[Alien Invasion 01.0] Invasion

by Sean Platt

  “Considering what?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Nothing.”

  “We have to go,” he said. “We can rest for a while, but then we walk. A bit at a time is fine, but we have to keep moving.”

  “Let’s just find a nice barn to shack in,” said Piper. “Like I suggested back in Pennsylvania.”

  Meyer straightened. Then he took Piper by the hand and practically picked her upright. Something in his manner must have registered with Trevor, because he stood too. Even Lila and Raj sat up, but showed no sign — yet — of coming along.

  “What?” said Piper.

  “You gave me an idea.”

  “About a barn. So we can do that. Shelter in a barn. Maybe steal some guy’s car later on so we can make a run.”

  “Not the barn.” Meyer shook his head. “What’s in the barn.”

  “A tractor.” Lila looked at Raj. “I am not driving down the road on a tractor.”

  “Horses,” Meyer replied.

  CHAPTER 29

  Day Five, Afternoon

  Colorado

  Lila didn’t know that Colorado — this part, anyway — was horse country. But it clearly was, and once they started walking and knew what they were looking for, they found a farm almost immediately. But there were people visible, milling in the house and walking back and forth to the barns. For a moment as they walked past on their way to the next one (not so close as to be obvious), Lila thought of who those people might be and what they might be thinking. Were they a family, like the Dempseys? Were they highwaymen who’d left the road to occupy a ranch? It was impossible to tell from a distance. Good men and bad men looked the same from the road, especially considering how thin the line between them had become.

  Lila forgot her pregnancy for hours at a time. It was still important (vital, really), but so many matters of consequence had surfaced in the past four days. There were the alien ships; there was the riot and fear of death; there were two ambushes resulting in one grand theft auto. Only during the slow times — like now, as they walked — did she stop to be a seventeen-year-old girl again. There would come a time when Lila grew large and another time when she’d have to discuss what had happened with her father. It hurt to think of; she’d always been such a daddy’s girl. Admitting to a baby would be admitting, in an irrevocable way, that she was no longer her father’s. She’d had at least one deeper relationship with a man her age. And she’d soon be a full-grown woman in nature’s most obvious way.

  Thinking about the baby made Lila think of her mother. Mom had, despite her caustic comedy act and her reputation for outrageousness, been an excellent mother. She’d only given Meyer custody because his life (with far less travel and fewer late nights) was more stable. It had crushed her to give them up, and she still doted on Lila and Trevor whenever she saw them. She stopped being irreverent Heather Hawthorne and became Mom again.

  Lila watched the first horse farm vanish behind a rise. Who were those people? Did they own the ranch and had simply never left? Was this all business as usual for them? Were they tending to chores as if the world wasn’t about to change forever — feeding horses who had no idea, no fear that Earth might be seeing its final days? Supposedly, animals could sense threats like storms and fires well before they were upon them. There was a hardwired, inborn fear that told them when running was worthwhile. What would it mean if, when they eventually found some horses, the animals were as calm as those people appeared from a distance? Would it mean there was nothing to fret about after all, and that their human fear of change was manufacturing the panic — all this chaos and lawlessness?

  What did it mean, when they found those horses, that they themselves would resort to theft … again?

  It was okay to commit crimes if it was for your own good, it seemed.

  It was okay to steal if it meant getting away from people who wanted to steal from you.

  It was okay to beat people up and make your own rules if it would get you to your hole in the ground, where you could hide while everyone else either died or tore themselves apart.

  Maybe the Dempseys weren’t anything special. Maybe they were just five average people, marching toward judgment like all the rest.

  Ten minutes later, they came to a large horse farm just as nice as the first. It was either deserted, or the owners were hiding. Either way, the horses whinnied loudly when they entered, clearly hungry, their stalls overfull of manure and in need of cleaning. Meyer and Piper strapped saddles on five of the horses while Lila closed an access gate and opened the seven remaining stalls to let the horses run free in a large indoor arena. Then she opened a gate at the other end, giving the animals access to stacked hay and a few unopened piles of feedbags in a storage area.

  Trevor was behind her, watching with ambivalence. “I think horses just eat and eat until they explode if you don’t ration their food.”

  “You’re thinking of goldfish,” she said.

  “So you’re saying they’ll stop when they’re full.”

  Lila shrugged. There was only so much she could do. If nobody had come back, they’d have starved in their stalls. If nobody came back even now, they’d run out of food and starve in the arena. Maybe they’d eat themselves to death. Maybe she was choosing their doom, same as she was choosing her own.

  Raj closed the gate to the storage area, and proceeded to toss several hay bales inside, followed by three cracked-open bags of feed. Then he vaulted the gate, walked to the arena’s far end, and opened the outside door. They were in the mountains, a wild area, with barely any traffic. Horses were animals. They’d adapt.

  “Split the difference,” he said.

  Time passed differently once they were riding. Lila hadn’t fully realized her exhaustion until she was back to traveling without using her legs.

  Something in her mind had shut off a lot of what was happening in her body — perhaps trying to keep her feet moving despite pain and fear and fatigue, obeying a primitive sense of self-preservation. But now that her only job was to balance atop the horse, Lila found her mind had returned to wandering. She wondered if she was in shock.

  What was shock like? Yet another condition she couldn’t look up. When she felt dizzy thinking of their destination, was that morning sickness, shock, or cowardice? Did Trevor and Raj feel the same? Did Piper?

  A few days was all it had taken to affect a change in Piper. She was still Lila’s quirky, vaguely New-Age stepmother. She was still cool; she still shared a surprising amount of Lila’s tastes in music — and of course in clothing, seeing as she was the brain behind Quirky Q. Lila’s friends had been over the moon when Lila’s father had married Piper Fucking Dempsey — but to Lila, it had all been so obvious. Yes, Piper was amazing. But her father had married her when she’d been Piper Fucking Quincy, a nobody known by no one. Piper Quincy had put the Q in Quirky Q, but the world only knew her after she’d married the mogul who funded her business to make it what it was now. To put the Fucking in Piper Fucking Dempsey, as it were.

  But now, in addition to being all those cool things — more an older sister than a mother figure — Piper had grown an edge. She rode beside Lila’s father rather than behind him as she would have in the past. She’d taken the driver’s seat several times when they’d still had a car — not just when Meyer needed rest, but sometimes because she liked her hands on the wheel.

  “Hey,” said Raj.

  He’d ridden up alongside her, same as Piper had ridden up to her father. She looked over, trying to see him anew. He’d proven himself during this trip, even though he technically shouldn’t even be on it. He’d been forced into the family as if by a crowbar, and seemed to fit. He’d been noble and stupid enough to run after the woman in trouble when the freeway riot began, then smart enough to cut his losses and drag Lila back out. He’d handled the car salesman with the gun. He’d stood up to her father, even though he’d lost. She could hardly count that against him. Everyone lost to Meyer Dempsey.

  “Hey.”

>   “How are you? I mean …” He looked ahead, past Trevor, to the adults at the front of their five-horse caravan on the road’s side. He patted his own stomach and lowered his voice. “You know. With the … ?”

  She forced a smile. “I feel okay. For now.”

  “Not sick?”

  Lila looked up at the bright-blue sky, hemmed in by hills and trees. Being up in these mountains was almost like being in a valley, but the feeling was secure rather than claustrophobic. It was almost possible to believe they might escape the spheres. The sun was high though the air held a chill.

  “Only in the mornings. I don’t feel like throwing up once it gets past noon, like clockwork.” She pointed at the high sun, establishing the time without digging for her phone.

  “You didn’t seem like you wanted to throw up this morning.”

  “I barfed in one of the stalls.”

  “Oh.”

  “But I don’t know if that’s morning sickness. I might just be convinced it should be morning sickness.”

  “How would that work?”

  Lila let it go. Her own mind could manufacture all sorts of illnesses if it thought it was supposed to, but Raj was cut and dry. He’d make a good doctor. Maybe even a good dad.

  “Never mind.”

  “Piper said she heard on the news that the ships are slowing down.”

  Lila looked over. Why did he have to say that? She’d managed to feel human and normal for a few minutes. They had a sunny day with long shadows and crisp mountain air. It was almost possible to imagine all the skiers arriving a few months from now, parking their expensive vehicles and walking toward lodges with their overpriced skis. That was a world where people had nothing better to do than reach the top of a big hill and slide back down on boards. A world that she suspected might never return.

  Lila recovered anyway. Denial wouldn’t help. If things were coming, she might as well force herself to get used to it.

  “I thought they were already slowing down.”

  “Well, sure. But now they’re, you know, braking.”

  “Like breaking into pieces?”

  “No. Braking. Like, ‘whoa.’” He pulled the reins back to demonstrate, and the horse dutifully stopped. Lila laughed as he nudged his mount’s sides to catch up.

  “What does that mean?”

  “That they don’t want to ram us.”

  She’d forgotten the idea that the ships might simply ram Earth to begin with. Raj’s bringing up the threat then dismissing it immediately didn’t feel like good news. It felt like a wash.

  Lila looked up, wondering how long it would be before people could see the ships with the naked eye. Maybe some people already could. The thought gave her a chill, but she stuffed it down.

  “Oh. Well, that’s good.”

  “Sure.” Silence, then, “What do you think they want?”

  Lila shrugged, trying to hide her dread.

  “What do you think they’re like?” he said.

  Lila didn’t like the images that brought up, either. She wondered at herself, watching her own reactions as if from the outside. Had she been thinking they might be giant marbles that would show up, hang out, then leave without doing anything? Because based on her reactions to Raj’s perfectly sensible inquiries, it sure seemed she had.

  “I have no idea.” She decided to rip off the Band-Aid. “I just hope they’re not those gray things with the giant, black, almond-shaped eyes.”

  Raj studied Lila.

  “You have big, brown, almond-shaped eyes. Maybe they’ll like you.”

  Lila wondered if she should be insulted, but he clearly meant it as a cutesy compliment. And besides, it was true. She did have big, brown, almond-shaped eyes.

  “Maybe.”

  “I get a little ashy sometimes,” he said. “Do you think our baby might be able to pass for one of them, if they take over the planet and enslave us all?”

  Now he’d taken it too far.

  “Raj, that’s not …”

  But her horse — with autodrive as good as either of their two cars on this long trip — had stopped to keep from rear-ending Trevor’s. His horse, in turn, had stopped behind the leads.

  They’d been on a long, packed-dirt road that Lila now realized was her own new driveway. She’d never been to the under-construction compound, but if they were really the only house on what she’d taken for this long road, it was isolated indeed.

  The house peeking between the trees looked finished to Lila, though there was a stack of lumber and shingles to one side and a port-a-potty standing on the unfinished dirt lawn. It must just be final details that needed doing up top, but her father had been clear: the bunker, which mattered most, was finished, full, and downright bombproof.

  “Wow, Dad,” said Trevor. “It’s awesome.”

  Meyer said nothing.

  “Dad?”

  Piper reached out slowly as if she wanted to touch him. But her hand seemed to decide it had been foolish and settled back on her leg, twitching as if unsure where to go.

  Lila looked from one to the other. In front of her, Trevor turned back, puzzled.

  “What’s wrong, Dad? Why did we stop?”

  “That strikes me as off.” He pointed toward an out-jut that was, seen from the side, probably a garage. Beside it was a blue PriusX, its bumper half-off and resting on the concrete.

  “Is that … ?” Lila began. But it almost had to be. “That’s Mom’s car!”

  Trevor’s head whipped around. Lila and her brother stirred, their horses sensing their desire to move forward.

  Meyer held out a pacifying hand, palm back, to stop them. “Hang on.”

  Lila waited for him to elaborate, then saw silhouettes moving in the window, behind a pair of pickups parked at the end of fresh ruts — two vehicles that had no business being here.

  The silhouettes were holding long things that could only be shotguns.

  “We’re not quite home yet,” he said.

  CHAPTER 30

  Day Five, Early Evening

  Axis Mundi

  Heather wondered if it meant anything that all three of the men who’d taken over Meyer’s house had facial hair.

  She wasn’t tied to a chair like a movie damsel, and she wasn’t gagged, but the three men had mustaches appropriate to binding and gagging damsels just the same. They kept threatening to rectify the gag situation if she didn’t shut the hell up.

  As far as Heather could tell, they didn’t recognize her. That was probably good because they wouldn’t see her as having any special value (as if the world, right now, cared about C-list celebrity), and it was similarly good because it meant she’d just be a loudmouth fortysomething Jew rather than a famous girl worth raping, if for no other reason than bragging rights.

  Or a rousing game of I Never.

  I never fucked a famous comedienne. And then these three assholes would have to drink.

  But she hadn’t been raped outside of Vegas, she hadn’t been raped after those onlookers had responded to the gunshots she’d managed to squeeze from the pistol despite her revulsion, and she hadn’t been raped the nights she’d had to stop her car after the GPS had failed and her Prius — not the most advanced vehicle — lost its ability to navigate without her.

  Heather wondered if she should be offended that so few people had tried to rape her. She was still smoking hot. All the tabloids said so.

  It was the kind of wry, inappropriate, that’s-just-wrong joke she’d make in one of her shows. Nobody would even flinch, probably. After all the shit that had made her famous onstage? She was immune. The infamous Hitler jokes assured that. Now, nothing from her mouth could shock an audience. And besides, the minute people started laughing at her wrong jokes — which they always did, and rather breathlessly — they were culpable. If someone had a problem with her jokes about wet panties and Hitler (note to self: need jokes about Hitler’s wet panties), that accusing finger would have to turn on everyone who’d ever thought they were funny, to
o.

  Heather stood, sat, stood again. They’d locked her in the second pantry, apparently agreeing that binding her to a chair was a bit too tried and true. The pantry wasn’t stocked yet, but for some reason only Meyer understood it had a mesh door that the assholes in her house had locked via two screwdrivers hammered into the jamb. They had a lot of screwdrivers. For a while, the leader (the one with the best, most Snidely Whiplash mustache; the others were closer to simply unshaven) had forgotten about his tool belt, as if this were just another day on the Vail house job. He’d taken it off after Heather mocked him about it through the grate, and for a while he’d stared at her with hatred. She was sure a revenge-raping was on the table. But then he’d pussied out, like all tough guys did. Heather should know, as a woman in an industry dominated by men. They’d all tried to push her around for a while when she’d been new, but then she’d crossed every line that anyone could possibly imagine, including that of her father’s secret alcoholism and discovering her mother’s vibrator and how it had been clumped with disgusting goo. Then the boys had left her alone. It was like fistfighting with a crazy person. You never knew what stupid shit they might do, seeing as they were out of their minds, so those with no stones just stayed in the corner.

  These guys were like that. But there was a fine line, and it wasn’t lost on Heather that they’d thus far kept her 1) alive and 2) unraped. It might mean they were saving her as a bargaining chip, should the home’s owner appear with guns blazing. Or it might mean she’d so far been lucky, and could be shot through the bars at any time.

  She couldn’t decide. On one hand, the trio’s leader, Garth (he of the black Snidely Whiplash mustache) had served Meyer loyally until just a few days ago. Heather had even greeted him warmly when he’d arrived, just twelve hours after her. She didn’t really know him, but had seen him once when she and Meyer had taken the Gulfstream from LA on one of his “business trips,” intent on spending the day checking progress and the night with Juha, Meyer’s shaman. Garth had seemed a competent foreman at the time. And she’d decided he did an excellent job once she was high — while she was seeing colors and Meyer was off in the spirit realm … or whatever the fuck he felt after he’d drunk and purged.