The Great Martian War 1913 - 1917 Page #5

to see clearly that,

unlike the Heron cockpits

there was no pilot inside

In fact, there was nothin

discernibly living at all

This unexpected

mystery is followed

by the gravest of discoveries -

one that would finally reveal

the fate of the vanished,

and damn the

High Command's entire war plan.

It begins when Roundway Down

deduces the composition

of the alien machines.

This piece is a piece

of Heron cockpit,

and these pieces -

from two of

the seven surrendered Spiders -

They're all made from

metals and alloys

which are abundant on earth -

iron, steel, lead,

copper, tin.

In other words,

Roundway Down realized

that the majority of

the alien war machines

had been built after

they had arrived.

And that was when

the activities

of the Martian lice

on no man's land

began to make a

dreadful new sense.

The long-held

belief that the lice

are harvesting the

bodies of the dead

is silenced by

a shocking truth.

In fact, all along,

there had been something of far

greater worth to the aliens -

the thousands of tonnes

of shells and bullets

and materials of warfare

that we had been depositing

on the fields of the

Front every single day.

The aliens build

their killing machines

with metals carried into

battle by the Allies.

Well, every shell I ever fired

only ever made them stronger.

With this realization,

the true fate of the millions

of missing soldiers -

"the vanished" -

was finally understood.

Here's the truth -

and the truth is much worse

than the rumours about th

human rendering factories

and the alien food stores

and that's this -

They were still there

out in those fields -

crushed, eviscerated,

ground into the mud.

All the while the lice

were swarming around

and they were foraging for

what they truly valued -

and that was the lead,

the metal,

the steel to make even bigger

and greater machines of war.

And then we learnt

what really happened.

They weren't taken away

by the Martians at all!

They were still there,

in that mud.

They were crushed

and churned up!

And all they wanted

was the metal!

I'll never stop hating

them for what they did.

These corridors under

the Combined Allied

Commission for the Vanished

bear mute witness to the

sheer numbers who died.

Look in each of these boxes -

34 files -

each file is a human life

lost in the war,

and there are

27 miles of corridors.

This is the

lowest moment of the war

Humanity is staring

into the abyss,

but Roundway Down

are about to discover

an alien secret that could

turn the tide of the war...

Across Europe,

the mood is dark.

But at Roundway Down,

there is a breakthrough.

In analyzing the

surrendered Spiders,

the element that

enables and powers them

is examined in detail.

To the perplexed scientists,

it's nothing short of a wonder.

This liquid

element which powers

all movement and weaponry

in the Martian machines

is like nothing

previously observed.

An organic metal capable

of self-replication

and what we can only

term as awareness.

As we investigate it responds

and appears to work with us.

Though impossible to classify,

we have given it a name

victicite.

The discovery is a lifeline.

The order immediately goes out

to turn the wonder

material victicite

back against the aliens.

There were profound

philosophical questions

to be asked about victicite -

its nature,

its properties -

but all that was

left by the wayside.

Why?

Progress was being made!

A first wave of

victicite-based war machines

are soon rolling

off the assembly line -

including an all terrain

fighting vehicle

called a landship.

They are swiftly tested,

made front line ready,

and in October 1916, deployed.

Prematurely, as it turned out.

At Douchey, les Mines,

we were hasty,

and it ended in failure.

But it was an

encouraging failure.

We had successfully engaged

the alien for a while

and it was his overwhelming

superiority in numbers

and really bad

battlefield conditions

that proved too much.

So there was ground

here for real optimism.

Faced with weapons

made using their

own technology,

the Martian strategy shifts.

All along the Front,

attacks intensify.

The aliens are no

longer nurturing war.

They're going for

outright victory.

Then, on November the 5th

Allied command's worst

fears are realized.

Near the

northern tip of the line

in the Netherlands,

a single Heron breaks

through to the Channel ports.

This is the stuff

of nightmares -

After three years,

the moment everyone

in Great Britain

has been dreading has arrived.

Well, there is chaos

here in Command Centre.

It's low tide in the Thames,

so the navy can't give chase,

and the small force that

was originally assigned

to protect the

British mainland,

the Home Air Defence Squadron,

it was critically depleted.

There are just two pilots

within striking

distance of London,

testing new

victicite-based weaponry

British aces Edwin Sinclair

and Gregory West.

They are immediately scrambled.

As the invader advances

up the Thames estuary,

warnings spread

throughout London,

and anti-alien batteries in

Regent's park take up position.

Now most people flee

westward, away from the danger,

but thousands of people,

with no conception of

the danger they're in,

choose to line the embankment.

The police are

issued with rifles.

But as they attempt to

drive the crowd back,

a silence suddenly falls as

a shape heaves into view.

And there it is.

Do I run?

Do I hell!

I run straight at it!

The new

weaponry stalls the Heron

but it's not enough.

And it's here that it fires

a single shot at

Sinclair's plane,

and as we all know,

the shot misses and

strikes Big Ben.

But help is on the way..

A third aircraft is coming in.

It has followed the

path of the Heron

all the way from

the Dutch coast.

In the cockpit is a young

Hungarian aristocrat,

Count Laslo Andrazovski,

and he is about to become the

most famous man in Europe.

I saw him give the signal

to the other two,

and they came in behind him,

and he leads 'em straight

down to the bastard.

Gotcha!

The expertly coordinated fir

had broken through

the Heron's shield.

Count Lazslo's first

visit to London

would become

the stuff of legend.

And as for the brief footage

of the falling Heron,

that would be replayed

again and again

throughout the entire world.

It was of immense value

for public morale.

Of greatest importance,

of course,

was what happened

in the aftermath.

The London

crowd, baying for blood,

descends on the fallen Heron.

Then we are runnin'

onto the bridge,

and there's fire and all

sorts falling on top of us,

but we don't care,

'cos we're so busy

tearing at the cockpit.

And I want to do it, too

because I want the same

as they want,

I want to be

the one that finds him

and rips him out

of the wreckage!

Then there's a surprise.

I see him and he's alive!

Wriggling like an eel on a hook

and then he sees me

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