Hatched

by Jason Davis

  How could she not have felt that? How could it not be bleeding?

  Was she insane? Was she imagining that she should be bleeding? Wasn’t it normal to bleed? Was she crazy to think so?

  She didn’t know. Her legs moved okay, though. She still couldn’t feel them, but she watched as they flailed below her. She decided to try to stand. She leaned forward and reached out for the tree. She started to push herself up. So far, so good, but shouldn't she feel her legs moving? Shouldn't she feel the rough bark of the tree as her hands scraped along it? She only knew she was rising by watching the world around her move, so unless she was now flying, she had to be standing. She was wobbly, but she was up.

  She took a step toward the path. She wasn’t sure how she was doing it because she couldn’t feel her feet or her legs, and she didn’t know how she was telling herself to do it, but she was. She was walking, moving. She was afraid to even look down at herself because she was sure that if she looked down, she would trip and fall over herself. She stumbled and moved slowly, but she was moving. When she made it to the path, she wasn’t sure which way to go, but figured down the path seemed the right way.

  Where was she going? She thought she remembered. She was going home. She had to get home. She needed to get home. But why?

  Chapter 7

  No! No! No! No! No!

  He should not be doing this. There was no damned way he should ever be doing this. It wasn’t his job, not his department. He was a lab man, not a field pawn. He was never meant to be out there and wasn’t equipped with what he needed to keep himself safe in matters like this.

  Bryan stood near the back door to the doctor’s office trying to convince himself that he shouldn’t go in. He didn’t want to, and he was pretty sure it would mean his death. After all, what did he have to go in with? He only had a white grocery store mask that would barely stop a cold bug, let alone anything lethal, and a small bag of various examination tools that wouldn’t be able to identify crap if he found anyone sick in there. It was nearly pointless to even go in.

  He guessed he could try and give his boss a call, see if he would authorize someone to bring him some proper equipment. Of course, his boss would try to find out what he had seen to make him think it was something serious, but he still hadn’t seen anything. As far as he knew, the doctor could be waiting inside for him, sitting in his office, ready to go over his notes.

  If that were true, why hadn’t the doctor answered the phone when he tried to call? He had even tried calling him again from his cell phone. No one answered and it just kept going to voicemail.

  Why go in? So he could face his boss when he got back and not sound like he had been a coward out in the field? He already wasn’t well liked in the office, and it would only add more fuel to the fire against him. It would mean more jokes, more things for them to say about him behind his back.

  He reached out to grasp the handle of the door. He turned it, but stood there, refusing to pull it open. At the corner of his eyes, he felt the moisture fighting to be free. He wasn’t going to cry like some schoolboy. He was too old for that. Yeah, he kept telling himself that, but he knew he didn’t really believe it. He was ready to cry a stream of tears to flood the earth.

  “You can’t cry, though. You can’t allow her to see your weakness,” he whispered to himself. Denise was not too far behind him and watched him as he stood there. He had to go in.

  He pulled the door open. Inside, there was a small hallway, which was dark beyond where the sun shone in. Denise had said that where the hallway ended, he could go left or right. In the center was the nurses station and the filing room. Along the outside of the hallways on both sides were the patient rooms. There were four total, three to the right side and only one on the left. If he was to turn right, the first door he would come to would be the doctor’s office. The first door on the left would be the breakroom.

  She had asked him to check in the breakroom, if he could. She wasn’t sure if she had turned off the coffee she had been brewing that morning. Judging by the acrid smell of burnt coffee, he guessed she had left it on, but he didn’t feel like that should be his first stop. Turning the coffee pot off could wait. It wasn’t going to start a fire.

  At the end of the hallway, he turned right and went to the first door. He expected it to be darker. When he stood outside, everything had looked like it was in complete darkness, but now that he was inside the building, he realized the lights had been left on. It was nowhere near as bright as outside, but once he made the turn, the light from overheard lit his way and showed partially into the little office on his right.

  The door was open, but with no light on inside the room, he could only see the desk. There were papers on the top, and he saw what looked like an ancient telephone off to the side. Could it actually be a telephone? The idea of having anything more than his cell phone seemed like a waste, but to have an old telephone, something that looked like it was out of an old movie, just made it that much more obscene.

  He took his eyes off the phone as he entered the room. He couldn’t allow himself to lose focus. He had a job to do. He couldn’t afford to get distracted with something as stupid as a telephone. He turned to his left, already reaching for the light switch. He flicked it on, but nothing happened. He looked over at it, then back to the hallway lights.

  Okay… There were lights on in the hallway, and it was obvious the building had power, so why wasn’t the switch working? He looked back to the switch and flipped it off, waited a few seconds, then flipped it back on. Still nothing.

  He looked back at the desk, taking his time to study it. It was a plain metal desk. Nothing stood out. There were papers on top of it, so he really couldn’t make out too many details about the top. There was that stupid, damned old phone, a spin dial Rolodex sitting next to it.

  Man, this guy truly was old school.

  He could just make out another shape on the far end. Was that a light? He couldn’t be sure. He maneuvered around the desk. He was moving slowly and carefully, afraid to touch anything. His latex gloves would offer him some protection, but why take any more chances than he already had?

  He eased into the chair, the wheels making a small chirp as he settled into the leather. Compared to everything else in the room, it was out of place. It was really rather comfortable. Probably a gift, he thought, looking to the dark corner of the desk. He could now see the light sitting there. He reached to turn it on. The room was suddenly bathed in a warm glow. It wasn’t much, but at least he could see what papers were on the desk.

  He let his hands glide over the desk, never actually touching anything, but just taking mental notes. It was just some bills, all of which looked to be old, and a legal pad. The bills made him think that the doctor never used his office because one of them was dated a year ago.

  The legal pad was a different story. It looked old, some of the paper wrinkled and torn, but the writing on it was from this morning. The doctor had dated it when he signed the bottom.

  Beside the notepad were three little spots of what looked like white ash or powder. His first thought would have been cocaine, but Bryan dismissed it. You don’t call the CDC and then hide and leave drug evidence where a federal employee could find it. The powder was curious because the desk, other than the old mail, was dusted. The doctor may not have used his office, but someone kept it clean for him.

  Bryan pinched up some of the fine powder and ran it through his thumb and forefinger, looking at its consistency. It was powder, but it seemed to stick to his fingers. It looked dry, but acted somewhat like it was wet and almost paste-like. Strange.

  He also didn’t like that he felt a warm tingle in his fingers though the plastic of the gloves. That couldn’t be good. He peeled off the glove, quickly dropping it into the garbage can next to the desk, then craned his head to see his fingertips in the available light. They were red and looked sore.

  Shit!

  He turned back to the legal pad and pic
ked it up with the hand that still had the gloves on. He scanned over the notes, trying to figure out the doctor’s handwriting. It wasn’t easy. He could pick out some words. “Spider” and “shared delusion”. And he also thought it said something about “walking corpse, no pulse”. But that just made no sense.

  This had to be a joke. It all seemed like too much of a set up. Who knows? Maybe he was on one of those home video or prank shows. Maybe soon, Ashton Kutcher would jump out of the closet and tell him he had just been junked…or whatever that catch phrase he used was. But hadn’t Kutcher been canceled? They now had a new host. They would just jump out, and this would all just be a joke on the federal government. Of course, the real joke would be on them when the U.S. Government went after their heads.

  Down the hallway, there was a loud crash that made the whole room reverberate. Something large pounded on one of the doors. It shook the door, its frame, and the whole wall it was attached to. It made Bryan jump, nearly falling out of the chair. If this were a joke, they really were going all out. He reached into his pocket and pulled out an extra glove, putting it on. He had a bad feeling it was already too late, but he wasn’t going to take a chance.

  He stood, took a deep breath, and started to walk toward the sound.

  ****

  She wasn’t sure what her name was. She didn’t know where she was going. She was on a road, and there were trees around her. Part of her was confused as to where she was, but something else, something deeper, told her that she knew right where she was. It was all somewhat familiar. If that were true, why didn’t she remember it?

  Because she didn’t remember anything. What was her name? She wanted to think that it sounded something like Lu, or Bu, or Ju, but she wasn’t sure. None of them really sounded right, but she thought she was close.

  So, where was she going?

  Home…

  But where? Where was her home? Was it around the corner? It all looked familiar, but was it? She didn’t know how she kept moving toward the curve. Her body was alien to her, she felt like a passenger in her own skin, but it was still going to where she wanted. The invaders didn’t have control yet. She still told the body where to go. She couldn’t feel it, and it felt like it was dead to her, but she still had control.

  Control of what?

  Who was she?

  Where was she going?

  Chapter 8

  Bryan reached the door. He knew it was the right one because he could hear them on the other side. He didn’t know how many of them were in there, but he heard more than one. It sounded like several people bounced around in there.

  He guessed they were waiting in there to play some prank on him, but weren’t being too careful about it. They were making enough noise that he had figured it all out pretty easily.

  “Hello?!” he said to the wood door. He still hoped to talk to the doctor and keep the joke from playing out. His boss liked the man. The last thing he wanted to do was get the doctor in trouble. He would try to give him an out, allow him to claim that the call had originally been a legitimate one.

  But if they went through with it, that option was off the table. He wasn’t going to allow himself to be made a fool of.

  Somewhere in the back of his mind, an itch of a thought tried to surface. Then it hit him. If this were a joke, why him? Did he know this doctor? Had he met him before and this was something he and Chris had dreamed up since Bryan was going to be in the area?

  It made sense. Why else would Chris send him out there? He knew he wasn’t a field agent and hated being around people. This all had to be a setup, a practical joke.

  “Doctor Wilson?!” he called again.

  There was a crash against the door. It sounded like a large group of people slammed into it. He heard the cracking sound of splintering wood. He looked at the door. It was cracked down the center and was bulging out as it had started to give way.

  This wasn’t a joke. He had known it from the beginning, but the proof of it sank like a led weight into the bottom of his stomach. He felt his breakfast fighting to come up and didn’t know how much longer he could hold it in. His hands shook and bowels pinched as a pain shot through them.

  I am not…a…fucking…field…agent!

  He took a step back and fell into the barrier that blocked his way into the nurses station. Instead of looking to move around it, he backed his way along the wall, not wanting to take his eyes off the door.

  There was another slam. This time, the door gave away even more, and there was now a gaping hole. The large shapes on the other side still couldn’t get through, but he saw one of their faces. It looked at Bryan, and his breath caught in this throat.

  Through the crack in the door, he saw the gray, dead eyes and the pale skin of what looked like a dead man trying to climb through the hole. There were gashes along the man’s face, but no blood poured down. There was dried blood on the face, but nothing oozed from the wounds. The man was dead. There was no denying it. There was no way a man could look like that and still be alive.

  Bryan felt warmth running down his thigh and knew that he had pissed himself, but he didn’t care. He backed down the hall, telling himself that if he could get away from the gaze of that beast, it couldn't hurt him. It wasn't human. Not anymore. Whatever… Whoever that had been, it was no longer human.

  Bryan found the gap into the nurses station and nearly fell backward into it. He wasn’t even sure how he had reached out in time to catch himself on the partition, but once he had, he turned and went into a full run to the doctor’s office. He wanted to get out of there, but knew it was too late for that. He was already exposed. He couldn’t chance making anyone else sick. At least that little bit of rational made it into his irrational mind.

  He slammed the doctor’s office door closed just as he heard the creatures slam into the door one more time. From the sounds of splintering wood, he guessed that the wood had finally given out and they were now in the hallway. He didn’t go look.

  He looked around the little office, then hurried over to the desk and pushed against it. The metal squealed as it protested, but after a good shove, it finally moved across the room and slammed against the door.

  He didn’t think it would hold, but at least it was something. It was something to keep him away from them, and right now, that was all he wanted. Not that it mattered. His life was probably over the moment he was within air contamination of those…those things.

  He had to call it in. This town had to be locked down. There wasn’t any evidence that it had escaped this office, but they couldn’t take that chance. If it were airborne, if Denise had it and had been around others, it could already have spread. He couldn’t take that chance. They would lock down the town and make sure. Then, if everything was safe, they would just have to come up with a good cover

  story. If everything wasn’t safe…

  Bryan grimaced at the thought. He knew that if they weren’t safe, if things got worse in the town, the media would be given an even better cover story.

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. It took him only a second to scroll through his programmed numbers until he found the one he wanted. It was right under the listing for “Mom”. The number he needed was listed as Mother. It wasn’t all that original, but he never did take those protocols too seriously. When would he ever need them, right?

  An almost mechanical sounding female’s voice answered on the first ring. In the most unwelcoming tone Bryan thought he had ever heard, the woman said flatly, “Lemrose Pizza.”

  “Flag Day,” he said into the phone. “Flag Day! Flag Day! Flag Day!”

  He heard them lumbering closer. It wouldn’t be long. God, he hoped they got there soon. He doubted he would be saved. Who the hell was he kidding? He was dead. There was no way anyone would come for him. He was gone. Dead the moment he had made that phone call.

  A heavy force slammed against the door, momentarily pushing in on the desk. Right n
ow, the quarantine was not his greatest concern.

  Another force, sounding like a heavy object without a lot of power behind it, slammed against the door, as smaller thumps continued to hit the wall. They’d keep going until they got through that door. They were going to get in, then he was dead. He was already a dead man.

  He looked at the phone in his hand. Maybe he should call his sister?

  He watched as a spider crawled out from under his sleeve and climbed onto the phone. He brought the receiver to his forehead, feeling the cool plastic on his skin, as a tear trickled down his cheek.

  Chapter 9

  She came to a large house that felt familiar. She wondered if it were a part of a dream she once had. All of this…moving without moving, not feeling herself…seemed like it may be just a part of a dream. Maybe she was just a pawn of her own imagination. Some part of her knew it wasn’t, but everything else screamed at her to accept that it was. It told her to pinch herself, but she already knew she wouldn’t feel it. She hadn’t felt pulling the long spoke from her bike out of her leg.

  This had to be a dream, but something else inside her, something deeper, told her it wasn’t.

  She found herself lumbering around the familiar house to the back door. She stumbled her way up the steps, falling and slamming her knees into the hard wood. She prepared herself to grimace and scream out for help, but there had been no pain. That alarmed her.

  However, it troubled her more that while she meant to scream, she hadn’t been able to. She wanted to cry out, to bellow in pain, but when she opened her mouth, no sound came out. Had her mouth even opened? She couldn’t feel it, and she couldn’t see it, so she had no way to know for sure.

  Awkwardly pushing herself to her feet, she finally made it to the back door. She watched, a prisoner in her own body, as her hand reached out and pulled open the door. She knew it was pure instinct that brought her to this place, but that had started to grow weaker. She didn’t know how much longer she had that force left in her. She was dying.