“Are you sure I can’t get you something?” she asked for the third time and twisted her fingers together in her lap. She looked adorable in her jeans and long-sleeve T-shirt with a pair of fuzzy pink socks on her feet. Jason knew that she really needed to have something to do, so he relented.
“Sure, I’ll have whatever you’re having. Do you want me to get it?”
“No, no,” she said, clearly relieved to have a task. She got up and headed over to the adjoining kitchen where she leaned across the breakfast bar toward him. “I kind of want a glass of wine,” she said a little sheepishly. “Is that okay?”
Jason considered himself more of a beer guy, but he would drink anything if it would make this woman he felt so drawn to feel more comfortable. “Wine sounds great.”
Jenny smiled and disappeared into the kitchen where he heard a drawer open and the sound of a bottle on the counter. The small, comfortable living room looked exactly as he would have pictured it—simple and feminine—a few girly knick-knacks, a large picture in black and white of a city street in Spain over the couch. On the built-in bookshelves beside her TV stand, he noticed several pictures that lay face down.
“Sure I can’t give you a hand?” he asked.
“I’m good, just grabbing a corkscrew.”
Jason figured he had a moment, went over to the bookshelves and quickly peeked at the three facedown pictures. All three held pictures of what he assumed to be her family. One showed a middle-aged couple, smiling in the way that only happy couples with a long history can, their faces pressed together closely. Another showed Jenny in a cap and gown, flanked by the same man, presumably her Dad, and another guy, who looked a few years younger than her—brother perhaps?
The last showed her and the same guy. Definitely a brother, he decided, sitting in front of her smiling parents, an overly decorated Christmas tree in the background. Jason felt the tug of sadness he always had when he saw happy families. Jealousy, he knew. But something else about the pictures troubled him and it took a second to grab it. The family in the picture seemed happy.
“Everything okay?” He turned around quickly like a kid caught with Dad’s Penthouse and blushed. She looked at him without anger or irritation but did seem pretty curious about what he was doing. She held two glasses of red wine out in front of her.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snoop,” he said, taking one of the glasses. “Just sort of looking around and trying to get to know you. You can tell a lot about someone by what they have on their shelves.” He shrugged awkwardly.
God, please don’t be pissed.
“What did you learn?” she asked. She seemed relieved to have something to talk about.
“Not much,” he said sheepishly as he joined her on the couch.
So now what? He watched her sip her wine and tasted his own. Not bad actually. Should he wait for her to bring up the nightmares? He couldn’t very well dive right in.
Thanks for the wine… have you been transported to a dark, hell-like cave where Lizard Men tore a man apart while he was still alive? Oh, by the way, was Nathan there?
“You doing okay?” he asked instead.
“Yeah,” she said and ran a hand through her hair. She smelled fantastic. “I’m really sorry that I called you so late. I’m a little embarrassed now that you’re here.” She sipped her wine again. “It’s kind of hard to explain.” She looked at him—gauging his response it seemed.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked after a moment. “I have bad dreams sometimes too,” he added and then regretted it. What the hell difference did that make?
Jenny scrunched up her (very cute) face as she thought about something. Her hand found his on the couch.
“It’s not just the dream.” She squeezed his hand. “It’s how I felt when I woke up. It’s not just tonight either.” She looked at him tentatively. “Lately, I have this weird, kind of… I don’t know—this weird feeling—like things are sort of out of place.”
She sighed and looked down at her hand in his. She studied their hands, their intertwined fingers, then smiled. She looked back up at him and held his eyes. “I swear this wasn’t a trick to get you over here.” She looked down again. “But I am afraid, Jason”—her hand squeezed his tightly—”of the dream and other stuff—and I would really like it if you would stay.”
Jason was mesmerized.
“I’ll be a perfect gentleman, and I would love to stay with you,” he said. “I’m off all day tomorrow and I have no where I need to be.”
Jenny laughed. “Well you don’t have to be a total gentleman,” she said nervously, then kissed him gently on the mouth. His heart swelled. He wrapped his arms around her, hugging her tightly.
“I’ll keep you safe.” It sounded pretty corny but he hoped she knew he meant it.
She leaned back, took his other hand and stood up. “Can we just go to bed?” she asked awkwardly. “I’m exhausted.”
Jason nodded and followed her into the bedroom. The lights were out but she looked gorgeous and erotic silhouetted in the crease of light from her bathroom. She pulled off her jeans, left on her top and slipped quickly under the covers. Jason joined her and she slid over to make room.
Jason’s hands trembled as he fumbled with the button to his jeans and awkwardly kicked them off, leaving them under the covers. The smell of her on the sheets drove him crazy as she snuggled up next to him. Her soft, bare legs sent a chill up his spine as she got closer. Jason shifted his hips away from her slightly. The last thing he wanted after his noble I’ll-just-hold-you-and-keep-you-safe line was for her to feel the effect she had on him. He breathed her scent in and wrapped his arms around her tightly.
“Thank you so much, Jason,” she said.
“You’re welcome,” he said, unsure what else to say. “Do you want to tell me about your dream?” he asked.
“In the morning, okay?” she said sleepily.
Jason lay with her, but his mind raced. He had lots of questions and he suspected a few answers that he wanted to share.
In the morning.
He held her close, lost for a moment in the softness of her hair, then he thought of Nathan.
He sighed and waited for morning.
Chapter
10
Nathan thought he woke up because he couldn’t stop thinking about his operation. Well, not the operation, but the part where they would give him medicine to make him sleep. A sleep he couldn’t wake up from. The lady doctor, the one that Jason knew, had come by and talked to him and his mom for a little while after it was already dark out. She seemed nice enough, but Nathan didn’t trust her like he did his friend. He hoped Jason would come by before the operation began.
He wanted to talk to him. He had no idea whether he could go to the cave from that sleep or not and he wanted to ask Jason what he thought. He asked the lady doctor about dreams and she had made a funny face, said she was pretty sure people don’t dream in the medicine sleep (she called it a long doctor word that started with an “a” that Nathan couldn’t remember).
Still, these weren’t really dreams, so Nathan felt uneasy. Maybe that didn’t apply to him at all. All he knew was that if he went to the cave, he might not be able to get back on his own like he had before and that felt pretty scary.
Scaredy cat, scaredy cat.
Maybe so, but sometimes things really were scary. This wasn’t like his bathrobe lying on his dresser that looked like a monster. The more you looked, the more it appeared to be some fanged beast. Even though you KNEW it was just your bathrobe, eventually you had to get up and turn on the light to be sure. No, that was just a silly game kids played in their heads. These really were monsters and Nathan felt terrified of what they could do if he couldn’t get away.
You saw what they did to Steve.
Nathan sighed, a big grown-up sigh, and pulled the soft cover from home up around his shoulders. It was still nighttime but he had no idea how long nighttime was or when the light would come back on.
Maybe just a few minutes but probably not. He wished he was big enough to drive a car. He could go to Jason’s apartment and talk to him. He still worried a lot about Jenny. She seemed fine when he saw her last but he felt like a lot could change in that cave.
Go check on her, scaredy cat. You can sneak up on them quiet-like again, like last time. Sneak up on them like Red Ranger and make sure she’s okay. What are ya—scared?
“Yeah, a little,” he admitted softly.
Maybe just a quick peek. If he did go now, he could come right back.
Nathan concentrated on the soft blanket rubbing against his cheek and the steady sound of Mommy’s breathing from the hospital chair. Then he tentatively closed his eyes.
It came much quicker this time so he guessed he must be getting better—at least at going. He would see if he could be quick at getting back. He opened his eyes and found himself standing against the wall in the narrow passageway just a short distance from the ledge where he had seen Jenny in the room.
Good, now be quick.
Nathan shuffled quietly up the path to the ledge, his body coated in dust after only a moment in the wet heat. He squatted down on all fours like a kitty cat and moved slowly the last few feet to the edge. Then he cautiously looked into the room.
Relief washed over him. He didn’t see Jenny lying naked in the corner anymore. He was more relieved that the Lizard Men weren’t there, but then worried about where they might be hiding. He peered nervously over his shoulder.
A real Power Ranger wouldn’t be scared. Anyway, you can always hear them grunting before they get close and they make that nasty fart smell when they first come around.
Huh. Nathan didn’t think he knew that before but he thought it seemed right. He thanked his invisible friend for that. Then he glanced back down into the room.
Steve looked pretty gnarly. There were long squares on his chest and sides, even on his arms, that were deep purple and wet where the creatures had pulled his skin off with their teeth. Nathan shuddered at the memory. He seemed to be alive though, which surprised Nathan a little. His left leg rocked slowly back and forth and he could hear a soft steady moan.
There was no blood or anything where Jenny had been and he thought she might be okay. He knew he wouldn’t really stop worrying until he saw her at the hospital. Or maybe if Jason just told him she was okay and that he had seen her.
A new shape was in the room as well. Another body sat half-upright against the far wall, the head slumped over onto the chest. He could see a ragged hole in the back of the head that looked wet and glistened in the nearly absent light. The hole looked like a mix of purple-red and a whitish gray. He wondered if that was what brains looked like.
I’ll bash your fucking brains out.
That was Steve’s voice, but it was a memory, he felt sure. The Steve he saw in the cave was in no condition to bash any brains out. He looked again at the big man with grayish-red hair and the big hole in his head. He guessed the Lizard Men had bashed his brains out—so now he totally knew what the expression meant.
He had seen enough. Jenny was gone and hopefully safe, Steve looked nearly dead and a new guy seemed dead with his brains bashed out.
Time to power down.
His own voice tried to sound like an SPD Power Ranger. He slid his body slowly back from the ledge and then thought hard about the soft blanket on his cheek and the heavy sound of Mommy’s breathing. Nathan opened his eyes and looked around the dark hospital room.
If I had a window, I could tell if it was almost morning.
Jason would be there soon, he felt pretty sure. Maybe he’s with Jenny right now. That thought made him feel better.
He drifted off to sleep hoping he and the other Power Rangers would bravely fight the crybots together with his SPD zord. That would be a way better dream than the stupid cave.
* * *
Steve floated, with his half-closed eyes out of focus. He didn’t want to know whether he lay in the cave or was paralyzed in his torture room. His mind tried to remind him that it might be nice to know which nightmare was real and which was just a dream but he told his mind to just shut the fuck up for a minute.
For now he wanted to savor the floating, stoned feeling that kept his thoughts off the horrible pain in his chest and arms. That pain called to him, from down a long hallway, and he knew it would find him soon. He tried to stay lost for just a few more precious moments, like hitting a snooze alarm for the tenth time.
Just a few more minutes.
The pain didn’t bring him back but the sucking swish, the pressure change in the room that announced a new arrival, did, and answered the question of where he was. With some difficulty he opened his eyes by not trying to open them—just letting the lids kind of slide back across his eyeballs on their own.
The intersecting black lines of his monotonous fucking ceiling confirmed what he knew. The horrible smell, like tasting a wet fart, told him that he had company. He listened to the hiss of his breathing machine.
I don’t give a fuck. I don’t care anymore. What the fuck are they going to do to me worse than what they’ve done? I’m not afraid of you anymore—not now that I want to die. Bring it on, motherfuckers.
He couldn’t really make sense of the hushed whispers so he stopped trying. He felt way past giving a shit. He focused on the black lines, listened to his lungs pumped in and out with air and tried to think of the sweaty hot chick’s cute titties, instead of the burning that wracked his body.
It seemed amazing how his mind could numb him to both the pain and fear. He knew his tormentors were there but they felt make-believe now. Steve concentrated on remembering every detail he could summon of the naked girl in the cave.
“Hello, Mr. Prescott,” the familiar voice hissed at him. It sounded more like Smith, the little rat-fuck sidekick with the scar and the teeth that he knew were now stained with his blood. He didn’t even try to move his eyes to see him.
Hello yourself, shit bag. You smell like ass. Did you know that?
There was a long pause and Steve tried to go back to the image of the naked girl, but his mounting anxiety kept her from him.
What are they going to do to me now?
Who gives a good wet shit? Try and picture the chick!
Hard shoes clicked on the floor and another voice joined the first as Mr. Clarke’s pale face, eyes glowing from under his hat, came into view.
“Feeling a little better, are you?” The blood-red lips parted slightly and Steve saw the long teeth. “Well, we can fix that.”
I don’t think so, bitch. I’ll be dead soon and you can fucking go hungry.
He wanted to smile but wasn’t the least bit surprised that he couldn’t. The thin, pale face leaned in closer.
“You’ll be dead when I decide it’s time, bitch.” The voice hissed in his ear. Steve was not surprised that the demon had heard his thoughts. “Not feeling scared, Mr. Prescott? Well, you should be.” The head pulled back and hovered just over his face. For a moment it seemed to shimmer and Steve saw briefly the raptor, though the eyes remained somewhat human. Then the thin red lips were back.
You will feel fear again, Mr. Prescott. The pain you have had is nothing compared to the unimaginable agony I am bringing you today. You will feed us with your terror, I promise you that…
The voice became real again in his ear as Mr. Clarke slid from view above him.
“Before you die today, Mr. Prescott,” it hissed, “you will feed me. You will feel horror and terror as you watch us rip your organs from your belly. You will be awake to see us feed on your liver, your kidneys, your miserable little shit tube, and finally your heart and lungs. You think you are ready to die? Before we are done you will scream, begging for death.”
A brand new terror was born. The blazing eyes came back into his view. His plan to deny the demons his anguish was a stupid, fucked-up pipe dream. He knew he would give them all the shit-yourself-terror that they needed. And he knew that death would be the
highlight of his day.
Steve heard the staccato click of hard-soled shoes and listened to the voices of Mr. Clarke and Mr. Smith.
“We will need a new doctor. We are close to losing one I think.”
“Get it done soon. We have another coming any time now. And get the girl back here. We need help keeping him alive for the feeding.”
Steve thought he heard a slurping sound.
“And the boy?”
“We have time for one more. He doesn’t yet know his power. We’ll be gone before he does.” A pause hung in the air and for a moment Steve felt twin pairs of hungry eyes on him. “Tell the team we have an organ harvest.”
The shit smell returned for a moment, but then faded away and he realized he was alone again. Tears filled his eyes, blurred the ceiling panels and his mind fought furiously for a plan to stop being alive. He couldn’t make himself stop breathing because the fucking machine forced air into his lungs. He couldn’t move, could barely think.
So instead, he screamed in anguish, an animalistic sound, quiet, inside his head.
Chapter
11
Nathan wanted to be brave, mostly for Mommy. She did her best not to let him see her crying but he knew. As the man and woman in the green PJ-looking doctor suits settled him onto the smaller bed and checked his IV he smiled and waved to her, but for some reason it made her look sadder.
“I’ll be okay, Mommy,” he said, trying real hard to sound grown-up.
His mom raised a hand to her mouth. “I know, baby,” she choked out. “Mommy is just silly sometimes, you know?” She smoothed his hair and kissed his forehead. “It won’t even hurt, Dr. Katzen says. She says you get some special medicine and just go to sleep. When you wake up, your hand will be all fixed.”
“It will still have a lot of healing to do,” Dr. Katzen’s voice cautioned from the doorway. “Another couple of days in the hospital I think.” His mommy ignored her and unconsciously shooed her words away with her hand, which made Nathan snicker.
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