The Little Pets of Arkkhan

Suddenly, Kent Knight began to run. He didn't want to, but his long sinewy legs drove him across the rocky plain at reckless speed, and his mind would not answer his frantic orders to stop. His lungs burned and screamed as they sucked in the asteroid's thin air, and his heart was a writhing, sobbing thing within his straining chest.

One ankle caught between two rough hands of rock and broke, but he did not stop running. Each time the weight of his body fell fully upon that fractured bone, it splintered a little more until the shards were sharp daggers biting into what mind still belonged to Kent Knight.

Then the other foot--the right one--stepped on a razor-edged rock that cut through flesh, bone and sinew, but still Kent Knight ran on. The Thing was chuckling at the stabbing pain signals.

Finally It said, "No, Kent Knight?" It released control, and Knight sprawled on the hurting rock, the blows and stabs of the rough plain against his body unfelt through the agony of his crippled feet.

"I hate you, Thing." Knight's deadly thought reached for the Thing within his mind. Then Kent Knight cradled his head in his arms and sobbed uncontrollably, his shoulders shaking convulsively, his whole body trembling with rage and agony.

"Why rebel, Earthling? You cannot prevail against us. So simple it was to hurt you. If you but accept your destiny as our hosts, it will be pleasant. Like this!"

The sense of peace which flooded through Kent Knight then was so deep and so full, he wanted to cry again--this time because he was happy and free of pain. For the agony in the broken ankle and the slashed foot was gone. The throb of the bruises, the aching loss of his individuality, of his will, the horror of his and mankind's destiny with the Arkkhans--all these were gone.

He stood up slowly and, for the first time since he picked up the strange furry little creature from its hiding place in a rock crevice, he felt like Kent Knight.

He lifted his dirty face, streaked with tears, to where he knew Earth must be circling its familiar old sun. He whispered, "Thing, all my life I have feared pain. Ever since I was a kid back on Earth and my pup dug his needle teeth in my hand, I have hated and feared it.

"But peace at your price is not for me. If you don't mind," and Knight's full, almost sensual lips which loved pleasure so well twisted wryly as he spoke, "I'll take the pain."

He got it....

It was Sammy's hoarse breath, saturated with liquor fumes, that was his first sensation when he finally crawled wearily back the molten road from his hell of pain.

His mind listened avidly, reaching out tenuous fingers, searching every nook and cranny of Kent Knight's brain, seeking out the Thing. The fingers grew surer, swifter as they worked through the brain, finding only pain. Then his desperate mind relaxed. Pain was something it understood; it could take care of that.

Knight opened his eyes. Sammy's blood-flecked black ones, popping as usual from his flushed face, stared into his eyes from only inches away.

"Cripes," muttered Knight. "Sammy, you're stinking drunk again!"

Sammy pulled his face back far enough so Knight could focus his eyes. He rubbed a huge blunt paw on his shiny pate, transferred the paw to his broken nose, tried unsuccessfully to straighten the sharp curve it made to the right before he answered, very slowly and very distinctly.

"You know, Kent, I do believe that you have made a highly astute and highly correct observation. I think, however, that you are guilty of an understatement when you say only stinking drunk. I have never in my binge-ridden life been as intoxicated as I am at this present moment."

He waved his paw at Knight.

"But, Kent, there is something very definitely wrong. Something is lousing up the usual beatific feeling I have after three quarts. Honest to gosh, Kent, I have been drinking for three days and three nights, but I can't go to sleep. I can't pass out. I can't get happy." He shook his bald head, and the wall-light made it gleam like a highly polished egg.

"Hell, Kent," he exploded suddenly. "All I do is drink and, honest to gosh, it gets tiresome lifting and dropping a bottle all the time, day and night. But I can't stop. My mind keeps nagging at me to stay drunk. It's just like there was somebody in me with me." He was shaking his head like a puzzled child.