Snake Eyes

Snake Eyes

By

Jamey O’Donnell

Newberry Springs is nothing more than a blip on the map, a township with no main street, no town stores, not even a post office.

It’s nothing more than a zip code northeast of Barstow, but the secrets there are bigger than anyone could have imagined. Had Buck Phillips known of the things living under the sand outside of his little spring fed 5-acre ranch, he’d have never bought out there, even for the dirt cheap price he paid.

Since their first emergence, he built an 8-foot-high security electrified wall around his property, costing him a pretty penny, but the peace of mind that came with the wall was priceless to him. Those evil demons resembling human beings, but far from them, would not be invading his home, because trying to scale the wall would mean certain death for them, as it did for the one that tried just after the wall had gone up.

The first time he saw one, he thought his old days of taking LSD had come back to bite him in the ass, experiencing a flashback from the old days. The creature he saw climbing out of a hole just beyond his property line was beyond frightening, and its smell could be whiffed from a mile away. You could definitely smell them before ever seeing them, and the smell was enough to make you gag and vomit.

He was outside the house on his front porch, having his morning coffee when he first saw one of them. Looking out past the sagebrush and yucca, he saw something moving on the sand, creating a mini dust cloud. It was the length of a football field away, but he knew something was amiss, so he began walking out toward it. When he was about a hundred feet away, he smelled the most God-awful thing he’d ever smelled in his life, then he saw a snake like creature with human facial features, with two scaly arms with hands and fingers, hoisting itself out of a hole in the sand.

Knowing he hadn’t taken any drugs for years, he figured he was seeing something caused by the residual effects of an old LSD trip, because he had heard of things like that happening to other people he had taken LSD with in the past, but this seemed too real, not to mention the smell. Had the smell not accompanied it, he might have kept walking toward it, thinking it was just a hallucination.

Then when it was completely out of the hole, it spied Buck and screamed at him with a sound that would scare the bejeesus out of anyone, and there he was 100 feet away from this thing and all he could think to do was run like hell back to the porch to grab his Smith & Wesson sitting on the table. The dogs were going crazy and circling the thing, giving Buck the chance to make it to the front porch, and to his gun.

His dogs were all fighting dogs and protectors, one being a Pit Bull, one a Rottweiler, and the other a Doberman Pincher, but they were no match for the thing. The Pit Bull lunged for the thing and was swallowed whole by it, while the Rottweiler was swatted away a good 50 feet, and the Doberman, seeing that this was nothing to tangle with, yelped and headed back to the porch with his tail between his legs in defeat.

Buck squeezed off a couple rounds at the thing, hitting it in the shoulder, causing it to jump back into the hole it crawled out of.

He’d never heard of creatures like this in the desert before, and had certainly never seen one, so his first call was to the Sheriff’s Department, where they initially asked him if he was on drugs or had been drinking.

It was then that he made his next call to a construction company in L.A. that specialized in building high security perimeters for the wealthy, and shortly thereafter, his wall was built.

He hadn’t seen any of them for a while after the wall went up, but one night a few weeks ago, he saw one attempting to scale his wall and was immediately electrocuted by the 50,000 volts coursing through wiring on the wall, killing it instantly, leaving a slimy humanoid snake creature in a smoking coil outside the wall. Later that evening, the creature was gone after being drug across the desert to the hole they had been coming out of.

The realtor that showed him the property failed to mention why no one else was living anywhere close to his ranch, and he had to know something was afoot, but he never said a word.

The only thing keeping those slimy bastards off of his property was the electrified wall, and should the power ever go out, he’d be a sitting duck for them.

He’d already spent a small fortune on the wall, and putting in a generator system powerful enough to produce the voltage needed for the wall that turned on automatically should the power fail would cost him even more than the wall itself, so until he had the money to do it, he was at the mercy of nature and the electric company.

His biggest question was what these things were exactly, and why were they only around his property?

There was one person that lived near him, down the dirt road about a mile from his property, and he decided it would behoove him to pay this person a visit and see what they knew about these creatures, so one morning he jumped into his Humvee, opened the electric gate, and drove down the dirt road to this other person’s property, armed to the teeth with two handguns and an AR-15 with several magazines.

When he arrived at the property, there was no security fence or gate, and he was able to drive right up to the front door, which he thought highly odd.

Could it be possible these things weren’t bothering him the way they were terrorizing Buck and his property?

It was a strange house indeed, resembling more of a building you’d find in an office park than a home in the desert.

Nonetheless, Buck exited the Humvee with a great deal of caution, handgun at his side and at the ready for anything weird jumping out at him, and he made his way to the front door and rang the bell.

The person that answered the door wasn’t who Buck was expecting at all.

It was an officer of the U.S. Army, Brigadier General John C. Walters, as he introduced himself to Buck before he could say a word.

“Hey there. I live down the road about a mile from you, and I was hoping to speak to whoever owns this place. Who would that be?” asked Buck.

“Well sir, this is United States Government property, and since I am an officer in the U.S. Government, you can speak to me. Please, come inside.” said the General.

Buck walked through the door into a very antiseptic looking lobby, more equated to that of a hospital than the home of someone living there.

“I’m going to ask you to place your weapon on the table by the door. You can have it back when you leave.” said the General.

Buck obliged and placed his pistol on the table.

“Please, take a seat” said the General, motioning Buck toward a couch and chairs, ones you would find in a waiting room.

“I think I know why you are here, but I’ll let you tell me” said the General.

“Really? You know why I’m here? How could you possibly know why I’m here? answered Buck.

“Could it be the problem you’ve been having outside of your security fence?” asked the General.

Buck sat straight up in his chair, not expecting to hear the candor of the General.

“I came down here to ask you folks if you’ve been having the same problem as I’ve been having, and it seems to me you’ve been having the same problem too by what you just said to me, so why don’t you fill me in?” questioned Buck.

The General sat back in his chair and crossed his legs, contemplating the words about to come out of his mouth.

“You might say that, that we’ve had a problem, but not quite the same problem you’ve had. I should begin by telling you we never imagined someone would be interested in the property you bought, otherwise we would have bought it up before you, in order to sidestep this problem, the same way we bought up all the rest of the parcels out here within a 5 mile radius. If you noticed, the man that used to live there moved out months before you bought it. Most people wait to move until after they’ve sold. We just thought we had more time, then you came along and bought the place. The good news is that you won’t be there long because we are going to pull the eminent domain card on you, so we will be taking possession of the property in the very near future. As a matter of fact, you should be hearing from the U.S. Government shortly.

Why did you buy that piece of crap house in the middle of a 115 degree desert, with the nearest facility 20 miles away?” asked the General.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but the price was right and I’m not real fond of people! This seemed like a great place to be, as long as you have good air conditioning, and you don’t mind tumbleweeds.” answered Buck. “On what grounds can you do that?”

Buck was starting to get annoyed and the General could see that.

“You never told me your name” said the General.

“Buck. Buck Phillips.”

“Look Mr. Phillips, let’s cut the nonsense, shall we? You’ve seen those things. Why would you want to continue living here with them right outside your gate? Yes, you’ve put up a security wall that’s keeping them out for now, but what happens when they figure out how to breach your perimeter, and they will. Trust me, they will.” asked the General.

“You seem to know quite a bit about these things. What’s more, you seem to know quite a bit about my wall. Why is that?” asked Buck.

“The government makes it it’s business to know everything around them. That’s how I know so much about you. I already knew your name, but I wanted to see if you would be truthful with me. We also have a pretty good idea about why you bought out here. You were just recently released from prison after 10 years incarcerated for manufacturing methamphetamine, and what better place to resume your livelihood than out here in the middle of the desert, away from anyone. We even know who you’ve been talking to and the nature of the conversations you’ve had ever since you came here. You have been monitored in ways so far out of reach of your understanding, you can’t possibly begin to grasp what you are up against. My best advice to you is to take the money the government gives you for the sale of your property and find another location for your business, because you won’t last long if you start up here.” said the General.

Buck’s heart sank as he heard the General speak to him, because every word out of his mouth was the stone-cold truth, and the only reason he had not already begun making meth was because of the delay these snake people were causing.

The money Buck had to buy the place and build the wall was from a private stash he had buried, money the Feds knew nothing about when he was initially arrested.

“Look man, that wall alone cost me a quarter of a million dollars. Is the government going to pay for that?” asked Buck.

“Indeed, they will. In fact, you will most likely make a sizable profit when everything is said and done” answered the General.

“Well, I guess that settles it, but I need to know something. Why is the government so interested in this property out here, and what do you know about those snake people living under the ground outside my wall? Do you have anything to do with them, and is that why you’re out here? Are you studying them?” asked Buck.

“You are asking me things that require a top-secret clearance for you to know, but since you’ve seen them and have actually killed one of them, I suppose I can tell you more, but the information I give you has to remain in this room. If not, you will definitely spend the rest of your days doing hard time in Leavenworth, and no one will believe your story. Still want to know?” asked the General.

“Yes. Yes, I do. How bad can it be?” asked Buck.

“6 years ago we took 10 men off of death row, from 10 different states, and brought them here, to be given an experimental vaccine to prevent death from snakebites, from any snake in the world. This vaccine would be given to our soldiers in case of a ground war in territories where poisonous snakes were indigenous to the battleground. Doesn’t matter what kind of snake, whether it be a cobra, krait, black mamba, even a rattlesnake or a bushmaster.

Venom was extracted from every known poisonous snake in the world, and a super vaccine was created from the mixture of all of them.

Underneath where we are sitting is one of the most sophisticated super laboratories in the world, and the men were brought down there to begin trials” said the General.

“These men agreed to this?” asked Buck.

“Yes, because their sentences would be commuted, so they all agreed to be part of the test trials. Unfortunately for them, the testing did not go anywhere close to what we had hoped.

The first 4 men given the vaccine died within a couple days. Their insides completely disintegrated, leaving nothing but a syrupy substance in place of their organ tissues.

Before giving anymore to the remaining 6, we went back to the drawing board to find out why this was happening, and after making some adjustments, we administered the vaccine to 2 more of the men, with both having dramatically different results. The best way to explain them to you would be to actually show you, so follow me so you can see for yourself” said the General as he got up from his chair and motioned for Buck to follow him down a hallway.

They stopped at an elevator door, and when the door opened, both men went inside, and when the door closed, it began to descend.

“We are going down about 10 stories, and when you see what I’m about to show you, you’ll understand why.” Explained the General.

After a few seconds, the elevator stopped and the door opened, revealing a long hallway with a greenish glow from recessed lighting.

Up ahead to the right was a long plate glass window, about the size of a room, and just after that the ceiling extended up to about 10 feet past the 8 foot ceiling in front of the first plate glass window, with a bullet proof glass window that extended from the floor, all the way up to the ceiling, 18 feet from the floor, and the glass for this window was a good 6 inches thick.

When they stopped at the first window, Buck almost vomited when he saw what was inside. Inside the room on the other side of the glass was a creature straight out of Dante’s Inferno. It could only be described as half man, half snake.

It was around 9 to 10 feet long, as thick as a large anaconda, but it’s characteristics more resembled a cobra than anything else. You could see that it was once a human being, but it’s legs were completely gone and it had tiny little arms with hands, and its face was human, except it had no nose, only nostrils, and its eyes were human, not slanted like snake eyes.

It’s mouth was the most startling part, because it had fangs instead of teeth, and its face looked incredibly sad, as if it remembered it used to be human.

“That’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen in my life. My God, I can’t even look at it!” said Buck as he was urged to look inside the bigger of the two windows, where he almost crapped his pants from fear.

Inside behind the thick glass was coiled a gigantic rattlesnake, bigger than the largest anaconda ever recorded in human history, with its head almost touching the 18-foot-tall ceiling, big enough to not only swallow a man whole, but big enough to eat a cow, which was what it was getting ready to do. That’s why it was in a coiled position, as it was getting ready to strike at a cow placed in the room just as they walked to the window. It then struck the cow, shaking the room and the hallway they were standing in.

The fang of the snake pierced right through the back of the cow and exited its stomach below, killing the cow instantly, then the snake began to swallow it, and you could see the snakes body expand and contract wherever the cow was inside of it, pushing it through to digestion

“Jesus Christ” screamed Buck. “Are you telling me these used to be men?”

“Yes, which is obviously why the vaccine was still a failure up to this point” answered the General.

Buck was visibly shaken and his sensibilities had been pushed to their maximum.

“I spent 10 years in prison for making meth, and you guys are allowed to do this? This is horrifying. If the public knew you were doing these kinds of things, they’d vote every single politician out of office and come after you!” screamed Buck.

“The public will never know about this, and neither will any politician. I’m sure you’ve heard this before, but when you make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs. Research and Development can sometimes be messy. You don’t even want to know how we came up with other vaccines we’ve created in the past, some you’ve had injected in your arm, I’m sure.

The last 4 men were injected with an amended vaccine, and those are the men you have seen outside of your property, with one of them now dead, thanks to your wall.

With these two behind the glass, we knew we were on the right track, because they didn’t die, but instead transformed, so we knew which direction we had to go, and once again, we’ve made more progress, and we believe we are there or close to it.

The men living underground in holes outside of your property have arms and legs and are much closer to human beings than any of the others.

Unfortunately, because they are much more human, they were able to figure a way to overcome the guards and escape the facility, but because they are also part snake, they could not figure out a way to negotiate their way out of the desert; hence, living in holes in the ground.

There are 3 of them out there now, and we are working on a way to capture them and bring them back here, and with you gone from the property, it will make it that much easier for us” said the General.

“I’m not gone yet. I’m still living there.” answered Buck.

“No, actually you are gone from the property. You are here with me 10 stories under the ground, a mile from your property” said the General as he pushed a button on the wall.

Immediately after the button was pushed, a door at the end of the hall opened up, and 4 servicemen with service revolvers pointed at Buck started walking toward him.

“What in the hell is this?” asked Buck, now frightened.

“Did you really think that I would divulge all of this top secret information and let you leave the facility? You are more naïve than I thought.” asked the General.

The soldiers surrounded Buck and cuffed his hands behind his back, then drug him into the room at the end of the hall the soldiers came out of. It was a brightly lit room with medical equipment along the length of the room, and a hospital bed surrounded by medical assistants, waiting for their new patient.

Buck began screaming profanities and putting up a fight, literally causing the soldiers to lift him up off the floor and slam him down on to the hospital bed, then strap him down to it, severely restricting Buck’s movements.

“If you don’t stop screaming, I’m going to instruct one of my personnel to gag you. Is that what you want? asked the General.

“C’mon man, knock it off. This isn’t funny. None of this is. Unhandcuff me and let me go. I’m not going to say anything to anybody. Believe me, no one would believe me anyway!” said Buck, trying not to scream.

The medical personnel were emotionless as they proceeded to prepare for Buck’s inoculation, behind Buck’s head, so he could not see what they were doing.

“Think of it this way. You are participating in an experiment to help our troops in times of battle. In your whole miserable life, you’ve never contributed a thing to society, but now you are, and that should make you feel good. It won’t make up for all the people you’ve infected with the drugs you’ve made in your life, but it’s a good start.” said the General.

“No, please God no. You aren’t going to give me that vaccine, are you? Please, you can’t. I’m an American and I have rights. I didn’t sign up for this. This is against my will!” screamed Buck.

The syringe was full of the lime green liquid about to be pushed into Buck’s vein, and was brought around the bed to where Buck could see it, and he began to shake violently on the bed. One of the personnel then put an oxygen mask over Buck’s face and administered an anesthesia, putting him to sleep in order to inject him with the vaccine.

Two hours later, Buck had awoken, still on the hospital bed, but his straps and handcuffs had been removed. He immediately looked down at his arms to see if he had changed into a snake and was relieved to see that his arms looked completely normal, and after further inspection, his whole body was exactly the same as it was before he had gone to sleep.

He got up from the bed to look in the mirror, and almost started crying for joy at the very human face he saw in his reflection.

The vaccine worked! He was still a human being.

The door to the room opened, and in walked the General, two soldiers, and three medical personnel.

“We just crossed a major hurdle, as it seems the vaccine did not change any of your DNA. You are still 100% human being from all the samples we’ve taken and been able to analyze while you’ve been sleeping.” said the General.

“Does that mean you’re going to let me go now?” asked Buck.

“Not yet. We need to keep you a few more days to find out if the vaccine actually works. We will take good care of you while you are with us. We have a room prepared for you. Follow me.” Said the General, leading the way out of the recovery room and into the next room over, a luxurious room resembling a fine suite in a grand hotel.

There was a big screen television, king size bed, sofa and chairs, and a nice big bathroom with both a tub and a shower.

The next three days would prove to be painful for Buck, as he was forced to put his hand inside many different cages with poisonous snakes, all biting him to test his immunity to their venom, so much to the point, he started to become accustomed to the pain of their bites, but each and every time, he felt no ill effects from their venom.

He was completely immune to every snake’s poison on the face of the earth.

On day 4, the General and two servicemen entered his room to give him the good news.

“Mr. Phillips, it’s conclusive. The vaccine is a success. You are officially immune to every snake’s venom on the planet. Thank you for your service to your country. We couldn’t have done it without you.” said the General, and with that, the General removed his service revolver from its holster and put a bullet directly between the eyes of Buck Phillips, killing him instantly. As the General said, he knew too much.