(I)
Slydes barely slipped back into the woods in time; he'd just finished checking the head shacks where Jonas grew his pot, when-Goddamn! Not her again!-the skinny woman in the black one-piece turned the corner. Slydes ducked behind the trees. If he'd been a second slower, the woman would have seen him.
What the fuck is she doing in there?
She seemed intent on something, a half smile on her face as she bopped up to the first door. She's spending an awful lot of time in there…
Slydes noticed that she was holding something. It looked like a piece of pink string draped over her pen.
"Come on, worm," she absently remarked. "Let's see what you're all about." And then she went into the building.
Worm? Slydes thought. Is that what she said? So the pink string was a worm, obviously a dead one. But now that Slydes thought about it, the worm was the same color of the thing that had landed on Ruth two nights ago, and the same color of the worm they'd stepped on in Jonas's dope shack, but a lot longer.
And…
Ruth said something about snakes, too, didn't she? Giant snakes that were… pink…
Giant pink snakes? Or maybe giant pink worms…
He caught himself. Don't be an ass. There'd be all kinds of worms on an island like this. Not to mention that Ruth was fried crispy from drugs. The dumb-ass girl had hallucinations all the time.
He couldn't ignore the coincidence, though. Ruth harped about pink snakes, and now here was this skinny chick with the frizzed-out hair walking into the head shack with a pink worm…
Longest fucking worm I've ever seen…
He felt too lousy to dwell on it, though. He had a doozy of a fever now; his nose was running and stuffed up, and the headache throbbed constantly. He was out here trying to find Jonas so they could get out of here, but there'd been no sign of him yet. Fuckin' low-life pothead brother, fuckin' everything up. We wouldn't be out here now if it weren't for him and his damn souped-up dope. He slipped away from the old missile buildings. If we'd never come to this damn island, I wouldn't be sick…
But he knew he couldn't go anywhere until he'd found his brother.
Slydes searched for another hour, branches swiping at his face, vines threatening to trip him. Toward noon, the humidity was soup-thick; Slydes poured sweat. Just when he thought he'd keel over from the heat, he found a narrow freshwater stream. He thunked to his knees, then cupped cool water into his mouth and over his face. That's the ticket!
Then he looked down into the water and saw some inch-long worms crawling about.
The worms were pink.
If he'd had anything in his stomach, he would've vomited. Instead, he trudged away, revolted.
This island's a pile of shit…
Slydes's heart almost burst when a hand grabbed his wrist.
"Aw, brother, we are seriously fucked," the low, guttural voice told him. Slydes jerked away from the clammy hand.
It was Jonas.
Jesus…
Jonas stood leaning against a tree, his skin yellow like a bruised banana, but dotted with brilliant red spots.
"What-" Slydes gulped back some nausea. "What happened to you?"
"Them things, you know? Them little yellow buggers. Some of them, when they bite you, they change your insides. And some of 'em are just… eggs."
"Eggs? What the hell are you talking about, Jonas? You're talking crazy." Slyde's power of cognition was on a rough track. "Where you been? You left the boat a night and a half ago, and we haven't seen you since."
Jonas kept on the subject. "They're eggs for the worms."
Worms, Slydes thought in the back of his head. Worms…
"You've seen 'em."
Slydes's eyes widened in thought. The skinny chick, with the pink worm…
"One fell on Ruth the other night, and then we saw that smaller one near my plants." Jonas's watery eyes looked like wads of phlegm. "They're using us, Slydes. We're the subjects for their experiment."
"You're not talkin' sense!" Slydes yelled hard. "Experiments? Subjects? Man, we gotta get off this island! It's all fucked up, brother!"
"There were two parties of college kids who got here before us." Jonas scratched at the red dots on his arms. "They're all toast now-except for the big one. Usually a host'll kick the bucket after a couple of days, a week, maybe. But that big one's still walkin' around here. So just remember that, Slydes. The big one."
"The fuck you talkin' about? Big one?"
"Big, big guy. Like a football player. I guess he adapted better than most. Shit, maybe he changed over completely, ain't gonna die at all. He's a big guy. Watch out for him. He's trompin' around here like a fuckin' zombie."
The words dragged Slydes's memory back like something on a hook. Big guy. Like a zombie. Ruth had said the same exact thing. And she'd also said a bunch of shit about-
"Tell me about the worms…'
"They're the whole experiment, Slydes. And like I said-we're the subjects. Any poor fucker who's dumb enough to come to this island… becomes part of the experiment them guys are doing."
Slydes's voice ground like gravel. "What guys?"
"You ain't see 'em? They sneak out every now and then to check on things. Military guys. Army, navy, I ain't sure. They're wearin' these camouflage rubber suits, and gas masks."
Slydes just stared at the information his brother had given him. "Shit, man-" Jonas's knees shook, and sweat made his yellowed face shine like baby oil. With difficulty, he sat down at the base of the tree. "Ahh, yeah, that's better. You gotta get your ass out of here now, Slydes. Get out of here before I turn over."
"What do you mean, turn over?"
"I been infected by those yellow things. They look like fat ticks, and they got red spots on 'em."
Slydes suddenly felt like he had a belly full of spoiled meat. He knew what his brother was talking about. Dread nearly closed his throat off. "Jonas, I picked a couple of the selfsame things off my body the other night. Am-am-am… I infected too?"
"You ain't turning yellow so probably not. Maybe you got 'em off before they could bite. When they bite they inject this shit in your blood… that changes you. Changes you yellow. Changes your insides… so the worms can grow in you better."
Slydes looked at his arms, saw no signs of the insane infection that had stricken his brother.
"But it also changes your brain, too, after enough time's passed. I ain't there yet, but I will be. It's almost like you start to take on the instincts of the worms."
"You mean like that little one in the pot house? And I just saw some more in that creek, little tiny things."
"Them's the worms I mean."
"But-but… but Ruth said she saw some worms ten feet long. That ain't true, is it? Tell me it ain't true."
Jonas grinned through gray teeth. "It's true. Them little tiny things in the creek? They grow fast, and they grow big."
"Not ten feet!" Slydes protested.
"Oh, shit, man-they get bigger than that."
The information wasn't what Slydes needed to hear.
"The big ones are the worst, 'cause they need to eat more. They dissolve your insides, brother, and then suck it out. That's what they eat. They choose smaller people to lay their eggs in, and bigger people to eat." Jonas's brow popped up. "And you're a pretty big guy, Slydes. So what I'm sayin' is you gotta get your ass off this island right now. Get Ruth off too. And leave. Now While you still got a chance."
'I'm taking you with me, get you to a doctor back on the mainland."
Jonas shook his head. His yellow finger trembled when he slipped a reefer from his pocket and shakily lit it up. "It's too late for me. Get out before I change more, 'cause you know what happens then?"
"What?" Slydes croaked.
"I'll come for ya. I'll try to infect you. Watch." Jonas coughed wetly into his hand, then showed it to his brother. Amid the wad of appalling phlegm, several of the yellow things twitched. Jonas picked one out and popped it between his fingers. "This one here, it ain't got a worm in it 'cause it's one of the ones that changes you. That white stuff inside."
Slydes saw white strings in the slime.
"It changes your cells or something, to make you a better host." He popped another one. "Ah, here's one. Here's a fertile one. See, Slydes, some of these things have the white stuff, and some of 'em have worms. This one's got a worm. Look."
Slydes could barely do so… but he looked anyway. In the dab of muck hanging off his brother's fingers, he saw the tiniest bright pink worm wriggling away.
"How do you know all this stuff?" Slydes asked.
Jonas's head tilted at the question. "I think because I'm changing. The more I change, the more of the worm's instinct I get in my brain, I guess." Jonas scraped the crap off his hand and got back to his reefer. "Get out of here now, brother… before I try to infect you with the same shit."
Crazy, Slydes thought. It's crazy.
But he knew now that it had to be true.
'Shh!" Jonas bid. "Listen…"
Slydes stood still.
He could hear something rustle, and when he looked through some trees, the brush was stirring.
It was stirring a.lot.
"Go!" Jonas whispered. "One of 'em's coming."
When Slydes saw the pink shine roving beneath the brush, he ran like a madman.
(II)
"Report?"
The major had called them into the security room. He appeared perturbed, but then, he generally did.
"Early this morning we investigated the first structure, where members of the third party have set up a field lab of some kind," the sergeant replied.
"I know, Sergeant. We all saw that on the monitor last night. They look like they're examining something in there. Didn't the colonel order you to find out what they're examining?"
"I did that, sir." He's already in a bad mood. Now it's going to get worse. "They're examining the subject."
"Our subject?"
"Yes, sir."
"Our worm, you're saying? They've found samples of our worm?"
"Yes, sir. And the examples of the motile ova. They were newborn hatchlings."
"Were the members of the party infected during the process?"
"I can't say for sure, sir, but they didn't appear to be."
The major leaned over the table. "Corporal, punch up the camera we have installed there."
"Yes, sir." The corporal put it on the main monitor. "She's in there again, sir." On the screen, the same slender woman was back inside, at the worktable.
'She's in there a lot," the major noted. 'You're sure you found progeny of the subject in there? Are you sure it wasn't something else?"
it was our worm, sir," the sergeant offered. 'They're replicating well, all over the island, and not just in humans. There seem to be many examples of the indigenous animal life that are adaptable. And that's actually good news."
'Yes, it is. But not if we're disclosed." The major wagged his finger at the corporal. 'Play back from the moment she reentered the building."
The corporal hit some buttons, and next they were watching the slender woman in the one-piece swimsuit unlocking the door and walking in.
Draped across an ink pen was a worm.
'1 guess I can't argue with that," the major remarked. "That's definitely one of ours."
"Yes, sir, it is. And they had samples of the ova as well. The ones last night probably weren't big enough to examine closely-not with the field equipment they have on hand, but-"
The sample she just took in there is fairly mature.'
"Yes, sir…
Silence stood with them in the room. Then the major said, if they know about the worm, then they may know about us."
"I don't think so, sir," the sergeant said. "I think they're just zoological scientists on a field excursion. They discovered our subject by accident, and at this point they have no reason to believe it's part of a genetic experiment. If they knew about us, they would have notified some authority."
"You're right." The major was thinking. "And that's our good luck. Turn on the jammers so they can't call out. We can't take any chances-the experiment's gone too well so far. We're going to be leaving soon."
The sergeant nodded. "I'm confident that everyone on the island will be infected by the time we leave."
"I agree, but we only have a few more maturation tests to do in the meantime. Keep an eye on them, and confirm infection." He looked the sergeant dead in the eye. "If you can't confirm one hundred percent infection within twenty-four hours, I want you to go out there and kill whoever's left."
The sergeant and the corporal looked at each other.
The major turned at the door. "I realize that may sound like an unorthodox measure, but it's all in the interests of the mission's ultimate success. Will that be a problem, Sergeant?"
"No, sir. No problem at all."
(III)
"I thought you were going for another swim with Annabelle," Nora posed when Loren ducked into the head shack.
"Yeah, but not till later in the afternoon." He walked in, then looked enthused. "Wow, where'd you get that?"
"Your pretentious blond friend almost stepped on it in the shower earlier."
"Hey, just because I worship her body doesn't mean she's my friend."
.You a betting man?"
"Sure."
"Okay, I'll bet you that before this shoot is over, she's putting overt moves on you."
"You're high," Loren said. "And I'll tell you something. I'm pretty sure she and Lieutenant Trent have something going on."
Nora laughed at the worktable. "You're so perceptive, Loren. What a bright light you are."
"Why do I detect unremitting sarcasm?"
"She and Trent have been doing the naked pretzel since the first night."
The surety of her words stunned him. "Really?"
"Yeah, and she wants to make Trent jealous-she loves games. She has no identity unless she's the center of male attention. That's why she'll be coming on heavy to you soon. Accept it. And don't be a dope. Don't feed her atrocious ego and utter lack of character by responding like a -horny mutt."
Loren's head rose in an arrogant pose. "Hey, just because I'm a few years younger than you doesn't mean that you know more about human romantic behavior."
"No, but the fact that I'm a woman does. I'm betting that she puts hard moves on you and you fall like a house of cards. You'll be absolutely convinced that she's crazy about you. Too chicken to bet?"
"You're on," he said, grinning. "Loser buys dinner at the winner's choice of restaurants."
Nora shook on it. "Now let's stop yacking about that ultraboobed peabrain and take -a look at this."
Loren sat down at the worktable, eyeing the footand-a-half-long worm. "You killed it?"
"No, it was already dead from the seepage at the bottom of the shower stall. Trent sprays it down with bug spray every day since we found those first motile ova." She slid the microscope over to Loren. "And I'm pretty sure we were right last night. This worm here is the same species as the tiny ones from the lobster. Which means we weren't seeing things last night. It's a species that grows at an exponential rate."
Loren's eye lowered to the scope. He went silent for several minutes. "There's no doubt. The pore scheme in the coelum is identical, and so are the mucoid ducts in the parapodal bands." He shook his head in studied amazement. "There's nothing else I've ever seen that's even remotely like this. This size? Good God."
"This is a species that the helminthology community is unawareof," Nora pointed out.
"We've discovered a new annelid." He took his eye away long enough to grin at her. "We get to name it ourselves."
"Yeah, but it's still a rip-off when you think about it."
"What do you mean a rip-off? It's every zoologist's dream to get credit for discovering a new species of animal life."
"Sure, Loren. But look at the fact of the matter. If a paleontologist discovers a new fossil, he makes a fortune. Somebody discovers a new enzyme, a new bacterium, a new friggin' fish-you name it-they make a fortune and they become famous in their field." Nora snorted. "We discover a new worm, and nobody will care."
"Yeah, and we won't make jack shit. But so what? We'll be the stars of the next issue of The American Journal of Worms… for about a month."
All of a sudden the new find seemed almost more trouble than it was worth. But Nora could still retain some level of excitement in their next step. "This one's big enough to dissect. You want the honors?"
"Damn straight."
"Start cutting, Doctor."
Loren got up for the case of exam and dissection implements, as something occurred to Nora. "One thing," she said. "We can't tell the others anything about this."
"You're right. They'd overreact in a big way."
"We'll just tell them the worm is typical and nothing to worry about. Any other way would be-"
Loren laughed. "Can you imagine Annabelle's reaction if she thought there was an undiscovered parasitic worm out here--that doubled in size in twenty minutes? And that they were in her lobster! She'd have a cow!"
"I'd love for her to have a cow, and every other conceivable farm animal," Nora remarked. "But I'd be more worried about Trent. He'd have an army quarantine crew out here."
Loren sat back down and unzipped the dissection kit. With forceps he readjusted the body of the worm across the stage, then applied stage clips. The case contained cutting instruments called microscalpels, which looked nothing like typical scalpels. Honed needles composed the blades, some made of steel, some made of hard resins. The kit also contained intricate pipettes, probes, and section lifters. "Yeah, this one's plenty big enough," Loren muttered. "Let's see what's going on in here…"
Nora waited.
"Same mucoid ducts that we saw on the parapods of the ovum," Loren observed.
"Mucoid ducts in the coelum mean it's a skinbreather-like an earthworm," Nora said, cruxed.
Loren daintily cut some more. "Plus gill sacs connected to the secondary dorsomentral channels. So we were right again. It can breathe air and also process oxygen when it's in seawater. Like lungworms and snakeheads. And it's definitely not a Polychaeta." He pushed the microscope over to Nora, frustrated. "I can't even guess what the family is on this thing."
Nora changed the numerical aperture and upped the light field. With microshears and a teasing needle, she peeled back the layers of the worm's coelum-its outer musculature that served as skin as well as the main sensory organ carrier. "This looks like a roundworm but demonstrates features of other nematodes and an nelids. No evidence of triphasic rhythm fibers. Part land rover, part free-range seaworm, but the outer physicality smacks of what we thought last night. Roundworms. Pink from oxygen saturation-"
"The Trichinella family."
"Um-hmm, and that's impossible because no Trichinella, nor Trichina, exists without triphasic rhythm."
Loren laughed, if a bit nervously. "When we discover a new species of worm, we sure do pick doozies."
Nora wasn't laughing. "Plus motile ova, plus chitinpenetrating digestive enzymes." She didn't say anything more, but jacked the microscope to its full 400x magnification. "Damn, what I wouldn't give for an SEM, or even just a scope that cranked to a thousand or fifteen hundred."
"Tell me about it."
Nora went silent again, then slid the scope back to Loren. "Tell me what you see."
Loren looked. "Muscular symmetry that looks both radial and spiral," he declared.
They both sat a minute, saying nothing. Only experts of their kind knew the ramifications. "This can only mean its motile ova are bifunctional. A mutator. Like-"
"Like a fair share of Trichinosis species. And if we're right, then these things can easily infect humans… I'm going to check the midlevel striations now." He cut some more, then said, "My hands are full. Get something to gently raise the stage clip, will you?"
The kit lay on the other side of Loren, so Nora looked around for a pen or something small to lift the clip. Damn… There was nothing near her. She slipped her finger in the key pocket of her swimsuit, but the only thing in it was that small, corded metal strip she'd found the other day. This'll have to do, she thought, and used it to raise the stage clip.
"What's that thing?" Loren asked, obviously seeing it under magnification.
"Something I stepped on in the woods. Not sure what it is. Trent said he thinks it's a calibration tool for an old army radio."
"It's got some funny markings on it," Loren told her. "Okay, thanks. Lower the clip now."
Funny markings? She took the metal strip away and decided to look at it under the other microscope. "You're right," she said, focusing. "What are those markings?"
"They're raised, like Braille almost," Loren said back while still concentrating on the next incision. "Reminded me more of a bar code or something. Trent said it was a radio tool?"
"Yeah. But he wasn't certain."
"Looks more like a key to me."
"That's what I thought too," she murmured, and looked more closely at the object beneath the magnifier.
The markings looked like this:
"Forget about that thing," Loren said next. "I just found the stomach process and the enzymatic sac."
"Did you puncture it?"
"Yeah, and guess what? The fluid is sizzling. It's even smoking a little."
The chitin penetrator," Nora said.
Then Loren said, "Holy shit. It's not burning the glass slide, but the stuff melted the tip of my probe."
"Is the probe tip made of resin?"
"No. Stainless steel."
"Strong stuff," Nora commented. But this wasn't terribly surprising. There were a number of invertebrates that possessed highly corrosive stomach enzymes: to burn through the shells of animals they were attacking, and to even burn burrows into coral. "Remember that article we read about the Norwegian lugworm? It released its enzymes all at once and burned a hole through the aquarium's slate floor."
"Yeah, slate, but not steel. This is really tough stuff, Nora."
She could see threads of smoke rising up from Loren's microscope slide. "Can you drip some onto the floor?"
With larger forceps, he kept the dead worm crimped to the slide, then lifted it all off the stage. Careful not to dribble any on his fingers, he tipped the slide. Several drops of the brownish fluid plipped onto the concrete floor.
Threads of smoke began to rise.
"Jesus," Nora said. She grabbed another probe and ran it across the smoking drops. "This stuff is really tough. It's burned some small indentations into the cement."
"We'll have to be very careful getting some more of these things to take back to the college," Loren said.
"I wonder what the preferred habitat is. Water or land?"
"Probably water. Something that gets this big isn't going to settle for beetles and bugs to eat. It'll go after larger crustaceans, the bigger meal ticket."
Like the lobster, she recalled. "When you're out looking for more bristleworms with Annabelle, keep an eye out for more of these. It'd be great to get some live ones to take back."
"I'll find some." Loren felt sure. "And speaking of that, I better start getting ready. Annabelle will probably want to start the next shoot soon."
`See Spot run," Nora said. "And don't forget our bet."
"Oh, I won't. You'll drop big money when you lose that one," Loren said. Then he winked and left.
Poor fool, Nora thought. The ignorance of youth.
She continued dissecting the worm… and continued to find physical features that seemed to borrow from several different species: epidermal pores to draw in oxygen from the air-like an earthworm-but also gill filters for water breathing-around intercoelic channels that stored seawater-like free-ranging Polychaetes. Ovaries that produced independent motile ova were possessed of many roundworm species-like the Trichinella classes-while the worm's physical appearance, too, looked like some of the nonmarine orders of Trichinella and Trichina.
On its own, though, Nora knew that the specimen could not be any of those.
Almost like a genetic hybrid, her mind whispered.
When she'd dissected all she could, she jarred the worm in preservatives and spent the next hour inputting notes into her laptop. That's when Trent walked in.
"Going for a swim?" Nora asked, for the lieutenant was wearing trunks and an olive-drab army T-shirt.
"Yeah, I might as well," he replied. "I've been stationed in Florida for the last ten years, but I don't think I've even been to the beach more than a few times. I thought I'd tag along with Annabelle and Loren, while they're looking for their scarlet bristleworms."
"Have fun."
"But I wanted to show you this first." He approached the table and handed her something. "Is that like the thing you mentioned?"
Nora placed it in her palm and knew at once. "The little camera lens, yeah. The one I saw was stuck in a tree, almost like it had been nailed into the bark."
"Same thing here, but I pried this one out. Originally I thought it must've been an electric-eye sensor, or maybe an infrared perimeter alarm, but I don't see any terminals on it."
"I didn't see any on the one I saw either. No connection posts or anything to hook wires to. When the army was using these things, how did they establish a circuit?"
"Beats me. But there does seem to be glass in the head, like a lens."
"I know," she said next. "Let me take a closer look…"
She placed the cigarette-butt-sized object on the microscope stage, then focused down.
"Yes, it's definitely rounded, polished glass. A bulb, maybe, an indicator light?"
"Can't imagine that. In the woods? And what would the power source be? See any terminals on it, or anything like a hole for wires to go in?"
Nora studied the odd cylinder more closely. "Nothing on the sides or on the butt end."
"See if there's any markings on it. I'll bet there's a defense contractor's name on it somewhere, or an army property line," Trent said.
Nora slowly revolved the object on the stage with forceps. "Wait a minute." She paused. "There is something."
"What's it say?"
Nora rubbed her eyes and got up. She bid Trent to sit. "Tell me if you've ever seen that before."
Trent sat down and put his eye to the scope.
What Nora had seen was oddly familiar. Etched along the object's side were markings like this: