It's My Party

"Ah… Well, the three of us have known each other since we were little kids. We used to go fishing together in the summers, even before high school, just the three of us. We were pretty close. We never really drifted apart."

Lynn thought of a nod for understanding which was also a request to continue.

"And eventually we became adults. I guess Brandi would consider me her primary boyfriend, but she also occasionally wants sexual stuff with Tom, and somehow… This is kind of difficult to explain because I've never really figured it out myself, but somehow I really don't mind very much. We were a threesome, and if Brandi and Tom want to keep a sexual part to their friendship, I really didn't want to feel jealous about it. That how I felt even in Burlington, and… and then we came here."

"Yes," nodded Lynn inside her thought. "Then we came here."

"Fatima thinks there are so few guys, we'd really be doing our gene pool a favor if women have multiple fathers for their children. Brandi and I have already talked about this. She wants a child from me someday, and one from Tom, and maybe even one from Mark."

"Mark?!"

"Yeah, through artificial insemination if we can figure out how to do that, or just the old-fashioned way if he's willing. Brandi thinks it would be better to keep the conceptions as natural as possible, and not just for medical reasons. Brandi wants to conceive through natural means for the bonding, so she and the men can be the natural parents to the different children. She told me she wants us guys to feel that we've sired our own children." Charles sighed within his thought. "All this stuff is years in the future of course. But this is what Brandi is thinking, about how things might turn out."

"Wow. Does Mark know about this?"

"Uh… I doubt it, and now that I think about it, Brandi never exactly gave me permission to tell anybody, so…"

Lynn nodded. "I won't repeat this, I promise. Thank you Charles."

A moment later they broke the link and were soon walking down the next flight of stairs.

Chapter 61.

Time: Sunday, March 3, 2019 11 AM

Mark was home in the large bath area of Red Mall, drying himself after a quick shower. He had put in a very strenuous hour downstairs in the gym, and was expecting to be back at the library communications console within a few minutes. Charles and Lynn would soon go past their point of no return.

His arms and thighs were a bit tired, but Mark was pleased with the results of his workout. He now considered his sword to be an adequate weapon against a large charging animal, even something as fierce as the pictures of the dead Dinofelis that had come back in the last batch of memory sticks. Mark had been experimenting with pushing his mind into accelerated time, similar to what he had experienced in the gun battle that killed Alfredo. Mark was teaching himself how to add just a short burst of accelerated awareness into key moments of the sword maneuvers. He had found he could use the enhancement without fatiguing himself if he limited its use to an objective second or less.

As Mark dried his hair, his mind jumped to the unexpected video of Jada. Madison had thoughtfully snapped a moment of video as Jada had climbed into her kayak shortly after their encounter with the cat. There was no particular reason for the video. Maddy just had some extra free memory on the stick and wanted to give Mark something to enjoy. With the pleasant image in his mind, Mark moved the towel behind him to finish drying his back. The door in front of him to the pantry room then flew open and Hannah came walking in rapidly.

Their society had evolved an unspoken code of conduct when meeting in bathroom areas. It was a strange adjustment to make, but the bathrooms on this planet were so culturally different than Earth. They had complete male / female integration of the bathing and toileting areas. Their group had finally given up on the concept of bodily privacy within the bathrooms and their new social custom was just to ignore the presence of the opposite sex as completely as possible.

So Mark turned his head as he finished drying his back and he tried to admire the artistry of the door leading to the bedroom corridor. It was thus to his great surprise when his naked body was embraced in a fierce hug by Hannah. "I was hoping I'd find you," she cried in a breaking voice. Without thinking Mark let go of the towel and hugged Hannah back. He felt her body trembling.

"Hey, what happened kiddo?" This felt so strange. Hannah was the youngest member of their group. A senior in high school, she had turned eighteen just days before coming to the Christmas party. More than once Mark had struggled with how to express his feelings for her. She was extremely cute and Mark thought she had perhaps the kindest and gentlest mind of anyone he had ever met. Mark's struggle was that he could switch back and forth from desiring her as someone very sexually attractive, to thinking of her as a kid sister he just wanted to protect. He felt that way now, switching rapidly back and forth from one perspective to the other.

And now here she was pressing herself against the front of his naked body and they had their arms wrapped tightly around each other. But Mark knew Hannah wasn't considering this to be a sexual encounter, and in his love for her, he forced his mind to adopt a similar perspective. Mark just hoped his groin would tag along and not do what it would normally want to do in such a situation.

Mark kissed her forehead very tenderly and whispered, "Hannah, what happened? Is someone in trouble?"

"Not for us," Hannah whispered back. "Black Mall, something really brutal. I felt like puking. Fatima told me to take some time off, take a nap if I wanted. Toshi took my place." Hannah paused for a moment and then trembled again.

"Tell me? Uh Hannah, mind if I get dressed first?"

"Huh? OH! Yeah, so sorry!" Hannah released her grip and turned her head politely away, allowing Mark to take a step to his nearby clothes. A moment later they both walked out of the bathroom. To save a few seconds, Mark led the way to the lounge and from there they jumped to the library below. Mark was at the console a moment later. Hannah was sitting very close by and occasionally she rested her head on his shoulder.

They joined the conference call with time to spare. Charles and Lynn were just starting their descent on their last flight of stairs, and as they went down Paige filled them and Mark in on the recent events at Black Mall.

Alfonso and Jessica had been fucking on guard duty again and Ricardo very discreetly had slipped into Jacob's Bar and Grill with them. Hannah and Paige had felt so hopeless. They both wanted to warn the lovers of the dreadful danger they were in. A few minutes later all six members of Black Mall were down in the bar.

Ricardo's administration of punishment was swift and brutal. He signaled with his cane for Alfonso to stand against a wall, and then before Alfonso's eyes his girlfriend was doubly raped by Jenaro and Hernando. Hernando forced mounted Jessica in her rear and then bent her backwards to be on top of him as he lay on his back, forcing her legs open with his and twisting her neck so she faced Alfonso. Then Jenaro entered her open vagina from above. Jessica's body was sandwiched between the two men and they fucked her brutally. Paige thought Hernando orgasmed and Jenaro did not, but both men stopped their fucking when Jessica passed out, perhaps from not being able to breathe properly.

Then it was Alfonso's turn. Hernando and Jenaro held him by his arms and legs, holding him off the floor. Then under obvious orders from Ricardo, Diego kicked Alfonso in the groin three times, fast, full-body kicks with the flat top part of his foot, first one kick, then another swift two, each blow strong enough to lift Alfonso's body into the air from the impact. Hernando and Jenaro then dropped Alfonso to the floor where he vomited.

Mark turned and kissed the top of Hannah's head which was leaning against his arm. The brutality had been too much for her to bear. Hannah sighed at the kiss and snuggled into his shoulder, her arm coming behind Mark and hugging him around his waist.

By this time Lynn and Charles had completed their descent. Mark had been hoping that perhaps by now there would be message in the elevator. That would mean as least someone from Jada's team had made it back to the entrance rooms from the underground world. But the elevator was as the supply teams had left it yesterday, stacked to the brim with four small kayaks and supplies. There was no message from their lost teammates.

Keeping the phone link active, Lynn and Charles held hands and committed themselves by letting the elevator door close behind them. The longer four-meter door leading to the first of the underworld's entrance rooms opened at once. Lynn wanted to check out the entire place immediately, but Charles overruled her, insisting they unpack all their supplies from the elevator carriage before they let the door close. He explained to Lynn that if they found later that the elevator door on their side no longer opened, he wanted to discover that unpleasant fact with the carriage already unpacked.

To everyone's relief, the new Leophone was still working perfectly, and the unloading would take a few minutes. Mark excused himself, and Toshi who knew that Hannah was with Mark promised to call him back when Charles and Lynn were finished clearing the carriage.

"Why such brutality Mark?" Hannah whispered. "I mean, why not just…" Her voice trailed off, never completing the thought.

But Mark understood the deep meaning of Hannah's question. "Oh, I'm not too surprised about this. I'd be more surprised if this were a chance discovery. I bet Ricardo set them up. He knew they were making love on guard duty and he set them up to fail."

Another crying whisper, "Oh dear God, why?"

"It's the old political game of divide and conquer. It's how Ricardo stays in power. It's how Stalin stayed in power. You divide your subjects into little groups and then you give some of the groups absolute power over the others. You encourage people to brutalize their underlings. Think Hannah. If Diego decides now he wants to overthrow Ricardo, can he conspire with Alfonso? Can Jessica confide in Jenaro or Hernando? The key to Ricardo staying in power is to be sure his top people have blood on their hands."

"Shit!" cried Hannah. "Yes, I see it! This is just how his horrible mind works! And he's succeeded!"

Mark and Hannah sat quietly holding each other until Toshi called back, and then they all listened as Charles and Lynn reported their exploration of the empty sanctuary at the end of the underground world. The dialog was uneventful; everything appeared in order until the two explorers reached the front door.

"It's unbelievable!" exclaimed Charles. "The sky! What the hell?!"

Lynn tried to give a better description. "There are spiraling bands of yellow clouds everywhere! The whole sky is like this. It's like looking up inside slow moving tornados. There's a dirty yellow light everywhere."

"I'm going outside," said Charles.

"Charles," Fatima's voice came over the phone. "Err on the side of caution. That's an order."

"Yes, right, I agree. I'm outside now. This feels really weird. I'm surprised there's no wind, but there's none, none at all. But the air seems charged with electricity, and the sky looks as if it's about to drop the mother of all hammers on us."

"People," replied Fatima, "Get back inside and button up. Charles, Lynn, there's no sign of Jada's team, is there?"

"No," answered Lynn. "But we can't see much from here. I mean, we can see a lot of far away stuff, but it's just like we expected from the pictures. The forest is blocking our view of where the boathouse should be. Fatima, our original plan was for us to leave the kayaks here and do a fast check down by the lake that starts the Mississippi."

"Back inside now, both of you!"

There was a moment's pause. "We are Fatima. Charles is closing the door now. The door is closed. Okay, we're safe."

There didn't seem much else to do in the immediate moment. Charles and Lynn went into what they thought was Madison's bedroom and sat down on a comfortable couch and kept up a report on what they were seeing outside. It soon became obvious to all that the strange weather phenomenon would probably go on for hours. Fatima asked Mark if they could put off their lunch date until tomorrow and he agreed.

Mark signed off and kissed Hannah again, moving his arm and giving a return hug at her waist. She seemed emotionally exhausted. "Hannah?" he asked gently. "Do you want to go to bed?"

"I am tired, maybe even a bit sleepy. But somehow…"

Over the last two months, Mark and Hannah had shared much, and Mark considered her an intimate friend. Without linking and without even a verbal explanation, Mark knew exactly what Hannah was saying. The raw brutally had really upset her and she didn't want to be alone anywhere, not even her own familiar bedroom.

"Want to listen to some music? I've got some free time and I found a really interesting selection of pastoral music in the archives a few days ago, duets for guitar and oboe, very pretty."

"Gee, could we? That sounds really nice."

A short while later Mark and Hannah were sitting in a huge super-sized double recliner in the music room. Mark had programmed a number of pieces. "The first series will be the duets I mentioned," he said, "and then if we're still around there's Handel's Oboe Concerto #3 in G minor Largo."

"Sounds perfect," Hannah said simply as she kicked off her shoes and pulled off her socks. She pushed the recliner to a deeply-reclined setting and then lost herself in the music.

The time passed peacefully with the soothing instrumentals. Mark felt a hand pressing a question into his thigh and he and Hannah were soon holding hands. Hannah sighed deeply and finally started to unwind. Mark reached up and petted her head, light caresses at the side, occasionally tracing her ear through her hair with his fingertips. Hannah signaled him with body language that she liked what he was doing.

"Oh why Mark?" she whispered. "Why? Jessica was crying during her rape. I could see it but not hear it. She deserved to have her cries heard but I couldn't hear anything."

"Try to get some rest Hannah."

Hannah nodded and did not speak again.

It was a fortuitous time for a retreat. Mark had nothing scheduled for the next several hours and he had discussed this plan with Toshi. He had her full approval and Toshi could come and get him at any time if something unexpected came up.

Halfway through the Concerto Hannah finally fell asleep. Mark slowly reached over to the remote and reduced the volume. He turned and stared at Hannah for a long while. Her hair felt wonderfully soft against his hand, and she looked so young and beautiful sleeping by his side. "What an honor," he thought, "to be here as her comforter, such a genuine privilege. Such a beautiful face, so pretty…" He lay quietly and enjoyed the music and watched over Hannah as she slept.

Time: Sunday, March 3, 2019 noon

Over the last four hours, Sandra's group had traveled another twelve kilometers south. They were now about three kilometers due west of the spot on the riverbank where they had planned to meet with Jada's group. They had stayed in the highlands, making good time along the flat ridgelines, much faster than the slow pace needed for moving safely through the forest. And now at last they had come to a critical decision point, to stay in the foothills until the storm broke or to descend. Before them was a glen providing easy access to the forest below.

Over the last few minutes, the sky had been getting ominously darker, more gray and then darker gray mixing in with the yellow spirals in the sky. The rotational speeds of the great vortices were also increasing and the light was fading, and yet the air was unbelievably still, with not even a whisper of a breeze. Their world was filled with deadly visual warnings but nothing for the auditory or tactile senses. The net effect was the feeling of sitting atop an atomic bomb.

Tom walked up to Sandra and Carla and said without preamble, "Why the hell are we stopping?"

Sandra tried to explain her reasoning. "We were debating whether to face the storm here or in the forest."

"Are you guys nuts?! We've got to get out of these foothills! We've got to get out of here now!"

Carla frowned and turned sharply to Tom, wanting to defend her leader. But Sandra wanted to understand Tom's logic. "You clearly are seeing something here that we aren't. Wouldn't it be more dangerous to be in the forest when the storm breaks? We could get killed by a falling tree when the wind kicks up, or the cats."

"Fuck the cats!" Tom half-shouted back. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. "Pardon my language, but we've got to leave now. In all your time here, have you ever seen healthy trees that had been blown over by wind? Look at these rocks in the highlands, all these smooth surfaces! I don't think it's water erosion. I think it's wind erosion! I think these rocks have been blasted by tornados. Sandra, Carla, we've got to get out of here! Move it!"

It was as if Tom had flipped a switch of understanding inside Sandra's mind. "Holy shit!" she hissed, and then she shouted to her troops. "People! We're heading down to the forest! Don't stop if the storm breaks! Don't stop for anything! Whatever you do, make it to the trees!"

They descended as rapidly as they could. Over the last three hours, Carla and Tom had been taking turns holding Sandra on her weak side, and the support had allowed them to keep up a three kilometer an hour pace, perhaps double what they would have achieved with the stretcher. Now it was Tom's turn to aid Sandra for the trip down the glen, and Carla noticed with a great feeling of appreciation both how much support Tom was giving Sandra and yet how gentle he was with her.

"You're a strong guy Tom," Carla commented with approval as they descended. "And sharp. In thirteen weeks, Parris Island could have made a Marine out of you."

He grinned in spite of the tenseness of the moment. "Thanks. I used to be on the wrestling team back at the University. Grabbing and pushing other people's bodies around is my specialty."

Sandra spoke up after they navigated a particularly tricky rock. "How long do you think we have?"

"Well," said Tom, "I'm guessing we have until solar noon. It's so easy to think of this as a real world, but remember it's all a fake. The sky is all mechanical. So the storm is artificial too and that means it must be on some sort of timer. I've learned the entities that created this place have a love for symmetries. I'm guessing they'll start the storm at solar noon."

Carla nodded and make a request with a hand sign for Tom to show her his watch. "12:07 PM," she called out.

"So that gives us another twenty minutes," panted Tom. "That's good. We should be… well into the trees… by then." He and Sandra had just descended over two large boulders. Carla marveled how Tom seemed to glide with Sandra on their rapid pace down the glen. They were moving so fast, Carla decided to look back to see if everyone was keeping up with them. So far everything was looking good. And the dark forest was coming up rapidly. It was a dangerous place, and they were rushing into it. Carla shrugged at the change in perspective as she tried to think of the deadly forest as a safe haven.

Meanwhile at the central island…