Orbs IV_Exodus_Post Apocalyptic Science Fiction Survival Thriller

by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  Now there would be only dark.

  She wouldn’t let him die in vain.

  “Go,” he said.

  A tear fell from her eye. She pushed herself up, ran back into the hallway, and made her way toward the back door. When she reached the exit, she pushed it open and checked the street.

  It was clear, and the radio tower was just two blocks away. She set off on the sidewalk, changing her rifle’s magazine as she ran.

  The crack of gunfire burst out behind her. Walker lasted several more minutes, just enough time for her to get to the tower before the din of the shots faded away.

  At the base of the tower, she threw the sling of her rifle over her back and pulled the communication device from her belt. Then she grabbed a rung, looked up, and started climbing.

  ***

  ENTRY 10001

  DESIGNEE – AI ALEXIA

  I finish a scan of the robots I reconstructed. They are all actively patrolling the air-ducts and other entries into the Biosphere. The bots outside the mountain continue to scan for Organics. None have spotted anything unusual.

  I check the feed from J-PP1, a cleaning robot I’ve retrofitted with a video camera. The bot moves on tracks like a tank, crunching over the dry, rocky terrain around the mountain. Views of Colorado Springs show an increasingly brown and arid landscape. Spindly trees, yellow foliage, and sage tumbling across the cracked dirt are a common sight out there.

  I switch from the J-PP1’s feed to the most advanced robot I still have access to. Lolo. The NTC satellite orbiting Earth is currently in a perfect position to observe the ships docked at the platform in the Atlantic. I’m calling this one Staging Area 19, as I’ve found more than eighteen of these massive landing pads in what remains of the Earth’s oceans.

  There are two dozen drones patrolling the platform, all within the same combat interval of a quarter mile. It’s quite remarkable how much security they have at these locations, considering the state of the human race. This tells me they are protecting something very important.

  But what I’m really interested in is the fighter jets sitting on the tarmac. I zoom in for a better look. Unlike most of the teardrop-shaped alien craft, these have two wings and a dorsal fin, like some sort of predatory fish. There is a cockpit, and doors on both the port and starboard sides.

  For the first time, I see the pilots. They are what the humans call Sentinels, best described as a mix between a reptile and a human. Spiked tails slither behind thick torsos as the pilots walk around their aircraft, apparently waiting for orders. I wish I knew who was giving them. My best guess is that the multi-dimensional overlords have some sort of AI like myself that controls their minions. Perhaps they use the nanobots they infected Doctor Winston and Lieutenant Smith with?

  I continue watching, while filtering through other feeds. A sensor detects an incoming transmission, and I switch to the comm system. I’m overly cautious about transmissions due to the threat of Organics hacking into my interface, but this one is legitimate. I trace it to the same location I sent to Athena two days earlier. The corporal is right on time.

  “I hope your intel is good, Alexia,” she says. “I lost a good man today to get here.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss, Corporal.” It is hard for me to understand death, even with my advanced programming, but I can tell by the tone of Athena’s voice that this one has hit her hard.

  “I’ve been working on finding a way off the planet for you and your crew, as well as other survivors scattered across the world. I’ve been in contact with multiple groups. One of them isn’t far from your location, only about one hundred and twenty miles, at Pelican Air Force Base.”

  “That’s a hell of a long ways on foot through enemy territory,” Athena says.

  “You won’t have to go on foot. I’m sending you the coordinates of an underground parking facility five miles from your location, as well as the location of Pelican Air Force Base.”

  “Wouldn’t the pulse have knocked them out during the first day of the invasion?”

  “It’s possible some of the vehicles are deep enough below ground that they might still work.”

  “What are the odds?” Athena says. “If I’m going to risk it, I want to know.”

  “I put them at forty-nine percent.”

  “Suppose we do manage to get some, and drive one hundred and twenty miles to meet up with this other group of survivors. Then what?”

  I take a split second to look back at the images from Lolo. A Sentinel climbs into the cockpit of an aircraft and takes off from the platform. By the time I respond to Athena, the fighter is soaring west over the draining ocean.

  “I have a plan,” I say. “A plan that will get you off this planet and to Mars with the others.”

  END ENTRY

  ***

  Emanuel stood at the front of the med bay. The air hissing through the ventilation ducts still carried the odor of charred plastic and hot metal. He couldn’t bring himself to sit, like the others. Bouma, Ort, Diego, and Holly were seated at a table in the middle of the med bay, surrounded by empty patient beds. Visions of the cryostat fluid running out had filled his head with dark thoughts.

  All he could see were images of Sophie lying, gasping for air, on the Sunspot’s deck.

  Jeff and David sat near the cryo chambers, as if guarding the other children. The duo had been bruised in the attack, but had come out of the crash otherwise okay.

  Bouma had already tried to usher them out of the med bay, but they’d insisted on staying. Jeff wanted to know what was going to happen next. Back on Earth, after they’d first found Jeff and David, Emanuel might’ve demanded the kids leave the room so the adults could do the talking. He wanted to shield them as much as he could from the darkness plaguing their reality. But any innocence Jeff and David once had was left behind on Earth. They had done their duty defending the Sunspot, and they deserved a place at the metaphorical table as much as any other crew member here.

  Pacing, Emanuel stared at the cryo chamber where Sophie was suspended. She had always wanted to get to Mars. It had been her goal to make it to Hoffman’s colony since the beginning. Emanuel had promised her they would make it. When he had loaded her into the chamber three months ago, he had thought he could actually make good on that promise. It turned out that he had indeed gotten her to Mars, but there was no way she’d live to see Hoffman’s colony with the leaking cryostat tanks.

  “We need to get to that crashed biosphere ship,” Emanuel said. “If we don’t, Sophie dies.”

  “Tell me where, and I’ll head out,” Bouma said eagerly.

  Emanuel nodded. “Good. We don’t have time to lose.”

  Diego’s gaze shifted as he looked to Emanuel. “We’ve got a hell of a deadline, but we’ve got to be realistic. Sonya said that ship is sending out some kind of damaged SOS. I don’t think I need to explain what that means.”

  “Rushing into a ship that might be full of Organics without a plan is not the best idea,” Ort agreed.

  Heat rushed to Emanuel’s face. “We don’t have a choice. Sophie is going to die if we don’t get that cryostat fluid.”

  “Doc is right,” Bouma said.

  “I won’t dispute that,” Diego said, holding his hands up. “But we’ve got to be rational. That other ship was knocked down by Organics, just like we were. We run in there to go get cryostat fluid for Sophie, we could all end up dead. That won’t help her.”

  Emanuel palmed the table. “You want to just let her die?”

  “Not at all,” Diego said. “I’m just saying we’ve got to think this through. We can’t sacrifice all of us for one of us. Not if that also means sacrificing our mission of finding the rest of humanity on Mars. I’m all for launching a scavenging operation, but we need better intel before blindly leaping out there.”

  Ort let out a harumph of agreement.

  “You’re in charge of this mission, and I’ll go out there if you order it,” Diego continued. “But I want you to at least c
onsider whether your judgment is being compromised by your relationship with Doctor Winston, or if you truly think this is the best thing for our mission.”

  Emanuel stiffened. He took a deep breath, and tried to revert to an expression of measured calmness. “It’s not just about Sophie. We also took heavy damage to the cargo hold. We need more food and water if any of us are going to survive.”

  Ort seemed to consider that for a moment. “Sonya, can you give us an exact timeframe on how long our remaining supplies will last?”

  The AI’s soothing voice answered back. “If you follow the prescribed rationing plan I have created, one week is it. But if you stretch it an uncomfortable amount, and do not mind some considerable physical discomfort, you can extend your survival to three point five weeks.”

  Diego gave Emanuel a look that burned through his skull. The soldier said nothing. He didn’t have to, and he knew it.

  Emanuel pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes. He let out an exasperated breath. Maybe Diego was right. He was letting his feelings for Sophie affect his judgment. They were in enemy territory here. Hell, the whole solar system seemed to be enemy territory now. He and the others couldn’t afford to act rashly. They would pay dearly for any mistakes.

  He turned away to recompose himself. There was so much at stake he could hardly focus, from Sophie’s life to the future of humanity. He begrudgingly had to admit Diego wasn’t entirely wrong. It was impossible for him to untangle Sophie’s survival from his preferred course of action, but he owed it to Diego to hear the man out. After all, he was the only military officer among them.

  “Tell me, Diego, how would you approach the situation?” Emanuel asked.

  “In a perfect world, I’d send out a couple of scouts. We’d observe the downed ship for two or three days.”

  A couple of days is all Sophie has left. Emanuel wanted to say it, but he bit back the words.

  “We’d scout the area, looking for signs of Organics both inside and outside the ship, while identifying potential entry and exit points. If there were no Organics, we’d go in. If there were Organics, we’d track their numbers to see if it’s a battle we could fight.”

  “And if it wasn’t?” Emanuel asked.

  “We’d look for a way to relieve the ship of supplies while avoiding Organics.”

  Emanuel slumped into a seat across from Diego. “How long would all this take?”

  Diego’s eyes went up for a second as he tallied the numbers in his head. “If we’re quick, we can make a reasonable effort to scout the ship and come up with a good plan of incursion in five, maybe even four, days. Plenty of time, given our remaining supplies.”

  “But not enough time for Sophie.” Emanuel stood up and walked away from the table. “Look, I’ll go out there alone. I don’t expect all of you to risk your lives for her, but I can’t let her die. That wrecked ship can’t be that much different than ours, so I’ll know where to look. And if I can just grab a few liters of cryostat fluid, it’ll keep Sophie alive long enough for you to do all your scouting and recon.”

  “That’s suicide,” Ort said.

  “It’s only suicide if there are actually Organics,” Emanuel said. “And besides, I have a better chance of surviving if it’s just me. One person is a lot harder to detect than a whole squad.”

  “No way, Doc,” Bouma said, standing. “If you go, I go. I owe Sophie that much.”

  Holly pushed herself up from her seat. “Give me a rifle and armor. I owe Sophie my life. We all do. We can’t give up on her. She wouldn’t give up on us.”

  Diego and Ort looked at each other.

  “I don’t know about this,” Ort said, his deep voice rumbling. He exhaled slowly. “A scientist, a marine, and a psychologist walk into a crashed NTC ship. There’s probably a joke in there somewhere, but the punchline doesn’t turn out good for any of them.”

  Jeff raised his hand from the back of the room, speaking for the first time. “I’ll go.”

  “Me too,” David chimed in.

  Diego folded his arms across his chest and leaned back in his chair. “You know, I’ve spent a few months on this ship with you people, and I still haven’t come to fully appreciate how insane you all are.”

  Emanuel waited for the soldier’s adamant protest against their actions. He knew it was foolish, crazy even, to think they could save Sophie. But hadn’t everything they’d done since the Organics attacked been some insane moonshot plan? Surviving in Cheyenne, using the RVAMPs, flying to Mars…

  “Look,” Diego said, pointing to Jeff and David. “Those kids are staying put, and so is the psychologist. Doctor, if you want to throw yourself in harm’s way, be my guest. But I’d prefer if you didn’t. This is a job for armed professionals.” He stood, then gestured to Bouma and Ort. “If the whole crew is going to go out there against our better judgment, then I’d be derelict in my duties as an NTC soldier if I let kids go out there. We’ll get into that ship today, and we’ll get those supplies.”

  — 4 —

  Captain Noble couldn’t get the words out of his mind. The multi-dimensional alien had spoken to him through some sort of telepathic communication. Or was that just his imagination?

  He wasn’t sure what was real anymore. He’d been isolated for so long that he yearned for any kind of contact. He simply couldn’t endure the mental and physical pain of being alone much longer.

  Sitting with his knees pulled up to his chest, he examined his frail body. His once defined chest muscles were gone, his chest now nothing more than skin clinging to his ribs. Long, matted hair clung to his chiseled jaw, and he reached up to feel his thinning beard.

  The coiled cord feeding him nutrients was just barely keeping him alive. He could feel and see himself wasting away.

  But somewhere inside, he believed he was still alive for a reason. He was one of only a few human survivors. Maybe the only human survivor…

  This was the first time the thought had crossed his mind, and it chilled him to the core. Billions had perished, and if he was the only person left, then he had to keep fighting. Curling up in a fetal position and dying was not what humans did. He wasn’t going to disrespect his species by giving up.

  Part of him doubted he was the last of his kind, especially after seeing the Sunspot launch from Offutt Air Force Base during Operation Redemption. He thought of Doctor Winston and her crew often, wondering if they had made it past the Organic defenses on their way to Mars.

  He wasn’t a religious man, but he did find himself praying they reached the NTC colony. Perhaps there was still hope for humanity there.

  Letting out a sigh, he looked up at Ribbit and then down at Roots. The aliens were both sleeping in their orbs. They too seemed to have a desire to keep living, even in these horrid conditions. He wondered what had happened to their species, and their homeworlds.

  While he hadn’t been able to speak to his odd-looking friends, their presence helped ease the sense of loneliness. He imagined it was a lot like how prisoners back on Earth had felt about a pet mouse, cat, or even a plant.

  Noble crawled across the floor to the other side of his orb, and angled his head to look down, past Roots, at the hundreds of orbs lining the bulkhead wall. There had to be thousands of prisoners inside the ship.

  He scanned the chamber, looking for the multi-dimensional aliens. He’d spent countless hours, days—hell, he had no idea how much time—waiting for someone to give him some answers.

  Standing in his orb, he decided to try something different. “Hey!” he yelled. “Come talk to me again!”

  Ribbit and Roots both stirred in their orbs and moved to get a better look at him. Croaking reverberated from above, and a cracking sound came from below as Roots swayed all four branch-like arms.

  “Come on, everyone!” Noble shouted. “Make some noise!”

  Other strange voices joined his cry. Screeching, chirps, and what sounded like barking followed, drowning out his own shouts.

  “Yeah, that’s right.
Let’s tell these alien freaks who’s boss,” Noble said. He held in a breath, exhaled, and then, at the top of his lungs, screamed, “LET US OUT OF HERE!”

  The cacophony of ethereal wails and alien voices blended together in a chorus that sent adrenaline rushing through his veins. But the warmth quickly turned to ice when he heard a strangely familiar voice.

  This time it wasn’t in his head. It sounded… human.

  He wasn’t alone after all. There was another human on this ship!

  He moved over to the edge of his wall, his face so close to it his matted beard stood up from the static electricity generated by the force field. Eyes flitting, and ears perked, he looked and listened for the source of the voice.

  Noble pulled on the tube connecting him to the bottom of the orb as he moved around for a better look. But just as he began to scan the western side of the chamber, he saw something that took his breath away.

  Four sinewy multi-dimensional entities sparkled into view. They fanned out in different directions. The dull ringing that followed their presence silenced the prisoners.

  Everyone but Noble.

  He shouted louder this time. “Who’s out there? If you can hear me, tell me your name!”

  One of the multi-dimensional entities blinked in and out as it crossed the chamber toward his orb, but the captain wasn’t deterred.

  “Please!” he yelled. “Please tell me your name!”

  The only answer was the ringing noise. Every single prisoner remained silent.

  The presence of the multi-dimensional overlords had them all spooked, and Noble began to feel the chill of fear as one of them halted outside the blue wall separating him from the black void beyond. He took a step back as it reached out with a blue limb that spun like a drill toward the orb. The wall peeled back, opening a doorway.

  Cold air rushed into his cell, and his hair stood up on his naked flesh. The spinning drill bit solidified into a needle, and continued toward his face.