Boy Gone

by Mark Wayne McGinnis

  A lot of the things Hank mentioned were currently racing around in Scotty’s mind. But the words disrobe and brine vats were among the most significant.

  Chapter 40

  Scotty followed Hank, once again back in his Human form, around to the side of the hard-hut where the big metal hatch was located. Off in the distance, he caught sight of Tori, walking behind Gail’s Vallic form. As if feeling his gaze upon her, she looked back over her shoulder and gave him a quick wave before disappearing around another hard-hut structure.

  “This way, Scotty,” Hank said, swinging open the hatch door. Noisy, complaining hinges gave Scotty pause before entering the darkened space before him.

  “It’s all right, son … don’t be afraid.”

  Stepping inside, Scotty’s nose was instantly accosted by a myriad of strange odors. That, and the near-total darkness surrounding him were freaky. He waited for Hank to swing the hatch door shut before saying, “Smells like an old shoe in here.”

  “Oh, come on, Scotty. Both you and I know it smells a whole lot worse than that.”

  As Scotty’s eyes slowly adjusted to the dim light within, he took in the domed space overhead. What looked to be a square pool of sorts took up most of the floor space—about five times the size of a hot tub. He heard liquid sloshing sounds and could just barely make out a bit of movement. Everything had the same drab greenish color—the vat, the dome, even Hank.

  “What’s that stuff on the walls … the ceiling?” Scotty asked.

  “I guess the closest thing you could relate to is that it’s a kind of moss. And it’s alive,” Hank said, stepping closer to the side of the dome and placing his open palm upon it. “Try it … put your hand on it.”

  Scotty did as told, and, sure enough, it was mossy. A spongy texture that tickled his skin. “It’s kind of gross feeling.”

  “If you think that’s gross, just wait ‘till you get in there.”

  Scotty followed the line of Hank’s outstretched finger. “Do I really have to get in there, into that disgusting slop?”

  “Yeah, the brine vat. Enticing, huh? Let me tell you something that will make this a bit easier for you.” Hank walked around the vat’s narrow edge—a walkway of sorts that surrounded the brine vat—until he stood directly across from Scotty. “Five minutes after you’re in there, you’ll be immensely contented. You’ll feel whole; you’ll feel relaxed; and you’ll feel happy, like this was the one place in the world you always wanted to be, but you didn’t know it until right then.”

  “Well, why am I going in there in the first place? What’s it for?”

  “To learn … it’s as simple as that. Assist you in fulfilling your destiny, going forward. To help those back on Earth, you’ll need to be a whole lot smarter than you are now. You’re going to have to know how to do many things that nobody on Earth has even a clue about.”

  “And all that gunk in there is going to teach me that?”

  “Actually, it is. That gelatinous goop is a concoction, which was made specifically for you. Basically, it is your DNA, countless nucleotide strings infused with what we call memory proteins. We call them mempops, for some reason. Anyway, the mempops will find their way into your body, into your physiology through your epidermal layers, and through various open orifices,” Hank pointed to his own eyes, nose, and mouth, “and soon you and that gunk will be like one entity.”

  “I’ll absorb memories? That’s weird.”

  “More like factoids. DNA has the capacity to store an incredible amount of data. You’ll simply know things you never had to learn on your own.”

  “What kind of things?”

  “Things like there are over two hundred galaxies in the known, observable, universe. That neutron stars are incredibly dense; in fact, one spoonful would weigh a billion tons. That the average person takes about 680-million breaths during their lifetime. Your heart will beat over three billion times by the time you’re eighty. And that there are seven extra-terrestrial worlds, all located within six light years of Earth. Three of those worlds visit our home planet on a regular basis. But just knowing such albeit interesting facts will not be enough. You not only need to learn the what of things, but also the how. How to do certain things with your body … primarily, your new Vallic body. And for that, you will need full sensory, and musculature interaction with the goop medium.”

  “Okay … I don’t really understand, but that sounds cool.”

  “Time to get started. I’m going to step out for a minute. Get yourself undressed then slide into the vat. Again, it will feel strange. Yeah, even a little disgusting, but it is necessary.”

  Scotty watched Hank exit the hard-hut, closing the hatch door behind him. Staring at the awaiting, thick greenish liquid, he made a face. Behind him, he noticed a wooden bench and a few cubbyholes he guessed were to store his clothes. He started to get undressed, removing his boots, socks, overalls, and underwear. Once he had his things stored in the cubbyholes, he hurried over to the edge of the vat naked. Sitting on its edge, Scotty let one foot slide into the dark muck. Grimacing, he said, “Ugh,” then reluctantly slid the other leg in too. Then, as the rest of his body followed, he found it was fairly deep. He figured that not even standing on his tippy toes would he be able to reach the bottom. At this point, his head still remained above the goop. The stench was pretty overpowering. Allowing his body to lean back farther into the goopy stuff, he then let his head go all the way back. He felt his ears filling up, all sounds becoming muted. His legs floated up as the rest of his body became more horizontal. Suspended, his extended-out arms floated on either side.

  Maybe this isn’t so bad, he thought to himself, letting his eyes slowly close. The subtle bobbing motion was making him sleepy.

  “Scotty … can you hear me?

  Scotty opened his eyes to find Hank sitting on the edge of the vat, his legs crossed Indian style.

  “I want you to look straight up, to the very top of the dome. Can you do that for me?”

  Scotty blinked a few times then let his eyes focus up there. “How is it that I can see outside now?”

  “You’re not actually seeing outside. The moss surface is stimulated. You’re seeing a flashing of colorful bioluminescent bacterial growth, which, in turn, creates the three-dimensional images you are seeing now. Highly realistic, looking as if you were right there.”

  “Yes, I am right there.”

  “I’m glad, Scotty. I want you to relax even more now. I want you to allow yourself to fully interact with your surroundings.”

  “Wow … I see an elephant. Wait … It’s not an elephant, is it?”

  “No, it is not. It is a Towheff. Bigger and far more dangerous than any elephant you’d find on Earth. It is an animal that has existed on planet Hope for thirty million years. But you already know that, don’t you, Scotty?”

  “I do know that. How do I know that, Hank?”

  “The slime, remember?”

  Scotty observed the ginormous animal. It appeared to have a thick gray hide, like those found on an elephant, but its head was oddly shaped. Flaps of drooping hide, like loose pages of a book, hung down on either side of its broad face. He also noticed it had a mouthful of sharp, pointy teeth. A carnivore. “Hank, I think the Towheff has noticed me.”

  “Yes, it most certainly has. Do you know what Towheffs like to eat?”

  “I do. I know everything about Towheffs. They eat various indigenous plants, but also eat a number of animals. Basically, whatever it can catch it will eat. Towheffs have an insatiable appetite. How do I know that word? Insatiable?”

  “Pay attention now, Scotty!”

  “The Towheff is charging! It’s coming right for me!”

  “Run, Scotty! Search your memories for the absolute best way to evade it. How to outsmart it.”

  Scotty was there, standing fifty yards away from the charging beast. Already he could feel the thunderous beat of its heavy stride, vibrating up through the ground. He looked around—searching for somew
here to hide. Seeing no trees and no rocks to hide behind, he ran—pumping his arms and legs as fast as they would go—unaware he was actually running within the confines of the vat. It was all a part of the DNA Inculcation Infusion process. Scotty, noticing his arms and legs, found he was an energetic form, striding fast across a hard, sun-cracked, desert field. “But how does the beast even see me, Hank?”

  “How do you think?” the distant voice asked back.

  “A form of heat sensory … not so different from infrared detection.”

  “Run faster, Scotty. The beast is gaining on you.”

  “It can smell me, too. A Towheff has stereo olfactory glands on its snout … amazing directional smell detection!” he said breathing hard.

  “You have mere moments to survive, Scotty. What will you do now?”

  “I see a pond up ahead. I am so tired … can’t catch my breath. I don’t want to die.”

  “Search your memories, Scotty. How have others evaded capture in similar circumstances?”

  “I’m too tired to remember. I can’t run any farther.”

  “Then you will be eaten alive, Scotty. Is that what you want?”

  “The Towheff is afraid of deep standing water!”

  “Yes … that is correct, Scotty.”

  Scotty could feel the beast’s hot breath upon him as it too quickly approached, could smell its foul odor. He didn’t dare look back. The pond was close now, and larger than he’d initially thought. Fifteen paces away—he ran even faster. Gave it everything he had.

  “Scotty? Why, would you suppose, is the Towheff afraid of the pond?”

  “Oh no … ”

  Chapter 41

  About five years later …

  The mobile power pallet, MPP, zoomed along ten feet off the ground at close to two hundred miles per hour. Another banking turn was coming up and Scotty tightened his grip on the nearest leather-like tether strap, so he wouldn’t be thrown overboard again. He shot Tori, standing at the controls, a weary glance. They’d be trading places within the next hour. She was talking on the hand-held—giving an update to base camp, located some two thousand miles away across the Macosian Ocean.

  Basically, MPP’s were little more than large flat slabs of metal, forged from trathion-tunston—a rigid metal compound, highly abundant on planet Hope. The rectangular-shaped, thirty-foot by sixty-foot MPP craft was powered by a Vallic organic power plant, equivalent to a two thousand horsepower engine back on Earth.

  Scotty’s arms were getting sore from having to hold on tight for so long. This particular trek was one of hundreds he’d been assigned to over the past few years; part of the redistribution of Hope’s less-than-friendly indigenous life forms. Preparation for the day when Humans would start to arrive on planet Hope in droves. But that was still years away.

  Scotty stared out across the rushing-by, non-descript, arid plains. The terrain could have been the high desert in California or Arizona—but this was Tyline, one of the larger continents on planet Hope. A continent perfectly suitable for the Liapalese organism, now strapped down and taking-up most of the MPP’s usable surface.

  Scotty wasn’t a fan of any of the dinosaur-sized Liapalese species. The creatures didn’t even look real. With eight stubby legs, overstuffed, toy-like bodies, they looked harmless enough. Their small heads were taken up by a singular, large, round feeding orifice, encircled by countless shark-like, but usually hidden, teeth. He’d recently learned these creatures were nearly identical to something called a Tardigrade species, found back on Earth. Only the Earth organism was tiny, almost microscopic in size. Similarities, other than their relative appearance, were found in the simple fact they both were almost indestructible; the stinky, disgusting creature that he and Tori were in the process of transporting would outlive most other life forms. It was a species that would be around for billions of years—one resilient to extreme temperature changes, and unaffected by high-doses of radiation. The problem was a Liapalese would be just as content eating Humans as eating tall trees or shrubbery. Like so many other predatory creatures on this planet, it would now find its new home exclusively on the continent of Tyline.

  Scotty, glancing over at Tori, yelled over the wind, “Set it down … let’s take a break. And we need to feed the Liapalese.”

  Tori at first didn’t acknowledge she’d even heard him. He continued to stare at her glowing form, standing within the phone-booth-like cab area, when she finally acquiesced with a single nod of her head.

  Typically, each of the surviving Earth abductees preferred to live life every day as an energetic Vallic. In fact, there rarely was a reason to transform back into Human physicality, other than to keep in practice. Being Human was not only physically limiting, it was also cumbersome and awkward in comparison.

  Scotty could hear Tori singing again. The girl loved to sing—never embarrassed that she couldn’t hold a note, went off-key, and destroyed just about any song she attempted to vocalize. He smiled to himself. She’d awakened him in their dorm-cave two mornings back, bellowing out Happy Birthday at the top of her lungs. Tiffany and Ernesto squawked, throwing their pillows at her. Scotty had just turned fifteen. Tori, seventeen, had never shown any romantic interest in him. Still, they were the best of friends. Scotty often wondered what she’d do, or say, if she knew just how head over heels in love with her he really was. But it wasn’t worth the risk finding out.

  The MPP decelerated to the point Tori was able to set the craft down with well-practiced proficiency.

  Tori came out of the cab, skirted the tail end of the bound creature, then together she and Scotty jumped down to the ground. Like a number of other Human-Vallic girls here, she’d snipped the pant legs off her overalls. Now short-shorts, they accentuated her thin legs.

  “Can we get away from it for a few minutes?” he asked, already heading away from the MPP and the struggling, constrained, Liapalese. Without the constant headwinds, associated with going two hundred miles an hour, the odor had quickly become overwhelming.

  “This is going to be tricky. Tell me … when has a two-man team ever successfully released something of this size?” Tori asked. “Hell, it took eight of us to get the beast up onto the MPP!” then continued to look at him, apparently the question wasn’t simply rhetorical.

  “We’ll be fine. We’ll stay out of sight, out of its way until it moves off,” Scotty said, sounding more sure of himself than he actually was. The problem was these catch-and-release assignments weren’t meant for a team of less than ten. But over the last five years, the population of original Vallic had decreased from over one several hundred worldwide to less than a hundred worldwide. And it wasn’t only the hunting and capturing of beasts, like the Liapalese, that caused the rapid decline in attrition levels. It was bad science. While the Dyad-Geneses process seemed to work relatively fine for Humans—having their DNA merge with Vallic DNA—things didn’t seem to work as well the other way around for the Vallic. The typically calm, good-natured Vallic were constantly having inner fights with their far more barbaric alternate Human selves. Their newly acquired DNA had both physical and emotional repercussions, which had only worsened over time. Surprisingly, what was killing so many of the original Vallic-Humans, was their inability to deal with their new, less evolved, Human emotions—anger, anxiety, and an oft crippling sadness. Sadness, to the point many hundreds of Vallic-Humans decided to commit suicide rather than deal with their newfound, overwhelming emotions. Scotty remembered the first time he’d witnessed an unstable Vallic back onboard the ship, when Horran ruthlessly killed the young boy named Thomas.

  “Did you hear me?” Tori asked.

  “Sorry … what?”

  “There’s only so much that can happen while we’re in our Vallic state … so … we’ll be fine,” she said.

  They both knew that was bullshit. Sure, it was safer than being a clumsy Human, but by no means perfectly safe. He’d witnessed a Russian kid just last week inhaled suddenly into a Liapalese’s feeding orifice
. Almost like he’d been sucked into a jet engine, it was horrific.

  Even after five years, none of the kids were fully accustomed to their Vallic forms yet—certainly not enough to make a necessary physical adjustment all that quickly. Existing as an energetic form required one to constantly adjust the output of gravitational forces around them. Whereas, being in the Human state when walking, one would simply utilize the weight of physical matter, along with maintaining the proper balance, and other natural properties. But being Vallic, one had no mass to speak of. Instead, they must learn how to direct a myriad of opposing, outward, forces—directing gravitational waves. Still, Scotty wondered if he would have been able to survive that unimaginable Liapalese ordeal. He was better accustomed to being in the energetic Vallic state than any of the other abductees—even Tori, although she probably wouldn’t admit it.

  “Let’s finish this and get back,” he said. “Seve says something’s up tonight … we all need to be there.”

  Together, they headed back to the MPP and Scotty couldn’t help but laugh, noting Tori’s disgusted face as the beast’s horrific smell enveloped them once again.

  “We really should take it inland a few hundred more miles. Finding a mate for that big beast here … in this remote an area could be difficult,” she said.

  “Tell me about it,” Scotty said, without thinking. Immediately, he regretted saying it—felt his Vallic cheeks turn hot.

  Tori, glancing back at him, asked, “What did you say?”

  “I said we shouldn’t worry about it. Do we really care if there is one less impregnated Liapalese?” Scotty could feel her gaze linger on him as they got closer to the MPP.

  Tori then asked, “How do you want to do this?” Thankfully, she’d changed the subject.

  Scotty took in the Liapalese—all the crisscrossing straps securing the creature atop the craft. “I say we remotely release all the straps at once then hide under the pallet until the thing wanders off.”

  “We should feed it first,” she said. “I remember being a kid and my mother wrestling with the vacuum cleaner hose, sucking up potato chips, crayons, and dimes from beneath the couch. I don’t want to be a potato chip today.”