Part 22 (2/2)

* * * With a liquid hum, the airlock controls finally responded to Kyle's inputs. ”Back inside the van.” There was no way to know what might come at them through the hatch he'd been so eager to open. On the rear deck of the van was a gas-powered, seven-thousand-watt, electric generator. Several multioutlet surge protectors were plugged into the generator. From the surge protectors, in turn, hung two vacuum cleaners, a leaf blower, a belt sander, a kitchen mixer . . . pretty much every motorized appliance in Kyle's house. ”Fire in the hole.” He mashed down the generator's On b.u.t.ton. As the engine roared to life, he and Blake began switching on appliances. The noise was deafening. As he stepped down from the van's side door, the inner airlock hatch thunked into its fully open position. Krulirim writhed and thrashed on the deck, some with limbs entangled in unrecognizable equipment. The thunder of the portable generator masked any sounds the aliens may have been making.

Just as Kyle was thinking, Victory, he was jerked roughly around. He lip-read, rather than heard Blake's words. ”We have a problem.”

* * * The overcrowded trailer in which Swelk anxiously waited was ripe with an odor she did not recognize. Despite every effort to keep out of the way, she was b.u.mped and bruised. The humans stretched, contorted, and strained to look past one another at the instruments and display panels lining the trailer's walls. Darlene tried to report status occasionally, but the cacophony of speech rendered the translator mostly useless.

It grieved Swelk that the humans still distrusted her. The trailer doors were secured by a keypad device. The irony that she had revealed the keypad code to the Consensus was not lost on her. What was lost on the people streaming in and out of the trailer, however, was that a Krul saw in a full circle-she was in no sense ”facing” one of the walls of instrumentation as were her human companions. She had already espied the code that would let her exit. That knowledge was of no practical use-this trailer was the only enclosure in the vicinity s.h.i.+elded against Kyle's impromptu magnetic weapon.

A cheer rang out. Swelk quivered, though the reaction must be only nerves. Actual exposure would have incapacitated her. Kyle must have succeeded in opening the airlock door. Please be all right. Please be all right. Images of her s.h.i.+pmates, of the Girillian menagerie, of Kyle alternated in her mind. She was not certain for whom the wishes of safety were most fervently intended. Please be all right. Please be . . .

The ma.s.s of people in the trailer had fallen suddenly, ominously silent.

* * * Truly awful violin music screeched from the Walkman ca.s.sette recorder Andrew Wheaton had brought to the airport. Wild clapping greeted the end of the tune. ”That's great, sweetie,” Tina encouraged. ”Play it again for Mommy?” Andrew laughed through his tears, remembering what Tina had later admitted-she'd had no idea what Junior had played.

”Thank you, Mommy,” answered a voice as sweet as the music was tortured. Screeching resumed. Tina's

again was the single clue this shrieking was related to the earlier ”tune.”Andrew brushed away the tears, but left the tape, the final recording of lost wife and child, running. Swinging the stolen tanker truck around the end of a row of hangars, the alien s.h.i.+p loomed before him like a beached whale. The truck had fishtailed coming out of the curve; he eased up on the gas, lining up on one of the vessel's landing legs. He patted the photo of the three of them he'd taped to the dashboard.

Then he pushed the gas pedal to the floor.

He was astonished to see puffs bursting from the concrete. Moments later, the tanker lurched, its rear

dragging. People were shooting at him-or at his tires, anyway. Were there troops here to protect the murdering devils? The truck swerved and swayed as he fought to control it. One of those swerves revealed a ramp leading into the s.h.i.+p. Newscasts often showed the outer airlock hatch open at the top of a ramp.

A low armored truck, a ”high mobility vehicle,” sped from a hangar, rashly trying to cut him off. There was no need to see if that driver truly was suicidal-better to sweep around and charge up the open ramp. Another Humvee raced up parallel to him. He didn't hear these shots either over Junior's playing, but his winds.h.i.+eld filled with holes. The wind of his forward motion pressed against the weakened winds.h.i.+eld. The gla.s.s shattered, countless shards stabbing him in the chest and face and arms.

He patted the St. Christopher's medal that dangled from the rearview mirror, and once more the photo.

”See you soon.”

The ramp was directly in front of him.

* * * Either the roar of the portable generator or the boom of the backup explosives was the commandos' cue to race across the tarmac from hangar to stars.h.i.+p. No part of the plan involved a tanker truck-but one was nonetheless barreling toward them.

Kyle couldn't make out much detail at this distance. The tanker driver had pale hair, dark eyes, and a cigar in his mouth. Then it hit him: Andrew Wheaton. Kyle never doubted that the grieving father and husband meant to crash into the s.h.i.+p. Blake's soldiers were at a loss, unable to stop the tanker and unwilling to risk setting it afire as it sped toward their objective.

Could he deflect the tanker? Keep it from climbing the ramp? Kyle gestured; Blake followed him back to the van. The generator weighed nearly 250 pounds; grunting, they shoved it out the van's side door onto the airlock floor. Electric cords yanked loose; Kyle threw appliances from the van. ”Plug it all back in!” he screamed into the sudden comparative quiet. He jumped into the driver's seat and threw the van into reverse.

Rualf thrashed and convulsed, as all around him animals calmly circled their cages or nibbled their fodder or stood watching him. Whatever had rendered him helpless had no effect on the Girillian beasts. Hearts beating erratically, limbs flailing, he tried to call out for a.s.sistance. His words were unintelligible, even to him.

When would it end? Would it end? That second question had just occurred to him when the phenomenon, whatever it was, abated. Limbs quivering, he climbed falteringly from the deck. How much time had been lost? To save a few seconds, he keyed in the override that opened the airlock's second hatch. He had to get outside with a utility Hovercraft, had to drag the human's obstruction from the other airlock, so that they could escape.

He was staggering toward a Hovercraft when the invisible forces, whatever they were, surged anew. Rualf dropped again to the floor, in helpless terror of whatever might come through the airlock that now gaped open, entirely unguarded.

* * * A cargo van burst in reverse from the airlock. It bounced down the ramp, gaining speed, aimed right at Andrew. Sorry fella, he thought in utter sincerity. He maintained course.

At the last moment, the van driver dived out, to be struck brutally by his own door. The van veered, whether from a final tug on the steering wheel or the drag of the open door. As the tanker smashed into the van, Andrew was glad to see the driver had tumbled clear.

The tank tried to go straight even as the cab tipped going over the van. As Andrew fought the skid, the cab's wheels slammed back down, the front left wheels of the tank hit the crushed van, and the steering wheel twisted out of his hands.

The rig jackknifed. The tanker spun and sc.r.a.ped along the concrete, raising a sea of sparks and a sound like the end of the world. The overturned vehicle kept moving forward. Near the base of the ramp, the tank ruptured. Clear liquid and the stench of kerosene streamed toward the stars.h.i.+p and its gaping port. Battered and bruised, Andrew saw a second person leaping from the ramp. Run fast, he thought, as another bounce cracked his head against the side window.

A spark ignited the spilled jet fuel. The devils who had taken his family were doomed.

CHAPTER 29.

Groaning, Kyle crawled away from the heat and flames. After a few painful yards, he was grabbed under an arm by Ted Blake, who half dragged, half carried him from the h.e.l.l that had erupted. Blake left him propped against a hangar wall, goggling at the raging inferno. He had by sheer good luck rolled behind the wrecked van, and been sheltered from the worst of the fireball.

What did this all mean? After his leap from the speeding van and the explosion, he couldn't think straight. Of one thing he was certain: Wheaton was dead. How many Krulirim had the man taken with him?

Darlene appeared from somewhere. ”Kyle!? Are you all right?”

He failed miserably in an attempt to smile, but vomited noisily without effort. ”I've been better.” Still, his mind was clearing. The airlock he had with such difficulty opened was engulfed with flames, entirely

impa.s.sable. And apart from the flames, the s.h.i.+p looked funny. It was at an odd angle; a landing support must have been snapped by the blast.The fire and explosion had surely incinerated the generator and his sorry collection of appliances. Swelk always recovered quickly after a electric motor was switched off. If any Krulirim survived, maybe on the opposite side of the s.h.i.+p, they would be recovered by now.

What would they be doing?

* * * For time without measure, the deck fell from beneath Grelben. The walls spun around him, receding into infinite s.p.a.ce. He somehow floated and fell simultaneously, limbs spasming. When the sensation faded, he pulled himself onto his command seat. Bridge displays showed F'thk robots littering the concrete, mostly torn to pieces. On other screens, a human ground vehicle racing toward the deployed ramp. The inner airlock door had been opened during his incapacity. His s.h.i.+p was exposed! Before he could engage the remote-hatch override, the onslaught of vertigo resumed. He toppled from the seat, limbs entangled.

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