The Compound
by Mark West

The dark night air was crisp and the few houses on the new estate that were occupied threw little beacons of light over the vast, undeveloped areas. Foundations, stark white against the brown earth, looked like freshly dug bones.
Jonathan Chandler reached the kerb and paused for breath. He was midway through his hourly round and tonight - like most nights - was really quiet. He looked both ways, stepped off the kerb and then he heard it - a noise that made him want to forget about being a security guard, forget about everything. He could be at home now in bed with his wife, cuddled up to her and stealing some of her warmth. That would be good - infinitely better than standing here now, listening to the dreadful sound.

It was the bulldozer, the one that was locked into the compound out by the MTS site - the executive area with houses bigger than Jonathan had ever dreamed of even dreaming about owning. As bulldozer's went, it was like any other Caterpillar he'd ever seen - a pale yellow body, scratched and dented through years of hard work with heavy, mud encrusted tracks. It wasn't even mean looking and that was the stupid thing. He'd seen some vehicles in his time that were weird, bizarre or menacing but this was nothing like that - in a bulldozer line-up, you wouldn't recognise the thing.

Except that it started itself up.

The first night, he'd gone to see what was going on. There was another estate backing onto this new development and sometimes, he knew, kids would climb into the compounds and try and start the machinery up. Hell, if he was a kid now, he'd be doing the same thing. But he wasn't a kid - he was a fifty eight year old man, married with three grown-up children, working for three quid an hour as a night shift security guard on an estate filled with houses that would soon be filled with people who wouldn't even deign themselves to look at him.

And he was being menaced by a bulldozer that started itself up.

That first night, he had been in the security hut, doing his crossword and listening to "Late Night Love" and the occasional rumble of rolling stock from the railway line. When he'd first heard the revving, he thought it was the train but it was a repetitive, insistent diesel engine, not carriages rolling over tracks. He wasn't a hero - three quid an hour didn't breed heroes - but he decided to go and investigate anyway. He pulled on his hat, got his long handled torch and his roll of pennies and made his way over to the compound.

Silence.

Far worse a sound than noise - when you want noise, that is. All he could hear was himself - his blood singing in his ears, the throb of his heart and the wheezy, cigarette-ruined gasping of his breath.

Apart from the noises from his body, the estate was quiet.

Then the bulldozer started up again, scaring him half to death. He took a couple of deep breaths and carried on towards the compound, his initial fear turning into anger - if he caught any little bastards on the machine, he'd clip their ears and drop them home himself. Right now.

He turned the corner by plot 136 and faced the compound. The security light - high above the ground and covered with a grill to prevent breakage from projectiles - was dark. Which meant that nobody was in the compound. But somebody was, because the bulldozer's engine was now revving - as though it was excited to see someone.

"Who's there?" he called, staying where he was. If someone stormed him from the compound, he wanted to be able to have a head start. After all, he wasn't as fit as he'd once been.

There was no answer.

"Who's there? Come on, come out. A bulldozer isn't a plaything, you know."

The bulldozer's engine revved twice, in agreement.

"Come out," said Jonathan, fear prickling at his spine. "If I have to come in there and get you..." He let the sentence die off hoping they wouldn't guess that he had no desire to go in and get them.

The bulldozer revved twice more and then cut out - the all encompassing silence filling in. Jonathan strained to hear someone get off the machinery and make their way to the far side of the compound but he couldn't. There was no sound except for his body. He looked around, saw nothing and then took a tentative step towards the compound. Nothing happened. The bulldozer remained silent, so did the night and the security light remained unlit.

"I'm coming," he said, wanting it to sound like a threat but fearing it sounded anything but.

No movement, no sound, no response.

He reached the chain link fence and the engine coughed into life, filling the night air and making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. He didn't shout for anyone to stop messing about because, his night sight improving, he knew it would be pointless. In the dim light, he could see the seat and the footwell - there were no passengers on the bulldozer.

That had been a Monday night - a week ago. He'd raced back to the security hut and locked himself in, determined that this was something that just defied description and that would never happen again.

He was right about that on Tuesday night. On Wednesday, it had revved constantly for about an hour and then stopped. On Thursday and Friday, it hadn't made a sound. Over the weekend, Jonathan was off-shift but Stan, his colleague, hadn't mentioned a thing.

Tonight, it had started again. He'd managed to convince himself that it was some trick, something that he couldn't see.

He made his way to the compound, willing his body to not react to each rev, trying hard not to turn and run even though his brain was screaming at him to do just that. It might be someone operating it by remote control - a sick practical joke. It might be someone who was distracting him and using the revving as a cover to steal something else from the site. It could be anything.

When he reached the compound the light above it was still dark - as it had been all last week. There was nothing around, apart from normal building site plant and machinery and a constantly revving, empty bulldozer.

He stopped in front of the main compound gate. The bulldozer began to idle, the chugging sound echoing off the walls of the half built houses around it.

"I'm here," he said. There was no response.

He picked up a stone and lobbed it high into the compound. At some point in its arc, it hit the sensor wall of the security light and the halogens burst into life, blinding him temporarily. The bulldozer stopped, seemed to consider this development and then it started again.

He rubbed his eyes and looked into the compound, the harsh light casting small, jet black shadows at the base of the various plant items. The bulldozer, it's yellow body peeling and cracking, sat empty in the centre, it's engine idling.

"What's going on?" yelled Jonathan, "who's there?"

There was no answer. Not that he expected one, to be honest. There was, patently, no-one in the compound and he'd heard no-one leave since arriving.

"What do you want?" asked Jonathan.

A little generator next to the fence, just by his feet, burst into life, making him jump backwards. From somewhere towards the back of the compound, a pneumatic drill started up. For a few moments he could only hear it - it was behind a fork lift - and then it bounced, like a demented pogo stick, across the compound. It disappeared out of sight and clanged into the chain fence, dying as it did so. To his right, a cement mixer burred into life, the small amounts of sand and cement inside it rattling around, adding to the cacophony.

Jonathan, a sane pragmatic man who knew what he believed in (and he didn't believe in a great deal), decided now was a good time to turn around and leave the site. Go home, wash and get into bed beside his warm and sleeping wife.

The bulldozer revved twice more and then stopped. The security light went out.

"What do you want?" he called though he knew he'd get no response. For a few seconds, the silence and the darkness were overpowering, then he heard a noise and he felt his heart lurch with fear.

It was a rasping, clicking sound - like someone undoing a padlock with a key. It was followed by a dull thud - like metal snagging on metal - and then a tinkling, like a chain being dropped to the floor.

"Oh bloody hell," whispered Jonathan.

He heard a creak as the compound gate opened. He felt the breeze on his face as it swung past him and whistled through the night air. It hit the fence and rattled, loudly.

"This isn't funny," he said, knowing it was pointless to talk. The best and most sensible thing to do now was to run - go back to his car, get in and drive away. This wasn't what he was employed for.

The bulldozer started again and he could feel the vibrations of its engine in his arms and chest. It revved five times and then stopped.

He bent down, picked up a stone and threw it into the compound again. The stone missed the sensor but clanked against something metallic. He picked up another stone and threw it high, aiming to hit the light support. He succeeded and the halogens burst into life.

Jonathan rubbed his eyes and then looked into the compound. Just inside of the fence, in a line, stood all of the building site plant and machinery. The bulldozer was in front of the line, it's headlights now looking like eyes.

It's engine rumbled into life and it revved twice.

It edged forward.

© Mark West 2002

Mark West lives in Kettering, Northants with his wife Alison. Since 1999, his stories have appeared in many small press markets, including Enigmatic Tales, Sackcloth & Ashes, Terror Tales, Horrorfind (including The Best Of Horrorfind), Roadworks and Tourniquet Heart. His first collection is due from Rainfall Books in September 2003 and Brian Keene called him "one of the brightest things in horror to come out of England since Clive Barker". His website, featuring news and on-line fiction, can be found at http://www.mwest1.homestead.com