Chapter 4

The Rescue

Outside an eerie silence surrounded them, broken up by distant roars of monsters, gunshots, and the occasional scream.

Ian watched from the doorway as Uncle Ben crept out the front door, through the yard, and down the driveway, slipping behind Dad's Toyota for concealment. Uncle Ben wiped the sweat from his forehead and waved for the rest to join him.

Ian saw a couple flapys, giant flying creatures that looked like pterodactyls, soaring in the distance. “This flapy is soaring on rising air-currents, not hurting anyone.” According to Uncle Ben, they'd swoop down on you when you least expected it. That was how he'd lost his backpack.

In the house across the street, an old black man watched them from behind a broken window. Ian didn't know his neighbors, but was pretty sure he'd never seen this man before.

“It's not fair,” Gabe complained. “BG gave Stacy a loan, gave jet pack kid a loan, but it won't even talk to me.”

“Jet pack kid?” Ian asked.

“Some kid I spotted flying around with a jet pack. A flying alien took the kid out. It gave that kid a loan, but me? No.”

Uncle Ben put his finger on his lips and made a shushing noise, then he pointed at what looked like a fat horse-sized creature with a gray armadillo-like shell. Its screen popped up. “This is a prickly. Pricklys like to eat human children. You should kill this prickly for human honor.” The prickly was eating some grass from a crack in the sidewalk about twenty feet away.

“It's slow, but if you get close to it, it shoots spikes from its body,” Uncle Ben whispered, “and it's armored. I shot one three days ago when I was on the way here. There was an explosion of spikes everywhere. I was behind a wall or it would have killed me. The prickly I shot wandered off as if nothing happened. I say we wait for it to leave.”

Three shots rang out, echoing through the empty street. With a cry, the prickly fell on its side, died, and vanished.

Ian saw the air ripple as Stacy's plushie pelts blended with her surroundings. She raced back to rejoin them.

“I would have said that was a terrible idea, but I guess it worked,” Uncle Ben whispered.

“I shot it in the mouth, killed it instantly,” she said. “Let's go.”

“We're talking about this later,” Dad said.

“Look, Gabe.” Ian whispered, “BG has a one-track mind. If you showed it you could kill a bunch of aliens tomorrow, it would lend you credits, but when you say you might kill a bunch of aliens two years from now, you're out of luck.” They crept along, watching for Uncle Ben's signal.

Kid Barbie fired her pistols twice, taking out two reptilian alien plushies sunning themselves in a nearby yard. Uncle Ben looked around, then gave a thumbs-up signal. They moved forward again.

“It's still not fair,” Gabe whined. “If I could master a few decent spells, I'd kill way more aliens than Kid Barbie here.”

At the Crabtrees's residence, it was obvious something was wrong. The doors were closed, but the right side of the house was severely damaged. Pieces of window and drywall were scattered around what had been a well-maintained lawn. Ian got a second impression, fear, stronger this time. From the damaged corner of the house, they heard a faint cry for help.

“She's hiding in her closet with her granddaughter. We don't have much time!” said Ian.

Dad and Kid Barbie moved cautiously to the right side of the house. Gabe followed Ian and Uncle Ben.

Uncle Ben tried the front door. Finding it locked, he reared back and kicked.

The front door didn't budge. Uncle Ben cursed quietly and favored his right foot.

Ian found a key underneath one of the potted plants. He unlocked the deadbolt and pulled the door open. Uncle Ben limped inside. Ian heard shrieks of alien plushies before they attacked, then two shots from a sawed-off shotgun. Then...

“All clear,” from Uncle Ben.

From another room, they heard a second muffled, “Help,”.

Ian entered quickly, eyes getting used to the dim light. The two plushies might be dead, but at least one giant cockroach (crunchy) was not. It made a clacking noise as it advanced on him from the corner of the room. It was over three feet long and close to a foot wide.

Ian desperately swung at it with his bat. He missed. The crunchy charged. Ian cried out and flung himself backward, hitting a lamp-stand, knocking it over. The large lamp sitting on top of the lamp-stand somehow landed on the cockroach thing, killing it.

His screen popped up. It was now filled with tentacled smiley faces, and what looked like fireworks going off, and the words “You have killed your first alien!” He could swear he heard the tune of The Star-Spangled Banner coming from BG.

“Cut it out!” Ian shouted.

“Come on Ian, get it together!” his father snapped, yanking him to his feet. He motioned towards something Ian hadn't noticed before. A thick grayish-green ooze, coming from the damaged corner of the house, moving in their direction. It made the oddest noise. A high pitched grinding that reminded him of a dentist's drill. He realized the sound was from the alien ooze eating everything in its path, including the tile floor.

A screen appeared over the ooze. “This is a cuddle. This cuddle entered your world illegally. It does not pay taxes, or do anything to contribute to your human way of life.”

Ian noticed the screen did not say how to kill it.

“Ideas?” Uncle Ben asked, backing away.

“If it has a non-centralized nervous system, it won't do any good to shoot it,” said Gabe, helpful for once.

Dad pulled a thin wooden stick from his backpack and lit it. He poked the cuddle with it. The cuddle hissed and backed away. Dad pulled out a bottle of what smelled like gasoline and poured some on the cuddle, then he used the burning stick to ignite the liquid. The cuddle let out a sound between a hiss and a scream, emitting a foul smell as it folded into itself, retreating. Dad followed it, pouring more gas on the fire. Gabe raised his hand and seemed to concentrate. The blaze doubled in size, burning faster.

They followed the cuddle as it retreated into the next room. It was the room with the broken wall and window. There were blast marks on the walls, and two human-shaped lumps underneath the cuddle. One was adult-sized, the other the size of a small child.

Dad emptied the bottle, pouring it onto the thing. He capped the bottle, put it back in his pack, then pulled out a second bottle and emptied it onto the cuddle, stepping away from the heat the fire produced. The cuddle retreated out the broken window, turning into a sick dark lump on the lawn before vanishing.

When Ian saw what the cuddle had been covering, he shuddered and gagged. Two half-eaten skeletons. One adult, one child.

There wasn't much left of the closet the two survivors were hiding in. It had eaten through the door. It was clear Ellen had kept herself and her granddaughter alive by using monster tape and clothes to reinforce the closet door. It was this cloth barrier that the cuddle had almost made it through before they arrived. They heard a tearing sound as an exhausted old woman and a girl of about nine pulled down the barrier from the inside.

“About time you guys showed up,” the woman said. She staggered out of the closet. Her left hand was wrapped in rags and monster tape.

“Let's get you guys somewhere safe...-er,” said Dad. “And I hate to ask, but we're almost out of food and propane.”

“Storage room, camp supplies, help yourselves,” she said. “What's going on out there?”

“It's not good,” Dad said. “We've been holed up at our place until Ian heard you calling for help.”

When Ben came back with a box of camp supplies and some blankets, Ellen used two of the blankets to wrap the two skeletons the best she could, and laid them out, side by side.

“My two boys. We'll be back to give them a proper funeral. Danny must have told that thing he wanted to be one of those TV cartoon characters. He came back with grenades.”

“Mutant Bob? I used to love that show,” Stacy said. “He'd throw grenades at all the bad guys.”

“Cartoon characters blow themselves up, and come right back,” Ellen responded. “Humans are not so lucky.”

Gabe who'd been quietly walking around the room snorted. “BG gave a six-year-old grenades to blow himself up with, but I'm a poor candidate for a loan?”

Ian felt waves of anger coming off the older woman and stepped back. She walked up to Gabe and smacked him with her good hand, hard.

“I realize you just saved our lives, but you do not disrespect a six-year-old boy who died protecting his family. Boy did the best he could... If that creature didn't give you something, count your blessings.” There was no place to sit down, but Ellen kind of slumped over. “I could really use some water. I'm Ellen, and this is Sabrina, my granddaughter.” The girl stared at them from behind her grandmother, silent.

“That hand doesn't look so good,” Ben said, handing her a water bottle. Ian noticed Ellen's makeshift bandage was turning red.

“Got some of that cuddle thing on me. Ate my hand to the bone before I could get it off.”

“Got something to help if you're interested. I bought one for Carl's ex-wife, but she lives over fifty miles away, and the way things are now, she...” Uncle Ben pulled out a syringe of the same green liquid he'd given the rest.

“I'll take what I can get,” she said. He jabbed her arm with the syringe. Ian knew from experience it hurt. She didn't even flinch.

“We need to go before something else shows up,” Dad said. He stuffed useful supplies into his pack and gave Gabe and Ian heavy bags to carry.

Soon they were outside again, on their way back.