by Tim Lebbon
*****
VISTA BUENA, CALIFORNIA
The Girls were crying. Jason had never heard them cry before, ever. But they were crying now. He was crying, too.
Gator had taken them into the Freak Show tent and, as soon as the flap closed behind them, his whole body had bubbled and boiled and shifted, as his clothes ripped off and he turned into something that looked a lot more like an alligator than a man. A gigantic alligator, standing upright like a cartoon did, but this wasn’t funny at all. Its hands were almost human, but with sharp claws at the end of the fingers. However, the long, wide mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth and a writhing tongue weren’t human at all. The eyes were the worst—kind of human and kind of not, glowing yellow, filled with evil and satisfaction both.
And yet, he could still see Gator somehow in the alligator’s face, though Gator no longer looked like he was wearing a costume. The Alligator Man was what Gator really was.
He was a fast alligator, too. All four of them had tried to run but the Alligator Man had caught them, easily, slamming them around with his huge, powerful tail, the tail Jason realized had been the odd shape in Gator’s pants.
Once they were all knocked down, Gator had gathered up the Girls in one arm like they were dolls, and took hold of Jason with the other. They’d screamed, but no one had come to help them. Jason wasn’t sure if anyone could hear them, or if everyone could and no one cared. Then Gator dragged them down a hole into the sewers.
Jason knew they were in the sewers because of the smell. It was worse than the smell of a million farts, an ocean of piss, and a ton of dog vomit.
Gator dragged and carried them through sewer tunnels. Jason tried to pay attention to where they were going, but he was too afraid to notice much and it was too dark to really see anyway. Then they’d reached a spillway or something like it, something narrower than the regular tunnels. Gator just fit into it. The spillway widened at the end into what seemed like a small, round room. And in here was Gator’s nest.
Not that this was someplace homey. It was filthy and disgusting—sewage-soaked rags making a bed, a rickety metal chair next to a rotting wooden box holding some weird-looking little statues, and some kind of stuff on the walls that Jason was pretty sure his science teacher would say were phosphorescent, giving off a sickly green glow that somehow was worse than darkness.
Gator had tossed the Girls onto the bed. Jason he shoved into the chair. Gator’s body and horrible tail blocked them in, so there was no hope of escape. Then he started to chant in a language Jason had never heard, while he moved the little statues around on the box.
Gator’s voice was raspy, but soothing in a way, and the movements he was doing with the statues was kind of hypnotic. Despite his terror, Jason felt his head nodding. He tried to look at the Girls, but his eyelids were too heavy and they closed without him wanting them to.
Jason woke up. There was no sound of chanting anymore. He looked around. The Girls were still lying on the filthy rags and Gator was still there and still more alligator than man. It hadn’t been a dream.
“Please don’t kill us.”
Gator looked over at him, his yellow eyes reptilian, not human. “You have nothing to fear from me, son.”
“You’re not my father.”
Gator grinned and opened his fang-filled snout. “So sure about that, are you?”
“I knew my dad. Before he left us.”
“There’s all kinds of fathers.” Gator turned back to the Girls. They seemed asleep, but not in a normal way. Their breathing was shallow and they weren’t moving at all. “I’d spare you, because I know they’re your friends, but you need to watch this.”
“Why?” Jason fought down panic. “What are you going to do?” Gator spread Amanda’s legs. “Oh, God, don’t do that! They’re just kids!”
Gator laughed. “These girls were born old. But in order to live, we need something they have. And you need to see how it’s done.”
Gator’s incredibly long tongue flicked out and into Amanda. Jason jumped on him, to make him stop, but Gator just held Jason up and away, with one of his powerful arms. And, as he watched, Jason added to the vomit smell, as Gator pulled something out of Amanda and swallowed it.
Blood was pouring out of her, but Gator didn’t pay any mind. He just did the same to Brittany and Caitlin.
“You’re killing them!”
Gator swallowed and turned to him. “Yes. So we can live.”
“I’m not like you. I don’t know what you are, but I’m not whatever it is.”
Gator nodded. “Not yet. But you will be.” He put Jason back down on the chair, fiddled with the statues some more, and began chanting again.
Despite his horror and terror, Jason fell asleep again. And when he awoke, Gator and the Girls were gone.
*****
VISTA BUENA COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS
“Why?” Mulder asked, when there was a lull in the discussion of the number of rounds of ammunition ordered, which coincided with their pulling off the freeway.
“Why what, Spookster?”
“If we take as our active theory that there’s an alligator-man who’s responsible for these attacks, why does he do it? There’s no sign of sexual assault. I mean, yes, he’s taking the girls’ ovaries, but the MEs never mentioned any evidence of normal sexual activity.”
“He’s not having sex with the girls,” Dales said. “He’s taking their ovaries for a reason, however.”
“The victims are all young, never older than fourteen, usually around twelve. Why those ages? And what happens to the boy? I mean, why does he take a boy, every time, along with three girls? And why three? And why do we never find the boy? Boys, really. What happens to them? Does he eat all of them as opposed to only taking their reproductive organs?”
“Good questions,” Dales said. “Now you sound like an investigator.”
“Do you have any good answers?” Mulder asked hopefully.
“Not a one. Well, not one you’ll like.”
“Sounds like Voodoo to me,” Johnston said offhandedly, as he flashed his badge at the police officers blocking the entrance to the fairgrounds. “They believe in shape shifting, right?”
The local LEOs had cordoned off the fairgrounds, which wasn’t as difficult as it sounded, since the grounds were on a mesa overlooking the ocean and there was only one road that led in or out.
“Ah,” Dales said. “That’s the one.”
“Voodoo? Seriously?” Mulder considered the possibility. “I haven’t spent a lot of time on Voodoo or any other African and Caribbean belief systems,” he admitted. “But from what I can remember, they believe they can change shapes. And reanimate the dead.”
“Wouldn’t have to be a real Voodoo practitioner,” Johnston said as he parked the car. “Could be someone who has some of the spells down and altered them for his own use.”
“Sounds like he’d be a very real practitioner if he could do that,” Mulder said dryly. “But what’s the motivation?” he asked as they got out of the car.
“Why create a zombie?” Johnston countered. “Because you can?”
“Because you want a slave,” Dales said. “That’s the reason for zombies.” He shook his head. “That’s not Sewers’ reason, or else we’d have found at least one of the boys he’s taken somewhere along the line.”
They were taken to the head detective, a man named Lambert, who looked grim. “We’ve found bodies,” he said, after badges were flashed and introductions were made. “Down on the beach.”
“How many?” Dales asked.
“Three. It’s the missing girls.” Lambert shook his head. “The boy’s still missing. Think he might have done this.”
“He didn’t,” Dales said strongly. “He’s a victim, too, and we need to search for him before it’s too late.”
“I want to see the bodies,” Mulder said. “And talk to any witnesses. We also need to take a look at where the children were abducted.”
“Bodies are
on the beach, like I said. Some witnesses are here, most are home, but we have their statements that you can read. Initial abduction site is the Freak Show tent on the fairgrounds.”
“We need to get some more guns and see where the sewers go around here,” Dales muttered impatiently. “We already know who killed those girls.”
Mulder pulled Johnston aside. “Look, you brought Mister Dales onto this case, so why don’t we split up? You two go check out the abduction site, get all those guns and ammo you two are so happy about, and, you know, go down into the sewers. I’ll examine the bodies and check the statements for anything that could give us a lead.”
“Hey, the new guy’s supposed to get the shit job, remember?” Johnston shrugged. “But fine. I think I’d rather go after the alligator-man than look at three dead little girls.”
Several uniforms escorted Dales and Johnston into the fairgrounds proper, while Lambert took Mulder down a trail that led from the parking lot to the beach below.
“How many paths are there that lead from this area down?”
“Just two—one from this side and one from the other. We had men on both of them since we started looking for the missing kids. No one’s come up or down that we didn’t know about, and no one went by carrying three bodies.”
“So how did the bodies get onto the beach?”
Lambert shook his head. “No idea.”
The morning fog still hadn’t burned off, and the day was cold, with a strong enough breeze to muss up Mulder’s hair. What the breeze might be doing to any evidence at the crime scene he wasn’t sure, but the smell of the ocean was nice—until they got closer to the bodies.
The nearer they got, the more he could smell sewage, and by the time they were at the scene, the area stank.
The bodies were still being photographed. They were in a hole that looked about four feet deep, piled on top of each other, and had sand all over them. “Were they buried in the sand?” he asked Lambert. “Or just left in this hole?”
“In the hole.”
“How long ago?”
“ME isn’t positive, but put the time of death between midnight and four a.m.”
“And there were police in the area at that time?”
“Yes. We’ve had the entire area searched and had men stationed at intervals along the beach, as well as throughout the fairgrounds area.”
“What distance were the intervals?”
“About a hundred yards apart, give or take.”
“And no one saw someone dig a four-by-five hole and toss three girls into it?”
“No,” Lambert said snidely. “Because if someone had, we’d have shot and killed the bastard. And then read him his rights.”
“No argument,” Mulder said mildly. He stepped away from Lambert and studied the ground around the girls’ impromptu grave.
The breeze was moving the sand around a bit, and despite the care being given, the CSI team’s footprints were smudging the area. However, Mulder saw some marks in the sand that weren’t made by shoes or breeze. They looked like claw marks.
He waved the team’s photographer over and had him take shots of the marks. Then he put his hand against them. “Why are you doing that?” Lambert asked.
“Testing a theory.” Dales’ theory, but still. The scratches didn’t look made by human hands—they were more animalistic. If he took the leap, a giant alligator should be able to dig a deep hole quickly. Alligators had short legs, but they were powerful, and this alligator probably had longer limbs anyway. And if said alligator timed it just right, it would be too dark for human eyes to notice, especially since the police hadn’t had a man stationed every two feet down here on the beach.
But the alligator had to come from somewhere, and it wasn’t down either path. Mulder was willing to credit the Vista Buena police with the ability to spot a giant alligator dragging or carrying three dead or dying girls down a path they were standing on, even in the dark.
Mulder looked around and tried to see the scene without all the LEOs there, to see it how it might have been before they got here and found the grave. He was rewarded by spotting something else that wasn’t right.
Part of the sand looked more pressed down than other parts, as if something heavy had been dragged along this area. The pressed sand was about two feet wide, but it wasn’t a straight line, it was more serpentine. And there were indentations on either side of the compacted sand, a set of five and a set of four on each side. He had the photographer take pictures of this, as well, ignoring Lambert’s muttering about the FBI’s ability to waste time.
The compacted sand led to the edge of where the police had cordoned off the crime scene. Mulder followed the packed sand leading away from the scene, Lambert following him. In a short time he was rewarded by finding a large drainage pipe that emptied out onto some rocks—it was well hidden by two sand dunes. The sand trail began near this. “Has anyone investigated that?” he nodded towards the pipe.
“Sent a couple uniforms in it last night and again this morning. It’s the sewage overflow pipe.”
“Really? You let raw sewage overflow right onto the beach here?”
“It’s there for flooding,” Lambert snapped. “My men followed it back, there’s a locked gate. The perp didn’t come through this way.”
“It’s large enough for a man to walk in, so long as he was stooped over.” Or for an alligator to crawl through on his belly.
“You want to take a look? Be my guest.” Lambert turned and stalked off.
“Touchy.” Mulder pulled out his flashlight, which he’d had the foresight to put in his coat pocket, and his gun. He didn’t have the high-caliber rounds Dales had suggested, but if he went off to get a bigger gun the alligator-man could escape.
Why he believed in the alligator-man now Mulder couldn’t say. Possibly it was the strength of Dales’ belief. But he lost nothing by checking this out, and they might lose everything if he didn’t.
*****
VISTA BUENA COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS, FREAK SHOW TENT
Dales had taken a .357 and a .44 Magnum from the arsenal provided by the Vista Buena Police Department. He’d considered taking one of the hunting rifles the local police had provided, but they were going to have to go down into the sewers, and as tempting as a rifle was, reality said that he’d have a better chance with a handgun.
Johnston had opted for a 30-30 rifle and a .44 Magnum. They both had a lot of extra ammunition. And a lot of backup—they were taking a dozen policemen with them. This time, Sewers wasn’t going to escape.
As it had been in Bailey’s Crossroads all those years ago, Dales found the Malligator’s exhibit located right on top of the sewer manhole. What was different was that no one in this circus seemed to know who Sewers was. And, even though the tent and its setup looked the same as the one from 1963, no one had heard of Emilio Zartec, either.
The party line seemed to be that they didn’t possess an alligator-man, no one knew of Allan G. Sewers or the Malligator or anyone matching his description working with the circus, and a patron with four children had turned into a monster, attacked his kids, and dragged them off into the darkness.
The cotton candy vendor confirmed that he’d sold four cotton candies to the “father” for his three girls and a boy. Other witnesses, including some of the circus freaks themselves, confirmed seeing the man turn into a giant alligator, though some said he’d turned into Godzilla with a longer snout.
The fact that this event had happened in the daylight didn’t matter—the Freak Show tent was dark, with only its exhibits lit, and not too well. The police had searched the tent and the sewers but found nothing. This didn’t surprise Dales in the least.
“Remember,” he told Johnston and the policemen coming with them as they headed down, “if he’s in the form I expect him to be in, he’s going to be hard to shoot fatally. One shot probably won’t do it. Focus on getting the boy away from him. He needs the boy for some reason. If we can save the child, maybe we stop this cyc
le from ever happening again.”
“It’s a maze,” Johnston said as Dales joined him and their police escort inside the sewer tunnel. “We’re right in the heart of a stinking maze. Pun definitely intended.”
Sure enough, there were seven options for where to go. They divided into teams of two, Dales and Johnston staying together, and headed off on the hunt.
*****
VISTA BUENA SEWER SYSTEM SPILLWAY
There was no evidence that proved anyone—man or alligator—had come down this pipe. However, there was no evidence that one of the police force had been in here, either. Mulder sloshed through some dirty water as he made his way to the locked grate about a hundred yards in. His flashlight showed nothing untoward in the water.
His nose had shut down by the time he reached the iron grate. It was a typical latticed covering, there to still allow water to go out, and to keep anyone, kids in particular, from getting into the sewer system. The gaps in the lattice were big enough to stick a man’s arm through, but not big enough for anyone’s head.
He rattled the grate. It seemed secure. However, closer examination showed that while there was a lock on it, that lock was on the inside—and it showed signs of activity. The grate and the lock were both rusty, but parts of the lock looked like some of the rust had been scraped off recently. And the lock itself looked odd, as if it had been mangled and then shoved back into its right shape.
Mulder slid his arm in and pushed the body of the lock down. The lock opened. He put it in his pocket, then flipped the latch open and moved the grate as quietly as he could.
Mulder left the grate ajar—in case Lambert decided to be a cop and follow him, why make it hard on his backup? And if Mulder needed a fast exit, why make it harder on himself?
Another hundred yards or so in, the spillway connected to the main sewer tunnels. He had a choice of going left or right. Mulder listened. There were faint sounds coming from both ends. Could be the alligator, the boy, or Dales and Johnston. He was pretty sure Dales would be in the sewers by now, hunting.
