Page 13 of Alien God

“Rance still ow air!”

Thank God. They must have been clear of the avalanche where they’d been working further along the hill. I should have stayed with them!

Then came another voice I knew. A voice I hated.

“I don’t... Life sigh!”

He doesn’t see my life sign.

Shit! Sometimes physical barriers could prevent a good reading on a life sign, especially when using the small, weaker scanners we took out into the field. The snow was hiding my life sign.

I fought to keep my dismay under control, listening harder. Major Corey was saying something else.

“Eez prolly ed! We’re ot! Tha shi... eve out us!”

That what? That shit? That shiv?

That ship?

Out us...

Without us.

They’re leaving.

Min-Ji screamed something else, or maybe it was Suvi this time, but I didn’t catch it. I was too busy taking the deepest fucking breath I’d ever taken in my life. If I could hear them from outside, if I yelled loud enough, maybe they’d hear me, too.

Just as I opened my mouth, another explosion rang out, terrific and terrible. It cut off my scream and made my snowy house of cards quiver alarmingly around my head. More explosions followed, and I lost track of how many there were or how many minutes ticked by. By the time the reverberations died down, there were no more voices outside. No more gunfire from what I could tell, either.

And the sound of engines...

Was quieter. Getting quieter every fucking second until I couldn’t hear anything outside at all.

I tried to lie to myself. Tried to tell myself that maybe it just sounded quieter because more snow had drifted around me. Or maybe because my own frantic heartbeat was drowning out everything else.

But I knew, deep in my snow-buried bones I knew, that they had left. Left the atmosphere.

Left me.

The ship was gone.

But what was even worse?

The thing that had hauled itself out of the sky, caused the explosions, and forced an entire military crew into retreat despite weapons and shields and machinery...

Was probably still fucking here.

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