Hatched

by Jason Davis

  The thing took another staggering step toward her. It was now only a few feet away. The creature seemed to realize this because it leaned forward. She didn’t think it was afraid to fall over if it meant falling onto her. She couldn’t allow that to happen, and her body knew what needed to be done.

  Her training came back to her and, in a textbook move, she moved quickly to her left. Then, with an angry yell, she brought her right foot up and slammed it down onto its outstretched leg. There was an audible snap, and she felt its knee pop. In an improvised move, she twisted her body and concentrated the remaining force in a punch to its jaw.

  The thing started falling back. She wanted to celebrate her triumph, but she had thrown so much of her weight into the blows, she fell with him.

  She continued to react. She wasn’t a fighter, but knew she had to become one in order to get out of there. She had to keep moving. There wasn’t anything she could do to prevent the fall, but as it slammed to the floor, she came down on top of it. From the hole under his chin, another burst of air escaped. She let out a loud grunt of her own.

  She rolled with it, sliding off the body. She hit the cold linoleum, the feel of it sending shivers along her arms. She kept rolling. She wanted to use as much of the momentum as possible. Something deep inside showed her a vague memory of doing that kind of roll down hills when she was a kid, but she pushed it away from her mind. She couldn’t allow herself to get distracted.

  Winona came to a stop when she slammed into one of the metal bases of the shelf. Her head felt like it was still rolling, and her stomach wanted to heave its contents onto the floor. She couldn’t stop now. All she had to do was make it to the door.

  She pushed herself up onto her knee and reached out for a shelf as she stood. The door was only thirty feet away so she should be able to make it. There was nothing there stopping her.

  She looked back to see that it had already turned toward her. It stumbled forward, almost looking like it was hurrying. That face was still deadpan and had no pain registration.

  She went to step forward, but her leg wouldn’t move. Then she felt it. The vice-like grip as it grabbed for a better hold on her ankle. Oh, hell no. She wasn't going to go down like this.

  In a move that seemed right at the time, she lowered her hands to the floor and thrust out her other leg, slamming it into his face. She had no way to really aim because her center of gravity was off, but she felt a solid connection.

  She heard the crack of cartilage and knew what had been left of its nose was crushed. She came down on her knee, but bolts of pain shot up her leg. Her jaw clenched in agony. She hoped the iron taste in her mouth wasn’t blood. She didn’t have time to think about it. She had to keep going.

  Using all the strength she had left, she pulled at her leg again. Her head felt like it wanted to explode, and she felt the warmth of all the blood flowing toward her brain. If she didn’t get away soon, this whole experience was going to give her a stroke.

  Sparks clouded her vision. She clenched her teeth harder and pulled, to no avail. He still held her ankle, and she felt him pulling her closer.

  She chanced a quick look back. She must have kicked him in the jaw because it just hung there by a small amount of flesh.

  She brought her knee up, getting herself ready for a more strategic kick this time. She didn’t know how much it would help. The other kick would have seriously hurt a normal person, but the blow didn't seem to even slow it down.

  That was when she saw them. She didn’t know how she hadn’t before. They seemed to be everywhere…black spiders racing toward her. She swatted at one on her hand. Even as she did, three more were getting closer. Behind them, she saw just over a dozen more coming. Some went for her upper body, but others headed toward anywhere that touched the floor. A small army of them neared her knee, and twice that many headed toward her other hand on the floor. She looked around. They were everywhere.

  Pain flashed through her ankle. She quickly twisted around to look behind her. As she did, she lost her balance, the creature letting go, and rolled onto her butt. Then she saw why it had let go. It had used its upper jaw to dig into the muscle just above her ankle and tear away a large chunk of it.

  She saw the blood before she realized what had happened. It gushed out of her and quickly flowed across the tiled floor. She stared at it, her brain not registering what it was. After all, none of this made sense. Why was there a big hole in her flesh?

  She noticed the spiders change direction. They were going toward her leg… No, they were going into her leg!

  Winona quickly thrashed her legs, kicking out. She was partly aiming toward the corpse, as it still crawled toward her, but she guessed it was now trying to claw up for something else to bite into. After all, a leg is nice to start with, but just like eating chicken, you want to get to a thigh or breast eventually.

  She kicked out, aiming at his head. She connected, but there wasn’t much strength behind it, so its head barely rocked back. With a gurgling-like groan, it continued to crawl toward her. She started crawling backward, getting closer to the door. It was still several feet away, but she couldn’t think about that. She had to keep going. She was almost there.

  “No matter what,” she whispered to herself, “you're almost there.” Blood pooled under her leg, and it was getting hard to lift and push with it. “Just a little farther. Come on. Just a little bit farther.”

  She didn’t want to look over her shoulder, but it was hard not to. The creature was getting closer. It reached out, pulled against the floor, and inched closer. More spiders fell from where its jaw used to be. They landed in her blood and following it toward her.

  She felt it grasp her upper leg. Its grip was like iron. It pulled itself closer to her. Or maybe she was being pulled back? Her head didn’t feel right. She felt like a cloud had formed behind her eyes and, as much as she tried, she couldn’t seem to find her way through it.

  She barely felt it as it used the teeth that were still there and bit down. It tore through her jeans and ripped into her flesh. She wanted to scream…and maybe she had. It all seemed like it was drifting away and she was floating. Pain? What was that? Instead, she felt like she wanted to close her eyes and let it take over. It was already too late. Just lay back, and let it take over. Just let it...

  Epilogue

  11:37 A.M., EST

  The phone rang, and the woman answered it. Her voice was mechanical and unfriendly, but she wasn’t supposed to be friendly. She’s not there to make friends. She was to sit at a phone…one that was never supposed to ring. While she was there, her life was on hold.

  And then, at just past ten thirty her time, a shrill sound broke through the silence of the room. A room that was always very quiet and free from distractions that would keep her from hearing a phone that should never ring. It was a black, push button phone, an ancient relic, just slightly newer than a rotary phone.

  However, there was no dust on it. Even dust was not allowed in the room. It was to be her and the few others like her who are locked in the secure room for six hours every day. Why six hours? Because it had been proven six hours was the amount of time a person could sit in a bare, locked room before exhaustion or little bits of insanity entered and distracted them. It had even been documented. She sat six hours a day, three days a week, watching a phone that never rang in a room buried deep in a facility that didn't officially exist.

  So when the phone did ring, she wet herself. She couldn’t help it. She had already been in the room for five of her six hours, her bladder was threatening to release itself, and she had to wait for operator six to come relieve her. None of them knew each other’s names. They just all had numbers. She was operator five.

  She felt the warm stream run down her leg, her slacks and panties becoming heavy and sticking to the inner part of her thigh. It felt so disgusting to know what it was, but in the extreme chill of the air-conditioned room, it also felt good.

  She
couldn't think about it. She reached out and grabbed the ringing handset. The vibration of the phone was hard against her palm, and she lifted the heavy receiver. The plastic was cool. Actually, it seemed to be much cooler than it should have been, the cold burning her hand a little. It shouldn't have felt that way, should it?

  The voice on the other end was frazzled, but quickly spoke into the phone. She heard a code phrase, which she typed on the little terminal in front of her. She couldn't really call it a computer. Like the phone, the terminal felt like it was something left over from when computers were first produced. All she had was the keyboard and a screen mounted into the cement wall.

  The room echoed with the sound of her fingers clicking away on the keyboard. She typed in the code that he gave her. She heard him getting more frantic. He said it repeatedly, getting louder and louder each time until he was screaming it into the phone.

  “Flag Day!”

  She typed it onto her screen and hit enter. She heard the computer come to life. There were clicks and a commotion of power. Something had started.

  Everything was set into motion. She continued to listen and type the information he gave her—location and knowledge as to whether it's biological or something else. She was barely able to understand him, but knew not to interrupt or say anything. That’s against protocol. She can also hear the pounding in the background. She didn’t think she had long to talk to the man. Someone else was there, and it sounded like they wanted to keep him from giving a report. In her observation, she concluded that there was a possible threat already on the scene.

  She also wasn’t supposed to talk to the man long. That would also be against protocol. She had to get the essential information from him, then disconnect.

  When she finished typing, she didn't have to click on anything. The report would be pulled in automatically. She ended the call. The man was still talking, but it sounded like it had all become gibberish. He seemed to be losing it while he had been talking. Besides, she had all she needed. She had noted not only all the pertinent information, but also all the little side remarks he had made.

  It was now 10:38 central time where the call had originated from. She didn't know who would get the information, but it was sent. Her job was done.

  The message was sent. Soon, the call would be put out. Troops would be moved into position. Commanders would be taken from meetings, and more calls would be made. They would cut off communication to the location, and life would be isolated and quarantined. It would be contained, investigated, and resolved.

  None of that was her concern, and she had no way of knowing how it would be taken care of. She only needed to know that it was best not to know.

  After that, she didn’t know what would happen. That wasn’t her job. She was one of six woman in a little dark room, all of them awaiting that call. She didn’t know if any of the others ever received one. They weren’t allowed to talk about it.

  She had an uneasy feeling in her stomach. Something about what the guy said made her quiver. She had a feeling she was the first in this room to experience the shaking hands and the overwhelming need to take a drag off a cigarette. She had not touched one in over ten years, but that pull to take in the poison was strong right now. She knew she was the first. Somehow, she also knew she wasn't going to be the last.

  What had the man said? Something about notes saying “Beware the spiders”? She hated spiders. She knew that when she slept that night, she would feel them crawling in her bed.

  In the dark room, she imagined them on her skin. The hairy legs racing along her flesh. A shiver ran down her, and a tear formed at the corner of her eye. She blinked, making it fall down her cheek.

  Many more things would fall later that day. She wouldn’t see it, but she knew.

  ****

  Bruce quickly turned the wheel of the truck to the right, then immediately back to the left. Rob could barely follow the motions of the man, but he had already realized he would rather watch him work the wheel than watch how fast he was maneuvering about in the small parking lot. How was this man able to get this big eighteen-wheeler into a spot that Rob questioned whether his car would fit in?

  Then the large trucker turned the wheel back to the right, forcing down the brake, their bodies pulled forward by the sudden stop. Bruce had barely had the truck stopped before he pulled the yellow knob on the dash to release the air breaks.

  “Well, we’re here. You can just head in there. They’ll get you all hooked up with your car.”

  “Thank you. I really do appreciate you driving me over.”

  “No problem. See that little place right across the way there?” Bruce said, pointing to a little bar on the corner at the end of the block.

  Rob looked down at the little place. It wasn’t much to look at. A standard building with a cement base that led up to a tiled outer wall. He saw the large neon sign of one of the main beer distributors, but from the angle, he wasn’t sure which beer it was.

  Rob nodded at Bruce, who had been looking at him, expectantly. He was quick to continue.

  “Friend of mine owns that place. I’m going to go in and pay her a visit. Once you get done here, come on over. I’ll buy you a drink.”

  “Don’t make me have to write you a DUI,” Rob said.

  Bruce smirked. “Coke only. Scout’s honor. I’m just visiting old friends, boss.”

  Rob gave the man a smile. On any other day, he would have been serious, but he doubted he would give the man a ticket today. Not for how much he helped him out. Besides, he had no jurisdiction here. He could have called the local guys, and would if he witnessed a crime. He can hold someone until they came, but he really couldn’t do too much officially.

  “Like I said, thanks for all the help. I really appreciate it.”

  Rob held out his hand to the man. Bruce looked at it for a moment, then shook it, smiling.

  “No problem. Now, go on. Ask for Sam. He should

  help you out. If not, point to my truck sitting out here and tell him this ol' dog will have to bite.” Bruce winked at Rob, who moved to climb down out of the cab.

  ****

  The sergeant walked into the darkness of the room, amazed at how calm and still it seemed compared to the outside world. Around him, in a world that had turned chaotic over the last hour, nightmare situations were being conceived and planned for, all in the nexus of what could be done on United States soil. Behind him was a mess, but in that dark room was nothing but a silence and a stillness.

  The cool air blew out of the room. He actually enjoyed the basement smell. There was something soothing about the moldy smell that hung and mingled with the stench of oil and diesel. Of course, that was possibly just memories from when his dad and he worked on Saturday mornings rebuilding the old Buick. Either that, or it was just a comfort that something wasn’t yet touched by the madness of it all. That there were places in the complex that were not yet touched by the hurry-and-wait frenzy going on behind him.

  He flipped on the light switch, instantly regretting it. He heard the hum as the long rows of fluorescence buzzed to life. They all started with their low glow that he knew would soon burst into bright light to bathe the area. The chaos was spreading, but he had been the one to bring it into the room.

  It didn’t matter. While the eggheads did their planning behind him, he would be doing his planning in there. This was his home base for the time being.

  He looked around at the jeeps and Humvees lined up in rows. Most of them had just been serviced last weekend, but some were there to be worked on in the next platoon’s guard duty. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t get the chance before the next time they were called into action. Sure, the bay only housed six of the large tank-like vehicles, as most of them were lined up along the fence outside, but he was sure all of them would be needed before the day was out.

  A nightmare situation… That was what they were calling it. No details, just that they were calling all active Guards to
the area.

  Goddammit, it was right here in his back yard, and he had to be the one in charge of it.

  He knew some of the details, though he rather wished he didn’t. Hammond. That was the town’s name. It had twenty thousand or so people, and was one of the larger towns in the area. It had a Walmart, a number of grocery stores, hotels, golf course, and a couple of fast food restaurants. Besides Ottawa, it was the largest town. The only real difference was that one had a hospital and one didn't.

  His brother-in-law grew up in Hammond, and still had family there. He wasn’t sure, but he thought his niece lived there and was pregnant with her first child. His cousin also lived there. She had been there since he was just a toddler, and his mother had always taken him to play there.

  Hammond.

  It's a Midwestern town, not too large, not too small, but it now had all the attention of the nation’s emergency teams. The CDC, military, and politicians were already getting phone calls. Hammond was a name that was spreading like wildfire, also being spoken about in secret all through the White House.

  Yet all the attention wasn’t what bothered him. What bothered him was the attention it wasn’t getting. It was his job to keep it that way...because he had orders to not let Hammond get noticed in the eyes of the media

  Sure, it was too soon right now, and it would take a while for the vultures to catch on, but it was his job to make sure it took them as long as possible before they knew. If he saw a camera, he was under orders to confiscate. He also had to detain any civilians he deemed a threat.

  It was a nightmare situation. All because some doctor had called from the town and some code word had been given. No one had even been able to get back in touch with the guy. He just calls, gives some cryptic crazy message, then the town is locked down.

  What the hell is going on?

  The sergeant walked over to a table near the door and, with a flip, dumped everything that had been sitting on top of it onto the floor. It had fallen with a loud crash, metal upon cement, bringing the garage to life. It wasn’t two seconds before the room was abuzz with privates hurrying around. They brought in different maps of the region. Some were the simple ones a person would pick up from any gas station or rest area, some were just pages from an atlas, and some were printouts from satellite feeds.