Feedback

Lily was no more than thirty feet away in the middle of the alley, bathed in a blinding green light. She was leaning slightly backwards, pitched at an unnatural angle, one that should have caused her to fall to the ground, but somehow she remained upright. Her arms were outstretched, as though she had been crucified on some invisible cross, while her feet drifted a few feet above the ground. White smoke billowed down from above. Bursts of vapor surged out of a series of flickering lights some twenty stories above the alley. The smoke swirled around her body as she slowly gained height.

“No.”

Jason’s one word was barely audible above the pulsating hum coming down from above.

The white light transformed into a kaleidoscope of color. Tiny, circular rainbows formed in the cold white mist, giving the view a trance-like quality.

Jason fell to his knees just a few feet inside the alley.

“No,” he repeated. “This can’t be happening.”

Lily was being drawn up toward the light, with her arms outstretched and her hands limp. Her body was pulled up into the swirling clouds still churning down from above.

The circle of lights above the building began turning, slowly building in speed as Lily’s body rose higher, becoming lost in the mist. From what Jason could tell, the lights were roughly forty to fifty feet across, but their exact width was obscured by the rooftop. Whatever this was, it had to be hovering no more than a few feet above the roof. Jason wanted to run for the stairs, to chase after Lily, but his body felt weak, drained of strength.

The rainbow of colors radiating above him reached a fever pitch, moving so fast the individual lights became indistinguishable.

And then it was gone.

The mist cleared, dissipating and disappearing into the night, leaving a clear view of the clouds thousands of feet above.

There were footsteps behind him.

“Tell me you saw that?” Jason said, his eyes still looking skyward.

“Saw what?” Mitchell asked, coming up beside him.

In the distance, well beyond the rooftop, bursts of light broke through the night. Spectacular splashes of color lit up the grey, moody clouds as fireworks burst in the sky over the river.

“Oh, damn. We missed the show,” Mitchell said with a hint of disappointment in his voice.

“We need to get you to a doctor,” Helena said, ignoring Mitchell as she reached out her hand and helped Jason to his feet.

Jason was shaking. His fingers were trembling.

“You’re in shock,” she said, looking into his eyes with compassion. She raised his forearms, taking a good look at the grazes on his arms. “Oh, that’s got to hurt. Come on. Let’s get you to the emergency room and get you cleaned up. I hope your tetanus shots are up to date.”

Jason was in shock, but it wasn’t the pain in his arms that had shaken his being. He’d spent the best part of a decade building a rational model of the universe in his thinking, establishing a framework for understanding the cosmos and formulating his theories and calculations, but here, in a matter of seconds, his world had unravelled. What seemed so crazy when Mitchell talked about it now seemed probable. No, he thought, not probable, actual.

Could it be that the anecdotes of UFO sightings were true?

Was Earth being surreptitiously visited by aliens from some other world?

Could his eyes be believed?

Should he discard his scientific training over some fleeting experience that seemed more like a dream than reality?

Could these two views be reconciled?

They couldn’t, he decided, and yet he had no plausible alternative explanation for what he’d witnessed. Although he knew eyewitnesses were notoriously unreliable in a court of law, he couldn’t bring himself to ignore what he’d seen.

Lily had been taken.

“There has to be another explanation,” he mumbled to himself. “There has to be.”

Chapter 07: Caught

Lee woke bumping around in darkness.

He was in the back of a truck weaving along a rough track. He bounced on the cold metal bed of the truck, sliding as the clumsy diesel engine rattled in his ears. His hands were tied behind him. A shroud covered his head. Dim light seeped in from around his neck. He felt sick. The smell of fumes wafted around him, making it difficult to breathe.

As the truck rounded a corner, Lee fought with his hands to steady himself. His bound fingers grabbed at the corrugation built into the steel deck beneath him, and he tried to avoid bumping into what felt like wooden logs or boulders on either side of him. Lee shifted his knees, trying to get some grip when a boot kicked him in the stomach.

“Lie still!”

Lee grimaced. He hadn’t anticipated the blow. He had no way of knowing he was being watched and the boot caught him on the side of the hip, causing a jolt of pain to surge through his body. He groaned in agony, sliding into the closed tailgate as the truck rounded another corner.

It was at that moment he understood the gravity of his situation.