Christopher Priest - The Space Machine

While we were waiting for the train to re-start, and several peasants were being herded aboard, Amelia opened the door briefly and looked up the line, in the direction in which we were heading.

“Look, Edward,” she said. “We are coming to a city.”

I leaned outside too, and saw in the light of the setting sun that a mile or two further on there were many large buildings, clustered together untidily. Like Amelia, I was relieved at this sight, for the all-apparent barbarities of life in the countryside had repelled me. Life in any city, however foreign, is by its nature familiar to other city-dwellers, and there we knew we would find the responsible authorities we were seeking. What ever this country, and however repressive their local laws, we as travellers would receive favoured treatment, and as soon as Amelia and I had come to agreement (which was itself a matter I had still to resolve) we would be bound, by sea or rail, for England. Instinctively, I patted my breast pocket to make sure my wallet was still there. If we were to return immediately to England what little money we had with us—we had established earlier in the day that we had two pounds fifteen shillings and sixpence between us—would have to be used, as a surety of our good faith with the Consul.

Such reassuring thoughts were in my mind as the train moved steadily towards the city. The sun had now set, and the night was upon us.

“See, Edward, the evening star is bright.”

Amelia pointed to it, huge and blue-white, a few degrees above the place of the sun’s setting. Next to it, looking small, and in quarter-phase, was the moon.

I stared at the evening star, remembering Sir William’s words about the planets which made up our solar system. There was one such, lonely and beautiful, impossibly distant and unattainable.

Then Amelia gasped, and I felt my heart tighten in the same moment.

“Edward,” she said. “There are two moons visible!”

The mysteries of this place could no longer be ignored. Amelia and I stared at each other in horror, understanding at long last what had become of us. I thought of the riotous growth of scarlet weed, the thinness of the atmosphere, the freezing cold, the unfiltered heat of the sun, the lightness in our tread, the deep-blue sky, the red-bodied people, the very alienness of all that surrounded us. Now, seeing the two moons, and seeing the evening star, there was a final mystery, one which placed an intolerable burden on our ability to support our dearest belief, that we were still on our home world. Sir William’s Machine had taken us to futurity, but it had also borne us unwittingly through the dimension of Space. A Time Machine it might be, but also a Space Machine, for now both Amelia and I accepted the frightful knowledge that in some incredible way we had been brought to another world, one where our own planet was the herald of night. I stared down at the canal, seeing the brilliant point of light that was Earth reflecting from the water, and knew only desperation and a terrible fear. For we had been transported through Space to Mars, the planet of war.

I moved across to sit next to Amelia, and she took my hand.

“We should have realized,” she said, whispering. “Both of us knew we could no longer be on Earth, but neither of us would admit it.”

“We could not have known. It is beyond all experience.”

“So is the notion of travel through Time, and yet we readily accepted that.”

The train lurched slightly, and we felt it begin to slow. I looked past Amelia’s profile, across the arid desert towards that brilliant light in the sky.

“How can we be sure that that is Earth?” I said. “After all, neither of us has ever—”

“Don’t you know, Edward? Can’t you feel it inside you? Doesn’t everything else about this place seem foreign and hostile? Is there not something that speaks to us instinctively when we look at that light? It is a sight of home, and we both feel it.”

“But what are we to do?” The train braked again as I spoke, and looking through the windows on the opposite side of the carriage I saw that we were stopping inside a large, darkened train-shed. On our side of the train a wall came between us and our view of the sky and its ominous reminders.

Amelia said: “We will have no option in the matter. It is not so much what we do, as what is to be done with us.”

“Are you saying that we are in danger?”

“Possibly … as soon as it is realized that we are not of this world. After all, what would be likely to happen to a man who came to Earth from another world?”

“I have no idea,” I said.

“Therefore we can have no idea what is in store for us. We shall have to hope for the best, and trust that in spite of their primitive society we will be well treated. I should not care to spend the rest of my days like an animal.”

“Nor I. But is that likely, or even feasible?”

“We have seen how the slaves are treated. If we were taken for two of those wretches, then we could well be put to work.”

“But we have already been taken for two of the overseers,” I reminded her. “Some accident of clothing, or something about our appearance, has compounded in our favour.”

“We still need to be careful. There is no telling what we shall find here.”

In spite of the resolution in our words, we were in no condition to take charge of our fate, for in addition to the multitude of questions that surrounded our prospects, we were both dishevelled, tired and hungry from our ordeal in the desert. I knew that Amelia could feel no better than I, and I was exhausted. Both of us were slurring our words, and in spite of our attempts to articulate our feelings, the realization of where we had been deposited by the Time Machine had been the final blow to our morale.

Outside, I could hear the slaves being herded from the train, and the distinctive crackle of the electrical whips was an unpleasant reminder of our precarious position.

“The train will be moving off soon,” I said, pushing Amelia gently into an upright position. “We have come to a city, and we must look for shelter there.”

“I don’t want to go.”

“We will have to.”

I went to the far side of the carriage, and opened the nearest door. I took a quick glance along the length of the train; evidently the slaves were being taken from the opposite side of the train for here there was no movement, bar one man sauntering slowly away from me. I went back to Amelia, who was still sitting passively.

“In a few minutes the train will be going back to where we came from,” I said. “Do you wish to spend another night in the desert?”

“Of course not. I’m just a little nervous at the thought of entering the city.”

I said “We must eat some food, Amelia, and find somewhere safe and warm to sleep. The very fact that this is a city is to our advantage: it must be large enough for us to go unnoticed. We have already survived a great ordeal, and I do not think we need fear anything further. Tomorrow we will try to establish what rights we have.”

Amelia shook her head lethargically, but to my relief she then rose wearily to her feet and followed me from the carriage. I gave her my hand to help her to the ground, and she took it. Her grasp was without pressure.

The sound of the whips echoed from the other side of the train as we hurried towards where a glow of light emanated from behind a protruding corner. There was no sign of the man I had seen earlier.

As we came round the corner we saw ahead of us a tall doorway, set well back into the brick wall and painted white. Over the top was a sign, illuminated in some manner from behind, and bearing a legend in a style of printing that was totally incomprehensible to me. It was this sign that drew our attention, rather than the door itself, for this was our first sight of Martian written language.