Gary Brandner

by Doomstalker (v2. 0) (epub)

  "As I said, I lay down to take a nap. That's not my usual habit, but for some reason I got fantastically sleepy. I thought I'd just rest my eyes for a minute. I turned to look at something at the window and - " She stopped.

  "What was at the window?" Kettering said.

  "It was ... it was ... a silhouette. A man, maybe. Tall. Strange-looking hands. Something funny about the head. It's just a quick impression. A flash. Then I was asleep."

  Kettering stared at her, then back into the bedroom. He took her hand and drew her away from the house.

  "What was it?" she said. "Do you think ... ?"

  "Yeah. I think so. Listen, how are you? Should you get treatment?"

  "I'm fine. A little shaky on my feet, and a sore throat, is all."

  "I want you to pack a few things and come to my place. You can rest up there while we try to figure out what the hell is going on."

  "Brian," she said, "was it a real fire?"

  "Real enough."

  She pulled his head down and kissed him softly on the mouth. "It's pretty lucky for me that you happened by when you did."

  "Maybe. Or maybe I was supposed to show up. Maybe this was a demonstration. Some kind of a warning." He gently disengaged her hands from behind his head. "Come on, pack some things."

  "Okay." She smiled at him and started into the cottage. At the door she stopped and turned to face him. "Hey, I just remembered. I'm supposed to be mad at you."

  "We can fight later," he said. "Move it."

  She punched him on the arm, then vanished into the cottage.

  ***

  Kettering sat on the convertible sofa and marveled at the transformation in his tiny bachelor apartment brought about by the arrival of one woman with one medium-sized suitcase. The dishes were washed and put away, the dirty laundry out of sight, the floor clean, the ashtray emptied.

  And there was more. His clothes were shoved to one end of the pole in the small wardrobe closet, while an astonishing number of dresses, jackets, sweaters, skirts, slacks filled the rest. The limited shelf space in the bathroom had disappeared under a jumble of bottles, tubes, jars, soaps, sprayers, and tiny implements, the nature of which he could only guess.

  It looks, he thought with a twinge of alarm, like she's moving in permanently.

  "I'll bet," she called from the bathroom, "you think I'm moving in permanently."

  He was so startled by her telepathy that he could only wave a hand feebly in reply.

  "Well, don't worry. We'll make other arrangements tomorrow. No offense, but I think we'd be at each other's throats after about forty-eight hours of this kind of intimacy."

  Kettering could not deny it.

  Charity finished arranging her toilet articles and came out to sit beside him.

  "Seriously, Brian, what are we going to do?"

  "Eventually I'm going to have to face this thing, whatever it is ..."

  "Your Doomstalker," she said.

  "Okay. Eventually, I'm going to have to face it and destroy it."

  "I said we, Kettering."

  "This isn't your fight."

  "Oh, no? Wasn't it I who damn near got incinerated in my own bedroom a little while ago?"

  "It wouldn't have happened if you hadn't known me," he said. "It's a pattern. Jessie, Mavis, Trevor, Al. Now you. Anybody close to me is in danger."

  "All the more reason I should be a part of the team."

  "Well, maybe. There's something I have to do before we start making plans."

  "What's that?"

  "My kid is involved with some goofy outfit up in the mountains. I promised his mother I'd bring him back."

  "What if he doesn't want to come back, Kettering?"

  "I'll face that when it comes up. I promised I'd find him, and that's what I'm going to do."

  "I understand," she said. "I wouldn't expect anything else from you. One question - can it wait until tomorrow?"

  "That's what I had in mind. Why, was there something you wanted to do today?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "What?"

  She reached over and pulled his head down to hers. The kiss did not end quickly. This time they did not wait to fold the sofa out into a bed.

  Chapter 24

  This was the Quiet Time.

  No shit, that's what they called it. The Quiet Time. It sounded like something from Sesame Street, but what the hell, it was fine with Trevor Kettering. They could call it anything they wanted to.

  If anyone had told him a month ago that he would willingly participate in something called Quiet Time, he would have fallen down laughing. What you were expected to do was go and stay in your room and be alone and silent. Alone? Who ever wanted to be alone? And silent? Not while there were CDs and tapes and records and FM stations and MTV.

  No way.

  Yet here he was, sitting in his tiny room in a mountain camp called Harmony Village that he hadn't even heard of a month ago. He sat alone, and there was no sound other than the whisper of Douglas fir boughs against the wall outside.

  The really weird thing was, he was happy. He was way the hell up in the woods with a bunch of kids he hardly knew and he was happier than he could ever remember being.

  The Quiet Time, they explained to him, was designed to let him reflect on his life before and after coming to Harmony Village. Trevor was not much for reflection, but he didn't mind remembering how things had been before, and especially what happened to bring him here.

  His life at home, at least this past year, had been without direction, without purpose. His teachers were preoccupied with getting higher salaries, his parents treated him with edgy tolerance, his friends were shallow, the girls were all nervous about VD. Nothing seemed to be going right. Then one night he had wandered into The Pit.

  At first he was not impressed. The tacky decor, supposed to make the place look like a cave or something, was no big deal. There was the same old loud music, the same smell of mingled sweat and perfume, the same crowd of kids trying to outcool each other, the same older guys at the bar trying to score with the young stuff.

  The kids that hung out there were a little more rootless and a little funkier than the usual Valley types, but you had to look close to see anything different from a hundred other clubs that sprung up and died like mushrooms around Los Angeles.

  Like everything else in his life, Trevor found The Pit to be a disappointment. But that was before he met Zoara Sol.

  After that, everything was different. The Pit became a wild and wonderful place of dreams. A magical cavern with hidden doors to untold delights. The music flowed through his body and liberated his spirit. It was like discovering the best dope in the world, only it was even better than dope.

  Drugs had never been Trevor's thing. He had tried a few of them when they were offered, grass, hash, reds, coke, but he did it as much to prove the cop's kid was cool as anything else. And it gave him a small charge to know that his parents never had a clue. After that, the kick was gone.

  Even when you discounted the ravings of the antidrug crowd, Trevor knew that most of them could do something bad to your brain or your body. He didn't need that. What you got out of drugs was not worth what using them finally cost you.

  Hell, most kids knew that. Just like their parents knew alcohol could pickle their livers and cigarettes rot their lungs. So what? Nobody really thought it would happen to them.

  Through Zoara Sol, Trevor discovered a high that was beyond anything you could get from drugs. He guessed it was something like those pain-in-the-ass Born Again Christians claimed they got out of their religion. Only this was better. There was no bullshit about faith and sin and all that testifying and I-found-it crap. You just felt good. All because of the magical woman with silver eyes.

  When Zoara Sol was near, everything around you was brighter, cleaner, softer. Suddenly you were completely in touch with your body. Your mind snapped back answers to questions you hadn't dared ask. You were bright, witty, beautiful, friendly; and so was everybody else. It wa
s, Trevor guessed, a little bit like dying and going to Heaven. If you believed in Heaven.

  The effect lasted even after Zoara Sol had gone, and it wore off gradually, and with zero aftereffects. The only bad thing was that reality all seemed to be shades of gray after the brilliant colors you saw with her. The good part was that you knew she was coming back.

  Before he met Zoara Sol, Trevor heard about her from the guys he met at The Pit. You did not just meet her, they told him. She sent for you. When she did, you were in for a brand-new experience.

  At the time he did not pay a lot of attention to their ravings. Okay, so this was a foxy lady with special talents. What was the big deal? Nobody could be as terrific as they were making her out to be. So he believed. When he finally met her himself, Trevor understood.

  On the night he met Zoara Sol, Trevor was hanging around late because he did not want to go home. To kill time he was playing a video game called Annihilator. Trevor had great hand-eye coordination, and he already had his initials on the screen when it flashed up the top ten scorers. He was shooting for the next level when Enzo DuLac oiled up to him.

  "What's happenin', dude?"

  DuLac was laughable when he tried to talk like the kids who came to his club. He used a combination of archaic slang and trendy words that he dropped into the wrong places. The kids tolerated him because he owned the place and he had the power to banish anyone who gave him shit. To be eighty-sixed at The Pit was the ultimate downer.

  "Hi," Trevor said, keeping his concentration on the video screen. His score was rapidly approaching seven figures as he destroyed the Gelph Monster with a laser blast.

  "Somebody wants to meet you."

  "Yeah?" Trevor's nostrils pinched at the overpowering scent of Jade East. DuLac must marinate in the stuff. "Who?"

  "Zoara Sol."

  An enemy ship slipped past his defenses and blasted him to atoms as Trevor's concentration wavered. He had always pretended to be unaffected by the wild tales of what happened when you were sent for by Zoara Sol, but he could not now prevent a sudden hollow feeling in his stomach and a light-headed giddiness.

  "Now?" he said.

  "Now," DuLac affirmed. "She's back in my office. Waiting for you."

  Trevor abandoned the Annihilator and let his chance of moving up in the high-scorers list vanish in a multicolored starburst. You did not keep Zoara Sol waiting.

  "You do know where my office is?"

  Trevor gestured toward the crimson curtain at the far end of the bar. "Through there somewhere."

  "Down the hall. It's on the right. Don't get lost." DuLac smirked at him as he headed back there.

  Trevor moved through the writhing bodies on the dance floor and slipped past the curtain. He continued through the door beyond it and stepped into a new phase of his life.

  The hallway smelled bad. It was narrow and dimly lit by low-wattage bulbs widely spaced along the ceiling. There was only one door on the right. Trevor stopped in front of it and raised a fist to knock. Then he decided, what the hell, I'm invited, and walked in.

  The office was empty. There was DuLac's cluttered desk, a couple of chairs, a file cabinet. On the walls were posters of the great heavy-metal bands who would not be caught dead playing a smalltime club like The Pit. There were no windows. A second door in the far wall stood open about six inches. Behind it there was a warm orange glow.

  "In here, Trevor." The voice muted, low register, musical, came from beyond the other door.

  Trevor crossed the office and pushed the second door all the way open. He stood for a moment on the threshold. The carpet under his feet was thick and spongy. The light was soft. In the air was the faintest hint of sandalwood incense. From hidden speakers came a compelling melody in soft ringing tones like great silver bells.

  All these sensations slipped to a far corner of Trevor's consciousness as he looked at the woman.

  Zoara Sol stood in front of a white satin love seat that rested on a dais across the room. She wore a shimmery garment of pale blue that descended from milky shoulders, caressed the high breasts, flowed over the flat belly, and ended midway down the most luscious pair of thighs Trevor had ever seen in real life or in any of the magazines he hid from his parents.

  "Close the door, please." Her lips, a glossy shade of pink, formed the words deliberately. The purring voice reached inside Trevor's clothes and caressed him.

  He did as he was told.

  "Come over here."

  His legs moved without a conscious order from his mind, carrying him across the lush carpet toward the woman. The pale hair floated in a cloud framing her high-cheekboned face. The wild, silvery eyes looked into his soul.

  "I am Zoara Sol."

  "I know." He was embarrassed by the piping adolescent sound of his voice. He cleared his throat and tried again. "I'm glad to meet you."

  Shit, what a nerdy way to introduce himself. To save his life, Trevor could not think up anything even slightly clever to say. The vision of the spectacular woman with those crazy silver eyes had paralyzed his brain. Zoara Sol did not seem to notice. She smiled at him.

  "Come up here with me," she said.

  He realized he was standing at the base of the dais staring stupidly up at her like some geek in front of a museum statue. He stepped up and stood facing her.

  The woman was as tall as he was. There was the scent of some spice coming from her. Cloves. Delicious. For a moment Trevor thought he might fall down.

  Zoara Sol reached out and took both his hands.

  "You're an attractive man, Trevor."

  Man! Not boy. Not young man. It was the first time anyone - male, female, child, or adult - had called him a man. He felt his scrotum tighten and the beginning of a hard-on.

  "You're ..." He groped, for a return compliment. What could he possibly say to this unbelievable woman that would even hint at the exploding emotions within him? He finally settled for, "You're ... beautiful."

  "Thank you." Her pleasure at the corny compliment was so sincere, you would think he had just produced a love sonnet. "I think it is time we came to know each other."

  "I'd like that." Better. At least he was getting his words out now without squeaking.

  "Would you like to make love to me?"

  The words were spoken in the same hushed, caressing tone that she had been using, yet the effect on Trevor was that of being clonged in the back of the head with a shovel.

  "Oh ... God ... yes!"

  She smiled. Her teeth were white and perfect. What else could they be? The silver eyes slid slowly down his body, then back to his face.

  "Take off your clothes," she said. "Then you can undress me."

  With fingers that felt like sausages, Trevor fumbled open the buttons of his shirt and pulled it off. He went to work on the fly of his Levi's 501's, wishing he had worn the zippered Wranglers tonight instead. He pushed the jeans down his slim legs and realized with acute embarrassment that he should have taken off his Reeboks first. Now he had to sit and pull them off his feet before he could get out of the jeans.

  Feeling more exposed than ever in his life, Trevor glanced up at Zoara Sol while he tugged at the suddenly stubborn denim. If she was laughing at him, he would die right there.

  She was not laughing. She stood straight, hands at her sides, watching him. Her expression showed affection, anticipation. Nothing more. The silky blue shift rose and fell gently with her breasts in time with her breathing.

  At last he fought his way out of the jeans and stood up. Although he did not look directly at her, Trevor was intensely aware of the woman who stood quietly watching him, giving off the faint, maddening scent of sandalwood. He fancied he could feel the heat of her body from four feet away.

  Trevor hooked his thumbs in the waistband of his Ralph Lauren briefs, silently thankful he had put on a clean pair for tonight.

  "Let me do that," she said, and stepped forward to where their bodies were that close to touching. "Do you mind?"

  "Huh-uh. N
o." Trevor took his hands away and swallowed, trying to clear his dry throat.

  His erection strained painfully against the thin material of his briefs, dampening them visibly.

  Zoara Sol's silver eyes caressed him. She lay the palms of her hands against his bare chest. Trevor's eyes closed as he savored the heat of her touch. Slowly, slowly, she slid her hands down across his nipples, over his ribcage, down his stomach. Her fingers insinuated their way under the band of his shorts, slipping into the pubic hair. She touched his cock. He damn near screamed.

  Dipping gracefully, she pushed the damp briefs down Trevor's legs, allowing his stiff member to spring free. Her eyes never left his face. When he opened his own eyes to peek at her, she held his glance like a magnet holds BBs.

  Zoara Sol went to her knees before him. Trevor reached down clumsily to help her up. Gently she put his hands aside. She curled the fingers of one hand around his cock and dipped forward.

  Oh my God look what she's doing! I don't believe it!

  Watching the sway of the pale cloud of hair as her head moved forward and back, forward and back, swallowing him, letting him out, was so hypnotic, Trevor almost forgot the wild feelings caused by the play of her lips and tongue and teeth down there. Almost.

  After a minute or so of agonizing ecstasy, she drew back her head and let his rigid member slide free. She kissed the very tip, setting him on fire, and stood up to look him in the eye.

  "Good?" she said.

  "Oh, Jesus," was all he could manage.

  She put a hand behind his head and pulled his face to hers. When they kissed him, he tasted himself on her lips, her tongue.

  Trevor groaned when she released him. At that moment the only thing he feared in the world was that she might leave him.

  "We've only just begun," she said, and led him to the love seat.

  At some point during the next incredible hour, Zoara Sol had told him about Harmony Village, a place where young people could live without the stress of dealing with the world. She invited him to come. He never hesitated.

  ***

  A soft knock at the door snapped Trevor out of the erotic reverie and back to his room in Harmony Village. The door opened and Vicki came in. She was small and trim, with an ass you wanted to bite. Vicki was his guide at Harmony Village. Everybody was assigned a guide when they first got here. Trevor figured he had lucked out.