D. B. Reynolds-Moreton - Transplant

Transplant

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Story Copyright 1998 by D. B. Reynolds-Moreton

The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted inaccordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may bereproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in anyform or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of thecopyright owners.

ISBN 978-1-908387-32-5 (ePUB)

ISBN 978-1-908387-33-2 (MOBI)

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G lyn Bolstrom burst out of his nightmare into the inky blackness of the cabin, his body bathed in an ice cold sweat and shaking uncontrollably. He could still see the group of hideously distorted faces surrounding him, mouthing their obscenities as his trembling fingers groped for the elusive light sensor pad behind his head.

Wave after wave of panic surged throughout his body as he tried unsuccessfully to differentiate between reality and the terrifying sequence of events which had made up his nightmare.

Eventually, his desperately searching fingers brushed across the smooth raised surface of the sensor pad and the cabin luminary flashed into life, flooding the area around him with its harsh blue white light, adding a hint of sanity.

The grotesque collection of distorted faces slowly faded from view, but not before another shudder had rippled through his already shaking body.

Glyn breathed a sigh of relief, his breath whistling through his still chattering teeth as he heaved his body into an upright position on the bunk bed.

I cant take much more of this. he cried out loud.

Having one of your nightmares again, dear? His wife had been woken by his thrashing about as he came out of the horrible dream.

Yes, and the damn thing is getting worse each time. I can still see their awful faces after Ive put the light on. Sorry to have disturbed your sleep again.

Dont worry, dear. Tomorrow, or I should say today, is Sunning Day, so you can sleep on a little and catch up on your rest, there are no set tasks for you today, as far as I know. At least, I didnt see any on the screen last night.

Try to get back to sleep, dear, and Ill see if we can get some help in the morning. and with that she turned over and drifted back into her slumbers.

He knew no help would be forthcoming as the Medic had broken down, or to be more precise, was only working intermittently, and then it only offered random advice which rarely fitted the problem asked of it.

Glyn would have liked to go back to sleep, but he was now afraid to in case the faces returned. One helping of that nightmare was quite enough for one sleep period, he thought.

His sleep had been disturbed for several weeks now, and the nightmare always began at the same point.

His wife was just about to give birth to their first born, although in reality they were not due to have children for some years yet, unless there was an unfortunate terminal mishap among one of the other members of the ship.

He was standing in the Medics room at the foot of the delivery couch, and Mia was smiling sweetly at him over the huge bulge of her distended stomach.

It wont be long now dearest, I can feel her moving about.

At this point the door bursts open, and six birthing attendants rush into the room and spread themselves around the bed, three to each side.

They are dressed in long grey robes with cowls hiding their faces, and mutter incoherently among themselves as they lay out an assortment of surgical instruments on the edge of the couch, flashes of light mirrored from the overhead luminary unit accompanying the tinkle of steel on steel.

And then the screaming starts. At first it is just a soft low whimper, repeated again and again, and it then builds up slowly into a crescendo of sound which threatens to split his head open with its persistent screech of torment.

The attendants are jumping up and down, clapping their hands and chanting some unintelligible words which somehow seem to have some significance to him, but he cant think what it is.

Mias face distorts into an ugly parody of what it once was, one eye sliding down to the middle of her cheek, her nose tilts sideways and creeps up the other cheek pushing the eye socket up onto her forehead. Her hair is all but gone, just a few straggly wisps of dull grey brown hang down limply, like chewed string.

Her face becomes a distorted patchwork of red and brown pimpled skin, while a dribble of dirty saliva seeps from the gaps between the few blackened and broken teeth which remain.

The attendant nearest to him pushes forward, nearly knocking him off balance, and then thrusts a gnarled and dirty hand between Mias legs. The screaming goes a tone higher and considerably louder. Glyns tries to shut out the torturous sounds and then the attendant braces himself against the couch and tugs and pulls strenuously, cursing and swearing.

Suddenly there is a loud plop and the attendant holds a baby up by one leg, letting it swing to and fro, as if it were being blown by intermittent gusts of wind.

The cowls drop down to the attendants shoulders, and a hideous array of faces are revealed. All are distorted and twisted to a point of being hardly recognizable as human.

One had only one eye, another, a hole where the nose should have been, the third had three eyes, one of which was in the middle of its forehead. Each had its own terrible deformity, made all the worse by their gesticulations and the high pitched ranting and raving which was going on.

One of the attendants, with putrefying sores and a piece of decaying jaw bone showing through the ruptured skin, spun around and thrust his face into Glyns, the overpowering stench of his breath nearly making him pass out.

Look what youve spawned, a mutant, a hideous travesty of humankind! It will have to be destroyed, burnt, mashed up into a pulp. It cant be allowed to live and breed more of its kind. And with that he grabbed it from the other attendant and swept out of the room, the little girl child with the perfect pink skin, golden curls and pale blue eyes gurgled and smiled at Glyn, waving her chubby little hand in farewell.

Each time the nightmare occurred, it contained more detail, more sounds, and now smells were added to the deep distress Glyn had just experienced.

He dimmed the light down until it was only a gentle glow so as not to disturb his wife, and lay there, wondering what to do about the horrors of the night.

In the beginning, it hadnt been too bad, just unpleasant. Now, as the nightmare gained more detail, it was just about the most awful experience he could imagine, and the last three times it had occurred the images had remained long after he had switched on the cabin light.

He could try the Medic once more, but he couldnt remember the last time it gave out a sensible answer to a query, and no one else seemed able to help.

Glyn drifted into a half sleep state and relaxed, but not for long as the stench of the one with the putrefying sores assailed his nostrils once more and he was snap wide awake again, a new gush of ice cold sweat being added to his already wet night clothes.

As he was now fully awake, he was determined to stay that way until it was time to get up, no matter what.

Suppose Ill get used to it in time. Anyway, it cant get any worse. he muttered to himself. But he had thought that a few weeks ago, and it had.

To pass the time, he went over the events of the past few days, checking to see if he had done all the work assigned to him correctly, and was pleased to discover that he could find no fault with what he had done.