“It wouldn’t be quiet. Brood won’t go without a ruckus,” Render warned staring at the man.
When Sticklan Stone smiled at him and answered, “Good,” Render knew the sort of man he was dealing with. He was the sort who just wanted people to die and paid no heed as to who or why. Now the Brood was looking for the shiner again, but this time finding him wouldn’t be so lucrative. Render hated working for free. He hated being under someone’s thumb even more.
“You gunna ponder that dick or do something about it?” he barked.
Trembling she closed her eyes and took him in her mouth. She loathed the process but Render sat back and sighed. She’d been smart and learned how to get him there fast. As soon as his prick sprung to life she slid her skirt up and moved to sit on him. He grabbed her and pushed her head back down. “Think you should do that a while longer,” he told her, then pulled her shirt from her body and squeezed one small breast. Defeated she knelt before him and sucked his dick while he groped her chest. He wouldn’t cum from this, she knew, which was why she was in a hurry to get him in her pussy. There she could finish him quick, but he wanted to make it linger a while. He wanted her to be down there with her mouth on his musty cock, smelling his unwashed balls and crusty ass. It felt good, that power.
Before they burned the ranch, Render found a few picture displays around the house. He had one of them sitting on his wet bar, displaying Quey’s picture. Whenever he looked at it rage roared through him and no matter what else he was feeling it gave way to determination. He’d find this moonshiner and he’d take his fucking balls off.
“If I were you I’d get it good and wet,” he warned and the girl drooled a mouth full of saliva onto his cock just in time. He snatched her by the hair and threw her onto the couch beside him, then he pinned her legs back by her ears and rammed his cock inside her. He fucked her hard, pounding against her pelvis, slamming his tip into her cervix and watching her face twist with discomfort. When she cried out it wasn’t from pleasure. He gripped her hair and yanked and demanded, “Look at me.” She opened her eyes, full of fear and glistening with tears and he felt himself throb. Grinning he said, “Yeah baby. I love it when you hate it,” and tore into her for another minute before finally exploding inside her.
Finished, he shoved her to the floor and collapsed onto the couch, his cock still throbbing as it slowly shriveled. The girl was curled up, making small whimpering noises.
Ahead of him was the curtain that separated his space from the driver, but that’s all it was, a thin bit of cloth, the illusion of privacy. “You want a go at her Kelm?” he called.
“Wouldn’t mind,” the driver agreed.
“Pull over,” Render barked and the girl looked up at him. “Then pick a dozen to follow. I’m done with this gash,” he barked, disgusted by her and left her alone in the back. The breaks squealed and Render hopped out. As Kelm gathered a dozen friends the boss took a piss in the woods, then went over and sat on one of the cars to drink booze, smoke his pipe, and watch the truck rock while he listened to ruckus. He drank and smiled as he listened to the voices of broodlings shouting encouragement as they gathered around and took turns with the girl, and her weeping under it all peppered with her occasional outcry. It didn’t take his men long to finish and when it was over they tossed her from the truck and dispersed. She landed on the rocky dirt beside the road, naked and bloody. Someone, a few someones actually, had punched her. She struggled against the earth, trying to crawl somewhere, but she was too weak and collapsed onto the side of the road.
Render walked back to his rig, not even pausing as he passed her. He simply drew his pistol and shot her in the back of the head mid-stride. Her skull smacked into the pavement as the muzzle flashed, but she didn’t feel it. Her brains were drooling from her forehead. Less than a minute later the Brood was rolling. They had a moonshiner to find.
Richter Crow was in a meeting with a group of assholes who formed some sort of board. A man in a cheap suit (compared to the ones he wore) was droning on about projections and production value and profits. None of it mattered, but Richter was the only one in the room who knew that.
Instead of listening he paid enough attention to not be obvious and used his ring device to access the network. He’d been taking a lot of heat on the signal as of late, what with the Brood growing bolder every day. Everywhere he went he was bombarded with questions regarding the raids. “Why has the Brood suddenly gone so rabid? What drew them from the outskirts and lured them to registered settlements?”
It wasn’t the Brood that had gotten off its leash, Richter knew but could never say because what was running rapid was, in fact, Sticklan Stone.
He scanned the signal, using his ring device’s holographic display, glancing up at the presentation he was supposed to be very concerned with from time to time and wondered if the implants had really been as bad as everyone made them out to be. Sure implanting computer parts into humans to make for an easier interface had taken a turn when the hardware was beset with a virus that, for lack of a better description, turned people into zombies and caused the deaths of billions, but still, was that reason enough to abandon a tech completely? Surely revisions could have been made, but then again humans were finicky creatures and preferred their limitations to progress they didn’t understand. There were rumors of people in the underground who had continued with the project and given the choice he would have added a deck to his spine without question but it was common knowledge no one voted for a man who augmented himself in such ways. The masses are dumb, always have been, most would go their whole lives without ever reading a book and they believed anyone with a chipset in their brains could be hacked.
Still, dumb people were useful. They tended to look the other way while the planet died around them and their money was used to fund a smarter man’s beach-side retirement.
The meeting was over and he sat back in his chair thoughtfully for a moment, squinting at the holoscreen across the room and nodding slightly. After a spell he said, “I’ll give it some thought and let you know in a day or so.”
This was always an acceptable answer to boards such as this, as they were usually happy to just not hear no. They’d allow themselves a celebratory drink in honor of not being denied, but only one as they hadn’t gotten what they wanted either. These people wanted to improve conditions in one of the assembly plants, near as he could tell. What they didn’t understand that Richter Crow did was that conditions didn’t matter. They didn’t matter because the corporations did something better than provide a decent space to work or live. They offered escape. Entertainment. The network signal was kept full of new video games and new shows and even movies from time to time.
Movies were a strange habit lingering from the past. Richter meant to do away with them completely years ago but there are some folks who tend to prefer them. Richter hated them because once they were over they were done. The nice thing about a show is it keeps going on. People get together and talk about what might happen next. They wait in anticipation of the next episode. They forget the pesky things that would get in the way of big business. Anticipating what might happen tomorrow is what held society together now. It was the reason release dates were carefully planned so the most popular forms of entertainment were never too close together or too far apart. Without anticipation people would stop and look around. Without entertainment they might take a moment to think about things. Neither of these happenings would be good for any corporation, much less the branch of Blue Moon operating on Saffron at present.
“If people stopped to think, we’d all be fucked.”
It was something Tolik, Richter’s mentor, had told him once. He’d been high ranking in Blue Moon and though he never got elected to the upper branches, he taught Crow how to be. He understood what every good businessman does. People don’t matter unless you can find a way to profit from them.
When Richter was starting out, his relationship with Della still fresh, he watched Tolik take a girl y
oung enough to be his daughter back to his hotel room. The next day he looked at Richter and sensed the young man’s judgment.
“You have a woman?”
Richter nodded.
“How long?”
“Bout a year.”
“You love her?”
Richter thought and answered, “I think so.”
“And you’ll marry her.”
“Maybe.”
“You will,” Tolik assured him. “Her or someone else. It won’t matter who, you’ll do it because it’ll look good and because you’ll want a son. That’s what a man needs out of a wife, Richter. A legacy. Your wife will give you babies. Every other cunt will give you pleasure,” Tolik laughed. When Richter didn’t the man added, “Give it time. You’ll see.”
He’d been right, Richter had to concede as he rode the elevator to the garage level where his car was waiting for him. Della had given him the two sons he desired and after that he’d found less and less use for her every year. To this day he cursed the drunken night he’d taken a nostalgic fancy to her and bedded her and knocked her up with Leone. If he’d gone any other way that night most of the shit he spent his days wading through at present wouldn’t exist.
Gren and Voz were the future of the Crow family. The other two were just a mess he had to clean up.
‘Then why not simply let them go?’ he began to ask himself as his driver closed the car door behind him. ‘Give up on them and leave it be. Call off Sticklan and sure as shit call off the Brood.’ They were a mess he didn’t need.
Viona had gotten one over on him. She’d played him the fool and she’d crossed him. He couldn’t let it go, he knew as the car began to move.
There was something else.
A blue dress. A swing set. That look in her eye when she challenged him.
He reached for the whiskey and poured a bit. Sentiment only led to weakness so he took a drink and tried to dispel it. He failed.
Though Sticklan Stone was growing frustrated with the situation, all in all he had to say things were going quite well. After the Brood’s raid on the Pickens and Zaul ranch, Sticklan Stone had been presented with a plethora of information about the moonshiner and it was taking him a bit of time to sort through it all. He had a lot of records regarding the business, things about the moonshine deliveries and how much was purchased at the individual stops, but none of that concerned him. He was focused, presently, on Fen Quada.
It seemed that the stops in Fen Quada always lingered longer than they should, especially given the amount that particular vender purchased, he should have been out in a day but stops made there seemed to linger on for many.
Railen’s Rusty Nails and Fluffy Tails…
A ridiculous name for a bar, Sticklan noted as he sifted through the information. He needed to find this man and the key to doing that was going to be in understanding him. He knew that, knew the Brood’s scouring and raiding might prove successful but it’s the way dogs hunt. Get enough of them together and they can overwhelm their prey, but one on its own is an awkward and clumsy mess. Sticklan was like a cat. Patient. Biding his time. Studying his prey. The dogs might get lucky and sniff out something from time to time, but when a cat pounces…
Sticklan continued to sift through the data on his sheet and he came across some pictures. He tapped the folder and began to glance through them. Slowly he pieced together the ones taken in Fen Quada. He’d seen the blonde man in Bravette, in the diner. The girl beside him he didn’t recognize but that didn’t matter. Finally he found a picture that was quite intriguing to him. It was the moonshiner himself, younger but definitely him, and a girl. He was making a silly face and she was laughing.
Excited, he went to another folder where the videos were kept. He began clicking through them, watching brief clips of his prey’s life. Finally he found one of Quey and the girl from the picture dancing. It was probably taken the same night, as they were wearing the same clothes, nice but not formal. It was a celebration, someone named Railen and his wife had been married on that day many years ago, he gathered from the video. Then there was a moment when the camera panned over to the married couple, locked in each others arms. There were other couples dancing and among them were Quey and this girl.
Grinning, he set himself to the task of discovering who this young woman was. Could be she was dead and cold in Fen Quada. Could be he’d get lucky and she was still alive.
It took him nearly a day to piece it together before he discovered her, registered and everything. Natalie was her name. She’d almost been a doctor.
Big Trouble and A Small Town
The gun roared in Rachel’s hands and leapt violently, sending a vibration up her arm and through her shoulders. The can of beans remained on the edge of the picnic table, unscathed.
One helpful aspect to the water being tainted was that with Once Men and rabid feral animals as threats there was as much of a legitimate market for bullets as there was an illegal one. Still, you couldn’t just walk into a store and buy them without a scan and tag on your file, or rather you couldn’t legally just walk into a store and buy them. Luckily for Quey he had enough cash on hand to wave any need for official channels, and his time on the streets had lent him a knack for finding the sort of seedy folk who traded such items on the sly. It cost him a quarter more than retail but it was worth it. The government allowed you to have a weapon and the bullets to go with it, they just liked to keep tabs and put limits on how many of each you were allowed on hand. After all, a man with too many guns or an abundance of ammunition might decide he didn’t like being pushed around by those in power anymore, and that might lead him to develop a desire to misbehave.
Of course the logic that a person didn’t need ten thousand rounds and fifteen guns to defend his home was sound, but like any law that puts restrictions on a commodity people desire, it conjures forth a black market. Such a market is where Quey and Reggie picked up the boxes of ammo presently packed in the back seat of the blue four-door and the front of the truck’s cargo hold, across from Geo.
Dusty came up behind Rachel and gave her some pointers. All Quey heard was a slight murmur, then she asked a question—a slightly higher murmur—and Dusty answered. He backed away from her a good ten paces or so and waited. Rachel took aim. The gun boomed and jumped and a tree three feet over the can splintered slightly.
“Errr,” Rachel grunted.
“It’s alright,” Dusty said as he made his way to her.
“You know Dusty I think Reggie might be right,” Quey shouted. When they looked over he suggested what the big man had said ten minutes ago. “Maybe she should start with a rifle.”
Rachel said something to him and he tossed up his hands. “Alright, alright. If that’s what everyone thinks then fine. It’s more likely she’ll be firing a handgun should trouble erupt but sure, let her try a rifle.”
Quey gave Reggie a look and he grabbed one of the assault weapons he’d taken from his shed before fleeing Fen Quada and jogged over to Rachel. He swapped weapons with her, gave her some quick instructions and a minute later, after a few questions that he quickly answered, she was standing ready to fire.
A moment passed where there was no sound in the campground save the gentle whisper of the wind passing through the tall grass and leaves. The man in the small building at the entrance said they were the only people out here at present and sure they could pop off a few rounds in target practice if they’d like.
The rifle cracked and jumped but far less than the handgun had. The picnic table splintered seven inches in front of the can.
“That’s good,” Reggie called. “Just remember there’s not going to be as much recoil so you don’t have to compensate for it as much.”
Rachel said nothing. Her feet remained planted firm and true against the earth as she took aim, breathed as Reggie told her and squeezed the trigger smoothly. This time the roar of the gun splattered the can of beans across the ground and Rachel yelped excitement.
“Hey!
” Reggie shouted, clapping his hands once. “There you go.” Dusty rushed over and hugged her.
“I like this gun a lot better,” she told him.
He mocked her playfully and they kissed.
“Good start,” Quey said as he picked up the box of potential targets they’d found lying around and started toward the table. “What’d’ya say we get a few in a row before supper, huh?”
Quey set up a line of cans, empty bottles, and a little girl’s lost doll. There were a dozen objects and Rachel hit them all in sixteen shots. “Not too shabby there for your first day,” Quey told her while Reggie set up the grill.
After dinner—steaks and vegetables—Rachel wanted to shoot again so Dusty set up some more targets and she popped them down one crack at a time. This time she hit ten in thirteen bullets, then it was eleven and the time after that it was twelve. She got it down to eleven twice in a row and then it jumped up to fifteen two rounds in a row and they decided to call it a night.
She could feel the weapons recoil in her hands and forearms and she liked it. The smell exhilarated her too. There was something exciting about the whole experience and that night when they hunkered into the bedroom of the small cabin they’d rented, the door was barely closed and she was already pulling Dusty’s clothes off.
After a passionate kiss she shoved him back onto the bed and straddled him. She rode him hard, grinding her hips and letting the thrill of him throbbing inside her and his deep gasps and groans of ecstasy swell and finally explode through her. His hands were on her skin as her muscles spasmed with ecstatic contractions and as her breath let out in a long slow sigh—she was thrown to the bed and he was atop her. She looked up and saw his face, feverish as he thrust into her. She felt the intensity build again as he gripped her breasts tight and another violent eruption fluttered through her. As she tightened around him she felt him plunge deep and explode.
The Saffron Malformation Page 34
