Another wave of nervous chattering swept through the auditorium. I scanned the audience, half expecting someone to flip out, but everyone remained calm and in their seats—including me. The revelation that evil aliens were coming to try to wipe us out didn’t send anyone into hysterics or create a panic—and I thought I understood why. For decades, we had all been inundated with a steady barrage of science fiction novels, movies, cartoons, and television shows about aliens of one kind or another. Extraterrestrial visitors had permeated pop culture for so long that they were now embedded in humanity’s collective unconscious, preparing us to deal with the real thing, now that it was actually happening.
“We began to send more probes to Europa, numbering in the hundreds, but nearly all of them were lost or destroyed shortly after they reached the moon’s orbit. However, through trial and error, we were eventually able to place a handful of remote surveillance platforms on several of Jupiter’s neighboring moons, allowing us to closely monitor Europa without being detected. Their cameras sent back the following orbital surveillance images.”
Thousands of satellite images of Europa began to appear on the screen, displayed rapidly in chronological order, so that they created a rough stop-motion video, showing what appeared to be a thin ring of metallic debris forming around the moon near its equator. When these photos were magnified and enhanced, millions of construction robots became visible, crawling along orbital scaffolds and the skeletal hulls of the spacecraft they were building.
It looked just like the Sobrukai homeworld during our mission last night, except that Europa’s surface was mostly white, instead of red. And instead of the purplish gas giant named Tau Ceti V looming behind it, it was the familiar cyclopean eye of Jupiter.
The Europans were building an armada, just like the Sobrukai. But much closer to Earth. They had Foundry Ships orbiting their moon, cranking out fighters and drones—just like those I’d spotted above Sobrukai last night. The Europans had also towed several large asteroids and meteorites into safe orbits around their moon, and now hordes of those spider-like construction robots could be seen swarming over and burrowing into their surfaces, to mine them for metals and other raw materials. When an asteroid was all mined out, another would be towed into orbit.
As the time-lapsed footage continued to play, flying through weeks, months, and years of incessant construction by these self-replicating machines, a small fleet of glittering spaceships began to form around Europa. It continued to grow until the alien war vessels grew so numerous they formed a Saturn-like ring that encircled the equator.
As the asteroids were towed in and mined out, six massive Dreadnaught Spheres began to take shape in orbit above Europa. “Despite all of our ongoing efforts to negotiate a truce with the Europans, they continued to make their preparations for war, constructing drones that then went on to build other drones,” the voice-over explained. “We watched with growing concern as their numbers began to multiply exponentially right before our eyes, month after month, and then year after year.
“In the mid-1980s, the Europans began to send scout ships to Earth,” Sagan continued. “Our military forces managed to capture and study several of the enemy’s spacecraft. That was when we discovered that they were all drones, which the Europans were controlling from hundreds of thousands of miles away, using some form of instantaneous quantum communication. For this reason, we still know almost nothing about the Europans’ biological makeup or physical appearance.”
I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, feeling a strange combination of frustration and relief. I’d half expected Sagan to reveal that the Europans looked just like the anthropomorphic squid-like Sobrukai depicted in Armada. It was a relief to learn this was not the case, but equally frustrating to be told that, after four decades, we still didn’t know anything about our enemy’s biology.
“However, after years of effort, our scientists were able to reverse-engineer the aliens’ quantum communication technology, along with certain facets of their ships’ propulsion and weapons systems. We have since used these newfound technologies to construct a global stockpile of our own defense drones, which we believe will give humanity a fighting chance against the invaders.”
I heard myself let out an uneasy sigh. I’d been willing to suspend my disbelief for the EDA’s “we reverse-engineered the aliens’ technology in just a few years” explanation back when I’d thought it was just a fictional videogame backstory. But I definitely didn’t buy it now that the EDA was trying to pass it off as a historical fact—even if they were using Carl Sagan’s voice to do it. It seemed utterly impossible that the EDA had managed to reverse-engineer vastly superior communication, propulsion, and weapons technology in just a few years while concealing this endeavor from the whole world—let alone mass-produce it into millions of drones. And even if that was possible, why had our enemy made the task so easy for us? According to what we’d just been told, the Europans had not only let us capture several of their vessels, they’d then given us enough time to figure out how they worked, to build our own fleet of ships with the same capabilities. And by constructing their armada in orbit around their moon, in full view of our satellites, they’d basically given humanity a detailed video of what to expect when their attack came.
There had to be some truth to what the EDA was telling us. The shuttle ride I’d just taken to get here was proof of that, as were my current surroundings. But I was sure there was more to this story than they were telling us. A lot more.
“Gradually, it became evident to humanity’s leaders that we faced certain extinction if we didn’t set aside our differences and unite as one species to defend ourselves and our home. This prompted select members of the United Nations to form a secret global military coalition for that very purpose, known as the Earth Defense Alliance, in the event that our worst fears are one day realized, and the entire Europan armada disembarks for Earth.”
The animated EDA logo reappeared on the screen.
“Until then, we continue to work toward peace, while preparing for the possibility of war.”
As Sagan finished the closing voice-over, the screen went dark and the film ended abruptly. Lex realized she was still clutching my forearm and let go of it. There were marks where she’d dug her nails into my skin, but I hadn’t even noticed. I’d been too busy having my whole perception of reality shattered into a million pieces.
When the lights came up a few seconds later, they hit us with the really bad news.
A TALL MAN in a heavily decorated EDA uniform mounted the small stage down below and walked to the podium at its center. When he reached it, his face appeared on the giant view screen behind him, and I gasped in unison with Lex and a chorus of others in the audience.
It was Admiral Archibald Vance, the cyclopean EDA commander who gave players their mission briefings in both Armada and Terra Firma.
I’d always assumed he was just an actor who had been hired to play that role, but it appeared I’d been wrong about that, too.
The admiral rested his hands on the podium and cast a long appraising gaze over his audience.
“Greetings, recruit candidates,” he said. “My name is Admiral Archibald Vance, and I’ve been a field commander in the Earth Defense Alliance for over a decade now. I’m sure many of you are surprised to learn that I’m a real person, and not a fictional character. But rest assured, I am real, and so is the Earth Defense Alliance.”
There were scattered cheers and some muted laughter. The admiral waited for total silence before he continued.
“You’ve all been summoned here today because we need your help. You people are among the most skilled and highly trained drone pilots in the world. The videogames you’ve each mastered, Terra Firma and Armada, are both actually combat training simulations created by the EDA to help us locate and train individuals like each of you—who possess the rare talents required to help us defend our planet from the impending Europan invasion.
“As you just saw, our alien enemy’s existence has been kept a guarded secret since its initial discovery,” he went on. “This was done out of necessity, so that humanity would keep calm and carry on long enough for our leaders to organize and mount a defense against the invaders.” He slid his hands off the podium and scanned his audience again.
“But we’ve finally run out of time. The day we’ve been dreading all these years is now at hand. And you people are the EDA’s most promising recruit candidates, from dozens of different countries all over the world,” he told us. “Which is why we’ve taken the precaution of relocating you here, to a secure location, before the truth of our circumstances is revealed to the entire world.”
“Holy fucking shit,” Lex whispered beside me.
“The briefing film you just saw was first prepared in the early 1990s,” Admiral Vance said. “We’ve updated the computer-generated imagery over the years, but its contents have changed very little. The EDA has always intended to release this film to the world when the threat of invasion could no longer be concealed. Sadly, that day is now at hand. After threatening us with extinction for over forty years, it appears the Europans have finally completed their preparations for war.”