Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer Read Free Book Online Page A

for a janitor working at the far end. She walked into the entryway, passing distribution boxes for the campus paper, The Excalibur , and, at last, headed out through the double doors into the warm night air.
    The moon wasn’t up yet. Mary headed along the sidewalk, passing a few students as she did so, although none she recognized. She swatted at the occasional insect, and—
    A hand clamped down over her mouth, and she felt something cold and sharp against her throat. “Don’t make a sound,” said a deep, raspy voice, pulling her backward.
    “Please—” said Mary.
    “Be quiet,” the man said. He was continuing to pull her back, the knife pressing sharply into her throat. Mary’s heart pounded violently. The hand over her mouth came off, and she felt it again a moment later on her left breast, squeezing roughly, painfully.
    He’d pulled her into a small alcove, two concrete walls meeting at a right angle, a large pine blocking most of the view. He then spun her around, pinning her arms against the wall, his left hand still holding the knife even as it also gripped her wrist. She could see him now. He was wearing a black balaclava, but he was clearly a white man—rings of his skin were visible around his blue eyes. Mary tried to bring her knee up into his groin, but he arched backward, and all she managed was a glancing contact.
    “Don’t fight me,” said the voice. She smelled tobacco on his breath, and could feel that his palms were sweaty against her wrists. The man pulled his arm away from the wall, yanking Mary’s with it, then he slammed both their arms back against the concrete so that the knife was closer to Mary’s face. His other hand found the front of his own pants, and Mary could hear the sound of a zipper. She felt acid at the back of her throat.
    “I’ve—I’ve got AIDS,” said Mary, scrunching her eyes closed, trying to shut everything out.
    The man laughed, a sandpapery, humorless sound. “That makes two of us,” he said. Mary’s heart skipped, but he was probably lying, too. How many women had he done this to? How many had tried the same desperate gambit?
    There was a hand now on the waist of her pants, pulling down. Mary felt her zipper parting, and her pants coming down around her hips, and his pelvis and his rock-hard erection grinding against her panties. She let out a yelp and the man’s hand was suddenly on her throat, squeezing, nails biting into her flesh. “Quiet, bitch.”
    Why didn’t someone come by? Why was there no one around? God, why did—
    She felt a hand yank down her panties, then felt his penis against her labia. He rammed it into her vagina. The pain was excruciating; it felt as though things were ripping down there.
    It’s not about sex , thought Mary, even as tears welled from the corners of her eyes. It’s a crime of violence. The small of her back slammed against the concrete wall, as the man smashed his body against hers, ramming himself deep into her, again and again and again, his animal grunts growing louder with each thrust.
    And then, at last, it was over. He pulled out. Mary knew she should look down, look for any identifying details, look even to see whether he was circumcised, anything that might help convict the bastard, but she couldn’t bear to look at it, at him. She tilted her head up at the dark sky, everything blurred through stinging tears.
    “Now, you just stay here,” said the man, tapping her cheek with a flat side of the knife. “You don’t say a word, and you stay here for fifteen minutes.” And then she heard the sound of a zipper going up, and the man’s footfalls as he ran away across the grass-covered ground.
    Mary leaned back against the wall and slid down to the concrete sidewalk, her knees coming up to her chin. She hated herself for the wracking sobs that escaped from her.
    After a while, she put a hand down between her legs, then pulled it away and looked at it to see if she was bleeding; she wasn’t, thank God.
    She