The Men: A Tale of Alien Terror Books

Dusk, in the middle of nowhere. Beth pulls into a rest area and shuts off the engine. Helicopters can be heard in the distance; Frodo whimpers and whines. There is a drone of crickets as Beth leans against the wheel. The place is abandoned save for a single pickup and camper. She sits back after a moment, stroking the dog’s neck, and rolls her head to look at the truck. It sits silently in the twilight about a hundred feet away: quiet as a tomb, with no sign of a driver. She experiences a wave of nausea—which sends her hurrying toward the restrooms—as the sound of the choppers rushes closer. She collapses over the toilet, vomiting repeatedly, as the helicopters thunder overhead. The pounding of the rotors diminishes as she spits and wipes her mouth. At last she reaches up with trembling fingers and flushes the bowl, and the water swirls down, gurgling. She slowly catches her breath. The crickets drone and Frodo barks. She sits on the floor with her back against the cold cinderblocks—notices a shoe covered in green plastic just outside the stall. She looks up. An eye is visible between the doorjamb and the wall. It blinks as she shrieks and suddenly disappears.

Everything becomes like a dream—it is the injection, of course—and she is dimly aware of getting into the pickup behind her and putting it into neutral. Then she is back in her car and reversing, pushing the truck clear, before peeling away from the scene with one of the green men riding the hood—like TJ Hooker. She swerves about the road like a mad woman until he falls off, then slams on the breaks and backs over him, just to be sure. She zooms back the way she came, careening against the guardrail, dialing Dr. Lairman, leaving a message telling him that she is coming back. When she passes the truck stop from earlier she notices that it’s gone completely dark. The motel, she thinks, incoherently. The old woman. Andy. They’ll help. That’s when she sees the Shape again. Sees it through the shattered passenger window—silhouetted against a flash of lightning, approaching over the desert hills, maneuvering impossibly. "No …" she whimpers, as Frodo barks and howls. Then a horn sounds and she faces forward—in time to avoid a head-on collision by mere seconds. By the time she skids to a stop on the shoulder of the road, a man is running up to her, apologetic, out of breath, asking if she is okay. She gets out, shrieking and gesturing with her arms, completely hysterical. "Did you see it? Did you see it?" He catches her wrists in his hands and holds them—an overly intimate gesture she could be offended by, but isn’t. "I saw a jet," he says, staring into her eyes, continuing to hold her hands. "A jet—they’re everywhere out here today. They must be doing maneuvers or something. It’s okay, all right? You’re okay." She begins to calm down at last, however slightly. There’s something about him, something about his mild eyes and soft but firm hands, his shock of dark hair, his soothing voice. She senses something and looks up, sees a fighter jet flying right over the top of them—low enough that she can make out the rivets in its fuselage. It is there and gone before its sharp-edged whine even cuts the air. "See?" he says, releasing her hands. "Just a jet."