“If you really cared about giving us what we wanted, you’d let us go home.”
“What? Back in the wild?” Freddie says. “Back where there’s disease? Archaic medicine? How will you ever survive? I doubt you could even feed yourself anymore. No, no, Toby. Like I said, you’re much better off here. I know what’s best.”
“Rot in hell.”
“Now Toby,” Freddie says, voice lowering. “I thought you could be civil about this. Besides, I don’t need you to upset your mate, either.”
Toby narrows his eyes. He wonders if he can clear the distance between the two before Freddie can get a shot off. “Stay away from her.”
“Don’t be like that,” says Freddie. “I need her to deliver healthy babies so we can get our nursery restocked.” He tosses the Rice Krispies Treat to the floor and uses his tentacle to whip out a little box. After giving it a few taps, a portal appears near the fireplace. “Come on,” he says. “Enough of this. After all, the season is still going, and we can’t have you running loose, can we?”
Toby doesn’t budge. “The only place I’m going is home. My home. And I’m taking Clarice with me. So make it happen, or else...”
Freddie sighs and raises his rifle. “I don’t want to have to shoot you here,” he says. “It wouldn’t be sporting, would it? And the maid will be in a tizzy if she has to clean up the mess.”
A knife suddenly appears about a half inch from Toby’s eye. Clarice, using her free hand, tightly grips his throat. “Leave him alone or I carve up his face,” she says.
Toby stiffens. “Clarice? Can we talk about this?”
“Shut up,” she says. Then, addressing Freddie, she says, “Now send us home.”
Freddie, however, seems unconcerned at Clarice’s behavior. In fact, if Toby would have to guess based on the alien’s body language, he’d guess the alien was happy, ecstatic even. “Clarice! You are pregnant!” he says. “It’s about time!”
In a flash, Freddie raises his handheld crossbow and fires. The bolt zips between Toby’s legs, and he hears Clarice grunt. She loses her grip on his back and wobbles before falling to the floor.
Toby yells and charges forward, but Freddie spins to the side, allowing him to slip harmlessly past. Toby manages to stop himself before he crashes into the wall, but it’s not the most grace-filled stop, and he stumbles as he spins around. To his surprise, Freddie’s gun is no longer pointed at him. It’s not even raised.
“Toby, Toby, Toby,” Freddie says, shaking his head. “Why get so worked up? She’s ugly.”
Toby snarls and charges again. Like the first time, Freddie slips away, deftly avoiding the attack. This time, however, the alien counters with a grab and throw of his own. Before Toby realizes it, he’s sent flying through the portal.
Chapter Twelve
Toby rolls across Preser Tech’s lobby floor and comes up in a low crouch. The portal through which he came is twenty feet away, and Toby has the urge to charge back through it. He has that urge, that is, right until Freddie comes through with his rifle shouldered and ready.
Toby dives for the nearest bit of cover, which happens to be the reception desk. An explosion rocks the ground where he was moments ago, shattering the tile and sending marble shrapnel in all directions.
“Bravo, Toby!” Freddie says. “Bravo, indeed!”
Toby crouches lower, trying to keep his head as far away from the top of the desk as possible. He glances left and right, looking for a way out, looking for a way he can reach the elevators or stairs without getting blasted. But the lobby is sparsely decorated, and he doesn’t think he’d be able to round the divider in time.
“I’ve got an offer for you, Toby,” says Freddie. “It’s an offer you can’t refuse.”
Toby shakes his head. A moment passes, and it dawns on him that Freddie is expecting a reply. “Does this offer include me and Clarice leaving?” asks Toby.
Freddie laughs. “Why would I go and do something like that?” he says once he’s calmed down. “Besides, what could that dirty home offer that you don’t have here?”
“My wife and kids, for starters,” Toby answers, “and me living.”
Freddie laughs again. “You call that living?” he says. “I bet you’ll say no when I offer you a promotion and raise. I’ll even toss in another secretary too. Are you going to honestly say your wife and offspring can compete with that?”
Toby curses under his breath. There’s no talking his way out of this. His eyes scan for an escape, but he still doesn’t see a way out from behind the desk. What he does see, however, is Boris’s belt nearby, complete with gun and mace.
“Well, Toby? What do you think?” Freddie calls out.
Toby tries to gauge where the alien is standing by his voice, and he thinks he can stretch and snag the deceased guard’s gear without being seen. And so he does. Like a snake striking at its prey, Toby lunges, grabs the end of the belt, and snaps back.
“I got you now,” he whispers to himself, pulling the revolver from its holster. But the moment he gets a look at the weapon, his heart drops. It’s all he can do to keep from crying in despair. The weapon is not a weapon at all, merely a high-quality replica. The mace, too, is nothing more than an inexpensive, plastic tube. Still, Toby wonders if he could use the pistol as a club.
A two-inch hole blows out of the desk, and the gun disintegrates.
“Time’s almost up on these negotiations, Toby,” says Freddie.
Toby, now sprawled across the floor, picks himself up and presses into the desk once again. He has no doubt that the alien missed him on purpose. “What do you want?”
“I lost valuable hunting time tracking you down,” Freddie coolly replies. “I want a chase. A good one. Since it should be only the two of us here now, we can keep things interesting, yes? A true sportsman’s challenge!”
“You want me to run?”
“I do,” Freddie answers. “But make it a good one.”
Toby smirks at the futility of it all. “How does this keep me alive long enough for that promotion, again?”
“The season is almost over, Toby,” Freddie says. “Not even four hours left. Give me a good chase and survive long enough, and voila! You’ll have your promotion, and I’ll have the anticipation of tracking you down next season, a mighty stag with an even longer name tag than before! And if you survive that one, I’ll promote you again. Just think, you might even make CEO one day.”
“Do I get a head start?”
“I think it’s only fair, don’t you?” Freddie answers. “How about to the count of ten?”
Toby leaps to his feet and runs. He rockets around the divider and past the vending machines before Freddie reaches three. By the time the alien reaches ten, or so Toby guesses, he’s up two flights of stairs with plenty of energy and wind to spare.
He exits the stairwell on the fourth floor, only because it’s the only floor he feels he knows to any degree. He halts for a second and gawks at his surroundings. Several of the vending machines and water coolers are spattered with blood. A few are even still impaled by spears of varying lengths and thicknesses, and the carpet is stained in a dozen places. Contrasting this grisly scene, a sweet perfume hangs in the air, and the sounds of intense, primal sex drift down the hall. No doubt a porno is playing somewhere, another baited trap.
Toby grabs one of the spears and tries to pull it free from the wall, but it doesn’t budge. Neither does the next or the next. Cursing, Toby runs to the break room he saw when he first arrived, hoping to scavenge some sort of weapon there.
He ducks into the room a few seconds later. It’s small, with a single round table in one corner and a couple of plastic chairs nearby. But it has cabinets, lots of cabinets. Unfortunately, as Toby throws open their doors and rips through their contents, all he can find are paper plates, cups, and napkins. The last cabinet mocks his struggle, for inside there are boxes of plastic sporks, and not even the sturdy kind.
“Oh Toby!” Freddie calls, his voice com
ing from down the hall. “Don’t make this too easy!”
Toby glances out of the room, but doesn’t see his alien pursuer. Freddie must have gotten off the elevators and is purposely toying with him. Whatever the alien’s motives are, Toby has no intention of sticking around and runs down the hall in the opposite direction. Though he tries to move lightly on his feet, his footsteps sound so loudly in his ears he figures he might as well be a rampaging elephant. Too bad he isn’t, Toby thinks. He could use a big pair of tusks and a killer stampede right about now.
Toby ducks into the cubicle farm, slipping through the doors as quietly as he can. Like the outer hall, the farm shows signs of a massive hunt. Cubicles are spattered with blood, and the rug is beyond any steam cleaner’s ability to repair. The radio hisses white noise, and to Toby’s left, a coffee pot lies on its side.
“Hot damn,” he says, picking it up. His enthusiasm fades, however, when he sees the pot isn’t made of glass, but plastic, and there’s no way he’ll be able to get a decent, stabbing shard out of it.
“If there’s one thing I hate, Toby, it’s predictable game.”
Toby spins around at the sound of Freddie’s voice. Though the alien is near, Toby sees that the doors are still closed. Not wanting to be there when they open, Toby moves through the farm, hunched over, as quickly as he can. He glances in each workspace he passes, hoping to see something he can use, but comes up empty each and every time.
Toby hears the double doors open and close, and he can practically feel Freddie’s presence in the air.
“Toby,” Freddie calls. “I’m afraid at this rate you’re not looking like promotion material.”
Toby stops when he spies the handful of empty pens he sucked dry earlier. He hadn’t given them much thought when he was trying to ward off being drugged, but now that he’s looking at them again, he notices that in the middle of four, cheap Bics is the broken shell of a well-made fountain pen.
Toby grabs the pen and lightly jabs it into his chest. It’s not the best weapon in the world, but it’s sharp and sturdy. Toby thinks he could get at least one good stab with it. Maybe even three or four if he went for Freddie’s eyes.
“I’m getting bored, Toby,” Freddie says.
Toby, still hiding in the farm, screams and grabs his left shoulder after the crisp staccato note of a rifle shot. Blood pours down his arm, and he doubles over in pain. He runs blindly with his left hand nearly dragging on the floor. He’s panicked, and he knows it. But he can’t think straight, and he doesn’t dare stop moving. He has to get out of the farm, and he has to do it now.
Toby bursts through the farm’s exit doors and stumbles into the wall. He pushes off, leaving a bright red handprint where he hit, and runs back to the stairwell. A second before he starts his ascent, he decides to try the elevator. Running up the stairs will cost him strength and provide an exact trail to follow. If the elevator is there, he figures, it might buy him some time while Freddie figures out which floor he got off on.
To Toby’s relief, the elevator is waiting on the fourth floor, and the instant he hits the button, the doors slide open with a friendly ding. Toby half falls, half staggers inside and hammers the button to the top, the twelfth floor.
The elevator rises, and Toby wipes his forehead, trading the sweat on his brow for the large amounts of blood on his hand. He catches sight of himself in the reflection of the brass plate that houses the buttons and stares. Though the wound to his shoulder is not life-threatening, it’s still made him a bloody mess. He’s such a mess, in fact, that if he didn’t know better, he’d have thought he’d already been killed.
The elevator dings, and the doors open. Toby spills out on the twelfth floor, his heart racing and his breath labored. The elevator doors close behind him, and the floor indicator above shows the elevator on a rapid descent down, a descent that stops at the fourth floor.
“Get moving, Toby,” he says, staring in disbelief as the elevator begins its ascent. Five. Six. Seven and climbing. “I said, get moving!”
Toby finally obeys himself and rockets down the hall. Most of the doors along the way are closed, but a few are open, revealing private offices. Toby smears his hand on each one, hoping it will cause Freddie to check them all and buy him much needed time.
The hall bends, and Toby wonders if the layout is similar to the fourth floor. But after the second bend, he sees that it’s not. The hall comes to an abrupt halt at a set of double doors. Above those doors is a plaque that reads: BOARD ROOM.
A thump, muffled, but distinct, comes from inside. Toby wipes his palms on his pants, quietly cracks open the doors, and peers inside. A large, polished conference table sits in the middle of the room, while a dozen leather chairs are spaced haphazardly around. On the far wall is a mural of a city skyline, complete with white, puffy clouds and a bright yellow sun. About halfway into the room, off to the side, is a portal. Toby would have run for it immediately, if it hadn’t been for the twelve dead office execs laying on the floor, all in a nice, neat row and the two Freddie and three Mr. Squid look-a-likes that were busy hauling other kills out of the office.
Toby quietly backs off the board room doors and peers around the corner, back the way he came. He sees Freddie step out from one of the side offices. Thankfully, Toby ducks back before the aliens sees him.
He’s trapped. Toby knows this. He looks down at the broken fountain pen gripped tightly in his hands. “You’re not going to get me without a fight,” he mumbles to himself. Toby looks up, looks to the boardroom and back down to his meager weapon before adding softly, “But there are alternatives to fighting.”
Chapter Thirteen
Freddie tracks Toby’s blood trail to the board room with ease. He reaches the doors and shifts his grip on his rifle. It’s time for a quick, clean kill, he decides. He’s a little disappointed with Toby as he did hope for a better hunt. The persie could have at least tried to double back once or twice, but alas, not every hunt can be perfect.
Freddie slithers into the board room and immediately spies his prey, but he doesn’t shoot. Instead, he lowers his weapon and resigns himself to the fact that the chase is over. Toby’s lifeless body lies face down alongside eight other kills, his back covered in blood and proud hunters standing near.
“Enjoy the day?” Freddie asks as his patrons turn to greet him.
“As always,” one of them replies.
Freddie nods. “Be sure to check those with the warden.”
“Of course,” says another.
“Don’t forget, we have an excellent taxidermist and butcher for all your gaming needs,” he adds.
“Porxil is the finest,” says a third.
Freddie smiles and gives an impromptu, two-fingered human salute, his customary goodbye to all his patrons, and heads through the portal. He passes through the freezer section without as much as a glance here or there and decides to stop at the bar to enjoy a bottle of wine and some good company before heading to his room. Maybe he can buy Toby when they’re done with him. After all, he got a good price on Matt.
As Freddie returns to his suite, he hums a few bars of Madame Butterfly and locks the door behind him. The fire burns low, barely more than hot coals on a bed of ash. But the light they give is enough to pierce the darkness and show Clarice still crumpled on the floor.
Freddie smiles. The tranq he hit her with should keep her down at least till the next morning. There’s plenty of time, he knows, to relax another hour or two, perhaps order some room service before going back to work and wrapping up another successful season.
The last thought, however, troubles Freddie. While it’s true that the preserve enjoyed one of its busiest hunts as of late, and both his customers and his stockholders are deliriously happy, two annoyances prick at his mind and keep him from enjoying a perfect evening.
First, Clarice had gotten ahold of an actual knife, which meant his staff had been slacking when it came to promoting a safe environment. After all, the last thing he needs is a pat
ron getting hurt. His insurance company would love to raise his rates.
The second thing that digs under Freddie’s skin is the fact that he wasn’t the one to bag Toby, even though he had every opportunity to do so. Freddie scolds himself for toying with his game, but he’s also quick to remind himself that at the very least, his customers are happy. No doubt, he adds, one customer is very happy, having bagged the VP of Communications and Investment Opportunities for the Acquisition of Hostile Companies. With that in mind, Freddie slithers to the window and looks outside.
Below him the city bustles with activity, despite the late night. Lights fill buildings as far as his eyes can see, and countless whites and reds mark a sea of automobile traffic on the streets. “Plenty more,” Freddie says to himself, tapping the glass. “Plenty bigger.”
Freddie reaches over and flips a switch on the wall. It takes his eyes a half second to adjust to the bright lights, and half that to spy the man standing in the bedroom doorway.
“Toby!” Freddie exclaims. “You’ve survived the season! A promotion is in order!”
“As far as I can tell, the season’s still going,” says Toby in a low tone, clutching a broken fountain pen. “And where I come from, you don’t promote game animals.”
Freddie twitches his fangs. “I see,” he says. “Then one of us will be a kill to tell the grandkids about. The other will sleep well tonight—very well indeed. Now, Toby, en garde!”
Epilogue
A timely yawn stops the story. “Did you sleep well, Grampy?” asks the smallest of three grandchildren.
“I did,” he replies. The fire burns low in the hearth and casts long shadows in the den. “I slept very well that night.”
Another yawn hangs in the air and is followed by the rustling of sleeping bags. “When did you get your robot arm?” asks the middle child.
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