Chapter 35
Thirty-Eight Years Post Apocalypse or 0038 P.A.
Never Hug a Hugabug
Seeker/Gabe rejoined Healer/Ian at the far edge of Paradise Avenue, looking like a drowned rat after his three days of drinking and partying. It took one of Healer's hangover remedies and a gallon of coffee to get him moving.
“You remember Manfred? Little guy we met four days ago?” Seeker asked. “He came to fight. He told me people underestimate him because he's small. So he comes out every year to make a bit of money and bring stuff back for his wife and kids.”
“I guess that's good,” Healer said. He studied their surroundings. They'd hiked down from the mountain and entered a forest.
“And Devon, the guy who came to buy a wife, got screwed, not in a good way,” Seeker said with a chuckle. “If he can be believed, Elma the merchant sold his wife to somebody else, and then tried to replace her with a three-hundred-pound old lady. He's pissed and wants a refund, but they do not do refunds in Paradise Avenue.”
“I'm glad you had fun,” Healer said. “Shit.” He raised his shotgun and fired at the beach-ball-sized alien insect flying toward them.
“How did you miss that!” Seeker said. He aimed his own shotgun and fired, blowing the alien insect to pieces. “I got a three-day hangover, and I'm still a better shot than you.”
“You're right,” Healer said. “Thirty-eight years' practice and I still can't shoot worth shit. And since we're about to get swarmed, that may be a problem.”
“No amount of skill points can turn a turd into a diamond,” Seeker said. He reloaded and fired again, blasting a second alien insect apart. “You know there are these things called stat points that can improve your innate abilities?”
“We got puffles,” Healer said. He hated puffles. If these alien insects got close enough, they'd explode, shooting spikes everywhere. He fired again.
He heard shouts and whistles from a nearby group of children.
“Suppose the swarm came with burrowers?” Seeker asked.
“Best not to chance it,” said Healer, firing again. It was hard enough to fight off flying aliens, without burrowing aliens attacking from underground. He cursed when a distant puffle exploded, showering them with tiny spikes.”
“You know if we could just...” Seeker said.
“Don't even think about it,” Healer said. “Get closer to me, it's plate-and-bowl-time.” Healer reached mentally into his inventory and pulled what looked like a giant, twelve-foot-in-diameter, steel dinner plate, and dropped it to the ground in front of them. Once they were both on the plate, he produced a large steel bowl of the same diameter, so it was directly on top of them, sealing them between the two. Just in time, too. Spikes rattled the outside of the giant steel bowl like rain on a tin roof. He had no idea what the items were originally used for, but he'd found his giant plate and bowl came in handy for protection from smaller aliens.
“It's not cowardly to let kids do our fighting for us,” Seeker said, pulling out an alien light so he could see. He sat with his back against the side of the bowl, looking gloomy.
“Course not,” Healer agreed, pulling spikes out of his arm. “The kids get more credits from BG for killing those things, and it's good training for them. Kids today either learn to protect themselves or they get eaten.”
“When we were kids, we had jocks trying to shove our head into toilets,” Seeker said. “Today's kids just have to worry about aliens trying to kill and eat them. They got it pretty good.”
“Sure,” Healer said. For a time there was silence. “You're getting scared? I know I am. It's coming up to do-or-die time.”
“It's possible this ancient dragon thing might not wake up,” Seeker said. “If that happens, I suppose we'll turn around and go home again.”
“The Ancient One is waking up,” Healer said. “I can feel him from here.”
The two of them spent the time in silence. Seeker checked his cell phone and worked on the book he was currently revising. Healer sat lost in thought, he wasn't looking forward to what had to happen next.
They heard a knocking on the steel bowl. “You guys okay in there?” someone shouted.
“We're good,” Healer said.
“You can put away the bowl now,” Seeker said.
“Yeah, about that,” Healer said. He'd already tried. The problem with their personal inventories was you could store very large objects in them, but getting the objects back into inventory when you were through with them could be problematic. Since the invasion, their world had become cluttered with things that could only have come from just such a situation.
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“You guys got a shovel or lever?” Healer shouted. “Maybe a stone to brace it with?”
Once they got out (one of the kids had super-strength) they followed the sound of crying to a little girl, maybe four years old. It was easy to see why she was miserable.
Most of the spikes sticking out of her were from puffles. Nothing serious, but there were several older spikes with nasty barbs poking out of her stomach, chest, and neck. These Hugabug spikes would be difficult to remove without hurting the girl and making things worse if the barbs broke off inside her. Without the basic regeneration gift all humans had at this point, these barbed spikes would have killed her by now.
“Go home, stupid. Quit following us.” A boy of ten with six wings coming out of his back glared at the girl from where he hovered nearby. Five other kids of varying ages, genders, and weapons gathered around to see what the men were up to.
“What do you say about Hugabugs?” Healer asked the little girl.
“It was a nice Hugabug,” she said, looking miserable.
“Doesn't matter,” Healer responded. “Never hug a hugabug.”
“Yeah, Stupid. Hugabugs are alien filth,” said the boy.
“Hugabugs may seem cuddly, and friendly like a big teddy bear, but you never want to hug them.” Healer said to the girl, as he pulled out his medical kit. “I'm going to give you some strong medicine to get those spikes out of you.”
“Mom says we have no money to waste on minor injuries like this,” said the boy. “If she'd just stay still for a couple of weeks, those spikes would come out on their own.”
“Fortunately for all of us, I work for free,” Healer said. “Why don't you all go home, and we'll meet up with you later.”
He waited until the other kids lost interest in the old men and wandered off. The kid with six wings hovered nearby, keeping watch. Perhaps he wasn't as heartless as he seemed. Healer turned back to the girl. “What's your name?”
“Melody,” she said in a quiet, shy voice.
“Well, Melody, I want you to take this,” he said, calculating a dose of painkillers large enough to knock her out, but not enough to cause serious side effects.
“She doesn't seem to have any gifts to speak of,” Seeker said quietly. “If we save her from this, she'll probably die of something else.”
“Then we did what we could,” Healer responded.
“Perhaps this will help,” Seeker said, holding out a small vial of silver liquid. “I was saving this for an emergency. But let it never be said that Zoltron the Mighty Wizard has no heart.”
“Thank you, Brother. This should help a lot.” Healer added the silver liquid to the drug he gave her. A few minutes later, the little girl was unconscious.
First, Healer pulled out the mostly harmless popper spikes, then produced a scalpel to remove the heavily barbed Hugabug spikes, careful to avoid cutting any major arteries or vital organs in the process.
Healer's surgical technique would make the sloppiest pre-apocalypse surgeons roll in their graves, but in a world without infection where most non-fatal injuries healed quickly, his technique worked fine. With the silver liquid from Seeker enhancing her body's regenerative abilities, it was only a couple of hours before she was awake again and running around, playing with the other kids in front of her home.
***
“Cough it up, kids.” The farmer/mother said to Healer and Seeker's young rescuers. She was a large woman and obviously pregnant.
The six kids moaned, giving up the credits they'd just made, or at least some of them. “We fought hard for that money,” said the eldest boy of around twelve.
“You eat here, you sleep here, you contribute upkeep,” his mother said without sympathy. “We are grateful to your kids for rescuing us,” Healer said.
“Don't see too many of you pilgrim guys coming through here, and thank you for whatever you did for Melody,” she said. “You want to join us for dinner?”
“If it's not too much trouble, we'd like to rent a room for the night,” Healer said. “Someplace private: we have a lot of praying to do.”
She shrugged, “Thirty credits apiece. I'd charge less, but I got taxes to pay. If I can't make the yearly quota, they send psychics to find out why. Hate those creepy bastards.”
“Wouldn't want anyone to be in debt to those guys,” Healer said, handing her the money.
“Look at me, I've got magic,” a dark-complexioned little boy said. He held his hands apart, causing lightning to shoot between his fingers. Everybody's hair stood up.
“Neat. You are magic,” Seeker said, leaning forward to get a closer look.
“No magic in the house, Ned,” his mother said. “He's our little lightning bug. Take my word for it, you do not want to be near this kid around water. Come on, kids, back to work. You've all got chores.” The kids groaned, but everyone started moving.
***
Seeker and Healer helped with the chores, then joined the family and hired help for dinner. During dinner, they learned about how The Three ruled this area, keeping a tight rein on the farming industry. The farmers had to buy and sell from them, and pay their taxes on top of that. It seemed injustice prevailed, even in the alien apocalypse.
***
“Like I was saying earlier, The Ancient One is waking up,” Healer said in the dimly lit room where he and Seeker had settled in for the night. “This dragon will be at least one hundred times stronger than that silver dragon that nearly killed us twenty-three years ago. So any lingering doubts you might have, now is the time to speak.”
“He will be the equivalent of one thousand to eight thousand silver dragons, according to my calculations,” Seeker said. He pulled out his pipe and loaded it with tobacco, summoned a spark from his hand to light it, then drew smoke into his lungs and exhaled. The smoke caused Healer to cough, but he didn't say anything. “I've learned a lot since the silver dragon fiasco. My offering will be worthy. You may have no doubt.”
“This offering is your best?” Healer asked.
“It's my best,” Seeker said. “And I'd bet my life no other human could do as well, let alone better.”
“Then, my brother, we are going to do this,” Healer said. “If we die, we will have died attempting something great.”
“Indeed,” Seeker said.
“The only way we'll get close to this being is if neither The Ancient One nor the church suspects us. If The Church of the Ancient One suspects us, The Ancient One will suspect us and we'll be dead. If we are to have any hope of succeeding, we must become the people we've spent the past five years pretending to be. I'm going to suppress your memories. After that, I will suppress my own memories, the harder of the two tasks.”
“How safe is this?” Seeker asked.
“Medium safe,” Healer said. “How safe is your offering?”
“Very dangerous,” Seeker said with a laugh. “Do what you have to do. I hope you can bring us back afterward.”
Under his breath Healer said, “So do I.”