Nathan Hystad - The Event

“We’d better stop. Light’s almost gone and not only do we not want headlights bringing attention to us, Ray doesn’t want to be driving this thing over the side. Over.”

“Sounds like a plan. I’ll pull over ahead.” I noticed they had already pulled to the side. I was watching the rear-view mirror and when I looked forward, there it was. A ship hovered there, a horrifying game of chicken in play. It was smaller than the ships we’d seen in New York and cutting up the world on the trip south, but mostly the same shape. I twitched and panicked. What to do? I saw the look on Mary’s face in the van. They hadn’t been moving, so more than likely, the ship had only seen me. Conflicting debate ran through my head faster than I’d have thought possible. I went with my gut. Seconds after I spotted the ship, I hit the gas, racing down the hill. It followed me.

Gravel spun under my tires and flung behind me as I tore down the mountain. Carey was sitting up, scared by the movement and noises. The ship, silent as ever, followed me effortlessly. I knew I either had to hide somehow, or just keep driving until this thing blew me up. Either way, I hoped I’d been able to give my friends time to get away and keep themselves safe so they could complete the mission. Vanessa would probably be dead soon, so that left Mary and Ray to do the task. I had faith they could do it.

I must have driven two miles, my knuckles bright white as I clenched the steering wheel, racing in and out of corners, trying to keep on the road. The ship was there still, staying just behind and above me, always visible in my mirrors. No green lights shone out of it, and thankfully no red ones either.

The sun was going down, and I knew my chance was going to be in a few minutes. I saw a waterfall ahead to the southeast and made my stupid plan. If anything, I was sure I could at least distract them from the others for a while. I heard my radio crackle, but no voices came through. The radios were only good for a couple miles, and out here, surrounded by mountains, it was probably less than that.

We whirred around another bend and the Jeep drifted on the gravel, so close to the edge I almost crapped myself. With a pounding heart, I saved it and kept going down the road, end in sight. As the last rays of light crossed over the mountains, I killed the lights and threw the e-brake on, turning to the waterfall. Before the car stopped, I opened the door and ran for the water. I could hear Carey growling and following me. He soon passed me and we both jumped the ten-foot ridge into the cool water. With a glance back, I saw the ship stop and turn. There was no time to watch them. We swam, me quietly urging Carey forward. We only had thirty yards to cross before we hit the falls, and there I felt some rocks under my feet and planted them, picking up Carey and sliding us beside, then behind the falls.

Just as I hoped, there was a cavern behind them. I had visions of huge snakes twisting towards us in the water, ready to asphyxiate us before swallowing us whole. How much worse could that be than alien death? Lucky for us, no snakes came out to greet us. The cavern was damp and muddy, but we clambered up and into it, Carey shaking off wildly and no doubt wondering what the hell I was doing to him.

My breathing was heavy and my heart banged in my ears, a real life tell-tale heart that I was sure the aliens could hear. Carey whimpered as we walked slowly into the dark space, where God knew what was hiding to devour us. I heard a voice calling out.

“Dean, don’t be afraid. We need to talk,” it said.

I crouched and moved toward the entrance, telling Carey to stay back. He seemed happy to listen. From here, I would have sworn that was the exact same man Vanessa had killed already. Did they all look the same? Maybe their human forms did. And why did they even look human? What did they really look like?

“You can’t turn the device off. It means the end of everything if you do. Come out and I’ll explain it to you,” he called. Damn right he’d explain it to me. With a laser to the head.

I sneaked back to where Carey was waiting, sure the alien hadn’t seen me, and walked deeper into the cavern. The man kept calling to me as I found a narrow passageway in the dark dirt-covered wall near the back of the cave. There was just enough room for me to squeeze through. There was light a little way away and where there was light, there was freedom. With a little coercion I wasn’t proud of, I tricked Carey into following me with the promise of a bone that I didn’t have.

The voice was getting harder and harder to hear as we neared the opening back to outside. We would be on the other side of this small rock outcropping. I picked Carey up, pushed him out the hole, then jumped up, grabbed the edges of the opening, and hauled myself through. Carey rolled around, trying to get the mud off his body. We were both soaked, stinky, and covered in grime, but we had evaded him for the time being. I headed east by foot, and hopefully away from capture; the canopy of trees would cover us from above. I only hoped that my crazy stunt had allowed the others to go unnoticed by the ships, especially if there were more than one around.

I kept looking back and to the sky for signs of pursuit but relaxed a little bit when I didn’t see any. I really wished that I’d had the common sense to bring my knapsack into the Jeep with me. I had nothing with me. For a time, I wondered if I should head back to the Jeep and see if I could find the group again, but for all I knew, the aliens were waiting for me to come back. So instead, I kept walking in the humid night, my shirt not getting any drier as we went. It felt like rain wasn’t far off, so I looked for some sort of shelter to stay under for a few hours.

I wandered for a while, and as the rain began to fall, I found a thick copse of trees with a large canopy of leaves above it. With no choice but to hope no wild animals had us on the menu, we hunkered down by a large tree trunk, only a small amount of rain creeping through to splash us. Carey snuggled in close, and I could feel his stress. I’m sure he was picking up on mine; it was probably radiating from me in waves. At some point, I dozed off, and when I came to, Carey was almost on top of me snoring away, and the first bits of light were showing to the east. It was time to keep going, and hopefully, meet up with Mary, Ray, and Vanessa along the way.

We stretched and got to our feet, both taking the time to relieve ourselves by a tree. Two wild animals in the jungle. Carey looked up at me, no doubt wondering why I wasn’t feeding him. My stomach growled at the thought of food, and we set off looking for the road and some fruit if we were lucky. I used the rising sun to direct me south. I was never the best outdoorsman, but I could build a decent fire and find basic directions. We walked through the morning mist for a mile or so before we meandered to the road.

Just as I’d given up on finding any sort of food source nearby, there stood a huge mango tree, heavy with fruit. I laughed out loud and ran over to the great tree, squeezed one of the mangoes and plucked a ripe one. I used my teeth to peel the first bit, then went into it with my somewhat clean hands. Carey sat by me, instantly knowing it was food in my possession. He took the first piece hesitantly and dropped it a couple times before deciding it was palatable enough. I almost forgot what I was even doing here, but with some food in my belly, it became clear again. I snagged as many mangoes as I could hold and we headed down the road at a brisk pace. I was sure we would come across a car soon. This area seemed to be sparsely populated, but there would be a village somewhere nearby. And where there was a village, there would be cars.