They all crashed against the internal wall after staggering back in.
“Jesus, Ben. Erika, Jimmy…” Maria said.
“I know it’s hard, but try to forget about them for a moment. We’ll get some back-up soon. They won’t just leave us here.”
“Who was that?” Ethan said.
“No idea, but stay out of sight. They can’t see here.”
Ben checked around the room, now assisted by light. What he originally mistook for grime had a dark purple color, spattered and speckled across the walls. He shoved against the internal door with his shoulder to no effect. Ethan slammed the bottom of his foot against it, grunting with every blow. Maria felt around the room, patting the stained surfaces, running her fingers down the corners.
“What are you doing?” Ben said.
“I don’t know. There might be a hidden button or something.”
Ben crouched and peered over the back of the ship into the distance. Nothing looked familiar. A group of black specks circled in the air, the trees had a white tinge and the outline of buildings jagged against the skyline, reminding him of the broken fence posts on the toy wooden farm in the orphan compartment.
“Did you hear that?” Ethan said.
“Hear what?” Ben said.
“Shouting. Listen.”
The engines continued to strain and lull below. Ben heard a voice drifting up on the breeze, between the mechanical screams.
“I’m going to check it out. Give me a minute,” he said.
“Stay here. We’ll be safer,” Maria said.
“It might be the people that saved our ass. I’ll crawl to the edge and have a look.”
“They might not be people. How are you going to communicate?” Ethan said.
“He’s right, Ben. You’ve seen the trench behind the ship. Doesn’t take a genius to work out we’ve crashed.”
Ben peered back at the fresh brown trail, chewed out of the ground. “We need to do something. I’m not waiting here for another psycho to show up.”
He slid onto his stomach. Maria grasped his ankle. “Don’t do anything stupid. We need you.”
Ben held up his thumb. He leopard-crawled across the platform, shooting glances at the body by the bike. A star shone brightly in the sky directly above him, warming his neck. The small dimples in the metal gave him a decent grip and he quickly progressed.
He reached the edge, took a deep breath, and looked over.
A single figure stood below, looking directly at him, the bearded face of a man. Ben thrust himself back with his elbows.
“Hello. Hello,” a male voice called out. “Do you understand me?”
He spoke in English. Another member of the crew? It made sense. That’s why they shot the attacker on the platform.
Ben leaned over the edge. “What the hell’s happening? Where are we?”
“I’ll explain when you come down. You’ve only got a few minutes.”
“What happened to the ship? Did we detach?”
The man appeared to start laughing, his shoulders rocked as he looked down, shaking his head.
“I’m glad you find this funny,” Ben said.
He gazed back up with a stern expression. “Far from it. If you and your buddies want to live, you’ll do as I say.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m not going to stand here debating. You’ll get us all killed. Come down in the next minute or I’ll leave you to join your friend,” the man said, pointing toward Jimmy.
“We can’t get off this platform, can’t see a way down,” Ben said.
“Look around the edge. There’s a ladder that runs up the side.”
Ben edged around the corner and looked along the side of the ship. It was a few feet away, rigid, and running from top to bottom. Easy enough to navigate. The view enabled him to get a handle on the size of their craft. Roughly two hundred feet long and seventy high. Colored a dull black but with something painted on the side he couldn’t quite see because of the angle.
“Get moving, boy,” the man shouted, all humor gone from his voice.
Ben weighed up his options. They couldn’t get back into the ship and needed some form of protection. This man and whoever he was with, provided it. They could have shot him, Maria or Ethan on the platform. It seemed like the Ops team only had one choice.
He ran back to the internal space. “Did you hear all of that?”
“Not quite, but we did hear some English,” Maria said. “What did he say?”
“We need to leave, now.”
“Where are we going?” Maria said.
“Who is it?” Ethan said.
“Possibly a member of the crew. He says we need to leave or we’ll die. Do you want to try and prove him wrong?”
“No. Where are we?” Ethan said.
“He’s going to explain when we get down. We’ve got a minute. There’s a ladder on the side. Ready?”
“Okay, let’s do it,” Maria said. “I don’t like it but…”
Ethan returned a vacant look. Ben shook his shoulder. “Are you ready?”
“Yeah… yes. I’m with you.”
Ben jogged back to the edge of the platform. “We’re coming down. There’s three of us.”
The man nodded and took a couple of steps back. He crouched on the dirt, surveying the area through the sights of his rifle.
“It’s just around this edge. I’ll go first,” Ben said.
He reached out and gripped the cold square ladder rail. Composing himself, he took a deep breath and swung his left leg around onto a rung, grabbing the opposite rail with his left hand.
The sixty-foot drop had a dizzying effect. He hugged against the ladder, squeezing the rails hard.
“Don’t look down,” Ben said.
He descended the ladder, concentrating on his deliberate movements while glancing up at the other two. After Ben climbed down twenty feet, Ethan swayed out onto the ladder with a youthful fearlessness. Maria followed shortly after and all three clanked toward the ground.
Ben flinched after the man shouted, “Denver, deal with that driver!”
He felt the man’s presence as he neared the dirt. With only four feet to go, Ben jumped off the ladder, twisting as he landed.
The man stood only four feet away. He wore a camouflage jacket and trousers with pieces of greenery attached, giving his clothing a strange organic appearance. The jacket hood had three ferns attached. They twitched as the breeze caught the edges.
A pink scar running down the center of his forehead wrinkled as he smiled through a thick dark blond beard. His striking blue eyes were rimmed with weather-beaten wrinkles giving him a hard look. He looked at least ten years older than Ben.
He held out his hand and with a low, rough voice, said, “Charlie Jackson. Your only hope for survival.”
Chapter 9
CHARLIE WAITED for the uniformed man to take his hand but he stood there, staring at Charlie with wide-eyed confusion. There was a degree of terror in there too. Charlie had seen that expression hundreds of times before. Usually when people realized their planet was no longer theirs, or in the final moments of their life.
“What’s your name?” Charlie asked as the other eventually took his hand. The man’s grip was weak, the shake clumsy. He’d obviously never shaken someone’s hand before. Wasn’t surprising.
The croatoans wouldn’t have bothered to go to that level of education for their ruse. They only needed people within the harvesters to believe they were on a generational ship and give them some bullshit procedures to follow in order to keep the harvesters on track for their yield of root.
“I’m Ben,” he said, releasing his grip. Two others joined him. Ben pointed to the younger male, “He’s Ethan,” and to the woman, “that’s Maria. What the fuck’s going on? Who are you? Where are we?”