T-Plus 1

Thoughts and queries rushed through Oliver's mind as a tide of bubbles. They popped as they reached the surface, leaving a myriad of ramshackled confusion behind. The flashing lights calmed, the emergency red dying with it. Emerson was the first to snap out of their daze.

“Quarantine?” she whispered. “What does that mean?”

“It means we're stuck here,” Toast responded.

“Until when?”

“Until they decide we're not a disaster zone,” Oliver replied, turning off the panel.

“What do we do then?”

“There’s no point in staying here,” he continued, hurrying to the door. “And I don’t want to find out what those sirens attracted either.”

The other two followed. They stood in the shadow of the Elevator's boarding area, right before the door. Oliver poked his head out. There was nothing.

“Where are we going? Your room again?” Emerson asked.

Oliver deliberated, glancing back at her. She seemed fine for the moment, her face no paler than usual. The problem was him. The pain in his legs remained fiery, although if he didn't focus on it for too long, he'd survive. How long that’d remain was the question, however.

“It's the closest. We'll figure out what to do when we're there.”

Back down the hallway they went, the light of the Elevator to their backs. Toast jogged ahead with the penlight again, checking for slugs. Oliver stayed with Emerson, who set their pace to a power walk. Her brows were furrowed, and her lips were set in a grim line. She had the don’t-talk-to-her atmosphere wrapped around her as a shawl, and he could only guide her forward in silence.

Toast ran back in the midst of the tension like he always did, jerking his thumb behind him.

“They’re still there. I’m going to lead them further down the hallway.”

Oliver nodded, glancing over at Emerson. She remained impassive. Toast went ahead as they waited around the bend. Oliver kept an eye out as Toast did his usual routine. He led their new neighbors out of Oliver’s view, his jeering cajoles reporting his status.

With the creatures out of sight, Oliver headed over to his room, slapping his card onto the reader. The door slid open, and he gestured for Emerson to enter first. He kept the door open as he waited for Toast. A few moments later, the scientist came sprinting toward him, his entire self covered in more space creature guts. Oliver shut the door and sighed to himself. They were back to square one, again.

The three settled in: Toast cleaned up, Emerson seated herself in silence aside from the crunching of chips, and Oliver took out his other flashlight to illuminate the room. The room bubbled with questions and tension, and the technician didn’t know how to pop it. Luckily, he didn’t have to.

“Why did they quarantine us?” Toast asked.

“Your playmates outside are enough of an answer for that,” Oliver snorted, plopping himself down on the floor. “The problem is what we’re going to do.”

“We just need to stay put until they lift it, right?”

Oliver sighed, rubbing the back of his head. If only it was as simple as that.

“We don’t know how long that’ll be,” Emerson murmured, lifting her face out of the chips.

“At the shortest, they’ll get us tomorrow; at the longest, we’ll be here until the slugs digest all of us.”

“So what I’m hearing is we’re having a sleepover,” Toast concluded.

The technician and doctor exchanged eye rolls. Emerson continued munching on the chips, leaving Oliver to move the conversation forward.

“Let’s organize everything we have first. We’ll need to grab whatever we’re missing.”

“Should we try contacting the others?” Toast asked.

“We can leave messages by the Elevator,” Oliver decided. “We’ll tell them to meet us here.”

There was no disagreement. They gathered everything they had on the table in the middle: the rest of his snacks that the other two had scavenged when he was unconscious, the half used first-aid kit, the three flashlights, a few extra towels, and the few extra pillows and blankets he kept.

“Definitely missing a lot,” Oliver said, staring at their meager pile.

They wouldn’t be able to survive long without water. They had food, if he counted snacks as food. He glanced at Emerson, who was simply staring at the pile in front of her. They would need a change of clothes as well if Toast kept crushing slugs with himself. And better medical equipment, if not another first-aid kit.

“Batteries?” Toast suggested, waving the dying penlight.

Oliver nodded in agreement.

“Power and blankets. Anything else will have to wait for another run,” Oliver decided.

“Where are we going to get that?” Toast asked.

“There’s a supply closet down the way you led the slugs,” the technician said. “There’s batteries in there, but not much else outside electrical equipment. Everything else we want is in other closets back the other way, past the Elevator.”

“So we’re making a round trip,” the scientist said, scratching his head.

The two looked over at Emerson who had remained silent through their exchange. She returned their gazes, a chip halfway to her lips. The doctor crunched on it, deigning not to give them a response until she licked her lips clean of salt.

“I’ll stay here. You guys go ahead.”

“You sure?”

She nodded, shooing them away with her hands.

“Go. I’ll organize all of this. Just knock when you’re back. I doubt you’ll be able to open the door with all the stuff you’re carrying. Actually, I suggest you take a backpack or something with you.”

Emerson continued to eat in her own world, giving them no other response. He and Toast exchanged their own set of looks before grabbing the backpack Oliver had in his closet and setting out. They left the penlight with Emerson, taking the two heavy duty flashlights with them.

As the door slid to a close behind them, Toast flicked his flashlight on, a shit-eating grin pasted on his face. Of course the mad scientist would find being stuck away from authorities “fun”.

“So? Where to first? Batteries or blankets?”

“Batteries first,” Oliver said, gesturing for him to walk. “I also want to take a closer look at our slug friends.”

“Why?”

“We need as much intel as possible,” he explained, taking it slow. “The more the better. We don’t know how long we’ll be stuck here.”

“There’s not much to observe,” Toast said, pointing ahead. “They’re over there.”

They hid in the shadow of the wall, angling their lights down toward their feet. Just beyond the light were the remaining slugs. After so many dying under the guise of a distraction, there were only three remaining from the original number. They were cleaning up the remnants of Toast’s most recent murder. The splattering of flesh colored goop spanned the right side of the hallway, the opposite side of where the supply closet was located.

“I wonder if they’ll notice us if we try to open the door,” Oliver muttered.

If they hurried, they might just make it before Toast would have to run around again. He nodded toward the quivering blobs, seeking the scientist’s opinion.

“What do you think they’re navigating with?”

“I don’t think it’s sight,” Toast said. “Has to be something similar to echolocation.”

“Like a bat?”

“Maybe.”

He pointed his flashlight in their general vicinity, moving the beam around like a laser pointer messing with a cat. The slugs didn’t react, continuing to finish off their meal.

“Yup. It might be heat, sound, or even scent?” the scientist speculated.

“Can’t check heat or scent at the moment,” Oliver said.

“Sound is easy enough,” Toast laughed, stepping out into the middle of the hallway.

Taking a deep breath, he shouted at the slugs.

“Hey! Are you aliens?”

Oliver covered his ears, watching for the creatures’ reactions. Nothing. They continued to eat away. Even the scientist’s loud call didn’t make them flinch. Toast returned to his side, less cautious now.

“That makes it either heat or scent. Just leaves the range now.”

“It shouldn’t be too wide,” Oliver said. “They didn’t start chasing me and Emerson until we were almost on them.”

“You go get the supplies,” Toast said. “I’ll test out your theory.”

“Don’t mess around too much,” Oliver warned as he skirted around the slugs.

He kept a hand on the wall, slowly approaching the door to the supply closet. On the other side of the hallway, Toast was heading toward the slugs, yelling teasing remarks about their looks. Oliver didn’t know what he was doing, but he highly doubted calling them oversized stress balls would affect them in any way.

With the light under his arm, Oliver slapped his ID onto the card reader attached to the door. It was a blessing the card readers had their own power supply. Otherwise they’d have to figure out more creative ways to break into the supply closets.

The door clicked open, sensing the tiny magnets imbedded into the card. He first headed toward the back where he knew the batteries were kept. With the light as his guide, Oliver skirted the mess that covered the floor. The shocks from yesterday had scattered this room’s contents, and a collection of everything was everywhere.

The batteries were in a corner on the ground by where their box was usually located. He tossed the lot into his backpack, surveying the nearby floor just in case he missed any. He stood after he made sure there were none left, dusting his hands. He made a circuit around the room, pursing his lips. Now to look for anything else that would be useful.

His eyes settled on a small water heater hidden among several boxes on the other side. He crossed the room, crouching beside it. It didn’t have a cord attached to it. He flipped the heater around, checking it. There wasn’t a mini-solar panel on it either. Instead, on the bottom there was a flap. He popped it open. A smile spread across his face at the discovery. It was battery powered. Well, they could finally eat the ramen packets like they were supposed to, or possibly even instant coffee.

He swept through the room again. He found a few more stray batteries and another flashlight, although this one wasn’t a heavy duty one, a handheld solar powered lantern, and two packs of specialized batteries that could probably fit in the penlight. Oliver tucked them all away in his backpack before heading out again.

The sound of the door closing and the lock clicking back into place accompanied the scene he walked out to. Toast was squatting on the floor covered in more slug corpses. The slimy essence of what he assumed was left of the aliens surrounded him. The scientist himself was poking one pile, watching it jiggle.

“What did you do?” Oliver sighed.

“I was testing their detection range,” Toast said, standing. “You were right, it’s not that far.”

“So? Why are they dead?”

“Well, they don’t have a very far detection range, but they seemed to have some sort of communication system between them. The moment I approached one, the further ones swarmed me.”

“So you squished them.”

Toast shrugged it off.

“Now we won’t have to worry about them.”

“For now,” Oliver snorted, helping Toast up. “Let’s go to the other supply closet.”

“What did you find?”

“Batteries and a water heater.”

“I hope you have some coffee in your room.”

“Not enough for three people.”

“Our next run needs to be a coffee run,” Toast decided.

“Let’s go,” Oliver stated, ignoring him.

They left the scene, ignoring the flesh colored goop on the floor. The journey to the other closet was uneventful. It reminded him of the times when he was still in college when he and his suitemates would venture through the school buildings in the dark, armed with only their phone lights.

“I wonder what brought the aliens here,” Toast said.

His voice broke the monotonous sound of their footsteps. Oliver surfaced from his memories, turning toward Toast.

“What?”

“I wonder why the aliens are here,” Toast repeated. “Those things seemed too dumb to purposefully be here.”

Oliver furrowed his brows.

“So they're here by coincidence?”

“Or maybe somebody called them here!”

Toast's eyes were practically sparkling. His steps became lighter as his hands became more animated.

“Hear me out! What if... The UEA got one of the other labs to search and call for aliens!”

Oliver blanched, taking a step away.

“And why would they do that?”

“Why not? It's about time we got some alien interactions out here, right?”

“Our contacts over in the Centauris not enough for you?”

“They're not aliens. They're just another sentient race we've discovered and get along with.”

“And how does that make them not an alien race like our new neighbors?”

“These guys came to us first!”

“That's beside the point. And according to you, these guys might've been summoned by the UEA through some strange method.”

“Probably has something to do with the Navigators,” Toast continued to mutter. “There's always been way too many stopping by here.”

Oliver rolled his eyes. He didn't think Toast would believe in conspiracy theories, much less concoct one himself.

“I highly doubt the UEA has anything to do with this situation,” Oliver said, deciding to be the sane person in this conversation.

“How would you explain it then?”

“There's been a lot of spatial anomalies outside recently. You study them yourself! These guys probably got thrown off course and ended up invading.”

Toast pouted, crossing his arms.

“You make it sound too logical. Can't you add more flair to that theory?”

“Why do you want to have more 'flair’?”

“Romance!”

Oliver shook his head, pointing ahead.

“Look, we're almost there.”

Light flooded the hallway from the Elevator. Nothing had changed from before. Oliver approached the door. Pulling out a notepad he'd prepared earlier, he scribbled their location before wedging it into the window pane.

“You think this closet will have coffee?” Toast asked.

“No. Any foodstuff is in the cafeteria's pantry.”

“Let's go get some then!”

“The cafeteria's on the second floor.”

“So?”

“The stairs are blocked. We'd have to climb down from the third floor. Unless you want to go climbing in the elevator shaft.”

“Oh. Nevermind then.”

They reached the other supply closet. This one Oliver knew held extra towels and blankets, and, if they were lucky, they'd find pillows or even an air bed.

Toast held the light on the card reader for Oliver. Right before Oliver brought his card closer, he noticed the traces of brownish-red that led inside. He stepped away from the door, pointing the flashlight downwards.

“Blood? Whose-”

An echoing voice came screaming from further down the hallway.

“Dammit! Fuck off! Aaagh!”

They sprinted after the scream.