When he awoke, it was still light outside, but the light had shifted, and the muscles in his back told him that he had been asleep for several hours. He heard nothing from the other room, no talking, but through the window, he heard the woman call to someone, “Keep it down! They’re still sleeping in there.”
Gary’s ears pricked up. The drug had worn off once again, not a lot but some, and that, combined with the now painful hunger in his belly, made him acutely aware of the need to stay alert. He was hoping to hear more words in English, but either someone had said something or she had caught herself, because the next words out of her mouth were in that alien language.
So his abductors were sleeping here. To Gary, that meant that their ultimate destination was still a long way off, and they were planning to travel by night and sleep by day.
Which meant that they weren’t planning on killing him.
At least not yet.
He desperately had to take a piss, though he’d consumed no water or other liquid in probably twenty-four hours, and at first he thought he’d just go in his pants, maybe take a dump in there for good measure. That would show those bastards. They’d have to clean him up, find him some new pants, and maybe somewhere in the process, his hands or feet would be free enough for him to fight back. But the thought of it was too gross. Maybe they wouldn’t even clean him up and would just make him sit in it. He couldn’t take a chance on that. He’d puke.
At that moment, there was a change in the limited light that entered the room, a slight darkening of the day. Gary moved his head to the right—the only part of his body he could move—and saw the woman peeking through the window, checking on him. “I have to go to the bathroom,” he told her. “I have to pee.”
He figured she would have one of the men escort him to a bathroom or, more likely, an outhouse, but she nodded, went away and a few moments later limped into the room through the door. Without speaking, the woman crouched down next to him, unfastened his belt, unbuttoned his jeans and took out his penis. Pulling it to the right, she pointed the tip into a brown ceramic jar.Against his will, he was aroused by the touch of her fingers, and his organ stiffened into a partial erection. That made it harder to urinate but not impossible, and though it took a while, she held him in place until he was finished and then walked out of the room holding the jar. She’d said nothing the entire time, and while he’d felt mortally embarrassed even in his doped-up state, her face retained a completely neutral expression the entire time. He might as well have been a cow she was milking.
There were stirrings in the other room, and once again the smell of food. Onions with the meat, this time. Potatoes. Tired of waiting for an invitation, Gary yelled, “I’m hungry!”
There was what sounded like a discussion out there, and then the guy with the weird head came in. He didn’t tie on a gag this time, but bent down, held open Gary’s mouth and poured in a thick, syrupy liquid from a metal cup. It had the same earthy taste as the gag, and Gary wanted to spit it out, but he couldn’t move his head, and it felt like he was going to drown. The only thing he could do was swallow it.
Then he felt good, and his shackles were removed, and he was led out through the adjoining room into a kitchen, where he sat with his three abductors and another man he didn’t recognize, while the woman led them in an alien prayer and then served them plates of greasy meat and boiled potatoes. The food was horrible, but he had to eat, and he forced himself to keep the wretched repast down and not throw up.
The sun began to set as they dined, and by the time they finished, it was nearly dusk. Gary was led docilely to his seat in the back of the car as everyone else participated in a conversation he could not understand. He had no idea why they had kidnapped him, but he hoped they were taking him to wherever Joan was, although he didn’t know what it would mean for either himself or Joan if they did.
As before, the man who seemed to be the leader drove the car, while the same two sat on either side of him in the backseat. Out of habit, Gary buckled his seat belt. The rest of them, he noticed, did not. Maybe they’d get in an accident, everyone else would fly through the window; then he’d just unbuckle his seat belt, get into the driver’s seat and speed away.
The thought struck him as funny, and he laughed.
He was still laughing when the car struck a deer and skidded off the side of the road.
They had already traveled up the long slope, past the boulders, and were in the hills, out of sight of the ranch. He had no idea where the deer had come from or why it had leapt in front of the car. All he knew was that there was a jolting impact, the violent sound of metal buckling and glass breaking, and then a massive, heavily antlered deer was on the hood and the car was swerving sideways off the narrow dirt road. The men to either side of him were thrown against him, against the doors, against the seats in front. The driver had somehow managed to keep his hands on the wheel, even as a giant hoof crashed through the windshield to strike the dashboard, but it did him no good. The car still flew down an embankment, smashing into a rock on the way that for a brief second penetrated the rear passenger-side window, split open the bald guy’s head and splattered blood all over Gary.
Then the car was rolling over.
And then Gary was out.
Eleven
Reyn was awakened by Colin Clive maniacally shouting, “It’s alive! It’s alive!”—the obnoxious ringtone that Stacy had loaded onto his cell phone as a joke. He’d been meaning to change the sound but had not gotten around to doing so, and he swore this time that he would finally go through with it and switch to an ordinary old-school bell. He looked at the screen for the identity of the caller.
Brian.
“Hey,” he said, picking up.
“I can’t reach Gary,” he said. “You know where he is?”
Reyn yawned. “No. Why?”
“He’s been deleted. Facebook, MySpace, everything. Just like Joan. I’d be willing to bet his records aren’t in the school’s database anymore, either.”
Reyn was suddenly wide awake. “What?”
“Yeah. And get this: when I call his cell phone, I get a message that his number is no longer in service.”
“Where are you now?”
“I’m going over there to bang on his door.”
“Wait,” Reyn said. “Have you checked any of our Facebook pages?” He saw in his mind a sudden image of Stacy accessing her account… and then watching as the photos and text were eaten away and replaced by dead white space.
“No,” Brian said. “But hold on a sec.” There was a pause. “I’m still there.” Another pause. “You’re there.” Another pause. “Stacy’s there.”
Reyn’s voice was low and sounded more frightened than he wanted it to sound. “We were all listed as friends on Joan’s page.”
“Our pictures were on there, too,” Brian said.
“I’m calling Stacy,” Reyn told him.
“I’m heading over to Gary’s. I’ll call you when I get there.”
Reyn quickly dialed Stacy’s number, and she answered on the first ring. It was early in the morning, but she was already wide awake and exercising. He told her about Gary, and before he’d even finished she said, “What about us? Have we been deleted?”
“No. Brian just checked.”
“Do you think something’s happened to Gary? Do you think it’s the same people who got Joan?”