Curiously, I looked all around the upstairs with a broomstick in my hand as defense. I looked everywhere except in the attic because I couldn’t reach the drawstring. If it hadn’t been for Phineas busting up chairs, I would have had a boost and searched the attic too. Instead, I stood below the pull-down type door and listened. I didn’t hear anything and decided that would have to do because that’s when I heard Papaw coming back into the house.
I ran to the head of the stairs and started down, but stopped short before they saw me.
Phineas was with them and his head was wet. He held a blanket around his shoulders and his teeth chattered a legato.
Aunt Liza was standing, holding the baby, as Phineas stepped past her and stood before the fire. Papaw and Uncle Pat smiled as Liza chided them. “I thought you were going to do something to him.”
“We did,” volunteered Pat. “He smelled so bad we washed him down with the sprayer out in the barn.”
“Well, wasn’t that too cold?”
“Oh, it heated up some there at the end.”
“He may get pneumonia yet.”
Phineas tried a little cough.
“Don’t be startin’ that,” said Pat. ”we still ain’t decided what to do with you.”
“Yes, we have,” said Papaw.
Pat faced Papaw. “What have we decided?”
“We’re going to turn him in to local authorities; whoever it is that’s looking for him. Let them decide what to do.”
“No, don’t turn me over, please. If that’s what you’ve got in mind, just give me my clothes and let me walk out that door. You won’t see me again.”
“Neither would anybody else,” said Papaw. “You’d freeze to death. No, you’ll stay here and do chores until we can hand you over.”
Phineas took the news silently, then calmly made a counter proposal that piqued Papaw’s interest. “You want to hunt the lizards, eh? Because of what they did to your son and his family?”
Papaw’s voice was cold. “That’s none of your concern.”
“What would you say if I told you where the den is located? The den of the lizard clan that raided this place and killed everybody.”
“You talk about them as if they were human,” said Liza.
“Naw,” he drawled, “they’re as animal as they come. Anyways, I know where the closest den is and I know it’s full.”
“Full?” said Pat. “What does full mean? How many is that?”
Phineas shrugged. “I’d guess a dozen or so. They’re down in the rocks, hidden away in a cave. They sleep mostly in this sort of weather.”
“You can get us there?”
“It’s not far.”
Pat looked at Papaw. “What do you think?”
“If he’s lying, I’ll kill him.”
Pat turned back to Phineas and started to repeat Papaw’s message, but Phineas interrupted, “Yes, I heard, but I’m not lying.”
“So you say,” said Pat, “so you say.”
Chapter 6
Uncle Pat peered into the camera and asked if we could see him. Hi, Uncle Paddy,” I said and waved.
“He can’t see you, Amanda.”
“But he can hear me.”
“That’s right. Everything he sees, we see on this monitor…” Liza pointed at a display that was projected from another micro-device the size of a button. “And,” she continued, “everything your Grandpaw sees, you can see on this monitor.”
A second device projected a screen presently filled with white noise. Papaw had already tested his camera with us and promised to turn it back on if there was something to see.
They hadn’t left yet, but lingered to test their equipment in the cold yard outside the front door of the farmhouse. Kaliis was with them as was Phineas.
Kaliis wore the same jumper type outfit he always wore. It was self-cleaning, or so claimed Kaliis and helped him regulate his body temperature with heating and cooling. He turned down a coat when Liza offered him a child’s coat she found upstairs.
Phineas gladly accepted a change of clothes from Eugene’s closet, although everything was too large to fit properly.
Phineas had a cold weather kit and a survival bag. The rifle he had stashed under the bed upstairs was only suitable for small game but he insisted on carrying it anyway. The remainder of the kit was a decent set of thermal overalls, which Phineas pulled on over his clothes.
Uncle Pat said no to allowing Phineas to carry a weapon. He said you can’t trust a thief, but Papaw asked if he’d force an unarmed man to go hunting? What use would he be?
“All right,” Pat relented, “but if he wings me with that pea-shooter, he’ll wish we’d have turned him out.”
Papaw made certain everything was ready and everything worked, including weapons, sensors, cameras, radios, and thermal gear; then he insisted they not take anything more than they could carry.
“Why?” asked Pat. “We can fit plenty in the striders.”
“We’re not taking the striders.”
“What? Why not? How are we supposed to get there?”
“We’ll walk. The boy says they’re close enough. Let’s just go get it done and quit whining about your personal comfort.”
“I’m not whining. I just don’t like surprises, that’s all. You like to think you’re famous for planning? Well, this plan really sucks so far.”
Uncle Pat and Papaw always fought like that, but in the end Papaw usually got what he wanted. This time was no different. Minutes later, Uncle Pat was fastening snowshoes to his boots. Pat looked at Phineas who already had his snowshoes attached to my daddy’s old boots.
“How long to get there? How far is it?”
Phineas took in a breath and looked to the west, toward Summit. He squinted his eyes and furrowed his brow as he calculated the number. “About twenty minutes,” he said.
Pat straightened up. “You’re kidding.”
“No, I ain’t,” said Phineas.
“You mean to tell me, there’s a clan of these things living that close?”
“Around these parts,” said Phineas, “you can practically find a lizard under every rock. Course, like I said, they sleep a lot in the winter.”
Papaw shook his head and, without a word, shuffled to the porch. Toby continued to watch the scene displayed on the projected monitor, but Liza and I looked expectantly at the door. It opened and Papaw, unable to go any farther because of the snowshoes on his feet, stuck his head inside. The cold air blew over us.
“Do not go outside unless you are armed, Liza, and make sure you have a gun within reach at all times.” Papaw looked at me. “Mandy, what’s our motto for high alert?”
I knew what he meant. It was something he had told me more than once. Simple frontier advice, really. “Shoot first,” I replied, “and ask questions later.”
“That’s my girl,” he said. Before backing out, he told us to keep the door bolted. “See you later,” he said and shut the door behind.
Liza watched him walk from the front door on a separate door cam feed, and then switched to the view from Pat’s camera. The microphone was keyed by voice so when Liza reminded Grandpa to turn on his camera, everybody heard her.
“We haven’t even gotten out of the yard yet,” said Papaw. “I’ll turn it on when I get in stride.”
“What does that mean?” I asked as I bounced up to look out the window.
“That means he’ll turn it on when he’s good and ready. Stubborn man.”
Papaw’s voice came back. “I heard that.”
Then, Uncle Pat’s voice. “You may as well go ahead and turn on the dern thing because she’s not going to give you rest until you do.”
“You’re probably right.”
The four of them were finally out of the yard, trudging west through the snow, when Papaw finally turned on his live feed.
“Thank you, Gary,” said Liza. “Take care of the old man, Pat.”
“Take care of yourself and pipe down while you’re at it.
I’m concentrating.” Papaw’s camera feed showed that mostly he was looking at the snow, but it also showed that Papaw was keeping a close eye on young Phineas, who was leading the impromptu hunting party.
Kaliis was behind Papaw, so we could see everybody, except for Uncle Pat, from Pat’s video feed. It soon became apparent Kaliis was not up to the task of hiking. He stumbled and fell several times and just couldn’t get the hang of walking with the snowshoes. I think they were too big for him. Papaw became annoyed and, five minutes into their journey, ordered Kaliis to turn around and return to the house.
“I’d prefer to press on with you, sir.”
“I’m flattered,” replied Papaw in a flat tone. “Now get back to the house.”
Kaliis hesitated. “Alone?”
“Yes, alone,” Papaw retorted.
Kaliis looked to the left and right out over the snow-covered fields. “Sir, pardon me, but what if some of your ‘beasties’ are about? I am not armed and I…”
“You can see the house from here, Kaliis.”
Kaliis looked in the direction from which they’d come. “Ah, yes, well my legs are shorter than yours and I think…”
“I don’t care what you think. Now, for your own good, get back to the house.”
“As you wish,” said the alien and, without further word, he/it turned and began walking over the snow in the tracks previously made.
There were a few minutes when Kaliis was out of everyone’s sight and, of all people, it was Papaw who was the most relieved when Kaliis finally knocked on the front door and Liza let him in.
*
Phineas was wrong about the twenty minute hike. It turned out to be closer to two hours. Still in the lead, Phineas held up a hand and the two men following him obediently halted. The young man smelled the air and squinted his eyes against the glaring white of the snowy ground before turning and walking back to Grandpaw.
Phineas pointed at the slope of the land before them. “It’s hard to tell because of the snow, but there’s a wash here. When it rains in the spring, this is a watershed that flows down to a gully and that’s where we’re going. There’s a box ending to the gully with a rock cliff. The rains create a waterfall from the other side and it pours down the cliff and collects at the bottom and runs off to a gash in the ground. In late summer, the water runs out and everything dries up again. That’s when the lizards come back every year to that spot. It’s that particular clan’s winter lair as near as I can figure.”
Before they continued, Phineas pointed to wavy patterns in the snow. “Lizard sign,” he said. “Headed the way we’ve come.”
“How so?” Pat asked.
“They sweep their tails back and forth as they walk…”
Papaw finished the thought. “To cover their trail,” he said.
Pat and Papaw listened to the boy and when he’d finished saying his piece, they checked their weapons and started moving forward again. The snowshoes left impossibly large tracks in the snow.
The boy didn’t need to remind the men they were nearing the lair of the beasts. They pressed on in silence, communicating with hand signals. When they were close enough to see the rocky cliff, Grandpaw peered through a monocular scope he carried. When he’d scouted the entrance to the cave, he handed the scope to Uncle Pat who took a good look for himself. Phineas had already seen it and waited for the men to familiarize themselves with the scenery.
Papaw whispered to Phineas, asking how wide the opening was, in meters, and how tall, and how deep did it go? Was it an underground river in the summer?
“Yes, it becomes a river in the summer,” Phineas replied, but he didn’t know how deep it went. The opening was only wide enough for one man to enter at a time.
“How do we even know they’re in there?” asked Pat.
“Look at the tracks at the cave entrance,” Papaw replied and Pat raised the glass to his eye a second time.
“All right,” said Pat, “there’s tracks.”
“I told you they’re in there,” said Phineas.
Pat didn’t bother to reply. Instead, he looked at Papaw and asked what he wanted to do.
“Gas ‘em,” said Papaw.
I didn’t know what that meant, but Uncle Pat hung his head and seemed disappointed.
“Sorta takes the sport out of it, don’t you think?”
“I ain’t doing this for sport.” Papaw let the pack slip from his shoulders and placed it on the ground as he searched its contents. Finding what he wanted, he withdrew a metal cylinder as wide and as long as his forearm. A relief valve and a blower assembly were attached to one end.
Uncle Pat recognized the cylinder immediately. “That’s a military grade neurotoxin. Really nasty stuff.”
“You’ve worked with this before?”
“I’ve seen it before. Haven’t worked with it. Seen what it can do on outsiders back on Earth. It wasn’t pretty.”
“They say it’s effective,” mumbled Papaw.
“Aye, that it is.” Pat took a step backwards.
“I’m not going to set it off here. You and I are going down to that cave and while you cover me, I’m going to place the device inside the entrance. We’ll back off, activate it remotely, and wait for any strays to make a break.”
“Hello, Professor Vimbacher,” said Phineas with a grin.
“And you,” said Papaw. “You stay out of the way. Find yourself a safe place where you can watch.”
“I’ve got a gun,” protested the boy.
“A pea-shooter,” reminded Uncle Pat. “Do what you’re told. Go find a hole and climb inside until we’re done.”
Phineas actually leered at Uncle Pat and casually strolled toward the nearest set of boulders.
For a moment, Pat thought about going after the boy and slapping him around, but Papaw barked at him. “Keep your mind on our business.”
Holding the metal cylinder in one hand, Grandpaw slung the pack over his shoulder. He held the Vimbacher in his other hand and he rested it on his shoulder, infantry-style, before cautiously marching down to within ten meters of the hole.
Papaw glanced at Pat and Pat nodded. He stepped to the side and went down on one knee, raising his Vimbacher Royal (Braithwaite Marine version) to his eye and pointing the weapon at the open mouth of the cave.
Only when Pat was situated did Grandpaw move forward. Papaw was a big man, six feet, six inches tall, and in his sixties, but he moved well and he didn’t stumble. Papaw didn’t make a lot of mistakes and that’s not just me saying so. He was a careful man.
We watched as he first moved to the mouth of the cave where he flicked on the light attached to his weapon and shined it down the darkened passageway. The path was narrow and partially filled with snow. As he stepped deeper into the fissure, he left Uncle Pat’s field of view, but the viewing audience at home – Liza, Kaliis, and myself – switched from Uncle Pat’s display to Papaw’s.
He shined his light ahead, then shined it on the ground, as if he was looking at something. It made me dizzy and Aunt Liza commented that he did go back and forth a lot. She shook her head. “He’s getting old,” she said.
Papaw moved forward, slapped a sticky-backed signal repeater (Liza told me what it was) on a rock face and stepped around a bend. The path suddenly opened up. The underground chamber was big enough to have dripping rocks hanging from the ceiling. Papaw’s breath exhaled out in clouds as he continued to work his way deeper inside. His light played over the scene, discovering a still, undisturbed pool of water in the center of the rocky cave.
On the opposite side of the pool appeared to be an odd jumble of rocks, or perhaps something else. As he stared, a portion of the rock moved and at the same time all of us decided it wasn’t rock at all. Rather, it was a jumbled pile of beasties, all gathered together for warmth beside that clear pool of water.
There must have been divine intervention involved because the light playing over their supine bodies and rattlesnake snouts did not disturb their slumber.
<
br /> Papaw dropped to one knee and placed the cylinder on the ground, pointing the blower end away and toward the pond. He removed the one ounce steel safety pin from the lock and cupped it in a gloved hand. Although he planned to release the poison remotely, he wanted to set the onboard timer as a back-up. In a moment, it was done and Papaw glanced at the sleeping mass. So far, so good.
He stood and took a step backward, simultaneously reaching to drop the pin into his left front coverall pocket. The pin slipped from his fingers. If he’d time to think about it, he’d have let it drop to the ground, but in reflex, Grandpaw kicked out a steel-toed boot tip and succeeded in diverting the fall of the one ounce safety pin. In fact, it bounced off the boot and sailed off in the only direction it could do harm: directly at the neurotoxin cylinder. It hit with a solid ‘ping’ and fell to the dirt where it landed without making any noise at all. The ping, however, was all it took.
Papaw looked across the pool to the pile of lizards and immediately saw a difference in the contour of the group. One was sitting up and looking directly at him. Papaw froze but continued to stare at the critter.
*
At that point, Aunt Liza instructed me to take Toby upstairs and play a game. Naturally, I wanted to continue to watch what was happening, but Aunt Liza stood up in front of the display and ordered me out of the room.
Reluctantly, I took Toby by the hand and led him to the stairs where I picked him up – as best I could – and started up one step at a time.
Liza returned to the display as Grandpaw made his move and ran toward the opening. He threw a glance backwards to see that the awakened lizard had decided to take up his pursuit. Additionally, a couple more of his friends had roused themselves.
Papaw grabbed the repeater on his way past and tore it from the rock face. The tight space of the cave entrance slowed his retreat… just as Liza looked to the stairs and saw me lingering. She pointed her finger at me and set her jaw.
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Come on, Toby.” We went to the first door on the left. That was my room. I left the door open and listened to the action taking place miles away and wished I was a grown-up so I could have adventures like that, never once believing that Papaw and Uncle Pat were in any more danger than they could handle.
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