Shadow Cast: A Brock Finlander Novel (Coastal Adventure Series Book 3)

by E. J. Foster

  I heard a click from behind me, and jumped in panic, then turned in a defensive fighting position.

  Katie.

  She had unlocked the lab door to reenter.

  “Here’s the gun,” she gasped, out of breath from her sprint to the boat. “The flare gun,” she corrected. “There’s five shells.”

  This particular model of flare gun looked like an old starter’s pistol; the entire gun constructed of bright orange plastic. There were four orange, twelve-gauge shells in a bandolier that was attached to the handle of the gun. Four shots.

  I released the barrel catch and folded open the chamber of the gun. I removed one shell from the bandolier and inserted it, snapping the chamber closed with a click, before refocusing my attention on the bathroom.

  I approached slowly, the gun pointed dead ahead, supported by both my extended arms.

  “I’ll need your help, kiddo,” I said. “You’ll have to open the bathroom door.”

  “What?” Katie protested.

  “The door opens outward, so you’ll have the door between you, and him, as protection,” I said. “I’ll handle whatever comes out.”

  Katie didn’t speak, but answered with a few quick nods of her head, before slowly approaching the door.

  The scratching from inside the bathroom was quieter now, but steady. Katie inched forward until she could almost reach the handle.

  She extended an arm to grab it.

  “Slowly,” I cautioned.

  She looked back and gave me a quick nod.

  I felt my grip tighten against the knurled handle of the pistol, as my heart throbbed heavier.

  My vision sharpened on the gun sights in front of me, with the bathroom door blurred in the background from depth perception. Once my aim was set, I refocused my vision on the door, bringing it into sharpness as the gun went blurry. I cocked the weapon and slowly placed my trigger finger inside the guard, letting it gently rest against the trigger.

  Just as Katie turned her attention back to the bathroom, the whole door thundered and rattled ferociously, as if about to burst off the hinges.

  I reacted.

  An orange fireball spit out of my weapon, sailing across the lab and piercing the hollow-core bathroom door, leaving a contrail of smoke between me and the bathroom.

  Emanating from the slit beneath the door, and the new hole above it, lights pulsated and flickered orange from the inside, glitching with the ruckus.

  The flare was inside the bathroom with the intruder.

  I looked down at the gun. Three shells left. I quickly opened the chamber and inserted another round, then clicked it shut, and cocked the weapon.

  I reset my aim, as Katie steeled herself once again.

  “Let’s do this now,” I commanded.

  Katie nodded, and swung the door all the way open, protecting herself in the small triangle of space between the opened door and the wall.

  I fired on instinct, hoping to hit the center-of-mass of whatever was waiting for us.

  Another contrail of orange fire sailed across the lab and into the bathroom, burying itself impotently into the sheetrock of the bathroom wall. It burned bright like a wall sconce. The trembling flame threw moving shadows in all directions making the bathroom seem alive.

  I shook my head in disbelief, trying to loosen the cobwebs.

  “There’s no one there,” I said.

  I loaded another round in the gun and trained it on the bathroom again. Two shells left.

  Katie’s head peeked around from the other side of the door.

  “It’s empty,” I continued, as I stalked forward.

  The bathroom burned bright white. It provided the only light, sending a soft glow that radiated out into the lab.

  A networking of shadows danced in the flicker as one flare burned on the bathroom floor and the other stuck in the wall like a torch.

  I walked slowly to the opening. There was still a part of the bathroom I could not see. Around the corner, where the toilet was. I swung out wide to get a better angle. The space behind the toilet was all dark movement of shadow.

  I thought I saw something black that wasn’t quite a shadow. Is my mind playing tricks on me?

  Katie emerged from behind the safety of the door.

  “Stay back,” I warned her, as I trained the weapon on the toilet.

  One of the dancing shadows evolved and clicked as it scurried out from behind the commode and stepped into the center spotlight.

  A large spider stood there, black and slim, and nearly skeletal. Sparse black hairs covered its spiny vertical legs that stood taller than the toilet, before sharply turning downward again to the bulbous body of the thing. Its abdomen had a stroke of green cutting across it like a lightning bolt.

  “What the...” I said without realizing I was speaking.

  Katie inched to the side to give her a better angle to see what I was reacting to.

  As soon as she saw it, her mouth fell open, and a sharp inhale of her breath hissed in the silence. Katie moved further, bringing the alien into full view, and in the process stepped into my line of fire.

  “Stand back,” I said, ready to put this thing down.

  Katie turned back toward me.

  “Wait, you can’t kill it,” she pleaded.

  “I can. And will.”

  “No. I have to find out what it is,” she pleaded again before refocusing herself on the thing.

  “Step aside, Katie. This thing is cornered, which makes it dangerous—”

  I barely got the words out before the alien spider leaped straight to Katie and attached itself to her face.

  It screeched a mechanical whine as it flew.

  It’s eight furry legs scurried and danced around the sides of her head, trying to gain purchase. Its bulbous abdomen made slurping sounds as it nestled on her face, covering the entirety of it.

  I could hear Katie’s muffled screams under the grotesque sounds the alien made as it connected with her cheeks.

  My veins were ice.

  I aimed directly at Katie’s head. My grip on the gun loosened and then tightened back again with indecision.

  Was I about to pull the trigger on my own daughter? To save her? Would this round penetrate the thing, and hurt Katie?

  There was another high-pitched squeal from the beast, and the muffled cries from Katie rang out again.

  Katie flailed. I couldn’t get a good shot.

  I circled around her to the side, aiming at her profile.

  “Hold still,” was all I could think to yell.

  Katie’s movements slowed. She tugged at the thing’s furry, bony legs, but couldn’t pull them away.

  “Hold still!” I shouted, louder now.

  She settled into a slow rhythmic rocking. All I could see was her ear.

  I trained the weapon on the alien, slowly rocking, matching its movement. The barrel of the gun was shaking at the end of my arms. Can I really do this?

  Katie stayed slow and rhythmic, but her screaming intensified. She was in a panic.

  The tip of the gun shook with every heartbeat, as my aim drifted, back and forth with the alien attached to Katie's head.

  Katie wailed once more, and I squeezed.

  Boom. A contrail of orange headed right for Katie. She rocked back at the right moment and my round hit the alien square, knocking it off.

  The flaming spider hit the wall and bounced off. A fountain of flames spewed out of the thing as the flare burned internally. It looked like a rocket-powered spider.

  The thing scurried and flailed and hissed demonically around the lab, ricocheting off table legs and chairs, casting shadows as it moved.

  After a minute of pinballing around like an uncontrolled firework, the thing slowed and settled into a heap.

  “Are you okay?” I asked Katie, never taking my eyes off the smoking carcass.

  I only heard her softly weeping.

  “Talk to me, Katie,” I said.

  “Mmm,” she managed to moan throu
gh tears.

  The gun was still shaking in front of me, aimed at the alien, and I realized it was empty. I looked down at the bandolier. Last round. I quickly loaded it into the gun and trained it back on the alien.

  Katie was already on her knees in front of the thing, still crying. She turned back to me, her eyes twin lakes.

  “You killed it,” she managed through quivering lips.

  15

  The boat ride home didn’t have the same feel as before. The sun was shining now and the breeze on my face should have felt relaxing, but it didn’t. I started to get that old feeling again. Like I was getting sucked into something I didn't want to be involved in.

  I set course for home and throttled to cruising speed, about ten knots on the research vessel.

  I secured the flare gun and the one remaining flare in its water-tight plastic case and stowed it.

  As we cut through the water, I wondered what in the hell we had just encountered. I’d never seen anything like it.

  Katie and I had been in stunned silence for the past five minutes. She had just spent the last two hours in her lab testing that thing, trying to determine what it was. She couldn’t find any answers. We had pieced together a rough idea, but really, all we had were questions.

  “Let’s go over what we know,” I said, breaking the silence.

  Katie was in a trance, and her faraway stare was focused on something far beyond the horizon, when my words snapped her out of it.

  She shook her head as if loosening the cobwebs.

  “Right. What we know,” she said, bringing herself back to the present. “The marsh rabbit is missing. The green spore residue was all throughout the lab and seemingly radiated outward from the... egg.”

  Katie was tapping two fingers against her lips as she thought, and then continued listing facts: “The spore dust, in vapor form, seems to be flammable. I’m assuming the green gas was ignited by the flame of the candle, but not before the rabbit was infected with the spores.”

  “Infected?”

  “The spider, if you want to call it that, had DNA strands I’ve never seen before mixed with rabbit DNA,” Katie explained.

  “What do you mean, never seen before?”

  “I mean, not of this planet,” she said flatly.

  “How is that possible?”

  “I’m not sure, but I checked it twice.”

  “Are you telling me, that thing...” I paused, unsure of what to call it, “was your furry little marsh rabbit?”

  Katie didn’t answer. She just shook her head; her gaze was farther away than ever.

  “You think that green stuff, whatever it was, transformed the rabbit into something else?” I tried another question, but Katie was consumed in thought.

  “That thing. That egg... came from outer space,” I reminded her. “Are you saying I might have just killed an alien back there?” I thumbed over my shoulder back toward the lab.

  “I’m saying, I was wrong,” Katie said, close to tears now. “We should have thrown that thing into the sea.”

  I thought about that. Was she wrong? How many animals could those spores have mutated? We’d be facing mutant sharks right now. No, her actions minimized the damage done.

  I thought back to how many of those meteorites had rained down on the bay. I hadn’t heard about any other accounts like this. But, why not?

  “What if we had thrown it in the water?” I posed a question, and waited a few breaths, giving her a chance to ponder it. “That green dust was everywhere, Katie. If it got out into the wild, I’m not sure we could have handled the consequences. You did the right thing, kiddo.”

  Katie leaned into my side for a hug as I controlled the throttle. I put my arm around her and pulled her in tight.

  “You know we have to figure this out, right?” she said.

  That was the last thing I wanted. To get involved in another mystery. Why can’t I just stay retired, already?

  “No, we don't, Katie.” I was going to put a stop to this right there and then. “Let’s clean up this mess and never speak about it again. I’m done.”

  I spoke the words out loud, but in my heart, I didn’t believe it. I knew we had a responsibility to do something. Katie wasn’t buying it either. I could tell by the way she ignored me.

  “We’ll brief Jules at the house, and make an action plan,” she said.

  I put on a stone face as I pushed the throttle faster, but I had a suspicion Katie could see the corners of my mouth curling upward, ever so slightly as we motored on.

  16

  I pulled into the home dock. Katie and I quickly tied off. Chum the dog was there taking his usual lazy afternoon nap on the dock. But by now, late afternoon had turned into evening, and Chum was not usually here this late, unless he was waiting for something.

  I hopped off the Ring of Life and onto the deck. The thud woke Chum, and he jumped up to greet me, tail wagging. He gave a big yawn as his tongue rolled out of his mouth, and his body assumed downward-facing dog for a big sleepy stretch. When he finished, I gave him a scratch behind the ears.

  “Whatcha doing here, boy?” I looked around and noticed the jon boat was missing. “Where’s Finn?”

  Chum sat and barked twice.

  “They’re not here?” I asked.

  “They were home when I left this morning,” Katie said.

  “No. They set out on the jon boat early this morning. You had already gone to the lab,” I reminded her. “With the egg.”

  Katie’s face fell into an expression of concern, and she stalked up to the house. Chum and I followed. Maybe Jules would know something.

  When we passed through the door, the house was silent, except for an electronic beeping emanating from somewhere, followed by a woman’s voice.

  “Please enter the code.” The voice was soothing and artificial. The beeping continued.

  Katie and I traded confused looks as we scanned the entryway.

  Chum ventured further in the house, oblivious.

  A deafening alarm began to wail. The force of it changed the pressure in my eardrums, creating an instant thump of pain. I reflexively covered my ears and dropped to my knees.

  Jules came running, shouting over the piercing sound.

  “I got it. I got it,” she said as she stabbed at a control panel on the wall next to the door.

  The hall fell silent.

  “Sorry. Just got the alarm controller set up today while you were gone,” Jules said.

  I got back to my feet, my ears ringing.

  “The four-digit code is Finn’s birthday.” Jules was still talking, but I wasn’t yet comprehending. However, the mention of Finn brought me back.

  “Where is he? Finn?” Katie was already asking.

  “I thought he was with you,” Jules said.

  Katie looked at me and I at her. I was still unnerved by what we had seen in the lab, and my memory of how many of those eggs fell out of the sky and into the bay. Were the kids in danger? Were we?

  “Don’t worry, Katie. Just give Finn a call and tell him to come straight home,” I said.

  She put her phone on speaker and touched a picture of Finn’s face. The ringing echoed out of her phone and around the silent house.

  No answer.

  Katie had been through a lot today and her nerves were shot. I could tell by the concern on her face and the quivering in her lips that she was about to lose it.

  “Jules. You’re a hacker. Can you find Finn’s phone?” I asked.

  Jules playfully adopted a smug smile.

  “Can I do it? Ha!”

  Jules had a laptop out in a flash and was already clicking away on the keyboard.

  “What are you doing? Hacking into the... mainframe? Decrypting phone company records?” I guessed at a few tactics using buzzwords I had heard but didn’t fully understand.

  Jules spun the laptop around to face me. On the screen was a map of Claw Island and the Chesapeake Bay. A red dot pulsed in the center of the map, located out in th
e middle of a blue field of water. The dot was labeled Finn’s Phone.

  “Find my phone dot com,” Jules said. “No hacking necessary.”

  “So, Finn is there?” I pointed to the dot.

  “Uh...” Jules studied the screen a moment more and continued, “Actually, no. That’s where Finn was... according to this, about four hours ago. Last known location.”

  “Dad,” Katie said, her voice addled with worry.

  “Don’t panic, Katie,” I tried to calm her.

  “What’s the big deal?” Jules asked lightheartedly. “He’ll be home on his own soon.”

  Katie and I traded glances for a moment. I wasn’t sure what to say. I knew how she felt about getting involved.

  “We have something to tell you,” I said.

  17

  Jules and I were headed straight for the pulsing red dot on the map. My fifty-five-foot yacht wasn’t built for speed; it was built for luxury. But that wouldn’t matter now. We only had a few miles to travel from Claw Island to the middle of the bay.

  I didn’t want to put Katie in any danger, and demanded that she stay back, in case Finn returned home. She was a headstrong woman and tried to refuse, but it just had to be this way. If anything happened to her, Finn would be orphaned, and I would never forgive myself.

  Against the wind, we headed west, straight into the sunset. The swirl of orange and red sky mingled with darker storm clouds on the horizon. I paused to admire the beauty in it. Sometimes, mother nature painted a picture that even the Dutch masters couldn’t copy.

  “Anything?” I asked.

  Jules was peering through binoculars, scanning the bay.

  “Nothing,” she answered. “The only things for miles are container ships, including the big one we headed straight for.”

  “Keep looking,” I said. “The jon boat is small, but you should be able to spot it if we get close.”

  “We wouldn’t have to spot anything, if you had listened to me. But no. You didn’t. Nobody listens to Jules.” Jules put on her mock voice and continued, “Jules is just a twenty-something with a red mohawk. Why listen to a millennial.” She was shouting over the twin engines.