Creature

"Maaaarg…"the creature uttered. Then again, a little clearer this time. "Maaarkhh!"

Mark staggered back. It wasn't possible, and yet as he gazed at the creature and it stood up to reach out to him, its full six-and-a-half feet rising up from the floor where it had been crouching, he realized it was true.

He was staring at what had once been JeffLaCo

A scream of horror rose in Mark's throat, but he stifled it before it managed to escape his lips. His mind was working furiously now, and he was remembering more.

The fits of rage.

Like Jeff had had, before they'd finally taken him away that night.

The strange changes he'd seen in his own face just last night.

His hands rose to his face and he traced his features with his fingers. They felt different now. His brow was jutting forward, and his nose seemed to have changed, too. And his jaw…

He ran his tongue over the suddenly unfamiliar contours of his teeth. They felt large-too large for his mouth.

Then he looked at his hands.

His fingers, long and thick, seemed to splay out from his enlarged knuckles, and where before his skin had been smooth, tufts of hair were now sprouting on the backs of his hands.

His fingernails, thicker than they should have been, were curving downward, almost like claws.

Panic welled up in him, and again he felt the urge to scream. But again he stifled the urge as his eyes flicked wildly around the room, searching for a means of escape.

That was when he saw what had once been Randy Stevens, no longer in the least recognizable as human, huddled in the corner of one of the cages, chewing obsessively at one finger while his eyes darted aimlessly from one place to another.

Then Mark looked up and saw the television monitor suspended from the ceiling, beyond the confines of his cage.

He recognized the image on the screen at once, and this time an enraged scream rose in his throat before he could contain it.

The image on the screen was that of his mother.

She was sitting on a straight-backed chair, a look of abject terror on her face.

As Mark stared at the image, his maniacal howl rose once more, echoing off the tiles that lined the room, bouncing back at him again and again, then becoming lost in the sounds of his next high-pitched shriek of fury.

The door at the end of the long narrow room flew open and three men hurried in. One of them was unreeling a fire hose and another carried a cattle prod. The third man waited nervously by the door, ready to open the valve as soon as the hose was straightened out.

The first attendant jabbed the cattle prod through the wire mesh of the cage, but before he could trigger it, Mark snatched it from his hands, jerking it into the cage, then shattering it against the side of the cot.

"Get the goddamn water on," he heard the attendant shout. As the hose bulged with the pressurized water of the fire system, Mark hurled himself against the gate.

The mesh bulged out, but held.

Then water spewed from the nozzle, and as the attendant struggled to control it, Mark grasped the wire mesh with both arms and began to shake it, hurling his full weight back and forth. He felt the mesh give slightly, and redoubled his efforts. Finally, as the full force of the jet of water struck him, the mesh gave way, the entire panel covering the cage door coming loose from its frame. Bellowing with rage, Mark threw the mesh aside and plunged through the opening, his hands reaching out to grasp at the nearest attendant. The man screamed as Mark picked him up, his scream cut short as Mark smashed him to the floor. The attendant's head struck the concrete with a crunching noise and immediately a pool of blood began to form around his skull.

The stream of water hit Mark full on the chest then, and he staggered back, his balance momentarily lost. Then, as if spurred on by Mark's own action, JeffLaCo

Mark paused for a moment. All his instincts told him to follow Jeff, to escape while he could! But then his eyes caught a glimpse of Randy Stevens and his mind suddenly cleared. He reached down and ripped the key ring loose from the belt on the body at his feet. Working quickly, he shoved one key after another into the last of the locked cages, until one turned and the door swung open. Leaving the keys where they were, Mark scuttled after JeffLaCo

In the cage, Randy Stevens gazed blankly at the open door for a few moments, then his eyes focused slightly and he shuffled forward, slowly stepping across the threshold. He paused by the body of the dead attendant for a moment, poking experimentally at the flaccid corpse, then moved on to the man JeffLaCo

That man lay on the floor, his spine shattered, unable to move anything below his waist. He was moaning softly and his fingers were working spasmodically at the floor as he tried to drag himself toward the door.

Randy studied him curiously for a moment, then reached out and jabbed at the man with one finger.

The man screamed in agony, his face turning pale as the blood drained out of it.

Chuckling insanely, Randy repeated the jab, then repeated it once more. As each jab produced its scream, Randy's giggling increased, as did the pace of his mindless game of torture.

It wasn't until the man fell silent-overcome by his pain to the point where he passed out-that Randy at last lost interest in the hideous sport.

Getting unsteadily to his feet, he shuffled slowly out the door.

His head weaved from side to side as he looked first in one direction, then in the other. Finally, mindlessly, he drifted away down the hall, snuffling softly as he tried to follow the scents of JeffLaCo

But of course, it had been months since Randy had been capable of putting names to anything, human or otherwise.

For Randy, the transformation from human to beast had long since been completed.

Now, in the ma