Hatched

by Jason Davis

  “Shit, man, you don't look so good."

  “Neither do you,” John rasped out.

  “We need to get you to the doctor. Let's get your shit and g—” Marty started, stopping when he saw all the spiders running along the hardwood floor. Those same damn black little spiders, the ones that looked just like the one now in his arm.

  “Holy shit.” Marty felt his mouth going dry, a large lump growing in his throat.

  “Yeah.” John's voice was dry and raspy as he looked away from Marty. He looked like he was losing his ability to sit up by himself. “If you see them, it’s already too late.”

  “That's it. We're going to the doctor. I don't care if I have to wake his ass up. It’s time to get you checked out,” Marty said, reaching down to pull John up. Spiders seemed to flake away like crumbs, falling to the floor and scurrying away like roaches. Marty looked at them briefly, then started pulling John to the door.

  “So, you can see them, too,” John said. He went into a fit of coughing, tiny black specks of spiders and blood flying from his mouth. “It's too late for you then.”

  Marty was able to support John and make it to the door, stumbling slightly when he had to move a pizza box out of the way with his foot.

  “No, it's not. We are going to get to the doctor and wake his ass up, and then all will be well.”

  John stopped Marty and looked at him, his gaze burrowing into Marty's. The stare was as cold as his skin and Marty knew, just as John did, that there was little hope for either one of them. Still, he was sure as hell not going to give up without a fight.

  Then John's gaze shifted, the shadow of himself reappearing. “I hope so. These spiders… They come in and out of me at will and I don't feel them. I don't feel anything anymore. I can't even feel you.”

  “We'll get this straightened out,” Marty said. He felt something shifting in his gut. His stomach rumbled, and he felt little tingles throughout his body. He knew the spiders, were inside him, dancing along his nerves, eating away at his insides. “Maybe the doctor can figure out what the hell this shit is.” Marty knew his words were hollow. He wasn’t too sure if he believed them himself.

  Chapter 6

  Marty turned the corner onto a dark street and into the outskirts of town. It was a small street. The left side lined with a thin line of trees that marked the edge of what many thought of as the town, but which grew on land no one truly owned. Maybe the city could claim it; however, they never forced their will. Maybe the city council felt that it made a good natural border for the city limits. Not the true city limits, just the separator from what was the town and what was the country.

  The trees were not well-maintained and their long branches hung low. As the car slid around the corner, Marty heard scraping along the roof. With very little light, and even less of it reaching this part of the town, it was very dark. He didn't even see the tree until he was already turning the wheel to keep from rolling the car. It flew by, just inches away from his side window, and he caught a brief glimpse of it as it passed.

  His heart was beating triple time and at such a rate, he feared it was trying to beat through his chest. He could barely breathe, and everything in his vision had started to shake.

  He pulled himself back onto the road, already starting to slow down when the doctor's house came into view. It was the only house on the street, tucked back behind the doctor’s office and lit up by a light on the front porch. The small light didn’t illuminate much, but he knew that the road dead ended a few yards past the doctor’s driveway.

  In the glow from Marty's headlights, he saw the white exterior paint of the doctor's house casting a slight glow as he pulled into the driveway. Marty quickly slammed it into park before the car finished skidding to a stop. He looked at the clock on his dashboard. It was just after five thirty, and most weren’t up yet. He was sure the doctor wouldn't want to wake up to Marty pounding at his door, but there was nothing he could do about it. He looked over at John sitting in his passenger seat, his head leaning against the window, his eyes barely open. Other than the occasional lift of his chest with a hoarse breath, Marty would have thought him dead. He had to hurry. He could tell his friend didn't have much more time. He didn’t need to have a fancy medical degree to know that.

  Marty quickly rushed from his car to run through the grass and up the stairs, trying to take them two at a time. However, his legs were starting to feel heavier than when he had raced up John's stairs earlier. His feet felt like bricks and on the last step the tip of his work boot caught, and he nearly went down to his knees. He just barely kept his balance.

  He didn't stop to catch his breath as he slammed into the door, quickly pounding his fist against the solid oak. He didn't have to worry about waking any other neighbors. The doctor's yard stretched for three lots, making it feel like he owned nearly a block. The closest house around, the one on the other end of the block, was dark and looked abandoned. Beyond that was the sheriff's house. However, he didn’t have to worry about him as there was still another hour before he was off duty. Most the town’s teens all knew the sheriff's schedule almost as well as he did. Not that it mattered much. Marty wasn't there to cause any harm. They just needed medical help.

  He pounded on the door with no result. He slammed his fist to the door once again. When he got no answer, he stepped back and ran down the long porch. He hadn't thought to check to see if the doctor's car was parked in the garage. He hurried over to look in the window. The garage was dark, but he could still see the outline of two cars parked inside.

  A yellow glow appeared in one of the upstairs windows, and Marty turned to see shapes moving around in the room. He rushed back over to the door and put his ear against the cool wood. Inside the house, Marty heard a clamoring of footsteps stomping down a very sturdy staircase.

  He looked through the ornate paned glass that was decoration around the door. He saw a light turn on inside and what looked like a shape coming closer to the door. Another shape stopped at the base of the stairs, then another light came on inside, lighting the way from the stairs to the door.

  “Who's there?” came a voice through the door.

  “My friend needs help. I don't think he'd make it all the way to the hospital. I need you to look at him,” Marty said to the closed door. The shape closest to the door, he assumed it was the doctor, came to the glass that Marty looked through. He stepped back as the shape looked out.

  Then the outer porch light came on. A few seconds later, he could hear the loud click as the tumblers of the lock gave way and the door opened. In the lighted entryway, Marty saw the short man standing there. His skin was dark. Marty, who had actually never gone to the local doctor, tried to remember what nationality he was. Hell, maybe if he could even remember the doctor's name, it might have helped him remember what country he was from.

  Marty quickly noticed the thick accent, allowing himself a moment to get distracted, contemplating what country the man was from and why was here in such a small Midwestern town. Then he shook off the thought and remembered about John sleeping in his passenger seat.

  “Please, my friend needs your help.”

  ****

  Tired. So tired. He didn't want to open his eyes. His legs, while feeling thick and heavy, felt alive and filled with a built-up energy. He could barely move them, but he felt motion inside them, wanting him to push himself up. They wanted to race down streets and jump into the sky. He felt so full of anticipation, of excitement, but none of that made sense to him. He felt it inside him, a fluidity that wanted to get up, run and go, but he also felt so tired and just wanted to stay sitting there. Something about that didn't seem right. He hadn't been able to even feel his legs earlier.

  His head felt cold and damp, but the air around him seemed stifling. He tried to open his eyes, but they didn't want to open. Shapes seemed to be covering them. He could sense something scurrying out of the way as he forced his eyes open.

  The world was dar
k. He saw the rough outline of the window his head leaned against and a section of the paved driveway they were parked in. Everything else in his field of vision was just bland shapes and hard to make out.

  He lifted his head, which seemed to have gotten heavier since the last time he had moved it. It felt stiff. Not just in his muscles, but just to think. He felt like he was in a fog. How had he gotten there? He knew his name was John, but John who? Who was he? Did it matter?

  "No," a voice inside his head told him.

  He turned a little to see the windshield his head had been leaning against. Windshields were typically cold to the touch. Hadn’t it felt cold when he had his eyes closed? He wasn’t even sure now. Even in the hottest days, it would still be cold. He should feel it. He touched it with his hand, and had his hand not stopped when it touched the glass, he wouldn’t have known it was there. He felt nothing again. Nothing except for deep anticipation.

  Oh well, he thought to himself as he leaned his head back on the window. What did it matter anyway? It didn't matter, and he just didn't care.

  John looked down at his hands as they just sat on his legs. He saw them, but were they truly his? Even emotionally, he felt detached from himself. He just didn't care anymore. Then a bump formed on the back of his right hand. He watched as it started to run back and forth, moving effortlessly under his skin. It ran one way, then another, then just stopped in the center.

  Then a black leg worked its way through his skin. If not for the darker color, he could almost believe it was nothing more than his hair. Short, about the same length as his arm hair, it swayed back and forth, as though it was feeling around. Then another small leg popped out. Beneath them, a small little lump moved impatiently under his skin as the hairs danced about.

  John didn't care about the spider under his skin anymore. He didn't care about much of anything. He didn't even care that Marty was up there, trying to get the doctor to look at him. After all, there wasn't much more he felt like could be done.

  He looked back at his friend. Marty had started to walk back to the car. Was he dragging his left leg? John wasn't sure, but it certainly looked like he was. Not that it mattered.

  Behind Marty, the doctor was following him. He was just in his boxers, a white shirt, and a robe. John wanted to laugh, but didn't feel like he had the energy. His mind could barely even stay focused enough to remember the joke that had just passed through what was left of his brain. Why had he wanted to laugh again? He couldn't remember.

  The fog was getting thicker. A haze blurred across his vision as the world lost its color around him. Didn't he used to be a part of it?

  He couldn't feel anything. He was looking out, but felt like he was looking out from his own mind, that he was a prisoner trapped in his own body.

  He had a name once, didn't he? What was it?

  He tried to grab for it, as it was there, just past the tip of his tongue. He wanted to know. He wanted to scream out that he had a name, but whenever he tried to just say it, it was lost in that fog, clouding his thoughts.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw a shape move. As far as he could tell, it was a blob, but he suddenly had a craving. Even though his senses seemed to have stopped working, he felt a tingle on the inside, a flurry of motion. It flowed through his veins, which no longer carried blood.

  All he wanted to do was to reach out. Simple enough, right? However, he knew something, a bad feeling deep in what was once his gut told him those impulses wanted to do something more.

  “Spread, spread, spread, spread, spread,” the whisper echoed inside him, carried on the sound of what seemed like a hundred little legs scurrying.

  “Spread…”

  Part 2

  Spiderlings

  Chapter 1

  Lucy was already awake when her alarm went off, the Disney show tunes sounding like a warped record from the days before CD's. The mangled symphony played, then bells chimed and a young voice from an old cartoon her mother used to watch as a little girl told her it was time to get up.

  Lucy reached over to the little pink castle that was her alarm clock and turned it off. She had the clock going on five years. She had gotten it for Christmas when she was seven. Now almost a teenager, she figured she would have to give it up eventually, but she wasn't quite ready to do that yet.

  She turned her attention back outside, the light brighter. She had watched it as the morning colors had started to push away the fading blues of the night sky, elegant in its daily ritual of telling the moon it was time for him to go rest. The morning sun, its reds and yellows, at first mixing with midnight blue, then the rainbow formed over the horizon. She hadn’t been able to sleep for most of the night, her stomach constantly twisting different directions and keeping her awake. She had hurried to the bathroom several times, not sure which way her stomach was going to release itself. She was always grateful when it didn’t come out her bottom, although puking wasn't that much better. Even water didn’t stay down, which made her very thirsty.

  The cup of water sat on her nightstand next to her. The ice had long since melted, and there was a ring on the table from the condensation. She debated whether she should try to drink some more. She knew she would have to try again eventually, but as her stomach flexed with another stab of pain, she decided she had better not right now. She was going to need to look like she wasn’t as sick as she was when her aunt came in to check on her. She had a game to go to later today, and she regretted waking up her aunt earlier to let her know she was sick.

  She wished her mom hadn't gone out of town. Her aunt Tina had wanted to rush Lucy to the emergency room. It had been just around one, and Lucy had to walk through the dark house, something she didn’t like doing, to make it to her mom's room where Tina slept. She didn’t belong there. Tina could never replace Lucy's mom. She tried, but she could never do it.

  When she had woken Tina, she didn't know what to do. Lucy had hoped she would know of something she could take to make her feel better. She had already tried some of that nasty pink stuff they kept in the kitchen. Her mom, never buying the actual name brand, had bought some kind of generic and it tasted just as bad as the other stuff, but was chalkier.

  Tina had freaked out. She had wanted to rush Lucy to the emergency room, but Lucy had told her no. It was probably just the flu or some other bug. She had to plead with Tina, telling her that she didn't want to go. The closest hospital was forty minutes away, and Lucy had once spent nearly half a day waiting there because of how slow they were. She didn't want to be there all night. She still hoped to make it to the final basketball game of the season, which started at noon. Bobby was playing and she liked him. She wanted to see him running up and down the court, building up a sweat. So, no hospital.

  However, they both agreed to go to Dr. Winston first thing in the morning before the office even opened. Maybe the doctor would see her before taking any of his daily patients.

  Lucy looked at her alarm clock, the large green numbers displaying 6:03. She didn't know what time the doctor typically went to his office, but she did know that it opened at eight. She hoped he went to the office early.

  She rolled out of bed, already smelling the morning scent of freshly brewed coffee Her parents always put the coffee machine on a timer. Tina must have put in a fresh filter and water last night before she went to bed. Lucy couldn't stand the taste of it, but she did love the smell. She could almost believe that her mother was home.

  Hopefully, the coffee would wake Tina up, Lucy thought as she started to tiptoe through the house. She wanted to hurry up and get to the doctor. She usually enjoyed the smell of the coffee, but her stomach was now doing flips. She heard it gurgle in disapproval, then something shifted, like a thump inside of her. She hurried to the bathroom.

  “Not again, not again, not again!” she panted as she rushed into the small little bathroom just off the kitchen.

  ****

  “Billy, Billy, show us your little willy! Billy
, Billy, show us your little willy!” chanted the voices that filled the little room. Voices that flowed in from the darkness and were all around him. Voices screaming out, shouting at him, echoing off the empty walls in the small room.

  He woke with a start and looked around. He saw the shadows shifting throughout the room. The darkness moved, shapes changing forms. It wasn’t the only chant he had grown up with, but it was the one he heard the most.

  “Billy, Billy, show us your little willy! Billy, Billy, show us your little willy!”

  “Get the fuck away from me!” he screamed at the shadow figures.

  A shout came out of the darkness. It was louder than the rest of them, and unlike the others that were indistinguishable, this voice was clear and distinct. As soon as he heard it, he knew who it belonged to. He remembered that disgusted look she always gave him.

  “Come on, Billy. Show me. Show me your little willy!” Samantha shouted. He saw her standing on the other side of the room. She was a shadow, just like the others, but her features were easily distinguishable. He could clearly saw her face and the look of disgust he had come to know so well.

  He didn’t remember sitting up, but he had and now he was looking at her, watching as she glared at him.

  “Get out of here!” he screamed at her, tears of rage and terror streaming down his cheeks. “Leave me alone!”

  “Come on, Billy. Show us your little willy!” she smirked, her lips turned in an expression that looked completely wrong on the little angel-faced girl. She was exactly how he remembered her from the fourth grade with her braids that dangled down the front of her summer dress. She looked nearly perfect. There was no way she was real. There was just no possible way she could be there now.