Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"I am first of all not a science fiction writer … I write, I suppose, what the Latin Americans call magic realism."
- Harlan Ellison
 |
| Centipede-Machine | ||
| Multi-legged transport. |
| As he spoke, the Martian official before them had uttered a hissing
call, and in answer to it a long shape of shining metal raced into
the vast hall and halted beside them. It was like a fifty-foot
centipede of metal, its scores of supporting short legs actuated by
some mechanism inside the cylindrical body. There was a
transparent-walled control room at the front end of that body, and in
it a Martian at the controls who snapped open a door from which a
metal ladder automatically descended.
The Martian official gestured with a reptilian arm toward the ladder, and Milton and Lanier and Randall moved carefully out of the cube-chamber and across the floor to it, each of their steps being made a short leap forward by the lesser gravity of the smaller planet. They climbed up into the centipede-machine's control room, their guide following, and then as the door snapped shut, the operator of the thing pulled and turned the knob in his grasp and the long machine scuttled forward with amazing smoothness and speed.
 (Monsters from Mars: Centipede Machine) In a moment it was out of the building and into the feeble sunlight of a broad metal-paved street. About them lay a Martian city, seen by their eager eyes for the first time. It was a city whose structures were giant metal cones like that from which they had just come, though none seemed as large as that titanic one. Throngs of the hideous crocodilian Martians were moving busily to and fro in the streets, while among them there scuttled and flashed numbers of the centipede-machines. |
| Technovelgy from Monsters of Mars,
by Edmond Hamilton. Published by Astounding Stories in 1931 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the ships with legs from Buck Rogers: 2430 AD (1929) by Nowlan and Calkin, the metal monster from The Doom from Planet 4 (1931) by Jack Williamson, the walker wagon from Farmer in the Sky (1950) by Robert Heinlein, the robass from The Quest for Saint Aquin (1951) by Anthony Boucher, the walking mill from Bread Overhead! (1958) by Fritz Leiber, the centipede from Killing Titan (2015) by Greg Bear and the walking fort from The Killing Machine (1964) by Jack Vance.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Monsters of Mars
More Ideas
and Technology by Edmond Hamilton
Tech news articles related to Monsters of Mars
Tech news articles related to works by Edmond Hamilton
| Elon Musk Says Robotaxis Will Be Ready This August, 2024 |
| Cheap Drunk Driver Detection From UofM |
| More Like A Tumblebug Than A Motorcycle |
| Tesla Camera-Only Vision Predicted In 1930's SF |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'
'The car had no steering wheel, and no one drove!'
Now that's power walking that Hugo Gernsback would have approved.
'It was disturbing to think of the Flatline as a construct...'
'...he rewired the delivery robot so that it would serve him midnight snacks.'
'On went the electric-yacht faster and still faster.'
'...the huge vessel had spun, with a sickening lurch, through a complete half-circle, the instant the power was reversed.'
'...he realized that it was not quite a clear lens. Speckles of colored brightness swirled and gathered in it.'
