Koontz, Dean R. - Strangers

by Strangers(Lit)

  better chance of slipping entirely out of Falkirk's notice.

  "A mistake," Bennell repeated. "Or rather . . . an example of the

  human race's typical xenophobia-hatred and suspicion of strangers, of

  anyone that's different. When we first viewed some of the videodisks I

  mentioned, when we first learned about the extraterrestrials' desire to

  pass these powers to other species, we apparently misinterpreted what we

  were seeing. Initially, we thought they were taking possession of those

  they changed, inserting an alien consciousness into a host body. I

  guess it's an understandable paranoia, after all the horror novels and

  movies. We thought perhaps we had a parasitical race on our hands. But

  that misapprehension was quickly dispelled when we'd seen more of their

  disks and had time to puzzle out some of the finer points. Now we know

  we were wrong."

  "I don't know it," Falkirk said. "I think you were all infected and

  then, under the control of these creatures, you began to downplay the

  danger. Or ... or the disks are merely propaganda. Lies."

  "No," Bennell said. "For one thing, I don't think these creatures would

  be capable of lying. Besides, if they could so easily take us over,

  they wouldn't require propaganda. And they sure as hell wouldn't bring

  us this encyclopedia that tells us they're going to change us."

  Ginger had noticed Brendan Cronin following the discussion even more

  avidly than everyone else, and now he said, "I know the religious

  metaphor may not be entirely appropriate here. But if they feel they

  come to us as the servants of God . . . and if they come to hand down

  to us these miraculous gifts, then you could almost say they were

  angels, archangels bestowing special blessings."

  Falkirk laughed harshly. "Oh, that's rich, Cronin! Do you really think

  you can get to me from a religious angle? Me?

  Even if I were a religious fanatic, like my dead and rotting parents, I

  wouldn't buy these creatures as angels. Angels with faces like buckets

  of worms?"

  "Worms? What's he talking about?" Brendan asked Bennell.

  The scientist said, "They look very different from us. Bipeds with

  forearms rather like us, yes. Six digits instead of five. But that's

  about all we have in common in the way of looks. Initially, they seem

  repulsive. In fact, repulsive is a mild word. But in time . . . you

  begin to see they have a certain beauty of their own."

  "Beauty of their own," Falkirk said scornfully. "Monsters is what they

  are, and they'd only have beauty in the eyes of other monsters, so

  you've just proven my point, Bennell."

  Ginger's anger with Falkirk drove her to take a couple of steps toward

  him in spite of his submachine gun. "You damn fool," she said. "What

  does it matter what they look like?

  The important thing is what they are. And evidently they're creatures

  with a deep sense of purpose, noble purpose. No matter how different

  they look, the things we have in common with them are greater than our

  differences. My father always said that, as much as intelligence, the

  things that separated us from the beasts were courage, love, friendship,

  compassion, and empathy. Do you realize what courage it took for them

  to set out on this journey across God knows how many thousands of

  millions of miles? So that's one big thing we share with them-courage.

  And love, friendship? They must have those too. Otherwise how would

  they have built a civilization that could reach to the stars? You need

  love and friendship to have a reason to build. Compassion? They've got

  a mission to bring other intelligent species to a higher rung on the

  evolutionary ladder. Surely, that takes compassion. And empathy? Isn't

  that obvious? They empathize with our fear and loneliness, with our

  dread that we're adrift in a meaningless universe. They empathize so

  much that they commit themselves to these incredible journeys on the

  mere hope of encountering us and bringing us the news that we are not

  alone." Suddenly she knew her anger wasn't directed so much at Falkirk

  as at this horrid blindness in the human species that led it frequently

  into spirals of self-destruction. "Look at me," she told the colonel.

  "I'm a Jew. And there are those who'd say I'm not the same as they are,

  not as good, even dangerous. Stories of Jews drinking the blood of

  gentile babies-there are the ignorant who believe that garbage. Is

  there any difference between that sick antisemitism and your stubborn

  insistence, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that these

  creatures come to drink our blood? Let us go, for God's sake. Stop the

  endless hatred here. Stop it now. We have a destiny that leaves no

  room for hatred."

  "Bravo," Falkirk said acidly. "A very nice speech." Even as he spoke,

  the colonel swung his machine gun toward General Alvarado and said,

  "Don't go for your gun, General. I assume you're carrying one. I won't

  be shot. I want to die in the glorious fire."

  "Fire?" Bennell said.

  Falkirk grinned. "That's right, Doctor. The glorious fire

  that will consume us all and save the world from this infection."

  "Christ!" Bennell said. "That's why you didn't bring more men with you.

  You didn't want to sacrifice more than necessary. " He turned to

  Alvarado. "Bob, the crazy bastard's gotten into the tactical nukes."

  Ginger knew that Alvarado was feeling precisely what she felt at this

  news, for his face twisted and went instantly gray.

  "Two backpack nukes," Falkirk said. "One right outside that door. The

  other in the main chamber downstairs." He checked his watch. "Less than

  three minutes, and we'll all be vapor. Not even time left for you to

  change me, I'll bet. How long does it take to change one of us to one

  of you? Longer than three minutes, I suppose."

  Abruptly, the machine gun tore out of Falkirk's hands as if it had

  acquired life and taken flight, wrenching loose of his grasp with such

  force that it cut his fingers and tore off a couple of his nails. At

  the same instant, Lieutenant Horner screamed as his machine gun erupted

  from his grasp with equal suddenness and force. Ginger saw both weapons

  spin through the air and drop with a clatter, one at the feet of Ernie

  Block and the other at Jack Twist's side, both of whom jubilantly took

  up the guns and covered Falkirk and Horner.

  "You?" Ginger said wonderingly, turning to Dom.

  "Me, yeah, I think," he said breathlessly. "I ... I didn't know I

  could do it until I had to. Sort of the way Brendan heals people."

  Stunned, Dr. Bennell said, "But it doesn't matter. Falkirk said three

  minutes."

  "Two," Falkirk said, cradling one bleeding hand in the other and

  grinning happily. "Two minutes now."

  "And backpack nukes can't be disarmed," Alvarado said. Running, Dom

  shouted: "Brendan, you take the one outside this door. I'll get the one

  downstairs."

  "They can't be disarmed!" Alvarado repeated.

  Brendan knelt beside the nuclear device and winced when he saw the time

  remaining on the clock. One minute, thirtythree seconds.

  He didn
't know what to do. He had healed three people, yes, and he had

  caused some pepper shakers to whirl through

  the air, and he had even generated light out of nothingness. But he

  remembered how the pepper shakers had gotten out of control and how the

  chairs had leapt off the diner floor and smashed against the ceiling.

  And he knew if he made one false move with the detonator in this bomb,

  he would not be saved by all his superhuman power.

  One minute, twenty-six seconds.

  The others had come out of the cavern where the ship rested and had

  gathered around. Even Falkirk and Horner remained under guard, though

  there was no reason for them to try to get their guns. They trusted in

  the efficacy of the bomb.

  One minute, eleven seconds.

  "If I smash the detonator," Brendan said to Alvarado, "pulverize it,

  would that-"

  "No," the general said. "Once armed, the detonator will trigger the

  bomb automatically if you try to wreck it."

  One-oh-three.

  Faye knelt beside him. "Just make it pop right up out of the damn bomb,

  Brendan. The way Dom tore those guns out of their hands."

  Brendan stared at the rapidly changing numerals on the detonator's clock

  and tried to imagine that entire device popping free of the rest of the

  bomb.

  Nothing happened.

  Fifty-four seconds.

  Cursing the slowness of the elevator, Dom virtually flew out of the

  doors when they opened, with Ginger close behind him, and dashed to the

  backpack nuke standing in the center of the main cavern on the bottom

  level of Thunder Hill. Heart pounding even faster than his stomach was

  churning, he crouched beside the bomb and said, "Jesus," when he saw the

  digital clock.

  Fifty seconds.

  "You can do it," Ginger said, stooping at the other side of the hateful

  device. "You've got a destiny."

  "Here goes."

  "Love you," she said.

  "Love you," he said, as surprised as she was by that statement.

  Forty-two seconds.

  He raised his hands over the nuclear device, and he felt the rings

  appearing immediately in his palms.

  Forty seconds.

  Brendan had broken out in a sweat.

  Thirty-nine seconds.

  He strained, trying to work the magic that he knew was in him. But

  though the stigmata burned on his palms, and in spite of the fact that

  he could feel the power surging in him, he could not focus on the ur ent

  task. He kept thinking about what could go wrong, and that in some way

  he would be responsible if it did go wrong, and the more he thought the

  less he could direct the miraculous energy within him.

  Thirty-four seconds.

  Parker Faine pushed between two onlookers and dropped to his knees

  beside Brendan. "No offense, Father, but maybe the problem is that you,

  being a Jesuit, are just too damn prone to intellectualize. Maybe this

  requires going with your gut. Maybe what this needs is the wild-ass,

  go-foreit, tryanything, gonzo, berserker commitment of an artist." He

  thrust his own large hands toward the detonator and shouted: "Come out

  of there you fucker!"

  With a snap of wires, the detonator leapt out of its niche in the bomb

  package and straight into Parker's hands.

  There were cries of relief and congratulations, but Brendan said, "The

  clock's still counting down."

  Eleven seconds.

  "Yeah, but it's not connected to the bomb any more," Parker said,

  grinning broadly.

  Alvarado said, "But there's a conventional explosive charge in the damn

  detonator."

  The detonator erupted out of the bomb, into Dom's hands. He saw the

  clock still counting, and he sensed it had to be stopped even though

  there was no longer a chance of a nuclear explosion. So he simply

  willed it to stop, and the lighted numerals froze at 0:03.

  0:03.

  Parker, unaccustomed to the role of magician, panicked at this secondary

  crisis. Certain his power was depleted, he chose a course of action

  perfectly in character. With a war cry to rival John Wayne in one of

  the Duke's old movies, Parker turned and threw the detonator toward the

  far wall of the cavern, as if lobbing a grenade. He knew he could not

  cast it clear to the other side of the chamber, but he hoped he could

  pitch it far enough. Even as it left his hand, he flung himself to the

  floor, as the others had already done.

  Dom was kissing Ginger when the explosion sounded overhead, and they

  both jumped. For an instant he thought Brendan had failed to disarm the

  other device, then realized a nuclear explosion would have brought the

  ceiling down on them.

  "The detonator," she said.

  "Come on," he said. "Let's see if anyone's hurt."

  The lift crawled upward. When they arrived at the second level, the

  main chamber was filled with scores of Depository staff members, all

  carrying guns and responding to the sound of battle.

  Holding Ginger's hand, Dom pushed through the crowd, toward the place

  where he had left Brendan with the first backpack nuke. He saw Faye,

  Sandy, and Ned. Then Brendan-alive, unhurt. Jorja, Marcie. Parker

  loomed on his right and gave both him and Ginger a bear hug. "You

  shoulda seen me, kids. If they'd had both me and Audie Murphy, World

  War 11 would've been over in about six months."

  "I'm beginning to see why Dom admires you so," Ginger said.

  Parker raised his eyebrows. "But of course, my dear! To know me is to

  love me."

  A sudden cry of alarm rose, which jolted Dom because he thought all

  danger was past. When he turned, he saw that Falkirk had dodged away

  from Jack and Ernie in the turmoil and had wrenched a revolver from one

  of the Thunder Hill staff. Everyone fell back from him.

  "For Christ's sake," Jack shouted, "it's over, Colonel. It's over, damn

  you."

  But Falkirk had no intention of resuming his private war. His gray

  translucent eyes shone with madness. "Yes," he said. "It's over, and I

  won't be changed like the rest of you. You won't get me. " Before

  anyone could reach him, or before anyone could think to tear the weapon

  from his hands with telekinetic power, he thrust the barrel of the

  revolver into his mouth and pulled the trigger.

  With a cry of horror, Ginger looked away from the falling corpse, and

  Dom turned his head, too. It was not the bloody death itself that

  repelled but the stupid, pointless waste when, at last, humankind had

  within its grasp the secret of immortality.

  3.

  Transcendence

  As the staff of Thunder Hill filled the cavern, milling around the ship

  that most had never seen before, Ginger and Dom and the other witnesses

  followed Miles Bennell into the vessel.

  The interior was not dramatic, but as plain as the exterior, with none

  of the complex and powerful machinery that one expected in a craft

  capable of such a journey. Miles Bennell explained that the builders

  had advanced beyond machinery as humankind understood it, perhaps even

  beyond physics as humankind understood it. There was one long chamber
/>   within, and it was for the most part gray, drab, featureless. The warm

  golden luminosity which had filled the vessel on the night of July 6-and

  which Brendan had remembered in his dreams was not visible now. There

  was only a line of ordinary work lights that the scientists had strung

  for their convenience.

  In spite of its plainness, the chamber had a warmth, appeal, and magic

  that, strangely enough, reminded Ginger of her father's private office

  at the back of his first jewelry store in Brooklyn, the one he always

  used as his headquarters. The walls of that sanctum sanctorum had been

  decorated only with a calendar, and the furniture had been inexpensive,

  old, and well used. Plain. Even drab. But for Ginger, it had been a

  fine and magical room, because Jacob had seldom worked there but had

  squirreled away with one book or another, from which he'd often read to

  her. Sometimes it would be a mystery, or a fantasy about gnomes and

  witches, a story of other worlds, or a thriller about spies. And when

  Jacob read, his voice acquired a resonant and mesmerizing timbre. The

  reality of the gray little office faded, and for hours Ginger could

  believe herself to be investigating with Sherlock Holmes upon the misty

  moors, celebrating with the Hobbit Mr. Bilbo Baggins inside the Hill at

  Bag End, or with Jim and Will as they explored the terrible carnival in

  Mr. Bradbury's lovely book. Jacob's office hadn't been only what it