Chapter 25

Like the others before her, Melinda had a restless night.

Each time she rose from deep sleep into dream sleep, the seed of the Darkness that had been planted inside her grew. Its tendrils reached inexorably into the surreal landscape of her dream world, shaping it as they desired.

Even on this ethereal plane, however, Melinda fought it.

A little knowledge was a dangerous thing, and the Darkness now fully understood this. Yet even forewarned as she was, she was not forearmed, and her resistance was not strong enough to push the Darkness back.

By the time the sun rose and her mind rose into the strange realm of waking dreams, she had nearly lost the will to fight it. Her last dreams, the most vivid of them all, showed Melinda her place. The Darkness was never scary or intimidating, and that had made it all the harder to fight. To give into it was to give into exquisite pleasure.

Melinda woke from her last dream with a start and uttered a soft gasp as she found Heather sitting on the edge of her bed, smiling down at her.

"Time to wake up, sleepyhead," Heather said in a tender voice.

Melinda moaned and struggled to push the erotic thoughts from her consciousness that the last dream had left behind. They were loathe to depart, and she had little strength left to use against them. Now she understood why it was two step process. A whole night of relentless dreams was near impossible to fight or ignore, and drained the will of the power to resist any further.

She sat up in bed, closing her eyes and quivering. Her pussy was damp and aching. Her nipples were hard and tingling madly.

Heather smiled and reached out casually with a single hand. She cupped one of Melinda's breasts and squeezed it, rubbing the sensitized nipple with her thumb.

"Uhhnn..." Melinda moaned, leaning into the touch. "Uhhh... oh God..."

She squirmed on the bed, her pussy growing very wet.

"I wish I could take you now, baby sis," Heather said softly. "But we have to take care of breakfast first."

Melinda blinked uncomprehendingly at Heather, her mind still in a fog.

"You know how Mom likes us to be together for breakfast on Saturdays."

"B-breakfast... with Mom and Dad... but h-how can I..." She abruptly uttered a tiny squeal as Heather lightly pinched her nipple.

Heather chuckled and withdrew her hand. "You'll be okay," she said, rising from the bed. "I won't touch you anymore like that until afterward."

Melinda felt a surge of disappointment at this. She took a deep breath and fought this down. She still had some of her willpower left. Maybe if Heather left her alone for a little bit she could fight back. She could resist when Heather tried to finish it.

When Heather would try to enslave her.

Melinda shuddered. She managed to cling to that. She did not want to be enslaved. Not to anyone, and certainly not to her sister.

"You better get your shower," Heather said. She returned to her own bed and smiled as she fixed her eyes on her little sister.

Melinda just nodded and started towards the bathroom.

"Wait a moment, baby sis. You forgot something."

"Huh?" Melinda said in confusion, though in the back of her mind she already had an idea what Heather was going to ask of her.

"You can't take your shower with your night clothes on, now can you?"

Melinda swallowed. She was already reaching to unbutton her nightgown. Her hands faltered.

"You're not mine yet, Melinda," Heather said in a husky voice. "But you still need to be a good little girl for me. Isn't that what you want?"

Melinda bit her lip as her body shivered in response. Waves of pleasure came over her as she was forced to think as Heather wished it. Her resistance was only enough to allow her to shout in her mind against it, but her hands dutifully undressed herself, and her sexual arousal grew in equal measure with how much of herself she exposed.

Finally Melinda was standing naked, her body visibly trembling, partially from desire, partially from the continuing struggle in her mind.

"You're so cute when you're naked, baby sis," Heather cooed. "Maybe you can do that more often around the house."

Melinda whimpered. Her pussy glistened with moisture.

"I can see what Jason likes about you now."

Melinda drew in her breath and let it go as a ragged sigh. The thought of Jason managed to spark a fire of rebellion inside her. "P-please don't make me give him up, Heather," she blurted.

Heather paused a moment. In those few seconds, the first flicker of doubt appeared in her eyes. Yet it was gone just as quickly as it had come.

Melinda had seen it. Moreover, the aura around Heather had reacted to it. It grew momentarily agitated, swirling and writhing almost randomly, before settling back to what it was before.

"Heather... y-you can fight it..." Melinda croaked.

Heather stood and strolled over to her. "I don't want to fight it."

"You're lying," Melinda piped. "You are. I-I can see it in... in... n-no... no, stop..."

Heather slid a single hand down Melinda's side, trailing little ripples of pleasure through Melinda's body.

"S-stop..." she moaned. "I... I c-can't think wh-when you do that..."

"I don't want to fight it," Heather said in a sultry voice, steadier this time. Her hand slid over Melinda's hip. "And you don't either."

"Y-yes, I do... I w-want... I..."

Melinda abruptly stopped as Heather's hand played along the insides of Melinda's thighs. Melinda panted hard, sliding her feet apart, silently begging for her pussy to be touched.

"Should I take you now?" Heather asked.

Melinda forced herself not to reply, for she knew what answer she would give.

Heather smiled and withdrew her hand. "Go take your shower, baby sis. I'll let you calm down. We'll let the rest wait until later."

Melinda just nodded and retreated into the bathroom.

She tried desperately to fight off the influence of the Darkness as she prepared the shower. It was exhausting. She kept wanting to slip off into blind obedience to her own growing desires towards her sister.

She had to hold on. If there was any chance of being rescued from this, she had to give Jason the time to do it. Surely he would come up with something.

If he even knew about it.

Jason was barely awake when he realized that the phone was ringing.

He scrambled out of bed as fast as he could. He had no idea how long it had been ringing. On the fourth the answering machine would pick up, as his parents refused to answer the phone directly before they rose in the morning.

Yet he had a feeling it was for him. He was the only one in the house that had friends that would have cause to call on the land line at that hour of the morning. His father received all of his calls from the hospital on his cell phone.

He stumbled over to the phone and snatched up the receiver. "Hello??"

"Hi, Jason, it's me, Cassie."

"Oh, Cassie, hi," Jason said, then immediately lowered his voice. "What's up? Is there something wrong?"

"Just wanted to check if you were doing okay. I didn't have a chance to call you after I got off the phone with Melinda," Cassie said, her voice sad.

"I'm doing okay. Are you? You sound upset."

Cassie sighed. "I got in trouble with my mother for yesterday."

"Huh? Why? What happened?"

"Did Melinda give you the details on how I stopped Ned?"

"No, she didn't."

Cassie recounted the tale for him.

Jason grinned. "Wow. I'm seriously impressed."

"Thank you. But my mother wasn't. Now if I want to leave the car to visit with friends, Harry has to come with me."

Jason sighed. "Damn. Well, wait, we may still be able to salvage this. Once Heather is better, we can put her or Melinda with you and she can leave the car instead. And maybe I can talk to Richie and convince him to resolve this issue with his detention."

"Jason, you talked to Melinda last night, right?" Cassie asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"Did she seem... I don't know, a little off to you?"

Jason paused, feeling a chill come over him. "Yes, she did. Did you have any odd dreams last night about her?"

"Sort of. It was hard to tell. I saw Heather and Melinda together, but I didn't understand what I was seeing. Actually, my dreams about Marcie Fuller are getting more..."

"Describe it. The dream about Heather and Melinda, that is."

Cassie paused a moment. "I saw them in a room together. I think it was their bedroom, since they were sitting on the edge of a bed. Heather was trying to be affectionate towards Melinda, and Melinda was resisting it."

Jason went stark silent, his heart leaping into his throat.

"Jason, are you there? Is something wrong?"

Jason felt like beating his head into the wall. Why didn't I SEE this before now?! he silently chastised himself.

No, he knew why he had not seen it. He had let his ego get in the way of logical thinking. He had assumed that if Heather was taken by Nyssa, he would be the target. He had never expected her to go after Melinda, not from the revulsion she had shown after Richie had made them go at it in the House.

It still didn't make any sense to him. Nyssa dealt only with existing desires, or so he had thought. Did Heather always harbor a desire for Melinda?

"Yes, there's something wrong," he said in a badly quavering voice. "Cassie, I need your help. Can you get down here this morning?"

"I can't, Jason. We're going away for the weekend. We leave in ten minutes and won't be back until late tomorrow."

"Dammit," Jason muttered.

"I know, I know! It's not like we're even close to these relatives we're visiting! It's just so we can show off how fancy we dress and how much money we have. I was lucky they let me call you."

"It's okay, Cassie."

"Jason, you don't think something's wrong, do you?" Cassie asked anxiously. "I mean, Heather was just sick, right? She wasn't... you know..."

Jason paused a moment. "I'm not sure anymore."

"Oh no..." Cassie said in a small voice.

"I might be wrong. In fact, I really hope I'm wrong."

"If something happened to Heather, we're screwed, Jason! She's our Precog! Without her..."

"You, me, and Melinda did rather well without her yesterday."

"You can't just write off..."

"I'm not! I just don't want us to panic, okay?!" Jason cried. What he didn't add was that he was doing plenty of panicking for the both of them.

"If Heather's been taken, we have to stop her from trying to do whatever it is to whoever her victim is."

Jason bit his lip, a shiver passing through him. He suddenly felt a surge of guilt. Part of him had actually felt a tiny amount of sexual excitement at the memory of Heather and Melinda being made to go at each other at the House. "I know. But you can't help me, and she's not likely to oblige and wait until the afternoon."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I'll have to call Richie and get him to help. Maybe if I call him right now I can catch him before he heads off to play ball with his friends or whatever."

"Okay, but please, call me as soon as you know anything. Leave a message if I'm not here. Just say whether Heather is okay or not, you don't have to leave any more detail than that."

"Will do."

"Bye, Jason. Good luck."

"Thanks. Bye."

Richie's voice, distantly at first and then steadily stronger: "... fine, don't get your panties in a twist, 'kay, Mom? I'll just be a sec... Yo."

"Richie, I need your help," said Jason.

"No can do, pardner. About to step out to see my Mom's sister across town for the yearly visit that's supposed to convince her we're not the cheap white trash we look like."

Jason sighed. "Anyway you can get out of it?"

Richie snorted. "Yeah, I wish. Her sister looks like a vulture and smells almost as bad." There was a ruckus in the background and Richie's voice went distant. "Hey, you don't like her either, Mom!" he shouted. "That was nothing considerin' some of the names you call her!"

"Look, Richie, be serious! Something might be wrong with Heather."

"I thought she had gone home sick yesterday."

"She did, but... I can't explain it, but I think something might be wrong. Nyssa might have gotten to her."

There was a pause at the other end. "Oh, really?" he asked in a hollow voice.

"Yeah, really," Jason said in annoyance. "I might not be able to get out the house for a little bit, since my Dad has chores around here that need to be done. You're just down the block from Heather, can't you just check to see she's okay, and that she hasn't done anything to Melinda?"

"Huh? Melinda? Why do you think... oh, wait, you mean Heather's going after... wow, fucking kinky, dude!"

"There's nothing amusing about this, dammit!"

"Okay, okay, Jesus. Between you and my Mom nagging me today, it's a wonder I have such a sunny disposition today."

"Huh, yeah, you do sound chipper today."

"Got big plans for today, dude, after the trip to my aunt's lair."

"I may have to ask you to take a raincheck on them."

Richie laughed. "A big negarino to that, nerd-boy."

"Richie, I'm gambling that Heather can't do anything to Melinda until the parents are away. I need you to help me get into that house somehow and stop them. Cassie did a trick with Ned where she used a diversion at one door to..."

"Sorry, man, afraid I can't help."

Jason was almost too nonplussed to reply at first. "What??"

"Maybe next time, you know?"

"What the hell are you talking about? You have to do this for me!"

Richie snorted. "Oh yeah? Why?"

"You're in the Harbingers, and Heather is your friend."

"Huh, yeah, a friend. Tell me another one."

"Richie, please... she might do something to Melinda... we don't know if any of this can be reversed once it does happen."

Richie sighed and became distant again. "Okay, Mom, I'm coming." He came back loud again. "Gotta go, dude."

"Richie! Wait! Please, you have to..."

"Dude, chill," Richie said coolly. "About time you learned something about me."

"What's that?"

"I don't have to do anything I don't want to."

Jason blinked in surprise at the abrupt click that followed, and spent the next few moments in stunned surprise listening to a disconnected line.

Sandra glanced at her son in annoyance for perhaps the fourth time since they left the house as she drove towards her sister's house. "All right, out with it," she finally demanded.

Richie took a moment to respond, lost in his own thoughts. "Huh? What?"

Sandra rolled her eyes. "Huh? What?" she repeated mockingly. "If that's how attentive you are in your classes, no wonder you still have fuckin' detention."

"Yeah, fine, whatever," Richie said with a snort.

"So what's going on with you?"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You've been sitting there since we left the house lookin' like you just smoked something real good," Sandra said sharply. "You're even fuckin' smug about it."

Richie just shrugged. He had not realized that he was being that obvious. All he could think about was Linda Davis and what she was going to be doing for him all day. He was so excited he wished there was someone he could tell about it.

This just made him smile broadly again.

"There it is again," Sandra said. "So what's going on? What have you done this time that you're so sure you got away with and how much is it gonna cost me when we find out that you didn't?"

Richie sighed. "It's nothing like that, Mom."

"Yeah, tell me another one."

"I'm serious! I just... I just have some plans this afternoon, that's all."

He started to smile again. Something about the way he did that sent a shiver up Sandra's spine. "What plans?"

"They're personal. As in none of your business."

"I'm your mother, remember? Your business is my fuckin' business."

Richie just barely stopped himself from blowing up at his mother. Finally things were going to go right for him. He couldn't afford to have them screwed up this close to getting what he wanted.

He took a moment to calm himself, though his voice still had a sarcastic edge to it when he spoke. "I got sort of a date this afternoon with a girl I've wanted for a while."

Sandra considered this for a moment. She didn't like the sound of that. Or the look on his face as he said it.

"A date?" Sandra asked. "Just a date?"

Richie knew he should just stick with that story, but he felt too smug about what he had done. "Yeah, just like you have 'dates, ' huh?"

"Aw, fuck."

"Now you got it."

"Don't be a wiseass, Richie. Goddamn. What did I tell you?"

Richie groaned. "Look, you already had the freakin' safe-sex talk with me, okay?"

"That's not what I mean. Who is it?"

"Who's what?"

"The girl you're about to screw, stupid."

Richie's expression hardened. When his mother got to the point where she started insulting him, it generally had the effect of making him stop talking. This time he felt too emboldened by what he had done to remain silent. "What the fuck difference does it make?"

"You know I told you there are certain people in this town you don't want to mess with!"

Richie laughed.

Sandra pulled the car rather abruptly into a parking space by the side of the street a half-block from her sister's house. She killed the engine and glared at him. "What's so funny?"

"Make up your mind, Mom. What advice do you want me to follow?"

Sandra looked at him in confusion. "Huh?"

"Huh?" Richie mocked in return. "You can have me follow that advice, or..." He grinned. "... the really useful advice you gave me the other day."

Sandra frowned. "You're making even less sense than usual."

"Control or be controlled is what you said."

Sandra shuddered. "What?? But that..." She paused a moment. Her heart was racing. "Richie, please... tell me you didn't..."

"Didn't what?! Didn't decide to do something for me for a change? Didn't decide I wanted a piece of what everyone else has?"

Sandra put a trembling hand over her eyes.

"You should be proud of me, you know that? You said control or be controlled. I decided I wanted to control, and that's what I got. Now I'm safe. I get to call the shots. That's what you wanted, right?"

"And does that mean you're going to start 'calling the shots' with me again?!" Sandra shouted. "Like you did over the summer?!"

The both of them were stunned into silence. Sandra for actually giving vent to her fears, and Richie for hearing her mother finally come out and accuse him of the truth.

Richie recovered first and shook his head slowly. "No, Mom. I'm not gonna do that to you."

"Yeah, well, thank heaven for fuckin' small favors, huh?" Sandra snapped. Though there was a sarcastic tone to her voice, there was obvious relief in it as well.

"You're being controlled enough," Richie said in a low, resentful voice. "You don't need me to help you there."

Sandra gave her son a stricken look at first, but it quickly became cold and hard. "Shut up and get out of the car so we can get this over with."

Melinda tried hard to make breakfast last as long as she could. She tried to engage in conversation with her parents as much as possible. She tried to focus on something else other than the slow burn in her pussy that would not go away, or the erotic imagery that would occasionally flicker through the back of her mind.

It finally started to work. She got both her parents engaged in a topic even after breakfast was done and the empty dishes were still lying on the table. But then Heather caught on to her clandestine show of resistance and put a stop to it.

It didn't take much. During a lull in the conversation, Heather simply reached over and placed a hand on Melinda's arm, caressing it lightly. Melinda lost her train of thought immediately and uttered a soft little whimper as her body trembled. Despite looking right at her at the time, her Dad barely seemed to notice what had happened.

"Melinda and I will be spending the day together," Heather said.

"That's a wonderful idea, dear," said Penny with a gentle smile. "It's nice seeing you two get along so well for a change."

"So what are you going to be doing?" David Sovert asked.

Heather grinned. She stroked Melinda's arm. "Let's just say we'll be getting to know each other better."

Melinda wanted to say something. She wanted to try to get her father's attention. But when Heather began touching her again, it was all she could do not to mindlessly mewl in pleasure.