Francesco Mazzotta - Cellular Activity

At the sight of the glass in front of him Ivanov retracts further, merely observing it as if it were poison and taking a few moments of reflection.

“Look”, he exclaims, “I think I can help you… but I need you to help me back.”

“Due to an error of yours almost two hundred and fifty persons have died”, exclaims Major Macready with an icy voice. “Do you really think that the United States government will make arrangements with you on that basis?”

“You’re judging me for crimes I did not commit, Major. Do you think I’m a terrorist? Well, you are wrong. You have no idea with what kind of monstrosity you are dealing with.”

After a few moments of awkward silence Ivanov goes on. “Here are the facts. It’s true, for me there is no longer a future in Russia, and we all are aware of this. I know I’m alone, however, and you’ll understand it soon, without my help there is no future for any of us. Neither in Russia nor anywhere else. All that I’m asking is to not be arrested or extradited, either now or when and if this situation gets resolved. I help you and you protect me. I don’t want to have to watch my back for the rest of my days.”

Ivanov and Ironside exchange a long look. It’s the latter who takes the initiative. “Dr. Moore, Major Macready, please, could you leave us alone for a few minutes?”

The woman gets up and leaves the room without a comment. Macready seems reluctant.

“Please, Major”, insists Ironside.

The marine slowly rises, visibly upset, and without looking away from Ivanov’s eyes. Then, without a word, he heads for the door.

“Brody! You still there?”

Greg White’s voice sounds muffled, coming from the inside of the military vehicle.

No response, the silence is broken only by the low hum of the equipment.

“Simon!” insists Greg, raising his voice.

After about a minute of additional silence, the marine moves toward the front of the vehicle and opens a side door. The air conditioning system and all the running electronic equipment makes the air inside the JLTV very warm. The impact with the cold night atmosphere outside seems to almost paralyze his sweaty face.

Greg White jumps out the vehicle, stretches his arms slightly sore from the prolonged position maintained until a few moments earlier, and arches his back. He observes the blanket of stars in the sky, and then walks a few meters towards the dune ridge overlooking the scene of the disaster. “Brody, where the hell are you?”

No answer.

The soldier adjusts the focal of his binoculars and watches the expanse of scrap, dozens of meters below. He runs through the area bouncing from one soldier to another, without dwelling on anyone in particular. He notices a group of colleagues around an object half-buried in the ground, dark and twisted like an olive tree. He can’t make out the details, but notices the interest of the other soldiers, one of which takes several photographs.

Forgetting for a moment his colleague that isn’t responding to his calls and intent on observing the scene, he doesn’t notice a dark shape that begins to stand out against the sky behind him.

For long moments the shadow grows slowly, moving silently and gradually erasing the stars in the sky.

Intrigued by the scene taking place in the plain below him, Greg leans forward, adjusting the binoculars to further optimize their focus. The marine is careful not to lose his balance, to avoid slipping on the slope of the dune.

Why the hell are they so interested in that thing?

The silhouette behind him keeps approaching slowly. No sound, and now it appears huge in comparison to the slender figure of Greg.

The silence is total, as if the world itself had stopped breathing.

Is it just an impression, or one of the branches of that weird tree has just moved?

The breath of the soldier is still, as he watches one of graceless appendages of the strange trunk, writhing slowly. Under the surprised look of White, the branch angle changes with a barely perceptible movement.

Are you fucking kidding? This can’t be… It must be a trick caused by the distance…

They are right there in front of it, they should notice…

A chill flows along his spine, shaking him like a thunderbolt.

For a moment he feels a presence behind him.

Then the world suddenly accelerates.

Two heavy hands grip the marine hip, pulling back with violence.

Greg’s heart seems to skip a beat when he goes to slam into a huge and massive body.

“Pppaaam!”, Brody shouts loudly at the same time. “Ha ha ha, my boy, that’s how we lost the war! Wow wow!”

Greg gets rid from the marine’s grasp. He feels like his heart jumped into his throat.

It’s hard to swallow and breathe, while the adrenaline causes him to feel a thousand pins throughout his skin and on top of the skull.

Simon Brody laughs loudly, amused by the joke.

“What a fun!”, more laughter, then he sniffles, accentuating the noise as of someone sniffing. “Uh uh… I bet you shit your pan…”

“Fuck the hell you Simon, what the fuck!”, is Greg’s answer, in a motion of anger he kicks the sand to throw it on the colleague, then he heads for the car.

“Come on, man, don’t take it this way”, replies Brody alternating words in an Eddie-Murphy-like laughter. “I mean, take it from behind!” Other laughs. “Forgive me, please… I could not resist. This will be reported in the annals, the guys will go crazy”, Brody keeps laughing, wiping a tear from the corner of one eye.

“Are you done being an idiot? May I know where you have been? You shouldn’t get away. You saw what a slaughter is down there?”

“I thought I heard a noise, this desert is weird. I went to see and there was nothing, a fucking nothing. So I took the opportunity to give my modest contribution, manuring this godforsaken place.”

White looks at him sideways saying nothing.

“Oh yeah, true and genuine New Jersey’s shit, a real jewel.”

Brody accompanies the last words with a lip smacking. The other remains silent, while his colleague laughs again.

“I mean it, Greg, come on, let’s go, come and see, it’s really a masterpiece. I swear, it looks like the monolith of that movie, A Space Odiss…”

“Did you take off your suit?”, blurts White. “At night, in the middle of the desert, during a containment operation of a possible biological hazard?”

The other looks surprised, his mirth dampens. “Well”, he mutters. “Up here we’re pretty far from that mess. It was only for a few minutes, you know, just time to let it go and…”

“Now that will really amuse Bishop”, says White, heading inside the armored vehicle.

“Hey wait, I didn’t mean… You don’t have any sense of humor. What the fuck… Come on Greg!”

In the area circumscribed by the containment perimeter, some soldiers bundled up in the yellow bio-hazard suits look at the mysterious twisted trunk. Disgusted expressions on their faces, as they look at the chaos of distorted limbs and deformed faces.

“What the hell is this?”, exclaims one of the soldiers.

“May God strike me dead if I know”, replies another one. “At first I thought it was some kind of a sculpture, some African voodoo freaky totem, but I can’t see the remains of a village, or other signs of human presence. And even if it was a totem, who ever would have put it here, surrounded by miles and miles of desert? It makes no sense, and… If it has been here before, the plane’s explosion would have disintegrated it. No… I think this… this thing came down with the plane. Come in, look at here… Approach the light, right here, shine it on this section…”