Cry of the Omuah

The impact rocked the old ’41 Studebaker, causing it to swerve in the road. Robby latched firmer onto the gigantic steering wheel and eased of the gas allowing the Detroit tank to slow down and steady itself. 

“Hold on everybody,” he yelled, and hand over hand pulled the wheel to the right and started pulling the beast over to the side of the road. 

Already the smoke was starting to envelope the inside of the car. Robby pumped on the brakes to get a good pedal and jammed the brake pedal down as hard as he could. The old car started sliding toward the road ditch in the loose gravel and finally came to a halt. 

“Everybody out! Run,” Robby screamed.

All four doors of the old sedan flew open and we raced out of it as fast as we could go. 

Devlin was wild eyed and hesitated a second in the middle of the back seat. Bennie grabbed him by the arm, yanked him back to reality and out of the car. 

The five of us were running across the road when the second explosion propelled us forward onto the side of the ditch embankment across the road.

The Studebaker lifted off the ground and was thrown forward, landing inverted next to the right-side road ditch and erupted in flames.  

Somewhere between barely conscious and petrified, I saw the three bright lights instantly come together as one. It hovered above us about twenty feet off the road. It was the brightest light I had ever seen, cone shaped, and about twenty feet in diameter at the base. It appeared to have no origin, almost like it came out of nowhere.

Devlin was closest to me. His body was distorted in a manner that would probably involve a wheelchair if he survived. 

Past Devlin, Bennie was still lying in the ditch and slowing moving.

Robby was on his feet, but staggering and I could not see Melvin.

A large figure caused a shadow in the bright light near me. The shock of it cleared my senses, but my fear responded in momentary paralysis.

I had heard the tales since I was a little child and once believed in their existence. They lost their effectiveness about the same time as Santa and the Tooth Fairy.

The hovering light stayed with the beast as it approached Robby who was evidently still in shock because he just stood there. The creature grabbed Robby by the legs and shoulders and lifted him above its head. It folded Robby until his back broke and threw his limp body over to the side. 

I had seen enough and my flight reflexes took over as I threw up my hotdog and fries. I started up the steep embankment to reach the top of the cut out the highway department made for Highway 70. My hands bled from digging into the gravel in the embankment slope and my footing constantly gave away on me, but I was gaining ground.

I was fifteen feet above the road bed and almost to the crest of the hill. I lay against the bank in the darkness for a moment to catch my breath. 

A second being appeared into the light and from the elevation I was, I saw Melvin lying there and not moving as the first creature approached him. He picked Melvin up off the ground, lifted him in the same manner and folded him like he had done Robby. He threw Melvin’s lifeless body on top of Robby’s and looked up. 

Bennie had the same idea that I had and was about half-way to the top of the embankment when the second beast jumped at least thirty feet from the middle of the road and grabbed him by the foot. The creature held on and drug Bennie back to the roadside kicking and screaming. 

I lost sight of Bennie as I cleared the embankment and stood up. 

I was running like a wild man; bushes and limbs were tearing my arms and face but I didn’t care. I made it to the crest of the ridge and looked back to find nothing but darkness and quiet. 

I stopped and leaned against a tree to catch my breath. I should be able to see the fire of the Studebaker but it was not visible. I made my breath shallow so I could listen for any sound. There was nothing. No crickets or any other insect noises, no whip-or-wills off in the distance and no wind rustling through the leaves. The only sound was my ragged breath and my heart beating. 

When I thought I could move again I started moving slowly and deliberately without sound down the ridgeline. I felt my way through and eased the limbs out of my way as I steadily moved forward. It seemed an eternity until I made my way to an open clearing. With the little moonlight that was available, I could see the clearing was a good hundred yards across. 

I took out across the clearing at a fast walk, trying not to stumble on the rocks and stumps. Halfway into the clearing the bright light erupted with me in the center of it almost blinding me. I took off at a dead run and ran straight into a brick wall made of fur. 

My bladder let go and I screamed when the big hairy arms grabbed me. I remember being lifted into the air over its head by my legs and shoulders in the middle of that blinding light. 

I felt extreme pain and then nothing.

***

My mind slowly drug itself into consciousness only to find my body completely submerged in a warm viscous fluid. I did not feel any pain, I could not feel gravity, only suspension and the determination that I was not breathing. There was a presence that I recalled from sixteen years before, a tube-like extremity leading out from my navel.

What the hell?

I opened my eyes and could not see anything except darkness, strained to hear anything with the only audible sound being my own heart beating. 

I tried to move my legs and found that I was paralyzed from the waist down. 

Ain’t that a bite, Fat-Head, that hairy bastard broke your back.

With my hands I could feel and touch the spongy membrane of the sack that contained the fluid.

 I opened my mouth to scream, nothing happened. My mouth and lungs were full of slime; the was no means of projecting a voice. 

I pushed on the membrane with my pointed fingertips. If I could break through, maybe I could escape. The membrane was too flexible to tear. 

Remember Billy, remember what happened. 

I remembered everything; even things that I should not remember were vivid to me, the pain of being forced through a tunnel that was not big enough for me, a bright blinding light, screams and voices and the new feeling of being cold.

 I can remember mom’s voice talking and singing to me as I fed on her breast. How she tickled my stomach during a diaper change. 

My Dad’s aftershave, my first ball glove, riding bikes with Bennie and Devlin, duck-and-cover drills at school, Penny Smith playing show me yours, I’ll show you mine, mom’s chicken & dumplings, Pap-pap’s funeral, everything was clear.

I took my mind to the State Fair, preparing the Polled-Hereford heifer for the show. Janet came over to me and asked me to show her how to groom the tail on her Black-Angus bull calf. 

Her soft brown eyes lit up the world when she smiled. I remembered the feel of her soft lips when we kissed the emotion of that moment and the bitter sweet agony of telling Janet good-bye.

Think, Billy, think! Where am I?

The ride back to Glenwood and the impact that caused the old Studebaker to swerve. 

The explosion and being catapulted against the embankment. 

Devlin’s twisted body, Robby folded in-half.

I escaped, and the feeling of recalled terror made the sound of my heart beat escalate. The blinding light, running into the creature, being lifted up, the pain and horror of the event that caused him to black out.

I was paralyzed but still in extreme pain. Tubes and lines were attached to every part of my body. 

I was lying on my stomach and my head was in a viselike mount; I could see movement of legs around the table within my peripheral. 

The pain was completely removed but I could feel the tug and pull of skin in various places, especially my lower back and neck. The world went black again.

A foggy memory emerged momentarily showing the figures of people surrounding the table with him now on his back. There was some pain in this memory. I looked down at my naked body to see an opening where my navel us to be; a tentacle was being inserted into it. 

I focused on the people;  they were not human. They were like humans, but their heads were larger, too large for the skinny frame of the being. They were bald and their ears were large circular mounds on each side of their head. Their eyes were very large, their pupils were the size of a quarter, and they were set close together between a nose-ridge that was thin as a pencil. 

Their mouths wide across their face, almost ear-to-ear, and when the one that looked at me spoke, his jaw opened up show a massive row of teeth and an enormous tongue. He or maybe she spoke to the group in a high-pitched squeal who all turned to look at me and I tried with everything I had again to move. 

I saw movement of one of the beings go behind my head and the memory collapsed into darkness again.

The next vision again started foggy and I felt extreme pain in my back as I was being lifted by both of my legs to a vertical position. I looked around trying to get my bearing and discovered from an inverted view that the Omuah was carrying me forward across the room and two of the beings were walking beside me carrying part of the new tentacle I had in my navel and pushing a cart that the other end was attached to. 

I glanced to the right; Bennie was lying on a table with another three creatures inserting a tentacle into him. 

I remember being lowered into the floor in a vat of liquid. I remember the panic of being held upside down while being submerged. The Omuah lowered me to mid chest. The breath I had taken was starting to burn in my lungs as I held it. The burning became unbearable and I tried to force my body to move in any way to get out of the drowning pool. 

As the terror heightened to climax in my mind; reflex overtook control and let the air out my lungs in a great flood of bubbles. The same reflex drew in the liquid. I coughed. More air escaped only to allow in more fluid. Another cough and another backfill happened while every perception of sensibility and instinct confirmed that I was being murdered by drowning. 

The familiar raising and lowering of my chest that I had known and trusted for over sixteen years stopped. My chest was still. My eyes could not see well through the cloudy fluid but the recollection of being lowered the remainder of the way into the fluid and then into total darkness led me to believe I was descending to hell. My heart beat in my chest like a jack hammer but I could not move my arms or legs. I was helpless.

The memory faded into blackness.

There were no other memories between then and this time and place. I have no way of knowing the time period that all of this took place. All I know is that I have been terrorized and placed in this sack with no way of knowing why this is happening.

Time has become irrelevant; I wish I could go to sleep, but my mind will no longer allow it. It seems like I have been in this sack for a thousand years. 

I have reviewed every memory of the abduction and the surgery over and over again to try to find something I missed. Everything draws to this conclusion; I am dead and I did not make it to heaven. One positive thing, the memories of the past no longer frighten me.

***

I was calm and recalling the memory of when me and Bennie went to Pigeon Creek and found Mrs. Thompson skinny-dipping with her sister Brenda Tyler. Their beauty was the envy of all of Montgomery County. Bennie’s eyes were the size of saucers and we never let the ladies know we were anywhere around.  

I was just about to the end of the session when a dull light opened in my mind’s eye. The image of Brenda Tyler standing there was still present and became as a moving picture show, only in color. It was almost as if I could reach out and touch her. 

I immediately switched to a memory of Janet so I could see her face. Janet appeared into view as she walked over to me in the yellow sundress behind the livestock barn in Hot Springs. She was about to ask her question when the image of Janet froze on the screen and the voice of a young woman came through.

“Mr. Peterson, can you hear me,” the voice of the young woman displaying a semi-sexy undertone. 

“I can hear you, Eager Beaver, but I can’t talk!”

 “You don’t need to talk, Billy. May I call you Billy?” The voice resounded with a chuckle.

“You can hear my thoughts?” 

“Yes, it is time that we opened communications.”  

“How long have I been in here?”

 “By using the human standard time continuum; I estimate about two months. How do you feel?” The voice responded.

“I do not have pain anymore if that is what you mean.” 

 “Billy, try to move your legs?” The voice requested.

I moved my legs at little, my knees bent a little and relaxed.

“That’s good, Billy. It will not be long and you will have full movement. We have started reducing the paralysis formula and within a week you will be completely removed from it.” 

“What does that mean?” 

“It means you have survived the first step of becoming and should be acceptable for rebirth.” 

“Does that mean I am going home?” 

 “You will never return to your recollection of home. You would no longer be welcome there.” The voice said.

“What happened to Robby, Melvin and Bennie?” 

“Mr. Beason and Mr. Dalton are progressing at about the same rate as you are. Regrettably, Mr. Thornton did not survive the first step of becoming. I have to go now but will return. In the meantime, I have installed the station path and mind viewer into your processing so you can obtain knowledge and view your memories clearly. Please enjoy!” 

The view screen immediately returned to Janet leaning over with her hands holding the front of her skirt down and those big brown eyes. I paused the memory and gazed upon the face of Janet for a long time. I focused on every detail; right down to the mole at her left cheek jawline. 

“I will see Janet, again, dammit.  I will find a way to ”

 I hoped the woman with the voice heard me. I ran through the abduction and surgery memories again; pausing and stopping the view in places. When I arrived at the Omuah lowering me into the vat, I realized that I am still submerged upside-down in the vat. 

“What did she mean by rebirth?”

 “File 3273A- Meaning of Rebirth,” a cold and metallic monotone voice stated.

The viewer opened up to show a mechanical tube positioned at the edge of a metal table. The end of the tube was closed by a vertical slit. 

The tube expanded rapidly and the viscous fluid began to leak from the pressure of the fluid being exerted. The slit began to open and a great flood of the fluid gushed from the opening leaving a large lump in the center of the collapsed tube. The lump moved forward in the tube and reached the edge of the opening. 

The opening was force open from the inside and the fluid-soaked head of an Omuah emerged into view. It coughed, gagged and vomited a large quantity of the fluid. It sucked in a big breath of air and coughed again. More fluid was dispelled and more air was sucked in. 

The struggling Omuah reached a point where it was breathing in and out, laboriously, but without coughing. 

The beast emitted a tremendous roar. 

The Omuah extended is hairy arms through the slip and pulled itself the rest of the way through the tube. It landed onto the table, balled into the fetal position and lay there shivering.

“End of File 3273A- Meaning of Rebirth,” the metallic voice stated.

The screen went back to the grey, empty background.

With my right hand, I rubbed my chest and abdomen. 

I felt the millions of tiny hairs that were starting to grow over my body. 

In perfect silence; I screamed.