The Thing Trapped in Time

Part 10

The bell rang, with a -ding, ding a ling-, as a man in a damp raincoat entered the parcel delivery service. He walked up to the counter and rang another bell. A man came from the back, and greeted him, as the man in the raincoat handed him the slip. The man walked to the back to get the package and brought it to the front. As he was walking out a woman was coming in so, he held the door for her. As the door chimed, he missed her say, “Excuse me, your package is leaking.”

He popped the package in the passenger side, and climbed into his car. As he began to drive he could smell a foul odor emanating from the brown paper package. He blasted his air conditioning, and the smell subsided. He had been told to try to keep it cool. There was already a red spot on his car seat though the dripping stopped in the cool blast of air conditioning.

He drove to a warehouse. “Ah, shit!”, he exclaimed, as he picked up the package. “That'll probably stain. This better be worth it.” , he said to himself, and the package dripped all the way inside.

Once inside it stopped dripping as it was a cool thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit The man traded his damp raincoat for a snowsuit, and brought the paper wrapped box into a room that was down to zero degrees Fahrenheit with a table, and lab equipment.

He picked up a walkie-talkie, “I'm in. Now what? Over.”

A female voice responded, ” Hold the door open. Over.”

“Confirmed, over!”

The man held the door open as a woman with a snowsuit and a parka rushed in as her instrument steamed to snow.

“Hurry close that door,” the woman demanded.

“Where's my fee?, ” the man challenged.

“I don't have time. Stick around or wait outside, I have a job to do, and I don't handle finances.”

“You told me this is important, and it's the only reason I agreed to do it.”, the man said.

“Which is why I need your help with this. Go scrub, and mask up, and help, or leave, and get your pay from whoever promised it to you. ,” the woman said as she examined the box.”

“Don't open it until I get back.”

“OK.”

The man went to scrub up, and came back to the woman missing. He looked at the package, and it was shreds of paper stained by blood.

“I told her we needed to it at lower Kelvin temperatures.”, he shouted. As he turned to leave he could see it's tiny beady eyes looking right at him, and it was in the way.

It looked like a fast moving slug that changes shape as it moves. Its mesmerizing color display starts distracting him and he stands up straight. in his place due to being hypnotized by it's color display.

“Where am I?”, the alien slug screamed in his mind.

“Earth.”, he said as though hypnotized.

“What are you?”, it asked curiously.

“I'm a human.”, the man answered.

“Who-man? Where are the reptiles?”, it asked desperately.

“Which reptiles?”

“The large herbivores?”

“Extinct.”

“What kind of animal are you?”

“Mammal.”

“Where is my kind? I feel so alone!”

“Extinct. But, I really don't know. I don't remember finding slugs in the fossil record.”

“Gone,.....Gone, a whole community gone!”, it shouted.

“We were exploring space, we had a colony on the moon. We had life on Venus when we were told we couldn't. Are you trying to tell me the most intelligent life on the planet couldn't survive?”, it demanded rhetorically, “We must be someplace. Do you have a globe?”

In a room behind a mirror, 2 other scientists turned the temperature down.

The man inside the room sat down at a computer, and brought up Google Earth. The being sat on his shoulder pondering the image.

“None of this is right? Where's Alasia, and Vandalis? It looks like they were ripped in two.”

“You know space travel but not plate tectonics? That seems weird.”, the man retorted.

“We were studying images, and there was a debate going on whether Gods were moving the continents, or if evil people caused them to punish us. But what could have caused this?”

“You were space faring, and a rock wiped you out 6.6 million years ago.”, the man stated as he started to undress, in now ultra freezing temperatures.

“This can't be right?!”, it exclaimed again.

“I can show you what scientists think the planet looked at over time.”

“Show me.”

The now naked man began Googling for photos of Pangaea.

“Tell them to turn the temperature back up, or I kill you.”

“Turn the temperature down, I'm really cold now.”

Behind the wall the two suited up scientists turned the temperature back up to thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit The two women were preparing specialized fire extinguishers that spray water cooled to point one degree Kelvin.

“Is he expendable?”, one woman asked.

“We ALL are now. I don't think this is going to end well. It has the densest brain tissue of any gastropod ever discovered, and no scientist survived after a piece regenerated,”, the other said.

“What do we do then?”

“Pray we're not prey.”

As the room warmed up the man still shivered, and he put his jacket over his legs since his ass and legs were now stuck to the steal chair.

As he shivered he asked, “Here are some theories.”

In one photo he saw Laurasia, and Gondwana.

“No, I said it was ALL connected..”, he implored.

Then he showed him Pangaea.

“Yes, that's it.”, declared the slug, “That's about what I saw in space.”

The man began to cry as he could feel the deep sadness in this being's heart to realize that this was the far future.

“It's been 300 million years...”, the being said in shock.

“You can read?”

“I'm using your mind, and for some reason I can't read theirs now.”, it admitted.

“They are trying to put you into a deep freeze, and I am expendable, and should have left when I had the chance.”

“Great, and I'm about to get weak from eating too much.”, it revealed.

“How can I help you?”, the man asked.

“Get them in here, and don't reveal my location..”

It climbed above the door, while the man used his walkie, “Hey ladies, could you kindly get in here. It's dead. I lured it into a trap.”, he said boldly.

No response.

After a few moments of silence he started, “I'm sorry, Over.”, he said absentmindedly. “Having a slug eat my partner has me rattled. Over.”

Instead of a response the door opened swiftly knocking the slug from it's perch. The first woman in the door blasted her extinguisher at it, and froze it in place.

“Thank God!”, the man exclaimed, as one of the women grabbed it with tongs. “I can't stand up without ripping skin. Could one of you find a bucket, and bring warm water.”

“Only if you cover up better.”, they all chuckled, as it eased the tension.

“Not as if there's anything to see right now.”, he said as he put his pants over him, under his jacket.

The woman with the tongs started examining the frozen slug, while the other fetched warm water for the man. Then she looked at the computer, and saw images of Pangaea. “I thought the hypothesis was that this was alien?”

“It was”, the man paused in thought, “but maybe it crashed which is why it left a crater.”

“What are you saying?”, the woman asked.

“We may not have been the first species to explore space according to it.” , he said.

She blasts the slug a second time.

“Be careful, it's not violent.”

“But...”, she glances at the stains of blood left from their colleague.

“It was hungry. After 300 million years, I think we all would be. I have an idea.”, he said as the other woman showed up with a mop bucket filled with warm water and towels.

Before she could get to it, they all stood erect at attention. As he did he screamed, as the skin ripped from his backside.

The woman with the mop bucket threw the steaming mop water at the other woman piercing her neck and face with shards of ice, killing her.

The man, who wished he were dead, and the other woman returned to standing at attention and said in unison, “How can we serve you?”

“Mate”, it said in their minds, so they did.

-----------

A day later, it began panicking.

“Where is it? I need it!”, the being screamed in their minds.

“Need what?”, the man asked weakly, his pants drenched in blood.

“Your eggs, lay your eggs!”, it screamed only at the woman.

“We don't lay eggs, you slug!”, the woman sneered.

I need an egg to survive.”, it said.

“Well, we're placental mammals, our eggs are inside.”, the man said.

“Sorry, but I need food, and I was expecting eggs. Is he needed for birth?”, it asked.

“No!”, she exclaimed, as the man's eyes grew wide.

He stood at attention, and removed his blood soaked pants, “Sorry this won't be pleasant for either of us.”, it said to him as it began crawling up his leg.

“No, Please, NO, I can hel..ARGGGG!!!”, the man shouted as the being entered his colon.

As it ate its way through his colon, he left most of it intact. Every so often it would take a bite to see where it was, and plugged the hole with mucus, from it's foot. It quickly found it's way through both the small and large intestines, using his liver to enter his heart. “This is going to hurt.”, the beast said.

“Go..ing..to..hu..rt?”, the man stammered, as his pain subsided for the brief instance it spoke.

The being then ate half of his heart, and used itself as the half it removed to keep his blood flowing.

After a brief heart attack it asked him, “Do you feel that?”

“Yes, I do.”, the man said.

“Over time you will die, but your adrenaline is my food. Keep active, and you keep us both alive. Stop, and I eat tissue.”, was its warning.

The man looks at the woman, and with wild eyes yells, “Please, kill me, please!”

“Think of something you love.”, it says.

He thought of his wife back at home.

“Oh good, how's that!”, it said.

A large smile came across his face, scaring the woman.

“Right now we are syncing up so that you will know what I know, and I will know what you know. Just keep active so you don't die.”, they said in unison in the woman's mind. “And now we are connected to her.”

The first thing it did in this new body was mate with the woman. Then he got online, and using both of their knowledge to figure out where the continents he was looking for were.

“Are you coming?”, the man said to the woman. “you know you have to!”, it said in her mind.

“Of course.”, she said wondering if she really wanted to go, or if the being was making her want to.