The Predator: The Official Movie Novelization

14

Rory liked candy, of course—mostly things made of chocolate. People who gave candy corn or jawbreakers simply didn’t understand the allure of trick or treat, but they weren’t the worst offenders. Folks who took it upon themselves to issue a silent condemnation of everything good about Halloween—the Stillsons, for instance, who gave out toothbrushes last year and Halloween-themed pencils the year before—were the enemy of all that was good and joyful about childhood. Rory’s neuro-diversity might make it hard for him to pick up social cues, but wandering around in spooky costumes and getting free candy had never been something he had to struggle to understand.

There were some real assholes in the neighborhood, shitheads like Tom Kelly and Dom Cortez, who would vandalize an old woman’s electric scooter if she’d just sit still long enough. Why those pricks hadn’t ever hit the Stillsons’ house with a hundred dozen eggs some Halloween night was a mystery Rory didn’t think anyone would ever solve.

Not that he supported vandalism. But still… toothbrushes? For trick or treat?

He’d gone upstairs to use the bathroom, had a bowl of spaghetti his mother had foisted on him, and then retreated to the basement again. Now he sat staring at the shoddy Frankenstein mask his mom had brought home and tried to decide what to do. He loved her so much and he knew that she loved him and just wanted what was best for him, but the truth was that she didn’t always know what was best—and neither did Rory. They were both learning, and that always made the decisions and the conversations difficult.

Trick or treat meant chocolate, yes. But what he loved about it most was the anonymity. He could go from house to house and mostly manage to avoid being recognized. The social encounters of the evening were so deeply ritualized that nobody expected any further interaction beyond the ringing of the doorbell, the chorusing of “trick or treat,” and the grateful acceptance of proffered candy. Rory understood this exchange. It didn’t require him to parse words, to search for hidden meanings, to gauge someone’s tone of voice—all strategies his therapist had taught him that took enormous effort and focus.

Halloween meant he could be anything or anyone, that people would see only the mask. As much as he struggled with the word normal, and knew that being on the spectrum was not at all unusual, every year he went out trick-or-treating and felt like he’d been suffocating all year and he’d finally learned how to breathe properly.

And yet… Halloween also made him sad. That was the awful part, the double-edged sword of it all. While he was out collecting candy, out among the people who had no diversity in their neuro and didn’t embrace it in others, he felt good. Happy. But at some point, either when he’d arrive back home or shortly before, he would begin to think about the mask and be forced to acknowledge that people were treating him normally because they didn’t know it was Rory McKenna behind that mask. They hadn’t had a conversation with him, only engaged in the ritual. The mask made them more comfortable than Rory himself would have, because they didn’t have to make an effort with the mask.

He pondered all of this as he picked up the Frankenstein’s monster mask and poked his finger through the eyeholes. At the same time, he wondered how many people would be giving away Hershey chocolate. Hershey chocolate and Reese’s Cups were his favorites. He liked the neighbors who allowed him to choose from their candy bowl instead of choosing for him. Usually he came home with about forty percent candy he would eat, and his mother would complain for a week about her lack of self-control as she ate the other sixty percent.

The thought made him smile. Mom liked Baby Ruths the best, which was funny, because from his observations in overhearing the conversations of his classmates and other kids in the neighborhood, nobody liked Baby Ruths the best aside from Emily McKenna.

Amid these thoughts, Rory paused, a frown creasing his forehead. He turned to glance at the small box window, high up on the basement wall. A scratching at the window made him cock his head. He heard a snuffling noise, like a big dog might be right outside, sniffing and scraping at the ground. He remembered the pit bull from earlier and wondered if it might be the same dog.

The sound moved off and after a few seconds, he couldn’t hear it anymore.

Rory turned his attention back to the Frankenstein mask. Unimpressed, he tossed it onto the table. After all, it wasn’t the only mask he’d gotten that day.

Emily stood at the sink with the water running. The bowl from Rory’s pasta was in her hand, but her mind had wandered a moment, as it often did. He seemed happy tonight—the prospect of chocolate usually accomplished that—but she always felt nervous about him trick-or-treating without her. Emily knew there were kids at school and in the neighborhood who were less than kind to Rory. There had been instances of outright bullying. He tried to put on a brave face, or hide the hurt from her, but even with the difficulty that sometimes came with deciphering his feelings, a mother knew. But Rory had a lot of heart and no one could deny he was brilliant—he would have to make his way in the world without his mother around. He had to learn to negotiate the social landscape in a way he could manage for himself, for a lifetime.

She sighed and rinsed the red sauce out of his bowl.

A creak on the floor behind her nearly made her drop the bowl, and she swung round. Had she heard the back door click shut? Placing the clean bowl in the drainer by the sink, she grabbed a dish towel and started for the kitchen door, wondering if Rory had gone outside.

The doorbell rang. She frowned—it must be that time already, but it felt to her as if the kids showed up earlier and earlier every year. She tossed the dishtowel onto the counter. She grabbed the bowl of candy as she made her way through the foyer to open the front door.

The men on her front steps weren’t there for candy.

In the center, there stood a handsome guy in a dark suit. He flashed a brilliant smile at the same time as he brandished an ID badge. Armed men flanked him on both sides and Emily wondered how many more there might be, out there in the dark on a street where hundreds of kids were about to go door-to-door.

“Mrs. McKenna?” the suit said. “Can we have a word?”

She squinted at his badge. Last name TRAEGER.

“Let me guess,” she sighed. “He’s done something crazy.”

That smile again. “Why would you say that?”

Emily silently cursed her husband—ex-husband—whatever he was to her now. “Because the look on your face says he’s not dead, and yet here you fucking are.”

Agent Traeger’s gaze shifted past her. Emily glanced over her shoulder and saw that he was eyeing Quinn’s gun case.

“Those are his,” she explained. “He’s a hunter.”

Traeger nodded sagely. “Shot a buck when I was six.”

Good for you, Emily wanted to say. Get off my stoop.

Instead, she mirrored his sage nod. “Our son never took to it. He’s more a ‘rescue bugs’ guy. He actually burns ants he thinks might hurt other ants. And sports… forget it.” She frowned as a memory touched her. “His dad did teach him to slide, though.”

“Slide?”

“Baseball,” Emily explained. “Didn’t go well.”

“Your son. Where is he?” Traeger asked.

“Around here somewhere.” She narrowed her eyes. “Why?”

“Mind if we speak with him?”

Emily shifted her body slightly, almost unconsciously. Smiling secret agent man and a bunch of black-clad fuckers with guns wanted to talk to her boy? Instinct kicked in, and she couldn’t help the way every muscle twitched, wanting to put herself between these guns and her son.

“Why the hell would you want to do that?”

Traeger arched a questioning eyebrow. “Just being thorough, ma’am.”

Emily inhaled slowly, running scenarios through her head. These guys weren’t here because Quinn McKenna had won a medal. They were here because he’d done something he shouldn’t have done, and it wasn’t the first time. What worried her was the biggest question of all—if they were here looking for him, that meant the army didn’t know the whereabouts of one of its Rangers, so where the hell had Quinn gone? In some ways, that question worried her more than what he might have done.

“Fine,” she said, then pointed at the armed men behind Traeger. “But they stay out here.”

“Agreed,” Traeger said, stepping over her threshold.

Emily let him pass, then paused to take in the expressionless, black-clad men on her stoop. “It’s Halloween, boys.” She handed the candy bowl to the soldier nearest her. “If kids show up at my door and you scare the shit out of them, at least give them some candy while you’re at it.”

The soldier seemed about to argue. One of the others gave her a “Yes, ma’am,” and gestured for the rest to spread out. The one with the candy seemed to sigh and resign himself to trick or treat duty. He slung his gun across his back.

Satisfied for the moment, thinking the kids would assume the soldier was in costume, Emily led Traeger through the kitchen and down into the basement.

“Rory, honey?” she said as she descended the steps.

Silence from the basement. She heard his absence, felt it, even before she reached the bottom step and glanced around. Behind her, Traeger scanned the basement and then looked back up the steps.

“That’s weird,” Emily said, but already her mind was going back to the moment while she was washing the dishes, right before Traeger had rung her doorbell. The floor had creaked. The back door had clicked. In the moment, she had thought she might be imagining it. Now… “If he’s not in his room—and he’s not—he’s always here. He said he was going trick-or-treating, but…”

Her words trailed off as she caught sight of the Frankenstein mask. And then the pirate mask. Both costumes she’d bought him were here, scattered on his worktable and laid across a chair. Her frown deepened.

If Rory had gone trick-or-treating, why would he leave his costume behind?

McKenna felt like a fool hiding in the bushes outside his own damn house, but he knew Emily and Rory might be in danger and he wanted to make certain he didn’t make it worse. He and the Loonies were gathered in the bushes across the street, with a parabolic microphone that had been with all the weapons in the gun dealer’s RV. They’d set up surveillance only twenty minutes before Traeger had rolled in with his team, and now they sat and listened to every word Traeger and Emily said.

Beside him, Nebraska held the parabolic mic and glanced at him. “You think this guy’s low enough to hurt your family?”

“Under the right circumstances,” McKenna said, “I think so, yeah. I don’t trust that smile of his. He thinks he’s charming; I think he’s a sociopath. But if the Predator shows up, I don’t mind Traeger and his men providing some cover—”

“You mean cannon fodder,” Lynch interrupted.

“If they buy me time to get Emily and Rory somewhere safe, I’ll be glad they’re here,” McKenna said.

“You really think the Predator’s showing up here?” Nebraska asked.

McKenna thought about the jungle, and about the gauntlet and helmet. He’d hoped they would be at the post office, but a small fear had niggled at the back of his mind—the fear that he hadn’t paid for his post office box, and when he’d checked on it and learned the truth, confirmed that the package had been taken here…

“I do, yeah.”

Nebraska grinned. “Good. Saves us the trouble of hunting it down.”

Rory had never owned anything this cool in his entire life. He knew he shouldn’t have taken it, knew that his father probably shouldn’t have taken it from wherever he’d gotten it. He was smart enough to know an Army Ranger didn’t pack something like this up in a tiny Mexican town and ship it to his private post office box without risking some serious trouble. Which meant that as soon as his father found out it was in Rory’s possession… it would no longer be in Rory’s possession. But while it was, the helmet was so damn cool.

The gauntlet remained on his wrist. The helmet was too big and bobbled as he walked, and he stumbled over a curb here and there and trampled Mrs. Markowitz’s bushes, but he could not make himself care. He was surrounded by kids in costumes and their parents, but he felt as if he was isolated—not the way he usually felt alone, but in a good way. Crazy good.

The helmet had an interior display. The eyepieces showed human heat signatures in every direction. The tech left Rory almost breathless, giddy with excitement. He knew he might never get to wear it again, and certainly not with so many people around—it’d look weird on any other night of the year. But tonight, everyone looked weird. The DiMarinos had set up their usual haunted house in the garage. The Khans had the inflatable screen out front showing It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown on a loop. Steve Bronson always set up a scarecrow at the end of the driveway, tied to the lamppost, with a speaker inside so that he could talk to the trick-or-treaters in a spooky voice and make it seem like the scarecrow was alive. Autumn leaves skittered along the street. Kids screamed happily. At Cheryl Gorman’s house, her drunken boyfriend had a toy chainsaw that made very real-sounding noises, and he chased teenagers down the street in a Leatherface mask. Cheryl and her boyfriend were alcoholics, but on Halloween, everyone pretended to ignore that sorry fact.

Rory loved it all.

It felt to him as if he was seeing his entire neighborhood for the very first time.

Like an alien, just setting foot on Earth.

Casey sat inside the RV with the guy they called Nettles—the one who had made her the foil unicorn, which she had now tucked into her pack, because she found it kind of cute. She wasn’t sure if Nettles was his real name, or a nickname because he got under everyone’s skin. She studied his tattoos while he blathered on, but after a minute or two she pulled her attention back to the task at hand—trying to figure out what the federal government had up their sneaky, stupid sleeve.

She peered into the portable microscope, which had been set up on the RV’s dinette table. The vial she’d stolen from Stargazer sat on the counter beside her. She had some of the liquid from it on a slide. The microscope wasn’t of the quality she would have preferred, but it was all she had to work with. Under the circumstances, she was glad to have it.

Adjusting the focus, she gazed at the smear of liquid, then pulled back from the microscope and blinked, incredulous. “Jesus. It’s like a… supermatrix of trihydroxy and amino acids.”

Nettles perked up expectantly. “Does that mean we smoke it or snort it?”

Casey glanced at the vial, talking to herself as much as to Nettles. “If I’m right… and I hope I’m not… it means they’re trying to upgrade themselves.”

Holy shit. She could barely believe she’d just uttered those words. It spooked her badly. Shaken, trying to tell herself she must be wrong but knowing she wasn’t, she picked up the two-way and keyed it.

“McKenna?” she said, after a small burst of static. “I’ve found something.”

The implications of Casey’s discovery echoing in his head, McKenna burst through the front door of the house that hadn’t felt like home for a long time. Heart thundering, he scanned the entryway and the short hall before he even let himself acknowledge Emily’s presence. She’d frozen when he whipped the door open and now she glared at him, her expression worthy of Medusa.

“Hi, honey, you’re home,” she said.

A beat went by, a breath, and then she glanced pointedly at the shotgun in his hand. McKenna had barely remembered that he carried the weapon and he didn’t have time to explain or apologize for it now.

“Where’s Rory?”

“Oh, I get it,” Emily said, falling into the old rhythm of their relationship, the familiar tone. “You think you can just waltz in here and—”

“I asked you a question.”

She leaned toward the stairwell, put her hand on the banister. “Agent Traeger, he’s in here!”

McKenna narrowed his eyes. “Nice try.” He tapped his earbud. “I was listening. Oh, and, ‘He’s done something crazy?’ Thanks for that.”

“What was I supposed to say?”

“How about, ‘Is my ex-husband all right?’ Normal families ask that.”

“There’s your answer.”

“Emily, now’s not the time,” McKenna said, thinking, as if the shotgun shouldn’t have told you all you needed to know. “Where’s Rory?”

Her mask slipped, and she revealed how worried Traeger’s visit had made her. She had loved him once, McKenna knew that, and maybe she still cared about him, but nothing mattered to her—to either of them—more than Rory. That maternal terror filled her eyes now and she turned to look back toward the kitchen.

“He’s not in his room. He was in the basement earlier,” she said. “I bought him two different Halloween costumes, but he went out without either of them. I think he’s trick-or-treating, but I have no idea what he’s wearing. Maybe last year’s outfit.”

McKenna moved past her, headed for the kitchen. “He’s spending a lot of time in the basement lately?”

“He always does,” Emily said, following him.

“I mean the last couple of days. More than usual?”

“I guess. Maybe.”

The basement door stood open. McKenna double-timed it down the steps and scanned the room, Rory’s worktable, his posters, the computer screens still open, ready for him to re-engage with the video games he’d been playing. Then he spotted a parcel on the floor next to the table and he rushed over to it. He could almost smell the dust from the tiny Mexican village on the box, and when he picked it up, the return label confirmed its origin.

He shook the box, but the weight alone told him it was empty.

“Shit!” he said as he tossed it aside.

Emily had paused on the steps. Now she descended two more stairs. “What? So he ordered some video games.”

“No, no, no, no,” McKenna said as he rifled through Rory’s things, checking under discarded sweatshirts and behind a stack of books and inside a chest that had once held toys. When he spoke again, it was a low rasp, mostly to himself. “The whole fucking reason I sent it to a PO box was so I wouldn’t put you in danger! Goddamnit!”

He spun around and stared at Emily. “We need to find him. Now!”

McKenna bolted, passing her on the stairs.

Emily pressed herself against the railing, staring at him as he rushed upward. “Quinn, you’re scaring me.”

He strode across the kitchen, almost dragging Emily in his wake. “You let him order any video games he wants?” he tossed over his shoulder.

Despite the situation—or perhaps because of it—she bristled. “Excuse me?”

“I specifically said no first-person shooters. No combat games.”

He heard her swear under her breath.

“Did you ever think maybe he plays them to connect with his father?” she retorted, almost hissing the words through her teeth. Then Emily seemed to catch herself, realizing how often they’d been in this argument before. “Oh my God. We’re doing this.”

McKenna had the impression she was going to say something more, but then they marched into the living room and Emily froze. He couldn’t blame her, really, as in the moments they’d been downstairs, the house had quickly and silently filled with lunatics. They’d apparently left Dr. Brackett—Casey—in the RV, but the rest of them were there: Nebraska, Coyle, Lynch, Nettles, Baxley. Every one of the crazy fuckers who’d become his de facto new unit, at least until this horror came to an end. McKenna surveyed his team, saw Lynch shuffling his cards and Coyle rubbing the stubble atop his shaved head, eyes wide. Baxley and Nettles were rummaging around the living room, picking up framed photos to look at them and wiping a bit of dust off the fireplace mantel.

The room was full of Emily’s paintings, the beautiful and heartbreaking works of her imagination, and the paintings were drawing the attention of the men too. Nebraska was leaning forward to peer at one with the intensity of an art critic assessing technique.

“What are you doing? Give me those!” she snapped, striding forward and snatching a couple of her paintbrushes out of Nettles’ hand. She wheeled on McKenna. “Who are these people?”

The corner of McKenna’s mouth lifted in the closest he could come to a smile. “They’re my unit. They’re soldiers.”

She gaped at him, incredulous. “They look like ushers at a porno theatre.”

Nebraska had now straightened from the painting he’d been examining and was looking at her. He raised an eyebrow.

Aware she might have overstepped the mark, Emily said, “No offence.”

Eyebrow still raised, Nebraska addressed McKenna. “The wife?”

“For better or worse,” McKenna muttered, wondering if Emily might grab a kitchen knife and murder them all. Seeing them through her eyes made them seem that much crazier. He sighed and tiredly waved a hand around the room. “Emily? Loonies. Loonies? Emily.”

As the Loonies murmured shy greetings, McKenna hurried around the room, snatching up pictures of Rory—school photos, holiday pictures—plucking them off the walls and side tables.

“Wait, back up,” Emily said, shaking her head as it all sank in. “Your unit? What happened to Haines? Dupree?”

McKenna took a deep breath. “They’re dead. And the thing that killed them is looking for Rory. So. You can think I’m crazy all you want…” He closed his eyes briefly. He wished to God he wasn’t here, wished he wasn’t having to say these words. “But now? Our son is in a kill box.”

Emily looked shell-shocked. The color drained from her face. “Looking for Rory…” she repeated, her voice low and croaky. Then suddenly the volume ramped up, became abruptly shrill, panicked. “What thing?”

“It’s…” McKenna saw the terror and accusation in his ex-wife’s eyes, and was suddenly at a loss for words. Turning desperately to the Loonies, he said, “Guys, what is it?”

Coyle was the first to respond. Fumblingly he said, “Um… it’s not, like, a person. It’s… a creature.”

Eager to help, Nebraska said, “You know Whoopi Goldberg?”

Emily looked at him in bewilderment. “Yes.”

“It’s like an alien Whoopi Goldberg,” he said helpfully.

Emily just stared at him. And when she finally murmured, “Oh my God,” it was unclear whether she was horrified by the image Nebraska had conjured in her mind, or horrified simply by the fact that she was having to trust her son’s welfare to a bunch of crazy—and possibly dangerous—people.

McKenna decided it was probably best not to muddy the waters still further by allowing time for the other Loonies to chip in. Instead, he started to hand out the pictures of Rory, his voice brisk, authoritative. “I want a grid search. Three teams…”

His voice tailed off. In his peripheral vision, he saw that Emily was shrugging into her coat, having snatched up, of all things, a fireplace poker. He marched across and grabbed it from her hand.

Furious, she squared up to him. “Our son’s in danger!”

“That’s right. And last time I looked?” He hefted his gun. “This is match grade.” Now he lifted the poker. “This? Not so much. But points for originality.”

Casey’s head jerked up as the door of the RV opened, her hand going instinctively for the handgun on the table beside her. But it was only McKenna and the Loonies. McKenna was all business.

“Nebraska,” he was saying, “find some wheels. Nothing flashy.” Nodding across the room, he added, “Casey, you’re with me.”

He paused for a beat, fixing each of the guys with a look of purpose and determination.

Then he said, “Let’s find my son.”