(A sample from Crawlspace.)
© 2009 asotir.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.
9:35 PM
Briggsville High
HE CAME TO SCREAMING.
—Or did the screams sound only in his head?
Duct tape strapped his wrist to a corner of a lab table. In the terrarium the cockroaches scattered. The tape strapped Tommy’s other wrist and the mantises cowered. The tape bound his ankles and the ants marched and the wasps beat against the glass sides of their jars.
Papers bound Tommy’s neck so his head hung down into the table sink. His eyes closed again. He decided he wasn’t screaming after all. He knew what was happening. But he was still out of it.
The Professor stood at another lab table. He had a deck of green playing cards and he laid out eight cards face up. Four were hearts. The other four were spades.
‘I hoped it would never come to this,’ he said. ‘I knew about Tommy, of course. But I hoped the pills would keep the Crawler in him from getting out. Damn it! We only gave him twenty-three doses! They don’t start to Change until they get to thirty, or more! How could it happen so soon?’
Papers checked the tape bonds. He tore off a length and strengthened the bond on Tommy’s ankle. ‘To, to tell you the truth, this should be interesting.’
Styles and Trickman stood by. They looked at Tommy’s body, stretched out on the table, obscene, naked but for torn white briefs.
The Professor looked away. He drew a deep breath and took back self-control. ‘For four years now Tommy was one of the Team. So I won’t decide this. It has to come from all of us.’
He handed them each a pair of cards.
‘You each have one heart and one spade. Now, we can either go ahead and Burn Tommy and get out of this forsaken town. Or Papers can go ahead and – examine Tommy – before he dies.’
Papers faced the others. ‘It cuh, could give us valuable information about the Crawlers – what they are, what makes them tick, how they can ma, mimic human beings so successfully.’
‘But it’s Tommy,’ the Professor said. ‘And it will cause him dreadful pain.’
‘Unavoidable, really,’ Papers murmured.
The Professor handed Styles the last card. ‘Hearts for mercy and a quick burn. Spades means vivisection. We won’t do this if any one of us disagrees. If there’s a single heart out of four – we stop now.’
OUT IN THE HALLWAY the Kid, Eddie, drank from a water fountain. The hall was long and empty and dark except for the Exit lights. The Kid looked at the door marked Science Lab. He listened at the door. Faint voices came through.
TOMMY lay naked on the table. His head turned a little and he opened his eyes. Blinked against the light.
He saw the fluorescent school lights overhead. He saw the tall shapes of the men of the Team. One by one they stepped up and laid the cards down on the table beside him.
Papers came first. ‘Never a que, question for me.’
Papers laid down on the table a spade.
Styles took his place. ‘We have to. Maybe we don’t like it. But it’s the job we took.’
Styles put a spade next to the one Papers left.
Trickman was the only one who addressed Tommy directly. ‘Sorry, pal. You were a good kid.’
Trickman added his card. Another spade.
The Professor stood with his back to them. He looked at the specimen jars – the insects crawling in their jars. He looked at the cards.
‘Three cards,’ he said. His voice sounded strange to Tommy. He didn’t know him any more. He didn’t know any of them. ‘Three spades. So it’s down to me after all.’
He stepped up to the table. He looked down at the Thing there – at Tommy. Tommy stared back, eyes big with fear.
The Professor said, ‘I want you all to know I’m proud of you. You chose principle over personality. You didn’t allow your affection or your … love … for what used to be Tommy to get in the way of your duty. And you were right.’
The Professor put down a spade.
And he said, turning his back: ‘Go ahead, Papers.’
Papers pulled on latex surgical gloves. They made a squishy snapping sound as he tightened them. He pushed aside the cards and unfolded surgical instruments. He selected a scalpel. It gleamed in the cold fluorescent light.
‘No anesthetics, I’m afraid, Tommy,’ Papers said. ‘Your reactions are important. But I will try to be delicate…’
At the far end of the room the Professor raised the blinds and looked up at the night sky. At the moon.
He said, softly, ‘I used to look at the sky at night. I liked to watch the stars, before Alicia died. But then the night sky got painted over black for me.’
Papers bent over the table. He started to work. Tommy couldn’t see what he did but he felt it.
Tommy’s legs jerked, and he heard his own voice scream—
FROM THE SCIENCE LAB door, Tommy’s muffled screams echoed down the long hall, past the hand-made signs.
Cheerleading Squad Tryouts
Hall Passes Required during all Class Periods
French Club meeting
Beat Luther Hills!
Out through the closed outer doors, out into the parking lot, Tommy’s screams rang. Styles was smoking and polishing the Ford. He ground the cloth into the finish as if he wanted to grind away what he was hearing.
IN THE HALLWAY Trickman sat on the floor surrounded by dozens of fast food wrappers. His shirt buttons were undone. It had been a feast. He unwrapped a burger for the Kid.
‘You mean you never tasted a bacon burger? Oh, you’re in for an experience, pal…’
A scream shot down the hall. The Kid flinched and turned around.
‘Yeah kid, that was a good one.’
‘Trickman … what’s happening? What are they doing to it?’
‘Believe me, pal, you don’t even want to know.’
THE LIGHT glared down over the dark shape on the lab table. Papers held a sponge up, dripping bilious blood.
‘How intriguing,’ he said. ‘He certainly seems human, down to the bones and organs. And yet, there are these odd nodes on the bones … and these strange anatomical formations here, and here. I’ve never gotten one to dissect alive, before. But we never caught one before – not alive, anyway.’
The Professor remarked, ‘You’re not stuttering anymore.’
‘I’m not? No, I suppose not.’
‘We’re running a risk doing this here. We should do it and get out. Before the police come.’
Papers selected a long curette and bent back to work. ‘No,’ he said. ‘This operation must be performed carefully. Delicately. You aren’t still attached to it, are you? This, this Thing?’
‘I always knew it might have to come to this. We always raise them from the eggs. If they survive we use them for Tracers. They can sense one another – even if they think they’re human themselves.’
‘Of course. That makes sense.’ Papers dropped the bloody curette into the pan.
The Professor said, ‘He’s quiet now.’
‘He’s watching me…’ Papers said.
Tommy’s eyes stared with silent rage. The were the last part of him that even remotely resembled something that might once have been human. The rest was just a mess.
‘I hoped the pills would keep him human,’ the Professor said. ‘I prayed we could avoid all this. You know, one can always hope for a miracle. But the Things always emerge at about this age. Even so – only twenty-three doses – we should have had at least half a year more from it—’
‘Professor. He’s growing angry—’
‘He’s about to Change! Sedate him – put him under – now!’
Papers wrestled with Tommy’s right arm – the arm bulged with bumps and beetle plates. The Professor pumped another orange ampule into the hypodermic and stabbed at Tommy’s arm but the needle skated off the beetle plates.
‘It won’t go in!’ Papers said.
‘Hold him steady! Now!’
The Professor plunged the needle under the edge of the plates. Tommy quieted and began to revert back.
‘God, what strength! He’s not even unconscious.’
The Professor wiped sweat from his brow but his sleeve was bloody and it left a red smear across his forehead. ‘It’s enough. Any more might reverse it.’
Papers opened one of Tommy’s eyelids. He hovered over it with a curved probe.
‘Now Tommy, try to take it easy. Soon begun, soon done.’
Papers brought his instrument to bear, and the shape on the table twitched and bucked against the bindings, and raised its voice in an almost human gurgle of pain.
A MOTH fluttered in a lamp over the parking lot. Beneath the lamp Trickman walked out to the Ford.
‘How’s Eddie doing now?’
Styles glanced in through the window. ‘Sleeping in back. I wish they’d get it over with.’
Trickman belched, loud. ‘I ate too much…’
The high school door opened. The Professor and Papers came out to the car.
‘Finished?’ Styles asked.
The Professor shook his head. Papers’ lab coat was stained with blood. He stuffed it in a trash can.
‘We still need to learn it’s, uh, recovery time,’ Papers said. He arched his shoulders and stretched. ‘Just a question of how long before it regains cuh, consciousness … and its strength.’
The Professor checked his watch. ‘It went under at 2:37.’
‘Just nuh, note when it comes to.’
‘We’ll take Eddie back to the motel and start packing,’ the Professor said. ‘I’ll be back.’
‘And when he comes to?’ Trickman said. ‘What then?’
The Professor handed Trickman one of the gym bags.
‘Exterminate it.’
They drove off. Trickman and Styles watched them go. They looked at the school. Styles looked at his watch.
‘Jesus,’ Trickman breathed.
‘What are you so jumpy about? It’s only a Crawler.’
‘But it used to be Tommy, man.’
The sound of a basketball bounced off the walls. Agnes appeared, holding the train of her skirts in one hand and dribbling the ball with the other.
‘Anybody up for a fast game of pickup?’
Styles and Trickman stared at her and behind them Miss Quinn appeared and flung them aside with brutal force. She beckoned. Agnes took Miss Quinn’s hand and they went inside the school.
MISS QUINN and Agnes approached the Science Lab.
‘Stay here, Agnes.’
‘I want to see him.’
‘No. Wait here. This is my homeroom, remember?’
Miss Quinn went in. Agnes bounced the ball off the wall, crossed to the water fountain and drank.
OUT IN THE PARKING LOT Trickman and Styles came to on the pavement. Trickman groaned.
Styles swore. ‘Would you mind being quiet and letting a guy sleep?’
‘What hit us?’
‘Something pretty fucking hard.’
THE SCIENCE LAB DOOR opened. Miss Quinn’s face appeared.
Agnes rushed up to her. ‘Miss Quinn – how is he?’
‘You’d better come in.’
Agnes squeezed in. The door closed behind her.
STYLES groaned and stretched his arms. Behind him Trickman unzipped the gym bag. He handed one Burner to Styles and took another himself.
‘Well, like the man said. Let’s go.’
THE SCIENCE LAB was dark except for the one light over the central table. Miss Quinn lead Agnes out of the darkness to the table. Something huddled on the table under a sheet. Agnes moved to it and hugged the sheet, getting blood all over her face and dress.
‘Oh, Tommy. Tommy.’
It moved and the sheet opened and the thing put one arm around her. It was Tommy. Bandaged, bloody, but human in shape and likeness.
He whispered, ‘Guess I don’t look so good anymore.’
‘Tommy. You didn’t kill Andrew or Angie, like they said – did you?’
‘No.’
‘Oh, Tommy – I’m glad.’
Miss Quinn watched at the door. ‘Tommy,’ she hissed. ‘How strong are you?’
‘Strong?’
‘Your friends are coming.’
