Space. It was such a beautiful thing. The stars among the black endless void, billions of light years away, and within even that black void were even more stars that even the human eye could not see, and within the black void between those far distance stars were perhaps even hundreds upon thousands of even MORE stars. Galaxies and nebula's of cosmic gas and stuff floating creating works of art and shapes that even the greatest artist or graphic designer could not truly capture the same level of awe inspiring beauty if they tried. And around those stars were a possibly endless stream of different planets.
And somewhere among those planets, was life outside of earth. Just waiting to make contact with. Just wait to say hello.
At least, that is what Lyra Heartstrings loved to envision as she stared up at the clear starry sky, her telescope focused on a distance passing comet. The young high school girl lifted her hazel eyes from the scope and sighed as she sat down upon the bench on the roof of her apartment complex. While it was already 10 p.m., and many people were already asleep, Lyra found she could not take herself away from this lightly beauty.
Besides, it was Friday; no school tomorrow. She could spend all night up here, cataloguing her star charts and looking out towards the final great frontier of man.
Lyra sighed in content as she unscrewed the lid of her thermos, and sipped the warm hot chocolate laying within. The winter break would soon be here, if the ever colder nights were any indication.
As she sat there, gazing up at the stars she found herself wondering, if somewhere out there among the stars, some other form of intelligent life was gazing up at the stars as well and wondering who else was out there. Waiting to be heard. Was she gazing at someone upon a different planet in a far off area of the universe?
She giggled at the thought, and stood up as she waved her arms and said, "We're over here!" She called before letting her arms drop and listened to the silence that space gave her in return.
Even without an answer Lyra still smiled as she adjusted her telescope towards a new area of space. Not many people would take the thought of other intelligent life seriously, though it was only a matter of time right? Besides, it would be a rather sad thing if humanity was all alone in that wide big universe.
At least, that was how Lyra liked to view it.
As she watched another passing streak of light of a far of comet pass by, she took a glimpse at her watch and finally decided that perhaps now would be a good time to head to sleep. Otherwise her roommate Bon Bon might start getting worried.
"It's not like I'm gonna forget to go to sleep. I haven't done that in months." Lyra said to herself, remembering a time when she had forgotten to come back inside during her star gazing. Bon Bon had not been happy to leave the warm comfort of her bed to drag her space loving alien obsessed friend back inside. Especially when they had a big test the following morning.
But, as she gathered up her things, a sudden bright light in the sky caused her to spin and gasp at what she saw. A meteor! Or she was sure it was one. It was a large white streak of light, burning across the atmosphere, and soon her ears were assaulted by the sounds of a low rumble as the piece of space rock grew closer to the earth as it flew across the sky passing over head and...oh god! As she watched the meteor descend faster she finally caught a glimpse of where it was heading. It was heading straight for the Everfree Wood, a large nature preserve not several miles away from town. The light vanished and the faint but still noticeable sound of a boom could be heard even at a far distance as whatever the space rock was crashed into the ground.
"Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod!" Lyra started to say, feeling her breathing increase. An actually meteor crash and not that far from her own location! It was like being able to gather a piece of space herself, for herself! She almost barely caught herself as she forgot all about her telescope and ran straight for stairs.
"I gotta...oh wait! Keys! Car keys!" She said, stopping and running down a hall toward her room. She could hear the voices of the other apartment occupants, obviously the far of boom must have woken many others. Even at a distance the crash had no doubt caused a stir. Which meant she had to get down to the crash site all the quicker before some other people or government workers got there first!
Stopping at her door she quickly insterted her room key and opened the door, charging in and grabbed the keys from the kitchen counter. A snore stopped her in her tracks and she moved toward Bon Bon's room. She covered her mouth to keep from laughing aloud. There she saw her room mate Bon Bon sleeping, her rear up in the air and her covers in a mess on her bed. Leave it to Bon Bon to sleep through a meteor crash. The girl could sleep through anything at times.
Shaking her head she quickly moved out the door shutting it behind her and running down the hall, pass several other occupants who called to her asking where the fire was
"Sorry, busy!" Was of course, all Lyra gave in response as she burst through the Apartment garage and ran toward hers and Bon Bon's car. Or well, Bon Bon's parents car but they shared it since Bon Bon's parents were over seas on a business trip. Normally Bon Bon was the driver, but....well what she didn't know wouldn't hurt her.
'Or me.' Lyra thought with a giggle as she jumped into the car and turned on the ignition and drove out, no doubt ignoring a traffic law or two.
"Let's see. it's 10:14 now. If I drive over the speed limit on the highway...and hopefully don't run into any patrol cars, I should reach the park in an hour and a half." She said to herself as she turned a corner, just barely missing the light change from green to red.
As she drove, Lyra felt her heart still racing. It wasn't often that she had a chance...actually this would be the first time in her life she could acquire a real piece of meteorite. It would be the perfect thing for her collection of space and NASA based material.
'Of course...I have to find it.' She thought. That gave her a brief pause and she slowed down due to it.
The Everfree National Park was a big place. But she had seen the meteor strike near the mountain. She knew that mountain well cause she had been there several times to get a better view for star gazing. So she had a general location....now she just had who know how much of area to thin out.
But the thought of someone else taking away HER space rock was enough to have Lyra step on the gas. She was known to be stubborn after all when she wanted something, and that was her rock. She saw it first! Finders keepers!
By the time she arrived at the park, Lyra was quick to grab the flashlight from the glove compartment and take off as her feet could take her. She choose the hike trail that would take her to the closest point of her journey, then it would be all off trail work...or...so she had thought.
After nearly an hour of additional running, stopping only to catch her breath, Lyra soon found the trail was cut off; or perhaps cut in half was the better term.
The flashlight dropping from her hand as her arms went limp as she stared at the large cut in the ground left by something big falling from the sky and skidding across the ground. Small fires burnt from the friction caused by the object and surface. Whatever had struck here was big.
Shaking herself out of her stupor Lyra picked up the flashlight and followed the skid mark towards its end. Her heart beating faster and faster as the thought of her prize at the end.
Maybe it was a big meteorite. If so, maybe some pieces had broken off. She doubted she could carry anything that caused a mark this wide back home. Besides....Bon Bon would have a fit if she did.
Now Lyra had expected to find pieces of space rock, perhaps even a single large one. But what she saw instead...only caused her to question her sanity and drop the flash light once more, and falling to her knees as her eyes widened in shock.
"Oh.....my.......god." She whispered in awe.
It wasn't a rock. It was...it was....a ship. A spaceship. An unidentified flying object. A UFO!!!! Lyra felt her breathing quicken as she got up and retrieved her light source and moved closer to the object.
This was big! Bigger the Roswell! Bigger then Area 51. Bigger then any ufo sighting in the history of all things alien!
She stopped herself when she stood but a few feet from the ship and looked around. There was no bodies around...was it empty? Was it still here but hiding? A feeling of being watched made Lyra shiver as she looked around at the dark wood and started remembering a horror film she had watched with Bon Bon during Halloween.
"No get a grip Lyra. Just stay calm. This is the chance you have waited for! Just...I'll just go inside real fast." She said to herself, though her mind was telling her to leave. Now!
But she couldn't just leave! All her life she had wanted to meet a real live alien, and now she might actually get a chance. But as she stepped close and closer to the wreckage, she noticed that, what must have been a door, was lodged open, and hanging on out as if it had been broken. By the crash? Or by something coming out?
Again Lyra's mind started to plague her with doubts and fears. What if it was hostile!? What if it was a government secret aircraft? She checked the craft itself to look for any sign of that second one...but found nothing that gave it away of being a secret project. But what about the possibility that something was outside....with her!
Lyra looked around once more, before slowly taking a breath and stepping towards the broken door.
She stood there at the threshold to what might merely be a dream. But as she slowly placed her foot inside, and expected to wake at any moment, Lyra found herself within the ship...and still there. She couldn't be dreaming. Could she?
She looked around at the inside, and felt herself gasping in amazement. The whole inside of the ship was a wreck. Bits and pieces of technology and machinery and goodness knows what else scattered everywhere. What any of it did was beyond her, but some of them seemed to be working, and were flashing strange alien symbols unlike any language she had seen.
As she walked further in, taking in the size of the ship interior. It had to be the size of her apartment room at least, she gasped and stood staring at a light within the center of the room. Flashing upon a large black coffin shaped box.
The box was pure black in color, with the edges steel white and lines of azure blue glowing lights that seemed to flow like blood through veins all along the sides and surface. As she got closer she saw a more strange symbols and a digital screen surrounded by what she assumed was a sort of keypad, with even more strange symbols on the keys.
"What....is this?" She asked herself, tracing a hand along the box. It was closed from what she could tell and seemed to be the only one on the ship. She breathed a sigh of relief knowing that, whatever it was or is, it was the only one.
But what exactly was it? Was it some sort of bed? Or capsule? Was there someone...or something inside of it?
Lyra felt her hand continue to wander over the box surface till she felt her fingers trace against the screen of the pad and several beeping noises occurring.
"Shit!" She swore as she pulled her hand away quickly, but gasped as the screen went from a blue to purple and steam or gas shot from the sides, forcing her back and covering her mouth while she held her breath.
"Oh crap. Oh crap!" Lyra said as the surface of the box split in two and slowly lifted themselves up and then folding down. As the box opened, the top outline of a body was noticeable. Lyra gasped silently, and felt her whole body tremble.
An alien.
An actual alien creature. Yet it was surrounded what looked like a thin sheet of ice, yet whatever it was swirled and moved as if like water.
Lyra drew closer and looked at the creature. It wasn't tall, though it was certainly bipedal based upon the way its body was built. It probably didn't come up any higher then her chest. The arms and legs seemed oddly lengthen, and while they ended in five digits, instead of finger nails were five long thin black shaped claws. The hair of the creature was also odd, long with two extra long and rather thick looking stands going all the way down to its kneecaps and the tips looking strangely shaped with the ends being more round and the remainder long and thing. The rest of the hair was wild, with stands sticking this way and that. As well it was white. Pure white like snow. Was it an albino? Did aliens even have that?
It's skin looked pale too, though it was hard to get a good look with the strange ice covering it, but it did look pale in the light.
The face of the alien was human like, but with a rather sharp shaped nose. The cheeks and facial features were also rather sharp. Not unnatural to be sure, but it gave the creature a rather serious looking expression even if...asleep? Unconscious? Dead?
As for the eyes she couldn't see as they were covered by a strange band like device that reminded her of that one character from Star Trek. Lyra giggled a bit at that. And it wore...well it looked almost like that body armor SWAT wore, only it seemed less bulky. What did that mean?
Before Lyra could do anything else, the ice around the creature slowly began to fade before vanishing completely. Lyra felt herself go still as she stared at the creature before her.
THen suddenly its hands shot up and grabbed her arms and yanking her with surprising strength towards it. Lyra screamed, but went silent as she saw her face inches from the creature.
Slowly the...hair....or whatever it was, started moving and thicker stands split into single threads that wiggled towards her. Almost like little tentacles on an octopus, starfish or jellyfish. The tips of the tentacles almost touched her before Lyra screamed and pushed the herself away from the alien, freeing herself from its grasp and staggering backward and falling onto her butt.
"Ouch!" She said, rubbing her butt before gasping as she looked up and saw the creature slowly remove itself from the box. It looked at her, and lifted a hand. Without thinking, Lyra screamed again and turned to run out the door, but the alien was faster and appeared infront of her in seconds.
Lyra gasped as she felt the hands grip her arms again, and this time the tentacles slapping themselves onto her face.
And that was when the pain began. Not a physical pain. It was more like something was peeling away the surface of her mind like one does the peel of an orange. It hurt and she let out a scream before finally blacking out.
Lyra's body went limp and fell to the floor, as the creatures grip on her loosened. The creature looked down at the human girl and tilted its head in a curious manner.
Then the creature knelt down and slowly extended its arms toward the girl again.
Lyra groaned, turning as she felt her body beign held down by something. Gasping she shot and felt the covers of her bed fly from her body. She looked around wide eyed and realized something.
She was in her room. In her bed. Back home. But how?
"What...but? Was it all just a dream?" Lyra asked, rubbing her head.
Everything was a bit blurry. Maybe it had been a dream. She looked around till she saw her clock and noticed that the time was 11 a.m. and she could hear the shower and Bon Bon singing.
Lyra smiled and shook her head, "I must have fallen asleep outside and Bon Bon brought me in. That was all just a dream."
Lyra sighed and stretched as she got out of bed and noticed that she was still in the clothes she wore last night. Bon Bon probably just tossed her into bed and went back to sleep. Lyra wasn't one to admit it but...she tended to sleep just as heavily as Bon Bon did as well.
"I guess getting out of this would be a good start to the day." Lyra said, and started stripping her clothes off.
As she did she hummbed to herself, folding her shirt and placing it into the laundry basket in her room. As she began removing her pants and leaving herself in only her underwear, behind her a visor wearing tentacle haired head slowly descend behind her.
The creature tilted its head and its tentacles moved and wiggled inches from Lyra. Lyra felt something watching her and turned around fast, but the creature was faster and brought itself up and out of sight, only to return to its behind observation when Lyra turned her head again.
Lyra walked to her closet and looked through her clothes. But as she decided on something to get into, once Bon Bon was done showering, the creature behind her dropped from the ceiling and slowly walked behind her, its footsteps silent as the wind.
The creature stood there, staring at her and when Lyra turned to place her clothes on the bed for later, she ran into the creature and felt its head pressed between her breasts.
"Huh?" Lyra said, blinking and looking down. There...between her, thankfully still bra covered, breasts, was a head. A white hair...tentacle...hair thing head. The head lifted itself and its strange visor like device stared up at her.
"Wh-wh-wha-" Lyra started to stammer, feeling her heart race. And her face reddening.
The creature stared at her and then said one thing, "Soft." It said, before placing a hand on one of her breasts and squeezing it gently.