Was this encounter being broadcast live? Bower felt like she should be doing something other than just standing there.
“Isn’t she beautiful?” Dr. Ambar asked.
“Yes, she is,” Bower replied, not having thought of the alien in such terms before. Dr. Ambar awakened the sense of awe she felt when she first saw the alien spacecraft in orbit so high above the atmosphere.
They stood there watching Stella as the floater drifted to within a mile or so, slowly moving closer to the Lawrence. Bower marveled at the brilliant plumage displayed by the alien vessel. The extended bladder kept the floater buoyant within Earth’s atmosphere. The rich purples, yellows and reds stretching across the bladder were accentuated by the last rays of the sun slipping below the horizon.
The alien craft paced itself so it would reach the warship without overshooting them. By the time the floater was overhead, the alien craft matched both their speed and direction. As the floater reached the Lawrence, it descended, coming down from several hundred feet. This was a larger craft than those Bower had seen in Africa, easily dwarfing the warship. Her heart pounded within her chest.
The wind howled across the deck. Sea-spray hung in the air. The warship rolled slightly with the swell of the ocean. But all eyes were on the tubular proboscis descending from beneath the floater.
To Bower, the proboscis looked distinctly like the trachea of a human. There were dozens of seemingly cartilage rings evenly spaced, providing the proboscis with structure, allowing it to form a tunnel large enough to drive a car within. There was no differentiation between the base, sides or roof of this windpipe-like structure. It would have looked the same from any orientation and Bower wondered about its function when it wasn’t rescuing stranded aliens.
“Here we go,” Dr. Ambar said.
The underside of the floater rested on the mast extending above the bridge of the USS William Lawrence. If the captain wasn’t already freaked out, she would be now. Bower watched as the radar domes on either side of the mast disappeared into a thick mat of blood red organic matter. As the proboscis extended down to the lower flight deck, the sound of metal groaning under the weight of the alien craft filled the air. Bower felt the warship shift beneath her feet, skewing slightly to one side beneath the imposing alien craft.
As the proboscis reached to within a few feet of the deck, Stella raced up to it, clambering onboard with astonishing agility. Within a fraction of a second, she was gone. The proboscis rested on the deck, oozing a sticky, transparent saliva, for lack of a better word.
There was no goodbye, no acknowledgment of all they’d been through, no emotional parting. Stella was gone.
Dr. Ambar stepped back while Elvis and Bower remained where they were, barely ten feet from the fleshy alien appendage. Bower wasn’t sure what the alien craft was waiting for, but the seconds passed, turning to minutes. Elvis looked at her but he didn’t speak. Words failed them. Looking down the empty alien trachea, Bower could see what seemed to be mucus lining the inside of the fleshy tube.
Over the howl of the whirling wind, she heard two words, “Green light.”
There, rolling down the inside of the proboscis, was Stella. She was moving around the tunnel, racing down through the trachea in a corkscrew motion that took her over the ceiling several times.
“Green light. Understand? Green light.”
“What do you…” Elvis never finished his sentence. Like Bower, he had to have known what she meant. The alien creature wheeled before the two of them, its gooey fronds gently slapping at her arms and raking across his chest. Again, Stella cried, “Understand. Green light. Understand.”
Bower hesitated. Stella rocked around behind her, gently urging her on with her fronds softly tapping her back and shoulders.
“Understand,” the creature said again.
From behind her, Dr. Ambar said, “Go.”
Elvis was already walking forward. He reached out with one hand as he stepped inside the proboscis, saying, “It smells like musty socks.” Looking at the slimy substance sticking to his hand, he added, “This is going to get messy.”
Bower swallowed.
“Come on,” Elvis yelled, already clambering inside the organic alien structure. “What are you afraid of?”
“How about, everything?” Bower cried in reply, to which Elvis laughed.
“What’s the worst that could happen?” he asked as she walked forward and stood in front of the proboscis. Mucus oozed around her boots.
“We could die.”
“We could,” he agreed.
Why did he have to agree? That really didn’t help. He was supposed to say something encouraging.
Bower stood there realizing that with one step she would move from her world to another, from the coarse, gritty, battleship-grey flight deck of the USS William Lawrence into a living creature that had traversed the heavens. She took a step, feeling the soft, spongy inside of the trachea beneath her boots, a stark contrast to the firm deck of the warship.
Bower reached out with her hand, leaning to one side so she could use the inside of the proboscis for balance as she stepped into the creature. It didn’t feel right to be standing on soft tissue. Everything about what she was doing screamed, No. She wanted to turn and run, but Elvis was right. There was nothing to fear. Her fear was of the unknown, it was irrational. The inquisitive doctor within pushed her onward.
No sooner had Bower’s other foot left the deck of the warship than Stella rushed past, twirling across the side and then the roof of the windpipe as she passed Elvis.
Bower felt the proboscis lift off from the deck of the Lawrence. She couldn’t help but look back. She watched as the deck of the warship dropped away rapidly. The proboscis was being withdrawn, its mouth closed like a sphincter, forcing her to move on. The cartilage-like rings were no more than twenty feet apart, but Bower struggled in the soft tissue in between. It was hard to keep her footing and she fell to her knees. Thick mucus covered her trousers.
“Well,” she said, accepting a sticky, gooey hand from Elvis to help her stand. “I guess things could be worse.”
“That’s the spirit,” Elvis replied.
Stella returned. Bower assumed it was Stella, but she wasn’t sure when another two creatures appeared beside the first alien. It was impossible to tell them apart, although they probably thought about humans the same way. The creature she assumed was Stella picked up Elvis and carried him away, only he was floating on a sea of constantly moving fronds gently slapping against his back. As the creature moved, its arms became legs, wheeling backwards and transforming into arms again as they came around yet again to carry Elvis on.
“Oh,” he yelled. “Crowd surfing. I love it.”
Bower held out her hand, wanting to say she was fine, that she’d make it on her own, but there was no discussion to be had. Another creature wheeled toward her, engulfing her and raising her up.
She lost sight of Elvis, which worried her.
As she was carried along she called out, “This is like being massaged by a car wash.”
“Just go with it,” Elvis yelled back, and Bower felt comforted hearing his voice.
To her, being carried by these creatures was the wrong term. Rather than being carried, it felt like the creature never really got her in the right position to hold her properly. She was constantly falling backwards, sliding off as the mass of fronds gently prodded and slapped at her back, keeping her from slipping to the gunky floor. If walking was falling and not hitting the ground, being carried by Stella was akin to being a lumberjack rolling on a log without slipping and getting wet.
And which one was Stella?
Bower noticed the third creature remained between her and Elvis, traveling upside down on the ceiling, and the central core of the creature was larger than either of those that carried them on. That had to be Stella. Rather than committing herself to either of them, Stella was overseeing both of them.