From beyond, p.27
From Beyond, page 27
“You made it!” David said.
“I almost didn’t. I got stuck and that beast grabbed me,” he said, rubbing his calf. Bloody puncture marks encircled his tattered suit.
“We have to keep moving,” Lennon said. “Can you walk?”
Liu winced as he tried pushing off the deck, but his injured leg wouldn’t hold his weight. David helped him up, and draped Liu’s arm over his shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said.
But before they even made it two steps, his Holo began trilling. It was Carter again. David fished the device from his pocket and answered, “Hello?”
“Commander. Mission Control is done crunching numbers. They’ve pinpointed our impact to somewhere off the coast of Boston. Or maybe right on top of it. They’re not totally sure yet.”
“That’s a heavily-populated city!” David exclaimed.
“Then they’re planning to shoot us down?” Lennon asked, crowding in around the device.
“No. They tried. It didn’t work.”
“What do you mean it didn’t work?” Lennon asked.
“You remember those lasers they shot us with?” Carter said.
“Oh no...” Liu whispered.
“Well, they intercepted our missiles. About a hundred of them. Just because we took out their thrusters doesn’t mean we damaged their defenses.”
“Where did they intercept them?” David asked in a hoarse voice.
“Safely, in space.”
“Thank God,” David breathed.
“I’m not sure how good it is, knowing that we might be responsible for killing millions when we touch down.”
“Can’t they evacuate?” Liu asked.
“There isn’t enough time. We’re at ETA twenty-five minutes to impact. All they’d do is incite a panic.”
David made a mental note of the time and minimized the call to set the countdown on his Holo from twenty-five minutes.
“Right now, Mission Control is hanging tight,” Carter went on. “They’re hoping the Interloper corrects itself, or that it makes a soft water landing.”
“That’s the best that any of us can hope for now,” David agreed.
“What are you going to do?” Carter asked.
“Locate a secure place to ride this thing down.”
“You won’t survive. It’s impossible.”
“So is crossing millions of kilometers in the blink of an eye, and yet somehow the Interloper did it.”
“That’s your plan?” Lennon asked. “You’re hoping they have another trick up their sleeve? If they did, don’t you think they would have used it by now?”
“Perhaps,” David conceded. “Either way—Carter, you need to use the lifeboat.”
“Negative, sir. There’s a chance I could get to you with spare pressure suits. We can all use the lifeboat together.”
“We don’t have time, and you know it.”
“Maybe if I...” He trailed off.
“Get clear, Carter. That’s an order.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied in a subdued voice.
“Good luck,” David added.
“You too, sir. And, uh, see you on the other side, Liu... Lennon.”
“You won’t see me where I’m going,” Lennon quipped.
“Goodbye, Carter,” David said, ending the communication. He hobbled on with Liu, bogged down by the man’s injuries and even his own.
Lennon trudged ahead, taking point. She produced her own Holo and opened their mapping app. The programs shared data automatically, and with the Interloper’s jamming field offline, her app now showed almost half of the ship. Lennon used it to lead the way, navigating the rocky tunnels and winding ever higher through the Interloper’s many labyrinthine levels.
“Where are we going?” David asked after a while. He didn’t recognize anything, even though he’d come this way with Liu before.
“Somewhere we haven’t been yet,” Lennon answered, picking another fork in the tunnels, seemingly at random.
“If they have escape pods, we should find them near the outer hull,” David added after checking his Holo. It appeared that Lennon was aiming for the very heart of the vessel.
“If they do have escape pods, you can bet that their own crew will be flocking there now. The last thing we need is to run into them.”
“But if we ride the Interloper down to Earth...” Liu began, but left his thought unfinished.
Lennon stopped to face them. “It’s big, but its velocity can’t be that high. It only ignited the engines recently, so we won’t hit with the force of a meteor.”
“It would be an extinction level event if we were going faster,” David said.
“Yes,” Lennon agreed. “But like you said, the Interloper could have some form of maneuvering jets or shields to buffer the landing.”
“So you’re betting we could survive if we’re shielded by the bulk of the ship,” Liu concluded.
“It’s worth a shot, isn’t it? What other chance do we have?”
Silence answered her question as they realized that she was right.
“We have to hurry,” Lennon said, continuing on.
They came to a door, much like the one before the cryo chamber. Lennon slipped her Holo into her pocket and turned the handle.
The compartment sprang open, and they entered a massive rectangular space that went on as far as their eyes could see. Aisles and stacks of what resembled supply crates ran the length and breadth of the room. It reminded David of a port, with its multi-colored stacks of shipping containers. Except that all of these boxes were gray, black, and silver, and different sizes and shapes.
Lennon produced her Holo again and held it out to measure the range to the far end with a laser. The shimmering red beam vanished into hazy green darkness, making it impossible to tell with the naked eye how far the chamber went.
“This runs fully half the length of the Interloper,” Lennon whispered in an awed voice. “One point one kilometers. It’s perfect.”
“Perfect how?” Liu asked. “The cargo will break free and fly around in a crash.”
“True, but we’re unlikely to become trapped by the collapsing superstructure. It’s big and open enough that we could find a way out.”
“In the ocean,” Liu pointed out.
“Ideally,” Lennon said.
“We’ll drown.”
“Try to stay positive,” David replied. “Let’s find a sheltered spot. And some means to secure ourselves.”
“Copy that,” Lennon replied.
They passed aisle after aisle of supply canisters and crates. David checked the timer on his Holo. They had seven minutes, which meant the Interloper must have entered the atmosphere already. He tried to pick up the pace, limping along with Liu.
“There!” Lennon veered toward two curving beams along the wall. They created a narrow alcove, and round holes in the supports would make it easy to attach their suits’ tethers.
It would have to do.
David helped Liu to the floor beside one of the beams and tied himself to it. Lennon did the same on the other side; then David attached all three tethers.
“Link arms,” Lennon suggested as they sat with their backs to the arcing wall.
David noticed the vibrations rumbling through the ship. It reminded him of turbulence, and the force of it was rapidly building.
“How much time do we have?” Lennon asked.
David released Lennon’s arm to withdraw his Holo, and balanced it in his lap so the others could see the screen. “Three minutes.”
Carter interrupted with a call, and David answered with a voice command.
Carter’s face appeared. He looked stricken, and David could have sworn his cheeks were stained with tears, but maybe it was just from the pain of his twisted ankle.
“Hey guys,” Carter said. “I’m guessing you’re not on any of those pods?”
“What pods?” Liu asked.
“They’ve been launching for the past ten minutes straight. At least a hundred of them. Still going, in fact.”
“So they’re abandoning ship.”
“The spiders? How could those…” Carter asked, his brow raised.
David slowly shook his head. “We found them.”
His eyes widened. ”Them. As in the crew?”
David nodded.
“Hostile?”
“Very,” Lennon replied.
“Shit...”
“Are you safe?” David asked.
“I’m in the lifeboat.”
“Good,” David said. “Listen. If we don’t make it, tell Kate and the kids that…” He trailed off, wondering what Carter could possibly say to ease their grief.
“I’ll tell them.”
“Thank you,” David replies, feeling a knot of tension releasing inside his chest.
“Have we slowed at all?” Lennon asked.
“Uhh...” Carter trailed off, his brow furrowing as he studied something on his end. “Hold up...”
“How fast?” Liu pressed.
“Just under three hundred kilometers per hour. And decelerating.”
“Target?” David asked.
“Looks like it’ll miss landfall,” Carter crowed. “That’s good news!”
“It’ll generate a massive wave for Boston.”
“What about us?” Liu asked.
“Not a lot different,” Lennon said. “Water is like cement at this speed.”
“But it yields eventually, doesn’t it?” Carter said.
“Once we start to sink,” Liu muttered.
David winced as the quivering hull reached a crescendo that made it difficult to hear. He counted down the seconds.
“Hang tight, guys,” Carter said. “You’ll be—”
A deafening roar cut him off, and their locked arms wrenched violently against David’s shoulder sockets. He flew out against the slack of their suit tethers, and his head snapped forward, clacking his teeth. David tasted blood. Cargo broke free and thundered around inside the storage room. Massive crates fell like leaves from a tree that had been shaken. The entire compartment reared and heaved as if it were made of paper, and yet, by some miracle, David was still alive and conscious to witness what was happening.
When his eyes focused again, a humungous storage crate was sailing straight for them. “Look out!” David screamed, but he couldn’t even hear his own voice.
THIRTY-SEVEN
The Interloper, Atlantic Ocean
Dreams saturated Lennon’s mind. Foggy memories, and glimpses of futures never developed. They were like old photos raining from the sky, but she could never grab hold of one. She was weightless. And for the first time in her life, she wasn’t scared or angry or sad. Or alone.
“Lennon!”
Her eyes opened, and she remembered where she was. But all Lennon wanted to do was sleep.
“Lennon, we have to go!”
Her ears were ringing, and she spat a stream of salty water from her mouth. Everything hurt.
“Where’s Liu?” she asked, and saw him floating face-first in the center of the cargo room.
“He didn’t make it,” David called.
She was about to check on the man when she saw the way his neck was bent. What a shame. All this effort for nothing. He’d survived the battles with the alien freaks, only to die upon their return home.
Water was rushing from all sides of the cargo hold, filling it quickly. Lennon sputtered, and noticed that her ties were undone from the beam. “Thank you,” she told David, who kept treading water without a word. “We need to leave.”
“What have we done?” he whispered.
“It wasn’t our fault,” she told him. “We tried.”
David nodded, and swiped a wet hand over his soaking head. “I have to get to my family. Protect them.”
“You won’t do them any good if we don’t make it to land.” Lennon scoured the space for anything of use. She didn’t worry about encountering any of the aliens. There was nothing here to defend themselves with, not out in the open like this. And they didn’t have the luxury of time. Another hour exposed in the water, and they’d both be dead from hypothermia.
Something sailed by, and Lennon swam to it, testing its buoyancy. The length of gray plastic floated well enough, and when David lunged on it, his half submerged slightly. “Where’s the best exit?” he asked.
Lennon gestured to the biggest rupture, where water was gushing in. “That way.”
The cargo hold was three quarters full by the time they kicked their makeshift life raft to the exit, and she paused near the waterfall. “We have to push past it. You ready for this?”
David nodded weakly, mirroring her fatigue.
“You can do this. One more obstacle,” she said, realizing that was a lie.
“Ready.”
She counted down, loudly, over the surging ocean. And they kicked with all their strength. Lennon frowned as they exited the storage area, and quickly realized there was a powerful current, threatening to drag them under.
After another few minutes of exhausting paddling, they were past it, wandering toward the light. The Interloper was trashed. They encountered the outer hull, and she surveyed the wreckage. Pieces burned, flames sputtering into the air.
“Arms to the sky!” someone yelled, as a dozen searchlights hovered above the ruined alien craft.
“I’m Commander David Bryce of Beyond III!” David replied.
Lennon almost blacked out, her eyes fluttering. She heard the roar of boat engines, the rotors of nearby helicopters, and something splashed as it fell a short distance away. “Take the rope!”
Lennon felt David’s hands on her; then she was hauled from the water, her feet dangling in the air.
She tried to gauge how far they were from the coast, but couldn’t tell. She was lowered into a small boat, and saw Carter on deck, a blanket wrapped around him.
“Carter!” She dove across, using the last of her energy to hug the linguist. “You made it.”
David arrived, and didn’t even attempt to stand. Two women gave him a blanket too, and tossed another to Lennon, who threw it on while her teeth chattered.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you alive,” Carter told her. “Thanks for abandoning me.”
Lennon shrugged. “I’m an asshole. What can I say?”
A red light flashed on top of the compact boat, and Lennon noticed a team of soldiers approaching the front half of the Interloper under a kilometer away. The sun was beginning to set, casting a bright orange glow over the waves. “What are they doing?” Lennon whispered. When no one responded, she grabbed the nearest woman in fatigues. Her name was on the breast. Collins. “Tell them this ship is dangerous. There are things aboard that will haunt your nightmares. We have to take them out. Now!”
The woman stared at Lennon like she was certifiable, and spoke into an earpiece. “We have our orders.”
The boat started for the coast, and Lennon spotted a helicopter lowering to the crash site. She knew the model well. Team Dark was here.
Lennon pointed toward the Boston city lights. “Was there a tsunami?” she asked the officer.
“Nothing terrible. The ship slowed dramatically before impact,” Collins said. She touched her earpiece again. “You three are requested for a meeting.”
“With whom?” Carter asked, his British accent thick.
“I think I know,” Lennon muttered.
***
Atlas
Unmarked Building, Long Island, NY
Atlas watched the news on his Holo while they waited for the others to arrive.
“Scientists are truly baffled by today’s meteor storm, Bob. There was no anticipating it, and just as soon as it began, it ended. It’s being said that the primary impact is five miles off the coast of Boston, but that’s yet to be verified. According to my sources, there’s an awful lot of military personnel investigating the scene.” The woman read the bit from her teleprompter, and the subject changed to another. It was about a shooting in the Midwest. Atlas couldn’t believe how quickly the world could move on.
Dark Leader paced the room in clipped strides. “Where are they?”
Atlas turned the Holo off when someone knocked on the door, and in walked Dark One. He passed his boss a device, and Booth turned the screen to face him. “What’s the word?”
“It’s empty, sir,” a voice replied.
“Empty?” Booth asked. “How can that be?”
“We searched every compartment, sir. There are no aliens on board the Interloper.” Atlas recognized the voice. It was James Wan.
Dark Leader fumed at the news. “Find them! We cannot let these… things invade our oceans. It’s only a matter of time before they reach land. Then we’ll have a real shitstorm with the media!”
The room was dim, and Atlas stood, stretching his back. They’d arrived in New York an hour ago, three hours after impact. At first, he’d expected chaos from the escape pods the aliens had released, but so far, there was no news to spread. It was disconcerting.
“Why aren’t we at Boston?” Atlas asked.
“You’ll see soon enough.” It was all the answer Booth was going to give.
Atlas opened the compact fridge and spied a few locally brewed beers. Since no one had offered him coffee or water, he cracked a bottle’s cap off, taking a sip as the doors opened again.
Atlas had never seen three people look so defeated.
David Bryce entered briskly, followed by the British crew member of Beyond. At the moment, he didn’t remember the guy’s name. The third was a woman, and she moved with confidence, despite their circumstances. She had a way about her he appreciated.
Atlas found himself staring at her as her gaze settled on him. Her lip formed a sneer, and she addressed Dark Leader. “We failed…”
Her voice caught when she saw Rutger.
***
Lennon
It was official. Lennon was broken. She staggered away, her back hitting the door. “This can’t be happening,” she muttered.
“Dark Three, compose yourself!” Dark Leader’s voice was gravelly, and she went rigid.
“Lennon, I’m sorry,” Rutger said, but this time, it wasn’t in her head like every other occasion.
“I almost didn’t. I got stuck and that beast grabbed me,” he said, rubbing his calf. Bloody puncture marks encircled his tattered suit.
“We have to keep moving,” Lennon said. “Can you walk?”
Liu winced as he tried pushing off the deck, but his injured leg wouldn’t hold his weight. David helped him up, and draped Liu’s arm over his shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said.
But before they even made it two steps, his Holo began trilling. It was Carter again. David fished the device from his pocket and answered, “Hello?”
“Commander. Mission Control is done crunching numbers. They’ve pinpointed our impact to somewhere off the coast of Boston. Or maybe right on top of it. They’re not totally sure yet.”
“That’s a heavily-populated city!” David exclaimed.
“Then they’re planning to shoot us down?” Lennon asked, crowding in around the device.
“No. They tried. It didn’t work.”
“What do you mean it didn’t work?” Lennon asked.
“You remember those lasers they shot us with?” Carter said.
“Oh no...” Liu whispered.
“Well, they intercepted our missiles. About a hundred of them. Just because we took out their thrusters doesn’t mean we damaged their defenses.”
“Where did they intercept them?” David asked in a hoarse voice.
“Safely, in space.”
“Thank God,” David breathed.
“I’m not sure how good it is, knowing that we might be responsible for killing millions when we touch down.”
“Can’t they evacuate?” Liu asked.
“There isn’t enough time. We’re at ETA twenty-five minutes to impact. All they’d do is incite a panic.”
David made a mental note of the time and minimized the call to set the countdown on his Holo from twenty-five minutes.
“Right now, Mission Control is hanging tight,” Carter went on. “They’re hoping the Interloper corrects itself, or that it makes a soft water landing.”
“That’s the best that any of us can hope for now,” David agreed.
“What are you going to do?” Carter asked.
“Locate a secure place to ride this thing down.”
“You won’t survive. It’s impossible.”
“So is crossing millions of kilometers in the blink of an eye, and yet somehow the Interloper did it.”
“That’s your plan?” Lennon asked. “You’re hoping they have another trick up their sleeve? If they did, don’t you think they would have used it by now?”
“Perhaps,” David conceded. “Either way—Carter, you need to use the lifeboat.”
“Negative, sir. There’s a chance I could get to you with spare pressure suits. We can all use the lifeboat together.”
“We don’t have time, and you know it.”
“Maybe if I...” He trailed off.
“Get clear, Carter. That’s an order.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied in a subdued voice.
“Good luck,” David added.
“You too, sir. And, uh, see you on the other side, Liu... Lennon.”
“You won’t see me where I’m going,” Lennon quipped.
“Goodbye, Carter,” David said, ending the communication. He hobbled on with Liu, bogged down by the man’s injuries and even his own.
Lennon trudged ahead, taking point. She produced her own Holo and opened their mapping app. The programs shared data automatically, and with the Interloper’s jamming field offline, her app now showed almost half of the ship. Lennon used it to lead the way, navigating the rocky tunnels and winding ever higher through the Interloper’s many labyrinthine levels.
“Where are we going?” David asked after a while. He didn’t recognize anything, even though he’d come this way with Liu before.
“Somewhere we haven’t been yet,” Lennon answered, picking another fork in the tunnels, seemingly at random.
“If they have escape pods, we should find them near the outer hull,” David added after checking his Holo. It appeared that Lennon was aiming for the very heart of the vessel.
“If they do have escape pods, you can bet that their own crew will be flocking there now. The last thing we need is to run into them.”
“But if we ride the Interloper down to Earth...” Liu began, but left his thought unfinished.
Lennon stopped to face them. “It’s big, but its velocity can’t be that high. It only ignited the engines recently, so we won’t hit with the force of a meteor.”
“It would be an extinction level event if we were going faster,” David said.
“Yes,” Lennon agreed. “But like you said, the Interloper could have some form of maneuvering jets or shields to buffer the landing.”
“So you’re betting we could survive if we’re shielded by the bulk of the ship,” Liu concluded.
“It’s worth a shot, isn’t it? What other chance do we have?”
Silence answered her question as they realized that she was right.
“We have to hurry,” Lennon said, continuing on.
They came to a door, much like the one before the cryo chamber. Lennon slipped her Holo into her pocket and turned the handle.
The compartment sprang open, and they entered a massive rectangular space that went on as far as their eyes could see. Aisles and stacks of what resembled supply crates ran the length and breadth of the room. It reminded David of a port, with its multi-colored stacks of shipping containers. Except that all of these boxes were gray, black, and silver, and different sizes and shapes.
Lennon produced her Holo again and held it out to measure the range to the far end with a laser. The shimmering red beam vanished into hazy green darkness, making it impossible to tell with the naked eye how far the chamber went.
“This runs fully half the length of the Interloper,” Lennon whispered in an awed voice. “One point one kilometers. It’s perfect.”
“Perfect how?” Liu asked. “The cargo will break free and fly around in a crash.”
“True, but we’re unlikely to become trapped by the collapsing superstructure. It’s big and open enough that we could find a way out.”
“In the ocean,” Liu pointed out.
“Ideally,” Lennon said.
“We’ll drown.”
“Try to stay positive,” David replied. “Let’s find a sheltered spot. And some means to secure ourselves.”
“Copy that,” Lennon replied.
They passed aisle after aisle of supply canisters and crates. David checked the timer on his Holo. They had seven minutes, which meant the Interloper must have entered the atmosphere already. He tried to pick up the pace, limping along with Liu.
“There!” Lennon veered toward two curving beams along the wall. They created a narrow alcove, and round holes in the supports would make it easy to attach their suits’ tethers.
It would have to do.
David helped Liu to the floor beside one of the beams and tied himself to it. Lennon did the same on the other side; then David attached all three tethers.
“Link arms,” Lennon suggested as they sat with their backs to the arcing wall.
David noticed the vibrations rumbling through the ship. It reminded him of turbulence, and the force of it was rapidly building.
“How much time do we have?” Lennon asked.
David released Lennon’s arm to withdraw his Holo, and balanced it in his lap so the others could see the screen. “Three minutes.”
Carter interrupted with a call, and David answered with a voice command.
Carter’s face appeared. He looked stricken, and David could have sworn his cheeks were stained with tears, but maybe it was just from the pain of his twisted ankle.
“Hey guys,” Carter said. “I’m guessing you’re not on any of those pods?”
“What pods?” Liu asked.
“They’ve been launching for the past ten minutes straight. At least a hundred of them. Still going, in fact.”
“So they’re abandoning ship.”
“The spiders? How could those…” Carter asked, his brow raised.
David slowly shook his head. “We found them.”
His eyes widened. ”Them. As in the crew?”
David nodded.
“Hostile?”
“Very,” Lennon replied.
“Shit...”
“Are you safe?” David asked.
“I’m in the lifeboat.”
“Good,” David said. “Listen. If we don’t make it, tell Kate and the kids that…” He trailed off, wondering what Carter could possibly say to ease their grief.
“I’ll tell them.”
“Thank you,” David replies, feeling a knot of tension releasing inside his chest.
“Have we slowed at all?” Lennon asked.
“Uhh...” Carter trailed off, his brow furrowing as he studied something on his end. “Hold up...”
“How fast?” Liu pressed.
“Just under three hundred kilometers per hour. And decelerating.”
“Target?” David asked.
“Looks like it’ll miss landfall,” Carter crowed. “That’s good news!”
“It’ll generate a massive wave for Boston.”
“What about us?” Liu asked.
“Not a lot different,” Lennon said. “Water is like cement at this speed.”
“But it yields eventually, doesn’t it?” Carter said.
“Once we start to sink,” Liu muttered.
David winced as the quivering hull reached a crescendo that made it difficult to hear. He counted down the seconds.
“Hang tight, guys,” Carter said. “You’ll be—”
A deafening roar cut him off, and their locked arms wrenched violently against David’s shoulder sockets. He flew out against the slack of their suit tethers, and his head snapped forward, clacking his teeth. David tasted blood. Cargo broke free and thundered around inside the storage room. Massive crates fell like leaves from a tree that had been shaken. The entire compartment reared and heaved as if it were made of paper, and yet, by some miracle, David was still alive and conscious to witness what was happening.
When his eyes focused again, a humungous storage crate was sailing straight for them. “Look out!” David screamed, but he couldn’t even hear his own voice.
THIRTY-SEVEN
The Interloper, Atlantic Ocean
Dreams saturated Lennon’s mind. Foggy memories, and glimpses of futures never developed. They were like old photos raining from the sky, but she could never grab hold of one. She was weightless. And for the first time in her life, she wasn’t scared or angry or sad. Or alone.
“Lennon!”
Her eyes opened, and she remembered where she was. But all Lennon wanted to do was sleep.
“Lennon, we have to go!”
Her ears were ringing, and she spat a stream of salty water from her mouth. Everything hurt.
“Where’s Liu?” she asked, and saw him floating face-first in the center of the cargo room.
“He didn’t make it,” David called.
She was about to check on the man when she saw the way his neck was bent. What a shame. All this effort for nothing. He’d survived the battles with the alien freaks, only to die upon their return home.
Water was rushing from all sides of the cargo hold, filling it quickly. Lennon sputtered, and noticed that her ties were undone from the beam. “Thank you,” she told David, who kept treading water without a word. “We need to leave.”
“What have we done?” he whispered.
“It wasn’t our fault,” she told him. “We tried.”
David nodded, and swiped a wet hand over his soaking head. “I have to get to my family. Protect them.”
“You won’t do them any good if we don’t make it to land.” Lennon scoured the space for anything of use. She didn’t worry about encountering any of the aliens. There was nothing here to defend themselves with, not out in the open like this. And they didn’t have the luxury of time. Another hour exposed in the water, and they’d both be dead from hypothermia.
Something sailed by, and Lennon swam to it, testing its buoyancy. The length of gray plastic floated well enough, and when David lunged on it, his half submerged slightly. “Where’s the best exit?” he asked.
Lennon gestured to the biggest rupture, where water was gushing in. “That way.”
The cargo hold was three quarters full by the time they kicked their makeshift life raft to the exit, and she paused near the waterfall. “We have to push past it. You ready for this?”
David nodded weakly, mirroring her fatigue.
“You can do this. One more obstacle,” she said, realizing that was a lie.
“Ready.”
She counted down, loudly, over the surging ocean. And they kicked with all their strength. Lennon frowned as they exited the storage area, and quickly realized there was a powerful current, threatening to drag them under.
After another few minutes of exhausting paddling, they were past it, wandering toward the light. The Interloper was trashed. They encountered the outer hull, and she surveyed the wreckage. Pieces burned, flames sputtering into the air.
“Arms to the sky!” someone yelled, as a dozen searchlights hovered above the ruined alien craft.
“I’m Commander David Bryce of Beyond III!” David replied.
Lennon almost blacked out, her eyes fluttering. She heard the roar of boat engines, the rotors of nearby helicopters, and something splashed as it fell a short distance away. “Take the rope!”
Lennon felt David’s hands on her; then she was hauled from the water, her feet dangling in the air.
She tried to gauge how far they were from the coast, but couldn’t tell. She was lowered into a small boat, and saw Carter on deck, a blanket wrapped around him.
“Carter!” She dove across, using the last of her energy to hug the linguist. “You made it.”
David arrived, and didn’t even attempt to stand. Two women gave him a blanket too, and tossed another to Lennon, who threw it on while her teeth chattered.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you alive,” Carter told her. “Thanks for abandoning me.”
Lennon shrugged. “I’m an asshole. What can I say?”
A red light flashed on top of the compact boat, and Lennon noticed a team of soldiers approaching the front half of the Interloper under a kilometer away. The sun was beginning to set, casting a bright orange glow over the waves. “What are they doing?” Lennon whispered. When no one responded, she grabbed the nearest woman in fatigues. Her name was on the breast. Collins. “Tell them this ship is dangerous. There are things aboard that will haunt your nightmares. We have to take them out. Now!”
The woman stared at Lennon like she was certifiable, and spoke into an earpiece. “We have our orders.”
The boat started for the coast, and Lennon spotted a helicopter lowering to the crash site. She knew the model well. Team Dark was here.
Lennon pointed toward the Boston city lights. “Was there a tsunami?” she asked the officer.
“Nothing terrible. The ship slowed dramatically before impact,” Collins said. She touched her earpiece again. “You three are requested for a meeting.”
“With whom?” Carter asked, his British accent thick.
“I think I know,” Lennon muttered.
***
Atlas
Unmarked Building, Long Island, NY
Atlas watched the news on his Holo while they waited for the others to arrive.
“Scientists are truly baffled by today’s meteor storm, Bob. There was no anticipating it, and just as soon as it began, it ended. It’s being said that the primary impact is five miles off the coast of Boston, but that’s yet to be verified. According to my sources, there’s an awful lot of military personnel investigating the scene.” The woman read the bit from her teleprompter, and the subject changed to another. It was about a shooting in the Midwest. Atlas couldn’t believe how quickly the world could move on.
Dark Leader paced the room in clipped strides. “Where are they?”
Atlas turned the Holo off when someone knocked on the door, and in walked Dark One. He passed his boss a device, and Booth turned the screen to face him. “What’s the word?”
“It’s empty, sir,” a voice replied.
“Empty?” Booth asked. “How can that be?”
“We searched every compartment, sir. There are no aliens on board the Interloper.” Atlas recognized the voice. It was James Wan.
Dark Leader fumed at the news. “Find them! We cannot let these… things invade our oceans. It’s only a matter of time before they reach land. Then we’ll have a real shitstorm with the media!”
The room was dim, and Atlas stood, stretching his back. They’d arrived in New York an hour ago, three hours after impact. At first, he’d expected chaos from the escape pods the aliens had released, but so far, there was no news to spread. It was disconcerting.
“Why aren’t we at Boston?” Atlas asked.
“You’ll see soon enough.” It was all the answer Booth was going to give.
Atlas opened the compact fridge and spied a few locally brewed beers. Since no one had offered him coffee or water, he cracked a bottle’s cap off, taking a sip as the doors opened again.
Atlas had never seen three people look so defeated.
David Bryce entered briskly, followed by the British crew member of Beyond. At the moment, he didn’t remember the guy’s name. The third was a woman, and she moved with confidence, despite their circumstances. She had a way about her he appreciated.
Atlas found himself staring at her as her gaze settled on him. Her lip formed a sneer, and she addressed Dark Leader. “We failed…”
Her voice caught when she saw Rutger.
***
Lennon
It was official. Lennon was broken. She staggered away, her back hitting the door. “This can’t be happening,” she muttered.
“Dark Three, compose yourself!” Dark Leader’s voice was gravelly, and she went rigid.
“Lennon, I’m sorry,” Rutger said, but this time, it wasn’t in her head like every other occasion.
