Invasion
Chapter 19

And they’re on their way back to Moscow, or aplace near to it. The helicopter journey is actually quite comforting for thetwo, quickly lulling them to sleep. They deserve the rest though after whatthey’ve just been through, and they’re gonna need all the energy they can get. They’rekinda following the same path they took to get here, just retracing theirsteps. Leaving the desert place, eventually they can see the city of NizhnyNovgorod again, the dark clouds still above them, and they head for the traintracks and go over the water. As they follow it, flying next to it on its leftside, Andrei can see the wreckage of the train crash from Sergey and company’sprevious endeavor. “Was that you?” he asks. Sergey comes up to the front tosee, “Yes, it was.” The fires and smoke are still raging among the steelwreckage and debris as the fires slowly melts them away. The hillside is still riddledwith train parts and wheels and cabins…and the damage from when the traindragged the ground as it slid down. Seeing it again brings back bad memories ofthat time…how they almost died. He goes back to sit down, trying not to thinkabout that anymore. Takashi suddenly wakes up. “Huh, what?” “It’s nothing, youshould rest,” Sergey tells him. He walks to the front to see what’s going on.Sergey lowers his head, knowing what his friend’s about to see. “What is it?”he asks as he sees it. He doesn’t say anything or express anything; he justkeeps staring at it for a few seconds before going back. Andrei continues tolook at it as they pass, he didn’t know. “Are you okay?” Sergey asks him as hesits back down. “I don’t wanna talk about it,” he replies. He then lays hishead back and tries to get some rest again. “Me neither,” Sergey says. Ofcourse he can’t really get back to sleep, he just wants to try. His eyes arewide open, though he looks away so Sergey can’t notice. It feels strange seeingit again, for both of them, but mostly for Takashi. It reminds him of theirmortality, for even with the powers they have, they can still die. It makes himthink of the arduous journey they’re about to take, more arduous than the onesbefore, and whether or not they’re gonna come back. Viktor didn’t see it forhimself, but he knows what they’re talking about. Not looking at it helps ingetting rid of it from his mind, but even so, he remembers. Nevertheless, theycontinue on their way.

Andreifollows the path of the train tracks over the barren plains back to the city. Eventuallyhe can start to see it, though the blizzard has disappeared, it left its markson that part of the city with its thick, white snow still covering most streetsand cars and buildings. But their destination lies elsewhere as they pass abovethe city.

It isn’t long before hecan see the city of Korolyov. Empty cars and bodies and blood also litter thestreets, not from the gas, but by the creatures’ hands. “Guys, wake up. We arehere,” he tells them. Sergey relays the message again as they didn’t hear hisfriend the first time. “Wake up!!” he shouts. In shock, they wake up in asudden manner, mumbling incoherently. “We have arrived,” Sergey tells them. Inexcitement of wanting to see the supposed space elevator, they jump to thefront to try and see it. But other than the broken city, they see nothing. “Idon’t see it,” Takashi says. “That is the point,” Andrei replies. He decided toland on a patch of open field, like it matters anymore where they do it. Hedoesn’t even wait for it to turn off, in fact he considered not turning it offand just get out right away, but that’ll attract too much attention. Maybe… Hedoesn’t have the time or the luxury to think about crap like that. They get outand he looks around to get his bearing. Where are they? Takashi approaches himand asks, “Even if we get to this place, how do you know there are still peopleleft to help us?” “I do not. But if that is the case, then we will figure itout,” he answers. He signals to the rest to hurry up and they go on their way.

Heading to the spaceagency, they can eventually see part of the elevator sticking out of the top ofthe quite small building as they go through the parking lot to reach the frontdouble doors. “Welcome to the Russian Space Agency,” Andrei says. The entrancehall is quite wide with the reception at the center end, and beside it, thedoors to main control room. The walls are painted white while the pillars are brown.“I thought the launch station is at the Baikonur Cosmodrome?” Olivia asks. “Itis, but we are not looking for the station or rockets,” Sergey answers, “we arelooking for the space elevator.” They enter through the left door into the maincontrol room. A variety of equipment, computers and radios, and monitors floodthe room. “This is where they observe and manage launches,” Andrei states. Surprisingly,nothing has been damaged as it looks like the creatures haven’t been here.

He quickly walks down toone of the computers and types something in. The big monitor suddenly lights upbright white, first showing static, but then changes to a diagram and schematicof what looks like the elevator. Everything’s in Russian, of course. “Is thatit?” Takashi asks. “Yep, the first of its kind. No other country has ever evenattempted to create one of this. But we were able to build a prototype,” Andreiexplains proudly, smiling. “What’re you doing?” Olivia asks. “I am turning iton, so we can use it.” Of course, the diagram on the screen doesn’t show halfof what the thing actually looks like. They’re in for a surprise. Nothingcould’ve prepared them for what they’re about to see. “Follow me.” Andrei leadsthem to a steel door on the left side, though it is locked and won’t able to beopened as it uses biometric security. He tries to open it anyway, failing to doso. He would expect nothing less for the door leading to such a machine. But seeingas there are no employees or bodies of employees around to use to open it, itseems that they’re caught between a rock and a hard place. “Damn!” he exclaims.“Without the right person, this door cannot be opened, and we do not have timeto search for one or another way in. Unless…” Takashi and Olivia smile, as theyknow where this is going. “Alright, we’ll try,” Olivia tells him. She pusheshim aside and they take position in front of the door. “This is gonna hurt,isn’t it?” she asks Takashi. “Most probably,” he answers, not liking it.

They gesture their handsto the door and begin trying to open it. It creaks and stutters as it’s beingpulled apart. It starts to break away from the wall a little. Even thoughthey’re both doing it, sharing the stress, they still feel the weight and thestruggle that it places on them. The steel starts to bend and bend…until theyfinally manage to rip it down. They both get a brief nosebleed as they propthemselves against their knees. “That…gave me a little headache,” Oliviastates. “You okay?” Takashi asks. “Yeah, I’m fine. Let’s just go,” she replies,wiping the blood away. Andrei, Sergey, and their men enter first. From theopening they can see part of the huge elevator, but they’re too busy recoveringto notice it fully. It isn’t until they walk in that they realize how huge itis and how…cool it all looks. It fills the whole room at the end, very wide andstretching up to the sky. The outer wall is comprised of a glass-like material,almost completely translucent and clear, and at the bottom is the door thatleads to the elevator. A big square-shaped platform with the corner edges attachedto some sort of wheel and connected to rails on the corners of the elevator.They approach it, slowly, as they’re filled with awe. “My friends, welcome…tothe elevator chamber,” Andrei says proudly again. “Wow,” they both say. “Thisis very cool,” Takashi says, “but are you sure it works?” “Only one way to replaceout,” Sergey tells them. EVA suits are also present, hanging on the walls. “Youneed to put these on before entering,” Andrei tells them. The suits are whitein color, though they aren’t very bulky like usual space suits, but quite slimand fit. Of course, the flag on the chest area of the suit is the Russian flag.Then finally, they put on their helmets, also quite slim and fit, comfortably. “Thehelmets will also allow us to communicate with each other,” Sergey explains. Theythen enter the elevator. The platform itself is also translucent as are theseats inside. There are 5 white seats laid in a line on each side of the elevator,except on the door side. “Doesn’t anyone notice this elevator??” Olivia asks,“won’t planes notice it or worse, crash through it as they pass by??” “Impossible.This airspace is restricted, commercial planes are not allowed to pass here.”“And the translucent material makes it almost impossible to see from afar orfrom outside. Haha, let’s do this then,” Takashi says. They all take a seat onvarious locations, except for Andrei who approached a small console on thecorner of the platform to activate the elevator. “Everyone ready??” he asks.They all tighten their seatbelts, make sure they’re secured, and drop downtheir visors, “Let’s do it.” “Alright, when we reach to the top, we will go tothe Vostok Space Station,” Andrei explains. Olivia raises her hand. “Yes,”Andrei responds. “Umm, how exactly do we get to this space station?” she asks,“is it connected?” “No, we will have to spacewalk,” he replies, “should be noproblem for you two.” “Anything else?” Everyone shakes their head. “Okay then.”He slowly reaches for the button. “Just get it over with!” Takashi shouts tohim, nervous. He presses the button and quickly sits down and buckles up as avariety of sounds, sirens, and alarms ring off.

They can start to feelthe vibrations of the platform activating. The door closes before the platformstarts to rise gradually, slowly at first, but gaining speed as it goes. Theycan feel the force of the upward motion pushing them downwards, as they get higherand higher. “You are now 20 KM above sea level,” a computer voice states. Itwas a little difficult to hear, but they understood. After that, a sort ofrocket booster at the bottom of the platform activates, increasing their speedeven further. Boom! “WHOA!!!!” they all shout. Just like that, they’re now goingup really, really fast. “You are now 35 KM above sea level,” the voice statesagain. At this point, the sound is almost impossible to hear…almost. “We arenow above 100,000 feet, hahahaha!!” Andrei screams out. “Whaatt??!!” theyscream back. “You are now 50 KM above sea level.” They’re very high up now, thesky and clouds are visible outside. It isn’t as bleak as some other cities, it’sunclear why or how the creatures are choosing where to change or affect theweather. Maybe it's just pure coincidence. Or maybe they’re trying to stop thegang from finishing their mission. “You are now 70 KM above sea level,” thecomputer continues to states. “OMG!!!!!” Viktor and Takashi yells. “Shouldn’twe be hitting the brakes by now???!!!” Olivia yells out. “Probably!!!!” Andreireplies, “shit!!! How do we do that???!!!” The platform shakes and vibratesviolently. “YOU MEAN THIS THING HAS NO FUCKING BREAKS???!!!!” she screamsloudly at him, scolding him a little. “IT IS PROTOTYPE!!!!” “Come on, Liv!!! I’vegot an idea, though you won’t like it!!!!” Takashi says to her. “Let’s just doit!!!!” They don’t have time to think left. “We have to unbuckle though!!!”“WHAATTT???!!” “That is terrible idea!!!!” Sergey adds. “You are now 85 KMabove sea level.” “WE DON’T HAVE TIME!!!!! Come on, Liv!!!!” They both unbuckleand quickly slam to the floor from the force as they tried to stand up. “Owww!!!!”they both exclaim. “Come on, Liv!!!! We have to get up!!!!! You go to the otherside, I’ll go this way!!!!” As soon as they unbuckle, they fall flat to thefloor from the sheer force. They use all the strength they have, includingtheir powers, to help them overcome it and they walk to each side. Even withtheir powers, they can feel the force pushing them down…and they’re gettingtired. “Okay, Liv!!!! We’re gonna try and stop it by using our hands!!!! We’regonna slow it down!!!!!” he explains. “Well, this isn’t the craziest thingwe’ve done in a while!!!!” she replies. “You are now above 100 KM.” At thispoint, they’ve reached space. Everything outside is dark and starry and theonly thing keeping them grounded is the force of the elevator’s upward motion. “Alright,Liv!!!! 1!! 2!! 3!!!” They pressed their hands against the wall of theelevator, causing it to spark and burn. “OMG!!!!!” Olivia shouts. “You are now250 KM above sea level.” As they rise ever higher, the trail of sparks can beseen on the walls. Eventually, they see the topmost point of the elevator andtheir end journey. “Uhhhh, what happens if we can’t stop it by the time wereach the top???!!!” she asks. “Then we will keep going…forever!!” he answers. “Pressharder, Liv!!!!!!” Takashi screams to her. They start to feel the elevatorslowing down as it creaks. “Hahahaha!!! It’s working!!!!! I don’t believeit!!!!” she yells. “You are now 375 KM above sea level.” “KEEP DOING IT,LIV!!!!!!!” They’ve significantly slowed down as they start to reach the end orthe top, as it is. Thankfully, the rocket booster turned off at that moment andthe platform docked. As it does so, they both try to kneel down, but floatsinstead due to the low gravity environment. They hold their hands up, burning,reddish, and painful even through the EVA suit. Surprisingly, the frictiondidn't cause too much damage to the hand area of the suit, although it’s noticeablyscarred. Even so, they can still feel the intense pain. “……ouch!” sheexclaimed. Takashi doesn’t say anything, though he is obviously hurting aswell.

The others unbucklethemselves and float around the area. It’s an average size square box with thewalls clear on all sides and corners so they can see outside. It doesn’t haveanything in it except gears and other machineries for docking. Sergey gentlyfloats towards the door that leads outside. “Come on, guys,” he says, “andwhatever you do, do not open your helmets. There is no more oxygen here.” “Terrific,”Olivia says sarcastically. “Let’s just do this,” she says with a tired voice. “Alright,everyone. Once we get outside, that is our objective,” Andrei points out to thespace station. They come closer to the window to see it. Sergey rotates thewheel to unlock the door and opens it. As it opens, the tiny bit of air in theroom escapes out. Sergey goes out first with Andrei following behind, thenViktor and Andrei’s man, Alexei. Takashi and Olivia quickly fly out, but shootsout quickly and replaces it difficult to stop and control themselves. “Whoa!!” Managingto stop, they float carefully in the void. “Okay, what was that?” she asks.“We’re in space now. Things work a little differently here,” Takashi explains. Thoughit is beautiful, and oddly peaceful. So quiet, no sound at all except theircomms and their breathing. Sergey and the others join the two in their bliss,and for a moment, they let themselves go and just float. The Earth looks sodifferent from up there. All they can see are huge green lands and blue oceans.Takashi then closes his eyes, really immersing himself in the moment. How longhas he waited for something like this? The silence and the peace… There’snobody around to hurt him anymore. It would be nice to just let go forever. Buthe can’t, he still has a job to do. Olivia floats gently close to him and hugshim, their helmets touching each other. “You alright, baby?” she asks. He’sstill closing his eyes and smiling. He opens them and looks at her beforeanswering, “Yeah…I’m fine. I’m better than fine, actually. Just enjoying themoment.” She smiles back. “I used to only imagine this. I never thought I wouldbe in a place like this, where everything’s quiet and peaceful. There’sliterally nothing,” he continues. “It is nice, isn’t it?” she adds, “but westill have a mission to finish.” “Right, let’s go.”

“If you two lovebirds aredone, we need to get going now,” Sergey interrupts. Takashi gives him a ‘thumbsup’ and they both return to the group, and they all make their way to the spacestation. They carry the others and fly towards it, gently and slowly this time.The space station is quite small in a way, most of it is a pipe-like or a corridor-like,circle shaped structure. It seems to originate from and branch off a centraldome-like structure in the middle, with some corridors having branches of theirown. Through the darkness of space, it’s a little difficult to make out thecolor, but it seems to be light blue for the corridors and the centralstructure is just grayish or silver colored. Sergey tries to contact the crewof the station as they begin their approach. “Vostok space station, come in.Come in, Vostok station. This is Captain Sergey Markovic. We need you to openthe airlocks so we can enter,” he signals them. But nobody seems to answer,static filling the comms. He signals them again and repeats his message. “Maybethey’re not there anymore,” Olivia speculates quietly, “I mean, the creaturescould’ve gotten them too. We don’t know.” He gets disappointed. Hopefullythat’s not what happened, but the space station is closer to the mothership.It’s very possible that the creatures have invaded the space stations first andkilled off everyone there. Nevertheless, he tries to signal them one last time,not wanting to give up. But alas, there’s still no answer. “So what now, boss?”Olivia asks. “We should be able to get inside ourselves. We need to replace theaccess door,” he answers. Suddenly, the station starts moving and turning,creaking and making that space station noise. The corridor that holds theentrance faces them now. “Uhhhh, why did the station move by itself?” Takashiasks, worried. The airlock then opens and they see something moving, looks likea person in an EVA suit. It signals to them to enter the station. “What do wedo? Should we trust…it?” Olivia asks. “We do not have choice. Our suits do nothave enough oxygen left,” he explains to them. Swallowing their doubts, theyhead to the now open airlock.

As they enter, they give adistrusting look to the person as they pass; they have to keep vigilant and beprepared for anything. He closes back the airlock door and the room pressurizes.He then opens his helmet to reveal that she’s actually a woman underneath. Shehas short brown hair, just above her neckline, and an oval-shaped face. Everyonelooks shocked. “I apologize for not replying. But the monsters might hear us,so we don’t use radios,” she explains. Still surprised, Takashi shakes it offand asks, “So they don’t know you’re here? They haven’t been here yet?” “Not yet, but we do not know how long that willlast,” she replies. She turns to Sergey and starts speaking Russian, “What thehell’s going on?? And what are they doing down there??” she asks him. Replyingin Russian, “Unfortunately, the creatures have overtaken them. We’re all that’sleft. We have to succeed.” She nods in understanding. They raise their visorsas she opens the door that connects the airlock to the corridor, leading intothe station. They pass one by one, floating and trying to avoid hitting thewalls. “Ow! Dammit!” they exclaim. None of them has ever done this before, it’scomplicated. The sensation of weightlessness is very new to them and feelsweird, especially for Sergey and the others. Takashi and Olivia had a littlebit of experience from their flying, but this feeling of completeweightlessness is a little different. They just keep floating and spinningaround… It makes them feel dizzy and woozy. “I think I will throw up,” Sergeysays still hitting the walls and each other. The woman looks at them with asmile and laughs. Having already experienced this environment for some time,she’s used to it. But watching them tumble around is quite funny, haha. “That’sit!” Takashi yells. He uses his powers to stabilize all of them. Suddenly they all come to a stand still. “Ah, thank you, my friend,” Sergey tells him. Confused,the woman asks, “How did you do that??” “Now that’s…hard to explain,” heanswers, “we’ll tell you later.” “For now, we need to regroup. Where is themain control center?” Andrei asks. “Follow me,” she says, “but please don’ttouch anything.” “What’s your name again?” Olivia asks. “My name is Alexandra,”she answers.