Roadkill by Dennis E. Taylor

Author:Dennis E. Taylor [Taylor, Dennis E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Ethan Ellenberg Literary Agency
Published: 2022-11-30T16:00:00+00:00

“So who are you guys?” Phil walked between and slightly behind us, shifting his gaze back and forth as if he was scared to miss anything. In person, he was even odder than his picture. Besides the hair, he was several days’ worth of unshaven, but not the cool kind of unshaven like TV characters—more of a “got tired of shaving partway through” look. He also had an eyebrow twitch that reminded me of the psychic on an old X-Files episode.

I stopped and turned to face him. “We’re colleagues of Tim. TimJay666 to you. He informed us that you might be in a bit of trouble and gave us an address.”

Eyebrow up. “Huh. And how did he know this?”

“I’m not at liberty to say,” I replied. “Need to know, and all.”

Patrick snorted without looking directly at Phil, but otherwise didn’t contribute.

Phil pulled the cloaking detector out of an inside pocket and held it out. I glanced quickly back at the administration office, but they’d need to have a system worthy of an astronomical observatory to pick up anything at this distance.

“This thing is supposed to detect invisible objects,” he continued. “It vibrated when I was in the field, and it vibrated when the slimy guy in the suit came into the room. He didn’t look invisible, though. Just slimy.” He waved the detector at me. “You know anything about this device?”

“Classified. Sorry.”

Other eyebrow up. “My ass. This is alien technology. Are you aliens? Are you the same aliens as the one in the freezer? Do you work for TimJay666?”

“No, Mr. Ross, we are not any of those things. We’re locals, born and raised.”

“Especially not that last item,” Patrick interjected.

Phil frowned. “Uh huh. Who are you with, then?”

“What makes you think we’re with anyone?” I said.

“Well, for starters, if your gadgets are classified, someone has to have classified them.”

Damn. Good point, I thought. Oh well, let’s roll with it. I put on my best confident smile and said, “A good catch, Mr. Ross. But you’ll never have heard of us. We’re from MOBIUS.”

Patrick almost lost it. He turned and resumed walking toward the parking lot, and Phil and I followed automatically.

“MOBIUS.”

“Uh-huh. Like I said … ”

“I’ve never heard of it. Right.” Phil pointed at the Duster. “So tell me, Men from Glad, is that an agency vehicle, or did you rescue me in your own car? If the latter, you’d better hope they don’t get your license plate.”

“Good luck with that,” Patrick replied.

I grinned, remembering how much effort Patrick had put into making his license plates unreadable without actually stepping over the line, legally. He’d even, at one point, bought one of those plastic covers that was supposed to be opaque to traffic-camera flashes. If a blurry frame from a distant webcam at a bad angle could extract a license number from the small part of his plate that was actually visible, I’d eat it.

I decided it couldn’t hurt to give Phil a little more to go on. Or a little more rope.

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