306: Cellar Door

Synopsis

The episode picks up where 305: The Shining... Skin left off. With the burned papers from the hidden laboratory in hand, the investigators pile into the truck and set out on the long drive west and north of town to the Russell farm, past the Kedridge farm. On the way, the researchers sort through the scorched fragments, and an extreme success on Library Use turns up three useful pages. The first is an anatomy sketch, apparently drawn after an autopsy, of the same headless creature seen in the photographs, with a face set in its chest. Percival Warthrop is alarmed. He says that creatures like this once overran the area years ago and were destroyed, and that he cannot explain in scientific terms how they could be back. The second is a burned fragment showing the creature's body with spell symbols drawn on it. Those who have read the tomes from the Corbitt house recognize the symbols. The third is headed "Parthenogenesis rate projection." Its table of weeks and generations notes that, given adequate food, growth "quickly becomes exponential," and Percival recognizes the population growth equation beneath it. The creatures, the group realizes, reproduce asexually and exponentially, which makes it a wonder the area has not already been overrun.

At the farm, the group splits up. Dr. Simeon, Billy and Percival stay in the truck to dig deeper into the notes, the symbols and the anatomy. Tallahassee Turner, Major Bakersfield and Dom go to search the farmhouse. Tallahassee, still protected by his Flesh Ward, spots bullet holes in the walls and large claw-like gouges around the smashed front door. Inside, the house has been torn apart. A chest has been shoved against the door as a barricade, and there is old blood, more claw marks and bullet holes everywhere. The master bedroom's back window is broken, with shotgun shells on the floor beneath it. At the top of the stairs sits a boot with a foot still in it, and a broken family photograph shows a man, a woman, and a teenage boy and girl. In the boy's room the investigators find three severed fingers under the bed. Looking out the back window, they see a storm cellar on the barn with a shovel jammed through its door handles.

On the way to the cellar, they pass the barn, which is strewn with blood, bones and the remains of livestock. Tallahassee pulls the shovel free, announces himself and leads the way down into a root cellar full of torn sacks. Something moves behind a support beam, and Tallahassee's flashlight catches a clawed foot before it slips out of sight. When the Major caws, a small, flesh-toned, headless creature, about four feet tall, bursts out on all fours with an enormous shark-like mouth. All three fail their Sanity checks. The Major and Dom are frozen in shock, while Tallahassee sees his long-lost friend Rondo Corto running to hug him. Rather than risk a reality check, he opens his arms, and the creature tackles him and bites into his shoulder, though the Flesh Ward absorbs the damage. Dom rushes in and buries his machete in the creature's back, and Tallahassee snaps back to reality. The Major runs up and fires his shotgun point-blank between its shark eyes, blasting it across the cellar, where it convulses and dies. In the truck, the others hear the gunfire, and the episode ends as the flashlight stops spinning on the motionless creature and Dom stands over it with a bloody machete.

Funny Moments

• Tallahassee assigns seats in the truck to "the five of you" and then admits, "I can't count."
• Tallahassee doesn't want to waste his "lizard skin" on library research; he would rather go pick a fight with Ike Watson.
• Asked whether he is better at reading or fighting, Percival calls himself a "jack of all trades or renaissance man," and someone replies, "You're the type of guy that nobody wants to hire."
• Someone asks whether there is a hat lying in the middle of a field, and says that if there is, they won't pick it up.
• Dom calls "Dibs" on the boot with a foot in it.
• After finding a foot and a hand, the group suggests taking the pieces to Corbitt to put the body back together, and later asks whether the severed fingers could be "replanted."
• When Tallahassee sticks his head up to check for an attic, the Keeper jokes that Seth "immediately gets his head bit off."
• The trio enters the cellar in a "flying V attack formation."
• Someone wants to shoot the creature "in the wiener," but the Keeper rules that nobody finished the anatomy research, so nobody knows where it is.
• Tallahassee greets the creature as Rondo, then scolds it: "Rondo, no bad boy."

Notable Quotes

• "I don't want to waste my lizard skin powers doing a library research. I want to go pick a fight with someone." —Tallahassee Turner
• "Not in this world that is defined by science and physics and laws of nature that are not violated by things like fate and destiny and magic." —Percival Warthrop
• "I'm older than I look." —Percival Warthrop
• "This is Tallahassee Turner. I'm coming down friendly. Do not fire." —Tallahassee Turner
• "Just stay behind my diamond skin." —Tallahassee Turner
• "Rondo Corto! It's been so long, my friend!" —Tallahassee Turner
• "Alright, make me proud, machete." —Dom Druncard