She rose and fell in curving motions, the soft flesh engulfing him as her unique internal muscles caressed the man in ways no other living woman could.
His hands gripped her waist hard as the gentle tempo became quicker, more urgent. She met his fervor, and thoughts of foreplay ceased, the sounds of slapping flesh masked by the falling waters of the military shower.
Softly in the background, the intercom chimed and J.B.’s voice announced dinner was ready, but neither noticed or cared. And for a few precious seconds, the two lovers enjoyed their private celebration of life and love, giving no thoughts at all to combat or death.
THE WINGED MUTIE watched the opening of the cave from the air above, waiting impatiently for the food to reemerge. Her belly crawled with hunger as her metabolism raced to heal the holes in her wings caused by the barking sticks of the two-legs. Fury welled within at the remembrance, and she cut loose a scream of rage at the meat escaping so easily.
However, the mutie knew better than to try for them in the terrible light, the most fleeting glance making her blind and helpless as if she were prey. Soon the sky fire would return, forcing her into hiding once more, and the prey would be safe to leave and travel away from the hunting ground. The thought was intolerable. There were young to feed! Then instincts flared and the rage slowly calmed. Eventually, the meat would be forced to come out, and she would gather them in the coming night before they could reach the terrible beams of light. Darkness was her mantle of safety.
Fluttering her great wings, the mutie took flight and circled above the cave one last time before turning her attention to the smaller creatures of the desert. Lizard eggs would do for now, but she could already taste the fresh blood and imagined it running down her fangs and chest. Soon enough, she would return and feast upon their living flesh.
Chapter Five
The black clouds slowly became tinted with hints of orange and gray with the coming of dawn as Harold darted from the shadows and moved to the outer wall of the ville. The hunchback looked both ways for the sec men on patrol, but his timing was good. They were beyond the curve of the circular wall, and the buildings blocked their view of this area. But only for a moment. The second team would be here in a few moments.
Taking a battered brass key from a pocket of his dirty clothes, Harold unlocked the smashed trunk of a big luxury car and stepped inside. Crouching low, he closed the lid tight, pulling until hearing the click that told him the lock was engaged. After waiting a few minutes to become adjusted to the darkness, Harold pushed down the back seat, wiggled into the front, clambered over the dashboard and out the gap where the windshield used to be. Crumpled cars and wags surrounded him on every side, tireless wheels jutting out, sprinklings of greenish glass squares everywhere, and seat belts dangling from above. From outside, the wall appeared to be impenetrable, a solidly compacted mass of smashed metal, but the hunchback knew that was false. The old baron had designed this area himself, and after the workers were finished, Harold had done something to them that made his head hurt to remember. And sometimes he woke from fevered nightmares of screaming men begging for life.
Able to see somewhat better now, Harold wiggled forward between an array of tires and tailpipes, ducking under a transmission and into an explosion hole in the side of a military APC. Climbing up the sloped interior, he left by the escape hatch in the roof, slid across the armor and climbed down the undercarriage of a slanted school bus.
A rat scurried from the wreckage and Harold stomped it flat, then moved on. Nasty things. Folks got sick and sometimes died when they got bitten. The old baron and the new both had a reward on the rats—kill a hundred and get a day off from work. Nowadays, it was getting hard to find a hundred. The rats wouldn’t come into the ville anymore, which made Harold sad. The first gift he had ever given Laura was a box of a hundred dead rats. That was the first day she kissed him, and he knew they were in love.