Before he could fire again, the rat leaped at him from the balcony. Instead of rolling to his right or left, Granny merely dropped to his haunches, pointed the gun straight up, and fired directly into the rat’s belly. The rat’s momentum, along with the blast from the shotgun, carried it over Granny’s head. The rat landed off balance behind Granny, who had already rolled onto his feet.
At the same time, the rat whirled around, teeth bared, claws ready, and was instantly on top of Agent Peters, who went down firing his .357 Magnum into the face and neck of the rat. Granny charged the rat from behind firing his shotgun into its back. In between shotgun blasts, he heard the other agent’s pistol clicking, then go quiet—he must have fired all cartridges in the revolver.
The rat twisted quickly to face Granny, but staggered sideways a couple steps. It was feeling serious pain. The other agent lay motionless beneath the rat. His eyes were glassy, his throat ripped open wide. Granny was now fighting the rat one-on-one.
Before the rat could resume its attack, Granny tossed the flare in his left hand directly in front of the rat and it pushed backwards, stumbling to get away from the hot, blinding flare.
Pulling the .44 from its holster, Granny walked slowly toward the rat. First, he fired the .44, then the shotgun, then the .44, and then the shotgun again. Every shot landed exactly where it was aimed. Although the rat didn’t die, the persistent firing from the two guns continued to back it up. Its screech of anger turned into a wail of overwhelming pain.
The rat turned on its heels to retreat, but before it could move, a single chime rang out from the grandfather clock. Everything in the room seemed to stretch out of focus. Then the room went dark. As Granny immediately ignited two new flares, everything again came back into focus.
Granny now stood in the Trona mansion, all clean and new. The transition had reversed itself. The alternate mansion, all dirty and damaged, had returned to the other world. With it went any flares burning on the floor as well as the dead body of Agent Peters. Both Granny and the rat were left behind, facing each other in the main hall.
Though the rat had initiated a dimensional transition, the clock had only held the transition stable for fifteen minutes before allowing an automatic reversal of the antennal fields. Agent Kline’s reset of the pause period was working, minimizing the time the door stayed open.
Confused and in pain, the rat backed away from Granny, screeching what sounded like an ear-piercing cry of distress, a cry for help.
Granny realized the time had come to take down the rat, but before he could move forward, both front doors of the mansion flew open with a flourish and a bang. Agent Jeffs stood in the doorway, pistol in hand. He had finally caught up, gasping and seriously out of breath.
The rat bounded toward the astonished agent and the wide-open doors.
Granny did not want the rat to get outside and disappear into the night, so he grabbed a hand grenade from another pocket. He tossed it to land between the rat and the door, but as far away from Agent Jeffs as possible. The grenade was a flash-bang, and to the consternation of both rat and agent, it went off with a loud bang and blinding explosion of brilliant light. If possible, the rat squealed even louder.
The detonation sent the agent sprawling, rolling backwards down the front steps. The rat turned in a frenzy of movement and tried to get away from both the explosion and Granny. Running toward the back of the main hall, the rat collided with the grandfather clock. As the rat scrambled to climb up the clock, its mangy bulk caused the clock to teeter and fall. The clock crashed to the floor in an explosion of wood and glass, clock parts shooting out across the stone floor.
Rolling once, and then twice, the rat regained its balance and in a fury turned on Granny. Granny did not budge, even though his ears rang from the grenade’s explosion. Not only did he not move backwards, but he ignited another flare. Dropping it, he knelt behind the flare and commenced firing with both his weapons at the charging rat, who screeched in agony as the brilliant lights and hot lead pummeled it savagely. The onslaught was more than the rat could endure.
Turning before reaching Granny, the rat made for the open front doors. Granny reached for another grenade, but the rat was already out the door. It ran directly into Agent Jeffs, who was picking himself up. In passing, the rat whirled on the agent, ripping his throat open, before running off into the darkness it treasured and disappearing into the shadows of the night.
Granny walked calmly to the front door and stood peering into the empty darkness. Two things were immediately evident. One, there was no point in chasing the rat any further that night. Two, Agent Jeffs was dead. Above, he heard thumping as somebody raced down the stairs.
Camm yelled, “The clock! The clock!”
Under his breath, Granny sarcastically commented to himself, “Oh no, don’t wait for me to give the all clear. Just come on down anytime you’re ready.”
Camm bounded across the main floor and ran directly to the giant, shattered grandfather clock. Retreating from the doorway, Granny joined her in surveying the ruins of the clock.
Camm gasped in horror. “Are we ever going to be able to fix it?”
Granny shrugged. “No, we’re not.”
Desperation etched Camm’s face.
“How can we do another transition if the clock doesn’t work?”
“We can’t.”
Tears flooded Camm’s eyes. “How will Cal and the others ever make it back home?”
Turning to clean up the mess made by the battle with the rat, Granny replied simply, “Without another transition . . . ? They won’t.”
XII
Mr. C adjusted his already reclined position. It didn’t help. No matter what position he assumed, he was always in pain. Closing his eyes, he sank back in the hot desert shade and tried to relax, breathing deeply the ever-present scent of the dry lakebed minerals. Somehow, this version of Searles Valley felt bleaker and more desolate than the one at home. Which was saying a lot.
True, coming to this alternate world had given him a little uptick in strength and health. The dry heat seemed to soak into his bones. But he still couldn’t walk easily and was always in pain. Though pain had not exactly become his best friend, it was his constant companion.
It was hot, but not too hot for Mr. C. He chilled quickly without help keeping his body temperature up. Even here, he carried a light shawl with him wherever he went and wore it now as he entered survey coordinates into a thick logbook, where he compared the coordinates of major landmarks that appeared in the landscape around the mansions of both worlds.
A survey of the home world region had been completed days earlier, and the two extra agents were now completing the same survey of the matching region in this world. The two comparable regions were remarkably similar.
Hearing a humming noise, he glanced down. Agent Allen sat cross-legged nearby, cleaning her gun. With the earbuds, she listened to something on her iPod. They sat in the shade, outside the alternate Searles Mansion, the dirty, damaged one. The mansion in Trona was always pristine.
Agent Kline was busy inside working on this world’s version of the grandfather clock. Mr. S was off scouting the area with the Jones kid who provided guided tours of critical locations.
Agent Allen’s humming grew a little louder. She began mumbling the words to the song she was listening to. “Wild man’s world is crying in pain, what you gonna do when everybody’s insane? So afraid of fortune, so afraid of you.”
In spite of it all, Mr. C smiled. He knew, and liked, that tune.
Without realizing she was being watched, Agent Allen swayed her shoulders as she grooved with the song. “I was willow last night in my dream. I bent down over a clear running stream. I sang you the song that I heard up above.”
Squeezing her eyes shut, she sang the final words louder, with more intensity. “And you keep me alive with your sweet flowing love. Crazy, crazy
on you. Let me go crazy, crazy on you!”
Agent Allen opened her eyes to find Mr. C smiling at her.
With a sheepish look, she removed her earbuds and switched off the iPod. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sing out loud. Was I bothering you?”
“Not at all,” he replied. “I’ve enjoyed listening to Heart for years. Ann Wilson is one of my favorite vocalists of all time. She has perfect intonation, a very soothing voice.”
Agent Allen could not hide the surprise on her face.
Mr. C chuckled. “What? Am I too old to like classic seventies rock ‘n roll?”
Agent Allen returned his smile. “I never figured you for someone who listens to Heart.”
“I admit, I like their old stuff better, but I did buy Jupiter’s Darling and Red Velvet Car.”
“No way!” Agent Allen looked impressed.
“Just because you’re an angry old man doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy good music.”
Just then, Agent Kline marched out of the mansion and headed toward them. Sweating profusely, his face was contorted with a glower of frustration. He started speaking before reaching the spot where Mr. C rested. “You were right Mr. C! Granny and his crew are having serious problems on the other side. I think it’s getting worse.”
The night before, the grandfather clock had begun chiming on its own, initiating an unplanned mansion transition. Fifteen minutes later, the automatic transition reversal brought back four burning magnesium flares, miscellaneous empty shell casings, and the dead body of Agent Peters. Peters was covered in green slime with his throat ripped open by the vicious bite of a creature with sharp fangs and teeth. Clearly, his death was the handiwork of the green rat.
Agent Kline shook his head. “Now, something is wrong with the grandfather clock. Not on our end, but seriously wrong on the other end. That clock no longer seems to be working.”
* * *
Cal reclined in the shade of a large bolder set back from the trail, glad to rest a moment and be alone with his thoughts. He knew he was living an incredible adventure. Not just the adventure of a lifetime, but an epoch, one-of-a-kind adventure of all time.
However, this adventure was growing old and tedious. Like camping, all was fun and exciting at the start, but by the time you headed home, you were anxious for a hot meal, a shower, and a soft bed. When he and Lenny first crossed over into this alternate desert world, the adventure had been weird and exciting. Oh sure, it was scary too. Every moment was scary, but still exciting.
Then that crazy grandfather clock had transitioned him back to Trona, and he had been immediately whisked away into federal lockup and kept in solitary confinement. “To keep you from telling your story to the other inmates,” he was told.
Finally released from lockup, he had gone straight back into this bare, primitive world with no chance to see his family or friends, no chance to refresh his spirits. Things had gone past old and tedious. Cal was more than ready for his hot meal and shower.
Besides, he was anxious to see Camm again. He still marveled at how warm and affectionate she had been. He shut his eyes, thinking of that kiss. In all the years he had known her, she had never kissed him like that. For years, Cal had dreamed of Camm kissing him like that, and being able to kiss her back.
Mr. S ambled over to sit by Cal and leaned against the same rock, adjusting his back to find a comfortable spot. He handed Cal a bottle of water. “Hot enough for you?” he said with a pant.
Sweat marks showed under the man’s armpits, and on his chest and back. The hot sun glared down without mercy on this wasteland.
“This place is mineral rich, but it has to be one of the most god-forsaken places on the planet, in either dimension. I don’t know how anybody survives, let alone lives, in a place like this.”
Cal smiled slightly. “I grew up in a place pretty much exactly like this.”
“I’m sorry.” Mr. S grinned sheepishly. “I knew that. I’m just not used to such intense heat.”
Cal grimaced. “I’m worried we haven’t found Lenny yet.”
Mr. S nodded. “Me too. When our extra agents complete the survey for Mr. C, I’ll recruit them to help us in our search for Lenny. Where do you think he could have gone?”
Cal stared off into blank air. “I thought he would hang around the mansion, you know. That would have been the smart thing, wait for us to come get him. Of course, there’s nothing to eat in the mansion. He would have to search for food. I figured he’d be hunting back up that green canyon, where we killed the grouse hen and almost got killed by the flash flood.”
Cal shook his head, running out of ideas. He and Mr. S had scoured the canyon, but found no signs of Lenny. They had also hiked from the mansion out to Great Falls. They found water trickling down the rocks there, but again, no sign of Lenny.
Cal shrugged, feeling helpless, but definitely not ready to give up on Lenny. “I don’t know where else to look. If it were me, I could think of all kinds of places to go. But Lenny’s not from Trona. He only knows what I showed him. Assuming nothing bad happened to him, where else could he be?” Cal refused to think the worst.
A giant shadow passed over them. Cal gazed up into the cloudless, blue sky and pointed. A hawk flew high overhead. At that distance, it was difficult to determine its actual size. But there was no mistaking the size of the immense shadow that had crossed over them.
Banking sharply, the hawk wheeled towards them, gliding down in their direction. Cal unholstered the Glock they had given him and flipped off the safety. He waited for the hawk to get closer—it was coming fast. As it came within range, Cal fired off two quick shots, leading the bird. He couldn’t tell where his shots went, but the hawk suddenly veered sharply off to one side and flew quickly away. At a lower altitude, the hawk seemed bigger than ever.
Mr. S pointed at the Glock. “Put your pistol away. Don’t waste bullets.”
“I thought it might be checking us out for dinner.”
Mr. S squinted. “That is one big bird.”
“Freakin’ big,” Cal agreed. “I hope it didn’t get Lenny.”
A look of concern painted itself on Cal’s face. “Do you think Lenny is still alive? A world with Cessna-sized hawks and giant rattlesnakes is not a safe place to live.”
Mr. S pursed his lips and thought for a moment. “What do you think?”
Cal holstered his Glock and leaned back again. “Lenny is real smart. I mean, like, scary smart. But, you know, sometimes he is too smart for his own good. He thinks because he’s smarter than everyone else, he can just do his own thing. He can get pretty extreme in what he thinks, like wanting to live like the hunter-gatherers. Then, you know, he doesn’t seem smart at all.”
Cal drew in the sand with his finger, deep in thought. Fixing his gaze intently on Mr. S, he asked, “Lenny has to be alive, right? It’s like when we were caught in the flashflood. It should have killed us, but it didn’t. And, like with Mr. C, he came with us so he wouldn’t die. I mean, because he can’t die here in another world that isn’t his own. Right?”
“I don’t think it works quite that way.” Mr. S knit his brows, thinking. “We are not of this world, and for reasons steeped in physics and biology that I don’t quite understand, it is difficult for us to die here, just as it is difficult for the rat to die in our world. But I don’t think it is impossible. Don’t forget: At one point, you and Camm did manage to kill the green rat.”
Cal considered what Mr. S had said. “So, are we like vampires? I mean, not that we suck blood, or anything like that, but we are hard to kill, like we have to have a stake through the heart or have our heads chopped off? Something like that? You know, like zombies, or maybe like that Highlander guy. He can only die if his head is chopped off.”
“Yes, those are interesting analogies.” Mr. S chuckled as he rubbed his chin. “The important thing to remember is while it may prove
difficult, it is still possible for any of us to die here. I’m sure getting your head chopped off would do the trick. We need to use the utmost care in avoiding danger and defending ourselves.”
“So how about Lenny? Chances are he is still alive. Right?”
“To be honest, I don’t know. It is not easy to stay alive in this place. There are too many serious threats here. Losing one’s head may be the least of our worries.”
Cal frowned. “What do you mean?”
Mr. S pulled an oddly colored stone out of his pocket and held it up for Cal to see. “Look at this rock. This is an unknown element that is totally out of place in either this world or our own. It is alien in every way. If it had fallen to this world in a meteorite, it would not have survived the heat in this form. This new element must have come to this world through a dimensional anomaly.
“We can say the same thing about the green rat. That creature is alien in every way. With its arsenic-based cellular structure, it does not fit naturally in either of the two worlds we know about. Something is going on in this particular world that is more complicated than just the presence of giant-sized predators.”
Cal shifted uncomfortably on the stony ground. He really wanted to get back home, but the list of things that could go wrong kept getting longer.
He almost hated to ask, but did anyway. “How could things get more complicated?”
“New life forms? New minerals? As the evidence mounts, I am more and more convinced that we are dealing with more than just two different worlds in two separate dimensions. This world appears to have portals connecting it to many alternate worlds, not just our own.”
“Huh?” Mouth open, Cal stared at Mr. S.
“This world appears to be at the center of a dimensional crossroads of some kind. How that could be so, I don’t know, but this world is a focal point for alternate worlds. I think there are many such alternate worlds, each different in its own way from the others.
Fatal Green Page 10