Copyright 2014 Wendy Beach. All Rights Reserved. ISBN: 9781311935731
First published in Dark Eclipse e-zine #35
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All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons or other beings and/or creatures, living or dead (or undead,) is purely coincidental. If you enjoyed this book, please return to your favourite e-book retailer to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.
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An Alien in an Alien Land
Somewhere north of the Eyre Hwy, Western Australia, 1978.
Clunk-clink went the last sound that Prosper wanted to hear from the engine, as she drove the Gemini along the remote turnoff. Half a day had passed since leaving the newspaper office, and the radiant heat of the Nullarbor Plain had far exceeded all of her expectations. Once again, Prosper leaned away from the leather seat to wind dry the back of her sundress. The car felt as if she was sitting in a pressure cooker.
Clinkity-clunk.
This can’t be happening, Prosper told herself, deciding to drive on and ignore the sound at least until she reached a pay phone at the abandoned mission ahead. Further along, Prosper had an interview arranged with an ex-Perth woman who had married a pastoralist and written a collection of bush-poetry. Being a cadet reporter for The Perth Observer was all about human interest stories like that. But all I need is the big one, she thought, the elusive-exclusive that will launch my career into investigative journalism.
Clum-clunk.
Prosper pressed the radio button, hoping the music would take her mind off the irregular engine noises. She turned its tuner dial through the static airways, until it picked up a local AM station.
An announcer finished his broadcast: ‘...so stay inside folks, meteorites are falling down all over the South West.’ He faded in ‘Baker Street’ by Gerry Rafferty.
Prosper looked outward at the empty sky, doubting the car would make it to the opposite end of the Nullarbor. She increased the volume and allowed the phenomenal saxophone riff to reel itself into her mind.
The road fringed around a salt lake lined by a sparse, low landscape of spherical grass clusters and sporadic stunted acacias, dried, petrified and purified by the persistent and scouring atmosphere. Prosper geared down, slowing the car long enough to read the words on an aged road-side cross:
R.I.P. EDDIE FALCON
She planted her platform sandal onto the accelerator again. The car sped up. It can’t be far now to the mission. By the time she noticed the sand-drift, settled on the road like a mass of slithering snakes, it was too late. The Gemini hit the corrugated sand, spun hard to the right, and bucked itself up and down like a wild brumby bolting through the scrub.
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The moon was already high in the night sky when Prosper regained consciousness. The shattered windscreen hung like a cobweb in its frame and the battery had died. She gurgled in pain as she unpeeled herself from the steering column.
CLUNK-CLUNK.
What on Earth is that noise? Prosper peered through the open window, Meteorites? She stepped out of the car, ignited her cigarette lighter and held the metal canister in the air. The flame hovered in the darkness, lighting the ground as she searched for traces of space debris. At the front of the Gemini she placed her hand on its cold body and pondered the strange upward dents on the bonnet. Maybe part of the engine blew?
CLINK.
Prosper stared at the Gemini. She stepped forward, moving the lighter’s flame over the hood to investigate. The dusty yellow paint had cracked and curled back where a new dent had risen in the metal.
CLUNK. CLUNK.
Two more dents emerged. Before Prosper could consider what to do next, the bonnet flew open and crashed against the remains of the shattered screen. She jumped backwards dropping the lighter in the dirt. She had barely begun to scream when she saw the creature at the back of the engine compartment.
The camera! Prosper told herself. Her body refused to move. She looked at the large, armour covered creature crouching, spider-like, under a silver, satin-chrome metal helmet. Its many deep red eyeballs encircled a disc-shaped body, and they were looking at her.
Camera! Get the camera! A single, translucent eyelid squelched down over the eyeballs and flicked back into the helmet. Her heart rocketed upward and hid in the soft spot behind her earlobe, beating rapidly and loudly as if to let her know of its displacement while her mind shouted EXCLUSIVE!
The creature shot upright on its many metal limbs, making a sound that reminded her of blades being drawn over a sharpening stone. She gasped. It scissor-stepped forward, chinking the engine metal, dispersing lime-green sparks from the points of its legs. Oh! Hell! Run!