Darren Wearmouth - Critical Path

Must be sentry towers, he thought.

Through the scope on his rifle, he noted they were constructed with repurposed pallets, old sheets of plywood, and what looked like corrugated metal roofing material.

Interestingly, though, the bottoms of the towers extended below ground level, indicating that there would likely be more buildings there out of sight.

He turned back into the trees. “Feels like a trap to me. If we go on foot, we’ll be seen long before we get there. I told you we should have taken the bikes.”

Denver brushed past him to look for himself while the alien stared on, blinking its stupid dumb eyes.

“You think we’re going to walk straight into your little settlement without some security?” Gregor said to it, not expecting a response.

Denver stepped back into the woods. “I’m going in. You can stay behind if you want, but I’m not waiting any longer.”

“Fine, kid, do whatever you want. Don’t expect me to come save your sorry ass. But perhaps it’s worth us coming up with at least some kind of strategy. We have collateral to use,” he said, nodding toward the alien.

“Kill it, I don’t care,” Denver said. “Tell the others I’ll be back before it’s dark.”

With that, Denver spun on his heel and left the security of the woods.

Gregor picked up the rope, untied it from the tree, and dragged the alien back to the others.

He decided they could babysit while Gregor planned his assault on the settlement.

On the way back, the alien spoke, stopping Gregor in his tracks, making him spin round. “What did you say?”

“You… kill Venrick.”

Gregor sighed. “What of it?”

“Sister.”

“Yeah? Good. I hope it hurts. Do you know how many of my friends and family died because of you bastards? Hundreds of them. Even my wife. You think I give a rat’s ass about you and your sister? I won’t be happy until every last one of you is rotting in the ground.”

“No,” the alien said, narrowing its eyes as it struggled to manipulate its mouth to orate English words.

Gregor got a hint of frustration from it as though it couldn’t communicate its thoughts properly. He was about to turn away and continue his trek when it finally found the words.

“Sister, me. Different. I kill no humans. Lost… commu… communi…”

“Community?” Gregor added. The alien nodded. “You’re from a lost community, is that what you’re saying? And your sister wasn’t?”

The creature bobbed its head and flickered its eyelids, indicating he had it right.

“So? I still don’t see how I should care.”

“No kill human. Live with human.”

It raised its restrained arms, the ropes tied tightly around its wrists, and gestured to itself and then, looking back to Denver’s location, said, “Human and… us. Community.” It whistle-clicked the last syllable, unable to accurately reproduce the sound, but it was clear to Gregor what it was saying: humans and croatoans living together in a lost community.

Given that Venrick was part of the invading force and a farm worker, it seemed that there were two distinct groups of aliens.

Which explained the battle, but it still didn’t explain why or how they were now living with humans or how they split off from the core group.

“How were you lost?” Gregor asked, trying to illustrate the groups splitting by placing his hands together, then pulling them apart and indicating one to the alien.

“Meglain,” it said, pointing to itself. “I, Meglain.”

“Good for you, Meglain. So, what happened? How did you become separate from the main group?”

Meglain took a moment to digest and think about the question.

Although he wasn’t exactly fluent, he did seem to have a higher than average level of understanding and intelligence compared to the other aliens that Gregor had worked with.

Most of the time, they rarely did anything to learn or expand their knowledge. They just carried out whatever task had been assigned to them. This one, and presumably the rest of its community, was independent.

“I sit?” Meglain asked, pointing to a tree stump.

“Sure.” Gregor gave him some slack so that he could sit down.

The alien folded his backward knees as he sank to the tree trunk.

Keeping his rifle trained on Meglain, Gregor used his free hand to wrap the rope around the alien twice before tying it off around a nearby pine tree.

Checking the knot was sturdy, Gregor walked back to stand opposite. He leaned against a tree and kept his gun aimed. Though the damned thing was talking now, a little extra persuasion wouldn’t hurt.

“You’re sitting, now start talking.”

Looking out toward the tree line, Meglain’s gaze focused on something far away as he started talking in his strange staccato voice. “Early days,” it began, always searching for the right translation, “we came up with others. We fought and… split from group. Human army drove us there.”

He extended a gnarled finger to the settlement.

Gregor thought back to his maps of the farms.

His territory was on a latitude that cut east-west through New York at its northernmost edge. Other than Freetown, further north into Canada—and that wasn’t activated—he knew of no farm facilities this far north.

They had already passed Toronto and Newmarket. Canada and the northern latitudes of the globe weren’t on the radar for cultivation for at least another fifteen years, the ground not yet ripe enough for large-scale root farming.

Although it seemed from that field beyond that they had done a decent job by hand to get things growing.

“How long have you been split?” Gregor asked.

Meglain did something so human it caught Gregor off guard. The thing shrugged with a very clear ‘I don’t know’ expression. It made him wonder if what he was saying was true after all.

Even though he was no anthropologist, Gregor could tell the difference between Meglain and Venrick—the latter hadn’t shown any such human-like traits as her brother.

“Before Ice?” Gregor asked.

It nodded, half-closing its lids.

Gregor felt like he was playing a child’s guessing game.

“During Ice?”

“Yes. All time,” Meglain responded. “Human and us. Together.”

“As a community,” Gregor filled in. “I get it. How many?”

The shrug. It was apparent the alien hadn’t quite mastered the concept of communicating numbers, but that was okay. With Denver being foolhardy, they’d likely soon find out.

Watching Meglain closely, Gregor got one of Mike’s communicators out of his jacket pocket and requested an update from Denver.

No response.

“Denver, come in. It’s Gregor. What do you see?”

Still nothing.

“Gregor? It’s Layla. What’s happening? Where’s Denver?”

He smiled at the tinge of panic to Layla’s voice. Seemed she cared for him more than she was letting on.

“Little Denny boy decided to go for a walk. We’ve spotted the settlement. I’m on my way back so we can make plans, especially as now we’re getting somewhere with Mr. Talkative here. Over.”

“You can explain more on our way back,” Gregor said. “Play things right, Meglain, and you might just survive this.”

Gregor untethered the alien and pushed it forward through the trees, toward the others. He thought about their next move. It depended on what happened with Denver. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if Charlie’s little boy came to a final end.

Gregor could quite happily work around that particular result.

Crawling forward on his elbows and knees like his dad had shown him, Denver remained deeply hidden within the three-foot-tall root crop.

The smell made his heart pound and sweat pour from him. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to stop his progress to the settlement and dig up and consume a massive chunk of root. The muscles in his arms and legs grew heavy and fatigued with the day’s efforts.