by B. V. Larson
“Let the blame ride on the rogues, then.”
“Pretend I’m not involved, eh? The Gray Men, as you call them, are not fools, Draith. They have been probing for some time now, attempting to estimate our strength and determine how we operate. I suspect they don’t have objects and don’t understand them. They proceed with caution, but if we hit them, they might move against us more directly.”
I knew that by “move against us” he meant “move against the Community,” which was still the only group he cared about. I decided not to argue further about his abusive treatment of rogues such as myself. I’d given up on arguing for the greater good. I needed him to see a benefit for himself in my actions to gain his cooperation.
“Or,” I said, “they might grow bolder as each day passes and we don’t respond to their attacks. We should stop thinking as disconnected individuals. We should include Earth’s governments as well.”
Rostok gave a rumbling laugh at that. “Who do you think makes up much of our Community? We do have government people, plus billionaires and the like. At any rate, I accept your proposal. In return for your service, I will allow this mission to proceed and I will send aid. But don’t push me like this again.”
I nodded, suddenly regretting I had broken his lock. We were allies now—I hoped. I decided it was best to exit before the damage was discovered. I mumbled my good-byes and pushed the door shut behind me. It didn’t quite latch, but it did stay closed long enough for me to leave.
In the lobby area, I found Robert Townsend had vanished. There were bloodstains on the chair where he’d been and a few droplets led to the elevator. I got the impression he’d been dragged away. I wondered if he was still alive. From Rostok’s hints, I doubted it. In my mind, I was already editing what I was going to tell Jenna about all this.
I took the stairs down.
Things went slowly for a while after that, compared to how fast they’d been going. But a few days later, I once again found myself standing in the desert east of Las Vegas. Under the cover of the falling dusk, McKesson, Rheinman, and Gilling joined me. McKesson was apparently working for Rostok today.
When the rich old man who lived on top of the eastern tower of the Lucky Seven had promised me support, I had envisioned a private army. Instead, I’d received one half-interested detective. I gathered that Rostok still didn’t want anything about this action directly traceable to him.
We’d come in two separate vehicles. Gilling drove the SUV this time, while McKesson followed us, bumping along in his sedan. It had taken us better than an hour to find the shallow depression with the scorched region in its midst. I’d been looking for the cluster of boulders, but of course, those had all come to life and crawled away. When we finally found the spot in the red light of the dying sun, McKesson climbed out of his car and began complaining.
“I thought you knew where the hell you were going,” he said. “It was sheer luck that I didn’t break an axle.”
“Sorry,” I said without a hint of regret. “This spot doesn’t look the same today.”
We left Rheinman as lookout and guard at the top of the rise, standing with the two vehicles. We walked down into the pit of the depression, which still felt hot under my shoes. The lava slugs had left hot zones here, which still sent up wisps of vapor when we kicked at the sands that covered them. The creatures had applied enough heat to the land to form trails of slag. Underneath the blowing top layer of grit, spikes of glass were everywhere.
“This is just like the blasted desert up north,” McKesson said, toeing the crunchy ground with his black leather shoes.
“The testing sites?” I asked.
“Yeah. Some of the atomic tests were above ground, you know. About a hundred of them. There were big patches of desert turned to glass and slag.”
“All right,” Gilling said, clasping his hands. “Now that we are all here, Detective, please enlighten us.”
“About what?”
“Why did they send you? What have you brought to this—party?”
We both stared at him. I wanted to know the answer too.
McKesson shrugged. “I was asked to help.”
“Excuse me, but we’re not impressed,” Gilling said. “We expected more from Rostok than one mercenary of questionable loyalty.”
McKesson snorted. “Look who’s talking. A couple of rookie rogues with big ideas. By all logic, I should shoot you both in the back now, bury your corpses, then run back to the Community claiming the Gray Men did it.”
“And why would that be a good idea?” I asked, my eyes narrowing.
“Because this is a suicide mission.”
I gave him a cold smile. “We aren’t turning our backs on you now; you realize that, don’t you?”
“Yeah, well, I kinda figured I’d blown that easy out when I told you about it. So, it’s time to answer your question, Gilling.” McKesson walked to the back of his dusty sedan and popped open the trunk. He lifted something heavy from the back.
I shoved my hand into my jacket pocket and gripped my gun. I realized I’d lost the last shreds of my trusting nature at some point over the preceding days, if I’d ever had such a nature to begin with. By the standards of a normal person, I was paranoid. But as I kept telling myself, I had good cause.
McKesson came back lugging a large metal case. It was about four feet long and made with ugly, green-painted metal. It was unmistakably military in appearance. He put it down at our feet and snapped open the latches. As we watched, he opened it. An even uglier piece of equipment was inside. It consisted of black metal tubes and green conical tips.
“This is what I brought to the party,” McKesson said.
I detected a hint of pride in his voice. For the first time today, I was impressed with him. “Some kind of rocket launcher?” I asked.
“Yeah. An RPG-seven with optical sights and an armor-piercing head. Soviet-made. It’s a bit out of date, but it’ll do the job.”
“What job is that?” Gilling asked.
McKesson looked at him with his eyebrows riding high. “What if we can’t get inside those cubes with Draith’s burglar routine?” he asked. “Or what if this imaginary machine of yours is really big? How were you planning to damage something the size of a house?”
Gilling pursed his lips and nodded. Now we were both impressed.
“Where the hell did you get such a thing?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “Drug dealers have big budgets for toys these days. And sometimes evidence sits around inside a cage in the station basement for a long time.”
I shook my head. “You really like to bend the rules don’t you, Detective?”
“I like to get the job done,” he said. He sealed the case back up again. “We’ve only got three shots. We have to make them count.”
Gilling and I set up the next part of the mission while darkness fell around us. We’d decided to work at night to attract less attention from the road, which was about a mile south of us. Creating the rip down in the depression where we’d met Robert and the slugs seemed as good a spot as any. The glimmer and flash of the rip itself would be invisible from the road down there.
While Gilling was paging through his book, looking for an inspiring bit of poetry to chant, McKesson came close.
“I’ve got something else,” he said quietly.
I looked at him expectantly. He eyed Gilling, then lifted his hand, cupping something within it. I was reminded of a drug deal pass-off. I took the object and examined it. Whatever it was, it was about the size of a doughnut and wrapped in aluminum foil.
“What’s with the wrapper?” I said, beginning to peel it open.
“Don’t,” he said suddenly.
“Why not?”
“It’s an object. Rostok said it’s dangerous.”
“How dangerous?”
“Very. He said not to use it until you wanted to destroy something big.”
I nodded. Another bomb. I carefully crushed the aluminum foil over the object a
nd slipped it into my pocket. I’d never handled an object that was directly destructive before. I had respect for such tools, however. I thought of the rag doll that fired gusts of intense heat. That thing seemed to kill anyone who used it. I wasn’t sure what Gilling had done with the doll, and I didn’t care as long as he didn’t give it to me.
“Did you add the foil?” I asked.
McKesson shrugged. “It used to wrap my lunch. I don’t like touching objects I don’t know how to handle. It’s your baby now, but you have to give it back to Rostok when we complete this mission.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
“Rostok said you will.”
I thought about that while we watched Gilling make his final preparations. He used five buckets of organic material to fuel his rip. Each bucket contained a gallon of lard. He’d proclaimed it was almost as good as blood—which was still the best, apparently. Gilling explained the fuel would burn quickly and brightly, but wouldn’t last long. I hoped we wouldn’t need much time, and I liked the idea of our trail closing quickly behind us. With luck, it would be the last chance the Gray Men had to come after us.
Gilling did his chanting and read from his book of Charles Baudelaire’s French poetry. McKesson rolled his eyes.
Quand la Vengeance bat son infernal rappel,
Et de nos facultés se fait le capitaine?
Ange plein de bonté connaissez-vous la haine?…
I listened, catching a few words. The passage was something about angels, armies, and hate. I’d taken the time to look up Baudelaire’s work on the Internet. It had been outlawed in France two centuries ago. Gilling sure could pick an uplifting piece.
Somehow, Gilling’s chant made the entire experience more otherworldly. I felt disconnected from my surroundings. Maybe it was the stark insanity of what I was about to attempt. We were going to assault unknown beings in their lair and try to damage equipment we’d never seen, but knew they must hold dear. My respect for these Gray Men increased as I embarked on the kind of mission they had performed against us many times. They had real courage to come to our existence and make daring strikes. But when I thought of Holly, Tony, and an unknown number of others, I hated them anyway.
When the rip opened enough to step out, we didn’t waste any time. I went first, and then McKesson came right behind me, lugging his RPG box. We left Gilling and Rheinman behind in the desert. Their job was to keep the rip burning until our return and to kill any Gray Men who tried to flank us by coming through to our side.
I could see a blur of walls around us. Where were we? My first thought was that we had made a mistake. Gilling had screwed up, reading the wrong poem, perhaps. With my luck, we’d find ourselves in the Lucky Seven again, or maybe in the middle of a shopping mall. That was going to require quite a bit of explaining.
I pressed ahead and stepped out of the active region of the rip. Reality shifted and rippled around me, but at last my senses operated properly and I saw where I was.
Walls. Flat, square, and boring. They weren’t gray, but rather a dull golden color like that of molten tin. I twisted this way and that, looking for armed enemies. There weren’t any. The walls were featureless for the most part. The cubical nature of them was unmistakable.
“Bull’s-eye,” I whispered over my shoulder. “We’re inside the cubes!”
I glanced back, expecting to see McKesson standing there with his box. But he still stood in the rip. I could see his outline blurring and whipping about like a dark sheet in a stiff wind. When seen inside a rip, a man looked like a painting done by a half-blind impressionist.
I snorted. McKesson was waiting to see if I died on the spot. I waved both my arms, beckoning him forward. The room was essentially empty, about the size of a standard living room with a high ceiling, and there was only a single corridor against the far wall that led in and out. The corridor had nothing that could block it; there were no doors to close.
McKesson finally inched forward out of the rip.
“All clear?” he asked me quietly.
“Get out here and cover me.”
He did so, with many reluctant glances. I felt cautious too, but decided bold action was a better policy. For all I knew, alarms were sounding in other cubes, and armed Gray Men were racing to this spot. We had no idea if they had cameras on us or not.
“Every second we stand around we are losing our element of surprise,” I told him.
“Yeah, but the longer they don’t know we’re here, the longer we have to find this mystery machine of yours.”
“You can’t carry that box everywhere,” I said.
“I suppose you’re right. I thought we would have to blast down a wall. I can’t believe we’re already inside.”
I gestured for him to hurry. I watched as he snapped open the box and quickly assembled the RPG. He loaded the weapon and stood up.
“I’ll lead,” I said. “Don’t shoot me in the back.”
McKesson shouldered his RPG, which now looked like a large rifle with a pointed rocket on the nose. In his other hand, he carried another charge. We were down to two, and I hoped that would be enough.
We walked for what seemed like a long time, passing more cubical rooms. Each was identical to the one we’d first entered. We passed eight of them, most of which had a truck parked inside. I realized we were in a garage, of sorts. I didn’t see how the trucks were supposed to get out of these cubes, since the walls they faced were blank, flat sheets of metal. I didn’t see a door or a button to push to open one.
Feeling like a rat sniffing at a trap too complex to comprehend, I pressed ahead. The first cube hadn’t had a truck in it and I counted this as a further stroke of good luck. We’d appeared in a relatively quiet region of their garage at night, and that was much better than popping into their mess hall in the middle of dinner. It was almost as if we’d planned it.
A negative thought nagged at me, however. Nine garages? Having that many garages indicated they might have a lot of personnel who needed transporting. That news wasn’t so good.
We came to the end of the line of garages and the corridor turned to the right. I turned with it, leaning around a corner with my gun in my hand. There was no one there, but new sounds assaulted me. Loud sounds of heavy machinery. A buzzing hum came through strongest of all, a sound that set my teeth on edge.
“What’s wrong?” McKesson hissed at my back.
“Something new up ahead,” I said.
I led the way, creeping ahead. I wanted to move faster, but it was nearly impossible. I expected one of those big bolts of energy to burn me down any second.
The next room was different. A dozen times the size of the garages, this region was a massive area filled with hot pipes that sweated thick liquids. I felt the heat on my face the moment I came through.
“What the hell?” asked McKesson.
I shared the thought but didn’t say anything. I walked along the empty, safer side. We were in the open now. Thinking about the building layout, I figured we must have seen the entire first floor by now. One side was a row of garages. Logically, these had to be located on the ground level so the trucks could drive out into the desert. Now we had entered the second half of the building, the one dominated by this strange machinery.
“Is this it?” asked McKesson. “This has to be it. Let’s blow it up and run.”
I shook my head. “For all we know, we’ll be destroying their sewage plant. I don’t see any projectors or computers. This looks more like a generator for power or hot water.”
“What the hell are we going to do, then?” McKesson demanded. “Keep prowling around until they find us?”
“Let’s see what’s at the far end.”
Grumbling behind me, McKesson followed. I picked up the pace to a trot. We were exposed, and the only thing I could think to do was move faster.
We found our first Gray Man then. He was wearing something like a wet suit. He had his back to us and was in the midst of the pipes, checking them or
repairing them. The machinery was making so much noise he didn’t even notice us pass by.
I felt even more nervous, but also exhilarated. The building wasn’t empty, but the Gray Men didn’t seem to know we were here. All that changed in the next few seconds.
I heard three sharp pops behind me. I stopped, frowning, and looked back. McKesson wasn’t there. I walked with my gun in sweating hands back the way I’d come. He soon reappeared. I knew in an instant what he’d done.
“What the hell?” I demanded.
“What? I eliminated a threat. Are you in love with these guys now too?”
“You didn’t have to shoot him!”
“Yeah, I did,” he said. “I’m not leaving one of them behind us. Any second he could have seen us in that long, straight hallway. We wouldn’t even know, and he’d sound the alarm. Don’t forget, Draith, you wanted to come here.”
Annoyed and uncertain whether he was right or wrong, I turned and pressed ahead. We finally reached the far end of the building. What we found was a corridor leading back to the other side of the building. Ahead I saw the back of one of their trucks. I understood the building layout now. This ramp led down to the garages again on the other side. We’d taken the long way around the entire bottom floor of the building.
“Something’s wrong,” McKesson said. “Look at the lighting.”
I did, and I saw what he meant. It was bluish now and pulsating slightly. There was no change to the deafening sounds of the place, but the lighting had indeed shifted. I wondered if the Gray Men really were deaf and they used subtle lighting variations to communicate.
“I bet that’s a Gray Man alarm signal,” McKesson said.
“Yeah, because you executed one of them.”
“We’ve got to take our shot and leave.”
I breathed hard, trying to think. We were amateurs, all right. McKesson wasn’t even willing to follow my leadership. Now that he’d blown our cover, we didn’t have much time.
“Wait here for a second,” I said. “I’ll check down this corridor.”
“That goes back to the garages, back to where we came in.”
