FLIPKA

Chapter Four

If the eyes are the windows to the soul, the taste buds are the autobahn to the brain. It’s true, believe me. You can’t possibly communicate with a group of teenage girls over dried apricots. It just can’t be done. I needed chocolate and there was certainly none to be had at Enev.

“I’ve got to take a drive,” I informed Winnie Peterson as I returned the girls’ files to the office for lockdown. “I’ll be back just after lunch.”

She was aghast. I had just gotten there; I hadn’t really met or talked to the girls, and now I was leaving? Luckily, the arrival of fresh new inmates temporarily distracted her. Hooray for the cavalry, I thought, as I watched five young ladies stumble out of a State of Nevada van, this week’s catch of bad girls from all over the state. My own little darlings were busy learning to be happy homemakers, along with a dozen or so other young ladies from the other barracks, in the stainless steel kitchen of the dining barracks. 

There were six other barracks, each containing from seven to twelve girls. They sat facing each other across a rectangular weed patch, where in the late 1860s, young men fresh from the Midwest and other points east had marched in formation, pumped up to fight the mighty Injun who turned out to be a squat locust eater unaware the land had been appropriated by the Great White God. After the cavalry left, the fort sat vacant, acid-washed by the wind until it resembled Stonehenge. Fort Palmer’s recent history was as murky as a dirty fish tank, which meant only one thing: the current structures had been built by the Feds, probably during the early years of atomic testing, and populated by human guinea pigs. 

The old man at the store near Steptoe recognized me right off and chuckled as I plopped down several bags of Hershey’s kisses, Rolos, and Ding Dongs on the counter. 

“What are you doing in these parts?” He asked. “I thought you were just visiting someone over at Fort Palmer.”

“I confess. I’m working there.”

“Enev?” he asked.

“Yup.” 

“What are you doing?” 

“I’m a nutritionist.”

He examined the bags of candy and chuckled. “That so?”

“Hey, have you ever had to deal with a group of teenage girls?”

“Damned Feds. They shouldn’t a put them girls out there,” he growled. 

“It is a hellish place, I agree, but it’s no longer a federal facility—it belongs to the state.” (I don’t know why I always insist on pointing out irrelevant facts. In psych terms, it’s called anal retention.)

“The Lechtay live inside Cavalry Peak you know,” he muttered as he rang the bags of candy and other assorted goodies. “That’s what happened to that woman who disappeared. The Lechtay got her. That’ll be eight fifty, ma’am.”

Ok, I thought, the old guy’s probably lived out in the desert a little too long. “I heard that all the Indians are in Utah now,” I countered, as I handed him nine bucks. “On some reservation. Keep the change.” 

“The Lechtay ain’t Indians.” 

“Then what are they? Bats?”

“If I tell you, you probably won’t believe me. But they got that woman, you know. They did, but the government covered it all up.”

“Well, hell. The government always covers everything up, doesn’t it? Aliens might be living among us but the government will cover it up. Heck, maybe the government is run by the aliens. Or maybe—an even scarier premise—it might be run by humans just like us. Thanks for the warning. But I’m from Vegas – land of vampires and werewolves. I think I can handle a few Lechtays.”