to stay here till somebody turns up,’ he said, at length.
The other did not answer; he was staring in fascination at a patch of open ground. Its whole surface appeared to be in motion. Drifting streams of sticks and chips of wood were oozing to several centres. David looked about hastily, and observed the same seeping movement in a number of places. ‘There must be dozens of them! ’
The sergeant nodded. ‘And we’re in the middle,’ he added ‘And it all comes of this gallivanting about the Universe. I never did think much of it. Stick to your own planet, is what I say; it’s quite big enough. But will they? Not so’s you’d notice it. They go flinging themselves into space, and then what happens?’ He paused aggrievedly. ‘They have to go and bring back this blasted thing from Venus! Damn’ silly, ain’t it?’
In their present predicament, David felt inclined to overlook the future prospects for interplanetary travel which were opened up by the more or less successful return of the Hurakan, and agree with the sergeant.
‘If we could only see the thing, we might be able to do something,’ he grumbled. Then suddenly an idea struck him and he swung himself back through the hole in the roof. As he searched through the accumulated rubbish, he noticed that a quarter of the door had already gone. An exclamation of satisfaction told the sergeant that he had made a find.
‘What is it?’
There was no answer for a while. Finally, David said: ‘Can you see the door from there?’
The sergeant found that, by craning over to the limit, this was just possible. David’s head and shoulders appeared through the empty window-frame alongside the door. His hand held a battered can of red paint, which he proceeded to pour out, but instead of reaching the ground, it threw the shape which lay there into visibility. It was a mere miniature, but even so, it was a far more alarming object than the aerial photograph had suggested.
CHAPTER FIVE
THE INVISIBLES’ SECRET
The main mass of the creature was hemispherical, with the flat side resting on the ground. The domed top was bare and smooth for more than halfway down its side, but for the rest of the way, it bristled with blunt projections. At the end of each of those was a wide mouth, snapping continuously and full of sharp teeth. David concentrated on one of these ‘heads,’ and daubed it thoroughly.