Watching the faceless man on the monitor, we saw that the image was now becoming unstable. The swarm had trouble keeping the appearance solid. Instead it fluctuated: at moments, the face and shoulders seemed to dissolve into dust, then reemerge as solid again. It was strange to watch it.
"Losing its grip?" Bobby said.
"No, I think it's getting tired," Charley said.
"You mean it's running out of power."
"Yeah, probably. It'd take a lot of extra juice to tilt all those particles into exact orientations."
Indeed, the swarm was reverting back to a cloud appearance again.
"So this is a low-power mode?" I said.
"Yeah. I'm sure they were optimized for power management."
"Or they are now," I said.
It was getting darker quickly, now. The orange was gone from the sky. The monitor was starting to lose definition.
The swarm turned, and swirled away.
"I'll be goddamned," Charley said.
I watched the swarm disappear into the horizon.
"Three hours," I said, "and they're history."
DAY 6
10:12 P.M.
Charley went back to bed right after dinner. He was still asleep at ten that night, when Mae and I were preparing to go out again. We were wearing down vests and jackets, because it was going to be cold. We needed a third person to go with us. Ricky said he had to wait for Julia, who was flying in any minute now; that was fine with me, I didn't want him anyway. Vince was off somewhere watching TV and drinking beer. That left Bobby. Bobby didn't want to go, but Mae shamed him into coming. There was a question about how the three of us would get around, since it was possible the swarm hiding place might be some distance away, perhaps even several miles. We still had David's dirt bike, but that could only sit two. It turned out Vince had an ATV in the shed. I went to see him in the power unit to ask him for the key.
"Don't need a key," he said. He was sitting on a couch, watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. I heard Regis say, "Final answer?"
"I said, What do you mean?"
"Key's in it," Vince said. "Always there."
"Wait a minute," I said. "You mean there was a vehicle in the shed with keys in it all the time?"
"Sure." On the TV, I heard, "For four thousand dollars, what is the name of the smallest state in Europe?"
"Why didn't anybody tell me?" I said, starting to get mad.
Vince shrugged. "Couldn't say. Nobody asked me."
I stalked back to the main unit. "Where the hell is Ricky?"
"He's on the phone," Bobby said. "Talking to the brass back in the Valley."
Mae said, "Take it easy."
Chapter 17
"I'm taking it easy," I said. "Which phone? In the main unit?"
"Jack." She put her hands on my shoulders, stopped me. "It's after ten o'clock. Forget it."
"Forget it? He could have gotten us killed."
"And right now we have work to do."
I looked at her calm face, her steady expression. I thought of the swift way she had eviscerated the rabbit.
"You're right," I said.
"Good," she said, turning away. "Now I think as soon as we get some backpacks, we'll be ready to go."
There was a reason, I thought, why Mae never lost an argument. I went to the storage cupboard and got out three packs. I threw one to Bobby.
"Let's hit the road," I said.
It was a clear night, filled with stars. We walked in darkness toward the storage shed, a dark outline against the dark sky. I pushed the dirt bike along. None of us talked for a while. Finally, Bobby said, "We're going to need lights."
"We're going to need a lot of things," Mae said. "I made a list." We came to the storage shed, and pushed open the door. I saw Bobby hang back in the darkness. I went in, and fumbled for the lights. I flicked them on. The interior of the storage shed appeared just as we had left it. Mae unzipped her backpack and began walking down the row of shelves. "We need portable lights ... ignition fuses ... flares ... oxygen ..."
Bobby said, "Oxygen? Really?"
"If this site is underground, yes, we may ... and we need thermite."
I said, "Rosie had it. Maybe she set it down when she ... I'll look." I went into the next room. The box of thermite tubes lay overturned on the floor, the tubes nearby. Rosie must have dropped it when she ran. I wondered if she had had any in her hand. I looked over at her body by the door.
Rosie's body was gone.
"Jesus."
Bobby came running in. "What is it? What's wrong?"
I pointed to the door. "Rosie's gone."
"What do you mean, gone?"
I looked at him. "Gone, Bobby. The body was here before and now it's gone."
"How can that be? An animal?"
"I don't know." I went over and crouched down at the spot where her body had been. When I had last seen her, five or six hours ago, her body had been covered with a milky secretion. Some of that secretion covered the floor, too. It looked exactly like thick, dried milk. Up where her head had been, the secretion was smooth and undisturbed. But closer to the door, it appeared to have been scraped. There were streaks in the coating. "It looks like she was dragged out," Bobby said.
"Yes."
I peered closely at the secretion, looking for footprints. A coyote alone couldn't have dragged her; a pack of animals would be needed to pull her out the door. They would surely leave marks. I saw none.
I got up and walked to the door. Bobby stood beside me, looking out into the darkness.