Lone Wolves

by Chesbro, George C. ;

  “Jesus,” Jack Kellerman whispered.

  “Don’t blame Jesus.”

  “You don’t seem all that concerned.”

  Furie turned in his seat to face Kellerman. “Look, Jack,” he said in an even tone, “it’s only a theory, so don’t waste your time worrying about it. In the end you can only be responsible for your own behavior, so do what you can to clean up and polish your life every day. Live smart and forget everything else I’ve told you. Those divided-memory quacks ruined your family and your childhood, and those militia maniacs were getting ready to ruin the rest of your life. I have contacts with a number of organizations that will give you a place to rest and counsel you, help you get your own life back on track. If you’d like, I’ll make some calls when we reach the next town.”

  “Yes,” Kellerman said. “I’d like that.” There was a prolonged silence, and then he continued, “If I’m going to start fresh, then I have to clean up the past. There’s something I have to tell you.”

  “What’s that, Jack?”

  “I was at Oklahoma City.”

  Furie saw Marla’s shoulders tense slightly, and she glanced quickly in the side and rear view mirrors. His mouth had suddenly gone dry.

  “The Murrah Building?”

  Kellerman looked away from Furie, slowly nodded. “I was in on the planning. We all were. We had to show we were committed to the cause. The bombs weren’t supposed to go off when they did. My brother was inside the building checking a charge when they blew, and he was killed along with the others. Next week I was supposed to plant another bomb in the county courthouse.”

  Furie took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, then turned around and glanced out the rear window. The road behind them was empty. For now. “This changes things, Jack.”

  “I know.”

  “I’m going to have to make some other calls besides the ones I mentioned.”

  “It wouldn’t be a good idea to talk to any of the local cops, Mr. Furie.”

  “I’ll be calling the FBI. The fact that you’re coming forward will carry a lot of weight in the courts, and those organizations I mentioned may still be able to help you.”

  “Will you wait with me until they come to pick me up?”

  “Yes.”

  Marla suddenly braked hard, throwing both Furie and the young man beside him up against the front seat. Furie recovered, then glanced up and felt his stomach muscles knot. Parked across the road, blocking their way, was a police cruiser with its rack of red and white lights flashing. Emblazoned across the side of the cruiser were the words, SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT. Standing in the middle of the road was a trim, broad-shouldered man in a deputy sheriffs uniform. He wore a stiff-brimmed trooper’s hat low on his forehead, and his mouth was set in a grim line. In his hands was a double-barreled shotgun that was aimed at their windshield.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Jack Kellerman whispered.

  “Is he a member of the militia?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Stay here,” Furie said as he opened his door and got out. Marla was already out of the car.

  “Won’t do no good,” Kellerman said, getting out and following after Furie. “He wants me.”

  Furie stepped into the middle of the road, stopped in front of their car as Marla slowly began to move off to her right. The deputy’s shotgun followed her.

  “Stay right where you are, cupcake,” the man said to Marla in a deep, gravelly voice. “I heard all about you. Try any funny stuff with me, and I’ll blow you in half.”

  “My name’s Brendan Furie,” the excommunicated priest said to the deputy as Jack Kellerman came up beside him. “There must be some kind of mistake, so there’s no need for you to be pointing that gun at us. What’s the problem?”

  “There’s a mistake, all right, mister, and you made it. You damn feds are always making mistakes, just like that rat traitor standing next to you.”

  Kellerman took a tentative step forward. “Harry, I never said anything about—”

  “Shut up and stand still, rat traitor! You’re a damn liar! It’s written all over your face! You’ve been spilling your guts!” The deputy abruptly swung his gun back on Marla. “What’s your name, cupcake?”

  “Her name’s Marla,” Furie said. “She’s mute.” He paused for a few moments, then asked, “What now?”

  “We wait.”

  Furie looked over his shoulder, saw in the distance a plume of dust that was moving rapidly toward them. He turned back to the man with the shotgun. “You look like a smart man, Deputy. There are two very big reasons why you should let us go on our way before General Fruitcake gets here. He wasn’t in a good mood when we left him, and things could get out of hand when he gets here.”

  The deputy grunted. “That right? Give me one good reason, you lousy Communist loving fed bastard.”

  “There’s no good end for you in keeping us. I’m not a federal agent; I’m a private investigator, and Marla and I work for some very powerful people. If you kill us, I assure you we’ll be missed. There’ll be media coverage.”

  “You’re full of crap, fed. And the Commie-loving media can go to hell.”

  “It’s not the newspapers and television you’re going to have to worry about, Deputy. Our employers know exactly where Marla and I are, and why we came. They know all about your organization. If I don’t report in six hours, you and General Fruitcake are going to be swimming in real federal agents right up to your eyeballs. Harm us, and you’ll get exactly what you’re most afraid of.”

  “We’re not afraid of the feds,” the deputy said, but now there was a tinge of uncertainty in his tone. “What’s the second reason?”

  Furie again glanced behind him. The plume of dust was much closer, perhaps only two or three miles away. He turned back, pointed to the plastic figure of Jesus mounted on the cruiser’s dashboard. “Are you a Christian?”

  The deputy spat. “Of course I’m a Christian. What, do I look to you like a Jew? I never met anybody in my whole life who wasn’t a Christian.”

  “Roman Catholic?”

  The man narrowed his eyes. “Yeah. So what?”

  “I’m a priest—or I used to be. I’m a man of God. Kill me, or anybody under my protection, and you’ll be committing the worst kind of mortal sin. You’ll be condemned to hell.”

  “Used-to-be doesn’t count,” the deputy said uncertainly.

  “Are you so certain that in God’s eyes I’m not a priest that you’re willing to risk your immortal soul? Think about it: What you do in the next minute or two could determine whether you spend eternity in heaven with God or suffering the fire of hell with Satan. Eternal agony or ecstasy. Which is it going to be, Deputy? Remember that it’s you God will hold responsible if General Fruitcake harms us.”

  “We’re soldiers for Christ,” the man said, licking his lips. “We’re fighting for God’s country, so God’s on our side.”

  Furie took a deep breath, fighting against the frustration and desperation that were making him feel nauseous. “What about the Rapture, Deputy?”

  The other man frowned slightly. “What’s that?”

  “There are a lot of good Christians like yourself in this country who believe we’re in the End Times. The final battle of Armageddon could begin at any moment. Instead of federal agents to worry about, you’re going to be fighting demons from hell—and demons take no prisoners. Christ will return to establish the Kingdom of God on earth, but only after the wicked have been destroyed. What you’re doing here is wicked, Deputy. I can see by the statue of Christ on your dashboard that you’re a devout man, and before you stopped us the chances were probably good that you’d be Raptured off the face of the earth to sit at Christ’s side until the battle is over and Jesus returns. But that isn’t going to happen if you kill a man of God and the people with him. In a single moment, with this one bad decision, you could be throwing away paradise and buying yourself a ticket to hell. Think about it very carefully, Deputy.”

  Shadows of doubt,
and perhaps even fear, filmed the other man’s eyes, but it was too late to let them go. A battered red pickup truck had skidded to a halt with a squeal of brakes and a shower of pebbles on the shoulder of the road. Floyd Kuhns leaped out of the cab and limped toward them. Blood was still streaming from his bullet-nicked ear, and his face was a patchwork of bruises and cuts. His nose had been pushed to one side of his face, and both eyes had already started to blacken.

  “Jesus, Floyd,” the deputy said in a low voice, “what the hell happened to you?”

  “Shut up!” Kuhns barked as he raised the .357 Magnum he carried and pointed it at Marla. “Did you get her gun?!”

  “I don’t remember you tellin’ me she had a gun.”

  “You’re a real cheesebrain, Harry,” the militia leader growled as he slowly advanced on Marla, keeping the gun trained on her chest. “Step over here and put the shotgun to her head. If she so much as hiccups, blow her brains out.”

  “Floyd…?”

  “Do it!”

  The deputy stepped closer to Marla and placed the barrels of his shotgun against her right temple as Kuhns, moving very cautiously, reached into the pocket of her nylon jacket and retrieved the revolver she carried there. Then he hit her in the mouth with his fist. Marla collapsed and lay still, blood dripping from her split lower lip, but Furie did not think she was unconscious, although her eyes were closed. He started toward her, then stopped when both the shotgun and .357 Magnum swung in his direction.

  “Listen to me, both of you,” Furie said with quiet intensity. “Stop this now, before you dig yourselves a hole you can’t climb out of. Marla and I aren’t federal agents, and we didn’t come here to spy on you. I came to talk to Jack about his experiences, not about you. Listen to the tape in the car, and you’ll see that what he talks about is personal, about himself and his family. Marla and I don’t give a damn about your militia. Kill us, and your whole organization goes down the toilet right after you. You’ll be caught and executed. If you’ve got something to hide, this isn’t the way to do it.”

  “Maybe we should listen to the tape, Floyd,” the deputy said to the other man, watching him out of the corner of his eye. “He could be telling the truth.”

  “Like I said, Harry, you’re a cheesebrain. Even if there’s nothing about us on the tape, how do you know what they talked about in the car? How do you know what the rat traitor is going to say if we let them go? There’s too much at stake. Shoot ’em.”

  “Remember that this is about your soul, Deputy,” Furie said softly. “Think about where you want to be in the next minute if the End Time comes then.”

  “I don’t know about this, Floyd,” the deputy said in an uncertain tone as he shook his head. “Maybe we should talk about it some more.”

  “Talk about what?!” Kuhns roared, spraying blood from his broken mouth.

  “Maybe we should just let them go like this guy says. He used to be a priest, so he knows things we don’t know. He says Jesus could be coming back soon, and we’ll all be judged. Maybe this isn’t such a good time to be killing people.”

  “You are an idiot, Harry! He’s been trying to brainwash you with a bunch of religious crap to try to get your mind off the mission! What God wants is for us to get rid of the federal government so they won’t be messing with our lives and trying to take away our guns! Now, shoot ’em!”

  “I … I don’t think I care to do that, Floyd.”

  “Then I’ll do it myself!” Kuhns snapped, and aimed his gun at Furie’s chest.

  “Floyd, don’t do it!” Jack Kellerman shouted, leaping in front of Furie just as the gun exploded. The Teflon-coated slug passed through the boy’s body, and Furie felt a tug on the right sleeve of his jacket as the bullet sliced through the fabric. A moment later the gun had dropped from Floyd Kuhns’ grip and he was making gurgling sounds as he clutched with both hands at the knife that protruded from his throat. Blood spurted from his jugular vein, ran from his mouth and nose. He turned around once, very slowly, and then his knees buckled and he went down.

  Furie glanced down at the young man with the hole in his chest, and knew that Jack Kellerman was dead. He glanced over at Marla, who had risen to her feet. The expression on her face was as impassive as ever. The left sleeve of her jacket was pulled up to her elbow, revealing an empty wrist scabbard. Furie walked over to where Floyd Kuhns lay, his eyes as wide and unseeing in death as they had been unseeing in life.

  “Oh, man,” the deputy said in a low, strangled voice. “Oh, man, how am I going to explain this?”

  “We’ll explain it to the authorities together,” Furies said carefully. watching the other man. “The important thing is that you haven’t murdered anybody today.”

  The deputy grimaced, his mouth twisting in anguish, and shook his head. “Everything’s going to come out. I’ll go to prison. That’s no good for me. I’ve got a wife and kids.”

  “Deputy, put down your gun and listen to me. Two people are dead already. That’s enough. Your soul is clean of the sin of what happened here.”

  Again the man shook his head. Now his eyes looked vacant. “My life’s going to be hell, priest. I can’t let them make me into a rat traitor and send me to prison. I’ll be killed there. I gotta’ do what I gotta’ do.”

  With the deputy distracted by Furie, Marla had been slowly circling around toward his rear, but now the man sensed her presence. He abruptly wheeled and leveled his shotgun on her. Furie snatched the Magnum from the ground beside Floyd Kuhns’ body, aimed and fired. The gun had a tremendous recoil, kicking up in the air, but Furie’s aim had been true. The shotgun discharged into the ground as the bullet hit the deputy in the right cheek, just below his eye, and tore off the top of his skull.

  Furie threw the gun to one side, then leaned over and vomited. Gasping for breath and retching, he was only half aware of Marla’s presence as she knelt down beside him and used her jacket to wipe her fingerprints from the handle of the knife sticking out of Kuhn’s throat. Then she did the same to the grip of the Magnum. Furie wiped his mouth, then walked unsteadily toward the police cruiser. He opened the door and reached inside for the radio, but stopped when Marla’s hand firmly gripped his wrist. When he looked at her, she slowly and firmly shook her head, just as she had done back in the basement room when Jack Kellerman had asked to go with them. She wiped his prints from the car’s door handle, and then motioned toward their own car.

  This time Furie took her advice.

  TOMB

  Somehow he had to find a way to do things differently from the others, quickly and as often as alternatives, no matter how seemingly illogical, occurred to him, or he would surely die like them, and at the moment the only thing he could think of to do that the amateur and professional cavers and team of Army Rangers had certainly not done during their descent down the glacier wall was to turn off the powerful light mounted on his helmet, and the instant he did so he was enveloped in a darkness so complete and almost palpable, and he felt so alone, that it paradoxically reminded him of the shimmering light on the surface of the glacier he now embraced and the scene of spiritual and physical chaos that had greeted him when he had arrived at the site the day before, parked his rented snowmobile at the edge of a sort of improvised “lot” filled with other snowmobiles, dogsleds, cross-country skis, and snowshoes, and then climbed up the polar white and emerald green face of the glacier on crude steps that had been cut into the ice.

  At the top he put on his sunglasses and scanned the area, which was littered with garbage, portable toilets, multicolored pup tents, rough wooden crosses mounted on tripods, scattered urine and feces stains, improvised lean-tos, three igloos, and even a large, prefabricated aluminum Quonset hut he presumed had been erected by the missing five-man team of Army Rangers that had disappeared a week before into the cave that so far had claimed seventeen lives.

  After forty-five minutes of walking around the campsite, occasionally peering into sleeping bags, he had not found the boy, which disappoint
ed and surprised him, but he did find Dylan Parker. The tall man with the full head of bushy white hair and piercing blue eyes swimming with madness was standing at the head of a knot of his followers staring, transfixed, at the entrance to the cave, a secret tens—perhaps hundreds—of thousands of years old finally revealed, millimeter by millimeter, by the eonslong whisper of a receding glacier. The opening in the stone—merely the top of an ice-blocked cave entrance estimated to be upwards of two hundred feet high—was perhaps two feet at its highest point, twenty-five yards long, as black as a stain of India ink splashed against the gray-brown rock of the mountain that erupted like a great god’s tooth from the bluish-white gum of the ice sheet that encased it.

  As if sensing Brendan’s presence, Dylan Parker suddenly wheeled around, and his eyes with their gaze that was slightly manic even when he was calm suddenly glittered with excitement. He threw back his head and shouted like a man in the throes of ecstasy, “Priest!”

  “Hello, Dylan,” Brendan said, and winced when the tall man threw his long arms around him and squeezed.

  “Even you know it’s true this time, don’t you?” Parker shouted hoarsely in Brendan’s ear. “It’s why you’ve come to join us!”