Splinters

by Matt Carter

  “From what you have seen, that sounds fair,” I said as indifferently as I could.

  “Go on,” he prompted me. “Your turn. Why am I wrong? What was that thing?”

  Less than a week earlier, I would have given almost anything for him to ask me that and be so ready to hear the answer.

  I really wanted to say something while he smoothed on the antibiotic, if only to clear up my thinking. My brain was doing something odd. It was mostly hazy, the way it always is when I have nothing to do, but, for some reason, Ben’s face and his hands on my arm were in perfect focus.

  And I could still remember that saying less would be better, for him and for me.

  When he tied off the bandages, he did an even tidier job than I could have myself, though I wouldn’t have told him so. He waited a few seconds afterward before asking, “Well?”

  I went back to packing up my kit, though it was nowhere near enough to make me clear. The energy drink I’d quickly gulped down before getting started was already wearing off, and after the look Ben had given me when I’d offered him one, it felt awkward to go get another one even later in the evening.

  “Is that what you want?” I asked. “To belong to my Network? To be the Splinters’ enemy every minute of every day?”

  He took a long time trying to find an answer, so I stopped him.

  “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”

  He looked more like I’d accused him of something rather than apologized.

  “I’m sorry I called you a creep.”

  “A sick stalker,” I corrected him. “And it’s fine.”

  “Then what? Is it because I’m not drinking the Kool-Aid? Because I like evidence? Just because I won’t promise to take it all as gospel truth, you’re going to keep me in the dark?”

  The kit was back in order, so I started piecing the garlic cloves back into a bulb to keep the train of the conversation. “What do you want from me, Ben?”

  “To know what I’m doing! I want to know what you know and what you’re basing it on, so I’ll know how to handle myself!”

  “I said I’d protect you,” I reminded him. “And you’re still here so far.”

  “You’ve been protecting me,” he said. “Look, just because I don’t think Haley’s like that deer . . . that’s all the more reason for me to be worried! People act weird around her as much as me whether they’re really people or not! You think this place is dangerous—I agree with you there. And I have to assume it’s just as dangerous for her until I know otherwise. I know what you think, why you don’t care about her, but she’s human until proven Splinter to me. And what about my mom? What about Haley’s mom? I’m sure you’ve got this down to a science and everything, but you can’t protect everyone, can you? I need to know what to do on my own.”

  I was getting that feeling again, the one I’d had just before my worst failure to date, the one I had to avoid at all costs. Not tears this time, but the same feeling, in the form of unexplained warmth in my fingers and erratic pacing in my pulse.

  I really needed to hear him laughing again like a normal, safe, happy human to remind me of the other reason I’d changed my mind, why I had to say no, that laugh I’d never had to hear out loud from him before he’d arrived in Prospero, the one I knew no Network member would ever have time to achieve. He was nowhere near laughter now, and no matter how hard I squeezed the garlic in my hands, I couldn’t quite recapture the sound in my head.

  I could hear him asking me to tell him everything two years ago. I could see something else that looked like him listening so earnestly in his place. I could feel that thing taking me to be replaced, leaving me with two broken bones and an assortment of second-degree burns in the attempt.

  Except that hadn’t been Ben, and the face that did belong in that memory wasn’t allowed in my thoughts anymore.

  Ben was different—would be different—in every way.

  Because I was too strong to let that feeling take me over ever again.

  Remembering my conviction that had been so solid before he’d actually arrived, there was nothing left in my head strong enough to stop the offer from slipping out.

  “First thing tomorrow, after Mom goes to work, I have to go back to where it attacked us to check for evidence and document the cleanup. You could meet me there . . . if you want to.”

  It looked like he was considering arguing for more, but he also kept glancing at his phone, the late hour of its clock and the growing tally of messages.

  “And then we can talk about this?” he asked.

  “We’ll talk about whatever you want,” I agreed. “If you still want to.”

  Ben stood up stiffly, carefully testing the movement in his right shoulder. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

  It felt like I was supposed to do or say something more before letting him leave. I couldn’t think of anything.

  Just as the front door closed behind him, my phone vibrated once more, and this time I answered.

  “I’m fine, Aldo. But something’s come up.”

  10.

  Leftovers

  Ben

  I found Mina Todd the next morning, crouching down by the curb near where we had been attacked by the deer. As usual, she was dressed in plain black with long sleeves in spite of the heat, with that hideous bag over her shoulder. Less usually, she also had a large glass box strapped to her back. She looked at me, more than a bit irritated. I was hoping the paper bag I had brought would smooth things over.

  “You’re late,” she said.

  Looking to counter, I quickly replied, “You’re outside.”

  “You’ve seen me outside before, several times,” she said.

  I had to keep reminding myself that she didn’t always register jokes like normal people.

  “Haley’s mom took my mom out shopping, so I had to walk her to play practice before coming here,” I explained.

  “It shouldn’t have taken you that long to get from there to here,” she said. Once again, she said it not as an accusation, but as a simple statement of fact. I had to tell myself not to get defensive.

  “Hence the bag,” I said, handing her the paper sack. She opened it up, pulling out the six-pack of energy drinks I’d bought. For a fraction of a second, I caught some of that radiant smile. It didn’t last long.

  “Tell me what you see here,” she said.

  They’d cleaned up nicely. The fence I’d been flung through had been repaired, the blood on the street was gone, and a brand new SUV with that same “CATDOC” vanity plate that had nearly decapitated me the night before was parked on the curb. Even the grass by the curb had been replaced, probably to cover for the fire. It was almost as if nothing had happened. I don’t know why, but that almost felt worse than having actually been attacked by an alien deer.

  Almost.

  “Is this what you meant by ‘document the cleanup?’ ” I asked, motioning to the SUV and trying very hard to hold my fear in check.

  “They’re fast,” she agreed. “Come on, let’s see if there’s any of it left. Usually the bits go back in the direction of the forest.”

  “What bits?” I asked.

  “Bits of the deer,” Mina said.

  She talked about this as if it were completely normal. It took me a moment to remind myself that to her it was completely normal.

  “Where do you get a perfect replica of a car, even a common car, in the middle of the night?” I asked.

  “I’ve told you how much of the town they’ve taken over,” she said, kneeling down and rubbing her fingers lightly across the asphalt. “Many of the town’s more affluent citizens help the Splinters maintain their anonymity. Mainly the Town Council. That includes the fire chief and the ‘Used Car King.’ And my mother.”

  I got a flash of the night before, that woman whose steely gaze looked so familiar. That explained a lot.

  “I have listening devices at all their meetings. They’re good at hiding what they’re talking about, but I’ve been able t
o determine that they have a treaty of sorts with the Splinter leadership. In exchange for keeping their families safe and the Council completely human, they help the Splinters cover up any problems, like the fire, while the Splinters themselves take care of any people who might be problems,” she continued. That reminded me of the man we saw running from the house last night, screaming and yelling about his car—a car that had come back from the dead overnight.

  “You know, if the car’s here, the guy who owns it probably still is, too. Maybe we should . . . I don’t know . . . apologize?” I suggested. It was a silly, stupid notion, but honor dictated that I at least put it out there.

  “You can try if you want,” she said, “when we’re done.”

  I lowered my eyes. This next part was not something I had been looking forward to.

  “So you’re going to make me ask again?” I asked. “What attacked us last night, and what are we looking for now?”

  “Last night, we were attacked by a Splinter,” she said quite simply.

  Okay, maybe I would have to get a bit more specific on this. “What are Splinters?”

  “Figuratively, they are perhaps the greatest threat unknown to mankind, a plague that seeks to replace us with otherworld duplicates so they can live our lives. Biologically, they are, in many ways, like any other organism. They consume, they rest, and they fight to survive.”

  “And reproduce?” I proposed, going down the checklist of natural functions I remembered from biology.

  This gave her a moment of pause. “I’m uncertain as to whether or not they reproduce as we know it.”

  “Then what do you call those pieces that broke off last night and came after us? They looked pretty alive to me,” I asked.

  “Smaller Splinters,” she said. “Are you all right with me entering the realm of speculation for a moment?”

  “Please do,” I said.

  “From what I’ve seen, each piece of a Splinter can survive as an independent organism, or they can rejoin into the original piece. I have also seen human Splinters transfer thoughts through physical contact. Based on this, I think it’s likely that all Splinters come from some larger consciousness, probably even one large organism that is capable of breaking itself into infinitely smaller parts, hence the name. I’m not sure yet about the parts’ exact level of independent thought.”

  I nodded, trying to ignore the way my skin was beginning to crawl with imaginary microscopic aliens.

  “What attacked us last night was what we call a Creature Splinter. Creature Splinters are bits that break off into Prospero without having a human body already brought to them. They grab and copy the first living thing that walks by and do what they can with it. And you saw the result. When they’re too broken to re-form, the pieces wander off, probably where they came from, but sometimes a few get left behind. Hopefully we’ll find one in time.”

  “In time for what?”

  “Creature Splinters use a cruder copying technique than human Splinters do. It makes them more . . . unstable. They have a harder time holding onto their form, and they only live for a few days, maybe even hours before dissolving away.”

  “So, if there are Splinters that are smart enough to pass for human—”

  “There are,” she said without hesitation.

  “If there are, then the thing we killed, if we killed it . . .”

  “It wasn’t like them,” she confirmed. “It couldn’t think like a person. It couldn’t even think like a deer.”

  That was comforting. Slightly.

  We worked our way down opposite sides of the driveway, searching flowerbed edges of the yards on both sides along the way before we had to walk around the garage and into the woods. I could tell that Mina would have preferred we split up to cover more ground, but I had too many questions that needed answering.

  “Do you know where they come from?” I asked as we began to walk into the forest. “The Splinters, I mean?”

  “Not precisely, but again, I can speculate,” she said. “Do you know of The Miracle Mine Incident?”

  I nodded. The Miracle Mine Incident is about the only thing Prospero is actually proud of. Prospero was founded as one of the many Gold Rush boomtowns, the earth around it pockmarked by dozens of crisscrossing mines. As mines often do, one of them caved in, trapping eight miners underground. The men had been thought dead after two weeks of fruitless rescue efforts, but then surprised the world when they walked into a nearby tavern, no worse for wear, and ordered a round of drinks.

  When I thought about it, the story sounded a little too familiar for comfort.

  “You think it happened down there?” I asked.

  “Before the incident, nothing out of the ordinary happened in this town. All the reports of monsters and other paranormal phenomena began shortly afterward, so, yes, I would say there is a likely correlation between the two. Since every Creature Splinter I have seen is based around something found in the forest, something that may very well have wandered by accident into an old mine, I would say it is very likely that the transformation process happens out there.”

  “So they can’t just take over anything anywhere?”

  She shook her head, “No. I’ve seen smaller pieces try. They’re not very smart, but for a complete transformation to take place, I think the person needs to be taken to someplace special, most likely within the mine, where they are stored and replaced. It’s a pretty quick process. I’ve seen cases where I am almost certain someone has been taken and replaced overnight.”

  “They’re stored?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Why would they need to store them?” I asked.

  Mina looked at me, almost hesitant, “To answer that, I have to speculate again, is that all right?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And feel free to speculate all you want, you don’t need my permission.”

  This didn’t seem to calm her any. “Well . . . from all I have been able to piece together, from my sources and investigation, Splinters are incapable of existing in our world for long on their own. In order to exist here, they need a link to both the living person they have taken over and their own world, and if you kill the body of one, the other will die.”

  She wouldn’t meet my eyes as she said this. Before I could stop myself, I asked, “You’ve seen this, haven’t you?”

  Mina stalled for a moment, kicking the grass as if to flush tiny Splinters out of it, her left hand wrapped unconsciously around her right arm, over that stiflingly covered scar, and then spoke as if she were pulling off a Band-Aid. “I have it from a reliable source that that is what I saw.”

  Her strong façade faltered for a moment, and I saw true sadness in her eyes. I didn’t push her further.

  “All right,” I said. “So if we kill either one, the other dies. I get that. If we can’t kill them, how do we fight them?”

  Mina waved to the town dramatically. “We watch, we gather information, and we do everything possible to undermine and sabotage their efforts.”

  “We can’t take the fight to them? What if we were to find this place where the humans are being kept prisoner? If we were to free them from the source, what would happen?”

  She shook her head vigorously, “Nobody knows where the Miracle Mine is for sure. Well, no human does, as far as I know. Accurate records from the era have been lost, and with all the accidents and lawsuits stemming from people trying to find it, thinking it has some fountain-of-youth kind of power, the Town Council has found it very convenient to keep any information there is on the location of the mines confidential. “For the public safety.” I’ve been hoping to dig something up for years.”

  She crouched down, tracing her fingers through a faint indentation in the dirt and leaves.

  “Find something?” I asked.

  “Maybe,” she said, following the faint trail farther into the woods. There was one question. One big question that still lingered here. It was the one I had been avoiding, the one I had been dreading most, but i
t was another one that we had to get out in the open.

  “So what does all this mean for Haley? If this transformation can happen overnight like you said, why was she gone for two months?” I asked. I wanted to stump her, for this to prove that, somehow, Haley couldn’t be one of these monsters Mina feared so much.

  Instead, Mina shot back, “Because sometimes they have a hard time taking someone over. Sometimes . . . it doesn’t take properly.”

  There was no uncertainty in this remark, no question in her voice.

  “This has happened before, too?” I asked.

  “Decades ago,” she replied, and when I looked to her for more information, she explained, “I’m not the first person to resist the Splinters. There isn’t much left of the ones who came before me, but I’ve learned what I could. Technically, this information is secondhand, so bear with me. Last time their secret got out on any noticeable scale, it started with a guy they couldn’t replace because of some preexisting brain damage. I learned a lot from his notes, in the beginning.”

  “So that means Haley wasn’t taken?” I proposed.

  “It could mean anything,” she said. “Haley not being taken is one possibility, but unless she managed to survive a gunshot to the head at some point without me hearing about it, it’s unlikely. It is also possible that they know that I know about this process, and they delayed her release to cast doubt in me. Or it could be something that I haven’t seen before. There’s nothing to suggest, just yet, that she’s anything but a Probable Splinter,” Mina said.