Closing her eyes in an attempt to sleep, Moni focused on the sounds of the desert: a small mammal tittering across the sand, a bat flapping overhead, the mating hum of insects. She heard something rustle through the scrubs below her on the mountainside. That wasn’t a little critter. It brushed against another scrub, a closer one. Moni got to her feet and opened her eyes. She saw nothing besides shadows, but her mind detected something stalking. Taking a few steps backwards, she asked herself what a Florida girl was thinking coming out here all alone. She didn’t know what kind of creatures called this desert home. Moni heard feet patter across a rock to her left, then immediately more feet unsettled the stones behind her. She spun around. The moonlight caught a pair of yellow eyes.
15
Aaron tried keeping his head down as he approached the library, but he couldn’t help but admire the salmon and teal building’s design in the Native American style of the Southwest. So used to Florida’s modern and Mediterranean architecture, Aaron felt like he’d strolled into a Western. A college girl with long dark hair and cutoff jeans strutted out the door of the library and smiled at him. He gave a polite nod and continued past her, acting like he hadn’t just driven across the country alongside a woman carrying doomsday in her blood only to leave her in the desert. He was just another 20-something studying in the shadow of the Organ Mountains looming over Las Cruces.
When he’d left the drug store where he bought his burner phone, he had shuffled past a family with four kids. As he glanced at their faces, he’d thought about what would happen to this city if Moni couldn’t contain the infection. This was the nearest populated area and its water made a tempting target.
He slipped his hand into his pocket and thumbed the phone. He could call the military. They could safeguard the city. No, they wouldn’t wait here while Moni took her spirit journey. They’d hunt her down. None of the “wanted” bulletins had mentioned him, so the less they could connect him to her, the better.
Leaving the phone for now, Aaron headed into the library. The walls were just as salmon inside as out. Children laughed as a librarian read them a story. He couldn’t help but grin. Kids should always be happy like that. Don’t let news of the real life monsters out there spoil it.
Aaron had been like that once, caring only about surfing and diving. That seemed like a lifetime ago.
He hurried through the rows of books, keeping his distance from the people scanning the aisles, and found an available computer. He hadn’t been online since he ditched his phone in Florida. Aaron opened the browser and started typing the web address of the Florida Space Coast newspaper. He stopped. Reading up on the devastation in his hometown would lead to hours of misery. Aaron needed to know that the two people dearest to him were safe. He opened his email and found a flood of messages from his mother, and one from his father. She wanted to know where he was and begged him to call her. His father asked whether he’d dropped out of college and, if so, could he get a refund on his tuition.
Aaron couldn’t put his mother through agony any longer. His father, maybe, but not his mother.
He couldn’t call her without a direction in life. Aaron ran some job searches for research assistant positions in the area. Both Las Cruces and El Paso had major universities advertising biology jobs, help needed immediately. They were funded by emergency government grants to study “exotic species.” That’s one area where he was uniquely qualified.
He applied online and then headed outside. The blistering dry air blasted him in the face like walking into a wooden sauna. He took shelter in the shadows behind the library and dialed his mom’s cell phone. She took longer than usual to answer the out-of-area number.
“Hello?” she answered apprehensively. “Who’s this?”
“It’s me, mom.”
“Oh my God, Aaron! I’ve been so worried. I couldn’t sleep. I thought something terrible happened.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not hurt.” He listened to her sobs. Aaron’s eyes stung from holding back tears. He’d been so focused on the thrill and danger of escaping with Moni, that he’d left his mother to worry whether he’d survived the invasion. He wiped his nose on his sleeve. “I’m sorry I couldn’t call sooner. It’s not that I don’t care about you. I lost my phone.” He pinched his wrist for lying to his mother. He’d tossed it at Moni’s insistence. “I panicked and drove away.”
“Drove? Drove where?”
“New Mexico. As far from the lagoon as possible.”
“Where? Down in Mexico?”
“No, mom. New Mexico.”
She said nothing, which didn’t happen often. He needed a valid reason why he fled to the other side of the country. They needed him there. The Space Could remained a dangerous place in the wake of the invasion, especially for an older couple. Aaron ran his hand slowly through his hair as he restrained himself from telling his mother about the incredible woman who needed him even more than they did.
“I saw a lot of people die. I can’t be near it anymore.”
“Well, New Mexico is as far from water as you can get. Far from us too. They kicked us out of our home. The whole beachside has been evacuated.”
Aaron sighed with guilt. Living like refugees, his parents needed him more than ever.
“Did you say New Mexico?” his father shouted in the background. His voice became louder as she put it on speaker. “What does he think he’s doing out there? We’re stuck in a ratty hotel and he’s taking a road trip.”
Aaron shuddered from his father’s raised voice. He shouldn’t have expected anything different. “It’s not a road trip, dad. I’m applying for jobs out here. And yes, I’m alive, thanks for your concern.”
“Oh yeah? Do they need dishwashers?” he asked. “Why don’t you finish the masters in marine biology that I paid for and then find a job. You could train Flipper or something.”
Aaron smacked his fist against the wall. “You want me to have a serious career, right? Well this is serious. The government is funding research positions to study the aliens. After everything I’ve seen, I can help them.”
“With everything you’ve seen, I’m sure you can,” his mother said. “I’m proud that you’re helping our government.”
Aaron’s palms got sweaty as he couldn’t stop thinking about the woman who he really intended to help. His mother deserved to know, but he couldn’t burden her with this.
“If you’re really in New Mexico, why did the alarm go off at my house yesterday?” his father asked. “Are you squatting? I bet you’re having a real fun time with my liquor cabinet.”
“I didn’t think you left a drop for him,” his mother snapped.
“It was probably looters emptying the place out,” Aaron said.
“Looters? They’ll take my stereo and my TV.” His father sounded more emotional than when he discovered his son was alive.
“Be glad you still have your life because many of your neighbors don’t.” Aaron took a deep breath as he thought of his former professor, the dedicated scientist who gave his life trying to stop the invasion. “Forget your possessions. I left everything I had and moved out here.”
Saying “moved” wasn’t entirely accurate, as he had no idea where he’d sleep.
“You left everything? Does that mean us too?” his mother asked with her voice cracking.
“No, of course not mom. I’ll be in touch as soon as I can. Just let me settle in and nail down this job. I swear, once I get control of the situation, I’ll come back and see you.”
“Ok.” She took a deep breath. “Would you like me to wire you some cash? Think of it as a housewarming gift.”
His father started grumbling. Aaron needed the money badly as he was down to his last $20, but he knew he couldn’t ask directly or else his dad would flip out and complain about their European cruise being kaput this year.
“That would be great. Thanks so much, mom.” Aaron said. “And you too, dad. Just do me a favor. Keep it quiet that I’m here. I don’t need anyone bugg
ing me.”
FBI Special Agent Cam Carter ducked out from the interview with the barely coherent Cajun man, returning to the scene where he had been beaten, and checked his text message. An FBI analyst had discovered Aaron Hughes’ mother received a call on her cell phone from an unusual location: New Mexico. Its length of 15 minutes indicated that it hadn’t been a wrong number.
He curled his hand around Nina Skillings’ hip and whispered in her ear, “We’re not far enough west yet.”
16
Moni couldn’t see them, yet she could smell the rotten carrion on their breath and their filthy fir. She heard a growl about ten feet down the slope from her, answered by snarling from a feeding line of coyotes all around her. She reached into their minds, telling them that this meal was no good. They would find a delicious catch at the bottom of the mountain. She heard them circling her, closer now. It had worked on the lone coyote before, so why not this time?
“You can’t plant a mental message on animals driven into frenzy by a pack mentality. Let us inside them and we’ll make them stop. If they make you coyote feed, chewing your flesh will infect them regardless.”
The beast she sacrificed to save her last night would have its brethren take revenge this evening. The pack of five squeezed tighter around her, cutting off her escape route, not that she could see where she was going. Moni tried to stop breathing so heavy. She wasn’t a helpless human. Her punch could crush one of their skulls, but could she halt all of them without getting bitten and spreading the infection? The aliens hadn’t made her invulnerable. A coyote could rip out her throat, killing her, and run off as the sole carrier of the alien DNA.
If the aliens could turn sea turtles and manatees into killing machines, she didn’t want to see how they’d enhance a coyote.
The coyote to her right growled. Its eyes illuminated in the moonlight, giving her an instant to make a move. Moni hurled the half-full gas canister in its face. As the stunned beast yelped, she dashed past it. The other four launched into pursuit, barking furiously. Moni ran downhill, picking up more speed. Running blindly, every kick of her legs on the incline felt like her feet were going off a cliff. They were almost close enough to nip at her heels. Running prolonged her life, but she doubted she could avoid them all night. Suddenly, her knee banged into a boulder and she went tumbling. She rolled down the rocky slope, scraping her elbows and hips on the stones. A coyote pounced on her, digging its claws into her back. She rolled over and kicked it in the stomach. Moni stumbled to her feet. A jolt of pain buckled her knee the moment she placed weight on it. So much for running. She sensed the minds of all five of them around her, even more determined to feast on this exotic smelling flesh. Why did she leave Aaron so she could die like this?
“You ready to become puppy chow, bitch? We’ll take their bodies over you.”
“Coyotes are stronger than me, I won’t argue with that,” Moni told the aliens. “But I know how you operate. You need a human mind to build the machinery that recreates your habitat. If you lose me, you won’t find another one out here.”
“Then do it already!” Their voice resonated so thunderously that her brain bounced inside her skull. “Bring us back to life on this planet. Just a small place. We won’t be kept prisoner inside this vessel forever.”
She couldn’t lie to those who inhabited her thoughts. They’d never unleash another invasion as long as she could help it, but that doesn’t mean their species had to end with her.
“I’ll do it, but on my terms. It happens out here, not anywhere near people.”
“Don’t forget your promise. Now relax your muscles and your eyes.”
Her heart jumped. A thousand needles pricked the inside of her skin. Not only did it erase the bruise on her knee, it made her muscles radiate with energy. Her eyeballs swelled under intense pressure. Moni’s view of the five coyotes around her came into focus. She saw not only them, but the landscape in the not-so-faint moonlight. Her awareness came just in time for them to rush her. She caught one with a punch on the nose. Its blood splattered across her arm and chest. Her swift kick nailed one in the ribs, making a sickening crack like the impact of a car.
Moni swatted another coyote away with a backhand, but its pack member leapt on her from the other side. It sunk its teeth into her left forearm. Its incisors jabbed down to her bone with crushing pressure, like getting jammed in a car door. She would have screamed if she could. She grabbed its snout, trying to peel it off, when the last coyote standing charged her. On instinct she spat in its face. Her acidic saliva seared its flesh, sizzling like bacon on a skillet. The yowling coyote darted off. Cursing in her mind as she realized what she’d just did, Moni finally pried the jaws open and withdrew her arm. She snapped the coyote’s neck. That wasn’t enough. She detected the signals from the alien nanotechnology inside the fallen beast. They were set to revive it under their control. Moni dragged the corpse over to the gas canister and doused it. She sparked her lighter and lit it on fire.
Her head pounded as the microscopic machines protested the destruction of their cousins and the loss of a new host. She didn’t fall for that distraction. Gazing over the desert with her newfound night-vision, Moni searched for the coyote with the scalded face, the one carrying the infection that could doom the world.
17
It had been a while since Aaron last set foot in a research lab. The looks he attracted from the bookish staff with his beach bum tan, discount chain button-downed shirt and long blond hair didn’t help his comfort level. Don’t mind them, he thought as he smoothed out his itchy collar and hid the discount rack tag he forget to remove. In Florida, he’d usually come to lab in board shorts. Lab could no longer be a holding pattern between diving expeditions, not if he wanted Moni back.
He knocked on the door of the principal investigator for El Paso State University’s Pathobiology Research Institute. A female voice with a hint of a Spanish accent told him to enter. He opened the door and faced the dark-haired woman studying him from behind her desk. She had striking blue eyes and a lithe body that barely filled her lab coat. At well north of 50, she was out of his age range, but Aaron could see why she had been a knockout ten years ago.
“I’m Erma Nunez. You must be our applicant from Florida. Thanks for showing up so quickly. The federal grants for the extraterrestrial research positions are first-come, first-serve.”
He extended his hand halfway until he realized she wasn’t returning the gesture. Of course not. She studied disease, and he’d just drove in from the most infected place on Earth. Or perhaps, the hotel soap he’d showered with this morning left a chemical odor.
“Aaron Hughes, that’s me. And as you can see, I’ve come a long way.” Settling into a chair across from her desk, he glanced at photos on the bookcase of her with smiling tribesman in Africa and South America. A framed letter of recognition from the World Health Organization hung on her wall.
“A big fan of my work at the PRI, are we?” She flashed a grin that formed a dimple on her cheek. He gave a nervous nod. “It’s okay. Our reputation doesn’t go far beyond pathology journals. I hear your specialty is marine biology, so it’s okay if you’ve never heard of us.”
“My dad calls me a dolphin doctor and, if he’s really festive, a manatee medic. Too bad your marine life out here is really dragging.”
“Really fossilized is more like it. I saw your transcript and you were well on your way to your masters in Florida. Why are you aiming to enter a whole new field? And why out here?”
Aaron folded his sweaty hands in his lap and stared at his rock-scuffed shoes. He’d expected this question and he’d practiced the answer in his mind, yet it just wouldn’t roll out. He’d make a crappy secret agent.
“I was there when it happened.” He met her analytical gaze. “I was on the lagoon. I saw people die.” Aaron drew a deep breath. “I can’t return home. But I’m sure as hell not going to let it happen somewhere else.”
Nunez narro
wed her eyes at him for a few moments, but ultimately nodded. “I treated cholera in Haiti after the earthquake and worked in a Chinese city paralyzed by Bird Flu. And still, I don’t think there’s anything I could say that would make you blink twice. I heard about what happened to your professor. I’m very sorry.”
Aaron scratched his nose and cleared his throat. He leaned forward, ready to stand up and shuffle out of there.
“You were very brave,” said Nunez.
He stared into her eyes and confirmed her sincerity.
“Most researchers wouldn’t put themselves in danger by getting so close to a biological threat,” she continued. “The people who work here stay in the lab, by and large. They don’t go out enough and look upon the faces of the suffering and the dying, the people counting on us. You saw it.”
“That’s why I’m here.” Aaron hoped he sounded convincing enough. “I heard the PRI’s mission got a little, uh, adjustment from the feds.”
“You could say that.” She rolled her eyes and flicked her shiny hair over her shoulder. “Apparently the transmission of HIV and pandemic viruses across the border isn’t a concern anymore. They froze funding on projects I’ve been at for years and now I’m studying extraterrestrials. They’ve got every decent biology lab in the country conking their heads together over slides of that alien virus.”
“I’ve seen it up close. It’s not really a virus. It’s a combination of nanotechnology, alien DNA and a biological interface that mimics a virus by penetrating cells and altering DNA. You shouldn’t treat it like a mindless virus. They are aware of everything around them and they spread intentionally. In the right environment, they can survive outside the body for a long time. Its main form of transmission is through bodily fluids or standing water.”
Silence the Living (Mute Book 2) Page 9
