|
Mike stopped to stare at a large, powerful dog. Creel choked
and tugged his arm.
“Sue, remember?”
A grin on his face, Mike nodded.
“We come here later,” Creel said. “If the judge messes
with us, we off him. Right?”
“Ms VanTur may not like that idea,” Mike said, his voice
hinting at censure. “She’s fond of her pets.”
Creel covered the lower part of his face, but his eyes were
gleaming.
All amusement gone, Mike grabbed the skinny man, thrusting
him at their taxi.
Creel was still fumbling with the safety nets when Mike said,
“Antone’s Place.”
The car shot into the sky, and Creel thudded against the rear
window.
Benny walked across the street from the man. The guy smelled
of tea. Tea? Since the cold war started with the princes of Asia, tea cost more
than coffee.
He made the effort to move at an easy, loose walk.
The shon:gili
ripped through the night and down an alley. He scattered a pack of scavenging
dogs and with an almost casual slash of teeth, killed one. The dog screamed, and
a man raced out with a club raised.
“Lay off my meat, you–“
The shon:gili
flipped around and came back after him. His eyes widened.
“Oh, shoot, no.”
The man dived into a doorway, but the shon:gili was right after him, ripping at the man’s leg. The club
swung with the man screaming and cursing. The shon:gili snapped it in half, clawing at rusted razor wire caught in
his teeth.
Eyes wide, the man sank back to the floor. Strings of blood
and drool running from the broad jaws the shon:gili
stood over him. He reached down and took the man’s head between his jaws and
slowly increased the pressure until the man shrieked and the skull popped.
He lay down and began to feed.
With the driver howling laughter, the taxi dropped two
hundred feet and slowed, halting just above the crumbling brick pavement.
Creel was gasping for breath, and Mike frowned. Mike unlatched
the nets. He handed the price of the fare through the illegal tip slot, then
punched his credit card in the box.
“Thank you, Mr. Donnelly,” the computer whispered.
Mike got out and moved to the black entrance of Antone’s
Place.
“Hey, buddy,” the cabby shouted. “You taking your
friend?”
Mike turned and there was Creel, fumbling with the netting.
With a savage groan not altogether brought on by Creel’s helplessness, Mike
sat in the cab. He shoved the man’s bony hands from the tangles and ripped the
latches open.
The nets retracted, and Creel beamed a sort of hero worship at
Mike.
The city was filled with strange scents and bitter odors that
Carl barely knew when he used to bring Leda down for her drugs. The shon:gili
noted all of it. One pervasive smell was a stench like burning manure and
rotting bone.
Shaking his head, the shon:gili
moved away from the body and outside. Seeing him, the pack scattered, returning
only as he left. They sniffed at the man. The small pack whimpered and shivered.
Then one licked at the blood and smears left by the shon:gili,
and they all moved in.
The shon:gili slid
out of the alley sniffing at the scents of the city. The bitter reek of manure
used as fuel was heavy and oppressing, underlying every other scent. Bone was
being burned. Methane gas. Rotting wood. The stench of decay was thick here, and
the demon quivered with an eager delight.
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
|
