The Black Seas of Infinity (7 page)

Two levels up I disembarked, crawling out of
the tunnel and running toward the aperture. I encountered even more
soldiers, clustered near the entrance. When they saw me they opened
fire. What if I had been a friendly alien emerging to greet them?
Then again, maybe they had seen some of the gore still clutching to
my arm and deduced otherwise. Or maybe they were in radio contact
with the team below. I charged straight through them, roughly
shoulder-checking one, and burst into the harsh light of the
hangar. There were now bullets whizzing all around me. I lunged
forward, the spinning projectiles buzzing past me like annoying
mosquitoes. Landing with a collision that cratered the concrete
floor, I kept running without missing a beat. Out in the open they
would probably use grenades. I didn’t know what the limits of the
suit might be, and I didn’t want to find out while RPGs or mortars
were being shot at me.

I headed back the way I came, ducking under
the overhead walkway, and headed toward the stairwell next to the
elevator. Picking up speed, I launched a flying blitzkrieg,
smashing through the glass door in a cascade of glittering shards.
My feet crunching down onto stone carpeted by fragments of silver,
I bounced back up in one smooth motion and ascended the stairs. I
twisted around a bend, and the steps let out onto a grated balcony,
the metal latticework riddled with holes that only partially
concealed the floor below. There was a door to my right. I pounced
at it, grabbing the metal lever and jerking violently. I was still
unaccustomed to my newfound strength, and the lever tore off like
paper. Tossing it to the ground, I formed my hand into a flat plane
and stabbed into the remnants of the door handle. Straight through,
like a knife through butter. Bending my forefingers, I pulled the
door outward, the latch catching briefly before tearing outwards in
an eruption of flying metal debris. I grabbed the edge of the door
and yanked my hand free. Immediately in front of me was a hall with
a stairwell at the end of it. I raced forward. Normally my chest
would have been pounding, my legs like lead and my brain telling me
the pursuers were right behind me. But now I felt strangely
detached. I hit the stairwell and flew up a couple of flights, my
legs hitting each step in the right place and flowing onto the next
one in flawless synchronicity. The stairs ended at a gray security
door, and I kicked it open. The metal crumpled in the center and
flew forward, crashing into a table covered with lab equipment.
Beakers and flasks flew asunder, shattering in a rain of glass as
they smashed into neighboring tables and onto the floor. Stretched
out in front of me was the expanse of worktables, the crumpled body
of the scientist I shot curled around the one nearest me. But there
was one new addition: a horde of SWAT soldiers clustered around the
far door, all staring at me with rifles raised. A brief pause was
instantly followed by a hundred metallic clicks. Suddenly I was
engulfed in a typhoon of bullets. They weren’t taking any chances.
Not that I blamed them. They had no idea what they were dealing
with. The tables and lab equipment were shredded, pieces of glass
and particle board forming a mist of debris in the air. I charged
at the soldiers, the volley now building up in a metallic crust of
ever-expanding spots on my body. The mob parted as I closed in but
continued to fire. I ducked my head and aimed at the doorway. They
scattered, and I crashed headfirst into the wall of the corridor
beyond. I spun around to see a hole in the shape of the upper part
of my body now breaching the concrete.

I sprinted left, toward the emergency door at
the end of the hall, and took a running leap, bearing down on it
shoulder first. It crumpled outward, the whine of tearing hinges
quickly replaced by the shrill of the fire siren. The disfigured
door bounced off the pavement and skidded to a stop, while I kept
flying forward. I spun in midair, my feet following a preordained
path, and I hit the ground acrobatically, touching down in an
elegant display of balance. The parking lot was black, but my eyes
instantly adjusted, using the reflected light of distant street
lamps to clarify the surroundings. I could hear the cicadas’
resonance in the nearby woods, the sound of soldiers running in the
halls of the building as they barked orders back and forth. All
sounds were amplified into a disorienting swarm. If I concentrated,
I could pick out a wavelength and magnify it. But it wasn’t the
time to break down and codify these sensations. I’d have plenty of
opportunity for that later. My Jeep wasn’t far away, and although I
was sure there were soldiers nearby, none would be guarding an
empty vehicle. I could make out a couple of Humvees off to the
right, near the main entrance, but they appeared to be unmanned.
For now.

Bullets started to pepper my back as I ran. I
didn’t know if they came from my original pursuers or new sentries
that just happened to be close by. I dove into the Jeep, my
newfound strength warping the seat and almost bowling me through
the cab. With apprehension, I flipped a switch under the dashboard,
righted myself, and tapped the gas pedal. The Jeep roared to life.
With a slight pop, bullets tore into the soft top. Soon they
started to punch through the body with a loud metal ping, one
bouncing off my lower leg. I spun the wheel and slammed it into
second. The vehicle tore forward. I must have made it to fifty mph
before I shifted out of second gear. I was sure they weren’t far
behind me, the sound of engines firing up in the background and the
fuselage cratering the pavement around me. I wasn’t taking the same
route back—they’d cut me off for sure in the woods—so I had to take
the direct route, right through the security gate and past the
MPs.

Asphalt exploded in a fiery ball ahead of me
to my right, shrapnel pelting me and cracking the windshield. It
didn’t take them long to break out the heavy artillery. The small
hut of the security gate lay just ahead, so I stomped the gas pedal
to the floor. A head popped out of the small, brightly lit
building, then quickly ducked back inside. The engine roared, and I
tore through the thin wooden barrier. My Jeep, with all its engine
modifications, was much faster than their Humvees, but I had no
doubt they would call the local police into this, not to mention
air support. The MPs would bring faster cars as well, but they
wouldn’t have four-wheel drive, and that’s what my hope of losing
them depended on. I stomped on my brights, spinning out with a
screeching of tires onto the main road.

The street was black, with no moon to
illuminate the night sky, and poorly paved. The stiff shocks on my
Jeep bounced me around, pitching the vehicle toward the dark walls
formed by trees on either side. I was on a roller coaster that
might tip over at any minute. I skidded around a bend to the left,
then another to the right. I had never come this way, which was a
stupid mistake on my part. I should have planned this out better. I
kept jerking the wheel, the small two-lane road twisting between
black corridors of trees and rocky crags. After one last turn I
could see the light of a small security hut. I magnified my vision,
and a dark form passed by the window. It was populated, but that
hut meant the border to Fort Bragg. I kept my sight trained on it
as I approached, but the soldier inside wasn’t discernible.
Probably notified by radio. I smashed into the wooden barrier, the
striped plank splintering and flying off sharply to the left. After
a short stretch of asphalt, I burst out onto the main street.

There was no traffic at this hour, but the
police couldn’t be far off. It would be hard to catch up with my
454 V8, but I was sure they would be forming a roadblock somewhere
ahead. As luck would have it, coming up on my left was the
four-wheeling trail. The dirt road was big enough for my Jeep, yet
too narrow for the mammoth Humvees. I stopped, hit the four-wheel
drive switch, pulled the transfer case lever, and veered left. The
Jeep bucked up and down through the rain gully, slipped slightly as
the wet tires hit grass, and jerked forward once they ground into
the dirt of the four-wheeling path. A black mass of pine trees
engulfed me on either side. I switched on my KC lights, upshifted
to third gear, and tore forward at about thirty miles an hour, a
precipitous speed for such a poorly maintained road. The path went
all the way up to Virginia, and I had a vehicle stashed there. That
should buy me some time, if I was lucky.

CHAPTER V

HOT PURSUIT

My mind was racing, but at the same time I felt
strangely calm, filled with a sense that I could handle anything,
meet any challenge set before me. Things seemed to take on a new
light, as if I had finally prevailed with some hard won
accomplishment. I couldn’t even believe it was real. In a sense it
felt more like some feverish dream. I looked down at my steering
arm to reassure myself. Black and alien looking, the smooth
contours on the forearm were interrupted by stretches of dark,
dried matter. Little knotted lumps, probably gristle held in place
by the blood, broke up the forward glide of silky black muscle. As
otherworldly as the arm appeared, I could sense it as if it were a
part of me. I looked out at the woods to my left, my sight
intensifying the ambient light so I could see the individual pine
trees. I concentrated, and my vision magnified. I could see the
patterns in the bark as it flowed up the trunk. The small branches
barely wrestling out of the oppressive layers of outer skin. A
rough jolt reminded me I needed to pay more attention to the road
ahead. I was lost in a daze and veering off the trail. Not that it
was very discernible as a road. More like a rustic stretch of
gutted yellow dirt crevices, raised patches of weeds and
underbrush, and the occasional jagged rock. Flipping the Jeep was a
real possibility. These things weren’t known for their stability,
especially the old CJs, and with a lift it was even more dicey. The
terrain angled downward, and I lightly tapped the brakes as it
skidded down a small hill, the narrow tunnel created by the
sheltering trees opening up abruptly into a manmade swath of
asphalt. It was a small two-lane road, and I bounded over it
quickly, not even pausing to check for traffic. That was probably a
bad move. A crash up with a local would drastically slow things
down, not to mention draw the attention of the authorities. Tearing
back into the trail, I slowed down as the Jeep started to jerk and
sway precariously. I resumed much slower progress, reasoning that
if this were rough going for me, it would be hell on someone in
pursuit. A little ways down the path I heard the soft ripple of
flowing water. A dark stream overlapped the road ahead, its tiny
waves surging in wavering rows beneath the onslaught of my off-
road lights. I let my foot off the gas as I approached what must
have been a small creek. I could hear the soft, hollow sound of
gently moving liquid. Slowing down to ten miles an hour, I splashed
into it, water shooting up the sidewalls of the Jeep and pelting me
through the open doorways. I glanced upstream and could see the
current trickling from around a raised bluff, the liquid so thin in
the starlight rocks could be seen just below the surface. No sounds
of pursuit yet. I kept going.

The trail through the woods started to seem
interminable—endless rows of trees breaking into small open
expanses of forest floor littered with pine needles. The stars
infused the needles with a pale blue glow, blotting them together
into clumps of decaying foliage. The trunks would occasionally thin
out and make way for a small meadow, the dusty yellow savannas
glittering in a thousand small blades before the all-consuming
forest swept back in. I wondered how far I’d made it into the
woods. I’d lost all sense of time and distance. I could probably
change that, if I knew how, but I’d need more time to explore that
ability. Instinctively I seemed to know I was headed in the right
direction, just as I knew it was still quite a distance to the
Mustang. Always impatient—that was one character trait that didn’t
seem to change. I’d notice bundles of trees or outcroppings of rock
that looked familiar even though I knew they weren’t, and it would
seem like I was traveling in circles. It didn’t help that the
surroundings all looked so similar in the dark.

I had no idea what hour it was or even how
long I had been in the woods. When would the pursuit begin? A
thought flashed through my mind. What if they already found the
Mustang and are waiting for me? No, that was impossible! I hadn’t
made a mistake. They would have had to track me for months. And
besides, how would they know? There was no way they could have
planned for this. If they had even an inkling of what was in store,
they would have tightened security. And the hangar was a cakewalk.
Unless of course they were watching me, even if they didn’t quite
grasp what I was doing. There was nothing unusual about building up
old cars, although driving one down to southern Virginia and
hitching a ride back might raise some eyebrows. No, I was being
paranoid. If they were on to me, I would have to deal with it when
I reached the Mustang. Maybe I just needed to be more cautious in
my approach.

The trees thinned ahead, and the trail opened
up into a small road. I stopped just short of the tree line,
shifted into neutral, stomped on the emergency brake, and climbed
out. Walking up to the edge of the trees, I peered right and left.
Nothing but empty expanses of black asphalt flowing off in both
directions, eventually disappearing around dark curves. The night
sky glittered off the dark surface of the road, a manmade stream
forcing its way through the enveloping forest. Four lanes wide, and
well maintained, this looked to be a fairly major highway. I
wondered why it was so deserted. Maybe the late hour? It was down
South, where people seemed to maintain more conventional sleep
schedules. Then something occurred to me. Maybe the military had
closed off the road at both ends? They knew I was coming this way!
Suddenly everything seemed like part of a trap. I ran back to the
Jeep and jumped in. Tearing forward, I bounced down through the
drainage ditch, onto the roadway, and up again as I mounted the
other side. Back on track, I lumbered through the trail, now
plagued by a nagging sense of dread. The Jeep wrenched violently
over rocks, tipping dangerously to the left. I had no choice but to
slow down. I was pushing it, trying to navigate the trail too fast.
It wasn’t even the possible ambush awaiting me—it was the
anticipation! I want this over with! I want to face my assailants
now!