Fear Nothing

properly operate pistols or revolvers; and with their relatively low body weight, they would be kicked head over heels by the recoil. These creatures were surely smart enough to understand the purpose and operation of handguns, but at least the horde of geniuses in the Wyvern labs hadn't chosen to work with gorillas. Although, if the idea occurred to them, they would no doubt immediately seek funding for that enterprise and would not only provide the gorillas with firearms training but instruct them, as well, in the fine points of nuclear-weapons design.
        Two more stones snapped against the targeted window glass.
        I touched the cell phone clipped to my belt. There ought to be someone we could call for help. Not the police, not the FBI. If the former responded, the friendly officers on the Moonlight Bay force would probably provide cover fire for the monkeys. Even if we could get through to the nearest office of the FBI and could sound more credible than all the callers reporting abduction by flying saucers, we would be talking to the enemy; Manuel Ramirez said the decision to let this nightmare play itself out had been made at “very high levels,” and I believed him.
        With a concession of responsibility unmatched by generating ions before ours, we have entrusted our lives and futures to professionals and experts who convince us that we have too little knowledge or wit to make any decisions of importance about the management of society. This is the consequence of our gullibility and laziness. Apocalypse with primates.
        A still larger stone struck the window. The pane cracked but didn't shatter.
        I picked up the two spare 9-millimeter magazines on the table and tucked one into each of my jean pockets.
        Sasha slipped one hand under the rumpled napkin that concealed the Chiefs Special.
        I followed her lead and got a grip on the hidden Glock.
        We looked at each other. A tide of fear washed through her eyes, and I was sure that she saw the same dark currents in mine.
        I tried to smile reassuringly, but my face felt as though it would crack like hard plaster. “Gonna be fine. A deejay, a surf rebel, and the Elephant Man - the perfect team to save the world.”
        “If possible,” Bobby said, “don't immediately waste the first one or two that come in. Let a few inside. Delay as long as you can. Let them feel confident. Sucker the little geeks. Then let me open on them first, teach them respect. With the shotgun, I don't even have to aim.”
        “Yes, sir, General Bob,” I said.
        Two, three, four stones - about as hefty as peach pits - struck the windows. The second large pane cracked, and a subsidiary fissure opened off that line, like lightning branching.
        I was experiencing a physiological rearrangement that would have fascinated any physician. My stomach had squeezed up through my chest and was pressing insistently at the base of my throat, while my pounding heart had dropped down into the space formerly occupied by my stomach.
        Half a dozen more substantial stones, whaled harder than before, battered the two large windows, and both panes shattered inward. With a burst of brittle music, glass rained into the stainless-steel sink, across the granite counters, onto the floor. A few shards sprayed as far as the dinette, and I shut my eyes briefly as sharp fragments clinked onto the tabletop and plopped into the remaining slices of cold pizza.
        When I opened my eyes an instant later, two shrieking monkeys, each as large as the one that Angela had described, were already at the window again. Wary of the broken glass and of us, the pair swung inside, onto the granite counter. Wind churned in around them, plucking at their rain-matted fur.
        One of them looked toward the broom closet, where the shotgun was usually locked away. Since their arrival, they hadn't seen any of us approach that cupboard, and they couldn't possibly spot the 12-gauge balanced on Bobby's knees, under the table.
        Bobby glanced at them but was more interested in the window opposite him, across the table.
        Hunched and agile, the two creatures already in the room moved along the counter in opposite directions from the sink. In the dimly lighted kitchen, their malevolent yellow eyes were as bright as the flames leaping on the points of the candle wicks.
        The intruder to the left encountered a toaster and angrily