The football player got to his feet with a smile. Kirkpatrick opened the doors and waved her out graciously. Gillian strode confidently over and shook hands with the big man. Marcus London was six foot three. He wore jogging shorts and an open button up shirt. His muscular chest was well tanned as was his handsome face. As always he had his tinted glasses and trademark, black, headband. While shaking hands, she could feel a physical attraction. His maleness was a draw to her, like a magnet to her body’s senses that she had not expected. It quickly passed and she managed to control her blushing and stay focused.
“It is good to meet you, Miss Johnson. I have been a fan for years. Actually since your first article for your college paper, Sports Journal, about the fame of college ball. I could tell you had a good grasp of your craft and your knowledge of the topic was excellent. Thank you for agreeing to do the interview,” he told her. She was surprised. She was usually the one thanking the subject. As she did then.
“You are welcome. I’m the one who should be thanking you, Marcus. I know you don’t do many interviews and I am glad to be here,” she told him honestly. He nodded and gestured to the table. Gillian sat and he poured her an iced tea and one for himself as she got out her notepad and voice recorder. She didn’t turn on the recorder or pick up her pad, not yet.
Gillian believed in taking a few minutes to speak with a subject to learn the flow and vocal tendencies so she had a better grasp of how they were saying something. She had found that it helped guide her questions and glean information she may not otherwise have known was there.
“Thank you for the tea. It is a beautiful home you have here Marcus. I must admit, I thought that out here, in the desert, was a strange place to want a house. Now that I’m here, I can see the attraction. The landscape is beautiful even with the sun's glare. You have managed to create a comfortable atmosphere in what some might call an uninhabitable space,” she told him. It was true. The covered porch kept the direct heat off of them and there was a breeze that came through, easing the heat just enough.
“Thank you, Gillian, may I call you Gillian?” She nodded and smiled. “I like open space. Unobstructed space you could say. When I was traveling through the desert some years ago, I knew it was where I would eventually settle. Even if I had not made it in the NFL, I would have ended up here somehow. It was inevitable,” he told her. She believed him. He was known as a person who got what he went after. Fortunately for her, so was she.
“Does it ever get lonely out here? It must be hard if you want to have a night out with your friends you have to travel so far to get there,” she said. Only realizing after the fact that asking if he got lonely, could be an awkward question to a single man from a single woman. She cursed herself inside for the mistake. She was better than that and wondered what was wrong with her. Suddenly the table shook for an instant and then stopped. Both of them looked around.
“Are there earthquakes in the desert?” She asked.
“Not here. That is very strange,” he said trailing off, looking across the porch to the sand and sagebrush. Gillian could see something approaching. She thought it was a bird and seemed to be moving fast. The table rocked and then the ground began trembling as it got closer very quickly.
“Shit, inside!” Marcus shouted, reaching to grab her hand and yanking her towards the door. Looking over her shoulder as they went she could see it was some kind of aircraft speeding towards them. In a brief instant, she could see a wave of something going into the ground below it and chunks of the earth were being kicked up. Gasping, she stumbled into the mansion and the door was shut and locked. Gillian faced the window, the craft roared closer and then screamed right overhead. The whole patio seemed to erupt from the ground and slammed against the glass. She cried out and jumped back, sure it would engulf them.
***** Alien Attack
“That will not hold against a second pass Marcus. I suggest you go to the bunker,” said the butler Kirkpatrick. Gillian was looking wildly around trying to figure out what the hell was going on. Why didn’t the window shatter?
“You’re right Marcus. I will meet you there,” he said taking Gillian by the hand.
“I am very sorry for this interruption. You are about to learn more than I wanted to reveal but circumstances have forced my hand. We must get to safety, come,” he said and tugged her after him. She might have resisted but the mansion shook again and she found herself running down the wide hallway with the football star. She heard something like a faint explosion and a cloud of dust rolled past them, engulfing them so that she could not see and began coughing.
“This way!” She heard Marcus shout and was towed behind him through a door, then down some stairs. She heard a hissing and a heavy locking sound. The violent crashes that had followed them stopped and the air seemed to clear. Gillian coughed and whipped the dust from her watering eyes.
“What the hell is going on?” She demanded. When she was scared, she got angry.
“You’re not going to believe me, let’s go in here first. It is a long story, well maybe not long, but hard to believe and you will want to sit down,” he told her and she followed him through an airlock type door. She had seen similar in labs. On the other side, there was a large room with big couches and amenities on one side and a bank of computer screens on the other. The door hissed closed and Marcus walked over to the computer, turning things on.
“Can I get you anything Miss Johnson?” He asked her casually.
“Yeah, what the hell is going on? You can answer that,” she said firmly. He turned his head to look at her a moment before gesturing to her. She moved over next to him and he pointed to the screen. She could see his mansion as if from a distance and then could see one of those strange, triangular crafts coming at the house. As it went overhead, she saw the house collapse and then to her horror, her car exploded where it had sat in front of the house. She gasped out.
“Damn it. Do you know how much that cost me?” she fumed.
“Tell me about it. My house is gone,” he said in the same frustrated vein.
“Who are those guys?” Gillian asked. She held her fear back with anger.
“Hm, those guys? Those are what you would call aliens,” he said looking at his computer screens. She realized then that she did not recognize the language of the words or the letters on the keyboard.
Aliens, she thought. The guy was nuts, she told herself, but she had a feeling in the pit of her stomach that it was more than that. He turned to look at her and she realized his glasses were gone. His eyes sparkled and seemed to be whirling with purple flecks of light. She could not stop the question that came out of her.
“What are you?” She asked.
“I am an alien too,” he told her. She didn’t know what to say. She watched as he turned back to the computers and cursed under his breath. Frustrated with something, she saw him run his hand through his hair and pull his headband off. She was startled to see he had pointed ears. They were delicate and looked like a fantasy artist’s drawing of elf ears, beautiful, yet definitely not human. She watched as they twitched. He turned, noticed the direction of her gaze and sighed.
“I know you don’t believe in aliens and I would rather you got to hold that belief. Unfortunately, events have transpired to prove you wrong. So why don’t we…” he was interrupted as the bunker shook and rumbled. Kirkpatrick came rushing in from a door along the wall of computer screens.
“They are using the sonic disruptor on the complex Marcus. It will not remain stable, we will need to vacate shortly,” he advised and nodded politely to Gillian before turning around and calmly walking back out. The room began to shake even more and Gillian was really beginning to get scared. Nothing was making sense, yet the feeling of immense danger was very present in the room.
“Did he mean this place is going to collapse?” She asked and hated the shakiness of her voice.
“Yes, he does. Fortunately, we have several options to choose from,” Marcus told her while closing do
wn his computer systems. When he was done, he looked at her for a long moment.
‘I am truly sorry about this Gillian; I will try and explain when we get to a place of safety. I will give you a real interview then, come on,” he finished, taking her hand and leading her through the door Kirkpatrick had come through. The way the rumbling of the ground was increasing, she did not feel like she had a choice but to follow.
This room was circular with five doors around the perimeter. Each was a different color. There was a green one straight across from where they now stood. A blue one to the right of it and a red one to the left. On either end to were two that had strange looking bolts on them plus what looked like palm locks from sci-fi movies. Marcus gestured to the three doors without the bolts.
“You can choose our destination Gillian. Any of these three should buy us some time to figure out what is going on and what to do. A little breathing room, you could say. Which of those three suits your fancy?” He asked as they both staggered slightly when the ground shook again.
She quickly pointed to the green door, mostly because it was straight ahead. He nodded and they went forward, stumbling over the shaking floor. He touched a panel, the door opened and then they fell through. Immediately the ground was no longer shaking and she could smell vegetation and moisture. Gillian spun around, letting go of Marcus’s hand in shock.
She was in a jungle. Thick, green leafy brush and trees were all around. She saw a brightly colored bird, several actually, in the branches. She could see through the door they had come through and watched it begin filling with smoke. The door shimmered and faded from sight and she was looking at jungle on the other side. She was shocked and amazed. Gillian turned to Marcus.
“Nice choice Gillian. Let’s get inside for now until we can determine if it is safe in this part of the world,” he said walking off towards a large hut with shuttered windows that was about twenty-five yards away. She stood a moment, watching him walk away and looking around at her surroundings.
“What the hell?” She whispered. She was scared again but for different reasons. She very much wanted to deny everything that she was seeing, but she knew that it would not be logical. She was experiencing this. This was not the Arizona desert she had been in minutes before and she knew of no modern technology that could have transported her here so quickly, but obviously something had.
Gillian believed her eyes and ears and they were telling her something beyond extraordinary had occurred to her. The humidity hit her as further proof of her instant change of location. Sweat ran down her spine and she wiped her forehead to keep it out of her eyes. Did that mean Marcus was telling the truth, was he an alien? She asked herself as he turned back and opened the door to the hut. Gillian knew many people who would just turn around and leave this bizarre and dangerous situation. She was not one of them. She was a journalist for a reason. She always had to know, so she followed him into the hut.
***** An Indian Jungle
The little hut was bigger than it looked from the outside. Like the previous place she had been this one had a section that looked like a comfortable living room with the opposite wall covered in computer screens. There was a hallway that led to the back of the house. Marcus went to the computers and she followed him there, wanting to see what there was to see. Everything was up and running and he pressed a few buttons and the views from all of them changed. Two of them looked like someplace cold and icy. Antarctic maybe, she wondered. Both of those looked like the house in Arizona, there were craters there. There was a cabin in a mountain area that looked peaceful, the place they were in and another on a beach somewhere. All of those seemed fine. She could see the remains of the Arizona place and it was completely wiped out.
“How is it, that something like that could happen and no one notice? We have satellites and other military devices that should detect an explosion of that sort,” she said. He looked at her and she noticed his eyes were whirling with green flecks of color now.
“Not this technology it wouldn’t. Not to sound too condescending, but earth’s technology is pretty minor compared to the rest of us. I was sent here to survey and it was one of the first things I noticed. It does make it easy for me to get around, you must admit,” he said with a slight smile.
“I would think looking so much like us would be a big asset too,” she told him. She did not like the reminder that she was dealing with someone from another planet. It went against everything she thought she had known, but the evidence was right in front of her and he could not bring herself to deny it. In the back of her mind, she wondered why that was.
“Well yeah, but between glasses, colored contacts as well as a headband, it is a juggling act. Not that I mind much since it works so well in that respect,” he answered watching her reactions the same way she had been watching his when they met.
“If you are a Surveyor, who did that?” She asked pointing to the crater in the desert. He glanced over and winced.
“I am not sure. It could be one of several groups. I can’t know until I can get some communications up and running that won’t be traced. Once that is done, I can find out and deal with it. Fortunately, this is one of the places I set aside specifically for safety. No one knows about it and it is the last place anyone of my people would go looking for me. We are safe here for at least a few days I would think,” he said looking back at her with a handsome smile. It was annoying to her that an alien was so damned good looking. Frustrated, she took off her jacket and slung it over the back of a chair. It was too damn hot, she thought to herself.
“So when can I go home?” she said to see his reaction. She was not ready to go anywhere until she learned more about what was going on.
“That could be difficult. I have specific transfer points, just a small handful. Everything else is regular earth transportation and I hate to tell you this, but we are in India at the moment. Far from any village, I am afraid. I did not ever expect to have company when or if I ever had to come here. Once I find out how things look I will find a way to get us closer to civilization and get you back home, I promise. I won’t strand you anywhere,” he said. Gillian actually saw worry in his eyes for the first time since the whole adventure started. He was concerned for her and for a brief moment that gave her a warm feeling deep inside.
“Okay then, we are stuck here for the time being. How long before you can get communications and find out what the hell is going on?” Gillian asked.
“I am not sure; I am waiting to hear from…” he stopped as Kirkpatrick came into the room with a rolling cart of food.
“It will be tomorrow morning. I set the programs to install but it will take until then for the system to be ready to go. I brought some food and drink for you both. I apologize Miss Johnson, but we do not have regular earth food in this safe house. I had the food design machines replicate American cuisine though and I think it is pretty close to what I was brought up on. I would be careful of the wine. It can sneak up on you,” he said with a kind smile. Gillian’s eyes widened.
“You are from here?” She asked surprised. He seemed to know too much to not be an alien.
“Oh yes. I am from Toledo Ohio. I learned my assistant trade and had a few pointers from an actual British butler. Mr. London had no idea that to do my job correctly I learn all I can about my boss, to better assist him. I think we were both surprised at how much I learned,” he said with a joking look in his eye as he glanced at Marcus. Marcus smiled and nodded.
“Very surprised, especially when he decided to stay on as my assistant. He is a life saver, though, as you have seen. I am lucky to have him. Have you heard anything interesting?” Marcus asked.
“Indeed Marcus. Social media is going haywire as usual. In this case, they actually have a reason. Some fans had been driving out to find your home and came upon a smoking crater not more than ten minutes ago. They Instagrammed the image and their shock was reported there and on twitter. Now, of course, theories abound and I believe the authorities are on
their way to the ranch,” he said and bowed his way out. Gillian was not surprised at social media’s response but curious.
“How are you going to explain that away?” She asked the sports star. He shrugged, starting at his lunch.
“Not much I can do really. My agent and several others knew I was home so I guess I am out of the football game for good. Hopefully, you can convince everyone you had not arrived at the ranch yet and so avoided the explosion. I have no idea what they will blame it on, but I am quite hopeful you can avoid any fallout, my dear,” he told her. That had not occurred to her. Her stomach rumbled and she bent to her food, thinking and quieting her hunger.
If she couldn’t come up with a story, she would be considered dead, she did not want that. Her job and acquaintances would be going ape shit trying to figure out what happened to her. She would like to say friends, but she really did not have any, work acquaintances were about as close as she got. Her parents had passed a long time ago, so at least there was no family that would be put through the worry. No matter how short lived she meant the worry to be. She began feeling better as she ate. If it was not American food she couldn’t tell and was glad for the familiarity of something that tasted of beef stew. A sudden thought came to mind and she voiced it.
“Ok so how many innocents are going to be hurt in this confrontation do you think?” She asked. He was startled.
“None, we are not barbaric. As far as I can tell those were fringe ships. They have a problem with surveyors, thinking we contaminate local species. In some cases, they had become militant. That is what I think has happened. Like I said, I will not know for sure until I can safely communicate. If that is the case, then I am the only target and harming a human being would be absolutely repulsive to them. They believe they are protecting you from me.
“I would never have agreed with them before, but thinking about it… well, the world now has a mystery around a football player who got blown up. I have a human butler and a reporter who know what I am. Perhaps they are right and I have contaminated the population. It is something I will have to think hard about when I get you home and safe. As a surveyor, my one big mandate is to not harm any local sentient beings. I have been very sure about that.” He said. She could tell how sincere he was and believed him. It was a relief to her and she released some tension she had not known she had. She sipped her wine and then raised it as a toast.
THE HEALING HEART Page 90
