"Where exactly are we going?" Ness signed.
"Not to the lab," Sebastian said.
"Not to it? We could have gone to a not-lab back in the Philippines."
"The lab is marked on the chart. If we wish, we can walk straight into the lab. Do you see the question?"
"Do we want to walk straight into the lab?"
Sebastian nodded deeply. "I think no."
"So we're looking for a crooked way in."
He clacked his claws. "Yes crooked. We shall be not as the canal but as the stream."
Ness frowned. "Because a canal can be spotted for miles," he tried, hands gaining speed as the idea unfolded. "But a stream follows the dirt, and thus is hidden within the shape of the land."
Sebastian bounced up and down. "You are the Way!"
Be that as it may, Ness was still surprised when Sebastian literally began following the serpentine gulch ahead of them. They zigzagged up the side of the mountain, stopping every few hundred feet to climb to high ground and search for any hints of alien presence. Looking downhill, the land to the left was grassy meadows, a few trees scattered around the draws and the old ranches down by the shore. To the right, the grass was interrupted by patches of gravel and bare earth, but whatever had been planned for these spots had never progressed beyond clearing the grounds. Above, clouds built against the bluffs. It was as desolate a place as Ness had ever seen.
After several hours of wandering up the gulches, Sebastian found what he was hunting for: a round cave bored through the side of a ravine. The entry was packed with silt. Twenty feet inside, rubbery orange matter carpeted the cave floor.
"Our crooked way," Sebastian signed. He touched his tentacles together in anticipation. "Remain with Sprite. I return when I return."
"You think you're going in there alone?"
"To bring you is the way of fools. If they see me, I am one of them; no questions. But you are one of the enemy."
Ness folded his arms, then gestured, "You must think I'm miles down the 'way of fools' if you think I'm letting my gutbrother go in there by himself. Aren't these Swimmers working with the ones who killed the Collective? Our gutbrothers?"
Sebastian was still for a moment. "That is the signs."
"Then you can't keep me back. You shouldn't want to."
"And now you have reminded me and I don't. We go together. As for Sprite?"
Ness glanced back over his shoulder at Sprite, who was watching the entrances to the gulch. "I'm sure he'll stay if I tell him to."
"No need." Sebastian opened and closed his claws in wryness. "Single human is the problem. Second human is a droplet to the sea."
"Great. I'll tell Sprite, then let's roll."
"First you must learn. This path is a stream and we do not walk on a stream as we walk on a road."
"Human it up a little for me?"
"This is no road. It is no standard. They set the path to grow as it will and it follows the simplest way. We don't need light or eyes to follow this path; we follow by feel. It carries us along like the stream. Do you see?"
Ness cocked his head. "You want us to climb up the tunnel blind?"
"That is how they do. If we do otherwise, they will know we are not Swimmers."
"And if we run into one of them?"
Sebastian spread three tentacles. "Then I speak while you go as still as rock. In the dark, if you are still, they are as blind as you are."
Ness rubbed his heavily-stubbled chin. "This is the best we've got? Wandering up some backwoods tunnel into the heart of their operations seems crazy stupid."
"We go someplace hostile. Thus all paths are hostile. This is as we have always done."
"Yeah, but we used to be backed up by a submarine bristling with rockets."
Sebastian stared down at him. "And so?"
"And so we're down to you, me, and some guy who thinks we're going to take down the world like..." He was going to say something about Luke Skywalker versus the first Death Star, but he had long ago given up attempting to explain such things to Sebastian. "We don't have much going for us, you know?"
"What would you do instead? Beginnings must begin somewhere."
Ness gazed into the hole in the wall of the short cliff. "How the hell should I know? I mean, what are we even doing here? Do you know?"
Sebastian drew himself up. "We are not gutbrothers."
Uncertain he had understood him, Ness asked Sebastian to repeat himself. The message was the same. "Sebastian, what are you talking about?"
"Gutbrothers trust gutbrothers. You do not."
"Come on, man. I can't question your decisions without losing my gutbrother status?"
"You can only question if you listen. You do not listen. Neither to your inside star, nor to gutbrothers who are your outside stars. Who should be to you as the stars you use at sea to guide you to your goals."
Ness glanced at Sprite, who had been watching the uphill and downhill approaches to the gully, but was now taking interest in their exaggerated gestures.
"You see?" Sebastian gestured. "You look to this man you do not know as if it is his mind that matters. Who should you look to?"
"You?"
"And?"
Ness shook his head slowly, then signed, "Me."
"Yes to you and to me. To the inside, where you dwell always, and to those stars outside that have always led you true. Do you see?"
"What I see is you trying to beat me into agreement!"
Sebastian's tentacles sagged. "Then we are not gutbrothers."
Ness clamped his eyes shut and jerked his hand back and forth. He reopened his eyes. "I'm sorry, Sebastian. Sometimes my inside star's a dark one. When it makes every path look bleak, it's tough for me to step onto any of them. Do you really think this is the best way forward?"
"I think," the alien signed slowly, "that we must pursue this place, no matter how much fool it feels to our darker stars."
"And as for the tunnel?"
"We may search for other doors if you do not trust this one. But look." Sebastian flicked his tentacle at the quiet, misty emptiness. "Do you see any sign of Swimmer threats?"
"It is about as isolated as it gets." Ness sighed through his nose, then gestured, "Let's give it a shot. Sorry for doubting you."
"Doubt is not the fault. Doubt prunes the garden, brings order. Too often, you trim until your tree is dead."
"Let's get a move on before all this wisdom starts leaking out my hears." Ness laughed wryly. "I'll tell Sprite the plan."
He did so, abbreviating much of what had gone into the decision to focus on the key facts: Sebastian thought the tunnel would take them to the lab, it was secluded, and they'd have to travel in perfect darkness.
"But he can see in the dark?" Sprite said.
"Sort of."
"Like only when he activates his Mystery Gift? Can he see or not?"
"Not with his eyes," Ness said. "He can sense motion. Like the detectors outside the slave camp in the Philippines. All we got to do is move when he says move and freeze when he says freeze."
"But he can't talk," Sprite said. "And we won't be able to see him gesture."
"We'll be holding his tentacles. If that's too creepy for you, you're welcome to stay out here."
Sprite's mouth fell open. He darted a look at Sebastian. "Are they...slimy?"
"You ever had a big ol' boa constrictor climb around on you? They feel like that. Wrapped in a toad's skin."
"How could I say no?"
With the afternoon getting on, they entered the tunnel mouth. The light faded fast. Just beyond its reach, the thick pad of alien grow-carpet began. Ness stepped onto it without hesitation. Sprite took a moment.
"You ready?" Ness said.
Sprite swore, the noise echoing in the rocky tube. "I don't know how one is ever 'ready' to stumble around in the darkness guided only by the touch of an alien invader. But if it's possible, then let's rock."
Ness gestured to Sebastian. A thin tentacle looped around his
wrist, then his palm. Sprite inhaled sharply. Sebastian squeezed, indicating it was time to move forward. Ness walked after him. At first, he got inadvertently smacked by stray limbs, and trod on a trailing tentacle more than once, but between the tension on the one wrapped around his hand and Sebastian's steady shuffle, he soon learned to adjust to any shift in Sebastian's pace. Sprite did some initial stumbling, too, but got the hang of it about as fast as Ness.
Their feet scraped and sloughed over the matting. Ness' eyes felt ready to pop out of his head. His heart was going much faster than their walking speed strictly demanded. He reminded himself that Sebastian could see, sort of, and that the Swimmers had no idea they were coming.
In time, he quit freaking out about the uselessness of his eyes and began to focus on his other senses instead. Sound was pretty good. Particularly when you knew the ground ahead was smooth. If he were alone, with no one else around to make a bunch of racket, he thought he might be able to make the ascent while avoiding any approaching aliens—or to climb back down. That thought was beyond comforting.
"Don't suppose he knows how much further it is?" Sprite said after a half hour or so.
Ness realized the uselessness of his shrug mid-gesture. "Doubt he's got any better idea than we do."
"Next time I ask, will you please lie to me instead?"
He began to wish he'd been counting steps. Not that he could think of much call for it. But on the off chance they needed to figure out how far up the mountain the tunnel climbed, he could estimate by—
Sebastian squeezed his hand hard. Ness stopped cold. So did Sprite. Sebastian shuffled to the left of the path and stopped. Something scraped up the tunnel. Fine hairs stood up along Ness' spine. The steps neared within twenty feet, then ceased. He strained his ears and caught the barely perceptible swish of limbs. Ness shut his eyes, then wondered if the alien would be able to detect such a small motion. On the chance it could, he left them closed. Sebastian's grip on his wrist stayed tight.
Sebastian pressed closer to them, threatening to unbalance Ness. Steps plunked down the passage, receding away into the tunnel. Sebastian squeezed their wrists again and relaxed, then began to move on, drawing them behind him.
A minute later, Sprite whispered, "That was an alien, right?"
"Right."
"I hope their sense of smell is as bad as their hearing."
Ness had no desire to inquire what he meant by that. The encounter was the last bit of excitement for another fifteen minutes until Sebastian squeezed his wrist again, much more lightly than before. Ness stopped. Gently, Sebastian pulled him forward, extending Ness' arm. His fingers touched something pebbly and moist.
"Door?" Ness signed with his other hand.
Sebastian gave him a small squeeze.
"Can you open it?"
A hesitation, then another squeeze.
"Then get to work."
Ness murmured the score to Sprite, then stepped back. Occasionally Sebastian brushed a tentacle against the wall, but there was very little sound besides their breathing. After a minute, the door peeled open with a wet rasp, spilling dim twilight into the tunnel.
"What took you so long?" Ness signed.
Sebastian stared down at him. "The door is not quite standard. I can close it on you and see if you are faster to get out."
"Just kidding, man. You are the master of all things standard and non-standard. Now where the hell are we?"
The door opened to the base of a narrow ravine carving through the mountainside. Its quick slopes were dense with bamboo. The orange carpet continued across the red dirt floor. Flowering shrubs lined both sides of the ravine. They weren't obviously part of a topiary, yet something about them was much too orderly to accept as natural.
"Almost darkness," Sebastian signed. "Maybe we wait for night."
"Whatever you think best."
The alien glanced over its shoulder. "If your mind captures disagreement, make it free. Trust must not be as blind as the tunnel."
"If I disagreed, I'd say so," Ness signed back. "But Swimmers always seem to quiet down at night."
"They seem to because they do." Sebastian gazed ahead. Thirty feet in, the ravine curved to the right, concealing whatever lay beyond. "A quick look in the light. Then back to the tunnel to wait."
He took the lead, Ness and Sprite lagging ten feet behind. After the stillness of the cavern, the rustle of the wind made Ness flinch. As the way forward began to bend to the right, Sebastian froze. Behind him, Ness did the same.
Sebastian signed, "Trust?"
"Trust," Ness replied.
"Then give over the guns."
He passed Sebastian his laser, then murmured, "Sprite, give me your rifle. Right now."
"What's up?" Sprite handed over the weapon. Ness gave it to Sebastian's waiting tentacle. "Hey, what are you doing?"
"Shut up!" Ness hissed.
"But he's—"
Four aliens strode from around the curve, silencing Sprite mid-protest. Each carried at least two pistols, possibly more; Ness didn't recognize all the tools in the Swimmers' grip. He recognized the pink bandoliers, though: security/soldiers.
One began to sign aggressively at Sebastian. He responded coolly; Ness wasn't able to pick up more than the opening questions about who Sebastian was and what he was doing there. As two of the Swimmers moved in to menace him and Sprite, Sebastian swiveled his head and winked one bulbous eye.
Tentacles lifted Ness clear of the ground. His pack was pulled from his shoulders. Beside him, an alien lifted Sprite clear of the ground, his legs kicking. He drove the toe of his shoe into the alien's brisket. It lifted him higher, as if to dash him against the ground, then whipped him across the face with a tentacle. He cried out, a welt raising across his face.
"Knock it off!" Ness said. "We're gonna be fine unless you fuck it up."
"Don't tell me this was part of the plan!"
"Trust me."
Sprite gave him a wild-eyed look, then relaxed in his captors' claws. They were carried down the path through the shrubs, followed by a third soldier, with Sebastian and the leader bringing up the rear. They stopped at the second door they came to. One of the aliens gestured beside it and it peeled open. Though it was lit with artificial lights, the interior was irregularly shaped, as if they'd grown the orange substance over the walls of the cavern. For twenty minutes, he and Sprite were held there, clutched in the snake-like tentacles. The three aliens minding them exchanged a few signs, none of which Ness was able to get a good look at. He didn't want to pay too much attention to their gestures, anyway. He wasn't sure what was going on with Sebastian, but the more Ness looked like a dumb vanilla human, the better.
The fourth alien arrived and gestured to the others. With no further ceremony, Ness and Sprite were marched into another tunnel. Its walls and curves were smooth, artificial; soft lights glowed from depressions above eye level. Ness counted down the number of doors they passed, repeating the numbers in his head until it was burned into his brain. Eleven doors and at least two miles later, their entourage stopped beside a door. One alien waved a tentacle before it and it shlucked open. They were taken to a bare room with fine grates in the floor, stripped naked, and sprayed down with lukewarm water that smelled of antiseptic. For the finale, the aliens patted them dry and dressed them in what appeared to be bulky white diapers.
A brief march brought them to a long room lined on both sides with six-foot orange boxes. Sprite's minder peeled the lid from one and lifted him inside.
"Ness?" Sprite said, clinging to the side of the box. "Ness!"
The alien placed a tentacle on his head and shoved him inside. When Ness was lifted into his box, he offered no resistance. The top sealed him into darkness. Through the box's walls, he could just hear the shuffle of the creatures departing the way they'd come in.
"Tristan?" a man shouted, distorted by the clammy organic matter. He laughed harshly. "Got you too, you bitch?"
"Hey!" Sprite yelled back. "Where are
we?"
"Is she with you?"
"Got who? What is this place?"
The unseen man was quiet for a time. "It's nowhere. And there's no leaving it."
That put an end to conversation. Ness had seen his box was empty, yet he explored it anyway, advancing by the touch of his fingers and toes. He found no seams in the walls. He was able to get his fingertips into the cracks around the lid, but the harder he pushed, the harder it pushed back.
He sat and leaned his back against the wall. Its feel and smell reminded him of the sub. When he decided to sleep, he had no trouble at all.
Many hours later, the lid peeled open. An alien reached in with a metal instrument and held it to his neck, then his ear. The room was lit with the same artificial sources as before and Ness had no idea if it was morning or night. The lid closed again. He thought about exercising, more to wear himself out so he could sleep sooner than to stay in shape, but he wanted his strength to be there when he needed it. Some time later, the box opened and a tentacle handed down two plastic bottles: one full of water, the other with a light, white paste that tasted like vitamins and root mush.
He had no real sense of time, but he figured about two days had passed before he was extracted from his box and herded to join Sprite, three men, and four women. They varied in age, but all were thin or getting there rapidly, and even those of Polynesian or Asian descent were looking on the pale side. Though you could hardly get less erotic than underfed people in diapers, Ness felt his animal side stirring.
As they were shepherded to the blank shower room, he focused on their surroundings, memorizing the route in case it proved useful later. The aliens stripped them and hosed them down. The other seven eyed Ness and Sprite dispassionately, then zoned out, staring at the walls.
While the water was still running, Sprite edged near him. "What are we doing here?"
"Trusting."
"That they're not planning to eat us?"
"I don't think we have to worry about that. Not the way they're feeding us."
Sprite balled his hands and rubbed his eyes. "You laugh. But I'm starting to see things in there."
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