Chapter 1

Custer woke me with his loud, incessant yowling. Before I could get out of bed he began scratching and clawing wildly at the back door. Rolling across the bed, I disentangled myself from Savana’s arms and legs, then slid over to get my feet on the floor.

Our bedroom opens onto a wide deck across the back of the house, and as I stepped out to check on Custer, he ran whimpering and whining past me into the bedroom. I looked back at the young yellow Lab as he cowered in the dim light at Savana’s side of the bed.

I turned and walked out to the edge of the wooden deck to see what, if anything was after him. The moon was full and the sky was clear. I could see the barn in the distance and the sheds all around. The only movement was the two horses. They were both running around the circle of the corral as if they were on a lunge line. I walked to the north end of the deck to look out across the open prairie to the northwest.

There was a faint red glow, low in the night sky. Almost immediately the wind began to blow and there was a low rumbling, like distant thunder rolling across the plains. The horses were bucking and kicking – then with what appeared to be hardly any effort, both of them cleared the five-foot wooden corral and continued east, up the dirt road on the south side of the house.

I whistled and they slid to a stop, turning back in my direction before rearing and breaking into a gallop toward the east once more ... as if something was after them.

I lost sight of them when they disappeared behind my metal shop building a hundred yards away. They were running toward the Canadian River, a half a quarter-mile to the east.

The wind was gusting even more and the air itself was vibrating as dust kicked up from the red Oklahoma earth. Looking back toward the northwest, the red glow was becoming brighter and closing in fast. Then, I could make out what appeared to be a red ball in the distance as it came closer. It was very low on the horizon, aiming directly at our ranch at an extremely high rate of speed.

The dust was in my face and the heat was like the noonday sun during August here in Oklahoma. The whole place was aglow from the red ball of fire. The barn, house, Poplar trees, and backyard – all looked weird as hell. The ball was glowing even brighter as it came nearer with a long yellowish-red tail wagging eerily behind. Whatever it was, couldn’t have been over a hundred feet off the ground. Its path is going to take it directly over the barn. As I watched, the red ball appeared to slam on its brakes, slowing so suddenly, I could actually feel the air around me gushing back toward the red object.

The deck began to shake and the boards were so hot they burned my bare feet. I saw the tall Poplar trees planted in the windbreak, as they began to lean with the force of the wind – leaves flying in all directions.

My skin felt like I was blistered from the sun, from my toes to my forehead. I felt like my skin was tightening, then loosening, as I stood – as if mesmerized by the red ball.

When the kitchen windows on the north side of the house shattered, I was finally able to turn myself away from the red glow. The energy coming from it was like a magnet, drawing me forcefully toward it, until I was finally able to break away from the pull. With one last look over my shoulder, I ran back inside, slamming the bedroom door behind me. Custer was whining and trembling as he tried his best to crawl underneath the low bed frame. I grabbed Savana as she slept, rolling her in the sheets and bedspread. Then, throwing her over my shoulder I yelled for Custer to follow me.

Running out of the bedroom and down to the end of the hallway, I opened the heavy steel door and ran stumbling down the steep steps into the storm shelter beneath our home. Savana was screaming, and kicking as she beat my back with her fists.

Custer ran past me into the dark, cavernous concrete vault as I slammed the door and threw the lever that sealed it. I flipped the lights on and hit the switch to start the standby generator all in the same motion. Then I put Savana on her feet in front of me.

“What the fuck are you doing Boyd Lightfoot? What’s that awful noise? Why are we in the storm cellar?” she screamed at me, fear and bewilderment in her voice and her eyes as she stood naked, looking at me. The one overhead light flickered and finally gained a full glow as the generator locked into a steady output.

“I don’t know Savana. Custer woke me barking, then he started howling like hell was after him. When I opened the door to look out, he ran inside ... The sky was clear when I first went out, then there was a red glow back to the northwest. The wind began gusting and the dust started to kick up – the whole place was shaking. The horses cleared the corral and the last I saw of them, they were running back toward the riverbed.”

“Is it a tornado? I hear an awful roar, but it’s not like any tornado I’ve ever heard.” She was screaming above the terrible roar that seemed to envelope us.

“I’m not sure what it is, but there were no clouds, just this red glow that’s coming right at us, like a big red ball of fire ... The roar is getting even louder now! Get down over here next to this wall and cover up. This concrete could crack with all the shaking – it feels like an earthquake!“ I was yelling at her and I could hardly hear my own voice. The concrete floor of the underground shelter felt as if it was going to heave up with the tremors that were rumbling beneath this place.

I grabbed both her and the fifteen month old Lab in my arms. Falling to the floor, I rolled the three of us in the quilted moving-pads stacked there. I even grabbed the sheet and bedspread I’d brought from the bedroom, pulling them over us.

“Cover your ears,” I screamed, as the noise reached ear shattering levels.

Custer howled pitifully and I covered his head with a heavy moving-pad, holding both him and Savana tightly to my chest. The earth seemed to be exploding above us – and beneath us...

... Then...

The noise was suddenly gone. The tremors had stopped and all was deathly still – and eerily quiet.

“Stay here,” I yelled as I broke for the door. I doubt I could have dragged either of them out with me at that moment.

When I reached the hallway I saw debris everywhere. Sheetrock and ceiling tile covered the floor. There were glass particles from the windows scattered over the floor, yet the glass wasn’t nicking my feet. I walked across the floor as if the shards of glass were sand. The door was blown open, with the half panel of glass missing from the top.

The acrid smell of smoke and ashes filled the air as I stepped through the open doorway. The red glow was now to the southeast. It looked as if something had hit the ground near the lake on our property. Slowly, the red glow began to dim until I could no longer see it.

The heat was all but unbearable and I was sweating as I walked out onto the deck boards, which were now charred black. My skin began to cool as soon as the sweat broke out. I looked at my arms and legs as I stood naked on the burned deck. My skin had a faint red glow and I held my hands in front of my face, rubbing them together. My skin felt different – like smooth, tanned leather – yet soft as Savana’s belly.

I reached back and ran both hands down across my butt, then on down the backs of my legs. My body, and especially my skin, had a different feel to it. When I stepped to the edge of the charred deck, I felt virtually weightless ... as if I could spring into the air. I looked down at my cock and it was bigger than ever before. I had to check it out, and took it in my fist. When I did, I felt an instant urge to ejaculate. My cock swelled to more than a handful as I blasted out across the burned off red clay dirt.

I thought of my hair and ran both hands through my long hair. I just knew it would be burned off, but my hair was even longer and softer than before. As near as I could tell, I was in one piece and I was alright. I knew my cock was still intact. Shit, I had just ejaculated out across the backyard – I still had my hair and the soles of my feet felt like I had shoes on.

Stepping off the deck onto the hot dry soil, once again – I felt this instant urge to just – spring into the air. I walked out a ways and looked the place over in the light of the cloudless, moonlit sky.

The barn and outbuildings were burning; too far gone to save. I looked back toward the low roof of our ranch-style home. The metal roofing was still in place but had a different – dull, ashen look to it in the moonlight.

“Boyd, where are you? What’s happened out there?” Savana yelled from inside the shelter.

“Stay there. I’ll come get you,” I shouted as I made my way back to the where she was.

I grabbed two flashlights from the shelter’s emergency storage cabinet. Giving one to Savana, we made our way back up top.

“Let me get your shoes, there’s glass every where,” I told her before she walked out into the hallway from the cellar.

“Boyd, I’m scared.”

“We’re alright, Savana. We’ll have to wait until morning to see what it was that hit, and what all has been torn up.”

Hell, I didn’t know what else to tell her at the time.

I found her moccasins under the bed and took them to her. We walked naked out into the bright, moonlit night and the smell of smoke, and the pungent, scorched smell of something other than burning wood, grass, and leaves, filled the air. The grass was burned off smooth to the red dirt surface of the back yard. The glow of the burning barn lit the entire barnyard eerily as we walked and looked.

“It’s another two hours until daylight, let’s make some coffee and see if there’s anything on the radio or TV about what this might have been,” I said as Savana held herself against me, her body felt warm against my cool skin, as if she had a fever.

“My God, Boyd Lightfoot – look at your dick,” Savana said as she dropped her right hand to grasp a handful of me.

“It does seem to be different, doesn’t it? I wonder if that red ball passing so close made my skin change, and my dick too?”

“I don’t know what it was, but something sure made your dick bigger and your skin feels like you’re made of suede leather. Shit, I could get turned on, just touching the skin on your ass. Boyd, how long did you stand out in the path of that fireball as it came roaring through here?”

“Not long ... at least I don’t think it was. I actually felt like I was drawn to the red object – like I could have leaped into the air and flown after it. I still feel like I’m lighter than before, yet look at me. Hell, Savana, I’m bigger than before and not just my dick either.”

“We need to get inside so I can check you over, I hope you’re not hurt in some way that will cause you to be sick,” she told me, swatting my butt, as we walked back inside.

There was no electricity so I pulled the coffeemaker out of the cabinet and took it to the shelter to make coffee. Savana turned on the portable TV once we were in the shelter, but there was nothing but a blank screen. She grabbed the portable radio and turned it on. There was crackling and static, but she finally picked up a station that was playing an old song by Garth.

‘Thunder Rolls‘.

“Very appropriate, I’d say,” Savana said dryly, as she looked up at me.

I looked down at her as she squatted there on the pads and bed sheets, rubbing Custer’s neck. She’s a beauty – tall, slender, with her braided hair as long and black as my own, from her Cherokee heritage. Her mother is Caucasian. Her dad, who’d died in a bar fight, was full Cherokee. Her skin has a dark golden hue to it – perhaps caused by the dim light from the single overhead bulb.

Her breasts are as prominent and proud as if she’s had implants, but they’re all natural, and we’re both proud of them. Her face is slender, with high cheekbones, a narrow chin and dark sexy eyes that can either melt me slowly or blow me away with a single glance.

We’ve been together a little over three years now. She was eighteen when we met late that Friday afternoon. Her car was broken down on the side of the highway and I stopped to offer help, or a ride. It turned out to be a ride, as her engine was locked up tight with a piston rod through the side of the block.

I was headed back to the ranch after a trip to town to stock up on feed, some beer and a few groceries. I saw her car on the side of the road with smoke and steam coming from under the hood, as she bent over looking into the engine compartment. I nearly slid sideways when I saw her butt sticking out, covered in what I first thought was light blue panties. The blue panties turned out to be her faded denim shorts with the seat busted out on each of her butt cheeks where the back pockets were once sewn.

I pulled off the road onto the shoulder in front of her car and looked back in the mirror to see her smiling face as she turned to look toward my pickup.

When I stepped out, she was already walking toward me – still smiling, and damn did she ever look good.

“Need some help?” I asked as she stopped at the back of my truck and I walked back to talk and get a better look at her.

“My damn car died,” she said, still smiling. There’s something to be said, about a good looking girl of Cherokee descent who smiles in the wake of trouble.

Damn what some tits, I thought – almost saying it aloud as I looked at her faded red shirt tied beneath her breasts.

“I can give you a tow, or give you a ride home if you like. I’m Boyd Lightfoot, by the way. I live down at the end of that next county road up there,” I told her, pointing toward the gravel county road nearby.

“I’m Savana Creekmore. I live with my mother and my aunt in a trailer park just outside the town limits of Custer City. I sure could use a ride...

“Boyd, you’re full Cherokee, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, both my parents were Cherokee – grandparents too.

“What do you do, Savana?” I asked as we pulled her bags, and piles of clothes from the backseat of her car and put them in my pickup bed.

“I’m a student at OSU in Stillwater. What do you do?” she asked as she saw me looking at her cleavage where her breasts were about to fight their way out of her faded thin shirt.

“I graduated from OSU a few years ago, myself. I raise a few head of cattle and mostly do whatever needs to be done around my place. My parents are dead – they left it all to me.”

She responded, “When did you graduate? I wish I was already out and had a job. I hate being stranded and broke.”

“I graduated six years ago.”

“So you’re what, twenty-eight, twenty-nine?”

“Twenty-eight.”

“I remember seeing a commemorative plaque at the dorm with the name Boyd E. Lightfoot on it. Would you happen to be that Boyd Lightfoot?” she asked, and again her smile broke out.

“Would it make a difference, if it was?”

“No, I was just wondering.”

“It’s me, Boyd Elliot Lightfoot. I donated the money in memory of my parents, when they died.”

“The plaque had Lightfoot Ranch on it and I remember the oil derricks ... You’re rich aren’t you, Boyd?”

“I never count my money, but I have enough to get by.”

“How come you never married?”

“How do you know I didn’t?”

“Did you?”

“No ... How did you know?”

“You don’t talk married. Most married men would be bragging about what they have, asking for phone numbers and a date by now.”

“Do you get that a lot? I would think you’d already have a list of young men your age who want a date.”

“I don’t have time to date. I want a degree and a career, so I can get out of that trailer park and be someone ... Speaking of trailer parks, there it is – right up there. Turn in at the first drive and go to the very back row. I live in the last trailer on the left. I hate for you to see where I live, but when you see it you’ll know why I want out and why I want better for my life.”