The Thing (22 page)

"Palmer and I are getting on it." He started running up the corridor.

The flashlight beam seemed weak and on the verge of failing as the two men stumbled down the short flight of stairs leading to the generator room. At the bottom Macready hesitated, turned and searched the darkness with the light.

"Sanders. Where's Sanders?"

They examined the stairway together, then the floor and walls of the generator room. Sanders was gone.

Palmer took a step back the way they'd come and asked unenthusiastically, "Want me to go look for him?"

"No. Not now," Macready said impatiently. "We've got to get this mother going first, then we can go looking for people."

They approached the silent mass of metal. It squatted like an armored dinosaur in the middle of the floor. The smell of diesel, thick and noxious, was everywhere. But it was fading rapidly.

Palmer used the light, inspecting components. The beam lingered on an open space near the base.

"The fuel pump's gone." Panic cracked his voice. "You've got to get up to Supply and find another unit, Mac. If we don't get this thing started soon it'll freeze up on us and we'll never get it going."

"What about the auxiliary?"

"I know what's been done to this. I don't know about the other."

"You sure about the pump? That's all that's missing?"

The flashlight beam retraced its path across the generator. "I think so. I don't see anything else. This is really Childs's department."

"Childs is busy," Macready reminded his assistant. "Hang on. I'll be back as fast as I can."

"You want my light?"

Macready glanced at his own feeble beam. "No, you keep it. Make sure nothing else has been jimmied." He turned and rushed up the stairs, heedless of tripping in the near dark.

Palmer just waited. It occured to him that he was all alone in the lowest, most isolated area of the compound.

Hell, get your mind on something else, he told himself.

Holding the flashlight tightly in one hand, he lay down on his back and edged under the generator. At least he could make sure everything else was ready to go.

Of course there was always the chance Macready might not return for a while. He might get distracted. Or something might distract him. Palmer furiously began tightening screws, regardless of whether or not they were loose.

Childs paced the rec room floor, swatting his sides to keep warm. The temperature was falling rapidly, the Antarctic night leaching the heat from the compound despite the multiple layers of insulation designed to keep it at bay. The torch lay on the card table, adding a little heat, its blue glow barely reaching to the corners of the room. Copper sat by himself on the couch.

At least he'd stopped that infernal giggling, Childs mused gratefully.

Macready charged out of the supply room, juggling his flashlight and a new solid pump unit, and promptly careened off another body.

"Who . . . who's that? Who goes there?"

There was no reply. The dim silhouette hurried off down the hallway.

"Sanders? That you? You flipped out again, man? It's okay . . . it's me, Macready. Hey, who . . ."

A dim voice drifted up from the other direction. "Mac?" Palmer sounded anxious. "That you, Mac? Where the hell is that pump?"

"Coming!" He threw a last look down the hallway, but saw only darkness. Then he was running for the generator room,

So intent was he on protecting the fuel pump that he nearly fell in his haste to get down the few stairs. Palmer's light beckoned from beneath the generator. Macready dropped to his knees and put the unit close to the other pilot. Palmer backed out and joined him in tearing at the box.

"This going to do it?" Macready asked him. Palmer was studying the exposed unit.

"It's not the same."

"Hell." Macready started to rise. "I'll go look again."

"No, no," Palmer grabbed his arm and held him back. "I mean, it's made by a different manufacturer than the missing unit. It'll fit."

Macready breathed a sigh of relief. "Shit, Palmer, don't do that to me."

"Hold the light for me, will you?" Palmer reached in and grabbed his own flashlight and handed it to Macready. Then he wormed his way back underneath.

"A little higher, Mac." Macready raised the twin beams. Palmer's hands came into view. Their breath was already starting to freeze as the temperature continued to fall.

He held the lights as steady as he could while Palmer worked with increasingly clumsy, numb fingers.

"Somebody definitely messed with it." A hose clamp was slipped into place, tightened.

"We going to make it?"

"Hope so. Another fifteen minutes." Palmer was beginning to sound more confident. "Wonder what happened to the auxiliary. What I don't get is—"

He was interrupted by a violent, thunderous screeching. Macready froze. He'd heard that sound twice before now. Once on the tape salvaged from the Norwegian camp, and once far out on the ice. He thought of Bennings as his heart began to hammer against his ribs . . .

Macready had never been so glad to see anything happen in his life as he was to see the lights come back on. Palmer crawled out from beneath the now humming generator, wiping grease off on his pants.

"That should hold it for now, until Childs can get down here and bolt it properly. Where to?"

"Rec room," Macready told him tersely. He was reluctant to abandon the generator room, but had to content himself with slapping a heavy padlock on the door as they exited.

The rec room was crowded by the time they arrived. The congestion, the presence of human bodies, was comforting after the long minutes spent alone with the generator. Neighbor studied neighbor. Palmer, Nauls, and Sanders, spread themselves out as far as possible, putting distance between themselves and everyone else.

Norris and Childs were using nylon ropes to tie the doctor, Clark, and Garry to the couch. Macready cursed himself for not ordering it done sooner. Too late now. He forced himself not to think of what might've happened if he hadn't been able to come up with a replacement fuel pump for the generator.

As Norris and Childs worked on the three prisoners Macready fiddled with the little propane burners he'd scavenged from Supply. They'd be dangerous to operate, but he trusted the makeshift blowtorches more than any of the guns.

"Where were the flashlights?" Sanders was asking him. "What happened to all the flashlights, man?"

"Screw the flashlights," Macready growled at him. "Where the hell were you?"

"I . . . I panicked again, Mac. Just started running, trying to get away. I'm sorry."

"
De nada
. Forget it." He rose, hefted one of the small torches and looked over toward Palmer. "I think these'll work. One of your better ideas."

"Thanks, Mac. But when I was getting the burner tips out of Supply, I noticed, something else. It reminded me that I couldn't find the magneto from chopper one. There's tons of stuff missing. Cables, wire, microprocessor chips . . . all kinds of shit. I didn't think anything of it until I remembered the missing piece from the chopper."

"Now that's funny." Nauls stepped away from the wall. "I've been missing stuff from the kitchen, too. I didn't say anything about it because I didn't think it was important. I mean, what the hell would anybody want with a food processor?"

Macready surveyed the room, counting heads. "Anybody see Fuchs? Or hear him?"

Nobody had. That was clear from their expressions as well as the silence.

Childs was glaring at the station manager as he started to tie the man's arms behind his back. "Where did you go when the lights went out . . . chief?"

Garry was still woozy from the effects of the morphine. "Was dark . . . find a light . . ."

"You lying bastard."

Garry fought the ropes, struggled to his feet. His words were slurred. "I rather don't like your tone . . ." He reached up a free hand and grabbed Childs by the collar.

"You sit back down." The mechanic whaled the station manager with a powerful right hand. Garry managed to half duck the blow, put his head into the bigger man's chest, and threw his weight to one side. The two of them fell backwards over the couch, almost taking Copper with them.

Macready and Norris dove in immediately, the pilot grabbing Childs and Norris wrestling with the dazed but still dangerous station manager.

"Easy, chief, that's enough. Take it easy!"

Somehow Macready managed to shove Childs to one side. "Stop it, man! You hear me? This is just what
it
wants. Are you fighting for it or against it?"

Childs was holding up a fist the size of a toaster; he stared blankly at the pilot as he digested the latter's words. The fist dropped slowly and the mechanic inhaled deeply. When he spoke again he sounded embarrassed.

"Sorry, Mac. I wasn't thinking." But he continued to glare at the station manager.

They were interrupted by a rumbling sound from above. High wind battered at the roofing. Macready glanced at the ceiling and released Childs.

"You all hear that?" He gazed around the room. "I checked Bennings's charts. That storm's going to start ripping any minute. So we don't have much time."

"Time for what?" Norris wanted to know.

Macready walked over to the card table and began distributing the portable blowtorches. He shoved the first one into Norris's stomach. "We've got to find Fuchs. When we find him, we kill him."

Sanders looked shocked, "Why?"

"If he was still one of us he'd have come back here by now. The lights have been on long enough. He hasn't . . . so that means that he can't, or doesn't want to because he isn't Fuchs anymore. If he
has
become one of those things, we've got to get him before he changes into . . . into whatever it can change into.

"Know what I think? I think it's tired of playing around. It knows we've got it stuck here, so there's no reason for it to keep lying low in hopes of stealing a copter or a snowmobile. The only way it can survive now is by making sure we can't finish it off. That means taking care of us. If it can't do that as a man, it may try doing it as itself.

"Remember, we've got less than an hour. I wish I knew how much less." He looked to his right. "Nauls, you and Childs and I'll check the outside shacks," He tossed torches to Palmer and Sanders.

"You two search the compound. Stay together."

Palmer turned a wary gaze on the radio operator. "I ain't going with Sanders."

Sanders's head snapped toward the backup pilot. "Something wrong with me, man?"

Palmer ignored him, avoiding his eyes. "I ain't going with him. I'll go with Childs."

"Well, fuck you, man."

"I ain't going with you!" Palmer's voice was on the edge of hysteria.

"Well who says I want you going with me?" Childs put in gruffly.

Macready stepped between them, angry and out of patience. "Cut the bullshit! We haven't got the time for this. How many times have I got to tell you guys that that's just the way the thing wants us to act. Afraid of each other, paranoid . . . we cut each other's throats and it'll sit back off on the side and laugh itself silly."

Palmer looked like the kid who got caught with his hand in the fudge. "Yeah, I know . . . but I still ain't going with Sanders."

"Okay, okay." Macready made no effort to conceal his disgust. "Sanders, you come with us. Norris, you stay here." He turned to confront the men tied on the couch.

"Any of them move, you fry 'em. And if you hear anything, anything at all that don't sound kosher, you let loose with that siren. We all meet back here in twenty minutes regardless." He lowered his voice meaningfully. "And everybody watches everybody else. Don't get mad, don't fight. Just watch." His eyes met those of close friends. "All clear? Then let's move."

The three men paused above the stairs. The wind blew balefully around them. At least the outside lights were back on, though flashlights were still necessary to illuminate the wooden walkway.

"Okay, watch yourselves now," Macready warned them. A powerful gust of wind gave impetus to his words. "This storm will be on us any minute. I don't want to be stuck out here when it hits.

"Sanders, you check the chemical storage shed." The radio operator nodded and started off to his right across a walkway buried beneath a half inch of slick snow. "Come on, Nauls."

With the cook at his side, the pilot headed up the walkway, leaning into the wind. He'd gone about a yard before he slipped and nearly fell. The flashlight beam was too weak to penetrate the ice-filled night air.

"Light up," he yelled at Nauls. The cook nodded. Each man pulled a flare from his pocket, twisted the head to set it alight. The intense glow brightened their path considerably.

They shuffled onward toward Blair's shed. The guide ropes that flanked the walkway were all that kept them headed in the right direction.

Childs opened the door carefully and peered into the exposed room. Empty. He closed the door quietly, moved a few yards down the hallway and opened the divider. The corridor ahead was also deserted.

"What'd we ever do to these things, anyway?" a voice said close behind him.