Pristine stars adorned a noir sky.
One Azarean guard stood oblivious to the beauty above, upright, astute, and stiff in scanning the blackness of night. Back and forth, he purposefully walked along the roads of suburbia. Down the sidewalk, between luminescent lamps and down midnight greens, he continued toward nothing out of the ordinary. As a result, his attention relaxed until he dared to surrender to peace. He looked at the moon.
Perhaps, he sought to remove his helmet, and behold unadulterated space, to contemplate life as it may have survived on his home planet. Then Jessica touched and shocked the hell out of him through the voltage in her glove, so toppled his motor functions and made him shake like a fish out of water. His face became intimately acquainted with the ground as the seizure continued. Eventually, he would stop moving altogether, settling into a sleep's calm.
"And that's how you make men quake in their boots," said Jessica. "Hehehe."
"You know what?" started Valerie, caressing her forehead in shame. "It's literally too late to be cracking one-liners."
"Stop misusing the word literally."
"I'm not dealing with kids, right now!" exclaimed Shannon. "I'm just not. Get your shit together before I lose mine." She turned to Valerie. "Now Val, where is this place?"
"I'll know it when I see it. Come on," she said, waving them along.
They found scarcely a shape in the dark realm of suburbia, except for the late-night liquor store that had come to define humanity's nocturnal habits. The indoor bulbs of a 711 solicited their thirst in passing. The midnight run had invited sweat, sore legs, and dry tongues.
"Why don't you hack one of those cameras, Jess?" Shannon panted. "That way we don't have to die of thirst before we die of conspiracy, know what I mean?"
"McFly!" Jessica jumped on her board to alleviate the spent energy of her legs. "Pfft! Who's tired? For a girl who knows karate, you need to work more on your cardio."
"Oh, haha, it's mixed martial arts. Need a lesson? Let me borrow the board."
Jessica replied with a stone face and an L sign on her forehead. Before either could throw another sassy remark, Valerie turned North on the street, giving Shannon the vain hope of a break at the store, but they proceeded at a relentless pace.
Tablet in hand, Jessica used her technical skills to erase any trace of their excursion, via recorded snippets. She fed a single-second thumbnail back into every cross-walk camera. As she did so, Valerie scanned the streets for law enforcement. Together, they skimmed security patrols, alien or otherwise.
***
Up ahead, Valerie had reprised her role as navigator, following the map of her mind to their destination. "Whatever you do, don't look back," she told them.
"Shannon," called Jessica, holding back a chuckle. "Did you actually know what the hell those guys were saying?"
"I was guessing," she said with a smile. "Not that hard, though. You should know this, but every derivative of cool is just a derivative of black culture whether or not they actually pull it off. You just gotta navigate and wade through the intonations of dialect, no matter how much it sounds like nonsense. Descriptivism is a double-edged sword."
"Well, I dig it!"
"Don't say that!"
"Sorry."
"I'm kidding."
They stopped under the glow of a corner street lamp, vibrant like angels in the dark. "Ay, we're close," said Valerie. She pointed at a shabby, worn-down building across the street, and, after double-checking every direction, led them to the other side.
Jessica darted her gaze at the bright, overhead sign. Pets for Memes it read, accompanied by a graphic of a basket full of furry animals. On the cusp of the entrance, she paused.
"Wait a minute, is this really the place?"
"Yes, it is," Valerie assured, putting her hand on the old-fashioned doorknob.
"Are you cereal?"
But Shannon interceded. "Okay, Valerie. Explain. What does a pet store have to do with anything?"
"You will see," she said, beaming, then entered. Jessica and Shannon watched her swagger down the shelves of pet food and other things no one thinks to buy before entering a pet shop. Another woman was inside, an employee judging by the apron and paw prints. She swept the floors, seemingly oblivious to Val and everything else. Shannon furrowed her brow at the wooden pole in her grasp.
"I've seen that before. What is that?"
"Seriously, Shannon?" Jessica scoffed. Thoroughly aggravated, she grabbed the doorknob and glared. "That's a broom. You use it to play Quidditch."
Shannon followed her inside. "Well, soooorry I wasn't into Lord of the Rings."
Within the conspicuous, vintage pet store, signs of architectural decay prevailed under the sporadic lights. Like straight out of a horror movie. It's amazing. First, Jessica stepped carefully between two shelves with plastic containers; visible kibbles and the occasional bit, then stranger jars, bags, and other receptacles made her nervous.
Further in, she found a transparent screen. When she saw the other side, she pushed her face against the glass. The loud slam attracted her friends.
"Jess!" Shannon stammered, jumping to her side
Valerie was walking to the counter when it happened. She doubled back, to find her best friend's sanguine cheeks and irradiated eyes.
Weak in the knees, Jess held the window. Together, they stared at a box of sleeping kittens. Gray fur, white fur, tuxedo, mackerel tabby, and orange all huddled together in a warm, snuggled bundle of sleep, and Jessica couldn't stop staring.
"Seriously Jess, you need to get a grip," said Valerie, glued to the screen. "Now's not the time for this."
"I've never had a cat," bemoaned Jessica. "It's unfair. It's really unfair."
"I had a cat once," Shannon mused. "Called him Simba because he was awesome."
Valerie was the first to demagnetize, returning to the counter. It was at that moment Shannon took out her phone. When Jessica noticed, her pupils further dilated, and she slapped the mobile device out of Shannon's hand, which in turn slapped a scowl across Shannon's face.
"Why'd you do that?" she barked.
"No records of us being here!" Jessica said. "That gets into the cloud, we're freaken screwed. Comprende? As a matter of fact, get the battery out. Take out that battery!"
"Alright! That's my bad."
Jessica held Shannon's head between her hands and stared deep into her nervous brown eyes. "Do. You. Understand?"
"Stop being weird."
"Good. Now, Shann, don't forget why we're here. I'm sorry you got caught up in this. Really. Homegirl said something from this place will help us..." Jessica winced over at the strange woman sweeping near the entrance, then proceeded to whisper. "And I have no idea what's coming, but it's life or death at this point, and I owe Val. So, go see what she's up to."
Shannon's cornea flipped. "I'm not gonna leave so you can stay and stare at the kittens."
"Why not?"
Over and behind the counter sat a man in brown khakis, a blue polo, a black trench coat and a hat with the store name written. Next to him, on the counter, lay a cage of white rats. When Jessica approached, she found Valerie staring directly at him. He kept his head down, face blocked by the hat's bill, and repeatedly cracked peanuts in his palm. In an ongoing pattern, he tossed the pieces into the rat cage.
"Place is about to close," he said gruffly.
"I'm looking for black cats and voodoo dolls," Valerie told him.
The man's head rose, reveling another person who wore sunglasses indoors. He slowly removed them, unveiling dark blue eyes, and leaned forward in his chair. "I feel a premonition."
"They have an aviary for bats here!" Jessica said. "Mice!"
"'She'll make you live her crazy life,'" Valerie continued slowly, "'but she'll take away your pain like a bullet to your brain.'"
"Wuw, who are we talking about?" said Shannon.
"Upside inside out?" rejoined the man.
"She's living the vida loca," Valerie answered.
He grinned. "It has been a while. Come on; I have what you need in the back." The strange man opened the red door behind the counter. Since it was too dark, Jessica and her friends lost sight of him.
Valerie glanced back at her friends and waved them over. Cautiously, she walked around the counter. Cautiously, her friends followed.
As expected, nobody could see a thing, so Jessica strapped her goggles. Night vision pinged the clerk and Valerie next to each other. The clerk was crouching beside a trap door—what looked like one, anyway. When he opened it, a harmless beam of light struck the ceiling. Now, Jessica really pondered Valerie's aim.
"You finally going to explain what we're doing here, Val?"
Valerie crouched as the man stood up, her grin illuminated by the white light from underneath, a grin that contrasted sinisterly against the darkness. "After you?" she said.
"What?"
"Quickly," the man said.
"You heard him," added Valerie. No more waiting, she jumped into the light pit, compelling Jessica and Shannon to race over. Unfortunately, the pit looked bottomless.
"Quick."
"In for a penny, in for a pound," Jessica sighed, folding her arms. And in she jumped.
Instead of an abyss, she was surprised—disappointed almost—by the endpoint. Her impact was cushioned by something soft. Something gelatinous. Beneath her gluteus, she found a pink bubble. Everywhere else, strange machinery cranked. And on the floor in front of her stood Valerie.
"You might want to move," she said.
With her friend's help, Jessica quickly hopped off the platform. From below., the substance looked like flan, a pink ball of flan resting on a base of trash like a snow globe. "What is that?" she asked.
"Jellified acid," said Valerie. "If you touch, it's like instant sunburn. Makes your skin peel."
Jessica frantically scanned her hands and fingers.
"Haha. I'm just messing with you. I don't know what the hell it is. Never been here before."
Shannon dropped and landed on the same bubble. "Wooow!" she yelped. "The hell is this?"
"It melted my skin off," said Jessica.
Shannon wiped the sticky layer all over her clothes and closely examined her hands, while Jessica turned a furrowed brow to Valerie. "Why bring us here if you've never been here, Homegirl?"
Shannon nodded at Jessica's question.
Returning apprehensively, Valerie answered, "Want to know what I actually do for a living? Fine! I'm a spy courier, mmkay? I get messages to safe drops. The people I work for, Sub Terra, I hope they don't kill us when we find them. I really do. I'm just one of many secret peeps helping the cells communicate. And for my own good, I never know the message. This time, though, the other cell went dark. When I had no one else to go to, I came to you."
Jessica tapped her chin in deliberation.
"The public doesn't even know what we are," Valerie added. "They only know what the Azareans tell them, and Azareans scapegoat us at every turn, Jess, 'cause they want us gone. But even if we were gone, they'd do what they did with Pine Rim all over again.
"We been trying to find out what happens to our people who get shipped off Earth, why entire regions of the world are off-limits, and what is in our food – Things nobody bothers to ask!" Valerie placed her hands on Jessica's shoulders. "What is in the tacos, Jess?"
Jessica hooked an arm around Valerie, brought her lips near the girl's ear, and whispered. "Freshly diced pork, beef, and chicken marinated in salt and sweet pineapple. The tortillas are handmade corn and frequently served with a side of fresh avocado." She took a few steps back.
"Is that it?" Valerie winced.
"And Goliath moonlights for the secretive military organization known as Asgard. They pose as a private security force, but they have a say in corporate matters. Goliath uses its finances to manufacture and research experimental weaponry in Antarctica via a subsidiary known as Spearhead. I was in the process of discovering their black sites before, well, you know the story thus far. It's a crappy one."
Valerie beamed at Jessica. "What you just told me, you should tell that to Sub Terra."
"This is a little heavy," said Shannon, inhaling. "No, this is very heavy. To sum up, you're taking us to the people you work for. And they're shady. Are you taking us to a rebel base?"
Jessica almost shouted a reference but coughed it back in. Clearing her throat, she calmly turned to Valerie. "You know what, let's just go."
Smirking, Valerie turned and started them down the one-way corridor of steel walls and humming machinery. Just a network of valves and pipes. Where the corridor ended lay a metal door. Valerie gripped the handle, revealing platform cleaner and more modern than the rest of their surroundings.
"One-way ticket," she said.
"'Hang tight and survive,'" Jessica sighed. "'Everybody does it.'"
"Insert movie reference here," added Shannon.
This time, Jessica was first into the cramped space. Shannon and Valerie followed.
ns 15.158.61.54da2
