Codename Alpha

Chapter 16

"That does actually sound kinda nice," I said. I bent down and unzipped the pocket of the supply bag I had put the remaining half of my nutrient brick, and pulled it out. I opened my door and hopped out, and then stretched. It was far nicer out than it had been during the day, but that was to be expected. Either way, it wasn't as humid or hot. I walked over the cool grass to the bed of the truck, which Max was already working on getting open. Marine came around from my side, also carrying a half-eaten nutrient brick. He got it down, and quickly climbed in. "I'm still amazed that the stuff you put back here is still inside," I said, pointing at the varying containers of unknown use spread about, as I climbed in as well.

"Personally, I'm amazed you even got us out of there." Marine said. "Was doubting your abilities when you said you learned to drive from a spy book, but you pulled through."

"Well, really it was just a matter of playing mind games with those other trucks and driving up a couple ramps. You've yet to see my latent spy abilities in action," I responded, while lightly kicking some of the containers out of the way so I could sit down next to Max, against the cab of the truck. Marine sat to the left of me.

I sighed up and looked at the stars. It felt nice to finally get a chance to just breathe and think without having to worry about escape or not careening off the road. There still weren't very many stars in the sky, due to light from cities nearby, but it was still calming. The only sounds were those of the crickets and some distant cars. Similar to the many other areas we had been in so far, with context removed, this could be any national park back home.

It really set in then how out of our element we were. I thought back to Marine's complaints from earlier, and realized that she really did have a point. None of this even came close to how I imagined contact with aliens would go, much less the actual first voyage of the Valiant. By all accounts, the original plan was to pick up the rest of the crew in Veta, and then head straight on to Tolyatti. Instead, for whatever unholy reason, we got stranded in some other star system. And then, as if the situation couldn't get any worse, our first meeting with aliens went probably as poor as it could go.

I realized there truly was no way that we were going to go home. Although it was entirely possible that we could survive a week and then contact the shuttle, once off the planet, there was nothing we could do. Even without considering the fact that the ion engines were probably decimated, it would take centuries to return home with them. Although another Nomad-class starship could probably make the trip here in several months, there were problems with that as well. No other nomad-class ship existed, and people back home had no sign that we still existed as well. No doubt, by this point construction on the other ships at Visoko Luka had been halted, probably suspecting some catastrophic inherent design flaw.

Our only hope was this whole ordeal being a misunderstanding. If we did make it to the ship, emergency supplies could only sustain us for so long, disregarding the damage it had sustained to power generation and radiation shielding. If these aliens truly were hostile to everything, we, along with everyone else on the ship, would inevitably starve to death. Everything Marine, Max, and I would do on this planet would be for nothing.

Evidently, I didn't do a very good job at keeping these thoughts to myself. I was brought out of it by Max nudging me. "Hey, are you okay?"

"What? Oh," I said, stumbling over myself. "I'm good," I said, trying to get something out over the heavy feeling in my throat. I could see Marine turn to face me out of my peripheral vision. "It's just that..."

"Yeah?" Max questioned, when I trailed off.

"Well, I... we're never going home," I said, cutting to the point. "No matter what. By all appearances, we're going to be stuck here forever. Even if the Navy does build new starships that could reach this system, they have no idea we're even still alive." I sighed, leaving us all in relative silence.

"Well," Marine spoke up. "I really do think that this was all just a big misunderstanding. After all, if they genuinely had it out for every alien that visited, we would definitely be dead by now. Like, during that run through the town, I was almost run over. I can only guess what those people are thinking now, especially now that we know that there is a primitive look alike species of me on this planet, but it certainly wasn't hatred. If so, they would've just rammed me all the way down instead of hitting the brakes."

"But..." I began, not finishing my sentence.