Live or Die Trilogy

by J. A. Hawkings

  From the Command Center, he could hear the carrier lift off in all its power.

  When the noise had become distant, the onlookers all turned toward a sudden whimpering.

  “You have condemned us all to death,” Chin Ho said, in tears.

  “You're crazy. You're crazy. You're crazy,” he continued, shaking his head, unable to make sense of what was happening.

  The colonel's suffering lasted a mere nine minutes and thirty-four seconds.

  A 1.2 gigawatt laser beam reduced the Command Center and all of its occupants to ashes.

  Part IV

  Alpha Orionis

  or

  Betelgeuse

  1

  The first to wake up was Mike.

  At first, he thought that he was still inside the hole, then his vision became clearer. He was lying on a malleable surface, similar to his memory foam mattress at home in Indiana. He got up on all fours and looked around him. He saw an area without borders, an ethereal dimension; it was silvery, with strange blue reflections. He tried to stand, in vain. He hadn't felt like this since the days when his body had to endure the discomforts of general anesthesia.

  The air seemed to have an abnormal texture, but nonetheless, appeared breathable. When his eyes began to focus better, he understood that he wasn't in a space with no boundaries, but in a building as big as the “The Luke,” a multi-purpose stadium in Indianapolis, where, career permitting, he loved to follow his “Colts”. The blue reflections overhead were annoying. It had to be some special form of artificial lighting. Fortunately for him, his eyes seemed to get used to it after a little while.

  What kind of place was this?

  Continuing to look around, he was surprised to see five people curled up a few meters away. How was it possible that he hadn't noticed them sooner? Then one of them began to wake up, just as he had a little while before.

  “Oh my God!” Mike exclaimed as he recognized the individual's face.

  “Where the hell am I?” Sirio asked, disoriented and wobbly.

  “I don't know,” the American replied dryly. It hadn't taken him long to recognize Tylor, Namiko, Franz and Igor as the other four faces.

  Mike didn't say more, giving everyone time to wake up and recover.

  The general astonishment left them speechless.

  They were in the center of a strange structure, which appeared smooth and uniform.

  “Am I wrong or is there no opening to this damned place?” Namiko asked.

  “What do you mean?” Igor responded.

  “Where the hell are the doors and windows?”

  The Japanese woman was baffled.

  “No, there aren't any,” the Russian replied.

  “No exit,” Sirio proclaimed.

  “We're in the ship,” said Tylor, who, until that point, had remained silent.

  “Oh come on!” said Franz, with his distinct German accent.

  “Do you have another explanation?” asked the Australian

  “Take it easy, guys,” Mike said, quickly trying to tone things down.

  “Why don't we divide up into two groups and try to see if there's a way out of here?” Sirio proposed.

  The others nodded, but after a few steps, their bodies smacked into an invisible wall.

  “An energy barrier!” Tylor asserted.

  “A what?” Sirio asked.

  “Yeah, I saw it once in a sci-fi movie.”

  “Don't tell me that you're a nerd.”

  “I have hundreds of DVD's at home.”

  “Good lord! And tell me, did you also notice how to escape from an alien ship where you're being held prisoner?”

  “I would say yes, but there's one small problem.”

  “Which is?”

  “We don't have a teleporter or a laser gun.”

  After a few jokes, followed by laughter, the desire for hilarity vanished quickly. Franz and Igor remained standing to scrutinize the absurd place, while Mike and Tylor sat down cross-legged. Namiko stepped to the side, getting down on her knees near the edge of the barrier, as though trying to find herself through some meditative practice.

  “We finally meet again, maybe sooner than planned?”

  Namiko, hearing his voice, came back to life. Sirio was only a step away from her.

  “I imagined slightly different circumstances,” she said with a hint of a smile.

  “Yeah, me too. But isn't it incredible?”

  “What?”

  “We were all taken on different days, and yet we all woke up together.”

  “We should ask Mike. When we woke up, he was already standing.”

  “Yeah, recently awakened from a coma!” the other said sarcastically.

  Namiko tried to reply but didn't have the chance.

  2

  Just beyond the confines of the barrier, part of the surrounding space began to flicker and, as if by magic, a gap opened out of nowhere. An eight-legged being emerged, arachnoid in shape, metallic and shiny.

  A robot.

  “It's as big as a Dobermann!” Sirio exclaimed, amazed and terrified.

  Namiko and Franz each cursed in their own language.

  Igor, Tylor and Mike were petrified.

  The automaton emitted, from what appeared to be its head, a wide green ray. The beam passed through the energy barrier, going towards the American who, in a reflex action, attempted in vain to escape. The ray followed his every move with pinpoint accuracy.

  After a few moments, the robot began to center its attention on Namiko.

  “Relax, it didn't hurt me,” Mike asserted , trying to reassure the others, who were visibly agitated.

  “I think it's scanning us,” Tylor reasoned.

  “For what?” Igor asked.

  “Maybe it's a biological analysis,” suggested Franz who, annoyed by the green beam, covered his eyes with one hand.

  Having finished with the German, the arachnid didn't take long to repeat the operation with the others.

  Once done with Sirio, who was last, the automaton quickly moved away and the gap closed again.

  3

  “I don't understand why it needed to scan us,” the Italian protested in a loud voice.

  “And I don't understand what the hell we're doing here,” the American said.

  “The really crazy thing is that we all awakened together,” Franz commented.

  “That's what Namiko said, before that thing arrived,” Sirio replied, shaking his head. “I was the last to be picked up. I even threatened to blow the planet sky high.”

  “When did they take you out of there?” the Russian asked.

  “September eleventh.”

  “But that's absurd!” Franz yelled.

  “I know,” the Italian agreed.

  “The only thing for sure is that we weren't picked up by the Commands,” Mike answered snidely.

  “I don't know about that,” Sirio replied.

  “What are you saying?”

  “We were always kept in the dark about everything. Who knows what might've been behind that.”

  “They did it so as not to influence us.”

  “I think they obtained the opposite effect.”

  “It might've all been an illusion,” Tylor said suddenly.

  “Explain what you mean,” the Italian urged.

  “Perhaps they invaded and defeated us a long time ago.”

  “Of course!” Sirio exclaimed, as though he'd had a flash of inspiration.

  “I see you thought of the same thing,” the Australian said with a trace of satisfaction.

  “Okay, guys, let's take this slow. What the hell are you talking about?” Mike asked, completely out of the loop.

  “Remember the landing at the UN building?” Tylor replied, trying to guide his companion to the inescapable conclusion.

  “Of course! And so?”

  “And do you remember the flicker too?”

  “Why didn't I think of that before? The calls from Mission Command were actually simul
ations! The aliens must've somehow gotten into the system.”

  “Exactly,” Tylor confirmed.

  “It had to have been the day of the blackout,” Sirio hypothesized.

  “But if they've taken over the Earth, why have they kept us alive?” asked Namiko, who couldn't wrap her head around the situation in which she found herself.

  “Initially to deactivate the nuclear weapons; that's obvious. But once they'd opened the hatches, they could've easily killed us,” the Australian asserted confidently.

  “Who knows what's behind the fucked up logic of these bastards,” Sirio said disdainfully.

  “None of us really knows; but, alas, I think we'll soon find out,” Igor responded, quietly and coldly.

  4

  “I'm thirsty...,” Mike announced.

  “And I have an urgent need to use the bathroom,” Namiko said.

  “I think we all need to do that,” Igor surmised.

  “Hey! Alien bastards!” Sirio yelled, jumping up and waving his arms. “Do you hear us? Do you want us to die of hunger? Elongated purple guys? Do you want me to do it on the ground?”

  “I don't think it will help much to let them find us in hysterics,” the Russian pointed out.

  “Oh, right. The drunk psychologist speaks.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I saw how you were gulping vodka in the hole, to stay calm.”

  “It's better than being a sex maniac.”

  Namiko felt a wave of heat flood through her body. Attacking Sirio about that meant judging her too. Luckily, she managed to maintain control and remain silent, aware that it was the stress of the moment which had made the other say unkind things. Fueling the discussion would be useless, if not harmful.

  Sirio was of an entirely different opinion, and rushed furiously over to the Russian, grabbing him by the collar.

  “Get your hands off me,” Igor whispered, with murder in his eyes.

  “Stop screwing around, you two,” Tylor interjected, and, aided by his companions, nipped the scuffle in the bud.

  “This is exactly the reason why the human race has been destroyed,” the American declared.

  “Well, excuse me, Mike, but I thought they were our little space buddies,” said Sirio.

  “No! It was a lack of self-control. The North Koreans launched an atomic bomb at them and they defended themselves.”

  “I thought we had all agreed that it was a simulation,” Tylor recalled.

  “No, or at least not with the US Command. There were real people talking until that moment. I saw the terror in their eyes. Only in later communications, if I think about it, was that missing, their humanity as it were.”

  “In any case, I'm beyond calm,” the Russian announced. “It's that hysterical Italian who needs to keep his hands to himself.”

  Sirio took a deep breath, unsure whether to respond to the affront. Then he felt Namiko grab him. Her hands in his, and her eyes seeking his, heart pounding.

  “'Please,” she said, letting him know how much she wanted all the hostility to end.

  Sirio felt his anger fall inexplicably into a vacuum. A pleasant warmth came from his hands, going all the way up to his head. It was his first physical contact with the Japanese woman. Namiko was even more beautiful in person than on-screen, and had an irresistible charm.

  “Okay,” he said. “As you wish.”

  She let go and he felt himself becoming agreeable.

  For a moment, he saw only her eyes, two enchanting black pearls. When Namiko finally looked away, Sirio came back to reality.

  Prisoner in an unknown world.

  5

  Peace and quiet had just returned when the passage from which the metal arachnoid had emerged opened again.

  A very tall being entered, with indigo skin and large slanted eyes.

  Sirio and the others looked at each other, speechless, then all eyes went to the alien.

  “We responded to your attack and won. Three billion human units have been terminated, which is accurate to within one percent. Your minds will be probed to uncover the possible existence of other Astro projects,” said the cold, synthetic being. Then he turned around in the direction of the exit.

  “Wait!” Mike yelled.

  The alien stopped.

  “We can already tell you that there are no other projects and that everything that happened until now is nothing more than a terrible misunderstanding. If we could...”

  “No request from the hostile organic units will be accommodated,” the extraterrestrial interrupted, and took his leave without further discussion.

  “He's nice, your friend,” Sirio commented.

  “They have no soul!,” Namiko said.

  The Australian began to shake his head.

  “What is it?” Mike asked him.

  “Something wasn't right about that guy.”

  “He was fake,” Igor added.

  “Another hologram?” Sirio hypothesized.

  “It was as if everything was programmed. All of their communications that I witnessed, including that sort of monologue in front of the UN building, make it appear that their brains never evolved,” Tylor hazarded.

  “You mean that the interaction you'd expect from an advanced civilization is lacking?” the Italian asked.

  “Exactly! No dialogue! And never a real possibility of dialectic discourse. We've been constrained to listen to canned phrases each time, adapted to context at best.”

  “How do you explain that?”

  “I don't know... Maybe it's all a hoax.”

  “Like this room?”

  “Yeah. I think this is a holographic projection and that we've been deluded into thinking it's a boundless environment. In reality, we're inside a cell slightly larger than the perimeter where the energy barrier stops us. It's the only explanation for why that passage opens just a few meters away.”

  “Whatever they are, they killed three billion people. That's not an illusion!” Franz said angrily.

  “Do you have any proof?” Tylor asked. “One day, we saw something in the sky, then they dropped us into the holes and we never knew anything more.”

  “You're right!” the American exclaimed. “None of us could see what really happened on the surface.”

  “The only certainty is that there's a projection of something. Someone made those movies, as well as any communications from that spaceship suspended in the sky,” said Namiko.

  “We could've been actors in something that completely eludes us. Maybe the aliens have nothing to do with it,” the Australian reasoned.

  “Tylor, I hope that it's all a deception, as you say,” Sirio replied. “Otherwise what the aliens said they did makes even less sense. Us, hostile? Ok! But what need could there be to cause such disaster? Under the circumstances, they could've neutralized the North Korean attack and sought alternative solutions. Three billion people? Oh my God! Over half of the world's population has survived, but in what kind of world? Will there even be a city still standing? Will people have food, heat and be able to take care of themselves? I doubt it.”

  “Dammit! What's happening to us?” Mike asked.

  “I don't know guys,” the German replied. “But that thing about probing our minds can't be good.”

  6

  Although shaken, like his comrades, Tylor felt the excitement of those who are destined to discover and experience the imponderable. As part of the Australian Special Forces, he had accepted the responsibility of being dropped a thousand meters down precisely because he was driven by an enthusiasm for adventure and the unknown, in a way that friends and relatives had always called crazy and irresponsible.

  His character was the result of an ingenious equation: his mind. He not only excelled in all academic subjects, but, unlike those others who are first in their class, he also distinguished himself in various sports, fascinating the girls and arousing the envy of other males. Among the thousand commitments that had characterized his teenage life, he had also beco
me passionate about science fiction and had decided to major in physics. Despite being a good rugby player, he was never able to make the leap to becoming a true professional, so he obtained a degree in physics and renounced his athletic ambitions. His eclectic talents had led him to enlist in the army, to his family's general amazement. After ten years, he became part of a select group of specialized soldiers who fought terrorism. Then the aliens came and his history intersected that of the five companions at his side.

  Now he found himself prisoner in a scenario similar to that in his collection of DVD's which filled the library at his parents' home in Canberra. Despite the dire situation, and its indecipherable and inherent dangers, it sparked a bright glimmer of fascination and admiration in his mind. His propensity to solve complex problems, usually advanced math or management of anti-terrorist operations, now forced him to frantically search for a solution, or at least the ability to understand a plot, that his lofty mind, until now, hadn't discerned.

  Then his thoughts were interrupted, not by the words of a companion, but by the opening of that passage he had come to know.

  A spherical drone entered, floating in midair. Its dimensions suggested that it had a diameter of approximately one meter. A small section opened, and it emitted a bright yellow beam, which hit Igor in the head. The Russian's eyes rolled up and he stood there, motionless.

  “They're probing him!” exclaimed Sirio who, in an attempt to stop his companion's mental read, had triggered a security system that emitted sound waves at an unbearable frequency.

  They all slumped to the ground, hands over their ears, hoping that the torture would end as soon as possible.