The general told them about Oleksii. They wanted to meet the Russian genius who’d managed to break into the BlueStar satellites. They needed to look over the data.
But General Tarkin also told them about something else. Rick Frost, the infamous cast out from the Olympus Mons mission, was on the way. Apparently he’d found an orb in South Dakota. An orb that wasn’t human in origin.
SpaceForce was communicating with Russian and Chinese space command centres by this time. The orb Rick Frost found was one among many.
Two SpaceForce officials were escorting Rick and what was left of the object back to SpaceForce command. They would be arriving any minute.
If that object was somehow related to the objects in the sky, they would need to study it.
Before meeting Oleksii, John turned to Chris. “Is Sharon going to be alright?”
The two hadn’t talked about Sharon over the past two days. It was the one topic too sensitive to talk about in any rational way. But the whole world seemed irrational at that moment.
“She’s left Houston,” Chris said. “But she’s stuck in traffic. Seems like everybody on the damn planet is scared. I don’t blame them. She said she’ll call when she gets close to Nevada.”
“Good.” He despised Chris, for the most part, but he still had feelings for Sharon. He wanted to know she was safe.
The two men met with Oleksii and started to go over the data. There wasn’t much, but it was all they could do.
At least, it was all they could do until Rick arrived.
Maybe that strange orb he’d found would be the key to all of this.
—
Rick Frost
SpaceForce Command Center, Las Vegas, Nevada
Rick looked at the SpaceForce Command campus at they pulled up. He’d never seen it so busy.
People holding tablets were running in and out, from building to building. Rick knew why. He’d heard the reports on the radio in the car as they made their way down from South Dakota. Invasion.
Little green men from some far off planet. At least that’s what the news said.
After they parked, a team of SpaceForce officials, some scientists, some soldiers ran up to them. They wanted to see what was left of the object. They pulled out the pieces and brought it to a lab. Rick followed closely, Domino stayed by his side the whole time.
As he made his way into the main building, he was greeted by General Tarkin.
Tarkin knew his father well. They had served in the second Iraq war together. That was a long time ago now.
“You look like shit, Rick,” the general said, extending his arm to shake Rick’s hand.
“Thanks, general.” Rick ignored the general’s hand.
“They don’t allow dogs in here.” The general looked down at Domino.
“Are you serious?” Rick looked at the general with a face of disgust. You would think they’d have bigger things to worry about than protocol concerning a dog.
“Fine. Take the dog. Tell me about the orb you found out in a South Dakota cornfield. Why didn’t you call us right away?”
“I thought it was of human origin. I was going to sell it for scrap.”
The general laughed. “If only your father could see you now. He’d be ashamed.”
“He was already ashamed. I haven’t changed.”
The general was busy and didn’t have time for a tit for tat with Rick. He told Rick that he was to speak to two scientists, one from NASA, one from MIT. They’d want to question him about the orb. They’d want to know how it exploded. Rick said he’d do whatever he had to do.
He made his way into the building, Domino followed him in.
It had been an hour since he arrived. Rick and Domino were holed up in a small, dimly lit office. It felt more like a cell.
General Tarkin walked in. The general was holding a document labelled classified.
Rick got up, but the general signalled him to stay seated.
“Sit down, son. You’re going to need a second to process this. That orb,” the general said. “The thing you found that exploded…”
“What about it?” Rick interrupted. The general was speaking to him in an unusual manner, as if he was about to apologize for something.
“We’ve had reports about an object like that before. It was during the Olympus Mons mission. It was from your father. We thought he was crazy. What he was describing, it… it didn’t make sense.”
Rick’s head began to race. His breath escaped his lungs. “What are you saying?”
“That thing you found is probably the same thing that disrupted the Olympus Mons mission.” The general threw the classified document on Rick’s lap. “That’s an account of what happened to your father up there without any of the redactions. You deserve to see it.”
“But you all said he went crazy. You said the crew went crazy.”
“We thought he did. We didn’t know what to say to the media, Rick. We needed to think of something to explain the deaths of twenty-four good men and women.”
Rick looked down at the document. He wanted to scream.
Epilogue
Rick Frost’s Diary Entry #1125
Just hours after they arrived, they started to attack.
We barely had time to figure out what the hell was going on. I barely had time to process the news about my father.
After I found out the truth, I wanted to leave SpaceForce, but I couldn’t. Everything was shut down. The only way out, the only way I could leave that building was to join the ranks of a small group of SpaceForce soldiers on their way to Los Angeles. My friend, Sam Matters, was among them. They were going to fight the machines. It was the only way out. So I grabbed a rifle and joined them.
To be honest, I wanted to die.
I left Domino with the two scientists, John and Chris. Dom was safer there. They stayed at SpaceForce Command to study the remains of the metallic orb I found in the cornfield.
They’re all probably dead now.
Five years later, I relive those events every day.
My father wasn’t crazy.
The classified report detailed that the Olympus Mons crew had encountered those metallic orbs. They tried to study them. They managed to bring one into the ship.
SpaceForce and NASA didn’t believe them because the orbs disrupted their communications. They didn’t have any visual proof.
They thought the crew had gone crazy.
But they hadn’t. They hadn’t gone crazy at all.
They had been the first to see.
And it cost them their lives.
It took about a month for the machines to exterminate half the Earth’s population. We didn’t put up much of a fight.
After that first month, communication links between countries began to break down. Our civilization fell apart. One month. That’s all it took.
Since then, I’ve been helping a group of survivors stay alive. We’re running out of food though. We will have to leave our camp soon and find a new place.
Earlier this morning, a member of our reconnaissance team found a family hiding out in the woods. They were dirty, like they’d been surviving for years out there.
How the hell did they do it?
It was a woman and her two teenage kids.
She looked familiar. Where do I know her from?
Hearing that they survived for years out there gave me hope.
Hope that we can fight back and survive.
But that’s all it is now. Just hope.
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The Fermi Paradox Page 7
