Gavin Mathews was driving down a deserted country road on his way back home from a break at college. He had promised to help his dad do some jobs around the farm which he wasn’t necessarily looking forward to. He was on the final stretch, which consisted of about 30 miles of gravel roads with typically no traffic. It was spring and he enjoyed looking at the green pastures and fields he passed. There was nothing out of the ordinary until a bright light in the sky made him look up. The light was accompanied by a loud noise that made his car vibrate. It was similar to a sonic boom but much louder, cutting through the music blaring from the car's speakers. The light cut through the low cloud cover forming a circular patch of clear sky radiating out from the light source, like ripples in a pond. In a flash, the light was gone and in its place a dark object appeared in the sky and immediately began to fall.
Gavin was so engrossed in the spectacle he almost drove off the road. He turned the steering wheel and slammed on the brakes, throwing gravel everywhere. He skidded to a halt, still barely able to keep his eyes off the falling object. He quickly got out of his car to get a better look. The object was at least a hundred feet up in the sky, about a mile or so off to his left. Gavin heard a distant clicking noise over his cars engine and a roaring noise as twin plumes of fire suddenly blossomed from beneath the object, slowing its decent. It twisted in midair and Gavin could just make out two smaller plumes coming from the back of the object.
“It’s a mech!” Gavin exclaimed, making out a cockpit on the machine, still not wholly believing what he was seeing. He was an avid fan of science fiction and had read many books on robots and mechs and loved mechs in anime. As far as he knew no real mechs were being built or even on the drawing boards outside of maybe Japan. In alarm, he realized the mech was headed straight toward the highline towers running perpendicular to the road and off into the distance like a twisting snake. The pilot of the mech must have realized this also and attempted to steer clear of the power lines. Gavin watched as the mech came closer and closer to the ground and the power lines.
The pilot was having difficulties and must have realized there was no avoiding the power lines. Suddenly a beam of crimson light shot out of each of the mech’s arms, which made Gavin flinch in surprise. The crimson beams came down on each side of the nearest highline tower, neatly slicing the power lines and sending them sparking and skipping across the ground. The beams left twin scorch marks in the earth where they had dug into to the ground. Gavin instantly thought "lasers" and watched in equal parts fascination and horror as the mech hit the metal highline tower, catching its leg and sending it tumbling to the ground out of control. The mech’s arms came up at the last second to try and shield the cockpit from the impact. With a horrible crunching noise, the mech impacted the ground and slid several feet. Unfortunately it slid right into one of the downed wires which sent dazzling sparks shooting into the sky before the wire bounced away, still sizzling and sparking. The tower had sustained some major damage and was leaning heavily but didn’t fall.
With a gasp Gavin took a breath, not realizing he had been holding it. The mech lay still and did not move. He had half expected it to blow up in a huge fireball when it hit the ground like in the movies but nothing happened. It had crashed up the road from him and about 50 feet or so out in the nearby pasture. He got back in his car and drove toward the wreck. He figured the pilot was probably dead but he had to make sure. As he drove toward the mech he tried using his cell phone to call for help but as usual he didn’t get a signal this far out in the country. Cursing, he threw the phone on the passenger seat and stopped the car on the side of the road close to the crash site. He didn’t have a first aid kit but he did grab the small fire extinguisher he kept under the seat. He also grabbed a flash light from the glove box and started walking through the tall grass toward the mech, carefully climbing over the barbed wire fence separating the pasture from the ditch. The downed power lines were still sparking but none were touching the mech anymore.
As he approached, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up as he realized the sheer size of the machine. If it was standing up it would have been at least 2 or 3 stories tall. It was painted in a reddish color and didn’t seem to have any markings except for white writing on its shoulder that he couldn’t read. It had bird like feet and two strange cylindrical protrusions sticking up from its back that curved over its shoulders. It didn't seem as badly damaged as he first thought, so it must be made of some pretty tough stuff.
As Gavin continued walking around the machine, he noticed the cockpit glass was cracked in places but intact and he hoped whoever was inside had survived. The cockpit was angular and half covered in armored shutters. The glass was tinted however, so he couldn't see into the cockpit. He didn’t see any way for the cockpit to open until he noticed a round hatch located toward the back and on top of the cockpit section. There didn’t seem to be any immediate threat of fire so he dropped the extinguisher in the grass. He climbed over the arm and up the right shoulder until he reached the hatch. It had a round wheel on it similar to an airlock hatch so Gavin turned the wheel. There was a clicking noise and he was able to pull the hatch until it flopped open revealing a dark interior.
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He turned on his flashlight and shined it into the darkness, seeing a short ladder and another hatch. The machine was lying down horizontally, with the cockpit pointed towards the ground. He had to drop down into the compartment. He got to the far end and tried turning the wheel on the second hatch but it wouldn’t budge. “It must really be some kind of airlock.” Gavin thought to himself looking at both hatches. He went back to the first hatch and strained to pull it closed again. Gavin noticed a strip of red light by the ladder came on, illuminating the interior when he closed the hatch and spun the wheel shut. His flashlight was brighter so he kept it on as he crawled to the second hatch. He tried it again and this time it turned a little bit accompanied by a loud buzzing noise.
Startled, Gavin dropped the flashlight which rattled on the metal floor. The buzzing noise stopped as suddenly as it started and he heard a hissing noise coming from a nearby grate. He grabbed the flashlight and shined it on the grate as yellow smoke started pouring out to fill the compartment. Gavin panicked as he caught a whiff of a strange ozone smell. He held his breath and quickly crawled to the other hatch and frantically tried to open it, not knowing if the gas was poisonous. The hatch wouldn’t open but luckily the gas was quickly vented out of the compartment through a second grate and the red light turned green. He cautiously took a breath and the ozone smell seemed to be gone so breathed a deep sigh of relief and returned to the second hatch. He didn’t know what the yellow gas was but he was still alive and the wheel on the second hatch finally spun freely, allowing him to open it.
“Hello, is anybody hurt?” Gavin called out through the open hatch. Getting no response, he shined the light into the cockpit and crawled in. The interior was dim, the only light coming from monitor screens. There was space to move on the left side of the cockpit with two unmoving figures in their seats, either dead or unconscious. A smaller figure was in the front seat and a larger person was in the rear seat, which was elevated above the first seat. Gavin moved to the larger figure first, careful not to touch any of the controls. It looked like pieces of equipment had come loose and bounced around the interior, littering the windshield which was now the floor. Wires, some still sparking, hung down from several places and it smelled like burnt electronics. He could not tell the gender of either pilot since they both wore baggy, grey colored pilot suits and black helmets with tinted visors.
Like the mech itself, there were no markings or insignia on either pilot that he could read or that looked familiar. Wires from their helmets connected to the controls and flexible tubing ran from the chairs to the suits. The pilots were hanging limply from their seats and the larger of the two’s neck seemed to be bent at a strange angle. Gavin carefully removed the dented helmet from the rear pilot to reveal an older man with close cropped graying hair. There was blood on his nose and mouth and his eyes were dull. Gavin already knew the answer but checked the man’s pulse anyway. He quickly pulled his hand away from the dead man’s neck. He had never touched a dead person before and the cramped cockpit was starting to feel like a coffin. He took a moment to get his nerve back and turned to check on the next pilot. He hoped the next pilot would be alive and could explain where they came from and what was going on.
He reached the smaller pilot and noticed the pilot’s helmet visor was shattered but the helmet was not dented. He carefully removed it and gasped as long blue hair spilled out revealing a girl who must have been in her late teens. She was pale and unconscious, but definitely alive. She had a white scar running down the right side of her face and across her eye but was still very pretty. His mind was reeling with questions, what was a teenage girl doing piloting a mech? Were they from the future? What were they doing here? He still couldn’t believe he was inside the cockpit of a real mech, it was all very surreal.
His thoughts were interrupted by a beeping noise coming from the girl’s controls. An orange light was flashing in sync with the beeps. Gavin peered closer at the monitor screen next to the light but didn’t understand what he was seeing. It showed a silhouette of the mech with the cylinders attached to its back flashing red. He wasn’t sure what to do, the girl wouldn’t wake up and he was afraid he might hurt her if he tried moving her. While he was mulling over his options the beeping started getting both faster and louder.
Gavin stared worriedly at the monitor thinking self destruct device or nuclear meltdown. He was about to say the heck with it and leave to get help when the mech started vibrating beneath his feet, almost making him lose his balance. He clutched the monitor screen and noticed the cylinders on the mech’s back had started to move, both of them swinging down so they were at waist level. The silhouette on the screen turned sideways and he could see the cylinders starting to extend to the front of the mech. The mech trembled even more and he could hear a screeching metal sound. The screen flashed red and yellow as the cylinders attempted to extend even further, but the ground was in the way.
The mech shook once more and seemed to raise itself off the ground several feet. This time he lost his footing and fell hard against the windshield. He had the wind knocked out of him. Struggling to rise, Gavin heard the beeps getting faster and faster and he knew he had to get out of there. In a bright light and terrible booming noise the mech disappeared with Gavin inside. All that remained were a few broken pieces of the mech and the damaged tower. They would find Gavin’s vehicle parked along the side of the road and a search would commence but no trace of him would be found. They would puzzle over the strange marks in the ground and the damage to the tower but the events would never be explained.