Painless (18 page)

Chapter 40

 Calvin swelled with urgency. “I have placed three metallic cans containing a petroleum-derived liquid mix beside the lake, adjacent to the boat dock.”

What the non-aliens call gasoline
, Billy thought.

“I need the two mares to take two of the cans and pour the substance along the brush of the shoreline. Then bring me the third can,” he instructed in a calm, mechanical tone.

“What if we refuse?” Dana asked, defiantly wiping tears.

“Then I will shoot the stallion and the friend,” he said coldly. He wasn’t fooling around. Whether the danger he felt was real or imagined, he believed firmly in its imminence. Chuck nodded to the group, indicating they should follow the orders.

The women reluctantly headed toward the lake. Beth and Chuck exchanged glances. Chuck shouted to her, his words attempting to reassure that he would protect Carolyn at any cost, but that was already understood. Beth took one last look at Carolyn and Chuck, holding it for a moment like she was taking a photo in her mind.

Once the women were out of sight, Billy put on his reporter hat. “Who is after Carolyn?”

Calvin appeared distracted. “The trainers.”

“Who are the trainers?”

“Time is limited.”

“You need us to help you,” Billy took a stab. “We will help, but only if you tell us who you are and who is after us?”

Calvin looked as if he were weighing the possibilities in his mind, before arriving at the conclusion that he needed their cooperation for the mission to succeed. He ushered Carolyn out of earshot, but close enough to keep watch over her, then told them the sordid tale.

“I was a member of a group called Operation Anesthesia. On a recent mission, my male sibling, André, who knew about the outside, set up an escape plan. He had told us of the outside world, a place they can’t make you go on missions, where,” he looked at Billy and finally had a name for those he fought with, “your
friends
didn’t come back and could no longer be with their dam. We must not let that happen to Carolyn. They are looking for me—the logical response was to remain concealed, but I couldn’t stand the idea of the trainers getting Carolyn. I saw her on the …”

He tried to explain it like he was playing
Pictionary
, but struggled to communicate. Either he’d never come in contact with this outside world he spoke of, or he was a great actor.

Billy finally grasped what he meant. “Television?”

Calvin nodded, as if the term had come back to him. “Affirmative. I knew they would come for her. My dam told us that they recruit foals with the anesthesia from the outside like my male sibling, André. I was born inside the camp, as was my other male sibling, Bronson, who also escaped with us.”

“Everyone in Operation Anesthesia has CIPA?” Billy asked.

Blank look. He needed to speak his language.

“All the foals they bring to the camp have the anesthesia?”

“Affirmative.”

“How did you escape?” Chuck asked.

“My squad was on reconnaissance mission to 31.41 degrees north latitude—53.49 degrees east longitude—city: Yazd—country: Iran. We followed André’s lead. He fired on our own squad and trainers. A sandstorm reduced visibility. The helicopter went down, allowing a window of opportunity for escape. I learned on the television that our squad was captured and terminated,” Calvin talked in text-bookish ways, giving latitude and longitude coordinates of a place, more like a computer than a scared kid. But his emotions were human; Billy could see the regret of leaving the others behind. Like Carolyn, he could feel pain on the inside.

Billy felt like his head would explode. If Calvin was telling the truth, his “squad” were the Iranian hostages! As Calvin continued to tell the story of Operation Anesthesia, Billy put the puzzle pieces together. And when the puzzle was complete, Billy couldn’t believe the picture it painted. Calvin was part of a covert operation that kidnapped CIPA children, trained them like robots at some camp, and then marched them into potential suicide missions.

As insane as it sounded, the premise was built on logic. Those afflicted with CIPA could withstand drastic temperatures and rugged terrain. And with a quick glance at Calvin’s shoulder wound, Billy saw firsthand how they could take punishment beyond the normal human. Billy’s gut told him that Calvin was telling the truth.

“Did you work for the United States Government?” Billy asked.

The questions began to overload Calvin’s computer, and he started to fluster. “I don’t know.”

“Where is this camp?”

“I don’t know.”

“Was it hot or cold? What language did the trainers speak? How did you get from Iran to New York?”

“I can’t sense temperatures, we were trained in numerous languages, and by hiding on cargo ship,” he methodically answered the questions, before flipping a switch to raw human emotion, “Time is limited!”

“Where are your brothers now—your male siblings?”

“I only have the ability to identify the location of Bronson. We are applying a tactic taught by the trainers to restrict the number of contacts. Only Bronson can identify André’s location, and only André can identify my location. A triangle.”

“Then where is Bronson?”

“45 degrees north latitude—70 degrees west longitude—city: Montreal—province: Quebec—country: Canada—continent: North America.”

“Why Montreal?”

“Bronson thinks if we don’t have the anesthesia anymore, then the trainers won’t need us. He is searching for a cure, but André informed him it would require a miracle. Our dam told us the story of miracles—miracles are located in Montreal.”

“How do we know you aren’t still working for this Operation Anesthesia, and you are just using us to get Carolyn?” Chuck asked, looking ready to drop the gloves if he received the wrong answer.

“Operation Anesthesia trained Anesthesia soldiers to be assassins. If I wanted to harm you or Carolyn, it would have already occurred.”

Good point.

Beth and Dana returned, carrying a red gas can. Beth immediately ran to Carolyn and hugged her.

“Mission accomplished?” Calvin asked.

“Do I
not
smell like a Mobil Station?” Dana snarled at him.

Calvin coldly pointed his gun at Chuck. Billy knew it was a bluff, but it was effective. “Yes, we poured the gas just as you said,” Dana conceded.

“Now I need the stallion to go into the trees and transport my motorcycle.”

Chuck began walking, no longer questioning the orders. Carolyn naturally followed, but Calvin grabbed her. “Carolyn stays with me.”

Beth then ran at him, punching, kicking and screaming. “You leave my daughter alone, you bastard!”

Billy could tell he couldn’t feel the punches, just like when they fought at the beach. But that didn’t seem to bother Beth. It took both Billy and Dana to physically restrain her.

Chuck returned with the motorcycle, which Calvin had hidden in a pine tree at the edge of the woods. He was either really good with bodywork or had stolen a different one after Billy had mangled the one at the beach. Calvin removed a backpack from the motorcycle and strapped it to his back. He then ordered Chuck to place the motorcycle inside the cabin.

Carolyn looked disappointed; she wasn’t going to get a ride.

Billy didn’t grasp the strategy. He thought they were going to get out of Dodge before the aliens showed up. But Calvin was hunkering down. This was going to be their Alamo.

Calvin took the gas can and soaked the cabin, inside and out.

 
What was he doing?

Chapter 41

“They are going to come from the water,” Calvin stated in a self-assured tone, aging decades right before their eyes.

He moved toward the lake, leaving the others behind. Except Carolyn, who he wasn’t letting out of his sight, or reach. When he returned, he asked Carolyn for one of her sparklers. The smiling girl handed him one, along with a safety-first warning. She then provided a spirited, “Sparklers are fun!”

Calvin then gathered his troops, who didn’t know what or who to believe, but had no choice but to follow. “Our best weapon is surprise. They don’t expect me to be here, and don’t expect you to have knowledge of what is going on. Recruiting squads are small and mobile. Quiet in—quiet out. The element of surprise is on our side.”

With his eyes, Chuck encouraged everyone to play along. Billy seconded with a slight head nod. He knew Calvin was right; if he wanted to kill them he could have done it without the drama. And if he were just a lone lunatic who forgot to take his meds, then they would have to stall long enough until the authorities arrived to investigate the fire he was about to start.

Calvin grabbed Carolyn and again headed toward the water.

Beth followed. “Wherever Carolyn goes, I go!”

Before the inevitable confrontation occurred between the two of them, the sound of splashing water pierced the quiet night. Light footsteps followed. If they weren’t on paranoid alert, they never would’ve noticed.

Calvin turned toward the dark night and fired his gun. It echoed loudly, causing everyone to jump. A dark silhouette fell to the ground. “It’s an aqua squad,” Calvin uttered matter-of-factly and then fired again. Another body fell.

Dana screamed. Billy and the others were too stunned to move or speak. Calvin lit the sparkler and tossed it toward the aroma of gasoline. “Move back!” he ordered, as the edge of the lake lit up like a fire fence.

Calvin reached into his backpack and pulled out...
a grenade!

He removed the plug and lobbed it out into the water. A boat lit up with an explosion. Then he tossed another. “They are coming by boat. Likelihood of five divers and a trainer, two are down,” he robotically rattled off.

They retreated backward up the lawn, away from the firewall. Another silhouette dashed through the flames, continuing to run toward them with its body ablaze. It looked like those gruesome suicides that were infamous during the Vietnam War. Calvin aimed and fired. The fireball dropped to the ground.

Billy winced. Based on Calvin’s story, it was probably a once-innocent CIPA kid who just got gunned down. Just like Carolyn. Kidnapped at a young age and trained to kill. Not even feeling the fire.

Calvin lobbed two more grenades. The explosions ripped through the night, and sparked retaliatory gunfire from the boat. Machine-gun fire pelted the coast. Another fireball of a man—or child—ran through the fence of fire. Calvin again coolly gunned him down, as he was trained to do.

Flames began to surround the entire meadow. The crackling of wood indicated that the fire had spread to the forest. The thick smell of fire was sweeping through like an invading militia, and breathing became a challenge. Carolyn didn’t do well in the heat with her fevers, and looked like she was going to wilt.

“We must get to the cabin,” Calvin talked over the sounds of war.

 They ran across the burning yard, surrounding Carolyn like a fortress; she was precious cargo. Bullets sprayed. Then Chuck fell to the ground like an anchor.

Beth ran to him—he was bleeding near his neck. “Get down,” Calvin ordered without emotion.

Like a trained physician, Calvin methodically examined Chuck. Pulse—heart rate—breathing—vitals. He referred to his eyes as “orbs” and used “pelt” to describe his skin color. More horse terms.

“It’s only flesh—carotid artery not hit,” he delivered the news in a mechanical style.

It wasn’t life threatening, but what was behind them was. They swiftly crawled to the cabin. Then the bullets suddenly stopped, which meant one of two things. The good being, the soldiers cowered and ran from the scene. The not-so-rosy scenario was they had come ashore, plotting to finish the job. From the look in Calvin’s eyes, Billy knew whatever they did in the next few moments might determine their futures.

They ducked inside the gasoline-smelling cabin. Billy couldn’t take his eyes off of Calvin, who appeared numb. He’d seen that look in the mirror. Calvin had come to the literal and figurative end of the road.

“Operation Anesthesia has retreated, but this is not the end,” Calvin addressed them, sounding sure. “The trainers will regroup. They will seek Carolyn until she is captured, just as they will with my siblings and myself. They always taught us that failure is not an option for Operation Anesthesia.”

Calvin knelt beside Carolyn. This time Beth didn’t object. They were now on the same team.

“It was a pleasure to meet you, Carolyn, but we now must go our separate ways.”

Carolyn’s face saddened. “You haff to go?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Whataya say, that instead, we ride motorcycles,” she tried to negotiate.

He smiled, but couldn’t mask the sadness in his face. A tear fell from his “orbs.” He was part raw emotion and part machine. “I must go now,” he said.

He took off a necklace—a replica of the rose he had tattooed on his arm. He draped it around Carolyn’s neck like a gold medal ceremony in the Olympics. “This will keep you safe.”

“It’s pretty.”

“My dam used to say to me that beauty is freedom and freedom is life. May you remain free on the outside.” He then kissed her on the forehead. Billy wondered if his mother would do the same when he would leave the camp to go on a mission.

Like a chameleon, Calvin metamorphosed from a childlike creature that inspired a heartfelt smile from Carolyn, back into a rugged soldier. He robotically motioned to Beth. “You and the other mare transport Carolyn to your vehicles and wait for instructions from the stallion and the friend.”

“Call me Chuck.”

“You can keep calling me friend,” Billy said, “and for the record, your brother Bronson is wrong. You don’t need a cure, there is nothing wrong with you. The people with the problem are these trainers.”

Calvin nodded with understanding.

Carolyn tried to negotiate to play with Calvin for five more minutes, before Beth and Dana whisked her away. She looked back and waved, a sad, droopy wave with a glum face to match. She knew this was the end of the road.

Billy was confused as to what would happen next. Then it became clear—

...and horrifying.