"Children With Amber Eyes"
May. 20th, 2022 05:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dochermes"Children With Amber Eyes"
6/8/2020
I.
Jocelyn Garimara had been prepared to experience some curious or open hostile stares in Forlorn Corners. This northern part of Minnesota was mostly populated by descendants of Norwegian immigrants who had come here for farming or logging more than a hundred years earlier. Not only did she had that rich deep brown skin tone, but with her naturally straight thick hair and distinctive features, she didn't really look like an American black person either. She thought it likely that there had never been an Australian Aborigine in this town within living memory. Still, the old man behind the counter of the gas station didn't need to be ogling her quite so openly.
Holding a double handful of snacks, she raised an eyebrow at the clerk. "Something wrong?"
That made the old man laugh, showing teeth so perfect they had to be dentures. "Heh. No, no, sorry to be staring like that. It's just that you're so pretty. When you turned sideways, your profile reminded me of that old time movie star Victoria Fields."
Despite herself, Jocelyn smiled. "Oh, well, that's a bit of all right then. I'm not above taking a harmless compliment." At thirty-four, slender and fit, she knew she was attractive but still felt so out of place in an area populated entirely by blondish white people that she remained self-conscious.
"Will that be all? Are you getting gas at the pump?"
"No, I'm good. I just want this trail mix with the peanuts and some iced tea and a few candy bars," she replied. "I've been driving all day."
Ringing her up, the clerk ventured, "Need any directions? Easy to get lost in these parts."
"No, thanks." Jocelyn retrieved her debit card and carefully tucked the receipt into the top left pocket of her denim jacket. Among her teammates, she was notorious for being tight with money. Growing up in desperate poverty made her watch where every penny went. Every expense incurred on this case would be covered not from her own funds but from her KDF account. Giving the old man a genuine warm smile, she said "Thanks again," and headed for the twin glass doors.
"Take care, miss."
"See ya."
Out in the tiny parking lot with its two gas pumps and an aluminum sign on a post which read CIGARETTES- LOWEST PRICE ALLOWED BY LAW, Jocelyn beeped open the door of the dark blue Nissan she had rented that morning at the airport. The tickling in her chest was becoming uncomfortable. Soon she had better let her Red Spectre out to blow off some steam, rather than have it emerge by itself when she fell asleep and so inevitably cause a panic. She placed her steel-framed aviator sunglasses on the snub bridge of her nose, settled behind the wheel and swung the car around around to ease out onto Route 169. There was no other traffic in sight, despite it being three in the afternoon of a Saturday when people might be expected to be going shopping or socializing.
According to her GPS, there were fourteen miles between her and the town of Forlorn Corners itself. She whipped along a typical country road with markers at intervals and frequent side roads that often were marked DEAD END- PRIVATE PROPERTY. Seeing a convenient flat area by the side of the road with no houses in sight for the past mile, she swung over and parked the Nissan. A knee-high stone wall made of loose irregular rocks ran parallel to the road, almost certainly a property marker. Glancing both ways, Jocelyn nimbly hopped over the barrier and trotted deeper into the woods until she could not be seen from the road.
Within her chest, the unpleasant twitching grew stronger. She tapped a fist lightly against her own sternum and snapped, "All right, all RIGHT. Out ya go." As Jocelyn sagged to her knees, a crackling silhouette of dark red energy shot out from inside her and whirled in a loop at tree top level. The Red Spectre was vaguely humanlike, with two arms and two legs but no more detail than that. Its head was a mere featureless oval. An ominous hissing sounded in its trail.
Jocelyn sat up on the ground, propping her stiff arms behind her to help. She remained conscious when the manifestation was out of her body but it took so much of her life force with it that she was left weak and dizzy. Ironically, she herself was at her most defenseless when her greatest power was unleashed. "Get on with it, damn you. That big dead tree over there. Yes, blow it up if yer craving some destruction."
Like the living lightning bolt it was, the Red Spectre flashed across the open space and exploded against a dried old tree that leaned at a precarious angle. Thunder cracked sharp and painful at such close range, limbs and chips spun away fast as bullets. Then, as the echoes still reverberated, the apparition flew back and dove back into Jocelyn's chest as a swimmer dives into a pool.
"Whew. That's a relief." The Aboriginal woman got to her feet with renewed vitality and tugged down her jacket where it had ridden up. "Ah, bloody hell. I shouldn't begrudge you wanting to get out once inna while. I myself like to stop the car and stretch my legs during a long drive. You're all right, me Gammon, I don't mind you at all."
II.
She rolled through the drowsy town of Forlorn Corners, population 838, going past a garage called Jack's Reliable Motors, a unisex barber shop and hair salon with THAT'S PERFECT written in blue script on the window and Beckert's Chop Shop which had a wide picture window showing a row of fat men perched on stools at a counter. Jocelyn pulled over near the curb and studied the scene before moving on again. The town did not have parking meters, cars were left at random where there was room.
A few blocks later, she saw the street sign Lark Street and swung a right. Here was the Acme Building, a white brick structure occupied by a real estate office, two insurance firms and the office of 'Paul K. Ohlen, MD.' A newish looking concrete ramp for wheelchairs ran up one side of the steps to the front door. Jocelyn pulled in and arranged her car so it was pointing out toward the road. Being set up for a quick getaway was an ingrained habit that had saved her life more than once.
For a few seconds, the Tel Shai knight straightened her sleeves and seemed to be merely adjusting her clothing. But actually she was doing a mental rundown of her gear. Under the blue jeans and white crewneck shirt was a full suit of the flexible Trom armor, thin as silk but protective against high-powered rifle bullets. Built into the high-waisted denim jacket were a dozen slits and inner pouches holding everything from a lockpick set to two grape-sized resonance grenades to an oxygen membrane which could be strapped over her lower face. The Link communicator was strapped to her belt and the anesthetic dart gun rested horizontally across her lower back, concealed by the jacket.
All these miniaturized gadgets and weapons were reassuring. She had used them all on past missions. But Jocelyn's ultimate resource was the energy manifestation that even then she felt coiling within her body. She described having a Gammon as 'carrying lightning in your chest.'
Entering the building, she found a staircase to her right and two office doors on the wall to her left. The frosted glass panel of the nearer one repeated 'Paul M Ohlen, MD' as well as office hours which were 8 to 4 and a phone number. As Jocelyn read that information, the office door opened from within and a spry little old lady bustled out. Despite being bent over and relying on one of those canes that have little feet on the end to prevent it falling over, the woman was energetic enough. She grinned at Jocelyn and tapped quickly across the lobby and out the front door.
For some reason, that fleeting encounter amused Jocelyn. Her spirits lifted from their usual glum brooding. Seeing the office door still ajar, the Tel Shai knight stepped into an unremarkable waiting room with five plastic chairs along one wall, a large clock up past eye level and a tin rack holding several ancient yellowed magazines. Next to a plain wooden door marked CONSULTING - PRIVATE, a modern streamlined desk stood with a middle-aged woman with a brown cardigan draped over her shoulders, busily tapping away on a laptop keyboard. She smiled pleasantly enough at Jocelyn's entrance. "One moment, please."
Jocelyn did not take a seat but studied the waiting room. Next to the entryway, a horizontal board nailed to the wall held eight pegs for hanging coats. There was a printed sheet about the importance of getting a flu vaccine every years and a rather dull drab painting of a cornfield by some local artist, judging by the tag, 'for sale $85.'
Swinging around in her swivel chair, the receptionist asked, "Yes, miss? Do you have an appointment?"
"Dr Ohlen asked me to stop in today as soon as I arrived in town. My name is Garimara, Jocelyn Garimara."
"Oh. Oh, yes indeed, he mentioned your name." She pressed a button on her desk twice and pointed at the Consulting door. "The doctor said to admit you immediately."
"Thank you." Jocelyn stepped through the plain wooden door, closing it behind her and finding herself in a short hallway. On one side, an open door showed a bathroom. To the other was an examination room with a high couch covered with disposable paper and a cabinet of supplies. Facing her at the end of the hall, another swung out to reveal a thin old man with thick-lensed glasses and a ring of white hair crowned by a bald dome.
"Oh, Miss Garimara. Thank God you've come. Please, please, come in here."
The office was not exactly cluttered, it was too neatly organized to be called that. But the profusion of thick reference books, folders and binders and stacks of loose papers, gave a stifling impression. Behind a simple metal desk holding an old-fashioned desktop with a large monitor, Dr Ohlen plopped down and gestured for Jocelyn to seat herself.
As she pulled a chair closer to the desk, Jocelyn read more than tension or worry in the doctor's face. There was fear there and more than fear, deep terror. "I came here directly you called us in New York."
"Yes. Yes. I know about your KDF, the Kenneth Dred Foundation, because Jeremy Bane was here in Forlorn Corners several years ago. Those trampling deaths, the so-called Triceratops sightings. Then he came back because of some bizarre Runestone cult that was accused to kidnappings. He made me promise to call if anything, well, supernatural happened again."
Jocelyn folded her hands in her lap and tried to make her voice reassuring. Her judgement was that this man was near panic. "I'm sorry to say Jeremy himself retired a few years ago. But the KDF team will absolutely be able to help. We've had the same training and background he did. Perhaps you can start by giving me some idea of the problem?"
"Give me a second," Dr Ohlen said. He pulled open the left drawer of his desk and came up with a stack of six manila folders tied together with twine. "This may well cost me my license to practice. Hell, I might come up on criminal charges for violating HIPAA regulations. These patients deserve privacy but... I have come to the conclusion that they are in grave danger like nothing human beings have ever faced before."
Watching him, calculating by his voice how much stress he was under, Jocelyn simply said, "Tell me what you can."
"I can't give you any names. Even revealing these details is going against my oath," the doctor said. "But every women in this town... perhaps every one woman in the world... may be at risk of suffering a terrible fate. It's horrible." After Jocelyn did not respond, he took a deep shuddering breath. "All right. In the past two years, six of our local women have become inexplicably pregnant and delivered seemingly healthy children. Four were married, one was a forty-eight year old widow beginning menopause and the most recent was a thirteen-year-old girl."
Meeting his hesitant gaze, Jocelyn prompted him with, "Come right out with it, doctor. I'm here to help."
"All of them told me there was no way they could have conceived. Three of the married women said they had not had sex with their husbands... or anyone else.. for over a month. The fourth wife was on birth control. The widow swore up and down she had not even kissed a man since her husband's death. And the teenager got nearly hysterical because she insisted she was a virgin. Yet all of them went through normal gestation and delivered without incident. Three girls, three boys, all alive and healthy today."
"Excuse me, doctor, but I have to ask. Did these children resemble the men who presumably would have been their fathers?"
"Oh yes. Completely. One husband quietly had DNA testing done and the results were 98 per cent conclusive. The children looked exactly as one might expect. The babies who were given birth by the widow and the teenager took after their mothers' genes so much that they resembled sisters more than daughters."
Jocelyn frowned so a vertical line appeared between her eyebrows. Her huge dark eyes were distant. "Something about this is strangely familiar... Doctor, does the rest of the town know?"
"Absolutely. We're a small little village and gossip is a way of life. But I'm happy to say everyone has been entirely supportive. As far as I can see, the married couples will remain together. The teenager's family believes she must have given in to temptation once and they are taking good care of her. She has been homeschooled."
"There's something you haven't told me yet," Jocelyn said.
"I should not have said even this much," Ohlen blurted. "But someone has to DO something. If I went to the police, they would listen politely and then dismiss me as delusional. If I went to the medical board or confided in another doctor... No. I have researched your organization. I have learned about the Midnight War."
"Go ahead, tell me what is really bothering you."
"Yes. Very well, I will. In the past few weeks, even though the anamolous children range in age from two years to eight months, they share something in color. Their irises have changed. All six have amber colored eyes."
III.
Ten minutes later, Jocelyn returned to the Nissan. She stood by it for a moment, taking in the layout of the parking lot and the building, planning her burglary. Her best efforts had not been able to pry more information out of Dr Ohlan. Certainly not the names or addresses of the patients. But he had let slip that one of the new mothers was a divorced woman and the other a minor, probably fourteen years old by now. That could be important.
Behind the building was an undeveloped lot filled with trees and bushes, then another side street. Good enough. Jocelyn started up the car, thinking over the mystery, went out on Lark Street and then back out to the main street of Forlorn Corners. On her way into town, she had noticed a likely motel which would suit her purposes.
The NeverCare Inn was a long pale-gold wooden structure with a railed walkway running along its second story. The parking lot was asphalt, which appealed to her because it allowed a quieter escape than gravel would. At the near end as one turned in, the motel held a bistro with a huge picture window and a menu taped facing outward.
Getting her travel bag from the rear seat, Jocelyn entered the lobby. A young woman no more than twenty was working the front desk and she seemed genuinely interested in seeing someone as out of place as Jocelyn was in this Scandanavian-settled town. Jocelyn asked for a room on the ground floor and was pleased to be given one at the far end of the building. She paid for three days with the option of taking a few more if necessary, using the KDF expense account and tucking the receipt carefully away.
"I have to tell you, except in the summer when we have a few festivals, we don't get many out of towners here," the girl said. "You're from Manhattan? I'd love to see Times Square some day."
Jocelyn smiled, the flash of perfect teeth bright against a dark face. "Oh, I may be doing some real estate work in this area. I'll be looking over some properties that would make nice homes for retiring couples."
"Good luck." As she watched the Tel Shai knight pick up her bag, the young woman got bolder. "If you want to learn about Forlorn Corners, feel free to come down and chat. I'm bored to tears!"
"I'd like that. See you later." Jocelyn took the plastic card that served as a key, raised a hand in a casual wave and left the lobby. Leaving the rented car where it was for the moment, she made her way to the far end of the motel and found her door. The room was more appealing than she had imagined, with real wood flooring and a solid substantial double bed. When she checked the bathroom, she found it sparkling as if scrubbed seconds before she had entered. Jocelyn wryly remembered sleeping on a blanket on the floor as a child, with a rolled up towel for a pillow and a rumbling empty stomach for company.
Jocelyn lived simply. Nearly all of her KDF stipend went into two saving accounts in different credit unions. She had not sought an apartment for herself nor bought her own car as most of her teammates had. Jocelyn also kept two credit cards with their available amount high as possible for emergencies. In her heart, much as she loved her teammates and found their work worthwhile, she was always ready for everything to end without warning.
It had been a long day, getting a flight from Newark Airport to this state and then driving two hours in the rented car. She felt she needed rest badly. Taking two hard rubber wedges from her travel bag, she jammed one under the door and the other in the window sash, securing them better than locks would. Jocelyn dug around in her bag and threw a fresh pair of panties and a plain white T-shirt two sizes too large on the bed.
Quickly, the Tel Shai knight got out of her boots, pants and crewneck shirt, unzipping her windbreaker and draping everything over the back of a chair. She still wore the Trom armor. It seemed to be a full-body leotard of black silk that left only her feet, hands and head exposed but it was proof against gunfire, flames or impact to a greater degree than actual ceramic plate armor would be. Jocelyn opened the inner paramagnetic seams and peeled the armor off, turning it inside out to be washed.
Naked, Jocelyn looked like a longtime runner, with long sleek muscles in her legs and arms. Her stomach was flat, her breasts small and firm, her butt nearly nonexistent. Entering the bathroom, she automatically pressed her hand edge to the door across the top of her head to check her height. Surprsingly, she was a full inch taller than she had been when joining the KDF. Her captain Sable hadguessed the Tagra tea diet with its enhanced healing properties was making up for the height which an undernourished childhood had robbed her.
After a long luxurious hot shower, toweling herself briskly dry, Jocelyn felt increasingly drowsy. The curtained window was getting dark. She had time before heading out, the Midnight War rarely started up in earnest until night had fully fallen. She had scrubbed out the Trom armor and hung it up by a clothes hanger to dry, but for the moment she wiggled into the clean shirt and underwear and felt immensely comfortable.
Before settling in, she checked the door and window again. The anesthetic dart gun went under a pillow where it could be instantly grasped. The Link sat on the nightstand, also within easy reach. Jocelyn yawned and decided she would report to Sable after an hour or two of much-needed sleep. She slid between cool fresh sheets, pulled the blanket up to her chin and dropped off to sleep before another thought could form.
Then, shockingly, she woke in the dark to the worst pain and sickness she had ever felt.
IV.
What was wrong? It was hard to think, her head felt foggy. An aching throb in her lower abdomen hurt worse than the time she had been shot. Rolling over, she grabbed her Link and thumbed the button for a quick scan of the room air. The instant analysis revealed no airborne toxins or harmful gas. She turned the device toward herself. The readings said her pulse was rapid and her blood pressure elevated, her oxygen count was low at 94. Jocelyn forced herself to sit up, feeling a pang below her navel.
Remaining calm with a great effort of will, the Tel Shai knight reached over to switch on the bedside lamp. Nothing in the room seemed disturbed. She glanced down and saw an angry red swollen area between her navel and pubis, with a visible puncture hole. What the hell? Some kind of insect bite or sting maybe? Jocelyn forced herself to sit upright on the edge of the bed and grab her travel bag. There was the bottle of Club soda she had hardly touched. A sealed plastic envelope held a dozen purple leaves, and she crumpled half of them up to sprinkle into the bottle, then chugged nearly the entire eight ounces at a gulp.
The healing effect of the Tagra plant rushed through her body in a comforting wave. Nausea and panic ebbed. Her lower stomach area still hurt but it was more bearable now. Jocelyn examined the wound as best she could, finding the puncture had not bled appreciably. It could have been an insect, she thought, but what made a single hole like that? No spider or centipede she had ever heard of and, growing up in Northwest Australia, she had seen many species.
There was a little more left water in the bottle, so she swirled it around and finished it off. Tagra worked best in a hot beverage but in emergencies the leaves could even be chewed and swallowed dry to some benefit. Jocelyn took readings again and found her vitals were closer to normal.
As if she was not already upset enough, the Red Spectre whooshed out of her body and swung around to hover in mid-air. The manifestation was her size and general shape, a crimson outline of gralic force that hissed and crackled ominously. What did it want? Where was the danger?
"I wish you could talk. Or at least shake your so-called head yes or no," Jocelyn grumbled. She stood up and decided the dizziness had passed. "I don't see any one in here, what is bothering you?"
After the gralic being made no further moves, Jocelyn summoned it back into her. The Red Spectre resisted and slid back into her T-shirted chest with obvious reluctance. This had never happened before. She glanced over at the door to the motel room and saw that the rubber wedge was still firmly in place. But not the one in the window. That wedge was lying on the carpet. Jocelyn checked that the window was down but the wedge had a chip out of its narrow edge. Damn, she should have taken a room on the second floor to make it more difficult for any attack.
Sitting down in one of the comfortably padded chairs, she adjusted the Link and did a more thorough scan of the wound on her stomach. The image on the Link's screen showed no foreign object inside the puncture but it was quite deep. Jocelyn tried to scan herself for any traces of poison or toxins but couldn't quite get results. Of the team, only Megan Salenger could utilize every function that the Links offered.
Thinking of Megan made Jocelyn decide she needed to call the team. Her investigation hadn't gotten anywhere... or had it? The fact that she had been the victim of this weird assault suggested that someone was worried she had learned something. She patched into the Verizon system and called the headquarters on East 38th Street back in New York. When Sable answered, Jocelyn gave a rapid but detailed report on the day's activities right up until the previous minute.
"That's really odd," Sable said. "You're a light sleeper even under normal circumstances. I find it hard to believe that anyone could open that window and jab you with a hypo or other device. Could you have been already drugged? Something in the air?"
"My Link can't find anything now," Jocelyn replied. "And I feel back to normal. I still have enough Tagra leaves to make a few cups of tea, I'll heat water in the coffee maker this room has provided. I agree that something strange happened. But now I'll be on high alert every second."
"And nothing was taken? None of your equipment?"
"No. If I really was unconscious, I have no bruises or soreness anywhere except for the one tiny puncture. It doesn't make sense no matter how I look at it."
Sable resoinded with growing agitation in her voice, "I wish I could send you back-up. No one's available until tomorrow morning when Jin and Timothy come back from Okali. I have to stay here because NYPD is sending a forensics man to question me about that headless body found on Far Rockaway. Otherwise, I'd be on my way to join you this minute."
"I know you would, captain. Tell you what, if I feel dodgy at all, I'll return to home base. As it stands, it seems that someone doesn't like me being here... and you know how I respond to that sort of thing."
"I know. I've seen what your 'wild lightning' can do. You're the most powerful member of our team, Jocelyn," Sable said. "Still, I can't stop from telling you to be careful."
"Understood, captain. I'll report any developments at all. Good night." Breaking off the connection, the Aboriginal knight checked her Trom armor. It was dry. She stripped down to tug it on, then put on fresh socks, her boots and pants. She got another black T-shirt from her travel bag and examined her jacket for its hidden gimmicks. Finally, she fetched the anesthetic dart gun and holstered it across the small of her back.
What rotten luck, she thought. Damn bad timing that the one time she had left the armor hanging instead of waiting for it to dry and wearing it while on case, she had been attacked. She felt fine, though. Before leaving the room, she heated some water, crumpled up two more of the purple leaves and sipped the tea as its minty aroma filled the air.
Deep within her body, she felt the Red Spectre stirring restlessly. Whatever was the matter with her Gammon tonight? Was it upset over the attack? Did it want some retribution? Well, that must wait. Dressed all in black, with her natural dark skin, she often teased her teammates how she was almost invisible at night. Now that would be an advantage. Opening the door a crack and peering out, she saw nothing but curtained windows. Jocelyn closed the door behind her and strode toward the Nissan which she had deliberately left parked near the lot exit. In a second, she was out on the road and coldly determined to get to the bottom of whatever was going on.
Forlorn Corners was nearly deserted at eleven-fifteen at night. Nothing was open, not even the Chop Shop. The maps she had studied before coming out here had indicated a bar called the Hole In the Wall, but that was located fifteen miles out of town in the opposite direction. This suited her fine. If there was going to be any carnage, best that civilians would not be involved.
Going past Lark Street where the doctor's office was located, she swung right onto the next road, Kelvin Lane, and pulled over onto the unused overgrown lot between the two streets. For a long moment, she watched and listened suspiciously, then got out of her car and abruptly ducked down next to it out of sight.
A white van without side windows rolled past and came to a stop fifty yards ahead of her. Jocelyn crouched down on fingertips and toes to scuttle noiselessly through the bushes. She got within reach of the van before its headlights were turned off. She could not have put into words why she wanted to get so close, it was instinct.
Then the side door opposite slid open and a nightmare creature emerged, barely visible in the starlight. Jocelyn held her breath. Within her, the Red Spectre coiled and lashed about angrily, and she pressed a palm to her chest to try to quiet it.
A normal if pudgy man in work shirt and jeans got out from behind the wheel and smacked the horror across the back. As her eyes adjusted, Jocelyn made out a thin insectlike creature standing on tubelike legs which bent backwards at the knees. The head was a bulb with a protruding muzzle and huge faceted eyes.
More stealthily than she ever had moved before, Jocelyn Garimara took a tracer disc from an inside pocket of her jacket, leaned over and stuck it high up inside the rear wheelwheel of the van. Its magnetic tab held it firmly into place. Now at least she felt she would be able to track this vehicle if she lost sight of it.
The insectlike monster seemed to be listening to orders given to him by the man. The creature swung around. From between its legs, a thin whiplike protrusion extended itself upward, ending in a barbed point.
An ovipositor. An egg laying organ. In one horrifying flash, Jocelyn thought she understood where the unexplained pregnancies in this town had originated, why the strange children were starting to change in the same way... and what must have been done to her that very night.
"Bloody Hell!" she roared and unleashed her Gammon. Enraged and bloodthirsty, the Red Spectre shot out from her body, lighting up the area with blinding scarlet sparks, and exploded directly into the insect being. Legs, head and various fragments flew in all directions from the vaporized thorax as thunder boomed deafeningly loud at such proximity.
With a scream of pure terror, the human swung back up into the open door of the still-running van and peeled out. Jocelyn called her Gammon back toward her and the eerie manifestation grudgingly hovered rather than give chase. Gralic force was not like light or heat or magnetism. It was a transcendental energy that did not recognize physics. If left unhindered, the Spectre could have overtaken that van before its wheels had completed a single revolution.
"Inside, inside, come on now," Jocelyn ordered. "Now's not the time to argue." She opened the trunk of the Nissan, hauled out a black plastic bag made for gathering fallen leaves and raced about to throw as much of the shattered insectoid into the bag as possible. She had to hurry. That flash of red light and crash of thunder at ground level might draw some curious neighbors to investigate. Flinging the hastily-tied bag into the trunk, she dove into the driver's seat and started the engine, flooring the gas pedal immediately.
A few miles down the road, after passing only two houses, Jocelyn swung over under an elm and turned the car off. She was hyperventilating. Trying to take deeper slower breaths, she closed her eyes and drew on her Tel Shai training. In a career where she had more than once been beaten half dead, shot, nearly drowned and struck by moving cars, she had never felt more completely damaged and outraged than she was right then.
"Listen," she said when she caught her breath. "Dear Gammon, my Gammon, if you never obey me again, do so now. I want you to surge through my body, okay. Find anything foreign, even a single cell that is not mine and I want you to burn it out! Do you understand! Clean me from the inside."
The next few minutes were excrutiating. What seemed to be white-hot mercury coursed through her veins and muscles, then a fierce stabbing agony deep in her pelvis made her scream. She sat panting and felt sweat running down her face. Then mercifully it passed. Jocelyn could feel the familiar sensation of her Red Spectre coiling back inside her torsom as comforting as a pet cat curling up on one's lap.
"Oh my God, oh my God, I hope that's done it. Thank you, Gammon, thank you." From the compartment inside the driver's door, she pulled a packet of tissues and wiped her dripping face. As painful as that cleansing had been, she actually felt better once it was over. The vague unease which had been troubling her had vanished.
Never mind breaking into the doctor's office tonight, she thought. A far better opportunity had presented itself by pure chance. Unclipping her Link, she noticed her hands were trembling. That would pass. Jocelyn activated the tracking screen, and a fine green grid showed the immediate area. Halfway up that grid, moving north, a blinking blip showed where the tracer disc was that she had planted on the white van. It had not gotten far in the few minutes she had stopped to be cleansed.
"Talk about things getting personal," she muttered as she started the car up and drove off in pursuit. "Why would anyone violate another person that way? Those poor women raising the amber-eyed children...." She pressed a palm to her chest. "Don't worry, dear Red Spectre. These scum will not see the dawn with living eyes."
V.
Twenty minutes later, staying behind the blip by at least a mile so her headlights would not be seen, Jocelyn's rage had simmered down to cold determination. She thumbed a button on the side of the Link that direct dialed KDF headquarters. When Sable picked up immediately, Jocelyn reported everything that had happened that night.
"So right now, I'm following the Human henchman or partner or whatever he is," she finished. "The trunk of this car is filled with a bag containing giant grasshopper legs and head and assorted bits. I hope it doesn't start to stink."
"I think I know what you're tackling," came Sable's voice. "You missed the final encounter we had with Cogitus. That would be, what, six years ago? When he was trying to open doors into Sub-space and unleashed what we called Insectoids?"
"Oi! Of course. I read the file. Where was I when that happened? Oh right, I was in Vienna wasting time contacting a STIGMA double agent. I'll be damned. Looks like those Insectoids have managed to break through again."
"Jocelyn, this is worse than before," Sable told her sternly. "One of those creatures injected a living larva into Haley's thigh. It would have burrowed deeper and grown by eating her muscle tissue until it was big enough to burst out."
"Yeah. Crikey, bad as that sounds, these monsters have gone beyond even that. Seems to me that now they're injecting, I dunno, hybrid Insect-Human sperm cells that get into your uterus? I can't imagine how they developed that. And the babies look Human at first but I'd bet my arse they're going to develop Insectoid characteristics." Jocelyn launched into a string of remarkably coarse curse words before catching herself. "If not for my Gammon, I would be on the way to having an amber-eyed baby myself."
"Listen, I'm contacting our reserve members. Unicorn, Sheng, maybe Galvan if I can locate him. Not casting any doubt on your capability but I want a full squad to attack these creatures."
"No time for that, captain. The blip is stationary. I see a big old house up ahead. Signing off." She drove past a tree by the side of the road that had a notice stapled to it, PRIVATE PROPERTY - TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED and under that, an additional sign, GUARD DOGS. Jocelyn swung the car around in a three point turn so it was facing back the way she had come. If she was being pursued, she'd be able to hop in and take off full blast without delay.
Taking the clunky-looking co2-powered dart gun from its holster at the small of her back, she screwed the extended needle-thin barrel into place until it clicked and inserted a full clip of the potent darts. When assembled, the weapon was too long to be worn concealed. Holding the dart gun ready up beside her face and pointing forward, Jocelyn hopped out of the car.
She had planned on sneaking up through the midnight gloom to circle around behind the house but cold anger welled up as she remembered again what had been done to her. Stealth be damned. Jocelyn sprinted up the dirt road toward the three story house where lights only showed on ground floor windows.
Her enhanced night vision had kicked in. She saw the dark form of a German shepherd loping toward her out of the shadows in plenty of time to fire a metal dart into its chest. Unlike regular handguns, the gas-powered dart guns were silenced effectively to make no more than a soft coughing noise. The attack dog kept running another few steps before skidding on its chest and rolling over limp on the grass.
There was the white van, parked in front of the house. She was nearly there when the front door opened and a stout form appeared backlit by the lights inside. The man said, "I'll go see..." before one of the dart jabbed into his abdomen. The pain of the dart invariably distracted subject for a crucial second while they thought they had been stung by a wasp. Then the potent Trom-formulated drug dazed them and left them unable to react. Three to five seconds after the dart hit, nearly all subjects were sagging to the ground in a stupor.
Still running, Jocelyn hopped nimbly over the fallen man and rushed into a large room devoid of any furniture or furnishings. Four lamps revealed the scene in clear merciless detail. Scuttling back away from her dramatic entrance were two more of the humanlike Insectoids, and swinging around to face her was the grotesquely mutated Hugh Lewis Sinclair... Cogitus.
From the photos in the KDF file on the ancient criminal, Jocelyn was expecting to see a withered elder relying on powered armor for mobility. Instead, she was being confronted by a bizarre figure that was a combination of an old Human male covered by a black carapace over his upper torso and limbs. The wrinkled face contorted and spoke with an effort that dragged each word out.
"Run away," he said with a marked vibrato. "Run. While you can."
"Dr Sinclair?" she asked in honest confusion. "What the hell happened to you?"
"I survived in the space between spaces," the hybrid creature buzzed. "At what cost, eh? I let these Gwerlim infect me so I could adapt to the conditions in sub-space. Escape, girl. Escape before it's too late."
"Yeah, I don't think so." Jocelyn swung her weapon to menace both the former Cogitus and the two Insectoids. Its darts would not penetrate the tough chitinous exoskeletons of these creatures, but they might not realize that. The threat of an unfamiliar weapon might keep them at bay for the moment. "What do you think you're doing, impregnating women that way? It's worse than rape, it's worse than murder."
"Insects do not share our concepts of right and wrong," Cogitus responded. He swung a black-cased arm to motion the two monsters closer to him. "You know about the wasp that lays its eggs in a living spider. You know about ant queens who invade another colony and kill the existing queen to spawn their own larvae, who hatch and eat the existing workers. That is all we are doing. It's.. just Nature."
"Whatever! It's ending now. First, what is going to happen to those children you inflicted on your victims? Are they going to turn into giant beetles like these guys?"
Cogitus tried to laugh but was no longer capable of doing so. All he made was a rasping wheeze. "No, no, the Gwerlim need to inject more of their hormones. They use pheromones to make the hosts sleep deeply. In a few months, the Gwerlim will add more hormones to start our hybrids transforming further. Otherwise, the offspring will remain mere mammals. Humans, as you say."
"God have mercy. You don't even think you're doing anything wrong, do you?" Jocelyn asked.
"It's just the way Nature works, you know that." The gruesome hybrid seemed to struggle with its thoughts. "Every species multiplies as much as it can."
Jocelyn fought down an urge to vomit. Her head was pounding and she could not remain cool and detached any longer. "Gammon," she said while tapping her chest, "Sic 'em!"
Soaring up from within her body, brighter and larger than before, the Red Spectre lit up the gloomy room with its crackling energy. It plunged forward toward the three Insectoid invaders....
VI.
Half an hour later, an exhausted Jocelyn Garmira plopped down on the porch. After her Red Spectre had burned the insect creatures into halves, cauterizing the opened surfaces, it had flashed outside to sear open the stunned human she had tranquilized. It had even killed the helpless German Shepherd before she could stop it. Then the manifestation had for the first time displayed glee by spinning around its own axis like a skater before returning into her body.
Feeling sickened and disgusted by it all, Jocelyn had dragged the dead man inside the house and then hauled the dog's body in as well. She had forced herself to search the house to satisfy herself there were no other occupants. Jocelyn had seldom felt so worn out after a mission. It must have been the emotional trauma of it all that was getting to her. From her jacket, she had taken two of the incendiary discs and placed them near the grotesque corpses. The discs were harmless until armed, and she had set them to detonate in five minutes.
She forced herself up to her feet and began trudging down across the lawn toward where she had left her car. It hardly seemed worth getting away, somehow. Jocelyn reached the Nissan, got in behind the wheel and waited. Part of her mind continued to figure out this situation. Before he had disappeared years earlier, Cogitus had an organization of aides and assistants to carry out the dirty work. That must be who that human thug had been, an old employee paid well to drive those monsters around town in the dead of night. And what was going to happen to the amber-eyed children? Could she believe what Cogitus had said about them needing more Insectoid hormones to change further?
She couldn't think straight at the moment. Her head was throbbing with weariness. Jocelyn decided she would return to the motel, sleep as long as she needed to, and then report to her captain. Let Sable figure out the follow-up. With a sharp cracking thump, a blinding gout of yellow flame rushed out the open door and blew out the glass from the windows. She watched for a few minutes to be certain the house had caught and would burn down to the ground. That was for the best. As the smell of burning wood reached her, Jocelyn started up the car and drove away with no feeling of triumph.
10/21/2020
6/8/2020
I.
Jocelyn Garimara had been prepared to experience some curious or open hostile stares in Forlorn Corners. This northern part of Minnesota was mostly populated by descendants of Norwegian immigrants who had come here for farming or logging more than a hundred years earlier. Not only did she had that rich deep brown skin tone, but with her naturally straight thick hair and distinctive features, she didn't really look like an American black person either. She thought it likely that there had never been an Australian Aborigine in this town within living memory. Still, the old man behind the counter of the gas station didn't need to be ogling her quite so openly.
Holding a double handful of snacks, she raised an eyebrow at the clerk. "Something wrong?"
That made the old man laugh, showing teeth so perfect they had to be dentures. "Heh. No, no, sorry to be staring like that. It's just that you're so pretty. When you turned sideways, your profile reminded me of that old time movie star Victoria Fields."
Despite herself, Jocelyn smiled. "Oh, well, that's a bit of all right then. I'm not above taking a harmless compliment." At thirty-four, slender and fit, she knew she was attractive but still felt so out of place in an area populated entirely by blondish white people that she remained self-conscious.
"Will that be all? Are you getting gas at the pump?"
"No, I'm good. I just want this trail mix with the peanuts and some iced tea and a few candy bars," she replied. "I've been driving all day."
Ringing her up, the clerk ventured, "Need any directions? Easy to get lost in these parts."
"No, thanks." Jocelyn retrieved her debit card and carefully tucked the receipt into the top left pocket of her denim jacket. Among her teammates, she was notorious for being tight with money. Growing up in desperate poverty made her watch where every penny went. Every expense incurred on this case would be covered not from her own funds but from her KDF account. Giving the old man a genuine warm smile, she said "Thanks again," and headed for the twin glass doors.
"Take care, miss."
"See ya."
Out in the tiny parking lot with its two gas pumps and an aluminum sign on a post which read CIGARETTES- LOWEST PRICE ALLOWED BY LAW, Jocelyn beeped open the door of the dark blue Nissan she had rented that morning at the airport. The tickling in her chest was becoming uncomfortable. Soon she had better let her Red Spectre out to blow off some steam, rather than have it emerge by itself when she fell asleep and so inevitably cause a panic. She placed her steel-framed aviator sunglasses on the snub bridge of her nose, settled behind the wheel and swung the car around around to ease out onto Route 169. There was no other traffic in sight, despite it being three in the afternoon of a Saturday when people might be expected to be going shopping or socializing.
According to her GPS, there were fourteen miles between her and the town of Forlorn Corners itself. She whipped along a typical country road with markers at intervals and frequent side roads that often were marked DEAD END- PRIVATE PROPERTY. Seeing a convenient flat area by the side of the road with no houses in sight for the past mile, she swung over and parked the Nissan. A knee-high stone wall made of loose irregular rocks ran parallel to the road, almost certainly a property marker. Glancing both ways, Jocelyn nimbly hopped over the barrier and trotted deeper into the woods until she could not be seen from the road.
Within her chest, the unpleasant twitching grew stronger. She tapped a fist lightly against her own sternum and snapped, "All right, all RIGHT. Out ya go." As Jocelyn sagged to her knees, a crackling silhouette of dark red energy shot out from inside her and whirled in a loop at tree top level. The Red Spectre was vaguely humanlike, with two arms and two legs but no more detail than that. Its head was a mere featureless oval. An ominous hissing sounded in its trail.
Jocelyn sat up on the ground, propping her stiff arms behind her to help. She remained conscious when the manifestation was out of her body but it took so much of her life force with it that she was left weak and dizzy. Ironically, she herself was at her most defenseless when her greatest power was unleashed. "Get on with it, damn you. That big dead tree over there. Yes, blow it up if yer craving some destruction."
Like the living lightning bolt it was, the Red Spectre flashed across the open space and exploded against a dried old tree that leaned at a precarious angle. Thunder cracked sharp and painful at such close range, limbs and chips spun away fast as bullets. Then, as the echoes still reverberated, the apparition flew back and dove back into Jocelyn's chest as a swimmer dives into a pool.
"Whew. That's a relief." The Aboriginal woman got to her feet with renewed vitality and tugged down her jacket where it had ridden up. "Ah, bloody hell. I shouldn't begrudge you wanting to get out once inna while. I myself like to stop the car and stretch my legs during a long drive. You're all right, me Gammon, I don't mind you at all."
II.
She rolled through the drowsy town of Forlorn Corners, population 838, going past a garage called Jack's Reliable Motors, a unisex barber shop and hair salon with THAT'S PERFECT written in blue script on the window and Beckert's Chop Shop which had a wide picture window showing a row of fat men perched on stools at a counter. Jocelyn pulled over near the curb and studied the scene before moving on again. The town did not have parking meters, cars were left at random where there was room.
A few blocks later, she saw the street sign Lark Street and swung a right. Here was the Acme Building, a white brick structure occupied by a real estate office, two insurance firms and the office of 'Paul K. Ohlen, MD.' A newish looking concrete ramp for wheelchairs ran up one side of the steps to the front door. Jocelyn pulled in and arranged her car so it was pointing out toward the road. Being set up for a quick getaway was an ingrained habit that had saved her life more than once.
For a few seconds, the Tel Shai knight straightened her sleeves and seemed to be merely adjusting her clothing. But actually she was doing a mental rundown of her gear. Under the blue jeans and white crewneck shirt was a full suit of the flexible Trom armor, thin as silk but protective against high-powered rifle bullets. Built into the high-waisted denim jacket were a dozen slits and inner pouches holding everything from a lockpick set to two grape-sized resonance grenades to an oxygen membrane which could be strapped over her lower face. The Link communicator was strapped to her belt and the anesthetic dart gun rested horizontally across her lower back, concealed by the jacket.
All these miniaturized gadgets and weapons were reassuring. She had used them all on past missions. But Jocelyn's ultimate resource was the energy manifestation that even then she felt coiling within her body. She described having a Gammon as 'carrying lightning in your chest.'
Entering the building, she found a staircase to her right and two office doors on the wall to her left. The frosted glass panel of the nearer one repeated 'Paul M Ohlen, MD' as well as office hours which were 8 to 4 and a phone number. As Jocelyn read that information, the office door opened from within and a spry little old lady bustled out. Despite being bent over and relying on one of those canes that have little feet on the end to prevent it falling over, the woman was energetic enough. She grinned at Jocelyn and tapped quickly across the lobby and out the front door.
For some reason, that fleeting encounter amused Jocelyn. Her spirits lifted from their usual glum brooding. Seeing the office door still ajar, the Tel Shai knight stepped into an unremarkable waiting room with five plastic chairs along one wall, a large clock up past eye level and a tin rack holding several ancient yellowed magazines. Next to a plain wooden door marked CONSULTING - PRIVATE, a modern streamlined desk stood with a middle-aged woman with a brown cardigan draped over her shoulders, busily tapping away on a laptop keyboard. She smiled pleasantly enough at Jocelyn's entrance. "One moment, please."
Jocelyn did not take a seat but studied the waiting room. Next to the entryway, a horizontal board nailed to the wall held eight pegs for hanging coats. There was a printed sheet about the importance of getting a flu vaccine every years and a rather dull drab painting of a cornfield by some local artist, judging by the tag, 'for sale $85.'
Swinging around in her swivel chair, the receptionist asked, "Yes, miss? Do you have an appointment?"
"Dr Ohlen asked me to stop in today as soon as I arrived in town. My name is Garimara, Jocelyn Garimara."
"Oh. Oh, yes indeed, he mentioned your name." She pressed a button on her desk twice and pointed at the Consulting door. "The doctor said to admit you immediately."
"Thank you." Jocelyn stepped through the plain wooden door, closing it behind her and finding herself in a short hallway. On one side, an open door showed a bathroom. To the other was an examination room with a high couch covered with disposable paper and a cabinet of supplies. Facing her at the end of the hall, another swung out to reveal a thin old man with thick-lensed glasses and a ring of white hair crowned by a bald dome.
"Oh, Miss Garimara. Thank God you've come. Please, please, come in here."
The office was not exactly cluttered, it was too neatly organized to be called that. But the profusion of thick reference books, folders and binders and stacks of loose papers, gave a stifling impression. Behind a simple metal desk holding an old-fashioned desktop with a large monitor, Dr Ohlen plopped down and gestured for Jocelyn to seat herself.
As she pulled a chair closer to the desk, Jocelyn read more than tension or worry in the doctor's face. There was fear there and more than fear, deep terror. "I came here directly you called us in New York."
"Yes. Yes. I know about your KDF, the Kenneth Dred Foundation, because Jeremy Bane was here in Forlorn Corners several years ago. Those trampling deaths, the so-called Triceratops sightings. Then he came back because of some bizarre Runestone cult that was accused to kidnappings. He made me promise to call if anything, well, supernatural happened again."
Jocelyn folded her hands in her lap and tried to make her voice reassuring. Her judgement was that this man was near panic. "I'm sorry to say Jeremy himself retired a few years ago. But the KDF team will absolutely be able to help. We've had the same training and background he did. Perhaps you can start by giving me some idea of the problem?"
"Give me a second," Dr Ohlen said. He pulled open the left drawer of his desk and came up with a stack of six manila folders tied together with twine. "This may well cost me my license to practice. Hell, I might come up on criminal charges for violating HIPAA regulations. These patients deserve privacy but... I have come to the conclusion that they are in grave danger like nothing human beings have ever faced before."
Watching him, calculating by his voice how much stress he was under, Jocelyn simply said, "Tell me what you can."
"I can't give you any names. Even revealing these details is going against my oath," the doctor said. "But every women in this town... perhaps every one woman in the world... may be at risk of suffering a terrible fate. It's horrible." After Jocelyn did not respond, he took a deep shuddering breath. "All right. In the past two years, six of our local women have become inexplicably pregnant and delivered seemingly healthy children. Four were married, one was a forty-eight year old widow beginning menopause and the most recent was a thirteen-year-old girl."
Meeting his hesitant gaze, Jocelyn prompted him with, "Come right out with it, doctor. I'm here to help."
"All of them told me there was no way they could have conceived. Three of the married women said they had not had sex with their husbands... or anyone else.. for over a month. The fourth wife was on birth control. The widow swore up and down she had not even kissed a man since her husband's death. And the teenager got nearly hysterical because she insisted she was a virgin. Yet all of them went through normal gestation and delivered without incident. Three girls, three boys, all alive and healthy today."
"Excuse me, doctor, but I have to ask. Did these children resemble the men who presumably would have been their fathers?"
"Oh yes. Completely. One husband quietly had DNA testing done and the results were 98 per cent conclusive. The children looked exactly as one might expect. The babies who were given birth by the widow and the teenager took after their mothers' genes so much that they resembled sisters more than daughters."
Jocelyn frowned so a vertical line appeared between her eyebrows. Her huge dark eyes were distant. "Something about this is strangely familiar... Doctor, does the rest of the town know?"
"Absolutely. We're a small little village and gossip is a way of life. But I'm happy to say everyone has been entirely supportive. As far as I can see, the married couples will remain together. The teenager's family believes she must have given in to temptation once and they are taking good care of her. She has been homeschooled."
"There's something you haven't told me yet," Jocelyn said.
"I should not have said even this much," Ohlen blurted. "But someone has to DO something. If I went to the police, they would listen politely and then dismiss me as delusional. If I went to the medical board or confided in another doctor... No. I have researched your organization. I have learned about the Midnight War."
"Go ahead, tell me what is really bothering you."
"Yes. Very well, I will. In the past few weeks, even though the anamolous children range in age from two years to eight months, they share something in color. Their irises have changed. All six have amber colored eyes."
III.
Ten minutes later, Jocelyn returned to the Nissan. She stood by it for a moment, taking in the layout of the parking lot and the building, planning her burglary. Her best efforts had not been able to pry more information out of Dr Ohlan. Certainly not the names or addresses of the patients. But he had let slip that one of the new mothers was a divorced woman and the other a minor, probably fourteen years old by now. That could be important.
Behind the building was an undeveloped lot filled with trees and bushes, then another side street. Good enough. Jocelyn started up the car, thinking over the mystery, went out on Lark Street and then back out to the main street of Forlorn Corners. On her way into town, she had noticed a likely motel which would suit her purposes.
The NeverCare Inn was a long pale-gold wooden structure with a railed walkway running along its second story. The parking lot was asphalt, which appealed to her because it allowed a quieter escape than gravel would. At the near end as one turned in, the motel held a bistro with a huge picture window and a menu taped facing outward.
Getting her travel bag from the rear seat, Jocelyn entered the lobby. A young woman no more than twenty was working the front desk and she seemed genuinely interested in seeing someone as out of place as Jocelyn was in this Scandanavian-settled town. Jocelyn asked for a room on the ground floor and was pleased to be given one at the far end of the building. She paid for three days with the option of taking a few more if necessary, using the KDF expense account and tucking the receipt carefully away.
"I have to tell you, except in the summer when we have a few festivals, we don't get many out of towners here," the girl said. "You're from Manhattan? I'd love to see Times Square some day."
Jocelyn smiled, the flash of perfect teeth bright against a dark face. "Oh, I may be doing some real estate work in this area. I'll be looking over some properties that would make nice homes for retiring couples."
"Good luck." As she watched the Tel Shai knight pick up her bag, the young woman got bolder. "If you want to learn about Forlorn Corners, feel free to come down and chat. I'm bored to tears!"
"I'd like that. See you later." Jocelyn took the plastic card that served as a key, raised a hand in a casual wave and left the lobby. Leaving the rented car where it was for the moment, she made her way to the far end of the motel and found her door. The room was more appealing than she had imagined, with real wood flooring and a solid substantial double bed. When she checked the bathroom, she found it sparkling as if scrubbed seconds before she had entered. Jocelyn wryly remembered sleeping on a blanket on the floor as a child, with a rolled up towel for a pillow and a rumbling empty stomach for company.
Jocelyn lived simply. Nearly all of her KDF stipend went into two saving accounts in different credit unions. She had not sought an apartment for herself nor bought her own car as most of her teammates had. Jocelyn also kept two credit cards with their available amount high as possible for emergencies. In her heart, much as she loved her teammates and found their work worthwhile, she was always ready for everything to end without warning.
It had been a long day, getting a flight from Newark Airport to this state and then driving two hours in the rented car. She felt she needed rest badly. Taking two hard rubber wedges from her travel bag, she jammed one under the door and the other in the window sash, securing them better than locks would. Jocelyn dug around in her bag and threw a fresh pair of panties and a plain white T-shirt two sizes too large on the bed.
Quickly, the Tel Shai knight got out of her boots, pants and crewneck shirt, unzipping her windbreaker and draping everything over the back of a chair. She still wore the Trom armor. It seemed to be a full-body leotard of black silk that left only her feet, hands and head exposed but it was proof against gunfire, flames or impact to a greater degree than actual ceramic plate armor would be. Jocelyn opened the inner paramagnetic seams and peeled the armor off, turning it inside out to be washed.
Naked, Jocelyn looked like a longtime runner, with long sleek muscles in her legs and arms. Her stomach was flat, her breasts small and firm, her butt nearly nonexistent. Entering the bathroom, she automatically pressed her hand edge to the door across the top of her head to check her height. Surprsingly, she was a full inch taller than she had been when joining the KDF. Her captain Sable hadguessed the Tagra tea diet with its enhanced healing properties was making up for the height which an undernourished childhood had robbed her.
After a long luxurious hot shower, toweling herself briskly dry, Jocelyn felt increasingly drowsy. The curtained window was getting dark. She had time before heading out, the Midnight War rarely started up in earnest until night had fully fallen. She had scrubbed out the Trom armor and hung it up by a clothes hanger to dry, but for the moment she wiggled into the clean shirt and underwear and felt immensely comfortable.
Before settling in, she checked the door and window again. The anesthetic dart gun went under a pillow where it could be instantly grasped. The Link sat on the nightstand, also within easy reach. Jocelyn yawned and decided she would report to Sable after an hour or two of much-needed sleep. She slid between cool fresh sheets, pulled the blanket up to her chin and dropped off to sleep before another thought could form.
Then, shockingly, she woke in the dark to the worst pain and sickness she had ever felt.
IV.
What was wrong? It was hard to think, her head felt foggy. An aching throb in her lower abdomen hurt worse than the time she had been shot. Rolling over, she grabbed her Link and thumbed the button for a quick scan of the room air. The instant analysis revealed no airborne toxins or harmful gas. She turned the device toward herself. The readings said her pulse was rapid and her blood pressure elevated, her oxygen count was low at 94. Jocelyn forced herself to sit up, feeling a pang below her navel.
Remaining calm with a great effort of will, the Tel Shai knight reached over to switch on the bedside lamp. Nothing in the room seemed disturbed. She glanced down and saw an angry red swollen area between her navel and pubis, with a visible puncture hole. What the hell? Some kind of insect bite or sting maybe? Jocelyn forced herself to sit upright on the edge of the bed and grab her travel bag. There was the bottle of Club soda she had hardly touched. A sealed plastic envelope held a dozen purple leaves, and she crumpled half of them up to sprinkle into the bottle, then chugged nearly the entire eight ounces at a gulp.
The healing effect of the Tagra plant rushed through her body in a comforting wave. Nausea and panic ebbed. Her lower stomach area still hurt but it was more bearable now. Jocelyn examined the wound as best she could, finding the puncture had not bled appreciably. It could have been an insect, she thought, but what made a single hole like that? No spider or centipede she had ever heard of and, growing up in Northwest Australia, she had seen many species.
There was a little more left water in the bottle, so she swirled it around and finished it off. Tagra worked best in a hot beverage but in emergencies the leaves could even be chewed and swallowed dry to some benefit. Jocelyn took readings again and found her vitals were closer to normal.
As if she was not already upset enough, the Red Spectre whooshed out of her body and swung around to hover in mid-air. The manifestation was her size and general shape, a crimson outline of gralic force that hissed and crackled ominously. What did it want? Where was the danger?
"I wish you could talk. Or at least shake your so-called head yes or no," Jocelyn grumbled. She stood up and decided the dizziness had passed. "I don't see any one in here, what is bothering you?"
After the gralic being made no further moves, Jocelyn summoned it back into her. The Red Spectre resisted and slid back into her T-shirted chest with obvious reluctance. This had never happened before. She glanced over at the door to the motel room and saw that the rubber wedge was still firmly in place. But not the one in the window. That wedge was lying on the carpet. Jocelyn checked that the window was down but the wedge had a chip out of its narrow edge. Damn, she should have taken a room on the second floor to make it more difficult for any attack.
Sitting down in one of the comfortably padded chairs, she adjusted the Link and did a more thorough scan of the wound on her stomach. The image on the Link's screen showed no foreign object inside the puncture but it was quite deep. Jocelyn tried to scan herself for any traces of poison or toxins but couldn't quite get results. Of the team, only Megan Salenger could utilize every function that the Links offered.
Thinking of Megan made Jocelyn decide she needed to call the team. Her investigation hadn't gotten anywhere... or had it? The fact that she had been the victim of this weird assault suggested that someone was worried she had learned something. She patched into the Verizon system and called the headquarters on East 38th Street back in New York. When Sable answered, Jocelyn gave a rapid but detailed report on the day's activities right up until the previous minute.
"That's really odd," Sable said. "You're a light sleeper even under normal circumstances. I find it hard to believe that anyone could open that window and jab you with a hypo or other device. Could you have been already drugged? Something in the air?"
"My Link can't find anything now," Jocelyn replied. "And I feel back to normal. I still have enough Tagra leaves to make a few cups of tea, I'll heat water in the coffee maker this room has provided. I agree that something strange happened. But now I'll be on high alert every second."
"And nothing was taken? None of your equipment?"
"No. If I really was unconscious, I have no bruises or soreness anywhere except for the one tiny puncture. It doesn't make sense no matter how I look at it."
Sable resoinded with growing agitation in her voice, "I wish I could send you back-up. No one's available until tomorrow morning when Jin and Timothy come back from Okali. I have to stay here because NYPD is sending a forensics man to question me about that headless body found on Far Rockaway. Otherwise, I'd be on my way to join you this minute."
"I know you would, captain. Tell you what, if I feel dodgy at all, I'll return to home base. As it stands, it seems that someone doesn't like me being here... and you know how I respond to that sort of thing."
"I know. I've seen what your 'wild lightning' can do. You're the most powerful member of our team, Jocelyn," Sable said. "Still, I can't stop from telling you to be careful."
"Understood, captain. I'll report any developments at all. Good night." Breaking off the connection, the Aboriginal knight checked her Trom armor. It was dry. She stripped down to tug it on, then put on fresh socks, her boots and pants. She got another black T-shirt from her travel bag and examined her jacket for its hidden gimmicks. Finally, she fetched the anesthetic dart gun and holstered it across the small of her back.
What rotten luck, she thought. Damn bad timing that the one time she had left the armor hanging instead of waiting for it to dry and wearing it while on case, she had been attacked. She felt fine, though. Before leaving the room, she heated some water, crumpled up two more of the purple leaves and sipped the tea as its minty aroma filled the air.
Deep within her body, she felt the Red Spectre stirring restlessly. Whatever was the matter with her Gammon tonight? Was it upset over the attack? Did it want some retribution? Well, that must wait. Dressed all in black, with her natural dark skin, she often teased her teammates how she was almost invisible at night. Now that would be an advantage. Opening the door a crack and peering out, she saw nothing but curtained windows. Jocelyn closed the door behind her and strode toward the Nissan which she had deliberately left parked near the lot exit. In a second, she was out on the road and coldly determined to get to the bottom of whatever was going on.
Forlorn Corners was nearly deserted at eleven-fifteen at night. Nothing was open, not even the Chop Shop. The maps she had studied before coming out here had indicated a bar called the Hole In the Wall, but that was located fifteen miles out of town in the opposite direction. This suited her fine. If there was going to be any carnage, best that civilians would not be involved.
Going past Lark Street where the doctor's office was located, she swung right onto the next road, Kelvin Lane, and pulled over onto the unused overgrown lot between the two streets. For a long moment, she watched and listened suspiciously, then got out of her car and abruptly ducked down next to it out of sight.
A white van without side windows rolled past and came to a stop fifty yards ahead of her. Jocelyn crouched down on fingertips and toes to scuttle noiselessly through the bushes. She got within reach of the van before its headlights were turned off. She could not have put into words why she wanted to get so close, it was instinct.
Then the side door opposite slid open and a nightmare creature emerged, barely visible in the starlight. Jocelyn held her breath. Within her, the Red Spectre coiled and lashed about angrily, and she pressed a palm to her chest to try to quiet it.
A normal if pudgy man in work shirt and jeans got out from behind the wheel and smacked the horror across the back. As her eyes adjusted, Jocelyn made out a thin insectlike creature standing on tubelike legs which bent backwards at the knees. The head was a bulb with a protruding muzzle and huge faceted eyes.
More stealthily than she ever had moved before, Jocelyn Garimara took a tracer disc from an inside pocket of her jacket, leaned over and stuck it high up inside the rear wheelwheel of the van. Its magnetic tab held it firmly into place. Now at least she felt she would be able to track this vehicle if she lost sight of it.
The insectlike monster seemed to be listening to orders given to him by the man. The creature swung around. From between its legs, a thin whiplike protrusion extended itself upward, ending in a barbed point.
An ovipositor. An egg laying organ. In one horrifying flash, Jocelyn thought she understood where the unexplained pregnancies in this town had originated, why the strange children were starting to change in the same way... and what must have been done to her that very night.
"Bloody Hell!" she roared and unleashed her Gammon. Enraged and bloodthirsty, the Red Spectre shot out from her body, lighting up the area with blinding scarlet sparks, and exploded directly into the insect being. Legs, head and various fragments flew in all directions from the vaporized thorax as thunder boomed deafeningly loud at such proximity.
With a scream of pure terror, the human swung back up into the open door of the still-running van and peeled out. Jocelyn called her Gammon back toward her and the eerie manifestation grudgingly hovered rather than give chase. Gralic force was not like light or heat or magnetism. It was a transcendental energy that did not recognize physics. If left unhindered, the Spectre could have overtaken that van before its wheels had completed a single revolution.
"Inside, inside, come on now," Jocelyn ordered. "Now's not the time to argue." She opened the trunk of the Nissan, hauled out a black plastic bag made for gathering fallen leaves and raced about to throw as much of the shattered insectoid into the bag as possible. She had to hurry. That flash of red light and crash of thunder at ground level might draw some curious neighbors to investigate. Flinging the hastily-tied bag into the trunk, she dove into the driver's seat and started the engine, flooring the gas pedal immediately.
A few miles down the road, after passing only two houses, Jocelyn swung over under an elm and turned the car off. She was hyperventilating. Trying to take deeper slower breaths, she closed her eyes and drew on her Tel Shai training. In a career where she had more than once been beaten half dead, shot, nearly drowned and struck by moving cars, she had never felt more completely damaged and outraged than she was right then.
"Listen," she said when she caught her breath. "Dear Gammon, my Gammon, if you never obey me again, do so now. I want you to surge through my body, okay. Find anything foreign, even a single cell that is not mine and I want you to burn it out! Do you understand! Clean me from the inside."
The next few minutes were excrutiating. What seemed to be white-hot mercury coursed through her veins and muscles, then a fierce stabbing agony deep in her pelvis made her scream. She sat panting and felt sweat running down her face. Then mercifully it passed. Jocelyn could feel the familiar sensation of her Red Spectre coiling back inside her torsom as comforting as a pet cat curling up on one's lap.
"Oh my God, oh my God, I hope that's done it. Thank you, Gammon, thank you." From the compartment inside the driver's door, she pulled a packet of tissues and wiped her dripping face. As painful as that cleansing had been, she actually felt better once it was over. The vague unease which had been troubling her had vanished.
Never mind breaking into the doctor's office tonight, she thought. A far better opportunity had presented itself by pure chance. Unclipping her Link, she noticed her hands were trembling. That would pass. Jocelyn activated the tracking screen, and a fine green grid showed the immediate area. Halfway up that grid, moving north, a blinking blip showed where the tracer disc was that she had planted on the white van. It had not gotten far in the few minutes she had stopped to be cleansed.
"Talk about things getting personal," she muttered as she started the car up and drove off in pursuit. "Why would anyone violate another person that way? Those poor women raising the amber-eyed children...." She pressed a palm to her chest. "Don't worry, dear Red Spectre. These scum will not see the dawn with living eyes."
V.
Twenty minutes later, staying behind the blip by at least a mile so her headlights would not be seen, Jocelyn's rage had simmered down to cold determination. She thumbed a button on the side of the Link that direct dialed KDF headquarters. When Sable picked up immediately, Jocelyn reported everything that had happened that night.
"So right now, I'm following the Human henchman or partner or whatever he is," she finished. "The trunk of this car is filled with a bag containing giant grasshopper legs and head and assorted bits. I hope it doesn't start to stink."
"I think I know what you're tackling," came Sable's voice. "You missed the final encounter we had with Cogitus. That would be, what, six years ago? When he was trying to open doors into Sub-space and unleashed what we called Insectoids?"
"Oi! Of course. I read the file. Where was I when that happened? Oh right, I was in Vienna wasting time contacting a STIGMA double agent. I'll be damned. Looks like those Insectoids have managed to break through again."
"Jocelyn, this is worse than before," Sable told her sternly. "One of those creatures injected a living larva into Haley's thigh. It would have burrowed deeper and grown by eating her muscle tissue until it was big enough to burst out."
"Yeah. Crikey, bad as that sounds, these monsters have gone beyond even that. Seems to me that now they're injecting, I dunno, hybrid Insect-Human sperm cells that get into your uterus? I can't imagine how they developed that. And the babies look Human at first but I'd bet my arse they're going to develop Insectoid characteristics." Jocelyn launched into a string of remarkably coarse curse words before catching herself. "If not for my Gammon, I would be on the way to having an amber-eyed baby myself."
"Listen, I'm contacting our reserve members. Unicorn, Sheng, maybe Galvan if I can locate him. Not casting any doubt on your capability but I want a full squad to attack these creatures."
"No time for that, captain. The blip is stationary. I see a big old house up ahead. Signing off." She drove past a tree by the side of the road that had a notice stapled to it, PRIVATE PROPERTY - TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED and under that, an additional sign, GUARD DOGS. Jocelyn swung the car around in a three point turn so it was facing back the way she had come. If she was being pursued, she'd be able to hop in and take off full blast without delay.
Taking the clunky-looking co2-powered dart gun from its holster at the small of her back, she screwed the extended needle-thin barrel into place until it clicked and inserted a full clip of the potent darts. When assembled, the weapon was too long to be worn concealed. Holding the dart gun ready up beside her face and pointing forward, Jocelyn hopped out of the car.
She had planned on sneaking up through the midnight gloom to circle around behind the house but cold anger welled up as she remembered again what had been done to her. Stealth be damned. Jocelyn sprinted up the dirt road toward the three story house where lights only showed on ground floor windows.
Her enhanced night vision had kicked in. She saw the dark form of a German shepherd loping toward her out of the shadows in plenty of time to fire a metal dart into its chest. Unlike regular handguns, the gas-powered dart guns were silenced effectively to make no more than a soft coughing noise. The attack dog kept running another few steps before skidding on its chest and rolling over limp on the grass.
There was the white van, parked in front of the house. She was nearly there when the front door opened and a stout form appeared backlit by the lights inside. The man said, "I'll go see..." before one of the dart jabbed into his abdomen. The pain of the dart invariably distracted subject for a crucial second while they thought they had been stung by a wasp. Then the potent Trom-formulated drug dazed them and left them unable to react. Three to five seconds after the dart hit, nearly all subjects were sagging to the ground in a stupor.
Still running, Jocelyn hopped nimbly over the fallen man and rushed into a large room devoid of any furniture or furnishings. Four lamps revealed the scene in clear merciless detail. Scuttling back away from her dramatic entrance were two more of the humanlike Insectoids, and swinging around to face her was the grotesquely mutated Hugh Lewis Sinclair... Cogitus.
From the photos in the KDF file on the ancient criminal, Jocelyn was expecting to see a withered elder relying on powered armor for mobility. Instead, she was being confronted by a bizarre figure that was a combination of an old Human male covered by a black carapace over his upper torso and limbs. The wrinkled face contorted and spoke with an effort that dragged each word out.
"Run away," he said with a marked vibrato. "Run. While you can."
"Dr Sinclair?" she asked in honest confusion. "What the hell happened to you?"
"I survived in the space between spaces," the hybrid creature buzzed. "At what cost, eh? I let these Gwerlim infect me so I could adapt to the conditions in sub-space. Escape, girl. Escape before it's too late."
"Yeah, I don't think so." Jocelyn swung her weapon to menace both the former Cogitus and the two Insectoids. Its darts would not penetrate the tough chitinous exoskeletons of these creatures, but they might not realize that. The threat of an unfamiliar weapon might keep them at bay for the moment. "What do you think you're doing, impregnating women that way? It's worse than rape, it's worse than murder."
"Insects do not share our concepts of right and wrong," Cogitus responded. He swung a black-cased arm to motion the two monsters closer to him. "You know about the wasp that lays its eggs in a living spider. You know about ant queens who invade another colony and kill the existing queen to spawn their own larvae, who hatch and eat the existing workers. That is all we are doing. It's.. just Nature."
"Whatever! It's ending now. First, what is going to happen to those children you inflicted on your victims? Are they going to turn into giant beetles like these guys?"
Cogitus tried to laugh but was no longer capable of doing so. All he made was a rasping wheeze. "No, no, the Gwerlim need to inject more of their hormones. They use pheromones to make the hosts sleep deeply. In a few months, the Gwerlim will add more hormones to start our hybrids transforming further. Otherwise, the offspring will remain mere mammals. Humans, as you say."
"God have mercy. You don't even think you're doing anything wrong, do you?" Jocelyn asked.
"It's just the way Nature works, you know that." The gruesome hybrid seemed to struggle with its thoughts. "Every species multiplies as much as it can."
Jocelyn fought down an urge to vomit. Her head was pounding and she could not remain cool and detached any longer. "Gammon," she said while tapping her chest, "Sic 'em!"
Soaring up from within her body, brighter and larger than before, the Red Spectre lit up the gloomy room with its crackling energy. It plunged forward toward the three Insectoid invaders....
VI.
Half an hour later, an exhausted Jocelyn Garmira plopped down on the porch. After her Red Spectre had burned the insect creatures into halves, cauterizing the opened surfaces, it had flashed outside to sear open the stunned human she had tranquilized. It had even killed the helpless German Shepherd before she could stop it. Then the manifestation had for the first time displayed glee by spinning around its own axis like a skater before returning into her body.
Feeling sickened and disgusted by it all, Jocelyn had dragged the dead man inside the house and then hauled the dog's body in as well. She had forced herself to search the house to satisfy herself there were no other occupants. Jocelyn had seldom felt so worn out after a mission. It must have been the emotional trauma of it all that was getting to her. From her jacket, she had taken two of the incendiary discs and placed them near the grotesque corpses. The discs were harmless until armed, and she had set them to detonate in five minutes.
She forced herself up to her feet and began trudging down across the lawn toward where she had left her car. It hardly seemed worth getting away, somehow. Jocelyn reached the Nissan, got in behind the wheel and waited. Part of her mind continued to figure out this situation. Before he had disappeared years earlier, Cogitus had an organization of aides and assistants to carry out the dirty work. That must be who that human thug had been, an old employee paid well to drive those monsters around town in the dead of night. And what was going to happen to the amber-eyed children? Could she believe what Cogitus had said about them needing more Insectoid hormones to change further?
She couldn't think straight at the moment. Her head was throbbing with weariness. Jocelyn decided she would return to the motel, sleep as long as she needed to, and then report to her captain. Let Sable figure out the follow-up. With a sharp cracking thump, a blinding gout of yellow flame rushed out the open door and blew out the glass from the windows. She watched for a few minutes to be certain the house had caught and would burn down to the ground. That was for the best. As the smell of burning wood reached her, Jocelyn started up the car and drove away with no feeling of triumph.
10/21/2020
