The clinking of crystal glasses was the only sound capable of drowning out the constant hum of anxiety pressing against his temples. Inside "Blue Memory," a small bar tucked away in an alley of the modern metropolis, the air was thick with cigarette smoke and the sweet aroma of roasted coffee.
He sat at the counter, in a corner where the light from the hanging lamp struggled to reach. His name was a detail that even he seemed to pronounce with uncertainty, as if his identity were written in sand during a storm. He was a soldier, an army sniper, trained to fire between heartbeats, to become a ghost before the target even hit the ground. But in that bar, he was just trying to feel alive.
"Another one, thanks," he murmured, sliding the empty glass toward the bartender.
Just then, the door opened with a faint chime. A girl walked in. She wasn't dressed flashily, but she carried a light that seemed out of place in the darkness of the pub. She looked around with a curious expression, as if searching for something she couldn't quite remember. Her eyes landed on him. For a second, the world around them seemed to stop. The noise of the traffic outside faded, and even the anxiety that haunted him subsided, replaced by an unknown shiver.
She sat two stools away. "Am I wrong, or does this place look like a sanctuary for people who don't want to be found?" she asked, smiling. Her voice was clear, a sound the protagonist felt the need to record in his mind, as if fearing it might vanish at any moment.
"Maybe it is," he replied, barely turning his head. "Or maybe it's for those who have already forgotten where they were supposed to go."
She laughed softly. "I'm Sophie. And you look like someone who has seen too many things through a precision scope."
He stiffened. It was an observation too sharp for a stranger. Before he could respond, a strange sensation of frost crept up his spine. It wasn't the cold from the air conditioning. It was something primal—the feeling of a predator watching you from the tall grass.
He turned his gaze toward the back of the bar. Sitting at a table in absolute shadow was a man. He wore a dark suit, perfectly pressed, and his hands were laced over the table. He wasn't drinking or eating. He was simply staring at the protagonist. His face was regular, almost handsome, but his eyes... there was no light in those eyes. They were like two black pits that absorbed every ray of hope that passed through them.
It was the Alien. But at that moment, the protagonist did not yet know what that being was. He only felt that this human figure hid an unfillable void.
The man in black gave a faint smile, a movement of the lips that didn't involve the rest of his face. It was as if he were studying a rare insect under a microscope. The protagonist felt his pulse quicken. His right hand, out of pure military instinct, moved toward his hip where he usually carried his service pistol, but there was nothing there. He was a civilian in that moment, or at least he was pretending to be.
"Are you okay?" Sophie asked, noticing his paleness.
"Yes... just a feeling," he replied, bringing his attention back to her. But when he looked again toward the table in the shadows, the man was gone. There had been no sound of a chair moving, no sound of footsteps. Quite simply, the seat was empty, as if it had never been occupied.
The protagonist felt a drop of cold sweat slide down the back of his neck. The anxiety returned, stronger than before. He felt that his orderly life between the barracks and the bar was about to be torn to shreds. Something was feeding on reality itself, and he, for some dark reason, was at the center of that feast.
"You know, Sophie," he said, a note of urgency in his voice, "there's an old legend that says the world ends every time someone forgets the love of their life. I hope you have a good memory."
She looked at him, startled, her smile turning sweeter and more melancholic. "I have a memory like steel. And you?"
He didn't answer. He looked at the reflection of his own face in the polished counter. He saw his eyes, tired and scarred by war, and for an instant, it seemed to him that his own image was fading, like an old photograph exposed too long to the sun. The Alien was out there, somewhere, and the feast had just begun.