Chapter 2: We become spies

Was it some kind of a ritual? In all my days of mowing the lawn, I had never seen my old neighbour move that fast...The two entourages on each side of him were different, their helmets had lights around their opaque visors that transitioned from red, white to blue like plane lights. They had rifles and I might say I was impressed with their sequence. Their footsteps were in sync as they approached the other brown camouflage guys who were lined up.

"Who are these guys?"

The one in the middle talked to Mister Wigglesworth and I could not believe my eyes, the parcel in his hand levitated. I glanced at Morty and he was equally as amazed as me and I scoffed. The parcel in his hand was eye-catching. It was black, prism-shaped with many facets. "Whoa." He tapped on it and it morphed remaking itself into spikes, I heard a pulsing noise, it morphed into a cube then back to the prism. I grabbed Morty's shoulder.

Another box materialized from out of nowhere and it stood at the centre like a podium in their centre, Mister Wigglesworth was nervous. They were expecting him to surrender the parcel and slot it into the box. 'What is that?' I thought.

"I'm taping this," I searched for my phone, I couldn't miss the holograms. I dropped Seymour and patted my pockets searching for my phone and came up empty. "Oh great. I need yours,"

Morty frowned at me. "I don't know, Zack, this looks pretty sacred, wait no!_"

I snatched his from him. "Give me your phone," This could be the biggest discovery of our lives and he was just letting it slip by. After all he did call me. I plucked out his phone and tapped the camera and Morty pulled it down.

"Let go!" I yanked it. Morty grabbed the other end and we wrestled.

"You're ruining my shot,"

I turned pale at the lasers on us and kind of peed on myself at the shot taken at the crate in front of us, the edge of the crate melted down to the styrofoam inside of it, they sizzled down to the end and the phone dropped from our hands.

"They're spies!" He heard one of them say and he choked at a rifle on his throat, the leader of the Klozar ambassadors snatched the box.

"You're trying to two-time us. Old knight. Kill them,"

"These are pretty minuscule spies, my lord," The leader said into his comms. They chattered among themselves. We had our hands up when they surrounded us. My throat clogged and I was running out of oxygen. I could barely think or breath. Mister Wigglesworth was talking briskly with bulging eyes to the colossal men and a rifle was lodged in his throat.

Mister Wigglesworth! Of all people was out there holding them off. Mort held on to the prism parcel. My eyes were pale. I got hit by the parcel. I held on to my stomach.

"Mort catch!" He threw the parcel, Mort winced when he failed to catch it. The box malfunctioned and I screamed at the blast and fell back into the shelter of more craters. I gasped.

[ System Activated ]

[ Installing Nanites ]

[ 5%...10%...25%...50%....]

[ D******d complete ]

"What's going on?"

[ Greetings Mecha Knight Zack, I am Ash, a Morphian Artificial Intelligence Unit ]

"No, it hurts," I did not feel like myself at all.

Boxes scattered, lasers made noises. The lights flickered like someone through a flare in a dark cave. I was in agony. I saw Mister Wigglesworth leap on top of an entity's shoulders, he flipped over losing his balance, another masked fiend behind Mister Wigglesworth had him in his grip and Mister Wigglesworth hurled him to the ground shooting him dead. He was fast I thought I was seeing double like he was in two places at once. I wanted to hurl and Morty held me up.

"Oh my g_He just killed someone," I blurted with terror and my eyes rolled up slagging.

We ducked as an entity flew over our heads to land against the wall and slumping.

Morty gaped at John Doe's helmet and his beaded blue eyes, his skin was humanoid, it was sizzling like fried eggs_which was as pleasantly as I could describe it and it made me lose my dinner. I was turning green.

My pain receptors were firing up to the extremes The background noise seemed to die down as well. A flourescent light tube clattered on the ground. The hangar was in shambles.

....

Mister Wigglesworth came around the crates and he hung up a rifle, he spoke into his watch in gibberish again like he always did. The coast was filled with molten dead bodies and the boxes were melting.

"Here, eat this," He gave me what looked like a mini croissant.

I ate it and it tasted nothing like a croissant. It was more like mint and sandpaper but it did take the pain off.

Mister Wigglesworth looked mad and he hoisted me up without effort. Morty was lost for words. He had the prism in his hand and his eyes had dark circles.

"Do you two realize what you've done!?" Mr Wigglesworth began.

"It wasn't my fault, it was him!" Morty bumped me frowning.

"You led him here," Mister Wigglesworth added. I shook my head as if he were speaking a different language.

Morty looked pretty mortified and glared at me.

"You should be proud of yourself, Dexter," He said.

"It's Zac_"

"I was curious," Morty confessed.

"You know what they say, Mort, curiosity kills the...thing," He said hesitantly while Seymour settled in front of him watchful.

"I hope you two 're happy,"

"Frankly, Mister Wigglesworth, I'm not proud of myself, what we did and I want to ask for forgiveness," Morty said trying to act all mature.

"What about the..." I raised my eyebrow eyeing him. "That box. That parcel that floats? What's in it?"

"That's none of your concern, there's no reason to be concerned. You three should just go home," He added giving Seymour a quick rub.

I was drawn to him at that moment. His enigmatic life seemed to hard to grasp especially when he was at that stage where he couldn't even move without slipping a disc. What was his life like?

"Home? My dad's not expecting me till tomorrow," I said weakly.

"That's not my problem," He let out walking away, and looked back at us and me especially, I've done some really bad stuff or things that ended up going completely wrong but I certainly wasn't expecting to give my neighbor a bad rep. Those aliens were dangerous. "Those aliens? Who are they?"

"None of your business."

"I'm sorry about your ritual. Okay, Frank?"

His eyes narrowed. "As you've always been. And it's not a ritual. Now get going," He nodded to the doors and Morty looked anxious, I carried Seymour like a sack of feed dawdling slowly home by his side. My stomach felt like a beaten up rice bag. Who was he? What business did Wigglesworth have with these homicidal freaks? was I really in trouble? Morty wanted him to be a secret.

Mister Wiggles_Frank was an understanding person it appeared and he didn't mean any harm and what did he mean 'As I've always been'? "Mister W_"

"You'll tell your father that you left early from your sleepover and you can forget that this ever happened, understand?"

"What is the truth? That thing that shot me. Why did it make me sick and craz_" I clamped up for the sake of my dignity.