Shadow Seed 1: The Misbegotten

by Richard M. Heredia

  It didn’t faze Leda. Not in the least. She stood her ground, once she had made it clear of the swinging door, and brazenly looked back at my girlfriend. Her chin was stiff, defiant as she wiped at a stray lock of hair that had fallen between her eyes, her brows knitting. “I did what I had to do, nothing more, and nothing less.”

  Ramona’s scowl hardened in outrage. “Are you telling me it was essential for you to cut him off from himself?” This time her finger actually touched the other girl squarely between her boobs, not hard, but there was definitely a veiled threat behind the subtle movement.

  “I had to know,” was all Leda said.

  “Know what?” asked my cousin. That was when I realized it wasn’t just my girlfriend in the room with us.

  All of the girls were present - Katie, Sandy, even Tirza!

  I was on verge of becoming embarrassed, not quite certain I should’ve been, but I kept having this nagging urge I had been close to having sex with someone. I kept wondering if I should let myself feel uncomfortable after all. I mean, I was standing there with the remnants of a woody before the likes of five teenage females for crying out loud!

  “I… I - ,” began Leda before she stopped, swallowed and then clenched her fists at either side and shook with frustration. “His Mutation makes him so fucking irresistible, I had to know if I really felt something for him or if he was compelling me to feel that way.” She paused, then; “I HAD TO KNOW, GOD DAMMIT!” She screamed it, turning away from the rest of us, her fists balled at either side, tapping one foot anxiously.

  “And you figured if you completely isolated him from himself, you find some sort of answer to this question?!?” It was Ramona again, looming over Leda like a sentinel. I was sure if they hadn’t been friends for so long, my girlfriend would’ve hit the other teen with her fists. She looked crazy-mad.

  Leda half turned to look up at her, returning Ramona’s accusatory glare. “How the fuck else was I going to find out.”

  “By mentally raping my cousin?” demanded Katie stalking up to Leda, shoulder-to-shoulder with Ramona. “That seemed like the right thing for you to do? Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “Wait, what?!?” Sandy screeched from the doorway, stepping completely through the threshold of the bedroom.

  Tirza trailed behind her, though she walked like she was stepping over hot coals.

  Mentally raping? The question had just across my mind as I finally regained my faculties to extent that I remembered how to use them. I felt my mind sharpen along the edge of those words, hidden anger emerging. Was it true? Had she used her Mutation to gain control of my mind? Had she forced me into wanting her…? Yet, it didn’t quite ring true, even as I thought about it. I tried to make myself mad at her over the issue. But, that’s not what had happened. Something else, she had done something else.

  “I didn’t…” Leda’s defiance crumbled, her orbs widening. She had just realized the extent of the damage she could’ve caused. She gave me a haunted stare, her mouth working, but the words didn’t match the movement of her lips. “I didn’t… Eff, that’s not what I -. Oh my god, please don’t think -.” A hand wiped at her forehead. “Estefan, I am so sorry!” There was nothing, but anguish in her face.

  I was about to answer, but Ramona interrupted me.

  “Estefan why don’t you go help Tirza get settled,” she said through clenched teeth, her eyes slid to me, cutting metal. “Your sister found a bunch of clothes that fit and she needs a place to put them, so your parents won’t complain about a mess up in the Loft. Okay?” Her expression softened. “Go and help Tirza. We girls need to lay some ground rules here. It won’t be good for you to be around… You understand, right?”

  I nodded slowly. “Don’t hurt her, Mona,” was all I felt needed to be said. I spun on my heel and walked out of the room, motioning for Tirza to follow me.

  She did so without question. Her eyes were about as wide as Leda’s had been a moment before.

  { ¹“Jim-hat”: late 20th century slang, referencing a contraceptive device, called a condom; a thin sheath of Latex, Polyurethane or Polyisoprene worn over the penis during intercourse. }

  { ²Lightsaber: a fictional weapon made popular in the Star Wars universe; also, a "laser sword," consisting of a polished metal hilt, projecting a brightly lit blade about 4 feet or 1.33 meters long. It is the signature weapon of a Jedi Knight or a Sith Lord. }

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~♦~~~~~~~~~~~~

  ~ Chapter 49 ~

  (Summer – 2018)

  An Unexpected Reconciliation

  She closed the last drawer with a degree of finality now that the task before us was done. She peered over her shoulder at me, a smile like those she used to give me when were an item. It graced the lower portion of her visage with a false brilliance I could almost see. It was a happy one, the type I had yet to see, since she had burst into the Loft, her family murdered in cold blood, running for her life.

  An hour had passed, since she’d asked me, “What did she do to you?” We had reached the stairwell leading up to the Loft.

  I turned at the waist, but continued up the stairs. “Can’t really say, actually,” I had shrugged the words out of me. “It was like being distracted, but more thorough, like she took all thought away from me and made me think only of her.”

  Tirza had tsked. “So she could find out if she liked you or not?”

  “I guess.”

  “Sounds a little dramatic to me,” she added as we attained the landing before the door leading into the Loft. It stood at our left, the Attic was at our right, an identical door barring the way.

  I had opened the door and let her in. She passed me, twisting her shoulders as she did so, not wanting to touch me for some reason. Tirza was like that. When she didn’t want physical contact with someone, she barred all physical contact.

  “Well, it wasn’t as bad as they were making it out to be downstairs,” I said, wanting to clarify the situation for her for some reason.

  Tirza had spun on the ball of one foot, her sock twisting underneath. “Oh I bet, who wouldn’t want the chance fuck Leda Quintanilla…” Then had she spun back around and made her way to Katie’s bed where her and my step-sister had piled a bunch of clothes from Flavia’s castoffs.

  “That’s not what I meant, Teezee.”

  “Whatever.” She tried to appear as though she didn’t care. I could see it, hidden, behind her bland expression. She cared. It bothered her. I’d begun to wonder why.

  Now, later, a very different Tirza stared back at me as she stood, rubbing her hands – a gesture one would’ve seen a million times upon completion of a task.

  “Do you like the dresser?” I asked lamely, not sure what to say, not wanting to ruin her mood.

  The tiny teenager glanced back at it. “It’s nice.”

  It had been the in Attic, the one across from the Loft, and not the one where we had planned to stash the girls should my parents come up unannounced to our private sanctum. Technically, the Loft was part of the Attic as well, but it had been built out within its’ roomiest portions, so now it bisected the Attic, cutting it in two; thus, the need to differentiate the two sections when describing them.

  We had both stood before Katie’s bed gazing down at the large pile of clothing, and I knew there wouldn’t be room in the chest-of-drawers my mother had provided for Katie. I’d stood there mulling over what to do for a few minutes. Then, I remembered the old dresser my mom had pulled out of Lucia’s bedroom after her and my step-father had purchased new furniture for her. She had me and Johan lug it up to the Attic, because she had decided to keep it to store old linens and tablecloths in it. According to my practical mother, it “still had some years of use in it”. At least, that’s what she had said.

  Nonetheless, it wasn’t what she’d done. She had promptly forgotten about it, so now, six months later, it stood against the far corner of the Attic, facing the door, empty and unused.

  Tirza and I pushed and pulled it into the Loft, across th
e huge room and had placed next to Katie’s. That had taken some time, but we had time on our hands, so we made a project of it, and now…

  …We were done. Tirza not only had a wardrobe, but a decent place to store it.

  I grinned unsteadily at the girl before me, hooked my thumbs in my waistband, my mind involuntarily recalling I had done something similar to Leda’s panties. I yanked my hands upward, inadvertently clapping my palms together. The sound was too loud for the confines of the Loft.

  Tirza’s quizzical cast told me she hadn’t missed my discomfort.

  I didn’t want to think about Leda at the moment, even though my cock spasmed in my shorts. Her pale skin was so beautiful underneath the dark hue of my hands, so pliant and yet strong… Her pussy had been so wet… I teetered from one foot to the other, like an electrocuted puppet. “So… uh, now what?” I wondered, trying to clear my thoughts of the dark-haired beauty I had come so close to screwing.

  Tirza was noncommittal. “I don’t know, I guess we just wait for the girls to finish pissing in the sand.”

  I laughed, thinking of the girls squatting down to mark their territory, then the thought matured and I saw myself in the middle of the “who would get what” bullshit. I don’t like golden showers, people! I’ve never been into that shit. They had better figure something out, because frankly, I didn’t want to have to deal with stupid backbiting and territorialism. This wasn’t the time for crap of that magnitude. It could get us all killed.

  Tirza must’ve noticed a change in my face, because her next question seemed to piggy-back on my thoughts.

  “How does it make you feel, Estefan, knowing all those girls want to be with you, knowing they are willing to share you between them? Must make you feel like some sort of Superman, huh?”

  I grimaced, my lips down-turning. “Naw, girl, I’m not made that way, you know that, Tirza,” I replied. “I mean, I’m not going to lie, okay? I like girls, I really like them. I like being around them, talking with them, being with them. You know that as well, I guess.

  “But, this shit is different, this Mutation thing has tipped the scales in a way I didn’t think they could be tipped.” I stared at her, imploring as she sat on Katie’s seldom used bed. “I’m used to chasing after you guys, you know? I’m used to the pursuit and the capture thing, and reaping the rewards of getting a girl to like me, to want to be with me. This shit is nothing like that.”

  She tapped the bed with the palm of her hand. It was an old signal between us. She wanted me to sit and talk with her.

  I capitulated without thinking.

  “I’m not sure how to deal with things when I girl just comes up to me and begs to be screwed. Because I always worked so hard at it in the past, it unnerves me. It scares me, the more I think about it.” I peered through a wrinkled brow. “I don’t like the possibilities, Teezee, I think that’s what scares me the most…”

  She was looked grim, sitting with one leg tucked beneath her, her hands folded in her lap. Her eyes glossed over like someone delving through the layers of the past, lost in memory, trying to reconcile an unforgiving present.

  I allowed the silence to grow, hoping she wouldn’t continue to think I was a douche. This was much more than me muttering Katie’s name, while her and I were making love. Things were much more complicated now, dangerous. There were four girls downstairs, hashing through the “do’s” and “don’ts” of their mutual interactions with me. They were discussing how they were going to share me, how they were going to divide up my time, how they were each going to allow the others to bed me! All of it was to be civilized, calmly considered. I was the motherfucken Christmas ham for fuck’s sake. Come and get it!

  “And there will be more…” That’s what Ramona had said. There would be more.

  No there won’t!

  Well…

  “The fact that it scares you is a good thing, Effy,” Tirza finally spoke. Apparently, she’d weighed the situation in her head and had come to some sort of conclusion.

  I bobbed my head in assent, thankful, at least, for a moderate response and not one of condemnation.

  “But, if you had an ability, like Leda’s, to force someone to not think, would you have used it to say… save my family?” Moisture clouded the brown of her irises, making them lighter.

  “Yes.” There was no need to say more.

  She cleared her throat. “If it had been a gun bearing, gang of women, bursting into my house that night, what would you have done? You’d have used your Mutation and made them lust after you in order to save my family, am I right?”

  I could see where she was going with this. “Yeah, I would’ve.”

  “Do you think you could make yourself use it against a girl just so you could bang her?”

  “I don’t think so,” I answered, questioning the darker side of me. Could I do that? If I wanted someone real bad, could I force her to fuck me? Was I that sort of person? Could I live with myself afterward? Could I rape? Was it rape?

  “What if she made you mad? What if she hurt you in some way? Could you do it then?” She edged closer, but it was more out of emphasizing her point than anything else.

  I went on pondering what she’d proposed. “I guess, it would have to know the severity offense, right? I mean what had she done to hurt me? Did she hurt one of my siblings or had she merely insulted me? My reaction to either would be very, very different.”

  Tirza’s face brightened as if I had hit some proverbial nail on the head. “It’s like owning a gun, huh?”

  My face clouded, perplexed.

  “You have to respect a gun enough to know when to use and when not to, correct?”

  Some of the clouds in my head cleared.

  “Pull out a gun at the wrong time could cause an escalation that could eventually lead to fatal consequences…,” she trailed off as she sat back, more centered down her spine. “Sex is your weapon now, Estefan.” She shivered. “I can’t believe I just said something like that, no different than making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich!”

  I chuckled, but she had me thinking and my mirth evaporated.

  “But, it’s true,” she added. Her voice was quieter, giving my face a once-over. “You’ll have to treat your Mutation like a weapon, possibly even a weapon of mass destruction, because, from what the girls told me, you’re pretty strong.” She plucked at something invisible on her skirt. “I mean look at what Leda did, just so she could know if her own feelings were real. You have to be pretty darn powerful to push her to do such an outrageous thing to you.”

  “So will you,” I reminded her.

  Her face bunched prettily.

  “A tracker,” I began, “at least that’s what Mona said you’d be.”

  “I know, but a tracker of what?”

  My lips twisted wryly. “Of everything, if I remember correctly.”

  Tirza leaned back on a hand, her elbow locked. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I have no idea, but it sounds ominous all the same.” I snickered, playing with the end of a thread, twirling it around my forefinger.

  “I can’t even begin to understand what she meant by ‘tracker’. I don’t feel anything different inside me, even after I got sick,” she spoke with a drop of sorrow in her tone. I knew she was remembering her life before her Mutation began to manifest, before her family was massacred.

  “It’ll come, Teezee, whether you want it to or not, it will.” After all, mine had, and I almost drove Katie insane with lust because of it.

  She grunted with discontentment. “I hate the inevitability of all this shit. It’s like we have no choice. It’s like, ‘here you go, bitch, your life had no changed forever’,” she said, her voice dropping an octave, mimicking somebody without much of an intellect. “I hate it!”

  “Yeah, things were a lot easier a few weeks ago,” I agreed, rubbing at my neck. It was getting stiff from sitting half on and half off the bed. I cracked it and lay down on the bed to ease the pressure on my spine
.

  “I don’t know if ‘easier’ is the right word, Estefan,” she retorted, her words measured as she were holding back a floodwater of emotion. It made her sound raw, like something critical being torn asunder.

  Instantly, I felt stupid for saying something as dense and uncaring as I had, my choice of words was an affront to the word, understatement. What the fuck was wrong with me?!? She had lost her entire family over the course of days. These were the same days that had gone from being easy to a nuisance for me. What was I thinking? Her parents, her sister – all of them, gone, and I could say in summation of such a monumentous loss was it wasn’t easy anymore! Sonofabitch, I had never felt like such a complete idiot than I had that afternoon.

  “Tirza, I’m so sorry,” was my inadequate attempt at reconciliation.

  She pinched the bridge of her nose as tears fell onto her lap.

  I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t sure if she wanted me to touch her or not. She could turn downright berserk if she didn’t want to be touched. I just sat there, repeating myself, saying I was sorry for being obtuse, sorry for what had happened to her, promising I would never leave her side, vowing to be the best friend she could ever have.

  She cried for a while longer, then took a huge draught of air and shuddered with its release.

  I watched with the eyes of an eagle, searching for the tiniest notion of a breakdown. She surprised me by pulling herself back together. She gazed at me frankly. The hurt hadn’t melted from her face nor had the haunted afterglow diminished in her eyes. It was Tirza stripped down, bared to me, vulnerable with the hope things would get better, her innermost feelings exposed for me to see. I hadn’t seen her look this open since the day she told me she was ready to lose her virginity. The day she told me she wanted me to be the one to take it from her.

  “You have no idea how much I wish things could be like they were eighteen months ago,” she whispered, so hushed I don’t think I would’ve heard it if I’d been standing.