Seed (Alpha Unknown 2)

“I know. But it’s for our daughter.” I nodded and breathed calmly. “It will be up to us to save the entire world.”

Wow. When I said it, it really hit me. It wasn’t going to be simple. But was life ever really that easy?

“How far will it take us back?” I asked.

He pressed a few buttons on the screen and shook his head. “It’s too difficult to say. The irregularities on the map are unlike any others I have ever seen. If this works, we could end up somewhere very far away. It is not without risk.”

Puffing out my cheeks, I exhaled and felt a little dizzy. This was big, but we didn’t have much of a choice. We couldn’t float around forever with no food, and most of the medical supplies had been torn into.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s do it. Let’s go to Earth.”

Talis grinned and held his finger over the ignition button. “You sure, little fawn?”

My child took my finger into his hand and held it, making the cutest noises I had ever heard. “Talis. I have never been so sure of anything in my life,” I said. “Press the damn button.”

The most important human trait might have been learning how to let go.

We all go through hell.

We all suffer.

We all die.

But, in return, we have the ability to make relationships and link the good together.

We can fall in love. We can make a story. We can tell the good parts and own the bad.

This wasn’t the end. This was a new beginning.

Talis made sure we were all buckled in. He pressed the bright and flashing button on the screen and pulled back on the ignition rod. With one hand on my baby to protect her from whatever extreme turbulence a wormhole created, I said, “Her name will be Juliana.”

Talis took my hand and squeezed. “It’s perfect. Everything is perfect.”

I felt gravity shift. The exterior of our ship started to rattle. I kept my eyes on Juliana as the particles around us started to alter, separate, and bounce around as if reality was completely illusory. Suddenly, everything flashed, and we whipped in an unknown direction. Sensation was lost, and, for a moment, everything went black.

Our spaceship puttered out and died. A strange glow emanated from outside, casting green and blue shadows against the glass. The color meandered up to our window. No matter how many times I blinked my eyes to confirm its appearance, I couldn’t understand it.

It was some sort of energy, some sort of unknown. Talis jumped from his seat and choked the throttle back, trying his hardest

to get the engine going.

“Where... are we?” I managed to ask.

Somehow, Julian was quiet, but his eyes were open. He was staring at the floating blackness. That’s when I noticed there were no stars around us. In fact, there was nothing at all. We had found ourselves in a vast black swath of emptiness.

Talis hit the screen when a red and alarming error appeared there. “C’mon, you son of a bitch...”

There was another ten long seconds of punching in a series of passcode combinations. Every time he eyed the systems for confirmation, another error would pop up and destroy his hopes.

The color outside our window moved closer. Now, Juliana squirmed and turned fussy. A small cry left her mouth, and then another, until she started to shriek.

The color turned from blue to red, shifting into what appeared to be fire. It started to change shapes, began to resemble a human. I saw it. I looked into its eyes and saw him. Cade.

“Goddammit! Start!” Talis screamed.

“Where are we, Talis? Tell me!”

My heart pounded frantically over Juliana’s cries. The presence outside our window opened its mouth. Cold chills ran down my spine, but the interior of the ship started to feel damp and hot. At once, the presence banged on the window. The most disgusting sounds, a cacophony of choking, retching, and deathly screams—screams from those I knew and once loved—came from the fiery presence.