The Harbinger Break (15 page)

  
He began garbaging food from his fridge by the pound. Anything with an expiration date he deemed expired, and he didn't look twice at his frozen corn dogs, fudge popsicles, pudding, even his orange juice. He cringed as he remembered the last time he had a glass and tossed the carton into the garbage as if it were a live grenade.

  
Once his home was free of poison, he drove to a local farmers market and purchased fresh fruit and meats. The men and women there had a healthy, spunky glow about them, one that Sam couldn't help but admire. His skin felt gray in comparison. This food change would be better for his health than he'd at first expected. Frozen corn dogs were only good up until the moment after the last bite. He hoped that this diet change would help mend the bridge between him, his scorned stomach, and his frazzled mind.

  
On his way home he passed the town hall and noticed a sign in front. A public forum was being held in a week. Sam made a mental note. No better place to start saving humanity than with the other public rights defenders and justice campaigners. Or so he thought.

   He'd begun his new diet immediately, and as the first five days passed Sam slowly descended to the pit of delirium. It had to be withdrawal, but he wasn't sure. The first day of fresh eating had been uneventful, but the next few days had weird sprites dancing in the outskirts of his periphery, and his stomach constantly churned and bubbled. He took sick leave from work, and remained in bed, attempting to repel the growing delusions with sleep–but losing.

  
By the time the week rolled by he was completely delusional, and it was pure reflex that led him to a seat in town hall–his mind was busy spinning in circles and fighting off mental fairies that blindsided it regardless of the direction it faced.

  
He took a seat in town hall–legs shaking, slight twitch, glancing around neurotically, trying to convince himself to bring up the drugged food–do it, no don't, they'll send you back, they'll cut off your nuts (you're nuts), they'll say you're crazy, crazy.

  
The stage dripped perpetually, like everything else. The world around Sam dripped downwards, like a waterfall of walls and pictures, originating from upper cracks and corners in the deepest parts of shadows. He tried to ignore the drowning sensation and focus his attention to the forum.

  
"…I spotted one, over Creek and Atlantic," a woman said, standing from her chair, looking crazy. Or maybe that was him reflecting.

  
The secretary nodded.

  
"UFO claim noted," she said. "Any other witnesses? By show of hands…"

  
Eight additional hands raised.

  
"In what direction did it head?" she asked the same woman.

  
"South! No, north! Which way does the sun set?"

  
"West."

  
"Then positively north! I'm n-nine out of ten percent sure, I mean percent, um. Sure," she said, then smiled, flashing missing teeth. Rumors of good money in spotting UFOs kept all idealistic unemployed eyes glued to the sky.

  
"Anyone else see a UFO north of Creek and Atlantic?"

  
"Aye!" a man said, jumping up, his torn Houston Oilers ball cap flying off his bowling-pin head.

  
"On what date?"

  
"The twenty-second! Yes'm ma'am!"

  
Sam shook his head. His eyes were closed and he barely heard anyone. He didn't want to seem crazier than these people. They apparently attended every forum, claiming to have seen UFOs. Some sector of the government took notes of these reports and looked for patterns, but considering how many crazies reported, he'd be surprised if they actually obtained anything useful.

  
The secretary nodded. "And on what date did you say that you saw that UFO?" she asked, turning to the woman.

  
"The twenty-second!" she replied, and turned to smile at the bowling-pin head guy, who smiled back, and the fruits of love blossomed. He removed his hat and brushed back what little hair he had. She fluttered all sixteen eyelashes.

  
The rest of the audience began murmuring and whispering excitedly. The secretary cleared her throat, ready to end the most degrading part of her month. "Alright then. Anyone with anything else?"

  
The hall was silent and Sam realized that this was his moment. He stood.

  
"Someone or something is drugging the food," he said.

  
Chairs shuffled as attendees turned to look. Sam remained standing. Holding a straight face, the secretary nodded–she was familiar with crazy.

  
"Mmhmm. When did this start?"

  
"It's been going on for years. If you stop eating normal food, you'll begin to go through some kind of withdrawal."

  
"Alright," she said. She glanced around. "Has anyone else noticed drugs in their food?"

  
Missing teeth jumped to her feet. She spoke quickly, eyes darting around the room. "I have! I've been going through the withdrawal! I been getting dry mouth, glossy eyes, wet toenails, itchy arms–might be the meth, could be something else, now I'm just rambling, ramblin, ramblin." Her voice slowly faded as she returned to her seat.

  
Someone up front coughed. The secretary nodded–she was a professional. Sam kept on. "I'd like the mayor to address this."

  
She sighed. "The mayor isn't here now. You can write him a letter."

  
Sam nodded. "Okay. A letter."

  
Returning to his seat, he took a mental note, having had lost his nerve when she'd made eye-contact with him. He was world-class at recognizing leave-me-alone, but at least he'd planted a seed. It was all he could do.

   Back at his house, Sam loaded his computer and began typing:

     
Dear Mr. Mayor,

     
My Name is Sam Higgins, and I'm concerned

     
about the drugs in our food. I have begun

     
experiencing symptoms common with withdrawal,

     
and I fear that this dangerous aspect of

     
life is detrimental to society. If you could

     
tell me what is in the food, that would help

     
ease my distress. Thank you.

     
Sincerely,

     
Sam Higgins.

   Sam never received a response, but when the letter was found, it read:

     
Mr. Higgins,

     
I'm unaware of drugs in our food. I

     
thank you for your query, but your fears

     
are ungrounded. I advise you to speak

     
with your primary physician about your

     
symptoms, as withdrawal-like sickness

     
can be caused by many other factors.

     
Thank you for your time and concern.

     
Respectfully yours,

     
Mayor Jonathan Farbman

   Two days later, a fully recovered Sam heard the mayor was found dead in his home. He wondered if the mayor had even received his letter, and if he had, if he'd begun to ask questions.

Chapter 8

   While the professor slept, recovering from the seventy-two hours straight he'd supposedly been awake, Cameron went out and talked with Brandon Holt and Jack Evans, telling them Shane's theories.

  
He ushered them inside Brandon's house and shut the doors, glancing around suspiciously. His friends watched him with raised eyebrows.

  
"What are you doing, Cam?" Jack asked. Cameron sat down on the couch and the two others followed suit.

  
"Listen," Cameron said when he considered their conversation safe from prying ears. "I have reason to believe that the aliens are already here, and posing as someone, or even a few people in town, right now."

  
Brandon raised a doubtful eyebrow, but Cameron knew his words hit home with Jack.

  
"What makes you think that?" Brandon asked, interrupting Jack who was likely about to ask the same question.

  
Cameron shrugged. "What makes you think they're not?" he replied, quoting his sleeping guest almost verbatim. "They landed here, they're millennia more advanced–what I'm saying is, why would they land, blind us all, get us all out into the open, then just leave?"

  
His friends didn't respond, so he continued. "I'll tell you why. They pulled a switcheroo when all of us went outside. Pat Shane is a professor on this extra-terrestrial stuff and he's certain that not all of us who went outside went back inside–although it sure as hell looked like it."

  
Brandon raised an eyebrow. "You're saying that an alien took someone's place."

  
"That's exactly what I'm saying."

  
Brandon and Jack took Cameron's words and shuffled them, not sure whether to be confused or skeptical. Birds chirped loudly outside and Cam looked out the window, half expecting someone to be standing there with a blank expression on their face. But he saw nothing aside from rustling leaves.

  
Brandon followed Cameron's gaze. "So you're saying that anyone who went outside when the aliens landed might not be themselves?"

  
"Yes."

  
"Like, abducted?" asked Jack.

  
"Yes."

  
"That's at least ten people."

  
Cameron started counting on his fingers. "I saw you two, Jack, your wife as well–and I saw both Scotts, Bernard and Belinda, and Mitch Anderson."

  
"I saw Andy and Leola Perkins," said Jack.

  
"And I saw Nick Robins and Jordan Wood," said Brandon. "I've seen them since though, and they seem the same."

  
"You can't be sure," said Cameron. "The aliens might've been spying for a while before they landed."

  
"True," said Brandon.

  
"So that leaves Mark and Marilyn Herman and Stanley and Lindsey Lang unaccounted for," said Jack.

  
Cameron sighed. "Even if you saw them, we can't be sure. Nobody kept a constant eye on anyone else."

  
Brandon punched his hand. "We need some kind of plan."

  
"Kind of makes you wish we'd thought of some secret code," Jack said. "You know, to confirm we are who we say we are in case of something like this."

  
Cameron shrugged. "Too late now."

  
He closed his eyes. How could the three of them together figure out who had been replaced?

  
"Jack, Brandon–you guys have any ideas?"

  
Brandon shook his head. Jack scratched his.

  
"We could throw one of those suburban parties," Jack said.

  
Brandon shook his head and grinned. "Now doesn't seem like the time for that, pal."

  
"That's obviously not what I mean," Jack said. "We could get everyone in the same place and figure out who's not acting normally, watching how everyone interacts with everyone else."

  
Cameron nodded. "I like it. I'll talk to Caroline–we'll throw it at my place. We can introduce the professor then too."

  
"Alright, I'm in," Brandon said. "I'll bring the dip."

   The party turned out, not a single person declined the invitation, and as Cameron walked around thinking of his secret guest upstairs, he wondered how his friends and neighbors would react when they discovered the real reason for the gathering.

  
Caroline had acted wonderfully–within a few hours she'd managed to conjure enough food and drink to suit all seventeen guests. Cameron wandered around with his glass of champagne, studying everyone for hints of abnormal activity.

  
He'd quickly discovered that the recent UFO landing was the talk of the town, and his party invitation was less accepted for a want of food and merriment and more as means to obtaining information. Which made Cameron's job all the more difficult.

  
Nick Robins approached with an outstretched hand. Cameron shook it.

  
"So," Nick said. "What do you make of our recent extra-terrestrial guests?"

  
Cameron laughed. Nick was an outgoing guy. He was openly homosexual–but by 'openly', he 'openly' talked about it, and aside from that Cameron saw no evidence whatsoever of Nick's sexual orientation. His friends agreed that Nick was the straightest gay man they'd ever met.

  
"I don't know," Cameron said. He attempted to take a casual sip of champagne. "What do you make of it?"

  
Nick shrugged. "Not sure. There's definitely an ill-at-ease pervading our neighborhood. I think half of us are afraid of the aliens, and the other half are afraid of how our Radicalist government will treat us once they find out we've been subject to near alien contact."

  
Cameron took another casual sip of champagne, thinking as he did so that his repeated attempts at acting casual must be glaringly obvious. "So which side are you on?" he asked.

  
Just then Belinda Scott, Bernard's wife, walked behind Nick and gave his rear a small pinch, which Cameron thought was wildly inappropriate, but not unlike her. She was normally one of a few who drank more than socially acceptable at their neighborhood's suburban parties.

  
Cameron remembered that Nick was openly homosexual, and wondered how Bernard Scott felt about his wife's antics. If Nick had been straight, Cameron was certain that Bernard would be upset. Then again, being much older than his wife and an advocate of sobriety, Bernard was already likely upset with Belinda.

  
By then, Nick had turned to talk with Belinda about a television show they both watched, so Cameron excused himself and made his way to the bar. At this rate he'd be drunk before his third conversation he thought as he refilled his glass for a fourth time.

  
Brandon appeared next to him and stared unblinking at the kitchen cabinets straight ahead. "Notice anything suspicious yet?" he asked, barely moving his mouth.

  
Cameron turned to his friend and raised an eyebrow.

  
"Yeah. You," he said. "We're allowed to talk, you know."

  
"Roger," Brandon replied, then grabbed what appeared to be his fifth beer and wandered off. Somehow, this was going poorer than expected, and he'd had low expectations to begin with.

  
He looked across his living room at the couch, at Mark Herman and his wife Marilyn as they spoke with a clearly bored and irritated Jordan and Opal Wood. The Hermans were the most straight-laced religious couple in town. Mark was in his late fifties, his wife much younger and incredibly gorgeous, and it annoyed Cameron to no end how obviously obsessed she was with her controlling, stuck-up husband.

  
Cameron sighed. Duty called however, and he left the bar to approach the group, making sure to take the bottle of champagne with him.

  
Jordan turned and locked eyes with Cameron, and a wide grin split his face as he took the opportunity to excuse himself.

  
"Great party, Cam!" he said. Opal glared at him as he stood and walked from the couch.

  
He and Cameron shook hands. "So what do you make of the UFO?" he asked.

  
Almost as if by force of habit, Cameron took another sip of champagne. At this point he was Pavlov'ed to drink every-damn-time someone mentioned the damn aliens.

  
"Not sure," Cameron said. "What do you think?"

  
"I think that if our little community wasn't fucked before, we sure as hell are now," Jordan replied with a grin.

  
Jordan was a pessimist, a
grinning
pessimist. If asked, he'd agree with a smile and tell you how he was religious because he could only attribute the fact that he wasn't yet dead to divine intervention. Cameron thought this interesting, to say the least, because Jordan was a highly successful author, and his books, which Cameron had fingered through, were wildly depressing. He'd introduce a single character and allow the reader to grow close with that character over the course of the book, and at the end kill him, her, or it off brutally, randomly, and without a trace of poetry. This lack of poetry was referred to by critics as poetic on a grand scheme, a subtle allegory that life is meaningless. This led Jordan to laugh angrily at his success. It seemed to Cameron as if he wanted the critics to shred his books and devise a rebuttal, stating his books weren't true to life and that existence has meaning. But none would, so Jordan Wood continued to write his depressing books and drink.

  
"You think Sherwood Hills was in trouble before this?" Cameron asked, certain that he wouldn't like the answer and immediately regretted his question. "Why?"

  
"I'd tell you, Cam–but the look on your face tells me you'd really rather not know."

  
Cameron laughed, then took another sip of champagne, polishing off his fifth glass.

  
"Maybe you're right," he said.

  
He checked his watch. It was ten to eleven. In ten minutes the time they'd agreed to reveal the true reason for the party would be upon them. He felt his anxiety wash into his stomach with another sip, and could almost feel it bubbling like a dissolvable gas-relief tablet inside his stomach, but doing exactly the opposite.

  
Well, better get ready. Cameron ascended the stairs, walked down the hall and into his bedroom.

  
Inside sat the professor and Caroline, mid conversation.

  
"…and from there I spent three years in DC as a resident under Dr Ron Howard, who confirmed my research with his own," Shane said. "We wrote countless papers on the subject, but all were rejected by every which journal of psychology and medicine, and the problem never gained traction. It was all hypothesis anyway, and the rejection never concerned us on a conspiracy level. It wasn't until my mentor was found murdered that I wondered if we'd stepped into something bigger than we'd thought. The aliens hiding among us, albeit logical, never seemed as dire as we'd imagined. But learning what we'd learned, it was clear that this problem was more than we'd first realized, and time was running out."

  
"But what about the ambulance?" Caroline asked.

  
"Ah, yes. I'd been conducting experiments with food, and with my medical license I'd been granted a permit to have one on scene in case of an emergency. I was just returning it to Savannah when I took a left at the fork and ended up here."

  
Caroline shrugged. "In any case, I'm glad you did. We'd be lost without your guidance."

  
Shane nodded. "It's exciting and frightening simultaneously to see my research so confirmed. We haven't much time to act, if we'd hope to expel them."

  
"Well," Cameron said, looking at his watch. "Now's the time. You ready?"

  
Shane nodded. Together the three of them descended the stairs. As they did so, Cameron locked eyes with Jack, then with Brandon, and the two approached while the other party-goers stared, confusion washed upon their drunk, tired faces.

  
"Can I have your attention," Cameron said loudly, needlessly–he already had their attention. He continued.

  
"Thanks. As you're all probably aware, three days ago Sherwood Hills was visited by aliens. What you don't know is that the aliens have likely taken the place or places of one or more people in our small community."

  
At this point, a few of the attendees gasped. Cameron continued.

  
"It's impossible for us to find out who–or it would've been if not for our guest here. Pat Shane is a professor of aliens and stuff, and it's fortunate that he agreed to stay and help us."