👽Fred👽

After whizzing down into Earth’s atmosphere at break-neck speed, a flying saucer the size of a football field came to an abrupt, wobbling hover, about 20 metres above the street of the Earthling town, Chook’s Creek. Pressurised gas hissed out of an aperture opening at the bottom which then folded open and lowered a ramp into the sky. A pair of Smarties, dressed in shiny white battlesuits descended to the ramp, coming to a stop at the very edge and looking down at the town below.

Fred’s heart rate was rising and he felt his hands growing sweaty. He gripped the controls of his mechanised battlesuit tightly as if he might accidentally leap off the ramp at any moment. His eyes constantly roved back and forth between the ground below and the heads-up display, which covered part of his vision, providing him information on the status of his suit.

As nervous as he was, he had to admit, battlesuits were rad. They were 150kg of sleek metal and plastic packed within a 180cm, Smarty-shaped frame. A pilot seat was located in the chest cavity where a Smarty could sit comfortably. Fitted with the latest in Smarty military-grade armour, combat assistant computers, and a super rad rocket-powered "fist delivery system", battlesuits could turn your average skinny Smarty into a war god. This knowledge did nothing to calm Fred’s nerves, however.

Below, a crowd of Earthlings had gathered on the street. What was surprising about this was that they weren’t gathered to gawk at the flying saucer. No, it appeared they were far too occupied with fighting one another to even look up and notice what was above them.

"What’s going on down there?” Fred asked, “There are a lot more natives down there than when we were in orbit. I'm feeling less enthusiastic about this every second,"

"Hahaha, you were never enthusiastic. I think this is gonna be awesome. Nothing has changed: twenty aliens, one hundred aliens, it's still the same. Either way, they’ll flee in fear as soon as they see us, then the fun begins! We get to chase them around until we find which one has magic in it and subdue it!” Einstein said cheerfully, “Do take care not to kill any; Earthlings really are weak," She was now bouncing from one foot to the other eager to get started. She pressed a button to add Edison to the conversation, "Ok Edison, We're heading down now. Keep track of us on the computer and guide us towards the target. Got it?"

"Yes, Captain!" Came Edison's enthusiastic reply.

Einstein’s suit grabbed Fred’s by the hand, which caused him to let out a little scream, "Try not to land on a native,” She laughed, “Ready? We jump in 3,2,1, goooo!" She leapt off the ramp, pulling Fred behind her.

Edison’s smarty phone beeped.

Air rushed past Fred and Einstein as they fell to earth. Einstein was screaming in glee while Fred was screaming in terror. After a few moments, they hit the ground with an enormous ‘bang’ cracking the asphalt underneath their feet. The pilots were only jostled slightly; the suits absorbed almost all of the fall for them. Einstein stood up straight and dusted herself off, “Nice; we didn’t land on anyone!” She cheered, then turning to the riled-up crowd of natives, she turned up the volume on the suit’s speakers and said, “OOooOOoooOo We come from another planet! OOooOOoOOO! Flee for your lives!” while waving her arms in what she thought to be a menacing way.

A cricket ball flew over, hitting her in the side of the helmet and bouncing off along the road, “Hey! What the hell!?” she barked.

Fred’s cockpit cameras zoomed in on the ball, curious as to what it was. While he watched it roll away, someone took the opportunity to run up behind him and hit him in the back with a club. He barely moved. His attacker continued with a follow-up swing. Fred ducked under it and counter-attacked with a simple jab to the Earthling’s stomach. The Earthling was sent flying, “Einstein, they’re not fleeing!” he shouted, noticing several more Earthlings approach.

He turned to check on his leader and saw her surrounded on all sides, already in the thick of combat. He started forward to help her, only to have his path blocked by a golf club-wielding Earthling, “Get out of my way!” Fred screamed, grabbing the Earthling by its arms, picking it up and throwing it into another one. He only took two more steps before a man leapt up and kicked him in the chest. A wooden sword cracked into the back of his knee at the same time and he almost lost balance; only his battle suit’s sturdiness kept him standing. He swung a backhand at one of the Earthlings who had hit him, missing completely, ”Arrrggg!” he cried in frustration as a pool cue jabbed him in the side.

In the ship, Edison was watching a “top 10 things you didn’t know about your favourite celebrity” video.

Fred had lost sight of Einstein in the chaos but he could still hear her over the suit's communicator, “Einstein! Are you ok? I can’t see you! Raarh!” He finished his sentence by kicking an Earthling.

“Yahoo! Take that! Haha, Oh, Fred? I was just about to contact you, HIYAAAA!, I can’t reach Edison for some reason, OOPH YOU SON OF A… GET BACK HERE! For now let’s just clear out this crowd and do what we came here to do, ORYAAAAA! The magic Earthling must be close by.”

Fred spun an Earthling around by the legs and flung it away, “I’m going to turn the suit up to full power. This is dangerous!” He said.

“What?! Don’t you dare! You’ll end up killing the target. Just have fun. Imagine that they are all magical fish. *EINSTEIN PUNCH!!!* Seriously Fred, look about, there's no danger here at all! Hahaha.” Einstein laughed with unrestrained glee.

Nearby, from the back of a nearby truck, yellow eyes looked out, examining the 2 unusual creatures who had just arrived from the sky.

Completely oblivious to that, Fred took Einstein’s advice and looked at the Earthlings around him. She was right - there hadn’t been any danger at all despite how many of them were attacking him. He took a deep breath to shake off the last of his nerves, looked up at the crowd of aliens surrounding him and smashed his fists together, pumping himself up, “Alright, nothing dangerous, I’m gonna have fun!”

The nearby truck’s suspension rocked as a large weight it was carrying hopped off the back. Several cultists gasped and whispered, “The Matriarch!” as their badly-injured leader limped through the crowd. Her eyes never left the aliens as she casually backhanded a police officer. Despite her injuries, she still hit him with enough force to send him flying and slamming into two cultists and a cricket player. In front of her were two creatures she had never hunted before. Her hunting spirit burned bright within her soul.

Fred was having a great time, punching a police officer repeatedly in the face when he first noticed the monster approach. He dropped the officer, who kicked Fred in the shin and scrambled away, before exclaiming, “Whoa, that's a big one! Einstein, can you see that? Is it even an Earthling?”

“What are you talking about?” asked Einstein, standing up from german suplexing a cricket player. She jumped up and down a few times to look over the crowd's heads and saw the approaching creature, “Wow, I think we found our target. Edison are you there? Scan that big one.”

In the spaceship, Edison was playing Space Candy Crush.

“Edison? EDISON?! Why isn’t he responding? Gah… Ok, whatever, let’s just suppress it and bring it back ourselves. Remember Fred, it’s not a fish, it’s just an innocent magic victim. Be gentle; we don’t want to break it.”

“Understood, It looks like it’s coming my direction,” Fred said, rolling his shoulders, “Ok. I can do this. Suppressing the target!” he started fighting his way towards the giant.

With a growl from the monster, all the nearby fighters felt the danger they were in and quickly scrambled out of the way. With an open space between them, Fred and the monster squared off each other, sizing each other up. A scream acted as the starting bell, and both of them burst into motion, sprinting towards each other. The monster leapt into the air a few metres before reaching Fred, its arms raised. Fred brought both of his arms up above his head to defend the incoming blow. With an immense thump, the clawed hands smashed down into his forearms, the asphalt below his feet cracked and yellow warning lights lit up in his helmet's display.

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“Holy science! You’re a tough one!” Fred Exclaimed, straining under its weight.

His knees bent as the creature's immense power pushed him down to a crouch. He activated the suit's inbuilt rockets on its back to shoot himself back up explosively, knocking the monster’s arms into the air. He then took a half step forward, twisting and winding his arm back into a heavy telegraphed punching motion. A rocket exploded out from his elbow, adding sudden, intense momentum to the punch. His body spun and his fist shot forwards into the monster. It tried to jump back at the last second but wasn’t quite fast enough; his punch landed on its chest. The blow sent the beast flying back but not before it swung its clawed hands down at him, gouging into his forearm and pulling Fred forward onto a knee. The claws sliced ribbons out of the metal armour.

He rose slowly and watched the wolf-earthling tumble backwards. He opened and closed his suit’s hand, noticing a significant decrease in dexterity due to the claw damage. He was forced to quickly refocus on his enemy as the monster wasted no time, regaining its footing and leaping back towards him. It closed the gap in moments and jumped at him, arms raised again swinging them down towards his head. He leapt back, narrowly avoiding the blow, which instead slammed into the ground, shattering the asphalt. He leapt back once more, trying to put some distance between himself and the monster. It was relentless, however, crouching down on all fours, immediately after its previous attack and launching itself, shoulder-first into Fred. He was unable to dodge this time and was sent rolling backwards along the ground for several metres. Many humans who were foolishly standing too close were knocked aside during his roll.

Cheers erupted from a crowd who had stopped to watch the fight, as Fred stood back up and faced his opponent. More yellow warning lights were lightning up on his helmet’s display.

"Fred, that was awesome! Is everything okay?!" Einstein called out from her spot in the circle of onlookers, “Do you need help?”

"No, I got this. Don't help unless I’m in danger. I’m guessing it was DNA Jellyfish or Yeti Fish that cast a spell on this poor Earthling," Fred replied, dusting himself off.

“I can’t wait to study it and find out!” Einstein said, “Anyway, good luck!”

The monster let out a low growl while hunching down on all fours, ready to resume their fight. Fred got into a fighting pose and gestured with one hand for it to come at him.

It accepted his invitation greedily, springing forward, arms out, jaw wide. Fred’s suit whirred loudly as he leapt sideways with such force that the sturdy mechanical legs strained and creaked from exertion. He twisted midair, rolled on the ground and stood up facing his opponent while his feet still slid along the ground. Rockets exploded from both of his elbows, reversing his momentum, and launched him back the way he came. The asphalt shattered further under his heavy strides. The monster-earthling didn’t even have time to reorientate itself before Fred was upon it. With a wide step and a rocket-powered uppercut, his fist connected with its side with a sickening crack. Its whole body bent around the blow.

The monster let out a wheezing yelp and swung its arm back, catching one of Fred’s legs. Its claws hooked into armour and pulled him off balance. He stumbled and shook his leg free, taking too long to recover. When he regained his balance, he turned and saw the monster towering over him. It came down on him like a ton of bricks, claws knocking his arms aside, giving it space to bring its jaws down. Fred hissed in pain. Cracks spidered out from where teeth crunched into his suit’s shoulder, piercing through armour and stabbing all the way into the pilot chair, into his real shoulder.

From the crowd, Einstein spun her laser pistol out from its holster and opened fire, taking two shots at the beast. Both hit, one in its back, the other in its thigh. They left small bleeding wounds but did less damage than Einstein expected. She was lining up to shoot again when the monster lifted Fred up and started shaking him like a ragdoll. He was spun abound right into the line of fire, preventing a third shot. The monster kept shaking him and slamming him into the pavement over and over. Einstein tried to circle around, but the beast was wary of her now and kept Fred between them.

Fred threw weak punches into the face of his opponent, but he might as well have been hitting it with a pillow. Yellow blood was spreading out from the tooth embedded in his shoulder, his armour was being ripped apart and the repeated slams into the pavement were draining his consciousness. Warning lights flashed, informing him of various systems shutting down. The battlesuit went limp and his body was flung away into the side of a bus.

"Oh, crud! Fred! Use your escape rockets! Fred?! Eidson! Somebody help!" Einstein called out into her communicator. Her calls went answered.

Fred’s ears rang and his eyes had trouble focusing. Not that he could look around anyway. The monitor that showed the outside of his battlesuit had gone dark so now his view was restricted to the little forward window in his cockpit that was pointed upwards towards the sky. He couldn’t see the monster but heard its heavy, wheezing, breaths close by.

Unsure just where it was, he looked back and forth, trying to glimpse it. He gasped and jumped back in his chair when something unexpected flew past the window. A naked, very muscular Earthling, almost as large as the beast he'd been fighting, flew through the sky.

🎣Wally🎣

Wally threw himself out the back exit, spinning around the corner so fast that his shoulder barreled into the wall that the invader’s head had slammed into earlier. Spotting the toilet door, he dashed forward so hard that his feet slid under him, trying to gain traction. With moments to spare, he burst through the toilet door and threw his pants off.

“Ohhhhh sweet goddess,” he groaned. Urine splashed all over the toilet seat and onto the floor as the blessed relief caused his knees to buckle and his aim to go astray. Angels sang, peace filled his heart and he enjoyed a secluded moment of Nirvana.

Several loud noises snapped him out of the moment. It was getting noisy outside. Wally heard the voice of that ogre woman, Wanda, conversing with someone within the store. Further away, he heard screams coming from outside the building. Whatever the police left to take care of was getting rowdy. Some kind of stressful event, no doubt Wally missed being a fat old man, fishing, smoking, and drinking as he pleased. With a sigh, he finished up and left the bathroom.

Looking around the back room of Wanda’s store, he considered his chances of escape. He wasn’t keen on letting Wanda get her grubby mitts on his soul like she did the poor Tomas fella out in a jar on her table. But he didn’t like his chances of escaping if he just ran. He needed something to defend himself.

The back room was strewn about with Wanda’s personal belongings and boxes of cheap imported mystic junk like that on display in the store. Sifting through, he found a box filled with dragon statuettes, like the one Wanda had threatened him with earlier and a box holding a few ornate decorative swords. He passed over both of these boxes as they were useless to him. After some more rummaging, he found a boxful of coathangers like the one he had used earlier; exactly what he needed. Conveniently, Tomas’ absurdly oversized pants were big and baggy enough for him to pocket an entire hanger, which he did. Then, snooping around a little more, he hit the jackpot!

On a side table, among Wanda’s stuff, Wally spotted a packet of cigarettes! He promptly pocketed them. He had been craving a smoke ever since his last puff. Unfortunately, nothing ever comes easily, he immediately ran into another big problem; there was no lighter. He racked his brain trying to remember where he had seen one recently and cursed when he remembered. There was a lighter on the table in the shop with Wanda.

Some heavy impacts outside the store shook the ground.

Cravings got the better of him and he decided to risk peeking in through the back door. Maybe if Wanda was distracted enough by whatever was going on out there, he'd be able to sneak in and grab the lighter. He cracked the door open, he looked into the shop. He was not ready for what he saw inside.

Muscles upon muscles and those muscles had a set of muscles of their own. Wanda was talking to the largest man Wally had ever seen. The guy was a two-and-a-half metre-tall giant of perfectly tanned, bulging mass. His ripped body would put any bodybuilder to shame. The reason Wally was able to understand just how impressive the man’s body was in such detail was that the bloke was entirely naked. Well, except for his eyes. There, for some reason, he wore Wanda’s soul-sunglasses. Wanda seemed to have no trouble with his attire, or lack thereof.

"... If it helps you come back sooner, then by all means," She was saying to the man.

Another crash outside drew both Wanda's and the man’s attention to the front door, “That’s my cue,” he said, “Thank you so much, Wanda. I promise I’ll be right back!” He turned back and reached for her shoulder, stopping abruptly when he spotted Wally peeking through the back door. He looked at Wally for several moments, before giving him a nod. Wanda spun around and glared. Wally cursed under his breath.

The muscle man waved at both Wanda and Wally, then ran out the door. Wanda held her hands to her heart and watched him leave. She let out a lovestruck sigh before spinning back on Wally.

Wally tried his best to act casual like he wasn’t just caught spying. He strode back into the room rubbing his hand on his pants, “Far out, that felt good,” He exclaimed, keeping his eyes faced towards the front door to avoid Wanda’s spiteful stare, “Anyways, who was the anaconda tamer you were yakking to?”

“He is none of your business. Cuff yourself back to the chair.” She ordered.

“Uh... How about we grab a smoke and have a gander at what the fuss is outside first?” he asked hopefully.

Wanda's fists clenched and she looked ready to pounce. Thankfully, There was a howl outside, and Wanda’s cigarette cravings kicked in. The tension slowly left her body, “Alright," She agreed, "But no funny business. Wait here while I get my smokes from out back.”

“No need, I got them here,” He smiled and pulled them from his pocket to show her.

Wanda clenched her fist again.