Pest Control, page 1
A NineStar Press Publication
www.ninestarpress.com
Pest Control
ISBN: 978-1-64890-397-7
© 2021 C.D. Habecker and Luna Nyx
Cover Art © 2021 Natasha Snow
Edited by Elizabetta McKay
Published in October, 2021 by NineStar Press, New Mexico, USA.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact NineStar Press at Contact@ninestarpress.com.
Also available in Print, ISBN: 978-1-64890-398-4
CONTENT WARNING:
This book contains sexually explicit content, which is only suitable for mature readers. Depictions of panic attacks and social anxiety, depression, starvation, illness, ableism, past trauma; animals hunted for food; discussion of homophobia.
Pest Control
C.D. Habecker and Luna Nyx
Table of Contents
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Acknowledgements
About the Author
For all the queer people out there. I hope you know that you’re loved and worth it.
Chapter One
Rhys pulled the string of his compound bow back taut, his hands steady as he readied his arrow. Tucked as he was behind the thick foliage, the buck’s tawny coat was well camouflaged in the autumn hues, making aiming for his target difficult. Though, it also benefited Rhys; combined with being downwind of the magnificent creature, the foliage kept him just as hidden.
The buck, completely unaware of his presence, stepped out enough to bend its graceful neck to drink from the trickling stream. Still on guard, cautious as animals of prey always were, its ears flickered at the tiniest of noises, its muscles tensed and ready for flight at any moment.
Rhys had only one chance at getting this right.
One wrong move, and the buck—a good month’s worth of venison dinners—would disappear into the forest, never to be seen again.
This wasn’t Rhys’s first rodeo, not in the slightest, yet he couldn’t help the nervous hitch in his quiet, slow breathing when it seemed, for a moment, that the buck had seen him. Its head jerked up and turned, dark eyes looking straight in his direction. It didn’t flee, only stared ominously as if caught in a truck’s headlights. Rhys knew he wouldn’t get a better chance than this one.
It was always a strange feeling to look into the eyes of his prey, of something he was going to kill. Ignoring the shudder that rolled down his spine, he took the shot anyway. Releasing his grip on the string, he allowed his arrow to take flight in a silent, quick whirr through the air.
Before the buck could even blink in reaction, the sharp metal arrowhead lodged deep where the shoulder of its front leg met its torso, cutting through thick layers of fur, skin, fat, and muscle—and hopefully its heart or lung, maybe even shattering its shoulder. Rhys had counted on his aim making the cleanest, quickest kill, one that would keep the animal’s suffering at a minimum.
The buck immediately took off running down the stream with a loud startled noise, and so did Rhys, chasing after his wounded prey. Still much faster than he was, even with its injury, the buck disappeared into the trees. Leaving a trail of blood and crushed foliage in its hasty retreat, it led the hunter on through the forest for what seemed like at least a good few miles.
But, when Rhys finally made it to the end of the blood trail, there was no buck in sight, only pools of blood mixed in with the muddy ground, and hoofprints leading off deeper into the forest, away from the stream. Rhys furrowed his eyebrows as he knelt beside them and traced their outline with his fingers.
Not hoofprints, he realized with an angry huff—wolf prints, and familiar ones at that, the large canine’s paws unmistakable to his trained eyes. Streaks of blood followed alongside them, which left Rhys with only one answer.
“It’s you again, huh?” he grumbled through gritted teeth, digging his fingers into the wet mud, replacing the print with his own.
This wasn’t the first time the wolf had stolen his kill. In fact, it was the fifth time this season. Rhys thought that by traveling far in the opposite direction he normally took toward his trusty hunting perch, he’d be able to avoid the bane of his existence, but yet again, he had been outsmarted.
It was as if the thieving canine had been following him, stalking him even, to drag away his kills, mooching off of his hard work and dedication. The reoccurring situation pissed him off to no end, especially when winter was only a mere month or two away from turning the landscape white and cold.
He needed this kill, needed the other four lost kills as well, to keep himself from starving in the dead of winter when it would be next to impossible to do any sort of hunting. This late in the game, his food storage cellar should be full already; he shouldn’t have spent all of his time hunting when firewood and water needed to be collected and stored, and his fall vegetable harvest needed to be pickled.
With how things were looking now, it was loud and clear: Rhys was utterly and completely fucked.
★
It took Rhys two whole days of hammering down scrap metal over the hot flames in his fireplace, but finally, the project was completed. Now, Rhys was back to march on into the forest, this time with ten heavy wolf traps in his backpack, clanging together noisily.
He hated that it had come to this, but the wolf had left him with no other options. If it wasn’t going to peacefully cooperate with him and share the forest’s resources like every other predator, then Rhys would have to take it out. And, he wouldn’t mind a fluffy wolf pelt to keep him nice and toasty.
Rhys set the traps up around his usual hunting locations, baiting each one with a scrap of rabbit meat—the only game he’d successfully hunted this season, along with fish and other small creatures he’d easily caught in simple snares. It was a bit of a long shot that this wolf would be dumb enough to step right into the trap, but Rhys thought it might work, given how gluttonous the predator seemed to be.
Or, at least, he hoped and prayed with all he had that it would work.
Rhys’s anxiousness kept him up later than usual that night with his windows wide open, unable to sleep at all, listening for the telltale howl or yelp of a caught, injured wolf in the distance. As much as Rhys absolutely hated the creature, he wanted to make sure he could immediately put it out of its misery instead of letting it wallow in excruciating pain for hours.
The sun had just begun to rise from its slumber when he finally heard it—the long-awaited howl breaking through the tense silence. Despite his grogginess from lack of sleep, all tiredness was lost at the sound, replaced with a straight shot of adrenaline pumping through Rhys’s veins. He jolted up in his bed, heart racing a mile a minute, hastily pulled on his boots, and took off into the forest toward the source of the noise. The eerie silence had returned, only broken by the sound of twigs snapping under his boots. Rhys worried that, somehow, the wolf might have broken free from the sharp teeth of the trap.
“Please still be there, please still be there, please,” he prayed under panted-out breaths, almost tripping over a fallen tree in his hurry.
With white knuckles, Rhys gripped his shotgun, a weapon he only used in case of extreme emergencies, since it was much harder to craft replacement bullets than the arrows for his bow. He was fully prepared to riddle the unlucky predator’s body full of lead and holes. But what he found was most definitely not what he expected: it was not a wolf.
“Wait, wait, fuck, don’t shoot!” the man pleaded, hands raised in the air in frantic surrender. “Don’t shoot! Please, don’t kill me!”
Rhys dropped his gun, letting it fall to the ground with a dull clatter. He couldn’t believe his eyes—was he dreaming? Had he ended up falling asleep after all, and was now experiencing a sick nightmare? Why was a human, with his bloody, mangled leg, caught in the wolf trap? And why the hell was he butt-fucking naked?
“Uh,” Rhys gulped, averting his eyes from the man’s junk, his gaze flickering down to give a concerned look to where the trap met skin. It looked absolutely nasty, steel teeth dug deep into the flesh, almost all the way through to hints of pale, white bone. And sure, he’d seen his fair share of gross carcasses before, whether during butchering or coming across a bear’s leftovers, yet his stomach rumbled with a wave of nausea. “A-are you okay?”
“Of course I’m not fucking okay!” the man squawked, bringing Rhys’s attention up to his face—a surprisingly handsome face, despite the dusting of dried mud on his dark skin and twigs stuck in his messy, bird’s-nest head of coiled black hair. “Why are you just standing there! Help me, please!”
“R-right, shit, s-sorry.”
Rhys cringed inwardly at his awkward stuttering. He knelt to stick a key into the trap, and the jaws snapped ope
The man let out a hiss of pain as he pulled his injured leg toward him. “Fuck, this is really bad. How am I going to be able to walk now?”
“I’m sorry,” Rhys said again like a broken record. “Y-you’re definitely going to need stitches for that. Do…do you need me to call a hospital? I got a phone back at my cabin—there’s no cell service up here, but if I drive down the mountain, there will be. I’m sure they can send over a helicopter and take you back—”
“No!” the man interrupted with a harsh shake of his head. “No. No hospitals!”
He attempted to stand up, scrambling like a newborn deer, only to let out a pained yelp when his injured leg couldn’t bear his weight. It buckled beneath him, wobbling precariously. But before he could hit the ground, Rhys quickly reached an arm out to stabilize him.
“Okay, okay, no hospitals, I promise. Just calm down, all right? You’re going to hurt yourself even more doing shit like that.”
Rhys grunted with effort as he hoisted the man’s body up to fully support him like a human crutch.
“Just leave me here to die,” the man groaned, letting his head loll back to rest on Rhys’s shoulder.
A moment of panic rushed through Rhys when the man’s eyelids grew heavy, and he worried if he didn’t get help soon, he would surely pass out or even die from the blood loss.
“No can do, stranger,” Rhys sighed, slapping the man’s face softly to hopefully get some color and consciousness back. He only received a flutter of eyelids in response, the man’s dark irises looking up at him in a daze, and it was nothing short of extremely concerning. “Come on; how about we go back to my cabin? I’m no doctor, but I’ve dealt with my own injuries before. You’ll probably be just fine with some stitches and rest, okay? How does that sound?”
Rhys once again received no answer aside from an incoherent throaty grumble, so he took that as the best confirmation he’d get out of the poor man. Thankfully, he wasn’t much heavier than the logs Rhys had once dragged out from the forest to build his cabin.
Rhys was thankful to finally reach his cabin and soon had the stranger laid out on his bed next to a roaring fire, a blanket draped over him, hoping to warm the eerily lifeless body that felt much too cold to the touch. He’d lost so much blood Rhys was far from convinced he’d live to see another day. But since his heart still beat weakly in his chest, there was a glimmer of hope for his survival—as long as Rhys wasn’t about to mess it up, of course.
The festering leg wound had finally stopped oozing, leaving a crusty mess of dried blood and caked-on mud that had Rhys’s empty stomach acid gurgling in protest. He was glad he hadn’t had a chance to eat breakfast because he’d surely have puked it out by now. Rhys put his own feelings aside as best as he could and focused on taking deep, calming breaths as he gently cleaned the injury with a rag soaked in a saltwater concoction he hoped would be enough to wash out the bacteria.
When he had finished, Rhys moved on to the most crucial step: stitching up the wound. He’d done it a few times to himself, but only for shallow, superficial cuts. By the time the task was completed, he’d spent an entire hour stitching up the gaping, deep wound. The result wasn’t pretty in the slightest, though it would have to do. He’d carefully dressed the man in his own clothes, which covered it up, anyway. Thankfully, since Rhys preferred his clothing to fit oversized, they fit nicely on the man, despite him being a larger size.
The morning was still young, with the sun not even finished rising over the horizon, but the combination of lack of sleep and taking care of the injured stranger had exhausted Rhys. He swore he’d only close his eyes for a moment, just a second—but as soon as his head hit the cozy pile of furs on the floor, he was out like a light, dreaming of wolves and a nameless man with dark eyes.
Chapter Two
Three days. Three whole days it took for the stranger to wake up. Three days that Rhys spent pacing back and forth in the small confines of his cabin, anxious out of his mind that the steady rise and fall of the man’s chest would stop, leaving him to deal with a dead body and an immense amount of guilt. Three days Rhys could have spent making up for his food deficit, instead of wasting what remained of autumn on monitoring him. Three days he wrestled with his conscience, debating whether he should ignore the stranger’s plea to stay away from hospitals. If he’d been stuck in a comatose state for any longer, Rhys would have had no choice but to act against his wishes and drive him down to civilization. Thankfully, though, it wasn’t necessary.
The stranger let out a soft groan, making his awakening known, and Rhys paused his pacing and whirled around to see the man slowly sitting up.
“Wh-where am I?” he asked hoarsely. He looked around for a few moments before letting out a screech when his wide eyes landed on Rhys. “Oh! It’s y-you! The hunter! Sh-shit, why—what—”
He quickly shuffled backward to shove himself into the corner. His breath quickened audibly, and his gaze darted around as if he were searching for an escape route.
“Relax, relax, it’s okay! You’re going to reopen your wound if you move around too much.” Rhys raised his hands in the air and took a few cautious steps back as if facing a flighty, terrified animal. “I know you don’t want to go to hospitals, so don’t worry; you’re just in my cabin. Been here for the last three days healing after I stitched you all up. Don’t you remember me saving you from that trap your leg got caught in?”
Gazing down at his injured leg, wrapped carefully with fabric, the man was silent for a few minutes. He took a series of deep breaths before returning his attention to Rhys.
“Yeah, shit, I remember. Sorry, I just…waking up here…thought you had taken me to a hospital.”
Rhys lowered his hands slowly and stepped closer. “I get it—I would be terrified, too, waking up in a strange place. But don’t worry. You’re safe.”
“Right, right, I’m safe…” the man whispered.
Again, the man was silent for a few minutes.
“Well, um, my name’s Rhys Ortiz. What’s yours, strange naked man I found in the forest?”
The corners of the man’s lips twitched into a weak, pensive smile. “Everett. My name’s Everett.”
“Just Everett, huh? No last name?”
Everett blinked. “Uh…no?”
“Okay…well, nice to meet you, then, just Everett. How old are you? I’m twenty-five; you look like you’re around my age.” Rhys held out his hand for Everett to shake, but he only stared at it with narrowed eyes, so Rhys dropped it to his side awkwardly.
“I’m…uh…twenty.”
“Ah, okay, I was a bit off then.”
Silence, once more, until Everett’s stomach growled quite loudly.
“Hungry, aren’t you?” Rhys laughed at Everett’s grimace.
He walked over to the pot hanging over the fire where he was heating up some rabbit stew for his own lunch. He plopped a heavy spoonful in a bowl and handed it to Everett, whose eyes lit up immediately at the savory, delicious scent. Without waiting for Rhys to give him a utensil to eat it with, Everett immediately tipped his head back and poured the steaming meal into his mouth, gulping it all down within mere seconds like a man starved. He even stuck his tongue out to lick the bowl clean, smearing broth on his rosy cheeks. When he deemed the bowl empty, he held it out to Rhys, who again filled it full of stew with a chuckle under his breath.
He ended up feeding Everett a total of six bowls, which drained the pot to only allow Rhys a single serving for himself. To be honest, he still felt a bit hungry. But Everett hadn’t eaten for three whole days, so he needed the nutrients much more than Rhys.
“Well,” Everett said, wringing his hands in his lap, “Thank you for everything. I really appreciate the food, the medical care, the clothes…but, I think it’s time for me to go. I’d feel bad mooching off any more of your generosity.”
Rhys waved his hand dismissively. “It’s really no big deal. Do you have anywhere to go though? If it’s far, I can drive you. I have my old truck parked in the shed out back; I haven’t taken it out in a while, but it wouldn’t be a big deal.”
Everett dropped his gaze sheepishly to the floor and kicked at one of the loose wooden boards—enough of an answer for Rhys.
