Huddled behind a car, Parker listened to bullets flash around him. Past the front of the car, he saw a puff of dirt rise into the air from a ricochet.

He risked a peek over the trunk of the car to see the battle rage on near the woods. Parker remembered once setting off a string of firecracker that had seemed to explode for a year, the explosions leaping high as the string disintegrated. The woods seemed like the old memory, only much worse as the lights exploded everywhere in the woods. It was a dazzling sight that robbed him of his night vision.

Movement at the UFO drew his attention. Parker watched as a large alien worked its way out of the hatch and watched the battle. Something about the alien’s stance or behavior suggested it was senior to the small aliens. Or maybe it was simply because the alien was bigger. It attracted Parker’s attention, and he worked his way into a position to take advantage of the alien’s fixed focus on the battle.

Sprinting to the next car in line, he crawled to the rear bumper and looked for a position closer to the alien. The shotgun would never make a hit from this distance and Parker was under no illusion that he could fire a handgun with any accuracy.

There was no logic behind his decision, only a faith in eyesight. He hoped the men in the woods were looking before they fire their guns.

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Brazenly, he stood and walked from behind the car, the solid thumps of bullets hitting nearby making him wince, but Parker did not return to cover.

The aliens had fixed their attention on the woods, giving Parker a clear avenue to the UFO and the time necessary to walk within shooting distance of the tall alien. It still cowered in the hatch, with its head barely clearing the edge of the ship as it watched the fight.

Calmly, Parker raised the shotgun as he walked under the lip of the ship and took aim on the head.

As if it could sense the threat, the alien turned its head at the last moment and stared at Parker.

He pulled the trigger, the alien falling back inside the ship with a smear of green on the hatch.

The racket of the explosions from the woods covered the shotgun report. Cracking the barrel, Parker pulled two shells from his pocket and reloaded the gun.

A small group of aliens, reminiscent of Custer’s last stand, stood in the center of the yard in a tight circle, their numbers diminishing rapidly.

Parker closed on their flank and began firing the shotgun in a rapid series of blasts and reloads, unaware the ramp to the UFO was closing.

The exploding lights ended as the firing stopped, as if the entire battle had come to a close with perfect timing.

Stunned men crawled out of the woods to stand around the dead aliens, their voices lost in the realization they had survived. Of the posse, only a handful of men had survived and none of them knew who they were or why they were at this house. They looked to Parker as a leader, the memory of a man walking into a firestorm the only tangible truth they had seen since waking to this strange world.

Parker looked at the UFO. The hatch was closed against human vengeance.

The only place left to go was the house.