sedona files 06 - enemy mine Read online

  “We don’t know for sure,” my mother replied. Since she sat with her back to me, I couldn’t see much of her expression. But I really didn’t need to see her. Usually, she was very good at shielding her emotions and thoughts so they wouldn’t intrude on me. Right then, however, I could sense the pulse of her unease, so I knew whatever it was, it couldn’t be good.

  “We’ve been getting…reports,” my father said. “People going missing.”

  I sat up straighter, ignoring the tug of the seatbelt against my chest. “Missing? Who?”

  “No one here in Sedona,” my mother said quickly. “Not that that makes it any better. But people have been contacting your father, saying that they know a friend of a friend who’s gone, or that a disappearance was reported on the local news before it was hushed up. In almost every state, and overseas as well.”

  It had to be the Reptilians. I didn’t know why, or how, but you didn’t start getting mass vanishings of people unless some kind of evil intelligence was at work behind the phenomenon. “Is there a pattern to the disappearances?”

  “Yes,” my father replied. Right then we reached the roundabout that would slingshot us onto the southbound State Route 87 and down to Sedona. He waited until he’d finished negotiating the curve before he continued. “They’re always taken at night from their homes. No one sees anything. They’re just…missing.”

  “It’s more than that, though.” My mother was fiddling with the straps of her purse where it sat on her lap, and that bothered me more than I wanted to admit. She was a high-energy person, no doubt about that, but she wasn’t given to nervous tics. This whole thing had gotten to her, whatever it was. “All the people taken have been young women. Mostly between twenty and twenty-five, although there are a few who were a few years older than that.”

  The temperature in the SUV was mild enough, the climate control on vent because of the gentle spring day outside, but I went cold anyway. Young women, taken by the Reptilians. You didn’t need a degree in advanced mathematics to do the calculations for that one.

  The question was, why now? Yes, I’d obviously thwarted Lir Shalan’s plans in some way, but I was only one person, no matter what my talents might be, while my parents had made it sound as if scores of women — if not more — were involved here.

  “And it’s not all over the news?”

  “No,” my father said, still in that dire tone. “That is, there’ve been a few times when something made the local news, but you’d never hear about it again, and those stories have been scrubbed from the archives. The people who contacted me said it was as if the abduction had never happened.”

  “But what about the police?”

  “It sounds like the police are stonewalling them,” my mother replied. “They say that the women must have left on their own, since there was no sign of a struggle in any of these instances. Never mind that, according to the information we’ve gathered so far, it doesn’t seem as if any of those who’ve disappeared had a reason to take off like that. Most of them were in college or had jobs they enjoyed. They tended to be high achievers.”

  A suspicion began to form in my mind. “Attractive?”

  “Yes. That is, we don’t have photographs for all of them, but the ones we do — yes, they were pretty.” She shifted in her seat so she could look back at me. “What are you thinking, Taryn?”

  Did I want to tell them? Yes, my parents knew about the Reptilians’ penchant for genetic experimentation, that they could create hybrids who looked just like regular human beings. What they didn’t know was that the aliens could reproduce with humans the normal way, without the aid of a test tube. Yes, it was more difficult, and the offspring of those pairings could vary wildly in their appearance, but it was possible.

  So the Reptilians had come to Earth and had pretended to be the saviors of our astronauts in order to earn some political capital. And what better way to use that capital than to convince the governments of the world that it was in their best interests to look in the other direction when a few of their women went missing?

  Another shiver passed over me. Yes, it was all conjecture, but I could somehow feel, in the pit of my stomach, that my guesses were the truth, or at least pretty close to it.

  “They’re taking the women so they can breed with them,” I said bluntly.

  The SUV shuddered as my father startled, then regained control of himself so we wouldn’t go careening off the side of the road. A red light on the instrument panel flashed, indicating that the vehicle would take over if he made another erratic movement. “They’re what?”

  It wasn’t that he’d never heard of such a thing before. Abduction reports were full of stories about hybrids, breeding programs. It was just that those stories had always been conjecture. No one had ever been able to offer any real, definitive proof. But he’d heard the truth in my voice. He knew I wasn’t making this up.

  My mother turned so far around in her seat that I knew her seatbelt wouldn’t do a damn bit of good if we did end up having an accident. Her hazel eyes, the same color as mine, were wide, staring. “You sound very certain.”

  “Well, I’m just guessing. But, based on what I learned when I was on board the Reptilians’ ship, I think it’s pretty plausible.”

  “They didn’t — ” my mother began, her face white, and I shook my head at once.

  “No, they didn’t touch me, or hurt me. But….” I trailed off then, wondering how much I should say about Gideon. Then I realized that at least some of the truth would have to come out at some point, simply because I knew everyone would have questions about the green-skinned man who had taken me by the hand and whisked me away from the abandoned alien base. “But I know that the Reptilians can breed directly with humans, instead of just manipulating their DNA in a lab. I know this because that’s who the green-skinned man is. He’s the son of Lir Shalan, the Reptilian leader, and a human woman who was taken from someplace here in Sedona.”

  My mother had looked pale before, but now she was positively sheet-white. “But…how? I mean, how is this being allowed to happen?”

  I had no answer for that. My father just gripped the steering wheel more tightly and said, “I think that’s what we all need to figure out. Unfortunately, because of the near blackout on the news about this, I have to believe that the suppression of information is coming from pretty high up.”

  In general, when my father started to go down the conspiracy rabbit hole, my mother would make some attempt to find other rational explanations, even though she knew as well as anyone else in our group that all sorts of hidden plots were bubbling beneath the surface at any one time. Now, though, she only shook her head. “But why? Even if the governments of the world are being overly generous in their thanks to the Reptilians for ‘saving’ our astronauts” — she made air quotes around the word “saving,” since we all knew they’d done pretty much the opposite — “I can’t understand how they would stand aside and allow hundreds of innocent women to be kidnapped by aliens.”

  I didn’t really want to believe it, either. But I could feel the strong pulse of worry coming from my father, and I knew he was extremely troubled. If I’d wanted to, I probably could have gone into his mind and seen for myself the very reports that had caused so much concern, but no way would I do that. I’d wait to see what everyone else had to say on the subject.

  Right then, I realized that, as much as I’d dreaded getting bombarded by questions from so many people, I also looked forward to being surrounded by everyone in our little extended family. Somehow with them around me, I wouldn’t feel quite as afraid.

  I was given the time to take a long, hot shower and then get myself as ready as I could be. Yes, I’d taken a quick shower at Michael’s apartment, but I hadn’t washed my hair or done much of anything to get myself prepped. Now at least I was wearing my own clothes, and had put on a bit of makeup, and generally felt a lot more like myself than I had when I’d begun the day.

  The whole time I was getting r
eady, though, I kept thinking about Gideon. I was far more worried than I wanted to admit. Lir Shalan had already proven that he seemed to be capable of just about anything. The question was, how important was his son’s life to him? Would the alien leader be able to look past Gideon’s betrayal because he didn’t have much choice? After all, Gideon was Lir Shalan’s only child, as far as I could tell.

  I told myself that Gideon would be fine. Lir Shalan wouldn’t do anything that would permanently injure his only son.

  I just wished I believed that.

  But then I had to push thoughts of Gideon away, just in case Callista or Kirsten or Martin might be able to pick up some of my inner turmoil. I didn’t want them to know how much it hurt to think of something terrible happening to him. I wanted him to be safe. I wanted….

  I didn’t know what I wanted. And that was the real problem.

  From the front of the house, I heard the murmur of voices, and I knew that the gang had begun to arrive. I paused in front of the mirror and wished I didn’t look so pale. True, I’d been stuck in Lir Shalan’s ship for the better part of two weeks without ever seeing the sun, but I guessed that my current pallor couldn’t be entirely blamed on my confinement.

  Putting on more blush would only look unnatural. I gave my curls one last scrunch, then headed out to face the horde.

  They’d all gathered in the living room, which was the only place in the house big enough to accommodate everyone. My parents had brought in chairs from the dining room so there would be enough places to sit. All those chairs were occupied now, by Kirsten and Martin and Callista and Raphael, and then Kara and Lance and Kelsey. I didn’t see either Kevin or Grace or their younger sister Melissa, which didn’t surprise me too much. Grace would be at work up in Flagstaff, Logan with her, and Kevin probably at work as well, heading up a Jeep tour. Melissa could have been at school, or at work; I didn’t really keep track of her schedule, since she was just enough younger that we didn’t hang out together too much.

  So it wasn’t quite as big a group as I’d been expecting, although it was certainly large enough. My parents sat on the couch, and I saw that the accent chair off to its side was empty. The place of honor, apparently.

  As I headed for the chair, Callista got up from her seat and came toward me. Before I could react, she was wrapping her arms around me and giving me a fierce hug.

  “I was so worried,” she said, and I could see tears shining in her eyes. Although I sensed that she was trying to keep it together, huge pulses of guilt kept emanating from her. She’d been blaming herself that I’d gone with the aliens, although that had been my decision. She couldn’t have stopped me even if she’d tried.

  “It was fine,” I told her. “I’m fine.”

  She pulled away and gave me a long, hard look. “Maybe.” And then she paused. A thought coalesced in my mind, a thought that wasn’t my own.

  But you and I are getting together later and having a drink, and really talking this over.

  I knew she’d never been able to do anything like that before. Apparently she and Raphael had been practicing their mental communications skills, and now she was using them on me.

  Since I couldn’t really protest, I gave a tiny nod, one she would be able to see but no one else probably could. Looking somewhat relieved, she went and sat back down in her chair, and I settled myself in the accent chair that had been reserved for me.

  Before anyone could say anything, I spoke. “I just want to let you all know that I’m okay. The Reptilians didn’t hurt me, or perform any kind of tests on me. I know they were observing me, but whatever instruments they were using to do so, they weren’t invasive at all.”

  “Then what was the point?” Lance asked. Trust him to get straight to the heart of the matter.

  I couldn’t tell them that Lir Shalan had wanted me as a psychic mate for his son. Maybe I could confess that horrible little detail to Callista when it was just the two of us alone, but to say something like that in front of everyone, especially the hard-faced Lance? No, thanks.

  “I guess you’d have to ask them that,” I replied with a shrug. “My best guess is that they were interested in my psychic abilities and wanted a chance to see them at work firsthand.”

  “Were you able to get anything from them?” Kara asked.

  “No,” I said. “I think their brain physiology and chemistry are different enough from a human’s that my gift — or whatever you want to call it — doesn’t seem to work when they’re involved.”

  My mother frowned. “That’s too bad. I’m certainly the last person to advocate tromping around in someone’s mind uninvited, but if you’d been able to do that, then maybe we would have been able to understand how they’re getting away with these abductions.”

  “I thought we hadn’t definitively proved it was the Reptilians,” Kara said, and Lance gave her an ironic look, complete with lifted eyebrow.

  “Who else could it be?”

  “I’m pretty sure it must be,” I said hastily. The last thing I needed was for them to start picking at each other. Their marriage was rock-solid, but they still tended to get a little snipey when they disagreed with one another. Before either one of them could say anything else, I came out with basically the same theory I’d given my parents in the car — that these women were being taken for breeding stock, even though the results couldn’t be controlled the way they might if these offspring were being created in a lab.

  Kara went pale, and Lance ran a hand through his short-cropped graying hair. Kirsten looked at her husband and said, “Martin, did you know anything about this?”

  A shake of the head, while Raphael put in, “It is news to both of us. Of course we’ve known for some time that the Reptilians have been experimenting with human genetic material, but we’ve never heard of them breeding directly with human women. On the surface, it doesn’t make a great deal of sense. As Taryn just pointed out, the results of these pairings would vary wildly. They wouldn’t be of much use in creating an army in the way that the hybrids were.”

  Right then I was glad that Grace and Logan weren’t present. I could tell that Raphael hadn’t meant any real insult, but he did have a way of talking about the hybrids that was impersonal to the extreme. It was possible he really didn’t think of Logan as a hybrid, since he had clearly developed as an individuated person, no matter what his Reptilian creators might have intended. But Grace was touchy about those things. I couldn’t really blame her, since her father had been a hybrid and she was now basically hooked up with one as well. However, the situation was complicated enough without her taking offense at an essentially innocent remark Raphael had made.

  “Did you see anything, hear anything?” Martin asked then. “Anything that would indicate they were gearing up for something big?”

  That was one question I could answer honestly enough. “No. I was given a room to stay in, and I wasn’t let out very often. I didn’t interact with any of the Reptilians except Lir Shalan — briefly — and Gideon.”

  “Gideon?” Callista inquired. The glint that appeared in her eyes told me she’d noticed something about the way I’d said the name. Well, I supposed it would all come out sooner or later, but I really wanted to hold off until the two of us could talk in private.

  “The human-looking one with the greenish skin,” I explained. “He’s Lir Shalan’s son.”

  Martin leaned forward in his chair, elbows propped up on his knees. He looked surprised — but not too surprised, as if he’d begun to put two and two together as soon as I’d mentioned the part about Reptilians being able to breed with human women. “So you had the most interactions with this Gideon?”

  “I — I suppose so. But obviously he wasn’t going to tell me anything about their plans.”

  “So what did you talk about?” Kirsten asked, tone frankly curious.

  “Um…things,” I said lamely. “He wanted to know about my psychic abilities. We talked about that a good bit. And he told me a little about his mot
her, how she’d been here in Sedona for the solstice and then was taken when the remnants of the force Kirsten destroyed fled back to their ship.”

  “Poor woman,” Kara murmured.

  I nodded. But I really didn’t want to go into too much detail; it wasn’t my story to tell, and I didn’t want to betray Gideon’s confidences. Besides, his mother’s tale, tragic as it might have been, didn’t have much bearing on what was currently going on.

  Well, except how each of the women being abducted might this moment be suffering her exact fate. Would Lir Shalan take his pick of those women so he could start over and try for a son who would be a little more loyal?

  A shiver went over me, and I clasped my hands on my knee as I did my best to dispel that terrible thought from my mind. “But I didn’t see anything much. Definitely no other human women, so if they were taking them to the ship, then they must have kept them well hidden.”

  My father spoke then. “So you were able to move about, even if you spent a good deal of time in your cabin?”

  “Yes, some,” I said. “Obviously, I was never allowed to go out alone. Gideon always went with me. But I did get to see some of the ship.” I decided it was better not to mention the astral projection, at least not right then. They’d start asking me questions about that instead of focusing on the real issue.

  “Can you describe it?”

  Of course my father would want to geek out over the Reptilians’ ship. I knew he was jealous that he’d never gotten to see Raphael’s sleek spaceship, even though Kirsten had kindly spent an afternoon at the house, describing it as best she could so my father would have some sort of record. At the time, I’d been kind of surprised that no one had tried taking a few surreptitious cell phone shots of it when Raphael wasn’t looking, but I supposed they’d all had other things to occupy them at the time.

  “You’ve seen their base,” I said. “The ship really didn’t look all that different. Everything was squared off, and the lighting was dim. The walls and ceilings and floors were all made of metal, a dark kind of alloy. I don’t know what it was. There was this one place where Gideon — ” As soon as I spoke his name, I flushed, and belatedly realized it was probably better not to confess that he’d taken me to his own suite. I took a breath and tried to backpedal a bit. “That is, there was a sort of observation deck where he took me so I could see Earth.”