Stephen Jones - Dark Terrors 5 - The Gollancz Book of Horror

It was nine-forty and we were discussing whether we should walk steadily down the front, carefully avoiding the ghouls, or try to make it in one quick rush. We had already determined that we must make our approach down the waterfront, even though it was swarming with ghouls. The alternative was to sneak through the back streets and with narrow roads turning and intersecting that was too dangerous — we would have no warning if one of the things were lurking around a turning, in a doorway, in an alley. On the front we could, at least, see the danger.

But to run or walk…

Mary summed that up.

She said, ‘I don’t think I could walk,’ and we knew what she meant. We decided to run. It might not be the safest policy, for quick movement might well draw their attention, just as the loudspeaker in the van had attracted them to it, but we doubted our nerve — doubted we could walk through that terrible throng. I felt my heart might explode if I denied my impulse to run… to maintain a moderate pace while my heart and brain screamed for the primordial solution, the flight that instinct demanded.

At nine-forty-five a van roared down to the gates.

The back opened and men jumped out, some in uniform and some in civilian clothing. The men in protective clothing opened the gates and the men from the van rushed through. The driver moved the van some ten yards down the barrier, then jumped out and ran back to the gates. A second van arrived, then a third. The occupants all passed through the gates and rushed directly out to the landing craft. There was no examination and I figured that must have already been done, at the laboratory. Examination at the pier was for us and any others who had remained in the town. I watched carefully but saw neither Elston nor Larsen. I figured they had left in the helicopters.

Then it was time for us to leave.

We went out the door fast, Jerry first and Mary next and I brought up the rear, shamefully close upon her heels. We went straight across the front to the fence, wanting that barrier on one side of our course. We passed within six feet of a ghoul. He turned stiffly, watching us, but did not offer pursuit. Two others took tentative steps towards us but, in doing so, they brushed against one another. They snarled in silence and snapped. Then we were running along the line of the fence and, for all our fear, it was easy. We made it to the gates with no more trouble than our labouring lungs and jangling nerves could claim.

We were not the first there.

Half a dozen others had come from the nearer streets of the town, joining at the fence, warily regarding one another. The gate was closed again and the men in protective suits had their visors down. Sunlight reflected from the black glass, glinting like stars in the void. They were faceless behind the glass, alien and inhuman. We drew up, panting, beside the others. Jerry spoke to a man he recognised. Three or four others came dashing from the streets, running hard. One was a woman, sobbing hysterically.

From behind his visor, one of the examiners said, ‘All right. You’ll come through one at a time. Go behind the canvas and take your clothing off. Take everything off.’ He paused at the gate. ‘The rest step back. Move it!’

Someone pushed the hysterical woman forward.

The visored man opened the gate and let her through. The men in blue uniforms had their automatic weapons trained on the rest of us. Two of them, standing apart from the line, held their guns on the woman. The visored man closed the gates again and the woman went behind the canvas. Two men in protective clothing followed her in.

Suddenly I felt like laughing… laughing wildly.

I realised that the canvas had not been erected to house some delicate instrument that could detect the latent disease but simply for the sake of modesty… so that we could undress in privacy! Modesty in the face of this horror! So was authority bound within their dimensions.

Then a darker realisation followed.

I knew we had hoped for too much from these saviours. They had found no way to detect the disease, they simply intended to examine us, naked, looking for any recent wound or break in the skin through which the disease might have got into our bodies.

I didn’t, at first and with my mind jumping madly, see how this would affect us.

The woman emerged from behind the canvas and was directed to the pier. She moved on, stumbling and sobbing. She looked back once. The gate opened again and a man passed through. Jerry took a step forward and the guns all trained on him.

He stopped dead, raising his hands to shoulder-height.

‘There’s another woman here,’ he said. ‘For crissake let her go through next!’

The man at the gate nodded. Sunlight ran like black fire up his helmet.

None of the ghouls had come any distance towards us, they were still milling about back by the jail.

Jerry took Mary gently by the shoulder and pushed her towards the gates, then stepped back. She looked at him over her shoulder, trying to smile, as she moved forwards. The faceless man had his hand on the gate, ready to open it the moment the preceding man had been cleared behind the canvas.

Abruptly, he stiffened.

The instant he stiffened, I saw the reason… and tumultuous horror spun through my guts.

He had seen the bandage on her leg.

‘Remove that,’ he said.

Mary looked puzzled and Jerry hadn’t yet understood. He still had his hands raised.

Mary said, ‘What do you mean?’ and the visored man said, ‘The bandage.’

‘What? Oh… no, that’s all right. I cut myself the other day, it’s not… what you think…’ She had started speaking easily, as if confident the explanation would suffice, but her words trailed off weakly. The man with the black glass face was rigid. I knew that his features, behind the visor, would be as hard and as cold as the glass itself.

Mary bent down and pulled the bandage from her leg. The cut was red and ugly-looking. The man stared at her.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

‘What the hell?’ Jerry shouted.

The guns were trained on him from behind the fence and his hands were still raised, as if he’d thrown them up in amazement.

‘They… won’t..’ I whispered.

‘I’m sorry,’ the faceless man said. ‘There’s no point in examining you further, miss. No one with an open wound can leave.’

‘It isn’t that!’ Mary screamed.

Her cry drew the attention of the guns. They shifted from Jerry to her. The faceless man was shaking his head, perhaps in negation, strengthening his words with the gesture — or perhaps in pity. The second man had come out from behind the canvas and headed for the landing craft. The others were pressing forward, clamouring to get through the gate.

One of the visored men by the canvas called, ‘What’s the hold-up, Jim? Get them through here!’

Jim said, ‘Please step back. You’re holding things up… I don’t want to have to…’ He turned his helmeted head to the side, indicating the line of armed guards. They were quite ready to shoot.

Mary gasped and moved back from the gates.

Jerry stepped forward, past her. He faced the faceless man. Jerry’s visage was like brittle glass itself. Had the visored man possessed a human countenance, Jerry might have argued with him, but they just looked at each other. Jerry had lowered his hands. I could tell what he was thinking as clearly as if my mind had been linked to his and the thought pulsing between us. He wanted to draw his gun and kill the faceless man who stood between Mary and safety. But he knew it would do no good — less than good, for he would be shot down in turn and Mary would still be on this side of the fence… without him.