“How very sad,” Em murmured.
She tried to imagine feeling so desperate for a mate that one would form a bond with a being with no physical body…and found it not that difficult, actually. No matter what she told herself, things had been quite lonely since Nigel had left her. It might be nice to have a friendly spirit to talk to and share dreams with.
It would be even nicer if the “spirit” in question also came with a big, muscular body covered in velvety fur, whispered a naughty little voice in her head. Em pushed it away.
“So you were already running out of females to, er, bond with when the Darklings attacked your universe?” she asked.
“Oh yes, for years it has been a problem,” Rarev said gravely. “My Sire’s generation was the last to have access to females. My own generation are all males—none with brides. And we have only one female left among us—the ancient Priestess who lives at the center of our Sacred Grove.”
“What sort of Monstrum is she?” Em asked, with interest. How difficult it must be to find oneself that very last of one’s gender aboard a ship full of males, she thought.
“She is a Tigris Monstrum,” Rarev said. “She is very ancient now—over a hundred cycles old—and her stripes are faded and gray but she still performs her duties in the worship of the Goddess. We all revere her as a grandmother—for that is what she has become to us.”
“Well, that’s—” Em began but her words ended in a startled scream. “Ahh!” she gasped, for something had grabbed her and it wasn’t letting go.
22
Looking down, Em saw a thick, pinkish gray tentacle wrapped twice around her wrist. And as she watched, another one whipped out and latched onto her breast. It slithered its way between the white strips of her Venetian Blinds dress, its suckers sticking fast to her bare breast and the nipple beneath the cloth.
“Ow—get off me! Get off!” Em gasped. The tentacles were coming from her right, where Om’bobla sat, and she was certain they must belong to the squid man.
But when she turned to glare at her tablemate, she saw that he was locked in the same deadly embrace that she was. For the tentacles that were groping her weren’t his—they belonged to the monstrosity he had molded out of the maker-clay and then apparently brought to life in the Rigellen intention-realization machine.
The thing was huge, Em saw with horror. She had gotten so engrossed in talking with Rarev that she hadn’t noticed what was going on beside her. Om’bobla had made a thing that looked like an extra-large lobster with long, deadly tentacles growing out of its sides. Added to that, it also had huge, snapping claws and a stinging tail like a scorpion with a deadly barb at the end, which it was presently stabbing at its maker, as Om’bobla tried to stay out of its way.
The squid man was wrapped in multiple tentacles himself—he was trying ineffectually to pry them off his slick gray skin, but he wasn’t having much luck. The lobster/octopus/scorpion thing he had made was apparently stronger than him and it was determined to sting him and have him for dinner.
As for how Em had gotten, quite literally, wrapped up in this mess, as far as she could tell, the alien monster-thing was just using her as a kind of anchor so that it could get better leverage to sting Om’bobla into submission. It was also gripping his wife from the other side, effectively trapping the squid man in a net of surrounding tentacles.
“What the fuck?” Rarev roared, when he saw what was going on. “What are you doing? What in the Seven Frozen Hells did you make, you fool?”
“Tompotamos,” Om’bobla gasped. “They’re…very good…eating.”
“Once they’re dead!” his wife screamed at him. “Why did you make a live one, though? What’s wrong with you? Why am I married to such an idiot?”
“Never mind scolding him now—how do I kill it?” Rarev demanded.
“Weak spot…in the shell…right behind the eye stalks,” Om’bobla wheezed, for several of the tentacles had wrapped around his neck and were squeezing him tightly. “Hurry…please!” he begged, his face turning from slimy gray to slimy purple.
Rarev wasted no time. Seizing one of the needle-sharp chopsticks, he located the spot behind the eye stalks, (there were five of six of them—it was difficult for Em to count, since they were all waving wildly about) and stabbed down hard.
There was a loud crunching sound and the creature’s bright red shell gave way. It made a high-pitched, unearthly shrieking sound like a tea kettle gone berserk and for a moment, Em was frightened that it was going to tear her breast right off her body! Its tentacles whipped and flailed and its stinging tail stabbed everywhere, piercing the white table linen and chipping the crystal table with a series of ringing thuds.