Greivances

Something touched my shoulder and I cried out, nearly falling over in my fright. It was just Devon, though, and he gathered me in his arms, murmuring quietly. He held me until the tension drained from my limbs and I calmed down.

He was looking at me with a grim expression, his lips pursed into a thin line.

My face was wet with tears I hadn't noticed. I brushed them away on my shoulder and opened my mouth to say something, but Devon pinned me against his chest, his arms wrapped around me.

I stayed there, shocked but comforted by his warmth.

"I'm sorry I made you do that," he whispered.

All I could do was shake my head, not trusting my voice. At first, the contact was foreign and uncomfortable, but as he held me tighter I started to melt until I was hugging him back, sniffing wetly and squeezing just as tight.

When was the last time someone had hugged me? When I'd left home to start work a year ago?

I'd forgotten how healing it could be.

Devon held me as long as I let him, but we didn't have time to waste. If there was anything I was good at, it was self-soothing, and the best way for me to do that was to be active. Not unkindly, I pushed away from him and wiped my eyes.

I said, "We should get going."

"There's a Dairy Queen over there," Devon said suddenly.

All I could do was stare blankly at him, trying to process his non-sequitur.

"What?" I asked, feeling dumb.

"Yeah, a Dairy Queen. Want to see if it's still open? Ice cream makes everything better."

He couldn't be serious. The thought alone that someone could be inside a fucking Dairy Queen buying a three dollar ice cream cone while I was outside chopping up aliens and killing a pregnant woman was ludicrous to me.

"What? N-no! We have to tell Wolf about this. He has to know they can breed."

"Right, gotta go find your boyfriend," he sniffed.

I smacked him for good measure and he rubbed the spot. Not dignifying the remark with a response, I said, "We should call the sheriff and tell him to issue an emergency curfew, then tell Hassan to lock the city down.

"You really think so?" Devon asked, his brows raised in surprise.

Nodding, I said, "Of course. They can breed now. That changes everything. If we don't jump on this now, we're going to have an infestation. This has to stop here at Gunnison before it spreads. No one can come in or out of this place."

My partner scoffed. "Please. No one is gonna visit this podunk town."

"Just make the calls." I rolled my eyes.

"Oh I'm gonna," he said, his phone already up to his ear. "Calling Eddie first."

"Tell him to arm his officers with armor-piercing rounds if he can," I added.

He nodded wordlessly.

I left him to it and gathered our bearings. Though we were a bit turned around, I was able to backtrack to where we'd parted with Wolf, towing Devon along as he made his important phone calls, trying to convey the urgency without letting Eddie know too much.

By the time I guesstimated which way Wolf went, he finished that phone call and went on to inform Hassan of the new development.

"Alright, Eddie is sending out his officers and issuing an emergency alert. They'll help enforce the curfew. I told them to shoot anything that doesn't look human first and ask questions later," Devon told me as he dialed Hassan's number.

For a second, I was about to protest and complain that he was going to get Wolf shot, but then I remembered that Wolf does look humanoid. Like a really big buff guy, but human-ish enough at first glance that he should be fine.

Not like the animalistic xenomorphs. Anyone with a brain would shoot those fuckers on sight.

While he waited to get a hold of Hassan, I led us in the direction I thought Wolf went. I paid his conversation only a little bit of attention.

Though I was a bit loathe to involve the military and the FBI while Wolf was around, this was a matter of minimizing collateral damage and stopping an alien infestation at the root. Wolf could handle himself and he had me to back him up.

"Alright," Devon said, finishing his call. "He's going to gather resources and contact the National Guard. He was glad I'd already informed local authority, but it'll still be a few hours before the Guard will show up."

"I expected as much," I sighed.

"So, how are we going to find ya boy?" he asked.

Ignoring his bait, I said, "I'm pretty sure he went this way, so we'll just follow whatever carnage we find."

"Okay great," he huffed, trudging along next to me. "But we're gonna need a little bit more to go on than a direction. The guy's invisible. Can't just spot him in a crowd, though lord knows he'd stick out like a sore thumb."

Rolling my eyes, I said, "He'll find us, don't worry. If he notices we're near, he'll show himself."

"If you say so."

"I do say so."

We lapsed into silence after that. The faint sound of police sirens wailed in the distance and I felt more at ease by a small margin, knowing that there were others out there to help the citizens now. I could only hope that they heeded the emergency broadcast and the curfew.

Though, I hadn't. My friends hadn't.

After a while, I turned to Devon and, without looking him in the face, said, "Thank you, Devon. For earlier. Comforting me, I mean."

He put his hand on my shoulder and smiled wanly back at me. "Don't mention it. You want to talk about it at all?"

Lips pressed into a thin line, I brought my eyes up to meet his. They were burning, but I was better at keeping my emotions in check.

Most of the time.

I shrugged and folded my arms over my chest and said, "Only awful people kill pregnant women."

"You're not awful," Devon insisted. "That was a mercy killing, you said so yourself. She was as good as dead in a few hours, and it wouldn't have been pleasant.

"Yeah."

/Funny. That's not what you were saying earlier,/ I thought bitterly.

As if reading my mind, Devon said, "It was wrong of me to think that we could do something for her. I saw those x-rays they showed us of the embryo inside someone. With so many extra in there, attached to organs and whatever . . ."

Eyes clenched shut, I fought back the wave of nausea just thinking about it.

"Well, it would have been impossible to remove all of them in any sort of timely manner. We don't even know if we can slow the process down . . . You were right, and I was wrong to argue with you," he finished, rubbing the back of his head.

I dropped my gaze and bit my lip. "I still feel like shit."

"It's no supposed to feel good," Devon pointed out. "I feel awful, too, making you go through that. It was very unfortunate that she was . . . with child, but you did what you had to."

"Don't say 'with child' ever again."

Devon pursed his lips and glanced at me, chuckling dryly. "Yeah, okay."

He gave my shoulder a reassuring pat, but it only helped a little bit.

Changing the subject, Devon said, "I'm tired of walking. Let's find a car and go drive around looking for that alien of yours. It would be quicker than wandering around and would help us conserve our energy."

Though I didn't really want to admit it, that sounded like a good idea.

"Where are we going to get a car?" I asked. "You wanna go try to rent one at this time of night?"

He pointed across the street to a parked car. "There's one there. I'm sure we can figure out this hotwiring nonsense if we can't find the owner. How hard can it be? Pop out a panel, cross some wires, bam. We got ourselves a car."

I rolled my eyes at him. "I'm sure it's a lot harder than that."

"Well, I've got a smartphone. I'll just look up a Youtube tutorial. There's a Youtube tutorial for everything these days," he said, already scrolling through his phone.

"That sounds like a terrible idea," I remarked, crossing my arms over my chest.

"Which part?"

"Everything! We're FBI. We can't go around stealing people's cars AND I don't think we should let you anywhere near the electrical components of a car. You'll kill yourself," I scoffed.

He snorted. "Well, fine. We'll flag down the next person we see and make them give us their car."

Anything I was about to say was drowned out by a faraway explosion. All around us, the city went black as pitch. Streetlights, buildings, intersections, housing—all dark within the blink of an eye.

I was plunged into a darkness so absolute, my eyes didn't have time to adjust. I went rigid next to Devon, my breath hitching in my chest, and I grabbed his arm to make sure he didn't go anywhere. I was frozen until Devon's voice cut through my fear and pulled me back.

"Well, what the hell did that?" he scoffed, squeezing my hand to assure me.

Though my knees shook and hands trembled, I pushed it all away and worked through it with a few deep breaths until I calmed down. It was just the dark.

"I'll give you one guess," I said.

Devon groaned audibly. "The whole city, though?"

"There has to be a power plant somewhere nearby, I'll bet he's there."

I grabbed Devon's arm and dragged him along for two blocks until I found what I was looking for—a group of people on the street. They were surrounding a police officer attempting to send them all home and I marched right toward them.

"Nichole, what are you gonna do?" Devon asked.

"Don't you know?" I said. "It was your idea."

Before he could respond, I let go of his arm and engaged the closest person: a woman standing next to her bronze hatchback.

"Ma'am, FBI!" I shouted, whipping out my badge and holding it up over my head. "I'm commandeering your vehicle for official business."

She stared at me, her eyes wide and jaw slack.

My partner hissed in my ear. "Nichole, we can't actually do this."

"These badges say otherwise," I muttered in response. Louder, I addressed the woman. "Is your car functioning and does it have gas?"

Finally, she managed to condense a response. "What? Yes. I mean . . . half a tank?"

"Perfect. We'll return it to the police department when we're finished," I said, gently moving her aside. "Can you tell me where the power plant is?"

Devon pointed above the buildings to the distance. "I'll bet it's that way."

I followed his gaze to a glow on the horizon outlining the trees and hillside with an orange halo.

"Ma'am," I snapped. "Which road do I take?"

She gave me brief directions to the outskirts of town. I circled around to the front but Devon grabbed me and held me in place, saying, "Nichole, you don't drive. What are you doing?"

Shrugging out of his grasp, I pushed Devon out of my way and explained, "I DON'T drive but I CAN drive. I needed one to get the job and they taught us more advanced maneuvers in Quantico. So just get in and buckle up."

He studied me for a second, then gave up and climbed into the passenger side seat.

I had the gist of where to go, so once Devon was seated, I backed out of the circle of civilians and tore off toward the fire. Devon barely had enough time to close the door before it was taken off by a mailbox.

"Woah, Nichole, relax!"

"I am relaxed," I said, my jaw tight and teeth grinding.

He buckled his seatbelt and shot me a glare. "You have no intention of returning this woman's car, do you?"

"What? Yes, I do. I don't want to destroy it. Like you said, this will be easier with a car."

With a huff, Devon crossed his arms and slouched in his seat to pout. "You may not have to worry about living on Earth after all this, but someone's gonna have to pay for this lady's car when you wreck it or something mowing down aliens."

I rolled my eyes. "I wouldn't do that, their innards are acidic and would eat this car alive."

"This isn't very practical. And she lied. This car only has a quarter of a tank."

"Now you're the one that needs to relax, Devon," I said.

There was only one thought in my mind at the time: that Wolf could be in danger. Somehow I doubted it, but the idea was still there. If it came down to Wolf or a stranger's damn car, I'd always pick Wolf.

My future was with him, not with the town or those living within it. It wasn't even with the FBI after all this.

/What about with Devon?/ a tiny voice whispered in the back of my head.

My fingers tightened on the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white. For some time now, I'd been considering trying to convince Devon to come with me.

The thought of having at least one other human to commiserate with while out in the cosmos was appealing. Besides, Devon was my only friend, probably the closest thing I had to a best friend, and was the only person I trusted.

He'd helped me through so much and was an asset in any situation. I wanted to keep the dream team together.

I knew for a fact, at least, that I wasn't romantically attracted to Devon. We'd been through a few tough pinches, though, and I loved him like I had Jess and Michelle. Leaving him behind made my heart ache, but I wanted to be Wolf.

These were my truths.

However, he'd already been abundantly clear that he held nothing but disdain for this choice I'd made. Maybe because I hadn't asked him outright yet. I wasn't sure I'd be able to.

And, honestly, I was kidding myself. Wolf would never go for it. He clearly wasn't fond of my partner. Whether it was jealousy or that he didn't think Devon was worth the dirt beneath his feet, I wasn't sure.

The angry silence spanned between me and Devon, but eventually, it grew increasingly more awkward. Neither of us could stay irritated at the other long, nor did we want to be the first to break it. So we sat quietly, pretending to stew and brood.

I decided to be the bigger person and spoke first.

"I'm sorry, Devon," I started with a sigh. "I just need to get to Wolf. He's behind enemy lines and if he was caught up in that explosion, he might be injured and alone."

"I get it," he replied, trying to sound blasé. Instead, he came off as mopey. "You're scared for him."

"I don't get scared!"

Even without looking, I could feel his incredulous stare burning into the side of my face.

When I made it clear I wasn't going to look at him, he finally spoke. "You hide it well, Nichole, but I've been hanging out with you long enough to know what you look like when you're scared."

"Okay, so what, I get scared. Everyone gets scared," I muttered.

"Oh for fucking sure. I'm terrified all the time! Did you see that big one with the face? Like, holy shit," he groaned, throwing his hands up in exasperation.

"So then what are you getting at?" I asked, blazing through a stoplight no one was at.

He was silent for a long time, then turned away to look out of his window and sighed. "Nothing, I guess. I just . . . you had this whole thing going. Been . . . keeping this huge secret from me. All this time. I'm a little, uh, a little hurt, I guess."

I loosened my grip on the steering wheel and exhaled all my leftover frustration before speaking. "I'm sorry about that, I really am. But it's not like I could tell you I was an alien sympathizer, you know."

"Yeah, I guess not." There was some doubt there, wavering within his voice.

"I'm sorry I kept it from you, up until he was trying to choke you to death," I said with some reluctance, glancing at him. "I should have known I could trust you."

Though he said nothing, he shifted a little taller in his seat, some of his pride returning. Devon said nothing for another few minutes, just bathing in my apology. It was starting to grind on my nerves.