The Phenomenon, page 23
Keeping her voice low and calm, Sharon responded.
"And just what the hell does that mean? Any idea what building?"
"Oh yeah, I've got a GPS here been running, let me see..."
He pulled a small black square device out of a breast pocket before flipping up his goggles, his brown eyes piercing the darkness and gaining their own shine from the screen of the device.
"What did you mean by ‘buggered up’?"
"It's gone, totally smashed, destroyed, demolished like."
"Yeah... we've heard buildings coming down occasionally as time's gone by. You said they've been searching others? What building was this one, or the others?"
"Hold on, hold on... Signals pretty weak and things are slow, must be the coverage overhead from all these bloody skyscrapers..."
"I don't doubt it."
"Here we go here we go; things are loading up now. Looks like... some kind of municipal office building. I can't be sure exactly what offices, though; that info's only provided when the regular wireless network is up."
"And what were the others?"
"Some astronomy society HQ, a UN server farm, and the central library."
"Wait, the New York Public Library?"
"That's the one."
"Oh, now I'm pissed. Destroying books, what the hell? Are they goddamned Nazis or something?"
"I don't think it was them that's done it, Miss...?"
"Sharon Harvick, and yourself?"
"Sergeant Eldritch, Her Majesty’s Royal Marines, ma'am, at your service."
"Former Sergeant of the US Marines myself. You know, we're descended from you guys, so far as traditions go."
"Is that right? Well, I suppose I should treat you a bit like family, then?"
"Certainly not as an enemy, if you don't mind."
"Eh?"
Sharon nodded at his unholstered weapon, as he seemed to have forgotten he was holding it.
"Oh, righty-oh."
He put the weapon on safe and holstered it before addressing her again.
"Look, I'm trying to figure out what's behind all these demolitions, and why the giants are crawling over them like ants on an apple core. Everything I've seen points towards them operating on some kind of instinct, so I want to know what it is about destroyed buildings that attracts them. You're wounded, but you're no threat to me, I reckon, so the choice is yours. I can wait until their attention is elsewhere and take you back where I found you, or if you can keep up, you can join up with me and maybe act as an advisor. Seeing as how you're from here and all, you might have some insights."
~
Day 78
Captain Longmire, Cox, Emil and Sarya sat around the loading dock in silence. The crates were loaded. The APCs batteries had been tested and found adequate, and a small fire of shredded oil paintings from the 30s was smoldering under the armored fuel tanks, warming and re-liquefying the diesel fuel inside. No sign indicated that the Shards had taken notice; apparently what little noise they'd made and what little heat they created weren't strong enough to exit the well-covered loading dock and alert them.
All that was left was for them to retrieve Sharon, then load up in the APC and make their way back to the Oregon. Captain Longmire broke the silence.
"I don't think we should delay much longer. It's almost dark."
Emil raised his head, his eyes dark and resolute.
"No, we shouldn't. She's been out there alone long enough. We should get her and get to the Oregon as soon as possible."
"Emil, get yourself and Sarya into the cabin of the APC so when we get back, we'll just load up and be ready to depart. Cox, you get set to cross the street with me and grab up Sharon."
Cox nodded before putting on his coat, hat, gloves, and IR goggles. Longmire followed suit as Emil took Sarya out to the APC. Scarcely a minute later they could hear the muted clank as he gently pulled the hatch closed behind him, sealing them in for the time being. The radio crackled briefly as he informed them there was still no trace of the phenomena in the loading dock.
The Captain and his Master at Arms then exited the loading dock for the final time, leaving behind only footprints in the dust and the shriveled remains of Dr. Opperthorne. They walked around the APC and to the opening to the street. From there, Cox reached out a hand to Longmire, before whispering that he couldn't see Sharons heat signature. Longmire turned up the sensitivity of his own goggles, peering through the swirling snow to see if he could catch any glimpse of Sharon, but there was nothing.
We should still go over there, just in case she's moved behind cover.
"Aye sir."
With no further conversation, the captain and his Master at Arms once more secured their gear and made sure that nothing would shake loose in the crossing. Then the captain raised three fingers for a countdown, dropping one, then two. On dropping the third he and Cox crossed the road at a light jog. It was only a few moments of searching before they had some idea of the story.
"Sir, look..."
Cox clicked on a small penlight and illuminated the tiled floor, revealing that there were scrapes and footprints in the frost that covered everything. The scrapes seemed to originate at the couch where they'd last seen Sharon, and went around to behind the scenery. Small droplets of blood marked the spot where she had apparently waited.
The footprints came from outside the store, moving in a semi-circle around Sharon's hiding place, before moving in, then, the footprints move off, one full set of prints, left and right, and one incomplete set, a scrape and a left foot print, only, moving off, out of the store and down the street.
Longmire indicated for Cox to switch off the penlight.
"What do you think, sir?"
"Well, isn't it obvious? Sharon saw someone coming, a stranger, and not being in any condition to fight, she hid. It wasn't enough, she was found out, and then taken, willingly or forced."
"What's the plan, sir?"
"Nothing we can do."
"Nothing we can...!?"
"What do you want me to do? Compromise our whole mission to go searching for one woman who isn't actually involved?"
"Well, not when you put it like that, but, I mean, it's kind of..."
"She’s a tough one. I have no doubts she's planning an escape from her captor even now."
~
Day 78
Sharon looked through the small circular window of the restaurant and down the street at the ruin, crawling with the giants, their limbs unnaturally long and spindly. Looking around at the surrounding buildings, she suddenly had a realization.
"Hey, Eldritch, where are we?"
Sergeant Eldritch looked up from the MRE he was wolfing down at a table deeper in the dining room.
"Uh... I think Park Row?"
"You didn't spend much time in Manhattan before things went to shit, did you?"
"Er... no. I didn't come here until after."
"How the...? Never mind, that can wait. Do you have any idea what building that is?"
"No clue, love."
"It’s One PP."
"Excuse you."
"No, goddamnit, One Police Plaza, NYPD HQ."
"So..."
"So? So Somebody demolished one of the most important government buildings in New York, for chrissakes! And shit, I was just here!"
"What's that then? What do you mean ‘just here’?"
"After everything went to hell I made a tour, as best I could, of major government buildings, looking for some kind of surviving authority."
"And I take it from the way you're not involved with any of them that your search was fruitless?"
"Essentially. The FBI, NSA, and CIA substations were all vacant, all dead. One PP Still had survivors, but..."
"But...?"
"But the maniacs were running the asylum."
"The prisoners?"
"Right, the people who had been put in holding overnight outnumbered, overpowered, and took over from the police that were on duty overnight."
"So, exactly what would be the purpose in bringing it down?"
"I’m not sure. What now? I doubt you're itching to go join them in crawling the wreckage."
"Not a bit. But then, this isn’t the last wreck I'm set to look over."
"So, where next?"
"I'm not right sure, miss; I've been following the Giants from ruin to ruin, followed them here. I suppose we'll be following them elsewhere. But, this is the first time I've been able to watch what they're doing about the wrecks, so I'd like to stay and see just what they're on about."
~
Day 78
Cox closed the hatch to the driver’s seat of the APC as gently as he could. Hearing the gentle thud as the heavy door set into its mounting, the Captain clicked his radio twice, sending a signal to Cox, who turned the key of the APC to on, activating its electrical systems without starting the engine. Just enough for the captain to press the button to activate the hydraulics and lift the armored ramp and seal the rear compartment. This was the most dangerous part. The ramp was a noise making affair, and if there was a time that there was a chance that the things in the sky would take notice before the engine were cranked, it would be now.
Seconds after the hatch sealed with a deep metallic clang and the hiss of hydraulics, the armored exterior of the vehicle responded from the impacts of countless Shards. Without further signal, Cox pressed the ignition, the engine of the APC sputtering and coughing only twice before turning over and settling into a raucous growl. Cox eased the throttle forward as he released the brakes and the behemoth steel box began moving forward on its treads, heading directly towards the gaping hole in the rolling aluminum doors of the dock.
Chapter 25
Day 79
"Lost contact? What do you mean, lost contact?"
Dr. Lucinda Alvarez stood towering over her peer and erstwhile ally Lt. McGuire who, sitting with legs spread and arms draped over the arms of his chair, seemed singularly unperturbed at his declaration.
"We've sent a packet diverting the Oregon, but we've been unable to get an acknowledgement signal from them indicating they've received their altered orders. We've lost contact."
"Well, what does that mean? Do we send another op to DC? What about the Opperthorne research? What about..."
"Whoa whoa whoa... slow down. All it means is that we've lost contact. Now, it could be a glitch in the satellite, it could be a mechanical fault on the Oregon herself. We have thousands of different things that could muck up comms and we can only eliminate about a hundred of them with the resources we have."
"It was unforgivably stupid of us to put all our eggs in one basket. How could we be that stupid!? Shit!"
"Calm down, Doctor; we haven't. At last report, the Oregon was in the Atlantic moving south on their way to DC. Now, if it's just a glitch, then no harm done. If they're gone, we'll have lost Opperthorne's work but we could still use alternate resources to retrieve the Shard. There's no real scenario where we're 100% up the creek."
"Over 95% of humanity is dead, we're completely incapable of living on the surface, the planet is experiencing a supernatural winter in both hemispheres, and we've just lost contact with the couriers of the one slim hope we have of finding an acceptable end to this. How exactly are we not up the creek and paddle-less?"
"You haven't read through the rest of the files, have you?"
"No, not all of them. I came as soon as I read about the Schmitt discovery."
"Well I, for one, am very curious about why the Tall Ones are excavating all over the world."
"That doesn't give us anything we can use; it's a dead end.
"You're thinking like a doctor. That these problems are like a disease, that we need to find some agent or method of fighting them wholesale. But I'm a submariner, I fight wars in ever-changing three dimensional environments. I can't operate on one track like that. If we can determine what the goals of the Tall Ones are, what they want, it may enlighten us as to the course of action to take."
"I see what you trying to say, and I get it, I do, it's just... that course of action might reveal something to do about the Tall Ones. What about the Shards?"
"Are you really of the opinion they're entirely unrelated? That one is unconnected to the other and we ‘just happened’ to end up encountering two distinctly unnatural and possibly supernatural types of life within weeks of each other, completely coincidentally?"
"Of course not. That would be naive and ridiculous. That’s why we've continuously operated under the presumption they're connected."
"Then why suddenly worry if we lack progress in addressing one? Won't any line of research we take on either eventually converge and give us the solution for both?"
"Well, not any line of research, but... I see your point. It's just... we're responsible for the continued survival of the human race. It seems prudent to me to attack the problem from multiple angles."
"We are. Opperthorne, the Schmitt discovery, our continued observation of the Tall One's excavations, your research into the exact pathology of how the Shards kill has been continued and expanded upon to include those few remains we have from Tall One attacks..."
"And yet our primary tactic is still avoidance."
"Until we have actionable intelligence or some kind of new weapon, that's our best bet."
The door to the council chambers opened and a young Marine poked his head inside.
"Sir, Madam, there's a Naval ensign here that says he has an urgent matter to discuss with you."
"Send him in."
"Yes, ma'am."
A few moments later the same ensign that had delivered the news about Air Force One came in with a sheaf of papers tucked under his left arm. Two Marine MPs followed, taking position by the chamber doors.
"I'm sorry for the interruption but this couldn't wait. Sir, Madam Councilor, we've completed our initial investigation into the deaths of the previous council membership."
"And what's your conclusion thus far?"
"I'm afraid we've completely ruled out accident or happenstance. There's a murderer in the facility targeting people of authority."
"Do you have any leads as to who it might be?"
"Yes ma’am, we do."
At that, the MPs stepped forward.
~
Day 79
The world came back slowly. Everything was in a haze, sounds echoed and reverberated unnaturally. All she could see was the pale blue purple shimmer of the otherworldly figure in the center of the giants.
There was no pain.
Her broken limbs, scrapes, and bruises seemed to have miraculously healed. She could hear a deep and bizarre hum. The rhythm and tonal pattern couldn't seem to make up its mind. It sounded like every form of wind instrument being played on random notes and switching from instrument to instrument with a maniacal fervency from a deaf orangutan.
It lasted only a few moments before changing into a symphony of singular tones, each just as bizarre as the whole of the last. Some were so high Angela wondered that her ears didn't hurt, while others sent deep vibrations shaking through the stones under her legs and back.
She began to see other colors, lights, poking through the haze, pinpricks of silver light with shades of every other color tainting the edges.
She strained to focus her eyes, to make out greater detail, but her eyes refused to cooperate.
"Don't bother, it's not going to get any better."
Angela struggled to turn her head to find the source of the voice, but her gaze remained fixed and pointed at the glowing figure in the center of the room.
"Shhh! They'll hear you!"
A cacophony of laughter sounded out in response. A new voice spoke up from the pack.
"Oh, mon chere... they do not hear us. They cannot hear us."
"Why not? Are they deaf!?"
Yet again a different voice answered, in a thick German accent
"Zere is leetle zey do not zee or hear, but vee are silent to zem."
"Why, why can't they hear us, why can't I turn my head, or focus my eyes, what's happening?"
"Oh you poor naïve girl, haven't you figured it out yet? You've joined the collection."
"What collection? I don't understand, I don’t..."
"When you first came here, did you not see us, standing at attention round the chamber, staring at the center, just as you are now?"
Angela's scream did not echo, as her throat made no sound.
~
Day 78
The radio in Captain Longmire's pocket clicked, an indication that Cox, up in the drivers compartment, wanted to talk. Longmire pulled the radio out and, setting it a few inches from his mouth, spoke.
"Go ahead, Cox."
"So how do we do this, sir?"
"Well, I've been thinking about that. The river's frozen, so the dinghies are out, but the river's not so frozen we can take this APC down there direct.
I'm thinking we park right next to that little shop with the upstairs office Hardy used, wait a few hours ’til the things from the sky lose interest, then unload into the building. After that we do quick runs. Shore parties from the Oregon come ashore, we unload the crate’s contents and take them aboard through the forward torpedo hatch.
Each shore party can escort one of us back aboard as well. Sarya first, Emil, then myself and you go last Cox; that way you lived up to your promise. Does anybody have any objections?"
Emil raised his fingers off his knee.
"I'd like to go first."
"Why?"
"If there's anything wrong, if anything goes wrong... I want it to happen to me, not Sarya."
"Fair enough. Cox, you have any objections?"
The radio crackled briefly before Cox's voice came through.
"Only that we've got to move these crates again, sir."
"Ah, quit your bitching."
"Well sir, we're about there."
"Good. Back us up to about eight feet from the bodega entrance, then shut everything down."
Emil stared at the captain.
"Where do we go after we're aboard your submarine?"
"Our orders were to make for a port in South Carolina to deliver the Professor and his materials. I'm presuming that's still true but once we're underway I intend to report in, give them an update, including the information about you."
