But there'd be no more bubble baths, no more Rocky Road ice cream smothered in the dark syrup lying at the bottom of the brown grocery sack. No more
Darkness crashed over her.
* * * *
"Wake up!" The command came through a fog. "Wake up ! We have to get you out of here."
The fog cleared as pain, sharp and unforgiving, radiated through her head. God, what pain. She struggled to open her eyes.
"Good, she's waking up at last."
The voice was familiar now. The rich baritone belonged to Tommy Conrad, her neighbor and best friend.
"Tommy?" It felt as though she screamed his name down a long tunnel, but she must have whispered because his answer was, "I think she said my name."
"How can that be?" a man whispered in a heavily accented voice. He sounded shocked, but why? She and Tommy had been good buddies for more than six years.
"I don't know, but we can't wait any longer. We know she's awake. Pick up that bag she was carrying, and I'll get her. Hurry, before anyone sees we have a woman."
What in the world did he"Ow, ow, ow !" He'd gathered her up, causing a cascade of pain that began in her head and ended indamn, it didn't end.
"Shh! You mustn't make any noise." To emphasize, he folded her to his chest so that any further protest would be muffled against his shoulder.
Hard, rippling muscles met her face as Tommy ducked and ran, zig-zagging like a car jockeying through traffic. Suddenly, keeping quiet wasn't an issue. White light enveloped her and Barb sank into unconsciousness.
* * * *
Barb took a soft, testing breath. Blessedly, she lay on something soft and warm. With a sigh of contentment, she started to turn into the comfort, when a now familiar agony stopped her. With effort, she opened her eyes.
Two men sat in straight-back chairs, regarding her anxiously. Matching drab, mustard-yellow shirts and slacks were all they wore.
She moved her head as much as she dared. Was she in a hospital? If so, it wasn't any kind of hospital she'd ever seen. She lay on a sofa. The room was large. A worn but exquisite carpet covered a large portion of the floor. An easy chair with a book opened over the arm sat in her line of vision. Bookshelves covered the opposite wall. Shades covered the windows, leaving lamps on three tables to illuminate the room.
She studied the men and found she was wrong. Neither of them was Tommy, though one did resemble him. He seemed to be around thirty-five, tall and well-built. His hair was the same light brown, his lips full and rich, and his eyes dark. Right now his eyes held worry, and were focused on her.
"Where's Tommy?" It took all her effort and concentration to get out the words. Her tongue filled her dry mouth.
As if he knew her thoughts, the Tommy look-alike picked up a glass and leaned forward. "Sip this. You'll feel better."
She took a bit of the liquid, and lo and behold, a few seconds later she did feel better. Her head ached dully instead of with sharp spears of pain.
"Have another." This time she tried to gulp but he tipped the glass for measured amounts. "Slowly."
Amazingly, more pain disappeared. Was she dead after all, and in some kind of heaven infirmary? The liquid was magical. Warmth spread throughout her body, even to her nipples and between her legs where her clit began to tingle. What was that about? She pressed her thighs together, and hoped the men didn't notice the flush she felt heating her cheeks.
"I'm Thomas, and this is Roland." He gestured to the man sitting beside him.
Roland's hair was golden. He looked to be about the same age as Thomas, and though in decent shape, no one would describe him as buff. Sharp angles formed his rough, square face, and beneath glasses, his eyes were two different colors, one blue, one green.
"Ah, I see you notice my eyes," he said with a thick Scandinavian tone. "I am academic."
She must have appeared confused because Thomas spoke up. "Maybe in your time professors have blue eyes only? That used to be the way here, too, until the government wanted to determine which branch of study each academic filled. Roland teaches genetics"
"The green," Roland supplied.
"and mathematics."
"The blue." Roland smiled as though that explained everything.
"What do you mean 'in your time?' Where am I?"
"Our home," Thomas said. "I'm sorry for the pain I caused carrying you, but we had to get you out of the courtyard before a guard wandered by. If they'd found you, you'd have been taken away before we ever had the chance totalk." He ran the back of his finger along her arm and his breath seemed to hitch. So did hers while a new wave of heat splashed through her.
A part of her mind commanded she jump out of reach, scream, and hope the guard he'd mentioned would hear. Another more primal side of her brain wished this Thomas guy would trail his tongue over the very path his fingers skimmed. Which possibility frightened her more, that the stranger touched her, or that she inexplicably wanted him to?
Who were these men? Her heart raced as the possibilities, all bad, flashed through her mind.
"It's so soft," he murmured, turning to Roland. "Touch it."
"No!" Yes. She wanted to purr her acquiescence. What was wrong with her? The drink. It had to be the drink impairing her judgment.
Roland eagerly extended his hand.
"I said no!" Common sense finally set in and Barb scooted into the corner of the sofa, her legs drawn up to her chest. To her surprise, she felt very little other than a floating sensation and a few tingles. No pain greeted her rapid movement. Good, she'd be able to run when the chance presented itself.
"You won't touch me if you know what's good for you," she ground out. She looked down and saw the crisp, yellow blouse she'd worn to work that morning was dirty and torn. The buttons, as well as her bra, were undone. A tear in her skirt rendered it useless. One shoe was missing. Panic filled her.
Hastening to cover herself, she found her fingers shook, making the buttons hard to fit through their holes. "What's happened here? Have you" She couldn't get out the word raped . "Have you already done something to me?"
Roland looked affronted. "Certainly not. We do not engage with unconscious women."
She gestured to her clothing. "Then what?"
"We don't know. This is how we found you," Thomas said.
"How you" She clamped her lips shut and tried to think. No easy matter, considering. "But how did I get here?"
Roland huffed a breath. "Thomas already explained. He carried you."
"I mean here ," she said, frustration and the odd heat from the drink fraying the ends of the rope tethering her to sanity.
"Oh." He waved his hands dismissively. "We do not know. We just know you are here, and we are here, and you are woman, so" He glanced pointedly at another room. A bedroom?
Despite her predicamentwhich she still didn't understandshe gave a harsh laugh. "No way we're going to have sex."
Roland wrinkled his forehead. "But we must. You are woman. Your purpose is to be touched, to be held and then to be had. Surely you know this?"
"I don't know any such thing, bud, and if you don't want me screaming my head off, you'll keep your distance."
"No, we don't want you to scream." Thomas stared at her, and then spoke to Roland in a foreign language. Understanding lit Roland's face and he sat back, his hands in his lap. Not before Barb spotted a hard-on tenting his slacks. A quick glace showed an erection tenting Thomas' pants, also.
Lord, how would she ever escape from these two? The FBI must have them on the 10 Most Wanted Looneys list, and here she'd just fallen into their laps. Or, more accurately, she'd been How had she arrived here? She'd been on her way home from the grocery store, hadn't she? She looked up, saw something, and thendarkness.
"Just let me go, okay? I promise not to tell anyone where you are."
Roland said something in that same foreign tongue and Thomas nodded. "We can't let you go. I hope you understand," he said.
Panic bubbled up inside. Barb couldn't get t
he words out fast enough. "I don't. I don't understand. Why can't you?"
"Because," Roland said slowly, as though speaking to an imbecile, "you are woman ." He threw out his hands in a gesture of surrender, though his expression said he expected her to be the one giving in.
"I know I'm a woman , ass" Steady. Keep your cool. Nothing like insulting the men who hold you hostage. "What do you intend to do with me?"
The men stood and released the buttons on their trouser plackets. In seconds, two cocks pointed toward her. Thomas' was long and veined with a large, bulbous head. Roland's was thick and shorter, with a purple, mushroom-shaped head. Roland took a step forward, stroking himself, a gleam lighting his eyes. Thomas held back and studied her.
Barb held up an unsteady hand. "I'm going to scream." She'd never screamed in her life, but she took a deep breath and prepared to give it everything she had. Thomas threw out his arm to stop Roland. The men conferred in low tones, casting her glances every few sentences.
"We found your papers," Thomas finally said. "You had an identification card and letters. Is it possible the mores of your time are so different from ours?"
"What in the world are you talking about?" My time? She'd heard of cases where people fell unconscious and then woke up years later, but that couldn't have happened to her. "What's the date?"
"Dix 10, 2836."
A nervous laugh bubbled up. "You're crazy." She cast a surreptitious glance at Thomas' groin. She wished he'd cover up. Roland, too. He continued to rub himself absently, though the look filled with longing that he kept sending let her know he hadn't forgotten she was there. "You're positively off your rocker," she said. "Even if I'd been in a coma, I couldn't have lived 827 years."
"I assure you," Thomas said calmly, "we are not crazy. And you have not been in a coma. We found you lying in the courtyard of our housing barracks with a bag beside you. How you arrived is a mystery. Do you remember anything?"
She frowned. "No."
"About the bag." Roland spoke now, moving to a table where the brown bag printed with the red pig wearing a ridiculous cap sat. "What are these things?"
She stood and cautiously walked toward them, testing her body as she went, checking to see if she'd be able to run if an escape path opened for her. There was no pain. How could that be, when minutes ago she'd suffered?
Thomas had grabbed the head of garlic and tried rolling it across the table. Roland removed her frozen lasagna dinner and banged it on the table edge. "The image on the front indicates this is to be eaten, but it is hard. How can this be?"
Was he acting? "You nuke it, of course." The men exchanged looks. "In a microwave? Hellooo."
"And this?" Thomas held aloft her baguette.
"Come on. This stupid act is wearing thin. It's a loaf of cheese bread, for Pete's sake." She held up the bottle of Chardonnay. "And you're going to tell me you don't recognize this? I think you've had too much to drink of it yourself. 2836 indeed."
Roland took the bottle from her. "Is thisis this wine ?" With wide, gleaming eyes he stared at it and then at Thomas. "I've read of this," he said in a hushed tone. "It's supposed to taste like sunshine."
"Sunshine?" Thomas' voice held as much wonder as Roland's expression. "How wonderful."
"You two are giving me a headache." Barb pulled out a chair and sat. In fact, once more an ache radiated from her neck to her shoulders. She rubbed her neck, fearing the return of the sharper, incapacitating pain.
"Give her more elixir," Roland urged in a low voice.
With a quick glance at Barb, Thomas leaned toward Roland and spoke in their language. Barb watched, wishing they'd tuck their penises out of sight. They seemed totally unconcerned with the state of their organs, still erect and leaking droplets of cum every now and then. The men might be crazy as ticks but they had fantastic cocks. Even in her current state she couldn't stem her appreciation for perfection.
Finally, the discussion ended. Thomas retrieved the glass from where she'd left it, removed a corked brown bottle from a cabinet and poured a small amount. "Here you are," he said. "But take small sips. We don't know yet how our remedies will react with your body."
She barely let a drop past her lips and waited. Almost immediately heat trailed down her throat; a quickening blossomed and then closed in her belly. She blinked and took a longer sip. The spreading warmth wasn't unpleasant, not unpleasant at all. Her neck suddenly felt better but other parts of her body tingled, begging for attention.
"Tell me why you think this is 2836," she said, and giggled. She slapped her hand over her mouth. What had caused that?
"That is an unexpected side effect," Roland murmured.
"Are you all right, Barbara?" Thomas asked.
Barb giggled again. "Barbara is what my mother calls me when she's mad. Everyone calls me Barb."
"But it said Barbara on your papers. Barbara Lynn Morrison," Roland insisted.
She wrinkled her nose, thinking. "You must mean my driver's license. You know the government. Sticklers for official full names."
The men looked at each other in understanding. "The government, yes, we see now. We shall call you Barb." Thomas smiled. A very cute smile, full of warmth tinged with lust.
"Not I." Roland stood as straight as his cock. "If Barbara is her official name then I shall honor it."
"Whatever." She held up the glass. "Hey, where can I buy some of this stuff?"
"Nowhere, I'm afraid." Thomas frowned at Roland, who simply shrugged.
Barb sipped again and walked to the window. "I don't even know if it's day or night," she said, and reached for the shade.
"Stop!" Roland grabbed her arm, and Thomas rushed to press the covering against the window frame.
"I knew you were lying," she said. "You've kidnapped me and shown me your cocks." She pointed at Roland's penis with one hand while drinking more of the liquid. Somehow she forgot to be afraid of what the men might do to her. Instead she was curious. The tip of her finger traced the rim of Roland's mushroom-shaped cock head. "It's 2009. There's no way it could be anything else. If it weren't, you'd let me see outside."
Thomas's somber expression cooled her more than words.
"I agree. There's no way it could not be 2009, and yet here you are in 2836." He turned to look at the covered windows. "I can let you look out, but only if you promise to be careful. If anyone sees you, you'll be taken to the government center where no date on your papers will be believed. Then Roland and I will be arrested."
"As you should be, for kidnapping me." She ended with another sip. The drink was almost gone. Warmth swirled through her. Her heart rate increased, all hint of pain was banished. Somehow, her whole hand had wrapped around Roland's cock and she stroked his length with a slow rhythm. He stood close enough for her to see his eyes had dilated and darkened to midnight and emerald.
Oh, he felt good straining and pulsing in her palm. A droplet of cum moistened her hand. She had the urge to swipe her tongue across it to see how he tasted. She sneaked a peek at Thomas. He was so big, so inviting. How would it be to sink to her knees and
What was wrong with her? How could she think of monkey sex with a strange mancorrection, two strange men, she thought with sinful gleewhen moments ago she feared she'd been kidnapped by perverts? Who was the pervert now? Only in her wildest fantasies had she made it with two guys, and even then she hadn't put faces or names with the phantom lovers.
Confusion clouded her mind, whether from the drink or whatever had placed her here. If she was going to figure a way out, she first had to know what "out" meant.
"Show me," she demanded.
With a deep breath, Thomas pulled back the edge of the window covering. Barb finished off her drink, handed him the glass and peeked outside.
She released Roland to take hold of the sill. Blinking and then focusing, she stared out onto unfamiliar territory. Her heart pounded. The landscape was completely alien. There were mountains but they were familiar only by rough shape. They'd lost their
comforting green protectiveness. Her neighborhood had disappeared. Instead of the Piggly Wiggly, a windowless concrete building filled the corner. The intersection between the store's parking lot and her apartment building was now park-like, covered in grass and bushes.
Through murky light she saw that her building, rustic and shingled, was gone, replaced with a low-level concrete structure. Four or five antennae on the roof faced not skyward, but toward the surrounding buildings. They turned slowly, seeming to scan the area.
A bullet-shaped vehicle, about the height telephone wires would have hung, had there been any wires, cruised by. A man was inside the vehicle, swiveling his head left and right as though looking for something. Thisshe felt herself begin to shakethis was not her world.
"Is it evening?" she asked quietly.
"No. This is the way," Roland replied, "the sun dies."
Barb whipped around. "What do you mean?"
Thomas pushed the covering back into place, and then took her elbow to guide her away from the window. "In ten years or less, our sun will de dead."
"But that can't be. Plants need sunlight. How will you grow food?"
"As we do now, or at least as long as power lasts. Special lamps provide light to grow our nutrients. We take them in the form of pills, not food." Thomas cast a look back at the table where the loaf of bread and thawing dinner lay.
"We know some of the history of your time," Roland murmured. "There were women, many women." He pushed his cock back into her hand.
"And disease, and war," Thomas added.
Roland's eyes turned wistful. "But also freedom to decide for oneself what one did with life."
Barb was so caught up in their story, she almost forgot to be afraid that they were so obviously out of their minds. "You two are insane."
"Not insane, Barb. Just in wonder at this opportunity we've been given." Thomas's cock nudged her other hand. Without thought, she stroked him. The vein that ran his length jumped in her hand and he sighed, swelling under her fingertips.
Barb was confused. She wanted to scream out her frustration, her fears, her inability to comprehend what had happened to her. At the same time, she wanted nothing more than to touch these men, hold them, take them to her. How could the thought of sex seem so right at a time like this?
Menage Amour 82: Tasty Treats Volume 1 Page 20
