Out of the Blue

Tremors: The Subtext #15

by Setcheti

 

 

Rating:  FRT: MP,SLC

Disclaimer:  I don’t own Tremors, because if I did the series would STILL BE ON THE AIR.

Author’s Note:  This story is the beginning of an Enterprise AU crossover arc.

 

It had been a week and a half since Tyler had come home from the hospital, and no sign of the flying things until today – in broad daylight, again.  Burt swore when the huge pterodactyl-like monster took wing out from behind a rocky outcropping not fifteen feet in front of him, obliquely between he and his truck, noting that even though it had to be sick it was still more than healthy enough to kill him.

 

He really, really hated the fact that Tyler would know the exact moment that it did.

 

Burt knew they should have talked about that more than they had, but to be honest he just wasn’t sure what to say.  Killer plants and mutated animals he understood, but this…Tyler had something special, some subtly inborn gift that allowed him to reach out and connect, and it didn’t have anything to do with monsters or government conspiracies or Mixmaster.  Tyler was probably feeling Burt’s fear right now, and tearing himself apart knowing something was wrong but unable to leave the compound to do anything about it.

 

The last bullet left the chamber of Burt’s gun, slowing the creature but not stopping it.  El Blanco wasn’t going to come charging in to save him the way it had saved Tyler the month before, and he knew without having to test the theory that he wouldn’t be able to outrun the thing, nor did he have anyplace to outrun it to even if he tried.  He tossed the gun away and pulled out his knife; there was nowhere left to go, nothing left to do but go down fighting.  Burt didn’t want to think about what effect his imminent, violent death-by-monster was going to feel like to Tyler, or about what might result from the experience.

 

Especially since Tyler hadn’t known about his gift before the first attack, and still didn’t understand it any better than Burt did.  Yet another reason why they should have talked about it and hadn’t.     

 

The sickly stink of the flying thing blew over Burt as wrinkled, leathery wings beat frantically at the air, slapping down against the rock it fell on top of when neither wings nor air proved strong enough to hold it up.  It hissed and lunged at him, but just when Burt was preparing to meet his maker a narrow beam of reddish light stabbed across the desert floor and hit the monster in the chest.  The flying thing screamed, flapped…and fell down, twitching, with a neat smoking hole burned right through it.  Burt didn’t have to examine it any closer to know that it was dead, and anyway he was much more interested in what had killed it.

 

Or rather, who.  A man he’d never seen before and hadn’t seen or heard approaching was standing on top of a large rock not quite a hundred feet away.  The stranger was small, only about as tall as Larry although not nearly as stocky, and he had dark hair, dark glasses, and functional, nondescript clothing.  Still, something about the way he was standing…  “If I ask you about your gun,” Burt called out, “are you going to tell me it’s classified?”

 

The small man laughed.  “That would seem rather pointless, since you just saw me use it,” he called back.  He had a pronounced British accent.  He jumped down off the rock and closed the distance between them.  “Are there any more of those things about?”

 

“That one shouldn’t have been here,” Burt told him.  “They’re supposed to be nocturnal.”

 

“Someone might have told him about it, then,” the stranger said.  He held out his hand.  “Reed, Malcolm Reed.”

 

Burt couldn’t help but smile, but he took the offered hand and found the man’s grip strong and firm.  “Burt Gummer.  Appreciate the help.”

 

“Glad I could be of assistance.”  Reed took off his sunglasses and smiled back.  His eyes were gray and sharp.  “This meeting was fortuitous for both of us, it would seem.  I’d actually come out here looking for you, Mr. Gummer.”

 

Burt arched a suspicious eyebrow.  “Who sent you?”

 

Reed shrugged.  “No one.  I’d read about you, I wanted to meet you.  And I thought I might be able to offer you some assistance, although I hadn’t intended on making a live demonstration out of it like this.”

 

He wasn’t lying, Burt could tell.  The survivalist sized him up again.  Military discipline, that’s what the easy, balanced stance was reflecting, and just a touch of martial arts training too.   Probably not much older than Tyler, but the gray eyes had shadows in them, deep ones.  Not the eyes of a mercenary, or of someone who took killing lightly, in spite of his obvious proficiency with a weapon.  There was also intelligence there, and suspicion to match Burt’s own – the kind of suspicion that had experience behind it.  Instinct told Burt this was someone he needed to find out more about.  “I’ve got about twelve more miles to cover before I call it a day,” he told the other man, resettling his cap.  “I wouldn’t say no to some company.  We can swing back this way so you can get your vehicle.”

 

“I’m afraid my vehicle isn’t in the immediate area.”  Reed made a face, looking slightly embarrassed.  “One of the tyres blew out on me, I was hiking up the road a bit in hopes of finding some assistance of my own.  I just happened to see the dust from your passage, and then I saw that thing take flight…”

 

“And the rest is history.”  Burt smiled.  “You’re in luck, Mr. Reed.  My partner owns the only garage in the valley.”  He made a face of his own.  “He’s not quite able to work in it at the present time – we had a run in with another one of those monsters that didn’t turn out so well, about a month ago.  But you and I can probably find a tire the right size and put it on.”

 

The smaller man nodded gravely.  “I would appreciate it – and it’s just Malcolm, please.”  He frowned and waved a hand at the dead monster.  “Should we take that someplace for further study, then?  If you don’t have something that would work, I’ve some plastic sheeting we could use to wrap it up.”

 

Burt walked over and kicked the monster to see if it would move.  It didn’t, and he kicked it again just because he could.  “I’ve got a tarp, but I really don’t want to haul this thing around.  I’ll call Casey – Dr. Matthews – and she and Roger can drag it back to the research station themselves.”

 

“Capital.”  Reed contemplated the dead heap of monster a moment more, squinting thoughtfully.  “But I suppose we’ll have to stay here with it to keep the other predators off, if they’re going to want it for study.  The science types don’t much like their specimens half-eaten, you know.”

 

“True.”  Burt chuckled.  “And since it’s contaminated with Mixmaster, there’s always the possibility that whatever eats it will spawn an even worse monster on down the road.”

 

“Heaven forbid.”  Reed was still looking around, still holding his weapon subtly at the ready…and after a moment Burt realized that the younger man probably wasn’t going to sit down unless he himself did first.  Definitely military, and recently active somewhere to boot.  So what was he doing way out here in the middle of Perfection Valley, carting around a ray gun and looking to help Burt?

 

It was a question Burt wasn’t going to ask – yet.  He picked a spot and sat down, hid a smile when Reed did a very obvious visual reconnaissance of the area before settling onto a rock of his own.  Personal questions would come later, but for the moment small talk would suffice.  “So, Malcolm, tell me about your gun…”

 

 

It took Casey and Roger less than half an hour to show up to collect the dead monster, and then after a quick check of the rest of the day’s patrol route Burt decided it was time to head back.  He and the younger man had mostly talked guns and tactics and terrain while they were out in the truck, and then vehicles and the repairing of on the way to Tyler’s garage and back.  Reed’s vehicle turned out to be a small, sturdy Jeep, well suited for the terrain around Perfection, and the more Burt got to know him the more he was starting to think that the man himself might be a pretty good fit as well.  He’d designed the gun - which he called a phase pistol - himself, and although he never came right out and said where it was he’d been stationed he did admit to having served in research and development prior to a truly awful experience of being pressed into service as a security officer on a ship that was field-testing some of his weapons.  “I didn’t know bloody security from a hole in the ground - or the hole in my arse,” he admitted with a laugh while stripping the damaged tire and wheel off his Jeep.  “I memorized the protocols, but every time a situation would come up and I’d trot them out the captain would overrule me.”

 

Burt responded to the younger man’s grimace with a knowing grin.  “And disaster would no doubt ensue?”

 

“Almost every bloody time.  And of course it was my record that got nicked for it, not his.”  A shadow crossed the angular face.  “I’ll miss…some of the people I served with, but I can’t say I’m not glad to be out from under that loony’s thumb.  It’s left me rather at loose ends, though, which is why I thought I’d trek out here to see if you could use an extra hand.”  A quick glance up from gray eyes.  “How is Mr. Reed doing?”

 

“Better.”  It was the answer Burt always gave, even when it was only marginally true and even when he knew the person asking much better than he currently knew Malcolm Reed.  He adjusted his cap.  “It could have been a lot worse.”

 

“After seeing one of the things, I’d have to agree with you.”  Malcolm pulled the freed tire off the axle and took a good look at it, then scowled and took a better one.  “What in God’s name…”  He fished into shredded rubber and yanked out a twisted three-pronged piece of welded metal, holding it up for Burt to see.  “Looks like someone’s not too keen on company.”

 

Burt scowled himself, taking it from the younger man and turning it in his hands…and then he swore.  “God dammit!  We’ve had this problem ever since those damned environmentalists came out here,” he explained.  “Some of them just can’t seem to get it through their thick skulls that the monsters aren’t the ones that need protecting.  I thought for sure after what happened last month…”

 

“That they’d see reason?  Fanatics never do,”  Malcolm snorted, taking the caltrop back and examining it more closely.  He shook his head.  “This one is new – and placed fairly recently as well, I’d say within the last day or two.”  He set it aside and went back to his tire, but his frown was thoughtful and his gray eyes abstracted.  “I might – and I do mean might – be able to help you out with that as well.  If I can cobble together a few sensors with any kind of decent range to them, we would at least know when a vehicle is on the road.  They’d need to be tied in to some sort of tracking system…”

 

“We have one, connected to seismic sensors placed to pick up vibrations from El Blanco,” Burt told him.  “Could you interface your sensors with that, or maybe adapt some of the ones we already have?”

 

“The tracking system yes, the sensors probably not.”  Malcolm shrugged.  “But halfway there is better than not at all, as…a friend of mine used to say.  We’ll see what we can do and go from there.”  Gray eyes glanced up before turning back to the work at hand.  “If your Mr. Reed wouldn’t mind, I could camp out in his garage while I work on it – and perhaps take care of a bit of his business as well, in exchange for the bunk.  I’m a fair enough mechanic when I need to be.”

 

Burt knew Tyler wouldn’t mind, because he had in fact been worrying about the state of his business – and the related state of his bank account – since not long after he’d awakened in the hospital.  But the survivalist wasn’t going to tell this Malcolm Reed that, not yet.  Burt was liking the man so far, and he definitely liked the man’s gun, but that didn’t mean he was ready to trust him.  Not entirely, anyway.  “You could talk to him,” was what Burt said in response to the suggestion.  He decided to test the waters a little.  “And you’d also have to talk to Agent Twitchell, our assigned government overseer.  He has to approve any and all residents in the valley.”

 

“I suppose I will have to talk to him, then,” Malcolm agreed easily, cranking on a lug nut.  He sounded nowhere near concerned.  “I just hope he won’t be too upset by the fact that there’s only so much I can tell him.”

 

Burt waded in a little farther, carefully.  “Covert ops?”

 

One corner of Malcolm’s mouth twitched with a wry smile.  “Something like that, yes.  Just having my phase pistol with me is violating a whole handful of regulations…but I for damned sure wasn’t leaving without it.  And I won’t,” he tightened a second nut with a yank that tensed respectable muscles under his sweat-stained shirt, “just sit on the bloody thing if I could be doing some good with it instead.”

 

“You did that.”  Burt couldn’t – and wouldn’t – tell him just how much good he’d actually done; even Twitchell didn’t know about Tyler’s ‘gift’, and Burt wasn’t planning on sharing that information with anyone else any time soon, if ever.  But he liked the younger man’s attitude, and he could tell it was sincere.  He made a decision.  “Why don’t you follow me back to my compound and we’ll talk to Tyler?  And I can show you the tracking system at the same time.”

 

Malcolm smiled.  “Capital idea,” he agreed.  He gathered up his tools and put them back in their box, then tucked the caltrop and the remains of his tire into the back of the jeep as well.  “If you’re sure he’s up for company, that is.”

 

Burt shook his head with a smile of his own.  “He’s been going stir crazy up there, he’ll be glad to see a new face.  Come on, let’s get going.”

 

 

The Englishman’s connection to ‘something like’ covert ops made Burt decide to go home the roundabout way instead of going through town – he wanted to feel the man out a little more before introducing him to the other residents of Perfection, especially since he was going to need to know how to introduce him.  A few months ago he might have been able to waltz through Chang’s store with a new person, toss off a few meaningless introductory phrases and let everyone dig out the rest on their own…but a few months ago Perfection hadn’t been a valley under siege.

 

Or in other words, the permanent residents of Perfection were bored silly and ready to pounce on anything that looked like it might relieve that boredom.  Burt was amazed that he and Reed had made it out of the garage with the tire without being accosted by at least three people.

 

Reed was impressed by the compound, and asked intelligent questions about depth and wall thickness and shielded ventilation.  Burt was still happily answering him when they descended into the bunker itself, and the enthusiasm in his lover’s voice as he described the reinforced walls brought a smile to Tyler’s face.  The former NASCAR driver picked up his cane and limped out into the bunker’s main room just in time to see Burt showing off his periscope.  “If I’d known we were havin’ company I’d have picked the place up,” he commented.

 

“There is nothing wrong with the place just the way it is,” Burt shot back, but his eyes narrowed when Reed not only jumped at the sound of Tyler’s voice but also paled slightly as well.  He decided to let it pass for the moment.  “Tyler, this is Malcolm Reed.  Malcolm, my partner Tyler Reed.”

 

Tyler grinned.  “Small world,” he said, limping the rest of the way into the room and extending his hand.  “Pleased to meet you, Malcolm”

 

“Likewise.”  The smaller man took his hand without hesitation, but he still looked startled.  “I’ve heard a good deal about you, Mr. Reed.”

 

“I can just imagine – and it’s Tyler.”

 

“Thank you.”  Malcolm frowned at the cane, which was one of the aluminum three-footed variety and looked particularly unwieldy.  “Bloody inconvenient things, aren’t they?  I don’t know how you manage the stairs with that, spread out the way it is.”

 

Tyler shrugged, coloring up a little.  “I can’t, right now.  I’m pretty much trapped in here unless someone helps me get up and down.  It’s damned embarrassing.”

 

“I agree with you, I never liked not being able to get around on my own either,” Malcolm commiserated.  He answered the question Tyler didn’t vocalize with a shrug of his own.  “About a year and a half ago, I had a support spike driven through my leg.  The only thing worse than having it happen was the physical therapy afterward.”

 

“Don’t I know it.”  Tyler made his way to the nearest chair and settled into it carefully.  “A support spike…you some kind of contractor, or maybe an engineer, Malcolm?”

 

“A weapons engineer, yes.”  Malcolm held up his pistol so Tyler could see it and at Burt’s gesture took a chair of his own.  “I came out here looking for yourself and Mr. Gummer because I thought I might be able to offer you some assistance.”

 

“He brought down one of the flying things,” Burt spoke up, and didn’t quite wince when his lover’s raised eyebrow demanded the rest of the story.  “It…surprised me.”

 

“I just bet it did.”  Tyler sounded resigned, though, not angry.  He managed half a grin for Malcolm.  “The one that got me was a surprise too.  I appreciate your comin’ along to rescue Burt for me, though, Malcolm.  He ain’t got no one to watch his back with me laid up.”

 

Reed nodded seriously.  “I’m just glad I was in the right place at the right time.”  He turned a thoughtful look on Burt.  “Isn’t there anyone else in your town who can ride the patrol with you, then?”

 

“No,” Burt replied.  “Larry is too inexperienced, he does better in town.  And Harlow is needed out at Rosalita’s.  The other farmers and ranchers in the valley…don’t have any interest.”

 

“They watch their own places, for the most part,” Tyler elaborated.  He grinned at Malcolm.  “I don’t suppose you’re huntin’ a non-payin’ job, are you?”

 

That was what Burt had been waiting for.  “As a matter of fact, he is,” the survivalist said.  “I told him he’d have to check out with Twitchell first.”

 

Tyler appeared to think that over for a moment, and then he gave Malcolm an odd look.  “Can you?”

 

To Burt’s surprise, the Englishman’s expression flickered with momentary uncertainty; a small, uneasy part of him wondered briefly if Tyler had anything to do with it.  “I certainly hope so,” Malcolm admitted.  “If not, I fear I might end up someplace rather less welcoming than a valley full of deadly mutations.”

 

A sudden thought occurred to Burt, and several comments the younger man had made clicked into place.  “I don’t suppose you left whatever service you were in…rather abruptly, did you?”

 

Malcolm sighed and shook his head.  “No, not like you’re thinking – I’ve not abandoned my duties, and I’m not absent without leave.  I was on...a mission, a covert one, and my superior officer saw fit to pull out and leave me stranded.”  He made a face.  “I believe that I’m ‘presumed dead’ at present, at least officially.  I was able to establish just a bit of a legal identity for myself, enough to get by so far…I’m just not sure how well it will hold up under scrutiny.”

 

This was territory Burt was familiar with, at least in theory; keeping a separate identity or two was common practice among survivalists, even though Burt didn’t happen to have one himself, and he thought he could probably help Reed check his for holes.  Something else to consider, though…  “Will your people come hunting you?”

 

“No.”  Malcolm was certain of that, and it showed.  “The only one who knows for sure where I am is the captain, and as he’s the one who abandoned me he’s got a vested interest in letting me stay lost.  He won’t be coming after me, I can assure you of that.”

 

Burt was glad to hear it.  “Good, because we have enough problems here with just the monsters.”

 

“And the occasional assassin,” Tyler added.  “So far El Blanco has eaten all of those that came out here, though.  He can be a right useful worm when he’s of a mind to.”

 

Out of habit, Burt glanced over at the seismo-monitor screen, seeing the fat red dot that represented the Graboid pause for just a moment before continuing on its way, no doubt a little more happily than it had been before.  If happy was something it could be, that was; Burt wasn’t sure he wanted to know.  But the big worm always reacted when Tyler praised him, always.  The survivalist pulled his attention back to the problem at hand.  “I think I can check to make sure your identity will hold up,” he told Reed.  “I’ve got a few…sources I can call on.  Do I need to know what your real name is?”

 

He was fishing, of course; he wanted to verify that Reed hadn’t chosen his cover name because of Tyler.  But the Englishman just chuckled and shook his head.  “Malcolm Reed is my real name, fortunately.  This mission was put together rather on the fly, so no one had the time to make me out to be someone else.  No, my only concern is whether or not the documentation I have will hold up to intense scrutiny.”  He pulled a wallet out of his back pocket, withdrew a driver’s license and a few other items from it and held them out to Burt.  “Here, have a look.”

 

It looked like a perfectly normal driver’s license to the survivalist, with none of the things that would have red-flagged it as a fake, and the green card and passport were the same.  Burt handed them off to Tyler.  “All the information on these is correct?”

 

“As much as possible, yes.  I saw no reason for it not to be – as I said, I’m quite sure I’m presumed dead.  And I rather like myself, so I saw no reason to change anything.”

 

Tyler laughed, which made Burt smile –that laugh hadn’t come too easily or too often lately, and it was good to hear it now.  “Don’t mess with perfection, is that it?” he teased.  He passed the documents back to Reed, who tucked them away again.  “So it looks like your only problems are findin’ out how deep of a background check you can withstand and comin’ up with a story to keep the busybodies around here from pryin’, am I right?”  When the other man nodded, Tyler grinned.  “Well, Burt here can clear up the one problem for ya, and I think I can solve the other one.  You’re my cousin,” the former NASCAR driver told the Englishman.  “You heard what happened last month and came down here to pitch in.  You can’t tell anyone what you’ve been doin’ in the service, but you’re ready to use all the top-secret knowledge you’ve got to help us out.”

 

“That story would hold water for just about everyone, I think,” Burt agreed.  “Some of them will still ask questions, but we won’t have to answer them.”  He cocked an eyebrow at his lover.  “Do you have any relations in England?”

 

Tyler shrugged.  “Doesn’t everybody, somewhere?  I don’t think anyone will give it a second thought, much less dig for details.  What I’m more worried about is explainin’ Malcolm’s gun.”     

 

“It really is my gun, I designed it – I truly am a weapons engineer and tactical officer.”  Reed hesitated, backtracked.  “Well, former tactical officer, anyway.  At the moment I’m Tyler’s cousin, come to help out and drop tantalizing hints about my shadowy past for the benefit of the bored residents here in your valley.”  A twinkle appeared in his gray eyes.  “Everything past that is ‘classified’, you know.”

 

Tyler grinned, but it slipped a little when he saw the effect the grin had on Reed – he’d noticed it before, too.  Shifting his weight, he leaned forward, blue eyes sympathetic.  “Looked somethin’ like me, did he?  Your…partner?”

 

Reed started, gray eyes widening…and then he snorted softly and shook his head.  “Sounded like you too – that bloody American twang.  But he’s…a long time gone, now.”

 

Tyler didn’t stop there.  “Your captain have somethin’ to do with that?”

 

“Everything, unfortunately.”  The Englishman sighed.  “I believe that was part of the reason I was ‘lost’, in fact.  The bloody loony had gotten angry with Trip some time back, I was apparently the next target of opportunity in the man’s quest to make his life miserable.  As if ruining his career and almost getting him killed wasn’t enough.”  He made a face.  “I’ve no hope that Trip is still alive, after this.  And even if he were, there’s absolutely no way he could find me.”  

 

“Stranger things have happened.”  This time Tyler did sit back.  “So how long were you together?”

 

Another sigh.  “Nearly three years.  Three of the best years of my whole bloody life, if truth be told.  He was…exceptional.  Gorgeous.  Brilliant.  Infuriating.”  He snorted again, a half-smile quirking one corner of his mouth.  “Perfect in every bloody way, in fact.  I don’t think anyone could ever replace Trip, not ever.”

 

Burt was relieved to hear that, although he didn’t say so; suspicion and just a tinge of jealousy had reared their ugly heads when Reed had admitted that his long-time lover resembled Tyler.  “If he feels the same way, he might just come looking for you anyway,” the survivalist told him.  “Like Tyler said, stranger things have happened – and strange things are always happening out here.”

 

“Ain’t that the truth.”  Tyler shifted in his seat.  “Tell you what, why don’t we do a little I.D. checkin’ tonight, and then tomorrow mornin’ we’ll get you settled in down at the garage and introduce you around.  And ol’ Twitch is a good guy, I don’t think he’s gonna be a problem.”

 

“Quite possibly not,” Burt agreed.  Twitchell had been openly concerned about the solo patrols, and he’d hinted around that the ranchers could be ‘convinced’ to help out temporarily if Burt wanted it that way.  Burt hadn’t; antagonizing the locals wasn’t a good idea in a place like Perfection, especially not now.  He didn’t think that was what Tyler was talking about, though.

 

Because the survivalist had to wonder if somewhere, somehow, Agent W.D. Twitchell had just paused and then gone on his way a little bit happier than he had been before.  But Burt still wasn’t sure he wanted to know.