“I require the parasite.” The humanoid leaned over the counter to glare at the pair. It looked disturbingly like someone had melted a turtle over a line backer. The head was definitely turtle-shaped, and there were hints of a shell behind it’s shoulders, but as you moved south it looked more and more human. Thankfully it appeared to be wearing a set of clothing designed somewhere other than Earth, otherwise Greg would have just given up and embraced his pending psychotic break. “Where is it?”

“Get it OUT!” Greg waved his arm at the creature, ecstatic that someone else wanted the weird dragon-bug-thing that he was pretty sure was planning on eating his brain, “Outoutout!”

The turtle jumped backwards in alarm, reaching for something that might have been a gun.

Becca grabbed Greg and dragged him behind her, half-hidden under the thick metal counter. “Don’t kill him! Greg stoppit.” She beaned Greg with a happy meal toy.

“Outout–ow! Wait, what?” Greg was still holding the infected arm as far away from the rest of his body as he could, but the threat of an alternate immediate threat shut him up. Slightly.

The turtle seemed uneasy, but it’s hands moved away from what Becca was assuming was a gun. “You have the parasite?”

“It’s in his arm.” Becca pointed, at the offending limb, only to realize that the faint scale pattern had vanished. “Um, it was.”

The turtle cocked it’s head to get a better view and Becca saw that the right eye actually had a small projection screen hovering in front of it. Data flashed across the screen for a moment and then the turtle nodded. “It is still attached to the host. I–”

“I’m not a host!” Greg objected, “I’m a, um, hostage!”