Fragment: A Novel

PROLOGUE......Page 2
5:27 P.M.......Page 5
2:10 P.M.......Page 8
2:11 P.M.......Page 9
2:14 P.M.......Page 12
7:05 P.M.......Page 18
7:08 P.M.......Page 20
6:29 A.M.......Page 21
5:48 P.M.......Page 22
5:50 P.M.......Page 23
5:51 P.M.......Page 24
5:52 P.M.......Page 25
8:55 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time......Page 26
5:57 P.M.......Page 27
6:01 P.M.......Page 28
12:43 P.M.......Page 30
1:37 P.M.......Page 33
7:30 P.M.......Page 37
2:56 P.M.......Page 45
4:35 P.M.......Page 60
8:33 P.M.......Page 62
SEPTEMBER 4......Page 64
5:10 P.M.......Page 68
8:10 P.M.......Page 69
9:32 P.M.......Page 70
9:45 P.M.......Page 72
10:08 P.M.......Page 73
10:11 P.M.......Page 74
10:26 P.M.......Page 75
10:40 P.M.......Page 76
10:44 P.M.......Page 77
10:58 P.M.......Page 78
7:32 P.M.......Page 79
5:10 A.M.......Page 87
9:01 A.M.......Page 88
11:46 A.M.......Page 89
11:49 A.M.......Page 91
12:02 P.M.......Page 95
12:04 P.M.......Page 96
12:05 P.M.......Page 97
12:06 P.M.......Page 99
12:06 P.M.......Page 101
12:07 P.M.......Page 103
12:11 P.M.......Page 105
12:14 P.M.......Page 107
12:19 P.M.......Page 108
12:33 P.M.......Page 112
12:35 P.M.......Page 113
12:45 P.M.......Page 114
12:51 P.M.......Page 116
12:52 P.M.......Page 117
1:02 P.M.......Page 120
1:03 P.M.......Page 121
1:06 P.M.......Page 122
1:07 P.M.......Page 123
1:15 P.M.......Page 124
8:51 P.M.......Page 125
12:06 P.M.......Page 126
12:43 P.M.......Page 131
4:23 P.M.......Page 132
4:14 P.M.......Page 134
4:49 P.M.......Page 137
5:08 P.M.......Page 138
5:21 P.M.......Page 139
5:59 P.M.......Page 149
6:01 P.M.......Page 150
6:16 P.M.......Page 153
6:22 P.M.......Page 157
6:52 P.M.......Page 160
7:03 P.M.......Page 163
7:10 P.M.......Page 169
7:23 P.M.......Page 171
7:29 P.M.......Page 173
7:54 P.M.......Page 176
8:42 P.M.......Page 183
8:47 P.M.......Page 185
8:52 P.M.......Page 186
8:55 P.M.......Page 187
8:58 P.M.......Page 188
“Dane-jer! Dane-jer!” Hender shouted, pointing down.......Page 189
Thatcher glanced over his shoulder at the others as he slipped out the door.......Page 190
“Come on, Andy,” Nell said. “Let’s pack their stuff in those specimen cases.”......Page 191
Hender twisted his head around and looked at Geoffrey. “Nell will come with us,” Hender repeated, nodding. He turned to Nell and both his eyes bent down and looked into hers. Suddenly, without warning, he embraced her, wrapping four arms around her.......Page 192
9:02 P.M.......Page 193
9:04 P.M.......Page 194
9:04 P.M.......Page 195
Geoffrey went after him. They both made it look fairly easy.......Page 196
Andy glanced down the sheer cliff face and began thrashing his legs wildly.......Page 197
As Andy plummeted down the face of the cliff, the hendropods’ tails stretched to the limit and then sprang back and jerked him upward like a bungee cable.......Page 198
“The scientists think the island is sinking,” Cane whispered. “They’re going to nuke it ahead of schedule, twelve hours from now, they say, if there’s anything left to nuke. They’re evacuating the lab and deep-freezing the last specimens for transport. We could just leave now, no problem, sir.”......Page 199
“But—” The gears were jamming in Thatcher’s mind. He noticed specimen cases in the back of the Humvee. “What are those, Sergeant?”......Page 200
“It doesn’t matter anymore, sir. We’ll just say we caught the others trying to smuggle specimens off the island: in other words, we tell the truth. My orders are clear, regardless of what you may want to do. This mission is now official, and not hypothetical, sir.”......Page 201
“I’ll be fine,” replied Cane. “I’ll be right back.”......Page 202
He pointed the vehicle down the slope, grabbed the satphone from the seat and one of the specimen cases from the back, then he shifted the Hummer into neutral and jumped out, getting lucky as he hit a relatively bare patch of ground and sprawled flat.......Page 203
Thatcher shifted the case from arm to arm, gasping for air as putrid gases wafted over the purple field.......Page 204
“Blue One just took a nosedive!” one RTO reported, turning to his CO in the communications room.......Page 205
“Yes, sir! But there were some VIPs on board Blue One, sir. Um…Dr. Cato, Dr. Redmond, and Dr. Binswanger… and Nell Duckworth. Plus that survivor they picked up.”......Page 206
9:09 P.M.......Page 207
“I don’t know,” Nell said, looking around.......Page 208
The spiger extended its spiked front legs two yards in front of it and shimmied rapidly up the spiraling tunnel of stairs.......Page 209
“Nell, hazar-do-us!” Hender shouted.......Page 210
The spiger plummeted past the basket, snapping its jaws a few feet in front of Thatcher’s face, and fell with a piercing wail seven hundred feet to the sea below.......Page 211
The hendropods, normally solitary, clung to each other in the center of the basket, watching the spigers above.......Page 212
The crew of the Trident spotted the faint light sinking down the cliff and Captain Sol unlatched the winch to let the Zodiac out.......Page 213
“Yeah!” Winger exclaimed, narrowing his eyes against the saltwater spray of the buffeting waves.......Page 214
“This island’s exploding!” Andy shouted.......Page 215
9:21 P.M.......Page 216
Nell and Geoffrey clung to the basket as it splashed into the cold black water.......Page 217
“Come on, girl!” Zero urged.......Page 218
“Keep swimming,” yelled Geoffrey.......Page 219
9:34 P.M.......Page 220
Nell saw the floating spiger convulse on the surface of the water behind Andy. “Reach, Hender!” she implored.......Page 221
Nell dove in and grasped Hender’s trembling hand, while Geoffrey grabbed her foot and held on—but her Adidas shoe slipped off, so he grabbed her bare foot, and then all the humans grabbed Geoffrey around the waist and pulled to keep him in the raft.......Page 222
The other hendros all moved from the bow and waded into the water sloshing inside the raft. In the center of the Zodiac, they clung to each other and one reached out a long arm toward Andy like the boom of a crane.......Page 223
The hendropods and humans scrambled from the half-swamped Zodiac onto the aft deck as the Trident picked up speed.......Page 224
The shivering hendropods approached the humans repeating “Thank you!” to everyone they met. Copepod barked as he greeted the crew, who were too dazed by the hendros to be amazed by the miracle of his resurrection.......Page 225
Captain Sol saw four others laid out on the poop deck. He frowned. “What’s inside them?”......Page 226
When he let her up for air she seemed ten years younger. “Now, now,” she purred, shaking a coy finger at him.......Page 227
“No water!” Hender said.......Page 228
The other hendros each opened their own stalls without as sistance, turned on the water with only minor fumbling, and stepped in.......Page 229
“WOOO-WAH!” one of the hendros squealed, and the shower door nearest Geoffrey burst open as the creature leaped out, dancing and dripping. Geoffrey reached in and adjusted the knob to bring the temperature down.......Page 230
He raised his eyebrows but said nothing as he followed her down the corridor to a large room forward of the gym.......Page 231
“Amazing. I plan to use two thousand of them right now.”......Page 232
“We got to get out of these clothes. We’ll catch up.”......Page 233
Nell looked at her single old beat up Adidas, the other having fallen into the sea. “My favorite tennies,” she mourned.......Page 234
“You’re getting out first, right?”......Page 235
She wrapped the towel around her waist and walked with her back to him. As she quickly turned the corner into the locker area and started drying herself off, she was thinking about Geoffrey and sex and sex with Geoffrey and keeping her eyes resolutely on the photographs taped to the lockers. As she straightened to dry her hair, she noticed the laughing snapshots of the obnoxious Jesse, and beautiful Dawn, and ever-polite Glyn, and bragging Dante and the others, and tears spilled without warning from her eyes. She sank down on the bench and brought a hand to her face as she quietly sobbed.......Page 236
She sniffled and stared after him. Then she rubbed the tears from her eyes, dropped the towel, and reached for her panties.......Page 237
Warburton, Captain Sol, and Marcello were already there and in a troubled mood.......Page 238
“That wasn’t exactly the answer we were looking for,” Warburton said.......Page 239
“No problem, Trident. Just part of the Navy’s job. Please proceed to Pearl Harbor for final inspection and debriefing. Good working with you. Enterprise over and out.”......Page 240
“Either the President or the Army deliberately left us behind on that island!”......Page 241
“Oh…”......Page 242
“Yes, I thought you might still be harboring some resentment.” Nell reached for a pickle.......Page 243
“Yes, thank you, my dear.” Thatcher rose from his chair.......Page 244
The door opened a crack. “Just no more filming, OK? Don’t let Cynthea in.”......Page 245
“Yes, Geoffrey. OK. Thank you thank you thank you!”......Page 246
“Safety, Nell,” Hender echoed softly, his fur effulging warm colors where she touched his back.......Page 247
“Maybe…” she answered. “I really don’t know.”......Page 248
“Hmmm,” Geoffrey wondered, feeling very good with this woman pressed against his back, her breath soft against his neck. Suddenly he felt the need to sleep tug him down hard and he yawned again. “Did you ever notice how many scientists’ names match their chosen field of study?” he asked drowsily. “I’m thinking of doing a statistical study and writing a trifling monograph on the subject…”......Page 249
“Uh…?”......Page 250
“You’re a genius. So what does Binswanger mean?”......Page 251
Thatcher pressed the crown to light his Indiglo wristwatch in the dimly lit passageway and used the glowing watch face to illuminate the hatch handle.......Page 252
“Welcome aboard the S.S. Plague Ship, you little bastards,” Thatcher whispered. “Go forth and multiply.”......Page 253
A grouchy voice answered after a few rings.......Page 254
He sat upright at the stern of the big Zodiac and was astonished to see the vast broadside of the guided missile frigate U.S.S. Nicholas cutting into the sea beside him. Stapleton had come through! He had to think fast.......Page 255
There was a long silence as the raft rolled up and down on the ship’s wake.......Page 256
Geoffrey and Nell ran to join Peach, Cynthea, Zero, Andy, Warburton, and Captain Sol on the bridge.......Page 257
Peach handed her a spare wireless headset from around his neck.......Page 258
Peach and Zero tore down the passageway. Zero opened the hatch of the control room—only to see five Henders rats leaping straight at him.......Page 259
“Um, there’s a delay, boss,” Peach said.......Page 260
Peach lurched out the hatch with gear under his arms. Still inside, the hendropods slammed the hatch behind him, the bottom of his pant leg caught with two rat arms pierced through the jeans. He yelled and jerked his foot to rip free and the hatch opened for an instant as the rat was pulled back in before the hendros slammed the hatch shut again, freeing his leg.......Page 261
The Zodiac drifted into the wide foamy plain of the Nicholas’s wake. The salt was thick in the air as the billions of bubbles churned by the frigate’s propellers fizzed on the surface of the sea around him.......Page 262
Thatcher knew his story was rock solid, that his reputation would win the battle of credibility, and that history would forever cast the others in shades of doubt, no matter the outcome. The odds were that he would gain even more stature before all was said and done simply by opposing them, even if by some miracle they did survive. He had, after all, witnessed them smuggling live, extremely dangerous specimens off Henders Island, in direct violation of a Presidential order, a crime tantamount to global terrorism. And the scene of the crime was about to be vaporized forever by a nuclear weapon.......Page 263
But he could settle for the crew and passengers of the Trident discredited as terrorists and quite possibly killed in a confrontation with the Navy; there was really no downside.......Page 264
7:21 A.M.......Page 265
7:22 A.M.......Page 266
Hender looked out. “OK,” Hender said. “Hi Andy!”......Page 267
Behind them, one last Henders rat crouched in the hatchway through which they had come, rubbing its spikes together as it chose a target.......Page 268
The President and his advisors stared in astonishment at only one screen—the one that carried the live feed from the guided missile destroyer, U.S.S. Stout.......Page 269
“Yes, sir!”......Page 270
4:25 P.M. Greenwich Mean Time......Page 271
The loudspeakers of the Stout echoed over the deck in the background, “TRIDENT, YOU ARE IN DIRECT VIOLATION OF UNITED STATES NAVY DIRECTIVES. BEGIN ABANDONING SHIP IN THIRTY SECONDS, OR YOU WILL BE FIRED ON.”......Page 272
11:27 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time......Page 273
People watched in real time as their world was instantly turned upside-down. All who watched knew the human race had arrived at a moment of judgment that would mark its destiny and its character, and its world, forever, and the war over the meaning of that moment had already begun in living rooms, cafes, bars, and dormitories across five continents.......Page 274
Nell squeezed Geoffrey’s hand hard.......Page 275
Thatcher screamed and knocked the satphone overboard as the drill-worms punctured his eyelids and one of the raft’s air chambers simultaneously.......Page 276
Before the aircraft cleared the cliffs of Henders Island, the bomb bay doors opened and a B83 gravity bomb fell forward. A parachute deployed and like a two thousand pound lawn dart, the warhead plunged five thousand feet.......Page 277
A 250-foot deep crater a thousand feet wide was instantaneously excavated at the island’s center from the initial blast.......Page 278
Nell and Geoffrey gazed from the prow of the Trident at the crimson dawn.......Page 279
Hender moved between them and hugged Geoffrey and Nell with four arms, and together they faced the uncertain dawn.......Page 280
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS......Page 281
v3.0......Page 282