Chapter 4: E.T. Phones Home

John, wake up!”

I opened my eyes, confused for a moment, and looked around quickly, remembering where I was. On the screen in front of me was Picket. He looked like he always did, even wearing the same bulky sunglasses, though the lenses were clear now and I could see his gray eyes.

“I’m awake”

“John, I am pleased to find that you have decided to seek shelter under my dwelling as I requested.”

“Whoa there, Picket! I was just here for a last quick look around until your machine coaxed me down here and now, seems insistent that I stay!” I replied, with a bit of heat.

“John, this is the first item we must resolve, and we must do so quickly as my ability to communicate directly with you is limited and could be interrupted at any time.”

I noticed that he was sitting in a reclined position in what looked like a large cockpit of some sort of craft. I could see others sitting behind him. Their appearance was like Picket’s with the same general body type, though there were noticeable differences. A few appeared to be female. They were all wearing the same bulky glasses that Picket wore and were clothed as he was. Each appeared to be busy performing some task or other. A small quake hit at that time also, jarring me back into the present.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“John, I and my companions, some whom you can see behind me, are currently on a craft leaving your world. We are heading for a location of relative safety in high orbit around your Earth. There we will rendezvous with other craft also fleeing your world.”

“Agent mentioned you were going to some space station or something and were going to monitor the devastation and damage. How long will that take? Are you going to return down here after things calm down?” I asked ... wondering if he intended to come get me later or ‘beam me up’ or something. I had a momentary vision of a flying saucer levitating me up naked. Maybe I’d have to worry about anal probing? I almost chuckled.

Picket hesitated a bit before responding. “No John, neither I nor my companions will be returning to your world any time for the foreseeable future, if ever. I am sorry if you understood or assumed otherwise.”

“I guess I had no understanding either way. I figured to be alone here at the end anyway.”

“John, you are not alone, and this does not have to be the end for you. I am offering you a small chance to survive, though it will obviously be a struggle. This includes, at some point in the future, the chance to survive with others of your kind, and hopefully begin to rebuild what you have lost.”

I thought about that a bit. Others? Rebuild?

“Does that mean that some humans will make it through this, maybe a remote pocket somewhere else on the planet? That there is a place safe from what is happening?”

“No John. Humanity and your current civilization will not survive this attack if our observations are correct. The others whom I am referring to are a small group of humans also under shelter in some of our former bases, in similar situations to your own.”

I looked around the room confused. “Is there anyone else down here with me?” I asked, unsure if I was hoping or anxious.

“No John. You are the sole inhabitant of that field base. The other humans are located elsewhere in some of our other bases. All field bases have the ability to shelter at least one human although most are empty. When my companions evacuated their dwellings and field bases, some had convinced certain humans which they had worked closely with to seek shelter in the sublevel of their bases.”

“There are currently three other humans sheltering in the western hemisphere of your world. You, along with two others, are sheltering in bases located on the northern continent, and one other human, on the southern. However, is likely that the human sheltering at the South American base has expired in a recent impact at that location. We have lost contact with that base and my companions there, who were in the process of evacuation, perished almost immediately after their pod was launched.”

“In the eastern hemisphere of your world, there are seven humans currently under shelter. Two humans shelter at separate bases in Africa. One is sheltering at the base in Europe. Three humans are sheltering at bases in Asia and the last is sheltering in Australia. Note, there is a chance of an eighth human, but we have lost contact with that base, located in Mongolia, and that human may have perished. We will continue to monitor that situation.”

I reran the numbers through my head. Including myself, ten to twelve surviving humans. So few! How the hell could humanity recover with so few?

I thought about that for a bit.

“Why so few, and why so spread out?” I asked.

“The answer to the second question is simple. The current attack is using kinetic bombardment impactors. It consists of a large number of projectiles with multiple and numerous targets spread fairly evenly across the land mass of your world. In addition, some are aimed at specific targets. These include populated areas, recently constructed dams which have reservoirs large enough to be visible from space, and your world’s nuclear power reactors. These reactors will certainly be targets as the Neutrino flux emitted by them is easily detectable from space.”

“The projectiles were launched from the outer parts of your solar system and most likely have been in flight for months. Although they have some guidance capabilities, some obviously will miss their targets. Thus, we cannot predict where the impactor will hit and thus, spreading out the shelters reduces the odds that all will be destroyed by any single kinetic impactor.”

That made sense, I guess just as another medium tremor shook the room reinforcing the point.

“The answer to your first question, why shelter so few, has many answers. The act of offering shelter is not our mission here on your world. It is what you would call a fringe benefit. Also, we could not shelter any thinking being without their consent and knowledge and to explain the reasons for such a request, would obviously compromise the overall secrecy of our true mission here on your world. Thus, we selected just a few humans to extend the offer of shelter. Each member of the team had a short list of people to offer shelter too. It was decided in the interest of security to extend this offer, and provide the reasons for it, only at the last minute.”

“For example, I had preselected you and one other human nearby to offer shelter to. I have the ability to shelter only one human here, so if the other human, a female living in Sioux Falls, who tended to my aircraft, had chosen to come I would have not have asked you. As it was, she declined, unexpectedly, having recently become close to another. She chose to remain with that human and perish and due to her sacrifice, you now may survive. This explains why I was rushed when I returned to my dwelling last evening. I had just a little time left before I needed to evacuate in my pod and why I was pleased to see you still at your residence.”

“The final reason for the low numbers is that with our limited resources, we were unable to offer shelter to many, but as you will learn at a future time, the number of survivors can be lower than you would expect and still allow for the survival and future regrowth of your species,” Picket explained.

I digested that. My first surprising and irrational thought was that I was a bit hurt by the fact I was his second choice. This faded when I considered that his first choice was one who basically worked for him. Also, I barely knew the man ... or alien ... whatever! Besides, she was probably younger, fitter and not a depressed wreck like I was, I mulled.

Picket must have noticed my expression because he next said... “John, I consider you a fine choice. As you will come to discover, age and health matters little for what is to come.”

Huh? That didn’t make sense.

He continued... “My greatest risk in choosing you was your early depression over the loss of your family. There was a chance that you would become self-destructive culminating in eventual suicide. That result did not occur and as time passed, I reasoned that that danger was reduced significantly, if not eliminated completely. You have already survived what many humans would consider to be the greatest possible losses and not only continued but prevailed. Recently, you demonstrated great improvement and increased interactions with others. In short, you have proven that you are a survivor and that is the perfect trait for any human facing the future you will now face.”

His words stunned me a bit. Had I been getting better? Had I been suicidal? Was I now? I glanced at the shotgun. It was gone!

“Where ... is ... my ... gun ... Picket!?” I demanded forcefully.

“You do not need it anymore John,” he replied, calmly watching me.

I stood up quickly and angrily. How dare him to tell me what I needed or not. He did not know me! Who the hell did he think he was! I looked around the immediate area but there was no sign of the gun. It could have been hidden behind the machinery. Maybe even taken outside the big heavy door and locked in the tunnel while I dozed. Shit! I realized suddenly, it could have been simply dropped into the pit by the door and rendered down to powder or whatever. Suddenly fatigued, I returned to the chair and sat.