Something To Be Proud Of

Chapter 1

Luckily the MNU (or Multi National United for those who are uninitiated) had relaxed many of the stricter regulations imposed on the 2.5 million strong community of 'Prawns'

These biped creatures had been left behind three years ago when their mother ship had suddenly departed Earth. Thus many people in Johannesburg had grudgingly accepted the fact that the prawns were here to stay.

But things hadn't been easy, as friction between human and alien had on more than one occasion erupted into full civil conflict, often requiring military intervention to put it down. Many had criticised the government's decision to retain instead of bulldozing the District 9 slum, alongside moving bulk of the Prawn population to the so called District 10 tent city, some two hundred miles away from Johannesburg.

Many of the 'prawn' community had broken out from District 10 and rejoined their compatriots in District 9.

This had led to further upheavals across the nation.

But at the same time as community relations began to sour in Johannesburg, a growing number of humans who had been humbled and appalled at the treatment of the extra terrestrial refugees, had come from across the world to protest and render assistance.

At first the South African government had barred their entry into the country and when that failed the so called Alien Rights Movement (ARM) group had had their passports confiscated and had also been harassed by the security services.

The Pretoria government had detailed the MNU to monitor the situation. But opinion in South Africa itself, now swayed by the activities of ARM, began to change in favour of the Outlanders.

It became illegal to address any member of the alien community as a 'Prawn' and for the first time Outlanders were allowed to eat in the same restaurants as humans (gorging on raw meat and cat food of course!) and were also able to use public transport.

There was even talk of the first Outlander politician, Percy White, being elected to the South African Parliament!

Against this background of greater tolerance to the plight of the Outlanders, ugly divisions between the species still remained. Despite the fact that the prawns were no longer technically 'confined' to District 9, many chose to either stay in their established communities or were fearful to move out into human-only areas.

The so-called 'worker' prawns (those who are deemed as a lower intellectual and physical caste, even within the Outlander community) had contributed to the new breakdown in relations by perpetrating a number of heinous crimes in the city.

These crimes included the first inter-species rapes, between Outlander (who could be both male and female in gender at the same time) and human females, together with a number of high profile murders.

Take for example Samuel Carter, a prawn male, who had been visiting a human friend in the Wynberg district of the city one evening when he had been set upon by a gang of humans and brutally murdered. In a reprisal attack, Precious Ntwange had been abducted from her Meadowlands home, before being raped and murdered by a gang of prawns known as The Dark Eaters (after their preference for the flesh of black humans)

These and other crimes began to galvanize the host population against the prawns, with many once again advocating the systematic destruction of the 'parasites' original home in District 9 and the new camp at District 10.

Human vigilante groups had been formed in the city and many Outlanders found that they became frustrated that the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) did little or nothing to protect them or investigate their complaints.

Percy White, speaking on a popular evening talk show for the first time, had been told to shut up and go back to his 'Prawn infested shithole' in District 9 by an Afrikaner politician opposed to greater alien integration.

Another guest had asked why the Outlanders did not just go home if they were so unhappy with things.

White, to his credit, had replied: 'By what means are we to return? I don't know if you have looked up in the sky recently, but our prior means of transportation have somewhat…vanished'

Many in the audience had laughed at the retort and cheered Percy White on, with the Afrikaner visibly blanching.

Percy White, the seven foot tall biped with golden brown shell plates and black swirly markings on his body, now actually represented the hopes and dreams of millions of his fellow beings.

By their standards, he was the equivalent of Martin Luther King or their own folk hero, Christopher Johnson, fighting hard for their place on Earth as rightful citizens.

Many occupants of Johannesburg, both human and alien, had often glanced up to the skies everyday since the alien anti-hero and his son had fled the planet in their decrepit space ship. Christopher Johnson had promised to return in three years, to rescue his fellow Outlanders and to initiate what many thought a well deserved revenge campaign against the humans for the atrocities waged against 'prawns' by the MNU.

There were dark rumours in District 9 that a human being who had worked for the MNU had been transformed into a prawn after being 'infected' with a fuel source brought from the ship. A dozen prawns had since been killed in alien 'witch hunts' after being accused by vengeful neighbours of actually being the human-in-prawn form.

But to date, the man himself had never been found.

For many prawns, the sight of their mother ship had provided them with comfort and a psychological link with their home planet for over three decades. They also felt protected in the shadow of the craft, knowing as they did the myriad of secrets within…

Many human people had called the prawn aliens 'refugees' in their own Earth language, meaning they are 'outside the place of their birth and are somehow unable or unwilling to return'

This was not strictly true, as many in District 9 knew; most of the population HAD in fact been desperate to go home. The Elders had whispered for years of salvation from the heavens, claiming the ship sent out a continuous distress signal to the home world and that help would one day come.

After thirty years of saying the same thing, the younger Outlanders thought the Elders to be senile and they soon ceased their rhetoric and the dashing the hopes of their community year in and year out.

Some humans had been sad to see the graceful circular arc float away, having known the machine to be present over the city for all of their adult lives. An equal amount had been somewhat joyous to see the ship go, seeing it as a blot in the sky and a constant physical reminder of the presence of the unwelcome alien beings.

A newly circulated prawn newspaper (created by the ARM) called Our Daily Life, had published an unofficial 'countdown' of the days left before Christopher Johnson would return to Earth with a rescue mission.

In the years since the mother ship had departed, life had changed in many ways for the better concerning those prawns in Johannesburg, with a dedicated radio station, the first advertisement posters in their own language and concerted attempts by the authorities to integrate the aliens into daily life.

Jobs, however menial, were offered and taken up by the prawns in droves. Ranging from car wash operators, to dust cart runners and street sweepers.

A roaring trade in junkyard salvaging made the so called 'lower caste' prawns hundreds of rand a week, as they scavenged and sorted scrap metal and sold it on to others of their own kind. It was said that they could make the most beautiful works of art with practically any sort of scrap.

The trade in old car tyres from the same scrap yards had also soared, given the prawns acquired taste for anything rubbery!

Indeed the MPD had reported nearly a two hundred per cent increase in the theft of car tyres from parked vehicles, staggering even by the standard of Johannesburg!

But the junkyard trade had a more practical purpose for the prawns; the using of the Earth metal's to fashion basic 'bio suits' and other weapons for self protection and for sale to criminal gangs.

Indeed a recent joint raid on District 9 by the MNU and the MPD had uncovered a weapons work shop containing a few bio suits in various states of completion!

The original bio suit was comparable to a walking tank, able to propel the wearer along at great speeds, give him untold extra strength and carry a fearsome array of weaponry. The version built on Earth was but a poor prototype without precious Outlander metals and engineering.

Nonetheless the prawns were experts at improvising with whatever was to hand!

Chapter 2

George Semba had worked as a security guard at the Johannesburg Central Hospital for most of his working life. Born in Soweto, his family had moved to the city to find work. For many years the Semba family had been ostracised and sidelined into unemployment by the oppressive white dominated 'Apartheid' government of the time. Even fellow black South Africans denounced the Zulu heritage of his family as 'backward and filthy'

The Semba family dreamed of the day when they could rise up and overthrow the Boer's, establishing their own free and democratic government.

Then in 1982 came what Semba's father and many other black Africans called The Miracle. A huge spaceship descended over the city…and simply stayed put!

When the authorities had dug out all of the insectoid-like creatures within from the craft, many black Africans knew their troubles were at an end. No longer were they to be the oppressed minority; at that moment a new breed of underling had arrived in South Africa, to be treated even more harshly than Semba had ever been. The aliens, now dubbed 'Prawns', had been fenced into a slum worse than anything Semba had ever known, which had then expanded of it's own accord to become District 9.

Lately the government had been taking a more relaxed approach to the newcomers, despite the accelerated removals of some of the creatures to the new District 10 camp, located near Kimberly.

Now the Outlanders, a less offensive name the aliens used to describe themselves, could eat in the same restaurants, use the same subway and apply for the same jobs as humans.

In fact George Semba had a five year old daughter who had two prawn classmates, a move which had provoked furore by many parents anxious that their children not mix with 'dirty parasites from space'

He had mixed feelings about the initial enforced segregation of the beings; on the one hand he felt safe as nobody knew what these things were capable of, but on the other hand he remembered his own feelings of despair and alienation from the whites.

The revelations of what Multinational United had been doing to the prawn beings had sent shockwaves through a community which should be used to the maltreatment of certain sections of society…

Damn, thought Semba, I was once going to apply to the MNU private security division, and they had a good salary too!

A series of chirps and insectoid clicks announced the presence of Semba's 'partner in crime' (as they were dubbed by friends) and fellow security guard, Michael Princeton. Over his small abdomen, Princeton wore a black vest with the word SECURITY printed on it.

It didn't necessarily fit him but it helped Michael to fit in.

You see Michael was an Outlander, a prawn or just a piece of alien shit, depending on your point of view. Over seven feet tall, with a green and dark yellow shell covering, Michael had the most beautiful golden eyes George had ever seen (and George Semba was NOT often impartial to homosexual type behaviour, although Michael could in fact change gender seemingly at will!)

They had worked together for almost fifteen years, after Michael had bravely defied the MNU and applied outside District 9 to the hospital for a job.

He too had a family to feed, one 'wife' to sire and two 'prawnlings'

So like any human, Michael had a regular job outside his shack in District 9 (successfully fighting off attempts to move him and his family to District 10)

Once, when an idiotic documentary crew turned up at the hospital to film 'ordinary' humans interacting with aliens, they asked George why there was not a 'prawn only' area for treatment and asked their boss why they employed Michael.

"Because of his brute strength, he is great if we need to throw people out…and because he is more reliable than most humans…more of a man almost"

This had touched Michael in the place where George thought his heart should be. At first they had struggled to understand each other, using sign language and drawings to first communicate.

Then the garbled clicks, chirps and antenna gestures suddenly made complete sense to George, with Michael soon picking up the bits of the local Jozi accent!

Now they spoke in an odd sort of pidgin mix of human/alien languages that got them through each day.

Over the years Michael had come to trust George and told him of his home planet, said to be ten times the size of our planet Jupiter.

He had explained that the alien race to which he belonged primarily existed to act as workers or 'drones', much like a bee's nest here on Earth.

Workers would harvest the offspring of a queen and scour other worlds for mining ore and other precious materials.

Indeed the world which Michael and the mother ship had been travelling too was supposedly one hundred times larger than Jupiter, and said to contain enough ore to keep the furnaces of his planet burning for centuries!

But then came the time when the leadership suddenly began dying off and the ship went dark. Michael said they had lived in their own squalor for a long time before the first humans broke open the vessel and extracted the surviving occupants. He had lost many of his friends and relatives before he could be settled in District 9.

Michael had gotten off lightly; he belonged to a caste of Outlanders who were what humans described as 'intelligent', so to them that meant he was useful.

Still the discrimination he suffered was felt all the more deeper owing to that same intellect. At first he had hated Earth and longed for the day when he could go back to his home world, away from District 9 and MNU.

But then over time Michael had seen in George a shred of decency, of humanity and this had restored his faith (just a little) in humankind.

"How are things this day, George?" Michael chittered in his strange pidgin language.

"They go well my friend, anything to report from your patrol?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary, save for two lost prawnlings!"

George always marvelled at the way Michael described his fellow aliens as 'prawns', even though he knew it was often used derogatively. Asked why, Michael said the true name of his people was unpronounceable in English or Afrikaans and so they stuck to the more straightforward term.

Despite the abhorrent treatment that had been meted out to the Outlanders ever since they arrived on Earth, Michael had grown somewhat fond of George Semba. He admired the fact that the human, despite the violent backlash from his own people, had declared his willingness to work and be friendly with an alien being.

This had cemented their intergalactic relationship into something solid.

Michael knew that even before his people came here, humans coloured the same as George had suffered brutalisation and torment at the hands of other humans!

Daily life in the shanty town that was District 9 had been a merciless grind for the first few years, with regular MNU 'security patrols' which were mounted to 'protect' the occupants within the camp. All but the simplest Outlanders understood that this was subterfuge and that MNU wanted to keep an eye on the aliens and actually protect the humans outside from THEM!

Michael had been gifted with great intellect which allowed him to teach his people the language and culture of the humans. Recently more humans had been allowed access to District 9, primarily consisting of humanitarian organisations bringing relief supplies.

These humans had been coming to Michael and his secret classes for some months now, allowing them to understand the 'prawns' beyond their badly portrayed media image.

Far from being a bunch of mindless savages, the Outlander society was made of up castes, of which the lowest was a 'worker' and the highest would actually be considered a member of an alien 'royal family' and treated as such.

On Earth there were no distinctions between castes, all Prawns were one and the same

vermin!

Chapter 3

The harsh overhead sodium spotlights lit the food queue in District 10 this evening with a newly discovered vigour. A group of stragglers had been rounded up from the surrounding countryside after attempting to escape.

Thousands upon thousands of Outlanders stood in the gathering dusk for their allocation of 'food', mainly reprocessed offal and the odd 'treat' of stale cat food for those harder workers.

An omnipresent MNU helicopter circled the camp, keeping an eye on the masses below. In watchtowers and patrolling in 4x4 vehicles, others MNU guards kept order in the camps, poking and prodding the prawns into lines and ushering away those who attempted to come around for second helpings.

All in all District 10 could be considered a latter day concentration camp, thought Dale Kleinveldt as he lounged against the fender of his white MNU jeep.

A one year veteran of the MNU, Kleinveldt had originally been employed by the South African Defence Force (army) and then served time in the Johannesburg MPD. He had joined Multi National United after being offered a lucrative security contract in the original District 9 town ship. The warrior in him relished the challenge of keeping these grubby insects they called 'prawns' in line. On a nightly basis his security detail had enforced curfews, rounded up D9 escapees and had killed a number of looters and thieves.

He saw the prawns as pests, nothing more and nothing less!

His best friend from the army, Karl, had been one of the first humans on board the ship back in '82 and described it as a hell hole, with hundreds of dead and dying prawns and the rest near-comatose.

At the time Karl and the others had been content just to plant shit loads of plastic explosive on the ship and blow it to hell!

Why did the government want to bring them out and into civilisation?

If Dale and other human citizens had known the endless trouble the prawns would bring to Jo'burg, then they too would have favoured total destruction of the vessel.

As it was District 9 had become an alien ghetto and so the government had developed District 10 as a 'rehousing settlement' for the immigrants, located near Kimberly.

In reality however Kimberly-District 10 had become an overflow camp for the large numbers of prawns who had been born on Earth.

(Incidentally Dale knew the fuckers reproduced at an incredible rate, despite early MNU attempts to destroy the ramshackle prawn nurseries and unsuccessful experiments to make the bastards infertile)

So here he was, in the middle of nowhere and babysitting a shit load of ungrateful prawns, feeling bored shitless!

True his salary had doubled and he also had other bonuses from the 'firm', but Dale liked nothing better than to brutalise the fookin cunts!

But that had proved impossible since those bloody hippies had turned up from the 'Alien Rights Movement' and promised the world that no more harm would come to the aliens.

Fucking do gooder bastards, they had even set up a permanent ARM liaison worker within District 10!

This would not have happened in the good old days, Dale remembered, but now these things apparently have the same rights as with humans!

Even before 1982, Dale Kleinveldt had come from an overtly racist family and at that time, the 'kaffirs' or black Africans had been the target of his venomous rage.

Now these aliens had arrived, they were fair game for equally bad treatment. And they were actually MORE disgusting than the kaffirs had been, scrabbling around in rubbish all day and spreading filthy extraterrestrial diseases around the population…

When asked if they would leave, the fuckers always turned around and said they couldn't leave as they were stranded! They got here didn't here, so why can't they fly away again?

And why does South Africa have all the shitty races of people or aliens populating it?

So many questions and yet nowhere near enough answers. These things had been here for thirty plus years and yet mankind had been no closer to understanding them now than they had been back in '82. He was confused by all this. Surely there must have been some sort of bigger game plan for the prawns? You know putting them to some sort of use while they were here?

Dale had heard stories on the grapevine of experimentation going on when that nutcase Wikus Van Der Merwe had lost it. But MNU had flatly denied all of it and claimed that Wikus had been 'mentally unstable for years'

Now that the daily riot that served as mealtimes had subsided, Dale climbed in his 4x4 and mounted a patrol around the perimeter of District 10.

Around the size of six football pitches, District 10 was made up from hundreds of 'occupational' tents lined up in neat rows, where the prawns lived. A number of larger tents and temporary buildings served as sick quarters, latrines and used for whatever else these guys did to maintain themselves.

In every sense of the word it resembled a concentration camp, like those you watched on the History Channel from the Second World War.

The ARM had a small building on the northern edge of the camp, which they used as a 'drop in' and administration office for their organisation. It made Dale sick that they could also pitch up camp here and that MNU provided a hospital for the damn things; weren't they meant to be slowly trying to kill the prawns off? By any means necessary?

Even some of the boys Dale knew had become a bit pacified, actually worrying about the prawns!

Chapter 4

Back in Johannesburg, Solomon King had no such qualms or worries about the human 'host' population. King was the leader of The Dark Eaters, a gang of Outlanders feared by both the humans and their own people in equal measure. The gang ruled over all of the organised crime syndicates within District 9 and now that MNU restrictions had been relaxed, other parts of the city came under their influence too.

King had a taste for human flesh and would not hesitate to kidnap an unwary human and personally rip them apart! Though he had a preference for black African people, anyone would do when it came to his hunger pangs, with the latest victim being a rookie MNU agent who had been harassing King's offspring.

Tall, even by Outlander standards, and covered from head to toe in shiny black plating, King cut a fearsome appearance. If you added his missing right hand, cratered shell and scarred face you had a real bad ass looking alien!

Solomon King had been born into a typical Outlander criminal family, who were as much feared on his home planet as the Mafia families here on Earth.

As a youngling, his father had noticed his aptitude as a fighter and quickly employed King to act as an enforcer for his many criminal enterprises. When his father had been killed by a rival family, King had risen up to take over the top spot.

But over the years his criminal activities began to catch up with him and as many Outlanders wanted him dead as alive. So when the opportunity came to escape his home planet on board a colonial resettlement vessel, King wasted no time in fleeing.

That same vessel, destined for a mining colony many light years away, had suffered a catastrophic mechanical breakdown and ended up stranded high above Johannesburg.

By the standards of District 9 King lived in comparative luxury, with three shacks serving as his headquarters and a home for his mate and two younglings.

His mate wanted for nothing, with only the best cat food and meat supplied daily by the Nigerian gangsters. King and his family also had the first pick of the human refuse brought into the camp, with his younglings allowed to scramble over the detritus before any other prawns were even allowed near it!

The MPD, even the MNU were terrified of King and his gang and this made them practically untouchable!

Only the Nigerians were brave enough to confront the Dark Eaters and this made them the sworn enemies of Solomon King.

After hearing many complaints from his people of the Nigerian gangs trying to rip them off when buying cat food and used tyres, King simply had them rounded up and killed.

Then he publicly ate all of them!

His gang now acted as unofficial enforcers in District 9, keeping the local Outlander populace in check and the humans out. King always chortled when the MNU claimed to be 'in control' of the slum; his people knew the absolute truth!

But still the MNU came, harassing the population on a daily basis.

Like today, when a detachment of elite MNU Alien Control Battalions (ACB) backed up by the MPD had come through the gates of District 9 at dawn and rounded up a group of 'suspected tyre thieves'

The Dark Eaters had gotten wind of the raids and responded in kind, setting off a running battle inside the slum.

Several MNU and MPD personnel had been killed, together with a number of innocent Outlanders and Dark Eaters.

But even though the 'suspects' were still carted off into custody, probably never to be seen again, Solomon King knew he had sent a message out to the humans: you come and fuck with us, you suffer!

Sunrise.

Dale Kleinveldt always loved this part of the day; the bright solar orb bringing with it life giving warmth and the promise of a new day. But then his mood soured when, for yet another few hours, the rising sun brought daylight to the District 10 camp and the horrors which inhabited it.

The fucking prawns!

Dale watched them scrabble from their tents at first light, expecting breakfast.

"Something for nothing baas!" commented another MNU employee.

"When are we going to put them to use in the diamond mines?" he asked no one in particular.

Many in the camp knew something was in the offing, something far bigger and better.

Why else would these things not be down the mines bringing up those precious rocks?

They were bigger, stronger and dumber than humans and were not able to string a coherent sentence together to complain. What a waste of a potential resource!

But there must be another reason why, the men had proposed during their breaks.

For some reason, the glowing disc of the sun reminded Dale of the prawn mother ship.

Perhaps the MNU and the government were expecting the ship to come back and simply take these mother fuckers away en masse?

Hence saving them the bother of keeping them!

Dale recalled his first week as a new employee and being taken aboard the ship, nearly a year before. MNU had wanted to survey the condition of the vessel after it had been hanging in the sky for nearly three decades. His team had been taken by chopper aboard the vessel in protective clothing and were detailed to provide security for the MNU scientists.

Whether the thing would fly or not only the prawns knew but inside it looked like a shit tip; worse than District 9 even! The place stank to high hell and some alien mildew seemed to coat every wall and corridor. There had even been some remains of dead prawns which the scientists had bagged for analysis.

But that was all.

The place was eerily quiet and Dale suddenly thought, possibly haunted by dead prawns! His mates had laughed at him for that, but he was more than glad to leave that vessel when he saw the MNU helicopter!

Where was it now? Dale thought.

It had left a year before and the stupid prawns said their little folk hero would be back in three years, some even said earlier than that.

No, he decided finally, it was gone forever and it had left behind its shitty little cargo to rot on Earth!

Each and every one of the Outlanders began to tire of their pointless existence at District 10 too. At least in Johannesburg there had been a sense of community, they were all in their predicament together and could at least draw comfort from others around them.

But a lot of the aliens occupying District 10 were Earth-born second generation, with many of their parents having been separated from them or simply worked to death. Discontent began to grow in the camp, with many advocating breaking out and returning to District 9.

Chapter 5

Meanwhile back at the hospital trouble had been brewing all afternoon down in the accident and emergency department. A prawn family had been spotted in the emergency room with an injured relative. Some humans had taken exception to this 'non-human' presence and had reacted angrily. It had now developed into a fully fledged stand off.

Michael and George had been sent down to assess the situation…

Michael had his antennas flicking away at full pelt for the entire journey from the security office to the ER, the almost extra sensory nature they possessed picking up the gravity of the situation ahead.

"Oh great, a fucking kaffir AND a prawn are going to help us now!"

A largely built white man stood in front of a group of Outlanders, gesturing and swearing.

"Why the fuck are they here and why the fuck do they get seen before my son?"

He pointed to a young boy with a bloody bandage to his head.

A group of onlookers silently nodded their agreement with the man.

"They are not welcome here in the hospital, in Jozi or even on this fucking planet…" he went on and then sat in a chair seemingly dejected.

It was difficult to tell at this point who was more incensed at this blatant expression of intolerant fascism; George, Michael or the father of the Outlander family.

The answer soon presented itself as the father leapt clear over the security detail with impossible agility and landed on the human, battering him into submission. Michael tore and pulled the Outlander male from the unconscious and bloody human.

Once he had calmed the situation, the Outlander father then responded with a staccato burst of clicks, chirps and wild hand gestures. Michael simply nodded his assent, from one alien to another.

"Why must we put up with this treatment? Why can't we just go home and leave this stupid planet behind forever?"

These were questions which Michael himself had often thought, time and again.

He trilled some soothing noises to his opposite number but Princeton knew the father would go now, away into the night. And so he did, snatching his children and wife and fleeing the hospital, jeered by onlookers.

George then jostled the human troublemakers out of the door in a flurry of blows while Michael simply carried two other humans under his arms, unceremoniously dumping them outside the hospital entrance moments later.

This demonstration of human prejudice was the worst Michael had seen. Even in a sanctuary for the wounded, no Outlander was safe.

Michael had stormed off in anger, punching a payphone from the wall.

"Michael, Michael!" George had shouted after his partner.

"That is not my name!" he had turned and bellowed in his own tongue "That is a name given to me by human oppressors; it is NOT my true identity…"

His words, the total rejection of his adopted name had stung George Semba and then hung in the air for some time after.

Piet Smit stared at the telephone for some time after the conference call had ended. The terse conversation with a senior figure in the South African Defence Force had both chilled and excited him. General Lars Fullerstein had advocated a plan of breathtaking brilliance that could potentially solve the problem of the errant prawn population forever.

If the bastards didn't want to leave, then so be it! MNU simply weren't prepared to be responsible for them any more, now that the Advanced Research Division had reverse engineered some of the more exotic weaponry into something more user friendly to humans.

When the last of the human wounded had been evacuated by helicopter, Dale and his battalion went round finishing off the non-human casualties and loading their bodies onto trucks for disposal out in the veldt.

Overnight a breakout attempt had been mounted by the prawns, with a handful escaping and the others being cut down by the ever vigilant MNU forces.

Dale was confident the remaining escapees would be rounded up soon.

At home after his difficult day in the emergency room, Michael caught up with his family.

News had filtered through from the brother of his wife that a group of rebellious Outlanders had escaped from District 10 and were coming back to the city.

"Is this a happy event?" his sire had asked him.

Michael thought for awhile. No it definitely was not good news, though he was secretly glad that some of his fellow species had stuck it the humans, because it meant that they would bring the full wrath of the authorities crashing down on their heads.

This meant there would be a struggle, a war even, as the humans had an aptitude for avenging crimes committed by aliens with a bloodthirsty enthusiasm.

So what was there to do?

For years Michael had lived in their world, had grown a little closer to humanity through George Semba and his hospital job, but in reality it all came down to the fact that two species could NOT coexist on this planet. So the Outlander population must either leave, something which they could not physically do without the mother ship or fight the humans and win, officially adopting Earth as their own.

But first they must get their weapons back, those which had been sold to the Nigerian gangs by non-humans desperate for their fix of cat food or tainted meat.

Michael had gathered together a small 'war council' consisting of brother aliens Slimu, Toku and Nastik.

Each had agreed that the time had come to end the oppression and show the humans that they weren't to be trifled with any more! If Christopher Johnson could do it, then these four Outlanders could lead the way.

Chapter 6

Gathering a mob of other able bodied Outlanders, Michael first went to the shack of Solomon King. One of the guards snarled that the leader of the Dark Eaters would not be prepared to meet with simple trash like them.

But when Michael explained the reason for their actions, King materialised straight away.

He couldn't resist the idea of tearing these humans apart, one by one and so was only too glad to mobilise the resources of his gang behind Michael, on the condition that King could lead from the front too.

Olubayo Sodje also caught up with his family after a hard day of criminal activity.

His 'family' however consisted of his fellow Nigerian gangsters who had also moved into District 9 with the prawns and had been exploiting their addiction to cat food ever since!

A god awful hubbub of noise had interrupted his evening in front of the television and he wanted to now why.

When one of his guards went sailing through the flimsy metal wall of his shack, he thought he knew why.

Fucking prawns!

He grabbed his assault rifle and ran outside, hearing shots and crunching noises.

A group of prawns were battering their way into the compound, pushing his men aside and tearing the limbs off those who resisted.

Olubayo saw a few of the beasts take full on frontal gun shots without flinching. Before he raised his weapon to fire, he immediately recognised the black form of the prawn gangster Solomon King at the head of the mob. Knowing that he ought not to resist such a District 9 figure head, he signalled his men to lower their weapons.

Over the years that he had shared his 'patch' of criminality with the alien inhabitants of District 9, Olubayo had come to understand their strange language and the significance of their facial expressions, realising all along that they weren't so different to humans after all.

"You know why we are here Sodje, so step aside and let us have back what belongs to us"

The one who spoke was not actually Solomon King, but another prawn wearing a security vest. Each of the others looked ready to tear the whole place apart if need be, he didn't mind admitting he was afraid but Olubayo was a principled man with a business to run.

"Your weapons? But they were sold to me by YOUR people in exchange for food…"

One of the prawns growled and stepped forward menacingly, drooling and cursing.

"Pesky human he has gotten my cousin hooked on cat food, I say we kill them all now" he spat.

Michael turned to Nastik:

"Be calm brother, their time will come"

Solomon King cocked his head to one side and stared at Olubayo, in an all too human gesture which said 'well?'

"Ok we have your weapons; but we don't know how to use them in all honesty…I will give them to you but do you have to offer us in return?"

"Your life" Solomon King said simply.

He signalled for his gang to move in and take the weapons from the strong room Olubayo kept in a neighbouring shack. It was stacked from floor to ceiling with all manner of exotic weaponry, all emblazoned with the orange hieroglyph-like symbols which betrayed their alien origin.

Standing at the back of the shack, like steel sentries, were three bio suits which upon being sold had netted their previous owners barely a hundred tins of cat food.

Olubayo stood watching with fascination as three prawns activated some hidden controls, allowing the front of the bio suit to part like a door and the alien to climb in.

"Holy shit" the Nigerian gangster mouthed.

Now the prawns were extra formidable, even stronger and more pissed than before!

MNU better have some serious fire power to counter these guys!

The escapees from District 10 had safely arrived in Johannesburg, circumventing a number of MNU, military and police patrols on the way in. They wasted no time in entering District 9.

Bouncing over the landscape effortlessly, the armoured bio suit spearheads of the final Outlander rebellion encountered the first MNU personnel who had been alerted by the generalised rioting going on in District 9. Like hot knives through butter, the bio suited prawns blasted the humans apart with arc weapons and simply threw their vehicles away like oversized toys.

Solomon King had encouraged the populace to rampage, in an effort to confuse the MNU and keep them tied down.

The call came through to Piet Smit at home just after seven in the evening. He snatched the receiver irritably from the cradle.

"Yes who is this?"

"It is Fullerstein; there is no time to waste here, it is happening dammit!"

"What is happening man?"

"The prawns are launching an uprising in District 9; several of my best battalions have already been annihilated by their weapons!"

"Oh my god!" Piet responded.

"Where the fucking hell did they get those weapons from anyway? I thought your MNU soldiers had cleared the slum of all forbidden alien technology?"

Fullerstein seemed both scared and angry at the same time. Smit simply blustered and bluffed, too shocked to respond coherently.

"There is only one resolution to this turn of events; we will have to bring the timetable forward"

"No…you cannot propose this now, I have barely managed to get my…"

"I CAN DO EXACTLY AS I SEE FIT TO REMOVE THIS FUCKING ALIEN THREAT TO US!" Fullerstein roared.

"May I remind you that I am charged by this government to execute the orders they decree to me?" the general went on.

"Yes General, I know…it's just that…"

"You will be feted as a hero Piet, the architect of the alien destruction!

Now we have all their secrets, what use are they to us?"

Jesus these things were restless today, what was wrong with them?

Just because a couple of other prawns had broken out, they all acted like a revolution was in the offing!

Which it might be, Dale thought to himself. Word had reached them that D9 had erupted into chaos and that the prawns were actually pulling themselves together and using their weapons against us. That would be a problem, certainly, but one which he was confident MNU could handle. If only he could bust of this shithole and go to Jozi and fight!

A single Swedish built 'Gripen' jet fighter bomber belonging to the South African Air Force took off from Waterkloof Air Force Base.

Slung beneath the centreline weapon station was the bomb South Africa had for years tried to conceal, when it 'gave up' its nuclear arsenal. The Cold War relic slung beneath the sleek and modern jet fighter was a small tactical nuclear weapon, designed to wipe out a small army on a battlefield. Today it would be used to level a morealienmenace.

The jet climbed and turned for Kimberley. It was time.

How to bring order to this fucking place? The man charged with commanding District 10 had shouted time and again.

A thin barrier of MNU personnel separated him from the aliens as he yelled through a loud hailer for order in the camp.

He had even been graceful enough to obtain a translation device to bellow the orders in the native prawn language, all to no avail, however.

One or two of the aliens had been brave enough to simply snatch an MNU trooper from the barricade line and tear them to shreds, throwing the body parts back as a warning.

"Fuck this Dale man, I am getting out of here, you hear me?"

As his friend Justin threw his rifle down and ran away, an alien leapt from the crowd and grabbed him off his feet, dragging the unfortunate deserter into the mass of Outlander bodies.

Looks like they were getting really pissed now, so Dale had all the excuse he needed to blow these things away for good.

He slammed home a fresh magazine and started to fire…

All of the other MNU personnel up and down the line followed his example.

This seemed to enrage the prawns even further, but Dale Kleinveldt didn't care anymore, he was beyond reason now. Magazine after magazine had been ejected and slammed home and barely the first line of prawns had fallen. They feigned attacks, snarled and grabbed the odd human trooper to feast on, but slowly they were falling back.

It seemed that in the heat of the moment that the prawns once again lacked the leadership skills and the savvy to fight back!

It was over the sounds of gunfire that Dale imagined he heard the sound of a jet engine…could it be?

Down below in D10 the scene reminded the Gripen pilot of some giant kicking over an ant's nest; hundreds of insect-like creatures ran around the small white tents, pursued by firing humans.

Time to end the madness!

The pilot made one pass over D10 and then came back round for another run, the bombing run.

A small black object detached itself from the Gripen, whose pilot then kicked in maximum afterburner and lowered his black out visor to protect his eyes from the flash.

On and on it fell silently, towards the earth below and the thousands of Outlander and human guards in District 10…

Like a giant flashbulb going off, the blinding light expanded outwards, creating a simultaneous heat wave and a crushing overpressure.

Super heated hurricane force winds followed the explosion, heralding the arrival of a boiling black, angry mushroom cloud which sucked up the remains of everyone and everything which had resided in District 10.

Nothing remained of the camp now except a deep radioactive crater.

Chapter 7

Amongst the chaos enveloping District 9 and the wider Johannesburg metropolitan area, nobody would have caught the blink-and-you-will-miss-it flash on the horizon, which marked the destruction of District 10.

Had the Outlanders like Solomon King, Michael Princeton, Slimu, Nastik and Toku known that their brother aliens had just been vaporised, they would have surely fought on.

As it stood, massive reinforcements had arrived in Johannesburg, from the army, police and MNU to every type of mercenary gunning for alien blood.

So it was to be war now.

The human citizenry of Johannesburg began to flee the city in droves, creating further chaos and gridlock on the roads.

During a lull in the fighting, some of the prawns had retreated one of their shacks. Solomon King smiled and tossed one of the arc guns to Michael Princeton. It had been freshly recharged and was ready to go.

One of the bio suits had been damaged and so a gang of Outlander technicians swarmed over the machine in an effort to patch it up.

"It seems we have the district under our control now, Slaku"

Solomon King clicked excitedly and using Michael's true Outlander name.

"But for how long? Already I can sense the human forces gathering at the gates to crush us!"

"You and your senses Slaku, you must learn to control them!"

"But now we have rebelled, they will have blood on their minds!"

The conversation went to and fro in this manner for a little while.

"What is our long term battle plan Slaku, we have them at bay now but next?"

Michael/Slaku realised that he had not thought of this at all before launching the attacks.

Would District 9 be their fortress against the humans or a prison?

George Semba had found the MNU lines in disarray and had easily managed to slip through unnoticed, despite the TV stations saying D9 had been 'locked down'

Within minutes of crossing the D9 fence, a large group of armed prawns backed by a robot had seized Semba and demanded to know the purpose of his visit to the slum.

"I am here to see Michael Princeton, Michael Princeton!"

All of the prawns looked at each other, confused.

"Um, he is tall, greenish yellow…coloured…" Semba could see the aliens struggling and knew he was seconds from being torn apart.

"Wears a SECURITY vest, see S-E-C-U-R-I-T-Y…"

One of the prawns clicked then, quite literally.

"Slaku" it said to a companion.

"I am unarmed" pleaded Semba as the group then searched him.

Then they marched him at gunpoint into District 9 proper.

Meanwhile on the global scene, a news blackout had been imposed on South Africa.

Pretoria had sought to keep the destruction of the alien refugee camp a secret. But satellite photographs had captured the flash over D10 and had followed up with further images of the blackened crater where the camp had been previously located.

At the UN and African Union, South African representatives had to answer awkward questions from fellow member states around the legality of such a move, with many other nations accusing Pretoria of cold blooded murder and even genocide of an alien race!

South African representatives countered these accusations by claiming that no other nation had a similar burden of an extra terrestrial refugee population. Ambassadors went further to say that when approached for assistance; other nations simply turned their backs on South Africa, leading to an impossible situation at home.

"What is the meaning of this interruption?" Slaku/Michael had yelled, seeing the form of a human being brought into the shack that served as a command centre for the Outlander forces.

"Michael, it's me George Semba"

Instantly relaxing, Slaku motioned the guards away and beckoned his work mate to sit on an old dilapidated sofa.

"Michael I am here to try and stop this madness, I…the vast majority of humans, don't want to fight you or your people"

"I am Slaku now George, Michael is a human name"

Puzzled, George went on.

"Slaku, I am appealing to you to lay down your arms and stop this! MNU and the government have some seriously fucked up shit coming your way if you don't…"

"Is that a threat, you human vermin?" growled Slimu, trying to grab George by the neck.

Slaku stopped him with a raised hand.

"Damn it there rumours that the government has nuked District 10, you know boom boom!"

"Nuked?" King asked quizzically, not hearing the word before.

"It means the use of a super bomb, a human weapon of mass destruction…" Slaku said quietly, clearly shocked at the new turn of events.

George sensed that the Outlanders were both appalled and angry at the same time. Would they vent their wrath on him as the unofficial 'ambassador' of the human race?

Surprisingly they didn't, as it seemed the prawns had now lost the stomach for battle. Oddly enough each alien had seemingly settled into a quiet contemplative state.

Salvation was on its way for both parties.

Chapter 8

"We killed our own people! How could they have done this?"

To many of the MNU executives summoned to this emergency meeting, Piet Smit looked to be losing it fast.

"But it looks as if the prawns are backing down now, Piet, maybe wiping out District 10 was a good thing to do" one of the men said.

That was true, Smit conceded, the rioting had calmed down and the errant prawns had either been chased back to District 9 or returned there by his forces.

Would they now start to play ball at last or were they hiding another trick up their sleeve?

Losses had been high on both sides and secretly Piet hoped the prawns would sue for peace.

Military radars across southern Africa started going wild around the late afternoon of that day, with a large single contact. Something big and slow moving began to descend on South Africa.

Many air traffic controllers had an immediate sense of foreboding at the coming event; with some having been on duty back in 1982 and remembering the same feelings then.

Piet still ranted and raved, only pausing to sit down once before springing back up again and continuing to shout. But the attention of the MNU executives was now directed outside…

For a huge shadow had begun slowly descending over the city, blanketing everything and even blotting out the sun.

"Oh my god!"

Piet backed away from the window, as if an avenging angel were outside waiting to pluck him away.

All he could see in the sky was the underside of a massive alien vessel, black with orange and red alien symbols.

Prawn symbols.

They were back, just as the idiot alien Christopher Johnson had promised!

District 9 residents and MNU forces alike stood mesmerised as the giant ship, which dwarfed the previous vessel, settled over Jozi causing a shut down of all electrical supplies across the city.

Johannesburg then simply ground to a halt.

This had not happened with the original mother ship in '82, so many human residents began to panic and flee in droves, fearing an invasion.

"Salvation" Slaku said simply, turning to George.

He felt this moment coming for many weeks now, his antenna acting strange through all of today and the preceding day.

He recognised the ship not as a mining vessel, but as a ship belonging to royalty.

The trancelike state of the other prawns now broke and various happy clicks and cheers broke out. Many knelt in reverence to the occupants of the ship.

Over District 10, another smaller vessel had descended and now surveyed the charred remains of the thousands of Outlanders who had been interred against their will.

Then it joined the larger ship over Johannesburg.

A second ship arrived over the city and landed near District 9.

Ramps opened on the ship and even taller aliens, dressed in regal clothing and carrying an assortment of weaponry, began beckoning the D9 residents inside.

Thousands of prawns simply ran into the vessel before it withdrew the ramps and lifted off, full to the brim.

The original ship began dropping representatives to the ground; they then rounded up the weaker aliens and encouraged those who hesitated to follow them with excited clicks.

It was over at last, Slaku said, the enforced exile of his people on Earth would cease on this day.

George was knocked over by a tidal wave of prawns galloping towards the columns of bright amber light which appeared from the ship, which acted as elevators for the aliens.

He couldn't see Slaku now, or Solomon King or any alien he knew, save the mechanised bio suits which stood tall over the crowd.

Like the fabled animals rushing to the arc, the last residents of District 9 boarded the ship and took off.

The whole operation must not have taken anymore than several hours. News crews had gathered and MNU/military representatives had been on hand to quell any further trouble.

Many asked would there now be a terrible vengeance exacted on mankind by the aliens, in light of previous MNU atrocities and the bombing of District 10?

But the answer was unequivocal: the alien beings simply went, leaving behind the District 9 slum forever.

At first many humans in Johannesburg actually began to miss the odd beings as the MNU bulldozers went to work on District 9. Life slowly returned to some semblance of normality not seen since 1982.

George Semba went on with his life, remembering the times when he had known and worked with an alien called Michael.