Alpha Rising

by G. L. Douglas

  Kaz scrambled over mounds of trash to Bach’s side and latched onto his arm.

  The crewmates’ faces reflected their fear as they got their first look at the disaster’s toll: G.R. in pain on the floor at aft ship; Bach and Kaz together at mid ship; Deni and Lynch strapped in their seats in the cockpit, injured; Faith missing.

  “Get movin’, Bach,” Deni yelled, “Find Faith. Be careful where you walk. And, Kaz, we need your help up front.”

  “Help me, too,” G.R. said, his voice weak.

  Bach found a flat piece of shiny metal in the rubble, propped it up at the mid-ship control center and shone the lantern on it to intensify the light. He looked around the cabin and noticed something near the galley area. To get there, he cleared a footpath and crawled under a portion of dangling ceiling insulation stretched crosswise across the cabin. Then, all the air in his lungs expelled at once when he found Faith’s body curled up and motionless. The others watched as he knelt at her side and felt for a pulse in her neck. When he rolled her onto her back, her body flopped over like a life-sized doll. He tried again to find a heartbeat then announced through a lump in his throat, “Faith is dead.”

  Kaz got as close as she dared. “Are you sure? Try again. There’s no blood—nothing seems wrong.”

  “She’s dead.”

  G.R. tried to get up. “I’m the doctor, I’ll determine who’s dead and who’s not.” A bolt of pain held him in place. “Oh, my back.”

  Bach scooted to G.R.’s side. “It doesn’t take a doctor.”

  Deni yelled from the cockpit. “Kaz, find the medical supplies. I need an ankle splint—have to get mobile. It’s black as pitch outside, but I want to find out what’s out there.” She mumbled to herself. “I can’t believe this.”

  Kaz searched the flotsam of cables, insulation, and damaged equipment, and found the medical kit under a sleep hammock. Carrying the kit in outstretched arms, she grumbled in Spanish all the way to the cockpit, then pushed it to Deni’s lap. “I can’t do it. I get sick seeing blood.” She turned away and burned off frustration by clearing a pathway through the debris.

  Deni opened the medical kit without a word. After splinting her ankle and tending to Lynch’s fractured forearms, she hoisted her tall frame onto one foot, pulled a piece of plastic pipe from the debris to use as a walking stick, and hobbled to aft cabin where Bach had just covered Faith’s body with a blanket. Leaning over, she steadied herself with a hand on his shoulder and spoke into his ear. “You positive she’s dead?”

  He lifted Faith’s hand and let it drop. “Not a mark on her. It’s like she died for no reason.”

  Kaz spoke from behind Deni. “She can’t be dead. She’s just unconscious—breathing shallow. Sometimes people seem dead when they’re not.”

  “Let it go, Kaz, she’s dead,” Bach replied. He looked away and his eyes stopped on the gilt-edged pages of Faith’s Bible sticking out of the rubble. He pulled it free and dusted it off on his sleeve, choking on emotion as he placed it at his fallen crewmate’s side.

  Kaz backed away, whispering, “Why is Faith the only one dead? Something scary’s going on. What if we die one at a time?”

  The copper-eyed face flashed through Bach’s mind. “It’s okay, honey. You’re just in shock. We all are,” he said, lying.

  “Faith may be the lucky one,” G.R. said. “The rest of us are lost in space.” He flagged Kaz’s attention. “Please find the painkillers, and water. My throat’s so dry, I’m dyin’.”

  Deni limped toward the cockpit to check on Lynch, who hadn’t spoken or left his seat. On the way, something outside a porthole caught her eye. “Oh, my gosh!” she yelped, pressing her face to the window. “What’s going on? Look outside. It’s like somebody turned on an underground light and the whole planet’s glowing gold. The light’s coming from within—gold!”

  “What kind of gold? Whaddaya mean ‘gold’?” G.R. yelled.

  Bach rushed to a porthole. Speechless for a second, he offered, “It’s hard to describe. The atmosphere’s dark, but there’s a luminescence coming from the ground. Like it originates from within the planet.”

  Kaz stood back, gnawing her thumbnail. “Is anybody out there?”

  “No. It’s desert-like with mounds and gullies. We’re in sort of a basin, and off in the distance are large craters filled with glowing gold dust. But no small craters.”

  Fighting a wild rush of dread, Kaz peeked over Bach’s shoulder. “Maybe we’re on the moon.”

  Deni shook her head and looked around the cabin. “We’re way beyond Earth’s solar system. Let’s get organized to ensure our survival.”

  “Right,” Bach said. Another peek outside brought an uneasy shrug. “Glowing gold. My mind’s racing through all the studies we did, but a fluorescent glow wasn’t anything I ever read about.”

  “Might be radiation, or the astral equivalent,” G.R. offered.

  Kaz grew jittery. “I don’t like this. Maybe aliens know we’re here and turned on the lights. We don’t even have a gun.”

  “Kaz!” Deni snapped. “Why automatically assume that unknown people are evil? Maybe they’re peaceful and helpful.” Moving debris aside, she saw the American flag on the sleeve of a space suit. She freed the jumpsuit and shook it off, watching as particles fell to the floor from gravity. She would find out more about this alien planet. Limping to the mid-ship control center to check for damage to the built-in equipment, she called to Bach. “Bach. This equipment looks functional. See if you can get something operational. There’s gravity, but it can’t be the AstroLab’s AG. Try to get stats for temperature outside, atmospheric pressure, oxygen. I want to go out and have a look around.”

  “No, Deni, we need to stay together.” G.R. said. “There could be dangers, and you’re in no condition.”

  “I won’t go far. I’m not going to sit around and wait for time to pass then wish we could turn back the clock and do something. Sooner or later we’re all going to have to go out. Time may be critical to our survival.”

  Bach tried to initialize the electronics. “Nothing. Processor’s dead. But one power cell’s operational. Thermal measuring units show seventy-three degrees in here and sixty-eight outside. Maybe I can get a little interior and exterior light going.”

  Deni examined the spacesuit she’d found, but it was torn and useless. Scrounging through the wreckage for another, she noticed an area at aft ship where cooler air and a ray of golden light streamed through a three-by-four-inch split in the ship’s framework. “Bach,” she yelled. “Come here. Hurry. The ship’s split open.”

  Bach inspected the opening with a huff of concern that soon changed to excitement. “This is good—it’s good!” He yelled to the others, “We got a sizeable rip in the framework and outer hull back here that compromised the vapor and compression seals. We’ve been breathing foreign air for over half an hour with no ill effects.”

  Deni stuck her face close to the hole to get a better look. “That means I can go outside without suiting up.” She angled one eye full into the opening. “A lake?” She gasped. “Is that a lake? It’s so still it looks like black glass.”

  Bach stuck his face next to hers and peered through the opening. “Looks like a lake with a big boulder or platform in it, but no reflection in the water.”

  Deni steadied herself on the makeshift cane and looked at him with determination in her eyes. “I’m going out.”

  “Don’t open that door, Deni,” Kaz warned.

  Bach stepped back. “You can’t go by yourself, Deni. I’ll go with you.”

  Kaz clambered across debris to Bach. “Don’t go.” She grabbed his arm. “You both don’t need to go. She can go if she wants to. G.R. might be right. Something bad might happen. We can’t get separated. Don’t go!”

  “We can’t just sit here, Kaz.” He wrestled from her grasp. “We need to know where we stand.”

  Lynch called out in a pained southern drawl, “How you gonna get out? Our boarding door’s flush against the
space station.”

  Bach pushed his hair back from his forehead and exhaled. “Okay, we’ll use the back ramp. The Lab’s tail is clear. I’ll open it manually.”

  “Gonna strain your guts crankin’ that ramp open,” Lynch said, “and you’re gonna jeopardize all of us to whatever alien life forms may be out there. But if that’s what you want, the crank’s right there alongside the ramp.”

  “Can’t you wait until daylight?” Kaz asked in a high voice. “At least wait until you can see more before going out there.”

  Bach grasped Kaz’s shoulders and looked into her worried brown eyes. “We can see enough to move forward. It’ll be all right.”

  She stepped back, face in her hands.

  He unlatched a clamp and removed the crank, then put it into the turn hole.

  Kaz yelled, “Bach!”

  As Bach turned the cumbersome crank with both hands, each turn inched the ramp farther downward to slowly reveal the golden, moon-like world beyond. His nervous crewmates stood there breathing heavily. He stopped halfway to rest. Then, minutes of agonizing anticipation ended with the door fully open and the earthlings face to face with the mysterious planet.

  Bach and Deni stepped a few feet out onto the ramp. He looked left, then right, and for some reason his mind rewound to one night as a kid when his big brother took him into a Halloween haunted house on a full moon. The mix of anxiety and titillation was the same now as then—almost unbearable. Get over it. Swallow your apprehension and do the same thing you did that night. Go forward bravely.

  By the time the two stepped off the ramp, Kaz had wrung her hands and bounced from foot to foot a dozen times. “Bach, come back! Please….” The world outside the door seemed to absorb her voice. As her crewmates moved farther from the ship, she rushed to Lynch in the cockpit. “What’s going to happen to us?”

  The commander smirked. “Face it, Kaz, we’re in an astral hinterland. We got no chance of survival.”

  “Don’t say that.” She walked away then rushed back, leaned into his face and focused on his beady blue eyes. “Why?”

  “It ain’t quantum physics, Kaz. We’re lost in space on a desolate, moon-like planet.”

  “But it’s not the moon, so where are we?”

  Ignoring her, he stared straight ahead.

  She darted back to the ramp. “Something bad’s going to happen, I feel it, I—”

  “Listen, Kaz,” G.R. interjected, “Earth has deserted areas and is inhabited by millions. This place is probably the same. In my opinion, it’s just a matter of time until someone comes for us.”

  On return to the AstroLab, Deni held onto Bach’s shoulder to navigate the soft sand. “I’m amazed that we haven’t heard a sound other than voices from our ship,” she said.

  Bach entered first and announced, “We’ve washed up on a deserted celestial shore. Don’t know if it’s good or bad news, but we didn’t see anybody.”

  Deni added, “It doesn’t seem an ideal habitat for anyone.”

  Kaz peeked outside. “Well, in G.R.’s opinion, someone is going to come for us.” She looked at G.R. “Now who might that be?”

  Lynch stared at the control panel and replied for G.R. “A little green man—for you.” His sarcasm ended when a gauge flickered on the console and grabbed his attention. He watched as it transformed into a glowing yellow energy form pulsing in and out in the golfball-sized circle. A face materialized, and within seconds the apparition’s hypnotic, copper-colored eyes weakened the commander’s mental processes. Lynch reacted by trying to touch it, but a scorching pain shot through his hand and arm and moved his senses further from reality. The disconcerting face whispered, “Welcome,” then dissolved away. Lynch’s throat tightened and he started to sweat. Maybe he was in shock.

  “What else is out there?” asked G.R.

  “We couldn’t see too far with the lighting—it seems deserted except for the lake,” Bach said. “There’s a partially submerged, flat-topped boulder in it as big as a bus. No vegetation visible anywhere, but plenty of sand. The space station’s dug into it deep.”

  Deni nodded. “There’s no sound or movement in the distance. No stars or moon. The sky is pure black, but that beautiful glow-in-the-dark gold illuminates everything from the ground. And no signs of habitation; we may be the first of a new breed.”

  “Oh, no,” Kaz whimpered.

  “Our biggest concern right now is food and water,” Bach added. “There’s enough to stretch out for one, maybe two weeks, but we’ll need more water for sanitation. I’ll try to restore the space station’s hydroponic gardens and merge the electronics and hardware from both the station and Wizard—see if I can’t get something up and running. First, I want to test the lake water for potability.” Bach searched the rubble for a water test kit and, after finding it, crouched beside G.R. and spoke confidentially, “In all your biological studies, have you ever encountered a phenomenon where water’s so still it looks like black glass?”

  G.R. shook his head. “You’re saying the lake is totally motionless?”

  “It was, until I tossed in a handful of sand.”

  “And…?”

  “It sank straight down with a gurgling stream. But then came a churning or heaving in that area of the water, followed by the whole lake transforming into what looked like a caldron of hissing bubbles that seemed hungry.”

  “Hungry?”

  “Don’t know how else to describe it—like they wanted to attack something.”

  G.R. raised his Neanderthal-looking brows. “Hmmm, varying densities could bring unusual movements, but bubbles? It could contain microorganisms, or something crazy like astral piranhas. Throw in something edible, like food crumbs. See what happens before you touch it. If the only problem is the bubbles, it might be a simple technicality due to difference in gravity or atmospheric pressure. But the black—I don’t know.”

  Lynch blurted out from the cockpit, “Something just appeared in a control panel gauge. A man’s face, three-dimensional, with eerie eyes that seemed to look straight into my mind. His tongue flashed, like silver metal. I tried to reach ‘n’ touch the image, but my arm and hand hurt.” Everyone stared as Lynch continued without emotion. “It seemed to be projected from somewhere beyond. And I ain’t crazy, but it spoke ’n’ said, ‘Welcome,’ then faded away.”

  Deni looked at Lynch with enlarged eyes, rested her fists on her hips and rocked her head back and forth. “You saw a face in the control panel with eyes that tried to control you? And it spoke English? You’re still in shock.” She backed away. “That’s normal after G-LOC.”

  “I’m not in shock,” Lynch snapped. “I was compelled to look, but sensed evil. What if it was Satan?”

  “You didn’t see Satan!” Deni stated. “There’s a logical explanation for whatever it was.”

  “He was real. I tried to touch him.”

  Bach got that sinking feeling he gets when his data panels crash. His silent exhalation formed the words, “Oh, God,” and he tuned out the rest of the conversation, wondering how many hypnotic, copper-eyed, extraterrestrials they were up against. One? Two? More?

  Kaz scurried to Bach and rambled nonstop, sounding like an old cassette tape played at fast-forward. “I’ve got a feeling that something bad’s going to happen. Like on earth when someone says that a spaceship came down and the aliens took them aboard and did bad or weird things to them. What if they stick needles in our navels?”

  G.R. spoke up. “First of all Kaz, we’re the aliens. And second, Lynch told us that the face said, ‘Welcome.’ That’s not scary.”

  Bach tucked the test kit under his arm and headed to the ramp with dried space food clenched in his fist. “Goin’ to do the water analysis.” He cast a final wary eye at Lynch who sat staring at the control panel. “Hey, Lynch, call me if you see the face again. I’ll check it out.”

  *****

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  With Bach’s statement ringing in his ears, Lynch wasn’t about to have his
authority undermined, and he was angry that his crewmates gave no credence to the worrisome face he believed was Satan. Determined to recoup his leadership status, the commander barked at Deni, “Get busy. See if you can get something operational. Raise someone or something on the comm links.”

  She limped to the cockpit. “It’s all damaged, Lynch. You don’t think….”

  “Do it.”

  Using energy from the functioning power cell, Deni tweaked the electronics and got a damaged component to kick on with erratic squeals and flashes of light. But a louder, more powerful whine ripped their attention away.

  Lynch leapt to his feet and hovered over Deni’s shoulder.

  “I don’t know what that is!” She flipped switches and turned dials with an uneasy huff. “It’s not us.”

  As the ear-numbing sound intensified, the startled crewmates bounced nervous glances off each other’s faces and looked from viewports and windows. Within seconds, the sheer power of approaching engines shook the three-piece earthship as if it were a pocket-sized toy.

  #

  Bach tried to make it back to the ship, but vibrations from the incoming craft spawned a waterspout that lifted him from his feet and plunged him into the lake. He struggled to swim from the bubbling whirlpool, but couldn’t tell up from down. Thrashing about helplessly, he felt himself funneling farther downward, and at one point thought he was going to black out. When the incoming ship’s engines powered down for landing, the turbulent water calmed a little and he shot upwards. But before he reached the surface his head hit something hard. An involuntary gasp filled his nostrils with a burning, acrid odor. His face was above the water, but he couldn’t see. He swam forward for a few yards, but again hit something solid. Then he realized that he was in an air space under the giant boulder. He felt around for a way out, and tried diving down, but the ship’s idling engines, or something in the powerful mechanics, produced an unnatural pressurization that held him in the air space.