It is the year 2033, in an American research base in Antarctica. Coincidently, the agents that were sent there were all former residents of Royal Woods, Michigan. Lincoln Loud, one of the pilots assigned to the group, was in his private shack, drinking whiskey and playing his favorite videogame on story mode. He had just won his fifth, consecutive level, and he only needed to win six.

"Poor baby, you're starting to lose it, aren't you?" He chuckled at his impending victory. The final boss stage began shortly, and ended with Lincoln's character being killed in half a minute. Annoyed, Lincoln poured the contents of his drink onto the console, causing it to short out. "Cheating bitch…" He muttered to himself. He was about to polish off the rest of his whiskey when he heard a chopping noise coming from outside.

With the bottle still in his hand, Lincoln put on his coat and made his way outside. Two of his sisters, Lisa and Lynn, must have heard the commotion as well, because they were standing beside Ronnie Anne to see the source. A helicopter was flying dangerously low, circling around the camp.

"Anne, what's he doing?" Lynn asked the mechanic.

"Looks like he's just hovering so far." The hispanic woman replied.

"Well, who is he?"

"Says 'Norj' or something on the side."

"Norwegian." Lisa corrected.

As the helicopter got closer to the ground, the group could see someone inside shooting at something on the ground. Rusty Spokes, the military officer in charge of the operation peered through the window, loading up his revolver as the copter landed. Not long after, Zach, Liam, and Clyde came outside to see what was going on.

A sled dog ran up from the helicopter's path and started licking Zach's face. The helicopter landed just outside the camp, and two soldiers stepped out. One of them, the pilot, accidentally threw a grenade into the snow right next to the helicopter. He dove down to try and find it in the deep snow, while his friend ran towards the camp.

The chopper exploded violently, making everyone flinch from surprise. Lincoln finally caught up with the others, checking to make sure his sisters were all right. The other Norwegian didn't stop to mourn his friend, he got up quickly and started shouting at the group. "Få helvete unna! Det er ikke en hund! Det er en slags ting! Det eretterligner en hund!" The group couldn't understand what he was saying. "Kom deg unna, du idioter!"

He aimed his rifle and fired at the dog. But the dog ran away, frightened, letting the bullet hit Zach's leg. Everyone else dove out of the way, trying to stay away from the maniac. Rusty smashed the glass in the window and aimed his pistol. With one shot, the Norwegian fell to the ground, dead. Lincoln was the first one to get up and check on his friend.

"Zach! Zach, you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm alright." Zach breathed through his teeth.

Lincoln gave Zach the bottle of whiskey and he and Ronnie Anne went to the sight of the chopper. Clyde and Liam followed with fire extinguishers. Lincoln, his sisters, and Ronnie Anne were kicking snow onto the smaller flames while Clyde and Liam used the extinguishers on the larger wreckage. "First goddamn week of winter." Lincoln muttered to Lynn.

After the chaos ended, Lincoln and Clyde carried the Norwegian inside, while Liam and Ronnie Anne helped Zach into the infirmary. In the meantime, Lynn took the dog to the rec-room. In less than ten minutes, Haiku was finishing up with Zach's leg. The redhead winced in pain as the needle slid through his skin.

"Oh, please…" Haiku rolled her eyes, apathetically. "It's four stitches. The bullet barely grazed you."

"What the hell were they doing flying so low?" Zach pondered out loud. "Shooting at a dog? And then at us?"

"Stir crazy?" She offered with a shrug. "Cabin fever, who knows?"

"Well, I wanna know." Rusty announced. Lincoln and Clyde had gone back to the wreckage to see if they could salvage anything, so he gathered everyone else into the rec-room to discuss their next move. Lisa went off to check on the progress of their communications officer.

"U.S. Outpost number thirty-one, calling McMyrtle, over?" Penelope took her finger off of the microphone's button to let the skipper respond, but all she heard was static. She pressed down, harder, clearly aggravated. "U.S. Outpost number thirty-one, calling McMyrtle, urgent! Come in! Over?" Still, only static. "Great." She cursed under her breath, taking off her headphones.

"Come on, come on!" Lisa tugged at her sweater, trying to prompt her to keep calling.

"Nobody!" Penelope replied.

"'Nobody…'" Lisa scoffed. "You need to contact somebody! You need to contact anybody! Protocol commands that we report situations such as this!"

"Look!" Penelope slammed her fist onto her desk. She knew it was important to report the horrifying situation, but she didn't appreciate Lisa's tone. "I haven't been able to reach shit in over two weeks! I highly doubt anybody has spoken to anybody on this entire continent, and you want me to reach somebody?!"

"Hey, cut the chatter." Rusty entered the room. "We're meeting in the rec-room."

A few moments later, Leni, Lincoln's other sister and the team's chef, rolled into the room with Liam close behind her. "Y'know, I was wonderin' when el capitan was gonna get a chance ta use his pop gun." Rusty shot the redneck and angry glance as he chewed on tobacco.

"Alright, let's get serious here." He said. "Lisa, do we have a map of where other countries are stationed?"

"Of course." The scientist replied. "Every research facility comes equipped with knowledge of other facilities should an emergency occur."

"Good. Haiku, you and Lincoln go up to where they're stationed and see if they need help."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on!" Lisa spoke up. "Are you certain that this is a good idea? What if the rest of them turn out to be hostile? Haiku did suggest they are suffering cabin fever."

"Well, did that 'knowledge of other facilities' tell you how long they've been out there?"

Lisa glanced down at the files she held tightly in her grasp. "Hmm, says here five weeks."

"That ain't long enough for them to go bonkers." Liam piped up.

"Bullshit, Liam." Zach snorted. "Look at you; you've been crazy since day one." The redneck smiled sarcastically and flipped his friend the bird. "But seriously, why did they attack us?"

"Oh!" Leni snapped her fingers and smiled, enthusiastically. "Maybe we're at war with Norway!" Everyone else in the room gave her incredulous looks. Leni frowned and crossed her arms over her chest, feeling insulted. "Well, I don't hear you guys coming up with anything!"

"Alright, Doc, I'll give ya a lift." Liam got up from his seat, ready to get his flight suit.

"No, you're staying here, Liam." Rusty declined.

"Hey, thanks for thinkin' 'bout it, though."

Back outside, the fire had now completely died down. Lincoln and Clyde had salvaged as much as they could from the damaged chopper, including six damaged canisters of kerosene. "What was all this for?" Clyde wondered.

"Lincoln!" The base's pilot turned his head to see Haiku and Rusty heading towards them. "Linc! Get your gear ready!" Lincoln looked up at the sky, feeling nervous. He met the duo at their own chopper, and, after they explained they wanted to see if there were any survivors at the other camp, he finally voiced his concerns.

"Look, guys, I'm not sure this is a good idea, right now. The storm-"

"It's not a storm, Linc." Rusty interrupted. "As soon as you get high enough it'll clear up."

"And what if you're wrong?" Lincoln argued. "If we get caught we can scratch one of our two pilots and our only doctor."

Haiku looked at Rusty, obviously preparing to side with Lincoln. "It's your call, Lincoln." She said. "If you don't want to fly, we don't fly."

Lincoln sighed. "You really wanna save those crazy Swedes, huh?"

"Norwegians." She corrected. Lincoln motioned for her to get in the helicopter and the duo set off. Meanwhile, Leni was looking out the window, watching as the aircraft lifted into the sky.

"Linky's really going, isn't he?" She said to herself, uncomfortably. Lisa and Lynn comforted their older sister, trying to assure her that he would be safe. But while Lynn was preoccupied, the dog they had rescued wandered off to explore the facility.

A few hours later, Lincoln and Haiku finally spotted the Norwegian camp, only to find that a tall pillar of smoke was climbing up to the heavens, as the rest of the camp was in shambles. Lincoln landed at a safe distance away from the base and they got out to inspect. Lincoln grabbed his shotgun and used it to break the handle off of the door. Inside, it was deathly quiet.

"Anybody there?" Lincoln called out. He didn't really expect to hear a reply, but he wanted there to be one. "Hey, Sweden!"

"They're not Swedish, Linc, they're Norwegian." Haiku sounded as if she was getting tired of reminding her friend. As they inspected the ruined facility, Lincoln noticed most of the walls were riddled with bullets. There was even an axe lodged in a concrete wall. They made their way into the radio room, and Haiku immediately noticed a trail of blood leading to someone sitting at the desk.

Instinctively, she placed a hand on the person's shoulder, causing him to lean back, revealing his slit throat. Lincoln aimed his flashlight at the rest of the man's body, finding a shaving razor in his palm. "Good God…" Haiku shuddered. "What the hell happened here?"

Lincoln went back out into the hallway to inspect the rest of the building while Haiku looked through the Norwegians' research tapes and papers. She had just finished gathering them into her satchel when she heard her pilot call her name. She walked as quickly as she could, trying to find the source of his voice. At last, she found him.

The pilot was standing in front of a large block of ice with a hole carved out of it. They glanced at each other, nervously, and decided to head back to their own camp.

Back at Outpost 31, Lynn, Lisa, and Leni had retreated to the rec-room to unwind with the others. Lynn had decided to join Clyde and Liam in playing with a hacky sack. Lisa and Rusty were watching a few of the movies they brought with them. And Leni, Penelope, Zach, and Ronnie Anne were content to playing a game of poker. Everything was peaceful, until:

"AH!" Zach dropped his hand as the sled dog stepped on his foot. "Lynn, will you put this mutt with the others where it belongs?!"

"Yeah, okay…" Lynn sighed and beckoned the dog to follow her. She crept down the darkened hallway, muttering about how badly she needed to have Ronnie Anne change the lightbulbs. When she finally got to the kennel, she opened the gate, but the dog wouldn't go in.

"Go on." She ordered. But the dog still hesitated. "Well, what are you waiting for? Go on…" At last the dog made its way inside. Lynn locked the gate and stared at the dog for a while longer. "That has to be the weirdest dog I've ever seen… I miss Charles." She thought to herself. After she left, the dog laid down on the ground.

But it didn't go to sleep. A low hissing noise came from its throat, waking up the other malamutes. The dogs immediately sensed an evil presence radiating from their guest, and began to growl and bark at it. Suddenly, the new dog's mouth opened up so wide, it split apart into four different directions. Its body began to twist and elongate into a grotesque form, frightening the other dogs. They clawed at the cage, desperately trying to escape, but it was no use. The thing grew tendrils that lashed out at the other dogs, dragging them closer to it.

Lynn had heard to noise from down the hall and came to see what was going on. As she fiddled with the flashlight in her hand, she opened the gate with the other. Just as the light turned on, two dogs rushed out of the kennel, trampling her as they fled. The flashlight rolled on the floor until it shone onto the target.

Lynn quickly kicked the gate shut and hurried to lock it. She ran out of the hallway, and activated the fire alarm.

(...)

FLASHFAN123 Proudly Presents

(...)

John Carpenter's

THE THING