Dominant Species Volume One -- Natural Selection (Dominant Species Series) (36 page)

It took
her a couple of tries to do it, it was hard to move her eyes from one frame to
the next and keep her focus on the hideous head of the creature. By the third
try, she was playing back a jerky but viewable little movie in her head. As she
played it back, she could see the subtle difference in the head of the creature
from beginning to end. It seemed to twist and turn just slightly as if trying
to extricate itself from it’s own body. What she saw was an alien beast in a
torment so profound it wrenched her guts.

The ship
was an unwilling victim bent to the will of its exploiters.

“The ship’s
not just alive, Greenbaum. It’s aware—as aware as me or you.”

*
 
*
 
*

Mary
thought it was a dream and the image of Bailey drifting by the opening was a
mere component of it. When she raised up on her elbow, blinked and saw the big
bastard following Bailey’s ghost, she wasn’t so sure. She got up and looked
out the opening.

“Oh . . .
my . . . God . . .” she said.

There,
standing in front of Phil’s hole were Gilbert and Bailey, flanked by the
biggest, meanest big bastard she’d ever seen. As if that combination itself
wasn’t shocking enough, Gilbert and Bailey were dressed in the ugliest,
thrift-store clothing Mary had ever laid eyes on. Gilbert had on a light brown,
plaid sport coat with dark blue polyester slacks. His wide, blue tie lay over a
light blue checked shirt with a big, high collar. The sport coat was at least a
size too big on his thin frame. He was holding his Bible against his dick with
both hands. Bailey had on a mid-length cotton print dress with ruffled sleeves
and a button-down collar. Her shoes were brown lace-ups with thick medium
heals. Her hair was pulled back and done up in a not- too-neat little bun. She
couldn’t tell for sure, but it looked like she was wearing a strange hat or
tiara.

She
looked at her watch and confirmed her suspicions. She’d seen thousands of
similarly dressed couples throughout the small towns of rural America on this
day. From time to time in her younger life, Mary had been there herself.

She
didn’t know how or where, but it was Sunday and Gilbert and Bailey were going
to church.

The big
bastard hissed.

Phil
heard it and shot upright with a pounding heart. When he looked out the opening
and saw Gilbert standing there, the sense of malice folded over on itself.

He came
cautiously to the opening and slowly sat in it, keeping his eye on the big
bastard. This one was especially malevolent. Its arms were covered with
tattoos, stretched and distended. It fixated on Phil with its pit-like eyes.

“What is
this, Gilbert? What’s going on?”

“I wanted
to come by and say hello,” Gilbert said. “You know, just a friendly hello.”

Phil
doubted it. He looked at Bailey, and she grinned broadly, strangely, as if she
was on some drug.

“Hi,
Phil,” she said.

“Hello,
Bailey.” He kept looking at her head because he couldn’t figure it out, but he
finally did —the thing on her head was a little crown of thorns. A new bell of
alarm went off in Phil’s brain.

Something
had happened that was completely unforeseen. Gilbert had achieved some weird
change of status and Phil had no clue how. The thought occurred to him that
Gilbert had somehow converted the aliens to Christianity. He entertained the
thought just until he realized that Gilbert Keefer lacked the military or
economic force to achieve such a conversion on a pagan society.

“New
hat?” he said to Bailey.

“Yeah . .
.” she said pressing it gently in place with a hand. “It’s different, huh?
Gilbert’s idea. Isn’t it cool?”

“I’m not
nuts about it,” Phil said.

Gilbert’s
hold on Bailey was especially confusing and distressing. It made no sense.

“What you
think doesn’t matter,” Gilbert said.

I should
have killed him while I had the chance,
Phil thought.

“Why’s that?” he asked.

“You and
those like you will never have an opinion of any consequence whatsoever again. That’s
why.”

“I don’t
follow you, exactly.”

Gilbert
handed his Bible to Bailey, and stepped close enough to Phil so that when he
bent down, his mouth was close

to Phil’s ear.

Phil knew
he was in for an earful of little secrets from this lunatic. They liked that,
the mouth-to-the-ear stuff.
Nothing
better than a captive little ear to beat up with their psychopathic noises.

“Would
you believe me if I told you something?” Gilbert whispered.

A wash of
bad breath fell out of Gilbert’s mouth and onto Phil’s face. He resisted the
impulse to clamp his hand on Gilbert’s scrawny neck and crush it closed before
it coughed up any more shit. “I might,” he said.

Gilbert
swallowed before he spoke. “You are evil. What you think is evil. You are an
abomination.”

“Come on,
Gilbert, tell me what you
really
think,” Phil scoffed.

“You are
evil.”

Phil was
surprised Gilbert could say it with such conviction. Most things he said were
shallow and bereft of passion.

“Why do
you think I’m evil?”

Gilbert swallowed
again. “You said you wanted to . . . put your penis . . . somewhere. Isn’t that
evil?”

“You mean
fuck your ass? Is that what you mean? Oh, for God’s sake!”

Phil
admitted to himself that fucking Gilbert Keefer in the butt wouldn’t be fun but
he stopped short at the adjective
evil
.
Obscene, certainly, but not evil. Things evil were devoid of justice.

“I take
it back, then,” Phil offered casually.

“You are
evil and those like you are evil.”

“You said
that.”

“You make
a mockery of . . .” Gilbert swallowed “ . . . righteousness and those who
follow it.”

“Righteousness?”
Phil asked.

“That’s
right, righteousness.”

“I see
you’ve come up in the world,” Phil said. “How come?”

Gilbert
was finished with the close-to-the-ear stuff and stood up. “The lord has looked
favorably on me.” He threw a glance at Bailey. “And this one.”

Gilbert’s
bad breath fell out of his mouth like a warm, heavy vapor. Phil winced as if
he’d been struck.

Bailey
grinned again. “I’m the first of the manys and the mother of the thousand,” she
said, absently adjusting her
hat
.

“Huh?”
Phil said.

She
looked like such a ditz to Phil that he knit his brow in amazement. All that
was missing was a mouthful of snapping gum to complete the picture.

Gilbert
gave her a dark look.

“I said .
. .” she started.

Gilbert
cut her off.
“Be quiet.”

“You
doing her thinking, Gilbert?”

“Do you
know the road to salvation?” Gilbert came back quickly. Phil found the
ham-handed diversion amusing.

“What do
you mean by salvation?” Phil baited.

Phil knew
the conversation was inches away from the pretzel logic such men relied on for
mental sustenance. There was no way to reason with an irrational mind. A
rational mind needs, seeks confirmation like the returned kiss from a lover.
The irrational mind masturbates constantly and needs no such affirmation. But
that’s just what a purveyor of bullshit wants — meaningless communication;
meaningless like an empty fuck.

“Look, I
don’t want to play this game,” Phil said. “It’s childish.”

“The
Lord’s plan is not a game.” The sphinx said.

“No, I
guess not.”

There was
no reasoning with him; perhaps a low insult would drive him away. It was worth
a shot. “Go away,” Phil said. “Your breath stinks.”

Bailey
puffed a brief laugh that brought another dark look.

Gilbert raised
his hand and brought it down on Phil’s face. Phil saw it coming and stiffened
his head and neck for the blow, but he refused to block it. It jarred him and
stung, but he managed to keep his eyes glued right to Gilbert’s. He was pretty
sure he didn’t even blink.

“That didn’t hurt,” Phil
said in a mocking tone. It was childish, but seemed just the thing to say. Phil
almost laughed. It was funny to him.

There was a peal of sudden
laughter and all eyes turned toward it. Mary was standing just outside her hole
in the middle of the tube. When she waved enthusiastically at Bailey, Bailey
waved back and smiled.

“What are you
doing?”
Mary yelled down
and started toward them.

Bailey opened her mouth to
answer. Gilbert grabbed her arm. “You are not to speak to these people,” he
said. “They are an abomination.” He spun back on Phil. “Do you know I could
have you killed?”

“Is that right? But you
couldn’t do it yourself. Me, on the other hand, I could kill you without
batting an eye. Scram.”

Bailey drew her mouth into
an exaggerated
O
of alarm.

“Both of you, you make me
sick,” Phil said. “If your buddy Bruce, there, is gonna’ kill me, turn him
loose. I don’t give a shit.”

“How many friends and
relatives do you have on Earth?” the sphinx asked.

“Why?”

“I wonder how high and
mighty you’ll feel when you see them eaten alive by the wrath of God.”

“The wrath of God?”

“That’s right. God’s . . .
worms.” When he said
worms
the word
came out just slightly sibilant.

He knows,
Phil
thought.
The jackass knows.

“What are you talking
about?”

They’d shared little or
nothing with Gilbert about the mode of the attack, so Bailey must have told
him. She’d told him, and together they’d formed some kind of doomsday club and
donned the clothes and crown of thorns as some kind of weird-assed reaction to
Earth’s destruction.

“I mean that within days
an attack will begin on the Earth that will destroy all evil.”

“Now
that’s
original,” Mary
laughed.

“All
evil, huh?” Phil said, staring at Bailey. “How do you know that?”

“And you can’t
wait for it to happen,” Mary said to Gilbert.

“Because
God has planned it so,” Gilbert said, ignoring
her.

“But not
us,” Bailey piped in. “We’re the thousand.”

“The
thousand
what
?”
Phil said.

“Whores, that’s
what . . .” Mary said with a steely look at Bailey.

“The
thousand that will be left,” Gilbert said, cutting her off. “Your seed and the
seed of all evil will be purged from God’s kingdom.”

“But not
us, right my king?” Bailey piped in.

It was
funny. Sick but funny. Phil wanted to walk away from these deluded fuckers. It
was written that a thousand would survive the apocalypse. All you had to do was
believe you
were
one to
be
one. Well, here were two of them.

Phil
couldn’t resist. “So what makes you so sure you’re the saved ones?”

“I have a
guarantee,” Gilbert said, almost smiling.

“A
guarantee?”

“That’s
right.”

“The word
of God, right? It’s written right there in the good book, is it?” Phil said,
pointing at it.

“No.”

“No? Well
then how do you know?”

“I
believe.”

“Okay
.............
”

“I
believe our captors are honorable.”

“What the
hell . . . ?” Mary said.

“Pardon?”
Phil said.

“I said,
our captors are . . .” swallow, “. . . honorable people.”

“Oh. They
told you you’d be spared,” Phil said nodding his head. “Why would they do that?
And by the way, they’re not people—they’re monsters.”

“I’ve
made it all possible. It’s God’s will.”

“What?”

“As the .
. .” Gilbert swallowed with his mouth open,” . . . agent of God, I’ve made it
possible,” Gilbert said.

A flush
of concern rose up in Phil’s guts, but he pushed it back down with a cautious
finger.

“How did
you do that might I ask?” Mary wanted to know.

Bailey
couldn’t be stopped. “Oh, please king, let me tell it. Please let me . . .
please!”

“King?
What the fuck is this
king
shit?” Mary asked. Gilbert closed his eyes slowly then turned his back on
Phil, then took a step away and lowered his head. The phony drama was almost
more than Phil could stomach.