It was an image of a dog-like thing. It had mangy fur and it looked emaciated beyond return, bones threatening to burst from paper-thin skin. It stood over a man, who lay on the floor, shackles on his ankles and wrists. In the background were three figures watching the scene. They had no faces, just smooth flesh where there should have been eyes and noses and mouths.
For a moment the image felt less static, as if it were a window into the actual scene, into whatever madness was on the screen in front of him. He could imagine the dog-thing opening its uneven jaw and digging into the chained man. He felt uneasy, like the faceless figures could see him at his desk.
The words somehow bothered him the most, like they meant something he could never possibly understand, something so outside what he knew his mind could not begin to process their meaning.
Critter Marrow.
Gary’s hand ached from straining against the mouse. What’re you waiting for? he thought. Just delete it and get the hell out of here. It’s Friday night. Your friends are waiting at the bar and this is just a piece of junk mail, nothing more.
He nodded. Of course it was nothing more. It was weird as hell—he’d admit that much—but it was some strange advertisement or thread just like the others. Emails were just words on a screen.
He took one last look at those awful figures and the dog-thing and clicked delete.
A small pinwheel appeared in place of the cursor, letting him know the computer was working its magic, sending the file away to the trash.
The words seemed to grow larger for a moment but it was just a trick of the eyes.
Critter Marrow.
Someone moved from behind. Gary spun around, ready to explain why the image was on his screen.
But there was no one there. He was the only one left on his floor save for a cleaning employee vacuuming across the way. He could have sworn otherwise.
When he turned back around the email was finished, the junk folder officially empty.
He logged off, grabbed his bag, and hurried downstairs.
At the front door, he realized he’d forgotten his sunglasses but there was no way in hell he was going back to his desk, not with the sun going down.
Not with those words still so fresh in his mind.
“What’s got you down?” Bradley asked.
Gary nearly jumped. He’d been spacing out. The band on stage was playing something soft and forgettable, nothing like their upbeat opening songs.
“Just tired is all,” he said, taking a sip of his beer. It had gone warm.
“Overtime again?”
He nodded. “Emily’s been on my back all week. I honestly think she wants me to snap at her. That’s why she keeps pushing me.”
“Don’t take it personally. She’s a bitch but she’s still your boss. Learn to deal with it if you want the job. We all put up with her and it pays off in the end. Trust me.”
“If you say so.”
“Another round?”
“Sounds good to me.” He handed Bradley his half empty glass and leaned back. The band was done with the boring tune now, stepping off stage for intermission and going outside to smoke. For a moment the bar was silent save for the chatter and clinking of glasses. It got under his skin somehow, like without the music his mind could wander to places he’d rather it didn’t.
His mind started to form the image and then the words.
A glass slammed down in front of him. His knee jerked upward, hitting the table. He winced and put pressure on it.
Bradley smirked. “Jesus, maybe you ought to go home and get some sleep.”
The thought of darkness and silence did nothing for his nerves. He grabbed the newly poured beer and drank it down in a half dozen gulps. The brain freeze seemed to clear his mind for a moment, making the words and the picture seem distant. “Maybe you’re right but I think I could use a few more of these first.”
He patted Bradley on the shoulder and headed for the bar. There was a line of four girls up front, all flirting and competing for the bartender’s attention.
Gary yawned and looked through the front windows. It was dark now and the streetlights were on, the closest one blinking frantically, a dying bulb. Across the street stood the band, passing a joint around and laughing at something.
Behind them, from the shadows of the alleyway, stood a figure. The darkness mostly obscured its features but even from here Gary could tell it had no face.
“What do you want?” the bartender asked but Gary didn’t answer. He made his way outside. The temperature had halved in the last hour. He zippered his sweatshirt.
He made his way across the street. A few cars swerved and beeped. The band’s drummer noticed Gary first, his eyebrows, both pierced, raising, as if Gary was coming over to start something with them.
The guy had a face. That much was for sure.
Gary checked all of them, making sure there were the correct amount of eyes and ears. Then he walked into the alleyway. A homeless man slept on the ground near the dumpster but Gary could see a grey beard. A cat meowed from somewhere nearby.
There was no sign of the figure from the picture.
Because it was just a picture and that’s all. Get a fucking grip.
He put a hand against the brick wall for balance. Suddenly he felt much drunker, the world spinning.
“Gary!” It was Bradley, crossing the street and heading his way. “That’s it, I’m calling you a cab.”
He wanted to protest but maybe sleep would do him good. He hadn’t noticed how tired he was until this very moment. It was an act of will to keep his eyes open. He thanked Bradley and hopped into the first cab that pulled up to the curb.
“I’ll see you on Monday,” Bradley said. “Get some rest. And don’t worry about Emily. Truth is, I think she likes you. I think you’ve got this job in the bag.”
Gary smiled, his head bobbing. He lay back in the seat and watched the bar recede in to the background. He double-checked the alleyway again but they were speeding off too fast.
And besides, he was just being paranoid.
The brightness woke him.
“Son of a bitch.” The sun. How was that possible? He felt like he’d only slept an hour or two at the most. There was a pounding in his head and ear canal, a hangover already taking shape in his skull.
He got out of bed and opened his eyes halfway, wincing at the light, ready to close his curtain.
But his curtain was wide open and the sun was nowhere to be found in the sky. It was pure blackness out there. His bedside clock was on. He read the numerals twice just to be sure. It was half past two in the morning.
His eyes followed the source of the brightness.
His laptop lay on his desk. It was flipped open and the screen was on, illuminating the room in a strange blue hue, distorting things, covering the walls in uneven shadows.
It had been closed and turned off when he’d stumbled into his room and passed out. He was sure of it. He was impeccable about those sorts of things, always gave his roommate shit for leaving the television or the fan on overnight. He walked over to the desk, reaching out to power it down, telling himself it was just a coincidence.
And batted his hand away when he saw what was on the screen, as if he’d been about to touch a spider’s web, trapping his finger in place, forced to wait for whatever had spun it in the first place.
The words on the screen stared at him and he stared back, unable to look away, though he wanted to badly. His headache seemed to triple and his heartbeat followed suit.
Critter Marrow.
It wasn’t an email for any sort of program he’d ever seen. There was simply a white background with the words typed in the middle of the screen in plain black lettering.
He forced his frozen arm to move forward and pressed escape.
Nothing happened.
He clicked the mouse a dozen or more times, trying to find a way to exit, but the words remained.
He clicked the power button, trying to look any
where else but in front of him. He held the button for what must have been thirty seconds. Nothing happened.
It couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible.
Critter Marrow.
Something in the dark room shuffled. He was not alone.
“Leave me the fuck alone!”
From down the hall there was a crash and then his door was opening wide. He was sure it was the faceless ones or the dog-thing coming to shackle his limbs and take their time with his pain.
But it was just his roommate, Zeke. He wiped at tired eyes and shook his head. “What the fuck’s wrong with you? Do you know what time it is? I’ve got to be at work in three hours.”
“Something is happening to me. I can’t explain it but I opened this email earlier and it’s…it’s messing with my head. Just look at my computer.”
Zeke threw his arms up. “Are you high? There’s nothing on your screen.”
Gary turned his head toward his laptop, tensing as his eyes drew closer to the words.
Except there were no words. His laptop was closed and powered off.
Though the next day was Saturday, he left his house the moment the sun was in the sky. He’d popped two Excedrin and washed them down with some orange juice, hoping to battle his hangover. His eyes burned and his skin was oily but a shower was the farthest thing from his mind.
He caught the subway and rode it four stops to his job. Not a job yet, he thought. And it may never wind up that way. You might get laid off once the internship’s over and go back to making yuppie lattes for less than minimum wage.
That is, unless you don’t go insane in the meantime.
He headed up the front steps, checked in with the security guy at the front desk, and rode the elevator to the tenth floor.
It was simple, really. Crazy and superstitious maybe, but simple too. He’d turn on his computer, open up his email, and sift through his trash until he found the message. Then he’d take great joy in deleting it once and for all. He couldn’t explain it—couldn’t explain much of what had happened in the last twelve hours—but knowing that email still existed in some format, hiding in some digital crevice on his computer—it made him feel like something had latched on to him somehow. He’d wipe it from his hard drive and be done with it—all of it.
The elevator door opened and his office immediately felt like a tomb. It was pure stillness except that he didn’t feel alone. He walked down the main aisle and turned left toward his cube.
His computer screen was black. Every inch of him screamed to turn away, remembering last night, the words appearing from nowhere. But despite himself, he turned it on and waited as it powered up.
After an eternity, he typed in his password and opened his email. There were nearly a hundred messages in his trash. He thought of deleting all of them at once but decided against it. He wanted to see those words as he sent them away forever.
He worked patiently, looking at each message and permanently deleting them.
At the very bottom of the list, it lay there, the email that had nearly made him lose his mind.
Critter Marrow.
He highlighted the message, right clicked, and chose delete.
He prepared to breathe a sigh of relief.
It caught in his throat.
The message remained. He clicked delete again. Nothing happened.
The message opened up and he was left staring at the words and the accompanying image, the one he’d never wanted to see again so long as he was alive.
Three faceless bodies, a dog-thing, and a shackled man.
Gary shook his head.
Delete. Nothing. Delete. Nothing.
Still it remained.
His throat constricted and he felt a scream forming in the pit of his stomach.
He should never have accepted this internship in the first place. He remembered the interview, how badly it had gone. He was sure that they would pass on him. Even then he couldn’t stand Emily, could tell she was rotten to the core, the kind of person who took great joy in intimidating those beneath her.
I’m afraid you’ll be staying late tonight, Gary. We’ve got a boatload of junk mail and it’s your job to sift through it.
The message vanished. For a moment his mind couldn’t catch up. He checked every folder, every inch of space on his computer, searching for those two awful words, but they were nowhere. They were gone, deleted after all.
Suddenly he hated this place a bit less.
There were worse places out there.
He shut his computer off and headed toward the elevator, thinking he’d go straight home and get some much deserved sleep.
“Gary?”
He stopped in the aisle.
“Gary, is that you?”
He turned toward the voice. It was Emily. She was sitting in her office, a cup of coffee in her hands. “What’re you doing here on the weekend?”
He tried to think of a sensible explanation. “Just catching up on some work. I was swamped yesterday and I just hate leaving things for Mondays. I guess I’m a little obsessive sometimes.”
“Obsessive is a good quality, especially in a place like this. You could say I’m a little obsessive too. I’ve been here since seven.” She did something Gary had never imagined possible. She smiled. He was taken aback. For the first time he realized she was quite beautiful.
“Catching up on work too?” He smiled back.
“You could say that. Ever since the merger, I’ve had corporate assholes on my back left and right, people I’ve yet to meet, people I sometimes think don’t actually exist. They want this place to run by their rules, not ours, not anymore. It’s enough to drive a woman crazy.”
He wasn’t sure what to say. He hadn’t spoken this long with her before. He offered a nod and a reassuring grunt.
“But enough about that. I’ve got something I’d like to talk to you about while I have you here. Do you have a moment?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll make it quick. It’s the weekend and neither of us want to be here longer than necessary. The bottom line is that you do good work. You show up on time, you’re willing to go the extra step, and you never complain.” She laughed, another first. “And you put up with me on a daily basis. That’s enough in my book. I’d like to offer you a full-time position.”
He froze, couldn’t quite speak. He thought of the student loans coming his way, remembered all the nights he’d lay awake crunching numbers, cursing his parents for not offering any help. You want to go to school, figure it out for yourself, his father had said time and time again. All his friends had their education paid off before they’d even graduated, but he’d been forced to make do and constantly wonder about the future. “I don’t know what to say. That’s great news.”
“Is that a yes?”
“Of course.”
“Great. We’ll start you on the payroll on Monday. I’ll have HR schedule a meeting about benefits. It’s a ton of paper work but then again so is the job.” Another smile.
For a moment he was sure all of this was a dream.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Don’t thank me. You earned it.” She bit her lip and stared at her computer screen. “We’ve got this month’s customer survey results. I’ve been going through it all morning. We have them fill out these questionnaires. Usually they’re straight forward enough, but this answer…it doesn’t make any sense to me. Here, have a look. Tell me I’m not crazy.”
She spun the screen around.
He swallowed and tried not to scream. Suddenly everything seemed more like a nightmare. They were there, on her screen. No faces, except for the creature and the victim.
“What do you suppose this means?”
“I…” He couldn’t manage any words. Emily’s office begin spin around him like a carousel.
“I think maybe they’re referring to something in development?”
They were not looking at the same thing, he realized. She could not see them as he could. He cle
nched his jaw.
“Is everything all right?”
He made eye contact with her, except that wasn’t apt, because she no longer had any eyes. Or a nose. Or a mouth.
“You’ll have to excuse me,” he said. “I think I’m coming down with something.”
He backed out of her office.
“Well, feel better,” she said through smooth skin and no lips. “We’ll see you on Monday.”
He half-jogged toward the elevator, thinking he needed a doctor. Something wasn’t right in his head. The door opened and he stepped inside, trying to calm himself as muzak played quietly over the speakers. He pressed the lobby button and the doors closed.
Something caught his eyes on the button panel. There were the usual numbers for each floor and the basement level but at the very bottom there was a button he was sure had not been there before.
In nondescript letters, etched into the metal paneling, was CM.
“No,” he said. “No. No. No.”
Why had he bothered to open the message? He could have just deleted all of them and no one would’ve known the difference.
He watched the button as the elevator descended.
Where did it come from? he thought. Whose computer had nested the original message and who had bothered to click send? How many email addresses had it skimmed until it wound up in the company’s junk folder?
The elevator stopped at the lobby floor but the doors didn’t open. Some part of him, defeated and terrified, was not surprised.
The music became distorted, out of tune somehow. The gears began to turn again and suddenly the elevator descended quickly. He held on to the bar for support. The basement light went on and for a moment he felt relief, but only for a moment, because the elevator moved downward still. It was an eternity between the last two buttons but eventually the last one lit up.
CM.
Critter Marrow.
He began to frantically push buttons, not caring which floor he went to, so long as it wasn’t this one.
He took out his phone and dialed 911.
Except nothing happened. The call would not go through. He had plenty of bars. It wasn’t real. None of this was. It was just an email, a strange chain letter and nothing more. He needed a doctor and a night’s sleep.
Fossil Lake II: The Refossiling Page 13