Dark Dream

17. Bring Back the Head

I collect  small parts

Have a penchant  for hearts

and the slippery coil of your spine.

They all levelled their guns at what they'd thought was a muddy football. It turned out to be a head. And what a head, it was....

Their minds instinctively crawled, repulsed and fearful. None of their training or years of experience in the field could prepare them the moments that lay ahead.

Cautiously, they approached. Shuffling through the prevailing dark, trying to ignore the feeling that their high-tech weapons and gadgets still left them feeling under-equipped and naked in the face of this unknown enemy.

Multiple LED beams, secured to their guns, revealed the entirety of the monster's head in stark relief. Accompanying laser dots merrily danced with the heartbeat of all four operators, picking out the dust motes that fell from the red Victorian brickwork above their heads. Dust that the creature had displaced in its frenzy to be free.

They coughed fought the desire to spit out the film that gathered on their tongues and throats. The stench of the sewer was unbearable. It took all their willpower not to puck onto the head they now revealed.

Bring back the head, they'd been told.

The camera footage from this locale had been relayed the observers above. It had shown the trap go off.  The rest of the body, minus the head, had kept on going. It had ripped its own head off and carried on running as if nothing had happened, blindly bumping into things as it ran. 

Unbelievable, they'd thought, while looking at the computer screens.

Little did they know just how unbelievable things could get.

They'd come into the sewers from both directions. Two on each team, meeting in the middle. None of them had spotted the body that went with the head they now looked upon. This was weird. They'd expected a head, thought it was a football, and now found something even more bizarre and terrifying.

"Jesus, what is it?"

"I'm not sure. But whatever it is, it's still alive."

They all gazed in amazement at the custom built steel jaws that cradled the abomination now smiled back at them. It looked like the cat that got the cream and then ate its master.

Its face was long, its head hairless. The skin looked greasy, a film of sweat-smeared-dirt covering every available inch. Steam rose from its grimy cranium. Wet slits made up its eyes, like black, shiny marbles. It had no eyelashes, or eyebrows, to speak of. Watery blackness stared back at them, knowing and unafraid. It showed no pain.

Openly, it mocked them.

This fact overshadowed any small triumph they should have felt. Despite all their gear (both standard and custom) they none-the-less felt naked in the face of this abomination. 

"Look at its mouth." One of them said, although they were all thinking the same. "Are those teeth? You've got to be shitting me?"

They were all crowding round at this point. All kept a respectable distance. They all had the irrational fear of it lurching their way. Either that or that of it flicking out a long, snake, tongue, to catch them unawares like flies.

No ears could be seen, only dark pits where ears should be. However, the mouth drew their gaze the most. Set within the large grinning mouth, which cut its face in two, there were what appeared to be small thumbs. Human thumbs.

Within these thumbs, there were slits and within these slits, there were pointy slithers of rigid metal. Sharp like razorblades.

Binding this strange graft of thumb and blade, there were dark strands of black nylon or plastic. It dug into the flesh of the pale thumbs, making sure that each strand would not stray from their function and the strange mutilation that had befallen them.

"What the.....!! It has thumbs instead of teeth," exclaimed one of them. It was a sentiment they all felt. "My God, it's grinning at us--it's still alive."

"That's sick," another agreed, fighting back the urge to flee.

"Let's shoot it, send it back to the hell it came from," one of the four interjected.

His name was John and he was one of the youngest and most jumpy of the crew. As he stood pointing the gun at this nightmarish spectacle, he felt every hair on his neck bristle with fear. The tension he felt made his balls shrivel and his gut feel like jelly.

The head's leering face stared defiantly into their blinding beams of light. It seemed to have no fear,  of them or its situation  It could not run or fight but John knew if it could do either, it would do so out of choice, rather than base fear.

They were all thinking the same thing. It was not as if they strictly needed it to be alive. Indeed, no mention had been made of a living head.

Whatever was left, the scientists could pore over.  But to let this demon go on living struck them all as an abomination against nature. Against God, even.

Those thumbs were tiny like a child's or small woman and it was openly laughing at their disgust and fear. Its eyes danced with dark merriment, basking in the turmoil it gleefully created. 

The madness and anger grew within each of them. A strong impulse was growing among them to strike back at this unknown but strangely familiar enemy.

One of the four radios they held crackled to life. "Come in, Team Leader. Are you reading me?" Time seemed to stretch before them.

*   *   *

There was no reply to the call but this in itself told them that all discipline and professionalism had just gone. They'd heard every exchange and knew that something had possessed the team that encircled the head.

With only a few commands, they mobilized a reserve team in response to this new development.