Rory couldn’t understand why the crash site hadn’t been discovered before now—he could only suppose that the blackened ground was less visible from the air, and that the original Predator had cloaked the ship, then led Traeger’s men well away from it, before allowing itself to be captured—but now that it had, it was a hive of activity. Over on the far side of the clearing, a group of techs were rolling in a giant screen, while others followed behind like an honor guard, holding armfuls of cable attachments to stop them trailing in the mud.
And on the periphery, more soldiers were variously hammering in posts, unrolling lengths of wire fencing, or engaged in the setting up of a generator, so that— Rory assumed—the site could be enclosed within an electrified barrier.
So engrossed was he in all this activity, and in the ship itself, that he had almost forgotten about Traeger. It was only when the man crouched beside him that he recalled who had brought him here.
“So, what do you say?” Trager said. “Think you can get us in there? Because I’m not sure that you can.”
Rory was not so out of touch with human emotions that he couldn’t recognize Traeger’s intentions. “Good reverse psychology, fuckface,” he said, deliberately using a word he thought his dad might have used.
Traeger chuckled, but his next words were anything but kind. “Put it this way, then. You love your dad, don’t you? You want to see him alive again, right? Then do me a favor…”
He put one hand on his sidearm and gestured with the other toward the hatch of the newly revealed ship. Then he leaned toward the kid and whispered, “Let your love open the door.”
Rory might have been on the autism spectrum, but he got the message loud and clear.
* * *
If Rory had known where his dad was at that precise moment, he wouldn’t have been all that surprised. Despite their differences, he had absolute faith in his dad’s prowess as a soldier, and was sure, even though his dad hadn’t been around all that much in the last couple years, that if he, Rory, was ever in danger—as he possibly was now—his dad would move Heaven and Hell to help him.
It would almost certainly have given Rory some comfort to know that his dad was looking at him right now. Quinn McKenna, who knew this terrain far better than Traeger and his bozos did, was currently perched on the highest spit of land overlooking the crash site. He was shrouded in foliage, completely camouflaged, his rifle leveled and his eye glued to the sniper scope, which allowed him to see what was happening with crystal clarity.
The pink helicopter was parked in a clearing just over a mile away, and the Loonies and Casey were out and about, doing their stuff. The Loonies might be a maverick bunch, but McKenna had faith not only in their loyalty, but also in their abilities. He didn’t know where any of this was ultimately leading, but right now he felt like the leader of The A-Team. Just him and his rag-tag bunch of oddballs against the world.
Through his sniper scope he saw Rory approach the crashed Predator ship, flanked by Traeger on his left and his smarmy sidekick, Sapir, on his right. Last time McKenna had been here, the hatch of the pod had been open, sticking straight up in the air like the damaged wing of a crumpled dragonfly. Now, though, it was closed—presumably by the Predator, which had sealed up its ship before allowing itself to be “captured” by Traeger’s men and transported to the Stargazer facility. McKenna watched as Rory halted in front of the hatch and examined a panel beside it, Traeger and Sapir looking on. Then his son reached out and began to tap a code sequence into the keypad.
* * *
Even though Rory was proud of his dad—and more so than ever after today—he had never wanted to be a soldier like him. He had little desire to shoot anyone, or to be shot at, no matter how noble the cause. But as he stood in front of the Predator’s ship, he wished he still had the helmet and gauntlet that had helped him accidentally vaporize the stoner while he was out trick-or-treating. He felt bad about that guy—figured he always would—but if he could have vaporized Agent Traeger, he wouldn’t have hesitated for a second.
For most of his life, Rory had never had to consider whether he had courage. He would never have said he was brave in the way his father was brave, but he stood up for himself. Now that he had to think about it, he supposed he had some courage in him. Cornered by bullies, he’d speak up, even fight back if he had to. But he wasn’t stupid. Agent Traeger struck him as the sort of person who had no sense of honor or nobility. If this guy needed to murder his father, maybe even his mother, to get Rory to do what he wanted, he did not doubt for a second that Traeger would do it.
So, he unlocked the ship.
Once he’d punched in the code, the hatch opened with a whisper. A cavernous darkness yawned within as the hatch rose. Tentatively, Traeger went first. Rory stood with Sapir, hanging back a moment. If he hadn’t stepped inside on his own, he figured Sapir would have nudged him. Traeger had recognized that Rory’s brain was an asset, and he had announced his decision to his aide the way a king might. The soldiers around them might think it was crazy for him to bring only Sapir and Rory into the ship, but they took their orders from Traeger and no one would dare challenge him.
Rory didn’t have to wonder about the decision, either. Traeger kept the others out because whatever might be inside the alien craft, it was top secret. Which meant that whatever happened after this, Rory would be forced to keep that secret. He imagined that meant Traeger intended him to be dead, but he was alive so far, and he planned to keep it that way.
So, he opened the door and he followed Traeger into the ship, and he didn’t even protest when Sapir gripped his arm to keep him from wandering. And he sure as hell didn’t try to run. Because where would he go, aboard an alien ship that might have homicidal monsters hiding away somewhere?
Once inside, the three of them gazed around in wonderment. There were symbols everywhere, but it looked precisely as Rory had imagined it. Once they had gotten past the entryway, they spotted several storage units set into the walls. Rory had seen enough movies to know this didn’t bode well, that these things might be hibernation chambers, and he shouldn’t want to know what they contained.
Except he did want to know. He couldn’t help himself, and he knew Traeger and Sapir and their whole gang of assholes at Project: Stargazer would also not be able to help themselves, given enough time.
Sure enough, Traeger grinned and rubbed his hands together, like a fat and greedy king who has just had a banquet laid out for him.
“Hook the translator into the mainframe, download everything,” he said. Turning to Rory—though only, Rory suspected, because there was no one else there for him to boast to—he added, “Been trying to figure out what these bird-chirping motherfuckers are saying since ’87. Gave the Harvard School of Linguistics a billion-dollar grant. Voilà!”
Gazing uneasily around at the tubes, Sapir said, “What’s inside these things?”
“It’s the property of Project: Stargazer, that’s what the fuck it is,” Traeger replied.
As he spoke, Rory noticed a control panel, like a podium that jutted from the floor between two of the cylinders. The panel was covered in symbols, the components of the Predator language, or at least some form of iconography that their species understood. Rory could see that each of the stasis cylinders was highlighted in red on the display, with a time-code beside them. The numbers were blinking, as if something had stopped them from continuing to count forward.
Or count down, he thought.
A countdown. It had stopped mid-sequence, the blinking an impatient signal, suggesting that all it would take was someone with the right code to get it moving again.
Rory shook himself from his reverie, abruptly aware that Sapir and Traeger were reacting to a commotion outside the ship. He turned to listen, and heard running footsteps, shouting. Then Traeger’s radio squawked. He snatched it angrily from his belt and held it to his ear. Rory heard the urgent voice of one of Traeger’s mercenaries.
“Code Three, Code Three, we
have motion at the south fence line.”
“Send a fire team to take a look,” Traeger barked. “Extreme prejudice.”
“Local wildlife?” Sapir ventured, but Rory was smiling.
“It’s my dad. He’s gonna save me now.”
Traeger knelt beside him. His voice was silky, but he had a look on his face like the bullies at school—mean and spiteful. “Well, if it is your daddy—and I truly hope it is—he has to be just about the dumbest motherfucker I’ve ever met. I mean, a Ranger sniper tripping motion sensors? He’d have to be…”
Then his voice tailed off and his face went slack, his eyes opening in horrified realization. Once again grabbing his radio, he looked wildly at Sapir and said, “He’s creating a diversion! It’s a fucking divers—”
Before he could bring the radio up to his mouth, it flew from his hand. As though attacked by an invisible force, he was knocked off his feet, his body smashing against a control panel.
Sapir whirled this way and that, eyes and mouth stretched wide with fear, looking for his boss’s assailant.
“Howdy,” said a voice.
Rory saw the air behind Sapir shimmer and coalesce, and next moment his dad was standing there, face blackened with dirt, a tranquilizer gun locked and loaded, and pointing at Sapir’s face.
Sapir looked nervous, but he did his best to sneer. “What, you’re gonna kill us with a tranq gun?”
McKenna’s voice was low, his hand steady. “You took my boy, so yeah.”
He pulled the trigger. The tranq dart passed through Sapir’s eye and into his brain.
For an instant, Sapir looked outraged. His remaining eye glared at McKenna. Then the life went out of him and his body dropped in an ungainly sprawl of limbs, so much dead meat.
Even before Traeger’s aide hit the floor, McKenna was moving. In one smooth motion he dropped the tranq gun and drew a pistol, which he pressed to Traeger’s temple as he hauled the CIA man to his feet by the collar of his jacket.
Rory smiled at Traeger. “Told you,” he said brightly.
Traeger looked as if he would have cheerfully strangled the life out of the boy there and then. Instead, he gawked at McKenna, as if unable to believe the sheer insolence of the man.
“You out of your mind?” he exclaimed, spittle flying from his lips. “We literally have you surrounded.”
“That’s why you’re coming with me,” said McKenna mildly. “I just want the kid, nobody has to die.”
“Umm, Dad?” said Rory, ever the pragmatist, and pointed at Sapir’s corpse.
McKenna shrugged. “I mean… y’know… from here forward. Now let’s go out there and tell your men to put their guns down.”
He shifted his grip from the front of Traeger’s collar to the back, and shoved the agent toward the hatch. They exited the ship and started down the ramp. The area directly in front of them was populated by armed mercs, all on high alert. Traeger cleared his throat and the majority of the mercs turned. It took a moment, but suddenly guns were coming up, all pointing in their direction.
Pressing close in against Traeger’s back, McKenna hissed in his ear, “Tell ’em.”
Traeger raised his voice. “If Captain McKenna doesn’t lower his weapon in the next ten seconds, shoot the kid’s knees out.” He twisted his head back to regard McKenna, curling his lip. “That work for you?”
McKenna jerked his head at Rory, who moved to stand behind his father, pressing himself against McKenna’s back as tightly as McKenna was pressed against Traeger. To McKenna’s dismay, however, he saw the mercs fanning out around them, and he knew that if he wanted to absolutely guarantee his boy’s safety, their only option was to withdraw to the dubious sanctuary of the Predator’s ship.
In truth, he’d misjudged Traeger’s reaction, and that irked him. He’d potentially bet his life—and worse, Rory’s—on the fact that Traeger, with a gun at his head, would turn out to be a coward. But the CIA agent had displayed a reckless bravery that had surprised McKenna.
“Fuck you!” he snarled into Traeger’s ear, trying to reestablish the upper hand. “My guys have this place covered from every angle.”
But even now, Traeger refused to be cowed.
“Funny story,” he said dismissively, “I don’t care. Ten… nine… eight…”
McKenna took another look at the mercs surrounding them, and thought: Shit.
21
Armed with a long rifle, Lynch was crouching close to where McKenna had crouched before him, looking down on the crash site below. His vantage point, though, wasn’t quite as good as McKenna’s had been. He had only a partial view of the site from here. He couldn’t see what was going on over by the alien ship, mostly obscured as it was by an overhang of rock and a drooping sprawl of decimated trees. Propped against a bush in front of his face, his radio hissed and crackled, but remained annoyingly silent for now.
Never a patient man, Lynch twitched and fidgeted, glaring at the radio as though it was a toddler that stubbornly refused to eat its greens.
Come the fuck on, he thought. Just give the fuckin’ word.
From the corner of his eye he caught a flicker of light. Fireflies?
He glanced to his right—and saw a trio of red dots dancing on his trigger arm. Red fireflies?
Then realization crashed in on him. Shit! He was being targeted! The sniper was being sniped! He scrambled upright, spun round, raising his gun.
Before he could take offensive or defensive action of any kind, a lightning bolt shot down from the heavens and hit him dead center. He was lifted into the air, as if by a giant hand made of sizzling light and excruciating pain, and smashed back down again. His ears hissing, his thoughts screaming, his body full of fire, he looked wildly around, and noticed something very odd indeed— his own arm, lying on the ground, fingers still twitching at one end, smoke rising from the other. Wondering if he was dreaming, or hallucinating, he turned to look at the place where his arm should be, and saw nothing but a charred stump, drooling blood.
I’m dead, he thought, and felt a kind of wonder. I’m actually dead. Aww, shit. Now I’ll never get to find out how this ends.
Above him, in front of him, he heard the crashing of undergrowth, the sound of something big heading his way.
Scrabbling in his pack, he pulled out a flare gun and fired it blindly into the air… illuminating a huge, dreadlocked shape, which pushed its way out of the trees and loomed over him like the Angel of Death.
* * *
Still calm, still counting down, Traeger said, “Three… two…”
McKenna wondered whether to shoot him in the head before he reached one, just for the hell of it.
Then a flare lit the sky above the jungle somewhere to the east, and was followed almost instantly by the hideous, drawn-out scream of someone or something dying a horrible death.
McKenna thought instantly of the Loonies, and Casey. They were out there. He hoped to God—
The momentary distraction was all that Traeger needed.
Spinning round, he made his hand flat and rigid as a blade, and stabbed it toward McKenna’s throat, intending to jab him right in the Adam’s apple. McKenna flinched away just in time, and Traeger’s hand scraped painfully against the side of his neck. It was still enough, though, to enable the CIA agent to break free of McKenna’s grip when the Army Ranger stumbled backward. As Traeger leaped from the ramp of the ship, hit the ground and rolled, the world suddenly erupted with gunfire.
We’re dead, McKenna thought, assuming that without Traeger there as a shield, the mercs had opened up on them. He threw himself backward, his only instinct being to protect Rory—with his own dead and twitching body, if need be.
It took him maybe a second to realize that the bullets weren’t coming their way. No, they were coming from the jungle, from the Loonies, God bless ’em, raining in on all sides, with the mercs as their target. And the mercs—those that weren’t cut down in the first volley—were scattering, running for cover, returning fire when
they could. McKenna had been in firefights before, and knew he had to think and act fast, that he’d have only a few seconds before someone once again identified him and Rory as targets.
Rory was lying on the ramp, curled into a ball, his hands pressed over his ears. Crouching beside him, veiled by smoke, McKenna scooped him up, carried him to the edge of the ramp—Rory’s body rigid, as if made of wood— and dropped to the ground. Blanketed by the haze, the two of them then rolled beneath the ramp and lay there a moment, recovering. McKenna could hear his son’s heart hammering in his chest, and he held him close, murmuring words of comfort and encouragement. Eventually, he felt Rory’s body relax, saw him crack open an eyelid. The ground was littered with the corpses of Traeger’s mercenaries, and McKenna told his son not to look.
“Are you okay?” he said quietly.
Rory was clearly petrified, but he nodded. From his pocket, McKenna produced the invisibility ball, polished it briefly on his thigh, and offered it to Rory.
“Take this. You need to vanish, you really vanish. Understand?”
Rory nodded again.
* * *
Diego Galarza did not consider himself a bad guy. Yes, he’d been prepared to shoot the crazy soldier, and maybe even his kid, but what he did, he did purely so he could send money home to his ailing mama and two sisters in East Harlem. Without his monthly contributions, he feared they’d slip below the poverty line, especially once his mama’s medical bills began to mount up. It was imperative, therefore, that he stay alive. And although it wasn’t looking too good for him right now, he felt sure things would turn out okay in the end. After all, he was a lucky guy, always had been. He’d even been known as Lucky Galarza in the neighborhood where he’d grown up. He’d had scrapes in the past—many scrapes, and some bad ones, ones where other people had got killed— but somehow or other, he had always come out on top.
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