Then she was gone, sliding down the ladder.
“God, what a hardass,” Kurnow whispered.
“You don’t know the half of it.” Dropping his own night vision goggles into place, he turned to find Kurnow standing just a few feet away, looking at him, her gun lowered by her side. With a sigh, he raised the Taser and took aim at her chest. “Sorry, kid,” he said softly as he squeezed the trigger.
THE HITCHHIKER
Jack and Melissa looked everywhere for Koshka. Jack crawled on his hands and knees under the LAV, walked the perimeter out to the wire, searched through the bushes and shrubs around the lab building, and asked every Marine he came across if he or she had seen Naomi’s white cat.
No one had.
“Naomi’s going to have your head, Dawson,” Carl told him after Jack had returned empty-handed. Jack set Alexander down. He’d had to carry him most of the time during their search.
Melissa’s cheeks were wet with tears. “It’s my fault,” she said in a hoarse voice. “I was supposed to watch after her.”
“Koshka can’t have just disappeared into thin air,” Jack insisted.
“That doesn’t leave us with very many possibilities,” Lowmack, who’d been talking with Carl about the progress on their defenses, pointed out.
Carl’s expression hardened. “What if someone took her?”
Jack shook his head. “Who would do that? Everyone in the convoy knows how important she and Alexander are now, especially since all the other cats are gone.”
“It wasn’t one of my Marines,” Lowmack said. “I can guarantee you that. Even the ones who normally hate cats would never let one come to harm or let someone other than Jack or Naomi walk off with her.”
“What if there’s a harvester with us,” Melissa said, “one that we don’t know about?”
“I don’t think that’s one of our worries, young lady,” Lowmack told her with a smile.
Jack was about to open his mouth to agree, then snapped it shut.
Carl stared at him. “What’s the matter, Dawson?”
“I don’t like to admit the thought,” Jack said, glancing at Melissa, “but maybe we shouldn’t dismiss that possibility so quickly.”
“How would that even be possible?” Lowmack asked. “Except for the seven lab rats, everyone in the convoy was human when we left SEAL-2, and we didn’t stop to pick up any hitchhikers.”
Carl and Jack exchanged a look. “We didn’t verify everyone’s identity before we left,” Carl said. “We were in too much of a rush and just went on the belief that there were enough of us with eyes on the others that we maintained continuity on our identities. And any reaction from the cats was already messed up because of Naomi’s pets. But that’s not the real problem, is it?”
“No,” Jack agreed. “When the crew of that Humvee was rescued on the way here, we might have picked up a hitchhiker or an impostor.”
“Bull.” Lowmack shook his head. “There’s no way.”
Jack gave him a hard look. “How many people were in that Humvee when we left?”
“Three. The driver, a rifleman riding shotgun, and the machine gunner.”
“And how many were in the Humvee that picked them up?”
“There should have been four in that one.”
Carl said, “And how many people got out of that Humvee when we got here? You did the head count on every vehicle, right?”
“There were seven…no, eight. Shit.” He looked sick. “But even if I fucked up on the count, the other Marines would have known they had someone who didn’t belong.”
“During that mess of a firefight, in the dark?” Jack shook his head. “For all we know, a harvester could have claimed it was a survivor from the other Humvee or the truck that we lost during the same battle, and could have been masquerading as one of the dead crewmen. We weren’t able to stop and count up the bodies, and all they would’ve had to do is act panicked like everyone else trying to pile into that Humvee. Nobody would have even thought of leaving someone behind.”
“And the thermal imagers might not have been much help with all the gunfire and the flames in the background,” Lowmack finished, a note of anger creeping into his voice.” He looked down at Melissa. “Maybe we need to put you in charge, kid. You’re sure as hell smarter than we are.”
She looked up at him, her eyes glowing with the reflection of the lights shining down over the entryway. “What are you going to do?”
“The only thing we can do,” Lowmack said. “We’re going to find the son of a bitch.”
“And Koshka, too,” Jack said. “If she’s still alive.”
***
Lowmack ordered his Marines to stay put, wherever they were. He, Jack, and Terje checked the LAV crews first, using Alexander as a harvester detector. One after another, the five three-main crews (which included Lowmack himself) were cleared.
Then they moved on to the various details that had been setting up the defenses, the observers on tops of the buildings, and the Army engineer and the handful of Marines covering him.
Man by man, woman by woman, all the Marines were cleared.
Lowmack ordered a rotation of the detail guarding the harvesters working with Naomi and the civilians and checked each Marine as he or she came outside. They didn’t want any accidental false positives from Alexander by taking him closer to the harvesters in the lab.
Finally, the civilians, including Naomi, were marched out of the lab and run past Alexander, whose only reaction was intense boredom.
Last through the gauntlet was Naomi. “What’s this all about?” She asked.
“We think we might have picked up a hitchhiker during that firefight when the Humvee crew was rescued.” He tried to get out the rest of what needed to be said, but the words caught in his throat.
Naomi put a hand on his shoulder. “And?”
“And we think that he…it…may have taken Koshka. When Melissa and I went back to get her from the LAV, she was gone.”
Pulling her hand away from his shoulder, she used it to cover her mouth. Shaking her head slowly, she whispered, “No. God, not after all this.”
“I’m going to find who…what did this,” Jack said, “and I’m going to find Koshka.”
“We’re going to find her,” Melissa added, taking hold of Naomi’s other hand. “It was my fault.”
“But all the Marines and civilians are clear.” Carl looked around them, beyond the lights and into the darkness that enveloped the campus. “The thing we’re after could be anywhere by now. We don’t have any way to track it down.”
“Maybe we don’t,” Jack said, his eyes looking through the glass of the lab building’s front to the fourth floor. “But they do.”
Carl stared at him. “Have you lost your mind?”
“No, he’s right,” Naomi said, turning to look in the same direction. “We know they can sense other harvesters, even at great distances. If there’s one who shouldn’t be here, they’d know.”
“Then they probably already do,” Carl said. “I take it they haven’t said anything to you?”
“No, and I wouldn’t really expect them to. Would we tell them about an extra human we picked up?”
Carl’s face twisted into a grimace. “No.”
“All right, let me ask them.” She turned and jogged back into the building.
A short while later, Naomi and Vijay, escorted by a pair of Marines, emerged from the building.
Vijay, as usual, wore a polite smile. “I am told you require some assistance in finding one of our kind.”
“That’s right.” Carl looked like he’d swallowed a cigarette butt.
“Vijay’s agreed to help,” Naomi said, “on the condition that the harvester be taken alive.”
“So there is one,” Jack said.
Nodding his head side to side in the Indian fashion, Vijay said, “Yes. One joined the convoy on the way here, as you suspected. And before you ask, we said nothing because we owe you nothing more than we h
ave already promised.”
Carl tensed up, the veins on his temples standing out.
“We accept your help under the condition you stated,” Jack told him.
“Fine,” Carl grated. “Get it done.” To Naomi, he said, “Let’s go back inside. You can give me an update on the way.”
With a last glance at Jack, she turned to walk beside Carl as he strode back into the building, her voice fading to silence as the door closed behind them.
“So,” Jack said to Vijay, “where do we start?”
The thing’s human-looking lips parted in a smile, making Jack’s skin crawl. “Why, we start underground, of course.”
***
Koshka had sensed it coming when she had been resting in the large box-that-moved where her human had left her to rest. Closer and closer it had come. She had cried out for her human, or the smaller female who had attended her on the way here, but none heard the warnings.
She got to her feet. She staggered at first, her leg and ribs making her cry out in pain. Then she had to escape the great metal box. What normally would have been a sedate and graceful hop to the ground became a fear- and agony-filled controlled fall onto soft grass.
The thing was approaching from her left. Following her instincts, she went right, making her way on three legs.
Humans wandered to and fro making their strange noises, but she dared not call attention to herself. The thing could move very quickly, and would be upon her before the humans could intervene.
Seeing nowhere to hide near the building that was bathed in bright light, she turned and fled into the darkness. She threaded her way through the fence the humans had built, slicing open her nose on one of the tiny blades as she leaned in close to sniff at it.
Beyond the wire, she kept moving. The thing was somewhere behind her. She could tell that it had stopped, but only for a moment. Moving again now, it was coming closer.
She needed a place to hide, but she knew nothing of this strange place. Everything was unfamiliar.
Behind her, the thing moved farther away, then nearer. That cycle repeated over and over again, as if it was crossing back and forth over her trail. But with each cycle it gained ground, coming closer, ever closer.
She reached the next building and turned the corner. There! A door stood propped open by a body, a dead human. Hopping over the carcass, ignoring the hunger in her stomach that had come alive at the smell of meat, she limped into the darkness.
It was a stairwell.
She mewled softly in indecision, a reflection of anticipated pain if she went forward, of fear of death if she didn’t.
One set of stairs led up, while the other led down. Going up the stairs would be too difficult. Down would be easier, and would take her into the earth. There, perhaps, she could find a lair. Safety.
Her senses tingling with fear as the thing came closer, she made her way down, step by agonizing step.
GLIMMER OF HOPE
Boisson crouched down behind the Humvee beside the KC-135, watching the harvesters approaching.
One of the agents whispered, “How many of them are there, Boisson?”
She snorted. “How the hell do I know? Enough to take us down.” Looking at the silhouette of the other tanker they’d passed, the one with the eaten-away tires, she said, “There are flares in the Humvee, right?”
“Yeah, I think so. Why?”
“I think we need to have ourselves a barbecue. Go dig a few out.”
The machine gunner glanced down at her while the other agent rummaged around in the Humvees storage bins “Why not just blast them into burning bacon bits?”
“I don’t want to draw attention anywhere near this plane. We’ll open fire if we have to, but not here.” She turned and looked back at their KC-135. “You two,” she nodded at the two men beside her. “Take cover behind the main wheels there and guard the plane while the rest of us go for a little joyride. You,” she gestured to the agent occupying the driver’s seat, “move over. I’m driving.”
As soon as she cranked over the Humvee’s engine, the approaching harvesters paused, then began to run toward them. Boisson stomped on the accelerator and the Humvee shot forward, right toward them.
“Holy shit,” the machine gunner cried, “are you crazy?”
At the last second, Boisson spun the wheel to the right and took off along the cracked and rutted concrete edge of the apron in the direction of the main taxiway. They zoomed by a big “X” on the apron, then bounced onto the asphalt joiner between the old apron and the taxiway, where Boisson pulled to a stop and looked over her shoulder.
“What the hell are you stopping for?” One of the other agents asked.
“I just wanted to make sure we didn’t lose anybody,” she said with a feral grin. All the harvesters were in hot pursuit, running on the ground like giant, loping cockroaches. While not a full-blown swarm, the group was bigger than she’d thought.
Just before the leading creatures reached the Humvee, she again jammed on the accelerator and turned down the main taxiway, the Humvee’s tires squealing in protest as they slid on the concrete.
“Christ, Boisson!” The agent riding shotgun gasped, leaning out so he could see behind them. “They’re practically on the bumper!”
“That’s right where I want them!” She shouted back. It was like one of the zombie video games her young niece (now probably dead, Boisson thought sadly) used to play. She would run around in a particular pattern until she had all the zombies following behind her in a big gaggle. Then she would whirl around and hit them all with a flamethrower, toasting dozens of the virtual undead at a time.
What Boisson had in mind wasn’t far different, although the penalty for getting caught in this game was a bit more serious than having to restart the level. “Flares! Both of you, get ready to throw ‘em!”
“Shit,” the agent beside her cursed as he handed a pair of flares up to the machine gunner, keeping another pair for himself.
Boisson slowed down ever so slightly until the agent on the machine gun began a constant stream of fear-filled invective. She wanted the harvesters close. Really close.
They passed the north end of the 155th Air Refueling Squadron’s main ramp, heading south. The KC-135 with the eaten-away wheels was just to her left when she spun the wheel so hard the Humvee, even with its low center of gravity, skidded and almost tipped over.
Ignoring the curses of the two men with her, she gunned the engine, heading straight for the plane. “Light off the flares!”
The KC-135 was big, but not big enough for her to drive under the fuselage itself. So she guided the Humvee for the spot between the plane’s two port-side engines and put the pedal to the metal, pulling away from the harvesters behind them. “Do NOT throw the flares! Not yet!”
“Goddamn!” The machine gunner ducked down as they spend under the wing. “Jesus, Boisson! The larvae are sticking to the tires!”
“I know, I know!” That was the one little problem with her plan.
Glancing back in the mirror, she saw that the pack of harvesters was stampeding right through the fuel spill, leaping over the larvae that were busy drinking it up. “Throw!”
Four red flares arced out and landed in the huge pool of JP-8 fuel under the plane, igniting it with a titanic whump. Boisson felt the heat wash across her back as the fuel lit off. In a fraction of a second, the malleable flesh of the harvesters ignited, and the plane disappeared in a roiling column of blinding bright flame.
She kept her foot on the accelerator, guiding the Humvee to relative safety behind the wreckage of the unit’s smaller hangar before the KC-135 exploded, sending up a huge fireball into the night sky behind them. Flaming debris rained down across the airport in every direction, setting off even more fires where the chunks of metal set fire to more larvae. Boisson watched, praying, to make sure that none of the debris fell on the KC-135 where Ferris and the others waited.
They were lucky. None did.
“Anybody behind
us?” She shouted.
“Zip. I think we toasted them all,” replied the machine gunner. “And this is the last fucking time I go anywhere with you, Boisson. You’re a lunatic!”
As she eased off the accelerator, one of the front tires blew out, sending the vehicle into a sharp skid to the right. “Shit,” Boisson cursed as she fought to retain control, barely keeping the Humvee from rolling over.
As the vehicle slowed to a stop, a second tire blew.
“Everybody out!” She grabbed her weapon and leaped clear of the vehicle, and the other two agents did the same.
It would take more than a tire change to make the vehicle useable again. The undercarriage was completely covered in oozing blobs that were hungrily consuming everything down to bare metal.
Taking out one of the half dozen cans of hair spray she carried in her combat vest, Boisson put a lighter near the nozzle and flicked it into flame. Leaning closer to the Humvee, she squeezed the nozzle’s top, and a gout of flame spat forth, enveloping one of the larvae. It sizzled and flared, burning bright and hot. Boisson fried a few more of the things until the vehicle fully caught fire.
“You really enjoy that, don’t you?” One of the agents asked.
“Hell, yes,” she said as the things burned. “And I hope they feel pain just as much as we do.” Putting the hairspray back in her vest, she said, “Come on. Let’s get back and make sure Ferris hasn’t gotten himself into trouble.” Staring at the burning Humvee, she realized something else. “I hope that plane has a working radio so we can contact Richards. I just fried ours, not that it was working worth a damn.” She looked to the south. “God, is he going to be pissed.”
Reaping The Harvest (Harvest Trilogy, Book 3) Page 27