“I don’t think you’d ever locate it. If you…got lucky, I think is the expression?—touching it would probably cause instant death for both of you.”
“You sure we need him? I swear I’d as soon take him out and shoot him.”
“Let him go, Dave,” Ethan said. “Whatever he was…he’s on our side now.”
“I always was. I swear, I—”
“Shut your hole,” Dave told him, and he was tempted to loosen the preacherman’s remaining teeth, but he released his grip and stepped back. “So what do we do?” he asked Ethan.
“We go on when we can. I believe the Gorgons are curious about where we’re going. The queen probably would like to know, because she must understand we wouldn’t be out in the open unless it was vital. And we have to find fuel soon, I think.” Ethan put his hand on Olivia’s shoulder, and when she looked into the strange silver eyes she saw not the coldness of space there, but the warmth of compassion. “I’m truly sorry about JayDee, and I’m sorry I couldn’t help. It was what he wanted and needed to do, whether we agreed with it or not. We have to go on as soon as we’re able.”
“You mean when I can see shit through this glass,” said Hannah. At least she had two headlights now, though the right one burned dimmer than the left.
“Yes, when you can see shit,” Ethan replied. He went along the aisle to the seat he’d left, but before he got there Nikki stood up. She was afraid of him now, really afraid, because she understood he was not the Ethan who had left the bus with John Douglas. She knew he wouldn’t hurt her—he saw that clearly—but still, there was the strangeness about him that she could not quite manage to handle anymore.
There was a tear in her eye.
“You took him away,” she said, “and you didn’t even let him say goodbye.”
“It was time,” he explained in a quiet voice. He watched the tear roll down her cheek to her chin, and the beating heart within him that kept the blood flowing and all the systems in operation felt heavy with grief, that this girl had held onto the human Ethan as long as she could and now she knew she had to let go. She had lost so much already. The images in her mind were horrific and tragic. He touched there only briefly and lightly, and then drew away, because his duty was clear.
“He understood that I’m ready,” said the new Ethan.
“I don’t. I never will. It was cruel not to let him live.”
How could he make her see that without his power, the human Ethan would’ve been dead long ago? That this thing of great cosmic importance—call it cruelty, yes—must be done to bring the end of a war, and for a race to survive?
He couldn’t. “From this point on I’ve got to be in total charge of the body and mind. The reflexes, the nervous system…everything. I can’t share those with him, Nikki.”
“Don’t speak my name.” She recoiled from him, even standing still. “You creep me out.”
There was no possible reply to that. It was the plain truth, plainly and truthfully spoken.
“I’m going to sit over there,” Nikki told him, and she turned away with what might be a shudder and went to sit directly behind Dave.
Ethan returned to his seat. Through his window, he saw that the rain was stopping. The storm had passed, but there would be others.
Hannah started the engine, turned on the headlights, and tried the wiper. The motor still made an ugly sound, but the blade was keeping the glass inset clear. She doubted it was going to hold up very long scraping across all that metal. “I guess we can move on. Everybody ready?”
No one answered.
“Giddyup,” said Hannah, speaking to herself in a raspy whisper. At a slow crawl, she put distance between themselves and the body that lay over on the westbound lanes.
They had to find a gas station, and soon. The good thing about the interstate was that, even crossing the Rockies, there were many exits and many gas stations with diesel for the long-haul truckers. It wasn’t but about another twenty minutes before the headlights made out an exit—an entrance ramp, really, since they were still traveling in the eastbound lanes—and when Hannah asked Dave if he wanted to try there he said, “Yeah, go ahead.”
Hannah pulled the bus into a truck stop. There were still some abandoned rigs and cars in the lot, and who knew what had happened to their owners? It didn’t take long for Dave’s flashlight to find that both of the stop’s diesel tanks had already been uncapped and emptied, so Hannah went on down the road to a Shell station. Again, the diesel tank had been drained. Dave recovered his hose and came back into the bus, and told Hannah to drive on.
On the other side of the interstate was a Phillips 66 station. Beyond it the headlights picked out the shapes of a few small houses in a little community, all dark. Ethan smelled the foul, sickly-sweet odors of rot and pestilence coming from one of the houses. It was something the others could not detect. “There are Gray Men here,” he said.
“Don’t stop, for God’s sake!” said Jefferson, his eyes wide. “Let’s get the hell out!”
“We’re needy, gents,” Hannah said. “Gas gauge is lookin’ sorrowful. What do you want to do, Dave?”
“Damn,” he answered. Hannah had pulled the bus to a halt under the station’s roof that overhung the two diesel pumps. Dave felt the flesh at the back of his neck crawl; he had no doubt that if the alien said there were Gray Men here, it was a fact. “How many?”
“I can’t tell. More than one, for sure.”
“Jesus!” said the preacherman. “Why are we still here?”
“Your call, Dave,” said Hannah. “We’re burnin’ fuel, just sittin’ still.”
“We shouldn’t stay,” Nikki said. Her voice quavered. “Really. We need to get out.”
“Olivia?” Dave prompted. “What do you think?”
She shook her head, her face still drawn and downcast. “I don’t know. I’m not thinking so well right now, but if we’re stuck without gas further on…it’ll be bad.”
“Right.” Dave was loading a fresh clip into his Uzi. His hand shook a little, but not too much. It had to be done. “I’m going to check first to see if the tank’s empty or not. Ethan, will you come with me? I may need some protection.”
“Yes.”
“You’re crazy!” The shine of fear sweat was already on Jefferson’s face. “Those things will smell us! It’ll be like the dinner bell ringing!”
“Just sit tight.” Dave slid the loaded Uzi into its holster. “Back in a minute.” Dave and Ethan took both flashlights out. Rainwater dripped from the roof, which slanted precariously to one side. It didn’t take but fifteen seconds for their lights to fall upon the yellow cap of the underground diesel tank. It was still in place and looked to have been undisturbed.
“Cut the engine,” Dave told Hannah when he and Ethan returned to the bus. “Jericho, I need your help.”
“Not me, I’m not getting out there! I’ve got two broken fingers, thanks to you!”
“Listen up! The faster we get this done, the better! We don’t have to fill the tank. Just get us enough to make it further along. Come on now, put your balls on.”
“No way!”
“Hell, if he won’t help you I will!” Hannah got up from behind the wheel. She already had her hogleg Colt in hand. “What do you need me to do, Dave?”
“I need you to stay right here and take a break. You’re the driver, not the mule. Jefferson, get your mule-ass off that seat!”
“I’ll do what needs to be done,” said Ethan. He already knew. Dave needed somebody to cover him while he did the work of popping open the fill cap on the tank and using the hose and hand pump to bring fuel up into the containers. He just needed Jericho as the mule to help carry the stuff out there.
“Here.” Dave loaded the Beretta and held it out to Jefferson. “Can you use one of these without shooting your pecker off?”