Resolve (Lost Fagare Ship Book 1) Read online

  Resolve: The Lost Fagare Ship Book 1

  by Edward Antrobus

  Copyright © 2017 SEAM Publishing. All Rights Reserved

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental.

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  Jim Bromley pulled his hard-hat off to mop up the sweat accumulating below his sandy brown hair. The sun approached the peaks of the Rocky Mountains to the west and when it dipped below them, the temperature would finally drop below the ninety degrees the summer seemed to be stuck at. The downside, of course, was that there would no longer be enough light then to keep digging. If they didn’t finish this pit on time, they wouldn’t receive the bonus promised, and Jim already earmarked that cash for a new AC unit to replace the aging one dangling out of the bedroom window in the fifth wheel RV he called home. The rest of his crew called it the office.

  The ground vibrated underneath him as the excavator hit something. Jim no longer felt hot. Instead, a chill ran down his spine and his gut churned. Shit. Shit. Shit. If that’s a pipe, we’re getting shut down for sure. Tightness crept into his chest. The hard hat still in his hand fell to the ground as his grip weakened. The little plume of red dust it disturbed went unnoticed as he completed the breathing exercises his doctor had given him to stave off another stress-related heart attack.

  Once his pounding heart slowed, he jogged over to where Bobby was already climbing off the machine. The treads reached the chest of his dark skinned employee and not for the first time, Jim found himself slouching to avoid dwarfing the operator further. Bobby claimed to be able to drive or fly anything, but there always seemed to be something wrong when he was around.

  He’d barely reached the excavator when Chris plodded into sight with the fiberglass extension ladder propped on one bulging shoulder like a child’s toy. Somehow, Chris had managed to come to the same conclusion as Jim, and had grabbed the ladder from behind the office/Jim’s home and reached the pit only seconds behind. I must be getting old. Well, at least one of us was thinking. . Unlike Jim, the large man seemed entirely unaffected by the blistering heat and the constantly blowing dust.

  “What did you hit this time?" He wiped his brow again, this time streaking the dust settling on his face.

  The frown on Bobby’s face twisted into a scowl. His hands closed into fists before opening again. The long, calloused fingers stayed curled, ready to resume their balled position at the slightest provocation. “Hey, Chris shouldn’t have parked that skid right behind me. That was on him.”

  Chris turned and swung the ladder wide, knocking Bobby to the ground. He dropped one end into the hole which resulted in a metallic clang. “Oops. Guess you shouldn’t been standing in my way. ’Cause not looking where you’re going is always the other feller’s fault, right?"

  Bobby leapt up but Jim stepped in between the skinny machine operator and his bulkier demolition expert. He shot a glare at Chris before returning his attention to its original target. “What did you hit?"

  Bobby bit his lip and kicked at the ground with his steel-toe boot. “I don’t know. The locates didn’t show anything over there. It should have been clear.”

  Jim shook his head and sighed. “Chris, take a look, would you?"

  “Already on it, boss,” he replied as he swung a leg over the ladder. Jim listened to the fiberglass rungs rattle as they strained against the weight of the muscle-bound man and watched he dinged and scratched hard hat covering his shaved head disappear from sight. Nobody spoke as they waited for news.

  “It’s not a pipe,” Chris called from the bottom of the excavation pit. Jim released the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Not sure what it is, but it’s big. And Bobby didn’t put a scratch in it. Don’t think it’s even metal.”

  “Alright. Now get out of there before OSHA sees you,” Jim said. He turned to Bobby. “Keep digging. Let’s see what we are dealing with. But be careful.”

  “Don’t worry about me. I could pet a cat with this thing.” Bobby leaned over the hole as Chris emerged. “As long as I know it’s there.”

  Jim decided to head off the argument before it got started. Their constant bickering got old fast, but they felt like family. And they rarely complained when payday was late. “Chris, grab Melissa. There’s probably going to be paperwork involved in this.”

  “Gotcha, boss.” Chris winked.

  “If you actually grab my stepdaughter, I’ll throw you in that hole and tell Bobby to fill it back in.”

  “Jeez. You take all the fun outta living.”

  Jim ignored him and edged closer to the pit. After warning Chris about the safety organization that could make their lives miserable with a surprise inspection, he considered donning his own fall harness. But the lure of whatever was in that hole kept him glued to the ground’s edge.

  Bobby fired up the hoe and dug wider revealing the edge of a glossy black surface. Clods of dirt streaked against the material, but the exposed parts shined as if they’d just left the paint shop.

  “What did you find down there?"

  He started at the sound of Melissa’s voice. He waved his arms to keep his balance. “Don’t sneak up on a guy, Mel.”

  “You know better than anyone that you shouldn’t be that close without fall protection.” She shook her head, sending her reddish bronze ponytail strung through the back of her hard hat flying. Smoothing it back out again, she added, “So what’s down there?”

  “I think it’s a flying saucer,” Bobby's voice crackled over the radio clipped to Jim’s belt, barely heard over the noise of the equipment.

  Jim and Melissa walked closer to the machine. He leaned on a section of tread not covered in mud. Melissa, her safety vest considerably brighter from spending most of her time in the office, inched up to the excavator but didn’t touch it. A faint smile crossed her face as she looked up.

  Jim grinned, too. Trust Bobby to come up with something ridiculous. He quashed the smile as Bobby killed the engine and popped open the door, “We don’t have time for your crackpot sci-fi theories.”

  “No, I mean it. I’ve found some of the edge. Look at the shape.” He pointed to the curved edge extruding from the clay. “It’s huge. Got to be a hundred yards across. Definitely alien.”

  “Maybe they’ll beam you up and stick a probe up your ass,” Chris said, having abandoned his task yet again for an update.

  “Name one thing humans have made that big.” Bobby balled his hands into fists.

  “A football field, dumbass.”

  “A building,” Melissa added.

  “A ship,” Jim said.

  “That’s what I’m saying. A spaceship.”

  Jim shook his head. “No, a ship ship. Oil tankers can get over a quarter mile long.”

  “You saying this is an oil tanker? How’d it get buried at the foot of the Rockies?" Chris twisted his head around to look at their leader.

  “I don’t think that’s what it is. But there are plenty of things that people have made without alien technology, even the Pyramids.” He stared at Bobby, baiting him for a comment on his favorite conspiracy theory. Jim had finally gotten tired of it and t
hreatened to fire him if he ranted about it at work again. This probably wasn’t a fair test to see if Bobby took him seriously, but he wasn’t in the best of moods right now either.

  Bobby opened his mouth but clamped it shut again and swallowed. Satisfied that his employee passed this test, Jim pointed at the mysterious object. “Keep digging.”

  They watched the diminutive man work from the air conditioned cab. Melissa sometimes joked that she preferred standing next to him because she finally had someone to be taller than, unlike her father and Chris who towered over her. The minutes ticked by as Bobby uncovered the object bit by bit. Melissa lost interest first. “I should get back to the RV. I need to start filling out incident reporting forms.”

  “Hold off on that.” Jim held up a hand. “I want to wait till we know what we’re dealing with. And we’ve got twenty-four hours to report it. Don’t need the authorities crawling up my ass and taking up residence any sooner than necessary.”

  Melissa frowned but nodded her assent. “Well, maybe I’ll get on Bannon and Mario. Their bills are past due.”

  Jim’s eyes lit up. “Yes do that. Remind them it’s an extra grand if they go past ninety days. That ought to loosen the pennies out of Bannon’s tight ass.”

  “Need any help?" Chris looked hopeful.

  “If I thought you would actually help and not stare at my chest the entire time, I’d say yeah.”

  “Don’t you have work to do on the skidsteer Bobby hit?" Not for the first time, Jim wondered why he kept this crew together if he constantly had to separate them. Then he remembered how short he was for tomorrow’s payday and decided their behavior was a small price to pay for their patience.

  He continued to watch Bobby dig. The operator was right. Whatever was down there easily spanned a football field, if not an entire stadium. The sun tracked lower in the sky while Jim stood fixed in place. The pile of dirt pulled from the pit grew. Between the rising pile and the lowering sun, it cast a long shadow over Jim and the RV behind him. Slowly an outline emerged. A disc tapered into a squat neck that split into two long tubes. Holy shit. I think he might be right.

  Bobby climbed down. “That’s as much as I can get.”

  The hoe powering down caught Chris’s attention, and he ambled over. Normally his frequent breaks and short attention span bothered Jim. If he wasn’t blowing something up, he got easily bored and took any excuse to stop working. In this case, Jim didn’t think he could really blame him. He peeked over the edge. “Damn, the little fucker’s right. That’s a spaceship.”

  “What clued you in?" Bobby sniped.

  “Well, it looks like one. Guess even you can’t be wrong all the time. There a door or something?"

  “Maybe underneath,” Jim said. “Excavator can’t dig any more out. We will have to grab some shovels.” He pointed to the southern edge, the only point still illuminated by daylight. “Bobby, get us a thirty degree slope. I don’t want to mess with the trench wall.”

  “I’ve got C-4 in my saddlebags,” Chris offered, pointing at his orange and black Kawasaki parked in between Jim’s pickup, technically belonging to the business, and Bobby’s rusting Civic. Melissa’s jet black Mustang was parked another hundred feet further away. She’d park even further from the constant dust in the air if she could. “That’d be faster.”

  “What are you doing with C-4 in your bike?" Jim held up his hand. “Wait. I don’t want to know.”

  “This is the greatest discovery in the history of the planet and you want to blow it up?" Bobby threw his arms out in exasperation.

  Chris clicked his tongue against his teeth. “Aliens made it, right? If they can travel across the stars and all that shit, they can build a ship that can stand up to a little plastic explosive.” He dropped his hands to his hips. “We doing this or what?"

  Jim’s shoulders slumped. “Okay. Just a small charge. Somewhere near the front.”

  Chris nodded and jogged off. He returned carrying a backpack stuffed with several bricks wrapped in brown paper.

  “Uh-uh.” Jim shook his head. “I said a small charge. One brick.”

  “Aww, you’re no fun.” He pulled out a brick and tossed it at Bobby who juggled it like it was about to go off. “Wuss,” Chris muttered. He dropped the backpack to the ground causing a small jump from Bobby. And Jim too, if he was honest with himself. Chris grabbed the first one from Bobby who couldn’t get rid of it fast enough.

  With the explosive tucked under his arm, Chris slid down the ladder. He circled the pit twice. “Hey, nerd. Where you think the door is?”

  Bobby gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. He exhaled and relaxed. “Try the saucer section near the neck. These things aren’t really built for landing, but there’s almost always a cargo bay or something around there.”

  Chris trotted over to the area that Bobby pointed out. He knocked at a few places before setting the charge. He climbed back up. “I’d back up. This stuff ain’t exactly C-4.”

  Jim sighed. “How far back?”

  Chris pointed past the excavator. “That ought to be good.” They moved, and he gauged the distance again. “Uh, maybe a bit more.” Again, they backed up. “More.” They ducked behind the skid parked near the RV.

  “Well, here goes nothing. Fire in the hole.” He flicked off the safety on the detonator and pressed the large red button that he’d painted a crude skull and cross-bones.

  The Earth shook. Dust and rock scattered in the air. Stones rained down, clanking against the parked equipment and scattering a few feet from where they stood.

  Melissa exited the RV as the air cleared. “Jesus, Chris. You can’t go detonating explosives without permits. You trying to get us shut down?”

  Jim put his hand up. “I okayed it. We are far enough out we probably won’t get any complaints. If we do, we have a good excuse.” He pointed at the ship. Pebbles were strewn across the top but otherwise it seemed to have weathered the explosion.

  “Speaking of which, shouldn’t we be calling the army or something?” Bobby said.

  “It’s an alien spaceship,” Chris retorted. “What’s the army got to do with it, you twit?”

  “I dunno,” Bobby said. “In the movies, it’s always the army that comes out.”

  “These the same movies where they take everything over and lock everybody up so the secret doesn’t get out?”

  Bobby’s head dropped. He twisted his boot around at the toe as if inspecting it. He mumbled something.

  “What was that? You admitting that’s a dumb idea?” Chris twisted the knife in Bobby’s pride further.

  When he didn’t answer, Jim jumped in. “Look, we have to report this eventually. But I got to admit, I’m curious what’s inside. We’ll take a look and then call it in.”

  “Anything in there is salvage, right?” Chris asked. “I bet there’s some pretty sweet weaponry on that thing.”

  “If there is anything in there we can sell without getting arrested, we should,” Melissa said. “This business could use some extra cash.”

  “Okay, it’s agreed then,” Jim said. “We will take a look around, grab anything that looks useful and then call the sheriff’s office and let them sort out who needs to come out here and take care of it. Melissa, get some flashlights. Chris, run an extension cord and set up the floods; it’ll be dark soon and I don’t want us climbing back up that ladder without light. Bobby, set the bucket down in the pit so we have a way to lift out anything we bring out.”

  The three scurried off to their respective tasks. If they moved like that all the time, we’d get jobs done in half the time and wouldn’t be losing money. Chris returned, pushing a light array that had been welded onto a hand cart. The orange extension cord unspooled as he pushed it along. When he reached the edge of the hole, Bobby helped unfold the stabilizing legs and point the lights at the area where they expected the door to be. A flip of a switch brought the lights buzzing to life. The ship’s edge cast harsh shadows against the rock around it.

 
; Armed with Melissa’s flashlights, all four went after the ladder at the same time.

  “I should go first. I discovered it.” Bobby stomped his foot.

  “By accident.” Chris jabbed a meaty finger at Bobby’s chest. “That don’t count.”

  “Well, ladies first,” Melissa said. She took another step towards the ladder.

  Chris stepped in front of her. “Could be dangerous. Wouldn’t feel right if something happened to you while I was stuck up here.”

  “You just want to look at my ass while I’m climbing down,” Melissa pointed out.

  “That don’t make what I said not true.”

  Jim took advantage of their bickering and swung his leg around the ladder. He was halfway down before they noticed. From the bottom, he called. “Melissa’s next. Then Bobby. Chris, you take up the rear.”

  They began to argue again. Jim rattled the extension ladder to get their attention. “Or I’ll lower the ladder and explore this thing myself.”

  Their jaws snapped shut. Chris slid out of the way and gave her a little bow. “After you, I guess.”

  Once on the bottom, they headed towards the front of the ship. Jim’s boot sank and he pulled it out of the wet mud with a wet suctioning sound. “Watch your step. Water table is apparently high here.” He scuffed the mud off his boot as best he could on a nearby rock.

  “Mario’s not going to be happy when he hears that,” Melissa said.

  “That’s his problem,” Jim answered. “I’m more interested in this.” He pointed his light, still off, at the hull of the ship. Under the saucer, a hatch rested on the ground, revealing a small opening. One by one, they crouched and crawled inside. Only Bobby made it through relatively upright.

  “They must have been really short,” Bobby remarked.

  “Well, little green men, right?” Chris grinned. He flipped his light on and pointed it at his face like he was going to tell a ghost story.