Free The Bug: Complete Season One by Barry J. Hutchison Page A

Her whole body convulsed involuntarily. “Jesus. What sort of bug?”
    “A… a big one. I don’t know. Not something I’ve ever seen before,” Mark said. “It was big and black and shiny and I knew I should be freaking out, but… it was so weird. I wasn’t.”
    “You weren’t? I would have been. I mean, Jesus, I’m freaking out about it now,” Abbie said. “What did you say?”
    “To the bug?”
    Abbie smiled and slapped him gently on the chest. “To the passenger. The guy whose sleeve it fell out of. I mean, as tips go, that one’s not great.”
    “Oh, him. Um, nothing. I don’t remember where he went after that.”
    “What about the bug? Did you kill it?” Abbie asked.
    Mark stiffened. “What?”
    “Did you kill it? The bug?”
    “Of course I didn’t fucking kill it,” Mark snapped, his voice suddenly filled with venom. “Why the fuck would I kill it? What kind of question’s that?”
    Abbie stepped back in surprise. “OK. Jesus, I only asked. No need to be a dick about it. I thought you’d have killed it. What did you do with it?”
    “Nothing,” said Mark, the anger in his voice now replaced by an even flatness. “I didn’t do anything with it.”
    “Then where did it go?” asked Abbie, frowning again.
    Mark stepped closer. His breathing seemed unnaturally loud in the dark. “I think… I think it went inside me.”
    Abbie snorted a laugh. “Inside you?” she said. She searched his face, but saw nothing there to suggest he was joking. “What are you talking about? How could it have gone inside you?”
    “I don’t know,” Mark admitted. “But I can hear it.”
    “Hear it? The bug that went inside you, you can hear it?”
    Mark nodded slowly. “It thinks… It thinks we should kill the baby.”
    Abbie felt her stomach tighten for the second time in the space of five minutes. “Shut up, Mark. That’s not funny.”
    Mark stepped forwards and wrapped his arms around his wife again, pinning her own arms to her side. He pulled her in close, squashing her hard against his broad chest. “I don’t want to, babe, I don’t want to,” he whispered. “But we have to. The bug says we have to. I have to.”
    “Let go of me,” Abbie said, struggling to break free of Mark’s grip. “Mark, you fucking let go of me right now.”
    “We don’t need it. We were fine before it came along. We’ll be fine again once it’s gone,” Mark said.
    “ She , Mark, and this is not funny. I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but the joke is fucking over. Let me go right now .”
    Over in her crib, Immy began to cry. Abbie felt a scream of rage well up inside her. It burst from her lips as she brought one knee up sharply, driving it deep into Mark’s groin. He groaned and stumbled back, clutching his balls and looking like he might throw up.
    Abbie ran for her crying daughter, but before she could reach Immy, Mark caught her by the arm and spun her round. “You ungrateful fucking whore,” he growled, his face twisted into an expression Abbie had never seen before in all their years together.
    His fist hit her like a wrecking ball, spinning her to the floor. She landed awkwardly on the carpet, her wrist twisting painfully beneath her.
    By the time she’d rolled over, Mark was over the crib, reaching inside. “We don’t need it,” he whispered. “We don’t need it. These are the things a good daddy does.”
    Abbie was on her feet before she’d even thought about moving. Her arm drew back, and she was surprised to see the candlestick in her hand, swinging towards her husband’s head. It hit not with the hollow thud she’d been expecting, but with a nauseating crack that she felt more than heard.
    Mark spun around, hissing like a demon. He flew at Abbie, but her arm came up all by itself again and the heavy base of the candlestick connected just above his right eye. He staggered and fell, a curved line of blood already appearing where the edge of the rounded base had struck