Ex-Patriots by Peter Clines Page B

He was a good three hundred feet above
the Hollywood Freeway now. He spun in the air as he tried to spot
the source of the low drone echoing across the valley. The
chattering of thousands of teeth had almost hidden the sound. If
Los Angeles hadn’t been a ghost town, they never would’ve heard
it.
    A line of fire shot past him and burst into a
red star trailing crimson smoke. Between the flare and the sun,
looking west was tough now, but he was pretty sure a prop-engine
plane wouldn’t be coming in from the Pacific. He could still hear
the faint sound, but he thought it was getting fainter.
    There was another flash, this time white
light, and the air crackled and danced on his skin as the sonic
boom ruffled his hair and clothes. Zzzap floated next to him in the
sky.
    Can you hear that?!
    “Yeah,” said St. George. “Can you spot it?
Radar or engine heat or anything?”
    Zzzap spun around once. Right there ,
he said. Looks like it’s following 101. It’s transmitting a
tight signal back thataway.
    Zzzap pointed to the east.
    “What’s it saying?”
    The wraith tilted his head as if listening.
It was one of a dozen habits he kept when he was in his energy
form. Doesn’t sound like talking , he said. I think it’s a
video feed. And I’m pretty sure this is military
encryption.
    “Yeah?”
    I saw a lot of it during the outbreak. Looks
like the same kind of patterns. It’s confusing at first, but once
you get used to it it’s like reading a ransom note, one of those
ones where all the letters are cut out of different magazines.
    “Can we catch up with it and signal the
pilot?”
    Zzzap nodded. Shouldn’t be too hard. He’s
only moving about eighty-five, ninety miles an hour and he’s
heading right at us. Been ignoring my signals, though.
    The two heroes flew higher into the sky.
Zzzap moved in short hops so St. George could keep up. Five minutes
later they were a thousand feet up. The air was crisp even though
the sun was harsh. The gleaming wraith pointed at their target. It
was a few hundred yards away and closing. They fell in next to it
as it passed and kept a dozen yards between them.
    The plane was about thirty feet long, if St.
George judged it right, with maybe a fifty foot wingspan. It was
hard to tell with nothing to compare it to. The shape of it
reminded him of a dragonfly, heavier in the front with a slimmer
body. A basketball-sized blister peppered with lenses hung below
the dragonfly’s “head” and the tail was two large vanes pointing
down at rakish angles instead of up. The propeller was mounted
behind the tail. He sailed above the aircraft and looked down at
the phallic front. There was no cockpit.
    Zzzap flitted up to the plane. He hung in the
air alongside the craft and pointed to the blue and white star
crest on the slim body. Told you it was military .
    “What the hell is it?” St. George had to
shout over the propeller and slid a few more yards away from
it.
    Zzzap followed him over. Seriously? Didn’t
you ever watch the Learning Channel or Discovery or any of
those?
    “I dumped cable two years before I became a
superhero. Too expensive.”
    So you never even saw the special they did
about me?
    “Barry!”
    I’m pretty sure it’s a Predator drone.
    St. George looked at the plane roaring
alongside them. “The robot planes they used in Iraq?”
    Yeah. And it’s not so much a robot as remote
controlled. Which means somebody east of here is flying this
thing.
    “And watching us,” said the hero. He pointed
at the lenses on the metal basketball. “They can see us through
those, right?”
    Technically, yeah, but I’ve been jamming its
transmissions since we got close to it. We don’t know who’s on the
other end of this thing.
    St. George glanced at his friend. “What makes
you say that?”
    The wraith pointed east. I can see their
transmitter over there. It’s about four hundred miles away.
Danielle could probably back me up on this, but I don’t think the
military