It's Always Time

by Oblimo

  "Anybody else?" SB asked.

  "I fragment awful fast," Eurydice replied, "I burn nanomek to stay coherent. And after that crash? I'm damn low."

  "We're going gray," Unyx said, "that can't be good."

  Raspberry sniffed the tails of her shirt. "I've never needed a hot beef injection more in my life."

  "You're less than a day old," CeeCee insisted, "and you've been saying that every fifteen minutes since you were born. So what are we going to do?"

  Raspberry blushed purple and looked across the street. Tomoe and Yves traded withering witticisms.

  Eurydice shook her head. "We can't ask him. You don't know what he's been through."

  "What if he…" Raspberry made a hollow fist and pumped up and down above her crotch.

  "Where's the fun in that?" CeeCee protested.

  Raspberry's blush deepened into a raging indigo. "I—we—that is…You know. Watch."

  "Oh, honey." CeeCee patted the lavender girl on her mane of orchid petals. "That man's turned you into a blushing violet."

  "Yves is out for the count," Unyx said. "He's been up over thirty-six hours, he's had the shit kicked out of him two, three times now, and he's running on empty calories, caffeine and adrenaline. He's amazing, but he's only human."

  SB pursed her lips, nodding. She stood up, scraping her hands together, a coppery one-piece dress settling over her firm lines and gentle curves. "Let me see what I can do about that."

  "Besides," Eurydice said, watching SB swagger over to Yves and Tomoe, "we're going to need a lot. Like, a whole lot. I'm talking pints."

  Unyx, CeeCee, Raspberry, and Eurydice all craned their necks, smooth and slow. Dee stood under the overpass across from Yves, a brunette coed in his arms, chestnut hair falling in ringlets into his face. He returned their burning gazes, oblivious.

  "What?" he said.

  Yves' migraine fissured his thinking. "I'm sorry, Tomoe. What did you say?"

  Tomoe held out the two pills again. "Little. Yellow. Different. Come on, it's a perfect straight line."

  "Tomoe, look." Yves felt the mad desire to drill a hole in his skull; anything to relieve the pressure-pain. He forgot what he was going to say.

  SB sauntered up, her usually tight one-piece dress flowing loose past her knees. "Hey, T, Yves. Wow, Yves, you look like shit."

  Yves tried to smile, grateful for the rescue, but only affected a grimace. "Well, I feel like shit." He managed to put two thoughts together. "So at least there's symmetry." His knees began to buckle.

  SB steadied him, her grip strong and cool on Yves' bare forearm. "Yves, you've got to take a break. You're dead on your feet." He lost what she said next to the miasma of migraine. SB's thumb slipped under the strap of his tan, sleeveless tee shirt, massaged a pressure point in the hollow of his collar bone. The pain and fatigue faded enough for him to focus. "Ride me, Yves."

  He found his balance. "What?"

  "Welcome back," SB smirked. Her grip slid down his arm and she placed her hand in his, careful to avoid the gauze bandage on the pad of his thumb. "I said, 'Take a ride with me, Yves.' Back to SRU. There's something there that I want to give you." Tomoe coughed. SB glared. "What now?" Tomoe unsnapped the top of her purse and pulled out a plain, glass mason jar filled with strawberry-red jam. SB's expression softened. "You knew? Of course you knew. And you're okay with it?"

  Tomoe held out the jar. "Are you kidding? I've been watching this bit for weeks." SB took the jar with her free hand and Tomoe added, "Give the knight his sword. After all, you haven't had this good a candidate in forever, seems like."

  SB took a step back and tugged on Yves arm. "C'mon, Yves. Eurydice and her pals are running on empty and looking at Dee like he was the Exxon Valdese. You don't want to be here for what's about to happen next."

  Yves shook his head. "Nothing Dee does surprises me any more, not after the skank-bot gangbang. The world works different for him, that's all. I just need to figure out the rules." SB smiled and tugged again, and this time Yves followed her. "But I can always work out the rules later. Or from a minimum safe distance."

  SB blew a kiss over Yves' shoulder. "See ya 'round, T."

  "I thought she said she, uh, wanted to watch?" Yves asked, wondering, What the Hell have I gotten myself into? At least I can't blame Dee this time.

  ["…we're so lucky Dee chose you…"]

  Or can't I?

  "She's watching," SB assured him, leading him around the slabs of concrete. "She was watching, she always will be watching. She's T, and I'm her cheeseburger."

  "I'm just going to pretend I understood that," said Yves, "and not say anything."

  "Good plan."

  Eurydice waved Dee over. She burned a few nanomek muttering in ultrasound, too fast and high pitched for Dee to hear. "He's faking it, you know. His obliviousness, I mean. He always knows exactly what I want, even before I want it, and he teases and teases until I can't take any more." Dee ambled forward, his expression puzzled. "Get ready for the hardest foreplay of your lives, girls," Eurydice added.

  CeeCee snorted back a laugh, then answered Eurydice by broadcasting on the same wavelength. "If it's an act, he deserves an Oscar. I know he's the love of your life, Eurydice, but when it comes to women Dee doesn't have the sense God gave a lemon." The brunette rocked in Dee's arms, a muzzy smile stealing over her face as her body settled against his. "Look, the Easy girl is wide awake and having a ball with your boyfriend and he hasn't even noticed."

  "Sure he has. You don't know him like I do," Eurydice broadcast before calling out in an audible frequency. "Dee, put the Easy down, please." Dee ground to a halt halfway across the road, seemed to notice the damsel draped over him for the first time. He looked about, shrugged and turned back, loping across the street in his signature jaguar strut.

  "And now he's making me watch him walk," Eurydice broadcast an ultrasonic sing-song.

  "Why 'make'," Unyx wondered aloud. "Why would he even want to make you…Oh." CeeCee, Eurydice, and Raspberry, their surface tension spotting with liquid goose bumps, ogled Dee's backside as he closed in on a low, even concrete slab. "Why is everyone so obsessed with ass? First Nyx with Ursula's ass, now you all with Dee's ass. Although I admit that girl in Starbucks with the great…Whoa." Dee bent over the slab. Unyx's eye-mask widened as her voice grew choppy and small. "okay — impressive." Dee stretched to lay the brunette out on the slab. "most — impressive." She shook her head, eye-mask receding. "How does he show off like that, just walking around?"

  Dee nudged the brunette into a comfortable position, unheeding how she trembled and squirmed under his touch. Eurydice narrowed her eyes. "Now he's showing me his kudzu in action, trying to make me jealous." Her core achieved a steady simmer.

  Raspberry edged away from the radiant green girl. "Good thing it's not working, huh?"

  "I still don't buy it," CeeCee insisted, but Eurydice could hear the amber woman panting. "He can't be doing it on purpose. He just can't." Dee steamrolled toward them. "No one's that…devious."

  Dee flipped the hair away from his eyes, scratching behind his ear. "What's going on, guys? CeeCee?" He cocked his head to one side "You okay?" CeeCee only nodded. Dee tapped a toe on the remaining bottle. Water spilt over the black lip print on the bottle's mouth. "Hey, is anyone going to drink that?"

  Eurydice mopped her forehead. "I—I don't think so. Why?"

  Dee reached for the bottle but Raspberry snatched it up and slugged some down in the blink of an eye. "Sorry," she gasped, wiping her lip with the back of her hand. "Needed one last sip. Here ya go, stud muffin. Thirsty?"

  "No problem." Dee took the bottle from her. "Thanks. I'm not thirsty, just itchy. Like beach sand in the crack of your ass, but a hundred times worse."

  "Dee, listen." Eurydice rose up to her knees, fidgeting.

  "Just a second, honey," Dee said, and upended the bottle over his forehead. He let water pour out in three long, lazy glug noises before righting the bottle. The clear liquid ran through his hair an
d down his face. The neck of his white muscle shirt soaked through.

  Eurydice stared as the tee shirt material stuck translucent to the toned contours of Dee's pectorals and his small chocolate brown nipples. Eurydice's legs softened and merged into a single, curvy wedge. Water droplets falling from Dee's hair dribbled onto her face. "Uh, D—Dee?"

  "Oh, shit, sorry." Dee took a step back, rivulets encircling his head like a melting crown. He peeled off his shirt with his free hand, and deadpanned, "Didn't mean to get you wet." Dee turned and stalked away, pouring water down his back till it glistened.

  CeeCee drew herself up, swearing, "That son of a b—" but Dee bent over to pull off his sweat pants and her lips glued themselves together. She broadcast in a burbling, babbling ultrasound: "He is. He really, really is. Please, Eurydice, let me fuck the inscrutability off that man's face. Please."

  Dee stood across the road, poured more water into his hair. "That should be me," Eurydice sighed. Water ran over Dee's arms. Eurydice caressed her throat, touched the upper swell of her breast. "That should be me." Dee emptied the bottle on his legs and rubbed himself down, his muscular back flexing with each twist and stroke. "That really should be me," Eurydice groaned, her shaky hands liquefied into nectarous waves coursing down her tummy and into her sopping sex.

  Raspberry coughed. "Well, tough shit, Sherlock." She slapped her hand onto the pavement. The water pooling at Dee's feet rippled. It zigzagged across the road in an army of clear pollywogs. "That was me."

  "that — last — drink — you — spat — nanomek?" Unyx accused.

  "Spit? Me? Never." The last of the pollywogs wiggled into her jellied fingers. "But I couldn't help a little backwash, now, could I…I…" The re-remembrances hit her and she toppled backward. "Oh fuck, he's everywhere and so solid and strong and, oh, shit, I'm cumming, I'm cumming!" She writhed in a violet puddle on the road, the fabric of Yves' shirt the only thing holding her together. "I could die, I could die now and it'd feel so good I wouldn't fucking care, I could die…"

  "Good." Eurydice crept toward Raspberry on all fours, green with envy, lust, and gallons of melting gelatin. "Because I am gunna kill you."

  Tomoe watched SB drag a bemused Yves down the road. Tomoe had foreseen this moment a few dozen times already, had relived this moment a few million times if she included the future. These next few days were among her very favorites, after all, and she experienced them as often as she could. "Well," she said, snapping her purse shut, "what now?"

  The brunette stirred on the level concrete slab, a copper-and-silk clad offering on an altar to some Pulp Fiction carnal god.

  "Oh, right." Tomoe traipsed through the minefield of broken masonry, wary of losing a shoe heel. She brushed off the top of the slab and sat by the brunette's head. "Oh, hey!" Tomoe said, making the brunette wince and blink. "Jo Echo, right?"

  "How did…Do I know you?" The brunette sounded hoarse and parched.

  "Nah." Tomoe shrugged one shoulder. "I've watched you before." The brunette, Jo, furrowed her brow. Tomoe thought fast. "Seen you play volleyball, I mean. You've got a great, uh, serve?"

  Jo closed her eyes, groaning, "Whatever."

  "What do you remember? How are you feeling?"

  "Little," Jo said, shading her eyes. "Terrible. I keep trying to sleep, but my heart is pounding, my head is pounding, but worst of all my…" She blushed, mumbling, "Sore. Really sore. What did I do last night? Who did I do?" Her blush burned fire-engine red. "And why do I want to do it all over again? Christ, why am I telling this to you? Listen, lady, you got any aspirin?"

  Tomoe shook her head. "No aspirin, sorry. Sleepy?" Jo gave Tomoe a curt nod, grating her head on the concrete. Tomoe popped open her purse and presented Jo with a SRU-labeled, trial-size pill bottle. "I've got some Endymizine, though. Just one pill and you sleep so good you never want to wake up." She shook the bottle, making it rattle. "Two pills and…Oh, you want some? For you? Five dollar." Tomoe's dark eyes glittered above an unreadable smile.

  "Um." Jo patted down her coppery one-piece dress. "This thing doesn't have any pockets. I don't have any money."

  Tomoe stared. She dropped the SRU bottle back into her purse. A blue and white plastic bottle clicked onto the concrete beside Jo's ear. "Here. Have some ibuprofen." She stiffened. "Free of charge."

  Jo propped herself up. "But…"

  "Forget it!" Tomoe threw her hands in the air as she marched away, not looking back. "You ruined it."

  The ivy-choked kitchen window of the Epsilon Zeta sorority house slivered the early-afternoon sun. Lancets of light tracked over the checker-tiled floor. Shimmering ovals glanced off the brushed aluminum of the industrial-sized refrigerator. A sickle-smile spotlight warmed the residue of cheesecake pudding and raspberry gelatin caked on the cock of the husky stock boy hogtied to the marble-topped kitchen cart. He shuffled his legs but his skewed smock got in the way, the underwear and workpants bunched around his knees restricted movement. The sugary gunk soaked into his pubic hair, trickled down his balls and greased his taint. He had never felt more befouled in his life.

  So why the Hell was his dick pointing straight at the ceiling?

  The swinging kitchen door bumped open. A cute girl in a tight, white spandex tee-shirt and pink hot pants stood in the frame. "Relax," she said, "she's not back yet. Something's happened to her."

  None of the Easies had talked to him before except to relay messages. Messages from her. "What do you mean?"

  The cute girl scuttled over. The stock boy cringed but she only stepped behind him, wrestling with the twine binding his hands to the kitchen cart. She smelled like a gym locker. "What's your name, kid?"

  None of the Easies had acted this alert before, either. A little hope bubbled up. "Eddie. What's going on?"

  "We don't know," the Easy girl said, tried to unknot the twine without cutting into his wrists. "But she's real low on nova-whatsis. Whatever it is she uses to control us. Do you know what that is, Eddie?"

  His eyes flicked to the closed tin of SRU thickener, half-hidden on the kitchen counter in a cluster of torn Jell-O boxes. "Not exactly. So, are you guys okay? Free, whatever?"

  "Not exactly," she echoed. "I still can't leave the house. I don't think any of us can. It feels like my feet get glued to the floor. And I can still hear her, sort of, like really loud music but from next door, you know? It's been like this for a while now."

  "Really? Why hasn't anyone come in here, then? It's been hours. Aren't you guys hungry?"

  The cute girl paused. "Starved." She went back to work, pulling one knot lose. "Listen, I'm real sorry no one's come to get you yet." She grinned. "But we've got you now, Eddie."

  Eddie felt a little chill. "I heard the doorbell ring. Around 10:30? Were you free then? What was that about?"

  The door bumped open again and another Easy marched in, licking her fingers. This one wore red leather pants and a black, tasseled jacket. Her thick mane of strawberry-blonde curls exploded out of a FedEx cap perched atop her head.

  "Dunno," said the girl in the pink hot pants. A second knot came undone. "Must've been a wrong number." She stretched to stage whisper at the other girl, the front of her tee shirt bussing the top of Eddie's head. "This is Eddie."

  "O-kay," Eddie drawled. Something was up. Other than his dick. Oh, Jesus, his dick. "Um, would you mind pulling up my pants?" He blushed. "Or just moving the smock? Something?"

  The girl in the FedEx hat popped a finger out of her mouth. "Now, why would we want to do that?" She sashayed over and sat on Eddie's knees. He could hear the scrunch of her leather pants. She wore no shirt under the jacket, just a racy, red, lacy bra. Tips of black felt gloves poked out from a jacket pocket. "What'cha got there, Eddie?" She twirled her slick finger around his pubic hair and slid a dollop of runny glop between her lips. "Well, phooey. Nothing but goo girl cum. We've eaten plenty of that. We're looking for something else."

  Eddie tried to shy away, but with Hot Pants pushing her tits on his head and FedEx squeezing
his legs between her leather-wrapped thighs, there was nowhere to go. There's a certain freedom, Eddie decided, in being totally screwed. "I thought you said she didn't control you any more."

  Hot Pants sat behind him and untied the rest of the twine. "She doesn't." His hands fell to the floor, painfully numb. Her hands crept underneath his leaden arms. "She can't tell us what to do, not exactly, until she gets more nova-whatsis. So we've been talking. All of us. And as far as we know, there's just one source." Her fingers wrapped around his honey-basted cock and her lips pressed to his ear. "And that's you, Eddie."

  FedEx settled her butt onto his knees, reached into her jacket, and pulled one red bra strap down her shoulder. "We like being free, Eddie." She grabbed one of his hands and brought it to her breast, encouraging his fingers to paw beneath the loose lingerie. Her flesh felt warm and silken. Eddie had not felt a girl up since high school. How could he resist? "Mm, although I don't think we're really free. We still share her instincts, impulses." She cupped his chin. "Appetites."

  Hot Pants' hands around his goo-girl lubricated dick began to pump, slow and lazy. Eddie felt the delicious sting of precum. "Well, whatever we are, we really…" Pump-up-and-squeeze "Really…" Pump-down-and-swirl "Like it."

  Eddie came in spurts, not even fully erect. The precum sting just got sweeter and sweeter until his cock wept globs of cum. Hot Pants held his dick, squeezing and kneading. FedEx sat on his knees, leering like the Chesire Cat, watching his cum ooze onto the other girl's knuckles. She reached into her jacket pocket and snuck out the gloves. They slid onto her hands with a silky sigh.

  His dick softened a bit. Hot Pants stroked up and squeezed, making his whole body twitch. FedEx reached down, and now there were four hands, two bare, two wrapped in cool black felt, kneading his cock into tingling over-stimulation. The gloved fingers were super-smooth when they glided down, became bristles against his cock when they wiggled up. The bare fingers were hot and slippy. In the shock of afterglow, his dick hardened like ironwood. "Wa—wait."