ENC 1101-B3 & B4: Writing for Discovery

The most bizarre night of Paul‘s life was only beginning to take shape. He had just had a miserable time at the homecoming dance, and after dropping his whiny date off at her house, he just didn’t feel like going home and calling it a night. So he gave his best friend, well really his only friend, a call.

“Hey, Will. That dance sucked. Alyssa was such a bitch. She even made fun of my truck and yelled at me for not getting a limo. What are you doing?”

“Nothing, man. It did suck. You wanna go fishing?”

Paul was not surprised at his friend’s suggestion.

“Sure, I’ll meet you at the lake in half an hour.”

Paul and Will always went fishing when things weren’t going their way or when they just needed a break. Paul remembered the time they both flunked their history midterms, and then decided to skip the rest of their classes and fish. Fishing wasn’t exactly the coolest thing to do at their school, and by now they were used to being called rednecks. But they didn’t care, because they never felt like they fit in at school anyway. They never had the desire to play sports or party, and before tonight Paul had never even been to a school dance. So after the way things had gone, Paul looked forward to dropping a line in the water. He hung up his cell phone and headed out to meet Will. The lake was only a few miles out of town, down an old dirt road that seemed much more welcoming than the homecoming dance had been The way the old truck dutifully negotiated the soft curves of the road was already starting to make Paul feel a little better.

When Paul got to the there, Will was already sitting on the bank, baiting a hook. He had not even gone home to change, just thrown on a t-shirt from the back seat of his Bronco and grabbed a pole from the stack in the bed. Paul got his tackle out of his truck, wondering why the faithful Ford was not good enough for his date, and sat down next to his friend. He put a big squirming night crawler on the hook, then made a good cast out into the lake. Then he began to talk to Will about the dance.

“Homecoming’s not what I thought it would be,” Paul sighed.

“I know what you mean, man,” Will said. “But still, Alyssa should have treated you better. ‘Specially after all the trouble you went through. And I can’t believe she made fun of your truck!”

“She would be so hot if she would just keep her mouth shut,” Paul said, and they both began to laugh. A good, hard laugh was just what Paul needed. But it was soon drowned out by a strange noise.

It was a low, droning sound, almost like a huge boat would make. But it was not a boat, as the surface of the lake remained perfectly calm. And it was slowly getting louder.

“Paul, what is that?”

“I don’t know, man. You think the military base is doing something?”

“That’s like thirty miles away, idiot. I don’t know what it is.”

Slowly, lights began to appear on the dark horizon. First blue, then green, then red. They were peaceful and almost beautiful off in the distance, but started to flash chaotically out of control as they got closer. It was mesmerizing. The ground was beginning to rumble.

Dumbfounded, Paul finally blurted out the words that they were both trying to say-

“I think it’s a flying saucer.”

“You don’t believe in that stuff, do you?” Will quietly asked.

Scenes of all the UFO and alien documentaries Paul had ever seen on television flashed through Paul’s mind. He thought of all the episodes of X-Files he had watched and began to feel weak.

By now, they could make out the shape of a triangular craft in the fog of lights. It seemed so unreal, the way it was slowly hovering over the trees on the other side of the lake. But it was definitely real. It was about the size of a house, and seemed to have some kind of opening in the metallic bottom. The noise it was making was by now deafening, and a fierce wind was blowing all of their tackle around. The surface of the once calm lake was churning with rough waves. Paul and Will just stood their shielding their eyes in awe, not knowing what to do next.

The ship slowly started moving across the lake towards them. Paul and Will still just stood there frozen, drenched in the shower of lights.

It went on like this until the ship was almost right on top of them, and the wind was making it hard for them to stand up straight. Staring upward at it, they could now make out perfectly the opening in the bottom of the ship, as it was beginning to glow.

Suddenly their was a blinding flash of white light, and after their eyes readjusted, they realized that they were standing in the middle of a spotlight coming down from the opening.

“Holy shit, run Paul!” Will said, breaking their hypnotic silence, and they sprinted for Paul’s truck. To their horror, the light followed them, darting across the grass as they ran. They both just knew that something horrible would happen to them if they stayed in the light, and they were not going to wait around to find out.

They dove in to the cab of the truck. Luckily, it started right up. As Paul floored the gas pedal, dirt and rocks kicked up from underneath the tires. They took off down the dark country road. Through all of the confusion, Paul had lost track of the ship. But the awful noise was still all around them, even drowning out the rumble of Paul’s engine at 80 miles an hour.

“Will, where is it at!?!?” Paul screamed in a panic.

To Will’s horror, he realized the ship was following close behind, maybe even gaining on them.

“It’s following us!” he yelled. “We gotta go faster!”

The blinding white light was shining all through the cab of the truck, and Paul could barely see the road. He was now doing over 100, and his old truck could not take much more of it. Smoke was pouring out from under the hood, and he glanced over at the temperature gauge and saw that it was in the red. If the engine blew, they would become sitting ducks. Then Paul saw the tunnel.

Ahead of them, the road went through a mountain. If they could make it to the tunnel, the ship would not be able to follow them through and they would be safe.

“Go! Go! Go!” Will was screaming, as smoke was still pouring out from the hood and all of the garbage on the floor was being flung everywhere. “We’re almost there!”

They screamed all the way until they hit the tunnel. They had made it. Inside, it was eerily serene, and the soft white safety lights glowing along the roof and walls were a sharp contrast to the chaotic beams that they could still see searching for them at the end of the tunnel. The truck stopped smoking as it cooled down, and Paul and Will sat and waited.

Neither dared speak for fear of breaking the silence. After a few minutes, when the light storm of the ship could no longer be seen, Will was the first to open his mouth. “Do you think it’s gone?” he hesitatingly asked in a soft voice. “Do you it’s still out there?”

“I think we’ll be alright,” Paul said, although he himself was really not quite sure. “Let’s get out of here.”

But it was not over. Through the lights and fog at the far end of the tunnel, there were four silhouettes approaching. As they stalked slowly closer to the truck, Will and Paul could make out their huge black heads sitting atop tall, wiry gray bodies. Aliens!

Paul was in total disbelief. “Quick, put it in reverse!” Will screamed at him. Paul looked over his shoulder as he slammed the shifter to R. But there were four more behind them, blocking off their escape to the rear!

Will was hysterical by now. “Shit, no! Forward! Just drive! RUN THEM OVER!”

Paul threw the truck back into drive and mashed on the gas pedal. The tires squealed and smoked as the old V8 of the truck roared to life. They were headed full speed at the aliens, they were so close! As they flew to the final feet at the end of the tunnel, the last thing they saw was the headlights suddenly illuminating the horrible features of the alien faces. Then, CRASH!

The truck plowed through the four ugly bodies. They saw pieces flying everywhere, bouncing off the bumper and breaking through the windshield. In horror, Will threw them out the open side window. Blood was all over the cab and hood, but it was not Will and Paul’s. They were alright.

They raced out of the tunnel into the open road, and were greeted by the stars of the now clear night sky. The ship was nowhere to be seen, and the warm lights of town were welcoming them at the bottom of the hill. The two friends had survived the most unbelievable homecoming night of their lives.