The Harvest (Book 1)

by Ferretti, Anne

  “Good evening my loyal followers.” Roth’s empty gaze scanned the room, pausing on Austin.

  “Good evening father.” They answered in unison.

  “You may be at peace.”

  They lowered their hands and raised their heads. Behind Roth, the two missing disciples entered the room. Between them was a shackled man, who looked to be in his late thirties and reminded Austin of Edward.

  “We have an unfortunate situation to settle tonight.” He waved for the shackled man to be brought forward. “Disciple Thomas has violated the most sacred rule of the Program by taking that which was not his.” The others shared looks of alarm and disgust. “We will cast a vote.”

  Thomas raised his head. His eyes flashed crazed anger. “You’re all fucking crazy!” Thomas yelled out. “And he’s the fucking craziest mother fucker down here.” He jerked his head at Roth.

  The group gasped. This outburst was as alarming as was his crime.

  Roth walked over to Thomas. He brushed the man’s hair off his forehead. Thomas jerked away from Roth’s touch giving him a look of disgust, frosted with pure hatred. Out of nowhere Roth hit Thomas with a powerful punch to his solar plexus, knocking his breath away. Thomas would have fallen to the floor had the two Disciples not been holding onto him.

  Roth turned back to his followers. “Please cast your votes.”

  Around the room each member raised a hand. Being in the dark, Austin remained neutral, not raising either hand. He wasn’t about to condemn a man without knowing what crime he committed. As soon as the last man raised his right hand, Roth raised his right hand as well. It appeared there were only rights.

  Thomas knew what this meant and laughed out loud. A laugh of an innocent man who can’t believe the judgment passed against him “You’re all murderers and rapists. I hope you rot down here. I hope the fucking Sundogs eat your fucking hearts out.”

  Another collective gasp rose in the room. The Disciples didn’t speak about the Sundogs and to speak out against them, was blasphemy.

  “That’s right. You fucking idiots! You fucking sheep. Follow the wolf to your death.” Thomas searched the group until he found Austin. “Ask him about the Program. Ask him about it and hear the lies. Ask him about the prisoner in the...”

  Thomas’ last words were cut off by the sound of a gunshot. Roth had placed a gun to Thomas’ head and pulled the trigger. Blood and brains splattered on the disciples holding him and on those closest to the victim. If Austin was surprised by what he’d just witnessed he didn’t let on. He met Roth’s quiet gaze from across the room with one equally calm. At that very instant, he knew Roth had shot Thomas to keep him from telling the section’s secrets, as much as to punish him for whatever imagined rule he’d broken.

  ***

  The concrete room was sound proof, so the girls had not heard the gunshot, but Eve had. This was not the first time hearing this and if the past was any indicator of the future, the general would bring her a meal tonight. The blood would be fresher than normal, but most likely still at room temperature.

  She wanted to search for the captain again, before he could leave the mountain, but she needed to eat. Her need to eat on a regular basis was becoming a problem. Prior to capture she went weeks at a time without feeding, never feeling the lethargy she’d experienced lately. Except for...

  She paused in her thinking. A thought popped into her head. That was unless she drank the tainted blood of a junkie. The tainted blood of a junkie she repeated, letting the words sink in.

  She repeated this over and over in her head until she realized the truth. The general had spiked the blood with a narcotic. A mild drug she hadn’t detected by smell or taste. She berated herself for missing this and contributed it to being too long in this damn box.

  This frustration brought the question to mind again of why she stayed. Why, when she could have shattered these walls into a million specs of glass. She could have ripped the guards to shreds and drank them dry, fueling her body to strengths beyond anything these humans had ever seen or imagined. She could grant to the general the eternal life he so craved and then rip it from his daft undeserving mind.

  Why? She asked the space around her and inside her, but received no answer. She lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling. She counted air bubbles and other microscopic flaws in the glass to pass the time. She wasn’t prone to having thoughts on the reasons for why things happened or why she was or who she was. The voice had decided she would stay imprisoned until the captain arrived to set her free and she would not go against the voice.

  How Captain Reynolds was going to accomplish such a thing did not concern her at the moment. The end was drawing near. This she knew and with this knowledge came a sense of anticipation, a sense that her world was going to change in enormous fashion.

  26 DISSECTION

  They stood in the barn in a circle and stared in curious wonder at the alien. After nine months of having no idea what they were up against, the answer now lay at their feet. It was easy to believe this creature, with its gargoyle like head, giant bat like wings and hairless body, was responsible for millions of deaths. The reality of what they were seeing had yet to sink in. The magnitude of what this meant remained to be decided, but for now all they could do was marvel at the strange creature.

  “Maybe Paulson really did see them. They kind of look like a dog.” Edward commented.

  “Are those fangs?” Luke wondered out loud at the alien’s long spiked teeth.

  “Look at its ears. They must be six inches long.” Madison noted, standing over the creature, her curious expression was mirrored back at her in its large black eyes.

  “It’s sexless.” Edward stated the obvious.

  “Wonder what’s it made out of?” Colin knelt down close to its smooth hairless head, which was slightly larger than a human’s, but narrow and oblong in shape. “It doesn’t look like skin. I mean not like our skin.”

  “Touch it sissy boy.” Zack challenged.

  “Screw that. What if it’s poisonous?” Colin answered back, not falling for Zack’s tricks.

  “You’re such a pussy.” Zack smacked him. “I’ve already touched it. How’d you think it got here? Flew?”

  “You had gloves on jackass.” Colin pointed out.

  “Like that mattered. Just help me get it into the cart.”

  Zack grabbed hold of the rope tied around the feet. Luke and Colin took the rope around its hands and they heaved it up into the cargo cart that was attached to the back of the ATV. Zack drove slowly onto the platform. “You guys comin’?”

  Climbing on, they kept their distance from the creature, despite that it had not moved for hours the group remained skeptical. Zack hit the button and they descended into the bunker. Everyone jumped off as soon as the floor was within safe distance and followed Zack as he drove the cart down the ramp to the garage area.

  “I’m taking it to the shop.” Zack informed them as they gathered around the alien once again.

  “What’re you gonna do with it?” Edward asked.

  “Cut it open.” Zack smiled.

  No one argued against his idea, except Madison, who thought they should wait for Austin to return. This was met with protest, since the timing of his return was unknown at best. After much convincing and pleading from the guys, Madison caved and gave in. She scowled at their pleased smiles, still angry they had kept Austin’s whereabouts a secret. She had given Zack hell when he denied knowing anything about the nature of Austin’s trip or when he planned to come back. Luke, much to her consternation remained steadfast and tightlipped under her intense questioning. He repeated the same useless information about Austin wanting to check out the base and nothing more. She hadn’t bought into his or Zack’s half truths, and now they were acting as if he was never coming back. She trudged along behind them to the shop.

  The shop was set up in typical Zack style. Every imaginable tool and piece of equipment one could want or need to build or tear apart just about anyth
ing. It was mancave heaven. And today’s project was dissecting an alien, an undertaking Zack in no way had, or could have anticipated, when he decided on how to outfit the shop.

  Looking around, Zack’s eyes came to rest on a CO2 laser machine. Oh yeah. He thought. If anything could penetrate the alien’s thick exterior it would be this machine. He rolled the workbench over to the cutter where they transferred the monster onto the work surface under the laser. Once the alien was stretched out and tied down again, Zack donned a pair of safety goggles. He ordered everyone back before flipping the laser’s switch. Without any idea of what to expect, Zack approached the task at hand as a doctor would operating on a human.

  Of course it would be easier to rip the thing open, just as they had done to so many humans, but part of him wanted to preserve the being. The part that was driven by his higher than average intelligence, which rightly pointed out the fact that history, and quite possibly the future of the planet, was in his hands.

  Through the computer monitor, Zack examined the structure, assuming it to be made of bones and therefore breakable. “You better not fuck this up. You hear me Zacky boy?” He said, mimicking his father. “Or you ain’t no son of Bobby Londergan.”

  “That’s right ole man.” Zack took a deep breath and typed in the necessary information to get the process started. They all held their breath as the laser moved from the top of the breast bone down the alien’s chest in a straight line, stopping just below the abdomen. The laser cut off, leaving behind a black line down the middle of the alien. Small wisps of smoke were visible above the burn mark. The rancid smell of sulfur filled the shop.

  Using an iron rod, Zack prodded around the burn mark. “Shit.” He retyped in the sequence, upped the power and set the beam on its path down the black line and back up again. More smoke appeared and the smell worsened, but still the alien remained in one piece. Behind him they were covering their noses and coughing. Zack cut the machine off and shoved up his goggles.

  “It’s not working.” He sighed in frustration.

  “You got anything else?” Ed asked.

  “I can try the YAG laser.” He said. “But I just applied enough energy to vaporize steel. Which is around five thousand four hundred degrees Fahrenheit. And you see how far that got us.”

  “What about…”

  “You can’t hurt them.” A girl’s voice interrupted.

  They all turned, surprised to see Charlie standing behind them.

  “What do you know about them Charlie?” Madison asked, doing her best to sound gentle so as not to scare the girl off. Colin hadn’t had much success getting her to talk, and all they knew was her first name and that she had turned fifteen only a couple of months ago.

  “Aaron, my older brother…he tried to kill one with a rocket launcher, but the rocket bounced off it like a toy. It didn’t feel it.” Her voice was faint and she had a faraway look in her eyes. “It didn’t even bleed.”

  “They must have some weakness. Some way to kill em.” Zack insisted

  Charlie shook her head. “Aaron was a Marine. I was with him and his unit. And we were on our way to Cheyenne Mountain when the Sundogs attacked.”

  “Sundogs?” Madison, along with her friends, was surprised to hear Charlie call them by that name.

  “Yeah. My dad named ‘em that on account of the suns in the sky being called the same thing and them showin’ up at the same time and all. What do you call ‘em?”

  “Sundogs.” Madison answered.

  “Oh.” Charlie didn’t know what to make of this. “It’s weird how we think the same even though we don’t know one another.”

  “Can you tell us what happened when they attacked?” Madison prodded using her gentlest voice.

  Charlie’s shoulders sagged a bit. “Aaron hid me inside this metal container, but I wanted to see…to know what was happening, so I raised the lid.” She paused for a long moment, staring blankly at them, not seeing them, but remembering the horror of that day. “There were three Sundogs and ten Marines with machine guns, rocket launchers and one guy even had one of those backpacks thingies that shoots out fire. A…a…”

  “Flame thrower.” Zack filled in.

  “Yeah. That’s right. But even that didn’t matter.” A tear rolled down her cheek. “The Sundogs kept coming.”

  Madison walked over and placed her arm around Charlie’s thin shoulders. “You don’t have to talk about it.” Although she badly wanted the girl to continue telling her story.

  “I want to. I want to tell you. So you’ll believe me. You’ll know there’s no stopping them.” Her haunted eyes pleaded with them to do just that, to believe her.

  “Ok then. Go on.” Madison encouraged her, keeping an arm around the girl’s delicate frame.

  “Aaron was the first to die. One of the Sundogs grabbed him and ripped him in half like it was tearing up a piece of paper. Then…then they fought over his body. A bigger Sundog come in and yelled at them, or something like yelling. They all backed away and the big one...it took Aaron’s heart. It sniffed it, and then threw it in some kinda container.”

  The group listened to Charlie, holding their breath. She told of how the Sundogs killed each of the Marines in the same manner as they did her brother. And after each Marine was killed, the lead Sundog sniffed the body before taking the heart and tossing the body to the others to fight over. Charlie shuddered at the memory of how savagely they fought over the bodies. She couldn’t bare the sight, but couldn’t turn away either. And the sounds, she said, chilled her to the bone. They reminded her of animals fighting over food.

  At one point, while fighting over a body part, they crashed into the vehicle she was hiding in and sent it tumbling several hundred feet down the highway. The latch on the metal box didn’t hold, and she was thrown out into the back. She thought for certain they would see her, so she lay motionless on the roof of the vehicle, hoping the wind wasn’t blowing in their direction. From the broken window, she watched their feet and legs, but they never moved towards her. After what seemed like an eternity of waiting, the Sundogs flew off. It was still another hour before she dared to move. She fully expected one to swoop down and snatch her up, but the only thing waiting for her was her dead brother.

  Nightfall was coming soon and she knew better than to be caught out in the open after dark, but she couldn’t leave her brother, or what was left of him, lying in the middle of the road. She decided to bury him in the morning, which meant spending the night inside the vehicle and it also meant no heat. She smiled at this point in her story, saying how only seven months ago she had been worried about things like her hair and boys and passing her algebra test. And she’d never even been camping, not outside anyway.

  A fire was out of the question, so she used a couple of wool blankets she’d found tucked around the spare tire and crawled into the metal box. The blankets smelled of diesel fuel and grease, but she hadn’t minded. She didn’t sleep much that night. When daylight mercifully arrived, she spent the morning digging a shallow grave and burying her brother. It took several hours and she was too tired to do the same for the other Marines, so she covered them with branches and anything else she could find. The burials were crude, but the best she could give them. Afterwards she’d felt like a prayer would have been the proper thing to say, but she wasn’t sure who to pray to anymore, having decided God had abandoned her. So she simply said goodbye and began walking towards Colorado Springs.

  No one said a word. They had all experienced death by the Sundogs in some form or fashion, but they hadn’t seen the evil in action, only witnessed the aftermath. Colin looked at the fragile girl and thought she was one tough chick. Not only had she walked all the way to Cheyenne, but she had done so with a sprained knee and a bleeding gash on her head. The gash had left a nasty scar on top of her head, but once her hair grew out no one would ever know it was there. As Colin thought this over, he wondered if that was why she had shaved her head, but when he asked, Charlie’s eyes took on a far off lo
ok and she withdrew from their world.

  “How about we find you some clothes?” Madison offered, trying to draw her back to them and away from whatever horrors were hiding behind her haunted gaze. “I’m pretty sure I saw some Firefly Girl stuff somewhere around here.” This caught Charlie’s attention and for once Madison was glad she had paid attention to her teenage cousin’s fashion the few times the two of them had been together. Madison offered her hand. There was an expectant moment before Charlie reached out and took it.

  ***

  Later that night they gathered in the diner for the evening meal. Madison and Charlie arrived last, making an entrance and an impression when they walked in. Charlie, if given the chance, was going to be a beautiful woman one day. A fact not lost on the boys in the room, especially Colin, who was closest to Charlie in age and desperately missed having someone he could relate to.

  Conversations remained light while they focused on the food. Zack had prepared mac and cheese, soy dogs and fast food style fries, with a promise of chocolate pudding for dessert. Edward marveled at the amount of food they consumed and not for the first time worried about their future. The hydroponic grow center would ensure they had fresh vegetables and fruit for years to come, but meat was going to become scarce and eventually non-existent. Not that it should matter. Many before them had chosen a vegetarian diet and lived healthy lives, probably more so than those who ate meat. He grimaced. After hearing Charlie’s story, he had lost much of his appetite for meat, and had decided the practice of killing animals for food was rather barbaric.

  Charlie pushed her food around her plate, knowing it was rude, but she couldn’t make herself eat. All around her they were laughing and enjoying their meal. She listened to them joke on one another, just like her and Aaron used to do. The thought of Aaron brought a pain to her heart. She missed him more than she could bear, but in a way was glad he hadn’t been around to see what took place in the mountain.