Loose ends

8.

Over three hundred thousand bats currently reside in the bat cave below," the park ranger announced. "Mexican free-tailed bats, to be exact. At the moment, they're sleeping upside down inside the cavern, about a half-mile past the main entrance, but soon all three hundred thousand will come spiraling out of the cave in search of dinner: mostly moths, mosquitoes, and other flying insects. Trust me, it's a pretty impressive sight when all those bats come flapping out of the cave all at once!"Dozens of tourists packed the outdoor amphitheater, waiting for one of Carlsbad Caverns's biggest attractions: the nightly Bat Flight. Constructed of solid stone and concrete, the amphitheater looked down onto the natural entrance of the main cavern, a dark oval gap at the bottom of a rocky cliff. To the west, the sun was already sinking toward the horizon, so the expectant throng knew that the bats would be making their promised appearance soon. Restless children, bored by the ranger's educational lecture, climbed up and down the wide stone steps of the amphitheater, squirmed impatiently between their parents, or attempted to frighten their younger siblings with black rubber bats purchased earlier at a souvenir shop. Near the back of the open-air theater, some joker played the theme music from Batman on his portable boombox.

"Why are we here again?" Max asked, as impatient as any of the unruly toddlers. Along with Liz and the others, he sat on one of the tiered stone benches overlooking the cave entrance. Only Michael was missing; according to Max, he had volunteered to stay behind at the Days Inn to keep watch over Morton's motel room, freeing Max to return to the park to find the rest of his friends and relatives. Liz had originally been startled by Max's newly-blond appearance, but he'd quickly restored his hair to its usual raven-black hue once he realized that the disguise bothered her. Her own tresses, however, remained brilliant red, for safety's sake, as well as for her own peace of mind.

"Because the Visitors Center is closed, and this is what people do at the Caverns at sunset," Maria said testily; Liz guessed that she wasn't happy about Michael being left behind to baby-sit an armed criminal of uncertain intentions. "You're the one who's always telling us to blend in and not attract attention." She was two seats down from Max, with Liz nestled between them. It was still warm out, but the summer heat was cooling to more bearable levels. "Besides, the bats are cool."I guess," Max sighed, peeking at his watch. Liz knew he was counting the hours and minutes before he could go spy on Morton's midnight rendezvous with the lieutenant. How far is Slaughter Canyon from here, she wondered, and do I really want Max out tailing Morton through the desert? They had already spent several minutes comparing notes after Max got back from his earlier surveillance mission. He had told them about the science guy inexplicably sharing a room with Morton, while Isabel had filled her brother in on what she had learned from Lieutenant Ramirez. Liz wasn't sure what any of this meant, and doubted that any of the others did. All this mystery was the last thing she needed right now, rattled as she still was by her resurrected psychological baggage from the shooting, but she had to admit that the entire situation was looking increasingly suspicious and alarming. A particle physicist with Morton? Conspiring with an air force pilot from White Sands? What could this possibly be about-except maybe more alien-inspired intrigue left over from the Crash? She shivered, hugging herself and wishing that she could just curl up into a fetal ball somewhere far from Roswell, New Mexico and its secrets. This was supposed to be a vacation from all that, she recalled with bitter irony, but so far it wasn't working out that way "How are you doing, Liz?" Max asked softly, searching her face with those soulful dark eyes. She guessed that someone, maybe Alex or Isabel, had also brought Max up to speed on her precarious emotional state. "I know you've been having a rough time." She detected a trace of guilt in his voice. "I'm sorry I haven't been around more."That's all right," she consoled him. In a crisis, she had learned from painful experience, there often wasn't time for togetherness. "You were doing what you had to do-for my sake." She turned toward him, looking up at the trou- bled face she knew so well. "Morton's my problem, not yours."I just wish I could do more," he said passionately. "The idea that he's still out there, up to no good, after hurting you!" His expression hardened and he clenched his fists, as if newly enraged by the very thought of Morton. A baseball-size chunk of concrete, resting by his foot, abruptly exploded in a shower of dust and gravel. Embarrassed and flustered, he guiltily peeked at the strangers around them; fortunately, no one besides his friends appeared to have noticed the brick's unnatural disintegration. "It just makes me crazy," he offered by way of explanation. "You can't imagine."Out of the comer of her eye, Liz saw Maria observing Max warily, eyeing him as she would a ticking time bomb. Isabel and Alex were discreetly monitoring Max as well. Liz felt her friends' shared discomfort, even as she appreciated their reluctance to intrude on her private moment with Max.

"I know," she said to him. Watching him simmer in anger and frustration, she wondered who had been most disturbed by Morton's return, she or Max? Once again, she was tormented by the possibility that Max might get hurt trying to avenge her shooting. I'd never forgive myself, she thought, if something happened to him because of me. "You don't have to do this, Max," she urged him. Her moist brown eyes pleaded with his for an end to diis disastrous expedition. "We could just turn around and go home, pretend we never saw him."He shook his head. "It's too late for that, Liz. Things have gone too far. We need to know what Morton is doing with that scientist and the air force guy, for all of our sakes." A rueful smile lifted the corners of his lips. "Anyway, Michael and I have already rented a couple of rooms at the Days Inn for us."The better to keep Joe Morton under twenty-four hour watch, Liz realized. The idea of staying that close to where the murderous gunman was hiding out made her sick to her stomach. I'd rather camp out in the bat cave, with three hundred thousand-plus flying mammals. She knew that Max was probably right; Morton needed watching. She wished she could do more to help Max get to the bottom of the mystery, but, in her present state, she was no good to anyone. When will Ijeel like myself again? she asked hopelessly. How long can constant terror last? Down at the foot of the amphitheater, the loquacious ranger wrapped up his lecture, glancing toward the setting sun and checking his wristwatch. "It should be any time now, folks," he announced, although predicting exactly the bats' big moment was something less than an exact science. "Please remember, no flash photography."An eager hush fell over the gathered tourists, quieting all but the most obstreperous youngsters. Danny Elfman's pounding Batman score echoed beneath the dimming desert sky as several dozen eyes turned toward die cavernous opening at the base of the cliff. "Have you ever seen this before?" Liz asked Max, trying to enjoy the moment as best she could.

"Once," he admitted, "when we were just kids." A gentler smile temporarily lightened his brooding demeanor. "Isabel was terrified the bats would get caught in her hair."Too bad Michael's missing this," Maria sighed. "Guys like bats and snakes and things, right?"Before either Max or Liz could respond to her query, a loud rustling sound came from the mouth of the cavern, like the fluttery susurrus of millions of shuffling papers. The audience held its breath en masse, leaning forward on their stone benches to get a better look, when suddenly a swirling cloud of black leathery wings burst from the cave, ascending toward the sky like, well, a bat out of hell. Wave after wave of hungry bats, several thousand at a time, poured out of the cavern, spiraling upward like some sort of vampiric tornado before dispersing into the night. Their high-pitched cries bounced off the rocky foundations of the outdoor theater, competing with the shrieks of excited spectators and the thunderous flapping of countless nocturnal predators. "Holy Bat-Surplus!" Alex exclaimed, leaping to his feet while, beside him, Isabel scrunched down as far as she could, protectively placing her hands over her hair. "This is just like Hitchcock's The Birds-but with fewer feathers!"Liz's own reaction caught them all by surprise. Even though she knew what to expect, having witnessed the twilight exodus numerous times as a child, the sudden roar of the bat explosion, the turbulent storm of furry black bodies blotting out the sky, overloaded her senses and sent her heart and soul winging back to the Crashdown and the day she was shot. Help me! she thought frantically, her hysterical screams lost in the tumult. Darkness, black as death, closed in on her. Pain flared below her ribs. Max! Where are you, Max? I'm dying! The blackness was still enveloping her as her friends took hold of her and hastily hustled her away from the bat show.