The other two sluts gleefully attacked the remaining malingerers. Not even the strongest of them could withstand the shock treatment for more than a few seconds. One by one, they deserted their dark hidey holes, then allowed themselves to be stampeded down the aisle and out the door.
Still clinging to his stanchion, Huth watched these events unfold with no small measure of delight. He was confident that one by one, the wrongs of his recent history were about to be righted, that he was about to resume his former, lofty place in the order of things.
From the bottom of the stairway, the pink haired slut aimed her prod at Huth’s scrawny behind. “And what about the bag of bones?” she asked.
“Nah, don’t waste the battery,” Big Mike answered. He grabbed the scientist by the scruff of the neck. Before Huth could protest, he was sent tumbling down the steps. The shovel landed in the dirt beside him.
“Better take that with you,” Mike said. “You’re gonna need it.”
As Huth pushed up from the ground, spitting dust, the battlesuited troopers closed in on all sides, trapping the passengers against the side of the bus.
The woman didn’t wait for a fancy two hole outhouse to relieve herself; she didn’t wait at all. As she cowered, monumentally topless, a wide, wet stain spread across the seat of her BDU pants. She wasn’t alone in her sudden loss of bladder control. Two of the young men likewise soiled themselves before they dropped to their bellies and buried their faces in the dirt.
Huth was the only one who showed no fear. He straightened, brushed himself off and, leaving the shovel behind, stepped over to one of the helmeted soldiers. There was no insignia on the trooper’s battlesuit, at least none visible to the naked eye. Not that Huth expected to see the word FIVE inscribed on the breastplate. He had already concluded that this wasn’t a FIVE operation. As director of the Totality Concept, he knew that FIVE didn’t have a backup trans-reality unit in place. Only the individual global conglomerates had the economic and technical clout to duplicate his great achievement. The research had to have been done in secret as it was a major treaty violation, subject to extreme punishment. Given the fact that his Earth was in its last days, the threat of punishment was no deterrent. You could only die once.
As Huth approached, the soldier reacted, and he found himself staring down the claw foot flash hider of a tribarrel laser. The muzzle was aimed at the bridge of his nose. Not only was the weapon capable of boring a hole clear through his head in a fraction of a second, but also it could simultaneously cook everything between his ears. The thought of his precious, genius level brain reduced to a pea sized cinder made him go momentarily weak kneed.
“Stand back!” The order blasted out of the battlesuit’s external speaker along with a squawk of feedback.
These were his people, Huth assured himself. He was a man of status, of renown, even. He spoke quickly, showing his empty, helpless hands. “I know how terrible I must look to you,” he said. “And I know how difficult it’s going to be for you to believe me, but I am Dr. Huth, director of the Totality Concept trans-reality program.”
The soldier didn’t respond.
Huth continued, and as he did, his voice rose in pitch. “I was sucked across to this world during the explosion,” he said. “I have endured terrible hardships to get here and find you. See, see this?” He held up the embroidered FIVE on his lab coat’s breast pocket.
The trooper’s gauntleted hand moved to the plate beside the pulse rifle’s trigger guard. Something snicked.
“No, don’t do that,” Huth groaned, realizing that the soldier had released the rifle’s safety. “I know about FIVE. Omnico, Invecta, Mitsuki, Questar and Hutton-Byrum-Kobe. I know you’re human under the battlesuits. How would I know all that if I wasn’t telling you the truth? If I didn’t come from the same reality as you?”
“Maybe you’re psychic,” said the digitalized voice. “Get in line with the others for your bracelets, or I’m going to fry your wormy little brain.”