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stuff down there that no one should use while mentally impaired. B had never been
heavily into S&M. A few props, a little leather, that stuff could spice things up, but he’d
never gotten off on elaborate scenes and equipment. Still, he had to admire their unseen
host’s completism—there was stuff down there B had never seen before outside of a
magazine or video.
He slipped out of the water and sat on the edge of the tub for a bit, cooling off. Someone
had told him that the people who ran the party periodically turned up the heat in the hot
tub to drive people out, so that the same few people wouldn’t monopolize the tub all
night. But B figured, since he wasn’t fucking anyone or eating the snacks, his twenty
dollars had bought him a permanent place in the tub.
When he saw Marla Mason emerge onto the back deck, B sank down into the tub up to
his chin. He did not want her to think he was following her—who knew how she’d
react? Of course, he’d planned to be where she was going tomorrow, so he’d have to
deal with it then, but he was here to relax, to forget about oracles and monsters and
sorcerers for a while. His stomach began to churn, acid sloshing, and he wondered if he
was getting an ulcer again.
Some guy with the standard-issue San Francisco hacker-boy look—short hair and
chunky glasses—was following Marla like an overeager dog. He was naked except for a
nasty-looking steel choke-collar, but the leash wasn’t in Marla’s hand—it was dangling
down his back. He was talking—pleading almost—and Marla was ignoring him, clearly
annoyed, stalking across the deck with the precision of an irritated cat. B couldn’t help
but grin—Marla had found herself a willing submissive, and she wasn’t willing to do
anything about it. She did emanate a certain dominant quality, though B wasn’t sure
how that would translate to her bedroom preferences. She must be like catnip to the
submissive het men here, though.
He thought about going to talk to her, to rescue her from the eager sub, but she probably
wouldn’t be happy to see him. Maybe he didn’t have enough psychic ability for her to
take seriously—what did he know about it, after all? Maybe he really was a midget
among giants. But his dream had been clear: Marla Mason would die unless he did
something to stop it, and if Marla Mason died, the whole city would be destroyed—
worse than the exodus of busted dotcommers at the turn of this century, worse than
gentrification, worse even than the 1906 earthquake and fire. B didn’t know the details,
but it had something to do with frogs. Which sounded silly, but the visions didn’t lie,
any more than the oracles and sibyls B so often found himself in contact with did.
Only the risk of a whole city getting more-or-less destroyed could bring B back across
the bay, from the home of his current low-key equilibrium in Oakland, to this miserable
place where he’d been so happy, once, back when he deserved such things.
Marla stood on the back deck for a long moment, then darted down the steps to the
basement. Her self-appointed submissive followed.
B grinned. She’d just gone into the dungeon. Not a great escape route to choose when
fleeing an overzealous submissive. Good-bye, frying pan. Nice to meet you, fire. He sat
back in the bubbling water. Why worry about Marla? She wouldn’t die tonight, the