How It All Began….

“Dr. G says it’s a body of our ancestors,” his assistant clarified, shouting over the rotors of their chopper. 

Hojo looked over his notes thoroughly, again and again, attempting to make out the photographs of the “phenomenal” discovery his college friend had the luck to find. His long, dark hair fell over his bony white fingers, tracing lines along a certain photo of a creature with pale, blue skin, lying inside what appeared to be a metal coffin. 

Our ancestors didn’t fall from space, he thought. Or else, there would be, certainly, a lot more craters on this planet. 

He sorted the photos, reviewing them while his assistant kept informing with, “Whatever it is, they should be close to extracting it from its vessel.”

This caught Hojo by surprised. He turned his tiny eyes sharply to the young man. 

“Is that wise? What about possible disease and exposure?”

The young man cleared his throat, bowing his head to dodge Hojo’s typical hard stare. 

“Well, that’s a risk Dr. G is willing to take,” he replied nervously. 

Hojo scoffed and looked away from his assistant’s tense face. 

“Of course, he is,” the bitter scientist muttered. He glared at the photos once more, seeing his once, old friend, smile right at him. Dr. G’s teeth were always straight, and he always had a youthful face, his eyes bright with pride behind square lenses. 

“We're coming in soon at eleven o’clock. Buckle your seat belts,” the pilot announced. The chopper began to descend. 

His assistant pointed gladly at the distant view. 

“There it is!”

Hojo stared through the window, taking in a crater so massive and ancient, it became a part of the Planet. Rugged black rock propelled so high from a blast long ago, creating an almost wide mouth volcano like projection, with snow and ice all along its outer walls. The winds grew rough, juggling the chopper as they neared. The crater expelled waves of green light, pulsing outward like gushing green fog, an endless generator. 

Free energy, just spitting out into the air, Hojo thought, amazed at the natural formation. A chill snuck into the chopper, urging the scientist to zip up his long coat. They did warn of ice. 

After landing, Hojo and his assistant made for a bumpy descend. They simply followed the lanterns planted by Dr. G’s team, spiraling down further and further. Bodies of monsters laid to waste, increasing Hojo’s nerves. He turned away from hard skin and bullet holes, along with puddles of blood around the trail. 

The farther they went, the thicker the air, filled with more loose energy until it seemed electrifying. Rough winds shot up through the cracks in the earth, acting as geysers for more green fog. 

“So much energy!” His assistant sang, marveled. 

It was at least a mile down the crater, unable to go as linear as Hojo had hoped, too steep for the matter. They had to circle it like a drain. Hojo breathed into his gloves, warming his hands. His red cheeks stung of cold, lips trembling. The fur trim around his coat did nothing to soothe the chill sneaking into his collar. There should have been more layers. 

Walls of rock and ice, eventually turned into crystal, until it was like walking into a world of broken mirrors. 

Hojo knew he was close when he heard the voices of the team ahead. He quickened his pace, his thin body unable to do more than a light jog. 

“Dr. G, your friend is here,” someone shouted. 

Hojo walked into a cavern of crystal, lanterns to make it seem like the sun was in there with them all. He squinted to such light, bulbs reflected easily in many angles. 

Dr. G turned around from the dig site. When he straightened and saw that it was Hojo, a warm smile formed on his smooth face. 

“Eriko! My old friend! I’m so glad you could make it!” The other scientist cheered. 

Hojo tried to smile, but doing so felt foreign to him. His struggles with finding a company to support his research has been carved into his once, young face. The bags under his eyes loathed Dr. G’s bright smile and fine complexion. A man always with a mission. 

Hojo was constantly looking for his. Still haven’t found it. 

“Fare, what’s this all about?” Hojo enquired, ignoring his old college’s wide arm hug. Fare dropped his arms with disappointment, but he smirked anyway. 

“Still a stiff, like in grad school. How’s the world treating you?” He laid a warm hand on Hojo’s small shoulder like they were lab partners again, competing for the highest grade, and yet, got along like friends. At least, a long time ago. Hojo’s eyes steered to that hand like it burned his shoulder, but said nothing of it. To answer the question, he muttered, “It’s fine.” He said it with so much distaste, even Fare couldn’t ignore it.

“Still can’t find a company to hire you?”

“No,” Hojo simmered. 

There was a pat on his shoulder, and then a chuckle. 

“Well, what if I told you, I could get you a job? I’ve found something big, Eriko, big! Come and see!”

Fare began to trek the hard earth path, his white lab coat flailing behind him like a hero’s cape. Hojo clenched his teeth as he followed. 

“Fare, please stop calling me by my first name,” he insisted. He looked to the walls, seeing many clones of himself just staring into his eyes, dozens of him frowning and eyes so puny behind such round glasses. All the studying and reading behind poor lighting left Hojo to wear such thick spectacles. His black hair remained short, though it seemed to have grown some behind his ears. His beard was growing out again, giving him that five o’clock shadow look. He was lacking on his hygiene lately, too busy searching for any company to hire him. There’s no living for a jobless scientist. 

With a hiss, Hojo looked away sharply from his reflections, and continued to follow. 

“I work for this company that’s willing to put more research into this discovery. What if this is one of our ancestors? What if this is proof we all came from space? Think of the possibilities!” Fare preached, his boots crunching along loose pebbles and crystals. 

Finally, his boots stopped along the edge of a slope, and the bright man peered down, the lights glimmering over his lenses. 

“There she is.”

Hojo stepped beside him and had a look. His eyes widened. 

It happened instantly, like the specimen knew of his weakened soul, though the bitter scientist was unaware of it as soon as he laid his dilated pupils upon her. 

Such a beautiful creature, with a face of a woman, eyes closed behind thin, blue skin, her gorged breasts stretched with veins. There was a torso, and what began to look as arms and legs, but they scattered off like long, fat vines coiled behind her like a bed. Her cocoon appeared to be a one man metal pod, its thick window covered in frost. Though Hojo could see clearly through that glass, lost in what slept behind it. 

Out of nowhere, wind slipped between his legs and under his arms, ruffling his thick coat while setting out to push him forward. His black hair lifted, face kissed by cold. His white cloud breath faded to her tomb below.

And then her voice came. 

You are precisely who I need.

Hojo spun around, searching for the voice of sirens, an angelic choir suddenly in the site, though he only saw the puzzled look on his colleague’s face. 

“Eriko, are you all right?”

Hojo gasped, looking back to the creature safe in its pod below, and the winds and voice vanished. Was he hallucinating? He required more sleep. 

A rock began to wedge into Hojo’s throat, and he swallowed, but it remained. 

“I’m fine. Just a little tired. I haven’t been getting much sleep lately,” he put it lamely. 

Fare grinned. “Amazing isn’t it?” 

He then stepped forward, and took to the slope, half sliding and half stepping as he passed the dozen of men delicately extracting the pod from the earth. Pickaxes, drills, brushes, water, shovels, it was all used to unearth such a finding. Hojo left his mouth open as he almost tripped over one too many times. He got closer, and then his hands started to go numb. 

Help me.

There it was again, that luscious voice. Hojo gasped to it, darting his head up and around, but all he saw were workers with hard hats. 

“Did you hear that?” Hojo nervously asked Fare. 

He was given an odd look, Fare lifting one blond brow up. 

“Hear what?”

“A beautiful voice.”

This got Fare to laugh, his wide mouth up to the tall, crystal ceiling, laughing so hard until Hojo thought shards would fall and impale them. 

“You’ve been spending too much time in your lab, haven’t you? You need to get out more, get laid. Speaking of, that’s the main reason why I brought you here.”

Fare scooted closer to Hojo to put an arm around his shoulder, and they both awed over the specimen just a few inches from their feet, gazing down at it like it was Snow White sleeping in her coffin. 

“You’re the smartest scientist I know. Hell, you’ve been the top of our classes. I was jealous,” Fare began. 

Hojo frowned. 

Was jealous, his thoughts echoed. 

“My company is starting this whole new project for just this discovery. They are a weapon’s company, but they have a great research division. As head of that division, I was able to convince the heads to fund this.” 

Fare then sighed, and he slipped his arm off Hojo, just to take his square glasses and rubbed them with a cloth he pulled from his pocket. 

“Look, Eriko, I know you’ve been looking for work, and I need a partner. With this specimen, something that’s never been discovered before, we could be working on this for decades. So, what do you say?” 

Hojo swallowed. That rock was still in his throat, even as he turned to gawk at Fare. 

“You want me on this project?”

Fare smiled so wide, his dark blond mustache seemed to have jiggled. 

“Of course!”

Hojo turned his attention to the unknown alien, squining to see her face through the frosted glass. 

Say yes.

Again, he heard it, and eventually came to the conclusion, that perhaps it was this alien speaking to him. It had to be. Hojo wasn’t a man of fantasies, so he was in disbelief when he heard it speak to him in thought. 

His mouth and lips dried, left too long open, and he finally licked them, his chin trembling. 

The alien’s pod glimmered in reflection from his glasses, the man behind them suddenly possessed without even realizing it. He saw her, the alien, open her eyes. They glowed like bright rubies in her sockets, and her plump blue lips curved upward. 

Slowly, she sat up, rising from her bed, her tentacles wiggling to life like snakes. 

“You know, what’s so interesting about this finding is how I accidentally found it. Even though it seemed to have fallen from space, this cave was sealed off by crystal. I’ve been mining for stones here for two years, when I found this place. It’s as if, someone or something kept this creature hidden on purpose. Or maybe it was the Planet’s natural formation around the pod. I can’t say,” Fare wondered aloud, his thoughts mulled, fingers playing with his mustache. Hojo was so entranced by his possessed thoughts, he almost didn’t hear any of that. He saw her floating out of her tomb, and wondered if Fare saw it, too. 

Soft, cold hands reached, and delicate fingers played with Hojo’s cheek. 

Join me.

Hojo saw how her full lips puckered up at him, how her red eyes gave him a longing look. Her hair flowed long and white. An angel. 

He blinked, and she was gone. Nothing but back with Fare as though it was all in his imagination. 

Hojo swallowed again, slowly perspiring, and he looked to Fare. 

“Yes. I will join you,” he confirmed without hesitation. 

Little did Hojo know, this was only the start of the shit show he was about to unleash. 

He was her fist puppet. 

(2072 w)