Scorched Earth, Alien Wonders
Chapter 25: Subterranean Launch

Wilder stood in the middle of the lab an hour later. He looked at Sara, Cassie, and my team with alternating apprehension, and wonder on his face, as he talked on about what the experiment could mean to humanity, and the universe at large, if it were to succeed. I kept looking over at Jones, who was holding a large, metallic basin full of Torie’s chemical-coated, bot-nytes and wondered how I could be so entranced by such a peculiar looking creature.

But I wanted it to be real.

Please don’t let it be a fantasy infatuation prompted by my faltering subroutine.

A few minutes later, we all left the lab single file with Jones and the Wilders in the lead. We arrived at the open end of the cavernous ditch. We walked inside, and headed to the middle, where the Wilders stopped and turned around.

“Jonesy, you should do the honors,” said Cassie.

“No,” said Jones, emphatically. “It should be you...Cassie and Sara...because this has been your dream, based on your work.”

Sara put her arm protectively across her tummy, as if to indicate the future of her child depended on these vital actions. With both hands on opposite sides, Sara and Cassie took the basin from Jones. They lowered it to the ground, tipped it sideways, which allowed the bot-nytes—that were visual only as a liquid, fluorescent ribbon—to flow onto the ground, and within seconds, they all dissolved into the dirt and disappeared.

Then Sara leaned down to lay a 12-square-inch metallic plate covered with the same fluorescent sheen on top of the ground where the bot-nytes had entered the Earth. We were all standing in a big circle under blue sky visible through the opening of the huge ditch. It was hot...like being in an earthen pizza oven.

“How long do we wait until Jones does her thing?” I asked, feeling like my skin was about to crawl out from under my fur.

“We will know when the bot-nytes are in position, because the plate will glow,” explained Cassie. “It should take less than an hour.”

“But we will monitor everything from the lab’s computers,” said Wilder, who didn’t want to stand around it the toasty trench for long.

We were all headed back to air-conditioned comfort, when suddenly the ground started shaking. Dirt and pebbles came crashing down from the freshly dug walls.

“Run!” Wilder shouted and he didn’t have to tell us twice.

Wilder grabbed his wife’s hand as they ran, with Cassie right behind them next to Jones, who was running on all fours instead of hopping on her hind legs like usual. I looked back to see a huge mound of dirt and rocks rumble down to land on top of the metallic plate.

My team and I ran past the Wilder’s like they were in slow motion. We made it safely to the end of the ditch then stopped, and watched them as they ran up panting for breath to stand next to us. We all looked back inside the turbulent ditch. Loose dirt was still falling down the inside walls. The tremor was over quickly, but the timing was bad...insanely bad.

Everyone was panting for breath, but we were okay. Then Sara dropped a bomb on us.

“All that dirt covering the plate has to be removed, so we can pick up Torie’s collective on the computer and Jones can use her tail to send the signal.”

“Ah bat-shit,” said Wilder, sweat dripping down his face. “I’ll grab a shovel, go back in there and dig it clear. How much time do I have?”

Then, weirdly, because it had never happened before, vibrations started up again.

Thankfully, the unusual after-shock only lasted a second or two.

Man, we need to find a way off this doomed world while we still can...

Everyone was standing there stunned and trying to get a grip on the unforeseen situation. I suddenly had one of my brilliant ideas. Without hesitation, I dashed straight back into the half-open entrance to the ditch. I made it to where the plate was buried in record time. It was under a pile of rocks, and dirt a few feet taller than me and the clock was ticking.

I took a deep breath, swirled into my torpedo-beast mode and started using my bottom cylinder to excavate the dirt. Debris went flying in all directions. The rocks got jack-hammered to bits and swept clear. Within a minute, the plate was shiny clean and looked undamaged.

Still in my beast-mode, I dashed back to the group standing outside the opening. I swirled down to the ground, and landed back in my full top dog glory, although a bit worn out. I looked around for a second. Everything inside the ditch seemed quiet and stable.

But damn, what is this fica, eerie feeling again and why won’t it go away?

My friends stood there looking at me like I’d just returned from planet Stupid-duh.

“Come on,” I yelled, not being in the mood to explain my actions. “Let’s get to the lab!”

“What the hell,” Wilder said as he began running, because he had never seen any of us in tornado-beast mode, he had only heard it described.

Cassie yelled out, “Dad, I’ll explain later!”

Once back inside the lab, we all hurried over to the screen as we were trying to catch our breath. The main computer was translating pinged information received from the bot-nytes into a moving depiction of Torie’s subterranean activities. It didn’t appear the seismic movement did any harm to the project.

Relief in the room was tangible.

Looking straight at me, Jones asked, “What the blasted fica-hell was that all about?”

Wilder offered his opinion after Cassie reminded him about our tornado-beast ability that we used to fend off the stooges the night they attacked her at the lab.

“Yeah, well, I might have been a little slower, but I wouldn’t have been as easily crushed by falling dirt,” he said, obviously referring to my mad dash back into the ditch.

Then Brown rescued me from all the scolding I was getting when she started laughing.

“Prairie dogs can run up to 35 miles an hour in short bursts. In beast-mode Rosenians can run 45 miles an hour. So, the captain could outrun you three times over, and he isn’t as bothered by the heat as you are,” explained Brown.

“Oh, well...in that case,” Wilder capitulated, with a smile.

But Jones still gave me a frosty glance over her wiry shoulder as she passed by.

Sorry...what?

Then it finally dawned on me that Jones was worried about my safety.

I knew it...she loves me.

“Oh, no! Look at those temperature readings!” I heard Sara shout.

We all gathered for a closer look at the computer screen, just as a heat-proximity alarm started beeping. The screen clearly showed the florescent ribbon moving rapidly downward, but it was descending very close to a molten-filled crevice.

How did I know that? Because the words on the computer screen next to a red tendril close to the bot-nyte ribbon said, “molten-filled crevice.”

“That is unexpected,” said Cassie, with Sara and Jones doing hand motions to boost equations on the screen.

“There’s another one,” said Moore, with the annoying heat-proximity alarm beeping faster. “And another...”

Red tendrils were sprouting up everywhere.

This can’t be good.

I was feeling over-heated and sick to my stomach.

“Torie is almost at the target!” yelled Sara. Things were happening fast now.

“Jonesy, you need to get to the plate and light him up the minute it glows,” said Sara. “He should be in perfect position by the time you get to the ditch.”

Jones sprinted out the door on all fours, followed by everyone, but Sara and Cassie, who stayed behind to monitor the computer.

We came upon an amazing sight as we grew near the massive ditch.

Every town-folk in Suburbia was lined up on the far side about 20 feet away, so they could watch from a safe distance, with Daisy front and center.

We cautiously entered the ditch, which was stable for the moment, and Jones hurried up to the fluorescent metallic plate, with her bifurcated tail in hand. We gathered around her, not sure what to expect.

As if on cue the plate started glowing so bright we had to squint to look at it.

“Do it now, Jones!” said Wilder, looking at his wrist device, which showed communications from the lab.

She lowered her tail and put it in direct contact with the plate. Tiny, electrical pulses could be seen jumping about on the surface as the rhythm instantly descended down along the ribbon underneath and through the ground.

Then in one of my least attractive male-hero, beast-mode, top dog moments...I walked over to the side of the ditch and vomited.

“What the hell is wrong with me, Doc? This isn’t funny anymore!”

“I can’t examine your subroutine, because we don’t have Torie’s mini-binocs, but I suspect this is further indication that your PD program is weakening and it may soon get to the point of no return.”

My team and I, were standing near the ditch wall about 10 feet away from Wilder and Jones, who still had her tail locked onto the plate.

“It’s working!” said Wilder excitedly, as he looked down at the text on his wrist device. A few minutes later, it was time to vacate the vast depths of the soon-to-be water canal.

Jones withdrew her tail and looked around at the rest of us. She seemed a bit confused, and I thought it must be hard for someone to function in disguise as an alien species in a stressful situation when they had never done it before.

“Back to the lab!” shouted Wilder and we all moved out.

As we left the ditch, the crowd of town-folk, with Daisy shouting the loudest, waved and cheered. We waved back to the crowd then quickly pushed on to the lab.

When we walked in, Cassie and Sara were standing in front of the big screen with worried looks on their faces.

What now?

“All the readings show chemical changes in the soil composites and it is spreading exponentially as we’d hoped, but only the top part of Torie’s bot-nytes are withdrawing and they aren’t moving fast enough,” explained Cassie.

“If I had to guess, I would say the seismic activity may have caused some subtle damage to the bot-nytes’ telepathic connection in some way,” offered Sara, sounding perplexed.

“Or maybe, they were damaged by excessive heat,” said Jones.

“Son of bitch,” shouted Moore as he tromped off to the back side of the room, laid down flat on the ground and put his paws over his big ears.

“But he needs every single bot-nyte to return into his collective before he can shift back,” I stated the obvious, which everyone already knew, but I was at a loss for any reassuring words.

“Okay, okay...but there’s still time for him to pull himself together...literally,” said Davis. “It’s only been a short while.”

“Normally, he could have all the time he needed to make internal repairs or whatever, but if this succeeds there will soon be water sprouting in liquid form from a trillion chemically altered soil composites that will start surfacing very quickly,” explained Sara.

“That’s right. So, if he doesn’t regroup, it will get even worse, because his bot-nytes will likely get swept further apart by the water forcing itself to the surface,” Jones completed the dire explanation.

Silence...

“Look at the screen,” said Wilder. “Is that supposed to be happening?”

We all gathered around, except Moore. There were all kinds of movement and flashing digital indicators happening on the screen.

“What does it mean?” asked Doc.

“Water is sprouting up and dousing the molten-liquid tendrils in the pathway,” said Jones, with astonishment.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” I asked, lamely.

“Normally, it would be, but the act of flash-cooling molten liquid produces steam,” she continued. “So, it appears the hot steam is helping facilitate water movement, but it’s not doing Torie any good.”

As we watched, Torie’s bot-nytes were literally disappearing off the screen.

“What’s happening to Torie!?” shouted Brown, as close to hysterical as I had ever heard.

“I don’t know. His signature is disappearing, but that doesn’t mean that he or his collective is gone,” said Sara, who clearly wanted to leave us with some slim hope that our friend would return.

Excitement from the monumental success of a history-making experiment was bittersweet beyond words and diminished by the potential loss of Torie. We watched movement on the screen that showed rapid ascension of H20, which was surfacing far faster than anyone anticipated.

Then suddenly the screen went blank, except for calculations, and digital readouts on the side. Silence fell over the lab as if the Grim Reaper himself had walked through the door.

“What happened?” but science dullard that I was, I already knew the answer, because information couldn’t be transmitted back to the computer without the connection to Torie’s fluorescent-coated, bot-nytes.

He’s gone...

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