Image of the Beast / Blown

by Philip José Farmer

  lurching like sick dinosaurs along a drying swamp to-

  wards the far wall.

  Maybe, Childe thought, maybe the thing can lip-

  read. Maybe she's giving him instructions for starting

  the reassembly process.

  But what if there is no reassembly? What if this

  is final? What do I know about her or others of her

  kind? All were strange, but Vivienne was the strangest.

  She did not fit into any categories of vampire or

  werewolf or lamia or ghost. Maybe, when the cord is

  yanked, the lanyard pulled, she has had it. Surely, she

  —her parts that is—can't survive long in this condi-

  tion. They have to eat and to excrete, they are as sub-

  ject to natural laws as any other creatures, even if they

  seem to be unnatural.

  There is nothing unnatural in this universe. Anything

  that seems so just isn't explained yet. All things can

  be explained by natural laws. If you don't know cer-

  tain laws, then you think a thing is unnatural.

  The snake-thing slid down over his eyes onto the

  floor. It crawled to Vivienne's head and coiled there while

  the upper part rose to a point a few inches before

  her eyes. It swayed back and forth like a cobra, and

  sometimes its head turned. Its mouth was working, and

  its face was twisted with rage. Only when its head was

  turned towards him could Childe hear the faint piping

  voice. It was still using the unknown tongue.

  Presently it communicated something or it tired of try-

  ing to communicate. It turned and crawled to a point

  just past his chin. He could not see what it was doing un-

  til a moment later. It crawled out past him, towing the

  uterus behind it. Its tail had been inserted into the in-

  terior and probably was being implanted again.

  When it was a little distance past his head, it

  stopped and turned again. It crawled back towards him,

  stopping with the uterus leaning up against his fore-

  head. The vagina moved away, and he was able to

  see that the snake-thing was butting it with its head.

  Herding it.

  When it had the vagina maneuvered into the proper

  position, it slipped through from the rear of the vagina

  and emerged through the slit. The vagina moved back-

  wards as if impelled by telepathy until it was reunited

  with the uterus-thing.

  Now what? Childe thought, and then he was able

  to worry about himself for the first time. Maybe the poi-

  son did wear off; maybe Vivienne had been lying about

  the necessity of the antidote. She must have wanted to

  give Bill an antidote to get him going more quickly.

  And at the same time she had administered the poison

  that would stop his heart. If she had not lied about that,

  of course.

  He tried to move but was as unable as before. How-

  ever, his thinking and his vision were not as unfocused.

  Now he began to be impressed with the utter alien-

  ness of the life before him. That a living body could

  fall apart into discrete creatures which were mobile

  was unthinkable. But there they were. And how did

  they survive so long? The blood system, for instance, had

  been cut off, sealed into each creature, but the circula-

  tion, of course, had stopped. That was easy to see. There

  was the heart, its veins and arteries closed up, moving

  away from him towards the underside of the bed on

  thirty frail legs. Something about it reminded him of

  a headless chicken.

  But how did these things live without the bringing

  in of oxygen and the carrying away of waste? They

  had to have some auxiliary source of energy and ex-

  cretion. Had to have!

  And how did Vivienne manage to hide all these

  fissures and cleavages, all these legs and God knew what

  other biological mechanisms, in her body? She should

  have looked fat and lumpy, but she had not. She

  had a superb body and that face, that painfully beau-

  tiful face, now walking around on a score of skinny

  legs and four support legs from behind her ears!

  The snake-thing dragged itself in front of him, trailing

  the uterus, in chase of the anus and buttocks. Obviously

  it intended to unite with them. But what then? It was

  becoming unwieldy and could not corner too many

  other pieces and unite before it became too heavy and

  too awkward.

  The head had been busy while he watched the snake-

  thing. It had kicked and pushed shoulders and a neck

  until they were huddled together in a corner of the room.

  Then the head went off in pursuit of various entrail

  things while the snake-thing backed into the buttocks

  and anus and hooked up as a railroad engine would hook

  up several cars with another.

  At that moment, he felt the floor vibrate slightly un-

  der him. A second later, two large shoes were by his

  head. Then the shoes moved on out past him, and he

  saw the chauffeur. He was a big man with a skin as

  dark as a sunburned Sicilian's, but his features were

  Baltic. He had a broad face with high cheekbones and

  a high forehead and straight dark hair. The scene be-

  fore him did not seem to bother him in the least.

  With swift but efficient movements, he began to re-

  assemble Vivienne Mabcrough. The parts were placed

  together or one inserted into another, and presently she

  was stretched out on the floor in a unit. The fissures

  closed; the cracks disappeared; the cleavages filled out.

  When her skin was again unbroken, he hit her over the

  heart with his fist. She gasped for air, breathed for a

  while, and then sat up. She was a little unsteady but

  waved the hand of the chauffeur away.

  The head of the snake-thing came out of her slit

  and stared angrily at him.

  "Barton," she said, "put him on the bed and undress

  him."

  Wordlessly, Barton picked Childe up in his arms and

  laid him out on the bed. He proceeded to take off all of

  Childe's clothes and to hang them up neatly in the closet.

  The shoes and socks went under a chair. Childe could

  see this because he was able by then to turn his head.

  He could not, however, talk.

  "You can go now, Barton," Vivienne said.

  The big dark man looked emotionlessly at Childe.

  Then he said, "Very well, madame," and left.

  Childe wondered what his place was in Vivienne's

  group. If Barton was wholly of human origin, then he

  was one of the vilest collaborators in history. Or in

  unhistory, since history, or any human science or sci-

  entific discipline, refused to acknowledge the existence,

  or the possibility of existence, of these beings.

  Vivienne stood over him and bent down so that one

  breast hung above his mouth a few inches.

  She said, "You frustrated me, my beautiful Herald

  Childe, and I don't like to be frustrated. You took away

  my Bill, a stupid ass of a man but a great cock. So you

  will substitute for him, even though you are now for-<
br />
  bidden."

  He wanted to ask her what she meant by "forbidden"

  but could not even open his mouth.

  Vivienne kissed him and thrust her tongue into his

  mouth and felt his tongue and teeth and gums while she

  played with his cock with one hand. Despite himself, he

  responded. His penis felt slightly titillated; it warmed

  up and swelled a little, if his sense of feel was any indica-

  tion.

  Vivienne moved herself up then and put her nip-

  ple in his mouth, but he was unable to suck on it. If

  he had been able, he would have refused. She was the

  most beautiful woman he had ever seen, but she was

  by now far from the most desirable. He did not care

  for murdereresses at all, and he loathed her for that

  thing coiled in her womb. He hoped it was still there, but

  he doubted it. His anus was beginning to contract

  in dread of its coming.

  Even though he did not suck or tongue it, her nipple

  grew large and hard in his mouth. She withdrew it and

  put the other one between his lips, and it grew large.

  Then she began to kiss his nipples and to stroke his

  cheeks with her fingers. She slowly traced her tongue

  down his belly, working back and forth and across,

  drawing geometric designs with its tip.

  When she came to his pubic hairs, she ran her tongue

  along the edge of the hairline and then worked her

  tongue over the hairs until they were wet. His penis

  swelled some more. He did not want it to be affected in

  the least by her, but the paralyzing effect of the bite

  made him unable to resist. He loathed her and he

  wanted to scream at the thought of the snake-thing.

  But the loathing and the horror were numbed, far

  away. The pleasure of her tongue and lips was the im-

  mediate entity.

  When he felt her mouth closing around his testicles,

  he began to be flooded with a hot sensation. It arose

  from under his navel and spread outwards but chiefly to-

  wards the base of his penis. When it oozed into his

  penis, it filled it out so that it rose up straight and hard.

  After a while, she pushed the testicles out with her

  tongue and lowered her head over his cock. Her lips

  went softly and wetly around the head, and her tongue

  pressed against the slit in its end. He groaned deep within

  himself and could not repress a desire to move his

  hips upward to drive his prick deeper into her mouth.

  The desire was all that resulted; his hips remained mo-

  tionless.

  Vivienne continued to suck on the glans and occa-

  sionally to move her head down so that the shaft went in

  all the way. The warmth at the base of his penis became

  a rod of fire which stretched from the tip of his spine

  to the tip of his cock. The heavy gray fluid was mov-

  ing slowly, rubbing against excited nerves, towards the

  entrance to his shaft.

  Suddenly, Vivienne got up and turned around, pre-

  senting that lovely back and the egg-shaped buttocks.

  She squatted over him and reached down and tenderly

  took the head between her fingers. This she guided into

  her anus as she lowered herself down on it. The head

  stuck in the tight mouth for a minute and then abruptly

  slid in. It moved against a warm slick surface until the

  flesh of her ass was against his pubic hairs.

  She lowered and raised herself slowly several

  times, causing him to feel ecstatic. It would hot take

  much of this to make him come. And he did not like

  buggering. Though he had done it several times to

  women who liked it, he had a distaste for it. Now his

  repulsion was on the edge of his mind. It bulked large

  enough for him to be aware of it, but it did not bother

  him.

  She stopped on an upward movement, leaving his cock

  half in.

  Knowing what was about to happen, he mentally

  gritted his teeth. The horror did not draw any blood

  from his engorged penis, however.

  Suddenly, something slipped down over his testicles.

  It slid over the sac and under, and something—the

  thing's bearded little head, of course—touched his

  anus. Then it entered and was pushing into his anus

  and then up his rectum. It felt hard and solid and un-

  pleasant, as when a doctor stuck a finger up him for a

  prostate examination. But this disagreeable sensation

  did not last long. Something, perhaps its bite or the sub-

  stance released by its bite, turned unpleasantness into a

  warm and relaxing feeling.

  A few seconds later, Vivienne began to move up and

  down on his cock, and he could feel the body of the

  snake-thing sliding back and forth in him. Its mo-

  tion seemed to be independent of hers; it was moving

  much faster than her motions could account for.

  The warmth and relaxation within his rectum and

  his bowels gave way to an almost hot feeling and a

  tension. The tension was, however, near-ecstatic. His in-

  sides felt as ready for orgasm as his penis. Both ex-

  quisitenesses acted as sine waves out of phase with

  each other. But as Vivienne increased her slidings up and

  down his pole, and as the snake-thing continued at the

  same rapid pace, the waves slowly came into phase.

  There was a moment of glory: a flashing red light

  across his eyes, a spurt of metal rubbing against his

  pleasure nerves, a breaking through of a red-hot drill

  in the center of his brain, and he exploded. It was as

  if he had been turned inside out as he passed through

  some fifth-dimensional continuum. He was a glove of

  flesh removed from a hand, inverted, and exposed to

  radiations that would never have reached him other-

  wise, intensely delightful radiations.

  Vivienne sat on him for a while but rotated on his

  cock so that she could face him. The action pulled the

  snake-thing along, but it, apparently, was through. It

  slid out of his anus and then was facing him. Its shaft

  and head were smeared and it was still expelling a musky

  gray fluid from its mouth. When the flow had ceased,

  its forked tongue flickered out and began to clean its

  face. Within a few minutes, its face and beard looked as

  if it had showered.

  Though it did not look as vicious as before, it still

  looked dangerous.

  Childe was glad to see it withdraw, although he

  wished that it had not first moved up her body and kissed

  her on the lower lip with its thin mouth.

  Vivienne scooted up when the thing disappeared into

  her cunt, and his penis slipped out of her anus. She

  kissed him and said, "I love you."

  He could not reply, but he thought, "Love?"

  He wished he could vomit.

  At that moment, three men entered the room. One of

  them had a cane, from which he pulled a thin-

  bladed sword. He stuck the point of it against Vivienne's

  neck.

  She turned pale and said, "Why are you breaking the

  truce?"

&n
bsp; 25

  Forrest J Ackerman, hiding in the bushes, was getting

  wetter. He was also becoming madder.

  Three days ago he had received through the mail a

  large flat box. This had come from England, and it con-

  tained an original painting by Bram Stoker. The painting

  depicted Count Dracula in the act of sucking blood

  from the throat of a young blonde. Many illustrations

  have done this; a number of reprints of Dracula, writ-

  ten by Bram Stoker, have shown Dracula going down on

  a sleeping young beauty, and innumerable advertise-

  ments and stills for various Dracula movies have

  shown this.

  But this was the only painting of Dracula done by

  the author himself. Until a few months ago, its existence

  had been unknown. Then a dozen oil paintings and a

  score of ink drawings had been found in a house in

  Dublin, once owned by a friend of Stoker's. The pres-

  ent owner had discovered the works in a boarded-up

  closet in the attic. He had not known what the paint-

  ings and drawings represented in money. He had sold

  them to an art dealer for several pounds and thought

  himself well ahead.

  But the dealer had brought in handwriting experts

  who verified that the signature on the illustrations was

  indeed Bram Stoker's. Forry Ackerman, reading of

  this, had sent a wire to the Dublin art dealer and offered

  to top any price submitted. The result was that he got

  his painting but had to go to the bank to get a loan. Since

  then, he had been waiting anxiously and could talk of

  little but the expected arrival.

  When he unwrapped it, he was not disappointed. Ad-

  mittedly, Stoker was no St. John, Bok, Finlay, or even

  a Paul. But his work had a certain crude force that a

  number of people commented upon. It was a primitive,

  no doubt of that, but a powerful primitive. Forry was

  glad that it had some artistic merit, although he

  had no knowledge of what constituted "good art" and no

  desire to learn. He knew what he liked, and he liked this.

  Besides, even if it had been less powerful, even

  crude, he would not have cared. He had the only orig-

  inal painting of Dracula by the author of Dracula. No

  one else in the world could claim that.