by James Lewis
Bang!
Robert shot up out of bed. “What the fuck?”
His bearings were out of whack. It took a few seconds, but once he noticed the flat screen in the corner, he recognized his sleep haven.
“Babe, what the hell was that?” Wiping spit from his cheek, Robert noticed Tosha’s side empty. He frowned. “Tosh—“
Bang!
Robert shook so hard he thought his bones would rattle through the skin. The noise came from the kitchen or living room. He slid the covers off him. “What the hell is she doing?”
Now out of bed, Robert peeped outside the bedroom window and noticed the dull glow of dawn awakening, guessing the time around six o’clock Friday morning. Almost time to head to the office, but he had to investigate the noise first. Robert strapped up a pair of boxers and grabbed his robe from the top of his dresser.
He stepped through the short hallway, saw Tosha standing in the middle of the living room, a cellphone pressed to her ear and back to him. She wore a black sweater and matching slacks, as if attending a funeral was in her near future. Shards of glass littered the area rug. A broken picture frame of their wedding lay next to the coffee table. Stopped dead in his tracks, Robert tilted his head trying to register the surreal sight before him.
“What the hell is this mess? Who are you talking to?” He scoped her out from head to black heels. “And why are you dressed like that?”
“None of your damn business, Mr. Johnson!”
Robert’s jaw dropped. He walked toward her. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“I’m about to take care of it now,” she said to whomever on the phone, then shoved it in her pocket. She whipped around to face Robert, gripping a shiny pistol aimed at his forehead.
“Shit!” he cried, throwing his hands up.
“Stay back!”
Wide-eyed, his jaw slack, Robert’s mouth lost function for a moment. He managed to say, “T-T-Tosha … w-what the hell are you doing?”
Tosha’s eyes … so dark … devoid of anything that could’ve been considered love or compassion. Almost Android-like, robotic. “Your species has been chosen for eradication,” she said, her voice now unshaken and calm. “I need the device.”
“What?” Robert said, palms still showing, a frown wrinkling his forehead. “Baby, please put the gun down. Whatever it is, we need to talk about it.”
Tosha grinned. “We don’t need to talk about a damn thing, Mr. Johnson. Doe Dilly has ordered the immediate eradication of your species. I must comply with my orders.”
Robert’s eyebrows crunched together. “ ‘ Mr. Johnson?’ Eradi ... what the hell are you talking about? Who’s Doe Dilly?”
Robert stared into the barrel and swallowed. Where the hell did she get a gun? And why is it pointing at me?
He eased a foot back, but his heel bumped into the edge of the couch. Tosha said, “Goodbye, Mr. Johnson.”
Her index finger slowly recoiled. Robert knew he had to make a move.
He leaned to the side Matrix-style, swatting his hand at her wrist and dodging a bullet that punctured another wedding picture hanging on the wall behind him. Knocking the pistol away, it slid down the hardwood floors of the hallway.
“Bastard!” Tosha shoved his chest with both hands, the blunt force hard enough to make Robert believe a cracked rib pierced a lung. While dazed for a second, Tosha darted pass him to retrieve the pistol.
Robert tackled her from behind. They crashed to the floor, his head slamming against the back of her thigh. He wrapped both arms around her legs to pull her back, but got a swift kick to the chest instead.
While reeling backward, his shoulders and head hit the wall. “Damn!”
Tosha’s frantic scurry on hands and knees propelled her to the pistol. Robert knew he couldn't get to her in time, so he scampered to his feet and ran toward the couch, the robe sliding off his back.
Tosha picked up the pistol, turned and fired. Robert covered his head as he dove over the couch to escape Tosha’s rain of bullets, shattering the wooden coffee table when he landed.
“Aw!” he cried.
Robert’s thick robe shielded him from broken pieces of glass and wood, but he wore no protection for his bare feet. He cuddled up against the couch, did a quick once-over for bullet wounds—he didn’t see any—then covered his head with both hands. Bullets riddled the flat screen, shattered pictures, tore holes in the wall. The epitome of a Mega Bitch on a Friday morning rampage lay behind the couch, but for what? Robert didn’t have a clue. A bad case of the “cycle,” maybe? Was it that time of the month? Robert had read of a woman who stabbed her husband to death but was acquitted due to insanity … from PMS.
Maybe Robert was the next case.
He heard sharp thumps against the couch’s wooden interior as bullets penetrated the fabric, his only barrier between life and a trip to the morgue. Hell, Tosha had already dressed the part for Robert’s final service.
“Tosha!” he cried. “What are you doing?”
“Eradication. Your species is no longer sustainable.”
“What?”
Tosha’s heels tapped the wooden floor. She was now vertical. Shit.
A bullet shot through the couch cushion, missing Robert’s temple by inches. He backpedaled on hands and knees toward the arm of the couch as she approached, still firing like a hellified Annie Oakley around the room. Bits of glass and wood stabbed his toes and hands, but he ignored the pain and made it to the arm side of the couch furthest away from Tosha.
He hauled in a deep breath, but kept quiet. Fight or flight mode activated. No more guessing games, no more trying to figure out the gory details, no more fucking negotiations, despite the marriage nuptials between them. Tosha was no longer his wife. Whoever she or “it” was, her mission obviously involved Robert aka “Mr. Johnson” bullet-riddled and dead.
“Your demise is inevitable, Mr. Johnson,” she said in a voice that almost sounded Auto-tuned. “I must dispose of you and upload the device into Doe Dilly's mainframe. You cannot escape.”
Robert’s heart thumped so fast and furious he thought she could hear it, but managed to close his eyes and slow it down a bit.
He heard her walk up to the back of the couch. “Hmmmm. Clever, Mr. Johnson. Where are you?”
Robert took in another deep breath, beads of sweat crawling down the side of his face. It’s now or never.
After reciting a quick prayer, Robert rushed Tosha, his sneak attack in full force. As she turned the pistol toward him, Robert pile-drived into her linebacker-style—again knocking the pistol out of her hands. It slid under the dining room table. The back of Tosha’s head smashed against the marble tile in the kitchen, hard enough to knock even a heavyweight MMA fighter out cold. Robert knew she was now in La-La land. She had to be unconscious, if not dead!
The “Dead” rose up from her back and slapped Robert across the face, pushing him onto his side. He used the momentum to roll toward the front door.
Whatever drug Tosha was on, it gave her the strength of a grown-ass man—one that could pummel Robert into a bloody heap of mangled mess. Tosha could barely open a new jar of peanut butter without his help. Now it seemed she could crack a brick wall with one punch.
On adrenaline overload, Robert got to his feet and dashed for the front door. Sensing her on his tail, he unlocked the door and swung it open. Barreling outside, the tail end of the robe riding the air behind him, he jumped off the porch into the front yard. The sidewalk became an Olympic track while he pounded the pavement, the scene around him a blurred view of Palmdale Oaks, a suburb not far from downtown Los Pingas, California. A swift turn didn’t show Mega Bitch anywhere in sight, but that didn’t matter.
Robert knew she was coming.
He cut between two houses and hurdled a small gate. In the backyard, he ignored snarls and barks from a Rottweiler tied to a chain. A Rott wasn’t shit compared to a woman with a trigger finger in hot pursuit. The image of her in his head pus
hed him forward. He stepped into a small garden, scaled a cement wall and crash-landed on his butt in a narrow dirt alley that led toward downtown.
His back against the wall, Robert scanned the bushes and behind a metal trashcan, even looking under a plastic milk carton. No killers in sight. Just him and the Rott still yapping away.
“Man,” Robert said, looking toward the orange-blue sky while trying to calm the torrent of air rushing inside him, “I can’t believe I’m outside in my drawers sitting in a back alley.”
Finding humor in the situation, he chuckled for the first time. The fact he had survived Tosha’s version of final justice made his smile spread wider. She must’ve unleashed at least fifteen bullets. Somehow, they found targets other than flesh. His flesh.
Deciding he no longer had to run, he stood up, using the wall for support. Adrenaline dissipating, sharp jabs shot through Robert’s toes and the bottom of both feet—pains he mostly ignored while in survival mode. “Ow!”
He raised each foot, saw razor cuts and smeared blood up to his ankles. Cringing, Robert wobbled down the alley on his heels, side-stepping pebbles.
“Wish I had my—ow—my damn iPhone,” he said, approaching the end of the alley that led toward Broadway Boulevard, the main artery of downtown. The long stretch of road before him brought relief. He was safe now. The downtown courthouse and police station was about four blocks ahead. Still too far to walk on bare feet, but close. Out in the open, she wouldn’t dare get “gangsta” and attempt target practice in public view of cop land.
Wiping a bead of sweat from his eye, he said, “What the hell am I going to do, anyway? Tell the cops my wife went all Terminator on me?” He shook his head. “And what did she mean by ‘Doe Dilly’?”
While mulling the predicament, Robert saw his favorite convenience store and gas station on the corner, a spot he hit up often for cigarettes. Deciding to go in, he walked between two parked cars through an itty-bitty parking lot, his heels still the best choice for transport.
“Maybe I can use their phone to call the cops to pick me up. Some shoes, too. I’m not walking up to the station from ... damn, I need to stop talking to myself.”
Pushing the glass door, he stepped in—then paused. Looking around, he raised an eyebrow. Nothing out of place—but nobody in place, either.
“Hello?” Robert said, peeping over the counter. No one. Not a word. Just an empty convenience store left in a condition not out of the ordinary. Clock on the wall read 6:35. The store opened at 5am.
Robert scratched his head. Something picked at him, like little nips from a needle—not just from standing in an empty public place; he realized he felt the same sensation of spiders crawling down his spine the moment he stepped out of the alley.
He didn’t know its source—until he turned to the window. “What the fu...”
A white Toyota Tercel was parked beside a gas pump, the nozzle still inside the tank, but no one holding it. Robert stepped back outside, saw other cars in a similar fashion. Only ghosts behind the wheel and in the passenger seats.
The sun was making its reappearance for a new day. Brighter outside, a city awakening. More light, which should’ve meant the usual hustle-and-bustle like any other downtown in a major city. But as he stared up Broadway, he saw rows of parked cars on the street, no one driving. No city buses, taxis, trucks—not even a cop on a horse. Robert’s jaw hung open as if trying to figure out how to construct a sentence. He couldn’t. Even the words in his mouth had made a mass exodus into the unknown.
Turning to the sidewalks, he saw the same thing—nothing. Nobody. The homeless—gone. Dirty pigeons near over-filled trashcans—AWOL. Flown the coup or somewhere other than the path Robert was on. The sidewalks were as naked as a newborn. Complete silence on some I Am Legend type shit.
Robert was alone ... except ... his wife formerly known as Tosha now known as Mega Bitch was still out there. Probably not far behind.
“W-What the hell is going on?” he said. “It’s like a damn no-man’s out here.”
Despite being an unwilling participant in a new game called The Vanished, Robert still knew someone was hot on his trail with bullets marked for him, so he tightened the robe belt and headed up Broadway toward the station. Flat-footed as he walked, the pain from the cuts subsiding, he stopped by each shop and restaurant on the way, pressing his forehead against the windows. Tables and chairs in their place, some with plates and half-eaten food on top. Everything in pristine condition. Still not one soul.
"Damn!" he cried, banging the window of a cafe.
Pressing on, he ascended steps of the YMCA. He tugged on the glass doors, but they were locked. No security guards stood inside; no one at the front desk. Like everything else around him—dead.
“Shit!”
Only a block away from the station, he passed by a donut shop and Starbucks, known havens for busy-bees and law enforcement, especially at the start of a workday. He looked inside. Empty. Just air.
Could Tosha get the whole damn city to punk him?
“All right,” he said, continuing on toward the station, “all right. Somebody has to be in there. This is ridiculous.”
Soon as those words left his lips, he caught a glimpse of two figures a few blocks past the police station. His face lit up, smiling like he’d won a showcase on The Price is Right. People! Finally!
Squinting at the sight before him, Robert froze and the smile faded. It appeared to be two men, cutting between parked cars on the street. They were heading toward Robert, sprinting in a shaky-jerky way—hands high, knees high—swerving their heads to look over their shoulders ... as if running for their lives. That was Robert a little while ago.
Something told him why they were running, but Robert didn’t move. He couldn’t. He had to know who the hell they were.
They jumped the curb onto the sidewalk in top speed, their path on course with Robert. He squinted harder, cocking his head sideways. A black and white guy ran parallel with each other, mouths hanging open. They were bare-chested, and it took Robert a second to register what flopped against their thighs as they ran, but he got it—and his knees almost buckled. Robert didn’t have a genius IQ, but he knew a pair of dicks when I saw them, flapping against the guys’ legs and bellies like twigs banging against the bark of a tree in a high-wind thunderstorm.
“Why are you guys naked? What the fu—”
“Run, you idiot!” the white guy said, shooting past Robert. “Get out of here!”
Robert’s head swerved from right to left as they zipped by. “From what? The police station is right—”
“Run!” the black guy screamed.
His mouth stuck, Robert stared until he realized he wasn’t too keen on his eyeballs fixated on the pimpled butts of ebony and ivory dudes, so he slammed his eyelids shut and whipped his head back around. When he opened them a few seconds later, the runaways had disappeared. Probably shot down the same alley he had just come from.
Shaking his head, Robert leaned down, placing his hands on his knees. He said, “Do I need to call myself Alice? I must be in a cracked out Wonderland. Tosha shooting at me, empty downtown, two buck-naked dudes running down the street ... geez. What else can we bring to the party?”
“Mr. Johnson?” someone cried.
Robert looked up. The “else” stood on the other side of the street about half-a-block away, near a Verizon retail store.
What the ... who the hell ... wow.
She stepped off the curb and into the middle of Broadway, cool and calm as an undefeated champion boxer. Robert did the same ... slow steps, drawing closer to find out who the hell called his name, let alone knew it. He felt like he was standing on a catwalk as he stared at her, strutting like a Victoria Secret model, high-heeled boots seamlessly in front of each other as she glided. The perfect straight-line stroll. Black mini skirt. Brown legs that seemed to never end. Long, dark hair at the wind’s mercy, blowing across her oval-shaped face ... which Ro
bert found odd because it seemed to only gust around her.
Fine. As. Hell. But ... that was beside the point. The only other female Robert had seen today went Glenn Close-in-Fatal-Attraction crazy on him; Ms. No Name was probably no different—but Robert stood his ground, hands at his side, fingers becoming fists.
To hell with that, I’m not running anymore. Definitely not like those goofy ass dudes earlier, so focus, Robert.
They stopped about thirty feet in front of each other, his robe opened and exposing sweaty boxers that were now barely white. Robert noticed her black banana-shaped purse and wondered what she held in it.
Hormones sabotaged his concentration. Her breasts ... perfect. Over-inflated twin bubbles, like she could rest her chin in the cleavage without looking down. With twins like that, Robert knew she rocked an ass tailor-made for a pool party scene in a rap video.
He shook away the X-rated fantasy brewing inside. Focus!
Taking in a breath, he asked, “Who ... are you? And how do you know my name?”
She didn’t reply. Just a cold stare.
Then she dug into her purse and pulled out what looked like a cell phone. She said, “The device is corrupted and must be formatted. I am instructed to upload it into Doe Dilly's mainframe. Your species does not have the processing power to properly utilize it.”
Robert’s eyeballs almost catapulted out the sockets. “What?” he cried. “That’s the same crazy nonsense Tosha was talkin’! What the hell are you people on?”
Her response was raising the strange gadget and aiming it at Robert’s legs. Frowning, he looked down, noticed a red light on ... the King.
“What the … oh sh—”
Zip!
A bright-orange laser beam shot between his legs, the heat nearly charring his skin. Missing his thighs by inches, it cracked a hole in the cement behind him. Broken pieces of rock slapped his legs. Any closer and the King would’ve been burnt ground beef.
“Shit!”
Robert dove back onto the curb, scrambling to hide behind a nearby light pole. Another laser barely missed his feet.
Bullets and now lasers. Two deranged females. A “device”. And some fuckin’ guy named Doe Dilly. “What is this, got-dammit?” he yelled. “What the hell is going on?”
Peeking around the pole, she walked toward him, the gadget still pointing his way. Had a look of steel. Hair still blowing in a wind made for only her. Cold. Like Tosha ... another Mega Bitch.
Now he had two of them on his ass.
Robert knew what was coming next. He darted away from the pole behind a parked police car, slamming into the passenger door.
Zip!
The foundation of the pole exploded, spewing chucks of cement and dust into the air. The pole buckled, tilted, then fell away from Robert, crashing onto several parked cars with a thunderous crunch only a few feet away from her. His whole body in a state of arrest, Robert managed to look up, saw her still walking toward him, slow and smooth. A “Herminator,” barely even batted an eyelash at the sight of debris around her.
Standing his ground against someone with a high-powered weapon straight out of a Star Trek movie was overrated. Fuck that. Time to run again.
Robert noticed a narrow road between the police station and courthouse, only a few feet from him. He felt a sense a deja vu, like he was back in the house hiding behind the couch from the first Mega Bitch. And like before, he readied himself to make a run for it. He looked up again. Shit. Only a few feet away from the trunk of the police car, the gadget still in her hand, prepped for another kill shot.
“Give it up, Mr. Johnson,” she said. “You can not escape.”
“Give up what? I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
She pointed the gadget at the car. Robert darted toward the road, seconds before ending up dust. Boom!
As luck would have it, the force of the explosion propelled Robert onto the road, narrowly escaping car debris that shattered behind him. He fell onto his butt and back, but still scanned the area in front of him, waiting for Mega Bitch 2 to pop out of nowhere. Propped up on his elbows, he looked around, but thick black smoke darkened his line-of-sight, the sidewalk ablaze from car fuel. No one would dare cut through those flames and smoke—unless they wanted to become a human hot link. Even she couldn’t have been that crazy.
After checking for signs of her somehow weaving through the fire, the back of his hand shielding his eyes from the smoke, Robert eased out a sigh of relief and got back to his feet. He then limped behind a dumpster. Resting his back against it, he slid down to his butt, legs spread out on the ground. Just spent.
Closing his eyes, he sat still and chilled for the first time in a while. And it felt good to have ... peace. Even if only for a few seconds.
But so much energy expended and still no answers. Just a cluster of questions on top of questions.
“I’m so damn thirsty,” he said. He’d been running for his life all morning, unable to take care of basic necessities like food and water. A pothole by his feet presented an answer to one of those problems—and he didn’t think twice about it.
On his hands and knees, Robert mimicked a stray dog and sucked in what he could, ignoring the coarse texture of dirt and rock grains against his tongue and throat. Muddy water never tasted so good.
A long screech startled him. He turned to a metal door creeping open on the side of the courthouse building, a door he hadn’t noticed while escaping from whoever-the-hell-that-was in the middle of Broadway.
Here we go again. Standing up, Robert steadied himself for fight-or-flight. An older gentleman pushed the door open, poking his head out. Robert paused, staring at the bag of bones with the oversized head, his body shaped like a lollipop, frail.
“Come with me if you want to live,” the man said, his voice sounding packed with phlegm.
Robert cringed. The man looked like he needed a month in the sun and a quick re-introduction to food. Teeth on its last legs, skin sagging off the bones.
Robert didn’t budge. Something told him he’d end up the same way if he followed. He said, “I’m not going anywhere until somebody tells me what the hell’s going on.”
The man smiled. Or it could’ve been a smile—Robert wasn’t sure. “Hmph,” the man grumbled, then turned around, the door slowly closing. “As you wish. Maybe she can tell you.”
“Who?”
Robert turned and almost released the water he’d just ingested on his leg. The Herminator stood in front of the flames, gadget in hand. Smoke raging around her, fire at her feet. Eyes only on Robert and somehow, unscathed.
What the fu … how the…
He caught the door before it closed and shot inside, slamming it behind. Pitch black surrounded him, so dark he couldn’t see his hands. The only light that crept in came from the crack under the door, but somehow, he felt safer in the dark inside than standing in sunlight outside.
Then Robert remembered he was in the courthouse, where men in uniform often walked the hallways with guns. He took in a deep breath, eased it out. Safe. Finally.
Pressing his hands against the walls to guide him, he realized he was walking a narrow corridor that seemed longer than usual. Robert felt like a man with no eyeballs, his hands and feet directing him forward. No other doors on the side—just walls.
Robert cried, “Hey, guy, are you in here somewhere? Where does this lead?” No response. Alone again. Damn. How did he disappear so fast?
Robert pressed on. He wasn’t sure how far he walked, but when he stubbed a toe against a wall in front of him, he reached down, felt a knob, and realized he was standing in front of a door. He turned the knob and pulled, stepping in with caution. The door closed behind him, but Robert didn’t notice.
If “bizarre” was a pill, Robert’s senses would have overdosed on it, especially since he thought he was walking into a courthouse building. He uttered the new incomplete catchphrase of the day: “What the fu…”
A symphony of machinery clatter harmonized the air. Assembly lines, conveyer belts, workbenches—all around Robert, as far as his eyes could take in. He turned his head like a man in a neck brace, mouth as wide as the hole in a donut. Forklifts maneuvered in and out of aisles, either lifting or stacking boxes on top of shelves. A warehouse of some kind. And huge. Wider than the length of a football field.
Breaking from the shellshock, Robert stepped behind a workbench, ducked, then slowly poked out his head for a peek. Worker bees went about their business, all wearing black—hundreds of them, it seemed—buzzing around different assembly areas. Walking in and out of doors, carrying boxes, turning knobs, pushing buttons—all in a rhythmic flow. Many of them stood at numbered stations wearing hardhats and safety goggles; others held clipboards while watching over the workers.
The industrial backdrop reminded Robert of a period from the 1950s during the boom of automobile manufacturing—the kind he’d read about in Time magazine. But he couldn’t figure out what the hell they were making. Whatever the product, it definitely wasn’t a damn car. And when did the courthouse become a factory?
I can’t believe what I’m seeing. What the hell is this?
While trying to answer yet another mountain of questions that didn’t make a lick of sense, Robert noticed a uniformity about them that went beyond just the black they wore. He frowned. They each had tube-shaped bags strapped around their shoulders, no matter their particular job.
Those “bags.” Such a strange shape. Actually ... purses? That’s how they looked. Like the one Herminator held when she pulled out a pocket-sized laser device and almost obliterated Robert’s testicles.
Oh shit!
Robert thought his heart would cannonball through his ribcage, lips quivering. His questions became answers, trickling in at a break-neck pace. He remembered Tosha using him for target practice. Empty streets of downtown Los Pingas … a second brush with death from another female on a murder mission. Two men blazing the sidewalks as they ran for their lives, dicks flapping away, yelling “Run!”
Can’t be!
Robert looked them over again and had no doubt. They were all females. Not one man in sight. Anywhere.
That only meant one thing. “I gotta get the hell outta—“
Whack!
Knock to the head. A grunt. Then the floor.
Before Robert could recapture his bearings, a knee pressed against his neck. While trying to sift through the haze, someone yanked his hands behind his back and tied them with rope. Face flat on the concrete, Robert tried to turn his head, but a shoe heel pressed his cheeks, mashing his lips together.
“Arghumb! Whaouatojlnaaison?”
Squeals of laughter met Robert’s garbled cries. “You sound like you have one of our toys in your mouth, Mr. Johnson! Ha!” The heel moved away from his mouth. “Stand him up.”
Tight grips around his arms forced him to his feet. He looked up. Tosha stood on his side, grinning, arms folded against her chest.
“Tosha!”
“Hello, Mr. Johnson. Finally got ’cha, didn’t we?”
“W-W-What is this? Why are—”
“Shut up!” Whack! A slap across his temple almost slammed him back to the floor. “I don’t remember giving you permission to say a word!”
“Ow! Damn!”
Struggling on his feet, the side of his face on fire, he finally took note of the two “security guards” holding him against his will. Two females, an Asian and Latina. Shorter than him. Small-framed—no more than 120-pounds, each holding the same weird purse. Average-sized ladies, but as Robert tried to shake them off, either his strength betrayed him or they were juiced up on the same drug that gave Tosha some kind of Herculean power because they barely budged. Like dope-head twin GI Janes.
They forced Robert to walk, and that’s when he realized he was no longer wearing his robe. Robert guessed they somehow disrobed him while he was dazed on the floor. He cried, “Why’d you take off my robe? And where are we going? Huh? Bitch, answer me! What are you doing? I—umph!”
“Shame on you, Mr. Johnson,” Tosha said, slapping duct tape across Robert’s lips. “That’s not appropriate language around a lady.” Then a blindfold. “You know better than that.”
They turned a corner. Forcing him forward, now unable to see, speak, or move his hands, Robert concocted a plan that involved a few head butts and dropkicks. He’d never hit a woman before, but after getting kicked, slapped, cut, almost shot several times—pretty much treated like somebody’s bitch the whole morning—all bets were off.
They stopped. Tosha said, “Here we are.”
Perfect. She was in front of him. Got her.
Robert threw his forehead toward where he thought Tosha was standing, but only hit open space. Before he could regroup and turn his cranial weapon against his two female escorts, he somehow found himself elevated and suspended in air. For a second, he was horizontal, then slammed against a hard, cold surface.
“Um!” he mumbled.
“Ha!” Tosha laughed. “Nice ‘dunk’, ladies.”
One of them untied his hands and pulled the rope away. Robert tried to throw a punch, but each female pulled his arms until he was flat on his back—then clamped with what felt like metal clasps. Both wrists. Then ankles.
He tried to kick, punch and pull. No go. Locked down.
Tosha yanked off the blindfold and tape. Robert lifted his head, moving his eyes around, scanning the room. From what he could surmise, he was in a fenced-in area with no roof near the door he had entered, but could still see the rest of the warehouse. Some workers walked by, eyeing him with twisted scowls ... as if Robert were a roach to squash. In their eyes, he probably was.
He lay in his boxers on what looked like a gurney, its metal clasps padlocked so tight around his ankles and wrists he could barely wiggle them. Tosha stood at his feet, her fingers wrapped around the strap of one of those strange purses that they all wore. Her two bodyguards were gone.
Robert glanced at her smirk. Cocky ass. Tosha stood with the air of Queen Bee, above the weak, as if Robert had found his rightful place beneath her. The color red painted across her lips, eyelashes darkened from heavy mascara, partially hidden from strands of hair. A black magic woman had emerged—an image he’d never seen or experienced before in her, or any woman. “Wifey” was long gone. Mega Bitch in the flesh.
“So,” he said, locking eyes with Tosha, “are you going to pull out that laser thingy and do to me what you did to the other men around here?”
“Aww,” she said, nodding. She walked around the gurney, grazing her fingertips around Robert’s legs. “So you noticed.”
“How couldn’t I? What, did every female in Los Pingas get together and round up the men like cattle? The only men I did see were running for their lives. You and some other broad were trying to kill me, talking about a dude named ‘Doe Dilly’ and a damn device.”
“I hope Natalia didn’t scare you. She can be so sweet!”
“Whatever. This ain’t funny. She almost blasted my nuts off, so fuck her and you.” He managed to clutch his fists. “Damn it, you’re supposed to be my wife! Why are you trying to kill me? And what happened to the men? How come—”
“Shhhhhh,” she commanded, pressing a finger on his lips. “You talk too much. Hush.”
Tosha grabbed his boxers and ripped them off. Now Robert lay naked and exposed for the world to see. He noticed a female walk by with dirt smeared on her cheek, holding a wrench. Just like Tosha and the other demonic she-devils that passed his private prison, they did not appear impressed. The King lay shriveled up, small and paralyzed, as if it had seen the same evil through Robert and was trying to hide.
Tosha ran her nails around Robert’s “sack” while circling the gurney, making him twitch. She said, “This thing is fascinating, Mr. Johnson. Men think of if as a sacred staff to part the seas, if you will, of every woman on Earth. Women are expected to bow down and worship it.”
“What?” he cried, frowning. He turned his head around, trying to follow her.
“Yes sir,” she continued, her nails now on his forehead and cheek, “it can transform a normal, civilized woman into a wild animal with every stroke, I tell you.” She sighed. “Too bad the mainframe it’s attached to is so corrupted we must remove and reformat it.”
An old man walked in from behind, seemingly out of nowhere—the same man that opened the door to this hell hole. He handed Tosha a jar, containing what looked like Vaseline, but colored blue.
“Thank you, slave,” Tosha said. She strapped on rubber gloves. “You did good.”
“I only serve you, ma lady,” the man said, then disappeared.
“Slave?” Robert asked. “What, I’m supposed to bow to you, now?”
“Of course. I’m a woman.”
Figures. “So … what the hell is that?”
She pulled out a glob of the goop, then spread it around the glove. “Brick Jelly. A form of flesh hardening cream.”
“For what?”
“Hmmm.” She looked upward. “Let’s just say, it will turn your software into hard drive. It definitely looks your device needs it now.”
“My device?” Robert paused. He peeped out the King. “All this time you were talking about my dick?”
“Yes, Mr. Johnson,” she replied. “And the rest of you is the mainframe. Corrupted, out-dated, and no longer necessary. Just like the rest your species. You no longer have the processing power to utilize this device, so we must remove it.” She leaned down, her face inches from Robert’s. Strands of hair slipped off her shoulder. “Since your feeble male mind can’t comprehend, I’ll put it to you like this: We’re going to cut your dick off.”
“What?” Robert lifted his head as high as he could, pulling and yanking on the clasps. The gurney rattled. “Not that! Oh, fu—you wouldn’t!”
Robert winced as she grabbed the tip of the King’s crown, which now looked like a baby mole rat. “Oh, yes, we would—and have,” Tosha said, spreading the goop around the King. “Most of your kind has met the same fate. It’s ironic that this powerful device is connected to a vile species such as man.”
Robert gritted his teeth, trying to summon the Hulk within him to break free. “Tosha, why are you doing this? Please, don’t!”
“There. That should do it,” she said, ignoring his pleas. “This cream will freeze your device at a rate ten times faster than a freezer. In a few minutes, it will petrify and you will lose all feeling. We will then commence with Operation Bobbit.”
Robert looked between his legs. Within seconds, the King lengthened and came alive, then lifted in a perfect vertical stance straighter than a soldier on duty. Robert’s cries went unanswered.
“I know this is … shall I say … ‘hard’ for you, Mr. Johnson,” Tosha said, now at the foot of the gurney. “You may wonder why we’re doing this.” She placed her hands on the clasps around Robert’s feet, staring into his eyes. “It is because of the two-minute mindless humping your species is known for, among other things. You haven’t done anything to satisfy me. Women have developed an intense hatred for your kind, so we banded together and devised the perfect ‘man’.”
Tosha pointed to several computers lined up next to each other, directly in front of Robert on the far end of the warehouse, about ten of them. They looked more like stainless steel refrigerators with monitor screens and keyboards. Women stood nearby, recording readings on electronic tablets. Conveyor belts stretched from the side of each computer like black tongues, and Robert finally realized the “widgets” they each spat out.
He cried, “You have machines to make dildos?”
“Not just dildos, Mr. Johnson. Together, each computer makes up one mainframe, and we call him Doe Dilly, model number PEN-1X. Developed entirely by women. It manufactures a flawless device. In other words, the perfect dick.”
“The perfect dick?”
“Yes. However, the Doe Dilly device is made from male foreskin. Like yours.”
Robert dropped his head and closed his eyes. “I don’t believe this. This has definitely been a day for the ages. Why not the real thing?”
“The problem is not the device,” she replied. “It is the male species and all the garbage that comes with it. When we load a device into Doe Dilly’s mainframe, it removes the flesh and blood inside, inserts specialized CPU chips and cushioning, and in some cases—especially yours—adjusts length and girth. The exterior remains the same, retaining its human feel. What is different, Mr. Johnson, it delivers orgasms so intense it can cause a woman to mess herself. And it surely won’t fall asleep before the woman is satisfied. The purses you see us carrying hold Doe Dilly devices tailored to the needs of each woman. With dicks like these, who needs a man?”
Robert’s head tensed up. The King was no longer at Robert’s will. So cold. Lifeless. Veins inside the King circulated blood several degrees below zero—at least that’s what Robert felt. Harder than steel, and only getting harder—yet becoming numb. Like she said, losing all feeling.
Without the King, death was a better fate.
“Arrgh! Baby, please stop this!” he cried. “I didn’t mean to hurt you! Why didn’t you ... ugh ... t-tell me you felt this way?”
“It’s too late to stop it. Besides, should I have to tell you, Mr. Johnson?”
Robert couldn’t answer. Torso tightening, he dug deep, trying to muster the will to overcome the inevitable. As he struggled, he glanced upward and noticed a long plastic tube lowering from the ceiling.
“There’s no use trying some mind-over-matter trick to get out of this, either. Oh, would you like to see how you’ll end up?”
Robert didn’t answer. Motor function had failed him.
Tosha walked toward the fence and yelled, “Bring them out!”
Two women disappeared inside a corner room and returned with two naked men, shackled around the ankles and wrists. The women shoved them face-first into the fence. Despite tears blurring his eyes, Robert recognized each one. Saw them high-tailing it down the sidewalk earlier, running from the greatest of all evils. Now they stood caught, shivering and bawling more like adolescent boys than grown men, trying to cover their crotches with both hands.
A heavyset woman swatted their knuckles with a Billy club. Robert slammed his eyelids shut, but not before witnessing the greatest horror inflicted on a man.
“Yes, their devices are gone. Now those fools have new vaginas and delusional Sweet Dick Willy memories.” Tosha threw her head back from laughter. She then said, “They were just like you—two-minute jackoffs who had no idea how to use their devices, so we detached them. Now they’ll be our bitches forever, just like the other men locked in the room. We have already reformatted the devices of every man in Los Pingas, except you. Soon, the world!”
The tube was now inches above Robert ... his new karma, reduced to a fuckin’ sheath made of hard plastic—perfect size for the six inches of dead flesh protruding skyward like a rocket awaiting liftoff.
Robert’s senses engaged in war, battling each other. He felt suspended in a psychedelic haze, vision going black. Before the tube covered that small part of him, he managed to whisper, “T-Tosha?” She turned an ear to him. “W-What about ... cuddling? No dildo can ... can do that.”
“Ha!” She bellowed. “What do you think cats are for?” Twirling a finger in the air, she cried, “Commence Operation Bobbitt!”
Robert’s hips yanked upward, the suction a high-velocity vacuum, powerful enough to rip pubic hairs away from his scrotum. Although lifeless, the King held on, but Robert knew it couldn’t be for long.
Before slipping away, he let out a series of screams that everyone in the factory must’ve heard. And yet, Tosha’s bellows of laughter echoed in Robert’s ears, loud and clear. Inside his cries were the words, “Don’t take it! Don’t take it ... don’t take it ... don’t take..."
* * * * *