by Rick Kueber
There was a certain relief when she saw the apartment number on the door but the moment she touched the knob, an uneasiness settled over her. She let go of the knob and sat the kitty down long enough to pull the rifle over her head. She picked up the cat, placed it on her shoulder and turned the knob. Pushing the door open she raised the gun to her shoulder and shot glances around the room. Suddenly, without warning, Bailey trotted into the front room from the hallway. Elle flinched and nearly fired.
“What the fuck?” Bailey nearly shouted.
“Son of a bitch!” was Elle’s reply. “You almost bit the big one.”
“What the hell were ya thinking?” Bailey asked, noticeably shaken.
“I was thinking about saving my ass.” Elle was more than angry with her new ’friend’. “Speaking of ‘what the hell?’s... Just what the hell are you doing in our apartment?”
“I was worried about you, and I wanted to make sure you made it back okay.” Bailey began to calm down, but Elle did not.
“Really?” She spat out sarcastically. “You didn’t go find me, or go check that place out yourself. You let the pregnant girl risk her life and were soo concerned that you came back here to wait for me to come back safely. What an amazing fuckin’ friend you are!”
Just then the sound of footsteps in the hall halted the conversation momentarily.
“Calm down.” Bailey tried to defuse the inevitable situation. “They’re here to help us.”
Elle wondered who ‘they’ were and felt the heat rising as her face grew flush. She didn’t have time to wonder for long. In seconds, Bob popped out from around the corner, and Elle let out a sigh of relief. Her relief was very short lived as a large man, an Ahsusha, rounded the corner only a few paces behind Bob.
“Don’t fucking move!” Elle screamed out, pointing the semi-automatic rifle in their direction. She sensed the fear and distress that came from Bob and felt the cool steel of the rifle in her sweaty and shaking hands. “This is going to suck, cleaning up this mess, so before I pull this trigger and ruin the paint and carpet, at least tell me what the fuck is going on here?” Her eyes cut over to Bailey. “Get over there!” She nodded, motioning for Bailey to join the others. “Thanks for checking on me, friend.” Everyone, including the Ahsusha, could sense the hate and anger in Elle’s voice.
“Now Elle...” Bob spoke softly. “It’s not what it looks like.”
“Oh really?” She danced back and forth nervously. “And what do you think it looks like?”
“It probably looks like we ratted you out as a rebel, but think about it... Why would Zo... Bailey, send you out to find an assault rifle? Wouldn’t it have been easier if we had just shown up today and let them take you if that was our plan?” Bob stuttered his thoughts into words.
“Maybe...” The idea made sense to Elle, but she was still extremely skeptical. “But if you knew about this the whole time, why didn’t you just go get it yourself Z0-Bailey, or whoever the hell you are?”
“Could you not point that at us? I can explain, but it’s going to take some time.” Bailey motioned with her hands for Elle to ease up. Bob stood statuesque, not wanting to provoke the obviously unstable Elle, and this stranger, this Ahsusha, swayed side to side, cross armed and stone-faced.
“Nope, not a chance in hell.” Elle sounded a little more like her old self and Bailey almost smiled. “Start talking and we’ll see if I point it away before or after I pull the trigger... Sit.” She waved the barrel of the rifle towards the couch. Bailey and Bob quickly took a seat, but the Ahsusha cocked his head to the side as if he didn’t understand. “I said sit... Or die. Your choice.” Her voice was cold and hard. Bob called him over, and he reluctantly squeezed onto the couch cushion next to Bob. Bailey began to ramble on, spilling her guts, occasionally embellished by Bob.
“First of all, I’m not really Bailey... Well, I am, but Bailey isn’t my given name. Officially, I am USAF Operations Intelligence Specialist: Zoey Brandt; I was stationed at Luke Air-Force base, but I was in the city when this all started and decided to try to stay incognito until the time was right.” Her revelation was jaw dropping to Elle but seemed to be no big shocker to Bob or the mute Ahsusha, who may not have even understood what she was explaining. Her voice was no less southern, or twangy, but it did seem less countrified. “Bus-driver Bob, is actually 1st Lieutenant Robert Dyer, retired.”
“Early retirement.” Bob chimed in and gave a nervous smile to Elle. “I can’t say it hasn’t been difficult to pretend you aren’t a high ranking officer, ma’am.” He directed his statement to Bailey.
“It has been an awkward game of undercover operatives. Not really my specialty. Anyways...” The country twang resurfaced stronger than ever in one word. “We’ve been talking for months about how to move forward, but there was never anything that we genuinely thought might be persuasive enough to sway any of the alien beings to take our side and, as you said so accurately put it, we may have a chance at success if we have any of them and their craft on our side. Until now, we had nothing, but you, Elle... You might be our secret weapon.”
“If you haven’t noticed, I’m the one with the gun. I’m not your weapon.” Elle was still hyped up on adrenaline and furious for the apparent set-up, but what Bailey was saying did make a little sense, except for why she was their secret weapon. “So... Keep talking while you can.” She tried to be harsh, but she was beginning to soften around the edges, just a little.
“So, like I was sayin’, you are the one thing that might be just what we need. Actually, your baby might be...” Bailey continued to explain. “If we can show them the union of human and alien through the birth of a child, carried by a human mother, maybe they might begin to understand our compassion. That’s why we brought Malcolm.” She gestured to the Ahsusha sitting next to them. “Malcolm is the only one of them that has made any effort to communicate with anyone about anything but the choice to serve or die.”
“My child is not a bargaining tool!” Elle dropped one hand from the rifle and coddled her round belly. “Besides, she won’t be born for almost two more months. What we need is someone with a terminal cancer. Then we just kill Mr. Malcolm here, and when the alien energy tries to take them over, boom, we have the ally we need.”
“That sounds like a good plan, except for two things, we don’t know of any terminal cancer patients here, and we wouldn’t gain much trust if we have to kill one of ‘em to get it.” As much as Elle hated to admit it (almost as much as she hated the southern draw of her voice), Bailey made her point clear, and it was hard to argue.
Chapter 8
Frenemies
“So, please explain about the life you carry within you,” Malcolm spoke calmly in the midst of the chaos and tension. “This is something we do not understand fully yet.”
“Okay...” Elle didn’t know where to begin, but she saw something in Malcolm that she hadn’t seen in one of these beings before; curiosity. All others seemed to have a single desire to follow the orders and protocol of their superiors. Malcolm did seem different, and perhaps somewhere deep inside there remained some sliver of humanity. “I guess I’ll start at the beginning. I fell for a guy named Tanner and we... Hmmm... Well, this is more awkward that I thought. We became physically intimate and...” Elle explained in vague details about how sexual activity can lead to impregnation.
More in-depth details were given explaining about how DNA is shared and how different genetic markers and chromosomes are from both parents, and they make the child an individual. Malcolm was fascinated at the thought that two individuals come together and join together on a cellular level, and that convergence creates a new life, yet that new life is also part of both parental participants.
“This life that grows within you...” Malcolm began. “...is partly you and partly Tanner, combined to make a new human being?”
“Yes. That’s right, and Tanner was partly human and partly... Well, whatever you are.” Elle meant no disrespect but didn’t know wha
t to actually call the being.
“And if I understand this correctly, this new life is made of two humans but also alien to some degree?” A confused and astounded look came over Malcolm’s face. Malcolm’s hand reached out hesitantly towards Elle’s obtrusive belly and quickly retracted. “I ...I’m...” Malcolm struggled with something slightly foreign to him. “I’m ...sorry.” His words sounded like a question as if he was unsure of what was happening inside his own mind.
“Holy cow!” Bailey burst out. “That sounded like you were worried about doing something that’d upset Ellie. Sounded almost like... Emotion.”
“It’s Elle ...and I still have the gun.” Elle thought how easy it would be to accidentally pull the trigger in Bailey’s direction. ‘oops. My bad.’ she imagined saying as she raised a flat hand to her mouth in exaggerated sarcasm. The vision in her head made her giggle out loud.
“Sumthin’ funny?” Bailey’s country charm didn’t penetrate Elle’s hard exterior.
“Inside joke.” Elle rolled her eyes. “You wouldn’t get it.” Although in a devilish way, she almost wished she would. She made eye contact with Malcolm and raised her bulky shirt, exposing her round stomach. Her hand reached out for his, and she placed his palm on her belly. Almost immediately, the child she carried moved and kicked hard. “Whoa, kiddo!”
“Remarkable.” He whispered in amazement and awe, withdrawing a trembling hand. “The Commanders were right. This is what we have been missing. This is what we have abandoned.”
“What?” Elle stood up and raised the rifle to her shoulder. “I knew it couldn’t be trusted!”
“Hold up there hon.” Bob raised his hands in surrender.
“After all that, it still thinks those alien bastards are right! You see! I told you they couldn’t be fucking trusted!” Elle was so furious she shook all over, and the tears began to stream down her flushed cheeks.
“I want one of my own,” Malcolm spoke softly but directed his words to no one. His eyes began to well with tears, and he twitched and shook his head, frightened by the human condition he was experiencing. “I need to create life.”
“Yeah?” Elle snarled. “Well, this is mine. If it were up to me, none of you assholes would ever have this experience. You’re all murderers! My whole freakin’ family is dead because of you!”
“Now Elle, honey, we can’t go back and fix the past, but Malcolm here might be our one chance to try to change our future.” Once again, pain in the ass and pain in the ears Bailey made some sense. “Let’s just take a deep breath and remember that our goal here is to find out how we can take back our world.”
“How are we supposed to do that if we’re teaming up with ‘em?” Elle refused to see any positive point of view.
“Because I have knowledge that can help,” Malcolm stated, blank-faced, with his eyes turned toward the floor. “There may be others that will join us. I can be influential in gaining their trust.” He smiled awkwardly as if it was his first smile ever.
“So, let me get this straight...” Elle’s sarcasm was only matched by her willingness to see and state the harsh realities. “With all of the bakery workers, there are about two hundred of us, and we’re gonna arm ourselves with the guns from that bunker and fight against how many of them, fifty thousand? A hundred ...two hundred thousand? Maybe more? How the hell is that going to work? I doubt there’s a quarter million rounds of ammo in that bunker.”
“Elle’s right. I don’t like the idea. Sounds like a slim chance. Sounds like Custard’s last stand to me.” Bus driver Bob was genuinely concerned and even though he was in support of Elle’s idea of a resistance, it sounded like an inevitable bloodbath, regardless of who won.
“I know, it seems like a long shot, but you are the first person to bring up fighting back. Have you already changed your mind, or was that all just talk?” Bailey’s words stung in Elle’s ears, and not just because of her accent.
“I’m not backing down. I just think we need a plan that gives us not just the element of surprise but gives us an immediate advantage... Before we even start the real fight.” Elle stated.
“A bomb,” Bob said solemnly. “Take a bunch of them out all at once and cause mass confusion. Something like that, right?”
“Something like that ...but I might have another idea.” Elle raised one corner of her mouth in a twisted half-smile, and her eyes looked up to the ceiling in deep thought. “When are we planning to do all of this? I’m kinda on a strict schedule.” She rubbed her belly.
“First, we have to get the arsenal back here, or somewhere that we can easily access it when it’s time. Not sure how to do that yet and it’ll probably take some time, but we’ll figure it out. Then, we need to start talking to everyone about our plan.” Bailey began to lay out the timetable.
“I think small groups, five or ten at a time. It would be easier to talk them into it and answer any questions ...reassure any doubts. If we have too many at one time, they could overwhelm us. If we have four or five of us, talking to five or ten of them, we could definitely be more persuasive.” Bob spoke up, explaining the way the military got the masses to side with them, a few influential people at a time and then let those people plant the seed with those who looked up to them.
“That’s right Bob.” Bailey, being a high ranking military officer, knew that was the only way to be sure of success. “Then once we get everyone on board and ready to fight at a moment’s notice, that’s when Malcolm will start talking to those he thinks might side with us.”
“But that’s going to take forever.” Elle spluffed. “Can’t we both start at the same time while we are moving guns? That might cut the time in a third?”
“What if I am wrong?” Malcolm’s voice was cold and serious. “Should I choose poorly, the consequences could be devastating.”
“Devastating? Like what?” Elle was honestly interested to hear what the enemy had to say.
“Firstly, I would be immediately brought before the Commanders and my energy would be extinguished. When that happens, this body would die.” He said morbidly, and the inflection in his voice hinted at the emotion of sorrow and fear. “Secondly, they would initiate an action to stop the revolt. Every human here would then be exterminated.”
“So...” Elle reluctantly agreed. “We have to have the guns in place and the people on board with the plan first so if something goes wrong, we can jump to action at the drop of a hat. Guess that means that if things go as planned, little Zoey might be born here, or in the middle of our revolution. It’s what needs to happen and revolution is what I want, but this is probably gonna suck, a lot.”
Malcolm and Bob left Bailey and Elle at the apartment and headed back to their daily duties. When Jenny arrived home after the end of the work day, Bailey and Elle filled her in on the activities and discussion of the day. The first group of influential and trustworthy people were picked from a list of the bakery workers and the following evening; they began to recruit the troops. Elle tried to devise a plan to move more than a few guns and ammo at a time, but everyone was concerned about using a car, afraid it might draw attention. One day, the following week, while Elle was racking her brain to come up with an idea of how to transport the guns and trying not to be so nauseous from morning sickness (which was more like ‘whenever the hell the urge hits’ sickness), a knock came on the apartment door. Bus driver Bob stood in the hallway with a smile on his face.
“I managed to find a cargo van and got it running. It’s parked in the driveway of the gun house.” He dangled a set of keys in the air. “If it goes unnoticed, I’d say sometime next week you can start going over to the house and start loading the guns in the van. Then when we’re close to ready, somebody can drive it back here and park it out back.”
“Sure, leave the physical labor for pregnant woman,” Elle smiled and snatched the keys from his hand.
“Well, girlie...” He teased and winked. “You’re the only one they aren’t watching.”
***
/> And so, that is exactly what Elle did. When the time was right, she began going to the home early in the morning. She worked as long as she could, hauling the munitions up from the bunker to the garage, little by little, taking breaks as needed to rest her aching back and sometimes swollen feet and ankles. Much of the ammo was packed neatly into wooden crates and due to the excessive weight, they had to be uncrated and carried a few small boxes at a time, but Elle was very tedious with her task and emptied each crate and carried the empty crate to the garage and then the van. Once all was in place, she repacked it in perfect order. With the near constant exhaustion and morning sickness from hell, it took her a week to move everything to the garage and another two and a half days to carefully pack it into the back of the box van. Just over three weeks from the day she received the keys, the task was done. The days were growing longer and hotter, and it made for miserable mid-days of trying to sneak back to the apartment high rise.
When Elle had completed her project, she didn’t tell anyone. Instead, she took two days off to do nothing but rest and recuperate. It was in the evening of the third day that she finally admitted her accomplishment. Elle was resting on the couch when she heard talking in the corridor outside of the apartment. She was not terribly troubled as it felt like it was time for the busloads of workers to start returning from their day at the bakery. A jingling sound echoed just on the other side of the door and was immediately followed by the twisting of the knob and the opening of the door, allowing Jenny and Bailey to come spilling into the apartment with an endless rambling of nonsensical conversation. When the door was closed and locked, the tone quickly changed.
“How are you feeling?” Bailey asked. “If you need to take a break for a day to rest, that’s cool. Don’t feel like you have to work non-stop just because you want to get it done before your baby comes.”