Free Sample Saturday is Back, Bitches






This week we're bringing you a sample from A Night at Swinging Dick's Saloon Enjoy.


“Swinging DIcks Saloon might not be the kind of place where everybody knows your name but it is the kind of place where a guy can hang out tell bad jokes with his pals or maybe even meet a hooker who at least has the decency to pretend she has a heart of gold."

Slim (name redacted) former bartender, Swinging Dicks Saloon



Urayull
Bodie Myers

“How did you lose your arm?”
The man with the long beard gave Drew an odd look which made Drew immediately regret asking the
old man whose right arm ended just below the elbow what happened. If he hadn’t been trying to
impress Jenny he would have let the guy alone.
“I never lost my arm.” the old guy said as he used his good hand to sip some of his pint of the yellow
swill found only on the taps of Swinging Dicks Saloon known as Red White and Blue beer.
Drew nodded. The last thing he wanted to after finally getting Jenny to meet him for a drink was to
get into an argument with a crazy person over whether or not he still had an arm.
“Now,” the old man continued, holding up the stump on what was left of his right arm, “My arm did
get severed a while back. Is that what you meant?”
“Then you should have said so. My arm was severed, it’s not lost. I know where the damn thing is.”
“Oh,” Drew said. He really wanted to go back to the bar and pretend this conversation never
happened. Jenny was sitting there looking at him and he was sure she would be disappointed if he
came back without the story on how the old guy sitting in the corner came to have his arm severed
just below the elbow.
“Ask me again kid. This time do it right.”
“Uh, okay. How did your arm get severed?”
The old guy smiled, showing he was down a few teeth, before he said, “That my young friend is a
story one tells over a beer or two. If you're looking for a few sentences you can bring back to your lady
friend I’m afraid I can’t help you. Now, if you wanted to bring your lady friend and perhaps a pitcher
for us to share then we can get down to business.”
“I don’t know...” 
“Come on, kid,” the old man said, “It’ll be worth the price of some of this swill Richard serves.”
“I need to get back to my date,” Drew told him.
“Fine, I understand. Hearing my tale will not get you any closer to finding out the color of that lovely
young woman’s underwear. Perhaps another time we can sit and have a drink and I’ll tell you how I
lost my arm to a Yeti.”
“Did you say Yeti?”
“Yes.”
“Like the cooler?”
“No, like the abominable snowman.”
“Abominable snowman? Like in the Rudolph the Rednosed reindeer cartoon?”
“The Yeti I encountered aren’t near as cute and lovable as the one on the show.”
“You’re fucking with me, aren’t you?” 
The old guy drained his beer and held up the empty glass, “Only one way to find out.”
Drew walked back to Jenny and ordered a pitcher of Red White and Blue. They returned together and
took a seat at the old man’s table.
Drew poured them all a glass of fizzy yellow liquid. While he was filling pint glasses the old man stuck
out his only hand to Jenny. 
After she took it he said, “Dr. Stanford Hatchetstone the third. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Jenny.” 
“I’m Drew,” Drew told him as he slid a full glass of beer in front of the old man.
“Pleasure to meet you both,” Dr. Stanford Hatchetstone the third said as he wrapped his fingers around
the glass and lifted it up. Before he put the pint to his lips he said, “My friends call me Hatch, or Doc,
or on occasion Doc Hatch, and anyone who buys me a drink is a friend of mine.”
While Hatch took a long drink, draining half the glass, Drew said, “I believe you were going to tell
us about the Yeti.”
“You are correct.”
“I thought they didn’t exist,” Jenny said.
“A common mistake. They are notoriously shy around humans and for that, you should be thankful.”
 “Aren’t they kind of like bigfoot?” Drew asked
“Indeed they are,” Hatch said, “much the same way your beloved black lab is like a wolf. They’re
related, maybe at one time they were much the same but over time one became a loyal house pet and
the other stayed a predator.”
“How did you know I had a black lab?”
“That will be part of the story. Trust me.”
“I don’t think either one is real. They’re like UFOs or the Loch Ness monster,” Jenny said.
“Oh, just like the UFO’s, this beer and the chairs we’re sitting on the Yeti and his gentler cousin Big
Foot are very much real.”
“So, do you believe in UFOs and the Loch Ness Monster?”
“No, I don’t believe in UFOs, I know for a fact they exist, but that’s another story for another time.
The Loch Ness Monster is, of course, bullshit. Everyone knows that.”
Doc Hatch finished off his glass of beer.
He was reaching for the pitcher when Drew pulled it away and said, “I think you owe us a story.”
“You’re right,” Doc Hatch said, “It started in Alaska…”



2.
“What do you think killed it?” Cole asked me as we came upon the remains of what had once been an
eight-foot-tall apex predator. I wanted to tell him a crocodile because that was the only thing I would
figure would have a chance against a full-grown polar bear, assuming the croc was huge and they
were in the water. Even then, however, I would’ve given the bear a puncher's chance.
Instead, I said, “Another bear?”
Cole shrugged, “I don’t think they kill each other as a general rule. If they got hungry enough I suppose
they might, but no one ate this one. They just killed it.”
I nodded. We were part of a prospecting team taking samples of the ground in a remote area of a
remote state hoping to find something someone could mine. Cole and I were there with rifles. Our
job was to make sure nothing ate the geologists. It was a good gig, except for the cold and the food.
The pay kind of sucked too, but if you are inclined to shoot things and see exotic places it was either
this or the army and I didn’t like the haircut Uncle Sam was offering.
“Maybe it’s the Urayull,” Cole said referring to sightings of a large ape-like creature. Witnesses claimed
it walked on two legs, with teeth like razor-sharp railroad spikes, and talon-like claws extending from
their fingers. The Inuit called the creature Urayull, which loosely translated back to Bigfoot or his artic
cousin the Yeti. 
Neither of us believed it existed.
“Maybe. At least we won’t have to worry about this bear eating a geologist.” 
“Yeah, but what about whatever did this to her?” Cole replied. 
 He had a point.
Cole pointed at her belly as he drew his knife, “Should we find out what she ate?”
“Why?” 
Cole had a weird obsession with seeing what things ate. On a previous gig like this one, we had to
shoot a couple of wolves. Cole cut them both open, digging in with his Bowie knife like a kid opening
presents Christmas morning. Turns out the dead wolves didn’t have anything in their belly’s, which
explained why they insisted on coming into camp trying to have a geologist for dinner.
“Why not? You don’t mind seeing some guts do you?”
“I don’t mind but I don’t enjoy it either.”
Cole stabbed the thing and started sawing. I claimed I could do without seeing what the dead bear ate
but found myself leaning in close to see what came sliding out.
We both jumped back when the first thing to pop out of the bear's stomach was a not quite ingested
hand. 
“A local?” I asked.
Cole leaned close and pulled the hand free he set it on the ground and looked it over before saying, “A
local what? I don’t think it’s human.”
“What the hell are you talking about,” I said before I realized it had three fingers. There was no stub
where it lost a digit, It seemed like this was the way this hand was meant to be.
“It should be easy to figure out who this belonged to,” I said, “There can only be so many kids out here
with only three fingers.”
“Assuming it’s a kid or at least a human kid.”
“What else would it be?”
I didn’t have a good answer to that so I asked, “Haven’t you seen enough?”
“Maybe there’s more of him in there.”
Seeing the partially digested body of the three-fingered boy didn’t appeal to me at all. I looked at the
horizon. The sun didn’t really go down this time of year out here but it was getting lower in the sky.
Even though the light didn’t change the animals seemed to know when it was evening and tended to
get more active. 
“Maybe we should be getting back,” I told him, “We don’t want to be out in the open during dinner
time.”
Cole looked up from the dead bear, “I guess you’re right. Not much else in there. It looks like the
three-fingered kid was his last meal.”
Cole took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wrapped the hand in it. Once the hand was wrapped up
he tried to stick it in his pocket but it didn’t fit. He looked at the pack on my back.
“Do you have room?”
“You're keeping that?”
“I figure we can ask the locals if anyone lost a kid with three fingers. We might as well give the parents
some closure if we can. Do you have room in the pack or not?”
“Yeah. I’ve got room.”
I took a nip off my flask while Cole put the severed arm in my pack. I offered him a hit of the whiskey,
Yukon Jack, because what the hell else should one drink in the fucking Yukon, but as always, he
declined.
 We left the polar bear and starting hiking back to camp. 
The walk back took us along a stream, cutting through a tree-lined canyon. We could hear the water
flowing under the thin layer of ice. 
Cole stopped and unslung his rifle from his shoulder, “Did you hear that?”
I didn’t hear anything.  Cole, however, may have been a weirdo who didn’t drink and liked rummaging
through the stomachs of dead things, but he was a top-notch hunter who knew the land as well as
anyone. If he said he heard something then something made a sound.
I unslung my gun, “What did you hear?”
“I’m not sure? You smell that?”
I did, as the breeze came across the water a pungent odor briefly found my nostrils. If I had to identify
it I would have said I was smelling the posthumous flatulence of a man who ate himself to death at
Taco Bell. Thankfully, it left as quickly as it appeared.
“What was that?” I asked.
Cole shook his head, “I was hoping you farted.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever done one that bad.”
“We share a tent. You’ve done worse.”
“Then I apologize.” 
“You should. Let’s keep moving.”
Cole made it two steps before a flash of dirty white fur burst from the trees. The thing towered over
Cole. I was thinking it was the biggest bear I’d ever seen when it swung an arm longer than any bear
would have and knocked Coles's head clean off his neck.
I watched Cole’s head spinning through the air, his mouth moving as he cursed silently. His body
remained standing, spurting warm blood up from his neck into the cold air much longer than it
should have. I raised my rifle and fired as the creature loped toward me. It moved like an ape rather
than a bear. It’s long arms pushing off the ground as it charged. 
My shot didn’t slow it. I saw the long razor-like claws at the end of its humanoid fingers and
instinctively moved my rifle to protect my face. The move saved my life as the knife-like claws hit the
barrel and sent the gun flying into the stream instead of decapitating me. Even with my Winchester
taking the brunt of the blow I still found myself on the ground. 
I hit with enough force I didn’t have to pretend to be knocked out. The creature's breath woke me up
as it leaned close and opened its mouth exposing a couple of rows of teeth about the same length and
sharpness as the claws at the end of it three fingers. I learned the hard way where the smell we detected
earlier had come from.
I tried to lay still and play dead as it looked me over with black eyes. There were no pupils, nor any iris,
just a pair of gelatinous dark orbs set high on its oblong head. I noticed it didn’t have a snout like a bear
but nose a lot like mine, only flatter. The teeth and eyes were wrong but otherwise, it looked a lot like
what people describe as Bigfoot in the lower forty-eight. I was looking at Urayull. I figured I was
seconds away from having my face eaten off as the mouth, which extended from ear to ear, opened.
It didn’t bite off my head, however. Instead, it grabbed me and flipped me over. I was still pretending to
be dead, I didn’t see what else I could do. It tore the backpack off of me. I didn’t dare look but the
tearing sounds I heard and the guttural shriek I heard told me it found the mysterious hand and wasn’t
happy about it. I considered making a move but I didn’t see myself getting far running. 
When it yanked down my pants I wished I had made a run for it. It appeared Urayull and Cole's old
hunting body had something in common.
Only unlike the deer Cole’s pal violated I was still alive to experience an intra-species rape. I didn’t
figure I would be living much longer. Even if I could somehow continue to play dead while being
sexually assaulted by a Yeti I didn’t figure I had a chance to survive the experience if the beast's sexual
organ was proportional to his size.
I didn’t look, I didn’t really want to know. I was really hoping the Yeti wasn’t a well-hung species. I
had never heard anyone say hung like a Yeti but they did have big feet, it was in the name of the
southern version. As the creature grabbed my ass I saw the other one come into view.
The damn thing almost looked sympathetic. I wouldn’t have thought the dark black orbs they have for
eyes could display emotions but it was there. Either that or lust. I was thinking the only thing worse
than Yeti rape would be Yeti gang rape.
I decided playing dead wasn’t the best option after all. The worst thing I could see happening was I
could be dead when they had their way with me, which sounded much better than being alive for it.
I tried to scramble away.
It felt like a truck hit me, though I suspect it was just the monster's fist. Had it used its claws I would
have been dead instead of just unconscious.
I never figured to wake up, but I did. The next thing I knew I was back in camp waking up the face of
Doc Baxter.

I said, “Can you get me a beer?”

To be continued...

******


Want more? Then go get yourself a copy of A Night at Swinging DIcks Saloon. The E-Book is only 3 bucks and a physical copy is only $5 (yep we're serious only one Lincoln)

Be sure to stop by The Swinging DIck's Saloon Shop for the official gear too. Get free shipping with the promo code COOL



Get this on your chest



The 10th Rule Books Merch Shop is open as well.

and that free shipping with the promo code COOL works there too.




Yep, we've got this on a shirt

 And her too!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Bedtime Stories read by a Psychopath are back, baby.

It's going to be a Rock-N-Noirror Weekend

A Night at Swinging Dick's Saloon

Be Sure to Vist Our House This Halloween