As the friends were discussing their next move, the sound of the hover tank receded, leaving only the sound of chirping birds and the wind blowing through the few dried leaves left in the trees. Punctuated, of course, by the occasional gunshot or rare explosion.
"Is it safe?" Shannon asked, looking around suspiciously.
"I don't know," Alex said honestly, "Marcus, you want to check it out?"
"That's right," he grunted, "send the black man to do the dangerous work."
"No, no," Alex said, trying to placate him, "I'll go. You stay here."
"Nah man," Marcus smiled with perfect white teeth, "I was just giving ya'all shit. It's no problem."
"We'll both go then."
"A'ight. You can handle y'self, so dats cool."
"Okay then. Let's go."
They were gone and back again within ten minutes, making barely a sound. "They seem to be gone," Alex reported, "maybe we should move into the school, at least for now. They've already cleared it, so they think it's empty. We should be safe for awhile."
"I like that idea," Karen agreed, "if nothing else it'll get us inside and under shelter."
"I'm good with that," Tony said, and the others agreed.
After packing up all of their gear, they made their way carefully, though not very quietly, to the high school. Alex and JJ, full packs on their backs and rifles at the ready, led the way with Marcus right behind. The rest followed in an uneven train, carrying bags and stumbling through the woods.
Hey Marcus," Tony said as they walked, "if you could beany kind of fantasy character, what would you be?"
"Ninja," he said without pause.
"Really? Why is that?"
"Perfect combo of stealth and whoopass."
"Interesting."
Entering the school through the new opening in the side, they saw an extra amount of carnage. Anything in the invaders' way had been either thrown aside, or simply smashed. The good news was that it made a convenient path for them to take to get inside.
Alex led the way through the empty hallway to the wide staircase leading up. On the second floor all of the doors had been kicked in, but otherwise it seemed mostly intact. The door just across the hallway caught his attention.
'CHEMISTRY LAB'
"I'll be in here," he said, "so if you want to look around, be back here in an hour."
"I gotcha boss," JJ said, "I'll help you in here."
"I'll set up on the roof and keep a lookout," Marcus offered.
The others said that they had things they wanted to do and scattered in different directions. John made his way to the auto shop, Karen to the computer lab, and Shannon to the nurses' station. Tony wandered off without giving any clue as to where he was going or what he was going to do.
Wild laughter brought Marcus' attention around from his perch on the roof. It wasn't jovial laughter, or even the laughter of pain. It was the laughter of a madman. Marcus could hear it in his voice from afar, and a cold chill of dread spread from his scalp down his spine, and rested in his gut.
"You can't catch me, coppers," the madman shouted in a Cagney voice from somewhere in the woods, "you'll never get cuffs on me!"
"What the hell," Marcus wondered out loud as he turned his binoculars in that direction.
"I'll get you, you dirty rats," came another shout, followed by several gunshots.
"Coppers? You dirty rats? What is this, old movie day?"
"Woo woo woo," came a Three Stooges sound. And then the sound of a grenade going off.
He could actually see the grenade blast, just a block to the east; a plume of smoke and fire that set some trees aflame. More gunfire followed, at which point Marcus ran for the stairs to let Alex know what was happening. Surely he had heard the grenade blast.
"What was that?" Alex asked, meeting him at the bottom of the stairs.
"I think it was a grenade."
"Invaders?"
"I don' think so."
"Then who?"
"Some crazy bastard spouting old movie lines."
"Old move lines?"
"Don't ask me."
"Show me," Alex said as they both ran back up to the roof.
"Hasta la vista, baby," the insane man was shouting as they two reached the rooftop.
They got there just in time to see a man, butt naked except for the straps of a backpack and a black mask, running up Poyntz Avenue, a large caliber revolver in one hand and a grenade in the other. He was tall and thin, his long brown hair waving in the breeze, and laughing maniacally. One of the black clad aliens was chasing him, and catching up, while another one lay motionless in the street a block back from it.
"Go ahead," the man screamed, "make my day," as he turned around and began firing at the thing, emptying the cylinder in one salvo. "Muahahaha," he cackled crazily.
The alien was first hit in the front leg and stumbled to the side. The next two shots missed, but the next two punched holes in it's breastplate, and the third cracked the helmet that had resembled an evil warthog with fangs. One of those fangs broke off as the bullet shattered the faceplate that was located inside it's open mouth. The thing dropped limply to the ground and stopped moving.
"Can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man!" he sang as he ran past the school towards the neighboring zoo.
"What the fuck, man," Marcus said as he stared in disbelief.
"That's a new one," Alex agreed. "Go find John and escort him out to the bodies. He said he wanted to get his hands on some of their tech and this is the perfect opportunity."
"On it."
"High ho Silver," the voice echoed up the street, "away!"
A few minutes later, Marcus and John ran from the school doors towards the fallen alien. Alex's hunting rifle was ready and trained on it, just in case it wasn't really dead. Bit it remained motionless as John began stripping things off of it, black blood pooling underneath.
After a couple of minutes, Marcus went from keeping watch to helping strip the armor off of it. Then, using the breastplate as a sled, they piled the rest of the armor up so that it could be pulled back to the school. Marcus picked up the rifle and brought it with them.
"Mission accomplished," Marcus panted when he got back up to the roof.
"Excellent job," Alex told him, "I'm going back down to take a look."
"Roger dat."
"So what does it look like," Alex asked when he got back to the science lab.
"I can't quite figure this weapon out," JJ said, holding it in both hands.
"The armor is brilliant," John said, shaking his head, "it's like super lightweight metal or composite combined with Kevlar."
"So our friend must have been using armor piercing ammo."
"What friend? Do we have someone new?"
"Definitely not. He was a batshit crazy naked man, running around and shooting aliens."
"Yeah," JJ snarked, "let's not invite him in."
"Keep working on that rifle," Alex told him, "I'm going back to my chemistry experiment."
