"Whoever did this couldn't be far away," Vijay whispered back.

Billy pointed the spotlight ahead and to the right of the corpse, thinking the killer would have either escaped to the road or would still be lurking somewhere nearby. A human couldn't have leapt over the canal, neither would they have jumped in it.

The creature did not feel well rewarded for having showed itself to the small human before feeding on it. For some reason, it had not emanated the emotion the larger prey had before. Nevertheless, the flesh was satisfying and it resumed its journey.

Forty or fifty yards from its kill, it felt the vibrations of a human machine moving next to the waterway. Before today it would have continued swimming, perhaps even accelerating its speed to put more distance between itself and its place of feeding. But that was the old program; it had new instructions now.

It turned and followed the vibrations. The machine stopped and after a period of time during which the creature could detect no new vibrations, it lifted its head and looked: bright lights pointed at the remains of its kill and it sensed two humans.

Watching to see what the humans would do, it tested several possible actions of its own and picked one.

Lawless lay on the back seat, holding himself and shaking. Although the vision ended several minutes ago, he had yet to say anything. His eyes were open but not focused.

Jensen was in back, his head on her lap, running her fingers through his hair while cooing soft words.

Baskel didn't know what to do or say, so he sat with his hands folded in his lap, staring at nothing.

"We were too late," Lawless croaked, focusing his eyes on Jensen.

"I know," she said. "But what could we do?"

"It has three yellow eyes. It's black and its head's about two feet across, maybe more. Rows of big teeth, like Fruega said. Gotta be ten inches long, maybe a foot. And when it opened its mouth, it was like, twice the diameter of its head. I get the feeling it wanted to scare the kid first because it came up out of the water and hovered over him for, I don't know, three, maybe five seconds."

"How long was it?" Baskel asked. He'd turned around in the seat and was looking at Lawless, who startled and sat up. He'd forgotten Baskel was there.

"I don't know. I didn't see anything but its eyes and teeth. Was someone close to the scene? Did we get a shot at it?"

"I had two officers within a half-mile but they haven't reported in yet."

Lawless's eyes defocused and he fell back onto Jensen's lap.

"Again?" Baskel said, giving Jensen a look, as if she was causing the visions.

She shrugged.

"It hasn't gone far," Lawless said. "Is one of your patrolmen Hindu?"

Baskel had to think. "Yeah. As a matter of fact the one I talked to on the radio is. Half Indian, I think. Last name's Williamson. Why?"

"Because I'm looking at him right now. He said they need to get out of the car and see if the boy's killers are still hanging around."

Lawless was quiet for a few seconds, then, "Ah, jeez ... they're at the scene. I see what's left of the boy."

Jensen was the first to realize what this meant. "You're looking through the eyes of a cop?" She began to panic.

Baskel's eyes got big.

Lawless, frantic now, "They're not looking in the water. They're supposed to be looking in the water. Get on the radio! Do it now!"

Baskel grabbed his radio and tried to remember what car they were in, but couldn't. "Williamson and Poloosa. Come in! Come in dammit!" he shouted into the radio.

"I hear your voice." Lawless said. "I'm looking back at the radio. Williamson's got one leg out of the car and he's got the shotgun."

"Poloosa! Pick up the damn radio! This is Detective Baskel!"

"Now he's looking out the front windshield and Williamson's all the way out."

"Poloosa! You're looking the wrong way! Look in the canal, man, the canal! It's in the canal!"

"Good. He's looking at the canal. Tell him to use the spotlight."

"Poloosa, use your spotlight. Point it at-"

"Look out! There it is! Tell him to shoot it!"

"Shoot it, Poloosa! Shoot it!"

"What do you think?" Billy asked.

"I don't see anyone. Do you?" Vijay said.

"Nope. Let's get out and look around."

Vijay opened the door and the radio squawked: Williamson and Poloosa. Come in. Come in dammit!

Billy frowned at Baskel's lack of proper radio protocol. "You go ahead. I'll get this."

The radio squawked again. Poloosa! Pick up the damn radio! This is Detective Baskel!

"I know who you are, dumb ass," Billy said to the radio.

Vijay got out of the car with the shotgun and said, "Hey Billy. You see something over there, by the canal, on the other side of the body?"

Billy peered through the windshield, reached for the radio, grabbed air.

"Poloosa! You're looking the wrong way! Look in the canal, man, the canal! It's in the canal!" Detective Baskel's voice boomed out of the radio.

"What's in the canal?" Billy said, frowning, turning to look.

He saw a black head with three yellow eyes peering at him from the middle of the canal. He squinted, trying to see what it was.

The radio squawked: "Shoot it, Poloosa. Shoot it!"

But Billy wasn't paying attention to the radio. He was reaching for the spotlight when the thing with the yellow eyes attacked, taking his left arm and most of the door.

"What's going on?" Vijay asked, hearing a screeching tearing metallic sound.

Billy didn't know. He stared down at what was left of the door and wondered how it could have vanished like that. "What happened?"

When he saw that his arm was gone, he screamed at the black head with blood on its face. The head lunged again.

It moved into position across from the human machine and lifted itself out of the water. The human turned and looked at it, then reached for the blinding light, infuriating it.

The creature did not hesitate as it had with the small human, sensing danger if it did. Lunging with lightening speed, it tore at the human and its machine with gaping jaws. It's metal teeth sliced through machine and human as if they were one. It pulled back and looked.

The human opened its mouth and made a vibration and bathed the creature with rich emotions.

The creature lunged again, taking most of the human's torso, then lunged a third time, biting further into the machine, taking all of the human it could before plunging into the canal.

It swam east, moving with great speed, charged with fury and nourished by human flesh.

Lawless threw up, splattering hot vomit onto the floor and Jensen's shoes. Baskel fought back the bile rising in his own throat and told himself none of this was happening. Struggling to maintain control over his emotions, over his sanity, he pressed the button on the radio. "Officer Poloosa, come in."

No one responded and he knew it was useless to try, so he called dispatch with an officer-down code. They would send an ambulance and backup.

The yeasty stench of vomit filled the car; Baskel opened his door and got out, laboring to remain focused. He wanted to call his wife to come and pick him up, give him something stiff to drink and put him to bed. Then, when he got up tomorrow, he would discover this night had been nothing but a bad dream.

The engine switched off and Jensen joined him by the side of the car, stomping her feet to shake the vomit off her shoes.

"What's he doing?" Baskel asked.

"Just laying there, staring. At the back of the seat, not the roof."

"Is he talking?"

She shook her head.

"How does he do that?"

"I don't know. How do you put a round metal disc on your roof, point it at the sky, and watch the Superbowl on your television? How does that work? There's all kinds of shit floating through the air, all around us: television broadcasts, radio waves, short waves, satellite transmissions, cell phones, x-rays, gamma rays ... thoughts and emotions. It's all around us, all the time. All you need's the right receiver. You got a receiver, you can tap into the stream."

She stomped her feet again and wiped her right shoe on the back of her left pant leg.

"Man, if he could just control it," Baskel said. "Just zoom out there," he made a flying motion with his hand, "and tell us where it is so we could blow it up. From the air. I don't want to be on the ground anywhere close to that thing."

Jensen thought. "Do you guys have a helicopter?"

"Three. Don't use them that much, but we got 'em."

"Three? What if we put them in the air? Would that cut our response time down?"

"Probably. The problem is, the thing's in the water. How can we see it in the water?"

Jensen thought some more. "What about heat sensors or thermographs, something that can detect heat on the ground from a helicopter? We could fly around and check the canals. If we could get three of them going we might be able to find it pretty fast."

Baskel brightened. "Shit yeah, that might work."

"It's some kind of reptile. Reptiles are cold blooded," Lawless said from the back seat.

"It still might work," Baskel said. He pulled out his cell phone.

Jensen returned to the car and said to Lawless, "How're you feeling?"

"I've been better."

"You wanna get out, get some fresh air?"

"I don't think I can stand."

"I'll help. Come on, it stinks in there."

She helped him out of the car and propped him up, looked him over: bad. "Do you think you should stand long? What if you get another one?"

He nodded. "I'm sure it's not finished."

She took a deep breath and held it, and removed the mat Lawless had vomited on. She walked it several yards away and dropped it on the pavement.

"That got rid of most it," she said, after testing the air in the car.

They watched Baskel as he walked around the parking lot, talking on his cell phone and gesturing with his free hand.

He came back, walking fast, energized. "I need you to take me back to my car. I got a crime scene to examine."

Back at Big Valley, Baskel said, getting out of the car, "You coming?"

Lawless shook his head. "Nothing we can do there."

"You got my cell number?" Baskel asked Jensen. She nodded. "Call me if he gets another one. Don't use the radio." He didn't need to explain why.

When Baskel got to the canal off Briggsmore, there were already a hundred people there, including two dozen cops. When they heard "officer down" on the radio, they had come running, eager to provide back-up for one of their own.

Now, however, most of them looked eager to leave, after having seen what was left of Billy Poloosa and the boy on the canal.

The press was there, too, trying to push their way in for pictures. Baskel wondered how many grisly shots they had managed to get before someone covered the remains. Reporters yelled questions at stoic-faced policemen, shoving microphones and tape recorders in their faces whether they answered or not. An older officer, heavy around the middle but wide across the shoulders, had had enough. He grabbed the most obnoxious reporter by the collar and ran him out to the road, pushed him into his vehicle, and told him what he could do with his microphone.

Half the cops were keeping the crowd back or standing by the remains while the other half rotated past the ruined patrol car, looking at the drivers' side, the side Baskel couldn't see. Each cop looked for a few seconds, shook his or her head, and walked away, either down the access road to the young boy's remains or down off the canal bank to help scowl at the crowd. He smelled the familiar sour odor of vomit, and took to watching where he stepped.

As he approached the patrol car, a young female officer he didn't recognize said, "Thank God you're here, Detective. No one knows what to do."

"Looks like you're doing a pretty good job keeping the crowd back."

"What the hell happened here?"

Baskel detected a faint whiff of puke on her breath and immediately felt sorry for her. This probably wasn't what she had in mind when she chose a career in law enforcement.

He realized he now knew how Lawless and Jensen must have been feeling for days: what exactly do I tell these people? He needed time to think. He said, "I'm not sure, officer. I just got here myself."

She wasn't letting it go. "The drivers' door was ripped off and Poloosa's torn up. Not even half his body's left. What the hell is going on?"