by Quil Carter
Then something occurred to me.
Just why am I watching and letting this happen?
“ADLER!” I suddenly yelled as loud as I could. “ADLER. SPIKE’S LETTING THE CICARO SUCK HIS COCK! ADLER!”
Spike shoved Kiki off of him. His hard cock, shining with saliva and with the head of it bright pink and swollen, getting pushed back into his boxers as it became flaccid. If looks could kill, even the white flames wouldn’t save me from the glare of death that he was giving me.
He ran out of the room, but to my satisfaction, when he got to the end of the dark hallway, the flashlight in his hand, I saw him skid to a stop.
“He’s fucking lying,” Spike snapped. He pushed past Adler and turned a left. I couldn’t see well with the flashlight’s disappearing beam, but I saw the shadowed figure look down the hallway then back to where Spike had been, and then disappear.
Kiki leaned over and grabbed the bowl with his teeth. He spun around with the plastic bowl in his mouth like Deek after he’d fetched the stick we’d thrown, and rolled over to me. He leaned down and rested it onto his bound hands, and with it balanced, he placed it on his lap, close enough so I could grab the food with my bound hands.
“It’s amazing how easy men are to manipulate,” Kiki said with a proud smile. “Tuck in!” Then he looked over and laughed lightly. I knew why when we both saw Ceph, half-asleep, giving us both quizzical looks.
An insult was waiting in my mouth but I was too hungry to throw it at him, and I didn’t want to risk the food getting taken away. I reached down and picked up a perfumy dried fruit, an apricot I think, and popped it into my mouth. All my hatred for Kiki, at least for the moment, disappeared.
And when I heard Spike shouting, followed by a loud impact of him getting hit, and even better… a thunk and a crash – I even smiled at the cicaro.
Chapter 29
Reaver
I woke up to the sound of something frying, something that must’ve deposited a lot of grease into the pan because it was sizzling and snapping.
My awareness came back to me, slowly at first; but once my muscles began to react to my mental signals, everything began restoring. I felt as if I was a computer being booted up, and I was waiting patiently for the default programs to finish loading.
Then the sharp inhale of breath to expand lungs that were used to being dormant. I never got over how satisfying it was to feel my tight chest stretch to near bursting.
And with that inhale, I smelled greasy meat… bacon I believed. My stomach growled from anticipation, followed by a burn in my throat to remind me that I was starving, and hadn’t eaten in possibly days.
Without realizing it, I put both of my hands to my face, then felt my own skin tense from my furrowed brow. I rubbed my eyes and opened them, my world blurry and my eyes stinging from the bright orb that was shining down above me. It was then I realized I was on something spongy, and when I took another deep breath, this time tasting as much on the air as I could, I smelled the microfiber scent of the couch, and the lingering odor of arians whose smell I didn’t recognize personally.
I shut my eyes tight and squinted them to try and force them into focus, during this time my mind went back to its shifting, sorting through memories of what had happened to try and get as much information as I could. So far there were no blatant alarms ringing inside of my head, but that didn’t mean there were none there.
Then plates could be heard clinking against one another. I winced at the noise and squinted again, this time my eyes focused and I saw in front of me a sliding glass door that revealed behind it, emerald green grass. So green it seemed deceptive, and planted in this grass, large trees with thick brown bark.
I sat up, realizing that indeed I was right and I was laying on the couch, and looked around the house. There was a coffee table in front of me, made of grey slate, with a red silk covering that had an ashtray resting in the middle, made out of the foot of an animal, and full of cigarette butts. There was also empty beer bottles beside an adjacent chair, and a groove from someone’s ass in the seat of it.
Past the coffee table I saw a stone hearth with charcoal in the fireplace, and on the mantle, old photos, more artifacts, and a clock showing me it was two in the afternoon. Framing the mantle were black bookshelves full of books, and cabinets that I just knew was filled with more crap.
And then my memory started coming back. My eyes widened at the same time as my body crunched up like a crumpled piece of paper, and I sprung to my feet and whirled around to face who I now realized was in the kitchen.
Yep, standing behind the kitchen island, watching me with a half-smile, was Nero.
“Afternoon, Ducky. All healed and brand spankin’ new?” Nero said. His cheerful voice drew up all sorts of malicious feelings inside of me. I hated myself for it, but the fact that I had been on a runaway train of PTSD, flashbacks, impotence, and psychosis, speeding towards a brick wall, and he was absolutely carefree and fucking jovial, tore at my infected wounds. The part that frustrated me the most was that I’d expect nothing more from this asshole, and yet my mind was flaring because of it, like I somehow expected remorse or an apology.
It didn’t make sense that my brain would want something like that, and the very fact that it was an emotion hidden, but still making itself known inside of me, made me hate myself, absolutely hate myself.
Or maybe I was just frustrated that I was reeling from this still, unable to shake the effects of what he’d done, and everyone else around me had moved on. Even Killian had moved on, and had used his time with Perish to make himself stronger – and use my own weakness to fuel that campaign. So they were either moving on, or using my misery to strengthen themselves.
It was just me stuck in the past. I didn’t want to be and I was doing everything I could to shake it, but though my will was strong and my desire to get over this was more powerful than every other drive in me… I couldn’t control what was happening.
I wasn’t used to not being in control. I needed to take back control, but I didn’t know how.
A king in Aras – but a fucking psychotic pauper in the greywastes.
My ears burned as Nero looked at me. Inside my dark self was still screaming at me to attack him again. That killing him and torturing him would make it all better, but I’d done that, I had killed him, and I was still bursting with infection.
I’d know when the time was, I guess. Right now I had to keep the mumbled pact we’d made, and concentrate on getting the boys back. During this time I’d appease the need to get my revenge by analysing my enemy and finding more weaknesses I could exploit. He had a husband and a cicaro, but both were out of my grasp at the moment. If I listened and stuck around him, maybe I would find out another weakness.
Or maybe find a way to deliver him back to the Legion. Then he could kiss the concrete some more with his husband, and I’d take custody of his cicaro and turn him against him.
“Yeah,” I finally managed to mumble and I got up from the couch. I looked around, half-hoping Killian had already killed his way back to the surface. “How long were we out for?”
“I woke up yesterday evening and it’s–” Nero glanced at the clock I’d just seen. “Two now. So you’ve been out for a day and a half. I was out a day. There’s been no movement from the laboratory, and the blood slicks would’ve shown prints, so the kittens are still down there. Makes me think they don’t have cameras here, but I don’t know.” He turned and took the hot pan off of the stove and flicked it off. I walked over and sat down on the stool and observed not just bacon frying in the pan, but mashed potatoes, already golden brown on the top surrounded by bubbling fat, and another frying pan with a yellow lake of what would eventually be scrambled eggs.
Smelled good enough and I was starving. I had barely had any of the Melchai fresh food, and there were a lot of things I wanted to try.
But I fucking didn’t want to eat with Nero, my body simmered at the thought of it. Even looking at him right now felt lik
e I was swallowing a hot iron bar.
I watched Nero, not taking my eyes off of him, as he turned around with a loaf of bread and plopped it down in front of me with a serrated knife, then he slid a toaster, so shiny I could see my reflection, towards me. “Cut up some bread for toast. They fucking have homemade marmalade here. Can you believe it? I’ve been eating that shit with a spoon.” I stared down at the golden loaf of bread, already missing a quarter of it, and heard him open the fridge, grab something, then the sound of silverware. Nero turned around, and put a jar of something orange and yellow with bits of shit in it, beside the bread loaf and a spoon.
I couldn’t stop staring at the knife, visualizing with crisp quality, sawing off his head. The serrated edges of the knife would be like I was using a chainsaw.
But I would go slowly.
“Try it. Ever had marmalade before?”
One of the things I always enjoyed was pinpointing the exact area of their vocal cords. It soothed my heart to hear those shrill, desperate screams before they were abruptly cut off.
A hand entered my vision and Nero snapped his fingers at me. “Hey. Ever try marmalade before?”
My head jerked back and I glanced at him before looking away. “Stop talking to me like we’re friends,” I said darkly. “Get me the fucking food, so I can figure out a way to get into that lab.”
When my gaze turned back to Nero I made a point to not blink. I glared into his purple and blue eyes, both clear of blood and sparkling again, and watched his every movement, his every facial expression.
“Yeah. I know you’re pissed at me, but you didn’t kill Kiki so you must have some goodness in you, Reaper-boy.” The left side of Nero’s face scrunched as he gave me a half-smile; he looked like a fucking stroke victim. “You try marmalade or not?” He skidded the jar to me; it landed right beside the serrated knife and the loaf of bread.
I don’t know why but I answered him. “Is it jam?” I asked. We had jam in the greywastes but it was full of sugar crystals from age. I looked down at the jar and picked up the spoon. “You spoiled fucks probably got this shit every morning.” I unscrewed the mason jar and smelled it, the inside of my cheeks gave a jolt as I smelled the sugary citrus, the weird spasm you get whenever you anticipate eating something sour.
Nero snorted and started loading up two dishes he had out. “Yeah. I feel bad for you greywasters having to eat that old shit. I was kicking around the plaguelands with Ceph and Kiki for the first bit and there’s a lot of food, but it all tastes like ass.”
They were in the plaguelands too? This revelation drew up an entirely new set of questions. It was enough for me to want to keep conversing with him, for now. “You were in the plaguelands?” I asked. I took a spoonful of the chunky orange goop and popped it into my mouth.
I regretted it immediately. My entire face scrunched up as an overwhelming sour and sweetness exploded in my mouth and murdered every taste bud that I had, before raping my saliva glands. It was too much flavour, and I didn’t know what to do with it.
Then Nero started laughing, undoubtedly at the expression on my face. I grimaced and spat out the remainders back on the spoon, that and a lot of spit.
“What the fuck is wrong with you, dude? It’s just orange and lemon jam!” Nero howled. “It’s fucking that sour to you?” He handed me a dishtowel and I started scraping my tongue with it to try and kill the sweet and citrusy flavour stinging my taste buds to the point of pain. When he offered me some water, I took it, and downed the entire glass.
“What happened to it?” I said, my face twisted in distaste. “There’s too much flavour in it. Did science do that?”
“Did science do that?” Nero laughed harder as he said my question back to himself. “No, binky. That’s just what fresh fruit is supposed to make marmalade taste like. I guess it makes sense though, you greywasters are used to everything being centuries old. Your mouth isn’t used to real flavours, ‘specially not citrus.”
He slid me a heaping plate of food, steaming and smelling like angels had been sacrificed to make it, but I was skeptical of it now. I picked up the spoon of saliva and jam and tossed it into the sink nearby and poked one of the scrambled eggs. “I don’t trust this fresh shit anymore. What else is citrus?”
“Nothing,” Nero chuckled, and he took a stool and pulled it up on the opposite side of the island. “You recognize the rest of this at least? Come on, work with me. You know what the fuck eggs and bacon and potatoes are, right?”
“Yeah. We had that shit in Aras. Bacon we had a lot of but it was rat bacon, eggs we paid out the nose for and potatoes, the ones I grew, were small. We actually need to work hard to survive there,” I replied. “Not like you.”
“Oh, stop trying to pick a fucking fight, Reav,” Nero said, his mouth already full of food. “This is entirely different circumstances. You’re my little bro now, not my prisoner. Shit’s different, so lighten the fuck–” Nero ducked just in time for the jar of marmalade to fly past his head before smashing into the wall between the counter and the upper cabinet.
I slammed my hands down on the stone kitchen island, my eyes blazing and my shoulders tensed together. Nero, who was looking behind him, slowly turned back to me with twin raised eyebrows.
“I am not your little bro,” I said in a harsh whisper. My fingers scraped along the stone before my hand locked into fists. “You’re going to stay the fuck away from me, understand? I have nothing to say to you. I want nothing from you. I’m only here for Killian. Do you understand me or should I dumb it down for you?”
Nero picked up his forkful of scrambled eggs. “I understand you.” He nodded towards my food. “Just shut up and eat and like you fucking said, then we can start trying to find a way inside the lab.”
The dismissive way he was handling this made a ringing come to my ears, but through some grace from some dead god I sat back down. I kept telling myself nothing would come out of killing him again, but my hand shaking back and forth like I had Parkinson’s was making it too clear that it was going to take all of my self-control not to tie him up and torture him now.
Nero was right in front of me. Right – in – front – of – me. The fucking bastard responsible for so many things currently going wrong inside of me.
I just wanted to scream at him everything that was fucked up with me now. I wanted to take him by his thick neck, and shake it back and forth and tell him I had lost who I was, and I was losing Killian. Not only was I going into some weird fucked up state whenever a flashback took me, not only could I not have sex with my boyfriend anymore, but because of this Killian was climbing all over me in an attempt to push me down and stand on me. Fucking Killian, wimpy shit Killian was trying to dominate me now. That’s how fucking screwed up I was, and I just wanted to scream it in his face.
As if… he’d have the solution for me to take my life back.
‘I can help you, brosy. If you let me… I can help you. I can help you make all your weaknesses your strength.’
To preoccupy myself, I ate. It tasted good which was a distraction. The bacon was my favourite part, the crispy fat melted in my mouth and was bursting with flavour but in a good way; the eggs were all fluffy and shit and I drowned them in ketchup cause I loved that stuff, and the potatoes were mashed with not just butter but milk or cream. Milk was even more rare than eggs since we had to get it from the bosen, and it was usually given to the kids so they wouldn’t grow up to be runts.
The bread was fresh too. I popped the last bit into my mouth and decided I was calmed down enough to start asking him one of the many questions that had been burning on my lips. Beforehand I gave myself a stern talk and took several deep breaths to keep myself cooled down. He was the only one who had answers and I didn’t have a variety of people to ask.
“How did Mantis end up infecting you with those worms?” I asked, setting my fork down. Nero had already polished off his plate, he ate like he was a vacuum cleaner, and had cracked open a beer. One was also set aside for
me.
Nero got up and took his beer, and motioned for me to follow him. I picked up my own drink and we walked into the living room. He sat down on one end of the couch and I took the other.
Nero reached into his pocket and pulled out a purple tin. He opened it and my eyes lit up when I saw pills, small black bricks, and white baggies.
“You liked heroin, didn’t you?”
My jaw locked and I nodded stiffly. He’d asked me what my preference was when I’d been tied to that bed. He remembered what I liked, how cute.
“You ever have china white before?”
I shook my head but I didn’t trust myself to talk. Nero got out a baggy and started prepping a few lines of white powder with a black card that had raised silver writing. “It’s powdered heroin. It’s your new best friend now.” He handed me the bag, with quite a bit of powder in it. “A present for you.”
I took it without a word and after he’d leaned down and inhaled three lines, he handed me a metal sniffer and I obliged. It seemed wrong, but I was a drug fiend like probably all of my brothers were, and Nero knew that. He knew my currency, and I wasn’t going to say no.
“There. That’ll calm your ass down,” Nero said when I’d raised my head from icing three lines myself. I rubbed my nose and took in a long breath.
“They’re called proxy worms or proxies.” Nero explained. “We saw them in the plaguelands and barely escaped. We realized they couldn’t survive without radiation and we booked it here. Unfortunately… Mantis is just as much of a crazy scientist as Perish, except, unlike Perry, he’s more obsessed with utilizing the worms than feeding greywasters and creating splices. Mantis was all friendly and shit, but unfortunately he overheard me telling Ceph I wanted to tell Silas about Adler, as a way to get in his good books so we could go home and go back to our lives. Mantis got spooked and he put his special experimented-on worms in us.”
“Experimented on?”
Nero nodded. “Apparently the worms function really different in immortals. Because the worms we see in the plaguelands kill their hosts pretty soon after they infect them, or proxy them as Mantis calls it. We can survive with them inside of us, and we immortals come back to life when we do get killed,” Nero explained. “Once the worm is inside and implanted in an immortal, it starts to learn and become smarter and each life cycle has the worms evolving to learn its host. Mantis figured this out by implanting Adler throughout the years, and he’s been breeding worms to obey him. What I was implanted with, was a higher generation of worms so I was a dumb puppet. For someone like Ceph, he was implanted with a different kind where they just kinda… wait patiently and learn you, I guess.” Nero’s shoulders shrugged. “They’re pretty fucked up little creatures. I’d stay the hell away from the plaguelands if I were you.”