Alien Taste (26 page)

Kraynak considered him, then slipped his PDA out
of his pocket, consulted, and muttered darkly. “There was a syringe found at the kidnapping site. Come on, kid, let's see what you can do.”

 

The clothing was a barrage of information. Death, illness, fear, dirt. They tumbled over Ukiah's senses in a rush. He picked out the shirt and handled it, closing his eyes against the room, to Kraynak's rasping, smoky breathing, to the musty air, the harsh overhead lights. He was his fingertips, and the cloth was rumpled pages of an encyclopedia. There was the blood from the head wound, fibers from a car's trunk, the crushed leaf juice from Schenley Park, the dry gray dust from the abandoned office building, sweat tainted with fear and then illness, deodorant and after shave now days old, vomit, and dirt.

Dirt.

Black oily dirt. He restlessly rubbed his fingers over the spot, then lifted it to his nose and smelled deeply, focusing only on the dirt. It was familiar. He willed the memory of it forward.

During their second year, when he was doing part-time work with Max, a child had gone missing, and he had tracked it cross-country to an abandoned lot. There, concealed by an overturned refrigerator stacked high with tires, he had found the boy's body.

On the steps up to the house, during the track across the dry, autumn landscape, and in the lot, there had been black oily dirt. It rained out of the sky from a local incinerator, so very fine that no one seemed to notice it.

He pulled himself up out of the focus and checked the other pile of clothes. Black oily dirt. He bolted for the door, shouting, “They're in Kittanning.”

“How do you know?”

“There's a tire incinerator there. The dirt gets on everything.”

“Ukiah, there's more than one of those things in the area.”

“Then I might be wrong, or I might be right. I have to go.”

“Ukiah, wait!” Kraynak shouted, but Ukiah left him behind, running down the halls of the police station.

He was out into the night and to his bike. He paused to flip out his phone and punch Max's speed dial number. It rang once.

“Bennett.”

“They're in Kittanning.”

“Damn, we're still over an hour out, and that's on the other side of Pittsburgh, like fifty miles out. You've got your gun and a jacket?”

“I've got my gun and extra clips. There's no time to fetch a jacket, Max. I have to go now.”

“Call me back when you find out where in Kittanning.”

“Okay. See you later.”

As he hung up, he heard a sound. He turned and made out Bear standing in the shadows.

“Kittanning,” Bear nodded. “Hex is the only one that makes Gets. He'll be there. It's been a long time since we've put our teeth in his face.”

Ukiah straddled his bike. “Then the Pack will be there?”

“They will have to be gathered together first.”

“I can't wait for them any more than I can wait for my partner.” Ukiah pulled on his helmet.

“Go. We'll be there when you need us.”

Ukiah peeled away into the night. Kittanning was up the Allegheny River, a straight shot on Route 28 with only a handful of red lights the whole way. On
his bike, late at night on the fairly smooth road, he could whip through the dark at 200 miles per hour if he pushed it hard. Only it left his backup far behind.

 

One blurred sign had read 43 miles. His speedometer read 180 most of the way. Fifteen minutes later he arrived in Kittanning. He rode the empty streets, nose to the wind, senses focused for the trace of Ontongard. When he found the building, he killed the engine and coasted into the shadows.

Max answered the phone on the first ring.

“I'm in Kittanning. They're in a building on the corner of Washington and Fifth, along the river.”

“I'm still at two-hour ETA to get there, kid.”

“I know. Call Kittanning and the state police and the FBI. See if you can get them out here. If nothing else, there's probably going to be some shooting.”

There was silence from Max, then, “Damn it, Ukiah, be careful.”

“I will,” he promised and hung up.
I promise to carefully get my ass shot off.

 

They weren't expecting trouble, and so he got into the door and through the first three Ontongard with ease. He cringed as he pulled the trigger, knowing in his soul that he was committing murder. As Indigo would no longer be her true, calm, loving self, these creatures were no longer human. They had been twisted and molded against their will. But he couldn't ignore the fact that they were like Pack. They were like Rennie and Hellena. They were like himself. He chanted to himself, “Don't wake the sleepers.”

Beyond the three there was a long hall and then a door opening onto a steel catwalk. He loaded a fresh clip, shoving the warm, mostly spent clip into his
back pocket. He moved out onto the catwalk, his pistol braced with both hands.

Ukiah's skin crawled as the short hairs along his arms and back lifted with awareness of Hex. He was here, the Ontongard's master.

Indigo was there too. They had her tied to a support beam, one arm free to facilitate the injection. She wore only his black T-shirt and faded jeans; they had taken her from her home, sleeping and waiting for his call. The one long lock of hair spilled forward, screening her face from them. She was still and seemingly fearless.

Ukiah spotted Hex as he reached the stairs leading down into the vast factory floor. He wore a white silk shirt, its left sleeve rolled up, and one of his Get was tying a tourniquet about the bared arm. The Get watched Ukiah come. Without looking himself, Hex drawled, “Get that dog. Do it as quietly as possible.”

Instantly the Get rushed toward him, a wave of bodies. There were too many of them. He emptied his gun as they flooded toward him and went down hard under their assault. A moment later they had him pinned on the ground, one pushing a shotgun over the others' shoulders to wedge the barrel tight to his head.

“Wait.” It was a quiet, calm command, but his attackers froze instantly, as if every muscle had locked in their bodies. Footsteps rang in the sudden silence and Hex came into view.

Hex was tall, thin to the point of gaunt, weirdly shaped about the head and face. His eyes were a solid black, no iris, no whites, just blackness. His hair hung black and straight, but it was stiff, as if it were of bristles instead of normal hair.

He studied Ukiah, then looked up to scan the catwalk, the building, maybe even the streets outside.
“You're alone. The Pack doesn't hunt alone. What are you doing here?”

Ukiah panted, trying to think and not to think at the same time. Pack memory told him that Hex might be able to read Ukiah's thoughts. A plan came to him and he shunted it away quickly, before it could be discovered.

The shotgun was cocked by one of his Gets, but Hex spoke as if he had the gun in his hands. “I'm told that this hurts immensely.”

“We know what you're up to,” Ukiah growled. “And we know you're screwed royally. We've decided to add to your misery.”

Hex sniffed, finishing tightening the tourniquet as if he were straightening a necktie. “You're bluffing.”

Ukiah forced himself to laugh. “She can't get it for you. The FBI doesn't have it. They never had it.”

Hex stopped, his head lifting to stare at Ukiah. “What are you talking about?”

“You screwed yourself good this time. You were so sure that the FBI had your toy that you've done everything but paint a bull's-eye on yourself. God, we've gone so long as your whipping boy, but now you've done it good. The FBI knows about you now. They hate you and they'll hunt you down like the monster you are.”

The Ontongard leader turned and walked away.

Ukiah thrashed against those holding him, straining to get closer to Indigo, to place himself between her and Hex. “You can make her into your Get, but she won't be able to fetch it for you.”

He risked a glance at Indigo. Her face was steeled to neutral. Her eyes flared with emotion when his met hers, pain that went deeper than any emotion he had ever seen register on her face, and then was gone, controlled and banished.

Hex returned, carrying a length of two-by-four in his hand. The Get holding Ukiah heaved him suddenly up and forward. “Doesn't have it?” He struck Ukiah with a casual backhanded blow across the face with the two-by-four. “Can't get it?” Again the two-by-four struck. “My toy?” A whimper of pain leaked out of Ukiah with the third blow. “Stop dancing around the pronoun and give the name.”

“The remote key. Janet Haze had it in the woods and lost it. Only she couldn't remember that, could she? You killed her because she screwed you to hell and back.”

The Ontongard leader stood looking at him, still holding the bloody two-by-four. It was quite possible, Ukiah realized suddenly, that he was about to be beaten to death with it. His eyes wanted to steal over and look at Indigo again, but he controlled them. He mustn't let Hex know how important she was to him.

“Shaw was in the park. He found it, didn't he?”

Certain that Hex could spot a lie, Ukiah kept to the truth. “For the first time the Pack controls the key.”

Hex looked down at him with what might be a glare. The all-black eyes made it hard to read. Into that silence Ukiah's phone chirped. It had chirped a second time when one of the Get pulled it from Ukiah's pocket and pressed the answer button.

“Talk,” Hex commanded.

He almost said his name, but swallowed it. “Yes?”

It was the Pack leader. “Where are you?”

Hex, hearing Rennie's voice, reached out and took it from the Get. “Shaw, you have something of mine. I have something of yours. I'm sure that you remember what I did to the last little one you were so stupid to Get.” An image flashed into Ukiah's mind and he almost vomited. A child served like a roast pig,
skin golden crisp and pulled back from joints, mint sauce on the side. “I suggest a trade. I'll even throw in an FBI agent. It seems I don't need her.”

Rennie's answer was clear. “Go to hell.”

The Ontongard leader held out the phone. Without warning the shotgun was placed above Ukiah's foot and the trigger pulled. The pain struck Ukiah with the noise, a deafening thunder and ring of the shotgun's report and the pain of dozens of pellets ripping his foot apart. Ukiah screamed, trying not to look, but his battered flesh reported the damage. His boot had been peeled away, along with much of his flesh. Bone was exposed to air, ripped free of flesh, and broken.

After Ukiah's scream fell to a whimper, Hex put the phone back to his ear. “He's a cute little puppy dog, Shaw. If I have to, I'll blow him full of holes.”

“I'm not far behind him, and I'll pay you in kind for anything done to him.”

“Growl, dog, growl. That's all you've done for hundreds of years.”

The Get, though, were moving. They produced a length of chain and secured Ukiah's arms and legs tightly, as he struggled weakly to get free. The chain was looped back to a support beam and padlocked there. One Get vanished and reappeared with cans of gel fuel.

“I'm done growling.” Rennie's voice was calm. “I'm going to tear your throat out.”

“Agree to the trade, Shaw, or there won't be anything to salvage of him.”

“You've gone mad if you think I'll trade the world for the life of one Get. Kill him. Scatter his ashes to the wind. You'll never see that remote key again.”

Hex flung the phone away. He turned and struck Ukiah with the two-by-four, again and again. Ukiah
writhed under the blows, trying to pull his chained hands over his head.

Suddenly Hex caught him by the hair, jerked him up to look him in the face. “Where is it?”

A pressure struck Ukiah full in the forehead. His mouth opened and the words rushed out. “It's in the tree—” He snapped his Judas jaw shut, biting his tongue deep in the effort.

Hex pulled him closer. “You know, don't you. Where is the key?”

The desire increased, like a scream of pain presses to be released. He fought the desire.

“You said ‘in the tree.' You will tell me where it is.” The alien caught Ukiah's chin and wretched his head up—locking their gaze. “Again. Where is it?”

At my home,
he wanted to scream,
with my moms and sister,
but he bit relentlessly down on his tongue. No. Don't tell. Never tell. Die first.

“Where is it?”

He howled, in pain for a moment, then it deepened as he found some secret refuge inside him. It was a wolf's howl of misery, of defiance?—no—a call to the Pack. He howled till the air was gone from his lungs. Then he breathed deep and started to howl again. Call the Pack. Call the Pack and they'll kill this torturer of cubs.

Hex growled and snatched the shotgun from his Get. He chambered a shell and shot Ukiah in the chest. Again. And again. And again until Ukiah lost count, pain and noise blurring together. When it stopped, the ringing of the report went on with the pain. Ukiah fought for breath, refusing to give in until he was sure Indigo was safe.