V05 - The Florida Project Read online

  The spoon ... He found himself using his left hand more and more whenever he ate. He knew from the lizards' occupation of Earth that it meant conversion was taking hold.

  He fought it, forcing himself to use his right hand whenever he slipped into using his left. At times it took a great effort of will to switch hands, but he always managed it, even when it left him weak and trembling.

  he picked up the spoon and poised it over the lukewarm green paste on the tray, consciously using his right hand. As he lowered the spoon, he began to shake. All he had to do to stop the shaking was put the spoon in the other hand, he knew, and the temptation was strong. But he wouldn't do it, even if it killed him.

  Holding his right wrist with the fingers of his left hand, he plunged the glop into his mouth and swallowed. The second bite wasn't quite so difficult, and soon he was eating with almost normal ease.

  Just as he was finishing his meal, the door slid open again. A man stood on the threshold—at least, he looked like a man. He was wearing a smock and had white hair and a beard.

  "May I come in?" he asked.

  His mouth full, Billy managed to get down the last of the green glop. "Why not?" he replied.

  The man entered. "Mr. Tiger, I am Dr. Morrow, the director of this scientific compound." He extended a hand.

  Billy declined to shake it. "Why are you holding me here?"

  Dr. Morrow slowly withdrew his hand. "We just want to conduct a few tests."

  "And when you're finished with your tests?"

  "What happens to you then will depend upon your behavior while you are our guest."

  "Guest! I'm a prisoner, a guinea pig for your experiments. How dare you call me a guest?"

  "Very well. You are a prisoner, Mr. Tiger. Does my calling you that make you feel better."

  "Yes, it does. You lizards don't seem to understand how important the truth is to a human being. If I pretended I was your guest and that you'd let me go if I cooperated, it would be a lie."

  "How do you know it isn't true?"

  "Common sense tells me it can't be. I know what you and your kind have done in the past."

  "That was the past," Dr. Morrow said smugly.

  "Oh, come on. Do you think I've forgotten that you tortured me in that conversion chamber until you almost fried my brain?

  I know you're a little disappointed that it didn't work, but that's just the breaks, I guess."

  "On the contrary. We are delighted that conversion didn't work with you, Mr. Tiger."

  "What?" Billy was taken aback just as he was getting wound up. "What did you say?"

  "I said that we are pleased that conversion didn't work in your case."

  "Explain."

  "Very well." Dr. Morrow paused, and then began to speak dramatically. "Because of your strength, your courage, your— intransigence, if you will, you have been chosen as the progenitor of a new race."

  "A new race?"

  "You will be its father, Mr. Tiger. And it will have the qualities that we admire so in you. Those qualities and more."

  "More? What do you mean?"

  "That will soon be evident, Mr. Tiger. Good day." Dr. Morrow stepped back through the door as it slid open to let him pass. A moment later he was gone.

  Imprisoned in his cage again, Billy realized that he might have just missed his best opportunity to escape. He had been so confused by what Dr. Morrow had said that he never thought of jumping him when the door opened.

  What could Morrow have meant? He, Billy Tiger, the father of a new race? Absurd.

  But the nonsense Morrow spouted had made Billy miss the best chance to escape he might ever have.

  Jack got his wake-up call at six o'clock, just as he had been promised. At least they weren't going to slip away without him. That little confrontation in Sabrina's house must have convinced Tyler that he could use Jack when the rough stuff started.

  After a shower and shave, Jack put on jeans and a work shirt, threw the rest of his things in a bag, and went down to check out of the hotel. He met Ham and Chris in the parking lot. They were riding in a four-wheel-drive Land-Rover with a rack on top carrying three canoes.

  "High-tech, Stem," Ham said as Jack threw his gear into the Land-Rover. "We'll drive in as far as we can go, and then we'll paddle the rest of the way. This way, we'll catch 'em by surprise."

  "I hope so," Jack said, worrying more and more about what had become of Sabrina. And, if the Visitors did have her, how they would get to her to bring her back.

  "Let's saddle up, boys," Tyler said. Jack got in and they drove to Alligator Alley, a road heading due west out of Fort Lauderdale. They seldom spoke, and when they did it was

  42

  usually to consult the map or express some other practical consideration. The sun rose steadily behind them as they cut across the swamps.

  It was almost eleven before they turned off the highway onto a two-lane road that led them, within an hour, to a gravel road whose banks sloped into the murky water of the Everglades.

  Chris was driving now. He had switched with Ham about ninety minutes earlier. As the tires crunched along, Jack became increasingly concerned. One bad decision and they'd be at the bottom of the swamp.

  "Take it easy," Jack said at last. "We want to get there in one piece.'"

  Chris glowered at him.

  "We don't have any time to waste," Ham said. "Keep driving, Chris."

  It occurred to Jack that he was dealing with two lunatics. He had read about resistance fighters in Ireland who wanted to keep on fighting even after the truce. And there was Jesse James, who kept on fighting for the Confederacy long after Appomattox. Maybe Sabrina had run off with some other guy, or maybe she'd done just what she said in her note. Of course, if the latter were correct, she should be home by the time he returned from this little adventure with two CIA men. If he returned. They seemed determined to take unnecessary risks. Unnecessary unless they were right about the Visitors.

  In any event, it was too late to back down now.

  "Ho-lee!" Chris slammed on the brakes. The Land-Rover swerved, the tires kicking up gravel.

  Jack shut his eyes, but not before he saw the police car careening right toward them. There was barely enough room for one car on this road, let alone two.

  The Land-Rover spun around. Jack saw Chris's cigarettes fly across the dashboard and out the passenger side. He said his prayers as the front end swung out over the muddy water.

  The tumult from the shouting, the roaring engine, and the crunching gravel ended even more abruptly than it had begun.

  V

  The three of them sat in breathless silence for a moment. A big man, wearing a broad-brimmed sheriff's hat and uniform, leaped out of the stalled patrol car and stalked over to the Land-

  Rover.

  "Where the hell do you think you're going, boy?" the sheriff demanded. "There's a speed-limit sign posted back ihere, says twenty-five miles an hour."

  "Right, Sheriff," Ham said. "But this is an emergency."

  The sheriff rolled his eyes. But when Ham produced identification, he began to look a little more attentive.

  "See-Eye-Ay—well, I'll be goddammed."

  The tension level dropped a bit, and Jack noticed for the first lime how sore his right shoulder and side were from being crushed against the vehicle door Ham had been fortunate enough to be in the middle, where he was cushioned by Chris and Jack. Jack got out and walked on the gravel, swinging his arm and stretching. After a minute he decided he was all right.

  "So what's the big emergency?" the sheriff asked. "Russians gonna parachute down into the 'glades or something?"

  "Worse than that, Sheriff"—Ham studied the officer's name tag—"Devereaux."

  "Some would have you believe you can't get no worse than that. What have you got? Cubans? Salvadorans?"

  "Visitors."

  The Sheriff had been looking off into the ominously dark growth blanketing the swamp. He did a double take. "Visitors? I thought they were all g
one."

  "That's what everybody thinks, Sheriff. And that's why they're doubly dangerous right now."

  "Well, that's a very interesting theory, Mr. Tyler. I don't think I buy it, but you seem to. I don't guess you were speeding through here just for the fun of it, so I'm not gonna give you a ticket. Somebody in Washington would probably just rip it up for you anyway."

  "Thanks, Sheriff." Ham started back toward the Land-Rover.

  "Not so fast, Mr. Tyler. I got a proposition for you."

  This time it was Ham who rolled his eyes. "And what might that be?"

  "Well, there've been some funny things going on around here."

  "What kind of funny things?"

  "People just up and disappearing. Dropping out of sight just like they were possums caught in a snare."

  Ham nodded knowingly. "That's our scaly friends at work, Sheriff."

  "You'd bet on it?"

  "Damn right."

  "Seems to me there might be some other explanation, but I'd like to go along with you for a while. See what you turn up."

  Ham and Chris looked at each other. Chris shrugged.

  "Sure. I guess we can use a little extra help."

  "Thanks," T. J. Devereaux said. "Now, let's see if we can get that rig of yours back on the road here, so we can get started."

  Her biological clock told Sabrina that it was almost time for her daily propaganda dose. She couldn't really be sure, since she had no way of telling what time it was or, for that matter; what day it was.

  The door to her pristine chamber slid open and Dr. Thorkel entered. He was a pleasant, bald man in his late fifties, whom Sabrina had met once or twice in a professional capacity.

  "How are you today, Dr. Fontaine?" he asked.

  "As well as can be expected."

  "Have you seen anyone being eaten yet?"

  Sabrina said nothing. The last time Thorkel had visited her, they had talked about the Visitors eating people, something which she had thought everyone knew about by now. Thorkel was oblivious to the truth. He wanted to believe that the Visitors were here to help mankind, even after all that had happened.

  "My dear Dr. Fontaine, I have seen things in this compound that are so wonderful. If we can obtain such knowledge from the Visitors, any minor misunderstandings between our two races must surely mean very little. For the good of mankind, we must cooperate with them, don't you see?"

  "Dt Thorkel," Sabrina replied, trying to remain polite, "you are being handed a bill of goods. You were here all during their attempt to seize control of our world, so it's understandable that you have been brainwashed into believing what they want you to believe."

  "Brainwashed? Has it ever occurred to you that you might have been brainwashed by the terrorists who've tried to drive away the greatest hope mankind ever had?"

  "I've never met a terrorist in my life. I worked in a lab where the senior scientists were taken away. They either came back spouting Friends of the Visitors slogans, or they didn't come back at all."

  "Perhaps a few were detained."

  "Detained? They were never seen again. They were lunch for a bunch of Visitors, most likely."

  Thorkel shook his head sadly. "The Visitors only want you to see the truth. If you persist in believing this nonsense, they'll have to assist you in learning what the truth really is."

  "Oh, Doctor;" she said contemptuously, "you make me ill. You've rationalized being a traitor to your own people. If somebody has to lecture me on the wonders of the Visitors' technology, let it be Dr. Morrow. At least he's working for his own."

  "He's working for us too, Dr Fontaine. Don't you see?"

  "No, I don't."

  "Surely as a scientist you perceive knowledge as universal. We must put aside our petty squabbles and work together for the good of intelligent beings everywhere."

  "Tell the Visitors to put down their weapons. Then we might be able to work together once they stop trying to exploit us and our resources."

  "I thought better of you, Dr. Fontaine. I had no idea you could be so insular in your thinking."

  Sabrina turned away. She had no further desire to speak to Dr. Thorkel, now or ever. She ignored him until he left her prison cell.

  just before the door whooshed shut, she heard something from outside her cell that chilled her. It was a horrible, wailing scream. It sounded half-human at best, a terrible, animal cry with the pathos only a man or woman could lend it. For the first time Sabrina wanted the door to shut, rather than hope that it remained open so that she might get away. At that moment she only wished to cut off that anguished scream.

  Her relief when the door shut was almost physical. She fell back on the bed, quaking in feat The sound she had just heard had affected her in a way she'd never felt before. An atavistic, almost animallike fear had gripped her.

  She never wanted to hear such a thing again, but she knew she would. They were always watching her, and they must have seen her reaction.

  Sooner or later; they would use it against her.

  Billy Tiger had heard the cries too. Sometimes the monstrous sounds woke him up at night. No attempt was made to shield him from it.

  A form of torture? Somehow Billy didn't think so. More likely the result of one of their experiments. But what sort of creature could make a cry like that? He rolled over on his stomach in bed, covering his head with a pillow. They could drive him mad with that sound.

  There was something familiar about it. That was what disturbed him most. He'd heard that voice a thousand times, it seemed, but not with this horrid, distorted quality. Whose voice could it be?

  He ticked off the people he'd known who had disappeared, and was certain it was none of them. He lay awake thinking about it for quite some time, and then at last he began to doze. In his dreams he was alone, just as he had been in the conversion chamber. The 'gators were after him again, but now he recognized them for what they were. They chased him through the corridors of the compound, baring their yellow, daggerlike teeth. He fought them, eluded them, surviving somehow in this place of horrors. He opened one door after another, searching for a way out.

  At last he came to a door behind which was darkness. This, he was certain, was the way out. But there was someone—or something—in there, blocking his way.

  He tried to fight it, but he couldn't. He saw it, and he screamed. He screamed again. And again.

  He awoke to the sound of his own screaming. And it was that very sound that froze his heart. For he screamed with the voice of the half-human thing he had heard outside the door.

  Riding in the sheriff's car, Jack noticed a sign saying that there was a Seminole reservation five miles farther up the road.

  "That's where Billy Tiger came from," T.J. said. "And that's where he ain't come home to."

  Jack looked at the burly lawman. "You say his girl friend called you about his disappearance?"

  "Yup. Worried as hell. The chief and his brother said he probably ran off with another woman, but she wouldn't swallow that."

  "People usually know when they're being jilted. But when things are going okay and somebody vanishes, you've got to be a little worried."

  T.J. took a packet of gum out of his shirt pocket. He offered a stick to Jack, who declined, and then removed one, shoved it into his mouth, and started chewing. "Them two CIA men are a pair beats three of a kind. Seems more like a married couple than partners."

  "They're close, all right." Jack turned his head and glanced at the Land-Rover following T.J.'s patrol car. "When you suggested we split up, I was relieved. Those guys are so used to taking risks, they do crazy things even when they don't have to."

  "Just a coupla fun-loving boys." T.J. chuckled. "Knew some like 'em when I was in the Army back in Korea."

  "Well, even though I know they have their uses, I'm glad I'm not riding with them anymore."

  "So long as we're in front of them, they can't drive too fast. Don't matter how fast they go now, though. We're just about there."

  T.J
. turned off the road, onto an even narrower one that seemed like a tunnel through the overgrown vegetation. The fronds and tree limbs were so low they often scraped the roof of the car. It was worse for Ham and Chris in the Land-Rover.

  At a small embankment, actually just a mound protruding out of the brown water, T.J. stopped and shut off his engine. Jack got out of the patrol car and stretched, peering into the midday darkness of the Everglades.

  "This is where Billy Tiger pushed his canoe into the water," T.J. said. "Nobody's seen him since."

  The Land-Rover pulled up behind them, and Ham and Chris joined them a few seconds later. Both of them were silent.

  "Now," T.J. said, "I might believe Billy ran off with a woman except for one thing. He's not the only one who's gone, and some of the other missing persons ain't exactly the most eligible bachelors around, unlike Billy. There was an old derelict named Walter Miles, who checked out about the same time Billy did. Trouble was, nobody was around to care about Walter. But he's gone, same as Billy."

  "So you're beginning to lend my argument a little credence," Ham said. "I knew you were a sensible man, Sheriff Devereaux."

  "Call me T.J. Everybody does."

  "We brought three canoes."

  "I noticed," T.J. said, slapping at a mosquito on his neck. "Jack and me can take one, and you boys can each have your own. We'll cover "more ground if we all go in separate directions. Then rendezvous back here at six."

  They unfastened the canoes and took them down. Chris went last, setting the sleek green craft in the water and climbing aboard without even getting the heels of his combat boots wet. His light brown hair streamed behind him as he paddled easily into the swamp. Ham was right behind him, and Jack carried the third canoe to the water and set it down. T.J. got in and told him to push.

  Jack pushed, soaking himself to his knees before he managed to get into the canoe. T.J. didn't laugh, but Jack sensed that he was amused to see how clumsy the famous ball player was off the field. Oh well, Jack thought. To each his own sport.

  After they drifted a few seconds, T.J. turned and asked politely, "Jack, don't you intend to paddle this thing?"

  "Oh." He supposed he would have to, since there was only one paddle and he was sitting in the back. He plopped the oar into the water, creating a splash that got both of them wet.