I slid into the passenger seat and sat silent for a moment, stunned, trying to get my thoughts straight in my head. It made no sense; none of this made any sense. Why would Jen be with him, and why would the two of them take Dad with them?
“Did they say where they were going?”
I shook my head.
“There’s only one place they could’ve gone,” I said after a moment.
“I’m waiting,” Helen said.
“They went to get the trunk.”
“The trunk? What’s in the goddamned trunk that’s so important they’d go and grab your dad and take him there to open it?”
“How about, why is Jimmy with Jen? How did she get out of the house without leaving any footprints behind? Who killed Mandy? Who killed Bobby and the boys? Or how about? What the fuck is going on!”
“I don’t know, but I’m gonna have to call this in.”
“Call it in? You can’t do that.”
“I have to let the Sheriff know that we have a possible sighting of your sister-in-law, as well as your brother,” she added.
I know it made sense—even as she was saying it, I knew it made sense—but nothing else about what was happening was making any sense. I watched as she reached over to pick up the mike. I put a hand out and grabbed her, looking at her and slowly shaking my head.
“Let’s go to the locker first.”
“I still have to check in. I’m supposed to check in every hour when I’m out on patrol, or on a call.”
“Tell them we went out for breakfast.”
“They’ll know we were here.”
“But not right now. Maybe later, if they even bother to look, and really, why would they? They’d need a reason to come here, and if they need a reason to come here, it’s because we told them about Jen and my brother, after we saw them, if we even do. They might not even be there. If they’re not, well, no harm no foul. We don’t make ourselves look like a couple of idiots, and tell them we went to the Home after we had lunch and that’s when we discovered they’d come in and taken my father.”
“I don’t like the sound of this. You’re sister-in-law is definitely a witness to what happened. We can agree on that, can’t we?”
“Agreed. But we don’t know if they are at the storage locker. That was just a guess on my part, and to be honest, you’re right, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense when you look at it. But nothing about this makes any sense.”
“Why would they want to open the trunk? What’s in there that’s so important that they’d take your father with them?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know, but you have an idea,” she said, taking her hand out of mine and keying the mike.
“Control, this is Tango Foxtrot Charlie?”
“Go head, Charlie?”
“Taylor?”
“Affirmative.”
“Look, I’m almost finished my shift here.”
“Acknowledged.”
“I’m gonna do a code thirty, and then take Mr. Baxter to see his father. After that I’ll take him home.”
“Is there a reason for all of that?”
“The man’s not doing too good. I don’t think he should be left on his own for a while.”
“Well, that’s awful nice of you to be so concerned and all, but that’ll take you late into the shift, and the big Bossman doesn’t want to be shovelling out for overtime—not after last night. So how about you drop him off at home, pick up a burger on the way out, and come back?”
“Roger that,” she said, and then turned off the radio.
“Why’d you do that?” I asked.
“If I can’t hear them, I can’t answer.”
“Won’t that get you into trouble?”
“I’ll just tell them we went out for lunch.”
“Don’t these things have GPS?”
“Shit, I forgot.”
“We can always park it and take my car. You can drive if you feel I’m still too shaken up.”
“And where would we park this?”
“There’s a coffee shop five minutes from my place.”
“No. Okay. I mean no. No! I can’t. I can’t leave this thing parked at a roadside coffee shop. God, why am I doing this!” she said, pounding her fists on the steering wheel.
“You good?” I asked after a moment.
“I’m good.”
*
Like I said, nothing was making any sense. I was sitting in the passenger seat of my own car, telling her when to turn left or right, and watching her as she tail-gated the car in front of us, and then turned off without signalling.
“Jesus, woman, where’d you learn to drive?”
“You never said anything before.”
“Maybe because it wasn’t my car?”
“Relax. I’m not going to smack your car up.”
“You’d better not.”
Fifteen minutes later we were still waiting for the motorized gates of the storage facility to open. I’d jumped out of the car and punched in the code, and after waiting for the gate to open, I told her which lane to follow. There was no one around
but as we came around the corner I saw my brother’s car parked in front of the storage locker. I told Helen to park around the corner.
“We don’t want to spook them.”
“Why are we here?” she asked. “What’s so important that your brother feels he has to bring your father here? Your demented father, I might add,” she said, drawing her gun.
“I don’t know if that’s the right word, but I get it,” I said. “Why are you pulling your gun out?”
“Why are we hiding? Your sister-in-law’s alive, and I’m glad. But she’s also the last one to see your brother and family alive. Until I know better, she’s a suspect in a multiple murder.”
“Are you serious?”
“How’d she get out of the house without leaving any footprints? How’s she with your brother? Why’d they take your dad out of the home?”
“All right, all right. I get it. She’s a suspect,” I said, and we moved up between the storage lockers, using them for cover. Helen was ahead of me, checking everything around her as we made our approach. I tapped her shoulder.
“Don’t do that,” she said.
“What did you want me to do?”
“How about just ask me?”
“Let me go in first. They know me. Hell, they might even be expecting me. We were supposed to be coming out here later.”
“Okay. I guess that makes sense.”
We were standing outside beside Jimmy’s car when I called out.
“Hey, Jimmy? What’re you doing here?”
“Ricky?”
“Yeah. I just went to see Dad and they told me you picked him up. Is he with you?”
“Yeah,” he said, coming outside. He stopped when he saw Helen, the gun at her side. “Hi.”
“Where is she?”
“Who?”
“Jen,” I said. “We got some bad shit going down, man. I don’t know what to say, or how to tell you. Bobby and the kids are dead. So’s Mandy.”
“I know.”
“You know? How do you know?”
“Jen told me.”
“Where is she?” Helen asked.
“That’s a little hard to explain,” he said.
“Where’s Dad? How come he isn’t coming out?” I asked.
“That’s part of the thing I said was hard to explain,” he said.
“What the fuck, Jimmy. What’s going on?” I said, and went into the storage locker.
It was full of furniture and things we couldn’t sell after Mom died. It took about two years after she died that we realized we’d have to sell the house and put Dad into a Care Home. He was just too much for any of us to handle. He needed full time care, and with Mom gone, we couldn’t do that for him. Selling the house made the best sense. We’d have enough money to take care of him if he lived to be 120 years old.
Seeing all that old stuff brought back a lot of memories.
Jimmy came in behind me, followed by Helen.
“You didn’t open the trunk yet?”
“Just got here.”
“Where’d you say Jen went?”
He looked at me and smiled, then looked at Helen.
“Well, there’s no other way of saying this than just coming right out and saying it,” he said, leaning against the old couch.
“Well, then say it,” I said. I could see the old trunk in the back and started to make my way toward it. I was glad Dad told us to leave it where we could get to it. That’’s why it was one of the last things to get put away.
“She was here. And so was Dad,” he said. “They left just before you got here.”
“We would’ve seen them coming out,” Helen said.
“Except they didn’t go out that way.”
“What’re you talking about? Is there another door here?”
“You know those stories Dad used to tell us when we were kids?”
“Yeah, me and Bobby were talking about it last week. That’s why we’re here. Dad wanted us to open the trunk and both of us wanted to know what’s in it.”
“That’s why he gave Bobby the key to the locker, you the code to the gate, and me the key to the trunk. Neither of us could come here alone.”
“So what’s in it?” Helen asked.
“Let’s find out,” I said.
“So who had the key to the storage locker?” Helen asked.
“Jen brought it.”
“She stole it?”
“She didn’t steal it. She knew where it was all the time. She took it when those guys came in with Mandy last night.”
“Wait. You know about that?”
“No,” Helen said. “What guys?”
“There were two of them. I guess they showed up the same way Jen showed up at my place.”
“I don’t follow.”
“She was just there. One moment I was standing at the kitchen counter making myself a cup of tea, and the next moment she’s there, dressed like she’s wearing some Tribal shit. I mean, sword, bow, quiver, breast-plate and thigh high boots. And she wasn’t fat anymore. She looked like she did twenty years ago.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I said, dragging the trunk out and sitting on it.
“I’m telling you the truth, man.”
“I still don’t believe it.”
“It’s all in there, she says. Everything.”
“That doesn’t tell me where Dad is.”
“She said she was taking him back.”
“To the Home?”
“To Amaroose.”
*
“For fuck’s sake, Jimmy,” I said.
“No, for real. I’m telling you. She grabbed him by the hand and they just, vanished. She was wearing a bracelet just like the one he had when we were kids. I mean, how can you explain any of it? I can’t. I just know what I saw.”
“Are you trying to tell me that Jen is from Amaroose? What about Mandy? And who are these two guys you mentioned earlier?”
“Look, when we were kids, Bobby dared me to put the bracelet on when Dad was laying in the tub.”
“Yeah, he told me.”
Well, what he didn’t tell you is that I didn’t just touch it, I put it on and disappeared. He was fucking freaking out, and said Dad came running out of the tub with a towel around his waist. But he said Dad put on another one. He had two of them. He came and got me.”
“Got you? From where?”
“Well, that’s the weird part. When he came to get me, he looked like the hero from those stories he used to tell us. He looked like Jen did when she showed up.”
“Do you expect anyone to believe any of this?” Helen said.
“Open the trunk,” Jimmy said, and tossed me the key.
I slipped it in. It was corroded, but I finally got it to turn. The two front hasps fell off and I lifted the lid. There were two bracelets sitting right on top of a large book. A long, savage looking sword inside a jewel encrusted scabbard; a small crossbow with a mall quiver that held about two dozen bolts as thick as my thumb and as long as my forearm.
“What the fuck,” Helen said, and I looked at her, at a loss for words.
As if on cue, there was a bright light against the far wall, and what looked like a large hole growing out of where the wall was. There was a smell of what I can only describe as burning wires, as Jen came falling through the hole. She rolled up against the couch and grabbed Jimmy by the arm. She put a bracelet on his wrist and pulled him with her.
“There’s no more time. Now!” she yelled at him, and then looked at me, surprised to see me. She looked at the two bracelets in the trunk and looked at me again.
“Follow us, if you want to live.”
She pulled Jimmy toward the hole. It was already fading, the energy inside of it dying, when another hole across from it opened, and two armed men began to step out. They raised their weapons at us. They were holding what looked to be guns, pointing them at us. I jumped to the side and the couch in front of me exploded. I rolled off to the side, picking up a frying pan and throwing it at the first of the two men.
There were two quick shots and both men fell to the ground, dead.
Helen was standing in a crouch, her handgun still smoking, the smell of cordite in the air invading my nostrils. I looked at her and she seemed frozen to the spot, looking at the two men as the hole in the wall, or wherever it was, faded and melted away.
“Fuck me! What the fuck was that!” I said.
Helen looked at me, coming out of whatever shock she was in, and then holstered her gun, walking toward the two men and bending down to check for any signs of life.
“Are they…?”
“Yeah,” she said, and sat back on the floor, trying to figure out what just happened.
My ears were ringing from the sound of the two shots, and I quickly went to the door, closing it and turning the tiny light on. I looked around before closing the door, and still didn’t see anyone. That didn’t mean nobody heard the shots, though.
“What did she mean when she said follow us?” Helen said.
I looked at the two bracelets in the trunk and then I looked at the two men laying on the floor. They both had bracelets on, but they looked somehow different. Everything about them was different. The two bracelets in the trunk were red and silver, striped with gold, and as thick as a watch band. The bracelets the two men were wearing were blue and gold, striped with green, only wider.
“We’ve got to take these off,” I said. “Wherever they came from, whoever sent them, they might be able to use them like a tracking device. Just like GPS.”
“You can’t do that. That’s evidence,” Helen said.
“Evidence? Jesus Christ in a handcart,” I said. “They were going to kill us. If you didn’t shoot them, I’m pretty sure we’d be dead right now. These have to be the ones who showed up at my brother’s place. And to think that Mandy was one of them. And look how they’re dressed. You saw Jen. She wasn’t dressed like these guys. She looked like something out of a Conan movie.”
“I don’t know what I saw.”
“Yes you do.”
We looked at the two men laying on the floor. One man had a shock of white hair tied back into a long ponytail that had been braided on the sides. There was a jewel-encrusted clasp in his hair, and I took it, putting it in my pocket. I took the bracelets off both their wrists and the moment I did, their skin started to melt and I could see that they were made out of metal underneath.
“What are they?” Helen asked, wincing her nose because of the smell of burning flesh. In a moment they were nothing but metallic husks.
“Robots?” I asked.
“No. No, no, no, no, no!” she said, stepping over one of the robots and making her way to the door.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m not staying here, I can tell you that.”
“Do you think anyone’s going to believe you if you tell them they just stepped out of thin air? Did you believe Jimmy when he told us?”
“No.”
“Neither did I.”
She sat down on something that might have been a coffee table, readjusted herself, and looked at me.
“What are you thinking?”
“You heard what she said. Don’t tell me it hasn’t crossed your mind,” I said.
“No. I won’t do it.”
“I don’t think we have much of a choice,” I said. “She said to follow her. What if more of these guys come here looking for us? I don’t know what we’ve gotten ourselves into, but I can tell you this, it’s bigger than both of us.”
“What is?”
“Amaroose.”
“There’s that word again. What’s it supposed to be?”
“It’s here, only in the future.”
“The future?”
“My dad used to tell us stories about it when we were kids. We thought they were just stories he made up. My grandfather used to tell me the same type of stories.”
“This isn’t making any sense.”
I picked a bracelet up and slipped it on my wrist, tossing her the other one. Then I started to sort through some of the things in the trunk. I put the sword on, and the quiver of crossbow bolts. I hung the crossbow from my belt.
“Are you for real?” she asked.
“Put the bracelet on.”
“No.”
“Everything will make sense once you put it on,” I said.
“What do you mean, it’ll make sense?” she said.
“Things just explain themselves,” I said.
“No! There’s no way any of this will make any sense.”
“Let me ask you something? Do those two things look like the just stepped out of a Terminator movie? That’s because, where they come from, they’re the oppressors. They’re here to kill me and my whole family. And now they’re going to kill you.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
“Fine. Suit yourself. Good luck fighting off robots for the rest of your life, too. Because they’re not going to leave you alone.”
“I don’t care. I’m not going with you.”
Suddenly, the air changed and filled with an electrical charge. I could see another hole forming in front of me and reached out for Helen, grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her toward me. I raised my arm and pointed at the wall in front of us. I watched Helen frantically slipping the bracelet on her wrist. The wall in front of us melted away and I dragged her through, feeling the life, and the man I was only a moment before, peeling away from me. It was as if the man I was had been left behind, and the man I would be on the other side…different.
Is this the final part of the story?