by Tim Marquitz
My heart skipped a beat as I nearly bumped into a man. I relaxed, exhaling deeply as I recognized Hastings. “Everything okay, Mister Corby?” the chemical engineer asked, looking quite normal.
“Yes, uh … everything’s fine. So far. Can’t say I slept well, though. Uh … did you?” I couldn’t help looking over his thick, chubby face. Not a mark on it.
“Sure,” he said with a shrug. “Hard work helps a man sleep.” He walked on by without another word. I grumbled under my breath. My relief at seeing him alive and well hadn’t masked the sarcasm in his remark. Running a hand through my hair, I stepped to the rail and stared out over the flat, slate-gray expanse of the sea. It stretched as far as the eye could see, hiding its timeless mysteries. I longed for this assignment to end so I could see civilization again. Cities. Bars. Creature comforts. Yes, my chosen profession was based on the fact the world was dying, but, like so many other people these days, I desperately needed to live my life in crowded, brightly lit rooms, isolated from the deathly pale of reality.
~
Hot water coursing over me, steam rising in the rusty shower stall, made me feel better than I had in days. The cold touch of emptiness and fear, which had hung over me, seemed to wash away like a layer of soil. My skin was red and tingling as I twisted the corroded metal wheel, shutting off the shower head. As I toweled off, I actually began to feel normal and at ease for the first time since setting foot on the rig. Not the most enticing of surroundings, a public washroom filled with pale, sagging male posteriors and garish tattoos, but it was welcome in its normalcy.
As I wiped the fogged surface of a mirror and unpacked my shaving razor, I chanced to notice Hastings as he stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist. As I lathered my face, I absently noticed he’d lost a bit of weight since the first time I’d seen him. (Not surprising, considering swill would almost be preferable to what they serve on these rigs.) As I brought my razor to my cheek and felt the sharp edge of the blade against my skin, that’s when it hit me. The appendectomy scar I’d seen several times on Hastings’ left side wasn’t there anymore. As he stepped up to the sink next to mine, I glanced down sideways, afraid he might notice. Sure enough, not a mark on him. I swallowed hard as I turned back to the mirror and slowly drew the razor across my cheek.
~
I told myself I must be mistaken, that I’d gotten Hastings mixed up with one of the other workers. I desperately wanted to believe that, but as iciness crept up my spine, deep in the pit of my gut, I’d known I was right. Alone in my cabin, I brought up Hastings on my computer pad and accessed his personnel records. Scrolling down to medical history, I saw what I’d hoped against hope I wouldn’t see. His appendix operation was listed. My heart throbbed, my fingers numb against the computer pad.
I admonished myself to remain calm as I unpacked my portable, computerized bio-chem analyzer. I then set about programming the analyzer to scan for a particular variety of life. I glanced nervously at the door. I’d never had to program the analyzer in this way before; the unit was designed to detect mutations in microbial sea life near oil drilling sites. However, I knew the microcomp was capable of recognizing any DNA pattern, and it had every known species in its database, so all I had to do was program it to recognize human DNA. Opening my shaving kit and taking out the wash cloth with which I’d wiped Hastings’ shaving razor earlier when he wasn’t looking, I swabbed a slide with the washcloth and pushed the slide into the analyzer.
My mouth grew dry as I waited for the result. I began to chuckle, almost hysterically, the absurdity of the situation reaching me through my fear. I pictured myself downing a bourbon a few weeks from now, laughing at myself. My heart nearly stopped when the result came through, those two words flashing red on the digital display: finding negative. An icy numbness spread through me as the meaning of those words sunk in. Whatever that thing was that had taken Hastings’ form … it wasn’t human.
~
Do you know what it is to live in perpetual fear of your life, every waking moment? Afraid to fall asleep for fear you would never wake? Obviously, I could tell no one on the rig what I’d found. I had no way of telling which of the others were already like Hastings. Since the only communication with the mainland was the sat-link radio, which only the rig manager could grant permission to use, I was completely on my own.
I stood in total darkness, my breathing rapid, my heart pounding in my ears as the seconds ticked by. Steady, I warned myself. A shock blasted through me as I heard the door lock click. My heart froze, my sweaty fingers tightening on the heavy steel bolt wrench I held.
Upon hearing the creak of the rusty door hinge, I switched on my helmet light. Hastings stood in the doorway, momentarily blinded. I drove the bolt wrench into his gut as hard as I could. As he groaned and doubled over, I raised the wrench and brought it down on the base of his skull. As he crashed to the floor, the deck lights came back on. They’d tripped the breaker sooner than I’d expected. Damn. Switching off my helmet light, I struggled to drag Hastings into his cabin before someone saw us. My brain was on fire as I strained. Sweat streamed down my face as I pulled at his infuriatingly heavy bulk, kicking his legs up over the threshold, and finally managing to force the door closed.
I fell back against the door, my chest heaving. My head rested back against the metal hatch as I took off my helmet and gratefully wiped the perspiration from my forehead. I haven’t killed a man, I repeated over and over in my mind. Whatever it is, it’s not human. Not …
My blood turned to ice as I heard it. Something moved in the pitch blackness. The sound of fabric tearing. I switched on the cabin light. Hastings lay prone on the floor as I’d left him, but something—some thing—was moving inside his clothing. Inside him, it seemed, wriggling, bulging under his coverall. Even as his smashed head hung lifeless, his back rose. My mouth opened in a silent scream as the coverall split open, a tear widening down its back.
My stomach turned at the sound of bones cracking. I caught a glimpse of … something. Like a dark spur or claw … some kind of blackish protrusion extending through the back of his shattered skull, even as I heard his neck snapping, saw his head twisting like the head of a broken doll. I clenched my teeth, strangling the scream inside me. I swung the wrench again and again with all my strength, smashing down blindly at the unknown thing I did not want to see emerge from that gutted shell that resembled a man. Whatever shred of doubt or guilt had pained me before melted into pure, blinding terror.
Once I was sure it wasn’t getting up again, I switched off the light. The darkness terrified me, but I couldn’t bring myself to look at the dead thing. I winced, shutting my eyes and crying silently in pitch blackness. I felt my sanity slipping away, but somehow … blind survival, I suppose … somehow, I held on. Someone banged on the door behind me. “Hastings!” a man’s voice called out.
“Coming,” I replied, muffling my voice with the sleeve of my coverall. Climbing into Hastings’ bulky, insulated rubber suit, I pulled his respirator mask over my face and attached the micro-camera as inconspicuously as possible. Covering Hastings’ body with a blanket, I slipped through the door, locking it behind me. The team of men I’d expected clambered by in their dark rubber suits, pushing on wheeled skids the hermetically sealed barrels marked with HAZMAT warning symbols. I joined them, taking Hastings’ place in the crew as I’d watched him do many times. This was closer than I’d ever been allowed to get, of course. Oh, I’d always inspected the barrels, making sure the seals were secure, done chem tests to ensure there were no leaks, but I’d never been allowed to accompany the excavation crews down the drill shaft. The company couldn’t guarantee my safety, and would not allow my presence in the secure zones for reasons of liability. Their lies seemed so transparent now.
As we wheeled the barrels into the elevator, I reflected darkly on how many friends the company had in Washington D.C., pulling strings to enfeeble our inspection rights. Even in the sweaty confines of that hot rubber sui
t, I felt chilled as I wondered, for the first time, just how high up this … whatever the hell this was … went. My heart skipped a beat as the elevator gates slammed shut behind me.
In the dim light of the elevator, I kept my eyes down as the lift started downward to the grinding of hydraulic winches. I reminded myself what a monstrous behemoth this type of rig was. Its shaft reached deep beneath the ocean floor, branching out into siphoning lines that stretched for miles, resembling some nightmarish giant squid parasitically draining oil out of the earth and poisoning the air above. I couldn’t escape the feeling I was sinking into Hell. I fought to keep my breathing steady as we descended. It grew colder as we went deeper and deeper, through the ocean’s depths and below, into the bowels of the earth. Even through the insulated suit, the cold sank into me like a knife. My sweat seemed to freeze against my skin, my breath fogging the faceplate of my respirator mask like frost on a windowpane.
After what seemed like forever, our descent stopped, the platform shaking as the elevator gates slid open. Pitch blackness yawned on the other side of the gate, like the mouth of some huge cave. I shivered, coldness, like death, sweeping over me. A fetid wind, like rot and waste, assailed my senses, even through the respirator. As we pushed the skids out of the elevator and into the passageway beyond, I heard something moving in the murky darkness ahead of us. Something huge … crawling … slithering.
My heart slammed my chest as we entered what appeared to be a kind of central cavern. The only light came from the shoulder-mounted, portable strobe lights carried by the other workers. Frigid water dripped from the cavern roof, spattering off my suit. The pale electric light diffused through a low mist like sickly yellow fog. The clinging rot under my boots felt as though I was walking through a huge charnel pit. Soft, yielding … nothing solid. I could swear I could feel something pulsing beneath the soles of my feet. I slipped and nearly fell once or twice. I was terrified of calling attention to myself and being found out.
Then, it happened. They opened the barrels. How I avoided vomiting inside my respirator, I still wonder. I remember the blood draining from every capillary in my body, all sensation freezing into ice. Thankfully, I guess my stomach muscles were simply too numb to clench even at the sight of disemboweled human remains emptied from those barrels into the slime pit in which we stood. Who were the victims, you may wonder? Who can say? Mariners lost at sea, perhaps. Pirates, smugglers, peasant fishermen from remote coastal villages. People who wouldn’t be missed, or who had been given up for lost. All I can surmise is that they were probably delivered to the rig … quite regularly … in the supply boats that dropped off hermetically sealed, refrigerated cartons labeled food.
The slithering grew louder, all around, as though something were coming towards us, out of the darkness. Then, as we began to unload the last of the barrels, a new sound … gnashing and tearing, like an animal gnawing on its prey. That’s when I caught my first glimpse of … them. They crawled out of the brine, just at the edge of the light, taking the flesh that was offered. I desperately wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. Spidery black limbs, as long as a man, crawled out of the darkness. Claws tore human flesh. Monstrous fangs and mandibles glinted pale white in the darkness, reddening as they cracked bone and sucked marrow. The lurid, hellish red light of glowing and bulbous, cyclopean eyes.
My hair stood on end. Just the need to keep still was driving me mad. One of the workmen … Johansen, as I saw by the name tag on his suit … motioned for me to help him with one of the barrels. I prayed he wouldn’t notice the trembling in my hands as I approached the skid. As I numbly helped him lower the barrel, I could swear I felt something moving inside it. As we set it down, I heard a muffled cry. Johansen unsealed the barrel and removed the lid. I nearly fainted. There was a living man inside, bound hand and foot, his mouth covered by duct tape. A wild look of fear was in his eyes. He was one of the workmen. One of the last, apparently.
I’ve never been a religious man, but since that night, I’ve seen Hell waiting for me in my dreams every time I close my eyes. Why, you ask? Because, God forgive me … I helped them. I had to. I was terrified of being suspected, so I helped them carry that poor man to his fate. Not even the darkest image of Hell my imagination could conceive could be anything less than comforting compared to that black pit at the bottom of the world.
Johansen and I, and two of the others, carried the struggling man into what appeared to be a kind of tunnel; a wide snaking tube between rows of arched supports, formed from fossil remnants, perhaps. There was something about it that seemed alive and yet dead at the same time. In the dim light, I started as one of those things took the man from us, lifting him in its horrible exoskeletal appendages, its inhuman voice hissing and perhaps, in a way … laughing. I was amazed my sanity had endured, stretched like a slender thread. What I saw next may have just been enough to sever that thread. Huddled in a dark corner, in a kind of cocoon-like formation, amid numerous melon-sized, egg-pods jacketed in mucous, was another of the workers from the rig.
Cooper, I think was his name. What I saw happen to him … it was difficult enough to watch and film without giving myself away. Describing it is even harder, so please bear with me. Cooper was … dividing. Duplicating, like an embryonic cell in utero, splitting into what would become twin fetuses. A second, identical full-grown man … another Cooper … grew out of the first. It was like watching Siamese twins growing apart with horrifying rapidity, finally sundering and going their separate ways. Cooper’s face split into two as a second head, second neck, second body … grew out of the first, duplicating cell for cell, it seemed. The expression of excruciating pain on his face—on both faces—was gut-wrenching.
The cloned Cooper’s skin was slightly translucent. I could dimly make out muscles, nerves, and capillaries as his skin still formed. Behind the clone was one of those hideous crustacoid organisms; a smaller one. Its limbs penetrated the newly formed body, apparently growing directly into his central nervous system. As with Hastings, I thought. It horrified me as I realized what I was seeing. These abominations were growing cloned human bodies as hosts.
I gasped when the arched supports all around us began to move, as though the whole tunnel were about to collapse, burying us alive. I went numb as the walls of the tunnel pulsed and undulated. How was this possible? Then I knew, even in the dim light. The supports were the multiple jointed legs of a gargantuan creature. Truly a titan, like a living leviathan as it turned, twisting like some monstrous worm, the size of a train. Its two rows of legs wriggled in mid-air as the monstrosity passed over us. I nearly doubled over, unable to watch as the monster arched and turned, its terrible head coming down on the mound of dead bodies.
I winced as it began to feed. The sound of human flesh and bone crunching between its grinding fangs sent a wave of bile rising into my throat. I dared not look away, dared not display my revulsion, for fear of being suspected. My stomach cramping, my eyes slowly adjusting to the gloom, I began to discern dim shapes in the darkness at the edges of the cave. My blood ran cold as I recognized immense mounds of human skulls and bones piled high against the walls.
The chamber pitched around me as Johansen and the others faced the giant creature and removed their respirator masks. I was astonished. Then, I saw why, and it sickened me more even than anything I’d seen up until then. They all leaned against the huge creature as it … as she … fed, and put their lips against her underbelly. They were suckling, I realized with horror and disgust, like pigs at their mama sow’s nipples. Their shoulder lights flickered wildly, and I saw my chance. It was now or never. I slipped back into the darkness and made my break for the elevator. I made it to the platform with no sign of pursuit.
As I shut and locked the gate behind me and started the elevator upward, the worm-like mother reared up, screaming a grating, inhuman scream. I froze in my skin as the monster slithered across the cavern floor with nightmarish speed, its multiple legs clattering wildly. I threw myself backward ag
ainst the rear wall of the elevator, instinctively raising my arms and shouting in fear as the face of the serpentine demon crashed against the gate, bending the metal grating inward as its hot, fetid breath washed over me. That face … as wide as a man’s height … I will remember that horrible face until my death. Huge, saber-like mandibles spread wide, a fearsome maw opening to reveal three sets of gnashing fangs, in a triangle-like pattern, leading into a yawning gullet. That single, fiery red liquid eye stared at me through the grating. It is seared into my brain forever.
By some miracle, I escaped, stealing a dingy and making for the mainland. And yes, I freely admit it was I who sabotaged the pumping system, causing the rig to explode. May the evil it nurtured lay entombed at the bottom of the sea forever.
*** end recording ***
Barrett sighed as he switched off the recording machine. “Well, Corby,” the Energy Commission supervisor began quietly, not looking at Corby as he stared into his vid phone. “You’ve been through quite an ordeal.”
Corby couldn’t make out the other man’s facial expression in the dim light of his office, but Barrett’s tone was flat; emotionless. “You do believe me, don’t you?” Corby asked, his heart throbbing, sweat beading on his forehead. “The video—”
Oh, yes,” Barrett said, waving his hand absently. “I’m looking over it now. Very impressive. You were very brave to have gotten such detailed footage, Corby. My compliments.”
His tone was as cold as ice, and it sank to Corby’s vitals. “What now?” He asked with a dry mouth.
Barrett laid down the vid phone on his desk top and walked across the half-lit office to the liquor cabinet. “Would you like a drink?”