No matter what happened to me up there, I was about to cause the deaths of a few hundred thousand people. No matter what happened, I would die a villain.
I opened the onboard closed channel to ask my co-pilot if we should disengage, then saw my wingman drop his first missile, followed closely by his second.
“Weapons green, weapons green,” came the call over the radio.
Shit. I took a deep breath and pressed the trigger.
“Missiles away,” I said. Please, God, let this be the right thing to do.
I banked as the missiles sped through the upper atmosphere toward the massive alien ship.
8
David
We were almost to the coordinates of the target, pushing our fighters’ altitude ceiling to the limit. A few minutes before our initial approach we got another confirmation over the radio. This was live fire, not a drill. Updated coordinates came through and I accelerated into my approach.
That’s when I saw it.
The massive starship glowed as it fell through the outer atmosphere. It wasn’t like anything I had ever seen, even in movies. It was roughly the shape of a Blackbird aircraft – except hundreds of times the size. It looked like someone had pulled the nose of the craft out ahead of the rest of the fuselage, Pinocchio style. At the very front of the ship was a structure that flared out a little from the rest of the nose. I couldn’t see it closely enough yet, but it was a different color from the rest of the hull and looked a little like a folded-up umbrella.
A solar sail? Long-term ship, meant for long voyages. I was speculating, but if I had to guess I’d say these guys were a very long way from home.
Instead of bulky, solid wings, it looked like someone has scooped chunks out of the sides, forming a kind of rounded horn-like wingspan. I spotted guns mounted on the inside of the wings and a bridge that extended above the rest of the craft. I could see an opening on it’s bottom, shielded by gargantuan blast doors. Circular openings on the sides of the ship made it look like an insect with its legs drawn in. Circling most of the craft was a massive ring that must have spun while they were in space to create artificial gravity.
The word ‘behemoth’ sprang to mind.
How am I supposed to do anything more than scratch the hull of this thing?
I flew a few passes to get a better look at what I was up against. The gun emplacements looked like the turrets we used to mount on old WWII bombers. Enough space for a single man and probably a hell of a firing radius.
Metal plates overlapped most of the hull like an armadillo’s scales. The area around the engines and the structure supporting the bridge were especially reinforced. The wings were similarly armored but the plates did not completely enclose them. I saw at least three weak spots that were possible targets for the missiles.
It dawned on me that I was about to fire the first shot in a potential war with an alien race.
Aside from the fact that I would probably be vaporized soon after, I couldn’t help but question my orders. This was the first real proof of alien life in the universe and they were trying to land on our planet. But were they Invading, or just arriving? Did they not approach us before because they feared the very thing that was about to happen, that we would kill them?
If I shot and the missiles were ineffective, I could be the man responsible for the extinction of the human race. Was taking the chance worth it?
My finger hovered over the firing switch. When I joined the Air Force, I knew that I might have to kill fellow humans, but even our most grisly war wouldn’t match this if it went badly. We were about to detonate nuclear warheads on an alien spacecraft over American soil. The fallout would be felt on the ground and the additional EMP from the blast would fry most of the electronics still operating. We were about to plunge a panicked country into complete darkness on a hunch.
No matter what happened to me up there, I was about to cause the deaths of a few hundred thousand people. No matter what happened, I would die a villain.
I opened the onboard closed channel to ask my co-pilot if we should disengage, then saw my wingman drop his first missile, followed closely by his second.
“Weapons free, weapons free,” came the call over the radio.
Shit. I took a deep breath and pressed the trigger.
“Missiles away,” I said. Please, God, let this be the right thing to do.
I banked as the missiles sped through the upper atmosphere toward the massive alien ship.
9
Alexandra
I watched with a mix of horror and fascination as the missiles appeared on the radar. I didn’t know if I should be hoping they impact or not; if they missed, you can bet that whoever was piloting that ship wouldn’t take it as a friendly hello. If they hit, well, America had been the first to engage in a nuclear strike before, hadn’t we? We could be obliterating the first contact with extra planetary beings. We could be dooming our species. No matter how this ended, we would be responsible for mass death.
I held my breath as the missiles cruised toward the massive alien craft on the display. Beams of light emanated from under the ship’s wings, and I felt an odd sense of relief as the beams connected with two of the missiles, detonating them far from their target.
The two jets that had fired on the ship peeled away. One of the explosions nearly clipped the wing of one fighter and I saw the aircraft wobble as the pilot swerved to avoid the blast.
The alien ship started firing its thrusters to maneuver but the ship was too big and falling too fast to change course quickly. One of the nuclear missiles connected, sending pieces of the ship tumbling away.
Cheers erupted as the ship careened out of control started to drop faster. Several smaller crafts jettisoned themselves away from the ship as it dropped. Were they escape pods, or fighters? I was guessing the latter as they zipped around their mothership at high speed.
A larger craft also jettisoned but did not engage in the fight. It looked like it was trying to reach the ground as quickly as it could. Smoke billowed from the larger craft. It didn’t seem to have any visible weapons mounted on its hull. I was surprised that the smaller craft weren’t escorting it, then saw on another screen they were zooming after the human jets. Alien fighters, then. I swallowed hard.
The large monitor’s image split from two views into quadrants with feeds from both fighters and two bird’s-eye views of the alien ship. A dogfight broke out as the small ships chased the human ships with astonishing speed. More launched from their mothership as it continued its fall toward the ground.
Radio broadcasts of the pilot’s communications piped into the large room. The action was moving too quickly for anyone to respond. The soldiers and officers had stopped dead in their tracks, everyone all but holding their breath as we listened while the pilots yelled to each other so quickly I could barely understand their words. Bullets spat from the jets, streaking across the air to tear holes in the wings of the alien fighters. The aliens adapted to the soldiers’ strategies almost as quickly as they could implement them.
Massive cannons on the main ship fired blasts at the fighters but missed, their guns too slow to target the nimble jets. The human pilots successfully took down two fighters but it was obvious that the aliens were regrouping.
It fascinated me, in a way. The alien craft synced movements in an irregular pattern, their flight paths reminding me of insect swarms. Perhaps the aliens didn’t rely on the same senses we did, or they weren’t bothered by constant shifts in orientation. When they clustered together, several craft peeled away while others rushed the jets head on, weapons flashing.
We could all hear the noise the alien beams made as they streaked by the fighters. The radio chatter between the jets changed from tense excitement to unease.
Things weren’t going well. Both fighters pulled an exceptionally-nauseating spiral maneuver and managed to damage two of the alien craft. Then one of the feeds cut off with a blast of radio static.
I winced as a jet on
the screen disappeared in an explosion of fire.
“Fuck!” The oath came from the second pilot.
Now, one pilot faced at least a dozen alien ships. He had to have realized his death was imminent, yet he kept going strong. I had to look away from the monitor after a few seconds because of the dizzying maneuvers he executed to avoid incoming fire from so many ships.
When I glanced back, part of his plane was on fire. Pilot and crewman were breathing heavily, the radio feed punctuated by moans and grunts as both men fought to stay conscious.
“Bailout! Bailout! Bailout,” the call came over the radio. Smart choice.
The two men ejected. The first, who had ejected from behind the pilot, floated above the explosion a moment, then plummeted. As the seconds ticked past, I watched the man flail, desperately trying to fix his equipment. When it became obvious his parachutes weren’t going to deploy, he tucked his arms and legs in, then tucked his head as well. It looked like he was praying.
A final radio transmission came through. “I’m sorry, Mom…”
I looked away, tears filling my eyes. I hoped he knew he wasn’t alone in that moment—he had the eyes of the entire United States military on him. I hoped it would be quick, though it probably wasn’t quick enough.
The alien fighters ignored both humans, returning to their mothership and setting into a formation to guide it down. I almost wished they’d kill the first man. No one deserved to die like that.
The second pilot’s parachutes had deployed, and he was rotating himself toward the wind. That made sense, it would slow him down enough to not hit the ground at a speed that would kill him. We waited for his call to base. None came.
Director Agarwal appeared in front of me, his face drawn. I stepped back and wiped my eyes.
“We’re going to, uh, need your help much sooner than expected, Doctor.”
I craned my neck to glance behind him, but he stepped in my way to block the screens. “Please,” he said, gesturing for me to accompany him.
I sniffled, then nodded and followed him. We were joined by a few other officers to discuss what would happen next.
10
David
“That’s more like it! Hell yeah,” I shouted.
Fighters had dropped out of the alien ship as soon as my missile connected. We were taking heavy fire. The mothership was falling out of control, flames erupting from where we had blown a hole in it.
“Damn.” The fighters were unbelievably fast. I was already pushing my jet to its limits, dodging evasively, hoping to stay out of the path of those beams of light. Turning the odds on them was impossible. They moved in strange patterns, like hornets swarming an animal to defend themselves. I tried not to be impressed as their craft zipped around in ways no human pilot could execute.
The fighters weren’t large. Each of them looked like it could house a single pilot. Unfortunately, this made them more difficult to hit. They moved in concert, too, like the ships—or their pilots—were connected and of the same mind.
Man, were we outmatched. Jim and I tried to separate the squadron. We took up a flight pattern close to each other and ran straight at them. When it looked like we were about to plow into them, we banked in opposite directions. Sure enough, a few fighters from the group turned to fire at each of us.
Trouble for them was our jets could roll as fast as their fighters, and we put bullet holes in a few of them. We tried the maneuver again, but the aliens caught on and we were forced to dive sharply as they formed a firing line to catch us.
Jim and I kept diving, banking in different directions as we dropped altitude big time. If the aliens had radar, moving so erratically should confuse tracking enough to give us a chance to get out of the way.
I panted like a dog, tensing my body as we ate the G’s. Even with years of experience, pushing a jet like this hurt. If I made it out of this alive, I’d be in for one hell of a recovery week. The hint of a migraine formed in my skull. I blinked hard to keep conscious. We had Auto-GCAS, but if I passed out it would be a one-way ticket to a permanent rest. The fighters eventually broke me away from my wingman and, before I knew it, I was on my own.
Two alien fighters strafed way too close for comfort, then I saw the fireball that used to be Jim’s jet. Fuck! I’d have to mourn him later, if I got the chance. It was then I realized I wasn’t going to make it home either. I pulled a few more maneuvers to avoid the endless stream of ammunition, but it was so much wasted effort.
My co-pilot moaned. He was feeling the strain too.
I had to figure out something or we would both lose consciousness. A dozen fighters closed fast. A shot took out part of my wing. Sparks and smoke billowed. Our chances of survival shifted from ‘not likely’ to ‘definitely not.’ In another five seconds, these bastards were going to turn my plane into shrapnel, and us along with it.
“Bailout! Bailout! Bailout,” I called.
I felt the jolt as my RTO pulled the lever to eject from the jet. The rockets under my seat fired, and I tucked my arms and legs in as the world went black.
I came to as I was jerked backwards, my parachutes deploying to slow my descent. The world beneath me was a seesaw blur, and my mouth felt dry as paper. I squinted above me. It looked like the parachutes had deployed correctly. The lines weren’t tangled. The sound of air rushing past was deafening.
I blinked hard and rotated my jaw, just trying to get focus back into my vision. I had no idea how I was alive. The alien fighters swarmed above, no longer interested in me. I looked around for my co-pilot’s chute, but couldn’t find him.
The alien fighters were just specks above now, returning to the mothership in that same insect-like formation they held through the battle. They took positions along the big craft as if trying to guide its fall. Random spurts of blue light ignited along the bottom and rear of the craft, its engines struggling to bring the ship down easy as possible.
I couldn’t help but gawk at the thing as it fell. It struck me I was still alive, yet being alive at that moment didn’t mean being alive when I hit the ground. I ran through the rest of the checklist drilled into my mind so much I could recite it in my sleep. Canopy, check. Visor, mask, seat kit, check. LPU, check. Now I just had to steer into the wind and prepare to hit ground. I lifted my visor away from my eyes and pulled my mask off. This was going to suck.
As I fell, I saw the alien ship crash into the earth a few miles away from my location, a massive plume of dirt exploding into the air. A minute later, the air cleared just enough for me to see the massive craft was mostly intact. Debris still fell from the sky around it.
One of the pieces of debris looked like it was executing a controlled descent. I squinted and saw a smaller jet plume from the back of a large shuttle. Smoke poured from the little craft. From my perspective, the craft wasn’t going to make it to the mothership.
It came down hard not far from where my landing site would be. I thought about activating my EPIRB, but it was probably not the best idea. I didn’t want to summon human forces to an ambush if I could help it, and I didn’t know if the aliens would be able to track me.
I’d have to assess the situation after I made it down in one piece. Assuming I did.
11
Alexandra
The director led me to a large chamber I could only describe as a war room. A massive table in the center had a touchscreen built into it, and decorated officers of every branch sat around scrambling to be heard over each other.
I heard someone talking about damage estimates and how to best move forces in to contain the alien invaders. I didn’t understand most of what they were saying and my gaze wandered to the side of the room where a group of people of white lab coats were talking heatedly.
As I walked over to them, a man looked up from furiously scribbling on a clipboard.
I held out my hand. “Dr. King. Can I help?”
All five men stopped what they were doing and jostled one another to introduce themselves. A young-looking
man in a labcoat stepped in front of his colleagues, took my hand, and gave it a firm shake—firmer than I expected, in fact. “Doctor, a pleasure. My name is Alan. What’s your specialty?” The young man took in my outfit and his smile grew.
“Social work and clinical psychology.” I tried not to react as the men struggled to keep their faces neutral. Their consternation gave all this a sense of normalcy. Hard science types typically pooh-pooh psychology…or any study of human behavior.
“Well,” the young scientist said, “that’s a shame. We were hoping you were our incoming astrophysicist. Ed over here,” he gestured at the man in the lab coat who’d returned to scribbling a complex equation on his smart display, “really wants to compare his numbers with someone else.”
“Numbers?”
“To figure out the capabilities of the alien craft. My training is more related to astrophysics than astronautics, so I’m analyzing the supernova incident. Quite stupendous and, might I add, stupefying.”
“Before I was brought here, I saw what looked like two suns in the sky. Does that have anything to do with it?”
“Yes! That’s right. We can figure out a few things for sure so far. We know that the ship’s original vector is from a similar if not precise orientation with that of the supernova. Right now, we’re conjecturing that it’s got to be from Alpha Centauri. We spotted a planet there not six months ago and if a high-speed black hole shot through the system it could cause perturbations of the triple suns. That could easily knock a bigger star closer to the white dwarf and kick off a nova. Add time and continued contact and you’re looking at a Type Ia supernova. I must say, the supernova must assuredly be the source of the EMP. This white dwarf exploded unexpectedly; you see, these kinds of stars don’t go supernova overnight, and this one was still many millennia from its evolutionary final stage.”
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