by N. W. Harris
When he turned around, Kelly, Steve, Laura, Maurice, Tracy, and Jules were behind him. They all dropped their trays in the window and gave him a what’s next look.
As if on cue, a man in a black jumpsuit entered the cafeteria and glanced around. When his eyes found Shane’s, he walked briskly toward them.
“I’m Jones,” he growled, glaring at them like they weren’t worthy of his attention. “I’ll be in charge of your training.”
Other than a large scar running from his temple to chin, the alien resembled the other male clones. But his facial features were where the similarities ended. Jones’ broad, muscled shoulders threatened to burst the stitches of his black shirt. He wore his dark hair in a crew cut like Tracy, and he stood tall, with his big chest thrust forward.
“Is it just the seven teams who’ll be attacking the Anunnaki?” Tracy asked, unmoved by the alien’s drill sergeant demeanor. “Won’t we be getting more troops?”
“We’re recruiting as many kids as possible for the fight against the Anunnaki. On hidden bases around the world, teams will be trained to attack different parts of the Anunnaki ship. This base is being used to prepare the special attack squads that have the most important role in the mission—destroying the reactor. Here, your group will compete with the other six teams to determine which is the best and, therefore, which will attack the Anunnaki flagship,” Jones rumbled.
After barely taking a breath, he continued, “Each human opposing the enemy must be given an earbud to suppress the slave gene. We have a limited supply of the earbuds, but we’ll give them to as many kids as possible to build several small forces for an exterior attack on the remaining Anunnaki after you and the other teams have completed your missions. Once the reactor is destroyed, and they are released from the enemy’s control, you will also recruit the humans who were enslaved. The Anunnaki will be outnumbered. Now, if you’ll follow me, I’ll take you to the barracks.” Jones spun away, putting an abrupt end to the questions.
He led them out of the cafeteria and onto the tarmac. The lush treetops reached up behind the hangars to their left, the forest of the Appalachian Mountains stretching away from the base. Shane imagined there was nothing but wilderness for hundreds of miles in every direction.
The thought of all of that uninhabited forest comforted him. He used to spend hours in the woods when he was younger, his imagination turning trees into skyscrapers and his arms into wings. Granny descended from Irish hillbillies who tamed this forest and lived off the land. She taught Shane how to run a trout line in the crisp, cold rivers and make a rabbit box to catch a meal. Intent upon keeping her family’s history alive, she even showed him how to create medicine from the wild ginseng and herbs that took an experienced eye to find.
He wished he could remember more of what she taught him, but he was confident he could survive out there just fine. If only he could flee with Kelly and his friends. They could build log houses and live peacefully amongst those towering pines—could try to put their broken lives back together and find some semblance of happiness.
The video Lily had shown them warned that any such escape to isolation would be short-lived. The enemy was too advanced and Earth too small for them to hide. The Anunnaki would find them. No—Shane, Kelly, and his friends had no choice but to fight.
“Why do you guys have names like Lily and Jones?” Jules asked, walking in the shade of the half-pipe-shaped hangars with Tracy separating her from Jones. “They don’t sound like names of extraterrestrials.”
“Most of us were born, or should I say cloned, on Earth,” Jones replied, sounding annoyed with having to answer another question. “Lily was one of the original two who crashed in New Mexico. Lilith is a popular name on our world.”
“An interesting choice, if you know anything about the biblical legend of Lilith,” Maurice mused. “The original disobedient wife of Adam turned baby killer.”
“This is our home now, and we’re willing to die for it,” Jones growled. He seemed easily annoyed by trivial conversation. “Though we will never be human, we don’t want to be thought of as alien either, so we’ve chosen earthly names.”
“I meant no offense,” Maurice murmured, his eyes wide as he looked at Jones.
His comment got Shane wondering. Lilith the baby killer—he wasn’t familiar with that story. It renewed his suspicion, but a thumping coming from the west distracted him.
A Black Hawk appeared above the treetops, flying so low that the tallest pines scraped its belly. Clearing the buildings, the helicopter dropped to the tarmac. Lily came out of the hangar where she’d met with Shane and his friends earlier, jogging across the fractured blacktop to greet the new arrivals. She slid open the side door and seven Asians, four guys and three girls, stepped out, all wearing matching blue tracksuits with red stripes down the arms and legs. Seeing these kids and recalling what Jones had said about the contest against the other six teams, Shane’s competitive nature took over, distracting him from all other thoughts.
“It’s the Koreans,” Jones explained once the engine on the helicopter spun down enough for him to be heard. “They’re a very promising group of teenagers, all part of the South Korean National Tae Kwon Do team. They were slated to be in the next Olympics.”
“How are we gonna compete with that?” Laura asked.
“They are formidable, but each of the teams has characteristics that give them a distinct advantage,” Jones reassured. “Don’t forget—we might not even have a chance if it weren’t for you.” A hint of admiration took the edge off his gruff tone. Judging by his drill-sergeant behavior thus far, Shane reckoned it was a rare occurrence. This dude preferred one-way conversations, with him yelling the entire time.
Shane stared across the tarmac, studying the new team. The shortest of the girls stepped ahead of the group and bowed to Lily. Unheard greetings were exchanged, and then Lily turned and led them to the building, where she would undoubtedly show them the same video he and his friends saw.
The short girl at the head of the Koreans—who he reckoned had to be their leader—looked at Shane as she walked. Her steely expression promised she would not be an easy adversary. Shane met her gaze, knowing looking away would give her confidence. He wasn’t about to do that. They passed each other before their eye contact broke.
“Did you get a look at those guys?” Jules asked once they entered the barracks.
“Yeah,” Kelly replied. “I hope our little competition doesn’t involve fighting each other.”
“Right?” Laura seconded with a chuckle.
“Hand-to-hand combat is part of your training,” Jones corrected.
“How’s that?” Steve asked, sounding less intimidated. Not a single member of the Korean team looked like they weighed half what he did, and Steve was solid muscle.
“We’ll be using an advanced form of MAC training, which stands for Modern Army Combatives.” Pride entered Jones’ gruff tone. “The version we will train you with is a hybrid between what was used to train your Special Forces and CIA teams and the training system used to prepare rebels for missions on our home planet. The training is designed to nurture your inborn warrior instinct and help you face the enemy with fearless aggression. The contests will motivate you and help us determine which group will have the highest probability of success on the mission, so we can determine who to send against the flagship. While much of the score will be accrued by tests of strategy and mental endurance, two major components are physical and combative.”
“Damn, you’re screwed,” Tracy said, looking at Laura.
“What?” Laura glared at her. “You don’t know me.”
“You’re right,” Tracy replied, condescendingly. “I don’t.”
Shane looked back and forth between the girls, uncertain as to what was going on. Before the world fell apart, he’d only known them in passing and hadn’t really ever hung out with either of them. He’d never seen them interact at school and, as far as he knew, they’d just met two days ago.
For some reason, Tracy didn’t seem to like Laura. It was like the quiet Goth girl had done something horrible to her in the past, or maybe Tracy just sensed weakness in her and didn’t think she belonged here. They glared at each other for a moment, and then turned their attention to the lodgings.
The barracks was a long, rectangular room with two doors, the one they’d entered through and another twenty-five yards down.
“Bathroom, beds, study area.” Jones pointed from the second door at the far end to the two rows of bunks taking up either side of most of the room, and then at the brown, metal chairs in front of a flat-screen TV that hung on the wall to their left.
It reminded Shane of a chicken house, long, narrow, and designed to pack in a bunch of birds, or in this case, people.
“Wow, this is much more than we need,” Shane observed, concerned.
“All seven teams will sleep in here,” Jones explained.
“I was afraid of that.”
The ill-tempered alien didn’t acknowledge him, walking to the TV and picking up a remote.
“Battle videos, audio files, interviews with soldiers and civilians, physiological analyses, engineering lectures on spacecraft and armor—everything you need to know about the Anunnaki plays in a loop here.”
He touched a button on the remote and a leaner, unscarred version of Jones appeared, but the sound was muted. Shane selected a set of headphones from a basket to the side of the TV with a tag that read “English” on it. He slipped them on, and the alien’s voice played in his ears. It was a lecture on Anunnaki anatomy, talking about their muscle connections and how they made most Anunnaki physically weaker than the average human. But, he warned, their armor more than made up for the difference.
Taking off the headphones, he returned them to the basket. Five other baskets hung on the wall, each with a different language tag on it. Shane gathered at least one other English-speaking team would be joining them. There were twice as many headphones in that language than the rest.
“The loop takes seventy-two hours to get through, and then it replays. You should spend as much of your limited free time as possible viewing these lessons,” Jones advised. “The more you learn, the more effective you’ll be when the time comes for you to try to save this world.”
“No pressure,” Maurice said, laughing nervously.
“I’m sure Lily made it clear, but to put it in words you can understand, we don’t intend to sugarcoat anything. You must fully grasp the magnitude of this situation, so the only one surprised during your attack is the enemy.” Jones shifted his cold gaze from Maurice to the rest of them. “We want you fully prepared. If you lose, we lose—my people have no place else to go either,” he added, no less aggression in his voice.
“Come this way, and I’ll show you the quads.”
They followed him past the TV area and between the bunks. Once they were in the aisle, Shane could see narrow panels separated the beds, creating cubicles that slept four people per section. The quads opened onto the aisle, affording no privacy from the people on the opposite side. In each divided area, four metal lockers sat under the high windows on the exterior walls. There were no locks on them to secure valuables, not that Shane or his friends had any. All they had left at this point was each other.
“This first set of quads belongs to you,” Jones growled. “Boys on the left, girls on the right.”
“I guess that means we get an extra bed,” Maurice said, cheerful in spite of the gruff alien’s condescension.
One of the bunks had stacks of black clothing on it—seven piles of sweatpants, shorts, and T-shirts—all the same as the ones Dr. Blain had provided for him.
“Looks like we all have to wear butt-huggers,” Steve complained, picking up the running shorts from the stack with the largest-sized clothing in it.
“They suit some of us quite nicely,” Kelly whispered to Shane.
“Yeah.” He chuckled. “I can’t wait to see you in them.” He shot a grin at her, and she was the one blushing this time.
There was also a small, clear plastic case with an earbud in it that looked like a tiny, transparent hearing aid, and a paper cup with five large pills in it.
“What’s this?” Jules asked, picking up the earbud. “I didn’t think we’d need to wear it until we attacked the Anunnaki.”
“It is the device that will suppress the slave gene, but it’s also a translator and the simulator interface,” Jones explained. “You’ll need to wear it at all times during training so you can understand the non-English speaking teams.”
“What about the Anunnaki?” Jules asked. “What language do you speak?”
Shane tried hard not to smile. She was pithy and aggressive as any of them—a fitting complement to his team. Jones’ face twitched—he clearly didn’t appreciate the label.
“They speak a universal language everyone on this planet will understand. To you, it will be English. To the Chinese, it will be Mandarin,” he replied. “You’ll understand the Anunnaki, and they’ll understand you.”
He wondered why the alien kept the scar on his face. After what Dr. Blain had done to the gash in Shane’s chest, he was certain she could fix anything. Perhaps the captain was just trying to look as intimidating as he sounded.
“And these?” Laura asked, poking her finger at the horse pills.
“Your training will be exceptionally vigorous,” Jones replied. “Those contain a special mix of amino acids, super nutrients, and vitamins Dr. Blain put together to help your body and mind recover quicker. If you don’t take them, you will fall behind.”
Not allowing for any more conversation on the subject, he turned away and led them past six more identical sets of quads to the door at the end of the barracks. He pushed his way in and held it open.
“Here’s the bathroom. To the left of the sinks are laundry machines and a locker filled with cleaning supplies. You and your roommates will be responsible for keeping this barrack spotless.”
“Great,” Kelly said apprehensively. “So is this one for the girls or the guys?”
“I’m sorry,” Jones growled, his voice getting louder. “Perhaps I haven’t spoken clearly. You will all share this barrack.”
“With only one bathroom?” Kelly sounded incredulous and unintimidated.
“Yes,” Jones replied curtly. “Sharing berthing and bathing areas will help us evaluate you.”
“That’s just wrong in every way,” Laura objected, putting her fists on her hips and donning a defiant scowl.
“Wrong?” Jones said, enraged. “The survival of your species, of this very planet, is at stake! The seven groups of seven who will train here are our only hope. Is it not worth a bit of suffering so we can prepare you for the single most important mission your species has ever attempted?”
The veins in his thick neck bulging and his face red with passion, Jones glared at each of them. Shane cast nervous glances at his friends. He could tell no one liked the situation any more than he did, and they seemed weary of the alien’s constant yelling.
The barracks didn’t look like a haven for rest, and Shane expected it was part of the plan. Other than the coed factor, it was a lot like football camp. Coach Rice used to give lectures to the football team to explain their training. In one, he mentioned the body and the mind best learned reflexive action, such as leaping to the side in an instant to avoid a tackle, when both were completely exhausted. He said this was why he made them run and lift weights until they nearly dropped and then had them practice plays on the football field once their eyes were drooping from fatigue and their arms and legs felt like jelly.
Shane and Steve were familiar with the aggressive approach, but he wanted to quit all the time when he first started. They were going to have to help the others along until they got used to it.
After impatiently staring at them for a moment, seeming to give Shane’s now gloomily introspective squad a chance to ask some final questions, Jones pivoted sharply on his heel and marched back throug
h the barracks. The seven teens shot wide-eyed dude’s crazy glances at each other, and then followed him.
“If you need anything, dial one,” he said, pointing at an old, green, touchtone phone to the right of the front door. “Each team has a number. From this point on, you will be referred to by that number. You are Team One.”
“I can live with that,” Steve said cockily. “I like being number one.”
“It has no reference to your rank as related to the other teams.” He looked at each of them in turn, his brown eyes narrow, and his brow wrinkled with intensity. “If you have no further questions, I will leave you to get situated. We start training at zero four hundred hours tomorrow. The rest of the squads will arrive today.” Jones walked, or rather charged, out of the building, the door slamming behind him.
Shane’s mind was a whirlwind, trying to process everything he heard and saw since arriving to this hidden base. His blurry gaze remained locked on the exit until Tracy cleared her throat. His friends looked just as dazed, but their attention was on him.
“This ain’t gonna be easy,” Shane said, breaking their catatonia. “But we can handle it.”
“How’d he know we shut down the limbic manipulator?” Jules asked, pinching her chin thoughtfully. “An hour ago, Lily acted like she didn’t know when we told her. Now it’s common knowledge?”
“Maybe the room where Lily met with us was being monitored too,” Tracy murmured covertly, glancing up at a camera in the corner to the left of the door. “They’re probably studying us already and planning our training.”
“I’m not sure we’re the right people for this.” Laura crossed her arms and rolled her shoulders forward, seeming to get smaller. “I mean, what experience do we have? Those Koreans have been practicing martial arts all of their lives.”
“Look,” Tracy snapped. “These aliens brought us the internet, computers, cellphones—hell, they came here in a spaceship. They’re way more advanced than we are, and I’d have to say a heck of a lot smarter. I don’t think they’d have chosen us if we weren’t good candidates. Out of all the billions of kids left on the planet, they picked just forty-nine. Why waste their time on us if we couldn’t hang?”