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Jahn sighed, smiling at the ceiling. The warning light
came on, the computer whispering to him.
“Sir, an obstruction is on the road.”
He pushed himself up. The radar showed a deer.
“Arm.”
“Sir, I must inform you, this is not an animal
–“
“Shut the hell up. It’s a deer. I know one when I
see one.”
With a thin whir of gears, a small machinegun pushed
up from the hood. Jahn took the controls. He slowed the car. The shocks took
most of the bumps and potholes in stride, but it could damage his aim.
The road moved over the hill, and then he saw the deer.
It was a large doe, according to the radar. He smiled. This time of year it
would be carrying young. The unborn were tender.
The doe watched him slow more. She even stepped out
onto the road. Jahn peered in the sights. She had antlers, yet she was a doe.
He squeezed the trigger, and a series of bullets
exploded. The barrel of the machinegun gave a temporary sullen red glow. The doe
only lowered her head, presenting a very effective set of antlers.
“Shit.” He checked the sights and the gun. Then he
aimed again and fired on semiautomatic. The doe began to trot towards the car.
With a scowl, Jahn set it full auto-fire and auto-guide, and looked through the
sights as the barrel glowed red.
The doe was perhaps a hundred yards uphill and now
charging full tilt.
Scowling, Jahn kicked down the accelerator, and the car
roared to over a hundred miles an hour. At this speed the doe would disintegrate
on impact.
The car hit the deer and exploded. Jahn was thrown out
of it by the auto-save device, and still in his seat with the woman mumbling at
the chill of air on her bare skin, they floated to the ground.
Shaking off strings of burning plastic and shattered
diamonds of safety glass, the doe stepped on delicate legs from the roar of
flames. Large brown eyes gave the car a gentle look before she noticed the short
flight of the man down to the laurel brush.
Then she followed. Once into the oaks and maples, she
paused.
An owl swooped down past her ears and she frowned at
it. It, too, followed the man.
Just to be ornery, she changed to the shape of a
bluebird, and Ma Creator shed her antlers for the mice to nibble.
The owl was a big one with a black shadow astride it.
Far and away in the narrow cut of valleys coming down from the Pocono Mountains,
a night-stalker bayed at the moon and smelled burning plastic.
He looked back at his coven and loped up into the
swamps to seek the source.
Sue gave Benny a look of angry frustration.
“Touch me again, and you’ll be wondering where your
fingers went.”
With a grimace, Benny cradled his hand and refused to
do more than glower at her.
“Hey, I thought you were a –“
"A woman, creep.” Her scowl deepened. “Some
ghost you are.”
“I ain’t. I can –“ Benny flushed, looking away
from Sue. Head hanging, he muttered something. Her scowl changed, dropping away
in the face of his pain.
Voice a little rough, she said, “Let me see.” She
grabbed his hand, and, unable to resist, Benny let her check the fingers.
Bending them one way, then the other, she said, “Ain’t broke.”
Snatching his hand back, a scowling Benny said, “I
know.”
Sue frowned, but moved away. She glanced over one
shoulder.
“I’m a pendeja
for doing this, but . . . Are you coming or not?”
Benny edged closer, and she swung away, walking through
the shells of buildings, heading north towards Lord Penn’s ‘barony.’ She
was silent, so he kept quiet. He tried to study her and keep an eye on the path
she took.
A goat bleated, then dashed through a patch of brush
with a small boy following with a switch. Seeing them, the boy skidded to a
halt, scowled, and ran after the goat.
“Bobby Ray,” Sue called, shaking a fist. “Man,
why the heck ain’t you in school?”
The boy’s giggle came back to them, then he shouted,
“Ain’t you hear, girl? School done close.” Moving deeper into the brush
and buildings, he chanted, “No more teachers, no more books, no more sec
guards dirty looks!”
Sue slowed. “Lord, no." She stared after the
boy. “Only blasted chance we got to escape this gross yi was through education.”
An air car roared through the sky, and Benny dived into
a building. Sue stood, staring at it. Bullets chipped and shattered masonry. In
a desperate lunge, Benny raced out, threw her over one shoulder, and dived back
in.
She slapped at him, screaming, “Lemme go,
pervert.”
“Geez, lady,” he shouted, throwing his arms up to
protect his eye. “Are you nuts? You could have been killed.”
Sue froze. “I . . . Sorry.” Tears ran down her
face. “We lost the school. We had one lousy school left, and they closed it.”
“Hey, so? School is a waste.” Benny snorted and
grinned. Tasting blood, he frowned and touched his nose. It was swelling, and a
thin trickle of blood leaked from it.
“Are you stupid?” Sue swung an around at the
ruins. “This is all most o’ the kids here will ever know.”
“Like, they get an education and can escape?”
Scrubbing the heel of her hand at the tears, she
nodded.
Benny said, “So they can take a number and work for
some two-bit jerk whose father is a member of the National Worker’s Party.”
Her hair flew in a wild cloud as she shook it.
“Freekin’-A, no. Folks might have to hunker down
and work hard, but the next generation gets better schools and better pay. They
got a chance –“
“To be a Nazi and offer incense to the president.”
Benny made an ugly noise deep in his throat and turned his back to her. “I
ain’t much, but I got no desire to see any kid o’ mine wearing this.” He
held up his right arm. A white scar stood out on the dark skin. “I cut it off
myself,” he said, bragging. “Better free and clean, than bending over the
desk ‘cause the boss likes to my-jack tender meat.”
She stared at Benny and burst into tears.
Before he knew it, he had his arms around her and
holding her, whispering in her ear, trying to soothe her.
Then one hand slipped down to her bottom and
squeezed. Strictly by accident, of course. Instinct. And Benny’s nose was soon
bleeding freely while Sue stomped his foot and cursed.
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
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