Prologue-2
1238 Words
It was some stupid piece of chick-lit: the kind with a James Bond lookalike on the cover and some wide-eyed girl clinging to his arm. Rob was tempted, but he wouldn’t be caught dead reading something like that. If one of the other guys saw him…
Seated at the security desk, Rob folded his arms and tossed his head back. “Can you believe this?” he muttered, swivelling his chair back and forth.
Alejandro, the lanky, olive-skinned young man who had been assigned as Rob’s partner for the evening, was busy flipping through the pages of some magazine. He was a handsome guy: tall with a thick beard and even thicker brown hair. “Believe what?”
“This!” Rob exclaimed, gesturing to the TV.
“What about it?”
Rolling his eyes, Rob let out a heavy sigh. “How long are we going to listen to this i***t prattle on? Don’t people have anything better to do?”
Alejandro looked up from his magazine. “It’s the anniversary of the most important day in human history. You really think people aren’t gonna be talking about it?”
Five years ago, Earth had made contact with aliens for the first time. Only, they weren’t aliens. They were humans whose ancestors had been taken to another world thousands of years ago. They developed spaceships and eventually found their way back to Earth.
Some of them – the extremely liberal, ultra-woke types – became Justice Keepers: superheroes with badges who went around imposing their ideology on everybody else. Watching people fawn over the commies with ray guns sickened Rob to his core.
He was grateful when the phone rang.
Snatching the receiver off its cradle, Rob brought it to his ear. “Yeah?”
“Hi, this is Christine at 32 Jefferson.”
“What can we do for you, Christine?”
“Would you mind sending someone to take a look at the Andersons’ place? I thought…I thought I saw someone skulking by the house.”
“Could it be one of the Andersons?”
“No, no!” Christine insisted. “They’ve been on vacation since the Fourth.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Thank you. Number 35.”
Rob hung up and climbed out of his chair. Alejandro was already checking his supplies – his radio, his sidearm – but Rob stopped him with a pat on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. I could use the walk.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. It’s probably just a raccoon.”
He exited the guardhouse, peering through the metal gate that protected this little community. On the other side, half a dozen cars went whipping up the street. Everyone wanted to party, to celebrate the arrival of their distant cousins from another planet. The Fourth of July was nothing compared to Friendship Day. The sun had gone down hours ago, but that didn’t mean anything. Most of those idiots would still be partying when it came up again.
Turning away from the gate, Rob jangled his keys as he sauntered up a suburban street lined with houses that all looked the same to him. Most of them had two stories and a big garage, well-manicured front lawns and the occasional tree.
He turned the corner onto Jefferson, noting how the only streetlight on this little cul de sac left the houses on the right side in darkness. No wonder Christine had thought that someone was lurking outside her neighbour’s place.
Retrieving his flashlight, Rob lifted it, but his finger hovered over the switch. He thought he heard something from the darkness. Muffled voices. It was the content of their conversation that made him freeze.
“So, they finally released you.”
“Yes.”
“And they sent you back to this world…as penance.”
If he squinted, Rob could just make out a flicker of movement in the darkness between two houses. Someone was lurking, but he had the distinct impression that these weren’t common thieves. For one thing, thieves rarely used words like ‘penance.’
wasFor another, the speaker claimed to have come from another world. That was certainly possible; there were over a dozen planets in this galaxy with human inhabitants. But criminals from other worlds usually had advanced technology. As much as he hated to admit it, this was exactly the kind of situation that Justice Keepers were made for.
His first instinct was to radio in and request backup, but curiosity got the better of him. The two trespassers didn’t seem to have noticed him. He crept over to the Mitchells’ lawn, hiding under the branches of their willow tree, and strained to pick up more of the conversation.
“Four cycles! They held me for four cycles!”
“What did you expect, Heldrid? Abandoning me on this world should have earned you a painful death.”
“I thought you would leave. Return to the Origin. You said it yourself. We have no business here.”
“Ah, but these humans present us with an interesting conundrum. Did you know that they have colonized multiple planets in this galaxy? We have encountered their species over a dozen times across thousands of universes. But in only three other instances did they ever leave their homeworld.”
“The Inzari played a role in that.”
“Yes, but do not discount human ingenuity. These humans are aware of their benefactors. They call them Overseers. An accurate, if unimaginative, name. They have even learned to duplicate some of the Inzari’s technology. In every iteration of their species, humans have proven themselves to be quite adaptive. Just look at the little world you left behind. What a curious place. The humans of 76848 should be studied. As should those who reside in this universe.”
“The Inzari have laid claim to them. If we interfere with their experiment, we risk a war.”
“So, we will simply have to maneuver the Inzari out of the way. Have you completed your assignment? Did you allow them to trace your dimensional vector?”
“I made my arrival in this universe as obvious as possible without arousing suspicion.”
“Excellent. Then I have every confidence that the Inzari will find Universe 76848. We must move the key players into position, and we must do so with the utmost care. Humans are an inquisitive species. Consider how easy it was to lure one of them here.”
Rob perked up at that.
He turned to run but was immediately confronted by a tall, imposing figure in a shiny, blue suit. The alien – a genuine alien with a pale face, misshapen eyes and a grin that just would not relent – pressed a hand against Rob’s chest. “Would you come with me, please?”
He whirled around and nearly crashed into the other one. This fellow was slimmer, shorter and wrapped in some strange, green material that reflected the streetlight. “No! No! No!” Rob whimpered. A portal opened only a few feet away: a whirlpool of colour that distorted the trees and houses behind it.
Creeping up behind him, the first alien laid an eager hand on Rob’s shoulder. It leaned in close, practically purring in his ear. “I’m afraid I must insist.”
He screamed as the alien threw him into the vortex.
- Writer
