Chapter 224: (Hesstla)

"Civil Defense is reporting thousands of landings planetwide. All civilians are urged to get to public shelters or, barring that, basements and other underground shelters. Terran military forces urge all Hesstlin within twenty miles of a Terran military base to seek refuge at the base," the voice was saying over the radio. The woman's voice was shot with static and the loud ka-rack of laser weaponry and the high pitched whine of autocannons could be heard in the background. "Terran military forces have labeled these things Type IV Precursors. They have entered the city and are attacking citizens."

Dambree wept silently as she drove the car on the road, following the vehicles fleeing the city. Unlike the other vehicles, she had the lights off. Her mother was beside her, holding her baby sister, who was nursing. The baby's eyes were red and her fur was damp with tears from being pulled from her bed and thrown unceremoniously into the back of a car.

"You left your father," her mother said softly as the cars came to a stop again. People began honking.

"He was dead," Dambree said, her voice flat.

In her mind rose up the image of Alkree's eyes being sucked into his skull as the tentacle vacuumed his brain from his skull. How the blood-slicked bone interior of his skull steamed in the cool night air.

How he had evacuated his bladder and bowels in death as she had scrambled over his body.

"Steer clear of any landing forces. Terran forces are under attack even as they attempt to make planetfall. Do not approach any landing forces," the female said. "I repeat: Civil Defense is reporting thousands..."

Dambree reached over and slapped the button on the radio, shutting it off.

The cars moved forward a few feet.

A flier roared overhead, sliding to a stop. Tentacles came down, tearing open the roof of the car beneath it. The half-dozen crysteel orbs two-thirds buried in armor and machinery had only one that glowed softly blue. The tentacles pulled three Hesstlin from the car. They were screaming as the tentacle lifted them up.

Doors burst open as Hesstlin fled their vehicles and up or down the highway, screaming, to get away from the flier.

Dambree's mother reached for the door and Dambree reached out and grabbed the fur between her mother's ear, yanking her back in the car as her mother screamed in pain.

"STAY IN THE CAR!" Dambree yelled, slamming her mother into the seat. The baby didn't lose suction on the nipple.

YOU BELONG TO ME roared out in her head as the flier dropped all three limp bodies. Three of the orbs went from dark to softly glowing white.

"EAT A DICK!" Dambree screamed, echoing the voice that had answered each bellow. It was stronger now, more voices joining in, echoing in her mind. They were defiant, angry, furious, and she felt stronger joining them in their defiance.

Dambree cranked the wheel and hit the accelerator, bouncing the car over the curbs and into the field of ullikleaf.

"What's a dick?" her mother asked, rubbing the back of her head. The baby was holding tight to her breast with both hands, still nursing.

"I don't know," Dambree admitted, gritting her teeth and trying to keep the wheel straight. "I don't care."

"You shouldn't leave the road," her mother said.

"I know," Dambree said. The car hit a furrow and jostled heavy.

The baby glared at Dambree.

"I peed myself, mommy," Dambree's little sister said. "And my head hurts from Dambree pulling my hair."

"You shouldn't pull your sister's hair," Dambree's mother said.

"I know," Dambree said. Her shoulder hurt from where she had crashed into the door. It felt like there was something inside grinding, like marbles or something. Her fingers tingled and her biceps hurt.

"You aren't old enough to drive," Dambree's mother noted.

"I know," Dambree said.

"You are only in your lower modesty clothing. People can see your mammaries," her mother said.

"I know."

"You're makeup looks like a prostitute," her mother said.

"I KNOW!" Dambree half screamed, tears running from her eyes.

A flier roared by overhead, close enough it rocked the car. There were two others with it, dark machines with a faint blue glow on the top.

Another flier was chasing them. A crude looking craft of black metal that looked somehow wet as well as corroded and badly welded. It had streaks erupting from the nose, arcing in on the left hand flier. The crashing roar of repeated detonations slapped Dambree's ears right before the aircraft roared overhead.

She saw the hand crushing a planet of the Terran Space Force on the bottom of the wings.

"They shouldn't fly so low," her mother noted.

"I KNOW!" she yelled, slamming the brakes. The car jerked to stop and her siblings in the back seat cried out. She turned to her mother, resisting the urge to grab the older Hesstlin and shake her. "I KNOW! I GOT THE CONCEPT! DAMBREE BAD!"

She turned back to facing out the windshield. "Now will you shut up and let me..."

YOU BELONG TO ME!

This time she screamed before the voice had finished shouting in her head.

"EAT A FUCKING DICK!" she screamed as she slammed down the pedal. The electric engine whirred and the car started slowly moving forward, gradually picking up speed.

"That sounds like profanity to me," her mother harumphed.

"I don't care," Dambree said quietly, reaching out and grabbing the bottle from where she'd wedged it. She took two long swallows, emptying it, and threw it out the missing door.

"Drinking. Cursing. Parading around in your underclothing. Hitting your mother and yelling at her," her mother said, shaking her head and making clicking sounds with her tongue. "How did I ever raise such a daughter."

Dambree slammed on the brakes, turning to look at her mother.

"They are killing people out there, and you're going to guilt me? Now? Right now? Right after we saw people get their BRAINS SUCKED OUT?" she yelled.

Her mother slapped her. "Don't you scream at me, Dambree Limberton," her mother said stuffily. She disconnected the baby and set her on the seat then turned to Dambree, shaking one accusing finger. "You need to be more respectful to your..."

The tentacle punched through the roof, the graspers closed on her head, and she was yanked out of the car, still shaking one finger at Dambree.

Dambree slammed on the accelerator again, plowing through the grain, jerking the wheel to the side in the hopes that whatever had just taken her mother couldn't follow her. The car was bouncing across the ruts, through the furrows, slamming down and then bouncing into the air.

Dambree reached out and grabbed her baby sister with one hand, catching her by the leg as she flew up into the air, pulling her onto her lap.

Her sister bit her.

The grain suddenly ended and she shot across a dirt access road.

She could see lightning ripping at the air, explosions in midair. Some kind of wavy curtain made of light in mid-air was barely visible, snapping and sparking at times.

She was across the road and back into the grain, blindly steering for the lightning ripping at the air. She could look up and see streaks whipping from whatever it was and into the sky.

The side of the roof above her ripped open and she screamed, leaning to the side, putting one foot on the steering wheel, pushing the baby onto the floor of the passenger shirt so she was laying on Dambree's abandoned and forgotten shirt.

The tentacle whipped in, the open graspers snapping shut on thin air.

Dambree saw the streaks of light sudden start whipping by the flier.

Then they hit. Explosions cracked out, hurting Dambree's ears, and the flier stopped as if it had ran into the wall, the entire front consumed by rapid explosions.

Part of Dambree noticed it only had one blue light as she sat up and grabbed the steering wheel again. She looked back in time to see it explode with a shriek that she could hear inside her mind and fall into the grain a ball of greasy looking fire.

I love you, Momma, she thought to herself, tears running down her face as she looked forward, her foot holding the accelerator down.

The car hit a rut and bounced onto another dirt road, this one leading sort of toward where the bars of light kept coming from. She cranked the wheel, overturned, then overcorrected, trying to see through her tears. Her baby sister and her siblings in the back seat all squalled as the car rocked back and forth.

She came around the corner and before she could react, she hit an invisible biped in the middle of the road. The surprised looking suddenly no longer invisible biped bounced off the hood, stared at her in shock, and then vanished over the top of the car.

Dambree slammed on the brakes. She got out and looked behind her.

She could faintly make out the biped laying in the dirt. Its clothing kept blurring into the dirt road, making it hard to see. She ran over to it and bent down.

"Oh dear oh dear, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she cried out, tears running out of her eyes and falling onto the biped's face.

"Fuck, my legs. They're broken," the biped moaned. She could see it had a rifle on a strap attached to its back and a heavy belt with a pistol and round spheres with rings on the top.

There was a low bass roar that trembled the bones.

"Help me to your car," the biped said, holding out its arms. "Drag me. We don't have much time."

She tried, pulling on the bipeds arms, but she couldn't move it.

"You're too heavy. I'm sorry," she said.

The biped looked at her. "Oh, Chromium Christ on a quasar powered rowboat, you're just a little kid, aren't you?"

Dambree nodded, still crying.

The biped looked past her.

"And you've got kids in the car?" it asked. Dambree thought it was a male as she nodded.

"Well, fuck," it said.

"Fuck?" Dambree said. "Fuck? Fuck! You're a Terran!" she said. "Oh, please, save my siblings, Mister Terran! Please?"

The Terran looked up and coughed. "I can't, kid. My legs are broken," he sighed. "Move, I'll try to pull myself..."

A stilter chose that moment to burst out of the grain fields. It looked the wrong way at first, then toward Dambree, the Terran, the car, and her siblings.

YOU BELONG TO ME! the stilter roared out into Dambree's mind, making her siblings scream in pain. It's legs extended and it went from only a foot above the ground to nearly ten feet up.

"GET FUCKED!" the Terran yelled back, pulling around the rifle that was on its back.

"EAT A DICK!" Dambree screamed.

The Terran fired, hitting the front leg. The stilter jerked, the leg shattering, and rushed forward. The Terran shifted the rifle even as Dambree cried out, covering her ears, and fired again at the same time as the stilter fired a bluish bolt with a red core that hit the chest of the Terran.

The bluish glowing globe shattered. Then the other. The stilter lurched to the side and the Terran cocked something on the bottom, aimed, and fired the weapon again, this time getting a dull sounding thump.

The top of the stilter exploded and it crashed to the ground.

The Terran was laying on the ground, gasping, his clothing on his chest scorched and smoking. He rolled slightly and coughed, then rolled back.

Dambree grabbed the straps that went from his belt over his shoulders, and screaming as loud as she could, started to drag him backwards toward the car.

Another stilter came out of the grain. Then another.

Like the previous one the looked the wrong way first. The stilts were retracted, collapsed, but Dambree knew when they saw the Terran and Dambree, they would suddenly stand up.

The Terran fumbled at his waist before holding up the pistol. "Security interlock disable, authorization two two niner alpha niner five."

"Disengaged," the pistol said in a female voice.

The two stilters began to turn around.

"Take this, kid. Get out of here. Use it on the littles first, then yourself. Push it against the temple," The Terran gasped.

Dambree let him go, taking the pistol.

The stilters saw them.

YOU BELONG TO

"EAT A FUCKING DICK, STRETCH!" the Terran yelled back, Dambree mostly joining him.

The two stilters rocked back.

"Run, kid," the Terran said, bringing his rifle around. He glanced at the magazine jutting from the bottom and sighed.

Dambree turned and ran as the Terran started shooting. She dove into the car, looking behind her as she heard and explosion. One of the stilters was falling to the side, the top burning, as the Terran cocked the weapon again.

The second stilter rushed him.

Dambree looked at the pistol. It had a red button that she pushed and it turned green. The weapon somehow felt heavier in her hand as she carefully wrapped her hand around the grip.

The Terran was shooting.

She raised the pistol, climbing half over the seat and looking down.

Her little brother and little sister looked at her, their eyes wide, the fur on their faces wet with tears. Blood had run from their noses and ears.

Beyond them the Terran blocked the first tentacle strike with the rifle.

"I love you," she told her brother.

The Terran blocked the second strike but it yanked the rifle away even as two other tentacles lunged forward. He slapped one away but the second grabbed an arm.

"I want momma," her brother said.

Dambree swallowed thickly. "Do you want to see her again?" she asked.

The Terran smacked away the second tentacle but a third grabbed his other arm.

Her siblings nodded.

"Close your eyes," she said softly, watching as the Terran was lifted up, looking at both of her siblings who were on either side of the Terran being lifted into the air by his outstretched arms.

They both closed their eyes as the tentacle came down on the Terran's head.

She lifted the pistol, putting it next to her brother's temple.

The tentacles dropped the Terran. One of the globes went white. It had four other blue globes.

She closed her eyes, trying to will herself to press the firing stud.

EAT A FUCKING DICK, YOU METAL COCK SUCKER! EAT ALL THE DICKS! roared out in her mind.

Her brother and sister screamed, clapping their hands to their ears and falling to the floor. The baby began screaming.

Dambree opened her eyes and stared.

YOU THINK I'M INSIDE HERE WITH YOU? YOU'RE IN HERE WITH ME, YOU METAL BRAIN SUCKING LOSER! the Terran was somehow screaming.

Dumbree looked at the Terran. It was limp in the road. She looked up at the stilter.

One of the globes was red. Bright, shining, enraged crimson.

The tentacles came up and began slamming into the other globes.

She didn't know why, but she knew the Terran was somehow doing it. She turned around, sitting back down, and dropped the pistol into her lap as she slammed the accelerator to the floor.

The car whined as it spewed dirt from under the tires, blocking the view of the stilter dancing and capering around even as the tentacles slammed into the crysteel globes.

OLLY OLLY OXEN FREE! COME OUT COME OUT WHEREVER YOU ARE! the Terrans voice shouted. I SPY, WITH MY LITTLE EYE, SOMETHING THAT BEGINS WITH... BRAIN!

She was crying again as she rounded the corner, leaving behind the maddened gibbering capering machine.

There was an explosion behind her that lit up the night.

Dambree kept her foot on the pedal, heading toward the wavering wall of light.

They're mad. They're all mad.