 
                             JUSTICE SEVEN:
 
Justice Seven:
 
Episode 1
 
memories of atlanta
 
By Ice Phoenix
 
 
 
            Lori stared across at her opponent.  The match was only
seconds old, but she was already tired of it.  This was the last
chance, the last competition to clear up this little matter.  Lori had
no interest in any further challenges from this contender.
 
            Her challenger lunged, in an effort to get her in a
headlock, but she sidestepped, grabbed an arm, and twisted, throwing
her opponent to the mat, head over heels.  Quickly, Lori dropped,
pinning the competitor’s shoulders to the mat with her knees.  The
designated referee slid into place, and slapped the mat three times. 
The third swat was very gratifying to Lori.  It was over.  She didn’t
have to put up with this shit any longer.
 
            Looking down at her foe, she sneered, and said rather
loudly, “And you wanted to *fuck* me, Adam?  You can’t even get me on
my back!”  The crowd that had gathered laughed as she stood up. 
Looking back down at him, she said, “This is over now.  You’ve lost
every competition.  As agreed, you damned well better leave me alone.”
 
            Adam, struggling to his feet and beet-red from
embarrassment, nodded, but wouldn’t look her in the eye.
 
            “That’s all I want from you.  Good-bye.”  Turning, Lori
walked out of the gym.  The large crowd of people cheered.  In the back
of the room, a reporter took notes.
 
 
 
            Her name was Lori Darlington.  Beating Adam Childress
hadn’t been difficult for her.  In fact, the hard part had been in not
making it look ridiculously easy.  Adam had been courting her all
summer, but she knew what he really wanted was to get in her pants.  It
was all any of the jocks really wanted from her.  None of them gave a
damn about who she was, or what she wanted, none of them cared about
*her*.  Adam had been so damned persistent, she had finally had enough
of his hinting around.  She had offered him a single chance: if he
could beat her in competition, she would bed him.  Today marked the
eighth such challenge, and the last.  Of course, word had gotten around
that the two were doing battle, and kids go where the action is, so
they had garnered quite a crowd.  Lori didn’t like that; she didn’t
like to show off.
 
            Had Lori wanted to show off, she could have body-slammed
Adam repeatedly.  She was at least four times stronger than he was. 
She was also faster, more agile, and had greater endurance.  Lori had
not yet found her limits, but then, she chose not to push them most of
the time.
 
            The thing she found truly odd was that she was not
muscular.  Her body was trim and well-defined, but her muscles were no
larger than any other track-and-field star, which was her specialty. 
On the track, Lori looked no different from any of the others, with the
exception of her rather large chest.  Her speed, however, was something
she kept under tight control.  She consciously slowed down her running,
because she didn’t want to draw undue attention to herself.  Besides,
she didn’t need to win all the time.  She ran because she enjoyed it,
and as long as someone from her school won the race, she was okay.  If
it had to be her, then it would be, but if Jo, or Sue, or Carol were to
win, she was perfectly okay with that.  She knew she could win any race
she chose to, and that was good enough for her.
 
            Other events were very much the same.  High jump, long
jump, hurdles.  She’d even done pole-vaulting a few times, but didn’t
care for the sport.  She also chose not to do relay races; she felt
funny competing with a team.  So, she stuck with her individual events,
and the coach was ecstatic to have her on the school track team.  It
was a good relationship for everybody.
 
            Lori walked outside, stretching to warm up for her real
exercise for the day.  She had stretched before “the match”, but she’d
known that was going to be a joke from the get-go.  Now, she stretched
seriously, making sure her body was limber and warmed up.  She spent
ten minutes on that, before heading off for her run.
 
            Her home was five miles from the community center, almost
exactly, and it was a good basic exercise for her.  She kept herself to
a five-minute mile, but that wasn’t a challenge for her.  She knew she
could go faster.  How much faster, she had never had the courage to
find out.  What if someone saw her?  There was no point in making
everyone think she was some kind of freak.
 
            *Even though I most obviously am,* she thought to herself. 
Over the past year, it had become obvious to Lori that she was very
different from her peers.  She had always been an athlete, but as she
had practiced over the last year, her speed had shot through the roof. 
Her strength-training workouts had become so easy that she had
automatically increased the weight, until she was pressing the entire
weight available to her, and still wasn’t struggling.
 
            Throughout, she kept this to herself.  She didn’t want to
be seen as different, she didn’t want to stand out in the crowd more
than she already did.  When she walked into a room, every male turned
his head to look her way.  It annoyed her, but there was nothing she
could do about it.  Didn’t they know she had an active mind, a vivid
imagination, and a friendly personality?
 
            *No, sweetie, all they give a shit about are your 36D’s.*
 
 
 
            Lori arrived home twenty-four minutes later, sweating, but
not nearly out of breath.  In fact, her heart rate was well below one
hundred at the time.  She stopped on the porch to do some warm-down
exercises, and then she headed into the house.
 
            Lori made her way back to her room, and stripped off her
workout clothes.  She grabbed a towel on her way into the bathroom, and
was soaking under the hot spray of the shower seconds later.
 
            As the water cascaded over her form, her hands slid over
her tits.  Her nipples were already erect from the water, and she
shivered as her fingers played over them.  She could already feel the
tingle between her legs, and one hand strayed downward to turn that
tingle into a full-blown crackle of sexual energy.  Her fingers quickly
slipped into her wet pussy, and they were soon slamming into her cunt
at a furious rate.  It was mere seconds before she came, loudly,
sinking to her knees in the wash of pleasure that wracked her body.
 
            *God damn!  I thought reaching orgasm was supposed to be
hard for a girl!*  It had all happened so fast that she hadn’t even
thought about *him* this time.
 
            Sated, for the moment, Lori gingerly washed herself, trying
not to arouse herself again.  Washed, dried, and dressed, she grabbed
her book bag and headed out the door for the library.
 
 
 
            As she approached the library on her bike, Lori saw a group
of kids gathered on the library lawn.  Her keen eyesight saw five boys,
one of whom was knocked to the ground just as she took in the sight. 
Her mouth turned into a frown.  Fighting, she didn’t mind.  Hey, they
were kids, and kids fight.  But four-on-one?  No, that was *bad*.  The
boy didn’t look like he could have stood up to *one* of the others, let
alone all four of them.
 
            Lori slid her bike across the grass, laying it down as she
hopped off.  She dropped to one knee, her legs tense.  In that moment,
for a split second, she was no longer Lori Darlington, but Atlanta,
legendary huntress of Greece, and her target, these four toughs, were
only a dozen feet away.
 
            Atlanta leapt, her legs thrusting her powerfully forward. 
It was a full twelve feet to her first target, but she didn’t care. 
She hit the boy square in the back, throwing him fifteen feet,
completely out of the circle of kids.  She landed on the other side of
the prone boy, ignoring him for the moment.  Her eyes were wild, and
her mouth was set in a snarl.  Lori had never been so angry, and she
had no understanding of her anger now, but she also had no time to
care.  Before any of the others could react, Atlanta leapt again, this
time impacting much more strongly against her nearest target.  She sent
him flying a good twenty feet before he fell to the ground, writhing in
agony.
 
            Lori returned to her senses now, but her eyes still sparked
with fury.  She turned on the remaining two boys, who took one look and
ran as fast as they could.  She thought briefly about running them
down, but one look at the broken boy who lay on the ground quashed
those feelings.  Atlanta returned to the depths of Lori’s soul, and
Lori looked down with great concern and pity
 
            Upon *him.*
 
            The thought startled her so badly, that Lori backed away
from him.  This boy, she had never seen before.  Well, to be accurate,
she had never seen him with her eyes.  He had, however, populated many;
okay, most; well, in fairness, *all* of her fantasies for the last
three years.  She could scarcely breathe as she turned and ran into the
library, to tell someone to call for help.  The boy was unconscious,
and it was obvious that he was in need of medical attention.
 
            By the time she got back outside, the two boys she had
assaulted were gone, but the injured one still lay, totally
unconscious, on the ground.  She heard sirens in the distance and
prayed to whatever gods ran the universe that they would hurry.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            Barbara and Zoe laid Luke down very carefully onto his
bed.  The ride home from the hospital had taken up most of his energy,
just to absorb the bumps and vibrations of the trip.  He groaned in
pain as he bumped his arm.
 
            Barbara Anderton looked down at her step-son.  She had
already cried at the hospital over his condition.  She was very near
tears now.  He had two broken ribs, a sprained ankle, and a green-stick
fracture in his left forearm.  That was on top of the swollen eye, the
broken nose, and myriad cuts and bruises.  He had taken quite a beating
before someone, she did not know who, had stopped the fight.
 
            “Are you going to be okay, Hon?” she asked, concern etching
lines in her face.
 
            Luke looked up at her through his one clear eye.  He could
see the worry in her expression.  He nodded, but even that hurt.  “I
just need some rest,” he said quietly.
 
            “Okay.  Well, you holler if you need anything at all,
okay?”  She left the room, but Zoe didn’t.  Instead, she sat down on
the edge of his bed.  She held the ice bag gently against his face,
since it would be awkward for him to do so, with his arm broken.
 
            “Shit, Luke.  It looks like you really stepped into it this
time.  What the hell did you do?”
 
            “Nothing!” he exclaimed too strongly, and winced at the
pain in his chest.  Zoe moved to calm him down, but couldn’t figure out
where to touch him that wouldn’t hurt.  He settled, anyway.  “These
guys, they’ve been harassing me all year.  They just haven’t gone this
far before.”  Of course, he didn’t say, he hadn’t threatened to tell
their girlfriends what he knew, before.
 
            “Damn.  Fucking animals.”  She looked down at her
step-brother with concern.  “*Are* you going to be okay?”
 
            “I think so.”
 
            “Who stopped them, anyway?”
 
            “I don’t know.  I got a glimpse of her legs, but I was
nearly unconscious already.”
 
            “*Her* legs?”
 
            “Definitely a her.”
 
            “Wow.”
 
            “Yeah.”
 
            “Well,” she said reluctantly, knowing that he would want to
be alone now, “I guess I’ll let you rest.  Shout if you need me, I’ll
be in my room.  Got a big report due next week.”
 
            “Thanks, Sis.”  

            She loved it when he called her that.  “No problem.”  She
left the room, shutting the door behind herself.
 
            Luke lay back, rolling his head so that it pressed against
the ice bag.  He groaned at the pain even that caused, but knew the ice
would take down the swelling, and so he was willing to put up with
that.  The doctor had said that his arm should be ready to come out of
its cast about a week after school started.
 
            *Like I needed something else to make me stand out.*  Luke
knew that what he had done today was foolish, but he’d gotten so tired
of being pushed around and harassed for not having done anything at
all, he thought that perhaps this would be a good time to try some
blackmail.  It had not worked.  The only question in his mind now was
whether or not to carry through with his threat.
 
            *Would that be the right thing to do?  More importantly,
would it get the shit kicked out of me again?*  He didn’t really have
an answer to that.  Luke considered for some time what to do about his
predicament.
 
            *Yeah, predicament.  All because of this damned thing in my
head.*
 
            It had started ten months ago.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            “Anderton!  Stop daydreaming and get back to work!”  The
class giggled as he turned beet red from his teacher’s rebuke.  He
looked back down at his geometry test.  His teacher, Mrs. Potter, was
the worst he had ever had.  She had no ability to explain math to her
students, though she was obviously quite good at it herself.  Other
kids had told him the problem was that she had come from a
professorship, and that this lower-level math was too easy for her.
 
            *Yeah, great.  Unfortunately, it might as well be Attic
Greek to me.*  Luke glanced up from his paper to look at the clock. 
Fifteen more minutes.  He had only completed about half the test.
 
            He turned his eyes on the esteemed Mrs. Potter.  She wasn’t
very much fun to look at.  For the moment, he was imagining a nice
laser pistol cutting a hole in her head.  It was one of his favorite
daydreams, to watch her brains spill out all over her desk.
 
            Only, this day, something very weird happened.  As the
laser beam in his imagination made its way through her skull, his point
of view was pulled inside her head.  Luke gasped as he saw images that
he couldn’t have imagined... and a few he didn’t even want to remember,
that involved Mr. Potter and sex.
 
            Luke was swimming in imagery, and soon he noticed that some
of the images that floated past him were the answers to today’s test
questions.  He took note of them as they passed by, filing them away.
 
            He was sharply pulled from his dream by, “What are you
staring at, Anderton!  Get back to work!”  Mrs. Potter was glaring at
him.  He was tempted to flip her the bird, but instead, he remembered
that he possibly had the answers to the questions.  He didn’t
understand any of what had just happened, but he wasn’t going to
question the answers.  He thought that perhaps his subconscious
understood geometry better than he did, and so maybe he had been able
to pull up the answers from his inner self.  Either way, he didn’t have
a better solution for the problems, so this one would do.
 
            Fourteen minutes later, Luke handed in his paper, just as
the bell rang.  He walked out of class with a smile, annoying Mrs.
Potter.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            It had taken Luke weeks to figure out what had been going
on.  When it started happening with other people, like his step-sister
Zoe, he knew that it wasn’t his imagination.  He had soon learned that
he was reading their memories of past events.  In the case of Mrs.
Potter, he had read the information she had remembered from writing the
exam in the first place.  It was astonishing to him that he could do
this.
 
            What became more astonishing to him was how people started
to treat him.  Once he had started to control his power, to be able to
read people at will, he had gained quite a bit of self-confidence. 
However, as often happens, the people around him took this as some kind
of arrogance, and they really started to dislike him.  He did not
understand this, nor was he able to cope with it.
 
            It hurt even more that, when he would try to make any use
of the knowledge he had gained from people’s minds, they would look at
him with fear, suspicion, and loathing.  Luke didn’t understand
people’s instinctive fear of people with seemingly private knowledge. 
He had never intentionally misused his power, had never purposely given
away sensitive information.  Still, the people around him sensed his
new strength, and hated him for it.
 
            *How can I ever have friends, be a normal guy, when this
thing keeps getting in the way?  Oh, and let us not forget that it gets
me beat up a lot, too.*  Luke knew that what he needed was protection:
his own group of friends to hang with, so that others would leave him
alone.  But who wanted to hang out with the freak know-it-all?
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            “I’m going out for my workout, Mom!” Lori called from the
front door.
 
            “Okay, Sweetheart.  Be home for dinner!” Mary Darlington
called from the kitchen.
 
            “Sure thing!”  Lori headed off on her bike for an area
outside of town.  The bike ride was actually part of her workout, and
she kept her speed right at 20 mph.  This was fast enough to warm her
up, but not so fast as to draw attention to herself.  She could get her
ten-speed going up to 40 mph on flat ground without a problem, but that
was too noticeable.  

            What she, herself, failed to notice was the car that was
tailing her from about a block back.  She focused on her exercise, and
the car followed along.  It was only when she turned off onto her
normal path that the car broke off.  She still didn’t notice as the
driver pulled over and then stared down the path at her in frustration.
 
            Ten minutes later, Lori broke out of the trees into a large
meadow.  She had never seen any signs that anyone other than her came
back here, but she made a whole new sweep of the area today, just to
make sure.
 
            Having settled her mind, she came back to where she had set
her bike, and then slipped off her sweats and sweatshirt.  Beneath, she
had on a tight sports bra and spandex shorts.  The tight, stretchy
fabric felt better on her when she did *these* kinds of workouts.  She
had opted for dark green today, and she reflected that she almost
looked like she belonged in this grassy area, dressed this way.
 
            Smiling to herself, she began to stretch out in earnest. 
For the next twenty minutes, she stretched and warmed her muscles. 
Today was not a normal workout.  Every couple of weeks, she would come
back here to try to test her limits, to see just how fast, strong, and
agile she was.
 
            Warmed up, Lori decided to start with a run today.  The
clearing was a large oval, and she used it as a track.  She had
measured it once, to find that it was ¾ of a mile around.  She started
off slowly, building her speed.  By the time she was halfway through
her first lap, she had built up to the fastest speed she had ever tried
before.  Pushing just a little harder, she managed to go even faster. 
She maintained this speed for the next eight laps, before taking one
more lap to slow down, and then she stopped. 

            Lori was breathing just a little heavy, but she felt
great.  She checked her lap counter on her watch, and did the math in
her head.  *A three-and-a-half minute mile.  Not too bad.*  Lori
wondered if she would ever reach an absolute limit for speed.  She
hadn’t yet reached a point of exhaustion on any of her tests.
 
            Next, Lori decided to test her strength.  There was a
collection of rocks near the center of the clearing that she had moved
their over the course of the weeks, as she had worked out here.  She
walked to one, figuring it to be about the weight of a bowling ball. 
She picked it up, hefting it in her hands.  Then, lifting it as best
she could to her shoulder, shotput-style, she took a step and heaved. 
The rock arced through the air, and Lori watched as it landed with a
very heavy *thud* some distance away.  Pacing it off, she found that
she had lobbed a fifteen pound rock about a hundred feet.  No big deal,
it hadn’t really been a strain, but she didn’t want to push it.  One of
these days, she would try to hard and tear a muscle, and she didn’t
look forward to the pain of that.
 
            Instead, Lori focused on another rock.  This one, she
estimated to be about two hundred pounds.  She chose it not for its
weight, but because it was a size she could deal with.  She lifted the
rock in both hands easily, and pressed it over her head.  She then
began to turn the rock above her, trying to find decent handholds. 
Once she did, she stepped forward, bending her body and using her arms
to hurl the rock forward.  It bounced three times across the ground,
and rolled all the way to the trees.  This was better than a couple
weeks ago, when it had only made it three-quarters the way to the
threes.
 
            Lori performed other strength tests, trying to push
herself.  The thing she was also noting was that she wasn’t getting as
tired as she used to.  By now, she was usually starting to fade in her
strength, but not this week.  All the same, she decided to change her
regimen.
 
            Lori settled into a clear area of the meadow, and dropped
back into a martial arts defense stance.  Quickly, she began one of her
black belt forms, only modified to fit her skills.  Jumping kicks were
done to hit ten-foot-high targets.  Leaps were done at imaginary
attackers fifteen feet away.  She was a blur, moving through form after
form.  She didn’t stop between each one, but instead moved quickly
through every form she knew, all the way back to white belt.  Finally,
she stopped.  This, at least, had her winded, for she was moving as
fast as she could manage.
 
            After several more agility exercises, Lori felt that she
had put in a good workout for the day.  She moved over to where her
bike lay, her sweats draped over it to keep them clean.  She dropped
down onto the grass in the shade, to rest.  She’d already done her
warm-down exercises, and she was feeling good.  She dropped her head
onto the grass, to look up at the sky showing through the leaves on the
trees.  She closed her eyes, and, as always happened, *he* came to
visit.
 
 
 
            Matthew Purvis was a reporter.  He had been on the trail of
this girl for two months now.  He’d suspected she was unique when he’d
heard about her challenging a boy to physical competition.  Watching
the contests, he’d grown to believe there was more to her than anyone
suspected.
 
            Today, he was hoping to get pictures of her doing something
that no ordinary person could do, but dammit, the path she had taken
wasn’t accessible to him.  It had taken him forever to find where she
had gone, and to get to a place where he could watch.
 
            *Shit!  It looks like she’s already done!  I wonder what
she did here?*  As he was watching, however, he noticed what she *was*
doing, and figured some pictures might be in order, after all.
 
 
 
            As the image of *him* ran through her mind, Lori’s hands
began to move against her body.  One hand roughly cupped a breast,
eliciting a strong moan from her lips.  Her other hand quickly moved
down between her legs, rubbing the spandex into her cunt.  It wasn’t
long before Lori’d had enough of the fabric, and she yanked her sports
bra up, letting her tits spill out into the open air.  Her fingers
immediately sought out a nipple, and twisted lightly.  Her moan echoed
across the meadow.
 
 
 
            *Holy shit!* Purvis thought to himself.  *She is one hot
bitch!*
 
 
 
            Lori’s fingers soon worked their way beneath the spandex
waistband, shoving the material down roughly.  She lifted her hips, and
pushed the shorts down to her knees.  Her fingers then began their
dance in her crotch, stroking her pussy lips until her juices were
leaking out on the ground.  

            She pushed her middle finger deep into her cunt, and
groaned loudly.  It was joined by a second finger, and her thumb began
to strum her clit.  In seconds, her hand was moving in a blur.
 
            Unlike at home, Lori did not stop herself from screaming
out.  She let loose with a wail of ecstasy as her first orgasm hit. 
But her fingers didn’t stop pounding her cunt, and her other hand
continued to twist and pull at her nipples.  Another orgasm was upon
her soon, and another.
 
 
 
            It was a solid hour before Lori stopped.  Purvis had come
twice just from watching her.  Now, she lay exhausted, her legs spread,
her shorts having slid all the way off her legs.  Matthew thought to go
down there and just fuck her until he was sated, but he preferred a
more, well, *active* participant, if not wholly willing.  He finished
off his roll of film taking pictures of her lying there, and then
slipped away.  He would get the pictures he needed next time she came
here, he was sure of that.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            Luke had spent the last two weeks recovering from his
beating.  He had tried to put it out of his mind, but of course he
couldn’t.  It was very hard to type with one hand, and the fingers of
his left hand were pretty useless the way his forearm was wrapped up. 
Luke was more than just a computer user; he was a hacker, and even the
never-seen leader of the local hacker group.  He took some perverse
pleasure in leading a group that had never met him.  He only
communicated with them through Internet Phone.  He’d even used a
voice-changer.  It was so very conspiratorial.  Luke did it mainly
because he thought it was funny, not because he was worried so much
about his security.
 
            But now, he couldn’t even *shower* properly, let alone hack
anything.  Here he was, trying to get clean, but with a bag taped over
his left arm, it was hard to get anything at all done.  He spent an
extra five minutes in the shower because of his cast, and he bitched to
himself about it every single time.
 
            Of course, he didn’t bitch to anyone else.  His mother
doted over him endlessly, and his sister was even being kinder than
usual to him.  They were really his *step*-mom and his *step*-sister,
but he never thought of them in those terms.  He’d been living with the
two of them for seven years.  His father had married Barbara Solens
after Luke’s real mother had been killed in a car crash.  Two years
ago, Luke’s father had followed his first wife in the same manner. 
Since then, Barbara had tried to make up for the empty spot in Luke’s
life.  She hadn’t been entirely successful, but he loved her dearly for
the effort.
 
            The truth was, Luke had never known his “real” family.  He
had been told from the beginning, when he was old enough to understand,
that he had been adopted as an infant.  His mother and father hadn’t
known who his real parents were, and it would be another few years
before he could get the courts to open the adoption records.  So, Luke
was actually on his *third* family in life.  But he was perfectly happy
with the family he had.
 
            Finally finishing up in the shower, Luke turned off the
water.  Now he could look forward to an even greater difficulty:
getting dry.  He opened the sliding glass door on the tub, and started
to reach for the towel with his bagged left hand, while his right
steadied him.  Fumbling with the towel, he dropped it on the floor with
a curse.
 
 
 
            Zoe really needed her purse, but she’d left it in the
bathroom, and Luke was in there showering.  But he probably was already
half-dressed, and she’d just sneak in and grab it.  He wouldn’t mind,
would he?  Of course not.
 
 
 
            As Luke bent over slightly to try to reach the towel, the
door opened suddenly.  Zoe stepped in without even looking, but then
she froze, seeing Luke, naked and dripping wet, reaching for the towel
on the floor.
 
            Now, Zoe had not seen Luke naked, ever.  Her eyes quickly
roamed his body, but they settled, somewhat predictably, on his dick. 
Luke was well-endowed, with an eight-inch cock, and at the moment it
was semi-erect, probably, she figured, from some daydream he’d had in
the shower.
 
            Luke stood, nearly unbalanced, staring at his sister, who
was obviously staring at him.  He was embarrassed, but he was in no
position to cover himself.  He said, “Um, Zoe?  Could you maybe pick
the towel up for me, before I fall?”
 
            Zoe couldn’t say a word.  Her face turned crimson as she
bent over to grab the towel. Handing it to him, she mumbled something,
and turned, rushing out of the bathroom and even forgetting the purse
she had come in for.  Luke, somewhat amused at her dismay, but
embarrassed enough not to be able to enjoy it, proceeded to dry himself
off.
 
 
 
            Back in her room, Zoe’s crimson blush had faded, to be
replaced with the rosy complexion of arousal.  She had been with a few
boys, but none had been so *big*!  Luke was at least two inches bigger
than her last boyfriend, and he wasn’t even fully hard!  Zoe found it
hard to catch her breath.
 
            She flopped down onto her bed, and tried to clear her head,
but all her thoughts turned to Luke’s naked body, his long, hard cock,
and how much pleasure it could bring a woman.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            The first day of school inevitably arrived, and Luke was
not looking forward to it.  He was already an outcast, but now he was
an outcast, *with* a cast.  The teasing, he was sure, would be
unmerciful and ongoing.  He made his preparations for school with all
the enthusiasm of a tree sloth on Prozac.
 
            “Honey, do you not want to go to school today?” his mother
asked him.
 
            He kind of smirked at himself.  If he said no, she would
immediately call the school and have him excused.  That’s how she’d
been of late.  Instead, he said, “Not really, but I can’t put it off
forever.  I’ll be okay, I suppose.”  *As long as I don’t come home with
the *other* arm broken...*
 
            “Well, okay.  You two hurry, or you’ll be late.”  Barbara
Anderton kissed her children and shooed them out the door so she could
get ready for work.
 
            Zoe felt uncomfortable.  This was the closest she’d been to
Luke since the day in the shower.  That was nearly a week ago, and she
still couldn’t get it out of her mind.  She’d masturbated at least a
dozen times in the past week, thinking about him.  She didn’t know what
the hell she was going to do.
 
            They arrived at school without incident, but before he got
out of the car, Zoe asked him, “Are you going to be all right, Luke? 
You need *any* help at all today?”
 
            He looked at her, seeing that she was completely sincere. 
“Nah.  I’ll be okay, so long as I don’t get lost.”
 
            “Meet me at lunch, okay?  Just so I know things are going
okay?”
 
            “You bet, Sis.”  With that, he climbed out of the car and
headed for his first day of high school.
 
 
 
            The day had gone about as Luke had expected.  The razzing
and bullshit he’d put up with in junior high had not gone away.  Even
Zoe’s presence at lunch couldn’t take care of the problem, even though
she was a senior, and so did have some pull with that crowd.  He’d put
up with it as the cost of doing business as a geek, and a bookworm.  Of
course, he longed for the day when he would not have the damned cast on
his arm to make him stand out like a dandelion in a field of violets,
but that was still a week away.
 
            His sister was waiting for him in the parking lot, so that
she could drive him home.  He often wondered if it bugged her to have
to lug him to and from school, but she had never once even hinted at
being upset about it.
 
            Today, she seemed rather anxious about something, but he
figured if she wanted to talk about it, he’d find out on the way home. 
He gave her his usual, “Hi,” and got in the car.  She, on the other
hand, took a long moment to get in and start the engine.
 
            Zoe had been tormented all day.  This was the first day
she’d been away from her brother for hours at a time since... well,
since *that* day.  She had been completely unable to focus, and it was
a good thing that it was basically an orientation day, because her
thoughts would not have allowed real knowledge past them.
 
            As she drove home, she pondered what she should do about
it.  Talk to him?  What would that resolve?  Of course, there was the
obvious, but... could she go through with it?  Would he even allow her
to try?  Was there any way to reduce his ability to say no?  *Ah, maybe
that’s the way to do it...*
 
            When they got home, Zoe took her shower first.  She wanted
to make sure she was clean for what was coming.  When she’d finished
up, she knocked on Luke’s door to let him know, and then went down to
her own room.  She dried her hair, but didn’t get dressed.  There was
little point in it, really.
 
            Luke, meanwhile, went through his usual extended shower
routine, grumbling all the while about his stupid cast.   His mind was
focused on school things, and he had completely dismissed his sister’s
behavior in the car.
 
            About halfway through his shower, Zoe tiptoed her way to
the bathroom door.  She could still hear the water running, and that
was good; she had arrived in time.
 
            *Maybe I should just barge in on him in the shower?  No,
that wouldn’t work.  He’s got that damned plastic bag on his cast.  So,
I need to wait for him to take that off.  I hope he does that before he
gets dressed.  I’ll just have to peak to find out.*  Zoe had opened the
door just wide enough to see in, but she was so absorbed in her
thoughts that she almost missed her opportunity.  Her attention finally
snapped back into play as she heard the sliding glass door on the tub
being pushed open.  She held her breath as she turned around to peer in.
 
            Luke grabbed the towel, and started to wipe down his body. 
*Only six or seven more of these,* he thought, *before I get rid of
this damned cast.*  He didn’t notice the door was slightly ajar as he
stepped carefully out of the tub to finish drying himself.  He ripped
the plastic bag off his arm, tossing it in the waste can, and then
returned to rubbing the water from his body.  As he twisted and turned,
he unknowingly gave his sister the best show she could have imagined.
 
            Luke dropped the towel into the bathroom hamper, and just
as the lid came down, removing the terrycloth from reach, the door to
the bathroom swung open, and Zoe stepped in.
 
            “Zoe!” Luke cried, stepping back, but there was little he
could do.  With nothing to hide himself, he used his hand, but that was
hardly effective.  He backed up to the edge of the tub, but that was as
far as he could go.  He noticed that Zoe’s face showed no hint of
embarrassment this time, and that her eyes were rather firmly glued to
the item he was trying to cover up.
 
            Zoe stepped toward him, still wearing her bathrobe.  In a
soft and sexy voice, she said, “Hmm.  I just thought that, since I got
to see you last week, it was unfair that you hadn’t seen me.”  With
that, her hands untied the belt of her robe, and then pulled it off,
letting it fall to the floor.
 
            Luke stared in awe at his sister’s wonderful body.  Her
long blonde hair flowed around her head, and ended just above the swell
of her ample tits.  His eyes continued down, across her flat stomach
and lingered for several moments at the light curls of her pubic hair. 
He followed her legs down for miles until they reached her feet, and
then he moved his eyes back up, forcefully pushing them past her tits
to look her in the face again.
 
            “Zoe?” he asked, uncertain of what was going on.
 
            “Do you like?” she asked, holding out her hands and posing
for him for a second, before walking to him.
 
            “Yeah... I mean *hell* yeah, but what...”  his words were
cut off when Zoe’s lips touched his.  His mind went into overload as
her slight fingers drew his hand away from his dick, and then grasped
his prick ever so gently.  She slipped her hand along his length as her
lips and soon her tongue engaged his mouth, keeping him from protesting.
 
            For several minutes, Zoe continued this, making sure that
he was totally erect and aroused.  She didn’t want him hesitating on
her.  When she felt confident that he was putty in her hands – although
he certainly didn’t *feel* like putty – she broke the kiss.
 
            “Ever since last week, I’ve been dreaming about you.  I
can’t get you out of my head.  C’mon,” she said forcefully, tugging
gently on the part of him she had hold of, leading him out of the
bathroom, and down to her own room.  She pulled him inside, and closed
the door, on the off chance their mother came home early.  She *never*
did, but Zoe was not taking any chances today.
 
            Pushing him backward until he bumped against the bed, Zoe
got Luke to sit down.  She sank to her knees in front of him, and her
eyes locked on his dick.  She marveled at how such a big cock could
exist on such a thin frame, but her mind was too enraptured to care. 
Without any further discussion, Zoe’s tongue snaked out and began to
lick Luke’s dick up and down.  Luke groaned at the sensation.
 
            Zoe worked her tongue over the entire length of Luke’s
cock, but she never got a chance to suck him.  Just as her tongue came
back up to the head of his dick, he grunted and came, without warning. 
Zoe sat back in surprise, and watched as his cum spurted higher than
she thought it could.  Several spurts later, and Luke was down to a
dribble.  Of course, Zoe still needed what she needed, and wasn’t about
to let him get away with that.
 
            Her lips immediately engaged the head of Luke’s prick, and
started sucking.  Several small spasms ejected more cum into her mouth,
and she swallowed dutifully.  Her hand and lips were working to get him
back to full hardness, which she didn’t figure would take too long. 
Luke proved her right by coming back to full-staff in a matter of
seconds under her expert guidance.
 
            Removing her mouth from his cock, Zoe looked up at her
younger brother, and smiled.  She said, “I’ve got to have this.”  She
stood up, but kept her hand on his dick.  She walked forward, and then
sank downward, her pussy moving in a straight line for where her hand
was keeping his erect cock in waiting.
 
            As her pussy lips touched the head of his cock, Zoe moaned
in pleasure.  She wasted not a second, but continued to push herself
down onto him.  Luke was so entranced by what she was doing that he had
no thought of interrupting her.  His cock was feeling things that it
had never imagined before, let alone felt, and he was sure that if the
world ended here and now, he would go out happy.
 
            But the world did not end, and soon Zoe was fully impaled
on Luke’s hard shaft.  She looked down at him, and then pushed him
backward.  She followed him down, and they were now lying together on
the bed.  Luke could feel the sharp, hot points of her nipples digging
wonderfully into his chest.  He could feel her light weight pressing
down on him everywhere, and the feeling was glorious.  His hips moved
almost of their own accord, for he knew not what he was doing.
 
            “Oh, yes!” Zoe cried, urging him to continue that.  Luke,
in response, continued that.
 
            Their movements were small, but rapid, and were driving
both of them insane with lust.  Luke sought out Zoe’s lips, and kissed
her hotly as best he could.  He had almost no experience with girls,
and he was sure he was inept, but he gave it his best shot.  Zoe, on
the other hand, seemed to enjoy his attentions, and she groaned and
mewled above him.
 
            Sensing that he was getting *something* right, Luke
continued his movements.  His hands, which had up until now lain
quietly at his sides, came up and rubbed his sister’s back.  She moaned
in encouragement, and soon they found their way down to her ass.  

            “Mmm, oh, yeah, baby,” was Zoe’s response to that.
 
            For a few more moments, they continued to fuck like that,
but Luke felt he should be a little more “take charge” about things. 
He moved his hands up to Zoe’s back, holding her against him, and then
rolled over.  Her bed was only just big enough to handle this maneuver,
and he had to be careful not to let them fall off.
 
            Zoe was too far gone to care, however.  Her legs came up
around her brother’s thighs, and she cried, “Yes, Luke, go for it!”
 
            Luke, needing no further encouragement, began to thrust
into his sister much harder.  Zoe was immediately grunting and
squealing beneath him, as his eight inch cock thrust harder and harder
into her.  Luke enjoyed watching her tits roll on her chest, her
nipples making circles in front of his eyes.  He reached over with one
hand and groped her tit, pinching her nipple very tentatively, unsure
of his actions.
 
            Zoe immediately screamed out, her body wracked with a
massive orgasm as Luke’s cock continued to thrust into her.  He watched
in awe as she wriggled beneath him in pleasure.  He smiled as her face
twisted into a mask of pleasurable torture, of painful ecstasy.  He
continued to move, but in smaller strokes, until his sister came down
from her high.
 
            Luke leaned over and hugged his sister, his hard cock still
buried inside her.  It didn’t take Zoe long to realize this, either. 
She wasn’t ready for more, though.  She kept him hard by pulsing her
cunt muscles along his length.  She could feel him shiver each time she
did this.
 
            Luke bent his head back, and their lips locked.  He knew,
somehow, not to move just now, as she kept massaging his dick with her
pussy.  They stayed like that for some minutes, keeping a steady buzz
of arousal between them.
 
            Finally, Zoe broke their kiss, and she said huskily, “I’ve
got just one word for you, Luke.”
 
            “What’s that?”
 
            “More.”
 
            They spent the next hour fulfilling Zoe’s command.
 
 
 
            Some time later, after they had each dozed off, they were
snuggling on the bed.  Zoe couldn’t believe how good he had made her
feel.  In fact, how good he was *still* making her feel, since he was
lightly stroking her back and generally just holding her sweetly.
 
            “Zoe?”
 
            “Mm-hmm,” she replied.
 
            “What just happened?”
 
            She chuckled very lightly.  “I think they call it sex.”
 
            “I know *that*,” he said in feigned exasperation.  “But,
I’m your...”
 
            “Brother?  I know.  Are you upset?”
 
            “Um... not really.”
 
            Zoe smiled.  “Good.  Was I any good?”
 
            “Uh....”  Luke didn’t know how to answer that question.
 
            “How did I stack up to the other girls you’ve been with?”
she persisted.
 
            “Um...”  At that, Zoe looked up at him.  “There, uh...
haven’t, well, *been* any other girls.”
 
            “Luke?  You were a *virgin*?”  He nodded.  “Ohmigod!  No
way!  You can’t be that good without practice!”
 
            Luke smiled at the back-handed compliment.  “Sorry to say,
Sis, you’re the only girl who’s wanted at me so far.”
 
            “But, I mean... shit,” she said, dumbstruck at the
thought.  He let the idea sink in, for it had obviously startled her
badly.
 
            Finally, he said, “Zoe?”
 
            “Yeah?”
 
            “Are... um... are we gonna do this again?”
 
            She ran her fingers across his chest as she asked, “Do you
want us to?”
 
            “Uh-hungh,” he said, trying to be coherent as her hand did
nice things to him.
 
            “Well, then I guess we can do it a lot,” she said with a
mischievous smile.  “But we’ve gotta be careful.  We can’t let Mom find
out.”
 
            Luke’s body shivered at the very thought.  “If she caught
us...”
 
            “She’d kill us both, yeah.  So, we can’t let her catch us,
can we?”
 
            Luke bent his head down to kiss his sister.  She kissed
back sweetly.  When he broke the kiss he said, “No, we can’t let her
catch us.  I love you, Zoe.”
 
            She trembled when he said that.  Although he’d told her
that on several occasions, usually at moments of importance, never had
it seemed to carry quite so much meaning.
 
            “I love you, too,” she responded, entirely from the heart.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            A couple days later, Luke was beginning to wonder how their
Mom could *not* find out.  Luke and Zoe had always been close, but over
the last couple days, they had become nearly inseparable.  They had
even taken to doing their homework in the same room.  Luke thought that
surely Barbara knew something was up, and just didn’t want to spoil
it.  If she only knew the *truth...*
 
            Luke didn’t have all that much time to consider his home
life, however, as he was faced with a fairly demanding day of school
work.  He was rushing, trying to make it to his English class on time. 
He had been held up by some seniors that thought making fun of him
would be good entertainment, and it had taken him too long to get
around them.
 
            He wasn’t paying attention to where he was going, and there
were some girls coming in the other direction.  They were talking and
laughing, and they didn’t see him until it was too late to avoid the
collision.  One of the girls knocked him to the floor, and then looked
down to see what she had done.
 
            “Stay out of the way, geek!” the girl snapped automatically.
 
            “June!” Lori snarled, being one of the other girls in the
crowd.
 
            “What?” June asked plaintively.
 
            Lori reached down to help the boy up.  It was then that she
realized it was *him*.  *You again,* she said to herself.  *Why do I
keep running into you?*
 
            She reached out to take his hand.  “Let me help you up.” 
She could *feel* the weight of his stare.  Lori had grown used to boys,
and men, staring at her.  She seemed to be an eye-magnet.  But when she
took the time to actually look back at Luke, she noticed he wasn’t
staring at her chest, or her legs.  He was looking at her *eyes.*
 
            Slowly, unsteadily, Luke reached for her hand.  This girl,
this incredible girl, was part of the school’s upper crust, and he
worried that her offer of help was another part of some cruel joke. 
But she smiled politely at him, and so he took her hand, and she
carefully helped him up.  

            When Lori’s hand touched Luke’s, it was as if an electric
current crossed over her entire body.  All of her senses tingled.  She
couldn’t speak, could barely stand, and was having trouble being still
in his presence.  She felt a warm flush all over, but especially in her
most private of places.
 
            “Uh... if you’re okay, I’ve, um... got to go,” she
stammered, unsure of herself and wanting to get clear of whatever
effect he was having on her.
 
            Luke watched in puzzlement as she staggered down the hall
to join her friends.  In a flash, he searched her mind, hoping to get
her name and phone number.  Hell, all she could do was reject him,
right?
 
            It was very puzzling to him that, on top of her name and
phone number, he found her very worried about a special secret.  He did
not usually get such information outside of what he sought, but he’d
received a whole host of impressions and images from her, and this was
one of them.  He also saw a special place, even a map to go with it. 
*What the hell is all this about?*  He knew that she would go there on
Saturday.  *Maybe I should be there when she does.*
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            It was just after noon on Saturday, and Luke was already
waiting.  He’d packed himself a lunch, and even a small dinner, just in
case.  He had found the place easily, for Lori’s memories of it were
very vivid, and of course Luke never forgot a thing he saw, so getting
here had been child’s play.
 
            Unfortunately, he had not drawn up a time from Lori’s
mind.  He wondered if that meant his brain had just missed that info,
or if she didn’t set a timetable for whatever was going to happen here,
or if maybe it wasn’t up to her.
 
            Sitting there on the hill, overlooking the meadow, Luke
considered what he was doing.  He could have just pulled whatever the
secret was from Lori’s mind, but he kind of liked her, and he didn’t
want to invade her space more than he had.  It occurred to him to
wonder what Zoe would think if she knew he was out here stalking some
girl, and he smirked.  The two of them had spent much time together
over the last few days, a lot of it naked.  He had not known how good
sex was going to be, and he was kind of miffed that he’d missed out on
it for as long as he had.
 
            Luke’s thoughts were interrupted as Lori biked into the
clearing.  He nearly held his breath to see her in her usual sweatsuit;
she looked outstanding.  What he could not have anticipated was that
she would begin to remove those garments.  He was sure his heart was
not beating as he watched her strip down to her sports bra and spandex
shorts.  *Oh, my fucking God is she incredible!*  He had not taken a
whole lot of notice of her body up until now, except to know that she
was very pretty, yes.  Now, it was impossible not to pay attention to
it, and he couldn’t believe how incredibly beautiful she was.  Her long
blonde hair was tied back in a pony tail to keep it out of her oval
face.  He couldn’t see her eyes from here, but he knew that they were
ice blue from the other day.  He could imagine the warm smile forming
on her soft, full lips.  Of course, her tits were, in a word, large. 
And her whole body was fully toned, and it was a very pleasant sight to
behold.
 
            Luke had anticipated her next move: she circled the meadow,
looking carefully to see if anyone was watching.  His hiding place
would be very hard for anyone to see, so long as he remained still. 
She didn’t see him, mainly, he was sure, because she really wasn’t
looking very hard.  She didn’t think anyone would come back here. 
She’d probably been doing... whatever... back here for months or
longer, and had never found anyone.  Well, today was different.
 
            He watched as she began her warm-up moves, and admired the
litheness of her form.  He marveled at her agility as she went through
her stretches.  Soon, she was up and moving, and now Luke got a good
idea of what this was about.
 
            *My God, she’s *fast*!* was the first thing he thought to
himself.  Lori had decided to start with her run again today, and she
was well into her third lap around already.
 
            It was then that Luke’s heart froze.  Off to his left, he
heard the click of a camera shutter, and a muttered, “Goddamn!” 
Slowly, very slowly, Luke turned his head to the left.  There, not a
hundred feet from him, stood a man with a camera.  Luke immediately
reached out and grabbed his thoughts.
 
            *Oh, fuck.*  The man’s name was Matthew Purvis, and he was
a reporter.  He had been stalking Lori for months.  Luke figured
revealing her secret would be bad enough, but that wasn’t all this man
wanted.  The man was intending to blackmail her into sex.  *Well, you
cocksucking son of a bitch.*
 
            The problem was what to do about it.  Luke paid very little
attention as Lori began her strength exercises.  Instead, he was
pondering how to handle the man who was going to... well, okay, *rape*
wasn’t quite the legal term for it, but close enough for Luke’s
sensibilities... Lori Darlington.  Luke had begun to like Lori, but
there was more to it now.  She, like him, was different.  She had
something that no other human did.  Luke didn’t yet question how two
such people had ended up in the same school, but he would.
 
            But what could he do about Purvis?
 
            It took nearly Lori’s entire workout for Luke to come up
with a possibility.  *But I’ve never tried it before.  I don’t even
know if I can.  I’m not even sure *how*!*  Suddenly, Luke’s mind was
drawn back to the field below.  Lori had finished her workout, and was
now lying in the grass...  *Holy SHIT!*  Her moans were even clearly
audible from where he sat.
 
            *Well, there’s no way I’m letting this creep have pictures
like that.  Let’s give this a shot.*
 
            Luke reached out with his mind, and entered that of the
reporter.  He saw the memories of the past hour or so, and tried to
wrap his mind around them.  He misfired a half dozen times, trying
different techniques, but finally he managed to come up with a way that
worked.  Suddenly, Mr. Purvis no longer remembered any of the last hour
and a half.  But it left a huge gap in the man’s brain-movie.  *I can’t
leave it like that, he’ll wonder what the hell happened to him.*
 
            Again, Luke was up against something he’d never had to deal
with.  How to put in a fake memory, to fill in the gap?  Could he just
link his own imagination to the man’s brain?  Only one way to find
out...
 
            Several false starts later, Matthew Purvis possessed a very
disturbing memory of fucking a porcupine, and being sodomized by a
bear, and enjoying both.  Luke had no idea how long, or if, the memory
would stick, but figured it would be long enough for him – and Lori? –
to figure out what to do.
 
            As Luke finished up with Purvis, he could see that Lori had
already left.  Purvis was still somewhat dazed, and so Luke moved
quickly.  Taking the man’s camera, he rewound and popped the film.  He
had to hurry, so he could only grab the rolls of film he could see.  Of
course, he had no idea how many rolls the bastard had taken.
 
            *A problem for later.*  Stuffing the film rolls in his
jacket pocket, he tore out of there, leaving Purvis shaking his head in
memory-fuzz confusion.  By the time Purvis got his head clear, Luke
would already be at his next stop.
 
 
 
            “Good afternoon, sir.  Can I help you?” the clerk at the
one-hour photomat asked politely.  His name was Charlie Franks.  He was
a hacker.
 
            Luke looked left and right, but he was the only customer,
and there were no others coming this direction.  Raising his hand into
the Vulcan greeting, he said,  “We live for *the one*.”  It was silly
to mix Babylon 5 and Star Trek, but they were hackers, and mixing
metaphors was second nature to them.
 
            Charlie went just a little pale for a moment, but then
responded properly, if somewhat quietly with, “And we die for *the
one.*”  It was the conclusion of their greeting.  Then, Charlie said,
“I don’t know you.”
 
            “You know me best as ByteStorm.”
 
            “Holy shit!  Uh, hey, man!  Glad to meet you.  Obviously,
you know who I am.”  Charlie was impressed to be finally meeting the
head of his hacker group.  Whatever he was up to, it must be
important.  “What do you need, man?”
 
            “I need to use the photo machine.  And... um... I can’t let
you see what I’m printing.”
 
            “Top secret?”
 
            “SI – Codeword stuff, my friend.”  By which Luke referred
to “Special Intelligence – Codeword” access material, a government term
they had adopted to mean that something was *really* important.
 
            “Sure.  You know how to work it?”
 
            “I’m sure you can show me fast enough.”
 
            “Sure thing.  Come on back.”
 
            In all this time, not a single customer approached the
photomat.  Luke figured that Charlie, or RavenC as he was known online,
appreciated the interruption of his boredom.
 
 
 
            Thirty minutes later, Luke had a stack of photographs of
Lori going through her workout.  And the last roll... well, that one
was worthy of Penthouse.  But it didn’t take Luke long to realize that
he did not have *all* of the man’s pictures, because the whole workout
was not shown.  *Well, fuck.*
 
            Tucking the pictures into a couple of sleeves, he turned to
Charlie.  “How much do I owe you?”  He needed to develop the pictures
himself, but he didn’t steal.
 
            Charlie, though, waved him off.  “I’ll cover it as a bad
batch.  Don’t worry about it.  Happens all the time.”  Which was true
enough.
 
            “Cool, man.  Thanks, I owe you one.  And, um... remember, I
was never here.”
 
            Charlie smirked.  “Yeah, gotcha.  I was just daydreaming
about some naked girl.”
 
            Luke laughed as he hopped back on his bike and left Charlie
to the remainder of his very dull day.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            Lori, meanwhile, had made it back home, and was very, very
confused.  *I can’t believe it was that intense!*  Never had her orgasm
caused her to pass out before.  It had, of course, been all about
*him*.  Before the day at the library, she’d never met him before.  And
when she’d touched him... * My God, could anything be more intense? 
But what the hell does it all mean?*
 
            Lori decided it would be a good idea if she tried to avoid
him until she could figure it out.  She didn’t expect that to be all
that hard.
 
            Nobody’s perfect.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            Luke spent many days trying to figure out what to do about
Mr. Purvis.  He could, of course, go to the police, but with no
evidence, they’d laugh at him.  Besides, that would mean revealing what
he could possibly blackmail Lori with.  That was the trouble with
blackmail: if you wanted to get the authorities involved, you had to do
exactly what it was you didn’t want to do: reveal your secret.
 
            So, if the authorities are out, then what?  He could go to
Purvis and tell him to lay off, but he’s not going to listen to a kid,
and besides, hadn’t Luke been beat up enough for now?  So, no, he
couldn’t warn Purvis off at all.
 
            Could he warn Lori?  No.  First, she wouldn’t believe him,
and second, he’d have to reveal his own secret to her to do it.  He
wasn’t so sure he minded doing that, but he didn’t think she’d believe
him if he did.
 
            So, what did that leave?  He couldn’t tell anyone what he
knew, for that endangered Lori.  He couldn’t warn off either of the
principles involved, because neither of them would think that he was
telling the truth, and wouldn’t listen anyway.  And, most importantly,
he couldn’t just let it happen, because... why?
 
            That was a much tougher question.  Why did he care what
happened to Lori Darlington, fastest and strongest person on the
planet?  He struggled with *that* question for two days before deciding
that why didn’t matter; the simple fact was that he did care, and that
was that.
 
            So, having decided that he had to do something, Luke was
left not having any idea what the hell it was.  He was at least happy
that, during all of these days of mental turmoil, he finally got his
damned cast off.  The doctor told him to wear a sling for a few more
days, and then to start using the arm, carefully and slowly, to get it
back into shape.  Luke was sure the next few weeks were going to be
some of the worst of his life.
 
            He was wrong.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            One of the things that Luke had picked up in Lori’s mind,
the one time he’d contacted her that way, was that she did her special
workouts once every two weeks.  That should have given him plenty of
time to come up with an answer, but he still didn’t have one the day
that she was to work out again.  It was somewhat amusing to believe, he
thought on his ride to the field, that of the three people involved, he
was the only one who knew all of what was going on, and he was also the
only one who didn’t know what was going to happen today.
 
            He arrived at the field, and looked around carefully,
trying to spot Purvis.  It took some time, because he didn’t look in
the kinds of places where Lori was likely to see him.  It had not
occurred to Luke that Purvis might be so bold as he was.  He was
standing at the spot where Lori normally lay for her “after-workout
entertainment.”  Well, it had been entertaining to him, at least.  He
had scanned those particular photos into his computer, and made a
screen saver out of them.
 
            Now, he had to wonder what Purvis was up to.  Was he going
to attack Lori?  Foolish, at best.  If she didn’t kill him outright,
she’d hospitalize him.  *But he must have photos of her, because I
didn’t get them all.  Will he try to make her sleep with him, right
here?*  Luke wished he could read Matthew’s memories, but he was too
far away.  Luke began to slowly creep closer, hoping that Lori would
take her time showing up today.
 
 
 
            Lori biked down the path to her workout field.  She turned
the corner, and slid desperately to a stop.  Standing on the very spot
she usually set her bike, stood a man.  He was about 5’ 7” tall, and
pudgy.  His black hair was short, but tangled.  He was not exactly
attractive, and the way he was leering at her was sickening.
 
            “Oh, excuse me,” she said politely.  “I didn’t realize
anyone was back here.  I’ll leave you alone...”
 
            “Oh, no, Lori.  I’ve been waiting for you.  Please, drop
the bike.”
 
            There was fear in Lori’s eyes as she dumped her bike on the
ground.  She stepped away from him, toward the middle of the meadow. 
She didn’t want to be too close to him.  Her eyes seemed to catch a
glimpse of movement, but she couldn’t focus on it.  *What’s going on?*
 
            “What do you want?” she asked, trying unsuccessfully to
keep the trembling out of her voice.
 
            “Well, now, you see, the last time you were here, I sort of
dropped by.  And I took this.”  He held up a photograph.  It showed her
holding a large boulder over her head, poised to throw it.  “And
several more, just like it.  You’re big news, you know.  Some kind of
genetic mutation, or perhaps an intentional experiment?” he queried.
 
            “I... don’t know what you’re talking about.”
 
            “Oh, come off it.  You think anyone can just pick up a rock
that size?  I doubt there are ten *men* on the planet who could do it! 
You’re unique.  And that could win me a Pulitzer.”
 
            “Please,” Lori said, clearly understanding the threat. 
“Don’t do that.”
 
            “Hmm,” the man said with mock-thoughtfulness.  “Well, I’m
sure we can come to some sort of arrangement.  Take off your clothes.”
 
            “What?” Lori said in shock, stepping back from him even
further.
 
            “Strip.  Look, I’ll make this plain and simple for you.  We
fuck, or you’re fucked.  I can publish these photos in a heartbeat.”
 
            “Why are you doing this to me?” Lori pleaded.
 
            “Have you looked in a goddamn mirror lately?  Jesus Fucking
Christ, you are like the *perfect* woman!”
 
            “I could... kill you, and that would solve my troubles,
too,” she said unconvincingly.
 
            “You could, but you won’t.  You’re not that type of girl. 
You can’t fool me, bitch.  Now, *strip*!”
 
            Lori’s hands were just about to reach for her sweatshirt. 
Her head was down, she was confused, but knew that she had been
beaten.  No, she couldn’t kill him.  She couldn’t even hurt him unless
he attacked her.  It had been too much a part of her life, that kind of
respect for others.  Just as she was about to pull her shirt over her
head, she saw Purvis shake his head, not negatively, but as if suddenly
confused.  Then Lori saw a blur of motion.
 
            

            Luke saw what was going on, and he’d heard most of the
conversation.  It had taken him forever to get into position.  He’d
waited only long enough to see what Lori would do.  When he realized
that she couldn’t fight him effectively, he’d decided to act.
 
            Luke wiped the last five minutes of Matthew’s memory, just
as he’d learned to do the last time the two had tangled.  Seeing
Purvis’ momentary confused state, Luke lunged forward, leaping out of
the cover he’d been hiding behind.  He saw Lori tense, but he had to
ignore that for a moment.
 
            Grabbing Matthew’s camera, Luke swung it upward as hard as
he could, connecting soundly with Matthew’s face.  The impact made a
sickening squish sound, but Purvis was thrown to the ground,
unconscious.  Without looking at Lori, he rummaged through Purvis’
bags.  The stupid fool had actually been carrying the negatives *with*
him?  Well, at least that removed the need for some B&E.  He had
worried about having to break into Matthew’s house to get these.  He
opened the camera without rewinding the roll, and ripped the film out
of the cartridge, exposing all of it.  He took all of the pictures,
stuffed them into their envelope, making sure he had all of them, and
then stood back up.
 
            Finally, after giving Purvis a few more memories of his
fondness for wildlife, Luke turned to Lori.  He stepped carefully
toward her, not wanting to seem in the slightest bit threatening.
 
            “Are you okay?” he asked softly, seeing the very upset
expression on her face.
 
            “He was... but you... how did... where... oh, God.”  Lori
fell to her knees, sobbing as the tension released from her body.  Luke
knelt down beside her, and tentatively put his arm around her
shoulder.  Immediately, she buried her face against his neck, her arms
wrapping around him, and she cried for a solid minute, trying to
understand the events of the last few moments.  They had been the most
upsetting minutes she had ever lived through.
 
            For Luke’s part, he was in rather a lot of pain.  He had
not exerted his left arm so much since having the cast off, and it was
protesting somewhat loudly about the abuse.  Also, with it wrapped
around the shoulder of a crying girl, it was sending waves of spasms
rippling across his chest.  If he had not been cradling a most
incredibly beautiful girl, he would have winced away from her.
 
            After a few more minutes of sniffling, Lori leaned back,
and let Luke go.  He rested his hand on her shoulder as she rubbed her
eyes free of tears, and wiped her nose on her shirt sleeve.  She smiled
her thanks at him.
 
            “Thank you... um, I don’t know your name.”
 
            “Luke Anderton.  We, uh... bumped into each other a couple
days ago.”
 
            “I remember,” she said with a giggle.
 
            “We need to get out of here before he wakes up.”
 
            “He’s going to tell the world about me.”  She was nearly on
the verge of tears again.
 
            “Not if I can help it.  C’mon, grab your bike.  I have to
go get mine.”
 
            Giving the unconscious Purvis a wide path, Lori picked up
her bike, and followed Luke up the hill, to where his own bicycle was
stashed.
 
 
 
===<<<+>>>===
 
 
 
            The two had decided to go back to Lori’s house.  She told
Luke that her mother, a senior executive at a local computer company,
was at a convention and would be gone all weekend.  Luke tried to keep
his mind on what they needed to talk about, and not what his libido
said they could do with an entire weekend.
 
            “Have a seat at the table.  I’ll be right back, I’ve gotta
change.”
 
            Luke looked around a little, admiring the house.  It was
somewhat nicer than his own family’s home, but they weren’t exactly
poor, either, so he was used to it.  He went into the kitchen and took
a seat, to wait for Lori to come back.
 
            When she did, he gulped hard.  She was wearing a tank top
and shorts, and she looked absolutely stunning.  Her long legs were
smooth and tan, and her top barely contained her large breasts.  Luke
could feel himself blushing just from looking at her.
 
            “It’s okay,” she said.  “I’ve grown used to it.”
 
            Luke immediately averted his eyes.  “Doesn’t make it the
right thing to do,” he said automatically.
 
            She smiled and said, “Want a soda?”
 
            “Sure.  Thanks.”
 
            She grabbed two, and then sat at the table next to him.  “I
guess... you know about me.”  He could tell she was very nervous.
 
            “Yeah.”
 
            “How long?”
 
            “Since two weeks ago.”
 
            “And you didn’t say anything?”
 
            “What was there to say?”
 
            Lori shook her head.  “I’m sorry.  It’s just that a lot of
guys would have... well, done what that creep was doing.  He would have
held it over me.”  She sat in silence for a while before a question
came to her mind.  “How did you find out?”
 
            “That’s a little complicated...”
 
            “We’ve got time.”  She smiled encouragingly.  His insides
melted.
 
            “Well, you’re not the only one who’s... different.  I’m a
little... outside of the norm, too.”
 
            “Oh.  How’s that?”
 
            “This is gonna sound nuts, but... I can read people’s
memory.”  Seeing the startled expression on her face, he nodded. 
“Yeah, kinda shocked me when it happened, too.”
 
            “So... um... what am I thinking?” she asked with a smirk.
 
            “I can’t tell you what you’re thinking now.  That’s
short-term memory, and it’s like trying to catch a river, it just keeps
flowing around you.  However, I think the blue top would have looked
good on you, too.”
 
            Lori blushed, for she had stood in her room trying to
decide between the blue tank and the pale yellow one she had chosen. 
“Well, okay, I guess that proves that,” she said.
 
            “How long have you known what you can do?” he asked.
 
            “Well, I’ve always been an athlete.  But I guess it’s just
been over the past year that it has really... become abnormal.”
 
            Luke nodded.  He took a sip of his soda, and then said,
“That guy, Purvis, is going to be a problem.”
 
            “What did you do to him?  I mean, obviously you hit him
with the camera, but...”
 
            “I wiped his memory.  But I don’t think it’ll hold.  I
don’t know.  That was new for me.  He was there last time you went out,
too.”
 
            “No shit?”
 
            “Yeah.  I wiped his memory, but I couldn’t do much else. 
He had photos to remember you by, so...  I don’t know if he’ll remember
you or not.  Probably he will.”
 
            Sitting there, Lori got very red.
 
            “What’s the matter?” he asked.
 
            “Um... how much of it did you see?”
 
            “All of it, why?”  He didn’t quite understand why her blush
turned even deeper.  He figured she was blushing roughly to her knees
by now.
 
            “Even my... even after my workout?”
 
            Oh.  That.  “Um... yeah, that too.”
 
            “Oh, god.”
 
            “Hey, it’s okay.  I mean... well... we all, you know, have
urges to take care of.”
 
            “Every time I work out, it’s like that.  Even my normal
workouts at the gym, although it’s not quite so intense.  I have to
come home and... you know, in the shower.”
 
            Luke nodded, understanding perfectly.
 
            “There’s... um... something else.  But it’s a little...
weird.”
 
            Luke shrugged.  “What isn’t?”
 
            “When I... you know, I’m always... well, you fantasize when
you do it, right?”
 
            “Yeah.”  He could see she was struggling with something,
but didn’t understand what.
 
            “You have a specific girl in mind?”
 
            “No, not really... I mean, it changes, depends on my mood
that day.”
 
            “Not for me.  For the last three years, it’s always been
the same guy.”
 
            “Wow.  Someone famous?”
 
            She shook her head negatively.
 
            “Hmm.  Ever thought of asking him out?”
 
            “I’d never met him until recently,” she said.
 
            “What?  You fantasized about a guy you’d never met?”
 
            She nodded.
 
            “You’re right.  That’s weird,” he said with a little
chuckle.  She didn’t smile back.  “But you said you’ve met him
recently.”  She nodded silently.  “So... um... well, why not ask him
out, then?”
 
            Lori floundered for words for a few moments, and then just
sat there, silent.
 
            “What’s the matter?” Luke wanted to know.
 
            “It’s you.”
 
            “Huh?”
 
            “The guy in my fantasies.  It’s you.”  Her voice was barely
audible, yet Luke heard her as if she had screamed at him.  He was now
a little numb himself.
 
            “I’m... uh... not sure what to say to that.”
 
            “Yeah.”
 
            Luke couldn’t take it anymore, and he had to stand up.  Not
because he wanted to leave, but just because the tension made it
impossible for him to sit still.  “That’s... whoa.  I mean... I don’t
know what to say.”
 
            Lori very slowly rose from her seat, and turned to face
him.  She took a step toward him, so that they were less than an arm’s
length apart.  “Could you do me a favor, please?” she asked in a very
quiet, pleading tone.
 
            “Anything,” he answered rather too quickly.
 
            “Kiss me.”
 
            For a split-second, Luke thought his brain had suffered a
general protection fault.  He couldn’t have heard her right.  Then,
after replaying her words in his head about ten thousand times, he
decided he must have heard her right.
 
            *Thank God for Zoe.*  At least he had the confidence of
knowing how to kiss a girl.
 
            He moved his hands to her waist, and very gently pulled her
to him.  Her eyes closed as their lips touched, ever so gently.  Luke
thought it was the most wonderful kiss he could ever imagine receiving,
so soft, yet so sensuous.
 
            Lori, on the other hand, was awash in the sense of arousal,
of rightness, of being where she belonged.  *This* was her man.  Her
search had ended, and she had found the prize.  But what if he didn’t
want her?
 
            By mutual agreement, their kiss became more urgent.  Luke
moved his hands to her lower back, pulling her more tightly against
him.  He loved the feel of her large tits against his chest.  Her leg
was lightly rubbing up against his, sending shivers up his spine.  His
hands very slowly moved down to cup her ass.
 
            Lori moaned at the feel of his hands on her bottom.  She
pressed herself more tightly to him.  Her tongue slid against his lips,
asking for entrance.  Luke agreed, and their tongues were soon dueling
pleasantly.  Lori’s fingers were lightly ticking the back of Luke’s
neck, and he was highly aroused by the entire encounter.
 
            After a few minutes, Lori broke their kiss, stepping just
slightly away from him.
 
            “C’mon,” she said softly, taking his hand.  She led him
down a hallway and into a sunroom.  Although the walls were all glass,
he could barely see out, for all the hanging and standing plants.  In
the center of the room was a large sunk-in Jacuzzi.  Lori flipped two
switches, and the lights and the Jacuzzi came on.  The water
immediately began to bubble and churn.
 
            “Mom likes to use this to calm down after a stressful day
at the office,” Lori explained needlessly.  Luke was unclear as to just
exactly they were doing; he didn’t have a bathing suit with him...
 
            Lori turned to him, and then pulled off her tank top.  Her
magnificent breasts bounced free, and he gasped at the sight of them. 
Her areolas were pink, and tight, and about the size of half dollars. 
Her nipples were large and erect, and, he noticed, she had no tan
lines.  She smiled at him to show him that she didn’t mind his
attention, but she also began to unzip her shorts.  Once they fell to
the floor, she began to wiggle out of her panties, all the while facing
him.  She could clearly see his erection in his jeans.  *God, is he
really that big?*
 
            For his part, Luke was stunned.  Here was one of the most
incredible girls he’d ever seen, stripping in front of him.  What else
was she going to do to or with him today?  He dared not hope for the
obvious answer, though he would jump at the chance.
 
            Once her panties fell to the floor, she stepped out of
them, now completely naked.  *When did she take off her sandals?*  She
turned very slowly, all the way around, to give Luke a good view of her
entire body.
 
            “Well, what do you think?” she asked with a twinkle in her
eyes.
 
            Luke’s throat was very dry.  He swallowed twice before he
managed, “Absolutely perfect.”
 
            Lori smirked slightly, but she turned and stepped gingerly
into the water.  He heard her groan softly, as the bubbles began to act
on her body.  She managed to walk all the way in, and then dipped
herself fully into the water, only her head staying dry.  He could see
her flush with pleasure.  *That’s kind of an odd reaction...*
 
            Finally, after she’d gotten control of herself, she looked
to him.  “Well?  Aren’t you going to join me?”
 
            Luke stood there, rooted to the floor.  At that one moment,
he was gripped with the insane desire to flee.  Strip, before this
goddess of perfection?  And show her his... pathetic, really... frame? 
Never!
 
            Nonetheless, his hands did reach to pull off his T-shirt. 
It was slow going, for he was extremely nervous.  Finally, he dropped
his shirt onto the floor.  Kicking off his shoes, he began to undo his
jeans.  He noticed that she was watching him intently from where she
sat in the Jacuzzi.  As his jeans hit the floor, he used his feet to
pull them, and his socks, off.
 
            Luke would not have been human if he hadn’t hesitated at
the final step.  Lori just smiled warmly at him, and waited.  Finally,
gathering his courage, he pulled his briefs down and off.  It was
Lori’s turn to gasp at seeing his large, and fully hard, erection, as
he stood back up.  Fighting the intense urge to cover himself, Luke
walked meekly over to the Jacuzzi and slipped into the bubbling water. 
As it reached his waist, he had to admit that it did feel pretty damned
good.  He, too, lowered himself all the way into the water, before
taking a seat a short distance from Lori.  He didn’t want to push his
luck.
 
            Lori, however, was having none of that.  As soon as he had
settled on a seat, she slipped over next to him, her wet body pressing
up against his.  She turned to him, and their lips met again, opening
immediately to allow tongues to pass by and caress each other.  Luke’s
right arm draped across her back, stroking the silky wet skin he found
there.  His left arm, tired as it was, decided to stay out of things
for the moment.
 
            Lori’s hands caressed Luke’s chest for a while, before they
began to travel downward.  Luke’s mind froze when he realized where she
was going.  He couldn’t, wouldn’t, stop her, and when her fingers
touched his dick, he thought he was going to orgasm right there on the
spot.  When her fingers slid over him a few times, he did.  Grunting
against Lori’s tongue, his cum shot out into the hot, bubbling water.
 
            Lori was a bit surprised that he had been so aroused.  On
the other hand, she was barely controlling herself.  Her body was
hypersensitive to all sensations, and she normally couldn’t stand this
roiling water for very long.  Today, it added to the heightened passion
she felt for *him*, and she was hoping that he would fulfill her
fantasies.  But, he’d needed to get that first one out of his system.
 
            She looked at him, with the pained expression on his face. 
A soft smile crossed her lips, to let him know it was okay.  “You were
a little too wound up.  We need you calmer.”  She could tell he was
confused, and that wasn’t what she wanted.  “Luke, I want you to make
love to me.”
 
            Luke’s mouth opened, but no words came out.  He couldn’t
speak at all.
 
            “I don’t know why I’ve fantasized about you for the last
few years, but it’s time to turn that into reality.  I need you to make
me a woman.”
 
            Finally finding his voice, Luke said, “You mean, you’re...?”
 
            “A virgin, yep.  All of the jocks I’ve gone out with,
trying to find... well, trying to find you, actually, they all
disgusted me.  I never let them in my pants.  I was saving that for...
well, for you, I guess.”
 
            His cock, which had softened somewhat after his first come,
was roaring back to life with this kind of talk.  Luke, his confidence
in himself somewhat restored, did what any sane man would do.  He
kissed her.
 
            As their lips tangled, Luke’s hands came up to caress
Lori’s breasts.  She moaned in his mouth, and he took that as an
encouragement.  When his fingers began to lightly twist her nipples,
she shuddered violently, breaking their kiss and moaning out loud.  It
was obvious she was orgasming.  He stopped twisting her nipples, but
kept his hands rubbing along her skin as she settled from her climax.
 
            “Oh, God, that was great!” she gushed, finally returning to
her senses.  “What else can you do to me?” she asked seductively.
 
            Luke leaned over, and began to lick at her nipple.  She was
immediately squirming in the water.  By the time he had switched to the
other nipple, she was thrashing about.  Soon, she was in the throes of
her second orgasm of the day.  *Damn, she’s hot!*
 
            When she finally settled from these passions, she looked at
Luke with lust.  “Please, before I black out, we really need to... do
it.”
 
            Luke considered what position would be best.  Zoe and he
had tried every one they could think of.  Finally, he settled onto a
seat that left only his head above water, and he motioned Lori over to
him.  She came, but was very unsure of what to do.
 
            “Sit in my lap,” he directed her.  Slowly, she complied,
rubbing her hot, wet body along his skin.  Her pussy hair tickled his
cock as she settled down against him.  For just a moment, he let her
grow comfortable with what they were doing.  They punctuated this time
with a lot of kissing.
 
            Finally, Luke lifted her body up off his lap.  She
supported herself with her knees, and he moved his cock.  The head of
it pressed up into her pussy lips, and she groaned in anticipation of
what was to come.
 
            “This might hurt,” he cautioned.  She just shook her head.  

            “Lost my cherry a long, long time ago.  Too many sports for
this girl.”
 
            Luke smiled at her.  “Well, then, this will probably feel
really nice.”  Saying such, he placed his hand on top of her thighs and
gently pressed her down onto his cock.  Lori mewled at the first
penetration, and that soon turned to a full-blown growl of pleasure.
 
            She was so tight that Luke felt as if his cock was being
inserted into a hole one size too small, but goddamn, did it feel
*good*!  With her tight, hot pussy gripping his cock, and her warm, wet
skin sliding along his body, Luke was in heaven.  His hands slipped
back up to her breasts, avoiding her nipples, but playing along the
outside swelling of her wonderful tits.
 
            Finally, Lori was fully impaled on his cock, sitting once
again in his lap.
 
            “Ohmigod,” she gasped.  “That’s... awesome.”
 
            Luke once again thanked fate that Zoe and he had
“practiced” for this, though he was sure that wasn’t what Zoe had in
mind.  He allowed Lori to adjust to the feelings for a little while,
but then he moved his hands down, slipping them around onto her ass.
 
            Luke lifted her off him just slightly, and then let her
slide back down.  After a few times of this, she got the idea, and
helped him by using her own legs to help propel her body on his shaft. 
It didn’t take long before she was moaning and writhing in complete
incoherence above him.  Luke admired the view of her swinging tits, of
her flailing hair, as she rode him.  Her pussy had loosened to take
him, and they sped up, thrashing the water into foam as their bodies
moved together.
 
            Lori had several smaller orgasms, but it was clear that she
was building up to a big one.  Luke was, himself, getting closer, but
he was also tiring.  He stopped Lori, even though he most certainly
didn’t want to.  He had her turn around, while remaining on his cock. 
That sensation was wonderful.  Then, he stood them both up, and turned
to face the edge of the Jacuzzi.
 
            Lori bent over, placing her hands on the edge of the tub. 
Now, standing on firm ground, Luke began to thrust into her.  Lori was
immediately crying out in pleasure, as Luke was able to take much
longer strokes this way, and was able to go faster, as well.  His hands
rested against her hips, to help with leverage.  Their bodies moved
faster and faster, and Lori’s screams rose in pitch.  Luke was grunting
with each thrust, and Lori was constantly moaning, mewling, and
screaming.  

            Finally, Luke couldn’t hold it back any longer.  He gave
one last, hard thrust, pushing himself all the way into Lori, and he
came.  And came, and came, until he had nothing left to give.
 
            Once Lori felt his seed spill into her, she was overcome
with her own massive climax.  Her vision blurred as her body seethed
and bucked against her lover.  Her pussy gripped his cock, trying to
pull it fully inside her, and her back arched, her head thrown back. 
She screamed loudly in passion, and then her body simply could not take
any more pleasure.  Lori passed out, going limp as quickly as she had
climaxed.
 
            Fortunately, Luke was aware enough to catch his beautiful
lover before she hit her head.  He grabbed her, conveniently ending up
with his hands cupping her tits.  He smiled at the thought, but he had
no energy left.  He slid out of her cunt, and then turned her around. 
He sat down with her in a comfortable seat, and held onto her,
marveling at how nice the day had turned out.
 
 
 
            “That was incredible,” Lori said softly, running her hand
across Luke’s chest.  It had taken her nearly ten minutes to wake up,
and Luke had almost begun to worry.  She kissed him softly on the
cheek.  “Thank you.”
 
            “For what?” he asked.  He considered sex a mutual thing,
and he was just as happy to have had it as she obviously was.
 
            “For making my first time special.  And, also, for saving
my ass back there.”  Mentioning that brought them both to a slightly
sober pause, but it didn’t spoil their mood much.
 
            After a few minutes of soaking quietly in the hot water,
Lori asked, “Hey, do you have... um... like, a persona?”
 
            “Huh?”
 
            “You know, have you adopted a character?  I mean, like the
day you got into that fight, and I stepped in?  There was this other
part of me...”
 
            “That was *you*?” he asked, interrupting her.
 
            “Yeah.  You mean, you didn’t know?”
 
            “I was a little unconscious at the time...”
 
            “Oh.  And here I thought you were being nice to me to repay
me.”  She tickled him to show she was half-kidding.
 
            “I’m being nice to you,” he said, running his hand across a
certain spot, “because you’re worth being nice to.”  They kissed for a
short while, but then broke off.  

            “Anyway, you were saying, when you saved my ass...”
 
            “There was this other part of me that, well, it’s almost
like she took over.  I mean, I was in control, I guess, but I’m not
really an aggressive person, you know?”
 
            “Aggressive enough for me,” he said, causing her to
giggle.  “But I know what you mean.”
 
            “Well, that day, when she took over, I *became*
aggressive.  I mean, I kicked butt and took names.”
 
            “Hmm.  Well, no, I’ve never had anything like that.  I do
have a couple of hacker names I use, but nothing like that.”
 
            “Hacker names?”
 
            “Computer names.  A handle you use online.”
 
            “Oh.  What are they?”
 
            “Well, the one I use with my hacker friends is ByteStorm. 
The one I use everywhere else is Mimir.”
 
            “I understand ByteStorm, but what the hell is a Mimir?”
 
            “It’s a Norse mythology name.  My eighth-grade English
teacher didn’t want to teach the same old Greek and Roman myths. 
Anyway, Mimir was a giant who guarded the well of wisdom, supposedly
the knower of the past and future.”
 
            “Hmm.  An interesting name for a guy who can read minds,”
she said with a playful giggle.
 
            He laughed.  “I suppose.  Did the lady that ‘took over’
have a name?”
 
            “Yeah.  Atlanta.  She was a legendary huntress of Greek
mythology.  *My* teacher loved the stuff.”  The two laughed easily with
each other, perfectly comfortable to be together, now.
 
            “Well, Atlanta, I’m personally glad you were there to save
my butt that day.”
 
            “So am I.  For more than one reason.”  She kissed him again.
 
            “*Mimir*,” she said, playfully using his nickname, “do you
find it a little weird that there are two of us?  I mean, in one town,
two people with weirdness?”
 
            Luke smiled at her.  “Yeah, it is a bit strange.  I wonder
if there are any more of us.”
 
            Lori looked deeply into his eyes.  “You’re the only one I
need.  Can we do it again before you go?”
 
            He didn’t have the heart or the will to turn her down.
 
 
 
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