The Spider Pt. 12

Anna walked down the empty streets of Grimm Town, the flush light of the full moon illuminating what the broken street lights no longer did. She felt good, strong, powerful, for the first time in a long time. She strode down the center of the streets, reveling in the freedom of each footstep.

She also felt cold. She had slipped out of Heather's arms, wearing only her panties and a sheer t-shirt, and that's all she was wearing still.

But she barely felt the chill. She knew, though, that she was in danger. It was only a matter of time.

She couldn't wait. She hoped the danger would show its face sooner rather than later.

Anna turned around a corner, onto a new street. It looked about the same as the others, formerly grand buildings that housed generations of families, now lapsed into ruin, window after window smashed out. A single sickly tree dying amongst rows of other dead trees that used to shade children as they would play. A broken down car, window smashed, one tire flat.

She stood in the middle of the street, moonlight cascading down all over her, and she closed her eyes, and breathed in the cold air deeply.

It smelled delicious. It smelled like freedom. It smelled like life, like excitement, like possibility.

It smelled like danger. There it was.

She opened her eyes.

Three men were walking down the street towards her.

"What do we have here," one of them was saying, discarding a lit cigarette into the street. "Someone came to play."

"Are you lost?" another was saying, finishing off the beer from a bottle, and breaking it in the street. "We can help. Don't be scared."

She wasn't. Anna just stood there, small, shivering in her underwear and t-shirt.

"Your old man throw you out? Are you working these streets? Ain't nobody here for you to be hooking."

The men came closer, spreading out slightly as they came close to Anna, flanking her. Making sure that she wouldn't be able to escape if she ran. She could smell the alcohol on them, smell their sweat, feel the danger dripping off these men.

She had no intention of running.

One of them reached out, and ran his hand over her long, dark hair.

"Maybe this bitch just wants to have a good time with us," he said to the others.

Another of them crudely grabbed at his crotch with his hand.

"You come looking for this? You need some of this?"

Anna smiled.

"Oh, boys," she said. "You have no idea how badly I've been needing this."

The three men leered at her. She knew that any second, they would fall on her like wolves, grabbing at her with their rough and dirty hands, ripping what little clothing she had off her. Anna knew that they were going to hurt her, and rape her, over and over again. She could see it in their eyes, in their flared nostrils, their bared and yellow teeth.

All of a sudden a voice yelled out from the end of the street.

"Leave her the fuck alone!" a slight man yelled out. The three men surrounding Anna turned and looked at him, glaring. Anna looked also, peering around the big men that surrounded her. The man at the end of the street looked a little familiar. He was a slender man, his breath steaming in the chill, his jacket pulled tight. Where had she seen him before?

The man closest to Anna reached inside his leather jacket, and pulled out a pistol. It was enormous, shining like death in the light of the moon. He pointed its long barrel down the length of the street at the man.

"You want to be a hero, motherfucker? Or do you want to keep on living?"

The man at the end of the street froze. His eyes grew big with fear.

"Just... leave her alone," he stammered.

"Looks like you want to die, then," the thug with the pistol said, shrugging. "No big deal either way."

In a flash, Anna's bare foot lashed out, kicking the enormous pistol away. It skittered down the street, sliding up against the curb.

The man behind Anna started to say something, but he was immediately dropped by Anna's elbow catching him in the throat, crushing his larynx. He fell to the ground, grasping at his throat for breath and trying to scream in hoarse chokes of pain.

The third man took a roundhouse swing at Anna. They always did that. Easy enough to avoid, Anna ducked under the blow, as she had a thousand times before. She leapt up, shoving the man's nose into the rest of his face, into his brain. He fell, bleeding, into a heap on the cold street.

But the man who had the pistol punched Anna in the face. Too slow, she thought. Off my game.

She fell to her knees, bleeding from her lips and nose. The man hit her again, making stars burst across Anna's eyes. He grabbed a handful of Anna's hair, and pulled his fist back as far as he could.

"Hey, asshole," Anna and the thug beating her heard a quiet voice behind them. They both turned to look, and saw the slight man now holding the discarded pistol and pointing it towards Anna's assailant.

"You can die today, too," the slight man whispered, his hand shaking as he pointed the weapon.

The thug holding Anna turned and ran down the street, ran in a terror past his friends, both of them crawling on the pavement trying to regain basic function.

Anna crouched, and sprung into the air. She caught the running man around his neck with her legs, like she had so many times, spinning him around by his head, and driving his face into the street.

Hard.

He didn't get up.

Anna stood over him, breathing hard, harder than she should be.

Out of shape, she thought. But fuck. That feels good.

The slight man came running towards Anna. She turned to face him.

"You OK?" he asked her. "Fuck. Where did you learn to do that shit?"

Anna just shrugged. She felt good. She felt almost high from the adrenaline.

"Here," the slight man said, taking his jacket off, and slipping it over Anna's slim shoulders. "You must be cold- you aren't wearing shit."

"No thanks," she said. "I don't want to take your coat. Then you'll be cold."

"No, no," he told her. "I don't need it much longer. Day after tomorrow? I'm getting on the bus and heading down south, where it's warm. My sister has a place for me down there. New place, new job. I'm getting the fuck out of this City."

"Oh," she said. She took the jacket. "Congratulations. I'm Anna."

He took her hand.

"Good to meet you, Anna. I'm Deacon."

"Hi, Deacon."

"You need an ambulance or something? Police? You need a place to go get warm? I'm not too far from here. My shit is all boxed up, but I can get my coffee maker out."

Anna just smiled at him.

"No thanks, Deacon. I'm all right. I'm going to head back home now. Get warm there. You should probably go home too, OK?"

"Oh, I agree," Deacon told her. "I'm not leaving the apartment until it's time to get on that bus. This City has almost killed me for the last time."

"Yeah," Anna said. "It does that."

But she couldn't recall when she'd felt more alive.

******************************

"Aren't you going to let me in, John?" Amanda asked.

"Yes- sorry," he said, opening the door enough to let her pass. He followed her into his kitchen. "I can make you some... I don't know. Scotch?"

"I'd love some scotch."

"It's actually in my bedroom," John admitted.

Amanda gave him a smile. Somehow, that smile was able to burst through the night with hope. How was she able to do that?

Fuck, he'd missed that smile.

"I like it," she told him. "Efficient. No more wasted trips to the liquor cabinet. Let's go."

She followed him into the bedroom. He put his thumb on the finger pad, and the glass door slid shut behind the two of them.

He poured the scotch into a glass with an unsteady hand.

"Here," he said, handing it to Amanda, trying to fake a confident smile.

She smiled back, taking the glass. Her smile, unlike his, was real.

"John," she said. She took a sip of her scotch. She closed her eyes and shook at little bit at the burn.

She started to laugh.

"I guess I'm not used to drinking straight scotch," she grinned. "Terrible stuff."

"Sorry," he said, waving his hand around his bedroom, which had basically been a prison for him these last weeks. The room was dirty, clothes piled up unwashed in corners, and dank. "I haven't been to the store much, or I'd offer you something else."

"That's OK," she said, taking another sip. "I'll get used to it. I didn't really come here to drink with you, anyway."

"You shouldn't have come," he said, taking a gulp himself. "I shouldn't have let you. Weak of me."

"No, you should have let me, and you are going to let me help you. I told you that on the phone. I'll take care of you."

"You don't know what I'm up against, Amanda. There's nothing you can do."

Amanda shook her head, and threw the rest of her scotch down her throat. She put her fist to her mouth, and coughed slightly at the liquor. She stood up.

"I'm getting so tired of hearing that out of you," she said, not unkindly. She stood over John, and took his face in both of her hands. She looked down at him, and bending over slightly, gave him a gentle hint of a kiss on his lips.

She stood up again, pulling him towards her, pressing his face against her flat belly, against her sharp hip bones. She kept his head in her hands.

"Come in," she whispered. "I'm open, John. Come inside me."

John pressed his head closer to her belly. She felt good. She felt safe, and warm.

He reached out with his mind, just a little bit. Tentatively. He wanted her. He wanted to be inside her mind. He had been in the minds of any number of people in his life, for one reason or the other, ever since he had discovered that other people had open doors to someone like him.

But no one had ever been like Amanda.

He couldn't explain it. She had always been open to him, more so than anyone else. He had barely needed to push into her that first time, before she had been open, more open than most people ever were, almost immediately.

She had felt good, being inside her mind, her thoughts, her self. She had felt like... like...

Home.

That was the word. She had always felt like home to John.

And she felt that way now. He pushed in a little more, still hesitant.

"That's it," she whispered, encouraging. She stroked his hair against her belly, holding him close.

He pushed in a little further. She felt good to him. He hadn't felt that good in a long, long time. He hesitated. He cared about her, always had. He didn't want her to depend on him. He didn't want her in danger-

No, he heard her words in his mind. You have to come in all the way.

And as he felt her speak in his mind, he also felt her pulling him in. It felt right for her to do that, he could feel her strength, deeper than he had known she had before. Her strength was powerful to him, intoxicating. He wanted that, wanted to be near that, wanted to take comfort from her. There was so much there, and she was leading him towards more of it.

"Come on," she whispered. She pulled him in further. It felt good. No one had ever pulled him in that way. He didn't know that anyone could do that.

His cock swelled in his pants. Amanda pulled his face even closer to her belly.

John could feel himself push further into Amanda's mind, deeper. Part of her self swelled up, encompassed him, taking him further and further inside her. She wrapped herself around his push, and pulled him in, as if pulling him under a pool of tranquil and un-rippled water.

All the way, he heard inside his head. I have something to show you.

He went further in to her, no longer sure if he was pushing further or she was pulling him in deeper. It didn't seem to make much of a difference at this point, her wrapped around him, leading him ever deeper inside of herself. It felt good to be inside her. He wasn't sure why he hadn't gone this far ever before. He thought that had he known it would feel so good, so right to be this far into her, he would have come this far the first moment he had been with her. He wondered if he ever would be able to leave again, or would ever want to.

You feel it too, he heard in his mind. We belong here together.

Yes, he replied in the same way. We do.

Down they went, the two of them wrapped around each other as one, deeper into the dark and cool part of her that reminded him of a pool. He'd never seen anything like this in a person before, wasn't sure what it was.

John didn't even know if everyone had such a place within themselves, or even if he did.

But Amanda's pool was deep, and so deeper down into her they went, tightly wrapped up in each other, exploring what was there. As they went deeper, it got darker and darker, still they submerged further into her depths in her down, and down, and down.

Where are we going, he wondered.

You'll see.

He wasn't scared. It felt right, he thought. It occurred to him that he felt better than he had felt in weeks. It seemed that all the pain and fear could not follow him here. He wondered if he would follow her everywhere after this, wanting to be able to return to this safe place.

He thought that he probably would.

And then he saw it, saw it without eyes. Deep in the submerged, dark pool that was the center of Amanda's mind and self, it was there. In his mind's eye, he thought it looked like a white hot, glowing sphere, if he were to describe it in terms of vision.

It was beautiful, he thought. Wonderful.

What is that? What is this about you?

I don't know. It's always been there.

The two of them contemplated the blazing white orb that was at the depths of Amanda. In their minds, behind closed eyelids, it was the most beautiful thing that they had ever seen. John knew that Amanda had always known about this part of herself, but had never told anyone about, unable to describe it. He knew that she needed him to be able to take her there, that she had been working up the courage to reveal this part of herself, whatever it was, to him for some time.

Thank you for showing me.

I need you to do more than that, silly.

What do you want me to do?

I think... I think you need to open it. I think we need what is inside it to be out.

John paused for a couple of minutes, wrapping himself tighter around Amanda's self, her pulling him more closely to her each moment at well. It seemed necessary for the two of them to be as completely intertwined as possible.

And once they were, they knew: they knew what they had to do.

Wrapped up together, as tight as an arrow, they went in.

The blazing white center of Amanda was hot, as if it was white fire, but there was no pain. The glowing orb was blinding, but there weren't any eyes to be hurt by the glare, to need to look away.

There was only the center. Pure, untouched, the center of the woman that was Amanda. A part of her that had always been there, waiting to be discovered, waiting to be unlocked.

John and Amanda unlocked her. They pierced the white hot orb.

It exploded. As the two of them pierced the center of her, the white hot part that was in the center of Amanda's very being burst. The white hot orb erupted like a universe would explode, casting galaxies filled with stars and thousands of worlds circling those stars all around the person that was Amanda, filling every corner of her body, mind and soul with the white hot essence.

The two of them were still intertwined, as close as ever, in the center of this new universe. Quiet. Throbbing with life, with potential, with power, and John and Amanda at the center of it.

Back in the real world, John's cock was squirting jets of cum into his pants. He gasped, and opened his eyes, pulling his head back from Amanda's belly. He looked up.

She looked down at him, smiling. She had never looked more beautiful to him. Nothing had ever looked as beautiful to him. He didn't think anything ever would. Radiant, light dancing around her hair, her smile confident, happy.

"I love you, John Claire," she told him.

"I love you, too," he told her, kissing her belly. "I'm sorry I sent you away. I won't do that ever again."

"We're together, John," she told him. "We always will be. We are one now."

She bent down and kissed him.

"I'll take care of you, John Claire."

John just nodded. He knew that she would.

For the first time in a long time, he knew that tomorrow was a new day. A new day, and a day that he wasn't going to let anything take away from him.