The Prometheus Invasion

"Good evening, Dr. Manville," said Prometheus.

Lance opened his eyes. Prometheus was clothed again, and Lance was still not.

"What have you done to Dana?"

"Dr. Lindstrom is fine. Athena is taking good care of her. Congratulations on your accomplishment. You are the first humans to have survived breeding."

Breeding?

"Yes, Dr. Manville," said Prometheus. "I hope this has become more clear to you now. Tell me something — is it true you had never met Dr. Lindstrom before three days ago? That is remarkable."

"Why is that remarkable?"

"Look between your legs," said Prometheus.

Lance looked down to see that his penis had grown and was semi-erect.

"Your body is responding to Dr. Lindstrom's presence ... even though she's not within your presence," said Prometheus. "Each of you produces certain hormones as part of your reproductive drives. As part of this ... experiment, I made you sensitive to hers, and she is now sensitive to yours. I merely mention her name, and see how you react. I suspect Dr. Lindstrom is having a similar physical reaction to you right now, where she is."

"Where is the real Socrates Prometheus?"

Prometheus responded with a look of mock indignation. "What do you think I am? A body-snatcher?" Then he laughed. "I am Socrates Prometheus. I have not assumed anyone's identity. ... At least, for your purposes I am Socrates Prometheus."

"Clearly, you're not human."

"On that, you are correct," said Prometheus, bowing slightly. "My race comes from ... a planet ... many of your light-years from your Earth. Suffice to say you are unlikely to find it in your lifetime."

"What are you doing on Earth?"

"Well, there are few explanations that would make sense, are there?" said Prometheus. "I must say that this is one of the facets of these bodies that I truly enjoy. You humans question everything. You debate incessantly. It is, I must say, a mentally stimulating exercise. Our race is more ... complaisant."

Manville stared at Prometheus. Had it not been for the previous two days, the conversation would have been something created under the influence of some kind of drug.

"We are actually not dissimilar to yourselves," said Prometheus. "Our planet has similar environmental conditions to this one. Nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere. We are both carbon-based lifeforms.

"You could live on our planet ... except that you cannot. And we cannot. Our sun is dying, and with that our own planet. It won't happen immediately, but it is happening. When our sun dies, our planet will die, and most of us will die.

"But not our race. I was charged by our leaders with finding an alternative world for our people. And I have found it."

"You plan on taking over the Earth?"

"In a manner of speaking ... but not perhaps as you think. I found this planet, and this is now my home. The technology you see here came from the ship that transported me here. It was ... how do you humans put it ... a one-way trip.

"I lost contact with my home planet once my ship left our solar system. When I left, my planet was building more ships. I have waited for their signal. So far, there is none. As far as I know, I am alone here on Earth."

Prometheus leaned back. "I have had to find ... other means to propagate our species."

"You're shape-shifters. You can't just wave a magic wand and create another version of yourself?"

"We have limited shape-shifting ability. It was necessary to take a human form for obvious reasons."

"Is Athena one of your kind?"

"No, she is a human," said Prometheus. "She was part of our earlier breeding experiments. Those failed, but I decided she could be useful in ... other ways, which I believe you and Dr. Lindstrom have experienced. She has the ability to stimulate males and females of your species, which was necessary to begin the breeding process."

"So I noticed," said Lance. "You said we're 'not dissimilar' to yourself."

"Correct. And that's where you and Dr. Lindstrom come in. ... We can assume other forms. But we cannot reproduce in a form other than our own. And we ... I have discovered that we cannot reproduce in our own form on this planet. As ... interesting as your reproductive methods are, they do not succeed in reproduction in this form. We need ... surrogates ... to pass on our genetic material and allow us to reproduce.

"I injected you with our genetic material. You injected Dr. Lindstrom so she could, as you would put it, 'give birth.' And Aithousa is the result. The two of you are the first to have successfully reproduced us. You have ensured our survival on this planet."

"So how did Dana and I get to have this honor?"

Prometheus smiled. "Given what I've learned about humans, I surmised that creating a mystery would make humans seek out that mystery to solve it. I orbited your planet for several months before I chose this location for landing. Our metal makes our ships undetectable when we want them to be undetectable.

"Once my island was activated, you Americans became curious. That was my, how do you put it, 'bait.' I have been experimenting with breeding since I arrived here nearly eight of your years ago. Some of the incidents you attribute to what you call the Bermuda Triangle were my selecting participants."

Lance was stunned.

"You have what you call your 'scientific method.' That well describes what finding the right formula for reproduction required. I discovered I could not reproduce here myself, so I had to find alternate methods for reproduction. I had to find appropriate candidates, and I had to determine the correct genetic adjustments. This took considerable time."

"Yeah, when your subjects keep dying on you, that has to slow things down."

"When one's survival is at stake, one does what one must do."

"How many people have you killed?"

"Your selective application of morality is interesting. How many people did you kill to win your second world war? How many noncombatants did you kill to win that war? How many people did you kill to preserve a stalemate in your most recent conflict? ... Shall I bring up the number of your aborigines you killed when your race colonized your country? Shall I bring up those you killed because they worshiped differently from you?"

"If you think you're going to impress me with your superior morality, think again."

"I never intended for any of my participants to die."

"I doubt you cared."

"Dead animals do not reproduce. When one's survival is at stake, one does what one must do. It took time to find a successful way to reproduce through human participation.

"Now that we have successfully bred you, ultimately, we will take this planet as our own."

Manville gave Prometheus a quizzical look.

"It's a matter of mathematics and time, Dr. Manville," said Prometheus. "Humans require nine months to reproduce, and then more than a decade to reach maturity for your reproductive purposes. At most, a human woman could give birth to 15 to 20 children over the course of two or three decades. And each of those children would require upwards of 20 years to reach reproductive age.

"We've now proven that with human hosts, we can reproduce in a few of your minutes. And with our superior intellects and our shape-shifting abilities, we can infiltrate the governments of your planet ... and we will control this planet before humans can do anything about it."

Prometheus paused. "This is necessary not merely to allow us to live here. It is necessary to preserve this planet of yours. Consider your two most powerful countries, with the most powerful weapons known to your species, busily developing them in order to destroy each other. And this 10 of your years after the most destructive war in your history."

"Our earlier breeding experiments were not successful with Athena. But you and Dr. Lindstrom were successful in creating Aithousa. You are our first breeding stock. Soon, we will create our next offspring."

Lance started at Prometheus.

"This must be difficult for you to absorb," said Prometheus. "Perhaps you and Dr. Lindstrom can absorb this together."

Prometheus got up and left. Shortly afterward, Athena led Dana in.

"How do you feel?" asked Dana, sitting on Lance's bed.

"I'm ... I'm fine, I guess," said Lance. Other than the fact that I want to fuck you all the time, he thought. His penis was hard once again.

"Do you remember anything?"

"I woke up. We were in the lab. And ... I'm ... I'm not sure what happened."

"I can tell you what happened. I ... gave birth. And I think you're the father."

"Oh, God," said Lance, realizing that his jumble of bizarre erotic memories — Athena going down on both of them, some weird monster sodomizing him, him raping Dana — wasn't just a nightmare or a hallucination. His head fell forward against his knees. "I ... I'm sorry ..."

Dana shook her head and hugged Lance. "I don't know what's happening to us. Prometheus must be doing something to us."

And I want to do something to you, Dana thought to herself. Which was the exact same thing Lance was thinking to himself.

"Ever since the plane crash ... you know, I never ... made love to anyone before we got here." Dana's head was on her knees, her legs covering up her chest and her genitals. "And I swear that I can't think of anything now except ..." She turned to Lance. "You."

Lance was staring at the wall, trying to focus and to not look at her. He knew what would happen if he just looked at her.

He turned to look at her anyway. She was close enough to kiss.

They kissed. For an entire minute.

Lance pulled her into his arms. Dana swung her leg over so she straddled his hips. She held his head in her hands as she lowered herself onto his penis.

She leaned her head back. Lance kissed her throat. He took her breasts in his hands and felt them. He kissed her breasts and started sucking on her nipples.

"Oh God," she breathed as her arousal spiraled once again out of her control. She came, arching her body back, her sex tightening on his penis.

Dana's orgasm sent Lance over the edge. He came, arching back until his head and back hit the floor.

Dana lay down on top of Lance, his penis still inside her, still hard.

While lying on his chest, Dana tried to figure out what was happening to them. When he wasn't in the same room with her, her heart literally hurt. When he was next to her, she wanted him. When he was inside her ... well, that was obvious. And when they had finished, she wanted him again, and more.

I must be going insane, she thought. Or I'm in love.

She thought maybe if they could stop, she could think rationally, clinically, logically. Instead, she lifted herself only as far as to be able to go back down onto his penis. She put her hands onto his chest. She felt his hands on her hips and on her ass.

Lance had eight bleeding fingernail marks on his chest and, though he couldn't see them, another 10 on his back. He couldn't have cared less.

"I think I know what's happening," said Dana.

"I know what's happening," said Lance. I've had as much sex in the past two days as I've had in the rest of my life, he thought.

"I mean biologically." She paused. "Female animals have reproductive cycles. Males can ... try to reproduce whenever they want. Females only produce eggs every so often. Female dogs go into heat every six months. Women ovulate every four weeks.

"Female animals give off signals when they're ovulating. That's how males know that it's time to breed with them. Humans can have sex whenever they want, but they can't reproduce whenever they want — only when the woman is ovulating."

"Which means what?"

"I think my body is turning you on. Continually."

"You don't need a medical degree to figure that out."

"But you're turning me on too." Every second we're awake, she added silently. Including right now. Again. "Somehow something biological, or chemical, or maybe both is happening."

They kissed again for another minute. Lance pushed upward inside Dana.

Dana rolled back her head, the urge welling up in her again. It was as if Lance and Dana were fated to be together, loving each other, making each other climax.

Whether or not they were fated to be together, that's what happened again, Dana screaming, Lance groaning as their climaxes met each other.

Lance lay back down, covered with sweat and by Dana.

"Think of it this way," she said, out of breath. "Reproduction is one of the most basic urges of life — any kind of life. The sex drive is one of the basic human urges. Do men think about sex all the time?"

Lance gave a short laugh. "Depends."

"All of the time?"

"Well ... not all of the time. There's food and drinking too."

"The difference between humans and other animals is that we are supposed to be able to control our urges. Something changed us so our sex drive has been turned way up."

That's the understatement of the year, Lance thought to himself.

"Tell me this: When we were in Nevada, or in Florida, did you want to have sex with me?"

Lance wasn't sure how to answer that. "I'm not sure how to put this. ... Men are turned on by women. Men always look at women. ... I was attracted to you visually."

"So what stopped you from trying to have sex with me?" What's stopping you right now? she thought to herself. Can't you tell I want you?

Lance wasn't sure how to answer that either. "Well, I didn't know you. Most men don't think of life as a giant stag magazine. We didn't exactly have time for dinner and a movie either."

"Inhibitions. Social barriers."

"Well ... yeah."

"All of those inhibitions have been taken away here."

"So what did we do?"

Dana thought. "I ... we ... gave birth. I think we're surrogates ... substitutes. I think Socrates inoculated you with whatever serves as semen in his species, and you impregnated me. Or Socrates must have given you whatever it is his species needs to reproduce, and I gave birth to it. Her."

"Socrates said something about Athena's being part of earlier ... breeding attempts. And he said we were the first to survive breeding. I think that's how he put it. So we must not be the first here.

"There's another thing. Do you feel attracted to Athena?"

Lance wasn't sure what she was getting at. "Well, yes." He thought. "I'm attracted to her. I mean, she's beautiful ... but it's ... not like with you." Jesus, I sound like a love-smitten 16-year-old, he thought.

He could tell from the look in her eyes that she felt the same way about him.

"What are we going to do?" she said.

"We have to figure out how to get out of here. He's trying to propagate his own species with us to take over this planet. We can't let that happen."

"We're going to be kicked out of the Garden of Eden again," said Dana.

"I think I've figured out his computer arrangement." Lance's engineering brain had kicked in. "He's got several computers running things in that lab. They probably control the whole island."

"If I knew more about engineering, I'd probably be impressed."

"That metal isn't transparent by itself. Otherwise, all this would be transparent. He's got some kind of ... I don't know, projection machine or something to make this all invisible. And it has to be solar-powered. That would explain how it doesn't show up during the day, but it does at night. Probably when he doesn't have other power running."

Dana couldn't resist anymore. She tightened her legs around Lance's, which tightened her vagina's grip on his penis.

They resumed kissing, their tongues meeting while he thrusted inside her. It took them only a few minutes to climax again.

"You have to promise something," said Dana after she caught her breath. "You have to take me with you when you figure out how to escape."

Lance stroked the side of her face. "We're either going together, or we're not going. I'm not leaving you here. I'm not leaving you."

"Excellent," said Prometheus, walking into Lance's room. "Your attraction for each other is more than physical. You are now emotionally mated too."

Prometheus noted the look on his prisoners' faces. "Come now, doctors. You must admit you have never had sexual pleasure the likes of which you have had on this island. You think of nothing but each other."

Suddenly, from beyond the walls could be heard an otherworldly scream. That was followed by a human scream.