Home Base (Harbingers Book 14) Read online

  Did he even have his phone with him? He was a Christian and therefore probably a Luddite, so it would figure if he’d left his—

  I heard a beep that sounded suspiciously like a phone receiving a text.

  But of course he didn’t check his texts. His aura looked like he was close to wetting the bed, so getting an update about his favorite NFL team or a coupon from Troll-Mart probably wasn’t high on his priority list.

  Three lampreys coiled together like a Braided Missile of the Apocalypse and started bending in Tank’s direction.

  Troll, check your text, I thought at him.

  No response. He spun around, though. Probably the lampreys had showed a hump of their back as they spiraled nearer.

  Cowboy, check your phone. Tank, ya bonehead, I’m trying to save your red neck. Check that doohickey in the pocket of your Wranglers!

  Nothing. But I did see his color change, and I think he was praying.

  The death eels were sent tumbling outward as if hit by a sonic detonation.

  Yeah, that prayer stuff could be pretty useful sometimes. About ten times more effective than “righteous anger.” He wasn’t going to tell that to anyone, though.

  Hey, person who thinks Andi would ever fall for him…get a clue and read your text.

  No response, and now the creatures were regrouping—angry, this time.

  I bundled all my will into a thought and played my last card: Bjorn Christiansen.

  His color shifted instantly blue, and I knew he’d heard me. He looked around in the fog as it drifted up to the lower branches of the evergreens around him.

  I pushed my thought again. Bjorn, you’ve got a very important text. Check it right now.

  He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his phone. A few swipes of his sasquatch thumb later, and I could see from his aura that he’d seen my text. The change in his posture suggested that he was trying to communicate with me telepathically, but that wasn’t going to work.

  I climbed out the bilocation and swiped another message.

  Can c u but not ur thots. Drive out of fog NOW. San Diego monsters.

  His color didn’t change much when he read that one, so I thought he’d already figured out his danger. What he’d been doing wading through thick fog—next to a freaking permanent fog sign—after what he’d been through, was beyond even my brain’s capacity.

  Tank dug in his front pocket for his keys but dropped them. He bent down, and that was the opening the nearest death eel had evidently been waiting for. It darted forward, big as a kayak, and slammed Big Bjorn in the back of the neck.

  I used my favorite German obscenity.

  They went down in a pile of Scandinavian muscle and demon flesh. The troll was strong; I’ll give him that. Even with an anaconda-sized monster on him, he fought for all he was worth. He got to his feet, gripping the thing hanging from the back of his neck in some kind of reverse stranglehold. The other eels smelled blood in the water and piled on.

  German profanity.

  I’d seen Andi’s memories of that San Diego massacre, and I knew what generally happened when even one of these things attacked somebody. Generally…just a puff of pink mist and adios muchachos.

  One thing was for sure: He wasn’t going to be checking his texts anytime soon.

  Well, Sweet Cheeks, no one can say I didn’t try. Not that I was sad not to have a rival, but nobody deserved to die like—

  The eels exploded off Tank like he’d erupted.

  It even knocked me back, the wave of spiritual power that blasted off him.

  The eel on his neck writhed and shivered like it was trying to get away from the guy but was hooked on by its circle of fangs. It stood out from Tank’s body like a windsock in a tornado, until bits of it began flaying off. In a flash, it was only a skeleton flapping in the gale, and then even that disintegrated. Last of all, the mouth went to powder and poured away.

  Holy bratwurst.

  Tank struggled to his feet, blood pouring down the back of his neck onto his shirt. He put his hand back there and brought it forward to look at it. Red goop and lots of it. I was formulating an instruction burst for him, but he was ahead of me. He tore his shirt off and bound it around his neck to stanch the bleeding. I had to say that, even in a remote viewing of his torso, the shirt wasn’t the only thing that was ripped.

  I needed to be sure Andi didn’t get to see him in a swimsuit until she was safely in my pocket.

  The death eels were still in the area, swimming upstream against the reverse magnetism Tank was putting out. But unless he passed out from shock or blood loss, it didn’t look like they were going to have another shot at him in the near future.

  He staggered away from the forested hill he was on, leaving the FOG sign behind and moving toward his vehicle—an old Honda Civic from like 1832. No pickup—really?

  The mists of bilocation obscured my vision and I thought I might lose touch with him. That happened sometimes. I heard the sound of a text message received, and I wondered who else might be sending him anything. Then I realized the text was on my end.

  I rose from the RV trance and looked at my phone. It was from him.

  Thx man.

  I smiled in spite of myself. He was a dufus, but a plucky one.

  Another message from him: going 2 hsptal – heal didn’t work

  Good call. I wrote back. Then take cab to airport. Tix waiting 4 u. Wait, I had another thought. wut is nearest airport 2 u?

  um… was his first text. Not helpful. Second was better: Del Norte, I think. crescent city, calif.

  k, thx

  I put the phone down and went along the RV road again. One more little lamb to save before I could go to the hotel bar and collect a female companion for the evening. I had the very one in mind. There was a bartender named Ashley. Of course there was.

  I didn’t like the thought niggling my mind. But even if I didn’t let myself fully think it, I couldn’t escape the image of those creatures flung away from Tank like water off a dog.

  That…that was power.

  Ah, German profanity.

  Never mind that. Now it was time to pay a little disembodied visit to my favorite pair of sweet cheeks.

  Chapter Three

  A Damsel in Distress

  It wasn’t hard to locate Andi. I knew she had been planning to visit her grandparents at the beach house, and I’d seen her in transit a few days ago.

  I hurried through the descent protocol and zoomed right to her. She was out with that black dog of hers, sitting on chaise lounge on the beach in her blue one-piece suit and with a book in her hands. That red hair rested on creamy white shoulders and contrasted beautifully with the cerulean swimsuit. It was sunny and bright, and beachcombers strolled by in the distance. No attack by evil nasties yet, but I knew from my quick journey here that they were moving in.

  Funny how you can get to certain people faster, in remote viewing, when you’ve checked on them often.

  Not that I’ve checked on her that much. Not saying that. Not saying that I’ve watched her journaling while sitting up in her bed. Not saying I’ve watched her fix meals for only herself in her apartment, chopping peppers and cooking stir-fry. Not saying I’ve learned her rhythms and gauged her aura. Definitely not saying I’ve been a little slow to pull away when she takes a shower.

  Nope. Not saying any of that.

  Hey, I’m not a stalker. At least, no one could bring charges.

  It’s just…she’s interesting, that’s all. Her mind is…nice. Orderly. Unexpected but always sensible. Even her whimsy is logical and delightful.

  Besides, I couldn’t be held responsible if, sometimes when I happened to check in on her, she wasn’t entirely clothed. The vagaries of bilocating and all.

  Andi, I thought at her. I hadn’t tried this, and I didn’t think she was gifted, but it was an experiment to see if intense feelings in the sender amplified the effects of the message. Andi, can you hear me? It’s Chad.

  Her aura permut
ated a bit and she put her book in her lap. She looked around, shading her eyes, as if thinking she’d heard someone call her name.

  Good girl.

  Then she made an I must be hearing things face and went back to her book.

  I was reminded again that by now I had for sure flagged all the bad guys about where I was. Hey, fellers, wanna come kill me? Who knew what critters they were sending my way even now? Maybe they’d wait long enough for the whole club to convene at the hotel. Maybe they wouldn’t.

  Back to Sweet Cheeks. I was looking at her in a little, full-color holo-sphere in the middle of the black nether of remote viewing. Things were almost photorealistic in that bubble. But outside it, everything was symbolic and vague. Tiny lights and flitting clouds and waves of feeling, all churning together in the darkness.

  But this wasn’t my first rodeo, and I knew what was what. So when I again saw what appeared to be collections of gray rags billowing in the invisible breeze and roiling toward Andi like a wad of seaweed caught in the surf, I knew what they were.

  This was not good. I knew without even checking that Sweet Cheeks wouldn’t have her phone. She didn’t like trying to use it in bright sunlight, and she wanted to unplug by the beach.

  Not saying I’d studied her moods.

  So…no texting her like I did Tank. And no direct communication like with Daniel.

  Too bad my gifts weren’t different. Then maybe I could hijack that dog of hers and start speaking through its mouth. Now that would be cool.

  The balls of rag were closer now. In Sweet Cheeks’ reality, they were probably already within a quarter mile of her. Maybe on the beach, maybe creeping up from the houses behind her, and maybe flying over the water. Maybe high above her or directly below.

  What form would they take to get at her, I wondered. Tank’s evil death eels? Black-eyed peas? Men in black with dark sunglasses over eyeless sockets?

  I couldn’t see much beyond the edge of the bubble. But it wouldn’t matter for long. Soon enough, their chosen form would be all too clear.

  Andi, you’re in danger, I thought at her. Andi, run!

  She put the book down again and cocked her head, but she didn’t get up and flee.

  I racked my prodigious brain for a solution. If I’d known about this earlier, I could’ve freaking called her and told her what was going on.

  No, better: If they were all together in one place, as a team ought to be, none of this would’ve happened. They would’ve been grouped and could pool their pitiful resources. And when that didn’t work, I could’ve saved them. But no, apparently they thought that fifty—or however many it had been—calls from the Watchers didn’t suggest a pattern or imply that there might be fifty more. So these geniuses go back to their little sewing clubs and badminton teams or whatever and end up getting pounced on one by one. It was just a wonder it hadn’t happened before now. Lucky for them, I was there now.

  Except…what about my dear cheeks of sweetness? Was I going to have to watch that beautiful flesh torn apart before my eyes? Was that puzzling, delicious brain going to be seagull dinner surprise? If only I—

  Right: the grandparents.

  I started climbing out of the RV so I could look up their number, but I heard—felt, really—Andi’s dog growl, and I knew it was show time.

  The rag balls were near. Seven of them, at least. All I could see was Andi in her chaise lounge. Then a shadow fell over her. It was perfectly round.

  Those shiny spheres. I’d seen them in action in Vegas. I remembered how brave Stephie had been to take the gun and shoot at them. And even if that weren’t true, I’d seen these things often enough in Andi’s dreams to know what they were. Odd how they seemed to pick a different form for each member of the team. Wonder what they’d pick for me.

  Andi’s dog went into crazed attack mode, barking and snarling and snapping at the spheres—I could see some of the golden orbs in my periphery now—and then cowering away and yipping, as if under some dog-frequency assault.

  Sweet Cheeks dropped her book and rolled to her feet, but there must’ve been other spheres behind her, because she stopped as if blocked.

  I didn’t like feeling helpless.

  Chad?

  The voice startled me worse than if a golden sphere had been right here in the hotel room with me.

  “Who’s that?” I asked the air.

  It’s Daniel. We’re at the airport, but I know Andi’s in trouble. I want to help.

  Daniel! “You know what, Junior? You just might be able to help, at that.” I let my brain run through the options. “Okay, look, I need to do what I can to protect Andi. You have Brenda use the airplane phone to call Andi’s grandparents in Indian Rocks Beach. Tell them to call the police and an ambulance, because I’m afraid Andi’s going to need them. Tell them to go out and find Andi on the beach and help her if they can.”

  Okay, but…Brenda says this plane doesn’t have phones.

  “Of course it doesn’t. Okay, have her use her cell phone.”

  Um! We’re not supposed to—

  “Do it, kid! Screw the FAA. Andi’s going to die.”

  I felt him thinking about it. Okay.

  Brenda gave her psychic Styrofoam a twist, probably telling me off, but I didn’t care, so long as she made the call.

  “As for you, Daniel, you can absolutely help me. I’ve never tried this, but it might work. I almost got through to Andi a minute ago, alone. But with you and me shouting at her together, I think she might hear us. You up for it?”

  Another thoughtful pause. Well, yeah, but I can’t see her. How will I know what to say?

  “I’ll tell you, then we’ll say it to her together. Got it?”

  Okay.

  I checked in with Andi.

  She wasn’t dead yet. That was good. But that might change soon. For some reason, she had run toward the water, not away from it. The orbs chased her like giant globular hornets. The dog stayed by her side, leaping at the things and falling hard back to the packed sand.

  I caught a glimpse of people watching the spectacle. Not surprisingly, they were dumbfounded. Dumb something else, if you’d asked me.

  A couple of slobby surfers ran to Andi’s rescue, jabbing their boards at the things like wide poles. One took a wide roundhouse swipe at an orb and slammed it on the side.

  It recoiled from the blow and knocked into the sphere next to it, and I had an insane inner vision of pendulum balls merrily smacking into one another. But the two affected balls arrested themselves in the air, made an aggressive move toward the surfers, and then boom, the dudes went flying away, feet sailing over their heads.

  Gnarly wipeout, dude. Cha.

  I couldn’t see them, but I sensed that Andi’s grandparents were on the case now. I suspected they were on their way over the dunes toward her. Probably both would have heart attacks on the way.

  Meanwhile, the spheres were still buzzing Sweet Cheeks and Wonder-Dog.

  Why did the balls of gray rags use the metal orb devices? Part physical conveyance, I knew, but what was scary about shiny cue balls? Still, anyone who knew Andi’s dreams like I did would know that it was a good form for them to use against her.

  People were fleeing the scene now, and nobody else offered to help. The surfers were limping away with their boards.

  An orb dipped too low, and the dog jumped at it, maw open. Not sure what it had in mind, but I couldn’t fault its devotion. The sphere sent out a beam of some kind, and I felt the dog’s pain across the ether. It fell to the sand in a broken heap, like a deer hit by a truck.

  “Abby!” Andi looked at her dog in shock, maybe waiting for it to move. Then she fell to her knees beside it and pulled its head into her lap. I could see her sobbing. The spheres closed in, and things were going to be over very, very quickly.

  Kid, I thought at Daniel, I need you to say this with me. Say, ‘Andi, you can’t stay there. Get up and run.’ You ready?

  I’m ready, Chad.

  And…now.
/>
  Together, we said, Andi, you can’t stay there. Get up and run.

  She looked up suddenly, and I knew she’d heard us. “Is someone there?”

  Kid, I said, say, ‘Your grandparents are in danger. They need your help.’ And…now.

  Your grandparents are in danger. They need your help.

  They weren’t really in danger, yet, but I figured it would take something like that to get her off her sweet cheeks and into motion.

  Andi looked to her left, toward the beach houses. “Sabba? Safta?” Abruptly, she stood, and I figured she’d spotted her grandparents. She ran toward them, and the orbs gave way.

  I heard a squeal of Styrofoam, and I knew what that meant.

  Brenda wants to help, Daniel said.

  No kidding. I sighed. Look, I don’t have time to… Okay, fine, she can do this: Tap her whenever we’re brain-shouting at Andi. Have her join her righteous fury—or her angry eyes or whatever she can bring—to what we’re saying. Okay? Tell her, but hurry up.

  After a second, he said they were ready.

  Back on the beach, Andi had reached two old people I knew from her memories were her rich grandparents. They looked terrified. Money’s nice, but it can’t save you from demon balls in the sky, you know what I’m saying?

  I figured we had another five minutes before the police got there, unless we got lucky and a car was already in the area. So, now that we had a way to communicate with Sweet Cheeks, what was my plan going to be—hide behind Granny?

  As the spheres converged on Andi and her grandparents, I saw in my mind’s eye an image of the death eels blasting off Tank back in the rain forest. I didn’t like the plan that my usually reliable brain began to tell me about.

  Um, Andi, I said, knowing she couldn’t hear me without my helper, but just trying the idea on for size, how do you feel about praying?

  I was aware of Daniel in the mindspace around me. You want me to say that, too?