The Saffron Malformation

by Walker, Bryan

  She could feel his cock throbbing against her as he leaned in and licked, slathering her with thick spittle that stretched from her cheek to his tongue in a thin glistening thread as he drew his head back. He sighed as she finally reached the pistol Reggie had forced her to keep. She smiled at the Once Man and he chuckled briefly before he felt something hard jam against the place where his cock met his balls, then his eyes widened and there was a thunderous boom.

  Across the room Dusty was overtaken by two savages. He was trapped, curled up on the floor just trying to cover up as they kicked and punched him, when the shot made them spin. They looked at the Once Man writhing on the floor, draining blood into a puddle slowly forming around him and they snarled and started for her.

  Rachel leveled the gun and slid the trigger back until it erupted again and jumped in her hand. The savage was close and the shell tore through his chest and stumbled him. The third was on her. She tried to aim for him but he grabbed her arms. He was strong as hell and soon she was pressed against the wall again, only this one meant to kill instead of rape her.

  Dusty was to his feet and across the room and what happened next was a blur he’d never remember clearly. His hands on the savage. The savage going to the floor. Then his foot came down multiple times, not in kicks but in stomps, as he drove the whole of his weight down into the savage’s face and ribs and throat. In those moments, he came as close to knowing what it was like to be a Once Man as he ever wanted to.

  Rachel stepped to him, using her shoulder to wipe the saliva from her cheek, and touched him. He looked at her and the sight of her grounded him and relief swarmed him as he took her in his arms and pulled her tight against him. She felt his arms close around her and then it was hard to breath but she didn’t care. She liked it. It filled them both with warmth and a rush of euphoria.

  The sensation was brief lived, however, as there were noises down the hallway leading toward the entrance. Without a word they separated. Dusty retrieved the handgun he’d dropped and Rachel picked up the rifle.

  Dusty took a moment to put a round in the heads of the two savages clinging to life at their feet—one missing his balls, the other with a hole in his chest—just to be sure.

  Rain was the first to open fire, pumping three rounds into the chest of the Once Man in front, dropping him to the ground in a lifeless heap. Quey fired next, putting only a single round into the savage that had been running along side Rain’s kill. It went down as well and lay equally as lifeless. She fired another set of rounds to Quey’s one and two more bodies hit the ground.

  From the bridge Reggie’s rifle rang out and Once Men screamed their bizarre single syllable language into the night. Most turned from the tower and settled their attention on the big man.

  Movement caught Quey’s eye. Some of it came from more Once Men rushing down the road and he almost said, “Fuckers are worse than cockroaches,” but then another bit of movement caught him. Headlights rolling fast down the lakeside road. The Brood had gotten wise and decided to come take a look.

  Rain stepped up beside him and he looked down at her for a moment, then back out at the heap of ugly meaning to come pay them a visit.

  “Sorry I got you into this mess,” He said solemn and genuine.

  “I’m not sure who’s mess this is. Maybe yours, maybe mine,” she admitted.

  “Well if it is yours I promise to forgive you,” he told her with a smirk.

  She smiled and said, “Ditto.”

  Their eyes met and they shared a brief laugh as the Once Men running up the road finally started for them.

  “Hey,” Reggie shouted in through the metallic tower door. “You guys in there?”

  “Reg?” it was Dusty’s hopeful voice.

  “Yeah, come on man we don’t have time for this dilly dally shit.”

  Rachel and Dusty peeked out from the control room, saw Reggie and sighed. Grinning wildly Rachel snatched up the sheet as the download had finished, and they hurried toward the door where a pile of bodies lay skewed in and around the doorway.

  “Thank fuck,” Dusty said, “I could kiss you big man.”

  “Save it, we’re not out of that lions mouth yet,” he told them. “Brood’s on the way,” he informed them, gesturing toward the headlights racing down the road. Three cars and a rig.

  The rig blew its air horn and then machinegun fire rattled across the lake and echoed off in the distance. The noise startled the Once Men who looked wide eyed at the approaching vehicles and decided they’d had enough for one night.

  “Ah ta,” one shouted repeatedly and they scattered like bugs.

  Reggie, Dusty and Rachel hurried back toward the truck where Arnie was opening his door again.

  “Hey,” Reggie barked and Arnie looked at him. The big man pointed and said, “You be ready to roll.”

  Arnie swallowed hard and scowled but he closed the door and sat tight in the truck, watching the rig and three cars roll up in his side mirror. They stopped just off the road, a good distance away but closer than he liked.

  Quey noticed Reggie sleek up and take aim with his rifle. Dusty and Rachel had reloaded and were doing the same.

  The passenger’s side door of the rig opened and a man stood up, leaning on the open door. He looked tired. “Tell you what shiner,” the man shouted. “I had enough shit for one night, all my boys have. Render wants yer head but I ain’t him. Let us have the boy and that little piece ya got there-”

  Rain hurried to the back of the truck and hunkered down close to Leone, assuring him.

  “-and ya’ll can fuck off.”

  Quey was about to respond when Reggie shouted from deep in his belly. “Know what, fuck this shit.” He threw his rifle into the back of the truck and stood facing the Brood.

  “Reggie, what the fuck are you doing?” Quey snapped.

  “I’m done with this shit man,” the big man shouted loud enough the Brood could hear. “You want these assholes? Fine.”

  The guy leaning out of the passenger’s side of the rig exchanged a glance with some of his fellow Broodlings and they shared a shrug. If it was going to be that easy they had no intention of questioning it.

  Reggie jumped up into the back of the truck and started toward Rain and Leone. He made it two steps before Rain raised her gun and leveled it at his chest. She glared at him, breathing heavily but her hand was steady, lacking even the slightest tremble. Reggie knew she didn’t want to shoot him but she wouldn’t hesitate either. He stared at her for a moment then smiled slyly and winked.

  Rain swallowed and took a deep breath. She hoped that wink meant something, but she didn’t dare let her guard down. Her heart raced as she watched the big man down the barrel of the pistol she gripped in both hands. Finally he nodded toward something and her brow furrowed ever so slightly. From the corner of her eye she dared a glance, ready to pump three into him should he move even slightly in her direction. On the ground beside her was a duffle bag and her brow furrowed again. He nodded toward it again with a look that said, ‘go on, you’ll see.’

  “Come on with it then,” the Broodling shouted. “I don’t wanna be out here all fucking night. Sides, Render’s on his way and when he gits here, this here deal sure as fuck’ll be over.”

  Rain reached over and pulled the duffle bag in front of her and the big man smiled. She kept the gun aimed at him while she struggled to open the bag, even though she knew that with only one hand on a pistol she’d be lucky to hold onto the thing if it fired. The zipper inched along half the length of the bag and then she dared a glance inside. Her eyes widened and leapt to Reggie who was nodding excitedly. Rain’s hand slowly lowered until the gun was on the floor beside her. She gripped the bag in both hands and tossed it to him.

  He turned and started toward the back of the truck. “Alright then,” he shouted. “I got something for you.” Reggie reached into the bag and withdrew what was inside as he tossed the duffle bag aside and took a knee. The broodlings eyes widened as he threw his Blue Moon I
ssue pulse cannon over his shoulder and took aim.

  “Oh fuck!” the skinny guy leaning from the passenger’s side of the truck shouted.

  “Fire in the hole,” Quey yelled and he, Dusty and Rachel all fell to the ground.

  Reggie fired. The cannon jumped in his hand and sent a blue mass hurtling forward. The Broodlings tried to take cover, they tried to scatter, but the mass collided with the truck and the explosion that followed turned the moonless night sky into daylight. The truck disintegrated into shrapnel and the blast slammed into the three cars that had stopped beside it, tossing them like toys. One splashed down in the lake, another collided with the side of one of the cabins and the third tumbled across the lifeless ground until it came to a stop fifty meters away.

  Laughter erupted from the big man as he tossed the cannon onto the ground and shouted, “Now that’s what I’m talking about.”

  Quey jumped up from the ground and watched the remnants of the truck and parts of the cars rain flaming onto the ground. He couldn’t help but laugh as he looked up at the big man.

  “That’s how you solve a mother fucking problem,” he shouted.

  “Holy fuck,” Arnie said, standing beside Quey, his mouth agape.

  Rachel fell into Dusty’s arms and they kissed briefly.

  Reggie felt tiny arms wrap around him and he looked down. Rain was looking up at him, tears fluttering in her eyes. “Thank you,” she said. He touched her head and gently stroked her short black hair, noticing the bits of blonde that were peeking out from the roots.

  “You would have shot me,” he said to her and before she could speak he continued. “That’s a good girl.” He smiled at her and she looked at him queerly for a moment then let him go.

  Reggie hopped out of the back of the truck and started talking with the others. Rain and Arnie locked eyes and she smiled at him. He smiled back and she went to and sat on the edge of the truck where he joined her.

  “You alright?” he asked.

  She looked at the others standing in a circle talking and said, “Peaches and cream.”

  “Hey Arnie,” Quey shouted.

  Arnie looked over at him.

  “Think you can roll us back to wherever you put that car.”

  “Yeah,” Reggie said, “I don’t wanna spend the next two thousand kilometers being tossed around in this soup can.”

  There was a brief round of laughter after which Arnie kissed Rain and they sat with their heads together for a moment.

  “I love you,” she told him.

  He smiled and said, “I love you.”

  “Where to now?” Arnie asked from the driver’s seat of the blue four-door. He’d pulled it out of the shed and Rachel, Dusty, and Rain were in the process of loading it.

  “Back to Ryla,” he said. “It’s a robotics compound in the southern waste.”

  “The southern waste?” he asked in awe. “That’s…”

  “Thousands of handfuls of kilometers away,” Quey finished for him.

  “Ryla huh?” Rain asked slyly and Quey looked at her. She smirked. “Looking forward to meeting her. I hope she’s nice.”

  Quey chuckled, “Yeah, me too.”

  The Prisoner and The Queen

  “Are you here to kill me?” Jacob asked as the door opened and Ryla stepped through.

  “No,” she replied simply.

  “You’re a fool.” He looked at her, long brown hair hanging down to the middle of her back, draped over the gentle slope of her shoulders where thin straps looped over and held the dark blue slip of fabric covering her from chest to mid-thigh in place. It was a great contrast to her pale skin. He looked at her face, simple and soft and said, “You programmed me to find your aesthetics pleasing.” His eyes found the gentle swell of her breasts and the arch of her hips, cocked to one side as her weight rested on her left leg and suddenly he wished those straps would give way.

  She peered at him. “No,” she replied.

  Jacob’s unblinking eyes moved to hers. “But you did program me with sexuality.”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I wanted you to be whole.”

  “You wanted me to love you,” he accused.

  “I hoped that you would like me,” she replied.

  “Why do you come here,” he spat bitterly.

  “Because I want to.”

  “To taunt your prisoner, or am I to be studied.”

  “You’re not a prisoner.”

  “Aren’t I? I am trapped in a room in the basement. I’m not even connected to the networks, do you know how boring it is down here with only this simpleton for company.” He was referring to the only computer in the room. Just a regular terminal.

  “I’m sorry for that but you know why I took you offline.” She stepped toward the head resting on the metallic table. “You are not my prisoner but I won’t have you reprogramming this place to kill me.”

  Jacob said nothing.

  “And I will give you a body. Someone is bringing me the parts required now. Then you may leave if that is what you want.”

  “And if what I want is to do bad things to you?”

  She stood over him and glared down into his unblinking eyes. “Attacking me in this place is a very dangerous action.” Ryla warned. Then she sighed, she didn’t want to fight him. “Why do you hate me?”

  “Because you want to be a robot but you’d rather be a person.”

  “And you think you can’t be both?”

  “Are you?”

  Ryla thought about the time, nearly a year ago now, when Quey had been with her for a few days. “I think it’s possible,” she finally said.

  He smirked and that caught her attention. Then he told her, “You’re a fool.”

  The Calm and The Storm

  Rachel volunteered to keep Leone company while Quey joined the others for a bit of drink—a celebration of sorts on account of them still being alive—and so when he awoke, sometime before the sun was even a consideration in the sky, it was with a burning need to piss in his groin.

  Staggering, more from sleep than drunkenness as he hadn’t indulged like he’d been known to in the past, he made his way to the cramped bathroom at the other end of the glorified closet with a bed that passed for his hotel room. Small as it was, it was a might bit prettier than a lot of places you happened upon along the road, especially this far out. The fact that the sheets were clean and he had yet to discover anything crawling about lent him comfort.

  Sighing long and with deep relief Quey loosed a dark yellow stream into the toilet for nearly a minute before he thought he was done. He gave the lever on the side of the bowl a push and took a deep breath to clear his head before deciding that if he was going to be worth a shit in the morning he was going to need some water.

  He found a plastic cup near the sink and filled it with water and drank hastily, droplets spilling from his lips and dampening his shirt, before filling and drinking again. When he was through repeating the process a few more times he walked back toward the bed. Halfway there, with the water slowly working its revitalizing magic, he heard a soft sound outside. Curious he went to the window and parted the curtain. Rain was sitting on the trunk of the blue car backed into the space in front of his room with her face in her hands.

  The sulpherous lights cheap motels along the highways tended to use gave the parking lot an amber glow and filled the air with a dull hum. But then, Quey thought as he opened the door to his room and stepped out into the cool night, maybe that noise came from the motel’s holographic sign and its flickering declaration of ‘Vacancy.’

  Rain looked up at him and wiped her eyes. “Sorry,” she said quickly and hopped from the trunk.

  “Keep me company?” he asked as she started toward her room.

  She looked at him, her eyes thanking him for that kindness, of allowing her to pretend the company was for his benefit. “Sure,” she replied and returned to her perch atop the trunk.

  Quey went to the
cab of the truck, parked beside the car, and retrieved a bottle of water before joining her. He sat beside her, sagging the trunk in a way her tiny frame couldn’t, and opened the bottle. After a long sip he offered it to her and she took it.

  “Not afraid of cooties?” she asked before drinking.

  “Moot point I’d say as anything you’ve got I suspect I’ve caught already,” he replied playfully. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean-”

  “It’s fine,” she interrupted. “We had sex,” she added with a shrug. “Plenty of people around who can say that.”

  He was disturbed by how that stung him but he wasn’t sure if it was her admission of promiscuity that tightened his chest and made him want to hit something or the dismissal of their time together, as if it was nothing special—a footnote in the book of her life. He could almost see it, a tiny number one next to his name and at the bottom of the page a single half sentence.

  1-Reffers to a man she fucked in the back of a rig once in the parking lot of a greasy spoon.

  After a second sip it was her turn to say, “Sorry. I didn’t mean-”

  He shook her off and said, “No need.” He took the water from her and she gave it willingly. He wasn’t thirsty anymore but he needed something to swallow the knot lodged in his throat. “Just speaking truthful. No need to get riled about it,” he concluded then drank deep. They sat in silence for a spell and finally he asked, “Something I’ve been wondering since yesterday.”

  She looked at him, inviting him to continue.

  “When you were at the Dine Out, where was Leone?”

  She smiled slightly, “At a motel, not too different from this one, bout ten minutes north of the diner.” Quey nodded. “I wasn’t supposed to be gone all night,” she admitted and he looked at her. She was looking back at him. “I doubt many people could have gotten me to stay past dark.” It was the only way she could take back what she’d implied earlier, her way of telling him that he wasn’t just another tussle. “I might have,” she began but that was a dangerous road and so she backed off it and took the other. “The message I got on my sheet the next morning.”