by Peter Idone
Logan followed him deeper into the building. He introduced himself. “I’ve been here on a few occasions. Me and the wife had dropped off some old computers and television sets. My dad, too.”
There were rows of floor-to-ceiling shelving stocked with used audio equipment, old CD players and amplifiers, computers and monitors. A couple of worktables were crammed with plastic milk crates filled with cannibalized parts: cables, d-subs, keyboards, hard drives, circuit boards. There were stacks of laptop computers in varying degrees of wear and tear. At the far end of the building, which would face Railroad Avenue, a bank of paned windows was mostly painted over, allowing a dull, diffuse light to shine through. There was a wide garage door and in what would be the staging area, Sutter had parked his small panel truck. He brought Logan over to the far side of the building, just beyond a partition, which was obviously the old man’s living quarters. Sutter sank down heavily on a cot with jumbled blankets and pillows. A deep work sink was built into a counter containing a microwave oven and a hot plate. An old rusting refrigerator stood in the corner. Sutter got up and grabbed a vial of pills off the counter and took a glass of water from the water cooler. He swallowed four pills. “Damn thing brought me up short when I saw it. I think I threw my back out a little.”
“You want me to go fetch a medic or take you to the hospital?”
“There’s no need. If I just lie still for a bit and let these painkillers kick in, I’ll be good as new. There’s beer in the fridge if you want.”
“No thanks. I’m fine. You run all this by yourself?”
“Then pull up a chair.”
In the corner was an old stainless-steel chair with a torn red vinyl seat. Logan brought it over and sat down. There wasn’t much in the way of creature comforts. This was all utilitarian, spartan. It was existence, pure and simple.
Sutter eased himself back down on the cot, propping his head up with the pillows. “I got a couple of part-timers. They work for a few weeks and then they’re off drinking and whoring. Oh hell, I don’t know what they’re up to half the time. They’re a couple of clowns. I don’t pay them much, but what I do seems like a waste of money.”
“I would imagine this would be a decent gig. You’d think your helpers would appreciate the work.”
“Mostly I need them to move the heavy stuff. My days of jack-assing a thirty-six-inch TV or stereo cabinet are long over. You’d be surprised how much of a market there is for hanging on to old electronics, with the economy the way it is. Production has cut back since the war, and consumers are more interested in hanging onto the shit they already own. The real challenge is getting parts. New processors and transistors and the like. It seems the military scarfs up that stuff before it makes it to the civilian market. It’s become cost-prohibitive. And then of course there are the big electronics firms. I would like to have more of a repair center then what it is, but under the circumstances all I do mostly is swap out parts. I can’t afford to hire decent techs. What do you do, Joe?”
“Right now, whatever I can lay my hands on, which isn’t much. I was doing demo and salvage work for a while. It was temporary. They laid us all off.”
“That’s all there is. The employment agencies are nothing but purveyors of serfs and slaves. No offense.”
“None taken.”
“The fuckin’ employment brokers are owned by the same corporations that they hire for. It’s like an extension of their HR department. All the wages are fixed. They call the shots.”
“It’s hard to fight it with so many folks out of work and needing an income. I wouldn’t know where to start. You just try to do what you can.”
“It’s a swindle all right, and those with the money have the situation all sewn up. I feel bad for you younger folks. Things were bad before the war, but now it’s worse. At least I have a long enough history to remember when life was somewhat better than it is now. But I never held out much hope. Deep down I always knew somebody or some group would fuck it up. We’ve been living in a plutocracy for a long time now, and there are some bad people running the show. Every safety switch has been thrown. The environment, resources, or the lack thereof, population, and a police/military hierarchy in which everyone abides.”
“There’s a reason why this new age we’re living in is called the Dislocation.”
The two men fell silent for a minute. Sutter closed his eyes, and Logan tried to guess how old the man was. He looked at least eighty, his face marred by liver spots and crosshatched with a myriad of wrinkles. His white hair was fine, almost like silk. When he opened his eyes, Logan saw how deep, clear, and blue they were. No, he wasn’t eighty, only a tired, well-worn seventy maybe. Then Sutter began to speak; his gaze was far off, but there was definite clarity to the memory he conjured. “I can remember when I was a kid in grammar school. Saint Michael’s in the Station…”
Logan knew the school. He and his sister had both attended it when they were children. The church and the school were only four blocks from their parents’ house.
“The nuns would have us do these fire-drill exercises,” Sutter continued, “at least that’s what they called them. They’d have us line up outside the classrooms in the hall, everyone facing the wall. We’d just stand there for five minutes. Then the bell would go off, and we would file back into the classroom. This must have been nineteen fifty-seven or fifty-eight. This was so, in case there was a nuclear war, it would be easier for whoever was left in charge to manage the dead. All those schools and all those little children stacked like cordwood. This was after ‘duck and cover.’ The government knew by then the population hadn’t a chance in hell of surviving. When it all became clear to me, later on, what they were doing, I never forgave them for it. I never forgave the nuns, the parochial school, or the government. Then there was the Cuban missile crisis. I was about eleven or twelve when that happened. The adults were scared. You could see it on their faces. Parents, neighbors, people at church. Imagine being a little kid and knowing enough about nuclear war and seeing the fear and helplessness in every adult face. I spent most of my young adult life fearing to a greater and lesser degree the possibility of the whole show coming to a close. The ‘iron curtain.’ That was the Cold War for you. There was a little while when I thought things could really turn around politically and with the environment. That lasted from about nineteen eighty-nine to two thousand. After that, well the rest is all recent sordid history. Christ I can’t believe I’ve lived this long. Still working, no retirement, and nothing to retire to. I’m not complaining, I know it’s the same for everybody else, but why is it that the same type of fucked-up human being is always put in charge?”
The loud thwack of helicopter blades reverberated throughout the building. Logan got up to look out the door. Sutter raised himself on one elbow. “You leaving so soon? Christ, I haven’t had a decent conversation with anybody in months! I can’t expect anything intelligent coming out of the mouths of those two assholes that work only when it’s convenient for them.”
Logan assured the old man he wasn’t going anywhere. “I just want to see what’s going on outside.” He cracked the door open wide enough to stick his head out. Toward the junction, yellow smoke markers had replaced the red ones. The helicopter flew low and was heading in a westerly direction down the tracks; it was some type of big military aircraft, all black without markings, possibly an old MH-53 or something like it. Logan was no expert on military aircraft. It had grown darker outside and the infrared, thermal imaging, or whatever sensors the craft had on board would be able to spot a heat signature source a lot easier. Hell, they know Sutter and I are in here and exactly what we’re doing, which isn’t much.
“Did they get it?” Sutter called.
“I can’t tell. There’s still a lot of activity.” Logan hoped not. He had a mind to go in search of the thing himself once the Tactical operation thinned out. He went back and joined Sutter.
“What do you think that thing was?” Sutter asked. “It sure put the fea
r of God in me, and I’m not religious.”
“I had the same reaction. It scared me because it looked so…different. I don’t know what word to use to describe it. Insane? It wasn’t interested in me, I don’t think. Maybe it wasn’t in the mood after killing my dog. Perhaps its thirst for blood had been quenched. I don’t know. I felt something, though, like it gave off this kind of power that was almost electric. It was very unsettling.”
“Unsettling. That’s the word right there. What I’d like to know, is the Response Team trying to capture or kill it? And even more mysterious is where’d it come from?”
“Good question, not that they’d ever tell us. I think it’s a Tactical weapon, some kind of security dog.”
“You mean like a K-nine.”
“Yeah, like that, only it’s gone rogue and has become dangerous. Just a thought I had.”
“How did it kill your dog, Joe?”
“Tore her throat out. There was a lot of blood.”
Sutter winced. “Oh jeez, that’s terrible. That thing is dangerous. Could you imagine if it gets its teeth into some little kid? They have to kill it.”
“Yeah, most likely. But like I said, we’ll never know.”
“Bet you’d like to get your hands on it.”
“Believe me, I’d make a career out of trying to find and kill that fiend.”
Sutter had thrown an arm over his head, covering his eyes. His breathing became heavier, chest rising and falling noticeably. “Its eyes glowed, but I didn’t tell that to the cops when I called…” he mumbled. It was evident the painkillers were taking effect. “Dying planet…already dead and we don’t even know it…outside is my contribution. A junkyard…can’t believe I’ve lived this long…” Sutter didn’t say another word; he was definitely asleep. A fluorescent tube mounted over one of the worktables hummed loudly. At least when the old boy regained consciousness, he would not be in total darkness, Logan thought. There was a definite odor to the place that was not at all pleasant, like the smell of muriatic acid. Getting antsy, he decided to leave, whether or not the Tacticals had wrapped things up. He slipped out the door into the gathering dark.
There was too much activity in the direction of the diner. A nimbus of colored lights flashed. There was no way he was going to meet up with Natalie; the entire junction had been turned into a control point. He headed back in the same direction he had come, remaining cautious of the Ruger pressed against the small of his back. When he reached Fourth Avenue, about a block from Hamilton Road, a dark SUV slowed down beside him. “Oh Christ,” he muttered.
The passenger-side window rolled down. “Get in.” It was Natalie. He jumped into the car, a 2008 Range Rover. “I thought you got snagged by the Testicals,” she said.
“The what?” He chuckled.
“The Testicals. It’s a joke me and Glass have. You say Tacticals enough, and it starts to sound like testicals.”
“Very amusing. I had an uncle who told me the same thing about the Iran hostages back in seventy-nine. They called them the ‘sausages.’ You say hostages enough times, and it started to sound like sausages.”
Natalie didn’t laugh. She drove past his house.
“I live right there…”
“This neighborhood is too hot. The Tacticals are widening the search.”
“Where are we going?”
Natalie looked at him and smiled. “I’m taking you to see Glass.”
12
Natalie wanted to get out of the Station as quickly as possible. She took the long way back to the art-deco villa in the Hills, driving down Jefferson Avenue and under the trestle, thus eluding any Tactical checkpoints on roads that crossed the railroad tracks. It appeared as though the entirety of Essex Station, or most of it, would be the Response Team’s zone of operations. “What made Glass change his mind about seeing me?”
“He doesn’t know you’re coming. Not yet. I’m making an exception in your case.”
“Thanks.”
“Look, you helped me out, so now I’m returning the favor. What did you find out?”
“I talked to the guy who called it in to the cops. I’m afraid he got more than he bargained for when the Tacticals showed up. He was ordered to stay indoors for the duration.”
“Did he see it? The dog-man?”
“It sounded as though he saw the same thing as me, only he called it a werewolf, but that’s just a matter of semantics. Where were you hiding this whole time?”
“I wasn’t hiding at all. The diner was open, and I went in and chatted it up with a couple of the guys. I met them before at the X. I had to leave though. Turner showed up. You know, Colonel Turner.”
“I heard of him for the first time the other night. I ran into Henry Bock at the X after I met you. I didn’t know he was in charge of security for the Pine Haven and Triumph sites.”
“Turner is a very dangerous man. He was in Central Asia during the war and had access to the orbiting weapons platform. A number of officers did, just in case Command and Control in Kuwait got destroyed. Apparently he still has access to the go codes that can initiate the launching sequence for any number of weapons on board. He might have been the one responsible for incinerating parts of Iran, Pakistan, and Kazakhstan, and any number of such god-awful places.”
“I thought Henry said he was with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations.”
“He was, but he had some kind of major appointment in base security. A string of bases. Like I said, a lot of high-ranking, important officers had access to the weapons platform. He was one of them.”
“You’re referring to the ‘Vampire Ship.’ It’s real then?”
“At least a version thereof. Turner can switch that thing on whenever he wants. He is a very powerful man.”
Logan didn’t know how Natalie had gained access to this kind of information, but he believed it was an exaggeration; nonetheless, he wasn’t about to call her on it. “Isn’t head security contractor a bit of a comedown from such a pinnacle?”
“You think? I don’t. If Turner is involved, then it’s important. He’s still tight with his Air Force cronies, and you can be sure he keeps them in the loop and vice versa. Colonel Turner, as he’s still called out of deference, has operational security control of every civilian nuclear installation from the east coast to the Mississippi. At least as far as Response Team Management and the Department of Energy and Defense have a contract.”
“It’s not like that kind of information is broadcast in any great detail. I never heard of the guy until two nights ago.”
“You’re wrong. The Essex Reporter carried it when work over at Pine Haven finally got underway last spring.”
The Reporter was a small local journal that had operated out of downtown Essex for as long as Logan could remember. It served as advertising for local businesses, wedding announcements, and short human-interest stories. “I must have missed that issue, but then I never did read the Reporter much. I found it a little hokey.”
“Not for the past six months or so it hasn’t been hokey. The son, Martin Ziegler, had taken it over from the father. He’s gotten on in years himself now. The paper was getting a bit too investigative for the authorities, the Response Team especially. Not very in-depth, but the articles raised a lot of pertinent questions. Questions Response Team Management and Control didn’t want asked. Ziegler has been threatened and stifled. I’ve spoken to him. No more articles about Turner or what he’s up to, or any mention of Pine Haven. The cat’s already out of the bag regarding the low-level radioactive waste, which the Reporter documented and urged civil disobedience, or at least implied it. The paper was deemed too inciting. Back issues were even purged from the files at the local library. You know Joe, I think you might have missed out on some relevant information. In fact, I’m rather surprised about your ignorance about what is happening around you. You definitely need to plug into some kind of a network for yourself.”
This was more than a little antagonistic, Logan thought. �
�Like what specifically? Because over the past few days, I seem to have landed right in the middle of something. I don’t quite know what it is exactly, but it is something. There’s also been a lot of UFOs flying over Pine Haven and black triangles floating over the Triumph plant. I haven’t seen one, but does that mean I’m ignorant? Should I feel left out?”
“No, but…”
“But what? With what looks like an entire planet collapsing around our ears, a political system that has abdicated to a police security state, one-eighth of the planet reduced to a burnt cinder, a couple of missed details don’t seem to matter all that much.” They drove on in silence for a short while, Logan feeling self-conscious about having gotten so worked up. “I didn’t find much about your boss on the Internet when I looked. I heard he had his own website, but was shut down by the authorities.”
“Actually, the site was being hacked and subjected to viruses. Glass terminated the site because it was a constant drain trying to fend off attacks. The government was involved, possibly some branch of the Air Force or some unit or group of individuals operating independently.”
“There was a blog which accused him of having some kind of relationship with the DIA and NSA or something, that he ran a disinformation campaign out of his former website.”
“Glass has never denied the fact that he had contacts in the intelligence community, which he used as sources for information. It was never a big deal, but there are some committed UFO nuts out there that have fixated on Glass for not espousing the same dogma as them. There have been two major points of view. Hypotheses, actually. There is the extraterrestrial hypothesis and the interdimensional hypothesis. Glass has always leaned toward the latter but has never ruled out the former. Another sore point for the faithful is the fact that most UFO sightings have been secret aircraft, especially what’s been observed over the last twenty to twenty-five years. The black triangles have been ours, enormous deltoid-shaped airships used for surveillance and materiel transport. Also, the alleged TR-3b or its variation, which is the ‘Vampire Ship,’ the weapons platform, which probably doesn’t do half of what most people say or think it does. As for the abduction scenario, which has been at the heart of the UFO controversy, that should be relegated to the field of psychology and let the analysts work it out with their patients suffering from that recurrent malady. Then of course there are the human-alien hybrid people, underground bases with alien and military personnel sharing information and technology…the list is infinite. People in the field defy all logic and take one small detail out of context and magnify it, jumping to outrageous conclusions. All Glass has ever done is point these discrepancies out.”
