Chapter 22

4 Years Three Months Post Alien Apocalypse, or 0004 P.A.A.

Disguise

Ian's Stat Sheet

Name: Lord Ian Mind Master

Age: 18

Physical Attributes: 3.2

With 10 being an Olympic athlete and 1 being an invalid in a wheelchair, you are 3.2.

Mental Attributes: 7.9

With 10 being a super genius, and 1 being severely retarded, you are 7.9

Status among peers: Low

If your peers hadn't been eaten, they would still consider you a nerd and a spasticle.

Spasticle is human slang for an uncoordinated clumsy person.

Some irrational and misguided humans consider you dangerous because you killed people, and assisted in killing thousands of mildly dangerous aliens. I assure them any normal human could do the same or better.

Claims to fame:

If Coach Benson hadn't been eaten, he would still consider you the worst player to try out in the fifty years he coached his little league baseball team.

Four women believe they are pregnant with your child. If these unborn children were in fact yours, this would be a mark in your favor, but since they are not, it means you are a bigger loser than you were before. I had not thought this possible!

Special abilities:

Psychic. Advanced Level 3 specializing in aliens.

Any other Advanced Level 3 psychic specializing in aliens would be doing far better than you.

Oh, and a certain young princess (princess by election, not by birth) has lost all interest in you. She is with a young man who, unlike you, is a fine physical specimen, and not a loser. I have complimented her on her good taste.

***

Ian sighed. Great.

He and Crazy Steve had spent the previous day driving in a large circle around the town of Little, careful to avoid any electronic surveillance so they could hopefully enter the town from the opposite side undetected.

“This is where we are,” Ian said the next morning, using his finger to identify their location on his digital map. “This is Little,” he pointed to a dot on the map about ten miles away. “Many big scary monsters are approaching Little from every direction. I was thinking of following the monsters into town, but I have no idea what they're planning to do. All I know is they have me scared. If I can't defend this town, I don't think there'll be much of a town left when this is over. But thanks to Captain Bradley being an asshole, we're going to need disguises to sneak inside.”

“I know all about disguises, Ian. Did I mention I used to work for the CIA?” Crazy Steve asked.

“A few times,” Ian said.

“I don't think I could pull off being a girl, Steve,” Ian said half an hour later, while covering his beat-up old red Jeep with tree branches. “I'm thinking we can go as a couple of scavengers. They're common enough, nobody notices them."

“Wait!” Crazy Steve said. “What about our displays?”

“Good point,” Ian said. He could disguise his face and body, but there was no known way to cover up BG's display. Every human had one, revealing their name and occupation. The display would pop up in the mind of anyone requesting to see it. Ian's display said Lord Ian Mind Master. His companion's, for some reason, said Awesome Steve, Alien Killing Machine.

“Fortunately, I'm pretty sure there's no way to pull up displays through a camera or telescope. I can cast a psychic illusion that will cause anyone nearby pulling up our displays, to see Jeb, Stupid Scavenger, and Earl, Stupid Scavenger's Assistant.”

“That is impressive,” Crazy Steve said, pulling out a disguise kit. “But if we get recognized, they're going to kill you, and probably me, so hat and sunglasses are not going to cut it. You can't dress like Ian, walk like Ian, talk like Ian, move like Ian, and definitely not look like Ian.”

“You pack a disguise kit?” Ian asked.

“Knowing you, I figured we'd need it,” Crazy Steve replied.

To Ian's surprise, the old man knew what he was doing. Soon Ian's hair was gray, his face looked wrinkled and aged, his nose plugged up, and something stuck to the roof of his mouth, to give him a speech impediment. He was dressed in some of Crazy Steve's old clothes, wore some of the man's cast-off armor, and an old pair of boots that were too large for his feet. Crazy Steve gave himself an enlarged nose, and a noticeable birthmark on his right cheek.

Ian studied himself with a handheld mirror. He had to admit; he looked like one of those old scavengers he'd seen, just another old man, trying to get by in a post-apocalypse world.

“Put this rock in your right boot,” Crazy Steve said, “That will change how you walk.”

“That's going to hurt,” Ian said.

“That's the idea. It'll give you a limp. Now one last thing. If you want to pass yourself off as a scavenger, you need to do some scavenging. I used to be a scavenger before we hooked up. Come on.”

Crazy Steve led him down a path to a group of abandoned houses. Thanks to the rock in his right boot, Ian was soon limping.

“Now these houses were picked clean a long time ago, but they should give you a feel for the scavenging life. Your pry-bar is your friend: it can open doors and windows, test walls and floors for hiding spaces, and kill low level aliens. Scavengers don't waste ammo. Save your gun for emergencies, and if we meet anyone, let me do the talking. You're Earl, my cousin, who I'm showing the ropes.”

“Okay,” Ian said. Thanks to the alterations to his nose and mouth, it came out as “Ogay.”

It was a strange feeling entering an abandoned house. His heavy iron crowbar felt comforting. They killed the few aliens they found there with their crowbars. That is, Crazy Steve did most of the killing. Even after four years' practice, Ian sucked at club-wielding.

The house had been picked clean, torn-up books and broken furniture littered the floor. Ian found a picture of a family and wondered what happened to them. In one bedroom, Ian saw something that made him laugh. Next to an open safe were scattered hundred-dollar bills whoever cleaned out this place had left behind.

“Used to be you could hold on to those and exchange them to BG for a credit or two,” Crazy Steve said when he saw the money. “But BG quit doing that over three years ago.”

Crazy Steve went to check out the backyard and let out a cry of joy. “I was hoping we'd find one of these!”

Ian went out to look. He found the old man examining a beat-up wooden cart. “I figure scavengers ditched this for something better... or they got eaten.” Crazy Steve tried to pull it. The cart rolled a couple of feet, letting out a horrible squeak. “Still works. No scavenger can afford a motor vehicle, so we'll use this to carry our stuff.”

***

“Scavenging sucks,” Ian said, but it came out as “Thavenge thucth.” He limped along pulling the crappy old cart, now loaded with weapons they'd disguised as junk, and a bit of food, water, and a few other things they thought might be useful, like toothbrushes, toilet paper, and of course a roll of Monster Tape. He wished he'd gone along with Crazy Steve's first suggestion, that he go as the man's ugly granddaughter. His right foot hurt, his armor chafed him in strange places, and the afternoon sun was hot.

A couple of motor vehicles drove by the two of them, going through the gated checkpoint. But Ian and Crazy Steve had to stand at the end of a line of people on foot.

A drone passed overhead. Ian was careful to keep his head down, no point in taking chances.

“Haven't seen you guys before,” said a one-armed old man with a large pack.

“Name's Jeb. From Texas originally. Came down to Poltrey, looking for work. That's when the aliens invaded,” Crazy Steve said, speaking with a Texas accent. “Heard a guy here called The Mechanic pays well for good weapons.”

“For good weapons, yeah,” the one-armed man said, looking dubiously at the junk in their cart. “I used to live in Poltrey. Do you know Nicolas Morales?”

Crazy Steve was about to shake his head, but Ian read the man's mind and nodded quickly, “Yeh, Mista. Tiny! Nithe guy.”

“This is Earl, my cousin,” Crazy Steve said, introducing Ian.

The next half hour in line was nerve-wracking, but between Ian's mind-reading and Crazy Steve's disguises, their cover held.

“You want to know where the real money is?” asked a skinny guy in a wheelchair. “Drugs. There's this alchemist kid Pete, who worked in a meth lab before the invasion. Pete figured aliens or no aliens, people are going to need drugs, right? So he had BG make him an alchemist. He invented this stuff he calls Formula B. Galactic Market don't sell it, and just a little will take you to outer-space!”

“If they catch you with that stuff around here, they'll kill you,” said the one-armed man. “Apparently, just because aliens invaded, Captain Bradley gets to suspend our Constitutional rights. Total bullshit.” There were general sounds of agreement.

The skinny guy in a wheelchair pulled out some blue pendants with swirls going through them. “I'm selling these lucky pendants. Thanks to these lucky pendants, I only lost my legs in the last alien attack. They disrupt BG's brainwaves, screws up her monster aim.”

“Wow!” Crazy Steve said, “how much are you asking?”

Ian forced himself to keep quiet as the two started haggling, but made a mental note to look up Pete the alchemist. Maybe Pete and Gabe could exchange notes.

“You guys heard Ian Anderson tried to sneak into town yesterday?” the one-armed man asked.

There was silence.

“Dumbass. Heard he knocked up twenty women last week, lucky bastard,” someone else said.

“Hey!” the skinny guy in the wheelchair, “Ian Anderson is a fucking hero. He shows up, monsters leave, and the story I heard is, BG made him do that. She wants him to repopulate the human race or something.”

All the men looked at each other, and for a second there was silence.

“Sure. Story I heard was Captain Bradley and his men came to an agreement,” the one-armed man said. “After they execute him, they're going to string him up so his right hand is over his head. That way everyone who wants to, can high-five his dead body for luck.”

There was some laughter.

Ian sighed. Great.

***

“Names, and business,” a bored looking guard said, when they'd finally gotten to the end of the line.

“Jeb, and Earl Gracy,” Crazy Steve said. “We heard The Mechanic pays good money for good weapons.”

The guard looked at the junk in their cart. “Yeah, but The Mechanic is a busy young man. Why don't you guys check out our soup kitchen. Two blocks down, on your left, get yourselves something to eat. Plenty of work around here, if you're willing to work hard and stay out of trouble. Stay on the roads and paths. Anywhere else and you risk alien traps. Next!”

And they were in the town of Little, Captain Bradley's territory.

Ian felt a psychic probe. A fellow psychic was sniffing around. He was sure whoever it was hadn't noticed him. Ian had yet to meet anyone who even came close to his abilities.

Because of Captain Bradley's hostility towards psychics, any psychic nearby would have to keep their abilities a secret, and Ian wouldn't give them away without a good reason.

The road they were on led to a makeshift central fort surrounded by walls made from whatever the townspeople could get their hands on. It looked like a smaller version of the Fortress, with guard towers everywhere bristling with guns.

This whole area felt relaxed. There hadn't been any significant monster sightings in over a month. All the guards were bored, and people were wondering if the worst of the alien apocalypse was over. Ian laughed to himself. Keep dreaming.

To Ian's left were farms, and the smell of animals and manure. To his right was rocky desert, where, at the edge of the barbed wire fencing surrounding the town, he saw a cluster of three pickup trucks next to a larger cargo truck that was backed into a narrow canyon.

Ian sensed they were a group of bored bibi wranglers. He wasn't sure what they wanted with bibis, Bibis were low-level aliens that tended to travel in packs. A group of them could cut a human to shreds in seconds.

He pulled out his binoculars.

One wrangler was bouncing rocks off the helmet of a much smaller wrangler. The smaller wrangler, covered head to toe in armor, let out a howl that even at this distance reminded Ian of fingernails on a chalkboard. She picked up the back of the pickup truck, tossed it to the side, and rushed the first wrangler. The smaller wrangler was Captain Bradley's youngest granddaughter, Tomitha.

Crazy Steve noticed her too. “Isn't she great? We could really use her help out there.”

“Noa,” Ian shuddered, shaking his head. Without armor, Tomitha looked like a cross between a hairless dwarf and a pug bulldog. He wouldn't hold her looks against her if she was at all nice, but she was also one of the dumbest, most annoying brats he'd ever had the misfortune to meet. Last time they'd been here, she'd picked up his Jeep and threw it into a ditch. Her grandfather, to his credit, had made her bring the Jeep back and paid for repairs. But the incident still left a bad taste in his mouth.

Ashley, the middle granddaughter, age 14, was also with the bibi wranglers, suggesting nobody believed they were in any danger. Ian sensed laughter from the wranglers. They were just kids having fun. Out of curiosity, he mentally searched for the oldest granddaughter. Teresa, age 16, was back at the fort, learning to play the piano.

The whole area gave off a calm, relaxed feeling. So why did Ian get a strong feeling he wasn't the only one watching the bibi wranglers, and something very bad was about to go down?

A broken-down house on Ian's left had a sign in the yard. Home of the Giant Monster Sausage! Made on Earth. No alien ingredients.

An old woman sat at a counter in front of the house, arguing with a customer. “But your sausage glows in the dark!” the customer shouted.

“Of course it glows in the dark,” the old lady snapped. “That's how you know it's good.”

Near the makeshift fort was a large sign that said Training Pits. People around the pits cheered.

Not feeling hungry, Ian left Crazy Steve with the guy in the wheelchair and joined the crowd around the pits to see what was going on.

What he saw was a circular dirt pit, about thirty feet wide and ten feet deep, covered with heavy iron grating. Inside was a boy around ten years old with a large knife.

On the other side of the pit was a large steel trailer rocking back and forth, with bulges on its sides made by whatever was inside. A couple of men raised the door to the trailer just enough for an alien bibi to slide out and down into the pit.

The five-foot-tall, cylindrical, alien bibi had two legs on the opposite ends of its body, and it moved like a demonically possessed slinky. It pulled itself upright, beeped angrily, and bounced toward the kid.

At the last instant, the boy dodged a razor-sharp heel spur, and slashed it with his knife. The bibi bounced off the dirt wall and attacked again.

“It's not what you think,” said a middle-aged woman standing next to him. “You think we're exploiting children, but it's the opposite. Children get way more credits and stat points fighting aliens than adults would, and this way we can help him out if things get dangerous.”

She bent over the pit and banged the iron grating with a stick. “Go, Alex! You can do it!”

Alex dodged the bibi again; then he moved in and stabbed one of the bibi's five central eyes, driving his knife in up to the hilt. With one last plaintive beep, the alien died and vanished. The audience cheered.

The boy climbed a ladder on the side of the pit, and a section of heavy grating was pulled away so he could get out. Another child dropped into the pit, taking his place.

“How mady kidth ged killd don dere?” Ian asked.

“If kids can't handle the pit, how long do you think they'll survive out there?” the woman asked, pointing at the desert. “At least in the pits my kid can learn to fight, earn credits and stat points in a controlled environment. If he does well enough, he'll get apprenticed to the military.”

“I met a little five-year-old girl who made a thousand credits, and five stat points for clearing out an alien-cockroach crunchy nest,” a second woman said. “A crunchy nest! Can you believe it? Of course they almost killed her, but that's how things are now.”

“Say what you like about Captain Bradley, but he likes kids, Earl,” Crazy Steve said, joining Ian. “I heard he used to toss his own granddaughters into the pits, to teach them to survive!”

“Whad a guy,” Ian said.

Crazy Steve held up two blue swirly pendants and handed one to Ian. “I got Ted down to ten credits apiece for these good luck charms. Figure we need all the luck we can get.”

“Graid,” Ian said.

Machine guns fired in the distance. The siren started blaring. There were screams. Ian sensed aliens and humans in the distance, fighting and dying.

People nearby looked around, trying to figure out what was going on. Others rushed for the fort entrance.

Ian got a sick feeling in his stomach as he sensed the monsters beginning their attack. This time around, Kitykity would be the least of his problems.

Ian spat out the thing in his mouth and removed his nose plugs. He pulled Crazy Steve to the side. “It's starting.”