Coven (36 page)

A bomb,
Wade concluded.
They’re
talking about a bomb.

Was Besser smiling? “And now I have a little
business to tend to myself. I’ll trust you to see that there are no
problems.”

“
Right, Prof.
Later.”

Then both figures left the glowing orange
room or corridor or whatever it was. Wade took his eye from the
hole, aghast.

He had no idea what he’d just seen or heard,
nor did he try to explain it to himself. All he knew was this:

They had a bomb, and it was going to go off
at one minute past midnight.

Tonight.

—

CHAPTER 31

Winnifred sauntered naked
through the low warrens.
Heaven down
here,
she mused. She was out of control in
her ecstasy. The psilight bathed her flesh as stark as bone as she
wandered amid the humming, tinged dark. She was probably insane by
now.

Soon they’d be gone, to
greater miracles ahead. The joy of being part of it stunned
her.
Me. Goddess Winnifred.
Excited blood pumped through her breasts and sex,
and there she went again, touching herself, plying herself with her
fingers.

The psilight hummed. Orange mist glowed
within the productionholds, relative influx of the
catalyticexchangers, which ran constantly. These low warrens seemed
to extend infinitely. Just how deep did they go?

A factory!
she thought in rushing pulses.
A factory of love!

The sisters paid her no mind. They were
perfect in their duplicity. Most were naked, as Winnifred herself,
unflawed bodies moist in the orange tint. She recessed into the
emwguidancetrackingpoint, a simple processor which countered
magnetic quadrupole activity, generating negative kinetic charge
momentum. The chamber was just a black honeycombed wall laced with
fine threads. She sat down. Here, in the labyrinth’s heart, she
would finish her orgasm.

Murmuring, she closed her eyes. The psilight
licked her nerves, sucked heat into her body. She filled her mind
with the most base sexual images: she was a cave woman being
gang-raped in the woods. One dirty Neanderthal after the next stuck
a penis that had never been washed into her mouth. Some came right
there, sending globs of sperm down her throat, or pulling out to
spatter her enraptured face. Other used the oral act as a primer
after which they rammed their excited cocks into her sex, humped
her hard in the dirt—one after another—until she was filled with
semen, overflowing...

Winnifred’s legs tensed as the images grew
more vile. She was being choked, sodomized, spat on and pissed
upon, yet each demonstration only inflamed her more. Then she lay
sopped and filthy; above her the cavemen stood round, all
chuckling, as they masturbated in unison for a final climax. By the
time they were all done coming on her, Winnifred felt covered with
a hot, pale rue, and then—

Her fingers worked furiously, and there it
went, like a bomb burst in her loins.

Lovely, lovely...

When she opened her eyes, a shadow stood
over her.

“
Dudley?” She squinted;
it
was
him. “What
are you doing here?”

“
Looking for you,” answered
the dark voice.

What could
he
want? He was supposed
to be bringing in the holotype. She got up, taming her disdain.
What did they need him for anyway? He was fat and arrogant. He
sickened her.

Immediately, his fat arms were about her; he
was kissing her, caressing her. “I love you,” he whispered, and
urged her back into the servicepass. Here the psilight shined more
keenly, replenishing her desires. His fat fingers fiddled at her
sex. She could feel the puny erection through his size 54
trousers.

Lips like a fish groveled to hers. His
tongue went into her mouth, his hand squeezed her buttocks.

Winnifred giggled. “Oh, Dudley, you’re
impossible.”

His trousers fell. He pushed her to her
knees.

So that’s what he
wants.
She gave it her best, pushing up,
but—

“
I’m sorry, Dudley, but
you’re so fat I can’t get to it!”

Besser looked down. “Maybe you can get to
this, then.”

Winnifred screamed. Besser jammed infusers
into her neck, one in each hand, then discharged a third into her
navel. The overdose of calciumdecimationliquetactor flooded her
bloodstream. Winnifred’s bones dissolved at once, and she flopped
on the floor.

Besser stepped on her stomach. Winnifred
spouted vomit.

“
How fat am I now,
bitch?”

He stepped on her head, which squashed.

“
How’s this for fat,
hmmm?”

Then, chuckling, he walked all over her,
like someone trodding grapes to mash. She looked ridiculous now, an
inchoate, squirming mass. He picked her up and slopped her down on
a levslat. Winnifred could only blubber in defense. He was trying
to rape her on the slat, his little bone prodding her spread flesh,
seeking entrance.

Chubby hands kneaded her around like a wet
towel, but soon the attempts faltered. Any orifice he sought to
invade proved too slack for coital purchase. Instead, he panted,
laughing, and masturbated. Winnifred could only slog upon the
slat.

Besser squeezed her head again. Her eyeballs
popped out, suspended by nerves. “Here’s some fat for you,” he
announced. He ejaculated massively into her squashed face.

Winnifred’s dreams of godhood pulsed away as
quickly. Besser dragged her down the pass, opened a hatch, and then
was stuffing her into one of the dropchutes. Winnifred wailed in
blubbering squeals. She flopped in resistance but to no use, oozing
into the chutehatch like warm porridge.

“
Goodbye, Winnie.” Besser
smiled and pulled the releaserod. Immediately, she fell. Just
minutes ago she’d wondered how deep the labyrinth was—now she was
finding out. She tumbled sloppily straight down. For minutes?
Hours? She didn’t know. Through the labyrinth’s bowels she
descended, down and down…

The dropchute emptied into a
slime walled hold. Winnifred dumped out onto the floorwall,
landing in a pile of excrement. She churned. Ten stout holotypes
surrounded her, flexing upward on corded limbs. Plump tongues fell
out of slatted mouths, and their erections, long as human arms,
were more proof than she’d ever need of their arousal. Here,
finally, were the cavemen of her fantasies. She floundered in the
midst of them—a relief package from the gods—as they hurried to
line up for this obvious and ultimate outrage: an alien gang
bang.

When they were finished, they ate her.

««—»»

From the basement utility room, Jervis sent
the elevator to the sixth floor. Then he shorted the terminals and
bypassed the control relay. Now the elevator was stranded.

I’m being creative,
he thought. He walked up to the fourth floor,
carrying under one arm five county manhole covers. They weighed
eighty pounds apiece. On four, he forced open the elevator door and
looked down. Then he smiled.

He was grateful Czanek had
gotten the address.
Here it is.
He dropped the manhole covers all at once. The
floor shuddered.

He rang the doorbell.

“
Vas?
Sarah?”

“
Meter man,” Jervis
said.

“
Zählerableser?”
The door opened a crack. “Zerr ist no
meter.”

Jervis grinned. “Hi, Wilhelm.”

Wilhelm’s handsome face
pinched.
“Vas ist…?
You!”

Jervis smacked the door
open. Enraged, Wilhelm stepped back. He wore a black robe with
a
Das Reich
emblem
on the breast.

“
Vut do you
vahnt?”

“
Revenge—no, cosmogenic
justice,” Jervis corrected.

Wilhelm laughed. “You vahnt
to fight me,
Arschkipf?”

“
You took what was mine.
Let’s just say that compensation is in order.”

“
Ich pisse dir gleich ans
Bein.”
Wilhelm produced a pistol.
A Luger,
Jervis
noted.
Why am I not surprised?
Did the guy carry guns around in his robe? Wilhelm
cocked the parabellum slide. “Get out or I vill blow you guts up
all over zah valls. Out!
Schnell!”

Was he bluffing? Perhaps a little
provocation would tell. “Say, your father surrendered to the
Russians, didn’t he?”

“
Schwein!
Mein fah zer vas unt war hero! He vun zah
Knight’s Cross mitt oak leaf clusters at
Sevastopol!”

“
I don’t care if he won the
Popsicle stick cross with cock rings at Fire Island. He was a
Nazi coward. He sucked Himmler’s balls, and your mama fucked
Russians for free.”

That was all it took. Some guys just
couldn’t take a joke. Wilhelm fired a volley of shots. The 9mm
bullets stitched a line across Jervis’ chest, punching smoking
holes.

Jervis fell down and calmly got back up.
“You’re going to have to do a lot better than that, pal.”

Seeing sheer terror congeal on the face of
this Aryan pillar of muscle brought delight to Jervis’ heart.
Wilhelm fled to the bedroom to a closet. Jervis followed him
in.

In the closet hung SS banners, regimental
standards, and a Nazi state flag. There was also a glass case full
of iron crosses and NSDAP pins. Wilhelm unwrapped a ceremonial SS
dagger.

“
That’s what I call a
closet Nazi,” Jervis quipped. He smiled at his opponent’s antics.
“What are you doing?”

Wilhelm gripped the dagger,
shouted,
“Aufgeben? Nein!”
and lunged. The blade sunk hilt deep into
Jervis’ stomach.

“
Take zat!”

Jervis tsked, standing tall. He withdrew the
dagger and opened his shirt. Wilhelm stared at the bloodless slit
and bullet holes.

“
Gott int Himmel,”
he muttered.

A fast backhand sent the German flying
across the room. His robe had come apart, showing a limp Teutonic
penis. Jervis noted with some despair that Wilhelm’s member was
bigger soft than Jervis’ was hard. He seriously considered cutting
it off with the dagger, but that seemed petty. Even an asshole like
Wilhelm didn’t deserve to have his dick cut off.

Jervis shrugged. He cut it off anyway.
Wilhelm’s deep shuddering scream sounded like a truck motor in high
gear.

Jervis held it up for his foe to see.

“
Arrrgh!”
Wilhelm bellowed, convulsing.
“Mein schlong!”

Jervis smiled brighter than a thousand suns.
The act was a symbol; he’d evened the score for all the guys in the
world who had lost their loves to a bigger penis. “See how many
girlfriends you steal now, buddy boy.”

Wilhelm kicked away, his screams
downshifting to wavering groans. He managed to get up, which Jervis
found admirable. It took a man of some resilience to stand up so
quickly after having his penis removed with an SS dagger.

“
Run,” Jervis
advised.

Hand to bloody crotch, Wilhelm staggered
out. Jervis lit a Carlton and took a deep, satisfying drag. Smoke
eddied up through the holes in his chest. He heard the German
stumble out.

Then, as predicted, came the long descending
“Woooooeeee!”

Thump!

Jervis meandered to the hall and looked down
the elevator shaft. Sure enough, there lay Wilhelm at the bottom,
broken, twisted, but—thankfully—still alive.

“
Now we’re going to play a
game,” Jervis called down. “And the name of the game is America
Bombs the Fatherland.”

Wilhelm whined, pleading up the shaft for
mercy. Jervis released the first manhole cover. It banged to the
bottom but missed.

“
Damn, I guess I better
adjust my Norden bombsight, huh?” Jervis let the second manhole
cover go. Its edge caught Wilhelm across the knees. Wilhelm
roared.

“
Good,” Jervis approved,
“but not good enough.” The third cover floated down almost
dreamily. Wilhelm’s bulged eyes watched it descend.
“Nein, nein, nein,
” he
moaned.

The eighty pound manhole cover landed
square across Wilhelm’s stomach. Wilhelm’s entire GI tract exploded
out his mouth.

“
Direct hit!” Jervis
celebrated. For posterity, he dropped a fourth cover, which
flattened Wilhelm’s head.

««—»»

Wade slunk into his dorm room, locked the
door. Finding Lydia was his priority, but he couldn’t very well
search for her on an eighth of a tank of gas. His wallet was empty,
and his only remaining cash was at the dorm. But now…

What was it?

He set Lydia’s .357 on the
bed. He scratched his head, looked absently out the window.
Normal out there, everything’s normal.
He got an Adams out of the fridge. It tasted good,
it tasted
normal
But still…

Then he realized what it was. He had that
proverbial feeling that he was being watched.

“
You’re probably wondering
why you feel like you’re being watched,” came the voice of Tom
McGuire.

Wade dropped his beer.

Tom’s severed head had been placed atop
Wade’s stereo. The gray face grinned. “What’s up, buddy?”

“
Give me a fucking break!”
Wade appreciably exclaimed. He asked the first logical question.
“How did you get here? You obviously didn’t walk!”