TITLE: Chamber of Horrors
AUTHOR: Tiffany Park
EMAIL: anderson7836@comcast.net
STATUS: Complete
CATEGORY: Horror, Humor, List Halloween Challenge Response
SPOILERS: None
SEASON: Two
PAIRINGS: None
RATING: PG
CONTENT WARNINGS: Minor language, descriptions of yucky things.
SUMMARY: Makepeace finds himself in a chamber of alien horrors and grotesqueries.
ARCHIVE: Please ask.
DISCLAIMER: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the author. This story may not be posted elsewhere without the consent of the author.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Still have writer's block, so nothing big or complex, sorry. I just noticed that tentacles seem to show up in a fair number of my stories. I wonder what's up with that? *G* Too much Lovecraft in my wasted youth, I guess...

Written for the ColRMakepeaceSG-3 list at YahooGroups.com.

Colonel Makepeace grimaced as he looked into the subterranean enclosure, twisting the straps of his rucksack in his fingers. He wanted to pull it on over his shoulders, feel its comforting weight against his back, but he knew he'd need to get into it pretty soon and so carried it before him. He wanted to get this trip over with as quickly as possible.

This room was, without a doubt, one of the most alien and downright creepy locales he had ever visited. He gripped his pack tightly and resolutely stepped through the doorway.

The place was built like a bunker and eerily quiet. Although artificial lighting illuminated every nook and cranny, bright as day, he could have sworn shadows crept alongside him and that hidden eyes followed his every move.

His edginess, he knew, was mostly due to the decor. Night black counters with shiny steel sinks filled the room. Tubes and rubber hoses snaked amidst iron pipes and transparent glass like modernistic sculptures-gone-mad. Here and there rested trays loaded with a weird array of gleaming silver instruments, many of them strangely shaped, most with sharp edges or pointed tips. To one side stood a large, brutish contraption, a rectangular hunk of heavy and impenetrable-looking metal. A spoked wheel was placed dead center in its square door, and it boasted a small collection of temperature and pressure gauges.

There were other machines in this place. Many hummed or vibrated softly, indicating that they were operating, fulfilling whatever functions their creators had designed them for. At least two looked like refrigerators, but he couldn't for the life of him figure out what the others were supposed to be. On his left hummed a couple of tall, pale blue machines. They gave off an incongruously pleasant warmth. On that realization, Makepeace moved a few steps away from them, clutching his pack a little tighter, pressing it against his chest like a shield.

The whole place stank. The air was redolent with disturbing odors, of blood and bleach, of phenol and formaldehyde, of old urine and warmed-over sewage, and overlaying it all was the nauseating smell of slightly rotten, half-cooked meat.

Machinery he could handle. The stench he could handle. But the walls, those gave him the willies.

The walls were filled with shelves. And the shelves were filled to overflowing with jars in many different sizes.

Grotesque things from a hundred different worlds floated in containers of clear or yellowish liquid. All in a rainbow of unearthly colors. Things with fur, things with scales, things with six legs, things with eight eyes. A bewildering variety of insectoids. Other jars held bits and pieces of once living creatures. A leg here, a claw there. Another held a set of disembodied eyeballs. A large number contained what might be internal organs.

Makepeace peered at one container that had caught his eye. Inside floated a gauzy, translucent bit of ribbon, colorless except for a faint violet tint near one end. He wondered what the hell it was, then decided he really didn't want to know.

He'd seen a lot of gore in his time, but the clean, clinical aspect of this mad scientist's laboratory shook him. Despite the fact that there weren't any human specimens visible, it was all too easy to imagine himself sliced open on a steel dissection table in here.

At this moment, he really wished he had some company. No one should have to come to a place like this all alone. Especially at this hour of the night. He headed toward the doorway at the opposite end of the room. The door stood slightly ajar.

Something gargled to his right, and he nearly jumped out of his skin. Turning, he espied a clear container that reminded him of a terrarium or maybe a fishbowl. But instead of plants or goldfish, this held a thick, brownish-red sludge. He studied it warily. The sludge twitched, and a tentacle reached out and tapped the glass. He flinched at the movement, then leaned in a little closer for a better look. The tapping continued. It was almost as if the strange creature was trying to get his attention.

So engrossed was he in his observation of the sludge-creature, that he didn't realize someone was standing behind him until he felt a small touch on his arm. "Colonel Makepeace--"

Makepeace yelped in fright and whirled around. Before him stood a wide-eyed man in a crisp, white lab coat holding a clipboard. Doctor Spohr, one of the base biologists.

"Did I startle you, Colonel? I'm sorry," said Doctor Spohr. "I was just coming to check on this little guy when I saw you watching it." He indicated the sludge-creature. "Would you like to know anything about it? SG-11 brought it back from PB2-106 just last week, so we don't know much about it yet, but that tapping activity seems to be how it lures certain prey animals into range. Of course, it doesn't normally tap on Pyrex, but in its natural environment there's an abundance of volcanic glass and--"

"That thing wanted to eat me?" Makepeace interrupted harshly.

"Well, it's hard to know for sure, but so far it hasn't been too fussy about what it consumes." The biologist smiled fondly at the ugly creature, like he would at a favored pet. "It taps for anything that moves in here. Humans are probably a little too large for it to handle, though. Still, I wouldn't advise sticking your fingers in there."

Great. This was just such a charming place. Makepeace set his pack down on a counter and pulled out several specimen containers of his own. "Here, I was just dropping these off."

"Ah, these would be from PH1-031? We've been waiting for these all night." Spohr nearly clapped his hands in his enthusiasm.

All SG-3 had collected were some water, soil, and plant samples, and a few tiny insects. Nothing as dramatic as the sludge-creature or the horrible things on the shelves, but then SG-3 wasn't a science team. When they weren't on SAR or combat missions, they just did basic recon. Other teams did more...thorough...examinations and specimen collections.

Spohr picked up a container of water and inspected it closely. "This is great, Colonel. We'll get to work culturing this right away. This is probably teeming with all kinds of wonderful microbes."

Makepeace winced, imagining the gelatinous, slimy, microscopic germs that he might have encountered during the rain on PH1-031. He jerked his head at the exit. "Yes, well, if you don't mind, Doctor, I need to get moving..."

"Oh, yes, yes, Colonel, don't let me keep you." Spohr gathered up his bounty and headed for a lab bench that held a microscope and a number of small, stoppered bottles of exotically colored solutions. "I've got plenty to keep me occupied tonight."

"Yeah, you have fun." Without another word, Makepeace hurried out of the SGC's exobiology lab to join up with his teammates. If there was one thing he really, truly hated about his job, it was returning to Earth during the graveyard shift.

October 31, 2004

Click here to return to Send in the Marines!