Tennessee Tiff

      “It may be your car Jamal. But, I’m a U.S. Marine.”

 

      “Ex-Marine! What you are is one cheesy m**********r but I ain’t going without Small Packet here.”

      “It’s sorted then,” Trakker smiled and reloaded his pistol then stuffed the remaining shots in his pocket. “How are we doing for weapons?”

      Between them they had just two guns. Jamal rolled a lighter round in his hand. “Those balls gotta be real flammable.”

      Jo looked around them all. “Junko needs a weapon; a sword or perhaps a spiky ball on a chain? Anime freaks would love that.”

      Small Packet laughed and reached over into the boot. “I got one here. It’s a fake though; dull edges so it ain’t good for nothing but it looks cool.”

      He pulled out a black curved scabbard with a shiny new sword inside and gave it to Junko.

      By then the two people had begun walking towards the car. As they got closer Trakker jumped out, followed by the others, and aimed his gun at them. “Who are you?”

      “John Paul Gama,” the man stammered. “This is my colleague, Heather Foxcroft. Don’t shoot us.”

      Trakker took a step closer. They were not wearing I.D. badges. “What are you doing here?”

      This time Foxcroft answered. “We work for an independent research company in Clarksville. We have been monitoring the tests by Mega4 Industries for the last five years.”

      “What tests?” Jamal asked. “We just saw a giant bug of some kind. It attacked us.”

      “It was probably as startled as you,” Foxcroft replied defensively. “The beetles are not aggressive by nature.”

      “This ain’t nature lady,” Jamal waved his finger.

      Foxcroft continued. “They have been manipulating the genes of various insects including dung beetles. Gama and I ran computer tests based on these models and realised that the variability of genes could have a catastrophic effect; gigantism.”

      “So, it’s not some kind of fall-out from Oakridge?” Jo ventured. “You know; something nuclear causes bugs or other creatures to grow uberly-massive over night like in some crackpot nineteen-fifties B-movie.”

      “That’s just not possible,” Foxcroft shook her head. “So, we came here to gather evidence to expose what’s been going on and to destroy the bugs for good.”

      “I’m all up for a bug hunt,” Trakker smiled. “I always said it was bugs and it would be my pleasure to help you ma’am.”