Banto Carbon and the Pre-Historic Proboscis
A novella by Arne L. Bue
Published by Baxter Bog Cards & Collectibles at Smashwords
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organization, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.
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Banto Carbon and the Prehistoric Proboscis, an eBook, Copyright (c)2009 by Arne L. Bue. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address Baxter Bog Cards & Collectibles, P.O. Box 1573, Homer, Alaska, 99603.
ISBN 978-0-9823118-1-3
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Banto Carbon and the Pre-Historic Proboscis
CHAPTER ONE. Mr. Sphincter pays a visit.
Thump. Thump. Thump!
The intrusive pounding on the apartment door caused Mr. Carbon to instinctively jackknife awake from a very deep sleep, and he grabbed the 45, flipped off the bed, and crawled instantly into his closet. The rattling doorknob increased his heartrate and Mr. Carbon’s formerly somnolent breathing transmogrified into short heaving gasps while forbidden images crawled into his life once again.
They want in. They want in, the dirty, rotten....
Mixed images from the years with SS4 raced through his head, horrible visions he valiantly tried once again to erase forever from his tumbling mind.
Oh, good heavens. That was years ago, before becoming an American citizen, before the work at the Museum. Jackal. Jackal has found me. At long last we can have this out, you lousy, no good...Wait: maybe that's not Jackal. Could be a drunk, trying to get in the wrong apartment.
Pile drivers hammered his head. The door's locked. I know I locked it.
Mr. Carbon tightened his grip, but the pearl handle of the 45 slipped like a bar of soap in his moist palm; nevertheless, he managed somehow to hook his finger around the trigger. The sights! Focus on the sights! If that door moves...
The door did not move.
One the one hand Mr. Carbon hated his 45, but on the other she gave him comfort, for in some way she helped him sleep, like those blue pills the good doctor insist he take twice a day. After he’d left SS4, he simply wanted the 45 at long last to rest quietly in his shoulder holster, certainly not like this.
Thump. Thump. Thump!
Oh no. They're not going away.
Mr. Carbon's stomach leapt to his throat, and he drew deeper into the closet, laying flat on the floor with the laundry.
Who the...
"Banto! Come on, man. I know you're in there. Your landlord saw you come home. Open the door. That's an order."
Steve Sphincter is messing around again, waking me at odd hours, the dirty son of a.... Mr. Carbon peered from the closet at his glowing digital alarm by the bed: 1 a.m., Wednesday morning. Why's he doing this? The doctor told me to get plenty of rest, and try to forget…
"Carbon! I need you, now. Let me in. Emergency."
He slipped into the slacks draped on the chair, the brown pair worn so often to work at the Museum. Trembling, he somehow fastened a belt buckle, one decorated garishly with a serrated knife and a vial of poison. Members of SS4 had carved this disgusting buckle, and Colonel Henrik had presented it to him as a going away present. Quietly -- with a liquid intensity -- a ghastly, vivid vision of Colonel Henrik seemingly stepped from the closet and spoke in Mr. Carbon's head with a grating, superior sneer, saying, "Commander Carbon, the boys here -- and I, of course -- want you to wear this in good health for the rest of your miserable life!" Thankfully, the ghostly apparition of the Colonel faded into the dark. Mr. Carbon hated the belt buckle almost as much as he hated the mere thought of Colonel Henrik.
Why can't I get rid of this thing? he said aloud, his hands shaking even more
He unbolted the apartment door.
"Who the heck you talking to in here? You nuts or something? You sleep like a log, Banto. I had to knock twice. I don't like waiting”
Mr. Carbon did not reveal his dislike of Sphincter, relying instead on what he’d somehow learned during hours of training he’d been forced to take in SS4 negotiation seminars.
Sphincter sauntered into Mr. Carbon's apartment as though he owned the place and in the kitchen he propped his feet on the breakfast table. A bulbous, brown cockroach waved a few feelers and skittered off. Sphincter's eyes followed. A beard, the same color as the cockroach, hid much of Sphincter's worried face.
"Got a call from the State Troopers in Anchorage about that archeologist I hired awhile back."
Mr. Carbon nodded as he normalized his blood pressure with a painful pinch to a certain nerve. "Jeremiah Irons," Carbon responded, displaying his boredom as well as his irritation.
"Disappeared. People haven't seen or heard from him for two weeks. He usually comes in from the dig twice a week."
"When did he last check in?"
"Well...about five weeks ago."
"That didn't worry you?"
"Nope. He's a professional archeologist. He can take care of himself. But the State Troopers asked questions. And the Governor's complained. They're all over me on this, Banto."
"Steve, go home and get some sleep and leave me in peace. He'll show up."
Mr. Carbon realized he'd spoken his mind too bluntly, for Steve Sphincter's facial texture amazingly attained a putrescine quality, an occurrence always quite astounding to Mr. Carbon, but one he'd learned to accept as a simple transformation which accompanied Mr. Sphincter's common surges of anger.
"Sending you to Anchorage, Banto,” he snapped. “That's why I'm here!"
Sphincter slapped an airline ticket on the table where the cockroach had rested.
Mr. Carbon hated travel. He wanted to stay in Juneau, and meditate, take solitary walks up Basin Road, and be alone.
Sphincter absently shoved a crumpled sheet of paper toward Banto's face.
"…and that is?"
"A map, Banto. Plainly, anyone can see that. The map shows you the trail to the dig. You find the dig, you'll find Jeremiah Irons."
Irons had probably faxed the map to Sphincter over a month ago, from the date printed on the bottom. Perusing the crumpled document, the trail to the dig practically leapt out at Banto as a heavy black line meandering into the Chugach Mountains, far into a remote valley. More out of curiosity than anything else, Mr. Carbon did an instant assessment, putting to use a certain mental astuteness acquired from SS4. Getting to the site, he surmised, would take a normal person two days, but he could do that particular hike in a day and a half; specialized training had given him an unusual hiking methodology that would cut half a day in travel time. But this hike most certainly did not interest him.
Sphincter kicked over a cold cup of coffee left from dinner. The coffee soaked the airline ticket. Sphincter ignored the mess and picked intently in his nose. He probably did not care about Mr. Carbon's mysterious past, or of the nervous breakdown -- if he knew, which Banto doubted. And Sphincter probably sensed Mr. Carbon's preference for peace and quiet. Surely, he could tell Banto would rather work in the dank archives with invoices, enter them in the computer, than get sucked into trouble. And Sphincter knew Mr. Carbon never volunteered for risky trips. He knew that because Carbon told him, time and time again: no more hair-raising trips.
"I'm not volunteering for this, Steve. My doctor would object. You know that. My meditations are important to me. A humdrum, commonplace life is what I need. No search party for me."