“Yes, ma’am, whole towns are now off the grid – everyone gone.” Decker’s eyes flicked down to read the reports, and then came up to stare into the distance.

Abrams could see the frustration in the older man by the way his jaws clenched, and answers became shorter and sharper.

“No, ma’am – no, ma’am – unlikely, ma’am – no, ma’am.” Decker exhaled and turned to shake his head at Abrams. “Begging your pardon, ma’am, though we believe these things have a base intelligence, they couldn’t give a hoot in hell for negotiation with us. I can’t tell you what else they want right now, other than what they’re taking – us. It seems we –”

Decker’s fingers tightened on the phone. “For meat; they want us as meat, or they want us to become like them. We’ve shot some of them so full of holes you’d think they were Swiss cheese, but they don’t go down. We’ve burned them, crushed them and blown them to bits – then the damned bits just disappear into the ground – we’re not sure they were dead even then.”

Decker closed his eyes. “We’re still working on that, ma’am. We’ve got just about every military laboratory involved in weapon research, but so far we have a single one in containment, and the others are evading capture for testing.”

He moved around his desk, and tilted his screen back. He then called up a live feed from the deep containment cells. Abrams saw the general’s jaws clench and knew the man was feeling the same revulsion and anger that he did when seeing the creature.

The cell now looked like the inside of an abattoir; its surface streaked with blood, mucus and other body fluids torn and spattered from the animals that had been pushed inside.

The Shoggoth had drawn itself back into the Harry Wilcox shape and stood passively in the center of the room, its wet nakedness incongruous in the red mess of once-living creatures that surrounded it. The thing was a marvel, a perfect copy of the man it had been, except for one thing; two of its eyes were fixed on the glass panel in front of it, and there was also another eye, perfectly formed, on the side of its head, that kept an unblinking watch on the sliding door.

Ever hungry, Abrams thought, with a twist of nausea in his belly.

“Fucking monster,” Decker whispered with enough hate written deep into his features that Abrams bet he wanted to walk in and try and tear the thing to pieces with his bare hands.

He pushed the screen away as the Secretary of Defense’s voice lifted from the handset once again.

“That is the only option we think has a chance of success,” Decker said, his voice low. “We’ve initiated convoys and airlifts of the Kentucky population. We’ll move mountains to get as many men, women and children out.” Decker exhaled slowly. “We don’t have much time, and that’s why I need the Presidential authorization. If we’re having trouble with things that are only a few times our size, what happens when a monstrosity breaks through that’s the size of a mountain? He looked at his watch. “We lose Kentucky or we lose the planet; in about ten hours. Ma’am, I need the President to approve the B83 burn, now.”