Noah Jordan vs. The Aliens

by Tyler Wild

  I glanced around, taking in the strange scenery. These creatures had most likely traveled across the galaxy, yet the machine of war wasn’t all that different. They appeared to have a chain of command, well-defined roles, and an established process. This was essentially like any other Navy ship, whether they called it that or not. I suspected there were officers and enlisted personnel, though I had no way of identifying either. They moved with expert precision and coordination.

  They marched us from the flight deck into an interior corridor that had a hexagonal shape. The deck was textured, and recessed lighting panels illuminated the pathway.

  Identification markers on the bulkheads denoted sections of the spacecraft with alien characters. The sheer size and scope of the vessel would make it impossible to navigate without some type of map. Screens with directories and schematics were placed at various junctures. The low drone of the ship rumbled through the corridors. It was almost soothing in its deep vibration.

  The aliens marched us through a maze of corridors to a detention center. There was a command station and several rows of cellblocks down various corridors. Guards with plasma rifles strolled the hallways. Multiple screens at the command station displayed security feeds from the cellblocks.

  They stuck Floyd and I into a general holding cell with about 20 other detainees. The cell was sealed off by a glowing red force-shield. The compartment smelled like fear—the nervous sweat of prisoners, ripened over three days without access to a shower.

  In the compartment, there was a sink and a toilet—but it was designed for the alien anatomy, not for humans. It got the job done, but it was awkward.

  There were thousands of cells just like this one, packed to the gills with prisoners from Earth.

  There was nowhere to sit. There were no bunks. No blankets, no pillows—nothing. The prisoners huddled on the deck, leaning against the bulkheads, and making a temporary home wherever they could find space.

  Floyd and I took a seat against the bulkhead and tried to adapt to our new surroundings.

  The prisoners looked hopeless. Families had been torn apart, loved ones slaughtered. They all had empty stares with eyes as deep as oceans.

  "How long have you been here?" I asked the man next to me.

  “Two days. Maybe. It's all a blur. They took my watch. We are all a little disoriented."

  He had short brown hair and a square jaw. He was in his late 30s and looked like he kept himself in good shape. His nose was crooked from one too many bar fights. “What’s happening down on Earth? Are we making any progress?”

  I shook my head.

  The man frowned. He extended his hand, “Brian Thompson. But my friends call me BT.”

  “Nice to meet you, BT,” I said. “What can you tell me about this place?”

  A grim look washed over his face. “A lot. And none of it good.”

  33

  “I’m not trying to scare you,” BT said. “But, I’ve seen some pretty horrible stuff. And what I hear is even worse.”

  I swallowed hard. I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to tell me.

  “They separated the men, women, children, and the sick. They will occasionally pull someone from a cell, and they are never seen again. From what I hear, they are running experiments. We are like guinea pigs to them. I’ve heard they are testing the limits of our physical endurance, pain, cognitive ability, reflexes, etc.”

  The knot in my stomach tightened. My overactive imagination began to run away with me, envisioning all kinds of gruesome scenarios. “Have they displayed any weaknesses?”

  BT laughed. “Are you kidding me? These creatures are unbelievably strong. And they run a tight ship. They seem well-organized. They are team focused, it’s almost like they are a hive. Some of them speak limited English. They must have been studying us for quite some time. Who knows, maybe they were picking up syndicated TV, learning about our culture from reality shows and soap operas? If that’s the case, no wonder they want to annihilate us.”

  I almost laughed. “Any tips for survival around here?”

  “They feed us little nutrition cubes once a day. A guard will toss them into the compartment. It’s a free-for-all. People attack the cubes like sharks in a frenzy. I suggest you grab your cube quickly, and be prepared to fight for it if someone steals it. It’s the only nutrition you’re going to get.”

  “Aren’t we all in this together?” I asked, appalled by the competitive scramble for food.

  “It’s every man for himself. In that regard, it’s best to keep yourself and not cause trouble. They tend to pull troublemakers out for experiments.”

  “They took my dog,” Floyd said. “Any idea what they would have done with her?”

  BT shrugged. “It’s hard to say.”

  Floyd deflated.

  “You mentioned something about a hive?” I asked.

  “Have you ever watched them move in groups? It’s a coordinated effort. They seem to know what each other is doing, instinctively. Their fight squadrons swarm like bees. I think they’re all interconnected on some level. But what the fuck do I know?”

  I glanced to the force-shield as a guard strolled by. His boots clanked against the deck. I stood up and moved to the glowing shield, trying to get an angle on the hallway. There were dozens of cells in this block. The force-shield hummed. I reached out a hand and pressed my fingertips against the barrier. It felt like glass. It didn’t budge when I tried to push my hand through it.

  I went back to my seat by Floyd and BT and anxiously fidgeted for the next few hours. Even if I could escape the cell, where would I go? How would I get off the ship? There didn’t seem to be a way back to Earth, apart from catching a ride with the aliens, and that wasn’t going to happen. Sorry, just kidding. We’ll take you back to Earth now. The invasion was just a joke. Ha ha!

  My stomach began to rumble, and a nutrition cube didn’t seem like it was going to do the trick. I had taken a few swigs of water from the fountain, and it tasted like shit. I couldn’t imagine the cube was going to taste any better.

  A guard tossed in a handful of the squares. This was our dinner. They passed through the force-field and tumbled across the deck. The beam apparently allowed directional travel.

  The prisoners scampered for the morsels, snatching and grabbing at the cubes like rabid rats. I dove into the fray and grabbed a nutrition square. The big guy next to me pushed aside an old man and snatched three cubes. The frail man got nothing.

  My body tensed and my fists tightened. I couldn’t stand bullies. High school had been full of them. “Hey, man! Give him a cube!”

  The big guy glared at me. He was twice my size—6’3” and thick with muscle. He had tattoos on his face and neck, and a scar underneath his left eye. His dog-shit eyes burned into me. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me. Give the man a nutrition cube.”

  The ogre laughed. “You gonna make me?”

  “If I have to.”

  “Tell you what. Why don’t you give me your cube, and we’ll call it even?”

  34

  The ogre stood tall and towered over me. He clenched his fists. They looked like sledgehammers. I had definitely bitten off more than I could chew.

  "Give it here, you little fucker!” He held out his palm.

  I popped the cube in my mouth and chewed it. The disgusting thing tasted like dirty socks. It had a rubbery consistency. It took several chews to get it soft enough to swallow. It made my mouth feel like a desert, sucking up the moisture. I almost choked, needing a sip of water. But by that time, the ogre’s fist was already careening toward my face.

  I ducked, and the sledgehammer moved overhead. I responded with a swift punch to the ogre’s groin. He doubled over with pain and dropped to his knees. I kneed him in the face, shattering his nose. Blood splattered from his nostrils, spraying the deck with crimson blood. I drove my elbow down into his spine with all my might, putting my body weight into it.

  The ogre flattened on the deck with a groan,
and his stash of nutrition cubes rolled free, dancing across the deck like dice.

  There were cheers all around. He'd been terrorizing the prisoners for days.

  I scooped up the nutrition cubes and redistributed them to those in need. Then I returned to Floyd and BT.

  "I thought we were going to have to jump in and save your ass there for a second," Floyd said.

  I flashed a cocky grin. "Nonsense. That guy was nothing."

  "Where did you learn to fight like that?" BT asked, impressed.

  “Video games," I said.

  It was pure luck. An instinctual reaction. Years of watching action movies and playing video games had ingrained certain movements. They say athletes can actually improve their performance by watching other high performance athletes. If you ask me, I just got lucky.

  The ogre finally pushed himself from the deck and wiped the blood from his nose. He glared at me, and for a moment I thought he was going to storm my way and start trouble. But he just pouted and strolled to the corner of the compartment. He took a seat and curled up like a scolded child.

  I was feeling pretty good about myself. I had established my dominance, and it was unlikely he would try anything again. He had his ass handed to him by a smaller guy. It must have been embarrassing.

  But my little victory hadn't gone unnoticed. Two of the guards had watched the event from the hallway. It wasn't long before they stormed into the compartment and grabbed me. My face washed with fear. "What's going on?"

  They dragged me by my biceps out of the compartment.

  The ogre grinned with satisfaction.

  "Where are you taking me?"

  The alien goons didn't say a word. They dragged me through the cellblock, past the command terminal, and into the main corridor. I had no idea where they were taking me, but I knew it wasn't good.

  They marched me through the labyrinth of passageways. I took the opportunity to learn as much about the ship as possible. Crew members scurried about in an orderly fashion. The ship buzzed with activity. We walked for what seemed like several city blocks to another compartment. I had seen but a small fraction of the overall ship.

  A guard pressed a button on the bulkhead, and a hatch slid open. They forced me inside—the barrel of a weapon pointed at my head.

  They had taken me to a lab. Two alien scientists motioned for us to enter. They instructed the guards to seat me in a restraining chair. My arms and legs were buckled in with metal cuffs. Once I was secured, the guards left.

  I struggled against the metal restraints around my wrist. I tried to make my fist as small as possible and pull it through, but the metal gouged my skin. I’d have to practically dislocate my thumb to get my wrist free.

  The lab was full of test tubes, beakers, centrifuges, display screens, vials, syringes, and medical instruments. Cadavers lined examination tables, sliced up the middle and dissected like frogs on a tray. It was a hideous sight. My stomach twisted in knots. Once again, my heart stomped in my chest, and a nervous sweat coated my skin.

  There was a human brain and spinal cord suspended in fluid inside of a stasis tube. Electrodes were attached to the gray matter.

  It was chilling.

  On a slab not far from the brain was the donor. What once was a beautiful woman was now an empty shell. The scalp had been sliced open, and the skull sawed off—the brain and spinal cord removed.

  The brain was still living.

  I had stumbled into the lab of mad scientists, and they were performing inhumane experiments. I wondered what the hell they were going to do to me.

  The bark of a dog garnered my attention. I craned my neck to see Daisy confined in a cage. She looked unharmed, and I was grateful for that. But there was no telling what they had in store for her.

  The two alien scientists hovered over me. They surveyed me and chatted back and forth, probably discussing what type of demented experiment I was best suited for.

  The shape of the alien skull reminded me of a praying mantis—large eyes and powerful mandibles. They had slick dark skin, with a lighter gray underbelly, speckled slightly with dark spots.

  This was the stuff of nightmares.

  One of them moved to a nearby table and grabbed a large syringe. It was loaded with a clear, slightly amber liquid. The creature moved toward me, the stainless steel needle sparkling in the overhead light.

  It was hard to decipher the aliens’ facial expressions, but it seemed like the two reveled in their sadistic experiments.

  35

  My stomach turned, and I felt lightheaded. Small needles made me sweat uncomfortably and pass out. This large needle was inducing a full on panic attack. My breath became short and shallow. The sharp needle seemed to move toward me in slow motion. I was going to hurl, or pass out, or both. But if I passed out, I wasn’t going to wake up on a cot in the nurses office. If I woke up at all, I would likely be missing crucial components of my anatomy. Hell, I could end up as a brain in a glorified test tube.

  This was the moment of truth.

  I pulled my wrist against the restraints as hard as possible. The skin scraped from the bone as I pulled my wrist free. Crimson blood trickled over my hand.

  I grabbed the alien’s wrist just as he stabbed toward me with the syringe. I pushed it aside, jamming the needle into the other alien. I mashed the plunger, administering some of the medication.

  The alien holding the syringe was in shock. He hesitated for a moment—long enough for me to remove the syringe from his colleague and stab it into him. My thumb depressed the plunger and injected the rest of the liquid.

  The aliens backed away and scampered to a cabinet, searching through the vials. They were probably looking for some type of antidote. Before they could find what they were looking for, the two aliens collapsed to the deck, sedated.

  I exhaled a deep breath.

  My hand hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, and my fingers tingled. I managed to release my right wrist, then my ankles, then climbed out of the chair and glanced around the compartment. I found what looked like a sterile cloth and wrapped around my wrist, soaking up the blood. I applied pressure to the wound for a moment as I continued to look for a weapon.

  A scalpel on a nearby tray would do. It was small but sharp. I wouldn’t be able to take on the entire alien Navy with it, but it was better than nothing.

  I used it to slit the aliens’ throat for good measure. I didn’t need them waking up in a few moments and attacking me. Green blood oozed from their veins. Their bodies twitched and convulsed for a moment, then went still.

  I tried to formulate a plan. I needed to rescue Floyd and Daisy and get off the ship. That was a tall order.

  I wiped the scalpel on my jeans, then slipped it into my back pocket. I grabbed another syringe from a tray. I figured it had the same sedative in it. It looked similar, and it might come in handy, I thought.

  “Help me,” a voice said.

  I looked around the room, but I was alone.

  “What?”

  “Help me! You can’t leave me like this,” the desperate voice pleaded.

  My eyes focused in on a speaker/camera combination by the floating brain. It was smaller than a golfball, and reminded me of an aftermarket laptop camera. It served as the brain’s eyes.

  Holy shit!

  The brain was indeed alive and conscious. Her thoughts were translated to speech and vocalized through the speaker on the camera. The voice was smooth and fluid, almost sensual—not mechanical or robotic sounding at all.

  “Can you see me?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Nice work disabling those two fuck-tards.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “What’s your name?”

  “Ariel.”

  “It’s nice to meet you, Ariel.”

  “You gotta do me a solid. You’ve got to kill me. I can’t go on like this. That’s me on the slab over there. Well, it was me.”

  I looked to the eviscerated corpse that was missing a brain. “I’m sorry. That sucks.”

 
“You’re telling me.”

  “Does it hurt?” I asked.

  “I’ve got phantom pain in limbs I don’t even have any more.”

  “I’m sorry.” I frowned.

  “There’s no way around it. You’ve got to kill me. Look at me. I’m never going to get laid again. What is the point of living?”

  She had a point.

  “But you gotta promise me something.”

  “Sure. What is it?”

  “You gotta make those bastard’s pay.”

  “You got any idea how?”

  “I’ve got a few. See, they fucked up.”

  My curiosity was piqued. “How so?”

  “When they hooked me up to their computer. Right now, they’ve got me jacked in, and they’re collecting data. But it’s a two-way street.”

  “You’ve got access to their central computer?” I asked.

  “In a manner of speaking. The aliens share a common neural network. This ship might not be alive, but it is a conscious entity. It’s connected to the drones and to the Queen.”

  “Queen?”

  “Nasty bitch.”

  “Have you seen her?”

  “No. But like I said, I am part of their hive mind now, to a degree. The aliens are sort of like bees—the warrior drones all serve the Queen. She knows what they know. They follow her mental commands. This ship is controlled by her. Destroy the Queen—”

  “And the invasion ends.”

  “Bingo!”

  “How do I destroy the Queen?”

  “Therein lies the challenge.”

  36

  “The Queen is located at the center of the ship. Her chamber is guarded by her elite warriors. You will have to breach her chamber and destroy her,” Ariel said.

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “How the fuck should I know?”

  I frowned.

  There was a long moment of silence.

  “So, I’m just supposed to sneak through a ship that’s practically the size of Texas, break into a secure chamber, and assassinate the Queen—who just happens to be the most powerful alien?”