The Baen Big Book of Monsters, page 41
I skip all entries for nearly a year. They are unimportant.
JUNE 30TH, 1897.
A change is certainly coming over my friend. I began to see it some time ago, but refused to believe it and set it down to imagination. A catastrophe threatens, the absorption of the human intellect by the brute body. There are precedents for believing it possible. The human body has more influence over the mind than the mind has over the body. The invalid, delicate Framingham with refined mind, is no more. In his stead is a roistering monster, whose boisterous and commonplace conversation betrays a constantly growing coarseness of mind.
No longer is he interested in my scientific investigations, but pronounces them all bosh. No longer is his conversation such as an educated man can enjoy, but slangy and diffuse iterations concerning the trivial happenings of our uneventful life. Where will it end? In the absorption of the human mind by the brute body? In the final triumph of matter over mind and the degradation of the most mundane force and the extinction of the celestial spark? Then, indeed, will Edward Framingham be dead, and over the grave of his human body can I fittingly erect a headstone, and then will my vigil in this valley be over.
FORT D. A. RUSSELL, WYOMING,
APRIL 15TH, 1899.
Prof. William G. Breyfogle.
DEAR SIR,—the inclosed intact manuscript and the fragments which accompany it, came into my possession in the manner I am about to relate and I inclose them to you, for whom they were intended by their late author. Two weeks ago, I was dispatched into the mountains after some Indians who had left their reservation, having under my command a company of infantry and two squads of cavalrymen with mountain howitzers. On the seventh day of our pursuit, which led us into a wild and unknown part of the mountains, we were startled at hearing from somewhere in front us a succession of bellowings of a very unusual nature, mingled with the cries of a human being apparently in the last extremity, and rushing over a rise before us, we looked down upon a lake and saw a colossal, indescribable thing engaged in rending the body of a man.
Observing us, it stretched its jaws and laughed, and in saying this, I wish to be taken literally. Part of my command cried out that it was the devil, and turned and ran. But I rallied them, and thoroughly enraged at what we had witnessed, we marched down to the shore, and I ordered the howitzers to be trained upon the murderous creature. While we were doing this, the thing kept up a constant blabbing that bore a distinct resemblance to human speech, sounding very much like the jabbering of an imbecile, or a drunk trying to talk. I gave the command to fire and to fire again, and the beast tore out into the lake in its death-agony, and sank.
With the remains of Dr. McLennegan, I found the foregoing manuscript intact, and the torn fragments of the diary from which it was compiled, together with other papers on scientific subjects, all of which I forward. I think some attempt should be made to secure the body of the elasmosaurus. It would be a priceless addition to any museum.
Arthur W. Fairchild,
Captain U.S.A.
The Giant Cat of Sumatra
INTRODUCTION
I still have reservations about the respectability of an editor anthologizing one of his own stories, but I’ll consider respectability as honored in the breach this time. Besides, in these pages I’ve briefly brought back my truly amazing cat Neutron, named after the feline in the movie of This Island Earth, who chased dogs with vigor and frequently attempted to operate doorknobs with her paws (without success, but she kept trying) and died much too soon (1965-1971), and what could be more respectable than that? I’ll add that if you’re looking for a *serious* story here, you’re in the wrong part of the book. You may also complain that R’lyeh is beneath the Pacific, not the Atlantic—or is that what They want you to think?
Hank Davis is an editor emeritus at Baen Books. While a naïve youth in the early 1950s (yes, he’s old!), he was led astray by SF comic books, and then by A. E. van Vogt’s Slan, which he read in the Summer 1952 issue of Fantastic Story Quarterly while in the second grade, sealing his fate. He has had stories published mumble-mumble years ago in Analog, If, F&SF, and Damon Knight’s Orbit anthology series. (There was also a story sold to The Last Dangerous Visions, but let’s not go there.) A native of Kentucky, he currently lives in North Carolina to avoid a long commute to the Baen office.
The Giant Cat of Sumatra
by Hank Davis
The mayor was looking at my face, unlike his assistant in the outer office, who mostly hadn’t looked that high, so I took a moment to seem to inspect his office, while looking for a reflecting surface to make sure I still had the right head on my shoulders.
There was no mirror in sight, but a metal plaque on the wall commemorating something or other gave enough of a blurred reflection for me to be relieved. The silhouette looked good, and the ears looked human, and they were on the sides of my head. Couldn’t get a good look at the eyes, though. The eyes change if I’m not careful.
The body parts that had captured his assistant’s gaze also require care and concentration to keep from developing extra helpings. Humans normally only have one pair, the poor things.
I looked back at His Honor, and he was still looking at my face. Maybe the eyes had slipped. Then he said, “Probably people are always telling you that you look strikingly like Julie Andrews.”
“All the time,” I said, wondering who Julie Andrews was. I’d have to have a very serious talk with Udjut, my makeup demon. Maybe a talk with a little show-and-tell involving red-hot instruments. At least Udjut’d followed my firm instructions not to make me look like Diana Rigg again, no matter how feline (for a human) he thought she was. Not when I was going to be where her face was familiar. So, he’d given me another famous face.
Maybe white-hot instead of just red-hot . . .
“But don’t worry, Ms. Bastion. I won’t make any jokes about Mary Poppins or the Trapp Family. You’ve probably heard them all.”
More names that didn’t mean anything to me, but I thanked him and nodded knowingly while I considered a few more ways to make life more interesting for Udjut.
“Please sit,” he said, and we both did. “How can I help you and the Environmental Protection Agency?”
Before yesterday, the EPA had never heard of me, but now I’m in their hard files and databases as if I’d been there for years. Anyone who doubts my official-looking I.D. and gives them a phone call will get a confirmation. It amuses me to spread falsehoods through a bureaucracy which was initiated by Richard M. Nixon.
“Mr. Mayor, we have reports that your city has an unusual rat problem.”
I’d thought he already had his politician’s face on, affable with a twinkle in his eye, with somehow an undertone of seriousness and competence, but my remark extinguished the twinkle and brought out a strong touch of would-I-lie-to-you? (Speaking of Nixon.) I’m sometimes impressed with what humans can do with their faces, and without the help of makeup demons, too.
“Ms. Bastion, New York certainly does have a rat problem. It’s unavoidable, when you have so many people in a relatively small space, and garbage can only be hauled away so fast. Where does the EPA come in? Rats haven’t been declared an endangered species, have they?” he asked, smiling slightly to let me know that that last comment was a joke, but not quite smiling enough to hide that he was worried it might not be a joke.
“Well, quite frankly,” and I wasn’t completely fibbing, “we’ve had reports of rats of an unusual size. Some reports say they’re big as a Labrador retriever.” If he asked me where I got my information, I definitely was not going to tell him that a cat mummy (an old friend of mine) in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Egyptian display had seen the big rodents running by in the wee small hours and alerted me.
This time, the smile didn’t quite hit five out of ten. “Ms. Bastion, some of the rats might be large for a rodent, but rats as big as a Lab? Certainly not—”
At which point he noticed the rising commotion outside his door, and stopped. I’d heard it earlier, of course, and was wondering when his mortal’s ears would pick it up. People shouting and sounds of running. Somebody screamed. It sounded like the assistant who had ogled me, and I couldn’t help smiling.
Then the door opened, and a rat loped into the room. Big one. His Honor hadn’t quite been fibbing, either, at least about rats as big as a Lab, since this one was at least half again as big as a Lab. I wondered if it had turned the doorknob by itself, or if it had help. It did have another kind of help with it, since four more rats, not quite as big, followed it in.
The mayor had a desk between him and the uninvited guests, but he pushed his chair back until it hit the wall, then seemed to consider whether or not standing up was a good idea, particularly since the rats weren’t heading for him—yet. I was the object of their attentions.
I was already standing and had raised my chair over my head. I bonked the biggest one on the nose (they hate it when that happens) with the chair and said, “Do you have an appointment?” Then I got down on all fours, not easy to do in high heels and a short skirt, reached under my blouse, pulled out the ankh that was on a chain around my neck, and snarled at them. It wasn’t really just a snarl, but no living human would know the language. I wanted to drive them out as unspectacularly as possible, so when the ankh grew warm in my hand, only the roots of their tails caught fire. Opening my mouth wide so that the fangs showed, I gave them a drawn-out hiss with plenty of attitude, and they beat a retreat. I wondered how they got in and if they could operate the elevator to get out.
Since they’d gone for me as soon as they came in the door, it was obvious that someone knew I was in town. And I was getting closer to being certain who that someone was.
I stood up and looked at the mayor, who was standing up now, looking at the open door. Then he looked at me, said, “How did you drive them—” and stopped, staring at my eyes. Oops.
In the excitement, I had let them slip. I needed to get to the real reason for my visit, anyway. I’d been about to say, “It’s a secret hypnotic power I learned long ago in the Orient,” but instead I just used my own genuine secret power to calm him down while I made my eyes look human again, without slit pupils. Just call me round eyes.
I tucked the ankh back under my blouse. Men seeing it might think I was wearing it as a sign of being open to indecent proposals, and I didn’t need any such distractions. Round eyes and round heels. Speaking of distractions, I glanced down the front of my blouse. Good. Still only two to a customer.
Two cops came through the door, guns drawn. “Are you all right, sir?” the older one asked, then noticed me. “Are you okay, ma’am?” He didn’t stare at my eyes, so I must have fixed that problem.
I glanced at his name tag and said, “We’re fine, officer Chandler.” Looking intently at His Honor, I added, “Aren’t we, Mr. Mayor?”
“I’m . . . uh, we’re fine. They ran back out, and we’re fine.” His voice was a little slurred and his own eyes had a glassy look, but I hoped the cops would attribute that to mild shock.
Chandler looked like he was going to say something else, but then sounds of shots came, not very close but still inside the building. All he said was, “Maybe you should lock the door, sir,” and, “Let’s go, Ray,” to the other cop. They left and I did as advised. I didn’t want anyone coming through the door for a few minutes, cops, rats, or staff.
I tried standing my chair back up, but a leg fell off and I gave up on that. “Mr. Mayor, did you see anything odd about me a few minutes ago?”
“Your eyes. They had slit pupils, like a snake. Or a cat.”
I decided not to slug him for mentioning snakes before cats. “Anything else?”
“When you got down on the floor. You had a great behind.”
Okay, I definitely wouldn’t slug him. This time. “You’re going to forget about the eyes. And—sorry—the other thing, too.” He’d sounded less slurred when he mentioned my second attribute. That might have been the habits of a professional hand-shaker and B.S. artist taking over, but he also might be coming out of the trance, so I slapped a fresh one on him, then asked him for his computer password. He told me, and I told him to take a little nap standing up. He complied, so I moved his chair away from the wall and attended to his computer.
It was handy that the mayor could use his own computer—smart for a politician, particularly a Democrat. I had to ask him for a couple more passwords, but I soon had stored all the information the city had about the oversized rats on a flash drive (shaped like a reclining cat—so, sue me!). Once the mayor was reinstalled behind the desk and given a final prep on what he would and wouldn’t remember, I thanked him and left.
On the way out, I had to detour around a dead rat on the ground floor. Bullets stopped them, or at least this one, which was good news. But once dead it hadn’t returned to standard rat size, which was bad. The top rat was as powerful as I’d expected.
I hadn’t brought a laptop along. Even turned off, they don’t respond well to being carried through a spacetime anomaly. I located a Kinko’s and took over a computer for most of an hour. It took my charge card without complaint, not that I’d expected anything different. Money was such a handy invention by the mortals. They think it’s real, but we know better.
I closed down the computer and headed back to the street. Reports of giant rats were increasing on a steep slope, and I probably didn’t have much time. From the data, I thought I now had an idea where the source of the problem was hanging out, but I’d need help. Unfortunately, the most likely source for help was iffy, likely to deny everything (again I thought of Nixon), so I needed to find something out first.
I hadn’t done much hopping around for a couple of days, so my energy level wasn’t low and I should be able to get there and back again with no problem. There weren’t as many people on the street as usual—maybe the rumors about giant rat attacks were getting around in spite of the secrecy—so I didn’t have trouble finding a spot with no one looking, and I left, changing my apparel (a much longer skirt) en route.
Since I was not just crossing the Atlantic but also doing a considerable time hop, I arrived feeling a momentary dizziness, not to mention being hungry, like I could eat a whole tuna. Later, maybe. I’m just not the gal I was three or four millennia ago. Fortunately, I was right outside my destination, on Baker Street.
I trotted up the stairs (17 steps—I counted them) and knocked on the door. The doctor opened it and, right away, sneezed in my face. Poor guy, he’s allergic to cats and won’t admit it.
“I’m terribly sorry, miss. I must have a cold coming on.”
Bad diagnosis, Doc. “That’s quite all right. Perhaps the cause might be all the tobacco smoke in here. Maybe you should go out for a walk and get some fresh air,” I said, applying a touch of influence. Actually, London air wasn’t all that fresh this late in the Industrial Revolution, but it would be less murky than the apartment was at that moment. The man I’d come to see was sitting in a chair and going full blast, incinerating shag tobacco by the pipeful. There were many ways in which he and the twenty-first century wouldn’t fit together, and the rules laid down by the anti-smoking zealots wouldn’t be the least of them.
Stifling another sneeze, the good doctor steered me to a chair while his friend silently studied me through a blue tobacco haze. Then he put on his hat, apologized once more, and departed. The detective continued to examine me, waiting for me to speak. Once again, his hawklike features reminded me of Horus, and I wondered if he might have had an immortal for one of his ancestors.
I said, “My name is—”
The hawklike features softened, and his gaze was no longer so intent. “Very good. The voice is different as well as the face. I congratulate you, Miss Bastoli. Or is it Helliwell? Or—”
Busted again! “Call me Bastion, please. Toffee Bastion. You think we’ve met before?” Dammit, I didn’t think he could possibly recognize me, after once having seen me looking like Diana Rigg, and the next time like Sophia Loren (I’d picked those two seemings myself, unlike the present one).
“My dear Miss Bastion—and since we have met before, I hope you’ll permit me that small informality of address—you somehow have changed your voice and your face, and I am impressed with the latter, since I can see no sign of makeup or a mask, yet it is very different from your previous three visits. Even the bone structure looks different. But to the observant eye, the way you move, even the way you sit is unmistakably similar to your motions I saw those other times. Actually, I explained this on your last appearance—please pardon the double meaning—and you gave it an interesting name then.”
Oh, well. No point in denying who I was. “Yes, body language,” I said.
“A singular phrase,” he said. “I haven’t been able to uncover an appearance of it in any journals. Did you coin it?”
“No, but you’re not likely to come across it this, ah, soon. I was trying to move differently—”
“That, too, was evident. But sometimes the more one tries to hide a characteristic, the more obvious it becomes. And while you’ve just arrived, and we’ve scarcely begun to converse, I’m sure that any discussion we have will once again bring to light the strikingly unusual word combinations and usages you sometimes employ. Since your last visit, I’ve often wondered what ‘jet-propelled’ could mean. Or why anyone would use the word ‘issue’ as if it were a synonym for ‘problem’ or ‘defect.’ But, in any case, it’s scarcely a deduction worthy of the word for me to notice that you are the only visitor to these rooms whose arrival inevitably precipitates a fit of sneezing on the part of my friend.”
“He’s allergic to cats, very strongly. That’s why he sneezes.”
