The Stranded Ones

by Jay B. Gaskill

  The Stranded Ones

  Jay B. Gaskill

  central

  avenue

  publishing

  2013

  Central Avenue Publishing Edition

  Copyright © 2013 Jay B. Gaskill

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This edition is published by arrangement with Jay B. Gaskill

  centralavenuepublishing.com

  Second electronic edition

  Created and distributed by Central Avenue Publishing, a division of Central Avenue Marketing Ltd.

  THE STRANDED ONES

  ISBN 978-1-926760-15-5

  Published in Canada with international distribution.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover Design: Christopher Bradford

  For:

  Robyn, my favorite librarian, for putting up with the distractions of a lawyer-writer husband and helping me tighten the narrative;

  Michael Crichton, for his scientific curiosity and our conversations about science and fiction at a certain wedding long ago;

  The Grand Masters of science fiction who didn’t live to see their new genre break into the mainstream;

  and the cyber-geniuses who made the miracle of a hand-held library possible....

  The Stranded Ones

  PROLOGUE

  THE AUSTRAL-SUMMER ANOMALY

  Early February Near the Ross Ice Shelf

  It was high noon on a late summer day in Antarctica, minus 20 degrees Celsius, partly cloudy, winds at 20 kph. The twin engine Dernier, a ski equipped spotter plane, was carrying an extra passenger, Phil O’Neal of the National Geographic, as it tracked the path of the special New Zealand-American team. The hastily assembled group had traveled ten hours across the Ross Ice Shelf on snow machines to reach a spot 296 kilometers from base. Gasoline and supplies had been airdropped a half-click in front of them. From Dernier’s windows, the bright orange containers were scattered below like candy against the monochrome icescape.

  A vast steam plume was gouting from a fresh crater in the ice ahead where a very large object had crashed into the Ross Ice Shelf close to the 80th parallel near the border of the Australian and New Zealand claim areas.

  As the Dernier banked to the right, O’Neal reached for his camera. The steam plume towered against the chilly blue of the Antarctic sky. Thirty six hours earlier, satellite imagery had captured a huge impact reminiscent of the 1908 Tunguska event in Siberia.

  This was the spot.

  After O’Neal had acquired his first four minutes of high quality images, the Dernier began banking away from the crater, preparing for another pass. Both O’Neal and the pilot were looking out when a sudden white flash engulfed the entire scene below. The searing pulse of light destroyed O’Neal’s retinas, fried the plane’s electronics and blinded the pilot as well. The brilliant flash and telltale mushroom cloud were captured from space at a very low angle by the nearest imaging satellite. Those images would be classified. The next morning a follow up team was sent from McMurdo by helicopter. They found the ice crater, still steaming, the wrecked Dernier and the remains of the ground team not far from the edge. The rescue team conducted a brief inspection and took several radiation readings, all negative. After a flurry of international calls, the incident was officially written off by the US, Australia and New Zealand as two “anomalous meteor impacts”. The suspicious nature of the post-impact explosion was ignored by mutual agreement.

  The Antarctic winter soon arrived and a cloak of media silence followed. Public attention was soon diverted by the usual scandals, and the unsatisfactory official explanation stood. The pilot and the members of the New Zealand-American team were quietly written off as dead…as was the National Geographic photographer, Phillip O’Neal.

  THE AOTEAROA VISITORS

  South Island, New Zealand A few months later

  Professor Harry Tamati first discovered the “Little Ones” on a predawn morning as they were scurrying away from the porch of his summer home in the Alpine foothills on South Island, New Zealand. They clicked when they scurried, looking in the starlight like large, complicated crustaceans; and they carried satchels. He vowed not to tell anyone, of course.

  Harry was on sabbatical from the University of Canterbury, Christchurch. He was also a Maori Shaman, a fact he’d omitted from his resume and his on-line curriculum vitae for the same reason that he would never go public with his discovery.

  This was to be the first of many encounters.

  The creatures had “borrowed” a broken pocket watch from the porch a few nights earlier. It had been a gift from a British Colonel to Harry’s great-grandfather, a Maori chief. The watch was 200 years old and Harry had left it on a table, unattended. After all, who ever visits? When the missing timepiece reappeared on the porch two nights ago, in perfect repair, it was accompanied by a note in precise block letters:

  PLEASE.

  ONE POUND SUGAR.

  ONE POUND SALT.

  ONE PINT BEER.

  Naturally Harry was intrigued. He had put the requested lager, sugar and salt where the returned watch had been deposited. He made it to the porch that pre-dawn morning just in time to see the strange creatures as they scurried into the shadows.

  Harry immediately realized the importance of his find, as well as the possible peril to his reputation. He vowed to investigate further, but he would need funding. After making a few discreet inquiries, he was referred to an Australian businessman named Jack Falstaff who came to the scene within the week.

  Falstaff was a tall, lean man with a reputation for intrigue, and a gift for the succinct. He seemed unsurprised at Tamati’s account. “Mark my words, Harry. The little buggers will be a gold mine. You take good care of them for me. And, yes, by all means, study them all you want.” Falstaff then swore Harry to absolute secrecy, and put the entire “research project” on a stipend. Harry was to file secret reports monthly and was given an emergency number. Months would go by without any other contact from Mr. Falstaff.

  Eventually, professor Tamati learned that his “Little Ones” were stranded space travelers. Trouble followed…

  CHAPTER ONE - THE STORY BEGINS IN…

  Siberia

  Donald Wu was a political fugitive. His picture, a stocky bald man with fierce eyes, was on Wanted bulletins from the Chinese, his own Mongolians, and the governments of four other countries. His were the crimes of disobedience.

  He had escaped from his prison cell, with outside help from an Australian entrepreneur. Wu had been trudging through the snow for several hours until he finally located his promised refuge. The log structure was exactly where and as described by his secret liberator, the man from down under, Jack Falstaff.

  A low ramp was a disabled access, a later addition to the old structure. It led from the snow to the front door. Curiously, the door was wide open. That was a warning sign but Donald was just too damned tired to care. Moving quickly, he located the promised weapon, a military L-rifle resting in its harness next to a log wall. Donald was fresh out of prison, and he had vowed to himself that he’d never go back in…alive.

  Snow had blown in as far as the fireplace. Wu pushed the door closed with his back, favoring his right arm; it had been nearly crushed during his escape. The building, judging from its primitive log and mortar construction, was probably a century old. It had been remodeled insi
de several times and, except for the snow, appeared well maintained and undamaged.

  Working with his left hand, Wu tossed some kindling in the fireplace, trying not to think about the possible broken bones in his right. He pulled the L-rifle from its harness and aimed a pulse at the center of the logs. The fire caught immediately. As the warmth spread through the small living area, Donald took a deep breath and began the search for more fuel. In the main cabin, there was only a bed, a Franklin stove, sink and cupboard, rustic table without cloth, three wooden chairs and an ancient dusty sofa.

  No wood. But a ladder led to a loft overhead.

  Prickly sensations were beginning to return to his right hand…and his lower arm now hurt with a vengeance. Moving carefully, Donald negotiated the ladder with one hand. At the top he found a small loft where there was another bed, a dresser and a small table. Part of the fireplace chimney filled one corner of the room. No wood here. No surprise, really. The floor plan he had studied before his escape showed a concealed SatCom antenna mounted somewhere below the roof. But the chimney column was much too narrow to accommodate the necessary electronics and power pack. Donald began looking around the tiny loft, noting the location of a small rug on the floor at the very edge of the chimney bricks.

  Bending low because of the sloping roof, he pulled the rug aside, revealing a neat circular crack in the floor. Kneeling painfully, he pressed down at the edge. It moved, giving him just enough space to grasp an edge. But the fingers of his right hand were much too swollen to be useful. So he pressed down with a knee and struggled with his left hand until he had opened the tiny cubby.

  In the recess he found a single old-fashioned telephone receiver. He picked it up. When he heard a chime, he recited, “This is opening day and I am on schedule. Alpha Zee.” Wu replaced the receiver in its cradle and waited. In a moment, the telephone rang.

  “Are you all right, Mr. Wu?” It was Jack Falstaff’s voice.

  “A little damaged but functioning. How secure is this line?”

  “Class one scramble, but you never know…”

  “When will you get here?”

  “Depends on the weather…I’m leaving momentarily.”

  “Any wood for the fireplace here?”

  “I ordered some. Look around.”

  Wu descended the ladder and inspected the cabin more carefully. He found a well-stocked medicine chest over a sink and a box filled with fresh clothes was just inside the small closet. Donald stoked the fire with some dry logs he found under a tarp by the bed then he sat down on a wooden chair. Moving slowly and carefully, he cleaned and dressed his knee wounds in gauze and tape. When the wounds were covered, he pulled on some fresh, dry jeans and a heavy flannel shirt, taking care not to disturb his swollen right arm and hand. He also found several pairs of heavy dry socks but no boots. Wu pulled the plastic outer boots he’d stolen in his escape over two layers of new wool socks.

  The carry sack attached to the L-rifle harness contained a fresh charge pack for the weapon. Better reload now than under duress, Wu thought. He shoved a fresh charge into the chamber.

  Donald’s right hand was still fat and discolored, but sensation was returning and there were no signs of blackness…yet. Maybe he would get to keep it.

  He then took three pain pills, ate a candy bar and swilled a box of juice, all from the medicine chest. Then he propped himself up on the bed, facing the entrance, the charged L-rifle at his side. Just as he allowed his eyelids to close, he picked up the sound of an approaching electric powered vehicle. Wu became instantly alert. The sound was just audible over the omnipresent wind.

  Wu heard the muffled whir of a small electric motor, then a sharp knock at the door. Falstaff? Wu made no effort to rise, but let his left hand grip the edge of the weapon. He shouted, “Who is it?”

  “Jack Falstaff sent me.” Before Wu could reply, the door opened, exposing a man of indeterminate age with a pale, bland face. He was sitting in an oversized, powered wheel chair. The chair immediately whirred into the cabin. “Are you Mr. Wu? I am to give you a lift.” The words emanated from a hidden speaker, as if the man were a ventriloquist. The speech cadence was strange, betraying a faint, unidentifiable accent, the voice edgy and androgynous.

  “Pardon me?” Wu was sharply alert.

  “Jack Falstaff sent me,” the man repeated. “I am supposed to pick you up.” His expression hadn’t changed.

  “I need to see your identification.”

  “I am supposed to pick you up.” The man spoke with metronomic precision as the wheelchair continued its inexorable roll towards Wu’s bed.

  “How do you plan to accomplish that, exactly?” Donald’s fingers slipped into the trigger guard of the L-rifle and his grip tightened. The wheelchair man’s eyes were glassy and expressionless. His face was perfectly unblemished. Every hair was in perfect place, yet his body was oddly proportioned. Wu now noticed something else. The man’s legs were dramatically foreshortened, like a little boy’s, but with adult sized feet. Suddenly Donald felt cold. “Stay right there!”

  But the chair still rolled to the foot of Wu’s bed, and Wheelchair Man began to elevate as if something underneath the seat was rising up. Just as a metal appendage snaked out from under the wheels of the chair, Donald snatched the L-rifle, took dead aim and pulled the trigger. No charge! Fighting panic, he jumped off the edge of the bed, holding the rifle under his bad arm while he pulled on the capsule eject lever. Idiot! He had inserted it backwards. Donald reversed polarity and jammed the charge capsule back into the power chamber.

  Wu’s next shot went clear through the man’s chest. But the chair backed and turned toward him as if nothing had happened.

  Need to recharge! The L-rifle and its charges had probably been at 7 below zero for weeks, greatly slowing the recovery time between shots.

  Wu stood next to the bed, his back against the wall. He was cornered. Pulse pounded in Wu’s head as he waited for the green recharge light. In between beats, three things took place, almost simultaneously. He noticed for the first time that a separate appendage had emerged from the man’s torso, a metal tentacle. It was holding a small, deadly looking weapon, pointed directly at him. Wu immediately pulled the trigger.

  When fully charged, a pulse from an L-rifle could melt steel. This time, Wu was lucky. A bright, hot pulse lanced at a downward angle, burning a hole through the man-figure’s lower torso and into the chair structure itself.

  The chair immediately began whirring and clanking like broken clock. Both metal tentacles began moving wildly side to side, one still grasping the weapon. The chair was bleeding smoke and the man-thing was lolling to one side, hanging like a discarded doll. Yet the whole apparatus continued to move forward, as if on autopilot. The little weapon fired twice, making two smoldering holes in the wall a meter to Wu’s left.

  Donald delivered his next shot directly into the center mass of the wheelchair. The L-rifle discharge burned a splattered metal track in the chair. A dense black cloud snaked through the opening. The entire faux human figure sagged as though its inner substance had turned to jelly. The “face” and “head” emptied and flopped like an evacuated rubber ball and several slimy excrescences emerged from under the chair plopping on the floor.

  The slimy runners began heading directly for Wu’s feet. Having squirmed out from under the seat, they were crawling along the floor toward him with startling speed. Donald jumped to the side, firing directly into the disgusting things. For a beat, nothing seemed to happen. Then they caught fire with an audible whoosh and unnaturally bright flames writhed around them. A split second later, with a second whoosh, a blue flash shot back to the chair itself. There was a shuddering, muffled explosion and the wheelchair became completely engulfed in an expanding cloud of oily black smoke.

  The smell was overpowering. Wu stumbled out of the cabin, choking, his eyes stinging. An ominous vehicle at the bottom of the ramp began climbing towards him. Donald was nearly blind from the tears and smoke but he instinct
ively fired dead center into the machine. He fired again and again, not caring whether the charge recycle had finally reached military specs. But sparks and flames immediately erupted from the vehicle, popping and hissing. Trails of smoke began snaking skyward from under its cowling.

  Thank God that damnable thing came without reinforcements, Wu thought. He plumped down in the snow next to the chimney, just out of the smoke, too dizzy and sick to move. Eventually Wu leaned back against the bricks and closed his eyes. He would just wait a few minutes for the air to clear.

  “Mr. Wu, I presume?”

  Donald awoke with a start. Through acid tears, he could see a tall man peering down on him.

  Thank God…no wheel chair…Jack Falstaff?

  Donald blinked away the blurriness and took a moment to study his rescuer. Falstaff was bulky in the chest, but otherwise slender in the sense that a cable is slender. For the moment, the man’s long, homely features concealed an irrepressible humor. His eyes were hidden behind very dark photochromic glasses and his face was grim as a tombstone.

  “Yes, sir,” Donald croaked. Then his new boss grinned and held out a hand.

  “I’m the same Jack Falstaff you’ve been dealing with,” he said. “Good to see that you survived.” Wu reached up with his left hand. Before he could speak, he was pulled roughly to his feet. “Looks like you had a rough go.”

  Wu brushed off the snow. “It was such a lovely cabin until that…thing…rode in. I’ll never trust a wheelchair man again!”

  Falstaff silently looked over the disabled snow vehicle and surveyed the mess inside the cabin. A moment later he emerged from the little building, shaking his head in disgust. “Someone ratted on us.”

  Donald was too tired and angry to detail his darkest suspicions. He managed just three words: “We were betrayed.”

  “Probably a guard on the take…They are corrupt to the core at that prison. Doesn’t matter now…I assume you still want the job?”