Dragon Blood

by Madelaine Montague

  She felt a little nauseated when she realized she couldn’t dismiss the possibility of a connection. It was just too coincidental to be a coincidence. In her line of work, that was usually a sure sign of a connection—not always, but usually.

  So … he’d spotted her and recognized her?

  Not that she’d placed much faith in the possibility of alien abduction to begin with, despite her certainty that that was why there was so much sudden interest in her by the government, but didn’t his presence make that even less likely? It had been weeks. Aliens wouldn’t be hanging around, would they?

  She rolled her eyes at the thought. She didn’t know why or even how—or for certain that that was what they actually believed, for that matter—they’d gotten the idea of alien involvement to start with. Of course that had a lot to do with the fact that she could remember damned little and no one had filled her in. They’d questioned her, seemingly endlessly, but that left as many gaps as it filled in.

  The searchers had found the bear—or at least ‘a’ bear—that she’d thought had attacked her and it hadn’t just been dead. It had been mutilated, it’s back broken in several places and its lower jaw ripped off. Even she didn’t see how that could be put down to another animal attacking, including another bear, but it was a hell of leap to aliens, wasn’t it?

  She’d gotten the impression that two men had arrived to help and they’d fought the bear.

  She hadn’t told anyone that. Fortunately, she’d heard about the bear before she’d had the chance to tell that tale and realized it probably wasn’t a good idea to tell her version.

  They would probably have put it down to hysteria or trauma anyway, but she was still glad she hadn’t.

  Unfortunately, the only thing that was really clear to her was the pain she’d felt and then the heat that had begun to infuse her like a fever once they’d bathed her. How could she have felt such pain if she hadn’t been hurt at all? Even the doctors had scratched their heads trying to figure out how she could’ve been unconscious for what was hours when they hadn’t found any drugs in her system or any sign of an injury that would’ve rendered her unconscious.

  It she wasn’t pregnant—and she still hadn’t fully accepted that—she would have gone on believing that the entire thing had just been some sort of delusion.

  It made her head throb just trying to come up with a reasonable explanation for what had happened and she finally dismissed it. She wasn’t going to get any answers until and unless she managed to track down the men who’d impregnated her.

  She would’ve liked to have been able to convince herself that it had been rape, and she still felt that she’d been manipulated somehow, but unfortunately her mind was pretty clear on that aspect. She hadn’t just been willing. She’d practically begged them to do something about the heat.

  Just like she had Gabriel.

  Today, she felt like complaining because she was tired and sore. Last night, she not only hadn’t complained, she’d been eager for him to scratch the seemingly insatiable itch.

  Gathering up a map of the park, a compass, a couple of bottles of water and enough food to see her through the day, she stuffed everything into a small pack and left the cabin. It would’ve made things a lot easier if she could’ve simply gone straight to the park rangers and asked to be shown the area where the ‘FBI woman’ had been attacked, but she decided it was too risky. She didn’t think any of them had paid enough attention to recognize her, but she didn’t want to take a chance that they might. She wouldn’t have worried about it if she’d thought she could get in, find her answers, and get out before her ‘tail’ figured out she’d headed to the park, but she was working on borrowed time and she knew it.

  She’d lain a trail south, but they might already have figured out she hadn’t gone that way.

  It was standard procedure for authorities to track down all known addresses associated with anyone they were trying to find—but they had to know she knew that and wasn’t stupid enough to go to any friends or relatives—except the one who’s car she’d borrowed for the first leg of her trip. They might realize pretty quickly that she would want to know what had happened and would head for the park, but she hoped not. She hoped they decided she’d figured out they were watching her and had made for the nearest border to try to get completely off their radar.

  If the last was the case, then she would have a little time to see what she could figure out.

  It would make her chances of getting out of the country later, if she decided to, nearly impossible, but then she still hadn’t figured out what she wanted to do ‘after’.

  A lot depended on what she found out. If there was nothing ‘other worldly’ about her pregnancy then she didn’t see that she had anything to worry about, or lose, in reappearing. She could just say that she’d headed for relatives in the south and changed her mind and decided to see what she could find out. They couldn’t prove she’d run, because she hadn’t committed any kind of crime and had no reason to think she was under surveillance. She couldn’t be charged with anything and she didn’t have to worry about disappearing into some secret government lab for experiments—or worry about the baby.

  She hadn’t consciously acknowledged that the main reason for her flight was concern that her baby might be in danger, but the moment she did, she realized that was her main driving force—fear for the life of a child she hadn’t even wanted to acknowledge was there.

  It was hers, though! Despite the circumstances of its conception, despite her plans for her future and a career, it was her child and she wasn’t going to let anybody decide its fate!

  She thought she might have felt differently if she’d felt raped. The truth was, regardless of the fact that she did not understand why she’d wanted them to fuck her senseless, she couldn’t lie to herself and claim rape.

  It had to have been ‘them’, whoever ‘they’ were—the two men who’d somehow rescued her from the bear. She hadn’t heard them speak more than a few words to each other, and she’d been drifting in and out of consciousness the entire time, but she was convinced she hadn’t changed hands at any point.

  She was just as convinced that the place where she’d been found wasn’t the same place where she’d been taken. She vaguely recalled an argument between the men. It had seemed to her that there were more than two—more than three, but she’d decided that must have been some sort of trick of her imagination. It just didn’t seem plausible that an entire gang of men would’ve been in the same place—especially since she was absolute sure that only two had screwed her—and she’d been found naked.

  She was in luck she discovered when she arrived at the trail entrance. The lodge she’d decided to stay at wasn’t far from the park entrance and she’d woken early enough that there were still a fair number of hikers that hadn’t taken to the trail. She wouldn’t have considered it luck at all except that as she was scurrying past one of the rangers she overheard one of the hikers asking about the site where they’d found the bear.

  She hesitated, debating whether the risk of being recognized trumped the information she might get, and finally slowed her steps enough to catch the conversation. It seemed obvious that the ranger wasn’t especially happy about the focus on the ‘possible alien mutilation’ site, but it seemed equally clear, from the resignation in his voice, that he’d directed more than a few people to the area.

  It unnerved her to realize that some sort of bizarre story must have hit the gossip rags, at the very least, to bring out the UFO nuts.

  On the other hand, she thought philosophically, that would just make her one more nut case and less likely to draw attention.

  She stopped near the trail head and made a pretense of searching for something in her pack and waited for the hikers to direct her to the trail. She’d done her best to mark her map from her memory, but this was far better since she’d been lost at the time and wasn’t entirely sure she had the spot marked correctly.

  Giving the hikers a head
start, she fell in behind them, close enough she could hear snatches of their conversation. She was rewarded for her efforts by catching a good bit of the dialogue about an article one of them had read online. There were arguments both for and against the possibility that the bear killing fit into the alien mutilation category. Mostly, those seemed to be farm animals and the mutilation didn’t really match either. It was still a strange enough circumstance that they wanted to see it for themselves.

  Personally, Marlee didn’t see their point. The bear carcass had been removed long since and she couldn’t imagine what they thought there was to see. The only reason she’d decided she wanted to see it for herself was that she wanted to see just how far away the site was from the spot when she’d been found.

  She’d been told it was several miles, but she didn’t know how accurate that was or even if it was close to accurate. Beyond that, she thought if she walked it there still might be a chance of finding some small clue that hadn’t been discovered.

  The possibility was slim, she knew. Not only had the searchers combed the area when they were looking for her, but there’d been another investigative team on the site afterwards—whoever the stranger in the dark suit worked for that she’d seen with her doctor.

  She couldn’t see that she had anything to lose by looking, however, and she thought if the distance had been exaggerated, or completely wrong, then that upped the chances that her ‘rescuers/abductors’ were plain old home grown guys—not weird aliens that wanted to impregnate human women for some strange reason.

  Of course, that also suggested that they were hikers which might or might not mean they were locals. She thought there were probably locals who made use of their proximity to the park, but the number of visitors would be considerably higher and therefore, she thought, the chances were higher that, even if it had been hikers, they were strangers to the area and it wasn’t likely she would ever track them down.

  The hikers stopped to rest and eat before they reached the site. Since she didn’t want to make it too obvious that she’d been following them, Marlee kept going for about thirty minutes more and then found a shady spot to rest and wait for her ‘guides’. She’d begun to think they’d changed their minds by the time they finally passed her. She focused on repacking her small pack while they trooped past, gave them another ten minutes and fell in behind them again.

  She was a little annoyed when she discovered they’d stopped little more than an hour from the site. If she’d known they were that close, she would’ve kept going. Her annoyance waned, however, after she’d watched them for a little while. They were serious UFO hunters and had brought equipment with them.

  Deciding after a little while that it wouldn’t hurt to indulge her curiosity, she wandered a little closer. “What are you guys doing?”

  She knew they had to have heard her approach but apparently they’d been too engrossed to really register it. All three young men whirled to look at her … and none of them looked especially welcoming.

  “Testing the radiation levels,” one of them finally responded.

  Her heart skipped several beats. “Radiation?” she echoed. There was no need for acting that time.

  The second man nodded, but he didn’t offer any explanation.

  “Why would you think there’d be radiation? Isn’t this the site where they found that bear?”

  “We heard it was a possible case of alien mutilation,” one of the men, who looked to be the youngest, finally volunteered.

  “I don’t get the connection.”

  The other two sent him an irritated look, but almost seemed to shrug. Wandering off, they left her and the talkative young man alone.

  “It’s pretty common to find higher levels of radiation around a reported UFO landing site.”

  That was news to her! “Really? I guess since you aren’t picking up anything that rules that out?”

  He shrugged. “Probably … not necessarily, though. It just means there was no landing as far as I can see. They could’ve beamed the bear up for experimentation and then dropped it here.”

  Marlee blinked at him. “Beamed it up?”

  He reddened slightly. “You know we have scientists working on that particular technology now, right? Well, we haven’t perfected it, but there’s no saying someone else couldn’t have.”

  “So … you’re leaning toward some kind of … uh … alien visitation thing?”

  “We’re here to study it,” one of the others said a little testily as he returned. “We don’t make conclusions until we’ve gathered whatever facts we can. But if you’ve heard anything about this, you’d have to agree that something really, really weird happened here.”

  The younger guy nodded eagerly. “The bear was only part of it. An FBI agent disappeared and was gone for nearly ten hours. They found her miles from here—even though there was evidence that she’d been at this site, where they found the bear, and she had no idea where she was or how she’d gotten there.”

  She actually had some idea. It just didn’t compute! She frowned, wondering if it was a good idea to hang around now that they’d mentioned her. The chances were if she’d been part of the story her picture had been plastered next to the story and although they hadn’t shown any sign of recognition, that didn’t mean they wouldn’t. “Really?” she said in a ‘tell me more’ tone.

  “The government has been crawling all over it. The last of them only pulled out last week or we would’ve been here sooner.”

  That was good to know! She felt a little cold at the realization that she’d come damned close to running into just the people she most wanted to avoid. She debated briefly and decided not to allow her caution to prevent her from finding out what she could. “What, exactly, was it about the killing that made you feel like it might have to do with UFO’s?”

  “There isn’t a lot that can kill bears,” the elder young man said dryly. “It wasn’t a little black bear. It was a grizzly.”

  “Another grizzly?”

  “Yes, but they’re pretty territorial. It wouldn’t be a ‘usual’ thing to find two that close together and from what we could tell about the pictures, there weren’t any of the wounds you’d expect to see if it had been a fight between two bears—no claw marks, no teeth marks—which pretty much rules out any other wild animal.”

  “Whatever it was ripped the lower jaw almost clean off,” the younger man volunteered eagerly.

  A wave of nausea washed over Marlee. “Ripped? Not cut?” she managed to say.

  “Wouldn’t that rule out aliens, too? I mean, wouldn’t they use … uh … lasers or something?”

  “Yeah, well, you’re right, I guess, but it’s damned strange. Something weird happened here.” He frowned, obviously thinking. “Not that I believe in any of that bullshit or anything, but I suppose the xenobiologists might have a case here for big foot or something like that, now that you mention it.”

  “Footprints? Hello?”

  The older man glared at the younger. Marlee looked at both of them questioningly.

  “They only found a couple of partial footprints anywhere in the area and they were both human. One belonged to the agent and the other … well, it was a big print, but clearly human—barefoot.”

  Marlee glanced around speculatively. “I don’t suppose there’d be much chance of discovering any other footprints after all this time.”

  “Not since the feds were here,” the eldest said dryly.

  “Maybe I’ll look around anyway?” Marlee said. “Just out of curiosity.”

  The guys shrugged, studied her for a few minutes as she moved slowly around the area, searching the ground, and finally returned their attention to what they’d been doing. Marlee poked around until she decided she’d looked long enough to convince them she was curious, but not overly curious, and then returned to the trail to wait for them to leave. She discovered she’d reckoned without their enthusiasm. An hour passed and then two. The young men began discussing trying to find the second
site—where the agent was found—on the following day.

  They seemed to be fonts of information—had been thus far anyway—which made her wonder if there was really any such thing as secrets of any kind anymore. After a while, she fell to considering if it would be worth trying to track them to the location or if she’d have better luck on her own. When they began to discuss their strategy for reaching it and getting to the nearest camping area in one day, though, she decided it might not be such a great idea to try it without any kind of guide.

  Leaving her watch position, she headed back to the trail head, wondering if it was possible that she might find a guide among the locals who knew where the site was and could take her and get her back without getting lost. From what the guys had said, she’d gotten the impression that it wasn’t near any of the marked trails and that could spell trouble with a capital T for her! It sure as hell hadn’t been any part of her plan to get lost and become the subject of another hunt!

  She was still struggling with the pros and cons of the idea when she reached the trail entrance and headed to the parking lot, so deep in thought that she damned near ran one of the rangers down. It was only the discovery that she was on a collision course that jerked her back to her surroundings and, unfortunately, that made it too late to avoid being noticed herself. The ranger, an older man, glanced at her, did a double take, and stopped dead in his tracks, staring at her hard.

  “You’re the agent that was lost up here a few weeks ago.”

  If there’d been a thread of doubt in the man’s voice, Marlee would’ve flatly denied it.