Reckoning ~ Indian Hill 2 ~ A Michael Talbot Adventure (41 page)

“Pull over!” Beth moaned.

“What is it? What’s the matter?” The sergeant was concerned. He thought Beth saw something. Something potentially dangerous.

“I think I’m going to be sick. Please pull over.” She labored, her cupped hands at the ready in case the truck didn’t get into the soft shoulder fast enough. The sergeant did his best to bring the truck to a safe and controlled stop. Beth had barely enough time to fumble with the door handle before her breakfast made its triumphant resurgence.

The sergeant waited the obligatory few minutes until he heard her innards calm down. Then he climbed out of the truck. “Are you alright? Was it something you ate? I hope not ‘cause I ate the same things you did.”

“No,” she said as she stood up, wiping the corner of her mouth with her jacket sleeve. “It was something I heard.”

“Was it something I said? Oh… Wait. The radio? What about it?”

“The man they were talking about.”

“Yeah, Mike Turtle, or something like that.”

“No, Mike Talbot,” she said, a little exasperated.  “That’s my Mike.”

Recognition dawned on the sergeant’s face. A pang of jealousy ripped through his belly. Where did that come from? He mused. “That’s THE Mike Talbot? I thought he was safe in a protected bunker somewhere.”

“So did I.” Concern laced Beth’s face. “We’ve got to get to get to where he said he would be when we talked as fast as we can. I’ve got to find out what’s going on.” And the jealousy was back. The sergeant, for the life of him, couldn’t figure out why he was having such strong feelings for her. He found it terribly distracting.

“Say something, Grady!” Beth pouted. She looked like a spoiled child who wasn’t getting the attention she felt she deserved. The sergeant was half expecting her to stomp her foot on the ground and cross her arms and then what? Pout her bottom lip out? Yeah, that would complete the picture, he figured.

“Where did he say he would be?" He asked.

"Walpole, it's a small town right outside of Boston."

"Well, with any luck, we should be able to get there in two days. Three tops.”

Now her lip did begin to protrude. “That’s too long. I want to be there tonight.”

“We can’t do it, Beth. We’ve got to be extremely careful crossing over. Every access road is going to be covered. I told you we are going to have to ditch the truck and cross over by foot. And once we hit the woods, it’s going to be some difficult traversing.

“And IF, (he emphasized “if”) we get through without any serious problems, we’ve still got to secure some sort of transportation, which in itself isn’t going to be easy. The Massachusetts National Guard, confiscated nearly all the cars and trucks that weren’t being used by their owners. And in some cases, they took those too. So you kind of see the dilemma.”

Beth clearly saw it, but that didn’t mean she liked it.

“Fine! Let’s get going,” she said as she hopped back in the cab of the truck.

Chapter 45 – Mike Journal Entry Eleven

“Where am I?” I said somewhat dazed. I attempted to sit up, to no avail. I was not sure whether I was sedated into paralysis or wearing restraints. When my head cleared up a little later on, I realized it was both. The room was lit but, much to my chagrin I realized, it was the ever present, all-surrounding luminescence of the alien variety.

“Damn! I hoped that part was a dream,” I muttered out loud, more to calm my nerves than for any particular audience.

“Not a dream, you turd. A bad dream possibly. A nightmare, most definitely.” That voice alone snapped me back from la-la land. My eyes probably bugged halfway out of my head.

“Yeah! I’d be scared if I had to face me too,” he laughed, that grating, familiar, maniacal laugh.

“Well, I see the extra time on this ship hasn’t done much for your personality, Durgan.” I nearly cursed out his name.

“Oh, it’s done plenty, you little pansy. While you were down with your little girly-friends, I was training and fantasizing about this very day. And to be honest, looking at you now, I’m a little disappointed. I have to admit that, at one point, you had me somewhat concerned. Not scared per se, but a little concerned. You looked like a wily and crafty adversary, one that was due a small measure of my admiration. The way you dispatched some of your foes was brilliant. Sheer brilliance. But now I’m not sure you’re even worthy of my attention, even with one prosthetic leg.” Durgan spat the last part out as he hiked up his jeans to show me what appeared to be something more out of ’The Terminator’ than anything man made.

“I still do owe you for this little beauty though, even if it is stronger than the original. Maybe when I’m done with you, the aliens will piece back together whatever is left and I can keep you as a pet.” He laughed again.

“Listen, you ape…” I wasn’t sure if this was the right approach, especially considering I was drugged and tied down, but the dude was starting to piss me off. "I have no clue what you are even talking about. And to be honest, I’m not sure that even you know.”

Durgan was leaning against what appeared to be a desk but from my limited vantage point, this was not clearly discernible. What was clear was Durgan cleaning his fingernails with a six-inch curved blade. That appeared to be much more important to him than anything I said. He looked up after he finished his task. A deranged grin spread from ear to ear.

“Well, I’m here to tell you, old buddy.” As he stood up and began walking over to me. I involuntarily tensed up. “Oooh, you are the nervous one, aren’t you.” He started to toss the knife back and forth between hands. I struggled to keep up with the movement, it was damn near impossible. Either he was just too fast or my doped-up perception was for shit. Then he folded the blade up and placed it in his pocket.

“You see, my friend…” he continued as he leaned on me, his hot breath scraping the inside of my nostrils. “One week from tonight you and me are going to dance. Only this dance is going to be unlike any other. Me and you are going to have the largest audience of all time. So you had better make this last. If you go and die on me in the first minute or two, I’m going to be really pissed.”

“Yeah? How do you think that’s going to make me feel?” He stood up, and this time, true laughter came out. Perhaps it was something closer to who the original Durgan had once been. But it was short-lived.

“You’re a funny man, Talbot, and I’m going to enjoy ripping that funny right out of your neck,” he said as calmly as if he were telling me about the weather forecast. “Don’t embarrass me out there! If you fall to your knees and just start begging for your life, I guarantee I’ll take my sweet ass time slicing and dicing you in front of your adoring fans.”

“You’re a sick bastard, Durgan, and don’t worry about me. I should have kicked your ass when I had the chance.” Durgan snarled at me as he walked out the door. I was hoping that my false bravado held up. Good thing for the restraints though; they kept me from shaking right off the friggin’ table. I fell back to sleep at some point, since there was really not a whole bunch to do when you’re strapped down. I was awakened later, by one of the Progerians whom I recognized, as crazy as that sounds. I definitely spent too much time on this ship.

“I know you, you helped me once.”

“Yes, yes I did. That might not have been the most prudent move, considering the outcome. The fact remains though you have made me rich. And although you destroyed a bunch of our ships and kidnapped our supreme commander, (may the great one live forever), my cousin was out on that dock! Did you know that?” His head bobbed up and down in an exaggerated tempo. It was something I noticed often happened when the Progerians got a little too agitated.

I wanted to tell him that I had nothing to do with the destruction of the ships, but it didn’t seem like it would have mattered, so why bother?

“I thought about killing you myself… Maybe just coming in here and shooting you with some poison. And I most likely would have, but when they posted the odds of your upcoming event, I couldn’t help but ponder the possibilities. You see, you are a hundred to one shot against beating Durgan and still the drakkar keeps pouring in on his side. The odds will just keep rising and that’s when I’m going to make my bet, when they are at their peak. I don’t know what it is about you, hu-man, but you seem to always ‘pull it out in the clutch,’ as your species says. No matter how bad it looks, you just win. And right now, from where I stand, it looks pretty bad. So instead of killing you, I’m going to give you some of my special concoction and free you up here so that you can begin your training.”

“I guess I don’t have any say in this?” I inquired as he raised up my shirt sleeve and revealed a hypodermic.

“Silly hu-man, you’ll never have another choice in your life.” I grimaced as he seemed to deliberately jab me with the needle. I guess I couldn’t blame him. He was wrong though if he thought I was going to be his little lap dog from here on. My blood began to boil; sweat came out of every pore. I thought I might combust on the spot.

“What did you give me?” I was concerned maybe he had changed his mind and decided to go with the poison.

“Just a little something to get you on your way. You look a little lighter than I remember; you had better start bulking up. A week is not that much time.” The Progerian left but not before he had completely freed me from my confines.

I sat up rubbing my wrists where the straps had been. I glanced around my room. It was my original room. A pang stirred in my belly. It was the same room all right, but there were none of the previous occupants. Images of Deb and Beth flashed before my eyes. I wanted to cry, right there and then. But what would that solve? If I ever wanted to see them again I was going to have to take care of business first.

I walked over to the weight bench. I felt like I could lift ten men, but in reality only if those ten men weighed twenty-seven pounds each. Right now, I wasn’t much weaker than when I left the ship, but how long would this doping last? That, however, wasn’t going to be a problem.

My greedy Progerian friend showed up every day to feed me food and my daily supply of “vitamins,” as he liked to call them. What this was doing to me internally, I had no clue. Physically though, it was unbelievable. Stamina, strength and sheer muscle mass, which had been lacking since my ‘surgery’, were now coming back in leaps in bounds. Progress that should have taken months was being reduced to days. It was almost hour-by-hour. I knew it couldn’t be good for me, but what was the alternative? Die at the hands of a madman?

Durgan also came to visit me on occasion. I felt like a toy to him, one which he had been waiting for some special holiday to unwrap. Somehow, I never got the feeling that I’d be one of those toys that stayed on a shelf as a souvenir. He meant to play hard and if he broke his 'toy'? Oops.

Chapter 46

Beth and Sergeant Grady O’Bannon made it across the state line, completely undetected. The going had been rough and slow, but for the most part uneventful. Beth’s surliness had only exasperated the sheer silence of their crossing. Had Grady known about his previous unit’s condition, they could have easily driven the truck across the border and into Walpole. A large group of bikers and hot rodders had tried to plunder the Guardsmen’s bounty.

The ensuing battle had nearly crippled Barracks Twenty-seven. The commanding officer recalled all units that were patrolling other ports of entry into the state. The Guard unit lost nearly a third of its men and just about half their equipment and munitions before thwarting the attempted takeover. The colonel was busy meeting with the wives of the newly departed while O’Bannon and Beth made their crossing.