Greg Cox: Loose ends

"Michael is right," Isabel declared. She lingered at the back of the grotto, a strained expression on her immaculate face. "It's too dangerous. We can't take the chance."Maria stared at Michael and Isabel in disbelief. "But we have to do something!" she objected, sounding totally appalled at the notion of doing nothing. "We can't just let this guy walk out of here scot-free. He shot Liz, for pete's sake!"Liz appreciated Maria's loyalty, but realized that Michael and Isabel had a point. They had all spent two stressful years covering up what had really happened at the Crash-down the day she was shot; did they really want to drag all that up into the light again? There was only so far Sheriff Valenti could protect them from outside scrutiny. "I don't know," she said hesitantly. "Maybe it's too complicated."Right!" Michael asserted. "What do we care about some lowlife, trigger-happy hood? We've got enough problems with alien invaders, rogue FBI agents, shapechangers, etcetera. I say we forget about him."Easier said than done, Liz thought. She'd always known, intellectually, that the shooter was still out there somewhere, but now, having discovered firsdiand that he could reappear in her life at any time, she wasn't sure she would ever feel safe again.

Max seemed to feel the same way. "You're all forgetting one thing," he reminded the others. Liz could hear the brooding intensity in his voice, sense the pent- up fury contained in his coiled muscles and posture. "This guy saw Liz, too. If he recognized her, he knows she can identify him. That puts Liz in danger."I hadn't thought of that, Liz thought, feeling the panic flare up again. She shuddered violently, and received a comforting hug from Maria, who also offered her a sniff from one of her ubiquitous vials of soothing scents. "I'm not sure I can face him again," Liz confessed, dreading the very idea of running into the volatile gunman one more time. "I'm afraid to budge from this spot." Apprehension tied a knot in her stomach, and her legs felt like soggy french fries. "What if next time he recognizes me for sure?"Well, we can take care of that easily enough," Isabel declared. At least a foot taller than Liz, she reached out and ran her open palm over Liz's long brown hair. Molecules rearranged at the alien teenager's delicate prodding and Liz's cocoa-colored tresses turned a bright shade of scarlet. "There," Isabel stated, "instant redhead." With another pass of her hand, she shifted the hue of Liz's wool sweater from dark green to lemon-yellow, then stepped back to inspect her work. "Not bad," she pronounced. "I doubt that anyone will recognize you now, let alone some jerk who only saw you once before, two years ago."Maria whistled appreciatively. "Boy, you must save a fortune on cosmetics and clothes," she remarked enviously to Isabel.

"I could change her eye color and hairstyle, too," Isabel said with a shrug. She produced a compact from her purse and offered the tiny mirror to Liz. "But that might be overkill."Probably, Liz thought, marveling at the startling transformation revealed in the mirror. So that's what I look like as a redhead. She had to admit that Isabel had done a good job of changing her appearance, which made Liz feel some- what safer and more secure. A good disguise works wonders, I guess.

"Thank you, Isabel," Max said to his sister. "That was a smart idea." He eyed Liz curiously, no doubt trying to get used to her striking new look. "It's still just a temporary solution, though. As long as this guy is loose, he's a potential threat to Liz." Liz recognized the look of determination in his eyes; he had made his decision. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going to track this guy down and make sure he never hurts anybody again-even if I have to do it alone."

I think I'm starting to get the hang of this sneaky stuff, Alex Whitman thought. Who would have guessed? Except in his wilder daydreams, Alex had never imagined himself the James Bond type. Yet here he was, trailing a dangerous, possibly lethal, suspect through the exotic setting of a gigantic cavern, eight hundred feet below the ground. It's amazing, he thought, what hanging around with aliens can do to perk up an otherwise dull lifestyle.

Locating Liz's mysterious assailant had been no problem; Alex had found the scruffy, heavyset stranger milling about outside the gift shop, looking impatient and irritable. The tricky part was going to be keeping an eye on the nameless shooter without blowing his cover. Alex hung out by the entrance to the underground cafeteria, pretending to be fascinated by a rock formation in the shape of an ice cream cone. Too bad there's no newsstand down here, he lamented; in the movies, private eyes and secret agents always hid behind their newspapers when shadowing suspicious characters.

Watching the alleged gunman out of the corner of his eye, Alex couldn't blame Liz for being spooked by this joker. Even if he hadn't already shot one of Alex's best friends, the big, imposing bruiser just looked like trouble. A trucker, maybe, or a convict, or both. The kind of brutal, bullying thug that ate mild-mannered high school kids for breakfast. Did he have to be quite so big and mean-looking? Alex asked silently, registering a complaint with whatever higher power was plotting his fate. After all, unlike Max or Michael, he wasn't equipped with his own personal force field and death ray. What do I do if he catches me following him? Run like heck, I guess.

Alex suddenly remembered the disposable Kodak camera he'd purchased at the Visitors Center uptop. He had intended to use the small plastic camera to snap some candid shots of his friends as they explored the caverns, but now a more devious application occurred to him.

Fishing the camera from the pocket of his jacket, he took a few random shots of the spacious cavern, just to establish his cover, then waited until Mr. Bad Attitude's sullen pacing brought him in front of a suitably photogenic stalagmite. Alex's index finger hovered over the shutter-release button of the compact camera, stalling until the elusive gunman was framed in the center of the viewfinder, then clicked the button.

The resulting flash was brighter than he would have preferred. Gulping, Alex felt his blood rushing toward his feet as the flashbulb's momentary discharge caused Bad Attitude to glance in Alex's direction. He hurriedly shot several more photos, in every direction except the mystery man's, before furtively risking a glimpse back at his unwilling (and highly intimidating) photographic subject. To his relief, the surly gunman was no longer paying any attention to Alex, having shrugged off the presence of the lanky teenage shutterbug. Thank goodness! Alex thought, feeling his racing pulse slow to something closer to a normal human rate. Now the only question was, having already pressed his luck this far, did he really have the nerve to keep on trailing the dangerous suspect? His resolve was tested only ten minutes later when the looming target of his surveillance checked his watch and grunted in approval. Carelessly tossing an empty candy wrapper onto the concrete floor of the rest area, Bad Attitude stomped toward the passage to the Big Room. What was he waitingfor? Alex wondered, giving the guy a few seconds' head start before sticking his camera back in his pocket and taking off in pursuit.

Once he realized the shooter was definitely heading for the Big Room, Alex grew worried that Bad Attitude was going to run right into Liz and the others. He considered running ahead to warn them, but quickly decided that would be jumping the gun, no pun intended. The Big Room was big, after all; chances were, the burly gunman would completely miss Liz and Co. in the vast, crowded recesses of the enormous cavern.

Certainly, Bad Attitude wasn't interested in sight-seeing. He hiked right across the paved, level surface of the Big Room, ignoring such popular attractions as the Painted Grotto and the Rock of Ages. Instead he marched straight to the far end of the gargantuan cavern, where he paused in front of a gaping chasm that a nearby sign identified as THE BOTTOMLESS PIT.