Beamo’s Gold part 29

Beamo and Little Bit take care of business.

“Is it true?” she asked. “Could they just be a couple of MA renegades hanging out and these square-heads are spouting make-believe stories to freak foreigners out?”

“No, don’t think so. It explains too much. Of course, the combined Zark and Aplash army right behind us won’t be anywhere near the Zark county nations when General Wound attacks. Our Heartland is in real trouble. All the gold in the Kosmos is going to be worthless if they overrun the Zarks.”

“First thing is we got to dispose of these two douchebags we just hired.” Little Bit didn’t hesitate. “Follow my lead.”

She released her lustrous hair from her ponytail then kick-started her cycle. I nodded then pushed my cycle behind her. When we got to the back, Little Bit had our cycle tanks filled and bought some other supplies like dried provisions and road flares. Then we oversaw the two ruffians fill the go-juice into the portable tank mounted on a trailer. They hauled it away with their six-wheeled diesel atvee. As they watched, Little Bit shook her hair and then took off.

I followed her for about twenty-five miles of slow progress back up the eastbound trail. I kept hanging back, trying to make out the chopper engine of that Mutant Angel who somehow owned those two Saints. I couldn’t hear anything through their noisy, smoky atvee bringing up our rear.

We got out of sight around a bend in the trail. It was just past the place we had had our argument. Little Bit led me up into a dry gulch. We halted and dismounted. Her face told a story about a sensitive soul who had to live in a harsh world.

“I changed my mind. I’ll let you take care of them.”  She cocked her two black .40 cal pistols and gave a slight smile.

“It’s a good decision. There are special healers like you and then there are specialists like me who do the opposite.” I walked around the little canyon. Not much vegetation but the chasm narrowed as it wound up into the dry hills. If necessary we could make a getaway up it if the sand wasn’t too fine around the next bend. The sunlight was getting faint and the noise from the Dezret diesel atvee was growing louder.

“We need to do this quiet,” I said. “We’re too close to Saint prospector work gangs mining these foothills.”

Thinking music turned on inside my head, a solo electriky bass guitar doing runs up and down the scale. I spotted a fat horned lizard scurrying over a boulder. There were about a dozen in easy catching distance in the sand. They gave me an idea. I caught the first one I saw. “Let me see your pig-sticker knife.”

Little Bit handed her long, narrow-bladed weapon to me. I squeezed the horned lizard and blood shot out of its eyes. The rolly-polly reptile wasn’t hurt; it could make blood jet out of its eyes any time it felt threatened. I set about catching all the others I could, smearing her knife and my neck with lizard blood.

Little Bit waved down the pair of Saint ruffians at the dry gulch entrance. The taller one driving halted then shut off the atvee with the loud diesel engine. The sudden silence came off as jarring as a surprise thunderclap. They both cautiously got out with their rifles and started towards her.

“I could use some help, boys!” Little Bit called out and shook her hair again.

“Where’s that insolent man you were with?” The lip sucker asked.

I was tucked down under the ledge of the shaded gulch wall. Started moaning and crying out for mercy, made bubbling noises like my throat had been partially slit. They spotted me and right off aimed their rifles my way.

“I got tired of him just doing his business in me like I wasn’t there.  He had nothing but lame moves, so I cut him.” Little Bit held up her blood-covered, pig-sticker knife. “Which ever one of you boys finishes him for me will get a special prize.”

“She looks ready and willing to get to fun!” the tall one shouted then threw down his beaver hat and took off his coypu vest. This irritated me because they hadn’t even tried to kill me yet. He wanted to do it with her in front of me before I was deceased!

“I want that fine Bowie knife he was packing too,” The lip sucker called dibs.

“One of you needs to finish him first. If you gots good love moves, I might even make you a partner in my girl-selling business. My only demand is that you finish him with a blade, not bullets.” Little Bit flicked opened the top button on her jeans.

“I want that fine Bowie knife too!” The lip sucker repeated then dropped his rifle.

They both sprinted. The taller partner dropped his rifle and rushed past him, coming for me with his big knife out. In sync with my battle music, I waited until just the right second to strike with my Bowie. I rolled out and sprang to a crouch, leaped forward and gashed with all my strength deep into his left leg right above the knee. Our combined momentums and my precise handling of the extreme sharp fourteen-inch blade left his lower leg hanging by just one ligament and a few flaps of muscle meat and sinew. He never got a swipe at me.

From the look in the shorter ruffian’s bugged-out eyes, I rose up like a bogle from a nightmare. I caught him in the right arm as he tried to bring his Bowie down from high over his head. This was a clean amputation and his knife flew out of his severed right forearm. His weapon took a long time to come down and finally hit the sand.

After a minute or two I got them secured. Little Bit put tourniquets on their wounded limbs. I collected branches, and she lit a small campfire with one of the road flares. Then she cauterized the stumps and treated them for shock.

They were making so much low-key ruckus, crying and whining like a pair of babies, that I almost didn’t catch the Mutant Angel sneaking up on us. The lipless, nose-less freak must have been hiding under the tarp of their atvee. I just stopped his short sword from splitting open my face and skull, the palms of both my hands pressing as hard as I could on the flat sides of his blade. He was strong as a kicking, biting mule and backed me up against the sunny side of the gulch.

Little Bit’s long pig-sticker blade slid out of his mouth like a metal tongue. Head wounds are funny. You never know how the target will react to major brain damage. In this case, he dropped his sword, flailed his arms, trying to circle around to get to his attacker. Little Bit looked like a puppet master, using both her hands to operate her giant puppet from behind until she yanked out her knife from his head-neck juncture. He spread his arms out like he was going to start flapping, convulsions waved through his entire body, and then he crumpled down to a squat and died sitting upright.

I was ready to comfort Little Bit. Wanted to tell her I knew she didn’t like killing, maybe bring up the goon she offed when they snatched Soosey last year, ask her if this was her second close-up kill. Gently remind her that I didn’t think it was right she was out here where murder happened too often. Instead of me getting to show my concern for her state of mind, she reached out and put her arms around my lizard blood and now human blood-covered neck, pulled herself up and gave me a hot kiss. Then she dropped to her knees, got my belt loosened and pulled down my pants. Started sucking on me with her soft, wet mouth.

After a while I pushed her head back and she stripped. She got us lined up and we started going at it like dogs in heat. Never had anyone watching me do it before but Little Bit didn’t seem to mind. The two Saint ruffians’ pain exhausted eyes widened through the show. We were doing it so close to the Mutant Angel corpse, I accidently kicked him right as we finished, and he slumped over.

After brushing the rocks away, I lay next to her sweaty, half naked body. She asked me, “Was that quiet enough?”

“Right up until just now.” I took some deep breaths. “That was foolhardy, Lytle. There could have been more of them coming up after us.”

“I wasn’t worried. I hope we didn’t hurt any of those horny toads; they’re cute.” She turned my head with her hands to look at her face. I resisted giving any more advice.

“You gonna eat us, aren’t you?” The one-legged ruffian started sobbing again. The shorter one missing an arm looked like he was going to say something to suck up, make himself seem friendlier than his partner, but he decided to stay quiet.

“It’s just a myth that Zark people are cannibals,” I said back. Well, mostly a myth. There were still some old school, backwoods long-pork eaters like Philindra, Bonehead’s gram. “You were going to waylay us and ravish the girls we claimed to have. We ought to leave you both tied up out here for the wolves.”

Little Bit turned my face to hers again. “Don’t ever give up on me.”

“I’m right here,” I said.