Slither (38 page)

Two species were merging into one before Ruth's
eyes. But there was still the yellow skin from the waist
down...

Robb stepped out of it, like stepping out of a pair of
pants.

Gleaming pink legs stood V'd over Ruth. What covered Robb now, clearly, was worm skin. Even his toes
looked more like the ends of worms than human toes.

But Ruth couldn't have cared less about the toes.

Her eyes shot to Robb's crotch.

What hung there was purely and simply a fat, teninch worm.

Oh, fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck, Ruth thought.

Now Robb had something to rape her with, and
worse still was the fact that the worm ... was erecting.

That's when Ruth grabbed the barbecue fork and
hooked it right into the pulsing column.

Blood that was white shot out on hot jets, painting
Ruth's determined face. The sound that Robb made in
objection bore no semblance to anything human now.
More like stabbing a barbecue fork into a rhino's penis.

The shed shuddered around the concussive sound.

Ruth became a blond maniac dynamo. The fork
blurred as she jammed it in and out of Robb's abdomen. Then more jabs in the neck, then a few more in
the boneless sack that used to be his head.

Dust rose from the wood floor's seams when the
fully mutated Robb White collapsed. Ruth jabbed the
now-flaccid penis-thing one more time, then ran like a
banshee out the door.

Her brain still registered very little. All she knew was
that she was no longer in that Shed from Hell, and she
was breathing fresh air, not monster-stink.

Her shorts still rung her foot. She pulled them on
and sprinted off down the first trail she saw. She only
knew that she was going to run straight to the beach
and start swimming.

It was worth the chance, even with the sharks.

First Nora checked the camp. They're not here, she
thought in the biggest disappointment. That meant
she'd have to go looking, and there was precious little
time for that. She found another can of repellent in
Trent's tent, then sprayed herself down liberally. For all
the good it'll do against those things, she told herself,
remembering just how big the worms could get.

Frustration overwhelmed her now. She jogged down
the trail. That was stupid! Her heart still hadn't let up.
Maybe God really had saved her. But for what? she
wondered.

Did she really deserve to be saved? How different would her life be if she survived this mess? Even amid
the chaos and all the impossibilities, some recess of her
mind seemed to dwell on that.

Try to do some good, she told herself.

She veered off back toward the RTG.

I'll find a way to disarm it ...

But when she got there ...

"How the hell?" she muttered.

It was gone.

She squinted down at the cement slab. The area
where the black disk had been seemed blemished, even
corroded somehow. Well, that's sure some shit ...

Then it occurred to her, One of the guys in the masks
must've moved it. They must know we're onto them ...

So what now?

When she turned she almost shrieked.

A dead worm lay like limp rope across the clearing.
End to end, it must've been thirty feet long.

She felt caught in a cross fire of confusion. Back to
the campsite, was the only recourse she could think of.
She took back off running ...

An unseen impact slammed her chest and plowed all
the air from her lungs. It happened too fast for her to
think. Had she run into a branch?

Her back slammed the ground.

Consciousness began to fizzle, her peripheral vision
going from gray to black.

Nora had been clotheslined, but not by a branch.

By a girthy arm.

A bearded face hovered over her.

Echoic words floated from slow-motion lips. "Hey,
baby. My name's Slydes. What's yours?"

Then a knuckly fist to the forehead knocked her out
cold.

Loren stood dumbfounded at the campsite. Yeah, I
need this headache! Trent was not to be found.

He foolishly checked all the tents, if only because he
could think of nothing else to do. Right, he thought. Like
the lieutenant's going to be taking a nap.... He was
about to start calling out, but thought better of it. Trent's
out there somewhere ... but so are those guys. Loren
had no choice but to think of them as that: those guys.
Those men in the masks and black hooded suits. He simply didn't have it in him to use the more specified label:

Alien research technicians.

But it was true and he knew that. And he knew they
were still on the island. He'd seen a total of three of
them on the surveillance screens.

What should I do? a voice unlike his own demanded.
Perhaps the voice belonged to his more courageous alter ego. He walked anxious circles around the site,
glancing incessantly at his watch.

Five minutes. Ten minutes. Fifteen ...

Nora said she'd be right behind me, he thought. She
should be here by now, and so should Trent.

He stood still and listened. Just then the island utterly lacked any sound at all. Not even a parrot
squawked. Not even a lizard scurried up a tree ...

Where is everybody?

Loren, of course, already knew what he should do:
Got to look for them! he thought. Find Nora, find Trent,
and then we can get to the boat and leave! Unless ...

Unless those guys in the masks and black suits-the
ALIENS, he forced himself-had already killed Nora
and Trent.

Or maybe something worse .. .

Maybe the worms or their ova had gotten them by now. He'd seen how fast Annabelle had been lost. It
could just as easily have happened to them on their
way back here, and come to think of it ... It could
happen to me, too.

Of course it could.

And he still had the bomb in his pocket. He removed
the puck and saw with some unease that about twenty
percent of the blinking border was gone. How much
more time before this thing goes or. And what the
FUCK am I going to do with it?

Loren didn't care for pressure or stress, and he
wasn't much of a decision maker.

But providence was changing that today. He could
either stay here, or he could bone up and go search for
Nora and Trent.

Do it, the other voice demanded. Don't be a
coward ...

Loren took the gun out of his waistband. Three bullets left, he knew. Then he pocketed the disk and decided he'd cut through to the other side of the island
and throw it as far out into the water as he could.

He jogged off down one of the trails. Trent said he
was going to check the body, so it made sense to look
there first, then ditch the bomb, then track back to the
control station. He could think of no other tactic.

Immediately the trail seemed more dense, hemming
him against the paranoia that pressed from either side,
below, and above.

The worms could be anywhere, he knew.

He moved very slowly, examining his field of vision.
Gun in lead, he felt foolish. He knew a bullet would kill
a worm with a head shot, but he only had three bullets.
There are a hell of a lot more than three worms on this
island. Worse, he was squinting through each forward
step, peeling his eyes for signs of ova that, by now,
probably existed by the hundreds of thousands.

One further question haunted him: If I don't find
Nora or Trent, what am I going to do?

He'd have to go to the boat and leave without them.

"Loren," a peep of a voice seemed to seep through
trees.

"Nora!" he replied. He wasn't sure which direction.

'Oh God, I think I broke my leg..."

Not Nora's voice-

He stepped a few yards off the trail and saw her, lying sprawled in the thicket.

Annabelle.

Loren stared down, gun poised.

She lay naked, inclined on her elbows. When she tried
to lean up farther, she groaned. But what Loren noticed
first and foremost was this: She looks ... normal.

She winced through obvious discomfort when she
looked more closely at him. "What's wrong with you?
Why are you pointing that gun at me?"

"I-" He didn't lower it. He saw no ova on her, and
no-yellowed-skin like the girl in the boat.

No sign of infection.

But ... that worm ...

"Put that gun away and help me!"

"You-you must be infected," he finally choked out.
"You have to be."

"Don't be an idiot, Loren!" she snapped. "Do I look
infected?"

Loren eyed the robust breasts and healthy, tan belly.
Actually, he considered, you don't. "But that wormTrent and I saw it. It was dozens of feet long,
Annabelle, and it lifted you up into the trees."

"Tell me about it!" she griped in her normal voice.
"That goddamned thing was trying to go down my
throat, but once it got a whiff of this"-she held up her
wrist, showing her plastic repellent bracelet-"it gagged
and dropped me. I must've fallen twenty feet!"

Loren's brain ticked. He had no choice but to doubt
what she claimed; it didn't jibe with the science. Those
bracelets, as well as the bug repellent they'd been using,
were only strong enough to discourage small insects
with microscopic sensory pores that would easily be
overloaded by the small traces of chlordane and diethylbased irritants. But a twenty- or thirty-foot worm? It
would be like killing a wild boar with a mousetrap.

Then again.. . bug spray killed the ova and smaller
worms, he remembered. And as a matter of fact, I
haven't been infected, and neither has Nora or Trentand we all used bug repellent and the bracelets.

"Loren! Just when I was really starting to like you,
and now you're really pissing me off! Would you stop
being a chicken and come over here and help me!"

He knew what Nora would do; she'd help her. Plus, if
anything, Annabelle looked one hundred percent as
healthy as she had earlier. The trickle of remnant attraction assailed him as well, even under these conditions.
Any real man would feel the same thing. Her raw beauty
lay before him, and she was in pain: the ultimate damsel
in distress ...

Loren put the gun away and went to her. "You said
you broke your leg?"

She ground her teeth. "I think so, when I fell out of
the tree-my right leg. It hurts so much."

Loren placed his hands on the warm leg, felt for
signs of fracture. "I think you lucked out," he said, trying very hard not to steal a glance at her breasts.
"There's no swelling, and I don't feel any bone fragments under the skin. You probably jolted the cartilage
in the knee and hip, though, and that's going to hurt
fora while. Let me help you up, see if you can walk."

She groaned again, head arched back, as he got her
to her feet.

"Can you put any weight on your leg?"

She clung to him with one arm, and gingerly stepped
forward. "Yes-damn! It hurts, but I think I can walk."

"Good. Let's take it slow."

At least Loren had some direction now, but ... Jesus, I've got to move fast. Got to get Annabelle to the
boat, then find Nora and Trent and get THEM to the
boat. And then get out of here ... AFTER I get rid of
this bomb in my pocket!

They limped along down the trail. This was going to
take a while. The bomb ticking away in his pocket only
reminded him further of how little time he had to get
everything done. And .. .

How powerful IS this bomb? the worst dread kept
forcing him to think. Loren didn't need that question
distracting him, and a distraction he needed even less
was Annabelle's warm, curvaceous body pressing right
against him. One big breast kept rubbing his side, and
every time he cast a tiny glance down ...

Oh, man ...

During one such glance, he could swear her nipples
were erecting, which hardly made sense given the situation. Stop looking at her, you pervert! he yelled at
himself.

He didn't see the kudzu vine crooked out from the
base of a palm tree. His foot hooked it, and-

Flump!

They both fell.

"Shit! I'm sorry," Loren bumbled. "Are you all right?"

Annabelle lay atop him, her luscious, hot weight
pressing him down. He expected that the fall had hurt
her leg, but she made no protest. Her face opposed his,
strands of blond hair falling to either side of his neck.
It looked like she was about to say something, but then
her eyes bloomed ... and her lips lowered to his.

The shock stiffened every muscle in Loren's body. He
felt agog at what was happening. Her tongue traced his lips, delved into his mouth, then slipped down to his
ear where she whispered, "I've been hot for you since
the day we got here ..."

More shock on Loren's part, and more stiffening, especially about the groin. I can't believe it, came the
thought through so much hot fog. I'm finally making
out with her ...

At last he relaxed and slipped his arms around the
small of her back. Her bare legs spread wider, her groin
grinding down. Her breathing issued as a series of
wanton pants and gasps. She raised herself on her
hands then, and hitched herself up.

To a guy like Loren, the mother lode had arrived.

The two perfect orbs of her breasts were now level
with his face. Then she positioned herself more precisely,
and a swollen nipple began to brush across his lips.

"Suck it," she whispered. "Hard. Real hard ..."

The instant Loren obliged, Annabelle moaned.

The way her bare hips were grinding down, Loren
wouldn't last long. Her warm body encompassed him:
She was a cocoon of his most erotic dreams. She
traded her nipples back and forth, "Harder." And then
one hand slid down, caged his crotch through the meager swim trunks, and squeezed.

"Take these off and fuck me," came the next desperate whisper. "I can't stand it anymore. I've got to have
you in me..."

Just hearing her say that almost spent him. This would
be tough. Even if he got that far, how long would he last?