by RM Brewer
THE DARK RIFT:
RETALIATION
by
R. M. Brewer
THE DARK RIFT: RETALIATION IS A WORK OF FICTION. NAMES, PLACES, INCIDENTS, CHARACTERS AND THEIR DIALOGUE ARE PRODUCTS OF THE AUTHOR'S IMAGINATION OR ARE USED FICTITIOUSLY. ANY RESEMBLANCE TO ACTUAL EVENTS, OR PERSONS, LIVING OR DEAD, IS ENTIRELY COINCIDENTAL.
THE DARK RIFT: REDEMPTION. COPYRIGHT © 2016
BY R.M. BREWER.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE USED OR REPRODUCED IN ANY MANNER WHATSOEVER WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION, EXCEPT IN THE CASE OF BRIEF QUOTATIONS EMBODIED IN CRITICAL ARTICLES AND REVIEWS.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN-13: 978-1540444721
EDITED BY SUMMER HANFORD
Beware of strength in numbers
They play better than one
A group of those who follow
Can never reach the sun
Be careful who you're thinking
Will save you in the end
Maybe we're all just waiting
For one beautiful friend
- NUMBERS, BY GREAT NORTHERN,
FROM REMIND ME WHERE THE LIGHT IS
THANK YOU, SUMMER
PROLOGUE
John Riley lay on his belly, trying to avoid being impaled by the cactus thorns littering the hot desert sand. He wiped the beads of sweat dripping from his brow on his shirtsleeve and repositioned his binoculars. Holding the radio to his mouth, he whispered, "There's another truck leaving now."
His radio crackled back at him for a moment until a woman's voice came through. "I'm ready," she said.
John swung his binoculars around, looking down Nevada Route 375. He watched a black SUV come into focus. It slowed and pulled over to the gravel shoulder where the female driver got out and went to the back of the vehicle and opened the tailgate. John could see the flare ignite, its white-hot flame dripping to the pavement until the woman threw it to the middle of the road, a few feet away from the SUV. He shifted in the sand and swung the binoculars back toward the truck, seeing it pick up speed as it barreled down the highway in the direction of the SUV.
Moments later, the truck slowed as it approached the woman. She stood in the middle of the road, waving her arms, signaling distress. The truck stopped when it reached her. John could see her run to it and the driver rolling his window down. As she stepped up on the side rail to talk to the driver, he saw her right hand slide toward the back of the cab, where she placed the magnetic GPS tracking device. "Good girl," John muttered as he lowered his binoculars, tracing over the outline of her body. "You're just as beautiful as the first day we met," he said, admiring his wife.
He watched as she jumped down and the truck started to move again, its driver waving as the vehicle picked up speed. His wife waved back and waited by the SUV until the truck was out of sight. After kicking the flare to the side of the road and burying it in the sand, she turned and flashed a smile, then got into the SUV and started driving in his direction.
John refocused on the worksite and watched for more trucks. Everywhere he could see, workers in HAZMAT suits milled around the crater that used to be Area 51. It wasn’t them that John found so interesting, though. It was the line of trucks that were backed up and idling in front of a temporary shelter. He’d watched a crew erecting it the day after the explosion decimated the aboveground structures within the installation.
One by one, tankers, tractor-trailers, and refrigerated trucks pulled into line and waited for their turn to back up to the vinyl structure and load up. After so many years of investigating UFO sightings and rumors about what was housed at Area 51, John had a pretty good idea of what was being loaded onto those trucks. Evidence of extraterrestrial life, alien DNA, possibly alien technology. Maybe even an actual alien in cryostasis, stored underground, frozen. All the government secrets related to extraterrestrial life gathered from the past seventy or so years, hidden underground in an impenetrable bunker, now on their way to a new home.
John jumped a little as he heard movement behind him. He relaxed upon seeing his wife, Trina, sliding on the ground, angling to get in position next to him.
“You didn’t even hear me drive up, did you?” she asked. “Lost in a government conspiracy somewhere, are you, sweetie?”
He pulled her close and kissed her on the cheek. “Just thinking about where we’ll be next. Did they give you any grief?”
“No. Just like we thought. They wouldn’t get out of the truck, but said they’d radio for a tow. I told them I already had one coming.”
“You’re wonderful,” John said. “And yes, you have one coming, but not a tow truck.”
Trina laughed. “Yeah? Promises, promises. We’ll have to see if you can tear yourself away from your otherworldly passions later.”
“So, speaking of the otherworld, where is that truck headed? I hope somewhere without these prickly things,” John said, pulling a cactus spine out of his sleeve.
Trina pressed an icon on her cell phone and a map appeared. Moments later, a green dot flashed on the map, moving northeast. “Too early to tell. For now, northeast. Kinda looks like they’re headed toward Vegas.”
“Must be going to Nellis Air Force Base,” John said, rubbing the day old beard covering his chin. “Ready for a road trip?”
“You bet, baby,” Trina said. “It’s about two and a half hours away. We should see if we can get ahead of those trucks and set up camp somewhere with a good view. I’ll drive. You rest. You’ll need it, you know.”
John grinned broadly as they took off in the SUV. Trina was right. He needed rest and quickly felt his eyes closing as he was lulled to sleep by the sound of the radio playing softly.
* * *
Even though the sun was blazing, Trina rolled the window down and let the hot air blow through her hair. She’d left the confines of an office building in New Jersey over a year ago to join John in the desert in his search for evidence of extraterrestrial life. Until the massive tsunami wiped out the eastern seaboard and all evidence of her prior life, she hadn’t even looked back. The desert was her home now and John, her life. Anyway, she thought, there was no going back to that life even if she wanted to. Fresh air, big sky, and John were all she needed right now. She stepped on the gas, hard, watching the trail of dust billowing behind her. If she drove fast enough, she could get out ahead of the trucks where the dirt trail met the highway heading toward Las Vegas. If she timed it right, maybe she and John would even have a few minutes for a romantic interlude.
About two hours later, Trina turned the SUV down another dirt trail and parked behind a stack of boulders. She’d been checking the GPS tracker as she drove and knew she was a good half hour ahead of the trucks. Trina almost hated to wake John. He looked so peaceful, his seat reclined, his head lolling to the side, a stream of drool escaping his mouth. She found herself laughing at what she found attractive in this man now that the world had been transformed. Reaching out, she touched John’s cheek. “Wake up, honey. You don’t wanna miss them unloading ET, do you?”
John shifted in his seat and mumbled. “Let’s set up the tent. I’ve been dreaming about you.”
Trina felt her heartbeat picking up speed in anticipation of their time together. “Let’s,” she said, feeling more eager by the moment.
The SUV covered in a camouflage tarp and their canvas tent set up, Trina unrolled the sleeping bags and sprawled out. Reaching down, she was just about to slip off her shorts when she heard John’s voice. Great, Trina thought. Just great. Another camper with very bad timing, coming to say hello.
Scooting forward toward the screen door, Trina heard John speak again, although his tone had changed. She could hear the anxiety in hi
s voice. Sliding out of the tent, Trina stood and looked over at her husband, who was backing up toward the SUV. “John, what’s wrong?” she asked.
“Stay back, honey.” His voice wavered as he reached back to open the driver’s side door. He continued to face the person advancing slowly toward him, who was silhouetted in the bright afternoon sun.
Trina couldn’t make out whether the person was a man or woman, but she clearly saw their head turning in her direction. As she strained to see against the bright light, whoever it was let out a terrible screeching noise, followed by a low growl that made the hair on the back of Trina’s neck stand up. Before she could react beyond feeling gripped by terror, the person lowered into a crouch and sprung in her direction. Trina stumbled backward toward the tent and fell. As she hit the ground, she finally made out the features of the person’s face. It was a woman, whose skin was distorted into a mass of oozing purple welts. She held her hands up to protect herself as the woman’s teeth exploded out of the front of her mouth, spraying Trina with blood and bits of bone. The woman crumpled to the ground, a gaping hole punched clear through her head.
Trina pushed herself backward, away from the body, and vomited in the sand. Looking up, she saw John standing near the SUV, a trail of smoke curling from the barrel of the weapon he held. She could see his eyes filling with tears as their gazes met.
“What … what was that?” he asked, his voice trembling. “Are you okay?”
Trina nodded, even though she couldn’t stop herself from shaking.
“Do you think that was one of the infected we heard stories about?” he asked.
Trina still couldn’t answer because her jaws were clamped together, holding back a flood of the remaining contents of her stomach that had mixed with her blood as the virus tore through her intestinal wall. A spray of body fluids shot out from between her teeth and she felt her spine contorting at an impossible angle. She was jarred by a loud snap in her neck. The sound of bones breaking traveled the space between her and John instantaneously. Looking up at him, she saw John’s expression change from shock to one of horror.
“Trina, what’s --.” John didn’t finish the sentence. He stumbled backward and started crawling to the SUV about the same time she felt her body stand and move without a command from her own mind. Hobbling forward, almost to John, the SUV door slammed in her face and she watched her arm cock back, ready to smash her fist through the window. At the last moment, before her hand hit the glass, the truck lurched backward and she only landed a glancing blow, tearing the skin from her knuckles. She stood still for a moment, perplexed by what was happening to her. John raced backward, sending the camouflage tarp flying off the truck.
A terrible confusion raced through Trina’s mind. Her body seemed to be propelled in the absence of her will, forcing her to attack. She could feel the blood streaming through her veins, filled with a rage she’d never known.
Trina turned toward the retreating SUV and sprinted as John stopped and shifted into gear, moving forward. She slammed into the front bumper and hung on. John accelerated and Trina tried to pull herself up onto the hood. From her vantage point, she could see John crying. She heard him through the windshield, sobbing that he loved her. She clung to the SUV as they picked up speed. Heat emanated from every pore of her body, creating an unnatural temperature, making her feel as if she were on fire. Then, she heard them speaking to her. Suddenly, the voices of her kin sounded in her head, beginning as a murmur and building to a collective roar, calling her, chanting her name, over and over, beckoning her to join them.
The engine roared beneath her. John was traveling at a high speed, swerving back and forth, trying to throw her from the vehicle. She saw his anguish as their eyes met. He called out to her again, telling her he loved her. She felt the power of his words conquer the voices in her head. Trina watched as John wiped the tears from his face with his sleeve. As he swerved, she locked eyes with him again, but this time, she let go, now free from all things that bound her. Trina felt weightless as her body flew through the air. All the wind was knocked from her lungs as she landed with a sickening thud against the base of a saguaro cactus. Once she recovered her breath, Trina looked down, seeing her legs in an unnatural configuration, realizing they were probably broken. She smiled at the oddity of seeing her foot twisted completely backward. Yet, she dragged herself to a sitting position, then stood, hearing the snap and crackle of the bones in her spine exploding. Oddly, she felt no pain.
Looking down the roadway, all that remained was a dust cloud where John’s SUV had been. Her head filled with voices again, calling, calling, and pleading with her, until she could barely stand the roar. In the distance, across the broad plain of the desert, she saw the truck she and John had been waiting for approaching guards at a gate. She felt herself being drawn to it, pulled there as if she were connected to the truck by an invisible tether. Trina stumbled across the roadway. Regaining her balance, she shoved one foot in front of the other until she was running toward the gate. All around her, she could feel them. Others like her, all with the same destination, and each with a singular goal. Their voices intermingled, forming a high-pitched murmur in her mind.
Trina ran harder, the gate nearer with every step. Then, she saw them, her brothers and sisters, careening toward the fence. On the other side of the wire mesh, a battalion of soldiers climbed up platforms, heavily armed, their faces covered and bodies swathed in combat gear. Trina’s eyes burned, watching the first of the soldiers aiming a flamethrower into the massing crowd and unleashing the fire within. But the group she found herself one with didn’t stop, even as the bullets began to rain down on them. They stormed the gate, laying down their bodies one on top of the other, piling up, a dozen at once, forming an unnatural ladder of burning flesh and bone upon which others climbed.
They piled higher and higher, screaming and spitting, their bodies exploding with the intensity of the heat thrust upon them. Trina ran toward the pile, focused on launching herself over the gate. Just before reaching the mass of incinerated flesh, she stopped, a flood of memories tearing and clawing at the rage in her mind. She remembered John, the horrified, heartbroken expression on his face as he tried to fling her from the truck. Before she could push the image from her mind and throw herself on top of the charred, smoking bodies, bullets blasted into her from every direction, tearing her body apart, shredding all evidence of her humanity. In an instant, all that remained were her mind and memories of her life with John, filling her with a sort of peace and warmth she’d never felt before. Trina stopped fighting and let the darkness take her.
CHAPTER 1
Jodie sat back in her chair and surveyed her office, certainly a change from what she’d occupied in San Francisco. With FBI headquarters now relocated to doublewide trailers parked in the desert just outside of Flagstaff, she found herself surrounded by a new team of eager agents, each of whom had suffered the consequences of Gypsum’s failed plan. They’d lost family and friends, homes and possessions, coming away, in some cases, with only their lives and the clothes on their backs. She’d selected each of them knowing that their commitment to justice, in combination with their personal losses, meant they would stop at nothing to get to the truth.
Her agents had already been successful at uncovering the funding stream that fed the Gypsum Corporation. An intricate network of global corporations with connections reaching into every aspect of human civilization, from stock exchanges to government agencies, the Gypsum funding machine was daunting. Jodie’s team worked quickly, hacking into and infiltrating communication systems worldwide, establishing links and collecting evidence. They reported directly to the President of the United States, with no sanitization of their findings by an oversight committee or legislative body. In fact, Jodie felt as if the people occupying the cluster of trailers and the President were the only people she would ever trust again, besides her father and the friends who’d been through Gypsum’s first round of devastation with her.
&
nbsp; A smile crept across her face when she thought of the upcoming weekend. After her briefing with the President tomorrow morning, she’d head home to Mountain City to spend a few days off at the cabin, where her father and Hunter were waiting. Nick, Christy, and the boys would join them later, after work and school. They'd moved in when the earthquake damaged Christy's house and it didn't look like they'd be leaving soon. Reconstruction was not a priority in some areas, with supplies and manpower depleted, but Jodie didn't mind. In fact, she wanted to talk to Nick and Christy about them moving in permanently. Friends were of more value to her now than ever in her life and her possessions, including her home, were something she wanted to share.
Besides that, she hadn’t taken a day off in over three months and was due for a breather and a visit to her doctor. Although she’d made progress in recovering from the gunshot wound she’d sustained while trying to rescue Mei, the pain could still be overwhelming if she didn’t get enough rest. The ache in her heart was what she worried about most, though. Leads to Mei’s whereabouts had all but dried up since she’d started her investigation. Jodie could only imagine the terror that Mei might be experiencing at that very moment. Plus, besides the charred police badge that someone had left at the diner for her, she hadn’t heard anything for months related to Chuck’s whereabouts. She was seriously considering the possibility that he’d perished in the Gypsum fire after all. She sighed and tossed the file she was reading down on her desk.
“You okay, there, boss?”
Jodie looked up to see a woman standing in the doorway. It was Claire Hathaway, the youngest agent on her team. Jodie thought, maybe the brightest, too. “Yeah, I’m just frustrated,” she said, turning toward the window and the desert beyond. “There’s still no sign of Ted Renfro, nothing of Walter McKinley, and not the slightest trace of Mei. With everything we’ve found in financial transactions and communication records, you’d think there would be a clue as to where they’ve gone.”