CONTENTS:
*
Chapter One: The Hitman
*
Chapter Two: The
Ambassador
*
Chapter Three: The
Campground
*
Chapter Four: The
Retreat
*
Chapter Five: The
Power Station
*
Chapter Six: The
Aliens
*
Chapter Seven: The
End Game
Recent
days had been long and troubling. An early summer heat wave
scorched city streets. Its sweat and fever were like a polluted
balloon. Thirty-five people were already counted among the toe
tags due to two days of 42°C heat. An unlucky number, as Sam had
done exactly thirty-five court appearances over the last while.
It was like doing time as a long string of old cases came to a
close. Sentences were already being delivered; the remaining
bodies were in the cooler. It was time to get out of the city
and escape the blanket of heat … time to get the office and
court-bench sores off his ass.
There
were too many enemies on the streets here, so Sam had a working
vacation in mind. He’d scored an out-of-city missing-person
case, and leaving town and cooling off for a while seemed like a
sexy option. Leaning back in his padded chair, he looked out the
narrow window; office people were rising in a street-view
elevator on the side of the cylindrical building next door.
Sunshine gleamed on the ledges of two marble-black towers, and
through the knife-edge alley space between them, he saw dappled
reflections of light and a twinkle of blue from the waters of
the nearby Toronto shoreline. Haze was dissipating out there
over the water, and the temperature was dropping to a bearable
31°C.
He'd
already shut down his office setup, leaving one portable work
screen turned on at the left side of his desk. As his tablet
beeped, he transferred the message to the big-screen display and
studied it. The initial payment had gone into his hidden
account, and the details on the person he was looking for came
up.
Sam
studied them for a moment, then he configured the security
systems for his office and enabled mobile use so he could access
the office from outside. The secure transfer and setup of
mobile-use software on his tablet were painfully slow. During
that time, he packed a small suitcase and placed it on the
visitor's couch. A thick envelope of special legal papers rested
beside it. They were case papers that had to be delivered in
person to a court processing office, sensitive items that
couldn't be filed online at any secure level. So it was the
delivery, and then he'd be leaving in a rental car.
His own
vehicle could be traced too easily. For this vacation, and case,
it was a car that would be traced to a phony owner. The special
phone would dummy his location back to Toronto while masking all
communication and searches. Any interested parties would get a
random trace on him as being somewhere in Toronto, though not at
the office.
His
condominium was already set to booby-trap mode, so it would be
bad news for anyone who broke in looking for him. Sam had his
real home with him anyway, in tablet form that was safe and easy
to use. No one, not even intelligence agencies, could backdoor
into his remote office system.
With his
car hidden away and the rental waiting for pickup, he took the
city's fast transit a few kilometers to the court building.
Emerging at the sweep-arched exit door, he had to follow an
enclosed live-ads walkway over the highway and take a short
dusty walk down a forgotten side street. This was downtown, and
summer sun flashed off the rows of towering buildings, sending
waves of radiant heat down to bake all flesh. The street was
crowded, a busy afternoon, and mostly well-dressed people
hurrying to a near run as they raced from one air-conditioned
building to another, fleeing a hot exhaust of pollution and the
open street like it was some huge killing ghost pursuing them.
Sam's
summer suit was light, but he'd already removed his jacket and
was carrying it over his suitcase as he walked up the shallow
steps to the court building. At the top, he turned and squinted
in the bright sunlight, studying the passing people. A couple of
guys had been following him. The first was an unknown quantity
he'd spotted on leaving his office, and the second was another
private eye or investigator that had appeared briefly near the
courthouse. Obviously, they knew enough about him to gather he'd
be making this delivery and had used it as a sure way to follow
him.
They were
out of sight now, lurking somewhere in the shadows, and they
likely wouldn't make any move on him in a heavily guarded court
building, so he turned back to the entrance and walked calmly
inside. His detective license got him past lazy guards who
already knew who he was, and then it was the usual boring wait
as he dealt with various bureaucrats, clearances, and closings
regarding his cases. The last item was a legal search booked on
one of the new anonymous terminals. He was doing it this way
because of the higher access level and organized delivery of
information. He doubted that it was as secure as his tablet, but
it would be good.
A piggish
guard issued him a temporary entry card, and he took the fourth
terminal. Entry was through an ordinary office door, but the
inside was a bit different: cramped to an extent, with equipment
embedded in the walls and a lockdown desk. Taking a seat, he
entered an access code and ran some checks. He was looking for a
missing person, and the subject had been last seen in a place
called Indian Falls, to the northeast of Toronto. There had been
no trace of him since, so it was safe to assume that whether
alive or dead or a prisoner, he was still somewhere near Indian
Falls.
Sam had
never visited the place, so he watched with interest as various
overlays moved across the on-screen map. The remote area had a
tiny population of 7,000 and, in many ways, didn't exist in the
modern sense. It had no police department but only the Indian
Falls Conservation Authority, which covered the town and the
nature area. The most important readings for any community in
the newer police-state, fragmented Canada were economic and
threat-level indexes. As readings rose in importance, so did the
degree of police and military control. Indian Falls read as a
big economic zero, which was why it had no police department.
The military installation had been closed down decades ago.
Zooming
out on the map, Sam could see military and police colors
spreading from Toronto. When he zoomed toward Indian Falls, a
sort of security ring formed around it on the edges of deep
forest. Military and police forces that were combined in Toronto
fragmented into various public and private forces in the
countryside. Indian Falls was surrounded by them as it was
circled by economic zones of a much higher rating. Mining,
forestry interests, the Deep River Isotope station, and even a
new military installation were outside its perimeter, while
inside, the Falls area had a small local economy of some farming
and light industry. The only security alerts that came up on it
were due to the presence of a nudist colony, a militia group,
and the protected conservation area itself.
A deeper
study had Sam scratching his head as he viewed an older alert
that had been downgraded to junk status. It concerned UFO and
ghost sightings in Indian Falls. Aside from that, everything
seemed okay; as long as he stayed within the rather large area
of the town and conservation area, he would avoid dealing with
numerous other police and military forces. And that was a good
thing, as from experience he'd learned that the authorities of
the day were not friendly, especially when it came to private
investigators or anyone who might be snooping around and
accidentally collecting information on their corrupt clients and
bosses.
The rest
of the dope on Indian Falls was ordinary. The cost of living was
low because they traded local produce for necessary imports.
Part of the economic zero was in its local nature. No free-trade
or mass-produced products, just farm goods, minerals, and
minimal forestry. The nudist camp was one of the largest
employers. There was fishing and rafting on the river, which had
fast-flowing rapids and ran through the town. Photos showed a
modern small town, nearly all new buildings in the core
replacing those burned out in wildfires twenty-five years back.
Older houses remained along the riverbanks.
Sam
walked out of the booth, wondering why anyone would need a
detective to find someone there. Most likely, the subject was
dead. Anyone making human contact would be easily found, while
anyone not doing so would have disappeared into the wilderness
or the rushing river waters. That realization gave him a course
of action that spelled quick investigation and then some
vacation time. Cooling off time. It wasn't likely he'd find the
person, and if a larger search took place, like for a dead body,
it would be a police matter. Only forest rangers could search
the huge semi-populated wilderness around Indian Falls.
A desk
guard signaled him as he came out of the washroom, so he walked
over and picked up a small envelope that had been left for him.
It had only his name on the front, so he pulled off the seal. A
note was inside, and the message was rather urgent. Handwritten
in capital letters, it advised him not to leave from the front
of the building and gave the location of a meeting place. He
knew he'd been followed, so perhaps this was wise advice.
Sam
avoided the front and the lobby, with its large, open-view
windows, and looked for a back entrance. Security posts were
present there, and he wanted to leave unseen, so he walked
around until he found a nearly hidden emergency fire exit at the
side of the complex. He knew the type of special fire door; the
alarm would be silent, and a fire car would automatically arrive
and create a distraction at the front, which was what he wanted.
So he went out, finding himself in a narrow, dead-end alleyway
that exited in the trash-compactor area at the back. Realizing
that the rear could be under watch as well, he ducked around the
large bin, looked, and then walked off quickly down the back
street.
He got
behind a gated wall segment, looked around, and then entered a
nearby condominium building by following a dog walker through
the back door. From its lobby, he looked from behind a potted
tree over to the front area of the court drop-off. A
construction area was off to the left, with a derelict building
awaiting destruction by the Ridell Corporation. Sam studied the
stripped building, then left out back again and worked his way
around to the side of the lot. A gate for workers wasn't even
locked, and he slipped in easily. No one was on site today that
he could see, so he went through some weeds to a robot dumpster
and calculated a line of sight and an angle. If someone planned
to shoot him at the front of the court, it would be from the
third-floor south window. He couldn't see it from his location,
but he knew any shooter would be there. Reason being no one
would do a drive-by shooting at a court location, but if someone
really wanted to get him, they'd do a targeted hit.
He used a
flat of metal he found on the ground to pry open a closed side
door and quietly went up some stairs. Three floors up, he had to
use genuine stealth as the windows and most of the doors had
already been removed, and only a shell remained awaiting
demolition. It was a stripped building, with even parts of the
floors and walls gone, as if they'd grabbed tiles, wiring, or
anything else of value. Entering a hallway and pausing in a
gloomy corner, he listened. A few minutes passed, and he heard
birdcalls and wings, and then, finally, a few footsteps on a
creaking floor. The sounds told him he'd guessed wrong and had
been prepared to rush through the wrong doorway. Moving quietly,
he got to the suspect door; the handle and lock had been
removed, so he ducked down and peeked through the door hole.
Light
from the missing window gave him a clear view. A tall, tanned
blond man was sitting in a canvas chair by the window. Some
supplies and his jacket were on the floor around him, and he had
a big gun on his lap as he observed the front of the court
building down the road. He suddenly began to move as though
alerted, so Sam threw the door open and rushed him.
As the
big man rose and turned, Sam banged him hard in the head with
the metal slat from the yard. The gun, a rifle, flew across the
floorboards, and the man staggered back. He had a head like a
rock because he didn't go out. Instead, he moved to counter
Sam's second blow and got in to grab him. Sam threw him off,
seeing blood drops spatter from the gash in his head.
The
gunman came back fast, swinging a wild right-hand punch that was
easily countered. Sam hammered him one in the belly, and as the
man doubled over, he whacked him with an elbow in the chin. His
head snapped back, and he stumbled back but managed to rally for
another charge. Sam threw him over easily, and his head took
another bang as it hit the floorboards.
That was
it; he was down and out on the floor like a tumbled sack of
sand. Sam moved quickly for the weapon. With the big rifle in
hand, he stepped up and looked down at the unconscious hit man.
He was completely out, so Sam searched him and a small pack
beside him. Other than tools of his trade, there was no
identification. The man was a pro; Sam whacked him on the head
again with the rifle butt, then grabbed the tumbled chair and
sat down to do an inspection.
What he
found he didn't like. The gun was feather light but not of any
metal he'd seen before. It was metal, but no paint could be
scratched off with a knife blade. It didn't have the feel of any
sort of hybrid plastic. He could see that it was easy to
assemble, and the case it came in was there on the floor. It
wasn't a rifle at all, but a beam weapon and a generic weapon
that didn't require a fingerprint or eye scan to fire. It could
be assembled to fire powerful beams or bullet-style energy
shots. To test it, he simply aimed at the hit man's head from a
ways across the room and watched the quick flash and burn as it
put a neat, clean hole through the forehead.
Steam
emerged, and the hole sealed itself. Perhaps it was killing, but
it was also necessary self-defense, as it was the only way to
stop a professional. This guy hadn't been hired by any of the
current crop of criminals he'd sent up. They were mostly drug
criminals – illegal Intel drug dealers for the large part. Any
hit man sent by them wouldn't have access to this sort of
weapon. It was military and experimental, and unless stolen,
could only be gained by someone with high military clearance.
The weapon was also deadly accurate if the man had intended to
use it for a sniper shot from this location to the front of the
courthouse. Someone big was after him, and he couldn't figure
out why. The only unknown was his current case, Indian Falls,
and it seemed impossible that a small case like it would attract
any powerful response. There had to be more to it, and he had
someone to meet, so after cleaning up, packing the gun, and
wrapping his suit jacket around the case, he walked off
cautiously and left the construction site.
He didn't
have a name, just a location on Jansen Blvd. It had tall
buildings on the east side and an open area to the west that
allowed direct sunlight, which, combined with reflected light,
created a vibrant, scorching scene. Stores with market fronts,
attic apartments above other local businesses, and patio
restaurants led to an easy feel. No sense of danger here, but he
wasn't fooled by impressions. He walked the street and studied
everything, including windows higher up, before he walked up
some narrow steps and past the gold latticework of a tiny Thai
restaurant. It was shadowy inside and sectioned off into three
areas, obscured from one another by screens and potted plants.
As per the note, his man was right inside at the back, sitting
alone at a table, his hat on the chair beside him.
Sam
walked up, the man nodded, and he sat down.
“Sometimes a note is better than a text message,” the man said.
He was twirling chopsticks in a bowl of soup, and when he looked
up, Sam saw an honest sort of face. He had an Italian look and
was another investigator. The hat, clean suit, and tie in hot
weather were a giveaway. Business dress on a person obviously
not a corporate shill.
“Yeah,
especially if you don't want to lose copyright and have everyone
in the world reading it.”
“To get
to the point. I sent you the note because I was paying you a
visit; at least I was until I noticed you were being followed.
It seems you have a shining reputation these days. Off-market
Intel drugs are in big demand, and you're putting everyone
dealing them in jail.”
Sam waved
the flower-shirted waiter away. “Just a chance thing to do with
several cases I had. But the person following me wasn't sent by
them. It was something else, I think.”
“I don't
know who it was. Allow me to introduce myself. I'm Enzo
Florinto. I was trying to contact you because I have a note for
your client. I know about the missing person case you have; I
turned it down.”
“Yeah,
I've heard of you. Corporate clients.”
“That's
right. My kind of guys like you. They don't like their
copyrighted stuff being faked and sold everywhere like candy.”
“I don't
have a moral opinion on that issue. If the powers that be say
it’s illegal to sell something, I take the case.”
“Why is a
big name like you taking this idiotic missing person case? I
looked at it, and it seemed ridiculous at the time. If the guy
went missing there, he drowned or something. Why bother to look?
At least I thought that then. Now it appears he's alive.”
“The
answer is to cool off. I'd appreciate it if you don't mention
where I'm going to anyone. I figured I'd take a small case and a
vacation.”
“It looks
like at least one person had an in on your movements. You had
better hope it's not more than that. They won't get any info
from me. They don't even know about me, unless you were followed
here.”
“I
wasn't. You have the note.”
Enzo
reached into his pocket and passed a crumpled piece of paper to
Sam. He opened it and looked it over. It was a brief, scrawled
message on the back of a food bill from the Indian Falls Little
Red Diner, signed by Marco Santino, the missing person.
Apparently, he'd sent it to his brother via Enzo. All it said
was 'Don't worry, I'm still around. Investigating some strange
happenings in the Falls. Have gone undercover.' The bill was
dated three weeks ago.
“Looks
like you have no case,” Enzo said. “The guy is still around. He
fancies himself an amateur investigator of the supernatural, so
I hear. They own a cottage out there, so he's around his own
territory.”
“I've
already been paid, so if he's there, I'll grab him and find out
what he's up to. Maybe he's either eccentric or gone off his nut
out there looking for ghosts in Indian Falls.”
“The only
mention I've heard about Indian Falls was a news thing about a
nudist camp out there.”
“Yeah,
that and a nutso militia that holds training exercises in the
woods.”
“Have a
nice vacation and keep your clothes on. Getting captured by the
crazies with guns out there, and in the nude, wouldn’t be nice.”
Sam spent
two hours arranging and getting to a second meeting on the other
side of town. The change in plans left him without possession of
the rental car. He walked through the black-onyx-shaded lobby of
a gated condominium complex for the super-rich out in Scarsdale.
A private elevator took him to a secure office located on the
35th floor of the complex. It was the office of Jerem Thomas, a
captain of the PSF, the Public Security Force, a private
security contractor that had taken over policing in Toronto
several years back. Jerem owed him more than a favor.
Information from Sam had given him several convictions.
Jerem's
office was awesome once one got past the dull waiting room. The
entire north wall was a security setup of screens and maps, and
the only window was a false view of an otherworldly city that
didn't exist, at least not on this planet. Sam went through the
rather dreary story of the courthouse hit man and the fact that
someone with a higher military sort of clearance had to have
sent him.
Jerem
Thomas' deep black skin was almost radiant. He paced
athletically behind his desk as he thought things over. Then he
spoke. “I'm going to use a couple of my close men, do some
checks and forensics on the body, and dispose of it at a black
site. I have to bury this case before some military outfit comes
in to make trouble, attempting a cover-up.”
“Any
ideas on who could be behind this?”
“No.
Gangsters and corrupt cops are everywhere, but this doesn't fit
the pattern. It's someone outside. I mean, from outside the
city. Generally, what I deal with is policing for profit, since
we work by contract. The incentive is always there for cops to
do whatever saves money or makes money. Often covering up things
or taking bribes saves money. In addition, the power to write
out custom fines means too many crooks simply pay out cash …
like drug dealers paying copyright holders in cash, as though
they're small-time when they're big-time. With this one, I'll
have to put the investigation into a compartment. If someone is
sending in hit men, I want to know who it is and put a quick end
to it. The only end-game publicity is the word put out
underground as to what happens to people who try that.”
Sam
nodded, and then he took out the gun case he had draped under
his jacket. “This is the weapon.”
Jerem
took the case and set it on the desk. He opened it and slowly
assembled the weapon. He aimed it at a sculpture across the
room. “My systems didn't register you as carrying a weapon on
entry, so it's invisible. There's nothing like it in our
arsenal, under development, or in the approval process. This is
a beam weapon, and I can see by the adjustments and engine that
it fires various beams. Few beam weapons on the market today
could kill a man hit-style from a distance. Usually, you'd have
to lock the beam on for a bit to burn someone. Most are
close-range wide beam weapons. There are no markings on this
one, but what identifies it is that in classic assembly it’s
styled to look like one of the old sniper rifles … smaller, but
the Canadian military version.”
“Someone
with deep military connections must want me dead. I can't think
of any damn reason for it.”
“Neither
can I. Your hit man was ace calibre to be in possession of this
gun. I can't even figure out what powers it. The engine is
better than nanotechnology. My advice for you is to go into
hiding for a while.”
“I am
doing that.”
“Where
are you going?”
“Place
called Indian Falls.”
“I've
been there. Beautiful nature area. It's an easy place to
disappear or get disappeared. You'll be taking the weapon with
you. Hide it somewhere in the bush and shield it in case it's
being tracked. We'll grab it later after the investigation. I
can't put it in storage here. Weapons are stolen all the time,
and this one may be hot. Word will get around if we keep
something like it.”
“That
should be it then. I leave town. All the bad guys will know is
that their hitman and his weapon have disappeared. No body gets
reported, no weapon. It should stall them for a while.”
“Long
enough for me to find out who it is and burn their asses.”
An
elevator from the underground took him up to High Rapid Transit
at the Scarsdale Station, and Sam flowed against a casual crowd
headed out of the city. Some Transit Authority cops were
pounding a beat on the platforms, and he definitely wanted to
avoid being targeted in one of their searches. The sort of thing
most people put up with, while anyone with a brain opposed such
foolish security measures.
Turning
and looking out the sweep of plastic windows, he studied the
curved bronze sides of a residential tower that rose 35 stories
against a public park backdrop. The cops ambled by without
noticing him, and a couple of minutes later, an express train
pulled up, and he was racing back into the city on a twisting
transit path running at about penthouse height. The air engines
whooshed in long decompression coming into the Lakeside stop.
On the
outside, he walked through a public garden and went down a slide
escalator into an underground commercial area. Though not widely
advertised, there was a second underground here that hosted
businesses that could be considered a touch on the shady side
and that did not boast signs affiliating them with any of the
twenty-five key world mega corporations. Sam passed several
shops. He wasn't here to buy cheap knockoffs of brand-name stuff
or pirate goods like most of the others. Half of the people he
passed were hopeless addicts here for counterfeit Intel drugs.
Addiction to those drugs was less of a physical disease and more
of an offbeat fashion and style or psychological dependence.
His walk
ended at the very back of this underground, near the warehouse
area, at an unmarked bronze-painted door with a small buzzer
panel. There was only one code, and he used it and waited for
the lock to click. Then he walked into a customer service area
and talked to a hot redheaded woman wearing shorts, sandals, and
a bead necklace that covered about as much as her blue top did.
Her name was Juana, and she had a looking-for-a-date smile. Sam
returned it, but the conversation was brief, and unless she
wanted to go to Indian Falls, the date was off. The only
information Sam gave was the name of his sales contact, Josh
Ponce.
Poncy, as
he was called, appeared within a minute and interrupted Sam's
small talk with the receptionist. Poncy was the type of guy who
existed only as a sales flack. There was no other aspect to his
personality. No private life that didn't have to do with his
pushing of hot vehicles, meaning vehicles off the government
books with washed temporary plates that would pass cop checks.
In a society where license suspensions were common, business in
this area was booming. Sam had a license; all he wanted was a
car set up to trace to some other identity that wouldn't connect
to him if someone passing in Indian Falls or on the route there
decided to run the plate.
Out in
the showroom, the low flat ceiling gave Sam the feeling that a
big crusher was about to come down. The musty air left most of
the vehicles needing a wash. Rather than ask for a specific car,
he asked Poncy to pick something.
“I've got
a special deal,” he said, shifting on his feet in his rumpled
suit and nodding his curly head in a way that made Sam wonder if
he was using. “A guy like you doesn't want just any car. You
need something special.”
“I don't
know about that. I don't want to stand out. I just need a
vehicle.”
“Follow
me.” Poncy took him through the first lot and down a concrete
walk to a second, smaller lot. He pointed out a small
cream-colored car with no recognizable logos. Just an unknown
one of a strange, spun wing on the hood.
Sam
frowned, wondering if he was being taken in by a used-car
salesman. “It's not exactly a brand name.”
“That's
the beauty of it. Everything from the flat-free tires to the
aerodynamics and interior is understated. In fact, it's an
experimental model. It even looks smaller than it is. The
interior easily seats a big man like you.”
“What
sort of engine is in it?”
“This is
the total modern smart car. The fuel tank is only for backup.
This is a super-efficient electric and solar car, and the
operating computer is the car's doctor, detecting problems
before they occur. It is constantly altering all of its systems
to increase efficiency. The engine is small, but the power is
big stuff. What you'll be interested in is the smarter onboard
computer.”
His sales
pitch actually described most cars on the market. "Maybe I don't
want smarter. That usually means more built-in detection and a
car that reports everything somewhere else.”
“This one
doesn't. No head office, so to speak. It reports only to itself
unless returned to the manufacturer for tuning. It is supposed
to be coming on the market as a private car for military VIPs.
You know, police-state bosses and corporate executives. People
who know better than to trust anyone. It's developed by Andersen
Wing, the same people who developed High Rapid Transit.”
“Okay,
I'll take it. But I'm not driving it out. I want you to deliver
it to a location on the outskirts of Scarsdale.”
It turned
out the car had advanced auto drive, which he tested. This was a
hilly area with many mansions and large country estates rising
from behind wildfire shielding. Sam went back to manual control
as the car raced through an area of townhouse complexes formed
around a huge shopping mall that bubbled out on flat land. After
that, it was a stretch of farm fields and forests with the
mostly automated farm buildings showing through the dust haze
over another distant road. Traffic was light, and Poncy had been
right about the vehicle. It attracted barely a glance, and he'd
been waved through the police screen on his exit from Toronto.
The
A-wing, as he called it, accelerated like a racer, and here he
was in an area without any speed limit, heading into Indian
Falls. Running the roads felt great, and for a moment, he
wondered why he didn't leave the city and its nanny police state
altogether … then he remembered that, except for areas
considered economically or strategically unimportant like Indian
Falls, the whole country was a police state. A place where you
could vote and select between the political shills the
corporations and the cop state put forward as leaders. There was
only one policy paper – it was all about economic control, while
the media put forward a cartoon world of civil progress that no
one other than a fool would believe. The genuine picture of
progress was now so obscure that millions of human beings never
quite figured out they were living in a corporate hell. It was a
strange hell, too, as the devil was everywhere with a grin and a
baton as he pretended to be your protector and friend … at least
up to the point where you met the flaming oven and felt the hand
shoving you from behind.
Foaming
river rapids showed from the top of the hill, so he knew he was
heading into Indian Falls. Sam slowed the car for an easy
cruise-in, but it didn't turn out that easy when he suddenly saw
a flashing light in his rearview mirror and heard the siren of
an approaching police car.
Sam
cursed and hit the steering wheel with the flat of his hand,
causing an interior alarm to sound and the car to swerve
slightly as he looked for the shut off. After that, a Provincial
Police Authority car pulled up beside him, and he pulled over on
the sandy side portion by the ditch.
Two cops
got out. They wore mirror shades, dark paramilitary-style dress
that wasn't suited for the heat, and broad-brimmed felt hats.
One walked around the car, studying it, and the other came to
the window.
“Saw you
losing control there. I hope you can pass a drug test?”
“I'm not
on drugs, officer. You guys came up fast on me and startled me.”
“We
tracked you driving a bit fast back there.”
“There is
no speed limit on this road.”
“Got ID.”
Sam
passed him the phony ID and registration that came with the car.
“Hum. 200
pounds. You're Marvin Hurley, is that correct?”
“That's
right. I'm a salesman.”
“And you
bought this vehicle at the New York dealership listed on the
registration?”
“I did.”
The cop
suddenly whistled, and his partner walked up, took off his
mirror shades, and stared in the window. “Get out of the car
slowly,” he said as he drew a G4 Stun Shooter from his belt.
Sam got
out and found himself quickly cuffed. “What's this about?” he
said.
Ignoring
him, the arresting officer looked to his partner. “Looks like
we've got the big guy. Marvin Hurley himself.”
Sam
gulped, not knowing what to say. Poncy had assured him he'd been
given a clean ID and car. The idiot must have forgotten to clean
the registration, and he was going under the ID of the guy who
stole it.
The two
officers turned back to Sam, but the situation changed, and all
three ducked as a low-flying drone passed overhead.
“What in
the hell is a Hawk drone doing here?” said one cop to the other.
But it
was Sam who answered. “There's more. I hear a helicopter.”
The sound
rose, and they all looked to the east as a sleek military
chopper came over the trees and in for a landing in the open
field next to the road. Three armed commandos hit the ground and
hurried over with weapons drawn. To the surprise of the police
officers, they were held at gunpoint along with Sam.
“Make any
moves, and the three of you are dead,” said a chunky commando
with grease-black under his eyes.
“But I'm
Sergeant McKraken of the Provincial Authority,” said the boss
cop. “You can't arrest me.”
“Didn't
say anything about arrest. I said I'd shoot you.”
The
Sergeant puffed up his chest but backed off a step. A tall man
in civilian clothes was now walking over from the chopper.
Everyone remained silent until he arrived, then the lead
commando spoke. “Can you ID him?”
The man
studied Sam with intense dark eyes. Sam pegged him as an
intelligence agent, but he wasn't sure which agency until he
spoke. His hair was gathering some gray, his accent was
Canadian, his look brooding. “I don't know who he is. The two
Provincial Authority cops are just cops.”
“What in
the hell is this about, Mike?” Sergeant McKraken said. “You guys
are going to be in big trouble for trying to aid this
terrorist.”
The tall
man ignored him.
“Who
exactly are you?” Sam said.
“Mike
Nelson's the name, and I'm with the Canadian East Intelligence
Service.”
“You've
got no authority on the highway!” McKraken exclaimed.
Nelson
studied him for a moment. “Shut up! This is a federal
investigation.”
“Yeah,
well, that's Marvin Hurley. The arrest is ours. We've got a
terrorist kingpin. Without a doubt, he was bringing a package
into the Indian Falls Militia, and in a stolen experimental
car.”
Nelson
grinned. “He isn't Marvin Hurley. We took him into custody a
long time ago. This guy has somehow come up with the car Hurley
ditched.”
“What?”
McKraken sputtered.
Turning
to Sam, Nelson looked him up and down. “Who are you?”
“I'm Sam
Michaels, a Toronto private investigator. The car and the name
Marvin Hurley were supposed to provide a clean identity to hide
me from some bad guys while I vacation in Indian Falls.”
McKraken
looked furious. “He falsely identified himself as Marvin Hurley.
The car is stolen. He is definitely under arrest.”
Mike
Nelson ignored McKraken and continued talking to Sam. “Had we
not come along, you would've been grabbed by McKraken or other
cops and be off somewhere in a detention facility. The car is an
experimental model. Three of them were sold off a while back.
This one got stolen after that by Hurley. It was sold again
after his capture. Looks like the dealer you got it from first
wiped it and then accidentally reactivated the agency tracker on
it, so it comes up as stolen.”
"No
private detective would be coming out here to vacation,”
McKraken said. “He's up to something.”
“It's a
missing person case, too. I'm checking up on a person who
might've drowned or something.”
Mike
Nelson put his hands on his hips. At six three and with
neat-clipped dark hair and a hard face, he looked impressive and
threatening. He passed Sam a business card. “I'm on a special
assignment, too. We have a case going on in this area. Don't get
in our way if we happen to send any people in on the ground.
Contact me if you see anything strange.”
“I can do
that. No problem. I have to look around the area for this
missing guy.”
McKraken
gestured at both men and the commandos. “Wait a minute. The
Provincial Authority hasn't been given full information on this
federal case. What exactly are you guys looking for?”
“That is
top secret. The local Indian Falls police are working with us.”
“Huh,”
said a surprised McKraken. “Indian Falls police? There are no
Indian Falls police.”
“Really,
well, I see their vehicle coming right now,” Agent Nelson said,
pointing to an all-terrain vehicle pulling out of a ditch onto
the road. The vehicle continued to approach from Indian Falls.
The driver was another large man with a broad-brimmed hat
somewhat like McKraken's.
“That
ain't no real cop, that's Nev Sweeting of the Conservation
Authority,” McKraken said, looking quite peeved.
The roar
of the ATV broke the silence as Nev Sweeting approached on the
road. He pulled up and stopped, and then he jumped out and
slapped dust and debris from his canvas pants. He stepped up
past the gun-toting commandos as if they were no threat and
exchanged a nasty glance with McKraken. Nev Sweeting was best
described as a beefy, red-faced hillbilly type dressed in the
Conservation Authority's ranger garb. He looked more like
someone who would wrestle a bear than he did like someone who
would solve a crime or work with special agent Mike Nelson. Nev
Sweeting's bright blue eyes were behind whisker stubble that was
rough as straw, and what they were seeing now was probably his
best shave. Rather than wait for introductions, he spoke first.
“Howdy,
boys, this must be that detective I heard was coming in. You can
take the cuffs off him McKraken. We know who he is. He's looking
for a body. Pardon me. I mean, missing person.”
Sgt
McKraken seemed more than stunned, but he did move to take off
Sam's cuffs.
Taking a
look around at everyone, Sam spoke. “Damn, is there anyone in
Indian Falls that doesn't know who I am already?”
“Nope,”
Nev Sweeting said. “Gossip gets around fast, and people are
talking about the top secret case I'm working on with the
federal boys. They think you've got to do with it since you're
coming in to look for that crazy fella.”
Sgt
McKraken turned to press Sweeting. “Must be real top secret if
everyone in Indian Falls knows about it. I need details on that
special case.”
“I can't
reveal anything about it.”
“I can
keep you busy, McKraken,” Sam said. “That car dealer in Toronto
set me up. Sold me on a hot car connected to a criminal,
figuring to get me shot or put away. Some major players went
down in the city as a result of my investigations. Once they
find out I'm still kicking, they might come out this way.”
“Really.
Well. The way it is, you may have to look after yourself. We
can't be hassling every tourist that comes by out here. You'd
better watch out for the Falls Militia, too, because they'd
probably put you underwater for a hundred bucks if somebody paid
them.”
Nev
Sweeting grinned. “Come on now, McKraken. Those militia boys are
just waiting for the big one, for the end to come or World War
Five or whatever. They ain't contract killers. But they might
kill someone they think is spying for the feds.”
“Sounds
like they should be killing you,” Sgt McKraken said.
Agent
Nelson grimaced like he'd had enough. “Let's wrap this deal up.
I'll disable the tracker on Mr. Michaels’ car, and he rides into
the falls like any other tourist. You boys can hit the road; he
doesn't need a police escort.”
The road
into town hugged the wide Falls River bank and, in narrow parts,
ran close enough that the flow looked threatening. A rocky
river, it displayed wild rafting paths through the rapids and
was at its foamiest on the other side of town. On its stretch
through the town, it broadened and calmed before quickening on
its passing. It was this calm portion that Sam was now
approaching. Judging by the sheer size of the oak trees gripping
the banks, the river had fought off the wildfires of a quarter
century ago. A new bridge arched over the river just past the
town sign, and as he mounted it, he saw rainbows in the mist,
then the stretch of commercial buildings that created the main
drag. A couple of churches of the newer broad hall design and
some tall buildings loomed in the background, but River Street
itself rarely rose above six stories, though the stories
themselves were tall at 9 feet or more. Sam already knew that no
sell-every-sort-of-thing big chain stores existed in this town.
For many supplies, the best option is a hardware store, so he
made his first stop at The Big Nail. It was a rather garish
place with large display windows and a few parking spots out
front.
Walking
across the beaten lot to the front doors, he experienced a
sudden rise of neck hairs and the feeling of being watched by
people nearby. There were a few pedestrians, mostly people with
a country look. Older people were overdressed in rumpled
clothing, while a couple of young women wore the
close-to-nothing-at-all summer outfits that were common
everywhere. The short black man behind the counter wore
brand-new jeans, suspenders, and a plaid short-sleeve shirt. He
continued working on a shelf and gave no greeting. Sam had a
thing for lights, and if he was going to be out at missing man
Marc Santino's cottage, he wanted powerful portable lights in
case any offbeat night work came up. Forgetting about being a
detective, he went on a bit of a shopping spree, filling an
entire shopping cart as he grabbed stuff that could be needed.
He whistled a faint tune as he came up a long aisle to the front
counter, but when he was almost there, he looked up and stopped
dead.
A small
crowd had gathered outside the store, and some people were
taking pictures of him through the doorway with their phones.
They didn't seem hostile or friendly, but more like nuisance
rubberneckers. Since no one else was at the cash, he rolled the
cart up and addressed the clerk.
“Afternoon, Mr. Michaels,” the clerk said.
“Who are
you? How do you know my name? Why are those people watching me?”
“I'm Leon
Ottawa. I own The Big Nail. Most people here knew you were
coming. They figure you might have an in on that big case Nev
Sweeting and Special Agent Spook Nelson are working on.”
“Figures.
Your local lawman has a big mouth. Who in the hell is this
Special Agent Nelson guy? What sort of case do they have going
out here?”
“Spooks …
that's why we call him Spook Nelson. He's a federal agent, and
he's helping Nev Sweeting with hunting the spooks out here. Some
strange happenings are going on again, and word came in that
you're a pal of that Marco Santino fella. He's the guy who
unleashed the spooks first, then disappeared.”
“I don't
even know him. His family asked me to find him. He's around here
somewhere because he sent a message recently. Other than that,
I'm here on vacation. I don't hunt spooks.”
“Well,
Sweeting and Nelson drive out every spook hunter that shows now.
Even if you're not a spook hunter, you might become one if
you're looking for Marco.”
“Why's
that?”
“They
appeared on his property first, and I heard you were to be
staying out there.”
“There
isn't a crowd waiting for me out there, I hope?”
“Nope.
The townspeople are scared to hang around out there. You'll be
on your own. If you need anything from town, just call, and I
can have it delivered.”
“I'll
keep that in mind. So what do I do about those people out there,
sign autographs?”
“Just be
friendly and play like a detective. That's what they came out to
see. You want to keep on their good side. Nev Sweeting says
you’re cleared for now, but I just got a call from Sergeant
McKraken asking me to report on what you're up to.”
“Tell
McKraken to kiss my ass. If you want to do something for me,
I'll leave you a number.”
“A number
for what?”
“To warn
me. If anyone comes into town asking questions, leave me a
message on it. Any strange happenings I'd like to know about,
too.”
“Okay. I
can do that.”
With Leon
Ottawa's help, Sam left the store, pressed the flesh out front,
and loaded the car. He drove away with a smile and a wave ...
that turned into curses and his angry fist pounding on the wheel
a half kilometer up the road. He'd driven across an invisible
border into another world here; at least it seemed like that ...
and he wondered what kind of spooks would inhabit a territory
like this one and how Marco Santino, a city boy, could be the
lead part of it.
Some wide
bends and a dead-man's curve decorated the road out to Marco's
cottage. After twisting away from the river, the road returned
to it, and he saw the falls sending out a rainbow in the mist
beside the steep hillside that banked them. Sam felt like
stopping for a look around, but reminded himself that he wasn't
a tourist while still working on a case. Coming around the bend
to a store and souvenir shop, he decided he could have a look
around there and still be investigating. A couple of people were
exiting the storefront as he pulled in. Other than them, he
appeared to be the only customer. The store was a new structure
designed with an antique flavor that would fool most people.
Inside, it was divided into a section for souvenirs and a second
grocery or general store area. Apparently, Sam had arrived at a
slow time, as only one clerk was present in the store. The clerk
was a young woman with a nice, slim figure and a native
appearance. Her hair was long and deep black, and its flow
accentuated her full lips and big dark eyes. At the counter, he
struck up some conversation, finding first that her name was
Deena.
Deena's
smile was cherry-lipped. “We don't get the bus tours we used to
get. Used to be a lot of business for the falls and haunting
sites before the cops shut everything up.”
“What do
you mean?”
“The
Provincial Authority, a cop named Sergeant McKraken, harassed
visitors and spook hunters so much that the bus company canceled
the tours. Nev Sweeting, the town ranger, and a man named Nelson
drive people out if they get into town. McKraken discourages
them from coming in.”
“I've met
all three. Don't particularly trust them. What's their game
anyway?”
“Been a
lot of hush-hush stuff about missing people out here. McKraken
wants to run some kind of investigation into it, but he has no
authority over the town line. Nev Sweeting is in charge of
that.”
“How many
people are missing?”
“About
twelve. But not the usual sort of missing. It has to do with the
strange happenings.”
“I'm
looking for a guy with a cottage near here. Name's Marco.”
“I know
him. He is also missing.”
“He's
around somewhere.”
“I don't
advise looking for him unless you want to go missing yourself.”
“How
about Nev Sweeting. What kind of cop is he?”
“A stupid
one. Talks all over town about how he's working with that secret
agent guy, Nelson, to crack this case.”
“I take
it you don't have much confidence in him?”
“No. I've
talked to that special agent Nelson guy, too. He's always
snooping around out here in weird ways. No wonder the people
call him Spook Nelson. It's hard to figure out whether he's
trying to solve the problems or is the cause of some of them.”
“Listen,
I'll give you my number. Call me if you hear anything about
Marco or anyone else missing or reappearing.”
Outside
the store, Sam watched a pickup pull up and a couple of bikers
pass on the road. The bikers wore semi-camouflage outfits, and
he pegged them as members of the Indian Falls Militia. A big
sign next to the pop machine advertised the tours to haunted
locations in Indian Falls. Cobwebs and dead moths gave it some
realism, but Sam didn't really believe that spirits of natives
and people who died in the big wildfires were really coming back
from the spirit world.
It was
all too easy to commercialize, and haunting and supernatural
occurrences had become another commodity around the world.
Tourist stuff for night walks and displays. Apparently, here it
had actually run past that phase to a new form of weirdness.
Perhaps it was because everyone connected to this town was
unusual and disconnected from the standard mass-media brainwash
networks. Proof that the stupidity spectrum couldn't reach into
every corner and perhaps had little power in remote areas where
other cultures of oddness had already set things into motion for
a separate reality.
He wound
through deep ravines and up some hills before coming back to the
river beyond the falls. It ran strong here, and this was deep
country. Still a tourist country to an extent, as he saw several
pullovers to fishing holes and signs for boat rentals farther
upriver. Houses dotted the landscape, all of them small to
intermediate in size and new constructions. It was high summer
now, and he recognized Marco's cottage from the satellite
photograph as he rounded a last bend. The structure was on
elevated ground with views of the river and forests, and fields
at the rear. Sitting in tall summer grass and weeds run through
with the brown of summer straw, it seemed quite elegant. At
least it did until he came partway up the rise and saw that the
place was occupied, and by people who would not be considered
sophisticated.
Several
motorcycles and ATVs were parked at the side under shade trees,
and a group of militia types was lounging and strolling with
booze in hand on the front yard. Sam slowed to a near crawl,
taking in the scene carefully as he pulled in and stopped in
front of a small side garage. He saw the men continue talking,
paying him scant attention, as he got out and walked over.
A tall
man, unshaven and wearing camouflage pants with a sleeveless
jean jacket, stepped out to meet him. His hair was wild and of a
straw color, and his eyes were on the piercing side. He was
swilling Mooseland beer. The necklace he wore was animal teeth
of some sort.
Sam spoke
first. “Is this Marco Santino's place?”
“You
lookin' for him?”
“You
could say that – his family is looking for him?”
“Yeah,
well, we're lookin' for him, too.”
“Good. At
least I won't be working alone. I'm supposed to be staying here.
Got permission from his family.”
“Wait a
minute. You're not working with us. I got word you're another
federal spy Nev Sweeting brought in. Means you're part of the
conspiracy.”
“I'm not
a fed. What conspiracy? Who are you?”
“I'm Burk
McCraw, captain of the Indian Falls Militia. The feds want to
get Indian Falls primed for world government takeover, and we
are the resistance.”
Sam
looked at a second rough-at-the-edges guy walking up, carrying
what looked close to a rocket launcher. It was hard to tell if
he was native or oriental, but he was a militia type.
“You
don't need a rocket launcher to fight me,” Sam said. “I'm only a
private investigator. Here, check my card. I met Nev Sweeting
and that Spook Nelson guy on the way in, but I'm not working for
them. They won't even say what they're working on. It's supposed
to be top secret.”
“Rin here
knows how to deal with top secret folks,” Burk said.
“That's
right,” Rin said, shouldering his weapon. “If that alien
ambassador shows up here again, I'm going to burn his top-secret
ass.”
Sam
raised his eyebrows. “Listen. I'm not a supporter of world
government, and I thought it was supposed to be ghosts or Indian
spooks around here. So where do the alien ambassadors come from?
I know Marco was a spook hunter, but I didn't hear anything
about aliens, whether illegal or from outer space. What I did
hear was that he's still around somewhere. He sent a message to
another man in Toronto three weeks ago.”
Rin
lowered his weapon and turned to Burk. “Maybe you'd better tell
him so he can get out of town before the big fry goes down. He's
probably got nothing to do with world government. The federal
spooks are just using him as a tool to find Marco.”
“Marco
appears to be the key to all this,” Sam said. “Maybe if I find
him, everyone will be happy.”
“Okay,”
Burk said. “Come on over to the picnic table and have a beer.
You need to know a bit of what's going on out here.”
“Top-secret stuff, you mean.”
“Yup, top
secret,” Rin said with conviction.
For some
unexplained reason, the other militiamen took to their vehicles,
kicking up pebbles and twigs as they blasted off down the road
north. Sam sat on the picnic table with Burk McCraw while Rin
paced back and forth in weed stubble. With a Mooseland beer in
hand, he relaxed and watched high clouds paint a picture of
summer while McCraw told a story.
Burk
McCraw had obviously spent a lot of time around the fishing hole
telling tall battle tales. He was on the hillbilly cutting edge
of the militia movement that existed here and there in the
countryside, or in the freer zone of the police state that had
once been the Canadian nation. “Yeah, I'm an expert on guerrilla
tactics and small weapons. My brother developed the guidance
systems used by rocket launchers and missiles today. The same
system that makes it possible to shoot tiny drones out of the
sky. We fought side by side against the feds during some of the
big battles ten years back. People like us have put a lot of
holes in world government and left a lot of open pockets of
freedom like Indian Falls.”
Sam
cleared his throat. “Uh, what exactly does this have to do with
disappearances here?”
“Cool it,
he's getting to it,” Rin said.
“That's
right. Rin fought at my side, too. The militia here doesn't care
if Rin is part Injun, part Chinese, and part Scotsman. We care
how a man fights. We spent years in the bush. The key here is
understanding that the feds and the big conspiracy for a
one-world government never end. They want a cop state from sea
to sea and in the sea as well, and when they see free areas like
Indian Falls, they see red. It's always new ways to scare people
into submission or control them. In the city, it's fear of
terrorists and rogue assassins. But out here, that doesn't work
because we are the terrorists, at least according to them.
Locals don't fear us, so out here they need a new way to scare
folks and get them running in for federal protection.”
Sam took
a big swallow as this appeared like it was going to be a long
story. “I buy it so far except for one thing. I can see maybe
Special Agent Nelson being part of a conspiracy of that variety,
but I can't picture Marco being in any way involved. He was a
sort of hobbyist spook hunter.”
Burk
McCraw took a slug. “Marco is on our side. That's why we're
looking around here for any clues. The other people who
disappeared were taken by the alien spooks, but Marco was on
this thing all along, investigating. He's ahead of them, and he
has gone underground somewhere. He's trying to find a way to
stop them or beat them.”
“Okay,”
Sam said as he started to wonder if Burk McCraw was sane. “But
how would he go underground out here, where everybody knows
everybody? You think he's hiding in the woods? And who are these
alien spooks you're talking about?”
Rin
suddenly threw his beer bottle into the straw grass. “That's
where we disagree, Burk and me. I think the ambassador is from
hell or some evil spook world. Burk thinks he's from an alien
world or dimension, and Marco actually got in there and is
hiding in their own world.”
Sam
massaged his eyes, wondering if this interview would produce
even a single clue as to Marco's whereabouts. “So you're saying
the feds, Spook Nelson, and Nev Sweeting are party to bringing
in forces from hell or another dimension to scare people in
Indian Falls?”
“We are
saying that,” Burk said. “Because Spook Nelson has known about
it all along. We've chased all his agents out of the area now,
so he's turned Nev Sweeting. Sergeant McKraken and the
Provincial Authority are watching too, but they're in the dark.
They know something's going on, but not exactly what. They help
Nelson by cutting off traffic into the area.”
“Count me
as being in the dark like Sergeant McKraken,” Sam said.
Burk
grinned. “You look a shot brighter than McKraken. Okay, let's
hit on the disappearances. There always was the odd
disappearance stretching back three decades. The old haunted
tour hit on some of the locations where the disappearances
occurred. Where there were witnesses, they all heard strange
noises, and some saw people vanish in puffs of mist. They saw
evil faces in that mist. It was all native spirit stuff until
recently. Then the light and bubbles came. Always at night. Rin
saw old Joe Boulos taken right off in one. Isn't that right, Rin?”
“Sure is.
We did a booze run out to Raven's Nude Beach and were parked
outside the perimeter in the lot when twilight was falling in.
Joe was drunk and drinking a sampler of whiskey while he fooled
around over by the pond. Right there, while I was sipping a
beer, I saw bluish mist forming, and I was sure I saw a weird
bird circling the pond. Joe stuck a foot in the water and was
yelling some foolishness into the mist when I saw, like, a big
soap bubble come up from the surface and cover him. Right away,
he was trapped inside this man-big thing with mist, and he was
struggling as it lifted and floated away. I could see him
screaming, but I couldn't hear anything, then I saw evil faces
in the mist – black evil things with beards of creepy shadow.
That bubble went off in the trees, and Joe Boulos has never been
seen since. Other people disappeared the same way, and not just
people. One of those things struck in the lot outside the
souvenir shop. It almost got Deena Muskok, but she jumped out of
the way, and the crazy thing swallowed Nev Sweeting's big-screen
TV. It had come in on order, and he hadn't loaded it yet. It's
like those devils are stealing stuff to study us. They might
still be experimenting on a lot of them. And they did learn,
because after that the ambassador came.”
“Ambassador?” Sam said, mystified. “Never heard a story like
yours, and you guys look at least half sober.”
McCraw
burped. “That's one of the reasons why we're here at Marco's
cottage. He was studying these things with some kind of portable
equipment he carried. Studying them all along like they were
ghosts, but he knew differently. They tried to get him in town
before he disappeared. Leon Ottawa saw a gold light like some
kind of shimmering wall chase him from the old haunted hotel
just before he went underground. Leon is a crazy old Black man,
but he's always truthful. We came out here looking for him and
saw the ambassador.”
Sam
nodded as though he believed it all. “Ambassador, who's that?”
Rin
stepped up close, as if he were disgusted. “Ambassador is a
pretty name Burk came up with for him. I call him the demon
because that's what he is. Whether he comes from another planet
or dimension, like Burk thinks, doesn't matter. If the place is
hell, he's from hell.”
Burk
cleared his throat. “True enough, but I don't think it is our
hell. Maybe just some other place that happens to be similar.
That was on our first day looking for Marco. The militia was out
here searching the grounds. Around nightfall, we spotted blue
lights past the forest, where the fields run over to the Falls
River. We thought it might be Marco, so we blasted off on the
new all-terrain machines – they're the Lift ATVs we use now. We
were fully armed, of course, in case of trouble. Not that we
expected any, as at that time many people had disappeared, but
in that spooky way and without armed violence. On the down-run
through the meadow, we slowed. The lights were in the big pines
and oaks at the riverbank. We had to follow a rocky path through
the sumac scrub fringing the edge of the meadow, then we were
out, gathering in assault formation. But other than the weird
flickering lights and mist on the river, there was no enemy. I
went ahead with Rin down toward the bank. Rin had our new Frisco
launcher, the same one he's got there now. Fires some potent
stuff from shock up to kill level.
So we
were getting close to the bank and saw one of those bubbles
floating in the mist there by a big oak that leaned out into the
water on exposed roots. It was bigger, about twice the height of
a person, and what made this one different was that it was like
a crystal ball ... meaning Rin and I saw ugly visions. I saw
blood, then it was like a lens showing some world of steaming
ground and screaming aliens. Like Rin says, there were black
demonic things, and the world wasn't even their world because
some of them were feeding on these smaller humanoid creatures
like it was a world they'd invaded. It was hypnotic, so much so
that we didn't notice another bubble floating off to the south.
It had come off the river mist and up the bank and was nearly on
us. Rin spotted it first, and we backed up at a near run with
Rin drawing up the launcher. Thing was, this one had a person
inside ... or maybe I should say, an alien person. Other things
were in there with it like dead fish, weeds, and some rocks and
sand like it was taking a sample. And it was trying to speak to
us. The face was twisted and evil to say the least, and it still
had green stuff on its lips from wherever it had been. We
couldn't hear a sound, but got a vision of its mouth moving and
its hands clawing at the bubble's surface.
So the
bubble stopped there and settled on the grass, with this sick
thing trying to communicate with us ... and at one point it
disappeared, and an image of gold appeared in the bubble. It
seemed to be a machine of sorts or a computer, or I don't know
what. Then it reappeared, beckoning to us as if it wanted us to
enter the bubble with it. It had changed, and I could tell it
was the same creature, but now it was a handsome man wearing a
suit. A magnetism of a type came with him, and I found myself
taking a step toward the bubble even though every bone in my
body told me not to do it.
That's
when the shape-shifting thing put a hand out through the bubble,
hoping I'd walk up and take hold of it ... and Rin fired the
launcher ... not a lethal weapon, but a shock grenade. It was
powerful enough that at that range, it knocked us back. On our
asses, we saw the blast dissipate around the bubble, but some of
the force had passed into the bubble. The ambassador's arm was
badly scorched, and his expression was a hateful open-mouthed
thing ... gross black blood drops flew out and ran on the
bubble, and we got up and retreated, and that's when Rin fired
again. Close-range rockets that blew up the grass and dirt and
part of a tree and knocked the bubble for a short bounce. The
ambassador was unhurt, though, and still mouthing silent screams
at us ... and I told Rin to try the Frisco's beam mode. It has
the new close-range beam weapon. He hit that at the top setting
... and get this ... the blast lit the bubble up and burned the
hair or tentacles, whatever it was that looked like hair off the
ambassador's head. He was wounded and angry, but had control
enough of that bubble to take a fast float out over the river
and disappear in the mist. After that, the mist cleared, the
event was over, and we have our theories about it. Maybe you got
an idea on it, too.”
“It's the
sort of thing that has to be seen to be believed,” Sam muttered
as he mulled things over, thinking that everyone in this place
had eaten some strange mushrooms because their testimony ran
against any scientific explanation. “You say the feds and Nelson
are behind something this crazy. How could that be? Unless they
are inducing hallucinations of some type.”
“They're
not hallucinations,” Rin replied. “You'll find out soon enough.
The town records say there was a military experiment conducted
here a long time ago, but we can't find the location, as those
facts were blotted out. The feds caused this somehow ...
bringing this ambassador and black bastard monsters in to
terrify people here. They likely lost control of it, and that's
why Nev Sweeting and Mike Nelson are working top secret. They
don't send in federal agents anymore. This area is slowly being
quarantined and sealed off.”
“They let
me in, and I'm an investigator. It did seem like quarantine,
though. I got stopped right away, and all of them showed up.
They may be using me to find Marco or for some other reason, and
then they'll have no further use for me. I want you boys to call
me right away if something strange happens so I can do some
checks. Let me suppose what you witnessed is real. This demon or
ambassador guy has been pulling in samples and taking people,
which is a military move that happens before an invasion. It
would be more than a scare tactic. A possible invasion, where
the feds have some secret knowledge of its possibility. It would
be a reason for slowly sealing off this town.”
“Yup,
those things got out of control. It's more like sealing off the
whole Indian Falls area,” Burk said. “Hell, invasion. Bring 'em
on ... we're ready for those black demon bastards. Just let them
show their asses instead of sneaking around like robbers and
kidnappers.”
It was
dark now, and the Indian Falls Militia had roared off to their
lair and other haunts. Sam felt certain he'd reached an accord
with Burk McCraw, but he still took time to check all directions
from the cottage with high-powered binoculars to make sure they
didn't leave someone behind in the woods to watch him. He batted
bugs away from his sweaty brow, and once satisfied, he pulled
out a beam light and took a tour of the cottage.
All the
power was off, but he found the service in the small basement.
He checked the basic wiring and fuses to ensure everything was
in order. It was. This was a new cottage and even had a bit of
built-in house intelligence. The base setting was all lights, so
when he snapped over the big main switch, the cottage lit up
with brilliant light – a yellow glow in the basement and
brighter light outside the window. Marco's work area was next to
the house systems; he'd thought it was a small storage area when
he looked at it with the beam light, but brighter illumination
showed it to be disorganization with a motive. As a scientist or
ghost hunter, Marco was sloppy. His work setup looked like
stacks of electronic junk in a wall curve around his chair and
bench.
The
equipment was all Greek to Sam, and he was tech-savvy. Sam
worked with systems for detection and avoidance of detection in
the human world, combined with his office security system, so he
really had no idea what sort of technology a spook hunter would
use. The sophisticated equipment gave the appearance of someone
who scientifically disproved crazy stories like the one he'd
just heard from the Indian Falls Militia. As a whole, the
equipment would be quite valuable, so it told him that people in
the area were honest. Marco was seriously looking for something.
As for the militia themselves, well, nothing here looked like a
weapons system. They would leave it alone.
A rather
interesting device sat on the bench. It was a handheld device
with a series of buttons, tiny dials, a readout screen, and a
scope mouth. Some sort of reader, he figured as he picked it up.
He could see that it was Marco's own invention as M-Scope was
embossed on the back. It looked professionally manufactured, and
Marco had his own symbol system to mark the buttons.
Sam
powered it up and went through some of the settings, which were
quite complex listings. It didn't take him long to figure out
that Marco was a genius of sorts. He'd created a scope that at
various levels could read the composition of just about anything
by point and shoot. Taking off his ring, Sam placed it on the
table and did a shot on it without doing any special settings.
The device produced a camera-type flash and read it as a ring,
with its dimensions and metallic composition.
Rather
amazed, Sam looked over the rest of the equipment and then took
the M-Scope with him as he went upstairs. At the side of the
house, the view was amazing. Marco's lights lit up the whole
cottage and a vast area around it. It was much more than Sam
wanted lit up, so he did a walk around, turning off lights here
and there until only the immediate exterior was lit up. He
checked the interior before unpacking the car and found it
somewhat cobwebby but cozy with a small bedroom and a side
kitchen. The living room had a large wall TV connected to a
general entertainment center. It flicked on to a baseball game,
which he left at low volume, and then he unpacked the car. He
had a lot of gear and tried to justify it by thinking of himself
as a detective who might need anything rather than a city boy
trying to move luxury within his reach in the country.
The
Mooseland beer he'd been drinking with the militia was already
fading to a shitty semi-hangover. No pure spring water in it, he
thought as he polished a rock glass and poured himself a
straight double of Southern Comfort. The double did the work,
and in a short time, he had his connection set up to his
downtown office. There were spooks in the secure wireless sector
out here, and he had to do a loop around that only an expert
could do to get everything connecting nicely. Realization came
that more than the highways were being closed off. With that
done, he decided to go out and check the car. He hadn't had time
to look it over, and he wanted to see exactly what Special Agent
Nelson had disconnected.
At the
car, he opened the hood to find an offbeat engine and the
strange construct that Nelson had altered, supposedly so the car
wouldn't report in as stolen to the police. Sam knew that Nelson
would have changed it so his location would always be available
to him, but not to Sergeant McKraken and others. This addition
had him baffled as the control electronic mind was in the
dashboard. Why would such a complex additional device be needed
unless the car had other capabilities?
Sam was
suddenly struck with an idea; taking Marco's scope in hand, he
focused it on the device and took a flash of it. He didn't get
an exact reading; he got comparable to – Device Comparable to
Leaming-7 armored vehicle weapons controller. With that reading,
he went over, sat at the picnic table, and spent a long time
adjusting the M-Scope to get more details on it. As well as
being connected to an advanced AI controller in the dash that
was capable of speech, the vehicle had a tracking system that
enabled self-tracking and tracking of its surroundings. A
weapons system was also included, listing projectiles and an
energy shield of sorts. After some time, he made some guesses,
went back to the car, and snapped open the assembly. He disabled
self-tracking as Nelson had placed a code in it. With that done,
he enabled the weapons system and local tracking. Sam disliked
talking cars, so he set the mind for the dash readout, then he
got in and powered up the vehicle. This time, the full-screen
system lit up across the dashboard.
Sam sat
for a moment, lost in thought. Marco was a genius more than an
oddball, and how his scope connected or what it connected to was
a mystery. It could grab so much information on so many things
that it was hard to guess. Neither was there anything in the
device or its readout that explained how it worked. The idiot
Marvin Hurley, who had originally stolen this car, must've had
no idea of its capabilities. Nelson apparently didn't either.
The weapons system had never been enabled. Probably it was still
in test mode.
He
decided to run a few tests and pulled the car around back,
checking the readings while facing the forest and the river. The
map and screen readout told him exactly what lay ahead and
offered to connect to get detailed maps. He didn't allow a
connection attempt; instead, he tested the weapons system, which
turned out to be a bullet system front and back. A test fire
tore a limb off a nearby tree, indicating that whoever had
supposedly disabled this vehicle had done so electronically
while leaving it fully loaded.
The gun
test gave him an idea, and he went back to the cottage to get
the hitman's gun. Sam assembled it on the picnic table and then
used the M-Scope for a reading. The scope was registered as SNX
Sniper Experimental. But other than listing it as a weapon, it
registered nearly everything else as unknown, including the
alloy composition. Deciding to do some test fires with it, he
went through the panel modes, carefully checking the numbers and
ranges. It had auto-tracking, so he enabled that and then took
some practice shots at a distant boulder. He found he could do
everything from a target piercing to an outright blast that
broke up the stone. And the weapon had other modes he was afraid
to test.
Back
inside, he had another shot of liquor and began to think things
over, and what he came up with he didn't like. He was being used
and had been tracked all along. Special Agent Nelson and the
military people behind him were the ones doing it. Maybe they
just wanted to track him and see if he came up with anything.
Burk McCraw had mentioned that the feds couldn't get any agents
inside Indian Falls anymore or didn't want any inside. They were
using Parks Cop Nev Sweeting, for God's sake.
It was
odd that he'd picked up this powerful car and gun, or maybe not
so odd. Mike Nelson had to be the military-connected guy who
sent the hit man with the special gun. They wanted him dead
because they knew he was looking for Marco. Since the hit man
had been buried anon, Nelson wouldn't know what became of him or
the weapon. The only reason Nelson could have for sending in a
killer was that he didn't want Marco to be found. At least not
by an outside investigator. Agent Nelson's people must have
checked his entire background, and when he didn't pick up the
usual rental car, they knew he'd go to Poncy. And Poncy had
passed him the dirty car provided by a military source so he
could be tracked.
That
meant it wasn't criminals from Toronto behind it. So maybe
Nelson did know the car's capabilities, but disabled them,
needing only tracking. Everything connected to Indian Falls and
what was happening here. Most likely, he wouldn't be allowed out
of the Indian Falls area now. Not if they suspected him of
having any information. The only course of action seemed to be
to pretend he knew nothing and was no more than a dumb city
private cop, stumbling around on a search for Marco.
After
taking a last look around with binoculars, he strung out some
tiny wireless cameras and had the signal replace the baseball
game on the big screen TV. His team was losing to New York
anyway, so he settled for an easy sleep on the couch. He kept
his eyes on the cameras for any movement. The small bedroom he
avoided for the present, as he didn’t feel confident enough for
heavy sleep. There was always the possibility that enemies had
gotten here first. He’d already done a bomb check through the
hook-up with his office in Toronto, and so far, the cottage and
its surroundings checked out okay.
Sam
drifted in and out of shifting light nightmares for about an
hour, and then he got a call. It was a priority number, and the
display brightened to show that it was Deena Muskok. It was only
a text message. Deena had seen some lights.
He hadn’t
undressed, so all he had to do was set the camera surveillance
to alert him if anyone approached the cottage. Then, with some
stuff in hand and under his arms, he went out to the car.
He raced
down the dark road and over a hilltop, and from there he saw the
lights of Deena’s store. She'd closed up and was standing out
front among some swirling moths. Only Deena’s car was in the
lot, and Sam kicked up some dust as he partially slid in on the
entry drive.
Deena
looked surreal, stepping out of the yellowing light with moths
swirling behind her, but in the dim interior, her dark beauty
was apparent. Sam wondered why she’d be out here by herself and
not picked up by a boyfriend already. And the answer he got was
surprising.
“Sometimes I sleep over at the store. Yes, I have a boyfriend,”
she said in a sad tone. “He’s one of the people who disappeared.
Though Nev Sweeting won’t list the disappearance. He says my guy
got bored and left for better places.”
“Our
parks man, Nev Sweeting, isn’t much of a cop, is he?”
“Other
than clear away tree falls and road kill and harass the people
at the nudist colony, I don’t think he does anything. All the
missing people, and he hasn’t even arranged a proper search
party or brought other police in to investigate.”
“He’s got
Special Agent Nelson, and when Nelson says he can’t get a man in
here, I get the feeling he doesn't want anyone in here. The
provincial guys like Sergeant McKraken are mainly blocking
access rather than investigating anything.”
“Yeah,
but it’s always been a bit like that in Indian Falls. Everything
we have here we built or paid for ourselves. Other levels of
government won’t invest a dime here. Even the Parks Authority is
paid for by the town.”
“All
right, town’s just over a couple of hills. What’s the story on
this Queen’s Hotel place and the new lights showing over there?”
“It used
to be on the original tour of Haunted Indian Falls as a feature.
Closed down fifteen years ago after some killings there. A mad
dentist from Toronto killed his whole family there. The rental
cottages to its side were closed up, and it continued as a
sleazy watering hole for some time. There were shootings and
stabbings at it. Then some of the first so-called new haunting
happened there. People said there were ghosts there, and it lost
business. It was little more than a late-night booze can by
then. It closed, but parts of it were fixed up some when they
ran the Haunted Indian Falls tours. A couple of my spookier
paintings are in the lobby. So originally it was just ghost
stuff, but when a new wave of spook stuff started, some of it
occurred there. A couple of people disappeared, spending the
night in it, and there was a night of mist and a fire at the old
cottages.”
The
interior lights were faint, but Sam spotted the glitter of a
tear in Deena's eye. “So it was open fairly recently as part of
the Haunted Indian Falls Tour. I also take it your boyfriend was
one of the two people who disappeared, staying overnight.”
“Brett
Peck is his name. I hate him.” She practically spat out the
words.
“So, it
was another woman, the person who was with him and went missing
with him.”
“That's
none of your business.”
“It is.
If I'm looking for a missing person, it matters whether the
others really disappeared. What I see here is that Nev Sweeting
saw an opportunity to write it off, saying Brett Peck ran off
with another woman and really didn't disappear. That pattern
probably fits all the disappearances.”
“What can
I say? He's an incompetent cop with no resources.”
“I always
look at things from both sides. There's always the possibility
he isn't incompetent at all, but that he knows something or is
somehow involved. He has federal resources now because he is
working with Special Agent Nelson.”
They were
on the run into town, passing a red highway diner building with
a couple of trucks and three cars in the lot. The hotel was set
well back with its own entry road, and Sam didn't miss it. He
turned in on the worn asphalt and followed the road through deep
scrub and pines, uphill, then down, into bright lights.
The
bright lights weren't from any haunting. Sam pulled over and
found Parks cop Nev Sweeting already there with a wireless
spectrum cube on his vehicle, powering brilliant lights he'd
mounted on a tall wooden side fence. Instead of illuminating the
hotel, he had the whole parking area and part of a lawn lit in
focus. Other cars were parked in the lot, many of them askew.
About thirty townspeople had gotten out and were standing behind
a rope fence that Sweeting had strung up to block all the
walkways. The hotel was set back in semi-darkness and resembled
a classic spooky structure. Sam had to squint to see it ... and
other blue lights flaring behind it. An occurrence of some sort
was happening at the hotel, but Ranger Sweeting's focus seemed
to be more on the crowd of locals than on it.
The
parking lot was situated at the north end and mostly off the
grounds. Patios, tables, and wide steps were at the front,
existing amid what had once been sculptured bushes, a manicured
lawn, and gardens. The area was now more of a weed garden. The
edge of a pool peeked out from another patio at the south end,
and he could tell the water in it was stagnant, as he could
smell it. The pool area was open, with trees well back, so in
the daytime it received light from the east, south, and west. It
appeared that this patio stretched around back, and that was
where the lights were coming from, as an aura showed on the
hotel structure itself. Some of the light was inside, glowing
blue through the windows, and it worked to clean up some of the
building's decrepit look. There was a long, wide lobby with
huge, extended windows, and further structures of the rooms
themselves, with wide bay windows at the lower level. It had
been an impressive place once. Perhaps not a five-star hotel,
but a country hideaway that was much bigger and more luxurious
than what could be referred to as cozy. The poor upkeep showed
even in the dark, as only the main lobby and front entertainment
area were in good repair. The rest seemed to be crumbling under
the weight of weather and encroaching weeds.
Deena
jumped out of the car and marched over. Sam followed at a slower
pace as his eyes were still on the hotel. He turned back to the
uninteresting sight of Nev Sweeting waving a rifle as he argued
with some of the locals. Sweeting shoved a man in mechanic's bib
overalls, and then Deena stepped up and started arguing with
him.
“Why are
you holding the people out here?” she said. “Is there something
in there you don't want them to see?”
“That's
right, it's a cover-up,” hollered an obviously drunk man with a
bush of dirty hair.
Nev
Sweeting's expression was a mix of arrogance and fear. Fear that
he might lose control. “Shut up, Dan,” he spat as he continued
to use his rifle as a block. “There's no cover-up. The best way
to keep people from disappearing is to keep the lot of you out
of there.”
The crowd
booed. Dan hollered back. “If those alien kidnappers are in
there, I want a piece of them.”
“Me too,”
another drunk yelled. Then Sam stepped up and spoke. “Whatever's
happening is happening around back. Those blue lights are
shining right through the hotel. There isn't any way to
investigate it by standing over here, a football field away.”
A tall
man standing on the back of a pickup suddenly shouted. “He's
right. I see something moving around back. It's one of those
kidnappers from Mars.”
“It ain't
nobody!” Sweeting yelled. His loss of control apparent. And in
an instant, everything changed. The people rushed Nev Sweeting
and knocked him and his rifle aside. The rope barrier was pulled
down, and then they were all walking at a brisk pace across the
lawn and around the back patio by the pool.
Sam and
Deena were left standing there with Nev Sweeting, and there was
a roar as Burk McCraw suddenly pulled up. He was driving a
sports car this time with the roof down. Rin was in the
passenger seat. Rather than take the long way around, Deena
began to pace up the front patios towards the main entrance. Sam
followed, Nev Sweeting was on his heels, and Burk McCraw and Rin
were two abreast behind him.
The blue
lights flickered through the windows and in the chandeliers of
the entrance. Deena opened a huge, silent door, and they were
inside a spacious lobby with a few steps up to the old front
desk and an adjoining entertainment area. Sweeting clicked on a
powerful torch orb that vanquished the spooky light, and they
were looking around at some old slot machines in an otherwise
empty area. Sam stared up at a large, stylized painting of the
falls and rapids. Apparently, one of Deena's paintings of
haunted Indian Falls. Other nearby paintings showed ghostly
beings moving through the forest.
Darkness
suddenly returned as Nev Sweeting shut off his light and clicked
on an interior chandelier. It changed the picture considerably.
The area now took on a grand, if aging, appearance, and they
could see across and out back to the crowd gathering there near
the glow of blue lights.
Rin
snapped a clip of ammo in his gun as they walked through the
hotel, and Sweeting glared at him to warn him off shooting.
“Brett
disappeared right here near the back entrance. A witness outside
said he was running from something,” Deena said.
“That
wasn't a reliable witness,” said a confident Sweeting. “He was
seen stopping at the diner, then he left town.”
Burk
McCraw slapped Sweeting on the shoulder. “Let's skip this
argument. Something's happening right now, out there. Maybe
it'll help us find out what happened to some of the missing
people.”
Rin
grinned knowingly. “They were taken. That's what happened. And
it ain't going to happen to me. That ambassador ain't sucking me
down into some hell.”
Deena
slid a tall, tinted glass door aside, and they stepped out on
the debris-covered back patio. The crowd was at the far end of
it, staring at huge bubbles of blue light moving nearby in the
dry grass and trees. Some of the bubbles were floating off the
back end of the stagnant swimming pool. The lights shifted
through different hues and had a hypnotic effect ... the feeling
of standing in twilight ... and nightfall, when some
otherworldly darkness would arrive, with its ghosts.
Sam
studied the show of lights and the way the bubbles rose to the
sky and disappeared. There was a quality that didn't seem
manufactured, and a feeling of static that gave one a sense that
something wicked was about to take place. The sense of awe was
also tinged with growing terror, and he could see it in people's
faces. They had marched around back as an angry mob about to
face hand kidnappers or murderers of some variety, and now their
anger was condensing to fear of something none of them could see
but only sense. It was certain that something was coming, and it
was going to be creepy.
Nev
Sweeting saw an opportunity and walked over to the front of the
mob. Again, leveling his antique rifle, he ordered people to
back away from the lights. This time, most people kept silent
and obeyed for some moments. A sound, some type of screeching
rose and faded, and it was a tin-foil-on-teeth noise with no
apparent source. Then there was a big play of the bubbles, and a
larger orb floated into view over the grass. It was unique as
something was inside, a blurry figure. This bubble also had red
tints and a surreal quality as it shifted in shape. Somehow, it
wasn't quite real and couldn't be called an illusion either, and
that realization sent a shiver of fright through me.
Another
dimension of movement took it as it came closer along the
ground, so that it was almost like a spaceship coming in, but
not from space – it seemed to be arriving through a hidden door
or opening, as if it were more than a bubble. It had the feel of
a view window from somewhere else.
This
effect drew a few amazed gasps; the being contained in the view
remained fuzzy, but some features were visible. This being was
mostly human but not quite. Its facial features were angular,
warped, and predatory, full of obvious evil intentions, and it
was ebony black. It was hard to tell whether it wore a hat, had
a pointed head, or had hair. In the blur, its features shifted
in shadowy motions. The face remained warped and pocked in every
movement and expression, and when its teeth showed, they were
sharp predator's teeth. Most of the lower body was lost in mist,
and it was trying to say something through cracked lips. But no
words came out.
Rin was
beside Sam. “Looks like the ambassador is back,” he whispered.
Sam
glanced around. Nearly everyone was wide-eyed with fright,
except for Dan from the Red Diner and Deena. Dan still had some
anger on his face from his earlier encounter with Nev Sweeting,
but it was now mixed with disbelief. Rin's gun hand was shaking,
and Deena had an intense expression like she might be going to
try something stupid. Tough guy McCraw looked like he was about
to bolt up his dinner, and he had no weapon ready. Sam waited
for Nev Sweeting to turn his face back to the crowd. He didn't
like what he saw in Sweeting's eyes – something glassy and
desperate, like he'd been through all this before. Like he was
about to sell everybody out to this bizarre creature. A cowardly
look.
The
ambassador gestured at the crowd and mouthed some more words.
Sam could read lips a bit and could tell that whatever language
it was, it wasn't English. Sweeting seemed to be waiting for
something, and the ice broke as Deena suddenly stepped up toward
the bubble, and the ambassador changed in appearance, morphing
almost seamlessly into a dark, handsome man in a suit. Just like
Burk had mentioned in his story. The ambassador was now somewhat
dark in aura, complexion, hair, and eyes.
Sam
expected Nev Sweeting to stop Deena, but this time he didn't. He
let her go. And she began to speak to the ambassador. “Where is
he? Where did you take my Brett? We want him back.”
The crowd
looked on. A sea of faces silently staring. The ambassador
didn't vocalize an answer. Instead, he moved in the
now-expanding bubble and reached one hand outside of it. It was
a dark, long-fingered hand, and he was imploring Deena to step
forward and take it.
“Go
ahead. Take his hand,” Nev Sweeting said in a near whisper as he
took a couple of slow steps forward.
Sam was
about to move to stop Deena, but Dan got in the way. He bumped
her aside and sprinted forward, and grabbed the ambassador's
hand. Then he began to scream in pain as the ambassador yanked
hard and drew his hand and arm into the bubble. There was
distortion, and only the arm went in as the rest of his body hit
the bubble and stopped like it had come against hard glass or a
force field.
Sam had
less than a moment to act. He saw Rin lifting his weapon, so he
dived in and tackled Deena, taking her down and out of the way.
Deena struggled as he held her on the ground, and he looked up
with one eye, clear at unfolding horror. Dan had pulled back
while the ambassador pulled in, and he lost his arm. The bubble
had closed on it.
Dan was
falling back to the ground with a fountain of blood spurting
where his arm had been severed. The being in the bubble held the
severed arm in long fingers and was turning to face the crowd,
then a burst of projectiles from Rin's gun ripped into the
bubble. Blinding blue explosions and mist followed; the bullets
failed to penetrate, and the bubble began to float back. The
crowd panicked, and those who hadn't already turned to run off
were backing off quickly. Burk McCraw and Rin were among those
stepping back when a sudden power burst from the bubble hit Rin,
and he flew into the air in a blue explosion. Burk was also
knocked off his feet, and in moments, the encounter was over.
Sam and
Deena stayed down. Rin looked to be out cold. Burk was rising,
the crowd had fled, and as the bubble disappeared in fading
mist, only Nev Sweeting remained, standing where he'd been at
the front of the crowd. He had the same glassy look in his eyes
and an expression of terror on his face.
Sam
walked over to Dan but was afraid to touch him. He leaned over
him for a closer look, then put a hand slowly to his neck. He
listened for breath, found none, and cleared his mouth. Pulling
his hand back fast when tissue and blood oozed out in a hot
mass. Dan was dead and beyond any technique of revival.
Burk came
close; Deena followed and also looked down, her expression grim.
Inside the blood-spattered overalls, the body had shriveled.
Dan's face and hair had blackened. The soles of his boots were
burned through like he'd been electrocuted.
Burk
McCraw spat to his left. “He was the best cook in town.”
Rin
suddenly coughed and got to his feet. His brow got stormy when
he noticed Nev Sweeting beside him. They walked up to the body.
“I told people not to come out here,” Sweeting cooed.
Rin gave
him a spiteful glance. “You told Deena to take that ambassador's
hand. Whose side are you on?”
“I was
hypnotized. Can't even remember saying it.”
McCraw
kicked some dust over the body. “You better not be lying. This
better not happen again.”
Nev
Sweeting tapped his rifle butt on the ground for emphasis. “Need
I remind you that I'm the law here?”
Sam
looked up from the body and from Burk McCraw to Nev Sweeting.
“You're the law. But not much good if that ambassador guy can
control you.”
Deena
turned away, unable to look at the body any longer. “What
exactly happened to Dan?”
Sam was
the first to speculate. “I think he would have gone through into
that bubble whole and alive, but he resisted. It left his arm in
one reality and his body in another and created a shock wave.
The bubbles are a barrier or force field, but where you end up
if you enter one, I don't know.”
“This is
supernatural stuff,” Nev Sweeting said. “Now I've got a dead
body. It's not just a missing person. I have to notify Sergeant
McKraken and his provincial boys. I can't report what actually
happened. They'll think I'm crazy. We have to cover this up
somehow.”
Burk
frowned with disbelief. “You've been covering everything up
right from the beginning. So I don't think it will be a problem
for you.”
Sam was
already walking away. “I'll be right back,” he barked at Nev
Sweeting. At the car, he used the code to open the dashboard and
pulled out the M-Scope. Powering it up, he ran some tests, and
then he went back to the others and the body. Nev Sweeting and
Rin were arguing, with Rin making accusations. Rin thought the
feds were behind the trouble. “They want an excuse to bring the
army in. They want to take away our guns ....”
Stepping
up, Sam cleared his throat. “Cool it with all the talk about the
feds. I don't see Special Agent Mike Nelson around tonight, and
I can't imagine the feds being able to cook this sort of event.
They know something about it, though, and so does Ranger
Sweeting here. But they aren't telling us.”
Nev
Sweeting was taken aback. He was about to answer, then he
decided to keep silent as he suddenly noticed the M-Scope in
Sam's hands. Sam focused on the body, and the others jumped back
from the flash. He took more shots of the body from other angles
and then some readings where the ambassador had been. Some lines
ran by on the screen, and then he powered it down and looked at
Deena. “I'll have to run out to the cottage to check these
readings on Marco's equipment. I can't get a full reading with
the scope alone.”
Nev
Sweeting's jaw half dropped in amazement. He'd watched Sam take
the shots with growing interest. “What in the hell is that
thing?”
“It's an
invention of Marco's that I discovered. Quite amazing, really.
Does complex readings on the composition of things.”
Sweeting
stepped up close. “I'm afraid you'll have to hand that over. It
may be evidence.”
Rin
suddenly had his gun on Nev. “We ain't handing nothing over to
you or Agent Nelson. You boys can keep on with your top-secret
investigation, and we'll do our own.”
“Look, if
I discover anything with this, everyone will be told about it.
Since I'm the only one who knows how to use it, confiscating it
won't be any help.'
Burk
McCraw looked interested. “We'll run out to the cottage with you
and Deena. Provide security while you do your checks.”
“Sounds
fine with me,” Sam said. “We’ll be out of your hair, Ranger
Sweeting, so you can call Sergeant McKraken and do your
forensics on the body. Witnesses shouldn't be a problem. You got
about thirty of them.”
Back at
the cottage, Burk McCraw and a few of the militiamen were
hanging around outside under the bug lights while Sam and Deena
were down in the basement at Marco's work area. Sam had to go
through a number of custom software programs as he continued to
get a grasp on Marco's operation. There were a couple of
programs the scope plugged into, so he ran them and tried to get
something he could understand on the shots he'd taken.
The scope
readout gave simple things like the composition of the air or
the notification that he was shooting a dead body. What he
needed was knowledge of what could be wrong or different with
the readings. That came with a trace of the blue light that had
remained in the distant trees while he was shooting the area.
The small
patch of light read as a big zero; it wasn't anything. Since the
M-Scope read things it didn't understand or wasn't programmed
for as unknown, he wondered what zero meant.
According
to the software, he found that zero was a theoretical reading.
The scope read between zero and other numbers set as the highest
value. Zero was the absence of everything.
Sitting
back, he scratched his head. His intention hadn't been to prove
the supernatural or that the lights didn't actually exist.
Alternatively, a better way to describe the lights and force
bubbles would be that they appeared but were not actually
present in this world. It was too bad that he hadn't thought of
bringing the scope out for a shot of the ambassador.
Going to
work on the shot of the body, he got various readings from the
initial reading of it as a dead body. Its contact with nothing,
so to speak, had done several things to it. The severed area
near the shoulder read as mineralization, and the blood in the
body had turned to some form of liquid copper that was unknown.
It was a dead body in every sense, as all bacteria and other
organisms on it had been killed, or, more precisely, were no
longer present. They had somehow vanished into the unknown with
the man's arm. There were other things: the teeth had turned to
stone, the hair to plastic. Various impossible transformations,
all from the broken contact with the ambassador.
Finally,
he concluded that, since remarkable changes had occurred in the
body, it wasn't a supernatural event. It was a scientific event
of some type, and a man had been killed, but other than that, he
didn't know what they had seen. Perhaps the whole thing was a
hallucination or a psychological effect, meaning they saw
something happen but not what actually happened? Sam considered
that, then decided they had seen pretty much what had happened.
A hostile being of some type was coming through into this world;
so far, it registered as nothing or a ghost. In fact, it came
from somewhere and by some means or force field that they had to
discover.
Sam
wanted Deena's opinion. “Any police investigation by Sergeant
McKraken or Nev Sweeting will go nowhere. This little study
shows that Marco had been onto something beyond the normal or
paranormal all along. He may have been taken by this thing
already as he tried to complete his investigation.”
“Probably. So what do we do?”
“We work
with Burk McCraw and as many other locals as will help us. As
soon as an event occurs, we head there and try to gather more
information. We can forget about higher powers like the federal
government helping us. They obviously already know something is
happening and are either covering it up or investigating in
secret. Nev Sweeting, we can't trust so we watch him. Maybe the
place to start is to track all known recent events and map
them.”
“I can do
that,” Deena said. “Maybe I'll map them as a painting.”
“Okay,
let's talk to Burk. Then we work slowly, and wait for this thing
to appear again.”
Morning
found Sam with a cottage full of houseguests. He woke to the
sound of gunfire and hurried out of the bedroom. Deena was
propped up on the couch, watching drama on the TV and eating a
bowl of cereal. Feeling a mess, Sam said nothing but walked out
the door to look around. Rin and three other militiamen had set
up targets in the back field and were practicing firing with
their automatic weapons. Burk McCraw was coming up the drive in
his ATV, and a flock of crows was hurrying west away from all
the noise.
Sam
stepped back inside the cottage and said good morning to Deena.
“People get up early around here.”
“It's
hard to sleep with all the excitement.”
“Yeah,
and even harder when militia guys are having a shootout in your
backyard.”
“Don't
worry about them; they're just boys with toys. Since you're up,
how about taking the water bottles out to the spring and filling
them?”
“There's
a spring here?”
“Yeah, in
the first group of trees beyond the targets they're shooting at.
Ask them to hold their fire for a bit.”
“I'll
check for signs of Marco while I'm out there. Is there any
reason why you people seem to know his cottage and its
surroundings so well?”
“Marco
was never here for more than half the summer. People used to
stay out here all the time.”
Deena
changed her mind, got up, and gave her long dark hair a quick
brushing, and then they walked along a dirt path, pulling a
wagon loaded with four large water bottles. Off to their left,
Rin was blasting a target with a shockingly deadly automatic
gun. Looking out at the clear skies of the summer morning and
the trees ahead, Sam wondered what they expected to accomplish
with guns. Last night had shown them to be somewhat ineffective
against the enemy, so unless they were still rehearsing for the
final battle with the forces of world government, they needed
more than guns. A better understanding of the enemy was needed
before they could plan anything.
They
reached the spring and entered a calm, shady area of bubbling
water surrounded by some large, smooth boulders and creeping
greenery. Halting at a sandy patch, they sat on a rock and
studied the spring.
“Marco
sent a message recently, but after last night, I'm starting to
wonder how he could be alive. Don't get upset, but I feel the
same regarding your boyfriend and anyone else missing out here.
That thing we saw was purely hostile, and so were the forces it
was harnessing. Unless it can somehow pull things through to its
side alive and has a reason to keep them that way for a while,
my expectation would be death.”
“My
thoughts have been about the same. I had a nightmare with Nev
Sweeting in it. In the dream, he was out by Deer Clearing. It's
near the nudist area. He was there using sign language to speak
to one of them things.”
“The man
is an idiot, and he thinks he's working on a top-secret mission
with our federal agent, Mr. Nelson. Nev Sweeting might try
anything dumb. Your dream could even be true, and he's trying to
establish communication with that thing.”
“He picks
up supplies at the store all the time. Says he's doing stakeouts
at the locations. Places where people were reported missing or
the lights seen.”
“I'd like
to take a tour of those locations. See if I can find anything.”
“I said I
was going to map them for you – a painting, remember.”
“We'll go
today, but forget the painting. Bring your sketchbook along.
Sketch the whole area and map out the points. There may be a
reason why they appear at certain locations.”
After
filling the water jugs, they pulled the wagon back to the
cottage and, along the way, decided to leave for a drive around
just after noon. The militiamen had set up a barbecue at the
front and had returned to eat breakfast of eggs and deer meat.
As he waited for breakfast, Sam sat in a canvas chair and talked
to Burk McCraw about the state of Indian Falls.
“Strange
stuff has been going on for a long time,” McCraw said
cheerfully. “Helped our recruiting last year. The place has a
reputation that draws people out here. At least it did before
this summer. About a month back, they practically sealed the
place off, sending tourists around us and harassing others.
Right now we're waiting for the showdown with the feds.”
Sam
looked at the tall brown grass blowing nearby. In the daytime,
the area was a normal country summer in every way. Burk, his
militiamen, and Deena were people he'd expect to see out here.
“Showdown,” he speculated. “The federal government and its
assortment of intelligence agencies would have raided you guys a
long time ago if they wanted to. So far, we see more of a
growing quarantine. They're sealing us in ... maybe hoping
they'll learn by watching what happens to us.”
“That rat
Sweeting knows what they're up to. Maybe we should torture him
for information.”
“Put a
man on him. Watch everything he does. He'll play his hand soon
enough. Right now, I have a gun I want to test.”
Burk
McCraw and Rin looked on with interest as Sam walked up with the
gun case. Opening it on the picnic table, he began the simple
assembly. He now knew the weapon had other capabilities from
detailed readings via Marco's scope.
Rin
nodded. “Imitation of a sniper rifle. The old military issue.
The real item would be quite valuable now. Not many were issued,
and only to top shooters. Killers ... guys that equal the odds
on missions against hard enemies. It's amazing how that one
comes apart and fits in such a small case.”
Sam
suddenly made some switches on the assembly. In a few seconds,
the sniper rifle had an altered scope and was short-barreled
instead of long-barreled.
Burk was
amazed. “That was a neat trick. What is that gun? It's only made
to look like a sniper rifle.”
“It’s an
experimental model … a beam gun in fact.”
“How did
you get it?”
“By
accident. I wanted to ask you, McCraw. Take no offense. How good
a militiaman are you?”
“Better
than those federal boys think … and boys is an expression
because you know that with them, the bigger half is soulless
women. They reason by the old terrorist script. They think we're
dumb homegrown animals that love guns and worship a wrong view
of God and our dead country. We’re smarter than that … under Rin
and me, it’s been a strategy on how to beat them more than
politics. They think we’re political extremists when they are
that. But everyone has politics. Without it, you’d be a clean
hit man. No beliefs, no worries other than collecting the
payoff.”
Sam
laughed. “You have a way with words. So we’re all dirty and
political in some way. Even apathy is a political opinion. But
aren’t you dreaming, thinking you can beat them? I believe you
are right. The tentacles of world government are everywhere
unseen. They have a forward contact here, Agent Mike Nelson.
Canada is mostly under corporate control, but the dead feds have
kept a strong beachhead. They’re ready to come in anywhere with
world government riding their asses. We know about them, but
what we’re dealing with here … you people call him the
ambassador, represents something unknown. What’s interesting is
that this new enemy is more direct than even others on Earth, as
they have sent this vile ambassador. This spells big trouble
because it means that when they come big time, they aren’t
worried about us knowing. My experience shows that Nev Sweeting
and Mike Nelson know something is going on, so local and federal
levels know some of the details, but Sergeant McKraken, for some
reason, doesn’t know many details. The provincial powers have
been left out of the equation, except that they are being used
to blockade the area.”
“You’re a
better investigator than you know. We don't usually trust anyone
from Toronto. But you don't look like Toronto or the police,
more like a real private eye who uses his brain before his
badge. We trusted Marco. He was on our side. He ran weapons in
for us, many things. Then this stuff happened. No one ever
thought that his oddball specialty would become the most
important work of all. The ghost hunter stuff was initially
thought of as a cover and a joke, but never by Marco. Damn
smart-ass, he knew something all along. Why do you think we’re
still hanging around here? It’s because we don’t know exactly
what to do. The feds used to call us conspiracy nuts and
dangerous, but what happens when the conspiracy gets too big for
anyone to handle, and damn aliens are making people pancakes.”
“What's
happening is some really big people are playing games. They know
something is weird here. Maybe they think we've been affected by
it and are locking us in. In one sense, we are the real
government now because those jerks are playing a dangerous game
with the whole planet. You can bet that the same assholes who
underestimate us have left themselves and the rest of the planet
in the soup via their stupidity.”
“Shit. I
really hope we can find Marco. Either that or we have to find a
way to shoot at a big zero. I’ve seen all those lights, and
Deena has likely seen more than she’s saying.”
“Tell me
something, McCraw. How do you shoot at nothing? I’m serious. I
took readings on that thing, and it is nothing and nowhere.”
“It can’t
be nothing and nowhere because we saw it. It's there, but it is
hiding like a plane with stealth technology. We just have to
figure out what destroys it.”
“Okay.
I’m going to do a gun test and see what this gun can do.”
Burk
McCraw looked mostly satisfied. “One last question. Are you a
fag?”
Sam
grinned. “I take it that question has to do with me coming from
Toronto. No, so worry about the ambassador and the feds because
they’re the ones that might get it in mind to chomp down on your
balls.”
The range
was a flat, open field. Long, tall weeds with nature’s brown dry
straw marked a high, hot summer. Crows and other birds had
already fled, leaving white butterflies as the only visible
omen. The trees marking the spring were the only close area.
Burk McCraw, Rin, Deena, and two militia guys wearing worn jeans
looked on as Sam went to one knee and targeted the gun. He was
adjusting it according to readings from Marco’s scope, having
found the hidden twist engine.
Sunlight
was bright, so he didn’t expect to see any beams. In
wide-mouthed mode, the first blast was a noise wave that shook
the distant wooden targets. It was at sniper range, so for a
sound blast, it was deadly. The targets were mostly faces of
celebrities and somewhat racist in order. Sam’s bias had him
aiming at random, as racism wasn’t his personal deal. Probably
wasn’t Rin’s either.
Targets
went down in succession, and some in a big way that demonstrated
the power of the gun. Its engine, tracker, and sights ran down
the scale to smaller targets, and the computer had the physical
composition of nearly everything he would shoot at.
He could
do fine twists on the inner engine itself. It was like cracking
a safe, and everything he did was to cancel things out. He got
to the end where he either had disabled the gun or was firing at
zero. Shooting unfiltered at nothing but a location, and from
that point, he did a setting to refine all other modes. The
result was a yellow beam that was visible even in brilliant
sunlight. Sam got knocked back for a somersault that saw him
lose the weapon as the beam flew, then hesitated in the air as a
rainbow arc that hit the target and caused it to vanish.”
“Jeeze,”
McCraw said, his eyes widening as he tried to see. “You
vaporized that target.”
“That is
exactly what I want. We don’t want to touch anything on this
weapon. We want this setting because we’re going to fire a
special beam. It's a start. If I can get a read on those force
bubbles, I may get other settings.”
Sam had
Deena at the wheel, and she was racing down a country road,
marveling at the power of the car. A kaleidoscope of foliage
passed, but he kept glancing surreptitiously at her out of the
corner of his eye. She was one of those women with natural
features doing what makeup usually intended … jet-black hair
that moved like silk, long lashes, and a radiant complexion and
facial symmetry that allowed light and shadow to create some of
the beauty of her cheeks and big, soft eyes. Without warning,
she went into a dangerous skid at the sight of some roadside
deer. The car came out into some open road as they passed an old
farm hidden in a hollow. A half kilometer past it, they turned
left down a bumpy road and came to a stop at a pond. The grass
was worn around some limestone boulders that appeared to have
been positioned to block the shoreline and its bit of reddish
sand.
Sam got
out, thinking that the cream car seemed to fit neatly into the
surroundings. A snake moved on the old limestone and past the
light haze over the small pond; he saw a cloud of butterflies
rising in the open meadow. This was a remote swimming hole, but
one that people around here knew about. Four people had gone
missing here, and that was certain as their vehicles were found
and towed off. They were young adults parked for Saturday night
skinny dipping, drinking, and smoking some dope. If the listed
drowning tragedy had happened, bodies would have eventually been
found in the water. Sam wondered how Nev Sweeting could write
these disappearances off and concluded it could only be that the
provincial and other levels of policing wanted it that way.
Deena
wore tailored jeans and an embroidered shirt with elbow-length
sleeves, unlike other local women who wore tank tops and short
shorts as a uniform. Despite it, Deena was beautiful,
back-dropped by the pond. Her walk and movements were unique;
she was a graceful animal. If she had fangs, they were
honey-coated and hidden behind a gentle smile.
The old
swimming hole had its ways and was way ahead of a city pool. But
Sam could also see a touch deeper, and that it would be a scary
place at night. Especially so if those lights appeared, and he
believed they had. There was no logic in looking for other
suspects, even though people could take advantage of the remote
situation. The evil they had seen was most likely the evil they
were tracking, if it could be tracked when it had shown as a
force that came to people on its own, not as one that could be
found.
Deena
pulled up her sketchbook and riffled open the cover. “Okay. I’m
putting this on the map as location four of fifteen. We can look
around. With that car of yours, we can make the other sites
quickly.”
Deena sat
on a rock ledge with her sandals on the sand and worked on her
drawing as Sam strolled the length of the shore. He’d left his
hat in the car and had to keep finger-combing his now
lengthening hair back. Coming up to two fire pits, he paused and
picked through the ashes with a stick. Taking his shoes off, he
walked in at the edge of the water. The shore was sandy and
lightly pebbled, the water blue and rippled from the westerly
breeze. The litter around the fireplace was mostly beer caps,
cigarette butts, and bits of foil. He could see that anything
larger had been taken by Nev Sweeting. If so, Sweeting had at
one time attempted to do some forensics or a real investigation.
“No one’s
come to this swimming hole in a while, though there’s a farm
nearby. Who owns the farm?”
“One of
Sweeting’s cousins, Jesse Milbrand. His kids are grown and gone
to your hometown, Toronto. My guess is Sweeting told him to keep
people away.”
“Don’t
see him bothering us.”
“Yeah,
but it isn’t Friday or Saturday night, and he may not be around.
Maybe he's working somewhere, like in the barn or fields.”
“True
enough. So far, our locations give up no clues. I mean, other
than they are somewhat remote and popular in the evening or at
night. Can you map them on the sketch map you’ve drawn, and
we’ll check for things like distance from town or any other
pattern.”
“Yeah, I
can do that in no time.”
Sam
walked along the shore and into a scruff of weeds along the
forest perimeter. On this side, it was open pines; on the other,
deciduous with massive maples. The pines were well spaced and
had patches of duff, an area with enough open ground in places
to camp. He could see no litter but heard a few telltale sounds.
Ten minutes later, he walked back to Deena, seeing that she had
her sketchbook placed on the ledge and was looking towards him.
edit
Sam made
a deep impression in the wet sand with his foot, then turned to
Deena. “We got company.”
His words
were followed by a click and a man stepping over from behind the
parked car. A shotgun was pointed straight at them, the person
holding it old and chiseled with a tanned face. The man had a
quick pucker that ran to meanness. And the pucker was
highlighted at present.
“Bringing
feds out here now, Deena?”
“Not at
all, Jesse. He isn’t a friend of Spook Nelson or Sweeting.”
“Who is
he, then?”
Sam
remained calm as though there was no threat. “He is me, and
that’s no one you know. But I did see you going through the
car.”
“Good
eyes. Guess you know I found something. You got a case with a
rifle in it in the back of your car. A new sniper rifle. You
ain’t out here to kill squirrels, fella, so who are you planning
to shoot?”
“Not you
or bears or anyone else from Indian Falls. That’s a special gun.
I plan on trying to shoot the same forces of evil you’re
hunting.”
“How do
you know I’m hunting anything?”
“Easy.
You’ve kept people out of here for some time. You’re hoping for
a clean shot at those things. Like that ambassador everybody
knows about.”
Jesse
lowered his gun. “There’s more than him now. I’ve watched them
standing right on the water, and I didn’t shoot. They are in
some kinda tunnels from hell, like they’re flying in them but
never quite arrive. It's like seeing them through a big lens.
Shooting might not get through to them. Like a force field is
protecting them. The ambassador is the one who takes on the look
of a fancy, dark man. The others are pure black creatures of
Satan.”
“Exactly
what I thought. More are coming, but the plan is bigger than
grabbing you and your farm. You should think of getting out of
here. If they come through this way, they’ll roll over your dead
body. My advice is to get into town and wait.”
“I ain’t
going into town. I’ll get out if I can’t kill them. Which brings
the question to mind. What are you and Deena doing here? You
think you can track them?”
“Deena is
mapping the locations where folks disappeared on a sketch with
the local map. At the sites we’ve checked so far, there are no
clues. Looks like Nev Sweeting has gathered up all possible
evidence.”
“It’s
done,” Deena said. “Maybe you men should look this sketch over.
See if it means anything.”
Excitement flashed in Jesse’s razor eyes. He set his gun down on
the rock ledge and walked up with Sam. Deena handed the sketch
to Sam, and he sat on a knob of rock. Jesse peered over his
shoulder.
Deena was
no amateur artist, and the sketch was large and detailed. Sam
remembered the maps of Indian Falls and recognized that Deena’s
was much better. Using pencils, she’d done it out in detail with
occurrences and the border marked.
The
border was very close to the same borders on standard maps, but
hers had been shaded in according to the recent disappearances.
The pattern was all over the falls area and not concentrated in
any one spot.
Some time
passed, and the sun broke in bright. Sam took his hand from his
chin. “I see that everything happens in the falls area, like
it’s contained here. Other than that, I gather nothing.”
Jesse
suddenly spat into the water. “I see something.” He pointed to
the sketch. “Deena, pencil in thin lines where I point.”
Bright
sunlight was now on the sketch, and Deena began to pencil in
thin erasable lines where Jesse directed. When it was finished,
he asked her to hold the sketch back at a distance for him and
Sam. Sam looked at the altered sketch, saw nothing unusual,
blinked, and then looked away. When he looked back, it was with
immediate surprise; the lines formed a face, an evil face …
similar to the dark side of the ambassador, except for one eye,
as that area was blank.
Sam
looked to Jesse. “The blank area where the left eye should be.
What is it?”
“Look
closer, city boy, at the background map. That’s the falls and
the river below.”
Deena
studied her own drawing with surprise. “I didn't realize just
how symmetrical that thing's monster face was ... but, to make
it exact, I would do this.” She drew in some faint curvy lines
that expanded it to a full face. “That adds two more areas. The
campground stretches across the larger part, and there is the
nudist colony touching on the other.”
Jesse
seemed to be speculating. Sam observed that he was a working
farmer to the point of having dead flies in his hairy arms. A
question came to mind. “Did some of your livestock get killed
off?”
“Yeah.
Two horses. All torn up. I buried them in the pit today.”
Deena's
eyes remained riveted on her sketch. “This is bizarre evil we
are dealing with. These new occurrences bear no relation to the
old haunting. Why would the occurrences form a face, and why
kill horses?”
Sam
reached for his tablet and pulled up electronic notes stored at
his office. He spent some time studying the small screen. The
images soon vanished, as did any record of their transmission.
“Looking at the dates you gave, the image forms like someone
drew the perimeter first, then filled in the rest. I think it
means everything will happen in this area, and we know where the
next two happenings will be. The reason for it is some other
form of reasoning. Beings that think but not at all like we
think.” Turning to Jesse, Sam considered him for a moment. He
had talents that could be used. “I'm gathering a phone list at
all the locations. People who have experience with these
occurrences. I want you to call in if something happens here,
and we'll call you along with the rest if anything happens
elsewhere.”
“Sure.
Jesse Milbrand is the name. I'll come right out if those things
show somewhere. Bring my gun and some boys, too.”
A
thunderstorm threatened to strike but passed, leaving a flow of
clouds in its wake. Deena was racing up a dirt road from another
remote location. The rest of the drive had been uneventful, with
the visit to Jesse and the drawing being the clue of the day.
Pulling out on the Falls Road, Sam saw something across the
fields and asked Deena to stop. At the roadside, they got out
and looked. The 607 Highway that bypassed Indian Falls but
passed the perimeter of Deep River had three military trucks
moving along it, followed by a number of police cruisers. Sam
grabbed some field glasses from the glove compartment and took a
closer look. The open canvas at the back of one of the trucks
revealed sawhorses and portable fencing. The soldier driving was
dressed in combat gear rather than the standard-issue uniform.
He put
his free arm around Deena's shoulders. “What exactly is that
base at Deep River?”
“It's
located there partly because the isotope reactor is not too far
from there, and it is considered vital. Soldiers from there
rarely come out our way, as it is nearer to the main highway.
They hold exercises from time to time. Some of them are combat
troops, but it's not an air base. They have a runway and one big
hangar.”
“The
military is federal, so you can bet Special Agent Nelson is
based there. I'm wondering why they'd be working with the
Provincial Authority. Let's take a drive out that way.”
The last
stretch of road to the highway turnoff was a long uphill
stretch, and with Deena at the wheel, they were going well over
the speed limit. She began to slow as she came up the last rise,
then braked quickly. A police car and a sawhorse were ahead at
the freeway ramp, blocking the entrance.
Sam told
her to stop, so she did, but waited in the car while Sam walked
up to the cops. One officer was familiar. It was Sergeant
McKraken.
Sam met
McKraken at the barrier. “Planning on leaving town in a hurry?”
McKraken said.
“Maybe.
Are you concerned about it?”
“I'm
concerned about how fast that girlfriend of yours is driving. I
know that woman. My advice is to stay away from her. It's a bad
lot that lives in Indian Falls.”
“Really.
Except for a few people in town, I've met mostly natives and odd
country folk. No bad eggs except for maybe that Nev Sweeting
character.”
“You got
him pegged right. But he's still a ranger, so show some
respect.”
“Any
chance of letting us through to the highway?”
“Nope.
There is no exit from Indian Falls at the moment, so plan on
staying a while.”
“I've
never heard of that before, quarantining a whole area.”
“We got
some emergency problems at the Deep River reactor. The military
is taking care of it. Roadblocks may be up for some time.”
“If it's
serious and there is radiation, maybe a lot of people will want
to leave the falls area.”
“It's not
that serious, and we aren't putting out any news on it. Special
Agent Nelson is taking care of things. Indian Falls isn't a
high-priority area with the feds. As a matter of fact, it's
about the bottom of their list, so they aren't worrying about a
few people that cry about being held at the border.”
“It
sounds to me like Nelson is in charge because there is some
radiation.”
“Just be
patient. If you try to create some kind of radiation scare,
we'll charge you.”
A
beautiful meadow spread out on either side of the narrow road as
they drove up to the reservoir. Small as far as reservoirs go,
this one was fed by a tiny canal and was a birdwatcher's
paradise thanks to the meadow and a bit of marsh on the south
shore. Beyond it, they were back on a better road on the
approach to the Indian Falls. At the turn, the road widened,
with picnic areas on both sides and some parking. Deena pulled
up in a sandy lot, and then they were out and strolling up to
the falls.
Sam found
them impressive; the fast-moving water and spray still created
rainbows in the sunshine, like the one he'd seen while driving
into town. The water itself flowed over a huge overhanging ledge
and thundered down onto the rocks below. There it raced down an
incline into continuing rapids. Sam was inclined to head for the
observation bridge, but Deena grabbed his hand and took him
downstream, where the picnic area ended, and trees lined the
steep bank. She went ahead as they went down a narrow path that
angled back toward the waterfall. They ended up right down by
the water, with a huge flow breaking over large granite boulders
along the shore. Mist and spray hit them lightly, and Sam saw
ahead to where the path ended at the edge of the falls.
The heavy
flow of water thinned to foam near the shore, and he saw a
transparent and even flow and beyond it to an area behind the
falls themselves. Deena suddenly raced through the flow. Sam
followed, finding himself soaked and in a huge area beneath the
falls' overhang. Here, the rock was sheer and curved up. A solid
flat rock floor existed at the bottom. It was a bit slippery,
with algae, and some form of water lilies along the edge, and it
led all the way across the falls. Sam studied the stone wall as
they walked across. There appeared to be several kinds of stone,
as there were patches of color from deep gray to beige. One
large section was light blue, and a rap with his knuckles showed
it to be softer stone.
Sam
looked out at the flow and pulled Deena close to him. They were
both soaked but feeling exhilarated. “This is amazing. I suppose
only locals know about this.”
“Most
visitors never find it. We used to play here when I was a kid.
This is the important part of the falls to me. Not the rafting
and fishing downriver.”
“This is
also the eye of the evil face on that sketch of yours. I wonder
why that is?”
“Well,
it's a magical place, at least to natives and born residents of
Indian Falls. There are many legends about it, but none of the
ghostly occurrences in recent decades happened exactly here. At
one time, these falls were completely closed to the public as
the rock formation was declared unstable. There was no access,
and the road was rerouted west for a dozen years. Apparently, it
stabilized on its own, and they reopened tourist trips here. The
area was called Indian Falls because numerous Native tribes
lived there throughout history. It likely would have been named
after one tribe or the other if any had stayed permanently. Way
it is, it became Indian Falls, the past home of many native
bands.”
“What we
just saw out there on the highway is history repeating itself on
a larger scale. Now they're closing off the whole area and not
just the falls. Slowly reducing traffic in and out, according to
some information or time scale we don't have. They don't present
any believable explanation. I've been following local news, and
there's no news on anything happening out at Deep River. It's
time to start listening in on military and police bands.”
“The
militia already does that. We should get an update from them on
what they've been hearing.”
Sam
pulled Deena close in an embrace. Their eyes were misted by fine
spray, and the light of the falls was like a rainbow. “We will,
after we explore the magic here,” Sam said.
The night
passed with a hot wind rising in Indian Falls and news of
distant forest fires raging. Deena drove Sam down country roads,
making brief stops at the campground and the perimeter of the
nudist colony. The colony or Raven's Private Beach had its own
super-size log cabin restaurant and store, and was really only
fully nudist deeper in, as far as naked flesh went.
Sam
passed the tall screen fence and saw families still out on the
wide sand beach at night. There were BBQ circles and people
playing volleyball under night lighting that lit swaths of the
beach. Over at Cedarwood Campground, it was much the same,
though instead of communal cottages like the nudist colony, it
had tenting and trailer areas. In addition to a store, it
featured an outdoor dance floor that, according to Deena, was
busy nearly every night. Sam studied it from the dark road but
didn't stay over to dance with Deena. Instead, they drove back
to the cottage with it in mind that nothing strange was on the
order tonight other than a few extra bats on the wing. Sam had
been hoping to be alone with Deena, but as he found the militia
boys' Lift ATVs parked around the cottage, he knew that would
have to be indoors and late at night.
He had a
few drinks with Burk, then went in and talked to Deena. No phone
calls had come in, so they watched a movie and made plans to go
fishing the next day. A conversation with Burk about Marco's
whereabouts turned up nothing. There didn't seem to be any place
for him to be hiding unless it was some secret spot in the
conservation area, and he was alone. If even one person spotted
him, news would get around lightning fast, so Sam was left
scratching his head and wondering if Marco actually had escaped
into some other dimension.
The hot
sun rose in a balloon of mist for another day, and with nothing
much happening, Sam arranged for some afternoon fishing with
Deena. Leon Ottawa rented boats from The Big Nail and had a
special order towed out and waiting in the water when they
arrived. They went upriver to a calmer, wider stretch of the
flow and hooked the boat to a small dock beside a boathouse made
of timbers and corrugated siding. The river was so clear here
that they could see to the bottom near the shore. Out in the
deeper channel, it was murky green, and that was where Deena
said to fish for lake trout and smallmouth bass. More than an
hour passed before Sam caught his first trout. Deena pulled in
two bass.
Sam's
fiddling with a custom radio killed the romance of the outing as
he kept switching through bands and listening in on irritating
police and military channels. Occasional messages were being
passed from checkpoints all around Indian Falls to a command
center at the Deep River base. It was all rather frustrating and
foolish. Finally, Sam turned it off. All he could gather was
that Indian Falls was pretty much sealed shut, but none of the
messages contained any information about the reason.
To ease
the radio ear sores, Sam had a quiet talk with Deena.
“Jenny
sent a message from the store, no business other than local
today. Maybe Burk McCraw and his people are right. The feds are
either planning to invade, or they want to kill us
economically.”
“What
we’ve been able to pick up has the area nearly sealed off, but
the invasion part is not a factor. There are no troops coming in
for any major military action. So far, it looks like McCraw's
final battle won't be with the feds.”
“The
whole thing means little to the locals, other than truckers,
most of them rarely leave Indian Falls. People here are
isolationists. Zoned out, they call it. That happened when the
government decided to value everything in economic terms.
Because the falls area produces no major products, we’ve been
taken off the government map in terms of importance. Only the
exploited are valued, and this is a conservation area they
haven't been able to crack.”
“They
have no proper sense of what is of value or even of what is
moral.”
Deena
looked to the sky over the distant treetops, and Sam suddenly
realized the bright day had darkened while they were talking. A
high flow of dreary clouds had taken shape and was becoming a
gray funnel. A longer look showed the clouds to be ashes blowing
by in a high stream of wind that curved over Indian Falls and
went southwest. It had the effect of darkening the area while
leaving brilliant light on distant horizons. Sam was about to
speak, but remained silent as a huge flock of crows passed
heading south. Though a natural phenomenon, the growing gloom
had a spooky touch as if it were the precursor of a long night
to come.
Sam
glanced at the dull reflection on the water. “Nearest forest
fires are seventy kilometers off and not headed this way. I find
it very strange that the ash is blowing over us.”
“This
will definitely scare people. You never see it unless a fire is
coming.”
The gloom
became a marker for the end of the day's fishing, and they
headed for the boathouse with the catch. They barely arrived
when another odd occurrence appeared in the sky. Huge flakes of
ash drifted above. A sudden lull in the wind followed, and then
it was snowing dark, dead ashes all across the falls area. The
ash continued to fall as they packed up. Pulling out, they found
the highway coated with dust. The treetops and fields wore a
cloak of it. Coyotes were howling in the distance, and Sam went
up the drive to the cottage with a bad feeling; he could taste
the ash in his mouth, and he was certain it was an ugly omen.
The
morning breeze and dew melted some of the ash fall, but left the
fields around the cottage showing an odd gleam in the sunlight.
After breakfast, Deena followed Sam down to the basement and
helped him set up communications. He ran his tablet through
Marco's computer hook-up and also ran an intermittent encrypted
connection to his office in Toronto. It didn't take long for
everything to connect securely, and then Sam was running
surveillance, analyzing communications in the region and the
messages in and out. Because of phone monitoring, he had to set
some flags to weed out uninteresting gossip calls. The rest was
easy. One of the first things he found was other monitoring,
likely military, and it was more than software, but a planted
device monitoring all communication in the area and controlling
what got out.
Though
he'd planned to have Deena aid him, her friend Jenny from the
store showed up, and they were sitting out at the picnic table.
Sam glanced out with phones on his ears, seeing a sleek young
woman, more like a schoolgirl, drinking spring water with Deena.
Apparently, the store was closed until later in the day as the
ash fall, forest fire trouble, and blockade had killed all but
local business.
A
fattened sun floated up in some dissipating haze. Sam studied
the start of a humid day, then switched on the air conditioner
and decided it was a good day to stay inside. Everything on the
forest fires came in first, and if there was a force of evil in
Indian Falls, it was protecting itself from being burned alive.
The fires had taken a wide cut north after swinging in a loop
south and threatening to approach. The sudden diversion of the
fires had caused the huge ash cloud to float in on the wind.
Fortunately, the ash had drifted high and cooled before falling;
otherwise, the falls area would be ablaze.
Sam spent
a few hours tracking radio and other messages from the
Provincial Authority, as well as some from Deep River. It was
after lunch that his office system cracked encryption for local
messages out of the Deep River military base. He got a line on
Sergeant McKraken and messages to him from Major Kowaleski, and
learned that the military and the province were now working
seamlessly together to close off Indian Falls.
They were
also running the operation in a compartment. People outside the
falls area would have had no idea what was going on because no
official messages were sent. Limited vehicle access and the
rerouting of all calls and internet traffic redefined the area
as a dark zone. Some of it was routed to Nev Sweeting's Parks
HQ. None of the messages ever provided any information as to why
such an operation was underway.
By
afternoon, Sam had swallowed four iced teas and was still
listening to communications. He saw Deena drive off with Jenny,
using his car without asking permission. As he nodded off, he
saw Rin and three other militiamen racing by on the road on the
Lift ATVs, then he was in dreamland, experiencing an ugly dream
where police were floating behind a force field at the cottage.
An alert
suddenly woke him, and he shook his head and tried to gather his
faculties. A message had passed and been recorded. He played it
back, and then another alert came in. It was communication
between Nelson, the base, and Nev Sweeting. Part of it was
unintelligible, but what he could grab was Nelson informing the
others that he'd arrived at Ground Zero and all was in order.
The second message, a few minutes later, said he was with the
asset.
Startled,
Sam woke fully and ran a program to attempt to track the
message's source. It took a while, but he found that Nelson was
inside Indian Falls. Yet he couldn't pinpoint the location to
anything other than the general town area. Another hour passed
with no further messages, but he got a notification on
communication between Nev Sweeting and the base. Parts of it
were garbled, but what he did hear was enough as Sweeting
mentioned Cedarwood Campground and tonight.
The day was shifting into evening on a bright and beautiful
note; the temperature dropped to a comfortable level, and the
sky cleared to brilliance as the sun moved lower. Deena was on
the way as Sam had made a couple of calls about spending the
evening out at Cedarwood Campground. He hadn't sent the message
to the whole list he'd gathered, but soon got reminded of the
nature of small towns. Calls started coming in from all over.
Jesse Milbrand told him that Rin had word that something was
going to happen at the campground tonight, making it the hotspot
for a night out.
“Might as well bring a few cases of booze,” Sam thought as he
clipped the phone. A crowd he didn't want, but he supposed that,
being a campground, it would be busy anyway. More people
wouldn't matter that much as long as they didn't go looking for
trouble.
Deena ignored him, talking only to her girlfriend as she packed
the car. Sam took the wheel this time, and along with Jenny,
they headed out on a pristine summer highway to the campground.
Yesterday's ashfall had mostly disintegrated and faded except
for some areas of road where it had pillowed and was blowing in
the light breeze. If evil was lurking, it was hidden behind the
glory of the sun god, waiting to make an appearance after dark.
Jenny gossiped with Deena about her new boyfriend, Donnie.
Apparently, he was the hottest guy in town, which out here
likely meant he was two steps above the swamp thing. Jenny was
immature compared to Deena, and it was obvious because Deena
spent more time playing with her pocket tablet than conversing
with her. After a few minutes, she slid the cover shut.
“I can't connect to standard wireless channels,” she said. “Some
messages come in, but replies don't go out. It's like everything
except local internet traffic has been disabled.”
Sam studied the road ahead. He remembered the turnoff and its
sign, which would be coming up soon. Flocks of birds appeared
overhead, a sign of the distant fires as they were coming in
here to safe territory. He looked to the sky but saw no sign of
ash clouds returning.
Jenny tapped him on the shoulder. “We should go in on the back
road. Otherwise, we'll have to line up and pay.”
Sam agreed and slowed at what Jenny called the shortcut. They
were in thick forest, and he saw no road at all until she
pointed it out. It looked like tire tracks through the ditch
weeds into a small forest pullover, but when he went through, he
found it was a road of weeds and sand, interspersed with wood
chips, that ran like a nature trail to the back end of the
campground.
On the exit from the forest, the car was running next to a
four-foot-high swath of goldenrod mixed with other weeds. The
goldenrod touched on a marshy band of reeds up to five feet
tall, and the reeds ended up at a screened fence eight feet
high.
It confused Sam. “Where are we? Is that the same fence we saw
before?”
Jenny answered. “Probably the other end of it. That band of
reeds and marsh marks the border between Cedarwood Campground
and Raven's Private Beach. You keep moving on the road to its
end. The nudist colony and its beach are on the other side.”
Sam did as she said, finding the road ended at a sandhill. With
impassable reeds, weeds, and a fence to the right, a hill ahead,
and tree falls to the left, it seemed there was nowhere to go.
“Looks like the end of the road. We'll have to walk in. This
isn't good if we need a fast exit.”
Deena chuckled. “You can get in if you drive around the bottom
of the sandhill.”
Sam went a piece up the sand dune, his tires spinning in the
sandy loam as he tried to round the perimeter. “Damn, if this
thing didn't have four-wheel drive, we'd already be stuck. It
isn't an ATV,” he said. Then he found himself suddenly around
the hill facing several ATVs, those of the Indian Falls Militia.
He swerved to avoid one vehicle and then stopped in an open
space. The impromptu parking lot was a clearing of packed sand
and tufted grass hidden from the campground and lake by a stand
of cedars.
No one was hanging out in the hidden lot, and as they exited the
car, they could hear music coming through the trees from the
distant outdoor dance area. Fragrances of campfire smoke and
spruce filled their nostrils, and other than the occasional
shout, the remaining noise was the rustle of foliage and weeds.
Beneath the strains of music, a low hum of crickets marked
wooded areas.
Jenny's light hair became a flash of reflected light as she ran
and disappeared through the trees, hurrying to find her new
love, Donnie. Sam remained with Deena, taking a slow look
around. He could see that they were at the far end of the
campground. It spread out on the shore of the lake beyond the
spruce trees, working its way around to where they were at the
fence's end and the dune marking the beginning of Raven's
Private Beach. Turning and facing off with Deena, he put his
hands on her shoulders. “Let’s take a tour,” he said.
Instead of heading off on the path winding through the spruce,
they followed the sand trail along the line of tall goldenrod
and reeds leading down to the pebbled shore of Small Trout Lake.
The lake was kidney-shaped, and they were in the inner
depression. To their right, the marshy area and reeds ran past
the dividing fence. They could hear voices from Raven's Beach on
the other side, but couldn't see through, though Sam noticed a
path through the weeds where people climbed the fence to either
spy over or get over.
The far shore was the broad curve of the kidney, and calm water
spread out to a brilliant patch catching the setting sun, with
opaque turquoise ripples beyond it, by the trees lining the far
banks. Some water skiers were still out, and farm buildings
showed in faint haze on the far side. To his left, the stony
shore became a wider sand beach that ran for the left dip of the
kidney, and he assumed Raven's Private Beach to be more
beachfront along the other dip. He had the feeling of walking
along the edge of a huge swimming pool, as many pools were the
same shape. It was warm inland water, making it perfect for
water sports. No cold ocean or Great Lakes water here, but a
purer river and spring-fed flow.
Off toward the setting sun, he saw another beach past the
campground area and some people fishing near a dock. As they
walked along the beach, they encountered children playing, and
the strains of music from the dance area grew louder. The strip
was still crowded, and they were down a ways before he could see
any of the cottages and structures. A tenting area showed first,
set in fields with pine and spruce, along with sand and grass
that was either tufted or short. Many beaten paths, and then a
cottage area set farther into the trees, appeared.
Deena pointed ahead. “We're at the far end. The main entrance is
way over there, where you see the high roof. That's a sort of
general store, too, while the beach food hut is over there by
the dance area. They keep the music playing all afternoon and
evening. There is no dancing at this time.”
They'd been walking long enough for Sam to notice that the music
was an eclectic mix from past decades. He also noticed that the
campground was filled to about half capacity. An effect of the
rogue policing that hit the area in recent days. Other than
locals, only a few outsiders who had been camped here for a
while were present.
Coming out in the dance area, Sam and Deena passed some teens
leaning on the railing. He noted that it had a raised DJ area
and a wide path leading to the food and ice cream hut, which
also had music playing. The hut had a semi-tropical design and
was staffed by more teens, who wore clothing similar to that of
forest rangers. Sam picked up a sports drink, Deena grabbed an
ice cream, and they strolled over to the main beach. The entry
lot was nearly full, so they knew that word was out, and many
people from town had arrived long before them, thinking to find
some excitement or maybe witness conflict with the forces of
evil.
They stopped briefly at a picnic table, having spotted Jenny and
Donnie there. A couple of armed militia members were walking
past by the water, so they followed for a short stroll and found
Burk and Rin commanding troops by an RV at a large open
campsite. Except for holstered handguns, the militia guys were
locking their weapons to a rack by the RV, and the military
exercise for the moment appeared to be organizing a BBQ by a
fire pit.
Sam followed Deena as they walked up to Burk. “Looks like the
whole town beat us here,” she said.
“People have relatives gone missing. No one around here is smart
enough to keep their noses out of trouble. If I weren't in the
militia, I'd mind my own business and leave others to get killed
off.”
Deena fanned away a billow of smoke from the fire pit. “What's
for dinner?”
“Corn, venison, stew ... whatever we decide to put to the fire.”
Sam grinned. “I guess hot dogs and marshmallows aren't standard
fare out here.”
Burk popped open a beer. “More like burgers and ice cream for
the tourists, but we eat a healthy meal.”
“Depends on your opinion of healthy food,” Deena said.
Sam was looking off through the trees at the entry road. He
could hear someone talking on a loudspeaker or bullhorn, but not
what was said. “So what's happening over there?”
“Leon Ottawa's got a crowd at the tables just past the entry
over there. Our ranger pal Nev Sweeting is already here, so
that's likely him hollering at them. He's got a fed with him,
too. It's that Major Kowaleski guy from Deep River.”
The news interested Sam. “I picked up transmissions from him on
the radio. Does he have any troops with him?”
Burk tossed his head in that direction. “So far, none in
uniform, but they may be parked out there somewhere. He does
have some soldiers inside dressed as rangers. To avoid conflict,
he never brings uniforms past the conservation area perimeter.
They have no real authority here other than what they claim by
bullying.”
Deena wore a worried frown. “Let's take a walk over. Maybe
there's an ugly reason why this military guy is here.”
Burk shrugged and remained at the BBQ, not interested in what
Nev Sweeting or Major Kowaleski might be jawing about to the
crowd of locals. Rin tagged along, walking behind Sam and Deena
as they cut through trees and shade and then over the dance
floor and around the busy food hut. The gang of locals had put a
ramp over a ditch and come directly in, avoiding the pay gate.
Their cars were all parked on open grass, and they'd created a
semi-circle three picnic tables deep, with a large BBQ pit
working.
Sam grinned at the pleasant scene. “Looks like no one wants to
pay around here.”
“We all know Stu Pooler, and we don't pay him,” Rin said.
Deena grinned. “Someone has to pay him.”
Sam raised an eyebrow. “Maybe the feds pay him.”
They came out on the sand path into an odd scene. Nev Sweeting
had his portable lights hooked up as if he were waiting for
nightfall. It made Sam wonder if the guy wanted to impress his
military guests by leading a surprise raid at night. Sweeting
and Major Kowaleski were standing on the open tailgate of a
high-wheeled pickup truck, addressing the crowd with a horn.
Almost half of the people were ignoring him. Children were
playing with balls, badminton rackets, and Frisbees in the
field, while men were drinking beer and playing cards on screens
mounted on the picnic tables. Those who paid attention to the
authorities were the ones who wanted to heckle them.
The Major remained silent and stern. Nev Sweeting lectured the
locals present. A man holding a shotgun stood at the forefront
of the crowd; he was balding and sad-faced, with ropy limbs, and
could only be Stu Pooler, the owner of the grounds. Mr. Pooler
looked pissed off.
Pooler shifted his gaze, and his glance turned nasty when he
spotted Rin. It appeared he had a couple of reasons to be angry
– those reasons being the people coming in without paying at the
gate and Nev Sweeting attempting to shut him down altogether
with help from the military. To make it worse, heavily armed
militia were roaming the campground. Legally, too, as there were
no gun laws in Indian Falls.
Nev Sweeting's voice through the horn was coarse and echoed in
the treetops. He was in mid-flight of a bullyboy talk. “... and
you locals didn't pay at the gate, so you're all trespassers.
Sun's setting, and once that happens, this camp will be under my
control. You all see the Major here, and he wouldn't be here if
it wasn't trouble.”
Stu Pooler was the first to holler back. “You can't boss locals
at a campground. Most of the people legitimately camped are
locals, too. Almost nobody came into the falls today because of
that Major's blockade.”
Another angry man jumped up on a picnic table, prompting
Sweeting to shout, “We don't want to hear from you, Randy
Giffen!”
“Well, you're gonna. On Stu's authority, I'm the head ranger at
this camp, and I'm here to serve paying customers and my staff.
I've already done an investigation, and nothing strange has been
happening here. The trouble is elsewhere.”
Twilight and shadows were beginning to settle in now. A liquor
bottle came flying out of the trees and smashed on a boulder
near the pickup truck. “I'll make arrests if I have to,” Nev
Sweeting said.
Stu Pooler replied. “I didn't ask for any arrests, only that
those who snuck in pay at least a portion of the admission
price.”
“You gonna arrest us?” Rin shouted, making Sam feel extremely
uncomfortable standing beside him.
“That's another thing,” Sweeting fumed. “We don't need an armed
militia on parade in this campground. You boys should be minding
your own business.”
“Our business is in a BBQ and a quiet night,” Rin said calmly.
“Ours too,” a drunk yelled from the picnic area. And that was
it. Suddenly, shouts rang out through the crowd. “Our business
too. Barbecue! Barbecue! Barbecue!”
Nev Sweeting's face paled, and the Major seemed to deflate
beside him. It was now obvious that no one was going to obey
him. Then a man shouted, “Why does he only hate locals? What
about people from out of town? What's the plan for them?”
Rin got up on a picnic table and started yelling, “Feds out!
Feds out!” In moments, the whole crowd was shouting. Defeated,
Nev Sweeting and the Major hopped down off the pickup truck and
retreated toward Stu Pooler's campground headquarters with Stu
himself hurrying right behind them.
Sam ignored the chanting, walked with Deena back on the path,
and bought snacks at the food hut. Sitting at a table, they
watched the people gathering by the outdoor dance floor and made
some plans. The decision was to take it easy until midnight, and
if nothing happened by then, they could return to the car, pull
the portable tent out of the back, and stay the night. Sam
didn't see any reason for constant patrols of the grounds,
because if anything happened, they'd see the lights soon enough.
It was better to stay in the front area and keep an eye on Nev
Sweeting to make sure he didn't spring some brand of surprise.
Sunset fell in shades of otherworldly orange due to the
pollution off on the horizon. A warm breeze wafted in with the
odors of cedar and the lake, and as the night lights and
firelight took over, the campground kept its promise as a summer
paradise. And one for all ages, as the crowd gathered for the
dance was young to old. The music soon shifted from eclectic to
tunes that moved, and night was underway with everything from
cooked moose meat to bison dogs. Sam sat for a time with Deena
at the food hut watching the odd social scene of people mingling
and dancing, some with food and booze purchased from the
ranger-outfitted staff, but more with their own goodies and
beer.
While dancing with Deena, Sam tried to catch the feeling of the
night, and though on the surface all seemed normal, he had a
sense of foreboding. In times like these, the simple night was
too good to be true. It was unusual the way the Indian Falls
crowd tied together. Militiamen still wearing side arms,
interspersed with very ordinary country folk. Then there were
young people, like young people everywhere. No hillbilly kids in
the countryside anymore. The tourists or visitors, most of whom
were from parts of the United States, came here for relaxation
without being in the jaws of the armed military camp most of
that nation had become.
They headed back to the militia BBQ but paused to kiss in the
dark. A bat swooped overhead, and as Deena pulled back, Sam
looked into her pooling eyes, suddenly realizing that he was
developing a deep attachment to her that might not be healthy in
the long run. Especially not healthy for her, considering his
popularity with the criminal gangs in Toronto. But this was an
escape, and he'd be a fool running from romance that others
searched for all of their lives. Embracing her, he decided to go
with the flow, wherever that might take him.
Mosquitoes were coming on thick now. Back at the BBQ, Rin had
pots of smoking herbs and battery-powered bug lights to drive
them off. The food was delicious as Burk's women friends brought
every sort of condiment, bread, and salad. Farther off, the mad
Nev Sweeting now had the portable lights blazing atop his parked
van, and the lights shone upward like a beacon calling for a
plane or alien craft to come in.
Some of the militia crowd went down to the beach. Sam took Deena
along, and they discussed Nev Sweeting.
Sam spoke quietly to Burk. “If anything does happen, what do we
do about Ranger Sweeting? On his own, he'll make things worse.”
Burke remained silent, but Randy Giffen, Stu Pooler's campground
assistant, spoke. “Nev's got a few of his rangers in the
building with Stu. Make sure you note the difference between
their ranger uniforms and our staff outfits. I don't want my
guys to get shot. Nev is supposed to come out with them and take
control if need be. I don't know why that major is there. He
says pretty much nothing, like he's here to watch if anything
goes down.”
Burk spat in the sand. “We know who is who, and you know more
than you're telling. Some of Sweeting's so-called rangers are
soldiers. The Major's here to do more than watch. He's looking
to declare an emergency of some sort and then bring federal
troops in to make arrests on my men.”
Sam shook his head. “We've got them monitored at the blockade
perimeter now. They don't have large numbers. It would be a
standoff. It would be too dangerous for them to attempt a raid.”
As they walked on the beach, it occurred to Sam that the
military could come in by boat. He paused and thought it over.
Burk lit a cigar, and Deena was throwing pebbles into the water.
A few minutes passed, then it suddenly got darker. Across the
water, the moon had suddenly disappeared in a blackened sky. Sam
knew there was no prediction of a thunderstorm, but it looked
like one was coming in. He turned to Burk as the wind suddenly
gusted, then noticed everyone looking south along the beach
toward the border and fence marking the entrance to Raven's
Private Beach. Mist and faint green lights appeared near the
marshy area, and a moment later, they saw brighter orbs rising
above it. As the lights brightened, every dog in the campground
began to bark.
A
siren whooped like a knife through the night. Sam jogged from
the shore and glanced through the trees. The emergency proved to
be Nev Sweeting's vehicle pulling out. His group of rangers and
the Major were approaching other vehicles.
Four men remained and kept people and other cars back as the
rest of the rangers pulled out, kicking up gravel on the run to
the main road. As soon as they were gone, the remaining rangers
moved back and blocked the exit road with vehicles and pylons at
a section where marshes lay on both sides. So Nev Sweeting
wasn't evacuating the campground at all, at least not at
present. He was penning everyone inside while he raced around on
the road to Raven's Private Beach and the new visitation.
The dance music ended abruptly on a bass note, followed by a
twang and a chorus of shouts. Stu Pooler, Randy Giffen, and his
ranger-outfitted employees moved through the campground,
pointing to a large central clearing where they wanted people to
gather. It was beside the area that the townspeople had seized.
Some campers obeyed them, but others argued. A brighter aura of
green showed again from the direction of Raven's Beach, so Sam
went back to the others, who were already congregating at Burk
McCraw's trailer.
Burk, his militia, Deena, and a few townspeople had already
formed a discussion circle.
Randy Giffen ran up and addressed them. Sweat was already
dripping from his loose curls. “Nev's orders are for everyone to
gather at the designated clearing. Stu will get instructions
over the radio as to what we are to do next.”
Rin threw a strap over his shoulder and ran through settings on
the militia beam gun. A few of the militia people gaped at Randy
like he wasn't quite real. Rin spoke. “Get out of here, Boy
Scout. The Indian Falls Militia doesn't take orders from Nev
Sweeting or Stu Pooler.”
A
frightened expression gathering on his strained face, Randy took
slow steps back. Sam spoke. “Let’s cook up a fast plan. It looks
like Nev Sweeting wants us held here. No evacuation because he
wants to make sure we don't drive over to Raven's Beach. Unless
we want to shoot it out with his roadblock boys, the only other
option is to head across the campground to the barrier.”
“That's a no-brainer,” Burk said. “Our vehicles are parked over
there. We have to get to them before those alien things come
over the fence.”
Sam nodded. “OK. We all head to the dividing fence. The militia
can form a line and take the lead. There's no way to stop others
from following, so Deena and I will be just behind and take
charge of them.”
Randy stepped back up to the circle. “Stu ain't gonna like
this.”
Burk turned on him like an angry dog. “Fuck Stu. You stay behind
us with the campers and don't get in the way.”
Rin took the lead, taking a small militia party along the beach
while other armed members fanned through the trees. Sam, Deena,
and some unarmed men and women followed a minute behind. Other
militia irregulars took a slow walk through the campground. The
green-blue lights and mist grew in power, but some of it was due
to the darkened sky. Blue tracers rose over the water and fanned
to a low aurora of sorts. Ten minutes later, they all reached
the clearing by the dividing fence; a haze of light lit the
twenty yards of golden rod and reeds running along the fence,
and the sand dune had a halo at its top. Still, nothing was
happening here as the brightest lights were far over the fence.
Sam raced over to the dune's edge to check the vehicles and
found some of the militiamen there. The cars and ATVs were okay,
but a cloud was growing overhead, and suddenly ashes began to
fall. It wasn't mist that they'd seen over Raven's Beach; the
approaching storm was another high wind carrying hot air and ash
from the distant forest fires.
Instinct gripped Sam. He told Deena to get in the car, and then
he backed away, turned, and drove it down to the beach. They
went a few hundred feet toward the campground. Parking by some
close trees, he saw some of the militiamen following his lead,
moving their vehicles down the beach in case the events
happening at Raven's Beach spilled over the fence. Running Nev
Sweeting's roadblock seemed a better option than trying to get
out through the forest road later.
They heard garbled shouting and saw bright white lights come on
at the other side of the fence. A terrifying cry echoed from the
distance, and in the lights and falling ash, the view of the
tall weeds, reeds, and fence was eerie. Sam moved ahead with
Burk and Rin, and they went down the narrow path through the
reeds.
At more than seven feet, the divider was formidable, but they
could see where notches had been cut in the wood, likely by
teens who had climbed it in the past. Burk pulled out a hunting
knife and, using force, hacked the bottom notches to larger
footholds. As he stepped back, Sam scrambled up and paused at
the top.
“What's up over there?” Burk yelled from below.
Irritated by drifting ash and mosquitoes, Sam shielded his eyes
and blinked, then looked through the dark into the strange
tunnel of light down the beach.
“A major event is happening farther down. This is ten times
bigger than what we saw at the hotel. Nev Sweeting and his
rangers have bright lights shining through the ash near it. I'm
going over; it's hard to see from here.”
The path through the marsh also existed on the other side. Sam
hit the ground on a wood-chip path that ran up to and along part
of the fence. He paused deep in the reeds, looking for possible
danger. A glance back showed him four figures coming over the
fence, one by one. The last was a female form he knew had to be
Deena. Coming out in the darkened end of the sand beach, they
looked ahead to the lights.
Nev Sweeting's lights were in the trees while green floaters and
a large bright aura formed a line along the beach. The falling
ash was just the odd flake now from the high dark sky. It showed
that a flow of ash was up there passing over in a wind stream.
Sam was sure he saw people down the beach running into the
trees, and he took the lead as they jogged a ways down on a path
through the scrub.
They heard a few more throaty screams and more chaotic shouting.
Heading into a path through some beach rock, they worked their
way down and came out in a cedar-ringed clearing that was
crowded with fleeing people. Beach huts were farther back, and
Sam assumed the people had fled them and congregated here. These
were the nudists, but most of them were clothed at night. Some
were wrapped in towels. Clothing was the best idea for people
who didn't want to become a feast for the bugs that zoomed in on
paths through foliage and trees.
The commotion and lights were farther ahead, and Sam halted with
Deena while Burk and Rin ran ahead. Sam grabbed the shoulder of
a blond woman with ashes and tears on her face. “What's
happening up there?”
“Death,” she hissed. “Creepy murder and lightning. Those things
ripped most of the old guys to shreds. We saw some of it and
ran.”
“Old guys?”
She kept shaking her head, like it was both disbelief in what
she'd just seen and an attempt to shake the filth of ash and
sweat from her hair. “Yeah. Their portion of the beach is up
here, closest to the dividing fence. They're naked old farts. It
drives away people who peer over the fence.”
“I see. So the main areas are deeper in.”
“Main beach is farther down, other areas are in back. We got
here by coming around behind on the path. Usually, there are no
official nude beach events late at night except for the male gay
strip, and it's mostly old guys that hang out there, looking for
late action. This was the only safe way to run. The killers
moved through the gay beach and are swarming the main camp now.”
Deena frowned. “Jeez,” she said.
Sam and Deena were the only civilians nervy enough to be moving
toward the lights now, and they passed several campers hurrying
past them to the clearing. Some of these were completely naked,
and Sam jumped aside from a grossly overweight woman with huge
swinging breasts. The path curved into a semicircle, so they
ducked off it, taking the straight way through. A line of trees
showed with green-blue ghost fireworks beyond. The lights
hanging in the higher air like liquid explosions. Reaching the
trees, they halted by a large embedded boulder and stared ahead
at a weird scene happening on the beach.
Burk and Rin were just ahead of them with weapons ready. Nev
Sweeting and his park rangers were slowly coming off a grassy
area to block the beach in front of them. A group of naked men
had run down the beach, and a few rangers were moving with them.
Nev Sweeting had a brilliant bank of lights mounted on a
monster-size ATV he was driving, and they clashed with the teal
supernatural light, creating a circle of bizarre effects two
hundred yards long. At the end of the reach of Sweeting's
lights, huge flare bubbles like they'd seen at the hotel were
floating, and light shimmered off something that seemed like a
curtain across the beach. Behind it, another group of naked men
was struggling, crying out, most of them stumbling and falling
as they attempted to run. But the mostly transparent curtain was
blocking them. It was a force field of some kind that slowed
them, making it look as if they were running against a wind that
held them back. Blue and green light flashed like sizzles in the
curtain of light.
Nev Sweeting's Godzilla ATV rolled closer, the rangers with
weapons at ready positioned themselves slowly, and Sam, Burk,
Rin, and Deena moved up silently toward the light. A closer view
clarified a startling reality. Gleaming bones littered the sand
like they'd been strewn there helter-skelter. A quick flash of
light spun overhead, and a fast-moving shadow came down on a
naked man. He had been choking as he tried to yell or scream,
and he was unable to move ahead against the force. The flash
became a black blur as the force field shimmered, and its effect
on striking the man was deadly.
Blood and brain matter exploded from his skull as the flash
struck and moved downward at slow spin, expanding out to
steaming splashes of liquid and ripped flesh as it moved to the
ground. The sand thundered; a bubble formed around the remains
as all of the corrupted flesh was somehow consumed in the
vanishing light. Then an ebony face, similar to that of the
ambassador's dark side, appeared in the air and faded into a
black figure dashing through the sand. Nearby, the skeleton of
another victim remained erect on the sand for several moments,
and the metal rings and piercings the man had been wearing
remained in the air before a collapse that dropped them to the
sand.
About twenty desperate men remained behind the shimmering force
curtain, and the dark creatures began to flash to each one with
the same grotesque and deadly effect. Nev Sweeting's rangers
panicked and opened fire, their bullets creating sparks all
along the transparent barrier. One young ranger ran forward to
attempt a rescue, but bounced back in a shower of sparks while
his rescue target became another grim explosion and more bones
floating down to the sand.
Rising from the ground, the ranger stumbled in a half circle and
then fell backward into the shimmering lines of force.
Amazingly, he went through the fence and tried to regain his
footing. Seeing where he was, he moved to run back out but
couldn't. A second later, the face of a grinning demon appeared
in the air; a dark form flashed, and he was instantly devoured.
The rangers had no stomach for this and lost their nerve. Nev
Sweeting was turning his monster ATV to begin a retreat toward
the reeds and dividing fence. Teal light flashed on nearly all
of the campground ahead, and as Sam studied the edge of the
force curtain, it shimmered and crackled like cellophane. Anyone
caught to the rear of it was dead meat. Most of the people,
though, had already retreated and were in the clearing, so it
was a matter of getting them over the fence. White lights
flashed as Sweeting finished turning his machine, blinding Sam.
He turned to Rin, who was also shielding his eyes.
“Run up and tell that fool to turn those lights off. All he's
doing is highlighting our location.”
Burke came out of a state of semi-shock. Along with Deena, he'd
been staring at the whirl of lights and bizarre carnage as
though it were a feature hallucination with revolting special
effects. He tapped Sam on the shoulder. “I've got a sniper's
eyes. Those flashes of light and dark are evil creatures of some
variety. They're partially camouflaged by that force curtain in
front of them. They tore those people up buzz-saw fast and from
the top down. Probably sucked down their souls, too. For some
unexplained reason, they leave the bones. Sweeting's no help
either. All his lights do is blind everyone.”
Sam ground his teeth as he watched Nev Sweeting's ATV approach
and the rangers behind it pacing backward along with it, never
taking their eyes off the evil fireworks of Raven's Beach. “When
the ambassador showed up at the hotel, he was in some brand of
large force bubble. Now there are a lot of evil creatures with a
whole force sheet. These are all ugly, no handsome human
illusion like the ambassador. And look closely, that force
curtain is moving slowly, foot by foot, towards us.”
“Yeah, it's creeping up on us,” Burke said. “Okay, fuck Sweeting
and his schoolboys. We have a whole clearing full of people back
there to get over the fence. This beach is screwed at the other
end, which is nearly the whole place. Those things have already
combed through most of it. Time to write it off.”
Sam turned his head toward the lake. “Shit. Look. There's a boat
just off the water, and it's turning to leave. That bastard
Major Kowaleski is in the back of it.”
Burk didn't hesitate. He broke into an instant run, pulling up
his weapon as he ran. He was at the water in seconds, and as his
boots splashed in, he opened fire on the boat. “Bastard feds,”
he shouted. “Leaving everyone here to die!”
Water splashed up, and then fire was returned from the boat.
Burke dived into the sand on the shore and rolled as Rin ran up
and fired a burst from his beam gun. Water and fire exploded,
but the boat was already roaring off across the lake.
Nev Sweeting's rangers turned and nearly opened fire on Rin, and
then they turned back as a large light bubble floated over the
trees from deeper inside Raven's Beach. The force curtain took
on an aura, giving the effect of swimming distortion as it
continued to slide slowly up the beach. The ambassador's human
face became clear in the bubble. His movements were blurred, and
he held something in his right hand that emitted a sudden fan of
blue beams. More bubbles appeared out of the sickly ash fall,
some of them briefly flaring before settling on the beach behind
the ambassador. Blurred figures moved inside the bubbles, and
dark predatory faces shifted in the lens-like distortion. These
monsters were speaking or hissing, revealing glinting rows of
sharp, fang-like teeth. Their bubbles were thinning like soap
floaters with a rainbow shimmer. They were about to break free
on the beach.
Deena had already left in a run to begin to organize an
evacuation of the clearing. Sam moved with Burke and Rin over to
the waterline and let Nev Sweeting and his rangers pass. They
were now facing off with the forces of alien hell, both sides in
a near pause as they studied each other.
“What the fuck are those things? What do they want?” Burke
whispered.
Sam reached down and cupped a handful of water. Taking a moment,
he washed the sand, sweat, and ash from his face. “They aren't
human, and they aren't man-made mutants or monsters. I'm sure
Major Kowaleski could tell us more about what they are. One
thing is certain. They're here to kill us, and everyone in
Indian Falls, and the military has marked a perimeter. It means
we have a huge problem. Not just how to stop them but figuring
out why anyone on earth, especially higher levels of government,
would be complicit in this.”
Rin had a knowing look lighting his face, like he wasn't baffled
at all. “The fucking feds. They want us dead, so they're using
us for a crazy experiment. Jeez. They brought them in here and
fed them a crew of crazy old queers for the appetizer, and some
of the rest for the main course. That must've been mighty
tasty.”
Sam focused, seeing deep into the flickering teal lights. “They
also plan on desert. Several fires are burning out of control up
in the main camp. We may end up dealing with a forest fire.”
Burke took a swallow from his wine skin, rinsed his mouth, and
spat it out on the sand. “You want to bet the feds will put it
out, so no outside help will be called in. Those idiot things
are just grinning and creeping up. Best we get out of here.
Bullets don't seem to be any use; they become flying slag when
they hit that plastic curtain of theirs.”
“It isn't plastic, and it's not a force field in the human
sense. I think it's a corridor of energy, where they flow into
our world. Let's try Rin's beam gun on it. Hit it with two
bursts. One after the other.”
Rin nodded and raised his beam gun. He altered the settings for
a wide hit, maximum heat, and maximum puncture force. He fired a
sustained burst. A circular area blazed on the force curtain to
the right of the ambassador. Red fire burned and swirled like a
vortex to Hades. Then Rin was knocked off his feet. He rose from
the sand, somewhat stunned, and fired again at the same target.
The blast hit with a bang like it'd struck a steel door, and
then for a few moments the flames vanished, and there was a
round hole four feet wide in the field. A third quick blast hit
a bubble behind it, and it exploded and rose to the sky like a
green flare. Then the hole closed, the area becoming like
cracked glass. For a moment, they saw a giant, round eye, red
rivulets within its transparency resembling veins, and then it
became fully transparent again and sealed.
As the hole sealed, several flashes lit the force curtain. When
they cleared, several crooked ebony figures were standing at the
shimmering edge. More ashes were blowing in, and these beings
had a ghastly look; grinning, wicked ghosts that were waiting
silently as though for a signal to attack. That came with a high
scream, not human but almost industrial in volume and pitch.
It signaled the movement of the force curtain as it suddenly
opaqued to burnished steel and swung up and over in the air like
a big trap. Thundering down like a guillotine, it came just
short of slicing Rin in half. Sam and Burk were a few feet
farther back and got temporarily blinded by the wave of sand
kicked up. All three of them staggered and, through stinging
eyes, saw that one of Nev Sweeting's men over by the water's
edge had got trapped behind the field. The lightning flashed
again, and the monsters appeared right in front of them. Others
flew in a blur to the trapped ranger and came down on him like a
spinning tornado that devoured him.
Burk took off first. Sam turned and ran a second later with Rin
following. The field swung up and over again, the thundering
knife edge right at their heels as they escaped and caught up to
Nev Sweeting at the edge of the clearing. A glance showed Sam
that the crowd was now larger, and the knowledge that there
wasn't nearly enough time to get them through the weeds and over
the fence was frighteningly clear in his thoughts.
They stopped at Sweeting's ATV. Sam suddenly choked, then caught
his breath. He turned to Burk. “Those things are coming fast
now. We have to take down that beach fence. Have Rin move up and
flatten a section of it with the beam gun.”
Nev Sweeting jumped down from his ATV. His face was bright red,
like his high blood pressure was about to finish him. His
rangers had formed a semi-circle at the front of the crowd. He
turned a fierce gaze on Sam and Burk. “That dividing fence is
public property. I can't allow you to damage it.”
Burke stared at Nev Sweeting with contempt; Rin shouldered his
weapon like he was going to take a long shot at the fence. An
arrogant look on his face, Nev Sweeting stepped in the way,
followed by Sam, who stepped in between the two.
Before this silent showdown could continue, Burk took off,
dashing across the edge of the clearing, around the crowd and
rangers, and into the marsh. Sam decided to follow while an
angry Rin remained in a face-off with Sweeting.
Burk reached the fence and pulled two objects from his pocket.
In the darkness, they looked like two chocolate bars. Sam caught
up and looked down, amazement on his face. “You were carrying
explosives in your pockets while dealing with that hell out
there?”
Burk passed him one of the thin bars. “Yup. It's E42, enough to
vaporize that fence. Plant yours over there, then duck back.
Keep those damn rangers back, too.”
Sam nodded, then he turned and plowed through the goldenrod,
deeper into the wet, marshy area and reeds. He planted his
explosive pack in a notch in the fence and then came crashing
out quickly. He saw Burk a ways down, doing the same, almost
like they had it perfectly timed. Then he was face-to-face with
a couple of rangers, telling them to get out of the way and
back. They obeyed, but Burk wasn't quite as lucky. A big ranger
attempted to seize him, and Burk responded by slugging him with
a knockdown punch. Two other rangers dragged the fallen man off,
then Burk pulled the trigger fob out of his pocket and did the
unlock on it.
He looked around and, seeing everyone well back, hit the tiny
button. A bang and a crack like a lightning strike hit the fence
and flashed yellow as crooked lines of red fire spread across
the wood. Though thick and solid, the force of the explosion
cracked the large section of fence apart like it had been made
of potter's clay. Dust and smoke rose in the already darkened
night as the section crumbled to the ground. The remains
smoldered, but there was now a clear passage. Perhaps not
obstacle-free, but open enough to get the people through
quickly.
As the explosion died out, many people converged on the opening,
but the night was confusing, and the blast itself frightened
others into running the wrong way. Adding to the confusion was
Ranger Chief Nev Sweeting. He was back on his big ATV, and he
unleashed a whooping siren as he lurched the vehicle across the
clearing.
Deena flailed her arms and yelled to some of the people headed
away from the opening. The ambassador was again moving forward
with his wicked army, and the force shield in front of him was
crackling with heat, causing a rush of air. Like an expanding
balloon of cellophane, the glittering force field zoomed forward
several yards, and three men who had been running the wrong way
were sucked into it.
Campground boss Stu Pooler's assistant, Randy Giffen, was right
behind them, and he grabbed one man by the shirt as he was
sucked in. But that rescue attempt was unsuccessful; his ranger
hat flew up in the hot wind, and he was left standing there with
a piece of torn cloth in his hand. The man he'd been trying to
save was screaming horribly as three of the dark monsters dashed
in and seized him. The impact was a flash of blood and burning
flesh, and there was nothing left but ebony ghosts floating away
in the night as smoking bones fell to the sand.
The other two men were running for the water's edge and got
enveloped and taken down by dark forces that silenced their
howls with surgical cruelty, their voices losing tone to become
hot rasps a moment before the flesh got stripped from their
bones. Black entrails pulsed on the sand as a steam cloud, and
the creatures it held moved down and fed on the remains.
Randy Giffen turned and fled. Nev Sweeting hopped out of his
vehicle and hurried towards the confused people. The siren still
whooped.
In the chaos, Sam saw an opportunity, popped up on Sweeting's
vehicle, turned it around, and gunned the engine, racing
straight toward the approaching ambassador. The ATV picked up
speed; Sam threw himself off and into the sparse grass. The ATV
hit the force field with a bounce that sent it up and over,
where it exploded before it hit the ground.
The people turned and moved in the right direction. The rangers
led people through the flattened band of marsh and the hole in
the fence, going out of the private beach into Cedarwood
Campground.
Sam was now the last civilian; he could see a crowd from the
campground gathered by the big sand dune, and more importantly,
just how near the force field was getting to him. The ambassador
and four other strange beings were now moving close, and they
all had that weird predatory grin.
Then something unusual happened far off in the main grounds of
Raven's Beach. The fires burning sent flaming debris up into the
sky, and while he watched, a large flaming object fell toward
him. He saw it before it hit – a flaming log. Sam dodged it, and
it burst into a burning shower near him. More burning debris
fell, pushing him closer to the shimmering force curtain. His
shoulder brushed against it and caught; he was being sucked
through, and a moment later, he tumbled on the sand and thin
grass on the other side.
In moments, they'd be on him. Running up to the fence, he tried
to push through. A painful shock knocked him back, and he
slipped on loose rocks and fell sideways back into the curtain.
Surprisingly, his arm went partway through, the feeling being
like plunging through liquid.
The ambassador and his evil friends were racing toward him,
using some power of levitation that eased their feet over the
sand. Flashes were spinning in the air. Rather than push, Sam
continued to turn sideways like he was turning around, and that
took him through the sparking curtain. On the other side, he
rolled and sprinted through the grass toward the crumbled fence
and the tail end of the fleeing people. His thoughts whirled,
but he'd learned something; the force field or curtain wasn't
solid at all but some type of thin energy shielding that could
be passed through at certain angles.
A
period of intense gloom arrived. Sam reached the other side of
the broken fence and found people congregated behind the sand
dune near the paths through to the main campground area. Serious
organization was lacking. They should have been evacuated
already, but instead, people were still coming through from
Cedarwood to rubberneck.
Nev Sweeting had his park rangers gathered in a circle,
discussing something. Some of Stu Pooler's campground rangers
were next to them and still gaping through the fence at the
fading lights. They looked like boy and girl scouts in the wash
of firelight from a bonfire pit one of the militiamen had lit. A
few more goose-bump screams echoed over from Raven's Beach, and
the fearful expressions on the evacuees as they looked around
and took a count on one another told a story of its own. None of
them wanted to discover that one of their friends or relatives
had been left behind. But a few did, and Rin had to step out and
seize a man attempting to run back through the fence.
The guy was lanky and blond – wearing a sleeveless T-shirt,
shorts, and sandals- and in good shape. He gibbered something
about his father, tears pooling in his eyes. But he met a harsh
reality when he tried to break free. Rin spun him around and
slugged him so hard he fell to the sand in a daze. Two other men
dragged him off, then Rin shouted, “If no one is fucking in
charge here, I'm taking charge. Don't even think about running
back through that fence. Anyone still there finds their own way
out.”
Nev Sweeting suddenly became alert to the fact that he was seen
dicking around, and the militia was about to take charge of the
situation. He stepped over to Rin right away. “All right, they
aren't coming through the fence. At least not yet. We're going
to begin a slow evacuation. My rangers and Stu Pooler's staff
are in full charge, and they will be leading you all through the
campground. Everyone is to get to the big clearing with the
others, past the main beach and the dance floor.”
A
buxom brunette stepped from the tight-knit crowd. “There are
still people missing. My brother is one of them. We can't just
leave people over there.”
Nev Sweeting shook his head like he was pissed at even hearing
such an idea mentioned. “My rangers are not going back in there,
so no one is going back in there. Anyone who goes looking in
there will be dead.”
Randy Giffen stepped into the firelight, his plump young face
pink and baby-like. “I've got five volunteers willing to do a
scouting mission back in there to bring out anyone hiding.”
Nev Sweeting spat in the sand. “You know Stu would never allow
that. You and your Girl Scouts are working on the evacuation.
Any one of you tries to play hero and go back in there, and I'll
shoot for the leg. Disobey and be carried out of here.”
Randy continued to argue. “I saw military trucks on the far side
of Raven's Beach. Maybe there are soldiers in there that can
help us.”
Nev Sweeting spat again. “You were hallucinating, boy. Don't
spread rumors about the military being in there. Consider that
place sealed. It's too dangerous to enter, especially by idiots
like you who think they can snoop around.”
Ignoring most of this chatter, Sam remained near the fire with
an arm around trembling Deena. Her face was unusually pale. Her
eyes were on what was happening on the other side of the fence.
Burk was also ignoring Sweeting and the others under the auspice
that taking one's eyes off the enemy would not be wise.
There appeared to be a lull. No more howls of victims. The aura
fanning from the ground up through the trees had faded, as had
the blue flares and lightning-like forks in the sky. It was
still dark above, the moon and stars buried, but the ash was
only flakes here and there now. The force curtain was still
present and had moved up to the edge of the marsh at the fence;
it wasn't crackling or sparking at present, but in an almost
dormant state – nearly invisible but lurking as very faint blue
amber. It seemed almost intangible, like dusty moonbeams fading
in from a crack in the clouds.
A
few alien lights were passing in and out of view, but no beings
were revealed by them. The enemy had gone close to invisible,
becoming movements of darker shadow in the odd scintillation of
faint night light. Overall, the atmosphere was calm, as the wind
had suddenly died. The crickets were now silent. Two dogs barked
from deep in the campground, and they proved to be announcing
the ambassador's new arrival, as an ominous flash followed.
A
large light suddenly flared above the reeds in the marsh and
drifted over to the opening. The elegant figure of the
ambassador stood right at the borderline as he stood on pieces
of the blasted fence. His face lacked the evil grin of his dark
side, and he didn't seem fully present, like he actually existed
somewhere else. His mouth was now a stern black line, and his
eyes glowed blue in deep sockets. His expression came across as
intense, full of hate … though it was hard to tell what was real
and what was distortion.
Burk had no intention of further contact. His feeling was that
death was the only message, so he tapped Rin on the shoulder and
signaled the other militiamen with his left hand.
Nev Sweeting and the assortment of rangers, along with the rest
of the crowd, ended up caught in the trap of their own
arguments, and when they did notice what was going on, the
militiamen and women had their weapons raised. Burk hollered for
action, and the scene became an explosion of bullets followed by
a sustained beam from Rin's gun.
As the projectiles hit, the lights in the opening flared and
became a swirl of black ... a hole that most of the people
didn't see as the rangers were ordering them back through the
trees. But they were unable to get a full retreat underway, as
many people kept halting and staring back at the action. They
saw the hole take on another dimension, like a tunnel, and the
next red beam Rin fired flew down it, bounced back out, and was
reflected over the top of the sand dune into the sky. A shining
shield remained in the air, spun, and became the light flare
again. Blue mist faded behind the transparency, and the
ambassador was there again before them, holding a small blue orb
delicately in his fingers.
The militia guns fell silent. The open area of the broken fence
glowed, emitting a piercing wave of sound. The ground began to
quake. Cracks opened, and beams of blue light shot up and fanned
out. The sand dune also came alive with light, and huge plumes
of earth rose in the air. Two rangers were sucked right into the
opening ground, Burk nearly went under a spray of sand, and
everyone went into retreat mode as flashes of black zoomed
through the fence. A sudden gust of ash came down from an aura
over the trees, and the force curtain ballooned over the
remainder of the fence. A militiaman and one of Nev Sweeting's
rangers were caught at the edge of the field. The first was
sucked into a vortex in the sand, and the other met a clutch of
black demons that consumed him.
Burk's formerly calm face had gathered a stamp of pessimism. His
lips skinned his teeth as if his intellectual powers were
strained. This mad disaster was more than the expected war with
the feds. It was more like a war with alien creepazoids. He
turned to Sam, his eyes salty and wide. “I just lost a man.
Sucked down into a hellhole. We'd better get to the vehicles and
move them back in case those things come on even stronger. It's
better to pull out than lose good men. Get a breather and figure
out how to kill those slime-balls.”
Sam's expression was also grim, and he nodded as Rin and Deena
ran up. “Okay. Let the rangers pull the people back. Call the
militia out of battle formation and run for the vehicles. We got
to get them clear because we need them to get out of this damn
place.”
Rin hesitated a moment as he looked over his shoulder at more
sand exploding from the dune. The rangers, Nev Sweeting, and the
crowd were seriously on the run now and already disappearing on
the tree-lined paths. After taking a glance at them, Rin barked
out some loud commands, and then they were all running down to
the beach and along it to the spot where they had moved the
vehicles.
Forks of lightning were now exploding like mauve-feathered
cracks in the sky, but there was no thunder – at least not
immediately. That came when burning objects began falling from
the sky; sparks and embers singed the night air as they flew in
spectacular bursts. Sam did a roll as one landed near him in the
sand, bouncing. He recognized it as a burning log – most likely
it had been part of one of the log structures at Raven's Beach
before the ambassador and his forces had sent it as burning
debris into the sky.
Debris was still falling behind them as they reached the
vehicles, and in moments, ATVs kicked up sand and roared away.
Sam had to wait for some of them to move as his cream Andersen
Wing was boxed in. A leather-jacketed militiaman roared out, and
he got to the door. Burning twigs showered down out of the sky,
and he batted them away as he got in. The light outside was
purplish-blue and brightening the area, giving the feeling of
being under some strange X-rays or cosmic rays. Deena appeared,
and more burning debris fell. A flaming shingle bounced off her
shoulder as Sam ducked over and opened the passenger door. She
jumped inside, and something banged on the roof; then sparks
showered over the windshield. Sam revved the engine and tore off
down the beach.
Deena's long tresses had found a windblown style. She looked
sexy when frightened, as her eyes had a childlike aspect. She
gave Sam a knowing glance; he pulled his attention back to his
driving. There was a bottleneck ahead, with all the vehicles
squeezed through on the same narrow path. Sam slowed, then
reached over and squeezed Deena's shoulder. “You never said
anything about your family. Are they in this area?”
“No, so at least I don't have to worry about them. My brother is
in Vancouver. He's a high school teacher. My father died of
cancer when I was ten. Two years later, my mother drank herself
to death. I was raised by my grandmother. She's buried here.
Died two years ago.”
“So you're independent. What about that Nev Sweeting character,
does he have a family?”
“Some relatives like Jesse. His parents and brother left town
and sold their property. He has a house in the conservation
area. Probably couldn't find anyone interested in marrying him.
He's boring, but he wasn't any trouble before this happened.
Something very strange about him now. He's been touched.”
“Yeah. More so than other people. You lost your boyfriend, and
it didn't affect your mind.”
“Maybe that Agent Nelson guy or the Major messed up his mind.
Promised him a big promotion or something if he tows their
line.”
“It would be something like that. He's not working for his
people here in Indian Falls. It's like he wants everyone to die.
Maybe he hates people, or maybe he's just over his head and
doesn't have the skill set to deal with this kind of stuff. If
not, he's in some way turned. Like the feds seem to be turned. I
mean, there's no logic in being on the side of a hostile force
like what we're dealing with. Unless it is somehow their hostile
force and they sent it.”
“Or it contacted them first, and has power over them.”
The bottleneck cleared, and Sam followed the last ATV out into a
wider clearing and across to the park with the other vehicles in
the grass by the gravel lot near the entry road. They could see
bright lights and the roadblock farther back blocking the exit
from the campground. Sam spotted something else just off the
edge of the lights: military trucks, classic style with
canvas-covered backs. He pulled his field glasses from off the
floor by Deena's feet and took a closer look. The helmeted heads
of a couple of soldiers poked out of the back. The men standing
at the roadblock were rangers, or soldiers disguised as them.
Sam put the glasses around his neck. “They've sandbagged the
road up past the roadblock and are hiding military trucks there.
For sure, they want us locked in here, and they don't want us to
know the military is behind it.”
Stu Pooler had all the lights on, creating a huge yellow dome of
light in the large clearing. Bugs swirled up to the top of it,
but the sky was so dark it began in the treetops and tunneled
off to the fading light show over at Raven's Private Beach.
People were streaming through the trees, coming from trailers,
tents, the beach, the dance floor, and other hidden places. In
fleeing, they'd abandoned nearly everything, and most of them
had already pulled their vehicles out, creating a huge parking
lot filling the road and stretching down over the grass to the
beach in places.
For tonight, people wanted out, most of them likely thinking
they could return and pick up the pieces another day. Stu Pooler
was shouting to Randy Giffen and his campground rangers, telling
them to bring women, the elderly, and kids up to pre-teens to
the brightest area around his entry headquarters. The long log
structure had a fenced area around it that he opened up.
The security formation being created was a roadblock, with
rangers keeping vehicles inside, and the most vulnerable people
packed in the area around Stu Pooler's place. Healthier adults
ringed them and were guarded by more rangers. The militia formed
a protective half-circle facing Raven's Beach, and it generally
wasn't a solution at all. Everyone knew the night was long from
over, and for any real safety, people had to load into vehicles
and get out.
Ranger Nev Sweeting appeared on a commandeered dune buggy. He'd
somehow managed to mount blinding lights on it and was dogging
all the paths outside the area while calling on a powered horn
for everyone to gather in the clearing. The last stragglers
slowly showed up on the paths; Randy Giffen and some rangers
went out to search the campground for anyone left behind, then
Sweeting decided it was time to address everyone, rode up, and
got off the buggy. Sweat and sand dust streaked the whisker
stubble on his face. He glared at both Sam and Deena as he
swaggered by, then he called the rangers around him like they
were a personal army.
In the shining lights, his eyes flared with wild effect. He
truly did look mad, and Sam was now certain he'd been touched.
Nev Sweeting was working against everyone in a clever way, and
there was no smooth way to deal with it. It would be nice to
step out and restrain him.
Burk passed Rin a cigar and watched as Nev Sweeting's men ran a
hook-up to the sound system in the dance area. The rangers and
Sweeting positioned themselves a ways off from it, facing the
crowd, preparing to make announcements. Some of the townspeople
were now armed and following the militia's directions. Jesse
Milbrand was there with some shotgun-toting farm boys and older
men with assault rifles. Leon Ottawa had apparently brought
weapons in for his circle of armed men and women. Most of them
from downtown Indian Falls.
Sam was now weapons-ready too, but not visibly so – he had the
SNX experimental gun in its case and the M-Scope inside a
plastic bag in his left hand. He noted some activity off towards
Raven's Beach again, and mauve light shot through the sky in
tentacles in that direction. Like odd lightning, the branches
arced in the sky and flashed to an endpoint inside Cedarwood.
Trouble was definitely afoot as the heavenly signs indicated
that the ambassador's bizarre forces were about to move deep
into the campground. All eyes remained on the sky, and then
flicked back to the ground as Nev Sweeting started talking to
his rangers. Ignoring Sweeting, Sam pulled out the M-Scope and
ran through the settings. He held it up toward the dark sky and
the lights. More tentacles flashed, and he pulled it down and
checked the reading.
Burk stepped up. “Get any reading on that light show?”
“Yeah. It reads as an unknown energy source, unknown spectrum
... and the power estimates are beyond belief. Those things are
aliens because everything else is ruled out. They are cracking
into this area with a force beam and an incredibly powerful
power source. Think of them as predators with technology that
allows them to tunnel right into other worlds and destroy them.
Or more aptly put, destroy other life forms, as that is what
they appear to feed on.”
“I knew they were more than ghosts. Those sick things are near
impossible to fight, and on top of that, the damn cops and feds
are helping them. To me, they don't make any real sense. They
use fantastic powers just to kill people.”
Sam shook his head, somewhat disgusted. “They have some things
in common with the bad side of the human race. But there was
never a guarantee that alien beings would share our humanity. It
is actually more likely that any alien life would be strange to
us. On the power, think of how much energy we gain in splitting
atoms. They may be splitting energy from biological life in ways
currently unknown to us.”
“Shit,” Rin said. “Sweeting wants to convince us that we should
stay here and die.”
Burk puffed his cigar. “Ain't gonna be that way. If those things
start coming this way, we'll blast that roadblock out of the
way. As far as those feds and rangers at it go, let God sort 'em
out, because we aren't wasting time screwing around with
traitors to humanity.”
Sam was still moving the M-Scope and tuning the focus around the
sky. Again, the heavens were slowly brightening like an
incandescent lamp, slowly producing more light. Unexpectedly, a
long, terrified cry came from deep in the campground. It served
to halt the chatter. Nev Sweeting and his rangers looked off in
that direction for a moment, and then the restless people grew
noisy, and the militiamen and rangers moved out a few yards and
held a line to block anyone from running off in that direction
with ideas of a rescue in mind. The people were agitated now,
and some were shouting. Nev Sweeting was again in an argument
with a couple of his rangers and had not yet addressed the
crowd.
Sam lowered the M-scope and talked low to Burk and Rin. “I think
I just took a reading on a person being killed out there. This
is important. The scope has been recording what it calls bursts
in transmission power from a local source. The scream registered
as a burst of refined energies, like the dying person released
it.”
Rin scratched his chin. “So what in the hell does that mean?”
“You saw how those things kill a person. It's almost like they
instantly pull someone apart and swallow every atom except those
in the bones. If the scope is right, their attacks aren't to
feed on flesh, organs, and blood. That horror is a side effect.
They are deconstructing the atoms or energies of the flesh and
brain ... or somehow processing body chemicals and feeding on a
burst of refined energy.”
Burk's eyes widened. He was definitely spooked. “Bastards eat
your soul. They won't get me alive.”
Sam continued in a whisper. “The scope records transmissions of
energy, but it can't say what the energy is except that huge
bursts come and go from a local source. That's how these things
appear here and there around Indian Falls. They are transmitted
from one point somewhere in this area. Or maybe they initially
arrive at one point.”
“Got a location on the source?” Rin said.
“No. Haven't figured it out. But I think there is a person who
did figure it out. Marco will likely be found at that source. We
have to find it too, so the immediate goal is to get out of
here. No matter what Nev Sweeting or soldiers want, we blast our
way and everyone else's way out of here.”
Burk grinned. “Copy that. I plan to take the center of town and
move everyone there. You're coming, too. We'll move Marco's lab
from the cottage. Once we have the people in the downtown, we
can defend against military and alien creeps. At least for a
while until we figure out how to stop those things or find that
source and Marco.”
Sam nodded in agreement. “Send one man around to everyone we can
trust. Do it while Nev is distracted up there. Tell them to wait
and break out with us at the signal.”
Burk agreed, walked off, and talked to one of his men.
Sam noticed the lights at the roadblock had been shut off, so
the area was in the dark. Despite the bright lights in the
immediate area, the sky in the direction of Raven's Beach was
still brightening so that one could now look through the
treetops at a huge splash of mauve that illumined the bottom of
the low ash clouds. A flash appeared in nearby trees, and it
introduced Nev Sweeting's latest talk. Back up on the open
tailgate of a pickup, he had a wireless microphone on his
collar, and his opening words created a blast of ear-splitting
distortion. Behind him, his soundman adjusted the software on a
control screen, and his next words came out slick and smooth.
“I know everyone's upset because some people are dead, but I
need everyone to remain calm.”
Angry catcalls instantly rang out. Some teenagers booed. Gill
Ottawa, Leon's son, made a rational challenge to Nev Sweeting's
intro. “Those lights are moving close fast. Remain calm, yes.
But we should remain calm while you remove the roadblock. We
need to get out of here.”
Nev Sweeting took it in stride. “You don't have your thinking
cap on, boy. It's best that everyone stay together. If people
leave, they'll disperse around the area, and there'll be more
victims. We can't let people go back over to Raven's Beach
looking for the missing. Any searches have to be in daylight
hours when those things don't show.”
Jenny's boyfriend, Donnie, was the next to yell. His voice
sounded weak in comparison to Sweeting's amplified tones. “Don't
let people disperse. We all go back into town in a convoy.
That's safest.”
Nev Sweeting almost crooned, like his being the center of
attention was what this was about. “We can wait them out.
They've done their damage for one night. Give it an hour, and
you'll see their lights die down.”
Sam saw Burk's man whispering in Deena's ear. She listened and
then yelled out to Sweeting. “That's no temporary roadblock over
there. You sandbagged us in. You're trying to keep people here,
and you aren't telling us why.”
Leon Ottawa followed with a holler. “He's penning us in ...
fresh beef for the slaughter by those alien demons!”
A
wind of nasty whispers swept the crowd. A couple of pop cans
bounced off Sweeting's pickup, causing two rangers to step back
and point their rifles at the teenagers.
“All right, there's more,” Nev announced in his firmest tone.
“The fact is, we have to be sure you people haven't been
infected. You've been exposed to an alien life form and rays we
can't identify. Indian Falls and the surrounding area are under
quarantine. This crowd stays here until medical experts arrive
by helicopter tomorrow. Once tests are done, everyone can
leave.”
Boos and angry cries cut Nev Sweeting off. His rangers were
fanning out, some with handguns drawn, and others with rifles.
Jesse Milbrand and his farmers stepped forward, facing off with
them with drawn shotguns. Burk's militia didn't react. They kept
their guns down. It looked like the restless crowd might settle
things by refusing to be penned in, but if Nev Sweeting's men
fired on them, chaos would break out.
The standoff reached a point of high-wire tension, and then a
green light suddenly flared high in the sky, right over the
trees at the edge of the clearing. It was a startling flash, and
this time there was thunder of sorts – but more of a bang, like
a car crash had happened in the heavens. A plume of blue sparks
appeared high above and fanned out as sparkles floated slowly
down on the trees lining the far end of the clearing. Glowing
brighter by the moment, they caused a loud crackling of the air,
and by the time some of them hit the ground, a curtain of light
had formed. It shifted and smoothed to a semi-transparent
curtain all across the tree line at the edge of the clearing.
This was not the same force curtain they'd encountered at
Raven's Beach, but likely another form of it. And rather than
have it creep across the campground as it had done on the nude
beach, the monsters were in with another surprise. Slowly, the
curtain took on the mauve shades that had been appearing in the
sky, and the whole thing blew forward in ruffles so that it
moved a few yards into the clearing.
It shifted in lace-like semi-transparency and had a shine like
dark silk at the folds. All eyes were on it, and initially, the
tree line appeared behind it, but that image slowly changed
until no trees were visible. An illusion; a vast, barren
landscape existed there, and large, creeping shadows and
boulders could be seen in the faint light from a moon-like orb
far on the other side.
The wash of the water tumbling in at the nearby beach became the
only sound as the crowd and even crickets fell silent in view of
this new occurrence. Rangers and Jesse Milbrand's armed farmers
now moved farther out in front of the crowd to face the strange
event, but the militia slowly melted back into the people as
Burk went ahead with the plan. He had men creeping into position
on the north side, along with Rin and the beam gun, as they
prepared to knock out the roadblock and clear away the sandbags.
Sam was busy M-Scoping the event, and after a seesaw reading of
huge unknown energy fields, he put the scope away. Squatting, he
opened the case and assembled his gun.
Whispering swept the frightened crowd, as something was moving
on the horizon beyond the curtain. Humanoid figures, darker than
shadows. They shambled slowly, backlit by the strange orb. As
they grew closer, they took on sinister silhouettes.
A
hot breeze, more than wind in its creepy touch and fragrance,
suddenly blew, and a portion of the energy curtain flew loose,
generating long wisps of floating gossamer. Like webbing, it
twisted, spun, and then fluttered around the food hut and dance
floor, which was now abandoned. It swirled there in a carousel,
emitting sparkles that hypnotized like the gleam of an arcing
watch fob, and then its energy became a flash of light. The food
hut brightened, faint music began to play on the dance floor,
and out of the light, growing shadows appeared and slowly took
form.
Sam glanced at the dance floor. He judged what he was seeing
there to be an illusion, and then he turned to crouch and watch
the figures moving behind the curtain. He knew the others,
especially those close up, were under a spell of sorts. Most of
the militiamen were clear of it, having moved off to hidden
spots near the roadblock. Both Nev Sweeting's and Stu Pooler's
rangers lowered their weapons and looked on stupidly at the
dance floor. Nev himself went owl-eyed and silent. Jesse
Milbrand's armed farmers had become like the rest, spectators
who had forgotten the danger they were in.
With his weapon assembled, Sam walked over to Burk, shook him,
and turned him around.
Burk shook his head and rubbed his eyes. “The crowd is
hypnotized,” Sam whispered. “The dark creeps over there behind
the force curtain is the reality. What's happening on the dance
floor is an illusion.”
Burk gave a groggy nod, then regained his composure. “Those
things are all tricks and stuff like spiders with their webs.
They play with reality like they aren't quite real themselves.”
“Get ready to signal Rin. We're going to make things happen
before that ambassador shows and does. Give me a minute to
position myself and my SNX gun, then start the fireworks.”
Burk slipped away quietly and moved in Rin's direction. Sam
walked off, and the show began before a few minutes had passed.
By the food hut and on the dance floor, the play of moving
shadows became a gathering of human forms. They were conversing
with one another and looking over at the staring crowd. Faces
came clear in the lights, followed by gasps from people in the
campground crowd. The faces were of some of the disappeared and
the dead, or illusions of them, and that illusion was enough to
confuse the crowd.
As the vision strengthened, Nev Sweeting's rangers lost control.
Jesse Milbrand saw a missing nephew there, put down his gun, and
began to stroll over. He was wide-eyed like he couldn't quite
believe what he was seeing. Deena was another; she broke away
from a group of teens and headed across the sandy field to
reunite with her missing boyfriend, Brett. Others hurried past
them, some women weeping, and when Sarah Parker from the town
records office broke into a run toward what she thought was her
missing daughter, Nev Sweeting suddenly appeared well in front
of them. He'd quickly circled, and he raised a handgun and fired
into the sky, bringing everyone to a halt.
Sam glanced back and marveled at the perfection of the illusion
and how quickly people forgot how it came about ... from
whirling wisps of an energy field to a mass hallucination that
blended perfectly into the reality of the campground. The dance
floor and food hut were there as before, but suddenly alive with
ghosts that had become flesh. If you believed in magic, it was
real, and if you were filled with grief, it was real. It played
on the human desire to believe loved ones were alive. But Sam
didn't believe anyone had magically returned, most or all of
them from the grave; he believed in an alien technology that
created a honey trap. Possibly, it was because he'd looked away
from it at the beginning. The hypnotism hadn't clicked in on
him. He knew it looked like reality. It was as if you could run
up and touch these people. But it wasn't possible or likely.
What was likely was that something else was hiding behind it.
Nev Sweeting began shouting, and the group of twenty people that
had come closest to the dance floor halted momentarily out of
fear of being shot by him. “We'll do this in an orderly
fashion,” he commanded. “I want everyone in a tight group, and
then you walk up slowly. These people aren't coming out to us.
So let's see if you folks can talk to them.”
Stunned silence had again come over the larger crowd. The small
group streamed around Nev Sweeting, and he had them move
forward, taking position at the rear as though he was bringing
over a herd of sheep.
Leading them to the slaughter, Sam thought. A thought that was
brief because the militia suddenly opened up on the barricade
with their guns.
All hell broke loose instantly, and Sam found himself part of
it. As he was lifting his weapon and moving off to the side,
there was a brilliant flash rising over by the roadblock. Rin
had stepped out from behind a tree to fire his beam gun. The
sustained blast sent the pile of sandbags flying, bursting into
a burning spray. The militiamen who had crept up also fired and
took out some of the soldiers disguised as rangers. There was
return fire and then panic on the grounds as people dived down
and ran off in various directions ... some headed for their
cars, others for the beach, and some for Stu Pooler's HQ
building.
Sam only had a moment to get far enough over for a clean shot,
and he found himself on one knee and squeezing the trigger
button on the SNX barely in time. Deena and a few others had
almost reached the food hut and dance floor area. The wide beam
he fired expanded to the left of them. He kept the burst
sustained, and on the illusion that he was sure existed.
Hellish flames sprouted and replaced the dance-floor mirage, and
the dream everyone was having vanished and was replaced by the
revelation of a magnificent lie.
The flames killed the beautiful illusions and the memories
they’d conjured up, and the melting fire of Sam’s beam painted a
new picture that brought surprise and shock.
The dance floor and food hut were empty and dead … while foolish
hope still had a few people running for a dream of loved ones.
It gave Sam a sudden stomach-turning feeling as another fading
flare in the sky became alien. Then the flames and light
receded, and in a blink the moon came out of the clouds.
The dance floor became the home of faded ghosts. The food hut
burst into flames, and Sam found little satisfaction in
destroying the illusion. It was disheartening to see cruel
disappointment appear on Deena’s face as the beloved she'd been
hoping to embrace turned into sprouting flames.
Inky shadows appeared. Wicked images that became the twisted
faces and fangs of the ambassador's vile army. Faces she was
able to avoid as she screamed and dived to the ground. Some of
the others did not halt in time and ran into the jaws of the
trap and an enemy that ripped up body and soul.
Jesse and five other people had also thrown themselves down, and
they turned and ran back to a crowd no longer there. The others
had already panicked and dispersed, aware of the movements of
other evil beings in the dark.
The remaining rangers and secret soldiers were quiet shadows
looking for an opening in the militia. Others were dead or
bleeding in the dirt. In the panic of the desperate crowd,
children and younger teens were quickly pushed into the back of
cars that could not move. Stronger-minded adults threw Stu
Pooler, a few rangers, and their guns aside. Other folk were
confused, and one beautiful blond Indian Fall’s mom ran
screaming down to the lapping waves, crying for her daughter.
Just past her, a stray cat ran out and did a mad dash right up
and across the dance floor … cheating the alien shadows and
their hungry mouths as it escaped into some bushes.
Fingers over the buttons of the beam gun, Sam wasn’t certain of
the setting, but Rin was as he locked his beam. Burk keyed the
militia to fire, and the night exploded again, taking out the
rest of the roadblock in a heavy explosion of blood, sand,
swamp, mud, and fire. The eruption buried a couple of military
vehicles in the muck with blasted bodies that would likely never
be found except perhaps mingled with the foul odors of swamp
gas.
Those rangers assigned to Stu Pooler had thrown their guns down
and gone in with the people loading the convoy of vehicles. In
the faint moonlight illuminating the chaos, Sam saw only the
blinding burst, then Deena’s dark hair blowing up as she dashed
over the grass. Her dress tore against her slim legs, and her
cat-like eyes found him. She was like another ghost running from
a terror the people of Indian Falls had yet to name. Fleeing the
sudden rise of motion on an evil dance floor … blackened things
that posed as shadows when they weren't that, but inky bodies
raised out of some alien killing ground.
They were coming through the curtain of energy across the field.
Organized forces of some otherworldly wickedness, appearing to
twist up from the lower ground into tall forms, hurrying out
into the killing moon now beginning to show in this world.
There were still people randomly dispersed around the
campground. Deena was in immediate danger, fleeing monsters were
already shifting form to lunge in at lightning speed. Nev
Sweeting also remained close to the monsters, running about and
spouting words like a madman no one would listen to anymore.
He'd gone from commands to crying for help, and Sam believed him
to be a lying siren trying to pull others in range of the ebony
killers.
Like ink with magic power, the monsters snapped into order. A
force of twenty of them came through the buzz of the energy
curtain, moving to pounce on the rest of the strays dispersed in
the field. At the same moment, Burk showed in the lights,
running down the entry road, yelling, “Start your engines and
move! Get everyone in and get out! The roadblock’s gone!”
The monsters took several victims, cutting them down fast in the
dark. Car engines roared, more ignitions found power, and many
more doors slammed as the moment of final escape arrived.
Sam saw a black wave … a vision that reminded him of bats flying
in … then the energy field morphed to absolute darkness,
blacking everything out in a fast flash. His fingers tapped out
a difficult pattern on the experimental gun, and then he fired,
going to one knee, sweeping the widening beam. A flash of yellow
brilliance melted the darkness, and he saw Deena. She'd likely
never been this frightened before. She tumbled beside him as his
beam swept up.
The shot was a lucky one, striking a swarm of the approaching
inky monsters, causing them to flare and melt to the sand as
oily liquid. Across the clearing, the energy fence hissed,
became visible as a burning curtain, and shot blue fire into the
treetops. A cloud of smoke drifted, a new cover for the
regrouping monsters.
It was over for a moment. Deena got up from the thin grass at
Sam’s feet. The main campground lights came back on in sequence,
and in the small return of reality, Sam felt residual energy
wash through him and collapsed. He saw Deena taking the weapon
from his hands, then he fainted and dreamed.
The sense
was of falling, being sucked down, and Sam heard sounds and
voices that were mostly nonsense. The dream congealed into
coiling snakes and repulsive dark images. Finally, a hissing
mist took it all under. It was as if his mind had been
snake-bit. It cleared on a vision of giant coins, some bronze,
others silver and gold. They were like parts of a collection,
and one flew out with overwhelming power.
He found
himself in space, looking down at a planet and moving toward it.
The descent was like that of a meteor with fire and burning, but
of his soul. He felt cleansed and a spirit seeing an earth-like
world. Floating down to a city, and in a sudden updraft, he was
overwhelmed.
A ghost
passed through him, and he saw vibrant times, music, and
celebration … not images he could fully understand, but they
were beings, humanoid, and it was another Earth with animals,
culture, and beauty … until the ambassador appeared deep in a
crowded city square. He was much as he appeared at present,
humanoid, with wicked features hidden behind a suddenly
developing, elegant facade.
The dream
became a bloodbath, except that the population of this planet
had blood more yellow than red, and it spilled as the ebony
monsters swarmed in to feed. They rested and fed again, killing
and using strange tricks and devices. Blue lightning cracked the
sky, and force fields crackled on the ground as they moved with
incredible speed over the surface of the world.
Grief
rose with the emotions of ghosts of the dead passing through
him. All of it adding up to a final scream and a falling tear,
dropping down to a planet become skeletons and desert.
There was
no mercy in this dream; another coin slipped into the galactic
slot, and he saw another planet destroyed. The soul-killing pain
went on, leaving him alive as the only witness and record. He
was the only possible agent of retribution for billions of
beings on dead planets.
He saw
how the monsters arrived from space, and there were always local
betrayers. Always a chamber through dimensions of space and
time. The biggest coin was the last world, the dead world of the
legions the ambassador led … a desert world, all sand and piles
of massive bones with a host of vile, hungry things … bleak
things that had killed their own planet.
They
gathered in legion near a sky-high arch imprinted with the bones
of the dead giants of their own planet. Waiting to traverse
space to new worlds, using an alien technology created by the
morally superior home-world race they’d destroyed. This arch
allowed them passage through to decimate other worlds.
Inside
that incredible and evil edifice, a new coin spun and glowed in
wonder and beauty. It was the Earth and the glory of a planet
rich with life. Behind the gate, black hordes of vile creatures
waited. They had no food, culture, or legacy beyond the dead
cities towering across their planet. Earth and a new feeding was
their lust; they knew only suffering, and chattering jaws as
they waited. They were life forms with no purpose, other than
one – to feed on and destroy others, and in their spinning
scopes hundreds of planets showed … all with one thing in common
— advanced life.
These
hungry villains had no heroes, love, or literature. All the past
glory of their home world had become dead bones on the sand and
a vacuum in their minds. They were creatures with the stolen
knowledge that had taken them through the planets to feed and
kill. The left desert planets behind as moldering monuments and
doomed places where any future visitors would only curse and
wonder what had happened.
Sam's
consciousness returned in the back seat of the car. Two kids
were sprawled across his body, and Deena and two militia women
were crammed in the front. One of the kids, an eight-year-old
girl, screeched as Sam shook his head and rose. The windows were
closed, but he could see out. The road ahead was illumined, and
he noted that they were at the tail end of the convoy fleeing
Cedarwood Campground. His was the last car, and behind it were
some of the militia's ATVs. He could see bright lights in the
clearing, and that it was split with the back half darkened by
blue mist and odd sparkles that stretched down to the beach. As
he watched, a man burst from the cover of a cedar tree, running
for the rear of the convoy. He didn't get far; a swirl of black
shadows suddenly rose in the mist and covered him.
Sam
cleared his throat. “We didn't get everyone out?”
His voice
disappeared in the sound of gunfire as the militiamen to the
rear blasted bullets into the darkness. He saw Rin step out and
fire a beam blast at the grass that sent a wave of dirt and fire
in the direction of the monsters.
Deena
turned to him. “We got most people, but not those who panicked
and ran off from the entrance. We can't go behind their lines
without being erased. They use shadows and darkness for cover
like chameleons. They speed out from any shadows and massacre
people.”
Ahead,
the convoy picked up speed. Deena hit the gas, driving fast over
the rutted blast area to avoid getting stuck in the sand. Light
was sweeping over the back windshield, so Sam opened his window
and stuck his head out to look back. He heard the kids yell for
him to shut it as they got down on the floor at his feet.
Sam felt
for his field glasses, and they were still there around his
neck. The car bounced on ruts, and that gave him some knocks,
but he saw past the militia vehicles on their tail and swept the
view through the campground. He caught a glimpse of some figures
running on the beach, the wrong way toward Raven's Beach. A
group of campground dogs proved to be smarter because they were
running the other way on the beach, fleeing the monsters. Bones
littered the dance floor and the area around the food hut, and
he saw shadows there seething and moving like beasts lying in
wait. Blue and green flares lit the sky, and what had been the
force curtain was now an area of twilight that wasn't quite
dark, where the campground lights didn't penetrate.
Night
lights nearly as high as the trees glowed but cast no light to
the ground. Mist was drifting as well, and he guessed that the
entire area back to the far side of Raven's Beach was inside the
alien circle of control or feeding.
The last
place he looked was by Stu Pooler's huge log-cabin headquarters.
The east end of it had caught fire from one of the blasts, and
behind it in the lights, he saw two figures by a birch tree.
They were facing one another. One was the ambassador, looking
barely rumpled considering the chaos. The other was conservation
boss Nev Sweeting. Sweeting had blue light reflecting in his
eyes and a glow on his face. He was talking hurriedly, like he
was almost begging something of the ambassador.
Sam
pulled his head inside and leaned over to Deena. “Deena, where
the hell is Burk?”
“At the
front – some of the militia are our escort. In case more
military or Sergeant McKraken's men show up to block us.”
“As soon
as you get a chance, I want you to get ahead and catch up with
him.”
“That
would be difficult. Rin's right behind us. Maybe you can get him
to call him on his pocket communicator.”
The
lights of Raven's and Cedarwood had all but vanished in the
distance, leaving the night like a hot breath in the darkness.
Ashes were still falling here and there, causing Sam to avoid
deep breaths as he got out of the car on the roadside. The main
convoy was moving ahead, and he waited while Deena and the kids
were transferred to the pickup Burk had commandeered. Deena gave
Sam a goodbye peck on the cheek and said only, “Be careful.”
Then the truck pulled out, caught up with the convoy, and Sam
was left in the taillights of his Andersen Wing car and facing
Burk and Rin.
Burk lit
a sweet, tailored cigar. “So what's this about Nev Sweeting?”
“I saw
him there through the glasses when we left. He was off in the
dark with the ambassador, and he wasn't dying. He's been working
with those monsters all along.”
Rin
raised an eyebrow. “The feds, too, because they aren't dying
unless we kill them. The ambassador must have gotten them back
at the beginning. He got to the feds, our local provincial
police, the military at Deep River, and conservation ranger Nev
Sweeting. They want the people here at Indian Falls eaten up by
those devils. At first, I thought they wanted a war with us. But
what we saw back there tells a different tale. They don't even
take us seriously, but think we're an easy kill.”
“My car
here has a weapons system. If we encounter any of them on the
road, it'll see some use.” He glanced at Rin's gun. “That beam
gun of yours held them back, and the experimental gun had
effect, too. Got any more beam guns?”
“One
more,” Burk said. “We can only do a fighting retreat because
once they're on us, they're too fast. We have to find another
way to kill those things. Maybe that scope of Marco's will
help.”
Sam had
doubts about that. “I think we've got nearly all the information
we can get with it. I did some reading on energy transfers.
Those monsters come from somewhere else, like across space, and
I think they have a main entry in the falls somewhere and a way
to transfer location. The reason I wanted to stop here is Nev
Sweeting. Where is his Ranger HQ? We need to check it.”
Burk
savored a puff. “He's deep in the conservation area. Lives in
the main HQ as his home. Few people go out there, as he has a
storefront office in town. The town office has nothing but
radios, a computer satellite hook-up, and walls of real-time
maps. I've been in there before.”
Sam took
a deep breath. “I had a crazy dream back there. It told me
something. Let's go ... we're going to see what he keeps at his
HQ.”
Nev
Sweeting's HQ was deep in owl country, down a country road in
the heart of the conservation area. Wild enough country that
most people drove slowly out of fear of hitting deer or even
bears. The road began to wind through ravines and gullies. As
they approached an arched bridge over a fierce running stream,
Burk told Sam to pull over and stop.
“If we
drive over that hill and someone's there, they'll see us coming.
If anyone's outside, they might have already noticed our lights.
Going in on foot is the only safe way.”
After
hiding the car behind some scrub, they set out on foot, taking
only small automatic weapons. The darkness was blinding, but
they used a pen flashlight and turned it off as they crested the
hill. The trees were tall, and the forest deep here, but Nev
Sweeting's HQ showed in an open crescent circle off the road
below. It consisted of one large structure and a garage that
looked large enough for several vehicles. Part of the main house
was a temporary barracks that could house several rangers. Only
one vehicle was out in the open, so it looked like that wasn't
populated now. A single light was on in the parking lot at the
entrance, where signage marked the public office. A few other
soft lights showed in some interior rooms near it, but other
than that, the place looked empty.
“That's
not a ranger truck,” Burk whispered. “It's military.”
Sam
lifted his glasses and studied the building. “I see one person
on the inside in the office area. Looks like he's talking to
someone, so there's at least two of them.”
“Neither
of them is Sweeting,” Rin said. “None of his vehicles has
returned.”
“Be quiet
for a moment,” Burk said. “Listen. I hear a weird humming noise
like they have equipment of some kind running in there.”
Splitting
up, they moved in on the driveway and building in a three-
pronged approach, and once they found the parking lot clear,
they sent Rin around the side to the back to see if it was
clear. A few minutes passed, then he returned. “No one's back
there, but there's a light on in a shed down a path in the
woods. Possibly someone in it. I didn't go down.”
A tossed
rock went through the window of the one lit room, and a second
later, Burk's flash grenade followed. Sam averted his eyes but
failed to avoid the loud bang. Flying glass came as the rest of
the window exploded. One of the men inside got off a shot, but
no more followed. Burk burst through in the lead, and they found
two men inside, both struggling to hear and see. Rin grabbed the
automatic pistol from one man's hand, and Sam got behind the
other one, put him down, and disarmed him. While they waited for
the two men to come around enough to talk, Burk rifled a closet
and came up with some plastic bag ties, the kind that lock, and
used them as makeshift cuffs. They were soldiers in unmarked
military camouflage clothing. They carried no identification
other than military-issued weapons and communications devices.
Burk
rubbed sweat from his brow. “Not much to ask here. They're from
Deep River; they're commandos and obviously working with Nev
Sweeting. He's been in on some secret federal operation all
along.”
Sam
opened a bottle of water he found in the fridge. He took a sip.
“They wouldn't be here unless they're protecting something.
Sweeting could've left just one ranger if he wanted the grounds
guarded.”
“There
might be something out in that shed,” Rin said. “I've been
watching the window, but I haven't seen anyone move out there.
Might be no one, but if there is, they're creeping up or
hiding.”
The two
soldiers were groaning now. One had spittle on his lips and was
trying to talk. “You watch these two. Sam and I will go out. Be
ready to act if any trouble starts or we don't come back in a
few minutes.”
The
darkness out back was thick as oil, but they could see a faint
light. Crossing an open lawn, they found the beginning of a path
through the woods. Again, they only used a penlight to avoid
tripping as they walked a short distance on the soft pine-needle
duff. They came out in an open area in front of a storage hut. A
wrecked car sat in the weeds there, and there were a couple of
wheelbarrows next to a pile of gravel. Listening, they heard
nothing other than night birds and insects. Sam crept up to the
window and looked in. He ducked back immediately and turned to
Burk with surprise on his face.
“I
expected to see a lamp or light cell of some sort in there. But
it's not a light, not a regular one. An object is glowing in
there. I'm not sure what it is.”
“Anyone
in there?”
“Can't
see anyone. I see one mostly open room, a table and chairs by a
computer setup, and that light.”
“Think
it's dangerous?”
“Probably
is.”
The door
opened on hinges that needed oiling. A soft blue glow filled the
room, and it felt like they were entering a carnival fright
house. But other than the light and a computer hook-up that was
turned off, they saw nothing. Burk sat down in one of the chairs
and lit a smoke as Sam cautiously circled the object. It was an
orb, placed on a small stand in the center of the room. It was
attached to a cube base of some variety of black stone. Its
light had odd effects. Though the orb was subdued, its beams
were blue and harsh to the eyes. It gave the feeling of
manufactured starlight or a new kind of black light.
Burk
shrugged his shoulders. “So what is it?”
“I don't
know. The M-Scope is back in the car. The beams from it remind
me of the light from one phase of that force curtain at the
campground. We'll take it with us and study it.”
“It might
be dangerous, even radioactive. Worse, maybe it'll draw them to
us. You want to chance it?”
“No
choice. Those monsters are going to move to finish the rest of
us soon. There is no outside help when the only people we can
contact are in on this conspiracy. This thing is probably a
transmitter or communicator that enables that weird energy they
use. We might be able to use it to our advantage.”
Before
Burke could reply, a man burst in the door and slugged Sam with
a gun butt. Burk had pocketed his own gun and didn't have enough
time to draw it. Sam slumped on the floor, the attacker turned
in the light, and a familiar face showed. It was Sergeant
McKraken, and he was out of uniform, dressed in an oversized
flannel shirt and brown pants like a hunter. But a hunter
stalking men, his weapon a sawed-off scatter rifle with only
close-range reach, yet enough power to leave a man shredded.
“I'm
afraid you boys won't be using anything to your advantage. This
phase will soon be over.”
“So
you're in it deep now, too, Sergeant McKraken. What in the
blazes are you locos up to, feeding Indian Falls to a swarm of
monsters?”
“Some
people are chosen to live. Some to die.”
Sam
slowly got up from the floor, feeling his head for a wound.
“What sort of gibberish is that, McKraken?”
“I mean,
it has always been that way. Even from the beginning in the
Bible, when God killed off the perverse heathen idol worshippers
so the chosen could live on their land.”
Burk
stared at McKraken. “Those monsters aren't God, and the people
of Indian Falls aren't filthy heathens.”
Sergeant
McKraken grinned. “I guess you fellows never spoke to the
ambassador. We did. He comes only to the chosen. We aren't
talking about Indian Falls only. Eventually, it'll be the whole
world. All but the chosen are to be sacrificed.”
“I see,”
Sam said. “That's how it all ties in. Everyone with police power
in this region has been bought off by this ambassador. You're
all under his control.”
“Ah, come
on. What a poor detective you are. Do I look bought off? We
tuned into a promise. A better world is coming, and we'll be in
control of it.”
“You mean
he didn't even show you the money?” Burk said. “You're suckers,
all of you. You talk about the Bible. That offering the whole
world deal is an old devil's trick. You bought a better world
where everyone will be dead.”
“Yeah,
and starting with you,” McKraken hissed as he swung the barrel
to fire. The shot never went off as the top half of his head
became flying splatter, and blood gushed up from what remained
as he fell dead to the floor. Rin stepped through the door. “So
much for the chosen,” he muttered as he kicked one of his legs
aside.
Sam took
a quick look out the door. “Let's grab that alien device and get
out of here before more of them show.”
The base
of the device wasn't quite as heavy as it looked. Sam took up
the rear with it as they went back up the path. The three of
them went back inside Sweeting's place. Burk did a check on the
soldiers, and they were about to leave when Rin swung his gun
around and quickly shot both men, each in the chest, delivering
instant death.
Sam
stuttered as he attempted to speak. Burk frowned. Rin coughed
and gave the bodies a disgusted look. “I heard what Sergeant
McKraken said. They sold us out willingly. Think they're the
chosen or something. Best that they're dead now so they can't
kill us later.”
On exit,
they used a ranger flashlight on the jog back to the car. Sam
had the device covered with a blanket, and it was bulky to carry
due to the base. Not knowing exactly what it was, he was afraid
of dropping or shaking it in case it might explode. From the
hilltop, they saw no lights or approaching vehicles, so they
figured they were at least in the clear if they headed back
toward Indian Falls.
At the
car, Sam got out the M-Scope and uncovered the device. He
glanced at Rin. “Those two soldiers were disarmed?”
“They
committed a capital crime. Being federal soldiers is bad enough,
but going over to an enemy that wants to destroy us all is too
much.”
“Not us
all. At least according to Sergeant McKraken. The ambassador's
job, as I see it, is to gather betrayers on this side and
supervise them. He must be promising them a lot.”
Burk
laughed cynically. “Only a fool would believe promises from
monsters like them.”
“Yup,”
Rin said. “So we got a problem. The world is full of fools.”
Sam ran
over the scope's settings. He had the orb in the backseat and
was trying to scope it through the open door. “Hum, I get GPS
readings flashing and changing, and nothing else. We'll have to
study this later when we get the whole lab of Marco's moved into
town.”
On the
ride in, they found a lot of activity on police and military
bands, both of which Sam and the militia had cracked. There was
plenty of movement on the perimeter of Indian Falls and over at
Deep River, but they could not detect any troops moving inside
other than a couple of beacons from near Raven's Beach. They
were on the approach to the cottage when a van suddenly tore out
from some dark scrub and got behind them. Bullets bounced off
the car's tail but failed to penetrate.
“Fuck,
it's soldiers in that van,” Rin said. “Hold steady. I'm going to
fire on them.”
Sam's
eyes were on the mirror. “Wait. I've got a surprise for them.”
The van
was speeding up to rear-end them and maybe knock them off the
road. Sam watched this in the mirror as he set the car's weapons
system with his right hand. The van was right on them now,
bullets whizzing off the sides of the car, then Sam fired,
sending heavy-caliber bullets from the rear right into the
headlights. It dropped back right away, more bullets hit, then
it exploded and flew off the road. Sam kept driving. Rin looked
back, but all he saw was darkness.
Burk
pulled a flask of whiskey from his pocket, took a slug, and
passed it to Rin. “Troops are going to move in on Raven's Beach
and Cedarwood. Already are. My guess is they're going to clean
up the aftermath. They know most of us escaped and headed into
town, so we've bought some time. But the long night isn't over.
We'll clean out the cottage and put the stuff in a pickup. Rin
will go ahead into town and mobilize the militia for defense and
supply detail.”
“What
kind of supplies are you gathering?” Sam said.
“Armageddon supplies. Weapons, food that'll last ... everything
you can think of. We've got underground bunkers all over this
area. Even in town.”
Rin took
a second slug of whiskey. “This is the big one, brothers.
Armageddon ... it's time for the final showdown with the feds.”
Back in
town, preparations for Armageddon got into play. The dark sky
was still blowing above, hiding any morning light or signs of
Venus that might usually show. The small Indian Falls Hospital
blazed with light, and Sam stopped there first and talked to a
militiaman named Carter. The town surgeon, Dr. DeBartolo, had
the hospital set up in emergency mode, and three armed militia
women and Carter were the early security. The Falls Hospital had
been barely operational in the past, except as an emergency ward
that did temporary treatment and transferred patients to fully
equipped hospitals with government funding. It was now in full
swing as there had been numerous injuries at the campground, and
medical supplies were already being plumped up as Burk's
girlfriend, Laura, had other militia women unloading a pickup
full of stuff they'd brought up from one of the bunkers.
Jesse
Milbrand and his armed farmers had been busy since leaving the
campground and had commandeered nearly every truck in the falls
area, including nearly all of Sweeting's ranger vehicles and
some military trucks. Some older trucks and bags of everything
from soil to fertilizer, along with pylons, sawhorses, and
woodpiles, had been used to set up roadblocks. The militia left
only the north and south main entries to the town passable
through swing gates as they closed things up in case of an
arrival by cops or military. Rin was already in town with three
trucks loaded with his Armageddon supplies, which consisted of a
lot of guns and ammo, packaged foodstuffs, and necessary tools,
tents, and miscellaneous items.
Many
people weren't from town, but the outlying area, and others were
too upset to go home. The park in the center of town sprouted a
tent city with strings of lights, and the town hall's barn-style
doors were open with a crowd inside. The militia had one larger
bunker hidden in the town core, and they emptied it and
designated it as a security location for small children.
As Sam
drove slowly along, he saw Deena dash down the town-hall steps,
her hair flying and her arm in a sling. He pulled over and got
out. Burk also got out and stretched his legs as he looked
around.
“Is your
arm fractured?” Sam said.
“No, just
a sprain. I didn't even feel it back there, but the pain is
setting in now. I'm working on the town hall setup. We want the
people in the main areas in case we have to make a run for it
again.”
Burk
walked up. “Nowhere much to run now. Unless we head into the
wild. They're already prepared for us to attempt to get out in
convoy style. We'd be sitting ducks. I like this new setup.
Makes the town look a whole lot friendlier, like another big
campground.”
Sam
nodded. “Where do you want to set Marco's stuff up?”
Burk
pointed down the street to a point where it got darker. “We set
up there. Nev Sweeting's storefront town-ranger office. We'll
put your equipment in the back room and use the front as our
security headquarters. Except that this time the sheriff will
actually be in town instead of playing with devils out in the
woods.”
Deena
huffed. “The sheriff, if that's what you are calling Nev
Sweeting, has stabbed us in the back.”
“Don't
worry,” Burk said. “He's got his dues coming. My feeling is he
can't leave the area either. We'll be seeing him and his new
friends soon.”
A faint
wash of morning light arrived. Ashes were no longer blowing
above, but dark clouds with hot gray bellies, but without rain
had replaced them. The slate clouds stretched from horizon to
horizon and moved like slow whales on a light breeze. Light,
like brightened salt poured from the cloud breaks and sky. The
park and town hall had become a quiet scene as many people who
hadn’t slept during the night were grabbing it. Jesse Milbrand's
farmers had set up there, and their trucks and militia vehicles
were the only vehicles going in and out of town. Only armed
townspeople and militia were active in the countryside now. No
soldiers or police had been reported at the barricades on the
town highway.
The
immediate downtown blocks were still lit, with streetlights on,
and people with stores or residences in the area had opened
them. A few people were walking about; some of them still
visibly confused. Other severely distraught people had been
taken to the town hall and hospital. Sam still lacked sleep as
they'd decided to set up Nev Sweeting's town ranger office with
Marco's equipment right away. Together with some militia with
technical skills, they put it all together in the back room, and
when powered up, Sam attempted readings on the strange orb
they'd found.
It was
still under debate as some felt it was not safe to keep it in
town. The M-Scope had more or less frozen during attempted
readings, and when fed into the main system, the only message
was "Processing Conglomerate Information." A reading that stayed
on the screen relentlessly, and after an hour, Sam fell asleep.
But it was short sleep as it was barely noon when he was
awakened. A prisoner was being brought into the station to the
lockup.
Rin, now
wearing fresh denim clothes and a toss-over flak jacket, carried
the prisoner in a rather rough manner to the lock-up and threw
him on the bench. But he wasn't in there long, as Burk came in
and ordered that he be brought out and placed in a wooden chair.
The man was in a military uniform and rather disheveled. His
hair and the front of his uniform were wet and grimy.
“Where'd
he come from?” Burk growled.
Rin gave
a non-committal smile. “Jesse found him wandering on the road.
He's been here for a while. Carter had him over at the hospital.
They gave him some treatment. He's all wet because Carter
questioned him. He water-boarded him.”
“Water-boarded him,” Sam said. “That's illegal.”
Rin
replied. Displaying a sidelong, arrogant glance. “I would've
shot him, and that's illegal too. Assuming there are any laws in
Indian Falls now. At present, I believe we are the law, and
that's the way it always should have been.”
Burk
pulled up a chair and sat facing the prisoner. “Interesting
point there, Rin, but we won't be the law for long if the
outlaws of the state and their ugly pets eat us. What did Carter
get out of this guy?”
Rin
grabbed a note from his shirt pocket. “A lot of babble. He's
from Deep River. Name is Sean Seaman. He was part of the
military operation and got lost in the confusion. A logistics
expert and a dumb one, because he stumbled through the bush and
went the wrong way. They found him near town.”
Burk
ordered the man's gag removed. The guy was young, a bit bug bit
and messed up. Unusually wide nose. Bulldog soldier face. “You
must be brighter than you look. But you're just what the doctor
ordered – a logistics man. I want to know exactly what the hell
is going on and why this town is blockaded because we can't see
any logic in it.”
“I was
never able to find out exactly why,” he said.
“Don't
give me that crap,” Burk said.
Seaman
cleared his throat. “OK. They told me a dangerous experimental
microorganism has infected this area and that the quarantine is
top secret. Infected people are a threat to the entire planet.
Logistics, military, and police movements have been based on
that for some time. Even local media people think that and are
keeping quiet on the promise of a bigger story later.”
“What's
the bigger story?” Sam said.
“For the
media, none. They've already killed some of them for getting in
too close. Any others that get wise will also disappear.
Killings are covered up. Logistics is keeping this operation
moving, while nearly everyone involved has no real meat on what
the truth is. Every branch is in a compartment. I was involved
in developing that brand of logistics.”
Burk was
unimpressed. “Sounds like you're putting us in a compartment,
too. So what happened to you?”
“I was
with several men; we were supposed to be dumping some top-secret
stuff in a bunker in the conservation area. Your town guy, Nev
Sweeting was there at the time. When we got there, we found out
the top-secret stuff they were burying was us. The men with me
were shot in the back. They made me do the work of dragging the
bodies down. They believed we'd learned too much; that's why it
was done. The last man out was supposed to shoot me, but he
didn't want to do it. He fired in the air and then closed me up
down there. I got out in the night and was disoriented and
confused. I went through the woods towards the lights I saw. The
lights turned out to be Raven's Private Beach, and I got there
just as the wave of killing started. I knew very little when
they threw me in that bunker, but after seeing those monsters at
Raven's Beach, I definitely know too much. I saw what must have
been you people escaping the other way in a convoy. Of those
that tried to flee my way in the brush, I think I'm the only one
that got away.”
Sam
sighed. “Who is in command, and I mean in top command of the
whole operation?”
“That
part is bizarre. Perhaps they thought I knew too much because I
questioned that. There was an intelligence agent, Mike Nelson.
And Major Kowaleski. What didn't make sense was that military
men much higher up landed at Deep River, and they were taking
orders from the Major, and believe it or not, Nev Sweeting. For
some reason, your town forest ranger is bossing people way above
him in the pecking order.”
Sam
turned to Burk. “The commander of it all is the ambassador;
that's why the pecking order is out of whack.”
“Who?”
Seaman said.
“Never
mind,” Sam said. “Were there any plans on the table for the
military to come in against us?”
“No. The
military was supposed to be facilitating a special force. Which
I've now figured out isn't military at all – the special force
is those horrible things that killed everyone at Raven's Beach
and the campground.”
“Okay,”
Burk said. “Take Mr. Seaman back to the hospital. Put a guard on
him for now. He's not going to do anything, as he has nowhere to
run. They'll kill him if he tries to return to base or leave the
area.”
“Wait a
second,” Seaman said. “I'm about recovered, and I can't go back
like you said. I might as well go down fighting with the rest.
I've seen those things in action, just like you, and unless we
find some weakness in them, we don't have a chance.”
Burk
thought it over, then nodded in agreement. “Take off his cuffs.
Let's review the situation. Now, we could try to get someone to
the outside world for help. The problem is that no one would
believe anyone we send. A few people got that massacre at the
campground recorded on various devices, and in the replay,
nothing shows but swirls of colored light. Most of our
electronic devices don't function properly near those force
fields of theirs. We're lucky our weapons worked. Even they
might fail close up. Most bullets turn to slag. The regular beam
gun has some effect, and Sam's special gun at least does some
damage, but not enough to put a beating to them when they come
on strong. We've got that device we captured ... is there a
reading on it yet?”
Sam
suddenly woke, as he'd been near asleep on his feet. He stepped
into the back room to find the display lit up with scrolling
text. After hours of processing, the message was very simple.
Multiple Location Device, Existing at the Current Visible
Location and Seventy Five Unknown locations. Power Reading
Unknown, Energy Source Unknown. Security Reading: Dangerous Due
to Unknown Status.
Sam went
back to the office and found Seaman speaking. “Several missions
were run to various locations in the area. Those were top
secret, but I planned the logistics. I was never told what they
were for, but if you say you've captured a device of theirs, the
missions may have been to place them in various locations. You
may have discovered one of many. Question still is: what do they
do?”
Rin paced
the floor, weapon in hand. It was clear he didn't fully trust
Seaman. Sam put his hand on Rin's shoulder as he stepped back in
the circle. “I have a reading, but it's not much and something
to figure out. I believe we have one piece of alien technology.
It may be dangerous; it may help us. That energy field of theirs
and they themselves don't come out of thin air. It must be a
transport beam to ferry them here. The orb we captured is part
of the puzzle. I need to do more studies on it. We also know how
Marco got so far in the development of his equipment. He must
have found something else, back at the beginning. Something told
him that what was happening here was beyond the supernatural
effects he studied. He knew that real beings, not ghosts, were
appearing in Indian Falls.”
Leon
Ottawa and Jesse Milbrand had entered the room. “Maybe that
device should be studied a ways out of town,” Jesse said. “If it
is theirs, they may be able to explode it like a bomb.”
“They
don't work that way,” Leon countered. “If it's valuable, they'll
come for it, and they're coming anyway. They don't kill by
blowing people up; they feed like devils.”
Burk
stood up to stretch his legs. “Good points. They've got us
trapped, and according to previous visitations, they don't show
nightly. If we have something that's important to them, they
might want it back right away. In which case, they'd send maybe
some soldiers or Nev Sweeting or that ambassador into town.”
Rin
looked spooked. “They send Nev Sweeting into town, and I'll burn
him down. What about Seaman here? Hasn't he sort of magically
appeared?”
“Nev
Sweeting ain't here yet,” Burk said. “If he comes, we'll play
along and see if we can learn anything. As far as Seaman goes,
he'll be stationed on perimeter watch and under our people's
guidance. They didn't send him, or that would have come out when
Carter tortured him.”
The long
gray day stretched to the horizon on a sky like a cocoon; Sam
found himself too fatigued to work and got some rough sleep.
Later, he toured the town with Deena. The militia was running
the hospital and was now the police force and perimeter guard,
while Leon Ottawa and some of the people living directly in town
had taken over running the town hall. Jesse Milbrand's farmers
and a gang of young people were running the park tent city while
campground rangers who escaped had been mostly demoted, along
with Cedarwood owner Stu Pooler. Randy Giffen and some of the
Cedarwood kids, who had been little more than groundskeepers
dressed as rangers, had simply changed into civilian clothes and
were actively setting up a makeshift stage in the park.
Evening
came with darkness falling fast as the horizon remained blotted
out by clouds. A huge barbecue was organized in the park, and
with music playing and other people off in the trees playing
their own guitars and drums, the town took on the airs of a new
Cedarwood, almost as though they'd moved the place into town.
Trailers and the rest of the wreckage, of course, remained out
at the lake; Burk had not permitted anyone to leave for daytime
excursions or searches for survivors out there. No funerals had
taken place.
A couple
of militiamen who had escaped from Raven's Beach in the other
direction reported no survivors there, or, if there were any,
they'd gone deep into the bush. News on the campground was about
the same ... all the last people to exit, and Sam was one of
them, reported that any stragglers had run into the jaws of the
enemy. So, other than attempting to retrieve some property,
trailers, and vehicles, there was no reason to go out to the
lake. And real reasons not to, as the military could be moving
in. No one wanted to be captured by them as word of Seaman's
report and burials of murdered men got around.
The town
hall became the focus of a late-evening meeting that mostly
adults attended. Younger children, teens, and those up to early
twenties stayed in the park or cruised around town. They were
the most resilient, adapting to change or Armageddon, as the
militia called it, as though it were an interesting change of
scenery and a new domain they could live with for a while.
People openly distraught, injured, or in shock remained at the
hospital, walled in behind the protection of armed militia.
Anyone with even rudimentary medical or psychiatric knowledge
was placed there with them. The hospital was, in fact, now
crowded, as elderly people had been driven in from the
surrounding area by Jesse Milbrand's men during the evacuation
of the nearby rural route.
With
darkness over the town and no lights in the sky to signal an
imminent attack, the town meeting took on the form of a big,
unruly discussion. Mayor Buckly Harris' lame address to the
crowd sparked an argument, as the mayor still hoped the military
would intervene on behalf of the town's people. His supporters
were a few area residents who hadn't seen the devastation and
didn't believe it could have happened as the militia reported.
They were overruled by people with direct experience; those who
had seen the soldiers attempt to seal them in at the campground.
The
debate deteriorated into a headbanger over socialism and
capitalism, as some stores were selling goods at inflated prices
while commandeered or militia-supplied goods were free. In the
end, stores were ordered shut; no freedom meant no free market.
All goods were considered in storage, as they could be needed
later. Burk argued that he didn't support socialism, but he also
didn't support people profiteering while others had suffered
huge losses. That debate continued through a couple of hours of
disappointing tongue-wagging. Nagging stress and headache left
Sam walking out with Deena and heading over to the park.
The scene
over there was calm and perhaps more sensible. In this
situation, they were trapped. Town democracy failed to provide
solutions but did give people a chance to work out their
frustration and hostility in verbal scrapping.
Human
reactions to the catastrophe varied, with some people
hospitalized for shock, while others responded with anger at
being unable to fight back. They couldn't bury their dead or
comprehend any explanation for the sudden and overwhelming
victory of an unexplainable evil. Alongside them were people who
wanted to argue about capitalism, socialism, and other
unproductive issues. The betrayal by Nev Sweeting and authority
figures was another electro jolt that had left people gasping
with much talk about how to execute him when he was captured.
His
sleeping patterns disrupted, Sam awoke at 2.30 am. He was on the
north side of the park in a double sleeping bag with Deena. A
snoring militiaman with a rifle beside him was at the nearest
tree, and a raccoon was stealing provisions out of his pack
while he slept. Off at the edge of the park, he saw a huge pack
of town dogs running down a side street. The weather was a
little cooler and damp, but not much of a late-night chill had
settled in. Seeing that all was mostly silent, he walked through
the park and back to the newly arranged security office and
Marco's equipment. Rin was inside, sipping coffee with another
militiaman. Sam poured himself a cup, then went in the back to
work through some more modeling on the device they'd found.
Again, readings went across the screen, and the orb remained
lit. It had never shut down, though nothing could be read on it
as to the power source … or rather, it was itself an unknown
power source and transmitter. An hour passed, and Sam ended up
stumped again, his brain tied in knots. He couldn't crack this
thing and wondered if it was even possible. He felt defeated and
weak, and as he turned his chair away from the screen, Rin
walked in. “Got some lights, weird ones showing, and right
inside town.”
“Place
guards on this place,” Sam said as he walked out with Rin. They
stood in the open street, and Sam watched as Rin waved over some
men and sent them inside. The sudden appearance of lights
brought about a quick reaction from the people. The dogs were
barking, and they were awake now. Sam saw many retreating deeper
into the park, and people with nearby houses and stores were
moving out toward the town hall for safety behind the militia
there. But not everyone was fleeing, as many armed residents and
teens remained. Several men in the older-than-teen category were
forming the beginnings of a mob by the first alley off the block
from the park. The startling aspect was that the light was right
over town and giving rise to the feeling that the barricades
were useless.
All eyes
were on the sky, and the expectant looks were a sure indication
that something was about to happen. Sam felt his body hair
prickling along with his scalp. This light was faint and high
up, with ominous purple tints. The enemy tribe was showing its
colors again, and if so, the gang would probably be arriving
soon.
Sam and
Rin were closest to the light. A minute later, Burk, Deena,
Laura, Carter, Leon, and Gill came up the street in a tight-knit
group. Behind them, Jesse and a gang of about twenty farmers
formed a line to guard the front of the park. The light began to
spread like a fearful disease in the low clouds above. It
suddenly expanded to a large oval and sent a faint beam down. A
glance over at the town hall, and Sam saw the big doors being
sealed. Another small group remained on the steps and moments
later walked over. It was composed of Sean Seaman, Mayor Buckley
Harris, Stu Pooler, Randy Giffen, and Donnie. The mayor walked
to the front and spoke with Burk.
“How
serious is it?” the Mayor said to Burk.
“Very
serious because I'm pretty sure we're about to have visitors. No
multiple lights yet. A smaller show usually means the visitor
will be none other than the ambassador.”
Ten
minutes passed with lights strengthening overhead and passing
through shades of purple. A hole showed in the clouds, but like
a burn hole, not one that revealed the sky; it stung the eyes,
and the electricity in the air only added to the certainty that
the ugly swirl high above marked the descent of something
sinister.
A wide
swath of air at the front of them glowed and took on shades of
amber, and they were certain it was a new form of the force
curtain. It formed a wide oval on the street that slowly
knife-edged down the road away from them in a line of light. In
the distance, some militiamen moved aside quickly as the light's
edge touched the barricade. Seconds later, a section of it
exploded into a slow rise of sandbags and wood fragments. The
debris fell softly into thickened air, and the small opening
revealed nothing but the darkness of night beyond.
No one
moved; everyone watched impatiently. A couple of minutes passed
in suspense, and then two figures appeared out of the darkness,
walking into and down the line of light. They came clear as the
ambassador and Nev Sweeting, and as soon as the militia by the
barricade realized who it was, they opened fire. The hail of
bullets exploded into fireworks in the light, and when the
rattle of guns ceased, and the last sparks fell to the ground,
the two were still walking, now approaching the oval of light
spilled at the front of the crowd.
The
natural reaction was for everyone at the front to step back, and
Sam followed the others, but they didn't go far, as it was clear
that they had to face them and see what they wanted.
There
were no bubbles or obvious protection this time, other than the
haze of amber light beamed from the purple hole above. A new
form of the force shield and one that worked effectively; Sam
was certain that he, Burk, or the others could step right into
it, but if so be at their mercy. Bullets and weapons likely
wouldn't function inside of it. Of that, he was sure. It was
also abundantly clear that the ambassador had been fine-tuning
the technology and probably had a smoother way to launch an
attack with his monsters.
Mayor
Buckly Harris stepped forward, showing unusual courage. He had
seen the ambassador before at the haunted hotel, so it wasn't
all new to him. Nevertheless, Burk seized his shoulder and
pulled him back. Waving Sam along with him, Burk stepped
forward, and they stood at the edge of the light facing Nev
Sweeting and the ambassador. Both had nasty grins on their
faces, but Sam had the desire to sock Sweeting the most.
Burk
spoke. His question was terse. “Looking for something?”
A vocal
answer was expected, but none came. Only Burk and Sam heard the
answer, and it was as a voice in their heads. It was from the
ambassador. Some form of telepathy. “I am looking for
something,” the ambassador said.
Sam
focused on his slick form. He'd never had a look at the
ambassador up close and in fine detail. He saw flaws. The smooth
outfit, neat hair, and features had a grainy look, as if they
were a projection of sorts. Perhaps more telepathy or an energy
field. And as he viewed the handsome face and full lips, a
sudden shift of perception hit him. The man he saw now was bald
and with sunken cheeks; a face that was masculine but wicked
and, for some reason, humanoid but not human. Perhaps it was the
eyes, and Nev Sweeting's eyes, too; they were dead yet reflected
a fire of some cold type, revealing an inner being like that of
an android, but not a human soul. Sam knew the ambassador was
also looking into him deeply, but he didn't know why. Perhaps
the ambassador had no understanding of human beings. Sam wasn't
sure what it meant; he knew that if these two were present,
neither of them was human in any earthly way. The ambassador, of
course, had been that way from the beginning, but Nev Sweeting
hadn't.
Sam
answered truthfully. “We know what you want. We aren't handing
it over.”
“Hum,”
Nev Sweeting mused. Then he addressed the ambassador, but not
telepathically. “Doesn't matter. They can't go anywhere with it,
and we can take it back soon when we bring the others in.”
It was at
that point that Mayor Buckly Harris rushed up, so upset that
spittle formed on his lips. He gave the ambassador a disgusted
look but spoke to Nev Sweeting. “Is that all? You come here for
your evil toy. Don't you think you owe the people of this town
an explanation? You killed many of the residents of this area
and betrayed us to alien devils. You swore as a lawman to
protect the people of this town.”
Nev
Sweeting's expression turned to irritation. His brow ruffled.
“You want an explanation. You're all going to die. Put that with
your last words on the town record.”
The mayor
rose to a sudden outburst. “Curse you!” he yelled, and then he
pulled a militiaman’s knife from his suit jacket, rushed into
the light, and thrust it into Sweeting's chest.
An
explosion of light knocked Mayor Harris right off his feet. Sam,
Burk, and the others staggered back, hit by the energy blast.
Nev Sweeting opened his arms and looked to the sky, and then he
reached down and pulled out the blade. There was no blood on it,
though it was red – red from extreme heat. The grimace on
Sweeting's face showed that it had done some damage, but not a
lot. He remained paused there for some moments as he healed.
Sam
feared the militia and Jesse's farmers were going to unleash a
hail of bullets and cause death everywhere. But that didn't
happen; people just stared in shock. And as they stared, the
ambassador began to flicker with flames. In moments, he was
burning, but instead of flesh cooking, it was an illusion that
wilted away like the dropping of a snakeskin. What remained was
the horrible, bald, and wicked humanoid thing Sam had seen. It
flew forward like shadows and liquid darkness. At incredible
speed, it seized Buckley Harris and dragged him screaming a ways
back into the oval of amber light. What happened there was more
like a hallucination or movie special effect than anything real
... in the whirl of shadows, blood exploded, and there was
spatter that ballooned up then imploded to nothing as bones fell
to the ground.
The slick
form of the ambassador reappeared standing at Nev Sweeting's
side. The metallic odor of fresh blood drifted on the breeze.
People were fleeing deeper into the park. Most of the crowd up
near Sam and Burk melted away in retreat. A couple of women
screamed as they were carried away, and Leon Ottawa began
gibbering like he'd lost his mind.
Carter
had come down from the hospital, and Seaman had come up from the
left of the barricade to watch. Deciding against any attempt at
a surprise attack, they walked around and stood beside Burk and
Sam.
At that
point, Nev Sweeting decided to talk. “Sean Seaman, well, well
... so I'm not the only one to come back from the grave.”
“You
never got me in it,” Seaman growled. “I escaped. So you're dead,
are you? Is that what it is? The mayor there was at least right
about one thing. If you're going to kill us all anyway, you
might as well tell us why. Who in the hell is this ambassador,
and what are you? You join them somehow?”
Nev
Sweeting smiled, but it was a vile smile, highlighting the fact
that even his ugly whiskers were retained in his new form. “What
am I? I am Beelzebub!” he cried, and as he did, his body
exploded to a rising fountain of shadows that buzzed like flies.
Sean Seaman stumbled off to the left, expecting to die. But
there was no attack as the flies suddenly took form as shadows
and then Sweeting again. “I pity you,” Sweeting hissed. “But I
say, fair enough. You want an explanation. I'll give you one.”
Burk lit
a cigar and tossed away the match. “So what is it?”
“You call
my friend the ambassador. Well, the name is perfect because that
is what he is. He comes from another world, another reality, so
to speak. He's the last of his kind. Our hungry friends that you
met back at the campground destroyed his world. Now he works for
them. We work for them.”
“Lovely
explanation,” Burk said, his tone calm. “You just happen to be
helping them destroy our world.”
“Oh-no,
definitely not. That's the beauty of it. They learned from the
ambassador and from us. They don't destroy entire worlds
anymore. In the beginning, they gained access to the superior
beings' technology and used it to destroy them. Because our
friends can survive only by feeding on other life forms, they
killed whole planets. That is, of course, not sustainable. The
ambassador came here with an offer to save Earth. Your friend
Marco almost ruined things when he learned too much. But we
overcame that. You see, it takes time and planning, but the
power is there. All the ambassador had to do was get to the
right people to set it up.”
“I get
it,” Seaman said. “He got to certain higher-ups. These monsters
have traitors in our military.”
Nev
Sweeting openly laughed. “Certain higher-ups. Try nearly the
entire global elite. Earth is an overpopulated, dying planet.
What do you think they would do if an offer came in to
depopulate most of the earth, yet keep them and much of the
environment remaining in great prosperity with new super
technology?”
Burk blew
out some smoke. “The bastards took the offer.”
“They
certainly did. Indian Falls is the opening showcase, folks. The
whole world is watching. I mean, most of the power brokers have
been watching it all along. They are watching this area become
depopulated. After Indian Falls, there will be three larger
experimental efforts, including a city, and then it will move
worldwide. A win-win situation. A race of aliens survives by
feeding on the excess population and keeps it intact for
long-term use. The chosen ones survive on a beautiful green
earth.”
“You
better check the record,” Sam said. “The other planets these
beasts visited are dead and deserts.”
“Perhaps,
but it is different this time. I am, after all, dead. Dead yet
alive. I have more in common with our hungry friends. I'm an
energy being, a transmission to the physical. I need the energy
of a biological being every once in a while to bind my atoms and
survive. It is all rather complex. I arrived here by instant
transmission just now. That means the old Nev was copied to
energy, so the new Nev, though an exact copy, is not the old Nev
who died. The new me is a new construction or energy child. A
new form of evolution, what humankind has striven for ...
immortality, you live on through your children, and each child
is exactly you.”
Sam
frowned. His mouth took on a skeptical slant. “That's not what
humankind has striven for ... to become soulless devils. Nev
Sweeting is dead, and you are not his child or even a biological
being anymore. You’re a copy of sorts, a tremendous fraud just
like the monsters you are championing as saviors of the Earth.”
“Don't be
too hard on him,” Burk said. “I would expect about as much from
Nev and the others, the global elite, buying into this
harebrained scheme to save the Earth by killing everyone.”
Nev
Sweeting took on a more serious expression, and the ambassador
showed interest. He'd been listening intently. “It does pose
interesting philosophical questions. But the deal is done.
Unfortunately, you people will be perishing, as we already have
the people we need on board. Now, at least you have time to make
your peace before you die. So you are lucky, as most of the rest
of the planet will not have such an opportunity. Terror and
death will be their lot as they die so superior beings can
prosper. Hasn't it always been that way?”
Sam knew
it hadn’t always been that way or any certain way. Death, under
the name and disguise of the aliens, was in town. Should the
ambassador and alien beings delivering it be respected in any
way? Obviously not in the face of recent murder and grief. Yet
Nev Sweeting was truthful. Throughout human history, the wicked
had killed off opponents and often the masses and prospered.
Burk and his people believed with faith that the unnamed elite
had always done so. They believed it had always been a
conspiracy of control.
In any
plan to save the planet, consideration had to be given to
whether humankind's beliefs were worth saving. Nev Sweeting
thought he was saving something, and the rest of the traitors
likely thought the same. But the monsters were the power here,
and if they saved any of the Earth, it would be so they could
feed longer on it. A future where humans might remain and be
bred for slaughter, with the planet a base to launch attacks on
more worlds.
Light
blazed through amber shades, and Nev Sweeting and the ambassador
walked away. Where did the argument exist that the greedy human
race deserved to live on? In the terrible light, and in the
blinding brilliance of the end about to come, was humanity’s
guilt contained in the knowledge of the endless sin against
nature and animals that encompassed all human effort? In the
final judgment, there was perhaps no genuine justification for
humankind to remain. Having failed in stewardship of the Earth,
what moral answer could be provided to aliens and an ambassador
with other ideas? Perhaps the answer that self-destructive
humanity was the lesser of two evils was the only answer.
The exit
of Nev Sweeting and the ambassador led to a temporary return of
the canopy of darkness. Lights glowed in the center of town and
the park, but outlying areas were dark and empty, and no one had
any desire to venture out there. Even the people who had
returned home mostly came back to the park and town hall, where
it was supposed to be safer. Sam doubted there was any safe
place, and those doubts intensified an hour later when they
received a report of distant lights from Jesse Milbrand. Again,
in the unmistakable mauve colors, but high in the sky from the
direction of Deep River.
A small
group gathered at The Big Nail, most of them drinking liquor
confiscated by the militia. Others were sober, and with a report
of new activity, the initial depressed atmosphere became lively
conversation.
Burk was
the first to speculate. “Maybe they had to kill a lot of
soldiers over at Deep River and unleashed the monsters on them.”
Seaman
nodded. He was cleaned up now and was wearing military garb,
including a militia-style jacket. He still looked tired and
drained. “That would be the case. Expecting cooperation from men
discovering the truth would be a lot. After the campground, a
good number would have known something more than weird was
happening.”
Sam had
been sitting quietly, playing around with the scope. “We're
still missing a couple of key players. Nothing has been seen of
that federal intelligence agent, Mike Nelson, and they mentioned
Marco, but not whether he is alive or dead.”
Carter
stood up and paced across the old wood floor. He stood by Leon
Ottawa at the counter and began to rap his knuckles.
Dr.
DeBartolo grimaced. “That rapping of yours is giving me a
headache.”
“I'm
thinking,” Carter said. “Thinking that we should get that device
of theirs out of here. The feeling I get is that they don't mind
it being here. They could have demanded we hand it over after
what they did to the mayor. But they didn't. That also brings
Agent Mike Nelson to light. I think they have other hidden
locations, not just Deep River. I think those lights tell us
something just went wrong over there.”
Rin stood
up. “I was thinking the same thing. Nev Sweeting and the
ambassador came in with power. I think that the device we got
has something to do with that power. They may have a lot of them
hidden somewhere and put them near where they are about to
attack. Which means we don't want it here. They're likely coming
tomorrow night for sure.”
Sam's
eyes lit up. “You've inspired me. The crazy readings. GPS and
all those locations registered as unknown. I want to set up a
final test. We're going to put that thing in a vehicle and move
it out of town. But I'm going to record how the readings change
when it moves. I remember the weird mapping of those monsters,
like the picture Deena drew of where they would appear in Indian
Falls. I think nearly all of those early appearances were tests
as they arranged their technology. I bet they placed those
devices where they would appear. They fine-tuned it over time
and brought in more stuff from wherever they come from. It's a
key reason for using the military in the first place. I mean, so
they can move stuff around and run their tests.”
A
decision was made to leave things until daybreak. Morning was
again gray but warm, the weather still summer though the sun
refused to shine. The farmers and out-of-towners got together
with the downtowners for another big cookout in the park, so Sam
joined it with Deena and most of the militia. With the
atmosphere festive, only a few people were left at the
roadblocks, and their job was easy, as not a single vehicle came
through on the roads. There was a line of vehicles waiting to
move out as people wanted to check on their farms and
properties. One vehicle, an ATV, already had a package hidden on
it, and the driver was to be Carter. He was to be the first to
leave, taking a spin around the area while Sam took readings,
and then stashing the device in a militia bunker not far from
town.
The sun
almost broke through for a moment as Sam talked with Deena about
where they might go next if they escaped Indian Falls. Sam
favored hiding underground in Toronto for a time, and Deena
agreed. They walked over to The Big Nail, where Sam picked up a
40-inch wall screen, a job that wasn't easy, as Leon still had
the idea of being paid for items. Burk cinched the deal, and
they walked out and over to the office. The screen was extra as
Sam was using a feed to track Carter's movements or the movement
of the device on an image map of the falls area. He had it all
working in a few minutes, but as Carter was still over by the
park, all they saw was one stationary point on the map. A second
large screen was below it, and all that flashed on it was the
other seventy-five numbers the scope always read from the
device. Locations that didn't exist or existed in some other
dimension or world.
When
Carter was fully prepped for the mission, Burk watched him drive
off, then locked up the front office. The rest of the town had
not been told about the experiment. Only Sam, Deena, Burk, and
Rin knew exactly what was up. They didn't even have to look out
the window to watch Carter leave because when he did go, the dot
began to move ever so slowly on the map. And numbers on the
second screen run through from the M-Scope also began to move,
all of them ... but at first glance not in any real way. They
appeared to be alterations of numbers with long decimal tails,
changing by amounts that were infinitesimal.
Rather
than stick to the risky highways, Carter began to move in a
pattern radiating outward from the town, following trails he'd
learned in younger days and as a militiaman. If the military did
decide to target him, he knew he'd be safer on the trails where
he could take cover with the Lift ATV. Using built-in
technology, he could blind most tracking methods, like motion or
infrared, with the new jamming signals. As far as drones went,
his screen showed no reading on any, and he was outfitted with a
bank of the new Sparrow stealth missiles. They varied in size
from that of a human thumb to some shaped like birds. Drones, if
they detected the Sparrows at all, registered them as birds for
that final second before they exploded.
The
trails were empty, gloomy … no vehicles and nearly all birds and
animals, even insects, were out of sight, perhaps hiding from an
enemy that they could detect long before human beings or current
technology could. Bouncing to the top of one of the larger
hills, he used his field glasses and spotted a military
barricade far off on an exit road. Though the vehicles were
parked, he saw no soldiers out on the road. He could only assume
they were inside the vehicles, though he couldn't see clearly
enough to tell. It was even possible that the barricade was a
dummy, just vehicles left there, while the soldiers had been
killed in that action that the light hovering near Deep River
through the night indicated.
Carter
turned onto the approach to the lake; he'd been ordered to stay
out of Raven's Beach and the campground, as they suspected
soldiers were stationed there. The highest close ground, a huge
dune, revealed nothing human. Mostly, he saw the swaths of
trees, a bit of lakefront and beach, and some burned-out areas
and buildings inside Raven's Beach. He realized that either the
soldiers had put the fires out or, more likely, luck had saved
them from a bigger forest fire.
Turning
back from Raven's and the view of some devastation, Carter got
the feeling of being in a dead world. The quiet forested routes
were eating at him. If it weren't for the sounds of his engine,
it would've been unnerving. Fortunately, he was now approaching
the river for a long run along it, and he knew the rush of water
would fill his ears and cast out the silence. A doe flashed
through the trees, and a hawk suddenly took to the sky as his
wheels thundered down a soft sand embankment to the river's
edge. He went right to the edge of the water, then accelerated
as he drove the riverside. This was a downward run, and the
river was deep here, though breaking in plumes of foam as it
rushed through large boulders and down ledges of stone. Carter
figured he'd done most of the circuit out, and calculating the
wind of the river, it occurred to him that he would cover most
of the rest of the territory following it back in.
Carter
was definitely feeling better doing a run of the river. He'd
done it so many times in the past, he could roar along knowing
about most obstacles before reaching them. A swamp area
appeared; one of his favorite fishing spots, then he pulled off
on a side trail for a bit and parked for a minute under the
hollow of huge and nearly hidden sand cliffs. It had been one of
his best hiding spots during militia exercises. Perfect in that
with the vehicle under the overhang, one could look out and
check the sky without being spotted by any approaching copters,
drones, or light planes. Hell, the military even had fairly
quiet jet packs nowadays, and if you didn't watch out, you could
be nailed by a grunt dropping down from treetops.
After a
moment's rest, Carter flipped open his militia communicator,
then he flipped it closed. He figured he was close enough to
town to be safe, but orders were orders. They were tracking him
from town but allowed no direct communication. Still, he
wondered whether they had gleaned any info from his drive
around.
The
bunker he was to stash the package in was close by, so he
prepared to move out. Then, as he was about to pull the engine
up from silent idle, he saw a blip on the screen. A drone and a
small one. Looking out from the overhang, he saw it pass by near
the treetops. It circled a couple of times but didn't detect him
in his hiding place.
Shutting
the engine and all systems off completely, he waited. The drone
circled a few more times; he could've fired and destroyed it,
but he didn't, because that would mean whoever was tracking him
would probably send out more. This was a bird-style drone, too.
Not a military issue, but more like something Nev Sweeting would
use to track things in the various nature reserves. Possibly, it
wasn't even armed, but with weapons modules so easy to add, he
couldn't take the chance. He waited and watched until it finally
faded through an open area of trees and fell to the ground.
Carter knew the location, the old hydro building. It had been
closed for decades and was practically buried in scrub, but
since it wasn't far from the bunker he had to reach, he decided
to stealth drive over for a peek at the place.
The Lift
ATV moved out with the engine nearly silent, but a vehicle of
its type still made noise going over gravel, sticks, and even on
asphalt. The trail down to the bunker also ran near the
decommissioned hydro station, and it was rough and nearly
invisible as it passed through a narrow gully with heavy
foliage. He kept his tracker on but got no further readings on
the drone. Figuring he would have got at least a faint signal on
it, he got the idea that perhaps something was hidden at the
station, like troops or more of the alien technology or weapons
to be used in attacking the town. Stopping by the hidden bunker
entrance, Carter thought about stashing the device first, and
then he changed his mind and pulled away. He planned to take a
quick run through the brush and use the field glasses for a look
at the station. See if anything was visible on the outside.
Perhaps they had a small drone pad there, and he could report it
to Burk.
Replaced
decades ago by the Indian Falls Electric Project, the old
substation was close to demolition. There were trails by it and
one access road, about the quality of a cattle path. Carter
moved slowly down a trail heavily choked by everything from
fallen rock shelves to vines. At one point, the wild grapes were
so thick that it looked like a vineyard had taken over a section
of forest. And there was wildlife here, an abundance of it -
sparrows and songbirds flew, he saw a fox, two raccoons,
chipmunks in the old growth, and even a couple of deer. If
animals were comfortable here, it didn't indicate a human
presence. He figured his hunch had been wrong and the drone had
simply flown off low and vanished elsewhere.
At least
he did for a few minutes, but when he got to the old road, he
changed his mind. He could see that it had been regularly
traveled in the last while … though still mostly weed-choked,
there were tracks, even truck tracks cut in the moist earth. He
could see a portion where gravel and wood chips filled in a
boggy area.
The road
took a few turns; he couldn't see any vehicles or the station
from his position. He followed it down slowly until a view of
the station showed, and halted there to study it with his field
glasses. It had been opened up, at least at the front entry. A
few parking spaces had been cleared, but there was only one
vehicle. It was a compact military truck. Not the sort of
equipment you'd see at any big military operation. Even the
trucks out at the roadblocks were bigger than it. The entire
front of the building remained overgrown with tall weeds, while
the station itself was really several buildings. Old concrete
structures, some with portions of crumbled walls replaced by
chipped yellow and red brick. There was a square silo for
something rising smack in the middle, and it was hard to tell
what any of the buildings were originally for – they were each
wall-marked with a large letter and number, but of no sequence.
The one where entry had been made was J1, a building with a
small, corrugated entry door. Beside it, a similar building had
a large green-painted barn-door entry that was closed. Far to
the right, an old brick structure sat atop a solid base that ran
down into a gully twisting off to the south. It was deeply
overgrown with marsh, as it had once been the riverbed. The
river had been diverted a good way south of this, passing a long
time ago, so unless the place was being used for storage or some
secret operations, it had no use other than resting in peace and
looking condemned.
He only
had one building to check out, and its windows were boarded up.
A quick look couldn't hurt, he figured, so he shut down the
vehicle and hiked quietly down. There didn't seem to be anyone
around. He checked the truck but found nothing relevant.
Approaching the building was a spooky affair, and he began to
wonder why he was investigating. Someone could easily watch him
through a hole in the boarded windows, so it was risky. Yet he
didn't hear any human sounds or noise. And at the door itself,
he listened but heard nothing. But he got a surprise when he
tried the handle; it turned, but didn't open. A check, and he
noticed it was an electronic lock and the newer kind where he
wouldn't be able to find the receptor panel because it would be
hidden and too small. It was a rather fancy security device for
a building with boarded-up windows, and of no use to him. It
only took a minute for him to pull out his combination army
knife and use the fast cutter to take out a board at one of the
windows.
Carter
entered a dark, cobwebbed room. He could see little via the
faint light beaming through the hole, so he put on a small
flashlight. The room was full of old, dusty, decommissioned
junk, mostly obsolete electronics. He moved through the
cluttered room to the far door. Switching off the flashlight, he
checked the crack. There was indeed light on the other side, and
the door was not locked. He opened it slowly, peeked out into a
dim hallway, saw no one, and stepped out. Turning around, he saw
the door he'd been unable to enter behind him. It led to nothing
but this long hallway.
He
switched the beam back on. In the other direction, the hall
ended at a distant door, and it was strange. He walked up,
stared at the vault-like construction, and wondered why it would
be here. And while he was wondering, it detected his presence
and opened with a panel whooshing to either side so that it
disappeared into the wall. Carter was afraid to step through but
did look, seeing a long, lit tunnel ahead. It ran down at an
angle, going either into the gulley or under it.
Hearing a
creak, he spun around but was too late. He found himself facing
Mike Nelson. The special agent had a hand beam-type weapon
pointed at him. Carter decided to go for it and draw his own
gun; a beam hit him hard, sending him through the door opening
and tumbling downhill. He saw fire; his head screamed with
intense pain and a rush of burning. Swinging to his knees, he
vomited up some liquid; barely able to see, he heard the sound
of Mike Nelson's boots as he walked up behind him.
Nelson
stopped. “Well, who have we here … Carter, isn't it? I'm afraid
you'll have to answer some questions. Like, how did you know we
were here, and who else knows?”
Carter
spat up some more liquid. “I don't answer questions for feds.”
Other
footsteps rose from below. Carter's vision began to clear on a
figure walking up to him. It was Nev Sweeting, and he had the
ugly grin on his face he'd shown in town.
“You
don't answer questions for feds,” Sweeting said. “Well. Bring
him along, Nelson; perhaps he'll answer questions from
Beelzebub.”
Carter
found himself walking slowly down a long, square tunnel. Mike
Nelson kept his gun at his back, though Carter couldn't see much
reason for it with Sweeting or Beelzebub present and probably
thinking about exploding into a hungry swarm of flies. The walk
was longer than expected, and Carter's head stopped spinning
long enough for him to ask, “How far underground does this damn
place go?”
Mike
Nelson responded by jamming the gun in his back. “You're the one
that's answering questions, not us.”
“What
difference does it make?” Nev Sweeting said. “He's at our mercy
now. The answer is a long way, pal. This is a tunnel to other
worlds. We may even have a job for you. A companion for Marco.
You can help him help us.”
“So
Marco's a traitor, too. Well, count me out. I'll never help you
people.”
Nelson
laughed. “You will if we want it that way. Once the ambassador
returns. Remember that telepathy of his. In one-on-one
situations, he can put you completely under his control.”
“Who is
the ambassador exactly? It is said he's the last of his people.
He sold them out to the invaders.”
Nev
Sweeting decided to reply. “No, the ambassador wants to save
life. Without him, our hungry friends would destroy everything.
So he is the ambassador not only from them to us but also from
us to them. The Alpha Centauri system is where he hails from …
so he's our nearest neighbor. Though his planet has been mostly
destroyed. The invaders, as you call them, come from far off, a
star cluster hundreds of light-years away. I'm surprised you
asked; no one else ever did, so I guess you and Nelson are the
only people who know the ambassador's origin. He likes things
like that … people who ask about him and see him as more than a
monster.”
Sweeting's voice caused Carter's body hair to prickle. “He is
like a monster,” Carter said. “He has powers a lot like theirs,
though you try to paint a pretty picture of him.”
“Do you
think humans aren't monsters? Imagine what we would do if we
captured the technology our friends have.”
Carter
didn't reply. He felt a wave of fatigue wash through him. The
strange downhill walk and the knowledge that he'd failed a
simple mission wounded him. He'd been sent to hide that device,
but instead, he had to play curious cat and be captured. As a
militiaman, he was supposed to do what was necessary to survive,
but that didn't include surviving as a brainwashed human tool of
the ambassador. Confusion had him wondering whether to attempt
suicide, then the tunnel widened, and a massive door appeared
out of the dim overhead lighting. They'd arrived at a vault
door, a structure that exuded solidity and power. Its metallic
surface gleamed silver, and tiny sparkles showed everywhere on
it. A few feet from it, they stopped, and the effect was
strange. Carter looked up, and the door stretched out of sight.
When he looked down, he saw the same and wobbled on his feet. He
felt Mike Nelson seize his shoulder, and if he hadn't done so,
he would have collapsed. A shaky moment passed, then the door
was replaced by a curtain of brilliant purple light. Nev
Sweeting stepped through, and Carter moved forward through it as
Mike Nelson roughly shoved him from behind.
+++
Sam had
Burk clear the back office so they could concentrate on Carter's
journey with the orb. As he drove out of town, his vehicle
became a slow bug moving on the map. Since the area had been
mapped in detail long before the town was sealed off, the map
was rich in detail. A sort of cute satellite view overlaid with
sign markers of the area. Only Carter's vehicle was live
information as his militia communicator sent in a steady blip.
And a blip was all Burk would allow; no communication by voice
or video that the enemy would track. As for the military
possibly watching via satellite or drone surveillance, that was
expected and a risk they were taking.
On the
second screen, Sam watched the play of numbers shift. All of
them slowly changed as Carter's remained constant. Of course,
the other numbers were readings of nothing, as the locations
didn't exist. All Sam knew for sure as he ran the numbers
through various programs was that they meant something.
Something was being read, but perhaps, since this was alien
technology, on Earth, the readings were distortions of some kind
and not the real thing.
As Carter
moved about the area, stopping here and there, it was becoming a
long, sleepy day at the screens. Burk made strong coffee, and
Sam sat back, twisting his brain for a couple of hours, trying
to get a grasp on what the numbers could be. Even coffee wasn't
enough, and Burk was becoming irritable, cursing every time
Carter stopped for a while. Finally, Carter was close to the
bunker and the burial of the orb when he stopped again for a
long time.
Burk
cursed. “What in the hell is he doing, taking a coffee break?”
Sam got
up and paced the room. “I think he's hiding. He may be being
followed.”
There was
nothing they could do but wait, bite nails, and pace the room.
Finally, he started moving again. He was nearly at the bunker,
then he veered off and went down for a run through the bush to a
part of the map with the tag – Derelict Buildings.
Burk's
face washed over with immediate anger. “He's disobeying orders.
I'm going to call him.”
“No,
don't. You might tip them off. Wait and see where he goes. What
would he be doing in an area of overgrown, derelict buildings?”
“Can't
say as I know. That's the old hydro station. He wouldn't be
there without a reason. Must have seen something. The bastard
could have at least come back first and notified us. Now we
don't know what is going on.”
Another
long wait nearly overcame them … it wasn't actually that way,
but it seemed like it because they were now nervous about what
might be happening. They saw the blip slowly enter the area of
derelict buildings, then it was gone. At that point, Burk turned
to Sam.
“His
communicator is blocked. Now what? He's on foot. You can't drive
in there. We have to go in. It's not that far. I'm going to pack
up some stuff right now.”
“Okay,
but let's think … what might we be up against? If we go now, we
might be in there after dark. And that's trouble.”
Burk
didn't get an answer out; the numbers screen was flashing, as if
Sam had become an instant prophet. And they did indeed have
trouble. The numbers alternated between long digits and simple
combinations. As Sam stared in wonder, one of his software
programs produced a reading. Eyes tired from the screen, Sam had
it printed out, and together with Burk, they stared at the
paper. According to the software, the other numbers weren't GPS
coordinates on Earth; they were star map readings.
“Holy
hell,” Burk exclaimed. “What did Carter do in there?”
“I don't
know. He stumbled onto something. We have to go out there now.”
Plans
were made to leave, but the idea of rushing to Carter's rescue
proved easier said than done. Everyone from Rin to Seaman and
Deena demanded they stay in town. Some, like Leon and Jesse,
were actually relieved to hear that the alien device had been
lost along with Carter. They didn't want it in town, and nearly
everyone expected an attack after nightfall from either the
monsters or the military or both. The visit of Nev Sweeting and
the ambassador had convinced everyone that time was nearly up.
Sam and Burke were in town. Too easy to be picked off outside of
it, and commanders were needed for the expected showdown. After
a brief meeting at The Big Nail, it was decided they'd return to
the office to further analyze the data and put together a town
defense plan.
Walking
past the park, they noticed that the people in that area had
become somewhat disconnected from those in the hospital and town
hall. People tended to stay put now, the more fearful at the
hospital and hall, the younger and braver out partying and
playing games in the park. The militia did constant patrols and
kept an eye out for defections. So far, no one had fled that
they knew of … some teens had broken into and taken over nearby
houses, but they weren't leaving. Everyone was taking their
chances in town rather than attempting any risky escape via the
river or the bush. The river was the last hope if a full
invasion of the town happened. They could get some people
downriver a ways in boats; maybe a fair crowd … but, given the
enemy's speed, the injured and slow would have no chance of
escape. Because of this, the militia had been very quiet as they
set up, covered the boats with canvas, and prepared for a
last-minute escape.
Back at
the office, it was mainly Sam who hashed things out with Burk.
Rin poured coffee.
Sam spoke
first. “The people mistakenly think we only want to rescue
Carter. In addition, they don't want us to bring that alien
piece back here. It's not about that. Whatever happened there,
Carter caused a burst and gave us new information. This is
probably the source where their power emanates into Indian
Falls.”
“That
makes sense,” Burk added. “It would be a hidden location, not
Deep River. They'd never fully trust the military.”
Rin
pursed his lips after a sip of bitter coffee. “Obviously, they
don't trust the military. Seaman told us that. They have
commanding officers under control and kill smaller fish that
learn too much.”
Sam
turned away from the screens. “If it is the source, we're the
only people positioned to go in. Maybe two of us. I'll go with
Burk. We go out the back way and leave undercover.”
Burk
nodded. “Rin will be in charge of town defense. We'll leave him
your experimental gun set to fire. Plus, he has our beam guns.
If military men come in, we've enough armed people to hold them
back for a while. Maybe we can get into that hideout there and
find something that stops them before shit hits the fan.”
Rin
rubbed his whisker stubble. “I'll set up a vehicle; put it out
back a street over. It'll be outfitted and waiting in thirty
minutes. I'll have a patrol pull people out of the way and open
that smaller west barricade for exit. It'll be the same as with
Carter. I can track you from here, but don't try any voice or
visual communication, just use a signal that appears as random
noise.”
Half an
hour later, Sam was outfitted in militia camouflage clothing and
driving with Burk through the opened barricade in one of the
militia's special Jeeps. Burk was at the wheel, and Sam had
turned in the seat to inspect one of the packs prepared for
them. Everything he could think of was in them, including enough
food rations for two weeks. Taking a quick look back to the
road, Sam saw Burk about to head downhill on a run over to the
river. Despite the bumpy ride, he went to work, lightening his
pack.
Burk
glanced over. “What are you doing?”
“I'm
taking stuff out of my pack. Rin outfitted us with way too much.
Enough ammo, plus guns and stuff under that tarp to fight a
small army. I'm not sure I need any of it. I need my scope, and
that's about it.”
“Lighten
mine too. Guess what we'll need to go in and maybe shoot against
a few people. The packs and this Jeep have everything because
they were prepared that way … for the coming Armageddon.”
“Yeah …
but if we make it to Armageddon, it'll be an act of God, because
we don't have much chance of seeing anything more than the end
of Indian Falls. The final battle will arrive if things don't
change. But that'll be after we're dead.”
Sam was
almost finished when water suddenly splashed over him, and the
ride got rough. He'd finished setting up the packs to his
liking, and he turned quickly and looked. Burk was driving right
into the foaming river. Sam wondered if the man had lost his
mind. But the Jeep didn't sink. The wheels found traction, and
the Jeep went across the river at a downstream angle. The
vehicle bumped onto the rocky shore and up a path cut in the
bank on the other side.
Burk
noted Sam's confused glance. “We went over a fallen bridge. It
never went completely under.”
Accepting
the explanation, Sam remained silent, picking up on the fact
that birds and insects were active here and not silent. They
were running along a faint trail. Apparently, Burk knew it and
could follow it easily. It never went that far from the river,
but into deep brush, and at about the deepest spot, Burk
suddenly braked and shut off the vehicle.
Sam
looked around. “I don't see any buildings.”
“We
aren't there yet. I got a reading, drone in the air somewhere
near here. We go the rest of the way on foot.”
And on
foot, they went, but only after cutting some brush and covering
the vehicle. It turned out they weren't far off but had to do
some torturous climbing up a long embankment. Sam reached the
top, sweating, and felt frustrated after tripping over roots
three times. At a group of trees near the other down run, they
paused and looked. The buildings of the old hydro station rested
in near-gloom below, and one building had a stone wall running
way down, out of sight, into a gully. Burk studied the sky with
field glasses but didn't spot any drone.
Sam
scratched his itchy head. “Why did we do this high climb when we
could have easily followed the trail around?”
“They'd
expect us to come in that way. The drone would be watching that
trail.”
“Okay, no
one's there, so let's descend.”
“Wait, I
see something. Someone's coming out of that building. Look who
it is.”
Burk
passed the glasses to Sam. A door had opened far below, and he
saw a man walking over toward an area of brush, about where the
trail would be. The man was Special Agent Mike Nelson, outfitted
in semi-commando gear.
Burk took
command. “I bet his drone landed down there and he's picking it
up. Carter parked in there, too. I remember the map. The way it
is, I go straight down, and you work around so one of us will be
at his front, the other his back.”
A problem
with the plan was that Sam was not trained in the bush like
Burk. As he walked through the dry gloom, trying to figure his
way around thick scrub, the pack became a burden, always
catching and threatening to make telltale noise. Everything
crackled on the dry ground, and recent rains of ash had killed
leaves and increased deadfall and duff. He ended up going a bit
higher to a band of evergreens he could get through. Despite the
difficulty, it didn't take long. As he came to an opening near
the field and end of the target trail, he expected that Burk
would already be there waiting for him. He also couldn't be sure
if Mike Nelson remained there. Enough time had passed that he
could have gone back in or left on the trail.
Sam found
the ground in front of him too dry; it would be hard to cross it
silently due to the deep grass and too many matchstick twigs. He
could see the end of the trail, so he waited and listened,
hearing bird cries, then a slight bang. It sounded like someone
rummaging around somewhere. Deciding to take a chance, he
crossed the opening and got behind an oak.
A glance
down the trail, and he saw Mike Nelson. He'd pulled the scrub
away from a vehicle and was searching the inside. It was
Carter's vehicle, of course.
Carter
wasn't present, and Sam wondered where Burk was, but not for
long because Mike Nelson suddenly turned and looked in his
direction. Sam kept behind the tree. He was sure he'd been well
hidden and wondered if the guy was psychic or something.
Turned
out he was, because footsteps began moving up the trail. Sam had
a gun in his coat, but he'd have to look around the trunk to
fire it. If Nelson already had his drawn, he'd get the best
shot. Since Sam knew Nelson was a trained agent, he didn't want
to test his shooting skills. Better to play cat and mouse, so he
crawled through the deep grass to the edge of the bush and
another tree.
He heard
Nelson running, and as he turned to duck behind the tree, a shot
was fired and almost got him. But it wasn't a bullet; it was a
heat beam that took off a section of tree bark and left curls of
burning wood smoke.
This was
big trouble, and where was Burk? With Nelson's silent beam, he
could already be dead. Another deadly beam hit the tree, this
one so fierce it slashed the trunk just above Sam's head and
left a tree branch about to fall. And it did come down with Sam
attempting a dive in nearly the same direction to escape
Nelson's gun.
The big
branch went down with a crunch in the dry brush, its force
causing a loud thump. Sam rolled up right next to smaller
branches that almost crushed him and barely managed to hold back
his trigger finger. He couldn't fire because Burk had jumped for
Nelson. Agent Nelson still had his weapon up, ready for the kill
shot, but the beam flashed off and caused some destruction in
the bush at the same time as Burk took him down in a hard
tackle.
A brawl
was underway in the long grass, opening with Burk laying fists
into Nelson and a hard boot as Nelson snaked away and got up.
Nelson lost his gun and pulled a blade, but he wasn't quick
enough. As he turned with the knife, he got a boot to the
breadbasket. The knife fell; he staggered back but recovered and
got into a karate stance. Burk moved in like a street fighter.
Nelson's karate chop was not a successful blow. He was taken
down hard in the scrub, and Burk was pounding him now like he
was going to murder him.
Burk
dragged the beaten Nelson up by the hair and threw him down.
“I'll kill you, you bastard fed traitor,” he rasped. He went at
Nelson with a flurry of hard kicks.
Sam ran
to his side and pulled him back. “He's out, can't you see that.
Don't kill him now; we need him to lead us inside.”
Burk's
face was red and smeared with dirt. Momentary confusion filled
his eyes. “Okay, let's handcuff him good. That's Carter's
vehicle; Nelson was searching it. No Carter present, though.
He's likely already been captured. Guess it was Nelson running
the drone. The pieces of it are on the ground up there. I busted
it before he spotted us.”
They
rested and drank some water. They had Nelson chained to the
vehicle, and Sam brought him out of a semi-coma by splashing his
face with some water. Burk was taking a leak. He looked around,
then zipped up and walked over.
“Lucky
you ain't dead, Nelson. Where's Carter?”
“You got
the wrong man. I tried to help Carter. I told him not to go in
there alone.”
“Bullshit,” Burk roared. “I just saw you try to blow Sam away.
It's you who was running that drone, too. So I'll ask you one
more time. Where's Carter?”
“Okay,
he's alive. He's inside. I'll take you to him.”
Sam
tapped Burk on the shoulder. “Our alien device is still in the
back. Carter must have hidden the vehicle and gone in. They
spotted him, shot him, or captured him.”
“Who are
they?”
Sam
grinned. “I mean guards. Likely military. This is a secret
location. Must be more soldiers. Probably Nev Sweeting, the
ambassador, and some of the invaders are inside somewhere, too.
My guess is that their real command center is here.”
Burk
nodded. “All right, special agent man. You're guiding us. Any
tricks and you die instantly. I don't particularly need you.
Only Sam wants you alive.”
Sam
checked to make sure Mike Nelson was securely bound wrists and
legs to the vehicle, and then he got the scope and had Burk come
down the path with him. Burk pointed out the smashed drone over
by some pines. Darker clouds were above, turning late afternoon
into early nightfall. Sam had the scope, and he wanted to check
the door first. The beaten path led to one locked door; they saw
a board pulled away at a nearby window.
“Strange,” Burk said. “Having the one door with a new lock on
it, yet the building has boarded up windows anyone could use for
entry.”
Sam
thought it over while he scoped the door. “The drone guarded the
path and area. This door must lead through to something like a
security post. Wait, the scope registers pretty much nothing
other than a door. Must be an empty hall on the other side.
Whatever is in there is in deeper. They could easily close off
the corridor inside and have motion detectors or cameras behind
the boarded windows. They'd know if someone entered. Carter
likely entered through the window. Let’s see, altering the
settings to read deeper, I do get a corridor, no booby traps or
anything else. The problem is the lock.”
“We'll
get Nelson to open the lock. He came out, so he must be expected
to come back in.”
Nelson
was in rough shape from Burk's beating. Sam freed him but kept
him handcuffed. They took another slow walk to the door, and
Nelson informed them that his lighter would open it. Sam pulled
it out of a pocket hidden in Nelson's jacket. The scope read it
as an electronic device. It also had a thumb impression in the
metal surface, so it only worked on Nelson's thumbprint.
The door
opened unexpectedly from the center with two panels sliding in.
Sam and Burk stepped to the side quickly, leaving Nelson to face
any music. But there was only silence and dim lights. Pulling up
the scope, Sam pointed it down the corridor, but nothing
registered but a corridor, so he assumed it must go in quite
deep, as it also angled downward. A reading suddenly flashed.
Energy bursts, but not from the corridor, but over by the gully.
“Know
what, Burk? This tunnel goes in a long way. I'm getting a
reading from over there, so let's take a look.”
The three
of them picked their way over. It was the spot where the largest
of the old hydro buildings had a deep stone wall dropping way
down into the gully. They couldn't see the bottom for the
darkness.
Sam faced
Nelson. “What's down there?”
“Nothing
that I know of. The entrance is over there.”
“Yeah,”
Burk said. “What does the entrance lead to?”
“Another
door, but I can get us through it. You're really wasting your
time here. We have a small military post there, that's all.”
Sam had
his eyes on the scope. “Nelson says nothing is down there. So
that means something is. The three of us can't climb down there,
but I can. You check out the door he's talking about. If it's
clear, wait there until I come back up. If energy bursts are
coming from down there, I have to check it because that's what
we’re looking for. A military post is of no use to us. A source
I might be able to disable is what we want.”
Burk's
skeptical look indicated disagreement. “Carter is in there. We
need to rescue him. Splitting up is dangerous.”
Sam
thought it over. “If they can overpower us in there, two of us
won't make a real difference. Let me do the climb down. Wait
until I get back.”
Burk
watched Sam begin his descent into the gully, then walked back
over to the entry door with Mike Nelson in tow. The door
remained open and didn't close until they were inside. The dim
overhead lighting, with its faint bluish coloration, reflected a
strange gloss off the walls. Metallic paint had been used to
cover the wall surfacing, and it appeared that any other doors
had been sealed off. Only one was visible in the side of the
wall a short way ahead, and if it weren't for Burk's sharp eyes,
he would have missed it. Only a faint crack showed. The sight of
it spooked him. It reminded him of a surprise door in a fun
house, set to be invisible so someone could pop out. So as he
prodded Nelson ahead, he took the safety off his machine pistol,
all the time wishing he'd kept Nelson's burn gun instead of
giving it to Sam.
“What's
that door for? What's behind it?”
Nelson
halted and replied after thought. “It's an old storage area. We
left it there in case we need to store anything near the entry.”
“Who's
we?”
“My
soldiers. I told you, there's nothing in here but a little
observation post so we can watch Indian Falls.”
Burk
rammed the gun in hard. “Open that door.”
“In case
you haven't noticed, I'm handcuffed. This door is different.”
Pulling
out his hunting knife, Burk put it in the crack, shifted it, and
pried. It popped open, and he stepped back, leaving Nelson
standing in the opening. Burk peeked in; saw piles of junk and
faint light from a distant boarded window. It was the window
with some boards taken off that they'd seen earlier. No one was
inside, so it appeared Nelson was telling the truth. It was only
a storage place or a door they could pop open and hide behind if
someone got through the entry.
Closing
the door, Burk had Nelson begin moving on. They walked downward,
and the light was giving Burk a headache. Frequency of it, he
figured. His mood shifted to one of mild depression. It had gone
from the high of hoping to pound Nelson to death to this journey
down to some dungeon; the contrast didn't agree with him. They
passed a section where a door had opened, with its panels
sliding into the wall.
It was
becoming clear that he should have waited for Sam or had him
stay with him. This wasn't any minor military post. It was too
far down. They were now well below the ruins of the old station,
and Sam was going way down lower. Any bunker that large and deep
would have strong defenses. He began to think about going back.
So far,
the coast had been clear. He could probably stop somewhere and
wait for Sam to come back up and down the corridor. They
wouldn't have to return to the door because Sam could burn it
down or come in the window that they suspected Carter of using.
Best to keep moving, Burk thought, his mind adrift. It came to
him that Nelson, even though cuffed, was expected to make a go
at disarming him. Maybe check him into the wall to knock him out
or something. But Nelson was cooperating, and that was a bad
sign, meaning he was confident that something waiting ahead
would free him.
After a
final downward run, the corridor leveled out; something loomed
ahead. The lights came on and brightened as they approached. A
minute later, they were facing a huge, heavy metal door. If it
were metal, Burk wasn't quite sure what it was made of. He
didn't expect an honest reply from Nelson either, so he forced
him to sit down and then approached the door himself.
Burk
remained wary; if Nelson made a move to get up, he'd turn and
fire on him. Finish the job and tell Sam he had no choice.
Moving closer, the door seemed to alter in appearance. He looked
up and blinked his eyes. He could see no top of the door. It
rose forever. Pulling his gaze away, he was struck by vertigo
and wobbled on his feet. Before he could recover, Nelson made
his move by rising and charging at him. Burk got half turned
around but no shot off; Nelson plowed into him, and they fell
into the door … and through it. The substance had either been an
illusion, or something had changed instantly to allow them
through.
Burk
tumbled like he was falling downhill. Darkness consumed him like
a closing glove, and then he was blind. Landing in something
soft, he rose to one knee and put his hand to his eyes. Nelson
wasn't on him, so he expected he'd been blinded too. Burk shook
his head and hair as long moments passed. Sparkles began to
switch to a view of something tangible. But what he was seeing
wasn't believable. His eyes told him he was in a vast vaulted
room facing a series of tall arches that were a ways across a
stone floor. These arches showed contrary visions, and none of
them was much like Earth. They were entries into other
environments; some with odd sunlight and foliage, others barren
desert, and others still, wind, water, and ice. Burk continued
to shake his head; something swirled and took shape in front of
one of the arches. At that point, he passed out.
+++
Sam
descended the steep side swiftly through a rough-and-tumble of
weeds, rocks, and broken bank. A ways down, only the sheer side
of the main building remained visible. Though the top square of
the building wasn't very big, the stone side stretching down out
of sight amazed him. There must have been a dam and a small
reservoir here at one time. It had all been taken out; a big job
that told him that natural disasters of some kind had been a
catalyst that led to the river being directed elsewhere. He was
also descending into deeper gloom as the hidden sun was falling
above and to the west. Its final glow disappeared, leaving him
in the halo of his light. The militia had prepared well for
Armageddon, the portable light being surprising in its ability
to light the distance without blinding the user. It almost
failed him once when he came to a sudden, steep incline, but he
halted in time. Studying the steep bank of hardened clay below,
he knew he was in the old riverbed, and it was deep in this
spot. Off to his left, the wall still stretched down, but he
thought he could see the bottom or the shadows of it.
Sam
worked his way along the side and found a deep crevice that
angled down through the clay. Here, he did some quick jumps as
disturbed snakes flashed in front of him and into the dark. The
snakes worried him, and he hoped there wouldn't be more. A
poisonous snakebite at this point would be very bad. Wickedly
bad, but he only saw one more before he came to the bottom
level. Though it wasn't very level. Using a play of the light,
he saw weedy undulations in front of him like furrowed ground
had been overgrown. He decided the best course would be to get
near the wall and check its bottom, but the downward run had
taken him in the other direction, so he had a ways to work over.
And it wasn't a pleasant walk in the dark, but more of spook
stroll. When he looked up, he could see dark mist and more
undulations ahead.
After ten
minutes of picking his way ahead, he came to a change of
scenery. He got over the last bank and met a flat plane that
stretched ahead in the direction of the wall. Stepping down, he
touched it tentatively with his foot. It was hard as stone with
a look of cracked black glass.
Sam took
a few steps ahead, feeling warmth come through to his feet.
Pausing, he took the M-Scope out of his pack and took a reading.
The simple text message was burn area. He didn't bother to
adjust the settings to find out exactly what had been burned.
Mud of some sort. The real question was how it would get burned.
There was nothing down here to burn anything.
The wall
appeared in the distance, the light shining across one dark
surface, revealing the outline of another rising straight up. He
walked ahead, noting nothing of interest on the ground other
than some loose stones. As he came closer to the wall, he saw
what at first appeared to be a stained portion, a few more
steps, and an inset portion of the stone. The mist was so dark
it was like drifting shadows blocked part of his view, but when
he was close enough, he saw that it was a large arch, and it was
more than inset; it tunneled right into the stone. A quick scope
revealed it to be the energy source, and that periodic dark
flashes were occurring inside it.
Sam
walked up as close as he dared; he felt entering it would be too
risky. Even being near it was too risky. It had to be energy
that had at times poured forth from it that had turned clay and
loam to a substance like black glass. Still, it was like a
volcano in one way; it had been active, but was inactive now.
Its entry was right at ground level, so he took a chance and
went inside a few steps.
Beyond
the thick metal ring inset in the indentation, he saw an
interior, the ceiling of which was ribbed like he was entering
the belly of a monster whale. Electricity or light suddenly
flashed high in the ribs farther down, causing him to turn and
run outside and quickly get away from the open arch.
He knew
this was it: the source or exit point from which the incredible
power of the alien technology emanated into Indian Falls. Since
the energy was unknown, he had no idea what it was other than
something beyond anything human science had ever engaged.
Going
across to the far side of the arch entry, Sam picked along the
wall. He figured there had to be another entry into this thing.
Maybe one for access. It was also hard to grasp how it had been
created; no road down into this gully, no sign of vehicles ever
being present. Something vast had been constructed with this old
power plant as a cover, perhaps very long ago.
Finding
an indentation, he held the light up and then stepped back. It
was the outline of a door; it was the same color as the stone,
and it opened inward. The outside was completely smooth. Putting
down his pack, he went through it. A small case of pliable
explosive was inside. He hadn't removed it earlier because it
was lightweight and he didn't want to leave it in the vehicle.
Taking his time and rolling over a small boulder, he placed it
in the four corners of the outline, set the tiny detonator nibs,
and got well out of the way. It blew with very little noise; a
hiss and snap like he'd broken a seal, then the whole piece fell
outward, releasing a draft of stale air.
With the
entryway open, he switched the light to beam mode and flashed it
inside. Just behind the blown door, a mass of sticky cobwebs had
survived the explosion. So much dust was floating in the light
beam that he couldn't see anything. A tall, stiff weed grew out
of the blackened ground not far from the opening, so he pulled
it and used it to sweep away the cobwebs. As the dust settled,
he noticed a small panel set into the interior stone and little
else. A corridor ran back a long way, and the walls were smooth
though stained.
He put
the light on the panel; it appeared to be only an interior
control for the door. No security devices and a very old model,
from a technological standpoint. Stepping inside, he walked
slowly ahead, with it in mind that this exit – he termed it that
because it didn't open as an entrance – was much older than the
other huge cavern-like tunnel.
Sam
noticed he was going downward, even deeper, and not up toward
the power station. He walked for about five minutes and guessed
that he was now a ways below the deepest foundation of the
station and the old reservoir bed. Smooth square walls ended,
and he was suddenly walking in a cave. But a smooth-walled one,
no stalagmites or moisture or slime. It was, in fact, quite dry,
dead, and even cobweb-free.
The walls
began to curve like he was corkscrewing farther downward, then
they suddenly straightened, and he found himself approaching a
large opening. The air was still and musty, and all ahead was
dark. He began to think he'd found a tunnel to something else
that had nothing to do with the forces above he was trying to
investigate. A large cavern was beyond the opening, and on
stepping into it, he became almost convinced he was on the wrong
track. He put his light on glow mode, and it lit the area,
showing walls painted with Indian art; it looked like ancient
Iroquois stuff, and a huge sculpture sat in the middle of the
cavern. It was a totem of sorts, but thick and squat. It rose to
the ceiling as a pillar, composed of three large heads. One was
a bear, the other a raven, and the top head an animal that did
not exist on earth. It was a cross between a large bear and a
humanoid being.
Sam moved
to the perimeter and studied the walls. If an escape route ran
from here, there had to be another hidden door. And there was.
He found the outline, and again it was one way from the inside.
The cavern seemed sound, so he planted explosives in the cracks
again. A very small amount, but the detonation proved enough. It
didn't fall out this time but opened. Again, a panel on the
inside, but a cave, not a tunnel. His light showed a turn not
too far in, so he entered and began to follow it. This time, the
cave melted into a square man-made tunnel that rose to a solid,
vault-like door. Stepping up, he studied it, finding it to be
steel. It had a large metal wheel handle on the outside this
time, so he grasped it and attempted to turn it. It felt seized,
so he grabbed a strap from his pack, put it over to get a better
grip, and used all his strength. It moved a tiny bit, so he
played it back and forth until he finally got it to spin left a
couple of revolutions. Again, using all his strength, he
attempted to pull it open. It moved very slowly; he got it open
just enough to maybe push his pack through and squeeze through
himself. But he didn't do that; instead, he reached through with
the scope and tried to get a reading. Pulling it back up, he saw
the composition of the stone walls on the display, which was of
no use to him … so he sifted through the full reading, seeing
'bunker or cave, no relevant life forms present.'
The
reading was enough to go on; he pushed the pack through, then
squeezed in himself. The light brightened a dusty corridor. He
walked down it to a green door and opened it quietly. He
illumined the inside and found himself entering a guard post of
sorts. Very old and abandoned. There was an enclosed area cut
out of the stone and empty gun racks on the wall behind it.
Other doors led to more rooms, some large and all of them
stripped completely. He found one room that still had some
paneling on a wall, plus a flag and an old framed photograph.
The tattered flag was Canadian, and the yellowed and shriveled
photograph was of a general. The uniform was an old World War
Two style.
Sam found
it all rather baffling; caves obviously led here from somewhere
else … this place had been an Indian worship site, a hidden
military base, and a power plant, all at different times. The
secret military base made the least sense. World War Two was
overseas, and nothing was happening here … or was it? Sam
realized that something had likely been discovered, leading to
the plant's closure and even the river's relocation. That would
be something top secret, but not the first opening he'd found,
because that was a new construction.
A lot of
this old base, if not all of it, had not been dug but was
concrete that had been smoothed over an old cave system's
floors. Other than the odd musty relic here and there, this
place was empty, but it led to something else because he heard a
growing hum. Similar to an electric power hum but deeper, a base
thrum at times that could be felt in the floor like an impending
earthquake.
He turned
out his light; complete blackness … continuing ahead, he went
down a corridor with a strong, salty fragrance. Then something
caught his eye, he put out the light again and saw blue light
spilling through a distant crack. It was in the wall at an
apparent dead end. This time, it did not mark a door, and the
humming noise from the other side was strong. Looking around, he
found an exit. He'd walked right past it, a tiny slit in the
wall one could squeeze through.
Piece by
piece, he went through, light, then scope, pack, and himself.
The light revealed a storage area, and right above the crack
he'd come through, there was a sign. It was lit in a
phosphorescent glow and read "Emergency Exit." And this told him
that the long way he'd entered, past the totem and old base, was
a way out if there was a catastrophe inside.
This
storage area had a main entry door, and as he looked around, he
saw mostly new, modern items. It took a moment to hit him
because when he turned off his own beam, the natural style light
that came on threw his vision off. This light was from tiny
cells in the ceiling and used almost no power. Generation would
be bacterial; a common form of lighting underground now, because
it never failed and could be set to activate with movement. A
look around showed cases of tools, everything from advanced
electronic replacement panels to ordinary hammers and
screwdrivers.
Whatever
was humming down here apparently needed maintenance. He went to
the door. It had a high-quality handle and lock fixture, but
wasn't locked. He opened it a crack, bright light streamed in,
and he closed it. Listening for a time, he waited for any sound,
but there was nothing but the ubiquitous humming.
Sam poked
his head out, got a brief view of a corridor, and pulled it back
in. He hadn't seen anyone, so he took a chance and stepped out,
finding himself in brilliant blue-tinted light. And this was no
cave; it was more like a transport tube in the form of a huge
copper-toned cylinder leading down to brighter light at a turn
in the tunnel.
No one
was present, and he saw no surveillance equipment, so he walked
down. The turn took him to an opening into an observation
bubble. Again, no one was present, but this time, what he
observed was incredible. He was at the end of what had to be the
arched entrance he'd seen outside. Looking down through
transparent pieces, he could see the vast arch. The same flashes
of light were occurring in it as he'd seen on entry, but now he
could see they came from large silver plates all along its back
at the top. These were hatches of some type and likely what was
being serviced from the room he'd been in. He looked down, and
directly below him, he saw something familiar – orbs, a mighty
array based on the same orb he'd been scoping. They were built
around a huge gun-like projection, as if this thing were an
apocalyptic weapon.
Sam's
feeling was that it had to be a different type of weapon, not
one that blew things up, but one that transmitted. And the
transmission was planet-destroying because it brought in hostile
life forms. This was the spaceship the ambassador and his
invaders used. Not one that flew through space, but one that
somehow transferred them across it.
Lifting
the M-Scope, Sam was about to try for a reading. A sudden
clanging noise behind him distracted him. He lowered the scope
and turned, certain a door or hatch had closed back there.
Another bang on metal echoed up the corridor through the hum,
convincing Sam to move. At this location, he was trapped. He had
to get back in the service room door before whatever was coming
saw him.
He tried
to run on silent feet, but his hiking shoes weren't very soft.
He could hear his footfalls, his heart, and an almost drumming
noise.
It was
bad news; there was likely more than one of them. He reached the
door and was about to open it when something came around the
distant corner. And this thing was ugly; a man-big insect of
sorts, but one that looked made of metal. It had feet like a
centipede and multiple arms … sickly eyes with heavy green lids
opened wide, as if it were amazed to see him. Then its mouth
opened, showing lines of sharp silver teeth, and it roared.
Sam was
momentarily frozen; the thing came alive, shook its back, and
emerged from a larger skin or coat, which clanged to the ground.
It had a flashing collar around its neck, as if it were under
the control of a master. Tools came to Sam's mind; this was the
repairman, and he wasn't human, and he was about to spring down
at him.
In the
flash of a second, he raised the scope and pressed the general
read button, and then he flew in the door and slammed it as the
thing sprang toward him. Inside the storage area, he moved
quickly, heading across to the narrow space where he'd entered.
The thing behind him was fast, and it took down the door with a
big crash. Sam was pulling his head the rest of the way through
the crack when he saw it charging for him.
It hit
the wall with a dull crash and sent dust flying. Sam was already
running through the old, empty base, flicking his light on as he
moved. Then the light flickered and failed; he heard the thing
tooling away the stone behind him, and now he was running in the
dark.
A tiny
sliver of light appeared; he managed to find another smaller
light in the pack. It glowed, and he found a door he'd missed.
Again, barely visible and of the type that had to be blown out.
He had the explosives in fast and blew it. It swung open;
another entry, this one to what looked like a living area but
not for humans. He was likely going right into the lair of the
monster repair creature, but since it was digging through and
would run down to him, he went inside and quietly used force to
pull the heavy door back into the seal.
Moving
quietly across the room, he studied the odd setup. A moment
later, he heard the sounds of the creature passing. For the
present, it was on a wild goose chase into the old base. Sam sat
on what was either a shelf or a long workbench and studied the
reading on the scope. Three lights were now blinking at the top
of the screen, and the text readout had altered to italic and
dark blue. At the bottom, a blinking message read "full
processing mode engaged." The M-Scope completed the read, and
the text appeared - Potential Alien Life Form.
Sam
raised his eyebrows; he'd been using the scope for a while, but
only now did Marco's reason for designing it come back to him.
Marco was a spook hunter. A lifelong hobby. He must have spent
decades designing this scope and its technology. It was also
questionable whether all the technology was from Earth. The
processing power seemed beyond even current military technology.
The hidden database inside the thing would be stupendously
large. It was a device that used the magnetic spectrum and who
knew what else to label something. The final purpose was to find
something that couldn't be labeled, something that didn't exist
on Earth in any scientific sense. A spook or, in this case, a
life form that didn't match anything on Earth.
Sam put
the scope in his pack, leaving it working on what it had found.
Another door showed in a distant haze of light. He guessed that
it was another entrance to the corridor, and he was correct. He
stepped out in it just as the hum suddenly sank to silence. No
one was in sight, but the new quiet atmosphere was not
desirable. He could hear himself breathe.
The
corridor led to a vault-like exit door, one that apparently
didn't discriminate, as it opened when he walked up to it.
Yellow-tinted light showed on the other side; there wasn't much
he could do other than walk through. He found himself in an
immense underground area the size of an airport hangar. A white
marble floor stretched flawlessly in front of him to a
bubble-shaped building at its center. Along the perimeter, he
saw arches, a number of them, and darkened but showing flashes
of light.
The view
was so overwhelming, he had no idea what to do next. And that
decision was made for him. Three figures were running straight
for him over the floor. Two were human soldiers, and he wasn't
sure what the third was … though his guess was that the scope
would read it as humanoid but alien.
Sam took
advantage of the charge by tossing his pack into the center
soldier and swinging around to engage the man on the left. Sam
quickly tossed him to the floor, but the larger humanoid was on
him with crushing strength and a bad odor that took his breath
away. He managed to free himself and nailed one soldier with a
hard punch that took him down, but the other two were back on
him, wrestling him to the ground. In moments, he was handcuffed
and being led off to the bubble station at the center. The alien
repair creature appeared at that point and skittered ahead of
them to a large blue door.
That door
opened; a shadowy form stood just inside, and it came into view
slowly, like a grainy hologram, becoming Nev Sweeting. Sweeting
had a confident grin on his face as he waved them inside. The
motley crew went through a short corridor and entered another
smaller room, similar in design to the large one. At the
exterior were views of the arches, and in the center was a
bubble shape. The arches were opaqued by mist-like flows, and
when a door opened in the bubble, it revealed a circular room –
a command post.
Nev
Sweeting had Sam brought over, and his cuffs were switched to
the front as he was placed in a chair. The last of the crew, the
multi-legged alien, didn't stay but exited, apparently headed
back to his job deep in the complex. Nev Sweeting also took a
chair but kept the soldiers standing. Sam glanced at the large,
almost-human alien soldier, studying six-fingered blue hands and
ears big enough to be weapons. The humming was present even
here, though faint, and Sweeting seemed to take a rise in it as
his cue to start talking.
“You're
late, the ambassador and his top boys have already left … a bit
of business having to do with the final destruction of Indian
Falls.”
Sam said
nothing. Nev Sweeting waved his hand, and the entire bubble
structure they were in became transparent. But not quite,
because arrays of screens and controls floated in the
transparency. Beyond the bubble, Sam again had a view of the
encircling arches and their strange flows of mist.
“I'm a
bit bored,” Sweeting said. “Nothing much to do until I go into
town. Everything here is automatic and nearly all controlled
from the source.”
Sam
decided to get Sweeting talking. “You mean from Deep River?”
“I'm
afraid not. There was a touch of disaster over there at Deep
River. We had a few betrayers in the top echelons. Had to feed
them to our friends. The actual control is from another world.”
Sam
smiled. “One in the Alpha Centauri system, according to my
findings.”
“You know
too much, but it's too late for it to do you any good. The
system is already primed … that's what Indian Falls is about.
Getting the game rolling on this planet, and that is already
done. We can pinpoint any location now, and thousands of our
friends ride in on the magic carpet. The great cull of the
deserving human race has begun.”
Sam
looked at Sweeting with disgust. “I wish you'd stop describing a
horrendous crime as a solution. And yes, I've already guessed
what Indian Falls is about … this setup and that huge exit arch
out there; it's what transports them in from another world. No
spaceships to detect, no war in the air. Control of the needed
people at the top. Decades were spent on this setup. The
ambassador came here long ago, too, using spooky happenings as
cover while it was all put in place. I suppose at that time your
friends were taking their sweet time devouring some other
planet.”
Nev
Sweeting raised his right eyebrow and took on an arrogant look.
“They do always populate the current host world. They'll be
populating Indian Falls. Sort of their hometown on Earth. But
you are wrong about other worlds. They don't devour everything.
Many are kept alive.”
“Yeah,
you said that before. But I don't much believe it.”
“Really,
take a look.” A wave of Nev Sweeting's hand and a
semi-transparent control panel took shape next to his chair. The
controls were a touch screen and an image that looked like a
puzzle. Sweeting moved a few pieces about, light flashed, and
suddenly the mist flowing at the entrances of the series of
outer arches vanished, revealing what was inside.
Sam
looked about slowly. Various levels of light lit long, deep
chambers; each arch contained its own environment … plant life,
furniture of different types. And strangest of all, each arch
was a prison cell, though the prisoners were not human beings.
Directly in Sam's line of sight was a blue-skinned humanoid
creature, completely naked and staring with large oval eyes. In
the next cell, a large bird-like creature slept in a bed of
sand. One cell contained a ghostlike form that shifted from a
humanoid shape to that of a large floating blot.
Awed, Sam
slowly studied the other occupants, and Sweeting became
impatient. “Look behind you,” he said.
Sam
obeyed and saw that the cell directly across to his rear
contained two humans. One of them was a rather hypnotized Burk
McCraw, and the other was Marco. Marco did not look hypnotized;
he was watching intently and seemed in good shape, though he was
wearing a full-body suit that looked like prison garb these
aliens had come up with for humans.
Sam
turned back to Nev Sweeting. “You mean your friends kept the odd
prisoner here and there from the worlds they ruined. If they're
here, I'm sure you have a use for them.”
“Of
course. They work for us. Except your friends. Burk will be
around until we question him fully and decide what to do with
him. Marco will be around longer; he will be working for us, or
we'll find a way to rob his brain. One or the other. Your future
is the same as Burk's. Questioning and death, unless Marco for
some reason needs a human assistant.”
“Really.
I thought you said this stuff was all self-operational. What are
workers for?”
“Perfection, of course. Don't forget it's stolen technology. The
creator race is dead. In decades to come, we have some long
leaps to make to other worlds. Marco's value is in his ability
to grasp the technology. No one on earth detected the ambassador
other than him; he even dared to break in here and steal things
for the improvement of that system of his. My personal interest
is, of course, as a conservation officer. I will be in charge of
preserving Earth's animal life. To me, it is the perfect
solution. Eliminating the human scourge that is destroying this
planet, handing the human heritage over to other species.”
“Yeah,
and eventually you'll leap to the wrong world, and that'll be
the end of you.”
“Enough
talk. Mike Nelson is returning, and I'll be off to Indian Falls
to destroy the rest of the idiots there. You get to wait with
Marco … and the longer we take, the better it will be for you.”
At Nev
Sweeting's hand signal, Sam was dragged off by the soldiers and
over to the cell; it was the alien soldier who opened the cell,
using a thin hand panel to momentarily fade the near-invisible
force wall. The M-Scope and Sam's pack remained over at the
command center. They threw him inside with a rough toss, and
Marco caught him and pulled him over to a spot on the floor. The
distant entry door to the complex was opening, and Sam glanced
over and saw Mike Nelson walking in. Inside, Nelson exchanged
some words with Sweeting and the soldiers, and a minute later,
only Nelson remained as Nev Sweeting and his men went out the
door, presumably on their way to Indian Falls to play their part
in its final destruction.
+++
Darkness
fell as a bit of deep-red sun died, giving the impression of
blood seeping into the gloom and finally becoming the black of
the grave. Rin had been puttering around with Sam's equipment,
hoping that Burk, Carter, and Sam would eventually return. Now
he'd put it off too long and would have to address the militia
and the people. The day had passed without anything exceptional
happening in town. A team of militiamen and women had played an
exciting soccer game in the park. The hospital situation was
under control, as most people had been released, and only five
people remained who could be listed as near-critical.
Over in
the town hall, people were playing card and tablet games, and
many people were drinking. More than a few people in the park
and out in the street were somewhat intoxicated, but it hadn't
been a problem. Lucky thing because there wasn't much to be done
about it anyway. There really was no point in walking about
telling people to keep sober so they could face up to monsters
most people would bolt from anyway.
Walking
to the window, Rin looked out; no mist, just darkness in the sky
above, like the clouds were a black sponge up there blotting
everything out. Downtown looked quite bright on the ground; the
streetlights were on in this section. He could see the lights of
the hospital, and the park was brighter than usual, as the
sparse streetlights there were now enhanced by the many glow
orbs people used for camping or in the yard these days.
A slim
figure walked up the street from the direction of the hospital,
and the bounce of long glossy hair told him it was Deena. She
ignored some catcalls from a few young men drinking at the
park's edge and came across the street to the station.
Rin sat
down and waited for her to enter, and she walked in slowly and
looked around. “No stoned end-of-the-worlders in lockup yet.”
Nope.
Looks like people here don't really believe in it yet.”
“Well. I
don't. Haven't taken up any offers for last day sex.”
“I didn't
get any of those offers. Guess people expect all work and no
play from me.”
“No word
from Sam or Burk?”
“No.
Nothing. Can't even get a track on the militia communicator Burk
carries.”
“So, are
you just going to sit in here by yourself? Shouldn't we be
preparing for the arrival of those things?”
“I don't
see anything in the sky out there but darkness. But I suppose
you're right. How about rounding up the group for me? Go out and
get Sean Seaman, Randy Giffen, Leon Ottawa, Jesse Milbrand, and
the main group of militia leaders I left supervising the
barricades. We'll set it up in teams – the militia is the main
army; Jesse's armed farmers are the second level. We have many
teens in the park, so we'll arm them all now. Put Randy and
maybe Donnie in charge of them. Last line of defence is armed
civilians, but we aren't arming all of them yet.”
Forty-five minutes later, Rin had his command group assembled on
the street out front of the office. Most of the preparations had
already been made. The hospital and the town hall were boarded,
barricaded, and defended. Stores like The Big Nail were also
boarded and barricaded. The park was now sandbagged into a
series of tent streets, and they had planned retreats to use if
necessary. Rin knew there was no genuinely workable plan. They'd
decided to defend the town in pieces, as putting everyone
together in a large group could mean being quickly overrun and
slaughtered. Dealing with the absence of Burk, Sam, and Carter
had already been planned, as Rin had passed the word through
Deena that they were on a guerrilla mission targeting a hidden
enemy base. Any final escape would be by vehicle, hidden in a
warehouse to the east, or by boat, prepared and covered at the
south river pier. Others had gone independent and were holed up
in houses around town. They would be on their own in any retreat
or escape.
The group
faced Rin, and he appeared to be looking off into some bleak
picture in the black sky. “As soon as this group breaks, start
the watch at your respective barricades and designated areas. So
far, I don't see anything out there but night. No sign. But
they're expected tonight.”
Leon
Ottawa took a step forward and was about to speak. Rin's eyes
went to three of the militia coming up the street at a fast
pace. All other eyes turned to them. The lead man, a long-haired
and bearded man named Jake, walked straight through and up to
Rin. “We've got a strange humming noise. North barricade up by
the riverside. The men are spooked. The devil dogs may be
approaching there.”
Everyone
heard. Rin glanced up the road with trepidation. “Okay, people,
let's walk up and take a look.”
The
brighter light orbs from the park cast a high haze over the
street, and people at observation points saw them walking down a
long arch of light toward the corner and the distant barricade.
Rin, Deena, and Jake walked three abreast in the lead, followed
by the others. They rounded the corner into faint light as the
streetlights had been turned off at possible attack points for
better cover. Ahead, they saw militiamen and women positioned
behind the barricade at the side of a military truck they'd
stolen.
The hum
Jake had mentioned was already coming clear in their ears …
long, eerie sound waves that gave the sense of an impending
event. Rin understood immediately why Jake felt they could be
coming that way, but he couldn't see anything visible to prove
it. Not a damn thing but darkness and the odd moth and insect
swirling out into the light.
Rin
figured that in most ways it was just another summer night,
though a dark one. Armageddon, if it was coming, was arriving
with a low growl. The hum created a sweaty feeling, as if
something terrible were about to happen, but not quite the end
of the world. He supposed that even his most devoted militia
folk didn't really believe this was the end. Hell, even the kids
in town didn't … just a bit of drinking and drugging. Everyone
still somewhere inside believed in either escape or victory …
that's why they'd turned the town into another campground. And
one somewhat subdued due to grief over the dead. Still, people
had rebounded fast. Rin was sure that those who could would put
up a fight. It was like they'd been waiting for it … saving
energy rather than wasting it on end-of-the-world party antics.
Rin even had some hope himself; he'd been forcing himself to
believe that Burk's failure to return meant he'd tracked Carter
and gotten on to something. Maybe they'd found the mother lode
of motherfuckers and were cooking the ambassador in a freak's
stew pot already.
After
about a minute of listening to the humming and looking about,
Jake spoke to the men at the truck. “I thought I told you to
hold the barricade. Why are you hiding behind that truck?”
The
answer came from a bony biker type with thick, frizzy locks.
“The sound rose when you were gone. We got the idea it might be
a bomb or missile coming in at the barricade.”
Muttering
in the group started to create confusion. Rin turned and held up
a hand for silence. “Wait here while I take a look.”
There was
no reply, but they all watched intently as Rin walked into the
shadows blowing from overarching trees and up to the barricade.
There was a seat at the peak made of some sandbags and canvas,
and Rin climbed up to it and stood there looking down the dark
road with his field glasses. He could see nothing but felt
bone-knocking vibrations come up from the sandbags to his knees.
He wondered what in the hell kind of hum it was as he'd heard
nothing like it before. It was an earthquake of sorts, and it
carried another almost hidden sound in it … like some big dragon
was letting out a roar somewhere underneath Indian Falls.
“We got
lights!” Jake yelled, prompting everyone to look up at the sky.
Most of them saw nothing. Then it became clear. Not much of a
light but more of a flashing stain moving in the clouds like a
plane was doing a slow run over Indian Falls. It passed in the
west, and Rin turned to get down off the barricade. He believed
something was coming, but likely later on … so for now, he'd put
men back on the barricade and return to the center of town.
He took a
step down but halted when he saw Leon Ottawa pointing west. The
faint light was returning; it grew brighter and flashed through
blue shades. Then it stopped, its location now being in the
clouds directly down the highway from the barricade. Queen's
Hotel was up that way, but it wasn't quite that far … Rin looked
with his glasses. The light flared, blinding him. He let the
glasses drop on their neck chain and staggered slightly as he
covered his eyes.
He heard
shouts from his rear; they were shots in the air to signal him
to move. But he stayed as his vision cleared, and when it did,
he was sure he was hallucinating. He saw a bright blue star fall
through the clouds right down to the roadway. And when it hit,
it thundered. That noise was followed by a horrible rise in the
humming. It became more like a metallic screech. Rin's hands
were on his ears, but he had to pull them away as he turned and
dived off the barricade.
At the
bottom, he rolled up and ran to the others.
What he'd
seen they hadn't seen because it had been at ground level
sheltered by the barricade, and that was a flaring blue fireball
shooting right up the road toward him. Rin was still running,
and he saw the others turning to retreat. At that moment, the
fireball hit the barricade, its impact force blowing it apart
into a fiery arch of debris. Fire licked down the road like a
red tongue emerging from the blue flare. But they had retreated
enough to avoid all but some scorching heat.
Rin
realized that the men had been right to disobey him and abandon
the barricade. It was now a blazing explosion with the asphalt
below split and curled aside. The contact energy of the
explosion had been enough to toss nearly the entire barricade
off into the dark. He felt a hand on his shoulder pulling him
back, and had a hard time taking his eyes off the blaze.
Turning, he saw Deena and retreated farther back with her. The
faces of his men were lit with awe and flashes of light. He
could still feel heat at his back, and when he looked again at
the barricade, it was gone. A blazing blue arch was in its
place, and the roadway now had the texture of scorched black
glass. He could see through the arch and down the road. Nothing
was on the road, but he could see that the arch itself ran back
as a shimmering hood or force field over the road. In the
distance, it all ended at turquoise lights, and he noticed the
sound had dropped back down to the faint hum they'd heard on
arrival.
Donnie
and some of the teenagers had arrived, and they were so awed
they'd dropped their weapons and were walking closer for a
better look. Jake ordered them back, and Rin ordered everyone
back farther. He looked around; the nearest natural defense, if
anything more came through, was to retreat to The Big Nail,
where the street narrowed.
They all
gathered under a huge maple not far from the end of The Nail's
parking lot. Since people couldn't seem to take their eyes off
the arch down the road, Rin put his back to it as he addressed
them. “Seaman and I are going back to get the beam guns,
grenades, and other stuff. Jake will remain in charge, and
you'll all obey him if anything comes up on that road.”
Deena
gave him a somewhat disturbed glance. “This attack is different
than what they pulled off the other night. How can we fight
stuff like this? I wish we knew where Sam and Burk are.”
Seaman
nodded in agreement. “We have big trouble ahead. They've learned
and gained power, too. Who knows what to expect? Looks like they
are coming in under a force arch. They'll have some shielding.
Be prepared to retreat.”
Rin shook
his head. “Like I said. Wait until we get back. We aren't
starting by retreating. We might retreat right into more of
them.”
Rin
walked off as another of the militia's stolen military trucks
pulled up. This one had some boxes of refitted grenades, a style
Burk thought might be effective on the invaders. But those were
the monsters of yesterday, and Gill Ottawa wondered if they'd be
of any use now as he passed a box to Randy Giffen. Jake's idea
was to arm the teen brigade, since most of them couldn't shoot
worth a crap and had already left their weapons here and there
on the ground. Aside from grenade boxes, the truck was empty,
and Deena, Laura, and another militia woman sat on the open back
while the militiamen drifted about, some smoking dope, others
drinking the odd shot from their flasks.
Some idle
chatter developed, and some talk about where Sam and Burk might
be. But it was cut short by a bright flash down at the end of
the road through the arch. Deena's friend Jenny was the first to
speak. “Shit, something's coming already,” she announced as she
popped around the side of the truck.
Jake
choked on the drink he was swallowing. Donnie stopped juggling
grenades to say, “Holy shit, it's a man.” And Jesse lowered his
shotgun to mutter, “Unless my eyes are tricking me, that's
Carter coming up the road.”
Jake
looked behind. “Where in the hell is Rin? That him coming? Fuck
no; it's that idiot Stu Pooler.”
On the
other side of the fiery arch, down the force-rimmed road, the
man walked forward at a slow pace. As he came closer, he came
clear as Carter. He was still outfitted in his special militia
gear, same as when he left. Only he wasn't carrying a weapon,
and he hadn't left on foot.
The crowd
was silent. Stu Pooler walked up, light from the arch
highlighting the confusion on his face. He spoke to Randy.
“What's Carter doing on the other side of that thing? He looks
stunned.”
“You're
right,” Randy said. “I'd better run out and pull him through.”
Stu
Pooler tapped his shoulder. “Go and get him, boy.”
Jake
suddenly seized Randy and pushed him back. He turned to Stu
Pooler, rage on his face. “Nobody goes out there. How do we know
that's Carter? He ain't saying nothing. He ain't even waving,
he's just walking.”
No one
moved. Carter continued his stroll up to the arch. They could
see his face now, and his usually intense features and tightened
forehead were calm. He was a man out for an easy walk in the
night, but under the bizarre circumstances, it all looked more
than wrong. Perhaps unbelievable, and the people seemed to grasp
that now, as everyone was watching and wondering.
Carter
reached the blazing arch, put his right foot up like he was
about to march through, then kept it there and froze like he'd
suddenly turned to stone.
Then
everyone spoke at once. “What in the hell,” Jake said as Pooler
shouted, “He needs help!” And that shout was over Deena's quiet
voice as she asked, “Anyone sure that's him?”
But the
voice everyone missed was Donnie's as he quietly said, “I'll get
him.”
Before
anyone could react further, Donnie was dashing right for Carter,
and Stu Pooler was hurrying forward just behind him. But neither
of them got to the arch because, at the same time, Carter
exploded into action. A tongue of flame flew up at the mouth of
the arch. Carter was running out of it, and then it became hard
to see, except that everyone saw Carter flying toward Donnie so
fast that he left a trail of nine images of his body behind. And
none of those images faded.
They also
saw that Donnie was really quick, because he threw himself down
and rolled, leaving the leader of the line of Carters racing
rocket-fast right into Stu Pooler. Then Carter wasn't Carter
anymore, and some ghostly black humanoid thing was tearing at
Stu Pooler. Blood was spurting up, and the other nine Carters
were now monsters running forward.
Donnie
did a rising leap to the side of the road. Jesse Milbrand fired
his shotgun, Randy threw one of his grenades, and the others
were backing off and then turning to run. Deena got around to
the front of the truck and looked back as the grenade went off …
a yellow flash, it blew the explosion of blood that Stu Pooler
and the thing attacking him had become into another burst of
fire. Donnie had tripped, but he’d escaped the explosion and was
running up the road with the nine other warped ghost humanoid
things pursuing him. He fell again, and as he did, Deena saw
someone step past her. It was Seaman with one of the militia's
beam weapons. He fired, letting an expanding beam sweep down the
road. Seaman's shot from the side barely missed Donnie and took
out the monsters flying through the air toward him. They went up
in tongues of flame, leaving no remains but scorched air.
Hair
smoking, Donnie reached the truck. Rin stepped out of the
darkness and stared ahead at the arch. Again, nothing was
happening. Only Donnie, Seaman, Jake, and Deena remained. The
others had retreated past The Big Nail.
“Guess
that's their way of saying hello,” Rin said.
Deena had
a tear of grief and rage in her eye. “Whatever that thing was,
it wasn't Carter.”
Seaman
put a hand on her shoulder. “Sure looked like him. They must
have got him earlier.”
Rin
nodded. “They got Carter. Maybe they didn't get Burk or Sam.
Maybe they would have been coming down that road with more than
Carter if they did.”
Seaman
lit a smoke. “Jeez. If they show now, we won't know if they're
real, fakes, or possessed. The boys will shoot them.”
+++
Inside
Marco’s home cell, Burk appeared to be subdued, an unhappy look
on his whiskered face. Marco had long-term stress imprinted in
his pained expression and lines of premature aging on his
forehead and eyes. His beard was thick and dark, but trimmed,
and his curly dark hair long and combed back. Beyond the arch,
the cell stretched back to a few hundred feet of living space,
but Marco had chairs scattered around near the exit, as if he
preferred to spend time there, looking out and hoping to find a
way out.
After
their rough arrival, Marco offered them chairs, and the three of
them now sat looking out across the central area at the
activities of Agent Mike Nelson and the three soldiers.
Considering the beating Burk had given Nelson outside the
station, he looked remarkably good now.
Sam
didn't bother to ask Burk how he got overpowered. Instead, he
asked about Carter.
Burk took
a sip from a glass of water and wiped some grimy sweat off his
forehead. “Marco keeps it hot in here. Carter, well, he's in the
heat, too. They took him somewhere before I arrived. Marco says
Nev Sweeting was laughing and talking about an experiment. I
don't hold out much hope of him being in one piece now.”
Sam’s
nose twitched like he smelled something foul. He turned to
Marco. “What exactly is going on? I mean, what is Nev Sweeting
now?”
“He is a
copy of the original Nev made in various energies. The
ambassador is similar. Some of the prisoners here are that, but
not most. Our hosts can shoot themselves across space in their
original form because they aren't carbon-based life but energy
beings. They have various body shapes: one for their original
home planet and another for the worlds they invade. They feed on
the energies produced by biological life, especially higher
forms. Here they feed on human beings.”
“That's
about what I thought,” Sam said. “How did you discover them?”
“Through
my hobby. I investigated the strange happenings, eventually
found this base, and even stole some of their technology to
create the new scope. The ambassador's race spanned hundreds of
years. Initially arriving via spaceship. They brought many of
the aliens who are prisoners here now. The ambassador is best
described as Nev Sweeting of his home planet. He is a traitor
that the invaders turned into an energy being.
Part of
this base is an old Indian temple that existed when alien
contact first occurred. Another old military base was
constructed long ago when the government first got involved.
Then the power station became a cover for an underground base.
It would have continued as beneficial contact with other worlds,
had the invading monsters not destroyed the ambassador's people
and used the technology to begin targeting many other planets.
All of the original agencies on Earth that knew about alien
contact and this base were killed off, leaving only those
approved by the invaders in control.”
Sam
interrupted. “The other prisoners, other aliens. Why are they
here?”
"They
were originally brought here because the ambassador's alien race
worked with others. Now it is for the same reason I’m here. They
have skills that can be used to keep the space travel system
working and expanding. I don't do anything physical. I'm forced
to do theory for them. They keep me alive because they haven't
discovered anyone else who understands the technology enough to
steal from it.”
“Oh, oh.
We're about to be rudely interrupted,” Burk said.
The three
soldiers were approaching, the bigger alien fellow walking
confidently out front of the other two. Across the court, Mike
Nelson was switching the center dome back from transparent to
opaque. It glossed gold and took on a sense of solidity. On
arrival at the cell entrance, the alien held up three thick
fingers and gestured for them to come closer. Sam and Burk rose
from their chairs; Marco did not.
Sam
stepped in front to face the lead soldier; the barrier suddenly
vanished, and a stun beam flashed. They fell to the floor, and
as they were dragged off, Sam could see but not move. Two of the
soldiers had Marco by the arms, and he assumed it was the alien
pulling him and Burk back to the central dome and Mike Nelson.
Sam spun
in and out of consciousness, and finally, the room came into
view. He found that they had been placed in three chairs not far
from the command circle. Special agent Mike Nelson was sitting
there, studying them astutely, and the three soldiers were now
standing guard at the entrance. Sam tried to move and found that
he was strapped to the chair with a wide, flexible band. The
strap seemed to have a life of its own, pulling him back into a
firm upright position whenever he tried to adjust. He saw that
Burk and Marco were held the same way.
Seeing
that all three men were now alert, Mike Nelson held out open
hands and said, “Welcome to the ambassador’s new show.”
Burk was
groggy, but he was the first to answer. “Only a crazy fed could
call this whole thing a show. It ain't the ambassador's show
either. Marco told us he's just another slave of the invaders.”
Mike
Nelson smiled, but it was a half-smile and ugly. “Crazy fed, I
don't think so. Take a look at this. A window appeared in the
dome wall off to his left. Images swirled and scoped closer. One
of the arches appeared, and the view went through the door. The
environment was rather lush with insects similar to yellow
butterflies flitting about. A rather bulbous green-skinned
creature sat in an open area on a bed of flattened grass. It had
several fine-tipped appendages, four of which converged on a
tiny item held in a vase.
Like Nev
Sweeting, Nelson was able to make control panels appear out of
thin air with a sweep of his hand. “Let's take a look at this
creature's home world,” he said.
The dome
window enlarged to an oval shape, and the view held extreme
clarity. Open space and the breathtaking feeling of sweeping
across it under the light of brilliant stars … a planet loomed
ahead and grew fast as the zoom went right down to it, like they
were landing a spacecraft. The view swept over oceans torn by
immense waves. A jungle world appeared. It was Earth-like and
rich with plant life and insects, but very different, with
filtered gold sunlight and odd light effects everywhere that
made individual plants and life forms hard to discern.
Mike
Nelson turned for a casual look at Sam; the display continued.
“This is an actual view of that being's home world in real time.
We can see many other planets from here. But this particular one
we can’t reach by travel.”
“Lucky
for them,” Burk said.
The
comment didn't amuse Nelson. “Ah, but their luck will run out
eventually, and we'll reach them with the system.”
“To
destroy their planet,” Sam said. “What's in this for you?”
“You have
to ask. I'm human and alive for one thing, and nearly everyone
else won't be. I'm not like Nev Sweeting, though, not altered.
Earth is my domain. Think of it this way: in the quickest time
possible, I've risen to the top of the food chain. Call me the
head of Corporation Earth. I work for the interplanetary bosses,
of course, but everybody does or will in time.”
Sam
sighed. “You mean as prisoners like the ones here?”
“Prisoners?” Nelson said. “The ones here have been captive for a
long time. They know no other life, really.”
Marco
gave him a nasty glance. “Don't speak for me.”
Agent
Nelson ignored the comment, turned, and rotated his hands in
front of him. A circular set of buttons and fingertip control
pads appeared and became semi-transparent. His right hand moved
adeptly on the controls, and the large image they were watching
altered. The view panned down to an image of Carter. He was in a
large open room with a smooth floor of emerald stone. An amber
glow circled him a couple of yards out, and Sam recognized it as
the same glow of one of the force fields that had shown at
Raven's Private Beach. Carter was sitting on the floor with his
chin in his hands, so it appeared he had been there a while and
knew there was no escape.
As the
image expanded, it showed the room around Carter to be vast and
cavernous, and Sam wondered how big this place really was … if
the ambassador's race had been here long ago, as they said, then
Indian Falls must have always been the place on Earth of alien
contact.
There was
no sound, and a whirl of fine, almost imperceptible black dust
began to circle outside the force field holding Carter. At
first, it moved slowly like a carousel and then faster. It
slowed, and pockets began to jell out of the dust; irregular
shapes began to take ghostly form. The shifting ghosts
brightened to ebony, and their forms blew about like they were
empty scarecrows filled with wind. A half-minute passed in this
phase, then they solidified from the head down: dozens of
blurred humanoid forms, still ebony black, with long, distorted
faces and flashing teeth. Their feet were bare and
multiple-toed, appearing as they hit the floor and took on full
weight. Not much distinguished one from the other, and they had
the same common look or imprint of evil. More and more of them
hit the floor, and the ones at the front were already walking up
to the edge of the force field and Carter.
They
stared at him with blazing eyes. Then Burk suddenly addressed
Nelson forcefully. “Don't do it! Don't lift that field!”
A flash
caused them all to blink; the view vanished, the inner dome
solidified, and they were facing Mike Nelson. Nelson slowly
looked the three of them over. “That was the past you were
looking at … some of our friends arrived early. They had a use
for Carter. Perhaps we should take a vote. Who wants to see what
they did with him?”
Marco
slapped his palm on the chair. “You're a bastard,” he said.
“No one
will want to see what we do to you,” Burk said, and before
Nelson could reply, an alarm began to shriek, and the three
soldiers ran into the door of the central dome. Nelson stood up
to face them. The alien soldier spoke in a voice with far too
much wind and bass in it to be human. “It is an interior
security alert. We have never had that before. One of the
residents has triggered it. Perhaps attempting an escape.”
In an
instant, Nelson had an oval-shaped control panel spinning out of
the air. As it whooshed and the center dome became transparent,
Nelson's cleft jaw dropped a little, and he appeared to be
thinking. His adjustments created a magnifier in the air, and
one by one he began zooming in on the arches, fading the entries
and swooping inside for a check.
One of
the human soldiers spoke. “I think it is something Nev Sweeting
did. I have already warned the ambassador about his lax
attitude.”
Marco
laughed openly, causing Mike Nelson to halt what he was doing.
He turned away from his controls and pulled a hand scattergun
from his jacket. His expression was deadly. “What are you
hiding? You had better talk. Attempted escape is a death
sentence.”
All eyes
were glued to Marco. “Sure, I can talk if that's what you want.
It's rather amazing. I mean, all the time I have been a
prisoner, and I've never seen a mistake made. That was with the
ambassador, the controllers, and you, I guess.”
Nelson
waved the scattergun. “Get to the point.”
“Well,
that was before Nev Sweeting came along.”
“Out with
it or I'll shoot now!”
“Okay.
What if a worker here didn't escape, but one of you guys let him
out without fastening the neck control collar correctly, and
were even so dumb that you didn't lock him back up after the job
was done?”
Mike
Nelson stared dumbfounded. A human soldier answered. “It's that
beast from one of the ambassador's planets at Alpha Centauri.
Nev Sweeting put it out for a job and forgot to notify us when
it was supposed to go back into lock up.”
Nelson
fired the scattergun, and from his shoulders to his pelvis, the
entire body mass of the soldier fused red and vanished. His
flaming remains fell to the floor.
The
second human soldier gaped as Nelson turned the gun on him, but
the alien soldier never flinched. Instead, he spoke through the
stench of burnt flesh. “This is the first error we’ve made here,
but it is correctable. That particular alien is practically
domesticated. It's just a matter of finding him and putting him
back in the lockup.”
“Do so.
But put these men back in lockup first. I don't want any more
mistakes. The ambassador won’t be happy about this.”
With
Marco in the lead, they were forced to walk in single file back
to the lockup. Once they were secured, the two soldiers left the
main area. Across the court, the dome was in transparent mode,
and they could see Mike Nelson using a burn beam to evaporate
the rest of the soldier's remains. When that was done, he sat
down, used a panel to open a view window, and began searching
the complex. He had a view passing in carousel-style as he
looked into every arch and verified the presence of the alien
occupant. At the empty cell, he paused and looked it over, then
he began to pan the complex looking for the soldiers and the
missing alien. Sam remained with Burk at the front of the cell
to watch this while Marco sat as though he had no interest. From
their perspective, they could see Nelson's screen but not in
full clarity.
The sheer
size of this underground complex and some of the areas Nelson
was scanning amazed Sam. He did not track the repair alien right
away, but did track the location of the neck collar it was
supposed to be wearing. The screen suddenly panned in on the
alien soldier standing in a long corridor, radioing Nelson with
some info. Then there was a view of the two soldiers running and
a pan ahead of the multilegged alien fleeing them. It was
faster, but it came to a dead end at one of the overhead-view
areas that looked down on the huge power arch that opened down
in the gully.
At the
end of the line, the creature quickly opened a service tunnel
door. The entry was to a transparent tunnel running along the
top of the arch with open areas around the huge plates that ran
like a spine along it.
The alien
soldier was in the lead, and he fired a high beam that glanced
off the creature. It halted, pressed something at the top of a
plate, and dropped down to the floor of the long arch. As the
soldiers reached the plate, the creature halted in the tunnel
well in front of them and waited.
Deciding
on a pursuit, the alien soldier ran ahead to face off with the
creature. He pulled his weapon up and gestured for the creature
to obey and come to him. Instead, it disobeyed and used its
multiple legs to run up the wall around the arch and back
through the plate. It popped straight through, catching the
human soldier off guard, and before he could react, the creature
jumped him. What followed was an uneven match as the creature
tore the man open with its legs and pounced on him as he fell.
Grotesque
intestinal damage and a slit throat left the soldier dead, but
the alien soldier proved skilled and was using some kind of
magnetism in his boots to run up to the plate. But he didn't
make it as the creature touched something to seal it and release
a charge. The alien soldier fell back, and the creature tapped
out something on the plate. A moment later, charges sparked on
the lower plates, and energy, like a ball of fire, shot up the
tunnel. The soldier raised his arms defensively as it slammed
into him and shot him down to the exit.
Another
alarm began to sound, and Mike Nelson was on his feet with
several control panels floating in the air around him. Many of
these panels had appeared just before the death of the soldiers,
and invisible fingertips, not Nelson, were operating them. Sam
knew what they likely meant; the game was in play. The invading
monsters were transmitting with full force, as the attack on
Indian Falls was underway.
Some dust
snowed as the whole complex shivered under the force of the
earthquake, and it became clear that Mike Nelson was putting his
central control area under lockdown. It went opaque and took on
a hard-as-stone gloss, and there was more this time, as mist
began to flow around the small dome, forming more layers of
hardened skin that added further protection.
Sam
turned to Marco. “What's your read on this?”
“It's the
highest power ratio I've seen them use yet. They are
transferring thousands of the invaders into Indian Falls for a
feeding. Mike Nelson is obviously locking himself in for
protection against that escaped repair beast. He would plan to
lock it out of the main control area until this phase is over
and have the ambassador take care of him when he returns.”
Burk
walked up close and faced Marco. “Come clean with us. All the
time you've been in here, you've been working on their stuff.
You must know a way out of this cell.”
Marco was
taken aback. “If I did, I wouldn't be in here. I did escape,
twice … but I couldn't escape the complex and ended up back in
here.”
Excitement lit Burk's usually gloom-shrouded features. “Give us
the details quickly.”
Marco was
about to speak; there was a sudden crash, and they looked out to
see the entry door to the large court warp inward like it had
been hit by a giant's fist. A second bang perforated it with a
large, rough-edged hole, and fire and sparks flew in and bounced
on the stone floor. Some tense moments passed, then something
burst through the hole, dropped, and skated across the floor.
It was
the armored repair alien, running on its multiple legs toward
the sealed inner dome. Coming to a stop about three yards from
it, the creature began to move around it, looking for something.
Then it ducked as a flash of fire flew from the dome's surface.
The alien beast dodged, ran quickly about, then jumped right to
the top of the dome and rose on its rear legs. Its legs began to
weave about in circles and shot out string-like white webbing
down the side of the dome. Slowly, it turned about, releasing
the webbing on all sides of the dome, and then it took a long
leap to the floor and backed away as far as possible.
A blue
flash flew from the dome and, this time, struck home, but the
creature was tough; it tumbled onto the floor but appeared to be
no more than singed. It fired a flash of its own, rising on its
short tail again and releasing the charge from its extended
stomach. That charge shot straight to the top of the dome and
dispersed into fiery drops that hit the web, setting it aflame.
Agitated,
the creature began to run around the dome at high speed to avoid
more fire. The charges missed him, striking the floor as the
webbing on the dome began to burn into the shell. Suddenly,
Agent Mike Nelson's protection was gone; the dome became
transparent, and fiery, glass-like shards fell to the floor,
shattering around him.
Silent
fireworks streaked the rolling gray clouds over the north part
of town, putting a colored haze into the ebony night. The
militia and other townspeople were in defensive positions at the
hospital, the town hall, and the park. Rin and Jake remained
watching the blazing barricade arch from a pocket of shadows not
far from The Big Nail. Leon Ottawa, Gill, and three others were
looking out from behind boarded windows at The Nail. Now there
was a whirl of dust at the mouth of the arch, and light as
bright as a blue moon showed down the road above the location of
the empty Queen's Hotel. The hum was back, shaking their bones
like an ultrasound they could feel and rattling skulls and
eardrums with a dull headache massage. The sound rose from
obscurity to a feverish pitch, the dust swirling at the
barricade igniting into streaks of fire as the area heated up.
Rin could feel the heat coming up the road like a forest fire
wind. The breeze stank like a foul, boiling witch's brew.
A blurred
human-like form appeared out of the dust suddenly, and Jake was
about to step out and fire when Rin pulled him back. They waited
silently, watching as more of the ebony forms appeared at the
arch and moved slowly forward. There was a lot of light here,
and it told them why the uglies had been nearly invisible at the
campground. They were black as shadows, faded into any other
shadows, and were rough at the edges. Through field glasses, the
clearest portion was their faces. Rin studied them … warped and
feral, always shifting through expressions, all of which were
hungry or hostile. The eyes were bare reddish slits and evil, as
were the thin-lipped mouths. They definitely seemed to be taking
on a more solid form now, where before they'd seemed more like
ghostly energy beings; this, he assumed, was because they had
everything tuned right, had fed some and were ready for their
world-shaking debut as the invaders who came to eat the planet
alive.
“When are
you going to fire that thing?” Jake whispered. He was referring
to the SNX beam weapon, which Sam had set in an experimental
beam mode he thought would do the most war damage.
Rin
whispered back, his voice barely audible in the hum. “Once I
shoot, they'll be tipped off. Wait until there are a lot of
them. If we can't hold them back, run for The Nail.”
The hum
reached a crescendo, and an explosion of congealing forms
appeared on the roadway out front of the arch. Rin felt creeped
out, his skin crawling with a dirty itch. If they continued to
arrive in sudden numbers like that, Indian Falls had no chance.
The place was more like a sacrificial puppy, and he could feel
their eyes looking his way, like they could see his blood.
It was
enough to force him to move; he stepped out and fired the SNX
beam. It expanded as it blew down the road, striking the enemy
with a blast of white light that took out a couple of dozen of
them in a burn, their bodies lit like red jelly, then evaporated
into a cloud of rising steam.
Those
remaining were now moving his way, and more were already coming
through the arch. Rin sprinted toward The Big Nail with the
weapon under his arm, and then Jake stepped out and fired a
blast with the militia beam gun. Jake's blast knocked up a wave
of asphalt chunks and dirt, slowing them. At The Big Nail, they
ran around to the side and waited a few seconds for one of the
men to unbolt the door.
+++
Mike
Nelson faced chaos inside the command center; a falling shard
singed his face, and he spun on his heels as he tapped a code
out on some buttons. A moment later, an amber force field rose
in place of the shattered one. Behind him, the banks of control
panels shifted in and out of transparency, and on the outside,
the repair alien was still running about looking for a way in.
Nelson rubbed the burn on his cheek, his face reddened with
fury. He had his scattergun, looking out beyond the force field
at the hurrying alien. His firm-set jaw was now unhinged, and
his eyes were wide. The unexpected event had left him in a
murderous rage. He obviously wanted to fire at the creature, but
didn't want to lower the force field.
Nelson
walked across the floor a ways. The circling alien decided to
stop and face him, chattering in some odd insect-like language.
This pissed Nelson off even more; he shook his curly head like
he was trying to shake away a hallucination, then he waved a
hand in the air, hitting an invisible button. As the force field
blinked, he fired a shot that missed as the alien popped up in
the air. It hit the floor again on running feet, ran into the
shield, and bounced off. Nelson fired again, and in that instant
the alien unexpectedly sprang with a rearward jump and got most
of the way through the field. One front appendage got severed,
but it was inside with Nelson and on him in a second.
Nelson
fared better than the creature's last opponent, managing to
throw himself away from it and fire a couple of wild shots. He
swung the scatter gun around for the kill shot, but the alien
was faster, producing a sharp front claw from the folds of its
flesh that whipped out and severed Nelson's wrist. His pumping
heart caused a spray of thick blood from the wound. He stumbled
backward, horror on his face, falling to the floor. A quick
skitter and then it was over. The repair alien was on him,
driving nail-hard legs through his abdomen, neck, and skull.
Rushing
away from the dead body, the armored alien expelled sweat from
its pores and shook itself furiously to clean itself of Nelson's
blood and bodily fluids. Then it sat on its hind legs and pulled
up a round plate with a series of buttons. Immediately, the
force field locking their cell vanished, and Sam, Burke, and
Marco hurried out.
They went
right into the command center with the alien, and Sam turned to
Marco. “Tell that creature to free all of the others.”
“Hold it
a minute,” Burk said. “Let's think this over. This deadly brute
appears to be on our side, but we don't know how dangerous the
others are.”
It was
the repair alien that replied, chattering out a message of sorts
as its severed front appendage sprouted back to form.
They
turned to Marco for an interpretation. He'd stepped back from
them all, and now they saw he'd picked up Nelson's scattergun.
Raising the gun, he held it on them. His eyes were wide like he
was hallucinating.
Sam
couldn't believe his eyes. “Marco. What in the hell are you
doing? This is your chance to escape.”
But Marco
didn't answer; he pulled the trigger, firing a heat beam at the
alien. It lit the creature red hot, and it fell over stunned,
but it didn't disintegrate.”
“Damn it
all,” Burk muttered.
Marco ran
his left hand through his beard, a look of deep satisfaction now
on his expressive face. “You must realize that the ambassador
wanted a failsafe, in case this sort of thing happened.”
Sam
sighed with disappointment. “Not another person with a mad
reason for working with him?”
“I have a
genuine reason. I spent years attempting to detect other life
forms. It was my life's work. I found them. The universe is
abundant with life, and the ambassador controls the technology
to reach them. Why would I bet on humankind? The best we'll have
is a warp drive of sorts that puts robot ships across space. It
doesn't come near the power of this technology. And the human
race, so to speak. Who needs billions of humans? A small number
is best. After the feeding is over, I plan to create a new
Earth, populated with life forms from around the galaxy.”
Sam
didn't find Marco convincing. “You want an Earth that develops
unnaturally, with the worst moral examples of humans on it
remaining alive while the others die.”
“No, it
is natural. It's the law of nature. Predators survive by feeding
on others, but they don't destroy everything, or they destroy
themselves. I have the future Earth well planned. So what if a
predator alien race is the controlling power? I can use them.
With my new equipment, this will be the hub, the library of
life. I will scope and document everything, all life. When I get
too old to be flesh and blood, I'll join Nev Sweeting as an
energy copy of myself. Trust me; it's the best way for the Earth
to live on. Think of it, a few former humans could control a
galaxy, not some pathetic future Earth of your timeline.”
“Well,”
Burk said. “Isn't it amazing how the best way always happens to
be the one that furthers the life, personal goals, and chosen
career of the one naming it? You're no different from a bully
who beats people up, thinking he'll never be stopped. Then a
stronger guy walks in and kicks his butt. You'll come up with
smarter aliens eventually, and they'll take you down.”
"You
sicken me with your hillbilly logic," Marco said. "We are
technocrats, and we believe we can solve problems as they
arise."
Burke
scowled. "If that's so, the technocrats have failed like they
always do because they lost their humanity."
Anger,
even disgust, marred Marco's bearded face. He swung the
scattergun for a direct shot on Burk's belly and squeezed the
trigger. But the gun hummed and failed to fire. At the same
time, the hum of the arch reached a mighty crescendo, and the
underground system shook with a small earthquake. Marco turned
to flee, but he wasn't fast enough. Burk tackled him before he
got five steps, taking him down hard on the floor. Marco
struggled, and Burk threw out two hard punches to the head that
stilled him. He was out cold.
Panting,
Burk looked up at Sam. “Now what?”
Rather
than answer, Sam took the seat Mike Nelson had used and imitated
the hand sweeps he'd seen. Some controls immediately appeared
out of transparency. “Going by the info we have, the attack on
Indian Falls was pre-set and can't be stopped. It's all
automatic. I'm going to try something else.”
“Like
what?”
“I want
to figure this system out enough to open those cells. We're
going to free the prisoners.”
Burk
grinned. “Well. At least you're someone who thinks about someone
other than himself. During all this, I had one serious beef with
those guys and their brave-new-world plans?”
“What is
the beef?”
“They
didn't include my people and me in the planning, and it didn't
really sound all that hot anyway, so we wouldn't have gone for
it.”
“Their
plans all suffer from a fatal flaw. If you believe an invading
enemy and cross over to their camp, you are fooled by their
propaganda. No great new Marco- or Sweeting-world would come
about. Only death will happen, unless we stop it.”
“You got
the feel of those controls?”
“I've got
a bit of it,” Sam said as he punched out a string.
Warning
tones echoed; they looked across to the nearest arches and saw
the pouring mist fade. Force fields showed and then blinked, and
in an instant, alien features showed as some of the occupants
began to emerge from their cells. “We'll leave all these open.
They may not all be able to leave their respective environments
for long. The arches appear to keep their atmospheres contained
inside. Drag Marco back over to his cell, though. We'll lock him
in until we decide what to do with him.”
+++
Only
eight people were in The Big Nail - a couple in their forties
having a drink at a polished table as though nothing was
happening; Leon Ottawa looking out an open slit in the boarded
windows; Gill Ottawa and the others behind him by a barricade
made of overturned tables and piled supplies. Leon suddenly
moved back and attempted to swing a heavy interior board back
into place to complete the seal on the front windows. But the
ground was suddenly shaking, and the floorboards shifted,
causing him to slip. He fell with the board and groaned. They
could all see a brilliant glare of light outside the long slash
of exposed glass, flickering light like flames, then suddenly
faces. They were long, distorted ebony faces, almost like a wave
of shadows pressed along the surface of the glass. Slit red eyes
showed, scanning the room with feral intent, and the building
kept shaking as if wind or pressure were pushing in from all
directions.
Rin
remained at the rear with Jake beside him. They weren't quite
sure what to do. They couldn't fire strong beams from inside, or
they'd take out walls and collapse the building, though it felt
like the boarded windows were about to explode at any moment.
A
decision was made for them. The faces blurred, and light
flashed, and Gill Ottawa reacted by cursing and firing a blast
of automatic weapons fire just over his father Leon, who was
rising from the floor. The glass shattered, but instead of
flying outward, some shards flew inside and slashed into Leon's
legs. The others turned to retreat to where Burk and Jake were
standing, but it was too late as the entire section of boarded
windows blew inward in a spray of glass and splinters. The
retreating men caught the worst of it. The couple at the table
suddenly rose against a slashing wind, blood flew, and Burk,
Jake, and the man who'd opened the door for them ducked behind
the rear row of high shelves. From there, they felt the hot
wind, and Rin saw, through a gap, what was happening up front. A
whole section of the front wall was gone, the door had blown
down, and a crowd of darkened forms was moving in incredibly
fast. They hit Leon first, but reached the rest so quickly that
they never got off any shots. A blood-and-organs bomb exploded
as the monsters fed. Rin, Jake, and the remaining civilian
hurried out a back door and ran across an alley in the dark.
They
ended up in a small weedy lot looking back toward The Big Nail;
the hundreds of dark forms that had spilled off the road by the
arch looked surreal in the streetlights over The Nail parking
lot. The front of the building had torn away like these beasts
absorbed everything through the sheer force of their attack. A
familiar figure, that of Nev Sweeting, stood on the road out
front, and the ambassador was at the front of a massive crowd of
monsters farther south by the side road to the hospital.
The lone
surviving civilian from The Big Nail spoke. “We've got to get
over to the hospital, they're going there next. I'm supposed to
be helping Dr. DeBartolo.”
“Who are
you?” Rin said.
“I'm Tim
Wong. I'm the orderly responsible for the interior hospital
defense. Dr. DeBartolo put me in charge.”
Jake gave
him a nasty glance. “You shouldn't have been hanging out at The
Big Nail.”
Rin
studied the hospital, its higher portions showing in gaps in the
tree line. “Let's go. We'll cut around to beat them. Try to fire
at them from the front. I've got militia there. We'll pull them
out and retreat to the park if necessary.”
Tim was
upset. “We can't leave everyone in there to die.”
Rin's
lips became a snarl. “We do what we can. Maybe we can't save
anyone. Not even ourselves. One thing's sure. We don't have time
to evacuate a hospital, even if there aren't that many people in
it.”
A path
ran through darkened deciduous trees and flowery scrub; beam
guns in hand, they jogged over and entered the hospital grounds
at the side. Rin whistled as they came out of the trees, and a
militiaman moved out to meet them. They entered from the back
and moved through the ground floor to the front lobby. At that
point, Tim Wong left them and went upstairs to the doctor and
the patients, all of whom were on the rear third and fourth
floors.
At the
window, Rin and Jake gathered with four others of the militia.
They could see the ambassador and an army of monsters coming up
the rise to the front grounds. Here, mauve lights were exploding
silently in the sky, and there was some screaming from patients
above who had looked out the window and spotted what was coming.
Jake's
look was one of semi-shock. “This place is a cooked goose. We'll
be lucky if we can get out of here ourselves.”
Rin
lifted the beam gun and did some programming on it. He decided
to keep Jake and one militiaman with a flamethrower by his side.
The others he sent to the back to go up the elevator, find Tim
Wong, and see if there were people who were well enough to walk
out the back in a quick evacuation.
“What's
the plan?” Jake said, as the ebony monsters closed in under the
lights of the blue hell at the front.
“This
lobby is only two floors high with the main tower of the
hospital behind us. We're going to fire through the windows,
retreat, throw grenades, and burn the whole front with the
flamethrower. Got that?”
The other
two men nodded. Rin and Jake raised their weapons and aimed at
the light distortion on the huge glass sheets at the front of
the lobby. They fired simultaneously, in sustained bursts,
taking out the entire front lobby in a big kick of blast, smoke,
and sparks. The debris flew in a wave at the crowd of invaders,
the front of the wave being the revolving left-front entrance
door, now flying like a reaping machine over the bushes into the
parking lot.
They
lowered the weapons and all three of them threw grenades, and as
they landed to explode, the militiaman with the flamethrower
fired a stream and swept it across the front landscaping. The
fiery blast was deafening, and a sudden inferno surged forward
as a giant ring of biting flames and searing-hot debris. The
force of it died down in seconds, leaving the entire area
running out to the road a burning landscape of Hades. Charcoal
was raining down, and Rin wondered how much of it was the
remains of the dozens of monsters they'd fried. But he didn't
wonder long because the whole front lobby was collapsing, and he
could see the ambassador and the rest of the approaching army
shielded by the amber glow of a force field as they prepared to
renew the attack.
With
concrete and dust pouring through from the roof, it was time to
flee. They ran down the long lobby to the back of the building,
and as they got there, the two elevators opened, and Tim Wong
and a group of bandaged hospital patients emerged. Rin signaled
them to follow, and they hurried out the back and over the lot
to a path through the bushes.
“What
about Dr. Debartolo and the rest of the patients?” Rin asked.
“They're
bedridden. I told him it's too late, but he insisted on trying
to get some on wheels for an evacuation. He’s still inside.”
Rin knew
they couldn't go back in for more, and as he thought that, the
lights went out at the hospital. All power down. Running into
the back lot, he shone a bright beam up the windows and spotted
someone standing there. Tim ran up beside him.
“It's the
Doctor. I think he's signaling us. What's that in his hand?”
“Oh-no,”
Tim said. “That's a bag of syringes in his hand. We've got to go
in and stop him?”
Jake came
alongside them. “Syringes … what's this about?”
“It's
about going down with the ship,” Rin said as Debartolo
disappeared from the window. “The Doc is going to inject
everyone quickly, including himself. The inky bastards won't
find anything in there but dead, poisoned bodies.”
Tim had
tears in his eyes, and he was visibly shaking. The other militia
folk and the patients had already headed off down the path,
attempting to reach the town hall. Rin and Jake each took one of
Tim's arms and moved off into the trees. Behind them, a big lick
of flame rose in the sky as the main building began to burn.
They were
moving in a half-circle toward the main drag, as Rin wanted to
get a look at the park. Before they got that look, a series of
explosions, automatic weapons, and shotgun fire shook the area.
The entire stretch of street they were about to emerge onto
became a tornado alley of flying debris, forcing them to
retreat. Rin knew what it was … the teenagers had grenades and
some of them were stationed on rooftops and in high windows.
They'd thrown their bombs in an attempt to halt the enemy
advance.
At that
point, Rin decided he needed a clear look. He told Jake and Tim
to stay where they were but to escape if required. He ran out of
the trees into the rear of a squat municipal office building.
Power was out in this building; he hurried up a rear fire escape
and reached the roof … there he ran across a flat bed of tar and
gravel to a ledge overlooking the street. Everything was well
lit by the alien lights in the sky, and the initial blasts had
receded to floating dust motes, small fires, and heaps of
wreckage. The view down toward The Big Nail and the hospital was
breathtaking. It was swarmed, an army of hundreds of the
monsters, and more still streaming in a black flow out of that
arch. The other direction gave him a view of a group of fleeing
teens heading toward the line of armed farmers and militiamen
guarding the street front of the park.
There was
still time to reach the town hall, which was safer due to heavy
barricades at the front and sides. Rin turned to leave, then
turned back as he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It
was movement below; Jake and Tim had abandoned his order to stay
put and were emerging on the wrecked street. Jake was attempting
to carry both beam guns and pull Tim Wong along at the same
time. Less than half a block back, the monsters were streaming
into the street like a river of dark wolves headed for dinner.
Rin could
see that it was too late; he pulled a grenade and tossed it
down. As it exploded, Jake looked back. The vision staggered
him, and he tripped with the guns. Tim broke free of him and
stumbled over to the shattered windows of a clothing store in
shock.
Rin threw
a second grenade; Jake saw he couldn't reach Tim in time and
stumbled away, carrying the beam guns … the grenade exploded,
and in Rin's mind, the debris settled in slow motion, with the
monsters flashing through it straight to Tim. His mouth opened
in a silent scream that may as well have taken place in another
world because they were on him and ripping him apart before any
sound escaped his throat.
Rin raced
back over the tarred stones and down the fire escape. On the
ground, he sprinted around and came out of the alley by the park
and the town hall. He saw Sean Seaman and Jake holding the beam
guns, about to face off with the rush of monsters. They weren't
coming to the town hall yet. Nev Sweeting and the ambassador
were at the front of them, and they were gathering in a
monstrous mob, readying for a run at the park. Jesse Milbrand
and some armed farmers and teens were still guarding the park;
it appeared that nearly all of the remaining militia had entered
the fortified town hall.
Glow
lights that were still on began to pop off across the park. Rin
could do little but watch some volleys of fire, then run off and
around to the back of the town hall. He got a glance out before
he got there and saw Randy Giffen, Donnie, and some other teens
being overtaken by the monsters as they retreated deeper into
the park, then blinding blasts from the beam guns swept the
area. By the time he reached Deena and the militiamen guarding
the rear, horrifying screams of dying people were echoing over
from the park, and the sounds of grenades and gunfire were dying
down. It was mostly over now, but the killing as they'd sweep
through the park and pursue all who had chosen that venue.
Ironically, many people had thought it would be better to be
there in case a fast escape was needed. Yet it looked like few
could escape, and he heard no roar of vehicles fleeing the
scene, just a couple of crashes that sounded like some people
had attempted to drive off and didn't make it. Dogs were howling
far off, so it looked like they'd escaped and, in the end, would
be the only park survivors.
The town
hall had its own generator inside, so it would remain powered
even if the rest of the town's power went out. Deena looked
flustered and drawn as she led them in the back. From an alcove
on the climbing staircase, Rin had an overview of the packed
central hall. A lot more people were now huddled in the hall.
Hundreds were there, so many people must have decided to retreat
to it when the shooting started. At present, he was more
interested in the park and the rest of the town. He wondered
exactly how many people had hidden in houses and guessed that
probably a lot thought they would be safer away from the big
crowds. He went up and over with Deena to a higher crow's nest
they'd set up in an empty room near the rooftop. Two militiamen
and Deena's friend Jenny were there. Jenny was in a corner
weeping, and the men were pale and red-eyed from lack of sleep.
Rin
immediately went to the view slit in the boarded window and
looked down. Sean Seaman and several armed militia people and
townsfolk were hiding behind the massive barricade at the front.
Fires were now burning all over town and were far worse in the
park as all the tents had caught fire. Heavy white smoke from
them shrouded the area, so all that could be seen were flashes
of the fast-moving black invaders and the odd person running for
cover in the distance. Torn asphalt and bones littering the
street running along the park told the story of a fast massacre
there. Rin gathered that Jenny had been watching from the window
when this began, and it was the reason she was now in shock. It
wouldn't have been pretty; they'd swept the street and park like
a stampede of reapers. The weapons and grenade fire kill off
only the leading edge of the endless flow of hungry demons.
The first
big wave of them had swept the park and was now returning; their
forms like an army of shadows in the smoke. Hundreds more were
coming from the arch, and when Rin looked back to the park, he
saw the ambassador and Nev Sweeting emerging from a cloud of
sparks and smoke by a flaming tree and tent. The whole gang was
now converging and congregating for the last major assault. The
attack on the town hall. After that, they would go house to
house.
“We're
going to hit them with a lot more fire from here than they got
from the park,” Rin said.
“Yeah,
but how long can we hold them off?” Deena said.
“Not long
without help. We can burn a couple of charges of them down, then
they're going to break through.”
“Hey,”
one of the militia guys said. “Come here, look at this.”
Rin
hurried to the window. Below, Nev Sweeting and the ambassador
had emerged on the road, but they weren't coming the rest of the
way up to the barricade. They had turned, and most of the army
of dark invaders was turning to follow them as they walked back
up the road in the direction of the arch.
Deena
nudged him aside and peeked out. “What does it mean?”
Rin
grinned. “It means Burk and Sam are still alive because the
leaders are leaving. It'll buy us some time. Something has
happened, and they got a report they don't like. It's the only
reason I can come up with for them leaving during a battle.”
Thirty
minutes passed, and though Nev Sweeting and the ambassador had
left, many of the invaders remained. Shades of deep purple
bruised the clouds, and brighter lights flared as the monsters
continued to gather. There were so many of them that they poured
into the park, filling it with a black sea of shifting demons.
They'd come over the curb now and were up at the barricade; a
crowd of fast zombies, but perhaps brighter as none of them
touched the barricade. Though their slit red eyes and twisted
faces showed a ravenous desire to attack, they waited. Many of
them turned faces to the sky like the strange light rained down
their commands or intelligence. In rushes of air, odd moans
drifted from them as though the night was full of ghosts.
Rin, the
militia, and townspeople also waited. Most were huddled and
terrified inside, while those armed were in high places or
behind the barricades and entry doors. They all knew the moment
of attack would come soon, and with the signal from Rin to hit
the enemy, all guns would be blazing.
When it
began, there was a brighter flare in the sky and an
instantaneous rush, like they'd all received a mental command to
attack at the same micro-instant. The force was incredible,
flashing forms hitting the barricade with the power of a
bulldozer and about to break it open and ride over it. The sound
rose in an ear-slapping series of whams and bangs, then Rin gave
the signal, and the town rocked under the force of a thunderous
explosion.
Thirty-eight human-sized road cones had been placed along the
entry road up by the park and down partway to the barricade. All
of these had been set up as large nail bombs, and the detonation
blew them all at once. Everyone in the town hall had dropped
down for better cover, and everyone cringed at the fierce blast
and the following wave of thumps, bangs, smashes, and nearly
every other nasty sound a wave of about a million projectiles
could create.
As soon
as it was over, Rin looked out … even the upper portion of the
town hall was embedded with nails and metal rivets driven into
the stone like porcupine quills. Nothing was left of an entire
section of the monsters. They'd been obliterated out on the
street, halfway across the park, and as far down the road as The
Nail. There was still a large crowd of them right at the
barricade, and they were streaming around to the sides of the
building.
Not
wasting any time, Rin gave the second signal and used the beam
gun on a wide beam to burn the invaders coming around the south
side. Another beam was fired by Seaman along with a hail of gun
blasts, grenade bursts, and automatic fire. It only took a
minute, and the first attack had been repelled. Yet it wasn't a
cause for optimism. Hundreds more were coming up the road and
across the grass to the obliterated section at the front of the
park, where barricades stood. They looked completely like an
army of ghosts now, or the returning dead as they walked through
the smoke of fresh bomb-crater hell.
The
stand-down order was given; all gunfire ceased. Rin heard Deena
breathing either sighs of relief or taking deep breaths to fend
off a heart attack. The militiamen below were pulling back to
near the boarded doors, and he could see a section at the front
where the barricade had been pierced. An area small enough to
slip through, and a person was slipping through it. It was Sean
Seaman, and he had the beam gun.
Deena
grabbed Rin's shoulder and dug her nails in. “Shit, Seaman's
lost his marbles. He's going out there to fire on them.”
Rin
watched, like he couldn't believe his eyes, as Sean Seaman
walked out into the plumes of smoke of the recently devastated
area. He was walking right up to the approaching monsters, and
then he turned and fired at the ground in front of the
barricade, sending up a wave of debris that closed the opening.
Turning again, he faced the monsters and prepared to fire. A
suicide blast; he'd get a good number of them, but there would
be no escape.
The black
wave surged toward Seaman. He fired, and Rin fired from above.
Jake had run up the barricade with a prepared sling of grenades,
set to release all the triggers when thrown. His arm was good,
and the first blast propelled the bombs even farther so that
they exploded well beyond Seaman, took out a small host of
monsters, and gave him time to rethink his suicidal actions.
Seaman didn't have time to return and climb the barricade, so he
ran south, where the street was cleared. The invaders were
rushing up the street from the arch direction and across the
smoking park. Seaman made it a ways down the road and turned off
away from them, dashing down an alleyway. After that, Rin could
see nothing other than the pursuing invaders heading that way
about ten seconds behind him.
+++
The huge
vault door shimmered, there was a rush of bright white light and
air, and out of it two forms appeared. This time, the ambassador
and Nev Sweeting didn't find themselves in a locked-down
underground prison and command post. They found themselves in an
open and altered one populated by their own escaped prisoners.
Prisoners who had left them in the dark as to the reason they
were called back.
The
central command area was under a new transparent force shield,
with Sam and a group of the most vulnerable aliens inside. Some
of them were in their own small environmental bubbles, as they
required an atmosphere and temperature Earth did not provide
outside of the arches.
Burk was
on the other side, unarmed and facing off with Nev Sweeting. The
ambassador's surprised face showed beads of sweat, dilated
pupils, and signs of stress as he used telepathic communication
to attempt to reestablish mind control over everyone present.
But it wasn't working now as he was facing too many opponents,
some of them harnessing similar powers.
Metallic-skinned reptilian men from the Altair stellar system
were the bosses of other amphibian-like aliens and bubbles of
amoeba-like beings. Their immediate guards were chameleon
reptilians with glowing, human-like features. The chameleons
could also move like fast shadows, having shape-shifting
capabilities like the invading monsters.
Ghostlike
creatures named Tahs moved freely along the perimeter, barely
tangible and unsettling, like the shifting demons of nightmares.
Cetians were also outside the bubbles, as they were human-style
beings with tan skin and lithe, naked bodies. They were
interspersed with Zeta Reticulans, beings that kept a gray
shimmer around their vulnerable bodies. They were considered
dangerous by everyone, as they lacked emotions and did not
necessarily prefer biological life to mechanical creations.
As well
as being shielded from the ambassador and Nev Sweeting, several
beings were protected from one another due to differing
temperaments and predatory instincts. Small green aliens, like
the bug-eyed ones long shown in alien visitation videos, were
from the cavernous depths of an Earth-like planet and were at
home in this complex. They were from the constellation Taurus
and quite strong as they had done much of the physical labor in
the early days of the complex after the initial rebellion of
robotic and cybernetic workers. Two other species hailed from
Orion. The first: tall, pale blue humanoids; the second: also
humanoid, but with orange fur and a stocky build.
Almost a
full minute passed before there was any real action other than
the ambassador attempting to back away. The usually talkative
Nev Sweeting didn't say a word but studied what had happened
like he couldn't quite believe it. The faceoff ended when a
seven-foot, blue visitor from a deeper part of the galaxy
stepped up and seized the ambassador.
He
attempted to shape shift free, but that was blocked, and he was
dragged unceremoniously over and locked in with Marco. Nev
Sweeting remained facing Burk, and his form shifted into
darkness like he'd decided to strike and kill, but the attack
never took place. A Zeta Reticulan floated up beside Burk at
that moment and screened him. The Zeta lifted a misty arm. Its
gnarled hand held a gold cylinder, and as it was raised, a cloud
of green mist hissed out and enveloped Sweeting, causing his
bodily form to writhe and disintegrate. It faded to a peel of
shifting dark forms that vanished in razor edges of vanishing
blue light. Mouthing a final scream, Sweeting disappeared like a
ghost.
With Nev
Sweeting obliterated, Burk looked around with grim satisfaction.
He returned to Sam feeling cheated. These two enemies had been
taken care of too easily, leaving little joy in the trap and
kill.
They were
fortunate that releasing the aliens had not caused chaos and
more murder. That had been prevented only because the Tah ghosts
had full telepathic abilities and had established communication
between all the disparate life forms. Some important decisions
had been made quickly, like not to kill each other but rather to
survive and kill the monsters, or as many as possible. The rest
were to be imprisoned on their home world, as they'd be left no
way to travel from it. Judgment had also been passed on Marco:
he wouldn't be returning to the human world but would remain
their prisoner.
Many of
the aliens gathered outside the closed cell, looking in at the
ambassador. Sam had risen now and was standing quietly as
telepathic communication circled the room. Various arguments
were going on in their minds, and it would continue for some
time. A number of the aliens broke off and left for other parts
of the complex. They were ones like the many-legged repair
alien, with the expertise to shut down the system and set up the
new plan for the complex.
The
estimate was now down to minutes, and then the invaders in
Indian Falls would be without a transport and energy feed
system. They would be trapped on Earth with no means of renewing
their energy once it was expended. Daily feeding on humans would
be their only remaining method of survival.
+++
A riot of
purple hues rode the clouds like a canopy over the town. Rin had
still not descended, but he was about to, as it was now the last
stand of the people of Indian Falls. They'd held the barricade
at the front with heavy fire, but the monsters had broken
through on the north side and delivered fast death to the
militiamen there. Rin's gun was now only firing weak blasts, as
the nano recharge engine couldn't work fast enough. A crowd of
black invaders flashed forward, tearing at a heavily boarded
window. Then he saw Sean Seaman reappear and fire a beam shot,
taking out those in the lead with a flash of flame and smoke. It
was his last shot, as this time the invaders flew in, riding a
fast blur of motion, and turned him into an ugly explosion of
mist and bones.
Rin
scanned the park and the street; gangs of the devils were moving
in, and now he heard screaming in the hall as the shielding was
torn away and the beasts began to enter.
It was
time to descend and face the end; he fired a last shot from the
window that smoked some uglies going over a barricade, then
something brightened in the sky, and he looked up. It was
raining blue fire that vanished before it hit the ground. Toward
the perimeter of town, the sky took on a bright yellow glow. So
bright, he thought the sun had somehow risen. The arch and the
highway were down that way, and on fire and bursting up with
light so bright Rin had to turn his face away. A flash that felt
nuclear followed, then there was absolute darkness as all lights
and fires went out.
A strange
silence came like a dream and lasted for a couple of minutes. A
faint blue light appeared in the dark sky. It was enough to see
below and that the invaders were still there. They were there
but moving away from the town hall. They were retreating; he saw
Jake toss a grenade, and a large clutch of monsters exploded in
the flare and burst to a smoking mass. In a moment, they were
down and dead, nothing but heaps of charcoal on the road.
Whatever
had happened, the aliens were now vulnerable, slower, and
retreating. He was sure the arch had blown, meaning no more
would arrive. And with that certainty in mind, he ran over and
began to descend. Hunt and kill time had arrived.
+++
Screens
of surveillance imagery floated around Sam, and one of the ghost
aliens had three other sensory ports open for aliens that lacked
eyesight or favored other senses to get a picture of the ongoing
operation. It was moving along swiftly and with fantastic
coordination; Burk was located way down by the arch exit in the
gully, entering there with the repair alien from Alpha Centauri
now that it had cooled and drained of residual energy and
radiation. The other aliens had already done their jobs and were
moving from various parts of the huge complex center and
converging on the command area.
Sam
leaned back in his drifting chair; he wanted to get out and make
a fast run back to Indian Falls, but he knew his arrival now
would make little difference. If anybody remained alive in town,
it would be up to them to finish the remaining invaders. He'd
viewed a simulation of the technical feat they had just
accomplished as the work was in progress. Along with two of the
aliens, he'd done adjustments at the main panel while the others
had programmed the big interstellar gun. Sam called it a gun
because, in simulation, it had that look. It involved extremely
complex molecular engines, sophisticated chemical reactions,
atomic releases, visible plates, electronics, and, of course,
the chamber itself. In some ways, it was reminiscent of Earth's
attempts at warp engines.
When
fully activated, rather than moving through space, the
impression was of space moving through it. In past decades, a
few nations on Earth had sent robotic craft deep into space;
these advanced devices channeled living beings across
light-years. Breaking the beam when it was already in play was
incredibly dangerous because if done incorrectly, it would
destroy the planets at both ends.
What
they'd done was sever it for a fraction of a second in a remote
part of space, meaning hundreds of the invaders were delivered
to cold, empty death in space. Remaining energy rode a loop back
to their homeworld as a deadly blast to destroy the connection
complex at that end. At the Indian Falls end, they'd beamed the
remaining energy arriving from the atmosphere into space.
That
meant Indian Falls had a chance, but they'd still have to battle
the monsters already present. Those beasts couldn't return from
Earth or gain the constant strength of the beam. They were
weakened and could be killed off as easily as people.
Lights
flickered, the patterns hypnotic, then there was a last
trembling of the complex, and the bone-shaking hum eased and
faded. The whole exercise was nearly over, and Burk and the
repair beast had arrived back at the main door, a host of aliens
behind them. They could now leave for a fast run into Indian
Falls. Once gone, they would not be able to return here. A new
force field was coming into play. One that would seal this
complex off from the entire world. Its entire physical area
would be rendered undetectable to all current technology. The
only travel from here would be to the homeworlds of the aliens,
as most of them returned to see what could be done to restore
their dead planets. Perhaps they'd keep the base here as a
permanent fixture, perhaps they'd shut it down in the end. It
didn't matter, as it was beyond the military power of any nation
on Earth to penetrate it or even find it.
+++
The
remaining militia were locked in a firefight with some invaders
that had arrived out front. Rin took the time to hand a set of
keys to Deena and marveled at her speed as she dashed down some
stairs. Long before the battle, they'd installed an armory in
the basement storage of the town hall. It was time to arm more
people in the hall. A plan that had been nixed earlier because
of fears inexperienced locals would use the weapons to commit
suicide, or disrupt the chain of command, or kill one another
before falling prey to the alien invaders.
He pulled
a militiaman aside. “Follow her down and be fast. Don't give
guns to anyone unless they know how to shoot.”
Deena
suddenly returned, asking which key it was. She remained silent,
then her slim figure faded into the shadows, and the militiaman
followed as she hurried down to a door. Rin moved with speed,
too, and reached a waiting guard. He went out a side door and
along the inner barricade. The barricading had many holes in it
now, but the enemy wasn't coming through. Jake and a group of
militia and townspeople had driven them back.
Coming
through a gap, Rin spotted Jake and three others out front with
irregular groups of men and women off to the side, rattling off
automatic weapons fire. The hail of bullets had taken down
numerous invaders, and many more were fading into the dark pools
of shadow in the park. The monsters were still ghostly fast but
slower than before. Halting by a couple of dead ones, Rin
studied the corpses. They were black, pocked by fungus or decay,
and shriveling. He didn't want to touch them, but the texture
looked like hard rubber leaking blood like oil, and their outer
skin had gone loose and flabby in spots. Rot was setting in so
fast that they were almost visibly melting. Portions of skull
protruded from sunken faces, the bone beneath having a silver
sheen.
Most of
the lights had gone out, but Rin studied the darkness with his
best eye. He saw a fair amount of motion in the areas ahead.
There were still quite a few of them, but he had the feeling
they'd take them down without losing many more people. The
invaders were now no more invaders, but dispirited and on the
run, unable to regroup or make a coherent survival plan.
Startled
by a sudden crash, he turned and saw a portion of the barricade
split, and Deena emerge with a group of armed people. He waved
them over and turned back to his militia, and then he was
blinded again. An incredible flash lit the entire sky. It was
like the opening of a full nuclear explosion, and everyone
automatically hit the ground. Rin's vision began to clear in
about thirty seconds; flurries of light snowed; he saw through
them to a distant beam shining like a beacon up into the sky.
The nuclear death blast he expected to follow never came.
Instead, blue flares exploded from east to west, creating cold
fire in the heavens. All of it was silent; he didn't hear a
sound other than the shouts of the others as they rose. Then,
more weapons fire as the battle began again under a slowly
darkening sky.
+++
At
daybreak, Jake stood with Jenny at a scorched clearing deep in
the park. The schoolgirl and store clerk he'd once known was
outfitted in tight, dirt-stained denim and looking like a female
warrior. The bones of the dead were visible, but now most were
the rotting silver-tinted remains of the enemy. Sporadic gunfire
still echoed in the town, but the fighting was nearly over. The
cloud cover had broken up like a shifting ice flow, and for the
first time in a long time, golden beams of dawn were a mantle on
distant rooftops. This beautiful light carried a welcome
message. It was now clear why the monsters only showed at night.
The freshly dead bodies of four of them lay crumpled by a nearby
tree trunk. Black hardened forms; their limbs dark and gnarled
like the roots of some evil tree. Hissing mist rising from the
deadly effect of a sunbeam that had just swept over them. They
were decaying fast.
Jake
calculated that those who remained, now being pursued in other
parts of town by militia, would likely die on their own. But he
had no plan of calling his forces off the hunt, as there was
always the possibility that, like vampires, some might hide in
dark buildings and wait for another night. He marveled at the
power they must have been harnessing, traveling between worlds
and back nearly instantly, always when it was nighttime at
Indian Falls.
Jenny's
usually bright eyes were tired and damp, her mood somewhat
vacant. Exhaustion rather than joy, and deep confusion over what
this had all been about, worked as a downer. If it had really
happened at all, where was the meaning? Even long after,
nightmares would haunt the sleep of the town's survivors. Not to
mention the distrust they would have of all authority figures. A
crowd of them was out in the street by the front of the town
hall, milling about in the devastation, not quite sure what to
do next. Jake looked back that way and decided to go back and
take charge. At the same time, he heard the roar of a convoy of
vehicles headed into town. A militia party that had gone out on
a scouting mission was returning.
Coming
out of the park, Jake stepped over the road and talked to the
lead man. A wiry guy named Bozzo.
Bozzo's
long face carried a look of perpetual surprise. This time, he
had a good reason for it. “Deep River's gone. The entire
military base is a crater. We didn't go all the way in. Just
looked with the glasses. Something hit there a while ago; it
looks like the feds or some other nation's military blew the
place to hell.”
“We're
lucky they pinpointed Deep River as the source of all the
trouble. One of the fears. A fear I still have is about bombs
hitting here.”
“It's not
going to happen,” Bozzo said. “We have contact with the outside
now. Rin told us Deep River wasn't the alien invasion HQ, but
we're not to leave any feds or military thinking that way. We
dropped him off at the meet-up with Burk. Rin is coming back
into town later, but Deena is leaving with Sam, and Burk is
tagging along with them for a time. They're going to move bunker
to bunker, then out of the area, undercover in the bush. The
story of how the attack got stopped is for militia ears only.
I'll give you the details later.”
“So we
tell the feds it was all from Deep River, and they killed them
off with their bombing raid. We do whatever we have to and keep
their investigation short. Otherwise, they'll never leave town.”
“That
investigation is going to begin really soon. They're already
moving in a military convoy on the far side of Deep River. One
of those new super tanks is in the lead.”
+++
Burk
turned to the bunker entrance and lumbered down below to gather
some vital supplies. Sam stood above with Deena, both of them
fascinated by the first brilliant morning sun in a long time. A
sunbeam gleamed off the edges of the silver soap-bar-sized
object in Sam's hands, and he closed the lid as the
communication ended. The connection through to the underground
base and the aliens was still good, and they could also covertly
read communications from the approaching military convoy out by
Deep River. Turning to Deena, he bathed in her calm smile the
same way he bathed in the sunshine. Hers was a romantic smile.
Burk
suddenly stepped out with a full pack and closed up the bunker.
He swept some loose brush in front of it and turned to Sam.
“Figure I'll stay in Toronto about a month before coming back.
Rin will close things up with the military here. Officially, I
wasn't here during any of this.”
Sam
smiled, and Deena winked. “Neither were we,” Sam said. “I need
the cover, and the cops and secret agents that met me on the way
in are all dead. I had my system set, so I was registered as
being in Toronto during this trip. That works in my favor. I
have no time for government investigations. We still have work
to do.”
“You must
mean dealing with the list of names we pulled from the
ambassador's files.”
Deena
turned to Burk. Surprise on her face. “What list of names?”
Burk
grinned, and Sam answered. “Ugly names. We have the full list of
military and government VIPs who were working to aid the
invasion. What we're going to do is watch the news and see what
the government propaganda on this deal is. Then we'll secretly
send them the names along with key pieces of evidence. It means
they will be swept up worldwide. They'll be imprisoned and
likely never released. Spending the rest of their days under
torture, questioning, suspicion.”
“Damn,”
Burk said. “Sometimes torture is a happy ending.”
========The End ========
