Dean Koontz - Phantoms

But she had time, buy some time, several hours, in which to set her plan in motion. The shape-changer was millions and millions of years old, virtually immortal. What were a few hours to this creature? Surely, it would comply with her request.

Surely.

She sat down at one of the computer terminals, her eyes burning with weariness. She needed sleep. They all needed sleep. The night was nearly gone. She wiped one hand across her face, as if she could slough off her weariness. Then she typed: ARE YOU THERE?

YES.

WE HAVE COMPLETED A NUMBER OF TESTS, she typed as the others crowded around her.

I KNOW, it replied.

WE ARE FASCINATED. THERE IS MORE WE WISH TO KNOW.

OF COURSE.

THERE ARE OTHER TESTS WE WANT TO CONDUCT.

WHY?

IN ORDER THAT WE CAN KNOW MORE ABOUT YOU.

CLARIFY, it answered teasingly.

Sara thought for a moment, then typed: DR. FLYTE NEEDS ADDITIONAL DATA IF HE IS TO WRITE ABOUT YOU WITH AUTHORITY.

HE IS MY MATTHEW.

HE NEEDS MORE DATA TO TELL YOUR STORY AS IT SHOULD BE TOLD.

It flashed back a three-line response in the center of the video display: A FLOURISH OF TRUMPETS THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD — A FLOURISH OF TRUMPETS Sara couldn't be sure if it was merely mocking them or whether its ego was actually so large that it could seriously equate its own story with the story of Christ.

The screen blinked. New words appeared: PROCEED WITH YOUR TESTS.

WE WILL NEED TO SEND FOR MORE LAB EQUIPMENT.

WHY? YOU HAVE A FULLY EQUIPPED LAB.

Sara's hands were moist. She blotted them on her jeans before tapping out her answer.

THIS LAB IS FULLY EQUIPPED ONLY FOR A NARROW AREA OF SCIENTIFIC INQUIRY: THE ANALYSIS OF CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL WARFARE AGENTS. WE DID NOT ANTICIPATE ENCOUNTERING A BEING OF YOUR NATURE. WE MUST HAVE OTHER LAB EQUIPMENT IN ORDER TO DO A PROPER JOB.

PROCEED.

IT WILL TAKE SEVERAL HOURS TO HAVE THE EQUIPMENT SENT HERE, she told it.

PROCEED.

She stared at the word, green on green, hardly daring to believe that gaining more time would be this easy.

She tapped the keys: WE WILL NEED TO RETURN TO THE INN AND USE THE TELEPHONE THERE.

PROCEED, YOU BORING BITCH. PROCEED, PROCEED PROCEED PROCEED.

Her hands were damp again. She wiped them on her jeans and stood up.

From the way the others were looking at her, she realized that they knew she was hiding something, and they understood why she was remaining silent about it.

But how did they know? Was she that obvious? And if they knew, did it know, too?

She cleared her throat." Let's go," she said shakily.

"Let's go," Sara Yamaguchi said shakily, but Timothy said, "Wait. Just a minute or two, please. There's something I've got to try.”

He sat down at a computer terminal. Although he had gotten some sleep on the airliners, his mind was not as sharp as it ought to be. He shook his head and took several deep breaths, then typed: THIS IS TIMOTHY FLYTE.

I KNOW.

WE MUST HAVE A DIALOGUE.

PROCEED.

MUST WE DO IT THROUGH THE COMPUTER?

IT IS BETTER THAN A BURNING BUSH.

For a second or two, Timothy didn't understand what it meant. When he got the joke, he almost laughed aloud. The damned thing had its own perverse sense of humor. He typed: YOUR SPECIES AND MINE SHOULD LIVE IN PEACE.

WHY?

BECAUSE WE SHARE THE EARTH.

AS THE FARMER SHARES THE FARM WITH HIS CATTLE. YOU ARE MY CATTLE.

WE ARE THE ONLY TWO INTELLIGENT SPECIES ON EARTH.

YOU THINK YOU KNOW SO MUCH. IN FACT YOU KNOW SO LITTLE.

WE SHOULD COOPERATE, Flyte persisted doggedly.

YOU ARE INFERIOR TO ME.

WE HAVE MUCH TO LEARN FROM EACH OTHER.

I HAVE NOTHING TO LEARN FROM YOUR KIND.

WE MAY BE MORE CLEVER THAN YOU BELIEVE.

YOU ARE MORTAL. IS THAT NOT TRUE?

YES.

TO ME, YOUR LIVES ARE AS BRIEF AND UNIMPORTANT AS THE LIVES OF MAYFLIES SEEM TO YOU.

IF THAT IS THE WAY YOU FEEL, WHY DO YOU CARE WHETHER OR NOT I WRITE ABOUT YOU?

IT AMUSES ME THAT ONE OF YOUR SPECIES HAS THEORIZED MY EXISTENCE. IT IS LIKE A PET MONKEY LEARNING A DIFFICULT TRICK.

I DO NOT BELIEVE WE ARE YOUR INFERIORS, Flyte typed gamely.

CATTLE.

I BELIEVE YOU WANT TO BE WRITTEN ABOUT BECAUSE YOU HAVE ACQUIRED A VERY HUMAN EGO.

YOU ARE WRONG.

I BELIEVE THAT YOU WERE NOT AN INTELLIGENT CREATURE UNTIL YOU BEGAN FEEDING UPON INTELLIGENT CREATURES, UPON MEN.

YOUR IGNORANCE DISAPPOINTS ME.

Timothy continued to challenge it. I BELIEVE THAT ALONG WITH KNOWLEDGE AND MEMORY THAT WAS ABSORBED FROM YOUR HUMAN VICTIMS, YOU ALSO ACQUIRED INTELLIGENCE. YOU OWE US FOR YOUR OWN EVOLUTION.

It did not reply.

Timothy cleared the screen and typed more: YOUR MIND SEEMS TO HAVE A VERY HUMAN STRUCTURE — EGO, SUPEREGO, AND SO FORTH.

CATTLE, it replied.

Blink.

PIGS, it said.

Blink.

GROVELING ANIMALS, it said.

Blink.

YOU BORE ME, it said.

And then all the screens went dark.

Timothy leaned back in his chair and sighed.

Sheriff Hammond said, "Nice try, Dr. Flyte.”

"Such arrogance," Timothy said.

"Befitting a god," Dr. Paige said." And that's more or less how it thinks of itself.”

" In a way," Lisa Paige said, "that's what it really is.”

"Yeah," Tal Whitman said, "for all intents and purposes, it might as well be a god. It has all the powers of a god, doesn't it?”

"Or a devil," Lisa said.

Beyond the streetlamps and above the fog, the night was gray now. The first vague glow of dawn had sparked the far end of the sky.

Sara wished Dr. Flyte hadn't challenged the shape-changer so boldly.

She was worried that he had antagonized it, and that now it would renege on its promise to give them more time.

During the short walk from the field lab to the Hilltop Inn, she kept expecting a grotesque phantom to lope or scuttle at them from out of the fog. It must not take them now. Not now.

Not when there was, at long last, a glare of hope.

Elsewhere in town, off in the fog and shadows, there were strange animal sounds, eerie alienating cries like nothing that Sara had ever heard before. It was still engaged upon its ceaseless mimicry. A hellish shriek, uncomfortably close at hand, caused the survivors to bunch together.

But they were not attacked.

The streets, although not silent, were still. was not even a breeze; the mist hung motionless in the air.

Nothing waited for them inside the inn, either.

At the central operations desk, Sara sat down and dialed the number of the CBW Civilian Defense Unit's home base in Dugway, Utah.

Jenny, Bryce, and the others gathered around to listen.

Because of the ongoing crisis in Snowfield, there was not just the usual night-duty sergeant at the Dugway headquarters.

Captain Daniel Tersch, a physician in the Army Medical Corps, a specialist in containing contagious disease, third in charge of the unit, was standing by to direct any support operations that might become necessary.

Sara told him about their latest discoveries-the neroscopic examinations of the shape-changer's tissue, the results of the various mineral and chemical analyses-and Tersch was fascinated, though this was well beyond his field of expertise.

"PetrolatumT' he asked at one point, surprised by what she had told him.

"The amorphous tissue resembles petrolatum only in that it has a somewhat similar mix of hydrocarbons that register very high values. But of course it's much more complex, much more sophisticated.”

She stressed this particular discovery, for she wanted to be certain that Tersch passed it along to other scientists on the CBW team at Dugway. If another geneticist or a biochemist were to consider this data and then look at the list of materials she was going to ask for, he would almost certainly know what her plan was. If someone in the CBW unit did get her message, he would assemble the weapon for her before it was sent into Snowfield, sparing her the time-consuming and dangerous job of assembling it with the shape-changer looking over her shoulder.