Chapter 60
Saturday, September 27, 2059
19 days to Armageddon
Choose Your Character
Trent hated airports. Navigating a dirty, noisy, crowded airport reminded him of why he didn't fly very often.
Worse, before now, he'd only flown by himself. Today he was with his fiancee and her three daughters, none of whom were any happier to be at the airport than he was. He sighed. Airport security had pulled them to the side and told them to go to one place, then another. They had less than an hour before their flight and whatever issue security had with them had yet to be resolved.
“Mom, I'm tired.” Seven-year-old Chloe clung to her mom's hand while pulling a wheeled suitcase.
“We're almost there, honey,” Isabelle said, towing a wheeled suitcase of her own.
“You said that hours ago.” Chloe lagged behind, forcing her mom to drag her along.
“Our flight should be right up there,” Trent said. “Flight 170. Looks like it's on time. If we can get past this security nonsense, we'll be boarding in 30 minutes.”
“Thank God,” Isabelle's oldest daughter, Tamara, said loudly, picking up her pace. Patty, the nine-year-old middle child, trudged behind her older sister, pulling a suitcase of her own.
***
CHOOSE YOUR CHARACTER.
The large obese boy ran down the hall, trailing five other students. Behind them came screams of once ordinary people turned into monsters. Panting for breath, the boy reached the double doors leading outside the school, in time to see them slammed shut in front of him.
Somebody on the other side of the doors laughed. “Too slow, Chubs.”
“Let me out! This isn't funny!” the large boy shouted, pushing ineffectually against the heavy doors.
“Come on. He's not one of them. Let him out,” somebody else said.
“Too late,” the first voice said. “They're right behind him. Besides, Chubs would only slow us down.”
“Good point. Let's get out of here.”
“Bye Chubs. Think of this as evolution in action,” the first voice said. “Darwin's a bleep.”
“My dad's got this huge shelter,” the first voice continued, harder to hear now because they were moving away from the door. “It's got a Jacuzzi, sauna, swimming pool, armory. It's even got a liquor cabinet.”
“Sweet.”
“Chubs,” whose real name was Byron, backed up against the doors, terrified. The large, obese young man looked smaller, facing over ten approaching alien monsters.
Byron started hyperventilating. Voices ran through his head from the past. He's like a baby elephant, just want to put him to sleep. Beat it, Chubs, you'll just get in our way. Was that an earthquake or did you trip, Chubs? Sorry, Chubs, we didn't bring enough food for you.
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All the laughter, insults, and cruel jokes from his years of being a picked-on fat kid went through his mind in an instant, and his fear turned into a mindless rage. Without thinking, his mouth opened, and he screamed a formless challenge: “RARRR!”
For a long second, the monsters stopped, unsure of themselves in the face of this aggression. Before they could recover, Byron charged, bowling over the first three monsters, picking up the fourth, throwing it into the school doors hard enough to make the doors bulge outward. He grabbed another's tentacles, tearing them out of the owner's mouth in a spray of green slime and blood. Byron's world turned red.
The next thing he knew, he was in the teacher's lounge, so weak he could barely stand.
It was all he could do to stagger over to close the door and barricade it with a table. He could hear distant screams and shooting, but nothing nearby.
Around him were the bodies and remains of monsters that had previously been teachers. The floor was sticky with their blood. A box of donuts, squashed, stepped on, covered with blood, green alien slime, and dead alien tentacles sat forlornly on the floor in one corner of the teacher's lounge. “One thing is certain,” Byron said to himself, “I'm not dieting during an alien invasion. And I am starved.” He proceeded to brush off one of the least squashed donuts and started eating.
***
“That one! I want that one!” Angie called out. “Dibs on Chubs, I mean Byron. I got dibs!”
“You want to play as Big Byron?” Jason asked, unbelieving, looking back and forth between the image of the huge obese boy eating a bloody doughnut off the floor and the tiny girl standing in front of him. Like the others, Jason had showed up at Mr. Osmond's place Saturday morning, the minute he'd heard the game pods had arrived. After hours of setting up the pods and running checks, the gaming began.
“Yes, I want to play as Big Byron. You got a problem with that?” Angie responded, looking back at Jason from her spot in the virtual gray room. All six of them stood in a circle. Above them, in giant glowing letters that somehow remained in front of everyone, no matter which direction they were facing, were the words.
CHOOSE YOUR CHARACTER.
“Tell you what, I'll arm wrestle you for him,” Angie said.
“Don't arm wrestle Angie, Jason,” Leo said. “Anyway, weren't you going to play the gunslinger guy? Personally, as long as I'm in the game, I don't care what character I get.”
“Yes. If we're doing dibs, I got dibs on Gavin,” Jason said.
“Anyone else objecting to Angie's character choice?” Mr. Osmond asked.
“Not to object, but any chance we can play the non-censored adult version of the game?” Liam asked from his spot in the circle.
“I had a hard enough time getting this version,” Mr. Osmond responded. “Fortunately, aside from bleeping out the profanity and blocking a few body parts, it's identical to the original. Since you are all juveniles, I believe this is for the best.”
“I'm curious,” Leo said. “Do any of these characters have happy backstories?”
“No,” Jason answered. “When the aliens invaded, Gavin was a homeless orphan. Joseph an abused child. Nina has to kill her entire family. Sophie is an incest survivor, and Teresa's parents are being held in a secret government prison.”
“Oh, well,” Leo said. “Anyone else have dibs on specific characters?”
“I will be playing Terrible Teresa,” Mr. Osmond said, “as she is the most cerebral character in the game. I will let the four of you sort out who plays the others.”
“He's playing Terrible Teresa?” Jason asked, a look of dismay on his face.
“His pods, his rules,” Leo said. “Remember, I put my neck out for you, Jason. Don't make him replace you.”
“But he's playing Terrible Teresa! With the kissing cut scene. I'm not kissing him.”
“I don't want to kiss you either, Jason,” Mr. Osmond responded. “There's a small red button on the lower left corner of your screen that will take you out of any cut scene. I suggest you use it.”
“I guess,” Jason said.
“So that leaves three of us,” Leo said. “What about Charlotte and Liam? Do you two have any preferences?”
“If possible, I'd like to play Ninja Nina,” said Charlotte. “She seems cool.”
“It's kind of a tossup for me,” Liam said. “Since Leo's spent a lot of time playing Joseph, it makes sense for me to take Sophie.”
“If a character choice isn't working out, talk to me. Maybe we can switch you with someone,” Mr. Osmond said. “Let's play.”