The First Moment
Copyright© 2026 by TMax
Chapter 17: Dirtan
We shuffled deeper. This time we always took the right-hand passage. We walked so long that Alice stopped holding her breath and breathed normally. Morgan still breathed too fast, but I suspected that she just naturally breathed too fast. Their hands no longer felt alien to me. Rather, we had started to move as a single entity such that their hands felt like a part of my body.
Sasha stopped us at a corner and whispered back, “A dome filled with aliens. They appear to have set up a defensive perimeter.”
“What are your intentions?” An alien voice appeared in my brain, but not really my brain, more like inside my ear canal. The administrators of this test must manipulate the nerve endings to make communication possible. An alien, small, palm-sized, hovered in the middle of the tunnel opening. It resembled a cartoon bee, with purple and green stripes, wings on the bottom and top of the cylindrical body, and no sense organs that I could see.
“Exploration and survival,” Sasha yelled back. Lanka ducked fully behind Sasha, while Nate moved more into the tunnel as if to protect the rest of us. Morgan shifted and pressed her ass against the back of my legs, and Alice held her breath.
“This is Dirtan territory. Best to leave us be,” the alien said back. I smiled at the name they gave themselves, just as we called ourselves Terrans, or Earthlings. I guess every species must call themselves after what they determine the name of their planet. Not sure if the species actually meant dirt or the magical, super-technological beings had translated it that way to avoid confusion with Earth.
“Not a problem, we will just turn around and head back,” Sasha yelled, and we turned to leave. Sasha had moved to the middle of the tunnel to pass us when a roar erupted in our brains. The Dirtan turned and rushed back to the center mass, where thousands surrounded a small group of non-flying, pure yellow spheres. Sasha, Morgan, Nate, Alice, and I rushed towards the entrance to see what made the roar. Lanka and Shivam stayed in their places.
We stopped about five feet from the entrance, close enough to see into the dome, but far enough away that we didn’t spook the Dirtans.
“Back off. We will defend our territory with our lives and yours,” the aliens shouted in unison. A cacophony of sounds, like angry wasps. They didn’t shout at us, but rather at the other side of the dome. No idea how I knew that, but maybe by the way the sounds echoed.
The Dirtans zoomed around the center of the dome. The tight mass of green and purple contracted and flew around the middle, so thick in the middle that we could no longer see the yellow spheres. Around that mass, rings of purple and green whizzed, too fast to see individual Dirtans. In the center of our tunnel entrance, five Dirtans hovered. With no visible sense organs, I didn’t know if they faced us or just blocked the entrance.
Each Dirtan had three sharp leg-like appendages on the bottom and a long, black, curled tail or hair-like structure on the top.
“Warning. Warning. Warning.” Like a klaxon on a naval ship or nuclear plant, the pitch rose until I couldn’t even hear anything behind or around us.
Alice’s hand dug into my shoulder, while Morgan pressed against me. Sasha and Nate stood on either side of us, hands in fists. Nate’s muscles flexed and hardened, while Sasha appeared relaxed, but ready to fight.
In the far tunnel, a green slime-like thing appeared. It filled the whole tunnel and oozed onto the sand floor. It looked like an earth slug, but massive, with small orange tentacles along its back. Thousands of orange eyes covered the front of it, which tapered down to a thin forest green slit.
The Dirtans flew close, but didn’t touch it. Instead, their line bent around the thing.
“Good. Humor. Happy. Pleased with this part of myself. The fewer other sentient aliens that survive this challenge, the fewer votes will exist against us. A good moment. A fortuitous event,” the green ooze said as it rippled in the starlight. Ten or so feet had oozed out of the tunnel, and yet it still filled the tunnel behind it.
Shivam and Lanka joined us.
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