Aidan and the Alien Invasion

Excerpt

Aidan and the Alien Invasion
Damian Serbu © 2026
All Rights Reserved

Chapter One

Visitors

“What the heck!” Jarvis exclaimed as he stared at the television when Aidan walked into the common area. “Have you seen this?”

Aidan glanced at the TV, wondering why his quad mate called his attention to some disaster movie he decided to watch in the middle of the day. Aidan ignored him and went to the fridge to grab an energy drink. He glanced out the window at the Chicago skyline, glistening in the afternoon sun.

Aidan squinted into the bright light, confused to see a Star Destroyer instead of an airplane heading for downtown. Maybe Ellie had a point last night when she told him to stop watching so much Star Wars.

“Dude!” Jarvis shouted, startling Aidan and turning his attention away from the window and back to the TV. Aidan grew alarmed at Jarvis yelling at him, for the first time he could ever remember. “Look!” Jarvis jabbed his finger toward the screen over and over.

Aidan walked over and stood behind Jarvis, who let his arm fall to his side as he sat on the couch, mesmerized.

Okay, so the movie impressed Aidan with its realistic scene. Everything appeared as if they watched one of the major news networks reporting on an alien invasion of Washington, DC. The news logo was prominently displayed in one corner with the time of day, the scroll across the bottom ran with the latest news, and in a tiny inset box, the anchor talked in a somber tone about the main event on the screen.

Speaking of Star Wars, most of the TV screen showed a lame rip-off of a Star Destroyer hovering over the US Capitol and stretching all the way to the White House. Shaped in the same triangular fashion, the movie Jarvis watched only bothered to change the appearance with a smooth, shiny gold surface and no other extended pieces of ship, guns, or protrusions. So they went with a golden Star Destroyer phallic kind of shape.

But the newswoman looked scared shitless. Seemed realistic. Aidan was impressed the movie producers got an actual anchor to appear in the film, and she could act well enough to sound believable.

“What are we gonna do?” Jarvis asked Aidan, his usual authoritative voice quivering.

“Huh?”

Jarvis pointed to the TV again. “We need to get out of here. But where can anyone be safe? They’ll come here too. They could go anywhere.”

“Have you been drinking?” Aidan asked. “What movie are you watching, anyway?”

“Dude!” Jarvis screamed even louder. “That’s not a darn movie! Real, dude. Real. Happening now.”

Aidan scrutinized the television more closely, and his heart raced. He grabbed the remote and hit the guide button to verify his fear. Jarvis was watching the actual news, not a movie.

“Holy fuck! They really invaded Earth? Are you sure? What are we going to do?” Aidan took his turn to shout in alarm as he dropped the energy drink.

“I asked you those questions already!” Jarvis launched off the couch. “Okay. Stay calm.” He pointed toward the spilled drink on the carpet. “Clean up, dude. No. Scratch that. We gotta go. Now.” He returned to his more staid and thoughtful self, but his body language gave off a sense of urgency.

Which was good, because Aidan prepared to lose his shizzle. “Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Two major problems.” Aidan and Jarvis stared at each other across the couch as Aidan spoke in an increasingly high-pitched whine. “We don’t have a car. And they’re almost here.” Aidan pointed toward the window.

Jarvis and he turned their attention to the skyline, where the supposed airplane of earlier flew at a slow rate toward downtown Chicago, coming close enough to show them the truth. An enormous gold triangular-shaped craft loomed on the horizon. It matched the spaceship taking over Washington, DC.

Jarvis clutched Aidan by the shoulders. “Pack a bag. Fast. Take whatever you need. Like we got two minutes to get out of here.”

Aidan loved a man in charge, even if the particular man commanding him was straight, so he launched into motion without thinking. He hurried to his room, grabbed his backpack, and threw in his computer, a couple of sentimental items from the top of his desk, and his favorite clothes from a drawer. The flurry of activity helped alleviate a little of his ADHD reaction to a major stress event. His mom’s voice in his noggin also reminded him to take deep breaths. He’d crammed in as much as possible and scanned his belongings when Jarvis yelled from the living room.

“Now, dude! Aidan?” Jarvis ran into Aidan’s room and pulled on his arm. “We gotta go.”

Aidan followed Jarvis into the common area as they sprinted toward the door, but Jarvis lurched to a stop.

“Wait.” Jarvis stared down at Aidan. “Where are we going?”

“Shit!” Aidan screamed. “I was following you. I assumed you had the next move figured out! You plan months in advance. You have your life all dialed in for, like, the next thirty years!” He knew he sputtered along like an unhinged lunatic, but rising to an emergency never was one of his strengths. He pointed at Jarvis. “You sounded like you had a plan. I thought you had a plan!”

Jarvis jabbed a finger toward the window. “Well, I forgot to factor major alien invasion into my future. I’ll recalibrate for these visitors, but for now, I doubt we have time to do much more than get out.”

Aidan nodded as they stared with vacant, fearful expressions at each other.

“We don’t have a car.” Aidan shrugged. “I doubt the El will get us far enough away. Uber. Taxis.” Aidan shook his head. “Not gonna work. I mean, I assume they all roared out of town or got riders already. I got nothing.”

Jarvis nodded agreement. “Yeah. Me neither. But staying here seems like a super bad idea.”

“Why?” Aidan asked. The safety of the residential hall and ignoring the crisis had a certain allure suddenly.

“Why?” Jarvis shot back. “Why? Aliens!”

“I know. I know. But are we fleeing because of danger or because we think we should flee?”

Jarvis squinted at Aidan. “You gotta make sense if you want an answer.”

“I mean, are they Sigourney Weaver nasty aliens or E.T. coming for a visit and some tea? How do we know if we should panic?”

“How would I know?” Jarvis’s eyes grew enormous.

Aidan pointed to the TV. “What’d the news say?”

“Oh. They said the spaceship appeared over Washington without communicating to the people below. There are no signs of massive explosions or blowing the crap out of the Capitol, like in a disaster movie. But the spaceship is hovering over everything, and all electronics have fizzled out. None of them work: no cell phones, no satellite communication, no computers, like, nothing but a few people calling from old-school landlines.”

“Landlines?” Aidan scrunched his brow.

“Phones. Don’t you ever watch old movies?”

As if on cue, Aidan’s phone rang with the “Imperial March” from Star Wars as his ringtone.

“Well, that’s fitting,” Jarvis muttered as Aidan grabbed his phone.

“Yes!” Aidan yelled as he looked down at Ellie’s smiling face. “She always knows what to do. Always.” He held up the phone and showed Ellie’s picture to Jarvis.

“Answer!” Jarvis ordered him.

Aidan tapped the screen and held the phone to his ear. “Ellie! What the fuck? Have you seen?”

Her calm voice on the other end immediately took Aidan’s blood pressure down several points. “Yes, I saw. I can’t imagine many who haven’t. I need you to listen to me and get control of yourself.”

Aidan took a deep breath. “I’m in control.” Shit, his voice quivered.

“You sound about ready for a major panic attack. Don’t lie. Is someone with you, in case you freak?”

Aidan nodded his answer.

“She can’t see you,” Jarvis said aloud.

“Right.” Ellie chimed in from the phone. “Aidan, who’s with you? Can he help?”

“Oh, yeah. Jarvis. You know, my roommate.”

“Let me speak with him.”

“You already are. I put you on speaker.”

“Jarvis, you can hear me?”

“Yep. Shoot.” Jarvis grabbed the phone from Aidan’s shaking hand before he dropped it.

“You two need to haul ass downstairs, fast. Don’t take the elevator because electrical systems are starting to fail like in Washington. Did you see the news? I assume the same will happen in Chicago and anywhere else these assholes go.”

“Yes, we know.” Jarvis answered again. Aidan decided to stay quiet and concentrate on remembering to breathe.

“So,” Ellie continued, “hit the stairs like you’re running a race, and I’ll pick you up in the alley. The alley out back, near the kitchen. Guys, roads are packed. People are fleeing. We have like two seconds to get out of downtown before this place goes to shit.”

“Gotcha.” Jarvis hung up and handed Aidan his phone. “Follow me.”

Jarvis opened the door and hurried into the hallway, where they saw a group of people waiting for the elevator. Aidan started to move, but Jarvis grabbed his arm.

“Don’t forget your bag.” Jarvis pointed to Aidan’s backpack, sitting inside their doorway.

“Yeah, yeah.” Aidan slung the backpack over both his arms and adjusted the straps to fit on his back as Jarvis hurried down the hall.

“Where are we going?” Aidan asked Jarvis because they moved away from the growing throng at the elevator.

“You want to be in the elevator when all the power goes out?” Jarvis asked him as he pulled on his arm to hurry Aidan along. “Did you hear a thing Ellie said?”

“I listened but can’t process very well. But no, I don’t fancy getting stuck in an elevator though.”

A few other students pushed past them in the opposite direction, but one looked at them for a second, then spun to follow after they passed him.

Jarvis slammed open the emergency staircase door and rushed into the stairwell, Aidan following close behind. Far below, they heard an emergency alarm sounding because someone had opened the exterior fire exit. Others ran down the stairs with them, a group of jocks pushing past as they leapt two stairs at a time without concern for shoving into people.

“Fuckers,” Aidan muttered under his breath as he concentrated on going fast without falling. His backpack must weigh ten thousand pounds, and he already had started to sweat.

Jarvis, taller and speedier, stopped at every landing to make sure Aidan was following. He carried his larger bag in one hand and did not seem to exert any effort whatsoever to move fast. At each floor, additional students packed onto the landing, pushing bodies more and more tightly into the stairway. Aidan stuck to the edge to lessen the feeling of claustrophobia beginning to set in. The white wall’s brightness felt more open visually than getting stuck in the middle of a crowd of panicked people, even though he knew they could just as easily smash him into the drywall as much as a body.

On the third floor, with Aidan feeling the breeze from outside rushing into the building, a woman moved slower with her foot in a cast. With one hand, she gripped the stair railing as she hopped down one step at a time, while the other hand held tight to two crutches.

Jarvis hurried down to her. “You need help?”

“I’m good,” she answered. “Protect yourselves.”

Unconvinced, Jarvis stayed beside her to block people from blasting into her, so Aidan took the cue and remained two steps behind him to create more space and make sure no one fell into either one of them. A few people bumped into his backpack before swerving around him and then Jarvis. Jarvis took the crutches from her, handing one to Aidan. Aidan’s heart thundered in his chest with fear, wanting to get out of the building faster but knowing he, and Jarvis more so, could never live with themselves if they abandoned her.

The last two flights felt as if they took an hour to traverse, but their efforts paid off with people slowing and going around them with more care.

Aidan noticed his armpits sweating as if he’d run a marathon and hoped he had remembered to wear deodorant today. How weird, he thought, to worry about body odor when he needed to concern himself with trying to survive.

At the bottom on the first floor, Jarvis held the door open for the crutches woman as she and Aidan got to the bottom. They emptied onto a side street to find the sidewalks bustling with people and the roads full of honking cars because traffic moved at too slow a pace.

“Thanks.” Tears welled in her eyes.

“You got someplace to go?” Jarvis asked.

Before she could answer, a group of girls raced over. “Penny!” two of them shouted in unison. Another grabbed her arm to lead her away with the group.

“Wait!” Aidan shouted after them. “Don’t forget these.” He held up one crutch as he took the other from Jarvis and handed them to one of the other women.

“Oh, yeah!” Penny smiled wearily. “Thanks again.”

Two of the women pulled Penny along, one explaining as they walked away, “We tried getting in, but too many people were streaming out.”

Jarvis tugged Aidan’s arm. “She said the alley, remember?”

“Penny?”

“No. Ellie. Focus.”

“Right. Alley. Fast.” A drip of sweat trickled down his side from his armpit.

Aidan stayed close behind Jarvis as they went as fast as possible through the people toward the corner. As with the staircase, people bunched onto the sidewalks going in every direction, most seeming to follow some decorum of not shoving into people or trying to harm their fellow humans, though Aidan spotted a few who pushed into folks and shoved through the crowd. Aidan had expected chaos and found, to his surprise, a more respectful atmosphere, unlike movie versions of panic where everyone trampled each other in a mad dash to save themselves. A few selfish jerks cared for no one else, but the majority attempted to survive with a certain amount of dignity.

Jarvis and Aidan rounded the street corner, a car horn blaring so loud Aidan’s ears hurt. Fewer people rushed along the side street, Aidan assumed because these roads did not lead to paths out of the city. A couple of yards ahead Aidan could see their next turn, free of cars, yet darker and narrower.

Proving, as always, how one must always listen to Ellie, Jarvis and Aidan sped into the alley to find a row of parked cars but a lane otherwise free of traffic. Up ahead, Aidan breathed a sigh of relief to see the red brake lights on an old black SUV.

“There!” Aidan pointed to the two-door SUV and ran forward, taking his turn to tug Jarvis along. Aidan yanked open the passenger door and threw in his backpack before jumping into the vehicle. After an awkward shove with his left foot against the door frame and hanging onto a seat belt with his right hand, he landed face-first in the back seat with his limbs flailing everywhere. By the time he faced forward, Jarvis sat in the passenger seat with his bag in his lap.

The minute Jarvis slammed the door shut Ellie revved the engine. “Fasten your seat belts,” she said, as if she were a flight attendant preparing for takeoff.

*****

Ellie gunned the car forward, slamming him into the back seat and causing his legs to fly into the air.

“Put your seat belt on!” Ellie screamed at him as she rounded the corner onto the street so fast the SUV tilted and sent his head flying into the window.

“Ouch!” Aidan yelled. “I’m trying!”

Aidan fumbled with his seat belt, almost clicking the latch into place when the SUV hit a bump, then missing again when Ellie slammed on the brakes, and the SUV screeched to a halt.

His shaking hands delayed him further in obeying her edict, but the stopped car allowed him to secure the seat belt into place. Aidan rubbed his head from where he smacked into the window and noticed an ache in his hip from bouncing with such violence.

Aidan looked up to see Jarvis sitting in the passenger seat, facing forward, his seat belt fastened, his hands folded in front of him, looking calm, cool, and collected, like he was the other flight attendant during takeoff. Ellie frowned ahead and drummed her fingers on the steering wheel but otherwise maintained control of herself.

“Am I the only one whose heart is ready to pound outside my body and explode all over the fucking place?” Aidan half yelled. “You two are sitting casually as if we’re on our way out to dinner or to adopt a puppy while the world implodes around us.”

He didn’t need to tell either of them how being confined in a back seat elevated his ADHD response to the situation. At least fleeing the residence hall had kept him active.

“I figure you have enough panic for everyone.” Jarvis’s words contradicted the tension Aidan heard in his voice, despite the slight upturn at the corner of his mouth.

But his comment made Ellie snort a laugh. “You know him pretty well already after a couple months as roomies. If we panic on top of what’s going on back there,” she made a fist but extended her thumb and pointed to Aidan while still looking ahead, “he’ll jump out the back and we’ll never see him again.”

Before Aidan could defend himself from what he admitted was an accurate description of his emotion, Ellie laid on the gas while making a sharp right turn onto the sidewalk when a gap between pedestrians occurred.

“Ellie!” Aidan shouted. “What the fuck?”

Ellie drove the SUV at a slow speed, allowing the people in front to set the pace but moving at a steady rate while cars in the street remained bumper to bumper.

“Get on the street, asshole!” someone yelled as they jogged by the car. Ellie flipped him off.

They continued moving this way for a couple blocks, until they arrived at a road leading toward DuSable Lake Shore Drive, upon which cars moved at a steady clip. Ellie jammed the SUV between a yellow taxi and a beat-up minivan, whose driver laid on its horn after slamming on its brakes.

“Fucker’s tailgating me now,” Ellie spat through clenched teeth. “Great idea, asshole! Let’s get in a big-ass wreck so we’re stuck here in Chicago with aliens taking control!”

“I doubt he can hear you,” Jarvis told her in his calm voice.

“Duh,” she answered. “But in a tense situation you have to release stress, or you’ll have a heart attack. And neither one of you can afford to have me drop dead at the moment.”

Jarvis nodded. “Point taken.”

When they merged onto DuSable Lake Shore Drive by almost hitting a ride share car and pissing off a fancy limo, traffic appeared to move at a brisk pace, but a half block later, Aidan realized the mirage. Compared to driving behind walking people, even fast walking people, the street looked speedy. But in reality, they chugged along at maybe ten or fifteen miles an hour, fast enough to seem as if they controlled their destiny but in truth, so slow as to give the golden Star Destroyer time to move into position and zap them. Their situation was helped by the fact they were on a one-way street.

Aidan wanted to press Ellie to move faster but knew a panicked announcement would aggravate her. He anticipated her yelling back for him to offer a solution or shut the fuck up. But remaining quiet might lead him to explode with anxiety because of the stress. “Ellie?” he asked with caution.

“Shut the fuck up, Aidan. I already know we gotta get going.”

“I wasn’t going there.”

Jarvis glanced at Aidan. “Yes, you were.”

Aidan shook his head. “No. Because I knew she’d tell me to shut the fuck up.”

“So why is your mouth open?” Ellie asked.

Aidan let out an exasperated breath. “So, I won’t perish from pent up stress.”

Ellie and Jarvis laughed at Aidan, which caused him to join them. At least he had released some of the tension, if nothing else. They could die laughing.

“I know your head is about to explode, kiddo.” Ellie smiled at him through the rearview mirror. “I have a plan. We just have to get to the park.”

“The park?” Jarvis asked.

Ellie nodded a silent affirmation.

“Oh, no.” Aidan slapped his forehead. “I know your tone of voice. I know your confidence. And I know this is going to get seriously fucked up.”

Ellie maneuvered the car into a middle lane and continued to search for a way to get into the far-right lane. As she drove with the calm of a fighter pilot engaged in battle, she talked to him at the same time, like a kindergarten teacher explaining reality to a toddler lost in unrealistic expectations. “Yes, we wouldn’t want to have anything fucked up going on. Imagine if aliens invaded Earth and took over Washington DC, and then people in Chicago, and probably around the world, started seeing gold spaceships invade. And everywhere, these invaders turn off all electronic devices in the cities while people try to flee. But yes, let’s worry about me fucking up a situation with my driving, not to mention my plan to save us if such a dire situation came about.”

Again, Aidan laughed. “This is seriously not the time for your comedic act.”

The SUV jerked with violence to the right when Ellie spotted a chance. “Yes!” she exclaimed through clenched teeth.

“I’m super thrilled we got into the slow lane too,” Aidan drolled.

Jarvis giggled. Aidan began to see his role in the end times as making his friends laugh on the way to certain death.

“The lanes are moving about the same.” Jarvis motioned out the window.

“Sure, take her side,” Aidan retorted. “You don’t even know her yet.”

“I’m feeling the uneasiness about getting stuck in traffic too. Unlike you,” Jarvis pointed to the back seat with his thumb, “I’m gonna let her enact her plan without comment because the alternative sucks worse. Unless you or I come up with a better plan, I say we zip it.” He motioned with his fingers over his lips and looked at Ellie. “You do have a plan, right?”

Ellie gestured in front of them. “Up ahead. Another block. Did nervous boy back there get his seat belt locked?”

“If I say no,” Aidan responded, “will you drive with more care?”

Ellie shook her head, both hands clutching the steering wheel. “No. The plan goes on without comment about my driving. However, if you’re unbuckled, I need Jarvis in charge of blocking you into the back seat each time you fly around so you don’t knock us out up front. We’ll be better off if you’re secured in the rear.”

“I am. I promise.” Aidan bit his tongue to prevent another plea for caution. One minute, he wanted her to get them moving and worried they would get stuck in Chicago when alien shit hit the fan, the next he was scared of her driving them too fast into the side of a building or over the bike path and into Lake Michigan. He understood his discordant reactions. Panic. Fear. All reasonable responses to the day’s events, but equally unhelpful in the current situation.

“Almost there,” Ellie whispered. “Almost there.”

“You sound like the fighter pilot at the end of Star Wars, Episode IV.” Aidan spoke to release more tension. “The one who first shot to get the blast into the Death Star but missed so Luke could save the day. ‘Almost there. Almost there.’” Aidan mimicked the voice of the actor from the scene.

Ellie sighed but suppressed a grin. “Do we really need your constant Star Wars references today? Of all times, I’m least in the mood to hear about space fantasies.”

Jarvis laughed. “He can’t help himself. Everything is about Star Wars: school, work, play. Whatever we do, he turns into Star Wars. I bet every time he jerks off, he thinks about Star Wars.”

Ellie cackled and pounded the steering wheel. “So true. Guys, we’re almost there. Seriously, hold on.”

“What do you mean, we’re almost there?” Aidan asked as he watched the traffic continue to move along but at a slow rate, especially given the fact they wanted to outrun a gold space cruiser.

“This.” Ellie drove through an intersection and took a hard right, hopping the SUV over the sidewalk between two groups of people and gunning the engine as they raced toward the lawn.

Jarvis grabbed the handlebar above his head, his eyes going wide even as he chuckled.

Aidan, on the other hand, screamed in holy terror. “What the fuck!”

When they cleared the pedestrians, Ellie pressed down even harder on the gas. They whizzed by trees, paths, and a few people as they cut catty-corner through the park. Aidan jolted and jerked all over the place, despite wearing his seat belt, and clamped down on his tongue to keep from more screaming because, while the ride unnerved him with its speed and defiance, he took note of how fast they zipped by the traffic on the roads. After a minute of four-wheeling through the lakefront parks in Chicago, he wondered why the cars obeyed the traffic laws. Like the people respecting each other on the sidewalks, Aidan envisioned more of a free-for-all as everyone fled to avoid being eaten by aliens, instead of the conformity before him.

When Aidan heard the roar of an engine behind them, he turned to see a big SUV barreling along a few yards from their bumper, followed by other cars swerving into the park. Ellie had created a trend. Despite the circumstances, Aidan laughed when a small electric car attempted to follow suit, jumped the curb and got about twenty feet when the back tires sank into a soft spot and the car stopped dead in its tracks.

“Where’d you learn to drive like this?” Jarvis asked Ellie. Aidan noticed Jarvis’s muscles relaxing more and more as they continued to get ahead of everyone. He also spotted a spark in Jarvis’s eye, thinking only a straight guy could put moves on someone in a situation like this.

“Rural Michigan. Where we grew up.” Ellie motioned between herself and Aidan in the back seat to indicate the two of them.

Jarvis arched an eyebrow. “Um, yeah, but I doubt Aidan could pull this off.”

Again, Ellie gave a crooked smile. “No. Not one of his strengths. He’d be back in the middle of Chicago with his blinker on waiting for a polite opening. He never went four-wheeling or hunting with us.”

Aidan fought against joining their laughter, which was at his expense, but smiled nonetheless. “I’m right here, you know. Behind you two. I see nothing wrong with my avoidance of murdering animals with a shotgun or not wanting to risk death by riding in an SUV driven by a madwoman getting her aggression out in the middle of Michigan fields.”

“Seems like the madwoman is saving your butt right now.” Jarvis glanced back at Aidan as he made his point.

Aidan took a deep breath as they neared the Field Museum because Ellie would need to remerge with traffic to avoid the fence and huge building in front of her.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck!” Aidan yelled louder and louder with each fuck.

“I’m going to tell your mother how you talk. You know how she feels about cussing.”

“Oh fuck! Ellie! Stop!”

Ellie refused to listen, and Aidan clamped his eyes shut when, instead, she floored the SUV and aimed them directly toward the fence.