'I guess that's what it was,' Carl answered. 'It was night, and I couldn't really see it. All I really remember is this huge thing in the sky blotting out the stars, coming down on us.'
'You weren't alone?'
'No. My girlfriend and I were out in my car… up on Mulholland. You know, messing around.'
'Uh-huh.'
He threw his head back and gave a sudden forced laugh. 'God, it was like right out of some monster flick. Teenage couple necking, and this slimy thing comes creeping out of the darkness. The girl screams.' After a short bout of giggling he shook his head back and forth. 'Jesus, Jesus, it was weird. So weird.'
'You said you could see the ship's outline against the sky. Was it saucer-shaped?'
'Nah. It was irregular, and it was big. Had this really complex structure. I couldn't describe it.'
'It didn't have any running lights, markings, anything like that'
'Nope. It was just this huge dark shape. The part of it that got near the car was this big rounded thing that opened up to look like the neck of a soda bottle. That's what sucked us up.'
'Your girlfriend was abducted with you?'
He shook his head sharply. 'Nah. She?' He sighed. 'They didn't take her. I mean?' He leaned his head back against the bulkhead and gazed upward. 'I pushed her out of the car. I think I might have killed her in doing it. Hard to explain exactly what happened. I guess I'll never really know if she made it.'
'Sounds like you tried to do the right thing,' I said.
'Maybe,' he said dully.
'Was there any sound? Did the ship make a noise?'
'That was the weirdest part. It all happened in complete silence, except for Debbie's screaming.' His face contorted with the pain of the memory. 'God, I'll never forget her screaming. Never.'
I paused before I continued probing. 'Now, you said you were in your car.'
'Yeah, my Chevy got sucked up with me in it.'
'That Chevy?' I asked, pointing to the burgundy-colored oddity parked between the stacks of supplies.
'No, the original from which this copy was made.' He shrugged. 'I think. This thing looks exactly the same, down to the little nicks and scratches in the paint. But it can't be the same car I was driving that night. Right? So…'
'I doubt it,' I said. 'Okay, now, you're inside the ship.'
Carl drew his lips together, pursing them into a thin line.
'What's the matter?' I said.
'I don't want to talk about it any more.'
'Why, Carl'
'Because I'll go crazy if I do.'
'It was bad?'
He considered it a while before he answered, 'Not bad physically. They didn't do anything to me. But inside the ship, it was… I dunno, strange. I was disoriented. Scared. I couldn't figure out what was going on.'
'That's not surprising,' I said. 'Did they communicate with you at all?'
'Yeah, they talked to me. Somebody did. Some guy. I never saw him. I'll never forget his voice, though.'
We were all surprised. 'The voice was human?' I asked.
'Yeah. He had kind of an accent. English, maybe. A little like the way John talks?but not exactly. Actually, he sounded like a fag.'
' 'Fag'?'
'Yeah. Sorry, I mean… you know, a homo. Er, homosexual.'
'Oh.'
'Hell, I don't know. He just sounded strange.' Carl looked at John. 'Sorry, John. I didn't mean to imply that you were strange or anything.'
'Quite all right,' John said affably.
'Okay,' I said, 'so this guy was talking to you. What did he say?'
'Not too damn much that made sense. He didn't say much except that I shouldn't get upset and that everything would be all right and that they weren't going to hurt me in any way. I remember I was pretty hysterical at first. I mean, I thought Debbie was dead. They told me she wasn't, but I didn't believe them. I still more or less don't.'
I nodded, waiting for him to go on.
Presently, he did: 'I guess I can talk about it to a degree. But I don't want to go into what went on in the ship. It was like a dream. I have trouble remembering most of it. Next thing I knew… I mean, when things got a little clearer and it wasn't like a dream anymore, I was driving my car down this strange road… and I saw a portal for the first time. But I knew what it was! Boy, it was weird. I'd never seen one in my life, but I knew exactly what it was and what I should do. Stay in the guide lane, maintain constant speed, all that stuff. And I knew where I was?out in space somewhere. I didn't find out when I was until later.' Carl took a deep breath and looked down at Lori's face. He smiled. 'She looks like Debbie. A little bit anyway.'
'Maybe Lori would like to hear this,' I said.
'I've told her a little of what I've told you.' He looked up and grinned. 'For some reason it was easier to talk to her.'
Lori's eyes fluttered and opened; then she sat up suddenly and said, 'Huh?' She looked around at everybody, frowned disapprovingly, and yawned. 'You people still jawing?' she said huskily.
'I was telling them about, you know, the crazy stuff that happened to me, about how I got out here and all that,' Carl told her.
'Oh, that.' She looked at us. 'I think he's fibbing.'
'You should try out the whole story on Lori first,' I said, 'then spill it to us. If she believes you, you know we will.'
'Oh, I was only kidding,' Lori said, snaking a possessive arm about Carl's neck. 'I don't really think you're lying, Carl. It's just that it's so hard to believe.'
Carl nodded. 'Sometimes I think I'm dreaming this all up.'
Lori yawned again, then complained, 'I'm tired.'
'So are we all,' John said. 'Perhaps we should turn in.'
'I'm for that,' Roland seconded.
So we did; rather everybody did but me, after we had stowed all the comestibles back into their, pressurized packing crates and had generally cleaned up. We also had to work Zoya and Yuri into the sleeping arrangements, split up the bedding and such, but we got it all squared away, and I took Susan forward with me, tucking her into the bunk in the aft cabin. I would take first watch, she the second.
I went out to the cab, slid the shotgun seat over in front of the keyboard console, and sat down to have a good look at what was going on with Sam. I had run a cursory check before the Voloshins had boarded, making sure the life-support monitors were working. Everything had seemed okay. Rechecking now, I found all systems functioning normally. I coded some diagnostic programs and went into main memory to see what was up, though I had a strong hunch what had happened. More than a hunch. Entity X had come out from hiding and had done his dirty work, that much was clear. I just wanted to know exactly what dirt had been done. Sam's Vlathusian Entelechy Matrix, that semimysterious thumb-sized Read-Only Memory component which was the seat of Sam's intellect and personality, had been completely bypassed. The phantom Artificial Intelligence program was in complete control. Hunched over the keyboard for two migraine-provoking hours, I tried and tried to alter that situation.
And failed miserably. There was little I could do but shut down the CPU?but you can't run and monitor a nuclear fusion truck engine without a computer, at least not very well.
Entity X was calling the shots.
I folded up the console, slid the seat back, sat down on it, and put my feet on the dash.
'Okay,' I said, addressing the unseen malevolence that hung in the cab like a bad odor, 'who are you and what do you want?'
'What have you got, Jake?' Corey Wilkes said.
