"W-what the hell was that?" Miranda asked.
"Seriously?" Ellie asked. "You're the one that knows about all this... stuff. What were you talking about? Mages? Did you... people really infect a demon?"
"I... I don't know. I think so. I mean, I heard about it, but I've never met the guy. But... yea, there are mages. Mages and demons are... well, our enemy. You'd do well to steer clear of the lot of them."
"More like look for them to team up with," George said.
"But, that? No, that was... That was something else entirely. I thought it was a mage with shapeshifting skills. But, no. If that were the case, he wouldn't have just shrugged off the spores like that. Did you see how they just... fell off of him?"
"Didn't you say you would need hours to replenish your ability to shoot off more spores?" Ellie asked.
"Did I?" Miranda asked. "I don't exactly shoot off my full load every time. That would be a lot. Plus, it regenerates faster if I don't. But, no, now I'm out... for now."
"Uh huh," Ellie said. "I totally believe that."
"No, really. I am. Trust me. I am quite defenseless right now."
"Miranda, you are many things. Defenseless is not one of them. Ever. Anyway, I wouldn't believe you if you told me the sky is blue. Now, the question is, what are we going to do with you?"
"I say we push her off the roof," George said. "See how she likes it."
"Ooh, good idea."
"Hey, now," Miranda said. She held up her hands, taking several steps away from them. "No need to bring violence into all of this."
"Miranda, you were trying to convert people against their will. You abducted two of my friends."
"Though, they're not really your friends anymore," George said.
"Never mind that. The point is, this started out violent. You just don't like it because that violence might actually be directed towards you now."
"Yea, and now the teams are more even," George said. "An alien on both sides. You're not going to be able to strongarm us anymore."
"One?" Miranda asked. By that time, she had made her way across the roof, back towards the corner that she had been in back when she was still restrained. She held up her arms out to either side, framing the air over the edge of the roof. "I'd say there are quite a few aliens on my side."
As if on cue, Ellie started to hear voices from below. They started off quiet, but quickly built over the next few seconds. Every once in a while, the voices would be accented by an explosion or the breaking of glass. It was clear, even without looking down, that Miranda had been right. The mob, the riot, had finally found them, north of the campus despite having gone south when they first started out. Ellie wasn't sure if the same group had swung out around the campus or if this was a new group. Newly made aliens ready to take up their cause. From what she had seen of Miranda's capability, and her claims that all females were like that, either seemed equally likely to her.
Miranda stepped up onto the ledge, her arms still spread like she thought she could fly too. Ellie thought that she might jump, but she wasn't sure how she felt about that. If she wanted to stop her or help her on. Instead, Miranda just looked down to the ground below, down to the crowd below, and started to wave her hands.
"Hey," she called down to them. "Help. I'm being held hostage."
"Okay, I think we should be going now," George said. He made his way to the ladder, but Ellie's staying hand fell onto his shoulder.
"That's not a good idea," she said. "If they're really down there, we'd be surrounded by the aliens, rather than just stuck up here with one of them."
"Couldn't you just get mixed up with the rest of them? You're one of them, aren't you? Well, at least, kinda?"
"I... I don't even know what that means? This whole being an alien thing is still new to me. They'd see that. Besides, I made enough enemies amongst their kind. They'd recognize me. Plus, what about you? It's not exactly like you'd fit in down there. If I had some colored contacts for you to use, maybe, but..."
"Well, then what do you suggest? They're going to come up here for her, aren't they? There's only the one ladder down."
Ellie looked down at the alley below, down at the base of the fire escape. There were already people mulling about down there, though she was too far away to see if they were the aliens from the campus or if they were normal humans, trying to stay out of the riots below. It was clear, however, that they had noticed Miranda, waving her arms around. It was then that Ellie realized she hadn't said who she was, or who was holding her hostage. Either side of the issue might try to rescue her, and she could just as easily play the victim no matter who came up to save her.
"You're right," Ellie said. A couple of the people below were starting to grapple for the ladder. Their lack of coordination seemed to suggest they were humans, but there was no guarantee of that. "Don't worry. I have an idea on how to get down without getting caught."
She led the way down the ladder, just as the group on the ground managed to start on their way up. George looked at her curiously as he started to follow her.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Overprotective Daughter
By the time Ellie thought it safe to exit the building, the sun had already set. The area was still blacked out, so the only source of light was the moon above and the flashlight functions on their phones. They had long since lost track of what had happened to Miranda. Fortunately, none of her would-be rescuers had noticed the broken lock on the window to the top floor. Ellie hadn't thought to bring her tools with her when she left the dorm, but the bobby pin she was taught to always have on her was all she needed to get it open. The two of them had managed to get inside before anyone had gotten high enough to spot them.
They emerged in the dark to a very different world. Not only was it bathed in darkness, in the middle of a city that rarely saw any, but the destruction around them seemed extensive. It looked more like a bomb went off than that a mob had stormed the city. While they had heard some of the destruction they had wrought, it still surprised Ellie how much the street had transformed. The fires that must have raged around them, notable by the burn marks and smell of smoke that still lingered in the air, had all burned out. Most of the windows below the third floor were smashed in, the glass littering the ground around them. Cars were overturned, with a few of them having exploded.
"All this to celebrate us not going to Mars?" George asked. "That doesn't even make sense."
"That's just what Miranda said it was about," Ellie said. "What does she know. Maybe there's something else that happened today. As long as we can stay away from the main horde, I don't really care either way. Let's head back to campus, see if we can find a hole to hide in."
"Do you think it's safe in the dorms? How many of these Hulandans lived there?"
"Enough," Ellie said. Still, she started heading down the road towards the dorm, not having any other destinations in mind. "I hope the others are alright."
"Screw them. If they can't deal with you being an alien, it's their problem." Despite his words, he whispered the word alien, like he was a child saying a curse word. "The only person I'm worried about right now is Becky. Do you think she'll be okay?"
"I don't know. Even if Hero got her to the hospital in time, she fell off a five story building. People don't just walk away from that."
"How did he even know she was in trouble? Do you think he was stalking her or something?"
"He probably didn't have much else to do, being an angel, her guardian angel, I guess. But, no. She wears that smartwatch. It's got family minder tech built in. He would have gotten the alert that she was in danger, dropped everything, and flew over here from wherever he was. I kind of wish my dad could do that."
"But with the cell networks down..."
"Those work on the Angel Corp hub network. As long as a hub was close enough, it would have gone through without a cell signal. Those things are everywhere from back when everyone was wearing them. I had one up until I went to my boarding school, th
ough the minders themselves were prohibited."
"Yea, my mom never thought it worth buying one of those," George said. "Too expensive, and it wasn't like there were any demons around here anyway. I kept telling her it was about the next wave of demons, not this one, but she didn't care. I almost think she would have preferred it if I was replaced by some demon."
"There was never any real proof that they would have detected being replaced by a demon anyway," Ellie said. "Though, I wonder, would they have detected being infected by an alien parasite." She looked down at her own, empty wrist, wondering why she had never put the band back on after graduating from high school. Of course, it would only compare to the biometrics on record, and hers would never have changed from when she was younger. Not if she was born an alien.
They walked back on campus, which seemed only slightly less damaged than the rest of the city around them. The grass in the quad wasn't showing any real destruction, just the use that one would expect from a large gathering in the middle of it. There were a few safety lights placed throughout the area, though half of them had been pulled from their mounting and were hanging from the wires that connected them to the electrical system. Those damaged lights threw the area into a more eerie view than what it would otherwise have had. The lights from the cell phones cut through it like a knife, chasing away those shadows and restoring some semblance of normalcy in a world that had taken on a very abnormal feel to it.
"So, dorm?" George asked.
He pointed over to the front doors of the dorm they had left only hours earlier. To Ellie, it felt a lot longer, a whole lifetime earlier. Although the damage to the windows and doors was familiar, it still made the building look like a stranger. To her, it felt like another one of her friends that had turned against her. She felt no comfort from the sight, no draw to the bed contained within with her name on it. With one glance at her phone, which confirmed that the cell and wifi networks were still down, she turned away from the dorm and further into the campus.
"I have a better idea, actually, some place much more comfortable than the dorm. More safe." She laughed a little at the thought, given all that had happened in and around that room over the years. Still, she started heading down the walks towards the physics building. George seemed to know exactly where they were heading without either of them having to discuss it.
"Hopefully the others hadn't thought of it as well."
"Let them think it all they'd like. It's my place, my dad's room. They can find some other place of importance if they don't want to join us. Besides, I want to make sure my dad is alright."
"What makes you think he's still there?" George asked. He didn't show any signs of slowing down, despite his doubts.
"He would have been in his office when the power went out. Knowing him, he would have wanted to finish grading the papers before heading home. Then, with the power out, he would have thought it too dangerous to drive. He's probably holed up with the rest of the physics department, discussing the finer points of test making."
"Oh, I hope not," George said. "I had actually considered being a physics major before taking his class. Now, I'm thinking engineering."
"Much more of a call for engineers out in the world than for physicists. Unless, of course, you're going into teaching."
"Maybe that's the real reason why he makes the tests so hard," George said. "So as to discourage people becoming his competition for employment."
"My dad is so not that conniving of a person. He says it’s because real life gives you problems, but doesn't always make it clear what the problem is. I mean, look at this. Look around us."
The campus had completely transformed over the few hours they had been away. Ellie had taken that same exact path less than ten hours earlier, yet it was almost unrecognizable. She saw the remnants of a tree that had been there for decades, the same tree that the aliens had taunted her from on more than one occasion. It had become a smoldering ruin of its former self. It seemed to have been the victim of one of the explosions they had heard earlier, the trunk splayed out across the path with the bottom portion in tatters. Splinters were everywhere, littering the sidewalk, hiding it completely in places. Two of the lamp poles that once flanked the tree were completely gone, perhaps ripped up by the aliens like Rebecca Anne had done before, perhaps even by Rebecca Anne, who was still on the loose out there. The destruction they had seen in the city, the destroyed windows, the expended fires, seemed to have started there, though there were no overturned cars. No cars at all.
As they came to the Physics building, it seemed to have weathered the storm rather well, for some reason. Ellie found this heartening, like her father had somehow protected the building, and would protect her and George from the coming tide. The destruction took a wide turn, showing that the mob must have diverted down the two pathways around the building without actually coming close enough to hit it. The front door was propped open with a brick, letting the night air, and the two of them, inside. They slipped through, into the dark corridor of the building, trying to make as little sound as possible. There could be a very different reason for the lack of destruction.
"Think he'll be in his office upstairs?" George asked, his voice just barely breaking the silence of the building.
"Let's check the lecture hall first." She didn't want to admit that one of the reasons she chose this was a slim hope that her friends, the ones that had abandoned her, were safe within there. As they approached the door, she noticed that there was a slim sliver of light pouring out from beneath it. She smiled as she pushed open the door.
Ellie looked first to the front row of seats, expecting to see the rest of the group, Becky included, waiting for her there. Those seats were empty, though, as were the rest of them all the way to the back of the room. It took her a few moments to look back at the front, over at the teacher's desk in the corner. Her father, Dave, was sitting there, his mouth half open, a sandwich in front of it, as he stared over at her.
"Dad," Ellie shouted. She charged over at her father, wrapping her arms strongly around him.
"Ooh, hey, Ellie," Dave said. He managed to put his sandwich down carefully before it could fall from his grasp. "Nice to see you, too. It's only been a few hours, though, hasn't it? Or have I lost myself in my book again?"
"Your book?" Ellie asked. She pulled away from him, seeing him sitting there, comfortably, book at his side, seemingly oblivious to the dangers that she had seen. "Have you been here the whole time?"
"Well, not the whole time. I went to the cafeteria for the sandwich. It was all they had, and I had to pay with cash, if you can believe it. Have you heard anything about the power outage?"
"Power outage? Dad, there's a riot out there."
"A riot, eh? Well, it looks like you two managed to make it through it alright."
"You... You weren't at least worried about me?"
"Well, not really, not that much. I mean, yea, I thought it was just a power outage. You're almost eighteen years old, been on your own for two years now. I figured you could handle yourself better than I could."
"Probably right," George said.
"Well... yea, okay. But, seriously?"
"Ellie, honey. I love you, you know that. But, well, children have to grow up sometime. Sure, if I had known there was danger out there, more than just the roads I mean, I might have at least wondered if you were alright. It's a parent's job to worry and all that. But, you're fine, yes? Where are the rest of your friends?"
"Um... well..." Ellie couldn't bring herself to tell him what happened, especially not what she was. She knew that, if she did, if she even tried, the tears would spill out and never end.
"They're around," George said.
"Well, you two are welcome to stay here, wait out... whatever is happening out there. You'll have to get your own sandwich, though. This one has mustard on it, and I know how you hate mustard."
Ellie snickered. She shook her head as she walked back around the table, heading for the front row of
seats, heading for the seat she usually sat in when her group would have their little conspiracy meetings there. "Yes, I know that you know it. That's the whole reason why you get everything with mustard on it, so I don't go and steal it from you."
"And you would, too. She would eat anything that wasn't nailed down growing up. I almost thought she wasn't really a girl at times, but..."
"Yea, that's sometimes a mystery," George said. He blushed a little as he sat down next to Ellie.
"Dad..." Ellie began, but she stopped, letting out a heavy sigh. She wasn't sure where to begin, what to ask, what would be safe and what would be immensely dangerous. Not just for this latest secret, either. Her mother had always been a touchy subject for her father, one of the many reasons why she didn't know that much about her. "What... What can you tell me about... Mom?"
"Well, what do you want to know?"
"Had she... Did she ever seem... weird to you? I mean, maybe weirder than she had been before?"
"Well, I guess that is a bit of a tricky subject," Dave said.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Mother of Ellie
"What do you mean?" Ellie asked.
"Well, what do you remember about your mother?"
"Not much. I just... it's more of a... sense of a presence than anything else. She came and then she was gone and then she was dead."
"That's about the long and short of it, yes."
"That's... not very helpful, Dad."
"Well, she was there for you in the early years. She took three years off of work, promised that she would stay home after that, but... well, she didn't. One day, she came home, and suddenly it wasn't even a discussion. She was going back to work."
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