Authors: James Dixon
She saw a light coming from her room, the room she occupied with Eugene. A door that had a lock on it. That’s it, she thought. She must try it!
She got to her feet, still holding on to the doorknob, still keeping the door closed so that the thing inside couldn’t get at her.
She had to run down that corridor, get to her own room, get inside, arid lock the door before that thing got to her. It was only about forty-five feet away. She was barefoot but she could run that in just a few seconds. But could the creature get outside the room and catch up to her in that time?
What was the difference? The door was opening more and more. She could see more and more of that thing, pulling with its superhuman strength.
She had to take the chance!
Ready. She was on her feet now, still bracing the door. Finally she let go! The door sprang open. Jody was running, screaming, racing for the light from her open door. The forty-five feet seemed more like a mile. She heard the scraping, running sound at her heels.
“Help!” she screamed. “Help!”
She reached the door of her room, grabbing the doorjamb to stop herself as she heard the infant skidding by. Then, as she saw the infant recovering, coming back at her, she grabbed the door and slammed it shut, hitting the infant, knocking it out into the hallway again.
She’d made it, she was inside, safe. She heard the creature, incensed, slamming against the door, almost forcing it open. She turned the bolt. Again the infant rammed the door. There was a chain lock. She applied that, too. The thing outside leaped against the door, pounding, growling. But I’m safe, she thought, catching her breath; I’m inside this fully lit room and that’s that; I made it; this thing can pound and pound all it wants and it’s just not going to get me; I’ll just stay here, waiting for help, for Eugene; oh, where is Eugene?
She turned. She looked back at her bed as if deciding what she would do with herself until they came, all of them, to help her.
Then she saw the mess! Her clothing, the clothing she had worn when she went to the movies with her mother, when she escaped to this place. There is was, ripped apart as if by some madman.
The dress chosen so carefully to survive the journey; to last possibly a few days, torn in two. The large leather handbag, the one Eugene had bought her at that Indian place in Santa Fe, torn open as if by claws.
All of her belongings, her compact, her address book, everything was ripped apart. And there in the center of it all was that lipstick. That strange, unidentifiable lipstick, torn open now as if bitten through by a set of incredibly powerful teeth, the wires and transistors hanging out for all to see!
Jody moved closer. Staring at it, trying to figure out what it was, what it had to do with her.
About to pick it up, but carefully, as if it might have some electrical charge to it, she heard something.
Not the pounding on the door—she had grown immune to that in the few minutes she had been in the room. This was a new sound, a different kind of growl, as if it were newer than the one outside! She turned as if she expected it. She was almost certain what she would find.
She saw it, there on the other bed, growling up at her. Jody recognized it. She saw the resemblance, she knew who this baby was . . .
Outside, police piled into squad cars, joking, laughing with each other, pulling away.
Dr. Forrest, handcuffed now, sat in the back of one of the police cars. The driver of the car was about to get in and take the doctor away. Before he did, he stopped to listen to policeman shouting at him from another police car.
“You mean you didn’t even get a shot at it?” the policeman snorted.
“Man,” said the driver of the police car Dr. Forrest was in, “all those hotshots from Central got in there to grab all the glory.”
“Well, better luck next time,” said the other policeman, laughing, driving away.
“For sure!” The policeman got into the police car and his huge shotgun on the specially built rack in the front seat.
Dr. Forrest coughed, clearing his throat. “Uh . . . listen, Officer, maybe I better tell you something . . .”
That was as far as he got. The policeman turned and said to Dr. Forrest brashly, “Listen, Doc, save it, will ya? Talking to me is like talking to that ashtray back there, for all the good it’ll do ya. You’ll get your chance when you get downtown.”
The last word or two of his remark was lost as the wail of an ambulance pulling up the road and onto the premises filled the night air.
All right, thought Dr. Forrest, watching the policeman almost lovingly readjust the shotgun on its rack, they’ll know soon enough, with their big guns; they’ll have a great old time when they find out; target practice, that’s all it is to them.
Jody stood in her room, staring at the infant. The infant was tense, ready, as if deciding whether it should strike.
Jody spoke. “You are mine, aren’t you? I can see it.”
Nothing from the baby, only a low growl. The pounding on the door had not stopped; in fact, it had become louder. From outside, and adding to the confusion, the fright of it all, the wail of an ambulance filled the air.
Jody persisted, staring at the infant, taking a step or two closer. The infant growled louder, signaling Jody to stay back.
“Can’t you tell who I am?” she asked.
Another growl.
“Why do you hate me?” she pleaded, reaching out a hand to touch it, evoking a bigger, more frightening growl.
Suddenly a crash! The door behind Jody burst off its hinges, flying, open, shattering the lock, ripping the chain off the wall. Jody whirled and screamed as Frank Davis rushed into the room and grabbed her, just as she was about to collapse to the floor.
“Easy, easy,” Frank said. “They won’t hurt you. They’ll do what I say.”
“Why do they hate me?” Jody cried, holding on to Frank for dear life.
Frank saw it! He moved Jody cautiously over to the bed. He picked up the lipstick with its wires and transistors hanging out. As he did, a few more growls issued from the infants.
“You led them here,” he explained.
“Oh, my God,” said Jody, realizing now what that innocent-looking lipstick really was.
“It wasn’t your fault,” continued Frank, “but they don’t understand that. Somehow they know what it is and what it does. That’s all they know.”
Jody took the tiny transmitter in her hand. “But how did it get there?”
She stopped. Of course! Who else but her mother! Her mother had put it there. She looked up at Frank, who had already guessed who had done it. “Yes,” she said, “mothers can be a very dangerous species,” and then, in complete frustration, she threw the tiny transmitter viciously against the far wall.
“How could she do it?” she cried. “How could she do a thing like that?”
“Take it easy,” said Frank, trying to calm her. “She only did what she thought was right. She just didn’t understand, that’s all.”
A noise! They looked up. The infant, Jody’s infant, no longer growling, was crawling toward Jody and Frank as if it understood what had happened, as if it now wanted to come to its mother, wanted its mother to hold it.
“Oh, my God, look, Frank,” Jody said.
Frank nodded. “I know,” he said, “I know.”
Jody went to it. She picked it up. And then, awkwardly at first, getting used to the shape of it, she held it in her arms . . .
Outside by the pool, Eugene Scott was being put on a stretcher. The body of the infant had been scooped from the pool into a net and placed by the side of the pool, as if for examination.
Detective Lieutenant Perkins was standing up on the huge lawn, halfway between the pool and the house. Perkins was of the same mind as Mallory. This house, these doctors, all of this could never have been organized in a few days. There was more to it than that.
He walked back across the lawn, toward the pool. Two police officers stood guarding the tiny corpse, waiting for whatever designated experts who would eventually come to claim it.
They watched Perkins as he knelt and peered intently at the baby. Suddenly the arm moved; even in death it terrified people with one last involuntary spasm.
Perkins jumped back.
The cops laughed. “Scared hell out of you, didn’t it, Lieutenant?” one of them said.
“I’m scared all right,” answered Perkins. “Scott’s baby was a boy, wasn’t it?”
“Sure,” said the cop, still smiling.
“Yeah,” said Perkins, looking down again at the baby to be sure. “Well, this one’s a female.”
Mallory smiled his thin smile. He thought he’d found what he was looking for.
He stood at the top of a long metal staircase. At the bottom was a massive, newly installed steel door.
“That’s it,” he said, “that’s where they kept it,” he mumbled to himself.
He started down the stairs. Police were with him. Guns holstered, they came down the stairs laughing and smiling, amused at Mallory’s stern composure.
At the bottom of the stairs, Haskins, smiling back at Mallory, asked, “Whatcha looking for, sir?”
“Just open the door,” said Mallory gruffly.
“Sure thing,” said Haskins, still smiling. “At your service.”
When the door was opened, the police all stopped cold. They saw, as did Mallory, the disarray within. Everything scattered, the outline of a white coat lying amidst the chaos. It smelled of one thing—familiar to any experienced policeman—death.
Mallory, gun drawn, stepped into the room first. Seeing Perry’s corpse, he stepped over it, eyes constantly wary, and moved ahead, waiting for something to spring. He turned to one side, then saw what he had expected to see. Not just one open cage but two, and then the third. All with food, water, different types of games, numbered blocks.
Turning, Mallory ran back to the door of the laboratory, calling to one of the policemen as he went, “Give me that,” he said, pointing to the policeman’s radio transmitter.
The policeman, only too happy to oblige, tossed it to Mallory.
Mallory caught it and spoke tensely into the speaker. “Attention, attention,” he said. “To all police personnel. This is Mallory. There are three. Do you understand? At least three of these creatures are presently loose on these premises. All police are to have their weapons out and ready to shoot to kill! Over and out.” He handed back the transmitter, repeating the words for himself, “Over and out.”
He smiled a gloating smile as he watched the cops, especially Haskins, draw their guns and look anxiously into every dark corner of that gloomy basement.
Upstairs, Jody was holding the baby, her baby, talking to it soothingly. Frank was at the window, but back far enough so that no one could see him as he watched the confusion below.
Mallory had just come out the front door of the house, yelling, repeating the information he had just relayed into the police radio. “There’s two more,” he said. “There were two more at the house. Be careful; maybe they’re out here by now.”
Frank turned back into the room. Starting toward Jody, he stopped, just for an instant really, to watch Jody, the mother, lovingly holding her baby.
A harsh voice from below the window brought him back to reality. “Shoot first,” it said, “ask questions later.”
Jody heard it, too. She turned to Frank, an anxious, questioning look on her lovely face. “What’ll we do?” she asked.
“We’ve got to get out of here. Come on,” he said, leading her toward the door.
“Where’s the other one?” Jody asked, suddenly remembering that the other infant was about somewhere.
Frank looked around. “Who knows? It’s too late now to do anything about it. Come on! We’ve got to at least save yours.”
At poolside, Eugene thrashed about in apparent shock, strapped to a stretcher by two ambulance attendants with the additional help of two policemen.
Incoherent, Eugene was mumbling something.
“What’s he saying?” asked one of the policemen.
“Sounds like, ‘We were wrong, Jody, we were wrong,’ ” answered one of the hospital attendants, used to this sort of behavior and able to interpret inarticulate ranting better than others.
Upstairs, Jody, carrying her baby, was being led down the back hallway by Frank Davis.
Halfway down the hall, and passing an open door, she slowed down, shuddering as she thought of that man, the dead man she had seen in that room.
Up ahead, Frank saw her pause. “Come on,” he said, urging her on. Jody, getting a hold of herself, moved forward.
Reaching the end of the corridor, they made a left, then another left and then a right, coming upon a short staircase that led to a back door.
Opening the back door, Frank stepped out onto a terrace behind the Spanish mansion. He turned to Jody as she came through the door, still holding the baby.
“Let me have the baby,” he said.
“What?” She could not give it up.
“Jody!” Frank said. “They’ll be here any minute. You stay here, keep them busy. It’s all been planned. I know a way out, up into those hills,” he lied.
Reluctantly, seeing that Davis was right, she handed over the baby. “Will I see him again?” she said.
“If it’s safe,” he said, taking the baby. “We’ve got to be sure it’s absolutely safe.”
Frank started across the narrow terrace carrying the baby. He climbed easily over a short fence and began to clamber up the hillside behind the house, into the thick firebrush surrounding it.
Jody watched as Davis climbed higher and higher up a steep embankment, some of the dirt shifting around, falling back down onto the terrace. Suddenly he slipped!
“Oh, no!” gasped Jody, holding her breath.
Frank grabbed at dried branches and clusters of brush to save himself. Secure now, he started again up the steep incline. Finally he reached the top and then disappeared into the darkness.
Jody sighed, relieved at least, that her baby was safe for the moment. Suddenly she heard a noise, someone yelling. She turned to one side. She saw a staircase and heard yells from individuals who were, right now, scrambling up those stairs.
She ran to the staircase. Suddenly the beam of a flashlight hit her full in the face, blinding her.
“Please,” she said.