Suddenly, her horns and wings faded. Tail too.

  “How…?” I started.

  “An illusion, but it takes a lot of concentration, and I have to be able to know who I’m targeting with it.”

  “Meaning we stay out of the spotlight as much as possible,” I noted.

  “Yes, and… maybe we should get me clothes that help me fit in better? It’s much easier if I don’t have to illusion my clothes as well.”

  “Great, after ruining my sheets.”

  “It was you who couldn’t control yourself with me being nude. Personally, I have no problem staying that way.”

  I gulped, wanting to say I had no problem with it either, but that was a double-edged sword. No problem? She was fucking stunning, but… yeah, I was likely to fall off a cliff while watching her ass.

  “My neighbor, Meher,” I said.

  “Great, she’s my size?”

  I analyzed her and tried to visualize the cute Indian lady who lived next door. “Maybe a bit chubbier, but not much.”

  “How do we take them?” She went to the window checking. “The thing is, this guy was a scout, so the others won’t be here right away, I think, but it won’t take too long. Let’s hurry and steal the clothes, then—”

  “Whoa, I’m not going to steal from Meher.”

  “Oh. Wait.” Ria turned to me, grinning wide. “Oh, shit. You have a crush on this girl?”

  “She’s a lady, first of all. Not a girl.”

  “Difference?”

  I scoffed. “One’s appropriate for my age, the other not.”

  “Oh, adult goes with lady.” She rubbed her chin, squinting. “Got it. Where I’m from, that just means female, I guess.”

  “Right. Point is, we’re not stealing from her.”

  “You want to go knock on her door and ask if she has some clothes I can borrow?” Ria stifled a laugh. “Good luck with that crush.”

  I frowned, realizing she was right. It wasn’t that I had a crush on Meher exactly, but she was attractive in that cute and slightly-overweight librarian way, and was always nice to me. And yeah, I’d considered asking her if she wanted to hang out sometime, maybe come over for tea, but after this, chances were slim.

  “Maybe…” I frowned, then sighed.

  “You were going to say stay here?” She walked out the door, starting to open it. “Two problems with that. One, she’s still going to wonder why you’re asking for clothes for another woman. The second and bigger issue there being that if my old colleagues show up while you’re over there by yourself, you’re fucked. I’m fucked. We’re all fucked.”

  She stepped out into the night, and I had no choice, apparently, other than to follow her. We kept out of the light as best we could, following the fence around and making for the front door.

  “Listen, let me do the talking,” I said as we reached the steps. “And aren’t you going to… you know, do the glamour thing?”

  “Glamour?” She frowned, then her eyes showed recognition. “Oh, my illusion ability? Don’t worry, already in effect for her. No reason to hide from you, right?”

  “True.”

  I reached the door, smoothed out my clothes, and then laughed at myself. Considering what was happening, my appearance should’ve been far from the top of my list of worries. First I rang the bell, then knocked.

  Ria watched, waiting. She folded her arms, leaned over to check through a window, and tapped her foot.

  “I would say we should check back later, but…”

  “Not going to cut it,” she finished. “Yeah, we’re going in.”

  “But—”

  Ria was already at the door, taking the doorknob and turning it so that it broke right off. With a playful smile, she gave the door a slight shove and it swung open with a creak.

  “Anyone home?” I asked.

  “Relax, you already did the knocking thing.” Ria walked in, not even bothering for the lights.

  “I still want to make sure,” I said, following behind her, glancing around with the realization I’d never been in there before. “She could’ve not heard. Maybe she’s sleeping, taking a shower…”

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Ria reached the stairs, starting up.

  “Excuse me?”

  She turned to face me. “If we walked up there right now and found her in the shower, would you look?”

  “I—”

  “Of course you would. When I showed up walking around naked, you didn’t even pretend not to look.”

  “I did too!”

  “Ah, but you only pretended.” She chuckled, then continued up the stairs, me close behind. As she walked, her tail moved out of the sheet, creating an opening and a view of her ass, even the curve where her ass went in, to where her pussy was, though it was too dark to see much.

  She paused, glanced back, and licked her lips. “You’d look.”

  She continued up the stairs, reaching the top and turning left as I stood there, mouth open. She’d tested me, and I’d failed. Damn.

  “It’s different,” I protested, going up the stairs two at a time. “You’re purposefully showing off, toying with me. She wouldn’t do that.”

  “Oh, she’s better than that, is she?” Ria laughed, checking a door but turning and shaking her head, then indicating the next. “Trust me, women are into it as much as men, sometimes more so. At least, where I come from, but I doubt it’s any different here.”

  I found the bedroom, hating myself for going in there without permission, and went to the closet to see what we could do about dress options. “You might be surprised.”

  “Not in this situation,” she said, then cleared her throat.

  I had just found a sexy, yellow nighty—almost like a summer dress, but way too inappropriate for that—and was checking it out when she cleared her throat again, causing me to look. When I did, the sight made me freeze. Ria was there at Meher’s sock drawer, holding up a sexy nightie in one hand, a badass looking dildo in the other. Florescent green with little poky things sticking out of the bottom that made no sense to me.

  “Seems your friend isn’t the prude you would like to think she is,” Ria said, giving the dildo a nice assessment. “From the little exposure I’ve had of you, though, I’d say you’re a good fit for her.”

  “Oh my God,” I said, storming over and taking the dildo to put it away.

  My words were echoed, “Oh my God,” but from another direction. Behind me, in the doorway.

  Meher.

  She stood with her mouth open, with a mace spray in her trembling hand. Her hair was tied back and she wore her red glasses with a tan turtleneck sweater. Beautiful in that seemingly innocent way.

  It took me a second to realize how horrible this looked, me standing there with her nighty in one hand, dildo in the other. A glance over made it worse, when I saw the nightie on the floor, no sign of Ria.

  Fuck. FUCK!

  “Get out…” Meher said, taking a step back, clearing the doorway. “I’m going to give you to the count of five, two more than anyone should get because you’ve always been kind. But this… just get the fuck out.”

  “Meher, this isn’t… what… it…” Dammit, I had nothing. No way of talking my way out of there. So I made for the door, cautiously.

  “You can leave the… toy.”

  I hadn’t even processed that the dildo was still in my hand, but I dropped it fast, like a hot potato. To my horror, standing in the doorway there, it bounced down the hall, rolled under the railing, and then fell down. A crack sounded, and I was pretty sure I’d just broken her dick. Dildo. Whatever. A fact that was confirmed when I reached the stairs and started running, and saw it in two halves below.

  “And the dress,” she called after me, suddenly falling back against the wall in a confused manner.

  “Sorry, I—fuck. Sorry, I need it!” I reached the front door, hanging open, and was about to try to close it behind me, when Ria appeared running toward me motioning for me to go, a gleeful smile on her face.

  “That was fun,” she hissed as she joined me to run down the steps and back toward my side of the fence.

  “Fun?!” I was trying to catch my breath, get my head to stop spinning. “You and I have different definitions of the word. Where’d you go?”

  She stopped there, taking the nighty—apparently she was calling it a dress—and holding it out at arm’s length, giving it an approving nod. “Had to illusion myself so she wouldn’t see me. Made it less awkward.”

  “There’s no way that situation could’ve been any more awkward.”

  “Didn’t have the dildo in your ass,” she winked, shimmying out of the sheet to pull on the dress. “And I figured you’d catch on if I made myself invisible to you, too. Right? You should be thanking me.”

  Her standing there naked in the night, while I was sure Meher was just on the other side of the fence calling the cops, it was too much.

  “Listen,” I shouted, “this is all your fault. Because of you I have a dead alien in my house, nearly got myself killed, and now, now…”

  I looked up to see Meher in one of her second-floor windows, staring at me with the phone to her ear.

  “Shit, she thinks I’m by myself here, doesn’t she?”

  Ria smiled, nodded her head, and pulled the dress up to cover herself. With the open back, it worked perfectly for her wings, but was still low cut enough to do an amazing job of showing off her cleavage. A few minutes before and I would’ve been surprised to learn that Meher even owned a dress like this, but after finding that dildo? Not so much.

  “Let’s just… get out of here before the cops arrive,” I said.

  “Lead the way.” She grinned, shaking her hips so the dress fell better around her body. Damn, it was a good look on her. Not on the same level as nude, but still nice.

  I motioned to the tree line, figuring our best bet was to get out of the line of sight as quickly as possible, and we ran.

  4

  The first thought I had when we reached the trees was that I had no idea where we were going. Ria had said we needed to form a team, but I didn’t have the slightest clue where to start. To make it worse, our options were limited, since my car was in the shop due to the hover function acting up. Sometimes I wondered about the old days, back when wheels were still in, and if they ever had such problems.

  At the moment, though, I at least needed a direction.

  “Where to?” I asked.

  “Tell me where we can find strong women, women with power. Who could stand against an alien invasion and not be scared.”

  A frown. “The diner?”

  “What?”

  “A diner I manage. Place with food.” I rubbed my hands together, in part because it was cold but also because it helped me think. “You don’t know tough until you’ve served the kind of assholes who eat at diners. Betty especially, this old woman who’d kick in anyone’s teeth if they tried to tell her to bring something back to the kitchen. Man…”

  “Would you fuck her?” Ria asked.

  “Fuck Betty?” I spat out. “I mean, not on purpose.”

  “I’m not sure what that means.”

  “Me neither,” I admitted. “I’m nervous. No, I wouldn’t fuck her if given the choice.”

  “Who would you fuck?”

  “I…” Glancing at her, the answer ‘you’ was a very hard one to push down. Also Meher, but now that was definitely out of the question. As for women at the diner, I wasn’t sure, though. There were several badasses for sure, but they were under me in the hierarchy. In general, I tried to be professional and not think of them that way.

  “No one?” Ria asked.

  “Barbie,” I blurted out, realizing she was the one that stuck out. Not because it had been a desire, but the woman had this sexy way of wearing short shorts and a tight shirt, small breasts pushed up to show her cleavage, and a tattoo on her chest that gave you no choice but to look. If there was anyone there I could imagine giving it to, it was her.

  “There we go. Let’s go find out if she’s there, and hope the rest of my old team takes their time getting here.”

  “You don’t know?” I asked, changing our trajectory toward the diner.

  She shook her head. “I’d estimate, but it depends on several factors, such as if they’ll actually divert from the plan to come for me first, or wait until the final invasion.”

  “Oh, shit… I keep forgetting. This final invasion being when?”

  The worry in her eyes showed the answer wasn’t going to be a welcome one. “Again, various factors, but—”

  “Ria…”

  “Tomorrow night, I think. If my calculations are correct.”

  My next step almost didn’t support me as my legs turned to Jell-O, but she was there to wrap an arm under my shoulder, to keep me moving.

  I pulled myself together and thanked her, but still I was walking in a daze. How could an invasion by evil supervillains and aliens be coming the next day? If not for Ria and her powers, as weird and confusing as they were, I imagined that would’ve meant my death was right around the corner. With her there, though, granting me some sort of powers of my own, maybe I’d stand a chance.

  Turning to her, looking at the dress as it clung to her skin, blowing out behind with the wind and perking at her nipples, I had a sudden new appreciation for her. This lady was possibly going to save my life, and if not, my last minutes of life would be spent with her.

  “Don’t,” she said.

  “What?”

  “You’re thinking you might die, so you’re filled with a new longing for me. Well, not going to happen.”

  “No, that wasn’t—”

  “It was what you were thinking, even if you don’t realize it. We’re not gonna fuck, because I’m done with that. And you don’t need to because you’re going to live. Don’t need you getting all worried and try to accomplish your bucket list.”

  “For the record, fucking an ex-succubus was never on my bucket list,” I countered.

  She scoffed. “Sure, until you met me.”

  Maybe she was being cocky, but she had a point. The worst part was, now there wasn’t much more than wanting to fuck her that I could think about. We walked in silence for a bit before she asked, “So this… Barbie?”

  “It’s her night,” I replied.

  “Great. But I was going to ask who she is. Does she have warrior training?”

  “Warri—no… No warrior training.” I laughed, but then remembered the black eye she’d come in with a couple of weeks back. Damn, now I was hoping that actually was from the kung-fu class as she’d claimed. “Maybe, of a sort.”

  “That’s something we can work with. And you?”

  “Me,” I said, walking, thinking about it. “Do you count Tae-Kwon Do when I was twelve? Or boxing in my best bud’s backyard for the hell of it?”

  “Should I?”

  “No.” I thought some more, then shrugged. “Most I can offer is some experience from street brawling. Grew up in Richmond, California. Back in the day it was known for being pretty fierce, but that’s nothing to where it stands now. I’ve had my share of brawls.”

  “Wonderful.” She shook her head, clearly not thinking much of that. Another thought seemed to hit her though, as she cocked her head and looked my way. “Tell me, why’s this Earth of yours so messed up?”

  “Is it?” I asked.

  She scoffed. “I’ve done my research. I know of the shit that went down in a place called Chicago… I know all about the last attempted invasion, about the role the Shadow Corps and others played—and yet, as soon as it was over your governments went about making sure it was forgotten. Now you have this system where Earth’s a shithole, but the worst of your kind live on Paradise Planets and get their every whim catered to.”

  “And you didn’t even say anything about Planet Kill or Abaddon,” I said. At her scowl, I knew she was familiar with both, and clearly didn’t approve of any system that pitted a bunch of people against each other for sex and death. “But what about you? Your worlds can’t be so much better.”

  A moment of silence followed, interrupted by her mumbling, “Fuck you.”

  “Another time, perhaps.”

  She glanced over, nostrils flaring. “You want to know about my world? Hear about the bullshit I’ve been through to reach this point, the shit I’ve done?”

  Hands up before she kept on the offensive, I protested, “I was making a joke. As in ‘another time’ for fucking you.’ Sorry it wasn’t well received.”

  “Another time…” she said the words, processing them. Then she chuckled, anger fading. “I see how that could apply to both situations.”

  We picked our way around the underbrush, working back toward the main road, but as we drew close I noticed the dim glow of the red and blue lights reflecting on the tree trunks and leaves overhead. Realizing where we were, I changed course, pulling Ria with me.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “The spot of the crash, earlier.” I pointed to where, when we crouched slightly, we could make out the car where the guy had died, the guy with his dick out. Near to it were hovering a couple of cop pods. “Either they took a long time to get here, or still haven’t finished up.”

  Her face scrunched up, but she nodded, catching on. “Not the type we want to get involved with?”

  “Not at all,” I replied.

  Moving back through the trees, I cursed. “This is bad.”

  “The guy was an ass. Yeah, he died and he didn’t deserve that.”

  “I mean, that’s a big deal and all, sure. But the police might be after me in connection to that, and for what happened at Meher’s place.”

  “Ah, well, if it comes to it,” she gestured at me, and my body vanished. “I can do it to you, too.” Her next step didn’t land well, though, and she stumbled so that I had to catch her.

  “Ria, I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that using powers drains your energy.”

  She nodded. “Energy, yeah. And more. So does gifting, another reason for doing it small amounts at a time and not too powerful at first.”

  “Damn. Thanks.”

  Her laugh warmed me. “No need for that. If I’m going to survive to help you, I’ll need you at my side.”