Deep Space

Chapter 5

"Nursing Officer Jane Hibron sat reading in the medi-centre, one ear open for the slightest change in regular bleeps coming from the monitors attached to her two patients. Joceyln Peabody and Karen Shaw lay in their cots under heavy sedation. A drug induced sleep had been prescribed as the only likely way to allow their minds to recover from the terrifying shock of the sline beast's attacks. In spite of the heavy dosage, every so often one of the girls would stir and shudder as deep in their minds they relived the horror. They had been quiet for almost an hour now. Perhaps this was a good sign, Jane thought.

She put down her book, smoothed down her white uniform tunic and crossed the room to note down the readings from their monitors on the girl's records. As she reached the professor's bedside she felt a peculiar sensation, an awareness of another presence in the medi-centre, a slight pungent, sulphurous smell. A moment later Jane's feet were pulled from under her by something grasping her ankles from behind.

Jane fell back against the cot, hitting her head against the frame. Stunned, she could offer no resistance as she realised she was in the grip of the beast that had attacked her patients. A tentacle was wrapped about her ankles and another about her chest fixing her arms in place. The beast drew her up until she was directly facing the single eye and the beast's beak. Still dazed by the speed of the attack she began to try to struggle against the beast's grip. The single eye stared at her, seemingly puzzled by her efforts. Another tentacle reached out to grip her head.

Suddenly the beast gave a short grunt, a blob of material shot from a vent just above the beast's beak, striking Jane in the face, covering her mouth. She tried to shake it free but felt it setting to a rubbery firmness. She tried to open her mouth but the rubbery material held it shut. The beast continued to watch as she struggled. Seeming to be satisfied that she could not free herself from the glutinous gag, the creature released the tentacle around her head and shot another blob of material onto her chest. Jane looked down as the creature reached for the blob with the tip of a tentacle and drew out a filament from it, pulling it out as a long fibre. The sline beast wound the fibre around and around her chest, locking her arms to her sides. Another blob was deposited on her thigh and a filament drawn out around her legs and ankles. Slowly she felt the fibres stiffen and tighten fixing her in an ever more secure grip. The beast placed her on the floor of the room and watched her struggles for a moment or two more, then happy that she could not free herself, it turned its attentions to the two patients.

The beast slid over to the two cots where the barely conscious women lay. It knocked aside the drip stands and tore off the monitor sensors, starting bleeping alarms that at once alarmed the beast. It pulled away the sheets that covered each of the women and then set to cocooning them just as it had Jane. With Jocelyn and Karen bound helplessly in the rubbery filaments it lifted itself up into the ceiling space through a broken panel. Reaching down with its tentacles it picked up each of its captives in turn and drew them up after it. All that remained of the three was a white mule that had fallen from Jane's foot as she had been dragged into the ceiling space.

Attracted by the sound of the alarms, Steve Perron came running into the medi-bay, ray gun at the ready. "Great heavens," he exclaimed as he surveyed the scene, picking over the debris and finding Jane's discarded, white mule. "The thing has obviously got back in and claimed its previous victims as well as the nurse. We have to find them and find it before it strikes again."

Madeleine Perron sat down at the dressing table in her cabin. She had about half an hour, she thought, before she and Steve would need to head off for their dinner. Being entertained by the Base Commander didn't happen very often and it was an excuse to get dressed up and have a really good evening. Steve ought to be back by now but he usually rolled up with hardly any time to spare. Somehow, though, he could throw on his dress uniform in a couple of minutes but still look great. For Madeleine though it took a little longer.

As she went to pickup the jar of hair gel to make the last few touches she noticed a dribble of goo on the table top. She didn't remember spilling anything.

It smelled foul too – it certainly wasn't any of her stuff. Then another drip. It seemed to be coming from the ceiling. Better call maintenance, she thought, looks like there's a leaking pipe up there.

Madeleine was pretty happy with how she looked. The dress was stunning. Golden, tight and off the shoulders, its 20 ^th century, retro, look would certainly turn some heads. Her neck piece was eye catching too – a necklet of solid gold. Steve would be proud of her.

She heard a noise behind her, but carried on peering into the mirror. Her eye make up was taking a lot of fixing.

"Hi, honey," she called. "I won't be long. Your uniform's on the bed."

She felt a soft touch on her shoulder.

"Oh, not now lover," she said smiling. "There'll be plenty of time to play later."

The touch moved down across her back and started to draw down the zipper of her dress. "Come on, Steve, cut it out!" She span around on her stool, saw a warty green tentacle stretching down from a hole in the ceiling and, almost at once, let out a piercing scream and struck out at the tentacle with her hair curling tongs.

Startled by the sudden noise and the blow, the sline beast reacted. The tentacle swung around and caught Madeleine across the forehead, leaving a bright red wheal and stunning her into silence. She slid from the stool, half conscious. Grunting in annoyance, the beast wrapped a tentacle around her waist and pulled her unconscious form up into the ceiling space.

Following the trail of the beast up above the medi-centre, Steve Perron had worked his way into the gap between the ceiling and the roof of the cave that the base had been built into. He'd had no idea that this other world existed above their heads, a world of pipes and ducting, insulation, discarded packing cases and construction debris. Walkways were in place to allow access to the service ducts and wiring and the trail of the beast was heading along one toward the accommodation block and the far wall of the base.

Steve eased himself as quietly as he could along the walkway until he could finally see the back wall of the cave. There alongside a bright yellow outcrop of sulphurous rock he could see the sline beast and its victims.

Peabody and Shaw were still cocooned in the sline creature's rubbery ropes. He had them hanging suspended from the roof of the cave, held up by a harness like arrangement of the excretion that left them swaying helplessly. Both still appeared to be unconscious as far as Perron could see but whether that was the continuing effect of the medication or something else, he could not tell.

Nurse Hibron was very much conscious however. She had been fastened standing against one of the pillars that stretched down from the roof of the cave and into the base below but was still struggling against the bonds that held her. The fronds were evidently composed of some sulphurous material. Where they criss-crossed her body chemicals were leeching out from the material staining her white nurse's tunic a violent yellow. She had been unable to dislodge the gag of material that plastered the lower part of her face and could only whimper as she fought against her bonds. At least, thought Perron, the creature has done no more than capturing her.

Beyond her, the beast seemed distracted by something else. As it reared up Steve realised it had found another victim. Then, as the helpless woman rolled over trying to escape the clutches of the beast, he realised the sline creature's latest captive was his own wife.

Perron's ray gun spat a stream of violet particles at the beast, striking it on the back of its head. Its tentacles unwound from its captive, it staggered back and turned to face its attacker. Perron's wife, freed from the grip of the sline beast crawled away from the creature and huddled behind a packing case, pulling the tattered remnants of her dress together as best she could to cover herself. 'Steve,' she called. 'Kill it! Kill the monster!'

The ray gun throbbed in Steve's hand as the energy cell recharged. A second stream of particles shot from the barrel. The beast reared up and then collapsed, its tentacles slid to the floor, twitched and were still. Madeleine leapt to her husband's side. 'Oh Steve, thank heavens,' she cried. He grasped her as they both stared at the corpse of the sline beast. 'Let's get the folk back to the medi-centre,' he smiled. 'Then you're going to need to freshen up. I think we've got a dinner to go to.'

Madeleine threw her arms about his neck and kissed him."

"What's the point of a romantic story with an unhappy ending," thought Duufrig, tossing the magazine aside in disgust. The cover had shown the sline beast stripping away Madeleine's evening gown with the nurse trussed helplessly in the background. You'd have thought he'd have ended up with one or other of them. All these magazines ffinished like that though. He couldn't understand it. Why wasn't fiction more like real life?