Chapter Four: The Cylinder Opens
When we returned to the common, the sun was setting. The crowds around the pit had increased further; there were a couple of hundred people there, at least, now. There were raised voices and some sort of struggle was going on around the base of the pit. Strange thoughts passed through my mind and Leonard just looked at me with a concerned look in his eyes. We made our way closer and as we got nearer I heard Winkle's voice: "Keep back, keep back… I have a shovel and I know how to use it", she spouted, as a teenager came running towards us. "It's moving", he shouted as he ran by, pushing past me and Leonard. "I'm outta here", he screamed.
Leonard and I went on to the crowd; everybody was elbowing and jostling east other, behaviour which I did not care for, and I hate crowds at the best of times. Too much chance for germs and bacteria to spread, I thought to myself.
"Take a wuck at all these idiots", Kripke said to Winkle. "Talking about idiots": he had spotted me. "Hey dumbass", Winkle shouted up to me from the pit, waving her shovel in the process.
The end of the cylinder was being screwed out from within. Leonard must have spotted this at the same time as I did because the both of us instinctively took a few steps back away from the cylinder. Somebody pushed past me to get a closer look, taking advantage of the space we had just created by stepping back. I turned around, and as I did so the screw must have come out of the cylinder, for the lid fell to the ground with a ringing concussion. I stuck my elbow into the person behind me, not realising that it was Leonard. "Ouch, watch out", he yelped. "Sorry", I whispered.
I think everyone was half expecting a man to emerge: possibly something a little unlike a terrestrial man, but in all essentials a man like Leonard and I. I know I did; I was secretly hoping that he would have pointy ears and tell us all to "live long and prosper", but I knew that was a long shot. Looking, I saw something resembling a little grey snake, billowing movements, then two luminous disk like eyes emerged; then something resembling the head of the Medusa: about the size of a bear, it coiled up out of the cylinder and withered, and I saw its clumsy body was being affected by our planet's gravity. The gravity on its home world must have been less to allow the bulk of this creature's body to stand, something which it was clearly struggling to do here. Suddenly a chill came over me and there was a loud shriek from a woman behind us; we both turned around and realised it was Penny. She must have followed us, allowing curiosity to get the better of her, despite being terrified of the cylinder on the common. She grabbed my arm again; I wish she would not do that, but I could see in her eyes how scared she was so I put my arm around her and she cowered into my body, burying her eyes into my chest as if she could watch no more. My eyes were fixed upon the cylinder still, from which other tentacles where now projecting. I saw astonishment giving place to horror on the faces of the people around me; even Leonard was looking wary eyed now. There was a general movement backwards. I saw people on the other side of the pit running off. I looked again at the cylinder, a governing terror gripped me. I stood petrified and staring. My fight or flight instincts must have been malfunctioning. Leonard had already started running back towards the trees where we had earlier taken shelter. "Sheldon, come on… we have to get away from here", he shouted. I became aware that I still had hold of Penny; tears were pouring down her terrified face.
I looked again at the thing that was sitting on top of the cylinder. Two dark-coloured eyes were looking in my direction. The mass which framed them, the head of the thing, was a round shape and it appeared to have a face. There was a mouth underneath the eyes, the lipless brim of which was slavering. A lanky looking appendage gripped the edge of the cylinder and another swayed in the air. Those who have never seen an extra-terrestrial life form before, other than in a science-fiction movie, could not even begin to imagine the strange horror of its appearance: the peculiar v-shaped mouth with its pointed upper lip, the way its eyes didn't appear to have a brow ridge, the absence of a chin and the incessant quivering of this vulgar looking mouth, the sheer mass of tentacles and the noise of it breathing in a strange atmosphere, the evident heaviness and the pain it must have been in due to the greater gravitational energy of our planet… the scariest part was those eyes, those big disk-like menacing eyes, there were monstrous. I was overcome with disgust and dread. These creatures, did not look like they had come in peace!
Suddenly the creature vanished: it had toppled over the brim of the cylinder and fallen into the pit. I heard it give a cry and forthwith another one of the creatures appeared. I turned and grabbed Penny by the arm and started running madly, dragging her behind me. "Sheldon…. I can't run as fast as you, slow down", she screamed, but I did not slow, nor did I release my hold on her. I ran startlingly and stumbling. I ran toward the trees, the same direction which Leonard had run off in. I was wishing that I had not allowed curiosity to put not only myself in danger, but Penny too. She meant more to me than I would ever admit to and all I could think about was getting her to safety.
The common was dotted with people, all running like I was doing. They had all been stood in half fascinated terror, staring at these creatures. Then with a renewed terror I looked back and saw a round black object bobbing up and down at the edge of the pit. It was the head of Kripke who was trying frantically to get out of the pit, but he was showing as a little black object against the hot western sky. Suddenly he vanished and Penny let out a shriek, I had a momentary impulse to go back and help him but my fears overruled.
Everything by this point was quite irreversible; anybody just arriving would have been amazed at the sight: over a hundred people all hiding but yet still wanting to stick around to see what happened next. I mean, it's not like these creature had done anything to harm us, we might have looked as scary to them as they did to us…
