Contact

by Johnny B. Truant

  “What’s the big deal if it went off in the house?” Terrence was talking to Christopher, but Christopher was looking at Raj, who, ironically, seemed the most composed.

  “He’s thinking it gave us away,” Raj said.

  “Won’t they just assume it’s a house alarm?”

  “Maybe.” Raj shrugged. “But then again, the house has been open for months. And supposedly, the house doesn’t have any power.”

  “Wouldn’t an alarm have batteries?”

  “It was only down here,” Terrence said to Vincent.

  “Yes, it would have batteries,” Raj told Trevor, rubbing his face and yawning. “But Vincent hasn’t figured out that the alarm not going off in the house is a bad thing.”

  Vincent’s head snapped toward Raj. He looked like he was about to say something, but Terrence seemed to get whatever Raj was saying immediately. He was staring at the monitor feeds, tapping and zooming.

  “Shit.”

  “What?” Vincent said.

  “Shit. Shit motherfucker.”

  “What?”

  “They heard it.”

  “What did they hear?”

  Terrence swallowed. “The vents. The skylights.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  Terrence pointed at the monitoring screen. Vincent crowded in to look. Trevor pressed in behind him, Heather at his side. They were packed enough that he noticed his mother shivering. How could she be cold?

  The screen was expanded to show the east lawn. The people camping there were moving slowly forward. Trevor was reminded of encroaching zombies.

  “What are they looking at?” Heather asked.

  “They heard it!” Vincent snapped. “The alarm. The goddamned alarm!”

  “You said it didn’t go off up top,” Christopher said.

  “Exactly.” All heads turned toward Raj, and he took a half second before speaking to bask in his earned attention. “An alarm going off up there might be strange, but whatever. There’s no power. An alarm would have a battery. Going off somewhere else, just loud enough to be heard from an unknown place? That’s much more interesting.”

  “Where is this shot?” said Vincent.

  “East.”

  He reached forward and flicked through screens. “They’re all looking. Every camera. So they can’t tell where it came from.”

  “Maybe they’ll figure it out,” Raj said.

  Vincent ignored him. “The door is concealed. Locked. They can’t get in.”

  “But now, maybe, they know there’s something here. Another place, with an alarm.”

  “We knew there was a bunker,” Vincent said.

  “But you were also trying to get in here alone, while keeping the others at arm’s distance. What did you suggest you were doing, if not breaking into a bunker hidden under the house? Did you let them think you were cracking a safe?”

  “Nobody’s getting in here.”

  “I’m not so sure.” Raj pointed at the screen. Some of the people were getting closer to the cameras in their various locations, looking up, pointing. “They must all be hungry. They’re clearly scared. They used to wander around, but now they’re clustered. Since those big thumps, they’ve seemed scared shitless to me. Desperate maybe.”

  Lila shook her head. “You’re not helping, Raj.”

  “Maybe we should go up,” he said. “Plant something. Even if it’s just a rumor.

  “How exactly would that work?” Christopher asked.

  “Got it,” said Terrence, who’d been tapping around on another screen. “Auxiliary vent, south. Where is that?”

  Trevor pointed. “That’s south.”

  “I meant the vent.”

  “Hey, Terrence, how about you just explain what the shit you’re talking about?” Vincent waved around. “Tell this fine group what’s going on, before everyone loses it?”

  Terrence sighed then looked around the group, Trevor first. “Okay. Look. We’re in a sealed room. Sealed by design; that’s what it’s here for — to keep the outside out and the inside in. But we need air. I’ll bet your dad has some liquid oxygen around here somewhere, based on the diversity of crazy shit he has stowed in that back room. Emergency use only, and very, very flammable. Dangerous if it’s used wrong, for sure. We’re all breathing outside air. Of course. Nothing wrong out there. So there’s vents. A bunch of them; I’d need to study the schematics to have any idea where they all come up. And they’re designed for redundancy. But we can’t just sit down here and let gravity bring us air, because we’re also filling this place with carbon dioxide. Slowly, but we’re doing it sure as anything. CO2 is as toxic as oxygen.”

  “Oxygen is toxic?” said Trevor.

  “Corrosive, actually. That’s where rust comes from. But again: whatever. This isn’t a space mission; we’re just underground. We need recirculating air. Like a furnace, even if it’s not heating or cooling, though I’m sure the getup here is doing that, too. Problem is, you block too many inputs or outputs from that system, and it loses efficiency. We could choke to death on our exhales.”

  Lila looked white, hand near her mouth.

  “No worries, little girl,” said Terrence, using an expression only he could have pulled off. “There are failsafes aplenty. Your daddy thought of everything. Or his designers did anyway. We suggested blocking your vents to Morgan as a way to force you out — don’t worry; we wouldn’t have done it; just needed him to think we would — but there were problems. First, you all dying didn’t help. We needed you to work with us, whether you wanted to or not. But the second reason was simpler: we couldn’t find them all.”

  “So … ” Lila said.

  “I doubt anyone’s going to do enough damage to us without trying — or even with trying — to make us suffocate. But they can do shit like this.” He tapped one of the screens, which showed a collection of tents like anywhere else on the grounds. Seeing it, Trevor thought of how, if these were the last days, the hippies had somehow managed to be the only ones able to mind their manners.

  “See that big red tent there?” Terrence said.

  Lila nodded.

  “See that shed it’s up against?”

  She nodded again.

  “Okay. Now look closely.”

  Lila did. After a moment, Terrence pointed at part of the screen as a hint.

  “The tent material is sticking to the shed?”

  Terrence nodded. “I’d guess that’s Auxiliary Vent South. He’s blocked it. No big deal, ordinarily, but shit, look at this place.” He tapped another of the thumbnails, and they saw the house from above, presumably from a camera in a tree farther up one of the hills, looking down onto the grounds. The lawn was packed, almost edge to edge. A few curious pilgrims coming to Meyer Dempsey’s Axis Mundi in hopes of being taken or meeting their celestial comrades had turned into a city, clotting the place and, apparently, taxing the bunker’s breathing.

  “There’s no way they’ve blocked even half of the ins and outs,” Terrence went on. “If I’d designed this place, I’d have put a few up high — especially outvents, where the breeze would draft gasses out without a fan. I’d have put ins on the most typically windward walls. Stuff like that. There’s probably a few out in the woods, hidden under shit. So no worries for us. But the alarm, which is watching things more closely, feels different.” He tapped the console.

  Dan looked at Terrence, Heather, Vincent. “So the alarm went off because, what, the pressure got too low or high or something?”

  Terrence nodded.

  Trevor pushed closer. On the screens, many of the people who’d come forward at the screaming alarm were wandering away.

  “They’re letting it go.”

  “Yeah,” said Vincent, turning toward Trevor. “But they’ll keep wondering. I’ll bet we get some more curious explorations in the next few days. Especially now that they seem to be avoiding the alcove near the lake. Whatever’s over there makes them uncomfortable. And I’ll bet they like the idea o
f being safe and protected a lot more than they used to.”

  “And,” Terrence added, “the vents are still blocked. Give them time, and they’ll block more, and I’ll have to practically sit on the alarm to keep it from going off every ten minutes.”

  Trevor waited for more, but the room had gone quiet. A proposition seemed to have been set on the table, but Trevor wasn’t catching it.

  “So what do we do?” Lila finally asked.

  “We go up,” said Vincent. “And clear the decks.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Shit.

  Cameron remembered the danger as if from a long-forgotten movie, never seen. The knowledge was simply there. He knew it in the way he knew his head was on his shoulders.

  Footing in the creekbed was unsure. Cameron didn’t have much experience with horses, but movies and books said you shot them when they broke legs. Stakes were higher now; if the horses faltered, they’d all be shot — all four of them, on all twelve legs. Maybe the horses could gallop full-ass over the slippery wet rocks, but Cameron wasn’t willing to risk it.

  They were trapped. It would take time for the Andreus warriors to run back and inform Nicholas that there were intruders on their land who hadn’t paid tolls in chattel or blood. It would be tricky to get ATVs and maybe even motorcycles down the slope into the ravine. But if they’d managed to descend on horses, the warriors would follow fine. Then, when they came from behind with their superior speed — driven to their quarry as if sliding down a funnel — the warriors would easily overtake them.

  Cameron looked at Piper. A thought — clearly hers, inflected with her voice — hit him.

  We have to leave the horses. We have to run.

  A vision, as if from his own imagination: dismounting, grabbing their bags and gear from the horses’ packs, then climbing the dirt walls, clinging to rocks and roots. Maybe, if they needed a boost, standing atop a horse’s back if the animal could be made to stand still. The two of them running, now on flat land, maybe making for the highway. Flagging down a car. Finding a savior. Watching as the sun was eclipsed from above, looking up, seeing the enormous form of one of the alien motherships, hearing it talking, watching it —

  It wouldn’t work. He shoved aside the paranoia, focused on reality.

  There weren’t any motherships around here, but there were plenty of folks like those behind them. Cameron and the others had run into a few land posses on their way to Vail, but he’d had Vincent with him then. Vincent was a little crazy. A lot crazy. He had a way of turning impossible situations into wins simply because he was too stubborn for failure. He fought like an idiot. His remorseless tactics were cold, logical, almost perfect.

  Even if they found the road, they probably wouldn’t find a car. The roads were controlled. That’s why they were sticking to the woods, following their shadows but never the roads themselves. Cameron had seen the folly of sticking to known paths in a dozen war-torn lands visited with his father, and the experience was reinforced shortly after the ships appeared on the Astral app.

  They surely couldn’t climb up and out, crossing the flat land on foot. If their pursuers had half a mind, they’d split into two groups. One would follow them into the crevasse like water down a river. The other would stay high, riding along and barring escape. They’d be much slower on foot — as easy to catch as Runaway Simon.

  It won’t work.

  “Why can’t we climb out and run?”

  Even with his mount at a nervous canter, Cameron’s heart tripping a rhythm almost as fast as the hooves, he paused at the question, thinking it odd. It was how he’d respond, if he’d done it aloud. Piper wouldn’t be asking if they weren’t somehow sharing thoughts — if she hadn’t heard him say her idea wouldn’t work. But that was impossible, so she’d included the supposition in the question, in case she was as crazy as Cameron.

  “They’ll see the horses. They’ll know right where we stopped.”

  Now that she’d spoken, going back inside his head felt wrong. Not just illogical but ridiculous. Of course they hadn’t been hearing each other speak without words. Of course they hadn’t seen and heard through the eyes and ears of the Andreus warriors above. And of course they hadn’t detoured — twice — before seeing that severed head, as if they’d known the future.

  “The horses will keep going!” Piper shouted back. Beneath her, the horse slipped and nearly spilled, causing her to grasp its neck for balance. The animal stayed upright and recovered, delaying their decision another few seconds.

  “They’re exhausted! They’ll stop, and those people will know right where we — ”

  Piper’s head snapped back. She rode looking the wrong way, hands turning white as she gripped the reins too hard.

  “They’re down here now. With us,” she said.

  “And up top.”

  “Their own horses.”

  “Four-wheelers.”

  “And a truck up top, filled with — ”

  “You have a gun too!” She seemed to realize something and reached back. “And so do I!”

  Two guns against dozens. Cameron and Piper weren’t Vincent. They’d be turned to pulp. Decapitated. Their heads would probably be mounted on pikes as a warning: this land was spoken for, and none may enter.

  He shook his head. No. They could defend themselves with guns, but only in the way honeybees used their stingers as a final defense: a last resort to do some damage before their inevitable deaths.

  They couldn’t go up.

  They couldn’t keep going straight.

  And given the fact that they were already at the ravine floor, they sure as hell couldn’t consider the final direction and go dow —

  Or maybe they could.

  They’re close, Piper said inside his mind.

  And then, frighteningly, seeing through the minds of those behind them: We’re close.

  But could their pursuers hear Cameron’s and Piper’s thoughts, as impossible as that was? His plan wouldn’t work for a second if so. If they kept running through the ravine, they’d be caught. If they climbed to the right, they’d be caught. If they climbed to the left, the might buy themselves a minute or two. But in all likelihood, the Republic of Andreus would have sentries on that side as well.

  It might work, and it might not. But they were running out of seconds to try.

  A clock ran down inside Cameron’s mind, its second hand too fast, its sweep too urgent. They had to do it now. And there were still the horses to consider — the horses which, left to their own devices, would rather rest than continue to run.

  “I’m sorry, girl,” he whispered down the horse’s neck, “but they’ll take it out when they catch you.” And maybe, if there was any justice in the world, get themselves kicked in the process.

  Cameron kept a few things in his pockets at all times. And despite the fact that he hadn’t been home for nearly half a year, old habits died hard. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the small key ring to his Chicago apartment: thumb lock and deadbolt. And a small mailbox key, for mail he was never in one place for long enough to receive.

  He removed a key from the ring, gripping with his legs and trying desperately not to fall off as his mount moved beneath him. He reached back and shoved the key between the saddle and the horse’s back, point down.

  The horse whinnied, bucked, tossed its head.

  Piper didn’t need to be told what to do. She held her hand out to catch Cameron’s keys. She did the same, seating the key far enough underneath the saddle so it wouldn’t slip out or flip down flat.

  Go. Now!

  A nearly synchronous jump. Piper spun to one side and dropped, but Cameron was too hurried; he fell as much backward as sideways and caught a hoof to the chest as the horses ran on, kicking up, fighting the strange new pain under their saddles. Riderless, they might turn and run back the way they’d come, but Cameron didn’t think so. The ravine was narrow. The only way to run from the spikes was forward.

  Reeling, his breath k
icked from his chest, Cameron still managed to drag himself to the small creek’s side. Piper was already there as he wheezed forward, trying not to clutch his chest and what might be a broken rib so he could dig. Piper was already shredding the root-strewn embankment, dragging autumn’s leaves and spring’s moss down in giant disgusting handfuls.

  They didn’t speak. Time was gone.

  With the loose detritus cleared away, they made themselves tiny, tucking legs and arms, retracting their necks like turtles. They dragged the filth back atop themselves, becoming one with the fetid earth.

  It took too long. Precious seconds. Cameron could hear his own heartbeat in his ears. He dragged in painful fits of breath, feeling suffocated as he melted into his blanket of moist leaves. Then it was done, and they waited. And waited.

  The sound of engines. ATVs shambling through the creekbed.

  The engines grew louder.

  They couldn’t run now if they wanted to. They’d never reach their guns, pressed against the embankment as they were.

  Waiting was all they had.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Lila hadn’t been sleeping well. She woke from a dream of Piper barely rested, feeling as if she’d been running for hours at Piper’s side instead of sleeping in the middle of …

  … but who cared what time it was? Who cared if it was day or night? Who cared if the bunker was real or if that pleasure belonged to her visions? She knew all the answers but didn’t care. Maybe it was all real. Maybe none of it was. Lila wasn’t the only one coming apart. Her mother seemed just as threadbare. Jumping at the same shadows.

  Trevor had finally grown himself a pair, but he’d become a different person since Piper’s departure. Almost as if he’d been waiting for the cat to go so the mice could play. He spent all his time with Cameron’s men (if they were, indeed, still Cameron’s men; Lila couldn’t remember if her dream showed Cameron dying or if he’d lived … or if it mattered since that was fake and the bunker was real), playing cards and shooting the shit. Sometimes, Lila wanted to point out that he wasn’t a rough and tough commando but was still a teenage boy.