Hancock cleared the table and fetched a small briefcase from the bar. He set it down in front of him at the table and opened it. He turned the case around and slid it over to me. Inside was a disturbingly organized pharmacy. "Now, I know you've picked up on some knowledge from pushing and being around me, but I need to make sure you know everything if you're going to fuck with chems. I need to know you're not going to hurt yourself or overdose. I need to know you know these things for my own peace of mind. Feel me?"

After breakfast, he wasted no time getting right to it. Still working on a cup of coffee, I was in nothing but my bathrobe and Hancock had never gotten past putting his pants and tricorn hat on for the day. The ghoul spent the better part of an hour, or maybe even more, going over safe dosages and combos. In that time frame, I had passed the peak of my high from my morning mentats and it had evened out pleasantly. It made me acutely aware of how soft the robe was on my bare skin, and even enhanced the enjoyment of my coffee and cigarettes as I listened intently to Hancock's instruction.

The gentle ride from the mentats had me floating like I was in a canoe on a placid lake. It was just smooth enough to tell it was there without being intrusive, like classical music on quietly in the background. But I didn't get to savor it any longer than that. It was time for my first sample combination.

Hancock slid a dose of jet to me from across the table. His fingers withdrew from the inhaler, revealing the enticing, candy-like red of the canister. "It's going to be different this time."

I tentatively reached for the chem. "How?"

He took a hit himself from the case. "You'll see."

I brought the inhaler to my mouth and emptied my lungs with a long breath before taking in the jet's contents. It hit me instantly, the first moment feeling like the familiar euphoria from the previous night, but that sensation quickly faded as it mingled with the mentat high.

My canoe dissolved and my classical symphony developed a steady backbeat. The imaginary concert took hold of me, driven by punctuated bass and snare, overlapping thickly with dissonant, haunting vocals, harmonious strings vibrating in reverse, and ivory keys all reverberated and echoing as though I was in a tunnel.

I kicked back in my chair, bringing my feet to the table's edge. My robe spilled open momentarily as I shifted positions, but I pulled the edge of the fabric closed, sprawling my arms across the back of the chair. "I wish you could hear what's going on in my head right now."

"I already know, love. I hear it all the time."

The melding of melodies and music ran through a filter and distorted into one piece so full, it filled all of my personal space, beating in time with my heart. Its organic rhythm held me together and every sound it made served a function inside me, somehow keeping me alive, but I couldn't move under its immensity. It was warm and tingly and blue and purple all at once, like a clear summer night.

"There's no way you could be hearing this, too."

As if to prove me wrong, he started rocking his head back and forth in sync with the percussion I was feeling with every molecule of my body.

"How are you doing that?"

"I told you, I hear it, too."

"There's no way." The beating grew harder and my hand instinctively reached for my chest. "I'm not going to die, am I?"

He shook his head. "No. That's what this session is all about, Helena. You already know that is a safe dose, and you know you'll be fine. Don't ya?"

I listened carefully to the music again and began to calm down. "Yeah, it's…it's actually making me…"

"What?"

"Making me wish I had a way to make music right now. I don't even know how, but I feel like if I had an instrument, I could… It wouldn't be this good though."

Hancock stood up from the table and drifted to me, sucked closer by every breath I took. He grasped my hand with his and pulled me up out of the chair. "You can be a part of it in another way."

He started waltzing with me slowly. The imaginary music seamlessly morphed into appropriate rhythm and tempo with my movements and my body knew just how to move with it. When he pulled me closer, the little bit of my skin the robe left uncovered met Hancock's naked chest, and I became conscious of the friction between our flesh as we danced. I gazed up into his bottomless ebony eyes and felt like we were the same magical being. "John…"

"Shhh," he beckoned me. "Just feel it right now… this moment…"

We spun in soft circles, our feet never touching the floor. More accurately, it seemed like we were still and the world was revolving around us. I could feel past the walls to every living thing beyond the Sanctuary house all the way to the sun and the moon sharing the rich indigo atmosphere. I was everyone, and the universe was me…and Hancock. We were guiding the stars, and the fate of all time was in our hands.

Until it started to fade.

I felt the crinkle of skin folding together between my eyebrows as I glared at the unseen forces taking it all away from me. The mentats started to dominate me once more, but they didn't seem as harmless as before, pushing urgent thoughts into my head as though they were panicking at the loss of their fleeting friend, jet.

Hancock was leading me back to the chair, gently placing me in it as the ephemeral effects of the jet wore off. He leaned forward into my face, meeting my involuntary scowl with a warm smile. "You in there, sister?"

I rubbed a couple fingers at the side of my head. "Yeah. I'm back."

He pressed his lips to my forehead and returned to his chair across from me. "You ready for your next lesson?"

I was trying to squint the unpleasant emptiness away. "I may need a minute... Or another hit."

"Nope." He flipped the chem case closed, ignoring my request. "That's your next lesson, love. The chems don't control you. You control them, ya dig?"

He made me go over and repeat back to him the information he taught me all afternoon. He didn't let up until he was satisfied that I was a textbook expert on being a functional junkie.

Late in the day, once he was content with the knowledge I had retained, he drew his lesson to a close, scooting his chair back. "You've been an excellent pupil." He patted his leg. "Why don't you come sit in teacher's lap and take your final?"

I stood up, a little loopy from the various traces of chemicals I had lingering in my system. With nothing on underneath, I let my robe drape open and sauntered over to Hancock. He narrowed his eyes at the strip of my exposed skin and exhaled deeply. I put a leg around his waist and eased onto his lap with my arms loosely extended over his bare shoulders. I drew my other leg around, encircling him like a spider would her prey.

He selected a syringe of med-x from the table and gently placed it in my palm. "I want you to administer that to me."

With slow, calculated movements, I did exactly as he taught me. I tied his arm off with surgical tubing from his case and tapped his arm. When I pushed the plunger in and released the tubing, I felt his body shudder underneath me as he let out a soft moan.

He removed another syringe from the table and injected it into the sensitive area of my inner arm. I gasped when the needle broke my skin and leaned my head back in pleasure as it exploded through my body. He put his hands on my hips and held me steady.

When I bowed forward again, he lined his face up to mine, not quite touching. "How's that feel, love?"

"Mmmmm, better." I closed the distance between us with a deep kiss, kick starting his desire. I could feel his raw strength as his hands drew up my torso, gripping and grabbing as if to consume me. He lifted me up and pinned my back against the wall, holding me there with my legs dangling, never breaking his mouth's connection to me. He kept arching into me, taunting the warmth between my legs with the bulge restrained by his pants. Since he wasn't letting me down, all I could do was relent to enjoying the ride.

When he finally lowered my feet to the ground, I tried to reach for his buckle on his pants, but my legs suddenly couldn't hold me up. He caught me before I collapsed. I tried to work at that buckle again, but he pulled my arms up over my head, pushing me against the wall once more with his lips trailing my neck, prolonging my yearning. My head was swimming. Before long, I felt the warmth of climax radiating through me. It seemed impossible.

"Ah! Ah, John!" He pulled me away from the wall, still holding me against him. As the orgasm ripped through me, I let my head fall backwards, his hand on my back keeping me stable. I felt like I was plunging into the earth, and the only thing that was keeping me from being convinced of this was the feeling of Hancock's body clinging to me. I slowly brought my head back up. "How did you do that?" I gasped, lightheaded from my orgasmic, faux fall.

He had a cocky smile on his face. "I dunno, love."

My fingers were mindlessly traveling down to my still pulsing center, eager for more. I felt fuzzy all over. "The chems?"

He stopped my hand and brought it up between us, intertwining our fingers. "Chems can't do that on their own. And I've hardly gotten started..." He said, lilting and lauded. "I must really got ya hot and bothered."

"Damn right, you do." I seized his lips in mine, toiling to restrain my needy tongue that was trying to be swallowed by him. With concentration and control, I glided it with sensuous little licks, carefully catching hold of his bottom lip and sucking. My roving palms embraced his bare, damaged form, voracious for the feel of him. Softly growling, he was steering us toward the couch as I hungrily tasted him.

There were slight gaps in my awareness as my chemical high flirted with my passion, making it seem like I was transported to the cushions in an instant with Hancock floating over me. My robe was gone, and I couldn't recall shedding it. His pants were gone, too, but I wasn't about to complain.

My extremities were tingling with desire as I clutched blindly at him. The gaps in my memory flashed intermittently and every time I could focus, his mouth was on a different place - my neck, my breast, my belly, inside my wrist, my thigh - a blaze of bliss blossoming from every contact he made on my flesh. I could only witness each touch for a moment before my perception lapsed, but the sensations lingered, spreading across my skin like a ripple from a raindrop in a puddle, enveloping me as the edges ran together.

His rough hands never stopped moving over me, my body instinctively clinging to his touch as though he were controlling me by strings. The good itch from the med-x was starting to take hold, and the uneven texture of his skin on mine only teasingly scratched at it, leaving me wanting.

I writhed as the wet warmth between my legs was building to an unbearable pitch. His hands stopped abruptly at my waist, holding me in place. He brought his face back home to mine, looking deep into my eyes, and unexpectedly, I felt the unseen but much welcomed pressure of him entering me with no further assistance needed. The fulfilling sensation of being split in two by his mass surrealistically swirled into the feeling of being pulled back together and joined with him as one.

I drew in a reprieved breath, and my back arched as I pushed my hips up into him harder.

Fully sheathed, he paused and lowered on top of me, wrapping himself around me. I sank back down into the couch at the pressure. He became still and spoke quietly by my ear, his head buried in the crook of my neck. "Helena…"

"Yes, John?"

He sighed a moan and I felt him twitch inside me. "I love you so much."

A shiver shot up my spine. "Mmm… I love you."

"You're the best thing I got," he purred. "You make me feel so… wanted…"

He had been motionless too long and I started to ache. "Please, John."

"Please, what?"

Static was crackling in my ears as I tried to pull him impossibly closer. "Make me feel good."

He twitched again as a soft growl rumbled from his scarred chest. He practically whispered in a deep, quiet gravel, "Anything for you." He began to grind into me in steady rhythm with my ravenous throbbing, giving me the relief I desperately desired. My eyes were mostly closed as I became fixated solely on my sense of touch. I was driven further and further from reality with every euphoric plunge he made inside of me. It was intense and powerful and almost too much to handle.

When my eyes opened again, he slowed to a stop, asking me, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," I replied, almost choked up.

"Are you okay?" He reached for my face, wiping wetness off my cheek with a course finger. "Are those.. tears?"

"No, mi amor… I mean, yeah. I'm better than okay." I tried to pull him back down on me. "It just feels so good."

With a shocked look on his face, he hesitantly continued. "That's a first for me…"

With him back at task, my rising tension began to be reflected in the enthusiasm of my moans that soon turned to unrestrained cries of his name. Amidst my fevered bawling, he sat up and reached behind him, unwrapping my legs from his back and resting them in front of him on his stout shoulders. I brought them closer to my chest, driving him deeper still into my core.

He grabbed hold of my ankles as his eyes lit up with amusement. "Pretty limber." Bracing himself on my legs that I was gradually spreading wider, he began to quicken his pace.

I couldn't take it anymore. I cried out for him, even louder than before as my release came thunderously moving me. He continued relentlessly with his gaze locked on me, satisfyingly drinking in the most certainly unflattering faces I was making as my body shuddered and shivered well into the aftershocks.

With his last few thrusts, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he spilled into my still palpitating walls. Once he was finished, he pulled out, and we crumpled up into a tired, messy heap, stuck to the couch in our own various fluids.

As we both gasped for air, my shattered brain was sifting through the internal chaos in an attempt to speak. I mumbled something incoherent - even to me - into his shoulder.

He separated from me slightly, his brow furrowed as he looked down on me. "What's that, love?"

"…More."

He didn't respond right away. Probably a result of his own brain lag. "It's too soon for another hit."

I shook my head. "No, not that." I pressed my lips to his as I sent my hand on a mission downstairs to find our missing connection.

With his mouth occupied by mine, he made a muffled chuckle as I palmed between his legs. He pulled away from our kiss and smirked. "Can I have a minute first? I'm all for another round, but ya gotta wait for the bell, if you catch my meaning."

I replied without thinking, "Well…then…another hit?" My addictive personality was starting to show.

He sighed remorsefully. "Can't do it."

I read the worry and frustration on his face and could tell he was already regretting endorsing my chem use. "Not med-x, mi amor," I said, trying to ease his troubled mind. "The jet."

His expression softened some. "That might be alright, …if you're willing to share." Still perched above my naked form, he reached into his pants on the floor beside us and pulled an inhaler from his pocket. He gently shook the chem before bringing it to his face and breathing in the drug. Tossing the canister to the floor, he brought his mouth over mine and gently blew the vapors into my face.

I sucked at the stream of mist with his pursed lips a fraction of an inch away from mine. When his breath tapered off, he brought them in for a landing, submerging me into the divine full-body kiss that is only capable of being forged through the chem. My world grinded to a halt in that moment, lasting almost as long as the forever I wished it could have been.

When he withdrew, the lazy smile of arousal was returning to his face. "I think I'm ready for round two, now."

"Good. I could do this all night."

"That's the idea, love."