Time Jacker by Aaron Crash (nonfiction book recommendations .TXT) 📕

minute,” the demon choked. “You’re totally not gonna wanna bang me after this. You’ll just remember all those disgusting noises. I was wrong. Having a body is stupid.”

“You’d be surprised what a guy can ignore,” Jack said. He took a minute to walk up to a semi pulling a big trailer. Eighteen wheels stuck in motion. Everything had a bit of blur to it, but it wasn’t so bad. Better yet, Jack’s head wasn’t starting to ache yet.

He walked over to a minivan. A mom was driving, and in the back seat were three kids: baby in a car seat, a toddler, and an eight-year-old boy with an iPad. A nice little family caught in the Tempus Influunt.

Movement behind a county dump truck drew his eyes.

From out of the truck’s open window, a collection of ugly one-eyed birds fluttered away from the driver. They were bright pink with black wings. Their claws were a dusky gold, long and sharp. They had one pale pink eye and a puckered mouth underneath. In that circle of flesh were teeth as dark yellow as their talons.

There were five of the cyclops birds. More Fugs, which was interesting given the fact they’d been snacking on the driver of the dump truck.

They came tearing over, flying on those slimy black wings, which were probably better at flying through the timestream than the air.

Jack pulled his gun. He had to assume he had one shot each. Jack got into a nice and stable isosceles stance, sights lined up with his right eye, shoulders rolled forward. He waited for the first bird to come within range. Jack anticipated where the bird was heading and aimed accordingly. Pulling the trigger, he watched the round slam into the puckered mouth of the thing, and the bird flopped to the pavement.

Jack felt the energy of the kill more acutely than when he’d killed the Mouth in the dumpster behind the Big Boy Café. He shot two more times, hit once, and brought another bird down.

“Jack!” Bailey screamed. “What are you shooting at?”

He was too busy moving to answer. He dodged another bird, and it winged around, but now it was behind him.

Claws raked up his back, but his leather jacket helped keep most of those claws off him. He whirled and blew through the wings of the bird who’d scratched him. It flopped onto the ground.

Three birds left, including the one flopping around on the ground. Their claws were too big for them to walk, so without wings, they were pretty worthless. Jack smacked away another of the things, and just touching that soft, squishy pink flesh made his skin crawl.

He ducked and fired into the ass of the monster. It went down, shrieking and bleeding black.

The last cyclops bird came right at Jack. He jammed his pistol into the thing’s eye and fired. The black brains and whatever other viscera went shooting out the exit wound. The corpse plopped to the ground.

Every kill filled him with what had to be Kairos. His head felt great. He felt great, full of the energy the cyclops birds had siphoned off the truck driver.

Bailey rose from where she’d been crouching. Her eyes were on him as Jack stalked up to the last Fug alive. He jammed a bootheel into the thing’s skull, crunching through bone. He felt that energy wash up into him.

Bailey nodded. “Oh, you killed more Fugs. Cool. I’m getting back into the car.”

Jack watched as the creatures began to dissolve into a puddle and then vanish. He then slid into the driver’s seat. Bailey, in the back seat, looked better after getting rid of the desserts.

Jack set his foot on the gas pedal, half pushed to the floor, and clicked the toy soldier to the right, and time started with a jerk. He’d kept the steering wheel straight, and they continued down the highway.

Bailey leaned forward, talking to him from between the seats. “That was good shooting. You’re police, right? But, no, you don’t have the fancy uniform. Your other uniform was like a mall cop’s. So what’s your story, mystery man? It’s time you answered some of my questions.”

Jack didn’t want to talk about himself, but he knew he had to play the game. Tit for tat. “I’m a security guard. My dad was a cop. I was going to be one, but fate had other ideas.”

“Well, that’s pretty fucking cryptic,” Bailey complained. “Don’t wanna share your backstory?”

“Maybe if you tell me what those things were back there.”

Bailey caught his eye in the rearview mirror. Her makeup had run a bit, which made her look even sexier, if that were possible. “They were Fugs. Obviously.”

“Are there different species or whatever?” he asked.

“Like I fucking know. Why didn’t you follow in your father’s footsteps?”

“What happened to Annie Blackburn at the bank?”

“Annie who?” Bailey seemed thoroughly confused.

“So, I saved Evelyn Mundi, right? From Horns. Only, I didn’t kill Horns—that was the Fug that was feeding off her. Annie worked as a bank teller, a pretty brunette with...” He was going to say she had a big ass, but he didn’t exactly want the sex demon thinking of Annie that way. “A pretty brunette who disappeared that same night. If you didn’t kidnap her, who did?”

“Kerrata, probably,” Bailey said. Surprise, surprise, the sex demon seemed eager to help. Most likely, Bailey thought she’d wind up banging Annie, and that gave her some incentive. “You stopping time caught my attention. Then I noticed that whole thing between you and Kerrata. He’s not your normal Fug. Most of the time, the Fugs don’t have that much power. I mean, like those bird things, they snack on people’s Kairos and then move on. Probably shaved a decade off that driver’s life.”

Jack had to think about that for a minute. When Fugs snacked on people, they removed the minutes of their life. “So with Evelyn, how long is she going to live after all that time with Kerrata?”

“Dammit, Jack, I’m a sex demon, not a