The world had gone completely insane. Malcolm, however, felt as if he had maintained a firmer grasp on what was left of reality than the rest. They essentially had no effective leadership. The buff sweaty Greek ER technician was good for kicking alien ass. Old Man Jones could at least drive. Big Head Tweet was good with details. The women were a mess. Leaving the decision making up to them had resulted in the liquor store fiasco. And now they had been joined by the psychotic bee-bee gun kid.

Malcolm, on the other hand, understood what was going on. Yes, he had been rendered deaf by the alien attack on his ears. And yes, no one looked to him for leadership because he was young, fat, and black. But he was a damned sight smarter than this crew.

‘Hell yes son! You are the creative force that needs to emerge to keep this thing from spiraling out of control. Keep your eyes open and apply your mind.’

For many a moment today Malcolm had doubted the reality about him. He knew better than to doubt his sanity. People thought that obese individuals lacked emotive stability. This was not the case. Malcolm had the ability to walk through life on a daily basis against body type; a walking taboo. If you put a fashion model’s mind in his body and made her look into the mirror she would lose her mind and be crawling on the floor of a mental institution for the rest of her days. He knew that everyone who met him judged him based on his massive weight, and he had never let that bother him. He was centered. Even now, having lost his hearing, he was more calm, cool and collective than anyone else on this bus to hell.

Even so, he had wondered often, over the course of this last hour of plunging insanity, if he had been dreaming, and had pinched himself quite often to make sure. Malcolm was a huge reader of fantasy, graphic novels, and vampire romance. He well knew that his sleeping mind could twist in such a way as to concoct a crazy story line like this. But now, with the entry of the maniac bee-bee gun kid into the crazy bus, he knew it was for real. You see, even when Malcolm dreamed his was the mind of an aspiring film writer; the next big thing on the cable miniseries scene. So, even if it were just a dream, his inner editor would never permit his wildest imagination to insert this PG-13 brat into what was obviously an R-rated plot.

‘Yes Malcolm Tarantino Ingosal, this is not a work of fiction. You are in the real shit now!’

They were nearing the city line and Old Man Jones hollered, but he could not hear the words just the hum of his voice. Kendra took his hat and wrote on it with her marker pen:

Overlea Station—with relief. We are saved!

They all crowded toward the front to see the National Guard perimeter set up at the top of the hill at the transfer point. There was a BFI trash truck being used as a barricade. The Hummers were up behind with a big army truck. A gas-masked soldier was standing out front of the truck, directing them to turn up the right-hand side-street for a detour. The women all cheered but the little brat with the bee-bee gun was darting to a side window and looking up into the sky. Jackie Spam was asking Miss Betty for directions. Miss Kendra was holding his hand. But something did not seem right.

‘I wonder what is up with Shorty here? He survived alone out there—must have good instincts.’

Malcolm then looked up out the window and saw a value jet plunging down out of the afternoon sky toward the trash truck. He screamed and it hurt like hell, setting off a ringing in his ears, “Turn left now Old Man!”

Everyone looked at him like he was stupid, except for Jackie, who screamed something and began shoving the women down between the seats. It was a silent ear-ringing pandemonium aboard as Old Man Jones ripped the bus left up into the side-street behind the extinct catholic church and the very world rocked like the planet had been slapped by God. He felt the heat of the spreading inferno, his body jiggling with the shockwaves that ripped through the bus. The church began to crumble to his right and Old Man Jones floored it.

The shockwave made him want to vomit so he went all the way to the back and puked in his hat, leaving it there. He then staggering numbly back to the front as the bus rollicked through side-streets, Jackie screamed things to him and Big Head, and the women howled in horror.

Eventually Old Man Jones found a hidden city lane—Cedonia—that slanted into the southeast, deep into the ghetto where Malcolm had been raised before Mom and he fled to the county. Jackie came to him and said the same thing over and over into his face until he figured out the movement of the lips, “Do you know your way through here?”

Malcolm shook his head ‘Yes’ and headed up front, directing Old Man Jones, who was strictly a country dude, by many twists and turns to the corner of Frankfurt Avenue and Sinclair Lane. Jackie then patted him on the back, strapped a face mask on him, popped chewed chewing gum into his ears—as if that mattered anymore—and handed him a sheet of paper that Miss Betty had written on:

We need some food. Please lead Jackie into the carryout and bring out the sides, rolls and anything that doesn’t need cooked.

Feeling pride that his years of fast food servitude and his big mouth had made him a crucial part of the Last Team on Earth, Malcolm beamed and shouted, “I’ll fire up the fryer and bring out twenty pounds of chicken in as many minutes!”

He could not hear them cheer but saw their smiles and felt, for once, like he really belonged.

Jackie, the bee-bee gun brat, and Malcolm darted from the bus across the asphalt to the covered walk in front of the carryout. As they hit the curb two gangbangers with their bandanas tied over their mouths like old-time western stagecoach robbers, stepped out of the door and leveled their guns at Jackie, who put up his hands. Jackie was just ahead off to the left side. Then something crazy happened. Malcolm felt the bee-bee gun kid lean against his left leg from behind and saw the barrel of the bee-bee gun slide out between his legs. Then the gangbanger on the right was clutching at a feathered dart the size of a fly protruding from his Adam’s apple!

Both guns turned on Malcolm and boomed. Everything was happening in slow motion and the reports of the nine-millimeter handguns, unheard by his ears, punched into his body—‘No, I’ve been shot!’

‘This little brat is using me as a meat-shield!’

Malcolm felt a burning on the inside of his right thigh, and a pressure on his left side that burned all the way out his back. Then the world spun as the little bastard pulled him to the ground like one of General Custer’s horses and hunkered down behind him pumping up his bee-bee gun.

Malcolm’s eyes were still on the gangbangers as he screamed to the kid, “You evil brat!”

The right-hand gangbanger with the thing in his throat was firing wildly, kicking up asphalt in Malcolm’s face, grazing his ankle with a burning bullet, and even shooting off a nipple—“Shit! Shoot him Kid!”

The other gangbanger was in deep trouble as Jackie Spam had his gun, and his arm, which he was breaking. The gun was still going off though, and was empty by the time Jackie had it.

The gangbanger with the throat injury was half-kneeling and half-sitting, trying to aim his weapon. The kid then popped up over Malcolm from behind, actually treading on him and causing blood to gush up out of his chest. The boy crouched right in front of Malcolm even as Malcolm’s two small toes on his right foot lit up in hideous pain and he howled and the world turned upside-down and the lights went out.

Malcolm woke and looked down to see Jackie applying pressure to what must have been a garden hose squirting blood out of the inside of Malcolm’s thigh. Jackie was extremely upset and crying. This was confusing since Malcolm felt fine, just a little sleepy.

“I’m okay Jackie.”

Jackie was pressing down real hard on Malcolm’s thigh and waiving the kid toward him. Malcolm looked over to see the kid slicing an ear off of one of the dead gangbangers with a wicked looking hooked knife. By the vibrations in his body he could tell that Jackie was still yelling for the kid, but the kid was collecting the gangbanger’s guns and searching the—Blackness.

A bright light hit him and then he looked up and saw Miss Kendra kneeling over him to his left. Below Jackie was working furiously on his leg with Old Man’s Jones’ multi-tool and dental floss, “Dental floss! What the hell?”

Kendra was crying.

To his right kneeled the savage little white-boy, who was placing two gangbanger ears and an empty nine-millimeter on Malcolm’s blood-soaked chest. The kid then stood over him, pushed back his paintball mask, and saluted him. He could tell by the shaking of her hands that Kendra was crying even harder now.

‘I can never recall feeling this right. What a nice blue the sky above is—and I did not even notice until now. Sorry about that God. I’ve been busy.’

He all of a sudden felt an unbelievable lightness of being, and felt a warm smile crease his lips as he patted Kendra’s arm to calm her. He looked up into the stern little pale face of the crazy kid and was certain he could hear the words as he spoke them, “You’re rated-R now kid.”

Continued in Kicking Ridiculous Butt! First Contact #13: Nick Against the Creepy Crawlers