Their Invasion- Planet Athion Read online

  I shrugged. “I can’t see how they’re not.” I looked to Casey. “Nothing picked up on the beams of light either? No electromagnetic readers or anything else unusual?”

  “No, nothing.”

  “Shit. How are we supposed to track these things down if we can’t get any trace on them?”

  Casey adjusted his glasses. “I have no idea, but we can’t be the only ones who’ve got a hint of this going on. There must be other reports, but we haven’t been notified about them.”

  I opened a web browser and clicked through social media channels, searching ‘missing women’ and ‘blue beams of light.’ It didn’t take me long to find what we were looking for.

  “What the hell?”

  Sure enough, people had posted more footage, exactly like what we’d just seen, but from all over the world.

  I glanced over at the two men beside me. “Is an alien race abducting our women? Is that what this is all about?”

  “We need to go to the top with this,” Mike said. “People need to know. The president needs to know.”

  “I agree,” Casey said. “Leave that part with me. Mike, you need to work on setting up a line of communication with each of the alien races we have contact with and see if we can find out who is responsible. Even if no one knows exactly who is doing it, someone might have an idea which planet would need human women.”

  Ice ran through my veins, and I shivered. I didn’t like the sound of this at all.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I spent the next few hours sending the footage through to different Observatories all over the world and fielding the barrage of emails and phone calls I got in return. I wished I could tell everyone who was behind what was happening, and what we could do to protect ourselves, but, other than the footage, I was as in the dark as everyone else.

  The more emails I received, the more I was able to see the massive scale of what was happening. While a couple of hundred women missing from one city might not have seemed like a huge number to have been taken, once you multiplied that with over four thousand cities all over the world, plus smaller numbers taken from towns and villages, we estimated over half a million women were gone. No, not gone. Taken.

  The number was mind-boggling.

  I leaned back in my chair, stretched out my arms, trying to unwind the kinks from my neck and shoulders. Miraculously, everything had remained quiet with the new arrivals, which was something I was thankful for. I wouldn’t have been able to work and deal with troubles between the civilians and military at the same time.

  I looked over to where Mike was bent over his computer, a set of headphones on and a mouthpiece attached to the headset. He didn’t appear to be on a call right now.

  “Hey, how’s it going?” I asked him.

  He exhaled a sigh and removed the headset, dropping it on his desk. “I’m not getting anywhere. I’ve contacted Prons-45, Zleo, XoZroph, Upru-1e, and Crioopra, just to start. No one is claiming to know anything. I’ve still got numerous more to get through.”

  “Make sure the other Observatories are working on it as well,” I told him. “This shouldn’t all land on your lap.”

  He ran his hand over his short, dark hair. “Yeah, they are. There’s just so many different planets, and not all of them are contactable at all times. It’s all dependent on the alignment of various satellites and planets in orbit, as you know.”

  “How about you, Casey?” I called over. “Any luck?”

  Casey twisted in his seat. “I’ve heard nothing from the White House yet, but I wouldn’t have expected to. I imagine they’re experiencing an influx of hoax calls and alien sightings right now. It’ll take them time to weed out what’s real and what’s made up.”

  Above our heads, a red light flashed.

  We each looked up, and then to each other, understanding what the light meant.

  We had an incoming call from another planet.

  Mike, as head of our communications, hit the button to answer. “This is Observatory LV903. You’re speaking with Mike Fitzgerald. My colleagues Camille Harran and Casey Steelman are also present.”

  A male voice boomed into the room. “This is Chief Advisor of Emperor Elrin of Planet Athion.”

  “Chief Advisor,” said Mike, rising to his feet, even though the Athion couldn’t see him. “How may we be of assistance?”

  “I’ve been asked by the Emperor to regale information to you in regards to the attack on your planet.”

  I exchanged a worried glance with Casey, and the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck prickled.

  Mike nodded. “We’re listening.”

  “We believe we know who is responsible for the attack on your planet and the reason behind it.”

  “I am keen to hear it, Chief Advisor.”

  “I don’t know if you’re aware, but we lost the vast majority of our female population on Planet Athion to a virus a few years ago. Since then, our population has been dwindling.”

  I frowned at Casey, unsure where the chief advisor was going with this. Was he trying to tell us they were responsible?

  Mike replied. “I assume you’re not telling me this to reveal you’re the ones who have been kidnapping our women?”

  “Not at all. But we weren’t the only planet affected. The planet Tradrych has a similar atmosphere to both Earth and Athion, and they, too, were affected by a similar virus. The Trads are not known to be of a kind disposition. We’ve theorized that they’ve decided to come and take your women for themselves.”

  I spoke up. “What would they do with them?”

  “Impregnate them,” came the reply. “In fact, I believe the impregnation part is needed before they’d be able to relocate the women to Tradrych. The human women would not survive unless they’re first carrying Tradrych DNA inside them.”

  Horror at the possibility coiled slow and sickeningly in the pit of my stomach. “You’re saying the Trads are impregnating our women here on Earth and then taking them back to planet Tradrych to give birth?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  Confusion washed over me. “But wouldn’t we notice if there were aliens among us? Especially if they were raping and abducting our women.”

  “That’s not how things work. They won’t be raping the women, and no, you most likely won’t notice them walking among you. Though Athions appear humanoid in most ways, we have our distinctive blue skin, but the Trads are different. They look exactly like your human men. In fact, dare I say that they look even better than your human men. They are creatures who use their beauty to lure in their prey, and I’m afraid, Ms. Camille, at this point you are their prey.”

  The world went fuzzy around me, and a strange buzzing sounded in my ears.

  Perfect men.

  Seducing women.

  Everything about it rang true.

  I remembered my time with Dean in the closet, how close we’d come to having sex. Was he one of them? If I’d gone further with him, would he have impregnated me? I had the contraceptive implant, but then I was pretty sure Tara was on some kind of contraception as well, but if she needed to be impregnated to be taken, I could only assume our contraception didn’t work against the Trads.

  Would I be one of the missing women right now?

  Oh God. Molly and Tara.

  They’d both gotten friendly with strange, beautiful men over the last few days. Was it possible those men were Trads as well? Or was I completely jumping to conclusions, and they were perfectly innocent human men who I was about to tarnish with the Trads’ brush?

  I ran hot and cold at the possibility.

  I had to find my sister and best friend.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I raced through the building, desperately trying to find Molly and Tara. Every person I passed, I stopped to ask, “Have you seen my sister? Have you seen my friend, Tara?”

  Night had long since fallen. Where would they be? Down in the cafeteria with the rest of the civilians?

  I kept
an eye out for Dean and the other men, too. My mind whirred about him. Could it be possible he wasn’t human? He certainly looked and acted as though he was, but wasn’t that the point? These aliens mimicked us so perfectly, it meant we thought we were falling for them, with their strong bodies and their perfect faces, and then when we gave ourselves over to them, they took us as their own.

  I felt sick at the possibility that I’d come so close, but worse than the shock of almost losing my own freedom was my fear that it was already too late for Tara and Molly.

  Were the Trads in the building aware we were onto them? I didn’t think so. Everyone in the building acted exactly the same. I got a few concerned glances as I raced through the corridors, but no one was acting any differently. As well as fear, anger built up inside me. We’d been used and manipulated, and women were continuing to be used and manipulated. How would we ever know who we could trust?

  But no, I knew I could trust Casey, and Mike, and Aleandro. Anyone who’d we’d known from before the strike was safe. It was the strangers who had slipped into our lives that we needed to worry about.

  I collided with a bulk of a body and let out a scream.

  Hands grabbed my arms. “Camille, slow down. What’s wrong?”

  I exhaled a sigh of relief as I realized who it was. “Aleandro. I need your help. I need to find Molly and Tara.”

  “I’ve just seen Molly,” he said, a frown marking his brow. “She’s in the cafeteria helping to take care of some of the younger kids.”

  “And Tara?” I asked hopefully.

  He pursed his lips as he thought. “I think I saw her with that guy she seems to have hooked up with. What’s his name? The guy in the suit.”

  “Rhett?” I filled in, my stomach dropping.

  “Yeah, that’s the one. Why, what’s going on?”

  “I think some of the men here aren’t just men. We’ve heard from the chief advisor of the Emperor of Planet Athion, and he thinks Planet Tradrych is responsible for the attack. The Trads are here on Earth with us now—that must be what was contained within the asteroids—and they’re taking our women back to their planet.” I knew I was babbling, the words streaming from my mouth, but I couldn’t hold them back. “I think Rhett might be a Trad, and Dean, too. And maybe even the guy Molly has been seeing. I mean, they turned up here, just like numerous others, but no one had ID, and people came from all over. We had no way of vouching for them and no reason not to trust them. We should have fingerprinted everyone and searched for them on our systems instead of just taking them at their word.”

  “We had a lot going on, Camille. How the hell were we to know?”

  I looked up at him. “But we know now. I have to find Tara. Can you go and get Molly and keep her the hell away from any men?”

  He nodded. “Of course. But be careful, Camille.” As a second thought, he reached to his belt and removed his gun and handed it to me. “You know how to shoot one of these things?”

  “Yeah, not well. But I can certainly fire a shot or two.”

  “Good. And be careful.”

  “I will.”

  With my heart seemingly in my throat, I ran back the way I’d come, heading toward the front of the building, where Aleandro thought he’d seen Tara going with Rhett. I prayed I was wrong about this, and Rhett was just a gorgeous guy who liked Tara, but it felt like all the pieces had slotted into place and formed the full picture.

  Everyone should have been inside, but through the glass doors, two people hurried away from the building. The guy’s arm was hooked around the girl’s shoulders, and they hunched together as though trying not to be seen. In the dark, it would have been easy to miss them should I not have already been searching for them, but I caught a glimpse of blonde hair and immediately knew who it was.

  Tara.

  What the hell were they doing out there? There was nothing out there except the few parked vehicles, and beyond that, the road and desert. But they didn’t seem to be heading toward the road or any of the vehicles and instead were going deeper into the surrounding wilderness.

  I ran to the doors and yanked on them, but of course they were locked. I knew the code, so I rushed over and punched it into the keypad. The doors buzzed, the light going green, and I threw myself back against the doors, pushing them open. They’d only stay unlocked for another few seconds, and I’d need to enter the code again to get back in, but I wasn’t worried about that for the moment.

  “Tara!” I yelled.

  They were a distance away now—a blob in the dark.

  I got my legs moving, breaking into a run. “Tara!”

  I thought she slowed, trying to turn, and my heart lurched in hope. Had she heard me? I kept running, decreasing the distance between us.

  Then, from out of nowhere, a beam of blue light projected down from the night sky.

  “Tara!” I screamed.

  Bright light illuminated her, Rhett beside her. Her eyes widened in understanding for the briefest of seconds—understanding of what was happening to her—and then both she and Rhett vanished.

  A second later, so did the light.

  “No!” My scream tore through the desert night. I covered my face with my hands and dropped to my knees in grief. My best friend was gone, taken by a Trad either to a spaceship, which I assumed was somewhere overhead, or to their planet. What was to become of her? Rhett—if that even was his name—must have impregnated her, and now she’d be taken back to planet Tradrych to repopulate their planet.

  Once she had one baby, would she be immediately expected to have another? Was that to be her life now? As a breeding machine for an alien race?

  Tears flooded my eyes and cascaded down my face. I wanted to wail and scream and pound my grief and fury with my fists against the desert floor, but I couldn’t. I still had Molly to think about, and there might be other Trads inside the Observatory who were just wandering around as though they were one of us.

  Staggering to my feet, I wiped the tears from my face. I stumbled back to the Observatory, knowing I needed to both find Molly and tell the others what had happened. There were no doubts in my mind now.

  We were under attack, and all women of a reproductive age were at risk.

  I reached the doors and fumbled my way through the keypad, entering the number incorrectly several times before eventually getting it right and the doors buzzed open. I fell through, into the foyer, blinking back fresh tears.

  To my surprise, the guys were already there. Aleandro, Mike, and Casey all stepped toward me, as though expecting to have to catch me if I fell.

  “They got Tara,” I blurted. “Those fuckers took her. I have to find Molly.”

  Aleandro put out his hand as though to steady me. “Molly’s safe,” he told me. “Don’t worry. We dealt with it.”

  At the back of the building, several of the soldiers had both Dean and Lee held between them. The two men—or Trads, or whatever the hell they were—struggled between the military guys, but they were vastly outnumbered.

  I knew something else had happened. I could tell just by the atmosphere and the looks they were giving me.

  “What is it then? What’s happened.”

  “You need to get your stuff, Camille,” Mike said.

  “What? Why?” I still didn’t understand what was happening.”

  Sergeant Byrd stepped from the sidelines. I hadn’t noticed him at first, my mind a whirl. I wanted to lunge at him and pound on his chest with my fists. I wanted someone to blame, and he was the one who’d brought strange men into the Observatory. But then I realized that I’d also let numerous strange men inside when all the civilians had turned up. We had no way of knowing if any of those men were actually Trads posing as civilians.

  “I’ve just had a call from the president,” the sergeant said.

  I looked wildly between him and the guys. “And?”

  “Because of your unique experience and background, Madam President wants you to help coordinate what happens next.”

/>   I stared at him. “What does that even mean?”

  “You’re going to Washington, Camille. The chopper will be here for you and your team in the next hour.”

  I sucked in a shaky breath. I would do whatever I could to stop the bastards who had taken Tara and countless others. I’d go to the end of the earth and beyond. I didn’t know if I’d ever see Tara again or manage to bring her home, but I’d die trying if that’s what it took.

  And I’d make the Trads pay.

  THE END.

  Follow the story in ‘Her Resistance’ which will be out on the 27th of December 2018! Keep reading for a sneak peak at the first chapter. ‘Her Resistance’ can now be pre-ordered only on Amazon.

  *Please note, this is a pre-edits chapter and may be subject to slight changes before publication.*

  Her Resistance: Planet Athion

  Darkest Skies Book Two

  Chapter One

  OUR WORLD, AS WE KNEW it, was over.

  In the distance, the thwuk-thwuk-thwuk of helicopter blades cut through the air as it approached.

  I heard the machine before I saw it, but then the chopper appeared as a dark dot in the rapidly lightening sky, and I sucked in a nervous breath.

  “You ready, Camille?” Sergeant Simon Byrd asked from beside me.

  I pressed my lips together and nodded, not trusting my voice not to tremble if I attempted to answer.

  “Don’t worry,” he continued, “we’ll keep the Observatory safe until your return.”

  “And Molly and all the civilians, too,” I reminded him. “They’re the people we’re trying to protect in all of this. Don’t forget that.” I was talking about the hundred or so civilians who’d made their way here from Las Vegas after the asteroid strike, seeking food and shelter.

  His lips twisted. “Trouble is that we have no way of knowing for sure if any of them are who they say they are.”

  He was talking about our recent discovery of an alien race from the planet Tradrych infiltrating us, posing as human men in order to seduce, impregnate, and abduct human women.