Dragon

[DerVVulfman]

Chapter Fourteen
In the Bedroom

She didn’t get him once.

It was pretty comical.

Becky rushed at Hunt from twenty different angles, and he deflected her every time. What made it doubly comical was that Hunt kept grabbing her and throwing her harmlessly onto the bed with very little variation. She shot back up, he threw her down, she shot back up, he threw her down. After the thirteenth failed attempt, Becky bursted out laughing, but she kept trying. And laughing. When the twentieth and final time was over, Hunt twirled her upside-down, flung her victoriously over his shoulder, Neanderthal-style, as she wriggled and kicked.

Hunt snarled at his helpless victim “Now will you EAT YOUR SPINACH?”, then threw her back onto the bed with finality. Then he threw himself onto the bed, landing like a human tiger overtop of the exhausted redhead.

“I am PATHETIC!” Becky realized, laughing still.

“Ain’t that the truth,” Hunt agreed. “Like I told you before, I’m very, very good at what I do. You can still be ad damn good SEAL, with the... skills you have...”

“Are you serious?” Becky asked, not noticing how dangerously close the sergeant was.

“Sure. We’ll just call you Private Flipper,” Then he shifted his weight and flopped face-up next to her, laughing like a maniac.

“Shut up!” she pounded his arm.

“Ah, don’t let it get you down. You’re not here for your martial-arts abilities. Plus, after your running down Deck 13 the other day, it’s probably for the best that we don’t teach you any weapons handling just yet.” He smiled and tilted his head to face her.

“No training with a flamethrower for me. Oh, joy.” she sighed.

“You’ve got the prettiest nose...”

“Shut up.”

“...and you’ve got a primo pair of eyes.” She frowned and twisted around and saw him gazing at her. “Y’wanna get frisky?”

“Kevin, c’mon,” Becky began. I knew I made a mistake having him here.

Hunt held up a finger. “No hedging. Yes or no, Fox. I respect directness.”

“No,” she said, a little too nervously. He could pin me if he wanted to.

“Okay, then,” Hunt grinned and let his head fall back onto the pillow. “Suit yourself,” he said as he stared at the ceiling. “I just thought you might want to have a little Fox-Hunt.”

“Cute, Kevin.”

“Address me as Sgt. Hunt,” he ordered, feigning annoyance. Suddenly his wrist-radio beeped, and a familiar voice spoke.

“Am I gonna see some action or what? This is boring,” Emerson complained.

As Becky shot up in bed in surprise, Hunt grabbed the radio. “Drop dead”, he answered back. “And turn your screen off.”

“Read a magazine!” Becky shouted back and threw a copy of Teen Beat at the camera. She collapsed onto the bed next to Hunt and both remained still for a time. She sighed “Even when I think I have some privacy, I don’t.”

Better not tell her I saw her naked, Hunt thought to himself. They half-turned, facing each other. There was an uncomfortable silence.

“Can he hear us?” Becky asked Hunt.

“Turn off the audio, Emerson,” the sergeant ordered. There was a click. “Nope.”

Becky wasn’t absolutely sure about Hunt’s trustworthiness, but she appreciated his current restraint. I just wish he answered the question about Julie.

“Kevin,” she said slowly. “I, um... the reason why I didn’t... well... want to...”

“Get frisky?” Hunt said.

“Yeah... I didn’t want to because... I, um... was raped once, and...”

Hunt’s face changed gradually. His smile vanished. His eyes moved to the wall, then the ceiling, not looking at her. “Oh, shit,” he said softly. “I’m sorry, Fox. I didn’t know.” He sat up and swung he legs off the bed. “When’d it happen?”

“A couple of years ago.” Becky was testing him for a reaction. He seemed natural, but she thought I should have my head examined for telling him this.

“Who did it?” Hunt asked. Becky couldn’t see he face, but she heard some tension in his voice.

“Some animal. It’s all right, Kevin. He’s--”

“Give me his name and phone number,” he demanded.

He’s putty, Becky thought as she smiled inwardly. “He’s dead, Kevin.”

Hunt faced her, and smiled like he’d never smiled before. “Well, ain’t that just too bad. How’d he die?”

“He was shot by a cop.”* Becky got off the bed and walked to the sink to get some water. Hunt’s manner reassured her greatly.

“Serves the @#$%ing bastard right, then. Jeez. No wonder you freaked when Fricker was harassing you.”

Becky thought about her reaction to Fricker, and gulped the last sip she got from the sink. She looked at herself in the mirror and swore to be in more control. And she didn’t want to be responsible for anymore injuries. Problem was...

“Kevin, what’s the next mission going to be?”

“I don’t know, Fox.”

“You’re just saying that.”

“I’m telling you I don’t know. The orders come from the General to Roberts to me. I never know until the mission starts. Which’ll be... two hours.”

“Roberts scares me,” said Becky. “He’s getting weirder every day.”

Hunt told her “Don’t be scared. Doc’s all right. Just a little messed up. He’s under a lot of pressure. He may seem like a callous guy with ice-water for blood, but deep down he likes you.”

He’s under a lot of pressure? Becky thought skeptically. “I’m nothing but a weapon to him. A tool for killing. I hate him.”

Hunt motioned an arm around him. “He got you these quarters, didn’t he? Three days ago, you thought I was the Antichrist, and now we’re practically lovers.” With her back to him, Hunt couldn’t see Becky blush uncomfortably. Instead, he scanned the room, and caught a glimpse of the Roy Schieder video collection. “Hey, Fox, wanna watch Blue Thunder?”

“Hey, Hunt, would it kill you to call me Becky?”

“Can’t do it, Fox. It’s called professionalism. Of course, if you want to get frisky...”

“Nah. I’d rather watch Blue Thunder.” She sat down in front of the television.

“Me, too. Not only is it just under two hours, it’s been a major VSO training film since ‘88.”

? ? ?

“YOU BONEHEADS!” shouted Lizzie.

“Eat my shorts, Blondie!” replied Rabikes from behind bars. “I’m being unjustly persecuted for a crime I didn’t commit! I never tried anything on HER!”

“Pardy shouted simultaneously, “Who are you calling a bonehead, you bimbo! I shot her FIVE TIMES, and she kept on running! Next time I’ll use real bullets--” Pardy was also locked in a cell. The one next to Chris’.

Moulty’s arguing overlapped with Chris’s and Pardy’s. “Diddle-diddle-ditt-ditt-ditt-ditt-DITT-DITT-diddle-diddle-diddle! DIDDLE-DIDDLE-DIDDLE!” He was doubly-locked-- once in a birdcage (the door stuck shut with a spoon), and twice in the cell itself. The three prisoners bickered all at once.

“ONE AT A TIME!!” David Furfy shouted. He pointed at Pardy. “You first. Why the heck did they put YOU in jail?”

Please, thought Lizzie. Don’t let it be for...

“Assaulting at least sixteen police officers!” Pardy answered proudly.

Damn.

“They put me in here with these two after I punched two more for calling me a boy! They’re so stupid!”

“THEY’RE stupid!” Lizzie flared. “You fly on a Big Wheel 3,000 feet in the sky just so you can get arrested for felonious assault?!? Don’t I raise you right?”

“No!” Pardy seethed contemptuously.

“Lizzie, Becky was running!” Chris stressed. “I saw her in the courthouse, I called her name and she ran like a bunny-rabbit! It doesn’t make any sense!”

Looking hard at Rabikes, Lizzie said, “Considering it was you, I think Becky’s reaction was about the sanest thing that happened all day!”

Furfy smirked. “I was gonna say that.”

“We did the best we could!” chirped Moulty. “That crazy dame be jumpin’ through fire! Makin’ whole walls of it! I tried to grab her!”

Lizzie sighed and tried to sound contrite. “I know you tried, Moulty, but it’s not you I’m mad at. You’re a bubble-headed booby, you don’t know any better. Besides, you’re accident-prone. Besides, you’re not human. Why am I even TALKING to you? YOU’RE JUST A BIRD! IT’S THESE TWO HUMANS I WANT TO--”

Chris banged his cell bars. “LIZZIE, LISTEN! She’s talking, too!”

“What are you talking about?” she asked him.

“Becky-- is-- talking,” Rabikes repeated. “I heard her voice. And she’s using her power-- which means she can CONTROL it.”

Lizzie considered that point. “That’s... wonderful, but... why’d she run?”

“SHE’S AN ASSASSIN, YOU NITWIT!!” Pardy shouted at the top of her lungs. “DO I HAVE TO SPELL IT OUT FOR YOU? A- S- S--”

“OH, LET’S NOT GO THROUGH THIS AGAIN, PARDY! YOU THINK EVERYONE’S AN ASSASSIN!”

“Becky is NOT an ASSASSIN!” shouted Furfy.

“I demand to SEE the GOVERNOR!” insisted Moulty, pounding the spoon with no success. “My seed’s gettin’ stale! Nobody’s changing the water!”

“Lizzie, don’t believe anything the cops say!” Rabikes said. “They think I’m some kind of floating, one-eyed sex deviant! I’m innocent!”

Lizzie turned away and sighed. “That’s too easy. I’m not even gonna comment on that.”

David was exasperated. “We’re here to bail them out. Can we just bail them out? Can ANY of you agree on ANYTHING?”

Pardy held the bars, eyeing Furfy. “I knew you’d come. Get ‘em to let us the hell out.” She was smitten the first time she saw him. If only the blast that forced his retirement from the bomb squad could have made him look worse, she could love him even more.

A frustrated Furfy walked off to explain things to the jail officer.

“Pardy, he’s taken,” Lizzie told her. “Forget about it. He’s too old-- for you.”

“Aw, come on, Ho-Ho! Why should Becky have dibs on the roughest guys? He’s older than Becky, too! She’s taken and she’s not coming back! We don’t need her burning up the place--”

“I don’t think he can believe Becky’s a mutant... much less an assass...” Rabikes began to say, but was cut off by Lizzie’s glare. “People, can we all just try to get along for his sake? Please?”

“Can you keep your doohicky zipped?” Lizzie challenged before she walked off to find the nearest payphone.

“Word of honor. God, I hope this doesn’t go to trial.”

“It will,” Furfy said as he returned with an officer, “but the bird and the kid are exonerated. We can all go.”

“Oh, swell. Thanks, Dave.” Chris winced. With the turn of a key, each prisoner was released. Pardy, being the last stuck her tongue out at the officer who was still nursing the black eye she gave him.

“I can’t believe that girl’s turned on by this,” Furfy said, pointing at his own face. “You know, Becky said to me... after the explosion... she didn’t care about the scares. She told me she didn’t care if I had a face at all. She’d love me anyway, no matter what.” Rabikes smiled, nodding. “That is the most --”

Lizzie sprinted up to them. She just notified Diamond on the phone. Now they had another problem. “Fred’s disappeared. He never got back home. It’s been too long.”

“Great!” Rabikes cursed. “Now we’ve got two mutants missing.”