It ended up being another fifteen minutes, but eventually the alarms blared from the aliens, tearing the air. Preparing for it made it tolerable, no question. With her ears covered, the noise was muted and not as jarring as when it woke her up. The noise lasted a few moments and then vanished. She lowered her hands and blinked.
“What’s even the point?” She slapped her hand against the wall, breaking the silence.
“The point to what?” Matt looked up at her.
“The aliens. If they’re here to kill us, why not do it already? And why do they eat us when they’re finished? Why the alarms? Why everything?”
Matt ran his hand through his hair, pushing back bangs that would fall in front of his eyes every five minutes without proper attention. Her hand itched with the need to push that lock back, and smooth out his hair and touch his shoulder again, which were surprisingly broad, given that -
Focus.
“Well, the eating isn’t too hard to figure out, I bet energy is involved somehow,” Matt said. He was wearing his explainer-Matt face, the one that came out when it was a topic he’d pondered over. “Maybe they’re converting biological material for power? The lasers must be a substantial drain and maybe if they shoot too often, the batteries will fail. So, by only shooting when we’re outside, they can limit the amount of energy they expend.”
“You’re wrong,” Abby interrupted, yawning. “It’s because we’re mice.”
“What?” Matt looked over at his sister.
“Remember when we had mice last year, and I wanted to keep one, but Daddy wouldn’t let me? He sealed up the holes in the walls and put traps outside all around and said, ‘As long as they don’t bother us, we won’t bother them.’.”
“The aliens see us as mice?” Heather asked.
Abby nodded. “They’re trying to keep us in the walls, so we leave them alone. I bet there’s an Abby alien who wants to keep us as pets, but I wouldn't like that.” She gave Fuzzy Bear a squeeze.
Heather’s brain pinballed from connection to connection and in an instant, the larger picture emerged, like when she stared at those 3D paintings for ten hours before seeing the image.
“She’s right,” Heather said, and Matt raised an eyebrow at her.
“If we’re mice, why not attack us? This is like sending an army to arrest a mugger.”
“Because it’s not an invasion. It’s an extermination.” Both Cutler kids were staring at her now, and Matt’s bangs had fallen back in front of his face. Her hands almost moved by themselves to touch his hair.
“Like Abby said, we’re all mice.” She cupped her hands behind her back. “Your dad didn’t blow up your house to get rid of them, he clogged up the hole in the wall. If the mice left the wall, they’d get caught in the trap. If they stayed inside…” she looked over at Abby and changed what she was about to say, which was that they’d all die, “…they’d be left alone.”
“They want to keep the infrastructure intact,” Matt said, more to himself.
“This is more efficient than destroying everything.”
“Yeah. Less effort too. If they’re not in any rush, they can send their robots to a planet, programmed to only kill things outside. If the targets stay inside, who cares? Time will handle the rest.”
“They get a mouse-free planet, and as a bonus, all the structures and functions of the planet are ready to use.”
“Oh man, you’re right.” Matt tucked his notepad back into his pocket and got up to pace the floor. “It’s like when the settlers came to the states. The Native Americans had sophisticated roads and cities. The Europeans killed them with a plague and used everything they found. Why ruin the buildings and rebuild from scratch when you can wait for everyone to die? Especially when you’re not in a rush.”
“See?” Abby said. “Mice.”
“That’s why they won’t kill anyone inside. They don’t want to damage the infrastructure.”
“Why do they shoot cars then?” Heather asked. “Wouldn’t that count as infrastructure?”
“If we force the mice analogy, it would be the same as mice driving away in a mouse car. You’d put a stop to that.”
“Like Stuart Little!” Abby clapped around an armful of Fuzzy Bear.
“You got it, Abs,” Matt said.
“These things are exterminator devices.” Heather looked back out the window.
“Sure. It also explains why they consume the corpses. They're cleaning up. They want a purified planet.”
“So why the alarm?”
“They’re trying to force us outside,” Matt said. “Or make us go crazy or stop us from sleeping. Maybe a combination of all of those. It’s part of the extermination pattern. Being trapped inside is bad enough, but the alarm is like torture.”
Heather realized they would never know the exact truth, but this fit. It provided a reasonable explanation for the random behaviors of the aliens.
“Knowing this, how do we win?” she asked.
Matt thought for a few seconds and then shrugged. “I still don’t know. They must be using motion sensors to keep tabs on us. I did a little research while our phones still worked. I'm guessing it's a variant on radio-based motion sensors, because they can keep track of us through walls. In theory, we could disrupt the signal, but we'd need a transistor big enough to send out a pulse that-”
Heather held up her hand to slow him down. Matt could get going when he snagged an idea. “Is there anything we can use?”
He frowned and shook his head. “No. Even if you disrupted the signal, you’d only be able to move in the localized area where the signal stopped functioning. They must be bouncing radio waves off each other, each acting like a receiver node, forming a net. They throw out radio signals to each other and look for a pure sine wave. Anything moving through the net that disrupts the wave becomes a target. That's the easiest way to cover the planet. If we disabled a node, like one single alien, we'd have a window. It’s not possible though. The alien is the node, and to cause an interruption in the net, you’d have to kill an alien. We saw the videos. They're un-killable.”
“Why aren’t they shooting the animals? There’s a squirrel outside right now,” Abby said.
“Weight? The disruption must be large enough to register. Maybe there's a lower limit.”
“Why don’t they shoot each other?” Heather asked.
“I suspect they’re all fitted with devices that tell them ‘although I’m disrupting the sensor field with motion, I’m also an alien’. They'd be equipped with onboard identifiers or something.”
“There’s something in this we can use,” Heather said.
“You both understand I’m guessing, right? This is how I’d do it if I was to program thirty billion death robots. I’m sure it’s off base.”
Heather ignored him, knowing if she gave Matt any rope of doubt, he’d hang himself. Better to keep going. She held up a finger.
“One, we know they’re sensing motion. Two, they have something inside to identify them as aliens. Three, they're communicating signals to each other, and if we can disrupt that, we can move.”
Matt shrugged again. “All guesses.”
“The box moved!” Abby said from the window. “I saw it! I saw it, I swear.”
She moved to the window with Matt and they both looked outside. The box was closer.
“Someone must be inside,” Matt said. “It’s the only thing that makes sense. One of our neighbors must have gotten in during the attack.”
“Why aren’t the aliens attacking?” Heather asked. “It's moving. If they shoot cars that drive away, why not the box?”
“Before the phones died, I watched a video of people trapped at the top of a skyscraper. I was trying to figure out the distribution pattern of the aliens and they were filming from high up, so you can see how they’re all laid out across the city.”
Heather cut him off by touching his hand. He glanced over, his heart in his eyes and she had to admit there was something attractiv
e about being desired. Still, she was trying to be gentle, so she smiled. “But the part about moving?”
“Right. Skyscrapers move. That’s the point.”
“Huh?” Abby captured what Heather was thinking.
“Skyscrapers move. It’s not noticeable when you’re in them, but at those heights they sway, as much as five to ten feet. So, the fact that the aliens don't shoot skyscrapers must mean they have a limit for what they consider 'movement'. Anything human-sized outside at any speed is an immediate kill, but for something like the junction box, you’re technically 'inside' a structure. Same with cars. These things are running a simple check: if human, shoot. If human inside a structure, ignore, as long as the something they’re in doesn’t hit the threshold for movement.”
“Okay, but then we can leave. If we move slowly enough.” Heather didn’t know why Matt wasn’t more excited by this.
“I mean, it’s theoretically possible, and the person in the box proved it. But we’ve been watching for two days and it’s gone twenty feet. Even assuming you can move a foot a minute, that’s only 60 feet an hour, and 700 feet a day, if you moved all day. Enough to get us back into our houses, if we had a way to move the tree house, but from a practical perspective, you’d only be able to move a mile every four days.”
“It’s something,” Heather said, frustrated that Matt wasn’t more enthused by this. He didn’t seem excited and she found herself shaky with anger. Not angry with Matt, although he was the catalyst, but angry with the situation, angry at the world, angry at everything.
She grit her teeth and turned back to the opposite window, the one facing Liz’s house, so she’d have somewhere else to put her eyes. Liz was so close. If she jumped out the rope hole, she could sprint over in five seconds, she was positive. Across the road, up the front lawn, and then -
Wait, what was that on the front? “Are those bottles?”
Matt wandered over beside her to look and squinted. "Beer bottles?”
Now that Heather was focusing, she could see them more clearly. “Liquor and wine and beer.” A huge grin broke out on her face and she was so proud of Liz that her heart ached.
“Half of them are broken, almost like-”
“Like Liz took every drop of liquor in the house and threw it outside.”
Liz
While her mom slept, Liz took every drop of liquor in the house and threw it outside.
Last night, after the power went out, her mom yelled something articulate about the electric company and taxes before clomping up to her bedroom to pass out. Liz counted to five before leaving the basement. Her body seemed like a car in desperate need of repairs, with her injuries making her move like an old woman. She was sure purple and black bruises must be covering her neck, adding to the welts on her cheeks and the blisters covering her forearm.
In the kitchen, she found an old flashlight in one of the cupboards and thankfully, it still worked. Light in hand, she started her search. It took her most of the night to get all the liquor moved from the house to outside. Her mom had hidden it everywhere. The laundry room, the kitchen, even a small bottle in the bathroom. It all got tossed out the open front door. Some bottles broke, some stayed intact, but after a long hunt lasting several hours, every ounce sat on the lawn. She was past caring whether her mother suffered withdrawal.
Now, Liz sat on the couch, waiting. The open front door let in sunlight, and Alexandra would see everything when she entered the living room. This was only step one of the plan. Step two involved the heavy metal cuffs in her back pocket. A reminder of better days when she and Kate dressed as police officers, one Halloween. If part one of the plan didn’t work, the cuffs would fix part two. This was for everything. She would resolve this thing with her mom, today. Now.
It was past noon when Alexandra rolled out of bed, the heavy thumps and shuffles from upstairs letting Liz know the event was close to starting. She couldn’t stop biting at her fingernails, a habit she thought she’d abandoned years ago.
Her mom walked through the living room, head down, and Liz’s heart stopped beating. Her mom wouldn’t remember any of the previous night, but even the sight of her caused Liz’s breath to catch and she experienced a moment of vertigo thinking about how Alexandra would react to the discovery that no liquor remained in the house.
From the kitchen, Liz heard cupboards opening and closing. The one above the fridge was now barren. That had been filled with three full bottles of vodka. Alexandra rushed back through the living room and up the stairs, completely ignoring Liz. She assumed her mom was going to check the master bedroom.
I found the booze there too, Liz thought, and forced herself to stop gnawing at her nails. It’s all gone. The beer in the garage, the wine in the basement, the stash beside your bed, the airplane bottles of scotch. Gone, gone, gone. I even threw out the hand sanitizer, mouthwash, and cooking sherry. The house is 100% alcohol free.
Eventually, her mom would figure out that nothing remained. She could guess what Alexandra would think- did I drink it all myself? Soon, she’d realize there was too much missing.
The odd thing about her mother was the effort she’d put into pretending her drinking wasn’t a problem. The excuses. The rationalization. The hiding. Secret gulps taken behind closed doors, her breath providing a vaporous rebuttal to the lies.
Liz reviewed her plan a final time. What she'd say to her mom, how Alexandra would react, all of it. Her mom would see her destructive behavior for what it was, and they'd finally be able to talk. Maybe even get to a better place in their relationship, one where Liz didn't need to cower under the blankets at night or hide random bruises with cover up and long sleeve shirts. It could go back to the way it was before her dad died.
“Liz, did you drink any of the wine?” Alexandra’s scratchy voice jarred her from her thoughts. Her mom stood halfway down the stairs, holding the railing, the other hand clutching at the collar of her shirt, untucked over the jeans she had been wearing for three solid days. Liz noted the careful language, not her wine or my wine, but the wine. As if it was a neutral occurrence in the house, appearing with the dust on kitchen shelves.
“It’s all gone, mom.” Liz stood up, trying to keep her voice even. Her legs trembled, but she managed to keep her hands steady as she gestured out the front door. “Or as good as.”
Alexandra frowned without understanding and hurried down the steps to peer outside. She got as close as she dared before stopping. The discarded liquor created an impressive mess on the lawn. Not every bottle broke, but many did and the whole thing looked like the remains of a college frat party.
“What did you do?” Alexandra hadn’t turned from the door.
“I threw all your alcohol outside.”
“Why?” Her mom’s hands closed into fists. Liz swallowed, telling herself this would work. Her mom would thank her, once she was free from the liquor. This would work.
“Turn around and I’ll show you.”
A moment passed before Alexandra spun, taking a menacing step closer. Liz tilted her head up to look her mother in the eye, and it wasn’t only the damage to her neck that made it hard. She wore a thin scarf to cover the bruises from last night and she pulled it down, letting it flutter to the floor. Alexandra gasped at the reveal.
“What happened?”
“You happened. Last night. And this.” Liz rolled up her sleeve to show off the blistering red landscape of her forearm. “And this.” She turned her cheek to the sunlight to show off the bruise to its best advantage. Alexandra reached out with a timid hand to rest fingertips on the mark, her eyes darting from injury to injury, finding no safe harbor.
“You think I did this?”
“This is what you do. When you drink. You blackout. You hit me.”
Liz couldn't stop her heart from sprinting now that the words were out. The truth floated between them, and all Alexandra needed to do was pick it up and embrace it. They could heal together.
“No.” Alexandra took a step back t
owards the door. “I don’t do that. You’re lying.”
“I’m not. Why would I lie about this?”
“You’re doing this to get back at me for something. I read about this, you’re doing this to yourself. Like self-harm syndrome.” Alexandra took another step back, shaking her head in time with her denials.
“You think this is me? You do this.” Liz’s voice rose with each sentence and she took a step forward.
“You’ve always wanted to hurt me. Ever since Alan died. I don’t know why.”
“I wanted to hurt you? You beat the shit out of me!” No amount of planning could keep the incredulity from Liz’s voice.
"This move with the bottles is the next step. I see that now." Alexandra stopped backing up. “It’s been so hard since he died, and nothing you’ve done has made it any easier. I’ve done everything for you, I pay the bills, I buy us food, I keep you clothed. What more do you want from me?”
Her mom looked so sincere, so honest. There was no guile in this, and of all the reactions Liz expected, pure and genuine denial wasn’t one. She took a breath to argue and surprised herself by crying. Small tears on her cheeks, but enough to give the upper hand back to her mom, who did not move to comfort her. Liz tried to stop herself, but the tears wouldn’t slow.
“Why do you hate me so much?” Her small voice collapsed under the burden of the words. She couldn’t look at her mother.
“I don’t hate you.” The words said one thing, but the tone said another. “I’m tired, Liz. I’m tired of your games. The drama. The lying about how I treat you. We have enough going on without you acting up. I need you to be a big girl now, can you do that?”
Liz brought her eyes upward. The expression on her mom’s face was weary distaste. Not love, not pity; exhaustion. Alexandra wanted this conversation over. The truth didn't work and neither did the bruises or the tears. Mom hated her. Her heart broke for herself and her consciousness narrowed to a point. She heard the ragged and uneven breath coming from her mouth.
Aliens and Ice Cream Page 17