The Terrestrials- By M.G. Sherman

            The man sat behind an elaborate desk in his office. The desk was large. Too large. It was the sign of a power hungry bureaucrat. The flag of the nation he ruled, Terra, hung on the wall behind him. His face was covered in shadows, apart from a frown that curled down like a malevolent snake. He was not happy. Suddenly, the door on the far side of the room slammed open. In rushed a short little man wearing a lab coat. He had large round glasses that kept sliding down his nose, and a head of bright orange hair, apart from his large bald spot.

            “Chancellor Gorman!” the scientist cried. “We’ve had a breakthrough!”

            “This better be good, Dr. …” the Chancellor said, squinting in the dark to try and place the man’s name.

            “Dr. Wesley, Sir.”

            “Yes, yes. Dr. Wesley. This better explain why the power is off in half of the city! I’m sure that I look very cool, but I just can’t get anything done like this!”

            “Don’t worry, sir,” the nervous scientist stammered. “The power outage was our fault. But there’s a very good reason! We have finally discovered how to replicate Dr. Stanton’s hyperdrive! That’s what sucked up all that power. All you have to do is install it into a spaceship, and the hyperdrive enables the ship to travel ten times faster than it could before!”

            “Excellent.” The Chancellor smiled. “Have the mechanics install this ‘hyperdrive’ into the Voyager X.”

            “The Voyager X?” Dr. Wesley exclaimed. “Surely you don’t intend to-“ Chancellor Gorman cut him off.

            “Have I not made myself clear?” he scowled.

            “N-no, sir,” Wesley sputtered. “I’ll inform them right away.” He hurried out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

            The room was plunged into darkness, leaving only the Chancellor’s gleaming smile visible.

            Chapter 1 ~ 2,000 miles above Planet Earth

          SAM was not exactly sure when his life started falling apart. It might have been when he received the letter from the Council. Or maybe it was when they called his name at the ceremony in the capital. He didn’t really know. What he did know, is that by the time that all of the other “volunteers” were on the rocket, shooting up into space, the tiny cracks and fractures that had appeared on the seemingly-perfect window of his life expanded so far that they became gaping holes of confusion and terror.

            Okay, I should probably explain what our hero, Sam Miles, was actually doing on a rocket, blasting into space when he was only seventeen years old. So I might as well start from the beginning. Sam Miles was basically your average geek. You know what I mean? Messy brown hair, gigantic blocky glasses: basically his style. There was no reason he should have been in space. He was just chosen, randomly.

            It all started decades ago, when the government sent up the first manned mission to Mars. Mars was to be the first. Then, they would populate as many other planets as they could. Eventually, the astronauts had built an entire base on the red planet, practically a city. But they never returned. Video cameras had gotten footage of a massive attack, wiping out the entire exploration team, the spaceship, and the precious hi-tech hyperdrive that enabled the ship to travel so fast. Even worse, the genius who had invented the hyperdrive had insisted to accompany the team on the mission, and he perished in the attack. No one could find the blueprints, and no one could replicate his design. The mission, it seemed, had failed.

            The astonishing thing is that the attackers filmed in the battle were not human. They were clearly alien. No one knew where they had come from. All we knew was that they killed our people. So we fought back. This started a ten year long war between us humans and the aliens. Thousands died. Cities were destroyed. And right when it seemed all hope had been lost, the aliens disappeared. They just suddenly left.

            Years passed. Then one day, scientists from Sam’s home country, Terra, discovered how to rebuild the hyperdrive. It turns out that Terra’s government was still intent on populating Mars, and with the new hyperdrive, that suddenly became a possibility. They called for one hundred fifty volunteers to be the colonists that would settle the abandoned base. But no one volunteered. The travelers would have to leave their past lives behind them, not to mention the ever-present threat of the aliens. So the government randomly chose people between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five to embark on this mission.

            And that is how Sam ended up two-thousand miles above Earth in a rocket. I know, right? It was crazy.

            The ship was long and narrow, with twenty-five seats on each side, facing each other. Fifty would go up at a time, and of course, Sam was one of the first fifty. After he was strapped into his designated seat, he sat there, with his eyes closed, trying to relax. Not very easy. He immediately thought of his family that he was leaving behind: his aunt and uncle. He was all they had left. Sam’s parents had been killed during the war with the aliens. Sam tried not to think about that. So instead, he thought of how cruel this whole thing was. The government was ruthlessly tearing apart families and friends just so they could populate space. But what could Sam do? He had to put the fear behind him.

            “Hey.” Sam suddenly was aroused by someone’s voice. He looked up. The whole ship had almost filled in, but he realized who had spoken. Sitting across from him was a girl. She couldn’t have been any older than Sam. She had long curly brown hair and emerald green eyes. He was so caught up in the fear and confusion of the moment that he did not realize it at first, but she was kind of cute. Actually, really cute. You get the picture.

            “My name’s Caprice,” she said. “Yours’?”

            “Sam,” he said, awkwardly pushing his glasses up his nose.

            “Isn’t this so exiting?” Caprice continued jubilantly. “We’re going to Mars!” Sam was taken aback.

            “You mean, you’re not scared, you know, about leaving your family and stuff?”

            Caprice frowned. It was one of the only times Sam ever saw her look so sad. A look of pain crossed her eyes. “I- I don’t have a family to leave behind. They- my parents, they were killed in one of the alien attacks ten years ago. The last attack, actually.”

            “Oh,” Sam said. “I know what it’s like. My parents were killed too.” Just then he was cut off by a robotic voice over the loud speakers.

            “Preparing to enter hyperspace. Please keep your seatbelt strapped at all times. Entering hyperspace in: three, two, one.” Suddenly, the ship lurched forward. Sam could see outer space whizzing by through the tiny round windows. He shut his eyes and tried not to think about what was happening, and where he was going.

            All too soon, the ship had arrived on Mars. The same robotic voice commanded the Colonists to remain in their seats. After a few minutes passed, a tall dark-skinned man entered the chamber. He had jet black eyes, along with a goatee and close-cropped hair. He was obviously a military officer. You didn’t have to see the various medals adorned on his hi-tech battle armor to realize that. Sam remembered hearing that a few officers would accompany the one hundred-fifty to Mars. They would train a certain group whose sole task was to defend the base and explore the Red Planet.

            The officer slowly walked down the corridor, silently scanning the colonists. He stopped roughly in the middle, and addressed the passengers. “I,” he said in a gruff voice, “am Officer Reginald Falkon. But you will call me ‘Sir.’ Before you people can enter the base, a group of soldiers needs to activate the oxygen supply, which will create a force-field around the perimeter, keeping the air in. However, we need to do this before this ship runs out of oxygen.” The Colonists looked at each other, terrified. Sam stared at the floor.

            “Personally, I think I should just go out there and activate the barrier by myself, but my superiors want four of you whelps to accompany me,” Officer Falkon said. Sam pressed his hand to his temples. He had always been a pessimist, but he had very good reasons to have a very bad feeling about this. Falkon slowly walked up and down the aisle, carefully examining the colonists. He eventually came to where Sam and Caprice where sitting. “You, girl,” he said to Caprice. “Come with me.” Caprice looked taken aback for a second, but a grin slowly spread across her face.

            “Yes, Sir,” she beamed. The Officer then went on to select a man that could have been an army veteran, and a girl that was built like a truck. One more person. Falkon suddenly turned to face Sam.

            “You, the kid with the glasses,” he said. Sam froze.

                        “Me?” he asked in amazement.

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