It's Always Time Act 06 Ch. 01

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The paperboy pelted down the narrow steps to the Epsilon Sorority House basement, satchel of soggy newspapers bouncing off his flat, newsprint-smudged ass. The pizza guy and Eddie followed close behind on the single-file stairway. The cable guy, his work-clothes little more than strips of cloth stuck to his sticky skin, hesitated at the top of the stair, set his jaw, turned and stood his ground.

Eddie poked his head back up the wood-paneled stairway, his face a blotchy patchwork of lipstick, bites, bruises, and vaginal juices. "C'mon, man! We don't have time."

"You guys go on," the cable guy said, his voice flat. The hordes of horny E-Z sorority sisters searching for them in other parts of the house sounded muffled but were getting closer. "It's too late for me." He adjusted himself. "And I can buy you a couple of minutes."

Eddie squinted up. The cable guy stood rigid, but Eddie could not read his body-language on his butt. "What the Hell, man?"

"I have erectile dysfunction," the cable guy answered in that same flat tone.

The pizza guy and the paperboy crowded Eddie at the stairwell's bottom. "Could've fooled me," the pizza guy said as the paperboy looked up, puzzled.

The cable guy sagged. "No, it's true. It's just not something I talk about. Even got a prescription for it. Never thought I'd need it, but I put one in my wallet, just in case." The rampaging Easies were close enough to pick out individual voices. The cable guy called over the rising noise, "Remember when I fell back on stairs, when we were headed for the second floor?"

"Oh my God," Eddie whispered.

The paperboy shrugged. "What?"

"I took it," called the cable guy. He adjusted himself again and stepped into the upper hall. "So get going."

The paperboy shouted from the bottom of the stairwell. "Took one what?"

"Viagra," Eddie said, his face ashen. "He took a Viagra pill. His hard-on'll last another three hours, or until his heart stops, whichever comes—uh, happens—first."

The pizza guy blinked back tears. "I'll never forget you, man."

The paperboy choked back rage. "You selfish bastard."

Eddie ran back up the stairs, grabbed the stairwell door. The cable guy took a few more steps into the hallway. Somewhere down the upper hall, a girl cried, "There he is!" Eddie and the cable guy exchanged a knowing glance. "Look at that, he's still hard," gloated another girl, "and just standing there." The cable guy nodded.

Eddie slammed the door to the stairwell shut, trapping the cable guy in the upper hall. He battered the doorknob until it he heard the mechanism inside crack. He hobbled back down the stairway, cradling his throbbing fist, where the pizza guy and delivery boy looked on in horror under a single, bare light-bulb. "Keep moving," Eddie ordered.

"What are we looking for?" the paperboy asked, casting about. An unfinished cement corridor and assorted basement clutter stretched in either direction.

"Storm cellar door," Eddie answered. "A huge-ass building like this has got to have a storm shelter. Right?"

The pizza guy nodded his agreement, then glanced up. Something thumped against the door at the top of the stair. "Did they get the extinguisher again?" The thump developed a steady rhythm and the pizza guy paled. "Oh, shit. That's his ass. C'mon kid." He clapped the paperboy on the shoulder. "Let's not waste the time he bought us." He led the paperboy down the left-hand side.

Eddie picked his way over steamer trunks and boxes of bric-a-brac to the nearest doorway: laundry room. Frilly under-things hung everywhere, a panty-raid mother load. Eddie shuddered and moved on, the hallway growing darker as he moved away from the stairwell. "You guys find anything?"

"Storage closet," called the paperboy.

"World's largest collection of old Cosmo mags," said the pizza guy.

Eddie found the next door. He rattled the rusty knob. "Please, God," he muttered, testing the door with his shoulder, "don't tell me we got all this way and the storm cellar's locked."

The paperboy's voice drifted down the corridor. "What the fuck is that?"

Eddie spun. The paperboy and the pizza guy stood at an open door at the far end of the corridor. They were bathed in a pale green light. "What's going on?" Eddie asked, hustling over as fast as he could.

"Is it," the pizza guy wondered, staring into the doorway. "Is it even real?"

Oh, no, Eddie thought. He heard the flickering buzz of florescent lighting as he approached. Light shone from the doorway ahead, casting scintillating motes of lime-colored light over every surface in the hallway. Please, no. He reached his two companions as the paperboy took his first step into the room. Eddie peeked around him. One look was all he needed.

The paperboy started, "Maybe it's just a sta—" but Eddie yanked him back.

"It's not," Eddie hissed. "Don't touch it. Don't go near it. And whatever you do, don't point your dick at it."

"All right, all right." The paperboy massaged his shoulder, then narrowed his eyes at Eddie. "But you know something. Something you're not telling us."

Eddie blocked the doorway and the contents of the room beyond. "It doesn't matter. Either way, we've got to get out of here, right?"

The pizza guy moved to the paperboy's side. "You've been here the longest, and I just realized you never told us how you got here." He folded his arms, making them dance with flecks of green light. "So what's your story, Eddie?"

"I don't have a story," Eddie insisted. His eyes grew accustomed to the eldritch illumination. "I'm just Eddie. And trust me, I have no fucking idea what's—the storm door."

The pizza guy blinked. "Say what?"

"Behind you," Eddie said, pointing. Now that his vision had adjusted, he could see the short stairway leading to a canted metal door. "It's right there. Guys, we're getting out of here."

The pizza guy turned. "Holy shit. You're right. We made it!" He marched up the stairs.

"I'm still a virgin," the paperboy insisted.

Eddie rolled his eyes. "Only in the strictest sense."

"Yeah," the pizza guy said, pushing on the door, "you've done things today that'd make Bill Clinton blush. Or give you a medal." The door creaked and moaned as metal strained against cement. "Eddie, give me a hand with this."

Eddie hopped up the stairs. The pizza guy shoved one side of the storm door. A sliver of light zigzagged down the stairs as the heavy metal door shifted half an inch before falling back. "It was just held by a sliding bolt," the pizza guy laughed, "but it's heavy as Hell."

Eddie shouldered up against the other side of the door. He turned to the pizza guy. "On the count of three?"

"Sure," the pizza guy answered, "but we're, you know, buck naked."

"So?" said Eddie. He gave the pizza guy a celebratory punch on the shoulder. "We're outta here!"

The paperboy mounted the foot of the stair. "Hurry up, guys, that thing in there's giving me the creeps and, well, a boner."

"One," Eddie said, shifting his weight. He grinned like an idiot.

"Two." The pizza guy tested his handhold on the door.

Eddie breathed deep. "Three!" He pushed.

Both sides of the door flew open, hinges squealing and sparks flying. Eddie and the pizza guy belly-flopped onto the grass. Eddie squinted in the sudden flare of sunlight until a long shadow fell over him, coasting wide to cover a huge swath of the lawn, as if cast by an encroaching alien starship.

"Oh, hello, Eddie. You've made a friend, I see. That's good."

Eddie punched the ground. "No, no, no." He turned his head. "I was so close."

Red Mary Jane jelly clogs skipped through the grass, stopping inches away from his eyes. "Aw, I'm sorry, Eddie. Was your friend close, too?" Eddie looked up at a pair of legs the color of a cherry creamsicle. "Don't you two worry. I'll help you finish."

Black Cherry swooped in. Eddie's stomach dropped. She flipped him over onto his back with one wing claw, pinned the pizza guy's arms to the ground with the other.

The pizza guy glared, murder in his eyes. "What did you do, Eddie?"

Black Cherry clucked, poking and prodding the pizza guy as if inspecting ripening fruit. A pair of long, black, braided hair extensions dangled from one of her hands.

The pizza guy hissed, "What. Did. You. Do?"

"Nothing." Eddie choked back tears. "I did nothing. I...I showed up for work."

"And I'm so glad you did, Eddie," Black Cherry said. She stood up, hands on hips, chest outthrust. "Because I'm starved."

"What the Hell's goin' on?" The paperboy tromped up the storm cellar stairs and into the sun before his eyes nearly popped out of his head. "Oh, fuck me."

Black Cherry tipped her head, the miniature pair of wings above her ears pricking up. "Okay!"

* * * *

"So," SB said, wringing the last of the strawberry spooge from her hair, "all that high-minded talk about 'existential monogamy' is really just a rationalization of your fetish for—"

"For mutual, simultaneous orgasm," Yves said, nodding, "yes." He shimmied the picnic blanket over his butt, hoping it would serve as an impromptu towel. Instead, Yves got the strangest impression that he was polishing his own ass with a chamois. "Although I prefer to think that my fetish partakes in my philosophy, rather than one being the reason for the other. I don't buy into the idea of the whole..." He made chopping motions with his hand. "Separating the mind from the body thing. Is that bad?"

"I can think of more selfish fetishes than wanting to cum together," SB leered, ogling Yves' derriere.

Yves returned a smirk. "Unless you can shrink that thing between your legs down a few—dozen—notches, you ain't getting any of this." He dropped the blanket and slapped his ass.

"But it's sooo shiny!"

"The palm sisters and their ten lovely assistants are itching for another go," Yves said, gesturing lewdly with both hands.

SB pouted, "Today's been a parade of ass, each juicier than the last, and it's all hands-off."

"I never said anything about hands off," Yves laughed.

SB hummed thoughtfully, furled the fingers of her right hand, and a knurled, pink dildo sprouted to fill them.

Yves' cock twitched. "Can you feel with that thing?"

"If I leave it unlocked," SB answered, "yeah." She sighed and the dildo zipped out of existence. "But it isn't the same."

Yves bent over to retrieve his sword, taking care not to flaunt his rear end in SB's face. The pale sword had struck a flat rock where he had dropped it, slicing through the stone and into the earth beneath. Yves pulled the sword from the ground and the stone crumbled to powder. He inspected the bare blade. "How do I clean this thing?"

"Liminal zero friction coefficient," was all SB said.

"I don't clean this thing," Yves translated. "Would you make me a scabbard?" He turned to her. "Do you have enough nanomek?"

"Normally, no," SB said, and pressed her palms together in a dreamy-genie gesture. "With most guys, the nanomek-sperm exchange rate is strictly two-for-one. But with guys like you and Dee?" Her hands parted. A curving, coral-colored scabbard grew in the space between them.

She tossed Yves the scabbard. He caught it and sheathed the pale sword in a single, lightning-quick motion. SB gaped at him like a crushing schoolboy, then licked her tongue across her teeth. "Mm. For men like you and Dee, meliae offer ten-for-one sales." SB bent to retrieve her dress, making sure Yves got an eyeful of strawberry-banana flavored ass. "Need anything else?" She feigned fumbling with the dress, her rump wobbling in the air.

"A new car."

SB pushed her cock to one side so she could gaze up at him upside-down through her legs. "Do you have any idea," she said slowly, "how many more times you'd have to cum inside me to create enough nanomek to make a car? Especially considering your cum-together fetish?"

"My weekends are free for the next few months," Yves confessed. "If I can save the world from Cherry Cupcake, that is. Tomoe would have to stick to her voyeurism, though."

SB's upside-down smile upturned into a frown. "Yves, there's something we need to talk about."

"Yeah, I figured." He took up the picnic blanket. "It's not even wet. SB, can you reshape something after you've made it?"

"Sure. But, Yves..."

"Too bad it's plaid."

"Color's not a problem." SB moved close and took his hand. "Quit stalling. How much do you know already?"

     ["...Gawain killed Yvain, and Dee will kill you..."]

"I know the punch line." Yves bundled the sword and scabbard in the blanket, did not like the way it looked, and started unwrapping it. "But I also know that Dee changed the joke. Cherry's supposed to be the spurned, older woman, like a fairytale witch-queen or something." Yves tried wrapping the sword again but gave up halfway. "Hell, Cherry wants to be the spurned, older woman, but she can't do that, not without a time machine." He blinked in alarm. "I don't have to worry about time travel, do I?"

"Not unless Mata Hari shows up," SB glowered.

Yves heard the edge in SB's voice and dropped the subject. "Cherry wants to be something she's not, and it's driven her batshit insane. Out of her gourd." Where had he heard that before? He shook off the reverie. "She wasn't her master's first," he continued. "She..." The blanket unraveled. The pale sword and coral scabbard clattered to the ground. "No."

SB moved closer, embracing him, trapping his arms. "I think you've got the full picture now."

     ["...No wonder that Black Cherry twat is out of her gourd..."]

"No." His mouth soured with the taste of copper. He tried to pull away but SB held him fast. "Let go."

"This is one time you need to separate your mind from your body, Yves," she said, refusing to budge. "You have to think it and remember it, without reliving or becoming it."

     ["...'Master' is gay..."]

Yves lost all control. He flailed and howled, kicked and swore. SB took all the abuse and would not let go. "What are you feeling, Yves?" she demanded, "What are you feeling right now?"

The word welled up and he spat it out. "Rage." Once named, it did not feel as deadly and wrong. "This is rage."

"'Rage,'" SB whispered, dropping back. "'Sing, O Muse, of the rage of Achilles'."

Yves rediscovered his center. He slung his sword over one shoulder, the spun-lace insulate blanket over the other. "What would you have me do?"

Relief washed over SB's face. "Someone needs to die today, Yves."

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I don't ask for much,
I only want your trust,
And you know it don't come easy.

—Ringo Starr (with George Harrison), It Don't Come Easy

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