“She joined their pack,” Hyena said to Talon.
Talon’s eyes were locked on her lost soldier.
“Not if I can help it,” she said.
Sam cried out on the roof of the dune buggy, still caught in the creature’s death grip jaws. Apple left the dune buggy and pried the beast’s mouth open. Her boyfriend slipped out, covered in blood and thick saliva. His eyes were wide and quivering, distressed over the situation. Once he got to his mechanical feet, he walked away from them toward the forest.
“Where are you going?” Apple cried.
“Away from you,” he said.
She followed after him.
“What’s the matter?” she asked. “You’re okay now.”
“Okay?” Sam said. He pointed at his metal legs. “Does this look okay? I only have half of a body now and a mechanical lower half that only works when the sun is out. And then I was nearly eaten by a giant wolf. Again. And my girlfriend now treats me like her personal property. How could I possibly be okay?”
Apple moved in closer to him but he stepped away.
“I don’t want to be with you anymore,” he said.
“Why?” Apple’s face was now becoming distressed.
“I was in that thing’s mouth,” he said. “It could have eaten me like a bite of cheeseburger.”
“But you’re okay.”
“You’re not getting it. That thing used to be a human, just like you. Some day you are going to be like that. You’re going to be a monster.”
“But, Sam . . .”
“You’re addicted to sex,” he said. “You’re going to be one of them in no time. And now that you think I’m your property, you think you can have sex with me any time you want. How long will it be before you grow into one of them? A year? A month? A week? I bet it would be much sooner than you’re thinking. And I don’t want to be a part of it.”
Sam whir-chunked madly away from her.
“But Sam, I love you . . .”
He continued walking until he disappeared into the trees.
“I order you to come back,” she yelled.
He kept going.
Talon came up behind Apple, and put her arm around her neck.
“Let him go,” Talon said. “It would never work out between you anyway. Just let him go.”
Apple looked down at her long black claws.
“Come on,” Talon said. “We need your help. I think we’ve figured out your place in the tribe.”
“Oh yeah?” Apple asked.
“You’re not a gunner,” she said. “You’re a driver.”
The plan was: Talon and Hyena would go around through the woods and get ahead of them further down the shore, while Kockwick and Apple would follow behind at a distance. It was important to get on both sides of the rogue pack, so that Bunny couldn’t get away.
“Whatever you do, don’t let her get past you,” Talon said, as if Apple’s life—in addition to Bunny’s—depended on it.
Apple watched as Hyena and Talon sped off through the forest. She bent down to the window, and said to Kockwick, “It’s just you and me, now.”
But Kockwick wasn’t moving. Her engine no longer made that funny sound, or any sound at all. Her eyes were open, as if she were staring far into the distance, but she was no longer alive. Apple would have to do this all on her own.
She drove down the beach, far behind the wolves, Kockwick’s body lying by her side for the illusion of support, the blonde wolf head still on the roof. If the wolves were to turn on her she would have no way of defending herself without a gunner.
“If only I had Sam with me,” she said, squeezing the steering wheel, angry at herself for treating him so badly.
Apple couldn’t see Hyena and Talon anywhere up ahead. She began to wonder if something had happened to them in the woods, maybe they were attacked and killed by more rogue wolves. Perhaps she was the only one of them left, stalking behind these great beasts for no reason other than to get herself killed. Either way, she pushed on. She had to try to help Bunny, even though she was a bitch to Sam, because Talon wanted her to.
The wolves ahead stopped at the shore, looking out to sea. They sat like obedient dogs; the red alpha wolf, the black gamma wolf, and the brown rabbit wolf girl sitting on her motorcycle. Apple still couldn’t see Hyena and Talon anywhere. She looked in the forest and on the other side of the beach, but they weren’t there.
The tide went out as a large black mass emerged from the sea. It crawled onto the beach with large shiny tentacles. The thing was a colossus, some kind of black octopus creature that was as large as an apartment building. It had eight eyes, six horns, and a goopy snail-like mouth. White waves crashed against its massive frame. It roared salt water into the air, glaring at the wolves bowing before it.
The creature rolled open its large mouth and presented it to its followers, a dark toothless cave of foul-smelling mucus and rot. The wolves got to their feet and stepped forward, toward the creature’s mouth. One at a time, they voluntarily climbed within the beast’s open maw. With each one, the creature oozed its greasy lips around the wolf, slurping its furry body, then all eight of its eyes would close for a satisfying gulp.
Apple could see Bunny was coming up next. She had to do something to stop the creature from swallowing her. Without considering a game plan, Apple took the launcher from Kockwick’s hand and hit the gas. She zoomed down the beach toward Bunny, sand spraying into the air.
The creature turned its attention from Bunny to Apple. Tentacles whipped out of the water and slammed down at the dune buggy, but Apple swerved to avoid them, spinning in the sand. She pointed the gun out of the driver’s side window and pulled the trigger, launching a spiky black ball at the tentacles. The ball missed and hit the sand, but upon explosion the creature’s tentacles were blown backwards away from her path. Apple took the opening, speeding toward Bunny.
A tentacle with a sharp metal tip pierced through the side of the dune buggy, lifted it off the ground, then coiled it up like a snake. Crushing metal sounds reverberated around her as the tentacle constricted the vehicle. Apple draped the launcher over her shoulder and crawled out of the window. She jumped just in time, before the vehicle was pulled beneath the waves.
The beast’s mouth opened up again for Bunny. The rabbit girl stepped forward, wiry snakes squirming out of her head like a medusa. Apple ran at her, ready to launch another exploding ball right into its mouth. But before she could get there, Talon came flying down the beach straight at Bunny. Her motorcycle screaming at top speed. With one axe, Talon hacked open one of the beast’s eyeballs, with the other she hooked Bunny by her gun strap, knocking her off her feet, and dragging her across the sand to safety.
The colossus widened its black hole mouth and roared, spraying globs of mucus across the beach. Apple realized she was now the closest thing to the creature, close enough to be covered in foul-smelling chunks of goo. At first, Apple thought it was going to scoop her up with a tentacle to eat her. Then she thought it was going to spray metal worms at her, to infect her with the mind control parasites. But, instead, the creature puked a massive pile of rotten stench onto the beach. A giant mound of wet meat. Apple wondered what the heck had just happened, why did the creature puke. Then she noticed movement within the pile . . .
Half-digested wolves uncoiled themselves, and stood out of the creature’s vomit. Their bodies crawled with metal worms. Much of their flesh was melted off, some revealing their skeletons or internal tissue. Apple wondered how they were still alive, how were they able to move with so much flesh lost. But then she realized it was the worms that kept them alive. Every animal that the colossus swallowed was kept alive through the entire digestion process, obediently lying in the stomach sack allowing itself to digest.
After several wolves emerged from the puke—dozens more than the rogue wolf pack—Apple also saw mutant men standing out of it, as well as other forest creatures such as deer and bears, all in different stages of digestion. Compl
etely under the tentacled creature’s control, the army marched forward. Then they attacked.
Apple launched spiked balls at the mob as they charged her, blowing their liquid guts and skeletal frames across the sand. But they kept coming. She turned to run, but the giant wolves seemed even faster with their lightened bodies. They closed the gap between them within seconds.
Hyena raced out of the woods on her bike, with other wormed creatures chasing after her. These wormed creatures were not like the digested ones. They were another group of infected animals that were on their way to the beach to feed the colossus, when their parasites gave them orders to attack. With armies on both sides, Apple didn’t know where else to run but toward Hyena.
The hyena girl had a severed antler of a worm-controlled deer sticking out of her arm. There were bloody claw marks across her face and chest. She had been battling them in the woods, holding them back to give Talon and Apple time to save Bunny. Hyena must have realized that now Apple was the one in need of saving.
Before an orange slime-covered wolf skeleton could bite down into Apple, Hyena scooped her up onto the back of her bike and rode off down the beach. The creatures closed in on them, racing beside them along the water and the forest, biting at their heels.
The chainsaw boomerang whizzed over their heads, cutting through a wolf at their rear. The boomerang killed some infected mutant men on its return to Bunny’s hand. At first, Apple thought Bunny was trying to help them, but then she saw the metal worms squirming all over her body like she was an angry porcupine. She could tell Bunny was trying to kill them.
Talon was heading in the opposite direction of Bunny, heading straight for the colossus. She weaved in and out of the wolves, decapitating skeletal men when she passed them. Once she got close enough, the tentacles of the colossus attacked her, whipping through the air like curly swords. Talon stood up on her bike, heading straight at the colossus’ face. She cut through tentacles as they whipped at her, ducking under the ones that tried to swipe her off the bike.
Two tentacles tangled together through the wheels of the motorcycle, flinging Talon into the air. But Talon used the propulsion to glide through the wind at the creature, both axes high over her head. The blades sunk deep into the creature’s forehead. The colossus let out a quick shriek, then it tried to thrash the wolf girl off. When that failed, it used its tentacles to grab at her, but Talon chopped them back. She blocked some of the attacking tentacles, and hacked others wide open.
Apple turned away from Talon to see Bunny tossing the boomerang again. Hyena ducked, but it nicked Apple’s forearm. Furious at the bunny bitch, Apple pointed the launcher at her and shot off a spiky grenade in her direction, but just as it was firing Hyena knocked the weapon upward.
“Don’t kill her!” Hyena cried.
The black grenade hit a nearby wolf instead, but as the beast exploded the force was enough to knock down the infected rabbit girl in the process. While on the ground, Bunny wasn’t able to catch the boomerang when it returned and the weapon flew further up the beach until it crashed into the sand a hundred yards away. Apple sighed with relief knowing that the rabbit girl was no longer armed.
Apple looked back at Talon. The wolf woman was hacking into the brain of the colossus with both axes, one after another, as rapidly as a jackhammer. When a tentacle came in, Talon would hack at it. Three severed tentacles lay on the beach below them. Once she hacked down into the brain, the colossus roared and lunged backward into the water. Talon continued hacking at the brain, trying to kill it, but the creature’s brain was massive and could take a lot more damage.
Apple saw Talon hacking and hacking at it as the beast descended into the water, bringing Talon down with it. But even after she went under, Talon didn’t stop swinging her axes.
Apple was thrown from the motorcycle, her weapon dropped to the ground, as one of the wolves caught up to them. For a split second, she thought the wolf had slammed into her with its muzzle, knocking her off, but then she felt a wet tongue against her belly and noticed that she was suspended in midair. The wolf had her in its teeth, carrying her by the midsection. Apple screamed as the thing ran away with her in its mouth. She watched Hyena looking back, but there was no way her wolf sister could turn around to help. The skeletal beast went in the opposite direction of Hyena, against the pack.
Although the colossus was mostly submerged, many of its tentacles were above water. In the way that the tentacles thrashed and whipped through the waves, Apple could tell that Talon was still alive beneath the surface, attacking the beast with her breath held tight. The water filled with black and red, changing the color of the waves crashing on the beach to an inky red wine-like hue.
Apple tried to push herself out of the creature’s rotten mouth with her free arms. Green goo oozed out onto her body as she struggled. She couldn’t push herself free. The more she resisted, the tighter the beast’s grip became. Metal worms slid out of its nose, and out of the side of its muzzle. They sprang at Apple, biting into her flesh. She pulled them off of her as fast as she could, trying to get them out before they burrowed into her skin. But there were a few she couldn’t reach near her stomach, blocked by the wolf’s teeth, that she could feel crawling into her body. She cried out as they squirmed inside of her, feeling their toxins released into her flesh.
Then she hit the ground. The beast tumbled over a dead bear, releasing her from its mouth. Apple rolled across the sand, and looked back at the beast. It was dead. The metal worms dropped from her body. She pulled out the ones that had gotten into her stomach. They were limp, motionless. All around her, she saw beasts dropping to the ground, lifeless.
Apple looked at the sea. The tentacles were no longer thrashing, they were dropping against the beach, descending into the sea. The colossus was dead.
Scattered across the beach were the bodies of the colossus’ victims. Screams of agony filled the air as half-digested beasts and men woke from their spell to discover the state of their bodies. Many of the creatures were too digested to recover and died instantly. Other creatures were in good enough shape to run off, into the forest. But some of the beasts were still alive, unable to move, cringing in agony at their melted flesh.
A mutant man lying nearby screamed as he noticed that all of his skin was missing. He was just a mass of soggy muscle. He could see his vomit-coated internal organs pulsing at him. One of his arms was melted to the bone. He pulled a knife out of his belt that had been fused to his hips and began cutting himself, as if in his crazed state of mind he believed that removing the burning muscle from his legs and chest would relieve the pain.
Apple stood up and looked around. She saw Hyena helping Bunny to her feet. The rabbit girl rubbed her head, confused, trying to figure out what was going on as she pulled the dead metal worms from her skin. The hyena girl walked away from her and began shooting at the half-digested wolves around her. She wanted to put them out of their misery as quickly as possible, although she saved the men for last.
The sea was becoming darker and darker with the colossus’ blood. Apple looked out at the water, scanning the surface for her missing leader. Then she saw a dog muzzle shoot out from the waves to gasp for breath. It was Talon. Even under the water, she was able to kill the massive creature. As the alpha wolf swam toward the shore, Apple waved to her. Talon stood out of the water like a female goddess of the sea, covered in her opponent’s oily blood, axes crossed on her back, marching casually through the waves as though defeating a colossal sea creature was something she did on a daily basis. Apple realized how much she respected this woman. She was the toughest person she had ever met. A true warrior, a barbarian queen.
As Apple admired her new leader, smiling with pride, a scream filled her ear from behind. She turned around to the skinless mutant man raising his knife at her. Apple only had enough time to raise her hands in defense as the knife came forward.
Then the mutant’s head disappeared from his neck as the chainsaw boomerang buzzed past. Blood spr
ayed from the headless neck and the mutant dropped into the sand. Apple turned to the person who had just rescued her, but it was not Bunny or Hyena as she would have expected.
It was Sam.
“Sam,” she yelled at her boyfriend, as he stood a ways down the blood-filled beach, looking at her with a sigh of relief. “You saved me!”
“I don’t care that you’re becoming a wolf girl,” Sam said, as he whir-chunked toward her on metal legs. “I don’t care if I have no working legs at night. I don’t care if some day you become one of those massive beasts. All I want is to be with you.”
Apple smiled and ran toward him. “I love you, Sam!”
“I love you, too!” he said. “More than anything!”
They ran along the beach with their arms wide open, ready to embrace. But just before Apple reached him, the chainsaw boomerang returned to its thrower and cut him in two. Blood exploded between them as Sam’s upper half dropped to the ground, his metal legs still standing upright.
Apple cried, “Sam! No!”
Apple dropped into the sand next to him, she lifted his half a body and hugged it to her chest. Her Asian wolf eyes became thin lines as tears washed down her cheeks. Talon, Hyena, and Bunny saw what had happened and ran toward them.
“Sam, you can’t die now,” Apple said. “I need you.”
His plastic replacement intestines uncoiled out of his torso between her thighs.
“It’s okay,” Sam said in a fading voice. “You don’t need me anymore.”
“Don’t give up. We can put you back together again like before.”
“Don’t bother,” he said. “It would be a waste of time.”
“But what am I going to do without you, Sam?”
The other wolf women gathered behind Apple, staring down with concern. Sam looked up at them and smiled.
“You’ll become a Warrior,” he told Apple. “You’ll fight mutants, go on raids, and ride with giant wolves. You’ll live wild and free. It is the life you always wanted.”
Barbarian Beast Bitches of the Badlands Page 5
