The truck drives on. The couple remains caught up in their sex act and does not react to the stench in the truck, probably assumes it to be fertilizer from some passing patch of farmland.
The road signs eventually indicate that Flat Rock is a mere twenty miles further up Highway 30. Ali Basra orders the Bhuta to slow the truck. The male grunts with pleasure, the female squirms and giggles at his satisfaction. The truck rumbles to a stop at the foot of the mountain.
The male comes to his senses. "Billy? What's the matter, dude?"
The female, only slightly embarrassed, wipes her lips on her sleeve and locates the quart of beer. She drinks deeply, belches and looks blearily out at the sky and the distant lights of the town they've left behind. She offers the bottle but the Bhuta sits quietly and does not respond.
"What's the matter, Big Billy," she chuckles. "Did we get you all hot and bothered?"
The male sighs deeply, leans back and closes his eyes. "Damn, that was good. Bro, this little filly could suck a golf ball through a yard of garden hose."
The female slaps him, but only half-heartedly. "You're a pig."
"No, I'm a generous man," he says. "Maybe you should give Big Billy here a taste of your magic tongue."
"What? No!"
The male slides his hand down into the front of her unzipped jeans and rubs. "In fact, let me watch. It might just get me going again."
Her eyes roll back in her head. The Bhuta observes this, and is in some strange way amused. It wonders how long it can maintain the deception before being discovered. Their stupidity is truly awesome to behold.
"Oh," she says, softly. "Oh, my."
"Come on, baby," the man whispers in her ear. "Give old Billy some of that sugar for driving us home. I want to watch. Do it for me."
His fingers move faster, faster still until the girl shudders with orgasm. They share a drink from the bottle. The Bhuta sits in the small pile of excrement in its jeans, watching and waiting. The female takes the silence for acquiescence. Finally her fingers crab-walk across the seat and up into the crotch of its pants.
"Billy, you're all soft. Maybe you're just too drunk."
"Go on," the man says, urgently. "You can get him up, I know you can."
The female leans closer, puts her head on the shoulder of the Bhuta. Her nose wrinkles with disgust. "Billy, you stink…"
"Do it." The male pushes the back of her head. His voice is dark with anger, thick with lust. "Get him off, damn it."
The female, her head close to the lap of the corpse, gags in horror. "Jesus, did you shit yourself, Billy?"
The Bhuta grabs her head in both hands and forces it down into the lap of the inhabited body so it can grip her neck. She squirms in panic, arms and legs thrashing. Beside her on the seat, the drunken male roars with laughter.
"That's it, man. Go for it."
The Bhuta turns her head up at an odd angle, so that she faces him. She is gathering air for a scream. He spits into her open mouth. The female gags, thrashes. She finally does scream, and the sound is one of outrage and terror.
The male calms a bit. "Easy, man. Not so rough."
"Let me go, you bastard!"
"Billy, back off!"
The woman is ready. The Bhuta pulls hard on her neck, separating two vertebrae, and then yanks sharply at an upward angle. The neck breaks with an audible SNAP. She goes limp and her bladder instantly evacuates, soaking the front seat.
The stink in the cab is now unbearable.
The drunk male is aware of what has happened, but still cannot take it all in. He sits in the same position, frozen with horror. "Oh, Christ! What happened? What did you do to her, Billy? What did you do?"
The Bhuta grunts something unintelligible and shoves the woman down toward the floor of the cab. The male begins to grope for the passenger side door handle, his bloodshot eyes suddenly wide as saucers.
"You killed her man, not me. You killed her."
The door unlocks, the male falls half out of the door but remains locked into place by his seat belt. He struggles with the clasp. His heart is thudding like a bass drum, flowing with fresh, hot blood; the Bhuta can hear the sound, and the rushing of fluids, and at last becomes truly aroused. It reaches for him with a cold, trembling hand.
"Don't hurt me," the male cries. "I won't tell anybody. We can dump her ass out here, I won't tell a soul. I swear."
The Bhuta concentrates until it manages to grab his arm and pull the panicked man back into the cab of the truck. Adrenaline has sobered him up, he is retching from fear and the ghastly odor in the truck; feces, urine and decaying human flesh.
The male fights hard, kicking and shrieking. He is much stronger than the female, and his movement eventually activates the interior light. When he sees the flat, lifeless eyes and stiffening flesh of his tormentor, he begins to babble nonsense, like a small human child.
"N-n-n-no…"
Ali Basra experiences the panic of another as the purest of pleasure; the human mind collapsed into itself, until only an exquisitely vivid darkness remains. It savors the sensation for precious seconds. It pries the jaws of the male open and kisses him, forcing bloody spit into his mouth.
The male shrieks, like the lost soul he has become.
With reluctance, Ali Basra orders the Bhuta to end it. The creature forces the male back against the window and bites into the exposed flesh of his neck.
It chews, gnaws persistently until a geyser of hot blood bursts into the confined space, adding to the stench. The male gurgles into nothingness. His legs kick and twitch, the fingers tremble and then the unlucky drunkard is gone.
The Bhuta yanks the body back onto the front seat and closes the door. It tries to start the truck, but the left arm of the female is extended over the gas pedal. It puzzles over the problem but eventually figures out how to move the body out of the way. The male and female soon sit together, side by side as before, with their mouths agape and their dead eyes staring.
Ali Basra starts the engine, puts the huge truck into gear and coasts up Highway 30, heading for Flat Rock, Nevada. He is now close enough to sense the proximity of yesterday's kill…
TWENTY-NINE
The brightness of the Tao seems like darkness,
the advancement of the Tao seems like retreat,
the level path seems rough,
the superior path seems empty,
the pure seems to be tarnished,
and true virtue doesn't seem to be enough.
The virtue of caution seems like cowardice,
the pure seems to be polluted,
the true square seems to have no corners,
the best vessels take the most time to finish,
the greatest sounds cannot be heard,
and the greatest image has no form…
The Tao hides in the unnamed,
yet it alone nourishes and completes all things.
"We got company."
Jeff Lehane snapped awake instantly, mouth filled with the metallic taste of adrenaline. Pops had whispered into the central com. Whiz instantly relayed the update. Lehane dropped his own small microphone into place and murmured a command. "Sound off." Everyone immediately counted off their positions again, one through four. For a brief moment, Lehane wondered if he'd made a mistake by firing Mike Castle. What if this team was too small?
"ETA?"
"Can't be sure from here, boss, but I'd say ten minutes, maybe less. Looks like some kind of trucker. How do you want to play it?"
"By the book," Lehane responded, softly. "We assume it's the boogeyman."
"Roger that."
"Whiz, got anything?"
"Not from that distance."
"Keep tracking."
"I'm half blind. I can try and get some satellite time."
"No, hold that."
"Boss," Guri whispered, "if he doesn't come closer I could leave my post and crawl to the edge of the slope for a look."
"How?"
"I've got the NV."
>
"Maybe, but you'll be exposed."
"I can live with it."
"Under advisement. Hold on that, too."
Lehane sat in the darkness, feeling frustrated and virtually blind. He watched Sandy's shadow fall across the console in the other room and considered the options. "Pops, can you see the truck?"
"Too far to get much more than shadows. The head lights just went out."
"Keep watching, you have the best POV."
"Will do."
"Whiz, are you lining up all the camera angles for Sandy, so I can see a panorama if I need to?"
"She's got the four winds, boss."
"Okay, get them as clear and sharp as you can."
"I still think I should try to dial up some satellite."
"Okay, start the process, but don't close the deal."
"I'm on it."
"Pops, what have you got?"
"Can't tell for sure, boss. I think someone is moving around down there in the shadow of the truck. It's parked at an angle to the east of the old casino, right in the middle of the ghost town."
"So it's not far from the driveway?"
"Maybe a hundred feet."
"So it could be our boy."
Guri groaned. "Or just some poor redneck who cranked up on crystal meth and needed a place to crash."
"Okay, but why go twenty minutes off the main highway to a ghost town to catch a nap," Sandy offered. "That doesn't make any sense."
"Maybe he's getting laid," Guri said.
Pops sighed dramatically "Lucky bastard."
"Yeah," Guri whispered. "Somebody should be."
"Settle down," Lehane said, mildly. "And keep quiet."
Lehane wanted to crack down harder, but held himself in check. They were all stressed because of the unknown nature of their quarry. They needed to blow off some steam. He checked his watch. It was nearing midnight.
As if reading his thoughts, Guri started joking again. "Okay, tell me what's wrong with this picture. We're all in the middle of nowhere, huddled in the dark in a ghost town, waiting to try to kill a zombie from hell, and the clock is closing in on midnight."
Pops snickered. "And your point would be…?"
"Hold it." That was Whiz, and he sounded nervous.
"What is it, Whiz?"
"Boss, we got movement from the southeast."
"Same as Pops, right?"
Long pause. "That's the point, Jeff. I don't think so."
Guri moaned. "Oh, you have got to be shitting me."
"Jeff, the sensors planted southeast at the edge of the trees are showing some activity, vibration in the ground."
Lehane thought aloud. "Those are the ones Mike Castle planted."
"Maybe he screwed something up."
"Hold one." That was Whiz, re-checking his systems, looking for anything abnormal.
"Talk to me, Whiz."
"Not the gear, boss," Whiz replied. "As of right now, everything looks okay."
Pops gave Whiz the coordinates for the truck parked in Flat Rock; Whiz crosschecked them against the coordinates of the second hit. Lehane could hear his fingers clattering on the keyboard.
"Nope, this is definitely a different bogey."
"Wildlife, maybe a brown bear?"
"I guess that's possible, but whatever it is the computer says it's moving pretty fast, five or six miles an hour at times."
"How big is it?"
"I'll know more in a few minutes, but it is definitely too small to be a car."
Guri blew a raspberry. "Just what we needed, our monster turns out to be a fucking track star."
Before the battle, plans are everything.
"Stay cool, people." He meditated for a moment, hoping to calm his mind, but a pervasive sense of dread began to overtake him. Nothing was developing the way it had been drawn up, and when the wheels came off, people died.
"Whiz, get that time on the bird if you can. Tell me what's going on down here on the ground."
"I'm asking right now. We may be able to steal thirty seconds off a weather bird, I'll let you know."
"Boss, permission to leave my post and crawl to the edge of the cliff over the driveway."
Lehane swallowed. "Permission granted, but watch your ass."
"It's the only one I've got."
"Sandy, how's your view, should I leave my station?"
"I'd wait for the bird, Jeff. We've got nothing but shadow on all four cameras."
"No heat signal?"
"Nope, but who promised you a zombie would have one?"
Lehane was damp with perspiration. He wiped his brow. "I was hoping we'd find a human wandering around."
"No such luck, or at least not yet," Sandy whispered.
"One."
"What you got there, Pops?"
"Someone is coming up the hill, slow pace, kind of staggering like a drunken sailor."
"Whiz, any heat registering?"
"Too far away without the bird, boss."
"Then get me some time. Do it five minutes ago."
"Yes, sir."
"Pops, what can you pick up?"
"Like I said, looks like a drunk. Weaving a bit, fighting his way up the hill."
"Guri, where are you now?"
"Maybe ten feet away from the gazebo, boss."
"Get back into position as quietly as you can."
"Damn it. Okay."
Whiz, from the command center miles away: "You think this is our boogeyman?"
"I don't know, but we have to try and play this the way we planned it." Before the battle, plans are everything, but once the battle begins…
"Bingo, faint heat signature."
"I don't know whether to be happy or pissed," Guri whispered. "Do I still have to crawl back into the garbage?"
"Yes, and move it. Do not get caught in the open."
"It's not your boy anyway, Guri," Whiz said in the tiny earphone. "I meant whatever is coming up the side of the mountain, the second bogey."
"The one moving so fast."
"Yeah, could be someone sprinting, but I'll tell you from what I've seen of the terrain that would have to be one hell of an athlete."
"Shit." Lehane was a little surprised to discover the epithet had come from his own lips. "Okay, everybody settle down. Pops, have you got a clean shot?"
"Working on one."
"Can you see anything yet?"
"Not facial features. Not very tall. It's somebody wearing jeans and a shirt, could be a man or a woman, not sure."
"Whiz?"
"No bird time available right now, boss."
"Shit again. How long, Whiz?"
Two seconds passed. "Not for twenty three minutes and eleven seconds."
"Too late to do us any good."
"Looks that way."
"Okay, listen up. Pops, do not take your eye off the target coming up from Flat Rock. He belongs to you and Guri, clear?"
"One clear."
"Got you, boss," Guri whispered. "I'm back in position."
"Whiz, you track bogey number two. If you become mathematically certain he's headed for the mortuary, clue me in."
Sandy interrupted. "If he's ours, I'll have to go outside."
"Negative."
"Jeff, come on. We may need more boots on the ground."
"I know. They'll be mine."
"With all due respect, give me one reason."
"I'm a far better shot."
Silence, except for nervous breathing, then Sandy joked: "If you're going to fight me with logic, I'm not going to discuss this."
"One, sitrep?"
"Boss, the drunk just sat down in the road. Nothing to report."
"Whiz?"
"The heat signal is still coming, but I've noticed something."
"What?"
"It's weaving a bit."
"Two drunks?"
"No, I mean when I track the movement it is vaguely serpentine."
"You've lost me."
"Well, that kind of pattern suggests to me
that it is someone following a road through the trees."
"You're saying there's a road we didn't know about?"
"Sorry, boss. It's probably just some kind of hiking trail or bike path that wasn't on a map. We wouldn't catch it unless it had traffic on it."
"You said the second bogey is moving pretty fast, right?"
"Like a scalded dog."
"Could the heat signature you're picking up be from an engine, like a motorcycle?"
"Yeah, that could explain it."
Guri whispered: "Even more bang for your buck, one zombie on a Harley."
The image immediately cracked them all up, but Lehane could hear the edge in their voices.
"Whiz?"
"Yes, sir."
"If we don't know anything about the trail he's on, we don't know where he's heading. Is that correct?"
"That is correct. As of now, we do not know much of anything except he's up here where he shouldn't be."
"Maybe a camper having a reckless, haul-ass drive through the woods at night with his girlfriend on the back."
"Sure."
"Could be he's heading for some cabin in the boonies or maybe even Flat Rock to hook up with our pal the trucker."
"Anything is possible."
"Then everybody listen up. Hold your positions."
"Roger that."
"Hang in there. We wait and see. Right now that's all we can do." Except pray that this entire mission doesn't go to hell in a hand basket and get us all killed…
THIRTY
The scooter moved steadily up the mountain path, crunching through dried leaves and twigs; its small headlight spewing yellowed shadows into the heavy undergrowth. High above, the high desert firmament was a pitch black, thick fabric freckled with pinpricks of brilliant white stars. The night air smelled of pine and wood sap. The driver hunched forward, his ears reddened and cringing from the cold, and tried to avoid crashing into a tree or slipping down a loose bank into the creek.
Donald Pinker had spent several hours down in the basin, at the Honey Ranch. He even dropped a couple hundred bucks spending time with his favorite babe Helena, but somehow the idea of getting laid while his animals went hungry just didn't sit right. The problem was that the mysterious Mr. Jeffrey had made it abundantly clear that Donald was not welcome near the mortuary, or on the front property, not for the rest of the night.
Daemon: Night of the Daemon Page 22