Horseplay
Page 41
The kiss lasted much longer than it needed to.
Afterwards, he held on to her and stared into her eyes. His blissful smile widened.
“You…”
She kissed him again, even knowing that he wasn’t going to say anything. He understood.
When the second kiss finished, he had a playful grin.
“You?”
She laughed and took his good hand. “Later. The serum for Park is almost ready. Let’s go take care of her. We have a lot of planning to do.”
EPILOGUE
Charlie and May Tanner stood side by side at the edge of the small mountain lake. A swath of trees behind them lay on their sides, charred fingers pointing away from where they stood on the shore. The two of them had been camping in the next valley over when the fireball came down, causing them to change their plans for the day. One of May’s friends had once sold some meteorite fragments for a few hundred dollars.
The dark blue lake was cold, but twenty meters away from them something was causing the surface to boil. A thin white cloud which didn’t behave like fog or steam was gathered on the surface, but they couldn’t see what was causing it. The couple was arguing about whether Charlie should swim out to investigate when another man approached from the woods.
The stranger clambered spryly over the fallen trees, seemingly not burdened by the large pack on his back. His scraggly grayish beard and disheveled clothing made Charlie suspect at first that he was homeless, but he chided himself for that assumption since they were a day’s hike from the nearest town.
The closer the quiet stranger got, the more Charlie disliked the situation. He wasn’t consciously aware that he had moved a few steps to put himself between May and the approaching man.
“Hello?” Charlie regretted sounding so weak and cleared his throat noisily. “What brings you out here?”
The man didn’t say anything to them but pointed a finger out into the lake. His hands were pasty, like the skin on his face, and Charlie felt more nervous than he ever did when meeting a stranger in the woods. The man didn’t look at them at all as he lowered his hand and took a few more steps towards the lake.
Charlie took a few steps as well, afraid the stranger might spot something valuable first. The white cloud had spread, but the roiling surface seemed to be less active.
“We heard on the radio about the meteorites that hit Las Vegas and the other places this morning. We figure this was one of them.” Charlie turned towards the man. “We were here first, but if you have a-”
He froze.
The side of the man’s face had developed a black line that ran from his chin up to his forehead. It widened, almost as if his face was a door that was slowly and silently opening. An orange sphere which might have been an eyeball appeared in the gap, looking at Charlie.
Charlie took a step back and brought up an arm to grab May, still facing the stranger. The orange eye stretched out of the face on a thin stalk and was joined by another. Each had a greenish-black needle-like prong underneath. He managed to choke out his wife’s name before one of the eye stalks suddenly stretched across the two meters between them and stabbed him in the neck.
He tried to grab at it, but it was already back in position next to the other one. Other two. Charlie stumbled backwards towards May, trying to make words. To move. Even to stand, but suddenly he couldn’t and was falling sideways.
He heard her shriek as the thing with a door for a face shambled past him and towards her. Charlie couldn’t move his head to watch or his mouth to speak.
He stared out at the lake, helpless. May’s scream went even higher then abruptly stopped. He tried to listen for further sounds, but the world seemed to be getting farther and farther away. His body was made of cotton and sand.
When the thing came back, Charlie didn’t really care. It dropped its pack where he could see it, and black pieces of metal in the shape of a man’s legs came tumbling out. They looked burnt. Then the thing leaned in for a closer look.
The face was all the way open now, revealing that the three stalked eyes were being joined by a tongue-like fourth appendage. A very reasonable voice spoke to him then. “Congratulations, human! You will be hot-mother to a new generation of Vreen. Our ship is destroyed and our crew is slain. If we are to be trapped here, then we will adapt to live here. To thrive here.”
The tip of the tongue-like thing pulled back, revealing a rigid proboscis. It reached out to his midsection and Charlie felt a sharp tugging, then a strange sensation of fullness. It continued until he felt like he had just eaten the largest meal of his life. “Together we will make a feast of this world!”
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