Revelation of the Beasts

By Boris D. Schleinkofer

Justine's entire world capsizes the night she quits her food-taxi job and instead takes up a story-telling game with Lucien, the overbearing, darkly-sexual Promethean Immortal.
A bargain is struck and a game declared:
One-hundred twenty tales be told
Of misadventures new & old
& whence the World's woes unfold
She will come to learn that many of the key figures in her life are intimately entangled in the curious web of his stories; he will realize that the whole world contains itself, and - if they're lucky - the two will discover each other in Tantric exploration of the universe.
But first, there's a whole lot of dirty, dirty work to do.
Fair warning: this horrifying pornography depicts depravity and vice, torture and the breaking of the human spirit. A tribute to the literary works of DeSade, but written by someone who actually believes in love.

Boris D. Schleinkofer is a slave, just like you and everybody else. He lives near the monolith of Baal. His number is 5x2-00x1-11. He is a good citizen.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Boris D. Schleinkofer
• Release date: Aug 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301977529

Boris D. Schleinkofer

He is a fictional character in the Horror-Play “The Greatest Practical Joke Ever”, by Shaytan Komp’ü’tor. He has never made love to a beautiful woman, never wallowed in fresh kill, never found a briefcase full of hundred-dollar bills. In fact, he doesn't even exist at all. So there...And another:Boris D. Schleinkofer is a slave, just like you and everybody else. He lives near the monolith of Baal. His number is 5x2-00x1-11. He is a good citizen.

Book preview

Revelation of the Beasts

or

Tales of Love Forbidden

or

The One-Hundred Twenty Nights of Gommorah

by

Boris D. Schleinkofer

©[REDACTED] Edition

ISBN 9781301977529

©2002, 2006, 2008, 2013, 2024 Boris D. Schleinkofer

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this ebook. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only; you might very well end up sharing it with your friends. If you would like to share this book with another person, please consider purchasing an additional copy for each recipient. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support, and for respecting the hard work of this author.

All characters and situations described in this work are entirely fictional, and no inference should be drawn upon any similarities to any actual person or etc. All of this is completely made-up.

To see more of this author's work, please visit the following website:

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/BorisDS

INTRODUCTION

I've written so far, to the best of my knowledge, exactly three cursed books. This is one of those three.

These were books that should not have been written. We'll get to that.

I read 'The Bogeyman' by Steven King when I was pretty young and it scared the bejeezus out of me, to the point where I developed a mild phobia of closet doors. Hey, I was a kid. Not all that long after, I had my own experience with closet doors, and it 100% happened—I swear I'm not making this up.

I was going to sleep and, already scared of the open closet door, I made absolutely sure that it was securely shut before laying down in bed. I had just closed my eyes when I heard the distinctive creak of a door's hinges and you can bet that I sat bolt upright in bed and looked over to see my closet door slowly swinging open.

'Ahh, I must not have pushed it hard enough for the little pushy-thing to catch on the bracket,' I said to myself, or words to that effect. Hey, it was a long time ago.

So I jumped up in a hot hurry and closed that door again, making very sure that it was closed all the way and wasn't going to swing back open again. I jiggled the knob and gave it a tug; I made very sure that it was completely closed. It was closed.

It was closed, and so I was going to go back to bed. I had school in the morning, etc etc etc. It was closed.

I lay down a second time and no sooner had I shut my eyes but I heard that damn thing opening again. I heard the knob turning; I heard the pushy-thing sliding over the bracket; I heard the creaky hinges. All of it. I was terrified, and then I did something that would later completely puzzle me.

I jumped out of bed yelling, 'No!' or something like that—hey, did I mention that this was a really long time ago?—slammed that door back shut again, and then lay back down in bed with my head on the pillow and fell immediately asleep. I don't know why I took such an approach to danger, it doesn't make sense to me now and you can bet I'd have a very different response today. But there you have it: confronted with unbelievable peril, I chose to close my eyes and wish it all away. Luckily, it worked. I woke up the next day and went on with business as usual.

You see, there had been people creepy-crawling in our apartment building around that time, and prowlings, and burglaries. If you don't know what 'creepy-crawling' is, that's the term that the Manson family gave to their criminal trespassing, where they would sneak into people's homes and....do nothing, just move around without being caught. Yes, creepy, indeed.

There's absolutely the possibility that there was a human trespasser in our apartment that night; I suppose there's also the possibility that there was a troublesome spirit in my closet making mischief, or that the power of my adolescent terror manifested as some kind of telekinetic activity, or that a fluke of completely normal physics and poor doorway design combined to make the perfect spooky coincidence. Who knows? All I'm certain of is that when I was a little kid, my closet door opened all by itself, twice, coming back out of nowhere to scare the living shit out of me.

Those books are like that closet door, crawling out of their graves in the middle of the night to shake my world up. Criminally-impossible books, books that should not be. Read on, my hapless victims, and you will find out exactly why.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Further Reading

About the Author

PREFACE

I started writing my first novel in '93 and spent a little over a year and a half to finish the first draft. It had been a labor of love for me, my romantic dream of becoming a novelist, the first steps taken doing something unfamiliar that I wasn’t sure I’d be able to finish. I was very proud of it; I'm pretty sure now that it was garbage—but none of that would matter, because I got married in '94 and while we were on our honeymoon someone burgled our house and took the computer it was stored on. All that effort, stolen, gone; I didn't even have my rough handwritten pages, as I'd thrown them away once I'd put them onto the computer. Gone. I didn't need them anymore—I had my book all on the computer! Something within me got squashed and I was heartbroken….gone.

So I stayed mad about it for a few years and couldn't bring myself to try writing another novel for a long time until, knowing that I desperately needed something to shake my writers block, I gave myself the perverse challenge of writing an unpublishable book, a volume so vile and [REDACTED]. It was going to be beautifully awful, sure to offend anyone and everyone. Only the perversity was going to get me over the hump. Hah.

It started off as my tribute to the writings of the Marquis DeSade. If you're not immediately familiar with that guy and his works, I'll save you the trouble: it's a bunch of torture and [REDACTED] and poop-eating. And then some more torture. He was the guy who inspired the term 'sadism' and he's a very famous literary figure. Please understand, I was not glorifying or condoning these practices, I was drawing on my own life-experience and the stories I'd heard from people I knew, and using them to show how it affected people and larger systems later on. It was going to be my examination of the cycle of violence. I had no idea at the time of the true scope of this evil.

You see, as a teenager, I'd discovered a problem: [REDACTED] was because they'd been abused as children. And I hated the molester, not because of anything that had happened to me, but because they were breaking all my girlfriends before they ever got to me. Yes, I know how it sounds—but I was young, and trying to understand my world. I also had my own set of issues to work through, of course. So my book was going to be a ridiculous, over-the-top depiction of everyday cruelty, and how it influenced everything I knew. I was coming to grips with a darkness that had always been with me.

By the time I started writing 'Revelation', I was still a little bit enamored of the 'dark side'. Let's face it: they have the best music, their fashion-sense is impeccable, and they have all the money and power in the world. I was still kinda on the fence and hadn't yet made the switch from 'good-example-of-something-bad' to 'bad-example-of-something-good'. I'm still not exactly 'happy' about it—I mean, who doesn't want to be on the winning team? Who would knowingly choose to be the underdog?—but at least now I like to think I'm facing the right direction. I'm ashamed to admit that I haven't always chosen to do so. I've [REDACTED] on the grounds that I may incriminate myself or others, but I also think that in some weird way it was necessary for me to have gone through those phases. There's some lore that you just can't learn unless you fully immerse yourself into it, and the dark arts fit that bill. I don't think I could have come to where I needed to be without first passing through that darkness.

To the people I've surely hurt while I was out of my mind: I'm sorry. Please, forgive me.

Halfway through the writing, a remarkable transformation took place—I found my way to the Internet. This was long before Facebook, before Reddit, back in the days of bulletin board services and chatrooms and AOL-discs by mail. The first time I signed on to the World Wide Web from my own home computer was with a 33.6K modem on dial-up that showed nothing but ads. That should pretty much give you an idea of the time-period. I'd been shown a device implanted in a friend's arm that I was trying to figure out, and getting some of those answers [REDACTED] and I had a significant change of heart. I've written about a lot of that in my other works. So about halfway through the writing of my book, which drew themes and stylistic affectations from DeSade, it suddenly took a turn very different from its original direction.

But even back then, in the late nineties and early two-thousands, a great deal of the material was….problematic. I fooled myself at first into thinking that I could pass it off [REDACTED], I was exploring a reasonable treatment of things that actually happened or could happen, and why, and what could happen as a result. With some philosophy thrown in because, you know….DeSade. I think I’m probably lucky that I didn’t get arrested for the earlier versions of this book, considering that I’d publicly offered them for sale a couple times with waaaayyy sketchier material in them than what remains in this edition. Some of it I had to edit out because [REDACTED] it just plain crossed the line and I’m not willing to be that guy anymore—the 'edgelord' who digs his own grave just a little bit deeper every time he opens his mouth. I know you know exactly what I’m talking about. I think, without exception, everybody I’ve ever met who was into the works of le Monsieur DAF DeSade was fucking creepy, no other way to say it, and I like being creepy but not that kind of creepy. You gotta draw a line somewhere.

So many times, I've trotted this thing back out again, thinking I'd 'finished' it and could close the door on it. The door was closed.

Here it is then, my first completed novel, twenty-five-plus years after its writing. I hope I've pushed that line back far enough, and if not....see you in another twenty-five, maybe.

Fuck.

And yes, it is extremely appropriate, for reasons that will soon become apparent if you should choose to continue reading, that I end this first Preface with the exclamatory 'Fuck!', so there you go. Fuck.

Fuck.

(Original Preface)

Author's Disclaimer: This work is intended merely to shock, inform and educate, in the best tradition of the pulp fictions. While I don't necessarily condone or condemn any specific principle, practice or etc. described herein, I most certainly do not participate in any of them.

Strongly-suggested other Disclaimer: To all you young gurus out there, you must first get your particular patients' permission—unlike the anti-hero of this book.

Ad Astra!

Chapter One

"Trim the sails the weird stars under—

Past the iron hail and thunder,

Past the mystery and the wonder,

Sails our fated bark;

Past the myriad voices hailing,

Past the moaning and the wailing,

The far voices failing, failing,

Drive we to the dark"

W. Wilfred Campbell, from The Dread Voyage

...

Upon your universe's rim I stood,

And plunged into the dark beyond,

Where curvature, recursion there preclude

Escape velocity, a cosmic bond.

Should I reach out, my hands would ne'er hold

Aught but the void, your matrix's embrace,

A sublimated colloid, blank and cold

And souring velvet emptiness of space.

A nothingness we shared, an interval

As I bid farewell to all I held and knew,

and Time, old sole companion, eternal

Statement, a proof of being ever true.

...

He lowered the pen and watched the sky for a while, alert to the oncoming vibrations of cosmic interruption.

...

Two hands suffice to span the earthly sphere,

Yet you elude my grasp; you cling and hide,

A sundial's shadow, ever following near,

Upon the obelisk's opposing side.

We burn like suns, yet caution, my Love, heed:

Time's hands cannot hold us, like children dear,

Or soon we'll ripen, spread our skins and bleed,

And fossilize in amber's timeless tears.

...

Something was coming, was about to happen; the air was thick with crushing anticipation. A knock at the door and he set aside his journal to receive the new visitor—short auburn locks and hazel eyes, shapely curves—the sweep of self-possessed, innate grace announcing the arrival of divine intervention.

So...

This was how it was to begin.

The sound of the alarm-clock this morning was almost too much to take; she was about this close to saying 'The hell with it all!' and turning the damn thing off and just spending the whole day in bed. But she couldn't. She had to do those certain things that she didn't want to do, like go to work and support herself.

Her neighbors upstairs had been up all night partying to loud music, while the people below her banged on the roof if she so much as breathed too hard, and between them both they had her coming and going; last night, the ones below had been punishing her for the noise made by the ones above, as if she were somehow responsible, and she'd gotten into a war of thumping that had kept her awake until only a few hours before she was supposed to be punching in.

Justine knew it was going to be a day like any other. She'd gotten used to her grindstone, but that didn't mean she had to let it tie itself around her neck and drag her to the bottom of the ocean. Just because the neighbors were horrible again last night, that didn't mean that today would be any worse or any better than yesterday, or tomorrow. Something could happen, something....significant, maybe, if she put her mind to it. Life was full of little surprises, not all of them nasty. No, not all of them.

And if she kept telling herself that, maybe someday she'd come to believe it. Practical experience had shown her otherwise. Life was one horror after the next, beating you black and blue, until one day you got bigger and could start hitting back. It really seemed to be all about that one particular unpleasant substance rolling downhill.

But no, no... Things didn't have to be like that, did they?

She settled for knowing that it would be a day full of opportunities, something that would unfold according to what she did with it. Her first act of self-empowerment would be to drag her sorry butt out of bed and off to work. Someone had to pay the bills, and she was feeling responsible today.

Her boss was being a jerk as usual, yelling at her for being a couple minutes late. There wasn't even anything to do, just sit there, but Justine held her ground and let the silly little bald man blow off some steam, and then she apologized and put on just enough of an act to portray her shame, until the silly little man was done with her and moved on, and she could get to work. God, the customers couldn't call in fast enough, to give her somewhere to go and something to do, and get her out from under his glare. She thought of his beady little eyes and his sharp little moustache, and his big shiny head, and laughed at the cartoon-like image that came to her; it was hard to take him seriously when he yelled at her, the way she saw him.

"Could you at least do something? Make yourself useful." The nasal tone of his wheedling sent sparks off in Justine's brain, and something in her snapped.

No, I don't think so, Mister Peabody. I was hired to do one thing, and that's what I'm going to do. You want me to work? Get me some customers. That's what you do, right? You need me to do your job for you, too? One part of her couldn't believe she was talking to her boss this way, there was no way she was going to be able to keep working here after this, but the rest of her was pleasantly surprised and already steeling itself for another round. This was new, this ferocious speaking of her mind freely, and she liked it. If it didn't get her into too much trouble.

She wasn't ready for the reaction she got. Yes yes, certainly I didn't mean to imply... Ahh, why don't you grab yourself a donut and a cup of coffee and relax while I get us ready for tonight. You can even pick the radio station.

This was unexpected.

She couldn't tell which was worse, the brow-beating or the sniveling; having to deal with him fawning over her was a step up from worrying about whether or not she was going to get fired, though, so she took the coffee and the donut and hid herself behind an old newspaper. She didn't care about stocks, but it was all she had to look at and pretending to be interested in the columns of inscrutable numbers was way more comfortable than trying to pretend interest in the goofy little Mister Peabody.

She wondered again about her outburst with her boss. Did she really say that to him? She guessed it might have been natural, the inevitable outcome of some decision, made long ago, to commit herself to the truth. She always told the truth—whenever she could, come on, you had to be realistic about it—and she demanded that others be truthful with her; she let the promise to herself spread into other areas of her life, and when she caught herself demanding that same honesty from the little voice that spoke to her in her head, she found she couldn't get away with certain things any more.

She was terrible at giving advice, because she was always telling people things they didn't want to hear, and they eventually stopped asking. Her relationships with her 'friends' had gradually fallen apart as she'd changed, and she wasn't entirely unhappy about letting them go, earning her a new and possibly-unsettling isolation. This, too, was a new quirk for her: being alone, without feeling lonely. It was weird. Something was opening up, was blossoming, and it was taking some getting used to but she could certainly learn to live with it, so long as she didn't get carried away. What she'd done to Mister Peabody might have been getting carried away, but the man was now, all of a sudden out of nowhere, all but licking her shoes and calling her 'Mistress'. It was a bit much for her.

She couldn't take it any more; she'd apologize and things would change, would go back to the way they were before, and she'd never have to deal with this again.

The phone rang. Some hungry idiot had just saved her day.

The car's idle wound down as she sat at the curb double-checking the address printed on the ticket. The building she'd stopped in front of didn't have any numbers on it anywhere, but it was the only one on the block and the addresses on either side said it had to be it, so she strapped the steaming bag over her shoulder and got out of the car. Someday, she'd have enough money put aside that she could safely quit her stupid job and move to another city, maybe somewhere on the East Coast, and try over again at the modeling gig, or maybe she'd write that book she was always talking about, or maybe she'd try something, anything, other than this dreary running around the city she did every day and every night. It was a life she was ready to change, to put to use in more satisfying ways, once she'd built up the momentum to get her off the couch and away from the TV, wishing she were somewhere...else.

Funny, the building had a pleasant feel to it, somehow comforting. She hadn't expected that in this neighborhood. Something about it made her feel good, like she was someplace not quite home, more like the friend's house she'd often visited. She knew she'd never been here before in her life; there'd never been any reason for her to come to this part of town, it was a big city and she still hadn't seen all of it, even though her job had taken her over almost every single square mile of it. But something here was unusual; for one, the place was big, how big she didn't know, bigger than what she could see behind the tall gates. She buzzed and they opened for her.

She crossed the lot and it wasn't the buildings themselves, not really—it was something in the architecture, in the lines, the ways they joined and diverged. She couldn't quite put her finger on it. It was just beautiful. The voice on the gate's buzzer had told her to 'Come up the service lift', so she looked for an elevator. There was no way anybody could miss it, it was a big bronze and glass thing with only one button, flashing red, in the spacious cabin.

She took a deep breath, and pressed it.

Food taxi. That'll be—

'Click.' What was that?

He filled the silence she'd left behind. No more. I have you now.

There was his heartbeat; he felt its pressure between his temples.

A note sounded, one higher-pitched than human ears could register, one to set the hairs on end.

His world had imploded again, and suddenly become limitless and immense.

It was as if the universe had been stretched into a single taut line, the infinite span of the Ourobouros untangled, and then bound into double-helix with...

Another.

Something went 'tick!' in her mind; she wondered if she'd heard an insect or maybe some gadget somewhere short-circuiting. Come to think of it, the noise sounded like it had happened between her ears. She wondered briefly it if were serious.

The door was some kind of red wood; she could still smell the perfumed air of the elevator sticking to her hair. The grille pulled back and there she was, faced with a long hallway with just this single door. This part was getting kind of spooky. She hoped it wasn't a mass murderer. It would be just her luck.

No more. I have you now.

Where once before there had been only the aching loneliness of knowing another to be there but outside one's reach, there now remained with him a sweeping calm. No more the looking; the chase was over, the hunt concluded. A commingling of timelines had taken place, irrevocably fastening the two to communion.

Night had fallen, and with it the dream of waiting.

One foot lifted after the other, plodding her way to the door—the bag wasn't steaming any more, but what did she care? They were always still happy anyway. They were getting food.

She said the phrase to herself, practicing the mantra she got ready when she was about to knock on someone's door, the magic words that established relationship and kept them on their side of the fence. 'Food taxi, that'll be...' Damn, how much was it again? She glanced at the ticket.

There was a doorbell set in a panel next to her, on the wall. She pressed it and a voice in a speaker said 'Come!'

How much was it again? She'd just looked at the damn ticket. Something in the air must have been making her feel funny. She checked the ticket again.

In the act of looking back up, she lost everything she'd ever been, lost all she'd ever known, lost herself completely in his eyes.

'Click!' There it was again—for the first time?—coming from everywhere, an effect without a cause.

The lines in his face, around his eyes and his mouth—they were so totally different from anyone else she'd ever seen, and yet it was as if she'd always known him. There was a familiarity to their curves that struck a deep resounding note in her soul, and she felt like she had been hit with an invisible cushion of air. She'd swallowed involuntarily and taken a step back before she was even aware that she had, that was how powerful his presence was to her.

She'd never seen this man before, of that she was certain.

Something... Something about him, though, was deeply, deeply familiar.

Why? Where did she know him from? It wasn't like it was a face that was easy to forget: his eyes a shade of luminous black, with a stern nose and fine features, his good looks were ageless and full of the thrill of sex. She forgot herself completely looking into those eyes, swimming through inky depths stained with carnality, and heard something within her sigh out an answering moan, and knew that she was his, if only he would say the right words. And he did.

No more. I have you now.

'Click!'

No more. I have you now.

Food....taxi. That'll....be—

There it was, the wall of electricity, pushing against her again, shaking loose Time's hold upon her.

Her body moved through it, and severed ties to a past that was forgotten as soon as it was left behind. The future opened out before her.

No more. I have you now.

And they were the perfect words. Here was a man who knew how to make a good first impression. The absolute certainty and deep, commanding tones of his voice brought a warm flush to her cheek, and she dropped her eyes.

Her world was about to become a much bigger place.

"I

" Have

" You

Now.

How long has it been? She'd spoken before she was aware she was going to; she didn't know why the words came out of her mouth, or what they were supposed to mean.

With any luck, it might just have begun. What say you?

Again, the words spoke themselves:

What the hell, I'm game.

He looked her over and she was giddy; he met her eyes and her heart fluttered, and she went weak in the knees. Have we met before, somewhere? You look familiar... She tried to hold herself together, to resist the magnetic pull of abandon in his bottomless stare.

There is no more need to talk just now. Allow me to say for you everything you've ever needed to express. The presumption!

He kissed her.

She tasted blood. She thought it might have been her own.

Curse it all, not again, not this time! he cried, Keep yourself together, woman!

Oh, I feel faint... What's happening to me?

He caught her in his arms as she swooned. 'Tis but the dust of ages falling from your eyes. Be not afraid. I should suffer no ill ease taking the blood, were it not your own. Keep your strength, and tell me how I may best aid you.

Your kiss... I've never had anything quite like it. I want another. Something about his penetrating looks worked a strange power over her; unlike the eyes of most strangers, they were kindly and they didn't make her feel like a bug under a microscope, or a piece of meat with a price-tag. They weren't exactly... friendly... not exactly, but she couldn't help her fascination with them just the same. It was like something or someone else was inside her head, planting these seeds of longing and telling her that everything was going to be okay. If she resisted, it felt like that someone was fighting for control of her, but when she went along with the feelings and gave into them, a great peacefulness came over her and she knew that what she was doing was right. Was this what it felt like to make a deal with the devil? She couldn't see why she hadn't done it before.

Another of these? I was afraid you'd never ask. He kissed her on the mouth and ran his fingers through her hair; a lock caught up in his hand, but he stopped short of pulling it. A tangle, a touch, and there, 'tis gone again.

Whoa, déjà vu. I could swear I've heard you say that before.

A thousand times and one, and then more.

"Why do I believe that? You're not like any other man I've ever met. There's a weird way about you; I think I like it. Where did you come from?"

I am of the earth. Let that suffice.

Hah. Nice. Are you going to put me down now? 'Cause if not, you could just lay me here. I'd like it best if you were on top.

I can accommodate the lady.

These were the memories he carried with him: of wars and skirmishes, of love found and then lost again, of great accomplishments before the Fall, and the end of Time itself. There was no darker part of history through which he had not seen, nor any hidden corner left unturned in the cavernous labyrinth of continuity that formed his passage of days, the black expanse lit here and there with pin-pricks of light, a string of stars holding up the name of one special to him against the blanket of the sky. That darkness engulfed everything, had devoured her.

He'd held a scepter in Roma, hosted révolutionnaires in France when every day their heads were lost in the marketplace, smuggled opium on a schooner from the Old World to the New, and this when he was already incredibly ancient. The ages held nothing new to him, neither under the sun nor in his dreams, and held no promise beyond the periodic connections made with his one true love—a contact ever so brief and always in passing, so that it made his heart break even while she was in his arms, knowing that she was to pass again and spiral off away from him.

But this moment, this pregnant window of opportunity, was what he now lived for—the time between knowledge of her approach and the first greeting between persons. Would she remember? He could never make himself quit hoping she would, never in all the ages. He'd tried everything he could to help her recall, but it seemed he was doomed to forever fail.

And the days wore on, and everything changed but stayed the same, and passed in a blur—but for those agonizing moments, the times when he knew she would be near. Then, with or without his consent, his heart would begin to ache with the awakening of dreams, and he would know the pleasures of longing, true friend of all Romantics.

So much of this is gloss, a shiny covering to enhance the meat of the matter; the moment approaches but one must first bite through the polish. Fear not, for this embellishment bestows...

...sweetness.

Today would have been a day like any other, yet [REDACTED] He didn't even remember ordering the take-out; perhaps someone had gotten an address wrong. He wasn't above taking advantage of an opportunity handed to him in goodwill by Fate. He would have been a fool not to.

Did he know it was going to be her? Perhaps a part of him might have known, but the number of times he'd thought it would be her and then it wasn't were beyond counting.

And then, and then....the approach of galaxies in collision, the monumental colossi pitched hurtling together into the twice-lit night.

He knew this time—damn it all, curse that bitch Pandora and her poisoned box full of hope!—that it might come to an end, that love would be his, and that he would belong to that love just as well, and that it would be forever and perfect. Nowhere was it written in his book of soothsaying that this time should be any different than ever before. Was he to allow himself to hope? He wasn't sure if he could withstand the pain of being wrong again, and dashed upon the rocks of fallen expectations and oblivion. And yet, and yet...

There was a warm thought that would not go away, that maybe this time would be different...

[REDACTED]

Later, sitting at his desk with pen alone to adorn his naked frame, he drew the last letter at the bottom of the page, leaned back in his chair, and turned to take in the vision of the soft female form lying upon his bed. She was just waking, breathing shallowly on the edge of sleep; a murmur, a twitch of her leg, and she awoke with a frown, clutching at her belly.

God... What time is it?

"I prefer not to call upon that entity within my home, but the manner in which you evoke it suits me. Good morning. Are you rested?

"Oh shit, I ditched out on work, didn't I? Mister Peabody's gonna kill me."

You need no longer concern yourself with such pastimes; I would be most happy to provide for your needs, such as they may be.

"Who are you? I just met you last night. I don't even know your name! Oh, Jesus, did I really do all that?"

He pushed away from the desk and turned to face her.Oh yes, I would have no doubt of that. You were quite....active, I shall say. Singularly responsive.

They'd spent the hours in passionate love-making, all night long and well into the next morning, beginning their fevered embrace shortly after he'd opened the door to her. She'd resisted, but the instinct was immediately at war with the other, more powerful by far, compulsion leading her to press her lips against his and forget everything but the demanding tug of her heartbeat.

Something in her head cleared, and she came back to reality.

You still haven't told me your name yet, she said.

You may call me Lucien.

I can call you that, huh?

You may call me whatever you wish.

Lucien's not your real name though, is it?

I have not used another in some considerable time. I answer to Lucien. It suits me.

There was a moment of silence in which she struggled with her need to fix an identity upon him and then, with but the slightest push, she dropped it.

I need to go try and patch things up with my job. I've got bills to pay, you know.

Why bother yourself so? You may stay here—or you may return from whence you came, if you prefer—I will provide for everything you might require. My offer was sincere and, I assure you, I am perfectly capable of holding true to my word.

He beckoned once, and she came to him.

Their congress was less ardent than that of the night before, as if some devouring internal hunger had been extinguished in her, yet only as a fire that had burnt down to embers ready to spring into flame again at the slightest breeze.

The graceful curve of her chin upturned, her brow moistened with passion's dew, the tautening and releasing of her musculature—these pleased him immensely. She was truly a prize, exuberant and enthusiastic in her sexual expression, unlike the joyless fare to which he'd grown accustomed.

When she paused, gasping, her nails sunk into the skin of his chest, his eyes again bored into hers with perfect intensity and she remembered:

You haven't....even asked....me my....Don't you want to know....who it is you're screwing?

In truth, the name you wear now matters not a whit to me. I thought to let you reveal it at the moment of your choosing; go ahead, call it out now to the universe, if to do so would increase your pleasure.

Bastard!

She said it again, and by her actions indicated that she was shortly to leave, indecorously half-dressed or no; he propped up on one elbow and halted her with a word:

Wait.

She froze again in the force of his enduring will, midway through the act of dressing herself to leave; she held her shirt bunched in one fist, hands upon her hips defiantly, brow peaked and flashing righteous anger, the classic portrait of a woman scorned.

What? The ice in the word was unmistakable.

Perhaps you misunderstood my meaning. Please, allow me to clarify: I care not for the description of a thing, but only for the direct experience of the thing itself. A painting of a loaf of bread will never fill an empty stomach. You, Justine, [REDACTED]. You are far more than any of that, and, I suspect, pretending to embark upon a course of action of which you have no real desire to complete.

What... How did you know my name?

It was on your name-tag. A very pretty name, Justine, but not necessarily upon you. Are you as attached to it as you seem to be?

Ooh, you arrogant, god-awful—

I suppose it does not really matter, and I should be a fool for suggesting that you should ever be anything other than what you are. Justine it shall be.

Why am I going along with this? Some deep instinct still had misgivings, couldn't quite let itself be convinced that there wasn't something fatally wrong with what she was getting into, and it surfaced in the form of a joke that both recognized as hiding deeper issues of trust. She acted coy, but the question remained with her nonetheless.

You are, because it is what you wish to do, yes? And he was right. It was what she wanted to do.

He beckoned to her, and she came to him; [REDACTED] He was inexhaustible, priapic and driven; she found that after all her efforts and calisthenics she had still been unable to raise his heat, and she collapsed against his chest, soaking him with her perspiration and panting into the hollow of his collarbone.

Her stomach groaned loudly and she caught her breath: "I am so hungry..."

His reply was not immediate. You are accustomed to feeding more than once every fifteen hours? She laughed into him, wincing with the contractions of strained and tired muscles, and he slid snake-like beneath her to maneuver his face before hers.

Do you require nourishment? Would you like something to eat?

She relaxed from her painful hilarity at last, then burst into fresh peals of laughter. When she managed to regain her breath, the grip of a mild and broken hysteria painted its highlights in the rise and fall of her voice.

Listen to you—you sound like a robot! 'Do you require nourishment?' Need some input, Tobor, take me to your feeder!

She laughed again and squirmed against him, curling with her face nestled against the hollow of his armpit, then mustered herself and pushed up onto her arms.

Alright you, yes, I need to get some minerals into me, and I need some water. I'm dehydrated.

Then I should invite you to dine.

He didn't bother robing, simply rose and exited the room in an abrupt manner, and she was left purely to her own devices and shortly fell into the half-sleep of the worn. When she awoke some time later, as the sun was just lowering on the window's horizon and streaking her hair with vermilion highlights and brightening her eyes, it was to find the entire floor covered with an assortment of foodstuffs from varying cuisine dividing the arrangement into quarters, and two pillows set across from each other in the center. He came in moments later with a candle, two glasses of a dark red wine, and a large silver dish of chocolates, and she sat up on the edge of the bed with wonder and awe rapidly displacing her somniferous haze.

Oh... Wow... I just said I was a little hungry...

And I trust you will find something to satisfy. Come, eat.

She let her gaze take inventory of the feast spread out before her and knew that she'd never get to examine each dish before they'd grown cold and unappetizing; it felt to her like a test—that he was watching her reaction closely and waiting to see how she would respond.

She closed her eyes.

A scent caught her attention, coming from nearby, and she felt her salivary glands moisten in response. It smelled delicious.

She chose that dish.

She repeated the process twice more, and discerned by subtle signs in the periphery of her awareness his approval of her method, but pretended not to notice and took her three servings to sit by him on the cushion. He selected a single grape from a bunch, plucking the succulent fruit and bringing it to his lips while regarding her in a manner calculated to disguise his close examination of her with a veneer of casual hospitality. She was again quick enough to see through the ruse and to know that she was being evaluated and weighed against an untold agenda, but was curious to see what result her natural behavior would have on this mysterious man who'd not only just offered to house her and take care of her every need, but then surprised her with this show of extravagance and wealth—she had to catch a glimpse of the man beneath, to see how he'd prove himself if she gave the appearance of playing along with his game. She ate her fill and wiped her mouth, and accepted the glass of wine he held out to her, and the smile that flashed across his face might just have concealed a suggestion of the sinister.

Sweet, she said, pursing her lips.

I'm sorry, we have no water, as the piping is just now disabled for the handyman's whim. They'll be back on without the hour. Come, do have a chocolate.

He extended the dish, and there may have been the barest hint of a tremor in his hand, submitting its bounty: a mound of small pebble-shaped chocolates with glazed shells, an irregular circle of medium-sized parfaits and truffles, and an egg-shaped mammoth wrapped in brilliant gold foil dominating the pile.

Mm—thank you. No, I'm fine; actually, I'd rather like one or two of those grapes you're having—something to clear my palate.

But I must insist. Do have an after-dinner chocolate, and thus sustain a tradition long-kept which has given me no end of satisfaction to indulge.

No thanks, I really don't want any right now.

I shall offer again, and if refused a third time, then let the matter rest and not disturb you with it.

No, thanks. For three.

As you will it.

The grape was hers, and [REDACTED].

She crunched a strawberry between her teeth. I like them best frozen. How did you know?

Then 'twas fortunate that these should be so, eh? My help are of the highest caliber; I could not have prospered as I have without them. There is much for which I owe thanks.

Yeah, where are they? All the food's gone, but I haven't seen anyone coming in or out of here since I got up. Where'd it all go?

The plates had been cleared by grey attendants masked in the anonymity of service, leaving only the dish of chocolates behind to show that the magnificent banquet had once been there; he'd kissed her, and then there was a blank spot in her memory, a fog of sensation that eclipsed all but the most surface impressions, as if his lips bore some narcotic venom that let her think of nothing but him and his overpowering presence. As a lover, he was everything she'd ever wanted in a partner; as a companion, he was like a flashlight in a dark room. She couldn't take her eyes off him.

It was returned by those who brought it. Rest assured, the household is larger than you might suspect, and everything that has been taken away will serve some ultimate good elsewhere,... and though his lips still moved purposefully and he seemed to be communicating with her, she couldn't hear a word he was saying. Her eyes drifted in focus and she looked away over his shoulder. She wasn't sure what was going wrong with her; and then, just as suddenly, the air solidified and she heard him clearly: ... nothing shall go to waste.

She let the matter drop, but there was something else that was curious to her. You've eaten nothing since I got here except for those three grapes. You didn't eat that slop I brought over with me, did you?

He shook his head. It wasn't the food I'd wanted.

That's good. I wouldn't eat anything that came from there. But, so, just a couple of grapes. I was watching, you know, although I couldn't tell you anything we were talking about... You're mesmerizing.

My constitution has hardened over the years, and I need not so much as my fellow man to remain fit. Besides, there was a while in which you slept; during that interval I took pains to see my needs met.

You make out like you're some kind of old man, but you don't look a day over....thirty-five, at most.

He let the comment pass without answer, and merely inclined his head at a slight angle to acknowledge that she had spoken.

How old are you, exactly?

I am advanced in age beyond that which embarrassment prohibits I divulge. You would not believe me, at any rate, were I to tell you. Suffice it to say that I have done my time and seen what the world has to offer, and have now come home to that which I like best. It was in my searches through parts East that I learned the arts of longevity and the body, and it is with inspiration drawn from there that I shall make you my next proposition...

You're not going to ask me to shove beads up your ass, are you? 'Cause I'm too full yet for any new monkey-business.

No, not just yet. You are correct in stating that now is a time best spent in repose, for should you accept my offer, you may find your energy to be appreciated later.

"Well, now you've struck my interest. What's your offer?"

That you should play my game, and entertain with me for nine full days, after which I shall present you with the prize of your choosing.

Game? What game? I don't like the sound of this. Every guy I've ever known who was into playing games was a real jerk.

The rules are simple, there is but one: you shall tell me one-hundred and twenty stories—in honor of my esteemed predecessor—that capture my attention. Stories. There's the game.

Stories? That's all? And who's this predecessor?

Ah, dearest, but I have found that stories make the best diversion of all; even when one suffers from no material want, that nothing be described that one cannot acquire, still one hungers for more. [REDACTED], and I would draw from you this gift under the following conditions: that not one day of the nine should pass without you discovering to me some novelty or revelation or unexpected turn of events, I care not if they be true or fictive, and furthermore that the common basis for these tales shall be that which we all have in common, namely, the pleasures of our sexes and of the conjoining therefrom. The predecessor must remain unnamed.

Ooo-kay. You said 'a prize of my choosing'—what does that mean? Like, what if I wanted the moon on a silver platter?

Indeed, whatever you choose.

And if I lose? What then?

Then you shall return from whence you came and I shall go my way, that we may never again lay eyes each upon the other, for such would be my greatest loss, that I should set my heart to finding an equal and, discovering one who promises to be such that I may finally know a worthwhile companionship, to find the one who shows this promise yet at last stands revealed as common as the chattel drifting the barren streets of this dull city of men—that would be my undoing.

But you already said— and the words seemed to die less reluctantly than perhaps they ought, when he cut her off.

Yes, yes, I am aware of this, and I will honor my agreement to provide for you in toto, whatever the outcome. One way or the other, your days of want are over. You must forgive my gambit, but such was necessary to allay your fears and render you the more natural in your behavior when it came time to administer my final test of your character, which, it should now be said, you did pass with aplomb and undeniable grace.

Test? What test?

At first, when presented with a variety too plentiful to ever sample representatively, you chose by aroma and thus employed the most reliable and least understood of the physical senses, although this was but one of many subtle indicators. The true examination was passed when, offered sweets after so cloying drink, you chose instead to clean your sensibilities and begin afresh, and I can only assume this to be a practice you carry throughout all facets of your life.

Tell me, if I'd taken the large golden one, what would you have done then?

Please, you must forget that I ever mentioned anything of such distracting temperament and instead bring your intellectual faculties to the task at hand, for tonight, my dear, you begin to play the Scheherazade for our amusement. I will go now; I have other matters that demand my personal attention. The run of the house is yours, and you may feel free to explore as you wish. Should you come to find a portal barred, then that passage must remain closed to you. In time you may be shown everything, as merited by your success at the game, but for now you must be content with what I choose to reveal. I will call for you again at midnight, several hours hence, at which point the game shall begin in earnest.

So saying, he took her leave and rose to depart; she, made speechless by the recent turn of events, allowed him to go without any further comment.

And there was the mystery, a puzzle she couldn't bring herself to solve: that this arrogant, cock-sure, pompous man would tell her what she was going to do, and she was just going to go along with whatever he said. But that wasn't it, not exactly—he wasn't stuck-up, just unshakably sure of himself, and he hadn't asked anything of her she wasn't already prepared to give. She had the feeling that it went deeper than that, even, that he'd refused something she had no right to offer....but that was nothing for her to dwell on, and her mind moved elsewhere.

She didn't need anyone to take care of her, she could pay her own way in life, she'd found that out the hard way; it wasn't his money she wanted, though she was smart enough to accept the offer once he'd made it. There was no such thing as bad money, if you drew your boundaries and stuck by them. It wasn't the sex either, she told herself, though she was hard pressed to remember anyone that had even come close to matching his prowess—but she'd gone down that route before, and knew better than to base a relationship entirely upon that. What was it about him?

She didn't really know.

It might have been something in his face, something behind his eyes. She looked into them and what she felt she couldn't place, a scary feeling too intense to bear, until she had to look away. It was as if she'd seen that face in her dreams before, how many times she couldn't say, felt those eyes boring into her soul over lifetimes...

It was just too weird.

She summed it up to herself that, at the very least, there was something he had to impart and something she needed to accept, and fate would decide how their threads would tangle or unravel.

Chapter Two

But just then the beast will crawl to us and lick our feet and splatter them with tears of blood from their eyes. And we shall sit upon the beast and raise the cup, and on it will be written 'Mystery'.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, from The Brothers Karamazov

He returned just at midnight, closing the door and sealing them in the room together perfectly in time for the clocks to strike; all throughout the expansive corridors of his estate, a great clamor of chimes rang out, a foreboding omen signaling to her an appointment that might change her entire life.

Great timing, she said, and her speech sounded strident to her, and she inwardly winced with embarrassment at her tone of voice.

It didn't seem to have any effect upon him. Thank you. It helps in the day-to-day.

He seated himself upon the edge of the bed and she made motions to engage him in sexual contact—this was an easy out, to deflect from her insecurities by the lure of love—but he took her arms and gently held her away, silencing her hurt protestations with a look and a few words:

Please, not yet. First the game.

She took a moment to weigh his directive against her own inclination and then, finding them enough in alignment, composed herself, shook free of his grasp and stretched languorously across the floor, catlike.

When do I get to satisfy myself with you?

There will be time enough for that later, provided you show yourself still willing to indulge me equally, with the story-telling I crave.

There you go with that high and mighty shit again—where do you get off, mister?

Lady, I cannot act in any other manner beyond my true nature. I may, from time to time, adopt a contrived demeanor, should I deem it necessary to meet my needs or prevailing whim, but these moods serve only as differing means to present the essential message, which remains basic and uncompromised in the seat of my will, and changes faces only as dictated by the recipient.

Just what are you getting at?

The point I would drive home is simply that I would have you entertain me, and I have made that task all the easier for you by defining the channel in which your performance shall take place. You are to uplift me with stories, themed on a common sexual basis. Take it or leave it, as you will. It could hardly be much simpler.

His tone of voice wasn't harsh, but the words bit into her just the same; she bridled at the indignity and the wounding of her pride, but then...

In a back corner of her mind, a candle flame flickered and winked out. She remembered the taste of blood in her mouth, and let her resentment of him wash away. The darkness could absolve anything.

She yawned and stretched on her side with an affected nonchalance, and then asked, Well, it's good that you don't care whether or not I make stuff up from time to time. Because I do that. So, how to begin?

Let us start with an arbitrary division of human sexual behavior into three classes: the harmless, the masochistic, and the sadistic; let us further divide these into three modes of expression, namely, the singular, the coupled, and the group activities, which shall refer to parties of three people or more. Tonight, for simplicity's sake, and to warm you properly to the exercise, let us begin with those passions of a solitary, harmless demeanor. Come, let the game commence.

She propped her head on her elbow, lost in contemplation, and then began:

Oh, yeah... I know one, but there's a bit of a back-story.

All the better. Please, indulge me. Do proceed.

Yeah, okay, so like... Once upon a time there was a young princess who lived in a big castle with her parents, the King and the Queen, and their two dogs and all the servants and the ponies. A big castle on the lake, where the dogs would chase the ducks and the Royal Family spent afternoons sipping tea on folding furniture under a giant maple in the front yard. That kind of place. The princess went to school and was happy, played in the park climbing on the jungle-gym with the other children, and her days were generally joyous, and her nights were filled with dreams of rainbows and unicorns and happy clowns that sang to her about true love and how to find her way home if she should get lost. Are you ready to puke yet?

Pardon? Ah, no, not in the way you suggest. I would see where you choose to take it.

"Okay, fine, I'll go on. Everything went well for