Toward the center of the crash area and strewn among the debris were several large container-like bins that looked somewhat intact. Most had small bottles on top of them that looked like oxygen cylinders. The old prospector walked to the nearest one for a closer inspection. The box or container or whatever it was stood a little over three feet in height and was oblong with a length of five feet or so. The front panel, or what Gus thought might be the front, was made of a clear material resembling Plexiglas. He peered through it as if he were looking through a window, holding his hand up to shield his eyes from the glare of the rising sun. When his hand came in contact with the clear panel, it warped and turned to a gel-like substance that first wobbled, then fell as water to the sands below. At the moment the substance fell, Gus felt a small electrical discharge strike his hand where it had touched the gel panel. He quickly stepped back, immediately disgusted with what he had touched. That was when he saw lying in the middle of the casing another viscous material that stank to holy heaven. It covered the entire bottom of the container and was murky and brownish. It was still bubbling around what looked like the remains of small bones and a little bit of fur floating on top. Gus looked from it to the small canister-like tanks on the top. There were three total, and one was still dripping a blue liquid into the mess that lined the floor. It looked as though whatever had been in there had been killed by the stuff in the small cylinders.
The old man shook his head, knowing he was guessing at things he knew nothing about. What in the hell happened in this place? The breeze picked up again, and along with cooling his skin, the wind brought the smell of something else as Gus sniffed and looked around. His eyes settled on a rather large piece of debris that was leaning against a huge boulder about thirty feet to his front. Stepping farther into the valley, a funny and almost scary thought crossed his mind and occurred over and over. There had to have been people piloting this... this whatever it was. If it wasn't automatically piloted, that meant a crew. If some had survived, just how in hell would he get them out of here and back down the mountain? Buck was missing, and even if he weren't, he was far too old to carry anyone all the way to town. He looked around at the scattered wreckage, doubly worried now.
He quickened his pace and walked right up to the piece of metal that was leaning against the rock. He hesitated a moment with his hand poised on the upper half of the panel. Gus figured he would check this out, then get the hell out of here and find Buck and go to the cabin and drink for about a week. He lightly touched the strange metal, running his fingers over what looked like hieroglyphs etched on the surface. The memory was vague, but he had seen something like them once in the museum up in Denver. He had taken a whole paycheck one month, splurged, and caught some culture for the first time in years. He went to the movies, saw a film about wars in space or something (stupid was what he thought), then he went to see the Egyptian exhibition over at the Museum of Natural History. While there, the tour guide had explained that the name of the writing that had been found on things in Egypt was called hieroglyphs. He believed that was what he was looking at right now. They were a metallic pink and violet in color and were engraved deeply into the metal about a quarter of an inch. He ran a finger over the engravings and received a strange electrical charge through his entire hand to his elbow. The feeling was familiar and somehow comforting.
Suddenly, the metal fell over toward him and he had to step back quickly to keep from getting hit by the sharp edges on the piece of wreckage. When what was on the other side was revealed, his eyes widened in shock. Still strapped into some sort of reclining seat was what looked like a person, but from what he could see, it was small and skeleton-thin. Gus swallowed and looked closer. The body looked half-crushed and had been gashed all over. He realized it was without clothes. It was light green with darker, grayish green highlights, and it was possibly bloated in death. The old man realized he wasn't looking at anything that would pilot an airplane that he knew of. He swallowed and stepped backward, his eyes never leaving the small body that had died strapped to its seat.
While in Korea, his squad had come across an American F-84 Sabre jet that had crashed not far from their position. They had assumed the pilot had escaped, parachuting to safety. But when they investigated what was left of the aircraft, they saw what appeared to be the body of the pilot still strapped tightly to his seat. He had been as mangled and crushed as the being Gus was now staring at.
One side of its face had been caved in on impact, so Gus couldn't get a good idea of what the person, or thing, looked like. He did see that the being was without one strand of hair on its head. The small hands had three long fingers and a thumb. The thumb was almost as long as the digits it was curled up beside. There were no visible fingernails. Its one visible eye was large and the pupil was black as coal. Gus had to turn away as he saw his own aged reflection in the dust-covered eye.
He swallowed and was just starting to turn away when his foot slipped into a hole in the ground. He dropped down, catching himself at the last moment, desperately clawing at the sides of a large boulder to keep from falling into the gaping hole. Gus quickly scrabbled away and gained his balance. When he looked back into the hole that had nearly swallowed him, the old man saw a gaping maw that resembled a mouth. As he watched, rocks and dirt were still trickling into the hole from his close call. As his breathing finally calmed, he noticed the edges of the dark pit were smooth all around, as if the sides had been carefully excavated and not torn. It was as if a plug had been pulled from the compacted earth. Gus reached down and ran his fingers around its opening. It was not only smooth to the touch but was coated with a shiny substance that was still somewhat damp. He quickly pulled his hand away from the strangeness of the hole and rubbed his fingers together, finding them sticky. It also gave off a sweet odor, like a just-peeled banana.
The old prospector was close to panic. He found himself backing away, and then he remembered what was waiting behind him. The mangled body would be lying there strapped into its seat. He stopped and stood as straight as he could, then he took first one step, then two, then suddenly found himself walking faster.
Gus was almost to the spot where he had entered the valley when he fell to his knees holding his head. The immense and overwhelming feeling of fear and confusion were sounding again; this time jabbering accompanied the feelings. It was even more desperate than it had been before. Suddenly the old man realized something as he removed his hands from his head. The sound wasn't coming from his own head as it had been earlier; no blood was trickling from either his nose or his ears. The sound was coming from somewhere behind him in the valley. As he listened, the confusing sounds echoed off the rock walls and bounced around. What was more confusing, Gus had the horrible feeling that the sounds would attract something he didn't want to see.
Gus turned and crept slowly in the direction of the cries. He carefully stepped around some of the metal debris as he crept closer to the noise. He bent over, shakily placing his hands on his knees to get a closer look at the bottom of a huge rock. He at first thought the sound might have been coming from inside the piece of granite, then realized this was ridiculous. That was when he saw it was coming from beneath the huge boulder. He noticed movement at the base of the rock as the soft jabbering suddenly stopped. He went to one knee as he felt something akin to relief mixed with horror flash into his mind.
Gus tilted his head and looked farther into the hole, trying desperately to penetrate the blackness. He moved his head closer, fear filling his mind. God, this thing must be terrified even more than me! A feeling of dread washed over him like a small wave, making him hesitant, and he tensed a little, but the feeling lasted only a second. Inside, he still sensed danger and pure animal terror, just as a deer might feel at the sight of a pair of headlights. As he looked into the coal blackness of the hole, he thought he saw two small pools of darkened water. Then they disappeared. Confusion clogged his mind as he tried to figure out what he was seeing in the dark. Then it struck
him with the suddenness of a lightning bolt, as the twin pools reappeared: he was looking into the eyes of something that had come down with this thing, and its eyes had just blinked at him.
"Hey," he said softly, "I'm not gonna hurt ya."
The thing blinked and continued to talk in the strange jabber Gus didn't understand.
"You hurt?"
As soon as he asked, he knew without a doubt, that, yes, the thing in the hole was indeed injured.
"You wanna get the hell out of there?" he asked, not really knowing what to call it, or even if he was being understood. "Hope ya understand my lingo, boy."
Gus suddenly straightened and looked around him. His eyes settled on the hole at the other end of the valley, the one he had almost stumbled into. Now it wasn't confusion, but terror that struck his mind. The dark void of that hole that was coming toward him, freezing him with the horror he sensed was there. Then his eyes quickly traveled to the rocks above him. He felt as if he was being watched. He had had that feeling a hundred times on a hundred different nights in Korea, and this was no different. He thought that whatever eyes watched him meant him harm. Again his eyes roamed to the large hole. That was a different fear from what he was now feeling. The hairs on the back of his neck were still at attention, so he shook his head to try to dislodge the confusion he felt because of the hole in the ground and whatever was up in the rocks.
He turned back to the creature still cowering underneath the boulder.
"Well, come on, let's getcha outta there," he said nervously, looking back at the hole a distance away, half expecting something to come charging out of it. When he turned back, his eyes widened in shock. There, with long fingers shaking and extended outward, was a hand. The slender fingers were light green, like the first mangled being he had found in the wreckage. A darker smear of liquid was on one of the extended fingers, and as Gus watched, a small drop of fluid fell from the digit and hit the sandy dirt around the hole and soaked in. Then his eyes went back to the hand, and without realizing it, he reached out and grasped it. He felt the shivering of the owner and relaxed his grip. He reached deep into the hole with his free hand and found what he hoped was purchase under the unseen being's other arm. Gus pulled gently at first, then harder as he realized the little body was wedged under the boulder like a cork in a bottle. As he pulled, he felt the creature shift and start to help. A long minute later he was done. As the strange being came to rest after Gus had released it, it immediately started looking around at its surroundings, its large eyes blinking rapidly in the brighter world outside the shade of the boulder. The old man sat hard on his butt and stared in amazement and wonder at what he had pulled from the rock.
The creature, after surveying the crash site, slowly lay down on its back and began gazing up at the blue sky with eyes the color of obsidian. The almond-shaped orbs again blinked, and the eyelids, to Gus's amazement, slid not down from the top but from the outer sides of the eyes. Then the small creature looked over at its rescuer, clearly in pain. The head was big, shaped like a lightbulb. Not a hair was to be found on its light green skin. Dark green blood was covering most of the boy-sized body. Some had dried, and more was still flowing, albeit slowly from several small wounds. The creature slowly moved its hand away from its body and held it out toward the sky. The small, long fingers reached almost longingly toward the heavens, before falling back into the dirt at its side.
Gus looked up at the sky and then down at the slowly closing deepness of the being's eyes. The strange eyelids closed from the sides again, enveloping the eyes from the temples toward its small nose.
"I don't think I can get ya back to Mars or nothin' like that. Hell, boy, couldn't even get you to Phoenix, but maybe I can fix you up a little and get you to someone who knows just what to do with ya. And if you have a friend up there in them rocks, I don't believe I care to meet him."
As Gus looked on, the eyes opened and the small mouth and thin lips tightened in either pain or anger, the old man couldn't tell. Then the large eyes roamed to the rocks above them for a moment as if it knew what Gus had said before. Then it turned back to Gus, and the thing's right hand came up and clenched around Gus's blue denim collar and squeezed, the eyes closing with pain at the effort. Then the grip loosened and the hand fell away. The eyes half closed and the small being shuddered.
The prospector reached down and took the small, broken body of the survivor in his arms. It weighed almost nothing as he lifted its small frame against his chest. The head rocked back with pain, then lay against the old man's dirty shirt. He only hoped his wildly beating heart didn't pound the poor thing to death.
Gus knew the injured being had passed out because the small body had lost its tenseness. He looked down into the now serene face. The features were soft, the mouth relaxed. He saw the small nose, no more than a bump with two little holes he thought were its nostrils. They were moving, so he assumed the creature was still breathing.
Gus shook his head and started toward the far end of the valley where he had entered. He steered a wide path around the large, ominous hole in the ground he had almost fallen into earlier. As he passed it, he didn't notice the small thing in his arms clench its fist in an unconscious gesture of fear. But the man did feel the terror engulf his own mind as he struggled out of the valley, leaving the mysteries of the crash site behind. But the image of that large hole and the feeling of being watched from the rocks remained, and the two memories pushed Gus forward as if Satan himself were on his tail.
The larger Gray watched the rescue of the keeper, the slave of its home world, and this time it let the growl escape its lips. Again it turned and watched as the man started his long struggle down the mountainside. The yellow eyes narrowed as it followed the retreating form. Again the nails scraped against the rock and left long scratches.
The Gray stood and limped toward the small opening in the mountain valley. It started tracking not only one, but two enemies of its kind.
TWELVE
Event Center, Nellis AFB, Nevada
July 8, 08.50 Hours
Jack had been up since 0400 this morning going over his security staff files. His new department wasn't in as bad a shape as he'd originally thought. He had some real good men on assignment here. Sergeant Mendenhall had top scores in all his field evaluations. Jack figured with his record, the young man should be targeted for officer candidate school. He closed the file on Mendenhall and took a swallow of coffee. The cafeteria was just now filling up with personnel from all of the departments. He watched as a familiar face walked in yawning. As their eyes met, Sarah McIntire smiled and gave Collins a small wave of her hand. Jack nodded and went back to his files.
He placed Mendenhall's file aside in a group that included that of Everett and five others who would eventually compose his initial discovery team if the crash site was found. Across from that file was another larger grouping of paperwork that included lists of the equipment they would need to receive from logistics. He had been most impressed with the equipment the Group had buried deep beneath the sands, such as weapons and night-vision gear. His predecessor had been serious enough to at least know what was needed for field operations. Right now Collins was only guessing at what would be needed for this mission. But he did know that this site would have to be secured first at all costs. He took another sip of coffee and watched as Sarah McIntire turned to him as she took her coffee toward the door. He looked away quickly when she noticed him and smiled again.
Collins walked into the computer center cleaned and in a fresh blue jumpsuit after his post-breakfast mile in the athletic center. Alice had called and left a message for him to meet her there.
He stood and watched the buzz of activity. The whole time he had been studying his personnel files, his mind had been here, wondering how the search for the saucer was progressing. Technicians in white, static-free coats were at consoles, and others were walking around with printouts. Large flat-paneled screens lined the walls, while smaller ones were mounted at eve
ry workstation. The largest high-definition screen was located in the middle of the white plastic wall and was filled with a color map of the western United States, and as he watched, a computer-generated line started sectioning the various points into a grid. A small dotted line ran up from Panama through Mexico and then split off into several lines as it crossed the border into New Mexico. The major noticed that where the dotted lines entered the state, they had been changed to small question marks instead of dashes by some imaginative technician. On other screens he saw raw data and real-time images of desert locations that were obviously bouncing via satellites to ground stations. Niles was sitting at one of the technician desks and staring at the large screen as if he were hypnotized.
"Jesus, Dr. Compton had to pull a lot of strings and dish out favors from now until next century to get that many KH-1 Is on this," Everett said, coming in after Collins.
"He did. The NSA is screaming bloody murder at the use of their bird," Pete Golding, the Computer Center director, said. He was standing nearby, tapping at a set of computer keys.
Collins looked from Golding to the wall projections. "Nothing on the crash site?"
"No." Golding seemed irritated as he looked back at the two military men and then removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. "Damn thing isn't where we thought it would be according to the track we initially calculated."
"Maybe it didn't go down at all," Carl said.
Golding just gave the navy man a sour look, then abruptly turned and walked away.
"Forgive Pete, he and Niles are a little tired and on edge this morning," Alice said.
"You look chipper," Collins said.
"Old people don't require the sleep you young ones do."
"It looks like Dr. Compton and Mr. Golding need to take five and get some shut-eye," Everett remarked.
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