Charlotte
I was half-way out of the shower when the ring tone from “Crazy Train” told me that work was calling. Groping for my cell, I almost knocked it onto the tile floor. The graceless dive I executed banged my knee hard against the chipped enamel sink.
Wincing, I gasped, “What?”
“Charlotte? It’s Derek. Where are you?”
Naked in my bathroom, dripping wet and fumbling for a towel with a knee that should only hurt this much at the bottom of a double black diamond run.
“At home.”
“Good.”
He sounded relieved, as though he’d half expected me to be high-tailing it out of Washington, D.C. along with so many others. Not that I could blame him. Rumor had it that a couple of the higher-ups at the State Department were AWOL already. I didn’t doubt that more would follow.
“You’ve got to get in here right away,” Derek said. “It’s all hands on deck.”
I closed my eyes for a moment, trying not to groan. In the past five weeks, I’d been home not more than a few dozen hours, barely long enough each time to grab a nap and shower. I’d hoped for a little more this time, maybe even a hot meal, but I should have known better.
Nothing had been remotely normal since the moment when our visibly shaken president stepped in front of the TV cameras to tell us that the great question of whether we were alone in the Universe had been answered.
He hadn’t actually used that line from “Independence Day” but the media had done so, heedlessly contributing to the panic that erupted about two seconds after the President introduced the undeniably handsome but still scarily alien representative of the Krinar, a super advanced, super powerful alien species that had decided it was time for us to meet.
Ambassador Arus had said all the right things--we come in peace, we respect the sovereignty of nations, we offer the hand of friendship, etc. But all anyone heard--myself included--was blah-blah, aliens!, blah-blah, ALIENS! Arus was still talking when the first riots broke out. They hadn’t stopped since.
“What’s happening?” I asked as I managed to get a towel wrapped around myself.
“Chaos, that’s what.” Derek’s voice shook. He was a nice guy--rawly ambitious like almost everybody at State but not an actual…douche is probably too crude. He wasn’t a dick. He’d asked me out, taken my refusal with good grace, and been pleasant enough to work with right up to K-Day when all the petty concerns of normal life got blasted to smithereens.
“There’s been an incident in Saudi Arabia. It’s going viral.” He paused a moment, perhaps reflecting that we were on an open line where anyone could be listening. Softly, he said, “The fear is that it’s going to give the Ks an excuse to step in and stop the disruptions using their own measures, whatever those may be.”
Despite the steaming warmth of the bathroom, an icy shiver of fear moved through me. I didn’t need any vast diplomatic experience to know that we were right on the precipice, the whole planet, all of us together teetering between having any chance at all of maintaining our independence or…
Being conquered. There was no other way to put it. The mere appearance of a species from another galaxy in orbit around our planet had left no doubt that our most advanced technology was puny compared to theirs. The fact that they resembled us so closely, even claimed that we were their creation, didn’t help at all. To the contrary, the way they moved, their body language, the keenness of their gazes all marked the K as powerful predators.
Our leaders could recite whatever words they wanted about the visitors’ peaceful intentions; no one was listening. Our deepest, most primal instincts said that the Krinar were the most dangerous threat humanity had ever faced, potentially a true ELE, extinction level event. But face them we must; there was no other option. I figured it was better to do that with our reason intact and with as much dignity as we could muster. Others felt differently and their side was on the verge of taking over the streets.
“I’m on my way,” I said, relieved that my voice didn’t sound as shaken as I felt.
“Be careful. I’d send a car for you but there aren’t any. Some of the drivers haven’t reported in and the ones that have are busy chauffeuring the head honchos.”
No surprise. There was a pool going at State on how long it would be before the helicopters would be lofting up, up, and away from our fair capital, leaving the rest of us to face the alien horde on our own. I had twenty bucks on three more days but I was an optimist. Plenty of my colleagues were counting down in hours.
From what Derek had said, they were the smart ones.
Fifteen minutes later, I’d gotten myself into a simple black-and-white sleeveless pencil dress with a short black belted jacket and black pumps that wouldn’t kill my feet. Running a brush through my shoulder-length blond hair, I spared a moment’s gratitude for the stylist who had given me a great cut just a few days before the Arrival.
What was he doing now? Most businesses were closed or opened at just a few hours a day, increasingly under armed guard. People were fleeing the cities, heading back to wherever they’d come from if they could. Rural areas suddenly had a whole new appeal.
I was spared any such temptation. There was no childhood home to flee to; no family was waiting for me. I had friends I could turn to but they had their own responsibilities. Rather than impose on them, I was much more inclined to stand my ground whatever the Krinar intended.
Rushing to beat curfew, I was on the way out the door when I remembered that I’d left the TV on. About to switch it off, I stopped abruptly. It was tuned to a news station. The announcer, a young woman looked ashen. She was struggling to hold onto her professional demeanor.
“Sources have provided us with this video,” she said, her voice shaking. “Which we understand is now also on line. We’re being told that it was shot in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia about an hour ago. It’s after midnight there so the scene is dark but there is enough light to show what’s happening.”
She hesitated and it was clear that she was listening to instructions in her ear bud. After a moment, she said, “We’re going to pause briefly before we start the video. Please, if there are children in the room, take them out now. Do not let them see this.”
I stood frozen through what seemed like an endless wait but couldn’t have been more than a minute. Long enough for frantic thoughts to run through my mind: Oh, God, what now? After everything that had already happened, what could possibly be worse? And what would the response be from a population that was already panic-stricken?
In the back of it all, looming even larger, was the ultimate question: What would the Krinar do? What were they capable of?
I had the answer all too quickly, as did the rest of the world.
The scene on the video looked like a back alley off a main avenue. There was enough light from the streetlamps to see a large group of men, close to three dozen, amassed in the alley. They were dressed in black and appeared to be heavily armed, including with automatic assault rifles. Several were wearing headcams. It occurred to me suddenly that they’d wanted the world to see what they were doing. They must have presumed they would prevail but it quickly became apparent that they’d been tragically, hideously wrong.
Half-a-dozen Krinar came into view, moving along the avenue. As with all the aliens we had seen, they were incredibly gorgeous--tall, ultra-fit, exuding power and confidence. This group also appeared to be exclusively male. From what I could see, they weren’t armed.
An order was shouted in Arabic. The band of men surged forward out of the alley where they had concealed themselves. At once, there was gunfire and the unmistakable sound of grenades exploding. Beyond any doubt, the intent was not to capture the Krinar but to kill them.
For a few moments, I thought that must be what had happened. All of the Krinar were quickly wounded. Their injuries looked so serious that they would have been fatal for any human. But not for the K. With blinding speed, the six of them regrouped and attacked the far larger Saudi force. The attackers didn’t have a chance despite their weapons, their obvious training and even the element of surprise. They were completely outclassed.
I tried but failed to hold back a scream as a Krinar male seized one of the attackers and with a simple twist of his hands wrenched the man’s head off. Blood spurted from the stump of his neck as the killer tossed the head aside. It rolled to the edge of the road and stopped, the eyes still open, staring sightlessly.
Nausea rose in my throat. I desperately wanted to look away but I stood frozen with horror at the hideous spectacle playing out in front of me. Several more of the Saudis were literally ripped to pieces, heads and limbs flying in all directions. The Krinar moved with blinding speed but even more shocking was their incredible strength. One of them seized two men at the same time and threw both at least sixty feet into the air. He didn’t even bother to glance at them as they fell, landing in the street with sickening thuds before lying broken and still.
The fight was over in minutes but it might as well have lasted an eternity. The impression it left was as terrifying as it was indelible. Not a single human was left alive. Most of the remains wouldn’t have been recognizable even to close relatives. They were just bloody pieces pounded to a pulp by an enemy that was inhumanly strong and utterly ruthless.
Our instincts had been right. For all their technological and scientific brilliance, the Krinar were capable of brutal savagery. They wouldn’t hesitate to kill us in the bloodiest and most violent ways possible.
The announcer was speaking again but I hardly heard her. The single thought screaming in my mind was that as bad as things had been since the Ks’ arrival, they had just gotten infinitely worse.