The winter of weapons and the road to Mars, a short story of sci-fi

The packed two deck bus was taking another scary turn on the road, maneuvering around the cliffs like a snake. It was a typical rocky island, where the road was a divider between the ocean and a stone wall, the drop down was making heads spin and the road seemed too thin to accommodate cars going in both directions. But somehow they managed.

Some of the tourists admired the guide that was standing in front of them, surely it was not safe, but her sense of balance seemed uncanny as she stood in the front part of the vehicle and delivered the boring touristy speech. She did not look like your usual tour guide either, with her outfit that seemed more fitting for colder destinations.

The people in the bus were the ones escaping their usual lives, the world was in turmoil, another cold war was taking over and those humans just did not want to think of the grim events back home. And even though nobody really believed in a possibility of a nuclear war, people were worried that a regular one would take place.

Surprisingly there were not the usual older generation in the bus, in fact, it was mostly millenials with some exceptions, young mothers and fathers with their kids. Not the usual crowd to take the kind of excursion they were taking. Most of them wondered how they had been convinced to join this tour, others chatted away just to forget. Some listened to the tour guide, delivering them a speech of the islands culture.

A young, pregnant mother with her husband and baby girl were sitting in the front, on the first deck of the bus, right next to the guide. The family was listening with vigor and the husband was making a video of their drive. The guide was keeping an eye on them just to make sure they were all okay as the little one looked a little wonky, she was falling asleep, the drive and the guides voice soothed her.

Suddenly a crisp ring went through the bus, seemingly from nowhere, and some of the sleepy ones jumped up, the guides eyes widened, and she pushed a button on the bluetooth device, secured in her ear. Some of the passengers were talking under their noses, in disapproval of their interrupted sleep, it was after all early morning and they had a long tour in front of them.

-- I am listening?... Yes?... Okay... Are you sure?... Okay, give the order, activate project Runaway with all of the ships... Yes, all of them, we want to get as many people out of here as possible... I want a ship for artifacts and two more for the wildlife... We have limited time, so activate all of the sleeper agents. Yes, even the ones that have not finished training.- the young family did not understand any of the text the guide was so rapidly saying, it sounded like a gibberish to them, but they did see the expression in the womans face and a fear crept into their minds. The guide looked right in the eyes of the young woman and smiled, reassuringly. Something in her eyes... was calming, like a tide of ease and comfort.

The next thing the guide did, was turned to the bus driver and whispered something in his ear, he slowed down the bus a little, before picking up the speed again while the guide switched on her microphone again and spoke in a cheerful voice.

-- Our plans have changed a little, the castle we are going to is going to give us a tour a little later, so we can go to a beach now for some free time an breakfast, there is a great spot a couple of kilometers from here, we will take an exit there and have around two hours for some leisure.- there were some cheers and some more unsatisfied mumbling, but nobody seemed to mind very much, there was not one person coming down from the second floor either, so the guide had time to think to herself. She totally forgot about the speech she was giving before, instead she picked up a bag from one of the seats and excused herself to the bathroom.

The time had come, the world was going to dust, this one at least. Project Runaway had been planted a long fifty years ago, when the first cold war still raged on. Her people had taken to the underground and built, built like mad back then. And when they had finished they took a breath as the war was winding down and there seemed to be no need for their creations. But they knew that human mind had a tendency to forget, so they left their ships where they had built them in case the madness would start again.

And it did. Sadly it did. Earthians were her ancestors so the Governess herself took a post as one of the undercover Martians in case the wars would escalate. She had taken a place of a tour guide, taking the same route every day, giving the same speech time. They passed by their escape every day, except that fateful day, that day they would have to take the exit to save some of the souls on the planet. The time had come to take some of the Earthlings with her as there was a huge possibility that Earth was going to see a very long winter.

The guide came out of the lavatory in different attire, similar to the one before, but formal, made out of a different , unknown material. She had a star and some stripes pinned to her chest, it looked like a military uniform and indeed it was.

-- Could I get your attention once more, please? I would like to inform you, that we are going to take the detour because of safety concerns, I am working with the government and we will be taking you to a designated location until further notice. It seems that the East and the West have activated their weapons systems and they are going to open fire at each other. There has been a report of a non-Nuclear rocket being launched from one of the parties and the other side is getting ready for a more serious attack. I would like you all to make a list of 10 people you would like to take with you, we have safe-houses on standby in various destinations.

As the woman spoke, she saw the question in peoples eyes, the wonder and disbelief, she looked at the driver and he nodded towards a tunnel in front, leading away from the main road and into a local beach. It was time. The tunnel seemed too low for the bus, but the driver still took the exit towards it and right in the last second, as the second deck passengers started to panic, the guide put both of her hands up in the air and the tunnel seemed to expand.

Shock and disbelief, some believed they were dreaming, others just thought they were going mad. The passengers looked at each other in a daze, looked for validation, their world had just been turned upside down by all the events in their tiny worlds. They went from shock to shock as it suddenly went dark, the tunnel did not have good lighting, in fact the only light came from the bus that was going slower now. It seemed like forever, slowly there appeared the sounds of pens interacting with papers as people wrote down names, they needed to keep their loved ones safe.

The tunnel turned into a cave, it was going down, closer to the beach. It was lighter as well, there seemed to come some natural light from the other side. As the guide walked around the bus, collecting the pieces of paper from people, the bus stopped. It was still in a cave, but on one side there was an opening that provided a view of the beach that was still far away. All heads shot to the window, in confusion. The guide exhaled, it was time. For thousands of years they had worked on hiding themselves amongst humans, and now she was doing the opposite.

-- Please feel free to take a walk around the bus, stretch your legs, it will take me a little while to contact the other side.- All of the people poured out of the transport, the father on the front was still filming, others were checking recent news, that were informing the masses of a rocket that had in fact touched down in the West, injuring and killing people on an island just like theirs, halfway across the world. The guide passed the papers to the driver and he started scanning through them, reading, putting down names in a device phone-like.

There was an overall feeling of fear and uncertainty in the crowd, they all clung to each other on the side of the bus, fearing to go too far, contacting loved ones, trying to reach each other. The guide stepped in the opening and looked at the beach, it had been a while since the ships had been buried, the tides had changed and the ocean had come closer to the shore. She saw a couple of humans down on the beach, locals taking a stroll.

For now she was letting them be, but she had every intention to gather them as well. She looked in the ocean once more and touched her bluetooth device, suddenly her head was enclosed in a helmet that appeared like she was in some kind of a sci-fi movie. Only some people with phones in their hands jumped and took pictures, the rest were too busy to notice. She smiled sadly. They had no idea.

-- Governess to the central, how are the other locations doing?- she was holding the button on her com, a voice answered her immediately.

-- We have all crew members in place, ready to move in, one is half an hour in, the rest will need picking up. We have activated smaller shuttles and are collecting your Earth family members. All hundred ships have been reached by their commanders as well. The West have already filled in their launch codes, they are doing a countdown as of this moment in case there is no agreement between sides, it is 8 hours that we have in the East. We are waiting for your orders.- it was as good of the news as they could be in the situation, they had eight hours to pick up their cargo. The guide ordered all coms to be open and the next order was given to all her people on Earth.

-- This is your Governess speaking, initiate project Runaway, and be safe.- a rain of ''yes ma'am'' followed and she switched off her microphone, there was no time for more at the moment. She pushed another button and the glasses of her helmet started displaying a different view, she saw what was hidden from the human eye. Her hands reached out once more, just like in the bus, as if she was lifting something and the people around her watched in confusion again.

The water close the beach started elevating all of the sudden, in huge quantities, it fell to the sides as a waterfall, something huge was being brought to the surface from under the ground. They saw the people at the beach starting running, even though the water was raising quite a distance from the shore, it was something that would bring fear to anybody who did not know. The guide spoke once more, addressing the distance that had started moving against all the laws of nature.

-- Alice, wake up, initiate order 134, you have coordinates in your system, please confirm.

-- Confirmed, voice recognition active, hello Governess, I am happy to see you. Sending systems report now, receiving crew details from mister Kirt, calculating optimal DNA sequence for passengers, should I extend the docking deck?- there voice in the guides helmet stopped and the view that was in front of the people was something they had not expected to ever see, nor could have ever imagined. There was a huge, rounder object in front of them, they were still more than 100 meters above the coast and the object that was hanging in the air was level with them, its lover part was almost touching the water, though. It was like a bowl, the middle looked hallow, but there was no sand or water in it, even though it had emerged from the ocean. It was in orange and white color, accompanied with blue streaks.

A hundred people saw a space ship for the first time in their lives.

---

This is part one of the story, part two coming tomorrow. I had the longest dream tonight, I had to leave some things out from the story as it would be a small novel if I did not! :D This is something that I am interested to write in my book one day as it is all about Martians and humans of Earth.

Part II here

Have a great day, week and life!
Linda