Stolen Skies (3) by Powers Tim

Author:Powers, Tim [Powers, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Action & Adventure, thriller, Fiction, Science Fiction, Urban, Alien Contact, Fantasy
ISBN: 9781982125837
Google: c3eCzgEACAAJ
Amazon: 1982125837
Goodreads: 58438467
Publisher: Baen
Published: 2022-01-04T08:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE:

Parasitoid Wasps

Vickery had driven south on Grand and turned right on First Street, and now he was speeding southeast between parking lots and low, government-looking buildings. Plowman was crowded against the passenger-side door, with Castine between him and Vickery, and Santiago was peering in through the open back window of the cab. The side windows were rolled down, but the sun was in their faces and Vickery wished he’d taken off his denim jacket before getting in. The radio was tuned to a talk station, nearly inaudible.

“Okay,” said Plowman finally, “What did you mean, a UFO nearly sat on you?”

Castine quickly described what had happened at Vickery’s trailer the night before, and what the Russian had said. From the corner of his eye, Vickery could see that Santiago was listening wide-eyed.

“And,” Castine concluded, “it happened because that GRU agent and I were tipped into echo-vision when Vickery here stepped into it deliberately, out at Giant Rock. That agent said we made a triangle of . . . punctures in now. He said it was a—” She turned to Vickery.

“Localized radiating discord,” Vickery said, “like out-of-phase radar waves.” He turned north on Spring Street. “We’ll go west on Sunset then south on the 110, loop around. If they’ve figured out the blood rags, this should keep ’em running in circles.”

“Radar waves,” muttered Plowman.

“And so,” Castine went on, “the thing that threw the shoes into the pool yesterday morning fell into the pool last night, in the L. A. River bed, and . . . became a ghost, the thing with the big hands.” She nodded. “And it was gelid as all hell.”

“Gooey?” put in Santiago, clearly mystified. “The pool?”

“Cold,” Castine told him, “and the pool, the surface of it, means our—universe, reality.” To Plowman she added, “And lately crop circles have been very damn cold, and there’s more of them all the time, these last few months. It’s—Sebastian, tell him about the gluons.”

“Sebastian,” said Plowman. “Vickery.” He squinted sideways at Vickery. “There’s stories about you.” He turned to Castine. “And I bet you’re the woman in the stories. Hah!” He slapped his thigh. “You flew a hot-air balloon out of Hell, is how it goes.”

“It was a hang-glider,” said Vickery. “But in Frankie Notchett’s poem . . .” He explained their interpretation of Notchett’s added lines in the Cosmogony. “So some kind of higher-dimensional entities are deflecting the electromagnetic, gravitational and Strong Nuclear force-carrying particles out of our four-dimensional reality by way of crop circles, which you said are their graves.”

“Yes,” said Plowman, “and I said they’re Lazaruses. And I guess they’re a lot damn closer to their mass resurrection than I thought. It’s like when cicadas all come out of the ground on the same day, after being buried for some prime number of years.” He tapped his distended jacket. “And I’ve got the complete negation symbol now. I’ll give it to you.”

“Negation . . . is that the ‘deeper grave’ you told me about once?” Vickery caught a green light and sped across the freeway overpass, glancing to the side at the tight ranks of cars in the lanes below.

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