How Is This Possible?

Typical

, Charlotte thought.

Truly fucking typical.

It was bad enough trying to hold down a job as a waitress in a shitty restaurant in the Quarter, without the busses deciding not to run in the middle of the night. She couldn’t exactly walk home; her apartment was almost two miles away and her feet were already killing her. Unfortunately, no better ideas were coming to mind. She could go and find a friendly tarot reader and make him (or her) even friendlier, but she’d recently broken up with one of them and the rumors about her had started. Rumors are hard to quell around here, no matter the source.

Thinking about breaking up with Gladerunner only made her disposition worse. He was a prick, no bones about it.

Goddammit, I let him fuck me up the ass.

Charlotte had been living with Glade for seven months before he kicked her out, and the lengths to which she had gone to make him happy were very high as far as she was concerned. Sitting there in the cold recesses of Bourbon thinking about this wasn’t helping. She had to get to her shitty apartment on the other side of town and bitching about it wasn’t going to do any good. She decided to torture her feet a little more. There were no other options. She got up from the dilapidated bench and started the long stretch home.

From nearly a block away, it stood from it’s own perch on the rooftops and started keeping pace. Nearly consumed with hunger, the thing would feed tonight. No more waiting, no more morality issues, no more denying. Its prey had been chosen, and only an act from a god it no longer believed in would stop it from taking her. Tonight, it began, and there was no turning back. Not for either one of them. Dressed in a T-shirt, khakis and sneakers, she didn’t look like a whore. It hated whores. Filthy things….

It’s amazing the things one thinks about when walking a long distance without a soul in sight. Charlotte knew she was a slut. There was a time when she was proud of it, but those days were long passed. She was convinced that no one had lived as much a hard-knock life as she had, but it wasn’t made better by the fact that no one cared. No one ever cared. The only thing anyone ever cared about concerning Charlotte was when she’d sleep with them. A half smile crossed her face as she remembered the lyrics. ‘

She only knows when someone wants her.’ Hmm. Maybe she and I should get together sometime over coffee.

She was so wrapped up in her own thoughts and physical pain that she forgot what part of town she had to walk through to get home: the Eighth Ward. The last thought that passed through her head, ironically, was that there wasn’t a soul she could think of that would give a flying fuck towards a rolling doughnut if she up and vanished.

“Are you lost, little girl?”

Despite the initial fear of hearing an unexpected voice from a direction she couldn’t confirm, Charlotte was still made of nails and broken glass. “I’m not a little girl, asshole. I’m 20, for your information.”

All that and you keep walking. Maybe your screaming feet will pay off after all, girl

, she mused to herself.

“I wouldn’t count on that. Pain will only slow you down right now. And I can follow you no matter where you run.” It was enjoying this. Why had it waited this long? Two hundred years…and it felt so much better already. It was finally happening.

Charlotte stopped dead in her tracks. The fear welling up in her nearly drove her to the depths of insanity right then and there. Where was he? Who was he? How many times had he done this? The thought that no media stories had been told about anything recently frightened her even more. If he had done this more than once, no one knew, which meant no one had survived. The fact that he had just responded to her thoughts didn’t rise to the surface just yet.

“What do you want?” she asked the dark voice as she turned and looked around, terror in her eyes.

“Well, now, why don’t you take a guess, little girl?”

The fear was only slightly pushed at by the anger of being called that again. But she wasn’t about to get confrontational with an assailant she couldn’t see. “I’d rather not. If it’s money you want, I don’t have much. If it’s sex you want, please…I’m not the best find you can get. I’ve been around the block.” Her feeble attempt to divert his sexual attention succeeded only in embarrassing herself.

It had to laugh at this. The infernal growl in its laughter nearly drove its prey to run. But she wasn’t going anywhere it could catch up to her. “What makes you think that? You may have ‘been around the block’, as you say, but you’ve wandered around the wrong block. Besides, weren’t you chuckling inside just a moment ago about how no one would notice if you just…” It waited to see if she would finish the sentence.

Terror became horror. He really could read her mind! Now a new question formulated in her.

What in the hell is he?

“Exactly,” it said just before descending from the roof not even ten feet from her. Charlotte screamed and ran. The sight of him was unbearably evil. It was only the lights playing on him, but the trench flying above as he dropped, the short hair – and were his eyes red? She hadn’t gotten a good look at his face.

But something strange was happening. She wasn’t hearing her own screams. There was no time to process that thought. She had reverted back to scared animal state, and what parts of her mind could think clearly weren’t convinced that she would survive the next few minutes. It was still debating that, itself.

Four blocks later, she tripped and fell, and more tears began streaming out. These, however, were from the pain of broken skin, not from fear, although those continued to fall. Moments later, she stopped in terrified anticipation as a shadow stretched out from her. He was behind her. Moving her mouse-brown ponytail out of her face, she turned her head to look at him. She still couldn’t make out his face, but as she saw his eyes, those faintly glowing red eyes, she screamed in her mind.

Oh, god, how is this possible?

“Don’t trouble yourself with asking him. He never listens. Not anymore.” She started to scramble away again, but all it needed do was speak. “Spare me the time. I’ve followed you this far and if you keep running, you’ll only die tired. Stand up.”

The mention of her dying didn’t help her to do as he said. She tried to stand, but her muscles burned from the failed escape. “Please…I don’t want to die…oh, please, please.”

“Perhaps you won’t. But if you don’t stand up right now, I can’t promise anything. Now get up.” With this, she resigned herself to whatever this thing – she had given up on thinking he was a man – wanted of her. The entire time she kept asking herself over and over:

How is this possible?

She finally got to her feet once more. Her ankles and knees were beginning to give out on her and she knew it. Fears raced through her head as to what would happen if she couldn’t do as it commanded. The cold was setting into her bones. Her body was wracked with pain and there was no telling how much more she was about to go through at the hands of…

what IS he?

“Lower your head.” She did so. At least those muscles didn’t ache too much. It stepped towards her and she saw in her limited vision boots and pants come into view. Charlotte couldn’t identify the brand or even the style of clothes she was looking at before the blindfold encased her eyes. Her initial reaction overcame her. She fought to get it away from her – hurt if she could manage, but away was the objective. Almost immediately, though, her arms were caught in inhumanly strong hands. The strength wasn’t what worried her the most however. What did was the texture of the skin. It had the texture of an old time cotton picker. They were rough and coarse. And something else….

“I thought you were trying to not get yourself killed? You won’t win a fight with me, and if you annoy me too much, I’ll kill you and move on. You may be ideal, but you’re not unique.” It paused, waiting for a protest. None came. “Now are you going to be a good little girl and do as I say?”

Flashbacks of her father saying the exact same thing almost infuriated her past the point of common sense, but the feeling of impending doom boosted her forethought. She nodded her response to him, not wishing to give him the pleasure of a spoken response. She remembered too late that he could hear her every thought. It was over. He had already won. It need only collect the spoils of the hunt. She belonged to this man, this thing, more than she had ever belonged to anyone else before now.

“Good. You’re beginning to get the picture. Now that we know where we stand, remove your shirt.” Slowly, and without raising her head, she untucked her shirt and pulled it over her head, revealing an eight-hour bra she had bought the week before, holding up her perky, full breasts. The cold and shame hit her like a freight train. She began to shiver.

“If I enjoy you enough, we might do this somewhere warmer next time. Remove your pants.”

NEXT TIME?!? Oh, please, no. Not again, I can’t take this more than once. I know you can hear me, so please, not again. I’ll do whatever you want, but please, please, please, don’t make me do this again.

(Pause)

Please say something.

“Take…off…your…pants…. Now.” It wasn’t growing impatient; it was enjoying itself. Taking control of her and letting itself go was proving more enjoyable than it first thought. She belonged to it now…maybe permanently.

Charlotte had gotten what she asked for, but not what she wanted. She had to deal with the possibility that she could not reason with it in any way. She had to do what it said. The control it had over her deepened with every passing second as she slowly unbuckled her belt and dropped the loose fitting khaki pants. Her thong made her wish she had more underwear as soon as the frigid street breeze caught her thighs and buttocks. She began to cry again, this time as silently as possible.

She lost it. With the intense September air cutting at her skin, her mind reeled and began leading her down paths of skewed logic. “My name’s Charlotte. What’s yours?”

The question caught it off guard. This was easier if it didn’t know anything about her. But now she had a name.

No matter

, it thought,

I can do this even if she does have a shadow in my mind.

“I didn’t realize you wanted to draw this out with conversation. Well, if you insist…”

The concept of staying here any longer than she had to snapped her a bit of the way back to sanity. “NO! I mean…no, that’s fine. Let’s just get this over with. Please.”

“That’s better. Now, you look foolish with your pants about your ankles like that. Take off your shoes and step out of them.” She bent over and it walked around to get a look at her from the back. The view was too much. Her perfect ass bearing the edges of her sex to it threw it headlong into lustful frenzy. It grabbed her by the hips and shoved her into a light pole. She let out a short scream as she fell forward and caught the pole, ignoring her shoes and pants. “Stay there. Don’t move unless I move you myself. I’ve gotten a better idea.” It leaned down to smell her and the smell was priceless. Before it came back up, she felt a slight tug backwards at her pants, and then he spread her legs apart.

What the fuck? What happened to my khakis?

Through the small space between the bottom of the blindfold and her cheek she looked at her pants and saw that they had been cut as if something a thousand times as sharp as a razor had dropped on them. The astonishment at this almost distracted her from the feeling of something (bone?) gliding itself under her thong before the fabric snapped and fell to the ground. Reality set in at that moment.

I’m being raped. Not coerced, not blackmailed, RAPED. I hate you. You freak, I hate you.

“You don’t even know me, little girl,” was the last thing it said before it thrust into her. The inconceivable mass of its member shoved a high scream from her throat. It was huge, not to the point of pain, but almost. The thrusts were slow at first, the thing wanting some lubrication before it truly got going. It didn’t have to wait long. Charlotte was caught in a battle between her mind and her body. Her mind was going on vacation, and quick, leaving her body to respond to this monster as if it were the greatest lover she had ever had and she was losing her virginity all over again. It more or less felt like she was. Her tears soaked through the blindfold and dropped to the ground as her juices flowed through her and the pace began to quicken. She wasn’t crying so silently anymore.

Oh god, you asshole, how can this be possible?

Her knees were giving out and her body ached. The thing inside of her didn’t feel like a penis. It felt like a rough dildo made of smooth wood.

God, how could you? Why is this happening to me?

It began to lose itself in the ecstasy of her body and its hunger grew. She would have to start pleading and soon, or it would kill her in its primal, lusting rage and ruin all this work. “Say it out loud. Say it or die.”

“Oh, god…oh god, please, you son of a bitch, how can this happen…oh god…oh, please…” she said as he slammed into her again and again. “How can you let this happen…my life has been bad enough, why…uhhuuuhh…” She let out a guttural moan as the insane pleasure of what was being done to her started to set in. “This…uh…this can’t be happening…oh, god, please help me…please ma-hake it stop…please tell me what it is…oh GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!”

The scream ripped through the street with as much force as the orgasm ripped through her body. It kept slamming away through the course of her continuing orgasm as people woke and started looking through their windows, searching for a scene they could hear, but could not see. It was in complete control. They would not see what happened, but it would make sure their dreams would harbor these happenings, one way, or another.

Charlotte’s knees and ankles finally began to give way, but it caught her before she dropped. Without removing itself from her hole, it moved her to the nearest wall, mere inches from where an old man was looking out his window trying to discern the location of the scream. It had an idea.

She felt herself pushed up against a wall and held there. This was a bit easier to handle, and she was just about to get used to the position, when her blindfold was taken off. The first thing she saw was red brick and a light from the corner of her eye in the night air. She turned and saw the old man and began to scream for help. He drank in her pleas with relentless abandon. The sound of her cries were so dampened that the old man couldn’t even imagine that they were coming from right next to him. Charlotte became frantic and excited as the next orgasm began to gather in her. Desperately begging this old man to help her, wondering why she could barely hear her own voice and why he couldn’t either. She screamed as she came once more and the old man registered only a direction. He turned his head without realizing that he was staring right into her eyes and said, “It’s coming from off down that way.”

Through the orgasm her eyes opened to see him looking dead at her. No, not at her, through her. Her mind snapped. Everything she had ever known was gone now. She belonged to it forever. However long forever might be…

Author’s note: This is only the beginning. But I do things a bit differently than some of my colleagues. You, the reader, in part control what happens next. If you want something in particular to happen to sweet, broken Charlotte, contact me and let me know. If you think “It” is done with her, and needs someone else, ideas will be reviewed. Don’t bother giving suggestions as to what “It” is. I already know that, and I have to keep you guessing about some things, now don’t I? If I don’t get any feedback, nothing will happen. Ever again. You want more? You tell me.