by M. G. Herron
“Typical,” I yawned, “Having to pull back-to-back stakeouts after a long road trip.”
To keep myself awake, I pulled out my phone and began reading news on the internet. I scanned headlines hinting at this week’s politically correct outrage, scrolled past a few funny dog videos, and read a touching story about a local couple helping people experiencing homelessness in the city. A few minutes later, I found myself typing another website into the address bar and pulling up Marsha Marshall’s zany conspiracy theory blog. It loaded slowly.
At first, I was confused because the design of the blog had changed. It was even more jam-packed with annotated photos of random buildings, senseless phrases in bright colors, words with odd capitalizations, and other coded phrases.
When I got down to the list of articles, my eyes bulged. Previously, all of Marsha’s articles—of Anna’s articles—had taken on a questioning, searching tone. Insistent, but journalistic. She covered the paranormal myths and legends you’d expect—Bigfoot, Roswell, and other strange encounters. Before, when I knew Marsha was an Austinite and nothing else about her, I used to read the site to have a good laugh about the latest crop circles or UFO sightings. Marsha had plenty of opinions about what was really going on, but I felt an honesty from her work. She would never conceal it if the crop circles turned out to be teenagers playing a midnight prank on their father. If witnesses told her that the chupacabra their neighbors saw in the mist was merely a rabid wolf, she’d never been afraid to include that information in her narrative.
Now, though…
Now, her website boasted bold proclamations like,
Flat Earth Theory, Bunk. NASA Already Discovered Proof of Alien Existence
Ten Thousand Americans, Anally Probed
Strange Skeleton Unearthed Outside Waco, Likely Belonging to Species Not of This World
And, Scientists Discover New Chemical PROVEN to Be EXTRATERRESTRIAL IN ORIGIN!
That one made me chuckle. I also felt a flush of shame. I was skeptical about the sheer quantity of anal probing, but her intuition about alien life was so spot on it hurt. Anna was more right than she ever imagined, and not only had I been keeping the truth from her, I had stood by while the memories that would vindicate her beliefs were wiped clean.
Perhaps because of the remorse I was feeling, I clicked into a few of the articles. The pace and style became more manic the closer I read toward today’s date. The newer pieces were madly, obsessively cited. I counted twenty three links in one paragraph on an article that linked out to hundreds of sources. Another article had ten pages of long, rambling quotations about a haunted manor, from so-called “eye witnesses.” The new design of the site made the font small and cramped, too. Blurry, annotated photos of unidentifiable objects and structures and landscapes floated throughout the text.
What was most disconcerting was that all of this new work had been done while I’d been chasing Mannheim around south-central Texas. Whatever you wanted to say about her, Anna was certainly no slouch when it came to her work ethic.
Or was obsessed a better way to describe what I was seeing?
Keeping one eye on the darkened house I was staking out, I went back to the homepage and scrolled down until I found the article that had clued me into Marsha’s true identity as Annabelle Summers. This piece was posted only a day or two before Alek offered me the Mannheim job. It began like this:
“My name is Marsha Marshall, and I was abducted by aliens.”
When I read those words three weeks ago, that was the moment I figured out that Annabelle Summers was the real person behind the pen name Marsha Marshall. She covered her tracks well. No amount of digital sleuthing betrayed her secret—no social media profiles, no photographs, no reverse searches. I respected that, and let her go on being anonymous. It was obviously a valuable outlet for her. Anonymity has a way of allowing people the freedom to express themselves in ways that society frowns upon. Sometimes, anonymity can be bad. Just look at the comments section of any major news outlet. But what if this crazy, rambling blog was the only thing keeping her sane? Based on the recent activity on her website, I worried that might be more true than I’d realized.
Rereading it now, I knew that the first time I’d read this article was also the moment that I began to distance myself from Anna. I’d made a promise not to share what I’d learned with her, and I’d been complicit in wiping her memory. My time on the road made it easier to bury myself in my work and forget about her than I liked to admit. That ability was a genetic gift from my father, who in recent years, took to drinking himself to sleep every night to drown out the loss of his wife—my mother. Dad and I had different strategies for burying the guilt. He used booze; I used work. Different approach, same result.
The screen began to blur. I had to put my phone down and rub my eyes with the back of my hands. Memories of my mother still had the power to incite unexpected tears, even three years on. I stared at Ken Lard’s house and let my mind wander. I still made it down to Port Aransas to see Dad on holidays, the nearest of which was yet a couple months off. Maybe I should go down there and see him sooner. I’d have to make the time.
I hadn’t seen any movement or light around Ken Lard’s supposed residence. Doubts began to bubble up in my mind. Had Rashiki’s head of security misled me to get me out of his hair? Was Ken Lard smarter than I assumed? Had he chosen to spend the night elsewhere? I expected these thoughts to surface. Doubts naturally cropped up on overnight stakeouts. I knew that the only way to find out if I was right was to wait, so I did what I did best, what my upbringing taught me to do, and shoved down my doubts and fears. After a while, I picked my phone up and continued to read Marsha’s blog.
In the middle of an article about three people who’d lost memories in twelve to twenty-four hour gaps—an article that was supposed to vindicate Marsha’s theory about her missing memories—I found this gem:
“Like these witnesses, I knew my memories of the Missing Day had been erased because there was a Specific Cutoff Point (SPC). One minute I was looking at the menu at a pizza parlor, and then next I jolted awake in my bed at noon with a splitting headache. First of all, I’ve never slept til noon in my life, even after I’ve been out late. Secondly, that headache was no hangover. It felt like someone had cut a piece of my brain out with a laser. Not like being drunk at all, or drugged. No foggy memories, no bits or flashes. Just the description of Hawaiian pizza in a serif font on a red dining menu, and then my bedroom ceiling. Red dining menu—bedroom ceiling.
“Since then, in addition to those quoted here, I’ve interviewed credible witnesses who claim to have been beset by the same symptoms. I’ve reprinted more of their testaments below. You can see how many of them have had experiences similar to my own. Clear delineation points in their memories—their own SPCs. Waking up in a different place and not knowing how they got there. Headaches.”
In another article, this haunting passage.
“I’m desperate to speak to someone who believes me. Only pouring my heart out on this page seems to help, and it is a cold comfort. Yesterday, neurologists scanned my brain and insisted that nothing had been removed. Hypnotists have tried to engage my subconscious to recover the memories, but even for me it’s hard to be open-minded enough for the hypnotism to work. The only person who listens to me is my fortune teller, and she’s paid to tell me what I want to hear. She’s a good listener but, ultimately, retrieving missing memories is not a service my spiritual guide offers. Only flashy rituals and soothing clichés…”
At some point, I dozed off. When I started awake, it was shortly before dawn and the sky was beginning to brighten with the first light of the day. I stifled a yawn. Checking the clock, I saw that I had only been asleep for about two hours. Ken Lard’s house remained dark. I pulled an energy drink out of my stash and sipped at it until my eyes felt merely tired rather than like there were barbells hanging from my eyelashes.
My patience began to wear thin.
“Come on,”
I said. “Give me something.”
I was left to stew in my own frustration for another few hours.
Finally, at a quarter to ten, the front door of the bungalow swung open and into the soft golden sunlight stumbled a tall man. Even from this distance, I could see the facial tattoos. His face and arms were also so heavily tattooed they appeared solid green.
There was a self-styled sideshow performer in Austin called the Lizardman. His body modifications, including green skin, sharpened teeth, and bifurcated tongue, were rather impressive.
Ken Lard’s choice of tattoos wasn’t nearly as intimidating. He squinted into the daylight and heaved a loud burp. Not the Lizardman. More like the Lizardman’s drunk uncle. Or maybe a washed up, homeless musician. In either case, few in Austin would bother looking at him twice.
I hadn’t seen his human disguise on the security footage, but there was no mistaking the Lodian. A rotund, hairy gut bulged out through the opening of a leather vest. Despite it all, I found myself laughing. The guy’s name was Lard. Lard—he chose that name. How fitting.
He had his wallet in his hands and was fingering the stack of bills inside and smiling to himself, probably calculating how many forties of malt liquor he could consume before passing out in a gutter somewhere.
I slunk down in my seat when Lard stopped in the middle of his yard and peered up and down the block. Then he put his back to me, unbuttoned the fly of his trousers, and began to piss on the trunk of a palm tree.
I calmly, quietly exited the truck and walked toward him.
He shook himself off vigorously, and looked back over his shoulder as I stepped into the grass of his unmowed lawn. That’s when I broke into a run. Lard’s rather pathetic, sluggish response bought me more than enough time. With one hand at his belt, Lard started to waddle away with his jeans still loose around his waist. Not fast enough. I slammed into him.
“Ahh!” he cried out.
Falling forward, he swiped back at me with the arm that had been holding his pants. His hand bounced ineffectually off my side and his jeans slid down around his knees, tying him up better than I could have hoped.
Yanking his arm up, I drove him to the ground.
“Remember me?” I asked.
“What in the hell’s your problem man! I didn’t do nothing!” I leaned sideways so he could get a good look at me, and watched his eyes as the look of recognition came, followed by clenching fear as he tried and failed to thrash out of my grip. Up close, beneath the green tattoos, his skin had begun to yellow and brown like an aged banana from the punches I’d given him the night before.
“You remember. That’s good. I have some questions and you’re gonna answer them. Got it?”
Ken Lard hocked a loogie to spit at me, but I shoved his face down into the ground again, forcing him to swallow it with a chaser of dirt and dead grass.
He choked and coughed. I held his arm behind his back at a tense, high angle.
“Shit, all right, easy, go easy, man.”
“Why did you jump Vinny?”
“Who?”
“The Pangozil,” I said. “Last night. The one you started a fight with for no reason.”
“I didn’t like his face. And the stinkin’ Pangozil bumped into me.”
I jerked his arm until Ken Lard squealed.
“I don’t believe you. Tell me the truth.”
Silence.
“Well, you asked for it,” I said.
This time he screamed so long I thought the neighbors would come out. But no one did. Maybe they didn’t like the guy, either. I forced his face back into the dirt in a poor attempt to muffle the noise. I’d be lying if I told you it wasn’t the best feeling I’d felt all goddamn night.
“Last chance, or I bring out the taser.”
He whimpered, breathing hard. Then, softly, he said, “An offworlder at the track hired me to hit him.”
My heart skipped a beat. It dawned on me that I hadn’t actually expected him to give me a straight answer. Between the guilt I felt for not being able to protect Vinny, and the shame I felt for concealing the truth from Anna—especially after reading her words and recognizing the beginnings of a downward spiral—I had merely wanted to take my anger out on someone. Preferably, on a target worthy of my ire. A shit-heel like Ken Lard had seemed like an excellent punching bag.
Now, I realized, I might be able to get more than an admission of guilt from him. I might be able to get some real information.
“Who?” I demanded.
“I don’t know.”
“Tell me who hired you or I’ll break your goddamn arm.” I cranked his elbow up another notch.
“Okay! Okay! I’ll tell you, but you’ve gotta believe me. Okay?”
“Speak,” I said through gritted teeth.
“I don’t know his name.”
“Ken…”
“I swear, he never told me his name! He just walked up to me, handed me a few hundred bucks, and asked me to sock your buddy in the face.”
“What did he look like?”
Ken Lard licked his lips. The device that maintained Ken’s disguise as a human must have been pinned under his body, because, for a moment, his appearance flickered and I saw the large, scared eyes of the gray-skinned Lodian beneath the green tattoos.
“I don’t know, all right?” he said. “It was in the back of a dim bar, but he definitely stank like a Pangozil.”
“A Pangozil? Like Vinny?”
“That’s right. I figured it was some kind of personal spat. Two Pangozil had it out for each other. What’s so strange about that?”
I shook my head. This was disconcerting. Had Vinny known his assailant? I needed to talk to Hix, to make sure he was looking out for a Pangozil on the off chance Ken Lard was telling me the truth.
“You should’ve asked for more money,” I said.
“And I would’ve, if I knew you’d be with him. Oh, come on, don’t give me that look, Earther. It’s been years since I seen a human in the Jel’ka track.”
I stared at him, stunned. “What do you mean?”
“Word gets around, bounty hunter. Austin’s the smallest big city you ever lived in. Every offworlder in a hundred miles knows the Gatekeeper’s got a new pet.”
I reeled. Ken Lard knew who I was. Worse, he thought I was in cahoots with that body-hopping mobster asshole.
“I’m a free agent,” I growled. “I don’t work for the Gatekeeper.”
Lard’s feeble attempt to squirm out of my grip kept me from pursuing the thought. My hands were beginning to cramp from holding onto him this long. He’d given me more than I’d hoped for and I figured I wasn’t going to get any more out of him, so I shoved Ken Lard away and began to backpedal, putting distance between us.
“Ow,” Lard said, rotating his shoulder in its socket and muttering under his breath. “Whatever man. I’m getting a ride off this rock before the whole place goes to shit…”
“You do that,” I said, and left him standing there as he hiked his pants up from around his ankles.
9
Still smarting from the encounter with Ken Lard, I drove to Vinny’s restaurant to make sure the air cover I’d provided last night was holding strong. I didn’t want to risk something happening between now and when he woke up that would blow his cover as an offworlder, send the local authorities after him, or make it any more difficult for me to track down his hooded Pangozil assailant.
Was Vinny’s attacker the same schmuck that the Gatekeeper was after? Or was it two different aliens? I shook my head. Whoever was behind the offworlder in the hood, Ken Lard thought it was a Pangozil. One of Vinny’s people. I wondered what Vinny would think of that and determined to ask him the moment he woke up. That would be fifteen hours from now at a minimum, assuming the Torlik medics had been right in their predictions.
When I arrived at Moretti’s, the new cook was outside, applying some serious elbow grease to a front window. I looked up and down the street for the meter maid, and when I d
idn’t see her, I parked in the fifteen minute zone and climbed out.
The new cook must have heard my footsteps. She peered over her shoulder, and her demeanor immediately brightened up, though she didn’t step away from her work at the window. She was young, with porcelain skin and round cheeks. Her ponytail poked out the back of the red ball cap all Vinny’s employees wore for work.
“We’ll be open soon,” she said.
“I’m a friend of Vinny’s. Anderson Gunn.”
“Oh hi, yeah, I recognize you from last night. I’m Willow. How’s Vinny doing? It was nice of you to call. If you didn’t, I’m not sure I would have gotten the place open on time.” She continued to polish even as the words tumbled out of her mouth. One of those nervous talkers. “Thanks again for calling. I mean it. I was worried sick when he didn’t show up for work, until I got your message. There’s a lot to do to get this place opened up in the morning. I can’t even imagine how Vinny did it all on his own for so many years.”
I fought to keep my face blank as a rush of relief passed through me. I was glad to learn that my fast thinking had worked in my favor. Despite the nervous chatter, Willow seemed confident and capable—and most of all, trusting. The young woman moved on to polishing the glass-faced front door.
I forced a smile and said, “Vinny’ll be back to normal in no time. He just needs a little rest.”
She glanced at me, nodded, went back to shining. “Good. That’s good. So he’ll be back tomorrow?”
I see-sawed my hand. “I don’t see any reason why not… but, you never know. Food poisoning really takes a toll on you. He might need an extra day or two to recover.”
“Makes sense. I should bring him a pizza,” she said. “I’ve only been to his place once, but I think I can find it.”
“No!” I said. “I mean, no need. He hasn’t been able to keep any solid food down. I told him I’d bring some chicken soup over later today.”