Edward Lee - Slither

"Twenty-foot-long snakes!" she added hysterically. She dragged herself up, her unknotted T-shirt swaying. Slydes eyed the large unbra'd breasts tossing beneath…

She seemed desperate, searching the deck. "Holy fuck, is there anything to drink on this tub?"

Slydes pointed a serious finger. "Watch what you call my boat, girl."

"I'm dying of thirst!" she bawled some more. "I was burning up in those fucking woods today."

"Why didn't you just come back to the boat?"

Her tense face glared at him. "I was hiding from the zombie!"

Slydes could only nod through another smile. "There's still a few beers downstairs-"

"I don't want beer, I want water!"

"Well, there ain't no water, unless you wanna drink the Gulf of Mexico."

She thumped belowdecks, then resurfaced, chugging half a beer in one pull. Her face blanched, she looked cross-eyed; then she threw up over the side. "Fuck!"

Slydes was not too sick to object. "Don't you be puking up perfectly good beer! I got a mind to bitch-slap you. What's wrong with you?"

"Shit, I'm sick…" Less than ladylike, she spat more bile off the deck with a retching sound worthy of a longshoreman.

Sick, Slydes thought. He scratched his beard. "Did you find any bugs on you?"

Ruth snapped a glare. "Bugs?"

"Yeah, piss-yellow little things, with red spots. Like ticks or beetles, but soft."

"No!" she barked back. "I told you I got attacked by worms! Same color as that one that landed on my arm last night-only fuckin' huge!"

When she bent over the stanchion again, Slydes couldn't help but notice she wore nothing but the fluorescent-pink T-shirt. 'Your bare ass is showin', girl. Where's your shorts?"

That big guy ripped them off!"

"What big guy?"

She bellowed at the top of her lungs, "The zombie! The zombie that almost raped me! And I think he wanted the snakes to rape me too! He laid me out naked in the woods last night when I was passed out-"

Sooner or later the drugs burn your brain, Slydes thought. That's why he stuck to beer. Jonas must've tricked up some of his reefer, he deduced. "I'm tired of looking at your brown-eye. Go put some pants on."

She huddled back down. "I don't have any more! The zombie took them!" Then she cradled her stomach and began to rock.

A thought more serious snapped into Slydes's mind. A big guy. A big zombie. Slydes didn't believe in such tripe, but he did believe in drug-induced hallucinations.

What if this "zombie" of hers was a real person?

One of them photographers…

His tone grated with import. "Hey, girl. When you were out running around in the woods, did anyone see you?"

"The zombie saw me!" she continued to shriek.

"Yeah, yeah-the zombie-I know. But I mean anyone else, like maybe one of those photographers?"

She groaned, shaking her head back and forth. "Holy fuckin' shit-I feel bad…"

"Go belowdecks and get some sleep," Slydes told her. "You're all fucked up. Sleep it off. When Jonas gets back, we'll be going home."

"Oh, good, good," she continued to sob. "I just want to go fuckin' home…"

Breasts swaying beneath the T-shirt, she dragged herself up again, and thunked downstairs.

Crazier than a shit-house rat, Slydes thought. If she didn't have that dandy mouth with the lips all puffed up from that plastic surgeon she'd been shacked up with, Slydes knew he wouldn't be quite so quick about keeping her around.

He wondered if he was feeling a little better himself, then convinced himself he was. But something else nicked at the back of his mind, now that he thought of it. Just before Ruth had gone downstairs…

The chick was in good shape, he'd give her that. Those big implants sticking out like grapefruits and nary a trace of fat on her body.

Slydes scratched his beard again, perplexed as the sound of peepers rose from the woods.

Had it been his imagination, or was Ruth's belly starting to look a little swollen?

(I)

Campfire light shifted on their faces. Nora had dragged the pot off the coals to serve directly, and by now the four of them sat back in the sand, stuffed.

"That's the best lobster I've ever had in my life," Lieutenant Trent proclaimed. Empty shells formed a pile of bright red debris in front of him. "To hell with the C rations."

"Yeah, Nora, they really were good," Loren said, occluding a burp with his fist.

Nora felt stuffed herself. "Freshness is everything."

The only one not to compliment the night's cuisine was Annabelle. Still in her bikini, she sat in a lotus position finicking with a plump tail. "How come these lobsters don't have claws?" she seemed to complain.

"These are spiny lobsters," Nora answered. "Ah, let's see-Panulirus…"

"Panulirus argus, " Loren finished.

"Warm-watered species don't have claws. In fact, most of the world's commercially harvested lobsters are clawless. The meat's all in the tail."

Loren slipped a tube of white meat from his last lobster. "And that's what I call a piece of tail."

"Hilarious," Nora said. She'd also thrown some stone crabs and sunray clams into the pot, all of which were readily devoured.

"You think we could have this again tomorrow night, Professor?" Trent asked.

Annabelle, as might be expected, frowned.

Nora sighed at the weary title. "Sure, and please stop calling me Professor, okay?"

"Why? You earned it. Must've been a lot of hard work."

"Yeah," she admitted, "but it's just the word that bothers me. Professor. Every time I hear it, I think of that guy on Gilligan's Island. Just call me Nora."

Trent and Loren laughed.

"There's still one more." Nora indicated the pot. She tonged out the last of the crustaceans. "I'm too full to even look at it."

Annabelle grabbed the lobster. "I don't usually make a pig of myself, but…" She smiled, sitting erect in an obvious pose that highlighted her roll-free stomach. "I live on Atkins. No crrbs, keeps me brimming with energy."

Keeps you brimming with pretentiousness, Nora interpreted. Why don't you eat my shorts, too? They're low-carb.

Loren and Trent were doing a bad job concealing their gaze at the blonde's body.

Jesus. Nora was just about to settle back in the sand when Annabelle screamed.

Trent and Loren went bug-eyed, and Nora lurched up as if stung. What the hell's she screaming about?

Annabelle had just broken the lobster open at the carapace, then flung it away in disgust. "Oh my God, that's so gross!"

"What?" Loren exclaimed, surging toward the blonde.

"Worms!" Annabelle shrieked.

Worms? Nora moved around the fire as Loren picked up the opened shell. She could see in the firelight-the lobster meat seemed pink and squirming.

Instead of disgust, Loren's face registered excitement. "Aha! Looks like we've got a decapod-targeting parasitic marine annelid."

Annabelle was shaking, she was so repelled. She looked like she was about to be sick in the fire. "It's a bunch of fucking worms in my lobster! Oh, Jesusthey look like dog-shit worms!"

There was an image Nora didn't need. Closer examination showed her a pack of the tiny worms churning within the red carapace.

"Most of them are dying," Loren noted.

"The cooking process," Nora said. But something bothered her. "But the worms closer to the center are still kicking. They don't look right for a nonsegmented parasite, do they?"

Loren agreed. "The hydroskeletons are all wrong. And they don't look like Polychaetes, either, or anything gastropoda."

Annabelle's beautifully suntanned face looked sapped of all color. When the silence settled, she looked dismayed at Loren and Nora as they continued to examine the nest of tiny parasites.

"I could've eaten those disgusting things," the blonde complained. "Are they poisonous?"