TERRA FIRMA LINEUP: BUTTING HEADS

 Mike Hodge, FBI; Dr. Berryann Priss MI6

He was the rising star.

She was the veteran.

He represented the future.

She carried the burden of the past.

Agent Mike Hodge of the FBI's International Team and Dr. Berryann Priss of MI6 could agree on only one thing.

Earth had an enemy.

Everything else...

was an argument.

Mike Hodge had earned his reputation the hard way. Brilliant, disciplined, and relentlessly analytical, he had helped expose a devastating breach within the multinational task force struggling to contain an enemy most governments didn't even know existed. To the FBI, he represented the future—proof that intellect, nerve, decisive action, and American resources could solve problems that had baffled others for years.

To Hodge, hesitation was often the greatest danger.

Dr. Berryann Priss possessed a different kind of brilliance.

She had spent years staring into a darkness few people could even imagine.

She had survived it.

She had studied it.

She had lived with its consequences.

The secrets she carried would have shattered many of the strongest minds on Earth. She understood that the struggle facing humanity was older, deeper, and infinitely more terrifying than Hodge yet realized.

He possessed a river of knowledge.

She carried an ocean.

Their disagreements were inevitable.

Hodge believed the British had an unfortunate tendency to mistake caution for wisdom.

Priss believed Mike Hodge represented a peculiarly American weakness.

Brilliance coupled with the absolute conviction that brilliance alone was enough.

To her, he was another gifted young American convinced that intelligence, confidence, and overwhelming resources could solve problems that had humbled civilizations.

She had met his type before.

Brilliant.

Fearless.

Arrogant.

Dangerously incomplete.

The cousins, as she privately thought of them, were energetic, resourceful, and endlessly optimistic.

They also had an irritating habit of believing every problem could be solved by moving faster, spending more money, and applying greater force.

Hodge, for his part, found the British equally exasperating.

If there was a crisis, he wanted action.

The British, he sometimes suspected, preferred another briefing.

Another memorandum.

Another cup of tea.

Then perhaps...

they might save the world.

The sparks flew.

Frequently.

Then things became even worse.

Priss met Gunz and Lucky.

Two undercover deputy sheriffs who joked with one another, spoke a language all their own, played in a band, and seemed entirely too carefree for people charged with confronting humanity's greatest nightmare.

To Priss, they looked hopelessly young.

Hopelessly informal.

Hopelessly silly.

One minute they were teasing each other.

The next they were talking about music.

Then came another ridiculous expression only they seemed to understand.

This...

was supposed to help save the world?

She wasn't impressed.

Not in the slightest.

In fact, she privately wondered whether Sergeant Estella Vasquez had completely lost her mind.

There would be time later to discover just how spectacularly wrong she had been.

Then came Halloween weekend.

Pasadena.

Edgemont Place Hotel.

And both Hodge and Priss discovered there was still another layer to the nightmare.

A horror beneath the horror.

The truths waiting there would shake even Mike Hodge's confidence, forcing him to confront a reality no amount of FBI training could have prepared him for.

At the same time, Dr. Berryann Priss would discover that even her vast knowledge had left one terrible question unanswered.

Neither could save Earth alone.

Fortunately...

they wouldn't have to.

Because somewhere inside that luxury hotel, two undercover deputy sheriffs named Gunz and Lucky were about to stumble into the greatest mystery in human history.

The clock had already started.

Seventy-two hours remained.

More from the Terra Firma Lineup: She Came as a Melody | La Jetée

I'd love to hear your thoughts, so speak your mind. Leave me a comment or feel free to hit me up at: fromandromedaandback@gmail.com. And thank you!