Prologue

The cold air whips around the team, threatening to knock them off their feet. They are tethered to one another as to not lose anyone to the dangerous hazards surrounding them. The team of five is led by Jonas Marks, explorer, scientist and vice president of New Eden Enterprises. The only reason they are is this vast emptiness of ice and snow in the middle of Antarctica is because satellite imaging showed something crashing here four days ago.

His lover, boss and owner of New Eden Enterprises, Beatrix Eden didn’t think it was of any value to investigate. She was even further convinced of her opinion when chatter from all the intelligence and space agencies showed no interest. But Jonas disagreed. He poured over satellite images and other planetary data. In the end she had given him the go ahead, most likely because his adventurous nature and overactive curiosity would just eat away at him until he went anyway or got on some other expedition.

So far they have spent two whole days trying to reach the landing site. The first day went fairly smooth until their equipment started to fail one by one. Soon it became a trek on foot because they were so close to their destination to just give up and go back. Radio communication to the outside world fell a few hours ago, but luckily the GPS is still working. And according to it, the team is practically on top of it.

Jonas holds up his hand in a fist. “Hold up guys,” he says into his headset. “I’m going to take a quick look.”

“Jonas,” one of his teammates says quickly. “Shouldn’t someone go with you?”

The vice president unclips his line. “I’ll be fine,” he says cheerily. “You know that I’ve done this stuff a million times before.”

Through the haze of billowing snow, Jonas can see the dark scorch marks from the impact. It is amazing that after four days there is even any evidence of the impact site.

“Stay back,” Jonas says into the headset. He steals a look behind him. “I want to make sure it is safe to walk along.”

He turns back around and the moment he does, the ice gives way beneath his weight. Jonas’ arms fly into the air and he falls before any of the team has the chance to react. The man goes sliding rapidly down the side with such speed that everything is a blur. The ride down is over quickly. He slides along the sloping floor of ice for several meters, until he naturally slows down to crawl to a full stop.

Dizziness and a wave of nausea roll through him. “Fuck, that was crazy,” he says aloud. His voice echoes off the surrounding ice, surprising him.

“Jon ... ar ... ou ... gh... ?” a garbled voice scratches through the headset. “We ... ng ... t ... et ... mp ... t ... n ... co ... of ... yo...”

“Damn it,” he whispers, pulling off the headset and tossing it. “May as well look around.” He reaches into a pocket in the side of his pants and pulls out a flare and ignites it. Instantly the cavern is lit up in red light. The flare sizzles and pops but otherwise everything around him is quiet.

Jonas climbs to his feet and looks up, but he must have dropped fairy deep because it is too dark to see the entrance. With a shake of his head, he decides to search the cavern. It will be hours before his team get down here. So he presses forward, pulling out a glow rod, activating it as the flare dies out.

After about ten minutes of walking, Jonas is sure that whatever crashed into the ice created this cavern. In fact, the cavern isn’t a cavern at all. It is one long tunnel, carved out and smooth by extreme heat. At the end of the tunnel is what can best be described as an interplanetary ship. No wings for atmospheric flight and disproportionally large turbines, though they look different from any Jonas has ever seen. It isn’t anything oversized, but rather like a one person vessel. Unless this is some type of prototype craft, it has to be extraterrestrial origin. Jonas in betting on the latter because there hasn’t been anything on the radio of about anyone scrambling to find their wayward prototype.

As he gets closer, he notices something leaking out, some kind of black substance. Rubber is the first thing to pop in his head. He kneels down, shining the light further onto it. It isn’t rubber, it is too smooth and more like latex. Jonas’ mind whirls with thought, especially at that last thought, especially with the latter discovery.

“I must have hit my head or something,” he murmurs.

Standing up, he decides it is better to look at the craft some more. Being of possible alien origin, the latex-looking material could be some kind of fluid like a fuel or equivalent to rubber. He takes a step past the oozing puddle. But before he can take the next step, something wraps around his ankle and yanks, causing him to slip and fall face first onto the ice. Jonas glances behind him, his heart beating quickly as she sees what looks like a tentacle, like something from a Japanese hentai, wrapped around his leg.