The room had been quiet while each speaker took their turn, but after General Johnson dismissed the meeting, it was a buzz of shuffling feet, muttering voices in different languages, and doors opening and closing as everybody dispersed throughout the factory or made their way to the hangar.

“We’re gonna fight the big one tomorrow?” Pan asked Anya. He had one claw on her hand and she gave it a gentle squeeze.

“Probably not tomorrow,” Anya said. “But soon, yes. But don’t worry, you’ll just need to stay with field command and guard them, like when we were on the island.”

“But I didn’t do anything,” Pan said and frowned. “And people got hurt.”

“That isn’t your fault. You were there to keep the regular people safe. If an alien had slipped past us, you and Gary and Chell would’ve had to hold them off.”

Pan trembled at the thought. “I’m sorry I’m still scared.”

“Nothing wrong with being scared,” Anya said. “I am too sometimes. Most times. I was scared to go talk to my mom. That seems pretty silly, huh?”

“I dunno. Does your mom have big teeth?” Pan asked and Anya laughed.

“No, just a big mouth,” she said.

“Those can be scary too.”

“Oi! I got a big mouth. You sayin’ I’m scary, shrimp?” Brody asked as he and Cooper stood up behind Anya. Pan giggled.

“No. You’re only scary to fish,” he said.

“Bloody hell. Horror movies get made about me, but this lil’ fucker ain’t even bothered,” Brody said.

“He’s just joshing you, mate,” Cooper said to Pan.

“That means telling a joke, right?” Pan asked and Cooper nodded.

“No joke: I’m fuckin’ hungry. And you are bite-sized, Pan-Pan,” Brody said and leaned down with a huge grin. Pan just giggled again.

“You want some ants?”

“Fuck no. But c’mon, we’ll go talk shit about how stupid humans are while we get Gary’s machines to make us some proper grub.”

“Okay!” Pan said and hopped off his chair. He and Brody walked away together, Pan holding up a claw like a child seeking their big brother’s hand. Brody had to lean down, but he took it and Anya smiled.

“You gonna keep fighting? It’s not really you the aliens are after,” Anya said as she looked at Cooper.

The sandy-haired Aussie shrugged his shoulders. He was in beach clothes: white undershirt, an open short-sleeved collared shirt over it, and loose board shorts and flip-flops. He had what looked like two chrome wrist-watches on either wrist, and matching anklets. That was his upgraded nano body-armor, courtesy of Brody’s RAC store and Gary’s upgrades. Gary hadn’t made any weapons for it, but he had integrated some serviceable weapons from the RAC store itself.

“Like hell they aren’t. They killed Aussies same as they killed Brits or Yanks or whoever. Some of the first blokes we met got killed when me and Brody were fighting them in Perth. Before one of the bastards died, it took out two city blocks and killed at least a hundred people. And they’ve been giving it to the Navy for days now.

“’sides, even if they were only after hosts, what happens when you lot are all dead? Think they’ll just give us a wave and fuck off back to space, hey? Not bloody likely. Earth’s my home. My friends and family are here. And so’s all the pot, porn, and BBQ, and I’ll be fucked if I’m gonna let some outer-space dickhead that ‘disguised’ itself as a soda machine on steroids fuck it up.”

Anya stared at Cooper and then laughed and patted him on the back.

“Pot, porn and BBQ are pretty good reasons to save the world, I guess,” Anya said.

“All that other shit’s nice too, but I’m a simple man,” Cooper said with a shrug and a grin. “I should probably go make sure Brody isn’t trying to get Gary’s replicators to print a whale or something. See ya later!”

Anya waved at him as he ran off. She brought up her menu when he was gone and texted Immonen.

ANYA: Hey, it’s me. Sounds like you’re expected to do your alien scan thingy soon.

She waited a few moments that seemed to drag on forever for Immonen to text her back. She hadn’t felt like this since high school. She’d had a crush on an upperclassman in her PE class. In college and after with guys everything had been just sort of impersonal and she’d been too busy to consider anything seriously. With the couple of girls she’d known most of her mental energy had been spent worrying about her mother finding out and disowning her or something. Her pseudo-boyfriend from New York had just sort of been there: nice but nothing more.

But it was different with Immonen. He was kind, and gentle, and definitely good-looking, even without the menu having to do any work on him. With the exception of the fight against the alien train and the few hours leading up to it and following, Anya had spent more time than she’d care to admit day-dreaming about their upcoming dinner together.

While both of them had the ability to have any rare delicacy from the RAC store or to dine in any exotic location on Earth, she’d mostly been thinking about a tiny little pizzeria in Brooklyn, two blocks from her old apartment. It was standing room only, barely big enough for the staff to fit behind the counter and customers to get by each other in front, but the pizza was the best she’d ever had. She’d had more than a few mental images of her and Immonen holding slices while they walked and talked.

She’d be perfectly happy to see Finland as well, or any place that he cared to show her. She sighed and then her heart sped up when Immonen responded to her.

GARRETH: Yes. We’re working on final containment procedures for shipping now. They’re still keeping me away from it despite its wounded state.

ANYA: I realize this may sound kind of selfish given everything, but are you free for a few hours? Maybe grab dinner while Gary is finalizing things?

GARRETH: It’s not selfish. Or if it is, then I’m selfish too. Sadly, I can’t. There’s too much happening here with the captured alien and prepping it for transport. And they’ve had me healing other hosts and soldiers constantly and I’m afraid I need my rest. I’m so sorry, Anya, I just don’t want to fall asleep on our first date.

Anya’s heart sank a little, but she expected as much. Really, she had things she could be doing as well. It just felt like once they put this last thing into motion, they wouldn’t have a chance until it was really over, if ever.

Big Al was no joke, and Omega was even stronger, and nowhere to be found.

But she wasn’t going to pout because she couldn’t have her date. Immonen was being responsible, helping as best he could, and she should do the same.

ANYA: Don’t be sorry. You’re doing what you should be. I should be doing something too.

GARRETH: When we have a moment to catch our breaths, I promise: dinner. Lady’s choice.

ANYA: Hope you like pizza.

GARRETH: I do, actually.

ANYA: Done. Brooklyn’s finest for the hard-working doctor. I’ll let you get back to your work.

GARRETH: Take care, Anya.

Anya sighed as she closed the menu.

“Something up, kid?” Gary asked behind her. She had vaguely sensed his heat, but it had just been background noise and she started in surprise.

“No, nothing,” she said. “Just talking to Garreth.”

“Got a date?”

“No, he’s busy,” Anya said. “And I am too. Some of the charms and wards on my armor got used up during the fight with the train. I need to see if Sam can fix them or buy new ones.”

Gary shook his head. “Not that I mind the work ethic, but you sure you two wanna spend the time on busy work?”

“Saving the world is hardly busy-work,” Anya said.

“I s’pose,” Gary shrugged. “Just saying. I never once regretted cutting work a little early to be with my wife. And it’s not like all the really important stuff isn’t being taken care of by other folks.”

“We’re not married, Gary,” Anya said and scoffed as she blushed.

“Not with that attitude you won’t be,” Gary replied and smirked. Anya shook her head and waved to Gary as she left. She returned to her dorm room and took out her armor as well as Reggie to let the elemental stretch his wings. She texted Samaira about helping with her armor if she was free, and then began inspecting the various battle damage it had sustained during the last fight.

Just please let this be over soon, Anya thought. For me, for Garreth, Sam, Gary, Pan, for everybody.

Reggie was the only one who sensed her thoughts, and slithered through the air to her side, where his mind touched hers with a soft ochre hue. The simple comforting contact was enough of a balm on Anya’s disappointment, and she set about repairing her armor.

Alien Containment Facility

Mojave Desert, California

The next day

“Containment fields one-through-twenty are all secure,” Gary confirmed.

He, Anya, Pan, Chell, Immonen, Samaira, Renn, and Mona were all present at the containment facility. Gary was up in the control room behind even more defensive barriers with Pan and all of the military and government officials from yesterday’s meeting. Anya and the other hosts were assembled around the main containment fields at regular intervals.

Immonen and Chell had their own honor guard of high-quality Exterminators surrounding them. Chell looked extremely uncomfortable, surrounded as she was by towering deathbots. Immonen was focused solely on the thing at the center of the huge room.

The room itself was empty, as big as a small stadium, with white walls bathed in pale green light. An inverted pyramid poked out from the ceiling, tip pointed down at the enter of the floor below. Said tip glowed green and white as it emitted a number of extremely powerful forcefields and other secure barriers around the alien. They all looked like a series of giant soap bubbles, one within the other.

The alien itself was a scrap of flesh and metal. A single eye-stalk similar to a crab’s swiveled weakly to-and-fro as it studied the other hosts. Anya didn’t dare look away from it. It was no bigger than her torso, and there was no telling what it had been before Zoya’s Czar Bomba had blown most it away, but it was still an alien.

It was a murderous, vile little shit and it would kill all of them in a heartbeat if it could.

And Immonen was walking straight at it.

Granted, Gary’s containment fields were contracting and pressing the formless mass of flesh and metal down, and everybody was ready to kill the thing the second it blinked wrong, but Anya still wanted to grab the doctor and haul him out.

They had Chell and Renn, both of whom had some level of psychic ability. Let them do it.

Hell, just let Renn do it.

Pan had mentioned Renn’s “weird smell,” to her after the fight in Beijing weeks ago. He’d said his smell had gotten bigger, stronger, stronger than anybody’s smell, but only for a brief span. It made Anya wonder if Renn had taken Battle Aura or something similar. Mona had tended to him like he was hurt after, even though he hadn’t been touched during the altercation with the Chinese robots.

Mona currently had her usual cadre of undead around her: a horde of rotting corpses decked out in enchanted armor and weapons, and a trio of robed ghouls that hummed with magical energy. Mona had called the armored ones Grave Gladiators and the ones in robes were elder liches. All of them were very powerful undead according to Felix and the RAC store, where one of those Grave Gladiators cost about 85,000 RAC, and that was without the enchanted gear.

“Getting within contact range,” Immonen said. The containment fields had condensed to a near solid shell of incredible force around the alien. It couldn’t even move its eye stalk anymore. A tiny portion of the shield faded, just enough for Immonen to put his fingertip through.

“Scanning,” he said and closed his eyes. Anya gulped and clenched her fists.

Nothing happened for several seconds, and Immonen frowned. Then his eyes snapped open and he backed away.

“What is it?” General Johnson asked over a loudspeaker from the control room.

“It’s in Honolulu!” Immonen said. “Alpha and its pack! They’re all right next to the city under the water!”

“Damn. There goes bombing it to hell,” Gary muttered.

“It sensed me,” Immonen said as he looked up at the observation window high above the containment floor. “I touched it, and it felt me scanning it. It knows we know where it is and it…it’s started to move on the city.”

“Oh god,” Samaira said.

“There are hundreds of thousands of people there,” Chell said.

“I’ve deployed every drone and Exterminator I have that isn’t stationed to the containment facility,” Gary said. “My AI is alerting all hosts along the Pacific coasts to converge on Honolulu.”

“What about Omega?” Renn asked. “Where is it?”

Immonen touched the secured alien again and Anya saw it tremble in a futile effort at movement beneath the containment fields. Immonen held his finger against the alien for several seconds, then longer, then opened his eyes.

“I don’t know. Not on Earth. The connection line just cuts off once it gets into outer space,” he said.

“We’ll have to risk it being far enough away while we stop Alpha. Is that little thing safe here?” Director MacDougal asked and nodded at the captive alien.

“I’ve already sealed it back in. The automated defenses here will keep an eye on it,” Gary said. “And I’ll stay behind as well. I can control my boys just as easily from here as anywhere else.”

“Good. Hosts! Get to Honolulu immediately. General Johnson will contact Admiral Roberts to mobilize the US Navy. If any of our foreign host guests would like to help us, you’re more than welcome. Put out a general help message to every host on your list as well.”

“Been waiting for this wanker for a while,” Mona said. She clapped her hands and her creepy Gothic carriage appeared in a swirl of flames and mist. “Coming love?”

“Of course. It’s why we’re here,” Renn said as he climbed in.

“Are you okay?” Anya asked Immonen as the hosts began hurrying to the exit. She and Immonen were headed that way as well.

“I’m fine. It was just a shock to feel such an alien presence see me, recognize me like that. I didn’t think this sort of thing was two-way.”

“And you’re sure there was no sign of Omega?” Anya asked.

“I’m sure it's nowhere on Earth, or the moon, but past that the connection just died. Maybe it has a distance limitation,” Immonen said.

“Not like we have a god-damned choice even if it was nearby. If that thing’s moving on a city, it’ll be New Delhi all over again.”

“Go. I’ll be catching up with Chell and Gary’s Exterminators to heal you all and any others I can.”

Anya paused in her jog down the exit tunnel to where the V-200 was waiting. She thought of what Gary had said, and of what she was about to do.

After weeks of it murdering thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, they finally had a lock on Big Al and its horde. It wasn’t going to be easy. It wasn’t even going to be certain.

Anya leaned her head down and kissed Immonen hard on the mouth. It was clumsy, rushed, and a little awkward with the height difference.

After a long second, Garreth kissed her back, then pulled away.

“More after,” he said. “Go.”

“I’ll see you there. Don’t you dare fucking die,” Anya said and then sprinted away.