V.

von H. G. Wells

THE STILLNESS

Before stepping into the pantry, my first instinct was to secure the door between the kitchen and the scullery. But when I entered the pantry, I found it completely bare; every last bit of food had vanished. It seemed the Martians had taken everything the day before. In that moment, despair washed over me for the first time. I hadn’t eaten or drunk anything on the eleventh or twelfth day.

At first, my mouth and throat felt dry, and I could sense my strength fading. I sat in the darkness of the scullery, engulfed in a deep sense of hopelessness. My thoughts revolved around food. I thought I had lost my hearing, as the usual sounds from the pit had completely stopped. I didn’t have the energy to crawl quietly to the peephole, though I longed to see what was happening.

By the twelfth day, my throat was so sore that I took a risk, fearing it might alert the Martians, and attacked the creaking rainwater pump by the sink. I managed to fill a couple of glasses with murky, tainted rainwater. To my surprise, it was refreshing, and I felt a surge of courage knowing that no probing tentacle had followed the sound of my pumping.

During those days, my thoughts wandered aimlessly to the curate and the way he had met his end.

On the thirteenth day, I drank more water and dozed off, my mind drifting between thoughts of food and vague, impossible escape plans. In my dreams, I was haunted by nightmarish visions—images of the curate’s death or lavish feasts. Whether asleep or awake, a sharp pain urged me to drink again and again. The light filtering into the scullery had shifted from grey to a deep red, and in my muddled state, it felt like the color of blood.

On the fourteenth day, I ventured into the kitchen and was startled to see that the fronds of the red weed had grown across the hole in the wall, casting the room in a crimson gloom.

Early on the fifteenth day, I heard a familiar sound in the kitchen—a curious sequence of sniffs and scratches. Listening closely, I identified it as a dog. When I entered the kitchen, I saw a dog’s nose peeking through a break in the red fronds. I was taken aback. At the scent of me, the dog barked sharply.

I thought that if I could coax him inside quietly, I might be able to kill and eat him. Regardless, it would be wise to eliminate him to prevent his presence from drawing the attention of the Martians.

I crept forward, whispering, “Good dog!” but he suddenly pulled back and vanished.

I listened intently—I was not deaf—but the pit remained eerily silent. I heard a sound like the flutter of a bird’s wings and a hoarse croak, but that was all.

For a long time, I lay close to the peephole, too afraid to push aside the red plants blocking my view. Occasionally, I heard the faint patter of the dog’s feet scurrying on the sand far below, along with more birdlike sounds, but nothing else. Finally, emboldened by the silence, I peered outside.

Except for a corner where a flock of crows fought over the skeletons of the Martians’ victims, the pit was devoid of life.

I gazed around, hardly believing what I saw. All the machinery was gone. Aside from a mound of greyish-blue powder in one corner, some aluminum bars in another, the black birds, and the remains of the dead, the place was just an empty circular pit in the sand.

Slowly, I pushed my way through the red weed and stood atop the rubble. I could see in every direction except behind me to the north, and there were no Martians or signs of them in sight. The pit dropped steeply beneath me, but a little way along the debris formed a slope leading up to the top of the ruins. My chance to escape had finally arrived. I began to tremble.

I hesitated for a moment, then, driven by a desperate resolve and a heart pounding in my chest, I scrambled to the top of the mound where I had been buried for so long.

I looked around again. To the north, there was still no sign of Martians.

The last time I had seen this part of Sheen in daylight, it had been a sprawling street lined with comfortable white and red houses, shaded by abundant trees. Now, I stood on a mound of crumbled brick, clay, and gravel, overrun by a multitude of knee-high red cactus-like plants, with no earthly growth to challenge their dominance. The nearby trees were dead and brown, while a network of red threads climbed the still-living trunks.

The neighboring houses had all been destroyed, but none had burned; their walls remained standing, some reaching up to the second story, with shattered windows and broken doors. The red weed thrived wildly in their roofless rooms. Below me, the pit was alive with crows fighting over scraps. I spotted a gaunt cat slinking along a wall in the distance, but there were no signs of human life anywhere.

The day felt incredibly bright compared to my recent confinement, with the sky a vibrant blue. A gentle breeze made the red weed, which covered every bit of unoccupied ground, sway softly. And the air was so sweet!