Blood Soaked and Invaded - 02 (33 page)

“No, not really. I’m sure things will become even more interesting when our Superiors process that zombies are the start of an alien invasion.”

“Shoei, you don’t think they’ll go for scorched Earth, do you?”

“Frank, I sincerely hope not. Anyway, today has enough worry in it to borrow things from the future we can’t know. If you and Miss Cooper aren’t booked with other things, I’d love to have your help with laying out all the UFO wreckage in the big garage.”

“What? Are you doing it like the FAA does with plane crash debris?”

“Exactly.”

“Oh, cool! We’ll drop by in a bit.”

“Thanks,” he said and closed the link.

Charlie gave me a funny look, which I returned.

“You realize we’ve been standing here in nothing but bath towels all this time?”

I looked down. What could I say? She was right.

“Maybe we should put on pants if we want to keep fighting for our lives today?”

“I don’t care about that right now,” she replied. “My nips are so hard I could cut glass. It’s chilly with no clothes on!”

I leered at her, full of interesting thoughts about anatomy, stained glass windows and the eternal art of the female form. She dropped the towel, and stood in front of me with her hands on her hips. It would have been sublime if not for the look of annoyance on her face.

“I’m going to find some clothes, Frank the Pervert. You can hang out here with goose bumps and boner if you want, but there’s coffee out there someplace and I mean to find it.”

Hola señor. Los hermanos Panza y yo estamos un poco frio tambien. (Hello sir. The Panza brothers and I are a little cold, too.)

In the end, I deferred to my mariachi and my girl. The time for pants and coffee had arrived.

A little while later we were dressed and about ready to make our debut in the outside world, when I remembered something I’d forgotten. I hadn’t cleaned the Man Scythe the night before, and I knew what leaving gunk on the blade would do to the steel. I asked Charlie to go over to B2 without me. She nodded, kissed me on the forehead, and headed out to Coffee Land.

I followed her down the stairs and took my baby to the bathroom to wash down her blade. It was a good thing I remembered; the blood had already started to stain the metal. A little soap and water got the dried blood and other fluids off, but I’d have to spend a little time with stones and metal polish later on in order to bring it back to pristine condition.

After I dried it well, I folded the blade back into the curved frame and gave it a final wipe down with the towel. I noticed something odd when I put the towel down. There was a handprint etched into the titanium frame that hadn’t been there when I brought it downstairs.

My body wanted titanium and just leeched some from my weapon. Not good! I wrapped it up in a dry towel and took it back upstairs. I’d make do with another weapon for the day, until I could find another titanium object to scavenge from.

I put the Man Scythe on my desk, and opened my gun drawer. After a quick look, I chose a .45, with two clips and a holster. For my blade of the day, I decided to kick it old school with my original katana, the blade I’d used before the Man Scythe, and set off to meet Charlie for breakfast and coffee.

Major Kenney’s people were having a run as I left the store. Some of Jeff Andrews’ crew was with them. I hoped to run into Jeff himself, since I’d not seen him in a bit.

That’s the strange thing about living in a small, isolated community–you become accustomed to seeing everyone at least once a day. Ever since the new buildings and people appeared, it’d become less likely to see everyone as frequently. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen Gina and Mark, Barry and Kathleen, or Darcy and her husband.

Just to comfort myself, I looked at the map in my head and located everyone. They were scattered all over the neighborhood, and it looked like they were occupied with something. Good.

I was pleased to note that Gina and Mark appeared to be in the cafeteria. She might have a little too much energy to cope with in the morning, but I’d feel better for confirming what the sensors told me.

“Mr. Stewart.”

I turned around when I heard my name to find Major Kenney in standard BDUs, walking towards me with a sinister-looking bundle in his hands.

“Good morning, Major.” I gave him a jaunty wave.

“I was coming to see you and give you one of these,” he said, holding up the bundle–a large handgun of some kind, or so it seemed.

“What is it?”

“It is,” he handed it to me, “your new standard issue sidearm.”

The thing looked like a cross between a Heckler & Koch and a sawed-off, single barrel shotgun. I could have put my pinkie finger down the barrel with room to spare. For the size, it was surprisingly light.

“What does it fire? For that matter, where does the ammo go?” I turned the thing over in my hands and couldn’t find anything I recognized other than the grip, trigger and barrel.

Major Kenney laughed–sounding more relaxed than I’d ever heard him. Maybe he’d gotten together with Riley the night before and made hideous love to her? I couldn’t help but hope it was the case, and that she was equally relaxed, if powerfully sore, today.

“It fires the same thing our rifles do: a copper jacketed carbide crystal mass that expands on impact. The clip,” he took it back from me, and popped the cartridge out of the base of the grip, “is in the typical place. It holds the battery that the weapon needs to fire the slug and ammo for fifty shots.”

“They have to be the size of breath mints to fit in a box that small!”

“They are. Think of it like a hand-held railgun, and you’ll get it.” He handed it back to me, and I felt like he’d just handed me a hand grenade with the pin pulled out. “So. You heading over for joe and a donut?”

“Yes...”

“Mind if I tag along?”

“No...”

“Fine. Let’s get a move on, my guts are complaining.”

Kenney walks with an indomitable stride. Nothing and no one would stand in the way of his determination. It suited me fine to follow in his wake, and I bet it prevented me from being distracted along the way, too.

I caught up with him as he swung open the door to the cafeteria proper and heard him mutter to himself.

“Fuck yeah. Bacon.”

He moved like a greased eel around tables and people, grabbing a plate and piling it high with pork products and eggs. Yolanda watched him like a hawk from the other end of the buffet as she put out dishes of yogurt and fresh fruit. Her vigilant gaze didn’t waver until he’d found a seat and began to plow through his breakfast. I couldn’t tell if she disliked him or was worried about running out of bacon.

I picked Charlie out of a small crowd of people enjoying better food than they’d seen in quite a long time. It gave me a bit of pause, because we’d been used to a surprising level of luxury before the military showed up. We’d traded for food, hunted, grew or made our own necessities, and things had worked out phenomenally well. How easy to lose track of the fact that others weren’t getting by as easy as we did then, or now.

Before I went to the buffet, I set my new gun and katana down in the free chair at her table. We exchanged a quick smooch, and I made my way over to the grand spread of food on the other side of the room. My brain was still stuck in “how lucky we are” mode.

I remained very thoughtful and grateful until I sat down beside her with a modest plate of food and a cup of coffee.

“Frank, you never told me that Yolanda and Ómer had owned a restaurant,” Charlie said by way of greeting.

“Sorry honey, I just took it for granted.” Therein lay the problem, I think.

“Gina and Mark were telling me about how they met at Yolanda’s place for their first date. It was so cute!”

Gina bounced around in her seat, as perky as usual, with one arm wrapped through her husband’s arm. Mark looked like his normal self, quiet, if a little happier than I’d seen him in a while.

“And!” Gina went on. “After we got married, we went there for dinner one night, and she told us about a house in her neighborhood that’d gone on the market that very morning!”

“I thought it would be a good location, so we drove by and took a look after dinner,” Mark elaborated.

“It was perfect! We put a contract down the next day and the rest is history!”

“Wow, honey,” Charlie said, clapping her hands for their success, “that is a super story! I’m so glad for the two of you.”

It is that kind of breakfast, warm, friendly, yummy, that makes you relax. I shouldn’t have been relaxing, but this is why they call it “20/20 hindsight.”

We finished up breakfast, loaded ourselves for bear, and walked over to the garage to help Omura with reconstructing the vehicle we’d brought back. Charlie tapped him to let him know to expect us in a minute or two. She let me know how appreciative he was, which made us both smile.

By the time we got there, the semi-trailer had been unloaded and a random pile of wreckage sat under the first double-wide garage door. Shawn was pacing up and down beside it, peering intensely at the strangely familiar and unfamiliar parts. Chunhua was standing against the wall, right inside the door, looking very uncomfortable.

“Chu,” Charlie called out. “Why do you look like someone’s walking on your grave?”

“It’s this,” she said, pointing at the debris. “It feels... icky to be around it.”

“Define ‘icky’, please,” Omura said, coming around from the opposite side of the pile.

“Biggie, the alien that rode around in me, lied to the Grays about how much he would leave behind when he left. I feel like I know things about this sort of craft and I wish I didn’t. I feel sick being around it.”

“You realize, I’m going to ask you to look at those memories, right?”

“I know Omura. I know.” She sat down on the cold concrete. “They grow the shell in the water, and fit the machinery in later. It’s like a giant specialized oyster.”

“What I want to know,” Shawn interrupted, “is how these Progeny know how to do all this. I mean, they were born here, right?”

“Genetic memory, my Bear,” Chunhua explained, shivering a little. “They’re born here, but grow to maturity in a matter of months. The older they get, the more dangerous they are.”

“I’m guessing you held back a little information when we debriefed you the other morning,” Omura said, rubbing his eyes. “Is there anything else you’d like to share?”

“I’m not holding things back because I want to. The information isn’t there until it shows up. I really want these images in my head to go away!”

“I’ve got an idea,” I piped up. “Chu, you know what this thing is supposed to look like, right?”

“Yes, Frank.”

“Tell us what goes where, so we can sort out the parts!” I felt brilliant.

“Okay.”

With her help, we had the outline of the craft’s shell laid out in two hours. Her input was also incredibly useful at sorting out what mechanical parts went where under that carapace. We didn’t need her help to figure out the placement of the cockpit. It was simple logic.

“Shawn, do you see the tube beside the parts of hollow globe?”

“Yeah, Chu. This one that looks swollen, like it burst?”

“Yes. That is what caused the craft to crash. It was either a manufacturing flaw or they couldn’t get the right materials.”

“Now that might be a point in our favor,” Omura smiled, “if they can’t build their products to spec. Good. Real good.” He looked up as though an idea had come to him. “Baj is helping Jayashri with the autopsy, but he needs to get his ass over here as soon as he’s available. I’m giving him a buzz.”

All three of us watched his face go gray under the lights of the gigantic garage. He spun on one heel and ran for the nearest trashcan, where he deposited the entire contents of his digestive tract. After a few dry heaves, he managed to stand up and move slowly to the closest workbench. He ripped off some paper towels and wiped off his chin.

“Did you guys know you can see through someone’s eyes if they let you?”

“Yeah, Shoei. I knew that.” I answered him, feeling really sorry for his experience.

“Next time you discover a new superpower, fucking tell me about it. Sumira’s insides are an incredibly unpleasant thing to see when you’re not ready for it.”

“I feel pretty sure,” Shawn said, fondling a chunk of wreckage, “we’re gonna remember that with no problem.”

“I don’t suppose Baj gave any indication of when he’d be free?”

“No, Frank,” belch, “he didn’t.” Omura still looked green around the gills. “I need to find a bottle of water or something.”

He wandered off for a while, leaving us to shift the parts around under Chunhua’s direction and Shawn’s instincts for mechanical devices. By the time Omura returned, Buttons in tow, we had a rough layout of the internal workings of the craft on the other side of the garage floor.

“Omura said this big cylinder thing,” I pointed at the object on the floor, “is probably the weapon housing. Don’t those things look like alternators from car engines?”