Come Alive Ch. 21

Dinky ignored the jab. "We will be leaving soon..."

"And what? You won't be coming back?"

"No, we will not."

"And Pinky? Will she be going, too?"

"No, she will not."

Henry tried to digest that one, but he found the idea unsettling. "Okay. What else are you not telling me?"

"Eva and Britt. They will be going with us."

"What?"

"And they will not return to this place."

"You can't do that."

"We must. And you know this must be."

Henry looked away, but even so he nodded understanding. "It's all happening so fast."

"We do not understand the process," Dinky said, and Taggart could feel the creatures apparent confusion.

"When?"

"Very soon. We will be gone within days. Nothing of our presence will remain."

"Aside from Pinky, you mean."

Dinky just looked at Henry, as if his silence alone could explain the lingering ambivalence he felt.

"Will you remain closed off to me?" Henry added.

"No. But there will be little I can do to assist you."

"So...alone again, naturally."

Dinky shook his head. "Such a sad song. Why do you still like it so?"

"You never cease to amaze, Dink. Is there anything about me you don't know?"

"I will miss you, Henry, if that's what you mean. I will miss our talks on the beach most of all, but perhaps they didn't mean all that much to you."

"Perhaps," Henry sighed, looking at his old friend. "Anyway, I'll miss you, as well."

"Britt and Eva will be with us soon, so please don't interfere."

Henry had almost expected this, yet he'd never really thought they'd actually try something so overtly disruptive, let alone dare to put such a plan into effect. Still, he shook his head before he spoke: "This is a mistake and you know it. Why do it?"

"Perhaps someday you will understand."

"I'm thinking about Dina and Rolf. They'll never understand."

Dinky sighed. "Yes, that is true, yet it must be even so."

"Will they be closed to me?"

"For a while. We will allow the boy a certain amount of contact after that."

"His name is Rolf, and you will be hurting him terribly."

"I agree; it is regrettable."

"Regrettable?" Henry sighed. "My coming into their lives will be the darkest moment he remembers. You'll undo everything I've tried to build."

"Perhaps."

"You know, the shittiest thing I ever did was to teach you the intricacies of poker."

"That depends on your point of view, Henry Taggart." Dinky smiled a little, his deep blue eyes twinkling in the cabin-light. "Again, my friend, I will miss you."

And with that he was gone, leaving Henry dazed and confused. "Gauze pads. I came down for supplies, for Dina. What do I tell her? How do I...?"

He heard a cannon-shot crack as thunder and lightning erupted from the storm in the same instant, then Dina was screaming and running from the boat...

He ran topsides and saw Dina running in circles, screaming, while Mike and Anton appeared to be searching for...

"Rolf," he whispered. "Where's Rolf?"

But he already knew the answer to that, didn't he? Dink had turned out to be a master of the bluff after all.

21.15

Dina was on her knees, her hands grasping at tufts of dry grass as she wailed into the night, then Henry dropped to her side and whispered in her ear -

- and like a switch had been thrown she stopped - crying, breathing, thinking -

- and in the next instant she too disappeared.

"Fuck-goddam-shit!" Anton roared as he stumbled backwards, tripping over a dock line and vaulting into the canal - again.

Mike looked at Henry. "Them?" he asked, pointing at the sky.

"Yup. I think we just got caught up in a dominance dance."

"Swell. Say, what is it with this guy? He really must like falling into the canal?"

"He's not a particularly good swimmer, is he? I guess we ought to help him again."

"Better than watching him drown."

Henry nodded. "I guess it's time to tell him what's going on."

"That ought to be fun. Mind if I listen in?"

"Better than self abuse, I reckon."

+++++

Eva had crept down to the rocks, the gathering crowds just out of sight, but the orcas were nowhere to be seen - and without them the water would be unbearably cold. Then...she saw a vague disturbance in the water and without thinking dove in.

'What if it's a shark?' she thought as she swam a few feet under the surface...

Then a blinding white light hit her and she looked up through the clear water, saw a police helicopter hovering almost directly overhead, then a diver in a red and yellow drysuit jumping from the helicopter's float, almost landing on top of her...

...but when the disturbance cleared this second naked woman was gone...as if she too had simply disappeared. Boats and divers moved to this new area, but an hour later this latest search was called off. Again.

+++++

"So," Anton said, still clearly exasperated, "this group you belong to, in Seattle, yes?"

"Yes."

"This Boeing group builds one of these space ships, but it never works. This is right?"

"Correct. The flight control system is maintained by direct neural link. We could never get it to respond to our efforts."

"Ship is still in Seattle?"

"As far as I know. There were also ships out on Long island and Edwards Air Force Base."

"What about this Area 51? Nothing there?"

Taggart shrugged. "If there is, I don't know about it."

"What about you. You think you can fly now? This reach out thing you speak of...is this not the means to control such aircraft?"

"It could be. We had no idea how specific and focused such thoughts can be, at least not then. Just food for thought here, Anton, but there were people still at work on the problem when I left a few years ago. There's no telling how far along they are now."

"Maybe that why Others leave now?"

"Yes, maybe."

"We must get one of these ships," Anton sighed. "We can get girls back, and boy too, if we have such ship."

"But," Mike interjected, "they don't need ships, do they? They can just reach out and take anyone, anywhere. Right?"

"It sure looks that way," Henry nodded, "but you've got to keep one thing in mind: most of this behavior is new to me. They've not done things like this before, so I really have no idea what their real capabilities are."

"Only that they're probably millions of years further along the evolutionary ladder than we are," Mike added.

Henry sighed. "We play chess. They play chess in four dimensions."

"Four?" Anton asked. "How this so?"

"Time is the fourth dimension, at least I think it is."

"They move around time?" Anton asked, almost gagging, clearly struggling with the idea.

"I think so, but I have no proof."

"Then ship make no difference. Would be fun though."

Henry looked around the canal, at the massive damage that had been left in the storm's wake, as he watched the sun rising through silhouettes of burnt trees and wrecked buildings. "We're going to need to push through these lines and get back out to sea - and today, if possible."

"What about..." Anton began, then he stopped. "Da, they find us if they want."

"Yeah. And I don't want to get caught in here if conditions deteriorate."

"What are you thinking?" Mike asked. "Riots?"

"Or worse. If food and medical supply distribution stops for a few days, there's no telling how fast a collapse might happen. Anyway, I don't want to find out."

"Okay," Anton said, standing up and moving to the aft deck, "so we get dock lines in and you start engine. We no talk about no more, we go."

"I like the way you think, Anton..."

And then Dina and Rolf reappeared - just a few inches from the aviator -

- who shrieked before somersaulting over the rail into the canal. Once again.

+++++

Eva tried to get her bearings again, and failed - again. She was submerged in some kind of fluid - yet she was breathing - and it was pitch black here - wherever here was.

'Clear your mind,' a voice told her. 'Others are searching for you, and they intend to take you away.'

'Away? Where?'

'Clear your mind.'

But that was impossible. She was caught like a fly in honey - at night - with no idea where she was - and it was impossible to think of anything else.

But then she felt warmth on her flesh and she recognized the smooth skin of the large female, and in a heartbeat a sense of warm well being permeated the space around her. She relaxed when she felt the familiar pectoral, and after she took hold she felt them moving through the void...

+++++

Rolf helped Anton climb back up onto the swim platform, but then Rolf sniffed the air around the Russian and stepped back. "Henry? I think he's covered in diesel fuel...?"

Dina hopped down to the platform and pulled out the shower head, but when she turned the valve nothing happened. "Is the breaker on?" she called out to the cockpit.

Henry shrugged then ducked below. After he turned it on he picked up a bottle a glycerin soap and carried it topsides. "Here, use this," he said as he handed the bottle to Dina.

Dina used a huge natural sponge and warm water to lather up the burly aviator - who seemed to enjoy the whole thing a little too much -

"You'll need to toss the clothes," Henry added. "That stuff will ruin marine washing machines without special detergents. Breaks down the seals, and the discharge is illegal."

"So - what? You want I should take off all clothes here?"

Dina turned away, trying to hide her grin; Rolf held open a large trash bag and waited for Anton to dump the clothes before carrying it to a nearby dumpster. Dina handed the bottle of soap to Anton and smiled: "Here you go. I ain't gonna wash your pecker for you, ya know?"

Anton smiled then got to work on his own equipment while everyone else got to work reeling in dock lines. A half hour later Time Bandits began inching her way back towards the ruins of Zeebrugge, the water in the canal an oily mix of fuel residue and fire retardants - and scattered hunks of debris clogged to waterway, making it quite possible the engine's cooling water inlet could be fouled in an instant. Oddly enough, the closer they came to the port the less occluded the water became, until with about a mile to go to the open sea the canal cleared completely.

Fire services were still hard at work putting out fires near the few remaining fuel storage tanks lining the canal yet, eerily enough, they were the only structures still standing. What Epsilon's winds had spared the fires had taken, and the landscape here felt little different from what they'd so recently witnessed around Rotterdam. Henry was heartened to find the entry locks manned, and they locked through with almost no delay and in a flash they were back in the English Channel.

"I didn't mean to ignore you," he at last said to Dina, "but where did you two go?"

"Go? What do you mean?"

"You and Rolf were gone for a while."

"I do not know what you are talking about. We went nowhere."

"Okay."

"So, on to France?" she asked.

He looked at her then slowly nodded. "Yes, I think so. We have a clear weather window right now, and it looks like rough weather might follow Epsilon, coming from the north this time, too."

"So...cold air?"

"Looks like a real possibility."

"What is happening, Henry?"

"The planet has been in a state of equilibrium for thousands of years, but that's changing now. My guess is it will take a while for a new equilibrium to take hold."

"A while?"

"Your guess is as good as mine, but I'd also assume there's evidence in the geologic record for similar events." Henry absentmindedly looked at the compass then did a double take; the NAV page on the chartplotter showed their current heading was 320 degrees magnetic, but the ship's compass was showing something completely unexpected. Magnetic north was now almost due south, and their current compass heading was 140 degrees - which led to a nauseating series of conclusions. Either the earth's magnetic poles had flipped or the Mother of all coronal mass ejections was slamming into the atmosphere. He glanced upwards and his stomach lurched.

"What's wrong?" Dina asked.

"Look at the compass," he replied, keeping his voice down.

She leaned over and looked, then shook her head: "That can't be correct."

"Assume it is. Where does that lead you?"

"If polarity flipped, wouldn't that effect the normal operation of electricity? Even our electronics?"

He nodded. "Yup. So, what else could do it?"

"I don't know, Henry, but you're beginning to scare me."

"Don't make a big deal about it, but look up..."

She looked up through the scudding clouds and her eyes went wide. "Oh no..." she managed to say - before all sound was pushed aside by a deep pulsing vibration...a strange, foreign sound, almost like a giant electrical transformer was up there on the far side of the sky. And it growing louder, like the noise was coming closer now.

21.16

They instinctively gathered in the cockpit, all eyes focused beyond the clouds, their attention commanded by the deep, pulsing waves of low frequency energy.

Kinetic eddies of chartreuse and magenta coursed through the upper atmosphere, yet just now Henry felt as though he could reach out and touch each and every one wave - before they moved out of reach. More curious still was the sky full of otherworldly sound - which seemed to ebb and flow depending on the color of the wave passing overhead. Magenta waves were deepest but not as boisterously loud as the lighter colored pulses, yet soon enough they could hear a kind of muted static crackling under the other modulations.

Then everyone's hair began to stand on end...

"Dina! The breakers! Flip everything to 'Off' on the main panel!" Henry cried as he killed the diesel and then shut down the electronics at the helm. "Mike...help Rolf with the main and genoa. Rolf...remember...main first after I get the bow pointed into the wind!"

"On it!"

Henry noted their position before he killed the plotter then looked aft to note features still visible on the shoreline before he turned into the wind; the huge mainsail rolled out of the mast moments later and Henry fell off the wind to port while Rolf and Anton turned to roll out the genoa. Time Bandits quickly picked up speed while Henry eyed his earlier repairs to the mast and shrouds, hoping things would hold together for just a few more days, then he fell a little more off the wind and reveled at the feeling of his little ship riding the wind once again, heeling and leaning into each new gust as she powered through the tiny waves. Rolf smiled too, and they nodded knowingly at one another, both then smiling at this simple, lasting bond between them.

Then Henry grinned and shook his head - at the sight of everyone's hair now pointing skyward - then he reached over to steady himself against a wave and a powerful spark of static electricity arced off a stanchion and zapped a fingertip. "Shit!" he cried, then he looked at the tip of his index finger and saw a deep brown burn there. "Try not to touch anything metal," he shouted just as Anton came into the cockpit. Of course, Anton touched the dodger frame and cried out when a two inch long arc caught a fingertip - but at least, Henry thought, he managed to stay onboard.

"Genry? Something seems very strange. Like the sicker you get the sicker the planet gets. Tell me this is just imagination."

Taggart smiled. "Yup, imagination would do it, Anton. There are a lot of people out there who are sick and dying right now, let alone these are physical, and not metaphysical events."

"Da. That sounds correct, yet even so..."

"Yet even so, Anton, humans have always looked to the supernatural to explain away things they don't understand, and sadly, that may be the most human characteristic there is."

"But if this was true, if your illness is tied to what is happening now," Mike said, joining the conversation, "what would that lead you to believe?"

Henry shook his head. "No clue. Delusion. Schizophrenia...you name it."

"Or when you die," Anton continued, "earth dies too."

"And you know what?" Henry sighed, grinning now as he looked away. "That would mean this is all a dream. That you're all just characters in my dream..."

"Why not my dream?" Mike asked. "Or Anton's or Rolf's?"

"You're wandering down a blind alley, guys. There are no solutions where you're headed."

"Why must be a solution?" Anton sighed.

"Because when you are faced with problems and you can't bring yourself to look for solutions you'll find yourself wandering around the land of madness, my friend, and you don't want to get lost in there."

"What about God?" Mike asked.

Henry shrugged again. "There are lots of people who still believe fire chases away evil spirits. So what? Let them. If someone embraces madness that doesn't mean you need to, does it?"

Then little slivered arcs of static electricity began pouring out Henry's fingertips, and he held out his hand and looked at the display. Mike held out both his hands a second later, and both were surrounded by glowing balls of static electricity...

Out of the clear blue sky lightning cracked and slammed into the sea - about fifty meters off the left side of the boat...

"We've got to find a ground!" Mike cried as the static hum increased in volume and strength.

Henry put his hand on the VHF radio head and the arcs disappeared from his fingertips, so he leaned over and touched Mike - and the glowing balls disappeared -

"Case in point. This radio is wired to a copper ground plane," Henry said, smiling. "So, it's either that or we're a bunch of evil sorcerers."

"Da," Anton added, "I get it. So, what is going on with sky?"

"Probably a big CME, a coronal mass ejection, that's also screwing with the magnetic pole."

"You mean, the sun?"

Henry nodded.

"Maybe sun cause hot storms?"

"Maybe. One thing I do know...without GPS we're going to have to sail along the shore. Too much traffic in the channel and I'm not sure I want to pull out the sextant."

"Too many clouds for that," Mike sighed.

"Okay, so let's pull out the paper charts and start a DR plot. Mike?"

"Can do. Rolf? Wanna give me a hand?"

Henry looked at this exchange, feeling a whiff of nostalgia and maybe a little 'changing of the guard' too, yet he was happy to see Mike taking over the role of father-leader.

Henry sighed when he realized it was already the end of October. Seven weeks to Christmas, he realized, and to the end of his road. The Others were out searching for Britt and Eva - and Pinky - while Dina and Rolf were obviously now a part of the experiment, too. But was that Pinky's doing, or was this some new scheme The Others were hatching? What could it be? A diversion?

What was he missing?

Hadn't Eva warned him of a great evil - just before Anton arrived?

And that vexing music! Why wouldn't it leave him be? It kept playing and playing over and over whenever he tried to rest, yet he was sure he'd never heard it before. What could that mean?

And just then Dina came up the companionway with Clyde, who hobbled over and hopped into his lap. Clyde's chin was soon resting on Henry's shoulder, the pup's paws on either side of his neck., and Henry held the old boy while he steered, and for the first time in weeks all felt right with his little world.

He began humming a tune - that music again - as he up looked at the pulsing sky...but in the next instant he felt that other presence and looked down into the sea. Yes, his friend the large male was there, as were the two smaller males, and they had taken up position on his flanks once again.

Then the large male swam close, so close Taggart could see the aurora reflected in his eye, and for a moment he sensed that the orca were happy to see the display. It was a sign, a vital sign marking the road ahead...

Then Anton saw the whale seemingly just inches away from Henry and he screamed - before he stumbled backwards and flipped over the lifelines - vaulting into the sea - again.