Independence Day: Resurgence: The Official Movie Novelization (23 page)

“Daisy, stop crying,” Sam said, “and can you please shut that stupid dog up?” She had to concentrate on driving.

“She’s scared, okay?” Felix said, cradling the little terrier. He was eleven, four years younger than Sam and four years older than Daisy, who didn’t stop crying.

“I want Mommy!” she wailed.

Bobby, who had wanted to drive even though he was only thirteen, tried to calm her down.

“We’ll find her, Daisy. Don’t worry.”

“No we won’t,” Felix said. “They’re both dead.”

“That’s enough,” Sam said, even though she thought he was probably right.

“You shouldn’t be driving,” Bobby said. “You don’t even have your license.”

“I don’t think anyone is gonna pull us over,” Sam shot back. “The radio said to head inland, so that’s where we’re going.” She worked the station wagon around a fishing boat dumped on its side in the street. As they passed it, Bobby called out.

“Stop! There’s a man on that boat!”

Sam shook her head. “I’m not stopping. He’s probably dead.”

“No,” Bobby insisted. “He was moving.”

“We can’t pick up everyone we see. We already picked up that annoying mutt.”

“Ginger’s not a mutt!” Daisy said, just to be contrary. But it stopped her wailing for a minute.

Felix was still looking out of the window at the boat.

“We have to stop! He’s really old. He needs our help.”

Fine
, Sam thought. She hit the brakes. Bobby and Felix threw open the doors, jumped out, and climbed over boxes and boxes of drenched books that had spilled out of the tilted boat. Bobby poked at the old man while Felix got distracted by the books. He picked one up.

“Help me unbuckle him,” Bobby said. “I think he’s knocked out.”

Felix pocketed the book and went to help his brother. They got the old man unbuckled and he fell to the ground with a heavy thud.

“If he wasn’t knocked out,” Sam said, “he is now.”

* * *

Once Whitmore had been carted off to the hospital wing to be stabilized, Catherine and David headed for the hangar where the tug was parked, still holding the piece of wreckage from Van de Graaff Crater. It was blackened by reentry but seemed otherwise intact—or at least as intact as it had been after its shattering impact on the Moon’s surface.

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence it showed up right before they did,” Catherine said.

David nodded. “I think you’re right.” He was certain that this ship wasn’t from the same alien civilization that was attacking them. Judging from Catherine’s phrasing, she was too.

“Baby, where are you going?” The voice came from the hangar door. When they turned, David saw Dr. Brakish Okun coming into the hangar and making a beeline for the piece of wreckage, followed closely by Milton Isaacs. David wondered how Isaacs must feel, having the love of his life back right when he couldn’t enjoy it because of the new invasion.

“Where did you get this?” Okun asked, marveling at the wreckage. He was still wearing a hospital johnny.

“From the ship we shot down,” David said.

“All the answers are in there,” Okun said decisively. “We have to cut it open.”

“Who is he?” Catherine whispered.

“He used to run this place before the first attack.”

The hangar intercom spat static. “Director Levinson, please report to the command center immediately.” David started walking, but paused to look back at Catherine.

“You coming?” he asked. “We need all the brain power we can get.”

“Call us as soon as you cut it open,” she said to Okun, and then she left with David.

* * *

“You heard the lady!” Okun said to the assembled techs, most of whom had been in high school the last time he’d been conscious. “This isn’t Madam Tussaud’s Wax Museum—people move around here!”

The techs just stared at him, not sure what to do. Isaacs figured he could help, but there were a couple of things to take care of first.

“I’m happy you want to dive right back into work,” he said to Brakish, who was glaring around the hangar wondering why nobody was doing anything. He still didn’t know exactly how long he’d been in his coma. “But maybe we should get you some pants.”

* * *

David got to the command center as a technical officer in Area 51’s satellite surveillance group made an announcement.

“We have infrared, sir!”

An infrared image of the giant alien ship appeared on a large monitor screen. David was a little taken aback by the number of little red dots in the satellite’s field of view. There were thousands of them. Many thousands.

“Are those…?” Catherine began.

David finished for her. “Yes. Aliens.” Then as the satellite’s view scrolled to the center of the ship, out over the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, a gigantic red mass dominated the view. “Enlarge,” David said. The satellite view zeroed in, and they saw the huge red mass was moving. It was alive.

“This must be what the alien meant by ‘she is all,’” David said as it dawned on him. Then General Adams got his attention.

“Director Levinson, I have Cheyenne Mountain and the remaining world leaders online.”

David followed Adams into the middle of the room. President Lanford appeared on a screen, as did a number of other world leaders—but several of the screens that should have hosted other leaders remained blank, a stark reminder of the losses humanity had already suffered.

“David,” the president said. “What can you tell us?”

“Ma’am, we were wrong,” he said right away. “They’re not like locusts. They’re more like bees. Like a hive, and I think we just found their queen. A very
big
queen.” He glanced over at General Adams.

“The alien we interrogated kept referring to a ‘she,’” Adams said, picking up the briefing. “This is an infrared image we just received.” He pulled up the image of the large red mass at the center of the alien ship.

“Christ almighty,” the president said.

“Sir,” Lieutenant Ritter said from a nearby terminal, “we’ve just received this from the USS
Alabama
.” He tapped in a command and a live video feed appeared, showing a huge plasma beam shooting out from the bottom of the gargantuan alien ship into the Atlantic Ocean. It was wreathed in steam, but the image was clear enough that David was fairly certain what was happening. It mirrored what had happened in the Republic of Umbutu.

“David, is this one of their plasma drills?” the president asked.

“I believe so.”

“Are they sucking up our water?” Secretary Tanner asked.

“No. We were finally able to measure the hole under the ship in Africa. It was almost two thousand miles deep. We always assumed they wanted our natural resources, but I think we were wrong.”

“So what do they want?” Tanner snapped.

David took a breath.

“Our molten core,” he said. “No core means no magnetic fields, no protection from solar radiation. Our atmosphere would evaporate. Basically, the end of life as we know it.” There was only shocked silence in the room after that, and it lasted for a long moment. Then President Lanford asked the question on all of their minds.

“How long do we have?”

“Based on the measurements we took in Africa, I’d say less than twelve hours. But we need eyes on the source.”

More silence as the finality of the situation sunk in. Tanner was the first one to speak.

“So you’re saying we’re already finished.”

“Not necessarily,” David said. “The drilling in Africa stopped when we blew up their mother ship.”

“I don’t understand,” the Russian president said.

“There must have been a ‘queen’ up there that we didn’t know about,” David explained. “Assuming that this hive theory holds true, if we blow up this queen, maybe it could work again.”

“So what can we do?” Lanford asked.

“We don’t have a hell of a lot of options,” Adams said. “But if their shield phasing is the same as last time, we can neutralize it. Then we send every fighter we’ve got and blanket her with cold fusion bombs.”

“How do we know this’ll work?” Tanner challenged them. “Your weapons haven’t been very effective so far, Levinson.”

Funny
, David thought.
You sure were eager to use them yesterday.
Catherine stepped up before he could put his foot in his mouth, though.

“This man has done nothing but devote his life to protecting our planet,” she said angrily. “
No one
could have prevented this—”

“Catherine,” David said. This was a little more than he needed right at the moment, although he appreciated the sentiment.

“Who the hell is she?” Tanner demanded. “This is a classified briefing, General.”

General Adams signaled to two nearby soldiers, who escorted Catherine out. David was glad she had stuck up for him, but also glad she had left without causing more trouble with Tanner. He was already in enough trouble. When she was gone, he turned back to the screens.

“Madam President,” he said, “I’m afraid this is the only option we have.”

The president considered her options, the weight of what was left of the world clearly all on her shoulders. Then she said what David had known she would say.

“Let’s do it.”

The commander-in-chief had spoken. Adams turned to Ritter.

“Scramble our fighters,” he ordered.

Whitmore dreamed, and in his dream he saw a vast chamber, its interior a furious collage of images cycling through the entire history of human civilization, from the first marks on clay tablets right up through the steel plates laid as the foundation of Rhea Base. The images blurred faster and faster, too fast for him to follow, but something was watching them, soaking them in, searching…

The images all froze. One of them was slowly drawn out. It was the spherical ship emerging from the wormhole near the Moon.

An inhuman scream echoed through the chamber, and through Whitmore’s terrified dreaming mind.

* * *

Patricia and Jake noticed Whitmore’s fingers twitching as he lay unconscious in bed. Dr. Isaacs was checking his vital signs and reading through the initial reports of the incident of his contact with the alien prisoner.

“Is he going to be all right?” Patricia asked.

“His exposure was limited,” Isaacs said. “He’s strong. He’ll pull through.” He gave them a confident doctorly nod and left.

Patricia turned to Jake. “I thought I’d lost you.”

“Why, because the Moon exploded?” Jake joked. “It’ll take more than that to keep me away from you.”

Patricia laughed through tears. “I guess I should’ve known better.” They kissed, and Patricia felt more certain than ever that as long as Jake was around, there was a chance everything would work out. He had that effect on her, and it was a big reason why she loved him.

“Hey, sorry to interrupt,” Charlie said, poking his head in the door. “Jake, they called for an attack. Pre-flight briefing in five!” Then he disappeared again.

It was “all hands on deck,” just like the stories of the War of ’96, when an alcoholic crop duster had saved a million lives. Even pilots who hadn’t completed training were called in, and that meant both Jake and Patricia. She gazed down at her father, so helpless and fragile. There was nothing she could do for him, though.

“We should get suited up,” she said.

“Patricia—” he began, but she cut him off.

“Just because I haven’t flown in a while doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten how.”

“I know that,” Jake said. After a pause he added, “You should stay with your father.”

“They’re going to need every pilot they can get up there,” she said. She didn’t add that she had always wanted to fly, just as much as he had, and that she didn’t need him keeping her out of danger like she was some kind of damsel in distress.

“Please,” Jake said. She knew why, and she didn’t answer. He kissed her again and added, “I’ll come find you after the briefing.”

Then he was gone.

Patricia looked down at her father.

She had a decision to make.

* * *

Jake made his way through a group of pilots suiting up for the attack, heading for his locker he’s been assigned, but before he got to it, he saw Dylan Hiller.

So he made it back.

A moment later he saw that Dylan was crying, his eyes fixed on an old picture of him and his mother taped to the inside of his locker door.

Oh, man
, Jake thought.
Jasmine
. “I’m sorry,” he said. What else could you say?

Dylan wiped the tears away. Jake was lousy at dealing with people, but he understood in that moment that this was a situation where he actually
did
have something to say.

“I know I’m probably the last guy you want to hear from,” he said slowly, “but I’ve been where you are. I know how deep it hurts.” He thought back, to the fires burning in Los Angeles, seen from high in the mountains twenty years before. “Take that pain and use it,” he said. Dylan looked at him for the first time since he’d started talking. “She wouldn’t want you to give up now.”

A flight officer saw Dylan. “Hiller! Where have you been? General Adams is looking for you. You’re leading the attack.”

Dylan didn’t move. The officer waited, looking impatient.

“Dylan,” Jake said. “You have to lead us.”

He saw his friend get himself together—just a new set of his jaw, a little straightening of the shoulders.

“See you up there, Lieutenant,” Dylan said. Then he followed the officer out of the locker room.

Jake opened up his own locker. Usually there was just his tug coverall in there, but today there was an old helmet. His old fighter pilot helmet. For a minute he couldn’t even touch it, because he was about to do the one thing he’d always wanted to do, and the anxiety of that almost got the better of him. But he had to take his own advice. He picked up the helmet, feeling its weight in his hands. They were all going to need to lead, and they all had something to avenge.

He headed into the briefing theater, and found that Charlie had saved him a seat. A final call echoed over the intercom.

“All pilots report to the briefing theater immediately.” Jake could feel the other pilots in the room looking at him. Many of them knew the story about him and Dylan, and others had heard of his escapades up on the Moon—Lao’s version, anyway.