"Faceless, pale manikins," Gwyneth repeated.
"Yes, that is what people say they look like," Felix confirmed.
"Not grey skinned, big eyed humanoids?"
He shook his head, "Nope, those have totally fallen out of favor in the UFO chatter-space."
Gwyneth smirked. "You realize that is a Doctor Who episode, don't you?"
"Hey, I'm just reporting what people are saying." His voice echoed through the section of mine tunnel they were using as office space.
"That is how these things happen," she replied, "people see something in popular culture, and they incorporate it into their delusions, creating a self reenforcing cultural feedback loop."
"Or is it the other way around," Felix countered. "Maybe popular culture is taking its cues from reality, speaking truths that have always been there just under the surface." He raised his eyebrow and nodded his head, agreeing with his own cleverness.
Gwyneth returned to her notes. She wasn't sure if she was exasperated with this current absurd notion or the fact that some of his previous preposterous theories had led to useful avenues of inquiry. They had been exploring this abandoned mining site for nearly two days, and while it had turned up many intriguing mysteries, it had not generated any firm answers regarding the approaching alien ships.
A melodious tune emanated from her laptop; someone was initiating a video chat session. "It's Lisa on the secure channel," Gwyneth called over to Felix. He moved closer to watch over her shoulder.
Corporal Lisa Bolokowski appeared on the screen. "Professor, I hope I'm not interrupting anything important."
"Not unless Felix spinning more alien conspiracy theories count's as important," Gwyneth answered.
The corporal laughed. "Normally I would say no, but we live in strange times. I just wanted to check in and give you a quick update on events in the outside world. I just got word that Christoph has arrived in Italy. He promises to report back ASAP if he and his archivist friend come up with anything. I've also got updated trajectory data. We've confirmed the alien objects are moving in two groups, and they are diverging. The forward group is on course to make either an arcing flyby of the planet, or they could settle into a very high orbit, depending on how much they decelerate. The second group is still headed straight toward Earth. They are close enough that civilian observatories have finally spotted them. The news broke on both CNN and MSNBC just a little while ago. I expect other networks will be all over it shortly.
"The news also reported a meteor entering the atmosphere somewhere over the mid northern Atlantic before burning up or crashing into the ocean. What those news stories didn't include, because they didn't know, was that it actually decelerated at the last moment, headed west, then disappeared somewhere off the coast of Massachusetts. NORAD has kept a lid on that bit. Be on the lookout for little green men, I guess. Oh, and we've retasked a couple of military communication satellites to send your greeting message on loop to both sets of ships, but still no reply. Anything to report on your end?"
Gwyneth let her breath out in a slow whistle. "Not much compared to all that. The surface teams didn't find anything unusual in the Bergbau offices. We've mapped most of the mine tunnels and mostly just found a bunch of walls covered in that superplastic. There are spots where we think there used to be equipment that got torn out. Lots of cable like things hanging all over the place. We took samples and sent them off to the labs at Wesmund Dunlop. Elizabeth says the R&D people are going nuts over it. They're talking about room temperature superconductors and a whole new era of materials science. We think there might still be equipment buried in some of the walls because some of the cables are carrying a weak current, but that superplastic is damn hard to get through, and we are being cautious so we don't break anything.
"The biggest mystery is still whatever is at the bottom of that main airshaft. Several big cables run down there and disappear into a massive slab of superplastic that covers the bottom of the shaft. Radiation levels are slightly higher than background. That could be some sort of natural ore deposit, but it seems more uniform than that. The smart money says something is down there. That's it. That's all we've got so far."
"OK, thanks, I'll pass all that along. Give me a yell if you make any breakthroughs." The corporal ended the call.
Felix snorted. "Little green men. I just explained they are pale white."
Gwyneth turned her chair and faced him. "You want to know why your description of aliens is ridiculous? It has nothing to do with their color. It's because the random mutation part of evolution makes it a near statistical impossibility that aliens would look anything like us. The idea that they would have the same number of limbs in the same arrangement with joints all bending the same way and so on... it just wouldn't happen... Are you even listening to me?"
"Sorry, I was just looking at those enormous rats over there."
She turned where he was looking just in time to see a white shape scurry behind a storage crate. "Oh this is just what my day needed. If I had known astrophysics would involve skulking about in rat infested mineshafts, I would have followed my mother's advice and studied music." A rat emerged from behind the crate, followed immediately by a second. The rats turned and looked at the two humans. "Wow, you weren't kidding, those really are big."
One of the rats stood on its hind legs. It twitched its nose, and a moment later it had grown into a pale white, six foot tall, human shaped figure. An instant later the second rat had done the same.
Gwyneth felt as if her heart had frozen in her chest. She reached over to grab Felix by the arm but discovered he had jumped on her portable desk.
"Sorry for the intrusion," one of the figures apologized, "but we were wondering if you had seen any extraterrestrial aliens in the area."
The absurdity of the question combined with the apparition's British accent left Gwyneth speechless. She merely pointed a finger back toward the manikin-like figure.
The other figure turned its eyeless gaze toward the one that had spoken. "Oh hell, we left them on the default setting." Gwyneth noticed it spoke with a decidedly midwest American accent.
The American sounding figure suddenly transformed again. Clothing blossomed on its body while hair and facial features appeared on its head. It now looked like a petite dark haired woman dressed in a Star Trek inspired jumper. "Ah, that's better." She turned to her companion. "Oh... I suppose I should do something about that." She touched the other on the neck, and a moment later they transformed into a middle aged man wearing slacks, a waistcoat, and spectacles.
"It's all true," Felix exclaimed breathlessly as he climbed down from Gwyneth's desk. "I can't believe it's all true."
Gwyneth looked at her hands and was amazed to see they were not shaking. "I... I don't know what to believe." She looked back up. "I have so many questions."
"I would love to answer those questions," the American answered, "but we are kind of on the clock here. An alien fleet is on its way to destroy humanity, and we need to find the other aliens who built a secret planetary defense system."
"Oh, and if you could get a message to your President, that would be most appreciated," the English gentleman added.
"I... can actually help you with that message to the President," Gwyneth answered, "but you are the only aliens I've seen."
The Star Trek attired American laughed. "Oh, we're not aliens. I was born in Ohio and lived half my life right here in Boston."
"And I was born in Dorset, more recently residing in Cambridge. Professor Roger Edward Heathcliff Pritchard at your service, but please do just call me Roger." He gave a short bow.
"And I'm Sydney Rossiter. Just Sydney is fine." The American stepped forward and extended a hand.
Gwyneth looked at her own hand, now unsure if this was a first contact situation. She hesitantly stepped forward and shook Sydney's hand. It felt unlike skin. Strangely smooth and slightly cool. Sydney's face looked... wrong... in some undefinable way as well. Her face gave the impression of a mask. Her eyes seemed to absorb the light. "Hello, I'm Gwyneth DeGrassi. My friend here is Felix Penworth. You're from Ohio, you say?"
"Yeah, I know I don't look it. It's these portable field projectors; they're not very good with detail. Listen, I would love to hang out and tell you about all that, but things really are urgent. We were expecting to find a bunch of actual aliens here, but it looks like they bugged out as thoroughly as they did on the moon."
Felix stepped forward. "Yeah, they abandoned secret bases like this all over the planet around two weeks ago. Wait a second... Did you say there were aliens on the moon?"
Roger had stepped up to one of the walls and was examining a bundle of damaged cables. "This does not inspire optimism." He turned to Sydney. "What does that say about the size of the coming attack if they decided to flee from their fortified position?"
Sydney joined him at the same bundle of cables. "It can only be bad. But we don't really have the option of running. We have to stay and fight. Maybe they left that defense system behind. Maybe with the world's nuclear missile arsenal, it could be enough. We have to try." She turned to Gwyneth. "I don't suppose you've found anything that looks like a giant honking space gun or anything like that?"
Gwyneth shook her head. "No, it's pretty much all like you see here, bare tunnels and broken cables. Well, except whatever is buried at the bottom of the main airshaft."
Sydney stood up straight. "Something in the airshaft? Show me that please."
"Perhaps Mr. Penworth could assist me with getting a message to your government," Roger suggested.
"Call me Felix, please." He gestured Roger toward the laptop.
Gwyneth led Sydney down the tunnel. "This way, it's not far. The air gets rather stale farther away from the shaft, so we set up our base of operations relatively close."
They soon arrived. The tunnel widened and ended at an enormous opening in the floor. "The bottom is about thirty meters below. It's capped by some sort of super strong polymer material. It has cables disappearing into it and is emitting a bit of radiation, which is why I think there might be something down there. The shaft also runs all the way up to the surface, a straight shot.
Sydney peered down into the shaft and then up at the similar opening in the ceiling. "Yeah, this might be it. Whatever this weapon system is, it would need access to the surface. I need to find a network access point and see what I can learn." She began looking at the cables dangling from the walls.
"Might this be it?" Gwyneth asked, holding up a particular cable from a mess of similar cords.
"Yes! That's a hexframe interface. How did you know?"
"It is one of the few carrying an active current." She pointed at the red sticker she had attached to it earlier.
Felix and Roger joined them. "We've sent a message to Lisa," Felix informed them. "She'll pass it along. How goes things here?"
"I'll let you know in just a moment," Sydney replied. She clutched the frayed end of the hexframe cable in her hand. It appeared to sink into her skin.
She stood silently for several seconds with her eyes closed. "Not much here," she finally said. "They stripped this worse than the moon base. They left lighting and sensors in the walls... a few field projectors... only one hexframe, though, and it's heavily firewalled. That's weird for them. I should be able to crack it." She stood, her eyes moving under her eyelids as if she was deeply dreaming. "OK... that should do it."
A monster appeared in the tunnel with them. It had an elongated body with numerous insectile legs but a head festooned with multiple tentacles.
"Holy shit," Felix screamed as he jumped backwards. Roger grabbed his arm and kept him from falling into the air shaft.
Gwyneth flattened herself against the tunnel wall, her heart pounding, her mind racing between terror and fascination. "This... is more what I expect from an alien," she finally croaked.
The creature reared up, lifting itself to nearly their height. Its shape softened and changed. A moment later a pale, faceless humanoid stood before them. "Miss Rossiter. I must say I am surprised to find you here," the creature stated.
"Do we know each other?" she replied.
It looked at its own manikin body before replying. "Ah yes. Perhaps this would help." Clothes sprang into existence. Sandals, then shorts, and finally a polo shirt completed the beachwear ensemble.
Sydney's eyes widened. "Jim... is that you?"