400 Boys and 50 More

by Marc Laidlaw

  He turned back to Paula. “Come on, I’ll show you to your room. Hopefully there’s something to eat around here.”

  They started to leave, stepping towards another dark doorway.

  “Daniel.” The voice was cold again, chilling. They stopped and looked back at the old man.

  “You forget,” he said, eyes narrowing, face hardening. “I’m stronger than you. I always was. You cannot resist the organism.”

  Paula felt Daniel’s muscles tighten beneath her hand.

  “Good night, Dad,” he said. They walked out.

  * * *

  Much later, in the darkened hallway upstairs, Daniel apologized again.

  “He’s gotten worse, Paula—worse than I had ever expected.” Daniel was nervous, his expression intensely bothered.

  “It’s all right, Daniel, really. Things happen to people as they get old.”

  Daniel pulled her closer to him. It was cold in the drafty darkness, only the feeble grey moonlight trickling in through the window at the end of the hall. But the embrace was not warming; Daniel seemed to be protecting himself with Paula.

  “It’s as if he wants to swallow me—the way he keeps touching and grabbing. So . . so greedy! I wouldn’t have come back if I thought he’d be this way.”

  “What did he used to be like?” Paula asked.

  She looked up at Daniel, but he wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were fixed on the door to his father’s room, where a narrow fringe of light spread into the hall from under the door. His gaze seemed clouded, distant; he was remembering something. Something unpleasant.

  “What is It, Daniel?”

  He shook his head, slightly disgusted. It was the look he always got when she asked him about his childhood. She could feel his heart pounding against her breasts.

  “Daniel, please, what’s wrong?”

  “I—I never told you. I never thought I’d tell anyone.” She began to urge him on, but he continued without prompting.

  “When I was a kid, I came out here one night—I’d had a nightmare, I think. It was late. I thought I heard noises in my parents’s room; the light was coming out just like it is now. I knocked, but no one answered, so I opened the door—just a little, you know? —and started to go in.

  “They were—they—just lying there, my mother and my father, wrapped around each other, and the light was so bright I wasn’t sure that—that it was my mother there—

  “I thought it was my sister, Paula!”

  Paula caught her breath, then instantly relaxed. Daniel had been young—he’d seen his parents having sex. Such experiences often led to traumas, delusions. She could imagine it lurking in his mind all these years, breaking free now. Daniel was trembling.

  “I yelled,” he continued. “I remember yelling. But . . they didn’t even move. They just lay there until I ran away.”

  He paused. Then, “It wasn’t my sister, of course. It couldn’t have been, I can’t believe it. She and my mother had the same color of hair, and that was all I could see; the light was so bright, they were so close together . . not moving. But I thought, for just a moment, that he . . .” Daniel looked towards the door and shuddered again.

  “Daniel, do you want me to stay with you tonight?”

  “What? Oh, no, that’s all right.” He forced a laugh. “Might be a little too hard on my dad. Maybe later, when he’s asleep, you can sneak over . . .”

  She yawned uncontrollably. “Maybe. If I can stay awake.” They kissed and said goodnight. Daniel parted with obvious reluctance, then went through the door into his room, closing it softly behind him. Paula looked down the hall, where light still spilled from beneath his father’s door. Thank God she was on the other side of Daniel; he was between her and that old man. Daniel’s story was ridiculous, of course: a childhood hallucination, magnified by the years. Things like that . . incest . . just didn’t happen.

  She slipped into her own room, and was somewhat dismayed to find that the lock didn’t work. It needed a key that was nowhere to be found. Just another inconvenience among many. She was surprised, actually, that this place even had electricity. The room itself was dusty and suffocating, but she supposed she could stand it for one night.

  In a minute she was in bed, trying to warm herself, the small table lamp shut off. When the sounds of her settling in had faded, the darkness swarmed around her uncomfortably, creaking and breathing in the manner of such old houses. She tried to ignore it, suddenly glad that they had stayed the night. Another nap in the car and she would have gone mad. At least she had been able to shower here. The old man was bearable when she didn’t have to confront him directly.

  Presently she drifted off, breathing with the house, her thoughts muffled by its thick atmosphere. But her sleep was restless, uncertain.

  Paula was never positive she had slept at all when she realized that she was wide awake again. The stillness was incredible. The house was holding its breath. She sat up, certain that something had jarred her from sleep. A noise.

  There. Perhaps from Daniel’s room, perhaps from the hall. Perhaps trailing from the hall into Daniel’s room . . .

  Suddenly Paula was certain she’d heard a door shut. And—footsteps? But where were they going? Where had they been?

  Those sounds were clear in the swollen darkness. But after a moment came less certain ones—rising and falling, always soft, as deceptive as the rush of blood in her ears. She was hearing things. No. Paula shook her head. She did not imagine things. Straining her ears, the sounds resolved themselves.

  Voices. From Daniel’s room.

  They stopped.

  Paula waited; heard nothing. A slight dragging sound that might have been the night passing through her mind. A dull footstep. And then, quite distinctly, three words, in the old man’s voice:

  “I need you!”

  And creaking.

  Paula was out of bed in an instant, hurrying quietly across the floor. She didn’t trust that old man, not for a minute, not alone with Daniel. She found the door, jerked on the knob—

  It was locked.

  Paula remembered the sound that had awakened her; it returned very clearly now that she could place it. It had clicked, metallically. A lock engaging.

  She pounded once on the door. Again, louder, tugging at the knob.

  And still not a sound from the other room.

  “Daniel, Daniel!” Paula began to sob, wishing that there would be another sound, Daniel’s voice.

  The door. Quieting, she returned her attention to it. The lock didn’t seem terribly strong, it was old. For a minute she considered throwing herself against the door, but it opened the wrong way. Chanting Daniel’s name, she wrenched at the knob, pulling it back with all her strength. It seemed to give a little. Paula glanced back into the room, hoping for something useful. Her hand mirror glimmered on the table, reflecting moonlight. It was heavy, had a sturdy handle.

  In a moment she was cracking the doorframe with it, chipping away the splintered wood, ripping and tearing. There was a grinding, and she yanked on the doorknob and the door crashed open, stunning her. She stood for just a second, considering the darkened hall beyond, then moved forward, into it, the mirror dropping from her fingers.

  No sound from Daniel’s room. None at all. Not through all her screaming and pounding and thundering . . nothing.

  “Daniel?” she called softly. She stopped outside his door, listening. Everything was grey and dim, shrouded in shadows. “Daniel?”

  Before she could reason with herself, she had turned the knob, had found it unlocked, had opened the door and entered.

  Entered.

  “Daniel?”

  On the bed, something grey, tangled in blankets, two shapes. God help her, she was going forward, approaching the bed.

  “Please, Daniel, are you all right?” The words came as a whimper.

  She was at the bedside, eyes squinted with fear, so that all she could see was the two of them, vaguely, Daniel and his father pressed close tog
ether as if . . as if kissing, or making love, his father on top.

  Down in the gloom, a huge spider, almost filling the bed.

  Her eyes closed.

  “Daniel—”

  Her hand went forward, to touch. Gingerly.

  “Please—”

  And there, on top, was the back of the old man’s head, his hair coarse around her fingers. She moved her hand down, consciously, forcing it to touch his ear, and pass around it, still down. Over a rough cheek, withered skin. Skin that abruptly smoothed; skin that continued, unbroken . . .

  Unbroken . . .

  Straight to another cheek, another ear, and the back of Daniel’s head.

  * * *

  “Tissue” copyright 1980 by Marc Laidlaw. First appeared in New Terrors #1 (1980), edited by Ramsey Campbell.

  RATTLEGROUND

  Crawling down the fire-scarred steel corridors of the enemy's lair, he says to himself, So,evil dogs . . . I see you quake in dread at the mere thought of my arrival!

  They have apparently fled before him. The corridors are empty and silent, crackling with the energy of anticipation. The walls are smeared and gleaming, perhaps with the blood of his foes. There has been an earlier flash-attack on this sector: a flushing of the rabbits from their warrens, with humble garden hoses replaced by the searing whitefire of dissembler-grenades. He smiles at the thought, grinning from a nearly toothless mouth.

  Vile pig-things, stinking scrambler bastards. Imagining my approach, you wet your pants with fright! Ho, triumph!

  For an instant he tries to stand, basking in his power but it is a hopeless endeavor. His chubby thin legs are unstable, the muscles lacking all but the faintest vestiges of tone.

  Somewhere, he hears a ticking.

  Then the clatter of footsteps. Footsteps!

  No, it is too soon!

  He scrambles for all he is worth, at last sighting an adjoining corridor. His training becomes reflex and he hurl himself toward the opening, into shadows, rolling like a ball. At the last instant before slamming into the wall, he drops open like a pink flower and presses into a corner.

  The steps pound louder. Voices:

  “—attack on 9. We'll need every unit in there."

  "That's cutting it too close. If we weaken the other sectors — "

  "They’re not exposed, damn it! 9's been peeled paper-thin."

  The footsteps are thunder all around him, the voices tumbling from high above. Squeezing back into the shadows, he glares up at the giants who have come into view. They are red-faced, panting, turning into the corridor where he is hidden.

  So, must I make my stand here? Then I shall take you down with me, you filthy—

  The looming figures start toward him, high, so high above. Their eyes, hidden behind shining grey lenses, do not detect him among so many shadows, but now they are moving in his direction, stalking like a storm down the corridor.

  You too will die! Yah!

  He leaps. He will fight until his strength is drained. He is ready to fight and die with only his small nails and nearly nonexistent teeth as weapons.

  But his body betrays him. His leap, though packed with all the power he can summon, takes him a matter of inches. He falls short of the tromping enemy heels and sprawls flat, gasping for air, tears starting at his eyes, his head throbbing in a halo of pain, his little pink face twisting up.

  As the footsteps fade away, he realizes that they did not even see him.

  Defeated, he begins to cry.

  Damn them, damn them, damndamndamnthebastards!

  When the sobs die down, he is breathless and shivering. He consoles himself with the thought that soon enough, his time will come. They will feel terror then. Yes! Terror! Then!

  He is moving again, once more taking up the rhythm of reflexes for which he was trained. He is a hunter, yes! Mighty conqueror, strength and champion of his own people.

  Crawling, he riffles the list of his weapons and defenses.

  Nails, yes: finger and toe.

  Limbs? No, they are not yet strong enough. None of them.

  Head? For butting, perhaps? Unfortunately not. The circular scar is still tender, the bones of his skull not fully reset; they have been expanded by surgery to accommodate his new brain, and they strain at the skin. Besides, his neck is infirm . . . wobbly.

  Teeth? No, they are but a few pale slivers on his gums.

  What else? What else? There is not much, true, but he does not doubt that his training will see him through. The enemy stands no chance before me!

  Now he slinks, his eyes devious slits, his pink mouth twisted with clever determination. His little fists clench as if holding knives. The concentric pain rings at his skull for just a second, and again the ticking sound seems to grow. Both of these irritations soon subside. He moves on.

  From behind, enemy tread sounds again. They are coming on to challenge his might.

  This time you'll not escape! Prepare to die!

  He feels no need to seek shadows. In the center of the corridor, he turns on hands and knees—ignoring a thousand tiny pangs—and faces the enemy. Faces them.

  Rumble of voices, thunder of monster footsteps. Three mountains, dark and goggled, silver in their flashing uniforms, crash over him. Boom—boom—boom—boom—BOOM!

  Die!

  They stop.

  Petrified with horror, are you? I crush your fates in my very hands. Your master rises before you, and your master . . . is I!

  But . . . why are they not screaming? Why are they not turning to flee, albeit futilely, for how can they escape? Can they not see him for what he is?

  One mountain is stooping, extending its hands, smiling.

  Touch and you die, foul one!

  "Why, look—" it begins, booming.

  Die!

  “—a baby!"

  Die! Now, die! Die, do you hear me? Dissolve into ashes—wither up and blow away! Damn it, why aren't you dying?

  The others speak. "A baby?" "Where the hell did he come from?"

  "Poor thing must have been abandoned during the attack.

  "We'll have to take it to the nursery."

  "What? Dian, we're heading into combat, we can't bring a goddamn baby with us!"

  "We can't leave him here. He'll be safer there than here."

  Listen to me! You must put me down

  "All right, but he's your problem."

  Listen, I—

  "Fine. Let's get going."

  And then: "Hello there, fella. What's your name?"

  He lies cradled in the hideous arms of a colossus, numb with disbelief. They do not hear him. They do not fear him. They . . . they seem to like him!

  This cannot be happening, not to him, not to the conqueror, the commando, the merciless warrior-slayer, not to him!

  "Deedledeedledee! Deedledeedledee!" The fiend's huge digits prod and tickle him. "There's a honey, yes!"

  He lunges for the throat of his assailant, but his hands are smaller than he had judged; he is mercilessly beaten back and exhausted by the pounding gait of his enemy, who is running. He collapses, limp, sobbing, and sees himself reflected in the grey insectoid goggles: tiny and pink and . . . God, so helpless! Can it really be him?

  And now he understands . . ..

  They are fooling him! These are clever ploys designed to make him doubt himself, to weaken his mind.

  It won't work! I'm too smart for you! But you will burn for this—burn!

  "Don't cry," says the voice in soothing mockery. "There’s a good boy, there we go. Whoops!"

  The voice of another breaks over him: "Keep it low, we’re almost there."

  With these words, a sudden flash of light licks at them, coupled with a roar ten times as mighty as that of the giants, nearly as powerful as his own imperial bellow. The blinding pain of it makes the fragmented bones of his skull throb and the scar beneath his scalp tear with agony; makes the ticktickticking suddenly bloat within his ears. He winces, writhes, twists within the titan arms and—

>   "Down!"

  Another explosion bursts over them.

  His carrier rolls, nearly crushing him as the ground comes up beneath them. He is dropped. His vision flashes and his thoughts dull for an instant. Before he too can roll and come up fighting, his captor once more incapacitates him, holding him close, pinioning his limbs.

  He sees the ruins of a corridor before him. Its entire side has been ripped away. Beyond gapes a night that blossoms with light. Out there are his own people, firing on this place where he is held helpless . . . helpless in the stronghold of the enemy!

  He cries out in frustration.

  "It’s all right, babe, it’s okay. There you go!"

  Voices are shouting nearby, giving directions to scurrying figures that move through the ragged shadows like perambulating worlds. Occasional explosions throw them into silver-etched relief. There are dozens, firing plumes of light into the darkness, diving away as grenades burst outside. He writhes again, struggling against the grasp of his captor, wanting only to join his own people in this pivotal battle.

  Let me go!

  The giant is relentless. He sags into himself, weeping. What is his purpose here if not to fight, kill, conquer? Why have they sent him on such an impossible task? Why?

  Another giant moves to where they lie in darkness.

  "Dian, where’d you find that?"

  "In a corridor. Isn't he cute?"

  I am not cute! I am not cute! But he falters, now uncertain.

  "Odd. That's really odd."

  "What is?"

  "Someone else found a baby about fifteen minutes ago, wandering down near Data Central. It was — well, the damn thing was trying to crawl behind the main library core."

  And now he remembers.

  He remembers his brothers and sisters.

  Another shape moves closer, clicking charges from its weapon, adjusting its goggles. "Yeah . . . and they found three in sector 7. Just crawling around . . .. "

  Ginger hands set him on the ground, with respect. The three figures back away, and now there are eyes on him. Goggled eyes, yes, but he can sense the fear within them as they back off, move away, into the growing silence. The battle itself seems to still for this moment.