Swamp Thing 2 - The Return of Swamp Thing

by Peter David

  A crumpled Ho-Ho wrapper was dropped into the dirt and trod underfoot. Darryl slung the baseball bat over his right shoulder and called out, “Omie?”

  Just ahead, Omar was trodding along, loaded down—as was Darryl—with assorted junk foods, sodas, comic books, etc. Instead of a bat, however, he was carrying a camera, which swung loosely on a strap around his neck.

  His parents would have a shitfit when they came back tomorrow to discover that his mom’s car was a pile of twisted scrap. Fortunately they hadn’t seen the newspaper with the article of the previous day’s adventures—unsurprising, he supposed, considering his parents had little to no interest in news. Their sole sources of information from the modern world were USA Today and Entertainment Tonight.

  Somehow, even though it wasn’t his fault, they’d find a way to blame it on him. He was sure of it. So there was only one thing to do.

  Make money. Lots of it, fast. Piles of it; enough to buy a car and more. And there was one sure way to do that.

  Get pictures of the Swamp Thing and sell them for a skillion dollars.

  Now what the hell was Darryl whining about?

  “Omie, I gotta stop!” he moaned, staggering behind his friend.

  Without stopping, Omar shot back, “You ain’t hungry again, are you?”

  “Five minutes!” came the plea. “Five minutes! That’s all I ask.”

  “Last five minutes turned into half an hour. We gotta move.” And mercilessly he picked up the pace.

  Gunn roused Points and the others from their light doze. “Just daybreak,” he whispered. “She’s sleepin’. I think he is, too. Let’s get ’em.”

  Within moments the squadron had rubbed the sleep from their eyes, loosened their stiff joints.

  They started in the direction of the great tree, which was hundreds of yards away.

  Abby slowly stretched, and then lazily brushed away a bug nattering about her face. She felt the moss beneath her naked body and luxuriated in it before slowly sitting up and opening her eyes.

  The Swamp Thing was there, seated, his legs drawn up, and he was looking out into the swamp.

  Was it all a dream the night before? she wondered. Well, whether it was or it wasn’t, it was the kind of dream lives could be built on.

  “Alec?” she whispered. Then she smiled shyly. “Do you still respect me?”

  He didn’t respond at first, then slowly he shook his head.

  “You—” Her eyes widened. “You don’t?”

  He turned toward her and seemed to focus on her for the first time. “I . . . am sorry, Abby. I was not . . . paying attention to what . . . you said. What was it?”

  “Nothing.” She waved it off. “It wasn’t important.” She drew closer to him. “Something’s wrong, though, isn’t it?”

  “Something . . . in the swamp . . . is stirring. I am not certain yet . . . from where. It will take me a few more moments . . . to locate it . . .”

  “And what will you do when you find it?”

  He said darkly, “Whatever I must.”

  Finally taking pity on his friend, Omar had allowed the two of them to break for a rest, seated on a log. Darryl was digging through their food stash.

  “Gimme one of them Ho-Hos, before you eat ’em all,” said Omar impatiently.

  “Out of Ho-Hos,” said Darryl with satisfaction, popping the last one into his mouth.

  Omar sighed. “What about Twinkies?”

  Darryl stared into the backpack. “Nope.”

  “Sno-Balls?”

  “Nope.”

  “Ding Dongs?”

  “Nope.”

  “Pudding pies?”

  “Nope.”

  Thoroughly exasperated, Omar almost shouted, “Then what’s left?!”

  “Got two apples,” said Darryl serenely.

  “Apples?! Aw, man!”

  Suddenly they heard a rustling, a snapping of branches, slow and methodical. “What was that?” whispered Omar.

  “I dunno.”

  “Neither do I. What do you think it was?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Neither do I,” Omar admitted again.

  “Better check it out.”

  Feeling a sudden decline in nerve, Omar said tersely, “I’m the cameraman. You’re the point man. You check it out.”

  Sounding like a commercial for Life cereal, Darryl promptly fired back, “I’m not checking it out! You check it out!”

  “What’s the matter, you chicken?” sneered Omar, as if he himself were not.

  “Well, I . . .”

  “Then check it out, check it out.”

  Darryl stood slowly, on trembling legs. “What if it gets me?”

  “It doesn’t want you,” Omar reassured. “Nobody wants you.”

  Darryl paused as he swung his bat experimentally. “My mother wants me,” he said defensively.

  “Nah. She just keeps you around ’cause if she dumped you somewheres she’d be arrested and stuff. Now get going.”

  Finding this of cold comfort, Darryl advanced tentatively, probing at the bush with his bat. For two long minutes he poked and prodded, and, finally satisfied, he turned back to his friend saying “You jerk, there’s no one . . .”

  Omar was completely surrounded by four extremely surly-looking men, one of whom had a gun at the boy’s throat.

  “. . . here.” finished Darryl weakly.

  “I have something for you,” said the Swamp Thing.

  They were standing at the base of the great tree house, and Abby, now dressed, said, “Not another one of those psychedelic yams, Alec, please—God, can’t you men ever get enough?”

  “It is not . . . that,” he answered with a sound of amusement. He held a rose out to her, almost shyly.

  “I didn’t know there were roses in swamps,” she said in surprise.

  “There are . . . now. Allow me. There are still . . . a few thorns . . .”

  Gently, carefully, he tucked it into her hair. It seemed to hug the side of her head as if happy to have found a home.

  “No one’s given me flowers since my senior prom. And they were wilted,” she recalled.

  Suddenly they heard a high-pitched screech for help.

  “That . . . that sounds like a child!” said Abby.

  “Stay here,” he ordered, and ran off into the green.

  “Be careful, Alec!” she shouted, which was all she had time for before she heard the alarming sound of rounds of ammo being chambered from directly behind her.

  The largest of the men, a husky former wrestler named Weaver, took a bite out of the apple. “What else you got, kid?” he asked a petrified Omar.

  “Got a camera! It’s a good one. It’s expensive! You can have it!”

  “No they can’t!” protested Darryl. “It’s my dad’s!”

  “Was your dad’s,” said Weaver. “Now it’s ours.”

  “So that means you’ll let us go, right?” Omar inquired hopefully.

  Weaver grinned and glanced at the other guards nearby him. “Wrong,” they all chorused.

  And from nearby a deep voice corrected them. “Right.”

  They spun as the Swamp Thing loomed out of the vegetation and advanced on them.

  Immediately seeing his chance for fame and glory, Omar swung up the camera and started to click away.

  Weaver swung his M16 up and had just enough time to say “Don’t move!” before Swamp Thing was upon him. Weaver jammed the gun into Swamp Thing’s body and fired. Dirt and mud blew out his back, the spray covering the other guards.

  His body reformed around the gun, and the firearm became embedded in it. Swamp Thing half turned at the waist, and the motion yanked the rifle out of Weaver’s hands. He tried to lunge after it, but Swamp Thing twisted back the other way and the rifle butt smashed across Weaver’s face, knocking out two teeth and breaking his jaw.

  Weaver went down, moaning, and the other guards leapt at Swamp Thing, climbing all over him like ants on a hill. He shook them off easily, t
hen grabbed up the agonized Weaver and, using him as a club, battered the remaining guards into insensibility.

  That done, one by one he hurled them far off into the brush. He turned slowly toward the wide-eyed Darryl, and then toward Omar who was busily snapping away.

  “Are you . . . all right?” he asked.

  “Fuh . . . fuh . . . fine,” Darryl managed to get out.

  His heart pounding, Omar said nonchalantly, “Mind smiling for one more straight-on picture.”

  “I will try.”

  He stood there, and his expression did not seem to change all that much. Nevertheless Omar snapped his picture. “Thank you,” he said.

  “You’re welcome. However . . . the lens cap is on.”

  Omar looked down at the simple black-plastic obstruction that had just cost him a roll of film. He moaned. Then he quickly removed the cap and said again, “Okay, now—”

  And from a distance came the scream: “Alec!”

  Omar took a photograph of empty air, for before the shouted name had faded from the morning dew, Swamp Thing had vanished.

  With a deep, heartfelt sigh, Omar thrust the camera at Darryl. “Take the film out,” he said, “and chuck it. Then we just gotta keep slogging away and hope we get lucky . . . again.”

  “You better let me go before your luck runs out!” Abby yelled.

  She was fighting Gunn’s angry tug every step of the way as he dragged her through the swamp. “Guys, somebody lend me a hand, please!” he said with faltering patience.

  One of the larger guards, Hugo, grabbed Abby from behind and unceremoniously tossed her over his shoulder. They started to run once again.

  Futilely Abby pounded on his back. “You don’t know who you’re dealing with!” she shouted. “He’ll go crazy when he catches up with you!”

  “Where the hell is the airboat?” demanded Gunn. “Which way was it again?”

  Tasha pointed with certainty, and they followed her lead, since no one denied that Natasha Pointsetta had the best sense of direction.

  Seconds later they got to it, floating serenely and anchored. It was a flat-bottomed boat, powered by an airplane propeller projecting above the stern.

  Abby got a brief glimpse of some miscellaneous equipment—guns, rifles, and some other items she didn’t recognize—before she was hurled like a sack of potatoes onto the deck. She tried to scramble to her feet, but now Gunn was there, and he stopped her attempts to escape in the most expedient manner—he sat on her.

  “Comfy down there?” He grinned.

  Points, from the bow of the ship, shouted “Hugo! Cast us off!” From the control board she flicked the ignition, and the huge propeller roared to life.

  The roar that came next drowned it out.

  “Alec!” shouted Abby, upon hearing it, and with a degree of satisfaction she snapped at Gunn, “You’re in deep now, fella.”

  The Swamp Thing, all his attention focused on Abby, emerged from the reeds, howling his fury and anger at the effrontery of these puny mortals. He lunged toward them, approaching the boat from the rear and getting ready to come around it, to upend it and smash it to pieces.

  The boat started to lurch forward, suddenly free of its anchors. One mooring line trailed past him, and Swamp Thing swiftly reached down, snagged it and held onto it tightly. Then, incredibly, hand over hand, he started to draw the powerful airboat toward him.

  Points emptied a full clip from her Magnum into him, and he didn’t even appear to notice. A deep fear began to build in the pit of her stomach as she realized she was facing something beyond her understanding.

  And from the reeds, Hugo, who had been the one to untie the moorings, slammed into Swamp Thing just as he had almost gotten the boat close enough to himself.

  With all his strength concentrated on the air-boat, Swamp Thing was off balance when the impact from behind came. He staggered forward, fell . . .

  . . . and was caught in the massive propeller.

  Abby screamed, a high shriek of panic, as the propeller chopped through the muck-encrusted body of Alec Holland.

  “That’s it!” howled Gunn in celebration. “That’s it! Turn him into Mulch Thing!”

  From the waist up, Alec was gone, mercilessly shredded by the powerful propeller blade. Hugo grabbed up the Swamp Thing’s lower half and tossed that in as well.

  “Stop it! Stop it! Oh, God, stop!” Abby shrieked over and over again, unable to so much as move. She struggled furiously against the far greater strength of Gunn and made no headway at all. “You’re killing him!”

  “Nah. Puree, maybe,” chortled Gunn.

  The propellers were now covered with the ground-up bits of the Swamp Thing. Abby closed her eyes against the grisly sight.

  “C’mon, let’s go, let’s go!” Points called out.

  Obediently Hugo leapt onto the airboat, and now the ship roared out into the swamp, hurling itself into the murky waters and plowing through effortlessly.

  Abby looked up at Gunn with pure, undiluted hatred. “You bastards.”

  “I love you, too, honey buns,” replied Gunn. “But first thing’s first. Gotta get you back to—”

  “Look out!”

  Hugo’s alarmed cry brought Gunn to his feet. Abby tried to jump up as well, but this time Gunn brought the butt of his rifle down on the back of her head. She fell to the deck, barely keeping her consciousness.

  Ahead of them, rising from the water like a green ghost, was the Swamp Thing, his body reforming before their very eyes.

  They were thirty yards away and closing, and he was raising his arms above his head and roaring out a challenge.

  Gunn’s cigarette dropped from his mouth. “Holy shit. How many times do you have to kill that guy?”

  Even as Gunn was speaking, Abby saw him grabbing up some sort of tank that was attached to the deck of the ship with metal clips. He cradled the tank in one arm and was swinging around some sort of attached hose with the other.

  “Hard right!” he shouted. “Now!”

  The airboat swerved to the right, just beyond Swamp Thing’s outstretched fingers. He turned on them, his face a picture of fury, and within five seconds would have caught up with them and rended their ship, and them, to bits.

  It was five seconds he didn’t have, for within two seconds the air was blistered with heat as Gunn unleashed the flame-thrower.

  Swamp Thing made a sound Abby had never heard from him before . . . a sound of fear. It was a horrified scream, and she realized it was not Swamp Thing reacting, but Alec Holland.

  Swamp Thing needn’t have feared fire. Swamp Thing could have simply dived back into the green, created a new body for himself in instants.

  But Alec Holland, the reawakened man, was reliving the most terrifying moment, the last moment, of his life.

  She had been with him, been a part of him. All that he was was now a part of her, and she felt through her haze the panicked agony he had felt when he’d been caught in the explosion. A man ablaze, a human comet, had come into existence and died that day, all in the space of a few soul-searing moments.

  She felt his mind become paralyzed with the fear of the man he had been, the man whose essence she had touched last night. If it had not been for her, he might not have reacted this badly.

  Swamp Thing lurched around, the water surrounding his knees becoming clouds of steam. His body was vanishing in a smoking blaze. He howled a name—“Linda,”—and his arms blackened completely and fell away; the moist leaves of his body dried and crispened and crumbled, and within seconds the lifeless carcass of Swamp Thing collapsed into a smoldering pile of leaves and grass.

  By that time the airboat was far, far away, and the last thing Abby heard before she allowed herself to lapse into merciful unconsciousness was Gunn’s triumphant laugh.

  14

  Lana Zurrell entered the lab quickly and, with some impatience, spotted Rochelle once again trying to hide away his nonsensical girlie magazines. Not in any mood for more of his absurdity, she
got straight to the point. “They’ve captured the girl. Gunn is bringing her down here. We’d best get Conklin out of sight, so Gunn won’t . . .” Her voice trailed off as she looked at the vacant table where Conklin had been. “Where is he?”

  “In deep freeze,” said Rochelle easily, getting to his feet. “He was near death from the blood loss, so I put him on ice until he recovers. Although it won’t be in time for the operation, I fear.”

  “Wait, wait.” Lana shook her head in confusion. “What deep freeze? What are you talking about? I’ve never seen a deep freeze unit here.”

  “Oh, that, why,” and he looked around nervously, “I’m certain you have at some point or another.”

  Her voice was low and certain. “I can assure, you, Dr. Rochelle, I would recall seeing such a unit. Where is it?”

  “Why, it’s—”

  At that moment they were interrupted by coarse laughter punctuating a string of profanity. Seconds later Gunn entered the lab, pulling along the now-handcuffed Abby. In his right hand he was holding the handle of a small box Lana recognized as the portable freezer unit Arcane had sent out with them. It was Abby who was cursing, naturally, and Gunn who was laughing.

  Behind them, strolling casually as if he had all the time in the world, was Arcane. “Now, now,” he scolded, “I thought, Abigail, your mother had taught you better. Such language.”

  “Up yours,” she snarled, and looked around at the lab. “Oh, great. And this must be the playroom. I have to say, no crazed scientist should be without one.” Her face tightened. “You may have stopped Alec, but he’ll be back. And he may have looked like a monster, but he had the mind and feelings of a man. You’re the exact opposite.”

  “Stopped him?” Rochelle was saying nervously. “Dr. Arcane, I hate to bring this up, but we still need a sample of Holland’s tissue for the locking serum we’re going to make.” He turned to Abby and explained, as if she cared. “Without the right ingredients for the formula, your stepfather’s body will eventually deteriorate.”

  “Yes,” Arcane echoed, smiling at Lana. “I will deteriorate.”

  “Like your mind,” shot back Abby.