Give the Hippo What He Wants Read Free Page B

running for our lives like you are right now, he told each and every one of us that you were the son of a bitch who ruined our lives.”
    The hippo cleared his throat loudly. “Don’t believe a word he says! Lies, all lies!”
    â€œAnd guess what?” said Casey. “The three guys you’re stuck here with right now? All three of us got screwed over because of you.”
    Thal looked at the other two men standing around him. He hadn’t recognized them before, but now he realized that their faces were as familiar to him as Casey’s.
    â€œNot that there are any hard feelings, of course,” said Casey. “Right, guys?”
    â€œAbsolutely,” said the dark-haired man with the sunken eyes.
    â€œDefinitely,” said the man with the shaved head and goatee.
    â€œThank God for that!” said the hippo. “They had me worried for a minute there!”
    â€œForgive and forget, I always say,” said Casey, right before he and the other men started pounding the hell out of Thal Simoleon.
    Â 
    *****
    â€œWow,” said the priest just before he punched Thal in the face. “I’ve never hit a god before.”
    Suspended spread-eagle from the ceiling by chains, Thal stared blankly at the scrawny priest. He wasn’t the first person to enter the white chamber with the intention of striking him; he wasn’t even the first priest to do so.
    In the months since Casey and the others had beaten him half to death and sold him to the man who kept him here, a seemingly endless parade of people from all walks of life had walked through the door and used him as a punching bag.
    Usually, they told him why they did it. A lot of them were still angry because he’d lost the World Series for the Bio Threats. Some were fans of other teams, avenging his victories over their favorites. Some had lost money betting on games because of him...or investing in Thal Simoleon memorabilia that had become worthless the minute he missed that fateful pitch in the Series.
    Some--the priests, especially--wanted to lash out at a fallen god. Some just did it for the novelty, so they could tell others and gain some minor notoriety in their circle of friends.
    And some, he thought, no matter what reasons they gave, just did it because they wanted someone they could hurt with impunity. Who could complain if someone took a shot at the man who’d lost the Series for the Bio Threats...the man who’d become the equivalent of Satan himself in the eyes of the fans?
    No one. Even if Thal’s torture chamber had been in the middle of Bio Threats Citydome Center for all to see instead of hidden away in a desert compound, none of his visitors would have been faulted for pummeling him.
    He was meat.
    â€œThis is for betraying your flock,” said the priest, hauling off and throwing a fist hard into Thal’s belly. “And this is for letting me worship you as a false god.” The priest swung again, this time cracking Thal’s nose.
    â€œThat’s gotta hurt,” said the pink hippo, who unfortunately hadn’t left Thal’s side for a moment since the World Series debacle. “These priests sure have a lot of pent-up aggression, don’t they?”
    The priest swung again, landing another punch in Thal’s gut. The chains rattled as Thal rocked back and forth from the force of the blow.
    As the priest continued to pound him, Thal let his mind drift the way he always did during the worst of the beatings. Though he was genetically engineered, he wasn’t unbreakable or impervious to pain; the only way he had managed to survive so long was by distancing his thoughts as much as he could from his body.
    As the priest hammered him, Thal cast himself back to his childhood in Citydome Godcrèche. He remembered days under the hothouse sun, running and throwing and hitting the ball under the watchful eyes of trainers and coaches who were the only parents he’d