Image of the Beast

Inspired by the story of the same name by Phillip Jose Farmer.
If you like this story, then find Farmer's "Image of the Beast"
and read it.

	The squadroom was filled with cops and smoke.  Kevin Steeles
took a seat near the back beside Lieutenant Bill Liederman.  The
chief of homicide stood up at the front of the room and raised his
hand for quiet.  There was a movie screen set up behind him and
projector with a 16mm film loaded and ready to go in the middle of
the room.

	"This is only the second time we've shown this film," the
chief detective said gravely.  "And we hope it will be the last.  I
want you all to be aware that we have a serious problem here."

	Bill Liederman and Kevin Steeles had been friends since
before Steeles had left the force.  That morning Liederman had
phoned and told Steeles the department had been mailed something
he thought he'd better see.  

	"Is it about Alex?" Steeles asked.  Alex Bowman was Kevin's
business partner.  They were both private detectives and had their
own agency.  Bowman had been missing for the past week.  He'd
been on a fairly normal job, tracking down an ex-husband named
Tony Riviera who had a habit of missing his alimony.  Then,
Bowman had disappeared.  He didn't come into work, wasn't at
home, and hadn't seen any of his friends.  No trace at all.  His car
was even parked in its place outside his apartment.

	"You'd just better come and see for yourself, Kev," Bill had
replied.  "Make up your own mind."  That kind of melodrama was
uncharacteristic of Bill and it made Steeles uneasy.

	"Don't give me that bullshit, Bill.  What is it?"

	"Not over the goddamned phone, Kevin.  Okay?  Just be here
at eleven o'clock.  I'll be waiting for you at the duty desk so
don't be late."

	So now Steeles was sitting here in the squadroom in the
basement of the fifth precinct about to watch some kind of film
that had the department going nuts.  A film that Liederman
implied had something to do with Alex Bowman's disappearance.

	Someone turned out the lights and the movie started.

	The scene showed a room with grey concrete walls.  In the
centre of the room was a doctor's examination table--a white
platform with black leather cushions and two obstetrics stirrups. 
The camera panned leisurely around the table to allow a good
view.  There were manacles welded on partway down the side.  The
stirrups had thick leather straps.  The whole table was
meticulously clean.

	Steeles felt the skin on his scrotum crawl.  He knew already
that this was going to be a snuff film.  With the medical-table
and those straps and manacles--someone was going to die here and
he was going to watch.  He prayed to God it wasn't Alex.  Damn
Liederman for making such a big mystery of it all.

	The camera stopped its circuit of the table and a man and
woman entered the frame.  Both were naked except for black
leather masks which covered their faces from the nose up.  They
waved to the camera and embraced, their tongues searching each
other's mouths.

	The woman was striking--with dark brown hair showing
beneath her mask and brilliant forest-green eyes.  Her breasts were
smooth and evenly tanned, the nipples small and almost perfectly
round.  The couple parted and Steeles could see the man's penis
rising up as it became purple and engorged.

	The woman raised herself up onto the table with the lithe
grace of a jungle-cat.  She lay down and spread her legs,
revealing the plump oval folds of her vagina, flushed pink under
the chestnut swirls of her pubic hair.  The man secured her legs
into the stirrups and then her arms into the manacles.  Smiling
into the camera, she strained at the restraints to demonstrate that
she was held tight.  

	The man laid on top of her and they kissed again, playing
their tongues together.  After a time, the man began to work his
way down with his tongue, probing a pink nipple, raising it erect. 
He moved on to the other one, trailing a glistening strand of
saliva.  Suddenly, he grabbed the breast with both hands, squeezing
and twisting it.  He sucked at the nipple for a moment, then took
it with his teeth and pulled, stretching the breast into a taut cone. 
Steeles had a vision of the stretched breast bursting like a water
balloon, erupting in a gout of milk and blood.  The woman let out
a tormented growl.

	Her partner laughed and released his hold.  The breast
flopped liquidly back into shape, a purple hand-print impressed
into it.  The man made a trail with his tongue down her stomach
to the edge of her pubic hair.  He looked up with a wicked grin,
then attacked her cunt like a man biting into a ripe peach.  When
he came up for air there was sticky juice running down his chin. 
He took another look at the camera, then went down again.

	The camera floated in to catch his tongue dabbing at the
crevice of her cunt, parting the lips with his tongue, leaving them
glistening with saliva.  The curls of her public hair were matted
down and slick and his cheeks glistened with wetness.  She
swivelled her buttocks, grinding her cunt into his face.  Steeles
could see his mouth working as he tried to drive his tongue
deeper and deeper into her.  His teeth sunk into the flesh around
her vagina, digging in for purchase to push him in deeper.  The
woman, crying out in pain pulled herself back, pushing herself flat
into the table, trying to dislodge him.  He pushed a hand under
her, driving a dry finger up into her rectum, forcing her to arch
her back.  He got another finger in, probing up her ass with both
hands, pushing her cunt into his face.  His teeth left red scratches
around her pubis while he forced his tongue in further.  She
bucked and twisted, trying to get free, but every movement drew
his teeth across the outside of her cunt--his fingernails across
tender insides of her bowel.

	They continued on for a while, until finally the woman went
taut, arching her back even further.  She quivered for a moment,
her face a rictus of exertion, then collapsed.  The man continued
his attack on her cunt, but gradually stopped.  The woman asked
to be let loose.

	"First you have to lick my fingers," the man said.  "You got
your filthy shit all over them."  He held his fingers in front of
her.  They were slimed with a film of brown shit.

	"Fuck off, Tony," the woman hissed.  "Let me out."

	"You stupid bitch," Tony spat.  "You better hope the fucking
sound ain't on."  He pushed his fingers into her face.  Steeles
sweated in his seat.  If this was Tony Riviera then what happened
to Alex?

	"Time out!" she screamed, pulling her head to one side.  His
finger left a yellow-brown streak on her cheek.

	All at once the camera pulled back and two big men, also
masked and naked, grabbed Tony and pulled him back.  Riviera
struggled until one of the men, a well muscled blond, reached
between his legs and squeezed his testicles.  Riviera howled and
sank to the floor, trying to curl up into a ball.  The other guy,
who had dark body hair, unfastened the woman.

	Is this Dolores Riviera?  Steeles wondered.  It was Dolores
who had hired Alex and Steeles had been struck by her green eyes
when he'd first met her.  Of course it was her.  Kevin felt stupid
for not making the connection right away.

	While Dolores stood back the two bodyguards forced Riviera
up onto the table.  He immediately began to kick and scream,
landing a good kick in the face of the dark haired man.  The body
guard was staggered for a moment, then responded with a solid
punch into Riviera's solar plexus.  Tony turned white and gaped
like a landed fish.  The two men got his arms into the manacles
and managed to pull one leg into a stirrup.  Riviera kicked again
and was rewarded with another blow to the stomach.  When both
legs were fastened, each bodyguard took a stirrup and extended it,
pulling Tony's legs forward until his anus was exposed.

	"Oh Christ," muttered the man beside Steeles.  "I'm not going
to watch this shit."  He got up and left the room.  Several more
followed.  Steeles had to know if Alex was mixed up in all this.

	Taking turns, the two bodyguards fucked Tony while his wife
looked on.  When they were done his balls and ass were foamed
with blood and shit.  Riviera was whimpering.

	"Shhhh," whispered Dolores, moving in between his legs and
taking his flaccid penis in her hand.  He screamed at her touch,
trying to pull away--but the restraints held him fast.  Dolores
stuck out her tongue, bringing it down onto his plum-shaped head. 
With delicate dabs she traced around the ridge at the base, then
up the purple lobes, and down again.  After several circuits of her
tongue, Riviera's cock began to stiffen and rise.  Dolores took the
whole thing in her mouth, pushing the head against the back of her
throat and literally sucked the life back into it.  Still sniffling,
Tony groaned and relaxed a bit.

	Dolores worked at him with long strokes of her tongue,
every once and a while taking him into her mouth and sucking to
help him keep his erection.

	"Tell me when you're just about to come, baby," she
whispered.  "I have a wonderful surprise that will make you forget
what happened just now."

	"Why did you..." Riviera pleaded, trailing off.  He couldn't
bring himself to say what had just happened to him.

	"Tony has been a bad boy," she replied as if she were
scolding a child.  "And he had to be punished.  Now mommy's
going to make everything all better."  As if to emphasize she drew
her tongue along the length of his shaft.  He moaned again.

	"I going to come," Riviera gasped.  "I'm going to come soon."

	"Good boy."

	Dolores looked right at the camera and smiled.  Her mouth
was filled with thick jagged teeth.

	Holy shit! thought Steeles.  When did she put those in?  It
must have been when the camera was focused on Tony.  Then he
realized what she was going to do with those teeth and closed his
eyes.

	"I'm coming, baby, don't let me down."

	Silence.  The sound of Riviera gasping and groaning, faster
now.  The sounds becoming more urgent.  There was a liquid
smack.  More groans.

	"Oh yes baby," Riviera pleaded.  "Come on, come..."  Silence. 
Then Riviera let out a high pitched shriek.  Steeles' eyes flew open
involuntarily.

	Dolores had Riviera's penis in her mouth and was whipping
her head violently from side to side.  Bright red blood flowed
from the base.   With one last thrust, she pulled her head away,
leaving an empty space where Riviera's penis should have been. 
There was a spray of bright red blood--in time with the beating
of Riviera's heart--then, a white spray of semen.

	Someone in the squadroom vomited loudly.  Someone else
repeated "fuck" over and over again in a low voice.  Steeles could
feel his gorge rising.

	The camera followed Dolores around the table, a purple tube
hanging from the middle of her mouth, her chin and chest covered
in blood.  She took Riviera's head in her hands and looked into
his eyes.  He was still screaming, his eyes wide with pain and
fear.  She smiled for a moment, then spat his severed cock into
his face.  Riviera's eyes rolled back into his head and he fainted.

	The screen faded to black, then to the words, "End of Part
One" done in fancy white letters in the middle of the screen. 
Steeles stared at the message in horror.  

	"Jesus, Alex, what the fuck did you get yourself into?" he
whispered.  Then put his head between his legs and puked onto his
shoes.