Seventeen
It was slower going than many of them expected. Though the stream travelled at about three knots their weight and bulk meant they travelled closer to two knots. At this rate Monica estimated they would be in the cold water for an hour; not great, but there was no choice. The thermal lining in their suits would provide some protection, but eventually the cold would seep through and start to slow down muscle reaction time. Any longer than that and hypothermia would set in.
The only sounds were the slight tinkling of the stream and a few whispers from among the team members. Matt kept both hands around Monica’s waist and Monica in turn dropped her hands to cover his. For the most part, except for the odd bump it was a fairly smooth ride.
Several times the team passed little black sandy beaches and heard scuttling sounds off in the darkness. But when they turned their torches in the direction of the noise, there was nothing there. From time to time they also witnessed small flashes of light on the walls of the cave. Monica leaned forward to Alex. “Bioluminescence, or cold light; probably small cave organisms or fungi. If we get enough, maybe we can do without the torches.”
Alex had requested they keep moving their arms and legs as much as possible in their restricted positions to ensure they kept their blood flowing right down to their extremities. It was easy to become numbed, and it was this numbness that allowed Mike not to notice that the water had diluted the gel over his wounds and they were once again beginning to bleed.
In the stream his faint blood trail moved ahead of them, at three knots to their two. In the dark and with such a small amount of blood it could not possibly be noticed; not by human senses anyway. After about fifty minutes in the water, Mike noticed his wounds were becoming almost unbearably itchy. It was not for a HAWC to complain about hunger, pain or discomfort. He had slept in snow, hidden in a steel drum in hundred degree heat and been camouflaged under mud for eighteen hours; he would wait until they reached a rest point as instructed by their team leader.
At last they reached a suitable rest point just a few hundred feet before the stream veered around a huge fallen boulder. A small beach of black sand curved in a crescent at the base of the rock wall. They all stood up in the waist-deep water, stepped out of the rope loops and struggled up the bank on cold stiff legs. Though they were shivering the team was in good spirits and looking forward to some rest, and perhaps some more chocolate. Takeda immediately took to lighting a miniature propane heating unit. Each of the HAWCs carried them; they could be used for emergency lighting, as an incendiary device, or in Takeda’s case, a way to heat his precious green tea. Alex allowed the small break in the rules as Takeda was the most serene and efficient warrior he had ever come across; if the tea helped, then he could have it.
Aimee was the first to notice the changes in Mike. He was bent over and his robust frame was smaller and seemed somehow shrunken. Where the rope had previously been looped tight around his lean muscular body, his waist had not yet snapped back into place. He looked deformed, soft.
“Mike? Mike, are you OK?” Aimee grabbed his arm and turned him around.
On hearing Aimee raise her voice, Alex rushed over to where Mike stood unsteadily on his feet. In the harsh light of Aimee’s torch his face was slack and looked like wax. Alex stared into Mike’s eyes and asked, “Second Lieutenant Mike Lennox, what is your immediate operational status?”—a command any of the HAWCs would have instantly responded to.
Mike coughed and fell forward. Alex caught him and lowered him to the ground, turning him over onto his back. Mike’s body was different — he felt lighter and less substantial. Mike coughed again, then again harder. This time some redness appeared on his lips. The team gathered around and bathed Mike’s prone body in the combined light of multiple helmet beams.
“He’s bleeding internally.” Alex rolled him onto his side to assist his breathing and this time Mike began coughing continuously. Blood spots appeared on the black sand, and then with the next racking cough a rush of a red gelatinous fluid gushed from his mouth to pile on the sand next to him.
“Oh shit, there’s something living in him.” Silex jumped back; there was no scientific curiosity, just a base human reaction to a severe parasitic infection. The disgust was clear on his face as he unconsciously began wiping his hands on his sides. Silex was right, among the piles of jelly beside Mike’s face there was a mass of worms, each about six inches long, writhing on the sand. The black and red mess had undoubtedly come from the flesh and blood the worms had been consuming from inside Mike.
Tank pushed Silex out of the way and cradled Mike’s head while Alex reached down and undid the straps on his caving suit. The sight that met their eyes made even the battle-hardened HAWCs wince, and Tank moaned at the vision. Where there were once wounds, there were now ragged holes that were alive with worms. Mike’s stomach and chest cavity must have been full of them as the skin moved across his bones in an unnatural rippling manner. His jaw worked as though he was trying to say something, but it wasn’t clear whether it was actually Mike or the worms sliding beneath the muscles in his neck and face.
“Dr. Weir, what are those things, leeches?” Alex himself wasn’t keen to touch Mike until he knew what they were dealing with.
Aimee had the back of her hand across her mouth; disgust and fear distorting the features of her face.
“Dr. Weir? Aimee?” Alex reached out and touched her arm.
“I, I don’t think so, more likely down here they’re some form of nematode.”
Aimee crouched down and tried to concentrate on Mike’s condition, hoping scientific curiosity would override her revulsion.
“Can we get them out of him?” Monica asked the question, although it was plain to everyone that even with the best medical care he probably stood little chance, and down here he was as good as dead. In the few extra minutes they stood around him he seemed to further deflate and shrivel as his flesh was being consumed from the inside out.
“I thought nematodes were microscopic things that lived in the soil,” Matt said.
“There are tens of thousands of types of nematodes and more than half are parasitic. Most are microscopic, but some are bigger, much bigger. There’s one species that can get to about thirty feet — it parasitises the sperm whale. These things have been around since the Cambrian and like our giant cephalopod, have probably been trapped down here for millions of years.”
“Yuck, those things were in the water with us.” Monica was stripping off her suit and checking her body. Everyone quickly did the same.
“I think we’ll be OK. Mike was the only one who was hurt and bleeding. These things are little more than mouths on the end of a fleshy pipe. They must have sensed Mike’s blood in the water and homed in on him,” Aimee said.
Mike’s eyes were like glass. They bulged up from his face and then began to sink into his sockets just as there was an almost inaudible
“Permission to dispose of the body?”
Alex didn’t have to think before responding. “Permission granted, soldier.”
Tank lifted what was left of Mike. From once being a man who looked like he weighed in at 200 pounds, Mike now looked a quarter of that. The worms dropped freely from his sleeves and ankles where the suit wasn’t fully closed. Tank walked with the body to the corner of the beach and knelt beside him. He looked to be talking to his brother one last time. He stood, crossed himself and removed his own propane cylinder from his backpack and proceeded to spray Mike all over. Tank depressed the ignition stud and Mike’s body flared yellow as the highly flammable propellant burst into life. As the suit burnt and peeled away there was an insane thrashing all over his body as the parasitic worms reacted to the destruction of their home and last meal.
Tank rejoined the group but his head, like his spirits, was down. Alex walked over to him and grabbed his shoulders. “Tank, he made us all proud. He was one of the best we ever had, I’m going to miss him; we all will.”
Tank gripped Alex’s forearms in both his hands. His lips were clamped together and his eyes shut tightly.
