Monsters (Ashes Trilogy 3)

Mostly, he worried about the kids, and his next move. The one thing he didn’t believe Mellie would do was kill the children outright. It just didn’t fit. True, that commander had Chuckies. They would need food. But why waste kids? More than enough oldsters around to keep the Chuckies happy for a while.

What he kept coming back to was that boy. The old commander was messing around with the Chuckies. But how? And why does he need my kids? There had to be a reason why Mellie had gathered children for her buddy in black. Tom suspected she and the commander wanted the Rule children for the same reason.

Whatever that was. Except for two dead dogs, a bigger blood splotch that looked as if it might have been a person, and a riderless horse nervously wandering around the horse barn, the farmstead was deserted. The horse trough had been moved, and the stockpile of explosives gear was gone. That, he’d counted on. First principles: all warfare is based on deception.

Every tent had been broken down and taken away—except his, set apart, close to the trees. He stared for a very long time, first from across the corral and on his horse, and then on foot as he worked a careful perimeter, thinking, Fool me once . . . He bet Finn read Sun Tzu, too.

It took him a while. The snow was all broken up, deeply incised with horse hooves, boots, and—this was a surprise—the cut of at least seven or eight wagons. But he finally spotted what did not belong: a thin curl of det cord coiled around a corner guy and grommet of his tent. Following that took him to a trip-release hooked to the front zipper. Peering through a seam, he saw a half block of plastique, with a Vietnam-era M28 detonator stuck in one end, molded to the tent’s center pole. The trip-release meant that he’d use more force on the zipper. One quick tug would arm the fuse and then boom.

Not good. He cut the cord with his KA-BAR, then broke down the rest of the bomb. Either they think one or both of us got out, or they’re being cautious. Each scenario was bad news and meant he would have to be doubly careful when he searched the rest of the farmstead.

None of the barns were booby-trapped. He took his time with the equipment shed, studying the roof and where the walls met concrete and then snow. Nothing. Now that he had his gear and binos, he peered in through the one window. Bare sawhorses, empty shelves. Using paracord, he carefully tied one end to the doorknob and strung it out behind. Then he wound the other end around the saddle horn, boosted himself onto the saddle, and spurred the horse into a sudden gallop. Startled, the horse bolted, and the door caromed off its hinges. But nothing blew up.

Save for a single half-roll of magnesium tape and a bottle of aluminum powder that had rolled under a sawhorse, the equipment shed was a metal and concrete shell. Pocketing the magnesium and ground aluminum, he walked out to the cistern. The cap was still in place, but once bitten, twice shy. When he was satisfied it wasn’t rigged, he shoved the heavy concrete to one side and peered in. His breath huffed out in relief. Still attached to an iron bolt on the cap’s underbelly, the black paracord was taut, exactly as he’d left it. Reaching in, he hauled up the heavy pack in which he’d stowed the lion’s share of his bomb-making materials.

Under Mellie’s nose, the whole time. Clearing a house of potential booby-traps takes time. All the rooms were clear and empty, except Weller’s. Interesting. Both hands on his Uzi, Tom turned a slow look. With its tight hospital corners, Weller’s rack could’ve passed any drill instructor’s muster. From his few changes of clothing in a duffel to his cracked leather dopp kit, everything was squared and ordered. Why not empty the room, or booby-trap it? Two reasons: either the contents held no value . . . or, on the off-chance Weller survived, they’re telling him to kiss off.

Every soldier carries keepsakes and charms, usually on them or in their over-vests: letters, pictures, Bibles, rosaries, scapulars. His own—a St. George medal from his grandmother and a picture of his little sisters—were tucked in the same sock drawer with his dog tags back home, and so much dust. The tags he wore now were Jed’s. As far as he knew, Weller had no tags, but he was an old soldier and habits die hard.

They were in the dopp kit, the first place Tom looked, and protected by a Ziploc baggy: a newspaper clipping and an old Polaroid. The clipping, almost three years old, read:

HOUGHTON VICTIM REMEMBERED AS “DETERMINED” AND “GOOD FRIEND”

Friends of Amanda L. Pederson recalled a vivacious, generous, and hardworking young woman ready to offer a helping hand and determined to return to school and pursue a college degree.

“Totally devastated,” was how Claire Mason characterized her reaction to the news of Pederson’s disappearance after a freak boating accident in Lake Superior. “I can’t even imagine what she was doing out there with a bunch of college kids in the first place. She couldn’t swim, and can you imagine her poor parents? How they’ll never have a body? It’s just terrible.”

The boat on which Pederson was a passenger went down in the still-frigid waters of Superior after a fire broke out in the vessel’s engine room. Repeated efforts by fellow passengers to free Pederson, trapped below deck, failed, and the vessel sank before a Coast Guard helicopter arrived on scene. Recovery efforts were suspended due to poor visibility and the depth of the lake, which has been recorded at over five hundred feet in that area. No further searches for the missing boat or Houghton resident are planned.

“Amanda was just the nicest girl,” Jack Laparma, a close friend, said. “She’d had some hard times, but she was completely determined, ready to move on.”

Pederson is reported to have enjoyed snowmobiling as well as time spent with family and friends.

The names of Pederson’s fellow passengers as well as the boat’s owner are currently being withheld until a preliminary investigation is completed and a cause of the engine fire can be established. Given the loss of the boat, however, and the reported lack of eyewitness accounts, a source close to the current investigation suggested that the death will be classified as accidental. No criminal charges are currently pending or anticipated.

Pederson is survived by her parents, Claire and Benjamin; a brother, Theodore; and grandparents Ron and Esther Pederson of Houghton, and William and Rosemary Weller of Marenisco. The picture accompanying the article showed Weller’s granddaughter in jeans and a tee, sitting atop a picnic table. In the background was a river, boats, and a lift bridge.

The Polaroid was so aged most of the color had bled. The ghostly image of two men posed before a Quonset. Each held an M16. Both wore camo battle dress, but only Weller, just as grizzled then as now, sported three tabs on his left sleeve—special forces, rangers, and airborne—and a smoke tucked behind one ear.