Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest #11 Read online

  "Put your hands up where I can see them. Hands up!"

  Jacobson did as he was asked as Becker scanned the rest of the mine's entrance. It appeared, except for the shifting doctor, completely empty. “Down now. On your knees. Do not move or I will shoot you. Understand?"

  "Fine, fine.” Jacobson lowered slowly to the dirt floor. He grunted with the effort. “Who sent you? Where are the others?"

  "All the way down,” Becker moved closer, checking behind him, keeping the light on the doctor's face. “Just relax. Relax. Everything is going to be fine."

  "Of course. If you don't mind—"

  "Down,” Becker closed the gap and drove the man's chest completely to the ground with his left hand and flashlight. “Easy now."

  Jacobson's next words were mumbled, his face buried in dirt. “Of course...” Both arms were secured behind his back with two custody strips.

  "Come on,” Becker lifted him up from the ground. “Time to go home."

  "Home? Did DSTI send ... no...” He squinted against the light and studied Becker. “I recognize the breed. C.I.A., yes? Or Department of Defense."

  "This way.” Becker led him to the mine opening.

  "How did you ... Jeffrey told, didn't he? Where is Jeffrey?"

  "Safe,” Becker said, pushing him ahead. “We want everyone safe."

  Jacobson laughed.

  "Something funny?"

  "Safe. Coming from you,” Jacobson smiled. “From the kind of men you work for. It's, shall we say, ironic."

  "Not interested in your bullshit, doc."

  "I see,” Jacobson said. “But you are assuredly ‘interested’ in them. Yes?"

  Becker followed the man's eyes. Below, down from the hill and standing at the edges of the ruined city, were three figures who were not the ghosts of the Winter Quarter miners.

  Three. Narrow shapes. Looked young.

  Shit.

  "Who is that now?” Becker asked and pulled the doctor closer as a shield. He'd put on his vest for the arrest but wanted the extra barrier in case.

  "John, I think,” Jacobson said. “John, Ted, and some of the others. I, well, I invited more than Jeffrey here tonight. I honestly thought we would be alone."

  "How many others? John's dead, by the way."

  "Is he?” Jacobson's voice sounded distracted, distant.

  "Murdered last night. Throat slashed, stabbed a dozen times. Some people will want to talk to you about that, I'm sure."

  "Me? No, no, not me. They'll want to talk to me about other things, I suppose. But not about John. Slashed, you say?” Jacobson chuckled softly.

  "More irony, doctor?” Becker found that he was moving toward the bodies below, not away.

  "I wondered if they would..."

  "Would what?"

  "You'll find out soon enough, agent. Or captain, is it?"

  "Stand still.” They were now only fifty yards from the others. Becker recognized every one of them. He'd studied the files enough to recognize each face. Albert, Ted and...

  Jeff!

  No, he reminded himself, this was the other Jeffrey. Four years older, even.

  Becker stuffed the flashlight into his jacket pocket and retrieved his cell. His gun was trained on the three boys who stood perfectly still. Waiting.

  "Becker?” The Major General's voice came over the cell, calm and forgiving.

  "I've got Jacobson. Get whoever you can to “Winter Quarter” mine outside of Scofield, Utah. Now. There are at least four more marks here. Copy?"

  "Copy that, Captain. Air support out of Salt Lake in fifteen. Can you—"

  "I'll manage."

  "Fine work, soldier. Hey, kiddo, I wanted to—"

  "Later,” Becker hung up.

  "Your masters are pleased, yes?” Jacobson asked. “That's always important."

  Becker shook him quiet. “I have a gun!” he called out to the others. Christ, it was freezing cold all of a sudden. “Is that understood?"

  "'I've got a gun,'” one of the boys mimicked in a high-pitched silly voice. “Fuck you, asshole."

  "And, if you move, I will shoot you."

  "If you move, we'll shoot you,” one of the other voices said, and the other two laughed.

  Becker pulled Jacobson even closer, tried to attach voices to the faces he'd come to know so well from file photos. It was always odd hearing their voices...

  "Jacobson?” the one named Al shouted. “Who's this loser? You Jeffrey's new friend?"

  Jeff?

  "This is over,” Becker said. He was not sure if he'd meant it for the kids, Jacobson, or himself.

  The teens giggled.

  "It's over,” he said again, to Jacobson specifically now. He wanted someone, anyone, to agree.

  "For me,” Jacobson said, “perhaps now. But ... over? No. This isn't over yet. Science without conscience is the soul's—"

  "Save your bullshit for the shrinks,” Becker snapped. “I'm not interested.” Jacobson stilled and Becker looked over the dark horizon. It would be another twenty minutes, at least, before backup arrived. He needed to stall. “Quite a party you guys had the other night,” he shouted over at them. “The one back in Orchard City."

  "Yeah, so? What the fuck do you care?"

  "I don't, not really. Just an observation. Nine dead. You see it on the news?"

  "Yeah, well. Wasn't us."

  "We'd have killed sixty,” said another voice. It was Jeff.

  No, not Jeff.

  'Jeffrey,’ rather. Only another, older, version of the same mold. He'd sounded so much like the boy Becker knew...

  "The Ammonia,” Becker tried. “Interesting idea..."

  "What the fuck you know about it?"

  "Enough. I also know about the family in Jefferson. And the woman in Diamond Springs."

  "Yeah. You're some kind of fucking genius, aren't ya?"

  "I've been told.” Becker decided then that he would kill all three without blinking if one moved an inch. Jacobson was the key, though. Jacobson knew every turn this Hell had. The rest were only more collateral.

  "You the guy who did John?” Al asked.

  "No way,” Jeffrey said. “It ain't him."

  "You're a dead faggot,” Al shouted.

  Becker checked the horizon again. The kids would probably run when the copters were in sight. Run, he thought. They'll get you easy. Jacobson shifted in front of him. He'd mumbled something. It had sounded foreign, Latin maybe.

  "You kill anyone today?” Becker forced the doctor still again and shouted back at the boys.

  "Not yet,” the last boy spoke, finally. Ted. His voice had been deeper and more serious than the others. He'd meant it. He'd also drawn a gun.

  "Easy there, tough guy,” Becker warned. “Put the gun down or I will end you."

  "Then do it,” the teen said, stepping forward. “You think I really give a fuck?"

  Becker reset his own pistol, aimed at the boy's head. “You don't,” he agreed. “I've read your files, asshole."

  The kid stopped, smiled broadly. For a second, Becker thought the skin might actually split open against the ever-widening jaw. Almost as quickly, the smile vanished.

  Ted turned, looking behind the other two into the ruined city. What was this? Becker tensed, scanning the surrounding shadows.

  Jacobson mumbled something in Latin again, then moaned.

  "What's that, doc?” Becker crouched closer behind him.

  "He's here,” Jacobson said.

  "Who—"

  Then Becker knew, too.

  He twisted instinctively, reacted to the sudden movement from his right. One of the shadows had leaped out at them.

  Becker felt his entire body lift from the ground, weightless, reality suspended. He'd seen his attacker for only a second, felt the steel-fingered hand against his shoulder and rolled against the expected strike. Burning pain sank briefly into his lower back. He crashed to the ground on his side. Someone close was screaming. There were gun shots, not his own. Becker knew he'd been cu
t, and deep. But he'd rolled away from the blow and the vest had taken the worst of it. He scrambled onto to his knees, fought back up.

  Someone stood directly between him and Jacobson.

  The man was small and lean, almost completely lost against the night. The same guy from the motel room.

  He lifted Jacobson by the throat up into the moonlight, as if studying him. The geneticist's feet kicked inches from the ground. Dark fingers had sunk deeply into Jacobson's neck, and a blade in the dark figure's right hand had already been jammed into the doctor's middle, helping to lift. The doctor's screeches were pitched too high, like the wails of a ghostly widow.

  Becker put five bullets into the dark man's back.

  The man stumbled forward with the impact but did not drop and, instead, heaved his arm sideways. Blood sprayed across the distance between them and splashed hot across Becker's face.

  Jacobson literally split open from the middle.

  The doctor's entire body buckled open to one side as his intestines burst from the gaping wound with a wet slurp. The corpse was tossed immediately to the ground as Jacobson's killer turned now to the others.

  The boys.

  It was going straight for the three boys. Becker could still see them sprinting back through the deserted town.

  Do I let it go? Becker wondered. He felt the fresh wound burning in his back, thought of the dead kids he'd seen barely hours before.

  He fired another burst of shots. Each hit and their rapport echoed through the canyon. Scare away all the ghosts, Becker thought, suddenly fighting to remain conscious. He'd lost so much blood already.

  The thing—Becker could think of it as nothing else now—turned toward Becker. He emptied what little was left of the clip at its head.

  It spun backwards against the force of the bullets, whirled to the ground with a screech that was not human. As quickly, it jumped back up and sprinted in a crouch away from Becker deeper into the ruins.

  It was hurt. It had to be. Still, Becker had never seen anything move this fast before. It had almost completely vanished into the night's shadows. Becker ran closely behind, charged another clip.

  He looked for the others. The three boys were gone. Or well hidden. Jacobson's killer moved more slowly now, only fifty yards away. It tottered ahead, stumbled, crawled on knees into one of the half-collapsed cellars.

  It was hiding. Trying to, at any rate.

  Becker had to admit, if he hadn't been looking, he never would have seen it. The dark figure was slumped against the far left corner of the shadow-filled cellar. It was twisted, misshapen, to hide itself better. Like a giant spider or a bat that was part human. And the long knife still glistened in the moonlight, like a single giant fang.

  Becker emptied his second clip into the shape. All nine shots.

  It buckled from the corner and rolled out from the shadows onto the floor. Becker reloaded his third and final clip and climbed down into the small cellar, using the collapsed rubble as stairs. There was no blood at all. Not that he could see.

  He looked up, wondering if the copters would ever show up. Had Durbin sent that somehow? No. There hadn't been time.

  He dared to touch it, to confirm what he already knew.

  The man was dead. The thing. Whatever.

  Becker stared for a while. He tried to make sense of what he was looking at.

  The strange eyes, now fading in death. The narrow head and grotesque skin. Its flesh was already changing, fading to a sickly grey. Two gaping holes where the nose should be, the mouth...

  Yet, still so eerily familiar. Becker could not tell how that was even possible. From his dreams, perhaps. Was that it?

  He climbed slowly out from the dark cellar, leery of the others. Ted, Al, and Jeffrey. They were probably still running, though. He couldn't blame them.

  Becker touched his side. It was wet and sticky with blood. He kept his hand against the wound and moved out of the canyon as fast as he could. His breaths were long and slow by the time he reached the top.

  He could see two helicopters moving swiftly into the canyon from the west. He'd not heard them over his own ragged breathing.

  Along the railway again, toward his car. He felt lightheaded, knew he'd lost too much damn blood. Knew well how much that took before he'd collapse.

  He had a thought then, a memory.

  So fucking familiar...

  Then he saw his car and the thought carried away on the night's icy wind. He moved slowly toward it again, gun drawn.

  "Jeff?” He checked the woods outlining both sides of the dirt road. “Jeff!"

  The car's windows were busted out. Front and back. All four windows on the sides. They'd been having fun, Becker thought. Teasing their prey. Anger crawled through him.

  The shattered glass lay everywhere. There was blood on one of the back windows. A paperback discarded in the back seat, Jeff's Flyers bag in a heap in the front. The tire tracks of a second car were furrowed deep in the dark ground

  They'd taken him. Jeff's “brothers."

  Becker rested against the front of the car, blew his breath out in small grey clouds against the cold. The ghosts of Winter Quarter mine whispered in the distance. Or maybe it was the helicopters.

  Becker didn't know which. He didn't care.

  He just knew he had another boy to find.

  To be concluded in our next issue

  December, 2007

  Jennifer Pelland lives outside of Boston with an Andy and three cats. Her short fiction has appeared in several issues of Apex Digest, as well as Helix, Strange Horizons, Electric Velocipede and others. Her first short story collection is forthcoming this spring from Apex Books, and will include two previously unpublished stories. Visit her on the web at www.jenniferpelland.com.

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  Visit www.apexdigest.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.