Aliens and Ice Cream

by Michael James

  “Round two, Kate.” She jutted her chin toward Matty.

  “Leave him alone this time. It’s funny, but you’re scaring him.”

  “I promise to be good.” Heather put her hand on her heart. “How much time are you going to give him?”

  “If he doesn’t ask me out this time, I’ll do it myself. Besides, he needs a win today after throwing up on himself.”

  “Get him into shape. A guy shouldn’t collapse after three laps around the street.”

  They laughed together as Matt approached and Heather sensed the awkward shyness coming off him in waves. Matty Cutler was a sweet, cute guy, but honestly. Grow a pair.

  “I hope you’re not laughing at me,” he said, waving.

  “Oh, we completely are,” Heather replied, and Kate punched her arm. Stop it, her gestures seemed to say.

  “She’s teasing, Matty.” Kate rolled her eyes. “Are you feeling better?”

  “Oh yeah.” He tried to play it casual. “I’m sure it was something I ate, no big deal.”

  “I wonder what the Romans ate before they went jogging,” Heather said, and Kate slapped her arm again.

  “Didn’t you say you left something in the tree house?” Kate asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “Oh right. I should get going.” She took the hint and besides, she’d promised to be good. The tree house would be empty as Liz wanted to stay home, not feeling up to socializing. She worried about seeing Pete with her arm all burned to hell. Heather wished there was something more she could do about the situation, but Liz had sworn her to silence. Maddening.

  She turned to leave when Abby, Matty’s little sister, ran over and slapped her on the bum.

  “Let’s play tag!” Her ten-year-old smile lit up her face, and she giggled behind her hands.

  “Not now, Abby,” Matty said. “We’ll play after dinner.”

  “I wanna play now!” Abby pursed her lips and folded her arms tight to her chest.

  “Why don’t we play together in the tree house?” Heather asked, taking Abby by the hand. “You can tell me about your favorite shows, and I’ll tell you the secret to winning tag.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Come on.” Heather pulled her away and both Matt and Kate looked at her with gratitude.

  She leaned over to say something to Abby when a sound crested over the horizon. It was unlike anything she’d ever heard, a tearing noise that came from every direction. Her ears filled with the sound, a catastrophic wrongness that obliterated thought.

  She saw Matt and Kate clap their hands to their ears as the adults did the same behind them. The sound came from every direction, a low rumble that vibrated through her bones. An earthquake? Beside her, Abby dropped to the ground, crying.

  “Matty,” Abby’s mouth formed the words, but Heather couldn’t hear anything, the sound blocked out all other noises. Matt ran over and picked Abby up, and Heather pushed them all toward the tree house. Behind her, Kate screamed and ran closer to her parents, who stood in front of the barbecue.

  As fast as it came, the sound stopped, and her ears popped in the sudden silence. She looked around, dizzy, not able to get her footing. It was like everything held its breath.

  “What the fuck is that?” Matt yelled and pointed upwards.

  The sky started bleeding.

  There was no other way to describe it. A fantastic rent tore the sky in half, a staggering cut that must have been hundreds of miles tall. Red miasma and smoke gurgled from it. Behind the gash, darkness pulsated, and she mistook it for the night sky, but that couldn’t be right. The night sky didn’t move. This blackness poured from the sky-wound, expanding outward like spilled ink.

  Abby screamed and hugged Matt. Heather grabbed his arm and pulled them towards the tree house. She didn’t even know what she was doing, only that she needed to hide. They scrambled up the rickety wooden steps together. She reacted on pure animal instinct, barely aware of moving, only knowing she needed to run from that horrible tear in the sky and the pitch black that poured from it. Her vision narrowed, like looking down a long, darkened hallway. She could see Pete and his parents down at the end of the street, crouched by the path to the forest, screaming.

  The blackness in the sky took form and where there was once a puddle of darkness, it split apart into individual shapes. Like pepper sprinkled over the sky, the darkness coalesced into black dots. Thousands. Then more. Somehow, more.

  The dots spread across the horizon so fast that for a moment she thought her eyes didn't work. Striations that meant she needed glasses, or something. That wasn’t it though, the black shapes moved, spilling across the sky, blotting out the clouds and sun with their numbers. There must be millions. It looked like a swamp of locusts, but bigger. Behind her, the wind picked up in response. It screamed at her, a buzzing noise added to the cacophony. It was all too much.

  The black dots whizzed across the sky with red flashes coming from them, striking down toward the earth like unerring bolts of lightning. There were no explosions, but the red, piercing lasers were everywhere, and they came closer. Thousands and thousands of red lights fell from the black shapes, creating something like a fireworks display.

  “What’s happening?” Matt yelled into her ear, but she couldn’t talk or move. Frozen, she stared at the horrible fissure that ripped her sky apart. It was odd to be protective of the sky, but seeing it ruined by this creeping sickness, she experienced a nausea borne from impotent rage. None of this was right. Whatever this was, it would destroy everything.

  “Get away from the door,” she said, unsure if any sound came out. She licked her lips to work moisture into her mouth. Some instinct caused her to tug harder on Matt’s arm and pull him further into the interior of the tree house. Abby sobbed into her brother’s neck, her arms and legs wrapped tight around him. Matt’s mouth formed a gaping ‘O’ of shock and he followed her into the shelter.

  In the sky, the black shapes flew closer, allowing her to make out individual details. They were egg-shaped, with no noticeable markings or attachments. Black, but with a gleam and polish that somehow gave off light. Nothing obvious propelled them through the air. No jets, no exhaust, nothing. And fast, so fast, at first appearing miles away and then in an instant, dozens surrounded them, pulling up short and hovering over the crescent. Her first thought was a terrorist attack, but unlike anything she had ever seen on the news.

  From beside her, Matt said, “I think they’re-”

  Before he could continue, the black ships erupted with the same red flashes from earlier. Each blast sounded like a chainsaw, a revving and angry rip.

  They attacked.

  Matt

  Matt couldn’t get his breath, Abby was squeezing him so hard. He didn’t remember walking into the tree house. The past few moments scrambled together. He needed to get his brain working, to figure out what was going on. But between the noise and the tear in the sky, it was difficult to put his thoughts into working order.

  Across the street, he tried to pick out his parents through the cacophony of panic. His mom was nowhere to be found, but there, at the foot of the driveway, his dad picked himself up off the lawn. He looked around and locked eyes with Matt. The rest of the adults focused on the destruction, looking upwards, but his dad was looking at his kids. The same dad that made him laugh, and that everyone joked put a piece of his brain in Matt’s head when he was born. The same dad that loved the same stories he did, read the same books. Especially the ones about monsters, the ones by Stephen King and Dean Koontz. Maybe Dad thought the same thing he did.

  Sometimes, monsters are real.

  “Dad!” he yelled across the noise. He waved his arms and made throwing gestures. “Get everyone in the house!” he screamed, competing with the noise. “Get in the house!”

  His dad nodded with understanding. He must feel it, this wrongness that overrode any rational thought. Hide. That’s what Matt's brain screamed at him, primal instincts taking over. His dad got up and pushed people tow
ard their house – Heather’s parents, old Mr. Gardner, everyone.

  By the forest edge, at the top of the street, Matt could see that Pete and his parents hadn’t moved. The dark shapes spread out across the neighborhood, hovering right around the roof line, hundreds of them, perhaps thousands. Matt wasn’t sure what they were doing, what they were waiting for. A group positioned themselves over Pete’s family.

  Matt tried to scream, but the noise caught in his throat.

  The black monsters opened fire.

  A noise like chainsaws accompanied each laser. Mrs. Carter went down first, one arm pointing when a beam from the craft sheared it off at the shoulder. Before she could scream, two more blasts hit her, putting a hole in her chest and taking off the top of her head. A puff of red mist hung in the air where she had stood. His second Mom, dead. The same woman who let him and Pete stay up late to finish their video games and would smile and ruffle his hair. The chainsaw-lasers reduced her to ruin and his heart hurt so much he thought he was dying. His legs were stiff, rooted to the spot.

  Beside her, Mr. Carter screamed. The lasers pumped holes through him, hitting his head, ripping off his leg, blowing out his stomach. In seconds, the black monsters reduced them to clumps of blood and parts, like broken mannequins someone had covered in red paint.

  Deidre fell to her knees, screaming, and Matt had time to think, surely they won’t hurt a little kid, before the lasers rained down, killing her. Her screams ended, replaced by Matt’s own. He pushed Abby backwards into the tree house yelling, “Stay here, Abby, don’t look outside!”

  He never saw Pete, either he was dead already or had run back into the forest. The black things circled and shot at everyone. People dropped like grass before a lawnmower blade, caught running back to their houses or scrambling for cover. One lady tried to get into a car parked on the side of the road, but the lasers found her and cut her to pieces. There was no way to survive that. Pete would be dead with the rest of his family. The words bounced in his head, jumbling together. It made no sense for Pete to be dead.

  Kate.

  He tried to pick her out of the crowd. Maybe he could wave her into the tree house, something. His head swung back and forth. There. On the road in front, he spotted her. Her hands covered her head, and she cried by herself, alone. None of the adults were close to her. He yelled at her to run. His feet wouldn’t move; he couldn’t make himself take a step towards her. Beside him, Abby bawled.

  Their eyes connected, and the world stopped. The noise faded. Her face filled his vision. She reached out to him. A laser fired from the air above and blew the front of her face from her head, leaving exposed bone. Her arm remained extended, reaching out to him, and she wept dark red rivulets of blood that poured from the holes where her eyes should be. He whimpered, once, and threw up for the second time that day.

  “Come away,” Heather pulled him backwards, and they both sat down, practically falling against the gritty floorboards that made the tree house floor. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and tried to speak, to put into words the horror from outside, but nothing came out.

  His parents were still out there.

  Paul

  Paul’s senses sharpened. Down the street, lasers tore through a family of four. Almost in slow motion, a mother covered her son with her own body before a black drone swooped down, cutting her to pieces. The boy had enough time to cry out a single time before a laser sheared off the top of his head. Paul remembered buying cookies from him, part of some fund raiser. Why were these things attacking his neighbors? They were good, harmless people.

  Everything happened too fast. First the sky ripped apart and now these things fell on them like black rain, firing their red lasers, blasting holes in his neighbors. He looked around, trying to find Matty and Abby. He couldn’t see Krista anywhere, but hadn’t she been right beside him? A flash caught his eye from the tree house, and he heard someone yell, “Dad, get in the house!” It was Matty, clutching Abby to his hip. They were safe, or at least sheltered from the things pouring death from above. He didn’t know what to do.

  “It’s madness!” Someone stumbled into him. It was old John Gardner, gripping him by the shoulders and pulling at him. The contact jarred him back to his senses, and he realized he’d never make the distance to the kids without being cut down.

  “Everyone inside,” Paul yelled. “Come on.” He saw Matty fall back into the tree house with Abby. They are safe, they are safe, they are safe, he thought. He made it into a silent benediction, a small thing to protect his children. They can’t hurt his kids while he prayed. The crazy and perfect idea stuck. He treasured the words like a talisman.

  The black ships whizzed silently through the air, hitting people with horrifying precision. A neighbor he recognized, dimly, ran towards him. Gary? Paul couldn’t remember his name. Maybe-Gary was only ten feet away when a black ship struck. The horrible sounds of chainsaws rattled in Paul’s skull, and then a hole appeared in Maybe-Gary’s chest, below his neck. His head tilted, and he stumbled the rest of the way to Paul.

  “Have you seen my jacket?” Maybe-Gary asked, his eyes wide and unseeing. Blood poured from his mouth. He collapsed into Paul’s arms and they both fell into a pile. Paul screamed, a high-pitched sound, and struggled from underneath Maybe-Gary.

  “They are safe!” Paul yelled. He pushed Maybe-Gary’s wet body to the side and half-crawled, half-ran to his front door, where John was already inside. Sharon, Martin's wife, was with him and had made it to the front step. Paul got to them at the same time another black shape attacked.

  “Watch out!” He dove forward, throwing his body through the open front door, past Sharon. He crashed into John and sent them tumbling. Sharon was a pace behind but wasn’t fast enough. A laser fired, and she screamed as she collapsed to the ground. John jumped over Paul and pulled her into the house and kicked the door closed with his foot.

  A single minute had passed since the attack.

  Paul’s hands were tacky with blood and he tasted pennies. Beside him, Sharon screamed and held her leg. More blood. Blood everywhere, all over his floor. Krista would be so mad, she’d want him to clean it. He pulled his knees to his chest and whispered, “they are safe” a few times for good measure. Sharon would not stop screaming and he wondered if his chant would be less effective now. The rules were not clear.

  “Shh, shh, it’s okay,” he said, knowing the words were lies. He didn’t move to comfort her.

  “My leg. It shot my leeeeegggggg!” Sharon screamed out the final word, writhing on the ground. Paul tried to shush her, all the while conscious of the growing puddle of blood pooling underneath her knees.

  “We have to stop the bleeding, Paul,” John said. "She’s hit, can’t you see it?" His British accent sounded out of place among the carnage and for some reason it reminded him of those old Monty Python sketches. He clamped his hand over his mouth to stop from giggling.

  The lasers had turned Sharon's leg into ruined meat from the butchers. They had sheared her calf off, leaving a ragged hole in her jeans. White bone peeked through her torn flesh.

  “They are-” was as far as he got before a day’s worth of beer and hotdogs exploded from his mouth. He turned his head and added the contents of his stomach to the pool of blood.

  “Okay everyone. Okay. It’s okay. Okay.” John was stuck in repeat, his eyes wide and unseeing. Paul tried to get up, but his hand slipped on the floor. The smell of the vomit mixed with blood, a visceral, raw odor that assaulted his senses.

  Sharon reached out with a shaking hand. "Help me, please." Tears streamed down her cheeks. "There’s so much blood. My kids."

  Paul let his mind run on auto-pilot. What would stop blood? Towels or bandages? And… jackets? Why would Sharon want a jacket? Who had said that? That didn’t seem right. He couldn’t think. But also, they are safe.

  Slipping on the blood, he got to his feet and stumbled to the powder room down the hallway. He grabbed towels and threw them at John, who caught them w
ith one hand, and tried to figure out how to press them on the wound. He attempted to take her leg and Sharon screamed, the terrible broken yell of a wounded animal. Paul clapped his hands to his ears and John recoiled.

  “We need to do something,” he said to John, who nodded. They stared, waiting for the other to make a move.

  “Pressure,” Sharon gasped. “You need to apply pressure.” Paul recalled that she was a nurse or something. He was just glad someone was telling him what to do. She gripped John and pulled him close. “As much pressure as I can bear and as much as you can give. Don’t stop this time when I scream.”

  John looked like he would pass out. Paul didn’t blame him.

  “Water,” she snapped as John leaned forward with his towels.

  Paul rushed to the kitchen. Behind, Sharon’s piercing screams followed. Towels. Jackets. They are safe. All good ideas. In the kitchen, he couldn’t find anything to hold water. He tried cupping his hands and bringing it to John that way, but the water kept draining out. On the kitchen table, a leftover cereal bowl from this morning. Would that hold water? Cereal bowls held milk. Was that right? Matty once called cereal cold soup and he had laughed. His thoughts came to him from a distance, fuzzy and half-formed. It was like watching a horror movie through your hands.

  He filled the cereal bowl, water mixing with leftover milk to create a chalky fluid. In his pocket he felt a buzzing. His phone. He pulled it out and came close to dropping it. His hands were so slippery with blood.

  The display said it was Matty. His boy. His baby boy. Only a touchscreen away. Paul kept trying to slide right, but the sensors on the phone wouldn’t register through the gore coating his fingers. Swearing, he wiped enough of the viscera on his shirt to answer the call.