Читать книгу The Whirlwind's Ride - Tom Boone's Anderson - Страница 6

I spent the next two days lounging around my bedroom, not even getting dressed. I spent the next two days after that wandering around the estate getting in everyone’s way. By the fifth day I was climbing the walls.

I took the assignment on Lindle 497 for two reasons. One, I was desperate to get off Cocuru and find some excitement and two, and most importantly, the gloride monster was a croc not a ghoul.

I avoid ghouls if I can. A croc cuts you to bits, eats the soft tissue and is done. A tic sucks out your juices and is done. Leaving you a shrunken husk, but it's done. A ghoul drags you to its larder and eats you bit by bit over time. One ghoul larder had over one hundred bodies in it which the ghouls appeared to have collected over about five years.

This croc was smarter than most. The last ghoul hunter team had every trap avoided or smashed and lost three members before they gave up. The archaeological team was about to lose its license if they didn't show some results and it’s difficult to show results when your workers are afraid to go in the mine.

Usually I like to spend the night before I go into a mine in a local bar. Do a little drinking, meet some new people, and I am always able to find a pretty girl who will make love to me as a going away present. I might get unlucky tomorrow. This could be my last night on earth. Maybe it was my last chance to be with a beautiful woman. Sounds hokey, but works most of the time. The next morning, before my hangover becomes tolerable, I go to the mine, wander around till the gloride monster attacks me, The Ride uses my body to kill it, then I collect some vines from the local grape varieties and head back to Cocuru.

In this case the bars were all closed, due to lack of business, and the local women were not to be found. It was harvest season and absolutely everyone was working in the fields. I resolved to always ask more questions before taking an assignment. I spent the evening alone drinking quantities of wine that were amazing even for me. I woke with a horrible hangover, but even with the pain in my head I was still incredibly horny. I decided to go in the mine and get this over with.

I passed through a group of mine workers on my way in. They were uniformly big men, most of whom I could walk under their straight outstretched arms and not touch my hair. No one said a word, but…we're you going Shorty…was in their eyes.

I must have wandered around for three or four hours before I realized my hangover was gone. I was in the right place. I continually found sliced up bodies with most of their soft tissue eaten. It was a croc alright, but where was he?

Every so often I would come across an atmosphere regulator. These things need constant adjustment. Working with them is what I went to trade school to learn. Every time I came across one I would stop to adjust it, turning my back on the corridor to do so. This was an invitation to the croc. They are huge powerful creatures, but given the chance they prefer to attack from behind. Little by little the mine’s air became fresher, but still no croc.

I walked back to the safe room just off the entrance. The expedition leader looked up at me. “No luck?” he asked.

“I don't know why it won't attack me. Maybe it needs to sense fear before it will attack.” This had occurred to me as I walked the tunnels. “I tried to drum up some fear, but I couldn't do it.”

The expedition leader looked at me trying to fathom not being able to be afraid of something that can slice people in half with a single swipe of its claw. “What can we do?” he asked me.

“I need someone for bait” I looked at the men around me. In spite of their size and the looks on their faces, the fear was thick in the room. If fear was the problem, any one of them would attract the croc like a bear to honey.

Still fear might not be the problem. The croc might have left on its own. It's rare. Usually a croc, once it has tasted human flesh, won't leave until it has picked every body part clean and become very hungry. The body parts I saw were far from picked clean. Still the croc might have left and I would be stuck wandering around the mine with one of these huge clods for who knows how many hours. Fortunately an attractive woman chose that moment to walk in the room.

“Should I start packing my equipment? Are we leaving?” she asked.

“She would make the perfect bait,” I said.

The expedition leader came back with an immediate, “Why her?” the other men in the room came back with silent relief.

I lied. “I don't think I would get any fear at all from the men in the room. The woman here, I am certain I would get what I need out of her.”

She was a bit smaller than most women, with shoulder length shiny brown hair curled in at the neck. She had a reasonably nice figure, but a very pretty, very intelligent face. She had the kind of face that usually belonged to a woman who enjoyed cutting men's balls off with words for the fun of watching them bounce on the floor. Still walking through the tunnels with her would be a lot more fun than walking with any of the men in the room, more practical too. I just had to be careful what I said to her and I might get out of this undamaged. If only I had a chance to have sex last night.

“You don't have to go,” the director said solemnly. “I don't like sending you in there at all, much less as bait.”

“Darrel, one of the men in there was the husband of my best friend. She wants his body back. If this man doesn't kill the croc, they will take our license and shut down the site. It might be years before anyone goes in there again. How can I face her if I have to tell her that her husband's body isn't coming back? If it will help kill the croc, I'll act as bait.”

“Who do we send your body to?” Darrel asked her.

She smiled, “I might get away, I’m pretty fast.” She headed out into the tunnel not looking back to see if I was following.

“Wait up. I need you to stay close,” I called out as I chased her.

She turned and looked at me. “I would think you would want your bait as far ahead of you as possible.”

“I said bait, not sacrifice. The idea is, the creature senses your fear and attacks you. I pull you behind me, it attacks me to get at you, I kill it, and we're done.”

“It attacks you and you kill it. That's all there is to it.”

“Pretty much.”

“You’re insane. I'm in here with an insane man.”

“Listen lady... let's start over. My name is Bob Nesslun. Please call me Bob.”

Silence

“And you are?”

“Dr Carroll”

“And I call you”

“Dr Carroll”

“Listen Dr Carroll, I've killed better than fifty crocs, twice as many tics, and a handful of ghouls”

“All with your bare hands I suppose.”

“Pretty much.”

We walked together in silence. In spite of herself, Dr Carroll stayed close. She didn't want to die. There is something about a frightened woman that usually makes you want to put your arms around her to protect her.

My problem was that with every step she looked better to me. I wanted to put my arms around Dr Carroll, but only as a prelude to stripping her naked so I could lick her from head to toe. This has to stop I thought. I grabbed Dr Carroll and turned her around so she faced me eyeball to eyeball.

“Listen, I really have done this many times. Killing a croc is easy for me. I won't let you get hurt. The capital city is only a couple of hours away by transport. If I kill the croc as easily as I say I can, you go there with me, let me buy you the best meal at the finest restaurant in town, and give me the chance to prove to you that I'm not such a bad guy after all.” I gave her my best smile. Dr Carroll’s face didn't budge.

“Mr. Nesslun.”

“Please call me Bob.”

“Mr. Nesslun, if by some miracle you kill the croc and we both get of this alive, I want you to take me to my quarters. And after we have had sex, I will do whatever you want me to do.” Dr Carroll turned and walked away. I hurried to catch up.

“Here, monster, monster, monster.”

Dr Carroll turned and gave me a look that if made solid would have left no piece of me larger than a slice of bread. “Can't you take this seriously? Haven't you seen the bodies we keep passing?” she said.

“I can't help them, they're gone. But I can kill the croc, their families can get the bodies back and the expedition can get back to work. I just need you to lighten up.”

I love to watch the wheels turn as a beautiful woman considers a problem. Dr Carroll stood on her toes and kissed me lightly on the lips.

“I'm sorry. You're just trying to do your job and I should be trying to help. I'm just not up to joking around.”

We walked together in silence, Dr Carroll slightly ahead. I was so glad Dr Carroll couldn't tell what I was thinking. As we walked along I tried to tear my eyes off her from time to time so I could watch for the croc. Damn, she looked good.

I was having so much trouble keeping my hands off Dr Carroll; it was a relief when the croc charged out of a side corridor. I picked Dr Carroll up and put her behind me. This was my dance.

The Ride started and I was just a spectator. The Croc took a swing at me, but The Ride moved my body just enough out of the way so the claw barely missed. The Ride moved my body in close and still managed to avoid the croc’s claws as my fist struck it with all my body’s strength and momentum concentrated in the one knuckle of my body’s fist that perfectly hit the croc’s rib bone. One strike to break the bone, one strike to free a sharp shard of that bone, one strike to position it...I heard a scream behind me...and a last blow to shove it through the croc's heart.

I turned around to see another croc holding Dr Carroll to the floor with its foot, its claw coming down to cut off her head. The Ride was over. I jumped in front of Dr Carroll diverting the claw from her neck but slicing me belly to upper thigh. The Ride began again. My body was in a perfect position to concentrate every ounce of strength in my body to strike the side of the creature's neck just below the jaw. The angle was perfect to break the bone and force a piece of that bone to sever the croc's spine. The Ride was over I managed to pull Dr Carroll and myself out from under the croc before it dropped like a bag of wet rags.

Dr Carroll let the doctor take over. She had me lay flat; blood covered intestine sticking out of my belly, blood pouring out the slice to the top of my inner thigh. As Dr Carroll worked she talked to me. “Lie still. Don't move. Do you feel any pain?”

“Yes and I'm feeling lightheaded,” I told her.

Dr Carroll gave me something for the pain, pushed the intestine back in, and applied a temporary patch. Dr Carroll worked on the bleeding, sealing one blood vessel after another.

“You should have let it kill me. Then you could have killed it without being hurt yourself.”

“I couldn't let it hurt you Dr Carroll.”

“If it had killed you it would have killed me anyway.”

“How could I possibly let such a pretty head be separated from such a luscious body?”

Dr Carroll gave me a look so full of sexual promise; I knew I was going to live.

“I really do need to put you in the hospital one of these days” Dr Carroll said with a smile.

When Dr Carroll got to the part of the cut just below where the thigh meets the torso, she lifted the piece of skin to look and turned white as a sheet.

“Lie still...don't move...don't even breathe...Okay Breathe, But Slowly, Gently!”

“I am giving you something to paralyze you from the waist down, and this will make you sleep.” Then Dr Carroll put her eyeballs so close to my eyeballs that our eyelashes brushed each other.

“Don’t You Die On Me!”

“Don’t You Dare Die On Me!”

I let my eyes close slowly thinking how beautiful Dr Carroll’s eyes were.

I opened my eyes to see Dr Carroll sitting in a chair next to my bed looking back at me. The room was blindingly white, the bed reasonably soft, and the air antiseptic in an institutional way. Dr Carroll’s clothes were nicer, her hair more carefully curled, her makeup more elaborate, more carefully done, but what really caught my attention was the look on Dr Carroll’s face. It was the look a woman gives you when she knows you are going to have sex with her and you are going to have more fun than you have ever had before.

“About time you woke up.” Dr Carroll felt my forehead, took my pulse, and looked into my eyes. “They tell me you’re going to live.” Dr Carroll bent over and kissed me, sliding her tongue in my mouth, licking the top of my tongue then licking the bottom of my tongue.

“Thank you for saving my life,” Dr Carroll said.

“Thank you for being my favorite bait,” I replied.

“You know I had hoped to put you in the hospital all by myself.”

“What?”

“In a nice way,” Dr Carroll smiled. “I have perfected bringing a man to sexual exhaustion down to a fine art.”

“Well as long as I'm in the hospital anyway,” I said returning her smile.

“You have to be very healthy for me to do it to you. I've never sexually exhausted a man into the morgue and I don't intend to start now,” Dr Carroll said as she continued to look me over carefully.

“Can you hang around until I'm healthy enough Dr Carroll?”

“I wish I could, but I can't. They need a doctor for an expedition on Lindle 77 and they have made some discoveries I really want to see.”

“You're not staying here? I killed the croc, isn't the expedition going to continue?”

“It's going to continue, but without me. I lost too many friends in there. I can't go back in.”

Dr Carroll moved in close and spoke softly into my ear. “I have never had anyone risk their life to save mine before. Thank you for not dying. I owe you big time. Tell you what, every time I am threatened by a gloride monster, you come rescue me. Every time we meet and you have a couple of weeks to spend in the hospital, I will demonstrate how sexual exhaustion works.”

“I’ll be in the hospital for a couple of weeks?”

“I have never sent a man to the hospital that didn't go with a big grin on his face and want me to do it to him again long before he was healthy enough. I'm a doctor; I know what I'm doing.”

Dr Carroll looked carefully into my eyes and then gave me a bright smile, “Bob I've been naughty. I woke you up so I could say goodbye. I have to go now. My star transport will be leaving as soon as I get there. They want you to sleep for another couple of days. What I gave you should be wearing off just about now.”

“Would you let your hair brush against my face as I am falling asleep?” I asked her.

Dr Carroll bent in close to me and turned her head so she could pull her hair across my face as I shut my eyes. Dr Carroll’s hair smelled like springtime, my dreams were wonderful.