round up some friends and look to get even. Although Hoken would be changing appearances very soon when he assumed the body of #1, he still didn’t want anyone to be able to recognize him. It was essential that no one get away unscathed.
Hoken caught up with the big lumbering oaf in just a few steps. The man looked over his shoulder at Hoken as he ran away, but made no attempt to turn and face him.
Hoken grabbed the man’s arm and with one yank both stopped the man in his tracks and spun him around to face him. The hunk of human Crisco was already dripping in sweat.
The look on his face clearly said it all—he was scared to death.
Too damn bad, thought Hoken. No mercy now. I’m on a mission beyond this idiot’s comprehension.
Hoken clamped his left hand on the man’s collar and around his neck, his thumb directly over the windpipe, and just started to squeeze with all of his strength. The man’s face instantly turned red. He reached up with both hands to try to break Hoken’s death grip, but that just wasn’t going to happen. Hoken put his right hand in the man’s groin and proceeded to military press him over his head until his arms were locked.
There was no straining, no grunting. Hoken was totally in control, the punk at his complete mercy. Hoken was such a stud!
With the man held above his head, Hoken took several short steps, turning slightly to his left to stabilize the mountain of blubber. Hoken then let the man’s head start to drop to his left so that for an instant the man was perpendicular to the ground, legs straight up in the air. He then slammed the man to the pavement on his back, slamming his own body onto the man’s chest. Hulk Hogan’s body slam of Andre the Giant was little league in comparison to this. The man was out cold, just a quivering mass of fat, like a flesh-colored Jello that hadn’t yet set, lying on the pavement.
In seconds Hoken had pulverized five thugs. Three were seriously injured, the other two out cold. But the dogs were still barking. Anybody, even a person just on their morning walk, could just happen to come by at any time. Someone could have seen things and maybe even already summoned the police.
Hoken needed to get away from the litter of carnage in the alley as quickly as possible, but first he needed to make sure he hadn’t dropped or lost anything during the melee. Ring still on his finger. Watch—okay. He checked his pockets—money and wallet—okay.
He took off the backpack, knelt on one knee, and put the pack on the ground. All seams were intact. He didn’t need to inspect the contents; clearly they hadn’t been disturbed.
Hoken grabbed the switchblade and took off running down the alley, toward the dog that had started all the other dogs barking. It was a surly mutt with a ragged, matted coat, with fleas and ticks as big as your thumb. The cur would make Cujo look like a Toy French Poodle, the ones with those ridiculous sissy hair cuts. The dog was tethered by a strong two-meter chain attached to a stake driven deeply into the ground.
At first the dog strained at the chain, standing, jumping on its hind legs, front legs clawing at the air, barking and howling for all of its Alpo worth. But Hoken quickly noted that the closer he got, the less the dog strained at the chain, the less it barked. Finally, as Hoken sped by, the critter was just standing quietly, panting, as cuddly as the best-behaved little puppy dog, meeker than Lamb Chops and Hush Puppy on the Shari Lewis Show. The old cur, literally a junk yard dog, knew something no man on the face of the Earth would hopefully ever know. He knew the Alien’s Secret.
Chapter Forty-Four
The Boarding House
Hoken glanced at his watch, it was almost 6:40 AM local time. The little fracas with the punks was over in barely a minute; he hadn’t even broken a sweat. He was still on schedule and would be at the boarding house in less than ten minutes.
He was walking east on Colorado with Kessler Park on his left. More cars were on the street all the time. A long yellow school bus, driven by a man rolling a cigarette, cruised by on its way to pick up its first student.
Finally: North Beckley—Hoken’s destination. The boarding house was on the other side of the street, so he crossed Beckley—looking carefully both ways—to walk south on that side.
Thirteen hundred north. Hoken always stayed focused on the mission but was, nonetheless, also very hungry. When he got to the middle of the block he noticed the Dobb’s House Bar and Restaurant on the other side. They advertised The Best Breakfast in Town. Even from across the street Hoken could smell what he would soon find out was bacon frying. It actually made his stomach growl. He quickly decided that after he finished his business at the boarding house he would have his first meal on Earth at the Dobb’s House Restaurant. He noted the address—1221 North Beckley.
There it was—1026. Hoken recognized the building even before he saw the address. The holographic pictures created by the ship’s computer were perfect: trees on both sides of the front yard, the patchy half-crabgrass, half brown and green grass in the front yard, the two-tiered hedges with some ground cover and a few flowers in front of the house, and the red shingle roof with exposed white gables.
He walked up the concrete walk, passed the “Bedroom for Rent” sign just off to the right, keeping his eyes glued to the ground so as not to trip over the uneven sections, to the front of the house and up the two steps to the porch that ran the entire front length of the building. He tried to look inside. Any information he could get about anything before having to enter was useful. The curtains were pulled on the windows of the rooms to the right side of the door, but they were open on windows to the dining room on the left. Hoken saw at least four people at the table and two others standing up.
By the time he got to the door, he had taken off his backpack and had it tucked underneath his left arm, close to his body, to make it look as inconspicuous as possible. Because this was a boarding house with people constantly coming and going, Hoken knew he didn’t need to knock or ring the doorbell or in any other way signal his desire to enter. He opened the screen door—one of those where the metal seemed lighter and flimsier than the screen, that seemed to buckle just from opening it—and took one step to stand at the threshold. He let the screen door rest against his back, opened the inner wooden door (barely more substantial than the screen door), and stepped inside, delighted that the doors didn’t fall off their hinges as he passed through.
Hoken always tried to look like he was in control, that he belonged there, that he knew what he was doing. The quickest way to draw attention would be to just gawk and look stupid like he was lost, so he just walked straight down the hallway like he owned the place.
On the wall on his right were two small framed pictures, one of the Statue of Liberty holding her flame high to the world, and the other he recognized as a smiling President Franklin Roosevelt with his signature cigarette holder clamped firmly between his teeth. The only thing on the left—the only piece of furniture in the entire hallway—was a tiny table, flat on one side, that fit snuggly against the wall. He didn’t recognize the somewhat elderly man in the nine by twelve framed hand-tinted picture on the table, but the woman was Gladys Johnson, the owner of the boarding house.
As he walked down the hallway, he glanced to his right into the living room. There was a young man sitting on the couch, reading a newspaper, and having a cup of coffee. Overall, the furnishings seemed sparse for such a large room. This was obviously a place for people of a lower socioeconomic class, thought Hoken.
The dining room was on his left. Five young men were at the table being served by two women in aprons, one middle-aged, one more elderly, both wearing nets to keep their graying hair in place. Breakfast seemed ample. There were scrambled eggs, cold cereal, bread or toast with butter and jelly, and milk and coffee, and plenty of salt and pepper.
As Hoken walked past, he heard one of the young men ask the others: “Okay, guys, what do you call an armadillo lying on the side of the road?” After waiting a few seconds with no response, the young man said, “Possum on the half-shell.”
From the laughter, Hoken presumed it was a joke, but had no idea of the context. He could tell from the looks on the faces of the two ladies