“Alright, I’m Candace and …”
“I know everyone’s name,” he interrupted.
“Okay. I guess we don’t need introductions then.”
The heavy ‘thump’ resounded again as Hammerhead hit the bars once more.
“Is he okay?” Candace asked, and began to move slowly toward the big man.
“Physically, yes. He does that banging trick every couple of hours. He’s no worse for it.”
Candace stopped abruptly when she spotted a slight movement in the cell next to the man. At the very back of the cell, half-hidden in shadows, a woman sat on the edge of a twin bed looking down at the floor. She was gently swaying.
“Hello,” Candace called.
The woman stopped swaying and looked up. Her eyes were large and lustrous with a distinct sparkle that Candace could see from where she stood. The woman stood up slowly and ambled over to within three feet of the cell door.
“What’s your name?” Candace asked.
“I’ve never seen you here,” the woman whispered.
“No. I’ve never been here.”
“I can’t get too close,” the woman whispered again.
“Why?”
“Might electrocute you.”
“What?” Candace moved closer to the cell and put her hands on the bars.
The woman jumped back a step.
Candace noted that the bars were covered with a hard, thick rubber. “What do you mean you might electrocute me? Is that what the rubber coating on these bars is for?’
“Oh, I forgot they coated the bars. Still, it can travel.”
“What can travel?” Candace asked. Exasperated she spoke a little louder than what she intended.
The woman began backing up.
“I’m sorry,” Candace pleaded. “I didn’t mean to raise my voice.”
“She’s a little timid,” Hands said. “And not quite the mental giant.”
Candace looked back to the man for a moment as though to say something, but then turned again to the woman. She had a lot of questions for the woman but judging from their brief talk she wondered how lucid the woman could be.
She thought of her first objective: to check out Hammerhead, the flat-headed man in the cell beside the woman’s. The cells were divided by a thick stone wall. She moved over to Hammerhead’s cell.
The man was standing next to his cell staring straight ahead. When Candace walked in front of him, he instantly bowed his head and slammed it into the bars. Candace jumped back, momentarily startled.
The man straightened up again. He grunted loudly and seemed to be trying to talk, but all that he could muster were deep, guttural noises.
“He doesn’t like people,” Hands called to her. “Can’t say I blame him. He just hasn’t learned how to narrow his hate.”
Candace headed back to Hammerhead’s cell.
“Are you going to tell us what you’re in for?” Walter asked just as Candace came up beside him.
“For being unlucky,” he answered.
“Oh, yeah. And how’s that?” Walter asked.
The man didn’t seem to hear him. “I’m aware, via this psychic energy you possess, that you have been told about the machine. The transportal as some have called it. But I’m afraid that you have not been told the entire ugly truth.”
“And this will explain why you are locked up?” Walter asked, a bit of harshness in his voice.
“Yes. Be patient. I’ll get to that. First, let me tell you that the statistics that have been quoted to you is much exaggerated. Byron, your mayor and his entourage would have everyone believe that the transport is more successful than it is, otherwise, there would be few takers willing to risk the trip. In reality, the success rate is closer to twenty percent, not sixty.”
“And how do you know this?” Stone asked.
“Well, when I first arrived here my psychic ability was much keener. I could see people, much like I saw you, but they didn’t have to have any psychic ability for me to make a connection. I could even read minds on occasion. It was with those two abilities that I was able to obtain the information. First from conversations made between Byron and his chief science officer and secondly from thoughts I overheard.”
“Is that why you were locked up?” Candace asked. “Because of what you knew?”
“In part, but I’ll get to that.” He smiled.
“There are four possible results of a transport,” the man continued. “One, the transport is a total success. Like I said, the chances are low. Two, the subject never appears at the designated site. In that case, the transport is considered a failure, though, so far, all subjects whereabouts and condition remain unknown. Three, either the subject arrives in a scrambled mass of pieces, or only a portion of the subject arrives. In either instance, the person is dead or only lives for a short while. And, last, but not least, the traveler shows up alive and viable, but deformed—or at least quite different. Such as the three of us, though there have been more.” He dropped off looking suddenly sad.
A rapid succession of ‘thuds’ broke the momentary silence as Hammerhead repeatedly slammed his head into the bars.
“Sometimes,” the man began again, “I wonder what kind of revenge Hammerhead would exert if he ever got free. The problem is I don’t know if he’d recognize who was friend and who was foe.”
“Were the three of you locked up because the others fear you?” Candace asked.
“Partly, but if that was all there was to it Byron would have had us executed a long time ago. No. The reason we were locked up, and alive, is simply that we are needed.”
“The way you speak of the mayor,” Stone started, “I assume he’s the leader of this underground community.”
“Oh yes. He runs everything. He’s the dictator. The conqueror.”
“Why does he need the three of you?” Walter asked.
“As Stone here already knows, without regular intervals of medication our people cannot survive on this planet. There is something, so far elusive, perhaps in the air, or on the ground, in plants, et cetera, that acts as a type of deadly allergen to anyone from our planet. The three of us, however, are immune. Our good mayor wants to know why.”
“Stone has told us about this fatal flaw you aliens have,” Walter said.
The man suddenly let go of the prison bars and came stiffly upright.
“What’s wrong?” Candace asked, realizing that something was disturbing him.
“Gunshots,” he simply said.
CHAPTER 32
It was minutes after the gunshots had faded that Mira looked down the length of the corridor, then let her eyes drift up to the ceiling. She strained to make out a shape in the darkness above the lights.
He dropped down from the ceiling and landed several yards in front of her in a full squat. Slowly, he pushed to his feet.
She ran over to him. “You okay?”
He breathed heavily and his dark cat-like eyes, peering out from his large head, looked as if the spark had gone out of them. “I underestimated them,” he said.
“Are you injured?” she asked. She held back the tears with sheer will power.
“Got shot a few times, but I’ll be okay. The healing is almost complete.” He let out a breath of hot air. “Damn! I got careless. I didn’t expect to get hit or for it to hurt this much. I was afraid another shot or two would be it for me. I should have pushed myself to the next level.”
“No, that’s crazy. Last time you did that you almost didn’t come back.”
“But I could have handled them easily.”
She took his hands in hers. “I don’t care. I couldn’t take it if you couldn’t return to me.” She pulled him close and hugged him.
“Okay,” he said after several moments. “I’ll catch up to them later. If they make it out no one will believe them anyway. And, if they do, we’ll tie them up in enough legal red tape that by the time they can check out our underground home there won’t be anything here but an empty cave.
Right now we have other business we need to attend to.
She pulled away. “Yeah, you’re right.” She moved back a couple of yards knowing what he was about to do.
He groaned. “I’ve got to change back before the others see me.”
She nodded. Only her and two others knew about his ability to change. She slipped her radio from off her belt and brought it to her mouth. It was time to take care of business.
He closed his eyes, took several quick breaths, and grunted. His muscles tightened like bands of steel and a deep redness washed over his face. A thin bead of sweat swept across his forehead. At once the extraneous hairs over his body began to shrink, slipping back into his body. At the same time, the gray hue of his skin quickly faded, and his extra weight dropped off suddenly. Then his head and face began to change, to reshape as though it were made of clay and manipulated by invisible hands.
When he finally opened his eyes, he was his old self once more.
“You alright?” Mira asked, stepping back over to him.
“I’ll be fine.” He sucked in a deep breath of air.
She placed her hand on his head and began to straighten his disheveled hair.
“I’ve got security guarding the perimeter to make sure our two troublemakers don’t escape,” she said. “I’ve also called for the electronic jammer to be extended over the entire estate, not just inside, to make sure no one can call out. Oh, and someone’s on the way to remove the body.”
“You’ve been busy. Now, what about getting our cameras online?”
“I’m afraid they won’t be back for quite a while.”
He sighed. “Okay. We’ll fix that problem later. Let’s get some security personnel to the Transportal. We need to stop this Stone and his two friends.”
“We’ll need some special weapons,” Mira said. “I suggest we load up our forces before proceeding.”
CHAPTER 33
Bass slammed a beefy shoulder hard into the metal door, but the door was too strong and his body came to an abrupt halt.
“You might as well save your strength,” James said. He was sitting on a step just below Bass pointing his pistol down the curved staircase.”
“We can’t get back into the mansion and we can’t get a signal on our cell phones,” Bass said. “Any suggestions?”
“I don’t know.”
“We have to go back down the stairs,” Bass said. “Maybe we can find another way out.”
“I can’t believe the creature hasn’t come for us,” James said. “Maybe it died. I’m pretty sure I hit it. At least one of my shots should have found its mark.”
“Or maybe it doesn’t know that we’re stuck here.”
“We’re both assuming that this creature has the capacity to reason.”
“Either way, James, we have to go back down there.”
“Yes, I know.” James didn’t want to admit it, not even to himself, but he was more afraid now than he had ever been in his entire life.
“If we’re not attacked by that creature again when we get back there, I’d like to take a minute to say goodbye to Darren.”
James nodded and pushed himself to his feet, shoving back the fear that was attempting to paralyze him. At once he felt lightheaded. He shook it off, forcing his head to clear. “Okay,” he said, and was somewhat embarrassed by the unsteadiness of his voice. “Let’s go.”
James took the lead, hoping with each step that he had indeed killed the creature, but inside his heart, he didn’t think he had.
They moved slowly around the curve of the stairwell half expecting a confrontation with the creature, or one of the mayor’s henchmen. It was with cautious relief that neither appeared before them.
At the foot of the stairs, they paused. The wide corridor was empty.
“Darren is not here,” Bass whispered. “Where … do you think he’s?” His voice rose expectantly.
“I’m sorry, but no,” James answered. “The wound was too great. They must have moved him.”
Bass slowly nodded. “Yeah. To hide what that creature did to him.”
“We’ll find him,” James said. “But first we have to find a way out. We can’t handle this alone. We need help.”
“I know,” Bass said. “So where to? Straight ahead or should we see what’s behind one of these doors?”
“Let’s see what’s behind the first door. Standing in this wide-open hall makes me kind of nervous.” He looked about at the camera behind them and then at the other two further down the hallway. They couldn’t hurt them. Not with all the damage they had done to their security equipment.
They quickly moved to the first door. They paused. James nodded to Bass then Bass quickly pushed the door open pressing the gun in front of him.
It looked like a small kennel. There were lines of caged animals in front of them. The occupants included various species of rodents, snakes, and dogs. All relatively quiet except for an occasional scratching at the metal doors.
On the concrete floor just to the left of them was a long, rectangular opening. An iron grate was lying on the floor beside it. Chunks of broken concrete were on the grate and floor.
Bass gently closed the door behind them. “What’s with all this?”
“My guess is that these are lab animals?”
“Reasonable. And, what about the hole?”
“Drainage, I would guess,” James answered.
“Looks like someone’s been working on it.”
James squatted beside the opening and poked his head down near the hole. “Looks empty as far as I can see. I wonder if this could be the way Agent Caine and her two friends got in. They couldn’t have come the same way we did. How would they have gotten past the cave door?”
“I don’t know. Are you thinking they could have got here through the drain?”
“Yes. And if they used the drain to get here we should be able to use it to get out.”
“Do you thnk Agent Caine and the other two will be alright until we get back?”
“I hope so, but us staying here and getting slaughtered is not going to help them. We need some help.”
Bass nodded and stared down into the opening. “I’m not real fond of climbing through drainage ditches.”
“It’s either this or take our chances strolling through the main corridors of this cave.”
Bass looked over at the caged animals and thought how awfully strange it was that the dogs hadn’t started barking. He wondered if something was wrong with them. Perhaps they had already been unwilling participants in a mad scientist experiment. He looked back at James. Alright, then, let’s get to crawling.”
CHAPTER 34
“You have to go,” Hands stressed.
“Where?” Stone asked.
“To the Transportal, of course,” the man answered. “You have to take care of that machine. Destroy it. Besides the lives it takes during transport I’m afraid that one day while someone is engaged in trying to improve on that thing it’s going to blow sky high taking the caves and entire town with it.”
“I had already decided to do something about it,” Stone said. “But one problem. I don’t think we can go back the way we came. I think we’re being followed. Is there another way to get to this machine?”
“Oh, yes,” the man said. “Go around these cells. Follow the walkway. It will veer to the left then dead-end at a thick metal door. It should be locked, but you shouldn’t have a problem breaking through. Subtlety is not an option at this point.”
“Let me get you out of there,” Stone said.
“That’s not going to happen,” the man said. “Even with your external power source, you wouldn’t be able to break these bars. They’re a little more substantial than mere iron. But if you tap into their computer system at the control room you should be able to find a disconnect switch in there somewhere.”
“We’ll do our best,” Stone said.
“Good,” the man began, “unfortunately I don’t know how Hammerhead and the woman wi
ll react to freedom.”
“Maybe Stone could find a way to free just you,” Walter said. “Until we can figure out what to do with the other two.”
Stone said, “I don’t know if I’ll have the time to separate the power to the individual cells or even if I’ll even be able to recognize which cell is which. I may have to de-energize, or energize, the entire circuit, depending on how it is set up.”
“Just do what you can,” the four arms man said.
“I will,” Stone assured him, and headed away from the cell. Candace and Walter took up behind him. They were about to pass the cell that held Hammerhead when the four-arms man shouted at them. “Wait! I forgot to tell you something!”
The three turned around almost in unison and started back the way they had come.
“Don’t use your weapons,” he said as they came into view.
“Why?” Walter asked.
“Odorless gasses are emanating from the Transportal unit. I can’t be sure how far they have expanded. A single shot from one of your guns in any of the affected areas could bring the whole cave down upon us.”
“That’s good to know,” Candace said.
“Then we’re virtually powerless,” Walter said. “against who knows how many people we’ll be facing.”
“We’re not powerless,” Stone said.
CHAPTER 35
It wasn’t quite as cramped as Bass had thought it would have been, but he still had to crawl on all fours. That he didn’t like. He didn’t like the thought that he might be crawling over whatever swill or excrement might have been dumped down these drains. Not to mention the bugs and rodents that might be scurrying about. down there. But one had to do what one had to do. Unfortunately.
It reminded Bass of a time long when he and his older brother, who was thirteen at the time, climbed through a culvert that ran underneath interstate ten. Back then he didn’t mind the bugs, and the spiders, or even the wetness of the concrete underneath their knees from yesterday’s rain. This was an adventure.
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