Both hands on the top of the chain link fence, Hawg stabbed her in the neck with his tusks and drew back, flinging the huge dog over the fence and into the empty field. Genesis rolled, howling in agony, but Hawg was quick to get down on his all fours, and charged. Tusks delving deep into the dog’s side, Hawg grabbed its bloody neck in one hand and her right hindquarter in the other. He stood erect and broke Genesis’ back over his head. He tore her open with his tusks and feasted on the slippery guts, rooting in her warm insides. Hawg needed something to cleanse his mouth. The skinny girl on the country road had a peculiar chest, for her breasts had burst at the grazing of his tusks. They never bled, but spewed a salty fluid. Hawg rooted deep, bursting the heart and lungs of the pit bull, determined to get the taste of bad tits out of his mouth.
***
Andrew passed two people he knew while riding on his Harley. One was his brother, Sheriff Doug White. The cop even flashed his cherries at him as he drove on north. His brother’s shifts changed every so often, so Andrew assumed Doug was at work or heading home. Doug didn’t seem in any hurry.
“Good day, Sheriff,” Andrew said. “Still not smoking?” Though his brother couldn’t hear him, Andrew needled his sibling, as all brothers do. He was glad he never started smoking like Doug, so he’d never had to wrestle with quitting, like Doug.
The other man he passed was another biker and Ambrose Brother’s Printing employee Randy Huxtable. Hux was a bulky fucker, riding a full dresser with straight pipes, who never saw a snatch he didn’t like. An example of this taste sat astride behind him on the big bike. They exchanged a wave in passing. Andrew wagered Hux was out for some back road loving in the rising moonlight; probably off to get high as well with the gal. Randy, a husky dude with an attitude a mile wide, was a guy who Andrew got along with, but he hated his wanna be biker gang attitude and obvious drug connections. His mouth tightened when he thought of the promotions Hux received at work. Not a man of great skills, but Andrew was certain Hux’s drug supplies greased his ascension from the bindery floor to hoist driver and then, assistant head of the loading docks. He cursed him in his mind, knowing it was un-Christian to do so, but he did it anyway. The rage in his mind for Jack Sullivan, plant manager and all around asshole came to the surface, but he let it slide off. Sullivan was unfair and arrogant, in love with his big beige Buick, and forgot where he came from. Since he was now Mayor of Miller’s Fork as well, Sullivan’s ego was out of control. Andrew decided to forget him instead of going to kick the ass of the man who could fire him.
Andrew passed the Ellington residence and expected to see Genesis in the pen flipping out on him. The yard light didn’t show the whereabouts of the big pit bull and Andrew blew this off. He and Ellington went back years, but Andrew still wanted to shoot that fool dog. He hated living so close to such a beast with little kids around.
What he wished he could do was banish the scent of the pigshit from the Solow place. Well, it was inconsistent, like the scent was closer at times and then fleeting. Though the Solow place was distant, he could see a few of the barns and the trailers out of the edges of his field where Elias lived, and the old blind lady Luella Goodkind. He pondered going to see Solow the next day, and perhaps dropping off some Braille books Jordan had bought for Luella last weekend.
***
Hawg heard the loud things on the road pass each other. He hated the roar of these beasts of steel. The vibration in his huge chest made him uneasy. The awful feeling inside he was experiencing after covering the brood sow in the stall made him feel worse. Gilt, bah, she was a long way from puberty, that one.
The machines that roared sounded alike, as if they were kindred. The one carrying two people had a ripple to the sound, something odd about it. Hawg couldn’t understand that, but it made him look after that vehicle longer.
Hawg couldn’t stop running and trying to satisfy his burning hunger. He was so thirsty and wanted fresh gilt, in the worst way. Anger bubbled in his mind at the one Elias and father had strapped in for him at the round barn. That was no gilt, nor a sow proper, but she did something bad to him. Ever since he entered her, Hawg’s heart raced and his mind was afire.
When the wind shifted, Hawg stopped, pivoted and raised his snout. Red eyes on the paved road, the other gurgling steel beast turned down a farmer’s path between the fields. Though at a great distance, Hawg smelled something better than fresh gilt on that machine.
He smelled gilt with blood on it.
***
“Mr. Solow?” Elias said as he opened the screen door of the main house. His fingers drummed on the door as he waited.
“Come on in, Elias,” the old man answered. Solow’s voice sounded tired and from a long way away.
“God is asking America, ‘Where art thou?’ A land founded by people fleeing religious persecution has found itself saturated in hate, clothed in racist language, painted by paganism, and obsessed with personal idolatry.”
Elias wiped his feet and removed his straw hat, but never walked in farther than the end of the back porch. He stared across the linoleum floor of the vast kitchen and into the dimly lit living room. Solow put his arm down from handling the remote to the stereo. Elias said, “All my work is done for the evening.”
“Good, but you don’t need to tell me that. You lose the ball cap?”
“It just wasn’t me, sir.”
Solow sat across the room from the kitchen in a recliner, legs out. Clad in clean clothes and smoking a cigar, the old man’s face gained illumination by the shifting glow of a television screen. On the wall behind him hung matted pictures Elias knew to be Solow’s mother and father.
Elias said, “I know that sir, but, well, what about Hawg?”
Calmly, Solow took a drag off the cigar, tapped it on a glass ashtray and said, “It was bound to happen, Elias. There’s nothing we could do in the end.”
“But…”
“No use cryin’ over it. He’ll come home in time. If not, well, that’s his destiny to be free.”
Hand scratching the back of his graying hair, Elias protested, “But sir…”
Solow’s voice grew stronger as he cut him off, saying, “You took care of the sinners and their awful car?”
“Yes sir. It was out of transmission fluid. Easy enough to fix and get rid of.”
Solow bestowed a nod and his voice returned to a gentle state. “There’s nothing to worry about, Elias.”
“I wish I could share that feeling, sir.” Elias then backed up and came near to knocking a picture off the wall behind him. As he righted the photo, he blinked at the pictures he’d seen countless times before of Mr. Solow and his shipmates in World War Two taken in Philadelphia.
With a wave of his left hand, Solow said, “Help yourself to a bottle on the porch, Elias. You do good work.”
Unsure if the bottle of homemade wine would produce a balm for his nerves, Elias took it and exited the house. He walked in the night, not afraid of Hawg, for he’d known him since he was a baby. Elias feared discovery and imprisonment. He was too old for that kind of life. Several acres passed before he reached his trailer on the edges of this side of Solow’s property.
Before he entered the trailer, he paused and looked over at Luella Goodkind’s trailer, situated on a lot an acre from his home. He sat the bottle on the step and walked over to her place.
Elias stood on her wooden deck, heard the television inside and called out, “Luella? You need anything for the night?”
The sound of the television stopped and the inner door opened. Through the screen door, Elias saw the gigantic woman sitting on a loveseat. It took a loveseat to hold the enormous girth of Luella Goodkind. Truly a candidate for the fat lady in the circus, the woman giggled and waved at him, eyes closed. The violets on her dress seemed to be a field that never ended. A large German shepherd eyed Elias, but never growled.
“I’m fine, sweetheart.”
“Good night, dear,” Elias told her.
“Oh, sweety?” she c
alled out as Elias turned. “Make sure you tell Mr. Solow thanks for the satellite hook up again. I so adore hearing all the religious channels and shows from the seventies.”
“I will.”
“God bless,” Luella said sweetly and closed the door.
Elias stepped off the deck, but the moonlight made a revelation that stopped him cold. On her bottom step was a splatter of excrement, recently deposited. Elias scouted around the edge of Luella’s white trailer and saw a smear on the edge of the white metal skirting. For something to have made that mark, Elias thought, the man or beast would’ve had to be at least seven feet tall.
***
Hux cast down a black Harley Davidson beach towel on the dead grasses right before he threw one in Micki Wingler. Sure, she’d been ragging it, but that never stopped Hux before, especially once he’d got cranked up. She was a cute girl, a preacher’s daughter, around twenty, a trifle old for the biker in his mid thirties, but he went with it. He hated them much older and able to enter the taverns to spy on him. He never liked them too thick in the middle, either, but Micki was willing and soon to be a regular buyer of Hux’s supply. She didn’t perform oral worth a damn, and had little tits, but he migrated on to the main course fast. He wanted to get a nut quick as he had a few deals to make later on. The drug mule from Cicero hadn’t arrived yet and Hux wondered what was up with that. Still, his glee went untamed as he concentrated on her slippery snatch.
“Oh God,” she kept saying, over and over, chewing on his long hair as it matted her face.
Not caring for her dialogue, but hot in the moment, Hux went to work, grabbing her buttocks and driving his point home, repeatedly. He grinned, wondering what else would Reverend Wingler’s daughter say?
The rising stench of fecal matter made his face contort, but never did he slow in his motions. Hux by no means even stopped when Hawg leapt from the field and slammed into his body, mounting his back, embracing the two of them tight. Claws in the ground, Hawg’s twisted manhood drove forward and pierced Hux’s backside. The biker screamed loud as he was defiled. Hawg penetrated him awkwardly, but several times. The monster’s penis corkscrewed into the biker and Hux howled, then screeched at the sudden agony in his frame. Hawg pumped on him numerous times and then withdrew. A single powerful wipe from a claw knocked Hux away, sending him cart wheeling into the ditch. He rolled, pants around his ankles, trying to get up. When he did rise up, the spectacle of Hawg raping Micki was one he didn’t want to behold. Blood flew everywhere, easily visible in the moonlight. Hux didn’t think it was all-natural from Micki, either.
The beast spasmed on Micki, thrusting deep and she screamed in pain, or at least Hux hoped it hurt. Micki was a slut and in a way, he almost thought she enjoyed it until the beast roared in orgasm and drove his tusks into her collarbones. Hawg stood up and these tiny bones appeared to snap. Micki plopped back to the wet towel and Hawg took a step back. Hawg then dropped his head and proceeded to root in her bloody hole with his snout.
Head spinning from the blow from Hawg, ass on fire from the assault from the monster, Hux felt his lucidity wane. For the first time in years, he thanked God for something.
Unconsciousness.
***
Andrew put his bike in the garage and slid the long wooden door shut. The paint on the door chaffed and Andrew lamented that a duty this summer would be to repaint the shed. He surveyed the property towards north to where the grass terminated at the pine tree windbreak. “Gonna have to get the mowers all ready soon,” he said. “Damn time Jordan learned the manly art of lawn mowing.”
A distant cry echoed in the night, more than one. These sounds made Andrew pause. Brows lowered, Andrew faced the sounds, still unsure what he heard.
His wife stood at the door, smiling. “Hey.” “Hey, Lynne,” he returned her word, still staring off.
“Sorry I was late. Had to get some stuff for a collector.” “You boys and your games,” she sighed, hand on her
hip. “What is it?”
“Weird sounds tonight. Dunno if the coyotes got a
pig cornered or what. Ya hear that?”
Lynne cocked her head and she said, “What is that?” “Not sure,” Andrew confessed. He walked to the
porch and kissed her on the cheek. He pulled out the Colt 45,
never pointed it at her and said, “Reach for the sky.” “Maybe later,” she teased.
He hoped so.
CHAPTER TWO Aftermath
Hawg followed the waterway that snaked through the barren field. Dead grasses and reeds that the hay balers missed still littered the long waterway. Many of the fibrous shoots snapped under his hooves and hands. Hawg paused when he sensed a movement in the grasses. The field mouse he disturbed never had a chance to flee more than a yard when Hawg snatched it up, slammed it to his maw and chewed down. Gristle in moments, the mouse was forgotten with a swallow. Hawg carried on.
When he stopped, he took a few breaths, red eyes glaring at the farmhouse a few acres distant. The property line cut out a large rectangle of pale greenery in the spring field. His instincts flared, but Hawg saw no barn, nor corncrib where more tiny morsels would hide. No machinery or implements infected the grounds, so Hawg recognized this was not a farmer proper.
He ran at a steady pace, seeking cover under the long line of pine trees to the north of the property. The cool wind touched Hawg as he lowered himself by the grasses the plows missed and this landowner’s lawn mower couldn’t touch. He hid in the dense growth. It served him well for cover as well as it performed its intended duty—that of a wind break. He passed water and looked on. Hawg nearly jumped as he heard a thump near the trees. Something struck a metal object and then he heard liquid. Was someone urinating out here? Snout flexing, he smelled a chemical, not piss. In another moment fire shot up between the trees. Hawg flattened out as the tall man came into view, lean, towering, bearded and dirty blonde haired. Hawg ground his steel tusks into the dirt.
Death is on him, Hawg could smell it. He’s a killer. He’d kill me if he saw me, not run like a scared runt. Hawg sensed danger, but never feared the man until he saw the long knife on the tall man’s belt. Hawg reckoned he could use it. The man burned something in a rusty barrel, smelling putrid like feces and then inspected his surroundings. In his hand he sloshed fluid in a plastic container. Hawg’s red eyes were on him as the man’s nose wrinkled.
“Dad?” a voice called out from the two-story farmhouse.
He gave the field a distasteful expression and backed away from the burning barrel. “Yeah, Jordan, I’m right here.”
The youthful voice called out again, this time with some humor to it. “Dad, aren’t you afraid of the bogey man?”
Still not turning his back on the tree line, the man replied, “Son, yer daddy is the bogey man.” The man walked to the house and Hawg could hear him say, “Back when I was a kid, when my Pa farmed this place, I used to be scared going out at night. It’s true.”
Hawg heard the boy laugh and say, “Carrying that dirty diaper, I couldn’t be scared of no monster.”
The man said lightly, “Yeah, that’d show him, huh? Even the bogey man wouldn’t want your brother’s shit pants in his face.” They shared a laugh and the man paused by the door. His face still in the direction of the burning barrel, Hawg could still pick up the conversation. “Back when I was your age it was the Bicentennial in America. They brought out all the Revolutionary War stuff for us to learn, but they had this ad for Legend of Sleepy Hollow stamps and movies. Well, every time I heard a horse in the distance out here I about crapped my pants.”
“Huh. You were scared of the headless horseman?” “Sure. It’s natural to be afraid when you are a kid.” “Are you still scared of him?”
“Naw. When you get older, you’ll see that there are worse things than monsters to deal with. After ya get yer heart broke a few times, you’ll be happy to get a chance to beat the snot out of some headless guy on a horse. C’mon. Let’s get in.”
&nb
sp; Hawg ripped himself from the damp field and loped down the northern tree line. He paused and started south as the lines ended. He considered the land, wondered if the crumbling stone silo would fall any time soon, and then proceeded south. Hawg loped on, traveled half the length of the property before his senses tweaked. A few random trees and high grasses made up the border to this properties’ western side. A small garage obscured the large grassy area. Hawg noted a fence post in the far corners of the land and figured it was a pen of some kind, ages ago. No one needed to tell Hawg what the empty lot was used for now. Since the season hadn’t greened up all the grasses yet, large spots thrust forth a heavy area of grass. There was a pattern. Hawg stood in a graveyard. By the size of the spots, it was a graveyard for animals.
The scent that drew him in wouldn’t have been apparent to any human. The odor that teased him came from under a fresh spot, where loose dirt still covered a recent interment. A small wooden cross stood in the dirt. Hawg slapped this aside and rooted in the looser covering. His keen senses were correct and he started to rut and dig.
Whoever dug the grave understood his craft, Hawg thought, for the animal was down several feet. Any wild dog would never go through the trouble Hawg experienced. After four feet of dirt, it became a personal challenge and Hawg had to have the rotten animal. He struck a layer of lime, fairly fine in its encrustment of the dog’s corpse. Still, it soured his ravenous appetite for a bit. Hawg pulled the dog free of the grave and pondered it for a few moments. The lime, dirt and dampness of the earth had turned a gray animal into a grimy black one. Frustrated at the lime, Hawg ripped the animal’s head free of the carcass and used his steel tusks to slice open the skin on its back. Almost with delicate motions, Hawg skinned the animal as creatures housed inside it fell free. The fur delivered him little trouble and he peeled it back. Ripping a leg loose, he chewed off a bit of the dog’s thigh. The meat was rough, and putrid, but the worms and grubs didn’t bother Hawg.
Hawg Page 3