Chapter 2: Horror Show
2.1
Juan and Ozzy take a quick survey of the aftermath. The hangar is full of ships turned upside down by Ozzy’s gravity manipulation. The bulkheads and the various hulls look chewed up, pocked with thousands of tiny impact craters. The ground is covered in dead bodies, pools of blood mixing crimson with pale blue, forming a macabre mosaic. Hundreds of thousands of silver ball bearings litter the deck.
A groaning sound rises from one of the piles of bodies.
Juan turns toward it fast, pulling two pistols, weapons he can manifest from his own blood. The crimson revolver from earlier, and a shorter, heavier double-barreled black one. The crimson revolver is called Faith. She sings fast and far. The black one is Hope. She speaks in a slower cadence, but she’s brutal up close. He approaches the sound slowly, saying to Ozzy, “Let’s clean this up, amigo. Make sure no one shoots us in the back.”
Before Juan can move, Ozzy relays his grievance telepathically.
Juan’s shoulders slump. He lowers his guard slightly, reacting to Ozzy’s voice, which only he and Alice can hear. “Really, amigo? C’mon, I’m sorry!”
He turns to Ozzy, floating, two wings flapping, the other two folded across each other like arms beneath his clock-shaped hand guard.
Ozzy’s screen reads: [ >:-#]
Juan pleads with his disgruntled sword friend. “I’m sorry, amigo! I had no choice! You saw the size of that guy. He was like a grizzly bear!” He raises Hope and points it at Kryoc’s bisected body. Ozzy wants none of it. Juan keeps making his case. “You serious, amigo? C’mon. Hope is strong, but she can’t take down a gigante like that!”
A near-dead Red Moon survivor makes a desperate last stand, aiming his gun at Juan.
“Okay. That’s what you want, that’s fine.” Juan turns fast and fires Hope. The close-range blast from the double-barrels scalps the top off the goblin soldier’s head. His lifeless body crashes down to the deck.
Ozzy makes his point with Juan. [ >:- o]
Juan looks at the dead soldier that Hope nearly decapitated. “Ok, maybe Hope could've taken out the gigante, but I didn't want to take any chances.”
Ozzy’s screen [ (-_-) ]
Juan turns back to Ozzy. “Let’s go do this behind some cover.”
They move behind one of the parked ships in the hangar bay.
Ozzy’s screen reads: [ >:-( ]
“Let’s be quick,” Juan says.
He pulls Ozzy from his sheath and gives him a couple of quick swings, shaking the blood from the blade.
Juan glances at Ozzy’s screen. It reads: [ :/ ]
“Really? You’re too much! ...Fine!”
Juan wipes Ozzy’s blade against his pant leg, working to clear away every last trace of blood, then slides him back into the sheath. Ozzy flutters away, satisfied.
“There, you happy now? Look, now we both got stinky ogre blood on us. Okay, amigo. We even Steven now.”
Ozzy’s screen reads: [ :p ]
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2.2
They head out to continue their cleanup, Juan drawing Faith as they move.
“Juan,” Alice calls through the bracelet, “can you hear me?”
“Yeah, go ahead, Alice.”
“These energy constructs, they’re semi-autonomous, right?”
“Yeah. Ozzy makes them from my memories. That’s why they’ve got personalities.”
Juan and Ozzy sweep their surroundings, checking that every threat’s been neutralized.
“Can Ozzy make them himself?”
Juan pauses. For a brief moment, an image passes through his mind, the last time Ozzy tried this technique alone. Juan can see the cavalry figure Ozzy made without him, rendered blocky and crude, like a low-polygon character out of some survival crafting game.
The image is of a child’s game figure covered in blood and gore.
Juan glances back at Ozzy before answering. Ozzy’s arms fold across his chest. [ (-_-) ]
Juan chooses his words carefully. “Ozzy can make them, but it’s not easy to build something functional from scratch and not...”
Juan sighs. “Let’s just move on. Ozzy gets a little embarrassed about it.”
“Oh, okay. I need a tracker. One of these guys can do that, right?”
“Yeah, take Little Arm. That’s his specialty.”
“Is that the one who stopped and raised his hand? The one with the bandana?”
Juan laughs. “Yeah, that’s definitely Little Arm.”
“His arms seem perfectly fine to me. Why do they call him that?”
Juan pauses nervously. Then he turns and glares at Ozzy, hissing in a scolding whisper. “Why did you say that? She’s still just a niña.”
Ozzy’s screen shows his winking angel emoticon: [ O;) ]
Alice chimes back in. “Aw, poor guy. It must be hard growing up with a deformity like that. A third little arm. Poor thing.”
“Uh, yeah.” Juan raises a finger toward Ozzy and mutters, “No more, amigo.” Ozzy just shrugs with his energy wings, and they move on.
Alice signs off. “Alright, Little Arm. I’ve got a mission just for you!”
Juan and Ozzy resume their search for survivors amid the carnage.
Juan reaches a cluster of bodies and drops down to examine their weapons. To him, the rifle resembles a massive machine pistol, something between a MAC-10 and a bullpup carbine, with two triggers. He picks it up, testing its weight and balance. The rear stock houses a large trigger, too big for any human hand. The forward trigger, though, fits his fingers naturally. “That’s clever,” he says, studying it. “Both the little gremlin things and the big ogre can use this.”
He releases the rear magazine. It’s clear plastic, roughly a third full of the same silver bearings scattered across the deck. He glances at the damaged ships around him. The rounds eat through metal without ever fully punching through it. “Ah. That makes sense. No wonder they were so aggressive with their fire.”
Ozzy spots a trio of alien soldiers still moving nearby. Juan walks toward them, talking to Ozzy as he goes. “I’m surprised Alice didn’t ask me more about her code being similar to these aliens’.”
He arrives at the trio. Bloody, wounded, barely clinging on. Juan stands over them and raises his left hand, the stitched one. A red split opens across his palm, revealing Metairie’s gift: her anja. A solid red eye, framed by a four-petaled lotus flower, a single dot at its center, its design echoing the Illuminati symbol on his belt buckle.
“Looks like Alice got distracted chasing down that orb,” he says. “Probably for the best. Not sure how she’d take it, finding out her own technology came from deals made between these aliens and the Illuminati.”
The anja begins to pulse. Something leaves the soldiers, pulled out of them, and they shrivel where they lie. Juan’s wounds begin to close, slowly knitting themselves back together. He reaches back and touches the singed stub where his ponytail used to be.
Still gone.
He’s annoyed about that.
“Juan!” Alice’s voice jumps an octave. “What’s going on? I can hear voices, loud, angry voices in my head!”
Juan sighs. “Sorry, Alice. I just absorbed some life force to heal myself. It tends to drag memories and emotions along with it.”
“Yuck! This is gross and creepy! Don’t do that again! Argh!”
“Yeah.” His voice drops, quieter. “I know. I don’t really like it either.”
He turns and starts toward the bay exit doors, Ozzy strung up behind his rear left shoulder like a rifle, the cord from the scabbard wrapped around Juan’s grip, facing backward to watch his six.
“When we’re done with this,” Alice says, “we need to figure out some boundaries, Juan.”
“I understand.” He surveys the corridor ahead. “Alice, lock the doors open and black out all the lights.”
He reaches up and tugs at his right ear. It comes off cleanly, transforming into a small shadow bat in his palm. A smooth black void sits where his ear used to be. He sets the bat gently on his right shoulder, and it stays there. He tickles behind its ear, and it rubs its tiny head back against his finger like a kitten.
A moment later, he can hear every door slam open in the ship, distant and echoing. The lights drop away to nothing.
Juan walks in darkness, the echolocation bat guiding him forward, Ozzy’s screen dimmed to a faint, barely-there glow. From Juan’s perspective, the bat projects sonar outward, circular rings flying ahead of him, mapping every shape they wash over, painting the corridor in invisible contours only he can read.
“Hey, Alice,” he says, pulling up her image on his bracelet. “Do me a favor. Let’s find a ship to take us out of here, and let’s locate the most secured room on this vessel. Like a vault.”
“Got it,” Alice replies.
Across the ship, the cavalrymen move through dark corridors like vengeful spirits, their energy forms glowing just enough to unsettle. They pass over anyone who hides or runs. Anyone who fights back, they put down without ceremony.
“Juan.” Alice’s voice comes in softer than usual. “I’ve got a feeling, the one you called Boss. It’s hard to explain, but I think he wants to show you something.”
“Got it. I can sense him.” Juan adjusts course. “Let me make my way to him.”
He follows the bat through branching corridors until he reaches the entrance of a large room. The echolocation can only paint outlines, but the shapes inside are enough to slow his step. Tubes. Hundreds of them. And Boss standing in the center, an ethereal horseman glowing in the dark.
“Alice,” Juan says quietly, “can you turn on the lights to this room only?”
“Just give me a second.”
The lights come on.
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2.3
The room is full of human beings.
Every tube holds one, floating in suspended animation, wired and connected at every point. Men, women, children. Every shape, age, and race the Earth has to offer, all suspended in the same cold silence. Every one of them is missing the top of their skull. Parts of their brains have been removed. Wiring runs directly into the exposed gray matter.
“Oh my god, Juan.” Alice’s voice has gone very quiet. “What’s going on? I’m looking at the footage and the data. Are these guys like poachers or something?” A pause. “Oh no. There’s kids in here.”
Juan moves through the room without speaking, his face solemn, almost remorseful. He turns at one point and sees a child-sized body floating in one of the tubes. That’s a little too much. He turns away quickly and looks up toward Boss instead, the towering energy construct, eyes stern, face projecting a cold and patient menace.
“I know, partner,” Juan says. “This world is still full of monsters.”
“Juan, I’m seeing transaction data.” Alice’s voice works through it in real time. “Receipts. Payments. Did you know about this?”
Juan’s bat twitches. Movement in the shadows. He starts scanning. “I heard rumors. But I didn’t know people ended up like this.” He turns sharply. “The Illuminati liked to act like they were the big shots who ruled the world.” His crimson revolver is already in his hand. He fires a couple of warning shots into the dark to stop the movement cold. “But they were just street pimps, selling the planet to greedy scumbags from outer space.”
Alice goes quiet for a moment. Then: “The similar code... they sold people for technology. The same code that makes me—”
Two figures try to hide in the shadows.
Female goblins, dressed in nurse outfits. They hold each other, shaking, their eyes wide and fixed on Juan’s pistol.
Juan stares them down. His pistol steady.
“Listen, Alice.” His voice is even. “I won’t sugarcoat this. Every hero is someone else’s monster. Every monster is someone else’s hero. The grave doesn’t care either way. The worms eat both sinners and saints. All our bones taste the same.”
He keeps his focus on the nurses, letting his echolocation bat scan the room.
“I’ll tell you about the duality of being human. A great man once told me this.”
Boss tilts his head toward Juan. Curious.
“If you go back far enough in every man’s bloodline, you’ll find two things. A king and a slave. We all carry the blood of a king and the blood of a slave.”
Boss looms over Juan. Almost proud.
“So what’s your choice, Alice? Are you going to follow the path of a king, or are you going to follow the path of a slave?”
He lowers the pistol and waves it aside. The goblin nurses glance at each other, then scramble away into the dark as fast as they can.
He looks back up at Boss.
Boss watches them go, then looks back at Juan and tilts his head. Quiet. Measuring.
Juan turns for the exit.
“I’m sorry. I need time to process this,” Alice says.
“It’s okay.” He keeps walking. “We’ve got the rest of our lives to figure it out. Hopefully it’s a long one.”
He glances back up at Boss one last time. “I know what you’re going to say. Even after two hundred years, I’m still a softie.”
Boss smirks.
The two of them walk out together. “Shut the lights off,” Juan says. “Let’s get off this ship.”
The lights black out behind them as he follows Boss out of that accursed place.
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2.4
Cut to the bridge.
Emergency lights pulse a dull red. Auger stands in the command and control module, screaming at the three female goblins who pilot and run the vessel’s systems. His alien language needs no translation. The fury in it is universal.
The senior pilot has long flowing blonde hair and glasses. She holds her station with the practiced stillness of someone who’s survived Auger before. The navigator has reddish wavy hair and is doing her best to stay small. The systems officer has shoulder-length black hair and a fresh black eye, doing her best to shield herself from Auger’s swinging attention.
Auger reaches for his sword, a cutlass shape, but where the blade should be is a large drill bit, dark and serrated.
Then a blue-white energy sword punches through the door from outside.
It’s Pancho, the cavalry man built in Juan’s image. Auger and the girls scramble back. Auger levels his drill sword and drives it straight through the center of the door. The tip pierces Pancho’s chest. Through the small window, Auger can see the construct is completely unfazed.
He spins the drill blade.
The rotation tears the door apart in a widening circle, the spinning force displacing the energy construct faster than it can reform. Pancho comes apart in a vortex of blue and white smoke and is gone.
Auger retracts his sword and immediately turns it on his lead pilot. He advances on her, speaking in sharp alien words, extending the drill toward her chin. He spins it slowly, just enough to draw blood. She holds herself as still as she can manage, eyes forward.
Auger finally withdraws. He turns and storms out of the bridge.
The pilot collapses into her seat. The other two move to her immediately. The systems officer, once the door has shut, turns back toward it and extends a middle finger while she yells with considerable feeling. The navigator quickly covers her hand.
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2.5
Juan, Ozzy, Boss, and the little bat continue through the darkness.
A thinking emoji pops up on Ozzy’s screen as he relays his theory to Juan’s mind.
“You know, amigo, I remember that movie. It had that alien that was using humans to make superdrugs,” Juan says. “That could explain the human farm.” He turns it over in his mind. “If you’re right, then why would they need to rip out most of their brains?”
He stops suddenly. Closes his eyes.
“Juan,” Alice says. “Did you feel that?”
“Yeah. Somebody just took down Pancho.” He opens his eyes. “Any luck finding anything?”
“Yeah, I found a massive ship hangar.”
Juan grabs the back of Boss’s saddle and swings up. “Alice, take Boss there.”
Boss breaks into a gallop, his glowing form cutting through the dark corridors like a lantern on horseback. “Alice, let’s bring everyone back there.”
“Okay.”
They ride in silence for a stretch. Long enough that Juan notices it.
“Alice, you okay?”
“Yeah.”...“It’s just... a lot to process.”
“It’s okay to feel that way. That’s a lot of weight to carry.” Juan watches the corridor walls slide past in the dark. “But you don’t have to carry it alone. Me and Ozzy, we’ll help carry it. We’re all basically la familia now.”
A small sound, something catching in her voice before it settles into a quiet laugh. “Yeah. One dysfunctional la familia.”
“A vampire, a demonic sword, and a beautiful AI construct,” Juan says. “One dysfunctional la familia, wandering space. Mija, how’s that sound?”
Alice is quiet for a moment. “You know... that doesn’t sound so bad, after all.”
A drill comes flying out of the darkness and punches through Boss’s chest.
Juan erupts into bats before he’s finished the thought, dispersing wide, letting the attack pass through empty air where he’d been sitting. Auger emerges from the shadows ahead, night vision goggles over his face, drill sword in hand.
Before Boss fully dissipates, his hand steadies. He draws a pistol, a crimson revolver nearly identical to Juan’s, and fires one shot. The round cracks one lens of Auger’s goggles and explodes his right eyeball.
Auger drops his sword and grabs his face, crumpling forward.
He feels a gun barrel press against his skull.
He looks up.
Juan’s black double-barrel pistol, Hope, floats in front of him, held by an arm that’s still forming, bats collecting around it, building upward, until Juan stands whole in front of him. Nothing in his eyes but malice.
He recognizes Auger from the towering holographic projection back at the landing. In person, he’s a foot shorter than Juan. Right now, he’s trembling.
Juan studies him for a moment.
“So, puta,” he says. “You’re the big bad Captain of this ship.”
He drives the twin barrels into Auger’s skull, forcing him to stumble backward. “Huh, gilipollas? I bet they paid you a pretty penny to hollow out the skulls of those niños, so you could, what, cook up some kind of drug?” He keeps advancing, forcing Auger back until his skull is pinned against the wall. Juan presses the barrel in and clicks the hammers back. “How about I hollow out yours, cabrón?”
Then he hears it.
A liquid trickle. Hitting the floor.
The smell confirms it before anything else.
Juan looks down. Looks back up at Auger.
“Oh,” he says. “You’re one of those guys.”
Auger snaps his piss soaked leg upward in a desperate kick.
A gunshot echoes through the hallway.
Juan’s instincts yank him back before he’s made a conscious decision. Not fast enough to do anything useful, just fast enough to avoid being splashed with piss. And that’s all Auger needs, to make Juan flinch and miss.
A flashbang bounces off the floor between them.
The world becomes white noise and white light. Juan’s echolocation bat recoils, snapping back to his head. Now he’s got blood coming from that ear. He blinks, half-blind, half-deaf, reaching out.
Ozzy rises up behind him, four energy wings spreading from the sheath, brightening the corridor enough to cut through the aftermath. Juan’s vision swims back. He looks at the floor. The drill sword is gone. A trail of piss leads to a small ventilation corridor in the wall, the cover slightly ajar.
Juan stands there for a moment.
“A smart coward like that,” he says, “is like a mosquito. Annoying. But still deadly.” He turns away. “Ozzy, let’s go. We’re almost to the main hangar.”
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2.6
The hangar lights come on as Juan and Ozzy enter, and the doors lock behind them.
The other four cavalrymen are assembled in the center of the bay.
There’s the massive Dutch, the unkillable Hanged Man, standing beside his usual partner, Quiet Eye, the team’s sniper and Little Arm’s brother. Near Little Arm is Shanghai, the time traveler. Shanghai holds a grudge against Juan, claiming Juan kicked him through a time portal.
Standing beside Little Arm is a holographic projection of Alice, rendered by the stolen orb, and she’s enormous. About twice Juan’s actual height, her projection fills the space like a jolly green-tinted giant.
Juan starts laughing. “Ha, so that was the mission you sent Little Arm on.”
Little Arm nods. He takes pride in getting things done.
“Yup,” Alice says proudly. “So, what do you think?” She spins around slowly, like she’s showing off a new outfit.
Juan tilts his head. He stands next to her and looks up, then back at Ozzy.
Ozzy’s screen reads: [=o]
Alice pauses. “Why did Ozzy call me a kaiju?” Then she looks down at herself, and at Juan standing beside her knee.
“Oh, I’m gigantic!” She turns to Little Arm. “Little Arm, why didn’t you tell me?”
Little Arm shrugs. He doesn’t look particularly troubled by it. He likes big women.
Alice looks back down at Juan, a slow smirk spreading across her face. “You know... I might keep this. What do you think, Juan?”
Juan looks up at her. “Up to you, mija. Doesn’t bother me. You’re free to be whoever you want to be. All I care about is that you be your best.”
Alice gives a quiet smile and nods.
The cavalrymen all chuckle to themselves, the easy, warm chuckle of people who’ve heard something like that somewhere before.
“Let me readjust the settings, someone maxed it out.” She turns to Little Arm, her enormous holographic hand lowering toward him. “Oh, before I do.” She rubs the top of his head gently. For some reason, her projection can interact with the energy constructs. “Thank you, Little Arm.”
Little Arm leans toward her and sticks his cheek out, waiting.
Alice blinks. “Oh, I suppose you’ve earned one.” She leans down and kisses him on the cheek.
Little Arm smiles. Then he looks directly at Juan and winks.
“Ozzy, hold me back,” Juan says immediately.
Ozzy deploys two of his four wings and pins Juan in place.
Juan points across the bay. “Hey, wey! You better not get any funny ideas! This niña here is like my little sister!”
Alice is laughing at the spectacle of it. “Juan, why are you arguing with your own memories?” She glances back at Little Arm. “Besides, Little Arm is harmless. I like him.” She smiles at him. He returns it.
The rest of the cavalry are thoroughly enjoying themselves at Juan’s expense.
Juan settles down. “Hey, mija, a strong memory can have a life of its own. Real memories are real.” He turns and begins waving the cavalrymen toward the exit. “Okay. Time to go. We need to leave. Vámonos.”
Dutch and Quiet Eye tip their hats and dissolve into smoke. Shanghai gives Juan the bird before he dissolves. Juan just laughs.
Little Arm lingers.
Juan claps his hands together. “C’mon. Boss and Pancho are waiting. Let’s go, wey.”
Little Arm looks at Juan. Nods. Then turns to Alice, and blows her a kiss.
She pretends to catch it, and presses her hand gently to her heart.
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2.7
On the bridge, the emergency lights still pulse their dull red.
The three women stand facing each other. The pilot speaks quietly, in their alien language, holding back tears. The navigator is not holding back at all. The systems officer has angry tears running down her face as she shakes her fist, saying what needs to be said.
The pilot bows to her crew.
They return it, and then break into each other’s arms.
When they separate, the pilot turns to the control panel and opens a red key box. She removes the key inside and hands it to the systems officer. Then she unclasps the necklace from around her own neck, another key, and presses it into the navigator’s hands.
They look at each other. They nod.
The systems officer and the navigator sit down, turn to face the console, and flip open two red covers.
Both keys go in simultaneously.
A drill punches down through the ceiling near the door.
Auger drops through the hole he’s carved in the ventilation shaft, landing in a crouch on the bridge floor. He’s covered in dirt, blood, grime, and the unpleasant reminder of who he really is. His right eye is missing.
The three women look at him.
The navigator covers her nose and turns away.
The systems officer looks at him for a long moment, then slowly begins to smirk, looking off to the side to hold it together.
The pilot simply stands and stares at him. Her gaze doesn’t waver. Not accusing, not afraid. She looks at him with a sense of finality. She’s had enough and won’t take it anymore.
Auger stares back. Her eyes work on him in a way the darkness and the combat hadn’t. He turns away from her, and finds the systems officer no longer bothering to hide her expression.
He erupts. He swings his drill sword at her.
The pilot moves first.
She throws herself between them. The sword takes her across the head. Blood and bone scatter across the consoles, across the other two women, across everything. The pilot’s body slides down the control panel and comes to rest on the floor.
Auger freezes.
The navigator and the systems officer look at each other once, a single, clear look, and turn back to the console.
They turn both keys at the same time.
Red lights flood the bridge. Horns start blaring. An urgent announcement in their alien language rolls out across every speaker on the ship.
Auger can’t process it fast enough. He’s lost everything, the crew, the prisoners, the ship, control of the situation. He scrambles at the computers, trying to claw something back, finding nothing he can reach in time.
The systems officer curses him out with both middle fingers raised, laying out everything she has left to say. He cuts her down.
Her blood reaches the navigator.
The navigator looks like she’s praying. Asking for something, forgiveness, or maybe just an ending she’s chosen herself. She turns and gives Auger a single, gentle middle finger while she prays.
He cuts her down too.
He runs.
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2.8
In the hangar, Alice has just finished resetting the projection orb. She stands now at a reasonable five feet, give or take, looking like herself.
The alarms hit all three of them at once.
Juan looks at Alice. “You know what that is?”
“I’ve translated their number system.” She runs the calculation. “All I can tell you is that a countdown has started. Roughly eight minutes.”
Juan looks at the hangar doors.
“Shit.” He turns for the exit. “They’re going to scuttle the whole ship.”
End Chapter 2
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and then Add to home screen.