Darkly The Thunder

by William W. Johnstone

  The man smiled. “You wanna bet?”

  “I assure you, I will be back.”

  “When you return, bring me a ham and cheese on whole wheat, please.”

  Mightily pissed-off, Mike wheeled around, stalked back to his car, and drove off to find the nearest phone, which wasn’t far.

  “Won’t be long now, Lieutenant,” a trooper said.

  “Yeah, I think all hell’s about to break loose around here.”

  He was right, in more ways than one.

  Mike stopped at the first phone he came to and called into L.A. “It’s big – real big. I counted at least eight checkpoints manned by probably forty troopers. I think they’re SWAT-trained and they’re all wearing camouflage field clothes. All communications into and out of the town have been blocked. The crap they’re handing out doesn’t hold water. All official statements have to come from the sheriff, and he’s made himself inaccessible. What do you think?”

  “I think we’ve got a big one. I’m rolling Dean Hildreth right now. You brief him.”

  Mike gave the man instructions and directions on how to get to Willowdale.

  Jill Pierce, super-duper reporter from a rival network, just back from covering a story in Germany, was walking through the terminal at L.A. International when she spotted Dean Hildreth at a ticket counter. She stopped and watched. Dean was in a hurry, and he was excited. She’d known him for several years and sensed that something big was going on. She slipped into line, staying several people behind him, and listened.

  “Willowdale is south and west of Denver, Mr. Hildreth,” the ticket agent told him. “The only way I know that is because I’m from Leadville, and Willowdale is not too far away from there. You’ll have to rent a car in Denver and drive over.”

  “No commuters?”

  “No, sir.”

  Jill stepped out of line and walked to another airline ticket counter. “Denver,” she said. “The first flight out you’ve got. And have my luggage transferred.” She handed over her luggage stubs.

  Ticket in hand, she went to a bank of phones and called in to her network.

  “Willowdale?” the bureau chief questioned. “What the hell is a Willowdale?”

  “It’s a town, south and west of Denver. Something big is going down there. Dean Hildreth was foaming at the mouth, and he doesn’t have rabies.”

  “I wouldn’t be too sure of that. He might have bitten himself.” Dean was a good reporter, but not loved by all. “You sure he isn’t going on vacation? We have nothing to indicate that anything is going on in Willowdale.”

  “Trust me. From what I understand, Willowdale is in the middle of nowhere. Why would Dean be going there on vacation? He’s the South of France or Aspen type.”

  “Okay. See what’s going on. I’ll have a crew in Denver in the morning.”

  “Have them meet me in Willowdale.”

  “You’re going on alone?”

  “Yes. I have a hunch it’s that big.”

  “Play it your way, Jill.”

  She ran to catch her plane.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The sheriffs office was beginning to take on the aura of the defenders at the Alamo. Cases of food and bottled water were stacked around the rooms. Bedrolls and suitcases were piled around the place.

  None of the staff at either motel had showed up for work that afternoon, and when the college kids had attempted to return to the motel for their toothbrushes – all they’d managed to bring down from Thunder – the girls had come close to being raped by some wild-eyed citizens.

  OH, GO ON AND GIVE THEM SOME SNATCH! Fury had howled. I’D LIKE TO SEE SOME GOOD OLD-FASHIONED HUMPING.

  Toothbrushes in hand, the kids beat it back to the sheriffs office.

  At the S.O., the Fury was playing games. As soon as lengths of chain were secured and padlocked on the cell doors, the locks would suddenly pop open.

  The prisoners thought it very funny.

  Gordie failed to see the humor in it.

  “How is the Fury doing it?” Robin asked. “Making bodies come hurling out of the air, unlocking padlocks, causing car wrecks? How?”

  “With its mind – or minds,” Howie called from his space. “What it has done is simply perfected the old spoon-bending and page-turning tricks that illusionists have done for centuries.”

  “Now how did he figure that out?” Maj. Jackson asked.

  Howie laughed. “Joey told me!” he called.

  Gordie posted guards with shotguns at the entrances to the cell blocks and let the prisoners have their limited freedom, with this warning, “The first one of you who sticks his head out a door, a deputy blows it off. You want to talk to one of us, you knock and then step back.”

  Gordie prowled the downstairs. He knew there was nothing any of them could do to protect themselves from the Fury, but there was plenty they could do to keep the townspeople from inflicting harm on them.

  And some of the citizens were beginning to get openly hostile.

  Gordie boarded up all the windows with three-quarter-inch CD plywood on the inside and the outside, the cavity between the boards filled with gravel. There was a ten-inch gap between top and bottom decking to use as gun slits, if it came to that. Any vehicles not in use were placed in the compound behind the office, and the gates locked and the fence electrified. The big generators were checked, and fuel brought in.

  The teletype clacked out another message. “For Major Jackson,” Mack said, tearing off the paper and handing it to him. Jackson had sent out a dozen messages that afternoon, all of them coded. Mack had typed out the gibberish, muttering under his breath as he did so.

  Howie stepped from his enclosure and stretched, just as the Maj. was decoding the communique. “What computer would you like me to contact, Major?” the boy asked. “It would be better if we did it that way, and you know why.”

  The Fury did not understand computers.

  “I’ll give you the access code, Howie.”

  Howie handed the Major a pad. “Actually, you can just tell me. The Fury is not here. I have analytically correlated this afternoon’s finding and built a graph. Let me show you.”

  As many as possible crowded into the room and around the door.

  Howie brought it up onto the screen. “This graph, or outline is what it really is, is of the town. North, south, east, and west,” he pointed out the directions. “You see the heaviest concentration of blips? That is the present location of the Fury. It’s really very simple.”

  “Howie,” Sunny said. “You’re going to make a great scientist later on.”

  “Oh, no, ma’am!” the boy laughed. “I plan on becoming the person in charge of the computer section at the CIA.”

  Sunny looked horrified. Maj. Jackson grinned. Then they both realized that Howie was having a joke by putting them on and laughed with him.

  “You’re sure,” Gordie asked, “that Fury won’t be able to pick up on what you’re sending or receiving?”

  “There is no way – at the present time – that it can. I’ve tested it. I called that thing every ugly word I could think of. Even tried to break through and tell it of false escape plans going on. It just doesn’t understand.”

  Captain Hishon said, “Howie, if that thing is over there,” he pointed to the screen, “what would prevent us from slipping out the other side of town?”

  Howie adjusted the screen’s contrast; now they could all see a circle of tiny silver blips all around the perimeter of the town. “The Fury has the ability to break off parts of its mass, let’s call it, and establish listening posts, or sentries, if you will. They are little thinking pockets of energy – that’s my theory on it. But they are sufficiently powerful enough to kill. I’ve seen them do just that. So has Angel. And the mass of the Fury can move with blinding speed. It can go from one end of town to another in less than a second. Maybe that’s our way out?” he mused.

  “What do you mean, Howie?” Hillary asked.

  “Everybody scatter
out and tire it. Make it use its strength chasing us.”

  No! the single word flashed on Sand’s screen. That won’t work.

  Why not? Howie typed.

  The sentries are pockets of mass. They don’t tire. And the Fury has enough energy stored – at this time – to prevent it from overtaxing itself. Good try, Howie.

  Thanks, Sand, Howie typed.

  Watch it. Here comes old fart-voice. See you.

  The screen went dark. On another screen, the blips became more concentrated.

  The crowd broke up, wandering away from the computer room.

  THINGS ARE BEGINNING TO PICK UP, BOYS AND GIRLS. TOMORROW IS GOING TO BE A VERY INTERESTING DAY.

  “You mean you’ll be leaving?” Gordie fired a verbal shot at the Fury.

  The room pulsed silently for a moment, a slow beating throb of anger. I’M GOING TO ENJOY WATCHING YOU DIE, SPIC. I HAVE PLANS FOR YOU

  “I’m sure you do.”

  Howie had left his cramped space and was sitting in a chair, listening.

  I DON’T TRUST ANY OF YOU PEOPLE. YOU’RE ALL UP TO SOMETHING. YOUR’RE

  The TV set that was playing Sand’s short life history began to wobble back and forth. The air was filled with curses, all of them directed at Sand.

  BAH!

  All felt the Fury leave.

  Howie went back to his computer room.

  The college kids once more gathered around the TV set.

  Outside, someone began screaming.

  At dawn, Jill Pierce was standing at a police blockade, arguing with a trooper.

  She had been delighted to find that Dean Hildreth had not, as yet, arrived.

  “I want to speak to the sheriff, Lieutenant.”

  “The sheriff is not here, Miss Pierce.”

  “I can see that!” she said acidly. “So why don’t you just get him for me?”

  “I’m not your personal servant,” the trooper said, then turned his back to her and walked away, before he lost his temper and said something he knew he would later regret. And it was going to get much worse, just as soon as the camera crews arrived and started putting the whole goddamn scenario on film.

  Jill prowled the outside of the barricade, set up on the main road leading into town. She questioned each trooper she encountered. When they answered at all, it was in monosyllables.

  To Jill, it was irritating as hell.

  Back to the lieutenant. “Do you mean, Lieutenant,” she said, “that you or one of your people would shoot me, if I tried to enter Willowdale?”

  “No, ma’am. I don’t mean that at all, and neither I nor any of my people have threatened to do that.”

  “Then get out of my way, for I am going into this town.”

  The trooper stared at her. “Ma’am, can’t you understand that we are under orders? Personally, I don’t give a damn what happens to you, or to any reporters like you. But you’re pushing me, and I strongly recommend that you stop.”

  Jill stuck out her chin and her chest and scowled at the man.

  Nice set of hooters, the trooper observed.

  “More newspeople, Lieutenant,” a trooper called.

  Dean Hildreth and his camera crew got out of one car, Jill’s camera crew stepped out of the other vehicle.

  “Get shots of all this,” Jill shouted, pointing to the line of camouflaged and heavily armed state police.

  Dean told his people to do the same. He walked to Jill’s side. “What’s up?”

  “I don’t really know. All they’ll say is that there is a killer on the loose in town. Supercop over there,” she pointed to the lieutenant, “won’t let anybody past those barricades.”

  “We’ll just, by God, see about that.” Dean walked to the lieutenant as the camera recorded it all. “Lieutenant, you know that as members of the press, we take chances many times doing our jobs.”

  “I am fully aware of that, sir. But I have my orders, my job to do. And my orders are that no one is allowed inside Willowdale.”

  “How do you propose to stop us? Shoot us down like the police do in South Africa?”

  The lieutenant noticed that the sound man recorded Dean’s combative remark and he resisted a nearly overpowering desire to tell the reporter to get fucked. “No, sir,” he replied. “But we shall overwhelm you with sheer numbers, and then place you under arrest on a variety of charges.”

  Dean knew he had pushed enough. “I . . . see. Well then, do you mind if we just wait around on this side of the barricade?”

  “Not at all. Just as long as you stay out of our way.”

  Dean walked back to Jill. He spoke only two words: “It’s big.”

  The Blanco County sheriffs deputies inside the barricades had gone to their tach frequency. “The press is gathering at the blockade on 80, Sheriff,” Deputy Hunt radioed. “I used binoculars to watch them. They’re top guns. It’s Jill Pierce and Dean Hildreth.”

  “Top guns is right,” Sunny said, drying her hair with a towel after a quick shower. “They’re both million-dollar-a-year broadcast journalists, and just as talented as they are pretty.”

  “You know either one of them?” Watts asked.

  “I’m on speaking terms with Jill.”

  “What’s that mean?” Gordie asked.

  “It means that we’re not close friends, but neither are we enemies.”

  “Would she listen to you?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Let’s give it a shot. Come on, we’ll talk about what you can and can’t say.”

  Jill and Dean watched as the sheriffs car pulled up and stopped, a man and woman getting out. Gordie and Sunny stood for a moment by the car.

  “Sunny Lockwood,” Jill murmured. “The plot thickens, as they say.”

  “What do you mean?” Dean asked, his eyes appraising the woman as the pair walked toward the barricades. He liked what he saw of Sunny.

  “Trade talk is that some major New York house approached Sunny to do a book on some renegade punk who was killed in this part of the country years ago. Sunny is a very good writer.”

  “So what does that have to do with this lockout?”

  “Beats me.” Jill smiled as Sunny approached. “Sunny. Looks like you got in, and we’re out in the cold. What’s going on in there?”

  “How are you, Jill.”

  She was introduced to Dean, then Sunny introduced Gordie all around.

  The cameras began to roll, moving in close.

  “Sheriff Rivera, what is going on in Willowdale?” Jill asked, shoving a microphone under Gordie’s nose.

  Gordie took a deep breath and verbally jumped in. “For the moment, all I can say is that we have a very bad situation in town. We have had a dozen brutal murders over the past few days.” He couldn’t even remember when it all started. The days and nights were getting blurry. “But we have the guilty party or parties contained within the perimeters of the town. That’s the reason for the blockades. To admit others would only add to the confusion.”

  Jill and Dean looked at each other. Both felt the sheriff was lying.

  Gordie noticed the quick look that passed between the reporters. It’s all going wrong, he thought. They’re not buying any of it.

  Jill studied the sheriff. A handsome man; but he looked haggard. She could not see his eyes behind the very dark sunglasses.

  “Can you tell us how the people were murdered, Sheriff?” Dean asked, sticking another microphone under Gordie’s nose.

  “Brutally.”

  The wind picked up and then shifted, bringing with it the smell of death. The small morgue was filled to overflowing. The hospital had been locked up, the bodies left where they were. There was nothing else Gordie could do until the shipment of spot-embalming fluid and bodybags arrived. And it was going to be gruesome work after that.

  Gordie lifted his eyes, and the cameras recorded his expression and the mikes picked up his sigh. Two eighteen-wheelers were coming down the grade from the pass. Gordie knew right then that all further pretens
e was useless. They could be the trucks he’d asked for yesterday. Filled with spot-embalming fluid and bodybags and medical supplies and various other equipment that Howie and the military had requested.

  Gordie wondered why the Fury was remaining silent. It wasn’t like the creature . . . whatever it was . . . to pass up an opportunity like this.

  The drivers of the trucks parked and got out, walking up to the barricades, the men holding clipboards in their hands.

  “We got some stuff here for Sheriff Rivera and for a Major Jackson,” a driver said.

  “Major?” Jill jumped on that. “Is the military involved in this, Sheriff?”

  “To a degree.”

  “Why?” Dean asked.

  “They were inside the town when the . . . incidents occurred. They received permission to assist the sheriffs department.”

  “Where do you want this stuff?” a driver asked.

  Gordie sighed. He had to say it. “Unload on your side of the barricades. We’ll take care of it after that.”

  Jill and Dean were silent, listening to the unusual orders.

  “Be easier if we just drove to where you want this stuff, Sheriff,” the second driver said. “Cuts down on handling.”

  “I want it where I told you to put it,” Gordie said.

  “Do it,” the lieutenant of state patrol told him.

  “Yes, sir,” the drivers said. “Whatever you say.” They walked back to their trucks.

  And, as Gordie had feared, many of the first crates out came straight from the military and were clearly stamped: BODY BAGS.

  Thankfully, most of the other crates bore numbers instead of letters.

  “You must have a lot of bodies in there, Sheriff,” Dean asked, as innocently as possible.

  “Quite a few,” Gordie acknowledged.

  “And expecting more?” Jill asked. “Possibly.”

  “Wouldn’t it be simpler to just move the bodies to a larger facility, Sheriff?” Dean asked.

  “We prefer to do the autopsies here.”

  “Oh. I see. What is that awful smell, Sheriff?” Jill asked. “It seems to be coming from town.”

  “Cattle back there,” Gordie said, waving his hand as the lies came easier. But the reporters weren’t buying any of it. “A large herd got into poison feed. That’s another reason the town is sealed off. Health hazards.”