The Black Seas of Infinity (8 page)

Suddenly I was overcome with a sense of calm.
I had come this far. Everything was going to work out. They had no
idea what they were dealing with. I just had to keep moving. The
greatest danger was in getting captured.

Finally, the sun started to rise. Not yet
visible, its coming was evidenced by the slowly bluing sky. I
switched off my KC lights. The trail ahead narrowed into a rocky
crevice, a narrow passage hewn out of the rock walls by millennia
of long since dissipated water. It was nothing I couldn’t pass
through, but the narrow valley and large rocks meant I would have
to slow my pace to a crawl. At five miles an hour I rumbled
forward, the leaf springs creaking as they compressed and
decompressed. The whole thing was like a concave rut. I scuttled
down slippery rocks, the Jeep tipping perilously to and fro. The
Jeep leveled out briefly, and then started a slight ascent, the
tires grinding and slipping over uneven boulders. Good thing I
installed a locker in the rear. A little added insurance. I also
had a winch on the front, just in case. I lumbered up the other
side, the trail finally opening up into a more stable dirt
path.

A little farther through the woods, and I
could see another road just a few feet ahead. I didn’t really have
time to slow my pace. Hopefully I was far enough away from the base
to be written off by any onlookers as someone doing some
off-roading. I was sure they would put it all together at some
point, but by then it would be far too late. Then again, if this
were state owned, they wouldn’t want me here after dark. The trees
parted, and I bounced out onto the shoulder of the road. I stomped
on the brakes and scanned right and left. This was getting strange.
There was nothing but a long, flat roadway extending in both
directions—double lanes, and perfectly visible with my
amplification of the pre-dawn light. Apart from the slight mist
wafting upwards at the far edges of the roads, nothing moving. I
leaned out the left-hand side and peered up into a dark sky, just
starting to metamorphose from black to blue. Stars shone brightly,
some twinkling, hinting at some deeper mystery. But that was it. I
concentrated on listening. Some mammal burrowed in the dirt,
several squirrels scampered up trees, branches whispered softly in
the wind. Nothing human. I didn’t like this at all. I pushed down
on the gas and powered forward. I sped across the highway and
climbed back up onto the trail.

What is waiting for me? I can’t even plan
what to do about it if I don’t know. The Jeep bounced back and
forth as the trail grew courser, but my mind was elsewhere, racing
through the possibilities. I heard a distant sound, and my
concentration was wrenched back to the present. It was a
helicopter. I could hear the blades cutting the air and the high,
thin whine of the motor. It approached. Suddenly, shafts of
brilliance intersected the trail in front of me. I pushed the
headlight lever in. Stupid! I should have done that sooner! My
amplified sight meant there was no need now that the first light of
dawn had arrived.

If they have any sort of advanced listening
apparatus, I’m screwed! The spotlights were now probing the trail
immediately behind me. They hadn’t quite found me yet. I sped up
and kept to the trail. The Jeep jarred violently, disagreeing with
the coarse terrain, but now I had no choice. If they found me, the
vehicle was lost regardless. The spotters cut a swath across the
path in front of me. If I wanted to hold onto this Jeep I had to
get off the byway. I tapped the brakes and swerved into the tree
line on the left. The beam of light swept right past where I had
just been, continuing on before quickly drawing back. It flowed
slowly over the same dirt path, the intense illumination growing
hazy as it hit the trail, the floating motes of dirt rising
incriminatingly. It passed back and forth several times before
finally giving up. Almost instinctively I held my breath before
realizing that was a human reflex, and thus impossible now.

After ten or fifteen minutes—it was hard to
tell—I shifted into gear and re-entered the trail. Soon I heard
another helicopter approaching in the distance. This one seemed to
be homing in on me. They probably had listening gear and night
vision goggles. Maybe infrared as well. They were definitely
picking up the sound of the vehicle, and if I parked it, they could
still locate it by the heat of the motor. Fuck! I didn’t know if
this body generated heat as well. It hadn’t in experiments, but
with an occupant it might be a different story. But I had no
choice. I pulled off the trail, shifted into neutral, and stomped
on the parking brake. Leaving the motor running, I jumped out.
Maybe that would buy me a little time. I started jogging, roughly
parallel to the trail. I made it about 150 yards when in a quick
backward glance I saw a spotlight singling out my Jeep. I stopped
for a minute and watched. A bright white strobe burned down on the
vehicle, blurring the sharp edges.

Moments later they were screaming demands
through a bullhorn. A rope dropped from the helicopter, and men
started to descend. They wore full riot gear, body armor and all. I
started running again. This body never seemed to tire, and I could
reach incredible speeds. I should have been relying on this all
along! I was traveling faster than the Jeep, and my trail was far
less noticeable. There was no way I could anticipate everything, so
taking the Jeep had not been a bad idea. But I just should have
ditched it hours ago. I kept my hearing trained on the receding
commotion while sprinting alongside the trail. At my current speed,
I would reach Virginia before too long. It seemed unlikely they
would make out my sound from the other animals in the woods. I
didn’t pant for air, and I seemed to have precise control of my
stride, conscientiously softening the blow of my footfalls. They
contorted around piles of pine needles, skipped over hidden
gullies, and hurdled debris. I heard the sound of guns firing.
About five minutes later, the Jeep engine shut off. Soon, very
soon…I just needed to get through this tricky stretch. I kept
running.

After a little while the helicopter floated
away in a fading din of thumping air, growing inaudible in the
distance. The other sounds of the woods took over, filling the
vacuum with moving animals, insects buzzing and clicking, and the
constant grind of pine needles crunching under my feet.

About twenty minutes later, I started to hear
a new sound. People—probably soldiers, with dogs—and at least two
helicopters, most likely searching with spotlights and infrared.
But they were all far away. The strength of this body, not to
mention my performance so far, was starting to boost my confidence.
I had no scent, gave off no heat, and was black. Real hard to find
in a large, wooded area. The dogs posed no threat. The most they
could pick up was the rhythm of my footfalls, and I was too far
away for that. It wouldn’t be long before I reached the car. With
it lay my hope of an easy escape. Then a thought crossed my mind.
If they followed me too closely, or anticipated my trajectory, the
clearing wouldn’t be too difficult to discern. The safest option
would entail me circling out into the woods and back in an attempt
to throw them off. Veering off to my left, I descended a slope and
ran deeper into the forest. A wall of reeds abruptly manifested
between the trees, and I tore through them, splashing into a muddy
pond below. Insects buzzed around me, and my pace slowed as my feet
started to slip in the muck. I tore out of the reeds and landed on
another dirt trail.

Pausing for a moment, I listened. A swarm of
gnats buzzed around me, but there were no sounds of pursuit. I
started jogging up the trail, the soft sand crunching beneath my
feet, a gang of tiny toads leaping out of the way to safety. The
sky was now growing bright, and I could almost smell the freshness
of the morning air. But that was just a memory. I couldn’t actually
smell anything. Something whizzed past my head and exploded. I
jerked to a stop and looked around. I could hear laughter in the
background. A kid, maybe ten years old, wearing a white T-shirt and
jeans came running over the crest of the hill. He was clutching a
mess of bottle rockets and yelling back to his friends. As he
stumbled down the slope toward me, his head came around and he
froze. His jaw dropped open as the bottle rockets fell limply from
his hand. Letting out a hoarse yell, he started to scramble back up
the hill, his feet slipping on the pine needles, kicking up dirt
and causing him to crash chest first into the ground. A couple of
his friends peered over the crest and froze, eyes wide in
disbelief. I must have looked like something out of a horror movie.
These kids were probably in grade school, for fuck’s sake. They
immediately dropped behind the hill, stumbling backwards, trailing
the sounds of their screams. The fallen boy had managed to scramble
back to his feet and was quickly disappearing over the ridge as
well. I decided it was time to look for that four-wheeling trail
again. It was doubtful anyone would believe the kids, at least not
at first, but some skeptical adults might come to check it out.

My sense of direction had improved slightly
with this new body. I would still be guessing, but I seemed to have
an inherent sense of my geographic situation, as if I had a
built-in GPS now. I ran up the hill and to the right, out of sheer
coincidence following the same path taken by the fleeing children.
I bobbed and weaved around tree trunks and underbrush, my feet
scouring pine needles with machine-like precision. The forest
abruptly ended in a wall of tall grass and bushes, the top bathed
in the bright morning light. I slowed my ascent, decelerating into
a trot as I cautiously approached the edge of the trees. I peered
through. The yellowed wild grass beyond waved softly in the wind,
rising and falling like a body of water. It covered a large,
circular plot. As I looked around the meadow, every direction
appeared the same. Then something drew me toward the far end. I
tried to focus, but it was slippery. A buried premonition. I
strolled through the grass, the beckoning tips brushing against my
hard shell of a body. Something darted across my foot. I couldn’t
see it, but I could feel it. Even more fascinating, something told
me it was a small mammal. But like the ephemeral pull toward a
direction, I couldn’t quite grab onto anything, and by the time I
noticed a presence it was already gone. I stepped out of the weeds
and into the far tree line. Just ahead I could make out the gurgle
of slow moving water, followed by a strange urge to advance toward
it. The ground rose up in a steep incline. As I scaled the hill I
climbed over a large fallen tree, the soil promptly falling away in
a downhill cant before leveling out into a small bank. It bordered
a shallow stream, the earth giving way in rough chunks to a
rain-carved gully. The tops of large rocks glistened up from
shallow depths, the walls descending layers of packed clay, scraps
of half-buried mica gleaming in the morning sun. I jumped down into
the stream and started wading, the water reaching only as high as
my knees.

After half an hour, the barely existent trail
crossed through in a slump of degraded mud walls and trampled
vegetation. I climbed up the embankment, using exposed roots to
pull myself aloft. The woods were thin here, the white slats and
red bricks of buildings visible off to the right. A few feet ahead
a chain link fence bordered the tree line, revealing a small street
that lay just beyond. Had it been summer the vegetation would have
provided better cover, but as it was the sparse leaves and bare
branches left me dangerously exposed. This would have been a good
time to have the Jeep, something to shield me from prying eyes. I
tried to stoop down as I passed, but it only slowed my progress. I
would just have to move quickly.

Before long, the trail thinned out as it led
into a clearing. I could hear voices speaking harshly, and it
sounded like police or soldiers. Are they here for me? Hiding
behind a thick tree, I trained my hearing.

“I don’t know? Big! A monster!”

The voice was thin and high, a child’s
voice.

“Fan out, encompass the area.”

That last voice sounded deep, filled with the
grating self-assurance that came with a lifetime of giving
orders.

Fuck me!

I glanced around. The trees seemed to thin
out on my left. I crouched down and ran in a stoop, stopping at
every tree and trying to remain out of sight. I glimpsed a flash of
black cloth in the distance. That would be some special squad,
maybe Navy Seals. They apparently aren’t taking any chances! I ran
faster, the trees suddenly breaking away as I spilled out onto a
poorly maintained lawn, the weeds rising mid calf. Freezing in
place, I swiveled around, desperate for somewhere to hide. Several
hundred yards away was a squat, ranch-style house. Focusing in, I
scanned the close wall. It looked like the rear of the abode. It
was straddled by a small porch, with a screen cloaking a glass door
beyond. Windows sat on both sides. The place looked empty, with no
sign of movement beyond the red curtains. I ran toward the portico,
the lawn falling away in a shallow depression before quickly rising
again in a steep hill as it approached the house. The window on the
left was a small kitchen aperture. The one on the right was much
larger, offering a view into the living room. Quaint and simply
furnished. Best of all, it appeared to be empty. Stumbling up to
the screen door, I pulled it open, stepping in to face the glass. A
quick tug and it slid back. That’s small town living for you,
leaving doors unlocked on an empty house! At least I hoped it was
empty. Glancing around, I spotted a small fireplace, a hall heading
toward the front door, and an opening on the left angling to what
looked like the kitchen. Just past the white floral couch on the
right were several closed doors. I headed toward the far door. Just
as I cracked it open, into what looked like a guest bedroom, I
heard a voice.