“Aye, aye, Cap’n,” he snorted, but not unfriendly.
“Like I said,” Syd began. “I saw you guys, everything went black, and then I woke up by the lake.”
“Actually,” Xander interjected. “I think we need to go back further than that.” At Syd’s raised eyebrows he scowled at her. “How the hell did Doc get you from the cabin?”
She winced sheepishly. “I thought I heard something outside the cabin. I went to go check it out but—”
“What the hell?” Xander snapped, sitting up straighter. “You heard something but didn’t wake me up?”
Syd raised a hand and Xander stopped yelling. “At first I just thought it was another hallucination. I hadn’t realized yet that whenever I hallucinated, it was always silent. The hallucinations never had sound.” ET gave her a strange look, but if she saw it she ignored it. “I figured I was just going to see something that wasn’t even there again. I didn’t want to wake you up for that. And I didn’t want to look like a crazy idiot again.”
Xander glared at her. He couldn’t believe she had shut him out again. And look what it had caused. He glanced at Shay and was glad to see she looked angry too.
“Syd,” his sister began.
But Sydney interrupted. “I know! I know! I don’t need a lecture. Trust me, I’ve learned my lesson about trying to do things on my own.”
“Have you really?” Shay asked.
Xander was glad that she was giving Syd shit for her actions. She managed to not sound as angry as she did worried. Xander’s words would have been much harsher, and Syd didn’t need that. Instead, he kept his teeth clamped together and breathed through his nose. He glanced at ET and realized he was still staring warily and Xander’s stomach sank. ET was putting the pieces together.
“Yes!” Sydney promised.
“Then what happened?” Xander finally managed to ask without sounding like he wanted to shake sense into her.
“Look,” she held up her hands. “I know it was stupid to go out and check things myself, but you have to put yourself in my shoes. Would you guys want everyone thinking you were crazy? Or worse, dangerous?”
“Fine,” Xander closed his eyes. “I probably would have done the same thing,” he almost managed to convince himself. “Go on.”
“Well, by the time I realized it wasn’t just a hallucination, it was too late. Doc was there. He had a bomb. He said if I didn’t come with him I would never get answers. And he threatened to kill you all. I did what seemed like the best thing at the time. He told me I was different. I needed to know why. I figured I could resist and he could kill us all there. Or, I could go with him, get some answers, and find a way to escape. I knew I had once already.
“Wait, wait, wait,” ET broke in. He stared at Sydney with wide eyes and had pressed himself into the door. “What do you mean you were ‘different?’ And why did you have to escape from him once before?”
Sydney looked from ET to Shay to Xander. He could see the wheels turning for both ET and Syd. Finally, her eyebrows raised. “He doesn’t know?”
“Know what?” ET snapped.
“No, not really” Xander ignored the kid. “I just told him I was trying to find my girlfriend who had been researching strange events…alien events,” he admitted, tired of skirting what they all knew they were dealing with. “I told him you had disappeared after researching the Quimbayan dig.”
“Aaaaahhh,” a strangled cry erupted from ET’s throat. He started banging on the door. “Stop the car! Let me out!”
“Whoa!” Shay yelled as ET managed to get the door open.
Zak veered towards the shoulder and slammed on the brakes.
“Calm down,” Xander yelled. He reached over Sydney to grab the kid’s shirt. “Stop!”
“She’s one of them!” he yelled. “Dejar ir de mí!”
Shay jumped from the passenger seat and blocked ET’s path. But Xander didn’t let go of him. He wasn’t a big guy, but he could hurt Shay trying to get by her. Zak put the truck in park and hurried to back Shay up. With the two of them holding onto ET, Xander finally let him go. He climbed out of the truck and Syd followed him. They joined Shay and Zak, but Xander just held up his hands.
“I didn’t tell you because I knew it would freak you out and I didn’t know if I could trust you or not. Sydney isn’t dangerous.”
“Mierda!” ET wasn’t struggling anymore, but he wasn’t ready to calm down just yet. “She is dangerous!”
“No. She’s not,” Xander assured him. He wanted to knock the kid on his ass and make him calm down, but that would be counterproductive.
“She has one of those things in her head!” he yelled, beginning to sound hysterical.
“Look!” Xander raised his hands. “I should have told you the whole story.”
“Besides,” Syd spoke up from next to Xander. “I’m pretty sure whatever was in my head is gone now. Everyone turned to stare at her in shock. “I mean, I’m not positive. It could just be dead.”
Chapter Eleven
After they had managed to calm ET down, Xander, Zak, Shay and Sydney convinced the kid to get back in the truck. He had refused to sit next to Syd though. Rolling her eyes, she took the front seat that Shay offered her. Syd could tell Xander was trying really hard to not let his anger show. She gave him a reassuring smile and he visibly relaxed a little. Anger was Xander’s go-to reaction. He wasn’t violent, but his temper was harsh and sometimes abrasive. It was just his way. Sydney was confident he was smart enough to know being angry at ET wasn’t going to help things. He closed his eyes for a moment and when he opened them again his shoulders lowered and he took a deep breath.
Syd let out a breath that she didn’t realize she had been holding. She wanted to goad Xander on the fact that he was being a hypocrite. He had gotten angry at her for not being open and honest with him, but he had done the same damn thing to ET. She put the dig away in her pocket for the next time Xander brought up her bad decisions.
Shay broke the heavy silence that had hung over the car. “What makes you think the…alien is gone?”
“The Dyian,” she told the car.
“The what?” Xander asked.
“The Dyian. That’s what Doc called them.”
“Which doctor took you?” Shay asked.
“I don’t know, I just called him Doc,” Syd looked at ET helplessly. He didn’t speak for several moments. She could see him trying to decide if she really was safe. He must have eventually decided she was safe enough to talk to.
“Did he have dark or light hair?”
“Kind of colorless. Light.”
“That is Robards.”
“Was,” Syd almost smiled.
“Was?”
“He’s dead.”
“How do you know,” ET asked and she could hear the hope in his voice.
“I stabbed him in the neck with a piece of glass. Then the Dyian crushed his throat. Then I blew up the cabin with him in it for good measure,” Syd couldn’t stop the smile that finally spread across her face.
The corner of ET’s mouth twitched. “Good.”
Syd looked at Xander and he was staring with a half smirk. “Well done.”
“What did you think was going on, if you didn’t know the whole story?” Sydney asked the kid.
“I don’t know?” he mumbled. “I just thought you…were trying to figure out what was going on too. Knew more than you should. Like me.”
“Eh, sorry.” When ET shrugged, she moved on. Syd recounted what she had learned from Robards. “Apparently, he took me after I replied to a request for beta testers. I must have met him somewhere and he drugged me.” Her stomach soured at the admission but she brushed it off. It’s not my fault someone drugged me and kidnapped me. Nothing I did deserved that. She hoped that she would eventually believe it completely.
“How are people infected?” Zak asked.
“The spores are implanted somehow. In the brain. Through the nose, I think.”
Xande
r shuddered. “Fucking bastards.”
“Apparently, they do best in people with more developed prefrontal cortices. Highly skilled people. Gamers. Mathematicians. Scientists. He infected his partner, Andrew.”
“Doctor Horowitz,” ET chimed in.
“I guess so.”
“Jesus,” Shay whispered. “His own partner.”
“Yeah. Some drug lord had been helping them.”
“Moreno,” ET supplied.
Syd nodded at him. “He convinced Moreno that he could get the specimen out in the States. That he would be able to transplant more Dyians into people if he could have access to resources in the States.”
“That worked?” Xander snorted.
“Apparently. But Doc let the Dyian hatch. They reproduce asexually. So, soon he had spores that he could put into new people. He used young, techie people. He said he figured they were less likely to be missed.”
“And that’s what caused the dreams?” Shay asked.
“I’m really not sure. I don’t know how much Doc—Robards—actually knew and how much he was just guessing. Some stuff just doesn’t make sense. He said that it takes about twenty-eight days for a spore to hatch. And I think he believed that caused the dreams. But, the timing doesn’t stack up.”
“Why not?” Xander asked.
“Well, for example, most of us were implanted about the same time. But, some seem to be on a different time line.”
Zak glanced at her. “How so?”
“Conner, he ‘lost it’ before Pan. Pan went batshit next. But, Randall—Short Man—he seems to have been crazy from the get-go. But, for all I know, he was a monster before he was infected.”
“And you,” Xander leaned forward. “You never went crazy.”
Syd laughed. “I guess it depends on your definition of crazy.”
Shay rolled her eyes, but smiled. “Did anyone else have memory problems?”
“Not that I know of.”
“So, what makes everyone different?” Xander asked.
“I wish I knew.”
ET finally spoke up again. “What makes you think it’s gone?”
“Before I…lost time…again. I was having headaches. Nosebleeds. I was starving all the time. I was exhausted. Having hallucinations.”
“Now?” he asked.
“I woke up with a headache. And…I was sick. I threw up this awful black stuff.” Everyone cringed, as she knew they would. “I think I almost had frostbite. But, after I got reoriented, I’ve been fine. I mean, I’m just operating on guesses here, but I don’t think it’s there.”
“Where the hell did it go? I mean, clearly, it didn’t come out like the one in the parking lot,” Shay shuddered.
“No. It definitely didn’t,” Syd agreed.
“So…?” Xander trailed off.
“No clue.”
“This is all incredibly frustrating,” Zak stated needlessly.
“No kidding,” Syd deadpanned. “I hurt my knee really badly when Doc was running tests on me. When I woke up, it was fine. Like I never hurt it. Granted, it could have just healed in a month…but it’s just another weird fact on top of everything else.
“So, how did you get from the Lake to Millville?” Shay asked.
“Well, that’s a pretty weird story too,” Syd snorted.
Chapter Twelve
By the time Sydney got done telling her friends about Frankie and George they were all struck silent.
“OK, we need to find a place to stop,” Zak announced. “I can’t take anymore weird shit without smoking a bowl first.”
“Agreed,” Shay sighed.
“Any ideas of where we can go?” Xander asked.
“Well, I didn’t want to interrupt Syd’s story, but we actually crossed into Franklin a while back.”
Syd was surprised. “Really?!”
“Yeah, a sign pointed this way for food, so I’m hoping we find a hotel too.”
“Sweet!” Shay looked excitedly out the window as if she was going to see a hotel already.
“Problem though,” Xander announced. “We shouldn’t use our credit cards. And does anyone actually have cash?”
“I have a few dollars,” Sydney offered.
“I have a little,” Shay added.
Together, the five of them were able to come up with eighty-nine dollars. “Will that be enough?” Sydney asked.
“For a shit-hole probably,” Zak shrugged. “It’s better than nothing.”
“Agreed,” Xander nodded. “It will do at least until we figure out a plan.”
Fifteen minutes later they found a small strip of restaurants, gas stations and two hotels. Shay was the one to point out the flaw in their plan. “I just thought of something, guys.”
“Uh oh,” Xander looked at her from the corner of his eyes. “What?”
“They will still want a credit card. Hotels want one for a deposit, don’t they?”
“Shit,” Syd grumbled.
Xander groaned. “How much weed do we have?”
“Nope, no way,” Zak shook his head.
“Do you have any other ideas? We can’t keep driving all night. We can’t go back to Chicago.”
“God dammit,” Zak scowled. “It’s in the glove box.”
Sydney opened the compartment and pulled out a travel mug. “Is this it?”
“Yes.”
She twisted off the cap and pulled out the baggie. “Wow, you travel heavy don’t you?”
“It’s most of a quarter.”
“Give it here,” Xander held out his hand and Syd passed him the baggie. “Go to the Rest Inn.” He pointed towards the more run down of the two hotels. “That one is our best shot.”
“How very stereotypical of you,” Shay laughed.
“Well, I’m pretty sure a place that isn’t a chain will be less likely to want to put our information into any kind of system.”
Zak parked the truck around the corner and out of view of the office at Xander’s direction. “Syd, take off your coat and come with me.” He twisted the cap back onto the travel mug after dropping some of the weed back inside.
“Uh, ok.”
Zak returned the mug to the glove box and Xander and Syd exited the truck. Xander wrapped an arm around her shoulders as they made their way towards the office. The lobby was little more than a carpeted space with two chairs older than Sydney and a coffee table that was scarred and stained. The whole place smelled like old cooking oil and she wrinkled her nose. A man sat behind the counter watching a tiny TV. He stood when they walked inside.
“Can I help you?” He was probably in his early thirties and Syd was pretty sure he was on a sex offender registry somewhere. His hair was greasy and a large, nasty look scar cut across his chin.
“We need a room,” Xander told him.
He glanced at the two of them. “How many nights?”
“One for now.”
“Sixty-nine-ninety-five per night.”
“Cash OK?”
They guy narrowed his eyes at them, his gaze lingered on Sydney’s throat. “I’m guessing that’s all you got?”
“Yep.”
“In that case, there is a sixty-nine ninety-five security deposit.”
Xander glanced at Sydney and then back to the guy. “What’s your name?”
“Jeff,” the guy grunted.
“Jeff,” Xander leaned on the counter. “Look, her ex,” he nodded towards Syd. “Is a real asshole, if you get my drift?”
Sydney’s back stiffened. Son of a… She was annoyed that Xander was making her a victim, but she managed to not contradict him. She stared at the counter, playing the part and hiding her anger at the same time. She hoped the clerk was stupid enough to believe the story.
“He also knows a bunch of cops. If we use a credit card, he’ll be able to find us. And we don’t have that much cash.”
Jeff scowled. “Tough—”
“But,” Xander interrupted. “What I do have, is the sixty-nine ninety-five and thi
s.” He pulled the baggy from his pocket and laid it on the counter. “Its good shit,” he promised. “You can smoke it or sell it.”
Jeff stared at the weed for a long moment "What makes you think I won't call the cops and report your asses now?"
"Why bother?" Xander shrugged. "It's a little weed. We'll be gone before they get here and you'll miss out on the money."
Apparently, Jeff was stupid enough. The man stared at them for a long while. “Fine.” He finally relented and shoved the baggy in his pocket. It wasn't his job to care anyway. He pulled a key from a rack of pegs on the wall. “If you fuck up the room I’ll call the cops for sure. Room 19.”
“Fair enough,” Xander snatched the key.
Outside, Syd scowled at Xander. “Thanks for that.”
“Hey! It worked didn’t it. We even have a little cash left.”
He jiggled the key at the truck and pointed in the direction of the room. While Zak moved the truck to a closer spot Xander and Syd made their way down the sidewalk. As they passed one of the rooms a woman half-screaming, half-moaning caused Syd to jump. “Shit.”
Xander glared at the room. “Great. I hope that is a sexy scream and not a scared scream.”
“Right.”
They unlocked their door and turned on the light. The room wasn’t as bad as Sydney had been afraid it would be. It was clean and only smelled a little like mildew. Catching her off guard, Xander shut the door behind them and pushed Sydney against it. Her stomach fluttered and she smiled up at him as he cupped her face and ran his thumbs over her cheeks. “I thought I had lost you," he whispered against her lips. His eyes burned into hers with such intensity, she almost had to look away.
“Nope,” she ran her bottom lip over his and he dug his fingers into her hair.
When he pressed his lips against hers she felt her heart shudder in relief and excitement. She wished they weren’t sharing a room with three other people. A wish that was reinforced when Shay slammed into the door jarring Syd and Xander both.
“Hey! Let me in! I need to pee!”
Chapter Thirteen
Shay rushed into the room oblivious to the fact that Syd and Xander both scowled at her in annoyance. Zak came in next followed by a hesitant ET.
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