Exit (10 page)

"Little late for that now, huh?"

"This is what happened," Tim began, and then they both swapped stories while cutting through the neighborhood.

Drones appeared in the night sky, near and far, scudding over the trees and rooftops.

Tim said, "What an adventure."

"When Alex and I spotted you on the screen…" Rayne began.

Tim broke in. "I know, it occurred to me after a while. I saw an unusual drone logo on the screen and then out here. There's a feed transmitting from here to the Gateway's screen in our world."

"You were the landscaper on the street and the sun was shining, so it was probably this afternoon. I saw it tonight. So there's a short delay."

"You see live feeds all the time for news and sports. This time, it's being transmitted from a parallel world—one thin portal away. Or in this case, right next door."

"Yes," she said. "Imagine that. When you were on the screen, you were an actor in a movie co-starring yourself and other jumpers. Border runners."

"You hear stories of people who cross a border to seek a better life. Here, jumpers unintentionally cross this border and become a target."

"We're deer during hunting season."

"Exactly. Picture it. In the last few weeks we've been working together on an offbeat screenplay about a crime victim trapped in an astral plane. Now look, we're trapped inside a dark thriller. We've gone full circle."

"Well, we've got to get out of here." She checked her watch. "It's ten-fifteen. That gives us just over an hour to think of something."

"C.C. Seymour had me trapped at the back door. He's gonna be watching the alley. I don't see how we get past him and whoever else. Or whatever else—he and his freaking drones."

"Uh huh."

"Those UAVs are state of the art."

"Tonight's our best chance. I told Alex to open the door each night, same time, just in case. But once they see us make a move tonight, they're gonna know. They're gonna be prepared. Tomorrow, and every night thereafter, they're gonna see us walking through the alley, heading to the door." She rubbed her temple with the heel of her hand. "Damn," she whispered.

"Yes."

They both fell silent, hearing their footsteps on the sidewalk, thinking.

After a minute, she tapped his arm and pointed straight up the street. "Look."

Tim focused on the next corner. Something was floating above the streetlamp, heading their way. "Come here," he said in a low voice, and took her hand.

They went up a dark driveway between two houses, out of sight from the street, and waited. Within a half minute a low-flying black object advanced along the street at rooftop level, its wings slowly flapping.

Tim whispered in her ear, "It looks like…"

"Yes, an angel" she said. "A dark angel."

They watched it curl upward in its flight, rise above the rooftops and trees, and slowly fade from sight. A dark shape receding in size, melting into the night.

"They have dark angels floating over Cambridge," Tim said. "Like some kind of night patrol. Being out here, it's like walking around in a dream."

"A fever dream."

"Never have I felt so homesick."

Finally she said, "I have an idea."

CHAPTER 12

They walked toward this world's version of Rayne's address. The neighborhood included a warehouse with a rear lot filled with trash barrels. They scavenged in the dark and found a discarded cardboard box for a large, window air conditioner. They also picked up a section of an old newspaper and an oily rag, and tossed them into the empty box. Tim carried the box to the front of Rayne's building and waited by the curb.

"This won’t take long," she said.

Rayne walked alone for three blocks and headed into Central Square, Cambridge. She approached the cab stand in front of an all-night diner, near the subway entrance. Three cabs were in line. The one in the middle had a familiar, electric sign attached to its roof. That settled it. She walked past the first cab, who barked something through his open window. She ignored him and opened the back door of the second cab. Her eyes were level with the purple, rooftop ad. Three words glowed in the dark.

EXPERIENCE THE INDESCRIBABLE

This sign, she decided, might also be a good sign. She slid into the back seat of the cab.

The driver said, "You're supposed to take the first one in line."

"Do you want the fare?" She looked at the skinny driver with the goatee and blue tats on his neck.

He said yes by way of throwing it in gear and hitting the gas pedal. "Where to?"

"I'm picking up a friend near Prospect Street. I'll show you where. Then we're heading to the airport."

"Late flight, huh?"

"No, we're sending equipment overnight to a musician. Make a left at the next corner."

When they arrived at her address, Tim was sitting on the curb.

From the back seat, Rayne leaned forward. "We got a guitar and amp we're delivering. We need to put the box in the trunk."

The cabbie was too bored to speak. He took an audible breath, then opened the hatch from the inside, using the automatic trunk release.

Rayne climbed out, and stepped over to the back of the cab.

Tim set an edge of the box on the back bumper, top flap open. He spotted a crowbar inside the trunk, next to a spare tire, and tossed it on the grass by the curb.

"Is it all set?" she asked Tim.

"Air tight."

"Let me see, just to be sure." She stood behind the raised trunk lid, leaned into the box and set a corner of the newspaper on fire with a cigarette lighter, putting the oily rag over the flame.

Tim watched her fan the flame. "It's packed snug as shit. It could withstand a plane crash."

"Hope you weren't buzzed when you packed it. Anything happens to LeRoy's guitar, he'll strangle us. That thing is mint, belongs in the Smithsonian."

"It's fine. A bazooka couldn't break that box."

"Then why do I smell smoke?" Rayne said, sounding pissed. "Is something burning?"

"Burning?"
Tim replied.

"Hey," the cabbie said. "The hell's going on back there?" A car door banged open. He came round to the back, snapped his cigarette onto the street, and saw a plume of smoke rising out of the box in his trunk. "What the fuck? You clowns—"

Tim twisted his hips and swung, hitting the driver hard in the jaw: his head rocked and he staggered. Rayne grabbed the smoking box by its sides and flung it into the street, getting it out of the way.

"You fucks
!" the cabbie said and turned toward Tim.

With both hands, Tim pushed him backward toward the trunk, its cargo space the size of a great white shark's open mouth. The cabbie stumbled, losing his balance. Rayne reached up, grabbed the trunk lid, and snapped it down, hitting the crown of his head. Then she and Tim converged on the groggy driver, shoving him into the trunk. They slammed the lid down. Tim picked up the crowbar and gas mask by the curb, tossing them through the side window and onto the back seat.

The driver began shouting death threats inside the trunk. Tim moved over, stood by the closed lid, and pounded it twice with the side of his fist. The shouting ceased. "Let's go," he said.

Rayne got behind the wheel. "How's your eye?"

"Could be better." He slid in through the shotgun side, the meter between them.

"I'm worried about it."

"I'm all right—all considered."

She cocked a thumb and pointed at the trunk. "That went down without a major fuckup."

"The only thing that has."

"We still have some time to kill, but not much. We need to time this next part down to the last second."

She heard a noise in the trunk, feet kicking the quarter panel. She didn't want to boost a cab at the last possible minute, in case anything went wrong. Nor did she want the cabbie to run free and contact the police. Keeping him locked inside the trunk was their only option.

"You better sit in the back," she told him.

"Good idea. I'll look like a fare."

"And sit next to the left door," she said. "Don't forget."

Tim watched her in silence for a moment, then stepped out of the cab and opened the back door. He slipped into the shadows of the back seat. "You may want to get going."

"What?"

"The box in the street, it's on fire."

The cab jerked when she hit the gas, which caused a thudding sound in the trunk.

A muffled voice said:
"You assholes!"

Tim said in a loud voice, "Here's an idea, sweetheart. If this ingrate doesn’t shut up, throw it in reverse and hit something. Crush the trunk like an accordion."

The trunk fell silent.

Rayne turned onto a side street and drove to Mass Ave in Central Square. When she braked at the stop sign, she saw three girls step over the curb and stand in an empty parking spot, looking up at an oncoming drone. The girls smiled and waved their arms.

"I keep seeing this," Tim said from the back seat. "People see a drone and run into the street, throw their arms up like they've just seen Jesus."

"What?"

"My reaction, too."

One of the girls pulled out her cell phone, held it behind her shoulder, pointing it upward.

Tim added, "These people are so fried."

"Tim," she said, "look again."

"What?"

"Those are selfies." Rayne pointed through the glass. "They're taking selfies in the street."

"Now that you mention it..."

"Drones are used for surveillance, right?"

"Military drones are used for air surveillance, missile strikes, who knows what else. The Pentagon hasn't buzzed me for a briefing. Non-military drones? What I hear, they do surveillance, search and rescue operations, package deliveries. Throw in some scientific research."

"'Scientific research,' whatever that means."

"Hey, maybe someone can buy a commercial drone, put a missile on it, and blow up a boss or an ex-spouse while he or she is driving home on the freeway. Shoot a missile through the back window before they race to get under the overpass and hide."

"They could call the drone 'the stalker.'" Rayne gripped the steering wheel so hard her knuckles whitened. "With no restraining order."

"This technology has shitstorm written all over it. It'll get all messed up, because everything eventually gets all messed up."

"So drones have cameras," she said. "Drones take pictures of these girls, who take pictures of themselves below a drone taking their picture. In other words, it's a drone selfie."

"I see where you're going with this. Yeah, drones have some type of video feed."

She shook her head, hit the gas and crossed Mass Ave.
"Drone selfies
. How low can you go?"

"How low? This place hit bottom, bounced, and kept dropping."

Rayne and Tim roamed the streets, constantly checking the time. Overhead, large drones of various shapes flew in the sky at the altitude of a child's kite on a windy day. White light from the streetlamps flickered against the front windshield as they passed.

"When I see so many up there," Rayne said, "they no longer look like unmanned aircraft. They remind me of flying creatures from a million years ago. Because there's so many, it somehow changes them. In our world, you never see anything like this. Not yet. Here, they fill the sky like prehistoric birds. In a way, the future looks like the distant past."

"Up there, it's a traffic jam of flying creatures."

"Yes," she said.

Tim leaned forward and rested his forearms on the top of the front seat. "When I first walked into this place, this parallel universe, and saw the drones, it reminded me of something. Then I made the connection. Drones remind me of floaters. Floaters invade your eye's field of vision and block the world. In my case, they took over all of one eye. Out here, you look up and see drones. You see them floating against a blue sky. Always moving, always watching you, never letting you out of their sight. Same way with an eye floater; it appears to be watching you day and night. Watching every angle where you look. You look to the left, the floater moves to the left. You look up, and it rises. And so on."

"Floaters," Rayne echoed.

A large drone the size of a school bus flew overhead. Written on its side: DR1.

"And just so you know, when I was in the alley with C.C. Seymour—"

"What an awful name."

"You should see his haircut. Well, just before I ran into you, he radioed in a drone. It was right over the alley."

"I saw it."

"He said it had cargo. It was carrying the next generation of drones called Tinks. It's named after—get ready—Tinker Bell."

"Seriously."

"Uh huh. If you think about it, it makes sense. Ever notice, the most dangerous organizations, think tanks, weapons, what have you—almost always have really benign names. The more innocent it sounds, the more lethal it is. If you run a company, let's say, that chops down half the Amazon jungle, why not call it 'Bambi and Friends.' If you run a think tank whose mission is to call climate change and global warming a hoax, call it 'The Lukewarm Foundation.' Anyway, a drone is also a type of bee. So if C.C. Seymour called his new drones 'the Killer Bees,' I'd be concerned. But when he names them after Tinker Bell, I feel petrified."

"I see what you mean."

"So," Tim summed up, "I don’t know what's waiting for us down there, but I don't think it's Peter Pan. Either way, it's almost time."

They headed toward the Gateway Theater. As they approached Harvard Square, Rayne spotted another dark angel flying just over the kiosk.

"The angels, those are the worst. Those really,
really
make my skin crawl."

After a moment, Tim said, "It looks like an Angel of Death. Wonder which one of these assholes make them—EyeSoar or DR1?"

"Angels? It's time to send in a drone. Their engineering department should be hit with a missile."

"When you see dark angels flying over your neighborhood, you might not be feeling too upbeat about the future."

"This world is so strange. It reminds me of, I don't know, Goya or a Hieronymus Bosch painting. We're in a stolen car, taking a joyride through the Garden of Earthly Delights."

Tim leaned forward and grabbed a handful of her hair from behind. "Can't say that analogy crossed my mind, but you have a point." After a moment, he asked the obvious. "How you feeling?"

"Same as you." She looked at him through the rearview mirror. Despite the cool air, she was perspiring. Somewhere inside her was a furnace with a broken thermostat. "I don't know what else we can do. This is it. It's not going to get any easier tomorrow. But at least we're not walking in there. So it could be worse."

He reached over the seat and gripped her shoulder. "Love you."

"Love you, too. But right now, my love is focused on getting us home. I would really love to get out of here. I would love to be home and eating cold, leftover pizza. I would love to never again see a dark angel flying over a telephone pole, or hear that asshole screaming inside the trunk. That's what I’d love."

He pulled a bandanna out of his army jacket's pocket, reached over, and wiped a thin sheen of sweat on her forehead. "Let's go home."

Soon they saw the cemetery dead ahead, and the mouth of the alley.

"Remember, get out on the left side," she reminded him. "And no matter what, protect that eye. Keep that patch on, it's better than nothing."

Tim rolled down his side window, reached for the crowbar and held it in his left hand, its tip hanging out of the cab, ready to swing. He adjusted his pirate's eye patch.

She pulled up and turned left into the alley's entrance. She squeezed the brakes, stopped for a moment.

They scanned the dark corridor.

Rayne wondered what awaited them in this narrow canyon. Gray exhaust fumes traveled through their open windows, smelling dusty and gritty like fireplace soot. Behind the back seat, the cabbie drummed the lid with his fist. Nonstop obscenities and warnings issued from the trunk. She could almost
feel
the loud death threats vibrate the upholstery and seat springs beneath her, which she found surreal. It seemed to her that the whole world out here was pissed and crazed—straight-up out of its mind.