“So. A bit of news after all.”
At the base of the tower, near where the only door into the tower had once been, two powerful lights mounted on tripods were being turned on, their focus the exact location of the now vanished opening.
An around-the-clock watch detail was posted there. Should the door reappear, General Wong wanted to know about it; immediately.
They had tried cutting their way into the tower using the most advanced equipment available. They hadn’t made even so much as a scratch.
They had brought in archeological equipment to measure the density of the material of the tower’s outer wall at various locations, looking for weak spots and hidden passages.
There were no weak spots, no hidden passages.
They tried digging down beside the tower. They found only more wall.
There was no way in without an invitation.
The sound of the door behind them opening; Johansen poked his head out. He spoke with a quiet calm.
“Sirs?”
Captain Adamson turned about just enough to acknowledge the interruption. General Wong only clasped his hands behind him and waited.
“Sirs?” Johansen asked again, more of a request for permission to disturb them. “Sirs… I have Lt. Quinn on the line for you.”
“Excellent,” stated Adamson.
General Wong simply grinned oh so slightly and gave a quick, curt nod.
§
The saloon appeared crowded, with everyone in the team there. Ramos and Quinn were hovering over the radio, the lieutenant filling General Wong in on their current situation. It was important that he detail as many of the facts and suppositions as quickly as possible, as they had no idea when they might lose communication.
Banister, Church and Liz Owen sat at one of the tables, while everyone else was gathered around either side of the bar. A few had glasses of water close to hand. For the moment, the water came from their canteens. They all still hoped to find water from somewhere other than the lake, but Ramos had yet to return to the well.
“Ghosts?” Carmody asked doubtfully. She was half snickering, but this was more from discomfort than from disbelief. In the tower, it seemed that just about anything could be true. She turned to the brains sitting around the table. “Crazy, right?”
None answered at first. Banister finally let out a low sigh. “I do believe this is meant to be a ghost town.”
This brought a low growl from Owen. “Okay, damn it. Whose mind did he pull this one out of?”
“Ghosts?” Carmody asked again.
“What we saw in the church had a supernatural flavor to it,” said Church. “Not your traditional ghosts as such.”
Costa indicated Ramos, who was still over at the radio with Lt. Quinn. “What Ramos saw was definitely of a ghostly nature.”
“What I saw, as well,” said Owen.
“All right,” said Asher. “What we’re talking about here aren’t ghosts. What we’re experiencing is the Adversary’s interpretation of ghosts… or whatever supernatural flavor you want to put on all this.”
“The Adversary’s minions playing at ghosts,” agreed Susan.
“Right.”
“But what does that mean for us?” asked Carmody. “How do we deal with the interpretation differently than we would the real thing?”
“You often deal with the real thing, do you?” sneered Owen.
“She asks the right question, Liz,” said Asher.
“That she does,” agreed Church. “Do these representations follow the same rules that we have given your everyday ghosts and other supernatural phenomena?”
“The rules that whomever the Adversary pulled this little dreamscape from,” said Owen.
“Ghosts can’t really hurt you, can they?” asked Lisa.
“Ghosts?” asked Carmody, yet again, for the third time. “Really?”
“True or not in the real world,” said Susan, “In here, ghosts, or something like ghosts, have been created for our benefit.”
“And whether or not they can harm you would depend on the culture or beliefs from which you draw their origin,” said Church. “For the most part, the created environments we find ourselves in appear to follow the guidelines of the memory from which they were born.”
Banister slowly shook his head. “Ah, but the Adversary has no problem deviating from those guidelines whenever it suits him.”
“You don’t know that,” argued Church. “He may very well be following very strict rules. We just don’t know what those rules are.”
“If you’re right, Doctor, then how do we figure out these rules?” asked Costa.
“By watching for consistent patterns in our interactions with what the Adversary presents to us, through extrapolation from actions and events.”
“Holy crap,” groaned Owen. She rubbed at her brow as if to work away a deep-seated pain.
“It will certainly take time,” Church continued. “We’ll not likely resolve it on this floor, or even the next.”
“Holy crap,” Owen repeated, the groan all the deeper.
§
When evening came, for most of the team it actually did feel like it should be evening. For the moment the cycle on this floor seemed to match their own. That could change if they spent much time here.
After a leisurely meal from their rations, they headed over to the hotel across the street. They all quartered on the second floor, pairing off to the same room partners as they had back on the freighter. Also, somewhat similar to their quarters on the freighter, a watch was established at the end of the hall near the top of the stairs. Carmody stood first.
There was a primitive water closet at the other end of the hall, though without the requisite water to make it fully functional. Costa and Ramos made a trip to the lake with several buckets each. A bit of water poured into the commode after each use made the water closet workable enough and saved everyone late-night walks to the outhouse behind the hotel.
Once he had finished settling into his room, Asher went downstairs and then outside. He wanted to take one more walk around town before it was fully dark.
He had only just stepped out the front door of the hotel when he met Quinn coming around from the alley. The lieutenant was making the rounds himself. They started together along the planked walkways fronting each of the buildings in town.
As they walked they speculated on where they might find the access to the next floor. It was little more than smalltalk, since they didn’t have much on which to base their conjectures. They didn’t see anything in common between the two portals they had discovered so far, the ladder on the first floor leading to a hatch, and the pool of water in the hold of the freighter on the second that led here. And as for trying to guess what the Adversary might be thinking… they didn’t have very much to go on there, either; at least not yet.
They were outside the telegraph office when Asher stopped and looked curiously across the street. He thought he saw a light through the front window of the general store. It moved, as if someone was carrying a lantern.
“Is that Sara?” he asked Quinn. Costa had left the hotel a minute or two ahead of him.
“Sergeant Costa and Ramos are making another trip out to the lake,” said Quinn.
“Then—”
“Everyone else is accounted for.”
“Okay, so then who might that be?”
As they looked on, windows all over town began glowing with the flickering light of unseen oil lamps. Shadows passed before the windows.
“I’m not liking this,” mumbled Quinn.
“It would seem our little community has a night life.”
Costa and Ramos appeared at the end of town, returning from the lake with buckets in hand. Seeing the lit windows and the shadows, they hesitated, soon stopped.
Asher and Quinn stepped into the street.
“This can’t be good,” said Quinn.
“Probably not.”
A sound then… a low rumbling as of a nu
mber of people all talking at once.
“Where’s that coming from?” Quinn mumbled. After a few moments, he eyed the saloon. “There.”
And then came the sound of the piano playing. Bright and cheery. Lively. Harsh and out of tune.
“Everyone accounted for, eh, Lieutenant?”
“I’m afraid so, Professor.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I suppose I should get this over with.” Quinn let out a long, dark sigh and started across the street.
Asher followed. Sgt. Costa and Ramos set down their buckets and approached from the edge of town.
The music got louder and more lively as they all drew nearer. The dull roar of voices, though unintelligible, also seemed to grow louder. The light from inside spilled out through the windows and onto the street.
Quinn climbed the steps up onto the porch. “Wait here,” he said.
“I don’t think so,” said Asher. He followed Quinn up the steps. Costa silently followed Asher, leaving Ramos standing on the bottom step.
Quinn raised his hands to push open the swinging doors.
The piano stopped.
The voices stopped.
Quinn pushed his way through the doors and entered the saloon. As he did, the room grew dark. There was only the faint light of dusk coming in through the windows, creating shadows in all the corners, beneath the tables and behind the bar.
Asher and Costa stepped up beside Quinn.
“Must be shy,” said Asher.
“I’m pretty sure I asked you to wait outside.”
“Yeah, really sorry ‘bout that.”
Quinn looked side-glance at Costa.
“Keeping an eye on the civilian, Lieutenant,” said Costa.
“Uh, huh.”
At that moment the oil lamp on the wall above the piano began to glow; dim and first, then increasingly brighter.
A piano key struck a sour note. Then a second key struck.
Then… nothing.
The light from the oil lamp flickered unsteadily but stayed lit.
Outside, Ramos stepped slowly down from the porch step and into the street. The town had grown dark; the graying sky overhead more gray.
A single window began to glow a brownish yellow, the light within shimmered and fluttered.
A second window in another building turned yellow. And then another.
Ramos glanced back to the swinging doors of the saloon. He looked back up the street.
The silhouette of a tall figure stood in the middle of the street near the livery; calm and still as the darkening shadows.
Across from the livery, the windows of the laundry began to glow, spilling yellow light out into the street and onto the figure.
“Lieutenant?” Ramos called softly, a touch anxious.
Episode Three / Chapter Three
Owen watched from her second story window. Ramos was in the street below, standing outside the saloon. Down near the livery, someone stood in the center of the street, the figure mostly in shadow.
Light spilled out then from the laundry opposite the livery and Owen was able to see the shape more clearly. It had the appearance of a man.
Lisa stepped up beside Owen. “A gunfighter?” she asked.
Owen studied the figure. He wore a maroon-colored vest beneath a long, black coat; black pants and boots, a flat-brimmed hat, the brim low and even above the eyes. From this distance, it was impossible to get a good look at the face.
Owen frowned uncertainly. “More like playing at being a gunfighter.” She thought he looked like some nineteenth century European nobleman come to experience the American West that he’d read about in dime novels.
Corporal Ramos was joined by Quinn and Costa, coming out of the saloon. A moment later, the three started up the street toward the dark figure.
§
Quinn stopped when they were three or four paces from the stranger; close enough to comfortably have a conversation. He held a hand up for others to stand fast, this time I mean it, and took one more step.
“Are you the Adversary?” he asked.
While the light from nearby windows managed to splash across the figure, the face beneath the flat brim of the hat was still mostly in shadow.
The eyes, however, sparkled in pools of black.
“I am but his humble servant.” He spoke with a heavy accent, faintly European and yet not quite.
“Hmm. I see. Well, maybe you can help. We have a few issues that need addressing.”
“That is irrelevant. I am not here to address issues.”
Quinn felt a cold chill. In a previous meeting quite similar to this, the visit had ended with Raso being killed.
He did his best to maintain his composure. “Is this to be a one-sided conversation?” he asked.
“I really wouldn’t call it a conversation at all, Lieutenant Quinn. That would imply a back and forth exchange, and as you have surmised, information will for the most part be flowing in one direction.”
“I’m always willing to listen to what those on the other side of a disagreement have to say.”
“Most wise, Lieutenant.”
§
“I wonder what’s going on,” said Lisa, watching Quinn and the stranger outside the livery. They appeared to be in polite conversation. Professor Asher, Sgt. Costa and Cpl. Ramos stood a pace behind the lieutenant.
“I expect we’ll find out soon enough,” said Owen. She was as curious as Lisa, but there was no sense speculating. Her hope at the moment was that the meeting would end without anyone dying. Their number was growing smaller with each floor.
There was a knock at the door, and before Owen could tell Lisa to go see who it was, Church and Banister came into the room.
“Sorry to barge in, Liz,” said Church. “We were wondering if your view of the little get-together was any better than ours.”
“You’re right next door,” said Owen.
“The angle, Elizabeth.” He stepped up to the window, crowding Owen and Lisa. “It’s not much better, Wes.”
“Then we wait and hope,” said Banister.
“It appears peaceful enough,” said Church.
“Right up until it isn’t.”
“Please, Elizabeth.”
“Sorry.”
“Looks like it’s breaking up,” said Lisa. Quinn and the others were backing away from the stranger. The stranger took a short step back, turned and started away.
“That it does, Miss Powell,” said Church. He headed across the room toward the door. Banister was right beside him.
Lisa called to them, her focus still on the street outside. “I think they’re going to the saloon.”
“I suggest we join them,” said Church, and he opened the door.
“Right behind you, Nate.” Banister looked back to Owen and Lisa Powell. “Ladies?”
“By all means,” said Owen.
§
Ramos was chuckling lightly, and even Sgt. Costa was struggling to hold back a grin. Both were standing near the bar. Quinn stood frowning, arms folded across his chest.
Asher sat down at one of the tables just as the others began coming in.
“What’s the joke?” asked Carmody.
Asher smiled now too, but only managed to shake his head.
“Well?” asked Owen. Everyone was settling in around the tables.
“Yes. Come now,” urged Banister. “What news did this character bring?”
“We have one day to find a way off this floor,” Quinn stated, with no humor whatsoever.
“I don’t get it,” said Owen.
“Lieutenant…” said Asher. “You have to admit—”
“I do not,” Quinn cut him off. It was almost as though he was afraid he might look foolish. “We’ve been given one day.”
Asher sighed, turned from Quinn to look at the others. “This tall dark stranger… he gave us till tomorrow sundown to get out of town.”
Owen appeared startled. “He told us to get outta Dodge?”
>
“That’s the gist of it, Ma’am,” said Ramos.
“There’s nothing funny about this, people.” Quinn stepped around behind the bar, set his canteen onto the counter.
“No sir,” grumbled Ramos.
“Out of town by sundown,” said Church, mulling over the words. He drummed his fingers on the table in front of him. “That does put our situation in a whole new light.”
“Yes it does.” The lieutenant poured water from his canteen into a glass. It looked like he was pouring himself a stiff drink. “Come dawn, our search goes from haphazard to precise.”
“What did he threaten to do to us, Lieutenant?” asked Owen. “Should we yet be here once the sun goes down?”
“The gentleman didn’t get into specifics.”
“An odd turn of circumstance,” said Banister. “From ghost town to Tombstone, one moment to the next.”
“Choose your peril, folks,” said Owen. “Ghosts or guns?”
A heavy silence in the room, drawn out for several seconds.
The harsh tinkling of the piano keys broke the silence… dink dink dink dink…
Ramos, standing at the piano, found himself uncomfortably the focus of everyone’s attention. He smiled apologetically and lifted his hand from the keyboard.
§
The early morning horizon had a colorful autumn glow. The air was cool but already hinted at the warm day to come. The town was still and quiet.
Carmody stumbled from between the laundry and the doctor’s office and out into the street. She was in a panicked frenzy, desperately swatting at a cloud of inky black shadows that were swirling about her head; wispy puffs of dust billowed up around her feet at each awkward step, the silence suddenly overwhelmed by a frenetic rush of harsh whispers seemingly from a thousand minds all speaking at once, all demanding attention, demanding to be heard.
§
Quinn leaned over the table and put another mark on the now much-marked hand-drawn map of the town. Banister stood near the bar. He was filling his canteen from the wooden bucket sitting on the counter. Church waited for him over near the saloon doors. The soft morning sunshine reached in and washed across his dark complexion.
Quinn had given them the general store to search. Yes, it had been gone through once before, but that had been cursory, as had the entire previous day’s survey of the town. This was to be much more thorough, right down to physically examining every shelf, every photograph; open up boxes, look in closets. Additionally, they were to go over the exterior of the building, board by board; go into the crawl space below and the attic above, if they existed.
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