Free Hybrid by Brian O'Grady

voice was no different from any other; they were all parasites, and if given a chance, they would destroy their host. For thirty years, a pedantic life of discipline and routine had allowed him to live an independent life. He forced himself to remember some of the faces locked behind tall, steel doors. Their screams still echoed in his ears. “That is what happens when control is lost,” Phil said to all of the voices in his head.
    The start of a motor made Phil jump, and a moment later his alarm went off. It took him a moment to realize that his neighbor had just started a snowblower. Phil climbed out of bed with unusual agility. His back didn’t seem to bother him. He stood to his full height and waited for the deep, boring pain to settle into its usual place. It had been with him for eighteen years, ever since the car accident that had taken the lives of both his parents and crushed two of his lumbar vertebrae. Except, this morning, it was little more than a muted ache. He slowly arched his back until he felt and heard an audible pop. One of the large bolts that had put his bones back together had broken ten years ago, and his back had popped ever since. It needed to be replaced, but he couldn’t face that ordeal a second time.
    He made up his bed exactly as he had for the last thirty years. He didn’t have to be at work for three hours, but two of those would be spent on a treadmill, pushing his body to the limit. Exercise was a constant in his life, serving the dual purpose of minimizing his lower back pain and anesthetizing his Monsters, who had recently developed an unnerving capacity to adapt.
    An hour into his run, Phil heard his neighbor’s snowblower abruptly shut down. George and Patsy Van Der had been Phil’s neighbors all his life. He was as fond of them as he was able. George was a retired lawyer, and despite being in his late eighties, was as sharp as he had been half a lifetime ago, and could easily have passed for a man in his early sixties. Patsy, on the other hand, had gone around the bend, as George had said on many occasions. She was moderately senile, but not so far gone that George couldn’t care for her on his own.
    Phil listened for George to restart the blower, but it remained quiet. There was no way George could be finished, and no way he would stop before he was finished. Phil ran for another five minutes, and still there was no sound from George. Concern started to grow in Phil’s mind. If George needed help, no one but Phil could deliver it. He still had fifty minutes to run, but it was becoming obvious that it would have to wait. Phil’s mind may have been ruled by The Routine, but his life was ruled by Moral Responsibility.
    He climbed off the treadmill and pulled the curtains back. It had snowed more than anyone had expected. George’s driveway was cleared almost all the way to the street, but his snowblower sat idle in the middle of a drift, and George was nowhere to be seen. Phil couldn’t see all the way up the driveway from his windows, so he quickly toweled off, put on warm clothes, boots, and a jacket, and opened his front door. The snow had drifted several inches in front of his door. It always did that when the wind blew in from the west, and some of it spilled into his entranceway. He poked his head out the door and saw George sprawled spread-eagled across his cleared driveway. A tall, dark figure stood over him.
    “Hey,” Phil yelled. Not very eloquent, but it managed to redirect the man’s attention away from George. Phil started to run towards them, but immediately tripped and fell face forward into foot-deep snow. He scrambled up, but the tall man was already striding across George’s lawn, leaving a trail of deep footprints. “What did you do?” Phil screamed after him.
    “You are too late again, Phillip,” the man called back.
    “Come back here,” Phil demanded, but the tall man continued across the yard, seemingly unhindered by the snow. He reached a Ford