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Spooky season is in full swing, and what better way to truly enjoy the Halloween spirit than listening to some of your favorite scary stories.So, let's get into it, as we drift deeper into Mr. Creep's mind.
I worked as a night guard at a grocery store, and they left a strange set of rules, written by Blair Daniels.I saw the job listing two weeks ago.Wanted.Night guard at West Market in Redacted, Pennsylvania.12am to 6am shift.$21 an hour.
The whole thing struck me as odd, right off the bat.What kind of grocery store needed a security guard while it was closed?Was the crime really that bad?But I needed the money, badly.
And two days later, after a phone interview with a man named Clive, I showed up for my first shift. As soon as I pulled up, I sort of understood why they needed a night guard.The grocery store sat at the edge of a run-down strip mall.
Large signs reading space for rent hung in the store windows, but judging by the dusty glass and flickering street lamps, nobody had taken them up on that offer in years.
I parked near the front door, and as I approached the building I saw a woman hurrying away from the store. I put them on the conveyor belt at register 1.
She gave me a polite nod and then stepped around me, heading for the only other car in the parking lot.Oh, thanks.Be friendly, my inner voice scolded.She's your new co-worker.I turned around.Hey, what's your name?
But she was already diving into the car.The door slammed, the car reeled out of the parking space, and then she was gone. So much for a new friend.I turned back towards the store.
The parking lot was completely empty now when the nearest streetlight was flickering with an odd erratic rhythm.A cold wind swept in, whipping a crumpled paper bag across the parking lot. Well, here goes nothing.I stepped up to the store.
The glass doors squeaked as they parted for me and then I stepped inside.Despite its outward appearance, the store was actually pretty nice inside.Bright fluorescent lights shone from overhead.Jazzy music played from hidden speakers.
I headed over to register 1 where a folded piece of paper was waiting for me.I flipped it open and began to read. Dear Aaron, welcome to the West family.We sincerely hope that you enjoy your first shift.
To help you, we've compiled a list of rules that should make your shift as easy as our fresh-baked apple pie.Rule number one.As night guard, you are expected to patrol the store every half hour, making sure that nothing is amiss.
You may spend the rest of your time in the break room at the back of the store, monitoring the security camera feeds. Rule 2.Do not go down aisle number 7.Do not look down aisle number 7.Rule 3.
If you hear a knocking sound coming from within the freezers in the frozen food aisle, ignore it.Rule 4.If you see a shopping cart that hasn't been put away, please return it to the shopping carts at the front of the store immediately. Rule 5.
Do not be alarmed if you find a pool of blood in the meat aisle.Sometimes our meat packages leak.Simply head to the storage closet, get the mop and bucket, and clean it up.However, do not step in the puddle or touch it in any way. Rule 6.
If you see a woman in the store, immediately go to the break room and stay there until she leaves.Do not call the police or report a break-in.Do not make eye contact with her.Rule 7.
The music we play throughout the store is a pre-recorded disc of instrumental jazz.If the music ever stops, immediately go to the break room and stay there until it resumes. Rule 8.Do not, under any circumstances, end your shift early.
Thank you so much and again, I hope you enjoy your shift.Clive I stared at the rules, re-reading them slowly.They were so weird.A woman in the store.Avoid aisle 7.
I had never been given instructions like this, even when I worked as a bouncer at a nightclub in a bad part of town. Maybe it was a test.They wanted to see how well I could follow instructions, no matter how absurd they were.
I looked up at the security camera, staring down at me from the corner.Okay, challenge accepted.I glanced at my phone.Might as well get my first patrol out of the way now, before getting settled in.
It was odd walking through the store when it was so empty and quiet.All the breads and muffins had been stored away somewhere.White opaque plastic had been pulled down over the vegetable display to keep the cold in.
When I got to the end, I made a right into the meat section.Sheets of plastic had been pulled over the meat coolers too. I saw flashes of red through the gaps, of massive ribeye and sirloin steaks, big slabs of meat with the bones still intact.
I averted my eyes.While I wasn't a vegetarian, I never really liked the sight of raw meat.I turned instead to the aisles. Aisle number 3, pasta and sauces, all lined up on the shelves, glinting in the fluorescent light.
Aisle number 4, cookies and snacks.Aisle 5, aisle 6.Oh, right, I wasn't supposed to look at aisle 7. I forced myself to look down at the floor.Yeah, it was stupid, but they told me not to look.
In the off chance they were going to check the CCTV footage later to grade my performance, I was going to follow every rule.I continued further into the store.
A few minutes later I found the break room, a nondescript brown door with a little square window cut into it. I took note of its location for later.
As soon as I was done with this patrol, I was going to break out my laptop and finish watching Friday the 13th 4.And then I was at the west end of the store, the frozen section.I turned down the aisle, heading back towards the front.
And that's when I saw it.A shopping cart parked askew in the middle of the aisle.I huffed.Of all the rules, this was the one that annoyed me the most. I was hired to be a security guard and not a cleanup crew.
Wasn't it the employee's job to put all the carts away at closing time?Sighing, I began pushing it towards the front of the store.The wheels rolled smoothly underneath me.The jazz music played softly in my ears.
I turned the corner and walked past the cash registers heading towards the front door.And that's when I heard it. A soft sound, barely audible over the jazz music.I stopped, straining my ears to listen.
Several seconds of silence went by, and then I heard it again.It sounded like somebody crying.The hairs on my neck stood on end.There's no one in here.The door has been locked the whole time.
Unless a customer has accidentally stayed past closing time. Maybe that employee, the woman that I had run into in the parking lot, didn't notice them and locked up before they could get out.Who's there?I called out.A wailing sob in response.
My heart plummeted.It sounded like a woman or possibly even a child.I'm coming, I called, breaking into a run.Where are you? They didn't reply, they just continued sobbing.
I frantically headed in the direction of the sound calling out to them, telling them that everything would be okay.But then I stopped dead.The sound, it was coming from aisle 7.Do not go down aisle 7.Do not look down aisle 7.
The rules had been very clear about that. I stopped just short of the aisle and next to an end cap display of mayonnaise and carefully positioned myself so that I was hidden.I'm going to help you.Can you tell me what happened?I called out.
They finally spoke, but they didn't answer my question.Help me. The voice cried through more sobs.Please.I wanted to step into the aisle.My foot was already halfway off the floor, ready to run in there and comfort them.But something stopped me.
A gut instinct, a little alarm bell going off in my head. Because out of all the aisles, what were the chances this person would be in aisle 7?And besides, they were safe.They were in an empty store with me.
It's not like they were in a dark alleyway in the middle of the night.Come out of the aisle, I called, my voice shaking a little.Then I'll be able to help you. Please, help me," the voice replied.This is stupid.
Clearly some person got stuck in here after closing time and they're scared.Just go into the aisle and help them get home.But there was another part of my brain, the instinctual lizard brain part, and it was screaming at me to not move a muscle.
Do you need me to call someone?Your parents or family, the police maybe. The voice pleaded again.The help me had sounded the same each time they said it.A little stutter at the beginning, an emphasis on me.
It almost sounded like a recording or some AI-generated thing looping over and over.It didn't sound natural.Come out of the aisle, come out and I'll help you, I shouted.The sobs got louder and faster, hysterical.
The voice pleaded again in a desperate tone that made my stomach twist.I stood there pressed against the mayonnaise display.Listening to them sob was making my stomach flip-flop, even if it did sound slightly unnatural.
I could call the police, I thought.They would know what to do, except I had left my cell phone with my backpack at cash register 1, and getting it would mean crossing aisle 7. The rules didn't say anything about walking past aisle 7.
They just said that I shouldn't go down it or look down it.And I couldn't just stand here and do nothing.What if it really was someone who needed help?A child who had sprained their ankle and couldn't get up.
Don't worry, I'm getting my phone and calling the police," I called out, and then I took a deep breath and stepped across the threshold of aisle 7, towards register 1.
As soon as I took a step, the crying stopped, just like that, violence sobbing and then, in an instant, nothing, like a switch had been flipped.And then the footsteps started.
Loud, slapping footsteps of somebody running down the aisle, way too large to be a child, coming straight at me.My heart dropped.It's a trap.They're coming for me and I'm probably going to die here.
But as soon as I made it across the aisle, the sound stopped.All I heard were the soft jazz tunes playing through the speakers overhead.I hightailed it to the break room, completely forgetting about the cart that I was supposed to return.
The break room was small and cramped.The little square window in the door had been blacked out with construction paper from the inside.The only source of light came from the computer screen on the desk, displaying the security camera feeds.
I scrolled through the feeds.I quickly noticed that none of them offered coverage of Aisle 7.It seemed like the cameras were intentionally placed to avoid that aisle.
After searching the grainy black and white video for anything amass, I lean back in the chair and I close my eyes. When I finally opened them again, it was almost 1230.Time for my next patrol.I didn't want to go.
I felt safe here locked up in this little room, but I also knew that I wouldn't be safe if I didn't listen to the rules.I shuddered, imagining what would have happened to me if I had gone down aisle 7, if I hadn't listened.
I pulled myself out of the seat and headed for the door.The store was completely silent, no hysterical sobbing or pounding footsteps.I started my patrol near the back, walking up aisle 17.
Cans of food glinted on the shelves as I passed, but when I glanced at them, I didn't see any labels that I recognized. No Chef Ravioli or Giant Green Man, just generically labeled cans of meat stew.
In fact, all the aisle had was meat stew, the same cans over and over and over. I reached the end and turned right towards the front of the store, and that's when I realized that I had already broken one of the rules.The cart.I hadn't returned it.
It wasn't where I had left it.Instead of haphazardly parked near aisle 7, it sat next to one of the cash registers, like some ghost man was checking out his groceries.
I paused for a second, hands hovering above the handle, and then I grabbed it and headed towards the door.Outside, the parking lot was pitch black, not a single street lamp.The shopping carts are only a few feet from the door, I told myself.
Just go in and out, it'll take two seconds. I did it as quickly as possible.I ran into the darkness, slammed the shopping cart into the row and dashed back inside, and then I shut the door as they unclicked the lock.Okay, that wasn't too bad.
I said to myself, letting out a sigh of relief. For a second, I reveled in the peace of the store, the silence, the safety of being locked inside, with no one else with me.But then I stopped.The silence.Oh no.The jazz music wasn't playing.
How long had it been off for?I had been so preoccupied with returning the cart that I wasn't even paying attention.I broke into a sprint towards the back of the store, cookies and snacks flashing by me.
and then I swerved right and sprinted into the break room.I pulled out the list of rules and read them over again.Do not, under any circumstances, end your shift early.Why did he write that?
Was it just because he didn't want anybody flaking out on him?Or if I left early, would some horrible fate befall me?Because I really, really wanted to leave.
I opened my backpack and pulled out the soda that I had brought and I popped it open, took a sip, and scrolled through the security feed.Five more hours.The next four patrols went fairly well.
The rules didn't say how long they had to be, so every 30 minutes I sprinted a lap around the store as quickly as I could.The whole thing only took about a minute, and then for the other 29 I locked myself in that break room.
On the second patrol, I heard knocking as I ran down the freezer aisle.It started as light tapping across the glass and then crescendoed into loud thumps, like somebody was slamming their palms against the glass doors.As per the rules, I ignored it.
I just kept running until I made it back to the break room. On the last patrol, the music had cut out again, so I quickly detoured and got to the break room as quickly as I could, the silence ringing in my ears.
And now, here I was in the break room with three hours left. I stared at the clock on my phone, ticking slowly towards 3am.I stood up, shaking out my nervous energy, preparing myself to sprint.
I had been a runner back in high school, but in the past ten years, I had gotten way out of shape.The last patrol had left me panting and breathless, with my legs aching.My hand closed around the doorknob.My heart hammered in my chest.
Three, two, one, go.I wrenched the door open and shot out into the store.But I didn't get very far, because there was an enormous pool of blood on the floor.
I froze, all the air sucked out of my lungs and I stared at the blood as shining in the fluorescent lights. The rules said to clean it up, but that would take at least 10 minutes.I wasn't safe out here.
I swallowed, and then I hurried to the supply closet.I got a mop and a bucket, and I started cleaning as fast as I could. The job was messy.I slid the mop through the blood and then dunked it in the bucket, rinsed and repeated.
The soapy water tinged red.A few times it splashed up and almost landed on me, but I did it.I cleaned it all up without touching a drop. Unfortunately, by the time that I was finished, it was 3.27, time for my next patrol.
I was too tired to run, and so I settled for a brisk walk around the store.I headed up through the frozen food.
I noticed now that there were handprints on the glass doors, handprints of all sizes, tilted and smudged, except the proportions looked all wrong, with fingers that were too long and too thin. I averted my eyes and kept going.
Two and a half more hours.My footsteps clicked against the tile floor.The jazz was starting to grate on my nerves.I must have heard the same looping saxophone melody twenty times now.It made me want to punch something.
Sighing, I continued towards the produce section, briskly walking past the aisles.And then I stopped. Something caught my eye in one of the aisles.I backed up and took a better look.Someone was standing in aisle 9.A woman.
She wore a blue linen dress and black high heels.Long black hair cascaded down her back almost to her waist. She faced away from me standing still, her thin white arms hanging limply at her sides.In her hand was a basket filled with cuts of raw meat.
The rule echoed in my head.If you see a woman in the store, immediately go to the break room.Do not make eye contact with her. I slowly backed up as quietly as I possibly could, and then I started down the next aisle towards the break room.
Clicking, I heard her footsteps echo against the tile.I hurried my pace towards the break room, but then I stopped.Her footsteps weren't coming from behind me, they were coming from in front of me.
I averted my eyes to the floor, just as I saw two black, high-heeled shoes step into the aisle.I stared at the floor.Do not make eye contact with her.Do not make eye contact with her.
The words repeated over and over in my head, but I had to get to the break room and she was standing in my way.
All I could see were her shiny, high-heeled shoes, and the little drops of blood that leaked out of the meat packages in her basket, staining the floor. I backed up.That was the only way that I could go.
I kept my eyes on the floor, careful not to look up.But she was following me.Click.Click.For every step that I took, I saw a shiny black heel come into view, attached to a thin, white calf extended, keeping time with me.
I quickened my pace and so did she.Click, click, click.I wheeled around and broke into a sprint.Click, click, click. I ran down an aisle at random and sprinted towards the break room, but then halfway down the aisle I stopped.
The shopping cart was parked across the middle of the aisle, blocking my path.And not just one cart, several of them stacked up in a teetering tower that was nearly as tall as the aisles themselves.I was trapped.I backed away, my heart pounding.
Click.Slow methodical footsteps coming towards me slowly, like a cat stalking its prey. I took my chances.I turned around, sprinted back out into the open, and I stepped into the next aisle.Oh no.No.And I knew it instantly.
A tattered lump of grey clothing and sickly pale blue skin sat on the floor.The person, the creature, the thing folded in on itself, in a pose reminiscent of a crying child.
But it obviously wasn't anything resembling a human, with its strange lumps and appendages and complete lack of head.I had stepped into aisle 7. I immediately reversed direction, but not before the thing unfolded itself and began to move towards me.
I whipped around, and screaming, I sprinted down the next aisle.Miraculously, I made it to the end in one piece. I veered sharply left, towards the break room.Almost there, I'm almost there.My hand hit the doorknob.
I wrenched it open and dove inside, and then I collapsed in the chair, panting.I sucked in a breath, staring at the locked door. Am I really safe in here?Technically, the rules never said that I would be safe.
Maybe staying in here only decreased my chance of death.I turned my attention to the security camera feed on the monitor.It showed the middle of the store, and from what I could see, the aisles were empty.No trace of the woman.
I switched over to the next feed, the produce section.Empty.I switched to the next one.I jumped.She was standing right there, right in front of the break room door.
She stood so still that the image could have been a photograph, except for the blood slowly dripping from the meat in her basket.I swallowed and glanced away from the monitor at the door.
My heart slammed into my ribs when I saw her shadow under the door.Go away, please, just go away, I pleaded in my mind. The shadow of her head in the window tilted, as if contemplating her next move.Now I knew why the window had been covered.
I forced my eyes away and I looked back at the screen.She was still standing there, except there was something different about the way she was standing. I squinted at the grainy black and white image, trying to figure out what was going on.
When my eyes finally fell on her heels, I realized they were facing forward, but I was still looking at the back of her head, at the long black hair cascading to her waist.
Either her hair was hanging over her face, or she had turned her head all the way around. It must have been 20 minutes before she began to walk away from the door.
I couldn't tell if it was just the low frame rate of these crummy cameras, but her movements looked jerky, her body lurching with each step.It made me sick to watch. When she disappeared from the screen, I let out a breath of relief.
My hands and legs were shaking, weak.Okay, think.The rules said to wait until she left.All I had to do was watch the feed by the front door.As soon as I saw her leave the store, I would be safe.
After a few minutes of sitting there waiting for my heart rate to return back to normal, I forced my fingers back to the keyboard.
I pressed the arrow key to move to the next feed, and then the next and the next, looking for the camera at the front of the store. No.Her face.Her face filled the entire screen.Her eyes filled me with horror.
They were pure white, no pupils, no irises, just pure white eyes threaded with spidery veins.I screamed and jumped back, and then I shut my eyes.The rules said don't make eye contact.Did that count, though, through the screen?
I let out a terrified, shuddering wail and covered my face with my hands, my entire body shaking.
When I finally took a peek through my fingers, I saw her, rapidly scaling down the wall, away from the camera on the ceiling like some kind of spider, and then she pushed through the glass doors and disappeared into the night.She had left.
I was safe, or as safe as I could be, in this cursed grocery store.I glanced at the clock.3.58 AM.Time to patrol. I really didn't want to, but I forced myself to swing the door open and run as fast as I could through the store.
I saw a shopping cart stacked in teetering towers, heard hands pounding against the freezer doors, saw little spots of blood on the shiny tile from the woman as she had stalked me. And then, a minute later, I was done.
I locked myself in that break room and for the first time in years, I began to sob.The remaining patrols went by without incident, though I did hear more sobbing coming from aisle 7, and more banging from the freezers.
And then finally the hour had come, 6 a.m.My heart soared at the sight of the pink dawn sky through the glass doors.I was safe.I was free. When I glanced out into the parking lot, I saw a few cars pulling in.
Disgruntled, groggy employees clutching coffee, heading towards me.As soon as the first one came in, I flew out of the store, ran to my car and got out of there as fast as I could. I had never felt such relief, such happiness.I felt like a new man.
All of my problems, even my financial ones, seemed dwarfed by what I had just gone through.
When I pulled onto the main road, I rolled down my windows and flicked on the radio, but it wasn't my usual classic rock station that blared through the speakers.
Instead, I heard the upbeat tune of a saxophone, and as I listened to that horrible looping melody, I realized that my days as a night guard for West Market may not be over yet. Today's episode is sponsored by Uncommon Goods.
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Don't miss out on this limited time offer.Uncommon Goods, we're all out of the ordinary.My work on a fishing boat off the coast of Canada.We caught something not from this earth.Written by DarklyGathers.
We were not aware at first that the hull had drawn anything unusual out of the sea.
We were all just standing around, watching with only mild interest as the arm of the boat's crane dragged the heaving net up and onto the deck, splattering the legs of the nearest fishermen with a shower of seawater as it did so.
The net was steadily and mechanically drawn open, and the squirming, writhing fish within began to tumble from the sides and out onto the floor as the fishermen backed up and away to higher decks.
The rain at the time was no more than a drizzle, but as I watched the fish spill out and over the boat, I nonetheless had pulled my hood a little tighter around my head, a feeble defense as the wind blew it bitterly sideways and into my face.
The weather as it is now is pretty typical of how it's been for the last few nights. I turn and look around, tilting my face away from the direction of the rain.I don't see much.To give you an idea of our surroundings, try to picture a world of grey.
Dark and shadowy clouds from horizon to horizon cover the sky, though the horizons themselves are hidden behind rumbling, tumbling swirls and walls of mist and fog.The sea churns softly but steadily.
frothing white against the hull of the trawler but grey-to-greyish blue everywhere else.The sea is all that there is.
In the first couple of weeks we saw other boats occasionally, but we don't see them anymore, not this far out from the Canadian coast.Aside from the occasional drifting ice, there is nothing.Formless, shapeless water and cloud.
And let me tell you, four weeks into a six-week round trip, six hours into an eight-hour shift, the mood on the deck at dusk is as gray as our immediate surroundings.
I'll give you a quick rundown of the crew, but there's no need to memorize their names.I'll try to make obvious who's who as we go, but might be useful for reference at least is my reasoning.There's Troy, our intrepid captain.
A lazy guy, scruffy one too.No idea how he came to command a ship, even one so modest as ours.Feels wrong to even call it a ship to be honest.There's only about a dozen of us on the crew.There's myself, I go by Charlie, Chief Officer.
90% of the responsibilities of the captain with 50% of the pay.Go figure.The trawlers engineer a redhead that we refer to as Enki for a laugh.And then there's the operators of the machinery.Brent and Bryn, both big dudes.
Saskatchewan boys through and through, though I'm pretty sure that Troy hired them for the alliteration of their names alone. Five fishermen.Sean, Scott, Omar, Ferris, and um, some other lad.Can't remember his name off the top of my head.
And then there's the chef, Ken.Though we sometimes just call him Chef, like in South Park.Decent guys, really.Every one of them, all things considered.Only one fight since we've left Doc, which is pretty good going in my experience.
It was really more of a scuffle anyway. Everyone bar for Chef and Captain Troy are on deck at the moment that the net in question is opened.There's no particular reason for this.
Some of the night shift crew are just up a little early, and there are very few other places to actually be.The hauling ins are tragically the most exciting features of the day.
Brynn turns and locks the winch into place, stepping away from the crane's controls for a closer look at the hull.His hair is blown about his face, eyes squinted as the fish flop and slip out and over the lower deck.And that's when we first see it.
We see the thing that the net has drawn up from the deep. Appearing at first as an oily black mass behind the silver, absorbing the low level of light instead of reflecting it, it becomes clearer and clearer as the fish disperse.It's pretty big.
I think to myself that we might have caught ourselves a baby whale or something, but no, that's not it. What the hell is that?"shouts Bryn from the opposite side.He has a better view than me, I think.
He turns to the man beside him, to Enki, and gestures to the object as the fish fall.His mouth moves and Enki replies, but I cannot make out their words.
The other step closer now was staring in awe at the thing that sits silently in the center of the dock, dripping onto the fish below. I would say it was roughly 6 or 7 feet long by my estimation, and maybe 2 thirds of that length and height.
It appears as a roughly hexagonal cuboid, pointed at either end like an enormous dark crystal.This is no crystal however, no precious gem.It looks sick, wrong almost. The surface is not shiny or sharp or near-translucent, nothing like that.
I hesitate to make the likeness but it looks kind of like skin, oily and blackened unless my eyes are deceiving me, which to be fair is entirely possible.I swear that I see the thing briefly throb.What the hell?Did anybody else see that?
Brynn shouts again from the opposite side.His eyes meet mine and they flash. a bright and pale blue, almost gray in their coloring.I, I reply loud over the wind, I saw it.
He hops down the short steps to the deck, kicking aside the fish as he approaches.Ferris and another of the fishermen, the fellow whose name I can't remember, jumps down too for a closer look. Hey, I call out.
Get away from that thing, we don't know what it is.In a classic display of respect and deference to my position, I am thoroughly ignored.I sigh and look over to my right, raising a hand to Brett.
He stands further up the boat, behind the controls of the machine that will open and lower the end of the loading deck, swallowing all the fish into our cold storage.
I catch his attention and I gesture to him to lock it up and leave the controls alone.He does so and I step down onto the deck and turn.Might as well go for a closer look if that's what everybody else is doing.
Brynn slaps his hand against the object, peeling it away at once with a sickening squelch and a laugh of disgust.Thin, sticky, saliva-like strands of dark fluid connect his palm to the object's surface.
I shake my head in disapproval as I circle around, allowing myself a good long look. Brynn shuckles and puts his hand out towards Fares, who promptly backs away in revulsion.
He instead grabs Engi in a headlock and tousles his hair, much to the engineer's dismay.The object is certainly nothing that I'm familiar with.Ain't never seen it in no nautical books either.
Could it be a clump of oil, all frozen together perhaps, but in such a shape?Does oil even freeze? Brin, I call out, and the big fella looks up, releasing Engi as he does so.
The freedman mutters and curses as he brushes his hair and pulls his hood back up over his ginger mop.How's it feel, then?This thing, what does it feel like?You're welcome to touch it yourself, Charlie, he replies with a laugh. I grimace at him.
I'd rather not, but tell me, how's it feel?He opens and closes his palm.It's warm.Feels like, I don't know, how you would expect the skin of a seal to feel, I guess.A seal.Interesting comparison, but whatever.And warm.
It's some kind of scientific anomaly, that's what I reckon.Says Brad as he scratches his chin.Ah, well, that's helpful.Personally, I hate it.I think we should dump it back into the sea.I reply. It goes deeper than that, though.
This thing, for reasons I can't quite explain, unnerves and unsettles me in a way that I don't really understand.It's sickeningly out of place in its current position, in the center of the deck.It doesn't belong.
This suggestion, however, is met with a general murmur of dissent from most of the crew.We can't just throw it overboard, says Brett. Talk to the captain, this could be a discovery of some sort, a big deal.
We should keep it on board and take it back to doc."The captain's asleep," I reply.We'll then wake him up, you're the chief officer, tell him it's an emergency. I look around at the crew and they're clearly in agreement with him.
I turn to our engineer.Even you Engie, you think we should keep this thing on board.He shrugs.Sorta.I relent.Fine, I'll go speak to Troy.
I turn from the object and head back into the body of the boat, striding the length of the narrow little corridors to the captain's quarters.One of the fishermen catches up with me as I approach.Omar. Charlie, he calls out to me.
Wait man, hold on, I think you're right, you know, about the thing, I think we should just chuck it back into the sea.Yeah, I know man, I reply barely slowing my stop.I hear ya, I might yet dump it back into the sea myself.
I will speak to the captain first though, I said that I would after all.We stumble a little against the walls as a wave knocks into the side of the trawler. The rain comes down a little harder against the roof.
I knock on the captain's door and then I push it immediately open before waiting for a response.Hey Troy, wake up man.Troy grumbles from the darkness and I see the rough shape of his body turn over on the mattress.Come on Troy, wake up.
We need you to come out and check what we hauled in from the sea.It's important.The man grunts again and waves one of his hands in a kind of shameless shooing motion. Troy, I wouldn't wake you up if it weren't important.
I don't really want it to haunt our ship any longer than it needs to be.Can it wait until the morning, Charlie?"He grumbles.You know damn well how hard it is to fall asleep on this thing.Troy, this is some alien-looking thing.Is it dangerous?
Not actively, but... Is it moving, flashing lights, speaking?No, it's not particularly animate, but... Well, then it can wait until the morning.I'll have a look at it then.Now screw off so that I can get some more sleep.I'm tired.
Troy, just get your butt out of bed and... Get lost, Charlie!I sigh and I draw the door to a close.Omar is still stood there, just looking at me. We'll deal with it come tomorrow, I say to him.Screw it.
I'm not thrilled by the object's presence, but what the hey, it doesn't look dangerous.It's just weird.I guess that it can wait until the morning.
I returned to the dock and ordered the lads to get the fish down into the cold storage, and then I'd turn in for the night myself.Might as well, there's not much else to do.
I'm more or less used to sleeping in the conditions that the ocean provides by now, but it still feels like a rough one tonight.I try to get some rest as the night shift officially takes over their roles on the ship.
But as I drift off into an uneasy slumber, my dreams are twisted and frightening.I find myself alone in the dark. Looking around there is only water in all directions.My arms and my legs kick and push gently to keep me in place.
The surface is far, far overhead and out of sight.And below, below is the void.Bottomless.A watery nothing that goes down, down, and down.And I find myself drawn down into it.
Pulled by an invisible current, I struggle as the pressure tightens around my head and I'm swallowed by the darkness of the ocean below.The water around me grows colder and colder and I can only shiver in horror as my blood turns subtly to ice.
Dark towers rise up from the gloom beneath my feet, and I am drawn ever deeper into the midst of a poisoned city, ancient and long forgotten and terrible beyond words.
Abandoned, it would seem, but alive in a way that I could sense for certain in the dream, but cannot explain to you now.
The material of the rising towers is the same as that of the object, slimy black and tar-like, yet emanating a disturbing and uncomfortable warmth, one that I should, by logic, be drawn to given the freezing nature of my surroundings.
And yet, yet I find myself wanting to distance myself as far from the towering pillars and spires as possible.Down I go, down, down, down.
But gaps and arches in the ruined architecture reveal to me that the alien cityscape now extends far out in every direction.
A humming rises up from the deep, low but growing louder and louder, reverberating up from the depths, and something moves in the darkness. Yo Charlie!My eyes crack open and I twitch in fright as I'm returned to a world of the awakened.
Angi's staring at me from the door, silhouetted by the dim grey light of the corridor beyond.There are other members of the crew out there too, I can tell. I grimaced and rubbed my eyes, and groaning as I set myself upright in bed.
This must have been how the captain had felt.I empathized with him at once.What is it, Engi?I grumbled, but there was real alarm in the man's voice, and once I realized this, I awakened a little quicker than I would have otherwise.
Brin's freaking everybody out.He won't stop swearing and cursing in his sleep, and he won't wake up either.He's sick, Charlie.I grumble and stumble out of bed.What's the matter with the man?
He don't look well, pale and leaking at the lips, and he keeps rambling and muttering about some city below the sea.My eyes flash with sudden horror as I stare the engineer in the face.He what?Angie stutters, surprised at my reaction.
The two fishermen, Ferris and Omar, stand behind him in the corridor and I push past them all as I hasten through the corridor of the gently rocking boat to Bryn's quarters.
I slam open the door and fumble for the switch, squinting as I flick it up and the room is washed in a sickly artificial light.
There lies Bryn, groaning and muttering in his sleep, blanket half thrown from his body, legs sticking out the end at strange angles, and his skin. Pale, Engie.Pale, you said.What the hell is this?Brins as white as a sheet and slick with sweat.
Worse than that, though, he looks decidedly wet.And his veins, his veins bulge black in his neck and chest and all the way down his right arm.He weren't this bad five minutes ago, I swear it.Though he didn't turn on the light.
Holy hell, this is above my pay grade.We're taking the trawler back to shore.See if we can't contact a helicopter to meet us on the way back.This is insane. None of the crew are looking at me now though.
They have all ceased listening, their attention focused on the man in the bed.My skin starts to crawl and I slowly turn to look back at our boy Bryn, diseased as he's upon the mattress in the corner of his room.
We watch in silence, us four, as Bryn retches and turns onto his side, falling from the bed to the floor of the room with a sickening squelch.A terrible and alien black fluid leaking from his nose and mouth.
But as he falls, as he slips from the bed, his legs, the top of which are covered by the sheet, remain exactly where they are.
Bryn now ends at the torso, connected to the mess that he's left behind in his mattress with a series of thickened, oily black strands.He looks up at us and his eyes roll over white. Jesus!
Someone shouts and we crash into and elbow each other frantically, hastily retreating from Bryn's quarters, staring at the twisted remains of the man as he rise against the floor.The ship rocks in the storm.Bryn!
I force out, fighting against a throat that is closing in panic. Brynn, are you in there, man?Rebuild.He mutters through wretches, fluid leaking from his mouth.Rebuild what has been lost.Her city grows, spawn for the spires.
He hisses and starts to drag his ruined body across the metal floor towards us.Jesus, no!shouts Omar behind my left ear. No."We all stumble back, tripping up and out into the hallway."'Angie," I splutter, "'get everybody awake at once.Bread first.
I need the guy in the crane.'""'No, I'm no idiot.This is the work of the object.I want it off the ship as fast as we can before it can do any more damage.Captain be damned.'" Engi nods and disappears off into the darkness of the corridors.
I am separated from the two fishermen.They back up into the corridor that leads to the deck, whereas I head further back towards my own quarters.Shut him inside, I think to myself.Close the damn door.But I'm already too late.
Bryn slithers out from his room though he doesn't even look at me.He instead crawls instantly towards the fisherman, dragging his leaking body in the direction of the deck.I'm speechless.
I have no idea what the hell I'm supposed to do with this man, my crewmate, this abomination.Omar and Ferris cry out in panic as they retreat, stumbling towards the lobby that leads to the deck.Omar does at least.
Ferris stops and grabs a fire extinguisher from off the wall. Raising it high above his head, jaw clenched and eyes wild and mad.Wait, Ferris!
I shout, but the man ignores me and brings the extinguisher down hard towards Bryn's head as the former operator scrambles along the floor towards him. His aim is off and he strikes Brin on the shoulder and neck with a spray of ink like merc.
Brin screeches into my horror, disconnects his jaw like a snake, ensnaring a good half of Ferris' lower leg in his teeth.Ferris screams and kicks, crashing into the wall and dropping the extinguisher.
and Brynn tears out a chunk of the fisherman's leg, not a small chunk either.Ferris drops like a tumbled stone, silent and shuddering, shocked to the core.
I should think, and Brynn continues along his way, snaking disgustingly from side to side as he hauls himself down the corridor, ever muttering to the backdrop of a low hiss in his throat. I go to the fallen fisherman.Ferris, I mutter.
Bud, speak to me.But he only stammers and pales before my eyes as blood spurts and leaks out over the floor. This is insane.I murmur as I stare at the wound.This was not covered in aid training.
I decide upon tearing the man's jacket from his shoulders and wrapping it tight around his leg.He finds his voice and screams out in the corridor as I apply the pressure and tie it off.
It seems like the others are finally starting to come to see what the hell is going on.Either that or Enki was successful in waking them up. My heartbeat is quick and loud, I can feel it heavy in my chest as I look at my bewildered colleagues.
The captain, dazed and clearly still half-asleep, behind him in a good foot taller, chaffing Sean of the fishermen.Ferris!he exclaimed, stumbling towards us and falling down onto his knees, checking the man over and lightly slapping at his cheek.
Ferris, hang in there, man, hang in there! Charlie, the captain says, would you care to explain to me exactly what?Go to the Dektroi, take a look at the object, it did this.
Brynn smacked his hand against the thing like an idiot and I don't know, something happened to him.I'm rambling.I turn to Sean as I clamber to my feet.Keep an eye on him, okay?
He nods and I beckon Troy and Shep down the narrow metal hall towards the lobby, following the trail of dark, slimy grease that Brynn has left behind.
To my left are a number of metal poles that we use for sorting the fish when the occasion calls for it.I grab one now and suggest to the others that they do the same.
The lobby of the boat is empty but beyond the glass windows the dark and rainy deck shows us blurred shapes darting from place to place.Screams can be heard above the winds and the rain.The hell is going on out there?
Troy mutters as we push into the world outside, instantly buffeted by rain and wind, squinting against the thrall in the darkness. The great grey waves froth against the ship's sides, uncaring of the drama that unfolds on the deck.
A flashlight beam crosses our field of vision, briefly illuminating Omar at the side of the boat.Another of the crew has stood behind him.Scott, I think. Omar's lower back is pressed against the rails as he stares in horror at the object.
The great black hexagonal shape, darker than dark in the midst of the storm.Omar!I call above the gale.Where is he?Where's Bren?Omar cups a hand around his mouth and calls something back but his words are lost in the wind.
I can see him pointing though, right at the object, and I can see that well enough.Chef, I say to the big man beside me.Aye, he replies.Get back inside and turn on the floodlights.Aim at center deck.
He nods and hastens back in and I turn to Troy to my left. He's messed up beyond recognition, Troy.I say to him as loud as is necessary.Brynn, he's poisoned.So what the heck is he doing out here, Charlie?
Troy shouts back and to that, I really have no answer for him.The edge of the captain's shadow is suddenly cast out long across the entirety of the boat, as one of the floodlights behind lurches into life with a slow and heavy mechanical clack.
Its angle changes ever so slightly. until it points ahead to the center of the deck, right on the object as instructed.
The new burst of light bids Omar and Scott to shield their eyes and also reveals a fellow to the left, the fisherman whose name I cannot remember in Brett, Brynn's operational counterpart, by the controls to the crane on the far side.This is chaos.
From his current position, our remaining operator cannot see the horrors that the rest of us can. What's happening?He shouts out loud over a temporary lull in the sea spray-tinted winds.What is it?But I find myself unable to answer.
Hellfire and brimstone.Troy splutters beside me, eyes wide and fixed on the abomination ahead. The object does not shine in the light.It absorbs the powerful beam and only seems darker in comparison with its newly floodlit surroundings.
The specks of seawater across its form, however, glitter brightly like false gems, as indeed does the moisture on the skin of our comrade Brynn.We watch him writhe and press himself up against the object with a sickening desperation.
His mouth is moving though I cannot hear his speech, and with his jaw so distended and broken as it is, I cannot read his lips either.
He turns from us and presses his face up against the object, pushing his forearm and his torso against its slimy black surfaces.Dark and sticky strands beyond count connect his body to the form of the object.
And as he pushes, he seems to be sinking into it, forcing himself into the actual object itself. It becomes difficult to tell where the man stops and the object starts.His skin at the edges begins to melt into the oily fluid.
The physical barriers between the two break down before our very eyes.I feel the rise of bile accompany a lurch in my stomach and I force it down.Charlie!Troy shouts.Shit!Should we stop him? Why are you asking me?You're the captain, are you not?
I think to myself, but to tell the truth, I don't know either.Instinct tells me that I, we should.We should be stopping this grotesque display at once.But on the other hand, I don't want to go anywhere near that thing.
And while it hurts to admit, I can't help but feel like our decision at this stage wouldn't matter much.Surely by this point, we're too late.Ah, screw it.We gotta at least try.This is Bryn we're talking about.
I step through the storm and onto the deck, the metal pole in my hands flashing in the glare of the beam light.Omar calls something to me, but again, the man is not loud enough and I don't hear him.
Shaking fiercely with the cold I taught myself and jaw clenched, I stride suddenly forward and jam the pole into a space between Bryn's steadily disappearing shoulder and the oozy black of the object.
The noise it makes and the bizarrely disturbingly mushy resistance are sensations that I will remember for the rest of my life.
The remainder of Bryn's head twists with the tightening of the dark strands that surround it, and he screeches at me, his lone visible eye white and wide.
I stagger back in horror, trying and failing to take the metal pole with me, and the end that I was holding clatters against the deck as the other remains stuck in the mixture.
Bryn's eyes, ever pale, seem only all the paler now, as his pupil has all but disappeared.He's gone. I back all the way up to the entrance to the lobby, never taking my eyes from the horrors that lay ahead.
Troy, man, captain, you need to order this thing to be dumped back into the sea, now.Our lives are about to get a whole lot worse.What the hell is going on over there?Brett calls from the crane controls.
You're kidding me, Charlie, the captain replies, with a member of my crew inside. No way I'll be tried for murder.Captain, use your eyes.You think anybody will believe this, Charlie?
The point is a valid one, but he's either ignoring or failing to feel the sense of impending doom that now weighs down, ever heavily upon us. Well, fine, if he doesn't have the balls to do it, then I'll do it myself.Brett, I call out.
Dump this thing back into the sea, as quick as you can.He starts making his way towards us, stumbling a little on the winds around the edge of the dock.
you want me to dump it charlie i thought we were taking it back to shore this thing belongs in a museum jesus christ i put my hands to my head and watch as the last of brin disappears through the membrane of the throbbing oozing dark shape on the dock
Blobs of flesh and pieces of clothes are left stuck to the side, and they drip and roll down to the deck with the rain.Fine, hey, everybody get the hell inside now.I turn to Troy.
You're going to take us back to Doc at this second, and I'm going to radio for an emergency helicopter.Aye?Aye.Troy mutters with a nod and then after a pause. Right, you heard the man, everybody back into the ship.
The captain and I turn hastily to try and return into the safety of the lobby, but we find ourselves face to face with our boy Ferris, jacket still wrapped tight around his leg but standing up right now, right in the doorway, if a little skewed perhaps.
Black fluid leaks from his lips and his eyes are staring, wider than they have any right to be.Lightning strikes the sea in the distance and we recoil in sudden terror.Behind him, it is Sean who now lays slumped on the floor.
His eyes are closed and I cannot tell if he's breathing, but there are bruises around his neck. and his face has been smeared in the dark substance that now coats the corridor, the floor and walls alike.Ferris!
The captain splutters and Ferris responds.The towers are close to completion.Spawn for the spires.We are bound to rebuild Troy. His speech is slurred and deep, but I can still just about make out his words.His skin has begun to leak.
Our duty is plain.Mother awaits.Mother awaits our... And he becomes incomprehensible. He falls to the ground with a squelch, clutching at my leg as he does.
I cry out in alarm and kick him away, shielding my eyes from a far-carried blast of sea spray sent up by the churning waves.The captain grabs ahold of Ferris' shirt by the shoulders and half-drags, half-throws him further down the deck.
as Omar and Scott reach the door.Brett is just behind and swears and curses in alarm at the scene.Everybody inside.Troy bellows.The fishermen push through the door at once.Brett, bewildered and uncertain, nonetheless does likewise.
I hasten into the lobby as Troy slams the door shut behind him, and from the panel I make the request for an emergency helicopter.I send out our coordinates, but I don't receive anything back, and we're a hell of a long way from shore.
Troy, I say, but he knows. He makes off into the body of the ship heading presumably to the upper level to steer us away, to begin our journey back to the coast.
But just as he's about to step past Chef, tending to the muttering and shivering Sean, he stumbles and hits the wall with the lurch of the boat.We all do.The ship's engine, it would seem, had just cut out.
We drift in a terrible silence across the surface of the roughening sea, all quiet but for the lashing of the rain in the windows and the swelled and distant roar of the waves and wind.I look around at the faces of my colleagues.
Enki's missing, I realize.Captain?Omar murmurs, but the captain does not respond. He stepped back up to the front of the lobby and his eyes are fixed on the scene beyond the windows.With a pounding heart, I turned to follow his gaze.
It's difficult to see through the rain-soaked glass, but the scene outside terrifies me in a way that I've never in my life experienced before. The object has begun to steadily leak, that much is clear.
Dark fluid pours out and over the deck, slipping this way and that with the rocking of the boat.Ferris has huddled himself up against the edge of the ship, his features illuminated ghostly pale in the glare of the beam light.
He retches and twitches, but he is not my primary focus now. My focus now was on the sea beyond.Out there in the watery darkness, the sea frosts and bubbles, out of sync with the churn of the waves and the waters are pushed up and apart.
An enormous and twisted shape rises up from the murk.I cannot make out its features through the glass, but it is a blight on the face of the ocean.A terrible blight indeed. We stare, all of us, out into the raging waters.
Something has arisen from the depths and blurred through the glass of the window in the walls of the rain.It is nonetheless obvious as something that does not belong.Brett is the first to speak.Lads?He says quietly.Now just what the hell is going on?
He's met with silence.Where is Brynn?No response. The thing in the water dips below the surface just for a second and then rises back up and out, higher than before, and whatever it is becomes clear as only a small part of a much greater whole.
Brett mutters and grabs the door to the deck, swinging it open and swinging it wide. It is caught at once in the wind and torn from his hand, slamming against the outside lobby wall.Jesus, Brett, get back inside!I shout over the gale.
I turn and grab the captain by the front of his shirt.The engine room, Troy.Get the ship moving again.We head back to shore at once. Troy nods at me and stumbles away, pushing past Chef and the quivering Shawn.Keep an eye out for Engi.
I yell after him.And Chef.Chef looks up at me.I would move the hell away from our boy Shawn there if I were you. Sean twitches and groans.It becomes clear that the black fluid smeared all over his face and neck has become worse.
It leaks like sweat from his skin.Curiosity is a powerful thing and even though I have a much greater sense of the threat that faces us than Brett, I still fall victim to its call and I push out onto the raining deck of the trawler beside him.
squinting and staring out to sea at the anomaly that is so defiantly pushed aside the waves.Up it rises, up, up, and out of the water.
It is difficult to see through the downpour and the darkness, but the initial shape that had caught our interest is no more than a crest I now realize.A crest atop an alien shape, horrific in its strangeness.
I hesitate to call the thing a head, as it bears no resemblance to any human head that I've ever seen, nor does it boast even a single face-like feature.Blood roars in my ears with the swelling crash of the sea.
I look through the haze and ye pour at the beast that has arisen from the depths. It is undoubtedly colossal in size, the length of the boat if not more.
The crest is a picture of spines, a thick grey-black flesh pulled taut and quivering between them in the storm.Below the crest is a body, or is it a head?Roughly hammerhead, sharkish in shape, though more definitively angled.
This monstrosity has no obvious eyes, but a lone dark void, the size of a man and in the form of a diamond, shivers grotesquely in the center of its face.On either side of this feature are clusters of smallish holes in the skin.
subtle graying lights flashing from within.
A squirming, angrily writhing mass of thick tendrils ripples and swarms at the sea's surface as the rain falls, clustered around the thing's base where it meets the waves, and a low, sick sound reverberates from its form, the holes across its surface widening and contracting intermittently.
Brett and I stare in silence, unable to tear our eyes away, frozen in place.I am vaguely aware of Chef.
He's joined us on the deck and laid his gaze on the beast, and he falls to his knees in the puddles and begins frantically muttering in desperate prayer.As I stare out to sea and into the void at the center of the abomination, my dream returns to me.
I see the twisted city and its dark and alien spires. My vision is blurred and uncertain, but I see it.I see the thing before me flow like a mist from spire to spire.I see shapes breaking away and drifting to the surface.Mother.
A flash of lightning to my right, far out above the waves, breaks the spell and sudden movement from the object on the deck returns me to the world of the storm, drenched in ice to the bone.I grab Brett by the shoulder and drag him back.
He stumbles and turns and we watch as the object begins to pulse violently.The object that we so foolishly hauled from the water.
Black ooze spurts out in jets and streams as it throbs and hisses, and it hardens and cracks, breaking apart like a shell and leaking poison out over the deck.Poison and a monster. Like a grey wet worm, it smacks to the deck with a squelch.
Illuminated in the glare of the beam light as it is, its shadows are deep and sharp.It rise and screams and tilts this way and that in the rain, deciding on a direction and slithering towards the sea. It turns to us as it approaches the edge.
It looks back as it squirms its way up over the railing, rocking in the waves, and for better or for worse, we see its face.
A hollow diamond fills the center, a void, but on either side of this shape are two bright and staring eyes, pale blue, almost gray in their coloring.They are Brynn's eyes, and they reveal nothing but cold malice.
Then the worm-like creature turns and slips clumsily over the rail and into the sea, and the great atrocity begins its descent, a deep and ethereal roar shivering out and under the boat as it does so.
As the thing slowly disappears beneath the grey waters, a great many things then happen pretty much at once, all in the space of about 20 seconds.Ferris staggers to his feet, pale and shivering as he is by the edge of the boat.
He grips the rail of the deck as it rocks from side to side. As he squeezes it with his fingers, fluid leaks from his palm, in the manner that water leaks from a sponge.He clambers up onto the side, raises his head, and throws out his arms.Ferris!
Someone calls from behind me, Omar perhaps or Scott, but the man does not respond.
The boat lurches and he falls over the edge towards the sea, but before he hits the water, a slithering snake-like appendage bursts from the churning waves and wraps around his chest, drawing him down into the dark of the deep. And he's gone.
I never see him again.In the same 22nd period, the boat is surrounded.On all sides and far out into the sea, dozens upon dozens of these smaller but still roughly man-sized and worm-like abominations raise their heads above the surface of the water.
Their features vary, and it is hard to see in the current weather conditions anyway, but they all at the least share that sick and disturbing hole in the center of their faces.I hear sounds of a struggle behind me.
I turn dazed to see the twisted and fluid-stained Shaun, eyes white and wild, grab one of the fishermen around the neck.He drags them to the edge, and Omar cries out and stumbles after them, slipping on the soaked surface of the deck.
Sean's head lulls from side to side, ghostly pale but for the dark ooze that leaks from his eyes and nose and mouth, and he doesn't even hesitate as he reaches the edge of the boat.
He throws himself over, and the fisherman caught in his grip is unable to keep himself on board.Both of them tumble over the side and into the sea, and as with Ferris, that is the last time that I ever see them. Yeah, that was the man's name.
His name was Felix, and like Ferris and Sean, he is now gone.This hectic half-minute culminates with the feel of something slamming into the underside of the ship.Chef slips and crashes to his side, but the rest of us keep our feet.
The slam comes again.The boat is under attack. Where is the captain?"I shout, turning and looking up to the glass of the level above the lobby, though it is too dark for me to see.If we don't get the trawler moving again, then this could be it.
We're all going to die.The slam comes again.Brett grabs me by the shoulders and yells into my face.What if it's after the fish, Charlie?We should dump it all before it's too late.
It's a reasonable theory, though a part of me believes it's more than that.Far, far more.But I want to live and action is better than inaction, surely.
So when he runs the length of the deck to the controls at the opposite end, swaying from side to side, I stagger backwards, pushing past a panicking chef and head into the lobby.
hastily activating and turning the dials for the controls that will allow us to dump the contents of the cold storage back into the sea.The slam comes again.
I feel mechanical movement beneath my feet, signifying that the fish are in the process of being released into the surrounding waters.
I look up and out the window through the rain, staring at the broken and cracked remains of the object in the center of the dock.
The light catches in the fluid it leaks as it washes from side to side with the rocking of the ship, and then comes another slam, the fifth, and it will be the last.Our efforts, if they would have even helped at all, are too little and too late.
The boat grinds and our ears are met with a series of terrible cracks. I watch the deck at the far side of the trawler begin to tip up and away, and to my horror, a different angle to the rest of the boat.
The trawler rocks to the side, and to my dismay, it does not correct itself this time. We're going down."I stagger out onto the deck and shout out into the storm.Brett, get back, quick!I'm coming!I think I hear him shout.
He was gripping onto the controls for the crane and cold storage at the far end for balance, presumably, but he released them now and he starts to run the length of the deck as thunder rolls across the sea.
The deck splits and he falls, trying and failing to hold onto the wet railing. I don't understand how the ship could be failing so quickly unless something is dragging it down from below.
With the sound that will stay with me till the end of my days, the trawler splits into two.The far end of the ship, the bow, the location of the crane, and my comrade Brett. breaks entirely from the rear half and tips into the sea.Brett!
I roar into the gale.As he falls, he turns to face the hungry waves and he's lost forever behind a cloud of froth and spray.As with the owners, he is gone.The trawler groans and creaks deliriously.Lads!comes the call of a familiar voice from behind.
Not from inside the lobby, but down the side corridor of the ship, between the walls of the hub and the railing.I turn and grab a hold of the edge, looking down to the ship's stern.There stands the captain, his hand held high.
Are you getting into a lifeboat then, or what?It's now or never.He's right, of course.I look around for the others. I see Omar staring wide-eyed towards the lost section of the ship as it slowly sinks beneath the waves, but he stands alone.Omar!
I stumble forwards and grab his jacket.Lifeboat, now!And before he can respond, I've already half-pushed and half-thrown him in the right direction.The door to the lobby is still cast wide open and I shout a final call down into the body of the boat.
There is no answer. I look all around me with a desperate hope, but neither Chef nor Sean can be seen, nor indeed Kenangi.I realize that I haven't seen him since I asked him to go and wake everybody up, but it's too late for all that.
With a heavy heart, I turn and stagger down the slippery deck towards the lifeboat. quickly catching up with Omar and bumping into his back.We hasten into the lifeboat as Captain Troy does the same.
With a metallic grind, he turns the lever that allows our descent, and the lifeboat jerks and jitters on its way to the sea surface. The ship screams beside us as the lifeboat smacks into the water and we disconnect from the trawler's body.
Troy sails the boat away from the wreckage as it sinks into the sea, and one by one the trawler's lights are fizzled out with clanks and groans and distant whirs.
All around us those twisted worms slither about in the waters, just beneath the surface and blurred in the grey-white froth and churn. There's something still on the upper deck.Omar mutters through shivers.Look.
I shield my eyes from the arctic wind, but I cannot see what Omar is talking about.Not until a brief flash of lightning reveals the silhouette of a figure stood stock still in the engine room, visible behind the glass.Engie, I think.
But as quick as he appears, he's lost.Lost behind the dark glass as the ship is swallowed by the sea. The worms rise up out of the water, they writhe and squirm over the trawler's corpse.Their hissing is carried on the winds.
The last of the vessel's lights fail and the ship is plunged into total darkness.Our lifeboat has an engine, thankfully, and Troy sails it grimly and solemnly away into the night.
One final roar echoes from the swirling waters that swarm the ship, and it is the last that I hear or see of the monstrosities that plague the final voyage of our accursed trawler. I shiver in the chill of the air.None of us speak.
I try not to think about the endless depths that lie directly below us.I try not to think about the horrors that I now know lurk hungrily beneath.I try to keep away the resurfacing memories of my twisted dream.The dark spires.
The dark spires made from the same material as the object. The storm fades as the hours pass, the winds ease, and soon the only sound is the rumble of the engine as we power on through the mists of the night.
We were found eventually, spotted by helicopters.A nearby vessel was rerouted and came to pick us up to return us to shore.I quit the industry the same day, Omar did likewise.I don't know what Troy plans to do. I still dream of that night.
When I close my eyes I see it.I see the colossal abomination that rose up from the sea, and the face of the worm that slithered from the shell of the object.
I've done pretty much nothing since then but read, read, read, and read to try and make sense of some of the things that I saw, of what we all saw.I have found little but what I have learned has worried me greatly.
I have learned about a process called external fertilization. common in amphibians, aquatic creatures, and sea life and the like.A process in which the eggs of the female are fertilized outside the body.
The sperm inseminates the egg in the open after it has been laid.I think about the object and I think about Brynn.And I think about my terrible dream.My dream of the enormous, endless, undersea city.Its angular spires in shapes and shadowy towers.
A sunken city made entirely of the same material as the object, if indeed it is even a city at all.I know the truth about the zombie virus.They want to silence me.Written by Brian Maycock. I was having a lousy day.
It started when the boss chewed me out in front of the whole office for a mistake that I had made on one of the accounts.A client had been overbilled and was using that as a reason not to pay anything.
It was stupid and it should not have been a big deal.I mean, it wasn't like anybody was going to die. But that was McKenzie and co-advertising agency all over her.
It was a hothouse of clashing egos, backstabbing and pointing the finger of blame when something went wrong. I was an easy target.It wasn't the first mistake that I had made recently, and I knew it wouldn't be the last.
Failure breeds failure just as surely as success follows hot on the heels of success.After the boss had finished telling me what a deadbeat I was, I went out to get a breath of fresh air, just for a couple of minutes while my cheeks stopped burning.
I was standing in the little square out front of the office block, taking calming breaths when I felt something strike my shoulder, something wet and white and disgusting.
The bird that had unloaded on my shoulder shrieked and took off from its perch on a window ledge above me.
Swearing under my breath, I went to the restroom in the reception area in the hope that I wouldn't bump into any of my colleagues, and spent 20 minutes trying to clean the mess off my shirt.
When I got back to my desk, I had 6 missed calls, dozens of new emails, and Peterson in the next booth over looking at me with a contemptuous grin on his face. The day did not improve after this.I drank so much coffee that I got the shakes.
I ate an overpriced sandwich at my desk and ended up with fiery indigestion.I sent a visual to the printers that had not been signed off by the client and didn't realize my mistake until it was too late.
The copy that I wrote for a new campaign seemed good until Peterson pointed out that it made no sense. I was convinced as well that my suit still smelled like bird crap too.
By the time that I finally left the office, my nerves were shredded and I was utterly exhausted.Living the dream, I thought, trying to summon up a smile, but I had nothing.
Eyes downcast, feeling older than my 25-year-old self, I set off walking for the train station.
Working from home was not permitted by my employer because the boss liked to crack the whip in person, so I had a soul-destroying commute between my home and a distant suburb of the city in the office every day. It was cruel, but not unusual.
There were countless commuters, like me, working in the city.We all had big dreams until reality hit.As I trapezed into the train station, my only ambition was getting back to my bed.
I would sleep the sleep of the dead as soon as my head hit the pillow.The platform my train departed from was at the far end of the station.Peak rush hour was over, but there were still plenty of other frazzled-looking commuters on the concourse.
A couple of bored looking uniformed cops were doing a walkthrough as well, nodding now and then as they passed a station employee.There was a row of food stalls but I ignored them.
I couldn't have faced another coffee anyway and my guts were still churning with indigestion even though I'd eaten nothing since lunch.I carried on until I reached the platform for my train.There were already a couple dozen people waiting.
Some had headphones on.One woman who was around the same age as me wore a fashionable brand that I would have loved to have been able to afford, and almost everybody, as usual, was engrossed in their phones.One haggard-looking man was not, though.
He was just staring off into space.He wore a creased, grey suit, and his tie hung at an angle behind a laminated photo ID badge on a lanyard. and years of stress were etched into his face.
I feel for your brother, I thought, and then buried my hands in my pockets and waited for the train.Ten minutes later, it pulled into view at its scheduled time.
After so many delays and cancellations in the last few months, I was feeling relieved that I was not late as I got on board, and I began to weave through the other passengers looking for a free seat. There was one to my left with plenty of leg room.
I beat a hairy-looking businesswoman to it and claimed my place.It felt like the first victory that I had had all day.I shuffled around on my backside, trying to get comfy on the hard train seat, sat back, closed my eyes, and tried to relax.
But the things that had happened at the office that day were still too raw, and I had a mountain of work waiting for me in the morning.So many problems to untangle.I started to think about an account with an AI startup company.
The CEO was an arrogant jerk who kept demanding more and more from me.He was yelling down a video call at me, telling me that I was a loser and that he was going to get me fired. I sat up with a start, and I opened my eyes.
I had fallen asleep, and it had been a stupid dream.I sighed, and then noticed the seat next to me was empty.I glanced around.The train had been packed to capacity when it set off, but there were a few more spaces dotted around now.
As the train approached its next stop, more passengers rose and headed for the exits. I knew the names of all the stations along the route, and when I saw where we were, I knew there was still an age to go before we made it to my stop.
I shuffled again, got as close to comfortable as I was going to get, and I closed my eyes. I suddenly felt like I was falling backwards into a deep dark space and I threw myself forward to try and stop.
Blinking, realizing that I had been falling asleep again, I sat there staring at the window as the world swept by.There were apartment blocks, a drive-thru burger joint, cars backed up on a nearby road.
Their headlights were on as the sun set on another fruitless day. I shook my head sadly, wrapped my arms around my chest, and closed my eyes again.A minute later, a loud tinny sound made me look up.
A teenager a couple of rows down from me was watching a video on his phone at full volume without headphones on. Whatever you was watching involved somebody screeching with laughter.It lasted for a few seconds and then repeated again and again.
I count it to ten.Why did this moron have to subject the rest of us to his mindless garbage? The passengers and range of the sound had thinned out even more by now.
I had no idea how many people were in the other carriages, but there were only a dozen or so left in mine.The businesswoman who I had beaten in the seat race earlier included.She looked like she was getting ready to leave at the next stop.
The woman who had given me headphone envy was further along the carriage as well.Thanks to her high-spec device, she was clearly oblivious to the maddening sound. The haggard looking man was still on board as well.
His eyes were half shut and his head rocked back and forward slightly with the motion of the train.He must have been so tired that he wasn't aware of the noise I figured, or maybe he had just lost the strength to care.
I had earbuds in my suit pocket and I could have put them in and connected to music on my phone, but I knew they weren't good enough to drown out this screeching on repeat. I looked up and down the carriage.
I hadn't seen a conductor yet on the train and it seemed likely that there wasn't one.
I had read a news article about cutbacks in the city's transportation budget, meaning that a lot of trains would only have drivers until the unions were protesting, and I hadn't cared until that moment in time.
If there had been a conductor, I could have complained to them instead of having to tell the teenager to shut it myself.I was so tired, though.This was the last thing that I needed.
I decided to leave it to somebody else to speak up and screwed my eyes shut. The noise continued to cut through and degraded my teeth, and then it started to sound like it was on the move.
I opened one eye and saw that the teenager was heading for the door.The train came to a halt, the door slid open, and he stepped off. I swore gratefully under my breath.A few more passengers left at the same stop.
I watched them drifting down the platform as the train pulled away.It was fully dark outside by now and once the latest station was out of sight, the only lights that I could see were from the occasional building.
There was still a way to go before we reached my distant suburb though, so I sat back once again and tried to relax.Only that still wasn't happening.I needed to go to the bathroom.
This was something best avoided on the commuter train that I caught each day. There were restrooms at either end of the train but they could be horror shows when it came to hygiene.I tried to ignore my bladder but some things just won't go away.
I pushed myself to my feet and walked down to the nearest restroom.Illuminated red letters and a little panel by the door informed me that it was out of order.Typical.
I thought and walked back along the length of the train to see if I would have any more luck with the other one. There were half a dozen carriages and some of them were completely deserted as I passed through them.
The others had the odd person dotted here and there.At least there won't be a queue, I thought, and thankfully the second restroom was in working order and vacant.
The smell that greeted me when the door swished open was grim and there was nowhere that I could put my feet or my shoes wouldn't get wet.I did what I needed to do and I got out of there.
I could have sat pretty much anywhere by now but commuters are creatures of habit and that was no different.And so I returned to what I thought of as my carriage and my seat.Though without thinking that at all if you know what I mean.
The woman with the fabulous headphones was still there, still happily in their noise-canceling embrace as far as I could see.The haggard-looking man was still there as well.I could see the bald spot on the back of his scalp as I approached.
That was it for passengers, though.I was the only other person in the carriage. Hoping finally that I could spend the remainder of the journey chilling out, I continued to my seat.
But as I passed the haggard looking man, I noticed that his face was coated in sweat.His neck above his creased collar and crooked tie and photo ID glistened as well, and the two bright electric lights of the train.
His skin almost seemed pale, even beneath the sheen of perspiration. I tried to remember if he looked that washed out when I had first seen him, and there was no avoiding the fact that he had it.I hesitated.
The only things that I knew about medicine came from working on the account of a plastic surgery practice, and it was clear this man didn't need a tummy tuck or liposuction.He appeared to need medical assistance. Still, I just stood there.
The man was a complete stranger, and didn't I have enough problems on my own?I did, I told myself.This had nothing to do with me.I started to turn away, but as I did, a low guttural noise started to come out of the man's mouth.It wasn't a snore.
It sounded wrong like there was a serious problem with his breathing. The word's death rattle popped into my head.I tried to shake them out of my thoughts and reluctantly figured that I should get involved.Hey mister, you okay?I asked.
There was no sign that he had heard me.The sound just kept coming from in between his lips.That slow, jarring rattle.Now that I was on this course, I persevered and tried.Do you want me to get help?
With no conductor and barely any other passengers, I didn't know where I would have gotten help from if he had answered that he would, but once again there was no response.I paced up and down trying to think.
I came to the conclusion that I did need to try and get help regardless, and not from asking if there was a doctor on the train because the odds of that were way too short. I took out my phone and I dialed 911.
It felt like a long time before the call was answered.Long enough for the train to make another stop and discard more passengers, and for me to consider hanging up and walking away after all.But then the dispatcher picked up.
I answered all their questions, giving them my name and then my location as best as I could based on the train that I was on. the last station that I had seen and the next one that I knew to be coming up.
I described the way the man looked and the sound that he was making, and then the dispatcher asked what the man's name was.I told them that I had no idea but added that the man had an ID and a lanyard around his neck.
I leaned closer so that I could see what it said.The photograph showed the man in better days.There was even the hint of a smile on his lips.
His name was printed below the picture so I read this out to the dispatcher, spelling the surname and then kept reading the text that followed.It said, Research Associate, Stoller Institute.
After this, the dispatcher asked me to hold for a moment, leaving me listening to a dull buzz, and leaving my mind free to wander. I had never heard of the Stoller Institute, so I had no idea what type of research this fellow spent his days doing.
It could have been something dry and academic.Somebody had to research economic trends, I figured.Or it could have been rocket science, or even something medical.If only you had taken your turn for the worse while you were still at work.
There would be no end of doctors to help out, I thought.Medical or biological. Perhaps he researched what happened when you emptied the contents of Test Tube A onto Sample B. The possibilities were endless, as was this call, it seemed.
Finally there was a click and the dispatcher came back on the line, only this time it sounded like someone different was speaking when they had asked.How many people are on the train?
I was thrown off by this and said uncertainly, um, me and a lady in this carriage, maybe a handful more on the rest of the train, no conductor I think, a driver though I guess.
There is a pause and a new voice said, I need you and the female passenger to leave the carriage that you're in and go to the front carriage in the train.Any other passengers that you see are to do the same.
I was so thrown off by this that I couldn't speak.Is that clear?The voice said.There was an edge to their tone that unsettled me even more.Yes, I managed to say, but why?What's wrong?
I was still staring at the man in the seat as I said this, seeing the sweat glint on his pale skin, hearing the rattle of his breath. And I thought of my flight of fancy, of test tube A and sample B, and what might be brewed and breathed in.
Oh, I muttered to myself as much to the voice on the other end of the line, and I asked, is he infectious?Is that why you're telling me to get away from him? There was no reply from the voice on the line.I swallowed.
My throat suddenly felt very dry and my skin felt very hot.What is it?I asked, the questions tumbling out as panic built inside me.What has he got? The silence on the other end of the line stretched on a moment longer than the voice said.
Leave the carriage that you're in and go to the front carriage.Ensure that everybody else does the same.Not even asking me, but ordering me, and not explaining a thing.
I kept staring at the man in the seat in front of me, and I could see a patch of discoloration now on his skin, just below his left eye.It hadn't been there before.It made me think of decay.Still holding the phone to my ear, I began to back away.
I stumbled into the edge of the seat, righted myself, and took a few more steps until I was in the eyeline of the woman with the designer headphones on. We have to move," I said to her.
She clearly couldn't hear me because of her headphones, but there was no way that she couldn't have seen me, which meant that she was blanking me.I mimed, taking headphones off and mouthed, you have to listen to me.She kept blanking me.
I didn't get it at first, but then I did.She was a woman on her own late at night on a near-deserted train and a man she didn't know was in her personal space acting agitated.
I took a few more steps away from her, held my palms up, hopefully showing her that I meant no harm.Please, I said slowly and clearly, there is a problem.Even though she couldn't hear me, she would be able to lip read, and finally she reacted.
She reached into her bag and took out a small canister.This is mace, she said. If you don't go away, you're going to get the contents in your eyes.And trust me, buddy, it's gonna hurt."I could have wept even without being mazed.
I shook my head, waved my hand slowly from side to side in front of my face, trying to make her understand.Drawing out each syllable, I said, infectious, and pointed over at her towards the man.
She was directing the mace at me but not pressing the release.
Infectious, I said again, and she must have been watching my lips and understood what I was saying, because she lowered the mace and turned to look at the man with a concerned expression on her face, and then she looked at me and swore out loud.
She took her headphones off, lowered them till they were around her neck and got unsteadily to her feet. What is it?"she asked.I don't know, I replied honestly.
I called 911 and the dispatcher saying that we should put distance between ourselves and the man.I didn't add that the dispatcher hadn't confirmed this was because of the danger of infection or tell her about the edge in their voice.
There was something very wrong here and I wasn't going to hang around for the details. Come on, I said and started to walk away on legs that felt hollow.The woman followed without saying anything else.
Just before I stepped through the connecting doors into the next carriage, I glanced back at the man.Even from a distance, I could see the discoloration had spread.It looked like a shadow was falling over one half of his face.
I shivered and put one foot in front of the other.As we moved through the carriages, I couldn't see any other passengers.Everybody else must have gotten off, I figured, which was good.
It meant that I didn't have to persuade any more reluctant strangers to move. A few long minutes later the woman and I had reached the front carriage.There was a door at the far end which I assumed led to the driver's cabin.
I wondered if I should hammer on it to get the driver's attention, or even pull the emergency lever. My head was spinning by now and I just didn't know, and then I remembered that I was still holding my phone.
I brought it closer and asked, are you still there?Yes, the voice replied, have you made it to the front carriage?We have, there's only two of us left on the train though, what should we do?
The answer was given straight off this time, stay where you are, the alpha team has been mobilized. I had never heard paramedics or other first responders referred to like that before, but I told myself not to sweat the details.Help was on the way.
And even better than that, I had a bright idea.Hey, I said, down the phone.There's another stop coming up soon.We can get off there.It'll be safer.I waited for the voice to agree that this was the sensible course of action, but there was no response.
The woman had been following my side of the conversation.I smiled in what I hoped was a reassuring way inside, just waiting to hear back what they think.
They're probably talking to the driver as well and updating the first responders to send them to the station. I was only too eager to fill in the gaps and hurry things along to where somebody else would take care of everything.
The woman didn't look convinced though, but the next station was coming up now.I smiled at her, anticipating the train slowing and then pulling to a halt.We could step out into the cool night air.Only the train wasn't slowing.
I could see the platform approaching the station name sign and that we were passing it at speed.I didn't understand.We didn't stop, I cried into the phone.It took me a moment to realize that the line was dead.
I looked at the phone dumbly and then looked at the woman.She asked, what's going on?I had no idea and I was still thinking what to say when there was an announcement on the train's public address system. This is the driver.
I have been informed there is a medical emergency on board, and we're proceeding direct to the next station where paramedics are waiting."I felt relief flooding through me.Everything was going to be okay.
Somebody else was going to take care of things.I grinned goofily at the woman, and she smiled back at me.For the first time, I thought how pretty she was.
I was single but didn't want to be and wondered if she might give me her phone number if I asked. I was wondering if this was the right moment to ask as the train entered a tunnel.
Through the train window I could see the dark tunnel wall slipping by, and then the train jolted to a halt.I was thrown sideways but managed to stay on my feet.
What the… I began to exclaim but didn't finish because the inside of the train was suddenly plunged into darkness.I couldn't see a single thing until a small square light appeared.
It was illuminating the nervous smile on the woman's face as she held up her phone.She turned the phone's flashlight towards me and said, Call 911 again."Now I could see my screen, but I put my passcode in, and then cursed and told her.No signal.
She angled her phone back towards herself and stabbed at it with her fingers before saying, same here.It was time to get the driver's attention directly.I figured and turned my phone's flashlight on to find the emergency lever.
Before I could, the door to the cabin clicked loudly and opened. A bulky figure appeared in the doorway.He was wearing a train company uniform, looked about 60.He had a flashlight as well, a proper one, not just a feature on a phone.
He raised the beam and took in the pair of us standing there, and asked in a gravelly voice, Are you folks okay?Not really, I thought, but I followed the lead of the woman when she started to nod.Good, he said, as he growled in his deep voice.
Well, I'll be honest with you good people, I don't really know what's going on here.
First I get the call telling me to hightail it to the next station along so the sick person on board can get medical assistance as soon as possible, and then when I get into the tunnel I see there's a red light, which means that I can't hightail it anywhere.
I put the brakes on then and called for an update, but nobody's answering me.It's strange, I tell you, mighty strange.What can't you drive on anyway?The woman asked.It surely can't be safe staying here.His wide shoulders shrugged as he responded.
There's a red light ahead, and it doesn't matter what else is going on.No train driver will ever ignore a red light and continue through it.
I don't want my grandkids to see my name on the news as the guy who caused people to lose their lives in a crash.
But while I'm waiting for the controllers to pull their fingers out, I figured I should go see if I can help the passenger who's in distress.He raised the first aid box that he held in his other hand so that we could see it.
The woman beat me to the draw when she said, we need to stay away from him, he's infectious.She turned at me and added, that's right, isn't it?The dispatcher told you.I studied my feet in the gloom.
I didn't want to admit that I had been told no such thing, that I had been led to that conclusion by fear.Probably, I mumbled.It was the best that I could do and I hated the sound of my voice at that moment. Well, the driver growled.
I don't know rightly what that means either, but I'm not going to stand here debating who said what while there's somebody on this train who needs help and a hand.And with that, he began to walk off down the train.I stayed rooted to the spot.
The woman started to follow him. I really didn't want to go back that way, but I also didn't want to be on my own.I had seen enough scary movies to know what happened to the person who was left on their own in the dark.
Muttering obscenities, I set off after them.The carriages were transformed by the darkness into one long, ominous passageway. Ahead of me I could make out the edges of the driver's flashlight in two shadowy forms.
They were moving rapidly towards where the man sat.My heart beating faster and faster, I kept pace.And there he was, the man, still slumped against the seat.I could only see his legs at first.
The driver was blocking my view and the woman standing off to one side.She had a hand over her mouth as if she was stifling a scream. I took another step forwards.I felt compelled to see now.
I needed to know what was revealed in the beam of the flashlight.I moved in between the driver and the woman and cold fear rushed through me.The discoloration on the man's face had continued to spread.
His skin where it was exposed was a dark layer of decaying matter.And on his face, around his eyes, his rotting flesh had collapsed inwards, exposing the pale orbs of his eyes in all their fullness.
They were staring blindly into the flashlight's beam.As my mind processed this hideous sight, I noticed that there were flies crawling through the man's scalp as well.The only small mercy was that the rattling sound had ceased.
His mouth hung open, but there was no breathing going on.He was dead. I swallowed down the bile which had risen into the back of my mouth and turned to the driver and said in a hoarse and shaky voice, Satisfied now?I don't understand, he said.
Yeah, me neither, I told him.Can we get out of here and leave it to the authorities?He tore his gaze away from the decomposing corpse and lowered his flashlight, casting the dead man back into the darkness.
And then he said, You're right, we should get out of here. There's a control for the doors at the rear of the train.We can use that to get out and walk along the tracks."I told him that sounded good to me.The woman hesitated.
She was still looking at the body.We should cover him up.It's the decent thing to do. There is no decency in this place, in my opinion.There is sickness and death.Forget it, I said, and put a hand on her elbow.
Barely touching her, I just wanted her to hurry up.She did start to move.I was alongside her.The driver was in the lead, using his flashlight to show the way.But then she hesitated again.She turned to look back, and her mouth opened.
And this time, she did scream.I span around. The driver flashed the beam towards where we had been.The corpse was no longer slumped on the seat.It was standing up.
I rubbed my eyes and told myself that I was seeing things but when I looked again the corpse was still there.Its back was to us and it was completely still. The only movement was the small cloud of flies buzzing around its head.
They must have flown off when he stood.The flies had left the building, I thought, and a hysterical laugh bubbled inside me.This was insane.The dead did not rise. Only this nightmare vision had.
It had stood up and now it was turning, slowly and carefully, as it was trying to remember how to move.And now it was looking at us with its bulging bloodshot eyes.Its cracked lips were twitching and drying back to reveal yellow teeth.
Its arms were lifting and its hands reaching out towards us. seeming to grasp at the flashlight's beam, and then it began to shuffle towards us inch by inch.Run!I heard the driver say this, but I couldn't respond.Now!
His voice rose over the sound of my ragged breathing, but I still couldn't react. I was aware that by my side the woman was moving.I felt her hand on my cheek and she turned my head so that we were looking at each other.
I was aware that tears were running down her face.Please, she said quietly, we have to run.I nodded and snapped out of my daze and together the three of us stumbled away.
The risen corpse followed, but its movements were so clumsy and unsure that it could not match our speed. It threw its head back and a distorted howl filled the carriage.It was thick with anger and pain and frustration.We were escaping its foul rage.
The driver reached a door at the end of the final carriage, unlocked it, and disappeared inside.The light on the door lock glowed.I slammed my hand against it as the driver reappeared.The door opened and he led the way out.
There was a jump down to reach the ground. After closing and locking the door using a button behind a hatch in the side of the train, the driver said, keep to the edge, the live track is in the center, you'll be fried if you step on it.
I squeezed as close against the tunnel wall as I could get, and I hurried along until I emerged into the night air. There were stars in the sky, but there were no street lamps or buildings or vehicles in sight.
It's a long walk to the nearest platform, the driver said, and for safety's sake, we should get off the tracks now and follow the line from alongside it.His flashlight illuminated a weed-covered verge at shoulder height that ran alongside the tracks.
I scrambled up onto it first. The woman followed, but as she clambered up over the edge, she cursed.I've dropped my phone, she said.The driver laughed.It was good to hear someone laugh, especially him.He had a deep, warm laugh.
Don't worry about it, little lady.I can see it just there.I'll get it and then join you."He took a few steps forward, leaned over, and when he stood up straight, he had the phone in his hand.The woman gave him a thumbs up, but then she froze.
There was a new sound in the air, a clattery noise. We all looked in the direction that the sound was coming from and saw the helicopter as it came into view.The driver whooped and said, there's the Calvary.
He started to walk along the edge of the tracks towards the approaching helicopter and the recovered phone in one hand, his flashlight in the other.He began to wave his arms in the air.Down here, he yelled.From the verge, the woman and I watched.
I started to get a bad feeling. Why was there a helicopter?An ambulance or a police cruiser off-roading into view would have been a welcome sight.
But this dark shape, growing in the night sky, its blades turning, its engine roaring, seemed out of place. The woman must have picked up on my unease because she said, it'll be an air ambulance, it's the quickest way to get help here.
Which it would have made sense, but the helicopter was close enough now for me to see that there were no markings on it.An air ambulance would have had some kind of healthcare across surely.
It dipped and slowed and began to hover a few dozen feet in front of the driver.He had stopped waving his arms.I think that he had realized something was wrong as well, and he was hideously right.
There was the sharp crack of a weapon being fired from the helicopter.He span and fell.I waited for him to move, and I begged silently for him to move, but he just lay there.Enclosed in the darkness of the night, the woman whispered,
They murdered him.I was too shocked to say anything.It seemed hideously clear that whoever was in the helicopter had not come to help.They were agents of malevolence.
Survival instincts kicking in, and I began to shuffle backwards, keeping as low as possible and making as little noise as I could.
The crew of the helicopter hadn't shown any signs that they knew the woman and I were there on the verge, and we needed to keep it that way. The woman clearly got that.She rolled over onto her front and began to crawl after me.
She caught up with me and tugged my sleeve, pointed at something behind me.I twisted my neck around and saw a line of trees.
While the helicopter's engine continued to growl threateningly, we scrambled into the extra cover that they provided and knelt there trying to catch our breath.
I didn't dare turn on the flashlight on my phone, but my eyes had begun to adjust to the darkness so that I could see tears were falling down her face.I didn't even know the driver's name, she said.
I thought all the driver had mentioned that he had grandkids and a cold sick feeling filled my stomach.Me neither, I said. The woman exhaled deeply and then held out a hand.I'm Helen, by the way.James, I replied and we shook hands.
It was crazily formal given our situation but somehow felt like the right thing to do. Pleased to meet you, James.So what on earth do we do now?I breathed out.Honestly, I don't know.
I could call 911 again, but I suspect any call from my phone will be transferred straight to whoever sent that helicopter. You know that you sound out there, like conspiracy theory paranoid," Helen said.I shrugged.
I don't think it counts as paranoia if they're out to get you.A fair comment.How about family friends, somebody that you can trust? I lived alone and my social life was non-existent and my parents had passed away.No.How about you?
I moved halfway across the country to begin a new life with my boyfriend but left him last week when I found out that he was cheating on me and I... Her voice began to break and she couldn't go on.
I was trying to think what I could say when the sound of an explosion filled the night.We both instinctively flinched and covered our heads with our hands.After a moment I looked up. I shook up, but no, I think I'm fine.
The explosion sounded like it came from over by the train tracks.She crept forward and peered out into the night.I shuffled alongside her and swore silently.
There was smoke streaming out of the entrance to the tunnel and the helicopter was circling high above. I think they just fired a missile at the train," Helen whispered.Yeah, destroying the evidence.I added in a shocked whisper of my own.
As smoke continued to billow from the tunnel, the helicopter veered away.The silence that it left behind didn't last for long.In the distance, sirens began to sound.Their cries sent fresh waves of fear through me. We need to get out of here now."
I gave her a thumbs up and together we scrambled deeper into the woods.My mind was racing with chaotic thoughts.I had gone from being a downtrodden advertising executive to a fugitive in a day.
and I had no idea where I was heading or what might be waiting for me.I glanced over at Helen.A line of red had raised on her cheek where she must have been scratched by a branch, and she had a set, determined expression on her face.
At least I'm not alone, I thought, and I hurried on through the darkness as the sounds of the sirens rose and fell in the night.We stumbled on. A while later, I honestly can't say how long or how far we had gone from the tracks in the tunnel.
The trees began to thin out.There was a building visible on the open ground.And I was done.I sat down heavily and gasped.I can't take another step.I'm sorry.Helen sat on the ground beside me.She was shaking and breathing heavily.
It took her a minute before she could speak. Can you use your phone to try and find our location?It's not much, but it's a start."Sure, I replied.I took my phone out and smiled when I saw that I had three bars.
There was also a news alert on the screen.The headline displayed sent a chill down my spine.Commuter train destroyed in collision with freight train. I clicked on the link and held the phone out so that Helen could read the story as well.
It detailed how a passenger train had broken down in a tunnel and been struck at speed by a freight train transporting chemicals cross-country.The driver of the commuter train was confirmed as a fatality and there was the possibility of more.
Sources were quoted saying the cause that led to this tragic accident were being investigated, but it was believed a signal fault could have been to blame. I felt sickened by what I had read.It's all lies, a cover-up.
Helen looked at me and said bitterly, I wonder if we'll be among the fatalities when they add to the lies later on.I hesitated.I hated myself for the thought that had just occurred to me, but I decided that I couldn't keep it to myself.
"'Which could be a good thing,' I said quietly."'It would mean they think that we're still on the train when they destroyed it.It would mean that we could walk away from this.'"Helen looked disgusted and honestly I didn't blame her.
"'I just can't walk away from this,' she said."'I can't forget the driver, the man who became that thing on the train. He was a human once, just like you and me.Though maybe he was better than us and he had people who cared about him.
A wife, children.I don't know, but it strikes me he's a victim here as well.I couldn't even look at her.I was so ashamed.I thought desperately how to redeem myself and inspiration struck.
There should be a phone number or an email for the news desk, I told her.I can contact them and tell them the truth. I found a phone number and was about to call it when Helen put her hand on my wrist.Wait, she said.
We don't actually know if they think that we're dead.They could still be looking for us.I guess, I replied hesitantly.But why should that stop me from phoning the news desk?
A journalist won't give us up to the authorities and once the story is out, then we'll be fireproof."She shook her head.It won't get that far.They have your name and number from the 911 call that you made.
The minute that you make a phone call it could set off an alert that they've set up to cover the bases. My finger hovered over the keypad.This was a nightmare.Every action could have a negative consequence.
There could be danger no matter what we did or where we went.There were shadows everywhere.I looked at my phone and said, now that I think about it, I believe the authorities can track your location from your phone.
You don't even need to be using it to make a call, it just needs to be turned on. Helen cursed, which I took to mean that she agreed with me.I didn't make the call.
I turned the phone off, and for safe measure, I took out the SIM card and battery, and I threw them away.This didn't help my nerves one bit, though.Neither did Helen, crawling forwards.Wait, I hissed.We can't just stay here, she whispered back.
I waited for a moment. hoping hysterically that the ground would open up and swallow me and then I wouldn't have to do anything.But the ground remained hard and cold beneath my feet, so I took a deep breath and followed.
Coming closer, I saw that the building was a diner.There was a single truck parked up outside and there was a man outlined in the light from the window.He was smoking a cigarette and yawning.
After taking a last drag on the cigarette, he crushed the butt underfoot and then headed for the truck.Helen was watching him and I couldn't take my eyes off her.I was wishing that I had met her in different circumstances.
Encountering a zombie being on the run and one wrong move away from an early grave was hardly an ideal first date in anybody's books.I realized that she was looking at me, gawping at her.
I must have been an open book because she said, I'm not sure this is the time or place for getting romantic.I felt heat rising up my cheeks, but then she smiled, and there was a gentle twinkle in her eyes that made me feel better.
I asked, So, if this isn't the moment for our proposal, what do you think our next step should be?She answered decisively, Keep moving, keep putting distance between ourselves and the tunnel.
Once we have some breathing space, then maybe we think properly of a way out of this.And I can see our ride about to depart.She got to her feet, strode right up to the trucker and asked him for a ride.And five minutes later, we were on the road.
We passed police cars speeding down the highway, there were sirens flashing and each time I saw one my stomach cramped up, but thankfully they were all heading in the opposite direction.
I wondered if they knew what had really happened at the tunnel and decided that they probably did not.The rank and file would be kept in the dark by the high ranking officials pulling the strings.They knew the truth and so did I.
It was a heavy burden to carry, but even so, as the night slipped by, I found my eyelids growing heavy.The cabin was dark and hot, and I must have fallen asleep because I found myself being shaken awake by Helen.I blinked at her and rubbed my eyes.
Time to go, she said. I saw that dawn was close and that we appeared to be on the outskirts of the city.There were high rises in the distance and the buildings on either side of the road were one or two story structures.
Many of them looked to be run down.The signs on shop fronts were faded and there was graffiti on walls and boarded up windows. Helen turned to the driver and said, could you pull up here?The truck rattled to a halt and we clambered out.
Why did you want to get out here?I asked.Surely we would have been better going into the city center. It would be safer and there are shops that don't look as if they're about to fall down, and we could have found somewhere to stay."
We already have somewhere to stay," she replied with a deadpan expression on her face.Linking her arm and mine, she led me back down the street.We passed the seediest looking bar that I had ever seen.
There were steel shutters over the windows and music and the sound of breaking glass drifted out of the door. Further down the street, we reached a building that stood on its own in between two empty lots.
It looked to me like it should have been knocked down as well, but the hotel stood there in all its shabby glory.There was a vacancy sign in one of the windows.Gee, that's a pleasant surprise, I muttered.
I would have thought they would have been all booked out.Helen gave me a playful tap on the back of the head and told me that I was a wise ass.
After we had checked in, paying cash to a man beyond the desk, wearing a white vest and with dark hair sprouting from his shoulders, and we were in our room, Helen explained why this dive was ideal for us.
If they're laying digital traps that could have facial tracking software set up to look out for you on CCTV cameras, the city's center will be full of them, but there will be a lot less around here, and I definitely didn't see any on the street when the truck drove down it.
But how would they know what I look like?I asked.Well, they know your name and phone number.It's simple enough after that to find your social media or your company's personal page online.And a snapshot of you is just the start of it.
They can easily find where you bank, get the details in your account, and set up another alert which will go off if you use your card. I was sitting on the lumpy bed as she spoke and started to feel that all hope was draining away.
So I can't contact anyone.I need to stay away from cameras on the street and I can't use my card.What can I do?I asked.She actually smiled when she answered. They don't know who I am, so you sit pretty while I go shopping."
And with that, she was gone.Left alone in the dank, grim room, I started to worry that she wouldn't come back.I mean, why would she stay?
She had a credit card that she could use and could have been on a bus heading to anywhere in the country easily enough. I sat there and sweated for what felt like a very long time.
When Helen returned, I was so relieved that I leapt to my feet and stood there watching wide-eyed as she put the things that she had bought on the bed.
There was cola and snacks, toothbrushes and toothpaste, and a change of clothes for both of us, and a laptop computer that looked about ten years old. I got it from a shop that sold everything from rat poison to dumbbells to these.
She sat and took a USB out of her pocket.Pay-as-you-go internet connection, she explained.Now let's bring ourselves up to speed. We started with a news search for the incident by the tunnel.
The story had spread across a lot of outlets, but there were no updates, which meant no confirmation of other casualties yet.A good thing, in a way.It meant that I might be a dead man in the authorities' eyes.
and all the alerts that we were worrying about were a figment of our paranoid imaginations.The next thing that we did was go on the website for the Stoller Institute.They had employed the zombie as a research associate before he had turned.
A quick scan of the About Us section showed that they carried out cutting-edge work in biochemistry through contracts for high-end corporate and government clients. It was light on the details and heavy on the buzzwords.
Glossy text that somebody like me could have written.And then we went to the Who We Are page and hurried past the CEO, Directors, and the Heads of Departments until we had reached a listing for the Research Associates.
The man who had been on the train was not listed. It's even easier to delete somebody's digital footprint than find out what they had for breakfast.Helen commented it opened a bag of potato chips.
and we spent the rest of the day checking for news updates, snacking and catching up on our sleep.I slept in a chair that had seen much better days.Helen crawled under the covers on the bed.
She still wore the headphones around her neck and pulled them over her ears before closing her eyes.I don't think she turned them on to listen to music.It was more of a comfort thing. In the evening, she went out to get a pizza.
While we were tucking in, I thought for the first time about my job.When I didn't show up that morning, did anybody worry about me?I wondered.Probably not, I soon decided.
It was more likely that they already fired me and were hiring some other poor slob to treat like dirt.Good luck to them, I thought and bit into another slice of pizza. Our days and nights settled into a strange rhythm after this.
Helen added old-school paper copies of local and national newspapers to the shopping list, which we devoured along with online outlets for any updates on the tunnel incident.There were no details, though, and the story lost traction as time wore on.
It appeared the authorities' lies were sinking out of sight.But we did find other stories. The CEO of the Stoller Institute was struck by a car and killed while out jogging.The driver hadn't stopped and the police had no leads.
A warehouse in the same district as the Stoller Institute headquarters was gutted by a fire.
With a little digital detective work, we found out that it was owned by a subsidiary of the Institute, and a military helicopter crashed in what was described as a tragic training accident.There were no survivors among the crew.
Anyone else who might have come across these stories would most likely have thought that they were unconnected happenings in the daily news cycle, but we saw the connection.We knew that the cover-up was ongoing.
After a week, though, the original stories about the so-called collision at the tunnel had still not been updated and were being relegated to the archives section of the news sites, and there were no new articles which we could link to the cover-up.
The pressure felt as if it was lifting and I started to feel safer. One morning while Helen was out on her daily shop, I sat on the bed staring at the same four walls.
The room was disgusting and cramped and I had a sudden desperate urge to get out of there.Just to stretch my legs for ten minutes I thought.Surely it couldn't do any harm and Helen would not even have to know that I had left the hotel.
With my mind made up, I went out for the first time since we had checked in, and boy did it feel good.Even though the neighborhood was run down, being out in the fresh air and able to just walk wherever I wanted was such a relief.
I crossed one of the empty lots, stepping around to broken bricks and walked along a street, and I was surprised to find that I was at the entrance to a small park.
It was overgrown and there was broken glass and cigarette butts scattered around, but when I sat on one of the wooden benches at its edge, I could have been in a carefully tended grand city park from the smile on my face.
I knew that Helen would be back soon enough, so I had to drag myself away before I would have light. I was in a bit of a daze as I headed back to the hotel, so much so that I took a wrong turn and found myself on the wrong street.
I figured that it ran parallel to where I wanted to be, so no big deal, and I continued to the end of the street so that I could hang a right.There was a drugstore on the corner and fixed to the wall across from it was a CCTV camera.
The happiness that I had been feeling drained away. Not only was I in line with the camera's lens, but I was staring right at it.I panicked and began to walk away.
It was less than a minute before I was back at the hotel and then I was running to the room, unlocking the door with shaking hands and hurrying inside.
I sat on the floor in a corner with my knees hugged against my chest, and I felt my heart beating as if it was fit to burst.When Helen got back 30 minutes later, there was no point in me even pretending that everything was alright.
I told her what had happened.She heard me out and then started to pace around the room swearing.It might be okay, I tried. Her pacing had brought her to the window.She turned and looked out into the street.It is not.They're here.
I jumped to my feet and went over to the window.There was a dark van parked in the corner just down from the drugstore, and another one parking up close to the bar.
Men and women with short military-style haircuts and wearing plain business suits were getting out and hammering on doors, showing IDs and when the doors were opened, then pushing their way inside.
My face had been tagged by a program somewhere and an alert had been sent out.Teams were dispatched and now it was only a matter of time before they made it to the hotel and knocked on our door.
They knew that I was alive and the cover-up was back on.We have to go now, Helen said and sprinted for the door.I stayed where I was at.What are you doing?she asked.Leave me here, I said.They still don't even know who you are.
You should get away while you can.She replied without missing a beat. No way, we're in this together.We can back up each other's stories when we do go public and besides, she did hesitate now and glanced away for a second before going on.
Besides, I've grown kind of fond of you.It's still a lousy moment to propose, but you never know.One day. It was a crazy time for her to be saying this, crazier than when we had introduced ourselves with a formal handshake, but it worked for me.
I hurried over to her side and we ran for the exit, but we were too late.One of the suited, stern-faced women was showing her ID to the receptionist.He looked worried and then his eyes lit up as he spotted us.
That's the man you're looking for, he yelled, with his girlfriend.The woman span around in a smile of triumph that flickered on her face.She reached for the holster at her waist, but she did not make it.
Helen threw herself forward and knocked the other woman off her feet. And then Helen was jumping over the prone woman and screaming at me to move it.I did not need to hear it twice.
I vaulted the woman narrowly avoiding a flailing shoe as she tried to kick my ankles. She had the sidearm in her hand now as well, and was aiming.I hurtled out onto the street.
There were more suited figures across the road, and they were turning to look at us.And then the sound of a gun being fired rang out.The woman had taken a shot.Her colleagues reacted instinctively by crouching, and that gave us a second.
We sprinted down the street.We didn't look back as more shouts rang out and voices yelled at us to stop.
We weaved chaotically through narrow lanes and scrambled over broken walls until Helen shouted, in here, and she grabbed me by the arm and led us into a derelict building. I sank to my knees.
Helen sat heavily against a wall and placed a hand on her stomach, where blood had spread through the fabric of her t-shirt.She lifted the bottom of the shirt and looked at the wound.Never been shot before, she said and laughed bitterly.
She had started to shake and was breathing rapidly.I moved closer and I took her hand in mine.You're going to be fine, I said. We'll get you to the ER and while they're fixing you up, I'm going to tell the world about these stone cold killers."
Another harsh laugh rippled through her.It clearly hurt.She put a hand on my cheek and somehow smiled.That's not going to happen, she said.Her voice reduced to a whisper, and each word causing her a fresh wave of pain. You need to go.
You can't use either of our cards now.You need cash.Take these."She took her headphones off and pushed them against my chest.The headphones that had been the first thing that I had noticed about her in what felt like a lifetime ago.No, I can't.
I sat and gently pushed the headphones back towards her. A new, crooked smile appeared on her face.Don't be an idiot.Take them, sell them, and keep going until you're safe.And one word of advice, you sweet, lovely man.Don't use the train.
She was the most amazing person that I had ever met.The most beautiful woman.I kissed her on the forehead and said to her for the first time, I love you.But I was too late.She was gone.
I did as she told me and despite the odds stacked against me I made it.I'm south of the border now living off grid.The pain that I feel from losing Helen burns in me every moment of every day and it drives me on.
They tried to silence me and they failed.I know about the zombie virus and one day soon the truth will prevail. Thank you all for listening to this week's episode, I hope that you enjoyed it.
Wherever you may be in the world, I hope that you're staying safe and sound.And as always, stay creepy.
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