Walter Greatshell - Apocalypticon

The oxygen!

Lying on the floor amid tumbled oxygen cylinders, Sal suddenly realized what was wrong: They had inflated only the outer envelope of the tent, the part that supported the structure, without flushing the inner chamber with pure oxygen. They had opened the stupid can in plain, ordinary air!

Feeling like a complete fool, and probably a dead one, he grabbed the valve on the nearest oxygen tank and gave it a spin, blasting a stream of gas at the shimmering quilted membrane that was just then breaking on him like a veiny, steel-stitched wave.

The force of the oxygen filled the thing like a billowing sheet… and all at once it was collapsing, blushing, retreating into a shriveled pile in the corner, attached by a rag of pink meat to the open drum.

"Fuck," Todd said. He and the other boys were tangled together on the floor, having tripped over each other trying to get out. "You got the bitch."

"Yeah," Sal said, getting up and retrieving his face mask. "Sorry-I didn't realize there were separate tanks for the O2."

"Hey, better late than never."

"Ain't like we knew what was goin' on. I thought we were toast."

"Yeah, good job, dude."

Sal shrugged, turning the valve low. He already felt a little giddy from breathing pure oxygen. Determined not to make any more fatal mistakes, he said, "Okay, we gotta move fast before we pass out in here. Everybody come over here and let's see what we can do with this stuff…"

It was disgusting, like handling flayed human skin that had been sewn into grotesque sheets-which is exactly what it was. Fumigating everything with fresh oxygen before they touched it, the boys were appalled at what twisted things they had been driven to: They were wearing human body parts!-something only the most disgusting psychopath would do. Nauseated and retching, they pretended it was rubber and tried not to breathe through their noses, making sounds of revulsion as they squeamishly draped themselves with slimy tissue of every kind. The stuff had been sewn together into crude overlapping ponchos and skirts that hung slackly to the ground, threatening to rip and fall off at any moment. More stapling was required to make it stay on, but the dragging hems were still collecting bits of dirt.

"Okay, you-you all ready?" Sal asked, shivering as if from a chill.

"No," Freddy said. Ray echoed him, and Todd said, "Not really, dude… but there's no turning back now."

Standing ready at the oxygen tank, Sal said, "Open the tent."

Freddy and Todd spread the tent flaps wide and let the outside air in.

Only a small percentage of the atmosphere is oxygen-the four boys were well drilled in this from living aboard the sub-most is nitrogen and other gases. But oxygen is the only one vital to animal life, the only hedge humankind had against Agent X. This was by design: The blood-oxygen bond interfered with Agent X absorption, which was why Xombies suffocated their victims. But oxygen was only effective against Xombies at artificially high concentrations (toxic carbon monoxide worked even better, as Lulu Pangloss had proved) such as those found in hospital ICUs, decompression chambers, and other such rarefied environments. Dilute it even a little, and the Maenad cells came back with a vengeance.

Waiting for the unthinkable to happen, Sal had a little revelation: If the atmosphere was comprised of pure oxygen, Xombies couldn't exist. Then again, neither could any vegetation-damn. Nerves jangling, he wondered how long it would take for the effect of pure O2 to wear off in Xombie tissues. Should have a stopwatch…

"Think of it as a s-science experiment," he said, trying to make light.

"Yeah, we're the guinea pigs," Todd said.

It was fast. The tent walls wobbled as a fresh ocean breeze swirled in and replaced the funk of four sweaty, unwashed boys occupying a big plastic bag. In a few minutes, they would have used up all the oxygen anyway, just by breathing-Sal couldn't help thinking they were fools to rush it.

Nothing's going to happen, he thought, as an odd crackling force began spreading across the surface of his body. At first it felt like a stiffening blood-pressure cuff… except all over. The tension spread unequally, so that some patches expanded faster than others and were answered by slower pressures elsewhere, creating an odd kneading sensation, a give-and-take as warring cellular kingdoms strained to achieve equilibrium.

Weird-it was alive. Sal's real skin crawled as those hanging meat skirts retracted, tightening and hugging the contours of his legs and lower torso, while the flesh cape and hood embraced his chest, arms, and head. The graying undead skin expanded and webbed outward to cover every inch of him, probing for chinks in his armor with the rippling delicacy of a predatory mollusk enveloping a clam. It was disturbingly like being caressed sexually, squeezed in alarming places, uncomfortably snug at the groin. He could feel the blood being forced from his thighs into his head as though his body were a toothpaste tube.

For a minute he thought he was suffocating, and he had to force himself to breathe against the pressure. Oh shit…

Then it let up: The weight on his chest met a counterforce from his back, and the two sides canceled each other out in twisting knots of repulsion, clinging to Sal's mesh panels like limpets sealed fast to a rock, both refusing to give way. The odd patches of hair on it-someone else's hair-bristled menacingly.

I can't do this, I can't do this…

Worst of all, the flap of flesh on his head oozed like melting wax down the screened dome of his helmet, threatening to completely block off his vision as well as his air. Panicking, Sal tried pushing it back and stapling it fast, but the skin was muscular and quick, rebellious as a live octopus. He couldn't get a grip-the flesh sheathing his gloves rebelled at handling it, so that Sal's hands kept slipping off, making him feel frustratingly clumsy.

He could hear the other guys going crazy as well, rocking the tent as they spun in circles or thrashed around on the floor trying to rip the weird membranes off their faces. Sal was about ready to start doing that himself, the sound of his trapped breaths booming loud in his mask.

In desperation, he found a machete and slashed at the thing, poking eyeholes and scraping their bleeding edges back. The holes tried to close immediately, grotesque eyelids weeping dark juice, but he kept digging, and suddenly Todd was there with a butane torch, shooting a jet of blue flame at the questing lips until they blistered and charred, searing open. He had done the same thing for himself, his perforated flesh helmet resembling a deformed jack-o'lantern. Resembling a Reaper.

"Whoa, watch my eyes," Sal said, gagging on the stink of burning flesh. As soon as he could see properly, Todd handed him another minitorch from a box on the floor, and they both set to work helping the others. It went quickly, and in a couple of minutes everyone was out of danger, if slightly hysterical. Voices muffled inside their helmets, they all thanked Todd profusely.

"That was quick thinking, man."

"Yeah. Good call."

Todd shook his head apologetically. "Sorry, guys. I would have done it sooner, but I had to be sure the oxygen count was back to normal before I lit a flame. Otherwise, we'd have been crispy critters in here."

They looked at Todd with dawning respect.

Sal was feeling better. Not just better but strangely euphoric, as though his whole body had become lighter and more compact. The more he moved around, the more the stiffness of the suit seemed to vanish, all its mismatched pieces joined under a pulsating web of Xombie flesh to form a snug body glove that supported him in all the right places. Though it had to weigh at least fifty pounds, the animated skin had a springiness that somehow helped distribute and carry the weight. It even had some kind of heat-exchange property that was keeping him cool. This was better, he thought, than his protective BMX gear.