Морган Райс - Arrival

“There’s no way the alien vapor can get in here,” he said, trying to reassure her. He didn’t want Luna to be scared. “Not if we don’t open that door.”

“I know it’s stupid,” Luna said. “I know that the vapor probably isn’t even out there anymore; that it’s just the people they’ve taken over…”

“But it still doesn’t feel safe?” Kevin guessed. Nothing felt safe right then, even in a bunker.

Luna nodded. “I need to get away from that door.”

Kevin went with her, back into the bunker, away from the emergency exit. It actually made him feel a bit safer, knowing that the two of them could escape if they needed to, but he hoped they wouldn’t need to. They needed somewhere safe, right then. Somewhere they could hide from the aliens until it was safe to come out again.

Or until his illness killed him. That was a particularly horrible thought. There weren’t any tremors from the leukodystrophy right then, but Kevin had no doubt they would be back, and worse. Only the fact that they had bigger things to worry about forced him to push thoughts of it away, and what did it say that it took an alien invasion to make his illness look insignificant?

“I think there are rooms down here,” Luna said, leading the way down one of the corridors. There were. There were whole dormitories there, with rank after rank of bunkbeds that were mostly no more than metal frames, but with a few that had possessions by them, along with mattresses and bedding.

“You’d have thought that some of them would stay inside,” Kevin said. “It makes no sense that there’s nobody here.”

Luna shook her head. “They would have gone outside to help. And then… well, by the time they worked out it was a bad idea, the aliens would have controlled them.”

That made a kind of sense, but it was still a horrible thought.

“I miss my parents,” Luna said from nowhere, although maybe she’d been thinking it all this time. The pain that had come from Kevin’s mom being taken hadn’t gone away; it had just been pushed into the background by the need to keep doing things, by the need to get to safety, and to make sure that they would both stay safe.

“I miss my mom, too,” Kevin said, sitting down on the edge of a bed frame. He found that it was impossible to picture her then as she’d been before the aliens came. Instead, the image that sprang to mind was of her as she’d been on the doorstep of their house, controlled by the aliens and trying to grab him.

Luna sat on a bed frame of her own. Neither of them had picked one of the ones with bedding. That didn’t feel right somehow. Those felt as though they belonged to someone, and their owners might be back at any moment.

“It’s not just my parents,” Luna said. “It’s all the other kids at school, all the people I’ve ever met. They’ll all have been taken. All of them.”

She put her head in her hands, and Kevin reached out to take her hand, not saying anything. It was just as enormous for him in that moment, with the thought that everyone out there in the world might have been taken by the aliens. Ordinary people, celebrities, friends…

“There are no people left,” Luna said.

“I thought you didn’t like people anyway,” Kevin countered. “I thought you’d decided that most people are stupid?”

Luna smiled slightly at that, but it looked as though it took an effort. “I’ll take stupid over controlled by aliens any day.” She paused for a moment. “Do you think… do you think that people will ever be all right again?”

Kevin couldn’t look at her. “I don’t know.” He couldn’t see how they would. “We’re safe though. That’s all that matters.”

It wasn’t, though. Not by a long way.

They looked around the bunker until they found more bedding, not wanting to take anything from the bunks that were already set up. Those remained as pristine as if their owners might come back at any moment, although Kevin had to hope they wouldn’t, because he guessed that the aliens controlled them now.

They went back to the kitchen long enough to get something to eat. The packet said chicken, but Kevin could barely taste it. Maybe that was a good thing, judging by the look on Luna’s face.

“I’m never going to complain about having to eat vegetables again,” she said, although Kevin suspected that she probably would. She wouldn’t be Luna if she didn’t.

When they were done, they took turns cleaning up in one of the bunker’s bathrooms. They could probably have just picked a bathroom each, or two, or more, but Kevin, at least, didn’t want to be that far apart from Luna just yet. Even when the time came to pick bunks, they chose ones almost next to one another, when they had the whole space of the dormitory to choose from. It was like a little island picked out in the middle of it, and if he tried really hard, Kevin could almost pretend that it was some kind of sleepover. Well, no, he couldn’t, not really, but it was good to at least try.

They turned off the lights, using military-issue flashlights to guide them back to bed. Luna hopped up onto the top bunk of her chosen bed, while Kevin took the bottom level of his.

“Afraid of heights?” Luna asked.

“I just don’t want to have a vision halfway up and fall onto the floor,” Kevin said. Not that he’d had any visions since the one warning him about the invasion. Not that it would do any good now if he did. He found himself wondering what the point of his visions was when none of it had helped.

“Right,” Luna said. “I guess… yeah, I guess you should be careful.”

“Maybe in the morning things will look better,” Kevin suggested. He didn’t really believe it.

“We’d have to see it before it could look better,” Luna pointed out.

“Well, maybe we’ll be able to find a way to see things again,” Kevin said. If they did, though, what might they see? Would they see hordes of aliens out there in the world now? A barren landscape with nothing in it?

“Maybe we’ll work out what we’re going to do next,” Luna suggested. “Maybe we’ll dream of a way to make all of this better.”

“Maybe,” Kevin said, although he suspected that any dreams he had would be dominated by the sight of all those silent people.

“Sleep well,” Kevin said.

“Sleep well.”

In fact, it seemed to take forever for Kevin to fall asleep. He lay there in the dark, listening to Luna as her breathing deepened and she started to snore in a way she would probably never admit to when awake. This would have felt very different without her here. Even if there had been someone else there, Kevin would have felt alone, but as it was…

…As it was, he was still almost alone, but at least Luna was there to share in the loneliness of it. Kevin couldn’t get away from the thoughts of what had happened to his mother, to everyone, but at least he knew that Luna was safe.

Those thoughts followed him down into sleep and into his dreams.

In his dreams, Kevin was surrounded by everyone he’d known. His mother was there, his friends from school, his teachers, the people from NASA. Ted was there, with military gear slung all over him, and Professor Brewster, his face in a scowl that suggested he disapproved of everything Kevin had done.

Their features twisted as Kevin watched, becoming every alien from a sci-fi movie ever. Some of them became gray-skinned and big-eyed, while others looked more like insects with plates of armor across them. Professor Brewster had tentacles coming from his hands, while Dr. Levin’s eyes were on stalks. They lumbered toward Kevin and he started to run.

He ran through the corridors of the NASA institute, barely able to keep ahead of them as they poured out of doorway after doorway, and even though he’d lived there, Kevin couldn’t find the way out to safety. He couldn’t find the way to make this better.