Forests of the Night

CHAPTER 27

The one at the valve had finished his job, and Nohar could hear the hiss of the methane.

The creature had half-turned toward him when Nohar heard a soft "phut" from the hole behind him. A small tube had planted itself in the folds under the creature's chin. There was a bubbling groan from the creature, and it raised a flabby white arm to the tube stuck in its neck.

Three more "phuts" and similar tubes embedded themselves in the other aliens. There was a shuddering moan from the first one. Its arm had stopped halfway to its neck. There was a tearing sound as the pink clothes gave way and the thing collapsed into a shapeless white mass. There was a clatter as its eyes, fake plastic orbs, rolled off the mound of shuddering flesh. A pair of pink dentures followed.

The others collapsed as well.

They weren't dead, so much as reverted to some natural state. They still moved, though in a shuddering, rhythmic fashion—occasionally throwing out a multitentacled pseudopod from their mass, only to be reabsorbed into the mound of flesh a moment later. They now looked like the amoebic form of life Manny had described.

Isham came through the hole behind Nohar and went to the valve on the cone, shut it off. She was talking to herself. "... cave dwellers, lots of heat vents and volcanic activity. Dim red-yellow sun, thick atmosphere, probably high gravity. They could survive very FORESTS OF THE NIGHT

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heavy acceleration. Could have ridden in on a nuclear rocket not much more advanced than our own. Gems are probably synthetic ..."

Nohar hadn't realized how tightly he was holding the shotgun until he tried to drop it. His hands didn't want to move. "Damn it, Isham. Where did you come from, and what took you so long?"

Isham squatted and was looking at one of the quivering mounds of alien flesh. She poked it with the end of an air rifle she was carrying. The white flesh rippled like a water balloon. "We were staked out at Midwest Lapidary 'headquarters.' NuFood seemed too small to rate notice. Our team got word from

the DEA. Mc-Intyre and Conrad have been two steps behind the Zip-perheads all night, ever since the rats jumped a cabbie at the airport. They radioed your message, and my team had to scramble all the way from downtown. I was point, got here about two minutes after you did—"

"What?" Nohar had spoken too loudly. He was suddenly out of breath and felt faint.

She activated her throat-mike. "Aerie, this is Bald Eagle—nest is clear, send the Vultures in with the cleanup. We need a local ambulance, with our own medics. Out."

She stood up and looked into one of the niches in the wall. She reached in and took out a diamond. It glinted red facets of light.

"I had to tape them just in case the drug killed them. Otherwise, their rapid decomposition would be hard to explain to Washington—"

"You were there." Nohar was fighting alternating waves of pain and nausea.

"All that time?"

She tapped a lens hanging off her belt with the diamond and dropped the gem back in the niche. "Two meters behind you. All the way through the building." Nohar sighed.

"That D ammo acid information was vital. But you threw the tac-squad for a loop. We had stunners, but we wanted the 'franks' alive. And because of you, we

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discovered the trank we were using wouldn't have worked right on their biology—"

Nohar looked at the pulsing forms of the aliens. "What'dyouuse?"

"The only thing I had access to, flush. It's a symmetrical molecule. Probably use the same stuff, wherever they come from."

Talk about poetic justice. "What happens now?"

"The cleanup crew'll be here in about three minutes. They'll pack these things up. The Fed will take over the processing plant here, keep them alive. If we're lucky, these will lead us to any more covert cells these guys have set up in the country. You do understand this is a national security matter. These are not aliens. This didn't happen."

The Fed and its passion for secrets. It was becoming difficult to remain conscious. "What about the Zip-heads, and the politicians?"

"The DEA has the Zipperheads, They can have them. The MLI plot was designed to unravel, so we'll let it unravel. WeVe done extensive computer searches into MLI's background, much more thorough than your hacker friend. These things seeded a money trail that leads back to the CIA. It's going to look to the vids, and everyone else, like this was just another rogue Agency operation—" Nohar sucked in a breath. "You're not really FBI, are you?"

Isham smiled. It didn't look like a grimace this time. "Only on loan."

"Just let the CIA take the heat for this?"

"That's what it's for. The CIA's designed to take the heat for the NSA, the NRO, and a half-dozen other organizations in the intelligence community. We'll gladly let them fall to the wolves to keep this bottled up. Justice will prosecute a good percentage of Congress, Congress gets to flay open the CIA. Executive hits Legislative, Legislative gets back at the Executive—"

Nohar leaned back on the curved concrete, ignoring the sudden dagger of pain that erupted from his leg. it was just too much effort to stay upright.

"Checks and balances, right?"

"The way it works in practice anyway."

"What about NASA's deep-probe project?"

"Congress will scuttle them. The NSA will black-budget them, launch, and eventually, we'll find out where these things come from."

Nohar closed his eyes. It felt like he was losing consciousness. "We're going to do the same thing to them, aren't we?" "Not my decision ... "

Figured . . .

Nohar slipped into darkness.

It was Friday, the 26th of August, and the weather was deigning to cool down a little. That, and it looked to be the first week of August with no rainfall. Nohar had just closed the deal on Manny's house, and he was feeling emotionally exhausted.

He sat down on a box in the center of the empty living room and looked at the comm. He wanted to call Stephie, ask her to go with him. However, he couldn't muster the courage—he'd been avoiding her ever since he made the decision to leave this burg. He knew if she said no, he wouldn't leave. And staying in this town would kill him. Too many memories.

He sat on the box in the middle of Manny's living room, realizing he was going to do to Stephie the same thing Maria had done to him. That decided it. He was going to call her.

He had just reached for the comm when someone at the front door rang the call button.

Their timing sucked.

Nohar grabbed a crutch and hoisted himself up to his feet. He was getting good at maneuvering with the cast. He managed to get all the way to the door with-

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out bashing it into anything. He didn't bother with the intercom. He just threw the door open.

There she was, carrying a huge handbag, smelling of roses and wood smoke.

Nohar fell into the cliche" before he could stop himself. "I was just about to call you."

There was a half-smile on her face. "Oh, you were? IVe been looking for you ever since you left the hospital. You moved out of your apartment—" "Transferred the lease to Angel—"

Stephie nodded and patted him on the shoulder—the left one where the fur had come back in white. "You going to let me in?"

Nohar stepped aside and let her through. She surveyed the empty living room and sighed. It echoed through the house. "So you're moving out of here, too—how is Angel, anyway?"

"She's lucky rabbits are common. They had skin cultures to match her. The fur on her legs is white now, but she can walk. She got a job."

The concept seemed to shock Stephie. "As what?"

"Cocktail waitress at the Watership Down. A bar on Coventry—"

She pulled up a box and they sat down, facing each other.

"So how are you taking things?"

Nohar slapped his cast. "They had to weave some carbon fiber into the tendons, but the cast comes off in a month, and with a few months of exercise—"

She shook her head. "That's not what I mean and you know it. You're still blaming yourself for Manny, aren't you?"

That hit home. "If—"

Stephie put her finger on his lips. "I talked to Manny a lot about you. He was your father for five years, and because of school you ran away to Moreytown and joined a street gang. When your gang got involved with the riots and you found out what your real father FORESTS OF THE NIGHT

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was, you ran away from them. Now you're going to run away from this life, right?"

Nohar shook his head. "I can't live here anymore . . ."

"I suppose not. But you aren't going to run away from me. I won't let you." They sat, looking at each other.

"I suppose not."

She smiled and shook her head. "At least he doesn't object. Well, I got myself a new job, demographics for Nielsen."

Nohar had a sinking feeling. He forced a smile. "Great. Where?"

"Santa Monica."

Nohar was speechless for a moment, and she seemed to enjoy his reaction. "You knew I was going to California?"

" 'California is a lot more tolerant,' " she quoted,

"Where did you hear that?"

"Those rodents had more than drugs and guns at that motel. The white one left this on the comm." She reached into the overlarge bag and pulled out a ram-card. Nohar noticed the bag kept moving when she took her hand out of it. The bag emitted a slightly familiar smell. "Seems to be a copy of whatever you had on permanent storage on your comm. I was going to give this to you when you got out of the hospital. But you slipped out without telling me. So I played it."

Nohar took the card wordlessly.

"That Maria is one stupid cat for walking out on you."

"No, she isn't."

The handbag was still moving. Nohar couldn't hold it anymore. "What the hell do you have in the bag?"

Stephie broke into a wide grin. "I still remember that line you gave me in the parking garage, about your cat."

Another thing Nohar wanted to forget. He sighed. "Yes?"

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Stephie reached in the bag and pulled out a small, gray-and-black tabby kitten and handed it to Nohar. Nohar had to collect himself enough to cup his hands under the little creature. It barely fit on his palm. Nohar watched as it stumbled a little, disoriented, and circled around. Then, finding the new perch satisfactory, it curled up, closed its eyes, and began to purr.

Nohar stared at the little thing in his hands, "Damn it, Stephie. That isn't playing fair."

"I know."

She began scratching the little thing behind the ears.