The middle-aged Asian male who strolled into the Baja Naja outdoor restaurant just off Mill did not draw a second glance from the late-lunch crowd of students, teachers, office workers, retirees, and tourists. In no way did his physique, posture, or expression impact on the bustling dynamic of the outdoor congregation. No one noticed that his stride was more confident than was typical of his age and demeanor, or that the slight upward curl of his lips might indicate a general contempt for the more youthful, more attractive people gathered in the popular hangout.
He took a table by himself, in the back, away from the street, and ordered quietly and without fuss, barely taking the time to glance at the menu. Cody didn’t even know he existed until the man rose, picked up his glass of ice water, and approached him.
“Good morning, Professor Westcott.” The visitor glanced at his watch. “It is still morning, I suppose. I see that you are alone. Mind if I join you?”
Cody considered the stranger, struggling to place the polite enigma who was blocking his view of the street. “Do I know you?” His smile was instinctive, automatic, and unfounded.
“I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone named Uthu before.”
“Westcott?” Cody’s response was muffled by his mouthful of sandwich.
“You are being humorous. Coshocton, of course. That is Amerindian, is it not?”
Cody chewed. “Commanche/Cherokee. What’s Uthu?”
Now his visitor was starting to make nut noises, Cody decided. Glancing around casually as he wiped his hands with a linen napkin, he scanned the street for signs of a passing cop. None were in sight. He also paid attention to the man’s hands. At the moment they rested on the table, in plain sight. If one slid toward a pocket, Cody felt he might have to react. Still, the Department of Archaeology was not typically a destination of deranged individuals. They tended to favor the animal research center, or the student newspaper, or the science labs that did work for the military. Research on bones and pots did not engender the kind of primeval passion that normally led to physical assault.
Cody wanted to run away, as he had run from a nest of baby rattlers when at the age of seven he slipped and became trapped in a narrow arroyo on his uncle’s ranch. It was a beautiful day. He was surrounded by happy, active people content in their work and leisure. Outside, beyond the iron fence that marked the limits of the outdoor restaurant, ubiquitous English sparrows hopped energetically to and fro, scavenging for table crumbs. A pair of rocks protruded from landscaping gravel. From each rock a saw-edged shaft projected vertically, weaving slowly back and forth like a lethal yucca. The sparrows ignored it. So did the people using the sidewalk beyond. They could not see it. Only Cody could see it. He—and Uthu.
“What are you?” Cody spoke slowly as he straightened his chair beneath him. The monstrosities abiding within the smaller man could not molest him or they would certainly already have done so. Evidently they were restricted to one host at a time. It was instructive, the cool scientific part of his mind noted automatically, to have confirmed the supposition that a single person could play host to more than one of the disquieting parasites.
“A man, like yourself. Human, but one who has given himself over to the Interlopers.”
“So that’s what they’re called.” It felt unreasonably good to be able to finally give a name to the diverse miscellany of malevolent nightmares.
“It is what we who are given over have chosen to call them. They have no name for their collective selves. We who are given over do not ‘talk’ to them in the accepted sense, nor do we share anything like a recognizable telepathy. We must rely on feelings, sensations, certain urges.”
They had moved into territory wholly new to Cody, a place where he had not even ventured to speculate. “You mean, you voluntarily serve as a host to these things?”
“Not at first. No one becomes a host intentionally. The great majority of humans who are called upon have no awareness of their altered state. They are blessed by a sustained ignorance of their condition.”
“So these Interlopers, they can extend a life?” Cody prompted him.
“That’s no gift.” Cody was at once fascinated and horrified by the parasitized man sitting across the table from him. “No parasite wants its host to die. If that happens, it has to go through the trouble of finding another.” He frowned in remembrance. “I’ve passed my hands through a number of them without suffering more than a quick chill. Yet you say that once inside, they cause pain and torment.”
“Yet in spite of that you serve as a venue,” the archaeologist murmured.
“Do they ever do that? Abandon a host, I mean?”
“No.” The Asian’s face was drawn but resigned. “Never. Not until the host dies.”
“Or turns psychotic.” Cody speculated pensively.
Cody flinched, but the man’s hand was not reaching for him. Instead, it swept aside the water glass that had been set before him. Cold water and ice went flying, just missing the couple seated at the table nearest to them. The girl rose sharply, wiping at where her thigh lay bare beneath the short skirt. Her male companion looked irritated.
“On the contrary, there is always call for that,” Uthu assured him quietly. “And for—other things.”
Cody’s eyes widened. “You killed Harry Keeler!”
“I’ve seen enough of these creatures to know that they can’t physically strike out at a person. You have to make contact with their habitation for them to be able to affect you. Or they can make contact by having an infected individual impact on another, just like they’re making you talk to me, right now.”
“If necessary.” Uthu replied calmly to the archaeologist’s question. “Keeler was abolished because he was in possession of the written formula for the elixir that enables humans to see Interlopers. That was a very dangerous thing. If humans could see the Interlopers, they would avoid them. Then no Interloper would be able to feed.”
“So these Interlopers influenced the Incas to overthrow the Chachapoyans?”
“Not exactly. They helped the Incas to lose to the conquistadors. There is a difference.” The smile widened unpleasantly. “Remember the reactions of the Incas to the arrival of the Spanish. While they could see many of the Interlopers, they could not keep track of them all. It was the Interlopers who started the fight between Atahualpa and his brother, thus splitting and weakening a previously united Empire at its most vulnerable moment. It was an Interloper who influenced the Inca to stupidly permit himself to be taken captive by the Spaniards. After that, it was Interlopers who spread divisiveness and fear among those Incas who were still determined to resist the invaders.” Sitting back in his chair, Uthu sipped at his glass of water.
“No. It was not possible to taint every Inca. Only those in power, the nobles and the generals and their immediate subordinates, were affected. And only a few of them, at that.” This time, the visitor’s smile was entirely ruthless, contorted by something utterly inhuman. “The Incas, fortunately, loved to be around rock and stone. Selective infestation could be carried out in a prompt and efficient manner. Occasionally, for various reasons, it could not be accomplished appropriately or in time. Ollyantaytambo was the most glaring example.”
Cody started. “The Incas beat the Spaniards there. Twice.”
“We will not kill you because it is widely known that you were working with Harry Keeler. Coming so close to his, your unexpected demise would arouse suspicions. It has therefore been decided to let you live.” A different sort of smile, warm and ingratiating, creased the Asian’s visage. It was as faux as the wood painted to look like marble that lined much of the main reading room of the library. “All you have to do is give up any research on the Chachapoyan shamanic codex, destroy your existing notes on it, and have nothing further to do with the subject. Oh yes,” he added pleasantly, “and stop interfering with the established activities of the Interlopers in this part of the world. You may observe them all you wish. It is only asked that you not intervene.”
Cody had listened without comment. “Anything else?”
“Why should you care, Coschocton Westcott? Humankind has survived and prospered in the presence of the Interlopers. It will continue to do so even in the presence of your silence. Leave the world as you found it a year ago. You know something of people, alive as well as dead. Are they not better off not knowing? Reveal all to them, and there would be panic, hysteria, and a reign of terror and death.”
Was it so very much that Uthu was asking on behalf of the repulsiveness that abided in the world? One empire would always conquer another, with or without the outside intervention of Interlopers. People would always fight, argue, bicker and disagree, whether influenced by abiding Interlopers or not. Or—would they? Exactly how much of human misery and despair was a natural consequence of sheer existence, and how much due to the interference of this vast panoply of unearthly parasitic beings? If he could alter that equation of suffering, even a little, did he not have a duty to do so?
For a little while then, for an indeterminate amount of time, he felt he could count on a modicum of safety. That was fortunate, because he had no intention whatsoever of complying with Uthu’s demands. Once the turmoil caused by Professor Keeler’s violent death had passed beyond the point of evening television newsworthiness, someone would come for him in the night. Him, and doubtless Kelli as well. Or they would be accosted on the street by an armed mugger, who would “panic” and shoot them both. Despite the Asian’s reassuring speech, Cody had no illusions about what lay in store for him. Unless he could find a means of acquiring more positive protection than the knowledge he now possessed and could not forswear, he was a man without a future. The Interlopers would not let anyone who knew of their existence live. Why should they, when humans were so easy to kill?
There remained a trove of photographs of glyphs and carvings that awaited explication. Far from abandoning his work, he would throw himself back into it with a vengeance. He had no idea how much time remained to him, how long the Interlopers and their human vassals would wait before deciding it was more hazardous to their activities to leave him alive than render him dead. Meanwhile, he would trust no one, and would watch his back.
Which was undoubtedly why the Interlopers were so anxious to put a stop to it.