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Worlds at War
Eventually, after almost half an hour's solid driving, which had nearly resulted in the car hitting a couple of farmers and various kinds of cattle, they were finally within visual range of the Martian ship.
Terry's basic description really was basic, Sawyer thought to himself, as the Martian ship's full height became apparent.
It appeared to be about five times the size of Edward Hyde, maybe even six times. The ridiculous part was that the ship's legs, of which it had three, took up almost all of that height. They looked too thin and spindly to support anything as heavy as what was above them; a large cylinder that looked like the form they'd seen lying in the field, but somehow more threatening.
"HEY, MARTIAN!" Sawyer yelled, as Nemo took the wheel and he got onto his feet, wielding his Winchester. "CARE TO TRY AND TAKE US?!"
Despite the fact that the creatures inside it probably didn't even understand the language that was being yelled at them, the Martian ship stopped walking forward and turned to face the League.
Sawyer took his chance.
He fired. Whether or not it would work was a valid point, but he had to try, at least. The bullet from his Winchester stuck the Martian ship and ricocheted off to the side. Well, at least I aimed at an odd angle, Sawyer thought to himself, as the bullet struck a nearby tree. Then he got back to the matter at hand.
"Let's go!" he yelled. Instantly, Mina, Frank, Terry and Logan leapt out of the car, heading towards the Martian ship. At the same time, Nemo hit the brakes, and Jekyll leapt out of the car. Jekyll pulled out a phial of his formula and swallowed it, changing into Hyde while Sawyer, Nemo, Skinner and Hartdegen grabbed some guns from the boot. However, Skinner didn't put his coat back on; he wanted to be ready for action if the need arose, no matter how unlikely that appeared at present.
As the transformation finished, Hyde roared in rage and charged towards the Martian ship. He grabbed the leg nearest to him, planted his feet firmly on the ground, and pulled. Evidently he was trying to pull it down, although he didn't seem to be having much luck; in fact, it pulled him off his feet and continued to walk onwards, with Hyde clutching its leg like a baby unwilling to let its mother leave it behind.
"HELP!" he yelled at the others, in a very uncharacteristic voice of helplessness. The League needed no encouragement. Instantly, Frank, Terry and Logan leapt for one of the legs, Logan landing on the same leg as Hyde. In the meantime, Hyde had managed to haul himself up
At the same time, Mina flew up onto the main Martian ship, and began desperately slashing at the hard metal exterior.
"Get down!" Sawyer yelled, as Skinner, Nemo and Hartdegen raised their guns. "We're about to fire!"
Mina looked back at Sawyer and shook her head.
"I don't need to jump, Tom!" she yelled at her partner. "So long as you don't hit my heart, I'll be fine! Just shoot! We have to stop this thing before it reaches a city!"
Sawyer briefly wavered in indecision, uncertain what would be the right move to make right now. Then, his mind made up, he looked back up at Mina.
"Got it!" he yelled up at her, before he glanced back at the others. "You heard the lady, guys! Open fire!"
The four of them did so, their guns blazing with a quickness that made the Fantom's automatic rifles look slow by comparison. The bullets showered over the massive vehicle with all the persistence of a heavy rain shower, but did about as much damage as the rain did to a human building. The Martians didn't even respond to the bullets; it was though they weren't even there.
*****
Looking around himself, Edward Hyde saw that the Martian ship was approaching the outskirts of a forest. It didn't appear to want to enter the forest itself, but it was going around it so fast that Hyde doubted it would make much difference.
Growling with anger at the alien device that was dragging him along, Hyde reached out with one arm and grabbed a nearby tree. Seeing what he was doing, Logan stuck his claws in the same tree. Instantly, the Martian ship stopped. It may have been able to carry six people on its outside, but tearing a tree out of the ground was another matter.
Hyde looked up at the Martian ship, and grinned.
"Is this all you've got?!" he yelled up at it. "I faced a tougher challenge from the Fantom's soldiers, and they were only human!"
A large thing that looked like a gun dropped out of the bottom of the ship and pointed towards Hyde.
"Ah crap," he whispered, as the weapon fired a heat ray.
Acting like lighting, Hyde let go of the tree and jumped for his life, landing beside the car. Logan leapt higher up the leg, landing just a few inches away from the main Martian ship.
The heat ray struck the leg of the Martian ship, but did nothing more than turn the leg slightly black.
*****
Nemo noted the heat ray's affect on the Martian ship's leg with a slight tinge of annoyance; it looked like they didn't even have the option of stealing one of the Martian's weapons to use against them. Still, it didn't prevent him from continuing to cover the Martian cylinder with bullets, desperately hoping to get in a lucky shot.
"They're getting out of range!" Hartdegen yelled at Sawyer.
"Yeah, and it's showing no signs of falling, even with the aid of the others!" Skinner called out to his friend at the same time. "Any ideas, Sawyer?!"
Sawyer nodded. "I have one, Skinner. It's time for a change of tactics!" he yelled, discarding his guns and sliding back into the driver's seat. "Hold on!" he called back to Nemo, Skinner and Hartdegen. The three of them barely had enough time to get into a better position before they were tearing after the Martian ship.
"Keep firing!" Sawyer yelled back at them. "The whole point of me doing this was to keep us within gunshot range! We have to keep on trying to bring this stupid thing down, at least!"
Nodding, the other three pulled out their weapons and began to fire their weapons all over again. The bullets were still not having much effect, but at least they were keeping up with the Martians.
I just hope something happens to turn the tide of battle, Sawyer reflected to himself as he crashed through the fragile remains of a fence. Otherwise, we don't even have a prayer against an entire species.
*****
Meanwhile, Hyde had shaken himself back to reality and was charging after the rapidly escaping Martian ship. He may not have been as fast as Nemo's car, but he could still outpace any normal human even on one of his weaker days.
Any suggestions, Henry? he asked his other self. Hyde didn't normally talk with Jekyll like this, but he had to admit these were desperate circumstances.
One, Jekyll replied. Maybe we could try and knock the Martians down? If you can get onto the cylinder with Mina, your extra weight might be enough to tip it off balance. If not, we could try and call up the rest of them to achieve that goal.
It has to be worth a try, Hyde admitted. Timing himself, he leapt straight for the nearest leg, landing almost halfway up it. It was the one he'd been on before, but fortunately he'd landed above the blackened area where he'd been previously; from what he could feel, it was still remarkably hot. Glancing up, he saw that Logan was desperately slashing at the ship where it joined on to the leg, but wasn't having much luck.
"Logan!" he yelled up at the little man. Logan glanced down at him. "Jump onto the cylinder! I have a plan!"
Nodding, Logan leapt up onto the Martian cylinder, vanishing from view. Hyde vaguely heard a brief roar of pain, and couldn't help but give a small grin; it sounded like Logan had landed on Mina. Then he scrambled up the leg like a monkey up a tree, and scrambled on to the top of the cylinder.
Mina glanced over at Hyde, her normally pristine face stained with sweat and a couple of small scratches. The most notable one was above her left eye, but it didn't seem to be anything serious.
"I hear you have a plan?" she asked, cocking her right eyebrow at Hyde.
"Well, it's mostly Henry's really," Hyde replied. "He thinks that, if we put enough weight on this cylinder, we might be able to make this thing fall over." Mina and Logan looked at each other and nodded.
"It's worth a shot," Logan commented.
"We can but try," Mina agreed. "Even if the ship isn't destroyed, it should be immobilised long enough for us to tear it apart. Right then," she said, as she turned to face Hyde. "We'd better try and tip it in your direction; any other and the chances are greater that Frank or Terry will get hurt."
Hyde nodded. Turning around, he dug his hands as far into the Martian ship as they could go, and leaned over the side of the ship as though trying to peek over the side. Beside him, Logan dug his claws into the ship as far as he could (Which, given that they were merely bone, wasn't that far), and Mina stuck her nails into the ship as well. The last had more effect, given that her vampire blood meant that her nails were durable enough to stick in solid rock. The ship was a lot harder than rocks, Hyde knew, but her claws were still strong enough to get some of the way in.
"Let's go!" Mina yelled, as the ship began to walk forward again.
All three of them instantly leaned over the side. Instantly, the Martian ship began to tilt, wavering dangerously on the edge. Before the ship's controllers could adjust themselves to compensate, the ship's two front legs had been torn off the ground, and the ship was heading for the earth.
"JUMP!" Mina yelled. Logan and Hyde needed no encouragement; all three of them leapt from the Martian ship, landing just in front of the car. Fortunately Sawyer had hit the brakes before they landed, but even then the car was still uncomfortably close to hitting Logan's head.
Looking back, Mina saw that the Martian ship had taken a definite beating, with the front part now nearly gone, but Terry and Frank had gotten out of the fall unharmed; they'd both leapt to the side of their respective legs.
*****
As Frank and Terry hit the ground, they glanced back at the Martian vessel. It didn't appear to be in any fit shape to walk, but Frank still felt like making sure that its pilots wouldn't be coming back.
"Shall we?" he asked Terry, glancing over at his strange new friend.
"Shall we what?" Terry replied, looking over at him blankly.
Frank rolled his eyes. This guy may have been good for raw power and military tactics, but he seemed to be totally clueless about basic slang.
"Shall we make sure the Martians are dead?" Frank asked, looking over at Terry inquiringly.
"Yes," Terry replied. With that, the two of them walked towards the ship. As they neared it, Logan ran round from the other side to join them.
"Um, what's going on here?" he asked, a little confused.
"We are simply confirming that the Martians are dead," Terry replied to Logan. "Tell the others to wait here. We'll be back." Then Terry placed his hands inside a large crack in the Martian ship and tore it open. He then walked in, as casually as if it was just another room.
Looking over at Logan, Frank simply shrugged and walked in after Terry.
*****
The interior of the Martian ship was remarkably complicated, filled with all kinds of machines that reminded Terry of the technology from his own time of origin. Lying in front of two large blank squares, which Terry identified as the Martian's computer screens, were the two Martian pilots.
Dazed, but getting back up.
"Be ready," Terry informed Frank. "They're recovering."
"Got you," Frank replied, tensing himself. Terry could sense that Frank just wanted to dive in and attack the Martians, but was restraining himself from acting too impulsively. Terry thought he understood Frank's reasons for that; Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was one of the numerous human novels Skynet had programmed him with so he could better understand the human mind. As he recalled, Frank had committed many murders in that book, and he must now see the League as a means for redemption. If he struck the Martians down before they could fight back, how was he any better now than he was back then?
*****
After a few seconds of confusion, the Martians were up and looking around. They saw Frank and Terry, and instantly pulled out two of their heat ray weapons.
Frank held up his hands in a calming gesture. "OK," he said, in a very professional manner. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. Your choice."
The Martians' tentacles began to tighten around their guns.
"DUCK!" Terry yelled, as he instantly dropped down onto his knees. Frank reacted a little slower, but still managed to hit the ground right before the Martians fired their heat ray.
Rolling to the side, Terry pulled out his gun and fired it at the Martian. It may have been only a pistol, and it didn't pack as much of a punch as Sawyer's Winchester, but it still did some damage.
Especially since Terry had managed to hit the Martian right in its eye.
Screaming and writhing in pain, the Martian collapsed onto the ground, dying in slow, terrible agony.
The other Martian looked over at the body of its fellow, and then looked up at Terry with what appeared to be anger in its eyes. However, before it could attack, Frank had grabbed its head, twisted it in a 180 degree turn, and it was dead.
Terry looked up at Frank. "Thank you."
Frank shrugged. "You'd do the same for me," he said simply. "Now, let's go." Terry nodded, and the two of them walked out of the Martian ship.
*****
As they walked out of the Martian ship and over to the rest of the League, Frank dusted himself down and looked over at the destroyed ship.
"That went well enough," he said, looking over at the other League members. Hartdegen groaned. "Frank, we nearly got Hyde and Logan killed, you and Terry could have been crushed by the falling ship, and our bullets did practically nothing when we were trying to bring it down. I don't know about you, but I don't call that a good job."
Frank shrugged. "We survived, didn't we?" he replied. "And," he added, jerking his thumb back at the Martian ship, "We know it's possible to defeat them."
"Yes, but only after a great deal of effort," Mina put in. "Somehow, I find it unlikely that we'll be able to pull off that stunt on every single Martian ship that lands here to conquer the planet. We need to find an easier weakness if we're going to have a chance of winning."
"I have a suggestion," Terry put in. "While I was waiting for you all to return I took detailed scans of the Martian's corpse. I discovered some-"
Just then, Logan raised one angry finger, made all the more noticeable by the claw that he stuck up beside it.
"Wait a minute," he said, sounding extremely annoyed. "You found out information about the Martians, and you didn't tell us?! Why not?"
"There was no opportunity to do so," Terry replied simply. "You were all occupied with chasing down the Martian ship that had attacked me. Besides, it seemed logical to test out the durability of the ship itself and discover whether or not we could stop it with our current resources."
"Oh, so you didn't particularly care about telling us that right then?" Sawyer butted in. "We could have died, Terry!"
"No," Terry replied, still as annoyingly blunt as ever. "If there had been a chance that you and Mina Harker would have been terminated, I would have intervened. My mission is to protect you, remember? Besides, I concluded that, with our available weapons, we had a fair chance of stopping one Martian ship at the very least."
*****
Sawyer sighed. He had to admit it, Terry had a point.
"Yeah, fair enough," he sighed. Then he looked over at Terry. "Just one thing, OK? When we're in danger, help everyone, OK? Don't just focus on me and Mina."
"I shall remember that," Terry replied.
Sawyer nodded as thanks. He knew that Terry meant what he was saying. Whatever else Terry's flaws were, you couldn't call him a liar.
Then he got back to the business at hand.
"So, Terry, what did you find out about the Martians from your survey?"
"That they have a remarkably weak immune system to Earth diseases," Terry replied. "In other words, conceivably they could be killed by the common cold."
The League stared a little at that statement. Skinner laughing, however, eventually broke the silence.
"Who'd have thought it, huh?" he asked when he'd stopped, sounding like he was fighting to not laugh. "Mass alien murderers, and they can be killed by a cold?! We've won!"
"Except for one thing, Skinner," Mina put in as she glanced back at the floating coat that signified Skinner. "How do you propose we give the entire Martian species a cold? Sneeze on them?"
"Of course not, Mina!" Skinner replied, sounding angry. "I was more thinking that we... that we..." He stopped and looked around at the others. "I missed a crucial part here, didn't I?"
"Exactly," Sawyer replied, hoisting his Winchester up onto his shoulder. "It's all well and good to say 'Let's give the Martians a cold', but there's a bit of a jump between decision and action. Anyone got any ideas?"
"I do have a suggestion," Hartdegen put in.
"Let's hear it," Hyde grunted, looking slightly on edge from the lack of anything to hit.
"Well, in the future, some military corporations have been developing germ bombs- bombs that release a virus upon exploding, infecting anything within a certain radius," Hartdegen explained. "Now, it's only a thought, and not a guaranteed thing, but I could go into the future and see if any of my contacts would be willing to construct one of those for me, but filled with the common cold virus."
The League looked around at each other, each one slowly starting to nod in agreement.
"No harm in trying," Sawyer said, looking back at Hartdegen with a grin. "It's not like we have any other options, and your contacts do have a great interest in insuring we succeed in our mission."
"Right then," Hartdegen said, heading back to the car. "Let's get going; we don't have much time to get back to the Nautilus!"
"Seconded, thirded, and motion carried," Skinner said, as the League got back into the car and began to drive back the way they'd come.
*****
After about two hour's solid driving, the League pulled up at the dock where they had left the Nautilus. As they got out, the large form of Nemo's incredible ship rose out of the ground, like the lost city of Atlantis returning to the world it had long abandoned. As the Nautilus finished rising, one hatch on the side dropped and Nemo's first mate, Patel, walked out of the ship.
"Good to see you back, Captain," Patel nodded at the Indian.
"It is good to be back, Patel," Nemo smiled at the man. Then, his face hardened. "Tell the crew to arm themselves for battle. We may require assistance here."
"Very well," Patel replied, as he turned back towards the Nautilus. Just before he entered, he turned back at looked at Nemo. "Anything else, Captain?"
Nemo glanced back at Hartdegen. Hartdegen shook his head.
Nemo turned back to Patel. "No, Patel. Thank you for asking, though."
"That's what I'm here for, Captain," Patel replied, before entering the Nautilus and vanishing from view.
"Well, I'd best be off," Hartdegen said, as he headed into the Nautilus, heading for his cabin. "Time waits for no man, even with a time machine."
"We'll be out here when you're done!" Sawyer called in after the former teacher.
"I'll remember that!" Hartdegen called back, before his footsteps were out of hearing range.
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Worlds at War
Eventually, after almost half an hour's solid driving, which had nearly resulted in the car hitting a couple of farmers and various kinds of cattle, they were finally within visual range of the Martian ship.
Terry's basic description really was basic, Sawyer thought to himself, as the Martian ship's full height became apparent.
It appeared to be about five times the size of Edward Hyde, maybe even six times. The ridiculous part was that the ship's legs, of which it had three, took up almost all of that height. They looked too thin and spindly to support anything as heavy as what was above them; a large cylinder that looked like the form they'd seen lying in the field, but somehow more threatening.
"HEY, MARTIAN!" Sawyer yelled, as Nemo took the wheel and he got onto his feet, wielding his Winchester. "CARE TO TRY AND TAKE US?!"
Despite the fact that the creatures inside it probably didn't even understand the language that was being yelled at them, the Martian ship stopped walking forward and turned to face the League.
Sawyer took his chance.
He fired. Whether or not it would work was a valid point, but he had to try, at least. The bullet from his Winchester stuck the Martian ship and ricocheted off to the side. Well, at least I aimed at an odd angle, Sawyer thought to himself, as the bullet struck a nearby tree. Then he got back to the matter at hand.
"Let's go!" he yelled. Instantly, Mina, Frank, Terry and Logan leapt out of the car, heading towards the Martian ship. At the same time, Nemo hit the brakes, and Jekyll leapt out of the car. Jekyll pulled out a phial of his formula and swallowed it, changing into Hyde while Sawyer, Nemo, Skinner and Hartdegen grabbed some guns from the boot. However, Skinner didn't put his coat back on; he wanted to be ready for action if the need arose, no matter how unlikely that appeared at present.
As the transformation finished, Hyde roared in rage and charged towards the Martian ship. He grabbed the leg nearest to him, planted his feet firmly on the ground, and pulled. Evidently he was trying to pull it down, although he didn't seem to be having much luck; in fact, it pulled him off his feet and continued to walk onwards, with Hyde clutching its leg like a baby unwilling to let its mother leave it behind.
"HELP!" he yelled at the others, in a very uncharacteristic voice of helplessness. The League needed no encouragement. Instantly, Frank, Terry and Logan leapt for one of the legs, Logan landing on the same leg as Hyde. In the meantime, Hyde had managed to haul himself up
At the same time, Mina flew up onto the main Martian ship, and began desperately slashing at the hard metal exterior.
"Get down!" Sawyer yelled, as Skinner, Nemo and Hartdegen raised their guns. "We're about to fire!"
Mina looked back at Sawyer and shook her head.
"I don't need to jump, Tom!" she yelled at her partner. "So long as you don't hit my heart, I'll be fine! Just shoot! We have to stop this thing before it reaches a city!"
Sawyer briefly wavered in indecision, uncertain what would be the right move to make right now. Then, his mind made up, he looked back up at Mina.
"Got it!" he yelled up at her, before he glanced back at the others. "You heard the lady, guys! Open fire!"
The four of them did so, their guns blazing with a quickness that made the Fantom's automatic rifles look slow by comparison. The bullets showered over the massive vehicle with all the persistence of a heavy rain shower, but did about as much damage as the rain did to a human building. The Martians didn't even respond to the bullets; it was though they weren't even there.
*****
Looking around himself, Edward Hyde saw that the Martian ship was approaching the outskirts of a forest. It didn't appear to want to enter the forest itself, but it was going around it so fast that Hyde doubted it would make much difference.
Growling with anger at the alien device that was dragging him along, Hyde reached out with one arm and grabbed a nearby tree. Seeing what he was doing, Logan stuck his claws in the same tree. Instantly, the Martian ship stopped. It may have been able to carry six people on its outside, but tearing a tree out of the ground was another matter.
Hyde looked up at the Martian ship, and grinned.
"Is this all you've got?!" he yelled up at it. "I faced a tougher challenge from the Fantom's soldiers, and they were only human!"
A large thing that looked like a gun dropped out of the bottom of the ship and pointed towards Hyde.
"Ah crap," he whispered, as the weapon fired a heat ray.
Acting like lighting, Hyde let go of the tree and jumped for his life, landing beside the car. Logan leapt higher up the leg, landing just a few inches away from the main Martian ship.
The heat ray struck the leg of the Martian ship, but did nothing more than turn the leg slightly black.
*****
Nemo noted the heat ray's affect on the Martian ship's leg with a slight tinge of annoyance; it looked like they didn't even have the option of stealing one of the Martian's weapons to use against them. Still, it didn't prevent him from continuing to cover the Martian cylinder with bullets, desperately hoping to get in a lucky shot.
"They're getting out of range!" Hartdegen yelled at Sawyer.
"Yeah, and it's showing no signs of falling, even with the aid of the others!" Skinner called out to his friend at the same time. "Any ideas, Sawyer?!"
Sawyer nodded. "I have one, Skinner. It's time for a change of tactics!" he yelled, discarding his guns and sliding back into the driver's seat. "Hold on!" he called back to Nemo, Skinner and Hartdegen. The three of them barely had enough time to get into a better position before they were tearing after the Martian ship.
"Keep firing!" Sawyer yelled back at them. "The whole point of me doing this was to keep us within gunshot range! We have to keep on trying to bring this stupid thing down, at least!"
Nodding, the other three pulled out their weapons and began to fire their weapons all over again. The bullets were still not having much effect, but at least they were keeping up with the Martians.
I just hope something happens to turn the tide of battle, Sawyer reflected to himself as he crashed through the fragile remains of a fence. Otherwise, we don't even have a prayer against an entire species.
*****
Meanwhile, Hyde had shaken himself back to reality and was charging after the rapidly escaping Martian ship. He may not have been as fast as Nemo's car, but he could still outpace any normal human even on one of his weaker days.
Any suggestions, Henry? he asked his other self. Hyde didn't normally talk with Jekyll like this, but he had to admit these were desperate circumstances.
One, Jekyll replied. Maybe we could try and knock the Martians down? If you can get onto the cylinder with Mina, your extra weight might be enough to tip it off balance. If not, we could try and call up the rest of them to achieve that goal.
It has to be worth a try, Hyde admitted. Timing himself, he leapt straight for the nearest leg, landing almost halfway up it. It was the one he'd been on before, but fortunately he'd landed above the blackened area where he'd been previously; from what he could feel, it was still remarkably hot. Glancing up, he saw that Logan was desperately slashing at the ship where it joined on to the leg, but wasn't having much luck.
"Logan!" he yelled up at the little man. Logan glanced down at him. "Jump onto the cylinder! I have a plan!"
Nodding, Logan leapt up onto the Martian cylinder, vanishing from view. Hyde vaguely heard a brief roar of pain, and couldn't help but give a small grin; it sounded like Logan had landed on Mina. Then he scrambled up the leg like a monkey up a tree, and scrambled on to the top of the cylinder.
Mina glanced over at Hyde, her normally pristine face stained with sweat and a couple of small scratches. The most notable one was above her left eye, but it didn't seem to be anything serious.
"I hear you have a plan?" she asked, cocking her right eyebrow at Hyde.
"Well, it's mostly Henry's really," Hyde replied. "He thinks that, if we put enough weight on this cylinder, we might be able to make this thing fall over." Mina and Logan looked at each other and nodded.
"It's worth a shot," Logan commented.
"We can but try," Mina agreed. "Even if the ship isn't destroyed, it should be immobilised long enough for us to tear it apart. Right then," she said, as she turned to face Hyde. "We'd better try and tip it in your direction; any other and the chances are greater that Frank or Terry will get hurt."
Hyde nodded. Turning around, he dug his hands as far into the Martian ship as they could go, and leaned over the side of the ship as though trying to peek over the side. Beside him, Logan dug his claws into the ship as far as he could (Which, given that they were merely bone, wasn't that far), and Mina stuck her nails into the ship as well. The last had more effect, given that her vampire blood meant that her nails were durable enough to stick in solid rock. The ship was a lot harder than rocks, Hyde knew, but her claws were still strong enough to get some of the way in.
"Let's go!" Mina yelled, as the ship began to walk forward again.
All three of them instantly leaned over the side. Instantly, the Martian ship began to tilt, wavering dangerously on the edge. Before the ship's controllers could adjust themselves to compensate, the ship's two front legs had been torn off the ground, and the ship was heading for the earth.
"JUMP!" Mina yelled. Logan and Hyde needed no encouragement; all three of them leapt from the Martian ship, landing just in front of the car. Fortunately Sawyer had hit the brakes before they landed, but even then the car was still uncomfortably close to hitting Logan's head.
Looking back, Mina saw that the Martian ship had taken a definite beating, with the front part now nearly gone, but Terry and Frank had gotten out of the fall unharmed; they'd both leapt to the side of their respective legs.
*****
As Frank and Terry hit the ground, they glanced back at the Martian vessel. It didn't appear to be in any fit shape to walk, but Frank still felt like making sure that its pilots wouldn't be coming back.
"Shall we?" he asked Terry, glancing over at his strange new friend.
"Shall we what?" Terry replied, looking over at him blankly.
Frank rolled his eyes. This guy may have been good for raw power and military tactics, but he seemed to be totally clueless about basic slang.
"Shall we make sure the Martians are dead?" Frank asked, looking over at Terry inquiringly.
"Yes," Terry replied. With that, the two of them walked towards the ship. As they neared it, Logan ran round from the other side to join them.
"Um, what's going on here?" he asked, a little confused.
"We are simply confirming that the Martians are dead," Terry replied to Logan. "Tell the others to wait here. We'll be back." Then Terry placed his hands inside a large crack in the Martian ship and tore it open. He then walked in, as casually as if it was just another room.
Looking over at Logan, Frank simply shrugged and walked in after Terry.
*****
The interior of the Martian ship was remarkably complicated, filled with all kinds of machines that reminded Terry of the technology from his own time of origin. Lying in front of two large blank squares, which Terry identified as the Martian's computer screens, were the two Martian pilots.
Dazed, but getting back up.
"Be ready," Terry informed Frank. "They're recovering."
"Got you," Frank replied, tensing himself. Terry could sense that Frank just wanted to dive in and attack the Martians, but was restraining himself from acting too impulsively. Terry thought he understood Frank's reasons for that; Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was one of the numerous human novels Skynet had programmed him with so he could better understand the human mind. As he recalled, Frank had committed many murders in that book, and he must now see the League as a means for redemption. If he struck the Martians down before they could fight back, how was he any better now than he was back then?
*****
After a few seconds of confusion, the Martians were up and looking around. They saw Frank and Terry, and instantly pulled out two of their heat ray weapons.
Frank held up his hands in a calming gesture. "OK," he said, in a very professional manner. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. Your choice."
The Martians' tentacles began to tighten around their guns.
"DUCK!" Terry yelled, as he instantly dropped down onto his knees. Frank reacted a little slower, but still managed to hit the ground right before the Martians fired their heat ray.
Rolling to the side, Terry pulled out his gun and fired it at the Martian. It may have been only a pistol, and it didn't pack as much of a punch as Sawyer's Winchester, but it still did some damage.
Especially since Terry had managed to hit the Martian right in its eye.
Screaming and writhing in pain, the Martian collapsed onto the ground, dying in slow, terrible agony.
The other Martian looked over at the body of its fellow, and then looked up at Terry with what appeared to be anger in its eyes. However, before it could attack, Frank had grabbed its head, twisted it in a 180 degree turn, and it was dead.
Terry looked up at Frank. "Thank you."
Frank shrugged. "You'd do the same for me," he said simply. "Now, let's go." Terry nodded, and the two of them walked out of the Martian ship.
*****
As they walked out of the Martian ship and over to the rest of the League, Frank dusted himself down and looked over at the destroyed ship.
"That went well enough," he said, looking over at the other League members. Hartdegen groaned. "Frank, we nearly got Hyde and Logan killed, you and Terry could have been crushed by the falling ship, and our bullets did practically nothing when we were trying to bring it down. I don't know about you, but I don't call that a good job."
Frank shrugged. "We survived, didn't we?" he replied. "And," he added, jerking his thumb back at the Martian ship, "We know it's possible to defeat them."
"Yes, but only after a great deal of effort," Mina put in. "Somehow, I find it unlikely that we'll be able to pull off that stunt on every single Martian ship that lands here to conquer the planet. We need to find an easier weakness if we're going to have a chance of winning."
"I have a suggestion," Terry put in. "While I was waiting for you all to return I took detailed scans of the Martian's corpse. I discovered some-"
Just then, Logan raised one angry finger, made all the more noticeable by the claw that he stuck up beside it.
"Wait a minute," he said, sounding extremely annoyed. "You found out information about the Martians, and you didn't tell us?! Why not?"
"There was no opportunity to do so," Terry replied simply. "You were all occupied with chasing down the Martian ship that had attacked me. Besides, it seemed logical to test out the durability of the ship itself and discover whether or not we could stop it with our current resources."
"Oh, so you didn't particularly care about telling us that right then?" Sawyer butted in. "We could have died, Terry!"
"No," Terry replied, still as annoyingly blunt as ever. "If there had been a chance that you and Mina Harker would have been terminated, I would have intervened. My mission is to protect you, remember? Besides, I concluded that, with our available weapons, we had a fair chance of stopping one Martian ship at the very least."
*****
Sawyer sighed. He had to admit it, Terry had a point.
"Yeah, fair enough," he sighed. Then he looked over at Terry. "Just one thing, OK? When we're in danger, help everyone, OK? Don't just focus on me and Mina."
"I shall remember that," Terry replied.
Sawyer nodded as thanks. He knew that Terry meant what he was saying. Whatever else Terry's flaws were, you couldn't call him a liar.
Then he got back to the business at hand.
"So, Terry, what did you find out about the Martians from your survey?"
"That they have a remarkably weak immune system to Earth diseases," Terry replied. "In other words, conceivably they could be killed by the common cold."
The League stared a little at that statement. Skinner laughing, however, eventually broke the silence.
"Who'd have thought it, huh?" he asked when he'd stopped, sounding like he was fighting to not laugh. "Mass alien murderers, and they can be killed by a cold?! We've won!"
"Except for one thing, Skinner," Mina put in as she glanced back at the floating coat that signified Skinner. "How do you propose we give the entire Martian species a cold? Sneeze on them?"
"Of course not, Mina!" Skinner replied, sounding angry. "I was more thinking that we... that we..." He stopped and looked around at the others. "I missed a crucial part here, didn't I?"
"Exactly," Sawyer replied, hoisting his Winchester up onto his shoulder. "It's all well and good to say 'Let's give the Martians a cold', but there's a bit of a jump between decision and action. Anyone got any ideas?"
"I do have a suggestion," Hartdegen put in.
"Let's hear it," Hyde grunted, looking slightly on edge from the lack of anything to hit.
"Well, in the future, some military corporations have been developing germ bombs- bombs that release a virus upon exploding, infecting anything within a certain radius," Hartdegen explained. "Now, it's only a thought, and not a guaranteed thing, but I could go into the future and see if any of my contacts would be willing to construct one of those for me, but filled with the common cold virus."
The League looked around at each other, each one slowly starting to nod in agreement.
"No harm in trying," Sawyer said, looking back at Hartdegen with a grin. "It's not like we have any other options, and your contacts do have a great interest in insuring we succeed in our mission."
"Right then," Hartdegen said, heading back to the car. "Let's get going; we don't have much time to get back to the Nautilus!"
"Seconded, thirded, and motion carried," Skinner said, as the League got back into the car and began to drive back the way they'd come.
*****
After about two hour's solid driving, the League pulled up at the dock where they had left the Nautilus. As they got out, the large form of Nemo's incredible ship rose out of the ground, like the lost city of Atlantis returning to the world it had long abandoned. As the Nautilus finished rising, one hatch on the side dropped and Nemo's first mate, Patel, walked out of the ship.
"Good to see you back, Captain," Patel nodded at the Indian.
"It is good to be back, Patel," Nemo smiled at the man. Then, his face hardened. "Tell the crew to arm themselves for battle. We may require assistance here."
"Very well," Patel replied, as he turned back towards the Nautilus. Just before he entered, he turned back at looked at Nemo. "Anything else, Captain?"
Nemo glanced back at Hartdegen. Hartdegen shook his head.
Nemo turned back to Patel. "No, Patel. Thank you for asking, though."
"That's what I'm here for, Captain," Patel replied, before entering the Nautilus and vanishing from view.
"Well, I'd best be off," Hartdegen said, as he headed into the Nautilus, heading for his cabin. "Time waits for no man, even with a time machine."
"We'll be out here when you're done!" Sawyer called in after the former teacher.
"I'll remember that!" Hartdegen called back, before his footsteps were out of hearing range.
