Alien Rites (4 page)

“No.”

“No?”

“Didn't sit right. All her appliances are there watching, keeping records. If she passed out or something, they'd call for help. So if I go in there, after we had a fight, it's like an invasion. But it's been long enough, so I'm going. That's why I'm here, to get you to go with me. Make it official. I'm the boyfriend, after all. Suspect number one.”

“Okay. Send your car home, we'll ride together. And, Mel?”

“Yeah?”

“Don't leave town.”

“Nice to know somebody's still got a sense of humor.”

SIX

David and Mel were sitting in the dark, Whispering, David's car pulled off the ramp and out of the way. The CSU van had just pulled out. A groan of metal, and the tow truck driver was done, black Visck gleaming on the flatbed. A patrol officer stayed in his car, waiting to provide escort.

The crumpled front end of the Visck made David wince. It was a beautiful car.

Mel drummed his fingers on the armrest. “Okay now, big Daddy? Everybody's gone, all right and tight. Can we leave now?”

It would be irresponsible to leave some poor schmuck in uniform alone here in the dark this close to Elaki-Town, even on a normal night. David gave Mel a look.

Nothing to see in the dark.

David started the car, called up the headlights. He programmed the navigator, but the car did not engage the tracks.

“You ever clean this car?” Mel kicked at something on the floor. “What is this, anyway? You been carting your kids around?”

David leaned over the console and picked the teddy bear up. Must belong to little Jenny Trey. David thought of the tiny girl, face flushed and feverish. Could she fall asleep without the bear? At that age, Kendra, his oldest, had a stuffed purple and green snake she carried everywhere, including to bed. Try to settle her in without it, and there'd be hell to pay.

David settled the bear in his lap. His hand was bloody, and he held the bear carefully, trying not to soil it.

“That yours, is it? Cause I have a blanket myself.”

“Funny, Mel. I wonder why we aren't moving.”

“Close proximity,” the car said.

David looked at Mel. “What?”

“Somebody standing by the car, Detective David Silver. Moving ahead would put subject in danger.”

David put a hand on the door.

Mel grabbed his arm, knocking the bear sideways. “
Wait
a minute. This car's armored and we're not. Want to exercise just a little—”

David grabbed the bear absently, wiped fog from the window and squinted. An Elaki, backside view.

“It's just String.”

“You sure, David? Look for that fishhook scar on the right side.”

“Too dark,” David said.

“Then how you know it's him?”

“He slouches.”

“Damn. Now that you come to mention it, String's the only Elaki I ever seen with bad posture.”

David opened the car door. “String?
String?
”

The Elaki turned. “Ssssh, Detective David. Am listening.”

“What for am listening?” Mel asked.

String swiveled. “For the bells.”

“I don't hear any bells,” Mel said.

“Not good this,” String said. “Bells have stopped. Must the go now.”

David reached backward, opened the door to the back seat. “Help a lot if you got in.”

The Elaki surged toward the car, then skidded to a halt. “Take van.”

“Ah,
Jesus
,” Mel said. “We going to shuffle cars all night? We're already in here, String. Don't go balky. We rode in the van last time. I don't like hanging onto them straps, and you take the corners so fast, I about get a concussion.”

String went headfirst into the back, muttering.

“Did you say ‘hernia'?” Mel asked. “'Cause Elaki don't get hernias.” He looked at David. “Do they?”

String hissed. “Isss translation, very like this hernia, folding fringe,
most
uncomfortable.”

“Close the door and close your yap.”

“And how this to accomplish, the yap closing? Bottom scale gymnastics bizarre?”

Mel looked at David. “I think what he means is he can't reach the door handle.”

David nodded, got out, tucked String's bottom fringe away from the edge of the door. Scales dropped, falling into the crack. David shut the door gently, then stopped, driver's door open, dome light bright—the only light visible except for the Interstate.

What was it he had heard?

The noise came again, a sort of whistle, but not quite—a noise made by something alive, but nothing David had ever heard. The whistle sounded again, followed by a trilling coo.

“What the hell was that?” Mel said.

“Sound too much like the trillopy,” String said.

“What's trillopy, some musical instrument?”

The Elaki's voice sounded hollow, coming from the back seat, and David wondered if String was catching a cold.

“Trillopy is predator hunting animal. Only found home planet, most to be relieved. Completely illegal Earth residence. Not indigenous here.”

“What do you
mean
by all of that?” Mel said. “David, will you get in the car? Do I have to beg here?”

David got in the driver's seat, then looked back at String. “He's worried about Miriam. She's missing, and they had a fight.”

“Most worrisome. What fight about?”

“Can we go now, Detective David Silver?”

David frowned at the car. “Go already.”

“Toilet seats,” Mel said.

“Who goes first in contention?” String asked.

The car inched forward, caught the tracks, increased speed. David steered, looked from side to side to make sure no one was left behind.

Mel snapped his seat belt. “
No
, not who goes first; that would be stupid.”

“What, then?” String said.

Mel muttered something under his breath.

“What was that?” David asked.

“I just asked her not to slam the lid. It was no big—”

“You on the seat when lid be slammed?”

“
No
, I wasn't on the … String, there are some things that aren't going to make sense to you 'cause you're not human, you're Elaki. You're
alien
.”

“No need to be sorry, Detective Mel. Unless sorry are you human.”

David rubbed the back of his neck. “Children, please.”

Mel looked out the window. “David, this goddamn car missed the exit. Miriam's apartment is at the university—”

“I am following navigational instruction to the letter,” the car said.

“We're going to Annie Trey's.”

String and Mel went silent.

“Yes,” David said. “
The
Annie Trey. I'll fill you in on the way.”

“Kind of late to be questioning her,” Mel said.

David held up the teddy bear. “We're on a mission of mercy.”

SEVEN

David tucked the teddy bear into the crook of his arm.

Mel pointed a finger. “Don't get too attached to that little guy; he don't belong to you.”

David grinned. It was an old bear, this teddy. He had never seen one quite like it. At twenty-eight inches tall, it was almost as big as little Jenny. It had a ribbon around its neck, a sweet, solemn face. Big head, long nose, short feet, and long arms. Its fur was soft, almost silky, well-loved. A clump of dried egg yolk adorned the back of one ear.

David wondered where Annie Trey had picked it up, thinking he would like one for Mattie. The bear had the aged air that said “Goodwill.” Best not to ask.

The car ran ragged as they approached Annie Trey's neighborhood. The road rails were old here, poorly maintained. Connemara was the neighborhood label in the navigational program, but the area was known around town as Cracker Village. It was bad—largely populated by dirt-poor Southerners, and rounded out by enclaves of cultural diehards from the Midwest, Jersey, and Saigon. The Vietnamese and the Southerners cooked and ran the clubs, the Jerseyites ran the garages and digital shops, and the Midwesterners were there to disapprove. The Texans were a world unto themselves. Most people hoped they'd keep it that way.

The first grid of Cracker Village was jammed with shotgun houses, barely a handsbreath between sagging roofs. The buildings were over a hundred years old—antique fire-traps, shoddy and dangerous, and superior to the street of tenements where Annie Trey lived.

The car tires bumped over a retreaded rail that rode like gravel. String shifted in the back seat. “This is the unnecessary roughness.”

Mel rubbed the tip of his nose. “Be lucky if we don't blow a tire.”

The car took them to an empty parking lot in back of a brick-and-mortar building. A peculiarity of the neighborhood. Parking lots—no cars. The pavement was littered with broken asphalt, dirt, snatches of old clothes. Thick yellow security lights made the pavement look somehow sweaty. The usual boxes of Jack Daniels and Coke provided a splash of color, and everywhere were piles of broken plates, ripped cushions, and old shoes—shoddy things no one wanted in a place where nobody had anything much.

Mel looked at David. “And I thought my apartment was a mess.”

David got out of the car. “You two coming or not?”

“Sure as hell aren't staying in the parking lot.”

“Car. Guard alert.”

“No kidding, David Silver,” the car said testily, born of a programmer with attitude. “Alert automatic in current location. Will report to precinct headquarters if not checked back within the hour.”

David nodded. He realized the car couldn't see him, but it didn't need an answer. It certainly didn't deserve one.

Aliens were an oddity in this part of the city. David and Mel kept String between them.

Clumps of people milled under the overhang in front of the building. It was late—wet and steamy enough that people talked slowly, even for Southerners, and moved even less. The city had run out of money for subsidized air conditioning, and the apartments, cubbies built with central air in mind, were breathless by late spring. On these long August nights, residents were forced out of their homes by the heat.

Tonight most people were inside, driven there by the rain.

A woman moved sideways on the front stoop to let them through. Her breasts were loose and large under a sleeveless sweater, and she had bad teeth, and the pronounced jaw and receding chin that bespoke generations of poverty. David wondered if the deep South was so bad that Cracker Village was an improvement, or if the people here were too tired or broke to go home.

Just another place, he figured. No better, maybe worse; just different.

A street light flickered out. The humidity made halos around the handful that worked. David expected an aura of animosity, but got apathy instead. The rain had turned people desultory.

“Hey.”

David tensed. There were only three of them.

“Hey, Elaki-sir. What's yer name, fella?”

String drifted sideways, eye prong cocked.

Mel shook his head. “Ignore 'em, String.”

“But polite they be, says ‘sir.'”

“That's Southern heckling, Gumby. They'll ‘sir' you before they spit on your foot.”

“
Spit?
”

“Just a form of speech.”

“Will not tolerate this
spit
.”

“String, go in, will you?”

The inside foyer was a checkerboard black-and-white linoleum, streaked wet and grey with grunge. Mel slipped, caught himself, muttered under his breath.

He ran a finger under the collar of his shirt. “Can't hardly breathe in here.”

The foyer narrowed into a hallway, close and claustrophobic enough to make David's chest go tight. The floor was covered in worn wood plank, and David stepped carefully, avoiding a dark stain of something he didn't care to know better. The wall on the right was old brick and had been painted white, sometime before his first child was born. The other side of the wall was the porous yellow plasticine that lasted forever, like all things ugly.

Another small form of hell, David thought, rounding a corner. He looked up. “Stairs.”

Mel looked relieved. “I was beginning to wonder. What's her number?”

“Three-oh-two.”

The stairs clanged underfoot, a surprise since they looked like wood. David took a second look. Metal, painted over to look like wood. Odd this, but nicely done. String zigged and zagged at the foot of the staircase.

“David?”

“Yeah, Mel?”

“Better give our buddy here a lift.”

“This is not to be the necessaries.”

David stepped backward, to String's left, while Mel took the right side.

“One … two … three …” David felt a fin slip, and String emitted a sharp whistle and slid sideways.

“Dignified this cannot be,” String said.

Mel groaned. “My back don't like it either, but we don't got all night while you skitter back and forth in the hallway there, and it ain't safe to leave you alone.”

“I do not do this ‘scatter.'”

“The hell you don't.”

“The hell, then.”

“David, did you hear that? This Elaki's learning to cuss.”

David felt sweat trickle down his back, and he wished he had a hand free to wipe his forehead. He thought about showers and icy beer.

A child wailed as they turned the corner. David and Mel set String down gently. A welcoming committee awaited, outside in the hallway at the top of the stairs.

EIGHT

The man who sat on the top steps blocking their way was in his thirties or forties, hair dark blond with red highlights. His eyebrows were startling—thick white crescents. He had a big nose and the sun-wrinkled face of a man who earns his living outdoors. His forearms, bare and hairy, were muscular. He reminded David of Popeye.