Ray nodded.
“Okay then, let’s take a look inside that briefcase.”
Amanda and Ray sat next to each other, across from his dad. Unconsciously she rested a hand on Ray’s thigh, as if the danger had drawn them closer. He felt light-headed and wondered if it was just the loss of blood.
His dad popped the latches on the metallic case. The inside was empty of the usual things a briefcase would hold—no papers, pens, or folders—just five identical objects. They looked like crystals, long and narrow with angular surfaces. And trapped within each was a viscous solution, a green liquid that almost glowed.
“What are they?” asked Ray.
His dad didn’t answer. Instead he picked up the first crystalline vial and held it close to his face. They were still inside the tunnel, so their window was a gray-black blur, the only light coming from a single bulb set into the ceiling.
Phil Gunstein almost dropped the object. Taking a deep breath, he steadied his grip and set the vial back inside the briefcase. He had a grave look on his face.
“Dad, what is it?”
His dad picked up the other vials and examined them one by one. Ray noticed for the first time that the bottom of each narrowed to a point, like a syringe.
“See for yourselves.” Ray’s dad lifted the first crystal vial so they could see the reflections moving across its surface.
Ray gasped. Inside the crystal was a perfect hologram of his father.
Every detail of his face, right down to the crow’s-feet around his eyes. He raised the next one and Ray recognized the face immediately—one of the women working with his father on the antimatter project.
Five vials for five scientists. Each with a perfect image of the recipient. His father had been first in line.
“What does it mean?” asked Amanda.
“I think these vials were meant to—”
“Kill you?” Ray blurted his worst fear.
His dad squinted at the vials. “Or make us forget.” He looked at his son and forced a smile. “But thanks to you—Ray Gun—they failed.” He paused and then added. “Whoever or whatever they are.”
“But won’t they—it—try again?”
His dad shook his head. “I don’t think so—once we hold our press conference, they’ll have no reason to come after the scientists.” He paused, drew a breath. “I guess anything is possible—we opened a doorway by accident. They saw it first and slipped something into our world.” He shrugged. “Maybe they’re afraid of us.”
“Afraid of us?i” said Ray.
“Maybe they’re afraid of what we’ll do if we visit their world. After all, we haven’t always done the best job with ours.”
Ray visualized the creature on top of the train. It hadn’t looked like it was afraid of anything.
“But if we opened the door,” his dad continued, “we can keep it closed.”
Ray looked up. “But that means abandoning your life’s work.”
“I won’t give up, just change direction.” His dad forced a smile. “Besides, I’m looking at my life’s work.” He placed a hand on Ray’s shoulder.
Ray felt himself blush. He turned toward Amanda to see if she’d noticed.
“Ray Gun?” she said. “You’re not serious.”
Ray started to reply but was blinded by a burst of sunshine as they emerged from the tunnel. Everyone blinked and glanced outside. Ray could see rolling fields with horses and cows, speeding past like an out-of-control carousel. Amanda opened her mouth to make another remark, but Ray never heard her, because her voice was drowned out by a thousand pieces of glass exploding into the car.
The creature was still alive, and it was climbing through the broken window.
It moved like a folding chair, knees bending in the wrong direction as they extended through the window frame.
Ray’s dad pulled them back toward the door. They could run to the next car, but they couldn’t all climb onto the roof like Ray did, and he was too weak to try it again. The thing in the window wasn’t going to stop.
His dad stared in disbelief but had enough presence of mind to push Ray closer to Amanda. Their eyes met, and Ray noticed for the first time that her eyes weren’t brown at all but were dark green.
Green like a gecko. That’s when he got the idea, and Ray knew from her expression Amanda was already there with him. She held his gaze for another second before dashing to the next compartment.
Amanda returned carrying a large plastic box with a wire mesh door. Ray could see a white furry ball with a wrinkled face, watery brown eyes. Amanda gingerly opened the door and made kissing sounds as she produced the smallest dog Ray had ever seen.
Amanda shielded the dog’s eyes as she stepped across the compartment. Ray’s dad was trying to position himself to shove the creature at just the right moment, but Ray knew the creature would be too strong. It had survived the tunnel, and a kick to the jaw had barely registered. It might not be graceful, but it was powerful.
Ray figured they had less than five seconds before the creature got far enough inside that it would be impossible to force it out again. He started counting in his head.
One. Ray’s dad reached into his bag and produced his antimatter gadget. “Maybe this will scare it,” he said through gritted teeth. “Stand back.”
Two. Amanda ignored him and squeezed in close to the window. She still had her hand over the dog’s eyes, but the wind blew fiercely into the cabin, and the dog was growling deep in its throat.
Three. The creature’s face became visible as it slid down from the roof. Its yellow eyes were glaring at them.
Four. Ray’s dad started to twist the two halves of the stainless-steel container.
Five. Amanda thrust the terrified dog through the open window.
Amanda held on tightly as the dog barked furiously, clawing Amanda’s arms in a frantic scramble to get back inside. She winced from the pain but didn’t let go.
Ray watched as the creature’s slit pupils narrowed in fear. Then a green light exploded in the cabin and Ray couldn’t see anything at all.
Ray blinked the spots from his eyes and saw his dad leaning out the window.
When he was satisfied the creature was gone, Phil Gunstein pulled his head inside and dropped the metal canister onto the table. “I thought I’d try to blind it.” He nodded at Amanda. “But I think your dog scared it silly.” He petted the dog, which was still trembling.
Ray noticed deep scratches across Amanda’s arms. “You okay?”
Amanda nodded as she left the cabin. Moments later she came back with a towel wrapped around her arms but without the dog. Ray reached for the first-aid kit but Amanda suddenly pushed past him and dropped to her knees.
“Greeny!”
Amanda laughed as a tiny lizard ran up her left arm and over her head, hiding itself in her red hair. She giggled and plucked it free, stood up, then held it by the tail only inches from her nose.
“No more running away, you hear me?” She looked at Ray. “Told you he’d find me.” Greeny swung back and forth, upside down. Ray smiled until the tiny creature swiveled its head in his direction.
The lizard blinked, and Ray gasped as he made eye contact with the gecko.
He recognized those eyes. They had tracked him across the dining car, followed him across the roof of the train. He looked from the lizard to Amanda, who was staring at him once again as if she’d read his mind.
Ray felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and wondered if it was only a side effect of his father’s invention. He blinked, but where he saw spots only moments before, now he saw only coincidences.
Ray glanced over at his dad, who was watching him and Amanda with a bemused expression, trying to connect the dots. Amanda still held the gecko only inches from his face. Ray forced a smile and said the first thing that came to mind.
“Hey, Dad, can we get a dog?”
Phil Gunstein looked from his son to the lizard, then back again.
“Ray Gu
n,” he said, “I think that’s a great idea.”
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
▼ R.L. STINE ▼
R.L. Stine loved horror stories as a kid, and when he discovered that the local barbershop carried copies of two horror comic books, he started getting a haircut every Saturday. He wrote lots of jokes and stories, kept writing through college, then moved to New York City to work as a writer. The first job he found was with a fan magazine, and he said that it was good training because it taught him to write fast and make up stuff.
He edited a humor magazine for a few years, but when it folded, he decided to try horror, and his series for teenagers, Fear Street, became a huge success. So he wrote a series for younger kids, Goosebumps, and his sales went through the roof. For several years in a row in the 1990s, he was voted not just the bestselling children’s author in the country, but the bestselling author. He has written more than three hundred books and sold more than four hundred million copies. He lives in New York City with his wife, Jane, and his dog, Minnie. His son, Matthew, is a musician, sound designer, and composer.
▼ HEATHER GRAHAM ▼
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Heather Graham was born somewhere in Europe and kidnapped by gypsies when she was a small child. She went on to join the Romanian circus as a trapeze artist and lion tamer. When the circus came to South Florida, she stayed, discovering that she preferred to be a shark and gator trainer.
Not really.
Heather is the child of Scottish and Irish immigrants who met and married in Chicago, and moved to South Florida, where she has spent her life. (She has, at least, been to the Russian circus in Moscow, where she wished she was one of the incredibly talented and coordinated trapeze artists.) She has written over one hundred and fifty novels and novellas, has been published in approximately twenty-five languages, and has over seventy-five million books in print. Recent titles include Nightwalker, Dust to Dust, and Unhallowed Ground.
▼ SUZANNE WEYN ▼
Suzanne Weyn grew up in Williston Park, Long Island, New York. As a girl she was very interested in theater and in reading. Louisa May Alcott was her favorite author, but she also read every Sherlock Holmes story. She now lives in upper New York State in a 1930s cottage on a horse farm. She was graduated from the State University of New York at Binghamton and received her master’s degree from Pace University.
Suzanne’s recent novels include The Bar Code Tattoo (2004) and its sequel, The Bar Code Rebellion (2006). The Bar Code Tattoo was selected by the American Library Association (ALA) as an ’05 Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers and was an ’07 Nevada Library nominee for Best Young Adult Fiction.
Her mystical, historic romance, Reincarnation, came out in January 2008 from Scholastic, and her novel, the bestselling Distant Waves: A Novel of the Titanic, was published in 2009. Her newest novel, Empty, came out in September 2010.
▼ JENNIFER ALLISON ▼
Jennifer Allison’s “The Perfects” was inspired in part by an old Victorian house the author passed each morning on her way to school in her small Michigan hometown. The author’s favorite childhood memories include sharing spooky urban legends and ghost stories with friends while sitting up in a barn hayloft or around a campfire. “Part of the fun of being scared by a story was sharing that feeling with my friends and bonding with them through that experience. People respond to horror fiction very physically; maybe that’s why the frightening tales always stuck in my memory.” After working as a book editor, news reporter, and high school English teacher, Jennifer Allison rediscovered her childhood passion for stories that are both spooky and funny. She writes a series of novels about a teenage sleuth named Gilda Joyce—a much-loved character among young readers. Books in the Gilda Joyce: Psychic Investigator series have received starred reviews and a nomination for the Edgar Award.
▼ HEATHER BREWER ▼
Heather Brewer was not your typical teen growing up, and she’s certainly not your typical adult now. She’s a huge fan of the macabre, and when she’s not reading horror, she’s writing it. Heather completely blames her father for her warped mind, as she recalls fondly watching The Twilight Zone as a young child, as well as every cheesy horror film you can imagine. Heather is the author of the New York Times bestselling The Chronicles of Vladimir Tod series, as well as the upcoming Slayer Journals series and Bloodbound series. She doesn’t believe in happy endings . . . unless they involve blood. She lives in Missouri with her husband and two children. Visit Heather at www.heatherbrewer.com.
▼ PEG KEHRET ▼
Peg Kehret’s middle-grade books have won dozens of state young reader awards, as well as the PEN Center West Award in Children’s Literature, the Golden Kite Award from the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, and the ASPCA’s Henry Bergh Award. Her thriller, Abduction!, was nominated for an Edgar Award by the Mystery Writers of America.
She enjoys writing thrillers because she gets so many letters from readers who tell her, “I love scary books!”
Peg has two grown children and four grandchildren. She volunteers with animal welfare groups, and has included dogs, cats, llamas, elephants, bears, horses, and monkeys in her books. Three of her books are co-authored by Pete the Cat, who now gets fan mail of his own. Peg lives in Wilkeson, Washington, with her dog and two cats, all rescued animals. Ghost Dog Secrets was published in 2010 by Dutton Children’s Books.
▼ ALANE FERGUSON ▼
People fascinate me—why do they do what they do, and how do their life experiences impact their choices? Since my best friend, Savannah, was the victim of a serial killer, I’ve spent a lot of my time studying the minds of murderers. I do believe in evil, but I also believe that every person is valuable, and I enjoy individuality—all are welcome at my table.
“Because of Savannah I began to write, winning the Edgar Allan Poe Award for my first novel. And, although I’ve published in other genres, the theme of mortality is a constant draw. In my YA Sleuth Forensic Mystery series, Cameryn, who works for her coroner father, sees death medically. Currently I’m expanding ‘Dragonfly Eyes’ into a novel that will explore the idea of justice and falling in love on the ‘other side.’ Through my family and my thirty-plus books I’ve learned to embrace life. Because you really never know . . .”
▼ RYAN BROWN ▼
As an actor Ryan Brown has held contract roles on The Young and the Restless and Guiding Light. He has also appeared on Law & Order: SVU, and starred in two feature films for Lifetime Television. His first novel, Play Dead, a comic supernatural thriller, was published in May of 2010. Ryan lives in New York with his wife and son.
▼ F. PAUL WILSON ▼
F. Paul Wilson is the award-winning, bestselling author of forty books and numerous short stories spanning science fiction, horror, adventure, medical thrillers, and virtually everything between. His work has appeared on the New York Times and other bestseller lists. His novel The Keep was made into a perfectly awful film, and The Tomb is presently in development hell in Hollywood. He’s perhaps best known for his urban mercenary character, Repairman Jack; he’s written about Jack as an adult and most recently as a teen in Jack: Secret Histories and Jack: Secret Circles.
His work has been translated into twenty-four languages. He also has written for the stage, screen, and interactive media. He has won the Stoker Award, the Inkpot Award, the Porgie Award, and multiple Prometheus Awards. He was voted Grand Master by the World Horror Convention and received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers of America. He is listed in the fiftieth anniversary edition of Who’s Who in America.
Paul resides at the Jersey shore and can be found on the web at www.repairmanjack.com.
▼ MEG CABOT ▼
Meg Cabot (her last name rhymes with habit—as in, “her books are habit-forming”) is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over twenty-five series and books for both adults and tweens/teens, selling over fifteen million copies worldwide.
Her Princ
ess Diaries series, which is currently being published in over thirty-eight countries, was made into two hit movies by Disney. Meg also wrote the bestselling paranormal series The Mediator as well as the 1-800-Where-R-You? series (on which the television series Missing was based).
Meg is currently writing an edgy new YA series Airhead, as well as the Heather Wells mystery series for adult readers. Her new adult paranormal, Insatiable, was just released.
Meg divides her time between Key West, Indiana, and New York City, with a primary cat (one-eyed Henrietta), various backup cats, and her husband.
▼ WALTER SORRELLS ▼
Edgar Award-winner Walter Sorrells is the author of around thirty mystery and thriller novels, including books written both for young people and for adults.
Walter’s most recent book for young adults is Whiteout, the third in his Hunted series.
A devoted martial artist, Walter holds a third-degree black belt in karate, and has also studied Brazilian Jujitsu, aikido, tai chi, and various Japanese sword arts. Walter is also a part-time swordsmith who specializes in hand forging Japanese-style swords and knives. He lives in Atlanta with his wife, Patti, and son, Jake (who is a heck of a baseball player). Someday Walter wants to write a book about the fun and insanity of youth baseball . . . but he hasn’t gotten around to it yet!
▼ JAMES ROLLINS ▼
James Rollins is the New York Times bestselling author of adventure thrillers, sold to over thirty countries. As a veterinarian, he still does volunteer work, but you’ll often find him underground or underwater as an avid caver and scuba diver. These hobbies have helped in the creation of his earlier books, including Subterranean, Deep Fathom, and Amazonia.