Alien Shadows

by Daniel Arenson

  ALIEN SHADOWS

  by

  Daniel Arenson

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  AFTERWORD

  NOVELS BY DANIEL ARENSON

  KEEP IN TOUCH

  CHAPTER ONE:

  THE HOLE IN THE UNIVERSE

  Siyona was walking through the shadowy, twisting corridors of the observatory when she first saw the ghost.

  She had always found Kaperosa Observatory creepy. The station was dark, claustrophobic, a place of sterile hallways, flickering neon lights, and windows gazing out into the unbearable black soul of the galaxy. The observatory was more like a surreal labyrinth than a scientific outpost, Siyona had always thought. The sort of place that trapped you in your nightmares, leaving you to search eternally for an exit that didn't exist. It didn't help that the observatory was marooned on a distant, desolate planet—a sole patch of life on a rock light-years from Earth.

  But worst of all was the view.

  Since Siyona had arrived here, it was that gaping abyss outside the windows that left her always trembling, always glancing over her shoulder, always feeling trapped somewhere between wakefulness and dreams.

  Oh, she had known long before coming that planet Kaperosa orbited a black hole. It was why the observatory even existed. It was why Earth's top scientists flew here. A black hole that was not quite a black hole. A black hole that spewed out inexplicable data as if something was awry within its emptiness, a chunk missing from its shadows, a broken darkness. Yes, that's how she had come to think of it. Broken darkness. An impossible nothingness. Perhaps almost as empty and cold as the place inside of Siyona's chest where her heart had been broken.

  But reading the data back on Earth had been one thing. Coming here to the observatory on rocky Kaperosa, actually gazing into that black hole every day—that was something quite different. Quite too real. Quite too . . .

  "Too broken," Siyona whispered, walking through the corridors that night everything changed. "Too wrong."

  The others had gone to sleep in their quarters. Seventy-three of the galaxy's brightest minds, now at rest. During the artificial days, when the neon lights were brightest, when the sounds of conversations filled the corridors and laboratories, it wasn't too bad. During those days Siyona could almost turn away from the pit outside, almost forget the terror of it. Yet now, at night, the lights were dim. The halls silent. The comfort of other living souls gone from her, leaving her shivering and cold.

  Walking here, there was no buffer between Siyona and the emptiness outside.

  She should have stayed in her quarters, even if she could not sleep. She would have rolled over in bed, pulled out her phone, perhaps watched an episode of Space Galaxy or read a couple technical manuals. Yet she had left her bed, had come here to wander the halls, feeling somehow drawn here, drawn by a presence she could not comprehend.

  She was a scientist. She had always worked on the border of the unknown. She had never feared to gaze into the darkness.

  She kept walking down the corridor. A light flickered above. She rounded a corner, entering the dark lab, and found herself staring out a window . . . and into the thing's gazing, consuming soul.

  Yurei was not a large black hole, not as large as the behemoths in the centers of galaxies. It was no larger than the sun back home. Yet as she stood barefoot on the cold lab floor, staring out into the black eye . . . it consumed Siyona's vision. A black hole that was not a black hole. An emptiness that did not suck in all matter. There was something inside that abyss. Something stuck in that pit like a bone in a glutton's throat. Something that wreaked havoc with their calculations, that made their computers moan in protest. Something invisible. Something that lost its light into the darkness behind it. But what could survive gravity that sucked in light itself, yet remain on the rim of the emptiness?

  A soul, Siyona thought, eyes stinging. A god. A cruel god.

  She shuddered. Foolish thoughts. She was not some superstitious girl. She was an esteemed scientist—young perhaps, yes, and new at Kaperosa, yet a scientist nonetheless. She had not come here to fear the darkness but to study it, to—

  You will worship us.

  Siyona grimaced and doubled over.

  You will weep for our glory.

  Siyona's breath trembled. Her heart pounded against her ribs. Arms wrapped around her stomach, she stared up, stared through the window, stared into the dark eye of the black hole. No, not a black hole. A being. A presence. A god.

  A god I must worship.

  She should not have come here. Not to this lab at night, alone and afraid. Not to this rocky planet. She should have remained on Earth, safe in the light, yet now she was here, light-years from home, afraid, alone. She could not look away from something that was there, something staring at her, something she could not see.

  Yet it could see her.

  She wept.

  When she finally tore her gaze away, it felt like ripping duct tape off her eyeballs. She screamed. At least, she tried to scream—what left her mouth was more of a moan, hoarse, weak, shuddering.

  I can't do this anymore.

  Tears streamed down her cheeks.

  I can't stay in this place of silent halls, of windows, of the darkness outside. I can't stay on this rocky world orbiting this shadow.

  She forced in a shaky breath. Tomorrow she would resign. She would summon a starship, even if it drained her life's savings. She would fly out, leave this place, fly back home. Back to safety. Back to where science made sense, where equations did not break, where a black hole did not stare into your eyes and whisper into your mind.

  She had taken one step toward the door when she saw the ghost in the corner.

  This time Siyona truly screamed.

  It stared at her, a shadow, a shard of darkness, a piece of the god Yurei here within the observatory. A thing of writhing emptiness. Of two red, glaring eyes. Of a shadowy hand that rose, reached to her, grabbed her.

  I never saw the beaches of Kitika, she thought. I never felt sand beneath my bare feet or blue water around me. It's too soon. Too soon.

  He embraced her, a spirit, a torturer, a lover. His darkness spread around her, his red eyes tore into her, and then there was only one eye. Black. Laughing. All-consuming. Siyona's own eyes closed as she vanished into its welcoming emptiness.

  * * * * *

  "That's ridiculous." Lenora leaned back in her chair. "There's no such thing as ghosts."

  "Something grabbed her." Dr. Harris stared at the monitor, clasping his hands on the tabletop. "Something made her vanish. Something we don't understand." The old man turned back toward Lenora, and his voice dropped to a whisper. "Are we so arrogant that we think we understand all forms of consciousness? Are we so confident in our knowledge that we think other types of life cannot exist—even an afterlife?"

  Lenora didn't want to shudder. She wanted to laugh, to dismiss these words, to call them a mere ghost st
ory, a tale best told around a campfire on Earth, not in a scientific facility on the rocky planet Kaperosa, orbiting a black hole. Yet she shuddered nonetheless. And she did not laugh.

  Because a scientist is dead. One of my scientists. Her eyes stung. One of my friends.

  "The soul is nothing but atoms," she whispered. "All we are—thoughts, emotions, memories—only atoms arranged into molecules arranged into our brains. When part of the brain is injured, memories can be lost, personalities can change. When the brain dies, so does the soul. Only atoms. So how can there be an afterlife? How can ghosts be real?"

  Dr. Harris reached across the table and patted her arm. His eyes were mahogany, soft and kind. "I'm sorry, Lenora. I'm sorry you lost your friend. I know no words of comfort for this loss. But I know what I see in this video."

  Lenora turned to look at the monitor. The video was playing in a loop. Again Lenora watched the scene—that scene that shot pain through her, that she could not stop watching.

  Siyona, a young scientist with round glasses and bushy dark hair, stepped into the laboratory. For a moment the woman stared out the window into the darkness, observing the black hole that forever gaped outside. Then—a shadow in the corner. A blur. A black smudge shaped as a man. Red eyes blazed, and a hand reached out, and Siyona seemed to be screaming.

  Then . . . nothing.

  Both of them gone.

  The shadow dispersed, and so did Siyona.

  Lenora closed her eyes. The pain was too real, too great.

  I know all too well what it's like, she thought. To be young, ambitious, a woman seeking to understand the cosmos.

  Lenora was only thirty-four years old, yet already she led Kaperosa Observatory and the seventy-odd souls who lived and worked here. She had begun in darkness—the daughter of a Knight of Sol, a stodgy old man who mistrusted science, who had told her the stars were but a myth. Growing up in Cog City back on Earth, Lenora would look up at the smoggy sky, telling herself that the stars were real, that they truly did shine beyond the muck. At age eighteen, Lenora had escaped her father. She had blasted off Earth, traveled to the Mars Academy, and had finally seen the stars. Finally traveled to the stars themselves—to here, to Kaperosa, to the frontier of the unknown.

  I took Siyona under my wing, Lenora thought. An ambitious girl from a poor family, a girl much like I was. I groomed her, I brought her here . . . and I lost her. I'm so sorry, Siyona.

  The video was replaying again. A scientist in an empty dark lab. A ghost. A silent scream. Then . . .

  "Wait." Lenora paused the video. "Look, Dr. Harris."

  They stared together.

  "What am I looking at?" the elderly scientist said, peering at the monitor. The video had paused just as the ghost was reaching toward Siyona.

  Lenora tapped the monitor. A thin, trembling smile tugged at her lips. "Since when do ghosts have shadows?" She turned toward Harris. "That's not a spirit. That's a life form. That's . . . an alien."

  She rose to her feet so fast her head spun. She took a shuddering breath, and her heart raced.

  "An alien?" Dr. Harris said, frowning at the video.

  "Planet Kaperosa is not empty like we thought." Lenora turned toward the window and stared outside. The rocky planes of this barren world spread outside the observatory. The stars shone above, everywhere but for one dark, gaping pit—the black hole Yurei, the anomaly that broke all their calculations. "We found life here. Life in the shadow of a black hole, no sunlight to warm it, no water or plants to sustain it. Yet life nonetheless." She spun back toward her colleague. "Hostile life."

  Dr. Harris rose to his feet too. The old man's fingers trembled. "We must evacuate. Leave Kaperosa. Return to Earth."

  Lenora shook her head. "No. I will not abandon years of research. I will not let Siyona's death be in vain."

  She pulled her communicator out of her pocket. She stared at the small screen, and another pain filled her chest, another loss.

  Her communicator's wallpaper displayed an old photograph, one taken almost half her life ago, when she had been only eighteen. A photograph of her with the man she loved, the only man she had ever loved. The man she had left.

  Steel Starfire.

  He had been only a youth then too, and joy had still filled him. Now he was older, somber, his smile gone. Now he was an exiled knight. Now he fought with the group of mercenaries who had saved the cosmos twice already—first from the skelkrin onslaught, then from the Singularity.

  And now I need you, Steel, she thought, staring at the face from her past. Now I need you to save me. To save a woman you once loved.

  Lenora began to dial.

  "Who are you calling?" Dr. Harris asked.

  She looked up at him. "The only people who can help us now. The galaxy's most professional, intelligent, and successful team of heroes. I'm calling the Alien Hunters."

  CHAPTER TWO:

  TROUBLE WITH T-REX

  As the mutated Tyrannosaurus rex roared, Riff raised his tranquilizer gun, only to discover that the syringe dart had been emptied.

  Standing at his side, Romy hiccupped. "Tasty." The demon licked her lips, patted her belly . . . then crashed down onto the forest floor.

  The dinosaur bellowed and burst into a run, trampling trees.

  "Romy!" Riff shouted. "Romy, god damn it!" He grimaced and looked over his shoulder at the other Alien Hunters. "Hand me another tranquilizer dart."

  His brother—Sir Steel Starfire, a knight in shining armor—pointed at a pile of emptied syringes. The demon's tooth marks appeared on them all.

  "Oh shenanigans," Riff muttered.

  "Riff, damn it, the dinosaur's coming our way!" Nova shouted. The ashai gladiator pointed. The sunlight gleamed on her blond hair and golden catsuit, and she clutched her electric whip. Her green eyes widened with fear.

  Riff glanced back toward the enraged, mutated beast racing toward him.

  Oh bloody hell.

  "Run!" Riff cried. "Run!"

  He scooped the sleeping Romy into his arms and took off. Steel ran to his right, clanking in his armor. Nova raced to his left, her hair and whip fluttering like banners. Ferns bent around them, and the dinosaur roared behind, its feet shaking the earth with every step. Riff could barely run while holding Romy—the damn demon weighed a ton—but fear gave him the strength to keep going.

  "This was supposed to be an easy job," Nova said. "Easy! Land on the planet. Tranquilize the mutant dinosaur. Airlift it back to the zoo. And you just had to let the demon come along, Riff."

  He groaned, struggling to keep holding said demon as he ran. The dinosaur kept howling behind. Trees cracked. Leaves flew. When Riff glanced over his shoulder, he saw the beast gaining on them, baring fangs longer than his arms.

  "I locked her up in the attic!" Riff shouted back at Nova. "It's not my fault she keeps sneaking out through the heating vents. God knows how she squeezes through. Damn demon weighs more than the dinosaur."

  Romy moaned, held limply in his arms. Her eyes opened to slits, and she gave him a woozy grin. "You know, Riff, you really should try tranquilizing giant dinosaurs instead of running from them." She hiccupped, and then her eyes rolled back, and she drooled in her sleep.

  Riff groaned.

  "Brother, you're slowing down!" Steel cried, running ahead.

  "Ditch the dead weight!" Nova shouted. "Toss the demon to the dinosaur."

  "It'll only whet its appetite!" Riff shouted back.

  The forest sloped toward the distant, misty valley where awaited the HMS Dragon Huntress, starship of the Alien Hunters. A few miles farther, past the mountains, lay the zoo the dinosaur had escaped from.

  Damn fools cloning mutant dinosaurs! Riff thought. Don't they watch old movies? Don't they know this always ends badly?

  Another roar pierced the forest, and foul reptilian breath washed over Riff. When he looked behind him again, the Tyrannosaurus was only a few meters behind.

  The beast was massive. Riff had seen T-rex skeletons in mu
seums—large animals, to be sure, but not much larger than a couple of elephants. But this creature, cloned in a lab and spliced with alien genes, dwarfed those old bones. It stood as large as the starship in the valley; all the Alien Hunters could easily fit in its belly. Shimmering green and purple feathers covered its hide, and its eyes burned with fury. Its arms perhaps were tiny, but its jaws opened wide, strings of saliva dangling between the teeth. Those were jaws large enough to swallow them all.

  "Ooh look!" Romy's eyes fluttered open. "A baby dinosaur. Can I pat it, Mommy?" Her eyes closed again and she snored.

  Riff was suddenly very, very tempted to see if dinosaurs liked eating demons.

  The beast thrust down its neck and snapped its jaws.

  Riff leaped.

  The jaws slammed shut behind him, ripping his T-shirt.

  Riff sailed through the air, still holding Romy in his arms, legs kicking.

  Steel and Nova leaped at his side. They vaulted down the slope, hit the ground hard, and fell. As the dinosaur bellowed, the four Alien Hunters rolled downhill. Riff cried out as rocks and roots slammed into him. Nova cursed as she tumbled, a flash of gold. Steel clanked in his armor. Romy slid downhill while still snoring.

  Dinosaur claws slammed down ahead of Riff.

  He grimaced as he crashed into the scaly foot. At his side, Nova thudded into a tree, and Steel hit a boulder with a shower of sparks and denting metal.

  Romy rose to her feet, stretched out her arms and wings, and yawned magnificently. A few dry leaves crackled in her hair of fire. "Oh my, I'm pooped." The demon blinked. "Hey, guys, look! That dinosaur you were searching for! I found it."

  That dinosaur leaned down, opened its jaws wide, and prepared to swallow Romy whole.

  "Damn it, Romy, fly!" Riff shouted.

  The demon yelped, beat her wings, and rose with a wobble. The dinosaur's jaws snapped shut, narrowly missing Romy. The T-rex reared and opened its mouth again, attempting to catch the fleeing demon.

  "Hey!" Riff shouted. He hurled a rock at the dinosaur. "Over here."