Reparation

"What?" Drac and the alien leader say simultaneously, Drac in shock and the alien in disbelief.

"You heard me," Susan said to the alien, not looking over at Drac, "If you hold your fire, and you leave this place unharmed, I'll go with you as your prisoner."

"Oh really!" the alien leader scoffed, "And what's to stop me from destroying this place and taking you anyway?"

"I think you know better than that," Susan reasoned, "If you fire, then I'll never stop fighting you! Even if you run I would hunt you down, even if I had to steal a spaceship to do so! But if you spare these monsters, who are of no threat to you, then you get to go with your greatest enemy as your prize."

"Wait, Susan!" Dr. Cockroach said as Butterflysaurus got close enough, "What are you saying?"

"You think you're my greatest enemy!?" the alien scoffed in disbelief.

"Yes," Susan stated, "Did you not often brag how you'd conquered ten planets with ease?"

"Twelve!" the alien leader corrected, "This will be my thirteenth!"

"And yet every attempt you've made to conquer this world I've stopped cold," Susan continued, "So yes, I do think that there's value to my capture."

After considering for a moment, the alien detached a pair of high tech cuffs from her belt and tossed them down to Susan, saying, "Put those on and board my vessel, and I will bring no harm to this man or his 'hotel'….at least not until after I've paraded your battered and broken body before your leaders and the conquest of this world is complete."

Drac watched in shock as Susan picked up the cuffs as Link protested, "Wait, Susan! Are you sure about this?"

"I'm sure," Susan said to Link, then she turned to Drac as she said, "I'm sorry for the things I've done in the past, for having brought this war to your doorstep. I'm sorry if I've hurt you, I hope one day you can forgive me."

"Why are you doing this?" Drac asked, his voice breaking.

With a small, sad smile, Susan said calmly, "It's the right thing to do."

Within that moment, Drac had a burst of clarity. Before the hatch on the mothership was able to fully open, Drac turned into mist and zipped over to reform between Susan and the ship, facing it and spreading his arms wide as he said, "No!"

"Drac, what are you doing!?" Susan asked, her voice close to breaking.

"I'm doing the right thing," Drac said over his shoulder, "what I should have done earlier: I'm choosing to believe in you! It should be impossible, it's only supposed to happen once, but you are my Zing!" Then he turned to the alien leader and said, "If you want Susan, you have to go through me!"

With a tremendous leap that cracked the stones beneath his feet, Frank went over by Drac's side and added, "And me!"

Then Johnny and Wayne rode down on Murray's sand wave with Mavis flying right behind to join Drac by his side, along with Susan's friends, as Wayne said, "And all of us!"

The alien leader appeared to hesitate for a moment before saying, "I have no problem with that."

Then the cannon started powering up again.

Susan watched in disbelief and horror as the events unfolded before her. She had chosen to sacrifice herself to save these monsters, these people that she had grown fond of, and now they were going to die in front of her. Even if she could break the cuffs in time, there was no way she'd be able to get everyone clear of the blast!

So fixed was her horrified gaze that she was able to spot a small object flying through the air and strike the alien leader in the head with a squeaking sound. It obviously didn't hurt her, but it did get her attention. The alien released the controls and allowed the cannon to fall dormant again as she picked up the offending object.

It was a plush werewolf doll.

"You leave Miss Ginormica alone!" Winnie screamed angrily.

In shock and surprise, Susan turned to follow the sound of the voice to see Winnie, angry and not scared at all, standing on the bridge glaring at the alien leader. As she watched, a horde of monsters came out of the shadows of the dark forest to add their angry voices to hers.

"Get off our planet!"
"We're tired of seeing your ugly face!"
"Find some other planet to take over!"
"I'll tear you apart with all five of my heads!"

"Don't let them take you, Miss Ginormica!" Winnie pleaded determinedly, "Kick those aliens' butts!"

Pausing for only a second to wipe a tear of joy from her eye, Susan called out to the others, "Well, you heard the little lady…" Then she concentrated hard, causing the Quantonium to overload and short out the cuffs as she grew back to full size as Ginormica finished, "…let's kick those aliens' butts!"

Then the alien leader caused the cannon to quickly retract into the body of the ship as Ginormica charged forward and hit the ship with a tremendous haymaker.

Back on the outskirts of town, the overweight Dracula fan is speaking with his Frankenstein-loving friend.

"Where do you suppose they're at?" the pseudo-Frankenstein asked.

"Do you suppose that the party ran late?" a woman dressed as a zombie asked.

"But the sun's about to come up," the pseudo-Dracula worried, "Drac wouldn't be able to come out when the sun's up!"

"Something must have happened," a werewolf fan chimed in, "but what?"

As if in answer, an enormous spacecraft hit the ground around 50 yards ahead of them, plowing a huge furlough for another 25. Then they felt the rumble of enormous footsteps and heard the flapping of gigantic wings. Turning towards the sound, the pseudo-Zombie girl cried out excitedly, "Oh my goodness, I can't believe it! It's Ginormica!"

"And Butterflysaurus!" The pseudo-Frank exclaimed, "And Link, BOB, and Dr. Cockroach!"

"And there's Drac….dressed up as Ginormica?" The pseudo-Drac said.

"And there's Frankenstein dressed as the Creature From the Black Lagoon!" another Dracula fan exclaimed, "And Wolfman dressed up as Dracula! I can't believe it, you guys, they made it! They brought their party to us!"

As they watched, the craft lifted off again and a hatch opened just as Ginormica reached it, causing dozens of human-sized robots to pour out and start attacking the other monsters.

"Uh guys, I don't think that the aliens were invited to the party," the pseudo-werewolf said with a troubled tone.

"What do we do?" the zombie girl asked fretfully.

"Well I'm certainly not going to stand around doing nothing!" The first Drac fan said determinedly, "Come on!"

As Drac and the others exited the Haunted Forest, Drac saw Ginormica grappling with the Mothership and he was amazed at just how strong she was. Even though the ship was easily 6-8 times as big as her, she was still holding her own. However, it seemed that the engines of the ship were a match for her strength. It was a standoff, and judging by the fact that the ship's cannon appeared to be trying to aim at her, the aliens were seeking to end that standoff.

As Drac was getting ready to lend Ginormica a hand, a swarm of alien robots attacked him and his friends. While he was able to deal with the ones who attacked him easily enough, it was clear that many of his friends were in trouble, which put him in a conundrum: does he go help Susan, or should he aid his friends instead? There wasn't enough time to do both!

As he was caught in this dilemma, he heard a commotion that caused him to whirl around. Behind him he saw a crowd gathered, many of whom he recognized from his unexpected visit to the Monster Festival one year ago. Only this time they ware all armed with real torches and pitchforks, and they all looked real angry! "Get them!" the overweight Drac fan yelled, and while his eyes saw the fans that claimed to love him and his friends last year, his mind saw the angry mob that attacked his home and killed his Martha over 100 years ago!

Stuck in his mental paradox, Drac barely noticed as the armed (and costumed) mob rushed past him. Only when he realized that none of them had tried to stake him or set him on fire did he spin back the direction that they ran, and found himself stunned again: the mob of fans were helping his friends attack the robots! They were jamming the pitchforks into the joints to pry off limbs, thrusting the lit torches into the exposed wiring, or just holding them still while the bigger and stronger monsters finished them off. As Drac watched, the Drac fanboy he met last year called back to him saying, "We've got these guys! You just go help Ginormica, bla bla bla!"

Feeling his eyes tearing up, Drac thought, This is the second time I'm finding myself grateful to these crazy humans! as he transformed himself into a bat and flew up to the ship.

Inside the ship, the alien leader was savoring her moment of triumph, her finger lingering over the button to fire the ship's cannon.

"At this range, I cannot miss!" The alien chortled, "One little shot, and the Earth's resistance will be broken!"

"Unfortunately," Drac said, having drifted through the seams in the main hatch's seal as mist and reforming some distance behind her, "that is one shot you will not be taking."

The leader, who'd spun around at the sound of Drac's voice, now chuckled and asked, "And who's going to stop me? You?"

"That's right," Drac confirmed.

"Give it up!" the alien leader said derisively, "There's no way you could overpower me!"

"You may be right," Drac conceded, "I may not be as strong as Ginormica or even as Frank, and I have no idea just how strong you are. And while I may be able to completely drain you of blood, as far as I know your blood may prove to be poisonous to me, and you'd still have the strength to activate your weapon. But I don't need to do either of those things to stop you, all I need is for you to look deep into my eyes!"

As Drac's eyes light up red, the alien leader scoffed, "Do you really think your pathetic power will work….on…"

"You are in my power!" Drac intoned.

"I am in your power," the alien replied in monotone.

"You will power down your weapon and recall all your robots immediately!" Drac commanded.

"I will power down the weapon and have all robots recalled immediately," agreed the alien leader, who then input the commands to do so.

"You will…" Drac started to say, then trailed off.

"…erase from the ship's computers all records of this solar system's existence." whispered helpfully the alien technician from her hiding place under her console.

"Thanks!" Drac whispered back, then speaking again in the commanding tone, "You will erase from your ship's computers all records of this solar system's existence and forget everything that's transpired here."

"I will erase from the ship's computers all records of this system's existence and forget I was ever here," the alien leader complied.

As the alien technician opened the main hatch behind them and jumped from it, Drac commanded the leader, "Now leave this galaxy, and never return!"

As soon as Drac had changed into a bat and flew out the hatch, the hatch shut behind him and the ship took off at high speed to vanish into the distance, accompanied by the loud cheers of everyone present. In that one instant, everything was perfect.

And then the sun rose up from behind the mountains.

Caught in the sudden glare of the sunrise, Drac could think of nothing but the pain the light brought. Then the pain went away again as a new object obscured the sun. Blinking his eyes to clear them, Drac saw a broadly smiling Ginormica, who was already holding Mavis in her protective embrace, standing between him and the sun. Then the shade grew even bigger as Butterflysaurus flew in close and warbled triumphantly. Smiling up at her, Drac said fondly, "Come on, Susan, let's go home!"

Back at the hotel, Winnie sniffed, "Are you really going away again?"

Susan smiled warmly down at the little cub as she said, "Yes, but this time I promise that I'll be back soon."

"Pinkie promise?" Winnie asked, extending her pinkie towards Susan.

"Pinkie promise!" Susan confirmed as she wrapped her pinkie around Winnie's. Then Winnie licked Susan's cheek and ran back to her mother.

Straightening back up, Susan said to Drac, "So I talked to Monger, and he's agreed to begin releasing the monsters we've rounded up into the Haunted Forest nearby, making sure to guide them in this direction. We have to do it in small stages, so as to not arouse the suspicions of the locals here, but any new monsters we prevent from causing a disaster will be brought directly here."

"We'll make sure to get them well acclimated to this life," Drac confirmed, "What of the alien who helped me on the ship?"

"After she explained how she was mistreated by her leader, General Monger agreed to let her work with us," Susan explained, "She and Dr. Cockroach are already hitting it off, so much so that now Link is asking when he'll get a partner!"

After chuckling once, Drac asked, "So where are you going now?"

"There's a small farming community in Kansas that was just devastated by a severe meteor shower," Susan answered, "The General is concerned that such an intense shower may have allowed a small alien scout ship to slip into Earth airspace undetected, so we need to check it out. Also, he's certain that the meteors have radioactive properties that are similar to the one that hit me two years ago, so we need to make sure that no harm comes to those people as a result of it."

"Sounds like you're going to be real busy," Drac said, "Are you sure you'll be able to come back to visit?"

"Are you kidding?" Susan laughed as she wrapped her arms around the Count, "This is my first Zing as a monster, you think I'm just going to give that up?" Then she pulled him into a deep kiss, one that lasted so long that General Monger called back from his position on Butterflysaurus, "Hey, you two, wrap it up! The Heartland awaits!"

As Susan released him and started backing towards Butterflysaurus, Drac called out, "Come back soon!"

"Always!" Susan said back, smiling, then she turned back around and settled into position on Butterflysaurus just as it took off. As Drac watched it disappear over the horizon, Drac felt a familiar pain in his chest, but it was notably less intense than it was before. Possibly because he knew she would keep her promise to return, no matter what adventures awaited her among the farms of Kansas. Perhaps one day she'll be able to return for good, but until then he'll make sure that there's always a room waiting for her at his hotel.

End of story

Susan will return in "Monsters Vs. Aliens: The Kr Chronicles"