“Only a couple of minutes?” Holmes blinked, surprised. “But if you’d gone down the slope by which we’d ascended, and run around the base of the knoll, it would have taken…” He snatched her hand and held it up to the light, staring at the palm. Then he turned it to examine the fingertips and nails. “Good Lord, Skye!” he exclaimed, his voice fervent. “You climbed down the bluff. Whatever did you think you were doing?”
* * *
Stunned, she stared at her own hands, seeing the signs: the abraded palms, the scraped, raw fingertips; the torn, dirty nails.
“Uhm,” she answered, lifting bemused azure eyes to pained grey ones. “Getting to my husband as fast as I could?”
* * *
Holmes drew a deep breath.
“Whatever am I going to do with you?” he muttered, disturbed. “That was a foolhardy thing to do, Skye!”
Skye visibly cringed at the rebuke, then her body stiffened in anger, and she lashed out.
“What the hell was I supposed to do, dawdle around and take my time, when you could have been dying?” she fired back. “I’m not stupid, and I’m not rash, but I’m damned if I won’t do what it takes to get to you if you’re in trouble! You know damn straight you’d have done the same thing, so don’t give me that!”
“Like it or not, I have somewhat over you in the matter of strength, my dear,” Holmes retorted.
“And I’m lighter than you, hence less likely to bring the slope crashing down,” she countered. “I love you, and I was afraid you were dying, Sherlock! I would’ve done anything to get to you in time. Anything.” She curled into a tight little ball, not leaving his side, but refusing to look at him.
Holmes stared at the top of the golden head, thinking. Suddenly, in his mind’s eye, their positions reversed, and his breath caught with alarm as he considered seeing that same blonde head disappear over the edge of the precipice. In imagination, he scrambled impetuously down the slope after her; and with a sigh the detective relented.
“Very well, wife, your point is made,” he reluctantly conceded in a soothing murmur. “It was, no doubt, done in the heat of the moment, without regard to the danger to your own person, and I cannot fault you for it. Indeed, it is the sort of thing Watson…or even I…would have done, in similar circumstances.” The tight ball beside him slowly released as he spoke.
“I’m sorry I’m not as cool in a crisis as you are, Sherlock,” Skye said quietly, her tone betraying mingled annoyance and regret. “But I honestly don’t remember climbing down that bluff.”
* * *
“Do you find me cold, then?” Holmes wondered, very subdued. “Do I seem unfeeling to you? To you, of all people,” he added in a whisper.
“No, I didn’t mean it that way,” Skye replied quickly, perturbed by his rare misunderstanding and seeking to reassure him. “Not at all. You’re just so…so calm and unflappable.”
* * *
“So are you,” he pointed out, hiding the full measure of his relief at her response. “You are positively formidable in a crisis, my dear. One has but to consider the emergency shutdown of the tesseract, and your deportment at the time, to realise that. But I do highly suspect you are still getting used to the idea of having family once more. Might I humbly suggest you are subconsciously fearful of losing your spouse, as you lost your parents, and so you responded more strongly than you otherwise might?”
Skye tilted her head back and looked up at him briefly before her bright blue eyes grew distant with thought. She pursed her lips consideringly, then nodded.
“You’ve probably got a good point. I guess both of us have reasons for hanging onto each other pretty tightly, right now.”
“You mean the Watson dreams?” Holmes shot her a sharp glance.
“Yeah.”
“I’ve not had one in weeks, my dear, I am happy to say.”
“But you’re still writing in your journal,” she observed with a hint of protest.
“Indeed.” The corners of his mouth curled in the faintest hint of a wry grin. “I find it helps me clarify my thoughts from time to time.”
* * *
“Ah,” Skye grinned knowingly at him. “Okay then. Um…so are you angry with me?”
“No. Why should I be?”
“Climbing down the…never mind,” Skye interrupted herself, deciding to let sleeping dogs lie. “How do you feel?”
“Somewhat better,” he decided, stretching gingerly. “I believe the ibuprofen has taken effect.”
“Good. Think you can take a nap?”
“Does my wife feel like taking a nap?” he wondered innocently.
“I thought I might.”
“Then I might, just possibly, manage it.”
* * *
The next two days were spent allowing Holmes to recuperate. Dr. Wilder came by later on the night of the accident to check on Holmes’ concussion, then once a day thereafter. The coroner called frequently, every few hours at times, to report the results of each new test he devised upon McFarlane’s body—all negative so far, unfortunately. Cause of death was still a mystery.
Ryker called or stopped by regularly twice a day to report progress—which, at this point, meant there was none. Holmes grew increasingly frustrated, but as yet neither Dr. Wilder nor his wife would allow him to venture further than the wintry garden plot of Gibson House. Holmes always had one or two caustic remarks to make each time his request to continue the investigation was refused. But the pinched, apprehensive look that immediately appeared on Skye’s face always prevented “one or two” from becoming “half a dozen or more,” though the detective never backed down, nor retracted the already-stated remarks.
In truth, the detective realized he had been fortunate not to have injured himself more seriously, and he was being kept well apprised of the situation; there was simply no true news to report. So he did his best to rest when he could, and followed Wilder’s injunctions to continue reducing the swelling and discomfort. By the second day after the accident, he was discarding the sling for all but the most strenuous activities, though the metal cane was still with him.
On the third day, Skye decided to run into town to pick up some fresh items for dinner. It was on her way home that matters took a decidedly unexpected turn.
Chapter 6—Close Encounters of the Unexpected Kind
SKYE WAS HALFWAY HOME WHEN SHE noticed everything around her suddenly had two shadows: One had sharp, clearly defined edges, patently from sunlight; the other was less distinct, and from a completely different angle. Automatically her gaze turned skyward, and sapphire eyes widened in shock.
“Ohmigosh,” Skye whispered, staring into the sky at the strange shining object as she automatically continued driving back to Gibson House. “It can’t be. I…I’ve got an actual sighting…” With one hand she fumbled for her cell phone, hitting speaker mode and voice activation. “Call address one,” she murmured, splitting her visual skills between driving and watching the glowing object in the sky. Meanwhile, the cell phone dutifully dialed the requested number. There was a click on the other end.
“Gibson House,” emerged from the phone in familiar, clipped, and somewhat brusque English. “Holmes speaking.”
“Sherlock, it’s Skye,” she said, the words pouring out. “Hush and listen. I’ve got a visual on our UFO.”
* * *
A decidedly grumpy and out of sorts Holmes limped over to the ringing phone, wishing to whack it soundly with his cane; he had been napping comfortably on the sofa in the sitting room, and had grown stiff in the doing. Rising from the couch thus reminded him all too well of his recent tumble. And, he thought in annoyance, it is likely merely some basic report—probably the coroner—that there is no news to report.
“Gibson House,” he snapped into the receiver. “Holmes speaking.”
He instantly silenced, however, when he heard the voice on the other end. Grey eyes began to glow with excitement.
* * *
“I’m about five miles
out from the house, as the crow flies,” Skye noted, leaning forward over the steering wheel to look upward. “The object is just ahead of me, say eleven o’clock high, near zenith. I have to crane over the steering wheel to see it. It’s got a yellowish orange glow around a central sphere. Hard to give size estimates, or even distance estimates, on account of the sorta ‘halo’ effect it has.”
She watched for a few seconds, trying to estimate the appropriate dimensions. “Um, maybe around a hundred, hundred and fifty, yards altitude? That would put it…geez, room size, Sherlock. Big room size. Maybe twenty, thirty feet in diameter? That’s counting the glow. I can’t tell how thick the halo is around it, though. The sphere inside may be a lot smaller.”
“Speed?” barked the voice on the other end.
“Um…” Skye studied the object. “Uh-oh…”
* * *
“’Uh-oh’?” Holmes echoed, leaning on his cane, rooted to his place in the sitting room as he listened. “Whenever you say that, in exactly that tone, Skye, it is never good.” His brow furrowed in concern. “What, precisely, is ‘uh-oh’?”
* * *
“Uh-oh means it’s pacing me, hon,” Skye observed worriedly. “And I’m traveling…” she glanced at the speedometer. “Um, about sixty kilometers an hour—that’s just over thirty-five miles an hour.” She looked back up at the object.
It wasn’t there.
“Lost it,” she murmured at the phone, straining her neck to look out the windows. Suddenly she spotted a golden streak in her rear view mirror. Twisting in the seat, she glanced backward.
The object was now directly behind her, and moving up incredibly fast. And it showed no sign of stopping.
“Oh, SHIT!” Skye cried, suddenly instinctively afraid. “Sherlock, it’s CHASING ME! Directly behind me, only about two or three feet off the ground, and moving in FAST! It fills the whole road!”
Instinctively, Skye hit the accelerator.
* * *
In the house, Holmes’ head grew light for an instant as the blood drained from his face. Then he galvanized into action.
“GO, Skye,” he urged, hobbling swiftly to the desk and extracting a Browning 9mm service pistol, popping the safety and racking the slide in the same move. Holmes had had the foresight to request a loaner of Ryker before leaving London, and he now had a hefty sized hunk of weaponry already loaded and nestled in his hand—not that he was certain it would be of any use in this particular instance. Still, it was better than nothing.
He held the phone to his ear with his shoulder, and limped as fast as he could go toward the garage, using his aluminum cane to skip and vault occasionally to speed up progress. “I will have the garage door open when you arrive, and will be armed.”
* * *
“Okay!” Skye answered, desperation in her tone, then focused on driving with all her skill. The road was a typical country lane in rural England, meaning it was both narrow and twisting, and it took all her police and FBI honed abilities to navigate it at her current speed, which had increased to nearly one hundred kilometers per hour. It did not occur to her that the fact that the unidentified object now fit between the fences and hedgerows bordering the road meant it had decreased significantly in size.
Still the object gained upon her. Within seconds it was nearing her rear bumper, seeming intent upon either colliding with her, or engulfing the entire car.
On a short straightaway, a deathly pale, badly frightened Skye dared to twist about in her seat and look back at it. It seemed to surge forward suddenly at that, and involuntarily she screamed.
* * *
Standing in the garage door, phone to his ear, Holmes heard his wife scream, and knew he went white to the lips as a cold wave seemed to break over him. He strained to look past the tall hedgerows of arborvitae bordering the front of the property and see any sign of his wife’s rapidly approaching vehicle. Nothing was visible, not even a glow from the object which chased her.
“Skye? SKYE!” he shouted into the telephone. “Say something! Are you all right?”
* * *
Abruptly the glowing sphere came to a dead stop over the roadway, and Skye’s vehicle shot away from it, accelerating down the lane.
“Oh, dear God! Oh, dear God!” she panted gratefully. “It stopped! Thank God, it stopped!”
* * *
The UFO stopped in the roadway, barely a foot off the pavement. Skye’s car sped off and around a corner, disappearing behind the hedgerows.
“Bad,” a voice emerged from the sphere. “She SAW us.”
“She did,” another voice from the sphere agreed. “And it nearly frightened her witless.” A pause. “Some fine tuning is in order.”
“I think you are correct.”
“Shut down?”
“Yes.”
And the UFO abruptly winked out of existence.
* * *
Skye fairly blew up to and into the garage, throwing driveway gravel and squealing to an abrupt stop, only slamming on the brakes at the last instant. Sherlock stood guard by the garage door, weapon raised and ready, watching sky and yard and field with intent grey eyes. As soon as the car was inside the garage, he ducked within the opening and slammed his palm down on the automatic door-close switch. Once the door was shut, Skye launched herself from the driver’s seat and into his arms, nearly bowling him over.
“Easy, easy; shhh, calmly, my dear,” he murmured, carefully setting both gun and phone on the bonnet of the car before wrapping his arms around her. “Take some deep breaths. Well, I believe I can easily see how someone might be frightened to death by such an apparition. Your heart is pounding like a hare’s.”
“Y-yeah,” Skye panted into his shirt. “Let’s go in the house. I’ll feel a little safer there.”
“And we must call Ryker and report this,” Holmes noted, gathering his pistol and cell phone, while keeping one arm around his wife.
“Yeah.”
They turned toward the door into the house.
* * *
Ryker came over immediately and took a full report from Skye. Skye was exceedingly grateful for this, as it meant she didn’t need to write it herself; and she was still somewhat shaken, although beginning to feel sheepish.
“After all, it’s the dream of a scientist’s lifetime,” she pointed out, mildly chagrined into the bargain. “First contact.”
“Why, then, did you not stop to meet it, instead of fleeing?” her husband wondered, trying to understand Skye’s contradictory reactions.
“I—I’m not sure,” Skye admitted, a ghost of the anxiety she had felt evident in her face. She was seated in her favorite sitting room chair, the old rocker, and both men silently noted the frequency of its movement increased with Holmes’ question. “Instinct kicked in, I guess. It’s one thing for it to occur in a controlled environment, and another entirely when it’s chasing you, and you don’t know its intentions. And it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before,” she added.
“Good point,” Ryker conceded. “Other than the fact it’s faster and more manoeuvreable than anything we know, and shows up on the various spectral sensors more like a hole than a spacecraft, we have no idea of its capabilities. Or intent.”
“A HOLE?” Skye repeated, furrowing her brow.
“Yeah. Should’ve been in the reports, but it might not have stood out. Let me see if I can get you another copy of that section.”
“Please do,” Skye nodded. “After what I saw today, I’m beginning to think this really is some sort of warp drive spaceship, and any info like that will be useful. Maybe with my science background I can figure out a little more than your field observers can about what the instrumentation actually was seeing. Get the most detailed reports on it you can find. Instrument data if you’ve got any. Raw, reduced, whatever; I’ll take it.”
“Okay. Hang on a sec.” Ryker popped his cell phone. “Ryker. Yes, Brooks, a second copy of the Rendlesham transcript faxed to the Gibson number. Um, yeah, good idea; mayb
e both the old AND the new reports. And include the instrument readouts, and any video taken by the night vision equipment. Yes, that too, if you can find it; burn it to CD with the rest and send it by courier. Anything you can get your hands on, send it over priority one. The Boss might get something out of ‘em. Yes, of course Mr. Holmes too. Thank you, ‘Moneypenny.’ You’re a gem.” He closed the phone. “Give it five minutes. She’ll have to dig out the old reports from the files. Any video will probably arrive by special courier in a couple hours or so.”
“Very well,” Holmes agreed, and they continued a discussion of the incident.
* * *
Six minutes later, the fax in the study shrilled. Skye fetched the output, and returned studying it.
“Hm,” was all she said, her brows drawn together in perplexity.
“So you make nothing out of it, as yet?” Holmes asked.
“No, not yet,” Skye decided. “Lemme think on it awhile.”
“Sounds good,” Ryker agreed. “Do you want some guards around the property, just in case?”
“No,” Holmes declared. “It did not follow her all the way to the house, so it may not be aware where she went, let alone that she is here. If there was intent rather than simple curiosity, we should not like to attract its attention by an increased presence.”
“Why would it be anything other than curiosity?” Skye wondered.
“We are the incident investigators, my dear,” Holmes pointed out.
“True,” Skye sighed.
“And I have one more observation,” Holmes added.
“What’s that?” Ryker asked, grabbing for his pad and pen once more.
“Skye evinces absolutely no sign of radiation burns,” Holmes noted enigmatically. “That, even though the object was no more than ten or fifteen feet from her, and at full…capability, shall we say.”
The two men watched, intrigued, as Skye turned to the decorative mirror nearby and intently surveyed the healthy, exposed skin of her hands and face.
“Interesting,” was all she said.
* * *
The Case of the Displaced Detective Page 93
