The Night the World Changed
by Matthew Gregory
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Table of Contents parts 1, 2, 3 |
part 2
Jason continued to stare intently at the back yard and then, suddenly, the creatures reappeared, moving slowly from in behind the storage shed. Jason shuffled in place as he watched them. This time they carried a much larger device which they used to sweep across the ground and into the air. It was amazing. They looked just like the aliens in the books and in the movies. And there they were, right there in his own back yard.
In that moment, he knew his chance had come, but he wasn’t going to stand there and wait for them. He had to get outside, before they had a chance to leave. This could be the only chance he would get and, if he missed out now, he would never forgive himself.
He moved away from the window, his anxiousness causing him to nearly fall over himself. In response, just before he stepped out of the bedroom, his wife turned over in bed once again and asked sleepily, “Where are you going?”
Jason stopped briefly and replied, “I need a drink of water. I’ll be right back.”
“Okay,” she answered, which was the response she always gave him when he darted from the room in the middle of the night.
He was sure, as he continued from the room, that his wife thought he was only giving in to his overreactive impulses, discounting him like she always did. But this time, it was for real. There were aliens in his back yard, and he had a date with destiny.
He crept from his house and slipped into the back yard where the aliens continued to survey the area. He watched them with the same glee as before, but as excited as he was, he knew he had to control himself. He couldn’t just run up to them and welcome them to Earth. How would that look?
No, he had to be a little more careful than that. This was the type of situation that didn’t happen every day and, because of that, an element of tact was needed. He didn’t want to scare them off or, worse, be vaporized where he stood. That wouldn’t be good for anybody.
His mind worked in a thousand different directions, trying diligently to come up with some sort of plan. How was he going to contact these aliens? Surely, there had to be a way that was less subtle than what he had read about or had seen on television. There just had to be.
Despite his vast knowledge on the issue, though, he couldn’t come up with anything. That is until he saw them go back around the building and then return a few minutes later with another piece of equipment. That was it. He would stow away on their ship. What better way to make contact and, eventually, see another planet!
Jason tip-toed to the fence at the side of the yard and then, as he kept his eyes glued upon the aliens, he slid along the tall wooden barrier and made his way to the far side of the storage building. When he arrived, he was met with the most dazzling, yet odd display yet.
Just in front of the building, on the side that couldn’t be seen from his bedroom window, was a box-shaped structure that stood approximately seven feet in the air and was no more than ten feet wide. It hummed with energy and glowed with odd colors from small, flashing lights that were spaced at various intervals throughout its exterior.
He stared curiously at the structure, unsure exactly what it was he was looking at. Was it their ship? It certainly didn’t look like it, certainly not what he was expecting, at least.
The ships he had read about in things such as the Roswell Daily Record or even the Russian newspaper Semipalatinsk, which reported on a UFO battle in the skies above Russia in 1989, told him that aliens traveled in ships that were shaped like saucers. Not in high-tech storage devices, which was what he was looking at.
But the longer he stared at it, the more he became convinced that the structure was in fact their ship. As they moved back and forth, loading and unloading equipment, there was just no other explanation. The aliens had come to Earth in a flashy tin can.
It didn’t matter, though. The fact was they were here. After all, maybe it was their shuttle; the Galileo in Star Trek looked like a big box, so why couldn’t this one? Maybe that was it. The odd structure in front of Jason’s building was the aliens’ shuttle, not their main ship. That made sense. The mother ship was up in space somewhere, waiting for its crew to return.
As he rationalized the structure in front of him, Jason suddenly realized that he had only a small window of opportunity in which to act. He couldn’t just stand there and awe over the shuttle. He had to get on board and somehow conceal himself from the aliens until the time was right.
When he was sure they weren’t looking, Jason pushed away from the fence and moved into the ship. Inside, his eyes were met with a brilliant white light, as the sound of the humming from outside only increased several times over. The air pulsed with the sensation of the superior technology as it worked at its respective tasks.
Along the walls were displays of all sorts, instructions and information written in an obviously complex alien language. Jason looked all about, fascinated by everything he saw. It was like he was floating, for even though it was right in front of his face, none of it seemed real.
But then, he snapped out of it as he realized he wasn’t there to explore. At least not yet. He had to quickly find a place to hide. For the time being, that was his first priority.
He moved his eyes rapidly over the strange surroundings, but the only thing he could see other than the instruments along the walls were a few seats in the middle of the ship. Other than that, there was nothing and that caused his heart to race. There was nowhere to hide.
Panic began to fall upon him as Jason was sure any minute, the aliens would enter their ship and find him standing there. They would probably think he was sabotaging them and that would be even worse than following through with his initial instincts from before. No, he didn’t want to blow it. He had to do something.
He scurried around the ship, looking for anything that might offer itself as a place to hide. He looked under the chairs, but that was no good, for he would stick out like a sore thumb. He moved a few feet away to the rear of the ship and looked around a couple of storage boxes, but that wasn’t any good, either. The aliens would surely place their equipment there when they came back from his yard. And even if they didn’t, it still wouldn’t work because his body just didn’t work like that; he certainly wasn’t a contortionist.
Fright suddenly began to overpower him as his options were becoming fewer and fewer. Maybe he should just go out and talk to them. It didn’t appear as though he had any other choice. His plan to hide was quickly crashing down around him.
But then, he spotted it. A chance, albeit a small one, for his plan to actually work.
In the front corner of the ship, next to the large display of screens, was a tiny compartment that he hadn’t noticed before. He edged gently over to it, hoping dearly that it would work. And when he reached out and slid the small door aside, his heart practically skipped a beat. That was it! Jason had finally found a place to stow himself away. Now all he had to do was wait for the aliens to finish up whatever they were doing and return to their ship.
He sat crouched in the small, confined space and after what seemed like an eternity, the three aliens finally came back on board. They placed their equipment away, just as Jason predicted they would, and as they prepared the ship, he watched them with excited eyes. He couldn’t believe it. He was actually pulling it off and any moment now he would be fast away in space.
The door to the outside closed and, as the air sealed them inside, the ship began to vibrate with power. All throughout his body, Jason could feel the tremors, but it was from more than just the engines of the ship. He could hardly contain himself, his body twitching and writhing from sheer joy, complete and total euphoria from the top of his head to the soles of his feet. He tried to pull himself together, but he just couldn’t and with that, he was sure that he was going to give himself away.
But much to his surprise, the aliens continued to work their instruments, until suddenly, the ship jumped and a noise filled the air like a sonic boom. He gasped from the shock, but then it was over. The ship was still and its engines were quieting down.
The door to the outside slid back open as the aliens stood from their chairs and exited the ship once again. Jason looked around, complete confusion swimming all around his head. Surely that wasn’t it, was it? Even if they were just going to the mother ship somewhere in orbit, it would take longer than that, wouldn’t it?
He had seen depictions of fast ships on Star Wars or even the transwarp speed the Borg used on Star Trek, but that all paled in comparison to this. This was beyond fast. In just a few seconds, he had rocketed to a point somewhere far beyond his own back yard. Or had he? Surely they didn’t crash back down to the planet. They couldn’t have. It would have been much more violent than the short ride he had just experienced.
He peeked his head out from the small compartment and, when he saw the magnificent rays of light beaming through the open door, he knew he wasn’t on Earth anymore. Daylight hadn’t come that quickly. No, somehow he had traveled to another planet. And even though he couldn’t understand how, who was he to question alien technology? That was why it was alien. Human beings weren’t supposed to understand such superiority.
After a few moments, Jason’s curiosity finally got the best of him and he could stand it no longer. He had to get out of the small compartment and see the wonders of the outside. After all, that is why he came.
He pulled himself from the tiny space and slowly made his way from the ship. And when he passed through the threshold to the area beyond, he was met by something that he could never conceive, not in a million years.
The bright light that lit the interior of the ship had apparently come from a sun, which hung radiantly in the yellow, sparkling sky. Its light fell across oblong-shaped buildings and structures of the most curious sort. And all around them were intricate machines of all kinds that moved about, working at an untold amount of tasks. It was all so breathtakingly grand, for it was the attainment of Jason’s lifelong goal. He was finally standing on the surface of another planet.
“An Ancient!” gasped an unknown voice suddenly, causing Jason to move his eyes to the front and notice for the first time since he had left the shuttle that he had inadvertently attracted a large crowd of the tall, gray-skinned aliens.
His body abruptly went numb. He had never thought about what he should do next. His surroundings had completely occupied his mind, and he had momentarily forgotten what he was doing.
Locked in a daze, he gazed at the horrified faces around him, the large black eyes studying him intently. He had to do something. Now was his one and only chance.
“Klaatu, barada, nikto,” said Jason ceremoniously, which was the first and only thing that came to mind.
The aliens looked at each other and exchanged puzzled looks until one of them said, “What did he say?”
Jason returned their puzzled looks with one of his own. “You speak English?”
“We have learned English, yes,” said one of the aliens suddenly, “but we usually speak something entirely different.”
Jason moved his eyes away from the aliens and continued to inspect the mysterious environment around him. “Where am I?”
The aliens looked at each other again. Of course, he didn’t know. He couldn’t know.
Copyright © 2025 by Matthew Gregory
