“The door marked storage,” Uncle Ben replied.
“Oh, whoopee.” I wheeled my suitcases over to the door and reluctantly opened it. The room was about twelve feet wide and ten feet long. It contained a single bed, a small metal desk with alamp and a chair. One wall held several shelves and a metal pole to hang your clothes on. “Living the dream,” I muttered under my breath. I put my suitcases in front of the bed. “What’s the plan?”
“I’m going to show you aliens really exist.” Uncle Ben gestured to the elevator. “It’s time you knew the truth about your heritage.”
Pasting a big smile on my face, I stepped inside. “Can’t wait.”
“Did your father tell you how your mother died?” He placed his hand on the sensor pad and the doors closed.
I gave him the evil eye. “Car accident, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me that’s a lie too.”
“A Coletti hunter was trying to capture your mother, and she ran out into traffic to get away from him.”
“And where is this infamous Coletti hunter now?”
“Dead. Your father killed him before General Jones had a chance to question him.”
Was he calling Dad a murderer? “Why would he do that?”
“To hide the fact you’re a hybrid.”
I exhaled a long breath and tried to ignore my churning stomach. That would explain my uniqueness.
The elevator shuddered to a stop and the doors whooshed open.
Noisy honks and quacks echoed down the corridor.
I frowned. “Do you have a flock of geese down here?”
“Are you ready to face the truth?”
“Show me what you’ve got.” If any of this was true, Dad had a lot of explaining to do.
“Follow me.”
Insatiable hunger, rage and the need to kill hit me suddenly. I grabbed my head and stumbled to a stop. What the hell?
“You are a psychic!” Uncle Ben exclaimed excitedly. “Maybe you can communicate with it.”
“It?”
He placed his hand on a sensor pad and the door slid back. “The alien.”
The breath left my lungs in an involuntary gasp. In a metal cage was a tall, hairless, skeletal humanoid with a mouth full of sharp metal teeth. Its three blood-red eyes were devoid of any speck of humanity. Metal spikes protruded from its milk white skull, and it wore a filthy red uniform. “What is that?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
The alien honked and quacked at me.
Huh? It was trying to communicate with me. I reached out mentally. A barrage of nightmare images spun through my mind. These monsters lived to eat. Like a plague of locusts, they destroyed civilizations, leaving nothing behind but rubble.
Horror rolled over me. He had stumbled upon our solar system and discovered human flesh was a delicacy to be savored. As soon as he could get to his communicator, he would notify his commander, and our world would be harvested.
“What is it saying?” Uncle Ben demanded.
The weird thing was how easily I understood everything about him. His knowledge. His culture. Was it some kind of mind meld? If so, how was that even possible?
“What does it want?”
