The Terror From Beyond the Void

THE SIGHT was bizarre. The hit-or-miss burning spots, the smoke—it had all come from whatever soared across the sky.

“Maybe it’s a small plane?” I said, throwing out an obvious observation.

Duke shook his head. “No. There’s no debris. No propellers or siding. Nothing.”

I wandered the scene, watchful as to where I stepped while trying to also take in as much of it as I could. I was looking for any sign of what had burned across the sky and crashed right here in Timber Acres. Then, up ahead, near a patch of thick, rising smoke, something caught my eye. The earth had been disturbed, pushed inward with a cracked and raised rim of dirt and soil encircling it.

I pointed to the crater. “It was a meteor,” I said. Duke joined my side and together we approached the smoldering cavity. Smoke rushed up from it, burning embers flickered in the disrupted dirt.

“Holy cow,” Duke whispered in astonishment. “I never imagined in a million years I would witness something like this.”

“Should we call the police? Or the park rangers?”

“With what? Nothing’s working.”

That’s right.

We leaned forward, breaking through a thin curtain of smoke to get a better look inside the crater. Where I assumed would be an obliterated meteor, was nothing. The impression in the soil was empty. I looked around, wondering if the pieces of it had just been launched in every direction. But nothing stood out. We were surrounded by lush wilderness, moss-covered mounds, fallen trees and thick shrubbery. There was nothing foreign around; no objects, natural or man-made.

Duke knelt down and climbed over the raised rim of the hole. I wasn’t sure if I should help him or just let him do it on his own. I decided on the latter and watched him slide down. It was deeper than it looked, the rim of the hole coming up to the middle of Duke’s thighs.

“See anything?” I asked, waving more of the smoke out of my way. Duke didn’t answer. He just carefully examined the mysterious anomaly.

A bird hollered from a nearby tree, making me jump and turn around quickly. I looked from one side to the other, finally settling on the rustling leaves from a tree branch dead ahead. A black bird crashed through the leaves and flew up through the canopy. Several others followed its lead, all fluttering from their own branches and then out of sight. They seemed spooked.

“I found something!” Duke shouted. I turned back around and dropped to my knees, looking down at him. He too, was on his knees, inspecting something in the dirt, in the dead center of the large hole in the earth.

“What is it?” I called down to him.

“Not sure. Some kind of oil, maybe?”

Oil? That didn’t really make sense unless it was from a small plane of some kind. Either that or maybe a fallen satellite.

“It’s green…” Duke added.

Green oil? Now that didn’t make sense at all. Duke then expressed a disgusted groan.

“God, it stinks too. Like old, wet grass, or something, baking in the sun.”

It was a perfect description of the odor. Only a moment after he described it, a soft breeze blew through the woods and carried the scent out of the crater, absorbing into my nostrils. It made me want to gag.

Green oil didn’t exactly answer the question as to what had crashed, though. “Did it spill out from something?”

Duke shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I don’t see a single sign of—”

A forceful, wet slapping noise stung my ears as Duke yanked his hand back away from the oil. He stumbled backward and fell into the rounded wall of the crater.

“Damn!” he shouted, holding his arm.

“What happened?” I frantically asked, standing back up and circling the hole to get closer to him.

“Damn thing came out of the oil like some ungodly tongue and slapped my arm!” Duke winced. “Burns like hell!”

Duke removed his hand and I saw the skin on his arm was already bright red, worse than any sunburn I had ever seen. He cringed and put his hand back over it.

“Help me up,” he begged.

I reached down and helped him out of the hole. When I got him to his feet, I could see his breathing had picked up considerably. He was shaking uncontrollably and his face was turning pale. Duke looked sick.

“Sit down,” I instructed. I didn’t have to work hard to get him to comply. He went down willingly, possibly even unable to control it.

His head bobbed around like he was losing consciousness and his eyes began to roll into the back of his head. I tapped him on the face, panic starting to set in.

“Duke! Stay with me. I’ll get help, just—” I stood up and looked around frenetically. “Help!” I called out. I heard my voice echo through the woods, getting softer and softer with each iteration. “Someone! Macie! Wes! Kevin!”

It was useless. I wasn’t sure how far away we were from the camp. I couldn’t be sure anyone was even outside to hear me.

I looked back down at Duke. He was flat on his back, his arms stretched out on either side of him. The arm that had gotten ‘slapped’, in his words, had surrendered its redness to a goopy, green pustule-like state. It spread before my eyes, from his forearm, to up and under the short sleeve of his shirt. It returned to view as it spread around his neck.

I couldn’t believe what I was witnessing. I didn’t know what to do or what to say. The infection was spreading on his body like a paper towel would quickly soak up a water spill. His other arm, his legs and face met the same fate within seconds. The physical form of Duke’s body seemed to pulsate and then deteriorate into a sloppy, gelatinous, green mess right before my eyes.

I backed away, looking at my hands to make sure nothing had spread onto me. They seemed fine, aside from the uncontrollable nerves shaking throughout them. I continued to back up, stumbling over clusters of sticks and rocks, keeping my eye on the green mass that was a man only moments earlier.

Another wet, slapping thud rang in my ears. Movement beyond Duke’s decimated body caught my eye. Something emerged from the crater. It was a hand; human-like, but green. It had smacked the raised rim of the hole as if something was trying to climb out. Not only was the hand green, but it was covered in a mossy texture, strands of grass and splintered pieces of tree branches emerging from it.

A second hand rose up and smacked the earth. I stopped, frozen with fear. Whatever it was then lifted itself into view. It was horrible; a creature not of this earth. Green, covered with moss and dripping dark fluids, it climbed out of the crater and onto its stomach. It used its hands to crawl toward me, reaching out and moaning mournfully as it dragged itself. Its eyes burned white, its face featureless from where I stood. I started to back up again, afraid my time had come just as it had for Duke. And in this way? What a cruel universe.

The creature continued to crawl on its stomach, picking up speed like it was learning a new skill. Just as I was about to turn and make a run for it, the otherworldly creature smacked both hands down into the slurry that Duke had become. A gaping, toothless mouth opened just beneath its white eyes, and it started to consume Duke in a messy, stomaching churning display.

I ran.