Chapter 2

True to her word, Kel supplied liquor, and they both attempted to drink each other under the table as the storm grew outside into tornado weather. Even so, they hit the bottles and kept their attention occupied to pass the time.

"How the hell are you keeping up with me, Girlie?"

She grinned and knocked back another shot. So far they had breezed through the bottle of tequila and started working on her whiskey. "Strong stomach." She put a hand to her mouth though as she felt said organ churn. "Though I believe I'm done for now." She fell back into her nest of blankets while Dante finished his current shot. "Gonna feel that in the morning." She hiccuped and burst into a fit of giggles.

Dante was, by then, almost as gone as she was and fell back into her recliner. "Haven't had anyone to drink like that with in ages. Only daily company I have is that banshee of a little girl."

Kel's giggling subsided a bit. "The little girl who—" She burst out laughing again. "—Who hit you with the mop?"

He growled. "It's not that funny."

"Ja, it is," she said before laughing took over her words again.

"You try living with a stubborn brat who won't get off your case!"

"Oh, I'm so frightened! If she keeps after you, why don't you just take her advise?"

"Because she's a spoiled little brat who steals my sundaes as payment for the cleaning I don't ask her to do."

"Oh, so you let her push you around?"

"Hardly!"

"It's plain as the white on your head. I bet you're even the submissive when you're with an actual woman."

Whether it was her laughter or her words that made him snap, he'd never know. One second he was gritting his teeth on the recliner, the next, he was crushing his lips against hers in her nest of blankets. He'd just chuck it up to the booze later, but forcing himself on the woman below him felt good, and she for sure wasn't fighting it.

A distant rumble made him stop short. That doesn't sound like thunder.

"Dante, don't stop," she purred, obviously drunk at this point.

He was about to silence her when she put her lips to his throat and slowly coated the exposed skin with kisses.

He was going to give in once again, but another rumble caught his attention, this one closer than the last. "Wait. Kel, seriously, stop."

She frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Listen."

They sat in silence for a few seconds, hearing nothing but the howling wind and heavy rain pounding against the high covered windows and barricaded storm door. "Don't be paranoid." She shifted to get better access to his neck, but stopped as the rumble happened again, even closer.

"Yeah, that's definitely not thunder."

Kel cursed and threw him off with breakneck speed, dousing the few candles they had lit for light.

"Mind telling me what—?" She threw a pillow at him to silence him.

"That's the noise we've been hearing," she said as a hushed whisper, crawling towards one of the high windows. "It's never actually come this close though." She peered behind the curtain, and fell back with a squeak.

He narrowed his eyes at her sudden onset of fear and looked out from where she stood just seconds before. And he instantly understood why she had fallen. The rumbles had turned into a consistent stride, coming closer and closer to where her house above laid. In the path before the creature, the walls were crawling with growing vines that seemed to be made up of blood, coating every square inch of the roads and buildings with the stuff. As the vines passed by her window, the air pressure shifted. "Oh no…"

Kel had curled into a shivering ball on the floor, covering her head with her hands. Lucky for her, since she didn't see the creature walk by the window.

The beast, a very large chimera, he deduced, slowly walked by the houses, seeking out life that it hadn't absorbed yet. By its side, a small horde of jomothumsiras leapt around the stoops, sniffing underneath the doorways. Dante let the curtain fall back before the creatures got close enough to see the moving fabric. "Sorry to say, but we're not in Kansas anymore."