Hive

“Nor is it to be thought...that man is either the oldest or the last of earth’s masters, or that the common bulk of life and substances walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces we know, but between them, They walk serene and primal, undimensioned and to us unseen.”

— H.P. Lovecraft

32

A few hours after Hayes went out on his mission, Cutchen appeared at the door to the infirmary. “Knock, knock,” he said.

“It’s open,” Sharkey said. She was staring into the screen of her laptop, glasses balanced on the end of her nose. “If you want drugs, the answer is no.”

But Cutchen didn’t want that.

He had an almost rakish smile on his face. And his eyes had that typical I-know-something-you-don’t-know gleam in them. “How’s things? Anything going on I should know about?”

Sharkey still hadn’t looked up from her laptop. “Go ahead, Cutchy. I know you want to. You look like a little boy trying to sneak a snake into the schoolhouse. Spill it.”

“It concerns our Mr. Hayes.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, about an hour ago I was coming back from the dome and I saw the craziest damn thing. I saw the camp bulldozer suddenly roar into life, come plowing through the compound and smash through the wall of Hut Six. Now isn’t that astounding?”

Sharkey was still reading off her screen. “Yup. Crazy things happen. Hard to see out there.”

“You know what I saw then? Oh, this is even better. I saw Hayes hop out of the ‘dozer and elbow his way through a group of people at Targa House, ignoring their questions as to what the hell he thought he was doing. Those people kept asking and he kept ignoring them and they were all smiling, some were even clapping.”

“Really?” Sharkey was looking up now, smiling herself. “Sounds like Hayes did a pretty careless thing . . . but it certainly perked up morale, didn’t it?”

“I would say so. Jesus, everyone’s been wandering around here like a bunch of goddamn zombies. All of them afraid of their own shadows . . . and now this. Yeah, they needed it. It was a real big boost, kicked them out of their shells. Maybe even gave them the sort of hope they’ve been lacking.” Cutchen laughed. “It certainly gave me a charge. Hayes is like our very own rebel leader now, our own Pancho Villa, our Robin Hood. But you already knew about this, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“And did you put him up to it?”

Sharkey shrugged. “I suggested it. Our Mr. Hayes is a very impulsive fellow, you know.”

“Oh, I know. Everyone seems to look to him now, like he’s in charge and not LaHune. I would tend to agree. Hayes is now our spiritual leader.” Cutchen sat down across from her. “LaHune didn’t care for any of it, of course.”

Cutchen explained that LaHune came storming into the community room, demanding to know what Hayes thought he was doing and Hayes told him that he was preserving Gates’ specimens before they rotted away completely. That he’d taken down that wall purely out of scientific concern for the mummies.

“LaHune, of course, started threatening Hayes with all sorts of repercussions.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Hayes then told him to go promptly fuck himself.” Cutchen laughed about this. “As you might expect there was more applause.”

“I imagine so.”

Cutchen sat there for a time watching Sharkey who seemed to be pretty enrapt with what was on her laptop. “Tell you the truth, Elaine, I didn’t just come here to tell you about that, though.”

“No?”

“Nope. For some time now, both you and Hayes have been pulling me into this scenario of yours and I’ll be the first to admit, I’m not seeing the big picture in this conspiracy. I know what I’ve been dreaming about and what I’ve been feeling and the things I’ve seen here . . . and at Vradaz. But you two have yet to feed me more than scraps. So let’s have it. Tell me everything.”

“Funny you should be asking these things, because I think I’m in a position, finally, where I can tell you. What I’ve been studying here on my laptop are Dr. Gates’ files. I hacked into his system because I had a pretty good feeling that everything he hadn’t told us that day in the community room was locked up on his computer and I was right.” Using her mouse, she scrolled through a few pages. “You see, not only was all of it there, but more. Gates has been sending written reports from his laptop up at the excavation to his desktop here. The last one was dated two days ago . . . “

“You’re a sneaky devil, Madam.”

“Yes, I am.”

“And? What did you find?”

“Where do I begin?” She sat back in her chair. “What we saw at that Russian camp, Cutchy . . . how would you classify that business?”