“He and Horowitz got secretive. They shut almost everyone out of their work. Even the other Columbia students. Then one of the wild dogs that lived around the camp disappeared for a day. He was a favorite because he we was the friendliest. When he reappeared he was tied outside the doctors’ tent and had some kind of wound on his head. The doctors kept watching the dog and making notes. A couple of weeks later the dog started acting sick and really aggressive. Then it died.”
Xander’s gut twisted but he didn’t interrupt the kid. Shay only glanced at Xander with a wrinkled nose.
“I thought everyone else was going to band together and kick the doctors out of the dig, but they started spending more and more time away from the site. The landowner had offered guards to keep everyone safe from criminals in the area—but the landowner was a drug boss so I don’t think they were there to keep us safe. Anyway, the guards began picking the doctors up and bringing them back. At first it was just for a few hours, then it became days at a time. Then they stopped coming back altogether. Most of the people on the dig were glad. But I was worried.”
ET drank more beer and hesitated before going on. “My father worked for Moreno, the landowner. I heard him talking to my mother one night. He was saying something about Moreno and some men from the States torturing people. I was worried about my father. He was Moreno’s accountant and Moreno was a lunatic. Everyone knew it. There were rumors that he practiced black magic, or Santeria or whatever. My mother hated that my father worked for him. But there were not a lot of options for jobs where we lived. My father wanted to provide for us the best he could.
For the most part, I don’t think my dad cared about the stuff Moreno did. But sometimes he came home worried and upset. They never told me why, but I think he saw things or had to do things he really didn’t like. No one said no to Moreno.”
For the first time he sounded more angry than scared. “Then my dad went to work one day he didn’t come back that night. My mother was worried because he had never not come home before. I wanted to go look for him right away but my mother wouldn’t let me. The police wouldn’t even give us five minutes after we told them who my father worked for. Crazy or not, Moreno brought a lot of money to the village and owned the police. I had been in Moreno’s compound before. To see my father or run some errand for someone there. My dad didn’t want me there, but it was an easy way to make a little money.
After a couple of weeks I ignored my mom and went to the compound. The guards let me in because they knew me. I don’t think they had any idea what was going on. I snooped around until I found the basement where the doctors were working. They recognized me and didn’t give me a hard time. They didn’t know the man they had strapped to a table was my father.”
ET’s hands stopped shaking and he looked like he was about the shatter the bottle in his fist. “My dad was on their table with blood coming out of his nose and ears. Robards and Horowitz acted like I was…a janitor or something, and was too stupid to understand what was going on.
“I couldn’t move at first. I knew I had to pretend I didn’t know this man. If they knew that I was connected to him and that I understood they had done this to him, they would have killed me too. Instead, they sent me away telling me to bring them lunch. I didn’t want to leave my father. I couldn’t. My legs wouldn’t move. But then…my father’s head turned to look at me. He couldn’t talk, but I could tell what he was trying to say. Go. He mouthed ‘run.’ So I ran.”
Xander felt sorrier than ever for the kid. ET’s face was paler and his voice was hollow. Next to him, Shay let out a little squeak that threatened to ruin her hard-ass façade. Zak spoke from behind them. “Holy shit,” he whispered.
ET looked at them all and Xander was surprised and almost proud to see the anger in the kid’s dark brown eyes. “I couldn’t bring myself to tell my mother for a while. I was afraid to say anything. Talking about it would make it real. Telling my mom would break her heart. There wasn’t anything we could do. The cops wouldn’t help. The only thing I could do was hope he would get better. That whatever they were doing to him wouldn’t kill him and he would survive and come home.”
“But he didn’t?” Xander asked.
“No. The next time I saw my father it was just his headless body.”
Chapter Five
Sydney climbed into the back seat of George’s old Bronco—a feat that was difficult to do without a stepladder. The man’s truck was elevated on tires that were nearly as tall as Sydney and definitely taller than Frankie. But the height of the truck wasn’t a problem for the older lady. George boosted her into the passenger seat as if she weighed nothing at all. He turned to help Sydney but she was already in. The more time she spent around the couple, the more desperate she was to get away from them. She might have been imagining it, but they were...not normal. When George saw she didn’t need any help, he chuckled and hurried around to the driver’s side.
He started the truck and it was surprisingly quiet. No wonder I didn’t hear him arrive. He made U-turn in front of Frankie’s cottage and drove down the steep driveway to the main road. Sydney was glad to learn she had been going in the right direction when she had been searching for town. Or, I was at least going in the same direction George is. She couldn’t shake the strange vibe she was getting from the old couple. For all she knew George was going to drive her into the woods and murder her there. If they were going to kill you why wouldn’t they just do it at the cottage where they knew they wouldn’t be seen?
Even though her voice of reason made sense, Sydney still couldn’t relax. George and Frankie just weren’t…right. They were odd and not just eccentric and old. Sydney tried to calculate an escape plan but realized that if she needed to jump from the moving vehicle she was screwed. They were going too fast and they were too high up. She would be shredded on the pavement. She really wished she had a weapon—the knife the migrant worker who gave her a ride into Millville the first time would be great. But, she would even settle for the tire iron she had hit Pan with in Vegas. She decided her best course of action was to pretend nothing was wrong—to not let her fear show. Keep them thinking she was fooled. Or, at the very least, not show them she was a paranoid dumbass.
Syd’s clenched her teeth. Maybe if she’d been so wary eight months ago she wouldn’t have been tricked and drugged by Doc. None of this would have happened to her. But that wouldn’t have stopped it from happening to anyone else though, would it? It would have been easy to wish what had happened to her on someone else, but she couldn’t let herself think the words. There was a reason why average citizens did extraordinary things then insisted they weren’t heroes. Sometimes people are given a choice—do something or do nothing and there are people who can’t live with doing nothing.
Sydney didn’t realize that she was one of the “do something” people until she was. It would be easy to run and pretend none of this was happening to her or her friends. But she couldn’t. Even if she didn’t die, she wouldn’t be living. Always looking over her shoulder. Always waiting for the creatures to do whatever they intended on doing. Even if she escaped for a while it wouldn’t be forever. By the time she was forced to do something it would be too late. If she wanted to move forward she needed to make sure there was something to move forward to.
The ride into Millville went quickly. Syd hadn’t realized how close they had been. The trip was maybe a twenty mile drive. A drive that she measured in pop music that Frankie and George played on the radio. George drove so fast that there was only time for only a few songs, but every time a new song came on and neither changed the station Syd was surprised. Aren’t old people supposed to listen to the oldies stations? Maybe they think you want to listen to pop music? When they pulled into town George asked Sydney where she wanted to go. And she jumped at the sound of his voice. No one had spoken the whole drive she realized.
“Uh…Is there somewhere I can use a computer?”
“I don’t know,” George replied thoughtfully.
“What about the coffee shop?” Frankie asked.
“They will have internet there, but I don’t have anything to get online with.”
“Can you get one of those disposable phones?” George asked, pulling into a large shopping center that Sydney had spent days wandering months ago.
“I could…” Syd realized, way too late, that she didn’t have any money. Shit! What the hell was I planning on doing this whole time? She had been so distracted and unsettled and desperate to get away from George and Frankie that she hadn’t thought things out properly. “I’m sure someone will let me use their phone or computer for a minute…”
George and Frankie glanced at each other, smiled, then George shifted his weight and, at first, Sydney had frozen, not sure what he was planning to do. But when he pulled out his wallet she was surprised. “Here,” he held out a hundred dollar bill.
“Oh! I can’t do that?” Sydney wanted to snatch the money and run, but the fear that she was being unnecessarily suspicious of the old couple kept her from acting like an ungrateful ass.
“Of course you can!” Frankie insisted.
“You guys have been too kind already,” Syd said, eying the bill.
“Take it,” George reached further into the back seat. “Everyone needs a little help sometimes.”
Sydney forced herself to take the money slowly. “I promise, once I get back to the city, I will pay you back.”
“Oh, you have more important things to worry about,” Frankie smiled at her with twinkling eyes.
Sydney didn’t know if the lady was referring to the cheating boyfriend or an alien invasion, regardless, she smiled, opened the door and jumped from the truck. She only looked back once and saw Frankie and George smiling broadly while waving at her. She gave them a quick wave and hurried into the superstore that was the anchor for the whole shopping center. She bought a phone that could access the internet, albeit only on Wi-Fi, and hurried across the parking lot to the coffee shop. She glanced around for George and Frankie, almost expecting them to be waiting and watching for her, but there were gone.
Inside, she bought a scalding hot, super sweet latte and took a seat in the window. She unpackaged the phone and looked over the directions to see what she needed to do to make it work. In minutes she was ready to get online. She googled The Bark and Meow, renewing her annoyance at not being able to remember anyone’s numbers by heart. Two taps of the screen later and the phone was ringing. Her heart was in her throat.
If something had happened to her friends she didn’t know if calling the store would tell her. Even if they weren’t dead, or captive somewhere, they might not be checking the messages at the shop. And if Shay is at the store working is that a better outcome? Wouldn’t that mean they had went back to their own lives? The jerk of an inner voice told her that was probably for the best.
When the voicemail picked up Syd was both relieved and disappointed. At the sound of Shay’s voice her heart felt like it was bleeding. “Hi! You’ve reached The Bark and Meow. We are unable to answer the phone right meow, but if you leave a message we’ll bark back soon. Thanks!”
A smile tickled the corner of Sydney’s mouth. She hadn’t thought through what she would say at for a moment she was stumped. Finally, she went with the simplest message she could. There was no telling who was listening into their calls. “Hi.” The one word had taken all of the air from her lungs. She had to take a deep breath to start again.
“Hi. It’s me.” She felt almost giddy and had to concentrate on not breaking into a fit of giggles. “I need a ride home. I’m near where Don used to live. Where I got started.”
Sydney hung up the phone and hoped with everything in her they would get the message soon. She had opted to not leave her number in case someone intercepted the message and could track her down that way. Hell, they can figure out my number just from the voicemail and pinpoint my location down to which seat I’m sitting in maybe. No point in making it any easier though, Sydney had decided. Shay can get the number off caller id if she needs it. Not knowing what else to do, Syd drank her coffee and waited.
Chapter Six
Sydney sipped her coffee and waited for her phone to ring. The afternoon had passed into night and she was pretty sure the staff of the coffee shop thought she was homeless. She hoped they didn't call the police on her. To pass the time she opened the browser on the phone and hesitated. She knew she should check to see if anything had happened while she was gone, but she was afraid of what she would find out. Taking a deep breath, she finally ran a search. First she googled her friends. Very few relevant results were returned. Social media profiles and Shay’s pet store were at the top. She felt her shoulders relax a little. If they had died or been arrested, it surely would have been at the top of the list.
Feeling a little more confident that her friends were at least not dead, she decided to search for events related to everything that had happened. She hesitated again, not because of fear this time, but because she wasn’t entirely sure where to start. She was reasonably confident searching “alien invasion” would bring up a whole lot of stuff that wasn’t going to be reliable or applicable. Finally, she typed “beheadings, Chicago” in the search bar and tapped the magnifying glass. The only results referenced terrorist murders that had been covered by Chicago newspapers. Syd sighed and tapped her fingers against her empty coffee cup.
Trying to be less specific she searched for “unexplained attacks, Chicago area.” This time she was more successful. The Tribune was the top hit and she clicked on the link to read the article. Each sentence turned her blood colder and colder until she wrapped her hand around the coffee for both warmed and reassurance, forgetting it had been a cold empty cup for a while. The article started by covering an attack on a young woman in a park. The woman wasn’t raped or robbed, instead she was beaten and left for dead. She was last listed as in a coma and unable to give a statement.
The article went on to connect the most recent attack with at least three others over the past three weeks. The victims were all different. Two men and one other woman. No one was raped or robbed. One of the men had died, one had permanent brain damage and memory loss and was unable to communicate effectively with the police. The other woman survived but was still intensive care. Her attack had only been five days ago. She was able to report that a young, white male ran at her while she was jogging and knocked her to the ground. He then began kicking and stomping on her resulting in two cracked vertebrae and a ruptured spleen. A group of joggers interrupted the attack and the man ran off.
The reporter who had written the article, Charlie Hacker, lamented the fact that the police didn’t seem convinced the attacks were connected. The assaults happened in different locations—two were in affluent neighborhoods and one was in the suburbs and the most recent was near Old Town. The victims were both male and female. The first woman attacked was Asian, one of the men was black and the other two were white. One of the men was 52, and the most recent woman was in her thirties. At first glance, Sydney could see why the police didn’t want to connect the attacks.
But, as Hacker pointed out, the brutality, randomness, and blitz-style was the common factor. Sydney thought back to Pan and Connor’s erratic behavior. It wasn’t a stretch for her to imagine either of them committing a similar attack. But Connor was dead, and the last she heard about Pan was he was missing. She had no way of knowing for sure that these attacks were connected to everything that had happened, but she didn’t doubt it. It would be stupid to write off anything unusual right now. But, she thought, if they are connected what does that mean? Wouldn’t any incubating aliens have hatched weeks ago? Doc had said it was different for different people and specimens, but the average was twenty-eight days after implantation. Once the spore hatched into its larval stage it took a month for it to burst out of its host. Sydney shuddered.
Even though Doc had insisted that he was right about these time lines, Sydney doubted him. If the weird dreams and floating or
bs that everyone experienced indicated that the spore had hatched, twenty-eight days couldn’t be a great estimate. He had implanted spores in people over several months. In her case it had been at least six months earlier. And Randall, whom she had dubbed Short Man, was on approximately the same timeline she had been. If she and Randall were both different and took longer to incubate, what did that mean for them? But that still doesn’t make sense, she realized. Conner and Pan weren’t on the same time line either. Connor disappeared weeks before Pan attacked her and Xander.
Did Doc implant them the same time? If so, how was he following and monitoring me simultaneously? Sydney was growing more and more doubtful about the so-called doctor’s theories. Now that she wasn’t currently trying to find her way out of a hostage situation, she had more time to consider everything Doc had told her. And it wasn’t making a lot of sense. He had to have left out information out on purpose or because he didn’t know it. Either was entirely possible. Sydney ran a hand over her face and sighed. Her headache was returning and she was getting hungry again. Her foot bounced up and down and Sydney rolled her shoulders. If it wasn’t time that “hatched” the spores what was it?
She stared out the window for a while before she shivered and turned away. The dark gave the scary things places to hide. Not to mention the fact that she was going to have to start thinking about where to spend the night. She remembered Don finding her in his doorway and her heart hurt again. He didn’t deserve what had happened to him, he had only been trying to help her and it had resulted in Randall cutting his head off. She remembered the horror of finding his body and her anxiety replaced his body with Shay, Xander and Zak’s and her breath caught in her throat.
Her heart began beating harder and her breath felt thin. She sucked in another lungful and tried to calm down. Getting worked up wasn’t going to help anyone—least of all her. The air in the coffee shop shifted and she realized conversations were stopping as the whole place grew quieter. She looked up to see what was going on and saw everyone staring at the front door. She turned slowly in her chair, holding her breath. The weird vibe caused her survival mode to kick in and her heart raced.
Show No Fear Page 4
