Page 24 of You Weren’t Meant to Be Human
He turns off the OPEN sign, shuts down everything except the emergency light, snatches the hive key from the register, and steps into the manager’s office without a sound.
Stagger follows grumbling, the dog he is.
The hive is buzzing. A single fly darts across the padlock. He fumbles the key once. Twice.
He can hear the hive already.
Blessed child of ours, what brings you to us?
The lock clicks.
How is our little one?
The chain falls and Crane barrels into the hive’s room, its sanctuary, and lunges for the first worm he can see.
Nobody knows a thing about the hive. That’s the truth of it. Nobody knows if they’re aliens or demons or some horrible natural thing that’s crawled up from the earth’s crust a few decades ago. If they came from space or another world or the dirt.
Of course, that’s not to say stories haven’t been passed down through the years.
An enforcer from Tennessee came through a year or two ago and said that, according to her hive mother, the worms and flies didn’t always look like worms and flies.
They came down from the sky in the shape of something else, a long time ago.
It’s only through the decades that they’ve come to be something recognizable.
Levi mentioned that, to the north, hives boast giant horseflies instead of flesh flies; once, visiting a hive in South Carolina, he found a swarm of botflies that attempted to nest their eggs in the tender skin between his fingers.
The worms themselves are always the same, though.
Some bizarre thing Crane hasn’t been able to find on Wikipedia, somewhere between a nightcrawler and a Bobbit worm, wet and slimy and chittering with teeth.
Whatever they are, they mold themselves to their surroundings. Nestle into the gaps. Make themselves a part of the natural world.
And they squirm and panic and shriek like everything else.
Crane misses the first one he goes for. It squelches back into the hive of hardened calcium. Shit, shit. He stumbles to the floor. Drags himself closer on his hands and knees.
The swarm explodes into a storm of wings and whining.
CHILD.
They did this. This is their fault.
The next one, he gets. By the tail. He hasn’t touched a worm since his bite three years ago, and it’s warm and wet and slimy, impossible to get a decent hold on. The hive roils and shrieks and snaps its thousand jaws. The worm’s head thrashes. He can see all its teeth.
UNGRATEFUL FUCKING HOMINID, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?
It’s rancid in this room. The worms are in a panic. They understand their people and they can taste the rage boiling over on his tongue, can smell the fear and hatred. The swarm turns the air into a shimmering roar.
He’s going to yank one of these things from its protective shell and hold it tight, head grasped between his fingers like the Crocodile Hunter holding a viper. And then he is going to put every ounce of pressure on that head until it’s about to pop.
AND YOU USELESS REJECT, YOU PILE OF DISGUSTING EXILES. ARE YOU JUST STANDING THERE? DO SOMETHING.
All the hive has to do is admit it was wrong.
Let him get rid of the baby and he’ll stop.
He’ll agree to anything in return. He’ll rat out Hannah.
He’ll make sure Jess is the one to carry the baby.
If Levi has to be the father, he’ll look the other way.
And he knows that twenty-week abortions are illegal everywhere in the fucking country, but he’ll figure it out.
He can bring Tammy to the hive, have them tell her it’s okay, they can do whatever they need to do in a chair in her kitchen.
No painkillers, no alcohol, no nothing. He’ll take it like a man.
All they have to do is agree, and he won’t—
Crane almost manages it. Almost unravels the creature from its tunnels.
But Stagger comes up behind him. Always Stagger.
A gloved hand slides under his chin. Another presses hard on his collarbones. Together those hands drag him back, fighting him every centimeter until he’s pinned against Stagger’s thigh.
The worm slips through Crane’s fingers.
Crane thrashes. Fucking dog, fucking half corpse, don’t touch me . The touch hurts. His skin burns. Every movement, every brush of clothing on flesh feels like a grater ripping him up.
“Shh.”
WE GIVE YOU SO MUCH AND THIS IS HOW YOU TREAT US?
Fuck you. Fuck you. He tries to dig his nails in. Tries to bite. Why won’t they listen? They’re supposed to listen. They’re supposed to understand, it’s not supposed to be like this.
“Stop,” Stagger rasps.
The last time someone tried to crack open the hive and get their hands on a worm, Levi put the Mossberg to the side of Harry’s head and pulled the trigger.
WE HAVE GIVEN YOU EVERYTHING YOU HAVE ASKED FOR, EVERYTHING YOU HAVE EVER WANTED.
He doesn’t want this make it stop make it stop he’ll do anything he’ll take the shotgun he’ll take it he will—
BUT PERHAPS WE HAVE THOUGHT TOO HIGHLY OF YOU.
PERHAPS OUR CHILD NEEDS A FIRMER FUCKING HAND.
Crane tries to fight but can’t. Stagger is too strong. Crane is too tired. He’s been so tired for so long. With one final moan, he slumps back, falls, helpless.
The hive takes a deep, calming breath.
We did our best for you, they say. We would like for you to know that.
Your mate will come collect you.
We will discuss the matter then.
The swarm congeals, finally making one shimmering mass in the air, before twisting through the open door.
On the floor of the manager’s office.
Sobbing.
You have the sun, the hive growls. You have the sky, you have the world, and yet you act like this. Would you rather be trapped in here with us? Is that what it would take for you to understand, child?
One arm sits tight across his belly. Crane knows that waiting to feel another flutter of movement is some form of mental self-harm, but he can’t help it.
It’s better than what his brain is screaming at him to do: to bust his chin open on the concrete office floor, dig his fingers into the wound, and pull pull pull until all the skin on his face comes off in a sheet.
On the floor with him, Stagger hums. There’s no tune. Only a low, imperfect frequency, a dying cat still attempting to comfort. It’s so gentle. Stagger has always been so gentle and for what ? He’s a prison warden just like Levi. He’s the same as the rest of them.
Staggers says, “Hurt.”
Crane coughs. Shut up. Shut the fuck up.
“Hurts.”
Yes, it hurts. His head hurts from crying, his stomach hurts because there is something inside him, his skin hurts every time he moves. Every nerve ending is raw.
Stagger attempts to say something else, but it’s too difficult. He can’t get his mouth to cooperate. The worms shift and move and squirm under the skin and all he can do is croak out some syllable or another.
Crane watches, borderline vindicated. It’s frustrating, isn’t it?
To be unable to communicate no matter how hard you try.
To have the right words slip through your fingers every time.
Hell, you can have all the words in the world, but if none of them can help you, if you can’t put them together in an order that will save you or even get them past your lips, what’s the point?
It’s so difficult that eventually you give up.
But Stagger doesn’t stop. He takes Crane’s hand, repositions every individual finger until it’s as close to the letter Y as he can manage—and holds it up between the two of them. Makes a mirroring sign with his own. Pushes toward Crane, then himself.
The motion for similar. The same.
And then, the sign for sorry. On his chest first, and then on Crane’s. He’s sorry. Stagger is sorry, is sorry, is sorry.
You useless reject, you pile of disgusting exiles.
Crane, sniffling, wiping his eyes, crawls forward until he’s in Stagger’s lap. He reaches under Stagger’s jacket, under his shirt, and places a hand on his stomach and feels the worms like the kicking baby inside his own.
The swarm eventually returns, with Levi. The bell over the door rings and Crane curls up with his face in Stagger’s neck, doesn’t look up, refuses, even when Levi’s heavy footsteps clomp past on the hardwood and the drone of the flies gets so loud.
“Fuck,” Levi says. “Get off the floor.”
Protector.
Levi snaps up. Stands tall, forever a military man.
The end of our patience has been reached. Something must be done.
Levi says, “I’ll handle it.”