Then he realized what he was thinking. Artificial chemicals were responsible for these creatures’ existence.
He decided he didn’t want to examine that thought very closely.
Besides which, he didn’t have the opportunity, as Casey actually poked his little head out and started munching on the puffs, eating out of Brandon’s hand exactly the same way a dog or cat would. Remarkable.
Slowly, very slowly, Brandon carefully moved backward, leading Casey out of the undergrowth. When Casey finished the puffs, Brandon turned around and started walking normally. Casey stuck behind him, following just like an obedient dog. Geez, he’s got that thing trained better than the puppy. The baby lizard’s namesake had never been an especially obedient dog. But this Casey is.
Jack was moved by the sight. A boy and his lizard. Who’da thunk it?
The touching moment was shattered by the squawk of the radio that Jack had clipped to his belt.
Casey stopped walking, and froze in his tracks, obviously not sure what to make of this alien noise.
Cursing himself for not doing it sooner, Jack turned down the volume on the radio and put it to his mouth. He heard Wayne’s filtered voice say, “Have you found anything?”
Really lousy timing, Colonel, Jack thought. But then, Jack had been asked to keep Wayne informed, and Jack hadn’t been doing that.
Jack whispered into the speaker: “We found the baby.”
“I can’t hear you,” said Wayne’s voice, still distressingly loud despite the volume being turned down.
Speaking a bit louder, Jack said, “We’ve got the baby. We’re on our way.”
“Give me a time,” the colonel said.
How the hell should I know? Jack bit back the retort, took a breath and said, “Soon. We’re on our way.”
Brandon looked down at Casey, then started walking. Casey, having apparently decided that the noise was nothing to be concerned about, again followed alongside him.
How about that, Jack thought, we just might pull this off.
TEN
“When that judge gave me the choice to go to jail or join the Marines, I should’ve given it a little more thought.”
T.J. White rolled his eyes. Why the hell did I have to be partnered with Jace? he asked whatever gods or generals controlled such things. Actually, it was neither god nor general who decreed that the pair of them be assigned to the two ground-to-air missle launchers and stationed on the Malau beach waiting for the Mother of All Lizards to make a return engagement—it was Sergeant Szabo.
Not that Harold “Jace” Jason was a bad person or a bad Marine, it’s just that he never tired of reminding people of the fact that he was in the Marines only because it beat the alternative of jail time. It especially irked T.J. since the little incident with that general. T.J. was the only black man in a squad that was run by a white sergeant and also included eight white men and two Asian men. Some four-star or other had come to inspect the troops, and when he got to their squadron, he mentioned that he’d heard that one member of the squad was a convicted criminal serving his sentence with the Corps. The general then made a beeline for T.J. and assumed that he was the felon.
To this day, it rankled on T.J.
However, it didn’t rankle nearly as much as the fact that he’d spent his entire tour sitting on his ass. Not that being a Marine meant anything other than constant work, but still . . .
“We’re havin’ action, man,” he said to Jace. “I got to thinkin’ we’d never have action.”
“Look, man, I saw enough action in Baltimore,” Jace said, pronouncing it “Bahl-mer.”
“What, you joined the Corps to relax?”
Jace grinned. “Naw, I just figured it’d be better than some lifer decidin’ I’d make a good squeeze.”
T.J. was about to make a comment along the lines of how good a squeeze he’d make, but then he noticed something happening—or, rather, noticed something not happening. One of the searchlights stopped moving. T.J. tensed up; next to him, Jace did likewise.
Out of the corner of his eye, T.J. saw Colonel Wayne raise his binoculars. If the colonel saw anything, he didn’t react to it. Not that he would, T.J. thought, and looked back out at the ocean. He couldn’t see anything in the searchlight’s beam.
Turning around to look at the searchlight operator, T.J. saw the private struggle with the light for a minute, then move it again.
Great, the stupid thing was just stuck.
Wayne relaxed and set his binoculars back down. Then he started pacing the beach.
Several ice ages came and went, though T.J.’s watch insisted it had only been a minute or so. In direct contrast to the constant noise that had been the hallmark of this operation since they first landed on Malau—between setting up and routing civilians around, not to mention the chaos of the cleanup after the Mother of All Lizards’ attack—it was now very quiet.
If Jace turns to me and says, “It’s real quiet,” figuring I’ll say, “Yeah, too quiet,” I’m gonna shoot him with the damn missile launcher.
So when the water started to churn, T.J. noticed.
Wayne was standing right behind T.J. and Jace’s position when the noise started. Again, the colonel brought his binoculars to his eyes.
Besides the water, there was something else: a kind of low rumble.
Then a massive head broke through the surface, followed by the rest of the body of the Mother of All Lizards.
Damn, T.J. thought, she came back. He couldn’t imagine why, given the reception she got before. Then again, it’s not like we hurt her or nothing. That’s why Wayne had ordered the missile launchers set up. They couldn’t very well have used them in the middle of town, but on a beach deserted of all save Marines, they’d work just fine.
At least T.J. hoped they would.
The searchlights all converged, illuminating Mother as she came out of the water and onto the beach in full forty-foot glory. Jesus Christ, she’s huge, T.J. thought. He hadn’t seen her quite this close the last time.
Behind him, the colonel spoke into his PRC. “Where are you, Ellway?”
“Close,” said a scratchy voice through the speaker. “We’re close.”
“It’s back. Say again, it’s come back.” Wayne sounded pretty damn calm for someone who was talking about a forty-foot reptile.
“We’re coming,” said the tinny voice, “we’re not far.”
Mother stomped across the beach. This wasn’t the casual stroll it took the last time—this was a bull-in-a-china-shop walk, a big lizard that wasn’t letting anything get in her way.
“It’s approaching—I can’t hold off much longer!” Wayne said, now sounding much less calm.
“Please wait, we’re almost there! I can see the lights,” said the voice on the PRC. T.J. wondered who it was the colonel was talking to and what he was supposed to bring to the party.
Mother reared her head back and let out a yell.
I do not like the sound of that, T.J. thought, and started praying.
Then the creature continued her approach.
Right at T.J.
In the back of his head, Private Thomas Jefferson White knew that Mother wasn’t really heading directly for him, that he was but one of many troops who just happened to be in the big lizard’s way. But in the front of his head, he saw a forty-foot monstrosity bearing down right on him.
Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, he thought as he heard Colonel Wayne say, “Fire!”
T.J. raised the rocket launcher to his shoulder. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.
He fired.
On Earth as it is in heaven.
Next to him, Jace did likewise.
Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses.
Twin streaks of light shot through the air from the perimeter to the chest of the Mother of All Lizards. And, unlike the mortar, bullets, and shells of before, these actually penetrated Mother’s scaly hide. She let out a nasty scream, louder,
higher-pitched, and longer than the previous wail.
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
“No!” “Stop!” “No!”
T.J. saw three civilians—two adults, one kid—running toward the beach, shouting at the tops of their lungs.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
The earth below TJ.’s feet shook as Mother pitched forward and collapsed in a heap on the beach with a second cry.
Amen.
It’s over. I’m still alive. Thank you, God, T.J. thought, crossing himself.
Jace looked at him. “That actually work?”
“We’re still alive, ain’t we?”
Then he saw a tiny creature that was a dead ringer for Mother scampering out onto the beach, making a beeline for the giant lizard.
The baby creature got to Mother’s side just as she closed her eyes for the last time.
Within a few seconds, the little kid civilian caught up with the baby and took it in his arms like it was his pet or something.
This, T.J. decided, is just too weird.
“Y’know,” Jace said, “when that judge gave me the choice to go to jail or join the Marines, I shoulda given it a little more thought.”
T.J. rolled his eyes. “Jace, shut up.”
Jack Ellway shook his head in amazement as he examined the corpse of the forty-foot lizard. One second she’s stomping around the beach. The next second, she’s falling onto the beach. Alive, dead, just like that. He compared it to the lingering agony of Diane’s bout with a brain tumor, of watching her disintegrate slowly from both the disease and the chemotherapy, then one day falling asleep and not waking up.
He wondered which was preferable.
“It’s a female,” he was saying, trying to keep his mind on the work rather than grisly speculations about mortality. President Moki, Chief Movita, Colonel Wayne, Doctor Hale, and Alyson all stood nearby, and Brandon sat on the sand a few feet away, Casey cradled in his arms. Wayne had ordered several searchlights to remain trained on the area, so the place was almost as well lit as it was in sunlight. “I’m sure it’s the mother of the baby here,” he indicated the three-footer, “and the nine-foot adolescent.”
The chief asked Wayne, “Will the nine-foot creature return? Must we prepare?”
“We’ll plan for it,” Wayne said, “but I’m not as worried.”
Of course not, Jack thought bitterly. We’ve just proven it’s no match for us.
“Could there be others out there?” Hale asked. “A family—or colony?”
“I hope so,” Jack said. Everyone turned to look at Jack like he had two heads after he said that. By way of explanation, he continued, “We discover three members of a brand-new species and immediately reduce it to two. We’re the human predator at its worst.”
“I won’t play that game, Ellway,” Wayne said angrily. “We did the best we could.”
“That’s what the predator always says.”
“Look,” Wayne said, “if it’s a choice between that thing and human lives, it isn’t a choice. Do you read me?”
“Oh yes, Colonel, loud and clear. If you had just waited—”
Wayne interrupted. “Between them, these two creatures have killed at least five people, maybe more. If I didn’t give the order to fire, that number would have tripled.”
Paul came running up before Jack could reply to this. “Well, it was inevitable. Fox News got wind of this. They’re on their way. And God knows who else is in their wake.”
President Moki shook his head. “Our island will never be the same.”
You ain’t kidding, Jack thought, though that was true the minute the nine-footer got tangled up in the same fishing net as two women from Minnesota.
He looked at Colonel Wayne. “The carcass needs to be shipped someplace to be preserved and studied,” he said in a mild tone. “I’m going to contact the National Institute of Science.”
Wayne spoke in a gentle tone as well: “I have to inform the Brigadier General in Okinawa of what’s going on here. In the meantime,” he turned to two men wearing captain’s bars, “I want this beach cleared and guarded until further notice.” The two captains nodded and moved off. Wayne turned back to Jack. “We’ll keep the scavengers away till I get my orders.”
“Dad,” Brandon said. Jack turned to see his son now standing close by, the three-footer by his side. “What’s gonna happen to him?”
Jack considered. “Well, he seems to trust you. I guess you’ll just keep looking after him for the time being.” He thought about it for a moment. “We should take him back to the room and examine him. The most important thing right now is to make sure he eats.”
“Who’s making sure that you guys eat?” Alyson asked.
Jack hesitated, realizing that he had no idea when his last meal was.
Before he could reply, Alyson said, “I’ll bring you some dinner, okay?”
He smiled. “Thanks.”
Hale stretched his arms and announced, “I, for one, need to lie down before I fall down.”
Jack grinned at that. Hale probably hadn’t had a nap in as long as Jack hadn’t had a meal. He put his hand on Brandon’s shoulder, and led him and Casey off toward the hotel.
Derek didn’t hear about the giant monster’s return until after it was all over. He had heard the commotion, and the firing of some kind of large weapon or other, but he hadn’t seen any of it—the main beach wasn’t visible from the clinic verandah, situated as it was behind the building.
As soon as he did hear, though, he was on tenterhooks waiting for Kikko to come out from his little visit with Naru. As soon as Kikko’s head poked out of the doorway, Derek grabbed him. “C’mon,” he said.
“What is it?”
“One of the soldiers that went by says they nailed the mother lizard. I wanna gander.” They started walking toward the beach. “How’s Naru?”
“Sedated, like the doc said,” Kikko replied. “He’s lucky the thing missed hitting anything important. Just shredded a lotta skin and broke a coupl’a ribs.”
“That’s good news, mate.”
“Yeah,” Kikko said, not sounding like he meant it.
Within minutes, they arrived at the beach—or, at least, the edge of it. A bunch of Marines were keeping anyone from getting too close.
Anyone, that is who actually lived on the island. Once again, Derek saw that Hale, Bateman, Ellway, and his dumb kid all got to be in where the good stuff was happening. Or had happened, in this case, since the magnificent creature that had stalked the island now lay dead on one of its beaches. “What a bloody waste,” Derek muttered. “The money that could’ve been made from this thing . . .”
He thought again about that Indonesian bloke.
“The nine-footer could still be around,” he whispered to Kikko. “It’s wounded—might be easy to catch.”
“Derek—” Kikko started.
“We’ll have a look in the morning. All may not be lost.”
A Marine walked up to them. “I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you people to move along. We need to clear this entire area.”
Bloody yanks, tellin’ us what to do, Derek thought angrily. He was well and truly sick of that.
As he and Kikko walked away, heading back toward the trawler—if nothing else, they needed to clean Naru’s blood off the deck—he noticed Ellway and his kid walking away from the massive corpse. He also noticed that the kid had something walking alongside him.
Sweet Jesus, he thought. Next to the boy walked a miniature version of the corpse, only up and walking around. Must be another part of the family. And it isn’t likely to go around disembowelling people.
Visions of paid alimony, paid taxes, a yacht, and restaurants in Fiji danced in Derek’s head.
While he was no veterinarian, Jack knew enough about animal husbandry to at least do a perfunctory examination of Casey. It lay on the floor while Jack checked it over—the no-frills Ritz only provid
ed one desk, and it was presently laden with Jack’s equipment—with Brandon also on the floor, nose-to-nose with him, feeding him cheese puffs. Jack had wanted to provide a little balance in Casey’s diet by giving him some of the Iozima Ridge water and plant life he and Paul had given the nine-footer the previous day, but Brandon would hear none of it. “I already tried the usual stuff,” Brandon had said. “He’ll just eat cheese puffs.” Jack doubted this to be completely true, but decided to indulge the boy.
“His eyes are clear, his heartbeat steady.” He stood up. “It’s hard to know what’s normal for this guy, of course.”
The examination complete, Brandon sat up and started petting Casey as if he were a dog. “He saw his mother die. That’s the worst thing in the world.”
Jack felt like he’d been kicked in the stomach. In the last year, he and Brandon had mostly dealt with Diane’s death by not dealing with it, not talking about it, nothing. The closest he had come was the half-hearted, one-sided conversation they’d had while gathering invertebrates for the nine-footer to not eat.
Dammit, I don’t even know how to deal with Diane’s death. How the hell am I supposed to help him deal with it? All I’ve done is run away—dash off to Vancouver, run over to Hawaii, scurry away to Maine.
“Well,” he said slowly, deciding to deal with the surface concern, if not the real one, “he’s got you now. When you lose someone—” he hesitated “—someone who took care of you—it helps if someone’s there to take over. Someone else who can love you and protect you.”
Still petting Casey and not looking up at Jack, Brandon asked, “What if it’s not enough?”
Ouch. “I’m afraid it’s gotta be.”
Brandon looked up at his father. Normally he could read his son like a book, but now Jack had no idea what was going through that twelve-year-old brain.
Suddenly, Brandon leaned over and nabbed a coconut that he had picked up on the way to the hotel. “Would you like to play with him?”
Jack just stared dumbfounded at the coconut for a moment.
“Just roll it to him.”
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