Sullivan Saga 3: Sullivan's Watch (4 page)

Ives began moving against the crowd, trying to reach the source of the panic. The crowd was beginning to thin as he made his way toward the corner. He was less than twenty meters from the cross street when he finally got a good look at who—at what—had been leaping above the crowd and causing the commotion.

Ives froze in place as a crouched creature with red and black mottled skin looked up in his direction. He couldn’t see through the reflective visor it was wearing, but Ives sensed that it had noticed him.

Ives managed to pull his attention away from the creature’s face and looked down. It was crouching over the body of a woman. Her face, neck and chest were covered in blood, and large pieces of flesh appeared to be missing.

Ives drew his sidearm. Even at twenty meters, the laser sight on his gun would ensure an accurate shot. He fired twice at the creature, hitting it once in the shoulder and once in the chest.

The thing opened its mouth in anger, revealing rows of sharp, curved teeth. It seemed mostly unaffected by the shots.

Ives adjusted his grip on the gun and fired three more rounds. The creature leapt up from its victim and bounded toward him. Ives kept firing as it advanced, but it didn’t slow.

It leapt high into the air to close the last few meters, and Ives raised his gun and fired frantically as the creature came down on top of him.

Winded and momentarily blinded by the impact of the creature, Ives could only feel the weight of the thing as it writhed above him. He felt claws puncture his shoulder and desperately pummeled the creature with his fists, trying to drive it back before it could bring its teeth down.

Abruptly, the writhing stopped. Ives pushed the creature off of him and rolled away from it. He got to his feet and looked down. From the blood and the shattered teeth, he could see that one of his shots had struck the thing in the mouth. It had taken several more seconds for the creature to acknowledge its own death, and in that time, it could have easily killed Ives if its claws had found his face or throat rather than his shoulder.

Ives tore away his sleeve and studied the seeping wounds. There were three cuts running down from his shoulder to his bicep. They were thin but deep, and he was bleeding profusely.

He wrapped the tatters of his sleeve around the wounds and knotted it tightly.

A flash of movement caught his eye. Another of the creatures had just rounded the corner and was watching him. Ives ran across the street and ducked into the doorway of the corner pharmacy. He pulled open the door and slammed it shut as the creature ran after him. It thumped its body against the door, but its clawed hands were unable to work the handle. Ives glanced to the windows and decided that the bars over them would be able to keep the creature out. The thing hissed at him through the small square window in the door then moved away.

Ives collapsed with his back to the door and looked in at the pharmacy. A dozen other people were also inside. As he studied their faces, he pulled out his handheld.

The pharmacist rushed forward with supplies to treat his wound as Ives called the Bureau office.

“Hello, Director Blanco? Ives here. I can verify the reports. Creatures of some sort, definitely nothing I’ve seen before. I killed one, but at least one is still at large. An unknown number of casualties.”

On the other end of the line, Ives could hear Director Leo Blanco sigh. “The Army is scrambling troops, but this isn’t an isolated incident, Jeff.”

“Sir?”

“Over the past few minutes, reports have been coming in from Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix, Washington, London, Paris, Rome, Moscow, Cairo, Tokyo…. These things are appearing everywhere.”

“Where’d they come from, sir?”

“I’ve just been briefed about the Mars incident. The military is certain that this is related.”

“So it’s an invasion.”

“It looks that way.”

“Orders, sir?”

“Can you get down to the office?”

“I don’t think so, sir, not if there are many of those things roaming around. And I’ve been injured.”

He paused as the pharmacist finished cleaning the wound. He lifted the spray can in his hand and pushed the nozzle on top. A white stream sprayed out, and as soon as it hit the wound it hardened into a flexible covering, sealing the cuts and stopping the bleeding.

“How bad is it?” asked Blanco.

“Someone’s just sprayed a liquid bandage on it, but I’m going to have to take it easy for a while.”

“Are you still near your apartment?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Can your building be secured?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, Jeff. Here’s what I’d like you to do. Get as many people as you can find into your building. I want everyone on that block in one place so if either the Bureau or the Army can get people in there, it’ll facilitate an evacuation.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Be safe, Jeff.”

“You, too, sir. I’ll be in touch.”

Ives put his handheld away and studied the bandage on his arm. “Thank you for that.” He stood and cleared his throat. “Listen up, everyone. My name is Agent Jefferson Ives of the Stellar Assembly Bureau of Investigation. We’re going to move a couple buildings down and secure that location. I need you to follow my instructions quickly and exactly.”

He turned and peeked through the window in the door. He then moved to each of the other windows as he made a visual survey. He turned back and nodded. “I’m going to open the door and check things out. Wait for my signal before following me.”

He stepped out and looked both ways down the street. At the nearest corner, he could see four bodies lying in spreading pools of blood. He looked back into the pharmacy and waved for those inside to follow him.

“Single file, hug the side of the buildings,” he said as he led them toward his apartment building. He stopped at his building’s door, waved his keycard over the electronic reader to unlock it and guided the others in. When they were all inside, he closed the door and made sure it latched securely.

“There’s a small lounge to the left where you’ll find some couches and chairs. I’m going to secure the building. I need one person at this door. If you see anyone outside, try to get their attention, but don’t open that door until they’re at it and ready to come in.”

After checking the back and side doors to make sure they were secure, Ives rode the elevator up to his apartment. He went in and kneeled down in front of a safe in his bedroom closet. He unlocked it and took out a fresh magazine for his sidearm. He also took out a small energy pistol. Last, he removed his ripped and bloodied shirt and, trying to ignore the pain in his arm, slipped on a fresh button-down.

He stepped over to his window and looked down into the street once again. Another of the strange creatures was slinking along the side of the building opposite. Ives pushed open his window and raised the energy pistol. He didn’t have to worry about recoil with the weapon; even though he was firing left-handed because of his injury, the beam of energy would hit true as long as he took the time to line up the shot.

Ives centered the red dot in the sight on the creature’s head and pulled the trigger. A flash followed, and a neat, cauterized hole was carved out of the side of the thing’s skull. The beam from the energy pistol had cleanly cut through the covering the creature was wearing over its head and torso. The standard-shot rounds from his sidearm seemed to have harmlessly bounced off of the material. Ives brought his handheld out again. He couldn’t be at the Bureau helping to fight this threat, but he could at least let them know what he had learned.

JEFF IVES LOOKED over at his handheld. He’d been asleep, but the high-pitched chirping had brought him around. The call was coming from an unknown location. He briefly considered ignoring it, but there was a chance it was Blanco or someone else from the Bureau trying to contact him through other channels.

“Hello?”

“Jeff Ives?”

“Yes.”

“This is Richard Sullivan.”

Ives swallowed hard. Sullivan was on Earth, or at least within the Solar System. He thought he detected a slight delay.

“Sullivan. What are you… what’s going on?”

“I was hoping you could tell me that. I’ve been monitoring the news reports, but the information is confused, scattered. Is there any safe place I can land? I really need to see you.”

“So you’re on a ship?”

“Yes.”

“How big?”

“It’s a small freighter.”

Ives got up from his bed and walked to the window. The building across from his had once been a hospital. It had been converted into apartments as part of a revitalization effort about a hundred years earlier. Ives knew he had seen private passenger ships land on the building’s roof before, but freighters were quite a bit heavier.

“I’ll send you the address of a building here in New York that has a landing pad. I’m not positive it can hold your freighter, but if you search the network you might find a weight rating for it.”

“Thank you, Jeff.”

“But you should know the city has been put on lockdown. No traffic is allowed in for the time being. It seems the creatures have only been appearing in the largest cities, so everyone’s trying to get out. Have you heard about the creatures?”

“Yes. Look, I need to get to Earth. Could you get me Bureau authorization to land?”

“Look, Sullivan, I….”

“Please, Jeff. This is more important than you realize. I’ve encountered these things before. I have information about them. And I have information about Frank.”

“He’s not with you, then?”

“He’s… no, he’s not.”

Ives swallowed. “Okay. Give me a few minutes. I’ll try to get you an authorization code.”

SULLIVAN ENTERED THE coordinates Ives had given him, and the ship began maneuvering toward Earth. An indicator light flashed on his console. He tapped on it.

“Freighter 19434J, what is your destination?”

“New York City.”

“Negative. City is on lockdown. I’m sending you a list of authorized landing sites now.”

“I have authorization. SABI-189573.”

“Please stand by.”

Sullivan glanced out the small round window on the side of the cockpit. The escort ship began moving away.

“Acknowledged, 19434J. Authorization to land has been granted. Be careful down there.”

“Thank you.”

Cloud cover was obscuring the city as Sullivan entered the atmosphere. He monitored the approach with his instruments, but it was highly unlikely the automatic piloting system would need to be corrected.

He halted the descent a hundred meters above the rooftop of the building Ives had directed him to. The immediate area looked clear. There was no movement on the street, human or otherwise.

He resumed the landing sequence, and the freighter gently touched down on top of the building. Sullivan called Ives again. “I’ve landed.”

“I’m in the building right across the street. I’ll open the door when I see you coming. Are you armed?”

“Yes.”

“Good. See you soon.”

Sullivan rode the elevator down to the lobby of the building. As the doors opened, a police officer turned toward him. His gun was drawn, but he was holding it with the muzzle down. “No one’s allowed out, sir.”

Sullivan put his hands up, hoping the energy pistol in his coat pocket wasn’t bulging too much. “There’s a Bureau agent in the building across the street, officer. I’ve just landed on the roof per his instructions.”

“You landed a ship on the roof?”

“Yes. And I will assist in evacuating as many people as I can, but I need to see Agent Ives first.”

“You’re not with the Bureau?”

“No. I’m kind of a consultant.”

The officer holstered his weapon. “You look familiar.”

Sullivan smiled as he stepped toward the front door of the building. “I guess I have one of those faces.” He cracked the door open and looked out. “I’ll be back soon.”

The officer nodded, and Sullivan jogged out into the street. He swung his head to the left and to the right as he ran and reached the building opposite without incident.

The door clicked open as he knocked, and he hurried in, closing it securely behind him. He turned and held his hand out to Ives. “Jeff.”

Ives shook the hand. “I never thought I’d see you again, Sullivan. I never wanted to see you again. Christ….”

Sullivan nodded. “I can accept how you feel about me. It’s completely justified. But right now, there are more important things to deal with.”

“Right. Come up to my apartment.”

Ives led Sullivan up then, after they had taken their seats around his kitchen table, said, “Where’s Frank?”

Sullivan smiled. “Frank is… well, he’s around.”

“What does that mean? He’s here on Earth?”

“Yes and no.”

“What the hell, Sullivan?”

Sullivan cleared his throat. “After the raid on Zednik’s compound—after Liz died—Frank went after Zednik. Well, I was after him, too, because he was still holding Kate Alexander hostage. Our paths crossed. I won’t get into the details right now, but Zednik was killed, Kate was rescued and that should have been the end of the story for Frank. He should have come home to Earth, mourned Liz properly. But he decided to follow me to Faris then to Edaline to help fight the war.”

“So he was on Edaline.”

“Yes. And because of everything we’d been through, we became really close friends, Jeff. He’s the best friend I’ve ever had.”

“He’s a good friend to everybody.”

Sullivan nodded. “Well, we settled on Silvanus for a while, but between rescuing Kate and going to Edaline, we’d encountered a strange entity in hyperspace.”

Ives raised an eyebrow. “Entity?”

“Yes. Sentient but not physical. Made up of energy. One of these entities took the form of Liz and began brainwashing Frank. They were using him to get both him and me to a parallel Earth.”

“You mean…?”

“Another universe, Jeff. If you travel deeply enough into hyperspace, you come out in another universe.”

“I think I’ve read something about that. But I thought it was only a theory. I thought we couldn’t penetrate that deeply into hyperspace because of the energy requirements.”