DRUG WAR
Chirping birds, insects, animals, and bustling traffic mixed with the lilting of people chattering in Portuguese all around him. The smell of mangoes, pineapple, exotic fragrances, piss, and petrol filled his nose—the marks of big city life. Retired LAPD captain Mike Harrigan felt like he was in a different world until he stepped inside the modern convention center and heard a familiar voice.
“Weapons of the future! The best new technology! Load ’em up, blow ’em away!” It was a voice he hadn’t heard in twenty-five years and never thought to hear again. Not since his time with the Los Angeles Police Department, a voice from a time of one of the biggest crises in his entire forty-year career. But here he was, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, of all places, and the former Fed, Garber, was standing right in front of him, under a bright neon sign that read: LEGENDS, INC.— Legendary Tech, Legendary Power.
After what they’d both barely survived in Los Angeles, all they’d seen, Harrigan was a burned-out ex-cop who occasionally got invited to speak at urban police conferences like this one, and Garber had moved on to selling weapons and high-tech destruction. Harrigan wondered which of them had learned the most from their experience with the alien bounty hunter.
Vendor booths lined both sides of the long entryway leading to exhibit halls, theatres, meeting rooms, and more of the Rio de Janeiro Convention Center. Crowds of cops, military types, private security, mercenaries, and more examined the wares.
As Garber hefted a long, sleek, heavy-looking weapon—a rifle of some sort with laser scope, attached grenade launcher, and two cartridge bays—a chubby, sunburned, flowery-shirted American tourist poster child and his shorter, round wife stopped and smiled.
“Awesome!” the man said. “Me and my Pebbles need something just like that there back in Texas!”
Garber smiled his best salesman smile. “Totally legal, folks. I can set you up today.”
From behind the Americans, a tall woman with long black hair and seductively tan skin approached with her companion, a shorter, bulkier, older man with a well-developed paunch like Harrigan’s. Both wore sidearms holstered at their belts, despite their three-piece brown suits, and as they turned, Harrigan spotted badges hanging from their belts: detectives.
“Amigo, what is that thing?” the woman asked in the lilting Brazilian accent that had grown so familiar.
“Ah, polícia!” Garber said, smiling broadly as he met her eyes. “This is the answer to all your problems, officers—the LI547-B1, the only assault rifle you’ll ever need once you own it.”
“It looks heavy, like a monstrosity,” her partner said, shaking his head. “You expect us to run with that?”
Garber grunted. “Why run when everyone else will? Once you whip out this baby, it’s over. You can stop them from sixty yards away. Pow!” He chuckled. “Problem entering a building? One blast from the grenade and you can blow your own entryway right through a wall. Blam!” As he described it, Garber demonstrated each move by aiming the weapon and pretending to shoot, shaking it for emphasis at each explosion.
Harrigan rolled his eyes, and the two detectives exchanged a look.
“If it’s even legal,” the female said.
“Oh trust me. Down here, it’s totally legal, or else I wouldn’t be here,” Garber said.
Her companion shook his head again. “It’s insane, amigo. The department would never approve that.”
“What if I told you they had?” Garber argued.
Just then the floor vibrated and Harrigan heard the distant thrum of a big explosion outside. As people around them muttered and exchanged looks, Harrigan and the two cops raced for the door simultaneously, the automatic glass doors opening wide in their path to emit distant screams and further explosions.
They stepped out onto the sidewalk and scanned the area surrounding the Convention Center, their eyes finding a nearby hillside slum where smoke drifted into the deep blue sky, a few buildings in flames as people yelled and scattered down the perilously narrow, steep sidewalks and passages between shacks, trying to get away.
Garber ran up to join them then. “What the hell was that?”
“It’s Cortado Centro,” the male detective said as he squinted toward the hillside. “A favela, slum.”
Another explosion rocked the hillside, debris, flames, and smoke flying outward to form a funnel.
“Merda! What is going on?” the female detective inquired.
“Holy shit!” Garber exclaimed, spotting something through his weapon’s scope.
“What?” Harrigan asked.
Garber looked at him, recognition dawning in his eyes. “Harrigan? LAPD?”
“Retired two years now,” Harrigan replied with a nod. “Garber?”
Garber grunted and handed him the weapon, pointing high on the hillside where a building burned.
Through the scope, Harrigan soon saw it too: a body hanging from a tree, human and bloody—it had been skinned head to toe. The sight was one that had haunted Harrigan’s nightmares for twenty-five years. Ever since the Predator. He couldn’t believe he was seeing it.
“It can’t be,” Harrigan muttered.
“You know it is,” Garber replied.
“What?” the female detective asked anxiously.
“They’re under attack,” Garber said, taking his gun back. “Time to arm up.” Garber turned back for the Convention Center. “Hang on! Let me get my stuff.” He ran back inside.
“Attack? By what? This kind of thing happens with drug dealers a lot,” the male detective said.
Harrigan shook his head. “Trust me. We’ve seen this before. We’ve gotta clear the area, lock it down!” Without further word, Harrigan was running off toward the burning slum and the two detectives followed.
“Lock it down from what?” the female detective called after him.
The three detectives stopped at a busy intersection, racing across as soon as there was an opening, the vehicles whizzing by with narrow misses just as they reached the other side. No one even seemed to have slowed at all.
“Jesus,” Harrigan muttered as he felt the vibration of a speeding box truck racing by, the smell of petrol and sweat mixing with chemicals, piss, and other unpleasantries common to Rio’s streets as he’d discovered.
“Who are you?” the female detective asked, looking at him as they ran.
“Mike Harrigan, former LAPD,” Harrigan replied.
“Ana Rios and Rodrigo Villaça,” the female said, motioning to her partner. “Metro Police, homicide.”
Harrigan nodded a greeting as they continued running. “Nice to meet you.”
“You wanna tell us what’s going on?” Villaça asked.
They rushed onward, reaching the base of the hill, where screaming men, women, and children were rushing out of the makeshift buildings and walkways.
“A hunter, hunting humans,” Harrigan said.
“What?” Rios replied. “A serial killer?”
“Yeah, kinda like that,” Harrigan said. “And we’d better hope to God there’s only one.”
* * *
“Rápido, rápido!” Fernando cried to his neighbor’s passel of kids, swatting their little behinds as they bolted away.
One of them breathlessly paused to glance up at Fernando, tears welling in his little seven-year-old eyes: “Obrigado, Fernando.”
Their mother, Solange, was away when an explosion rocked the favela, upturning the table where Fernando and his grandmother were having lunch and their usual argument about how he was wasting his life. It started, of course, with the flamboyant blouse.
His grandmother chastised him in Portuguese while pulling pão de queijo out of the pathetic makeshift wood-burning oven. “You think you are special, Fernando?” She gestured to the blouse, adorned in colorful palm fronds, tropical plants, with a giant tiger’s face smack dab at the center.
“I like it, it makes me feel fierce.” Then when her back was turned, Fernando gave an obstinate shimmy in her direction.
Her head swiveled around to give him the stink eye. Grannies saw everything.
“You’ll see, Avó,” Fernando said, confidently. “I’m not destined for life in the favela, I am going to be a star.” Licking the cherry gloss on his lips, he smiled. “I’ll soon be acting alongside Brad Pitt and Ryan Gosling in major motion pictures.”
She snorted derisively and settled her creaky bones into a rickety chair only to be catapulted out when the explosion hit.
Fernando blinked hard, finding himself splayed on the ground next to his grandmother, balls of pão de queijo bouncing and rolling around their heads.
Jumping to his feet, Fernando hauled his granny up and out of the shack. The streets were swarming with cariocas fleeing the favela. Smoke visibly rolled through the air.
It was too close.
Solange’s kids called out from next door. They were trapped inside.
Grabbing a fleeing man, Fernando firmly transferred his granny’s hand onto the man’s arm, instructing him to get her out safely. With a grave nod, the man took off, dragging protesting grandma behind him while Fernando hastened to help the neighbor’s kids.
Now that they were out, Fernando knew he needed to get his own fabulous unsinged butt out of there, too. That’s when he saw the trio fighting against the flow of cariocas. They stuck out like a bad perm in a sea of salon-styled hair.
Polícia. Two of them, along with an older black man, his face an arrangement of ferocious intensity. They were all armed and stalking further into the favela.
The woman polícia shouted over the crowd to the black man: “If you are retired, what are you doing here at an arms conference, Harrigan?”
Harrigan shot her a glance. “If Los Angeles has taught me anything, Rios, it’s that war can break out at anytime, anywhere, by anything. I’m all about being prepared.”
Los Angeles! Fernando’s heart thudded in a different fervor of excitement now. If he could just get to the City of Angels, he could be a star! Everyone who moved to Hollywood was instantly given opportunities and made into movie stars. Fernando looked closer but didn’t recognize this Harrigan person, but maybe Fernando just hadn’t seen his movies yet.
Harrigan stopped to squint up at the smoke plumes. “Are you sure we are going in the right direction? I feel like we are running in circles.”
Fernando stepped directly in front of Harrigan, forcing him to stop, and grinned. “Yippee ki-yay, motherfucker!” He deepened his voice, despite his heavy accent: “He’s the disease and we’re the cure.” He still had some work to do on his Stallone impression.
“Get out of my way,” the cop growled. Pointing up at the smoke plumes, Fernando tried a new tactic. “You want to be there? You need my help. It’s a honey brush in here.”
The man called Harrigan gave Fernando a strange, uncomprehending look. The other two polícia slowed to a stop. “Honeycomb,” the other polícia man corrected him.
“Come on, Villaça,” the woman called Rios said to her partner. “We don’t have time for this.” They hurried past Fernando, but he refused to get out of Harrigan’s way.
Seeing as Harrigan was about to slam him to the side if need be, Fernando spoke quickly. “They won’t find it either. This place is a honeycomb.” He used the correct phrase this time. “I help you get there fast, you help me get to the City of Angels.”
Harrigan shook his head like he didn’t have time for this, until he saw his two polícia friends double back, having taken the wrong way the first time.
“Take me there,” Harrigan said through tightened teeth.
Hope blossomed in Fernando’s chest and he couldn’t help the smile spreading across his face. “And you’ll get me to City of Angels?”
“Can we discuss this later?” Harrigan said as an explosion rocked a nearby shack and sent debris raining down on them. Fernando whirled around and led him to where the smoke billowed up, darkening the sky.
Hurrying up and down the winding paths of the favela past rusting housing units, Fernando was about to tell him they were close when another explosion hurled them to the ground.
Sputtering out puffs of sandy dirt, Fernando lifted his head and turned to see if his new buddy was okay. White sand was caked to the side of Harrigan’s unhappy dark face.
Extending an arm, Fernando pointed just around the corner of the next building. “There.”
Harrigan tried to jump to his feet quickly, but the way he moved and the wince on his face told Fernando he had creaky bones like Grandmother. Getting up with more ease to follow, Fernando smacked into Harrigan when he abruptly stopped. Peeking around him, Fernando saw what made him stop.
All hell had broken loose.
* * *
The slanted wood and clay roof next to him exploded as Harrigan followed the Brazilian up the winding narrow walkways through the favela. Pieces of clay, wood, dried palm leaves, and dirt rained down on their heads as they both ducked instinctually even while they kept running.
“Merda!” the Brazilian man muttered.
Then they rounded a corner and entered a small square and the man stopped cold, staring, his jaw dropped open. “Mãe de Deus!” he whispered.
Harrigan saw it too. A decapitated corpse lying in a heap, the head beside it on the cement covering the square, just a few feet from where they’d left the walkway. Blood was still pouring from the body and head, forming crimson pools. To the left, another body lay, stabbed through the chest with a gaping wound—a kind Harrigan had seen before: the Predator’s spear. The decapitation had clearly happened from one of those computerized Frisbee-like discs they carried. Scorched marks smoked on the sides of buildings and a patch of cement between the two bodies—body laser. The stench of burnt concrete and blood now mixed with that of the urine, mud, sweat, and general uncleanliness of the favela.
A familiar clicking sound echoed from the distance. The creature. This shit was not happening again. Not while Harrigan could stop it. His memories of the last time had not faded one iota over the two decades since. If anything, they’d become more vivid. It was a situation he’d never thought he’d face again, and yet somehow he’d always known, always feared the aliens would be back. But this time he had an advantage: this time he knew what to do, and whatever it took, he’d do it.
Automatic weapons fire exploded above them—further up in the favela, tearing apart more roofs, trees, and more, followed by screams and yelling. These people are poor? Drug lords? He put a gentle hand on the Brazilian’s shoulder, as the man stood frozen, staring at the bodies. “Hey, buddy. What’s your name?”
No response.
Harrigan squeezed his shoulder. “Buddy!”
The Brazilian mumbled, “Fernando.”
“Okay, Fernando, who’s doing the shooting up there?”
“Milícia,” Fernando said, still staring.
“Militia?” Harrigan asked. Poor slums with their own militia? Jesus Christ, what was going on down here.
Fernando shook his head and met Harrigan’s eyes. “Drug lords, they run all the favelas.”
Harrigan nodded. “Okay, well, we have to get up to where the Predator is. Can you still take me?”
Fernando stared back at the bodies and nodded.
“There’s nothing we can do for them,” Harrigan said, stepping toward the entrance to the continuation of the climbing walkway across the square. “Come on!” He motioned to Fernando.
Fernando crossed himself, like the traditional Catholic he was, then forced his eyes to Harrigan and hurried to join him resuming the climb.
They ducked under laundry lines, filled with linens and clothes, dodging through more small squares, climbing even as it sounded like the world was exploding above them. Fernando said nothing, he just led the way and Harrigan followed, weapon at the ready.
A few scared women and children rushed past them, headed down. At times, the passage was so narrow, either the runners or Harrigan and Fernando would have to stop, press themselves against a wall and wait for the others to pass. No one said anything; it was all in the eyes. As soon as they were clear, each party continued on their mission, racing as fast as they could.
And then, as they rounded a curve, plaster and wood exploded beside them as a stream of bullets struck a building then raked across the pathway. They halted, shrinking back against the wall and waiting, and Harrigan moved into the lead, motioning for Fernando to stay back as he moved cautiously, sliding along toward the corner to grab a peek.
There were four men armed with assault weapons—two AK-47s, and IMBEL IA2s, of local make—using what cover they could and yelling back and forth as they fired toward a rooftop a level or two higher.
Their bursts of automatic fire were met with streams from an invisible laser cannon exploding against buildings, cement, and other objects around them. The Predator was cloaked, but his red triangular targeting laser appeared and highlighted its targets, causing many to panic, confused. Who was the enemy assaulting them? They did their best to aim in the direction of the laser fire, but the Predator kept moving quickly, each burst coming from some new position, and the four men were hopelessly beaten, even if they couldn’t accept that.
Then, one by one, they were hit, their chests highlighted by a red dot before the laser tore holes through them. From behind his cloak, the Predator laughed or clicked, and Harrigan heard the familiar sound of hydraulics as its laser cannons honed in on one target at a time. Occasionally branches would bend as the creature leapt between them or dust flew from clattering tiles, marking its movements. Each time, the survivors’ fire became more and more desperate, as they sprayed the rooftops and surrounds, spinning, eyes desperately searching for the target. The first three screamed as they died, their chests smoking as they fell.
Their companion’s panic grew with each fallen comrade, and then he was alone, and a thump came from behind him. The man whirled, aiming his IMBEL but then the Predator was on him, a spear slamming through his chest as he gasped, its tip poking out the front as blood flood. The man tried to stay on his feet, stumbling, even as his weapon fell. Then his neck tore open as an invisible knife pulled across it and he collapsed.
“Meu Deus!” Fernando whispered from beside Harrigan, where he’d sneaked up to get a peek.
Then there was a shimmer and a buzz as the Predator uncloaked, his full ugly green spotted, dreadlocked mass appearing before them. The Predator bent to retrieve its treasures, quickly scalping the latest victim, and grabbing his weapon, as Harrigan flashed back to memories of his previous confrontations.
Fernando gasped loudly. “A monster! Cristo Jesus!”
The Predator chittered and whirled, alert and staring right toward them, even as its laser cannon’s servos whirred and took aim.
“Get back!” Harrigan shouted, reaching back to pull Fernando behind the wall, even as he heard a whistle growing in volume, and the ground near the Predator’s feet exploded.
“Take that, you son of a bitch!” Garber shouted and moved into view along a rooftop to the east, aiming a grenade launcher with laser sights, the red dot lighting up the Predator’s chest.
And then the world exploded again as Garber and the Predator unleashed their hellfire on each other.
* * *
Harrigan grabbed Fernando and threw him to the ground as fire swallowed the air above them. Coughing from more concrete dust and thick smoke, Fernando mourned his blouse wasn’t likely to survive this insanity.
When he tried to get up, Harrigan smacked him back down again. Carefully, Harrigan rose to a crouch to get a better view of the fight without losing his head. He stunk of sweat and fear, a scent Fernando had become intimately familiar with in the favela.
Except Fernando’s fear dissipated as he stared up at the crouching retired polícia. His mouth dropped in a small ‘o’ as he took in the white dust smeared across Harrigan’s face; his forehead glistened with sweat and blood, and a gun was clutched firmly at his side. He looked like an action movie star.
And action movie stars needed bigger guns. Lots of big guns.
Scooching back on the ground before getting up, Fernando then whistled at Harrigan. “Hey, you want more guns like crazy down there?”
Harrigan’s head swiveled around to look at Fernando, but his gaze was unseeing, almost haunted. Fernando saw the monster too, but he could question reality and cry like a hysterical baby later. He sternly reminded himself the favela overflowed with hidden and not-so-hidden monsters. You learned quick not to stop and stare when you found one.
He locked eyes with the ex-cop. “Say hello to my little friend, eh?”
Harrigan’s brow creased and his eyes flickered with understanding.
“Rapido, Harrigan,” Fernando cried and took off running just as the building next to them shuddered violently. Laser bolts and gunshots flew overhead. Apparently, neither the monster nor the crazy guy below was dead, yet.
“Guns, yeah, yeah I’d like more guns,” Harrigan said, still distracted but following Fernando now.
Daintily stepping over a couple of bloody decapitated bodies and into a shack twice the size of any near it, Fernando raced around looking for weapons.
Harrigan watched, skeptically. “What makes you think there are guns in here?”
“Because,” Fernando said exasperated, still not having found them, “the drug lord always has guns. Lots of guns.” A flicker of an idea practically lit up over his head and Fernando ran to the small attached bathroom.
“Yoohoo,” he called to Harrigan, pleasure evident in his voice.
Harrigan barely fit into the bathroom alongside Fernando. The rusted-out bathtub overflowed with guns. Big damn guns. AK-47s, Heckler & Koch MR762 models of various types, shotguns, even a few Uzis and other machine guns. Boxes of ammo shoved in stacks wherever they fit around them.
Harrigan greedily gathered up several AK-47s, two H&Ks and an Uzi, but nearly dropped them. Fernando followed his fixation to where the bloodless face was now revealed in the center of the tub. Someone was dead and buried under the guns.
Picking up a handgun, with his forefinger and his thumb, Fernando said, “Yeah, don’t mind him. He was already here.” Then he gingerly placed the gun back on the pile. “I’m a lover not a fighter.”
Thoroughly strapped with semi-automatic weapons, pockets bursting with ammo, and a sawed-off shotgun slung over his shoulder, Harrigan started back for the warzone.
Fernando grabbed his arm to stop him, having second thoughts. “What if you die? How will I get to the City of Angels?”
“If either of us are going to get to the City of Angels,” Harrigan jerked his head to the outside, “we’ll have to go through hell first.”
Fernando clapped excitedly. “Oh, I think I have seen your film.”
Harrigan shook his head before running back, Fernando close on his heels. They found the big crazy one shooting a stream of fire out from a flamethrower. The Predator had thrown up some kind of invisible shielding but it weakened his own invisibility. Fernando gaped as large chunks of the alien flickered in and out of visibility.
The alien gave a high-pitched shriek of anger as it felt the heat of the firepower.
* * *
The top of the slum was exploding with gunfire, detonations, flying debris, and noise as Harrigan led Fernando back along a winding pathway, climbing, searching for a good location to get a bead on the deadly Predator. Men shouted, screamed, and bullets whizzed—filling the air.
“Come on, motherfucker! Is that the best you got?!” Garber shouted and sneered as he launched another grenade then sent a laser-guided stream of automatic fire in its wake straight toward where the alien had been crouching moments before. A wall exploded and fell, the roof caving in—no sign of the fast-moving foe. It was all too familiar, Harrigan’s memory flashing back to images of Los Angeles—gang wars, the streets, Leon Cantrell, Danny Archuletta, Jerry Lambert, even his old Captain Pilgrim. Archuletta and Lambert had been killed by a Predator in LA years ago during Harrigan’s last encounter with one. Now, countless others were adding to the Predator’s body count.
In front of him, a wall exploded, a thatched roof caving in, accompanied by the screams of a woman and children, an infant crying. Harrigan fought the urge to run in and rescue them. It wasn’t safe. He couldn’t do anyone good buried in wreckage.
Drug dealers with grizzled faces bearing various stages of facial hair screamed in Portuguese, firing their AK-47s, Uzis, and sawed-off shotguns at the fast-eluding alien, now cloaked again in the barely visible vibrating haze, but Harrigan knew what to look for. His trained eyes multitasked, searching the mountainside for both an ideal sniper position and the alien foe at the same time.
There he is! Over in that palm tree, moving to a new position. He was tempted to call out but knew his warnings would be too late every time, if anyone even heard them over all the noise. Instead, he ran faster, dodging, ducking, and diving for cover whenever the explosions or bullets came too close. As long as he and Fernando stayed hidden and in shadows, as long as other aggressors took the alien’s focus, they’d be safe. Predators targeted prey who fought back with only occasional innocents caught in the crossfire. They were about the sport of it, and killing unarmed innocents wasn’t sporting on their planet either.
Like his foes, the Predator kept firing off a steady stream of laser fire, his red triangular laser sights the only indication of his location along with hand-thrown bombs of some sort. Occasionally, Harrigan thought he could pick out a familiar chittering chirp, but each time he turned to look, the beast had moved on.
“Look out!” Fernando shouted fruitlessly from behind Harrigan as the corner where Garber had just fired from exploded into a cloud of dust, debris, and orange and yellow flashes.
“Fuck me!” Garber yelled, but somehow he was still standing, face blackened when the smoke cleared, even as he raced for a new position.
“Holy God,” Harrigan muttered as Fernando crossed himself.
“Up there,” Fernando pointed, and Harrigan turned. It was actually a perfect spot—a partially shielded small balcony above one of the few semi-solid buildings on the hill—some sort of residence just north and around the bend from them.
Harrigan nodded. “Good eye. Thanks.” And led the way.
As they rounded the bend, through a break between shanties and trees, Harrigan watched as the ground exploded at a drug dealer’s feet and the man fell, screaming, his body shaking as red holes appeared up his legs, his AK-47 letting off a continuous stream as he fell.
The acrid smoke combined with burning thatch and stucco in a cloud that made Harrigan’s eyes water as it passed over him. Behind him, Fernando squinted, and coughed. “I love the smell of gunfire in the morning,” he quipped, clearly evoking the famous Robert Duvall line from Apocalypse Now.
“Napalm,” Harrigan muttered as he climbed a stepped stone wall up toward the house with the balcony and headed for stairs leading up the side. “It was napalm.”
“Ah,” Fernando said. “Yes. I don’t know what is napalm.”
“Nasty shit,” Harrigan replied. “I hope you never will.”
The seven feet of steps led to a landing covered by thatched roofing and then another enclosed, winding staircase that led up to the short balcony. Harrigan examined his weapons and ammo as he climbed. He had to hit the Predator and hit it fast before the alien spotted his position. Surprise was key as much as focus and staying ahead of the alien.
As Harrigan set up his shot, three more drug dealers fell, chests and heads exploding from their deadly foe’s precision targeting. Only one had a mouth left to scream as he fell and the three companions left standing were panicked, eyes wide and darting about like raving animals now—their attempts at returning fire a mere waste of bullets.
Harrigan looked around: Fernando had disappeared. Where was he? He shook it off—no time to worry about him now.
The rooftop where the Predator stood erupted with fire from a screaming Garber then and splotches of green appeared as the alien was apparently hit. Harrigan heard an alien scream.
Garber cackled. “Take that, you alien fuck!” Seconds later, his face froze as an alien missile finally found its mark and blew his legs apart. What was left of him screamed as he fell, and a red laser lit up his head just before it exploded.
Harrigan had the alien in his scope when it uncloaked, clearly intent on gathering trophies. It hopped down from its perch to the plaza and headed for the nearest fallen prey, chittering.
Harrigan’s hand moved toward the trigger when the alien whirled and their eyes met. He saw recognition there, the alien muttering a strange word, “Ooman… Cetanu.” Its shoulder cannon shifted, taking aim.
Harrigan jerked, his focus back to his scope, when he heard a strange yell—almost like a Southern Rebel yell but with faster syllables. Then below, someone began pelting the uncloaked alien with coconuts, pineapples, and… were those lemons or oranges? Shouting insults in Portuguese.
Then Fernando appeared, fruit strapped to bands on his body like ammo pouches, the Brazilian screaming as he ran. “Shoot him, maaaaaan!”
Harrigan couldn’t believe his eyes.
* * *
Fernando was performing the role of his life, and though the audience was limited, he was going to play it out like his life depended on it. Which it did.
While Harrigan raced to high ground, Fernando observed all the other players in the show getting their heads blown off, splat. It didn’t take long to do the math.
Fernando had survived many shootings and riots because when the screams started, civilians ran around in blind panic. Even at nine years of age, Fernando had recognized that those people made themselves targets, like a flock of birds prime for the shooting. While they flapped around, he would slip away unharmed amidst the raging melee.
His action hero was going to get blown up because there were no more birds left to distract the big bad. If Harrigan was blasted away, so would Fernando’s hopes of surviving as well as his dreams of moving to the City of Angels.
Ducking away, he found an abandoned fruit cart. Nimbly, he used the nets from the cart to arm himself with coconuts, oranges, and whatever else until he resembled a fruit-strapped Rambo, then he rushed back into the battle, positioning himself opposite Harrigan to divide the monster’s focus.
“Hey, you big ugly,” Fernando taunted in Portuguese, chucking another coconut. “You look ridiculous in that net body suit! Don’t you know that only looks good with boots and a miniskirt? Are you into bondage and domination or are you just not over the eighties?”
The monster cocked its head, and though its features were practically alien, its human eyes shone a disbelief that mirrored Harrigan’s stunned face from where he was perched. As its shoulder laser cannon pivoted to aim at Fernando, he ran and screamed, “Shoot him, maaaaaan!”
A shot echoed. Fernando winced, resisting the urge to cover his ears and hit the deck. He kept his eyes open long enough to watch green goop spurt from the monster’s left shoulder as Harrigan’s bullet hit its mark.
Without wasting a second, the monster dropped and rolled, disappearing from sight as it vanished once more.
Still chucking fruits in the direction where the monster had disappeared, Fernando suddenly felt very exposed in the open space.
“Move your ass, Fernando!” Harrigan cried, already on his feet to find new cover.
With a surprised eek, Fernando ducked down an alleyway coming face to face with Harrigan a minute later, who reared up with surprise at Fernando’s quick appearance.
“Honeycomb,” Fernando explained again, panting with fear.
Harrigan barely slowed down. “He’s bleeding which means he’s leaving a trail.”
Nodding, Fernando ignored his shaky knees and followed. Mustering all his confidence he added, “I wonder if the punk feels lucky?”
Harrigan threw him a strange glance as they raced towards the rooftop where they’d last spotted the creature.
“Like Clint Eastwood,” Fernando added, insistently. “That is us. We are the Clints.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” Harrigan grumbled, not wanting to play along. “We need to get to those guns down there.” Harrigan pointed to where the crazy man had got himself blown to bloody bits.
“But,” Fernando protested in a whine, “I already got you guns. You have all the guns.”
“Not the right ones.” Harrigan shook his head. “I got lucky. Garber almost got the upper hand, and we need the same kind of firepower.”
With an exasperated sigh, Fernando grumbled as he turned around to backtrack down to where the firepower was. “I give you guns, but no, you want crazy man guns.”
As they wound their way down the favela, they had to take care not to trip over the bodies. Half of the bodies were scalped and two skinless bodies swayed sickeningly overhead. Fernando daintily touched his lips, fighting his gorge. He’d never seen such indescribable evil.
“He isn’t taking time to retrieve his trophies.” Harrigan grimaced. “We’ve got him on the run.”
Opting to stay back, Fernando pointed to the landing where Garber’s intestines and fleshy bits littered the surrounding area like gory confetti.
Harrigan rushed ahead, shedding the guns Fernando cleverly found him before, opting for two large firearms, soaked in dead man’s blood. From what Fernando could tell, it didn’t look like those things shot bullets.
Screams resounded in the distance.
“Come with me if you want to be living,” Fernando called to Harrigan, knowing exactly where the screams originated.
Harrigan shouted after Fernando, “If you want to live!”
Tossing a quick look back, Fernando said, “Of course I want to live! I want to go living in the City of Angels!”
Fernando didn’t understand Harrigan’s snort of anger, but whipped by shanties to the east side of the favela. Something wet dripped onto Fernando’s head. Slowing to wipe it off, his eyes widened as he saw it was the same florescent green gloop that had jettisoned out of the creature.
Harrigan came to a full stop and looked up. “He’s running the roofs.”
“Do you know if this can wash?” Fernando asked, lip curling, dismayed to find the shoulder of his poor blouse had also been dripped on.
Harrigan didn’t answer, he was busy trying to heft himself up onto the roof by gripping the edge and pulling himself up. The idea was better than its execution.
Shaking his head, Fernando critiqued his performance. “You’re too old for that shit.”
Sweating and shaking with exertion, Harrigan’s head whipped around to shoot Fernando a nasty look. “Thanks,” Harrigan reluctantly groused.
With a sigh, Fernando dragged over a nearby table, climbed on it where it was a medium step from there onto the rusting metal roof. Reaching down he gave Harrigan a hand up.
“Look.” The cop pointed at the roof where the green blood visibly glowed and led towards the east end toward where Harrigan and the Rio detectives had entered the favela.
Running the roofs made for a fast trail though they had to take care where they stepped so not to fall through the rotting or rusted roofs.
“Deus me ajude!” Fernando muttered, praying as he ran.
They stopped abruptly when three roofs down, a ratty-looking carioca struggled in the creature’s grasp; the carioca’s handgun slid off the roof and away. The creature, no longer cloaked, cocked his arm back, jagged blades attached from his wrist jutting out past his hand, about to make the killing blow.
Fernando gasped, and the monster jerked around. Meeting eyes with pure evil itself, Fernando froze; even his heart seemed to stop. He barely registered the small cannon mounted on its shoulder redirecting aim at him.
“Fernando!” Harrigan yelled, prompting him to look down at his chest where three red laser dots were trained.
Harrigan pushed Fernando to the side with tremendous force at the same time a bright blue laser beam shot from the shoulder cannon. Fernando screamed as fire burned his left shoulder with such intensity he burst into tears, praying to God that he wasn’t ready to die.
Smacking hard onto his back, somehow managing not to slide down and off its edge, Fernando saw Harrigan had propelled himself in the opposite direction avoiding the creature’s shot.
Gasping, Fernando managed to get out, “Go ahead, make his day,” hoping his action hero could save them.
* * *
A stream of bullets exploded from below and Harrigan heard voices shouting orders, even before he saw the Brazilian detectives, Rios and Villaça, firing their rifles as they directed other police and armed civilians to where the alien stood atop the roof.
Harrigan scrambled to his feet, after verifying that Fernando was only shot in the shoulder—he’d live. At least, he had as good a shot as any of them did to get out alive.
The alien emitted a piercing growl as bullets struck its uninjured arm and shoulder, sending more glowing green blood trailing down its body. Sparks and electrical streaks ran across its armor, indicating something important had been damaged. It stabbed the captive carioca it still held firm in its grasp, even as it turned to run, hurling the corpse with its inhuman strength toward the firing humans to provide a distraction and block their aim. Bullets tore up the roof beneath its pounding feet as it ran.
Down below, a blonde, bulky tourist in a flowery shirt Harrigan recognized grabbed his short, round wife by the arm and yanked her away just as the carioca’s corpse landed right where she’d been standing.
“Son of a bitch almost hit my Pebbles!” the man screamed and opened fire with an LI547-B1, one of the crazy futuristic cannons Garber had been demonstrating. The rooftop where the alien had once stood exploded, shattering clay tiles, stucco, and wood into flying splinters.
“Calma, amigo! We need to find him again,” Rios called, shaking her head as her eyes and her partner’s searched for the alien.
Harrigan used the distraction to pull Fernando back to his feet. “Get behind me,” Harrigan instructed. “You want to go to the City of Angels right? Stay sharp.”
“What is a Pebbles?” Fernando mumbled, still trying to wrap his mind around the idea he might live.
Below, two SWAT-type vans pulled up, lights flashing, and armed men with body armor poured out, setting up a firing line behind the two detectives.
“Do you see him?” Villaça called, spotting Harrigan.
Harrigan shook his head and cupped his mouth: “He can cloak! Stay ready! And shoot for the head and upper body!” If they hit him enough times there, the beast would falter, maybe even die. All it took was one good shot, Harrigan remembered from decades before. Back then it had taken a lot more but now they had much better weapons with computer targeting.
With a thumping crash, the Predator landed down below, mandibles flaring, and ran across another rooftop, struggling with its control panel as it went.
Harrigan suddenly realized the alien couldn’t cloak. “There!” he yelled and aimed the grenade launcher he’d retrieved from Garber at the alien, letting the targeting system beep even as he shut off the safety and fingered the trigger. He launched two grenades at once, before taking off at a run again, Fernando staggering but close on his heels.
The Predator almost made it off the roof to another when the grenades hit, blowing up the ground beneath its feet. As it leaped into the air, trying to minimize damage, and whirled toward a nearby tree, trails of automatic gunfire flowed through the air all around it. Harrigan thought for sure it would be hit multiple times, but it landed with barely a grunt and glared back at him, then scanned the area below where the police and armed civilians had formed a line, assessing its options.
Harrigan lined it up in his sights again, preparing to use the second grenade launcher’s contents. Automatic fire tore up the edges of the roof, but the Predator was at an angle where the police and civilians couldn’t see much of it from the ground as their fire tore up the edges of the roof and the ceramic tiles and thatch, doing the alien no harm.
“That’n-da s’ yin’tekai!” the Predator shouted, raising its chin in defiance, back arched, mandibles flared as it typed furiously on its wrist control.
“Oh shit!” Harrigan yelled, realizing what that meant. The bomb. It was arming the bomb. “Run!” he called to Fernando, even as he took off to put distance between himself and the alien.
Then the air shimmered ahead and four Predators appeared—spears in hand, eyes narrowed with determination, mandibles flaring—and marched toward him.
“Meu Deus! We die!” Fernando exclaimed, shrinking back and halting his steps, uncertain. He cradled his wounded arm, fear shining in his eyes.
The lead Predator stopped and locked eyes with Harrigan, saying, “Na’tauk, ooman.” It raised its hand, holding a 3D cube of glass or some composite metal and aimed it at Harrigan.
Harrigan stopped running and prepared to dodge. Fuck. What was it—some new weapon?
Then the cube flashed and an image appeared—a picture of the Predator who’d been attacking the favela, his markings clear, bright, bold words in the alien tongue above and below. The layout resembled a wanted poster.
The lead alien nodded. “Tarei hsan,” it said and all three of the other Predators stared with contempt at their injured comrade, mandibles clicking rapidly as they emitted some kind of rumbling clicking—a form of laughter mixed with contempt, Harrigan thought.
The injured alien growled, staring at them with almost challenge for a moment, then lowering its head and eyes, as if in surrender. And the cube went dark again.
“Harrigan, get down!” Rios called as Harrigan looked back to see the police and civilian line redistributing themselves to positions where all four Predators were in range.
Harrigan turned and raised a hand. “No. Wait!” His eyes met Rios’.
“Are you crazy? There’s more, we can take them,” Villaça shouted.
But Rios suddenly understood and nodded to Harrigan. “Hold your fire!”
Harrigan sighed and turned back to the Predators, nodding. “He’s all yours.”
The Predator search party quickly surrounded their wounded comrade, stripping away his weapons and securing him with some sort of restraints then grabbing him by the arms to lift him. Two whirled him around and led him back toward where they’d appeared, up the hill near the remains of some shacks.
The lead Predator clicked, mandibles crossed, and nodded to Harrigan. It looked almost like respect. “That’n-da s’ yin’tekai,” the alien said warmly, as with great respect.
“Thatinda yinteki,” Harrigan did his best to repeat back and nodded.
With that, the lead alien raised a palm in salute, then whirled and followed its comrades, all four soon disappearing as if fading into a mist, only the air was filled with smoke and debris instead.
Harrigan turned back to Fernando. “You okay?”
Fernando nodded weakly, bleeding heavily but keeping conscious. “What happened?”
“He was wanted, a criminal,” Harrigan explained.
“Wanted by us, for sure,” Villaça said as he and Rios hurried up the hill to stand beside Harrigan and Fernando.
“His own will punish him in their way,” Harrigan explained, realizing his understanding was more intuitive. He hadn’t understood the words but somehow the meaning still reached him.
Rios glanced around them at what was left of the ruined favela. “What a mess,” she said, shaking her head. “Think they’d fix this?”
Harrigan laughed. “I think the rest is up to us.”
Fernando grinned, hopeful. “So now you take me to City of Angels?”
Harrigan grunted. “Are you sure you want to leave all this excitement behind?”
All three Brazilians laughed.
“Just a normal day in Rio, amigo,” Fernando laughed, but it soon turned into a wet cough. He crossed himself.
“If only that was a lie,” Rios added. Harrigan joined them then in laughing.
“Let’s get you some help, hero,” Harrigan said, clapping Fernando on his good shoulder as ambulances began joining the other vehicles at the base of the favela. Fernando beamed proudly and they all started down the hill together.