William Meikle - The Hole

“I’ll take the job,” he said. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

She smiled wanly.

“Maybe you ain’t got any choice in the matter.”

The laboratory was in semidarkness, and at first glance Janet wasn’t sure what she was looking at on the trestles. They looked like giant heads of corn, some six feet long, over a foot in diameter, but they were pink where corn would have been green; pink and wet, like flesh. As she got closer she saw they were translucent, and contained rounded, unformed embryos.

Then she got it.

Pod people. Somebody’s thing is pod people.

Mullins pointed at the pods.

“Is this the same material you told me about?”

“Put on the lights and you’ll see for yourself quickly enough.”

“I don’t have to do that. I’ve got some on a slide.”

Mullins pointed Janet over to a microscope. She looked down, and saw exactly what she expected to see. The illuminated mount gave out enough light for the sample to revert to the basic protoplasm she’d seen in her own surgery.

Mullins was bent over a trestle, examining the pods.

“The geologists we sent down to check out the mines found them. They say the whole system is full of them; hundreds, they said.”

Janet tried to gauge the scientist’s emotional state, but couldn’t read anything through the facemask.

“I told you when I was here before. These are just a manifestation,” Janet said. “One of the geologists has a thing for Pod People, that’s all. You could just as easily have found the nest of a giant spider. Indeed, you might well do just that the next time you go down there.”

“Nobody’s going down there,” Mullins said. “The general is going to burn the place out, just as soon as it can be arranged.”

“I suspect that won’t cure anything,” Janet said. “You people are now as much infected as we are. You just haven’t noticed it yet.”

“Nonsense. We’ve taken every precaution.”

“And it’s not enough. But you’ll be finding that out for yourself when it gets dark.”

Mullins went quiet at that. Now that she had the scientist thinking, Janet pressed her advantage.

“And if you don’t want a mutiny on your hands, I suggest you get some supplies over to us. There’s only six of us now, but we’re running out of food.”

Mullins nodded, although she had a faraway look in her eyes. Janet didn’t want to push too hard. She stood, and Mullins let her walk away.

“Now excuse me,” she said as she went down out of the trailer. “I have an experiment of my own to prepare.”

“Are you sure this is wise?” Bill said.

It had grown dark outside. The CDC had the parking lot lit up with arc lights, but here at the back of the bar the gloom thickened and shadows crept. Janet stood at the open kitchen door, looking out into the backyard.

“The CDC is no better off than we are,” Janet said. “And the general’s answer is to bomb the shit out of it. I’m sure that’s not wise.”

She turned to look at the sheriff. They were the only two at the door, the others having turned down a chance to watch Janet’s experiment in favor of staying in the bar. They’d left Fred and the girl in conversation, Ellen Simmons in her corner, and Charlie behind the bar with a fresh bottle of JD. Here at the kitchen door the only sound came from the constant beat of the generator.

Janet leaned against Bill. He put an arm around her and pulled her close. They stood like that for a long time, neither speaking, as the darkness gathered in the yard outside.

Shadows shifted in the passenger seat of the rusting pickup. Night fell. Somebody sat in the pickup, staring back at Janet and the sheriff, unmoving, as yet.

“It’s showtime,” Bill whispered.

“Shush. I’m concentrating.”

The figure swung itself out of the seat. The legs flowed and thickened, becoming pale, naked and strangely thin, with three toes on each shoeless foot. The too-thin body rolled out of the pickup, languidly, smoothly, with all the grace of a practiced dancer. It stood in front of them, unblinking, five-foot-high arms too long in proportion to its height. The slender oval head tilted to one side. Large oval eyes—all pupil and blacker than the surrounding shadow—stared straight at Janet. The thing raised a hand that contained two long fingers and a thumb and spoke from a mouth that was little more than a slit across the lower part of its face.

“Fred is dead,” it said.

Janet took a deep breath and stepped out of Bill’s arms to stand directly in front of it. She had no real plan of action in mind beyond attempting communication. She held up her right hand to mimic the thing’s gesture, and spoke.

“Fred is dead,” she said.

“We are with Fred,” it replied. Janet watched carefully, but there were no accompanying hand or head movements that might give away what it meant or what it wanted in reply.

“We are with Fred,” she answered, hoping that she was saying the right thing and not just making matters worse for them.

“Fred is dead.”

This is getting us nowhere.

At the corner of her eye she saw something else shift in the dark inside the pickup. There was something else in the passenger seat.

“Janet,” Bill whispered behind her.

“I see it,” she said, softly.

The thing in front of her cocked its head at the sound.

At least I know it reacts to me and it’s not just some kind of recording.

She stepped closer and opened her arms, showing her palms.

“We mean no harm.”

“Weemean,” it replied, and opened out its palms to her. At the same time a second pale figure stepped down out of the pickup. It too spoke.

“Weemean.”

“Janet,” Bill said behind her. “This isn’t fucking Close Encounters. Get back here.”

“Weemean,” a third one said as it stepped out of the shed. Two more came into the yard from out of the trees. Once all five were together, they advanced on Janet.

She tried to force down her fear; the nights spent hiding under covers, too scared to look out in case the Grays had come for her. There were other times too, when she’d run home in the gloom, scared that a sudden bright light overhead might lead to her being sucked up and away into the sky. Silly girlish worries from a time long past… but all too real here in the dark of the yard.

“Janet!” Bill said, and she heard the fear and worry in that one word. She ignored him, and held her ground as the Grays gathered around her.

“We mean you no harm,” she said softly.

“Weemean,” the five said in unison.

The closest one reached out and stroked Janet’s arm. Pain hit her, as if a red-hot poker had been drawn across her skin, the burn coming up immediately in a six-inch, pencil-thin line. She drew her arm away as another Gray reached for her.

“Weemean,” the five said, and closed in. One of them grabbed her on the wrist, long fingers circling all the way round, bringing a new flare of pain that was almost unendurable. Janet screamed.

The five Grays backed off, as if confused.

“Weemean,” they said.

Janet could barely speak through the pain.

“What do you want?”

She felt Bill’s hand on her shoulder.

“What do you want?” she shouted.

They cocked their heads to one side.

“Weemean.”

They came forward again, long fingers reaching out, as if needing to touch her. When Bill dragged her away, she let him do it.

“Weemean,” the Grays said, and came after them.

“Eat shit and die,” a voice replied. Charlie stood in the doorway, waving the flashlight, passing the beam over the pale forms. Where the light hit they melted and flowed. Thin wisps of dark smoke rose from the liquefying flesh.