In Alien Flesh

by Gregory Benford

  Grotesque, yes ... but maybe that was it.

  VII.

  He felt a tremor. The needles wobbled in his hand.

  “Hey!” he shouted. The tube flexed under him.

  “Something's happening in here. You guys—"

  In midsentence the com-line went dead. Reginri automatically switched over to emergency, but there was no signal there either. He glanced at the tapper lines. The red phosphor glow at their ends had gone dead; they were not receiving power.

  He wriggled around and looked down toward his feet. The tapper lines and the com cable snaked away into darkness with no breaks visible. If there was a flaw in the line, it was farther away.

  Reginri snapped the tapper line heads back into his suit. As he did so, the flesh around him oozed languidly, compressing. There was a tilting sense of motion, a turning—

  “Frange it! Get me—” then he remembered the line was dead. His lips pressed together.

  He would have to get out on his own.

  He dug in with his heels and tried to pull himself backward. A scaly bump scraped against his side. He pulled harder and came free, sliding a few centimeters back. The passage seemed tilted slightly downward. He put his hands out to push and saw something wet run over his fingers. The slimy fluid that filled the trough of the pithole was trickling toward him. Reginri pushed back energetically, getting a better purchase in the pulpy floor.

  He worked steadily and made some progress. A long, slow undulation began and the walls clenched about him. He felt something squeeze at his legs, then his waist, then his chest and head. The tightening had a slow, certain rhythm.

  He breathed faster, tasting an acrid smell. He heard only his own breath, amplified in the helmet.

  He wriggled backward. His boot struck something and he felt the smooth lip of a turning in the passage. He remembered this, but the angle seemed wrong. The Drongheda must be shifting and moving, turning the pithole.

  He forked his feet into the new passageway and quickly slipped through it.

  This way was easier; he slid down the slick sides and felt a wave of relief. Farther along, if the tunnel widened, he might even be able to turn around and go headfirst.

  His foot touched something that resisted softly. He felt around with both boots, gradually letting his weight settle on the thing. It seemed to have a brittle surface, pebbled. He carefully followed the outline of it around the walls of the hole until he had satisfied himself that there was no opening.

  The passage was blocked.

  His mind raced. The air seemed to gain a weight of its own, thick and sour in his helmet. He stamped his boots down, hoping to break whatever it was. The surface stayed firm.

  Reginri felt his mind go numb. He was trapped. The com-line was dead, probably snipped off by this thing at his feet.

  He felt the walls around him clench and stretch again, a massive hand squeezing the life from him. The pithole sides were only centimeters from his helmet. As he watched, a slow ripple passed through the membrane, ropes of yellow fat visible beneath the surface.

  “Get me out!” Reginri kicked wildly. He thrashed against the slimy walls, using elbows and knees to gouge. The yielding pressure remained, cloaking him.

  “Out! Out!” Reginri viciously slammed his fists into the flesh. His vision blurred. Small dark points floated before him. He pounded mechanically, his breath coming in short gasps. He cried for help. And he knew he was going to die.

  Rage burst out of him. He beat at the enveloping smoothness. The gathering tightness in him boiled up, curling his lips into a grimace. His helmet filled with a bitter taste. He shouted again and again, battering at the Drongheda, cursing it. His muscles began to ache.

  And slowly, slowly the burning anger melted. He blinked away the sweat in his eyes. His vision cleared. The blind, pointless energy drained away. He began to think again.

  Sasuke. Vanleo. Two-faced bastards. They'd known this job was dangerous. The incident on the beach was a charade. When he showed doubts they'd bullied and threatened him immediately. They'd probably had to do it before, to other men. It was all planned.

  He took a long, slow breath and looked up. Above him in the tunnel of darkness, the strands of the tapping lines and the com cable dangled.

  One set of lines.

  They led upward, on a slant, the way he had come.

  It took a moment for the fact to strike him. If he had been backing down the way he came, the lines should be snarled behind him.

  He pushed against the glazed sides and looked down his chest. There were no tapper lines near his legs.

  That meant the lines did not come up through whatever was blocking his way. No, they came only from above. Which meant that he had taken some wrong side passage. Somehow a hole had opened in the side of the pithole and he had followed it blindly.

  He gathered himself and thrust upward, striving for purchase. He struggled up the incline, and dug in with his toes. Another long ripple passed through the tube. The steady hand of gravity forced him down, but he slowly worked his way forward. Sweat stung his eyes.

  After a few minutes his hands found the lip, and he quickly hoisted himself over it, into the horizontal tunnel above.

  He found a tangle of lines and tugged at them. They gave with a slight resistance. This was the way out, he was sure of it. He began wriggling forward, and suddenly the world tilted, stretched, lifted him high. Let him drop.

  He smashed against the pulpy side and lost his breath. The tube flexed again, rising up in front of him and dropping away behind. He dug his hands in and held on. The pithole arched, coiling, and squeezed him. Spongy flesh pressed at his head and he involuntarily held his breath. His faceplate was wrapped in it, and his world became fine-veined, purple, marbled with lacy fat.

  Slowly, slowly the pressure ebbed away. He felt a dull aching in his side. There was a subdued tremor beneath him. As soon as he gained maneuvering room, he crawled urgently forward, kicking viciously. The lines led him forward.

  The passage flared outward and he increased his speed. He kept up a steady pace of pulling hands, gouging elbows, thrusting knees and toes. The weight around him seemed bent upon expelling, imparting momentum, ejecting. So it seemed, as the flesh tightened behind him and opened before.

  He tried the helmet microphone again, but it was still inert. He thought he recognized a vast bulging bluish muscle that, on his way in, had been in the wall. Now it formed a bump in the floor. He scrambled over its slickness and continued on.

  He was so intent upon motion and momentum that he did not recognize the end. Suddenly the walls converged again and he looked around frantically for another exit. There was none. Then he noticed the rings of cartilage and stringy muscle. He pushed at the knotted surface. It gave, then relaxed even more. He shoved forward and abruptly was halfway out, suspended over the churning water.

  VIII.

  The muscled iris gripped him loosely about the waist. Puffing steadily, he stopped to rest.

  He squinted up at the forgiving sun. Around him was a harshly lit world of soundless motion. Currents swirled meters below. He could feel the brown hillside of the Drongheda shift slowly. He turned to see—

  The Drongheda was splitting in two.

  But no, no—

  The bulge was another Drongheda close by moving. At the same moment another silent motion caught his eye. Below, Vanleo struggled through the darkening water, waving. Pale mist shrouded the sea.

  Reginri worked his way out and onto the narrow rim of the pithole. He took a grip at it and lowered himself partway down toward the water. Arms extended, he let go and fell with a splash into the ocean. He kept his balance and lurched away awkwardly on legs of cotton.

  Vanleo reached out a steadying hand. The man motioned at the back of his helmet. Reginri frowned, puzzled, and then realized he was motioning toward the emergency com cable. He unspooled his own cable and plugged it into the shoulder socket on Vanleo's skinsuit.

  “—damned lucky. Did
n't think I'd see you again. But it's fantastic, come see it."

  “What? I got—"

  “I understand them now. I know what they're here for. It's not just communication, I don't think that, but that's part of it too. They've—"

  “Stop babbling. What happened?"

  “I went in,” Vanleo said, regaining his breath. “Or started to. We didn't notice that another Drongheda had surfaced, was moving into the shallows."

  “I saw it. I didn't think—"

  “I climbed up to the second pithole before I saw. I was busy with the cables, you know. You were getting good traces and I wanted to—"

  “Let's get away, come on.” The vast bulks above them were moving.

  “No, no, come see. I think my guess is right, these shallows are a natural shelter for them. If they have any enemies in the sea, large fish or something, their enemies can't follow them here into the shallows. So they come here to, to mate and to communicate. They must be terribly lonely, if they can't talk to each other in the oceans. So they have to come here to do it. I—"

  Reginri studied the man and saw that he was ablaze with his inner vision. The damned fool loved these beasts, cared about them, had devoted a life to them and their goddamned mathematics.

  “Where's Sasuke?"

  “—and it's all so natural. I mean, humans communicate and make love, and those are two separate acts. They don't blend together. But the Drongheda—they have it all. They're like, like..."

  The man pulled at Reginri's shoulder, leading him around the long curve of the Drongheda. Two immense burnished hillsides grew out of the shadowed sea. Zeta was setting, and in profile Reginri could see a long dexterous tentacle curling into the air. It came from the mottled patches, like welts, he had seen before.

  “They extend through those spots, you see. Those are their sensors, what they use to complete the contact. And—I can't prove it, but I'm sure—that is when the genetic material is passed between them. The mating period. At the same time they exchange information, converse. That's what we're getting on the tappers, their stored knowledge fed out. They think we're another of their own, that must be it. I don't understand all of it, but—"

  "Where's Sasuke?"

  “—but the first one, the one you were inside, recognized the difference as soon as the second Drongheda approached. They moved together and the second one extruded that tentacle. Then—"

  Reginri shook the other man roughly. “Shut up! Sasuke—"

  Vanleo stopped, dazed, and looked at Reginri. “I've been telling you. It's a great discovery, the first real step we've taken in this field. We'll understand so much more once this is fully explored."

  Reginri hit him in the shoulder.

  Vanleo staggered. The glassy, pinched look of his eyes faded. He began to lift his arms.

  Reginri drove his gloved fist into Vanleo's faceplate. Vanleo toppled backward. The ocean swallowed him. Reginri stepped back, blinking.

  Vanleo's helmet appeared as he struggled up. A wave foamed over him. He stumbled, turned, saw Reginri.

  Reginri moved toward him. “No. No,” Vanleo said weakly.

  “If you're not going to tell me—"

  “But I, I am.” Vanleo gasped, leaned forward until he could brace his hands on his knees.

  “There wasn't time. The second one came up on us so, so fast."

  “Yeah?"

  “I was about ready to go inside. When I saw the second one moving in, you know, the only time in thirty years, I knew it was important. I climbed down to observe. But we needed the data, so Sasuke went in for me. With the tapper cables."

  Vanleo panted. His face was ashen.

  “When the tentacle went in, it filled the pithole exactly, Tight. There was no room left,” he said. “Sasuke ... was there. Inside."

  Reginri froze, stunned. A wave swirled around him and he slipped. The waters tumbled him backward. Dazed, he regained his footing on the slick rocks and began stumbling blindly toward the bleak shore, toward humanity. The ocean lapped around him, ceaseless and unending.

  IX.

  Belej sat motionless, unmindful of the chill. “Oh my God,” she said.

  “That was it,” he murmured. He stared off into the canyon. Zeta Reticuli sent slanting rays into the layered reddening mists. Air squirrels darted among the shifting shadows.

  “He's crazy,” Belej said simply. “That Leo is crazy."

  “Well...” Reginri began. Then he rocked forward stiffly and stood up. Swirls of reddish cloud were crawling up the canyon face toward them. He pointed. “That stuff is coming in faster than I thought.” He coughed. “We'd better get inside."

  Belej nodded and came to her feet. She brushed the twisted brown grass from her legs and turned to him.

  “Now that you've told me,” she said softly, “I think you ought to put it from your mind."

  “It's hard. I..."

  “I know. I know. But you can push it far away from you, forget it happened. That's the best way."

  “Well, maybe."

  “Believe me. You've changed since this happened to you. I can feel it."

  “Feel what?"

  “You. You're different. I feel a barrier between us."

  “I wonder,” he said slowly.

  She put her hand on his arm and stepped closer, an old, familiar gesture. He stood watching the reddening haze swallowing the precise lines of the rocks below.

  “I want that screen between us to dissolve. You made your contribution, earned your pay. Those damned people understand the Drongheda now—"

  He made a wry, rasping laugh. “We'll never grasp the Drongheda. What we get in those neural circuits are mirrors of what we want. Of what we are. We can't sense anything totally alien."

  “But—"

  “Vanleo saw mathematics because he went after it. So did I, at first. Later..."

  He stopped. A sudden breeze made him shiver. He clenched his fists. Clenched. Clenched.

  How could he tell her? He woke in the night, sweating, tangled in the bedclothes, muttering incoherently ... but they were not nightmares, not precisely.

  Something else. Something intermediate.

  “Forget those things,” Belej said soothingly. Reginri leaned closer to her and caught the sweet musk of her, the dry crackling scent of her hair. He had always loved that.

  She frowned up at him. Her eyes shifted intently from his mouth to his eyes and then back again, trying to read his expression. “It will only trouble you to recall it. I—I'm sorry I asked you to tell it. But remember"—she took both his hands in hers—"you'll never go back there again. It can be..."

  Something made him look beyond her. At the gathering fog.

  And at once he sensed the shrouded abyss open below him. Sweeping him in. Gathering him up. Into— —a thick red foam lapping against weathered granite towers—

  —an ellipsoidal sun spinning soundlessly over a silvered, warping planet— —watery light—

  —cloying strands, sticky, a fine-spun coppery matrix that enfolded him, warming— —glossy sheen of polyhedra, wedged together, mass upon mass—

  —smooth bands of moisture playing lightly over his quilted skin— —a blistering light shines through him, sets his bones to humming resonance—

  —pressing— —coiling—

  Beckoning. Beckoning.

  When the moment had passed, Reginri blinked and felt a salty stinging in his eyes. Every day the tug was stronger, the incandescent images sharper. This must be what Vanleo felt, he was sure of it. They came to him now even during the day. Again and again, the grainy texture altering with time...

  He reached out and enfolded Belej in his arms.

  “But I must,” he said in a rasping whisper. “Vanleo called today. He ... I'm going. I'm going back."

  He heard her quick intake of breath, felt her stiffen in his arms.

  His attention was diverted by the reddening fog. It cloaked half the world and still it came on.

  There was something o
minous about it and something inviting as well. He watched as it engulfed trees nearby. He studied it intently, judging the distance. The looming presence was quite close now. But he was sure it would be all right.

  Afterword

  Once when I was scuba diving I saw a shark. It was about a hundred yards away but the water was so clear that it looked like it was right beside me. White, sleek, stately, beautiful.

  Other things were happening at the same time—I was carefully coming up on some fish I wanted for lunch, keeping clear of my diving mates, wondering why my mask was fogging a little ... and then there came that slowed-time reflex you get in an auto accident, when there is all the time in the world to think about what you're going to do next.

  This was off the coast of the Yucatan peninsula, in 1967, about forty feet down. Adrenaline enlarges everything, throws it into stark relief, but still—this shark was big. The long, white form coasted lazily over a ridge of stones, looked toward us for what seemed like forever, and turned majestically our way. Those goggle eyes seemed both blazingly angry and stupefyingly dumb at the same time, but the important fact was that they seemed to be looking right at me.

  I can remember thinking, with that speed-freak energy, that the thing looked alien. As though it was out of place, shouldn't be there, wasn't natural, couldn't even be in the same ocean with me. It was so implausibly huge. I could easily fit inside....

  I'd like to say that I did something brave, like moving to defend the others, but the fact is that I kept swimming as rhythmically as I could, and angled down behind some other rocks I don't even remember looking at the other divers.

  The shark was a great white, all right, and it swam majestically by, about fifty yards away, and then coasted off with smooth indifference, into the far hazy mist.

  I remembered that when I started thinking of this story. In fact, my stunned judgment that the great white could probably swallow me whole without great bother was probably the germinating impulse behind this story.

  A lot of the stories in this collection deal with the alien, in one way or another. Strange creatures, or else the process of making things strange, alienation.