The Pearl

Brick shithouse's reaction was different from what I had hoped. Instead of crumpling into a heap of fear and shock like I would have, he produced another knife and ran at me flailing it with his one remaining hand. Great. I didn't exactly want to kill this guy, just get him off the woman. In that respect my plan worked flawlessly. He completely forgot about her. She, however, looked likeshe was going to crumple in a heap of fear and shock. This rescue was going just wonderfully.

I didn't try to stop him as he reached me and thrust his knife at my under scales with all his might. The knife broke at the hilt and clattered to the ground. Brick shithouse looked at the broken hilt, then at my unscathed scales. I grabbed him and hauled him off the ground. He tried to bite my hand.

"This is ridiculous," I huffed. "Look, what do you think you're going to accomplish?"

"Son of a bitch! Put me down and I'll show you!"

I obliged. He dropped about ten feet to the ground and landed on his but. I lowered my face into his.

"Go away," I ordered him calmly. "You can't hurt me and I really don't want to kill you. So leave before we both regret it." I don't know what I was thinking as I began the descent back to the river, but the young woman's scream was enough to tell me brick shithouse wasn't done yet. If he couldn't hurt me he'd hurt whom I was trying to protect. Stupid! How could I be so stupid? And how the hell long does it take for blood loss and shock to set in anyway? He was bleeding out for God's sake!

I flew back to the spot. Brick shithouse was on top of the woman again, and I couldn't tell what he was doing because his blood was everywhere. Enraged, I grabbed him and wrenched him off of her. I slammed him down on the ground and glared.

"What in the hell do you think is going on here?" I asked harshly. "What do I have to do to convince you to leave?"

He didn't respond and I realized from the blank expression on his face that he wasn't going to. My claws were stuck deep into his body, and I was leaning a lot of my weight on his chest. Blood flowed from his mouth. My heart sank as I came to fully understand what I'd done. Slowly, I retracted my claws. I turned to the young woman, who was staring at me wild-eyed.

"I'm sorry," I said faintly. "I'm just so very sorry."

"For what?" she asked, somewhat dazed.

I stared at her a moment before replying. "I never meant to kill him."

She looked away for a moment. When she looked back, her eyes weren't as wild. "You saved me," she said simply. "He wasn't going to go away. If that's what he pushed it to, who am I to judge?" There was a silence between us for a short time before she spoke again.

"Thank you."

I choked a bit on my response. "You're welcome, " I finally said.

Slowly, I turned the body over. "Will you check if he has a wallet?" I asked.

Gingerly, she came over and pulled a wad of money out from his back pocket, but no identification. Whistling, she examined the money.

"He's been a busy boy. What should we do with it?"

I was surprised she asked me. It didn't take much thought to come up with a response. "You should have it."

"Me?"

"Sure, why not? I can't use it. We have no idea where it all came from and he's well past needing it."

"Won't I get in trouble for this?"

I wasn't certain what she meant and said so.

"Well, I'm robbing the dead. Isn't that, like, seriously bad karma?"

I shook my head. "No. This is my karma, not yours. Besides, it seems to me you deserve to get something for this."

She still seemed somewhat apprehensive, but she pocketed the money. "What happens when somebody finds the body?"

I regarded the corpse grimly. "No one's going to find the body," I assured her.

As I drug the body down the embankment, the woman seemed to be struggling with something. I was getting ready to leave when she suddenly spoke.

"Is there anything I can do for you?"

I glanced back at her. "Do for me?"

"Yeah. Is there anything I can do or get for you?"

Thinking about my diet for the past week, I wryly answered: "Two, no make that three, of everything from Toxic Taco."

She fidgeted nervously. "OK. Well, I guess I'd better get going."

I nodded and she left. I knew I'd never see her again.

I returned my attention back to the body. Now what the hell was I going to do with a dead body? The thought of eating it was fairly revolting to me, the arm notwithstanding. I couldn't just leave it along the railroad tracks. Somebody would find it, and though I didn't see how it could be linked to the young woman, it seemed to me that it would raise way too many questions. Especially the question of how he died. I considered ripping the body to pieces and letting the current take care of it. I debated my options for about an hour, maybe less, when I felt someone was looking for me.

It was a curious sensation and a little eerie. It hit me out of the blue, this knowing that I was being searched for. Cautiously, I looked up on the bank. The young woman from earlier was back, carrying a large cardboard box. The box smelled of Mexican food. I climbed further on the bank and said hi. She jumped slightly and looked in my direction.

"God! You scared the shit out of me!"

"Um, sorry. What's in the box?"

She set the box down in front of me and pulled out a Toxic Taco bag. "Three of everything from Toxic Taco, liked you asked for. This bag," she held it up, "is mine. The rest is yours. Assuming you're still hungry." The last part was said quietly. I wasn't sure if I was meant to hear it. I decided to ignore it for the moment.

"You didn't have to do this, you know. How much did it set you back?" I asked, sticking my head into the box. I hadn't been particularly hungry, but the food smelled very good, and my mouth began to water. I was passingly glad the dead body didn't have that effect on me.

She started to unwrap her taco. "Not that much," she said around a mouth full of food. "The money you gave me covered it easily, with some to spare. You should have seen the clerk's face when I ordered, though. They thought it was some kind of joke. The manager rang me out and made sure I paid up front. Man, did they have to scramble. Besides, this is what you asked for."

I carefully removed what smelled like a burrito and unwrapped it. I popped it into my mouth and barely had to chew. I could have swallowed it whole without any difficulty, but this was the first "real food" I'd had in a week and I intended to enjoy it fully. I took out another item. "So, what's your name?"

"Dakota," she answered.

"North or South?"

"Huh?"

"North or South Dakota," I explained, feeling pretty lame.

"Oh, I get it. Duh. It's not even like that's the first time I heard that joke. So, what's your name?"

"Sebastian."

She looked at me disbelievingly over her taco. "What was that again?"

I shrugged. "Sebastian, as in the composer. Or the crab fromThe Little Mermaid. Whichever you prefer to remember it by."

"You're serious?"

"Yes, I am. What's wrong with Sebastian?" I asked lightly. I was enjoying my first conversation in a week.

"Nothing. I just seems like such a normal, run of the mill sort of name is all."

I saw what she was getting at. "That's because a little over a week ago, I was a person. A normal, run of the mill person."

She looked at me with wonder and a little skepticism. "You have got to be putting me on."

"Don't you think this is a little far for punked?" She just looked at me. "No, really, it's God's truth. If you're interested, I'll tell you what happened."

She was, so over the course of our meal, I told her the whole story, beginning to end. She occasionally asked questions, and made a derisive snort when I mentioned that brick shithouse was the one who mugged me.

"I know it's wrong to speak ill of the dead, but I don't see how you can be sorry he's dead. Can you even guess how many other people he's hurt, maybe even killed?"

I couldn't. But I didn't really want to talk about him, so I continued with my story. "And so that's how I became a snake," I finished.

"A snake?" she asked uncertainly.

"Okay, a giant snake."

"Snakes don't have legs or hair."

"Yes, I know, but what else would you call me?"

"A dragon," she said slowly.

"Dragons are bulky. Their bodies aren't the same width all around, and they have wings," I responded smugly.

"European dragons are like that, not Oriental."

"Oh." She was right, off course. I hadn't even thought of that.

"But I'm not oriental. Or at least I wasn't when I was human."

She shrugged. "I can't tell you why things happened the way they did, but what you look like is an oriental dragon."

We continued talking, mostly small talk if you can imagine that. Eventually, I noticed it was getting on towards dawn and pointed that out to Dakota.

"Shit! And I've got to work an early shift this morning, too."

"You want my advice, call off. After what you've been through, you deserve a day off."

She said she would consider it. Then she picked up the box and took off. I watched her go, trying to decide who helped who more. It was nice to talk to someone, and I hoped desperately to see her again. Then I set to work on the body. I decided to tear it apart and send it down the river. As I worked, I said a silent prayer, for both brick shithouse and myself for killing him. I don't know if anybody heard.