Succumbing to Menudia Ch. 02

Mason thought back to the very first time he'd seen her step out into the waiting room, in her white dress shirt and black tights, calling his name, inviting him into that cozy little office of hers for their very first counseling session. This was the school therapist?

Initially, the sight of those luminous green eyes staring directly into his own was so distracting that he almost had a hard time opening up to her, joking to himself that he might need a second therapist in order to deal with how bangable his first therapist was.

Yet as the weekly appointments rolled on and on, he gradually found himself more and more able to share his deepest problems and most taboo thoughts with this lovely married professional. Although he tried to hide it, sometimes he couldn't help stealing a quick glance at her breasts, or the spot where the edge of her skirt met her milky thighs ...

Oh, and the glasses. Every once in a while she would be wearing a pair of thick black spectacles, which he felt complimented her appearance well (sort of that "sexy secretary" appeal), and sometimes he would find wearing her long black hair in a ponytail, which he thought did the same. And a couple of times, she even wore her glasses and her hair in a ponytail ... which were very special counseling sessions indeed.

One session, about six months in, the conversation took a somewhat sexual turn, and Mason dared to finally bring up his vinyl fetish, which he knew was weird and embarrassing and was something he'd never talked about to anyone. Danielle, with utmost professionalism, explained that sexual fetishes were perfectly fine, of course, but that they didn't have much to do with the initial realities of dating, relationships, and genuine intimacy, which was what their sessions probably needed to be focusing on at that stage in his life. Slightly relieved, and yet slightly disappointed, Mason was careful not to bring it up again.

And for Haley, things had been even more awkward than they'd been for Mason! After four unproductive sessions with Danielle, she still couldn't bring herself to mention the mere possibility of any confusion and anxiety regarding her own sexual orientation. Instead, the geeky redhead mostly sat there like a lump, while trying in vain not to gape at Danielle's open-toed shoes or into her radiant green eyes. And the "glasses and ponytail" look ... sweet Jesus.

Trained therapists like Danielle weren't idiots, of course. When Haley mentioned, off-handedly, how much guys didn't "do it" for her sometimes, Danielle responded, "Have you ever had any thoughts of that nature about ... girls?" Ah, here was the perfect opportunity, but ... Haley totally chickened out. She changed the subject faster than the proverbial senator accused of cheating on his wife.

It was funny. She'd come to therapy in the hopes that whoever she'd worked with would solve her whole sexuality crisis once and for all, but ironically, the presence of Danielle only seemed to be exacerbating it! Nevertheless, on a basic level, Haley lapped up the vibes of unconditional support and encouragement that she was receiving from this warmly empathetic older woman, even though the 60 minutes would often roll by without her hardly muttering a useful word.

So strange that Danielle, of all the school employees, happened to be their chaperone at the picnic -- but, well, it was a small college, and the staff tended to wear many hats ...

But neither Mason nor Haley felt the slightest concern that Danielle would mention any of the topics they might have discussed with her during private therapy to others. The woman was a titanium vault. In fact, they were only too glad that she was present to protect them throughout this unanticipated crisis, since she must have been aware, better than anyone else, what was surely at stake for the two of them.

*****

Slipping out of their troubled reverie, Mason and Haley suddenly looked up and found themselves isolated on one end of the store along with Curt, Ellis, and Karen. The five of them instinctively formed a circle, each one understanding the unspoken fear that they were facing, none of them feeling it necessary to express it out loud. Ellis placed his right hand, palm down, in the middle.

"I want you all to promise me, whatever we do, no matter what happens, none of us will ever let Menudia take us."

The other four placed their palms on top of Ellis's. "Never!" They raised their hands to the ceiling, like athletes pumping themselves up at the start of a match, and the circle collapsed.

Danielle began handing out orders. "Rachel, Curt, why don't you come with me? Emily and Julie, you head toward the parking lot. Mason and Karen ..."

Just then, a "rat-a-tat" noise came from the direction of the screen door, and everyone turned their heads to look. A handsome face nonchalantly peeped through the wiring. Recognizing Greg, the Menudian who had so eagerly taken Angela, Haley let out a blood-curdling scream, and all of Danielle's orders swiftly went out the window.

Dashing through the front door of the general store in Haley's wake, the rest of the group found themselves dodging two Menudian men and three Menudian women, and chaotically sped off in all directions.

*****

"Oh my God, I was gonna piss my pants back there."

Emily and Mason could just barely make out a cluster of the slow-moving Menudians creeping up over the grassy hill as they glanced behind them.

"Mason! Shit, shit ... they're coming this way!"

"Maybe we can make it to the creek. I heard Menudians hate creeks."

"Knock it off. We make it to the creek, but then what? It looks like ... this is sooooo weird ... I think Vanessa's with them ..."

Mason's eyes reluctantly confirmed Emily's observation. It was unnerving to observe how relaxed and serenely satisfied their taken Latina classmate appeared -- such a tempting contrast to the petrified, agitated pair running away from Vanessa and her new "pals."

"Maybe she'll have pity on us, like, convince them to leave us alone?"

His voice grew unexpectedly serious. "Don't you get it? She's not the same Vanessa anymore. She only has one mission in mind, just like all the other Menudians she's surrounded by, and that's to find people like us and turn us into one of them!"

"Can we, like, kill them or something?" Every conceivable possibility seemed to be popping out of Emily's mouth. Perhaps panic brought out the best in her.

"Look, we'll figure something out, we've just got to keep heading west, OK?"

"Some help Haley and Curt were," she griped. "Just sitting there like a lump, while the rest of us are trying to come up with a fucking plan!"

"Oh, is that what you were doing? From what I recall, Danielle and Ellis were coming up with a plan, while you and Julie were trading insults with everybody."

Knowing the accuracy of this comment was fairly high, Emily pretended not to hear it. "God, what is up with Haley anyway? I swear, she's always looking at me funny. Like, if you want to have a little lezzie love affair, just come out and say so, you know? She's such a weirdo. And Curt -- if a girl so much as breathes on him he'll prematurely ejaculate. He can't even say five words to me without shriveling up into a little ball."

Then, without warning, Emily's tone seemingly took on a more honest, confessional air.

"Mason, I ... I don't want them to get me." In her fear, Emily momentarily clutched his arm with her right hand. As he almost always did whenever pretty girls touched him unexpectedly, he unconsciously flinched -- which wasn't to say that he didn't exactly ... enjoy it. Hadn't that been the second time she'd touched him that afternoon?

"They won't get you, you've just got to ... just be on the lookout." Emily let go, and they turned and ran toward the sound of rushing water. While doubting his own words of encouragement, and emphatically doubting that Emily would have the same level of tenacity to resist as he would, Mason quietly wondered if she kind of liked him in "that" way?

Arriving at the creek, they splashed their faces with water and sat down on the pebble-strewn bank while catching their breath.

"Now, if we just follow the creek," Mason theorized, "we might make it back to the parking lot, or at least buy some time in order to figure out how to resist them."

"Mm-hmm."

"I don't know, maybe we'll run into some other people who know how to combat Menudians. I mean, there must be a way, right? Maybe they're like mosquitos, we can smoke them out? Or maybe you can become one of them, and then still be returned to 'normal' somehow?"

He gazed at the trickling water as it made its way between two particularly prominent boulders, wondering if he was grasping at straws. Emily had apparently grown quiet.

"Or we can make it back to the town somehow, and the campus, and maybe they can't follow us there. Like, they can only attack in the village, where there's less people around. What do you think?"

Expecting a response, Mason received none.

"Emily?" He turned around.

Emily was gone.

"Oh for the love of God ... where the hell did she ..." As he stood up, he spotted her bouncy blonde mane skating above the bushes and heading toward a meadow behind him.

"Emily! Emily!"

When he saw a red-haired Menudian boy methodically make his way into the same meadow, a queasy sensation grew in his abdomen.

Of course. He should have figured.

It would be just like Emily to read the direction the tide seemed to be turning in, and then switch over without even a hint of conviction. Who could have expected a weak-willed little social chameleon like her to resist the insidious force that was gathering all around them? He ran up to a row of bushes bordering the meadow, telling himself that perhaps -- somehow -- he could still prevent disaster.

The moment Emily stepped out into the meadow, the Menudian boy turned and gave her a strange, suspicious, and yet welcoming smile.

"Hello," the boy said in his eerily pleasant way. His muscular build pressed against a light grey tank top and some black polyester gym shorts, and his eyes had an elongated, squinting sort of quality, as if he were permanently engaged in shenanigans.

"Um, yeah, so ..." Emily's voice shook slightly as she tried to formulate her question. "You all seem to be, like, transforming people somehow ..."

"You would like to become one of us. I can tell."

"Well, uh ... we were all kind of trying to run away from you, but ... maybe it's not so bad?"

"It is the gateway to pleasure beyond any pleasure you have known. Come and join us, and you'll find out how beautiful it truly is."

"OK, but ... we were trying to figure out exactly how it is you're 'taking' people, you know? Like maybe you're doing something with your face, or with a smell, or mental telepathy ... I think it's all ridiculous, personally."

"Ah, it's simple. To become a Menudian, a non-Menudian simply has to look directly into a Menudian's eyes -- for at least five seconds. And then it happens."

"Wait ... that's ... that's it? You can't be serious." She began to chuckle in defiance. "You mean you just stare at somebody and then they suddenly turn into this hive-mind hovering person? That's got to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard of! Whew. For a moment there, I was almost afraid. I mean, obviously I've been looking into your eyes for more than five seconds, right?"

"And so you have been."

Mason observed the boy's eyes emit a freakishly inhuman pale yellow glow, and then, after a subtle "whooshing" sound appeared and disappeared, and a warm gust of air blew across the meadow, he observed as Emily's lovely blue pupils lost their usual hue, responding in kind with an equally inhuman, equally pale yellow glow.

The fear and anxiety that had been all over her face instantly receded, as every last trace of her feisty and combative attitude vanished in the soft breeze that was now causing her pink blouse to dance lightly around her upper body. She began to levitate several feet above the grass, and the boy followed her into the air.

"You have succumbed ... to Menudia."

"It is a pleasure to serve Menudia." Mason could somehow hear the audible exhilaration beneath Emily's seemingly placid response.

"My name is Austin."

"My name is Emily."

"You have been secretly desiring to join Menudia ever since you became aware of her arrival in the village."

"Yes, Austin."

"But your school friends tried to keep you from joining us. Menudia is pleased that you have chosen to rebel against your friends. She knows that you will serve her well."

"Yes, Austin."

"Now you will join us in the task of converting the rest of your school friends to Menudia's control -- a task that Menudia knows you will deeply relish."

"Yes, Austin."

"But first, you shall experience the abandonment of your former self, and embrace your new self -- the self that is one self, the Menudian self. You will quickly find that there is no purpose more worthwhile or meaningful."

"Yes, Austin."

With that, Emily popped open the metal fastener on the fly of her black denim jeans, and Mason watched in amazement as her zipper seemed to unzip entirely of its own accord. Similarly, she unfastened the top button of her blouse, and the remaining buttons, without any assistance from her, teasingly went POP! POP! POP! in quick succession, from the second-highest down to the last, allowing the two sides of her shirt to part, revealing the unexpectedly provocative white lace bra that she'd been wearing underneath.

Feeling that he should run, and yet finding himself physically unable to flee, Mason looked on as Emily leaned back in mid-air, her jeans and panties gently sliding down her hips, the flower she'd placed in her hair earlier that morning falling out and spinning toward the ground below.

Austin flew toward her, placed his body slightly parallel to Emily's, spread her legs with his hands, and slowly pressed his lips between Emily's thighs, causing a look of odd euphoria -- a look few who knew her would have expected to see on the face of someone often so petulant and moody -- to envelope her features.

Paralyzed, Mason gazed on as Emily's breaths grew quicker and quicker, her hips twisted more and more forcefully, and the skin on her face grew more and more flushed.

Why wasn't he running? Did part of him hope that he still had even the tiniest sliver of a chance of rescuing her? Or did perhaps another part of him simply find the spectacle of Emily suddenly being ... well, who possibly could have looked away?

His brain swimming in a mist of confusion and contradictions, he huddled helplessly behind the bushes as Emily's eyes began to once more beam that blinding shade of yellow.

Suddenly, for a short instant, her eyes almost returned to normal, a fleeting expression of defiance and refusal falling across her face, as if she were trying, with every fiber she could muster, to keep herself from enjoying the stimulation (and thus from tumbling into Menudia's clutches), only for that burst of resolve to peter out and a look of demonic ecstasy to return in full force, as if the menacing creature now insider her had sharply resented any potential denial of the satisfaction it craved.

Her short blonde hair fluttered against her cheeks, the bottom of her unbuttoned dress shirt drifted against the skin of her exposed behind, her arms fell limply behind her head, her lips whispered "Austin please ... please please ... Yes Menudia ... yes Menudia ... yes, yes ...," her chest (bound in that lovely white lace brassiere) rose and fell in awkwardly uncoordinated spurts, and she ... something serenely intense was taking over ... then her eyes ... then she ...

With a sudden burst of resolve, Mason ran from the scene, and didn't stop until about five minutes had passed, where he sat on an empty bench near a drinking fountain.

*****

He'd never seen a girl having one of "those" before.

No matter how much he tried, he couldn't shake the sight of Emily's pretty, exquisite face experiencing what appear to be ... he couldn't be sure, he certainly was no expert but ... she looked like she was having ... you know ...

But if so, it wasn't the kind he'd seen women having in porn movies, where they screamed and hollered and tossed their hair around. It was all so ... quiet. He'd never actually seen a girl in real life, with his very own eyes, having one. That expression: so frightening, mesmerizing, disturbing, beguiling ...

He couldn't reconcile that image with the Emily he'd known in college for so long. And if Emily was capable of allowing that aspect of her sexuality to rise to the surface, then what about everyone else he knew?

Hell, what about himself?

An avalanche of thoughts that Mason tried his darnedest to ignore began to hit him. In a strange way, he began to almost feel ... happy for her. He wondered how nice it would be to experience what Emily had just experienced. He wondered if that could ever be him someday? Or if perhaps he could find himself in Austin's position, his face buried in Emily's golden snatch, bringing her to a heavenly, tension-releasing little ...

No, no! This was sick, evil! All of it. Emily had betrayed her friends, the village, the whole town! She had refused to fight, and this was punishment, not reward.

But it certainly hadn't looked like punishment to Mason.

Man. It always seemed to be like this. How come none of his peers ever managed to be responsible? And what did he have to show for all his responsibility? Confused and petrified, he headed back toward the trail that led to the general store.

But as bewildering and horrifying as the scene had been, at least he had finally gained perhaps the most critical piece of information of all:

The eyes. They took you with their eyes.

Where were the others? He needed to tell the others!

*****

Sprinting up a hill behind the creek, Mason slowly peered over the top, where he was presented with a relatively unobstructed view of the general store -- but alas, it was not the sight he'd been hoping to see. The picnickers' former hiding place was now overrun with "those" people.

Menudians, Menudians, everywhere!

Glancing to his right, in the direction of the ranger station, he caught a brief glimpse of a shirt with a blue-and-white striped pattern on it.

Haley!

He stealthily trudged his way through the evergreen shrubs and baby conifers, attempting to make his way toward Haley and the others without being spotted. Gradually, the conversation of four of his fellow students grew louder.

"But was Julie with them?"

"I thought she headed toward the water tower."

"We better figure something out -- the sun'll be setting soon."

When the branches behind them began to shake, they nearly leapt out of their shoes.

"Run, run!"

Mason waved his arms wildly, telegraphing as best as he could that he was not a threat.

"It's Mason, it's Mason! Relax, it's just Mason."

"Oh you scared the bejeezus out of me," Rachel sighed.

"We thought you were --" Ellis began.

"No, no, it's OK. I saw Haley and ... I had to sneak my way through the bushes, I mean ..."

Mason then paused, and stared intently at Curt, Ellis, Haley, and Rachel. For a moment, he wondered if he had potentially just walked into a trap. Hell, as far as he knew, they could have all become Menudians by then! Maybe he'd just been a bigger idiot than the clueless old lady who replies to a phishing email with all her credit card info.