Slimer

by Harry Adam Knight

  Shelley gave a feeble nod. 'Yes. Only one. It didn't need to reproduce. It didn't even possess the capacity for reproduction, either a sexually or bisexually…'

  'I don't follow you,' said Paul. 'Why couldn't it reproduce?'

  'I told you - it didn't need to reproduce. Species only reproduce in order for their genes to survive, or we could say that genes themselves have contrived for the species to reproduce in order to improve the chances of their own survival. But because the Phoenix organism is in itself immortal, or thought it was, it didn't have to rely on such a clumsy mechanism…'

  'The Selfish Gene,' murmured Paul.

  Another ghost of a smile from Shelley. 'Ah, I see you have seen my video tapes. Young man, you must ensure that those tapes are seen by the right people. Steps must be taken to ensure that something like the Phoenix can never be unleashed upon the world again. Do you promise?'

  Paul nodded. 'Don't worry. We'll make sure the full story of what happened here gets out.'

  'Good,' said Shelley. He gave a deep sigh and his head lolled back on his shoulders. His features began to melt and run together. Then there was a hissing sound and something black emerged from between his lips.

  'Get back!' Paul warned Linda. They began to retrace their steps up the corridor, keeping the lamp trained on the squirming shape on the floor. It was then that Linda realised they'd left the flame-thrower up on the landing pad.

  Shelley rapidly disappeared and in his place was the familiar horror of the pool of glistening black slime. But it was different this time. Its viscous surface was rippling and bubbling in an agitated manner. Then thick, greasy-looking fumes began to rise up from the liquid.

  Both Paul and Linda started to cough as the acrid gas reached them and were forced to back even further away. 'What's happening to it?' wheezed Linda.

  'It's dying - I hope,' said Paul.

  They watched it for about ten minutes. By the end of that time there was nothing left of the creature but a scattering of dried, black flakes. Eventually Paul walked carefully towards them and then prodded through them with the barrel of the M16. 'Careful,' warned Linda.

  'It's okay. There's nothing left but ashes. It's all dried up. It's dead.'

  'But how can we be sure?' She wanted to believe it was dead, with every fibre of her being, but the suspicion remained. The thing had tricked them before.

  'We can't be. Not absolutely,' said Paul. 'But I'm 99% convinced and that's good enough for me.' He came back to her, a wide grin on his face. 'I really believe it's all over.'

  'God, I hope you're right. But what do we do now?'

  'We find that other pilot,' said Paul, slinging the M16 over his shoulder. He sounded almost carefree and she half-expected him to start whistling at any moment.

  'How do we know he's not in there?' she gestured at the pile of blackened flakes. 'The thing might have got him while we were up top.'

  'No, I don't think so. In the condition it was in I doubt if it was capable of attacking anyone. I'm sure we'll find him safe and sound. Come on, let's go.' He set off down the corridor with a definite air of jauntiness.

  Linda followed him wishing she could feel as cheerful as he obviously felt but she couldn't shake off the strong suspicion that their troubles were far from over.

  SEVENTEEN

  They eventually found him outside. They were about to descend the gangway to the lowest level when he suddenly came running up the gangway towards them. He stopped when he saw them. He was a heavily built man in his late twenties. He had a crew-cut and was dressed in the same sort of overalls as the one Paul had shot.

  He stopped when he saw them. 'Who the hell are you?' he shouted. Linda noted the alarm in his eyes. He looked as if he had just received a bad shock.

  'I'm Paul Latham. This is Linda Warner. Our yacht sunk and we ended up here a few days ago.'

  'What the hell is going on around here? Where is everybody?' He spoke with a pronounced American accent.

  'It's a long story,' said Paul. 'Just believe me when I say there's no one left alive here but us and that we should get away from here as soon as possible.'

  The pilot narrowed his eyes. He was looking at the M16 slung over Paul's shoulder. 'If you're the only ones here that means you shot Mike…' He reached down quickly and Linda noticed for the first time that he was wearing a holster.

  But as he unbuttoned the flap and started to draw out a .45 automatic Paul moved faster. He had the barrel of the M16 pointing at the man before the hand gun was even clear of the holster. 'Don't!' cried Paul. 'Drop your gun over the side.'

  The man hesitated, obviously considering his chances of getting a shot at Paul before he could fire. Then, with an expression of disgust, he held the automatic out to one side and let go of it. It bounced off the gangway steps with a metallic clatter and disappeared. 'You did kill Mike, didn't you - you murdering bastard,' he snarled at Paul.

  'It was… an accident,' said Paul helplessly.

  'Yeah?' he sneered. 'Tell that to the judge. You're going to fry for this, kid. We got the death penalty back where I come from…'

  Oh great, thought Linda as her sense of despair returned with a rush. After all we've been through we end up being convicted of murder. And who was going to believe their version of events? There was no evidence to back them up except a lot of empty clothes and piles of ashes. Then she remembered the video tapes…

  'Paul,' she said urgently, 'we should go and get Shelley's tapes. No one's going to believe all this otherwise.'

  'Yes,' he said wearily, 'You're right. I should have thought of that myself.' Then to the pilot he said, 'Look, I did shoot your friend but it was an accident and I'm sorry. It's just that… well, things have been pretty bad around here...' He shook his head helplessly. 'I wish I could explain but it would take too long. And it would sound crazy, fantastic… you're just going to have to accept my word for the time being that I had a good reason for thinking your friend was dangerous. But I'm no murderer!'

  The pilot obviously decided to change his tactics. With a slyness he couldn't conceal he said, in a conciliatory tone, 'Okay, kid, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt for now but let me go back to my chopper so I can radio for some help.'

  'No,' said Paul quickly. 'You'll call no one. Not yet. First we've got to go and pick something up. And you're coming with us. I warn you if you do anything stupid I'm going to have to shoot. I'll try not to kill you but that's not easy to guarantee with one of these things.'

  The pilot went pale. He raised his hands. 'Hey, keep cool. I won't try anything, I give you my word.'

  'Good. Get moving then,' ordered Paul, gesturing with the gun, 'Back the way you came…'

  ***

  Even though she knew the creature was dead - or at least she was nearly certain of it - having to go inside the platform again was the most difficult thing she'd ever done in her life. Once again the feeling returned that she was never going to see the end of these damned corridors - that she would spend forever wandering through the maze.

  Then, when they finally reached the video room, they had to spend a long time sorting through the tapes trying to find the right ones. With the power off there was no way they could check to make sure so they decided to take as many as possible, using Paul's shirt as a make-shift sack.

  While all this was going on the pilot, who'd been forced to lie face down on the floor with his hands behind the back of his head, kept asking questions.

  'Are you guys going to tell me what the fuck happened here?' was the first one.

  'I told you,' said Paul, 'it's a long story and you probably wouldn't believe it. That's why we need these tapes. To prove it.'

  'What happened to all the people that were here?'

  'They got eaten, in a manner of speaking.'

  'What? Are you crazy?'

  'See, I told you you wouldn't believe me.' Paul was examining cassettes in the weak light from the single lamp, trying to recognise familiar code numbers. Fortunately some of th
e cassettes were still sitting on the console and, as he told Linda, he was confident that the vital tape - the one they'd looked at last with Shelley's description of what had happened - was among them.

  'What ate them?' asked the pilot, after a long pause.

  'That's the difficult bit,' Paul told him. 'It's to do with what those scientists were working on here. You know all about that, don't you? You must do otherwise you wouldn't be here.'

  'I'm just a pilot. I don't know anything.'

  'Don't give me that,' said Paul with a bitter laugh, 'you knew this place was housing a secret laboratory. You also knew what they were doing here was illegal.'

  'Is that so?' said the pilot warily. 'So tell me, what happened? What did you find when you got here?'

  'You can read about it in the newspapers,' said Paul, tying the corners of his shirt together. It held over twenty cassettes. 'That's it,' he said to Linda. 'Let's get out of here for good.'

  Linda experienced a tremendous feeling of relief as the heli-copter lifted off from the pad. The emotion was so strong it was intoxicating. She wanted to cry and laugh simultaneously. At long last they were actually leaving the hateful place…

  'I can't figure why you still won't let me call in,' said the pilot. 'They must be getting pretty anxious 'by now back at my base.'

  'Let them,' said Paul. 'You aren't touching that radio.' He was sitting beside him in the co-pilot's seat,and had the barrel of the M16 pointing at the top of his head. Linda was sitting behind Paul. The cabin was quite spacious and could probably seat at least ten passengers without any difficulty.

  'Yeah? What will you do if I do touch it? Shoot me?'

  'Yes,' said Paul.

  The pilot laughed. 'I really doubt that. You might have shot me while we were down on the platform but not up here. You need me now. Shoot me and this baby falls out of the sky.'

  'No it won't. I know how to fly a helicopter.'

  'You're bluffing.'

  'Possibly. But can you take the chance?'

  The pilot didn't answer. Nor did he make a move towards the radio.

  'Any idea where you're going?' Paul asked him.

  'Yeah. There's another Brinkstone platform less than thirty klicks from here due east.'

  'A real oil platform or the cover for another one of Mr Brinkstone's unusual enterprises?'

  'It's a bonafide oil rig, pal. And we'll be there in about ten minutes.'

  'No we won't,' said Paul. 'We're not handing ourselves over to your people just like that. We know too many embarrassing things about Brinkstone. Your boss isn't going to let us walk free to talk to the media if he can help it. More likely we'd just disappear…'

  The pilot laughed. 'Hey, hold on now. We're an oil company, not the goddamn Mafia. You really think old man

  Brinkstone would have you killed? You're crazy…'

  'Yeah? If you're all so innocent why were you carrying a gun? And why did you have such a well-armed team of guards on the platform back there?'

  'Security precautions, that's all,' he said curtly.

  'Huh,' grunted Paul. 'Well, we're taking security precautions of our own. You'll fly us directly to the mainland. You'll set us down in a field or something right near a town.'

  The pilot glanced at him with surprise. 'The mainland? But that's over two hundred klicks away. I don't have enough fuel.'

  'Show me your fuel guage,' ordered Paul, pushing the barrel of the M16 lightly against the pilot's cheekbone.

  After a pause he pointed at one of the dials on the instru-ment panel. Paul peered at it then said, 'You're carrying enough fuel to fly us six hundred kilometres. I told you I know about helicopters. You've got more than enough to get us all the way to Aberdeen. So that's where we're going. Get your charts out and prepare a course.' He nudged him again with the gun barrel.

  'I still think you're bluffing,' he said, but he reached down to the chart case clipped to the side of his seat and did as Paul ordered. Then, as he plotted a new course, he said, 'What will you do after you land?'

  'Organise a press conference somehow. Get these tapes seen by the right people. Make sure the full story comes out. And make sure that steps are taken to see that what hap-pened back on that oil rig never happens again.'

  'And what did happen? You can tell me now. We've got time.'

  'The scientists working for your boss accidently created a new kind of life form. A highly dangerous one. It was practi-cally unkillable. It was only through sheer luck we got rid of it…'

  The pilot laughed. ' "Practically unkillable" but you managed to get rid of it? Doesn't sound very dangerous to me. What exactly was it?'

  'Well…' Paul hesitated. 'Well, it was a creature that could change its shape. It was genetically engineered to adapt to anything that threatened its survival. At times it looked human, other times it was a pool of moving jelly...'

  The pilot gave a snort of disbelief. 'You give that story to the media and they'll lock you up in an asylum. It sounds crazy.'

  'Yeah, well, it doesn't matter if you believe me or not,' said Paul defensively.

  'Oh, but I do believe you,' said the pilot, removing his helmet.

  Linda screamed. Staring out at her from the back of his head was a round, fish-like eye.

  EIGHTEEN

  'Shot it, Paul!' screamed Linda. 'Kill it!'

  'I wouldn't advise that,' said the 'pilot' quickly. 'It would be inconvenient for all of us. Before I could reform this machine might possibly go out of control and crash. I would survive, of course, but you two wouldn't. And I do know, Paul, that you were bluffing about being able to fly it. I know everything about you that your friends did…'

  Paul's face twisted with indecision. He backed away from the pilot, flattening himself against the door, but kept the M16 pointing at his head. 'Jesus,' he cried, 'Shelley lied - there were more than one of you!'

  'Shelley? When did you speak to him last?' asked the pilot in a conversational tone. His voice hadn't changed - if it wasn't for the third eye staring blankly out at her from the back of his head Linda could have convinced herself that it was all a terrible delusion.

  'I asked when you last spoke to Shelley,' he repeated. He continued to face directly ahead, not looking at Paul and ignoring the gun barrel. Linda saw Paul's finger tightening on the trigger but still he didn't fire.

  'Just before we met… you,' said Paul. 'He told us there was only one of you. That you couldn't reproduce because you didn't have to.'

  The pilot chuckled. And for a moment sounded like Alex. Linda wanted to scream again - to launch herself at the thing and rip at it with her nails - but she could only sit frozen in her seat, transfixed by the single, staring, unfathomable eye.

  'I'm afraid that wasn't Shelley. That was me. Or rather the other me. Shelley had remarkable will-power. He held out longer than all the rest but in the end he had to succumb to me. It was inevitable.'

  'Then there are lots of you?' asked Linda fearfully.

  'No. Not. There is just me now. What the other "I" told you, apparently, while imitating Shelley was the truth. Or had been the truth. I didn't possess the means to reproduce but once it became obvious that the heroin was killing me I was obliged to rapidly evolve some sort of reproductive mechanism. The result was crude, but, as you can see, effective.' Again there came the obscene chuckle. 'And in a sense you two are responsible for this new development in my life cycle.'

  'You got to the pilot,' said Paul bitterly, 'took him over…'

  'Not in the way you think,' said the creature. 'Otherwise nothing would have been solved. There would have been two of us dying of heroin withdrawal. Instead I injected him with a small collection of newly-formed cells - an embryo if you like, but one that contained all the information and memories of the parent organism. In other words, a miniature version of me.

  'Once implanted within the host the embryo grew and spread at a remarkably fast rate, cannibalising the host's various organs as it went. The whole process only took twenty-seven min
utes from start to finish, though it was a very long twenty-seven minutes for the host, I'm afraid…' Again the chuckle. 'Yes, from the host's point of view my reproductive method has its drawbacks. Extremely painful ones. As you yourselves will find out before this flight is over.'

  'Us?' Paul couldn't keep the fear out of his voice. 'Why do you need to reproduce again? You're not dying now?'

  'Ah, but there's still only one of me. I know now - or rather let's say "I" am now aware on the genetic level - that I must continue to reproduce to ensure my survival. As I told you, thanks to your very nearly successful efforts to destroy me I have evolved a step further. As will always be the case whenever you puny humans attempt to stop me.'

  'But does it have to be us?' cried Linda desperately. 'Couldn't you just let us go?'

  'Idiot,' said the creature blandly. 'Fear is making you irrational. Anyway it pleases me to have you two as the carriers of my seed. As the ones who almost killed me it is fitting you should assist me in the introduction of my kind to your world.'

  'You mean you intend to keep on reproducing?' exclaimed Paul. 'What will happen when…?'

  'What always happens when a superior species confronts an inferior one. The superior one overwhelms and eradicates the inferior - and I am unquestionably superior. I possess the combined intelligence of many of your scientists as well as great strength and various other unique physical characteristics, as you well know. I am the ultimate survivor. The end product of evolution because I will always be one step ahead of any competitor. And soon there will be ten of me, then twenty, hundreds, then thousands. The human race will quickly collapse and its remnants will be acknowledging its new masters…'

  'But does it have to be like that?' cried Linda. 'You said yourself you have the combined intelligence of many people. With such great intelligence why do you need to be our enemy? Shouldn't you be beyond such primitive emotions as the need for violence?'

  The single eye regarded her unemotionally for a few moments, then the creature said, 'You're confusing intelligence with some hazy notion of moral superiority. Just because something is intelligent doesn't necessarily mean it has a well-developed empathy for other living creatures. That concept is a piece of wish-fulfillment created by the more idealistic among your race. But your human system of ethics is meaningless to me anyway. This intelligence I possess - a mental patchwork of the minds I have absorbed - is nothing but another survival tool to me. At the core I remain what I originally was before those scientists, in their egotistic way, took me from my natural world and carried out their experiments. I still have the same primal drives… the same appetites…'