by SM Reine
We started to head back upriver, but hadn’t gone past more than two of the cavate openings when the voices grew clear and distinct behind us. Simon pulled me through one of the entrances and extinguished his light again. We patted our way to either side of the door, and I pressed my back against the wall.
The voices continued on, calm and unhurried. I hoped that meant they hadn’t heard us.
I kept waiting for a lamp or flashlight to brighten the air outside of the cave. It didn’t. They couldn’t possibly be navigating the narrow ledge in the dark... could they? No, they must have night-vision goggles. Although didn’t those need some ambient light to work?
Two splashes sounded right outside our cavate. I shouldn’t have peeked my head out—what exactly did I think I would see in the dark?—but some instinctual curiosity as to whether or not they’d fallen in prompted me to do so before my brain thought better of it. I saw one thing before jerking my head back, actually four things. Two violet eyes and two blue eyes. Glowing in the freaking dark. What the hell?
A pancake couldn’t have been pressed flatter to the wall than my back was. My heart pounded against my ribs, the image of those glowing eyes burned into my own retinas. They’d been out in the center of the river, the violet pair turned toward the blue pair as the men continued their conversation. Men. Was that the right word? I didn’t know why, but for some reason, glowing eyes disturbed me more than the idea of a monster.
The voices faded until only the sound of running water remained.
“So Simon,” I said, the pitch of my voice uneven, “what episode of Star Trek has aliens with eyes that glow in the dark?”
At that point, I wasn’t sure if I was joking or not. I’d never once entertained the idea of aliens or extraterrestrial influence for the weirdness of the monster—like I’d said, scientists were doing all sorts of funky things with gene manipulation these days—but this was different. Nobody was supposed to be making mutant people. Even if somewhere, some unscrupulous Dr. Frankenstein was, those guys appeared to be in their twenties. I sincerely doubted the technology had been that advanced more than two decades earlier. I tried to remember when the first sheep had been cloned. Back in the 90s sometime. But those riders weren’t clones. They were... what? I didn’t know. Genetically enhanced human beings? If they had see-in-the-dark eyes, who knew what else they might have?
“Gary Mitchell’s eyes glowed silver in Where No Man Has Gone Before,” Simon said.
“What?” My mind had been zipping from thought to thought so quickly that I’d forgotten what I’d asked and it took me a moment to remember.
“It was the second Star Trek pilot. Remember the one where the cast hadn’t yet been solidified? And they were down on that planet with the two officers who developed psionic powers? Their eyes glowed silver. I don’t remember if they were shown glowing in the dark ever, but uhm... why do you ask?”
“No particular reason.” My short laugh had a hysterical edge to it. I clasped my hand over my mouth to muffle the noise, afraid it would travel. Those two might not have noticed me sticking my head out, but they’d spot our duct tape rope when they got to the hole. I stiffened. Temi would still be up there, and they might not look kindly upon her after the fire extinguisher incident. “We better follow them.”
CHAPTER 14
The duct tape rope was gone.
“Not good,” Simon whispered.
Daylight still entered through the hole in the ceiling, but less of it than before. The sun must be dropping behind the trees up there. Even though I had no idea what those two... people had done down here, besides burning a hole into the rock, I was more than ready to get out of the forest. That would, however, prove difficult if we couldn’t escape the passage.
“Any idea how far the river flows before it pops above ground again?” Simon asked.
“Not until Wickenburg. And just in case you’re thinking of taking a swim, the odds of the ceiling remaining high with a breathable supply of air the whole way are not good.”
“No wonder this isn’t on that site for Arizona’s best tubing spots.”
I closed my eyes, trying to listen for voices up above. Several moments had passed since we’d last heard the words of Eleriss and Jakatra. After our brief encounters, it was strange to think of them by first name, but I couldn’t consider them normal human beings now, so calling them “men” seemed even odder.
“Temi?” I risked calling up.
Somewhere high above a peregrine falcon screeched. I tried to decide if that was a bad omen or not. At least it wasn’t a vulture.
“Temi?” I called again, louder this time.
Simon sprang up, trying to touch the walls at the bottom of the hole. He didn’t come close, managing only to get both of us wetter.
“You jump like a geeky white guy,” I said.
“Yeah, there weren’t a lot of NBA teams scouting my high school.”
“Is this the high school you’ve mentioned before that had a hundred and fifty students?”
“That’s the one,” Simon said.
“Did it have a basketball team?”
“Of course. Football too. If we hadn’t had jocks, who do you think would have tormented me between classes?”
“The girls you tried to woo by quoting Star Trek episodes?”
“No, I would have been happy for such attention from them.”
When my calls didn’t produce a rope-dropping savior, I reluctantly uncoiled my whip. It was already wet from my trek through the river, and I didn’t have any confidence in my ability to crack it through a hole, much less get the popper to wrap around something up there, but I might as well try. It’d distract me from how cold my lower body was—not to mention the slimy something that had just brushed past my hip.
I prodded around with a foot, searching for a rock to stand on, something that would get more of my body out of the water. “Can you give me a boost?” I finally asked.
Simon eyed the whip dubiously. “Do you promise not to hit me?”
“I’ll try.”
“That wasn’t a yes, was it?”
“Sorry, this is going to be awkward. I might hit myself.”
“That doesn’t make me feel as good about being whipped as you’d think,” Simon said.
“I’m not even sure the hole is wide enough for what I plan. Boost, please.”
Simon grumbled under his breath but clasped his hands together to make a step for me. He sank down, hissing at the coldness of the water, so I could clamber from there to his shoulders. When he stood, I could reach the bottom of the hole. Too bad the stone was too slick to climb. At least I could brace myself with one hand.
I’d never tried to snap the whip directly over my head, and it took me a minute to find a position where I could send the thong through the hole. It took several more minutes to figure out a technique that would get the popper and the fall out of the hole up above. At last, the whip made a muted crack. Now if I could find something for it to latch onto... Unfortunately, our friends had cleared away all the foliage around the hole. But there’d been a stump a couple of feet up the bank. Maybe...
“Not to complain,” Simon said, “but every time you snap that thing, your clod-stompers grind into my shoulder.”
“While I appreciate your uncomplaining support in holding me up, I feel compelled to—” I snapped the whip again, knowing it’d be luck and repetition rather than skill that wrapped it around the stump, if I managed the feat at all. “Compelled to point out that they’re running shoes. The heel isn’t hard.”
“It is when it’s under a hundred and—”
“Careful,” I said, as the whip, failing to grasp anything, tumbled back down to be coiled again. “I might forget our deal not to hit you.”
“Right.”
I snapped the whip again. This time, to my surprise, it didn’t flop limply back into our hole. It’d caught on something. I was about to give it a tug to see if it would support our weight, when someone up the
re finally spoke.
“That would be my ankle,” Temi said.
“Oops,” Simon said.
“Temi, is it safe up there?” I asked. “Can you lower our rope?”
“Your rope was... incinerated. I’ll see if I can tie the whip to this stump.”
“Incinerated?” Simon asked.
I thought of the glowing eyes. What else could Eleriss and Jakatra do? I let go of the handle to give Temi some slack.
“Can you reach it?” she asked a moment later.
“I can, though we’re going to have to think of something else to pull up Simon. He won’t be able to reach it. It seems he wasn’t on his high school basketball team.”
“Go ahead,” he said. “I have more tape in my pack. I’ll make another rope.”
“I hope duct tape is tax deductible.”
“Given that it’s being used in our pursuit of pictures of monsters that are going up on our webpage to make us advertising money, I should think so.”
“I’d love to be in the room when you explain that to the IRS auditor.”
“Hm,” Simon said, “maybe we’ll just categorize it under shipping supplies.”
Temi had finished tying the whip, so I grasped the handle. Even with its aid, the climb wasn’t easy. I struggled to pull myself up, hand-over-hand until I was high enough that I could thrust my feet against the walls to reduce the strain on my arms. Given how physical our workdays had been of late, Simon and I might have to add gym memberships to our tax deductions too.
“What happened up here?” I asked while Simon worked on Rope Number Two. “Did you have any warning that those guys were climbing out, or did they see you?”
“Your rope started smoking, then burst into flames,” she said. “I took that as a warning.”
“Er, I would too.”
“I rushed over there and hid.” Temi pointed toward a couple of thick-trunked trees growing from the bank. “I’d barely reached the spot when one climbed out, with the other right after.”
“Wait, they climbed out after they torched the rope?”
She nodded. “They seemed quite agile.”
My mind boggled at the idea. I’d barely made it out with the whip.
“One of them was carrying something too,” Temi said.
“Oh?” I hadn’t seen a thing in the dark down there, aside from those eyes.
“It was bundled up, but a handle or maybe a hilt stuck out of the end. If I had to guess, I’d say it was a sword.”
“A sword? What would that be doing down there? Nobody in North America had swords until the Spaniards showed up.” An image of an Aztec Macuahuitl came to mind, but that was more like a sharpened club than a sword.
“It can’t be a Spanish sword?” Temi asked.
“Well, I guess it could if the cavates aren’t as old as I thought. Or... I don’t know. They dug under the caves, didn’t they? For something buried... when? Before the cavates were dug? It’d make even less sense for a sword to be in there, then, don’t you think?” I was puzzled, but I was fascinated. I really wanted to talk to those riders again. And figure out a way to convince them to provide answers to my oodles of questions.
“I don’t even know what a cavate is,” Temi pointed out.
“My rope’s ready,” Simon called up. “Can someone catch it?”
“Yes,” Temi and I said together.
Something slapped the side of the hole, then splashed into the water below. “Oops, just a second. This is going to take a few tries.”
A distant roar sounded from farther up the valley. Motorcycles starting up.
I grimaced. “Not that there was much room for maneuvering, but I wish we’d hidden Zelda.”
“We’ll have to hope they thought incinerating the rope was enough of a delaying tactic,” Temi said.
A wad of braided duct tape flopped out of the hole. I caught it before it could fall back in, then tied the end around the stump. “If they incinerated the van, Simon will be devastated.”
“I didn’t get the sense that they felt that... angry toward us,” Temi said.
“What gives you that idea?”
“I thought I was pretty quiet in moving toward my hiding spot, but they both looked toward my trees before they jogged off up the riverbed.”
“They saw you?” I asked, then leaned over the hole. “You’re set, Simon.”
“Thanks, coming now,” he called up.
“I can’t be positive, but it seemed so,” Temi said. “After eyeing my hiding spot, they exchanged looks with each other. I thought their expressions were more... exasperated than murderous.”
“It’s true that I didn’t get a murderous vibe when I talked to the chatty one either,” I said. “Though I definitely don’t think we should consider them buddies.”
“Which one is the ‘chatty’ one?”
“Uh, the younger one. I guess I can’t be sure if he’s younger, but he seems more innocent. Less hard and chiseled. That’s Eleriss. Blue Eyes.”
Scuffs and pants drifted up from below. Simon was having as much fun with the climb as I’d had.
“What’s the other one’s name?” Temi asked. “He was more... striking.”
“Jakatra.”
Simon’s head popped up, then he stuck his hands out on either side of the hole. The worried crease on his brow didn’t seem to have anything to do with the climb. He was frowning at Temi, though she was gazing off in the direction the riders had gone.
“Who’s striking?” Simon mouthed to me.
“It’s not important.” I stood and helped him the rest of the way out of the hole. Even if Temi thought Jakatra was a handsome cat, she’d reassess any attraction once she saw those eyes on a dark night. I shuddered. I told myself it was because of my soaking clothing, but I wasn’t certain that was the truth.
CHAPTER 15
By the time we made it back to the van, the sky had grown a few shades darker. The sight of Zelda’s blue paint filled me with relief. The van hadn’t been incinerated or otherwise demolished. So long as Eleriss and Jakatra hadn’t decided to pay us back with slashed tires...
Perhaps fearing the same thing, Simon jogged ahead. While he was doing a lap around the van, his gaze toward the tires, I noticed that the driver-side window had been rolled up. It had been down before, hadn’t it? Yes, and I’d cracked the one on the passenger side a few inches too. Now all of the windows were up.
“I think our friends may have visited the van again,” I said.
Simon followed my gaze to the windows, then he tried the side door. We’d locked it, but he opened it without needing a key. “I knew it! I’ve got those punks now!”
He jumped inside, his fists balled, then lunged for the corner where he kept the Dirt Viper.
“Huh, it’s still here,” he said.
I climbed inside. “If they found their sword, they wouldn’t need a metal detector anymore.”
“Their sword?” Simon asked.
“You didn’t hear that part?”
“Must have been when I was grunting and straining to get out of that hole.”
“When they left, Temi saw them carrying a bundle she thought might be a sword,” I said. Temi had fallen behind on the jog back to the van, but she was limping out of the riverbed now. I gave her a wave, then turned the motion into a scratch of my jaw and peered around the van. “If the metal detector is here, what’s missing?”
“I’m... not sure. But I can find out.” Simon headed toward the front. “Could be they enjoyed the springiness of our seat cushions the last time they broke in and came in to rest their feet.”
“Yes, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been tempted to jump into random people’s cars to take a load off, if only I knew how to pick the locks.”
Simon had left his MacBook on the dashboard, but he frowned when he got up there. It was upside down on the floor. “Weird.”
I sniffed. “Does the van smell like cleaning solution to you?”
“Now th
at you mention it... yes, which is odd. Because we don’t clean.” He picked up the computer and prodded a key, bringing the screen to life, though it brightened gradually instead of simply flashing on, like usual.
“Hey, I sweep out the bread crumbs now and then.”
Temi leaned inside. “Perhaps we should discuss this from the safety of town. It’s starting to get dark, and it took us a while to drive out here.”
“Good idea.” Even if the monster was twenty miles to the north, I didn’t relish the idea of navigating the tangle of unmarked forest service and logging roads in the dark.
“Wait,” Simon said. “Let’s see what my camera footage caught.”
“You recorded the interior of the van?”
“Knowing those thieves were parked right up the gully? Of course, I did.”
I gave him a quick look, wondering if it was “thieves” he’d hoped to catch footage of. Maybe he’d thought the monster would be out here and that the riders had been heading out to deal with it. And maybe his recording had less to do with getting me a language sample and more to do with catching that thing on video.
Simon plopped into the passenger seat without meeting my gaze and brought up the webcam software.
Temi looked at the woods, then climbed in and shut the door. “Can you drive, Delia?”
“Yes, if someone didn’t lose the keys in the river.” I poked Simon in the shoulder.
He was fast-forwarding through footage of the van’s interior. Without taking his focus from the screen, he fished the keys out of his pocket and handed them to me.
I didn’t get further than plugging the right one into the ignition when he said, “Ah ha!”
My curiosity got the best of me again, and I leaned over to watch. One figure in a black leather jacket hopped into the van, then the other followed. Jakatra carried the bundle Temi had mentioned. That did look like a sword hilt sticking out of the fabric wrapping. The camera had recorded the sound of them speaking, though it was hard to make out because they hadn’t been anywhere near the built-in microphone. But maybe with enough enhancement...