A Shambling Mess

I slammed the door shut behind me, bringing us back into darkness. I was half-mad with panic and running on instinct, my body moving before my conscious mind figured out what I was doing. Schreck squirmed in my arms, a limp weight, not quite resisting and not quite moving with me. I struggled to get a handhold on him, gripping him by the shirt before losing hold, then putting a hand around his belly to tug him that way, and finally when he squirmed out of that I just put a hand on his chest and shoved him into one of the pillars.

When his back hit the cold glass, he screamed.

Right, it was ice cold, hurt to touch. I hadn’t meant to be quite that rough on him. The scream made me jump and I pulled back, let him go. He fell forward onto his hands and knees, breathing hard.

“What- the heck are-” He whimpered, looked up at me in shock, in horror. “Why are you- oh, that’s not good, man, that’s not good, I’m gonna get in so much- what’re you doing in here?”

First thing’s first. “Is it just you? Nobody else coming? Where’s Lucas?”

I held the clipboard I was carrying up like a baton, ready to hit him. It felt like a bit of a limp threat to me, but Schreck paled, and to my surprise he even flinched like he was genuinely afraid of being hit. “He sent me to check on the centipedes! He’s uh, making sure the uh-” He caught himself, cutting off mid-sentence and setting his jaw. “-that… other stuff… is secure. He thought you’d be sneaking after that, not this… wow. Priorities, huh?”

“What was he securing? You have other stuff like this?” I gestured up to the tube. He coughed in pain. With him on his hands and knees like that I could see his back where he’d frozen, I didn’t see any ice crystals forming on the clothes or anything, didn’t think I’d given him frostbite or anything serious, not that I was doctor enough to tell for sure.

“Sure, we got, uh, we got stuff.” He replied, vaguely.

“What stuff?”

“Lots of stuff. And things, and-”

“Tell me, dammit!” I hissed in frustration. I didn’t have time for a long interrogation but this was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up. He knew, dammit, he knew what was going on, and so help me god, he was gonna tell me.

“You know, stuff type things. Like- you know, wow, if you saw it you’d be-”

I hit him with the clipboard, hard enough to make an audible crack.

He collapsed onto his front. Eyes watering, making coughing noises and flopping like a limp fish.

I hadn’t hit him that hard, right? My stomach tightened a little as I looked down at him just writhing away on the floor.

“Shit, are you, uh, are you okay? I didn’t- should I get- I can get help, or-”

I reached for the door, fully intending to do just that, but he held up a palm. His other hand was at his throat, but he clearly intended for me to stop. Still choking, he pointed frantically at one pocket.

Some kind of medical condition? He had medicine in there maybe? Of course he did. My breathing slowed just a touch, just a little of the tension drained away. I still stood over him, ready, but decided to wait and see. He reached slowly into that pocket, real slow, keeping his other hand where I could see it.

He let out a hacking cough as he took out a small snuff-box from his pocket. Unscrewed the cap slowly.

And hucked it in my face.

Everything went white. My eyes stung like I’d just filled them with soap, I recoiled.

“You little shit!”

He’d been faking. I heard rather than saw him leap to his feet, footsteps heavy as he pushed me back.

I staggered a few steps, and when my vision cleared, he had one hand on the control panel to one of the tubes. One of the centipede-zombie-filled tubes.

“Stay back! I’m warning you, man.” He said.

I hissed as I wiped the dust from my eyes. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it didn’t appear to be toxic or caustic, might as well have been sand. A white dust. Probably a hallucinogen, I tried to keep from breathing it in, but it didn’t appear to have any effects beyond blinding me for a moment.

“Okay, okay.” I raised my hands, real slow. “I just wanna talk. I was a bit rough, panicked and thought you were a security guard or something. It’s just you? I just wanna talk.”

He met my eyes, looked me over. I probably didn’t look very threatening, teary-eyed, haggard. My hair was a mess, my stolen labcoat dishevelled. My breath smelled of-

He untensed just a fraction. His finger, hovering over a big red button on the control panel, lifted a fraction of an inch.

“What are you even doing down here, man? You ain’t supposed to be down here, it’s like, private.”

“I could ask the same thing. What’s with the centipede army? I was looking for Godbox stuff, I thought you’d have an idol to Lady Regress down here.”

His eyes widened a moment. Looked to me, then to the corpse floating in the green goo. It was just barely visible through the bubbling muck if I squinted, now I knew it was there. There was one in each of these.

“What? This is a medical project, we’re trying to figure out how to… not-dead people. I know it looks a bit… creepy. And oh, wow, are these things creepy, huh? There’s way worse deeper in though, did you go deep enough to see the giant spider with the neural- I should stop talking, huh?”

“So it’s not… an army.” I said, really slow. He was making just barely enough sense for me to understand. At least, I thought I understood.

“Pretty sure they’ll collapse if you take ‘em out of here, dude. Them and regular physical laws are not copacetic, what use’s an army you can’t take out’ve the house?”

That was still almost certainly illegal though. And unethical, and-

“Lady Regress. She’s down here, right?” I refocused on the important part. The point.

“Who?” He tilted his head in genuine confusion.

“Goddess, crying woman statue. Warps space, she-”

“I don’t know any Lady Regress.” He said, a little sharper than necessary. A little more firmly. The man’s voice was usually a bit airy, he didn’t quite slur his words but he was close to it. But this time he came out harsh enough I was taken aback.

Had to be a lie, no way he’d be that forceful if he was telling the truth, it was almost unnatural on him.

“What about the Flamingo then? What, are you keeping them as a pet or something? How did one get into a highly secure lab without-”

His eyes narrowed at me for a moment. I could see him processing. I was sure he was genuinely an intelligent scientist when he had his brain together. But at the same time, he fixed me with a look I was familiar with, he’d given it to me just earlier, outside at the faire.

“...I dunno what you’re on, but are you sure I can’t have some?”

“...Schreck.”

I spoke with a low, warning tone. He tensed up, hand right on the button. “Don’t- don’t come closer!”

That had been a mistake. Threatening him at all wasn’t very productive, it just made him panic. His voice was high, shrill. He was looking at me like I had a gun rather than a piece of flimsy wood.

I rubbed the back of my neck, trying to look unthreatening. “Okay, look, I’m sorry I pushed you into the ice thing, okay? You hurt? I just wanted information. I’m sure I can, like, get you seen to, and then whatever…” I couldn’t believe I was about to offer this. I winced. “Whatever… stuff you want, I can get some, and you-”

“Knew you were on something. All- talking about flamingos and going from shouty and hitty to nice in a second. It’s- you-”

“I’m not on anything. Just take a breath, Chartered. You-”

He twitched and winced. I took a step back, held my hands out, keeping them in his view.

He let out a shriek like I’d pulled a weapon out. “Stay back, damn you, stay-!”

I did exactly what he asked. Stood stock still, made no threatening moves, didn’t give him any reason to get more worked up.

He hit the button anyway, and let the zombie loose.

With a hiss the base of the tube came apart into four segments. The green ooze drained away and as it did, and the dead body inside slid out, onto the floor.

It lay there, wet, sticky, headless in a puddle of goo. The centipede sticking out from the spinal column twitched, chittered.

And then its two dead arms planted onto the floor, and with a heave, it started to push itself up to standing.

The zombie took a moment to orient itself.

Schreck fished some kind of spray out of a pocket, like a little perfume bottle, and spritzed himself with it. His hands were shaking as he did it and he nearly fumbled and dropped it at least once, keeping his eyes locked on the centipede as he did so. Probably it was some kind of pheromonal protection. Pheromonal protection I didn’t have.

I lunged forward to try to grab it out of his hands, and whilst he jerked back the zombie jerked forward. Its arm shot out between us, grasping and raking nails against my shirt, like it was trying to grab me but not quite sure how to work the muscles. I shoved it off and it stumbled back, the centipede head twisting into a twirling spiral, twitching in obvious agitation.

“Easy! It, uh, probably wants a new host but it’s a touch confused. I’d- I’d stay back, I don’t want it to hurt you, but if you don’t leave right- right now, I’ll let it, uh-”

Schreck was trembling with fear, and honestly I didn’t blame him. I’d pushed this way too far trying to interrogate him, and even if I didn’t feel a little bad for the guy, I did not plan on fighting his new guard dog. “That seems fair to me.” I tried to smile, tried to play it cool. “I’ll just be going then, eh?”

Time to evacuate and try to process what I’d learned. I opened the door back to the main lab. Pale electric light shone through, and I backed away real slow. I wasn’t getting any more answers out of Schreck, this was a lost position, and if he was going to threaten me into leaving, I was happy to oblige.

The zombie stumbled forward after me anyway.

It was the fact I’d tried fleeing I think, the movement seemed to trigger it. The centipede stopped spinning and instead stood on end, curling into the crook of a question mark, curved like a fishook as its torso came for me. It was surprisingly quick, not quite managing a run but at least a quick lurch.

I stopped backing away and turned, breaking into a run as soon as it started moving. If I hadn’t, it would have caught me then and there.

“Wait, not out there, don’t chase-! There’s windows, dammit, people will see-!” Schreck cried. I made it through the door, followed by the zombie, followed by the scientist, a mad procession, everybody trying to grab everybody else.

I’d broken into a sprint out of panic and only after I was already running did I even try to assess my surroundings. I only noticed the table as I was already slamming into it, hitting it with my pelvis and knocking the wind out of me. The zombie was inarticulate, un-co-ordinated. It could barely aim itself, tried to adjust to avoid hitting the same table but didn’t make it, adjusting maybe a few degrees and hitting the table anyway just to my left.

Its body was busy trying to re-orient itself after the impact, but the head moved like it was independent. It realised it was right next to me and coiled around my arm. A hundred legs dug into my skin, each drawing a droplet of blood through my shirt, setting my arm alight with a hundred pinprick bites while its mandibled head bit hard and tried to tear into my skin.

“Get- ohsweetHylyssohcharteredgetitoffgetitOFF!”

Schreck came to help, grabbing the torso by the waist and pulling. I took the opportunity to hit the centipede part over the head hard with my clipboard. It flinched, loosened its grip on my arm. That hurt it, hitting it hurt it, good to know. I jerked my arm back, out of the centipede’s grip, and went to hit it again, two-handed this time.

It dodged. Twisted its body to the side and lurched. It grabbed the board with its mandibles and jerked, tearing it out of my hand. There was an almighty crack and the flimsy wood shattered into two.

I stared down at my bloodied arm. A hundred little spots of blood soaking into the fabric of my sleeve. There was a faint blue aura around each wound. At first I thought it was the centipede, but-

“Don’t I have a protective-”

I suddenly became aware of the room around me. The shelves of documents, the measuring equipment on the tables.

The ritual circle with the hunk of metal inside it, and the deities powering it.

The zombie lurched for me again. I kicked over a table to put it between us. “I- one of you, I don’t even know your names, but- random deities, I beseech thee, help!”

Most of them stayed silent. Most. One, an alabaster woman in an old-style priest’s robes and mitre, glowed a golden hue and replied “You’re not licensed. Sorry, honey. Wish I could.”

She sounded genuinely upset, too. I hissed. The zombie started to clamber over the table, and I grabbed a thick textbook from a shelf to try to batter it back. It just took the blows on the chest, unrelenting.

“Screw the license, I need- Schreck, are you-?”

He had two arms around the zombie’s waist and was entirely failing to pull it back. He spoke up anyway, throwing his head back towards the circle whilst he put his back into pulling. “Sunstress, I beseech thee!” He yelled, The Alabaster woman, Sunstress apparently, glowed once more.

“I’m not a guardian nor combat deity, and am a pacifist besides.”

“Change the physical laws in the lab, then! It requires a dedicated set, right?!” I hissed. She ignored me. The zombie got one leg over my improvised barricade, but I shoved it hard right as it was about to put its weight down onto its leg and it tumbled over backwards.

Sunstress ignored me. I gave Schreck a pleading look.

“I- Sunstress I beseech thee, envelop the lab and-”

“I have only one statue in here, dearest. I could either keep your radio equipment here intact, or alter the room to match the outside world, rendering it incompatible to your… centipede. I can’t do both, I’m afraid.” She replied, voice low and smooth.

That sounded like a plan to me. The zombie stumbled to its feet and I rushed for the statuette of Sunstress.

“Wait, no, that’s an incredibly valuable experiment, you can’t-”

Schreck grabbed me by the shoulder. I shrugged him off. “Pick a side, dammit! I- keep the zombie down, I’ll-”

“Don’t you dare-!”

I slapped at him and he slapped at me. The whole time we were wrestling and engaging in futile fisticuffs the zombie was getting back up.

“Let go of me, you-”

“Don’t break the circle, I spent so much time on that, man, Lucas’ll kill me!”

I pulled away from him hard, pushing against his chest. His grip broke and we both staggered back a step, carried by the momentum whilst we were separated. He tripped over the table and I tripped over the statuette of Sunstress, moving in perfect symmetry.

The circle broke. I knocked the statuette to the floor and the head cracked off, by the looks of it, it was only made of white plaster.

There was a hiss, a shifting of air, and even though the feeling remained oppressive just a little of the divine static on my skin faded away.

The hunk of metal in the center of the circle let out an electric fritz, and started, slowly, to smoke. It wasn’t dramatic, it didn’t burn into flames, but…

“No!” Schreck cried out like he’d lost a child, crawling forward.

“Sod.” I cursed. Not at the loss of what was apparently an oversized attempt to recreate a Dreaming Empire radio, but at the statuette. I cradled it in my hands, broken, gone. Couldn’t use it now.

The zombie was standing. I was on my back.

I scrambled back as it rushed for me. I didn’t have anything to defend myself anymore, no clipboard, no book, no table. I tried to stand, but in the time that took, it was on top of me.

This time it didn’t even bother to wrap around my arm. It went for my back, specifically my shoulderblade. It simply bit a hole in my flesh with its mandibles and slithered inside.

It only got the head in, though, a few inches sticking out under the flesh, a horrible bulge. I gripped the wound with one hand like I was trying to stem bleeding or apply a tourniquet, gripping onto the centipede’s neck hard with my other, what of it was bared between the zombie’s spinal column and my skin.

I didn’t bother holding back the screaming. Nor did Schreck. I screamed, he screamed, we all bloody screamed. Even the centipede chittered and writhed. The cacophony must have been audible from the street.

I cast my eyes around desperately, looking for something to help myself. Grabbing it would only hold it a few moments, if I lost my grip at all… with my two hands on it, strangling it, I could stop it, but I had no clue what it would do if it got deeper still. If, Chartered forbid, it got to my spine.

I staggered blindly, dragging a whole other body with me, before my eyes settled on one last chance.

The door. The way out, into the open air. Schreck had said the centipede wouldn’t survive it, right?

“Get the door open! My hands are full, get-” He was distracted, looking forlornly at the burning radio. He’d torn one of the curtains off the window to cover it, trying in vain to smother the internal fire that was making smoke. “Schreck!” I cried louder. “I can’t hold it, open- open the fucking door, Schreck!”

His eyes snapped over to me. He saw me struggling, staggering, blood streaming from my arm and my back. I looked like a ghost, pale and red.

He’d set this loose on me.

But I don’t think he wanted me to die.

He hesitated. Looked to one of his creations then the other, to the radio then the zombie. He could save the radio, or he could save me. Could save me or save the centipede, even.

I didn’t know how much that last one weighed, he had hundreds of them after all.

But either way, he made the decision.

He went for the door.

With a heave, he opened it. The air pressure shifted again. Whatever law of physics had been enacted inside this lab, it had to do with the air, I was sure. The decompression was immense, and the gale-winds that flooded through the door whenever it was open pulled me through like a vortex, the centipede too.

It felt like I was being cut open with a dagger, felt a slice across my skin red and raw as the force of it pulled the centipede out of me. We separated, I lost my grip on it as it was thrown into the back wall and I rolled across the floor, leaving a bloody smear behind me.

I laid on the floor a moment, just breathing hard. All the energy drained out of my body, I laid there like a stone. Was it done? I didn’t get up, but nor did the zombie. I didn’t know what about the outside would be so lethal to it, what law there was that it wouldn’t be able to stand. Was it dead already?

It let out a low hiss.

Then it burst into flames.

And then it got up again.

“Oh come on!” I yelled. It was just the centipede-head that was on fire, the torso was fine, intact. Apparently in possession of its motor functions. Even as the thing controlling it burned, it moved just fine.

I got up, cradling my right arm. It felt numb, between the attack on that shoulder and the arm itself, the blood loss must have been draining it dry. I was slick with sweat, and had to brush damp, clumped hair out of my face.

The zombie was falling apart. Its arms held more limply than before, its shoulders slouched, a puppet on looser strings. But it still stood, even as its centipede head twisted and contorted in pain, letting out a glass-shattering screech.

If I tried to grapple it again I’d just burn to death, even ignoring the damage the centiped would do trying to crawl inside me to find shelter from physics itself.

But it was between me and the front door to the building, and I didn’t have an escape route except back into the lab, where it would no longer be on fire. I didn’t have any other options but to fight it one more time.

I stared it down. It took a half-step back, readying for a charge.

And then the door slammed open behind it.

Lucas was there. Lab-coated, furious. I didn’t know if he’d seen the chaos through the windows, heard the screaming, or was just coming here anyway. I knew this meant I was caught, but all I could feel was relief. Better him than the zombie.

He took the situation in in an instant. Saw me dripping with blood, the burning monster. Schreck standing there bewildered, the laboratory door slamming shut behind him by atmospheric pressure.

He looked to the statue of Anchorhold in the little alcove in the corner, the one that had given me the protective blessing. He grabbed the stone anchor.

And beat the zombie with it until it stopped moving.

He hit it in the kneecap first, bowling it over, and then slammed the heavy stone idol over the burning centipede with one, two, three vicious crunches. It was left smouldering away on the ceramic tile flooring.

His chest heaved from the exertion before slowly settling, staring down at his hands, covered in black ichor and ash. He spat on the body, slowly pushing himself to standing.

“Bloody security deities. What am I paying you for if you don’t stop shit like this?”