You Promised Me Geeks: UK Summer

"Holy shit," Tracy had wrenched her jaw back into place, a second pop. It hurt a bit when it did that but the pain kept her focused, her brain wanted to shut down.

"We guessed it was the urgency, they COULD leave their bodies. Well, kind of. A bit of them got out, but not enough to infect anyone. They're just like the ghosts in the stories, spectres, they show up now and again. But they can't show often or for long. Can't cause trouble. Well, we don't think so. Nothing so far."

Tracy watched Asha slug down the last half of her pint in one almighty swallow.

"One more," Asha pushed her glass at Tracy, "I need to get ripped."

Tracy tried to imitate Asha, coughed, stopped, managed to finish on the second swig.

"Yeah, no argument here."

She stood and carried the empties to the bar, placed them amongst a number of other such on a mat. Got the bartender's attention. Asha played up for his leers this time, pushed out her tits, the shapes and color of her nipples obvious through the all-but transparent shirt. Tracy chuckled when an overflowing ESB went all over the floor in his slack-jawed stare.

Two pints properly filled, Tracy picked them up and her body turned quicker than her fogged brain, beer sloshed a bit as two people did more than she did to narrowly avoid a collision. A man and a woman, heads of white-yellow hair, both taller than her, maybe close to six feet.

"Oh, shit, sorry," Tracy said too loudly, the slightest slur audible now that her concentration from Asha's story had lessened.

"Not a problem, dear," the woman said to her, a comforting hand steadied Tracy's arm, "just as much our fault. Go ahead."

Tracy smiled shyly, nodded, continued to her table as Asha's mouth showed a silent laugh. She heard light laughter behind as her new acquaintances resumed their transit, both wore jeans and short-sleeved button down shirts. The pub was near full, a casual crowd that was overly balanced to older people, this local in a residential area near their hotel apparently not on the young and rowdy circuit.

It was only after she'd sat down and stared at Asha's nipples that threatened to push through her shirt and above that the now-buoyant smile that she looked for the couple again, didn't see them in the crowd. Had the man been wearing a bright yellow belt? And the woman a red scarf?

"Now," Asha's voice brought her back to face her friend, "about our solstice celebration tomorrow..."

A Monument of Stone and Power

[June 21, 1986]

"Please tell this bus and everyone on it to be silent, ok," Tracy's voice had a plaintive whine, her eyes tightly closed and her hands covered her ears.

"It's not a bus, hick," Asha said in a quiet and lilting voice, "it's a coach."

"Whatever, tell it to be quiet and quit rocking around!"

"Yeesh, she has four pints and I have to carry my country mouse back to the hotel, such a lightweight. It'll only be a couple of hours to get there."

Tracy's moan was half pain and half growl.

"How come you're so cheerful, bitch. You drank as much as I did," Tracy's voice went very soft, "another superpower you don't get drunk?"

Asha laughed.

"Not as fast as you do, and I don't get hangovers. Upgraded liver. I even had another. You were asleep at the table and I had another with a couple. Too bad you were out of it, what I could see he had a nice cock and I'd have let you have it. I'd have had the white hair of the woman between my legs before I'd have given her a strap-on workout. But you were out of it so maybe another time."

"White hair?" Tracy's voice cold, halting.

"Yeah," a cheerful reply, "both of them."

"Yellow, red clothes?"

"Um, yeah. Bits."

"I saw a couple like them at the Telegraph. Then them..."

Asha snorted.

"This is London. People are fashionable. Not like at home where everyone tries to outslob each other."

"Ugh, ok, just tell the bus to quit moving. As to fashion, that halter dress is way shorter than you usually wear and from the side I can see half of your ridiculous tits. At least it cuts down the blood going to my brain."

"You keep telling me my thighs aren't THAT fat, Miss Stickfigure, so we'll see. But I need something that'll be easy to get off at exactly 5:29 pm."

"Huh? Get off?"

"We're getting naked to dance about and touch all of the stones from the exact time of the solstice. They'll let us into the actual stone circle a few minutes before. Why else would we be going to Stonehenge today along with these other fine folks?"

"Fine, noisy folks," Tracy muttered, "I'm not getting naked..."

Asha's voice was suddenly a BBC presenter's accent.

"Yes, you are. Go in the little bathroom, get rid of your knickers now then we'll both have none, half your cute little ass is already hanging out of those shorts. Save time later. That tank top will come off easy enough and it really frames YOUR tits quite nicely since you listened to me about no bra."

Tracy just closed her eyes and growled with a low sound in her throat. Then she opened her eyes and squinted at Asha.

"5:29? The fuck? We're in room 529!"

"Happy coincidence, that. Means all will be well!"

"Whatever," Tracy growled, closed her eyes and leaned her head against the seatback. Asha found the thin girl's right hand and squeezed it.

A bit refreshed after her hour long nap, Tracy watched as the bus, no, the coach, rolled slowly on the A344 just after it had turned off the A303, past the standing stones of the ancient monument. Traffic had slowed to a crawl and there was a fair crowd already in the fields surrounding the monument, a loose ring of police and security discouraged entrance into the stone circle itself. A bit further on the coach turned right into another field and parked amidst a half dozen others like it.

Asha led Tracy off the coach and they separated from the crowd.

"That way," Tracy tapped her friend's shoulder, pointed toward the phalanx of portable toilets, "I need another piss. I drank all our water on the way here."

After that Tracy refilled the two small plastic bottles at a tanker truck that charged a pound for each. They fit nicely into the outside pockets on each side of her pack.

"What's with all the police? And all these people," Tracy whispered, "get naked? Hah!"

"Riots last year," Asha shrugged, "too many pagans. Why do you think they checked our tickets so closely back in London?"

"Yeesh. My mother really likes you but if I die she'll be upset..."

"But this is nothing. If we'd come for sunrise it would've been REALLY crowded."

"Fuck if I'd come here at 4 am. You'd have been on your own. For such a famous site, it just sits here in fields, roads like feet away, a couple food carts. Bit underwhelming on the presentation front."

"Shoulda visited three thousand years ago, woulda been rocking then," Asha laughed as she led them through the tunnel to the monument's side of the road.

They joined the loose procession that beat a mostly counter-clockwise path around the standing stones. Tracy pulled her little Instamatic out of her pack and snapped pictures of the monumental structure and the crowd. She saw the drab green tents set up on the far side of the monument where the security team had their headquarters. With her eyes still on the stones to her left she veered a bit away from most as her sneakers retraced ground well trampled by the sunrise crowd but empty now to get wider angles.

"Oh, hey, sorry," she stopped to avoid colliding with a woman who stood off her right shoulder. She turned to apologize.

"Wha...," no one stood there. She looked around, saw Asha side on about forty feet behind her, standing still with her head cocked to the side as she looked at the stones. Tracy's mind wandered for a moment at Asha's magnificent bust displayed as if her dress were paint and a round ass that some might consider 'fat.' Such people were fools, their opinions not worth consideration. And the just barely there but slight roundness of the lovely girl's tummy. It wasn't that she was proud of it but she certainly didn't let it bother her. Tracy had been convinced the crimson hair, a shade she'd never seen before, that fell around her shoulders and just reached the edge of her halter dress had been dyed. But it wasn't.

And Tracy was hard pressed to remember any other time since her friend's ankle had healed that she'd seen that beautiful creature in sneakers. Devil girl popped up in the most extreme high heels Tracy had ever seen, but not even she was so consistent about heels of all types. But this one had taken a rare, practical turn to address the day's terrain challenges.

No one else was close. She turned back again.

"Oh, there," again just the fleeting glance, "what the fuck?"

She shook her head, took a breath and focused on a distant stand of trees to clear her head.

"What a tasty, tasty morsel you'd have been, girl."

The voice was from her right side. It could've been Asha's, but for an element of menace, implied threat, in it. She turned. No one. She sniffed, squinted her eyes. Still no one.

She momentarily regretted that Psychology elective Spring quarter. Was this a schizophrenic break? Did that tanker dispense LSD with its water?

She turned so the stones were square to her left and she let her sight rest on the trees again, relaxed her eyes.

"That's it, my sweet girl, so innocent and pure you were."

Tracy fought the urge to turn her head or to even slide her eyes. In the very corner of her eye was a woman, maybe just shorter than Asha, pale skin, her voluptuous body in a form-fitting button down green dress with red flowers, three buttons each top and bottom undone, the rounded shapes of large breasts framed on top and a shapely thigh exposed by the lower split of the knee length dress. Tracy thought she could almost see through the woman. Her mind reeled a bit, the headache that had retreated with her nap threatened to return.

And. And, long, wavy red hair, the red of a spectacular sunset. A face... a face she'd seen. The photo hadn't quite done her justice. If she WERE here now, that was...

"Janet...," Tracy said, "you're Janet."

"So my disappointment of a daughter has told you about me, has she?"

"Disappointment? She's awesome."

"She's barely MY daughter. That she failed to feed on such a wonderful, such a perfect morsel as you were... So delicious you would've been. So nutritious. You remind me of Marsha, even if she was taller. Thin, brunette, like you. Had never been with a man, like you. Before. But my daughter is too soft. Soft in the head and the heart. She's so..."

"Human," Tracy interjected, "she's human."

The apparition, hallucination or whatever Janet was, laughed mordantly.

"Yes, much to my regret."

Asha stepped suddenly into Tracy's sightline, the muscles in the side of her face tight, lines radiated from their force at her visible eye.

"Regret? You regret what?" Asha's voice, directed forward. Janet's gaze hardened.

"That you not only failed to feed as MY daughter should've, but that you corrupted the pureness of this prey. You and that strange girl with the horns... This prey was so perfect, so symmetrical, before. No longer. But even then you still had your chance..."

"Symmetrical?" Tracy said with a loud exhaled breath. Asha's face morphed, muscles confused, she turned, looked at Tracy.

"You can hear her? See her?"

"Not if I LOOK at her, only the corner of my eye... like, a shimmering projection. She's in front of you. Green dress with flowers."

Janet shifted her feet in their high, open toe heels with ankle straps, pushed her chest out in a manner identical to what Tracy had seen from her friend any number of times. The dark-haired girl shivered slightly.

"Her favorite dress. How?" Asha looked at her mother.

"This is a place of power. Do you know how many humans are buried here? How many were sent to my side with the knives and axes of blood rituals? And, how can she not catch fleas when she lies down with a cur?"

"Hey," Tracy hissed with as much venom as she could manage, two red-topped faces turned to her, "if you're interested in dying a second time, you body stealing bitch, you say that again. She's not a cur, she's my best friend. So, you want it, say the word. I'll accommodate you."

Asha turned to look back at her mother as Tracy shook with anger.

"Mother, enough. I'm not the daughter you expected. Too bad. Live with it."

"'Live.' Funny word. Don't worry, even with the power at sunrise I couldn't take anyone. At least, no one worth taking. But if you think it's a big happy family on this side, that we're all together drinking coffee and eating cake, you'd be wrong. There's something going down. The ones that seem to be involved don't talk to me, they hate me, it's mutual, so my guess is there will be no love for you on that side."

Tracy heard the sudden change in the apparition's timbre as she continued. The voice slowed, deepened, the anger closer to the surface.

"I'm looking forward to having you here with me but I don't want... this way."

"Here? Today? Why not at sunrise? That's maximum power."

"Yes, but ALL are active, aware at sunrise and sunset. Balance is kept. But the solstice is almost right in the middle today. Most will be... asleep."

Janet turned her head to her left and frowned a bit as if she saw someone or something, the shimmering shape became less distinct, turned its head, its gaze for a heartbeat on Tracy as it moved then stopped to face her daughter.

"Take care, prey, my Asha. Just remember, you, your brother, you did what our kind does," she had a slightly feral smile, "you're not as human as you hope."

Tracy was unsure if Janet had moved or simply wasn't there anymore.

"Is... is she gone?" Tracy asked softly.

"Yes."

"That was weird... Who's Marsha? Said I reminded her of Marsha."

"No fucking idea. None. No one, other than me and Aron, has ever seen either of them before."

"I took her picture," Tracy held her camera up, "well, I think I pointed it in the right direction, from my hip. Took a few. Need to put in a new roll."

"Huh, never tried that," Asha mused, they both looked around, it didn't appear they'd attracted any undue attention, saw a few people about who seemed in their own conversations with space maybe not as empty as simple sight indicated, "maybe you should give the film to leather boy when we get back."

"Why?"

"He's apparently got connections in the photo lab, did the pictures that found those alien satellites that are up there."

"This isn't much of a camera, not like what he has. But probably better than one of those hour places. What about what she told you? She on the level?"

"Well," she nudged Tracy's wrist, held it up so they could see the watch face, then pulled her to start walking again, "we have an hour and a few minutes. Let's look around, I'll see if anything smells funny."

"Smell?"

"Very sensitive to trouble if I'm paying attention. Fucked up that night Jed surprised us at Crown Burger but I won't let that happen today. She hates me but if anyone's going to take me down, she'll want it to be her. No one else."

"Shit. We should've asked her about the aliens. If the ones up there, if Anna's one of them, if they're the same."

"Yeah, if mom and dad killed a bunch of them... would be nice to know. Lovely. Vengeful aliens, killer druids, asshole ghosts. I ever lead you wrong, Tracy? Stick with me kid, we'll go places."

"Like where? The middle of drug deals? Psychos for dinner? Hell?" Tracy's smile was broad but her eyes a bit sad, "And kid? I'm older than you are! Well, seven months older..."

Asha put her arm around the shorter girl's shoulder, they both laughed softly.

The Summer Solstice

Asha and Tracy followed the crowd into the ring of standing stones fifteen minutes before the solstice as the majority of the two dozen police and security guards walked outside of the circle and stationed themselves under the large tents set up about 50 yards from the stones. Six remained to remind celebrants of their presence but stood casually in a spot that allowed access to the stones. The crowd compressed itself and its counter-clockwise rotation allowed everyone a close-up to most stones in turn.

The two young women edged their way into a gap between two of the large, standing stones and Tracy reached out to feel the roughness of one, the surface warm with the bright sunshine of the clear day. The gap didn't offer easy progress beyond so they weren't pushed further on as people continued past, many other hands traced their ways along the stones, soft murmurs.

"Uhh," the sound Asha made wasn't vocal so much as dragged from her throat, Tracy shivered slightly as she turned to look at her friend. She saw Asha's left side as she rotated slowly away, that low mix of hum and grunt continued.

"What's up, Asha?" Tracy's voice was firm, but low, a slight quaver as she reached out and rubbed the bare back just above the top of the halter dress and through red tresses. The 'warning' from Asha's mother came back into Tracy's thoughts. Asha stopped her turn and reached out and touched the stone Tracy had just released. She turned and looked at her shorter friend.

"There is so much power in this circle right now," Asha's voice was slow and heavy, her eyelids heavy over bright but unfocused eyes, "I've never felt anything like this..."

"You're scaring me," Tracy said, her voice still low but firm, she scrunched her eyes by a few degrees, her hand rubbed Asha's left shoulder blade, "is something going to happen?"

Asha's head turned back to look at the stone as he lifted her chin to look at the top of stone. Tracy followed her gaze up, standing on Asha's shoulders she'd still be nowhere near touching the top of this and the others that matched it.

"Saracen," Asha said, her voice still leaden, "it's a Saracen stone..."

"Huh, um, sarsen," Tracy said, "the signs outside call them sarsen stones..."

"Saracen, olden power...," Asha insisted, she closed her eyes again and inhaled deeply, kept her hand on the stone.

Tracy had another flashback, to the night with Jed, when she'd watched Asha feed by pulling from that big, violent man some essence of his mind. Even Asha didn't know how she really did that or what exactly she pulled from people, just the necessity of it. That it put him into an apparently permanent coma meant something had happened and in Tracy's view Asha's actions and mood seemed very similar here in this stone circle. That might be good. Asha had been confident she'd not need to feed again for some time but had never told Tracy how long that might be. If this allowed her to 'fill up' again without needing to take it from a person that would be a bonus.

She looked at her watch, five minutes until the actual solstice. Her worry was that after Asha had fed on Jed, Aron had later told her that his sister had been unconscious for hours. Even his work to more carefully reset her snapped ankle and to fashion a brace hadn't caused the beautiful energy vampire to waken. He'd admitted to Tracy that he'd been worried, had never seen anything that extreme.

Tracy stepped closer to Asha, her left hand found Asha's left, the grip returned even as the other latte-coloured hand stayed on the rock and the smooth-skinned beautiful face held to the sky, eyes closed. Brunette hair mingled with crimson as Tracy leaned her head against Asha's bare shoulder. She saw smiles and kind expressions as fellow celebrants strolled past and acknowledged what they must've taken to be two young women having found a personal stone with which to commune. They were not the only attendees who were up close with stones made personal.