by Lucian Bane
Charlotte smiled in the rearview mirror. “And I have an endless selection. Would you like to watch Tarzan?”
“Yeah! Tarzan, Tarzan,” he chanted.
“Can you drop me off here? I can walk,” Cado said.
“Please,” Charlotte intervened, feeling bad for the still scared boy. “Do you know who I am?”
“No ma’am, I don’t.”
“I’m a famous writer. I wrote Black Blood and oh, you may have heard Three Nights in Hell? I wrote that under my John King name.” She glanced at the boy in the mirror, and winced at seeing her horror credentials weren’t making him feel any safer.
“I don’t really read. I don’t know any of that.”
Poe turned to him now. “You play an instrument?”
Charlotte waited in the sudden silence. “I… no.”
Poe let out a frustrated sigh and faced forward. “You’ll have to trust me for now. Soon you’ll understand more. Hopefully,” he muttered nearly under his breath.
“What are we doing?” Cado asked.
“Finding six more Sound Arks,” Poe said.” He turned to Charlotte in that second and she again nailed her gaze to the road while he stared blindly at her.
“Getting back at me?” she finally said after a tormenting time.
“For what?” he asked, sounding confused.
“Staring at you for a rude amount of time.”
“You have an aura now.”
“Ohhh, I do? What does it look like? Pink?”
“Red. Like blood.”
She quirked her lip. “Geeze. What does that mean?”
“Nothing I want to say here. Or anywhere, really.”
Curiosity burned her. “What,” she demanded. “What does it mean?”
“I surely am not telling you what it means. Trust me when I say it’s not the least bit important.”
“Well then tell me. Is it dangerous? Something bad?”
“It’s nothing good, let’s just say that.”
“You sound… angry.”
“I’m frustrated,” he said. “I just gained my sight and now I’m blind again.”
His tone said she should totally get that. And okay, yeah, she did. “Sorry about that. I know you must hate not seeing.”
“My brain has habits and needs I must satisfy.”
“Of course.” Charlotte did another mirror check, feeling his frustration.
“I have to know details about everything.” Okay, now that sounded almost like a complaint. And you should know, you made me that annoying way. “It’s quite time consuming and troublesome.” At the most inopportune times, she heard loud and clear.
“Well you have fifteen hours to get all the answers you may want.”
“While blind, thank you.”
“You can also ask questions,” she reminded, realizing how stupid that was to say to him.
“Right. Questions. Thank you.”
“What!” she whispered exasperated, glancing at him. “Do you really want to do this right now?”
“Do what?” he whispered back as though he loathed all manner of questions.
“Complain at me. How poorly I constructed you.”
“An off switch would have been nice,” he tapped his head, “even a… volume control. Or maybe it’s this loathsome, barbaric humanoid form I’m stuck in. Hypersensitive to every sensation.”
Charlotte bit her lower lip and glanced at her mirrors again. She couldn’t help it. His mannerisms in real life were funny. “I doubt I can drive for fifteen hours straight. We may need to sleep.”
“And eat!” Kane said loudly. “I’m hungry.”
“Are you?” Charlotte tossed a smile over her shoulder
“We shouldn’t stop,” Poe said.
“He needs to eat,” Charlotte argued. “And our company, I’m sure, is hungry or will be hungry too. I don’t have to stop, I’ll order over the phone and pick it up through drive through.”
“Fine then. Do that.” Poe dropped his head on the seat, sounding tired.
“You sound exhausted.”
“I am. Very. And starving.”
“I’ll get pizza. Do you like pizza? Everybody likes pizza, right?” She glanced back and Kane was the only responder, loud enough for all of them. “Pizza it is,” Charlotte laughed.
****
Poe lifted his head at feeling the vehicle slowing. They’d eaten and he’d fallen straight to sleep. He looked around and realized. “I can see. Where are you going?”
She gave a light gasp then whispered, “You can see, oh thank God.” Poe watched parked vehicles passing them. “I’m sorry, I’m tired. I’m pulling off to rest my eyes before I drive us off the Grand Canyon and get us killed.” She gave out a light moan that seemed to prick at Poe’s curiosity in the most annoying way.
“Of course.” With the ability to see again, it presented him with the insane requirement to study her. Problem was, Poe was quite accustomed to handling the things he studied and he couldn’t very well do that. He realized suddenly that the red aura was gone and let out a sigh of relief. Was it a glitch in his second sight sensory? He prayed so. As far as he knew the red aura was prevalent in the Romance genre province. Though he’d never gotten close enough to study, he was quite sure it was nothing good.
What was a Horror Scribbler—even Fantasy Scribbler-- doing with that color aura and why had he not seen it before when he was blind?
Something with the boy he’d picked up brought changes in him. He’d felt them. He looked at his Scribbler who laid her seat back and curled up on her side, mumbling about thirty minutes and she’d be good as new. The final words were barely audible and Poe stared at her in the dark, making out those long dark lashes resting on perfect skin. He wanted to look all around but he couldn’t stop staring at her. Studying. Matching what he’d felt with his fingers to what he now saw. She snuggled a little and made a small sound then swept the tip of her tongue over her lower lip, making it shine in the dark. Poe angled his head, his brain suddenly a camera set on rapid shot, capturing every angle it could, not stopping at her face but hungrily collecting puzzle pieces along every part of her neck. Slender, like all of her. She seemed fragile. Breakable even. He reached a dead end at the neckline of her blouse and attributed his annoyance to the puzzle solving obsession she’d plagued him with. He wanted all the puzzle pieces and he wanted them now. No, the second he’d met her, even without sight.
He finally turned away in shock at realizing what it was he was wanting. To see all of her. How absurd. Was this another glitch in his human form? It was surely full of them, even now it reacted in a chaotic fashion, shooting strange signals to his brain and body parts that made no sense to him but certainly had his undivided and annoyed attention. He shifted in his seat and realized that thing was happening again with his male appendage.
The bathroom. He needed to relieve himself. That was it.
Poe leaned toward his Scribbler to whisper he’d be right back, and paused when her scent hit him. He slowly inhaled, processing the data in the smell, adding another puzzle piece to his collection. He didn’t recall these smells before. They were different. More… potent. Organic maybe. “I’m… “
Lost. That’s what he was and that oddity in itself confounded his perceptions.
Alarm struck Poe at finding her staring at him through half opened eyes. Instead of his instincts aiding his common sense and pulling him away to safety, they held him spellbound in fascination with the close up view of his… creator. That is what his body understood before his common sense did. Right here, inches before his face… was his Scribbler. The one who gave him life. Meaning. Purpose.
He held his breath for the sure recoiling or concern in her countenance, but instead he found her with a look that did things to his body he couldn’t process fast enough. The speeding of his heart, the increase of blood to all unmentionable extremities and the compelling urge to get even closer than he was had Poe’s every muscle locked in a war. There was knowing in her gaze. And it
seemed to say he should know it too, but he didn’t, and he needed to understand that as well and immediately of course. In fact, his mind was usually the first to know. But here, his body was first, giving instinctual commands that promised him perfect understanding. But there was a disconnect, or rather a confliction of wills, codes, and instincts—his Octava mind with his human form. His body assured him the answers he sought could be discovered right there in her full parted lips using his very own, and the blasphemy severed the power over his limbs, shooting him back to his seat and causing his Scribbler to jolt in alarm.
He could hardly believe what he’d been thinking, what those instincts were telling him. To kiss her. And not in the lifesaving manner he’d done, no, this was a hadrons difference. He wanted to learn, feel, discover, explore even, her perfectly. His Scribbler!
What sort of sorcery was this?!
She now sat up and smoothed her hair as though worried about something. “There’s a bathroom.” She pointed absently and Poe was once again dragged into a puzzle of what was she feeling. Had she caused it, contributed to it, or was this all his doing? He glanced in the back seat and found Cado and Kane still sleeping. The sheer volume of uncertainties had him fumbling to open the door and remove himself from the snare. “I must…”
“You know what?” she whispered, “I think I’ll accompany you. I need the little girl’s room too.”
Poe looked back at the boy and Kane, not sure he wanted to leave them.
“Don’t worry,” she whispered, “I’ll lock them in. We’ll be quick.”
Yes he would. Poe got out and found his limbs stretching of their own accord. He’d never get used to having his vessel doing its own anything. He watched as his Scribbler walked ahead and quickly followed, not liking her too far away and alone. When he stepped up next to her, she linked her arm in his, throwing Poe back into that state of chaos. Quarks and hadrons, why should something so simple as her holding his arm toss him into such a spin?
“It’s chilly here,” she whispered.
Poe used his power to reach out around him, discerning the air and energy. When he didn’t connect with anything worrisome, he let out a breath of relief. Chilly. She shivered and he looked down at her just as she glanced up at him. She smiled a little and Poe’s brain again became that camera, snapping images. Her lower jaw trembled from the cold and he tore his gaze from the sight, focusing on his surroundings. A rest area she’d called it.
There were several people going in and out of the building they approached. After his Scribbler pointed him in the direction he was to go, she went to her side and he entered his, wondering if hers smelled as awful. Once he figured out how to safely lock himself into one of the tiny squares, he looked down at his next challenge and worked the fastener open to merely the top of the bulging and painful member. Poe ended up having to lower his pants a little to get at the male apparatus. He couldn’t believe something like using the bathroom was supposed to be this much trouble for him.
Once he had the thing out, he hurried as quickly as his body allowed, which was hardly quick at all. He closed his eyes and purposely thought on the waste system and how very efficient it was. And active. Poe new many characters did this type of thing on Octava without needing to. Or did they? Now Poe wasn’t so sure. Maybe they did need to and he simply did not, being a Miskriat. Were the characters who were entered into Octava’s lawful system more real more human than those that were not?
Good question.
At feeling his waste functions completed, Poe took a scrap of the tissue and stared at the tip of his manhood. The thing was forever engorged it seemed. And the tip of it was nothing to trifle with. Like a little monster that grew into a beast when you least pet it, then forced you to its will. Holding his breath, he dabbed it once and watched it do that jump thing. Poe clenched his eyes at the tingling and heat that shot into the length of it. Divinities!
With gasps and grunts, he worked the now stiff limb back inside the tight underclothing then fought with the fastenings on the pants. By the time he was done, Poe was winded and realizing he was taking far too long. At the sink along the entire wall, Poe welcomed the distraction of cold water. He washed his hands then his face, feeling like he could stand to douse his phallus in it as well.
It was no surprise that his Scribbler waited for him outside his facility when he finally emerged, feeling like he’d barely survived the most annoying human task called urinating.
“I was about to come and get you, thought you fell in the toilet!” she whispered.
“My apologies,” Poe said, feeling like an imbecile.
“I should have warned you about public facilities, they can be confusing.”
“Yes,” he said, as she hooked her arm in his again.
“Geeze, it’s so cold.”
“Don’t you have an overcoat?”
“In the truck. I need to dig it out the back. Do you think we can stop at a hotel?”
Poe looked down at her and quarks and hadrons he was once again entirely lost. “A hotel?”
“Just for a few hours to get real sleep and a shower?” Poe’s body chose that moment to remember his last shower. “I could use a hot shower,” she said.
“Of course,” Poe said, only because he needed to not think about showers while looking at his Scribbler a second more. As soon as he did, he realized. “We can only stay a few hours, I don’t know how long it will be before we may be followed. And until I know who is following us and why, I prefer not being a sitting target.”
“Four hours is all I need.” She shivered and stood next to the vehicle, hand on the door, a small smile playing at the edge of her tiny mouth with the full lips. “I need to get in,” she whispered.
Poe realized he was just standing there staring at her, blocking her way. Without a word, he made his way to his side of the vehicle, reaching out into the air instinctively to locate danger.
He felt none. Yet.
Chapter Fifteen
“You need to stop this nonsense right now!” Charlotte wiped her towel in vigorous circles over the foggy bathroom mirror and jabbed a finger at herself. “You’re a horror writer. Fantasy at most. Not romance,” she hissed.
Despite her little moral pep talk, she took extra care with her make-up and hair. She squeezed body into the short hair, putting some behind her ears. She had nice ears. And the way he’d touched them made her think he admired them.
Exiting the bathroom, she paused in alarm at finding Poe, standing at the window peeking out.
“Is something wrong?” she whispered, hurrying over.
He turned and the serious look on his face faltered. She suddenly felt like such a player to be dressed in her random white satin pajama pants and not so modest matching top. His head slowly angled as his gaze roamed gradually lower as though he were capturing every bit of her, making her body flush with that familiar heat she’d given up feeling long ago.
His gaze stopped at her chest and his dark brows came together in… concentration? Agony? Need?
He snapped his eyes to hers and her heart hammered.
“What are you doing?”
Alarm and shame boiled her face and her arms covered her chest without thought. “I… took a shower.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
She managed to look at him and the accusation and anger in his nearly glowing white eyes stung her further. “What do you mean?” Because the first stupid question that pops in one’s mind should be asked right off.
“You’re… making me feel things, I can feel it. I suspected it but this time, I can feel it.” He angled his head as though the answer had finally dawned on him. It made Charlotte swallow in guilty fear. “You want me to feel this.”
She shook her head. “No, I just…” She looked down and turned to sit on the bed.
“What? You what, Scribbler? Tell me what it is that has you doing this when the fate of the worlds could be resting on our shoulders.”
She froze and l
ooked at him before slowly sitting, pain sawing in her stomach and chest. Not just pain. Anger and disappointment. “Where are the boys?”
“Sleeping.”
“We can’t leave them alone.”
“I put them to sleep. They are fine.”
She bit her lip, looking right. This was not just her, he was part to blame. “Okay fine. You’re the one causing this.”
He walked slowly, regarding her in a way that made her feel dirty. “Explain, Scribbler.”
She sat cross-legged, arms over her chest, trying to appear unaffected while wanting to hide. “You have these needs and I can feel them.” He seemed to freeze, staring at her with a half worried look. “Yes, your body, I can feel what’s happening to it. It… it makes things happen to my body.”
“Like what?” He was clearly afraid to ask that but had to know.
Lord, here it was, right in the open now. She decided to treat it like she had the first time. Medically. “Your physical needs arouse my own.”
“Arouse?”
She raised her brows, hating how she’d given him zero knowledge on that topic. He was like a three year old on the subject, a why with everything, not even realizing how inappropriate it was. So yes, treating the questions like they were perfectly normal was the only thing she could think to do. “Your… privates are… affected? When you showered, what did you feel? Did it feel… did it make you happy?”
The horror on his face was mixed with curiosity now. “You speak of it like… it’s normal.”
“Oh, it is,” she said, as casually as she could manage. “As is my body’s reaction to yours.” The idea that she could play the innocent teacher entered her mind and made her even more excited at the prospect.
“Do you… always have reactions to other human’s…”
She shook her head. “No. Never. This is the first time since…” she shook her head. “Not in a long time.”
Confusion and worry replaced his anger as he slowly sat on the bed opposite her, elbows on his legs, head in both hands like a desperate man. “You’re my Scribbler,” he whispered.
“Trust me, I know that. But… I don’t see me the way that you do.”
