Free Salmonella Men on Planet Porno (Vintage Contemporaries) by Yasutaka Tsutsui

should be nearly there now,” I said. “Whereabouts are we?”
    “Yes, whereabouts are we.” Gorohachi’s wife tilted her head. “We should have arrived long since. But I can’t see the ground for the clouds. I wonder if we’ve gone off course.”
    “She wonders if we’ve gone off course,” Hatayama repeated to me with ever-widening eyes.
    “Aw, shut your trap,” Gorohachi’s wife shouted as she hoisted the crying baby further up her back.
    Thinking she meant him, Hatayama ducked his head again.
    “Could someone take over for a mo? I need to feed the baby,” said Gorohachi’s wife.
    “Right-o,” answered Red Nose, standing up nonchalantly.
    Hatayama blew his nose again. “Let me out.” He started to cry. “I want to get out. Where are the parachutes?”
    “There aren’t any. But there’s a broken old umbrella over there in the corner,” answered Sticky Eye, laughing heartily.
    Gorohachi’s wife handed the controls to Red Nose and squatted down on one of the passenger seats. She opened the front of her overalls, slipped out a breast the size of a softball, and thrust a chocolate-brown nipple into her baby’s mouth.
    “You’ll get mad again if I say anything now, won’t you,” Hatayama said to me with tears in his eyes.
    “Too right,” I replied, staring him out before he could go on. “So don’t say it.”
    “I can say what I like, can’t I?” He squirmed in his seat. “Why do you have to get so angry at everything I say? You’re worried about getting a rollicking from the Chief, aren’t you. You’re trying to forget your fear by thinking about that. Aren’t you.” He looked over at me with bloodshot eyes. “But really, you’re scared too, aren’t you. Just a bit.”
    “What if I am?” I screeched. “Is that going to change anything?!”
    “I’m more scared of losing my life than what the Chief will say. All right?!” he screeched back. “Because me, I’m just a photographer! See? If it came to that, I could earn my living freelance. What do I care if the Chief gets mad and fires me?! But not you. It’s not that you love your job, mind. You’re just scared of the Chief. You’re scared of him because you don’t want to lose your job.”
    “Shut it!” I screamed, standing up. “One more word and I’ll punch your face in!”
    Trembling under my fearsome gaze, Hatayama put his hand to his crotch.
    “I need a wee,” he whimpered.
    “Loo’s at the back,” said Gorohachi’s wife, still feeding her baby. “But it’s full of junk. We use it as a cupboard. So you can’t go in there.”
    “Where can I go, then?!”
    Sticky Eye stamped on the straw matting in the aisle. “There’s a gap in the floor under here,” he said. “Why not do it through that?”
    Red Nose looked round from the pilot’s seat. “Hold on. We might be going over Fox Hill. You’d better wait. It’s bad luck to piss on the Fox.”
    “I can’t hold it any longer!” cried Hatayama. He pulled back the straw matting and, lying face down, hastily thrust his member through a hole measuring a couple of inches in the floor. “Bad luck, Fox,” he groaned.
    He meant bad luck for you, not the Fox
, I thought.
    The sound of the engine suddenly dropped. Then the whole plane lurched to one side, making a strange sputtering noise. I looked out of the window. The propeller on the left side had stopped moving.
    I pointed to the propeller. “Augh. Augh.” No words would come out.
    “Aw, has it stopped again?” asked Gorohachi’s wife. She’d finished her feeding, and hoisted the sleeping baby up onto her back again. Then she heaved herself out of her seat with a “Hey-oop” and returned to the controls. “Move yourself. I’ll take over,” she said to Red Nose.
    “Has something happened?” asked Hatayama, still squatting there in the aisle.
    “One of the propellers has stopped,” I replied as if it were nothing.
    He started to laugh a dark, demonic laugh. “Heheheh. Hahahah. I told you.