by Ann Gimpel
Sara waited, counting as they came. Not counting herself and Jared, twenty-one men and women stood in the small clearing. Kevin and the broken-arm woman, plus nineteen others. They all had the same end-of-the-world-survivor patina with tattered, dirt-smeared clothing. Only a few had jackets.
“Wow!” Sara let her gaze drift over the group. “We never write wilderness permits for more than fifteen.”
“Like I said,” Kevin cut in, “this wasn’t exactly a well-planned trip. We didn’t have much notice, and we sure as hell didn’t stop to get a wilderness permit—”
“You’re talking in circles.” Sara interrupted him, not in the mood for a game of twenty questions. “Why are you in the backcountry? More pertinently, how’d you escape annihilation from the ships?”
“You’re still here.” Kevin stared her down.
“Yes, but I work here, and from the looks of things, I know a shitload more than you do about how to survive out-of-doors.”
“You may as well tell her,” a dark-haired man called.
“Yeah,” a woman chimed in. “What the hell can she do to us?”
Sara gritted her teeth in frustration. She felt like tugging her service revolver from its holster and firing a few shots in the air to drag words from them. “Tell me what?” she demanded. “You snuck up on my cabin like thieves last night. You stole my tent.”
“You weren’t using it,” another man pointed out.
“Not pertinent. Part of the backcountry creed is you never, never take what doesn’t belong to you. You have no idea why that tent was left there. What if someone was counting on it being there for them? What if it meant the difference between survival and death? My ranger cabin is locked when I’m not in it.” Fueled by frustration, anger got the better of her, and she balled her hands into fists.
Still by her side, Jake growled.
When she glanced over to Jared and the woman, she saw he’d gotten the bandage off. Christine’s arm was a mangled mess with what looked like the beginnings of gangrene, and it held the sticky-sweet stench of rotting flesh. She hadn’t been far off when she diagnosed herself as being done for.
“We’re the reason you’re in this predicament,” Kevin said.
“Huh?” She stared at him. “You have to say more because I don’t understand.”
A woman with short, dark hair stepped away from the group and squared her shoulders. “We’re the original group of NASA scientists who crafted the intergalactic trade agreements. And also the same ones who exited out of those agreements when it became clear the aliens planned to strip Earth of all its resources.”
Sara shook her head. “But that’s what they’re doing now, and killing everyone in their path. How’d you save us from anything?”
“It’s a long story,” Kevin said. “Turned out we didn’t know a bunch of important things. If we’d pulled the plug six months earlier, things would’ve been fine.”
“We don’t know that,” the dark-haired woman cut in. “A year would’ve been safer.”
“Whatever,” Kevin snapped. “We had a small amount of advance warning, which is how we ended up here.”
“Enough warning to flee, not enough to equip yourselves.” Sara filled in details.
“That’s about right,” the woman replied.
Sara narrowed her eyes to slits. “Did you warn anyone? Like the government, for example? Or did you just try to save yourselves?”
“We told the Pentagon.” Kevin made a sour face. “They didn’t believe us. Or they didn’t want to risk offending the aliens. Net effect was the same.”
Sara ran her practiced eyes over the group. They looked like they’d walked through Hell. “It’s been cold at night. Any injuries or fatalities beyond the broken arm over there?”
“Three of us didn’t make it,” Kevin said. “One probably had a heart attack. Another didn’t wake up one morning, and the third was attacked by a mountain lion. By the time we got to her, she was already dead.”
“Cougars don’t frequent the high country,” Sara protested. “That’s very unusual.”
“We weren’t in the high country,” the dark-haired woman said. “We walked in from Wishon Reservoir. Knew we were running out of time, and we were afraid if we took the time to drive to one of the high trailheads, they’d nab us.”
“We’re the ones who fucked them over,” Kevin muttered. “They know who we are.”
“Okay.” Sara walked to Jared. Jake shadowed her, not leaving her side. “You hearing all this?” she asked.
“Every word,” Jared replied and continued his ministrations. The bone no longer protruded through flesh, but that was the only positive as far as she could see. The redhead’s face had turned a pasty color, and blood showed where she’d bitten her lower lip. She sat on the ground with Jared beside her.
“Had you planned how to feed yourselves?” Sara addressed Kevin and the dark-haired woman.
“Not exactly.” Kevin seemed to be picking his words again.
“Humph. Unless we get lucky and shoot something really big, there’s no way I have provisions for all of you.” Sara shook her head. Maybe burning Lonnie and Stuart had been a tactical error after all.
“It’s all right.” The dark-haired woman patted Kevin’s arm, then turned to face Sara. “We didn’t expect to be back here all that long. There’s a good reason the aliens want to kill us. We’re the only ones who know how to send them back to where they came from.”
Chapter Eight
“Yes,” the redhead croaked from where she sat next to Jared. “Problem is we’ve been on the move ever since we left the cars at Wishon, and we need twenty-four hours in one place to put our plan into action. Maybe as much as thirty-six. So far we’ve been on the move every six to eight hours.”
“So that means they’re after you,” Jared said. “You didn’t fake them out by running into the wilderness.”
“That’s exactly what it means,” the woman replied, making a sour face.
“How can you tell when they’re getting close?” Sara asked. Curiosity lined her question.
Jared poured disinfectant over the gangrened arm in front of him. It wouldn’t do much good, but lacking an intravenous antibiotic, it was the best the woman would get.
“Electronics tuned to their particular frequency,” Kevin spoke up. “We designed a tracking device once we became concerned they weren’t happy with the amount of minerals they purchased from us.”
“It would be best if we could leave this open to drain,” Jared told the woman. “Can you tolerate it that way?”
She gave a sad, little shrug. “I know enough to understand I’m dying, and it won’t be pretty. What difference does it make?”
“The odds aren’t in your favor,” he agreed, “but it’s not one hundred percent hopeless. Your body could fight off the infection.”
“We can leave it open.” She met his gaze for the first time. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He shouldered his pack and made his way to a small creek where he rinsed his hands before joining Sara and Jake. “Don’t know about you,” he said, “but I’d like to hear more about that electronic tracking system.”
A high, thin wail blared from somewhere behind him, and he twisted his head. “What the hell was that?”
“Our electronics.” Christine struggled to her feet, grunting with the effort. “I’m the systems engineer who designed them. Before you ask,” she walked slowly toward the noise, “it alerts us before they’re close enough to get a bead on us. It’s the only reason any of us are still alive.”
“So basically you’ve relocated every time your alarm system went off?” Jared asked.
“That’s about the size of it,” Kevin said.
Jared turned to Sara. “Didn’t you say the Muir Hut made you invisible to the ships?” When she nodded, he went on. “I found the same thing. I hunkered under two overlapping boulders the first few days after the attack.”
“Good piece of intel,” Ke
vin said. “Now all we need to do is find a place made of stone where several of us could stay long enough to fix this mess.”
“But no one’s left,” Sara protested. “What good will fixing anything do now?”
“There are people left.” The dark-haired woman stepped forward. “I’m Vivian, by the way.” She grimaced. “If you got hold of official-looking dispatches, they were fake. Lots of people are dead, but nothing like what they want you to believe. It was part of their strategy to demoralize everyone, so they’d play along.”
“I need more information,” Jared muttered. “Lots more.”
The siren blared louder, and Christine walked forward cradling something in her good arm. She stared intently at it and made a few adjustments. “Need to move that way.” She pointed back the direction they’d come.
“I want to know more too,” Sara said. “One of you needs to come up with at least an annotated version of what’s going on while we’re walking. Do you have things to gather?”
Vivian nodded. “Yeah, but we’ll be ready to roll in less than five.”
Jared watched her and the others walk away. “What do you think?” he asked Sara, keeping his voice too low to be overheard.
She squinched her forehead in thought. “I don’t know. Either they’re on the up-and-up, or they’re nuts.”
“It’s unlikely so many would share a delusion,” he said. “Plus, there’d be no percentage in them lying to us.”
“Same conclusion I came to.” She shook her head. “If stone will do the trick, maybe I could chopper them up to the hut. That alert device of theirs might make the trip less dangerous.”
“Let’s see what they have to say, first.”
Instead of answering, she leaned into him for the briefest moment. Her action warmed him, made it feel like they were truly a couple. He wrapped an arm around her and held her close before letting go.
The NASA group gathered in twos and threes. When everyone was accounted for, they set off, using Christine’s device as a guide for which way to go. Jared and Sara flanked Kevin and Vivian, with Jake by Sara’s side.
“Go ahead,” Sara urged. “Fill us in.”
“I’ve been thinking about how to do that,” Kevin replied.
“Don’t think too hard.” Jared couldn’t keep suspicion out of his voice. “Just plunge right in and tell us.”
“The background doesn’t matter much,” Vivian said. “What does is the aliens are dependent on a harmonic from their ships.”
“They have trouble with the atmosphere here,” Kevin broke in. “Too much carbon dioxide for their physiology. It’s why they’ve merged with humans.”
“Even doing that,” Vivian picked up the recitation, “they still require a particular frequency that their ships generate. Without it, they’ll lose their ability to breathe.”
“We have a generator that should interrupt the harmonic,” Kevin said. “But it needs to run continuously for a minimum of twenty-four hours. Thirty-six would be even better. After that, any aliens left here would certainly be dead.”
“What’s to stop more of them from arriving?” Sara asked.
“Fear?” Kevin laughed hollowly. “Their only chance was to strike fast and hard.”
“We never actually thought they would,” Vivian said. “But they have an inexhaustible appetite for trace minerals that they used up on their world. It’s why they approached us in the first place about a trade.”
“What was in it for us?” Jared asked.
“Money. Learning more about another race.” Kevin shrugged. “At first it seemed like an ideal match, but that was over five years ago. Over time, their requirements escalated until we couldn’t meet their needs.”
“Are you sure this harmonic deal will work?” Sara demanded.
Kevin nodded. “Absolutely. I created it with Vivian and a couple of the others. We worked offline, since our funding doesn’t encompass developing destructive technology.”
“Has it been tested?” Jared asked.
“Not outside our lab,” Vivian admitted, “but I have confidence in it.” She paused a beat. “More importantly, the aliens believe we hold the key to their destruction. It’s the only reason they’d have come after us. We used to be their friends since we were their initial point of contact on Earth.”
Jared looked around them and recognized ground they’d covered earlier in the day. “We’re not far from the ranger station,” he said. “Does the fact that the siren quieted down mean we’re safe?”
“For now,” Kevin said, “but not for long. They always come back and try again.”
“Hold your people here,” Sara instructed. “I want to talk with Jared.”
“You got it.” Vivian settled on a large, flat stone. “None of us are backcountry travelers. I don’t think I’ve gotten even one night’s sleep since we hatched up this plan, and I’m beat.”
Jared was glad Sara suggested a pow-wow, so he didn’t have to, and he walked by her side to a fast running creek a few feet away. Jake trotted along, nuzzling Sara’s hand.
She took off her pack and sat on it, patting the ground next to her. “What do you think?”
“Funny.” He eased his pack off and sat next to her. “I was going to ask you the same thing.”
“Well, they believe what they just told us. Even if I’m skeptical, I still think I owe humanity getting them to a place they can work undisturbed.”
“It’s more than one chopper ride. How many can you take at a time?”
“Maybe six plus me. So you’re right about it being more than one trip. I suppose we could hike it, but it’s a three thousand foot climb, and some of them look like they couldn’t walk that far. Certainly not fast enough to stay out of harm’s way. Once you hit the lakes, it’s pretty exposed because it’s above timberline.”
“I don’t like the odds of you making multiple trips with the helicopter.” He laid a protective hand over one of hers.
She shot him a crooked smile. “Neither do I, but what choice do we have? I’m the only one here who can fly—”
“You don’t know that,” he broke in. “I just found you. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
“Noted.” She moved so her side pressed against his. “And appreciated, but I’ll do what I have to. Chances of one of them being a chopper pilot are slim.”
“True. Let’s see. Twenty one of them means four trips.”
“Not necessarily. Maybe some of them could walk it. If they could, that might cut it down to three. Maybe all of them don’t need to be there to activate whatever technology they brought with them.”
He pulled her into a quick, hard embrace. “I’d feel better if it were two—or maybe only one trip. Let’s see what their minimal requirements are for whatever equipment and manpower they need to get this done.”
Sara angled her face and brushed her lips over his. This kiss was brief and sweet, and it filled him with the need to protect her from every bad thing in the world.
He cupped the side of her face. “Sara. I don’t want you risking yourself.”
She smiled. “Silly. It’s what I do for a living. You like who I am. Don’t go all Neanderthal and try to change me.”
“Good point.” He grinned back. “Guess my first move—assuming we get back in one piece—will be learning to fly helicopters, so I can help out.”
“Getting out of this unscathed is a pretty big assumption. Let’s get through the next part first.”
“Wise woman.” His kissed her and got to his feet, extending a hand to help her up. She didn’t need assistance, but he liked touching her. Jake licked his hand, and he ruffled the big dog’s fur.
They made their way back to the group.
“I have a helicopter,” Sara said without preamble. “Are any of you licensed pilots?”
Kevin shook his head. “Sadly, no.”
Sara set her mouth in a determined line. “I can fly some of you up to the Muir Hut. It’s made of stone, and it protected
me from the ships. They couldn’t sense me when I was inside.”
Kevin’s dour expression shifted for the first time. “That would be great. How soon could we go?”
“How many of you does the equipment require?” Jared asked.
“Twelve,” Vivian said. “We have three mini-generators, and the timing of their output is critical. We need an A team and a B team, since one will sleep while the other mans the generators. Thirty-six hours is too long for anyone to maintain the level of attention these generators need.”
“And Christine. We need her to monitor her early warning system,” Kevin added.
Jared added the numbers. “So each generator needs two people to operate it.” When Kevin nodded, he went on. “Two active and two resting times three yields the twelve.”
“We hope that will be enough,” Vivian said, sounding worried. “When we begin transmitting, there’ll be a few hours when the aliens will panic. They’ll know it’s us and escalate their efforts to locate us.”
“Well, they won’t be able to find you in the Muir Hut,” Sara said. “I’m confident of that.”
“Yes, the thirteen of us there should be fine.” Kevin spoke slowly. “This is likely a death sentence for the other eight.”
“Is there room in the hut for all of us?” Vivian asked.
Sara started to nod, but Jared cut her off. “Probably, but the helicopter has limited capacity. Every single trip puts Sara at risk.”
“Could some of us walk there?” Kevin asked. “How far is it?”
“Seven miles,” Sara replied.
“That doesn’t sound too bad,” Vivian said.
“It’s also three thousand feet of climbing,” Sara added. “I could make it in two hours. It would likely take you five or six.”
“That’s too long,” Vivian murmured.
“Why would Christine need to be in the hut?” Jared asked. “Seems her radar system would do more good for those of you who aren’t there.”
“Of course you’re right.” Kevin clamped his mouth into a straight line. “I wasn’t thinking. Or rather, I’m used to thinking of all of us together, since we each have specific tasks...” His voice ran down.