Darkly The Thunder (22 page)

“Great God Almighty!” Willie shouted. “Hit's from outer space. The little green men's done invaded us!” He dropped to his knees. “Oh, Lord!” he cried. “Give us a sign. Tell us what to do?”

Jewelweed walked over to him and held out a snake. “Here, Willie, take this.”

Willie recoiled backward. “Get that motherfucker away from me!”

“When the roll is called up yonder,” Sister Adele sang sweetly.

“Do you have people in the town?” the question was tossed at Martin. “From the White House?”

“Yes, we do. Megan LeMasters volunteered to enter the town and assess the situation.”

“And her report?”

“Grim.”

“When will she come out?”

“She won't, until a vaccine is found, and the survivors have been inoculated. She is a very brave young lady.”

 

 

“I don't feel very brave,” Megan said, listening to the radio. The press briefing was being heard around the world.

WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO LEVEL WITH THE PEOPLE, BABY?

In his computer room, Howie shook his head. The Fury was bigger and stronger than ever. And it could now move so fast he had very little time to warn anyone that it was coming.

“That's what you want, isn't it?” Megan tossed the question into the air. “You want publicity.”

I WANT THE WORLD TO KNOW WHO I AM AND WHAT I AM. YES.

“It isn't time for that,” Megan said, taking a chance. “You tip your hand now, and our scientists could very well find a way to destroy you. Think about that.”

UMMM. PERHAPS YOU'RE RIGHT. BUT WHY WOULD YOU WARN ME OF THAT REMOTE POSSIBILITY?

“To give us more time to live.”

YOU PEOPLE ARE SO DAMNED HONEST YOU MAKE ME WANT TO PUKE. WHAT A BUNCH OF BOY SCOUTS. BAH!

“It's gone,” Howie called.

. “Came up pretty fast this time, didn't it?” Maj. Jackson asked.

“So fast I couldn't warn any of you,” Howie said. “That was quick thinking, Miss LeMasters.”

“Desperate thinking, Howie. And I may have bought us an extra day or two.”

Mack looked over at the newcomers, Gene and Donna Harvey. He had known the pair for years, and there was something about them now, that was all out of whack. Something just didn't ring true.

Gene felt the old deputy's eyes on him and turned his head, meeting Mack's gaze.

His eyes, Mack thought. That's what's wrong. His eyes are ... dead, he found the word.

Mack forced himself to smile at the man, and Gene returned the smile.

“People running up the sidewalk,” Judy called. “Eight or ten of them. They're not armed.”

Those in the office could hear the people outside yelling. “Let us in! For the love of God, please help us.”

“Let them in,” Lee ordered. “But keep an eye on them.”

Howie inserted a tape into a VCR that he had immediately requested when Gene and Donna entered the office. The sounds of a space battle drifted out to the main office. Megan and Judy exchanged glances and smiles. Howie was one sharp little boy. In the event those new survivors were imposters, he had quickly arranged it so they could report back to the Fury that Howie was indeed playing space games with his Buck Rogers ray gun.

“Oh, boy,” Judy said, cracking the door. “It's the sheriffs wife among them.”

Gordie and the others bagged up a hundred bodies and poured the fluid. The smell was gone as soon as the fluid hit bloated and maggot-covered flesh. Finally, the smell and the back-breaking work took its toll on them all, and they knocked off for the day.

I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU'D LIKE TO HAVE A PARTY TONIGHT, WOULD YOU, SHANTY IRISH-SPIC?

“I think I'll pass, Fury.”

PITY. I'M IN UNUSUALLY FINE VOICE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO HEAR?

“Do I have a choice?”

NO. LISTEN: DO BOP DE DO BOP DE DO BOP, DE DO. DOESNT THAT TAKE YOU BACK TO THE GLORIOUS DAYS OF THE FIFTIES?

“I don't remember anything about them, Fury.”

THAT'S PROBABLY WHY YOU'RE SUCH A DICKHEAD.

Fury left, but not before unzipping the last pile of body bags and dumping the bodies out onto the sidewalk.

“I wonder if that's it?” Watts questioned.

“What do you mean?” Kathy asked, just as a hand closed around her boot-covered ankle and the smell of the grave wafted to her nostrils.

She stifled a scream and twisted, trying to break free of the dead hand. The man grinned up at her and opened his mouth to laugh. Bloated blowflies and maggots dropped out of the mouth. The tongue was blue black.

Watts picked up a heavy stick from the sidewalk and bashed the living dead corpse on the head. The head exploded like an overheated pressure cooker, showering those closest with brains and blood.

Kathy jerked out her Beretta 9mm and began methodically pulling the trigger, blowing the dead wrist apart and finally freeing her ankle.

The dead fingers clung to her boot as the shattered arm flopped on the sidewalk.

Gordie had to kneel down and pry the cold fingers from her ankles, first breaking the fingers, and then peeling them off as one would a leech.

“Jesus!” Kathy said, as the last finger was tossed to one side.

THAT WAS FUN, WASN'T IT? LET'S PLAY SOME MORE FUN GAMES.

The body bags began moving, rolling from side to side, with muffled screams coming from each bag.

“They're dead, people,” Gordie said, as much for his own benefit as for the others. “Keep that in mind. They're all dead.”

THERE ARE DEGREES OF DEATH, GORDIE ME BOY. LET ME SHOW YOU.

A body bag suddenly burst open, and a man lumbered to his blackened bare feet, turning slowly to face the sheriff.

Kathy had already ran to the car and grabbed up two shotguns, tossing one to Watts. She pumped a round of double ought buckshot into the chamber and leveled the muzzle. She put a round into the dead man's chest, and the second shot took off most of his face, knocking him down to the sidewalk.

GOOD SHOW, GANG. GOOD SHOW. NOW YOU'RE ALL GETTING INTO THE SPIRIT OF THINGS. NOW WE CAN HAVE SOME FUN. PARTY TIME.

Martin had returned from a newly installed mobile home close to the town, just in time to hear the shots booming out of town. He was immediately surrounded by reporters.

“What's all the shooting about, Mr. Tobias?” he was asked.

“I have no idea, people. But you will know just as soon as I do, I promise you that.” He turned to Larry. “Find out what that was all about, Larry.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why can't anybody call into the town, sir?” he was asked.

“All existing lines are being used for emergency use only. And I was told there was some damage to the telephone company's terminals in there. We can't risk any lives by sending people in to fix it.”

“Sir, there is unusual activity around the Russian, Canadian, Mexican, French, and German embassies in Washington. Do you have a comment on that?”

“No, I do not. This situation here in Willowdale is my immediate concern. I have not been briefed on any unusual activity in Washington.”

“Sir, why isn't the governor of the state of Colorado present?”

“The governor is not feeling well. He caught a cold doing some late season skiing, and it turned into a mild case of pneumonia. I'm on the phone with him a half-dozen times a day.”

Actually, both leaders of the House and Senates – both Democrats – after being briefed by President Marshall – a Republican – had called Governor Siatos, and told him to get sick and maintain a very low profile until this matter was resolved. They did not want him blundering around, shooting off his mouth, and sticking his foot in it.

Larry returned after speaking with the trooper in charge at the barricades. “Some prisoners tried to break out of the jail, sir,” he lied with a straight face. “They didn't make it.”

“Thank you, Larry,” Martin said. “There will be another briefing at eight o'clock in the morning, people,” he told the members of the press. “I'll see you then.”

“This is all a bunch of shit,” one reporter said to a small group of his peers. “First, there is some story about a mass murderer on the loose. Then all of a sudden we get this bubonic plague crap. And I was told by a waitress up the road that this all has something to do with a man called Sand.”

“Sand?”

“Yeah. Some outlaw rebel that was killed by a Colorado state trooper some thirty years ago. Man by the name of Alvin Watts.”

“Where do we find this Watts person?”

The reporter pointed toward Willowdale. “In there. And no way to get to him.”

“I'm with you,” another reporter said. “I'm not buying any of the crap the government is handing out.”

“I got an idea,” yet another reporter said.

They all looked at him.

“Let's find a way to get into the town.”

 

 

Gordie and those with him fought their way through a line of bloated and stinking walking dead and made it back to their vehicles. Several of the newly risen climbed onto the bed of the trucks and hammered on the top of the cabs, grunting and howling and cursing.

One crawled onto the top of the cab, a brick in his hand, and smashed the windshield, sending shards of glass into the driver's face. The poor man spun the wheel, fighting it, trying to see through the blood pouring into his eyes from numerous cuts on his scalp and forehead.

Gordie thought the truck was right behind him. But the truckload of bodies, dead and still and dead and risen, had headed the other way after the windshield was smashed – straight toward the barricades.

The walking dead leaned over and threw himself into the cab, smashing the brick into the deputy's face, knocking him unconscious.

With an insane grin on his rotted and bloated face, the dead shoved the deputy out of the way and got behind the wheel. He dropped the truck into gear and headed for the barricades.

HEE HEE HEE HEE, the Fury giggled, spreading the distance its voice would carry.

“What the hell was that?” a reporter asked.

“I don't know. But it came from the town.”

Martin and Larry had heard the giggling from inside their mobile home and had stepped out.

The truck, swerving from side to side in the wide street, lurched toward the barricades. The reporters noticed the erratically driven vehicle and began gathering near the barricades, as did the preachers and the government personnel. Cameras were recording it all.

The truck stopped about a foot from the barricades, the dead driver grinning at the crowd through the broken windshield. He picked his nose, pulled out a maggot, and flipped it toward the crowd.

“Jesus!” a reporter said. “That's a maggot!”

The deputy managed to open the passenger-side door and fall out onto the concrete, blood pouring from head wounds.

The reporters and camera crews tried to push past the troopers. The troopers shoved them back, none too gently.

OH, LET THEM COME IN, BY ALL MEANS.

“Who said that?” a woman yelled. “Where is that voice coming from?”

DO BOP DE DO BOP DE DO BOP, DE DO.

“All pretense is thrown to the wind,” Larry muttered.

“I'm afraid you're right,” Martin agreed. “Back up, Larry.” There was urgency in the man's voice. “Run, boy, run.

They ran.

Gordie squealed to a stop, the tires on his vehicle smoking from the sudden stop. He jumped out. “Get back!” he screamed. “All of you get back. Run, goddamnit, run!”

Most ran, including the troopers. A few reporters and camerapersons stayed. But not for long. The barricades remained intact. The vehicles parked close to it were not harmed.

The people standing on the outside of the barricades, close to the barriers, disappeared.

Screaming leaped out of the air, followed by a heavy crunching sound. A bent and useless minicam popped out of the air, falling to the roadway. Tape recorders and watches and belt buckles and lipstick tubes dropped to the concrete.

A large belch sprang out of the air.

OH, MY, the Fury said. NOW THIS IS INTERESTING. I'M STORING SOME DATA TOTALLY NEW TO ME. I MUST TRY TO UNDERSTAND WHAT I HAVE GATHERED. BYE, NOW.

Gordie had returned to his unit and radioed in. He had walked back to the barricades, a bullhorn in his hand. He lifted the bullhorn and triggered it. “You goddamned sons of bitches. You greedy, sorry, motherfuckers have condemned us. I asked you to leave. I pleaded with you. Now I'm going to do what I should have done from the first.”

He looked around as two S.O. units drove up. Deputies got out, scoped high-powered rifles in their hands. The rifles were 7mm Magnums.

“I will shoot anyone who gets within five hundred yards of any barricade,” Gordie spoke through the bullhorn. “And my orders are to shoot to kill.”

One reporter tested Gordie's orders. His body lay still under the warm spring sunlight. When asked if the body could be retrieved, the reply was a terse, “No.”

Governor Siatos had finally broke his silence. He issued an apology for the death of the reporter and ordered his state patrol out of the area immediately. President Marshall ordered a full company of Army Rangers to be flown in from Fort Lewis, Washington. The Rangers were in place by nightfall.

Gordie talked over the barricades, now moved back another half-mile from the town, with the CO of the Rangers.

“Do my deputies have to remain at all checkpoints, Captain?”

“No, sir,” the Ranger told him. “We are under orders from the president of the United States to shoot to kill anyone who attempts to compromise our perimeters.”

“You have someone in constant touch with Howie?”

“Yes, sir. We have established both a voice and computer link with the boy.”

“Good luck to you and your men, Captain.”

“Good luck to you and your people, sir. I don't envy you your position.”

Gordie tried a smile that almost made it. “We've lasted this long. Maybe we can pull this thing off.”

“Captain,” a man called. “The boy says the Fury is resting. The thing is all tapped out from the recent extending of its territory.”

“What exactly does that mean, Sheriff?”

“It means we can talk freely without the Fury suddenly popping up to listen without our knowing.”

“My briefing was pretty sketchy, sir. What is this thing you're facing? And I have a top secret clearance, sir.”

Martin Tobias had walked up, and walked up very softly. “You may tell the captain, Sheriff. After the incident with those . . . dead people this afternoon, and the gobbling up of half a dozen reporters, we're worldwide news. And before you brief the captain and myself,” he smiled, “how is Megan?”

“She's fine, Mr. Tobias. Like the rest of us, coping.”

“Continue with the briefing, Sheriff.”

“The Fury is a collapsed, neutron star that somehow – we don't know how and probably never will – managed to evolve to become a thinking mass. But one that is nearly totally evil.”