Nathan Hystad - The Event

This was all about to end one way or another. Either I was going to save the world or end it, and I had just enough guts to give it a try. I was slowing down as I rounded the final bend, and was on the last section of road leading up to the ruins of the Inca city. There was a car parked at the end of the lot, and a path leading up even higher. Carey stopped and fell to the ground, rolling on his side. He lapped at some water in a small pool on the road, and this time, I didn’t stop him. I had half a mind to join him, and instantly regretted not bringing my own water. I searched the car and found a half-empty water bottle in the cup holder. I drank it without hesitation; not something I would normally do, but my lungs were burning and my legs aching from the few miles’ uphill run. My treadmill at home didn’t have incline quite this intense. I tossed the bottle to the car floor and started the trek to the city. I still couldn’t see much and crossed through a stone archway that led to a steadily inclining pathway. There was still an intense light ahead, but it was pointed away from me, so I stumbled a few times on rocks or steps that I couldn’t quite see.

Carey followed along again, stopping every now and then to drink from a puddle. He didn’t seem to mind the muddy water too much. “Almost there, little guy,” I said. His tail wagged at my voice.

I heard my name and saw Magnus and Natalia a few hundred yards behind. I kept going. I didn’t want them there to decide for me. I picked up the pace and started to move at a jog. My thighs fought me every inch of the way, but a few hundred yards of paths and stairs later, I entered the Incan city of Machu. Even in the darkness, it was beautiful. I finally had a vantage of what was going on. One of the ships was hovering near the ground at the far side; Wayna Picchu loomed behind everything like a gravestone in the dark. It was an eerie sight, making the hair on the back of my neck stand straight up.

Which aliens were here, the good ones or the bad ones? Not that I knew which side was which.

I walked toward it all and tripped on something. I fell and landed on my right elbow, pain exploding up my arm. I rolled to my side, and I was staring straight at a body.

It was Vanessa.

I rolled her to her back and checked for a pulse. Nothing. She’d been with us on this huge journey, and it was terrible to see her lying there. She was so small. If she was here, that meant… “Mary!” I called out. “Don’t do it!”

I reeled and ran to the ship. If the cheap tourist maps were accurate, they were over in the Sacred Plaza, an area that looked like a large room with parts of the wall missing and no roof. No doubt it had been a town square of some sort in the Incan times. I tried to take in everything I was seeing as I ran to them. The ship was there, with the two twins’ backs to me. I knew it was them just from the way they were standing. As I got closer, I saw Mary with a rifle aimed at them. Ray was nowhere in sight.

“Mary! Don’t do it! Not yet!” I yelled. She glanced at me and almost smiled through the terrified, angry look she was giving the aliens.

I passed by them, holding my gun in my hand. My elbow was aching, but at this point, so was the rest of me. I stepped between them and Mary. “Mary, hold on.” I tried to catch my breath. She looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “I think Heckle and Jeckle may be telling us the truth.” Images flashed in my mind. Janine and one of the alien twins, sitting at a table.

“It’s too late, Dean,” she said, lowering her gun. A bright orange light shone from behind the plaza’s largest wall. There was a crack in the foundation large enough for a man to fit through, and that was where the light emanated from. A whirring noise sped up and then slowed down, the light dimming with it. “Ray turned it off.”

The twins fell to their knees and yelled in anguish. Another ship came quickly from the sky, and now I could see the differences in them. These were slightly larger and had more of a curve, whereas the others were smaller and more linear. A red beam shot out of it and destroyed the ground around the twins. They disappeared down the crevice.

“We have to turn that thing back on! Now!”

Five Years Earlier

My head felt so strange, and I wondered what she’d put in my coffee. This man had shown up at our house and Janine had instantly become nervous. I had never seen her like this before, and I didn’t like it one bit. She asked if we could talk in the kitchen and went to get us all some coffee. The man never said his name and our small talk went nowhere. I asked him where he was from. He said “quite some ways away” in a voice that literally had no accent, if that was possible. Everything about him was monochrome. Even his hair looked like it was a doll’s hair. None of this bothered me much once I drank that first sip of coffee; after that, I just sat there like an open-mouthed fool. I thought about trying to interject, but my brain didn’t want to participate. Instead, the fool thing made me drink more of the obviously drugged beverage.

Janine and the man argued about a few things, and they pointed at me a few times. She was telling him that she was already in their bad books. That they were still upset about me not being the chosen target, but that she was more than likely under severe scrutiny. I heard her mention Bob, her cousin from our wedding that we hadn’t seen since that day he’d come here.

After a few minutes of this back and forth my brain didn’t let me comprehend, he came over to me and put his hands to my temples. He repeated some words I didn’t understand and then Janine’s face came in front of mine, inches away. I could smell the spinach omelet she’d eaten for breakfast, and the coffee she just had been drinking. Out of all of that, it felt like a very intimate moment for some reason.

She held my hands and spoke softly. “If the day comes where you end up at Machu Picchu, don’t turn the device off. Wait there for this man, or a man that looks like him. Turn off that device and they’ll swarm the planet. Most likely, they’ll send a scout to confirm it’s off. They’re patient. Once confirmed, they’ll destroy it, and Earth will be theirs. No humans, no device to kill them. Do you understand?”

It took me a moment to realize that she had been speaking to me, even though her nose was touching mine. Tears fell down her face; I wanted to wipe them away, but my hands didn’t listen to me.

“Dean, do you understand?”

“Yes,” I said, not sure what I was agreeing to.

“Trust no one but a man who looks like this.” She stepped back and his face hovered before mine.

“Okay,” I said.

She then repeated a numerical code over and over, until I was repeating it back to her.

After, they talked for a while longer, and by the time he left, I was falling asleep on the couch, with no memory of anyone ever being there.

Ipushed my way to the crack in the wall, Mary trying to grab me on the way over. “What the hell are you doing, Dean?” she yelled, grabbing my arm. “You don’t actually believe those guys, do you?”

It had all come back to me. That strange visit from years ago. Janine’s tears at the prediction I would be here at this moment. I’d failed her. I’d failed everyone.

“They were right! Vanessa is one of the bad ones! This device is here to keep the aliens away. Those guys were trying to help us keep our damn planet,” I said, fighting to make her let go of me. “Trust me, Mary. It’s true. Do you see our people beaming back down?”

The new ship hovered a hundred yards away, and something was beaming down from the green light. Magnus and Natalia were right behind the ship, and I could see them moving out of the way, trying to get between us and the new arrivals.