He pulled them out slowly, every motion of his muscles an ache along his nerves. Arrowing hatred from his mind at the Eyes, he drew back his hand, and let the bombs fly.
They hit, and the gas bloomed and billowed. He covered his face as the Eyes disappeared into the fog. He tried his legs again. They still wouldn’t move. Then, in the middle of the try, they became mobile, and the strain he was putting into them sent him sprawling out of the gas on momentum alone. As he hit the ground, he rolled away from the mist. His eyes burned and watered and he felt that he would choke. But when his body lost its rolling speed, he scrambled to his feet and ran, back along the trail through the woods. If he could just run far enough, he would find help. The National Guard was entrenched here somewhere, and they would help him.
He ran, his thumping feet jarred his body and his overtaxed heart. Saliva seeped out of his mouth, and he was afraid to sample it for fear of finding blood. Still, he ran.
He broke into a clearing, and something bobbed up in front of him. He shrieked once, and fell. Unconsciousness beckoned and he clutched it, not caring any longer where it led him.
* * * *
The sun was on its early fall journey downward when he awoke. He sat straight up, but hands caught his shoulders and laid him back.
“Take it easy,” someone said. “You’re all right now.”
He looked up into the blurred face of a tall man, and as his foggy vision cleared he saw gray eyes and a smooth skin with tired lines and the flash of ribbons on a uniform blouse.
“National Guard?” he asked.
“Yes. You ran right into us. What was after you anyhow?”
“Eyes.”
“Oh,” the other man grunted. “No wonder you were so desperate.”
“They didn’t follow me then?”
“Not into our position, anyway.” The man stood up. “My name is Kellroy. Lieutenant Kellroy. Whoever you are, buddy, you look like you’ve been to hell and back.”
“I have. I’m Linc Hosier from the Space Lab.”
“And just what were you doing out there?”
“I was in the hole.”
Kellroy’s expression clearly showed doubt.
“I was,” Linc argued. “I went in and came out again. I know what’s down there now. I’ve got to get back and report.”
Kellroy still looked doubtful, and Linc didn’t blame him. It was a crazy story.
“Look,” Linc said, “if you’ve got a hook-up, get hold of Dr. Iverson or Colonel Stanley. They’ll vouch for me.”
“Do you know Stanley?”
“Of course. I’ve been working with him.”
“Then do you know about the attack we made the other day against the hole?” Kellroy was pumping him for confirming knowledge.
“I watched the whole thing from the fire tower in the woods. I saw your boys get taken. As a matter of fact, the tear gas was my idea in the first place—only I never intended it to be used that way. It’s not a weapon.”
Kellroy grunted again. “Tear gas, huh?” he said. “You’re not by any chance the guy who captured one of those Eyes, are you?”
“I am. I have it caged in my lab right now.”
Kellroy nodded quickly. “Okay. I believe you. If you were anybody else, I’d order you to stay in bed for a while. But with the information you must have, I’ll send you to the lab in a jeep. Express.”
“Thank heaven I ran into a sensible man,” Linc sighed. “And a scared one. If you’ve got anything at all to help solve this mess, I want it put to use—and fast. Come on. I’ll drive you back myself!”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Iverson, Stanley, Kellroy and Collins gathered close around him as he told the story from start to finish, leaving out none of the fantastic or revolting details. He told them of the dark, and the glow, the empty sockets and the shrinking eyes. He described the queer ritual of the man, and relayed his guesswork about the source of the radiation sickness.
“So you see,” he concluded, “the Eyes aren’t what we thought at all. Our first guess was actually the right one. They’re not complete beings. They’re a fantastic part of a fantastic creature. From space—they must be from space.”
No one said anything, and he sat back in his chair, giving them time to come around. He felt better. The first thing he had done on hitting the lab was to check himself for radioactivity. He was carrying some, but not enough to harm him. Still, he had taken a shower and scrubbed his skin red to wash away every trace. And now, with night outside and the good, yellow light of electricity about him, the fear was washing away, too.
Stanley said, beginning in the middle of his train of thought, “Then destroying the Eyes alone will do us no good, if it’s even possible. There’s more to destroy—the creatures themselves.”
“Right,” Linc answered. “And they’re big. Like small whales with arms and legs. I’d guess that they normally go on all fours. I don’t see how they could heft their bulk any other way.”
“Well,” Iverson said, “I guess that settles it. I’ve been against it from the start, but now I can see that it’s the only way.”
“What are you talking about?” Linc asked.
“Collins’ plan.” Iverson met his gaze. “The A-bomb. If we have to destroy those giants to get rid of the Eyes, then the bomb is the only way. The poor people in there with them will just have to die, too.”
Of course, Iverson was right. The information he had retrieved from the hole made Collins’ plan more feasible. The bomb would not only destroy the Eyes, it would destroy the parents of the Eyes.
Linc searched his conscience to see if he had any compunction against this killing of the innocents, and decided that he didn’t. They would die, anyway—slowly and painfully. Then his mind swung to Wes, and he found the compunctions. Wes had given his life to save those people. Whether they died later or not, they shouldn’t be slaughtered without a chance. And what of the new ones who walked down the ramp every hour of the day? They could be saved. They shouldn’t be bombed.
He stood up, determined to carry on Wes’ fight. “Collins’ plan is no good. It never has been. Aside from the people in the hole, there’s the entire area to consider. The evacuation has been a fiasco. You’re sending people out to their doom in flocks. You can’t do that and call it a necessity. It’s inhuman. No matter what label you give it, it’s inhuman.”
“Then what do you suggest?” Collins sneered. “You’re the hero here. What do you suggest?”
Linc smashed his cigarette out in the ashtray. “It might not be a bad thing if you remembered that I’m the hero here. I risked my life, just as Wes did, to get information. I didn’t sit here in this safe office and plan to murder thousands of people. I went in with them. Now, I intend to use what I know to find a way to save them.”
“But every hour we delay means more lost,” Iverson protested. “People are being captured. We can’t let that go on either.”
“Then stop your stupid evacuation and order people to stay in their houses!” Linc commanded.
“How long do you think it would be before the Eyes started going in after them?” Collins asked.
“Who knows?” Linc didn’t let it jar him. “It would at least give us a breather—give us time. I need time to sort things out. One thing I’ve learned—I don’t jump at actions any more. I was responsible for too many deaths through over-eagerness.” He turned to Iverson. “Give me your answer, Doc. I want time—a day, maybe two days—but time. Am I going to get it?”
Iverson hesitated and swerved to Stanley. Stanley, in turn, swung to Collins. Collins shrugged. “You know what I think”
Stanley fingered a pencil lying on the desk. “I have to stick with Collins. I’m a military man. I understand weapons and I trust weapons. The bombing plan sounds good to me.”
“Doc?” Linc asked the gray-haired man.
Iverson stared out the window, then said whiningly, “I hate to go against you, Linc. I’ve always known you to be capable in the past, but this situation seems to have you stumped. I can’t in good conscience say, ‘Okay, take your two days,’ while innocent people are constantly being captured. I have to go along with Stanley. The bomb is the best answer. And the sooner, the better.”
“All right,” Linc said. “Then it’s your show. I’ll go home and bury my own dead. You bury yours—after you’ve finished killing them.” He strode for the door, angry deep inside, wanting to smash the smirk off Collins’ sharp face with equally sharp blows.
“Hosier!” Stanley’s voice was harsh with command. “The evacuation will run at least three more days. Isn’t that good enough for you? Why do you need special privilege?”
“I never asked for special privilege,” Linc shot back. “I only asked for lives. For time when people wouldn’t be sent out to die. What’s the use of my work when you guys here are undermining any good I might do? Your evacuation has to stop. That’s the kind of time I want.”
“Then it’s settled,” Stanley said. “I’m sorry to see you leave us like this.”
“And surprised,” Iverson added.
“I’m not,” Collins said. “Nothing Hosier could do would surprise me. I’ve worked beside him too long.”
“One more crack, Collins,” Linc hissed. “Just one more—”
“Before you leave the lab, Linc,” Iverson interrupted him, “please turn that Eye you’ve got caged loose. I don’t want it around any more. It’s too much of a danger to the staff. It may start reaching out for people. Turn it loose.”
“I’m sure it will thank you for its freedom,” Linc said, and left the room.
He went to the little lab where he and Wes had battled so hard with the watery-blue monstrosity. He switched on the light. The Eye still floated in the cage. It turned slightly to meet him, and gazed at him blankly.
“I’d like to punch the insides out of you,” Linc cursed it. “But you’ve gotten the thumbs-up sign, you slimy, rotting—”
He stamped to the window and opened it wide, then back to the cage and loosened the lock. The Eye was free, but it didn’t move. He picked up the tarp and shook it at the thing, shooing it out, tipping the cage up to spill it out. Still it remained captive.
He put the tarp down, grasped the cage tightly, and pulled. The cage came away, leaving the Eye hovering four inches above the bare workbench, free of the enclosure.
“Now get out of here!” He shooed it again, hitting it with the tarp. He maneuvered it up and finally out, then shut the window and locked it.
He left the little room despondently. It had all been for nothing. All of the energy put into fighting the hypnosis, and all of the danger. Wes had killed himself for nothing, and he had risked death for nothing. Collins and his bomb had won.
* * * *
Kelly met him at the door. She was hollow-eyed with tiredness, and her voice was husky. “Hurry, Linc. I think Wes—” She broke off and ran for the stairs. Linc followed her quickly, climbing the stairs three at a time.
They went into Wes’ room, and he stopped short beside the bed. He had been absent only one day, but the change in Wes was the change of years. His skin was ashen, and his hair ragged and sparse. There was a rattle to his sighing, and the feel of death clouded about him.
“I’m so glad you got here in time,” Kelly whispered. “I didn’t know if I could face it alone.”
“You could have faced it.” Linc wasn’t kind.
She stared at him, and her chin was quivering and her face begging for a scrap of compassion.
He wanted to respond to her need, feeling an equal one of his own. But the words wouldn’t pull themselves free of his throat.
He went closer to the bed. “I’ll watch,” he said to Kelly. “You go down and get yourself some coffee.”
“No. Wes was my friend, too. You never remember that. Everything is always all yours. But he was my friend, too, and I’m going to stay with him.”
Linc didn’t say anything more. He merely held on to Wes’ hand, and waited.
He knew when it was dawn by the coldness that settled in his bones. Dawn was always chill and stark, dismal, before the pink of sunrise, a fearing time, a time for the evils of the world to have one last gallop before they settled back into their holes. And this dawn was more stark, more chill, than usual, because with the coming of it Wes grew cold. His gasps came less and less often; his jaw went slack, and he grew cold.
Then it was done, and it wasn’t hard, because his brain and soul were already away, and only his body had to stop its pulsing.
Linc let go of his hand and closed himself inward, not daring to utter a sound. Kelly cried quietly. He put the sheet up and over Wes’ face in the age-old ritual of hiding death, then said, “Now—will you make that coffee?”
She left, and her footsteps were soft on the stairs. He heard the click of Ichabod going beside her, and the imagined sight of the little dog was more tearing than the entire night had been. Now, he supposed, Ichabod was his, and as much his duty to care for and comfort as Wes had been.
He denied himself the relief of grief or maudlin thoughts, and joined Kelly in the kitchen. The dog already eating his breakfast, and Linc put the cream and sugar on the table, as Kelly finished with the coffee.
She sat across from him, yet they were light years apart.
He had to break the silence. “I’m going out as soon as it’s a decent hour and arrange for a funeral.”
“There aren’t any funerals any more,” she said. “No one will go to them. People don’t bury their dead. Not with ritual, anyway.”
“Wes will have ritual,” he said flatly. “I’ll find somebody if I have to drag them out by the hair.”
“Will we wait the usual three days?”
“No. He’s dead now, and who can say what will happen in three days?” He gulped a hot bubble of coffee. “Wes was a Methodist, wasn’t he?”
Kelly nodded.
“Then I’ll get a Methodist minister.” He stood up. “You be ready when I come for you.”
“I thought you said you’d wait for a decent hour.”
“There isn’t any decent hour if people are unwilling. I may as well pull them out of bed, too.” He started out of the kitchen. “Play with Ichabod, will you? Throw that toy rat he likes to chase and—Kelly, don’t be nervous here alone—I mean…”
“I know what you mean. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it.”
****
He found the rectory, and his knock was loud and brutal on the door. He was prepared to argue, to plead, to be angry, anything to accomplish what he had come to accomplish. He pounded again, and this time the door creaked open and a pale face peered out at him.
“Yes?” the face said.
“Is the minister at home?”
The door opened a bit further, and revealed a woman in a bright print housedress. “He’s at breakfast,” she said.
“I want to see him. May I come in?”
“He’s at breakfast.”
“So? Does that mean he’s unavailable? Since when does breakfast interfere with service to God?”
The woman met his gaze sharply, then stood back and opened the door wide. “Right through that door, and straight ahead to the kitchen,” she pointed the way. “It’s Dr. Putney. Tell him I sent you in.”
He followed her directions and came into the better light of a big kitchen. It was clean and airy, much like his own, and a small man sat at the table, sipping juice and eating toast. He wore horn-rimmed glasses that fell forward on his nose whenever he bent to take a bite, and his hands were pale and delicate.
“Dr. Putney?”
The minister swiveled brown eyes quickly around to rest on Linc. “I am, young man. What can I do fo
r you?”
“I’ve come to ask for your services. I have a funeral to be held, and I want it Methodist, and I want it today.”
The minister went back to his juice, filling time.
“Well?” Linc demanded.
“Sit down. Have something to eat. I don’t like to have strangers in my home without offering to break bread with them.”
“Thanks just, the same, but I didn’t come for that. I have a funeral to—”
“I heard you the first time.”
“Then why the stalling?”
“It’s an unusual request nowadays, young man. I haven’t held a funeral in weeks. Not even a Sunday service.”
“But you have no reason to refuse?” Linc probed.
“To be honest, I hadn’t given it any consideration, because I didn’t expect to be asked.” He indicated a chair. “Are you sure you won’t join me?”
“I haven’t the time. I have other arrangements to make. A cemetery lot, a man to dig, a casket. I came to you first because I thought you would naturally be the easiest to get. As I told the woman who let me in, nothing—not even the Eyes—could interfere with your service to God.”
Dr. Putney cleared his throat, and his pale face reddened. “You run right to the heart of things, don’t you?”
“I see no point in hiding what I mean in obscure language. You either accept me or refuse. Which is it going to be?”
“What sort of service are you planning?”
“I don’t need anything fancy. Just a graveside service.”
“That would entail a group of people, out in the open,” Putney said, and his voice suddenly trembled.
“It would. It might be dangerous—and it might not. We’d have to take that chance. But, Doctor, if you knew the chance this man took—he wasn’t simply a victim of the Eyes. He gave his life trying to fight them. He can’t be buried without the proper honors.”
“He gave his life, did you say?”
Linc explained the circumstances of Wes’ death, and Putney listened quietly. The man’s face was expressionless, giving no hint of the thoughts behind it, but when Linc was through, he said, “Well, that decides it, doesn’t it? If he was willing to lay down his life for his brother, I certainly can’t do any less.”
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