The Thing

TW: Extreme gore/violence

9:45

“Alright Mathis. You’re on your own. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“See you.” I mumbled back half-heartedly. I hadn’t had the night shift in a while. And it had to happen the night before my daughter’s concert. I wouldn’t be home till five and she had to be there by 5:30. I locked the door behind him and sat back down at the desk. I hope it's an easy shift today. Maybe I can get in some sleep.

10:30

I finish off my third cup of coffee. I haven’t had to stay up this late since my daughter was first born. I had changed my schedule to help my wife and I still ended up with the night shift so she could get in some sleep. I should get something to eat. I grab my radio and head out of the office, toward the vending machine down the hall. As I’m waiting for the bag of chips to fall, I hear someone cry out. Shit. Right when I leave my station. I walk in the direction I heard it from, leaving my things behind.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” I say when I reach the end of the hall. The only response is another yelp. “Are you hurt?” Everything comes to a halt when I survey the room. Empty. I head back to the office, grabbing my chips on the way.

12:48

The cry comes again a few times, but the cameras show nothing. I leave to check a few times and the sound stops every time I enter the room it seems to come from. It's been traveling closer and closer to the office each time.

1:04

I hear footsteps outside the door.

“Please.” I hear before the voice dissolves into sobbing. It's the first time I’ve heard it say a word. I walk to the door.

“What do you need?” I ask through the door.

“Please.” It cries again. Nails claw at the door. “Let me in.” I check the camera. There's nobody outside the door. The crying stops and I go back to the door. I reach reluctantly to open it only to find that whatever was outside is gone.

“Maybe I should get some sleep.” I say, sitting back down.

2:13

The crying didn’t come again for a long time but when it did it was always outside my door. Still nothing showed on the camera.

When I finally see something on the camera it's just a woman getting something from her car. She comes in the middle of a fit, disturbing the pattern of the voice’s cries. The harsh yelping screams of the thing become the small, frightened cries of a child. The woman looked scared and confused when she heard it. What could a child be doing out so late? How had they gotten in?

I wanted to tell her not to follow the cries. There would be nothing there. But I had the feeling she would find something.

2:19

The woman followed the cries to the bathroom and has not come out yet. I have to go check on her. I’m not sure what happened and I’m afraid to find out.

2:24

After waiting to see if she would come out, I finally push myself to go check. The halls are still silent. I reach the women’s bathroom at the end of the hall near the parking lot and knock.

“Ma’am? Is everything alright in there?” Silence. I knock again. After another moment of nothing from the other side I push the door open. It creaks loudly and stops midway, as if something was blocking its path. I take a deep breath and shut my eyes. I hope when I open them it will be right. She’ll be on the phone. That’s why she didn’t answer me. I push the door again and it stays put. I step through the half open door and survey the restroom. I stop short of looking behind the door. I walk away from it and check in each of the stalls. Empty. All of them. I turned to leave, finally taking in the mess behind the door.

The woman lay on the bathroom floor, blood pooling lazily around her motionless body. Where her eyes should be are empty sockets, a sluggish waterfall of blood streaming down the side of her face and into her pale brown hair. She lays on her back, fully exposing her carved out abdomen. It looked like something had scraped her cleaner that bones on an ant pile. Her face displayed the terror she must have felt when she was killed. The only thing I saw left of her was her heart. It was placed in her cupped hand resting on the floor beside her, as if she was handing it to me.

I turned and ran to one of the stalls. I vomited the bag of chips and three cups of coffee I’d had earlier, only able to think about what had happened to the rest of her. After it seemed like there was nothing else I could throw up, it stopped. I wiped my mouth and stood, taking deep breaths to steady myself. I walked to the sink and washed my face. I was careful not to look in the mirror, so I didn’t see what was behind me. I walked out the door with my eyes closed and headed back to the office.

2:39

I grab look for my phone, preparing to call the police but I can’t find it. I hear it ring. It's coming from outside the room. Then something wails. I slam the door shut again as the claws scratch outside. I twist the lock and the thing starts pounding on the door.

“Please! Please let me in!” it cries over and over again. I look at the cameras, still seeing nothing outside the door. I look to the corner of the screens and see a room that wasn’t there before. The office. This office. The door on screen creaks open. I look, expecting to finally see the thing tormenting me, and see nothing. The only movement is on the screen. I watch the door swing open fully, but don’t see anything that could’ve opened it. The door on screen slams shut again and the knocking outside stops. I press my ear against the door, listening for the thing. I hear it whisper

“I’ll be back.” A shudder runs through me at the sound of its voice. Calm. Unlike I’ve heard it all night. I sit down in front of the screens, eyes trained on the one with me in it, and wait.

3:00

It hadn’t come back at all since the last time. I thought maybe I’d make it to the morning. Then I heard it cry. The door on screen opens but nothing comes through. I turn to the door in the room and see it hasn’t opened yet. Nothing had entered the room on screen, but I turned and looked back. I stood and walked backwards in fear, then the screen goes dark. I sit rigidly still as I hear the door behind me creak open. I slowly turn to face whatever it is that tore open the woman in the bathroom.

In the small crack of the door I see a face. It looks almost human. It stumbles into the room in a way that almost mimics walking. Everything it does is so horribly almost right. It looks like a human gone sour, rotten. Everything about it is just wrong in a way you can’t figure out. It looks pale and sick, its hair hanging in greasy strands. Its arms are just a bit too long and bend at an almost normal looking angle. Its neck seems to stretch far too long until you look at it all together and everything falls into just the right place. You can’t put your finger on what's wrong with it, but you know this thing is wrong.

It continues its slow, lurching walk towards me. With every step it takes forward I shuffle back, stopping only when my back hits the wall. It stops a few steps in front of me and smiles. Its teeth are just a bit too sharp, too long. They sit crooked in its too wide mouth. Its smile stretches across its sallow, sunken cheeks. It steps forward again, letting its mouth drop open. Its tongue lolls out and drops to just below its chin. It steps again. The distance between us disappears and it's standing over me.

It seems much taller now, arching over me, saliva dripping on my face. I see one of its hands reach for me. I feel its long nails against my shirt and then searing pain through my abdomen. Its claws tear through my skin and muscles. I drop to the floor staring at this thing. It kneels by me, still smiling, and begins to dig into my stomach. I feel it removing my organs one by one. Blood pools around me and drips from the mouth of the thing devouring me. Its yellow teeth and pale skin are now stained red, underneath its claws are bits of flesh. I see its hand reaching for my face. I try to shut my eyes, but it digs its bloody claws into the socket anyway. In a moment of horror I feel my eyes, one after another, being ripped from my skull. I start to scream. The pain is too much. I can only feel its nails scraping the sides of my torso clean. I scream until my heart is torn from my body and placed neatly in my hands to be found the next morning.