It Lives Again (20 page)

Eugene was on the chair, reaching up, trying to dislodge the trapdoor. He was determined. Something was up there and he was going to find out what it was. He used one hand to push the door up, the other to hold the gun steady.

Suddenly it opened! Eugene turned his head as a mound of dust and dirt settled on him, some of it getting in his eyes. Never mind, the trapdoor was open! He must climb up into it now, head first.

He repositioned himself, and using the wall stud for a brace, stepped up onto the back of the chair. That gave him added height, and then he pushed himself up slowly but surely, raising himself up into that crawl hole. He had to get his hand up, then an elbow, pulling himself up with great effort; his back still hurting badly from the slashes he’d received so recently.

Jody was coming up the staircase, intent on reaching Eugene before he did something to her baby. In her haste she tripped on a step. She righted herself and, determined, moved on, mumbling, virtually incoherent. “It’s ours,” she said. “We have to find out . . . we have to find out first. It may have come to love us . . . Eugene,” she screamed as she stumbled again. “Eugene!”

Eugene, holding the light cord, was climbing up into the crawl hole! Suddenly there was a flurry, a flash of something at him. A screech, and a large bird flew out of the crawl hole into the closet! A bird had been trapped in the attic of the house, a bird that had flown in through that hole in the roof and was seeking a way out!

Eugene stumbled and the chair turned over. He fell to the floor of the closet, filthy from the dirt from above. He was shaken but still conscious. The bird was flying frantically around the small closet, crashing into the walls and into Eugene, his hands up to protect himself from the maddened bird.

Jody rushed into the room. She heard the commotion in the closet. She ran to it, crying, “Don’t hurt it, don’t hurt it!”

She pulled open the closet door, fully expecting to see her infant; instead she saw this crazed bird flying at her. It brushed her, narrowly missed hitting her directly in the face.

“Agggggh!!” she screamed, terrified.

The bird flew out of the closet door into the room. From the floor Eugene was screaming up at Jody, “Open a window, open a window.”

Recovering, Jody rushed to the window, unlocked it, started to open it. But the window had been painted shut and wouldn’t budge! The bird was insane with fright now, flying back and forth in the smallish room, banging itself into walls, screeching, clawing, trying to find a way out.

“Help me!” Jody screamed, still trying to open the window. “It’ll kill itself!”

Eugene, on his feet now, moved toward the window to help Jody. Despite the chaos, he was still able to think rationally and to tell Jody what must be done.

“Call them back,” he shouted. “Quick, before they get here. Tell them it’s a false alarm.”

“Never mind that,” said Jody, still trying to get the window open. “Help me!”

Eugene was at the window now, tugging, trying to get it to open. Suddenly he realized what she had done.

“You didn’t call them, did you?”

“Why should I?” Jody screamed, both of them still yanking at the stuck window, the bird flying madly about them. “Don’t you see, the mistakes have all been ours. We have to give it a chance. It may be coming to us for help, for love.”

“Sure,” retorted Eugene. “Everybody who believed that, Davis included, was murdered by them!”

“We don’t know what happened with Frank. I don’t care what the others did. This baby is ours,” she cried.

The tension between them was accentuated by the smashing against the walls, the flurry, the noise.

Eugene, desperate, sure that if he didn’t get that bird out of there right now he would go mad, pushed Jody away.

“Get out of the way,” he roared. He grabbed both handles of the window, twisted it, pounded it, until finally he managed to pull the window open wide enough to let the bird out. But instead, he let something in! Something leaped through the window at him the very instant it was opened!

It happened so fast that Eugene and Jody saw only a flash of it at first. They knew what it was, more by the sound, the growl, than by anything else. As the bird flew out to freedom, Eugene and Jody stood there staring at this creature, their offspring, their only child!

Jody spoke first. She moved toward it, clearing her throat, trying to show the infant she was not afraid.

“Forgive me,” she said.

“Jody, don’t,” warned Eugene.

Jody ignored him. She moved closer. “Forgive me,” she said again.

“Jody, I’m telling you, stay back,” cried Eugene.

Jody saw a flash out of the side of her eye. She turned. Eugene had pulled out his gun and was standing there aiming it at their child!

“Gene, throw it away. Throw away your gun,” she begged. “Let him see you throw it away. He’ll understand. Please! Try it!” she pleaded.

“Are you crazy?” he shouted. “Are you crazy? This has nothing to do with us! This thing, it’ll kill you, don’t you understand? It’ll kill both of us!”

“Please, Gene, please,” she screamed.

Eugene wavered a moment, looking at the infant. For the first time he really looked at this monstrosity that was his. He saw the eyes, suddenly seeing there not only their malevolence but their understanding as it followed and seemed to comprehend the battle raging between its mother and father—hoping, it seemed to Eugene, that its mother would prevail, that its father would throw away the gun, that the father and mother would welcome their child to them.

Then he did it! Eugene threw the gun, clattering, into the corner.

Jody smiled. “Thank you,” she said.

The infant growled.

“No, no,” Jody said, turning to it. “You see, he threw the gun away. Your father doesn’t want to hurt you. He loves you. You understand that, don’t you? You see, he does.”

Jody moved closer. “Careful,” Eugene warned.

“We were all afraid,” Jody said, inching nearer. “That’s what it was. But now we know you wouldn’t hurt us. Now we want to touch you, to hold you. Let me touch you.” She drew closer, pleading, “Please let me touch you.”

Eugene watched, paralyzed with fear. What if the infant struck? The gun in the corner—could he retrieve it, fire it in time to save his wife?

Jody was on one knee now, reaching out. Those frail, delicate hands; that pale white throat, so vulnerable to attack. And then, in a moment, she had the infant in her arms. The mother’s arms enclosed it . . . and it began to cry!

“There, there,” said Jody to her baby, “it’s all right, everything is all right . . . You see,” she said, looking up at Eugene, “it didn’t want to hurt us. It wants us . . . it wants us to hold it. Come and hold it, Gene, please. It’s just as Frank Davis said. He didn’t die for nothing, Gene. He was right.”

Eugene watched the scene unfolding before him, his wife holding, loving, this strange, alien thing. What should he do?

Jody continued to talk softly, pleadingly, knowing instinctively that the survival of her baby was directly linked to her husband’s support. “Touch it, Gene, hold it, feel it in your arms, and you’ll know.” Eugene began to move slowly but surely toward the mother and infant.

When he reached her, Jody handed him the baby.

Taking it, he shuddered for a moment; a visible tremor as a shock wave passed through him. And then the mother and father and baby were united; holding one another, all three of them sank to the floor. A sound from the baby, not a growl really, more like a moan.

“No, no, it’s all right now. Everything’s going to be all right now,” Jody cooed, holding her baby, holding her husband, her life together again . . .

Above them, the length of that tree-covered hill away, Mallory had seen the open window. Nothing going in or coming out of it, just the window open to the night air.

“I tell you,” he said, insisting to Perkins, the other policemen, and several scientific advisors at the vantage point, “it’s some kind of signal. That’s what it is. Why else would the window be wide open this time of night?”

“They’re probably hot,” said Perkins. “If anything was wrong they would have phoned.”

Mallory ignored Perkins and addressed his remarks more to the scientists, the men of reason, trying to convince them. “If you were afraid of something getting into the house, would you leave the window wide open? Would you?”

Silence from the scientists. Finally, a dark-complexioned man offered, “Not likely, unless you wanted the thing in the house, or just as likely, if it was already there.”

“Exactly,” said Mallory. “That’s exactly what I think. I’m going to make the call.”

“You’re going to blow it,” said Perkins.

“You think so?” said Mallory, reaching for the telephone. “Well, I don’t. I don’t think so at all.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

In the San Fernando Valley, in the industrial section of Van Nuys, in a small warehouse-type building a scant five miles away from the small Colonial cottage, a crew sat waiting.

The phone rang, the phone that had been installed just days before exclusively for this call. A man garbed in protective clothing reached over, instantly picking it up on the first ring.

“Fredricks,” he said.

“Roll it,” said a voice, Mallory’s voice. “You hear me, roll it!”

That was all. The phone clicked dead.

“Let’s go,” said the man, getting quickly to his feet.

With Fredricks in the lead, seven members of his crew, all dressed in the same type of protective clothing, charged out the door and into the night.

Outside the building, a huge sign in the parking lot carried the name of Mr. Fredricks’s place of business: FREDRICK’S EXTERMINATING SERVICE.

Under that was depicted a series of different kinds of bugs, each with human-like faces and all in different states of discomfort as the lettering proclaimed loudly: WE KILL ANYTHING THAT WALKS, CRAWLS, OR JUST LIES THERE.

Below the sign, policemen sitting in two squad cars turned to watch Fredricks and his crew run from the building.

“It’s on,” Fredricks yelled.

Requiring no further explanation, the squad cars sirened their way into the dark city streets, serving as escorts for the three trucks that followed, heading quickly and efficiently for their rendezvous somewhere in those dark hills up ahead.

After lying crouched together on the floor for an endless length of time, Eugene and Jody Scott had brought their baby downstairs.

Eugene had set a fire, and the amber glow cast soft shadows on his and Jody’s faces as they sat cross-legged in front of the fire. Eugene held the baby, slowly explaining to it, comforting it, telling it what he would do for it.

“I’m a lawyer,” he said. “You don’t know what that is, do you?”

He paused as if expecting the baby to reply. Jody watched her husband, loving him for what he was saying, what he was going to do.

“I can go to court, before a judge. I can fight this. Even animals have something called the humane society to protect them. I’ll find something. I’ll use the law to stop them.”

The baby began to moan softly. Jody took it carefully from her husband. “He wants to sleep.” She smiled. “He hasn’t slept in such a long, long time.”

Eugene watched his wife cradling the baby, rocking it ever so softly in her arms. She is so happy, he thought. No matter what the price, I have to keep her this happy.

Then he heard it!

“What’s that?” he said.

“The fire.” Jody nodded in that direction.

Then he heard it again, a strange crackling sound like a fire, but not really. More like the crackle of plastic or cellophane.

Eugene stood up. He looked around the small living room. Nothing!

No place else to look, so he moved toward the window.

He heard it again. Louder now!

He pulled back the drape, expecting to see into the dark front yard.

Instead he saw nothing! The view from the window had been obliterated, blacked out! Something dark, frightening, had been put over the window, over the house. He heard them now, a flutter of activity, men working.

Eugene turned to face Jody, who was now aware that something was wrong. “Oh, my God.” He hissed the phrase, little more than air escaping from his tightened throat.

Jody was on her feet, the baby still in her arms. She stared at her husband.

“What?” she demanded. “What?”

Outside, working quickly and quietly, Fredricks’s crew, with the aid of the police, had almost completely enclosed the house from top to bottom under a tent of heavy-duty, completely opaque plastic material, making the small house virtually airtight.

Even now two men waited on the roof, next to the chimney, as a truck backed into place. The warning on the side of the truck clearly read: “DANGER—CHEMICALS—METHANE GAS.”

Inside, Eugene answered Jody. The rumble of the truck coming closer partly obscured his answer. “They’re here.”

Still holding the infant, Jody crossed the room to see for herself. As she did, a figure appeared from the small kitchen to her left.

It was Mallory! Gun at the ready, he motioned to Jody and the baby. “Put it down,” he said.

Instantly Eugene started to move, to get in between Mallory and his wife and the baby. “Hold it,” Mallory warned.

“It isn’t hurting anyone,” Eugene said. “Can’t you leave it alone?”

Mallory ignored him; that question, as far as he was concerned, was not worthy of an answer.

“You can still get through the kitchen window, same as I,” he said. “They haven’t sealed it off yet.”

“Sealed it? What do you mean?” Jody screamed, not understanding what was happening.

“Listen,” said Mallory, addressing both Jody and Eugene. “There’s a truck full of poison gas out there. Right now they’re backing it up to the house. You’re smart enough, you figure it out.”

The truck was now in place and the house, except for the kitchen window, completely airtight.

On the roof, the hose from the truck was being inserted into the chimney of the house.

“It’s ready,” cried Fredricks, on the roof.

“Start pumping,” yelled a police official on the ground.

“No, wait!” said Perkins, standing by. “They’re still in there!”