Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 5): May (8 page)

The explosion tore through their charred flesh and scorched bones, almost shattering the entire group of them with the shockwave alone. Sister and Apocalypse Girl took out the few that survived with sniper rifles and we descended into the crater, making sure to kick footholds into the shiny glass. I was honestly not certain what we might find down here, maybe a downed satellite, or a meteor perhaps, both of those might have been responsible for the fireball that tore through the clouds the other night.

When Sister pointed out the glint of metal I felt more certain of my crashed satellite theory, but when the
thing
leaped out from the smouldering wreckage I had to not only revise my ideas, somewhat, I very nearly shat myself.
Fuck me, but this thing was
fast!
In a blur it was on top of The Kid, trying to drive what looked like a steel spike sprouting from the tip of one of its three tails through his skull. He caught it in his teeth, snapping off the spine with a powerful bite. Two more spikes swung towards his head from opposing directions, which he took in one mighty claw each, stopping them mere millimetres from penetrating. A thick green ichor oozed from the tips of the two remaining spines to splash upon the glassy ground beside The Kid.

The thing held onto The Kid's shoulders with one pair of claws, raking at his chest with another pair sprouting from its chest. A third pair of limbs held down his legs. Sprouting from between its 'shoulders' was the head from out of a nightmare. Large, shiny and slimy, it bared its broken, blackened teeth before darting its head down to try to take a chunk from The Kid's own. He blocked the creature's attack by shoving the two spines down its throat.

A bullet hole appeared in the things flank, courtesy of Apocalypse Girl, followed swiftly by another in the side of its head, from Sister's sniper rifle. This only seemed to piss it off and it leaped off of The Kid, towards the girls. This brought it bounding past me, seemingly ignoring me as I sliced into its underside with my katana, releasing a torrent of thick, dark blue blood.
The thing fell at Sister's feet, bleeding profusely, and she finished it with a point black sniper round. The Kid stood, hobbled over to me and we wandered over to investigate the creature.

“
What … the …
FUCK?!?”
Apocalypse Girl wondered, voicing my own question perfectly. I wiped the blackening blue ichor from my sword, then sheathed it in a smooth motion. I kicked the thing over, leaving a trail of giblets behind. The creature had three wide nostrillike openings in the front of its head, just above the toothy, triple-jawed mouth. “Is it … some kind of mutant?” The centre nostril contained what could have been some kind of compound eye. It was beginning to leak out now, though. The whole thing, in fact, was beginning to decompose before our eyes, leaving only a dark blue powder behind.

“
I don't think so,” Sister said bare above a whisper. The smoke was clearing, revealing more metal, scattered about the crater with the largest part almost buried in the middle. Switching to her assault rifle, she wandered over to check it out, stopping for a moment before wandering back. “There're markings on this thing, whatever it is. I think it might be some kind of alien craft. Whatever it is, though, we need to wait for it to cool down a bit more before we can get near it.”

evening
We decided that we would spend the night in the truck, then check out the wreckage in the morning. Apocalypse Girl wanted to just leave, not even think about what we might find in there. She was the only one, though. Sister tried to help The Kid patch up, clean and bandage his wounds, but he told her not to waste anything on him when he will heal up nicely anyway. After a brief argument, he relented and allowed her to at least wash out his wounds with melted snow. He wouldn't allow her to waste any fresh water either.

Once Sister was done with him, The Kid folded himself up in meditative position on top of the truck while the rest of us spoke briefly about what we had encountered. It was hard enough to believe that it was extraterrestrial, but all of the earthly mutations that we had seen at least still bled red, and didn't turn into dust upon death. That, coupled with the smouldering wreckage in the crater beside us did not bode well.

May 16thYear 1 A.Z.

morning
A few Dead had stumbled into the crater overnight, The Kid warned us as we left the relative safety of the truck. Now that the smoke and flames were no longer a problem, Apocalypse Girl took a few dozen photos with her phone. The metal gleamed brightly, though there was little enough light for the purpose, the glass of the crater crackled underfoot as we descended once again. The Kid, whose injuries had already mostly healed over from yesterday, moved in and swiftly dispatched the few new Dead.

The alien craft seemed to have mostly disintegrated upon impact, but a large portion appeared more or less intact. We pulled out our pistols and moved towards the centre of the wreckage, keeping an eye out for an opening of some kind.

We found a corridor that had half been disintegrated, Apocalypse Girl's keen eyes spotting the panels next to rounded doorways. Placing her palm on the nearest, the door melted away, allowing our entry. Glancing at me momentarily, she entered the newly discovered room, gun leading the way. I put my own away, drawing my sword instead, quietly motioning for Sister and The Kid to stay outside and on guard. If anything came at us in these cramped quarters we would be ready.
The shining walls inside the room were pristinely preserved, betraying no sign of any kind of crash. Apocalypse Girl had discovered some kind of medical lab, it seemed to us, as there were small, sharp instruments arrayed on racks, not to mention a large, menacing-looking machine tucked away in one corner, bristling with what looked like hypodermic needles. A holographic display flickered to life, showing a pair of skinless, hairless and very naked humans, male and female. A moment later the display showed the insides of the pair, the female being obviously pregnant. With a start I realised that it was Apocalypse Girl and myself. The display disappeared a moment later, as we exited the room.

“
Anything interesting in there?” Sister asked us. I shook my head, while Apocalypse Girl described some of the equipment we had seen. “Ahh, the anal probing room, I see.” We smiled somewhat at her attempt at humour. “There might be something useful in there, though.” I told her that it seemed unlikely, anything alien would have different physiology to us, after all and any medication would be geared towards them. Undaunted, she ducked in anyway, returning a moment later with some of the sharp, spiky protuberances, saying that she had been thinking more along the lines of weaponry than medical supplies. She carefully wrapped them and put them away.
Apocalypse Girl tried the next panel, on the other side of the corridor. This one opened onto what was clearly a cargo hold, though the cargo had not survived the crash. Whether it had self-destructed or been burned away by the fires which had consumed part of the alien craft was irrelevant, all we could see was black soot covering every available surface. The stench was unbearable, and we backed away. The door closed, cutting off the unpleasant odour.

“
Shall we see what's behind door number three?” Apocalypse Girl joked, swiping her palm over the third and final panel, at the end of the vastly-shortened corridor. I followed her through, Sister close on our heels. When we were through, The Kid folded himself under the low doorway.
The sight that lay before us was not a pleasant one. Two bodies, definitely not human, had been crushed with such force by loose machinery, spreading a greyish souplike glorp around the room. All that remained intact was the arm of one alien under one machine, the legs of its companion sticking out from under another in a death not unlike that of The Wicked Witch of the West. Not a lot left.
Moving further into the room, The Kid theorised that it must have been the bridge, or command centre of the craft, as there were several displays around the edges, with seating for the crew that monitored them. A large, central chair dominated this end of the room which The Kid suggested was likely the captain's seat. It looked cramped and uncomfortable. Sister asked him how he knew so much about alien ship design. “I don't,” The Kid replied. “I just used to watch a shitload of Star Trek.”

I thought I saw movement from behind one of the consoles, went over to investigate with my katana at the ready. There were several more dead aliens over on this side of the room, seeming to have been thrown into walls, the ceiling perhaps, and crushed with the impact of the craft crashing. They were small, barely over a meter in height, by my best estimate, hairless but for a soft, dark green downy looking substance covering their greyish skin. The more or less human-like facial features were a little disturbing, though their eyes were a little larger and their ears much smaller, almost funnel-like in
appearance.
Each one wore a tight-fitting uniform, shiny and metallic to look at, though soft as silk to the touch. Apocalypse Girl had moved over to my side while I investigated the pile of dead extraterrestrials. “So they really
are
little green men, then,” She observed. “Little green
fluffy
men...” At that moment one of them moved. Apocalypse Girl stood from her crouching position, gun in hand pointed at the apparently not dead alien. It started to convulse.

Asking Apocalypse Girl for a hand, I grabbed hold of its arms, she took its legs. A moment later we had it lying on a small table in the medical lab, the holographic display showing what I assumed to be ruptured organs and shattered bones. In seconds, the machine in the corner powered up, ejecting a tray just large enough to deposit the unconscious, seriously injured extraterrestrial. The tray disappeared back into the machine, which began to whirr and buzz, the pointy needle-looking attachments jabbing down into the body of the device, and, I assume, the alien inside it.

noon
The medical machine worked its technological marvels in under an hour, and the tray spat out a freshly healed, but still unconscious, extraterrestrial. The holographic display showing the previous injuries compared to the current state of the alien. The Kid went off to grab some food for the rest of us, at Sister's request, and we sat around eating, waiting for this odd little creature to wake up.

“
I never thought I'd ever meet an alien,” Apocalypse Girl told me. “For fucks sake, I never even thought they existed!” She sounded shaken. Taking a deep breath, she calmed herself. “Then, I never thought the Dead would walk, either.” That was one of the things I admired most about Apocalypse Girl, her adaptability.

“
I always knew they were out there, somewhere,” Sister told us. “Just not this close!” She chuckled. “Should we maybe tie this little guy up?” She gestured at the unconscious alien. I told her that, since we didn't know if it was hostile or not, it was probably better not to. We had our weapons, if necessary, I also pointed out.
“
Weapons not necessary. Mean humans no harm.” The little critter sat up, chattering at us in a gravelly, yet strangely high-pitched voice. “Gratitude for not restraining or detaining.” Sister was staring at it, an amused smile on her face. It blinked. Three sets of eyelids. The eyes themselves were black. Apocalypse Girl offered it some of her Meat-beast steak. “Not needing feeding. Also different inside. Food wrong food.”

I asked it where it had come from, it thought for a moment, then pointed, up and to the east. “That way.
Loooooong
way away.” It looked upset. “Not able to tell. Not know human talk well. Told no more humans when arrived. Found your group. Was watching you. Too closely.” Its mouth moved upwards slightly. I realised after a moment that it was smiling.

“
What are you even doing here? On Earth, I mean,” Sister asked the little guy. “I mean, in the movies, aliens only come here to wipe us out, or enslave us, things like that. You seem, well, too nice to be like that.”

The extraterrestrials mildly alien visage turned sour. “Scientist. Here to learn. To watch. To listen.” It waved a gloved, four-fingered hand over its other wrist. A moment later one of the radio conversations between Apocalypse Girl and Soldier warbled from a tiny, hidden speaker in the alien's uniform.
“
So your people didn't infect us with the Dead Plague?” The Kid asked it.

“
No.” It said. It sounded very sad. “
Humanity
made humanity extinct with Dead Plague.” It looked at each of us in turn. “Sorry.” It smiled again. “But some left! Thought would all be gone by now. Maybe able to help. Take to new place. New planet.” Its expression turned thoughtful. “But would bring infection. Not possible.”

“
What was that thing that attacked us outside?” The Kid asked, describing it. I shuddered, remembering the sheer vicious brutality of the monsters attack.

“
Mnanx.
Mostly used to hunt. To protect. To guard. Loyal,
very
loyal. Like Earth dogs.” It smiled again, this time slightly sadly. “Bigger. Nastier. Shame you had to kill. Like
mnanx.
Good companions.”

evening
We spoke with Fluffy late into the night, it seemed fascinated by how we had managed to survive. It spoke little of its homeworld and species, though it told us they were asexual, from a binary star system and were able, at least at relatively close range, to communicate with one another telepathically. Not with any other species, however, at least not with any that the
Schfrandfelths
had encountered this far.
Schfrandfelths
being Fluffy's species. Apocalypse Girl asked it if there were any other aliens out there, to which Fluffy responded in the affirmative. There were three different factions right now, in fact, that were engaged in a political struggle for control of a planet that was considered uninhabited, requiring only a cleanup job which should take only a matter of months. One wishes to colonise this planet, it told us, one wanted to save whatever could be saved of the native flora and fauna, which would involve massive amounts of genetic research, not to mention the mutation, forced evolution, really of thousands, maybe millions of different species, any and all that could not adapt to the way their world was changing all around them.