Grumpy Alien King by Celeste King
Heather
Xxuric’s shuttle got smaller and smaller, then disappeared into the blackness of space altogether.
I counted to one hundred in my head. Then set a course back to his compound and engaged the engines.
I smirked. My plan, cooked up on the fly, had worked. I’d convinced Xxuric to give me a weapon. Which meant when I landed at the compound, I’d be able to kick some ass myself.
Not that a KV-38 was a power horse of a weapon. But I figured after a few kills, I could pick up some of the enemy’s weapons and go from there. I decided to think of the little blaster as my ‘starter pistol.’
If only my friends and instructors at Teshie’s could see me now, I thought. As my pod hurtled toward the fray, I imagined how things might go if I were to contact Jeggian again.
“Oh yeah, been an interesting adventure. I am no longer marrying the guy I was ordered for, but instead I’m fucking the dude who was supposed to be my father-in-law, oh and guess what, I’ve used my training in a fucking battle.”
Maybe I could tell Headmistress Yves about all this, after. It could make a killer quote for their advertising.
My humorous musings came to a halt as I entered the atmosphere, then pushed through the cloud covering to discover the compound.
It was a much different look than the one I’d had when I first approached. Smoke rose from all around the building and its grounds. There were places were walls had fallen under the assault. Littered around the hillside were the burning husks of enemy ships, shot down by Xxuric’s gunners.
Circling the compound from on high, I tried to find Xxuric’s shuttle. There was so much confusion in the air, though. Small attack crafts zipped here and there, some attacking the compound, others defending it. The compound’s cannons – the ones that hadn’t yet been destroyed – squeezed off blaster bolts that cut through the sky. Now and again, they took out another attacking ship.
A flashback of when one of the cannons opened fire on myself came back to me. I tried to get in touch with someone on the ground, but there was only static. I supposed their comms were being jammed.
There was still no sign of Xxuric. I was starting to get anxious.
Then, two attack craft suddenly erupted into fireballs not far from me. A ship went zipping past me, its guns blazing, already targeting the next attackers.
There you are. I breathed a little easier. Then my heart raced as I watched his attack.
He had moved on to confront some of the cruisers hovering above the compound and launching a bombardment on his home. Showing off moves that astounded me, he weaved in and out of their ship-to-ship gunfire, evaded some rockets, and then attacked a cruiser at its weak-point.
The ship erupted in an explosion that momentarily engulfed Xxuric’s shuttle. A moment later, blackened but otherwise undamaged, the shuttle emerged from the flames, already launching an assault on another cruiser that soon met its own end.
Suddenly, a proximity alert triggered on my pod.
A small attack craft was closing on me.
I banked hard out of the way. I didn’t have any weapons, so I needed to rely once more on my piloting skills.
The attack craft started firing, and my cockpit lit up with red light from the bolts that were streaking past me. I maneuvered around the shots, spinning my pod. I piloted high up toward the clouds, then down toward the ground.
The attack craft managed to match me move for move and turn for turn.
Time to get crazy, I thought. And steered my pod right for one of the cruisers.
The attack craft stayed right on my tail.
My pod was so small that the cruiser didn’t really pay me any attention. That was fine. I swung up under the belly of the thing. The attack craft stayed with me. Then I banked right, then shot up above the cruiser, making a loop around it. I hugged tight to the cruiser. So tight I nearly collided with it.
I managed to not hit it. The attack craft on my tail, however, finally failed to match my piloting. He smashed into the cruiser, exploding into a brilliant fireball. That fireball set off a chain reaction that caused explosions to erupt along the length of the cruiser. Soon, the whole thing was plummeting toward the ground.
In a much more controlled manner, I decided it was time to land as well. The only area close to the house that seemed untouched was the pool. All around the pool was a concrete area of beach chairs and umbrellas.
I dropped my pod onto some of those, crushing them as I landed.
For a moment, I sat there, holding my breath. My eyes were locked on the proximity monitor, waiting to see if any attack craft were going to follow me down.
Nothing.
I shut down the pod’s engines and leapt out of my seat. I pulled the blaster out of my pants. Inhaling and exhaling once, sharply, I opened the pod’s hatch and leapt out, gun raised.
Immediately, I came face to face with a mean looking Sanax. Both his horns were chipped and his teeth filed to sharp points. He was carrying a large weapon of some sort. I didn’t recognize it right away, but I was pretty sure I had no interest in getting to know any of its features from the side of it I was on.
Luckily, I’d gotten the drop on him. Confused by my sudden presence, he spun and stared blankly at me.
I squeezed the trigger on the blaster. The bolt caught him right in the middle of the chest. He flung his arms out and went stumbling backwards. He fell into the pool, where he floated face-down, unmoving.
Let’s do this, I thought, and raced into the house.
