Gary shook his head and scowled at the back of his truck as the suits and goons of the federal government tucked tail and ran.

It was all they ever did, really: cover their own asses and leave the little guy to deal with the mess. Although Gary supposed he wasn’t exactly the little guy anymore. He wasn’t just some ignorant punk PFC in the middle of the jungle with a shitty rifle.

Gary checked on the status of his boys in the building below. There were six of them, each on a different floor. Their primary job was finding the aliens, but they were also programmed to direct any people to stairwells and act as guards while escorting them down and out. His camera feed showed him a lot of very panicked people, mostly from being confronted with a hulking robot, but no aliens as of yet.

Another two robots stayed at his side and guarded him. He doubted their viability in a straight up fight with an alien, let alone five, but they could cover him until he got away. Assuming his truck got back quickly.

Gary grumbled under his breath. When his AI had told him aliens would be invading within a year and he’d confirmed he wasn’t suffering early onset dementia or anything, he had gotten to work. He had taken samples of various powerful metals from the RAC store and experimented with them until he had found the best he could with his funds and skill level. Then he had set about setting up a nice little workshop for himself.

It felt odd to start thinking of any place as his after years of living in his truck. The treatments for his wife and her funeral had bankrupted him, and not too many folks wanted to hire an old man these days. But the plot of land he had picked out in the country wasn’t going to be a home. He might set up a cot in the corner, but his plans called for a lot of conveyor belts, lifting machines, and replicators.

The Chinese had just bought their factory parts apparently. Far faster and cheaper, but the end result wasn’t worth much of a damn.

He had wanted his own bespoke assembly line. He’d slapped a few construction droids together and set them to work far outside Chicago. It was some plot of land several hundred acres large up for sale in the middle of nowhere. Gary hadn’t asked, he had just excavated a huge hole for his factory in the night and then covered it back up once he had a basic frame in place. Nobody was the wiser.

He had been told he had a year, and figured he’d have everything ready to go in two weeks or less, and maybe his first battalion of battle droids a week after that.

But the aliens had come early, and Gary had spent most all of his RAC on materials for the factory and bots it would produce. So he’d been forced to make due: scrap metal from yards, salvaged weapons, and whatever else he could get his hands on. The pangolin’s metallic scales were a boon: Gary had held one in his hand and his metallurgist skill told him it was on par with his fancy alloys and materials from the RAC store. Maybe better. Plus they grew back. The overlapping and flexible nature of the metallic scales helped a lot too. Anya’s armor wasn’t great by comparison, but he could synthesize it from common Earth metals easily if he needed.

The Chinese bots had been mostly trash. Shiny and fancy, and lethal against conventional troops, but next to useless against hosts and likely aliens as they were. He’d folded their materials and combined them with a few of Pan’s scales on the long flight back and managed to do a little better.

Still, he wished he had his own place up and running. He’d sped up the droids back in Chicago as much as he could, and managed to send a few more scrap-bots to help, but it was still going to be another week or two.

And the aliens had proved they were not accommodating to any schedule but their own.

“Think she’ll be okay on her own?” Samaira asked and pulled Gary back to the chilly rooftop.

“Probably better off than we would be,” he replied. He took out a small, handheld buzzsaw from a pouch at his belt and began working on one of the guarding robots. “I’m almost done here. You should head down.”

“All right. I’m going to go find the doctor and make sure he’s okay.”

“Watch your back. There’s at least one alien real close,” Gary said. “As soon as my truck gets back I’ll send in the cavalry. Just don’t get yourself killed.”

“Will do!” Samaira said and ran back down into the building with Chandrali at her side.

“I’m sorry I can’t fight,” Pan said once Samaira had left.

“Nothing to be sorry about little guy,” Gary replied as he installed a powerful forcefield of his own design into one of the two robots standing guard. It looked a bit like an overgrown, rotund beetle. In the face of higher quality metals, forcefields had proved to be a decent defensive option. Gary patted the beetle on the side and it hummed with new energy.

“You head down to the second or third floor. Look for strong heat signatures and protect whoever is making them,” Gary said. The robo-beetle beeped at Gary, it’s simple programming able to understand just enough to follow basic orders. Go there, guard here, protect them, attack this. Good enough for now.

Gary turned back to Pan and patted the shy creature on his armored shoulder.

“If you can’t fight, better to stay out of the way,” Gary said. “No shame in knowing your limits.”

The draft for Vietnam hadn’t much cared who wanted to fight and who didn’t or couldn’t. It threw thousands of dumb, scared kids into the jungle and sent their guts home in boxes.

I’m scared, Hendricks, Gary heard the voice echoing at him from decades ago, from back then. It had been such a stupid war.

“I don’t want you or Anya or Samaira to get hurt though,” Pan said, and Gary happily left the memory in the past where it belonged.

“Just because you don’t fight doesn’t mean you can’t help,” Gary said. There was a boom several floors below them. Gary saw the familiar blue light of Samaira’s magic emitting from over the side of the building.

“Shit, seems like things have gotten started. They really don’t give a damn about anybody else’s timetable, do they?” Gary asked. That was when Pan’s menu system beeped and expanded in front of him. Anya appeared in a communication window, her eyes glowing and her skin radiating a faint orange light.

“Hello?” Pan answered. “Anya? It’s scary up here.”

As if to punctuate the pangolin’s point, the building shook from below and Gary heard Chandrali the tiger roaring. An update appeared on the HUD in Gary’s glasses and he saw his centaur-bot had joined the fight with Samaira and the doctor.

“I know it is, but I need your help. Can you get down here quickly?” Anya asked.

Gary smirked as Pan’s eyes brightened and he said, “I can help! I can help without fighting! Gary said so!”

“That’s great, Pan. No fighting needed, just protecting. And I’m close to the ground so you should be able to get at some good Earth. I just want you to move some people from inside to outside. If there’s a scary alien, you tell me and I’ll fight it, okay?”

“Okay! I can do that,” Pan said. “Gary? I’m gonna go help Anya!”

“Good luck little guy!” Gary said.

“I’m on the second floor. Use Bee-Eff to find me. Hurry!” Anya said to Pan before her window closed. Pan gave Gary a quick wave and then tucked into a ball and rolled away. Gary turned to his two guardian beetle-bots.

“You, move the doc’s chrome egg somewhere safe and then come back and get Anya’s stealth car. And you, stay here and guard me while I make sure I’m all set,” Gary said. The beetle-bots beeped at Gary and then the first one hurried away while the second loomed at Gary’s back.

Gary climbed into his truck. It still looked like the same beat-up old F-150 he’d had for years, but it had plenty of surprises under the hood. It was the one piece of equipment that had gotten a full RAC store upgrade that wasn’t currently at his construction project outside Chicago. It hadn’t been ready that night on the beach. He’d been hesitant to use it at the fight in the mall because they’d been in the center of the city and there had only been the one alien. Using it in China would have been overkill and might have only pissed off the other hosts.

New York was even more densely populated than back home, but with five of the extraterrestrial bastards, he didn’t have much choice. The government could send him a bill later. His robots patrolling the building had confirmed that the upper floors were free of any living humans, save for Samaira and the doc.

Gary buckled in and started the ignition. The flight from China, diverting power from the fuel cells to work on his robots during the flight, and his last-minute adjustments to make it go faster without optimizing the engines had drained most of the truck’s juice.

“Shit,” Gary said. It would take a few minutes to recharge enough to a decent level. Normally that would be nothing but now…

He just hoped the others could stay alive long enough.

Dig. Eat. Dig. Eat. Sleep. Dig. Eat. Danger! Curl! Curl! Stay. Stay. Safe! Dig. Eat. Sleep. Dig. Dig. Eat. Dig. Sleep.

Simple things. Simple ideas that Pan’s body told him since forever.

Forever.

Pan knew the word now, but still had difficulty putting it into think pictures. Words were nice. Words let him talk to Anya (Tall Friend), Gary (Old Friend), and Samaira (Sparkle Friend), and all those new friends in Chhhhiiiiiii-nnnaaaaaa.

China.

Pan liked words. Sometimes they were confusing, but they were more useful than just think pictures.

Visualiiiizzziiing.

Visualizing.

Think pictures were nice, and his mind defaulted to them for more simple concepts, but for all the new and wonderful things he had encountered since yesterday, words were best.

Words, words, words.

So many things to say, so many to think about.

Visualize.

Pan visualized “forever” as the sun going up and down, up and down, up and down, and so on until he got tired of thinking of it. Forever was enough time to make the sun get tired and go to sleep. That was a long time!

His think pictures used to be very simple. Ants for eating. Dirt for digging. Curling for danger. Dark for sleeping. Easy easy.

But now there was more out there than just dirt and ants!

What a world!

There were friends, and going to new places, and weird not-ant foods, and clothes! Pan had decided to wear pants because Anya wore pants.

And they sounded like his name plus ants.

Paaaaaaan.

Paaaaannnntttss.

Aaaants.

Pants.

Good word.

Nice nice.

But the bad guys, aliens Anya called them, they were too scary for him. Pan had distant memories of something big and scary and sharp trying to push at him, trying to push sharp things past his scales. But he curled, and he stayed curled, and then he was safe.

But these aliens, they didn’t care if you curled or not, even if you curled forever. That was a long time!

“Bee-Eff!” Pan said and his bright friend appeared beside him.

“Yeh?” Bee-Eff whispered.

“How do I get to Anya fast?”

“This,” Bee-Eff said and floated in front of metal doors. It was a box that moved up and down and moved people around. The word was elevator. Pan hadn’t ever used the word before, but his menu told him it was correct. “Go down fast.”

“Okay!” Pan said and waddled to the elevator. He didn’t know how to work it, bright circles and musical dings made it go, maybe, but that took a long time. Anya needed help now.

Pan raised a claw and swiped it at the metallic elevator doors. He sliced right through them and their pieces fell away, revealing an empty black pit to the ground below.

“If I fall, will it hurt?” Pan asked.

“Distance is okay with your new good body,” Bee-Eff said. He was fading out, trying not to be too bright.

“Okay!” Pan said and tucked himself up tight. Bee-Eff said it was okay, but still, maybe danger.

Curl!

Pan rolled forward and then giggled to himself as he dropped. The fall made his stomach feel floaty, and he liked the wind rushing past him. He snorted when he hit something hard and metal and flat, then uncurled himself.

Safe!

“Okay?” Bee-Eff asked.

“That was fun!” Pan said.

“Careful. Aliens close. Anya is down there.”

Pan frowned and nodded. He was on top of the elevator now, and Anya was still further below. Pan slashed the roof of the elevator open like paper and hopped down. He slashed the door open once more, then entered a deserted hallway. Bee-Eff pointed straight down and Pan beamed.

He dug down through the carpet and concrete and then emerged from the ceiling with a wide smile as he saw Anya.

“Hello!” he said.

“Damn that was fast,” Anya said and returned the smile. Pan had only known smiling for a couple of days, but he liked it. It was like a visualization for happy that everybody could see. No words needed.

“I fell down the eeelllll-evatooooor,” Pan said as he tested the word out, “elevator hole and then just rolled over here.”

Pan dug the hole wide enough for him to fit into, curled into a ball, and rolled through it and hit the floor with a thump. There were some new maybe-friends behind Tori (Freedom Friend) and Riley (Government Friend).

Pan knew the word government, but didn’t really understand what it really meant. It was a bunch of people, together, like friends but not. They lived in a big place together, and Anya had told him that people living with a government had to pay “taxes.” “Taxes,” were money, which was paper, but special paper, and sometimes metal? Pan knew metal. Anya said the paper had value, like he valued his ants.

And sometimes the government took the ants.

Pan had been very nervous about meeting Riley, but he hadn’t seemed interested in Pan’s bag of ants. That was nice. They could be friends.

“Hey again, Pan,” Tori said.

“Hello!” Pan hadn’t seen his other liberator in person since his escape, when he had still been a mostly normal pangolin. She looked the same though, but smelled funny, and she had wet brown stuff over the front of her shirt.

“What floor were you on?” Riley asked.

“I dunno. On the roof with Gary,” Pan replied.

“This building is 41 stories tall. You plummeted down the elevator shaft to the third floor and you’re just…fine?” Riley asked.

“Well, I am scared about the aliens, and I haven’t eaten in a while,” Pan said. It was true. He hadn’t had ants since Gary had let him scratch around in China. That had been hours ago.

“After we get everybody out of here, okay?” Anya said. Pan nodded. He was hungry, but you couldn’t eat when you were scared. It made the ants taste bad. “Look, I just need you and Riley to take people away from the building. Keep them safe, but don’t fight. There’s an alien outside, but if it attacks you, just try and block it or get away, all right?”

“I can do that,” Pan said. It was just like Gary had said: help without fighting. Pan knew he was a lot stronger than before, that he was the strongest pangolin ever, and he could probably not-curl in front of most dangers and be okay.

Bee-Eff had told him about menu levels, and that the more you had, the stronger you could be. Pan understood the basic idea, but he understood better with his nose. Anya and Samaira and almost all the people in China smelled really strong! They had a crackling, new smell.

Some people, like Gary, had a really good strong smell. Some of the hosts in China had similar smells, like the big guy in armor, Jiro (Muscle Friend), or Brody (Shark Friend).

The man in the helmet, Renn, his smell hadn’t been very strong though. It had been okay.

Except during the fight with the robots. Then it had changed a lot.

It had still been an okay smell though.

Not like the aliens.

Pan had never been near one until now. Bee-Eff told him there were five, three very close. But even if Bee-Eff hadn’t said as much, Pan knew. His nose told him lots of things. Most of all it told him that the aliens smelled wrong.

They didn’t smell of anything good or natural. They smelled like death that wasn’t dead, or dirt you couldn’t dig. Pan didn’t have the words for it, and neither did his menu except the one: Wrong.

He didn’t want to fight those things, no matter how strong he was.

But Anya needed help. Anya had freed him from the Zoo, from a lifetime of scratching at the same dirt. Anya had made him smart, been his first friend, and kept him safe.

So he couldn’t just curl and wait for the danger to leave. The aliens were staying, and he had to do the same.

As soon as Pan thought that, his instincts screamed at him to get into the tightest curl of his life and hide.

One of them was here.

“Anya?” Tori asked in a tense whisper. Pan looked behind Anya and twitched his nose at the alien that had emerged from a side room somewhere.

It looked like a white chair to Pan, but his brain told it was a “toilet,” and that humans pushed out old not-ant food into it when they needed. Pan thought this was very silly, as it was easier to just push old food out anywhere and then move along, but humans were pretty smart and they must have some reason.

“Go,” Anya said. That was Pan’s cue. He had to help now. He had to stay strong and not hide. Get these friends to safety, then maybe help Anya.

“Bye bye! Come this way friends,” Pan said as he rolled and bounced down the stairs. Tori said something behind him that he didn’t quite hear and then hurried down the stairs after him, along with Riley and the other men. One of the men was wounded, and Riley grunted as he carried him down.

Pan could help with that!

Pan landed at the bottom of the stairs and felt for the Earth. He had taken Earth Dominion, and that had given him the Bones of the Mountains. He felt them inside his body: strong pillars that held him up, reinforced his already tougher, stronger body, and rooted him to the ground like the biggest trees ever. When he stood on the ground, he became immovable and as one with the rocks and stones, or at least it felt that way. The closer he was to bare Earth, the better.

This city was all covered in concrete, asphalt, steel, glass, and more. There was still good Earth underneath, though. Up on the roof with Gary, he’d felt exposed. But down here, he was strong. And even better, down here, he could talk to the good Earth and summon his friends.

“Come out dirt friend!” Pan said. The concrete cracked in front of Pan as the dirt swelled up and a golem rose out.

“Mmrrr,” the golem groaned. They were loyal friends, but very very stupid. At least at this level.

“Jesus Christ,” Riley puffed as he almost ran into the golem.

“This is my dirt friend. He’ll carry that guy,” Pan pointed at the wounded man. “I’m helping?”

“Yeah. Yeah that would be a huge help. This guy is pretty heavy,” Riley said and gently handed the wounded man to the golem.

Pan and everyone else flinched as something boomed just above them and the walls shook. Pan didn’t curl up though. Anya was fighting and he had a job to do.

“Bee-Eff, is there another alien nearby?” Pan asked.

“One above, another one further up, then another two up high. One outside, somewhere,” Bee-Eff whispered as he floated close to Pan’s ear. “Careful.”

“Careful careful,” Pan agreed.

“What’s the deal, Pan?” Tori asked.

“Deal?” Pan asked and his brain rummaged for the word. Deals were like…agreements? Business? Sale?

“The situation. What should we do?” Riley asked. “Are there more aliens nearby?”

“Oh!” Pan said and nodded. His brain finally connected the word “deal,” with what Tori must have meant. “Yes. One alien outside. I can protect you, but I can’t fight very well. Too scary. And the alien can find you if it can find me. I’ll protect you while you run. I won’t follow.”

“Just tell us the general direction of the alien and we’ll run the opposite way,” Riley said. “The director has already probably made some calls. SWAT and maybe even some military special ops guys should be on their way already along with the national guard.”

“Okay. The alien is somewhere close to the building, maybe in front. Not sure. It keeps moving,” Pan said. He didn’t know what good people swatting the alien would do or how special an op could be, but he hoped it would be helpful.

“That’s okay. We’ll wait until you know the direction for sure and then we’ll get to safety,” Tori said. Pan nodded and then lead the small group into the lobby of the building. The front windows were smashed in, and there were gouges dug into the walls, floor, and ceiling. Blood was smeared in chaotic trails and spattered in dry gruesome murals. Several bodies lay still on the ground, with pieces of other bodies nearby.

“Oh my god,” Tori said. Pan could smell her fear. It was a piercing, acidic scent.

“Holy shit is that Jones?” one of the agents behind Riley said.

“Keep it together. Don’t look at them,” Riley said. “Pan? You okay?”

“I’m okay,” Pan said. He was scared too. Humans seemed so big and strong, but all these humans had been broken so easily. “T-this way.”

Pan waddled forward and kept his nose twitching. Bee-Eff floated beside him, his tiny holographic claws clutched against his chest as he darted his head from side-to-side. They walked past the bodies that smelled of death and the lingering wrongness of the aliens.

Pan tapped his feet and slapped his tail against the ground and summoned another three golems that rose out from under the tiles. They formed a wide ring around the group as they exited the building.

More blood and bodies outside. Several cars had crashed along the sidewalk and been abandoned. Snow gathered on their hoods and roofs and had already started to bury the still forms of fallen humans.

Pan wiggled his nose and pointed at one, two, three humans. They still smelled alive. His golems trudged over and picked them up as gently as they could, and Pan summoned two more golems as they did.

He now had six golems out, and was at his limit. His Earth Dominion skill enhanced his golem summoning, and strengthened the bonds to his summoned servants. With this many of them out it started to tax his concentration and his endurance. Each golem was like a piece of him being pulled in another direction and straining his ability to hold it there.

“Pan! Ahead! Careful!” Bee-Eff hissed. Pan’s nose twitched and he smelled a wall of the most wrong thing charging at him.

“Danger!” Pan said and stomped his feet. Earth swelled up beneath the concrete and rooted him to the spot. A wall of densely packed dirt and stone erupted from the ground in front of Pan, ten feet long, half as high and thick. Riley, Tori, and the others let out a startled cry as the ground they were on sank beneath them as the earth moved and a concentrated blast of gale-force wind slammed into the opposite side of the wall.

The dirt and stone absorbed the hit, but broke in the middle. Another hit and the wall would shatter.

“Run!” Pan shouted. Tori, Riley and the others took off in the opposite direction, fleeing across the street towards a distant crowd of humans who had stopped to stare. Many of them screamed and began to flee as they saw Tori and the others sprinting away with Pan’s golems close behind.

Pan heard something on the other side of his wall. It was a buzzing, whirring noise like bees, and a sucking noise like the biggest pangolin sucking in the biggest ant.

Just as he started to dig, another blast of wind blew his wall to pieces and flung pan into the air. He screamed and curled up tight as he was slammed into a wall. He fell and it took effort to uncurl and look around him. It wasn’t because he was hurt, but the wrong smell was so strong that Pan didn’t want to do anything but hide until Anya came to help. Almost as soon as he uncurled, his eyes and nose focused on the alien far across from him.

Pan’s brain searched for the word that identified the alien as a “fan.” It was almost as tall as Anya: a straight white pole topped with a circular hub from which several wide blades extended. The front of the circular hub opened and revealed a wide, blinking eye where the blades met. The edges of the blades gleamed with an almost blinding light and then began to spin when the eye focused on Pan.

It was very, very wrong.

The blades of the fan lengthened, split, duplicated, and spread out away from the fan in concentric rings. Pan tried to dig underground but some invisible force nabbed him by his tail and pulled him away from the earth. He summoned a golem to help him, a wall to block the blades spinning toward him, and once a wall was up, the invisible force stopped.

The wind created by the blades’ passage was enough to shake Pan even behind his wall, to sweep him to the side and keep his claws from finding purchase. Several cars were thrown aside like cheap toys as the wind grew and began to circle around the perimeter of the plaza.

Pan fought to maintain his connection to the Earth, but whatever the fan was using to pull him up was stronger than he was. His claws and feet slipped away from the solid ground and he was raised up by the wind. The fan’s eye focused on him and once more Pan felt the invisible force grasp him.

The fan had shortened its glowing blades, and they now spun around the hub in a deadly ring of flashing light. Pan squealed in terror as the fan pulled him inexorably toward the spinning blades and its glaring eye.