Anatomy of an Invasion Ch. 06

Cassie could see her own apartment across the water, the black windows glinting in the sunlight.

The women were mostly out of bed, and were chatting, or watching television, or talking on their phones, probably to their families. The families were not allowed in here, of course, because of the "radiation".

The few that remained in bed were missing much of their hair, and looked skinny, but had colour in their cheeks, and smiled at Gabby.

One of them, a tall brunette with dark eyes and olive skin, sat up in bed, caught Cassie's eye and motioned her over. She was about Cassie's age.

Her face was also stunningly beautiful.

Smiling at Cassie, she patted the bed beside her.

Cassie moved towards her.

"My name is Sheyda," she said, shifting across and turning down her sheet, leaving room for Cassie to get into the bed with her. Cassie caught a view of her legs, skinny and wasted, but the skin was in good condition and a healthy colour.

"Do not be embarrassed. We are all host-form here. What I say to you, we all say to you."

The activity of the other women paused, and they all turned towards Cassie. They all smiled at her, then went back to what they had been doing.

Gabby smiled at them both.

"I think you're well on the way to making a new friend, Cassie," Gabby said, quietly.

"I know you need to spend some time getting to know the infected women, so I'll leave you here for a while. We wouldn't normally do this with a first meeting, but Doctor Kelly has requested that you be given full access, and suggests that you should spend as much time here as you like.

"You can stay here for dinner if you like, and later I'll show you where you can sleep. You're quite safe here, but just give someone a call if you run into difficulties. We all carry quick pagers just in case there's a problem, but I don't expect you will have any."

Gabby passed Cassie a black plastic tube with a button in the end of it, and went back to the lift.

It fitted nicely in Cassie's palm, and she put it in her pocket.

Cassie suddenly felt very alone. She was the only free woman in a room full of women controlled by aliens.

But it was hot.

It was her sick, twisted fantasy, made flesh.

Sheyda turned to Cassie, and spoke to her in a gentle voice.

"You are not like our other visitors, Cassie. You like us, Cassie. You do not hate us. You like us just as we are, I can see that.

"You are afraid, but also curious. Come on, Cassie. Lie in bed with me. Hold me."

Cassie hesitated, as if at the edge of a precipice.

"Gabby comes to visit us," Sheyda said, "she lets me hold her."

Cassie's panties were getting soaked.

She pulled herself up onto the bed, and lay beside Sheyda.

This was her deepest, darkest, most pleasurable fantasy, made real, but something was wrong.

Why am I feeling awkward?

Sheyda pulled the blanket and sheet over them both, and snuggled close to Cassie.

"Cassie. Cassandra. That's a nice name. Knowing the truth, but never to be believed. But I trust you, Cassie. I know you will speak truth to me. Where are you from, Cassie?"

"Sydney," Cassie replied, and discovered that she wanted to pour herself out to Sheyda.

Cassie really liked Sheyda.

"I lived in Sydney," Cassie continued, "but I hated it. My family are Exclusive Brethren.

"Fundamentalist Christians.

"Hateful people.

"When I came out, when I told them that I loved women, they wanted to lock me up. They wanted to 'cure' me.

"I got out of there as soon as I could.

"When I ran away, my family disowned me.

"I haven't spoke to them since."

"I understand, Cassie," said Sheyda, "I understand."

Cassie knew she had felt a common bond with Sheyda when they had first seen each other, and believed her.

"Sheyda, that's a nice name," Cassie said. "Are you from Iran?"

"I am host-form, Cassie. I am from Iran. I am Australian. I am from the stars. We like you, Cassie."

Sheyda wrapped her arms around Cassie, and moved her lips close to Cassie's ear. She tugged Cassie's earlobe with her teeth, and whispered to her.

"I am as you. My family was as yours. They were Muslims, very strict. I love women, I have always loved women, but to be myself would be the death of me. I could not live that way, with the lies, with the hatred, with the rules. I thought I had to give away everything I knew to leave them and come to Australia."

Cassie realised then that herself and Sheyda had a lot in common.

"In truth," Sheyda continued, "I had nothing of value to lose, and coming to Australia was like being reborn. Australia is a paradise, Cassie, it is a kind country. I thought my life was perfect.

"Until I got cancer.

"But that is past now, my mistress has cured me.

"You will enjoy being host-form, Cassie. I am pleasured by my mistress, all day, and all night, and I can feel the pleasure of my sisters, too.

"We like to give pleasure to those who we prepare to become host-form. You are special, Cassie. You do not need to be prepared, you are ready."

Sheyda kissed Cassie then, and whispered, "Be still, Cassie. Hold me tight."

Cassie held Sheyda then, and Sheyda pulled up Cassie's shirt, and wrapped her arms close to Cassie's skin.

She rolled to face Cassie, and Sheyda held still for a time. Cassie soon felt the tendrils. There were many of them, and they were light, fluttering things as they moved across her pants.

She only properly felt them as they reached her bare skin.

Although alien in origin, they felt like a lover's caress.

She felt doubly held, firstly by Sheyda's arms, and also by the tentacles, which now encircled her waist.

Sheyda smiled at Cassie, but then looked a little disappointed.

"So it is not yet, Cassie. You are marked. You are not to be host-form just yet. But soon, we must join as lovers and share with each other.

"I love you already, Cassie Grayndler.

"Please, let me pleasure you. When I have pleasured you, we can talk some more."

The tentacles withdrew, and Sheyda's fingers undid Cassie's pants.

Cassie helped Sheyda push them down, and they were soon thrown out of the bed, with her panties following.

Sheyda was only in a hospital gown, which she shucked over her head.

Her breasts were beautiful. They stood up proud, and the nipples were red, and engorged.

Sheyda nodded her head at Cassie, in invitation.

Cassie leaned down and took a nipple in her lips, and was rewarded by a flow of warm milk.

Sheyda gazed down at Cassie, beaming, and stroking her long hair.

"Good girl, Cassie. You will be a good friend to us."

When the breast was drained, Sheyda swung Cassie around, and was soon on top of her.

"My mistress wants to feel you."

Sheyda positioned herself above Cassie, and Cassie felt the wriggling worm, questing for her pussy. It was all of her fantasies, made flesh. She would come soon, when she was penetrated, she would come, she would come immediately.

But, she realised, it was not what she wanted.

She was ashamed.

She didn't want this.

She wanted Julie.

Cassie knew then that love was more important to her than physical pleasure.

Loving Julie had given her as much fulfilment as the worms ever could. Maybe not physical pleasure, but she wasn't ready to trade one love for another quite yet.

Sheyda was not Julie.

Giving herself up to Sheyda would mean betraying the woman she loved.

Julie might not realise it, but Cassie had not had another lover since they had moved in together.

Their relationship was flawed, or, more accurately, completely dysfunctional, but her love for Julie was the most important thing in Cassie's life.

Cassie knew that her love was held together by denial and sacrifice. Admitting this to herself, and taking another as a lover, would mean giving up on Julie.

Cassie gently pushed Sheyda away, retrieved her pants, pulled them back on, and slid out of bed, feeling disloyal.

All of the heads turned towards Cassie.

Two dozen women looked at her, disappointed, and sighed.

Cassie smiled inside.

Her love for Julie had always coexisted with her dark fetish for parasites. When unearthly temptation came along, Cassie found within herself that, after all, her love was more important to her than the prospect of dark pleasure.

She had seen enough of the infected women for now.

She should be spending her time on the fourth floor, interviewing the cured woman, worm-free, safe, ready to head home to their families.

Cassie leaned in towards Sheyda, and whispered in her ear,

"Goodbye, Sheyda. I have work to do know. I'll come visit you, though, don't go away."

There would be plenty of time to visit Sheyda on her breaks.

***

Julie missed Cassie that afternoon. They'd been together, night and day, since they'd moved into their new apartment, coming to grips with their new work, and the worms.

Cassie had seemed pretty pissed off with Eve, and Julie really didn't know what Cassie was supposed to be doing now. Was she doing a test to detect cured women, or was she helping cancer patients? The two tasks didn't really seem related in any way.

Still, when Cassie had rung her from the hospital, she had sounded happy with her lot, and had told her not to expect her at home in the evening.

Eve had said that Cassie might want to stay over at the hospital, but Julie couldn't imagine any reason for her to want to do so. The whole idea of interviewing cancer patients had seemed terminally dreary to Cassie, and Julie had to agree with her.

Anyway, with Cassie gone, Julie was making good progress on the data sets.

The views of the normal and the infected women were looking very impressive now, and Julie had made real progress with the cured women. She had finally produced a view of the trails left in their flesh, and had managed to render them to look very similar to the silvery structures so visible in the infected women. She thought they looked very convincing.

Julie kept tweaking and improving over the next couple of days, and was soon feeling the limitations of the small data sets. She had finished as much coding now as she was able, but wasn't sure how her programs would cope with full body scans with bone structures.

She hoped new data would be coming any day now.

She also found time to play with Cassie's survey data, and set up a scheme whereby she could detect cheating with only a few hundred multiple-choice questions.

Julie felt confident that if the worms still exerted any influence on the cured women, then they could be detected. If they were truthful, or if they were cheating, they would be detected, either way.

***

Cassie was enjoying her work at the hospital.

The cured women were delightful, and Cassie spent a while getting to know them. Cassie didn't want to administer the tests herself, so Eve had sent her some undergraduates to do the actual testing. Cassie knew a double-blind trial would be more convincing, anyway. This left her a lot of time to roam around the hospital.

She was eating her lunch by herself at the hospital's cafeteria when she saw them walk in.

She turned away, hoping she hadn't been spotted.

It was Sophie and Jessica Landers.

"Cassie!" their voices shouted in unison.

They sat themselves down on either side of Cassie, and tried to give her a hug in greeting. Cassie wasn't at all pleased to see them, so it was a bit awkward.

They were fraternal twins, and very striking. They were very similar in their facial features, which were strong, and angular, but Sophie was a red-head, and Jessica a blonde. They were tall, and looked very fit, and when they'd been on campus, they were always wearing shorts and sports jerseys.

If Cassie had liked butch, she might then have found them quite attractive.

But she didn't.

They drank, and played hockey, and chased boys.

They had been a thorn in her side her whole time at Uni.

If the twins had been stupid, Cassie might have been able to tolerate them better, but they weren't dumb jocks.

They were smart jocks, and really knew how to hurt people, and had managed get right under Cassie's skin.

They had made it quite clear to Cassie that they didn't like Lesbians, and had made it quite clear to everyone else they knew that they didn't like Cassie in particular.

Cassie had learned to avoid them, but she'd had a tough time avoiding the vile stories they spread about her. The fact that some of the stories weretruewas especially galling.

Their father was John Landers, the Federal Minister for Health.

Cassie had only met him the once, outside Eve's office, but Julie knew of his work, and said that he was a good man. Julie and Cassie had never been able to work out for sure why the twins had turned out to be such poison, but they had gone to CCEGGERS, a posh private school in the old part of Canberra. Knowing some of the girls that came out of that place, it seemed to be another case of nominative determinism, as they drank hard, and partied hard.

She had some sympathy for the twins, however.

Their mother had died young, and they had completely missed out on inheriting any feminine graces.

After graduating, they had both been hit hard by early-onset Huntington's.

That's what had killed their mum, and, at the time, they weren't expected to live more than a few years.

Cassie had even felt a little sorry for them at the time.

But here they were, looking in robust health. They were both wearing nice Italian shoes, skinny jeans, un-logoed shirts, and they'd grown their hair long.

They looked quite feminine for once.

Actually, they were both looking really nice.

Sophie, the red-head, spoke first.

"Hi, Cassie, how are you doing? Are you still hanging out with Julie?"

Cassie decided to be non-committal.

"Hi, girls. I'm well, really well. Julie and I are doing great."

"We haven't seen you for a while. I guess we lost touch after uni," Jessica said.

There was a moments silence, then Jessica continued.

"Sorry about all of that. I guess we weren't very nice to you back then."

Sophie changed the subject.

"Did you know we've both been sick?"

"Yes, I heard," Cassie said, "It sounded really bad."

"Yes, it was really bad." Sophie said, "I think we both seriously thought that we were going to die.

"That's while we were conscious, anyway.

"We've been patients at the clinic here. We're cured now."

Both of them turned around, and lifted up their hair.

Right at the base of their skulls, just on their hair-line, Cassie saw their tattoos.

A black snake twirled around a red staff.

How appropriate,Cassie thought,a snake. But isn't Huntington's a genetic disease? And doesn't it destroy your brain? I thought that nerve tissue never regenerates?

"So how did radiotherapy cure that?" Cassie asked.

"You and Julie are working for Eve Hunter now, aren't you?" Jessica said, seemingly ignoring the question.

"Dad met her three years ago at some medical conference in New York," she continued, "We'd only just been diagnosed, and I think he was kind of desperate for help. He helped Eve and Lucille get everything set up in Canberra, and Eve got us a place in the clinic as soon as it opened. It was only just in time for us, I can tell you! We were bed-ridden, Cassie, all drooling and slobbering, with tubes coming out of our faces."

"Disgusting. It was truly disgusting," said Sophie.

"It was the same way Mum went," said Jessica, more quietly, "she was only twenty four."

They both shuddered, and shook their heads.

"Hey, Cassie, enough about us," Jessica said. "What's Eve got you working on here? And what's Julie doing now? Are you guys married yet?"

"Ummmm ... no, Jessie. But we're still living together. In the new apartments on Parke's way."

Cassie was surprised to find herself beginning to warm to the pair. Maybe she just had a thing for women who had spent time being under the control of alien intelligences.

But that wasn't fair. The twins were being really nice now.

Cassie didn't think that Jessica was being deliberately rude, as gays and Lesbians had been getting married in the ACT for a few years now.

Perhaps Jessica did not know that that Cassie and Julie had never, in fact, been together at all in any real sense.

"And Eve has me working with the cured women," Cassie continued, "doing some surveys, seeing how much pain the treatment is causing them. As you guys would know, I don't think there are any problems on that score. By all accounts the treatment is not hard to bear at all."

"You got that right," said Sophie, and they all laughed.

"Julie's working with the Taubett machine," Cassie said. "She's helping them get it integrated with the gamma source, so they can target the radiation better."

"Uh-huh. That sounds great, Cassie." said Jessica, doubtfully.

Although they knew that it was a snow job, Cassie reckoned that they could probably join some of the dots.

"Hey, Cassie," Sophie said, "we've started up a social club for the cured women.

"We're having a get-together at the new Uni bar in November. It's the six-month anniversary of the clinic opening. The weather should be starting to get really nice by then.

"It's mostly for cured women, but as you're helping out with the hospital, would you guys like to come? Tickets are fifty bucks each, but there's an open bar, we're getting a few bands, and Tezuka Wasaba is doing the finger food."

Cassie was really warming to the twins now.

She really did want to to come, and was interested in meeting more of the cured women, especially those from the early days of the clinic.

"Sure, Sophie. That sounds great. We'll come."

Cassie pulled out two fifty-dollar bills from her purse, and handed them over. Jessica wrote out two tickets, tore them out, and handed them to Cassie.

"Hey, Cassie, sorry again about first year." said Jessica. "You can't believe how sorry we are about that."

She handed one of the fifties back, and tore out four more tickets, and handed these to Cassie as well.

"If there's anyone else working for Eve who wants to come on the night, we'll let them in, no worries." said Sophie, and continued.

"We're working at the new Uni bar now. We're being employed as caretakers, there's a flat right at the top of the building, it's really nice. There's a sort-of private club at the top for regulars. We're doing door there most Saturday nights, and we're always easy to find.

"Come visit us, don't be a stranger."

"Thanks, Jessica, thanks, Sophie." said Cassie. "I'd like to do that. I'll try to bring Julie this Saturday night. We're due for a big night out."

"I hope you'll do Eve proud, Cassie." said Jessica "She saved our lives, you know, and we still owe her."

The twins bade Cassie farewell, and both gave Cassie a kiss on the cheek, one on each side.

Although they were still tall, and strong, and a bit overbearing, Cassie thought that they seemed kind of cute now.

Cassie cleared off her table, oddly uplifted, and went back upstairs to learn more about the cured women.