by Aaron Dennis
While At-Emon vocalized the readings, Nandesrikahl decided to school the rest of the crew on astronomic facts, saying, “See that? It’s Neptune. Its strange orbit is an indicator of the stress caused by another planetary body, and there it is…I knew we’d find this planet,” Nandesrikahl grinned.
At-Emon turned to the crew to speak. “We have located your Nibiru.”
“I can’t believe that all this time there was another planet no one knew for certain existed. I wonder why it was kept a secret,” Nandesrikahl asked.
They all looked at the planet in question, a bluish rock with gaseous light wafting off in a red and orange haze shaped like wings. “Probably, someone upstairs knows something we’re not supposed to know,” Swain ventured.
“Upstairs,” Imes asked.
“He doesn’t mean God, dumbass,” Becker snapped. “He means a government crony.”
Swain and Imes shrugged to each other. O’Hara cocked an eyebrow, and as he thought about his friend’s proposition, he slowly turned his gaze to the agents. Adams and Franklin made brief eye contact. These guys know something. Neither one of them had said two words since they boarded the Carrier.
“There are reasons,” Adams said, cryptically.
“Protocol,” Franklin added with a nod. “The Bureau has known a few things for certain for a long time, but gentlemen, you must understand….”
Some Thewls looked the agents over. They whispered in hushed, gurgling tones. Adams made a gesture of acquiescence.
“There is so much more to the universe, and all of it threatens Earth.”
“We can tell them now,” Franklin remarked. Adams didn’t mind, but both Humans and Thewls were curious and huddled around. “In all likelihood, a race of intelligent beings did arrive on Earth during the time of the Sumerians.”
Adams immediately picked up where Franklin left off, saying, “They may have made contact before and after that period. Whoever these people were...” Adams paused, leading the crew believe Franklin was speaking next.
Neither agent said a word. They just stared blankly. O’Hara leaned in and raised his eyebrows expectantly while Swain wrung his hands.
“What man?” Martinez yelled.
“They don’t exist anymore,” Adams smiled.
Everyone was quiet. Ambassador Weh grew concerned, denoted by the pallor draining from his visage. He was nearly gray.
“What do you two know about the travelers,” he asked.
“Not much, I’m afraid” Franklin answered.
“This planet, it’s actually called Marduk, and it does come by Earth every thirty six hundred years,” Adams continued.
“The last time it came by, we waited for our friends. They never came, though. Until recently, we didn’t have the ability to attempt communication,” Franklin said.
“Well, that’s not entirely accurate,” Adams corrected. “We made an attempt to communicate about fifty years ago and found nothing.”
“I didn’t mean we personally,” Franklin condescended. Adams gave him a look insinuating it was a useless addition. “Right, there was some, static, energy frequency—a lingering residue of energy—if you will,” Franklin explained.
“Yes, something one might expect to find following an exodus. We tried to pick up the trail, but it vanishes two, thousand miles outside the planet’s atmosphere. We’re really baffled at this point,” Adams finished
“Ambassador…speaking of energy trails. I’m picking up heat signatures,” a female Thewl stated.
“What do we have?” O’Hara asked.
“Not sure. Looks like they’re about two hours old and dissipating. About a hundred, Sir,” the Thewl replied.
“Are they inbound or outbound,” Admiral Yew inquired.
“Inbound, Sir,” she replied as her hue shifted to a bright orange.
“Sounds like we got a welcoming committee,” O’Hara breathed. “Can you follow their trail to where they might have landed?”
“Yes, but after that, I can’t see to where they traveled. I’m picking up some massive cooling on the surface, so they must have emitted a coolant to cover their tracks as soon as they landed.”
The Thewls all behaved apprehensively. Not only were subtle changes occurring in their complexions—turning grayish, or orange, some went almost black—but their speech inflections intensified, they fidgeted like Humans, and kept looking around the bridge. O’Hara and his crew felt the tension, the confusion.
The ambassador broke the silence, “We have reason to believe the Lokians may have arrived. I can’t imagine what they’re searching for, but we must see they don’t find it.”
The female Thewl said there were buildings beneath the surface. “I’m reading more, energy signatures, too. There’s power down there; likely, the Lokians are harvesting new tech as we speak.”
“Power down there?” Swain echoed. “This is crazy.”
“Can we send an air strike team to blow them away,” O’Hara asked.
“Unlikely, whatever’s down there might be destroyed or damaged, not to mention Lokians are clever; they may be tunneling beneath the surface in order to hide their signatures, or, perhaps, they’ve already acquired new tech to mask their signatures,” she commented.
The ambassador walked away and spoke to the admiral in private. A Thewlish conversation ensued. Nandesrikahl tried to listen again; his concentration was evident, but Ambassador Weh suddenly addressed the bridge.
“Thewls, steel yourselves. Today we battle the Lokians once more. We will disembark from the Carrier and make our way to Marduk. We will land where the Lokians have landed. It is probable that we will find suitable information to help us along our journey, and so we must be successful. The admiral will keep the Carrier in orbit and see that no more Lokians arrive. We will disembark,” Weh announced.
With that, the helmsman gurgled for clearance, and Admiral Yew turned his attention to O’Hara. “Will you join the fray, Captain? I’ll send a strike force to search for a sign of the travelers. Your assistance is welcome. This also provides your crew an opportunity to learn about the enemy firsthand.”
The captain looked at his crew. Determination and excitement was plastered all over their faces, but he thought about battle. None of them had ever fought, not for their lives, and to fight aliens for their debut adventure was out of this world. He glanced at the agents, too, but they had poker faces.
“Of course, Sir. It’s our duty,” the captain replied. “Anything we need to know before we join the strike force?”
“Korit will be the party leader. He’ll provide any information once you all return to the Explorer,” Admiral Yew replied.
The Human crew saluted the alien admiral. Out of respect, he reciprocated the gesture. Then, they followed Ambassador Weh out of the bridge, and filed into the elevators, where looks of concern were partially masked by excitement.
Arriving on the Explorer’s quarters deck, the Human crew met the Thewlian strike force. The largest Thewl any of them had seen yet stepped forward.
“Captain,” he asked.
“Yes. I’m O’Hara.”
“I am called Korit,” the Thewl spoke with a deep, guttural voice.
“Good. What do we need to know?”
Before answering, Korit turned and walked away. He motioned for the captain to follow with an all too Human gesture; he half turned and moved his head. The Human crew quickly jogged behind. Korit then came to a halt in front of a room.
“Before you suit up, what you need to know is the Lokians are almost never the same. What I mean is, they constantly evolve and switch tactics. They have a super dense exoskeleton, but our energy based weaponry usually cuts through. Also, they aren’t affected by the environment, meaning they don’t require air or pressure. Somehow, they regulate it all internally via artificial organs. They are devastating and fascinating.”
O’Hara nodded and turned to his crew, saying, “Suit up, gang.”
****
Thewls wasted
no time releasing from the Carrier. Dozens of fighters—angular ships with stubby wings mounted to cylindrical tubes, which revolved around the vessel—flew off into space to set up defenses in the event of a Lokian, space strike. Additional fighters accompanied the Explorer to Marduk for backup.
There, ships pierced the delicate remnants of an atmosphere. Marduk was a dark, desolate place covered in ice. Hard winds thick with sleet and snow blew furiously. Several holes in the surface were visible to the Explorer’s navigator.
****
Meanwhile, the Human crew and Thewlian strike force suited up. Adams and Franklin decided to join the fray. While the spec ops team wore their issued, battle attire, the two agents wore something totally different. Adams and Franklin were decked out in skintight neoprene. Their black suits were strapped with belts and harnesses. O’Hara didn’t see any firearms.
“What the Hell is that?” he jeered.
“Our gear, Captain,” they replied in unison.
“Listen, I can’t be babysitting you two. You should stay behind,” O’Hara snipped.
“Not a chance, Captain,” Franklin retorted.
“We can handle ourselves. This isn’t our first ro-de-oh,” Adams added with an eerie laugh.
They then looked to each other and whispered something before grinning at the captain. O’Hara was pensive, but the agents proceeded to the loading zone. Once Phoenix Crew was fully prepped, they also made their way. Arriving just behind the agents, they exchanged pleasantries with the other members of Korit’s crew. Everyone waited impatiently for the green light.
“There’s only one way to do this, we have to land on the surface, and use their tunnels,” the red giant explained.
The bay door slowly rose to a half open position. As a result, a violent flurry of snow pelted the crewmembers. Some of the Humans ducked to stick their heads out. All they saw was a blanket of white.
“We can’t see anything here that even resembles buildings. They must have been buried by the ice,” Fitzpatrick yelled.
“They’re beneath the surface, honey,” Becker snipped.
Even fully suited and speaking through their comm. units, yelling was required over the raging storm. Sleet peppered their visors as the Explorer hovered over the area pock marked with holes. Martinez called everyone together for a last minute inspection of their gear.
“I’d check your gear, too, but I don’t know what the Hell to look for,” he joked with the Thewls.
Their equipment wasn’t vastly different from Human gear. Due to their thick, membranous skin they were naturally insulated and resistant to a variety of environmental hazards, yet the frigid temperatures were too much for skin alone, so they wore black suits fashioned from an Element-115 alloy mesh; a few plates protecting their vitals reflected the loading zones lighting.
****
On the bridge, Thewls scanned the drop zone. Only moments passed before they detected the safest, entry point. The artificial shaft was close to a mile long. Oddly enough, it was growing in length. Though scanners still didn’t detect life signs, it was evident that whatever was creating the tunnel was twelve feet across and had the ability to cut through dense ice and rock at a rate of one foot every twenty seconds. After deciding it was unsafe to send a clustered crew down a single tunnel, they opted for a variety of entry points.
****
During the selection process, the Humans were provided a rundown of weapons technology.
“Most of what we use boils down to condensed gasses and sound frequencies. Our weapons reflect this as well. Sidearms are similar to your handguns, but much wider due to the length of our fingers, and they don’t shoot bullets,” one Thewl explained as she held up her gun. The end of the barrel looked like a steel claw with four points facing each other, at the center was a small protuberance. “A gas canister is placed in the rear of the barrel and activated by the trigger. This action releases a current of electricity into the canister, ionizing the compound, and quickly releasing a small portion of ions at an incredible rate of speed.”
Others carried rifles similar in design to the sidearms. A safe assumption was that they boasted greater accuracy, fired more rapidly, or fired for a longer duration before needing to exchange a canister.
“Some of us use sound emitting guns called bostas,” Korit added. “They look like metal boxes with handles and rods sticking out of the front. The rods conduct electricity like a bolt of lightning and project forward something like thunder. A wire mesh binds the rods and keeps the sound from backfiring, but they’re mainly close range weapons. No sense bringing them along.”
As the largest of the Thewls, Korit carried the largest of the weapons.
“What the fuck are you carryin’,” Martinez asked.
“Miniaturized version of the plasma cannons on ships.”
“God damn….”
The thing was shiny black and roughly the size of an old, helicopter mounted, fifty cal. Korit handed it to Marty, who was shocked by its weight. It was surprisingly light, a result of the Element-115, alloy structure. On top of that, it was connected via some corrugated tubes to a pack on the alien’s back, which contained gas, bypassing a need for bulky canisters.
A voice erupted into everyone’s ear, “Lam-Yung, here, Junior Strategist…we spoke on the bridge. I located the best point of entry. You’ll need to split up. I also located a few other points of entry, so you won’t have to move clustered together. Be ready to disembark.”
The ship pulled close to the first hole, hovered above it then fully opened its hatch, allowing the crew a safe drop. Four crews of five men and women, Thewl, and Human, were arranged by Korit. He mentioned it was only twenty feet straight down before the angle of descent stabilized.
Apparently, twenty feet wasn’t much for a Thewl, but it was a big drop for a Human, so the crew tied off to some hydraulic beams and repelled using jump cord. The procedure was repeated at the other three holes, where Adams and Franklin, who had joined another mixed team, simply leapt, no cord or anything.
As soon as O’Hara hit the ground, he cut his cord and inspected his team. Nandesrikahl, Martinez, and two Thewls, a man, Jun, and a woman, Sura, made up their squad of five. Immediately, they flicked on their gun lights and hurriedly made their way down the icy tunnel.
Jun made some gurgling sounds then more were heard coming through their comm. units. “This trip should only take about ten minutes then we’ll be coming up behind whatever’s making this tunnel.”
“A Lokian,” Sura remarked.
“What? A fuckin’ drill bug,” Marty clamored. “Hey, if we take it out, how do we keep goin’ forward? I mean, this thing is tunnelin’ towards somethin’, ya’ heard?”
“Good question,” O’Hara replied. “What do we do after we kill it?”
“We have our own tunneling instruments aboard the ship. We just need to kill this thing,” Jun said. “Once all the Lokians are dead, we can figure a way to reach what they’re looking for.”
Minutes passed while the crew steadily jogged downhill. As Jun continued onwards, the captain watched closely how the alien kept calm. He knew he needed to do the same for his men.
The dark tunnel revealed little as swaths of light bounced off frozen crags. Martinez and Nandesrikahl released gasps of awe. Soon after, a strange vibratory sound grew audible. The Human crew held their breaths. Thoughts of danger plagued their minds.
Matters worsened when the whole tunnel shook. Then, Fitzpatrick insulted Adams over their comms. O’Hara set his jaw, gulping with anticipation. The ominous blackness beyond the aliens brought a sense of dread.
He knew everyone else was just as scared, and wanted to say something motivating, but Jun threw a hand in the air, indicating they halt. He then signaled to turn off the lights. Darkness enveloped them, but someone moved forward a bit; boots clomped over stone, kicking rocks.
Jun whispered to the crew, “Slowly move one step at a time. As long as we move more than a foot every twenty seconds,
we gain on the tunneler, so there’s no need to rush. I know it’s dark, but this tunnel’s clear all the way to the beast.”
“Roger that,” Martinez whispered.
Agonizing moments ensued during which the Humans’ deep breathing sounded over their march. Finally, Jun spotted something ahead. A large mass emitted sparks from its front.
Errant lighting caused by the shiny flakes produced enough illumination to spot the crewmember directly in front of the next, and a second later, everyone noticed the leader came to a halt. The churning sound of stone grinding echoed.
Meanwhile, in another hole, Swain, Zakowski, Imes, and two, Thewl women, Flem and Ton, were progressing through a similar scenario. In their icy corridor, the team kept their lights on as they trudged. While the Humans gawked in amazement at the smooth, crystalline walls, they were too scared to say anything unnecessary, yet they heard Adams mention a Lokian on the move.
Fortunately for Swain’s crew, an uneventful trip ensued for the better part of twenty minutes, but before they reached the end of the line, sounds of battle erupted. Worrying for their friends, and thanking the powers that be for their safety, they found an opening into a large, underground chamber. There, they all perched at the end of the tunnel, gazing out at a small, abandoned colony.
Humans and Thewls shared glances. While they waited to hear back from their compatriots, they scrutinized the architecture. Buildings looked like a plethora of rocky, gray hills, but smoothed. Oddly, there was light emanating from an undetected source. Either the light itself was soft blue, or it was the reflection from the ice, which had taken over a great portion of everything visible.
“Where are the Lokians,” Zakowski whispered.
“Something feels wrong,” Imes replied.
Before they came to grips with the heart of the statement, a commotion came in through their earpieces.