Dinosaur Lake

by Kathryn Meyer Griffith

  Chapter 15

  As the Deep Rover before it, Jim Francis’s friends brought the Big Rover down to Cleetwood Dock on a flatbed truck. It impressed Henry that Francis was able to secure another vehicle after what had happened to the last one.

  The submersibles were worth a fortune, and after Lassen’s death and the Deep Rover’s destruction, Francis’s benefactor had been cautious. He hadn’t wanted to lend out the Big Rover. But Francis, in the end, had talked it out of him. It’d helped that the man was one of Francis’s good friends and had known Lassen, too.

  “Since the massacre at Ranger Headquarters and the leveling of Rim Village, the word there’s some mysterious predator stalking the park is out of the bag,” was the first thing Francis relayed to Henry when he met him and the others on the dock that morning.

  “It was all over the news last night and this morning. You’re going to be plagued from now on with television crews and newspaper reporters from all over, swarming into the park hoping to get a look at the monster from the lake. Danger or no danger. It’ll be crazy.”

  “Damn, just what we need. Trespassers and gawkers. Well, we’ll just have to keep them out, that’s all.”

  “Good luck,” Francis muttered. “I saw the curious gathering at the park’s main entrance as I brought the Rover in. They’re a pack of wild animals, let me tell you. They were all over me with questions and camcorders in my face.”

  Henry was relieved Francis was more himself since his return. He also seemed extremely determined to find what they were looking for and to deal with it.

  The Big Rover was a different sort of craft than the smaller Rover had been. Francis confessed right off that it was an experimental model designed for much more than research. “It’s brand new off the assembly line and bigger, sleeker, than the first Rover. It’s also diesel-fueled, entirely computer controlled, and built for speed, with strong retractable jointed arms and claws for picking up objects. It can outrun anything in the water and resist any attack, its hull is that strong. It’s made to defend itself, with limited missile ability, if need be.

  “And, as you can see, it’s a dull black, no shiny surfaces to attract the leviathan, with large portal windows circling the top, and is also equipped with underwater lights, television and cameras. It seats four people.”

  “Only four, huh?” Henry studied the machine as it was lowered from the truck into the water. The men who’d brought it were anxious to unload it and get away from the lake. He didn’t blame them a bit. If he could, he’d run away, too.

  Patterson posed the top question on everyone’s mind. “Which four of us are going on its maiden voyage?”

  Henry had decided on who should go the day before but until that moment hadn’t talked about it. “I’m going. Greer, as my second-in-command. Maltin, because he’s the dinosaur expert, and, of course, we’ll need Francis to operate it.

  “The rest of my men will remain behind to keep people out of the park and keep things running, with Patterson in charge. He’ll have my permission to alert the National Guard or the army if the creature reappears and heads for any park exit.”

  No one was surprised at the choices. Patterson was openly relieved he wasn’t going below as did most of the other rangers. After what had happened to the Deep Rover none of them wanted to play Sea Hunt in the lake.

  “I’ve been in helicopters and on boats of various kinds,” Greer admitted. “No submarines, though. And I’m eager for the coming adventure.”

  “I haven’t, either.” Henry patted the man on the back. “So it’ll be a new experience for both of us.”

  “The three of us, you mean?” Justin interjected. “I’ve never been on one, either. And I don’t like closed in spaces. I’m sort of…claustrophobic.”

  Henry eyed the young scientist. “You don’t like water and you hate caves. Now you’re telling us you’re afraid of tight places? You sure you want to come along, Maltin?”

  Justin straightened up to his tallest height, his gaze steady. “You need me. I think I know the creature we’re going after better than any of you. So I’m coming.” But to Henry, with that unruly blond hair of his and round spectacles, he still seemed an innocent teenager.

  Henry nodded, looking out over the lake in the early morning mist. Where was it now, he thought? Where was it?

  The rain had not materialized, but the air was wet with moisture and made everything feel clammy. The clouds had blocked the sun’s light, making it look more like early evening than morning.

  Greer was busy checking out the Big Rover. He’d been intrigued from the first second he’d laid eyes on the contraption, asking questions of Francis on how it was operated and controlled. He’d started making conversation to bring Francis out of his lethargy brought on by Lassen’s death. But once he’d got the man talking about his work and now the Big Rover, Francis had opened up. He’d even begun to smile again.

  Once the Rover was in the water, Francis gave Greer, Justin and Henry a guided tour of its interior. Henry wanted to know everything about the control panel and what switches and dials ran what. Francis was happy to oblige.

  “This doesn’t look anything like the other one,” Greer said to Jim Francis once they’d lowered themselves into the craft. “It’s got so many windows.”

  “The two Rovers are light years apart, and yes, there’s a reason for all the window area, Greer. It’s so you can see more outside.”

  “With the sneakiness of our quarry, we’re going to need that.”

  To Henry the Deep Rover had brought to mind a large suited-up space alien with a bubble head. Its basic design hadn’t been very appealing. But the Big Rover looked more like a true submarine should. It reminded him of a very large, sleek ebony shark. Which might or might not be a good thing.

  “You men ready for a trial run? I’ve been dying to try this baby out.” Francis looked at them one at a time.

  “I’m ready,” Henry replied.

  “Let’s do it.” Greer tipped a finger forward.

  Justin gulped, but bobbed his head yes.

  Henry marveled at the advanced technology and the maneuverability of the Big Rover once they were submerged. He tried a hand at piloting and caught on quickly as Francis explained the running sequence. Then Greer tried his hand at the wheel. Henry and Greer pestered Francis with questions about the machine and the pilot seemed happy to answer them.

  “It wouldn’t be such a bad idea,” Francis proposed, “if you and Greer had a rough idea of how to handle this baby.” In case, Henry thought, something happened to its pilot?

  Justin didn’t seem interested in driving lessons. He was more obsessed with the view from the windows and the smallness of the enclosure. His eyes never left the water beyond the glass, his fingers never stopped tapping nervously on one surface or another.

  Francis took extra care explaining how the sub ran to Henry and Greer, though.

  “There…that red toggle switch there, Shore…easy…easy…now you can accelerate. That’s right, that pedal. You want to try reverse?”

  “Sure. Which switch is that?”

  Francis showed him as the Big Rover cleanly sped through the water. Suddenly the sub came to an abrupt stop and backtracked so quickly, Justin fell out of his seat.

  “You seem to have a knack for it, Chief Ranger. You’re a natural.”

  Greer chuckled. Justin buckled himself in like he should have done. Henry tried again. The ride was smoother the second time.

  After a little more instruction Francis declared, “Shore, if you ever consider giving up bossing around these rangers of yours give me a call. I’ll put you to work in one of these babies. Make you my new partner.” Henry had done well on his maiden voyage, as had Greer, and Francis agreed to teach him more when they had the time. Then Francis took over the controls.

  “Thanks. I’ll remember that offer.” Henry watched Francis maneuver the sub. “After this little escapade of ours, I might need a new job. And I always wanted to live in Ca
nada. I hear the hunting’s real good up there.”

  For the brief time they’d taken turns piloting the sleek submersible their predicament hadn’t been the main topic. Their problems were set aside but not forgotten. Even Justin seemed to stop worrying about the monster lurking beyond the windows as they traded stories of old hunting trips and better times.

  It was the break they needed.

  “You heard right,” Francis said. “Sometimes my brothers, I have three, and I go out camping in the wilderness for weeks. We pack up tents, warm sleeping bags, and live off the land. Sometimes I go alone. Last year I ran into a herd of moose and followed them for days, observing. Magnificent animals. Dumb, though. And the country’s beautiful up there. No humans for as far as the eye can see, just forests and sky. Virgin territory.”

  “As beautiful as this?” Henry waved his hand to include the lake and the land beyond it.

  “Almost.” Francis grinned over the video screens in the sub’s cockpit. “Except the bears are worse up there than here. We grow them bigger and meaner because the winters are harsher.”

  Greer gave Francis a doubting smile.

  The sounds of the engines steady and strong were humming around them. Henry could feel the acceleration as the sub moved silently through the water.

  “No winters are harsher than Oregon winters,” Henry stated. “We’re usually snowed in from September to May.”

  “Well, then.” Francis chuckled. “We’d better catch this thing before September. I don’t think Big Boy here can cut through ice.”

  “Why not? It appears capable of doing everything else.”

  “Doesn’t make a difference anyway,” Justin put his two cents in. “This lake is never going to freeze again. The water’s too warm.”

  Greer seemed to tolerate them and their chatter. The second part of the trial run, after he’d put his time in at driving, he was busy with his notebook and intent on the murky outer scenery through the portals as they slid through the water back towards the dock. But Henry knew it was just a façade he presented to the world. The night before Henry had caught a glimpse of the caring man he was underneath all the stone, but that hadn’t lasted long. Today the man was back to his old, professional self.

  Though, in his own way, Greer was absorbed with the submersible and everything connected with their coming odyssey. And Henry was certain he was listening closely to everything Francis was saying; watching everything they were doing at the controls and most likely memorizing every move. Using that photographic memory of his, no doubt.

  Justin, on the other hand, had disliked the submersible the minute they’d lowered themselves into its belly. Even if it was four times larger than the smaller Rover, it was still too cramped for Justin.

  There was no place to go once you were in it, he complained. He hated contained spaces, hated the blackish water where you couldn’t see five feet ahead, and hated the very thought of exploring the underwater cave. But he still wanted to come along.

  He sat slumped in his chair peering out the portals most of the short trip, lost in reverie. Not that he could see anything outside, he couldn’t. Oh, every once and a while a column of light-colored rock would loom up and then fade away, or a lone fish would slither by a portal. There wasn’t much of the wildlife left. Their enemy’s voracious appetite had seen to that.

  They spent a couple of hours getting familiar with the submersible, scouring the lake’s bottom and the lower walls, seeking Lassen’s underwater cave until they found it, sensitive to the fact that every hour wasted brought them closer to outside intervention with their problem.

  Yet they didn’t enter the cave and didn’t stick around longer than they had to, for fear the beast would show up, but made plans to return once they were fully prepared to enter and fight it.

  Just the hours they’d been underwater had brought more people to the park. Greer, with his binoculars, sighted more illegal intruders, probably reporters, crawling around on the rim of the crater. Some Henry’s rangers sent packing; some were too quick and scurried away into the woods before they could catch them.

  “Stupid reporters, stupid tourists,” Greer groused under his breath when he spotted them. “Going to get themselves killed.”

  Henry couldn’t have agreed more. “So last night’s ten o’clock news has released the genie from the bottle?”

  “Looks like it.”

  But they were too busy after that to worry about the human trespassers. Their weapons had arrived and they made plans to submerge at dawn the following morning for the final time, not coming up until they’d taken care of their problem once and for all. They talked, packed and made plans.

  There was no time to see Ann and Laura, no time to waste. But Henry stole a few minutes to write a last letter to his wife, full of the love he’d felt for her in their life together, and shorter letters for his daughter and granddaughter, and gave them to Patterson to deliver if they didn’t return.

  The four men packed as if they were going on a hunting combination cave exploration trip with minimal supplies (because there wasn’t much room in the submersible) and climbing paraphernalia–and, of course, the new weapons.

  Henry left detailed instructions with Patterson and his rangers. This was when he missed George the most. George would have been the man to take his place. He could always count on George. But since George was gone, Patterson would have to do.

  So it was early the next morning when Francis stared out of the front window of the sub and announced, “There’s the cave’s entrance off the starboard at approximately two o’clock.”

  No one uttered a word. All faces were tense. And Greer’s eyes were hooded as he peered out at the yawning hole ahead of them.

  They waited as Francis expertly steered their craft, careful to avoid the sharp rocks along the crater wall, into the opening. The Big Rover was tough, but not indestructible.

  When the submersible entered the cave Justin’s teeth could be heard softly chattering. “You don’t think it’s waiting for us right inside, do you?”

  “Let’s hope not,” Henry couldn’t help saying.

  “And if it is,” Francis whispered as he checked his instruments. “We’ll shoot the bastard out of the water.”

  Justin piped up, “Sounds like a good plan to me.”

  The scientist remained visibly uneasy, but when nothing happened he did begrudgingly acknowledge it was a splendid and unusually rare, vast Lava Tube cave they were entering. “I wonder if we’re the first ones to explore it, besides Lassen, I mean?”

  “Possibly,” Henry answered. “There’s nothing whatsoever about it in any of the park’s records. It was undiscovered, I imagine, until now.”

  Henry glanced at Justin and gave him a thumbs up sign in the artificial light. Justin’s face was so pale it looked like it was painted white, but the young man smiled back, fighting hard not to show alarm. He was sure the monster was lying in wait somewhere, or would somehow corner them down in the depths of the cave. Ambush them. They’d have no way out. And what would be left of their mauled bodies would never be found, like Lassen and the others.

  Henry was scared, too, but not as much since he’d learned the sub was equipped with defensive weapons of electrified probes set two feet apart across the hull.

  “Anything tries to touch us, we’ll fry it,” Francis had declared.

  The sub also carried the two precious grenade launchers Greer had procured and a large supply of rigged-up phosphorus rockets. And at that moment, Greer was inspecting one of the launchers as he sat up front with Francis. He was going to be ready if the beast showed up.

  This time, Greer was positive, they’d be able to hurt and kill the creature.

  A lot depended on where they found it as well as how effective their weapons were, in and out of the cave. And those were the unknown factors that made their journey so perilous. None of them were sure they would be victorious, but they had to do it anyway.

  So they rationalized, graspin
g for hope. The fatal flaw in the smaller unarmed Rover’s destruction had been engine trouble, Francis had concluded. “It wasn’t up to evading the creature, wasn’t powerful or fast enough, and, in the end, of escaping its clutches.

  “That won’t happen with the Big Rover. I know we can outrun or shoot the monster if we need to.”

  Henry only wished he could believe that. It sounded too easy. That was the problem. Go and find the monster and shoot it. Kill it. Way too easy.

  Strangely enough, the beast hadn’t shown itself or made an attack in days. No one knew where it was or when it was going to strike again. The submersible couldn’t be everywhere in the lake at one time. What happened if they missed the creature and it got past them? If it was out of the water; out of the park already? That thought terrified them, though there were enough people sneaking through the woods and around the lake to keep it fat and happy.

  They had to find it first. None of them wanted more people to die.

  “You think we should really be doing this? Going after the thing into the cave? Puts us at a disadvantage, doesn’t it? Maybe we should wait until it emerges onto land again,” Justin grumbled to Greer. “I despise caves, especially one with a nasty surprise hiding in it.”

  “Too dangerous. Once it gets out on land again it’ll just be a short run to the exits. Then the towns. And I’d think that as a paleontologist,” Greer raised an eyebrow, “you’d have been in lots of caves?”

  “You would think that, wouldn’t you?” Justin replied meekly. “But no, I’ve stayed out of as many caves as I could manage. Always let someone else have those particular jobs, unless the discovery was monumental. That hadn’t happened, until now. I hate caves,” he repeated.

  “Would you like to tell me why this cave is called a Lava Tube?” Greer was making conversation to ease Justin’s discomfort. They’d entered the underwater cave and the walls were closing in.

  “Sure, I’ll tell you. Because immense flows of lava moving through drilled it out from the rock. And this particular cave, from what I see on the Deep Rover’s camera, is even rarer,” he added. “Since its main orifice originates in a volcanic caldera. There is even less known about volcanic Lava caves.”

  “Yeah, and, I bet, this sort of cave is highly treacherous, isn’t it?”

  “Of course. Lava Tubes can be real tricky. And sometimes, as in this one, there’s active lava, and you never know how deep under your feet an active flow is still moving. So, if we leave the sub, be careful where you step.” A small grunt escaped Justin’s lips, and he directed his next remark to the three men around him, reiterating what he’d already said. “Hey, you guys, maybe we really should have waited for the thing to come to us?”

  Greer turned around and playfully thumped Justin on the shoulder as Henry chuckled and said, “Too late now. We’re here, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Godzilla doesn’t already know we are.”

  Greer even cracked a smile at Henry’s off-handed reference to his partner Patterson’s original nickname for the creature.

  Peering out through the glass into the open cavern, Justin looked as afraid of the looming cave walls as he was of the monster.

  The Big Rover glided into the immense cavern they’d seen through the other Rover’s cameras, and it slowly surfaced into the main chamber. They’d accepted this cave was the most likely candidate to be the monster’s escape route, its hiding place or even its home. Lassen had also believed that. So they’d explore it first.

  “Well, here we are,” Francis announced. “It was a little tight getting in, but it’s not so bad now.”

  Unlike Justin, Henry adored caves. He’d studied them and had trekked through lots of them when he’d been a teenager. Many a weekend he’d spent crawling around in the caves in the woods behind his house. But he was only familiar with the more common limestone variety, not Lava Tubes. For him this was a new experience. And he thought the cave was beautiful, no matter what it sheltered. It wasn’t the cave’s fault it hid a predator.

  The chamber they found themselves in was filled with stair-stepped rows of orange-red stalactites and large rim stone deposits formed of drip-deposited silicon dioxide. Thin grayish black stalactites of once molten lava hung above bulkier stalagmites built up drop by congealing drop, and could be traced to the slumping and dripping of glazed lava that thinly coated the tubes.

  All along the stone on their left the glaze had formed spectacular patterns resembling clumps of gray toffee. The cave walls were grooved, deeply ridged, and ledges created long ago by various lava flows through the tunnels jutted out along the cave walls. Congealed lava tongues and frozen lava falls were everywhere as the crackling active lava lit the cavern into a soft golden twilight. Steam rose from the churning magma flow that meandered across the rear section of the chamber and as it met the colder air, it created a wraithlike fog that drifted head high through the tunnels. Henry had to squint through his portal to see anything. The cave’s weird formations and stone were wreathed in the heavy fog and muted rainbow lighting.

  “As dangerous as it is…it’s still beautiful. The colors are so rich, vivid,” Henry said. “And now we know where the mist on the lake is coming from.”

  “Yes, exquisite, isn’t it? This cave’s so primitive. Like something from another time.” Greer’s voice was tinged with awe.

  “And was probably formed thousands and thousands of years ago, when the volcano blew its top off,” Henry supplied, his park ranger spiel kicking in. “It hasn’t changed much since, except for the gradual cooling of the lava, which allows us to enter it now. I’d wager only some of the chambers we’ll be going through will house active lava; be hot. Most will be bearable.”

  “Hope you’re right about that.” Greer was still eying from the portals the cave they were traveling through. “Or our expedition might become very uncomfortable.”

  “Oh, I’m pretty sure I am. How long do you think we’ll be in the cave?”

  “We’ll be in the cave as long as it takes to search it, on foot if the waterway runs out. We won’t leave until we’re sure it’s empty or we locate our hungry friend.”

  “Oh, boy. Cave exploration with a voracious meat-eater Jack-in-the-Box hiding somewhere in the tunnels. I can’t wait.” Justin shook his head.

  The sub had broken the surface of the water and come to a full stop. The water had run out. Ahead of them was nothing but cave.

  Well,” Greer swung around in the tight space and spoke to him and Justin. “Are you ready? Let’s find out if this is the bastard’s home.”

  Everyone looked at him. The certainty of what they were about to do had settled in. They were leaving the metal sanctuary of the submersible and going on foot into unknown territory.

  “Justin,” Henry reminded him, “don’t forget the radio and the fire crackers.”

  Music and firecrackers had been Justin’s idea. They’d use them to draw the creature out because they couldn’t just sit around and wait for it to show up. That could take forever.

  “When we see signs of recent habitation or believe the beast is near, we set off the fireworks, turn up the music loud as we can,” Justin had said. “The more noise the better.”

  “Anything, but shoot off the real guns,” Greer had advised. Henry and Greer were sporting revolvers on their hips. “The shells might ricochet off the rocks or walls of the cave and hurt one of us, or break through a lava seal, you did say they could be fragile, and flood the tunnel or chamber. And we’d be flooded in with water or fresh molten lava.”

  Justin had whistled. “Don’t want that.”

  “No, we don’t. We only use the weapons within the confines of the cave, especially the grenade launchers, if we absolutely have to. And when we have a target. The bigger the cavern we’re in, the safer firing our weapons will be. So keep your heads about you, boys. Eyes open.”

  Justin had brought his own radio, an old battery powered Magnavox boom box. Ancient. Said he took it with him everywhere. It made Henry smile wh
en he’d first laid eyes on it. It reminded him how young Justin was. The young always had to have their music. Laura was the same way.

  Greer was watching Justin as he unloaded the radio from the sub.

  “If we suspect our creature is anywhere in the vicinity,” Justin said, “we’ll leave it in the open, turn it up full blast; shout loud enough to wake the dead, and set off the fireworks then run like hell and hide. Wait. All the ruckus should attract the monster if it’s anywhere nearby.”

  “Should. Sounds in a cave this deep can carry for miles, even through the water.” Greer was struggling into his backpack. “If the monster’s anywhere within that radius, it should hear the commotion.”

  “And when it shows up, we shoot it with the grenade launchers,” Justin finished, grinning.

  “If the launchers can pierce the thing’s tough hide,” Henry tossed in.

  “And if our aim is true,” Greer worried out loud. “That monster can move.”

  They’d discussed the plan many times, but now that they were actually in the cave, disembarking, it didn’t sound as fool proof, clever, as before. There were a hundred things that could go wrong, and they were beginning to think of them.

  For instance, it’d dawned on Henry as Greer had been giving his warning about firing off live rounds, that if live bullets in the cave could be hazardous, what would happen when they fired the RPG-7’s? If they missed the monster, big as it was? He didn’t want to think about that.

  There were risks any way he looked at it.

  “I hope the cave’s not too hot,” Justin had fretted as they exited the submersible.

  “By the way, the lava in this cave can actually be cooled down enough for a man to enter and move around through,” Greer cautioned, “but still be deadly because of lethal gases and places where the magma is still active. So appearances can be deceptive. If the lava is fiery and steaming, and moving, I don’t have to tell you to stay away from it, we all know that. But if any of you detect something strange in the air, it could be noxious gas. So say something and put on those gas masks you have in your backpacks immediately.

  “Be careful where you walk, scan your helmet lights downwards as much as ahead and upwards. There’re bottomless pits and crevices where you can get so stuck you can’t get out.”

  The other men trailed Greer, helping each other over the damp, slippery rocks to solid ground that led up into the cave. They’d unloaded the supplies and divided them between themselves to carry, and were stalking through the cave’s above water chamber loaded down with their backpacks.

  Making small talk among themselves to ease the growing tension, Greer entertained them with his spelunker horror stories.

  “Ever hear of Floyd Collins?” Greer asked innocently.

  “No,” they chorused. Their footsteps were loud in the dark cave. The lights from their helmets tiny rays of brightness leading their way.

  “Well, he was a man in 1925 who’d decided to explore this cave on his property. Don’t know what they called it back then, but today it’s called Kentucky’s Onyx Cave. He got trapped in a tight corkscrew fissure so tightly locked in that he couldn’t, for the life of him, get out. Sometimes it happens that way. Spelunking can be dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. You should never do it alone, I say. After a few days missing, his brother went looking for him, suspecting he’d gone down in the cave. Floyd was always exploring them. His brother found him, but couldn’t get him out. The crevice was too narrow and too deep. The man’s body, too tightly compressed, had swollen. He was wedged in that fissure for eighteen days as they tried to free him.

  “People flocked to the place, like it was a circus, to wait, pray, and socialize while they tried to dig the poor man out. You have to remember there wasn’t any television back in those days and this was a big deal. But, no matter what they did, they couldn’t free him. The rock was too hard. They fought to keep him alive. Talked to him. Fed him. It was January, bitterly cold. And, though, they tried to keep him warm, they couldn’t. The rocks holding him were like ice, and he was caught so tightly between them they couldn’t even get a blanket around him.

  “He died a horrible death. When he was dead they finally retrieved the body by cutting it into pieces.”

  “Oh, my,” Justin moaned. “That’s terrible.”

  “Cheery story to recount while cave exploring,” Francis cracked, trudging along behind them. Greer was at the front, Justin behind him. Then Francis. Henry at the back. Henry had thought it best to put the two greenhorns in the middle.

  “Oh, there’s more,” Greer went on happily. The man was becoming quite the clown of the troupe. As if by leaving his stuffy briefcase and suit behind he’d liberated the true Dylan Greer. “There’s the well-known story of Lost John. Well, that wasn’t his real name, no one knows his real name. That was the name given to the skeletal remains found pinned under a six ton boulder in Mammoth Cave.”

  “Sheesh,” Justin exhaled, shuddering under his heavy backpack.

  “So you see, people are hurt, lost, or die in caves all the time, if they don’t know what they’re doing.”

  “Thanks, mother.” Henry laughed. “We’re so glad we have you along then. Heck, you’re not only entertaining us with you heartfelt tales of past cavers, you’ve warned us what to expect and even how to dress for caving. What would we have done without you?”

  “A lot worse, I daresay,” Greer said. “You’re all newbies compared to me when it comes to exploring caves. Now let me tell you about this one cave I spent a week lost in–” And off he went on another cautionary tale, everyone groaning aloud.

  Well, Henry mused, the guy was still as smug as ever. That hadn’t changed.

  Like most Lava Tubes, the walls had long ago been carved out of the rock by exploding lava, and were jagged and sharp, hard on clothes and human skin alike. Greer had advised them the night before to wear extra rugged clothing. He’d provided the special knee pads, gloves, and boots they were using, having taken their sizes and actually having one of the other rangers run him into town late the night before to purchase everything, as well as the tents and other supplies they’d be using on their journey.

  Henry had been impressed by Greer foresightedness and touched by his thoughtfulness.

  “Don’t be too grateful, Chief Ranger,” Greer had cracked, when he’d shown Henry the booty. “I put it all on your tab.”

  He’d brought back unbreakable flashlights, lifeline ropes to connect the four of them together for when they’d have to climb or descend, a sturdy inflatable raft in case they encountered a body of water, and caving helmets with carbide lamps attached to the front.

  “Carbide is a gas and its light’s a brilliant white, better than regular flashlights, though flashlights are an adequate back-up.” Greer had wanted them prepared for anything.

  Henry couldn’t get used to Francis in a helmet instead of his cowboy hat. It’d protect his head good enough from falling rocks, but didn’t go with the ponytail as well.

  The four made a motley crew. Francis, a wiry old man, with as much spunk as a man twenty years younger. Greer, strange looking in marine fatigues instead of his usual meticulous suit and fancy watch. No notebook. Justin was in faded jeans and a plaid shirt, long stringy blond hair and those golden wire glasses of his. He hated the helmet he had to wear, said it was too clumsy, hot and uncomfortable. Henry sported worn hunting clothes and a three-day beard on his solemn face. The cover-everything clothing made the heat more intolerable, but it kept their skin from being scratched from the sharp protruding rocks.

  Greer led the men through the tunnel, one of the grenade launchers on his back hanging from its straps; talking a blue streak in a low voice, which was also unlike him. But then, some men reacted differently to stress.

  Henry, in the rear, lugged the other rocket launcher. Justin, besides his backpack, carried a compressed bundle that was the raft. Francis, as the old man of the group, toted the first aid kit, the firecrackers, a
nd Justin’s boom box.

  Every man carried generous canteens of water. In a cave a person dehydrated quickly, and in an environment sometimes heated with steaming lava, even quicker.

  The four of them explored. Two very tall men and two short with drawn faces and glittering, wary eyes.

  “I’ve been thinking about if and when we have to use the RPG-7’s.” Henry moved ahead of Justin and Francis and broached the subject to Greer. “We’d better be sure we hit what we aim at, don’t you think?”

  “Don’t see any problem with that. If I can’t aim and hit something that big with this rocket, I’m a sorry hunter indeed.” But, for the first time, Henry caught a flicker of doubt cross the other man’s face as he glanced over his shoulder at him.

  For Greer knew as well as Henry that it was possible to miss anything.

  It was suddenly hot as blazes. Henry fell back to the rear of the group as they entered another cavern. Sweating, he felt it trickle down his back under his shirt.

  “Heat’s not too bad,” Greer pronounced when they’d first exited the submersible, yet he was sweating now, too. “About eight-five degrees, I’d guess, right now in this cavern. Warming up, though. We can take it. As long as we remember to keep drinking water.” He’d grinned in the glow radiating from his helmet, the gray of his long hair glinting in the light.

  The next section they marched into was considerably hotter. The one after that, a little cooler. And that was the way it was. Some parts of the cave were almost unbearably hot, while others were normal, or even cool.

  “This is one of the most breathtaking caves I’ve ever seen,” Henry admitted a short while later. “The limestone caves I’ve explored can’t hold a candle to this. It’s huge.”

  “Ah, breathtaking, but hazardous to people,” Greer responded. For the rock they were treading on was wet and slippery, the fog pesky as it further hindered their progress. Even with the bright headlights, they had to watch every step or they’d end up sliding down into a black pit or a lava stream.

  They had to look out for Justin. Though he kept swearing his banged up ribs weren’t bothering him, it was easy to see they were. Henry had been a lot luckier, his sore muscles and bruises from the jeep accident had faded away in the time since. Yet soon after their trek through the cave had begun, he realized they shouldn’t have let Justin come along. His ribs hadn’t healed enough. But it was too late to turn back so they’d have to make the best of it. Under the guise of needed rest breaks for all of them, they halted often; stayed close together.

  They couldn’t become separated, no matter what.

  Carefully working their way down the winding maze of stone capillaries and veins, it looked like it’d go on forever. Down, down, down. They used the ropes when they had to, to lower themselves to a ledge, or get up to another entrance. And as they descended further into the narrow twisting tunnels, they left a trail of red phosphorescent ribbon to mark their passage so they could find their way back later. Another one of Greer’s excellent suggestions.

  The heat was one of their worst enemies, sapping their strength. When the group came to pools or streams of churning lava, which was often, the temperatures soared. They walked guardedly on tip-toe across passages of what appeared to be thin crusts covering cooled lava and they burrowed through small connection tunnels dragging their packs and supplies behind them. They splashed through shallow lakes of water for hours and hours.

  Finding no creature or even a sign of its passing.

  The blackish walls and rock they moved past and across were sometimes unstable, and crumbly, and they took extra care to avoid brushing the ceilings or disturbing talus, an accumulation of rock debris. The mineral formations, stark white blooms of gypsum and Celestine, as they worked their way deeper into the cave, were delicate and it wouldn’t have taken much to bring them down on their heads.

  “Careful here,” Greer would say. “No. Come this way. That ground won’t hold your weight there.”

  Then there was the heart-squeezing fear that at any moment they’d come face to face with what they were seeking and that made every discomfort worse.

  But they kept moving.

  They walked in single file at times, peeking into dark corners and back tracking when they had to. Their conversation died as the going got rougher. They didn’t stop to eat for a long time. If they were hungry they pulled snacks, candy bars, granola bars, or dried fruit, from their pockets and gnawed at them as they walked.

  They overhanded across cliffs with the aid of the climbing ropes, waded through chest deep water and climbed endlessly, helping Justin when his injury acted up. As intense as their journey was, they still marveled over the flow stones created by centuries of coursing water, and at the left-behind and wedged lava balls, remnants of the lava flow that had once surged through, which plugged many of the corridors and made them almost and sometimes impassable. There were places they could barely squirm under, or climb above, but they managed somehow. Everyone was soon exhausted from the extreme exercise.

  In the silence their hearts were as loud as drums. Henry knew they were all running scared. They’d seen the creature and what it could do to a human. Yet they couldn’t give up and forged on.

  Until their bodies told them in no uncertain terms it was time to rest.

  “In caves there’s no such thing as time,” Greer said. “No days. No nights. It’s dark all the time. Unchanging. It’s easy to forget time completely. But the body still needs sustenance and sleep. To remain sane and healthy, we must continue to follow the outside world’s time table. So it’s time to pitch camp and get some real food in our bellies and some sleep while we can.”

  “Wise words, friend,” Henry seconded. “Let’s do it.”

  Tired and filthy, they set up camp that first night in a cool chamber. With sparse conversation, they ate their army MRE’s (Meals Ready to Eat) hungrily. The meals were compact and, thus, had been easy to carry with their limited space; another one of Greer’s ideas. Wrapped into a tiny bundle of dark brown plastic, all of it looked worse than it tasted. Justin had diced turkey with gravy, Henry had chicken a-la-king, Greer had beef stew, and Francis had meatballs with barbecue sauce. All of them had added entrees of dehydrated fruit, beverage powder for a cold and hot drink, a dessert, unsalted crackers and a cheese or peanut butter spread.

  Justin had never eaten MRE’s before. In the beginning, as he unwrapped his dinner, he made faces, then after the food had entered his mouth, he declared with surprise, “Other than my hunk of maple nut cake resembling a smashed heel of wheat bread, it isn’t that bad. In fact, it’s pretty good.”

  “That’s because you’re starving.” Francis laughed.

  “Well, the pears were good, even for a MRE,” Greer concurred. “They’ve improved them considerably since I was in the service, I can tell you that. But,” he handed a small package to Justin, “I’ve had enough peanut butter and crackers to last me a life time. Here, you want them?”

  Justin did. They, too, were gone in seconds.

  “There’s no vegetables,” Francis pointed out.

  “Sorry,” Greer muttered. “Maybe the next batch will have them.”

  They slept in their army sleeping bags. Nearby, a lantern was turned down low for light, and they took turns at guard duty through the eight hours. They couldn’t take the chance of being unprepared if the creature showed up.

  The following morning they resumed their search, tracing the dank tunnels through the earth. Still they found nothing. No tracks, no fossils, no human remains or animal leavings.

  “What if it’s not in the lake or the caves anymore at all,” Justin worried out loud, “but out in the park, or, worse, in a town somewhere, wreaking havoc?”

  “We can only do what we can do, one possible hiding place at a time.” Henry’s lips were drawn into a tight line. “We’re only four. We’re only men.”

  He locked eyes with Justin. “We continue on until we’re sure it isn’t in the cave. If we don
’t see evidence it’s been here within the last couple of days, we’ll consider returning to the lake and looking somewhere else. We can even sub through the water and see if we can’t get the thing to come out after us.”

  “Ah, we’ll be bait, huh?” Justin didn’t seem happy with that proposal.

  “I don’t like that idea, either, but it might be one way to draw it out.”

  Justin fell silent and the men kept moving.

  Greer believed there were other entrances to the cave. That it honeycombed around and came out somewhere else, maybe under the lake itself. He became more sure about it with every mile they chalked up.

  “I know another exit is down here somewhere,” he told Henry. “And I know the monster’s in this cave, or has been recently. I feel it in my gut.” He tapped his abdomen. “It’ll be back. I promise you.”

  “You get these feelings very often, Greer?” Henry teased.

  “Sometimes. I’m usually right.”

  “I bet you are.” Henry recalled Patterson’s warning about Greer. That he had special talents most people couldn’t understand. Henry was beginning to. Greer’s special talents had to do with intuitions and a sixth sense that frightened most people. Not Henry, he was open-minded.

  By the second night, their bodies more used to the strenuous activity, they had the energy to sit around and talk before they went to sleep. Sitting on their sleeping bags, MRE’s balanced in their laps, their faces and clothes caked in lava dirt, they speculated as to what the creature really was.

  “Remember that picture I showed you in that one book, Henry? Of the Nothosaur?” Justin asked. “You thought it was so ugly?”

  “It was.”

  “I believe our creature’s a far advanced hybrid of the Nothosaur, no doubt about it, the next evolutionary rung up. Or two. The one that was never allowed to be born before the comet fell, or whatever it was that happened to plunge the world into dinosaur genocide.

  “Somehow, this particular creature’s egg was preserved and protected and remained viable. And it actually hatched. Astonishing. Certain circumstances, the earthquakes and the warmth of the lava, most likely, uncovered and incubated it.” Justin reclined on his sleeping bag, propping his head on his backpack, wincing, reminding everyone his bruised ribs were still giving him discomfort.

  “You mean this thing we’re chasing hatched…from an egg?” Francis sputtered. Sitting cross-legged besides Greer, for being the old man of the group, he’d weathered the last two days better than any of them. He didn’t appear tired and his eyes were alert. He’d begun to act as if he were enjoying their strange crusade. In the end, he’d accepted his friend’s death quietly, though sometimes spoke affectionately of the missing man as if Lassen were still alive somewhere.

  Henry sympathized with him about his absent friend. He couldn’t think of George as dead, either. It was easier to pretend the Indian was just out wandering the woods, happy and free. That he’d see him again someday.

  “That’s where dinosaurs come from. Eggs.” Justin had closed his eyes. He looked about twelve years old at that moment.

  “Wait a minute,” Greer interrupted, bending towards the paleontologist. “Then it’s possible there are more eggs somewhere? Unhatched or ready to hatch?” His eyes gleamed blacker in the lantern’s soft circle of light that separated them from the cave’s outer darkness.

  “You’re correct. There could be more eggs or more…dinosaurs. None of us can say for sure there’s only one of the creatures, can we?”

  “Oh, boy. I’d never thought of that possibility. That there could be more than one,” Henry growled in a low voice. “One’s enough for me. Oh, boy.”

  “Not necessarily,” Justin rationalized. “Our hostile antagonist has only been sighted for the last two years. Where was it before that? In an egg or living somewhere else where it didn’t have easy access to humans?”

  He shrugged. “Who knows? And if there are two or more of the beasts, why haven’t we seen them together? Dinosaurs are herding animals. But, hey,” he put his hands up in an apologetic gesture,” that’s only my opinion. A lot of paleontologists don’t believe dinosaurs ran in herds and cared lovingly for their young. I do.”

  “But there could still be other eggs somewhere and someday there could be more of the creatures?” Greer wouldn’t let it go.

  Justin sighed, his face sleepy-looking. “There could be or this creature might be the only survivor.” He yawned.

  “We can only hope.” Francis was studying the blackness beyond their camp. “We’re having enough trouble tracking and trying to kill just one.”

  Greer was brooding. There was an odd expression on his face and his thoughts seemed elsewhere. Henry wondered what he was fixating on, thinking about; where his mind truly was.

  After a while, Greer turned towards Henry, changing the subject. “How was your wife doing when you left her?”

  “So, so.” Henry fluttered his hand. “She’s trying to cope.” The sorrowful image of Ann’s tear-stained face came back to him. “She blames herself for George’s death and nothing I said changed her mind.”

  “It wasn’t. It’s the monster’s fault George is dead, no one else’s. From what I’ve heard of her, she’s a strong woman. She’ll get through this. Just give her time.”

  “I hope so.” But in his heart, he, too, knew Ann would be okay. Greer was right, she was a strong woman.

  And with the video Henry had found when he’d searched the dead reporters’ camp site, Ann might be in a position to help save Zeke’s newspaper and her job and that would give her some happiness. What she’d done hadn’t been totally in vain. It wasn’t getting George’s life back, but it was something.

  Henry found himself telling Greer about the video. How it showed the monster in all its glory. Close up. It played like a horror movie with great special effects. Frightening to watch.

  “I hope Ann makes a bundle off it, writes the most sensational story ever to go with it and wins a Pulitzer. Any reporter, especially a woman, having the guts to chase a story the way she did, danger and all, deserves it.”

  “I hope so, too,” Henry could only say.

  Greer was attempting to be kind with his comments. But his words only reminded Henry of Ann’s despair and those poor reporters’ and George’s awful deaths. All in all, the price for the video had been too high.

  “Ann didn’t want you coming down here, did she?” Greer pressed Henry.

  “No, she didn’t. But she knows catching this monster is necessary. It’s my park, my responsibility, our lives. She understood.”

  “Remarkable woman. You’re lucky to have her.”

  “I am, and I know it.”

  Ann hadn’t understood him coming on this mission. She’d been terrified that he wasn’t only reentering the park, but was going into the lake in a flimsy (as she’d put it) submersible to hunt for the creature. Too dangerous, she’d said. Far too dangerous.

  She’d tried talking him out of it. Had cried. She hadn’t done that before, not in all the years he’d been a cop. More than anything he’d wanted to stay with her, hold her in his arms and promise he wouldn’t put himself in danger again, but couldn’t. He had to do what he had to do.

  When Ann had seen he was going to go, no matter what, she’d clung to him, told him how much she’d always loved him, would always love him.

  “You’re the best man I’ve ever known. The bravest. Come back to me, Henry,” she’d whispered. “Please come back to me.”

  He’d never forget the love in his wife’s touch, her smile or her sad eyes as he left Zeke’s house. They’d held each other and she’d cried silently as he’d given her a final goodbye kiss.

  He’d hated to hurt her. Hated to see her cry.

  He’d never loved her more than that moment, except perhaps that other long ago morning when he’d awoken in a New York hospital after being shot and had found her head bowed on his bed. She’d slept nights in a chair by his side, refusing to leave. When
he’d come out of the coma and she’d looked at him, well, he’d never forget that look, that smile ever, either.

  The four men talked among themselves, of things only men liked to talk about. They expressed their fears of what lay ahead and went over their plan again on what they’d do when they finally confronted the leviathan.

  Henry was touched by the camaraderie growing between them. He hadn’t been this close to a bunch of guys since he’d been in the Marines. These men were his equals, his peers, while his rangers had always been like his children, George being the exception. He’d held himself back. But true danger sometimes brought people close in a way nothing else did and there’d never been any real danger being a park ranger–until now.

  “You’ve never been married have you, Francis?” Henry was munching on a Hersey’s bar. Dessert.

  “Never have. Oh, there have been women. Some were good women. I’ve loved a few of them. But none of them could take me away from the sea, the water or my submersibles. My job has consumed me. My exploring. It’s been my only passion, my obsession. If I stay out of the water too long, I get homesick.” He smiled. “I’d always thought it’d be too cruel on a wife and family to be away as much as I am. Wouldn’t be fair to never be home.” He spread his hands in the gentle light, his face melancholy at what might have been, but never had.

  “Lassen was married, though, wasn’t he?”

  “Yeah, and he was in love, really in love, with his wife, his family. It wasn’t the same for him. He didn’t love the job as I did. He went home often, while I kept working.”

  Everyone was quiet, Lassen on their minds.

  “And you, Greer? You been married?” Now it was Francis’s turn to ask.

  For a long time there was no answer. The ex-FBI agent seemed lost in his own thoughts. Francis must have thought he’d hit a raw nerve and dropped the subject.

  Henry swallowed the last piece of chocolate.

  Then, “I was married. Once,” Greer confessed.

  Henry stared at the man. He wouldn’t have guessed. Greer never seemed to need anyone but himself.

  “Divorced, huh?”

  Another silence.

  “No,” low voiced. “Her name was Amy. She was an artist. Beautiful. Loving. And she died a long time ago. Murdered by a serial killer.”

  He stopped talking, his dirty face blank, as if the memories could no longer bring pain, as if he’d accepted her death, the way she’d died. Unless you looked into his eyes.

  Greer would reveal nothing more about his deceased wife, that’s what his eyes said.

  A slight jolt went through Henry. He’d received a sudden insight into the man of stone. Was his murdered wife the reason he’d initially joined the FBI, or was it the reason he left? Had his wife been one of that serial killer’s victims…the man he’d killed in cold blood? Was it why he came across as an extremist, especially concerning killers? Hmmm. Perhaps, one day, Greer might tell him.

  Justin asked, “Francis, with all your submersible time in the oceans, have you ever gone down looking for buried treasure?”

  And the three of them listened in fascination as Francis launched into stories of his early treasure hunting days, until exhaustion claimed them.

  Henry was about to nod off; Justin and Francis, Francis snoring softly, were asleep and Greer was sitting guard when he startled Henry by saying, “Ranger, remember when I said that this was the strangest situation I’d ever been involved with?”

  Henry groaned. He was next in line for guard duty and had almost been asleep. Was walked and talked out. Yet something in the man’s hushed tone brought him back.

  “I remember.” Henry shoved himself into a sitting position, rubbing his face. What he wouldn’t have done for a shave, a bath. Putting on clean clothes tomorrow or brushing his teeth with water from a canteen wouldn’t do it. Maybe they could find a shallow pool sometime tomorrow and take a quick dip. His tired thoughts touched on his wife. He missed her as she slept in her safe, clean bed at Zeke’s.

  “I lied.”

  Henry waited, wondering what this was leading to, and why Greer was telling him now.

  “All right, you lied.”

  Greer’s eyes turned to meet Henry’s half-lidded ones. “You know, there’re things in this world we can never understand. Oh, I didn’t doubt you in the beginning when you told me about your monster in the lake. I’ve just learned to keep a low profile. Because, you see, I’ve come across things in my life I simply cannot explain away. Don’t even want to anymore. Though, lord knows, I’ve tried.”

  Bingo, Henry thought. Perhaps he was going to learn why Patterson believed his partner, Greer, was so unusual.

  The ex-agent gave him an unsettling smile, his voice a low rustle so that Henry had to scoot closer to hear him.

  “Especially this one experience I had. A case from my earliest days in the bureau. Heck, I was a kid. Not even twenty-five. Only been in the agency for about a year. I was real green back then, never questioned anything they told me to do. Always followed orders, no matter how idiotic they seemed. Like I said, I was young. Later, as I grew older and smarter, I’d question things more. That was one of the reasons I eventually left the Bureau. I couldn’t trust them anymore and couldn’t, wouldn’t, blindly obey.”

  “Go on, tell me about your experience,” Henry encouraged. “I’m listening.”

  Greer took a deep uneven breath. “I’ve never talked about this before to anyone. No one knows this, except the men with me all those years ago. I believe they’re dead now. Unexplained accidents and suicides, all. I guess it’s time I tell someone. Someone else should know, in case it ever happens again. Though, I don’t want to put you at risk, for knowing, that is.”

  “It’s okay. I’m a big boy. I can take care of myself.”

  “All right, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” A pause.

  “Do you believe we’ve been visited on earth by aliens before?”

  The bizarre question threw Henry off. “Greer, before this little adventure we’re on now, I might have said: Hell, aliens? And thought you were probably nuts.

  “But now, I don’t know. If an extinct dinosaur can come back to life, anything is possible.” Henry’s eyes stared off into the endless pit beyond the lantern’s glow. He could hear something, a shuffling, scratching noise, out there. He just wasn’t sure what it was.

  He shut his strained eyes, rubbing them with sooty fingers. He could hear Francis’s snoring. Justin restless tossing in his sleep. Hear water dripping somewhere behind him in the cave. They were in a warmer cavern tonight than last night. Smaller. He wiped a trickle of sweat off his forehead. He’d taken his shirt off, leaving only a T-shirt.

  “I believe we’ve been visited by aliens. Many times. As far as I know, it’s still happening.”

  Now Greer had captured all of his attention. The thought of sleep was receding.

  “These days, Ranger, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit to learn my next door neighbors were aliens. Or that the world was populated with aliens and ghosts.” He released the breath he’d been holding. “I’m open to anything. I’m a believer.”

  “That the reason you left the Bureau? Aliens and ghosts?” Henry couldn’t help but ask.

  “Some of the reasons.”

  “Well, are you going to finish your story or not?” Henry pushed.

  “Oh, the story. Yes. It was twenty years ago and, as I said, I thought I knew everything. Smart-alecky young FBI agent. College graduate. No one could tell me anything. I imagine I was a real pain in the ass. Enough people told me so anyway.”

  Henry chuckled. Greer echoed it. They’d both been there. Everyone had.

  “There was this little podunk town in Nevada. I won’t tell you its name. Doesn’t matter anyway. It doesn’t exist any longer. The whole incident is high priority top secret. The bureaucrats have sealed the records tighter than a new soda bottle cap.”

  Henry shifted on his sleeping bag, the stone beneath was hard and his hip
was killing him.

  “You’re not going to believe this, but we were called in to investigate the sinister disappearance of the whole town. Over two hundred people. Men, women, children. It was unbelievable. Everything was gone. Everything. The people, their houses, their possessions, cars, dogs, cats. Even the trash cans and mail boxes. There was nothing but the scooped out dirt holes where the houses had been and impressions of where their possessions had stood. Kind of like that old spooky episode of Twilight Zone, you know? Where a whole neighborhood is snatched up and taken to an alien planet and the people wake up to find themselves surrounded by…nothingness?”

  Henry found he’d been holding his breath. He let it out. He remembered the story. His mouth fell open, but he shut it long enough to ask, “What happened to the people in the town? Anyone come forward with an explanation, anyone see anything? Witnesses?”

  Greer released a cynical laugh. “Oh, there were witnesses, all right. Three men who’d been on a camping trip that weekend and had, unknown to them, camped very close to the town. When, in the middle of the night, they said they were awoken by a horrendous ruckus of some kind and they went to get a look. Investigate. What they saw scared the hell out of them.”

  Greer stopped talking. He was peering past the perimeter of the light’s circle again as if he expected someone or something to come walking into their camp.

  “Well, what did they see?”

  “They swore, I mean, swore on the bible, that when they got to the town there were these huge silver glowing spaceships all over the place, hovering right above the ground, and they were lifting the people and the houses; yanking them right from the earth like bad teeth and drawing them into their bellies. When there was nothing left of the town except fresh ovals of dirt, they zipped off into the atmosphere. Disappeared in a flash as if they’d never been there.”

  “What did the FBI do about it?” Though he already suspected the answer.

  “Covered it up, of course. Pretended as if it never happened. Like they do with a lot of cases they can’t explain. Are frightened of. For the public’s peace of mind, they say. Ha. They think every man out here is a superstitious fool. Wouldn’t, couldn’t understand. Would panic. To this day, I don’t know what they did with those three campers. Poor slobs. They whisked them off somewhere. Years later, out of remorseful curiosity I tried to run them down. They’d vaporized from the face of the earth. Even their birth certificates were gone.”

  “How about relatives of the people who’d lived in the town? Friends? People who’d visited or had done business there?”

  “They told everyone the town had been hit by this virulent and very contagious virus. Everyone had died. No one was allowed to come near. That was why they had to bulldoze the town into oblivion and burn everything. The FBI quarantined the area for miles around. And as far as I know, it still is.

  “Because there weren’t any other witnesses, they were able to cover the whole thing up.”

  “Well,” Henry huffed. “That’s one thing they can’t do here, can they? Cover this up. Too many people have seen too much. The story will be all over the world news as soon as the gag order’s lifted. Which, as I see it, won’t be much longer. It’s already leaked out.”

  “Yes, it’ll be pretty hard for them to cover what’s happened up, won’t it? Maybe, without Ann’s video, and all the press nosing around, they might have been able to. But not now.”

  Greer was obviously finished.

  “That incident in Nevada really shook you, didn’t it?” Henry didn’t know what to think about it. It was almost too much to grasp. Aliens taking complete towns. Cats and all. He shivered, even in the warmth of the cave. How many times in history had such things happened, and how many times had their government hidden them?

  “At the time, no. I believed what the bureau told me to believe. After our job was done, I went on to another case and shoved that weird town out of my mind. Pretended it’d been some great practical joke. Ignored the facts right in front of my eyes. Denied what those campers had told me. Hell, one of them had been a bank president, the other two had been respectable, level-headed businessmen from a nearby town. They hadn’t been some country yokels. Where was my brain? Why would men like that have lied? It made no sense.

  “Over the years, that town and its missing population haunted me. More each year. Not that I wasn’t part of lots of other shady situations when I was an agent, I was. But that cover up was one of the reasons I left the Bureau. I finally had to face the truth about that town or it would have driven me insane, you know? Dwelling on aliens abducting entire towns and taking off with them. To where? Why? What happened to those people? Were they subjects of some cruel alien experiments, as a lot of abductees say, or are they living high on the hog somewhere on some Eden of a planet? Fat, happy, and sassy, like in that movie Cocoon?

  “And, my worst speculation of all was, were the aliens someday going to return and steal something bigger the next time…like New York? I figured if they could abduct a town, they could abduct a city. And we couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”

  “Now that’s a mind-boggling thought. New York nothing but a big earth-black pit.” Henry didn’t laugh. He could tell Greer was disturbed by the whole thing.

  “I suppose that Nevada town vanishing into thin air could upset a person,” he offered instead. “A sane person would’ve tried to forget it, but, as you did, probably wouldn’t have been able to. I wouldn’t have. The idea of being so helpless that any extraterrestrial could just zip us away would scare the hell out of any human.”

  “It scared, scares, me. I can’t forget that place. Sometimes I want to believe it’s a nightmare I dreamed, or the first blossoming of insanity. To accept that things like that can even happen in our safe little world. I hadn’t been myself at that time to begin with. I’d recently lost Amy. Coming so swiftly after my loss, it pushed me to the edge.”

  Henry caught the reference to Greer’s wife and another piece of the man’s life fell into its slot.

  “You believe me, don’t you?”

  “I have no reason not to. Though I don’t know what to think about it. Heck, I don’t want to think about it at all. I’ve got enough trouble of my own right here. This here’s another one for the book of the unbelievable and strange.”

  Greer chuckled, scratched the side of his cheek. “Sorry, but I had to tell someone. After all these years. Someone who wouldn’t laugh.”

  “Sure. You wanted me to go nuts, too, trying to figure out where in the hell those damn people went,” said with such humorous sarcasm Greer laughed out loud.

  “Get some sleep, Chief Ranger,” Greer finished. “You stand guard next. I’ve already kept you up too long with my crazy story.”

  “Wasn’t a crazy story. Interesting, actually. It gives me something to ponder on. But it does sound like our government, always making weighty decisions for the public, whether we want them to or not.”

  “That’s our government, for sure.”

  “Goodnight, Greer.”

  “Henry, can you call me Dylan from now on? That’s my name. All my friends call me Dylan.”

  “Sure thing.” Henry smiled, secretly pleased, and laid his head down into the plumpness of the sleeping bag. “Wake me when your watch is over…Dylan.”

  “Will do. Oh, and about that serial killer who murdered my wife? He’s the one I shot to death up in Utah.”

  “I’d figured that one out already.”

  “I thought you might have, Henry. You would have made a great agent.”

  “Thanks. See you in an hour and a half. Don’t forget to get me up.” It’d be like the man to take his shift, too. He didn’t seem to need much sleep.

  “I won’t,” Greer droned softly, and went back to checking the grenade launchers’ mechanisms for at least the tenth time since they’d started their quest. He’d told Henry often enough they had to work perfectly, without a hitch, at the moment they were most needed. It could mean life or
death for all of them.

  Shaking his head over the enigma that was Dylan Greer, Henry shut his eyes and slept.