by Wol-vriey
CHAPTER 4
Malone
Malone pulled into the parking lot of Hailey’s Toy Factory and parked.
The lot was a large concrete expanse filled with burnt cars.
Great place for a meeting, he thought with grudging respect. Frank’s a smart bastard. These wrecks everywhere mean I can’t keep an eye out for accomplices.
He honked his horn, flashed his lights twice. A replying flash of light came from the dark doorway of the factory building directly in front of him.
Malone got out of his car and raised the case with the money in it overhead.
The light flashed again.
I guess that means bring it over.
Walking briskly, he headed for the light in the factory door.
He heard footsteps behind him.
“Stop,” a male voice said.
Malone froze. “Frank?”
A laugh. “Dumb question. Do you have an appointment with someone else here?”
He was jabbed in the back with something hard. “Okay, turn around.”
He turned around.
Frank was tall, about Malone’s height. In the moonlight, Malone made out that he had blond hair. His face was however hidden by a fright mask designed like a skull.
How fucking appropriate, Malone thought.
Frank was pointing a blaster at Malone. The gun was big and ugly. Malone recognized it as a military model. One blast from that fucker and anyone seeing his remains would think a dragon had fucked him up.
“I told Mrs. Fischer to come herself,” Frank said in a soft, cultured voice. “Or did she have a sex-change overnight?”
“She didn’t have the balls to come,” Malone said. “You know how that can be a problem.”
Frank laughed.” I like your sense of humor,” he said. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Bud Malone. I work for Mrs. Fischer. Security.”
Frank’s behavior bothered Malone. He showed no traces of the nervousness normally associated with kidnappers. But his voice wasn’t entirely level.
That marked him out as a sociopath. Malone hoped Rachel Fischer was still alive.
Malone held up the briefcase. “Here’s your five million dollars, Frank. Now, can I have Rachel Fischer back?”
Frank shrugged. “She’s a big girl. Tell her ma she’ll be back home tomorrow night.”
“Uh uh. Not good enough. I was asked to bring her back with me.”
Frank waved his gun at Malone. “Don’t be a dickhead. Just deliver the message.”
Malone raised his hands. “Okay, I’ll tell the old girl.”
“Good,” Frank said. “Now put the briefcase down and back off.”
Malone did so. The flashlight from the doorway behind him flickered on and off, a warning to not try any heroics.
Frank picked up the briefcase. “Okay, messenger boy, your business here is done. Go back to your car and get lost.”
Malone walked back to his Mustang and drove out of the factory premises.
He didn’t get lost. He sped down the street, turned into Christopher Columbus Plaza, and parked.
Then he activated the tracker for the bug he’d planted in the money case and watched the signal.
The tracker was good for ten miles and overlaid position data over a map of Boston.
The indicator—a red dot—moved in a zig-zag. Malone smirked; Frank was clearly trying to lose any tails. Keep trying, dumbass.
North Commercial Wharf . . . Atlantic Avenue . . . Richmond Street (Malone heard the car zoom past him). . . Arch Way . . . Cross Street.
Reaching Cross Street, the red dot’s progress stabilized into a straight line.
Malone set off after the kidnappers, driving with his lights off.
In the middle of Cross Street, the indicator froze and kept blinking.
Malone smiled. He reached in his glove compartment and pulled out his gun. A weapon as big as Frank’s.
Time to retrieve Rachel Fischer and her mother’s money.
***
The house the tracker singled out was by the old post office at the Hanover Street intersection.
It was a mutant. This happened occasionally—a beetle laid a corrupted skyscraper. This one was squat and lopsided, with monster spidery legs sticking out between its floors.
Just looking at the building gave Malone the creeps. Yes, this is the sort of place I expect a kidnapper to reside in.
Dim light shone through a broken ground-floor window.
No sign of Frank’s car. That meant nothing. Good criminals didn’t leave markers. Malone had left his own car in a parking lot two streets back.
He dashed to the house’s front door, ducking between its dangling legs. The legs stank like nests of cockroaches.
The front door opened easily. Light shone from an ajar door on Malone’s right. He padded across the turd-tapestried living room and kicked the door open.
“Okay, Frank, the games—”
He shut up. There was no one in the room. Just the briefcase the money had been in. A glowing flashlight stuck into a side compartment illumined the room. Shards of glass stuck in the case meant it had been thrown through the broken window.
Malone checked the briefcase. It was empty.
He cursed silently. Shit! Sara Fischer would be pissed about this.
Then he heard the snuffling sound behind him.
Malone spun around firing.
He got off a shot which hit the fractured window, before the raptor’s jaws clamped shut over the muzzle of his gun.
Fuck! he thought, staring momentarily past the lizard’s head at the charred window frame.
The raptor held Malone’s gun in a vise-like grip. It wrenched its head left and right, seeking to yank it from his grasp. It made no attempt to attack Malone, just kept its teeth clamped on the weapon.
The raptor was huge, almost Malone’s height. A miniature T-Rex—green scaly skin and a body built for the kill. It pushed against him with its tiny upper limbs, trying to make him to release the gun.
Malone winced. This was the problem with the fucking raptors—they had delusions of intelligence, were continually learning from their mistakes.
This one clearly knew that guns were dangerous and wanted to disarm Malone.
Looks like I’ll have to do this the hard way.
Unable to free his blaster, Malone let the raptor have it. He reached down for his knife instead. Then he quickly cut the flashlight off the money case.
The raptor was reared up, fighting with its prize. It tried biting into the gun, but the metal defeated its jaws. Malone heard the distinct crack of two of its teeth breaking. He expected the raptor to spit the weapon away in disgust.
He was disappointed. With a massive gulp, the raptor swallowed Malone’s gun whole.
Malone was surprised. He’d never seen this sort of dino behavior before.
He grimly conceded the raptor’s action made sense. It wasn’t smart enough to consider the weapon a separate entity from Malone. It likely thought guns were simply dangerous human symbiotes.
The dino finished gulping down the gun. It burped, then looked at Malone, its eyes windows to a primal hunger.
The reptile’s nostrils flared with its breathing. Its tongue floated between its teeth. It crouched in the room’s dim lighting, limbs tensed to leap. It was confident that its hunger would soon be assuaged, but wary of the knife its prey clutched.
Malone played the flashlight into its eyes, disorienting it.
He groaned. Behind it, another raptor shambled into the doorway. This one was larger than the first. It stood and regarded Malone, eyes glittering like diamonds made of urine.
Malone looked at his knife, then at the two reptiles that intended eating him.
I’m really going to have to do this the hard way, he thought.
“Bring it on, shithead,” he spat at the raptor. “What the fuck are you waiting for?”
Like it had been awaiting the invitation, the lead raptor leapt
at Malone.
He waited till it was too close to change direction then jammed the flashlight crosswise into its mouth. He forced the flashlight deep into the angle of the jaw, so it snagged on the raptor’s molars, wedging its jaws open, so it couldn’t bite.
Confused, the raptor staggered back. Malone rushed after it, pushing it into the doorway to prevent the other dinosaur from entering the room. He held it tight there, embracing it like they were dance partners.
Then, while the raptor scrabbled at the flashlight in its mouth with its tiny upper feet, Malone gutted it with his knife.
A long scream exited the dino’s throat as he worked, cutting a deep rive in the soft belly below its ribs. Its intestines spilled out into his hands, hot like they’d been cooking inside it.
Bracing a shoulder against it so he could free his other hand, Malone quickly felt upward for the raptor’s stomach. He slit the sac open and reached inside it for his gun. He winced as the raptor’s digestive juices scalded his hand.
Malone freed his gun and quickly wiped it off on his shirt.
The raptor had meanwhile managed to work one end of the flashlight free and was trying to swallow it. It was in horrendous pain.
The one behind it, sensing something was wrong, was trying to push it out of the way.
Malone stepped away from the raptor. Guts hanging out of its belly, it staggered to one side, screaming in pain. The flashlight beam danced over Malone and the walls.
Immediately the doorway was clear, the second raptor charged Malone.
He was prepared for it.
He hit it point blank with a single blast between the eyes.
There was the quiet ‘whoosh’ of controlled cold-fusion, then the now headless reptile tottered on its feet in front of Malone. No blood spurted from its truncated neck—the blast had cauterized the wound it had made.
The dino’s brains were splattered all over its companion, which had now succeeded in swallowing the flashlight and was bent over wondering why its guts were hanging down to the floor and why light was shining out of its belly.
Bloodlust got the better of its good sense.
Malone grimaced when the raptor picked its intestines up off the floor and began eating them. The flashlight’s lamp was now poking out of its ripped stomach, throwing red-streaked beams around the room.
The raptor ripped apart its guts and swallowed them. It screeched piteously with each burst of pain it caused itself.
“Damn,” Malone said disgustedly, “and I thought you fuckers were smart.”
He blew its head off with a blast of gunfire. It collapsed on top of the other carcass.
Malone regarded both dead dinosaurs for a few moments. Then he picked up the empty money case and left the house.
He was disgusted with himself over this fuckup. Worse still, he doubted Rachel Fischer would turn up at home tomorrow night like Frank had said.
CHAPTER 5
Sara
Sara Fischer waited for Malone in her armored limo, in the John Fitzgerald Expressway tunnel entrance by Haymarket Square.
The profusion of repulsor rods coating the car made it look like a metal porcupine.
The rendezvous point was quite safe. It was close enough to The Grid for dragons not to bother it, while dinos didn’t like being underground.
Sara had vetoed Malone’s suggestion that he simply bring Rachel home.
“I relish any chance to leave the mansion,” she’d said. “There’s almost nowhere to go nowadays.”
***
Now, Malone parked and walked over to the limo.
The black chauffeur opened the rear door and he got in.
“I see things didn’t go according to plan,” Sara said simply.
Malone looked pained. He explained.
“No bother about the money,” Sara replied with a smug look when he was done. “It was mostly counterfeit.”
Malone gaped at her. “Di . . . did you just say counterfeit?”
She nodded back, amused at his confusion. “I expected this to happen—that you’d lose my cash. So I had a banker friend find me a stash of funny money.”
Malone winced. Sara continued:
“Frank will think the money’s real. There’s about fifty thousand in real notes that we used to pad both sides of each bundle so they’ll pass an inspection.”
Sara was very pleased she’d thought of this. No way was she parting with that much cash. Her daughter’s life was important, but so was her money. She’d be no one without money. No one. And if some kidnapping son-of-a-bitch thought he was getting the dough she’d fucked her dead husband David for forty years for, he was more stupid than the dinos.
“You should have told me about this,” Malone said.
Sara giggled. “Why? So you could tell me it wouldn’t work?”
“You hired me to get your daughter back. I assumed you meant alive.”
That shook Sara a little. “He said he’ll deliver her tomorrow night, didn’t he?”
Malone nodded. “For five million dollars, yes. But now he hasn’t gotten it . . .” He let the words fall into emptiness.
“Stop being negative. He can’t discover the trick by then.”
Malone got out of the back of Sara’s limousine, then leaned in through the window. “You’re forgetting how confident I was that my tracker would work. He found that out, didn’t he?”
Sara’s worry reflected on her face. “But . . .”
“I think this Frank fellow is very smart. And remember too that he isn’t working alone. We’re dealing with at least two kidnappers, maybe more. Associations lend to the chance of someone having useful random knowledge.”
“You’re scaring me, Malone.”
He frowned. “I’m just being realistic. Okay, we’ll wait till tomorrow night. Maybe the kidnappers won’t notice that the money’s fake, and they’ll deliver Rachel as planned. If she isn’t home by then, I’ll start looking for her.”
Sara nodded. “You do that.”
She watched Malone walk to his car with major misgivings. Her simple plan to protect her money had seemed so smart, but now it looked like it might possibly get her daughter killed.
***
Riding home in her armored limo, Sarah let her worries come to the fore. She wept, dabbing her tears dry with a silk handkerchief.
Rachel was all she had in the world. She didn’t want to be left all alone.
Shit, David wasn’t even dead eight months yet.
CHAPTER 6
David
David Fischer liked to pretend that he was an ape.
The current state of affairs made such pretense viable. The once perfectly manicured mansion grounds were now overgrown, bearing more resemblance to prehistoric jungle than anything else.
Aiding the illusion was the fact that David Fischer was an extremely hairy man; squat and powerfully built too. Apelike.
He was sixty-four. His wife Sara was sixty-three.
“It’s as if the dinosaurs brought the Mesozoic Era back with them,” he’d once told Sara, while she was fellating him.
Sara, her mouth full of penis, had been unable to reply. She’d simply grunted and redoubled her efforts to make him cum.
(Sara prided herself on her blowjob technique. It angered her immensely, when like now, her husband’s thoughts wavered from the pleasure she was giving him.)
She wet a finger by sticking in her pussy, and slid it up his backside, pushing it in deep and massaging his prostate. With her other hand she tapped his testes gently.
David groaned and spurted in her mouth. Afterwards he ate her out in return.
“You were thinking of the fucking dinosaurs again,” she chided him afterwards, her pride in her sexual prowess still wounded.
He grinned and stroked her hair. “I’m sorry dear. I can’t help it. Something about the modern world—The New Past— brings out the caveman in me. It’s like I’m . . . no . . . like we’re all regressing back to the Stone Age.”
&n
bsp; He raised an arm and gestured expansively at their bedroom window, now protected by an iron grill specially tempered to resist pterodactyl attacks.
Outside the night was black as coal, the moon unable to dispel the darkness. Sara, following her husband’s finger, felt a cold chill.
“Are we really reverting, dear?” She didn’t believe it, but wasn’t certain what she believed. Two years ago the world was normal, and now . . .
Her chill deepened. She snuggled close to David, seeking refuge in the familiar, in the certainty of sensation. “Make love to me darling, I’m cold.”
He did, rolling her onto her belly, and inserting himself from behind. Her pussy was still slick with his saliva and he slid into her easily. Sara relaxed and moaned beneath him.
Sex never changes, she thought as she savored the deepness of the penetration, the feel of his hairy chest pressed on her back. As long as a fuck still gets you off, nothing is really bad.
David however, didn’t share her thoughts. Even as he thrust and ground on her buttocks, his mind was really outside. He fantasized that he was a gorilla, swinging from tree to tree in the Neo-Jurassic jungle the City of Boston had become.
***
One night a week later, after making love to Sara, David Fischer had slung a rope with a grappling hook across his shoulders and walked off naked into the bushes surrounding the mansion.
His intention was simple—to free the ape-man in himself.
David wasn’t stupid. Around his waist he wore a military-grade issue in a holster, in case of dino trouble.
He figured he cut an iconic figure—primitively dashing—as he stalked across the grass to the nearest oak.
This oak had a ladder that led up to the tree house Rachel had ‘played’ in as a child. David had never gotten his head around the fact that even at the age of eight, his only child’s idea of play was to sit down reading books about the solar system and mechanics.
“I want to make robots,” she kept saying.