The Shimmer by David Morrell Page A

as firefighters sprayed foam on what was left of the burning bus. Eight Highway Patrol cars were parked next to three police cars from Rostov. Law enforcement officers and medical personnel seemed everywhere. Page heard the wail of a departing ambulance and the roar of a medevac helicopter as it rose from a nearby field, its takeoff lights painfully intense.
    From his vantage point a short distance down the road, he watched a patrolman interviewing Tori in her car next to the viewing platform. Page had already spoken to several officers and took for granted that they'd have more questions. Right now he was grateful for the chance to step back from the commotion and try to adjust to the trauma of what had happened.
    He found himself next to a metal pole that had a large, brass rectangle attached to the top. Words were embossed on the rectangle. The harsh reflection from the emergency vehicles provided just enough illumination for him to be able to read:
    Welcome to the Rostov lights. Many people have claimed to see them, but no one has ever been able to explain them. If you're lucky enough to experience them, decide for yourself what they are.
    Footsteps approached. Page turned from the plaque and saw a silhouette of a man in a cowboy hat. As the figure came nearer, he recognized a Highway Patrol captain he'd spoken with earlier. The Hispanic man had a broad face, with prominent cheek- and jawbones. The emergency lights revealed his blue tie and tan uniform.
    His last name was Medrano.
    "We finished interviewing your wife," he announced. "You can take her back to where you're staying."
    Page didn't comment on the complexities that lay behind that statement.
    "You're done with me, too?"
    "For now. All the survivors tell the same story. The guy went crazy.
    If not for you and your wife, a lot more people would have been killed. You still don't have any idea why he did it?" Medrano looked as if he desperately wanted something that would explain what had happened.
    "Only that he said the lights were evil."
    "The lights? The way you talk about them . . . You saw them, too?"
    "It took some effort, but yeah. At least, I saw something."
    The captain looked puzzled. "I live in Harrington, about a hundred miles down the road. It's a big town because of the oil refinery, but there's not a lot to do. Whenever my wife's parents or my brother and his family came to visit, we used to drive here to try to see the lights. I bet I made that trip a dozen times. Never saw a thing. Neither did my wife's parents or my brother and his family, even though strangers standing right next to us claimed they could. We finally gave up and stopped coming. What'd they look like?"
    "They seemed miles away, yet I thought they were so close I tried to reach out and touch them. They bobbed and floated, merged and separated, and came together again. They kept changing colors. Once I saw them, I had trouble turning away from them."
    Medrano nodded. "That's usually the way they're described."
    "The thing is, I'm beginning to wonder if I just persuaded myself they were out there. It was like mass hysteria, and I might have just been caught up in it."
    "Yeah, that's one explanation--that people talk each other into seeing them."
    "One explanation? What are the others?"
    "Phosphorescent gas that rises from seams in the earth. Another theory suggests that the underground rocks here have a lot of quartz crystals in them. After the heat of the day, the rapid cooling causes the rocks to contract and give off static electricity."
    Page looked past Medrano toward the emergency lights, the smoke rising from the shell of the bus--and the corpses.
    "All those people died because of static electricity?" He shook his head. "If so, that makes it even more senseless."
    "Your wife says the killer shouted to the crowd, 'Don't you realize what they're doing to you?'"
    "He meant the lights. Then he started shooting at the horizon. He yelled, 'Go back to hell where you came from.' Then,