I feel like I can’t do anything right. Except it’s not really me that’s at fault here. You’ve all been telling me this for a while now and even the literal devil is getting in on bullying me into standing up for myself so maybe I should work harder at believing that. My therapist says that maybe I’m blaming myself for everything that goes wrong because I want to feel like things are actually under my control. That my actions matter and that I can change the outcome of what happens to myself and the people around me.
It’s funny, isn’t it? I’ve said that people ignore the inhuman because they’re scared of a world where who you are and what you do doesn’t matter, that bad things can still happen to good people because of chaotic, random chance.
But in the end, I guess I don’t want that to be real. Maybe everyone else can be foolish in their willful ignorance but I knew better and I thought I had accepted that, but I also thought that because I know better I can change things and there wasn’t anything that was out of my power to fix.
Coping mechanisms.
Daniel is alive. So am I and so is Maria.
But so is the worm.
And someone else isn’t.
Let’s start with our conversation with Daniel.
(if you’re new, start here, and if you’re totally lost, this might help)
It went better than I expected. I was even optimistic when it wrapped up. We met him on Friday evening, over dinner at the student union. I thought that was a bad idea, considering how he seemed perfectly willing to blow up at me in public, but Maria insisted. Clearly she has more confidence in Daniel’s ability to pull himself together than I do. So we showed up and sat down and Maria did most of the talking.
Tonight, she said - and I was a little surprised, because I thought we were going to try Saturday night, but I guess she took one look at the scratches on his face and changed her mind - we’d all go over to his dorm room. We’d show up just before the worm arrived and no one would talk so we wouldn’t wake up his roommate.
(for the record, I was deeply uncomfortable at the thought of sneaking into a room while someone was asleep, especially after what happened with Cassie)
(I do have updates about Cassie but not right now, I have too much to talk about regarding Daniel)
We’d go into the hallway with him, Maria explained. Unsurprisingly, he balked at that point. Maria quickly calmed him down by pointing out that he wouldn’t be alone and he certainly wouldn’t be defenseless. She lowered her voice and told him that she had some weapons hidden in her dorm room and she’d bring them with her when we came. It’d be three against one, she said. We’d be well-prepared. That thing was nothing but a giant mindless worm. We’d try to kill it together.
“But didn’t you like… forget where you were?” he asked desperately. “What if I’m just standing there and you’re staring uselessly?”
“You just have to take that first step,” Maria replied calmly. “I’ve got glass jars we’re going to fill with gasoline. You throw one of those and I’m sure that’ll break us out of our trance. And then we light it up.”
He fretted nervously for a minute. Maria subtly kicked me under the table, which was my cue to give him an ‘out’. A way for him to think he could back out, but in reality he wasn’t going to need it, because this was going to work and he was going to kill the worm like he was supposed to.
“I think we can switch targets,” I said. “I saw it happen with another creature around campus. I got out of the room, thinking it was only after me, but it… went after… the person that was still there.”
I tried to keep a straight face. I needed to sound confident if Daniel was going to go along with our plan, which meant I couldn’t think of how horrible I felt about what happened to that student.
“So if something goes wrong,” he said slowly, “I leave the hallway first?”
“Yep,” I confirmed, “and then Maria and then me. If my theory is correct, it’ll switch the target.”
It wouldn’t. We didn’t know what the trigger that got the worm’s attention was. But Maria and I just watched Daniel as he thought it over, our expressions carefully determined, waiting for him to buy into our plan.
“Do you remember what happened to Patricia?” I said. It was time to play my appeal to emotion. “Do you remember how angry you were? How you demanded that we do something to the creature that killed them? It’s not the same creature, but this is your chance to fight back. To do something.”
I sat there, staring him in the eyes, my hands folded on the table. He stared back at me and I waited for the confusion on his face to clear, for him to realize that yes, this was his chance to stop feeling so scared and helpless.
It never happened.
“Who is Patricia?” he asked.
“Okay so we’re meeting tonight just before midnight,” Maria hastily said, standing and slamming her hands on the table. “Great. Good talk, everyone. Don’t worry Daniel, we’ve got this handled.”
He nodded absently. I guess that while we didn’t get a firm commitment, him agreeing because Maria wasn’t giving him a choice was the next best thing. Then she grabbed my arm and we hurried out of the student union.
“Who is Patricia?!” Maria hissed as soon as we were outside. “What the HELL?”
“People forget,” I muttered, running my hands through my hair. “Cassie - she said everyone but her forgot her roommate after she vanished.”
“So he’s forgotten Patricia? But we haven’t?”
I nodded. I wanted to scream. My chest felt tight. I know it’s not true, that what I did to destroy the eyeball mattered very much, but it still felt like somehow I’d failed. Patricia was forgotten. This campus had won in the end. It’d eaten them up and made sure no one ever saw their remains.
It made it hard to carry on with our plan, to be honest. I just felt exhausted. Like the only thing keeping me going was the thought that all this work and worry was going to help someone in the end and for some reason, hearing that Daniel had forgotten about Patricia ripped all that away. Maybe I’m being silly. But I just didn’t have any heart to go meet Maria and help her transport her arsenal over to Daniel’s room once it was late enough at night. At least she took my silence as grim determination. She carried plastic bags, each layered inside the other and tied tightly to hide the smell of gasoline. Inside were glass mason jars that she’d filled up somewhere off-campus, so that she wouldn’t be seen and so that the smell of the gasoline wouldn’t linger.
It was a simple plan. Maria and I would carry the jars, one each. We had more, but we needed our hands free to hold onto Daniel. Our hope was that contact with him would ward off the strange mind effects, for he was the intended target after all. Once we got close to the worm, we’d unscrew the lids and throw the jars. There were more in the bag and Daniel would carry that on his wrist. Once it was soaked, then Daniel would let go of us and get the molotov cocktail out.
He’d set it on fire, throw, and then grab us again and we’d all flee together while it burned.
None of us had ever made or thrown a molotov cocktail but I’d heard that some of the guys in my class back home had done it so it had to work. Maria had everything ready to go. He only had to pull the bottle out of its many layers of protective plastic baggies, light and throw.
He didn’t seem too pleased to see us when we knocked softly at his door. We’d gotten lucky and his roommate was out and likely wouldn’t be back until much later in the night, if he came back tonight at all. We laid out the plan for him and showed him everything we’d brought.
“It’ll be fine,” Maria said encouragingly as he stared nervously at the bottle and the lighter. “We’ll be right there.”
He glanced at the door and then at his watch. It was almost time. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and nodded.
He was going to do this.
Finally.
We put the handle of the bag holding the gasoline jars over his wrist. The bag with the molotov cocktail went on the other wrist.
I stepped into the hallway first. In my free hand I held a jar. My other hand clutched at Daniel’s hand. A strange sense of pressure ran over me as I left the safety of the dorm room. Like trying to step through plastic wrap. It passed quickly and I was standing in the hallway, one hand stretched behind me to keep hold of Daniel, and my mind was clear.
“It’s fine,” I told them. “This is working.”
Daniel entered next. Then Maria. We stood side by side and faced the approaching worm. It wasn’t all that far away from Daniel’s door, perhaps only eight doors away. Much closer than when I came in here.
I tried to take a step forward, but Daniel didn’t budge. He didn’t let go of my hand, but he was frozen in place, staring straight ahead at the approaching worm. His face was pale, the scratches on it as red as cherries in the harsh overhead lights.
The worm was no longer making its leisurely way down the hallway. It was bigger than I remembered. It filled the upper half of the hallway, its sides nearly touching the walls. Its thin stilt-like legs moved in unison.
And it saw Daniel. It had no face, but it knew he was there. The cohesion in its movements broke down. Its legs churned chaotically. A ripple ran along the length of its body, starting from the back and working its way towards us. It was like watching the tide come in at the beach, and as it reached the front of the creature, the worm opened its mouth.
It didn’t have a face. It only had a mouth.
The flesh split into four portions, peeling back like a tin can, and the inside jaw was thrust forward. It ripped free from the flesh holding it in place, tearing away from the skin, and I could see the dripping muscle beneath holding the bones and the teeth in place. Its saliva became long, stringy loops, dripping from its jaws. The tip of its long tongue flicked the drool around its exposed jaw and where it touched muscle, it solidified into a new layer of ivory flesh. Like a caterpillar spinning a cocoon. It was spinning itself new flesh.
This all happened in less than a minute. Another ripple had started at the rear of its body, rapidly traveling up to the head, and behind it was another and another. One of the ripples paused and then bulged outwards to either side, and legs split out of the flesh, thin and slick with fluid, reaching down to the floor on needle-like points.
They weren’t actually legs, I realized. I mean, that’s what they looked like, and they were moving like legs, but they were just going through the motions. They barely touched the ground and they certainly weren’t gaining enough traction to move the worm forward.
It wasn’t walking down the corridor. It was growing to fill the length of the corridor. Growing until it reached Daniel’s door.
Except now its growth was speeding up. It saw Daniel. And it was coming for him.
“Stick to the plan,” Maria said, but her voice was a thin squeak.
We were all scared. Daniel’s hand in mine was cold and damp. I tore my eyes away from the approaching monstrosity long enough to glance at him. His face was pale, his mouth open and his lips trembling. We had to do this, I thought, before his nerve broke.
“Let’s go,” I said.
It wasn’t after me. That’s what I told myself. It was like Krampus, it would just pass me by because I hadn’t done anything, I wasn’t the reason it was here. That’s how I got myself to take a step towards it and then Maria did the same and Daniel just came along with us because he had to.
The worm was growing as fast as it could, its jaw lunging forward a foot at a time. It left splatters of blood on the hallway walls. The flesh barely had time to solidify before it was ripped open anew as the muscles contracted and forced the jaw free. Its four jawbones clacked together like a giant pincer, rattling the teeth in their sockets. There were holes pitting its body, revealing the pink muscle beneath, for it couldn’t slather its saliva across itself fast enough to cover its body entirely with new skin. It was still creating legs, but those came at uneven intervals now, skipping segments, and a few of them emerged only half-formed - one leg only or both legs stunted and waving uselessly in midair.
I hefted the jar of gasoline. This was a good plan, I told myself. Fire was one of our most ancient weapons. Surely it’d work.
We were almost within throwing range. And that is where it all went wrong, because it also realized that Daniel was almost in range.
It lunged forward. The jaws ripped free and kept going, two spindly legs tearing their way out through the front of its skin. The flesh continued ripping, a long seam opening up down its underbelly where the thin, barely formed flesh could not hold any longer. Like an overfilled garbage bag finally breaking at its seam. Its muscles spilled forth, thrashing wildly, trying to propel the jaws close enough so that they could snatch up Daniel and dash him to pieces against the walls of the hallway.
I raised my arm to throw.
Too late. Too slow.
For Daniel shrieked as the snapping jaws slammed against the walls and floor, the trembling legs dragging the insides of its body out of its ruined flesh in one last desperate attempt to connect with its prey.
He let go of our hands.
And with him went my coherence.
I remember the feel of the jar slipping from my hand. I don’t remember when I lowered my arm. I only know that I did and it fell onto the ground uselessly, bounced off my foot, and rolled away.
I remember half-turning my head towards Daniel. Opening my mouth to say something to him. But he wasn’t there, there was only an open doorway beside me. A single open door among all of them arrayed down the length of the corridor. If I could see what lay beyond it, I can’t recall what it was.
I remembered thinking that if it had changed its target, then there was nothing I could do to save myself. For its jaws were inches away, so close I could see the shine of the droplets of blood and saliva on its teeth.
Then it slammed into me as it went racing past. I was thrown against the wall, I felt hot moisture soaking the front of my shirt, and there was an impression of something rushing past me - like a gust of wind.
My mind was clear. I was leaning against the hallway wall and the front of my shirt was soaked with fresh blood. Maria stood opposite me, pale and shaking, her eyes fixed on the doorway that Daniel had escaped through.
The creature was gone.
And the door was closed. Neither of us said anything. I reached over and tried the doorknob.
It didn’t open.
The hallway was silent except for the sound of our rapid breathing. Everything about it felt… wrong. It was profoundly empty in a way that felt somehow familiar. I’d experienced it before.
My house. It felt like my family’s house after dad vanished. Like the moment when I’d wake in the morning and expect to hear his voice from the kitchen because everything felt the same and of course he’d be there but there was only silence and I knew the emptiness was permanent.
That’s what it felt like.
I wonder how many more hollow shells are laying around our world, after the monster is dead or gone.
“We-we should probably leave,” Maria said. “Before his roommate gets back and closes the door.”
I was still too shocked by what had happened to reply coherently, so I only nodded, and we stumbled off towards our remaining exit. We left our jars of gasoline and molotov cocktail behind. No sense trying to smuggle those back out of here. We didn’t need them anymore.
The door was still open and we slipped into his room and Maria quietly shut it behind us. Then she opened it again and there was the regular dorm hallway. Someone was playing music a few doors down, loud enough that we could hear the faint trace of a melody. It was a comforting sound. We were back. We’d made it out.
“What do we do now?” Maria asked once we were outside, walking together in the direction of our own dorms.
I didn’t have a good answer for her, other than finding out if Daniel was still alive.
I’m tired. I guess this is what happens when you try to save everyone. The effort drains your blood, grinds up your bones, and leaves you as nothing but dust. That’s how I feel. Like I’ve given everything and all that’s left of me is dust.
Maria tracked Daniel down the next day. She staked out the lobby of his dorm room until she saw him slinking out, trying to hurry to the door before she saw him. It didn’t work. She ran after him and pestered him until he admitted to what happened after he escaped through that unknown doorway.
He found himself in someone else’s dorm room. The occupant was awake and was startled to see him bursting in through his door. They didn’t have long to be surprised, though, for the worm came charging through moments later.
Daniel was knocked to the floor. He heard a scream and then blood splattered… everywhere. He didn’t know what happened. He was curled on the ground in a screaming ball of abject terror, unable to move, unable to do anything to save himself or that poor random person that had nothing to do with any of this.
When the noises died down, Daniel found the nerve to raise his head and look. All around him was scattered bits of the student’s insides. Pieces of tissue, shards of bone, stringy lumps of muscle. Everything inside the student had been scooped out and discarded. Like hollowing out a pumpkin.
But the student was still on his feet. He turned to look down at Daniel, a broad, thin smile on his face. Then he walked out of the room. That’s it. Walked away and left Daniel there on the gore-coated floor.
I shouldn’t have told him these creatures could switch targets. I shouldn’t have given him the idea. I knew there was a good chance he’d run, but I thought if he did, he’d run back to his dorm room and we’d get a chance to try again, to talk him into it, but instead… he ran into someone else’s room. And they died because of it.
The worm has escaped the hallway. It has a body and it’s loose on campus. And maybe Daniel isn’t of interest anymore, but I don’t think this is over. It can’t be.
I don’t know what to do about it. [x]