Koontz, Dean - Time Thieves

by Time Thieves(Lit)

  A world where the sky is orange, shading toward yellow at the horizons, with clouds that are tinted a soft green, with a sun that is only a white dot in the sky . . .

  Buildings of glass . . .

  Yellow trees, turning black in autumn . . .

  Flowers that pull up their roots and walk, . . .

  One after another, the shatered fragments of the other-worldly visions flowed through his mind, sharp but not unpleasant.

  He stabbed into the deepest regions of that mind, looked at the eyeless creature's innermost desires and hopes, understood only a fraction of them, whirled, twisted, and looked elsewhere.

  As he had hoped, his sudden atack and attempt at intimacy had disconcerted the eyeless creature on the other end. The white sphere went black as it momentarily lost control of its mechanical servants.

  An unvoiced scream ululated along the telepathic channel, as frightening as some enormous, swift-moving centipede. It was not a scream of pain, so much as it was a forlorn cry of emotional anguish, of spiritual turmoil.

  Silence.

  Then it returned, long, wailing, scraping across the surface of Pete's mind like a hacksaw blade.

  He tried to break the connection. This time, because the alien was too preoccupied to interfere, he managed to seal off the contact.

  He got to his feet, weaving slightly, and hurried away from the garage and the expensive houses.

  The pressure was gone. His mind felt light, quick, almost intoxicated. The white sphere was gone as well; he was not being traced any longer.

  He should feel jubilant, flushed with triumph. Instead, he felt as if he had done something unspeakably cruel to that strange being whose toothless mouth had bellowed such an eerie and yet basically human call for help.

  XIII

  His clothes were a mud-smeared, tattered mess. He didn't want Della to see him like this, first thing, before he had time to offer an explanation. He walked along Market Street to the Surplus Outlet Mart where he pawed through jeans and work shirts until he found ones he wanted. He paid for them and changed clothes in the rest room.

  It was only ten of eight, and the only other place open at that hour was Halberstrom's, on the square. He walked down there and bought himself a large breakfast. He sat in a corner booth, out of the main traffic, and allowed himself some thought for the the first time in many long hours.

  Just a day ago, the only problem had been finding out who had caused his amnesia and who was watching him from the sidelines. Now, abruptly, the problem was far more complex. It was no longer "who" but "what". Now, he had to consider extraterrestrial creatures. And robots. And spaceships, certainly. And all the other paraphrenalia of fantasy.

  At one time, he would not have been able to accept that. But, before last night, he had not been able to read the minds of other people. He had not been chased by robots with faces of pliable putty. He had not traced an alien creature's thoughts with his own telepathic probe. And last night, he had done all these things, and now he could believe.

  And despite these abrupt changes in his perception of the world, he did not feel particularly unsure of himself. If his strongest personality trait before had been a need for a minimal solidity to life—a home, a wife, a business, a style of existence—his most powerful trait now was his ability to assimilate anything, no matter how radical it was, and work within the new picture of the world that it presented to him.

  It was not solely his encounter with the eyeless alien's mind and with the indestructable robots that brought about the shift in his vision, though both those hings were surely a part of it. No, more than all that, more than spaceships and beasts from outer space and androids, was Della.

  Yet he dreaded going home and having to, in some way, explain it all to her. That was why he had bought breakfast first, he knew. What if Della could never understand? And, honestly, how could he ever expect her to grasp the world he now saw? She did not, after all, have the benefit of extrasensory perception.

  Worse still, what if, once he had come to know Della, once he had explored every nook of her mind, he grew tired of her? Might she turn out to be nothing more than a curious novelty for his new powers—and nothing but a silly antique when he had nothing more to know about her? They said that a woman's attractiveness often is related to the mystery that surrounds her. In a short time, a year or two, perhaps she would hold no mystery for his psionic mind.

  He refused to consider that. Della would always be Della. He would always be in love with her. No power on earth, even telepathic, could change that.

  Besides, she would be like a second part of him by the time that he had finished exploring all of her store of thoughts and hopes, theories, emotions and instincts. She would be Pete Part Two, an intricate part of all the things that made him the man he was. And did a man stop loving himself, ever? Of course he didn't.

  But he wasn't sure.

  He paid his bill and leaving the restaurant, stood on the pavement drawing the summer air deep into his lungs. Across the street, on the park benches, three people sat.

  But that was only another attempt to avoid seeing Della, to postpone the agony that he suspected might come as he drew closer to her than ever—while she was simultaneously alienated from him.

  It won't be that way, he thought in the taxi on his way home. Besides, I have to tell her. She has to know about all these things, and we have to plan some course of action together. The eight-fingered alien creature would not yet have abandoned his game, whatever it was.

  They arrived at the house at a quarter past nine. He paid the man and tipped him, then went inside.

  "Della!" he shouted, trying to put warmth and excitement into his voice, concealing his disquiet.

  She did not answer him.

  He crossed the kitchen, wondering if she could still be asleep. She would have gotten his note, and she wouldn't have gone out until he came home. He thought of reaching out and touching her mind, to see if she were asleep yet, but he decided against that. Somehow, he knew that, until he had talked with her, until he could see, more plainly, what their future was going to be, he should not invade her private realms again.

  "Hey sleepyhead!" he called as he passed from the dining room into the front room.

  Here, the willows outside cast shadows over the windows and kept out a great deal of the sunlight. Without any lamps burning, the chamber was in semidarkness. He was almost ready to turn for the steps when he saw her. She sat in an easy chair, in her house robe, staring at him. She had the most peculiar expression that he had ever seen, and he could not guess what it meant.

  "Are you all right?" he asked her.

  She smiled, but made a bad job of it. "Yes," she said. "I'm all right."

  "But you don't look well."

  "I'm fine!" she said. It was a false bravado—but as if she did not realize, herself, how false.

  "But why are you sitting here, in the dark like this?"

  "Waiting for you," she said.

  "Della-"

  He started toward her, then heard the footsteps on the stairs, behind. He whirled and looked up at the two mechanical men coming toward him. One of them held a weapon of some sort, short-barreled and amber, like a piece of shaped glass.

  "It's for your own good," Della said.

  He fell, rolled, and heard something tinkle against the wall above him, at the exact spot where he had been standing only a moment ago.

  He came up against a small coffee table, clutched it, and brought it on its side betwen himself and the robots.

  A burst of tiny, silver needles studded the wood.

  He stood behind cover of the table and heaved it at the mechanicals as they reached the bottom of the staircase. It knocked them off balance and gave him a moment to flee. He turned toward the dining room in time to confront a second pair, their faces expressionless, all wearing identical raincoats and slacks and shoes.

  To his right, there was a small, Connecticut window, many-paned with small, thin wooden str
uts between the sections of the glass. He flung himself sideways, closing his eyes and throwing his arms about his head, smashed through the window and struck the yard with his wounded shoulder. The place where the bullet had grazed him broke open and began to bleed again.

  He got up and ran, back along the house to the alleyway behind the garage. Once in the open, where the neighbors might see him, he began to walk, though he kept a steady, brisk pace. Every few hundred feet, he looked back to see if they were following. They weren't.

  He had gone two blocks when the white sphere intruded on his mental horizons, drew down on him and tracked along the perimeter of his telepathic shield.

  Furious, he directed a blast of psionic power at it. It seemed to yellow, shrink and retreat. When it did not return during the next four blocks of his route, he knew that his telepathic abilities had continued to develop and that he was now capable of using his psionic power as a weapon, on a smaller scale but similar to the eyeless alien's ability.

  But what good did that do him? They had Della.

  XIV

  She wakes up and reaches out and feels cold sheets. When she opens her eyes on the dark room and his absence finally registers on all levels, she withdraws her hand, beneath the covers, holds her breasts and tries to keep her breathing even.

  She listens for him.

  She throws off the covers and gets out of bed, slips on her tongs and goes to the bedroom door. She opens it, steps into the hallway and stops again to listen for him.

  Silence.

  "Pete?'

  Silence yet.

  Perhaps, she thinks, he is dwnstairs, sitting in an easy chair, reading. He likes to read in the mornings.

  "Pete?"

  But why doesn't he answer her?

  She starts down the stairs.

  Her heart is thudding. She has a hollow ache in her stomach. She feels a weakness behind the knees.

  When she is halfway down the stairs, she sees the shape move at the bottom. At this hour, shortly after seven o'clock, the front room is in all but complete darkness. But it must be Pete.

  "What are you doing down there?" she asks.

  He comes out of the shadows.

  He isn't Pete.

  He is a complete stranger who—

  No, he is the man from the Emerald Leaf Motel, the stranger Pete swears he sees everywhere.

  Men have never frightened her, no matter how crude or fresh or direct they get. Still, this man, in this place, in this awful silence—this man frightens her.

  "What do you want?"

  He smiles.

  He says, "We will not harm you, Mrs. Mullion."

  "We?"

  Another man appears behind the first. They are twins.

  "Stop right there," she says.

  They continue up the steps, towards her.

  "We will not cause you any pain, believe me," the first man says.

  She turns to run, swaying on the stairs.

  She can't seem to lift her feet.

  Arms touch her from behind.

  "Stop it!" she shouts.

  "No pain-"

  A shroud falls over her mind. She feels blackness welling up, consuming her, soft and warm and gentle. She struggles against it, without success. As it swallows her completely, she thinks of all the things she fears, lets them roll through her mind, hideous vision after hideous vision. . . .

  Then she sleeps.

  Then she wakes.

  She is sitting in an easy chair in the living room, with no idea how she has gotten here. In her mind, some alien presence holds down her will to act. She tries to lift her arms from the arms of the chair, and she finds that she cannot do even this simple thing.

  She now discovers a terror she has never known before, the horror of complete helplessness. Visions of cerebral hemmorages, of paralysis and lifelong dependency on others fit across her mind. If this is what has happened to her, she will kill herself. She will not be a vegetable all her life, watching Pete wait on her, hand and foot.

  "Relax, Mrs. Mullion," a voice in the darkness says.

  She does not turn her head to look for the speaker. Someone else turns it for her.

  She sees him, and she remembers the twins.

  "You will not be harmed," he says. "Just relax and play along with us. You can't do otherwise anyway. We guarantee your safety."

  She tries to question him but still cannot speak.

  "We'll be upstairs," he says. Then he climbs the steps, out of sight.

  XV

  "Della?"

  "Who's there?"

  Confusion, fear mixed with anticipation . . .

  "Pete."

  "Where are you?"

  "With you."

  "I don't see you? Where? How can you hear me when I can't talk?"

  A glow, slight but warm, anxious to burgeon . . .

  "I don't understand. Are you here, in the living room?"

  "In your mind. I'm not physically with you, love, but mentally and emotionally I am."

  "Mind reading? Are you telling me you're reading my mind?"

  "And projecting my thoughts into yours."

  "I'm dreaming."

  "You aren't. Try to accept it, and try to be calm."

  "But I don't understand I"

  "Must you?"

  "Yes!" Silence. Then: "Well, not right away, not if you say you can't explain at the moment."

  "I can't explain. But I will."

  "Okay."

  Then she realizes they are waiting for Pete and that, no matter what they might say, they are here to get Pete, to hurt Pete—or to take him away and keep him again and let him come home without knowing where he has been. . . .

  Pete broke his telepathic probe of Della's mind. Now he knew what had happened to her this morning. He realized he was cursing them, angrily, out loud. Other diners in the pizza shop were looking at him speculatively. He took a bite of the pizza before him and chewed on it, not because he was hungry, but because it was something to do, something to keep him from cursing.

  He knew that he was going to have to go back to the house and get Della. He almost enjoyed the prospect of doing a little damage to those plasticfaced sonsofbitches.

  "Right now, there's very much to do. I'm going to come into the house, in a little while, to get you."

  "These men—"

  "They aren't men. And I can handle them."

  "But-"

  "I can handle them."

  "But don't take chances."

  "I won't have to."

  "Pete?"

  "Love?"

  "How long have you been able to—to read minds, to do this thing?"

  "Tonight."

  "Have you read mine?"

  Doubt, anxiety, but a certain thrill as well . . .

  "Yes."

  "Much?"

  "Some."

  "You're avoiding answering me."

  "Looks that way."

  "Just tell me—do you love me?"

  "Yes. Very much."

  "Come and get me."

  "In time. I just want you to remember to be calm, not to get involved, not to move until I tell you to. Even when you feel them losing control of you, don't leave the chair. Stay where you are and wait. No matter what. I don't want you getting hurt."

  "Okay, Pete."

  "I'll be in within the hour."

  "You're breaking contact?"

  "Yes. I can't afford to exhaust myself."

  She projected images of comfort, love and sex. He did not wish to withdraw, but he did.

  XVI

  He had taken up a position behind a long, shaggy hedgerow across the alleyway from the back of his house. The ground was warm and dry though uncomfortably stony. He could see the kitchen where only a night light burned. Now and then, he fancied that he could see movement beside the kitchen curtains, as if someone stood there, watching the rear lawn. But he could not be sure of that, and he did not want to make his move until he was certain of a lot of things about the trap they had
laid.

  Along the side of the house, the dining room window was dark, while the living room window emitted a strong, yellow light. Della was still sitting there, in her chair, They could not hope to fool him again, so easily. They were counting on his love for her to draw him back in some abortive attempt to free her.

  They would be surprised, an hour or so from now, to find themselves holding the dirty end of the stick.

  Ten minutes later, the rear door opened, and one of the mechanicals looked out, staring intently at the corner of the garage where a bed of tall marigolds grew. He came over to it and satisfied himself of something or other, then returned to the kitchen and closed the door.

  It was exactly the sort of thing he had been hoping for. It showed him that one of them waited in the kitchen and indicated the others were most likely situated all over the house, keeping a watch on all approaches. Too it was evidence that, since he had driven the last mind probe away, they could not locate him telephatically - which meant his own power was at least equal to theirs, and perhaps superior.

  He stayed with the hedge but crawled farther along until he could not see the kitchen windows and could not be seen by anyone waiting there. He stood up, brushed himself off, and crossed the alley to the garage doors. He searched along the bottom sill, found the lever, depressed one end of it and lifted. The door swung overhead with only one scratchy bit of noise to draw anyone's attention. He was sure it could not have been heard inside the house.

  He crept along the dark shape of the car until he was kneeling beside the interior door which connected with the kitchen. Cautiously, he rose and looked through the corner of the glass. In the soft, blue light of the twenty-five watt safety lamp on the stove, the mechanical man leaned against the kitchen table, commanding a moderately good view through both kitchen windows. He was the only one in the room.

  Pete bent down, rested his back against the wall and opened his mental shield to permit a contact ribbon of telepathic energy to weave outwards.

  Immediately, the alien master, through the consciousness of his nearest robotic servant, sensed the emanations of his prey. The white sphere of the mechanical pseudo-mind bore down on Pete's own mind—