Steven M Nedeau, Author

Marla’s Message

by Steven M Nedeau

Erin looked down at the knife in his hand. The blood coating the handle ran between his fingers and lined the ridges of his fingerprints, leaving his mark on the wood. He had woken to find the knife placed next to him and his glasses missing. On the floor, bloody footprints walked toward and away from the table where the knife had been placed. The blood from the prints bled into the traction grooves of the stainless steel floor, dispersing them, making them harder to identify.

Erin squinted at the marks on the floor, trying to focus. He didn’t recognize the species. There were so many on board. He scoured his memory, searching out clues to the owner of the trail. The species was bipedal. 

The rest of his room appeared normal, except Marla wasn’t there. Her clothing from that morning lay on the bed. If she left the room, she left naked. The sheets were strewn about from their vigorous lovemaking session. Her cup of tea rested on the table next to where the bloody knife had been sitting. Where was she? Did the owner of those footprints drag her away? Erin looked at the prints again. There did not appear to be any sign of a struggle.

He returned his attention to the clothing on the bed, picking them up. Under Marla’s morning clothes was a strange pair of pants. They were slim, much too slim for Marla. He looked at the pattern and matched it to his own. He held them up to his hips. They could fit him if he went on a significant diet but there was no way these were his pants. He could add one more clue to the owner of the footprints, whatever species it was wore clothing.

Erin followed the trail of blood, not the trail leaving the room, but the trail entering. Whatever brought the knife into the room had come from another area of the ship, probably from the specimen containment area. Had this being injured itself escaping its confinement? 

Why did it leave the knife? He asked himself. And why didn’t it kill me?

He pressed the button opening the door to the hallway and crept outside. The prints traveled the along hall to one side, crossing over themselves. A blood trail smudged the wall panels, three thin lines. Erin steeled himself and pushed on.

Security was going to get an earful for their sloppy work and Erin considered heading straight to their office instead of following the trail. Find Marla, first. He thought. She was there when you fell asleep. Maybe she ran to try and escape this thing?

The trail ended at a door on his left. He looked down the hall away from the door. The blood didn’t lead to containment but to a crew member’s apartment, Marla’s apartment. He pressed the button on the wall and the doors slid sideways away from the opening.

Erin’s breathing stopped as he fell to his knees in shock and came back in a sob. Inside was Marla, or what was left of Marla. Her face lay near the bed, pulled away from her skull. Her skin and portions of her musculature lay in a pool of blood in the center of the room. Her bones were absent, all of them. Whatever demon had left those prints had dismantled the love of his life like she were no more than cattle.

Moving out into the corridor, Erin sounded the alarm by pulling the key out of the wall. The small brass key screamed in his hand emitting a piercing tone reverberating around the ship, communicating the location of the alarm to the other crew members. In his mind the wail of the key became a scream of pain and he dropped it. A dizziness overcame him. Was he in shock?

Disorientation gripped him and he fell to lay next to the key. 

Why am I so weak? He asked himself, pressing against the floor and realized he didn’t have the energy to stand. He shook his head, fighting the loss of control he seemed to be experiencing. Help should be coming. Boots should be thundering down the halls to answer the alarm.

There was silence.

Erin lifted his eyes to the end of the hall, to the door there, to the closed door. The image was blurry and Erin wished he had his glasses. There on the other side of the glass was a slender being, naked, hands pressed against the glass, watching him. Bathed in the blood of Marla the being had hair well past its shoulders. Erin could see because of its nudity that the being was a female but he still couldn’t place the species. There were so many.

Behind her the vacuum of space framed her image in the glass. She held the bridge. She was in control of the ship, of the crew, of the specimen containment units, of the life support. The realization of his predicament struck Erin. She had turned off the oxygen.

Erin woke and tried to sit up, but he found something holding him down. Straps, yellow and black, crisscrossed his chest, arms, and legs. The air had returned to the cabin. Looking around he recognized his room again and upon further visual inspection noticed that he was covered in blood. He tried to scream through the gag as he pressed against the straps. All he managed was a, “Harumphg!”

“Ah, you’re awake.” The female from the bridge walked out of the shower stall drying her hair with a towel. She wore the pants Erin had found on the bed but she was otherwise naked. She was hideous. Erin glanced at her bare feet and surmised that it was she who had left the prints.

She walked to the table and picked up the knife with the tips of her grotesquely slender fingers so as not to dirty herself again with the blood she had just washed away.

“It took me quite a while to get everything I needed but I think this is all going to work out fine.”

“Harrumg,” Erin said through the gag, flexing his arms against the straps holding him down.

“Oh, yeah,” she said and ran into the bathroom with the knife, dropping the towel. When she returned the knife was clean of Marla’s blood. Straddling Erin’s prone form she slid the tip of the blade inside the gag against Erin’s cheek and cut it away. “You were saying?”

“You killed Marla.”

“Yes, I guess you could say that.”

“And my crew?”

“Yeah, them too.”

“How did you escape containment? Where did you get the knife?”

She laughed, a hideous lilting screech, and said, “You gave me the knife.”

“You’re mistaken.”

“No, I don’t think so. What do you know of the species in containment?”

“Why?”

“Humor me.” She rested the tip of the blade against his chest.

Erin disliked the lightness of her weight on him. Her knees rested on his arms held down by the straps.

“Did you cut me?”

She laughed again. “That’s not your blood. It’s Marla’s. I was still pretty gory when I dragged you in here.”

Erin struggled again but the straps held firm.

“What do you know of the species in containment?” She asked again.

Erin relented, hoping she would lower her guard and an opportunity to escape would present itself. “They’re simple. None so far advanced as we.”

“And the lack of advanced technologies means they are inferior and can therefore be corralled like sheep whenever the need arises?”

“The creator made us and gave us the universe to do with as we see fit.”

“Can you clone beings?”

“Why would one?”

She slid the knife along his nose. “If I were to cut this off, could you grow another one to take its place?”

“Of course we can. We’ve had that technology for more than a century.”

“Us too.”

“Impossible.”

“Oh, no, completely possible. We can grow more than our own flesh. We can grow yours now, too. Sometimes,” she mused, playing with the knife against his neck, “we can be very original. In fact, the last thing we grew was a costume. Wanna know how?”

“Not really.” Erin felt disgusted at the thought of conversation with any other races, no matter what planet they originated from. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll cut these straps and carry yourself back to the containment cells.”

“But, I’m only an animal. I don’t know what’s good for me.”

“You’re inferior.”

“And you snore,” she spat back, winking at him. Erin’s eyes revealed his understanding. The costume was Marla.

The hideously thin woman rested the knife edge against Erin’s neck, saying, “We will be using you and this ship as an example.” She clamped a hand over his mouth and, with all of her strength, drove the blade into the grey skin of his neck, watching the terror in his eyes as he struggled against her and the restraints.

As Erin’s body relaxed to his fate she brought her lips close to his ear and whispered gently, “You should have thought twice about visiting Earth.”