by Rick Kueber
It was just then that an ultra low frequency hummed in our ears and vibrated the ground beneath us. My head spun around and searched what I could see of the horizon. I expected to see the lights of a Titan towering over us, but I saw nothing. Perhaps this time, it really was an earthquake or tremor. The trike touched down harder than I would have expected a few hundred feet from us. Zipping toward us, the space between us shrank all too quickly. Before I could think or react, they were on us and Alex cut the ultralight glider hard to the right and as it skidded to a stop, the left rear wheel lifted off of the ground and then bounced back down.
“GO! GO! GO!” Alex shouted as he jumped from the driver’s seat.
“We gotta go now!” Elle shouted as she dismounted the running craft.
Alex leapt into action running faster than I would have expected him to be able to move. First he rushed to the second trike, turned on the fuel, and fired it up and without a moment’s hesitation, he darted to the third and got it running too.
“You!” He shouted to Torrance. “You’re coming with me! Let’s get in the air... NOW! FOLLOW ME!” He screamed to express his urgency.
“I’ve been up.” Elle jumped into the driver’s seat of the second craft. “Who’s riding with me?”
“Go ahead Mariah. I’ll figure out how to fly that one.” I nervously smiled. “Can’t be that hard, right?”
“Nope... Can’t be that hard, but I already called the green and yellow one.” Mariah took off toward the empty ultralight and shouted back over her shoulder. “You might feel the need to hold on to somebody tight and I’d hate to make Elle jealous... I know how she gets.”
I could barely hear her last words over the sound of the four-cycle motors grumbling loudly. I tossed her a wave good-bye and though I knew she couldn’t hear me, I shouted. “Be safe and fly high!”
“Get your ass on and strap in!” Elle was intensely serious.
“No helmets?” I asked as a last-ditch effort, but Elle threw cation to the wind.
“Why?” She was growing impatient as another tremor shook the earth. “If we fall out of the sky, do you think a helmet is going to help? Get the fuck on here NOW!”
Alex and Torrance were scooting across the ground at an outrageous speed but struggled to get off the ground. The extra weight of Torrance’s enormous, linebacker stature was keeping them earthbound longer than anyone had expected. Finally they began lifting off as we began to speed across the barren earth. My stomach was in my throat when Elle goosed the accelerator just before we left the ground and shot us upward in a very vertical climb. If I had anything in my stomach, I would have lost it when I watched the green and yellow glider, zipping across the ground below, shrink frighteningly fast. I could only imagine how poor Torrance must have felt and I wondered if he might have actually ‘tossed his cookies’. Mariah bounced up and down a few times and as much as I wanted to watch and make sure she lifted off safely, the longer I looked down, the more nauseous I felt. I wrapped my arms around Elle’s midriff and held her tight, placing my chin on her shoulder and looking out to the night sky while mother earth shrank below. The blood ran from my face and I went pale when something in the distance to our right caught my eye.
“SHIT!” I yelled in Elle’s ear. “Where the hell did that Titan come from?” I watched as the gigantic beast, as black as the night that surrounded us, stood up and its lights searched the ground ...for us.
“Outer space?” Elle’s sarcasm did not falter, even in the face of utter peril.
“Smart ass!” I shouted and then kissed her ear.
“Dumb ass!” She smiled and then leaned her head against mine as the frigid air blew through our hair and stung our eyes. “I think maybe...” She struggled to have a conversation, talking loudly without screaming, “Maybe when they passed through, they knew we were here and one stayed behind.”
“Makes sense.” I said with a raised voice in her ear.
“If they knew we were separated from ‘Nix, maybe they knew we’d have to go after him.” Elle reasoned.
“You’re giving them an awful lot of credit.” I teased. “I’m not so sure they understand humans that well.”
I thought for a moment and realized they had studied my memories... My entire life... Maybe they did understand more than I gave them credit for. A brief and detailed memory whizzed through my mind. A flash of an airplane trip, my last airplane trip, when a Titan caused the jet to crash, killing the woman I had once loved. The thought of losing the second love of my life in mid-flight terrified me. While I pondered all of the possibilities, I was taken by the spirit of freedom that flying in the open trike gave me. We were only a few hundred feet in the air, but the world looked peaceful from up here. For a minute, it almost felt like everything was normal; like somehow, someday, everything would work out and be okay...maybe it could be more than just okay.
Chapter 8
Flight or Fight
The growl of the motor and the screaming of the wind past our ears kept the pounding footsteps of the Titan from distracting us. My eyes wandered across the vast sky and although we weren’t in a tight formation, I could see the other two ultra-lights and we were all headed in the same direction. The stars seemed to dim and the blackness above turned midnight blue as the dawn began to approach. The high pitched rev of Mariah’s craft intensified and she began to pull ahead of us all. It made sense that she would travel faster, being one passenger lighter than we were. Instead of heading straight away from the lone Titan that had awakened, she seemed to be guided, on a mission, and turned to our right slightly. Our glider leaned to the right and followed behind our new leader. Alex and Torrance followed suit but struggled to keep up.
I had hope that we would escape without even being noticed. The Titan scoured the earth below with its infra-red beams, searching frantically for its prey. While I rested my whisker stubbled chin on Elle’s tender shoulder my sense of optimism and calmness were shattered by a flashing of white and red light across the underside of our wings. We had been found. I held my breath, kissed Elle’s cheek and waited for the worst possible outcome. And then... Nothing. My head swiveled on my shoulders as I looked over my shoulders. Its lights were focused on us but ignored the others. The sky brightened and the sun crept over the horizon to our left. I knew by the direction of the sunrise that we were headed north, but I also could tell by the change in the temperature. It should have grown warmer with the rising sun, but there was no warmth, only the frigid air that cut through us as we flew.
Elle was concentrated and focused on piloting; staying on course with Mariah, adjusting for cross-winds and keeping us aloft. I watched the Earth below us and my heart cried out as I saw the scattered wreckage of a commercial jet, several military aircraft and the destruction of small towns and cities along our route. Elle ignored the obvious signs of death below us, but I knew she was as aware of it as I was. To our right, there were gorgeous canyons and deserts. In another life that would have been a destination instead of a momentary distraction, but this was not that life.
“We’re being followed.” Elle said over the ambient noise.
“You’re just now noticing that?” My tone enunciated my annoyance. “It’s been behind us for hours.”
“Exactly.” Elle said curtly. “That’s why I said followed. We aren’t losing it and it isn’t gaining on us.”
I felt as big as a mouse. She was right. We were being followed. The Titan was most definitely tracking us and following with its gigantic steps, but it did not seem to be closing in and we were covering a lot of miles quickly. This Titan wasn’t trying to catch us, wasn’t trying to bring us down. We were leading it somewhere. Perhaps we were leading it to ‘Nix. My heart went cold and I wanted to tell Elle to break from the group, but she was one step ahead of me, as usual.
“Hold on tight!” She yelled at the top of her voice. “Farewell friends!” She tossed a wave to the others, but they didn’t seem to notice. Elle cut our glider hard to the left and my thi
ghs clenched tightly around hers. The bright blue sky, dotted with cotton white puffs was now to our right and the unforgiving earth was to our left. The sickening taste of acid stung in my throat and I swallowed hard to keep it down.
“Holy shit!” I said out loud, to myself as we began to level off.
“Right?” Elle almost laughed.
Before I could respond with some cynical and sarcastic remark, we were hit. An ultra-low frequency and an accompanying electromagnetic pulse killed our engine. The invisible force shook us like the shock wave of an atomic bomb, sending us tumbling across the sky. Again, the flashbacks of the appearance of the first Titan sent thoughts of doom through my mind. Had it not been for the safety harness we would have both been thrown from our glider and met an abrupt ending to our story, but as fate would have it, we spun out of control, cartwheeling across the sky. I focused on Elle and Elle focused on something I could not see. Her hands gripped the steering controls with white knuckles but her face was stone. Her eyes closed gently and my arms wrapped around her so tightly I was afraid I would crush her ribs. Watching our end held no purpose and so I closed my eyes and joined Elle in my thoughts and memories. I felt her body relax under my grip and the few seconds of chaos (that felt like an eternity) quickly ended and as I opened my eyes, I found us right-side up and drifting in the mid-morning sun. There was a peace in the silence of gliding and I wondered if this was how it felt to be a bird carried by the wind.
“We’re not dead.” I spoke into Elle’s ear, but did not have to shout. I waited for a smug retort, but instead she simply turned her head and smiled.
“Not today Tanner... Not today.” She turned her attention back to piloting our glider and searching ahead and below.
She knew we had only a limited amount of time and distance before we ran out of wind. The ground below grew closer and I noticed a small town, more like a village, growing in the distance. What difference it would make, I had no idea. The Titan was still following us and even though there seemed to be some large structures silhouetted just beyond the burg, there was no real shelter from the aliens. They were tracking us like bloodhounds and if we stopped, they would catch up and find us. Maybe we would be better off out in the open or in a forest, but I was not in control of our destination and I had faith in Elle and gave her my complete trust and confidence. Amber colored grasslands gave way to a large lake that lay between us and the little town. The speed of our descent seemed to increase. The closer we came to the ground, the faster we seemed to fall.
“Are we going to have a splash down?” I asked nervously.
“I think we can make it to the other side, but we’ll see.” Her answer did not fill me with a warm and fuzzy feeling.
“Holy hell!” I shouted out subconsciously as the silence was broken by a deep electronic hum and a stuttering, creaking sound. The three large structures beyond the tiny burg began to vibrate and move. Brilliant white lights nearly blinded us and the moments of realization that we had been duped distracted me. I hadn’t noticed that we were now a hundred yards from the far shoreline and only a couple of feet from the water.
“I love you!” Elle shouted to me just before the wheels touched the water and we flipped end over end and immediately began to sink into the icy waters of the sapphire lake.
My instincts told my arms and hands to unbuckle my harness and escape, but my mind, in a moment of pessimism and despair told me to take a deep breath of water and give up. Surely the few moments of pain and fear would be easier than this lifetime of running, hiding and uncertainty. My survival instincts overrode my willingness to die. More than that, I was not willing to let Elle die and I was not about to give up on our quest to find Phoenix. The watery crash had knocked Elle unconscious and if I didn’t save her, she would drown in seconds. A sudden burst of adrenaline shot through me like electricity and I ripped her from the deadly clutches of her safety harness. I fought our way around the huge fabric wing and breached the surface of the lake gasping for breath. Our crash had shaken and disoriented me, but I found that we had stopped and sank about fifty feet short of land. Keeping both of our heads above the water, I dog paddled until my feet touched the mucky silt of the lake bed. My rubbery legs were heavy and my mind raced, wondering if my lover was breathing and alive, or if the cruel waters had stolen her from me. Finally I made it to land and dropped her from my shoulder to the ground with a heavy thud.
“Umph.” A noise came from her and it gave me hope. If her lungs had been full of water, she would not have uttered a sound. Rolling her flat on her back and arching her neck, I leaned over to give her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. “Easy cowboy.” Her voice was scratchy and strained, but she was alive and more than that, she was coherent.
“I don’t know what to do.” I felt like crying. “There are Titans in front of us and behind us. We flew from the frying pan into the fire, babe.”
“Help me up.” She managed to speak as she tried to catch her breath. “Where are we?”
“On the edge of the lake. We crashed in the water.” It seemed she had a lapse in her memory.
“No... I know that much. Where on the shore?” Her snide remark was actually comforting.
“Oh...” I smiled as I helped her to her feet. “Looks like some kinda hotel or something. Maybe we can hide out inside.” I didn’t think for a moment that we would be safe inside, but I wanted to ease her mind.
“Sorry.” She leaned on me and put her arm around my waist. She stopped without warning. “I should have chosen a different direction.”
The space between us and the quaint resort was quickly filling with Takers. The Titans ahead were now fully upright, their infra-red lights were laser focused on us and the Titan that had chased us into this trap was slowly closing in behind us. The Titans ahead of us were a pale, almost sky blue in color and made me think of a teenager’s first car; dented, oxidized and faded... In poor condition at best. I had noticed that even though these machines, these gargantuan beasts, were incredibly technologically advanced, physically, they were no better suited to our environment than a 1972 Ford Pinto.
“I suppose we could make a run for it.” I pretended to be optimistic, but I suppose I wasn’t very convincing.
“Fight or flight, huh?” Elle kept her spirits. “We didn’t do so well with flight and I’m not so sure I’m up for a fight right now.”
“There are too many to fight.” I admitted honestly. “We can let them take us. Maybe look for an opportunity to escape when the odds look better.”
“Too late now.” She put her hands up in surrender as the Takers closed in on us.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands of red and gray eyes stared at us. Their motionless mouths hung open slightly, an endless and unwavering, monotone hum escaped them. It was nothing I hadn’t heard before. Each encounter with a hoard of Takers was accompanied by this audible alert. It seemed to be a call out to whomever was their commander to alert them to our presence. Their drab and dirty clothes, their unwashed and unkempt hair was unpleasant to say the least, but the odor that preceded them was even more foul than their sight. In moments, we were surrounded and overpowered, like some celebrities tossed into a crowd of excited fans. We were grabbed and groped, pushed and pulled along by the odiferous mosh of Takers. We were drenched and cold as we were drug along the uncomfortable walk from the grassy edge of the lake to a vast red brick paved patio, the wrought iron tables and cushion covered chairs were pushed aside by the mindless flood of the zombie like beings.
“They’ve all got the same tattoo.” Elle muttered to herself. She saw things that I did not. In her eyes, she saw a mark on every Taker; a sort of tattoo in blue on their temples... An arrow facing forward, toward their eyes.
My eyes caught a glimpse of one of the Takers who had just a glint of humanity in their cold gray eyes and I wondered if I had ever known any of these things when they were normal human beings like me... Well, not like me, but more like Elle. I knew that only a couple of years ago, they had a
ll been everyday people with jobs and families, bills to pay and dreams to be disappointed by. That future didn’t exist any longer. A shove from behind made me trip and my feet scuffled to avoid falling. The backside of the building was mostly dark tinted glass windows and french-style doors, divided by white painted grids and sashes. The takers ahead of us divided and opened the way to the large double doors in the center of the glass wall. Two Takers took us in vise-like grips by the upper arms and pulled us inside. The remaining Takers lined the glass wall. Even in the bright light of the day, they were no more than faceless figures crowding the nearly opaque tinted windows.
The interior was dark and stale and the room was huge and open. White marbled floor and columns ordained the space and darkly painted walls shrouded the space in mystery. A few dozen figures could be seen gathered on either side of a small arched line of beings. Their glittering eyes were the only real details we could make out, aside from some appearing more female than others, the outlines of their stature, and other vague differences, like the length of their hair, their height, etc. From behind the semi-circular line of figures, a quiet shuffling, hissing and scratching sound broke the daunting silence briefly. Suddenly, a warm, yellow, flickering glow filled the space behind the glittering green eyes. Two fuel lanterns had been lit, one at either end of the curve of beings and I wondered who or what lay in store for us. Would we be killed, tortured and brainwashed, memories erased and enslaved? They were all possibilities that I did not look forward to.