"Send cars by all our guys on Briggsmore and Lateral Number Four." He pointed at the map while giving the orders. "Tell them to make sure every light is on and every volunteer is at least fifty feet from the canal. They miss anyone, they get suspended without pay."

He stood there, hands on hips, staring at the map. He would soon learn he had guessed wrong, and while he would feel bad it didn't matter because it was too late.

Randy Foghorn was already being ripped apart when Captain Bozeman sent his resources north instead of south. Buddy and Randy never did turn their lights on and they never heard any of the radio warnings because Randy, whose turn it was to handle the radio, had dropped it in the canal while fiddling with the channel dial.

The young swam close to the adult. Their first taste of prey had ignited their genetic lust for flesh and blood, and they were eager to kill again. Apt students, they would learn all the adult knew about the prey on this planet in two days.

This was a critical time for their kind, a time of rapid evolution. They needed to grow wings and disperse soon, requiring the expenditure of great quantities of energy: they needed to feast while the planet's bright star was cool.

They swam by her side and hunted with her.

"You clumsy shit," Buddy called Randy, after Randy dropped the radio into the canal. Then he laughed, glad it was Randy who would have to answer for the radio. He hoped they would make him pay for it and wondered how much one cost. Randy probably knew.

"I bet they make you pay for that, man. How much you think one of those cost?"

Randy was worried, but more about getting kicked out of the cadets than having to pay for a radio. "I think two hundred bucks," he told Buddy, who laughed again. Randy had no idea how much the radio was worth.

"Man, where are you gonna get two hundred bucks? We don't even get paid for doing this shit."

"They'll pay us good when we're on the force," Randy replied, sending his mind off in a new direction, already forgetting the radio.

Buddy was tired of sitting and doing nothing, and they still had, what? Five or six hours until daybreak? And he was tired of eating food from a package, he wanted something hot. He got off the curb and stretched his legs, trying to think of where they were and what fast food joints were near.

"Hey Randy," he said. "I'm going to make a quick run to Jack in the Box. You want something?"

"We're not supposed to leave our post."

"What post? A canal? Forget that. I'm tired of chips and Pepsi. I'll be back in ten or fifteen minutes. Watch my stuff, will you man?"

Buddy got in his car and drove away. Randy hadn't asked for anything from the restaurant, but Buddy knew his friend well enough to know he was crashing and needed a dose of caffeine and sugar, something big. Mountain Dew if they had it. Maybe even some kind of frosty coffee drink with shots of espresso.

Randy sat on the curb, thinking how he didn't like being here by himself in the dark when he remembered something about lights; weren't they supposed to set up some lights? He looked on both sides of the street, but couldn't see lights anywhere. He tried to remember if they had been given lights in the first place, but his blood sugar was running so low he was having trouble thinking.

He crossed to Buddy's side of the street and took one of his Pepsi's from the cooler. He didn't like Pepsi, but it was cold and had caffeine and sugar. He drained half the can in a few seconds and immediately felt better. Sitting on the curb, he peeked into Buddy's snack bag and speared a chocolate donut, munched, got into Buddy's chips, which made him thirsty again so he drained the Pepsi. He polished off two Pepsis and a thousand calories of junk food in ten minutes.

He jumped up from the curb, spilling a bag of chips onto the ground, driven by an intense urge to pee. He hopped up and down and looked around for the most private place to relieve himself.

He hustled around the railing to the side of the canal, unzipped and barely had his penis out when a stream of hot urine came shooting out, arcing into the canal. He sighed and smiled.

A splash to his right: something was there. He waited for his eyes to adjust, sure he can't be seeing what he thinks he sees. The image doesn't change and he forgets his bladder and takes off for the road, in such a hurry he forgets to scream.

("What do you see?") ("Nothing but blackness.") This had been his answer for ten minutes. The creature was swimming somewhere in the canals but Lawless couldn't tell where and every time he tried to send his mind out to next victim he got nothing.

Baskel stood in front of a window, staring into the night, had been there since Jensen told him the monster's ultimate goal was to wipe out humanity. He alternated between thinking and trying not to think, knowing they could peek into his brain at any time and read his thoughts.

He got a can of soda from the kitchen and stopped behind Jensen and Lawless. She'd been doing the same thing for thirty or forty minutes: holding Lawless's hand and stroking his head.

He sat on the couch and cleared his throat. "Did you bring those, things, with you, like some parasite you forgot to zap before you left your planet? And how did you get here? Where'd you come from? Who the hell are you?"

Jensen's voice answered, ("We came from a planet far away, through a space-travel machine. We didn't bring the Evil Species with us but we knew they would come, sooner or later.") Baskel took a drink and looked miserable. A thousand questions popped into his mind. "How? How did you know they would come?"

Jensen turned away.

"What? Tell me."

("I don't want to tell you because I'm ashamed.") "Ashamed of -" Baskel's sentence was interrupted by Lawless's voice, ("I'm in the next victim. I assume.") Baskel set his soda down and picked up the radio.

("What do you see?") ("I'm by a canal, just opening a can of Pepsi.") Baskel activated the radio and said, "We're starting up again."

"Good," was all the captain said, and Baskel thought, Why's that good?

("There are no lights by this canal, none on either side.") ("Can you see a street name or a store, anything we can use to identify the location?") ("No, but it's a narrow canal.") "They don't have their lights on and it's one of the smaller canals," Baskel relayed into the radio.

"Everyone's been warned many times to turn their lights on and get away from the water. Maybe it's not one of our guys," the radio said back.

"Have you accounted for everyone? Everyone's checked in?"

A pause, then, "We're still working on that. It's likely some of them left their radio in their car, or never even turned them on."

("He's jumping up and down. Now I'm looking around, going around the railing and walking to the canal.") They knew what was coming next.

"Can't you communicate with him somehow?" Baskel said, frustrated. "Scream in his head or something. Tell him to get out of there."

("He's urinating ... He sees the monster. The monster's out of the canal, and ... it's moving on legs. It's adapted to land already. I'm running!") "Ah, shit." Then, into the radio, "It's coming after the guy, and it's grown legs."

("Do you see wings?") ("No, but I couldn't see everything because I turned to run for the road.") There was a pause when they held their breath, then, ("It's grabbed me ... and it's carrying me back to the canal. I see ... six sets of silver teeth in the canal. It's released me and I'm falling ... It's dark ...") "Holy mother of God," Baskel moaned, then pressed the send button.

Buddy ordered a sourdough burger, fries, and a Coke, up-sized the fries and drink for seventy-five cents and ordered an extra-large Coke for Randy. Pepsi owned Mountain Dew, Jack was a Coke chain.

It took him longer than usual to get his food, but he didn't mind. It was good to get away from Randy. After checking his fries to make sure they were fresh, not reheated, Buddy pulled forward to allow the car behind him to pull up to the window, put his car in park and took his food out of the bag. He took a big bite of his burger and snagged a few fries, stuffing them in his mouth. The food was hot and delicious.

A horn tooted and he left, in no rush to get back to the canal. It wasn't going anywhere.

Taking a bite of his burger, spinning the steering wheel with one hand, he turned onto the street that led to their assigned canal. Half of a hamburger patty fell out from between the toasted bread and landed on his shirt, then slid down onto the seat between his thighs. He swore, set the bread down on the flattened paper bag where he'd laid his fries, dug in his crotch for the meat, found it and popped it into this mouth, all without once looking at the road.

When he finally did look, he was thirty feet from some kind of long black thing - a dinosaur? - holding Randy in its mouth. Buddy stomped on the brakes and skidded to a stop. Randy screamed when the thing dropped him into the canal.

It had legs and impossibly huge silver teeth. Buddy's mind went blank.

The thing turned and looked at Buddy's car. He flipped on the high beam, making the thing wince and shut its three eyes. It jumped onto his car, landing on the hood and roof. His car rocked and groaned. Sharp metal claws gouged up the hood and two poked through the roof.

It bit through the roof. Buddy saw huge silver teeth above his head and stomped on the gas, made it ten feet before the thing tore his head off.

When the cops came later, they found Buddy's car ripped to shreds: all four doors chewed off, the roof gone, tires shredded, trunk crushed. All they would find of Buddy was his right leg below the knee, his foot wedged under the brake peddle. They never found any part of Randy. But then, they didn't really look.

The room went silent as Baskel's voice crackled out of the radio speaker, reporting that two of their cadets had just been killed. Bozeman and the others tried to picture the scene in their minds, but were having trouble creating an image of the monster with legs. Hadn't Baskel also said there were six more?

Someone checked the roster of cadets who hadn't checked in and found three pairs. Cars were dispatched to each and within five minutes they knew who had been killed.

They made a cursory sweep of the area to make sure no one was laying around somewhere wounded. Finding what they expected, nothing, they sealed off the street with yellow tape and flares, got back in their cars, and left.

"All they had to do was turn on the lights," the captain said in disbelief. "Was that so hard to do? Did we not make that clear enough?"

He became prophetic, seeing future lawsuits, official inquiries, and crucifixion by endless op-eds and speculative reporting. They would say he should've brought in the National Guard, that it was reckless to place untrained personnel, teenagers and retirees, in the line of fire as he'd done tonight. He knew all that would've changed would be who got killed, but he clearly understood he'd made a career-ending mistake.

"Send cars to every one of the volunteers. Tell the officers to check the lights and make sure they're working, then send everyone home."

"Home?" someone asked.

"That's what I said. The buffet is closed for the night. Let it come out of the water to eat, where we can get a couple of good shots at it."

"Brothers and sisters, I call you my brothers and sisters because we are all children of the Lord God Almighty."

"Praise the Lord!" the congregation shouted.

"Brothers and sisters, we have a pool of water before us, water not unlike the River Jordan where our Lord and Savior, the very Jesus Christ that bought us with his blood-"

"Amen!" yelled the congregation.

"-went down into the water, just like he went down into the depths of hell for us and yanked our souls back up to God-"

"Hallelujah!"

"-so we could receive the baptism of John. Brothers and sisters, let this pool be your spiritual Jordan tonight. Come wash away your sins and show forth a mighty sign that you accept him as your Lord and Savior, your personal Lord and Savior."

Pastor Keith took off his jacket and tie and removed his shoes.

"Who among you is a sinner? Who among you has a broken heart, broken on the cross of the Lamb?"

Sister Tanya's heart, while not broken, certainly was pounding. She was picturing Pastor Keith lifting her out of the water, his strong warm hand supporting the small of her back, her blouse clinging to her bosoms, water running down her thighs ... She almost fainted.

"Who will be baptized tonight, as a sign of their repentance and faith in the Mighty One?" Pastor Keith roared.

"I will!" shouted a fat man with long red hair. Sister Tanya recognized him as a faithful churchgoer and one of their most generous donors. On any other day she could have recited his name and the amount he had given in each of the last three years, but tonight such facts and figures were buried under a mountain of passion she had never known.

"Brother!" shouted Pastor Keith. "Come to the pool of Jordan and be washed clean of your sins!"

The man rushed forward, kicked off his shoes, and stepped into the water with Pastor Keith, who shouted some kind of prayer and dunked him. So enthusiastic was the dunking that a wave of water splashed into the dirt around the pool, making a muddy, slippery mess.

The fat man shouted "Hallelujah!" and climbed out. A church helper threw a towel over his shoulders and hugged him. The man collected his shoes and walked back to his seat, shivering.

"Who else will accept the Lord tonight?" Pastor Keith hollered.

The fat man was a plant and had gotten the ball rolling, as Pastor Keith had hoped he would. Soon there was a small line of sinners waiting to be saved. The choir director received a visual cue and swung his baton, leading the choir through a medley of rocking gospel hymns. Sinner after sinner was dunked until there wasn't enough water to submerge anyone in.

His clothes wet, Pastor Keith climbed onto the stage and led the congregation in prayer. He prayed for the sinners everywhere, including the Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, and atheists. He prayed for the sinners in Modesto who hadn't attended his revival and thus hadn't had the privilege of having their sins washed away. He prayed for the sinners in the congregation who lacked the courage to give away their sins, prayed for their souls.

Pastor Keith did not pray for the children; he had something special planned for them.

"What good is any of this doing?" Baskel said in frustration, drop-kicking his empty soda can across the room. It struck a wall and clanked onto the carpet, spilling sticky warm soda. "We're nothing more than passive observers."

He turned to Jensen and Lawless. "Tell me, what good is any of this doing? You follow this thing, these monsters, across the universe and all you can do is talk without moving your lips and read minds? Don't you have any useful powers? Why couldn't you bring a ray gun with you, or a photon torpedo? And stop rubbing his head! I'm sick of all this head-rubbing!"

Jensen looked up and shocked him: her skin had become white, almost translucent, and her features had changed: her jaw line had straightened and her nose was not so pointed.

("The stroking serves a purpose; it stimulates his mind and helps him to see. It will help him to become.") "See what? Become what? You're not telling me anything!" Baskel paced and waved his arms around. "We got metal-toothed monsters out there tearing the town apart and you're giving scalp massages and talking about 'becoming.' Gimme something useful!"

("Your shouting is not serving a purpose and it's upsetting him.") ("It's not winged yet, but it will be tomorrow or the day after. We're not too late.") Lawless's voice said to them.

"So what? That still doesn't help me," Baskel said. " 'We're not too late' doesn't mean anything because you haven't done a damn thing, except narrate the slaughtering."

Lawless continued, ("It needs to feed its young so they can change as well. It's good that you're moving your volunteers away from the canals. At least they will be safer.") "What do you mean, safer? It can't get them if they're not by the canals, right?"

("It grew legs for a reason. If it can't find the prey it needs by the canals it will go on land to find it.") "Oh, thank you, that's the best news I've had all night. Now no one's safe, is that what you're telling me? First you say it can't be killed and now you're telling me it's going to be crawling around on land."

("We never said they can't be killed. We said your kind can't kill them. Our kind found a way.") "You did? How? If you can kill it, what are you waiting for?"

("I can't remember how.") "You forgot how to kill them?"

("No. I just haven't remembered yet.") The feeding frenzy had been spontaneous, all seven creatures unable to control their fury. How dare the prey hide from them in its metal machine? They tore it to pieces, pulled the insolent prey apart and devoured it.

They now hunted as a pack, the young ones' confidence bolstered by their successes. The prey was soft, weak, easy to dominate and destroy; it's flesh and psychic emanations nourished and strengthened them. They grew at an alarming rate: each was two feet longer than when they had left the lair.

She was pleased with the young ones progress. Their savagery impressed her but she knew they needed to feed through the entire period of darkness if they were to make the necessary changes in their bodies when the planet's sun was bright and hot. She must find more prey.

She was growing impatient; there were too few prey by the waterways and there was too much light. They needed to leave the waterway.

She slowed her pace and began searching for a high concentration of prey in the dwellings next to the waterway. There were many prey nearby, but she wanted the dwelling with the most prey, for she had six hungry young to feed.

Sensing something, she made a vibration at her young and leapt out of the water.

Rod Pennyworth had been looking forward to this night for months, a night with his buds, a night of debauchery and drunkenness where not only did no one leave sober, no one left at all. Anyone who began the night at his house would finish it there.

Rod loved hanging with the guys, doing stuff they could do only when their women weren't around: drinking excessive quantities of alcohol, eating heart-stopping gut-fattening colon-clogging food, and looking at naked women. Isn't that what every guy did when his woman was otherwise occupied? Rod thought so.

Tonight was Dermit Griswold's bachelor party, but the occasion wasn't important to Rod. What was important was what they were going to do. Although he loved it all - the drinking, football, gambling, softball in the summer and basketball in the winter, car and gun shows, barbecues - his favorite guy-thing were parties with strippers. Any bachelor party worth attending had to have a stripper.

Most guys were okay with porn, but not Rod. Why look at a television screen when you could have the real deal, bumping and grinding right there in your own living room? Maybe the stripper would let you touch her, maybe she wouldn't, but at least there was a chance. There was no chance of getting any action with a dvd.

Strippers were easy to hire, just look in the Yellow Pages. On slow nights or weekdays, he could get agencies to drop their price to beat a competitor's quote. He could get one on an hour's notice, like Pay-Per-View; he'd done it several times.

Dermit's party had started as usual, with good one hundred percent blue agave tequila, mixed drinks, beer on tap, and more tequila. Rod paced himself, didn't want to be shit-faced when the stripper arrived; you can't fully appreciate the show if you're seeing double and you can't get it up if you need to, if the opportunity presents itself.

He pushed the groom, though, made sure he was so wasted he would never remember what he did. That way everyone could lie, make up stuff and get him in trouble. It was great fun.

When they were half ripped, Rod brought out the embarrassing stuff: photos of the groom drunk off his ass doing something incredibly stupid; stories of chicks he might have laid if he'd had the balls; ugly chicks he did lay but later wished he hadn't; dropped passes; missed free throws; and all the other stupid, dumbass things he'd ever said and did, and some he didn't.

They were at the bar doing shots when the doorbell rang at eleven, right on time.