by M. G. Herron
A cheap coffee pot rested on a filing cabinet in the corner. I never used the filing cabinet for its intended purpose. There were dry-goods inside—a change of clothes, water, some snacks and of course, coffee beans. After combining ingredients in the right order and hitting the button, the smell of the fresh coffee filled the room. The ritual and the lovely smell helped relax me somewhat.
Finally, I grabbed an icepack from the freezer of the mini-fridge, then gazed around again, making sure nothing was out of place. Had that black smudge on the windowsill been there before I left? Had any of the papers on my desktop been disturbed?
“You’re acting really paranoid,” Anna said.
“Easy for you to say, I just got jumped by a…” I trailed off.
“A pack of robot attack dogs?”
I winced. “So you saw that.”
“The last few seconds. Who’s trying to kill you, Gunn?”
“Wish I knew.”
She arched a thin eyebrow.
I shook my head and sighed. “Another long story. One thing at a time.”
She dug a notebook and pen out of her bag.
“You’ve got to promise me you won’t put any of this on Marsha’s website. Or should I say, on your website.”
She opened her mouth. Closed it. “Why not?”
“Apart from the obvious reasons? I just got my ass handed to me back there. It’s dangerous.” I set the icepack against my left cheekbone, sucking air through my teeth as the frosty plastic touched my skin. I didn’t have to look in the mirror to know I’d be covered in yellow bruises in a few hours.
“Oh, you big baby.”
I glared at her over the icepack.
Pursing her lips, Anna tucked her pen and paper back into her bag. “I haven’t told anyone about Marsha. Start there. When did you figure it out?”
“Shortly after our date.”
She inhaled through her nose. The troubled emotions suddenly rose to her face, and her eyes trembled with fresh tears. “What happened, Anderson? Why can’t I remember anything other than a… a vague sense of terror and… the willies, sometimes? Like hands are touching me all over and I can’t wash the feeling off no matter how many hot showers I take?” She shuddered.
That part hadn’t been on her blog.
“Just ‘red dining menu, bedroom ceiling,’” I quoted.
She sniffed. “So you did read my blog.”
I nodded. “It started with the Kovak job. What happened to Kovak wasn’t what I expected at all—wasn’t what anyone would have expected.”
I sighed. This was difficult. How did I explain?
“We were eating lunch. Your phone rang and you left the restaurant. It was weird because it was the middle of the meal. When you disappeared, I followed you. You met someone at a café. Do you remember that?”
She shook her head.
“I didn’t hear the conversation, but it turned out to be Kovak’s mistress you met. Everything happened after that. There was a fight with—with the creature who killed Kovak.”
Anna inhaled through her nose. Her hand unconsciously reached into her bag for her notebook. I cleared my throat, and she pulled her hand back into her lap.
“Someone who was helping me got hurt in the fight. The creature disappeared into the crowd. When he emerged—”
“Wait, hold on, what kind of creature?”
“You might find this hard to believe…”
“An alien,” she said, matter-of-factly.
I nodded. “This one happened to have razor-edged tentacles and also be wanted for murder. An intergalactic fugitive with telepathic abilities. After he killed Cameron Kovak, he wore his skin like a suit. Nasty stuff.”
“No shit?”
“None at all.”
Anna swallowed. “No wonder I keep getting this creepy feeling all over.”
“He took you hostage. Though you fought mightily, he had you completely under his control. He made you steal my truck and drive off with him.”
“I stole your truck‽”
“It wasn’t your idea. You were under duress. But we chased you down, me and Detective Gonzalez, and someone named Dyna. Dyna’s a Peacekeeper. It was her partner who got hurt in the fight with this murderous alien.”
“What in the world is a Peacekeeper?”
“Look, I'm not supposed to be telling you any of this.” She twisted an imaginary key to her lips. I let out a breath and said, “Peacekeepers are… other aliens. From what I gather, they’re kind of like, you know, intergalactic cops.”
Her eyebrows knit together and she frowned.
“I know, it sounds crazy, but there it is. Anyway, we followed you, eventually found where you’d been taken. The Peacekeepers and Gonzalez and I killed the alien and rescued you. Kovak’s mistress, the one you went to meet at the café, turned out to be half-cracked. I think you knew that already. You were in much better shape since he’d had less time with you. The Peacekeeper wiped your memory so the awful experience didn’t traumatize you.”
Anna crossed her arms. “Why did you let her do that? Don’t you think I’d want to remember what happened?”
“You act as if it was my choice. But I won’t pretend like I tried very hard to stop her, either. What happened to you was awful. Dyna could make it go away, just like that.” I snapped my fingers. “And you could go back to living your normal life. Seemed like the best possible outcome at the time.”
She glared at me as she balled her fists under her crossed arms. “After all I did for you. I thought we were friends.”
“We are friends, Anna.”
“Friends don’t deceive each other like that.”
When the coffee maker sputtered, I poured a steaming black brew into two stained porcelain mugs and handed one to Anna. She cupped it in her hands, as if trying to draw its warm comfort into herself.
“I didn’t realize until later that your normal life involved writing and researching obsessively about alien encounters.”
“I don’t write only about aliens. I cover all kinds of unexplained natural phenomena on the blog. A lot of the people I interview point the blame at aliens, but that’s not my focus.”
“Strange hobby for an accountant, wouldn’t you say? Guess I’m not the only one practiced in the art of deception.”
Anna looked away, tucked a strand of stray hair behind one ear, and sat back in her chair. “That’s why I don’t tell anyone about it. I used to. When I was younger… and more idealistic. I was obsessed with UFOs and other urban legends. But now? At my age, if I told people what I really did in my free time, they would call me crazy.”
“Well, I don’t think you’re crazy.”
“But you don’t respect me enough to tell me the truth, either.”
“I’m telling you now, aren’t I? At least now you understand the real reason why I didn’t want to return your phone calls. What I’ve seen these past few weeks… I couldn’t face you.” I looked down at the desktop and shook my head to clear the feeling of shame that made me want to curl up into a ball and die. “You think you have the willies now, but you have no freaking idea. I’m just beginning to realize how little I know about these offworlders.”
“Offworlders?”
“That’s what they call each other, as a collective. I’ve met offworlders of dozens of different species.”
She shook her head in disbelief.
“Honestly, you’re taking this all rather well. Better than I expected.”
“I guess I have some practice,” she said. “I get unbelievable emails from my readers every day. They’re desperate to talk to someone, to anyone who will listen. Most folks will rationalize whatever doesn’t fit their worldview, given a little bit of time… but some. Some can’t let go of the things they’ve seen. Even when their friends and family don’t believe them.”
“Do you believe them?”
She shrugged. “I don’t feel like it’s my job to pass judgement. It’s my job to tell their stories, and that’s
what I focus on. Personally, I’ve always suspected there was other life out there in the universe. And there’s a whole lot that we still don’t understand right here on Earth. Anyone with half a brain can see that.”
She blew on her steaming mug, took a little sip. She wasn’t wrong about that. It was part of the reason I read her blog and had always loved hearing stories of conspiracy theories. It was hard not to be drawn into that narrative.
“Got any cream?” she asked.
I reached down into the small mini-fridge and produced a small yellow bottle with a red cap, and handed it over. “So you’ve always believed?” I asked.
“As for alien life, it seems so obvious to me,” Anna said. “We found water on Mars. We found organic life on Jupiter’s moons. Why not other intelligent life elsewhere? We only occupy one tiny corner of the universe. Tangible proof of extraterrestrial life, however, is hard to come by.” She made a frustrated noise in her throat. “I can’t believe that the one time I do see something, I can’t remember a damn thing. Tell me more. You owe me that much. What else do you know?”
I don’t know if it was guilt that drove me, or just a desire to connect with someone, but I finally opened up and told Anna what I knew. Over the course of the next hour, I regurgitated every single piece of knowledge I’d acquired about the Peacekeepers, who wanted my help to keep Earth safe; about the Federation of Lodi, who the Peacekeepers worked for and who were the primary governing force in the galaxy; about the Gatekeeper and the rest of the underworld of alien weirdos living in and around Austin. Just about the only thing I didn’t tell her about was my promise to Dyna to report back to her if I saw evidence of the Tetrad’s presence on Earth again.
Anna listened with rapt attention, hanging onto my every word, soaking it up like a dry sponge. She asked probing questions whenever I stopped for breath, and I answered them as best I could. Although, admittedly, my base of knowledge was far from complete. There was so much I was still trying to puzzle out.
She asked harder questions, too—questions I hadn’t been ready to grapple with on my own. Who else on Earth was aware of aliens living among us? Had the government been hiding it? Did offworlders have anything to do with the increasing number of UFO sightings and other strange phenomena, like Roswell and Bigfoot, documented throughout the last century?
I told her the truth: “I don’t know.”
Anna was a good audience. When I started laying out the events of last night, she ooh’d and ahh’d in all the right places. When I told her about Vinny’s real identity, she gasped and covered her mouth with her hands.
And she was seriously worried about him, same as me. Apparently, they’d had a few long chats in my absence, and she’d grown fond of the restaurateur.
“What if something’s happened to Vinny? You have to go check on him.”
“As soon as I can,” I said. “First, I need to find this drug dealer the Gatekeeper told me about. I’ve got…” I checked the clock on my cell phone. “…about ten hours before Vinny is supposed to wake up.”
“This dealer, what did you say his name was?”
“Spider.”
“Hm…”
“You know something?”
“I might know people who might know something. Can’t be many grown men going by the name of Spider unless they drive a Harley Davidson.” She let out a mirthless laugh. “I’ll ask around.”
“Thanks. I appreciate that.”
“One more thing,” she said. “This Peacekeeper you told me about, the one with the cybernetic implants—Dyna.”
I nodded.
“What did she say to you when she left? You told me a minute ago she had a ship. She just packed up her things and flew away?”
“More or less. Her partner, Kilos, was hurt pretty badly and she needed to get him back.”
“And that’s it?”
“Pretty much,” I said.
Only it wasn’t.
Anna shrugged, then stepped out to make a phone call to inquire about this Spider. A few minutes later, after applying some antiseptic to the cuts caused by those damn robot attack dogs on my shins and chest and arms, an idea struck me. I popped outside to grab the gray cloak from my truck.
Anna was walking up and down the sidewalk, talking on the phone. She gave me a tight smile and a thumbs up. I grabbed the cloak and went back inside.
It turned out to be even better than I suspected. Upon closer examination, I discovered a small device built into the cloak that encircled the cowl and neckline.
I’d never handled one of their reflective photon cloaking devices before, but the construction of the ones I’d seen the Peacekeepers and Vinny wear reminded me of this—not exactly the same, but similar in design. This one was a loop, only about the size of a thick chain. It was metallic, quite heavy for the size, and hidden in the fabric of the cloak so that it would encircle the person’s entire face when the hood was lifted.
I found a button near the base of the neck. A small beep and brief green LED light told me it had activated. The light went off.
Panicking, I dropped the cloak on my chair and stepped back. You know, in case it was going to self-destruct.
Anna came back into the room at that moment. She held up both hands, her phone pinched to her palm in one of them.
“Whoa, what is going on? You look like you’re bracing for impact.”
“It’s okay. I think.”
“You think?”
I lifted the cloak from the chair. Taking a deep breath to prepare myself, I wrapped the cloak around my shoulders, clasped it across my chest, and raised the hood.
“Take a photo.”
She lifted her phone. Whatever she saw on the screen made her eyes go wide.
She snapped a photo, turned it around and showed me the screen. Where my face should have been was a tan, pixellated blur.
Her eyes shone with a bright light that overshadowed the dark circles under her eyes. “Can I try?”
“Well, that explains one thing,” I said, elaborating to Anna briefly on the specifics of what I’d seen on the security footage at the Jel’ka track while she played with the face-masking device.
“This is how he hid his face from the cameras.”
“Why give up something so potentially useful?”
“He wants to show that he’s not afraid of me. He thinks that’ll be enough to scare me off.”
“Is it?”
“Hell no.”
This made Anna chuckle and shake her head. I couldn’t help but return the smirk as her rebellious spirit rose up to meet mine.
Damn, it felt good to talk to someone about all this stuff.
“And the other reason,” Anna added, “is that he knows you saw him in the cloak already. He can’t use it again unless he wants to risk giving himself away from the get-go.”
“Bingo. I need to get out to the track, see if Hix has narrowed down the suspect list at all.”
“I’d love to see this Jel’ka track…”
“Uh-uh, forget it. After everything that’s happened in the last twenty four hours, I’d be out of my mind to take you there.”
“You need someone to watch your back.”
I shook my head. “Too risky. I can’t protect both of us. If I go alone, I’m only risking my own life.”
She shoved her tongue against her lower incisors, jutting her chin at me aggressively. “I can look out for myself. I’ve taken Jiu Jitsu classes.”
“You don’t have the field experience.”
“I have more than you think! What do you know about my field experience? You’re just being sexist.”
“That’s not it at all. I’ve worked with plenty of women in the field. Like Detective Gonzalez.”
Anna rolled her eyes. “I still can’t believe the Peacekeepers let her keep her memories, but you let them take mine.”
“Gonzalez didn’t get kidnapped by an oversized, murderous land squid.”
“Whatever.”
My hear
t slumped as Anna turned away, sullen and angry at me yet again.
She sighed and leaned against the wall next to the window, letting herself slide down to the floor, the cloak spread across her lap. She settled it on her knee and took more photos and videos with her phone, testing the device’s limits. If it had any.
She had every right to be angry with me, but either she didn’t grasp the potential for danger, or she cared more about seeing these offworlders for herself than she did about staying safe.
A taut silence stretched between us. Anna kept turning the cloak over in her hand. At least now she had more than just my word for it.. The gray cloak, the face-obscuring device designed specifically to outsmart cameras, was a symbol of the hidden society I’d just described. Once hidden in plain sight, but no longer.
I sympathized. I’d stumbled into the hidden offworlder society by accident; whereas Anna had been searching for proof of the paranormal practically her entire life. She’d created a new identity just to protect her search for so-called “unexplained natural phenomena.” To keep exploring it. No one lived a shadow life that intensely unless they were truly committed to finding what they were looking for.
I slid down onto the floor next to her.
“Somebody wants to hurt me, Anna. Badly. I’ll never forgive myself if I drag you into that.”
“Too late, Bucko. At least, if I’m to believe your side of the story. I still can’t remember anything about that day. I just have to take your word for it.”
I hung my head. “You’re right. I have a lot to apologize for. But that doesn’t mean I want to do anything that could make it worse than it already is. Whoever sent those robots after me means business.”
“Even better reason to bring me with you. You need help.”
I shook my head. “If the attack dogs today had seen you, they would have hurt you just as badly as they did me. Maybe worse.”
She looked away, but stopped arguing.
“I have an idea though. There’s another way you can help.”
“I already made a couple calls. We’ll find this Spider.”
“Not just find him,” I said. “We need to figure out where he’s getting this alien drug, Ora. If we trace the Ora back to its source, it will help us figure out who attacked Vinny. And why.”