Chapter 3: Zwhim

“What the fuck?!”

“What the fuck?”

I probably would have added my own voice to the questioning chorus, only I let out a much more reasonable, “Oh, shit!” as I pulled away from Eve. Our bodies were wet and slick with shower water. We stumbled out of the shower, reaching for towels that weren’t there. Nothing was allowed inside the Box that could possibly used to attempt modesty, nothing that could hide our bodies from the unknown force that had dropped us into its sick little experiment.

The mysterious alien ray had triggered once again, finally awarding our prize for escaping the strange interstellar war that it had dropped us into several hours before. Continuing the trend, if two events could even be called a trend, another person had appeared. Only this time I recognized the person who had been added to our little exhibit. My jaw dropped too low to be of any use. Standing in front of us was Bethany Lance, international pop goddess responsible for the chart topping hit, “Oops, He Hit Me Again”.

And she was just as naked as Eve and myself.

I don’t know how many times I’d jerked off to the thought of those lovely, hazel brown eyes looking up at mine as her soft pink lips wrapped around my cock. Her honey blonde hair was held back in a familiar schoolgirl braid that sent my already charged libido into overdrive. I could feel my cock grow heavier as the blood that was assisting with my thoughts decided it had better things to do.

Bethany’s eyes raked my body. The pop singer’s lips sort of ... twisted when she came to my erection. It was the sort of twist that could either make a man jump for joy or wither his soul depending on how he chose to take it. For my part, I was mostly confused. It must have shown on my face, as Bethany turned to Eve and asked, “Is he going to be any help explaining what is going on?”

Eve puffed out her cheeks as she decided on how to answer. “He probably has a better idea of what is going on than I do, even if his thinking does appear to be a little bit impaired at the moment.”

“Hey!” I squeaked. Yes, squeaked. My voice cracked like a thirteen year old’s who just hit puberty inside a Victoria’s Secret outlet. Eve looked a little annoyed, but getting ganged up on was totally unfair. That my response was to just squeak just made things that much worse. I cleared my throat and tried to start again. “Just because I’ve got a dick doesn’t make me an idiot!”

“No,” Bethany drawled. A hint of southern accent crept into her voice. She smiled, making it obvious she was joking as she nodded at my crotch. “But the condition that you are in, I don’t think I ought to be asking you to talk and chew gum at the same time.”

“It’s not that bad,” I growled.

“Well, what if I offered to take care of that for you?” Bethany purred, leaning in and squeezing her breasts together between her upper arms. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted Eve turn red with angry jealousy.

My brain froze harder than an Antarctic iceberg. Complete mental blue screen of death, if the issue persists please contact the manufacturer to see if the device still under warranty. But at least I had enough sense of self preservation to keep my jaw shut this time.

Bethany turned back to Eve and smiled. “Point made. So... ?” She motioned to the room around us.

“Aliens,” Eve sighed. “At least, we think its aliens. Though now that you’re here, I’m entirely willing to revisit the idea of this all being some horrible sex dream of his.”

Bethany’s ever present smile turned brittle. “Aliens? Really? But I have a concert tonight! Are we sure this isn’t some sort of dream?”

This time it was my turn to share a look with Eve. The singer’s cheerful bravado was quickly fading as she was forced to acknowledge that this was all too real, and not just some bad hallucination. It hadn’t really sunk in, I guess, that we weren’t figments of her imagination. To be fair, I don’t think it was anywhere near as easy for her as it had been for me. My only choice had been to accept that reality was indeed reality or admit that I was completely insane. By the time Eve arrived, I’d already started on making the space a little bit more human, as well as providing familiar face for her to latch onto. There was a fundamental element of trust and safety that came with my presence.

Bethany on the other hand...

She’d been dumped naked in a strange room with a pair of equally naked, slightly younger strangers. In that situation assuming that she was in a dream just made sense. It was Occam’s Razor at its finest, only this time the Razor was a little dull. This wasn’t a dream, a hallucination, or a really bad trip - this was one hundred percent actually happening. And, honestly, I doubt my erection was helping anything. Considering what I knew about the average guy, she probably got sent a dozen dick pics a day. I wouldn’t have been surprised if more than half of her dreams involved naked strangers by that point in her career, and I got the feeling they weren’t anywhere near as pleasant as the ones that I normally had.

“No, no, nonononono!” Bethany’s wail echoed through the small room. She wasn’t quite throwing a tantrum, but she was throwing a rather exceptional fit. She had fallen onto the couch and grabbed the edge with white knuckled hands. Her long hair whipped back and forth as she rocked in place and violently shook her head. Every movie I’d ever seen insisted the proper course of action was to walk over and slap her back to coherence. It was at that point I realized just stupid every movie I’d ever seen actually was and how woefully unprepared I was for what was actually happening.

Instead I walked over to where she was sitting, ignoring the look that Eve was giving me, and sat down just outside of hair whipping range. I was tempted to throw my arms around Bethany and give her a hug, but that all seemed just a little too personal. Instead I clasped my hands together and set them down in my lap. Just being there forced the superstar to stop rocking. Tears left shiny streaks down her cheeks and for a moment all I could do was marvel at how human she looked without all the usual make up. Bethany was plain and beautiful at the same time, but the mystique of the internationally famous was forever banished. Forget about belly-baring tye offs and plaid microskirts, she would have looked right at home in a pair of faded jeans and a snarky tee-shirt.

“Look...” My words trailed off and I frowned as my brain realized it didn’t have anything else to offer my tongue. Psychology wasn’t something I’d ever been interested in, outside of the mandatory classes I’d had to take for school. Eve wasn’t much better; she looked at me and shrugged helplessly. Bethany turned, waiting for whatever pearls of wisdom I was prepared to dispense. Trapped, I smiled and said, “On the plus side, no more having to sleep on a tour bus?”

Our newest companion blinked slowly. The corner of her mouth twitched. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it was a start. “Well ... I suppose. I’m still not entirely convinced that this isn’t a dream, mind. But...” She shook her head. “Aliens?”

I stood back up and offered her my hand. “Want to see what is responsible for all of this?”

Bethany wiped her tears away with the back of her left hand as she took my offering with her right. Yes, there was a small thrill at knowing I was holding her hand. There was also the acute sense that Eve was looking for the best place to sink a dagger into my back. We walked over to the pedestal, which was glowing faintly. I waved my hand as if revealing a grand prize. “This is why we are here. Its some sort of device that likes to ask us questions. Every so often, it will offer a prize of sorts. That’s where all the furniture came from. When I first arrived, this was all just a great empty space. Sometimes the questions are just general trivia, like, “Who was the first U.S. President?” or, “How do you spell CAT?” After you’ve answered a few, they start to become more difficult. “What is the square root of three hundred and sixty-eight?” Then after a while it starts to get to the real doozies. “What do you get when you add a donkey to a dog?” Which sort of raises the question of how do they even know what a dog and a donkey are to begin with, bu then they know who George Washington is, so...” I shrugged. “Finally, there are the choices they ask you to make. This or that, pick from one of these three ... Those are the fun ones. If its a physical option like a piece of furniture then it ends up here. Sometimes it will ask you to pick a combat option. Those won’t appear, at least not right away...”

My words trailed off before I could add, “ ... only when its ready to try and kill us again.” Though even the words ‘combat option’ had probably given the game away.

“You-” Bethany choked. “You mean we need to fight people?!”

I wiggled my hand back and forth. “Sort of? I had to fight some sort of toad thing before Eve got here. The second time we just ran away from some aliens that were fighting each other.”

“Other aliens? How many are there?!”

Another shrug. I was getting really good at them. “We’ve met three different species, at least for a certain value of met. At least if you can count getting shot at and nearly disemboweled as meeting someone.”

I’d never seen someone actually turn green before. “How can you say that so easily?”

“Look, its not that hard,” Eve announced as she walked over to the Pedestal. The stones decorating it began to glow more brightly as she approached, waiting for her command. I was curious to see how it would react now that we had a new player. I hadn’t had the chance to watch the first time Eve had played. Was it going to pick up where she had left off or was it going to reset for Bethany’s presence?

The dreaded yellow button was absent, leaving only behind the green and red options. I pointed to the green button and said, “Go ahead.”

Bethany reached out hesitantly and tapped the button. All three of us where more than a little startled when a life-sized hologram of Elvis Presley materialized, complete with guitar and classic white jumpsuit. He strummed a chord, rocked his hips left, rocked his hips right, then sang out, “How many cylinders in a Model Teeee?”

I was utterly baffled. Cars had never been my strong suit to begin with and having Elvis standing there, shaking his hips and softly singing “Hound Dog” as he waited for an answer wasn’t helping much. Eve was equally flabbergasted, while Bethany just seemed puzzled. Not so much by the question as by us.

“Y’all don’t know this?” Her nose scrunched in amusement. “Figured this would sort of be common knowledge. The answer is four.”

“Co-co-correct!” Elvis sang. He gave one last strum of his guitar and then vanished.

“Well, that was new,” Eve muttered as the buttons began to glow again. She reached past Bethany and tapped the green button. This time four symbols appeared where Elvis had been. They were, in order, a white sun, blue water drop, a red fireball, and a green tree. There was a noticeable space in between the water drop and the fireball.

“Oh, that’s easy!” I blurted out. I could see that both girls thought I was more than a little nuts as I reached out to touch the space, I just had with the earlier shapes puzzle. Only this time instead of providing me with options, my hand phased right through the hologram. “Hey!”

“Let me try,” Bethany suggested. She reached up and produced the exact same result.

“So then...” Eve reached up and tapped the hologram. This time several shapes appeared in the air in front of us, including the the familiar black skull that was missing from the line. I nodded to it, and Eve slid it into place. The buttons flashed for a moment, then the most dangerous light of all appeared - the flashing purple rewards. Since Eve was the one who had tapped for the question, it was only natural that she got to tap for the reward as well. I was less than surprised when it ended up being a selection of narrow bladed knives. Eve reached up without thinking and selected the one in the center, a waspish stiletto with a bone carved handle.

Zwhim

It was definitely much more of a surprise when the knife materialized in midair, only to clatter to the ground at Eve’s feet. She knelt down and gingerly picked it up. We all watched as she tested the edge against the pad of her thumb. The younger woman frowned as a tiny droplet of blood blossomed on her skin. Her frown deepened as she looked from the dagger to Bethany, then back to the dagger. “Oh, those sick fucks!”

The volume of her anger snapped me out of my shock. “What?”

Eve pointed at Bethany, or at least the dagger did since it was still in Eve’s main hand. That wasn’t the most intelligent move considering her answer. “They want me to kill her!”

“Aw, HELL NAW!” Bethany yelled as she started for Eve. I stopped her by stepping between them and putting my arms up, catching a palmful of tit as she walked into my hand chest first. I sucked in a deep breath as I tried to ignore how wonderfully warm, soft, and firm her breast was and settled for shaking my head.

“Pause!” I ordered, and this time my voice managed to keep from cracking. I looked to Eve and nodded. “Now, would you mind explaining that at least a little less dramatically?”

Eve motioned to the dagger in her hand and finally realized she was waving around five inches of sharpened steel and set it down carefully on the Pedestal. I felt the tension start to ease from Bethany as Eve disarmed herself.

Eve shook her hand as she started to explain. “Sorry, it just seemed really obvious. First they add an element of stress to an already existing relationship...” She nodded towards Bethany. We both followed her gaze to where my hand was still on Bethany’s tit. I yanked my hand back faster than if I’d been grabbing a hot stove. Eve grinned as she continued. “And of course the stress they add isn’t just a minor one, but one that checks off every single possible angle of attack. Wealth, beauty, popularity, and probably experience as well.” Bethany smiled crookedly, took a half step back, and curtsied. Finally, Eve nodded to the dagger. “Then they tossed in a way to dispose of the third wheel. Of course, the only way to get it was through cooperation first. The test was to see if I wanted Adam to myself enough to go ahead and screw over the rest of the group, violently, or if I was willing to risk losing Adam for the betterment of the group.”

“That is sick!” Bethany declared. Her accent was much more pronounced than it had been before. I began to wonder how hard it was for her to suppress it, or if it just came out when she was feeling stressed. She walked back to the couch and flopped down heavily. Her hands waved angrily in my direction. “I don’t even want him!”

My first thought was to protest, but my brain kicked in before my tongue took off. I smiled crookedly and said, “Yeah, that’s fair.”

The silence that followed was uncomfortably long.

“Um, what?” Eve finally asked. She stepped around the Pedestal and poked me in the shoulder. “Who are you, and what have you done with Adam? That’s Bethany Lance. I know you’ve jerked off to her at least once!”

Bethany twitched at the comment, then stifled a smile behind her hand. I just smiled and nodded in agreement. “Yeah, and? So have several million other guys my age. Sort of goes with the territory of being hot and famous. But just because I have thought about banging her doesn’t mean that she wants to bang me.”

“So you do want to have sex with her.” Eve’s tone was completely neutral, the way an executioner’s axe is completely neutral. It was followed by the same sort of silence where the forest shuts up to watch the wolf pounce on the rabbit. Only this bunny rabbit was crazy enough to pounce on the wolf instead.

“I’m a guy, Eve,” I said as I pointed to my still mostly hard cock. “What the libido wants, the libido wants. That’s not the same as saying gets, however, and that’s not even checking to see if the heart and head agree.”

I knew the comment had struck home based on the weak smile she gave me. It was the kind of smile reserved for people who recognized the truth when they heard it, even if they didn’t naturally agree with it. I walked over and pulled her into a hug, savoring the feel of her warm body against mine. There’s something comforting about having another person wrapped up in your embrace. I could feel the anxiety fading from the room as we held each other. My body even had the decency to recognize that it was a moment of intimacy rather than lust, my cock finally easing back down. Finally, after a good long pause, I kissed Eve on the top of her head and stepped back.

“So what’s next?” Eve asked as she walked over to the fridge and pulled out several cans of Coke. She tossed one to myself and one to Bethany, then started tamping down the top of her own can. The pop and hiss of escaping carbon filled the room as we all pondered the question.

“Well, we know we need to keep playing,” I said after a moment’s thought. “And we know we’re going to get involved in another fight, at least eventually. So I think Bethany should be the main player, at least for a while.”

“What?” Bethany sounded startled by the suggestion. “Why? Why me?”

“Because you haven’t had the chance to make any selections,” I answered soothingly. I walked over and picked up the dagger that Eve had summoned. “We know there’s going to be another fight scene eventually, but we don’t know what the rules for the scene will be. All three of us could go, or it could just be one or two of us. If Eve or I go, we’ll very likely be armed. But if you get whisked off and haven’t had a chance to pick any weapons, then you could very likely be at a severe disadvantage.”

“And I could end up flatter than a flapjack,” Bethany added with a nod. She frowned at the thought. “I don’t suppose they’d just let me sit that out?”

I shook my head. “I seriously doubt that’s an option.”

“All right.” Bethany sighed. She pushed off from the couch with both hands and headed towards the Pedestal. “Let’s get started then.”

We played the Q&A game for several hours after that, with Bethany at the helm the entire time. The more we played, the more the rules became apparent. Verbal questions could be answered by anyone and somehow the Pedestal could tell the difference between someone trying to answer and people discussing the problem. Friendly fellow that way. On the other hand, puzzles and philosophy were single player only. Puzzles, at least, Eve and I could offer suggestions on. But if we opened our mouth for anything philosophical, the Pedestal seemed to consider that cheating. And it truly did not like cheating.

“How full can one fill an empty cup?” a cowboy asked as he leaned back against an invisible fence. Somewhere off in the distance a cow mooed. The Pedestal’s holograms were improving, becoming more detailed and realistic. I was dying to know where it was getting its source material.

“No more than a drop,” I scoffed. I thought I had done it under my breath.

“Well, partner, I think you’re riding a southbound train when the map says you ought to be going west,” the cowboy drawled. I frowned at the apparent non sequitur, but it turned to a look of shock as he drew the six-shooter hanging from his belt and leveled it at my chest. Flames stabbed out of the barrel, accompanied by the thunder crack of a gun going off at short range. It looked to be a standard Old West revolver, which meant I was looking at taking a .40 caliber round straight to the heart.