Peter Cawdron - Xenophobia

“Water is important for our biology.”

She could have kicked herself. Hell, most people on Earth didn’t understand biology, let alone an alien intelligence from another planet.

“We’re at least sixty percent water. All our chemistry takes place in water. Without water, we will die.”

Just keep saying water, she said to herself, try to get the message through. The creature had shown sensitivity to touch, hearing sound was simply touch sensitivity applied to vibrations in the air. Surely, it could hear something.

But what chance was there the alien would even register her speech as deliberate? Even on Earth, speech took multiple forms. Cuttlefish spoke with light, spiders spoke to each other through vibrations within a web, cats spoke more through pheromones, through chemical signatures in their urine, than they ever did with a growl or a snarl. And if humanity couldn’t converse with other species on Earth, what hope was there of talking to an alien? Even intelligent mammals, like apes and dolphins, were limited to the most rudimentary of human concepts.

“Water.”

She could hear water dripping nearby.

Moonlight drifted through the cracks. She could see the alien barely fifteen feet away, close enough to strike if it so chose. The alien had backed up, crossing into a thin stream of light breaking through the steel shutters. Its tentacles or fronds or whips or spikes or whatever they were waved in the soft breeze cutting through the stifling heat. The creature had positioned itself beside one of the steel panels covering the next window, drawing on whatever draft circulated within their dark tomb.

“All I want is the water. I’ll take some water and leave you alone in this dungeon. Do you understand. Water, and I leave.”

The creature remained where it was, its thin arms waving softly like wheat in the fields. If it had heard her it didn’t show. Bower felt like she was creeping up on a lion in the undergrowth.

As her fingers ran along the wall she felt a steel pipe running vertically. She followed it down to a dripping tap. Although she couldn’t make out the pipe in the dark she could tell it ran up from the ground to the floor above. There was probably another tap directly above this one on the upper floor.

Looking at the crack between the steel panel and the wooden window frame, Bower could see a large splinter of loose wood. It was no more than an inch or so wide but it was almost two feet in length. If she could pull that away she’d get a better look outside, not only that, she’d let in more light. What would the creature make of such an act? Would it feel threatened?

“Water,” she said, hoping to reinforce that she wanted nothing more, even with this act.

With her eyes on the alien fronds, Bower gripped the splinter and pulled gently on it, hoping it would give way easily. The shard of wood was still firmly attached at its base, but she was able to twist the splinter sideways, widening the gap.

Moonlight crept in through the thin crack.

The creature continued to watch her impassively, or was she imagining it watching her. Did the alien eye her with curiosity or malice? Did it recognize any such notion? Did it even have eyes? Somehow, the creature had seen them wielding the gun.

Water dripped with regular monotony from the tap into a puddle next to the drain. To her surprise, she could see insects swarming about the small pool of water on the floor. A trail of insects led back to the alien. For a moment, Bower lost her fear.

“Water,” she said. “You too need water.”

The alien didn’t respond.

Bower knelt down, looking at the insects swarming around the puddle. On one level, she felt repulsed, but what looked like cockroaches were clearly alien. The tiny creatures had segmented bodies with an exoskeleton much like an insect on Earth, and yet they appeared spherical, not just round in two dimensions. They seemed to be able to swivel beneath their shell segments, so there was no way of telling which way they were facing other than by the direction in which they traveled. That is, if facing in a certain direction held any meaning for them.

The insects varied in size from that of a small bead or a pea to a marble, with the largest being no more than tiny black Ping-Pong balls with crab-like legs. There had to be more to them than that, but in the half-light, that was all Bower could distinguish, and there was no way she was going to touch one of them or pick them up for a closer look. They were gathering water somehow, moving in a living stream as they scuttled between the puddle and the alien creature.

Bower turned the rusty tap, allowing water to flow softly. She cupped her hands and drank deeply. The water was fresh, as fresh as could be expected in Africa. Bower soaked the makeshift bandages in the water. She went to turn off the tap but thought better of it. Perhaps the alien creature would understand this as a gesture of friendship. The insects seemed excited by the additional water flow, even though all it did was to run out of the puddle and into the drain.

Bower couldn’t turn her back on the creature. She wanted to know where it was, so she retraced her steps as she moved back along the wall. When she was no more than two shuttered windows away, a distance of perhaps twenty feet, the creature moved forward into the moonlight by the water tap.

“Water,” she said as a means of bidding the creature farewell. Finally, she turned away and headed back to Elvis.

Sitting there on the mattress, Bower cradled his head, squeezing the cloths one by one into his mouth. Some of the water dribbled out, but in a reflex reaction he seemed to swallow some of the water as well.

Bower was tired. She wanted to stay awake. She felt a sense of obligation to stay awake and look after Elvis even though she knew there was nothing she could do for him. Try as she may, sleep overtook her and she slumped on the mattress next to him.

Morning broke with birds singing outside the factory.

For a moment, Bower forgot where she was. In the soft light, her eyes deceived her. The air within the ground floor had cooled overnight, providing a pleasant relief from the day before. Already, the heat was starting to build, but for now it was almost a summer’s day in England.

It was the smell that shocked her. Having been in Africa for almost two years, Bower was use to the rancid smell of overpopulated cities, but this smell was different, like the stench of rotten meat burning in a fire.

Beside her, she could hear the soft clatter of insects swarming over each other. She turned, horrified to see Elvis buried alive by a swarm of alien insects. They were crawling all over him, burying him, covering his arms and legs, running through his hair, over his face. Beyond them, the blood-red alien creature stood like a sentinel. Bower was repulsed by the thought they were devouring his body.

“No,” she yelled, scrambling to her feet.

Bower crouched, ready to jump at the creatures and pull him to safety, but there were thousands of them swamping him.

“Don’t eat him. Leave him. Let him go.”

Her movement startled the spiky alien looming over Elvis with its blade-like fronds. The alien flexed, seemingly doubling in size. Its tentacles, previously limp and waving like the branches of a tree, struck out like spears. This was the best view she’d had of the animal. Could it be called an animal? Perhaps not in the terrestrial sense of the word, but it was a living creature.

The spiky alien was on the other side of the mattress, directly opposite her, with Elvis lying beneath the beetles or bugs or whatever they were between them. The central mass of the creature, inside its outer barrier of scarlet tentacles and spikes, was awash with these insects. They swarmed around its body, moving in waves, pulsating like bees within a hive. She could see streams of these tiny creatures scurrying down the alien’s stiff, spiky legs and over towards Elvis.