Short Story 10 Part 3

There was always information not given to me. I stood outside my car and let my third cigarette burn down to a stub as I contemplated what was inside the darkened storage container. The shipping yard was dotted with stacks of colored metal boxes and most of them weren’t worth shit.

The Glut’s was not one of those.

I was told to be at the yard at ten-thirty and wait for someone to come open the container. I didn’t know how long I would wait or who was coming, I just had to wait.

Levi was supposed to be at the yard, but the fat ass slipped outside her apartment and broke a rib. Apparently being a dangerous monster was not a defense against gravity. In the few months after her fall she became very humble – very quickly. For a time she even convinced me to come pick up her mail; she couldn’t walk without a great deal of pain. Once she was on the mend, though, it was back to business and her bite returned. I immediately regretted helping her out. Maybe if she starved because of her handicap she would gain some mobility. Hindsight. What a bitch.

So she wasn’t at the shipping yard that night, not a loss in my mind. Honestly she couldn’t even drive very well, it might have to do with her sloth claws, but I’d be fairly certain that she was clinically insane. Also color blind. This sort of job – especially when Levi wasn’t around – was the kind I enjoyed. I simply wait around, play body guard to some schmuck and his money and – voila! – paid. Mostly it was two or three hours of late night talk radio.

NPR was still plugging along and was – as usual – discussing Hybrid rights. The ten to twelve spot that night was a short segment featuring a right-wing Christian evangelist who was made famous by his declaration that Hybrids were not in the image of God and therefore did not make it into the big book that Christ held by the lake of fire and brimstone. This stood in opposition to a growing sentiment on the matter that Hybrids were people just like humans and should be afforded every such consideration, but this Christian nut job – Pastor Matthew Jacobs – was not concerned with their lifestyle. This messenger of God felt that his territory was that of the Lord and the one true God would not see his heavenly landscape polluted with Hybrids. They were the offspring of Satan, they had lain with beast and should be sacrificed.

I didn’t know what to feel on the topic, really. I mostly listened to the segment for the passionate rapport:

“Pastor Jacobs, how can you say God will deny these individuals when so many have accepted His word into their lives, even knowing they are not in His image? Doesn’t that sort of faith put them on His good side?”

“The creatures – the Beasts – of the earth were created for the express purpose of being lorded over by man. God gave us dominion over them so we could exploit them, so says Genesis. God gave Man dominion – not woman, not beast, not part man, but Man – and man is in the image of God. If the things that crawl over the earth are not permitted into his kingdom then their brethren shall be so denied. Amen.”

“And the fact that more than twenty percent of Christian congregations are made of up of Hybrids?”

“Does the existence of non-believers destroy the image of our Lord? No. So, does the corrupting of the image of Man change the face of God? No. Can these beasts choose to assemble and ask forgiveness of the Lord? That is their business. Will the Father accept them into his kingdom? No.”

“So you do believe that Hybrids have free-will, just as the gift of free-will was given to Adam?”

“They stole it! These imitation men – “

“How can a natural derivation of Homo Sapiens steal free-will?”

“- poison the well of our families and teach our children that it is okay to be monstrous!”

“What are they teaching?! I don’t know if you’re aware, Pastor, but our board-op behind the glass is a Hybrid and he’s the hardest working Man at minimum wage!”

“The children of Satan are here?!”

I could heard a small commotion on the radio.

“Where is it?!”

“Ladies and gentleman, Pastor Jacobs has left the studio! I have called security! I think he’s trying to break into the board-op office down the hall!”

The struggle was broadcast live to a few hundred thousand people. Father Jacobs became and even more prolific symbol for the anti-Hybrid movement and the board-op – a Hybrid named Shelton Gartier – got promoted.

As the segment came to a close, I saw headlight turn onto the row of containers. A light mist moved in off the water and the closing lights burred into fuzzy wisps.

As half the distance was covered, I leaned in the driver side door and flicked my headlights off and on. Off- on. Off – on. It was met with the same signal. I could see as it approached that it was a dark-colored Cadillac. An Escalade. Typical gangster shit.

It rolled up alongside me and dropped the passenger window. The interior lights were off and it was hard to see the driver in the darkness.

“Name?”

Almost everyone in the Glut’s crew knew me by name, but she made a habit out of being thorough, “Atticus.”

“I am a monster. I have two sides, but only one face. I am green, but those who seek me are green with envy. What am I?”

Lately the Glut was big into riddles, especially when I was on assignment, “Money.”

Get it?

“Alright Atticus, back your car up a few containers and aim your headlights at the doors.”

So, I wasn’t allowed to see what was inside, that’s what his order mean. Obviously what was inside wasn’t heavy or bulky if one man was handling it and it was something valuable that I wasn’t trusted with. Maybe trust is the wrong word, the Glut trusted me, she gave me jobs and information that were delicate and dangerous, she had been for a few years. This storage container and its contents were simply something she didn’t want to burden me with, objects or information that I didn’t need to have, because having it would involve me in other jobs – larger jobs that use different crews. Division of labor in her own way.

“Yeah, holler if you need a hand.” I slid in behind the wheel of my junker and maneuvered around the Caddy, Parking about fifty yard away, just at the edge of the container yard. The twin beams of light reached their hazy yellow way towards the courier as he got out and walked toward the container. I pulled my hood up and stood outside the car to smoke. The gentle drizzle and the hum of the car engines were the only sounds I could hear, like a blanket of white noise that muffled the Cadillac driver and his business.

I could see in the distant silence the courier open the container door. At the same time a swift slapping sound came cascading towards me from the opposite direction. It was the same pattern of a horse’s gallop, but was soft and wet.

I couldn’t see it, not in the darkness beyond the yard, but I could hear it coming closer – very quickly. Trying to look calm, I let my cigarette rest between my lips and pull my gun from my waist band, pointing it into the darkness.

Something was coming. The shadow outside the headlights was almost a tangible force, like a wall of pitch that was draped across the night. It hid the approaching sound.

As it reached the ring of light, it stopped. Silent as if had never been there at all. An empty fraction of a second for me to drag on my smoke and then it came crashing down. The Hybrid was falling on me like a hurdling furry torpedo. It must have leapt out of the darkness to come hurdling down from above – poised to strike me in the chest.

I raise my gun but it was too late. .

It hit me in the gut and left me choking for breath. The whole thing was just a blur of fur and skin that I couldn’t follow with my eyes. The force of the impact knocked my gun from my hand, I grasped for it desperately.

We tumbled backwards in a torrent of limbs, my back and head slamming into the hood of the car. The hollow bong sound of the cheap metal bending in and my grunt of pain were stifled by the ambient sound around us. Fireflies flickered around my eyes from the blow and warmth crept down my scalp.

“Fuck…” I pulled my arms up and pushed against the Hybrid, “Off!”

Instead of me shoving, it leapt off and found all four of its feet – all four of its hands, it had human hands instead of paws – and landed facing down the corridor. The Hybrid was a dog, but it had very clearly defined human parts. She was almost a sphinx in my mind, with a soft-angled human face that was filled with anger, her furrowed brow made a deep V above her eyes and she glared into mind with a fire, burning into my skin.

“You’re in over your head,” She growled.  Atop her head was a crown, a casually fitting ring of dynamite that was tilting back above her ears.

I could feel the free-flow of blood from the top of mine, spilling over like a bathtub that’s been left to run for hours. Only then, in the stunned moment after impact did I hear the buzz – the whispering countdown of a timer on the bomb.

She took off down the corridor, her pale-white hands slapping against the pavement, kicking water as she closed on the courier.

“Hey!” My heartbeat was a fast black thunder in my ears, pushing more blood out of my head.

“HEY!” I fell on my gun and fumbled to get two hands on it. Suddenly I was all thumbs, aiming the gun like an ape holding a banana.

I finally got my finger on the trigger, but the night ripped open. A sharp white cloud came rolling down towards me, full of yellow and orange claws that carried pieces of the black Escalade. The roar of the explosion swallowed me and spit me out, leaving my bones shaking in my skin. It threw me backwards, grabbing me by the ankles and whipping me against my car.

I was flung to the ground and was helpless as the world around me burned.

Short Story 10, Part 2

I was forced to ride shotgun.

And no one even gave me a gun.

The nameless driver had simply pulled up and told me to get in, beyond that he didn’t say a word. He was human, as far as I could tell, and was one of the Glut’s favorites – a henchman, plain and simple. I wasn’t sure if I qualified as a henchman at this point, but it was dawning on me that the glut had more of an idea about it than I did. I’d met the Glut dozens of times previously, but never in a hsate and never one on one. Thus my lack of sidearm.

She didn’t trust me yet.

The ride took us straight out of downtown, carrying along in silence. The radio dials looked like they had been last turned with a clawed hammer; I assumed the whole thing didn’t work. Even inf it did, the driver struck me as the kind of guy who still used cassette tapes. It was nothing in the way that he looked, it was just a sort of era and time that I felt he belonged to – late 1980s, hair bands and cocaine. These were the sort of things that got a guy into this line of work in the first place.

His appearance didn’t betray any of that, but it certainly said something else. His leather jacket was cracked and faded, but still whole with a working zipper. He picked me up wearing a Cleveland Indians baseball cap sporting a logo reminiscent of the franchise during their late 90s success – the days of Alomar, Ramirez and Vazquel. His salt and pepper scruff matched the hair peeking out beneath the cap and complimented his worn and splotched smoker’s skin.

At any moment I expected him to break the silence with the familiar crackle of a pack of smokes. His nails had that warm yellow tint at their edges and were gripping the wheel a little too tightly.

“Trying to quick smoking?” I adjusted my position in the sea, trying to get off the metal rails that were practically bursting through the cushions.

I could see his grip loosen on the wheel, but he said nothing.

“Yeah, I remember what that was like, no patch or anything. Cold turkey was cold. See, they just don’t make ‘em like they used to, damn doctors and their Hippocratic bullshit were making people like you and me suffer, because some whiney ne’er-do-wells wanted a cause for lung cancer. Let me tell you, all the “science” that was used to correlate smoking and cancer, you show that to Colonial Americans and see what those hard asses have to say”

I was beginning to wonder if any of my drivel was getting through, if I kept comparing him to me it was bound to get him irked, especially with me coming off as such a bitchy nut.

But it would prove much harder than that to draw some emotion out of my sulky chauffer of stone. The driver sat silent with his fingers working on the wheel.

“I bet you were a Malboro man back in the day, weren’t you? Beds too, I can see it. Those were the last of the flavor – real tobacco, real drag, filters that you can just snap off, fuck those things.”

We were rounding the corner into our industrial block, I was running out of time to work this guy. By the time I get out of the car I want to be expecting a blow to the face, but he’s keeping cool. Humans are so difficult sometimes.

“She’s expecting you.”

“Oh! There you are. Want a smoke?”

“Get out of the car.”

He stopped the sedan right infront of a loading dock, a produce packaging warehouse. The Glut kept eyes and hands on all sorts of businesses and produce was –strangely – one of them It was ironic in its own way, but n o one was going to laugh at it with the Glut around.

“Lets do this again sometime.” I hurry out of the car, leaving the guy red on the inside, I was sure. As soon as I cleared the doorframe he threw the car in reverse and tried to take me down. I don’t know what would have looked more foolish, allowing him to knock me down or what I actually did: throw myself onto the door and hang on like an exhausted beaver flailing down river.

I planted my feet and broke to the side, grinning as I made a dash for the loading dock. The driver turned his backward progress into a dirt-kicking turn and barely slowed as he cleared the small lot where he dropped me, letting the car’s momentum close the door. I would go on to see him quite frequently, whether during work or after and he picked up smoking again a few days after that meeting with the Glut.

It was important for me to get my laughs in when I could, short moments like that when I was not at risk of getting shot were rare. Car rides could not always be counted on to be low-stress. After that day I would throw men in trunks, car jack old women and be mopping up blood off of car mats – thankfully never my own.

Hopping onto the dock I made way into the dark warehouse. There was no regular business today, the packing machines and belts were all in stasis, the colored lights and sounds of industry were all absent, having gone home with the crew of twenty something.

The glut kept an office up a flight of stairs. Maybe “office’ is the wrong word. When I imagine an office it has a desk and chairs with maybe a filing cabinet or a table with a large print calendar. These are the offices for men. For humans. The Glut’s is something else.

Padding up the metal stairs, I made no attempt to hide my arrival. The steps were extra deep and were a grid-like cast that allowed for excellent grip. No one would slip on those stairs, but plenty have fallen down them. They had a water-resistant finish applied on the surface, a maroon coating that reminded me of dried blood.

Safety standards for factories and most work environments had been written with average humans in mind. The impregnation of the contemporary work force by non-humans happened in the early 1980s, almost paralleling an international recession that the western workforce took right in the gut. Obviously, speculation about the inclusion of non-humans in labor positions and the timing related to the economic downturn was widespread and proliferated until investors and entrepreneurs demanded action. Legislators refused to acknowledge non-humans under equal opportunity standards and safety requirements and user access for establishments only had to accommodate those with hands, feet, two arms and two legs.  Of course each business could redesign their facilities to welcome the newly accepted abject, but this was a fantastic challenge for places such as restaurants and stores as the variety within the non-human and their possession of animal qualities often risked contamination and violation of existing health codes. Really, the arrival of the non-humans into everyday society was a global dilemma in civil rights and the question of autonomy. It put even international giants such as McDonalds at the brink of collapse, in their case it was something so simple as “do we serve burgers to people with cow bodies, even though they have cold hard cash?”

The Glut was very much involved in this socioeconomic battle. She had clout – to say the least – and kept in good relations with a few dozen congressmen (all of which were human). I had heard stories before I met her in person that she was involved in politics in the early 40s, keeping her hands entangled in pre-war policy. At the time – nearly eighty years ago – non-humans were not acknowledged as sentient or aware, a sentiment  only comparable to the attitude toward black slaves in the 1700s. I’m still not sure of the truth behind these claims, simply based on the timeline, but people were discovering more and more about non-humans every day.

I came to the double-door frame that lead to the Glut’s office and leaned against it, not passing the threshold, but letting the room come to me.

The office was only possessive of a small circle of couches, a coffee table and a large padded platform – almost a stage – that oversaw the ocean of upholstery. The platform was riddled with pillows like the lounge of an Eastern king. If the Glut put some hookah pipes around the room it would make a seamless transformation.

Riding on couch number one was a lone man. I had never seen him before, but that didn’t mean anything. He dressed like a farmer and had the build of a football player (it should be noted that the NFL refused to draft non-human players), but his fear was evident on his face. His big brown eyes darted around the room and barely noticed my arrival. The Glut wasn’t there yet, she loved to make people wait; always arriving fashionably late and making it clear that people came to her not the other way around. The middle-age quarterback was tensed like a spring, wringing his hat between his nervously working hands.

I simply waited and watched, knowing that this was something I was meant to see. The Glut undoubtedly timed this so her earlier meeting overlapped into ours. There were other doors into the room and I had expected her to enter through them, but she snuck up behind me. I was either too lost in thought or she was getting very good at being stealthy. She didn’t acknowledge me, she simply brushed past me as she navigated through the open door frame.

The Glut always filled me with mixed emotions. I could understand the fear the couch-rider felt, she was a sight. She stood a head taller than me and could straight up to an east seven feet. Most people describe two things after they first meet the Glut, one is her lower body, the other is her upper. I could never decide which attribute was more shocking. Below her waist was as if her bottom started where a chicken’s head ended. The white feathered mass blossomed at her hips and contained the breast, wings and legs of the classic feathered foowl. While it maintained a poultry-esque referent it was as if such a critter were enlarged to a three and a half foot tall hen with talons as long as a grown human’s hand. Above the gargantuan bird the Glut had a stunning female torso; a flat-bodied, ample-chested, ivory skinned monument to sexuality which was never covered in clothing. This is not what was unusual , though, at the shoulder the Glut sprouted six additional arms, all of which were toned and sculpted to match her muscular form. This almost arachnidan mutation allowed her to multi-task like a machine and gave her speech and personality a monstrous animation. Two of her arms were always occupied. I didn’t know if the Glut was even aware of it, but she constantly was groping her own breasts. When I looked upon her I was always terrified and aroused. Only the potential for her to end my life kept me from pitching a very awkward tent.

She clicked past me, touching the door frame and letting her last-most hand brush my cheek. The multitude of limbs was always moving, touching whatever was in reach – cracking knuckles, fondling breasts…something. She let a small smile touch her lips, but what she was smiling at was hard to tell. The Glut kept a strange cap about her eyes and head. It may have been an additional segment of her anatomy, but regardless it was clearly identifiable as a Lily of the Valley, a pale white flower that crowned her head.

“Good afternoon, gentleman. Thank you for waiting, Bill.” So I learned the man’s name was bill.

Bill came to his feet, nearly tripping on his own shoes, “’Afternoon, what’s this all about, Glut?”

“In time, Bill. I want to show you something first.” She glided on her claws to the stage and smoothly hopped onto its raised surface. From somewhere unseen she drew two ears of husked and cleaned yellow corn, juggling them amongst her many grasps. “These were both taken from your many acres of land, Bill. Do you know what the difference between these two is? No? Of course not. It isn’t something so visible. However, it is a vital difference. One difference that brings us to the purpose of our meeting. Any guess? Still no?

“Well I’ll tell you. This one is yours. And this one is mine.”

Bill’s mouth stammered along silently, unable to make the words that we were both thinking: What?

“This ear,” in one of her right hands, “is from seed you’ve gathered through seven generations of your family. Corn whose diversity is natural and derived through careful hoarding of raw materials. This other,” dancing in her left set, “is a genetically modified ear, scientifically perfect and resistant to disease and most insect life. What has happened is that somehow – some unfortunate accident I’m sure – you’ve collected a sampling of my seeds and unfortunately let them grow alongside your own. So one has to wonder: how much of that crop is your seed and how much is mine?

“See, Bill, you’ve stolen this corn – “

“Whoa now! I have done no such thing!”

“- and consequently infringed on a copyright and patents I have on this produce. My attorney tells me I can bring suit against you and force you to stop harvest for years during litigation. Now, tell me Bill, How much did you net last year?”

Bill was stuttering and pressing his palms into his temples, struggling to wrap his mind around this turn of events.

“Bill.”

Nothing.

“Bill!” The Glut’s arms tensed and cocked as if going to throw the corn.

“Se-seven-seventy.”

“Okay, Bill, that’s not bad. You’ve carved out a decent living there and I’m sure with your wife’s wages you clear one-twenty on a decent year. So, I’ll tell you what, I’ll make you a deal. If we should pursue the proper legal course here you make nothing per year and most of your wife’s income would go into lawyer’s fees and I don’t want to do that to you.”

The relief on Bill’s face was like the sun coming out of the clouds and just as bright.

“What I think we can do is compromise. I think, since you’re such a gentleman, that you can go on using my seeds and – for now – I won’t lose a feather over it. In exchange for my niceties – essentially y allowing your farm to limp on – I’ll be expecting to receive 40% of your profits. Annually.”

The crashing disappointment hammered Bill’s face again, “That’s almost half of my income! How can I….How…”

I continued to stand by, unmoving.

“Bill, Bill, think about how much of your money you would lose if you had no harvest per year.”

The Glut had just added nearly thirty thousand dollars to her annual salary.

The farmer known as Bill weighted his losses and potential disasters and signed on with the Glut. He walked out and forgot his hat.

She and I stood in silence for a few moments after his departure.

Eventually she broken the silence, “Have a seat.”

I did.

“How long have you been under my employ?”

“Thirteen months.”

“I’m sorry I missed our anniversary.” She slowly got off the platform and came to stand before me, “Has it been as good for you as it has for me?” She gently ran a single hand along my knee.

“It’s been a thrill,” I don’t want to betray my discomfort,” Honestly, I’m surprised you called me here.”

 She sighed and took her hand off of me.

“I had heard you were fun, you don’t seem fun.”

“I’m a walking thrill ride after a few shots.”

“We’ll have to test that out some time.”

“Name the time and place.”

“One day. In the meantime, I brought you here to tell you who your new partner is. It’s been a few weeks since we lost Gene and we need to get you back in the swing of things. When you get your next job, you’ll be working with Levi.”

“Oh, no, come on, Glut”

“Don’t whine. Levi is an excellent partner, you’ll learn to love her. Trust me, Atticus.”

Short Story 10 (Untitled)

Levi sat across from me, stabbing herself in the gut.

“What the fuck is that?” A classy inquiry if there ever was one.

She managed to cram an additional slice of pie into her maw, “Its medicine, dick, it keeps my heart in check. Ya know, ba-bump-ba-bump?”

“There are better ways of doing that, ya know?” Dragging out the last word, I glared into her swine eyes, trying to burn some semblance of respect into her tiny, tiny brain.

But she was having none of it. She swung her arms over the plastic table between us, grappling me in her talons. Levi was stationary nearly twenty-four-seven, but had no problem calling on her speed. Her arms were twice as long as a human’s and were covered in a thick, abundant fur. The Glut once told me she had the arms of a sloth, but never having seen one I wouldn’t know. The three nails on each paw wrapped my throat like a ribbon, pulling in around my chin and drawing a string of blood from my Adam’s apple.

“What the fuck?” I choke out, I don’t resist or raise a hand against her, even though I have a sem-automatic on my hip. I might act panicky, but I know she’s just flexing – peacocking , so to speak – and trying to scare me. I know Levi a hell of a lot better than she knows me, I watched and listened long before I came on as her partner.

Our work together was brutal and she didn’t make it any better nor did my not being like her. She was one of Them and I would never be.

I stood five foot ten, pale skin – skin all over – and looked the perfect part as a human specimen. Ten fingers, toes, two arms, legs and eyes. I would never find out if Levi resented these qualities or simply prejudiced against me for it. It really didn’t matter, her pig-faced scowl was enough to make regular pigs choke and die. In fact, I believe she harvested the bacon for the pie she was now enjoying. I don’t know if that’s sick or twisted, as a self-classified omnivore I –of course- enjoy the occasional ovine, but I certainly don’t eat my fellow man, I wouldn’t even entertain the thought of eating one of Them, considering how close to human they appear. I’m no cannibal.

“Don’t talk shit, flanges! Doc says it’s genetic. We can’t all walk around with our bones sticking out of our stomachs, okay, skinny? If you want to see what medicine can do for you just say the word. I’ll give you a bit of something that’ll take you years to flush out.”

Bitch. “Got it, got it.”

Levi got right back to chomping down the pie, one slice in one bite. She placed her hand back on the syringe, pushing down the plunger and sending whatever it contained deep into her thick and cold blood. Her black solid eyes now ran up and down my face, looking for my fear and trying to register its validity, seeing if her weight was enough to push me around or get me on the back foot. Fuck her, she can bully all day and it won’t matter, I can pretend until my face is blue but when push comes to shove I’ll be the one with hands covered in pig blood.

“Whatever, Levi. How’s your pie?” The flow of blood kept running down my neck, I pushed aside thoughts of dabbing at it. Let her see it, lick her lips at it, be a fucking….pig. I knew Levi was a sadist, she had to curb it when we were working otherwise she could fuck up whole jobs by sending people through windows or something else ridiculous, but I’d seen her left unchecked.

Two weeks before this small luncheon Levi went out to get payment from a family in the burrows - protection money to keep them under the Glut’s wing – and when she shows up the mom sends out her youngest son to break the bad news: they don’t have the money This really doesn’t surprise me, it’s a fairly common event considering the type of people the Glut keeps in his wallet. So, Levi gets down on her stubby little knees and puts a paw on the kids head. The whole thing looks gentle and innocent from the car where I sat and watched, but Levi started drooling. This almost black sort of ichor ran from the corners of her floppy jowls nearly dripping onto the kid’s shoulders, threatening to drape him in a black shroud.

The driver of our four-door watched with me. He leans back in the car and mumbles, “Ya know how they say not to shoot the messenger? Watch and learn.”

Levi turned the kid so he could be seen from the windows of their pitiful shack and whirled her arms around like she was showing off a prize to a game show. “One last chance!” she called out, drawing the boy in closer. No reply and rip, Levi dragged her claws down the kid’s face. Three fat gashes opened up down the right side of his head and sprayed blood like a hose. Her other hand was clasping his skull like a vice and his struggling and wriggling were futile. Mom came out, she screamed, she gave up some money. Lovely.

“Pie’s fine, flanges,” what a stupid nickname, “I’d offer to share, but I don’t really like you.”

“I’m aware of that, any dessert following your pie? Or are outta here?”

“Don’t be pushy or you might get pushed back.”