Mark watched as the machines ascended rapidly, and within seconds they were lost among the stars.
He considered what he had just seen. Looked at the marks and troughs in the ground all around him, the broken trees, the steaming earth.
“B
LIMEY
!”
SAID
K
ATE.
“What happened to you? You’re covered in mud.”
Mark said nothing. He simply closed the door, leaned back and rested his head against it. After a long moment he looked at her and shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?”
“I mean I don’t know. I was driving home and...” He stopped.
Kate waited. “And what?” she said.
“I saw this light.”
“What kind of light? Was it a migraine?”
“No. Nothing like that. It was in the sky. I thought it was the moon at first but then I realised the moon was on the other side of the car. It came down in Holt End woods.”
“Oh my God – was it a plane crash?”
“Well that’s what I thought, so I went over and had a look. But it wasn’t a plane. At least I don’t think it was a plane.”
“If it wasn’t a plane what was it?”
Mark shrugged. “I don’t know. It was round. The door was open and the pilot was lying nearby.”
Kate put a hand to her mouth, wide-eyed. “Was he dead?”
“No. And I think it was a woman but I couldn’t see properly through the helmet. Then another one turned up.”
“Another plane?”
Mark nodded. “It didn’t land. It just hovered. A couple of people got out, put the injured pilot in some kind of bubble, got back into their machine and went away.”
She looked at him. “Some kind of bubble?”
“Yeah. Like a soap bubble, you know. But huge. They lowered it over the body, lifted it into the air and put it into the second aircraft. I thought it was some sort of military thing at first. An experimental aircraft.” He hesitated. “But I think they might have been...”
Kate raised her eyebrows. “Might have been what, Mark?”
He looked at her. “Aliens,” he said. “I think they might have been aliens.”
Kate smiled. “You’re winding me up, aren’t you?”
“No, I’m not, Kate. I swear to God.”
“You don’t believe in God.”
“You know what I mean.”
“So you were driving along, an alien spaceship crashed, and you saw the injured pilot who was then rescued by more aliens in another spaceship. Have I got that right?”
“It sounds mad, I know.”
“Sounds like you’ve gone back on the pills.”
“You know I haven’t done anything like that in years.”
Kate got up off the settee, took her coat from the back of one of the dining chairs and put it on.
“What are you doing?” he said.
“If an alien spaceship crashed in Holt End woods, I bloody well want to see it.”
“They took it away. The second one sort of towed it with this beam of light.”
She stopped and looked at him, one arm in one sleeve. “Right. So there’s no evidence that any of this happened?”
“You don’t believe me.”
“You’ve got to admit it sounds a bit crazy, Mark.”
He said nothing for a few moments, then looked at her. “The trees,” he said.
“What about the trees? I suppose they spoke to you, did they?”
“They were all broken where this thing came down. The earth was all churned up, too. It’s obvious something’s happened.”
Kate finished putting on her coat, walked over to the cupboard by the front door and took out her wellies. “Come on, then,” she said as she slipped her feet inside them. “Let’s go.”
“It’s quarter to eleven.”
“I don’t care. If an alien spacecraft landed in Holt End woods I want to see the evidence. Besides, you never take me out these days.” She grabbed the torch from the shelf at the back of the cupboard and turned to face him. “Well come on then,” she said. “What’s the matter with you? It’ll be an adventure!”
T
HEY WALKED THROUGH
the trees, the torch beam waving around in front of them, twigs snapping underfoot.
“It’s a bit spooky,” said Kate. “But fun. How much further?”
“It’s just here.”
They emerged from the trees into the gap created by the sphere. They stopped. Kate shone the torch on the broken trees, the rutted, muddy ground.
“It was right there.” He pointed to the crater where the sphere had rested. “And the pilot’s body was just over there. If you shine the torch up there you’ll see how the trees are all broken where it came down.”
“I can see trees all right.”
Mark looked up at the stars, frowned, shook his head. “It was here. I saw it. I saw the pilot, and I saw them take her away. I know I did.”
“When you went out after work – you didn’t have a drink did you?”
“I was driving.”
“And you honestly didn’t take anything... exotic?”
“Look, I didn’t have a drink and I didn’t take anything. I know what I saw and I know what happened, okay?”
“All right. Calm down. You’ve got to see it from my point of view, though, Mark. This is all a bit weird. Are you sure you didn’t fall asleep at the wheel for a second and dream it?”
“Kate.”
“Okay, okay, sorry.”
“Look, forget it. Let’s just go home and pretend I never said anything.” Mark turned and started to walk back towards the car.
“Mark. Mark, I’m sorry.” She hurried after him.
“It doesn’t matter. You’re right. It’s ridiculous. I’ll make an appointment with the doctor first thing in the morning and get my head examined.”
As he passed the point at which he had found the pilot’s body Mark stopped walking and looked at the ground, then stooped and picked something up.
“What’s that?” said Kate when she caught up with him.
Mark wiped mud from the object. It was round, a similar size to a small apple, with a slightly stippled surface like frosted glass. He held the ball up by his ear and shook it, but it made no sound. It emitted a faint blue glow and felt slightly warm in his hands.
“The pilot must have been carrying it,” he said quietly.
She looked at him. “You are joking. This is a joke, right?”
“No, I’m not bloody joking.”
She looked more closely at the device. “Does it open? See if there’s anything inside.”
Mark examined the ball for a moment. He noticed a thin groove around its circumference. He gripped the upper and lower halves in his hands and twisted; there was a faint click and a whistling sound.
Mark felt as though he drifted sideways. The world greyed, distorted. He felt somewhat numb. He could see Kate, blurred and indistinct, shimmering as if he were looking at her through a veil of heat haze. He could see that she was saying something but her words seemed garbled and distant.
He heard a strange wailing sound and glimpsed a black motorbike speeding along the country lanes, its headlight illuminating the hedgerows. Mark seemed to be watching the motorbike from overhead. The machine approached the bridge across the river but did not slow down. Just as the road narrowed the machine skidded and slewed sideways. The rider lost control and the machine hit one of the bridge pillars, catapulting the rider on to the river bank.
Almost immediately Mark became aware of another motorbike approaching from the same direction as the first. It looked identical, following the same course. The rider took the bridge without slowing down, failed to see an oncoming car, was thrown from the bike when his machine collided head-on with the other vehicle. This was followed almost immediately by another bike; the machine raced towards the bridge, slowed slightly, crossed the river and disappeared along the lanes on the other side without incident.
Mark twisted the orb back to its previous position. Sound and air burst on to him. He blinked, staggered a couple of steps and threw up against a tree.
“Are you all right?” Kate asked. “What happened?”
Mark leaned against the tree with one hand, gasping and sweating and staring at the ground.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I came over all weird.”
“You kind of faded. As if I could see through you.”
At that moment Mark heard the sound of a motorbike on the country lane on the other side of the field; he immediately recognised the note of the engine. He stood upright and turned to face the road. “Oh my God.”
“What’s the matter?”
Mark said nothing. He could only watch through the trees as the motorbike’s headlight sped towards the bridge. As the rider approached the river he eased off the power, took the bridge with caution, then accelerated away into the darkness. Mark gazed towards the road as the sound of the engine gradually faded.
“What is it, Mark?” said Kate. She touched his arm. “What’s the matter?”
“I saw that bike,” he said. “When I twisted this thing.” He looked at the sphere. “In fact I saw it three times. But the first two times it crashed. I saw the same bike have two different accidents. I’m sure I did.”
They both looked at the sphere.
“Come on,” said Kate quietly. “Let’s go. This place is beginning to creep me out.”
I
T WAS WELL
past midnight by the time they got home. Kate slipped off her muddy boots then shrugged off her coat and threw it on to the back of the sofa. While Mark went into the kitchen and filled the kettle Kate placed the sphere on the coffee table, sat down and stared at it.
As he waited for the water to boil Mark turned and stood in the kitchen doorway. “So what do you think?” he said.
Kate shrugged. “I don’t know. Tell me again what you saw.”
Mark did so, concluding, “Then I saw a third time when it didn’t crash, and that’s what we both saw. Do you want tea or coffee?”
“Tea, please. Just a small one, though.”
As Mark turned and went back into the kitchen Kate picked the device up off the coffee table and rolled it over in her hands. “It looks like glass,” she said, “but it feels warm and soft. Like wood.”
“Weird, isn’t it?”
The object emitted a faint blue glow. Kate examined its stippled surface. She noticed that there was more than one notch around its circumference. She grasped the device firmly between her palms and rotated the two halves until it clicked, turning it to the second notch.
The world greyed and closed in. She felt an almost asphyxiating pressure and dizziness, heard a strange howling and saw ghostly shapes.
She could see Mark in the kitchen, but there was a second image of him, too, a strange overlay. As the first Mark lined up a couple of mugs, a second Mark was picking up already filled cups and turning towards the door. As the first Mark put teabags into the cups Kate watched the second Mark walk across the room towards her. As this Mark passed the sofa he banged his leg on the coffee table and stumbled slightly, half-spilling the contents of the cup in his right hand. She felt his anger and embarrassment quite clearly. He turned and placed the cup on the table and shook tea from his hand. Behind him, the first Mark watched the kettle as the water it contained reached boiling point. That was her Mark. The real Mark. Wasn’t it?
She twisted the device again. The room seemed to shift sideways and she was enveloped in darkness. Kate heard a babble of voices. Fighting the compulsion to deactivate the device Kate closed her eyes and listened through the cacophony.
One voice she recognised. A woman crying. Elanor from next door. Through her tears she was asking David why he treated her the way he did. Why was he such a bully?
Kate focussed harder. She felt as though she were moving through a tunnel. The pressure increased and the darkness intensified until after a few moments she found herself in Elanor’s flat. She could see their living room, their sofa, their television. Kate was behind and to one side of Elanor. The other woman was slightly blurred but it was definitely her. Kate could feel the intensity of her misery and fear.
David was a dense, dark shadow to Kate’s left, looming over Elanor’s slender shape. Kate tried to focus on him but he remained indistinct. Yet his animosity was palpable. When David spoke, his voice was distorted, like a badly tuned radio.
You’re a useless excuse for a wife
. His voice shifted and warbled.
Useless. Useless excuse. Waste my money again and I’ll knock your stupid head off. Do you understand me?
Kate’s head swam; she felt as though she might throw up.
You’re pathetic. If you waste my time again I’ll break your stupid neck. Do you understand me?
Elanor spoke again – although Kate could not distinguish the words it seemed to be a defiant challenge.
The David shape swelled and stretched and threw Elanor on to the sofa. More tears, more shouting. A stream of garbled, stuttered words.
Stupid neck. Understand me? Do you understand... Neck... Pathetic... Head off, neck, stupid, stupid...
The room spun. Nauseous and dizzy, Kate quickly returned the sphere to its original setting and was dumped back into her own living room.
She blinked, took a moment to catch her breath. She heard the kettle reaching its peak and then looked up to see Mark walking towards her with the tea cups.
“Are you all right?” he said.
“I think so.”
As he neared her Mark banged his leg on the coffee table. He swore, kicked one of the table’s legs, put one of the cups down and wiped his hand on his trouser leg.
“Stupid bloody table,” he said. “Here.” He handed Kate the other cup and looked at her. “Are you sure you’re all right? You look as white as a sheet.”
“I turned that thing.”
Mark glanced at the sphere. “Right. So what did you see?”
“I’m not sure. I saw you in the kitchen. But there were two of you, doing different things. I saw you bang your leg on the table. Then I clicked it again and I was next door. As if I was in there with them, in their flat. They were having another row.”
“What about?”
Before she could answer there was a thump against the wall and muffled voices.
Why do you treat me this way? Why are you such a bully?
You’re a pathetic excuse for a wife. If you waste my money again I’ll knock your bloody head off. Do you understand me?