Matchstick walked away and stood next to Billy, staring at him, blinking its eyes, then smiled at the boy and touched him on the shoulder. Then it looked at the black Kevlar helmet Mendenhall had placed on the kitchen table.
“Mahjtic and Billy, we will help you.”
“Good, we’ll leave right—”
“Want soldier helmet,” it said, looking from Jack to the helmet on the table and then at Billy.
“Yeah, a helmet,” Billy said, looking defiant.
“Tough negotiator,” Fielding said.
“That’s a high price, but, okay, you have a deal,” Jack said in all the seriousness he could muster.
Mahjtic walked over to Gus and took his hand, then pointed at the picture on the small table by the bed of the young Gus in uniform.
“Gus, fight with Mahjtic, make young again,” it said, still pointing at the old black-and-white picture.
“Looks like you’ve been drafted, Mr. Tilly,” Jack said.
Gus Tilly looked at the picture and then at the others around the room. “S’pose it wouldn’t do any good to call my congressman right about now, would it?”
All three soldiers shook their heads no.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Chato’s Crawl, Arizona
July 9, 1340 Hours
Julie Dawes had been forced to enlist the aid of Tony, who was sober this afternoon because he had misplaced his truck again the night before and hadn’t been able to get to the bar. Now he was up for waiting tables to deal with the army-induced rush of business. Juan and Carmella were in the back helping with the dishes. Julie also asked Hal Whikam, her weekend bartender and full-time bouncer, to run the kitchen while she took food orders.
Big Hal had a huge red beard and was wearing one of his many slogan-riddled T-shirts. His current shirt read KIRK OVER PICARD AND JANEWAY UNDER ME! It wasn’t as funny as the one that had said IT’S GOD’S JOB TO FORGIVE OSAMA BIN LADEN, BUT IT’S A MARINE’S JOB TO MAKE THE INTRODUCTIONS. Hal barely fit his bulk into the shirt, he was so large. Not fat large, but hulk large. Julie counted on little trouble from the people who plied their trade at the Broken Cactus because the ex-marine kept anything from getting out of hand, and if it was going to get out of hand, today would be the day.
The army had started collecting all the field reporters, cameramen, and tourists, and thank God, most had already been bused out of town, but because the Broken Cactus had food and water, it naturally became the place in town for those remaining to be removed from the quarantine zone, waiting on the next round of transport.
Most of the remaining townspeople were sitting off in the twenty-two corner tables and booths in the café section, watching events unfold around them. They were amazed at the way all the field reporters were shouting into cell phones explaining to their producers the predicament they found themselves in. All the while cameramen were getting all the background footage they could, which of course entailed bright lights aimed in other reporters’ faces. Then at exactly 1:45 in the afternoon, all cell phone service in the valley was interrupted. Jason Ryan, USN, had just finished placing the last inhibitor around the town that blocked any signal from leaving. So now all that was heard were the thirty or so reporters and crew simultaneously cursing their cell service for their loss of signal.
Ryan had come in twice since this morning and announced that they were under quarantine because of a serious outbreak of brucellosis in the valley. When pressed for answers, Ryan had coolly explained that Thomas Tahchako had lost most of his cattle already, and the disease could easily spread out of the valley and even into humans. Julie had watched through the hail of protests and questions as he calmly gave out copies of a prepared press release. Julie had also noticed him look her way and smile on his way back out. That smile had caused her to get the “schoolgirl” goose bumps that had lain dormant in her all these years. It had been a while since anyone had given her that kind of feeling.
Julie was harried, though grateful for the extra business, but it didn’t belie that something was seriously wrong out in the desert. She couldn’t wait for the final word for her to close down and head for the buses that were due to arrive anytime. She kept looking for Billy through the crush of strangers since it had been several hours since he had left the café. She only hoped he was somewhere in town.
“Hello,” a man said loudly while half leaning over the bar with his feet on the barstool.
Julie looked his way and noticed the stranger smiling at her. He was good-looking, probably in his late thirties or early forties. His hair was blond and combed straight back. The small, circular lenses of his glasses gave him that bookish look that was the fad these days. He wore simple Levi’s and a blue denim work shirt.
“Hello,” she answered back loudly, walking up and flipping open her order pad.
“Is it always this crazy around here?” he asked, smiling and gesturing to all the reporters.
Julie looked from him to a cameraman who was holding a Minicam just a foot from her face, the light atop it blinding her. The reporter she recognized as that irritating Kashihara guy from Phoenix. He was doing some background and was speaking into a microphone to kill time until they were let go, which Julie heard wasn’t going to happen this side of Phoenix. Squinting her eyes from the glare, Julie deftly tossed one of the soaking bar rags over the lens of the Minicam.
“Hey, what gives?” the camera jock yelped.
“Lady, you just ruined a pretty good voice-over,” Kashihara said loudly.
The stranger at the bar stepped in front of the newsman and said, “I guess it means the lady doesn’t like being window dressing, and my boss wouldn’t like seeing me in your shot either, I’m supposed to be working. Now go and play somewhere else.” He gently turned the reporter around and gave him a gentle shove.
“Who the hell are you, her father?” Kashihara asked, but still moved along as he spoke with his trailing cameraman about going to the Ice Cream Parlor, where it was calmer.
“Thanks,” Julie said, raising her voice a little to be heard over the noise of the crowded bar. She smiled at the newcomer. “Can I get you something?”
The man looked around the crowded room and then leaned closer, placing both hands on the bar, and said, “Water and a ham-and-cheese sandwich would be great.”
“It’ll have to be on white, out of wheat and rye.”
“White is fine.”
“One ham and cheese on white, Hal,” she yelled as she pulled a glass from below the counter and poured her only sane customer that day some ice water. She set the glass in front of him and looked him in the eyes. “In answer to your question, no, never this crazy. Are you one of them?” she asked, nodding toward the reporters.
He held out his hand. “Henry Tomlinson, Department of the Interior.”
Julie took the offered hand and shook. “Julie Dawes, owner of this madhouse. I take it you’re a part of that quarantine thing the army claims is going on?”
The man lowered his glass after taking a long swallow of the cool water. His eyes focused on the body of the woman behind the counter, appraising her a moment as he deftly displayed nothing. “Let’s just say I’m here to evaluate the situation. If you don’t mind me asking, why say the army ‘claims’?”
Julie wiped her hands on the dish towel and looked the man in the eyes. “I wasn’t born yesterday. All those guys walking around in CDC coveralls, they’re armed. Strange way of fighting a bug, isn’t it?”
“I wouldn’t know about that, only what my boss in Washington tells me. But I do know one thing for sure: someone could open up a used-helicopter dealership out there.”
Julie smiled at his reference to all the news choppers sitting just inside town. Most of them had been forced to land by the lethal-looking army helicopters, which had very nicely told them to set down, or else.
The man watched as Julie made her way down the bar removing dishes and replenishing water glasses. Somewhere in the back, the jukebox started up, and an old Creed
ence Clearwater Revival song, “Hey Tonight,” began to play, and it bounced its way through the crowd with some cheers and some boos.
He sat and took it all in as Julie returned and placed his ham and cheese in front of him and started writing his ticket.
“One ham and cheese on white, anything else?”
“No, this is it. Can you tell me where the army has set up?” he asked, then took a bite of his sandwich.
The question made Julie hesitate a moment as she wondered why this man didn’t know where the army had their camp since he was from the government. But she decided it was probably innocent. “All I know is they’re everywhere. But you may want to look for a Lieutenant Ryan. He seems to be in charge in town.” Julie looked up into the man’s eyes. “Do me a favor. If you see a little boy hanging out with him on a four-wheeler, tell him his mother needs him back home, would ya?” she asked, batting her lovely eyes.
“My pleasure, ma’am, and the name of the guy is Ryan, gotcha. By the way, how will I recognize the boy?”
“Easy, he’s the only child in this madhouse.”
The Talkhan watched as her young started their separate journeys to the surface. They had eagerly devoured all the nourishment she had stored for them, and still their added abilities demanded more for their burning metabolisms. They were again starving.
The activity felt and sensed from above was enough to set them on their instinctual path to the outside world.
The only offspring to lag behind the others was the male. It sat far away from the females and watched. The mother had approached it earlier in an attempt to wrest one of the smaller females from its clawed grasp, but it would have none of it. Already as large as her, it puffed out his purple neck armor and backed away a few steps, its horrible eyes never leaving her. The mother, sensing danger, moved off to tend to the females. The brooding male dove into the earth, its instincts taking over and driving it away from the others for survival. The females, their food exhausted, went separate ways, diving into the soil in all directions.
The mother watched as they went, then she too dove upward from the birthplace and into the soil. She would hunt separately.
The extinction of mankind was now beginning in earnest, and a new king was about to sit alone at the top of the food chain.
Ryan was trying to hold his rising temper in check with the state trooper as best he could. He felt for the man, but missing brother or not, he couldn’t let him go back out into the desert. The other twenty state troopers that were also surrounding him all shouted their curses at the same time.
The forty members of the 101st Airborne who had been assigned to Ryan were spread throughout the town, but some were starting to make their way to the assembled crowd of policemen, as their shouts of protest were becoming a little more threatening.
“Look, we have men out there right now. We didn’t try and hand you a bullshit cover story like the rest, and you saw yourself what this animal is capable of from the cattle you found. Do you want to run up against that with just a sidearm and riot guns?”
“We can take care of ourselves and don’t need the fucking army to hold our hands, goddamm it!” Dills shouted back, and the other officers nodded in agreement and shouted epithets like Damned straight “We’re willing to go along with your bullshit cover-up about a disease, but you have to give us a break. Let us go back out there and do our jobs. We have missing men and my brother is one of them!” Dills shouted.
At that moment, Ryan felt someone tugging at his sleeve. He ignored the shouted curses of the state troopers and turned. At his side were a man and a woman. They were disheveled to say the least, as the older woman’s hair was loose and going in every direction of the compass and still had a few curlers hanging on for dear life. The older man was pale and had small cuts on his face and neck and was sunburned.
“Yes?” Ryan said, looking at the two people as if they had fallen from the sky.
The state troopers settled for a moment and they too looked at the couple, who seemed to have just stepped off the elevator from hell.
The man cleared his throat and looked from Ryan to the staring state troopers. Dills and his partner had a vague memory of helping these people change a tire last night.
“I would like to report an… an… an accident,” the man said haltingly.
The woman rolled her eyes. “Accident my ass, Harold,” Grace Tracy declared a little too calmly. She looked from her husband to Ryan, staring at him, and without blinking said, “Our camper was hit by a monster in the desert and tipped over, and I want to know what you are going to do about it, young man?” Her eyes were wide, moving from Ryan to the state troopers.
Ryan and most of the troopers blinked under the woman’s maniacal glare.
“Well, are you going to do something about it, huh… huh?”
Ryan was just going to ask her to give a report to one of the state cops when he heard yelling and screaming coming from the center of town. As he watched, people broke out running from the Broken Cactus in a steady stream. Someone even threw a chair out the big plate-glass window in the front, followed quickly by people jumping through the empty frame, some knocking others down in their frenzy to get out of the Broken Cactus. Ryan stared for just a moment at the strange spectacle before him. Then he shook himself and started running toward the center of town, quickly followed by his men, and then, drawing sidearms and yanking shotguns from their patrol cars, the state troopers came.
Harold and Grace Tracy decided they had dropped back into Chato’s Crawl at a bad time. Only one thing ran through Harold’s mind as they turned away from the horrible scene once again unfolding around them in the very place they had had lunch the previous day. He really regretted not having gone to Colorado to visit his sister-in-law.
Julie didn’t realize the attacks had started until the floor exploded under her. The music had been playing loudly, but not loud enough to cover the ear-shattering crack of the flooring as it exploded upward into the milling crowd of reporters. Screams sent chills down Julie’s spine as the crowd parted and she saw people being pulled down into the now missing floor of the diner.
Tomlinson reached over the bar and shoved Julie to the left as the part of planking she was standing on cracked and splintered. She screamed and moved quickly around the bar.
Suddenly, a dark, nightmarish form jumped from the hole behind the bar and roared, sending the featherlike armor plates lining its neck and head outward from its body. The crowd around the bar stared in shock and added their screams to that of the creature. The beast was about eight feet in height with shimmering thick, black hair that caught the light streaming in through the window. The claws were huge, and they came down and sank into the mahogany bar and snapped the three-inch-thick hardened wood as if it were made of balsa. The green eyes fixed on them, its mouth opened, and claw-tipped mandibles parted to show three rows of sharklike teeth. The ears were sharply pointed over a snout that was huge and curved off into the jawline with bunched muscles. The thick brow was covered in sharp points of protruding plate that highlighted its terrible eyes. The tail, its barbed stinger dripping venom, shot forward and missed Tomlinson by an inch as he fell back into Julie and they both tumbled to the floor.
“Run!” he shouted at Julie, who was busy pushing herself out from under his weight and scooting backward on her ass. She didn’t need to be told by any stranger to get the hell out of there.
With lightning speed he pulled a hidden pistol from somewhere on his body and started firing at the beast, which had deftly jumped to the bar and was ready to spring. The huge head swayed left and right, surveying the area for threats; the armor plates around the neck were now relaxed and swayed with the movement like a large headdress. Out of ten bullets fired, one missed and five hit the thickest chest armor of the animal and ricocheted off. But then the next four of the Frenchman’s shots found a weak spot in both its eyes. The nightmare roared again and swiped at its assailant, missing him by mere inches. Its momentum
carried it over and off the bar and crashing to the floor. As it hit, two huge claws of another yet unseen animal burst through the wood and tile and grasped the dying beast and pulled it under with a sickening crunch.
Tomlinson quickly turned over and gained his feet, picking Julie up on the way out of the slaughterhouse.
“What in the hell was it?” Julie screamed.
He turned and pulled Julie close and yelled, “Just get the hell out of here. I have to find my men.”
As he was shouting at the woman, the crowd started pouring out of the Broken Cactus, pushing the two apart and carrying Julie away outside.
In the kitchen another of the creatures burst through the flooring and black and white tile went flying. When he realized what was going on, Hal quickly grabbed the first weapon he could, a large, lethal cleaver, and he immediately went on the attack. As he moved forward, Tony stepped in his way with an armful of hamburger patties just retrieved from the freezer. Hal pushed a wide-eyed Tony into the large walk-in refrigerator and quickly swung it closed, saving Tony and making more room to fight.
The beast circled the big ex-marine. Saliva dripped from its mandibles as it clicked its huge claws together. The green eyes looked into those of the man who had the nerve to confront it and glared in all hunger. The tail was constantly swinging in quick arcs behind it, and once every few seconds its stinger would stab into the stainless steel countertop, sounding like a gunshot and leaving a clean hole dripping with a bluish green liquid. The feet were large and they too scratched the black-and-white-checkered floor with curving claws. The weight of the beast must have been tremendous, Hal saw, because every step it took cracked and separated the tile and broke wooden beams beneath its feet.
“Come on, fuckhead, you want some of this, come and get it! Come on, Charlie, get some.”
The beast bent at the waist, roared, and charged the cook, head down.
Event: A Novel Page 34