Otherworld (2 page)

“Sore at me? No, I don't think so. I don't know hardly anybody anyway.”

“You go to Tabernacle Faith, right?”

The perturbation was radiating from Pops's face now. “The wife's the churchgoer.”

“My folks go there. Bill and Paula Petrie?”

“Don't know 'em,” Pops responded matter-of-factly.

Dismayed, Petrie shook his head. He had hoped the conversation would cover his failure to find anything substantial to say about the cow. “Can't think of anybody who'd wanna kill your cow, huh, Mr. Dickey?”

“No. Like I said, she's just a regular cow.”

Petrie surveyed the dead animal. “I'll get a specialist out here right away, Mr. Dickey.”

“Say what, now?”

“A specialist. A veterinarian or somebody to look at this cut. Inspect the animal.”

“Listen, no big deal. She's just a cow. I just wanted to file a report and see if you guys could maybe find out who did it. Cows cost quite a bit. Sure, I'd like to catch whoever did her in, you know. But I don't need a specialist or whatever.”

“It's okay, Mr. Dickey. It won't be a problem. I think somebody more qualified could get more answers here than I could.”

 

Two hours later, Captain Graham Lattimer was still fighting off the pain in his head when Petrie's call came in to the station.

Kelly got his attention. “Captain? Officer Petrie's on the radio.”

The headache played with his comprehension. “On the radio?”

“The police radio, sir.”

“Oh, right.” He had to exit his office to answer the call. He used the receiver on Kelly's desk. “Petrie?”

“Sir,” came the reply, “I think you need to come out here.”

“Out where?”

“The Dickey farm on Trace Road.”

Graham looked at his watch. “Shouldn't you be at home?”

“Um, sir. We have a situation here.”

“What are you talkin' about?”

“The dead cow, sir …”

“Yes?”

“Well, sir, we have a doctor here, and he says the cow's missing several internal organs.”

Graham waited for more. It didn't come. “Okay. So?”

“Well, um … the cut. The cut in the animal is very small and very precise.”

“I'm not following, Petrie.”

“Sir, the doctor here says the cut wasn't made by any knife.”

“What was it made by?”

“He says it was made with heat. A laser, probably.”

“Come again?”

“The doctor says this cow was cut open with a laser, or something like it, and that certain specific organs were removed in some peculiar way.”

“What are you trying to say, Petrie?”

“Well, sir … have you ever heard of animal mutilations done by … um, well … You should probably come out here, anyway. It's like a UFO kind of thing.”

Graham didn't answer. He paused to make sure he hadn't imagined Officer Petrie saying what he thought he had. And then, glancing down at the police radio receiver and realizing that anybody could hear the exchange, he realized he needed to get to the farm before any of the kooks with police scanners could.

CHAPTER THREE

Landon University seemed every bit as large as the city of Houston itself. The campus ran endlessly in every direction, connected by thousands of yards of meandering sidewalks leading to thirty-six different buildings. There were technical complexes, art halls, history centers, and that odd hybrid
cafetorium
. Nestled in a nook of woods in the northwest part of the fourth-largest city in America, the place was a labyrinth.

In the southernmost parking lot, thirty-six-year old Mike Walsh, whom stress had made appear several years older (he'd been pondering the creases in his face and flecks of gray in his hair while contemplating the mirror that very morning), emerged from his old import, its original beige gleaming from the recent wash of melted frost, and looked up at the imposing structures. An uneasy sensation of déjá vu rushed to meet him. He struggled to reconcile the fact that he never liked school yet had decided to make a living studying, researching, and writing. It was his editor's idea—no, it was his editor's
mandate
—that the writers of
Spotlight Magazine
take a few midsemester fast-track courses at the university. So after years of freedom from the strife of academia, Mike found himself back in college. He glanced down at the schedule clutched tightly in his sweaty hand. He'd been signed up for something called Cultural Anthropology. He made careful note of the room number for the hundredth time that morning and set out to find the Smith Building on the narrow white cement pathway, watching his step, as the path was still a bit icy. Once in the Smith Building, he would search for the Study Wing. He'd been warned that nearly every building housed a Study Wing, so it was of paramount importance that he find the right one. He had called ahead of time. “Smith Building, Study Wing. Room 144 is on the first floor,” the nice lady on the other end instructed.

“Yes, but can you tell me how to find the Smith Building?” he countered.

“From the southern parking lot, stay on the main sidewalk. It will be the fifth or sixth building on your right.”

“What if I can't find a parking space in the southern lot?”

She sighed. “You'll find a space.”

And he did. He was nervous, probably more so than when he had entered college for the first time, but recently, more and more, he managed to find a way to be nervous about everything. The minutiae of his life took center stage. Every detail was pored over, studied, contemplated, and worried about. Insomnia, like a disease, slowly overtook him, stealing more and more hours of sleep away from him every night. His job ruled his day. Cable television infomercials and YouTube searches ruled his nights. It had been this way a long time. It had been this way since Molly left.

She'd complained about his lack of attention. He was “devoted to his job, but only fairly acquainted with his wife.” He knew this. He realized it, even saw her resentment coming, and he pretended it was petty. It was easy to justify ambivalence, and he fooled himself into thinking everything would work itself out. And then (he wished he could've thought,
Out of the blue
…), she'd packed up her things in the luggage given to them at their wedding and went to live with her sister in Dallas. She'd been gone nearly a year. He had called every day the first few weeks, but she wouldn't speak to him. He surrendered full pursuit and reduced his efforts to one call a week, but he'd only made genuine contact twice.

He said all the right things, but then again, so did every man in his situation. Saying the right things was saying the wrong things. He couldn't begrudge her wariness. He just wanted her back. He offering to do anything—counseling, self-help books, date nights, going to church—everything. He missed everything about her, but mostly he missed her being the consolation of his very existence. In the soul-searching through her absence, he had pretty much realized that more than missing her, he missed what she did for him. When he didn't pity himself, the reality of his selfishness appalled him. He wanted to tell her this. He desperately wanted to inform her of his breakthrough. He knew she would be skeptical, but he would ask for one more chance. He had to have one more opportunity to make things right. He saw it clearly. He could not entertain even the consideration of leaving her, and the fact that she had left him made him realize what a poor excuse for a husband he had been. Many men, perhaps, would criticize her for forsaking her marriage vows, and in his fits of self-justification, he had fixated on this fault as if it was
the
fault, but he knew he could really place no blame on her. He had done that too many times before. It was his turn to shoulder it, right or wrong. He would rather die than divorce, and he had to believe that, in her heart, she would too.

Now he floated, like an astronaut off the line, minutes from suffocation, his source and safety miles away. In Dallas.

The Smith Building was indeed the fifth building, but it lay on the left, not on the right as the telephone lady had claimed. In broad block letters of gold to the right of its glass-door entrance, it announced its name (and underneath, FUNDED BY THE CECIL SMITH FAMILY). He took a deep breath and strolled into the pungent aroma of ammonia.

His shoes squeaked shrilly at every step, which of course did wonders for his profound sense of self-consciousness.

After one wrong turn (in the course of which he took the long way around, even pausing to drink from a water fountain so as not to draw attention to his misdirection), he discovered Room 144. He was the first person to arrive, and he immediately busied himself with debating whether to sit near the front or the rear. He settled on the front.

An older man with silver hair entered, took a seat at a metal desk beneath an expansive whiteboard, and began rifling through papers that were tucked into several manila file folders. He said nothing—didn't even acknowledge Mike's presence.

Mike glanced down at his hands. They were thin and pale, ghostlike, barely distinguishable from the white desktop.

The class trickled in slowly. The instructor began the roll call, and Mike's name was called last, as always, and like always he took its alphabetical placement personally.

 

Not far from Landon University, Captain Graham Lattimer pulled into the driveway of Pops and Gertie Dickey's humble farm. It was a tricky maneuver, what with the staggered position of three vans and an assortment of pickup trucks. He could see at least one camera crew standing in the dirt in front of the front porch. Several people held up video cameras and recording devices of various kinds to two figures atop the porch like they were presenting flowers to players on a stage. One fellow on the porch was a thin old man in overalls, and the other fellow belonged to Graham.

“P-e-t-r-i-e,” Officer Petrie instructed the press as Graham approached. They gazed at the young man intently, and he was beaming.

One reporter turned to Graham as he wedged his way into the crowd and ascended the porch steps. “Are you the chief?”

Graham ignored him and positioned himself nose to nose with Petrie. “Nobody authorized this powwow,” he said.

“Uh, sir, I,” was all Petrie could muster. Graham grasped him firmly by the elbow, spun him in an about-face, and entered the Dickeys' home through the screen door, leaving the farmer to field inquiries alone.

Graham barked, “What do you think you're doing?”

“Captain, I didn't expect all this.”

“What did you expect? You blabbed on a public frequency about UFOs and sheesh. You know how many bored weirdos we got out here.”

“Cap, they just showed up and started askin' questions. I just thought someone should answer 'em.”

“What did you tell them?”

“Well, nothing, really. They just got here. Just a few minutes before you did. I only got as far as my name.”

“Good.”

“Pops is still out there, Cap. Should I bring him in?”

“No. It's his house. I can't keep him from talkin' to nobody at his house.” He paused to listen. He couldn't hear what Pops was saying outside, but he feared the worst. “Now, what's this all about, Sam?”

“The cow, sir. Like I told you, Doc Driscoll looked at the cut and all.”

“Doc Driscoll? Who's he?”

“A vet.”

“A vet? What's with the”—he lowered his voice—“UFO stuff?”

“He reads about it in books.”

“Sheesh.”

“Granted, sir, he's no certified expert or nothin'.”

“He's a certified
somethin'
, tell you what.”

“Granted, but he looked real good at that cut. He said nothing on earth made that cut.”

“Least nothin' on earth he's seen.” Graham could hear Pops out on the porch say something about aliens. “We gotta get the old man in here.”

 

As Mike Walsh's cultural anthropology class made its way down one of the Smith Building's many hallways to the resource center, his phone began to vibrate. He'd had the forethought to turn off the ringer. As he guessed, it was work. He hated to abandon the trip to the center on his first day, especially since he was positive he would be unable to find it later on his own, but he was only there by his boss's orders to begin with. If boss calls, boss gets called back. Finding a quiet corner, he called the number.

“
Spotlight Magazine
, this is Robbie Jensen's office,” came the answer.

“Tina, this is Mike.”

“Sure, Mike, hold on a second.” Then, her voice laced with sarcasm, she added, “You're gonna love this.”

A classical concerto filled the earpiece for approximately seven seconds.

“Mike. This is Robbie.”

“Yeah?”

“Look, something just came up. A story not far from you.”

“You realize I'm right in the middle of a college class
you
sent me to. You realize that, don't you?”

“Yeah, sorry about that, but forget the class.” For the first time in a long while, Mike Walsh was genuinely happy. His editor continued, “I want you to head out to Trumbull.”

“What for?”

“You're not gonna believe this, but some Trumbull cop just radioed in a report of alien mutilation.”

“Come again?”

“Alien mutilation. Some old farmer … I got his name right here. Lucas Dickey. Twenty-four Trace Road in Trumbull. You know where that's at?”

“Whoa, slow down. What'd you say?”

“You heard me. Alien mutilation.”

“You gotta be kidding me. What are we,
The Star
? TMZ?”

Robbie laughed. “Don't joke; they'll probably be there.”

“This is all kinds of stupid.”

“Yeah, but it's all kinds of cool, too. Twenty-four Trace Road, okay? Get on down there. I want this story.”

“A story on aliens. In Trumbull.”

“Mike, I'm not joking, dude.” Robbie's voice hinted at annoyance, but then again, he always seemed annoyed. “We're a special-interest magazine, and this is definitely special interest. Right in our own backyard. Move it.”

“Okay,” Mike replied, though his disbelief remained. He managed to say, “And forget about the class?”

“What? Oh … yeah, forget about it for today.”

Now Mike was unhappy all over again. He ended the call without saying good-bye and retrieved his gloves from his oversized winter coat. The drive to Trumbull would not be very long, but the heater in his car was a poor performer.