J.M. Dillard - War of Worlds: The Resurrection Read Online Free PDF

swinging the two-by-four, she decided. He'd worn a lieutenant's gold bar on his collar. The noncoms included the corporals she'd killed.
    Chambers nodded. "Mossoud, Finney." His voice was serious, authoritative enough to make Finney stop gloating and listen. "Do a body count. Make sure there are no stragglers. Teal, Einhorn—set up the perimeter charges."
    The others filed off, and she and Chambers were left alone. She would have liked to talk to him then about the odd metamorphosis she had undergone, how frightened, insecure Lena was gone forever and this strange new cold-blooded person had taken her place, but something about his manner held her back. Instead, she said, "Let's find a good place for the transmitter."
    They were heading for the side panel when the telephone in the guard shack began to ring. She started; Chambers put a hand on her shoulder.
    "Let it ring," he said. "The world's going to hear about us soon enough." And he actually smiled.
    She returned the smile gratefully. And the walls came tumblin' down . . .
    Mossoud looked down at the lieutenant's bullet-ridden body and rubbed his aching shoulder one more time. Serves you right, you son of a bitch, thinking you could take me on!
    He bent down and felt for a wallet in the dead man's back pockets, then the hip pockets, then the pockets on the thighs. No go; maybe he had it in one of his front pockets for some strange reason, in which case any money had been shredded into confetti by the machine-gun blast. He heard the faintest noise, like a hiss: the guy breathing? Nah . . . impossible. Maybe just air seeping out of his perforated lungs.
    He ignored the sound and looked at the guy's wrist. Left one bare .. . Jesus, didn't this guy wear anything where he was supposed to? On the right wrist Mossoud found what he was looking for: a watch with a gold band, eighteen karat at least, with an inscription on the back. To Jeff, Happy Graduation, Love, Mom and Dad. Mossoud pulled it off the dead man and slipped it onto his wrist. A nice fit. He heard Finney coming and pulled the sleeve of his leather jacket down over his prize.
    "Finney. Give me a hand with this one."
    "You check his pockets?" Finney nudged the stiff with his boot before stooping over to take the guy's legs. Mossoud caught the body under the shoulders.
    "Guy's got nothing worth taking," Mossoud answered innocently, then groaned as they lifted the body up. "Can you believe it? All those goddamn pockets, and not a thing in 'em."
    Neither noticed as, behind them, a thick, caustic liquid hissed through a bullet hole in one of the newer barrels onto an old rusted barrel beneath it. The top of the rusty barrel sizzled as the toxic ooze ate through the metal.
    They were both gone by the time the three probing fingers of the alien's hand burst through.
    TWO
    Suzanne McCullough sat outside Dr. Jacobi's office and glanced impatiently at her watch for the thousandth time in the past twenty minutes. She'd arrived precisely five minutes before the appointed time. Coming any sooner would have revealed how anxious she was; coming any later would have reflected poorly on a newly hired employee. Of course, she'd actually been twenty-five minutes early—it'd taken less time than she expected to get Deb to school—and had wandered around the grounds to kill time. The Pacific Institute of Technology sprawled out over several acres of beautifully landscaped terrain, and at the top of one gently rising hill she'd been able to see the water. In the bright California sunshine, Ohio seemed very, very far away.
    God knows, they were certainly laid back around here. Jacobi was the director, and here he was already ten minutes late. The director of Zubrovski Labs in Canton would never have been late for an appointment. Suzanne sighed and shifted on the too-soft, too-low couch. Even the receptionist was late, shuffling in five minutes before, although she was friendly and kind enough to offer coffee. Suzanne was tempted, but