“Marion,” she said.
“Marion. I’d been meaning to ask you what your first name was.”
“You’re Phil?” she said, staring him down.
She’s drunk. And I’m on watch. Perfect.
“Yeah. Call me Reyes.”
“I think I like Phil,” she said.
“Okay,” he said and paused before continuing. “Hey, why aren’t you out causing trouble? Not that I’m complaining.”
Marion smiled and leaned up against the bulkhead just under the CIWS. The moon lit her beautifully.
“I thought I might come back here and cause some trouble of my own,” she said.
He felt his cock squirm, like a puppy trying to find its way out from under a blanket and for the first time that night, he was warm all over. Maybe he could retire that sock and follow her off the brow tomorrow after work.
“Aren’t you cold?” he said.
She was. He could see her nipples poking, hard as rocks, through the bra and thin tank top she wore. He saw gooseflesh prickling at her skin. She didn’t answer, but ran her hands up and down her own arms in a self-hug. He heard her let out a quiet moan as she did. Reyes didn’t say anything, just stared at her. She stared back, and for a moment that stretched almost long enough to be uncomfortable. It was the radio that interrupted them, the battery in the radio to be more specific. It squawked and beeped.
“Time to check in?” she said.
“Um, no. I checked in fifteen minutes ago. Just need a new battery.”
“Oh?” she said.
He nodded. It would beep every thirty seconds or so as a gentle reminder. Reyes kept watching her, taking her in, trying to reacquire that silent stare where nothing else existed. He didn’t know what else to do.
Her expression changed from a sultry look, eyes half mast, lips in a quivering smile, to wide-eyed bewilderment. Reyes shifted from one leg to the other, then switched the rifle sling to his opposite shoulder. Marion stood up straight and stepped close to him, close enough he could feel her breath on his face as she spoke. Sweet, minty breath tinged with liquor and cigarette smoke.
“Are you going to kiss me or not?” she said and reached a hand around him to the radio, turning the volume down until it clicked. The beeping stopped.
“What?”
“I know you think about me,” she said.
“You do?”
“I know you fantasize about me.”
He took a half step back as she pushed her body against his, but grabbed the small of her back and held her close to him. The puppy was still searching for a way out from under that blanket and Marion knew it. She cupped him and squeezed gently while she leaned in and up to kiss him. Her lips were cold, but soft and her tongue tasted sweet like candy. He groped her ass, pulling her as close as he could, feeling her breasts against his chest and her thigh pressed against his hard on.
The kiss lasted a full minute, groping and feeling, tongues and lips smacking. His rifle sling sliding down to the crook of his elbow and almost bouncing the stock on the deck, but he caught it in time and pushed her against the gray, metal bulkhead again, pressing against her while she bucked her hips, grinding and dry humping and squeezing his ass. Then, she pushed him away, breathing heavy and watching him like a hungry animal that had just found a meal. She smiled—a wicked thing, full of dirty promises. He looked around.
He’d heard of things like this happening. In those tales, it was the married sailors, the ones with some experience on the ship who paired up out of understanding. Once the ship’s whistle told the world they were underway, the couples formed. Any chance encounter, any alone time was taken advantage of, and it didn’t matter where or what time of day it was. Then as the ship came back toward home, the couples started to split, a weaning process that took a few weeks. He’d seen it happen, even on short underways, but it had never happened to him until that moment. So fast. So hard. So unexpected. So like one of those stories in the filthy magazines and movies the boys in berthing called training material.
Still, he was on watch. At a normal job, when you got caught fucking a coworker at the office, there were consequences. Maybe you’d even get fired. If he got caught with his tongue in her mouth while he was standing the post with that weapon slung on his shoulder, there would be hell to pay. All the chiefs screaming at him, then the XO, then the skipper followed by loss of rank, loss of pay, loss of liberty. The worst though, might be explaining to his brother. Kyle would laugh, and ask him if she was a freak in the sack, then he would chew his ass. He didn’t need any of that. He and Marion weren’t at that point yet, but she felt as ready as any of those girls in high school, as ready as any of the one night stands back in home port San Diego. No, they weren’t in the full swing just yet, but it didn’t matter.
“We can’t do this here. Not now,” he said.
“We can go somewhere else,” she said. “Anywhere. You’re on roving watch…take a ten minute break.”
The thought was tempting, more tempting than anything. She was dangling the most delicious food in front of his nose and he was starving.
“It’ll be quick, Phil Reyes. I can feel that,” she said, giving his swollen member a squeeze.
There was a glint in her eye, something he hadn’t noticed before. A red speck of light. A reflection maybe, or was she just that hot?
“Quick tonight, then tomorrow night, you come out with me and we’ll take our time.”
She kissed him again and he was done. Captain’s mast be damned. Kyle be damned. The chiefs would give him hell, but only because most of them were jealous that he was with her, and he could live with that. And that was only if they got caught. He wouldn’t get caught.
He had ten minutes before he needed to check in with the quarterdeck, then thirty minutes before he had to check in again. His mind raced. This woman, the one he’d wanted since she’d arrived was ready to go. He’d requested permission to come aboard and she was saluting and saying, board me, board me. If by some reason this was alcohol or drug induced lust, he didn’t want to miss out. “I need a battery. I’ll check in while I’m up there and then we can meet somewhere.”
“The bridge,” she said.
“What?”
“Meet me on the bridge.”
“The watch officer is up there,” he said.
“Don’t worry about that.”
She kissed him on the end of his nose and gave his puppy another squeeze. Then she dashed off into the darkness and disappeared.
*****
Reyes stood there for a moment, collecting his thoughts. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and then with his sleeve and adjusted the swollen thing in his pants so it wasn’t so obvious before climbing the ladder down to the quarterdeck. “Battery’s dead. Do you have another one in there?” he asked the Officer of the Deck.
“In the shack,” said the OOD, a snooty ensign named Branson. “Are you checking in?”
“Yes sir, since I’m here.”
“I have you checked in at 0314. Go rove. Don’t just hide on the missile deck.”
“Yes sir,” Reyes said.
He crossed amidships and climbed the ladder to the O2 level, then O3, and finally the ladder to the bridge and walked inside. There should’ve been another watch in there, Chief Intelligence Specialist Collins or ISC was on the watch bill, but the room was empty. He walked out on the port bridge wing. Empty. Starboard bridge wing. Empty. Marion had kept one promise, now to see about the other one.
“Hello?” he said.
It was a hollow sound. It was a hollow feeling, and the cold seeped back slowly into his bones. He touched the ship’s wheel and looked out through the glass at the forecastle and the five inch gun, then he approached the Captain’s chair and pulled himself up and took a seat. He was surprised at how comfortable it was. He’d decided there wasn’t a truly comfortable spot on the whole ship, but that chair wasn’t too bad. It wasn’t too bad at all. Not until the cold fingers wrapped around hi
s eyes and warm breath tickled his ear. Reyes jumped, almost sliding off of the slick vinyl.
“Marion?”
“Lucky for you, sailor. I could’ve been anyone. I could’ve been the captain. What do you think he’d do if he found you in his chair?” she said.
“Don’t know.”
“I know what I’d do,” she said and let go of his eyes.
“What’s that?” he asked, turning to face her.
She was nude, and she was climbing up on the chair to straddle him. He started to protest, but her lips found his and pressed tightly against them. Her tongue darted and tasted the inside of his mouth and his hands felt her lithe body. She slid the weapon from his shoulder and hung it across the arm of the chair, then she fumbled for his web belt, then his zipper, then his underwear, and then she was mounted on top of him. He watched her, beautiful in the moonlight. She was a mermaid, perhaps, or a siren from mythology, he thought.
The penalty for getting caught sitting in the skipper’s chair could be nowhere near as great as getting caught fucking in the skipper’s chair—fucking anywhere on board for that matter, but she was so confident, so dominant, and he was all in. Permission to come aboard, ma’am? Permission granted, Phillip Reyes. Ride my wave until it hits the beach, bro. Spectacles, testicles, watch and wallet. They can all come aboard.
He felt the rush of building pleasure as the climax boiled, almost to the point of no return. Eyes closed, he grabbed her hips and thrust her down harder and harder, gripping handfuls of her buttocks, definitely not navy issue, then one of his hands found her breast and squeezed. He rocked and the captain’s chair squeaked. She was driving herself down, harder each time, grunting and right as Reyes was about to give in and let all his little sailors abandon ship, he felt something wet as his thumb popped through the skin of her breast.
His fingers, gripping her ass cheek popped through as well. They popped through her flesh like he’d been squeezing bad places on a piece of fruit. Eyes open and completely startled, he’d forgotten all about the little sailors, all about the Penthouse Letters sex he was having, all about the shitstorm of discipline he was in for if he got caught, if she got caught. He forgot about standing his post and his duty to the United States. Instead, he saw black ooze trickling out of her wounded breast, felt it on his hand as he released her buttock, saw the same black, viscous fluid soaking his pants, his shirt tail, and his penis as it slid in and out of the corpse’s vagina. In the moonlight, Reyes saw her face was pale, bluish in the low lights and her eyes were glazed over and milky. He smelled the bitter, gag-inducing stench of death. It was QM2 King—Marion, as he just found out—but she was dead and already rotten on top of him.
He heard a toilet flush and a door creak open behind him. There was a head in the bridge. The watch officer, Chief Collins had been taking a dump. He must’ve heard. How could he not have heard? But he hadn’t, or he would’ve pinched it off and been out here sooner. Reyes stared into those milky dead eyes for another second, only a second. Sirens lead sailors to their deaths.
How long have I been here?
Red lights came on, washing over everything and turning those milky eyes pink, the black ooze coming out of her got blacker. The stench grew, crawling over him like a colony of ants.
“Holy shit,” Chief Collins said.
It was an angry whisper. Reyes looked at the mess around him, looked at the mess in his lap. He was still erect, still inside her dead body. It was all hazy to him—a dream he hoped he would wake from soon.
“What in the unholy fuck is going on in here? FC3? What the fuck did you do?” Chief Collins shouted from behind him.
White lights flickered on. That was a no-no according to the rulebook. White light travels farther than red and can give you away. It’s not a big deal pier side, but we used red lights on the bridge almost all the time. Reyes shoved the thing that was Marion King off of him and it crumpled against the console leaving a thick, burgundy smear in the white light as it slid off his lap and onto the deck. He stood up and grabbed his M-14 rifle, unable to speak.
“Reyes, what happened? Who is that? What did you do?” Chief Collins said.
His voice cracked with disbelief, with tears. The man was blinking, and he was crying. His eyes were filled with rage and disbelief. Reyes had no answer and only stood there with his pants around his ankles and his gore stained erection. Collins pulled his weapon, a 9mm pistol and pointed it at Phillip Reyes, Fire Controlman 3rd class, almost Surface Warfare qualified.
“Drop that fucking rifle, son. Drop it right now and pull up your goddamned pants.”
Reyes didn’t drop the weapon. He raised it. He raised it and fired before Collins could issue a second warning. The side of the Chief’s face exploded onto the wall in the back of the bridge and his body collapsed into a twitching pile. Reyes fired another shot into his chest, finishing the job. Reyes’s radio beeped.
“Bridge, Quarterdeck. What was that?”
A moment later, “Topside, Quarterdeck. That sounded like gunfire. Bridge?”
There were sounds of shuffling papers as the quarterdeck watch checked the three-ringed binder of laminated regulations. The Petty Officer of the Watch in his nervousness had held the transmit button on his radio and Reyes heard everything.
“Holy shit, sir. Was that gunfire? What do I do?”
“Security alert. Call it away. I’ll contact the CDO. Shit, we’ll have to call the captain. Was it gunfire?” the snooty ensign said, sounding less cocky and more like a frightened ten-year-old.
As the bells sounded from the quarterdeck, and the announcement was made that there was a security alert on board, Reyes turned the rifle on himself. He looked with tear-filled eyes at Chief Collins, then at the corpse of Marion King and then crossed himself.
Spectacles, testicles, watch and wallet.
Bang.
MY NAME WAS JOHN
We had grown weary. The hunt dragged on days longer than initially planned, but there was a twelve-pointer I was stalking, and my friend Todd was good enough to stick with me, even after the beer ran out. We had food. Energy bars and a few smaller kills that we cooked over the campfire, plenty of water and coffee, but no trophy. We wanted the trophy.
My feet and fingers were numb when I woke up that morning. I longed for a hot shower and a real mattress. I watched Todd’s breath steaming from his nostrils as he slept. My name was John.
I worried about our supply of water freezing as the nights grew colder, but found it was still mostly liquid and took a drink to rinse the foul taste of a night’s sleep from my mouth. I shook Todd to rouse him.
“Get up,” I said.
He groaned.
“You ready to pack it in?” I asked.
“Nope,” he said, sitting and then stuffing a wad of Skoal in his lip.
I popped open a pack of breakfast bars and started on some coffee. He unzipped the tent and stepped outside, stretching. I pulled out two packs of a chemical hand warmer and crushed them, placing them over my icy toes and felt the warmth rush through my body. Todd left the tent and I heard him outside taking a piss. “Can’t you do that somewhere away from the tent? I hope you’re at least aiming downhill,” I said.
Todd laughed and I pictured the satisfied look on his face. He lived to annoy me. We’d been like brothers for nearing thirty years, just like our fathers before us. We even married a pair of best friends, and our families were close. Our children would grow up together, and if all was right with the world, so would their children.
I finished pulling on my last set of clean underwear and socks, laced up my boots and went outside to start the campfire and make breakfast. I saw Todd, standing mouth open and pointing. He hadn’t even zipped. His face was at once a picture of shock, and then his lip curled into a mischievous smile. I followed his gaze.
The twelve-pointer stood some fifteen yards down the hillside, chewing on greenery and looking about its surroundings. Either it hadn’t yet sensed us, or i
t just didn’t care. I was doubly mad at my partner for pissing on the ground. Triple mad because I’d never get to my bow before the magnificent specimen caught our scent, or the noise of a twig breaking under my boot caused it to bolt. Todd zipped up, never taking his eyes from our target. I could see the gears turning as he worked out some plan in his head.
I managed to get to the tent and grab my compound bow without startling the buck. It was going to be my morning. The animal shuddered, raising its head, eyes wild in anticipation, but it didn’t run. Its nostrils flared and its ears twisted like mini radar dishes, searching for us as I drew my arrow back. I steadied my breathing and sighted, then corrected. Just as I was about to let it fly, the deer turned and ran—not away from us, but toward. Its hooves thundered on the hard soil and leaves kicked into the air as it came.
“What the hell?” Todd said.
The deer took two mighty leaps over the brush and leaves, and had already cleared most of the distance between us when something enormous hit it from the side like a middle linebacker. It knocked the air from the buck’s lungs and I heard the animal wheezing as it tried to catch its breath. The other creature, a black-furred thing, sunk its teeth into the deer’s long neck, twisting its own and tearing a bloody hole in the flesh. Dazed, I spotted a second beast as it appeared next to a tree just beyond where the buck had been standing. It roared–or maybe screamed is more accurate–a deep throaty noise that shook my internal organs.
Is that a bear?
It had the length and coloration of a bear, but not the girth. It wasn’t a wolf. There was only one other thing I could think of, but Todd beat me to it.
“Fucking Sasquatch,” he said.
He ducked in and out of the tent, grabbing his rifle. He flipped the safety, loaded the chamber and leveled the weapon at the feeding animal in one swift motion. The sound of the bullet ripped through the morning air, echoing off of distant hills and rock outcroppings. The monster fell over top of the dead twelve-pointer and twitched. The second creature–startled– halted for just a moment before it ran, howling in that ape-like voice, breaking limbs as it went. It was gone in a flash and we had no hope of shooting it or catching up. Its long legs loped easily through the woods and in seconds, it was far enough away that I no longer heard its footfalls.