Happy Hour
Chapter 7
When I woke up next to Carter sleeping I smiled brightly, feeling more awake than I have in a long time. There was a new voicemail alert on my phone and an in-box filed to the brim with text messages. Something about missing humans in connection with the club we visited last night. I decided that it must be a dire situation so I called back before I decided to put my clothes on.
In the middle of listening to the voicemail telling me where to meet Bo, Dyson, Kenzi and Hale, Carter stirred awake. His eyes fell open and he had a doughy, child-like smile on his face. There was electricity filling the room, snapping and popping against my body.
"what?" I asked pressing end on the phone.
"Last night was fantastic." Carter stated simply.
"Well yeah you were with me." I teased standing and all in one movement slipping all of my clothes back on.
"You're making me dizzy!" He yelled sitting up now. "Where are you going so soon?"
"Bo asked me to help her with some Fae policing."
"Aww I was hoping we could go for round two..." Carter pouted.
"Well maybe when I get back." I said sticking my nose in the air like one of those rich girls on old cheesy movies.
Carter stood and walked over to me wearing only a tight pair of Hanes boxers. His hair was a mess but that sort of made it look better, more wild than the cleanly styled version. He slid his hands over my cheeks just below my cheek bones and pulled me into him. At first he kissed me for a second, just a quick peck, then as he stared into my eyes he kissed me harder and longer. Embracing and engulfing me completely in the bliss that is him, his scent, his looks, his voice, even the way his mouth tastes minty still after sleeping. I nearly fell away from Carter as he pulled back to stare into my eyes, never in my life had I experienced something so heart-wrenchingly intense. I swear to you my adrenaline kicked in half way through, and I felt like there may have been some reality to the saying "heart beating out of your chest."
After the kiss Carter walked me out and let me borrow his motorcycle. He had to teach me the ropes first, it only took a few minutes before I was on my way to help Bo. The elevator ride was the best part, you could put your hands on the wall and still feel what went on last night.
Riding over was a thrill and the purr of the motor made me smile the few short blocks to the precinct. Wind blasting my hair behind me and the felling of moving so effortlessly is intoxicating. When I rode up the boys clapped and whistled setting back in a stance that made them look more or less like douche bags. They got a punch from both Kenzi and Bo not to mention the death glare that I gave them, flashing a hint of bloody red in my eyes.
"So how many people have gone missing?" I said straightening out my jacket and the dress shirt I "borrowed" from Carter.
"Ya know you really should be wearing a helmet, it is the law." Hale said with a toothy grin.
"What you gonna tattle on her?" Kenzi prodded.
"Naww I don't want her pretty little self to get hurt."
"Yeah, yeah, you can flirt later. What has happened with the club?"
"There's been the 10 humans that have gone missing recently." Dyson finally spoke up.
"10? and you didn't notice till now?" I blurted in surprize uncrossing my arms.
"No we didn't notice a pattern till now. Every one of them are were frequent visitors of the club, and they just disappeared after having a night out."
"Do you think its the people working there or just some random guy?" I said sending a text to my Mom telling her that I miss her lots that I would visit soon.
"We have no idea, it might not even be Fae but we decided not to report the pattern just in case."
We headed down the short alley towards the club, it seemed way different from before. No blast of energy to resist, no loud thumping music to yell over, and certainly not as many people inside. Dyson and Hale walked through the large entrance first, followed by the rest of us. There was just one guy at the bar, one skinny man behind it shining the counter tops with a white dishcloth. But below I could faintly hear other people talking and laughing, even some of their heartbeats if I concentrated hard enough. Mostily though I could feel the emotions of some of the people beneath me, hate, pity, love, remorse. I could even feel what they felt, the most dominant was pain and thrill. It seeped up through the drain in the center of the concrete floor.
Bo looked over at me with the same confused expression that I wore, what the hell was going on down there. Most likely it's where the missing humans have been, or will be might not even be with us anymore.
It was weird though there was this sort of musky smell that wasn't present before now, and it accompanied a haze of smoke that filled the air around the drain. It made my skin crawl and anything that it touched stung like snapping yourself with a rubber band or anything elastic.
"The clubs closed." The small man said behind the counter.
"Well its open to us. We have a warrant to search this place top to bottom." Hale said with his usual gracefulness.
"Oh well then sit down, have a drink if you'd like"
"Well then lets all do some shots?" I asked sarcastically turning to meet the eyes of every person, the bartender last.
"Oh.. no drinking on the job. My bad." He spoke with his hands raised and a wicked smile on his face.
"What the hell is that?" Dyson sniffed turning around to see a man cloaked in black shreds of fabric. It looked like he was the smoke, it was rolling from his body as he stood there with black eyes.
The first to fall was Kenzi, first she wobbled caught herself on the countertop then collapsed to the floor with a thud. Second was hale, he was straight as a nail and fell like one too, bouncing off the hard surface slightly as he reached for his close friend. Next was Dyson who clawed and growled at the air, appearing to be fighting the monster in the smoke, but he lost that battle. As I started to teeter I bounded over to Bo catching her just as she toppled off of the chair she sat at. Some part of me felt attached to her, more of a guardian than a love interest but still all the same.
I sat there for a few seconds holding her mesmerizing sweet body just embracing her heat. It was like that first day again where I was in a world that involved only us, I could feel every morsel of her being. It was a wonderful thing to feel till the bartender came at me with a bar stool.
"So you're the fighter ehh?" He spoke lifting the chair in his hands measuring the strength of it. "Well everyone falls with a hard enough blow to the back of the head!"
With the snap of a finger I was out, turns out he was on the wrong side to hit me in the back of the head. I could feel the bone crumbling in my left cheekbone and hear the pop of my now broken nose.
What is it about me that attracts the people who want to chain me up and torture me? I thought it was bad enough when my grandmother did it but turns out when a complete stranger does it... no it feels the same. Both were strangers and both are monsters, I guess in more ways than one. But why the hell am I the main target?
"sky" I heard quietly as I woke all the way up.
I was in this between state where I could hear and feel things but I was still in sleep paralysis or something and my body wouldn't let me move.
"SKY!" I heard loud in my ear.
I woke with a gasp of air and Kenzi kneeling two inches from me shaking my shoulders. When she lifted a hand and swung to slap me I caught it and snarled lifting my lips over my teeth.
"Woah relax its just me."
"Where are we?" I croaked standing immediately with blinding speed, there where thick iron cuffs around each of our wrists with enough chain to be able to play a game of basketball and not be bothered.
The ancient wooden door that was behind me creaked as it opened, wafting in an all too familiar scent. Everyone in the room stopped breathing as the man walked towards me, I knew who it was but I didn't want it to be true. It can't be true. I closed my eyes and let out a breath of hot air casting a puff of steam as it blew out. I smiled as I turned and waited for him to take the chains off holding them out in the air for Carter to unlock.
"what are you doing that for?" He said raising an eyebrow.
"Arent you... Why are you here Carter? How did you know." I said, my smile falling away.
"you, actually believed the act?" He said with morning breath.
"What act Carter?" I said staring directly at the withered tiles beneath my feet.
"What you can't honestly believe that we were in love could you?" He said setting a hand on my shoulder turning my face up.
"I can't love." I snapped dashing behind Carter wrapping the heavy chains around his throat. "No. I got that taken away from me when I watched my parents burn alive!" I screamed as tears flooded from my eyes.
"you were to young to remember." He choked through gasps of air.
"I was three yes, but us types of Fae are infamous for our mousetrap memories. What comes in after birth never goes back out. Reading for once gave me some good information."
I yanked the chain back harder into his neck as the images of my mother and father tied to a basement floor, being set on fire. Screaming out in pain the man shifted back to his original form falling to his knees seconds after I let him go. He was around the same height and weight as Carter but no way the same build or look. The guy looked around 30 and his beard was short and well kept, kind of like Dysons.
"Jeez Skylar how the hell did you know it wasn't him?"
"I was just with Carter and he wasn't wearing a suit. And I remember this bastards breath from the fire, smells like rotting grass." I said as Dyson was picking him up by the collar of his shirt.
"Your boyfriends here too, we picked him up after you left. That's how we got his scent, his clothes, even his look. Pretty little bitch didn't put up much of a fight though. Id say you were ravenous last night, right?"
Red sliced through the pale blue of my eyes and I dove straight for the mans throat teeth bared and ready to kill. Dyson moved the man out of the way just in time for Bo and Kenzi to catch me.
"Woah.. I have never seen her this bad. And she has gotten pretty terrible before." Bo said wrapping her arms over my chest.
"Thats because shes under the spell of monkshood, the effects vary in the amount her body absorbs." Dyson explained as the man giggled.
"whats so funny?" Bo half yelled getting in the mans face.
"You stupid man. They are in chains, how did they overpower you?" An older woman said walking through the doorway.
"Wheres Carter?!" I said walking demanding towards the woman.
"Relax now child, It'll all be over soon."
Everyone cried out as the woman put her prune skinned hand on my shoulder, causing a bought of exhaustion to overcome me. The combination of allergic reaction and some random Fae voodoo isn't the best for one to introduced to. I had horrible nightmares about Carter getting beheaded, or Bo getting shot. Id say that it was a coincidence that I woke to the sight of my close friends unconscious, and chaind to a wall but its to obvious.
The room was many times larger than the one before and had eight walls, four of which were occupied by us. The chains from before were still around our wrists but they were attached to a metal rings that were pounded into the walls. Bo was infront of me, Dyson a wall away from her to the right, and Kenzi a wall away from me on the right.
I panicked and started to yank on the chains as hard as I could making a small drip of blood run down my wrist. The commotion caused Bo to stir awake.
"Bo are you okay?!" I yelled between yanks.
"Yeah, why do I feel hung over?" She half asked.
"Oh so you're awake? I guess I didn't give the succubus enough. Oh well now were going to have an audience." The man from before said entering after a metal cart.
"audience for what exactly?" I asked as calm as I could.
"Well since your species of Fae were named extinct nearly a hundred years ago, the supply for your venoms and other... liquids has been on the lower side of abundance." He said breathing his nasty breath in my face.
"I'm not giving you anything!" I roared pulling as far from the wall as my arms would stretch.
"I guess that's understandable seeing as we aren't even on a namely basis. Hi my names Daren whats yours."
"You don't care what my name is." I spoke backing to the wall again.
"very true, now come here."
I spat at the ground and stood where the chains kept me, my skin pricking from the steamed Monkshood floating in the air. He walked up and grabbed my face holding a syringe, fit with needle, in the air.
"First things first girl, your blood has the ability to heal instantly when it comes in contact with an open wound. ohh and if you drink it the same thing happens and the high... matched by no drug in this world."
"NO! NO!" Bo and I screamed as the needle pierced the skin of my neck.
Bottle after tiny blood filled bottle lined the entire bottom shelf of the cart even after being emptied by the woman from before. After a while though Daren got bored and attached an IV to my right arm. I put up a big fight for that one ripping it out time after time, so he locked the chains above my head.
"Your gonna kill her!" Bo screamed
"Shut up." He yelled throwing a piece of the crumbling wall at her.
I bucked up and lunged for Daren, teeth bared ready to break bones upon impact.
"Ohh you don't like that? Is she your lover too, or just the person you made contact with after you woke up?"
"Don't touch her..." I seethed
"A little of both from what I can tell."
He picked up another massive syringe but this time the needle was off and he wore leather gloves. I knew why as soon as he pried my mouth and stuck it in the puddle that formed under my tongue. That was filled within seconds and he went for a smaller one, much smaller and with a needle.
"Keep it open I need some of the enzyme surrounding your teeth."
The syringe was thin and short, but he had to go with double hands at the syringe. It was so suctioned and so little in my mouth that he had to use both hands and stick part of his middle and index finger in my mouth.
I saw my chance and took it biting down so hard I crunched through bone and all. He screamed dropping syringe and finger to the floor, he ran out in agony.
"The level of stupidity in that man is astounding." The older woman said as she walked in carrying a cattle prod. "as well as your level of determination."
"Leave her alone!"Bo screamed as she held it up to me making blue electricity zap between the two prongs.