Hive Read Free Page A

something but what you are?
Oh Christ, Hayes, it’s . . . those eyes . . . those fucking eyes . . . they unlock things in your head, they .
. . “
    He paused there, breathing very hard now, gasping almost like a fish that was asphyxiating. There was sweat all over his face and his eyes were bulging from his head, cords straining at his neck. He looked to be on the verge of utter hysteria or maybe a good old-fashioned stroke.
    â€œYou better get him back to the compound,” Gates said.
    They were all staring at Lind, thinking things but not saying them. A clot of ice dropped from the mummy and Hayes stiffened at the sound. It was enough, by God, it was more than enough.
    He helped Lind with his parka and led him to the door. As Hayes made to open it, Lind turned and looked at the scientists. “I’m not crazy, I don’t care what you think. But you better listen to me and you better listen good.” He jabbed a shaking finger at the mummy. “Whatever you do, whatever any of you do . . . don’t stay in here alone with it, if you know what’s good for you,
don’t stay in here alone with it
. . . “
    Then they were out the door.
    â€œWell,” Bryer said. “Well.”
    The wind clutched the hut like a fist, shook it, made the overhead lights flicker and for barely a second, they were in the dark with the thing.
    And by the looks on their faces, they hadn’t cared for it much.

4
    T here were a lot of camps at the South Pole. Collections of pitted bones scattered over the frozen slopes and lowlands like sores and contusions on the ancient hide of the beast. But only a handful of them were occupied when winter showed its cold, white teeth.
    Kharkhov was one of the few.
    Just another rawboned research station, its numerous buildings like meatless skeletons rising from the black ice, shivering beneath shrouds of blowing white. A desolate and godforsaken place where the sun never rose and the wind never stopped screaming. The sort of place that made you pull into yourself, roll up like a pillbug and hold on tight, waiting for the night to end and spring to begin. But until that time, there was nothing to do but wait and languish through the days that were nights and keep your mind occupied.
    What you didn’t want to do was to think about ancient, hideous things that had been exhumed from polar tombs. Things that pre-dated humanity by God knew how many millions of years. Things that would drive you mad if you saw them walk. Things with glaring red eyes that seemed to get inside you and whisper with malevolent voices, filling your mind with reaching, alien shadows.

5
    A lthough he drank a pint of Jim Beam Rye before lights out, Hayes didn’t sleep worth a damn that night. He had weird dreams from the moment he closed his eyes to the moment they snapped back open at four a.m. In the darkness he lay there, sweat beading his face.
    The dorm room was dark, the readout of a digital clock over on the wall casting a grainy green illumination. There were two beds in there. If you fell out of yours, you stood a good chance of falling into your partner’s. They were crowded places, the dorms, but space was limited at the stations. Tonight, the other bed was empty. Lind was sleeping on a cot in the infirmary, shot full of Seconal by Doc Sharkey.
    Hayes was alone.
    Dreams, just dreams. Nothing to get worked up about.
    Maybe it had been what happened to Lind and maybe it was something else, but the dreams had been bad. Real bad. Even now, Hayes was all fuzzy-headed and he couldn’t be sure they
were
dreams. He couldn’t remember them all, just some tangled skein of nightmares where he was pursued, hiding from terrible shapes with burning eyes.
    He could only remember the last one with any clarity.
    And that’s the one that had yanked him out of sleep, made him sit right up, teeth chattering. In the dream, some grotesque freezing black shadow had fallen over him,