by Isaiah Lee
The hallway ended with an abrupt right which, unfortunately, opened into what seemed to be an identical space. More rooms, more enclosed vats filled with the deadly fog. The ominous sounds, though, had disappeared. Was that a good sign? Or did it mean that the aliens were in hiding, waiting to maim their unsuspecting victims.
“You check the rooms on the left. You, the right. Karen and I will keep an eye behind us.” Jason directed each member of the party what to keep an eye on. Each seam in the greyish metal was thoroughly inspected, as well as ceiling, floor, and wall panels.
That hallway ended as well. This time, instead of just stopping or opening into another narrow hallway, there was a huge open room. Dozens, possibly hundreds, of alien ships were loaded into slots in the walls.
They watched as an alien scaled the vertical wall with ease, its tentacles offering impressive grip and climbing abilities, and opened the hatch on the craft with what seemed like little more than the wave of a tentacle. The alien climbed into the cockpit, closed the hatch, and a slight humming noise emanated as the craft began to hover. It effortlessly slid from its dock and zoomed into a tunnel on the far end of the room. Light poured through the tunnel. That must have been the entrance to the ship visible from the outside.
A missile connected with the alien craft as it emerged from the nest. The explosion reverberated back into the hangar. “On my count,” Cooper whispered. It was barely a whisper, even; his lips moved and air had definitely escaped, but it was hard to call it a whisper.
He held up his index finger, then index and middle. On three he jumped up from cover and rolled down a ramp into the hangar. His movements went unnoticed, at least for a moment. Two more men followed the movements. The next couple down the ramp were spotted as the closest group of aliens shot. The man on the left, who was known as Young, caught a blast in the face. Grey matter splattered the other man, who managed to duck just in time. He held his composure extremely well considering his vision was blurred by blood and gore. He pulled the glasses from his face and smeared them against his pants in a futile attempt to clean them.
Jason ducked behind cover, with Karen following, and pulled the pack from his back. He readied one of the two remaining UAVs and held a screen in his hands. The UAV launched and headed straight for a large gathering of aliens. The warhead struck and exploded. Over thirty aliens, along with three or four ships, were obliterated. What could only be compared to scaffolding – it was tall and slender and appeared to provide a lift pad for cargo – began to lean, its base damaged from the blast. As the lift tumbled, it crushed two aliens and blocked several ships on the lowest two levels of the hangar.
“Damn!” Cooper called back. “How many of those do you have left?” He dove for cover at the bottom of the ramp and blind-fired a few shots outward. All but one ricocheted and proved useless; the one which hadn’t missed grazed one of the aliens. It tore a chunk of pinkish flesh from where one of its tentacles attached to its body. The alien hardly seemed to notice as it pointed a smallish weapon and returned fire.
The whi whi sounds of alien weaponry filled the air as more joined the fray. Another ship launched out the tunnel as more were being readied for liftoff.
Jason replaced the pack on his back and thought for a moment. “Three UAVs left between us. We also have some remote bombs, but I couldn’t tell you how many.”
Gunfire erupted beside Jason as Karen shouldered her assault rifle. She squeezed the trigger and watched as an alien fell from the open cockpit it was climbing into.
Cooper stood from cover at the bottom of the ramp and burst-fired three shots toward the creatures. They tore through one creature’s middle section – for what would one call the middle section on a squid-like creature – seemingly crippling it. The creature fell face-first to the shining floor, green ooze leaking from the wound.
Eleven people. All that remained inside nest was an army of eleven people. Twenty weapons – six assault rifles, four sub-machine guns, two shotguns, and an array of handguns – plus too few magazines were meant to fend off over a hundred alien soldiers.
Between assault rifle reports, Karen asked Jason, “What… do you th… think… we should… do?”
Jason wished he could drown out the commotion around him and clear his mind of distractions. The constant whi whi whi of return fire was working on his nerves. He was not a battle-hardened soldier. Neither were probably ninety-five percent of the entire resistance army leading the assault on the nest at PNF6. He had not been prepared for the end of the world. He and Hank…
Hank.
His best friend in the world lay smashed under the rubble of The Coliseum.
A green blast came within inches of Jason’s face as he snapped back to the present. Karen noticed the tears in his eyes but left the subject untouched.
Jason watched as the soldiers, all of whom had made their way down the ramp and had scattered into a tight semicircular pattern, fought with everything in them for survival. Jason watched as another of the soldiers flew backwards with a chasm in his chest.
“Fuck it!” Jason bounded down the ramp, leaving Karen behind cover, and leapt through the air to the right. The soldiers spotted him in their peripheral and lay suppressive fire to cover his movement. Jason slid behind a cylindrical object which was barely large enough to protect his crouching form. He sprinted from cover toward the closest alien craft; an alien had already opened the cockpit and was climbing its way into the seat.
He lifted his gun and fired. The creature’s large, pinkish-grey head exploded as the limp body fell over the side of the craft into a heap on the floor. Green chunks dotted the exterior of the craft. Jason climbed onto the ship, carefully avoiding the caustic splatter, and worked his way into the seat. Thankfully there was none inside.
The seat of the craft was narrow – he had to sit on his left butt cheek with the right elevated – and hard as a rock. Squid-like creatures must not have needed padding. There was no instrument panel. There were no buttons. There wasn’t a joystick or even a latch for the roof. His head was exposed in his current position.
Jason decided to recline since there wasn’t a back on the seat. He lay halfway on his side and glanced around. Still, no buttons or joysticks. But there was a panel now to his right – right above his right shoulder in fact – that had an almost impossibly small blinking… cursor.
It resembled a cursor on a computer, anyway. He touched the panel and at first nothing happened. Then, slowly, it began to light up. Or, rather, the space around his head began to light up. It was a hologram of some sort. At first, only a single red button appeared. Jason held an index finger up and pushed the air in front of his face.
The hatch began to lower until it was sealed.
Chapter 37
Karen freaked out and screamed. “Jason! No!”
She hurried from cover and slid down the ramp to join the others. She let off several shots, each connecting with a different alien; each shot downed one of the aliens. Karen was determined.
Karen was pissed.
She dove to the left, behind one of the cylindrical objects like Jason had used, then bounded toward a larger object. They were all the exact same color as the ship, as the floors and walls, and were scattered here and there. They were made from some sort of metal, but what exactly Karen could not place her finger on. Had it not been an alien death machine, Karen would have found the entire ship bland and unoriginal. She had expected some exquisite décor and unimaginable beauty from a race that was assumed to be superior to humans.
She stood just long enough to kill another pair of the creatures.
Cooper was now only a few feet in front of her. He glanced back at her and smiled approvingly. “Damn, girl.” An alien popped up out of nowhere and began firing. Cooper dove as he pulled a handgun from his ankle holster – mid-roll, of course – and connected a shot with the creature’s gooey face. “You done this before?”
She nearly laughed at his comment. “Sort of. My cousins were
all-boy.”
Cooper nodded. The ship Jason now occupied began to lift, then immediately crashed down to the floor with a thud. “Come on, Jason. You got this!”
◆◆◆
Jason watched out the holographic screen; the entire vessel was solid with no windows or ports, but the screen wrapped a 360 degree view with an above and below view – and saw Karen staring directly over at him. She yelled something at him, he knew not what, and began conversing with Cooper. He hoped that she was still alright. She was standing – well, crouching to be exact – at the moment, which he took as an indication that she was still well.
Controls lit below Jason’s feet, as well as a control panel near each hand. He slowly began to navigate around the controls. First, he pushed forward with his left hand. The ship began to lift. He panicked and let off the control, sending the ship crashing back to the floor.
Jason put a steady pressure on the left control, ensuring to keep his hand on the hologram; surprisingly, the hologram seemed tangible. It was unlike any virtual reality he had ever dabbled with.
The ship rose again and maintained its altitude of three feet above floor level. Jason rolled his left hand. The ship rolled left, mimicking his exact movement. He flattened the ship out and played with the right controls.
When he rolled the right control forward, the ship lurched forward. If he turned the right control, the ship would follow. Jason had experience playing video games and was sure he could learn the controls quickly, but they were unlike anything he had ever controlled before.
He pressed the right foot control forward. Two green blasts shot out of the ship and blew apart an unoccupied ship on the opposite side of the hangar. This drew the attention of nearly every remaining alien. Some began scrambling faster for an empty ship. Others fired at Jason.
He slowly, awkwardly, eased the ship out of its place in the wall and turned. He fired another volley at the next ship over across the hangar. One blast caught it, one blew a chunk out of the metal wall of the nest. Using his left foot, he pitched the ship down and fired.
The blast tore through several aliens, one of which had Karen directly in its sights. Moments later and Karen would have joined the fate of the downed soldiers.
Karen, Cooper, and the other soldiers, emboldened by Jason’s success, continued their assault.
Surprisingly, the Qspolians began to retreat. Jason turned, rolled, and twisted the craft, continuing to destroy everything in his path. He didn’t notice as one of the higher ships began to hover. It pitched down and launched two green blasts.
The hologram lit green just in time for Jason to zoom forward. The blasts blew right behind Jason’s craft. The hologram flickered and lit up an indicator of some sort – inevitably a health report of some sort – in a language that Jason couldn’t even begin to decipher.
The other craft launched another volley as Jason zigged left and raised his altitude. He pitched the weapons toward the other craft and fired. The other ship exploded, raining molten chunks of metal onto the floor, and occupants, below.
And people say video games are completely useless!
Karen watched as one of the soldiers, the red-headed man who was obviously a civilian and wasted way too many bullets blind-firing from behind cover, was crushed by falling debris. A scream escaped her lungs.
She counted fifteen aliens remaining now. They had gathered at the far end of the hangar. There were three ships within reach. “They’re going for the ships!”
Cooper led the remaining seven soldiers forward in a last assault. Jason spotted their targets and turned the craft. He pressed the foot control; nothing happened. Could these ships run out of blasts? The way the fighters outside blasted away, he thought it highly unlikely. He pressed the foot control again and another indicator lit up on the projection. Again, he had no idea what it was supposed to mean.
Suddenly Jason’s ship dropped twenty feet and slammed into the floor. The cockpit flew open and Jason found himself face to face with a Qspolian. The bastard had hijacked Jason’s ship! It had somehow rendered Jason’s controls useless.
Jason realized in that moment that he was fucked. He had no sidearm. His pack and gun were left behind in a pile where the spaceship had originally resided, just in case anything were to happen to him. Anyway, the crash had him disoriented and in pain.
The alien snarled, a low ominous tone, before opening its mouth wide; it bared its razor-sharp teeth as it screeched at him. Jason pressed himself further into the craft. It was useless. The creature was over him. It was holding him down. He was seconds away from sure death.
“Fuck you!” Jason yelled at the creature as he broke his right arm free and landed a punch directly into the creature’s gooey head. It recoiled slightly but remained unharmed. Jason’s eyes grew wide and he cursed again as he landed another punch.
Nothing.
As Jason reared back for a third hit, the creature lunged.
Chapter 38
Just as the creature’s razor-like teeth were upon Jason, a .44 caliber round shredded through its head. The teeth grazed Jason’s forehead and cheeks, but he remained intact. Green ooze covered Jason’s face and within seconds he felt the searing pain. He clawed and wiped and managed to mostly save his face and neck.
The caustic ooze managed to burn blotches on his cheeks and throat; they were equivalent to a horrid sunburn. Still, Jason would choose slight discomfort to having his face melted off.
Cooper lowered the smoking .44 and nodded to Karen who ran to Jason. She helped him from the wrecked ship. “What happened?”
Jason shook his head. His aching head. “I don’t know. That thing climbed onto the ship and my weapons suddenly stopped working.” He looked around the hangar, trying to find the remainder of the aliens. “Is that all of them?”
Karen glanced in the direction of their most recent kills. “They,” she said as she waved a hand toward the remaining soldiers, “took care of it.”
Jason limped over to where his backpack and weapon lay. He shrugged the pack over his bruised shoulders and leveled the gun. “Great job, men.”
The soldiers nodded their thanks. Cooper spoke up. “What kind of communications devices are we looking for?”
Karen shrugged her shoulders. “Your guess is as good as ours. Lead the way.”
Cooper rounded up his men and led the way out the far end of the hangar; no sense in going back the way they came from. Besides, the entryway had been blocked by a crashed helicopter. The only other way would be to climb fifty feet into the air to escape the tunnel in the hangar, which would put them further away from their objective.
The first hallway was nearly a mirror image to the first. Rooms littered the space, each equipped with the fog-filled tube. Ideas swirled around Jason and Karen’s minds. Were they sleeping pods? Preservation chambers? What affect did the gaseous fog have on the aliens?
The group marched onward as the path twisted and turned further into the structure. There were no longer any signs of life, other than their own, which did little to ease tensions.
“The path forks ahead,” one of the men said dully. “Which way?”
The soldiers turned to Jason and Karen. “Uh…” Jason started. “Does anyone have a radio?” Everyone shook their heads indicating no such luck. “Phones? Anything so that we can contact the rest of the group?”
“Nothing of the sort,” Cooper confessed. “If we split up, it will be difficult to contact the rest of the group. I suggest we stay together. It will take longer, but it will be less dangerous and we can be more thorough.”
Karen nodded. “I agree.” She shot Jason a look that pleaded for him to understand. “I think we should stay together.”
“Then it’s settled.” Jason pointed to the path that appeared to lead up. “This way.” He began climbing the incline, about a thirty percent slope. It was just a single path; no handrails, no walls. Only an open ramp of sorts that twisted and curved out of sight higher in the ship.
Below the ramp, a large room appeared. It was not as vacant as the hallways had been. It appeared to be a storage room of some sort. Massive metal boxes, perfect cubes in shape, were stacked all around. There were illegible markings on each box. The cubes were much larger than the crafts like Jason had operated. It made him wonder what devious devices might be stored within.
The path continued its slope straight over the storage area until it opened into the ceiling of the room. It twisted precisely ninety degrees exactly to the right and began to climb steeper. Outside of where it breeched the ceiling or a floor, it was still devoid of railings of any sort. The creatures must have been very sure-footed.
The next floor seemed to span the entire width of the nest. What appeared to be tables and seating were lined up on one half; meticulous care had been taken in getting everything set up like a perfect grid. There was not one seat out of place. Had the aliens not been up to such a nefarious act, the sight would have been impressive. They were obviously very meticulous.
The other half of the floor was devoted to entertainment. Or so it appeared. Intricate designs were marked along the greyish metal floor; it was impossible to tell if it was artwork or markings similar to those found on a ball-field. Strange navy-blue, rope-like objects hung along sections of the wall. More navy-blue objects littered the floor. It seemed strange to see the blue objects in the otherwise monotonous grey ship.
Finally, upon reaching what appeared to be the last floor, the group found something that might prove useful. The top floor of the nest was not nearly as large as the remaining levels. The ship rounded off towards the top, similar in shape to the fighters. The space had rounded ceilings and walls and seemed out of place next to the otherwise geometrical portions of the ship.