*There is nothing wrong being a Lucky Bastard. It is wrong to rely on it*
(Monday later)
Buffy had finally dismissed me when Katrina summoned me to her office. Ignoring me getting into an altercation… in the Full-Blood gym… yet again, I had a good day. No property damage, lost items, or physically damaged employees. Ragged by most people’s standards, but a good day for me at Havenstone. I still had a chance to walk out under my own power.
Katrina motioned me to come to her desk. Upon my arrival, she slid a tablet over to me with a single icon on the screen. I tapped it. Aya’s face appeared as the vid-mail began. She was glowing. There was tent fabric in the background so I had no idea of her geographic location. I didn’t care.
“Hey!” she squeaked. “I’m doing great at camp. I met three girls who are as small as me and we’ve formed our own squad — the Fatal Squirts.” I chuckled.
I had encouraged her to steal strength from her perceived weaknesses. She had to believe in herself then take that as she built up her skills. I had faith in her when no one else did.
“I showed some of my councilors a picture of you. I think you would get into trouble if you came here. I want you to come, but I thought it was only fair to warn my favorite bed-buddy,” she giggled.
“Send me a message when you can. I understand there will be a delay as the messages have to be physically delivered. I know you are doing okay. If not, hold off your vengeance until I can return and guard your back. I love you, Cael. Be well,” she smiled as her picture faded into darkness.
“Ah damn,” I whispered. Aya looked good — confident, upbeat and spirited. “Katrina, can I make a message for her right now?” I begged.
“Of course,” she gave me an approving tilt of the head. “I think the courier is still in the building.”
“Cool. What do I do?” I urged.
“Use the webcam — make a message and forward it to my computer,” Katrina told me. “I’ll take it from there.” I made the message, pretty much updating her on my latest exploits with limited editing. Aya was a surprisingly innocent yet worldly 9 year old.
Much of that came from being Katrina’s and Desiree’s niece — mainly Katrina’s. It gave her access to tidbits of sensitive data from time to time. Not so much she was a real security threat. Enough so that she got some things confused — like what sex was truly about. I felt in my soul she’d be a great Amazon one day. I didn’t remind her of that much. She had enough pressure for a kid her age.
“You are seeing Oneida now?” a frosty voice unnerved me. It was Buffy.
“Fuck,” I jumped up. “Damn Buffy, stop sneaking up on me like that, or I’m going to start thinking you are a stalker.”
“I am stalking you, Einstein,” Buffy menaced.
“I’m glad we got that out of the way,” I rolled my eyes. “Oh look! It’s Daphne coming to my rescue. I am so out of here,” I exulted. I edged passed Buffy, slipped her attempt to grab my arm and raced for the ‘new hires’ at the elevator.
“Get back here, you Cock-sucker!” Buffy howled as she chased me down.
May miracles never cease. Daphne, Violet and Tigger formed an Amazon (I wasn’t sure if I could consider them ‘human’ yet) shield between my frail form and the hulking brute that was Buffy.
“Calm down, Buffy,” Daphne pleaded. “He fought Elsa today — again.”
“Get out of my way,” Buffy snarled.
“Thank God you stopped her,” I huffed to Dora. “I hope to she never finds out that I soaped up Elsa’s entire body while we were sharing a shower together.” Daphne turned and gave me an incredulous look.
“Cael, you are a Dumb-ass,” Daphne sighed. Looking to Buffy as she stood aside. “Have at.”
“Are you mental?” Fabiola chimed in. The elevator doors finally opened, Buffy shoved me in and the rest of the posse followed. Helena joined us at the last second.
“He’s taunting me,” Buffy responded to Fabiola while using her middle finger to poke my chest. “At this rate I am going to have to devastate a dozen male escorts so I can make it the remaining the 69 more days until he’s mine again.”
“Is he really that good?” Paula wondered. Buffy twisted around to confront her.
“He hammered me so hard, I thought he’d dislocate my hips. Later, we spent an entire hour, naked, wrapped up in each other’s bodies with no actual penetration — touching, tasting and whispered affections,” Buffy curled her lip. “He’s better than you could possibly imagine.”
“You realize we have 27 seconds left, right?” I reminded Buffy.
“Really?” Buffy’s head snapped back to me. I nodded and she jumped my bones. She had her hand down my pants, pulling on my rod, and the other grabbing the back of my head to deepen our kiss.
For my part, I had my left hand on her breast and the right down the back of her pants, fondling a panty-covered ass cheek. In a culture where you summoned a male, ordered him to perform and he did so the same exact way he’d done a dozen times before, what Buffy and I were doing didn’t make sense.
The two of us didn’t give up an ounce of control yet meshed perfectly. Our pleasure was obvious, vocal and we didn’t give a damn about the crowd around us. Buffy and I had created our own little lust-bubble. The chimer went off. We settled down and straightened up our clothes.
“Fuck it all — that’s some good dicking,” Buffy mumbled. That was an inside joke between me, Timothy, my big, gay, buff tattoo-artist roommate, and the few women he chose to share that descriptive with — ‘a good dicking’. We tumbled out of the elevator.
“Is he always like that?” Fabiola mumbled.
“He’s a whole lot better with his clothes off,” Buffy sneered at Fabiola. Sometimes I’m a super-selfish bastard; I want life to cut me some slack. Waiting for us was Oneida… in biker clothing. That would have merely been bad, dangerous and creepy except I was dressed in work clothes.
I was planning to meet some of the guys (all two of them) for some after-work drinks. The encounter went from not-good to horribly awkward. Oneida had checked up on me, been told how I got to and from work as well as when I left. Unfortunately, she hadn’t checked my social calendar — mainly because I didn’t keep one — sophomore year mistake.
If a girl is in your apartment, she will find the thing you don’t want her to find… every single time. I burned my diary and unfriended everybody after that final, hospital-resulting episode.
“Hi,” I greeted Oneida. She’d figured out she’d screwed up something fierce. “What bike do you use? I have a Specialized STSE hybrid. Maybe we can use some paths one weekend.”
I was trying to diffuse her embarrassment. We were two bikers talking about bikes. Nothing wrong with that.
“I have a Specialized Source…” she got out then realized how BAD that sounded. She had the exact same bike as me… how bizarre? Unless you had somebody come down and take a look at what I bicycle I used.
Time to save the day.
“Do you want to make a date for 6:30 am on Saturday?” I suggested. “Provided this wacky place hasn’t offed, or misplaced me by then.”
“Ah — that would be nice,” Oneida rebounded happily. “The date, that is.”
“Whoa Oneida, what are you doing with this guy?” Brian derided me as he walked up. I wanted to say, ‘Brian, you’ve insulted a princess of the Amazon people. Please continue making an ass of yourself and give Trent and Khalid my regards’. I didn’t.
“This is Cael Nyilas. He’s a real player,” Brian smirked. “You can do better than him.”
Oh yeah, Oneida and Brian were co-workers — ‘new hires’ in Acquisitions.
“Brian, it took you three days to even use my name,” Oneida gave Brian a neutral stare. “I love Cael. He saved my life and he sees the real me.” For the love of all that’s holy, someone shoot me in the head right now. I could hear the nearly subsonic growls emanating from Buffy.
Brian looked at me, laughed and went to put an arm around Oneida’s shoulder. After all, if I could pick her up, it should be effortless for him to take her away, right? Dumb-shit. Laughing at me was okay. Laughing at… then I noticed the two chicks in black leather standing about doing their best (until a second ago) to go unnoticed.
Cael had gotten away with such familiarity because Cael had risked his life to save their Princess. Brian Fung? He barely knew her name and they worked together. These weren’t even SD chicks — they were something else. My guess was Arinniti House Guard. Did Katrina’s House Epona have a house guard?
Sure, I imagine they did. They were probably with the rest of House Epona where ever they lived. It wasn’t like the whole kit and caboodle was here in NYC. That would have been foolish. If Caitlyn, Aya’s mom, had a security issue, she called us at Havenstone HQ, less than four kilometers away. Without a doubt, Elsa would stop by and kick ass for her.
I gave Brian this much — he had a working set of eyes. The second those two harbingers of death began closing in, Brian back-pedaled.
“Hey Brian, let’s go grab some drinks,” I offered him a graceful exit.
“Sounds good,” Brian tried to sound cool.
“Oneida, take care,” I nodded to my new romantic stalker. “Ladies,” to my ‘new hire’ crew. “Buffy,” to my sometimes boss, “remember you are still hot for a… mature chick.”
“You are going die a long, torturous and extremely painful death,” Buffy sizzled.
“What? Are you going to make me eat your cooking?” I laughed.
Buffy didn’t articulate a counter before Brian and I slipped outside.
“Cael, who was that woman?” Brian whispered.
“Which one? You need to be more specific. My erotic malfeasances are terribly confusing.”
“The one you insulted,” Brian said. “The last one you insulted,” he clarified.
“Buffy. She’s one of my bosses,” I grinned. “She loves me. She’s even promised to play the bagpipes at my funeral. Personally I think that’s because she doesn’t want to risk anyone hearing me pounding on the coffin lid, trying to get out.”
“You are not going to make it the full 84 days with that attitude,” Brian lectured me.