SODIUM:1 Harbinger (11 page)

I sat just staring at his attempts as the blood dripped from my shrapnel encrusted face and a single line of blood made its way down his. Bull fired one more round and we heard it make an impact and then the rocks stopped. We waited a full 30 seconds and then Bull decided to check to see if the demon was still alive before he popped up himself. He took out a handkerchief and wrapped it around a stick and then poked it up above the rock. The demon took the bait and again started its barrage of stone missiles with the first one striking the stick and handkerchief decoy dead on.

All I could do was stay behind cover, lying on the ground as the debris from each shattering stone filled the air all around us. Bull made a move towards the end of our defense wall and the rocks followed him, shattering on the boulder wall just above his position. We were trapped and it was now inevitable that we would be overtaken.

As a distraction I poked my bat up and down and moved it from side to side. That strategy only worked for a few throws before a direct hit on the bat almost knocked it from my hand. I entertained thoughts of having one good swing at this beast if it got close enough to me, but I knew the chance of that was slim. The demon was smart. It had been adjusting its attack all along the way in order to counter our every defensive change. And it was intelligent enough to try to trick us into coming out when it had stopped its barrage.

The rocks continued to shatter behind us and we were soon forced into covering our faces from the debris in order to protect our eyes. I had no doubt that it was the end for us. The thrill of the hunt, which I had latched onto earlier, seemed like a curse that was going to inevitably do us in.

I didn’t want to die, but it seemed I had no choice in the matter. Bull was attempting to get an angle on the demon by moving as far away from me as he could. All it was going to do was to allow the demon to focus on him with his .45 as I sat helpless towards the other end of our defensive line.

As the demon closed to ten yards the angle of the rocks began to change with each one now starting to come in at a downward slant. This made it even more difficult to protect ourselves as with the new angle the beast had also slowed down its throwing speed. The result was that the rocks were no longer shattering, but were instead now bouncing around between the boulder and our wall in front. My thoughts then turned to the fact that I was now going to be stoned to death. Bull had already taken four hard hits and was showing the pain from each of them.

As a last effort to try to distract the demon so that he could get off one last shot I began to pound the bat on the ground just hoping the noise would be enough. It worked, but not before the last rock it heaved in Bulls direction bounced and caught him square in the forehead knocking him nearly unconscious.

As the first several rocks now began to bounce around my end of the wall I knew the end was upon me. My demon hunting days were over. Then, in an instant, a barrage of gunfire erupted from the flats! I could hear clear impacts on the demon!

It was the girls! They had doubled back! The rock throwing ended as the shots continued. In what was probably the quickest decision I had ever made in my life I jumped and ran over to Bull. I picked up his .45 and popped up from behind our rock wall, just in time to see the demon recoil as another one of Allie’s rounds cut through its outer shell.

I fired off a round from Bull’s cannon of a gun and put a large hole square in the middle of the beast. A spray of demon bits exited the other side as the recoil from the .45 shook the gun from my hands and onto the ground. This happened just as the girls were reloading. And even though I had made a dead center strike on the beast with a .45, it continued to function.

With that one hit the adrenaline was now pumping through my veins and I felt as though I could now take it on hand to hand. I looked down towards my bat lying beside me. I wanted to reach for it, but it seemed that time was standing still.

The demon was on the defensive and instead of throwing rocks it sprayed out a green mist. It then turned back towards me and jumped. In one bound it cleared the ten yards between us and landed on the rock directly in front of me. With its next leap it went up and over the large boulder behind us and I could hear it continuing to run as it bounded away.

I recovered Bull’s .45 and then looked back towards where the girls had been standing. They both backed up as the green mist descended upon the area around where it had been sprayed. As I watched I could see the bits of demon that had been blown off of it by our gunfire beginning the dissolve. Also, any grass and other organic matter that was in the mist seemed to disappear before my eyes, all that remained was dirt and rock.

I could only reason that as a defensive move the demons cleaned up after themselves, leaving nothing behind for an enemy to make use of. It would seem to be a very effective and well thought out strategy. It was evident that they had done this before.

The girls circled around the remains of the mist and made their way over to our position. Bull was now sitting upright and although he was aware, he was still groggy. Allie nursed the cut on his scalp and Susi wet a handkerchief with water from her canteen and began to clean my face.

She then pulled a pair of tweezers from her pack and began to pick the larger bits of rock from my skin. It was painful, but the adrenaline coursing through my veins made it tolerable. I had gotten my revenge for the shrapnel when I blew the hole through the demon. I viewed my battle scars as nothing more than a badge of honor.

There were now two new heroes to thank. After a few minutes of nursing Allie decided we had better get out of the area as there was still one more of the aliens roaming about. We gathered our stuff, donned our packs and made our way out of the ravine.

We had another two hours to go to get to Laurel Lake and only about three hours of daylight left. We would need time to set up a defensive position once we arrived as we could no longer just camp out in the open. We would also want time to tend to our wounds and to get food in our bellies, our energy was running low.

We had not eaten anything since our dry lunch the afternoon before. Fatigue would not be our friend if we were going to be fighting for our lives. And fighting for our lives was exactly what we were doing. We reached our previous campsite at Laurel Lake and Allie went looking for small game while I attempted to fish.

I no longer feared death by the demons as I had now been to the brink and had survived. I was not sure how Bull felt. After winning our small battle I felt it had brought out a warrior in me that had been fast asleep deep down inside.

Before casting into the lake I had decided to give calling Minhafa another try. I knelt down on a rock by the water’s edge and smoothed the water gently while repeating “Minhafa” three times. I looked around afterwards and was let down that seeing my spirit protector earlier was really just a coincidence.

As I cast into the lake I hooked a nice fish. After reeling it in I then looked up, there on a rock 500’ away, stood a proud and mighty mountain lion. I was emboldened with a strong feeling that it was indeed Minhafa and that it would be watching over me, ready to come to the rescue should the need arise.

The girls had protected me today, but as a superstitious chap, I took comfort in knowing that my spirit protector was also watching. It was just too much of a coincidence that it had appeared to me again after I summoned it, and then before again on that day by the river. Little did I know how true those thoughts would be. I returned to our camp with three large fish in tow and a big grin on my scabby face.

Chapter 9

We decided to stay at our previous campsite by Laurel Lake. It offered open expanses going out several hundred feet to the woods. And there were almost none of the horrible baseball sized rocks lying around. To our back we had the lake. If the demons were to attack us here they would need a new strategy.

With our limited amount of daylight remaining we gathered an abundance of sticks and branches which were just dry enough to burn on our fire. We built a defensive rock wall with stones large enough to not easily get knocked away by thrown rocks and we set up several fires that we could use to keep our perimeters lit up.

We took a few minutes to inventory our ammo and the count was much lower than desired. Bull brought a box of 50 .45 cal rounds of which he had used 24. Allie and Kyle each had a box of 9mm rounds with 61 remaining. Since we had been using Susi’s .22 for hunting she was down to 28 as she had only begun with half a box. We would have to be careful with our ammo. Other than our guns we were left with my ball bat, Bull’s bear bow with four arrows, a small hatchet on Bull’s pack and several hunting knives.

We would not reach the area where the meteor had fallen previously for another day and we would then have at least one additional day after that to make it back to any civilization. If we were able to find and free Kyle we would try for Cherry Lake Dam in hopes there would be a telephone there.

The others had a forlorn look to them. I was still all hopped up on the fact that those were aliens out there that we were fighting with and we had beaten them back once. I was also excited that I had a secret weapon waiting in the woods should I really need it. I had convinced myself that Minhafa was real.

Allie returned with another rabbit and along with my three fish we had our first full hot meal in several days. We needed every bit of it as our energy levels were all low after slogging through the rain and fighting with the demon. Our lack of sleep was of no help either.

When I offered up the fish I told the others of my Minhafa sighting across the lake. They all brushed it off as coincidence. I took it as a sign that it was there to watch over me. A week before I would have called anyone who thought such a “nut case”, but that wasn’t what I believed any more.

As we sat around the campfire we talked about the skirmish with the rock throwing demon. It looked as though they were not equipped with any weaponry other than being able to heave heavy objects at us, to make use of the tools on their legs or to spray that green fog we had seen in our last encounter.

We talked about how the girls had managed several hits on its body with the 9mms and how I had the one shot that blew a hole straight through it, yet it was still able to turn and flee. We reasoned that perhaps I had missed anything critical or maybe they were just that tough. We had no way of knowing.

The one thing we were sure of was that we had done enough damage or had at least offered enough of a defense that it knew it was time to leave. I reasoned that perhaps it was scared, if it was possible for a machine to be scared, and it decided to cut its losses and run. I was thankful that there had not been two of them together or we would have surely been overwhelmed, loss was not an option. Going forward we would have to be careful as we moved about, always looking for cover or for a good defensive position.

I was fascinated by the intelligence we had seen displayed by a machine. These things could think on the fly as well as any of us. Even though our little group was now at war with them, I had a strong desire to want to meet the makers of the machines face to face.

I pondered how interesting and exciting it would be to talk with a being from another world. What other technology did they have? Flying cars? Force fields? And rockets that could reach other planets… my mind was consumed with thoughts of what we might learn from galactic travelers.

But none of that really mattered while we were at war. They had outright attacked us and possibly even kidnapped one of our own. The answers to my many questions would have to wait until such time as we came in contact with a live alien.

As my mind continued to wonder I imagined dunking a live alien repeatedly in the cold mountain water or threatening to burn out their eyes with red hot coals. That was, if they even had eyes. If the stories from Roswell were true then their eyes would be big and black. I imagined them telling me everything I wanted to know after I worked them over with my bat. Maybe that was just a bit of my short attitude coming through, I wasn’t sure, but it was exciting to think about it as it fed into my already excited state.

Bull interrupted my alien daydreams by telling me to hit the hay as he and Susi were taking the first watch. We might as well start early so we could maximize our sleep. With about six hours sleep in the last two days I did not foresee bedding down early as a problem. As I lay in my sleeping bag I once again began to think about the aliens and what might lie ahead for us. The fatigue took me down in only a few minutes.

I was awakened by Bull at 1AM. Allie was up and Susi was fast asleep. Bull had let me sleep over the hour after several failed attempts to wake me at midnight. I thanked him for giving me the extra rest and then pressed him to get some sleep of his own.

Bull had a nasty knot on his forehead from the ricocheting rock and a small cut on his scalp. The knot was still prevalent, but shrinking and the cut had scabbed over. It was the first time I ever thought of Bull as being vulnerable. It seemed he was human after all.

When the girls had tended to our wounds at the end of our demon skirmish they had taken the time to remove all the small pieces of rock imbedded in my lower face. It was painful, but they managed to get every little piece. I then washed my bloody face in the lake before dowsing it with iodine from our small med kit. I was not in need of an infection on top of my other injuries.

The rock debris was not deep into my skin, but it left me with a face full of small scabs. I thought at the time it was just a few more minor wounds to add to my long list of maladies from the trip; two near drowning’s, almost falling 60 feet into a ravine, bruised ribs, bee stings, rope burns, a broken wrist bone and a list of other bruises. The scabby face was just icing on the cake.

Had I been lucky or was I really just that tough. I preferred to think the latter and if anyone asked, that was what I would tell them. And to top it off I had taken on an alien machine with nothing but a bat.