Invaders Read online

  Maybe that was just as well. This way, at least, I knew what I had to do. It was option one now all the way.

  I twisted back again. I’m not sure what I expected to see. Maybe I figured disc-shaped UFOs would appear, skimming the ice after me. Instead, I could make out two snow-cats giving chase. The warehouse had already dropped out of sight.

  I laughed because that was better than howling in despair.

  They had found me. But I was a free agent again. I’d slain them, paid them back in full for what they had done to me. There were worse ways to go in life than battling for your planet.

  The way I saw it, I was winning against the aliens. I had become a huge pain in the ass for the rest of them. Maybe dumb luck had played a part. So had my willingness to go onto the offensive the first chance I’d had.

  I twisted back once more. It looked as if the two snow-cats had gained on me just a little.

  I debated plans and rejected them almost as fast. It seemed to me that keeping my morale high was half the battle. If I let myself get depressed, I would lose fast. If I kept believing I could do something against them, I’d at least try. I had won several encounters by trying.

  I gripped the steering wheel, bouncing up and down in my seat as the cat crawled over a rocky patch. The clattering treads moved me toward a large canyon in the distance.

  I wondered if the Guard-ship was out there. Who was this Galactic Guard anyway? Did that make these space invaders criminals? That would give the whole thing an entirely different spin.

  My stomach rumbled. I was hungry. I searched as I drove, but there was nothing to eat in here. Finally, I remembered the Certs.

  I tore open the package, eating them slowly one by one. It did little to assuage my hunger, but I’m pretty sure I had the mintiest breath in Greenland.

  I thought about what the last alien had asked me, “Why have you transformed into that hideous Earther shape?”

  Did that suggest the aliens were shape-changers? They lacked a spine and bones. They had dense meaty bodies, and they had humanoid appearances. Maybe the Organizer used these particular aliens because of their one amazing talent, the ability to shape-shift into the aboriginal form—us.

  I thought about that and old Earth myths. Werewolves were supposed to be able to shape-shift after a fashion. Vampires turned into bats according to some of the legends. Demons took on the shapes of people or animals. Maybe those ancient legends held a tidbit of truth. That would imply the invaders had been here before. Vampires were supposed to be stronger than humans were. The same held true for demons.

  I snorted. It was a fanciful thought that didn’t make a bit of difference to my situation. Aliens were on my tail. Did anything else matter?

  I studied the snow-cats behind me. Since I’d been holding the pedal to the metal, our distance had remained the same. I might even have pulled away a little.

  It was a good thing they didn’t have any guided missiles. I thought more deeply about weaponry. Just how far did these rayguns fire? Maybe the disintegrating beam dissipated over distance. Maybe they were only good at short range.

  What did Nevada and Greenland have in common? What did the aliens do in those warehouses? They had said Nevada was Location Seven-A. That implied at least seven landing points. Here in Greenland was Location One.

  The canyon had grown as I traveled. Worse, I saw two snow-cats heading toward me from there. I squinted into the distance. I thought I could make out another warehouse at the edge of the canyon, but I wasn’t sure.

  I thought up a wild plan. I would leap out of the snow-cat, first making sure it headed straight for the others. I would then wait in the snow for the two cats following me. Like an Indian (feather not dot), I would rise out of the snow to wreak havoc on these shape-changing invaders.

  The problem with the plan was waiting in the icy cold. I’d finally started to get comfortable. On no account did I want to open any of the doors and brave the arctic chill.

  That meant playing a game of chicken with the aliens heading toward me.

  I debated how that would work. Two snow-cats against one would be poor odds. Yet, I’d beaten Z17 and Q11 at much worse odds. True, I’d had surprise on my side…

  I remembered some of my Marine training. Surprise was a force multiplier. I also remembered grade-school multiplication. One times anything was still that number. But a force multiplier would be one times three perhaps. That would give me a force of three instead of just one.

  I nodded as the distance between us closed.

  The two vehicles headed straight at me. If each snow-cat contained two aliens, they had a force of four. Did they have better weaponry than me? That was questionable. Clearly, if each alien had a raygun, together they had four times my firepower. I noticed something else. The approaching snow-cats did not fan out, but came at me one on one like braves on the warpath. Was there a reason for that?

  I twisted back in my seat.

  I couldn’t make out the vehicles well enough to see if they had done the same thing.

  Why did the approaching cats come at me one on one? Could the area around the snow trail be full of landmines?

  I grimaced. I knew too little. Maybe that was just as well. If I knew the real odds against me, I might never have gotten the balls to try anything.

  I had to use surprise against them if I hoped to survive.

  I turned the steering wheel, veering sharply off the trail. The treads churned snow. I was still headed for the long ravine coming up, but I no longer headed toward the approaching cats.

  I kept my eye on those two.

  The seconds ticked away into a minute. Neither of the approaching snow-vehicles followed me off the trail into the snow, although they still closed the distance between us. Now, however, they did so at an angle to me.

  My heart began to beat faster and my breaths were shorter. I squeezed the steering wheel.

  “Let’s think this through,” I said. Hearing my voice helped my battered morale a little. “It’s possible you’re going to reach the ravine before any of them do. What do you do once you’re there?”

  I tried to analyze that, but kept staring at the two approaching vehicles instead. I did not like it that neither of them had left the safety of the trail.

  “This is what you have to do to win,” I told myself. “This is just like pocketing the screwdriver.”

  My snow-cat lurched suddenly. I looked around as I heard a great splintering sound.

  Sweat beaded my forehead. Should I put the cat into reverse? I clicked on my seat belt, noticed a shoulder strap as well, and clicked that into place, too.

  I kept moving the machine forward. The noises had stopped, and the cat did not lurch like that again.

  I wiped my forehead, glanced at the nearing enemy machines—

  An explosively splintering sound and a sickening lurch downward told me I’d been right in one fashion. This wasn’t a minefield but it was dangerous leaving the trail. My vehicle plunged down. I had time to see whiteness flash past me. Maybe I had been driving across a glacier and this was a giant crevice.

  Sickening squealing noises and terrific buffeting told me the worst. I was indeed in some kind of crevice, sliding against the walls. With a slam and a jolt, the ride ended as suddenly as it had begun.

  I sat there dazed, my mind wanting to shut down, my body too tired to keep doing this. I tried to reason this out. Instead, I sat there with my mouth open, remaining in a semiconscious state. Maybe it was time to let go of my consciousness and take a break from reality…

  -12-

  My shivering brought me back to reality.

  I realized the cat must have shifted while I’d sat here in a daze. I stared into an icy depth. It seemed to go down forever, an opening into Hell perhaps.

  The straps holding me constricted my breathing. I glanced to either side of me. Icy walls had pinned the snow-cat. The light came from above, likely through the hole I’d created by falling through.

  I’d lo
st the game of chicken with the aliens. I had flinched.

  A tapping noise confounded me. It came again, from behind. I twisted around and saw one of the aliens at the back window, the highest point of the snow-cat at present. The bottom of his dress shoes gently landed there.

  I realized in a sick instant that I had to act now before it was too late. I searched the passenger-side seat, but failed to see the raygun. Then I saw the alien weapon on the windshield where it had landed after the fall.

  Using my legs, I braced myself against the windshield, pushing upward enough to release the tension from my seatbelts. I clicked myself free of each of them.

  I heard a heavy thump from the back window, another, and then glass shattered. A shower of glass pieces struck my seat back. A few hit my head. They all rattled against the windshield like hail.

  Twisting upward, I saw the alien floating feet-first into the snow-cat. I imagined he had a harness around him.

  “Do not move,” the alien said. He aimed a raygun at me from between his fancy dress shoes.

  “Please, save me,” I wailed. “I’m hurt. I can’t move even if I wanted to.”

  His raygun made a soft whine that I recognized. The tip glowed red. I tightened my muscles. So this was it. He was just going to murder me. Why had he come down to do that? He could have—

  A beam flashed past my face. It struck the raygun on the windshield, melting it into uselessness and fusing it into the windshield glass.

  An animal instinctiveness motivated me. I knew capture meant my death in the short term. Z17 and Q11 had proven that beyond doubt. My only opportunity for further life was to strike now.

  I gathered myself and leaped upward, clawing at the front seat in the process. The fingers of my right hand reached upward just as he lowered another fraction. I grabbed a foot, pulled myself higher, and latched my other hand onto the same foot.

  He must have fired the raygun again. I heard it whine. At the same time, I yanked him to the side and got lucky. The beam grazed his leg. That must have caused him to release the trigger stub.

  The whine quit. His leg smoked, squirted black gunk and he jerked convulsively.

  That dislodged my grip.

  I slammed down against the glass-littered windshield. That caused the snow-cat to creak with metallic complaint as it shifted the tiniest and most ominous bit.

  “Cease this resistance,” the alien said.

  I jumped up again, clawed at the driver’s seat again and grabbed the silky fabric of his pant leg. Like a monkey, I hoisted myself higher.

  He moved the raygun downward so the solid tip struck my head.

  Bellowing like a madman, I latched onto his wrist and twisted savagely. I yanked down, pulling him a little. My feet touched the windshield. I snarled as if I’d gone berserk, and I bit his wrist as hard as I could. It was like chomping onto hot tree-bark.

  His fingers convulsed just the same, releasing the raygun.

  I snatched it, let myself collapse out of range of his hands and aimed the weapon up at him.

  We looked at each other. I realized he wore a silvery belt with a great glowing gem in the front center. Wait. There were glowing gems on each of the four points of the compass on his belt. The fingers of his left hand moved toward a disc that appeared to be affixed to his left palm.

  I fired. The beam drilled him between the eyes a second before his fingers could connect with the disc.

  I stopped firing.

  His head slumped forward as black gunk jetted from the hole in his forehead.

  I scuttled out of the way along the windshield, avoiding the dripping gunk.

  Once more, the snow-cat screeched metallically against the sides of the icy crevice. I peered down, still not seeing a bottom. That made my stomach lurch as I shivered with dread.

  I had to get out of here.

  Looking up at the alien, I noticed his body slumped around the silvery belt. I did not see a rope trailing up from his body. Was the belt some sort of gravity flying device?

  That seemed likely.

  While pocketing the raygun, I stood up on the windshield. I tried my best to ignore the metallic and icy creaks and groans around me. The snow-cat was going to plunge farther soon. This part of the crevice was narrower than the area beneath us.

  I climbed the front seat to reach the dead alien. He had to be dead, right? He certainly hovered in position.

  I fanned through options, knowing I had to act in seconds. I didn’t have time to strip the gravity belt off him. Besides, how would I control it? Maybe if I took the belt off him, it would float up, relieved of his dead weight.

  That gave me an idea.

  I climbed upward, finally reaching the shattered back window. I reached behind me and grabbed the alien’s hat. I pulled him upward. The hat seemed fixed to his head. He also seemed to have what I would call neutral gravity. He neither floated up nor sank down on his own.

  The opening in the ice up there was a long way from me. I thought to see two more aliens drifting down the crevice toward me.

  I had to get out of here.

  Wrestling the dead alien out of the snow-cat, I maneuvered him to the side of the vehicle.

  I was sick with fright, did not want to do this, but I didn’t see any other way. This was another opportunity, and I was going to take it while I could.

  I wrapped my arms around the alien. Then, I shoved off with my legs and quickly wrapped them around him—or it—as fast as I could.

  I held my breath. Would we plunge down as I half expected? No, we began to sink, but it was at a steady and not particularly fast rate.

  I grinned wildly. I was doing it.

  We sank past the snow-cat and headed down toward the unseen bottom. As I silently congratulated myself on my ingenuity and daring, I heard more metallic screeching.

  Craning upward, I saw two disintegrator beams strike both sides of the snow-cat. The rays devoured metal and ice. That allowed the trapped vehicle to slide along the walls. The vehicle gained speed—and suddenly, the snow-cat was plummeting after me, zeroing in on me like a guided missile.

  -13-

  Death plummeted toward me. I had seconds to act, no more. I used the Third Law of Motion—for every action, there is an opposite reaction.

  I hurled myself from the slowly sinking alien corpse. That sent the corpse in one direction and me in another. I twisted in the air clumsily due to the parka and my oversized frame. I scrambled for an icy hold for the second before I gained too much velocity.

  I dropped nevertheless, scratching at the raspy ice. Then I slammed against a ledge.

  The snow-cat hissed past, missing me by a whisker. I felt the air displacement of its passage. Instead of looking down and watching, I closed my eyes and fought to keep from groaning. I struggled to keep myself still even though I wanted to twist in agony at my impact against the ledge.

  I hardly breathed as I lay there.

  Soon, I heard the snow-cat hit the bottom. A moment later, I felt my icy ledge quiver at the shock.

  Now, I opened my eyes. I lay on more than a mere protrusion of ice. This was a slick rocky ledge, and there was an indentation against the wall as well. I would have liked to have a cave, but an indentation in the ice-wall might serve me, too.

  I rolled until I couldn’t move any farther. The aches and pains had receded enough that I could begin to think again. I had the floor space of a tiny tool shed. The outer lip was maybe half that size.

  I kept myself still, waiting for it, waiting for it—

  I inhaled sharply but silently as an alien in a silk business suit floated past my hiding spot. He wore the same glowing belt as the first alien had done. A moment later, another alien floated past me on his way down to the bottom.

  I waited several heartbeats. Then, I forced myself to move. I began trembling violently before peering over the ledge. I hated heights.

  The two aliens flicked on some kind of light, beams. They played them down into the darkness.

  I
rolled back into my depression. My shivering changed soon enough from fear to cold as the iciness began to seep into my bones.

  If I hadn’t started with perfect health, I doubt I would be awake now. I felt utterly exhausted. My morale sank to its worst so far.

  Yeah, I’d escaped death and capture, but I was just about as lost as a man could be. This seemed like the end of the line for me.

  An indeterminable amount of time later, the two aliens floated upward. One of them carried the third gravity belt. Maybe they had gone to retrieve it instead of seeing if I was dead or not. Neither of them had a detector out. It led me to believe they figured I was history. I was just an Earthman, anyway. I knew the invaders had a low opinion of humanity. At the moment, that was fine with me.

  I waited, shivering harder as time passed. Finally, I leaned out of the opening, peering upward. I saw clear sky up there, nothing else.

  I didn’t want to look down. Instead, I rolled back into the depression.

  The aliens possessed gravity belts. In another time and place, I might have thought that fantastic. Now…

  I was becoming sleepy. I shook my head, squeezed my eyelids together and opened them wide.

  I’d just won a fantastic hand-to-hand battle against an alien. I’d fought my way out of a precarious snow-cat to land here. The aliens had stopped chasing me. If I did nothing, I would soon freeze to death. So, unless I bestirred myself right now, the game was over for me and the aliens would win.

  I had two choices if I wanted to live. I could climb up or I could climb down. If I wanted a quick suicide, I could jump off the ledge.

  My only tool was the raygun. It might be enough. Up or down, that was the only decision I had to make. Creating tiny handholds with the raygun would be easier if I climbed up. That would mean hoisting myself each time. That would quickly tax my remaining strength. Making footholds downward would be harder, but climbing down would be easier than going up.

  “Uh…” I said. “What do you do once you reach the bottom?”

  I peered up at the distant opening. I didn’t believe I had the strength to reach there. Besides, what would I do once I got outside?