*
It took my bitch of a wife long enough to get knocked up
, Raymond Tillis thought as he brooded in his study. After trying time after time, Becky finally got pregnant with his heir. No matter, it is finally done and to hell with those damn doctors that said it couldn't be done. He was still pissed at Becky for keeping him waiting the other night and for not opening the door when he demanded, but he didn't dare lay a hand on her... not while she was now carrying his son that would take over after he was gone. Instead, he sent her away to her parents' house to stay for the next year under the close eye of her family and all of their doctors. She'd receive the best prenatal and postnatal care that money could buy and he could buy it ever since he inherited everything from his deceased mentor.
Fucking breeders
... he now thought at the memory of his fallenmentor, Spence. Raymond vowed that he'd find a way to bring them down or, at the very least, punish them for what they have done. In the year since being beaten by the Prime Creature's breeders, Raymond went to work systematically exterminating those minor Creatures that he could find while at the same time cultivating business contacts, investors and political protection. Even now there was a mission about to launch with another Creature on the hit list.
Raymond looked up at his chief of R&D, Edward Barents. As much as he would've liked to, Raymond couldn't think of the man as a doctor. One of Edward's doctorates in Genetic Engineering had been revoked as he had been caught in mutation experiments. He was just the type of man that Raymond wanted on his staff. "What can I do for you today, Ed? Did you find something new, I hope?"
"That, and then some," Edward said, smiling brightly behind his mirrored eyeglasses. The man was tall and willowy, in his mid- to late forties, with dark brown hair that was starting to go grey at the temples.
"So could we create any of those... things?" Raymond asked, looking up from his work.
Edward shook his head. "Sadly, no." He held up a hand to forestall Raymond as he saw his face reddening. "While we could essentially clone and grow our own, all that we have created are nothing more than empty shells. It would be great if we were breeders and we needed a transplant organ for an adult creature, but for us, it is useless for what you want to accomplish."
Raymond folded his hands in front of him and leaned forward, staring at Edward intently. "I hear a 'but' lingering in here."
"Indeed," Edward nodded. "In the year since you brought me the body of one of those creatures, we've found a way to actually electrically stimulate parts of its body. Remarkably enough, the different parts of their bodies, especially the tentacles, retained certain instinctive reactions."
"Instinctive reactions?" Raymond arched a bushy eyebrow.
"Yes. For instance, we found the portion of their brains that deal with its tentacle control." Edward let out an evil laugh. "You should've seen one of the tentacles shoot across the floor to dart up the skirt to one of my female interns. The tentacle had ripped through her panties and blew a wad that had been left in it into her before the poor girl had even known what hit her. She was quivering on the floor from a sudden orgasm before you knew it."
Raymond was intrigued by this development. He got an idea from some of the research that he'd done on the internet on possible breeder activities. The less cautious of the breeders, he found, tended to frequent Hentai sites and forums. It seemed to be a perverted fetish of theirs. "So, do you know what each of their tentacles do? Like we know that they can supply air through one since the creatures keep their breeders underwater for some time while they spawn their young."
Edward gave him a curt nod. "Of course, we've been systematically mapping them out and experimenting."
Raymond smiled and he pulled up some images on his computer. "Since dead breeders are of no use to us, I want to find a way to make them useful. I want to have an organic prison of sort to keep them. Thankfully, the online art community is full of ideas." He beckoned the rogue scientist over to look at the monitor.
Adjusting his glasses slightly, Edward looked at a few images of some nubile cartoon girls lined up, breasts inflated and lactating, while secured to a wall. Each either had a blank look on their face or had their heads covered completely; a veritable prison that would be self-sustaining. "I think that my team and I can do just that," he said after mulling the challenge over in his mind, he started nodding. "We could possibly even induce lactation into a human subject if you wanted them to do this. Maybe in time we could do a collective consciousness so a creature of our own could think on its own. But my only question would be, for what end?"
"It would actually go to feed some new pets that I have in mind... well, their young at any rate. Anything extra can be shipped overseas to underdeveloped third world countries that could use milk for their children and would be an excellent source of revenue and it makes the parent company look good to the press." Raymond said, now beaming brightly. "I can finally turn these breeders into slaves that will actually be useful to the human race as opposed to some damned alien race." He looked at Edward. "Do what you have to. I'll secure you some female breeders to test the process on."
"Consider it done."
"Good," Raymond said proudly. Things were coming together. "While you're at it, look into something like this," he said, pointing at another series of pictures. "Why should men do all the work when we can engineer creatures to do our bidding for us?"
Edward looked it over and nodded. "Sure, get me a new creature body to work with and some human hosts and I can do that quite easily as a first project."
Raymond nodded back. "Keep me apprised. I have an important meeting to attend to. There's this new... 'group'... of people that I am interested in bringing in as an addition to our arsenal."
*
CHAPTER 2:
I drove all night... crept in your room...
woke you from your sleep... to make love to you.
Is that alright?
-Cyndi Lauper (or Roy Orbison... whichever), "Drove All Night"
"This is it, gentlemen," Raymond Tillis said, standing up next to the cab in the back of the surplus troop transport truck the next day. He stood proud to address the men and women of his newly formed Hunter Division of his brand new corporation: T.D.I. "This is the first official operation of Terran Defense Incorporated in which we take the fight to the scourge that has been plaguing our planet for so long. This has been a long, hard year in the making. But tonight we send a message that Earth is for Humans and no one else!" he said with anger in his voice, grabbing a handhold to steady himself as the truck rumbled and bounced along the back woods road a bit east-northeast of Metro. "You will use live ammunition on the monster that we are hunting. You are NOT to harm the human breeders that believe themselves to be the thing's 'Caretakers'. Use non-lethal force to subdue so that our people will be able to get them the therapy that they need in order to free their minds."
Closer to the back door, Carlos couldn't help but wonder if Tillis was trying to emulate the President from
Independence Day
amid the ragged cheers of his cohorts
.
He was then jerked to the side as brakes squealed and the truck lurched to a stop. "Alright! Everyone out!" Tillis ordered. Spurred into action, Carlos reached out with his free hand to unhook the chain on his side while his squadmate on the opposite side, another Latino fellow named Angel did the same. Carlos was paired up with Angel and the two of them jumped out of the back of the truck as one into the pouring rain.
Carlos and Angel were directed to proceed to the nearby lake while other teams, about fifty men in all, were dispatched to flank around the lake and to go directly for the cabin. "What the hell are we doing here?" Carlos wondered aloud as he flipped down the night vision on his combat goggles. "What is it that we're looking for?"
"Beats me," Angel said in a Latino accent as thick as Carlos's. If Carlos had to guess, the man was from Southern California, Arizona or even Mexico. He wasn't entirely certain as he was still getting to know everyone. "Boss says it's some kind of huge monster that lives in the water according to the briefing."
"What are we supposed to do other than make sure it doesn't get loose? Go spearfishing or something?" Carlos asked. Angel laughed at that as they cautiously made their way forward.
Then all hell seemed to break loose as there was gunfire at the cabin. Carlos and Angel both turned to look for a threat with their assault rifles up. The front porch of the cabin went up in flames like a roman candle. Off to their side over at the lake, something breached out of the surface of the water and went running the moment it hit the shore.
Was that the creature?
Carlos wondered.
"Vasquez! Bell! Get that breeder! Make sure you use stun rounds to capture her!" their squad leader said over the radio.
"Got it boss!" Angel said while ejecting the magazine from his rifle and shoving a new one holding the stun rounds in its place. Carlos did the same and then the two of them were off chasing the girl that they could now see with her hair swaying in her wake as she ran hell-bent for the horizon. Carlos and Angel got a glimpse behind them as something else broke the surface of the water and let out an unearthly roar of anger. A moment later it was silenced as a team of Hunters threw large barrels into the water that exploded while another team fired at it with shoulder mounted bazookas. The creature let out one final roar of pain before falling to the ground dead.
