by Sam Hall
Only to be met with an echoing sound further in the bush. I looked down at Purple, and he looked up at me. Was he looking excited? It was hard to read his furry little face. The answering meeps grew louder and closer, as well as more plentiful.
“Perfect,” I said, “I’ll dump you off with your flock or whatever and be on my way.”
It was right about then that I should have questioned the wisdom of tramping through an unknown environment with a strange creature in my arm. But, ever the sucker for something cute and furry, I stomped onwards as Purple played a game of Marco Polo—or Meep Meep—the cries of the others luring me deeper and deeper into the bush. Because, luring was the best description for it.
The first thing I noticed when I stumbled out of the undergrowth was the gorgeous waterfall. Luminously blue, the water poured into a crystal-clear pond below that was surrounded by fern-like plants. The second more important thing I noticed was the big arse creature sleeping right next to it. Looking something like a cross between a boulder and a lizard, it blew small snot bubbles as it snored on. But it was its bed mates that were of the most interest, because all over the granite like skin of the beast was a huge flock of purple people eaters.
“Shit, shit, shit,” I hissed. I glanced down at Purple, who looked up at me with big shining eyes, its lips parting to show a row of sharp teeth. “C’mon, Purple,” I whispered. “Work with me. I carried you all the way back to your people. I’ll just put you down here, and you can—”
“MEEP!”
Fifty odd heads popped up, big eyes shining with what I was starting to think was bloodlust.
“MEEP! MEEP! MEEP! MEEP! MEEP!” the little furry bastards began chanting in answer.
“OK, down you go, Purple. Good boy.” I tried to pry him off my arm, but of course, the prick held on with a prehensile strength I hadn’t been expecting in an ‘injured’ animal. He finally threw himself into the air and fluttered over to his mates with two perfectly functioning wings. The bloody arsehole. His voice joined the chorus as he landed on rock lizard’s back, the beast snorting, then snuffling as he started to wake.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. I spun on my heel and launched myself into the brush just in time to hear the creature roar. I heard a whuffling sound, then felt a great shudder through the ground as the beast got to its feet.
You are in danger, my Tirian said.
“No fucking shit!” I growled, diving into the bush, scrambling madly on all fours in my haste to get some traction.
I am taking over now.
What? I didn’t get to consider what that meant as my body felt hot all of a sudden, and then… The process is hard to describe, though the gut jerking weirdness of portal travel was probably the closest thing I’d ever experienced. Instead of a human clumsily scrambling around, all of a sudden, I was on four paws and competent. I was in Tirian form.
This is a rock crusher, she said, spinning around to face the lumbering beast. I watched the monster stomp over, flattening trees and bushes with little effort.
Pretty sure it’s an equal opportunity crusher! I yelped, and felt the curious sensation of urging my body to move and not being able to. What the fuck?
Steady, my Tirian said.
Steady? I stared through my unmoving eye sockets and saw the bloody barrel-shaped monster stamping closer and closer. I felt my body drop down into a crouch rather than do the eminently sensible thing and run the fuck away. Our legs coiled, our belly grazing the ground. The boulder lizard opened its great big maw, revealing many blunt teeth, as the purple people eaters all hung on for the ride, flapping their little wings and meeping in encouragement. I half expected them to be meeping Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries.”
We need to move, now!
Finally, my Tirian obeyed my screeches, but not in the way I’d hoped.
Not that way! Away from the bloody rock crusher thingo!
She paid me no mind, stampeding—from my point of view—right into the beast’s mouth. Then, the miraculous happened. Right when the animal was about to lunge forward and catch us in its jaws, our paws slammed down on its broad snout, sending its teeth clattering against each other, but we didn’t pause to consider the dental ramifications. I felt a curious lift, like the feeling when you’re on the top of a roller coaster about to come slamming down, as we ran down the animal’s spine. The purples all pricked up their ears, big brown eyes all registering the same expression of ‘oh fuck!’ before they took flight as one. But not to run away, because of course not. No, the little bastards grinned bloody thirsty smiles and then swarmed.
Impudent beasts, my Tirian growled, pausing for a moment as we dropped our head down and prowled along the rock crusher’s back. It shifted under us, but its lumpen body made it difficult to do much. We snarled a warning to Fluffaggedon, but they paid us little mind, meeping their disdain right up until our jaws closed around one of them.
I felt bad, somewhere in the recesses of our shared mind. Their fur felt just as silky on our gums as it had on our skin as we shook our head, whipping the little needle toothed bastard back and forth before sending it sailing through the air. The prolonged sound of its mournful meep as it flew past was, I admit, satisfying. I imagined our open-mouthed skulk looked pretty bloody badass, if the rapid retreat of the purples was anything to go by. The rock crusher roared its frustration at us, but apart from some impotent stiff-backed bucks, it was nothing to worry about.
I should have been worried about it.
The purples rose in a flock, back-winging in what I thought was recognition of our physical superiority. The meeping fell silent as they flew higher and higher.
Looks like we showed them, I said. The rock crusher began crooning this weird arse dirge I could feel all the way from my paws to my ears. The resonance of those powerful lungs pumping air through massive vocal cords could be felt throughout the surrounding area. The purples hovered where they were, their reedy meeps a curious counterpoint to the crusher’s song.
Oh no, this is a female.
What does that—
I didn’t get a chance to finish that sentence, nor prepare myself for what was to come, because there was no way to anticipate it. My Tirian’s head swung around, as if searching for a place to jump, but we needn’t have bothered. Like the stereotypical representations of ‘wall of noise’ heavy metal bands in music clips, the rock crusher hit some kind of uber note, and the sound acted like a physical wave, shoving us up and off the beast’s back.
The world was a terrifying blur, spinning as we sailed past, before we came crashing down with a thud.
Fuck! I yelped as pain stabbed through my body, my jaws open and desperately trying to suck air into winded lungs.
We scrabbled in the dirt, attempting to right ourselves, get back on four paws, but our bruised and battered limbs struggled to obey. That’s when the rock crusher turned. Flanked by its meeping cloud of doom, the beast took one ponderous step towards us, then another.
I must shift, my Tirian said.
No! Don’t leave me with this bastard thing!
I must.
I didn’t get a chance to argue further as I unceremoniously emerged on the grass. My arms and legs shook as I shoved myself upright, only to wobble when I did so. The rock crusher paused, opened its mouth, and belched out a foul-smelling note that had me floundering back and smacking into thin tree trunks. Then I was shifted back into Tirian form, my view of things considerably lower and no better for the change. I could see every one of the bloody animal’s teeth and the beady eyes of those bloody purples. I didn’t spend any more time dwelling on this, I finally did what I’d always thought was the wisest choice—I ran.
We leapt from a standing start, ran into the bush, over rocks, and burst through bushes. Smaller animals and birds skittered and flittered out of our path as we ran, but we got little chance to dwell. The rock crusher was slow and ponderous, but it had a stride that was far longer than mine.
Where are we going? What if we�
��re going deeper into the scrub where there’s more of these things?
Feel, she replied, quick and clipped. Reach for them.
Fuck, everyone kept asking me to reach for obscure psychic bonds with little to no preparation. I took a deep metaphorical breath—it wasn’t me who was directing our now pumping lungs—and tried to shut out the insane rush before me. It came reluctantly, that dark internal landscape with its sullen black sun. It was the place we always came to when we joined spiritually, so I assumed this is what she had meant about reaching for the guys.
“Hello?” My voice felt curiously flat, like this place did not have the physical capability to transmit sound and what I was doing was somehow an affront to this reality. I frowned, wondering what the fuck I was supposed to do.
“It’s OK, Jules. I’ve got you, now reach for it,” Brandon told me as our bodies entwined.
I dunno if I’d describe what I did as reaching. It felt more like my consciousness spread thinner and thinner, filling the endless barren landscape within us, fusing with the air, seeping into the earth. I poured the crazy shit I’d stumbled upon into the mix, the fear, the stupid, the ridiculousness of it all, then it hit.
I was bowled over by a great tumbling mass of fear and confusion, flashes of memories and viewpoints, slashes of anger and recrimination, incoherent shouts all smashing into me like blows. I opened my eyes and saw I was back in my beast’s body and we were arrowing towards the campsite, the cars just visible through the gaps in the trees, but so was the rock crusher. We were labouring, my breath harsh and ragged in my chest while the bloody lizard seemed to be powering on, its progress fuelled by some kind of naturally occurring combustion engine.
Close, she said as we forced our legs on, stabbing our paws into the earth and sailing forward in mechanical rather than fluid movements.
“Fucking hell!” Aaron said as we burst out as he and his men all moved like well-oiled machines into formation, rifles swept off backs and into arms. Eyes looked down sights, but he called out, “That’s Jules! Do not shoot until she’s out of range!”
But his order was ignored by one. Finn stepped free of the cars, rifle on his shoulder. He found the target, put his finger on the trigger, and then squeezed. The rock crusher’s bellow flattened me to the ground, its screams clawing at my ears as I lay there, breath rasping in and out. I heard a chorus of meeps, felt the flutter of their wings as they tried to settle on me, their modus operandi apparent now. The placid rock crusher was the muscle, and they, the carrion eaters that cleaned up after it. A few quick shots that whistled above my head had them rethinking their life choices. Both lots of monsters appeared to feel a retreat was strategic, if the sound of the rock crusher’s footsteps were to be trusted.
“Oh god,” I groaned, realising I’d reverted back to human form.
“Jules…!” Brandon had rushed to my side, and was whipping off his shirt and placing it over my now apparently naked human flesh. “Oh my god, what the fuck happened?”
“Where the hell were you?!” Slade shouted at Finn.
I didn’t get a chance to hear the answer, using what muscle strength I had to look up at Brandon as he shuffled in and rested my head on his lap. Slade barrelled up to a wide-eyed Finn, still holding his rifle in somewhat limp fingers. He didn’t answer, obviously processing what happened. That wasn’t good enough for Slade. He had his fist pulled back in one second, and drove it into the side of Finn’s face in the next, man and gun going flying. He stood over the fallen man, chest heaving.
“You were supposed to fucking make sure she was safe! What the fuck were you doing?”
Finn had no answer. He sat up slowly, hand going to his jaw.
“We’ve been best mates since we were kids, but fuck me, if you don’t get your fucking head out of your arse, I’ll do my damnedest to break the mate bond myself. This is not you, Finn! Your dads wouldn’t want you neglecting the one thing they have to live without because of them. This isn’t helping anyone.”
I struggled to get to my feet, feeling the discord as keenly as a knife to the ribs. I needed to fix it somehow. The ragged sound of Slade’s voice breaking as he delivered his judgement, Finn’s blank-eyed stare, it all tore at me.
“No,” Brandon said when I managed to sit up. I was hauled back into the shelter of his arms, his limbs wrapped around me like iron bars. “Just stay, please.”
Brandon, as always, knew what he was doing. Slade turned on his heel, his face disfigured with disgust, something that only softened when he saw me. He marched over, then dropped to his knees beside us.
“You don’t have to let her go, but I need to hold her as well,” Slade said in a low voice. I felt Brandon nod, loosening his grip a little, sharing the burden that was me between the two of them. “You better not tell me you’ve got a shy bladder, princess, because I am gonna be on you like white on rice. Taking a piss, even a dump, I am there.”
“Slade…” I gasped, both of them feeling a bit oppressive as my head started to swim.
“We’ve gotcha, love. We’ve gotcha.”
And that seemed as good a time as any to pass out.
6
“Give her some air.”
“She’s got plenty of air! There’s a whole world of it around her! She just has to breathe it!”
“She’s breathing, Jack. She’s OK.”
“She’s not OK. This should never have fucking happened.”
“This is an alien world. Shit’s gonna happen. We need to—”
“RAWRR!”
My eyelids fluttered at the sound of the godawful roar, trying to open and assess what new danger awaited me. My brain refused to comply, my face falling lax. It stayed limp as I was scooped up and hauled away from where I’d passed out at incredible speed. I groaned faintly, frowning at the dizzying swirl in my head as we went. When we came to a stop and I was delivered gently to a firm surface, I found my body was slightly more compliant. I forced my eyes open.
“Jules…”
“Aaron?”
To say I was surprised to see the man leaning over me—his breath coming in shuddering gasps that weren’t brought on by exertion, and his eyes glowing green—was an understatement. I reached up to touch his face, and he grabbed my hand, bringing it to his mouth and depositing a rough kiss on the palm. His eyes closed for a moment as he rubbed his nose across my wrist, and when they opened again, they had returned to hazel.
“You OK, big guy?” I croaked.
“Don’t worry about me, worry about you. Jules, what the fuck?”
“I know, I know, my reputation as a trouble magnet is maintained. In my defence, the little purple guy looked so cute.”
“What?”
“And then there was this big rock lizard thing…”
I was scooped up and held tight to his chest.
“Just…stop talking. I’m holding on by a thread, and listening to this isn’t helping.”
His arms were tense around me, but he wasn’t content to simply hold me still, his hands moving restlessly, trying to draw me closer. His fingers buried themselves in my hair, his nose going to my throat as he breathed me in, his lips soon following.
My chest felt tight, not due to his constriction, more because I felt like I was right on the edge of something. This wasn’t the reaction of a guy who liked fucking me, who liked performing with Brandon, showing me hot man on man sex. This was something else. I carefully put my arms around him, a thing I’d done so many times before, but now felt strange and new. It seemed like it was the right thing to do, his fingers digging into my sides, a low groan coming from his chest, something that turned almost into a purr when I stroked the short pelt of his hair.
“Fuck, Jules…” he said in a low growl, then he reached down and tugged my mouth up to his.
Kissing Aaron was always intense. Apart from the whole big and strong thing, he was always one hundred percent into whatever we were doing, and the breaks forced upon us by his military service made things that bit
hotter. But this was different somehow. It was like he was trying to memorise the taste of me by lips and tongue, moving slowly, slick and sensual, not rushing into anything. Though I felt the effort that took in the faint tremble of his limbs.
“Jules…” He couldn’t—we couldn’t pull away long enough for him to complete the sentence, rather he panted my name between kisses that grew more and more open-mouthed and hungry, until I felt the shift of my fangs. He jerked back, hand going to his lip where a small spot of blood welled. His eyes were wild, staring at my teeth, as he reached out to capture a drop of venom when it dropped, where it sizzled on his palm as he rolled it around.
I want this one, my Tirian said.
I do too, but we haven’t had a chance to—
No, I gave you time to engage in your monkey rituals. We need this one.
And if you rush into something—
She disregarded me, not for the first time, taking over my body and making the decision for me. She pushed Aaron back onto the leaf litter, and only then did I realise we were under a tree somewhere as his golden skin contrasted starkly against the grey-purple of fallen leaves. My fingers went to claws, and I held them up in front of him, causing his hands to go to his buttons and undo his shirt in record time to stop me from slicing through his clothes. The talons faded away as he shrugged out of his shirt, the mesmeric sight of his muscles bunching and shifting enough to settle my Tirian. His hands went to his belt with a questioning look shot to me. We nodded, and he peeled them off.
We were rushing this, I felt that deep inside me, but damn the sun loved him. The golden dappled light seemed to soak into his skin, reflecting it back with a luminous radiance. He was this huge expanse of man flesh, and my mouth watered with venom saturated saliva at the sight of him.
This will hurt, I thought, belatedly dragging my consciousness away from what was before me and back to reality, but even as I thought the words, I craved it—that deep, stretching sensation that let me know I was getting seriously fucked. There were no tricky angles, no special sexual positions to get him to hit my g-spot. That dick would smash into every sensitive spot and then some.
