Invasion of The Body Snatchers

I turned back to the body on the table. I was getting more and more irritated. I didn't like this; there was something strange about this dead man on the table, but I couldn't tell what, and that only made me angrier. 'Come on, Jack' – I looked at him again. 'I don't see anything but a dead man. Let's cut out the mystery; what's it all about?'

Again he shook his head, frowning pleadingly, 'Miles, take it easy. Please. I don't want to tell you my impression of what's wrong; I don't want to influence you. If it's there to see, I want you to find it yourself, first. And if it isn't, if I'm imagining things, I want to know that, too. Bear with me, Miles,' he said gently. 'Take a good look at that thing.'

I studied the corpse, walking slowly around the table, stopping to look down at it from various angles, Jack, Becky, and Theodora stepping aside out of my way as I moved. 'All right,' I said presently, and reluctantly, apologizing to Jack with the tone of my voice. 'There is something funny about it. You're not imagining things. Or if you are, so am I.' For maybe half a minute longer I stood staring down at what lay on the table. 'Well, for one thing,' I said finally, 'you don't often see a body like this, dead or alive. In a way, it reminds me of a few tubercular patients I've seen – those who've been in sanitariums nearly all their lives.' I looked around at them all. 'You can't live an ordinary life without picking up a few scars, a few nicks here and there. But these sanitarium patients never had a chance to get any; their bodies were unused. And that's how this one looks' – I nodded at the pale, motionless body under the light. 'It's not tubercular, though. It's a well-built, healthy body; those are good muscles. But it never played football or hockey, never fell on a cement stair, never broke a bone. It looks… unused. That what you mean?'

Jack nodded. 'Yeah. What else?'

'Becky, you all right?' I glanced across the table at her.

'Yes.' She nodded, biting at her lower lip.

'The face,' I said, answering Jack. I stood looking down at that face, waxy-white, absolutely still and motionless, the china-clear eyes staring. 'It's not – immature, exactly.' I wasn't sure how to say this. 'Those are good bones; it's an adult face. But it looks' – I hunted for the word, and couldn't find it – 'vague. It looks – '

Jack interrupted, his voice tense and eager; he was actually smiling a little. 'Did you ever see them make medals?'

'Medals?'

'Yeah, fine medals. Medallions.'

'No.'

'Well, for a really fine job, in hard metal,' Jack said, settling into his explanation, 'they make two impressions.' I didn't know what he was talking about or why. 'First, they take a die and make impression number one, giving the blank metal its first rough shape. Then they stamp it with die number two, and it's the second die that gives it the details: the fine lines and delicate modelling you see in a really good medallion. They have to do it that way because that second die, the one with the details, couldn't force its way into smooth metal. You have to give it that first rough shape with die number one.' He stopped, looking firm me to Becky, to see if we were following him.

'So?' I said a little impatiently.

'Well, usually a medallion shows a face. And when you look at it after die number one, the face isn't finished. It's all there, all right, but the details that give it character aren't.' He stared at me. 'Miles, that's what this face looks like. It's all there; it has lips, a nose, eyes, skin, and bone structure underneath. But there are no lines, no details, no character. It's unformed. Look at it!' His voice rose a notch. 'It's like a blank face, waiting for the final finished face to be stamped onto it!'

He was right. I'd never seen a face like that before in my life. It wasn't flabby; you certainly couldn't say that. But somehow it was formless, characterless. It really wasn't a face; not yet. There was no life to it, it wasn't marked by experience; that's the only way I can explain it. 'Who is he?' I said.

'I don't know.' Jack walked to the doorway and nodded out at the basement and the staircase leading upstairs. 'There's a little closet under the stairway; it's walled in with plywood to make a little storage space. It's half full of old junk: clothes in cardboard boxes, burned-out electrical appliances, an old vacuum cleaner, an iron, some lamps, stuff like that. We hardly ever open it. And there are some old books in there, too. I found him in there; I was hunting for a reference I needed, and thought it might be in one of those books. He was lying there, on top of the cartons, just the way you see him now; scared me stiff. I backed out like a cat in a doghouse; got a hell of a bump on the head' – he touched his scalp. 'Then I went back and pulled him out. I thought he might still be alive, I couldn't tell. Miles, how soon does rigor mortis set in?'

'Oh – eight to ten hours.'

'Feel him,' said Jack. In a way he was enjoying himself, as a man will who's made a big promise and is living up to it.

I picked up an arm from the table, by the wrist; it was loose and flexible. It didn't even feel clammy, or particularly cold.

'No rigor mortis,' Jack said. 'Right?'

'That's right,' I said, 'but rigor mortis isn't invariable. There are certain conditions – ' I stopped talking; I didn't know what to make of this.

'If you want,' said Jack, 'you can turn him over, but you won't find any wounds in the back, and there are none in the hair. Not a sign of what killed him.'

I hesitated, but legally I couldn't touch this body, and I picked up the rubber sheet, and tossed it over the body again, half covering it. 'All right,' I said. 'Where to, now? Upstairs?'

'Yeah.' Jack nodded at the doorway, and stood with his hand on the light chain till we'd all filed out.

Up in the living-room, Theodora politely asked us to sit down, went around turning on lamps and placing ash trays, then went into the kitchen and came back in a moment without her apron. She sat down in a big easy chair, Becky and I were on the davenport, and Jack was sitting by the window in a wooden rocking chair, looking down on the town. Almost the whole front wall of his living-room is a single sheet of plate glass, and you could see the lights of the entire town scattered through the hills; it's a nice room.

'Want a drink or anything?' Jack said then.

Becky shook her head, and I said, 'No thanks; you folks go ahead, though.'

Jack said no, glancing at his wife, and she shook her head. Then he said, 'We called you, Miles, because you're a doctor, but also because you're a guy who can face facts. Even when the facts aren't what they ought to be. You're not a man to knock yourself out trying to talk black into white, just because it's more comfortable. Things are what they are with you, as we have reason to know.'

I shrugged, and didn't say anything.

'You got anything more to say about this body downstairs?' Jack asked.

I sat there for a moment or so, fiddling with a button on my coat, then made up my mind to say it. 'Yeah,' I said, 'I have. This doesn't make sense, it makes no sense at all, but I'd give a lot to perform an autopsy on that body, because you know what I think I'd find?' I glanced around the room – at Jack, Theodora, then Becky – and no one answered; they just sat there waiting. 'I think I'd find no cause of death at all. I think I'd find every organ in as perfect condition as the body is externally. Everything in perfect working order, ready to go.'

I let them think about that for a moment, then gave them some more; I felt utterly foolish saying it, and utterly certain I was right. 'That isn't all. I think that when I opened the stomach, there'd be nothing inside. Not a crumb, not a particle of food, digested or undigested; nothing. Empty as a newborn baby's. And if I opened the bowel, the same thing: no waste, not a bit. Nothing at all. Why?' I glanced around at them again. 'Because I don't believe that that body downstairs ever died. There is no cause of death, because it never died. And it never died because it's never been alive.' I shrugged, and sat back on the davenport. 'There you are. That screwy enough for you?'

'Yeah.' Jack said, slowly and emphatically nodding his head, the women silently watching us. 'That's exactly screwy enough for me. I only wanted it confirmed.'

'Becky' – I turned to look at her – 'what do you think?' She shook her head, frowning, then sighed.' I'm – stunned. But I think I would like that drink, after all.'

We all smiled then, and Jack started to get up, but Theodora said, 'I'll get them,' and stood. 'One for everyone?' she asked, and we all said yes.

Then we sat waiting, getting out cigarettes, striking matches, holding lights, till Theodora came back and