36
People were leaving. He’d helped people escape.
He was a hero.
He watched with satisfaction as the room emptied. Even Godly Jim had shuffled out, muttering angrily.
He just needed to find Teena and the others, and the worst would be over. Maybe Sarabeth could shut down the freaky laser-shooting ship, and with all the captives free, the town could help fight the aliens, if there were any more left.
The room was down to a couple dozen people, younger guys who’d been helping round up people and get them out. One of them was Cameron Lewis, Teena’s true object of affection.
But he wasn’t jealous. He wanted Teena to be happy. Maybe someday, she’d pick him. If not, he’d live. Obviously, I’ll live, he thought. At the very least, alien attacks put things in perspective. Even if sometimes, in his heart, falling for Teena felt bigger than life and death.
“I can’t believe that you did all this,” Cameron said, coming up and slapping him on the back. Cameron was one of those guys who never made Evan feel like a loser. “I mean, it was freaky, man.”
“Pretty fucked-up,” Evan said. “It wasn’t just me, though. Leo and Teena helped, and your sister was with us, too.”
Cameron’s eyes grew watery. “Sarabeth? Do you know where she is now?”
Evan clasped his arm. “We think she’s okay, and somewhere on the ship,” he said, not wanting to say more because he really didn’t know.
“She was lucky to have had you guys,” Cameron said, smiling wanly. “Is lucky,” he added, not seeming convinced.
“We were all lucky, I think. Really lucky.” Lucky to have been trapped in a cellar with the best people you could ever be trapped in a cellar with, he thought.
“Pretty crazy shit, four high school students fend off an alien attack,” Cameron said, discreetly wiping his eyes. The last few people trickled out the door. Cameron nodded his head toward the exit. “You coming?”
“I’ll be there,” Evan said. “I just want to do one thing.”
“Okay, dude. Thanks again,” he said casually, as if Evan had helped him move a couch.
As Cameron finally left, Evan contentedly took one last look around the empty room. The giant room that he’d helped evacuate. He marched up the ramp, ready to go. Ready to find his friends.
He was about to push his way into the burned nest when two claws locked around him and dragged him backward. Above him were the fly eyes of an alien.
The only weapon he had left was his bat. It had done him a lot of good against the greenies, but it wasn’t going to do much good against a huge, indestructible foe.
The alien had Evan under his arms. He kicked his feet against the ground uselessly. The alien’s grip was so strong, Evan could barely move.
The creature threw Evan onto the human juicer and fastened straps across his ankles, stomach, and chest. The juicer was like being in a coffin already. Its lid, which would soon close on him, was covered with hundreds of tiny needles, waiting to emerge and pierce his flesh. Beneath him, he felt hundreds of pinpricks against his back, next to his skin. In seconds, they’d be in his skin.
How could he have let this happen? He’d come so far, and he was still going to die. The hero wasn’t supposed to die.
The alien pressed a button, and the machine started to close in on him.
“Cameron? You there?” he called. “Is anyone out there?”
The only answer he got was the machine’s malicious hum.
He could barely move his hands, and he couldn’t kick his feet high enough to keep the door from closing down on him. He felt the pinch of the pins as they penetrated the back of his spandex suit.
Wriggling his hands back and forth, he felt the familiar ash handle of his bat next to him. The alien had thrown it inside with him. He grabbed the handle. Somehow, he managed to stand the bat up, wedging it between the lid and the bottom of the juicer.
The bat prevented the lid from continuing to close. Evan was safe for now, but he wouldn’t have long before the bat broke under the pressure of the lid’s descent. If he could free himself from the straps soon, it would mean his trusty bat had come through again. If he couldn’t … he didn’t want to think about it.
He gritted his teeth and strained against the straps that held him down.
He couldn’t die. He had a new life to live.