Luckily, he asked her to lunch instead of, say, inviting her to join his secret harem. By now she knew he didn’t have a secret harem. He’d only had eyes for her since the day they met.
“What kind of details do you have on these prisoners?” Wyatt asked no one in particular. They were well out of sight of the lights from the truck stop.
Cam frowned. “What do you want to know?”
“I want to know if they have a propensity to stop and hide at the first place they see or if they will try and run to the ends of the Earth to escape.”
Axel pulled out his communication device and scrolled through several screens. “Looks like six of the fifteen will likely look for a hiding place, while the other seven will continue on.”
“Who else is out here looking and where are they?” Wyatt’s head turned left and then right as he carefully searched the area with each step he took.
Diesel answered this time. “Jack, Wheeler and Gage are with a team east of the truck stop. We’re headed west, of course. South is the truck stop and north is very heavily forested and, I hope, mostly inaccessible.”
Wyatt nodded. “Right. I expect your other brothers will find any prisoners hiding in that direction more easily, as there aren’t as many buildings to search. The direction we’re going has probably 70 percent of the structures in the entire search grid. The north is more accessible than you think, especially when you consider the motivation the average criminal will have to escape.”
Axel said, “If they finish checking their area quickly, they will head in our direction. If we have to go north, we’ll do it all together.”
Wyatt nodded. “Good enough.” They continued through the woods toward what Valene knew was a group of five cabins. They were the closest human structures to their landing field. The cabins were likely empty this time of year after the busy summer vacation season, but it was possible a few could be occupied in anticipation of the fall hunting season.
Diesel stayed in the lead, Wyatt followed close behind him and Valene was next. Axel and Cam, side by side, trailed the group, alertly scanning the trees around them.
The first cabin they reached was small and dark. A quick check showed no one inside. The next cabin was also dark, but larger. The back door stood ajar.
Wyatt took the lead, shining a narrow-beamed flashlight all around the frame of the back door. The light reflected off what looked like some sort of slime or resin on the frame near the doorknob.
He pointed to it. Her brothers nodded, as if they knew what sort of creature might be found inside. No one seemed particularly alarmed. Wyatt moved forward without asking any questions, gun raised and ready to fire as he slowly entered the cabin through the broken back door.
Just past the threshold, a staircase went directly up from a small landing. Wyatt slowly climbed the first few steps, gun up with the business end leading the way.
Valene knew her brothers planned to let Wyatt shoot the shackle bullets at the escaped criminals because he was the best shot in three counties, possibly in the entire state of Arkansas. He wouldn’t miss. If she asked whether he’d be able to hit an alien criminal with an equally alien shackle splatter bullet gun, he’d simply say, “Does a bear poop in the woods?”
The thought of Wyatt’s funny response popped into her brain. It was completely inappropriate for the current circumstances. She had to stifle a laugh by covering her mouth as though to stop a cough or sneeze, making an equally inappropriate snorting noise loud enough to be heard by everyone in the stairwell.
All four of the men on the stairs looked at her with varying degrees of annoyance. She ignored them and vowed not to think of all the funny, charming things Wyatt did. That would occupy a lot of her thoughts.
She noticed more slime on the handrail, a clear indication that one or more of the Moogallian criminals were either inside the cabin or had been. An alien that looked like a cross between an octopus and a human could be an amazing sight if a person wasn’t used to it. Earthlings were not at all used to it.
Perhaps they should have shown Wyatt pictures of the convicts they might encounter. The moment Valene cleared the half stairwell to reach the cabin’s main floor, a Moogallian with all eight tentacles raised as if in complete fright stepped into the room from a door on the other side of what looked like the living room.
Wyatt didn’t hesitate, firing the weapon and hitting the Moogallian in the chest through two of his raised slimy tentacles. The moment the projectile hit, it splattered a purple gel into a circular blob and all eight tentacles dropped.
“Great shot,” Diesel said, moving toward the now-subdued Moogallian.
“Wait,” Wyatt said in a terse voice. He took a quick step beside Diesel as a shadow flickered in the doorway. Another convict, this one a tall, burly humanoid with dusty greenish skin, burst through the doorway holding what looked like an Earth-style shotgun cocked and ready to fire.
Wyatt shoved Diesel to one side and stepped into the line of fire as he took a shot at the menacing second alien. The shackle bullet hit him square in the face. Unfortunately, as the shotgun fell from his seven-fingered hand, a crack of sound split the air. Wyatt grunted and bent at the waist. To Valene’s horror, she saw the shotgun’s blast had struck him in the belly instead of its intended target, Diesel.
Valene screamed as Wyatt dropped to the floor, the shackle weapon still in his capable, but motionless hands.
Wyatt woke after dreaming Valene was upset and shouting. She never screamed or shrieked, so it was rather disconcerting, even for an obvious nightmare.
His eyes opened to find Valene’s brother Gage, wearing a white lab coat, standing over him, face drawn in a serious expression.
“Where am I?” Wyatt asked. His eyes searched the room, which sort of looked like a scientist’s lab. He saw beakers and Bunsen burners on a table nearby. Gage Grey was reportedly interested in science, but Wyatt had never before seen him dressed for the part.
“You’re in the basement of the Big Bang Truck Stop.”
