Alien Love

by Stan Schatt

  Ricky handed a weapon to Moon, who checked to make sure it was loaded.

  “We don’t have much time,” Jack said.

  “We need to go this way,” Cassandra said as he began walking down a corridor to the right of them.

  “The plan says we get to the trains and get out of here. I thought they were to the left,” Jack said.

  “The trains are to the left. There is something else we must do. The Draconian quantum trans-dimensional generator is over here. We need to destroy it to keep the Draconians from sending reinforcements.”

  Jack looked at Cassandra and shook his head. “Why didn’t you bring that up earlier? We probably have already attracted every Draconian in five miles. Why take a chance?”

  “If you’re not brave enough, go to the trains and I will follow. I can do this by myself.”

  It’s not a question of brave enough. I’m not sure what your deal is. I’m beginning to wonder if we can trust you,” Jack said.

  Cassandra began moving down the passage. She spoke without looking back. “If you don’t keep more Draconians from coming here, eventually they will take over your world and millions of your people will die.”

  Jack looked at his friends and saw all of them including Hawk nodding. He shrugged and motioned for them to follow him as he moved quickly to catch up with Cassandra. She reached a dead end as the path turned to the right. Jack reached into his pocket and pulled out a grenade because he had the same feeling in his gut that he always got just before something terrible happened. He saw Cassandra raise her weapon as she stuck her head around the corner. He felt slightly dizzy and saw Cassandra fall to the ground. He dragged her back behind the wall and saw blood pouring from her shoulder.

  Jack pulled the pin as he turned the corner and threw the grenade. He dove back to safety, but he caught a glimpse behind the crowd of a large piece of equipment that seemed to cover one entire wall.

  Chapter 21

  JACK HELD the antiseptic wipe tightly against Cassandra’s shoulder. The blood slowed just enough for him to wrap a compression bandage tightly around the wound. Larson glanced at the wound.

  “I guess she was telling the truth when she said that she bleeds like us,” he said.

  Cassandra smiled weakly and rose to her feet with Jack’s help. “We should leave now and head that way,” she said and pointed down a long corridor.

  “Hawk, stay at the rear and shout if you see anyone behind us,” Jack said.

  The group moved quickly down the hollowed out passageway. There were no signs, no decorations; they only saw blank walls. Jack saw a Draconian weapon on the ground similar to the one Cassandra held. He picked it up and stuffed it in his pocket. He probably would need all the firepower he could carry.

  “They’re not much for making stuff pretty,” Milburn muttered.

  “They have no art, no music, and no culture because they’re a race of warriors that only cares about conquering or dying bravely. They kill their children if they show any weakness,” Cassandra added.

  Larson gripped his rifle tighter and glanced behind him. Jack kept one hand on Cassandra’s arm to help prop her up and thanked God she was so light. She stopped suddenly and raised her arm. The men froze.

  “The tracks are right around this corner. I see two Draconians waiting. Let me handle them, and then let’s go.” Cassandra stepped around the corner and fired her weapon. All the men watched her in action, and Ricky nodded with appreciation.

  “Wherever she’s from, they train them real good. She hasn’t missed once.”

  Cassandra waved her arm and the men hurried to follow. Hawk took one look back and froze. “Duck! They’re coming,” he said. Just as they hit the ground, a burst of what felt like hot air streamed over their heads. Ricky turned and fired his Carl Gustav. The sound almost deafened them, but the explosion cleared the passageway of the Draconians.

  “The train’s here!” Milburn shouted.

  Jack looked up, surprised because he hadn’t heard any sound. A large brown colored vehicle shaped like a gigantic bullet pulled up and stopped. Cassandra motioned and the men followed her. She placed a hand on a door and it opened silently. The men entered. They saw benches inside with very deep depressions.

  “It looks empty. What about the driver?” Milburn said.

  “No driver. Everything’s programmed from here, depending on which station you need,” Cassandra said.

  Larson sat, but immediately he began squirming as he moved forward and then backward in the seat.

  “It’s made to fit the Draconians,” Cassandra said. She walked to a wall containing a sign in the Draconian language and studied it before nodding. “It’s going in the direction we want. What we don’t want is another train to follow us.”

  Hawk smiled and took out the strange looking contraption he had carried with him. He pointed in the direction where the train had come and pressed a lever. Nothing seemed to happen, but Cassandra’s lips cracked into a small smile.

  “I can tell it worked. Let’s go now.” She looked below the sign she had read and placed her hand over a series of buttons. She moved her hand over them without actually touching them. Suddenly the train began to move. While there wasn’t any feeling of movement, the scenery changed as the train left the station. Soon they saw nothing but blackness.

  “What if there’s a reception party waiting at the next station?” Jack said.

  “I bypassed the intermediate stops. We’ll be traveling at least thirty minutes until we reach the last station. I’m sure guards will be waiting for us there, but you’ll understand later why they won’t want to use heavy weapons on us,” she said.

  The group sat silently while the only evidence of the train’s rapid movement were the tunnel’s markers that they saw fly by them. Suddenly the men began grabbing their heads in anguish. Jack saw Cassandra appear to lose consciousness. He felt a stab of pain in his head and then heard a voice in his head. Surprisingly, it spoke in English.

  He looked in the direction of the car that housed the engine and saw a door open and a figure, distinctly alien, move toward them. The alien resembled the popular conception of what an alien should look like. The small figure was gray with huge dark eyes that lacked an iris. It wore what looked like a silver colored uniform.

  “You will do exactly what I tell you. The pain you now feel is nothing compared to the pain I can inflict on you.”

  Jack put his hand on his forehead even though he knew the gesture wouldn’t make the stabbing pain in his head go away. His team appeared to be in far more pain than he was. Hawk was whimpering like a small child while Larson’s face had turned white. Cassandra lay on the floor, but Jack saw that her body was quivering, apparently in pain. He wondered why he could still function.

  Jack heard the alien’s voice again. “You are now prisoners of the Draconian Alliance. You will be turned over to a Draconian warrior when this vehicle stops.”

  The alien looked dispassionately at Cassandra’s body and then focused his eyes on her. She began shaking uncontrollably as if she were convulsing. Jack realized her body couldn’t take too much more of that level of pain. He moved his right hand closer to his pocket, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

  I’m almost there, he thought. At that moment the alien looked directly at him as if he had read his thoughts. He turned his eyes on him, and Jack’s headache grew more severe. The pounding in his head increased until he felt he would pass out.

  “You will not reach for the weapon,” the voice in his head said.

  Jack felt his resolve weaken as the pain intensified. The pain reminded him of the sessions he had with his shrink. He turned his mind to his mantra and focused on it with all his remaining will. Gradually the pain in his head began to dissipate. He thrust his hand in his pocket and pulled out the weapon, pointed it at the alien and pushed the button.

  Nothing seemed to happen for a couple of seconds although the air around the alien seemed to waver. Suddenly the alien exploded
, and its body seemed to dissolve before Jack’s eyes.

  Jack’s headache went away, and his men seemed to be recovering rapidly. He reached over and picked up Cassandra and placed her on a seat by his side. He held her and studied her face. Gradually her color returned, and he saw her eyes flicker. They opened, and Jack saw that she recognized him.

  “You saved us! The Traveler would have turned us over to his masters,” she said in a voice that sounded exultant.

  “You were strong enough to resist the Traveler’s power of mind. I have never heard of anyone with the mental strength to be able to do that.”

  Jack saw his men now had all recovered. They stared at him as if he weren’t human.

  “How did you keep that headache from crippling you?” Larson said.

  Jack had already asked himself the same question. “I don’t know. I remembered how my shrink taught me to meditate whenever I got a bad headache. It worked. I did feel pain, but it probably wasn’t nearly as bad as what you guys felt.”

  “Are there any more of those little buggers around?” Milburn said.

  “There should be many more of them at our destination,” Cassandra said.

  Chapter 22

  “HOW MANY OF THEM are there here on Earth?” Larson said.

  “The Travelers? I imagine a few hundred. They perform procedures on the people they abduct and assist the Draconians.”

  “They give me the creeps. What about the Draconians? How many do you think are here on Earth?”

  “Probably thousands, but they can’t reproduce on this planet. That’s why it was so important to knock out their connection to their home planet.”

  “Our government is in on this. They’re liable to come after us with everything they have once they hear what happened down here,” Jack said.

  “The treaty will be broken now that the Draconians have no way to send the heavy metals to their home planet. I think your government has more to worry about with the Draconians now than with us. They’ll probably try to consolidate their territory.”

  “How long do they live?” Larson said

  “Around thirty of your years. The gravity is heavier on this planet than on Draco, so it takes a toll on their hearts because of their size.”

  “That gives them plenty of time to do damage down here before they die out,” Jack said.

  “Most don’t have that much time left since they send older, more elite troops here. Still, everyone we kill is one less to worry about.”

  Jack looked at Cassandra who talked so calmly in a way that sounded like dialog in a bad science fiction movie. “I’m not so sure that word will trickle down from the top that we’re suddenly the good guys.”

  “I can get all of us back to San Diego, and then you can decide what you want to do,” Cassandra said.

  The tunnel’s blackness broke occasionally as they neared well-lit stations, but the train continued at its same pace. Jack caught a glimpse of Draconians waiting at some of the stations. They took a step or two toward the train and then moved back quickly when they realized it wasn’t going to stop.

  Jack glanced at his watch and saw they should be approaching their final stop. He looked at Cassandra, who nodded.

  “Be ready with your weapons,” she said.

  The train slowed beside a well-lit platform where Jack saw several guards looking in their direction. Cassandra calibrated her weapon and fired just as the door opened. The Draconians fell to the ground. Jack saw that some human looking figures dressed in suits appeared to be unarmed; they dove for cover when the shooting started.

  “Who are they?”

  “Your government’s people. They’re not allowed to carry weapons down here,” Cassandra said. She dialed her weapon and then fired in their direction. Jack felt a little dizzy as the men fell to the ground.

  “You didn’t kill them, did you?” he said.

  “No, I know your feelings about killing innocent people. They’ll be okay. We have to move quickly now.”

  Cassandra led the men to an elevator where Jack’s eyes grew wider as he saw that while the door contained directions in the Draconian language, the interior contained English directions as well. She pressed a button.

  Jack saw the elevator’s doors close, but it made no noise as it rose. He couldn’t feel any movement, even though he saw the illuminated numbers change.

  “It will stop soon. Try to stay out of sight and keep your weapons ready,” she said.

  The men flattened themselves against the walls. Jack stood next to Cassandra. He noticed that she wasn’t even breathing hard. She might just as well have gone for a day in the park.

  The door suddenly began to open. Jack saw a well-lit corridor and a sign in English that said Immigration this way.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” he said.

  “Your government tries to keep track of the Draconians as well as other …visitors.”

  “Including your kind?” Jack said.

  “No, we tried to approach your government once, but they threatened us. The Draconians already had convinced them that we were their enemy.”

  “So what do we do at Immigration?”

  Cassandra pulled a strange looking device from her backpack. It resembled a large syringe. “I’ve studied the designs for this building. It’s very late, so no one really expects us at this time.”

  She led them to a locked door, pointed her small weapon at it, and then pulled it open. She waved for them to follow her. Soon they came to another locked door. Instead of forcing the door open, she pointed at a nearby wall with her syringe-like device and slowly moved the plunger inward. The wall seemed to vibrate and then it began to crumble. Cassandra kept moving the device inward until a large hole stood where the wall had been.

  “Follow me,” she said.

  The men walked through the hole. Jack could see bright lights in front of them.

  “Keep only the guns you can hide,” she said.

  The men dropped their rifles and other assault weapons and followed the small woman. She stepped out of the wall. Each man looked around as he emerged.

  “It looks like an airport terminal,” Milburn said.

  “It is. This section is officially closed for construction, but it never will reopen. If we walk to the left, we’ll come to the main terminal.”

  “Where the hell are we?” Ricky said.

  “Welcome to the Denver International Airport,” Cassandra said.

  Chapter 23

  LARSON SAW a potted plant and started to ditch his weapon in it.

  “Don’t,” Cassandra said.

  She took out several pieces of silvery cloth from her backpack and distributed them to the men. She motioned for the others to follow her example as she wrapped her weapon with the cloth and placed the bundle back in her backpack.

  “Aren’t you afraid the x-ray machine will spot it?” Jack said.

  “No, this material will reflect back into the machine. It will look as if nothing’s there.” Cassandra rummaged through her bag again and then began dispensing cards to the men. Ricky looked at his and laughed.

  “Robert Johnson. Could you have made me any more white bread?”

  Jack studied his new California driver’s license. It looked perfect. “More alien technology?”

  “Nothing you can’t buy at Office Depot,” Cassandra replied and smiled. She put her hand on Jack’s arm. “I’ve made us a married couple. I hope that’s okay with you.”

  Jack gave her a quick hug before looking at his men. “Congratulate me, guys. We’re married now.”

  “Usually the honeymoon comes after,” Larson said.

  “He’s just jealous,” Milburn said.

  Cassandra pulled a credit card from her pocket. Larson glanced at it over her shoulder and shook his head.

  “You have Visa where you come from?”

  “It’s easy technology to fool,” she said.

  Jack watched Cassandra hand the card to a woman at the Southwest Airlines coun
ter as he explained she would be paying for the entire group. Alien hackers. What would the credit card companies say if they knew that aliens considered their best security to be a breeze to beat?

  The group went through the Southwest Airlines security line. They could still catch the last flight to San Diego. Jack held his breath as their backpacks went through the security conveyor belt. One TSA agent studied his screen and then pressed a button for the backpacks to continue to where the group waited to collect them. Jack watched Cassandra pick up her bag and proceed calmly toward the gate. She was one cool operator! Imagine what a group of warriors like her could do? Even a well-trained SEAL team wouldn’t be a match. There probably wasn’t any defense for some of that Kung Fu stuff she did. Her weapons were far superior, and she never missed when she fired.

  The flight was uneventful. Jack and Cassandra sat close together as anyone would assume a married couple would do. She leaned her head against his shoulder and fell asleep. Jack saw that the compression bandage he had placed on her wound was holding. Her regular breathing convinced him she really was asleep. He studied her face and saw that the purple bruise, now almost healed, didn’t detract from her perfect features. She seemed so vulnerable while sleeping. Still, Jack had seen her in action and now knew that she really was a warrior. Her marksmanship had been uncanny, as had her courage under fire.

  Who could stop an army of aliens like her? Cassandra’s companion, Mark or whatever his name is, what exactly was he doing? He wondered about her real mission. She’d blown up the gateway so the Draconians couldn’t send reinforcements. Now what? How did she get here? What about that woman he’d seen who looked exactly like her? How many others like her were in the city?

  Cassandra awoke as the plane went into its final descent. She opened her eyes and studied Jack. Her eyes seemed particularly penetrating in the dimly lit cabin.

  “Jack, I think you’re even more special than you think. You never showed fear. Some men probably would have left me when I was wounded. I knew you’d carry me if I couldn’t continue.”