even speak.
Jane Doe Cykes seemed to grow, to swell, to ripen, as she absorbed the red reservoir in the bed. The girl disappeared beneath its surface. A voluptuous black-red woman lay upon the spotless sheets now, the secret form of the goddess who had slept in the veins of the bruja , visited upon the daughter from my unwitting lips.
Randels relaxed his grip and I elbowed him in the face.
I knelt before her, my arms out in surrender. “Take me! What are you waiting for? I can help you escape, I’ll be your host, just don’t leave me! You need me!”
Jane Doe Cykes stretched to bursting with an ocean of singing blood. She was breathtaking as she drew herself up and flowed to the door, her face stolen from Jane Doe Cykes’ body and reproduced as a negative framed in locks of fluid hair undulating to the beat of her heart.
After all the inquests, the civil trial and the APA review, the incident was explained away as inexplicable. The lab technician found unconscious in my closet, the vessel by which she came to my office, could shed no light on the events. The security tapes were, of course, not entered into evidence. Jane Doe Cykes was never seen again.
Dr. Randels and I both took medical leaves after the last review, he to resume drinking, I to decode the Cykes journals. Others, FBI cryptographers and a retired Army Signal Corps officer among them, tried to break them, but their skill had no personal impetus behind it. I have succeeded, at least partially, where others failed because I desperately needed to. Where I have achieved little else, I have solved at least a fragment of the mystery.
“Host A is unaware of the symbiote in her bloodstream. Interactions between the two organisms seldom take place above a cellular level, and conventional tests cannot discern any abnormal presence, though Host A attests to feeling a ‘holy spirit’ inside her when she performs her ritual cures. I believe Host A’s perception of stimuli from the outside world acts as a buffer between the host and the symbiote, suppressing any macromolecular contact. It sustained her, worked miracles through her, loved her, though she never knew it.
“If this buffer could be removed by the screening out of all stimuli from birth, the host’s perceptive sphere would be turned entirely inward, a world unto itself. In perfect darkness, they might find each other, and develop mutual comprehension, symbiotic consciousness, even a means of life support that would render nutritive intake obsolete. Host B, my darling Ruby, nears the end of her gestation period, which should make such an experiment feasible at last. Such a life will truly be a gift, when one considers the alternative to which we are all condemned.”
So I’m waiting in the dark. I’ve made encouraging progress since I weaned myself off solid food and punctured my eardrums. I must lie still, so that my pulse becomes regular enough to hypnotize me. Soon, I will lose the use of my eyes, weakening them with mild acidic irritants until I see only black, then red. I must dive into myself and slow the dismal thunder of my heartbeat until I can hear her voice again in the place where she hid inside me before, until some remnant mote of her teaches my blood to sing. I must lie still and whisper into myself until I hear a response. Soon, I know, there will be two less lonely souls in the world.
I am an ugly man. Women seldom look at me, and never in the eyes, unless I’m giving them money. So I go to strip clubs.
Let me tell you about my favorite.
The Black Box used to be called Strip Search, and before that, Freaky Kiki’s Cockpit, but nothing else about it has changed, except the cover charge. It’s a topless dive next to the airport runways. The overpriced, watery drinks keep the sailors and bikers away, and the hardcore perverts go to the all-nude shows at Les Girls and Pacer’s. Only hardcore losers and conventioneers go there, before hitting their flight home; people who
Jane Doe Cykes seemed to grow, to swell, to ripen, as she absorbed the red reservoir in the bed. The girl disappeared beneath its surface. A voluptuous black-red woman lay upon the spotless sheets now, the secret form of the goddess who had slept in the veins of the bruja , visited upon the daughter from my unwitting lips.
Randels relaxed his grip and I elbowed him in the face.
I knelt before her, my arms out in surrender. “Take me! What are you waiting for? I can help you escape, I’ll be your host, just don’t leave me! You need me!”
Jane Doe Cykes stretched to bursting with an ocean of singing blood. She was breathtaking as she drew herself up and flowed to the door, her face stolen from Jane Doe Cykes’ body and reproduced as a negative framed in locks of fluid hair undulating to the beat of her heart.
After all the inquests, the civil trial and the APA review, the incident was explained away as inexplicable. The lab technician found unconscious in my closet, the vessel by which she came to my office, could shed no light on the events. The security tapes were, of course, not entered into evidence. Jane Doe Cykes was never seen again.
Dr. Randels and I both took medical leaves after the last review, he to resume drinking, I to decode the Cykes journals. Others, FBI cryptographers and a retired Army Signal Corps officer among them, tried to break them, but their skill had no personal impetus behind it. I have succeeded, at least partially, where others failed because I desperately needed to. Where I have achieved little else, I have solved at least a fragment of the mystery.
“Host A is unaware of the symbiote in her bloodstream. Interactions between the two organisms seldom take place above a cellular level, and conventional tests cannot discern any abnormal presence, though Host A attests to feeling a ‘holy spirit’ inside her when she performs her ritual cures. I believe Host A’s perception of stimuli from the outside world acts as a buffer between the host and the symbiote, suppressing any macromolecular contact. It sustained her, worked miracles through her, loved her, though she never knew it.
“If this buffer could be removed by the screening out of all stimuli from birth, the host’s perceptive sphere would be turned entirely inward, a world unto itself. In perfect darkness, they might find each other, and develop mutual comprehension, symbiotic consciousness, even a means of life support that would render nutritive intake obsolete. Host B, my darling Ruby, nears the end of her gestation period, which should make such an experiment feasible at last. Such a life will truly be a gift, when one considers the alternative to which we are all condemned.”
So I’m waiting in the dark. I’ve made encouraging progress since I weaned myself off solid food and punctured my eardrums. I must lie still, so that my pulse becomes regular enough to hypnotize me. Soon, I will lose the use of my eyes, weakening them with mild acidic irritants until I see only black, then red. I must dive into myself and slow the dismal thunder of my heartbeat until I can hear her voice again in the place where she hid inside me before, until some remnant mote of her teaches my blood to sing. I must lie still and whisper into myself until I hear a response. Soon, I know, there will be two less lonely souls in the world.
I am an ugly man. Women seldom look at me, and never in the eyes, unless I’m giving them money. So I go to strip clubs.
Let me tell you about my favorite.
The Black Box used to be called Strip Search, and before that, Freaky Kiki’s Cockpit, but nothing else about it has changed, except the cover charge. It’s a topless dive next to the airport runways. The overpriced, watery drinks keep the sailors and bikers away, and the hardcore perverts go to the all-nude shows at Les Girls and Pacer’s. Only hardcore losers and conventioneers go there, before hitting their flight home; people who
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