CHAPTER 3
ELLIE
Archaeological findings should be preserved in-situ if possible. Which is relatively impossible to do when an alien crash lands in your research site.
Option one: I’ve stumbled upon some ancient pathogen, of which an immediate and severe side effect is vivid hallucinations.
Option two: this guy is bonkers.
I don’t use the word lightly, but this dude seems categorically loony.
I’ve met some people really committed to LARPing and cosplay, but Zarek here takes the cake.
He’d get full marks if he’d come up with a more creative alien name than basically Derek.
No one even likes that as a human name, why would he voluntarily choose it?
The costume and body paint, which didn’t budge an inch when he grabbed my arm, would be impressive if they weren’t evidence that I am dealing with someone potentially dangerous. Must be some professional-grade makeup. Again, evidence toward unstable-level dedication.
There’s no way he lives in these catacombs.
For one, the survey group that cleared this area for study confirmed that there were no communities settled here.
But secondly, he’s in hyper-realistic alien cosplay.
No matter how rich and complex the societies of the inhabitants of the Paris Catacombs are, I sincerely doubt they include fandom to this extreme.
At least my hastily-made plan—acting agreeable and helpful so I can get us out of this enclosed, isolated space and up to the land of living so I can scream for help—seems to be working.
It’s difficult to read his expression with the strange contacts he has in, but he appears pretty thrilled to go looking for whatever he needs to fix his fancy tablet.
“Fantastic, the stairwell is up this way,” I say, backing up toward our survey site while keeping my eyes locked on Zarek.
He has to duck his head to not bump it against the ceiling, and I realize I’ve never seen someone this tall in real life.
He’s like, professional athlete-level tall, even though he’s got the slightly gangly build of most of my fellow scientists.
“Before we see other humans, I need to engage my BLEND chip.” I blink at him, trying to keep the mollifying smile on my face as I nod. Please, let that not be some weird innuendo.
“Is that a soppro thing?” I ask, feeling a little like I’m cooing at a wild animal.
“Sapphiro,” he corrects, and I diligently fight the urge to roll my eyes. “And yes. It’s like cryptic coloration in some of your animals, yes? An inherent disguise, to blend in with humans.”
Oh, thank god. He’s going to unearth some baby wipes from lord knows where, wipe off the paint, and take out those unnerving contacts.
“Sure. Camouflage,” I agree tightly, hoping that this is step one toward him coming out of this highly-dedicated performance act.
Zarek nods once and furrows his brow in concentration. For a moment, the pale cyan patterns painted onto his skin glow, and I think they must be embedded with those weird micro-LED lights.
And then, in the blink of an eye, everything changes. There’s no fade, no cleaning, no baby wipes. One second, my vision is filled with blue and chrome, and the next, someone sort of human stands in front of me.
I can’t even help it when I scream.
I’m frozen in place, staring at Zarek’s horror-stricken and not fucking blue face, as the shriek is ripped from somewhere deep within me.
Probably my primordial instincts, my evolutionary mind reacting to an unknown predator.
Somewhere beneath the unadulterated terror, I’m pretty pissed that in the battle between fight and flight, I am decidedly freeze.
Zarek holds his hands up again, like we’re in a fucking country western film, and waits out my impressively long scream.
Eventually, I run out of air, though my mouth still hangs open like it wishes I could yell more.
Zarek blinks at me, his very human eyelashes unable to obscure those eyes like black holes filled with stars.
“Why are you screaming?” he asks, almost like he’s as startled as I am.
“What do you mean, why am I screaming?” I retort, my voice a lot thinner than I’d like to admit. “You just…you…”
“I was under the impression you understood what cryptic coloration meant.”
I huff out the last bit of air in my lungs in disbelief. Wow, so it was option one. I am deeply hallucinating. I must have unearthed something during our dig, or maybe when I was doing my ill-advised perusal. That’s the only explanation for what I’m witnessing.
This is Jo’s fault. Sure, aliens aren’t her thing, but cryptozoology is basically the first cousin of exobiology, and her unending stories of the creatures who live among us have finally fully infected me, encouraged by some historical brain-eating amoeba, probably.
“I can’t believe this,” I mutter, still frozen to the spot, watching Zarek dust his shoulders and readjust his shirt.
I’m hallucinating new clothes on him, apparently.
Loose jeans and a t-shirt that would look more at home on a college campus than in an underground tomb, but apparently my brain isn’t particular.
“This was more the reaction I was expecting, honestly,” he says, with not a small amount of disdain. “There’s a reason you’re not invited to the IUS.”
I don’t have the time or wherewithal to ask what that acronym means, because I’ve finally realized that, more than ever before, I need to get out of here.
With or without my hallucination buddy, I must get out of this cavern and away from whatever biological agent is fostering my delusions.
I need fresh air, and maybe medical care.
At the very least, I should climb up the stairs to the gated entrance and wait for my team to come back.
They may hate me, but they take health risks at these sites seriously, mostly to avoid losing grant funding or having to pause the research. They’ll get me help.
“Sorry,” I finally say, looking at Zarek The Hallucination with a pleading expression. I must get the vision to work with me. “I was just surprised by the alien technology and all. Comes with a costume change!”
I must sound as harebrained as I feel, because Zarek just raises an eyebrow at me. His hair is slightly lighter now. Still dark, like it was before, but it has more dimension. Maybe it just looks different against his now warm, olive-toned skin.
“Yes well, the goal is to blend in,” he says, twisting his shoulder almost like he’s showing off the outfit. Wow, my amoeba-induced delusions are weird.
“Totally, you look just like a Parisian,” I agree wildly, still trying to appease Zarek, even if he is a hallucination. “We should go look for whatever part you need to fix your…thing. There are tons of technology service places in Paris.”
“I appreciate how quickly you’ve gathered yourself after that outburst,” he says, pocketing the tablet-looking-thing and giving me a smile that I imagine is supposed to be friendly. “So far, you’ve been much less primitive than my academic books taught me you would be.”
I have absolutely no response to that. Instead, I turn on my heel, finally unfrozen, and walk back toward our survey site. The dead no longer hum around me, or maybe I just can’t hear them over the buzzing in my ears and the sound of Zarek’s stride, right behind mine.
I don’t even bother putting my tools away as we pass the well-lit worksite, dropping my UV flashlight and lantern, and snagging my bag without missing a step.
If my imaginary friend has questions, he doesn’t voice them.
Instead, he hums contently behind me as I let the weak, warm light of my headlamp lead us to the stairwell.
Each step upward, I promise myself that once I reach the freedom of fresh air, of nitrogen and oxygen and no errant long-dead viruses or bacteria, I will be free of this temporary delusion. I’ll take a deep breath, look over my shoulder, and see nothing but a makeshift stairwell and dim work lamps.
I tell myself this, even as I hear two sets of footsteps on each step.
The bright, incessant sunlight temporarily blinds me as I make my final assent. I push open the gate, watching as one of the security guards glances over his shoulder and nods at me, and take a breath so deep I can feel my lungs push against my ribs.
“Wow, kinda spooky in here.”
Zarek steps next to me, dusting off his t-shirt. For a moment, I weakly believe—hope, even—that I’m still seeing things.
Then the security guard does a double take and lifts his eyebrow at us.
So he definitely sees the tall guy, too.
I have enough self-preservation in me to smile at the faintly familiar security guard, waving at him like everything is normal.
He sees tons of researchers and visitors, though I can imagine he’d remember seeing one this fucking tall.
Still, confidence is like ninety percent of getting through a lie, so I pull a random set of schematics out of the pocket of my bag and turn to Zarek.
“Read the papers with me,” I mutter under my breath, pointing at nothing on the page. When I flicker my eyes up, the security guard is turned back around, but he glances over his shoulder again.
“Why? Is it a map to the technology store?” Zarek doesn’t even sound sarcastic when he says it.
“No. You said you don’t want the authorities to become aware of you. We need to make it seem like you belong here so that guard doesn’t ask too many questions.”
Thankfully, Zarek falls into his role easily, ducking down to look at the page more intently. After a moment, I tug him toward the exit of the vestibule, my heart in my throat.
“And that’s why our research is so invaluable, Dr. Merced,” I say in my most PhD Candidate voice, loud enough for the guard to overhear as we pass. “I know this is your first time down to the Catacombs yourself, but as you observe our work, I’m sure you’ll see the value…”
I let myself trail off as soon as we’re through the wooden doorway.
Like stepping through a portal, the wood and dirt melts into stone and pavement, and the streets of Paris appear around us with all their noise and bustle and relative safety.
Still, I make sure we get around another corner, just in case someone comes to investigate further.
“Quick thinking, Ellie,” Zarek praises, patting me on the arm with his very human looking hand, no blue patterns to be seen. His skin is slightly warmer than mine, and I can’t tell if it’s an alien thing or not.
Oh god.
Oh my fucking god.
A fucking alien.
The guard could see Zarek. The people milling around the streets of Paris right now can see Zarek. They stare, like anyone would at an unusually tall stranger.
I did not breathe in some ancient bacteria.
I am not hallucinating.
I did not imagine Zarek shapeshifting in front of me.
He is…
“An alien.”
I must have said the words out loud, because Zarek’s eyes flicker across my face, looking for something. Or at least I think he is. I haven’t figured out how to read the empty space yet.
“Are you going to scream again?” he asks, worried. Probably that I’ll reveal his secret. Maybe that I’ve lost my marbles.
Aliens are real. One is in front of me. I am speaking to an alien from outer space.
“You’re going to need some contacts.”
Those are not the words I thought would come out of my mouth, but to be fair, I really could not have placed a bet on what I was going to say. Zarek blinks at me again, the little reflections in his eyes winking in the sunlight.
“Are my eyes not camouflaged?” he asks, the furrow between his eyebrows so human it would be funny if it wasn’t short circuiting my brain.
“Not even a little,” I laugh, reaching into my pocket to grab my phone. There’s limited service in the Catacombs, so a flood of messages and emails and notifications is still cascading in, resulting in an unending buzzing in my hand. “Okay, first stop, let’s find a costume shop.”
Ignoring the notifications and also my better instincts, I swipe to my map app and type costumes into the search bar. It’s fucking Paris. I assume there’s like a billion weird, niche costume places around here.
My assumption is thankfully correct. Ironically enough, a cosplay shop is closest, and I start walking in that direction, already knowing Zarek will follow behind me. Before we get too far, I dig my oversized yellow sunglasses out of my bag—a gift from Jo—and stretch my arm out behind me.
“Trust me,” I say, wiggling them at Zarek without looking back. I hear a little grumble, but he grabs them from me as we turn down the road, dodging tourists clustered on the sidewalk. Without saying a word, I pull up my texts with Jo.
Me
I know this isn’t your specialty, but give me everything you know about extraterrestrial life.
Jo
I THOUGHT YOU’D NEVER ASK!!!