The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Disclaimer: The following story has all sorts of sexual activity as well as violence of an extreme nature and death. If you don’t like it. Don’t read it. You have to be over 18 to continue. The story is completely fictional. Any characters, places or events that are similar to any real people, locations or situations, is purely coincidental.

(MF, MFF, FF, inc, v, rp, nc, mc, death)

Alien’s Gift II

Part 03: Inferno

by Ardin Resolute ()

Prologue.

The old man stared at the chess board in front of him. Chess was his game. It was all about strategy, all about placing his pieces where he wanted them and luring his opponent into making moves of benefit to him. This was what he found so fascinating about chess. Not just what he could do, but what he could make his adversary do. And he found he could make them do many things. He had won whole games on forcing his opponent to self-destruct, forcing them to make bad moves. It was all very interesting, and all very envigorating. And envigoration was a good thing for one as old as himself. He got up from his seat in front of the old board and walked over to the edge of his enormous penthouse’s deck. The old man looked out upon the sea of humanity below him. He saw people as the ants they were, bustling about their menial little tasks, engrossed in their puny little worlds. He saw them as his puppets, as his tools, as but pawns in his greater game of chess.

He smiled. This was all going according to plan, according to his plan, which of course was the perfect plan. Everything he did was perfect, perfectly organized, perfectly set up and always without any flaw. That was the way he lived his life, and that was why he was where he was now, on the brink of perfection, on the brink of having it all. That was his life, and it was a good life.

A knock on the door behind him jarred him out of his reverie. “Yes?” He didn’t bother to turn around, the old man knew who was there.

A soft, feminine voice came from the doorway. “He’s here.”

The old man smiled briefly, a gesture unappreciated by the one behind him who could not see it. “See that he is briefed then send him in.” He folded his arms and continued looking out.

The woman behind him nodded once. “Yes sir.” And the door closed behind her with a soft thud.

The old man looked upon the people beneath him once again. This was the beginning of the end. Not the end of everything, but the end of another beginning. It was the beginning of the end of the beginning of his plan. He was finishing his first set of moves, his first gambit in the greater game of chess that he had always played, and always loved playing.

The old man took one last look at the scene below him, then turned and started inside.

It was beginning.

I.

Sherri Winters opened her eyes, her head desperately trying to focus the image of the room around her, trying to stop the spinning. It had been a few days since Rick had taken over the GJL, a few days since she had been able to get any decent amount of sleep. She groaned, and now, as if things couldn’t get any worse, she had been knocked out and taken to another room in the mansion more than likely because Rick had something to say to her. She groaned in frustration. It would have helped immensely if she wasn’t so damned horny. Her fault of course, her fault for wanting to be part of that lesbian orgy so much that she had carelessly prepped her body for it before time. Carelessly, because when ick strolled into the room and locked her mind down, she was left without the ability to turn her need to be fucked off. And damn, did she need to be fucked. Damn damn damn. She had managed to keep herself sane and in fairly good control of herself so far due to her constant masturbating, but her arms were getting very sore because of her shackles and she knew eventually she’d just be left screaming for release, begging for it, a thought that chilled her to the bone. There had to be a way out, had to be something Rick missed. Had to be something, anything she could do to free herself. Goddamit, this wasn’t fair! She was the good guy wasn’t she? There had to be something to do!

She kept struggling but there didn’t seem to be much use. Her strength, already sapped from hours of non-stop masturbation, was fading fast and the shackles that imprisoned her were far too durable for her to break even if she was at full strength. God damn it! God fucking damn it! She took a deep breath, and while her mind was still somewhat clear in between fingering sessions, she turned her attentions inward, probing and feeling out the barrier which Rick had put up to keep her from accessing the gift. Slowly she ran her psychic fingers across it, “feeling” it out, trying to find a hole, a defect, anything she could use to break it down. C’mon, there had to be some flaw, nothing was perfect. She kept testing, trying out each section of the barrier like tapping a wall to find a weak spot. It was slow and excrutiatingly repetitive work, but the hope of escape was more than enough to keep her focussed. The wall seemed too well made though. That was what had impressed her right off the bat. Rick had obviously grown greatly in strength and skill since the last time her brother had dealt with him. It had been two days since she had been captured and during all that time she still had not been able to find any way to break through. Even the most powerful Gifted she knew had problems making such a perfect mind shield. Still, nothing was impossible to circumvent, she just had to find the... wait... there it was... a flaw... a very tiny, very minute, but very, very significant flaw! She smiled. This was what she had been looking for all along. Now all she had to do was...

No. She felt it. The urge was coming back, stronger than last time for that was how the urge worked. Each time she fought it off, it returned, stronger, more powerful, more dominating than before. No. Not now. Not when she had just... ohhh... god... Focus. She had to focus. Focus on breaking down the shield, focus on coming up with a way to... focus on... coming... yes... she had to focus on cumming. She needed to cum. God did she need to cum. Sherri’s hand was a blur beneath her as her fingers rifled quickly across her clit, over and over and over again. Fuck... what.. what did she... need to do? Wha.. what was it? God, she couldn’t think straight. She needed to cum. She needed to cum. A glazed look came over her as the rampant desires raged across her body, setting off every nerve ending and making her scream in pleasure with every touch and caress her tired fingers managed to give her. Nothing mattered anymore. Escape, revenge, desperation, none of that was any of her concern anymore. The only thing Sherri Winters, second in command of the now-defunct GJL and sister of the strongest gifted on Earth, cared about anymore was cumming as many times as she could.

It didn’t matter that she was only a hairsbreadth away from freeing herself from Rick’s devious mind shield. It didn’t matter that if she had just 1 more second of un-interrupted thought she would now be free instead of in chains and desperately rubbing her clit raw. Because ultimately, all the second-guessing and what ifs in the world wouldn’t have changed the truth and that truth was Sherri Winters wasn’t a prisoner of Rick Evans, she was a prisoner of her own desires, a metaphysical cage, fashioned by herself for her own pleasure and ultimately doing nothing more than preventing her from escaping her pain.

* * *

Rick got out of bed in a rather mixed mood. On one hand, having wonderful sex with Colt Winter’s lovely subordinates every night was great. On the other hand, Colt was going to be back very soon, and Rick hadn’t yet figured out what to do about it. He knew Colt would know instantly that his base had been breached and knew also that Rick was in the area. There wasn’t much element of surprise here. Rick had Sherri as bait but not much else. The girls were useless. Colt knew their weaknesses better than he did, and so using them as weapons would do him absolutely no good. Rick needed more cards to play than he had. Rick needed a force, and currently he had no idea how he really would get one.

Rick was confident he could take Colt one on one now. He had trained very hard since their last fateful encounter and he wasn’t worried that he would lose a duel. But he wasn’t sure if Colt would come alone, or even if Colt wouldn’t have a trick up his sleeve. Colt was a smart man, a very smart man. If Rick was going to take him on, he needed a plan. He needed something.

Rick walked to the bathroom and clapped his hands. Danielle and Andrea appeared almost out of nowhere. Though Rick knew that really they had just broken up their passionate love-making in the other room to serve him. Already naked (Rick rarely dressed in clothes while he was in the GJL headquarters), he strolled into the shower and stood there. On cue, Danielle turned on the shower and Andrea soon joined them with the soap. Both girls then began to lather his body with soap and worship it as they cleaned him. Of course, one girl was always kneeling down soaping his bottom half and sucking on his hard cock.

The strangest thing was, Rick only had half a mind paying attention to the pleasure he was getting. Not that it wasn’t great. It was. He loved the attention as always and loved the hot female flesh around him, as always. But life was more than sex, for Rick at least, life was also revenge. Vengeance was high on Rick Evan’s mind, even now, and as the days ticked by and Colt’s return grew more imminent, vengeance was beginning to consume him.

He needed an advantage. He needed some sort of back up, something he could use. If Colt brought Jade, or the government, or hell, even Trent, Rick would find himself outnumbered in a hurry. He needed to make sure that didn’t happen. He needed...

Suddenly, as Rick came in Danielle’s mouth, it hit him, he knew what he needed, and the thought brought him almost as much pleasure. It was perfect, it was absolutely perfect. He had almost all the parts also, just a couple excursions and he’d be ready. He’d be ready for Colt and whatever or whomever Colt might have brought him. The bait was already set in Sherri and now he had the cards to play once Colt joined him at the poker table. It was absolutely perfect.

Rick Evans was about to get himself an army.

II.

Deanna Jackson had no idea why she was following Tom. She had no idea where they were going either, but for some reason that didn’t matter to her. She had no idea why she was giggling at every word he said either, the guy was a nerd, or at least was, or maybe she just thought he was... it was so confusing she couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Tom was just some geek at her school she looked down on, wasn’t he? But... but she loved him so much, he was so beautiful, so wonderful, so damned sexy. But... but she didn’t think so yesterday. Didn’t she? But that didn’t make any sense... because she loved him so much, she had always loved him, she knew it, she could feel it, she thought it... but... but she didn’t remember it like that. God, her head hurt so much from thinking. Then another thought occurred to her: she should stop thinking. Yes! That was it, if thinking hurt her so much, she should stop thinking. Just... stop thinking. She smiled and giggled softly as her headache receded and the world made sense once again.

The car stopped. She looked around confused, but wasn’t worried, Tom would take care of her, Tom loved her and she loved him. She smiled as the door opened and she saw the object of her affections staring back at her.

“C’mon we’re here, get out.” Tom took Deanna by the hand and led her out into the slowly dimming night. They were in front of a bar with a big neon sign at the top that read ‘The Mind Bender’. Of course Tom knew that wasn’t what most people saw. Only Gifteds could see the truth. Mundanes would see a closed old warehouse with boards on the doors. He smiled and led Deanna through the etheral “boards” that barred their entrance into a whole new realm.

The music inside was loud and festive. The furniture was very modern and there were seveeral large screen high definition television sets scattered around. Obviously the owner had lots of cash on him and wasn’t afraid to spend it, but Tom knew that already, it was, after all, not the first time he had been here. The bar was packed tonight, there were at least 30 or 40 men in the establishment, several of them newbies he had never seen before. They were, of course, all Gifteds, and all looking to fraternize with their own kind. Some were at the counter getting some drinks served to them by a 36D blonde who was so horny she had to stop to rub her cunt every few drinks she poured. Others had their cocks out and were getting blow jobs by one of the many hot girls that either were “with” the establishment or were brought in by patrons. And of course there was the usual crowd around the Sexual Duel arena where 2 Gifteds would use their powers on two girls in the centre of the arena to see who could create the hottest sex scene. At the moment, the current challenger had a girl with massive E breasts shoving them up another girls inhumanly stretched pussy, fucking her as the crowd watching cheered, both girls were screaming in ecstacy. Of course, none of that interested Tom at the moment, it might later on in the night, but right now he had more important things to do.

“Hey Tom boy, who’s the chick?”

Tom smiled at the question and walked to the back of the room where the owner, Abram was. He waved a finger to Deanna and like a puppy she quickly ran up to him.

Abram, a towering man of middle-eastern decent looked approvingly at the girl then back at the unassuming boy who had total control over her. “Pretty hot man, so who is she?”

Tom chuckled a bit, a deliberate delay to set up the big answer, “Deanna Jackson.”

Abram blinked. “Deanna Jackson? Yo.. you mean...” His voice trailed off, his mind still trying to comprehend the gravity of what his young, brash friend had just done.

Another chuckle. “Oh yeah, Alicia Parker’s girlfriend.”

Abram paled. “You, you know she’s going to come here right? When I let you in as a member last month, you promised you weren’t gonna start nothin, and you swore, like everyone else here, that you wouldn’t start no gifted war in my joint, or bring one in here.” He was shaking a little and walked over to the counter to get himself a drink.

If the older man’s concerns meant anything to Tom, he didn’t show it, if anything his smile just got bigger. “Hey don’t worry about it Abe, this isn’t me bringing in no war, I’ve barely even met this Alicia chick, but I found out her girl went to my school, and I said, why the fuck not?” He walked over to wear the owner was now sitting, half-slumped on a bar-stool. “Look, Alicia may be the most powerful female gifted out there, but she isn’t invincible and she sure as hell won’t be able to stand walking into a room full of male gifted’s with a huge lack of respect for the weaker sex, so don’t worry about it. In fact, think of it as a chance to expand the business. With Alicia as our main slut, imagine how much business you’d get, hell you might even be able to get a guy like Rick Evans or that Tempest dude to promote your club. You’d be the man when it comes to Gifted clubs.” Tom ended it at that and bought himself a drink from the 36d blonde mindlessly running the bar. He was obviously letting his words sink in and judging by the thoughtful look that had just fallen on his host’s face, they were indeed sinking in.

“Hmm...” Abram stroked his chin thoughtfully and Tom knew he had just sold his idea. Money didn’t mean anything to a Gifted, and for that matter, popularity among mundanes didn’t mean anything either, they lived in their own world after all, but popularity and reputation among Gifteds meant a lot. It was a dog eat dog world for Gifteds sometimes, and in a world with no law (except for the occasional tussle with the GJL) it was all about strength or hanging around those with strength, and bagging a female Gifted would go far for Abe’s rep and probably get him the respect of a real big guy like Rick or Tempest and clearly Abram was beginning to see it that way too.

“Hmm... okay, you have a point, but what do you get out of it huh?”

Tom laughed. “Saw right through me did you?”

Abram returned his smile, albeit not as warmly. “You never do anything without an angle boy. I figure you want a piece of the bar.”

“For starters, I’d also like to be able to take a couple of your girls whenever I need them.”

The older man thought about it for a few seconds. “All right, you can use my girls one day a week, but only two at a time and I want them returned in the same condition you got them. Also, I’ll cut you in as owner, say 20%.”

“Thirty.”

“Twenty five, don’t get greedy.”

Tom shrugged. “Twenty five it is then.” At that, they shook hands and Tom was having a parade inside. After all, it wasn’t the bar he wanted as much as the girls. It wasn’t like he couldn’t get his own girls of course, but Abram’s girls had been really worked over by Gifted powers and were very easy to work with. It was like using windows instead of DOS, everything was laid out and set up for you to play with, and you just had to click. Besides, he could examine them more closely in private and find out how to duplicate the work. Or better yet, and this was the real kicker, he could learn more about Abram’s techniques and take the old fart out later on. Tom smirked inwardly; yes things were just going to get better for him.

It was then that he felt it. Not as much felt as just knew that something had arrived, that someone had arrived. And he wasn’t the only one. All heads whipped to the door as they felt an enormous burst of Gifted power waft in, a power some knew and others had only felt in the memories of others. It was Alicia.

Tom tried his best not to gape. He had heard of her, had even gotten good desciptions of her, but to see her was another thing. It wasn’t precisely that she was hot, she was a feminist and a lesbian after all, making herself out to be a man’s playmate wouldn’t exactly make any sense, but she definitely caught people’s attention.

Standing at a few inches under 6 feet, Alicia was a very imposing woman, not in size (she wasn’t all that large) but just by her manner and dress. Her hair was black, cut short and gelled up with streaks of pink in it. She had 2 bangs of blondish hair swing down around her face framing it and her hair had a very loose and full look to it, not flat at all. Her eyes were like two green gemstones, her nose and lips were thin and matched the serious cut to her face. In terms of body, she was between a B and C cup (not that such things mattered to a Gifted as body could be changed as easily as clothes could) and had long athletic legs. She was wearing black army boots, black cargo pants and a dark purple t-shirt that looked deliberately ripped underneath a long black trenchcoat. Nose, lip and eyebrow piercings capped off her menacing yet pro-actively sexy look. And right now she didn’t look very pleased.

Tom decided to move first and got up, mentally making Deanna walk up next to him. “So you arrived after all.” He said in a slow, careful manner. He waved a hand over Deanna making her shudder in orgasm. “Too bad you hadn’t found me earlier, you would have caught your little girlfriend getting hooked on cock.” He smiled evily, knowing he had just hit a nerve.

Alicia didn’t say a word. She didn’t move a muscle, she didn’t grunt, she didn’t yell, she didn’t scream out or swear. No, she did nothing.

Three of the Gifted sitting at the table nearest her suddenly coughed up blood in unison and fell over their table. All three of them instantly... dead.

It was then that Tom decided that he wasn’t taking any more chances. He gave the mental command and everybody in the bar attacked.

Amazingly enough, Alicia stood her ground, her mental shield would not break, her will would not break, she would not give up when it came to her beloved. It was almost fourty against one and she was giving them a run for their money. Unfortunately, even those odds would have been steep for 10 Gifteds and she was just one, and inevitably she made a mistake, she faltered and soon one attacker snuck in, then another, then another, then... she hadn’t ever realized how much she liked men... not just liked, fantasized, admired, adored men. She tried to fight it, tried to fight them, tried to fight their cocks, their big throbbing cocks, their huge overpowering, pleasure causing cocks. Oh God, she wanted it, she wanted it deep in her pussy, she wanted...

It took Tom and the rest of the patrons of the bar about 40 seconds to get their thoughts away from the writhing female on the floor begging for a hard cock in her hole and to realize that they were now powerless and nobody in the room seemed to possess the Gift anymore. It took about fourty seconds to realize that, and another twenty to look at the doorway and see why.

Alan Storm smiled. “Did I interrupt something?”

III.

Storm strolled in calmly. He walked casually by the 3 dead men leaning over their table and even nonchalantly knocked one of them out of his path. The teenager walked into the centre of the room, stood atop the pool table and did a slow 360 turn observing the scene around him. Girls were having sex, girls were in the middle of going down on their men and one girl who looked remarkably familiar to him was lying on the ground begging for cock. Of course none of this really had anything to do with him, and none of it bothered him in the slightest. Alan had, after all, been in Gifted bars before. And just like before, he wasn’t at all intimidated at the prospect of being outnumbered either. However, unlike all those other times, he had one other advantage, everybody in the room was now on equal footing. Alan couldn’t be affected by the Gift anyways, but at least now his adversaries wouldn’t be able to change their physical strength either or communicate to each other mentally, nothing that could allow them to get the jump on him. And he knew and he knew that they knew it. So it was time to get down to business.

He took a deep breath. Starting simple was always preferred. He scanned the room, making eye-contact with as many people as he could. “I’m looking for Rick Evans. Anybody seen him, heard from or of him, or just in general want to tell me anything about him?” Alan waited a moment then sighed as he was greeted with blank and some condescending stares. He shrugged. “All right then. Let’s play a game then. It works like this; you don’t have any powers right now. I know you don’t have any powers, and you know you don’t have any powers. So there’s no point in dancing around that point. So we both know that you’re powerless. We also both know that you don’t like being powerless, which brings us to how can we find a solution to this that is mutually beneficial? Well, before I go any further, I’ll have to clarify your position first.” Alan reached into his inner jacket pocket and brought out a small device, it was about the size of a tennis ball, round and metallic with some buttons and lights on it. He held it out for everybody to see. “This is a psycho-neural field distabalizer. Without getting into the details of how it works, I’ll just tell you that it does work, and the fact that you don’t have any powers prove it. You see as long as this thing is functioning, none of you will be able to lord over the mundanes, hell none of you will be able to have any fun as long as I’m here, and I plan to be here for as long as it takes to get the information you want. And if any of you try to leave...” In a blur, Alan had spun around with his gun in his right hand and fired a point blank shot pegging a brown haired fellow who had just tried to escape through the front door.

It wasn’t luck and it wasn’t ESP that Alan had known this, it was simply another side-effect of the mental overload he got at the hands of Rick. Not only was he immune to the Gift but he had a sixth sense that allowed him to feel the movements of any Gifteds in the area. It wasn’t very detailed, but he had gotten the hang of knowing what each minute jolt meant. He felt another one and swung his gun to track a thin tall boy who was about to sneak out the back door. “I wouldn’t try that if I were you. See, this is how it is... you have two choices. Life is all about choices, so it’s only fair that I give you one. Either you tell me where Rick is and I’ll let you guys go, of course, you’ll lose the bar, the girls and anything else I deem isn’t yours, but at least you’ll be alive and have your powers. Or... and think long and hard about this. Or... you try to take this little doohicky from me.” He tossed the device up and down in his hand. “It’s really up to you.”

He looked at them, they looked at him. He pocketed the device back into his jacket pocket, they began reaching for bottles, pool cues and chairs. He smiled, put his gun away and pulled out a smallish metal tube. They advanced. He pressed a button on the tube and from either end more metal tubes linked together shot out until he was holding a long metallic bo-staff in his hand. They looked wary for a second, but only a second, and charged. Alan grinned. “Wrong choice.”

* * *

The last thing Tom remembered was charging that mundane who had just invaded the bar. Well, actually that was the second last thing. The last thing he remembered was seeing a large metal pole head straight at his face and then everything went black. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs out of his brain. Jeez, what the hell happened? He tried to get up and realized that something in his leg was broken. Instinctively he tried to use the Gift to heal himself as was shocked and dismayed to find out that it was still missing. Shit. He found a chair sitting on its side near him, put his hand on it and propped himself up a little to see what the hell had happened. The sight that greeted him was shocking. Gifteds were laying everywhere, some were bloody, some were more than bloodied. Many had their limbs bent at strange angles. Tom tried to pull himself up again but failed, his foot slipping on a pool of blood under him, his body collapsed under its own weight and the pain he felt caused him to scream aloud.

That proved to be a mistake.

Alan Storm sighed in frustration as he threw another unconscious Gifted to the floor. He was not one for patience, and having to wait for somebody, anybody to wake up, was not his strong suit. Dammit. God fucking dammit. Why couldn’t people just tell him what he wanted to know instead of trying to fight him? There were easier ways to save face. Easier and safer ways. Alan sighed again. This was utterly moronic. All he needed was a small piece of information, all he needed was... a scream? Hmm, it looked like somebody was awake after all.

Storm pulled out his gun and walked over to the noise. An average sized brown haired kid with an obvious broken ankle lay slumped on the ground, struggling to get up. Alan, being a nice guy, decided to help him and grabbed the kid by his neck lifting him up onto the table nearby and slamming him down on it.

“What do you know about Rick Evans? Where is he?” His voice was low and menacing, not an act at all, but exactly what he was feeling, all the rage, all the hatred he had for Gifteds and Rick in particular was beginning to flow out, he had no more time to waste of this bag of scum anymore, all he needed was a simple answer and by God he was fucking going to get it!

Tom, the eternal survivor, stammered out the best reply he could. “I… I don’t know... I really… don’t... fuck, that hurts.. I don’t KNOW!!!”

Alan pointed the gun right at Tom’s ribs. “Not good enough. Wanna try again?”

“Look... look man! Don’t shoot me! I don’t know anything about Rick! I was thinking of getting in contact with him but I had no idea how! That’s why I wanted to lure Alicia here, she knew, she’d been keeping tabs on him I heard. But I don’t know anything!!!” Tom’s face was getting really pale and sweaty, his panic was clearly evident, he had just gotten used to being in charge and now he didn’t have his security blanket to give him confidence. He was a man broken.

The pressure of the gun lessened a little, but only a little. “You don’t know, but you know somebody who does. Who’s this Alicia girl?”

Tom felt a bit of relief, he was going to get out of this alive after all. A little more confidence came back to him. So what if he didn’t have the Gift? He still had his Gift of talking his way out of situations. He was the eternal survivor. “Alicia’s a gifted chick. She’s over there on the floor, you see her.”

Alan did indeed see her and finally recognized her. Alicia Parker, the strongest female Gifted known to exist. He didn’t know much about her since she had committed no major criminal acts to his knowledge, but he did know that she was a lesbian and sometimes had a tendency to go over board in punishing what she saw as male crimes against women (though he had to agree, she had a point sometimes, especially when it came to punishing men for rape). But she wasn’t a lesbian nor a feminist (and he knew of course that both were not the same thing) right now, in fact she seemed like a cock-hungry whore. “She doesn’t look like she’d be any help to me at the moment.” He muttered.

Tom was growing more confident by the minute. “That’s because she’s undergone a bit of an attitude change. She’s become a real woman, you know, not a womyn like she used to be.” He said it in such a mocking tone that the word came out as “womine”. “But look, I can help you. You just let me go, you know, forget this whole thing, I’ll fix her up and...”

Alan had stopped listening to him and was fiddling with a binocular type device that he had pulled out of his pocket. He scanned Alicia and then scanned Tom. Once satisfied, he pocketed the device once more and turned to Tom.

“That won’t be neccesary.”

Tom blinked. “Pardon?”

Alan looked amused. “You’re stuck.”

Tom wasn’t following at all and was wondering what this had to do with him getting out of here alive. “I know I’m stuck but it’s just a broken ankle, if you let your dampening field go...”

“That’s not what I meant. You’re mentally stuck. You didn’t close your connection with Alicia before I walked in. See, technology is still trying to get the hang of the Gift. We can’t say, fix something that’s already happened and been closed off, such as say, those girls over there by the betting table, those girls are beyond our abilities. But what technology and the people who use it, can do, is go into an open connection and eradicate any Gifted threads left there. What that means in short, is that once the change has been fixed, the connection closed off, we don’t know where to start to fix things. But if it’s open, we can send a burst in and clear it all out. We can’t choose what to get rid of, but at least we can get rid of it.” Alan paused as he saw Tom trying to get in a word.

“What does this have to do with me?”

Alan smiled, a cold, uncaring smile. “Well, you didn’t finish off when I walked in, you were still in her mind, still playing around with her. You, my friend, still had your connection open, but not just that, you were still in it. So you’re stuck. You’re in the way. The connection is open, but there’s something jammed in it and it’s your thread.”

The gravity of what Alan was implying finally began to dawn on Tom and he wasn’t liking it one bit. “Hey! Look, we can make a deal, we can still work this out, I can...”

Alan’s voice was stone cold as he interrupted. “As I said, your thread has jammed up the opening, preventing me from fixing the damage and the only way to clear it...” Suddenly he swung his gun up and over, pointing it straight at Tom’s head. “Is to cut the thread.”

“Hey wait!!! No!! Please!! We ca...”

And those were the last words that came out of Tom’s mouth. His dreams of unlimited sex, of rubbing noses with the elite, of owning a bar, all of it, disappeared at that moment. Everything that he was, that he could have been, disappeared in the time it took to pull the trigger. Today was supposed to have been his greatest day, but life had a way of fucking things up sometimes, and so did Alan Storm.

IV.

“Who the hell are you working for!?”

“I can’t tell you! I can’t..”

“Wrong answer!” Jerome’s sentence was cut off as Trent hurled the large black teen clear across his spartan apartment slamming him into the nearest wall.

Trent advanced on him, angrier and more threatening. “Look asshole. I’m sick of your traps, I’m sick of you messing up a perfectly good woman’s life and I’m getting sick of you!” Jerome tried to get back on his feet, tried to focus himself to launch another mental attack but Trent was ready for both, stuffing his thread and smashing a fist hard into his temple. The darker-skinned Gifted collapsed in a heap, but could only lay in that heap for a few seconds before Trent hauled him back up and threw him against the wall. “Look, you WILL tell me who you’re working for! And you’re going to tell me before I really get mad.”

Jerome again tried to sputter out an answer. “Lo..look... I can’t tell you! I just can’t! Please!! I’m really sorry! I’ll help her, but I can’t betray my boss, I just...” And that was it for his ability to stay conscious for the next ten minutes as Trent threw him hard the big screen television on the far side of the room. The hefty teen lay there in a heap, his head smashed into the previously very useful appliance.

Trent sighed and slumped against the couch. This wasn’t going well at all. As if having to avoid the trap set for him wasn’t bad enough, now the guy wasn’t being very forthcoming about what he was really involved in and Trent had this nagging feeling that he was involved in something big. He had no proof of course, but there was something about Jerome’s demeanor, something that showed that he was scared of more than just being arrested, or even being killed. Whoever his boss was, he was deathly afraid of him. Of course, it wasn’t like Trent COULD threaten him with death because that wasn’t in Trent’s way, he wasn’t the killing type. Trent was many things, he had harsher ideas of punishment than say, Colt, and he certainly wasn’t a nice guy in a fight, but killing wasn’t in his way, at least not killing in cold blood, and right now, if he killed Jerome, it would definitely be in cold blood. But what could he do now but try again and take the information out of him? He sighed, looked at the black kid, prepared a thread and dived in.

His brain was insanely cluttered. Obviously the guy had not had the Gift for very long. In fact... and this was starting to scare Trent a bit, the guy didn’t have the Gift at all. At least not THE GIFT, not the the Gift that he, Colt, Rick and all the other Gifteds he knew had. It wasn’t fully formed, in fact, it was very rudimentary, almost like it was a mere shadow or copy of the Gift, almost like a man-made thing. Trent couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Jerome had his body changed all right, but not by him, the kid didn’t have the ability to change the physical form, nor did he have the ability to manipulate minds thoroughly. He had a more instinctive, primal Gift. It allowed him to make women more attracted to him, to make men more scared of him, to put a latent command into things he said, but he didn’t have full control over it, and he probably had no idea why he had the powers that he did. And it wasn’t complete. Trent got the feeling from the look of it, whatever “it” was, that this was nothing more than an experiment, but an experiment in what? He kept digging, trying to find out what Jerome knew, what secrets he had tried to conceal but to no avail, something seemed to be impeding his path, like an invisible wall, something was keeping him out.

Trent gaped at it for a minute. It was certainly a piece of work. Layers and layers of traps and pitfalls, barrier after barrier around it, and the coup de grace, a small program that prevented whatever secrets were inside from being leaked out even by the host. If the secrets were leaked out, if Jerome even thought it, he would die. Now Trent began to understand. It wasn’t that Jerome wouldn’t say who he was working for, but that he COULDN’T. He just wasn’t allowed to. The program simply prevented him from saying it on pain of death. This was unbelievable! Trent had never seen anything quite like it, nor was he particularly pleased that he was seeing it for the first time now. Who the hell was behind this? Who could have...

And then it dawned on him and a chill ran up his spine. The kid. This was just like the kid. Well, almost like him, but it was very similar. It wasn’t the style that was similar exactly, or the particular weaves, or anything tangible, it was just... the concept. The whole all-or-nothing strategy. The “if you try to find the secret I will destroy the person who holds it” approach. It was very sinister, and very disturbing and at that moment Trent just felt like he had just stumbled on the tip of a very large iceberg and he was just beginning to realize how big it really was.

But what could he do? He had to figure out what was going on somehow. He had to figure out how to crack that program without triggering a memory wipe or even worse, instant death. Trent took a deep breath, considered his strategy briefly then went in.

It wasn’t easy at all. Trent was quick, probably the quickest and most deft of any Gifted, but this was becoming incredibly taxing. Every thread he cut seemed to have a backup trap attached to it. He kept working, slowly picking it apart, slowly trying to find a weakness in it, poking and prodding at it, but nothing was happening. He couldn’t seem to find an opening, couldn’t find a solution to the puzzle. The strain was incredible. Whoever had built this either had spent a good decade working on it, or... he didn’t want to consider the or—this was impossible!

Trent couldn’t take it anymore and pulled out, closing his connection. This was insane. What the fuck was he supposed to do? He slammed his hands down on a nearby coffee table in exasperation. “What the fuck am I supposed to do!?” He screamed out in frustration. It was a purely rhetorical question of course, he hadn’t expected an answer.

However, he got an answer.

“Die.”

Trent spun around and had the briefest image of a dark lumbering, all to familiar silhouette, before nothing but sharp flashing white teeth consumed his vision.

V.

Colt was nowhere and everywhere. He was at every point in time, at every possible outcome of every possible decision, and yet, he wasn’t. He existed, but had no comprehension of how he existed. He had no idea what was going on, and yet, in the vaguest, most primal sense, he had every idea what was going on. Images, thoughts, words, phrases, ideas, sounds, feelings all flooded through him, bombarding him, soaking him. It was a dream and yet... it wasn’t a dream. A portent, maybe, of things to come, or things that would never be. It was all too much, and yet, he couldn’t look away, couldn’t shut it out, all he could do, was watch and listen and feel and smell and taste and learn.

He saw his sister Sherri, but not as she was now, but as she used to be, as how she should be, younger, less developed, but yet, harsher, her face was not hers, it was... different. He didn’t know how or why it was different, it didn’t look different, yet he sensed it was. There were two swords fighting, one was larger than the other. The smaller one faltered and she reached for it and it grew and smote the larger one. Then it faded to black and before Colt could think about the meaning a new image appeared.

Brandy. It was Brandy. Colt tried to say something, to ask her what was going on, but found he had no influence over the images, he was but the audience. Colt was suddenly holding a dildo. He had no idea where it came from or why he was holding it only that he was. Brandy walked up to him and bent over. Colt had no idea what was going on, it was like a dream, yet there was something real about it. He found he had no control of his actions as he shoved the dildo deep in her pussy. Suddenly blood began to leak out from her hole. The blood began to flow and he knew that it was not her blood but the blood of others and it poured out and soaked Colt. She then walked up to him and took the dildo out and gave it to him. He held the plastic cock up and broke it. Brandy then touched Colt and the blood that soaked him vanished.

It continued, faster now, more urgent. It was a baseball game. Colt was up. The bases with loaded with 2 outs in the 3rd inning, but he struck out. Suddenly it was the 9th inning, Colt was on second base, they were down by 1. A hit was made and Colt ran and as he rounded third the base coach was waving him home, but he stopped, the runner behind him was bearing down and realized that Colt wasn’t heading home. The other runner tried to get back to second but got thrown out. Trent was next and he hit a fly ball deep, Colt saw that it would be caught by the outfielder. It was caught, but Colt ran to home plate and made it. Trent walked towards the dugout, but it was on fire and Trent was consumed by it.

There was a hawk, it flew in the sky proudly. Around it were fields full of mice. It flew towards them and feasted on them. Then it laid an egg and from it a hawkling came out. The smaller hawk had claws of fire and the mice it touched turned to char. It did not eat any of them. The smaller hawk soon grew and became larger than its parent and then destroyed the older hawk with its fiery talons.

Nothing made sense anymore. It was all so insane. Colt clutched his head as one last vision approached him.

It was Jade, his love, but she wasn’t alone. There were 3 birds attached to her. One was a robin holding her wrist, another was a crow holding her ankle, the third was a dove holding her other ankle. Colt head flapping next to his ears and saw that he had wings as well. He was the fourth bird, an eagle and he was holding her other wrist. He tried to pull her away, towards him, but he could not, the other birds were just as strong as he, although he was the eagle. Finally, he stopped and let go, and all the others let go as well. Jade, now freed, gathered all four birds in her arms and held them to her chest. Colt felt warm and loved. He felt his feathers press against her warm breast....

And then like a sudden rainstorm, it was over. Everything faded to black and Colt was left with nothing but metaphor and strange images to deal with. He had no idea what they meant, had no idea what had happened, only that it meant something. He had no idea what, but the five images, the five visions, weren’t just a random collection of happenings, but were something. Maybe they were future, or maybe they were the past. Or maybe they were warnings of what was to come, or what would never happen, or perhaps they were events that would happen no matter what. Perhaps they were events etched in stone that would happen, and would happen no matter what Colt knew or did, for the future was the future.

Colt had no answer. He had no idea of what they meant, or what their significance in the grand scheme of things were. He had no grasp on where to start looking. At that moment, he knew less than he ever did, even less than he did at birth. The universe was more closed off to him now than it ever had been before and possibly ever would be again. For Colt had gotten knowledge he knew he was not meant to have, and such knowledge was so powerful, so intense, that it was humbling. There was no order to the images. He knew that for certain. Colt had no idea how he knew, he just knew. Well there was an order and there wasn’t. The order he saw them in was of no consequence. He knew that. But there was an order to them. He just had no idea what.

He had no idea of anything anymore. He had so much on his mind already and now he had more. And he wasn’t ready to deal with it, not yet not now. He still had no idea where he was. Or why he was. He wasn’t even sure that if he was. The darkness encompassing him was threatening to engulf him. It was thick and murky and almost tangible. It wasn’t an absence of light, it was just darkness.

Suddenly there was a bright flash around him. He had no idea where it came from. But it was beginning to grow. The light was white, pure white, and was slowly filling the void, filling his mind and he began to remember. He remembered the trap, the girl, the box, the enemy, it all began flooding back and he remembered much more than that. He remembered the capture, the bonds that held him, and he saw them, he saw them not as they looked, but as they were and he realized that he had a chance now to prepare himself, to ready himself for reality. And the darkness around him vanished.

VI.

“I see you’re finally awake.”

Colt blinked his eyes as he began to regain consciousness. The room was bright, and he had no idea how long he’d been out, but his eyes needed much adjustment.

“I hope you’re all right, it seemed like you were dreaming.”

That voice. Colt knew that voice. Knew it not by experience, not by tangible, first-person hearing, but by hearing the voice in other people’s minds. He knew who was holding him even without being able to see him.

“Steve.”

The voice sounded slightly surprised but tried to mask it with confidence. “Yes, that’s right. I’m glad you recognize me. I didn’t know I was so famous, but maybe I should have.” The voice began to get closer, and Colt started to make out a shape from all the light. “It’s too bad that you had to show up in such unfortunate circumstances. You know, if you hadn’t come to arrest me, we could have been friends.”

Colt blinked some more to clear his vision. “Friends? You don’t have friends Steve. You only have tools and toys.” He was seeing better now. The man in front of him was becoming more clear. “Those you use and those you can get pleasure out of. We could never have been friends.”

Steve chuckled, it was not a pleasent sound. “You’re right of course.” He walked closer and Colt now finally saw his opponent. Steve was tallish, with short brown hair and piercing blue eyes. He wore a silver vest over a black t-shirt and dark black jeans. There wasn’t the slightest bit of sensitivity in his eyes. “But I don’t need friends do I? I have all the power in the world, and I can have anything I want.”

Colt focused his mind. There was a mind shield around him, but he had expected that. However, the shield wasn’t the issue. What Steve didn’t know was that right before the blast, Colt had sent a small piece of his consciousness, of his Gift out, far out to beyond the usable part of his mind, to beyond his consciousness, to beyond even his instincts, to as far as he could reach. And he placed it there, on the teetering edge of his mind, as a piece of salvation. Mind shields tended to be rather thick, especially, Colt knew, one that would be needed to contain him. In order to contain Colt, the shield would have to encompass his entire mind and consciousness, but its thickness would mean that it would be larger than it and that was where his small shard of himself would come into play. Where it sat was right in the middle of the shield and it was programmed to destroy any Gifted thread that surrounded it. All Colt needed to do was wait a little bit and the shield would be gone.

No, the shield wasn’t the problem. The bigger problem was the shackles that currently kept Colt in place. The Gift allowed him jurisprudence over the biological and mental world, but the physical was another problem. He couldn’t very well increase his muscular strength to break out unfortunately, because Steve would sense it before he was finished and no doubt would kill him on the spot. There had to be another way. All he had to do was find it. But in the meantime, he still had a conversation to carry on. “Everybody needs friends Steve.”

His opponent looked bored. “No they don’t. They just think they do. Mundanes, regular people, hell even you, lead such boring, inadequate lives. You don’t try new things, you don’t take risks. You don’t try to push the limits of our existence, of our world. Hell, even now, even with the Gift, even with this ability to manipulate existence, you still don’t explore, still don’t delve into the possibilities. And that’s why you and everybody else like you, feels the need to have friends. You want to hear gossip, you want to listen to other people’s experiences, you want to have somebody hold you down while you go looking for new things. You’re cowards. You’re cowards at heart and you don’t want to admit it. You want to hear about something so you don’t have to risk trying it. You don’t have any sense of exploration, or adventure!” He pulled out a chair and sat down on it backwards, legs spread on either side of the back, his hands resting on it.

Colt looked angry. “So we should be more like you right? More open to new ideas? Steve the explorer, Steve the pilgrim, Steve the discoverer of new worlds, is that it? We haven’t mutilated enough women? Haven’t tried enough disgusting acts? Is that what you’re telling me?” His eyes scanned around him, hoping to find something, anything he could use to make his escape when the time came.

“You make it sound so sordid.” Steve sighed in a way that made him seem like somebody who was trying to explain a simple math equation to a child. “Don’t you ever wonder about the ifs? About the buts? About everything that happens around you? Do you ever wonder about pain? Or the equation of pain and pleasure? Do you wonder about emotions like disgust and anguish and happiness and joy? Do you wonder why we feel what we feel, or why we are who we are? That’s what this Gift allows us to answer Colt. That’s what this Gift has allowed ME to answer. The infinite questions that are out there to be answered.”

“And you’re the one who can answer them?”

“Not the only one, no, but I am the one who is trying.” Steve looked almost proud of himself. “See, you see one of my girls, and you think it’s disgusting. You think using a human being as a toilet is disturbing. But what’s disturbing to you, really, is society’s conditioning of you. There are people, believe or not, that find such acts to be erotic. I, admittedly, am not one of them, but... what’s that saying? Walk a mile in another man’s shoes? And that’s what I’m doing. And I can track my subject’s response. I can even make her respond in a different manner. Isn’t that amazing? She can equate a disgusting act with pleasure and make it a pleasurable act. Which proves that we aren’t hardwired to think in a certain way. In fact, if I change just her memories, I can still affect the way she reacts. It’s marvellous really.”

Dammit. Colt racked his brain. He desperately needed a way out soon, if not to escape but to throttle the guy. “And you have no problem with the lives you’ve destroyed, with the pain you’ve caused? These are human beings we’re talking about!” What the hell were these shackles made of anyways?

“Lives I’ve destroyed? Pain I’ve caused.” Steve laughed once more. “What lives have I destroyed? Humans are born, they go to school, go to university, work, retire and die. Over and over and over again ad nauseum. Until what? Until the sun goes nova? Until the ozone breaks down and we all are fried? What exactly is this wonderful life I’m depriving people of? Of freedom? What’s freedom? We’re all slaves to our brains, all slaves to the particular emotions, to the particular feelings and thoughts our synaptic patterns give us. We’re slaves to the environment we live in, slaves to the ideas that are around at the time. From our birth to our death we have no freedom because our brains, our biological computers, are jails. But this Gift allows me to change that. And I’ve caused no pain. My girls are all very happy, and isn’t happiness the true definition of success in life? They will never be harmed physically, and if they do, it’ll disappear. No permanent damage or unhappiness is ever caused. And if they don’t remember it, then it never happened, for what is history but memory? Don’t presume to take the moral high ground with me. You’re the one who arrests Gifteds. You’re the one who wants to turn a gift into a curse.”

Metal. Metal! That was it! His shackles were made of metal, and not a particularly strong metal and rusty too. And where there was rust there was bacteria. Colt focussed on the bacteria and made them multiply faster, eat faster. “There’s such a thing as too much freedom Steve. One can go too far. And you’ve gone too far. You can’t do this to innocent girls!” C’mon, faster dammit.

Steve looked annoyed. He got off his chair and walked to the far side of the room and took something out of a bag. “That’s easy for you to say isn’t it? You who used girls so liberally before and still won’t release the changes on them even now. You who decided to be a good boy AFTER you had your fun! You make me sick. But I’m tired of talking; I’m tired of trying to explain myself.” He brought the object closer and Colt saw that it was a knife and a rather fancy one at that with lots of jagged edges and curves. “I’m going to have fun slicing you into ribbons, peeling the skin off you. Just another experiment, just another...”

That was when the shackles and Steve’s mind shield broke. Colt leapt forward like lightning bolt and slammed straight into Steve. Steve stumbled but gathered himself quickly, more angry than shocked. He held the knife high and charged.

Colt dodged easily and kneed Steve right in the midsection. Steve keeled over and Colt floored him with a stiff uppercut. Taking this chance, while Steve was down and woozy, Colt dove into his mind and sealed him off from the Gift, completely and as thoroughly as he could, putting up as many mind traps and shields as he could. Like Colt, Steve’s Gift was developed enough that it couldn’t be removed from him, but that wasn’t in Colt’s game plan at the moment. Later on, in the comfort of the GJL, he and Jade or Sherri could make Steve’s “castration” permanent, but for now Colt’s manipulations would have to do.

He looked down at the once powerful Gifted villain. He saw the hatred in his eyes, the anger, yet he also saw disappointment, honest disappointment and pain. Steve had lost more than a battle; he had lost a chance to explore the world, to explore his desires. It was a chance that Colt sometimes wanted and sometimes feared. He wondered, inwardly, if Steve was right. If he really was afraid. But now wasn’t the time to worry about such things. He still had to find the girls that Steve had captured and fix them.

Colt smiled as he put cuffs on Steve and dragged him out. Whatever problems were out there on the horizon, he could deal with, after all, he wasn’t the top Gifted in the world for nothing.

VII.

Trent hit the wall hard. Venom didn’t even wait for him to land before pouncing again. Tendril’s whipped out from his body, razor sharp, ready to shred him into bloody ribbons. Trent, of course, had no intention of letting that happen. He reached out and grabbed a handfull of the tentacles and pulled his much larger adversary towards him. As the huge mass approached, Trent shot out his feet and slammed a powerful double footed kick straight into the monster’s head. Venom fell hard but got up immediately, obviously in some pain, but not letting that slow him down. As quickly as he had recovered, the beast was in full charge once again, aiming to take his prey down. Unfortunately for him, Trent had not survived this long just to quit and leapt clear out of his way.

Venom let out a bestial roar that shook the room. Damn Trent and his enhanced abilities, the same enhanced abilities that Venom held inside of him. He faced off against his enemy, against his blood rival, for what seemed like the billionth time. “We will have your blood this time; we will stop you from hurting others.”

Trent looked relaxed, but his body was far from it, tensed and ready to leap. “Look Von, how many times do I have to tell you, I’m not the bad guy here!”

Von, Venom, it didn’t matter anymore, they were one and the same, stared angrily, his large fanged mouth opened into a menacing smile. “We have much reason to doubt your credibility we do. We are not interested in talk, nor are we interested in your excuses. We came here not for you, but to track down some scum, but we find you here. It is not surprising we suppose, as scum tend to hang together. Perhaps you were helping him?” At that he lunged.

Trent leapt once again out of the way, this time landing a quick kick to Von’s temple in the process. “You’re absolutely insane did you know that?” He was shouting now, it seemed like the only way to get through to him (or was it them?), if there was any way to at all. “I was here to find out what I could from that idiot as well! But at least I don’t feel the need to rip people apart to find things out!” This time Trent was on the attack, jumping at his adversary with his arm cocked back for a hard punch.

Venom caught it easily and slammed Trent hard into the wall over and over and over again like a toy. He didn’t let go of his arm when he stopped either and held him there in front of his face, in front of all his teeth. “You of all people should understand the need for justice, the need to destroy those who do wrong. You created our better half, you created us! It is fitting that we should destroy you then, before we let you destroy any more lives.” He shot his tongue out and wrapped it around Trent’s throat, squeezing, waiting to here that delicious sound of his neck snapping, of his arteries bursting. He had waited an eternity to hear that sound.

What Venom had not expected to hear however, was the sound of his own voice screaming in pain. In desperation Trent grabbed his tongue and pulled hard, so hard, so unexpectedly, that Von thought that his head was about to be ripped off, which of course was never a danger. The pain was, however, enough to force him to let go of Trent and recover.

Trent hit the ground and rolled to safety. He got up and breathed hard. This was absolutely insane. Why the hell wouldn’t Von leave him alone? But he knew why, he knew Von, he knew all his reasons, he knew this monster in front of him all too well, for the human part of Venom was once Trent’s best friend, and the other half, was once Trent’s other half.

It was a long story, as most everything in his life was. The short summary was this: Von Appollito was Trent’s best friend back in high school. He was also unpopular, though not neccesarily a smart guy, but he was strong-willed and always wanted to be the best. He didn’t have Trent’s killer-instinct however, and it meant in sports games (and especially hockey which Trent was the star and leader of the team), Trent would be the one who didn’t choke and Von was the one who could never come through in the clutch. Even in fighting games such as Street Fighter or King of Fighters, Trent would win and Von would lose. And it wasn’t like Trent was the absolute best at everything since he was also notoriously lazy. But Trent always, always beat Von, he got the girls ahead of Von (who never got any), he got the marks, even if Von worked at it (although he never really did), and he beat the tar out of him in each and every competition. And then one day Von got the Gift and he wreaked havoc on Trent’s town, school and family. Von did horrible things that Trent wanted to forget but never could and the new Gifted had humiliated who was supposed to be his best friend. It was a horrible period of time for Trent, until one day he got the Gift as well. Although it was an uphill battle, he eventually found and soundly defeated Von with a desperate come-from-behind victory, even though Von had by far the mostthe experience. Trent then proceeded to strip him of the Gift. So Von’s quest for power ended in humilation and worse yet, Trent made him forget it all, and go back to being the regular Von, but without being so bitter. Now he was like a faithful puppy.

Trent stopped thinking. Venom was back up. He steeled himself as the monster lunged once more. Trent rolled out of the way and shot out a leg for a sweep but Venom dodged deftly and swiped a claw at him. Trent hopped out of the way and threw a punch which was blocked but his elbow wasn’t. And so they danced once more, jumping, punching, blocking, kicking, biting, clawing, doing anything they could to win the battle. Finally Venom missed on a vicious backhand and Trent clubbed him hard two-handed sending him careening away. He stayed in a crouching position, ready to hop out of the way at the first sign of danger, that blow wouldn’t do anything but wind Von for a few seconds.

He wished that their battle on top of the school had been the final one. He wished that this chapter of his life would have been closed at that. But of course, these things never ended tidily. Trent, several months later, found another consciousness. One, he would find out later, that was alien. He had no idea where it came from, except that when it was with him, he had the faintest idea that it was some sort of predator, that it was the last remnants of what was a great alien killer, like the great white of another galaxy. At first it was great. Trent’s body had been enhanced permenantly by his fierce battle against Von and the alien only helped to further exagerrate his abilities. He could jump further, fight harder, run faster, everything, but there was more to the alien than he realized. It wanted blood, it needed to feed and it wanted him to help him do it. This of course wasn’t what Trent had in mind when he had met the creature and he desperately tried to get the damned thing out of him. It took every ounce of energy he had and it was only at the end that he realized that the thing took on all his characteristics including his fears and by bringing it into proximity with spiders (Trent was deeply afraid of spiders), he was able to drive it out of his psyche. But of course, it didn’t die. It left Trent and went looking for another suitable host, and by coincidence found Von. Trent had no idea how they met, but they had, and Von quickly realized everything that had happened, from his brief ascent to power to Trent beating the tar out of him and this realization turned immediately to hatred. They were a match made in heaven, Von’s lust for power, lust for revenge being perfect fuel for the being’s need for blood and flesh. They became one, and Von, who had always been a big comic buff, recognized the similarties between what he now as and Venom, and decided to become Venom, right down to the black costume and large sharp fangs. And so “Venom” had sought out Trent and attempted to kill him, and of course Trent had avoided death each and every time. This of course didn’t stop them from tangoing over and over again. What made it even more difficult was that the being had given Trent’s powers to Von, and so they were more or less evenly matched except that Von was much stronger due to the creature’s innate predatory persuasion. The only weakness Venom had was vibrations and especially high-frequency vibration. Von had been trapped in an earthquake as a kid, and that experience had haunted him until even now, and since the creature took on the fears of it’s host, intense vibrations was the only weakness Von really had. Unfortunately, Trent wasn’t able to produce seismic shocks at a whim, and so they usually had to duke it out.

Speaking of which. Trent quickly dodged the couch that Venom had hurled at him. “Look this is moronic! We’re both here for the same reason!”

Venom, however, wasn’t about to let a little thing like logic get in the way of his revenge. And he made that clear with several tentacles sent in Trent’s direction. “We care little for your reasons for being here. Our reasons are in the best interests of justice. But at the moment, we simply want to dispose of you!”

Trent avoided the tendrils as best he could, dodging some, punching others away. “You’ve got absolutely no grasp on reality you know that!?” He rolled quickly to avoid having his ears lopped off.

Venom didn’t let up and tried again with his razor sharp limbs. “Reality is a relative concept. We never did well in philosophy so we apologize if our views are not to your liking.”

Realizing that there were too many tentacles to deal with, Trent decided to switch strategies and chucked a loveseat at Von, which forced him to use his tendrils as a shield rather than to attack. “Look, I really don’t have time to argue with you Von, right no...”

The slamming of a door caught their attention.

Venom turned to the sound almost as quickly as Trent did. “You idiot! You let him get aw...”

Trent cut him off. “Shut up! What the hell is that sound?”

Venom did indeed shut up, though rather reluctantly. He listened carefully. “It appears to be a beeping of some sort.”

“Beeping?” Trent looked confused. “But I thought I shut off that bomb when I came i...” His voice trailed off as he realized what had just happened.

Venom stared at him. “Bomb?”

The beeping stopped.

VIII.

Alan held the device over Alicia’s now-still body. He had been forced to give her a tranquilizer to stop her from acting like such a slut which was becoming quite tiresome and made it difficult to treat her.

Slowly he scanned her body with the device and then pressed a few buttons, causing 2 metal prongs to shoot out from the tip. Those were the antennae that would initiate the clean-sweep. He entered in the final command and watched as the prongs glowed a bright red, then turned to blue, then slowly began to fade in colour as the process ended. It was fascinating to watch, especially since he had no idea that Alicia had changed her body that much. Slowly her body turned back to the way it was, the way her true self was. Her hair returned to its original shoulder length, it turned a dark brown and became thin, flat and wavy. Her eyes became grey/green, her breasts shrank at least a cup-size and a half, and her body shortened. She lost muscle and gained a couple of pounds, her legs were short and chubby, and her bottom was less well-formed and larger. Her top half was still thinnish, but it didn’t match her bottom too well. Her skin also returned to its original state of disrepair. She was a completely different girl. Alan felt almost like he had just watched her strip naked. He knew something of the Gifted ways, having hunted them for so long. Seeing a Gifted in his or her original form was the most private thing that could be shown to a person, and usually meant something special. Alan felt almost like he was raping her.

Alicia’s eyes slowly fluttered open, regaining consciousness. She looked like she was trying to figure out what had happened. Alan almost wished that she couldn’t know. She looked up at him and he tried his best to smile, but it was hard because Alan wasn’t the smiling type. He settled for something between concern and nothing.

Alan knew he had to say something. She looked so conflicted, trying to process her memories of what had happened and the strange new (or was that old?) sensations from her body. But what could he say? He didn’t feel bad, even though he knew he should, but it was war, and people got hurt in wars, or worse. Finally, he looked down at her and tried his best to sound disarming. “I had no choice.” It came out cold.

Alicia looked confused. “You’re the Gifted Hunter. What are you doing here? What do you mean no choice? No choice to...?” Then she stopped. She felt it. She was nervous. Really nervous. Her shyness was back, she had no confidence, no... she looked down and almost shrieked. Her body. Everything, her legs, her ass, her breasts, everything was back to the way it was. She was the old Alicia, the Alicia she wanted to bury, the weak Alicia, the Alicia that couldn’t come to terms with her homosexuality, the one who wanted to be popular. She wanted to cry, except... she didn’t. Because she felt it. The Gift was still there. Thank God, the Gift was still there!

Seeing the relief in her eyes, Alan knew what she had felt. “No, you didn’t lose it. I had to do a clean-sweep, which meant wiping out everything.” He stopped at that. He felt something else needed to be said, some words, distant words he no longer knew how to say, no longer wanted to say, no longer cared to say. Alan thought of an alternative. “You have the gift, you’ll be okay.” It sounded uncaring, but it was true, she would be okay. Luckily for her, he thought bitterly, the change is far from permanent. There was absolutely no reason for sympathy. She was a Gifted, she had the power to heal herself from almost any injury, physical or otherwise. She was the lucky one.

Alicia got up slowly and waved off Alan’s hand. She hobbled off into a corner and crouched down. Alan could see nothing but the back of her trenchcoat. Slowly she changed, it was like watching a person take a leak, you knew it was private act and it was uncomfortable watching, but Alan stood there, hands folded, watching blankly. People could be so obsessed with embarrassment sometimes. There were more important things in life than modesty and niceties. You could learn a lot by watching people take leaks, just by how they stood, and if Alan was going to survive and win this war, he would have to understand everything about Gifteds including deeply personal things. And so he watched.

Alicia slowly became herself again, her eyes, her face, her hair, her body, everything turned back into the strong woman figure that she had been moments before. And most importantly, she gave herself the renewed confidence she once had. But she didn’t turn around yet.

Alan looked curiously. She was still crouching. This was unusual. She should have been done by now. He didn’t have all the time in the world. Then the sound hit him. It was a small, quiet sound. Sobs. She was crying. Nothing loud or dramatic, just small controlled sobs, her shoulders heaving to the teardrop melody. Alan didn’t know exactly what to say or do. He understood fight situations just fine. He was absolutely comfortable in those. He understood the emotions involved in a fight. He knew hate and fear and anger all too well, but sadness was something he had problems dealing with. Probably because he couldn’t deal with his own. He had so much sadness in his heart that he just shut it off, he refused to deal with it, preferring to concentrate on anger and revenge. But here, right now, in this warzone of a bar, was sadness, and he couldn’t ignore it because it was right in front of his face. He walked up to her. There was something on the tip of his tongue, something that he knew he should say, but couldn’t. Alan just couldn’t bring himself to say those two words. So instead he settled for others. “I told you, I had to.”

Alicia just kept crying in her slow and controlled way. “You saw something private, Hunter, something I never wanted anybody to see or remember ever again, you saw it, and I can’t change that. But you aren’t the reason.”

Alan tried again. “But you’re okay now, you’re fixed, I got rid of the people...”

“Do you really think something like this can be fixed? Do you really think I can ever be okay?”

Alan decided that at that moment, discretion was the better part of valour and said nothing.

Alicia rose up, her eyes still red from the crying. “Do you know how it feels? To have your feelings not be your own? You’re not being FORCED to do something, you’re not even being coerced into it! You WANT it! You WANT to do something that disgusts you because every feeling you have tells you you want it! Do you know how that feels!? To have more than your freedom taken away from you, to have your freedom of thought and FEELING taken away from you!? That will never be gone from me! Never! It will never be removed from my memory, even if I wanted to get rid of it, because IT HAPPENED. I wanted it. Oh God, I wanted it! I wanted any of them to... to...” Her voice broke and Alan understood. He may not have understood a whole lot at that moment, but he understood that. He couldn’t know, could never know, how it felt, and hoped he never would, but he understood, and he understood that the pain would always be there. It wasn’t just a rape, it was worse, it was making someone WANT a rape, it was making them need to be raped, it was raping them of their emotions, of their ability to reason, of themselves, it was making them work against themselves. And he knew then, he knew that he was a witness to one of those moments in a person’s life that never is forgotten and never could be removed. It was... painful.

All he could do, all he knew how to do at that moment was nothing, and so he just stood there. Finally, after several minutes, Alicia gathered herself as best as she could and walked over to him. He looked at her. “Your girlfriend is sitting down over there. I had no way of fixing her.”

Alicia nodded slowly and walked over to Deanna who was still giggling like a stupid bimbo.

Alicia tried not to get too upset over what her beloved had turned into, but Alan could tell on her face that it was definitely in her mind. However, she was an incredibly strong-willed person and she dealt with it, knowing she had to fix it. Closing her eyes, Alicia appeared to focus for a second, then opened them as Deanna seemed to jolt awake from her bimboness. “Oh Alicia! You’re here! I just had the most horrible dream!” She looked on the verge of tears, fear was evidently painted across her face.

Alicia grabbed her and held her close. They stayed there, hugging for several minutes, each taking solace in the other. Alan wasn’t enjoying this at all. Being uncomfortable was something he wanted others to feel, he hated feeling it himself. Still, he had information to get, so if it meant toughing out a sensitive moment, then, well, he’d been through worse.

Finally, Alicia broke the hug. She looked at her lover and said “Honey, could you please wait outside?”

Deanna looked confused. “Wouldn’t it be better if I stayed here with you? I could help.” Alan found her enthusiam refreshing, if not a bit misguided. She didn’t talk like a bimbo at all, nor did she act like one. Deanna was softer than Alicia, but no less capable, and she too could be assertive.

Alicia smiled. “No darling, just wait outside, please?”

Deanna looked to protest again, but decided against it after seeing the seriousness in Alicia’s face, nodded and walked out.

When she was obviously clear of the bar, Alan turned to Alicia. “So, can she see what’s really here?”

Alicia looked tired. “No. I didn’t think she needed to. She’d be able to handle it, but some things... some things are just better if nobody sees them at all.”

Alan nodded. “Out of curiosity, does she like you for real, or...” His question was answered when she shot him a glare.

“Do you think real love can be made? Do you think even if she loved me because I made her, I would be able to love her back knowing that it wasn’t real?”

Alan said nothing.

Alicia sighed and walked over to the women in the lounge, all still in full-out wanton slut mode. She looked at a couple girls who were currently in a sixty-nine and mentally put them both to sleep. She then proceeded to turn them back into their original forms. “This is what they think lesbianism is. Sex. Just something else to entertain their moronic libidos.”

Alan again said nothing. There was nothing to say.

It was quiet for the next few minutes as Alicia walked from woman to woman, putting them to sleep and turning them back into the way they were. She then mentally commanded them all to leave the bar, go back to their old lives and forget everything.

Finally, when all was done she turned back to Alan. “So hunter, you rescued me for a reason.”

Alan took a deep breath. At last, all that quiet, sensitive stuff was over with. “I’m looking for Rick Evans.”

Alicia looked interested. “You’re going after Rick? Are you sure you can take him?”

Alan’s faced blackened. “I’ve been ready to take him on for a long time.” His hand clenched around his gun, an action that was not lost on Alicia.

“Personal issue huh?”

The young Gifted Hunter chuckled bitterly. “It doesn’t matter. I’m just looking for him; do you know where he is?”

Alicia nodded. “I hear he’s set up shop in the GJL. It’s unconfirmed, but I trust the source.”

“The GJL?” Alan was incredulous.

The lean, athletic woman nodded again. “Yes. Both Jade and Colt are off right now, and Sherri and the rest apparently fell pretty quickly.” She looked at him for a moment. “You’re not planning to bust in there are you? Fighting Rick is bad enough, but in what’s now his home base, is not a smart idea. I wanted to go after him too, but this is really Colt’s business now, if he was harassing girls like I thought he was, I would take him apart, but this is just him continuing his feud with Colt.”

Alan’s face was as cold as stone. “I’m going to find him and I’m going to kill him, one way or the other. And if I happen to do it before Colt gets his hands on him, then all the better. Colt will eventually be on my list too.”

Alicia seemed to take offense to that. “Your list? Am I on that list too? What are we? Animals to be hunted?”

But Alan wasn’t really listening. He had more important things to do than argue about his ethics. “I don’t have time for this, you’re safe, your girlfriend’s safe, the girls are safe, and I know where Rick is. That’s a good day’s work for me. I think it’s time we left.”

Alicia appeared miffed at being blown off, but decided not to press the subject. “What are you going to do about these guys? Arrest them?”

Alan shrugged. “No time, no patience, and honestly, no reason to.” He walked over to the kitchen and returned with a large container of kerosine. He uncapped it and began pouring it across the room and even on the patrons, several of them now stirring from being beaten unconscious.

Alicia looked on in horror as it dawned on her what Alan was doing. “You’re just going to burn them all?” How insane was this guy anyways?

The young vigilante kept pouring. “I’m not going to burn them. Just the building. If they happen not to make it out in time, it’s not my fault.”

“But this is murder.”

Alan shrugged, tossed the barrel aside and lit a match. “They chose to wipe their existences off of any known record, they chose to change their identities and they chose to conceal this bar. It’s not murder to kill people who don’t exist in a bar that’s a figment of the imagination.” He dropped the match and walked out as the blaze quickly spread, soon consuming most of the interior of the bar.

Alicia couldn’t believe what was happening, though she wasn’t really that pissed. Those bastards did deserve to die, but... what a way to go. She turned to say something to Alan but found that he’d already disappeared.

She sighed and walked over to her car where Deanna was waiting patiently. Alicia got in, gave her beloved a deep french kiss, then was about to start the car, when she noticed a note attached to her windshield.

Curious, she picked it off her wiper and read it.

Alicia, You are not high on my list, but if you ever are, I promise you, you will be seeing me again. You can then assume that our next meeting will be our last. Regards, Alan.

Alicia smiled sadly, and stuffed the note into her pocket. She got back in her car and started it, then turned the key to stop it again. She looked straight out at the window, at the burning bar, at everything it represented and cried. Deanna held her close and she let it all out. It was not a girly cry, it was not a weepy, emotional cry, it was a deep, mournful, powerful cry. It was a cry that showed more strength than any act of violence ever could. There had been so much sadness this night and there had been a lot to cry about. There was no shame in it. She cried for her violation, for Deanna’s enslavement, and for Alan Storm, because like them, he had lost something valuable to his humanity as well, except that unlike others, he didn’t know it.

IX.

Ezekiel Rage woke out of bed with a huge headache as his alarm clock woke him up with its annoying mix of off-key noise and rock music. He had no idea why his head hurt so much, or why he couldn’t seem to remember anything that happened after his date last night. All he remembered was that he had been humiliated by Lauren Jamison and then he had slunk out of her house and attempted to grab a bus home when... Augh... It just wasn’t coming to him, he really had no idea what had happened. Groaning, Ezekiel forced himself out of the comforts of his sheets and sat up. Argh, what the fuck had happened? He hated waking up as it was, but with this headache, not to mention his morning stiffy. He sighed. He had hoped to have that taken care of last night with Lauren and not use his hand like always. Well, nature called after all. Ezekiel slipped his hand into his boxer shorts and almost screamed. What the hell was he grabbing on to? He knew how his dick felt well enough, and this was not it. Almost in a panic, the sixteen year old boy ripped off his shorts and looked down. It WAS his cock all right, but it was bigger, MUCH bigger. His penis had been an embarrassment to him last night when not only could he not get it hard but Lauren had laughed at it’s not so impressive size of 4 inches, but now, now it was at least 10, and much thicker. Ezekiel couldn’t believe it at all. He quickly ran out of his room and into the washroom next door and shut the door.

The slightly pudgy, short, rat-faced kid looked in the mirror and couldn’t believe his eyes. It wasn’t like he was a whole new man, but his little bit of excess weight had disappeared and he had a more fit built now, also, if his vision wasn’t deceiving him, he had grown a couple inches, and his face was, well, more or less the same, but more serious looking and he looked more rugged and less comical. This was of course, not possible. Rage touched his face and body, making sure that this was actually him, then he touched the mirror. He absolutely could not believe it, nor did he exactly know how to feel. He was currently caught between being deliriously happy and being worried of being deliriously happy. Nothing good ever happened to him. Yet, this was real, wasn’t it? He pinched his arm, and quickly decided that it was indeed real. What the fuck happened last night?

Rage left the washroom and ducked back into his room. He quickly went to the closet and got out his clothes from last night and hunted through the pockets for possible clues. His black trenchcoat yielded nothing, nor did his black gothic styled shirt, but in the back pocket of his pants... Feeling something there, the bemused teen shoved his fingers in and pulled a small sheet of paper out. He quickly opened it and read it eagerly.

Hello Ezekiel, by now you must have some idea that something has happened to you. This is not an accident. You have been given powers by me. I know it is in your nature to be suspicious, but I think you should have physical proof by now. Anyway, these powers allow you to alter any biological matter, humans, animals, plants, whatever, you can do with them what you like. You can also control minds, and not just control but alter and plant thoughts in. This works with any form of communication including written words, email and phone. You may have as much fun with this power as you please, but on one condition, you must come to a meeting at the address written at the back of this sheet Sunday at 10pm sharp. I am not forcing you to come, but I think out of a gratefulness to me you should. You should also be aware that if you are not grateful, I could very well take the powers away, if I so chose to. Anyway, until we meet, feel free to play around with your new found Gift.

Blinking twice, Ezekiel read it again just to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. He then turned it around hoping to get some clue as to who had written it but found nothing except for the aforementioned address. Ezekiel slumped down upon his bed and gave the whole situation some consideration.

So some person had decided to give him a power to practically do anything he wanted? Why? Was this a test? Should he not abuse it for fear of losing it? But the note did tell him to do whatever he wanted with it. That couldn’t be also a test could it? He had so many questions, but also a deep curiosity that was growing inside him. Ezekiel had a very scientific mind, and loved to test things out and there was no way he wasn’t going to test this power out.

Sucking up his reservations, Ezekiel decided to first test them out on himself. He stepped back into the washroom and checked himself out once more in the mirror. Not bad, he thought, but not great. He pondered what to do about himself? Should he make himself into a super jock? Or maybe a suave Fabio? But that wasn’t in his style; he wasn’t that sort of person, even if he had the chance to be. Rage looked at his reflection, now how did this work? He began to come up with the idea in his head and amazingly enough he saw his body changing. His hair became jet black from its original brown and lengthened down to his ass like he had always wanted. His skin became slightly paler and his normally out of control body hair vanished completely. He made himself a bit taller, and more fit. He looked at himself in the mirror, he looked almost like a vampire, and he liked it. For a second, he considered adding fangs, but decided that would be going a little too far. He was amazed how good he looked. Now he hoped he would fit into his clothes.

Going back to his bedroom, Rage got into his oversized black jeans and slipped on a baggy black t-shirt. Well they seemed to fit, all right, although they didn’t bunch up at his ankles at much, which was probably a good thing. He then slipped on his various menacing looking necklaces and attached the chain that linked his wallet to his pants and put the wallet in his back pocket. He applied a new coat of black nail polish on his fingers and took one last quick glance in the bathroom mirror before he went to school. His reflection was perfect. He was exactly the man he wanted to be. Regal, handsome and menacing all at once.

Smiling to himself he went downstairs for breakfast. His mother, baby sister and stepfather were waiting for him. A sliver of fear crept into him. Would they notice? He hoped maybe that somehow they wouldn’t, that they’d just assume he looked normal, though that was probably hoping a lot, since his parents already didn’t like the way he dressed. However, he couldn’t very well just sit in his room for the rest of the day avoiding everybody, so with a bit of trepidation, Ezekiel walked into the kitchen and moved to get a bowl and some cereal. Amazingly enough, nobody said a word. His mother saw him and wished him a good morning, as did his stepdad, his sister said nothing as usual. Stupid brat, he thought, at least treat your brother with respect. He leaned poured himself some cereal and went to get the milk from the fridge but it wasn’t there.

“Here you go big brother. Good morning.”

Ezekiel blinked and turned around to see Rayne, his 8 year-old sister pouring him milk. “Wha.. what was that for?” He asked somewhat shocked at her abnormal behaviour, and as usual, quite suspicious. “What do you want?”

Rayne looked hurt. “I don’t want anything big brother, I just wanted to do something nice for you, isn’t that what little sisters are for?” She smiled cutely up at him.

Now Ezekiel KNEW something was up. She rarely smiled at him. He didn’t really know why either. Maybe she was just a bitch at heart, or maybe she didn’t feel he was her real brother since they didn’t share the same father, or maybe it was because he swore at her all the time. But either way, she was never nice to him and never, not in a billion years, THIS nice. But here she was, Rayne Rage, treating her half-brother Ezekiel Rage with respec... Respect! That was it! He had wished in his mind that she would treat him with respect and she was now doing so. He did have a power after all! That was also why nobody was astonished by his appearance either. Amazing. He could do so much with this! A grin spread on his face. It was time to test it out some more.

Ezekiel took his cereal and sat down. He began eating it slowly while throwing ideas around in his head on what to do.

“Ezekiel, you better come home early today.”

Knocked out of his train of thought, Ezekiel looked up at his stepdad angrily. “Why? I was planning to hang out at the computer club tonight.” Well, that was half-true, he wasn’t part of the club, nor did he have much aptitude at programming, but he did have many friends who attended it. Of course, he never had any intention to go to the club anyways, he had originally planned to go to the local pool hall where he normally hung out, but those plans were changing rapidly.

“I know you’re not going to go to any club Zeke. You’re just going to hang around with your loser friends in your little hole.” His dad lowered the newspaper he was reading slightly and glowered at him. “When are you going to grow up Zeke and learn that you have responsibilities? You have your little sister to take care of? You have to be home to keep an eye on her!”

Suddenly a smile began to creep onto Ezekiel’s face. “C’mon David,” he said calmly, relishing using his stepfather’s first name casually, “she’s old enough to take care of herself don’t you think?”

His stepfather looked shocked. “Zeke, she’s hardly old enough! She’s only 8!” He was about to say more but Ezekiel decided to cut him off right there.

“I think you mean 18 dad.” A smile spread broadly onto the teenager’s face now. “(((Rayne’s 18 remember?)))”

His father blinked twice. “Ye..yeah... you’re right. I’m sorry son, I don’t know what got over me. She’s old enough to take care of herself.” He looked disturbed at his own lack of memory, shrugged and went back to reading the paper.

Rayne, however, did not share her dad’s sense of calm. “Big brother! What did you mean by that? I’m not—”

Ezekiel sighed, looked at her, and she shut up and sat stock still. He grinned inwardly. This would take some work, but what better way to flex those mental muscles eh? He got up from his chair and sent a mental command to his mother that also made her believe that she had an 18 year old daughter. Then he walked into the living room and plopped himself comfortably onto the couch. “Rayne, dear sister, please come into the living room.” He called out almost mockingly.

As if in a trance, Rayne walked in. Ezekiel looked her up and down and chuckled. His sister was just a little girl, but she was already looking like she belonged in the family, and that was in no way a compliment. She didn’t look too similar to her brother of course, but that was to be expected since they were only half related. Rayne had the same deep brown eyes as Ezekiel and his mother, and also the thick eyebrows that unfortunately added to his former rat-like appearance, however that was it for the similarities, the rest of her features came from her father. She had the same dark curly brown hair, thin lips and bulbous nose he had as well as a larger than preferred backside and a body shape which hinted at a future appearance less than... attractive.

Ezekiel grunted. He didn’t know the extent of his powers yet, but he did know that he was, at heart, a scientist, and was by no means timid about trying new things. And boy, was this a new thing. He concentrated, first deciding to make her older. He closed his eyes, concentrated and thought it then opened them again. Ezekiel noticed two things right off the bat. Firstly, his sister wasn’t going to become a very good looking 18 year old, and secondly, he had forgotten that she was wearing clothes. It was a situation easily rendered of course, he simply ordered her to take off her clothes. Now that she was 18, he had no qualms about seeing her naked. And incest never really bothered him anyways.

He looked her over. Now that she was undressed he could study her as he would a painting. First off, the grown-up Rayne was unusually hairy. Her pussy was covered in deep thick dark pubic hair that looked quite unsightly. As well, she had hair on her legs, armpits and a little on her arms. It wasn’t exactly pleasent to look at. She was also a bit on the chunky side, her ass was still bulbous and her face wasn’t very pleasing. As well her breasts with smallish and saggy. She wasn’t UGLY, and he was certain that had she grown up normally, she would obviously have shaved, but she wasn’t exactly the very model of a modern major male wet dream either.

Ezekiel clasped his hands together. Time to get down to business. First went her hair, dropping to the floor like so much flotsam. He also made sure that she wouldn’t grow any new hair on her either, why not plan for the future after all? After that he decided to change her body shape. It was simple enough business. She soon became a 5′8″ ravishing beauty (except for the face of course) with long thin legs, silky smooth, slightly tanned, skin, a small tight ass, large firm C cup breasts and a nice taut thin waist. Next was her face. He decided to make her eyebrows thin and shapely, her eyes a deep green, her lips full and red and her nose dainty and small. He laughed. It was like he was a fairy godmother in some bizarre retelling of Cinderella. There was only one more thing to do. He snapped his fingers and hair brown frizzy hair became straight and went down to her ass. It was still brown, only now it was light brown with blonde highlights.

Ezekiel observed his work and smiled. It was good. His 8 year old sister was now a voluptuous and very, very sexy 18 year old sister. All he needed to do was make sure she thought so and everybody else did as well. He smiled and quickly sent some commands to his sister.

(((Rayne, you are 18, you remember growing up older than me, and you remember being popular and slutty.)))

(((You love me, and you always have. You also have been sexually attracted to me for as long as you had hormones and we’ve been fucking for years. You have no better lover than I.)))

(((You are bisexual, and love to have sex with women.)))

(((You are a slut at heart, you love flirting and teasing, but you love sex even more. You will, however, under no circumstances have sex with anybody except me or other women without my express consent.)))

(((You love sex in every position and you’re an expert at pleasure and you multi-orgasm very easily.)))

(((You go to my high school and are in your final year; you will act as such and will act like you know people and have friends.)))

Ezekiel grinned. That was pretty simple. He didn’t want to let her unfreeze yet, for he had something else to do. He took her student card and imprinted some messages into it.

(((To anybody who reads this card. This is both Rayne Rage’s driver’s license and student card. Her age is 18 currently, and you know that. Nothing is different; she’s always been this old. She is the most popular girl at Thorn Avenue High School and you will react accordingly.)))

After he was finished, Ezekiel gave the card back to his now sexified older sister. “Rayne listen to me very carefully. This is both your student card and driver’s license. You can drive. All the necessary abilities to drive are being copied from me to you right now. Show this card to everybody the first time you see them from today on. You will now wake up.”

At that Rayne’s eyes fluttered open and she looked at Ezekiel. Immediately she smiled.

“Hey there little brother, what’s up?”

Strangely enough, Ezekiel wasn’t sure how to respond. “Uhh, not much really.”

She looked down at herself. “Hey why am I naked? For that matter, why aren’t you naked? Oh well, that can be fixed.”

Ezekiel had no clue what she was talking about and was shocked and also pleasently surprised when Rayne knelt down, unzipped his fly and pulled out his cock.

“Wow, I’m always amazed by the size of this thing. I really should be calling you BIG brother.” She took it quickly in her mouth and sucked on it, deepthroating him.

Ezekiel’s eyes rolled to the top of his head. The feeling was incredibly. He had never had a blow-job before but he had a feeling that this one was probably something special. He couldn’t hold it in for long and came quickly into her mouth, flooding it with sperm.

Rayne didn’t seem to mind at all and in fact held it in her mouth to suck up every bit. She opened her mouth to let him see it in there then closed and swallowed. When she re-opened her jaws, her oral cavity was empty.

Ezekiel plopped down on the couch, shell-shocked, but Rayne seemed to be expecting more and crawled on top of him, while taking his pants off.

“I know you’re going to be hard in a second my incredibly hot brother, so let’s not waste more time.”

Rage looked down and smiled bewilderedly. He was hard already. He was thinking it in his head and his body reacted. It was amazing. He had total control over himself.

Rayne smiled and slipped her tight, wet cunt over his tool. “Oh yeah little brother, you’re so FUCKING HUGE!” She cried the last part out as she sank all the way over his 10 inch cock. She closed her eyes as she orgasmed visibly. “FUCK YEAH!!! I LOVE FUCKING YOU!!!” As she recovered she began to ride him slowly at first, then quicker and hard. And apparently, Rayne was as loud a teenager as she was a child. “Oh fuck me!!! Fuck me little brother!!! Yeah!!! I love it!!! I fucking love it!!! Fuck my pussy. Fuck it you stud!! Fuck your sister’s slutty twat! Yeah fuck my sloppy pussy!!! Fuck it!!! OH FUCK I’M CUMMINGG!!!!”

Ezekiel was enjoying the sensations incredibly. Not only wasn’t he a virgin anymore, he had become a stud overnight and he loved every fucking minute of it. And as his sister kept riding him, he thought of the possiblities. This wasn’t going to be the last time he used the gift for sure. His thoughts were drowned out soon after as another wave of pleasure hit him as his sister clamped her wet pussy right over his cock and came again.

X.

Jerome Jackson stared triumphantly at the flaming wreckage of what used to be his apartment building. Fire trucks, ambulances and police cars now surrounded it, as news crews began to arrive like vultures looking for a meal. The black teenager smiled from his perch on the top of a nearby building. He may not have been as strong as the two fuckers who had so rudely busted into his home looking for information which he would never divulge, but he was smarter than them. Okay, so his trap hadn’t surprised Trent the first time, but the point was that in the end he had gotten it to work while they were fighting. And that was what distinguished the winners from the losers and if Jerome was anything it was a winner.

He smiled confidently once more and turned to leave and as quickly as his smile appeared, it faded.

“Okay now I’m pissed.”

Jerome quickly spun around in an attempt to dash off but Trent was too quick for him. A couple kicks and a punch later and the ebony pseudo-Gifted was down on his stomach gasping for air.

Trent closed on him. “Now are you going to be cooperative or do I have to have beat you around some more?”

Jerome, looking like a cat cornered, got up quickly, really quickly, shoved Trent out of the way and attempted to make a dash to the stairwell leading to safety. He made maybe one step towards freedom before his leg broke. A scream leapt from his throat shattering the stillness of the night before another tendril wrapped around his neck forcing him to shut up.

Trent walked over to Venom who had the criminal tied up like a puppet. “Was that really neccesary?”

Venom’s luminous “eyes” focussed on Trent. “Perhaps you would prefer to take his place?” His teeth, those sharp pointy teeth, broke into a large grin, showing the pleasure that he would get from such an arrangement.

It was however not an arrangement Trent was exactly thrilled about. “Look, if you can just go five minutes without making threats at me, we might actually be able to get some information out of him and NOT get blown up for once!”

“If you had not interfered in our apprehension of this criminal, then perhaps we would not have been in that situation.”

“Look fangs for brains, we can keep arguing until the sun comes up or we can actually find out what this guy knows. All right?”

Venom appeared to consider it for a moment. “That is acceptable to us. You will be allowed to assist us in interrogating him.”

“Good.”

“And then we will eat his spleen.”

“No!” Trent wasn’t sure whether to laugh, pale or scream. “No eating spleens!”

“But our other wishes it. We are Venom after all.”

Trent sighed. “No, you’re not Venom! Jeez! I’m surprised Stan Lee hasn’t slapped you with a lawsuit yet!”

The pale half moon eyes focused on the Chinese teen once again. “Then we would be forced to eat his spleen, a most unfortunate turn of events.”

“Fah!” Trent threw his hands up in the air in frustration. “Fine! You know what? I don’t care! I don’t know why I ever cared! You can eat as many spleens as you please while I’m not around, but when I’m here, you don’t kill anybody. Got it?”

“We would like to see you try and stop us.”

“Oh you’d like to would you? I think that could be arranged.”

“We look forward to your demonstration.”

Trent glared at Venom. “Don’t push me okay? All I want is to get the information out of...”

Jerome made a noise, it was a slight gurgling noise and obviously he wanted to say something, except that Von had him currently in a tight noose with his tentacles. He gurgled again.

Trent stared at the larger Gifted. “Well?”

“Well what?”

“Aren’t you going to listen to what he has to say?”

Venom grumbled and the hold loosened slightly, but only slightly, on Jerome. But at least he could now speak. “Guys, seriously... uhh... could you please just let me go? I haven’t done any...” Immediately the pressure around his throat increased again, making it almost impossible for him to breathe let alone talk.

Trent sighed. “You know what? I was wrong, he doesn’t get to talk.”

His fanged adversary looked annoyed. “We do not see why we have to delay. We should just rip into his mind and take the information we desire.” He focussed and it was obvious that he was beginning a mind probe.

“Hey wait! You can’t just go in there!”

Venom looked peeved. “We can go where we choose, we are Ven...”

Trent didn’t have time for his egoizing. “Yeah I know, but look, whoever was in there last really did a number on his mind, and if you try to get the information you’re looking for you’re going to kill him.”

Those unblinking staring half moons came back. “Your point being?”

“My point being that you can’t just go around killing people!”

“We do not agree. This man is a criminal he deserves to be punished. We wi—”

“Punishment, yes! Beaten to a bloody pulp with bags of doorknobs sure! Thrown into a pit of rabid weasels, why not? But not death! We’ve come further than that!”

“Then how do you suggest we get the information then if we are not allowed to waltz in and take it?”

Trent stopped for a second and thought. “I don’t know.” He admitted.

“Very well then we will act as we see fit.”

“No!!” Trent leapt at Venom and slammed a hard right into his head. Venom recoiled angrily and took a swipe at his most hated enemy. Trent dodged with a roll and got back up ready to attack once more.

“We always knew you were soft on crime being a criminal yourself.” Venom’s voice snarled with as much hatred as a person could have, if Venom was even a person anymore.

“I’m the criminal? I’M THE CRIMINAL? Excuse me mister let’s take over a town and fuck up everybody’s lives. I didn’t know that saving people was a criminal act.”

It almost looked like Venom was growing larger; his muscles were tensing so much. “Aiding and abetting those who harm others is a criminal act. Those you consider to have “saved” were not fit to live their own lives!” He charged dragging a helpless Jerome behind him.

Trent blocked his attack and flipped over him. “Von, I am getting really sick of you butting into my life and trying to kill me! I’m getting sick of you fucking up my investigations and I’m getting real sick o—” And he felt it. Venom felt it too because he stopped moving as well. Both looked in confusion as the psychic presence flew in out of nowhere.

“What the—?”

And then Jerome keeled over as his brain began to shut down.

Trent ran over to Venom and Jerome swearing. “Goddamn it. Can we save him?”

Venom who was already in his mind shook his head. “No, it’s too late. If you had not atta—”

“Shut up! Fuck! Do you know where that came from?”

“We felt nothing until the last moment. We cannot track it.”

Trent uttered profanity in several languages under his breath. “Goddamn it!” He waved his hands in the air helplessly.

“Ne.. ne..”

“What was that?” Trent quickly turned around to face the now-dying Jerome Jackson. He knelt over over his body as Venom did the same. “Ne.. new something?”

“Ne.. new... new yo...”

Venom blinked. “New York?”

Jerome nodded once then his world faded to black.

Trent stood up. “New York then. Something is happening in New York. If we could go there, maybe we’d be able to find ou—” He turned around to see Venom perched on the top of the building ready to leap off.

“We implies you and us. We are not a team. There is only one “we” that we are aware of and that is us.” His head craned slightly towards Trent, staring at him.

Trent stared back. “You’ve said a mouthful already. Do you even listen to yourself? And where do you think you’re going?”

Venom flicked his tongue out and bared teeth. “We are going to New York to find the mastermind behind all of this. We will let you live for now because feasting on the bones Jerome’s boss is a more urgent matter. However, when we are finished our task, we will be back to destroy you.” And with that he dropped out of site.

Trent ran over to the ledge seeing only Venom’s shape dissapear into the night as he hit the ground and leapt off. “I wouldn’t count on it.” He mumbled.

The Chinese Gifted straightened his back stiffly. Oh damn, he was sore. He needed to get back home and get some rest. Being with Amy wouldn’t hurt either. He smiled at the thought of a night of carnal sex with his girlfriend.

He walked off, after speeding up the decay of Jerome’s body and burning his clothes so that there was no evidence. And tommorow, he thought with both excitement and reservation, he was going to book a flight to New York.

Epilogue.

Ezekiel Rage walked into the empty warehouse not exactly sure what to expect. Maybe he’d be walking into a trap and dozens of FBI officers would jump him for abusing some sort of phychic power (though that would have been pretty insane). Maybe he would find a warlock inside, or some sort of Satanist cult? He wasn’t exactly sure if what he saw before his eyes was any more ordinary however. There were at least a dozen men in that room, of various ages all sitting facing what looked to be a makeshift stage. Each one of these men looked almost normal, much like Ezekiel himself looked almost normal. He could see in each person, what they SHOULD have looked like, but what he saw on the outside, on every person, was a perfect man. Each perfect in their own way, with their own differences, but there was not a zit between them or a scar, or even a misshapen beard or a flabby stomach. He understood. Everybody had the same power as him. And everyone had been given it by the same person that had called them all here. Ezekiel had to admit to a bit of nervousness. This wasn’t exactly something that was of the norm. And he had no idea what was to come.

Rage shuffled his feet nervously and found a nice crate to sit on. He tried to make conversation with the others but it wasn’t going particularly well. Everybody here was just as confused as he was, and most of the conversation around him was mainly focussed on what each and done with their powers. Finally, the crowd hushed up as the light dimmed a little and the feeling was much like the opening trailers ending in a movie theatre. Rage looked to the “stage” and wondered what was to come.

A teenaged boy walked on. He looked more or less normal and wore a t-shirt and jeans. He didn’t look very impressive. However, Ezekiel knew that appearances were deceiving. The boy spoke.

“Welcome all. I trust you had no problem getting here. I’ll make this short and to the point. You have all been given a Gift. This Gift is from me. The Gift once belonged to others, but I have since taken it from them and have decided to bestow it on to you. The reasoning is simple. I am a Gifted. We Gifted have been given a power by Aliens that allow us to do almost anything, a power you should all be familiar with by now. You have not been chosen at random. Each of you has exactly the type of personality and beliefs I want. You all hate your lot in life and wish to improve it and understand that life is about opportunity and exploitation, not about bleeding heart liberalism. We have a power and we should use that power, we deserve as much as we can get. You know I’m correct. However, there are others that don’t agree with this philosophy, which is where you come in. I require allies and associates, whom I hope, will be you. There is one who will seek to stop us, and we must be ready for him, and with you at my side, we will be. We will be triumphant and take from this world what we want and what should be ours! I can feel in your minds that you agree with me. Together we have no boundaries! Are you all with me?”

Nobody needed to say a word. The thought appeared around them and everyone agreed except for one who was still thinking.

It was a brief thought. A brief hint of worry about morals but that was it. Ezekiel knew he wanted to be part of this, because the man was right, they were better and deserved better. Beautiful people took advantage of their Gifts, this was no different. He nodded once and the mental vote was unanimous.

Rick Evans smiled. “Well then gentlemen, welcome to the Gifted Underground Alliance.”

The end of Alien’s Gift II, Part 03.