“You don’t want others jealous?” I ask, kicking the limp woman. “What should I do with her?” I lift her up and aim her head for the trash—and would have succeeded if the fork in her forehead hadn’t gotten stuck on the edge. I’m trying to fix the problem when the security guards come rushing in, having figured out who’d just fucked with their minds.
“I can also drown her if you’d prefer,” I offer.
Strangely, they don’t seem to prefer it, and instead, they inject her with something that’ll likely keep her under.
The guards are swarming the place when we head back to Nolan’s room, which seems to be in disarray as Landon and August kneel on the floor while holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes.
“They have been taken over by mind-probing aliens; we should put them under,” I declare, wishing I still had my fork they refused to let me pull out of her forehead and take with me.
“They’ve been like this since they learned they were trying to attack each other,” Nolan explains. “Are you two okay? You must have succeeded since her mind was suddenly filled with something about a fork being rammed into her head.”
“How peculiar,” I say.
A guard peeks into the room. “Is everyone okay in here?”
“We are. We’ll help you get the building under control,” August says as he realizes that maybe his attention should be on other things than staring longingly into the eyes of his lover.
I pick up the box of potato wedges and pull out a piece to munch on. “If there are any more skulls to bash, I am your man.”
Brandon’s girlfriend looks oddly horrified, like she didn’t just stand there and do nothing for the mere moments it took me to gain control of the facility. If I were her, I’d have been bored, not terrified.
“Brandon, why don’t you get Paisley out of here? I think that’d be for the best,” Nolan suggests.
“Ooh, right! We could go get ice cream!” Brandon says, also not too shaken up.
“Y-Yeah, leaving this place sounds really good,” she murmurs.
I head out into the hallway, looking for anyone else worthy of my attention, when Ellison’s illusion nearly trips me.
“You like seeing me in peril, don’t you? But only caused by your hand,” I say, proud of myself for not falling on my face.
“I was simply existing and you ran into me,” he responds dryly.
“I’d like to do more thanruninto you, if you get my drift.”
“I do not,” he says before he walks off.
“Ellison, please, don’t leave me,” I whine as I trot after him only to find that when I turn around the corner, he’s gone.
“Asmodeus, you’re needed this way,” Ellison says from behind me.
“You can’t decide which way to pull the strings of my heart.”
“Or maybe you’re easily distracted?”
I shrug, feeling like that is such a boring way of looking at it.
“I can’t look away from any of you for even five seconds!” Valerie screeches when she enters the facility. Working together, we’ve dealt with the villains in the facility, which she could compliment us on, but of course she can’t do that. It helps that almost all of them are on medication that dampens the strength of their powers to a more manageable level in case something like this were to ever happen.
“I think she’s infected,” I say as I pick up another fork. “It’ll be my honor to put her down.”
Ellison takes the fork from me.
“You have chosen to saddle yourself with this task. Sexy,” I declare.
Ellison’s expression informs me that he’s not thrilled by her possible execution. “We’re not… ‘putting her down.’”
I tsk as she takes the fork from Ellison and throws it at my face. The plastic thing lightly smacks my cheek before dropping. I can grab it and swing it up so the prongs settle against her throat, my newest invoice dangling from them.
