Page 6 of Alien Desire
Occasionally, from the corner of my eyes, I see a flitting movement, which I assume must be the others from the pack of dogs. They are quick and I fail to obtain a proper look at them. I suppose I should count my blessings that they leave me alone. They never come close, and Fluffy simply glances at them with disinterest, sniffing the air and huffing.
If the day is stormy, I bunker down and read, fuss over Fluffy or play chess with Sheila. Occasionally I sketch.
At night I eat my dinner, listening to the music from long ago that now seems less strange. Afterwards I stargaze. The pattern across the sky is becoming familiar. Always the same.
Until it isn’t.
On the 171st day of my stranding, I see something new.
A streak of colour rushes across the sky, a ball of neon hues that grows in size. A rumble accompanies its arrival, shaking the ground. The ball streaks towards the ice and a huge flash of light hits the earth, a loud boom exploding into the silence, forcing me to hunker down and cover my ears.
When I stand, I can see fire raging in the distance.
I am no longer alone.
Chapter three - Emma
Could anyone survive an impact like that, I wonder as I race into the garage. Fluffy bounds after me but I shoo him away. He lets out a put-out grunt and sits, watching as I jump up onto the saddle, grabbing the medic pack from a peg on the wall as I do, and rev up the snowmobile.
Am I on my way to discover yet more corpses?
This crash site is in a ninety degree direction to my own. Racing that way sends me over ground I’ve not yet covered. It appears flat to the naked eye, yet the landscape is anything but. I bounce and jerk about on the seat, gripping onto the handle bars for dear life.
The cold, as it pounds over my face, makes my teeth scream with pain and my eyes blur with water that freezes as it slides down my cheeks. I should have worn the snow gear provided at the station. The thick winter snood and a pair of goggles. But I was too desperate to get there. To rescue anyone alive.
If I can help it, I won’t let another person die on this planet.
I am doing it more for me than them. Out of a desperate need for company rather than a moral duty to help. It is selfish and I don’t give a shit.
The fire rages, drawing me closer. Red flames leap into the black night, embers spit, and the ship crackles noisily as it is consumed.
It is smaller than ours — I can tell by the condensed impact site — and the nearer I get, the stranger it appears. The shape, the metal, the smell of burning fuel, are all different to anything I’ve come across before. Even the fire, I discover as I draw up as close as I dare, burns a multitude of rainbow colours in its centre.
I stumble down from my vehicle and stare transfixed, unsure where to start, what to do. Even in the cold, the heat is fierce, and I raise my arms to shield my face as I skitter around the edge of the bonfire.
Panic bubbles up from my chest. My throat constricts.
I can’t help them. I can’t help them.
But I don’t want to be alone. I don’t want to let another person die on this planet.
So I battle forward, marching closer to the flames, determined to beat a path through. The flames whip up around me, smoke fills my lungs and stings my eyes. I choke, and the heat fries my skin.
I retreat backwards, coughing and spitting on the ice, fleeing from the fire and the heat.
There’s nothing to douse this burning inferno, and I can’t fight my way through the flames.
Whoever is trapped in the wreckage will be burned alive. Scorched to a crisp.
I can’t save them. Just like my crewmates. It is useless. I am useless. I ball up my fists and scream, the noise soaring above the fire.
When I stop, there is a low groan in reply, and I almost jump out of my skin.
It came from the ground. I rake my gaze left and right over the wreckage, around the base of the fire, then further away, spotting bits and pieces of debris thrown far from where the ship crashed.
Heaving the medical pack onto my shoulder, I dash from one dark huddle to the next. Strewn across the ice are shards of the strange metal, and paraphernalia I don’t recognise — things spewed from the ship’s belly when it split.
“Hello?” I yell. But no sound greets me and I suspect I imagined that noise.
