That’s what it felt like here.
This place wanted to be left alone.
Milo knew it. The place knew it. And he was pretty sure that even Shark and Killer knew it.
The pyramid squatted there inside its coldness and dared him to come closer again.
Milo knew that he would not and could not.
He knew that he dared not.
Barnaby found them a few minutes later, and as soon as he saw the crash site, he clapped Milo on the shoulder. Very hard.
Barnaby Guidry was a fifteen-year-old Cajun teenager assigned to train a pod of twelve younger kids in several useful skills. Woodcraft and orienteering were big, of course, because no one could risk living in cities anymore. But Barnaby, whose family were rogues before Mom brought them into the Earth Alliance camp, was a first-rate scavenger. Much better than almost all the adults in camp. A field trip with him might involve infiltrating and raiding a small town or a remote store that was abandoned and overgrown, searching for anything of value while avoiding Dissosterin traps and land mines. Another trip might be like the one they were on today: following up on a report of a downed ship.
Investigate, locate, identify, scavenge. That was the plan.
“Well, lookit that, boy. You done gone an’ found it, you,” said Barnaby in his Cajun drawl. He was thin, tall, with green eyes and skin the color of coffee with a big splash of milk in it. His wiry black hair was wild and stood out in all directions as if Barnaby had touched a live electrical wire. He shook his head and grinned. “And Mr. Sharkey here was saying that him was going to win the prize today. Poor boy gonna cry, cry, cry.”
“Bite me,” muttered Shark.
The prize for finding a salvage site was first pick out of the salvage barrel. The barrel, which was under lock and key, contained items recovered by salvage teams but which had no value in terms of survival or combat. Books, old comics, toys—some of which still had most of their parts—board games, sports equipment. Like that.
Milo once got a novel that had no burned pages and wasn’t water-stained. The book was The Hobbit, and it was mostly complete. Only the last four chapters were gone, which was okay. It was rare to find whole books anymore. Weather, mold, and war destroyed paper. Milo liked making up stories to fill in missing pages. However, rumor had it that there was a baseball glove in the barrel. A real one. He wanted that glove very much. Thinking about it had made him excited for this scavenging hunt, and it had spurred him into allowing gut instinct to lead him to the crash site while everyone else followed logic.
Now, though, he couldn’t care less about the glove or anything else.
The pyramid, the wolf, the girl, and what had happened to him were all he could think about.
The things she’d said were so strange. He hadn’t told Shark everything. Like the stuff about his kind wanting to kill her kind. He thought his friend would laugh at him. Milo knew for certain Barnaby would.
But it burned in his mind.
Barnaby cupped his hands around his mouth and let out a series of birdcalls that always sounded to Milo like someone strangling a turkey. Within a few moments, the other kids from the pod began emerging from different parts of the swampy forest. Some of them groaned when they saw that Milo had won the prize.
Lizabeth, who, at nine, was the youngest of their pod, came over, scooped up Killer, and stroked the nervous dog’s fur.
“What’s wrong with you, puppy boy?” she asked. She was tiny for her age, with lots of wavy strawberry-blond hair and those pale blue eyes. Not the same as either the strange girl or the wolf, though. Lizabeth wore baggy jeans and two layers of sweaters despite the heat. She was always cold, even on the hottest day.
Barnaby noticed Killer too. “What is wrong wit’ him? Dog get himself spooked by a coon?”
The local raccoons were big, smart, and fierce. Even some of the bigger dogs in camp avoided them.
Milo didn’t want to explain, but Shark pointed. “He got spooked by that.”
“Wha-a-at? Tee-dog been to a dozen crash sites and—”
“No,” corrected Shark as he clicked on his flashlight. “That.”
Barnaby entered the burned area and stopped in front of the pyramid. He straightened, frowned, took a few steps back, then moved forward again. Then he rubbed at the beads of sweat on his forearm and frowned.
“Feel that?” asked Milo. “The temperature?”
The team leader glanced at him but didn’t respond. He looked confused and concerned, and his hand rested on the curved handle of a lug wrench he carried when out in the woods. Barnaby called it a “slug ranch.”
Lizabeth began to enter the cold zone, but Killer started barking and squirming in her arms. Only when she stopped moving toward the pyramid did the dog settle down. Even then he whined and growled softly.
“What is it?” asked Lizabeth.
Barnaby said nothing for almost a minute. It was a long time, and Milo felt more and more uncomfortable as the seconds passed. Then Barnaby began backing away.
“Turn off da light, you,” he said, and Shark complied.
“What is that thing?” Lizabeth asked again. “It feels . . . It feels . . .”
They waited for her to finish.
“Feels what, Lizzie?” asked Milo.
Her eyes met his and fell away. “You’ll just laugh.”
“No,” he replied, “pretty sure I won’t be doing that.”
Lizabeth hugged Killer. “It feels sad. And . . . really mad.”
Nobody laughed.
Barnaby turned and studied the burned clearing and the surrounding woods. His green eyes were narrowed, and his face was without expression. He stopped when he was facing the pyramid again.
“You think the Dissosterin built that?” asked Shark.
“No. Dem cockroach din’ make dis,” murmured Barnaby, his voice gone suddenly quiet. As Shark’s and Milo’s had before.
“It looks old,” said Milo.
Barnaby nodded. He licked his lips as he continued to study the woods. He didn’t say what he was looking for. As he looked, though, Barnaby dug into his pocket and clutched something. Milo knew what it was. Like a few other Cajuns in the camp, Barnaby had a small deerskin pouch in his pocket filled with special herbs, stones, chicken bones, and other items that his grandmother had gathered for him as protections against the gris-gris. Against evil.
Milo didn’t mock. He had his lucky black stone. As everyone always said, the world was pretty short on luck. You held on to any of it you could find.
“C’mon, man,” insisted Shark. “What is it? Is something else going on in these woods?”
“Dey’s always something goin’ on in dem woods, you,” Barnaby said without looking at him. “Always been dat way, goin’ alla way back.”
“What kind of stuff?” asked Lizabeth, her blue eyes huge. The other kids had gathered around now, and they took turns looking at the crash site and then at the pyramid. One by one they clustered around Barnaby.
“When you is out here, you got to be real careful,” warned Barnaby. “Most of you ain’t never been this far out.”
“Why?” asked one of the other kids. “Alligators?”
Barnaby snorted. “Dey’s more than gators in dem woods, you.”
“Like what?” asked Lizabeth in a frightened whisper. “Stingers?”
“Dey’s probably Stingers out dere too,” said Barnaby. “But dat ain’t what I’m talkin’ ’bout. Dey’s stuff out here ain’t never come down from the sky, no. Tings dat was already here. Stuff dat’s been here a long time. Stuff dat live bag dare in the swamp.”
Lizabeth looked off toward the east, toward the part of the swamp forest beyond their scavenging patrols. Milo followed her gaze, and his imagination began playing tricks with him. Those vine-draped, mosquito-infested swamplands were no different from where they stood, but at the moment they looked different. They felt different. They felt wrong.
Barnaby sucked his teeth as if deciding whether to
say more; then he glanced at the pyramid again and nodded to himself. “Dis here’s rougarou country. Don’ you know dat?”
Lizabeth’s blue eyes snapped back to stare at him, and now they were wider than ever. “What’s a—a rougarou?”
“A rougarou?” said Barnaby quietly. “Why, dat’s a big bad wolf, cher. Got long, pointy teet. He bite you whole.”
“Wolf?” gasped Shark. Before Milo could stop him, his friend blurted, “Milo just saw a wolf.”
Barnaby’s head whipped around toward Milo. “What dat you say?”
“It’s true,” insisted Shark. “Right here.”
The older teen grabbed a handful of Milo’s shirt and pulled him close. “You tell me exactly what happen, you. Don’t be lyin’, no.”
Milo didn’t want to. This was starting to really scare the daylights out of him as bad as what had happened earlier, but there was no way out of it. So he told them all what he’d told Shark.
When he was done, Barnaby looked deep into his eyes as if searching for a lie. Then he let go of Milo’s shirt and stepped back. The Cajun teen’s brown face had gone slack, and he gave his lips a nervous lick.
“Okay, okay . . . Whatever’s goin’ on, dis ain’t our bid-ness, no,” he said slowly. Then he deliberately turned his back on the pyramid and faced the debris field. “We’ll tag da spot and den we’re out of here. And I don’ want to hear no complainin’, me.”
The others groaned in protest, but they all knew this was Barnaby’s call. The pod-leader was responsible for more than the scavenge trip; it was his job to bring them all home safe.
The grumbling continued, though, because even though Milo had won the big prize for this hunt, there were other things they could win by finding good bits of salvage–extra food, fewer chores, bonus points in their sit-down school. But Barnaby wouldn’t budge. He ordered four kids to tie orange markers to trees on the outside of the burn zone.
He didn’t let anyone go into the crash site, and he did not step even an inch closer to the damaged pyramid.
While the team was buddy-checking their gear for the hike back, Milo, Shark, and Lizabeth cornered Barnaby. In a hushed tone, Milo said, “What’s with you? What’s going on? Why are we bugging out like this?”
“What you tink?” said Barnaby sourly.
“Is it because of the wolf?” asked Lizabeth.
“Maybe dat’s right, cher.”
“Why?” asked Shark. “Is it rabid or something?”
“Or sometin’,” was Barnaby’s reply.
“C’mon, Barn,” Shark pressed. “What’s wrong? You looked like you swallowed a hairy caterpillar as soon as Milo said he saw a wolf. How come? It’s just a wolf. What’s the big?”
Barnaby shook his head. “Dat’s where you wrong, Mr. Sharkey, you. If Milo saw a wolf here.” He pointed to the pyramid. “Here. Den maybe it a rougarou. And a rougarou ain’t no everyday kind of wolf, no.” When he was scared, the Cajun’s accent got even thicker. “The rougarou—him’s a big, bad wolf.”
“Bad?” asked Lizabeth. “What do you mean?”
“I ’member my grandmama tole me when I was little, before dem Bugs come down here. She said I don’ do all my chores and don’ say my prayers before bed, den da rougarou gon’ come an’ eat me all up. I believe her, too, ’cause everybody down here heard da rougarou howlin’ on a dark night.”
“You’re talking about the boogeyman,” said Shark.
“Da boogeyman? Him’s a puppy compare to da rougarou. Da rougarou—him knows who you are. Da rougarou is all da time watchin’.” Barnaby laid a straight finger alongside his nose. “He smell if you been good or bad. You good, he maybe leave you alone, you. Maybe. You never can tell. You bad—well, he knows. You very bad, da rougarou come and bite you.”
“Bite?” echoed Lizabeth.
“He bite you, cher, and make you a rougarou just like him.”
“How . . . ?” she began, but Barnaby leaned close.
Barnaby’s green eyes burned as bright as an alien lifelight. They shone with a sinister emerald fire. “’Cause the rougarou—him’s a werewolf.”
Lizabeth’s eyes were so big now that they seemed to bug out of her head. “A were—were—were—”
It was as far as she could get.
Milo was about to say something, to tell Barnaby to knock it off, when the team leader suddenly let out a big bray of laughter. “Look at you faces. You believe me, you. Don’t tell me you don’.”
For a few seconds he was the only one laughing. Then the others joined in. Slowly, reluctantly. Lizabeth too, though hers sounded entirely false and forced. Milo and Shark exchanged a look. They were the only ones who didn’t laugh.
“You’re a total dipwad,” Milo said to Barnaby.
That only made the pod-leader laugh harder. He sauntered away from them, slapping his thighs as he laughed.
Shark leaned close to Milo but nodded toward Lizabeth and in a quiet voice said, “Guess who’s going to be wetting the bed for, like, the next month.”
Still chucking, the Cajun walked back, waving to the pod to fall in behind him.
Shark and Milo lingered at the edge of the clearing, fuming and angry.
Under his breath Shark muttered, “Maybe when we take a bathroom break, he’ll wipe his butt with poison ivy.”
Milo said nothing.
He hadn’t liked Barnaby’s story.
He’d been angry about the joke.
But he did not believe for one second that Barnaby’s laughter was real. It sounded fake and forced to him. It sounded like a lie.
He saw little Lizabeth mouth the word “rougarou.” There were tears in the corners of her eyes.
Milo held out his hand until she took it. “Come on, Lizzie. Don’t you believe any of that stuff. You know Barnaby. He’s just messing with you.”
She gave him a smile, but from the look in her eye, Milo knew that she didn’t believe it was a joke any more than he did.
Barnaby did not make them leave after all.
After warning everyone to stay well clear of the shrine, he gave orders for the pod to do what they came to do. Examine the debris and search for anything useful.
“Wonder why he changed his mind,” Shark said quietly.
Milo shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe he’s just being annoying.”
While the pod unpacked their gear in preparation for examining the debris field, Barnaby stood to one side, his right hand resting on the butt of his stun gun, the other on the leather-wrapped handle of his knife. He was sweating, but he kept a smile on his face. It was the most false smile Milo had ever seen. He said as much to Shark.
“He’s spooked,” agreed Shark. “Lot of that going around.”
Milo nodded. “Yeah.”
They began unpacking their gear. Milo dug his pack of microtools of out his jeans pocket, selected a little meter, and attached the leads to a piece of junk. The readout told him that the machine was Dissosterin. Milo used a couple of small tools to remove the cover and isolate undamaged circuits. Then he removed them one by one and put them in his pocket. Shark was doing a similar job, removing booster cells from a communicator. They worked quickly and with great efficiency, using techniques they worked every day to refine. Even at their age, this was something they—and nearly everyone in their pod—could do well. With the tools in their kits, they could dismantle everything from a drop-ship antigrav engine to a complex mechanical door lock.
While they worked, Milo noticed that no one even glanced in the direction of the broken pyramid.
They all feel it, he thought.
He found a clear patch of ground and ran through the standard equipment check they were all required to do. He had his tape measure, portable Geiger counter, digital land surveyor, metallurgic analysis scanner, and a dozen other gizmos. Most of them were secondhand—damaged and refurbished, handed down from soldier-scouts to pod members.
A shadow fell across him, and he looked up to se
e Barnaby. The pod-leader was no longer smiling. He glanced around to make sure everyone was busy with their own gear checks, and then he squatted down next to Milo.
Before he could speak, Milo said, “That was a rotten thing to do to Lizabeth.”
Barnaby glanced at Lizabeth, shrugged. “Didn’t mean no harm, me. You know dat.”
“Still.”
“Mo chagren,” said Barnaby. Then the pod-leader sighed and repeated it in English. “Sorry. I’ll make it up to Tee-Lizzie, me. We’re having ice cream wit’ dinner. She can have my share, her. Tink dat’ll do?”
“Better if you didn’t do something like that again, man. Lizzie’s got issues. Ever since . . . you know . . .”
Barnaby nodded and sighed again. A little more than a year ago, Lizabeth’s parents went missing when one of their previous camps was attacked. Later, when they’d found a new, safer spot, a patrol had gone back to look for survivors. All that was ever found of Lizzie’s parents was her mom’s left shoe. It was torn and stained with blood. Lizabeth didn’t get hysterical or anything. Instead she went into her own head and seemed to get a little lost there. It was shortly after that when she started seeing monsters. Most kids would have been treated harshly for telling lies—after all, the whole Earth Alliance survived on the strength of reliable intelligence. Bad or false intel got people killed. Nobody came down too harshly on Lizabeth except once or twice. Mostly people just smiled and nodded and pretended they believed her. Milo was pretty sure that Lizabeth wasn’t lying. He thought she believed that she was seeing these things.
Shark thought so too. It scared him.
It made Milo sad and a little frightened. Not of her, but of the world. He had vivid dreams—nightmares, really—and sometimes things he dreamed about came true. He’d dreamed of his father disappearing the night before he went missing when his patrol tried to raid a hive ship. So, if Lizabeth said she was seeing monsters, maybe she was. Real ones or ones that were coming their way.
It was tough living like they did.
The Orphan Army Page 5
