Shadow Seed 1: The Misbegotten

by Richard M. Heredia

  Wanting to keep his desperate girlfriend happy at the same time, he had done what every able-bodied stoner would do when they don’t own a vehicle of their own - he stole one. Yeah, I know fucking brilliant. He had come back with the car, picked her up at the park and said promptly, “Baby, I will take you wherever you want to go, but first we need some supplies.”

  Katie had merely nodded. She wasn’t even all that surprised when the above mentioned “supplies” included picking up his cousin Mike, his skanky-looking baby-mama and one of Chad’s other friends - a guy Katie only mentioned, but never said his name. Or maybe she had and I just forgot it.

  Once their posse was fully formed, they had made a pit stop at the very same convenient store Chad had boosted the car a few hours earlier. They bought a shit load of junk food in the process and they were finally on their way. Of course, by now, an APB had been issued for their arrest, because the clerk behind the counter had watched as his car drove away… for a second time that night.

  It’s funny how even a lowly clerk can sometimes have a photographic memory, isn’t it?

  As it was, Katie had told Chad, while they pulled away with the now infamous shit load of junk food; she wanted to go to California, to Los Angeles specifically. She had told the idiot she wanted to see the ocean again.

  Chad had given her a big kiss and said her wish was his command, and off they went into the starry night.

  My mother, Patrice, got a call two days later. Apparently, Chad had crashed the car on Interstate 10 just outside of Palm Springs after a California Highway Patrol officer noticed its five passengers fit the ABP and had run the plates of the car. When it had come back a positive match, a short car chase ensued, about fifteen miles long from what the CHP officer had written in his report. Back then that would have been considered an afternoon stroll of a car chase for Southern California. This had been a part of the old United States notorious for high-speed chases, some of which went on for hundreds and hundreds of miles.

  Giselle had asked my mother if she could drive to Palm Springs and pick up her daughter for her. My mother had agreed at once. Then Giselle asked my mother - and this always made me wonder – if she and our family could take care of Katie for a few months until she and Ricky could figure some things out.

  Now, when I look back at it, I think Katie’s actions were the straw that broke the “camel’s back” in their marriage. I think they needed time, without Katie distracting them, to figure out how they were going to divide Ricky’s the multi-million dollar real estate business and who was going to live with whom. I believe this, because things between them were never quite the same with them after those last few months of 2018. Even though Katie never went back to live with them, they were forever changed, especially in those last few weeks.

  I know they felt Katie was too much of a nuisance. I know they felt like they needed time to figure out how they were going to handle her. But I also believed they secretly hoped my mother and father, our family, could help Katie in some small way. Since none of my brothers or sisters had found themselves any in any sort of serious trouble – no one was pregnant or got anyone pregnant. In our family, we had no serious druggies or anyone in trouble with the police. We all managed to get decent grades in school, despite being well-off and more than a little spoiled.

  In truth, I think I was probably the only one who did anything remotely off the beaten path. Back then, I did smoke pot here and there, usually garnered from my crazy cousin Jacob. But, I didn’t do it for the high itself, mind you. Rather, I liked to wank-off when I was on the edge of being high, because my orgasms blasted through me like a geyser whenever I was under the influence of marijuana. It was my practice to toke-up at night, all by myself, just like Green Day sang about. Then I would watch some porn, get nice and hard and jerk-off like a motherfucker. I always got the biggest hard-ons and came with the thunder. Yeah… I was born a pervert.

  Well, anyhow, my mother had agreed to take Katie in for the entire summer and made plans to go bail her out of jail, planning to leave within the hour.

  It was a bright, late May morning, when she pulled me aside just before I was about to head out for school and she was about to go get Katie. She asked me then, if I felt I was responsible enough to help Katie, to show her around and make her feel at home. She told me Katie was going to be living with us for a spell and she was going to have to count on me to help get the girl under control.

  I remember smiling broadly and nodding, telling my mother she could count on me, all the while, I kept thinking about the last time I had seen Katie, the year before. The personal question she had asked had rung in my ears for the past ten months and still, I couldn’t shake free of it.

  Ten months prior, the world had been more normal. This was right at the initiation of the Northern Intercontinental Alliance’s declaration of war on genetics. This was before the disappearances first began, when the public executions had yet to start. The mass slaughter of people had yet to come, but the Shadow Seed had. Already, it had begun to wreak havoc upon the human population all across the globe. This was before we began to change as well.

  All of the above was commonplace now, but it didn’t stop the fact that Katie’s question still burned in my mind all this time later. I needed to know. I looked my mother straight in the eye and said I would help Katie in any way possible. Inside, I couldn’t wait to see her again. Maybe this time, we could finish what I think would’ve been something very, very special.

  { ¹Cha Cha’s: a female, generally of Latino descent, who goes and socializes with club-going, drug-using crowd. They are said to dramatically gossip about everything and anything, to anyone, around them. }

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~♦~~~~~~~~~~~~

  ~ Chapter 6 ~

  (Summer – 2017)

  20 Questions

  [He can’t believe he’s brave enough to try this, especially after feeling so much doubt, but he does all the same. He sends a verbal command this time. “Full Immersion, please…”]

  It was hot that day, real sticky and muggy one too.

  I remember, because I had taken off my shirt, wearing only some knee-length, cotton shorts and nothing else. Still, I was sweating. We were in my bedroom on the third floor of my parent’s house with all of the windows open. I was sixteen, a sophomore in high school, lifting weights like crazy, and trying, with all of my will, to put muscle my body. It wasn’t meant to be though; I didn’t possess the necessary mass to work with in the first place. My efforts only made me smaller. I was rock hard and lean, so in the mirror I had all of the proper cuts and definition of muscle. They merely weren’t as big as I would’ve liked them.

  I had shaved off all of my hair on my head the year before, deciding that was going to be my look for the remainder of my high school career. Katie, I recall, was rubbing my scalp, which was slippery from the thin layer of perspiration. I remember I was looking into her eyes and got the impression I was falling into them. I had shaken myself free of them at the last possible moment, making her smirk. I ignored her and began looking over the rest of her face, thinking she was pretty. I knew in the back of my mind she would follow in the footsteps of her sister Caroline and her mother. Both were beautiful women, a pleasure to gaze upon.

  She had her hair up in a bun, keeping it off her shoulders, because of the heat. I could see her sinuous neck as it glimmered with a similar sheen of perspiration reflected in the sunlight. My eyes trailed down to her collarbone, then to her blouse. It was made of very thin cotton, opened enough to reveal the top of her bra and the upper swells of her breasts. She must’ve looked at my eyes then, because she tightened her grip on my head and made me peer back into hers.

  “You like the view?” she asked in her seductive Katie voice, the one that could tie me in knots in seconds. There was no immunity to that tone, especially with us being so much older now. Both of us were sexually active, so I couldn’t help, but feel the full effect of her voice from the nape of my neck to the base of my nut s
ack. I shivered imperceptively.

  “Sorry,” was all I managed at the time, feeling my throat constricting in embarrassment. Fuck, she had caught me ogling her tits!

  She stared at me for a time, her eyes boring into mine. I refused to look away; though I was a little nervous she might be mad at me. Then, she let her wrist fall to my shoulder, though her hand was still loosely touching my neck. I was sweaty there too, but she didn’t seem to care.

  “So tell me more about the little whore you’ve been messaging about for the last few months. You’ve been boning now for what… like a year now?” The question came so far in left field, I moved away from her startled. Her hand fell beside my hip to my bed where we both sat.

  I laughed self-consciously, although I unconsciously placed my hand atop hers. “What do you want to know?” I asked, hoping to throw the ball back in her court, not sure if I had.

  “What she like? I mean, you’ve been fucking her on the side for the past year, hiding her from all your other girlfriends. I mean, if she’s worth all the effort, she’s gotta be good then, right? So, I want to know about her,” she explained intertwining her fingers in mine and moving our hands over the surface of the comforter covering my bed. We supported each other’s weight, while, at the same time, we moved closer together.

  I fell into her eyes once more, trying to figure out where she was going with this. I hoped to divine an answer within, but failed. I let my thoughts stray to Reyna Munoz, the girl who lived around the corner from my parents, whose mother and father had gone to school with my mother. This was the girl I’d been having sex with off and on for more than a year now. In my mind, I reconstructed the sight of her. She was five foot five inches tall with long, dark brown hair, as straight as an arrow, cascading down to the top of her butt. Her shoulders, back and hips were narrow. In sharp contrast to her full breasts, giving one the impression she was top-heavy, unbalanced. She had a v-shaped face with prominent cheek bones as equally sharp as her chin. Even from memory, she looked like she’d been carved out of marble. Her skin was so perfect, even its’ color was the right shade of brown. As flawless as it was, it wasn’t even her best feature, not by a long shot. It was her eyes that could stop a man in his tracks. They were the purest lime-green ever visited upon a person – crystalline, endless. I could almost see them now, impossibly large, captivating.

  “I don’t know, Kat, she’s… uh… eager, I guess that’s the word I am looking for,” I explained somewhat lamely.

  “Eager?” began Katie. “What the fuck does that mean? Is she foaming at the mouth for it or what?”

  That made me laugh out loud. “No!”

  “Well, then what are you talking about?”

  “Well shit, let me think, ok?” I demanded, uncertain if my descriptive ability could accurately depict the girl in my head.

  “Ok, ok, sorry…,” she replied trailing off with an imploring look on her face, though her eyes were still delving deep into my own.

  “I don’t know… she kinda keeps us on the down low, you know. She acts all secretive and shit. She doesn’t show anyone she’s remotely interested in me. But when we’re together…,” I paused to squeeze her hand to make sure she understood my point, “…she goes like crazy, like whatever she’s been suppressing, she’s letting out all at once. It makes her do some crazy shit.”

  “Like what, she let you hit it doggy?” wondered Katie with a sly smile, turning to the side, so she was looking at me from the corner of her eyes.

  “Yeah,” had been my sheepish reply.

  “Face down, ass up?”

  I nodded.

  “Does she swallow your shit?”

  “Yup.”

  “Hmmrph!” she sputtered knowingly, then, “Does she give up the ass too?”

  I bounced with sly giggles. “Yeah.”

  “She gives you anal?!?” she queried with a large slice of incredulity.

  “Yeah, Kat, she likes it that way, that’s the only way I can cum inside her,” I conveyed more vehemently than I wanted.

  “God damn bitch is crazy… and in heat for you,” concluded Katie.

  I just gave her a look of agreement.

  She returned it with a curious cast to her face. “Why, though?” she asked after a time.

  I pulled back with a frown. “Why what?”

  “Why is she all gonzo for you, Eff? I mean you’ve told me before that she isn’t in love with you and you’re not with her, so what’s the deal? Why does she keep coming back for more?” She looked me up and down, as if she were taking stock of me, which made me feel uncomfortable. I had known her for so long. We had become close over the years, but in a more platonic way. I wasn’t used to her looking at me like a piece of meat fit for consumption.

  “I don’t know!” I exclaimed too forcefully, agitated. “I mean, I have always sort of liked her, even when we were little kids, when I first moved here. We used to play spin the bottle with her and some of my other friends. I liked her eyes. They shift from blue-green to green-blue, depending on her mood. I have always thought she was pretty,” I iterated, hoping it would make some semblance of an explanation she could comprehend.

  She seemed to consider this for a time, but the longer she thought about it, the more she began to shake her head from side to side. “No, Eff, there’s something more, I know it!” She mulled over the situation almost as though she was chewing on it. Then, “She doesn’t really spend time with you, right?”

  I nodded.

  “And you guys don’t talk on the phone all that much, right?”

  She got another nod from me.

  “And yet, every few days or so, when she has the time, she texts you that she wants to fuck you and then you guys go at it.” It was a statement, but was framed like a question, her raised eyebrows conveying comprehension.

  “Yeah, that sounds about right,” I said a bit confounded. I held my hand out to either side of me, palms up in supplication. I shrugged nonchalantly. “I don’t know what else to tell you. It is what it is, Kat.”

  She stared at me for a long time. I squirmed like an earthworm in the hot sun underneath her consideration. Until, it seemed a new, vastly different sort of thought had entered her mind. Her facial expression melted into a knowing one – one that confused me even more. She released my hand. I hadn’t felt her grab it again. She placed it back on my neck. Her wrist was once again resting upon my shoulder. She leaned in close and pulled me to her. Our foreheads were almost touching. “I don’t want you to freak out, ok?”

  I nodded non-committedly, completely unsure of where she was going with this. My stomach was tied up in knots.

  “Let me see it.”

  It was so vague a question, so lacking in description or specificity, I was immediately taken aback. “See what?” I asked through a creased brow.

  “Come on, Eff, don’t act lame. The girl is obviously sprung on something and if it isn’t your face or your body that tells me it is something else. That’s why she keeps you in the closet, but keeps coming back. And I think I know what it is… Show it to me, ok?” she clarified with a smile growing on her face, despite her expression - determined, set.

  I frowned at her, hoping she didn’t mean what I thought she meant. Then, at the same time, I was hoping it was exactly what she meant. I had to find out either way, right? “You want me to show you my junk?”

  She merely nodded, satisfied I’d finally understood, blinking her eyes rapidly.

  “But, Kat, don’t you think it’s… I don’t know… crossing a line we shouldn’t cross?” I asked, but I was still of two minds. So, there wasn’t much weight to my words. I know we’d been friends for many years and I didn’t want to tarnish our relationship in any way. At the same time though, another side of me, centered at the base of my manhood, wanted something more between us.

  She stayed quite contemplating the situation. Then, “Think of it as a medical procedure. I am just your doctor checking for abnormalities with your ‘stuff’. How
does that sound?” She used her index fingers to physically bracket the word “stuff”.

  I mulled it over. I couldn’t find any fault in her logic, especially since my dick was about to burst out of my shorts already, which was undoubtedly clouding my reason. I couldn’t think past the urges surging through my privates back in those days.

  “Ok,” I mumbled as I tried to pull down my shorts, but they got stuck on the tip of my cock. I had to stand in order to pull the fabric free from the engorged head of my penis. I pulled down the only garment I was wearing to my knees.

  My dick sprang free and bobbed for a bit in the hot summer air, free of constraint – harder - since a beautiful, teenage girl was scrutinizing it with the eyes of a hawk. I pushed the blood toward it and made it swell even more, loving the sensation of feeling so solid, hard. I was still relishing the feeling, when out of nowhere - Katie grabbed it, forcing it to stop moving. I glanced down at her in shock. I saw her lean in, so she could inspect it in greater detail.

  My eyes nearly popped out of my skull.

  “Damn, Eff, your cock isn’t the longest I have ever seen, but fuck it’s thick like a tree trunk,” she said somewhat breathlessly, squeezing me from the hilt and making a small dab of pre-cum bubble out of the slit. “Now, I know why she keeps you around.”

  I never really thought of my penis as having substantial girth, because I figured that’s what most guys had swinging between their legs. My younger brother, Johan, was hung just about the same as I. I had seen him many a time as we grew up through the years, so that sort of solidified my conclusions on the matter. “Why?” I asked hoping to gain some feminine insight, though I really wanted nothing more than for her to put her lips around my shaft. I wanted nothing more than to cum like I had never cum before down her…

  But I flung those thoughts aside, trying to clear my mind. My cock was aching for attention, so the effort needed to do so was gargantuan.