Final Frontier: The Human Incursion

The Human Incursion

Tyler's blood dripped onto the spaceship floor, the bandaged gash across his chest reopening. Though, he hadn't noticed. Hadn't had time to care. The only thing he did to address his reopened wound was subconsciously put his hand on it and apply pressure. A voice yelled at him from the other end of the hallway. "Don't come any closer!" Near the door at the far end stood a scientist, once a modest and shy friend now turned manic, and wielding a gun. Very few situations were as dangerous as this. And yet, an even worse danger was skulking about the spaceship. Searching for them. At any moment, it could hear them.
The hallway Tyler was standing in led to the only working escape pod on board. Clyde's escape route. The scientist had his exit all planned out. Until everything got completely out of control. Tyler could duck around the corner and hide in the adjacent hallway with about two steps. Conversely, Tyler could reach his former friend and take his gun away in about eight steps. Tyler knew that his friend had never taken firearms training at all, but at this distance, he really wouldn't need any. While all of these thoughts were racing through his mind, Tyler didn't move. He kept staring at Clyde and wouldn't look away. This frightened the young scientist even more. Clyde would have to look at his best friend if he wanted to kill him.
"Yeah, stay still!" Clyde shouted, moving another step backward. He only needed to take two more to reach the escape pod. An idea struck Tyler at that moment. It was risky, dangerous, and if it backfired they would both be dead, but what other choice does he have? However, he stored it for the time being. "That is my last resort" He thought. "There has to be a better way." Though Clyde had sabotaged the spaceship and inadvertently killed everyone else, Tyler still wanted to reason with him. Clyde was the closest thing he had to a friend onboard, especially now. If anyone was able to turn him in without any more bloodshed, it'd be Tyler.
"Listen, Clyde." He took a tiny step forward, making sure not to step out of range of the other hallway quite yet. "You are an honest and good-natured person. I know that much from serving with you these few months."
Clyde cuts him off before he can continue. "Shut up! Don't try to humanize me." He begins waving the gun frantically around with his hand. He's becoming more unstable by the second. But his other hand is protectively wrapped around a strange object. The likes of which no human has ever seen before. Tyler knows this situation rests on a tight rope. But he has to keep trying. Tyler speaks again.
"Our history together has been brief, but it has also been fun, hasn't it? Trust me, I would've gone crazy if you weren't here. You've made me laugh, you've been kind enough to share a beer with me and make me feel welcome, even though the last thing your friends wanted to see was military involvement in your project." That cursed project. Four months ago, Tyler was assigned to be protection detail over some scientists heading into space to collect a new material they discovered. It was an odd mix between a meteor and a spaceship. Metal and rock seemed naturally fused together, resulting in an artifact about the size of a person. Right now, Clyde was holding a chunk of that artifact, and he was prepared to kill for it. Tyler closes his statement. "Clyde, I consider you a friend." Clyde was taken aback by this. He physically recoiled at the words by taking a half step backward. Further separating him from Tyler and nearing him closer to the escape pod.
Clyde spoke, "Right now, that means nothing. I betrayed you. I'm a murderer! You can't forgive that."
"I don't care about forgiving right now." Responded Tyler.  "I more than anyone knows what it's like to kill for a cause. I'm the only one who understands what you're doing, Clyde. But I don't know why. What is your cause? Why are you doing all of this? Make me understand."
"You can't understand it!" Yelled Clyde. "You told me yourself. You don't know what drives greed, you don't get the 'big deal' about money. Let me tell you something, life is expensive! You, with your military scholarship, are fine. Being fed, working out, getting buff, but I had to spend my life slaving to the system. I have so much debt. A lot of it to the wrong people. I'm doing this to not only escape them but to retire. I'll be the youngest person ever to retire. I'll make history!" Tyler couldn't believe what his friend was saying. Tyler took a full step closer. He narrowed his gaze, he looked straight into the scientist's eyes. The once analytical and skeptical friend Tyler knew was gone. He left, and insanity took over his body. The sight of the alien must've broken him. Scientists have long suspected alien life existed in the universe. Though, Tyler doubted that they expected anything more than micro-bacteria or plants. Certainly not a fully formed carnivore with hyper-sensitive hearing, right? This thought drove Tyler to ask the burning question. "At Keats answer me this, Clyde. Was the alien part of your plan from the beginning?"
"No!" Clyde screamed. Tyler's heart starts pounding. If he keeps screaming, he'll draw the alien. "It, it, I- I- I- I don't believe it! I don't believe it's real. I don't believe everyone is dead! I- I- I- I can't do that. Their blood makes no sense. Why would their blood be-" Clyde continues his mad babblings about the alien and his friends' deaths, but Tyler has tuned him out to think. "If Clyde never knew about the alien, that amalgamation of metal and flesh that broke out of the artifact and killed everyone in front of him, then maybe no one was supposed to die. The sight of his friends dying like that must have driven him insane." It happened so quickly. Tyler never saw the actual event, he only saw the bloody aftermath, and his friend curled up in the corner. All Clyde wants to do is leave, collect his money, and block this entire event out of his mind. But he can't, not yet. Because he doesn't quite know what Tyler will do next. That room sitting behind Clyde is the only way out. Even though the alien was a destructive occurrence, Clyde's escape plan is unhindered. "Unless he thinks I'm going to block his escape somehow." Tyler thought. He then focused back on his friend who was muttering the word "blood" over and over, like a stuck record. He began to stumble backward, towards the escape pod. Tyler must act quickly if he wants to escape. An idea struck him. "I found a loophole." he remarks. Clyde looks up at his friend, baffled.
"What?!" Clyde responds. He's worked himself up into such a frenzy, he can't even talk without screaming. Tyler takes one step forward. He needs to take seven more before he can disarm Clyde, but the alien was most likely closing in on them. This was his last chance. "If you didn't know about the alien, then your plan wasn't to kill us, right Clyde?" His friend shakes his head. Tyler takes another step forward, six remaining. "Then your instructions were only to take the samples back to earth and sell them off to a competing company, right?" Clyde nods again. The intel was right. One of the crew members was a saboteur, and it turns out to be the one Tyler desperately needed it not to be.
"Then you don't have to leave me here to die. We can leave together." Tyler tries to take one more step towards Clyde, but he's cut off. The gun is raised again and Clyde yells. "I know what you're doing! You want the sample too! I can't let you have it! Take one more step and you'll die." Being this close to Clyde, Tyler looked at his friend in the eyes again. They weren't the eyes of Clyde Elrich. They were fierce and crazed. Tyler knew this man had every intention of shooting him. With a heavy heart, Tyler took a step towards his friend's animated body. An ear-blasting gunshot was heard, Tyler fell to the floor. He didn't pass out, he couldn't pass out, he had to embrace the pain. Tyler muffled his screams. He couldn't risk letting loose all the pain he felt. He couldn't jeopardize his plan. Seeing the state his former friend had worked himself into, Tyler knew that landing a kill-shot would be nearly impossible. Clyde's hands were shaking too much for him to hit even a shotgun blast at this range. The shot landed in Tyler's collarbone.
Despite the pain, Tyler lifted himself up a little bit and looked at his former friend with sorrow, then laid down quietly and focused his gaze at the other end of the hallway. At the very end, lit in a demonic cadence, stood the alien. Its ears searching the soundwaves, and its metal claws eager to feel skin and muscle give way under their glory. It heard the gunshot and came rushing down to find its next victim. Clyde made the slightest gasp before clasping his mouth, but that's all the alien needed. It sprinted down the hallway and rammed into Clyde with enough force to send them both crashing inside of the escape pod. There was a lot of screaming, it bounced around Tyler's ears as he attempted to stand up. "Clyde was dead before the alien grabbed him." Tyler thought. Getting to his feet, Tyler's mind partially escaped to his memories of him and Clyde. Of all the good times which ended too soon, of the beers and the laughs, and anything else he could remember. He couldn't meet the same grizzly fate as the man in the escape pod, he had come too far. Using the wall as support, Tyler turned towards the escape pod and made his steps, mesmerized by the sight of the alien tearing through the skin and muscle of a man who was once a respected scientist and beloved friend. Five steps, Clyde's screams became more desperate. Tyler envisioned this scene in the lab, where his other friends died. Four steps, Clyde's screams were weaker as parts of his lungs were slashed away. This creature ripped away the lives of everyone Tyler had grown to love over the past few months. Three steps, Tyler didn't know how much of Clyde's body was still intact, but there was enough for him to make the most guttural noises. The intensity of his anguish never died down. Two steps, there were no more sounds coming from the mouth of Clyde Elrich, but the alien was still slashing away in a rhythmic fashion. Tyler could hear it making some kind of noise. It sounded strange, yet familiar. It sounded like... One step, the only thing Tyler could attribute the noise to was joy. Zero. Tyler leaned himself against the door mechanism and closed it. The alien stopped slashing and laughing and spun around at the sound. It stared at Tyler through the small window, but Tyler was too afraid to look at its eyes. He pressed the "eject" button, heard the hissing sounds signifying the pod's detachment from the ship, and looked up to see the capsule slowly drift away. His plan worked.
Tyler stared out the little window at the escape pod. His body and heart both ached. He wanted to curl up and cry. He wanted time to stop so he could process everything, but he couldn't. There was still more to do. His wound needed to be treated and Clyde's signal jammer needed to be broken for an SOS to be sent out. He began walking the large and empty spaceship, feeling even more stressed by how suddenly quiet it was. He will find the signal jammer, he will be transported back home, and his name will live in history as the only survivor of the first-ever incursion.