Fading Light: An Anthology of the Monstrous: Tim Marquitz (41 page)

I whip the stock of the shotgun around and shatter tooth and bone,
chambering a shell while the creature rears in pain. I fire directly
into its chest, my heart thumping as I end another life.

“Help,” a weak voice calls from behind me.

I pivot on the balls of my feet, the torch illuminating a dark figure
bent over a large body lying on the ground. Gray. The liquid sound of
tearing flesh tells me all I need to know. I fire. An animalistic cry
echoes throughout the empty power station, freezing me where I stand.

“Gray … you okay?”

Silence.

“Come on, stop messing around.”

I focus my eyes on Gray’s form and startle as his chest expands
with a heavy wheeze. He’s still alive! I rush forward and take a
knee, the back of my hand gently brushing against his cold, clammy
forehead. I stroke the side of his face, whisper that everything will
be alright, and die a little bit inside every time his wet coughs
bring up blood and bile. My eyes fall to his chest and my heart
sinks. Tears streak down my face. I need bandages. I need to get him
to the doctor. I need to save him, this time.

“The lights,” Gray’s voice rasps, barely audible
over the sound of something thumping along the roof. “Hurry.”

He’s right, but it sickens me to leave his side. I do it,
anyway.

It only takes a moment to find the gas can, and I cringe as my
fingers close around the gore covered handle. I make my move towards
the generator, barely able to keep my feet as I stumble over body
after body. My ribs hurt, my mind reeling, but the job comes
naturally. I unscrew the fuel cap, insert the funnel, and start
pouring.

The primal screams seem so distant. The scraping of claws across the
grated floor tells me they are getting closer, but I am completely
focused.
Pump the primer, adjust the choke, start the engine
.
I clench my hand around the ripcord, brace my knee against the
generator, and pull as hard as I can.

The motor spurts, stutters, and comes to life for the briefest of
instances before cutting out. I try again and again, but the engine
refuses to ignite. Something tugs at my consciousness, pulling me
from my focus.

“Behind you!” a voice shouts.

I try to turn but the pain of a dozen needles pierces my stomach. I’m
hoisted off the ground and tossed across the room, crashing into one
of the broken generators before falling face first to the ground. My
chest feels as if it’s on fire. I can hardly breathe.

Claws click against the grated floor, approaching with deliberate
steps. I reach out, searching for something, anything I can use as a
weapon.
There
. My hand closes around something flat and sharp;
one of the aluminum generator blades. Searing heat explodes across
my back, and I am dragged across the floor. A gurgling chuckle erupts
above me. The thing is fucking enjoying this.

It moves to my side, clenching its gnarled feet against the ground
before it slams its talons into my side. I grip the blade tight,
knowing I’ll only have one shot at this. The creature squeezes,
and I howl with blinding pain. I struggle to gather my thoughts as it
rolls me over, pulling me closer while its claws dig deeper inside
me. I look up and meet hollow eyes staring back at me, its gaze
penetrating my mind and my soul. My throat is parched, my mouth is
dry, but my broken lips provide just enough fluid for this to work. I
draw back my teeth and launch the bloodied wad into the nearest
socket.

“See you in Hell!”

I let out a nasty roar and swing the blade. It curves through the air
and barely slows as it slices through flesh and bone. Blood spurts
from an arterial wound, lacquering my face in its warm, thick spray.
The adrenaline drains from my system as the monstrous form falls
away, releasing me from its hold. My body is racked by coughs. I’m
barely able to move, but I’m alive.

I force myself to stand, tired muscles begging me to stay still. The
workshop is bathed in a dim glow, probably from the torch on the
shotgun, making it easier to navigate my way to the generator. I hear
noises echoing throughout the station, and I know this is my last
chance. I give the primer a single push and adjust the choke one more
time. Wrapping my hand around the ripcord, I whisper a silent prayer,
and give it an almighty yank.

The engine leaps into action.

I collapse against the nearest workbench. My exhausted body aches in
places I never knew existed. The lights flicker to life, illuminating
the workshop.

My heart stalls at what I see.

The walls run red. Rivulets of blood snake their way to the floor.
The putrid stench is overwhelming, and I start to heave, the powerful
muscle spasms inflaming my broken ribs. I drop into a crouch and hold
myself, purging my mouth of the fouled saliva while trying to regain
a semblance of control. I lower my gaze and examine the first body.
Its chest is torn apart by a gaping shotgun wound. Under the faded
light of the lamp, I can see this is not the remains of some hideous
monster.

I know this person: Jessica.

My eyes sweep the room, identifying body after body. Mark: intestines
spilling out through a jagged stomach wound. Tom, whose left side of
his face is ripped to shreds by shotgun pellets. Paul is dead of a
shotgun wound to the heart. His blood-soaked body stands out like a
beacon, its throat slashed in the shape of a vicious smile.

The pieces fall into place as I gaze upon my tormentor.
I got you,
Dan, you worthless piece of shit.

I stay there a few moments, taking in the scene I’ve created,
afraid to confirm what I know lies in wait for me. My thighs start to
cramp, and I’m left with no choice but to face my fears. I feel
nauseated as I hobble forward on unsteady feet. I inch toward the
door, each step bringing me closer to my fatal mistake. I take a deep
breath, hold it for what seems like an eternity, and step out into
the corridor.

Gray lays there, his peaceful face unmoving, dead. No large chunks of
flesh have been torn away by hungry monsters. Staring back at me from
the center of his chest is a single shotgun wound. Blood spills in a
pattern of interwoven streams.
It’s my fault
.

I fall to the floor beside him, overcome. I pull his head close to
mine and yell incoherently. My tears splash against his beautiful
face, and all I want to know is
why
. Why did he have to die?
Why couldn’t it have been me instead?

A blood-curdling wail startles me back to reality, followed by
frantic footsteps. I lift my eyes to see the only person who could
make this situation worse.

“No, no, no, no, no! Get away from him!” Zoe shrieks, her
feet scraping against the grate floor.

The light flickers, and the image of Zoe blurs. Shadowy elongated
limbs sprout from her torso. I blink once, twice, and rub my eyes,
but the image darkens and grows in front of me.
That thing is not
Zoe
. It’s coming for the generator. It’s coming for
me
.

I reach for Gray’s pistol, still holstered in his belt loop.
Taking it in hand, I work the slide action, chamber a round, and aim
at the monstrous beast bearing down on me.

“I love you, Gray.”

The lights go out.

Ancient night. A cold place that has never known the sun. In the
years that took man from the trees and gave him speech, this trench,
this deep wound, has remained undisturbed. Nothing but slow currents
and slower still, the grind of continental plates. Seven miles of
dark water stand above these rocks. Seven empty miles.

“Careful now, you’re getting close.”

“Like I’m going to crash it.”

The Pandora rides the gentlest of ocean swells. Occasionally the
waters slap against her iron hull, the only sound on a midnight
ocean, starlit and calm.

“Careful!”

“Yeah right. Because I’m really going to drive my baby
into the seabed after seven fucking hours getting her down there”

In a small cabin crowded with PCs, printers, spare propulsion units,
power cells and a robotic arm that has never worked, two men peer at
a monitor showing live video feed.

“OK, I can see the rocks now. Going neutral.” Kim Green
looks too young for the beard sprouting from his chin.

Seven miles of fiber-optic sheathed in buoyant polyester joins his
terminal to Prometheus. A delicate umbilicus pulsing with images and
other, less tangible data. The robotic mini-sub maneuvers a yard above
the floor of the ocean trench.

“Registering good telemetry.” Daniel McKay is older, a
solid thirty. Earnest, reliable.

In the ancient night the Prometheus glides over a sterile landscape
of black rock. The narrow beam of the nav-lamp scans the seabed.

“We should try the flood lights.” Kim thinks his beard
makes him look like a young Cat Stevens. It doesn’t.

“Main lights are charged for go.” Daniel flicks two red
switches on the console before him.

The Prometheus moves through cold, still waters. Its electric engines
whirr. In the deep places there are things older than man, things
that cannot be forgotten and so are better left unknown. In a street
at the heart of Prague’s old town a witch-woman moans in her
sleep. An old woman in the East End of London turns over tarot cards,
Death, Tower Struck By Lightning, The Fool. A mystic in New York
bleeds from her tear ducts and starts to scream.

The Prometheus chugs along its course. In the ship above, Kim reaches
for his coffee. He sips from a bitter cup.

“Lights are go.” He types the code.

In the darkest place a thousand watt bulb explodes with a white
blindness of photons. Capacitor banks sigh as they release their
charge. The shadows race away and a new day is brought to the depths.
The first day.

“Neat.” Kim is pleased.

Over a forest in the Ukraine a vast flock of starlings starts to die.
Their bodies fall in a light rain, by the hundred, and then by
thousands in a deluge that paints the ground black.

“Keep recording.” Daniel stands and stretches his back.
“Gotta go to the head.” He’s learned the nautical
phrases already. Two weeks at sea and he’s Mister Sailor.

Kim watches his monitor whilst Daniel sets off along the central
corridor to answer nature’s call. At the helm the Pandora’s
captain smokes a cigarette and watches the compass spin.

The harsh light from the floods paints the seabed in stark shadows.
Prometheus glides on, past a yawning sink hole.

Kim reaches for the joystick. In Berlin twin sisters, blonde and
twelve years old, go into epileptic fits. Neither will recover. In
Vatican City father Alphonse Riticio notices the holy water boiling
in the fonts at the Basilica.

Kim steers Prometheus toward the hole, a rocky gullet several yards
across.

Across the world babies wake screaming. Many will never sleep again.
Others lie quiet and grow cold.

Daniel returns from the head. He feels a sharp sense of unease. The
corridor to the operations room seems to stretch away from him. His
footfalls make no sound.

A black thread links the Pandora to the heart of darkness seven miles
below.

Daniel reaches the comms room door. He doesn’t have to knock,
but he pauses, he raises his hand.

“Kim?” His voice sounds too loud.

He reaches out to touch the door, tentative, as if he expects a
static shock.

“Kim?” He can’t do it, he can’t bring himself
to touch the door.

One by one the corridor lights go out.

“The fuse has gone,” Alan said It seemed a likely
explanation.

“You kids okay?” he called out loud enough for them to
hear him in their bedrooms.

“The Nintendo isn’t working, Dad!” Sarah shouted
back.

“I’m getting the flashlight,” Ben hollered.

“No!” Jane from the kitchen. “Stay exactly where
you are and let Daddy fix the lights. I don’t want to be
cleaning up the mess after you blunder into everything.”

Alan felt his way along the hall wall. The kids should have been
asleep, not playing video games. “Shit!” He banged his
knee on the phone table.

“You alright, dear?” Jane sounded closer. Not following
her own advice.

Alan’s fingers found the catch on the basement door. “I
had a fight with the table,” he said.

He opened the door. The smell of damp earth hit him. They’d had
the basement fully finished five years before, plastered walls and a
concrete floor, but it still stank like a root cellar. The flashlight
above the door came on with a feeble glow that died away within
seconds.

“Damned batteries.”

The wooden stairs creaked as he went down. It seemed to get colder
with each step. He found the fuse cupboard by touch, on the wall at
the bottom of the steps. He counted along the switches. If it wasn’t
the damn fuses he’d have to get an electrician in, and he
wouldn’t be seeing much change from $200 just to get one of
those guys across the doormat.

The last switch was down. Alan flicked it up. Nothing happened.

“Shit.”

He’d spent three years at the University of Boston studying
earth sciences, and his college education took him as far as flicking
a switch. After that he was fresh out of ideas.

“Thanks Dear.” Jane’s voice from up above. “I’m
going up to bed now.”

He noticed the glow illuminating the first few steps up by the door.
He patted the wall beside him for the basement light switch.

Click. “Let there be light.” If one switch fails ... try
two.

Alan scanned the crowded basement, cardboard boxes left over from the
move six years back, some yet to be fully excavated, the shelves
against the far wall. He needed some batteries for the flashlight.

He shivered. It didn’t feel like autumn upstairs, but down here
it felt like time to fire up the furnace. He checked the toolbox
under the fuse cupboard. Sometimes he left spare batteries there. He
spiked his finger on a loose staple.