Read Online The Stuff of Dreams by Hideyuki Kikuchi - Free Book Online Page B

appeared. Out on the rich pasture there was a herd of meat beasts, several of whom were munching the grass. Seven feet long and easily in excess of fifteen hundred pounds each, the barrel-shaped beasts were covered with armor-like plates that could deflect lasers. Their snouts were reminiscent of power shovels with a pair of curved buckets, which were actually their upper and lower jaws loaded with massive molars. Yet, despite their daunting appearance, nothing tastier had ever graced a dinner table. Though the aesthetic sensibilities of the Nobility had given shape to many ghastly creatures for the sole purpose of terrifying humanity, these beasts were perhaps the greatest exception to that rule in that they also provided food. What’s more, so long as the beast wasn’t fatally wounded, the flesh that’d been carved from it would begin growing back twelve hours later, while the creature itself felt no pain at all and offered no resistance. It was said that with a pair of these treasured beasts, a family of five would never go hungry. Unfortunately, these meat beasts were extremely limited in number, and they rarely produced offspring. Usually, if someone found one, they’d have a creature that could fetch them enough money to buy one of the Nobility’s flying machines, and that’s usually what they did rather than keep them for food. By the look of it, there were at least thirty of them on the ranch, leading D to the conclusion that not only was this region peaceful, it was rich as well.
    As D headed straight for the main house, scarlet streaks of fire occasionally skirted the periphery of his field of vision. The streaks were flames disgorged by the scarlet moles that were supposed to guard the place, although their numbers were less than a fiftieth of what an ordinary ranch would have. With so few of them, you could never hope to see the hundreds of fiery pillars that usually erupted from the earth to greet intruders on the surface or in the air.
    A sensor set forty feet away from the main house was tripped, and before D’s horse had stopped, a woman appeared from the front door carrying an old-fashioned Tommy gun with a drum magazine. D halted.
    As the woman stared at his face, a faint red glow rose in her cheeks. “Um . . . Can I help you?” she asked in a voice that had a touch of good-mannered timidity to it. Her black hair was tied back in a light brown scarf and her face was that of a woman long past her prime, hard around the mouth and razor sharp through the eyes in a way that let the bitter precipitate of her life bleed through. And yet, there was something refined about her, the clear line of her nose and her gracefully thin eyebrows suggesting a life far removed from that of her faded cotton shirt and long skirt. In addition to the Tommy gun, she had a well-weathered knapsack slung on her back.
    “Are you Ai-Ling?” the Hunter inquired.
    “Yes.”
    D advanced on his horse.
    “You . . . Stop right there. I can’t let you come barging onto our land.”
    “Sorry, but this is urgent,” D said from up on his horse. Dismounting by Ai-Ling’s side, the Hunter said, “I’d like to ask you a few things about the girl sleeping in the hospital—Sybille. My name is—”
    “D,” Ai-Ling muttered as she slowly lowered the barrel of her weapon. “I can tell you what I know. But right now, I’ve got to feed the beasts . . .”
    “I’ll wait.”
    An expression flitted across the middle-aged woman’s face that straddled a line between resignation and delight. Shouldering the Tommy gun, she slowly headed toward the fence. D walked right alongside her.
    “What did you come here for?” Ai-Ling asked. Perhaps she, too, sensed that D was dangerous.
    D didn’t answer. As Ai-Ling opened the gate and walked out to the middle of the pasture, D leaned back against the fence and watched her. It was clear he didn’t have the slightest intention of helping.
    Tucking the Tommy gun under her right arm, Ai-Ling