2nd novel part one

2011 NANO Part 1

    “Are you sure she’s a virgin” Alexander peered at the girl suspiciously.  Still unconscious her hands and feet bound with electrical tape with a crude gag in her mouth she certainly looked the part of the natural born captive.  Mascara leaving behind languid trails down her smooth tanned face, head leaning to the side, collar bones jutting out.  The picture perfect blonde haired image of frailty.  This one might be the girl who in the horror movie would draw upon a secret well of strength that would allow her to escape from her semi mutated inbred captures to live out the rest of her life within the icy grip of post traumatic stress syndrome.  Or she would be one of the unlucky ones to die for the audiences sick amusement.  Alexander continued to prod her gently as he mused.  He’d been on the earth for centuries at this point and it is always the same old story when people like them get involved.  It isn’t so much that people need to get hurt or that the boogie man needs to be real.  It is just that sometimes there are bad people and they need to do bad things.  It isn’t personal, they are just a simple means to an end. 
    Stephan shugs his shoulders in response, “According to her wallet she is only 16 years old that should put her safely within the virgin range yeah”
    Skeptical, Alex turns away from the girl leaving her to her repose and begins to dig through her hand bag, “I remember back in the day when I would have a room full of virgins for this very purpose.  I wouldn’t have to skulk around schools like some old pervert or anything like that.  I could just go to the virgin room, grab me a virgin and that was that.  I miss my virgin room.”
    “Yes well those days are over now more or less.  I mean they are aren’t they”
    “Well considering we have a girl both bound and gagged lying on the floor in front of us, and we are standing around trying to acertain her virginity I would say they aren’t that far behind us then are they?”
    Stephan mulled Alex’s statement over in his head for a bit.  He did have a point.  It all started off so simply.  Then one thing leads to another, then another, and now they have a tied up virgin on the floor.  It is funny where life can take you sometimes, “Well we aren’t going to use all of her are we?”
    “No no we only need a few drops of blood and then we will be good to go.  We’ll wipe her mind and set her back at home no harm no foul.  Hopefully, she won’t even wake up before we get started.  I mean if we were going to go further this might be an issue but we have most of the materials we need right here already so she should be fine.”
    “Alright then lets try to make sure that we hurt her as little as possible okay?  I mean if it turns out we need enough blood to kill her or some such thing lets just abort and find another way.  Also we need to keep her away from the Star Things”
    “The Star Things”
    “Yeah yeah, we may be able to wipe her mind and what not but if some star things do their thing then we gotta be ready.  They will destroy parts of her brain in ways that even Jerimia could repair.”
    Alexander sighs heavily, “You know I’ve been around for almost 1000 years, I’ve mastered the mystic arts from all over the world, I hold knowledge that has been lost from mankind, and I posses the ability to summon swarms of beasts, monsters from myths, and fireballs.  However, I stayed well away from all your creepy star, between the universes, sanity destroying horrible monster stuff because they are horrible reality destroying creatues that are better left alone.  Why the hell would you go make deals with those things?”
    “I was in high school.  I also don’t want to talk about it”.  Unlike Alexander Stephan doesn’t look the part.  5’3 and frequenly knocked over by stiff winds he normally stands with his arms nervously clutched around himself.  His sandy blonde hair a mass of tangles, combined with his glasses makes him seem more likely to be pushed down by the school’s bully rather than making deals with creatures that could eraticate your mind just by looking at them.  Aging did nothing to erase that awkward highschooler and even though he is now in his mid 20’s he still looks like he might get shoved into a locker at any moment.  That is ordinarily.  Ordiniarily, he looks like someone who would only stand his ground under the assumption that his ground was somewhere else completely.  However, over the course of Alexander’s probing his stance changed slowly but surely.  Legs, usually tangled around each other spread apart he adopts a stance of both balance and command, his eyes grew feirce, and they locked directly into Alexander’s own.  Like it or not despite all of his magical powers Stephan did something Alexander never could or would.  Stephan has started into the face of absolute madness, the face of a thing that skulks between universes feasting off  nightmares and who knows what else, babies, those things are best never ever messed with.  One of the few things to ever teriffy Alexander and there Stephan stands, looking apprehensively at their captive, a man who made those things his bread and butter.  He does his best to hide his envy and when Stephan makes a stand it is best to direct the conversation in any other direction, sometimes two or three different directions at the same time just to be safe. 
    “Isn’t there some way you could just check” In walks Devan his $2000 custom tailored suit ruined by her blood. 
    Alexander quickly puts his hands up, “Woah look there is no way I am going prodding between her legs on a hymen search that is just wrong.”
    Stephan nods in agreement, “I mean we just need her blood no need to go rooting around in her vagina besides I don’t we have any duck lips around here and I have no idea what a hymen looks like.”
    Mouth slightly agape Devan does his best to rally his senses despite the adverse senario, “I just meant from her blood.  Is there a way we could test her virginity through her blood?”
    The metaphorical light bulb pops up over Alexander’s head, “Ah ha!  No I have no idea I never designed a spell of virgin seeking.  You’re the one that found her, how do you know she is a virgin or now”
    “Oh I don’t know” Devan shrugs as he takes a sip from the glass of milk he’s been carrying around, “She looks the right age, I think we caught her before she did anything”
    Stephan looks surprised, “You don’t know, can’t you like check the big book for her sins or something?”
    “Alright look first of all I need souls to go check the big book.  So unless we are going to be sacrificing her friends and family and all of that no I don’t think so.  I used to have people go and do this for me.  I don’t know how to find a virgin I just grabbed one that seemed old enough to have had her period but not so old that she’s gaurnteed to have gotten some.  We’ve kinda just threw all of this together you know”.
    “Wait so every time you’ve looked into the big book you’ve”
    Deven makes quick swiping motion with his hand, “Lets not focus on what I’ve done in the past.  Let us instead focus on the problem at hand.  Now why virgin’s blood?  I mean I know that my lord satan doesn’t need virgin’s blood instead it actually kinda pisses him off.  It is better to lead the virgin into temptation and the life style of a whore than to wack a girl who is still all sweet and hymen intact.  So I mean do you NEED virgin’s blood for your incantation or will just plain old young girl’s blood work?”  Deven took another sip of milk.  Devan is a man of sharp angular features and quick movements.  He likes to call himself the red right hand, and during some occations, like this one he will wear leather gloves, the right one red the left black.  The other two observed that he only drinks milk and wears the gloves around them.  No one knows about the milk but it is generally agreed that he wears the gloves occationally because they make him look kind of stupid.  Still the man has made a deal with the devil and while he may lie, cheat, and fuck his way though everyone else he is a man who is fiercly loyal to his friends and his master.  It also doesn’t help that his friends include an ancient wizard of near immeasurable power, and someone who has managed to deal with the Star Things and not go utterly bat shit insane. 
    Alexander sits down heavily and strokes his beard quietly in thought.  Though he is capable of taking many forms, and he often does for his own amusement he prefers the form of an older gentleman with white hair, a thick white beard that goes down to his chest, Hawaiian shits and kaki shorts.  Once Deven tried to explain to him why sandles and socks look stupid together.  It ended with the two of them almost killing everything within a 200 mile radius if it wasn’t for John Smith pulling them apart.  That’s the nice thing about John other than the fact that he is a snappy dresser.  He always seems to be around right when the shit is going to hit the fan to unplug the fan from the wall and to seriously injure anyone who is willing to throw some poo anyway, “Maybe.  A spell of this magnitude though we really shouldn’t risk it.  We should get ourselves some honest to god virgin’s blood.  Especially since we will be dealing with Stephan’s Star Things it is best to follow that to the letter, I‘ve been meaning to say this for years now  actually, but isn‘t there a better name for them than Star Things?  I sound like a complete idiot every time I say it.”
    “Well look the first time I talked to one I was busy trying to reassemble my brain tissue out of a mixture of non organic parts, and ooze left behind from the star thing.  So I never really tried to come up with a better name for them.  I’m sure if Lovecraft were around today he would come up with some fantasticly unpronounceable jumble of syllabuls that would thrill you to no end.  He would also probably kill himself when he realizes that realitiy is so much more horrible than anything he’s imagined.  So excust me, what is it that you want Devan”
    Deven who’s been poking Stephan excidely takes the opening to jump it, “Aren’t you a virgin Stephan?”
    “What?  Well yeah kinda, I mean I’ve never done it with a woman before but I don’t think the stuff in my veins quantifies as blood anymore.”
    Now curious Alexander comes over with knife in hand, one quick slash, and one slow reaction speed compliments of Stephan and he got to see why.  Stephan, for his part held his arm spewing forth a stream of a thousand curses.  Eventually, in one of his quick little silencing motions, Deven quietly said, “Oh come now it isn’t that bad, you are bearly bleeding, now come let us see what sort of mystery juice you are filled with.”
    Slowly Stephan takes his hand away from his arm, the cut was larger, and quite a bit deeper than Alexander had meant it to be.  From the wound a substance the color of lemondade didn’t so much as bleed out of him but rather it seemed to be crawling out.  The whole mass writhed on him arm as it began to reknit the skin back into place.  The other two loose focus as they start to look at it, like its boreders aren’t all there, or it is covered with billions of tiny tentacles all moving around some blindly and some with purpose on its way to keep Stephan alive.
    Alexander nods solemly, “Alright.  So we definitely can’t use that.  By they way I didn’t mean to cut you that deeply are you alright?”
    “Oh yeah I’m fine.  This stuff doesn’t look like much but it will have me patched up in no time.  I’ve had to make some modifications to my body to survive the stuff.  So much so that I don’t really have any idea what I am made of or how I work.  On the upside pears taste amazing”
    “Huh” Devan puts his hands in his pockets and looks around, his eyes catches the girl’s.  Her eyes are open, she is awake.  He is pretty sure she shouldn’t be.  Sure sure they were going to wipe her mind away and they just wanted a few drops of her blood fresh from the vein.  Not to much to ask, I mean really, but  then it hit.  An ephiny like thunder, “We can just ask her!”.  The other two startled by Deven suddenly shouting and pointing at the now awake girl. 
    She begins to sob in fear as the three of them notice her, ignoring the sobbing Alexander wonders, “Will she tell the truth there is stuff riding on this, important stuff too I might add, she might lie to just to get at us.”
    Deven nods, “That is a good point, we should get something to threaten her with.  There’s gotta be something around that we can wack her with or what not, wait what happened to the knife you used on Stephan?”
    “His horrible mutant thing blood ate the blade”
    “Oh man was that one of her blades cause she is gonna be pissed, why the hell were you carrying the knife around anyway”
    “To get the blood out of the virgin you should really try to keep up with these sorts of things, I know we move fast and all”
    “Yeah but oh I don’t know I usually have people do all this sort of thing for me.  So we are gonna what wack her or find another knife.”
    “Look Deven we aren’t wacking her, if for no better reason that it sounds stupid when you say it.  We will just thrust the knife in her face-”
    “Why don’t you just cast a truth spell on her or something?”
    Exasperation.  It flooded Alexander as his remaining sanity attempted to build an ark fast enough to keep his sanity safe.  Much like in the real world the unicorns didn’t make it, “Look I’ve told you time and time again.  I am not some 9th level wizard from dungeons and dragons okay?  This is magic, the power to take material components and bend reality to my will using mostly will.  I can’t just sling spells around at the drop of a hat just because we need some girl of questionable virginity to fess up as to weather she is a virgin or not.  I am a god damned wizard not a hedge mage, I don’t make love potions or cast lightning bolt.  Got it?”