Lock, Croc and Two Smoking Barrels

Michael redoubled his effort to look for the cell key. A black key fit inside, and he turned it. The lock clicked out of place, the door opened and he ran inside. They embraced, the chain rattling behind her. They kissed, Michael pushing her backwards into the wall. Michael went back through the keys, trying to find the keyhole on this horrible collar. There appeared to be none, a single hole in the front like the hex-key lock on public building door locks. He had no key in this shape.

"Who has the key to this?" He asked. "Who unlocked it before?"

"I don't know his name, but he's... got a white shirt on." Odile explained.

That wasn't particularly helpful. "Did he have a nametag? Like this?" He pointed to his chest. Odile looked at the nametag, squinted, blinked, and looked up at Michael, feeling more helpless than ever.

"You can't read?" Michael asked.

"What use is reading in the swamp?" Odile asked. "Who do you reckon would've taught me?"

"It's OK. I'll find the guy with this key and I'll get you out of here." He reluctantly let her go, turning on the ball of one foot to leave, but Odile didn't let him go.

"Don't leave me here, Michael." She pleaded, pulling him back. "Please."

They looked at each other. Even if she wasn't significantly stronger than him... he was still helpless to resist. They took a seat on the wet floor, still holding each other.

"Have they hurt you?" Michael asked.

"No, except when they captured me. They cut off my air with a wire... hook thing coming out of an oar. It wasn't like not being able to breathe. I can hold my breath a real long time. It felt like I would die from something else."

"They were cutting off blood to your brain, maybe. That sounds horrible. What about the show? How did that start?"

Odile shrugged. "They said people would want to see me, so... they told me to dive from the high thing and do some other stuff. I've never been seen by so many people. They said were going to feed me a 'mackerel,' whatever that is."

"It's a fish. You've probably eaten them before. They're around here, but maybe not in the swamp."

Odile's eyes lit up with excitement. "Oh yeah, they fed me something called..." She looked off, searching for the word. "Steak. It was this big slab of meat. That was so good! I could almost stand to stay here, if they keep feeding me that."

For a moment, it looked like Odile had forgotten she was a prisoner. "When we get out of here, I'll get you all the steak you can stand." Michael promised.

"How?" Odile said. "What if you can't get me out? Maybe I'll be stuck here forever."

"You won't. They can't keep you here against your will. You're not a slave. You're not an animal."

"I don't know." Odile mused. "I'm not a wild animal, but I still killed those men just for trespassing in my swamp. Maybe this is what I deserve, to stay behind bars and in a cage like a criminal."

"No, don't say that." Michael huffed. "You're no criminal, and you're no animal."

Odile looked at Michael, her vertical pupils wide."How can you be so sure what I am... when I don't even know what I am?" She took him by the head and stared at him intensely. "What am I, Michael?"

Michael gulped. "You're the woman I love."

And they kissed with incredible intensity. Michael delicately slipped his tongue in her mouth, and they flicked against each other. Her cold breath gave him goosebumps, even in the moist, warm air of the enclosure.

His hand forming a W, he pushed two fingers into Odile's slit. Her head bucked back, the chain clattering at the sudden movement. How Michael wanted to kiss her sweet neck, entirely covered by this horrid collar. His head went between her breasts and moved back and forth. It felt like he put his face into the palm of a catcher's mitt. His head moved to her nipple and gave it a gentle nibble.

Michael pulled his fingers from inside her, leaving a string of fluid hanging like fishing line. He yanked her bottoms downward to her knees, and then off her scaly feet. He fumbled his fly open and freed his suffering erection from his Speedo.

"Wait a minute." Odile looked down at his unit.

"What? What's wrong?"

"I know what that is." She pointed. "That's not a second brain at all."

"No, it's not. It's a penis."

The word meant nothing to her, but she knew what it was supposed to do. "Doesn't it go all the way inside your body when you don't need it?"

"No." Michael said, almost shouting. "What kind of nightmare would that be?"

"I don't know, it's just not what I expected." A long pause. They looked each other in the eye. "Are we still doing this?" Odile asked.

"If you want, absolutely."

Odile kissed him rather than answer. Michael placed his hands on her hips and slowly pressed himself into her. Inside, it was slick, narrow... and rather cold. American Pie had not prepared him for this. He pulled his hips back, withdrawing most of the way and sliding back in. He started with a slow rhythm, moving his hands further upwards as he grew comfortable with the motion.

Michael looked at Odile. She was silent, her lower lip sucked in and gently held in place with her top teeth. Her eyes were closed, her hands were clenched shut momentarily, then open to palm her own breasts. She was breathing hard, her tail thumping against the floor of the cage, her legs kicking out involuntarily.

She is so into this, Michael thought. What was he so worried about? His penis was a decent size, and this girl loved him. It was perfect. This was perfect.

It was time to turn up the gas. Michael sped up, and Odile started to moan involuntarily. They grew deeper, more guttural, as her head rolled back with every gasp. Michael felt entirely entwined with her, moving as a single unit. Then something grabbed him. He felt Odile slip away from him. He threw his hands out and tried to grab her, but her cold reptilian skin slid out of his fingers.

Two men had grabbed him by the shoulders and pried him off Odile. They had apparently tried yelling at him to stop, but that went unheard as they were in 'the zone.' Michael thrashed about and tried to break free of the two men, not making any attempt to cover his erection. Odile stood and tried reaching out for Michael, but he was dragged out of her reach.

"What the hell are you doing, you weirdo?" Yelled someone, as the men dragged him into view. It was Salty Peter, if that was really his name. But it was definitely him, with his inexplicable two eyes and no hook hand or peg leg. Michael fantasized about Odile breaking loose and making this man much more authentically piratey with one clasp of her jaw.

"You can't keep her prisoner like this!" Michael yelled, trying to bring his hand down to cover his boner, but the men were too strong and he couldn't reach.

Salty Pete made a disgusted grunt, took the plastic pirate hat off his head. Another identical hat was already underneath it. Salty Pete apparently had a number of them stacked there like chairs in the corner of an unused meeting room. He tossed the hat and it landed on Michael's boner like the world's worst game of horseshoes.

"I locked her up because she could have killed us." Salty Peter snarled, still inexplicably talking with a pirate accent. "How did you get so close to her?"

"You can't just lock her up! She's human! She has rights!" Michael repeated, trying to work his way free without letting the pirate hat fall off his groin.

"Get this freak out of here!" Salty Pete pointed behind him, towards the door. The men started to push Michael away, and Odile held out her clawed hand.

"NO!"

All the heads in the room turned to her. Salty Pete cocked his head to the side, looking at Odile through the bars. "By the barnacles in Neptune's beard..."

"Do you really fucking talk like that?" Michael asked.

"Watch your language. This is a family establishment." He admonished Michael from a short distance. Turning back to Odile, Salty Pete asked, "You can talk? Why didn't you until now?"

"Because you choked me when you dragged me in here!"

"We only did that to stop you biting and scratching us!"

"Can you blame her?!" Michael yelled. "I'm just trying to get her out of here."

"Oh, that's what you were doing, sure." Salty Pete said.

"Don't talk to the freak, man." Said one of the employees holding Michael still.

"She is not a freak!" Salty Pete said sharply. Michael was surprised he hadn't got the chance to said it first. "The only freak here... is him." Salty turned back towards Odile with an icy state. "I'll deal with you later, lass."

Odile's hand went over her heart as she felt something she hadn't in a long time; the barest sliver of fear.

At Salty Pete's command, the two men dragged Michael, kicking and hollering, down the hall to the fire door and out of the park, the hat suspended on his unit bouncing as they stepped.

It was not Michael's proudest moment.

Finally free of the men's grip, Michael tucked himself into his pants. He looked up at Peter from the sand. Getting thrown out by him, or his damn brother, was about as embarrassing as he thought it might be.

"Give me back that shirt." Peter outstretched his hand. Michael pulled it over his shoulders and tossed it to him. "I'll get this back to... Michael. Now, whoever you are..." Peter pulled a white hankie from his coat pocket and grabbed Michael's hand. He smeared the hand print on the back of his hand into a light, indistinguishable blur.

"You are banned from Salty Peter's Cove of Fun..." He said severely, tucking the hankie back where he pulled it, the two guards standing opposite him like Secret Service agents. Michael felt hate boil inside him, and he stood up from the sand without pushing himself up with his arms, about to give Salty Pete what for.

"For a week." Pete added. "If you entered into the watermelon carving contest, you will get a partial refund of your entry fee."

Michael was so staggered, he had no retort. The men turned around and closed the door behind him, leaving him in the grass-speckled sand in the back of this resort.

A week?

He balled his fists. They ruined what was a beautiful moment between him and the woman he loved. She was still in there, suffering, captured, alone.

Michael decided on a tactical retreat. He wanted nothing more than to bust back in there and finish what he started, but he relented. He would not even find some place or discreet bush to finally crack out a sly one; that jism was meant for Odile, and they stopped him from giving it to her. He would hold it in his painful gonads until they would be reunited.

Walking around, Michael found the parking lot again. He would not wait a week to see his trapped beloved again. He would be there tomorrow, bright and early.

After all, he thought, as his hand entered his pockets and touched the keys he's purloined from the sleeping guard...

He's got the keys to the kingdom.

Chapter 13: Croc-in' Pneumonia and the Boogie-Woogie Flu

After being thrown out of Salty Pete's Cove of Fun in the most embarrassing way imaginable without them dragging through an adult-oriented magic show and having the clown make unflattering comparison to a balloon animal, Michael got a lift to the closest motel. Graciously, there was one vacancy, which he put on his credit card. He walked to the closest store a quarter-mile down the road and bought supplies.

He took a long, cold shower, no condensation on the mirror as he stepped out onto the mat. Michael hadn't seen his reflection in the preceding week, and could scarcely recognize himself. His hair was flat and uncombed, his beard thick, his eyes sharper and more visible against his tanned skin. The week of barely eating anything had burned away a few extra pounds of fat he normally carried, his muscles more visible and defined. He knew his choice was between a flat stomach and a beer every now and again, and he chose the beer.

The corner of his mouth turned up as he looked at himself. He got a girlfriend, and suddenly, he's more confident. Amazing how that works. Nevertheless, he shaved off the beard she seemed to enjoy. He had to change his look enough that he might not get identified.

Despite the bed being much, much more comfortable than Odile's straw-lined cot, Michael had restless, lonesome sleep. And not just because he swore any time his skin itched, it were the bed bugs come to drink his blood and infest him for all eternity. This was, by far, the crappiest motel he'd ever been in. It was the kind that advertised 'free cable' as a selling point, and where the pool closed long ago because they could never afford to fix the cracks in the shallow end that let all the water out.

Michael woke around six o'clock. Another forgotten benefit of his return to civilization: knowing what time it is! The man at the front desk got him a cab to go further into the city to run some more errands, grabbing some new clothes, a hat, sunglasses, a folding hex wrench set that he suspected would open the lock on Odile's collar, and most crucially, real underwear.

As it turns out, it cost a lot for a taxi to chaperone him around all morning. Finally, his bank and credit cards had value again. He ended his trip at the entrance to Salty Pete's Cove of Fun.

Michael forked up another twelve bucks for his hand-stamp. That all-summer pass on the lanyard started to make more and more sense. The park was less occupied this early, which wasn't what he wanted. He hoped to move through the crowd without anyone noticing him. Then again, he was an adult at a theme park with no children. That hand stamp was probably one of those trackers they put on endangered animals to see how they migrate.

Thinking of the least suspicious activity he could do, he went to the driving range on the grown-up section of the island and purchased a bucket of golf balls. He had never played golf in his life, and didn't realize you were supposed to bring your own clubs. They did have loaner clubs for people who apparently only golf on vacation. Apparently, that variety of person did exist.

Michael hit a few balls, watching them disappear into the glare and land invisibly in the distant grass. People do this for fun? He kept hitting them, occasionally deflecting the small talk of the older men who questioned his form. That golf ball retriever wasn't driving around yet, as there weren't enough balls down field yet, so he couldn't even try to hit that thing to see if he could hit a moving target. He returned the club and basket, wondering why someone would do this instead of the firing range.

He entered the lobby of the hotel, entering the restaurant and ordering breakfast. This place thought it was fancy as hell, as a glass of orange juice was seven dollars, and it wasn't the size of one of those orange buckets from Home Depot. All he wanted was some eggs... and maybe a coconut opened by Odile.

More people were starting to filter into the park, and thus the hotel lobby and other areas. Michael moved towards the entrance of the theater where he'd seen Odile perform against her will. The door was surely locked, but he had the key. He searched the keychain to find the right key...

But the door was slightly ajar. Michael shrugged and tucked the stolen keys back into his pocket. He made a beeline to the animal quarters. The first face he encountered was somebody kneeling near the entrance to the animal cages. He had two thin tools in the keyhole, like he was trying to pick the lock.

"Can I help you?" Michael asked automatically.

The man turned to him quickly. He had sandy blond hair, indistinct tattoos on his arms and one eye slightly higher than the other. "You work here?"

Michael went with it, hiding the hand with the stamp on it. "Yeah, what's the problem?"

"They can't get this door open, so they brought me in to open it." He kept looking at his picks, like the keyhole was a peephole.

"I have a key for that door." Michael looked through the keys. With horror, he remembered the door was unlocked last time. What key was it? The man removed his picks and Michael tried a random key. It didn't fit. He tried another. Nothing.

"I know it's on here." Michael said.

He didn't know it was on there. He was just really hoping it was. He could sense this slightly suspicious man look around and grow impatient. The fifth key fit the lock, and he turned it and threw the door open perhaps too enthusiastically.

"That was easy." The lockpicker said, tucking his tools into a pocket on a rag, rolling them up and inserting them into his coat. Both men walked into the animal cages, shoulder-to-shoulder.

The animals were all there, but the far cage, where Odile was yesterday, was empty. The shackle that bound her to the wall was open, sitting in a puddle of water in a dip on the floor.

The lockpicker looked around. "Wait, this is where the animals are?" He said. "This isn't the lock they told me to get open. No wonder your key still worked. I got to go talk to someone. I don't know what's going on." He left.

Michael felt lost. It was encouraging to know she wasn't chained up like a junkyard dog anymore, but... where had she gone?

Michael stepped out of the animal enclosure, but nearly bumped straight into a familiar face. It was Salty Greg. He was not in his lion tamer's 'uniform,' but apparently his curly mustache was authentic.

"Hey, you work here?" Asked Greg.

"No." Michael said, momentarily disarmed that Greg didn't recognize him without the beard.

"Then what were you doing in there?"

"It was a joke." He tried to cover. "I thought you'd pick up on the sarcasm."

"Sorry, maybe it was a dumb question." Greg shrugged. "Where's your nametag?"

"I took it off and lost it. It keeps getting caught on the bars in there and I ripped my shirt the other day."

"Are you doing anything? Can you get Pete out of the drunk tank?"

Michael blinked. "Salty Pete?"

"Yeah, he found his way back there again. We need him for the show at noon. Go get him."

"I don't have a car."

"Here, take mine. It's the only BMW out there." He threw him keys.

Michael stared at the keys, a few seconds passing. "What are you waiting for? Chop-chop." Michael was woken from his confusion, and he ran out the backstage area and to the parking lot. In the first row was a BMW with the vanity plate "SLTYGR." Surely that had a more unfortunate, alternate interpretation, but there was a maximum of six letters on vanity plates.

Michael piled in, started the car and drove off. This was the first time he'd driven a BMW. It felt powerful, though he would resist the desire to open her up in this crowded parking lot.

So... Michael's mission, should he choose to accept it, was to go to the drunk tank pick up the person who caught him fucking Odile. He'd been in worse situations than this. Like that one time, he almost got killed in the swamp, and eight days later...

Well, Michael didn't kiss-and-tell.

Chapter 14: House Upon the Croc

Michael had driven to Davie, Florida, about twenty-five minutes of highway driving out from Salty Pete's Cove of Fun... to retrieve Salty Pete himself, the man who had seen him make love to his reptilian paramour.

Two police officers hoisted Salty Pete down the steps of the police department, his legs dangling below him like a marionette held too low to the ground. Salty Pete was still dressed as he was last night, but no more plastic hats decorated his balding bonce. He held his arms up to shield his eyes from the sun.

The cops shoved him in the backseat of the BMW like he was the last thing to pack on moving day. Salty Pete pinched his legs up to let them close the door. He'd taken this ride a few times before.

Michael started to drive off. "I got stuff for your hangover, sir." Michael said in a fake voice, not sure he'd recognize it from last night.