Pit Bulls vs Aliens (11 page)

Sally sat on the edge of the boat and prepared herself again. She nodded as Erique held up five fingers, then she fell back into the water.

Minutes passed as Erique paced the boat again, which made Dr. McNair nervous. “What happened the last time you were here?” Dr. McNair asked.

Erique looked down as the events of that day replayed in his mind. “I don’t know. Something down there scared the dolphins. All I know is, a diver was killed and one badly injured, and it was all wrong how it happened.”

“What do you mean?” Thomas asked.

Erique started recounting the horrific ordeal as Thomas and Dr. McNair looked on. Suddenly, he stopped and pointed.

Bubbles had erupted on the calm surface thirty feet behind the boat. Sally’s hand breached the surface, but that was all. Erique ran and dove over the side of the boat and swam out to her. Thomas did the same. Dr. McNair jumped over the transom and waited. The two men made their way to the back of the boat, towing Sally’s limp body. Dr. McNair held her while the men climbed up and lifted her back into the boat. Her mask was gone and blood was running down from a severe laceration in her neck.

Erique rushed to the front of the boat, started the engine, and sped away. He grabbed the radio and started calling for help. “Mayday! Mayday! We have an emergency.”

Dr. McNair tried to stop the bleeding. Sally still had a pulse but was unconscious.

The radio screeched and a voice came back. “What is the nature of your emergency?”

Erique motioned for Thomas to take the wheel of the boat and pointed in the opposite direction of the sun. “Keep it going that way.” He squeezed the mic again. “We have a diver badly injured. We can’t make it back in time. Please send a helicopter. Our coordinates are twenty-one degrees west by twenty degrees north. I have activated the emergency beacon. We are heading back toward Nouakchott. Please have the helicopter meet us.”

The voice on the other end of the radio confirmed. “I’m sending the helicopter now.”

Erique rushed back to Sally and Dr. McNair. “How is she?”

“I have stopped the bleeding but she’s lost a lot of blood.” Dr. McNair kept his hand pressed tightly against her neck. “I hope that chopper finds us soon.”

Erique went back to the controls and motioned for Thomas to step aside.

“We should have listened to you, man. I’m so sorry,” Thomas said.

Erique kept his eyes on the sky. Twenty minutes passed but seemed like hours. “There!” he yelled.

Dr. McNair looked up and saw the helicopter approaching. Thomas began to wave his arms wildly back and forth above his head. “We’re going to make it,” Thomas yelled. He stood beside Erique and watched the helicopter getting larger in perspective.

Suddenly something rose out of the water a mere forty yards ahead of the boat. It was round, metallic blue, and shining in the sunlight. It seemed to be twisting as it rose. Erique veered the boat sharply to miss it, but it was too large.

Thomas grabbed the side of the boat and looked back at Dr. McNair. “Hold on to—”

The boat hit the object with a resounding thud. The front of the boat disintegrated on impact as the vessel went airborne. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion from that point as all four passengers flew off the boat and hit the water along with debris from the wreckage.

The helicopter arrived as all four bodies were floating in the water. It hovered.

Thomas saw Sally floating facedown and turned her over. She wasn’t breathing so he started administering mouth-to-mouth.

“Is she all right?” Dr. McNair asked.

Erique had gotten to Dr. McNair and was helping him stay afloat. None of them had been wearing life preservers.

Thomas kept his focus on Sally and continued administering CPR. Finally she started coughing and spitting out water as everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Thomas kept one hand tightly on the wound in her neck to prevent more bleeding.

A diver jumped out of the helicopter and swam to them. Another person in the helicopter lowered a cable and basket. The diver and Thomas lifted Sally up first and secured her for the ascent. Within thirty minutes all four were safely aboard and were given blankets.

The diver and the other rescue guy began tending to Sally’s neck. “What happened?” one of them asked the others.

“We didn’t see,” Dr. McNair said, “but it could have been dolphins or killer whales.”

The two rescue men looked at each other in disbelief.

The helicopter flew directly to the hospital and landed on the roof. Orderlies quickly took Sally to the elevator. Dr. McNair, Thomas, and Erique waited for the elevator to come back up. When it opened, a familiar face was looking back at them, at least familiar to Erique.

“We’re making a habit out of this, Mr. Sarpong, aren’t we?”

“Who are you?” Thomas asked.

The tall dark man stepped out of the elevator. “I am Officer Jakande. I cannot believe you would take people out there again.”

“Sir, in his defense,” Dr. McNair said, “he didn’t want to. We talked him into it.”

“This I believe,” Jakande said. “Get yourselves looked at. I’ll be back to get a statement.”

“You’re just so adorable. Yes, you are.” Rebecca, Darren’s beautiful young assistant at the new SETI command center, rubbed Roscoe under the chin as he excitedly accepted the attention. The neckline of her blouse hung down enough to reveal a black bra.

“You like dogs, do you?” Darren asked while trying to keep his eyes on her face.

“Oh, yes sir, Dr. Mitchell. I sure do. Well, to be honest, I like men who like dogs.” Her smile revealed two perfect rows of stunning white teeth.

“Yeah, me too,” he said.

She laughed.

Darren blushed. “I mean . . . I like dogs, not men who . . . uh . . . not men.”

She laughed harder. “You’re cute,” she said as she turned her attention back to Roscoe.

Who’s cute?
Darren wondered.
Me or Roscoe?

“So how long have you had him?” she asked.

“Ten years.”

She nodded. “Did it hurt him when you clipped his ears and tail?”

“Oh, I would never do that,” Darren answered. “He was like that when I got him.”

“Was he a rescue?”

Darren smiled. “You could say that. I found him living in the woods in Alabama.”

Rebecca smiled. “Tell me about it.”

“Sure. I was in my last year of grad school and I had gone home for spring break to visit my folks. They live in a very rural area of Alabama on a small farm. Mom told me about this stray dog that they had been seeing, you know, coming around scavenging for food and stuff.”

“That’s so sad,” she said, her full attention now directed at Darren.

“Yes, I agree,” he said. “I mean, he was surviving in an area full of coyotes. He was scrawny and so dirty we couldn’t even tell what color he was. I knew I had to do something. I told my mom and dad that we needed to catch him and give him a loving home.”

“What did they say?”

“They agreed, but my mom thought I had too much going on with grad school to take care of a dog too. She wanted us to catch him and try to find him a home or turn him in to a shelter. But I knew the shelters in smaller towns don’t have the resources to handle a lot of dogs, and being a pit bull might move him up on the list to be put to sleep, and I couldn’t take that chance.”

Rebecca’s eyes glowed and she crossed her arms over her chest. “You have a big heart. You saved him.”

“Well. He saved me if truth be told.” Darren was laying it on thick. “My life got so much better after I took him in. He was so scared at first. He wouldn’t go anywhere in my apartment until I carried him there. But he slowly came out of his shell and has become the best dog in the world. He’s still afraid of some things, like thunder and lightning, and even rain, but he loves the dog park and being around other dogs.”

“You never thought of getting him a little brother or sister?” she asked.

“Oh sure,” Darren lied. “I figured once I had a bigger family I would do that.”

“So what’s keeping you from doing that?” Rebecca added a devious look to that question.

Darren swallowed hard. “I guess I just haven’t met the right person. You know it’s hard with work and all.”

Several seconds passed as they stared at each other until it became uncomfortable.

“Well, can I get you a cup of coffee, sir?” she asked.

“Sure, that would be nice.” Darren turned his attention back to his computer as she walked away. “Yeah, that’s right, I’m cute,” he said to Roscoe. It was great being the boss and certainly something he was not used to.

“Hey, boss.”

Darren spun around to see Brian, one of his fellow SETI physicists. Brian’s family had moved to the United States from India, and Brian had the look and even wore traditional Indian clothes at times, but had no accent at all.

“Tell me you got something,” Darren said.

“Nada.” He handed Darren the latest report.

“How is this possible?” Darren studied the sheet carefully. “It doesn’t make sense. If we can detect the signal and even determine its level of output, then why can’t we tell where it’s coming from or how far away it is?”

Brian shrugged. “It’s a mystery for sure. We’ll figure it out, though. Thanks again for choosing me to be part of the team.”

Darren smiled and nodded. Brian was one of the sharpest young minds he had ever met. “What do your parents think of your career choice now?” He remembered Brian mentioning how they were disappointed in his chosen field.

“No improvement,” Brian said. “My dad is a neurosurgeon and thinks I should have followed in his footsteps. My granddad was also a surgeon.”

“But this discovery is huge. Don’t they realize that?”

Brian shrugged. “They said that when I meet E.T., they’ll support me.”

Darren laughed. The remake of the classic movie
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
had hit theaters at the beginning of the summer.

“What about your parents?” Brian asked. “Do they believe in what you’re doing?”

Darren nodded. “Yes, they do. Of course they don’t understand it. I’ve tried explaining to them but whenever I mention aliens, they think I work with National Security keeping an eye on Guatemalans.”

“Dang, I should have told my parents that,” Brian said with a chuckle. “So what’s next, boss?”

“Have everyone meet me in the conference room. Let’s have a powwow,” Darren said. He gathered his notes as Brian went to deliver his orders.

“Here’s your coffee, sir,” Rebecca said, walking up with the Styrofoam cup in her hands.

Darren shifted his notes under one arm and took the cup. “Thank you.” He walked into the conference room and put the cup and papers at the head of the table. He waited as the other six SETI employees joined him, all of them with their own notes.

“Okay,” Darren began, looking out over the faces at the table, “let’s talk about what we know and what we might be able to deduce from it. Since the signal is mathematical and since they have the technology to send it, I think we have to assume they’re intelligent.”

Everyone around the table nodded in agreement.

“So the first question is,” Darren continued, “why can’t we tell where the signal comes from or how far away it is?”

Steven Yuen raised his hand.

“Steven?”

“I’d say it’s intentional.” Steven looked around the room. “I mean, I’d say they don’t want us to know.”

Darren nodded. “I’ll buy that. That certainly coincides with them being intelligent.”

“Not just intelligent,” Barbara Long, another physicist, stated, “but possibly hostile.”

“What do you mean?” Darren asked.

“Well,” she continued, “why the need for secrecy? If they’re intentionally keeping us from knowing where they are, how can that be a good thing? Okay, maybe not hostile, but certainly sneaky. The signal was not meant for humans, nor do they even want us to know about it and certainly not to understand it. If that is intentional, then they’re up to something.”

“I see your point,” Darren offered. “That certainly puts it into context. What else is something we don’t know?”

“Why the oceans?” Brian asked.

“Very good, Brian,” Darren said. “Why the oceans indeed? Any thoughts?”

A woman named Tanisha raised her hand. “Maybe they’re ichthyological.”

Barbara laughed. “Fish people? That would be cool. Can’t wait to see what they look like.”

“So they’re communicating with their own kind?” Darren shrugged. “Maybe.”

Steven spoke up again. “Maybe they have bases underwater, on the ocean floor in the deepest parts. Maybe they’ve been there a long time.”

Darren stared upward as he pondered the possibility. “Or maybe it’s a rescue mission for a ship that has gone down in the ocean.”

“Yeah,” Brian said. “I like that.”

Ahmad joined in. “Is anyone else worried that the signal is directed at the oceans when water might be the most scarce and valuable element in the universe?”

The room grew quiet as everyone considered the possibility.

“That would be bad,” Brian said, breaking the stillness. “If they came here and robbed us of our water, we would all die.”

“So how do we stop them?” Barbara asked.

“This is just a hypothetical,” Darren said.

“Okay, then,” Barbara said, “hypothetically how would we stop them?”

Steven laughed. “We send a sign up into space saying, ‘Welcome to Earth. Don’t Drink the Water.’”

Almost everyone laughed.

“They’re instructions.”

Everyone turned to look at Lucas, the one at the opposite end of the table, the one who never spoke up during these meetings. He was clearly the smartest person among them, which is why Darren had selected him to be part of the group, but he had regretted the decision. Lucas was crude and had offered no insights into the situation. His overly large frame, dirty T-shirts, tight sweatpants, and unkempt beard, which was long and jet black, were a turnoff to everyone.

“What was that?” Darren asked.

Lucas crossed his arms and stared out from under his thick black eyebrows. “Instructions.”

“Okay, I got that,” Darren said, “but can you explain what that means?”