Outland (Revised Edition)

by Dennis E. Taylor

  How many people were hiding in that thing, anyway?

  The next few seconds were a blur. The woman who had stepped out from behind the frame, a short, very curvy brunette, prodded Zeke with her rifle and suggested he drop the gun. Carl and Jimmy came through the frame back to the warehouse, their hands up, followed by another man and woman, also carrying rifles.

  Zeke’s brain finally re-engaged, and he realized that he had lost control of the situation. Questions of where people were coming from, or where that shed actually was, didn’t matter now. He might be dead in a few more seconds, so there was no point in being subtle. Trying not to telegraph his intentions, he spun around to grab the geekoid to use as a shield. But before he could complete the motion, the large man grabbed his gun arm and twisted. Zeke grunted in pain but refused to let go of the geek or the gun. There was a brief impasse, while the two men tried to out-muscle each other. Unfortunately, this state of affairs tied up both Zeke’s hands and left him unable to maneuver. The brunette took a step forward and applied a soccer kick right where it would get his attention. Zeke lost interest in fighting as his world contracted to a small, intense core of agony. He dropped into a fetal position on the concrete floor, moaning.

  “Jeez, Monica, I kind of expected you to shoot him.”

  “I would have, but he was trying to use Kevin as a shield. He might have succeeded at exactly the wrong time.”

  “And shooting him would have meant getting the cops involved.”

  “So?”

  Silence.

  Zeke’s vision began to return as the bright nova of pain subsided slightly. He rolled onto his knees and groaned.

  Two of the men each grabbed an arm and helped him to his feet. He glared at the brunette and muttered, “Fucking bitch.” Her only response was an insolent smile.

  “Our friends will come looking for us,” Jimmy said. It was bullshit, of course, but good on Jimmy for trying.

  “The moving van wasn’t a ruse,” the shorter, pudgy man said. “Well, okay, it was, but we’re really going to move. You won’t find us. And if you do, we’ll be ready for you.”

  The large man made a disgusted sound. “Great tough talk, Bill.” He looked at Zeke. “We don’t want to kill you, but we can’t have you hassling us. So we’re going to put you on ice—”

  “On ice? Jesus, Richard, no one says that.”

  “Shut up, Bill. We’re going to put you—we’re going to store you until we’ve moved, then let you go. If you come after us again, we’ll go to the cops. We’ve got enough video of this whole scene to identify you, I think.”

  Zeke didn’t bother to look around. Cameras were everywhere these days. It wasn’t a stretch for a threat. Not that he cared. These bozos were going to learn the meaning of retribution before this was over. Especially the brunette. He’d make sure she died slowly.

  Richard gestured with his rifle toward the frame. “Into the shed. Step to the back.”

  Zeke, Jimmy, and Carl did as instructed, stepping through the mysterious oval one at a time. Jimmy was shaking a little. Promises of not killing them could be just so much air, designed to keep them cooperative until they were all in a corner. It was what he would do, if things were reversed.

  They stopped in the middle of the shed and turned around. From this side, the oval floated in the air unsupported, showing the interior of the warehouse. Zeke’s rage ebbed briefly as his curiosity got the better of him. He realized that the four extra people must have been waiting in the shed, behind the oval, so that they couldn’t be seen from the warehouse. And they’d have been behind Jimmy and Carl when they went through the oval to check the gold bags. This had been carefully planned and choreographed right from the beginning. He’d been set up.

  The man named Richard looked to the side, then back at Zeke through the oval. “You’ll need these if you go outside. I suggest you do that as little as possible. We’ll be back to let you out in a day or two.” With that he tossed the confiscated handguns into the shed. Before Carl or Jimmy could react, Richard said, “Okay, Kevin, cut it,” and the oval disappeared.

  “What the FUCK!” Jimmy yelled. He pounced on his pistol. Zeke and Carl did the same, and they quickly checked their weapons.

  “Still loaded,” Carl said. “That’s either incredibly dumb or incredibly confident.”

  “Or,” Zeke replied, “they really think we’ll need the guns. Which is maybe scarier.”

  “Why would they care if we do?”

  “These are college kids, Carl. They don’t kill people. They phone 911. Except, for whatever reason, they can’t. You heard them talk about not wanting to get the cops involved. They’re amateurs, caught up in something too big for them to handle. This is how they ease their consciences.” Zeke was silent, considering. “I’m going to kill the fuckers. Slowly. Every one of them.”

  Jimmy had been examining the bags. “Aw, shit. Rocks. The only part that was gold is the part that was spilled out.”

  “This was a setup right from square one,” Carl said.

  “I’m going to kill them,” Zeke said. “A lot.”

  “Rifles are empty, too. Hey, these are AR-15s. Not bad at all.”

  Zeke glared silently at Jimmy until he dropped his gaze.

  “This whole situation is bizarre.” Zeke stepped forward to where the oval had been. A few feet beyond, the shed doors were closed and latched. In a corner there was a stack of bottled water, a couple of boxes of protein bars, and a pail. Zeke’s eyebrow went up, but he decided to put off consideration of those items for the moment. He reached for the doors. “How is a garden shed supposed to hold—The fuck?”

  As Zeke opened the doors, he found himself facing a totally unexpected sight. Instead of the inside of the warehouse or even the parking lot, prairie grass stretched off in all directions, broken by the occasional copse of trees. Antelope, buffalo, and less identifiable wildlife dotted the landscape, while huge flocks of birds swarmed overhead. In the distance, something roared. Something big.

  “I don’t think we’re in Nebraska anymore,” Jimmy said.

  “Maybe we are,” Carl replied. “Time travel.”

  “What?”

  “It would explain the disappearing oval doorway. It could explain the gold. It would explain this,” Carl continued, waving at the view. “The fuckers invented time travel. They built a shed here in the past, baited it with those bags, tricked us with the time portal thing, and marooned us here.”

  “You have got to be shitting me.” Zeke glared at Carl, willing him to take it back.

  Carl sighed. “Maybe. Maybe not. But it would also explain them giving us the guns and the warning. Ever watch Jurassic Park?”

  The unidentifiable roar reverberated again across the prairie. Without a word, Zeke slid the shed doors closed.

  41. Reactions

  “That was awesome!” Bill bounced from foot to foot, still grinning like a fool.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” Kevin said. He stumbled off toward the washroom.

  “Can it, Bill,” Richard replied. “People could have been killed.”

  Monica glared up at Richard. “Fine with me. I’d have been happy to start.”

  “Damn. I’m a little scared of you.”

  Erin laughed. “Only a little? You’ll learn to fear her a lot, Richard.”

  “My fans,” Monica said.

  “Okay, great, we won that round,” Matt said. “But we still have to get a new location, move everything, then figure out how to retrieve the thugs without getting shot in the process. I’m betting they’re not going to be all grateful and just walk away.”

  “You ain’t wrong,” Richard said. “We’ll have to choreograph the retrieval really carefully. However, the snowflake actually seems to be good at this, so I’m sure he’ll come up with something.”

  Bill laughed. “My fans.”

  “Don’t push it.”

  There was silence as everyone attempted to shift mental gears, broken by Kevin’s retu
rn. He looked marginally less green.

  “I accept that we have to move,” Erin said. “But what about moving everything to Deadwood?”

  “No time. We have to move now, and we still need a location in Lincoln. Anyway, the place in Deadwood isn’t big enough to take everything. It was just supposed to be a secondary base of operations.” Richard began to pace as he talked. “We don’t know for sure whether or not anyone will be coming after the thugs that just tried to hit us. We need to be out of here before that happens. Once we’ve got a new base here, we can go back to stocking up the second address in Deadwood.” Richard looked around. No one appeared inclined to argue.

  “Listen, Richard,” Bill said, “the assay services are only a risk because we’re bringing in raw gold. That’s unusual enough to get attention. But gold sellers bring in gold all the time, and I bet in pretty significant quantities. It’s just already refined. I’m sure it was bringing in the raw nuggets that got us noticed, so all we have to do is smelt the gold ourselves. I could set up a small furnace easily enough.”

  Matt looked at Bill, then around the warehouse. “Hey, why not? You’ve already pretty much taken over.”

  Richard grimaced. “Wish we’d done that in the first place.”

  Monica placed a hand on his arm. “Come on, big guy, don’t be so hard on yourself. None of us thought of any of this. It’s not like there’s a manual for this kind of thing.”

  Richard smiled at her, then looked around at the group. “Okay, let’s get this show on the road, before more of them show up.”

  The move went quicker than they could have hoped. A moderate vacancy rate for warehouses around Lincoln guaranteed the group their pick of locations, available immediately, and they already had the van partly loaded from the ruse that had pulled in the thugs.

  The group stood in the middle of the new warehouse, this one considerably larger. They had leased an entire half of a building, complete with its own plumbing, security, dedicated electrical system, cable and Wi-Fi, and heating and air conditioning. Everything from the two old units fit comfortably into the new space.

  Bill sighed with contentment, then headed to the kitchen to set up his gigantic coffeemaker. “If it came down to it, we could live here. Did you notice we have a shower?”

  “Yeah. A shower. One.” Monica glared at him. “You feel free to live here. I like my apartment.”

  Bill laughed, then turned to Richard. “And more important, a security system. Matt and I will do an audit and add whatever we need for full coverage.”

  “And as dumb as I feel for saying it,” Richard replied, “we should watch for tails and never wander around alone when on company business. I’m not going to call Bill a snowflake on this one, because it looks like paranoid enough is the watchword from now on.”

  “And let’s start putting up the big sheds on the other side, okay?” Bill waved his hand in the general direction of the palleted supplies. “I’m glad we didn’t start that at the old location, but let’s do it now. I think having most of our inventory overside will help a lot with security. And I’ll work on fail-safes and backups.”

  “Are we forgetting something?”

  Everyone turned to look at Erin.

  “Three thugs in a garden shed. We either bring them back or we leave them to die.”

  Bill and Kevin worked on prepping the portals. Everyone else held AR-15s. Finally, Bill held up the pole-cam and handed it to Kevin.

  Richard looked around at the group. “The plan is, we get them to toss their guns through the pole-cam portal. Once we have three guns, we open the big gate and let them through. We march them out of the building and watch them drive off. Then we get the hell away from here and never come back. Questions?”

  There were none.

  Richard motioned to the gate. Kevin activated the hardware, and Bill stared at the tablet for a few seconds.

  “Uh oh.”

  Richard glared at Bill. “Can you be more specific?”

  Bill turned the tablet so the others could see it. The video showed a garden shed, or at least the pieces of one. It looked like it had been run over by heavy machinery. “No thugs.”

  “Bodies?”

  “Just a sec.” Bill had Kevin move the pole-cam around while he watched the video feed intently. Finally, they stopped. Bill looked at Richard. “No bodies.”

  “Oh, great,” Erin said. “What now? If they ran off, they might still be alive …”

  “And you think we should go looking for them? Hell no!” Monica shook her head. “Much as I’d like to shoot them, they’re not worth the risk and effort.”

  The group stared at the video feed for a few more seconds.

  “Okay, how about this?” Erin said. “Let’s make a signboard. Tell them we’ll check in every day or so, around noon. If they can’t hang around, they should at least leave a message on the board. We’ll leave a permanent marker tied on a string or something.”

  “That works. If they’re still alive, their smartest move will be to come back to this spot.” Richard sighed. “Of course, coming back here all the time means we’re putting ourselves at risk again.”

  Erin gave him a raised eyebrow. “I don’t think we have a choice. This is a line in the sand. If we abandon them, we’re killers.”

  42. It’s Really Happened

  July 25

  The men met on Sunday morning at the new warehouse. Bill looked around. “Monica and Erin aren’t helping?”

  “They’re going to stop by the old warehouse to check for signs of the thugs. They’ll call us if they find something,” Richard replied.

  “So we get to play with the heavy equipment for a few hours,” Bill said.

  He laid the large-shed blueprints and instructions out on a folding table. “Let’s hold off on arguing until we’ve got the ground prepped, okay? Maybe having a foundation set up will help clarify things.”

  “Agreed,” Richard said. “Kevin, you should set up the portal equipment when we get it unloaded.”

  Kevin replied with one of his rare smiles. “And not try to drive the forklift? Fine by me.”

  Bill snickered and climbed into the forklift. As he unloaded pallets of equipment and supplies, Richard and Matt began to prep the Bobcat and backhoe they had rented.

  In short order, Kevin straightened up and waved to the others. “All ready.” He had the new truck gate set up against a wall of the warehouse, ensuring that only one side of it would be accessible when activated.

  Bill, Matt, and Richard walked over. “How do we do this?” Bill asked.

  “Once we start driving around with the Bobcat and backhoe, everything with legs or wings will head for the horizon,” Richard replied. “But until then, yeah, we have to worry about predators with more appetite than brains.”

  Matt strapped a shotgun across his back and hoisted an AR-15. “Well then, let’s clear the area as quickly as possible.”

  As soon as they opened the truck gate, Matt walked through, brandishing his weapon, and did a 360. When he didn’t immediately start shooting, Bill and Richard followed with the heavy equipment.

  Richard used the Bobcat to flatten the area needed for two large sheds. Matt took the backhoe and started digging trenches for the walls, taking direction from Bill, who was laying out the location. Kevin, per standard operational procedures, stayed Earthside in case something went wrong with the gate.

  Once they had laid the groundwork, they swapped the forklift attachment onto the Bobcat. Matt began driving supplies through the gate, starting with the shed pallets. Bill and Richard set to building the sheds.

  Or tried to. “Two people, my aunt Heinie,” Bill finally said in exasperation. “Maybe if the two people are superheroes.”

  Richard looked down at the plans again. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure this step here requires five hands.”

  “And an eight-foot reach. Let’s get Matt.”

  Matt shrugged when asked and replied, “I’m not on a schedule. Let’s try using
the forklift to raise some of these sections.”

  Using the heavy equipment sped up the work considerably. The men got into a routine, and before long they had one shed assembled and the second one started.

  At this point, Richard called lunch break.

  “Pizza?” Bill said.

  “Pizza!” Richard and Matt responded in unison.

  They shut down the equipment, stepped back to Earthside, and Kevin turned off the gate.

  Matt and Bill drove off for a pick-up order. Soon they were all sitting around the warehouse kitchen table, eating pizza and drinking beer.

  “Can’t operate heavy machinery now,” Bill said, holding up the beer.

  Kevin snickered.

  At that moment, Monica and Erin burst into the warehouse, out of breath. “Have you seen the news?” Erin exclaimed.

  “No, what’s up?” Matt said.

  “Yellowstone. It’s become more active. Very much more active. It’s beyond fissures and minor eruptions now. They’re reporting significant and sustained lava flows and almost constant earthquakes. And there’ve been unconfirmed reports of lava bombs.”

  “Lava what?” Matt grabbed the remote and turned on the TV. Monica, meanwhile, helped herself to some pizza.

  “Lava bombs,” Erin replied. “A large mass of lava gets tossed into the air, solidifies in mid-flight, and lands as a red-hot boulder.”

  “Doesn’t sound like fun,” Bill said. “And unfortunate for the park, of course. But they’ve been saying for weeks that this was all routine and didn’t signify anything.”

  “I think it’s beyond that now, Bill,” said Erin. “They’ve kind of given up on the ‘nothing to see here’ narrative. And this could still get worse. Much worse.”

  “Okay, I’ll bite. How much worse?”

  “End of civilization?”

  “Seriously?” The looks on the others’ faces mirrored Bill’s surprise.

  “Ah, look, it’s not one or the other,” Erin said. “Yellowstone could do anything, from just what we’re seeing and nothing more, all the way up to a Siberian Traps event. We just don’t know.”