What the Hell Did I Just Read

by David Wong

  Maggie Knoll went into the cell, crying but not resisting, and the glass door closed and sealed her in. Loretta, sobbing, was taken down the hall to answer some questions.

  As soon as her mother was out of range, Maggie instantly stopped crying. She stood perfectly still in the middle of her cell, made eye contact with Amy, and said, “Hi.”

  For some reason, this seemed to creep David out quite a bit, and he actually took a step back from the glass wall. Amy didn’t answer. Loretta was now talking to the NON agent, who was entering information on a tablet. Amy noticed the agent glance her way the moment she heard “Maggie” speak.

  Maggie said, “You seem nice.”

  Amy said, “What are you?”

  Maggie shrugged.

  “I know you’re not a little girl. What are you really?”

  “What are you? Really?”

  “Or, maybe I should ask, what are you going to be, once you grow up?”

  “I don’t think I’m going to grow up.”

  Amy tried to read the expression on the little girl’s face, but couldn’t. Finally, she said, “What you are, what you really are, can’t live here.”

  Maggie met her eyes. “When they brought me in, just now, they took off my clothes and scrubbed me. That man over there, in the lab coat? He watched, and he liked it. But he lies about it. About liking it. It’s like that everywhere. Mommy thinks I’m weird but she won’t say anything. When they said they were taking me away, she was mad but I could see that she was happy, too, way down inside. Like she wouldn’t have to be scared anymore. But she will hide it. Everybody is hiding what they really are, way down inside.”

  “That is not the same thing. What you are, you’re going to hurt us. If we don’t do something.”

  “I said you seem nice. But you’re going to kill me. Because of what you are inside.”

  Amy heard the agent rapidly walking their way.

  “I’m not really talking to you. You can’t even talk. You’re not a little girl, you don’t even have a mouth. This is all … it’s all something you’re doing to my brain.”

  “If a spider walks onto your bed, you squish it. If a butterfly lands on your bed, you take a picture. Is the butterfly ‘doing something to your brain’? If I didn’t make myself look like this, I would already be dead. You kill everything that doesn’t have pretty wings.”

  “So you’re not dangerous? You’re not going to grow up and declare war on us?”

  “Are you at war with the cows who give you milk?”

  “We’re not going to be your cows, Maggie. If that’s what you’re getting at. We can’t let that happen.”

  Maggie shrugged. “It’s already happened.”

  Me

  Tasker’s shoes clicked up the concrete and I sensed she was about to tell us to stop interacting with the specimen. Before she could say anything, I put a hand on Amy’s shoulder. “Let’s go.”

  I pulled her away from the glass, which was now smeared with the ooze that had trickled off the enormous maggot that was sucking on it, its mandibles clicking off the surface like it badly wanted to bite its way through. Amy had been talking with the thing and it bothered me that I couldn’t hear both ends of the conversation. The effect of the Sauce was fading, but it was still next to impossible to hear “Maggie” unless I devoted every ounce of concentration to it.

  As we walked away, one of the NON “doctors” escorted the half-eaten Loretta up to Maggie’s cell. Loretta put her hands up to the glass, asking the creature if it was okay, if it was feeling all right, reassuring it that they’d be going home soon.

  I put my hand on Amy’s back and walked a little faster.

  To Tasker I said, “Mikey’s here? Or is he loose on the town, destroying everything we know and love?”

  Tasker said, “He’s here. Came along without incident.”

  John said, “Hmm. Just like Maggie. Didn’t put up a fight, didn’t blow the cover.”

  I said, “Okay, so can we trust you to actually kill these things? You’re not going to change your mind and decide you want to keep them as biological weapons or something?”

  Agent Tasker said, “Follow me.”

  “No, we don’t need to see you do it. There’s no reason to give Amy nightmares for the next twenty years.”

  Amy said, “I want to be there.”

  “Why?”

  Tasker said, “There’s actually another reason. Come.”

  She led us down the hall and then over to what turned out to be another cell block—how many were there?—which was uninhabited save for a single cell occupied by a pulsing larva that I had to be told was Mikey. I made myself focus and found I could sort of see the disguise. But what I saw was clumsy. Monstrous. A mannequin made by incompetent hands in the dark. Ridiculous to think that it had ever fooled me.

  Tasker said, “As we alluded to on the conference call earlier, our past experience has found that one substance seems to be fatal to the—”

  “Is it sulfur?” said John.

  Taken aback, Tasker said, “That’s a key component, yes. Burning sulfur. It’s embedded in a thermite compound, formed into pellets that will ignite in midair. They should continue burning once they’ve penetrated the hide of the larva, releasing the sulfur internally.”

  John said, “And if you combined that substance with a piece of silicone in the shape of a human ass?”

  Tasker just stared.

  I said, “So it’s that simple? After all of this talk of interdimensional energies and entities and all that, we’re just burning holes in them? So what are we waiting for?”

  “It’s actually not that simple. Sulfur doesn’t work for its chemical properties. It works because it has, let’s just say, symbolic power. There is an invisible mechanism at play.”

  “Sure, it’s a vampire holy water situation. I get it.”

  “I don’t think you do. From previous incidents with similar organisms, the effectiveness of the weapon has varied wildly according to who is wielding it, and their state of mind at the moment the fatal blow is struck.”

  I said, “Okay.”

  “We are requesting that you do it. At least for this specimen.”

  Agent Gibson shuffled over, holding a modified shotgun. “Don’t get cute and shoot this at me, dirtbag.”

  Amy glanced at the gun and muttered, “Wellness center.”

  John lit a cigarette.

  Tasker said, “There’s no smoking in here.”

  “If he gets to shoot a gun indoors, I’m thinking I can smoke a cigarette.”

  Amy said, “We’re obviously not going through with this. Even I can see this trap coming.” She nodded toward me and said, “They stick you in the cell, Mikey eats you. Since they didn’t do it directly, they think they escape the supposed curse that’s protecting us.”

  I said, “You two are staying outside the cell, right? I’m the only one that goes in, you guys stay out here and watch for shenanigans. I mean, we were just in the room with this thing earlier today, I don’t think this is among the top ten scariest creatures that have tried to eat me. I’ve got to say, I’m fine with it.”

  Amy made an exasperated noise and said, “Why are you fine with it?”

  “Because we were hired by Chastity to do a job and this is it. Didn’t you just tell me I needed to see things through? Well, here’s Mikey. It’s not what we expected, but so what? For better or worse, this is the final resolution to the Payton case.”

  I took the shotgun from Agent Gibson. I pulled back the slide enough to confirm there were in fact shells in it, and that they weren’t going to stick me in the cell with an empty gun. I sniffed it—the shells smelled like farts, all right.

  I asked Tasker, “So how does this, uh, process work?”

  “You’ll go into the adjacent cell, here—the walls between cells slide open, that is done remotely, from the guard room. Exterior door closes, wall opens, there’ll be nothing between you and the specimen. Fire at will.”

 
Amy said, “David, this is stupid.”

  “That has literally never stopped us before, even once.” I asked Tasker, “Loretta and Maggie aren’t going to be concerned by the sound of gunfire?”

  “We’ll close the door between cell blocks, they’re utterly soundproof. It’ll be no louder to them than someone softly knocking on the wall.”

  I looked toward John and he shrugged. “I mean, if we’re not here to do this, why are we here?”

  To Amy I said, “You see the kid in there, right?”

  “He’s just staring at me. Accusingly.”

  “Do you need to go wait down the hall or something? You going to be able to handle this?”

  “No, I won’t be able to handle it and yes, I should be here anyway.”

  “Let’s get it over with.”

  I stepped into the adjacent cell and the door slid closed behind me. The invisible hand of claustrophobia slowly but firmly squeezed my butthole. The wall that separated the cells was solid steel—I couldn’t see what was happening in Mikey’s cell.

  Through the glass, I asked John, “If you concentrate, can you see and hear Mikey? Or is it just the larva the whole time?”

  “Give me a second … yeah I can see Mikey pretty clearly. If I try.”

  “What’s he doing?”

  “Sitting on the bed, now. Crying. Asking why we’re here, why his mother doesn’t want him.”

  I made eye contact with Amy, who looked distraught. “Fresh-cut grass, that’s all it is.” To Tasker, I said, “There’s not going to be any ceremony or ritual here. You open that wall, I’m pointing the gun and I’m pumping sulfur rounds into that thing until the gun goes click. Whatever data you’re looking to collect, you’ll have to collect it from that.”

  Tasker said, “You’re ready?”

  “Yeah.”

  The wall slid open. Sitting in the other cell, on the bed, was Mister Nymph.

  24. AN EXPERIMENT YIELDS SOME INCONSISTENT DATA

  He was wearing a clean black suit, coldly staring me down. I had the thought that it should have been like looking in a mirror—his was, in the basics anyway, my own face. I thought it seemed off somehow, then I remembered that it’s because the image wasn’t reversed—it put my scar on the wrong cheek.

  He also just looked so much healthier. So much more alive.

  I aimed the shotgun.

  Nymph said, “Do it.”

  I didn’t.

  John said, “Dave? Do it, man.”

  Nymph said, “You heard him. Do it. I can see that you feel the doubts creeping in. The fear. Interesting to see if you can stand up to it.”

  I said, “Shut up.”

  “We keep arriving back to this point, do we not? So, are you a man, or are you a hollow vessel, echoing with mindless desire? Your fear says to take one step back and let them close up that wall again. So, which will act next—the man, or the fear? For it is in this moment—the moment in between feeling an impulse and succumbing to it—that you actually exist. Soon, the waves of impulse will crash in and your soul will be swept out to sea. When my Master consumes you, I doubt he will find you a terribly crunchy morsel.”

  “You don’t exist. You’re a manifestation of the swarm, built to play on our self-doubt. Break you down and you’re just a bunch of mindless insects who’ve learned to push people’s buttons.”

  “If I pull out a handful of your cells, would they add up to anything more? So, at what point do they become you?”

  John shouted for me to shoot and this seemed like great advice. I raised the shotgun and in the time it took me to send the command to my trigger finger, Nymph managed to spring from the bed, fly across the room, and start ripping the gun from my hands.

  The two of us both wound up on the floor and I had a moment to remember that John had done this exact thing with the Ted doppelganger, and that he had been tricked into “killing” “Ted” and then for the first time I realized that in that story, not even the gun had been real.

  As if it had wanted him to shoot.

  Why?

  And, in that brief moment of doubt, the gun was torn from my grasp. Nymph stood and aimed it right at my face.

  John said, “Shoot! David!”

  “I don’t have the gun!”

  Confusion outside. I opened my mouth to say what are you seeing but at that moment Nymph opened his mouth and in my voice said, “John! What are you seeing?”

  John said, to Nymph, “I’m seeing two of you.”

  Amy said, “Oh my god.”

  Agent Gibson said, “Well look at that. We got an evil twin situation here.”

  I said, “He’s the one in the suit, guys.”

  John said, “You’re both wearing the same thing!”

  “Oh, goddamnit. John, concentrate, see past the disguise. The one without the gun, meaning me, is the real David. Look at me, look at him.”

  Nymph said, “He’s lying! You know he’s lying!”

  John stared. First at Nymph, then at me.

  He shook his head and said, “When I concentrate, you both look like, uh … I don’t know, man. He’s doing something.”

  Nymph somehow smirked without moving his face.

  I sighed.

  I said to Tasker, “You know what these things are vulnerable to and you knew what this facility would be used for. I’m going to take a wild guess and say that as an emergency measure, each of these cells are rigged to rain burning sulfur down on whoever’s inside, despite being a massive violation of state and local building codes. Am I right?”

  She didn’t answer, because she didn’t know if she was talking to a person or a monster larva. But her expression, plus previous experience with this organization, told the story. She—or somebody, probably in that guard room she mentioned—just needed to push a button. Probably.

  I said, “Let’s assume that’s true. Here’s what’s going to happen. He’s going to make a play to try to get you to open that door. He can do it one of two ways, either by trying to convince you he’s me and to just let him out, or by doing what I think he’s going to do, which is just shoot me and have me out of the way, at which point he’ll have all the time in the world to convince you of whatever he wants. I’m going to try to stop him, but I probably won’t be able to—he’s stronger and faster. When that happens, when he kills me, I want you to push the button that fills this cell with fire. This cell, and the one with Maggie. Kill us all.”

  Amy said to Tasker, “Don’t do it. That’s what it wants.”

  I said, “You know this is me.” I looked at John. “You, too. The monster just wants out. I want Amy to be safe. And by far the safest option is to just kill us both. Easy answer.”

  I stared down Nymph, who was grinning like an asshole.

  I said, “I don’t know who or what you really are and at this point, I really don’t care. Whatever levers you think you can pull in people’s minds, playing off their soft hearts, you’re going to find all those circuits are dead in me. It’s not pretty, but neither is that shit-encrusted plunger we keep next to the toilet. But in the moment that toilet starts to overflow, that shit-encrusted plunger is the most beautiful thing in the world. Well, that’s what I’ve come to realize, over the years. I’m that plunger, that stinking, necessary thing. So, you’re standing there with your gun and your plans, thinking you can reach into their heads out there and play their emotions like a tune. But it’s not them in the cell with you, it’s me, and your unholy hive mind forgot to account for one thing—I just do not give a fuck.”

  Nymph nodded, as if in admiration. Then he set the shotgun on the floor.

  He said, “You know what? You’re right.”

  He turned to the group in the hall and said, “Fry us both. It’s the only way to be sure.”

  He turned to me and got a pensive look in his eyes. “I’ve seen things you wouldn’t believe. I have seen a snail get eaten by a bird, survive its digestive tract, then get shit out two hundred miles away onto the roof of the World T
rade Center, five minutes before the first plane hit. I have seen a man’s body obliterated by a train because he was trying to retrieve a dropped slip of paper that a woman had written her phone number on, not realizing the number was fake. I have seen an entire species-changing genetic line wiped out when a single Homo erectus got his dick stuck while humping a knothole. All these moments forgotten, like piss in a swimming pool. Time to die.”

  I turned back toward the hall, feeling an odd sense of relief, trying to quickly put together my last words to Amy. It wouldn’t need to be anything too profound (why start now?).

  I met her eyes, and it took me a moment to realize there was no glass between us—she was standing in the open door to the cell.

  She screamed, “COME ON!” at the exact moment Agent Gibson arrived to try to wrestle her away from the door.

  Nymph flew toward the open door, trying to blow past me. I threw my body at him and slammed him onto the floor, and I couldn’t tell if I was feeling the flesh-and-bone body of a dude in a business suit, or the squishy, pulsing mass of the fuckroaches. I think I was feeling them both, at the same time.

  The shotgun skidded across the floor, bounced off the wall, and skipped back toward me. I crawled over Nymph, grabbed the gun, and shoved the barrel into the back of his head.

  I yanked the trigger.

  Click

  I pumped it and pulled the trigger again and again, nothing.

  Tasker had sabotaged it. Pulled out the firing pin, probably.

  That bitch.

  Nymph flung me aside and bowled past Amy into the hall. I followed.

  Alarms were sounding. Black cloaks were flowing into the hall from wherever they’d been hiding. I yelled for John, but couldn’t find him in the pandemonium. The cloaks aimed their strange weapons at both me and Nymph.

  Tasker said, “Don’t harm the specimen!”