Coming Out

Kitty backed against the wall. Her face grew long and she exhaled as if all the air in her lungs wanted out all at once.

Who will lead us now? The President is dead and the Vice President is no where to be found. Is the Speaker of the House alive? Kaitlyn Jenner is definitely not ready for this kind of responsibility, she thought.

A sharp pounding on the glass door of the break room interrupted her thoughts. Enveloped in a cloud of fog from the fire extinguisher is Dr. Fritz Rommel; sort of. He was a zombie now and he was clawing at the glass with his shitty hands, trying to get at her. Luckily, he was pushing on the pull door. As long as the glass held, she was safe.

A loud ruckus started somewhere deep within the foggy room, which momentarily got the doctor’s attention, before he returned to clawing away at the door.

Is that another one? Is it a newly zombified Evan Bacon? Kitty thought.

Kitty heard a quick snap, as Fritz is yanked backwards into the thick smoke; the white air fills the void and he disappears. Kitty freezes and studies the room trying to make sense of it all.

As she moves in closer, a hand reaches out in a flash and grabs the handle of the door. She jumps back and slams into the wall. If it were sheetrock, she might have even passed through it. The door opened and the cottony air spilled out into the hallway..

“Oh my Kanye… How?”

“Yeah, I guess I have some ‘splaining to do,’” Evan said.

Moans were coming from somewhere behind Evan. He turned around to investigate. The room was clearing and he could make out where Fritz and Marietta were lying. Slowly, they were pulling themselves up off the ground. Kitty brought herself closer to Evan and peeked around his shoulder.

“Oh no…” She said. “Wait… They’re okay?”

“Would you look at that,” Evan said.

Evan looked at Kitty; she could see wheels turning behind the lenses of his eyes, like he was trying to manufacturer the correct thing to say.

“Kitty…”

“Please, Mr. President, call me Ace Reporter, Kitty Catan.”

“No, I’m not doing that. Kitty, we need to get to the others. I may have just figured something out.”

“Yes sir, Mr. President.”

“Please, call me Evan.”

“Yes sir, Evan, as you wish.”

“Okay, first of all, go back to calling me Mr. President. I regretted telling you to call me Evan as soon as I heard you say it.”

“Oh… Yes sir.”

“That’s on me,” he said.

A voice rang out from down the hall.

“Mr. President!” Stanley cried out. He stopped running and placed his hands on his meaty knees. Trying to catch his breath, he said between gasps, “We… have to… hurry.”

“What is it, Lunchbox?”

Stanley’s response was indecipherable.

“I think he said Timmy is trapped in a well again,” Kitty joked.

“No… bitch… aliens… coming…”

“Whoever sent you is an asshole,” said the President.

Fritz and Marietta were walking towards the hallway.

“Are you two okay? Can you run?”

“I think so,” Marietta said.

Fritz nodded. “Yes sir.”

“Great, let’s go.”

The three of them started down the hall, as Stanley trailed behind as best he could. As they ran into the control room, Mick greeted them.

“Evan! What happened? Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine, Mick. I’ll explain when we’re all safe.”

“Mr. President, the bird is down, but we can still make it out of here on Air Force Two. Everyone is on board and Eastwood has it fired up and ready. There’s a fleet approaching from the East. Every second counts; they’ll be within following range any moment,” General Norm Usrodd said. ”

“Then there’s no time to lose, General.”

The group ran down the tunnel to join the others. As they reached the breach, they could see Inkaku ships, but they were too close together to make out how many.

“Why are they moving so slowly?” Kitty asked.

“I don’t think they’re moving slowly; I think they’ve stopped,” the general responded.

Yukon was waiting by Air Force Two as they approached. “They stopped about five minutes ago,” he told them. Kitty ran and threw her arms around.

Kitty shot Evan a look; he knew what she was thinking.

“I was gassed five minutes ago,” he said.

The General looked at him with wide eyes. “Sir?”

“Babe? Are you okay? What happened?” Mick asked.”

“Marietta turned into an alien. She and Dr. Rommel attacked me and I fought them as long as I could before Marietta gassed me,” Evan said.

“But they’re both fine now and you’re fine. How is that possible?” Yukon asked.

“I think I’m immune…” Evan said. He looked into Mick’s eyes. “We’re immune.”

Mick seemed to know what Evan was alluding to. He pulled himself into an embrace with his husband. Dr Rommel’s wheels were turning as he tried to solve the riddle.

“Oh!” He exclaimed. “Because you’re gay?”

Everyone paused and stared at him, like he just farted in an elevator.

“Oh no… Am I gay now too?”

“You’re not gay, doctor and we’re not immune because we’re gay,” Mick said.

“Doctor, I’ll explain when we’re all safe. For now, let’s just get back inside,” Evan said.

“Inside?” Marietta asked. “But the aliens–”

“They’ve stopped,” Evan reminded her. “I think they share some sort of psychic bond. You gassed me about the time they stopped coming for me. As far as I can tell, they’ve been coming after me this whole time. They’re probably coming after all the world’s leaders. When you gassed me, they probably thought I was taken care of. I think we’re safe for now, so I need everyone to get inside. I will explain everything to you… to the world. There’s a communications room in one of the lower levels here. We need to get to it. I think I know how we can save the world.”

 

***

It had been an hour since the death of Guy Fieri and the group was still staring at his lifeless body on the floor, except for Tad, who was staring at the Vice President’s boobs. No one said anything about Marlo’s death, no one cared. Tom the waiter, whose real name might actually be Tom the waiter, took off Guy’s iconic shades and put them in his pocket.

“Hey, who said you could have those?” Tad asked.

“He would want someone to have them.”

“He would want someone cool to have them.”

“Well, that rules you out,” Geoff said.

“Enough of this; we need to come up with a plan. Those aliens surprised us earlier with that gas, and I want to be ready for the next attack. I don’t know if the President is alive or not, so I will need to act and make decisions on the assumption that he is,” Honey said.

The only thing that Tad heard was the word come.

“I have a full clip and one extra,” Langhorne said.

“Same here,” Anna said.

Hook pulled out a Berretta from his jacket, as well as a Sig Sauer p238. He also had a bowie knife tucked into his sock. He was always ready for an attack; after all, he did work for the government. “This is how we roll in FEMA.”

“The American people must be terrified; they haven’t heard any updates in hours,” Honey said.

“I doubt they’re sitting at home tuned into their television sets anyway; I’m sure they are busy running for their lives, except maybe in Detroit,” Langhorne said.

“Don’t be stupid, they don’t have televisions in Detroit,” Marlo said.

“He’s right, hey,” Lorenzo said, eating a chicken wing that he had picked up off the kitchen floor.

“We are probably as safe here as we are anywhere else. I think the best thing to do, is wait until we have confirmation about the President. I for one think he is alive; he is a tough bastard,” Anna said.

The group heard a noise in the Theater Room; it sounded like something was knocked over. The Secret Service Agents and Hook drew their guns, and proceeded into the Theater Room. Langhorne motioned for the rest of the group to stay put.

“God damn it Darryl, watch where you’re going! That vase you just broke was a relic from the Ming Dynasty,” Larry said sadly, realizing he no longer had to distinguish, which Darryl he was referring to, since there was only one Darryl now.

“Bitch please, my wife bought one identical to that at The Dollar Tree,” Darryl said.

“You idiot; do you think former President Trump shopped at The Dollar Tree.”

The other agents and Hook dropped their weapons when they saw them.

“Welcome to the party,” Langhorne said with a smile.

“You wouldn’t believe the day we’ve had. I’ll tell you about it, after we’ve had a plate of chicken wings. The thought of Guy’s wings has been the only thing that has kept me going,” Darryl said and could see from their faces that something bad had happened.

“I don’t know how to tell you this, but Guy is dead. He turned into an alien and I had to shoot him,” Langhorne said.

“Noooooooo! Muther fuckin’ shit!”

The group in the kitchen heard the voices and came into the Theater Room.

“Why do you have a dick on your forehead dude?” Darryl asked Tad.

Melvin grinned; he drew it there early this morning and no one bothered to tell him about it.

“What? Melvin, you asshole,” Tad said spitting on his fingers and trying to wipe it off.

“You’ll have to scrub harder; I used a sharpie.”

“More importantly, why do you have shit on your head?” Hook asked pointing to Katie.

“I guess we’ve both had weird days. Well, since we won’t be getting any chicken wings, let me just tell you about the day we’ve had,” Larry said.

Larry told the group everything, about how they got on to the spaceship, the rescue of the girls, Darryl number one’s untimely death and how his last act was to knock a shoebox filled with poop out of Katie’s hands.

“Why were you carrying around a shoebox full of poop?” Honey asked Katie.

“It kills aliens; it’s like their kryptonite,” Rose said.

Tad had been staring at Honey’s boobs this whole time and just now noticed Rose.

Oh shit! He thought to himself, as he slipped behind Melvin and increased his efforts to remove the dick drawn on his head.

Geoff smiled. “It’s not coming off, dude; you’re just smudging the dick.”
He quickly snapped a pic of Tad’s head and posted it on Twitter, with the hashtag #SmudgeDick.

Rose’s phone vibrated in her pocket. She checked the notification and began to laugh, showing it to Katie who also began laughing.

“Ha!” Katie chuckled. “Smudge Dick.”

“Dude! You tagged her in it?”

“Yep, and Melvin just retweeted it.”

***

In a section of hallway untraveled for quite some time, deep within the mountain at NORAD, Evan and his gang were coming upon a large metal door marked EBR.

“Kitty, we need to send out radio broadcasts to everyone in the country. I need you there to ask any questions you think the people will have after my statement,” Evan said.

“I can handle it, Sir.”

“I believe you can; I just want you to be prepared. Trust me, this day is about to get even weirder. You think it’s all kittens and dildos now; just wait.”

“I don’t think anyone thinks that, sir… or says that.”

“Oh they do.”

Finally reaching the end of the corridor, Evan, Kitty, and the other survivors reach the emergency broadcast room. It smelled unused and the lighting was, “unflattering” as Mick was quick to point out. Kitty surveyed the room. She couldn’t help but think it looked like the first set of The Tonight Show if Bruce Wayne tried to replicate that set in the Bat Cave. But it was a bit smaller; like the Bat Cave’s bathroom. Kitty fought to hold back her giggles, when she thought about how great it would be if her makeup guy, who just so happens to be named Alfred Butler, were here with her right now.

“How did you know about this place?” Eggs asked.

“It was in the brochure,” Evan replied as if he were serious.

“I hope all this old equipment works,” Yukon said.

“There,” Evan said and pointed to a sound booth.

Evan and Kitty sat down in adjacent chairs and turned to one another, clearing off cobwebs and cleaning their respective areas.

“Okay, let’s see if we can get this puppy up and running, people,” Mick shouted.

After a few minutes and a bit of random lever pulling, everything seemed to be in order. Luckily, Homeland Security Director, Stanley Johnson use to run a small music studio out of his basement back in the nineties during his short rap career under the name C-Rap.

A voice called out, but neither Evan nor Kitty could tell who said it. “We’ll be ready to go in about two minutes.”

“Kitty, I need you to remain perfectly calm. Remember, everything is going to be alright.”

“Yes sir; I understand.”

“It’s going to be a lot tougher than you think… like shitting up a wall.”

“Shitting up a wall?”

“I’m sorry you’re hearing this along with everyone else. I wish I could give you time to absorb it all, but when you and the listeners hear what I have to say; I think you’ll understand. I just hope you don’t freak out too much.”

“What could be worse than an alien attack?”

“My secret,” The President replied. “Coming out to the world was never supposed to happen.”

“But everyone already knows you’re gay.”

“Oh, I’m not gay; my husband is.”

“Now I’m confused,” Kitty said as she tilted her head slightly like a dog trying to figure out how the ice maker on the fridge works.

“If you’re not gay, why would you marry a man during an election year, while running for president? I would think you would’ve liked to avoid that battle.”

“I did it to draw the conversation away from my stutter.”

“Umm… I don’t understand,” she confessed.

“Are you making fun of my speech impediment?” Evan asked in a raised voice.

“No, sir,” Kitty was quick to say before noticing Evan’s grin.

“Are you messing with me, Mr. President?”

Evan nodded. “I’m just breaking the ice.”

The next thirty seconds were the longest in history. Everyone remained as calm as they could be during an alien invasion. On the other side of the booth window, where “all the magic happens,” everyone was preparing for broadcast. It was a stark contrast to the area Kitty and Evan occupied. The time had arrived. What seemed like an eternity of stillness for Kitty was over in three… two… one…

Ladies and Gentleman and anyone out there listening to the sound of my voice. This is Kitty Catan coming to you live from deep within a secure compound, with President Evan Bacon. The President believes we have it in us to turn the tide of this battle. Now, in his own words, Commander In Chief, President Evan Sedgwick Bacon. Mr President …

Thank you, Kitty. My fellow Americans, we’ve been tested today. An unknown enemy descended from the heavens and changed us forever. They answered the question of are we alone in the universe. The answer is a resounding hell no. They hit us and they hit us hard. We were ill prepared for this day. I know all seems lost; I’m here now to tell you that it is not. There is a way. It’s not a pretty solution… I’m sure by now; you think you’ve seen it all, but you haven’t. I know you’re tired of being told to remain calm. Well I’m asking for that again, one last time. I’m asking you to trust me; I am here to help. WE’RE here to help. I am part of a secret society that can end this battle once and for all. Moments ago, I was attacked by two zombies and I survived, but more than that, I successfully cured my attackers. You heard me correctly. There is a cure, if you can avoid it; I ask that you please stop killing the zombies. We have the power to save them. All I ask is from you is, to believe in me and believe in America. Don’t be frightened; we are here to help. We… are Nosferatu.