Buddy Holly is Alive and Well on Ganymede - Bradley Denton (best thriller books to read TXT) 📗

call was answered by the voice that had given him his orders that morning.

“Richter?” The voice sounded agitated.

“Yes,” Richter said. “No macroscopic clues as to the how of it, although a tech team should examine household electronics. But I have an idea of where he’s gone.” Richter’s throat began to hurt. For him, this was a long speech.

“Then go get him, and hurry. Circumstances dictate that you act alone if possible.”

Richter wanted to shatter the phone. He had been hoping that he would be ordered back to D.C. “Sir, I think it best that another operative retrieve him. He’s fleeing several hundred miles, en route to—”

“Classify it!” his superior cried. “This satellite channel may be monitored, and we do not want the Bad Guys getting to Vale first. We had believed that he was nothing more than a hacker, but we were wrong.”

“Yes?” Richter prompted.

He heard a rasp of breath. “Richter,” his superior said, “preliminary radio telescope data indicate that the primary source of the Buddy Holly broadcast is indeed located on Ganymede. They’re picking up pulses that translate into a dork playing an electric guitar. Do you have any idea of the implications of this?”

“Yes,” Richter said, starting the Jaguar. He was tired of talking, and of listening.

“It means that an extraterrestrial intelligence has infiltrated our solar system.”

“Yes,” Richter said. He held the phone wedged between his cheek and shoulder as he put the Jaguar into reverse and backed onto the street.

“And since these aliens—God, aliens!—have fingered Vale as their contact, then he’s either an alien himself or he’s been chosen to—Well, hell, you saw all those Spielberg movies. So get to him fast, and request backup only if you’re in danger of failing. In that event, use a pay phone with a command sequence to keep the information on earthbound lines.” The voice paused, then said, “Any reason to think you can’t handle this by yourself, old pal?”

“No,” Richter said stonily, pivoting the Jaguar so that it faced south.

“Good. Don’t fly, whatever you do; too conspicuous. But drive like a demon was chomping at your butt. Assume that this conversation has been overheard. And by the way, there’s to be no elimination of Vale. Understood?”

“Yes,” Richter said. He put the Jaguar into first and stepped on the accelerator. The automobile sped forward smoothly.

“Unless he’s about to be taken by the Bad Guys, of course.”

Richter said nothing.

“My God, Richter, just think of it! Little green men. A tech squad’s on its way to examine every molecule in Vale’s house, and who knows what we’ll find? I don’t know about you, but I’m excited!” The phone clicked dead.

Richter hung up the receiver, shifted to second, and switched on the police-band scanner. He wasn’t excited. A hacker who could take over satellite transmissions might also be able to generate spurious radio-telescope data.

Richter didn’t believe in little green men.

As for keeping Vale alive…

Upon finding his quarry, he would learn what he could, make an evaluation, and act accordingly. Then he would tell his superiors whatever they wanted to hear, just as he always had.

Old pal, his ass. Damn straight he could handle it by himself.

His throat felt as if it had been rubbed with steel wool. He resolved to revert to his practice of speaking only in monosyllables until he either found Vale or reached Vale’s intended destination: Lubbock, Texas. The final resting place of Buddy Holly.

CATHY AND JEREMY

Cathy lowered the binoculars and took off the earphones. “The guy in the Jag is a U.S. government spook,” she said. “His boss thinks that extraterrestrial aliens are behind the broadcast.”

Jeremy was crawling around on the Congoleum floor, occasionally bumping his head against the refrigerator or a table leg. “In other words,” he said, “you goaded Vale into running, and now the feds who have come to look for him are one house away from finding us out.”

Cathy sighed in exasperation. “Oh, they are not. They don’t know thing one about us. Seekers aren’t aliens.”

“Technicality,” Jeremy said, snuffling at toast crumbs at the base of the counter. “We’ve been gone so long that Earth is hardly our home, now, is it? They could figure that out.”

“If they do, it isn’t my fault. I didn’t generate the broadcast, did I? And I didn’t goad Vale into running away. I simply decided not to stop him.”

“That’s not what you said this morning. You said you wanted him pressured to act so that we could get this thing over with. You said—”

Cathy stepped past him, kicking his ribs and knocking him over as she did so, and sat down at the table. “Don’t worry about it. The G-man may even kill the poor schlub. How do you think our cousins in El Dorado will react to that?”

Jeremy lay on his side, staring under the microwave-oven cart. “They’ll try again.”

“Maybe, but by that time someone besides you and me will be stuck with this mess.”

Jeremy closed his black dog-eye and looked up at her with his blue human-eye. “You don’t really want Vale killed, do you?”

Cathy pursed her lips and looked away. “If I did, I’d be no better then the fleshbound. But if he is killed, I won’t have had anything to do with it.”

“It would be nice to think so,” Jeremy said, getting to his hands and knees. “But one who knows how to prevent a death is guilty of murder when that death occurs, regardless of the active agent. Wouldn’t you say?”

Cathy did not respond.

“Well, then, would you like a status report?”

Cathy nodded.

Jeremy closed his blue eye and opened the black one. “Vale has left the motel. He isn’t in sight, but the scent of the motorcycle indicates that it’s only a few miles ahead of Ringo’s current position.”

“Is that all?”

Jeremy cocked his head. “No. Ringo’s lonely.”

“Lonely? He’s a construct!”

“He’s also part Doberman pinscher. Just as you and I are part flesh.”

Cathy stood. “If you’re going to get nasty, I’m going to watch TV.” She left the room.

Moments later, she was back. “I forgot,” she said. “Buddy Holly’s on every channel.”

Jeremy smiled warmly. “Imagine the ratings he must be getting. Probably beating hell out of the last episode of M*A*S*H.” He resumed snuffling the Congoleum.

RINGO

He had reached the motel at midmorning and had dozed among the evergreens until awakened by the siren. Now he sniffed around the base of the dumpster, sorting through the odors of rotten vegetables and burning crude oil.

There: The motorcycle had headed back toward the highway. The wailing automobile that had been here briefly was now following it.

Ringo began trotting away from the dumpster, tracking the Ariel.

“Hey, ol’ dawg!” a voice called behind him. “Where’d you come from?”

Ringo paused and looked back. Across the fence, among ruined and rusted machines, stood a man with wild red hair. Ringo knew that the hair was red because his new eye gave him images in color. Sometimes it also gave him a glimpse of the bricklike Congoleum in Cathy and Jeremy’s kitchen, but mostly it showed him what he was looking at.

“You hungry, boy?” the man asked, reaching into a pocket on his chest. “I got some beef jerky.” The man came close to the fence and held a strip of dried meat between the links. “My name’s Boog. What’s yours?”

Ringo’s implanted chips understood the man’s words, and although his modified body did not require food, the dog part of his brain longed to accept a morsel from a human hand. He approached the fence and sniffed the meat. His processors analyzed the odor and concluded that it smelled good.

He took the strip and gulped it down, then pressed his nose against the fence so that Boog could scratch his muzzle.

“You’re a big motherfucker, ain’t you?” Boog said. “How come I never seen you around here before?”

Ringo grunted. The scratching felt wonderful.

“Man, what’s with your eyes?” Boog asked.

Ringo closed his eyes for an instant and saw Cathy looking at him sternly.

He gave the big man’s fingers a lick, then pivoted and ran for the highway, his chain collar jingling.

“You come back anytime, now,” Boog called after him.

Ringo wished that he could stay longer. He liked Boog.

He ran to the other side of the building, then slowed as he saw a fat woman coming toward him on a concrete walk. She was carrying a bucket, and she smelled of bacon. Maybe she was bringing him a treat, as Boog had. He trotted toward her to find out.

She screamed and pulled a bottle filled with blue liquid from the bucket. Ringo stopped, realizing his mistake, but he was too late. The fat woman squeezed a lever on the bottle and sprayed him in the face.

Ringo bolted for the highway, sneezing as he went. His artificial eyes had not been hurt, but his Doberman nose was burning. His processors analyzed his olfactory responses and told him that the blue liquid was called Windex, but he didn’t care what it was called. All he cared about was sneezing it away. He needed his nose clear to follow the scent of the motorcycle.

The fat woman had taught him a lesson. He must concentrate on his mission. He could not afford to indulge his desires for affection and snacks. He would try to forget the man named Boog.

Ringo ran down the shoulder of the highway, ignoring everything in the world except the trail of the Ariel. The twilight became night.

SKYVUE

Khrushchev sat on a Naugahyde-covered bench in the projection room, his eyes closed and his face puckered in concentration. Eisenhower lounged beside him, munching popcorn while watching Buddy Holly perform on a five-inch color TV that hung from the film projector.

Khrushchev’s eyes opened abruptly, and he clambered to stand on the bench and look through the projection window. Gazing across acres of speaker poles, he said, “There goes your boy, right past us. Did you plan that?”

Eisenhower swallowed. “No. It’s Fate.”

“And here come the cops after him. Is that Fate too?”

“Don’t be sarcastic.”

Khrushchev turned away from the window and sat down with a thud. “I’m not being sarcastic. I’m merely curious as to how much of this you’re orchestrating and how much you’re just letting happen. I mean, since I’m not directly involved anymore, curiosity is all I have.”

Eisenhower gave him a look of sympathy and sincerity. It was an extremely presidential sort of look. “I’m orchestrating nothing. Everyone is free to react to the broadcast as he or she wishes.”

“In that case, we might as well give up on these people and convert back to noncorporeality right now.”

Eisenhower’s expression became stern. “You sound as though you’re on the anti-flesh side.”

“Not at all,” Khrushchev said, folding his arms. “I believe in the right of the fleshbound to attain Seeker status. However, I admit that I do understand the anti-flesh position.”

Eisenhower nodded sagely. “As do I. That’s why I prefer not to intervene in whatever events the broadcast may foment. Nevertheless, because I selected the catalyst, I must accept responsibility if the outcome is tragic.”

Khrushchev’s eyebrows rose. “How so?”

Eisenhower looked back at the TV and stuffed a handful of popcorn into his mouth. “I shall pay the price along with them,” he said, his voice muffled.

“You mean death?” Khrushchev exclaimed. “Are you nuts? I should open your head and—” He stopped in mid-sentence and climbed up to look through the window again. “There goes the opposition’s canine computer.”

“He isn’t theirs,” Eisenhower said. “He does their bidding, but he belongs to himself.”

“If you