Aliens - The Truth is Coming (Book of Aliens 1)

by Adrian Tchaikovsky

  He had encountered a handful of other species in his time; life was far rarer than one might expect, given the plethora of stars in the galaxy. Most species never discovered combustion, if they even managed to invent writing and master the smelting of iron. Humanity were in the upper third, an interesting species, but not necessarily quite capable enough of progressing much further.

  If it wasn't humans, it was another species, visitors like himself. He questioned then why they would execute such a precise attack upon his persons when, as far as he was aware, they shared no emnities. It seemed likely then that they were eradicating any species they regarded as a threat to whatever it was they wished to undertake.

  This knowledge narrowed the likely perpetrators to just two races; the Elun or the Masst. Both were aggressive, expansionary races with access to advanced space travel technologies. On balance, he hoped it was the Elun, as they tended to treat races like humanity as colonies, taking over administration of a planet rather than replacing its natives. Indeed, a number of his own kind were members of their wider empire.

  The Masst, though, were of the latter persuasion: a race looking for resources, everything else being superfluous to their requirements.

  He continued to think through the implications of it being either race, but turned the majority of his attention to the subject his semi-intelligent search program had found. His searches of human chatter, activity and development across their communication networks pinged an anomaly.

  His files were filled with rumours of a secret selection program run by an anonymous group over the last three years. The group had no name but used the icon of an insect that gestated over a seventeen-year cycle. They ran extremely complex puzzles every other year or so, with the first few who successfully made it through the several rounds of ingenious teasers being offered an, as yet, undisclosed prize. The identities of the winners, the prize or even the reasons for the competition remained unknown, even plausible speculation being thin on the ground.

  Veel was a master of group interactions, so expected there to be very little coherence around groups such as these, but the lack of any concrete facts -either leaked by the winners or revealed through the bragging of one of the group-, flagged it worthy of further exploration. It was within the Elun’s modus operandi to select the very brightest for adoption into their culture, and the secrecy around the outcome of this contest fit that pattern perfectly.

  Knowing which race it was did not help him decide on his own strategy, however. If it was the Elun, he needed to be together to confront whichever agent he could find and sue for peace before they eradicated him; if it were the others he needed to run and hide, splitting himself down as quickly as possible while he looked for a way off the planet.

  He spent the next twelve hours with all four of his necks itching as the seconds ticked by, feeling his own life expectancy shortening. Yet he couldn't risk acting before he knew which of them it was.

  He ran a new search via all four of his parts, the better to hide from these invaders the fact that someone had identified them and, hopefully, to obscure his own locations. He was acting through the shock of losing more than half of himself. He knew that sooner, rather than later, his psyche would emerge from the other side of the numbing disbelief of what had been done to him, at which point he'd start to fragment. There were rituals to observe, hosts to lay to rest. His people honoured those who carried them, who gave their own bodies that he might be more than the speck of bare chemical reaction he had to become when he chose to travel among the stars. Tradition demanded he spend several weeks remembering all they had contributed to who he was, what they had been to those who had given them birth and what they might have been if they had not surrendered to his embrace.

  With what they considered a deeply sympathetic approach to living with others, his kind had been outraged to discover a race that classified them as parasites, as nothing more than a pest which depended on its host and brought nothing in return.

  They understood that when they took hosts, those who were taken no longer lived fully independent lives, becoming a platform for his needs and desires, a kind of distributed network of his consciousness. It had been the fashion, once, to subsist as a trinity, denying the glories of being a hundred or a thousand strong. The perilousness of being so few, of being so limited, was a kind of authenticity its adherents claimed was impossible for the many to achieve.

  He was shaken out of his reverie when one of his males, Patrick, heard the doorbell ring. Immediately suspicious, he decided right then to move himself to a safe house, prepared shortly after his arrival for such an eventuality. He expected to lose Patrick, but hoped that in this loss he could discover more about his aggressor.

  Patrick cut a short, blunt impression, and, as Veel had discovered, was not attractive. With his flat nose and pockmarked skin, he was considered one of nature’s afterthoughts. He had been Veel's sixth host, offering himself before Veel could even ask.

  They had met by accident while bird-watching on the southern coast of Florida. Not being familiar with the paraphernalia surrounding bird-watching, Veel had gone without binoculars. Patrick, seeing his poverty of equipment, offered him a spare pair. Veel found the man had a quick, self-deprecating wit coupled with fathomless compassion that, tragically, had never found a cause. He felt for the man, that he was unattractive despite his obvious qualities, but was surprised into silence when Patrick asked Veel if he had any use for someone like him.

  Veel carefully explained to Patrick exactly what it meant to be a host. Patrick did not take long to make up his mind, a wistful expression on his face when Veel discussed the way he was constituted, as a community united in one mind, like a bee returning to its hive.

  Patrick's house remained much as it had been when they'd first met: a generous wood-framed space with more bedrooms than any one man could ever need, most of them visited once a year as he did the rounds checking for problems in the windows or roof. Patrick, when alone, had occupied three rooms in his home; the kitchen, the bedroom and his den, a small snug where he had put a gigantic television which was linked to the internet.

  The house felt less safe now than when they’d first met. Through his small, long-sighted eyes, he saw a large woman standing on the other side of the door. She smiled as he opened the door.

  'Can I help you?' he asked.

  'Hello Patrick.' Her sounded pleased with herself.

  The Elun have arrived on Earth, thought Veel. A flood of relief crashed through him with the knowledge that his kind had regularly negotiated non-aggression pacts with the Elun buoyed him up. Except they've been killing my hosts.

  'You have me at a disadvantage.' Patrick kept the door half-shut, ready to bolt if he needed to.

  'We do, don't we?' She raised a small, flat metallic object. 'Let me inside.'

  'So you can kill me without attracting attention?'

  She laughed derisively, ‘From whom? These apes? They'll hardly notice if I incinerate you on the porch.'

  Patrick stepped away from the door and moved back into the living room.

  She carefully closed the door behind her before following him in.

  'There's no need for this.' He held his hands up, gesturing that she shouldn't take offence, perhaps at his very presence. 'Our people have always reached agreements in the past.'

  'Different time, different agents.' She shook her head as if sad about something. He couldn't decide if it was that others had accommodated his kind or that she was prevented from doing so. She obviously meant to kill Patrick.

  'Why this change?'

  She narrowed her eyes, weighing him. Her face relaxed as she reached a conclusion, 'There's been no change. Each of our agents are authorised to prepare a planet for our arrival in whatever way we deem appropriate. Others may consider your presence here benign.' She pursed her lips, clearly unable to agree with her peers. 'I, however, do not. You are a creature that can exist in many places, can absor
b the consciousness of its hosts. This does not fit with the Elun's wish to colonise this planet.'

  'I see.' He didn't dare ask if she'd already visited the others on the planet. His other parts were already moving, it would at least give him time to plan. 'Yet you're not changing what will happen here? You'll install a colonial government, create a localised administrative class? These people will become part of galactic society?'

  'I don't see how it matters to you, but very well. No, I think this planet, and the others of this solar system, are ripe for strip mining. You know we have expansion plans for this arm of the galaxy; a system like this, with its main sequence star, is perfect as a base for preparing a colony fleet. At best, the inhabitants will be reduced to being technology-free. It's likely some of them will be used as household assistants.' She shrugged, not entirely convincing him that she regretted the decision she was making.

  'Slaves? I didn't think you were that kind of people.'

  'Needs must. We are very far from home and resources are scarce.'

  She's enjoying this. 'So it's just you? You're the one making these decisions without the awareness of your superiors?'

  She tutted and he knew he was out of time. 'I have no superiors, little parasite. Just senior officers. They believe the reports I write. In due course a force will arrive to carry out my recommendations for the local population.' She wrinkled her nose, using the metal bar in her hand to indicate he should move to the middle of the living room, away from the furniture. 'The problem for you people is that you think everyone else is as unified as you. Why should the Elun not be a competing mess of corporate and social interests like any proper race?'

  'You're being quite expansive.' Why is she telling me all this?

  'Oh, I'm barely telling you one percent of what's really going on.' She smiled, this time a genuine grin, like that of a tiger with a deer under already bloody paws. Patrick shivered, that much of his own brain responding to the fear she was provoking in both of them. 'Now, where are the rest of you?'

  Veel launched himself at her, in an attempt to touch her, to have an opportunity to overwhelm her consciousness. She moved quickly, stepping to the side of him so he passed her by, overbalancing and landing in a heap against the wall of the room. Looking at her, fear grasping hold of him, Veel had long enough to know what was going to happen, but not enough time to act. She pressed her fingers onto the metal block; Veel’s pattern within Patrick froze.

  'You don't get away, and you don't get to have me. Did you think I'd not be ready for you to try to capture me? This is why you're a threat.' She laughed, a sound like the breaking of glass. 'Where are the rest of them? Patrick, is it?' Veel squirmed within Patrick, but couldn't break free; the device holding him in place. The other parts of Veel were unaffected, which was, he thought, irrelevant, because she'd use his presence in Patrick to find them as well.

  Patrick's own consciousness started to surface, a confused, fuzzy mess of pathological activity. The woman waited until his eyes could focus on hers before speaking again, 'I've freed you. In return I'd like you to tell me everything you know about the creature who enslaved you.'

  Veel could sense Patrick trying to shake his head, his brain wasn't ready to transmit the right signals, so instead he lolled, chin on neck, ear to shoulder. Patrick recognised Veel within himself. I know you're there, he thought clearly enough for Veel to understand it. I am on your side.

  She will kill you either way. I am so sorry.

  It's ok, replied Patrick. Then, faintly: We had fun didn't we?

  Veel wanted to weep.

  'Hey, focus, little ape.' She snapped her fingers, bringing Patrick's attention up to meet her gaze. 'Talk to me.'

  Patrick tried to speak, but oozed saliva instead. She snorted with disgust and sat back to wait for him to regain some control of his body. Patrick delayed the appearance of his recovery as long as he dared. Just as she was becoming impatient with him, he jumped up from the couch, stumbling only a little as his body continued to disobey him.

  She shied away involuntarily, clasping at the metal block in her hand, obviously expecting it to work on him. Patrick did not attack her as Veel expected but ran out of the room.

  'You can't get away!' she shouted after him. Veel could hear her footsteps behind Patrick. His friend entered the kitchen, heading for the knife draw. He was rummaging around as she entered the room. Realising how close she was, he grabbed the longest knife he could find before spinning around to brandish it in her direction.

  Veel tried to tell Patrick that the woman in front of him was nothing more than a projection covering the real creature underneath, a hulking brute of a special agent from the Elun empire, whose gender was as irrelevant as her strength, speed and intelligence were superior to Patrick's.

  You misunderstand me, thought Patrick.

  She opened her mouth to say something, but instead stood there in stunned silence, watching with wide open eyes as Patrick stuck the point of the knife against one eyeball and pushed with all his strength into that soft jelly.

  Veel reeled with the shock as his connection to Patrick was literally severed.

  ***

  His parts took two days to collect themselves in central Manchester, in the United Kingdom. During that time, Veel decided he was going to fight her. After all, she's alone out here while I have the advantage of choosing the battlefield, time and method of our engagement.

  His host in Manchester was Sas, whose ancestors had, just two generations ago, travelled half way across the world from a warm and fertile land to make a new life in what was, by any definition, a wet, cold grubby landscape full of people whose heads were bowed against the studiedly uncertain weather.

  Sas booked three rooms in a hotel above Manchester Piccadilly station then waited for his other parts, Qing Li and Mercy Adebayor, to arrive. Veel provided for Sas' physical needs through work as a freelance translator; they brought the technical manual he was working on to pass the time.

  When they arrived he checked out Manchester city centre, using all three of his remaining parts to explore the urban landscape.

  The station itself represented his best opportunity, a huge warehouse somehow erected out of the ruins of a much older stone building. A large concourse laid with modern materials echoed regardless of the number of people crowding it while high ceilings and stark lighting lent it a tenuous concert hall feeling. The station was so well lit it was impossible to tell the time of day, unless one ventured onto the platforms where, inexplicably, not a single brick or pillar had been physically touched for a hundred years.

  Coffee shops dominated the edge of the internal square, dotted here and there with temptations for the hurried traveller such as news agents and greetings-card sellers. Veel spent several hours wandering the station in each of his parts, one always using station CCTV to keep an eye on the perimeter in case he'd underestimated the Elun agent's ability to find him. He felt he was well hidden for the time being, and that sense of space permitted him time to plan.

  When he was done, having run over his plan several times, stopping once or twice to consider what he'd do if he survived, he let slip in the right places online where he might be found. He worked hard to ensure he didn't make it too easy to find.

  It took a day for her to arrive, stalking into the station from the city side rather than arriving by train. He'd spent that day awakening technology he had reconstituted over the decades but had hoped to never need to use. The most useful piece scanned her from head to foot, giving him a read-out of her ordinance.

  She was well prepared, carrying enough firepower to level half the city. He doubted she'd be so off track as to deploy even a fraction of it, yet her commitment, her caution, gave him pause. He couldn’t help wondering if she could have any idea of what he had prepared for her. He forced himself to stop worrying. If she did know then he'd only end up as she'd planned anyway. If she didn't know, well the odds were still in her favour, not his.<
br />
  He allowed her to see Qing Li, idling near the centre of the station. Before she could approach, Qing drifted towards one of the coffee shops, where she sat down at an empty table. Sas remained on the far side of the concourse, only stepping away from the wall where he'd been half hidden when the Elun made for Qing.

  'Where are the other two?' asked the Elun, not waiting for an answer before seating herself opposite Qing. Qing shrugged.

  'I will level this entire station if I have to. They can't be far away. Humanity is so dense they'll blame one of their own.'

  'You're going to enslave this entire people anyway. What does that matter to me?' The Elun pursed her lips but didn't speak; instead craning her neck to make sure she wasn't being crept up upon. Humans milled around, a waiter of African descent came and went, cleaning the table next to them with a tired, oblivious efficiency.

  'When I'm done with you, I'll let your people know of your failure,' said Qing.

  'Oh,' said the Elun. 'Is that the best you've got? You'll tell on me? I'm not acting on my own, I'm just providing those I work for the reasons they need to come here and do what they want to do, regardless. All they need from me is a set of boxes checked.' The Elun laughed, a heartless roar that came up from her belly before crashing around the coffee shop, raising people's heads as they wondered what it was she found so amusing.

  Her admission almost derailed Veel. If dealing with her wouldn't stop the arrival of the Elun, he was lost as to what to do. Just survive was his conclusion.

  Sas came to the table. As he sat, the Elun said, 'Where's your last part?'

  A stranger interrupted their conversation to ask if she could take the last empty chair. Veel stared at this frail, elderly lady, someone he'd never seen before. She carried a plastic bag from which she unpacked sandwiches without looking at any of the people with whom she was sharing a table. A coffee was brought to the table by the waiter. Sas looked at the waiter but said nothing.