SODIUM Trilogy Part One

by Stephen Arseneault

  At first the captors attempted to intimidate my rescuers by calling them punk kids and telling the girls just what they were going to do with them when they got a hold of them. I wondered at how my team would hold up, as many a person would have just turned and run away from their drunken brazenness. But not my gang. They would have none of it, and the raiders’ attempt at intimidation soon turned to anger.

  The bearded man was the first to snap, and he began yelling at David at the top of his lungs while waving his gun around. David and the girls were each well positioned, but the degenerates didn't seem to feel threatened by the pack of scrawny teenagers. Next the bearded man turned toward Janie, and as he yelled at her to drop her weapon, he began to raise his own.

  I was looking directly at Janie, and there was a fierce look in her eyes as she let go a round from her .38 straight into the bearded fellow’s thigh. He dropped to the ground with an enraged cry of pain and at the same time again began raising his weapon.

  By that time his pig-faced friend had turned and began to run, and David fired off a shot, just missing him. Rachel fired next and struck his upper arm, but it was only a graze. He then returned fire as he ran, and the two took cover.

  Janie, on the other hand, was now mostly hidden behind concrete blocks. At the same time the bearded man fired off his first round, she let loose with a burst of three. His drunken shot hit a concrete block in front of her, sending rock and sand shrapnel into her face as she fired back. Time stood still for me as the short gun battle raged. I was taken back to the time of my Ferrari accident, when it seemed as though I was watching from outside of myself.

  Janie's first round entered the man's right shoulder, spinning his upper torso slightly around. Her second round ripped through his neck, and a stream of blood splattered into the air from the exit wound. Her third round entered his left eye, which was then looking directly at her. As it left, it created what was a large hole in the back of his skull. The man dropped to his knees and collapsed backward.

  The lifeless, bearded man lay slumped over on his back as his blood flowed freely onto the ground. Throughout the bearded fellow’s death, the heavy metal booming from the back of his bike raged on. Their drunken mistake had allowed David and the girls to move in unseen and unheard when they had noticed there was trouble from a distance.

  By the time the gun-play ended, the pig-faced man had managed to get to his bike, start it, and was fleeing the scene. Rachel ran over to tend Janie and David worked on giving me my freedom.

  Although the back of my head was throbbing and bleeding, my wounds were superficial. Janie, on the other hand, had taken a spray of shrapnel to the left side of her face and was a bloody mess. We got a water jug and first aid kit from Mike and tried to rinse and bandage what we could, but it was evident she needed much more help than what we could give to her there.

  We got back into the vehicles and headed for home, at first heading in a roundabout direction in case anyone else was watching. The last thing we wanted to do was to lead bad people to our little sanctuary. The day’s events had shattered our once-happy little world. I would heal and Janie would need help, but the bearded man was gone forever, along with our sense of security.

  We returned to our no-longer-innocent little colony looking over our shoulders the whole way there. I was somewhat in shock at the maturity and fierceness Janie possessed for someone that young, and at the same time worried about what damage the shrapnel might have done.

  Most would have sat there with their jaw dropped, or run, or let out a squeal and ducked behind the blocks, but she had no hesitation whatsoever about taking the man's life. Perhaps her short time here and everything that had happened to her had hardened her. Perhaps she felt helpless as her family had perished. She did not want to feel that way again. Whatever the reason, I was glad she was on my side, and I would do whatever I could to aid in my fierce rescuer's recovery.

  Once at the bunker, we moved her inside and began to clean her wounds. Our first aid kits had plenty of bandages and antiseptic creams and such, but nothing at all for pain other than common over-the-counter pain-killers. Those were hardly adequate for the pain Janie was going through, but it was all we had.

  During the whole ordeal, the young girl never let out a whimper, even as we carefully picked tiny pieces of concrete block from her face with tweezers. The shrapnel wounds were mostly small, so stitches were unnecessary, but she would likely have scarring from it.

  But scars were the least of our worries, as one tiny piece of block had lodged itself in her left eye. We had no idea of how to remove it without fear of causing more damage than there was. All we could do was to make an eye patch and hope that her body could heal on its own.

  One thing we had learned that day was it seemed there were others still alive out there. Unfortunately, the ones we had encountered had been hostile. I wondered if there had been other victims like myself who had not been so lucky.

  And, I was still puzzled by why they were collecting gold and such, as it had no possible survival use. One thing was certain: I hoped I would never get to ask the pig-faced man why. As for the bearded man, the vultures, dogs, and rats would soon take care of his remains.

  Just before coming to my rescue, Rachel had found the operational camera and lens we needed for our trip back to Daytona. After the day’s trials, we decided we needed a few weeks to rest and heal and to better prepare our colony against an attack from outsiders, if one should ever come. Even though she only had use of one eye and was in obvious discomfort, Janie insisted on getting back to her chickens and cows after only a single day of rest.

  David and I strategized for days about how to defend our homestead. We dug and covered numerous foxholes and outfitted each with a small stash of nonperishable food and ammo. We had no desire to get caught out in the open.

  Rachel stocked the freezer, and Janie built a small chicken pen beside the bunker. After several weeks of rest and defensive preparation, we decided attack was not imminent. So it was time to turn our efforts back to our real enemy—the alien invaders.

  Chapter 14

  * * *

  We had the route to Daytona all mapped out, but the worsening roadways ate away any time savings we gained by knowing our way there. It was nine in the morning by the time we arrived and unloaded the four-wheelers. As we closed in on the beach, we could again see the large water ship hovering a mile offshore, its complement of fighters buzzing about. We had brought with us a small telescope along with our digital camera.

  Through the scope, the intricate details of the ship were clearly visible, but somewhat unremarkable and very utilitarian. The outer skin of the vessel was covered with box shapes, tubes, and piping that seemingly ran everywhere. It certainly did not have the sleek appearance it had from a distance.

  It actually gave me hope that if we could manage to get the projectile from our gun past the concussion weapon/shield, we might actually be able to do some damage. I was, of course, still only guessing their weapon also acted as a shield. But the thought that it might be their only defense was inspiring.

  We reasoned we could stay hidden away in our little compound until they left, but what if they decided to stay? And even if they did leave, it seemed to me that without more citizens in our colony, we were doomed to a life of ever-increasing hardships; the salvageable material around us continued to decay.

  How would we be faring in ten years? In twenty years? And the thought of these interlopers getting off scot-free really irked me. We were humans after all, and we weren’t going to take it anymore. I had to stop myself at that point because my daydreaming was beginning to interfere with my focus on our surveillance mission.

  We again set up a small camp and planned an overnight stay. The girls handled the details of making certain we were fed, discussing their own observations while they worked. Even with only one good eye, Janie noticed the fighters circled twenty-four times in one direction and then switched to the other. With five of them alwa
ys going, it was difficult to detect, but she had noticed the pattern. And Rachel, using the telescope, had noticed a flotilla of small watercraft bobbing on the surface just below the ship.

  It was a new and fascinating discovery and gave us all something to observe and discuss. What were they for? The boats, if that’s what they were, looked like bubbles floating on the surface of the waves. They were about the size of a large car and were transparent in appearance.

  With the constant bobbing up and down, we couldn’t make out what they were doing or what they carried, but there was definitely something going on inside them. Was this going to give us our first look at an alien?

  We thought hard about it and discussed what they might be doing, but nothing of reason came out of our speculations.

  Maybe we would discover something when we analyzed the digital photos on the PC back at the colony. We would need to return with a larger scope on future visits, but it had taken us two weeks to find the telescope we had, and we had just happened across it on one of our salvage runs.

  The scope had been poking out of the tall grass in what was once someone’s back yard. The previous owners had likely been avid bird-watchers and may have taken it out to try to observe the alien ships. The thought crossed my mind that we would never know. It was a nice scope and we were glad to have it and were lucky to have found it. Our chances of finding a more powerful model were almost non-existent, but we added it to the long wish list we carried with us on our scavenging trips.

  Night came quickly, and the cool ocean breeze was a bit cooler than we had expected. We ate well considering the circumstances, but the daily work to keep the colony going kept us lean. I had dropped forty pounds in the last year alone, so a cool breeze was less than comfortable with our lack of body insulation.

  We had one blanket in our supplies and wound up sharing it among the four of us. David and Rachel were enjoying this excuse for close snuggling, and I was tempted to try to put Janie or myself between them.

  But they had acted responsibly to this point, and I could see there was no stopping the inevitable. They genuinely seemed to care for each other, and as long as I could keep the romantic activities to a minimum, I didn’t mind letting them have a little happiness of their own. We had the breeze largely blocked by our camo tent, but the cool air was uncomfortable enough by itself. The four of us huddled close and slowly drifted off to sleep one by one.

  The budding romance between the teenagers did me some good, too; it brought back fond memories of my teen years. There was nothing like that first love and the adventure that came with a close mutual relationship with someone you cared for. Even if it seldom worked out, it was a learning experience that most everyone remembered fondly.

  It was after two in the morning when I was awakened by a rumble. I thought it was likely the water ship lifting off toward the mother ship. My movement had the rest of the group up as well, so we all crawled out of the tent for a look. There was a lot of activity going on. Two of the water ships were side by side and lit up like Christmas trees, and the mother ship was hovering just above them.

  At nearly five miles across, the bigger ship was immense and intimidating. The outer reaches of the mother ship nearly reached the shore. Had it centered itself above the other two, we would have been sitting directly under it, looking up at its belly. Since we were only about a thousand yards out from its outer edge, I grabbed the scope and scanned the mother ship for potential vulnerabilities.

  The darkness of the night and the lighted activities around the other two ships made it impossible to pull out much detail. I switched the digital camera we had to night-vision mode, but was unable to make out any more detail than with the naked eye. Interference from all the ocean moisture; infrared did not work well with high humidity, kept a clear image from being captured.

  So I turned my attention to the lighted ships. After a few minutes, I realized none of the fighters were buzzing about. Where were they? With the mother ship sitting this close to the ground, I thought they would have been out in force. As I peered through the scope, the hair on the back of my neck stood up. A low hum approached us from behind.

  The fighter passed five hundred feet above our heads before turning straight up and then heading back in the direction in from whence it had come. For whatever reason, we had not been noticed. We were still sharing that one blanket, and perhaps it had shielded us enough to avoid detection. Janie quickly retrieved one of our camo covers and pulled it over the top of us. Aside from a slight infrared signature, it would make us largely invisible.

  I turned my gaze back to the two water ships. From what I could see, they were busy using long cables to fetch the multitude of bubble boats from the water below. The bubbles were then hoisted out of the top of the water ships, again on long cables, up to the mother ship. With the bright spotlights illuminating the bubbles and with their slow ascent up to the mother ship, I finally got a good look at what they contained.

  One side of each bubble appeared to be filled with a silvery substance. I wasn’t the best at chemistry, but from what I could remember, silver, tin, and potassium were all silvery in appearance. My best guess was this was potassium, because they appeared to be moving it very carefully.

  While seawater has a fair amount of potassium locked in it, the potassium is combined with other substances. Potassium and water don’t mix without a violent reaction, but they were quite explosive when thrown together, of that I was certain.

  If they had wanted to gather potassium and/or salt for its sodium, I would have initially thought there were better places than off Daytona.

  But I guessed that by doing it here, they had unlimited volumes of water to use in their processing efforts. I also ventured to guess these were the processes they were familiar with and perhaps had been their best method of gathering this material elsewhere. Whatever their reasons, they were gathering large amounts of both.

  A fighter hummed overhead about every five minutes. Janie had been looking away from the lights and had been able to point out two other fighters following the same pattern, one to our north and one to our south. How bold and empowered I felt being so close to the massive ship, and without being noticed. And then again, how awed I was at the scale of the immense craft that hovered nearly overhead.

  Despite our tiny size, we were still the first humans to have observed these invaders from that close without being flattened. I wondered what damage my coil gun would do from that distance. I wondered how much fun it would be to release the potassium from one of the bubbles back into the sea. I wondered how heroic I would feel if I was able to bring down just one of the ships and inflict a little human vengeance on these alien invaders. It took a nudge and a pointing finger from Rachel to bring me out of my fantasies.

  One of the two water ships seemed to be in trouble. There was a flurry of activity followed by a bright flash, and soon the rolling thunder from an explosion. Perhaps one of the bubbles had burst or fallen. Whatever had happened, a water ship was burning.

  Even though the ships were already a dark gray color, I could clearly make out a darkened and still-smoldering part of the hull. There was a buzz of small activity around that area of the ship, as if fires were being fought or repairs of some kind were being made.

  Perhaps the potassium was tricky for them to handle and a mishap had occurred. Sodium itself was just as explosive when combined with water, so it was possibly an accident from that instead; either way, it was the first sign of weakness we had seen from them, and I was all about trying to figure out a way to exploit it.

  We watched the entire night, and it wasn’t until dawn’s first light when the mother ship finally lifted off back up to its perch high in the sky. The second watercraft then moved into a position directly above the damaged craft, and its fighters buzzed about both ships.

  I felt the break was as good a chance as any for us to pack up and make our way out and safely back home to our bunker. During the night, I had cringed at the though
t of trying to sneak away with the mother ship so close by and fighters passing overhead. So we took the opportunity to quietly leave.

  When we arrived back at the colony, the girls went off to their daily attendances, while David and I began looking over the images we had captured. We gave up after several hours, as our firsthand experience had provided more information than we could gather from the digital images. The camera itself had not been useful, but the spotter scope had worked wonders. We would look for a larger one on any future scavenging trips.

  I wanted to make another run over to the coast within the week to see what progress had been made with the damaged ship. Perhaps we could gather more useful information while repairs were under way. And if they were still actively working on them, I would venture to guess the damage had been extensive. We had not been noticed in our two trips over, so I was somewhat eager to return.

  The following day, we had all fallen back into our routines. David was now working on our ground-cover project at a torrid pace. I didn’t for a minute believe he was enjoying it. It was much more likely he was trying to impress someone. And it was easy to guess who that someone was.

  The way those two kids had been looking at each other, I knew it would probably not be long before they were sneaking off into the woods in the middle of the day. I was certain they wouldn’t dream of doing anything in the bunker, where they would get caught. Either way, I would have to keep an eye on them.

  It was very uncomfortable for me as I had absolutely no experience with dealing with teenagers or anyone else on such matters, but I decided I would have to give them a talk. I remembered my own awkward adventures back when I was a teen and how terrified I was of getting caught.

  Even though I had pictured myself as somewhat of a ladies’ man back then, I had not gone past third base with any of my girlfriends until Renee. My parents were devout Catholics, and the whole premarital sex thing had been drilled into me pretty good by that age.