Walking an Endless Path Pt. 02

The sailor nodded to the General and handed Joe the receiver drive, which he tucked into his back pocket. Joe put the helmet on, and he peeked around the rock pile. Again, the blast of heat felt like a physical blow. It felt uncomfortable, but he could tolerate it. He nodded at the General and Bannon and started running towards the inferno. He managed to get considerably close to where the dead zone had been, but the heat pressure finally stopped him. He saw an enormous crater, some bent and distorted metal at the bottom, and flames shooting out. The heat was so intense his jacket ignited, and he had to tear it away with his shirt. By the time he threw them away, they were engulfed in flames. With a final look with his augmented vision, he confirmed he saw no sign of the black door. He turned and ran back towards the rock pile. His shoes melted, so he kicked them off. Then his pants ignited. He grabbed the drive from the pocket and tore off the flaming fabric.

Soon, he was standing in the field naked except for the helmet and the drive in his hand. He started running again and made it to the shadow of the rock pile. Joe almost felt chilly away from the inferno raging in the back field. He didn't want to return to the house naked, but he had little choice now. He started jogging down the lane and was halfway back to the house when he saw headlights approaching him. He took the helmet off and held it modestly in front of himself. His Dad's truck skidded to a halt ten feet before him. He could see Bannon was driving and his dad in the passenger seat. Agent White jumped out of the back door and walked up to him with a Geiger counter extended in her hand. She passed it before his body, but it remained quiet. She leaned back from him as he was radiating so much heat. She gestured for him to follow her to the car.

When he got beside it, Joe took one look at the blanket-covered back bench seat and shook his head. He'd set the interior of the truck on fire. He made a gesture for Bannon to turn the car around. Once he had, they headed back to the house with Joe walking beside them. They rolled their windows down.

"What's with the Geiger counter?" Joe asked. His voice had an odd, hollow and brassy tone to it.

"If you were radioactive, I would have asked you to remain where you were. But you're clean, so that's good," Agent White said impassively.

"If I was radioactive?" Joe looked at his dad with concern.

"But you're not," she repeated.

Joe looked nervously at his dad, who was looking back at him with concern. "Are you okay, Dad?" he asked.

"Yes, your mother sprayed disinfectant on my arm and wrapped it with gauze. When we heard and felt the explosion, I wanted to come back, but Clara insisted I wait for someone to drive me. Then Roger and Rachel got back with the General. What happened?" he asked.

"They opened a portal, and the General called in an airstrike. He must have hit something vital because the whole dead zone is gone. There's a huge crater now, and some kind of structure underground is now burning very rapidly. The heat was crazy intense," he replied.

He saw Agent White put her hand out the window to feel the heat radiating from him. She pulled it back quickly when she got close and shook her fingers. "Your skin is painfully hot!" she exclaimed.

They exited from the farm lane, and Joe could see the house and all the activity surrounding it. Two more army trucks were in the driveway, and a portable command center had been set up on the lawn with large white spotlights illuminating the gloom caused by the black smoke rising high into the sky, blotting out the sun.

The truck stopped beside the house, and Joe stopped next to it.

Clara and Safa immediately ran toward Joe.

"STAY BACK!" Agent White yelled as she jumped out of the truck. Clara and Safa froze and stumbled back as heat waves rippled from Joe's skin. Their eyes widened as they saw his skin had darkened in the heat. Where he'd been a golden brown before, now his skin practically glowed with a deeper reddish gold.

Agent White ran around the back of the truck and went to the side of the house. She uncoiled the garden hose and set the sprayer to mist setting. She turned on the tap, approached the driveway, and held it ready.

Joe looked forward and saw scattered across the lawn and on the porch a bunch of military people he didn't recognize, plus the Marines, the Engineers, the General, all four of his surveillance team, Bannon, his parents, Safa, and even Doc Watson. They were all watching him. His eyes hadn't snapped back from black yet, probably due to the heat coming off his body. They all got a good look at him as he looked back.

Joe looked down, sighed, and tossed the helmet and storage unit onto the lawn, where they sizzled against the grass. With so many people watching him, there was little point in trying to maintain his modesty. He nodded, and Agent White squeezed the trigger. The water shot out in a dense mist, and Joe walked into it. He immediately felt it hissing on his skin and was surrounded by a cloud of steam. He slowly turned in place to let the mist get to all his skin. The hiss went on and on. He rubbed his hair with his hands, and the water hissed extra loudly as the heat was released from it. The steam slowly began to dissipate as his skin cooled. He finally held his hand up, and Agent White stopped the water. Safa was immediately at his side with the towel his mother had gone inside to get for him. Clara stood waiting a few steps away with his dressing gown and a smile.

Joe quickly rubbed the water from his body with the towel and then wrapped it around his waist. He stepped to his mother to get his robe. When he pulled it on, people started to move again. Joe blinked a few times and finally got his eyes to return to normal. His Mom and Dad were immediately before him to hug him, though he was careful of his father's arm. When they left to go into the house, he looked ahead he saw Doc Watson standing there with a strange, frustrated look on his face. Joe turned back to Safa. "Could you please speak with my friend here and tell him whatever he wants to know."

Safa glanced at Bannon, who just nodded. Joe bent down and picked up the helmet and storage unit. He walked to the General with Bannon and Agent White in the command tent. Joe placed the items on the table and warned the General they were still hot.

"Just how close did you get, son?" the General said with an awed voice.

"I don't know. Pretty close. Maybe two-hundred feet?" he guessed.

The group looked at each other, and the General connected the drive to the laptop he had on the table. The computer was connected to a projector that displayed the video on a large white screen set up ten feet away. The General scanned forward in the footage until he saw himself standing beside Joe by the rock pile. The camera's view switched as the helmet was passed to Joe. Then, the footage showed the blast site as Joe ran closer. The camera steadied and slowly panned across the wreckage of the structure. Then the camera jostled as Joe tore off his burning jacket and shirt. The view then showed the field as Joe ran back, stopping a few times to discard his burning clothes. The General turned off the video.

"That's excellent footage, Joseph, but you were much closer than two-hundred feet by my estimation." the General said.

"Joseph, you're getting hot again." Agent White said.

Joe untied his robe and took it off. The others stepped back as his body radiated strongly. His eyes snapped to black once more.

"You'd better return to the hose before that towel ignites," Bannon said.

"Dammit!" Joe cursed and rushed over to the side of the house with only his towel wrapped around his waist. Agent White was right behind him, and she got the hose going on him. More steam swirled around his body and from his hair. Joe felt so many eyes on him. He looked at the Agent with frustration written all over his face.

"I'm tired of all this attention, so I think I'll head inside to stand under the shower in my room. Are we going to have to evacuate?" he asked.

"I'll check with the General," she said.

Joe walked away dripping wet. He blinked his eyes back to his normal brown and went to the front door.

"Mom! Can I get a dry towel?" he called out. He knew better than to walk into the house dripping wet.

Thirty seconds later, Clara showed up at the front door with a towel in her hands. Joe thanked her and rubbed the excess water from his body. His Mom took the old towel, and he wrapped the new one around his waist. Then he made a mad dash up the stairs to his room and got his bedroom and bathroom doors between him and the crowd outside. The creepy feeling of all those eyes on him finally went away.

He tossed the wet towel into the laundry bin and then stepped into his shower. He got the water running on warm and sat on the floor under the gentle spray. There was just a little steam from his hair, and he took that as a sign that he'd dumped most of the heat he'd absorbed at the blast site.

He finally had a moment to process what he'd just gone through. There hadn't been time to think when he'd been in the moment. He just did what he had to do.

And there'd been aliens! The same bastards who turned him from a normal human baby into... what he was now. Something that was able to walk right up to an exploding inferno and not die from the heat. As the water washed over his skin, he looked at his hands and saw normal skin. He didn't feel different.

Now that he'd seen the damn aliens, it felt so much more real to him. It really was too much to absorb all at once.

He leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes.

Chapter 24

Joe awakened as the water shut off. He saw Safa drying herself off. She'd had to step in to get to the taps.

"The fire is out. Whatever was burning seems to have depleted. The site is still too hot to visit, but the danger appears to be over," she explained.

Joe rubbed his hands through his hair.

"Where did you get that bracelet?" she asked.

"What bracelet?" he asked, looking at his wrists. The piece of the coil that had latched onto his wrist was still there. He tried to pry it loose, but the broken end appeared to have melted into the surface, forming a tight bond. Joe couldn't slip his fingers under it or get any purchase on it.

"This is a piece of that damn machine that shot at Dad. It grabbed me, and I couldn't break free. They finally had to shoot the wire to break it. This last piece still won't let go."

"General MacAvoy is asking to debrief you," she said, still examining the smooth ring of metal on his wrist and its strange markings.

Joe realized he was sitting on the shower floor totally naked in front of Safa, and she seemed totally unaware. That actually made him feel a little better.

"I need to get up and get dressed," he said, and Safa moved back. He quickly dried himself with another towel. "Am I still radiating heat?"

Safa touched his arm momentarily. "No, you seem to be back to normal. Your color has returned to the golden-brown shade as well. Perhaps a little more gold than before, but the reddish tone is gone."

Joe walked into his room, and Agent White was standing by his bed. He caught her quick glance down before she looked him in the eye. "The General—"

"—wants to debrief me. I was told," Joe interrupted. "Could I get a little privacy so I can get dressed?" he asked. Safa and Agent White left the room, and Joe looked for something to wear. He realized that his wardrobe was quickly diminishing due to the abuse he gave it. He'd have to get himself a new jacket as well. Winter was coming, and he wasn't good in the cold. "Dammit!" he cursed quietly, recalling that he'd need new shoes too. He'd call his old boss, Rene Duval, at St. Germain's Feed and Supply to see if they still had a supply of those black work boots in his size.

He found a pair of worn jeans, a flannel shirt, and some wool socks. He pulled them on and headed downstairs. He stopped by the kitchen and made a quick sandwich, which he wolfed down in no time. Then he tried to call Rene, but the phone had no dial tone on the line. He hung up and thought longingly about his cell.

Joe found his old rubber boots by the back door and his grubby old farm jacket and pulled them on. He went out the back door and saw the backyard was also buzzing with activity. He walked to the front and saw that the General's command center had grown. A couple of trailers had been set up on the wide gravel area at the top of the driveway. One had a series of satellite dishes pointing skywards in various directions. The other was apparently for the General. He approached the uniformed man standing at the foot of the stairs. His insignia wasn't the same as the Marines, so... Army? Joe guessed his current grubby appearance sharply contrasted with how he looked before, as the Soldier showed no recognition.

"Hi, I'm Joe Neumann. The General wanted to see me?"

The man's eyes went wide, and his body went rigid for a few seconds as he processed that the man before him was the fire god they'd all watched take a shower before.

Joe blushed in embarrassment as he watched the recognition play over the man's face. "Can you just let him know I'm here?" Joe said quietly.

"Yes, sir!" the Soldier barked, snapping to attention.

"No, really, not sir. I'm just Joe. Please," he said patiently.

The man nodded and spoke into the mic hooked to his shoulder. Joe heard the send him in over the mic, and the Soldier stepped aside. Joe thanked him, went up the three steps, and entered the trailer.

Inside, he faced two more Soldiers sitting at small desks on either side of a door. One stood up with a metal detector wand, and Joe groaned. The rod screeched and screamed over his body. The inner door opened, and the General looked out to see what that noise was.

"Put that away! Joseph, sorry about that. Come inside, please." he said as he retreated into his office. Joe entered and looked around. It wasn't a lot of space, but it looked much more comfortable than a table on their front lawn. And plenty of displays showing the property and several views of the blast site. He took a chair before the General's desk as the man settled behind it.

"I'm going to record the debriefing. This is standard practice," he said, looking at Joe.

Joe nodded.

"I understand you have never visited this part of your property until today."

"Yeah, my dad told us it was poisoned and warned us to stay away. So, we did," he replied.

"You never snuck away to the field to see if your father was telling the truth?" the General prodded.

"Aside from keeping my encounter with the symbiote a secret, my dad has never lied to me. Why would I have doubted him? And you saw yourself, the field was poisoned. I've never been to the field... until I went with you."

"Okay. We've combined each Marine's camera footage and found something we need help explaining. I've synced up the time codes on these four recordings." The General turned his monitor so Joe could see it. The screen was split into four parts, and each was a view from a different camera. The top two showed what two Marines saw of the two new cylinders coming from the ground. The bottom left window showed a long side-view of Joe standing beside the crippled cylinder. The last one was from the General's perspective behind the hood of the SUV and at Joe's back.

Joe saw the metallic cable shoot out and wrap around his wrist, dragging him forward. In the top views, the two cylinders had cleared the ground and began to move towards the Marines. The green light flashed over Joe's body, and he fell to his knees. The General froze the playback at this point.

"This. We don't know what made you fall at this point," he asked.

"I felt really dizzy after the light passed over me. I could feel it in my bones, like when the portal was open. It just caught me by surprise, and I stumbled." Joe explained.

"So, the light likely wasn't a weapon but some form of scanning technology. We suspected that, and it fits a scenario we've been forming. Now, what it does after it scanned you is more interesting," the General stated before he started the playback again.

Joe heard the cylinder's loud tone and saw how the other two cylinders immediately responded by stopping their attack and moving to where the portal opened instead. The General stopped the playback again.

"So, it scans you and signals the others to open a portal. They were on a direct route to attack the Marines, but a signal from the one that scanned you changed their entire game plan. Any idea why?"

Joe looked blankly at the General. He had no idea what the General was getting at. How would he know that?

The General considered Joe carefully, his eyes piercing and intelligent. Joseph may have a whole host of surprising abilities, but the General didn't believe he'd ever be much of a liar. His face was too transparent, and his body language was too easy to read. The General knew honest bewilderment when he saw it.

"Okay, let me tell you what our brain trust came up with while you were cooling off. Based on the behavior we witnessed, we think they were after you." The General changed his display to show a frozen frame of the open black doorway and a dozen beings carrying silver tubes. "Your father said that twenty-one years ago, these beings crossed through a portal from wherever they come from to experiment on humans. Two died, but they never saw what happened to their third and final experiment because the Sheriff and your dad chased them off. We assume the cost of making that crossing is high based on the infrequency of their visits. If we accept that assumption, it increases the importance of the experiments for those beings. One theory we are leaning towards is that they may have been trying to produce a being like you, a successful merging of the symbiote and a human. They were certainly not looking for a way to destroy us one at a time. If we accept that as fact, then the cylinder that scanned you made it back through the portal with the help of the other two and may have delivered proof that you exist."

"Why?"

"Why what?" the General asked.

"Why did they make me like this? Why do they want me now?" Joe said with frustration.

"Their intent is probably, forgive the pun, alien to us. We may have no way of understanding the purpose behind their actions. We are basing all our assumptions on human reasoning. We may be way off, but to human minds, that's what their current actions appear to mean. They. Want. You."

Joe looked at the metal stuck to his wrist. It was feeling more like a shackle the more he heard.

"What's that?" the General asked.

"It's what's left of the metal rope that cylinder grabbed me with. It melted, and now I can't get it off." Joe complained.

"Have our Engineers take a look. Maybe they can cut it off," he suggested.

"Getting back to aliens, their access technology is destroyed, right? I mean, they can't come back, can they?" Joe asked, suddenly nervous.

"We haven't been able to get too close to the blast site as it's too hot still, but from what we saw in your video and what we see with the zoom lenses, it appears to be a complete wreck. But Agent White is currently compiling a list of possible alternate sites. The gravity anomalies have happened elsewhere to lesser degrees. We will investigate these other sites to ensure they haven't set up the same tech in those locations."

"I guess the cat is out of the bag?" Joe asked.

"Not at all. We've got a cover story for the explosion, and it's already being fed to the press. A Radical Cult set up a base in an unused field and stockpiled military-grade weapons. All without your parent's notice. Joint OP with the FBI and the CIA. Lots of credit to spread around, and the men who died now get recognition for their sacrifice. We came in to capture the baddies, but in a desperate move, they set off their explosives. The public eats this shit up," he said with a grin.