Chapter 13: Battle in the Rec Room
Jonas screamed as the arm-thing's legs dug into his own arm. Desperately, he tried to shake it off. He attempted to pry it off and even banged it against the bookcase, but it was too strong. It advanced, slowly but menacingly, up his arm and on to his shoulder.
"GET IT OFF ME! GET IT OFF ME!" The Norwegian wailed.
Some of the group stood stunned, others tried to find a way to help Jonas. Colin realised that no one was looking his way and quickly fled the room.
Jonas tried to push the arm back, but it had a grip like iron and was now barely 5 centimetres from his face. The end nearest him began to open up into some kind of hideous toothless mouth, snarling at him. Jonas screamed harder than ever, just as the thing made one final push and clamped itself over his mouth, where it began to pump some sickening fluid down his throat.
Carter was taking aim with his flamethrower. He couldn't shoot that thing now or he'd burn Jonas with it. But he was starting to think that may be better for him. Just then though, a growling gurgling sound behind him caught his attention. They'd been so preoccupied with the arm that they'd forgotten the rest of Edvard-thing, lying on the floor. Now, it was roaring at them and something was writhing beneath his shirt.
"BURN IT!" Kate screamed.
Carter took aim and pulled the trigger. A jet of flame burst out but quickly spluttered and died. He tried again. This time, nothing happened.
"Burn it man!" Shouted Jameson.
"Something's wrong with it!" Carter shouted. Something must have gotten damaged in the explosion.
"GOD DAMN IT CARTER. BURN IT!" Adam wailed as he pressed himself against the wall with all his strength.
Edvard's belly ripped open and a huge tentacle, with a razor sharp end sprang out. It swiped at the group, who quickly scrambled away.
"Carter! Table!" Shouted Jameson. The two of them flipped the pool table on its side to form a makeshift barricade. With Kate rushing to join them. Carter pulled off the flamethrower to have a look at it. The fuel line had become disconnected and he would have to re-attach it quickly. His work was interrupted briefly as the tentacle struck, smashing a hole their barricade and missing the two of them by inches.
Sander used this opportunity to run the way Colin had gone. Seeing that there was no other way out, Adam ran after him. But the tentacle was too fast. It caught round his ankle, flipping him through the air before landing him painfully on his back. Before he had the chance to recover, the tentacle struck again. This time stabbing into his stomach and pulling out his intestines like spaghetti.
"We gotta' get some kerosene!" Jameson shouted. He stood up and ran out the door, firing wildly to cover his escape. One lucky shot hit the neck of the tentacle, slowing it just long enough for him to make it to the door. Unbeknown to him however, the thing was detaching Edvard's other arm to run after him.
"Derek wait!" Carter temporarily forgot the flamethrower and ran after his friend, desperate to warn him. At this point though, the tentacle recovered and swung at him once more. The pilot ducked and rolled, taking cover behind a couch. It was only then that he realised that the thing was now between himself and the flamethrower.
"Kate!" He shouted at the only person within the flamethrower's reach. "There's a valve on the side of the nozzle! Hold it open 'till you smell gas, then pull the trigger!"
The thing struck at Carter once more but got jammed in several inches of wood and springs. Instead, Edvard-thing turned its attention to the injured human next to it.
Adam was trying to crawl away but the intense pain was paralysing him and stopping his limbs working in unison. "NO! NO! NO!" He screamed as he saw the thing retracting the tentacle. Scorpion-like legs sprouted from Edvard's torso, much longer and tougher than any human appendage. Screaming that same hellish scream, the thing raised itself up and crawled towards him. "NO! PLEASE NO!" Adam cried again.
The thing was now hovering over him, Edvard's head bent backwards to roar at Adam. It began to lower itself towards him. Adam tried to push it away but acid sweated from its back, burning his skin. With that barrier gone, Adam began to feel his hands melting into the creature.
"KATE! BURN IT! KATE!" Adam wailed.
Kate desperately wanted to help him, but her repair work wasn't finished. This was some kind of nightmare and there was nothing she could do.
As the thing lowered itself towards Adam's face, the American leaned away desperately. But the creature now pressed Edvard's cheek against his. Adam screamed in agony as it burnt itself through his shin once more. First muscle, then teeth, then bone fused together until it was hard to tell where one face ended and the other began.
Finally, the flamethrower spluttered into life. Kate pulled the straps over her shoulders. The tanks felt cumbersome on her petite frame but that didn't bother her. She stood up and fired at the creature, only to discover that it had sensed what she was about to do and fled before the flames could catch, dragging what was left of Adam with it. She rushed out into the hall. The thing was nowhere to be seen.
Returning to the rec room, Kate saw Jonas collapsed against some bookshelves, the arm thing well into the process of absorbing itself into him. The Norwegian was gasping for air, in as much as it's possible to gasp through your nose, and his right eye was blood red and bulging outwards. With his one remaining eye, he silently pleaded with the palaeontologist to kill him. Kate solemnly obliged.
Carter emerged from his hiding place and moved into the corridor, with Kate following behind. The fires were spreading fast now. Clearly, the base wouldn't be any use to anyone much longer. "Jameson?" He shouted "Sander? Colin?"
Colin piled as much weight as he could against the radio room door. Nobody was getting in here Nobody!
Moving to the other door, he realised too late that it opened outwards, and attempting to barricade an outward opening door would be futile. Hurriedly, he pulled out a strip of spare wire and tied one end to the door handle, the other to a pillar. It would do little to stop the creature but the radio man was fast running out of options.
Colin just wanted to be home, or at least back at Rothera. Even the Falklands would be preferable right now. Just anywhere but trapped at the bottom of the world with a some creature, hiding in the others. Tormenting him until it chose to strike.
He powered up the radio and picked up the mike. "Mayday. Mayday." He said, as loudly as he dared. "Can anyone hear me? Over." No response came. He may as well be trying to signal the TARDIS, but there was no other way he was getting out of this. "This is Thule Station. Do you read me? We found something in the ice. We need help down here. Can anybody hear me? We found something. We found something. We found something!"
Author's notes: To answer your first question, that character was supposed to die later but their death had to be re-written due to budget. Matthijs has said in interviews that he was quite disappointed by the loss. Fortunately, this is fan fiction so I'm not restrained by budgetary matters and I can try to re-imagine the scene.
The thing sweating acid is probably how it can fuse itself with human flesh. It can't infect through the skin or it would have walked around poking people and the whole base would be infected within an hour. The acid requires it to be more proactive about assimilation.
The characters in "The Thing From Another World." do try to baracade an outward opening door at one point. However, they probably did it deliberately as they wanted the thing to come at them from that direction.