Amish Vampires in Space (4 page)

The remaining men looked at each other, waiting for someone to be the first. Finally, one of the older men—Amos—stood and walked to the dining room door. He stood just outside and whispered only a single word to the occupants before returning to his seat. This process was repeated by every baptized man and boy. When it came Jeb’s turn, he met both pastor’s eyes and whispered, “James.”

After the men finished, it was the women’s turn. When all the baptized had gone, the pastors exited the dining room, taking positions on either side of the door.

Mark stood with his hands clasped together in front of him. “We have made our selections,” he said. “And the hymnals have been placed. When I call your name, please enter the dining room and sit in front of one of the hymnals there.” He nodded. “Amos Shrock.”

The older man rose again and made his way to the dining room. Samuel watched him as he went in out of sight. There was the sound of a chair being drawn out. Amos sitting down.

Jebediah’s stomach started to trouble him. “What if Sarah…?” He looked toward the kitchen, again sought his wife’s face. She flashed a smile. His feeling intensified. It took at least three votes to be selected. Sarah might have voted for him, but he hoped no one else would. Please, Lord, not now. Not when I’m so confused.

“Luke Hochstetler,” Mark said.

Jebediah’s anxiety lessened. In their district, usually three or four were selected for the lot drawing. Being selected as a pastor—a deacon or bishop—was typically for life. Only occasionally would someone resign the post due to illness or grief. It was a hard life. A heavy duty. He’d never wanted it. Few did.

There was the sound of Luke taking his seat. Jebediah looked at the floor. Prayed again.

“Jebediah Miller.”

Jebediah masked his feelings. Numbly, he walked to the dining room. Amos and Luke were seated on opposite sides of the table, a faded green hymnal before each. There were two more hymnals available. Either to Amos’s left or to Luke’s right. Jebediah paused at the end of the table. Breathed a prayer. He took a step toward Josiah, but then stopped himself, backpedaled, and moved to Amos’s left. He stared at the hymnal for some time before slowly sinking into the chair.

The pain in his midsection intensified. The confusion.

A few moments later, James Stolfuz entered. He was a heavyset man, balding beneath his hat. He nodded at everyone in the room and took the final seat, looking white and nervous.

Samuel and Mark entered, stood at one end of the table. “‘The lot is cast into the lap,’” Mark said, “‘But its every decision is from the Lord.’”

Samuel nodded in agreement. “You may open the hymnals now.”

Jebediah felt his palms begin to sweat. He wiped them together under the table. To his right, Amos opened his hymnal—thumbed through it. Found nothing. Next Luke went. He also found nothing.

Jeb’s heart pounded. Lord, why would You bring this to me?

“You go first,” James said. He looked doubly nervous. James was what passed for a physician in the settlement, and was typically quick to laugh. Jovial even. Nothing should make him nervous.

Jebediah girded himself. Reached for the hymnal cover. Opened it. Saw nothing. The slip of paper could be anywhere, though. A piece of paper with the written form of the verse Mark had just quoted. About decisions being from the Lord.

Jebediah could not bear the responsibility. Not when mixed with his secret. It would be like water and kerosene. He picked the book up by the spine. Held it over the table. Shook it. Waited for something to fall.

But nothing did.

Jebediah looked to see James holding a slip of paper in his hands. His eyes were red and brimming with tears. Others in the room, and then in the house, began to weep and pray with him.

Jebediah wept too.

• • •

That evening, after the livestock had been fed, Jebediah reclined in the living room in a chair he had built himself. It had broad wooden armrests and leather cushions that had taken weeks to sew together. In his hands he held the Bible his father had left for him. Today, his daily reading was on the Exodus. The part where the Israelites were standing on the shores of the Red Sea with the Egyptians bearing down on them. Just the sea before them and the soldiers of the enemy behind. Trapped and surrounded. No escape in sight.

In the back of his Bible, Jebediah had a map of the route the Israelites had taken. To get from Goshen, where they’d started, to Mount Sinai where the Ten Commandments had been given, there were other routes they could’ve followed. In fact, it appeared there was a much easier route—an overland route—traveling north of the Red Sea. That route even appeared shorter. Furthermore, the whole route to the Promised Land seemed like a winding mess. As far from a crow-flies straight line as one could get.

Yet the Lord had taken them the way He did. Marched them out of their way to a place where they were absolutely boxed in. The sea in front. Angry soldiers behind.

Why would He do that?

Jeb heard a small ruckus from the kitchen. The clatter of something hitting the floor. He quickly straightened his seat and hurried that way. He found Sarah leaning against the counter. On the floor at her feet was a widening pool of water and an otherwise empty pan. She smiled when she saw him. He moved to help her, but after a simple hug, she nudged him away.

“I’m fine, husband.” Another smile. Brighter this time.

Jeb couldn’t take his eyes off her. “Are you? Really?”

“Yes! Just a little dizzy all of a sudden.”

Jebediah pulled out a seat. “Rest for a moment.”

Sarah seemed to contemplate it. Jeb noticed a strand of hair had escaped her kapp. A bit of dishevel she rarely showed. Finally, with a nod, she took the seat. Jeb took the seat nearest her. Reached out for her hand.

She smiled again. “Aren’t we the hero,” she said. “Looking out for your dainty wife.”

Jeb managed a smile. Looked at her face.

Sarah gazed at the floor, then back at him. “How do you feel about secrets?” she asked.

Secrets? He wasn’t sure what to say. How to begin. First questions about his sanity, now this? He wondered how his father had maintained balance. Surely Mother had suspected something. She didn’t miss anything we kids did, that’s for sure.

“You know what the bishop says,” Jeb said. “About how the devil loves them.”

She nodded, looked at her hands, looked at him again. Smiled. “Yes, that is right. I just wanted to be sure.”

He felt more terrible now than ever. He was a hypocrite. A liar and a hypocrite.

Sarah knotted her hands together. “Husband, I have been keeping something from you.”

Jeb’s eyes widened. Sarah…? He felt a lump in his throat. A condemnation of his soul. His terribleness. “Sarah, I have something to say also.” Finally, freedom. Someone to talk with. He felt a twinge of guilt, though. The words of his father. Jeb looked at the floor. Shook his head. “You first,” he said.

It was clear she was struggling. Emotions wanting to bubble to the surface. Yet she didn’t seem sorrowful. Remorseful. She seemed giddy.

“Jebediah Miller,” she said. “I’m pregnant.”

• • •

Jebediah rose early the next morning. He and Ezekiel had an appointment to fix a section of fence together. Before he got started with that, before the heat of the day, Jeb had another obligation to fulfill.

Sarah, pregnant? It wasn’t supposed to happen. Not with them both touching forty. Not now.

Thankfully, the news had kept him from having to share his secret with her. Too much excitement. Too much surprise!

The night that followed had been terrible, though. He hadn’t been able to sleep. The bed had felt softer than it ever had. In need of tightening. And the itches! He’d never remembered his bedclothes feeling so uncomfortable. It was like there had been angry chigflies in the room. Except there weren’t. Just him, Sarah sleeping, and an extremely restless mind.

Even without yesterday’s sermon, he knew what the Scriptures said about relying on the Lord. He knew the importance of yielding to His will. Believed it. But what was most important now was that the people of Alabaster survived.

And who was to say that Jeb wasn’t Gott’s instrument in this? That in his own meager way, he might not enact the will of Derr Herr? Just like Moses.

It was still dark outside. On the way to the barn, Jeb marveled at the stars overhead. He wondered how many of them held planets like their own. How many were occupied. He knew that some were, but were any of them like their planet? Like Alabaster? Were the people the same?

Inside the barn, Jeb lit a lamp and walked back to the work table. The table was heavy, solid. Appeared impossible to move. But that was only if you didn’t know what to do. Where to look.

He stooped to the left table leg and slid a hand along the back. There was a small plate there, a stop, that with a pull he was able to disengage and slide up. He did the same with the other leg and felt the table shift ever so slightly. There were hidden wheels in the legs, and though they were never oiled, rarely used, they appeared to function just fine.

With only a slight tug, the table moved his direction. He grabbed the left side and pulled it back more than a foot. He hissed as one of his glass storage jars hit the barn floor and shattered. He nervously checked behind him and stooped to pick up the pieces. Thankfully, there had been only a couple of dozen nails in the jar. He collected the broken glass and set them out of the way. He gathered the nails and put them in a separate jar.

He checked to make sure no other jars were in danger of falling and pulled on the table’s right side. After a few more feet, working one side and then the other, the table stalled on a clump of straw. Jebediah frowned, considered removing the straw and moving the table out farther, but he finally just shrugged. It was enough space.

He made another check of the barn behind him. In the lamplight, he could see only the closed door and the head of one of the horses looking over its stall at him. There had been no sound from the cows yet. Even after the jar broke. A blessing.

He walked around to the back of the work table. There was a hole in the wall there, a two foot high by one foot wide opening. Jeb set his light next to the hole and looked inside. The object was still there. Exactly where his father had shown him.

He couldn’t help but feel a bit of apprehension. What if he were wrong?

Jeb slid both hands inside and touched the object. It felt cool and smooth. He ran his hands over the surface. There were rounded ridges that reminded him of the metal skeps Zedekiah used to mind his bees. He hoped that was where the similarities ended.

Jeb pulled the object out and set it on the floor in front of him. It somehow seemed taller than when he’d seen it as a young man. Yes. It looked exactly like a manmade beehive or an elongated and ridged bell. Except it was much lighter than a bell or skep would be, and a lot shinier. It reflected the light better than the hitching posts outside. Plus, it had a circle of inlaid glass around the top and a singular square plate at the bottom—the “activator,” his father had called it.

This object, his secret, contained more technology than he had used his entire life. It also had a built-in power source, somehow able to run for centuries. To wait until it was needed.

He felt guilty just looking at it.

Jebediah heard a huffing sound behind him. He felt a twinge of panic, and almost—almost—pushed the object back into the hole again. He had no business touching it. It wasn’t the time. This wasn’t right. But then he remembered the tests he’d run. The failing of the crops. The unusual heat. The spectral lines.

…his pregnant wife.

The noise was just one of the horses, he thought. It was snorting because it couldn’t see him any longer. It wondered what he could possibly be doing that didn’t include getting it food.

Jeb shook his head. Smiled. This is it. Using this device is what I need to do.

Without further ceremony, he reached out and pushed the activator. One of the glassed sections at the top immediately lit up blue. Another followed, and another, until finally the whole top circle was glowing. A few seconds went by, but nothing more happened.

Is that all it does? Just lights up? He scratched his head. How would he even know it was working? His father had never told him what to look for or even what the strange device did.

Jeb sniffed. Maybe his anxiety and indecision had been for naught. Maybe the thing was broken—

The lights flashed and Jeb scrambled back a few paces, finally stopping when he touched the surface of the work bench. The intensity level steadily increased. He wondered if he should stand up and get back even farther. He instead brought his hands to his face and peered out through barely separated fingers.

The object began to emit a sound. A droning hum that steadily increased in pitch until it became quite disturbing. Jebediah shut his eyes and moved his hands to his ears.

There was another flash, a pulse really, and a shaft of light escaped from the top of the machine and stretched up toward the barn roof.

Then it was over. The machine went completely dark and completely silent again.

Jebediah sat stunned, breathing hard. Excited and frightened at the same time. He heard another sound behind him then, a whimper, but not from a horse. He stood and bringing up his lantern, looked out into the barn again.

Standing just three paces past the work bench was Ezekiel.

His eyes were wide, but otherwise he was completely rigid. Almost frozen. Jeb called his name, but only the younger man’s eyes moved. They looked at him, and then up toward the apex of the barn. Then back at him.

“Jebediah Miller, what have you done?”