Arc Epilogue: Nothing ends like you want it to

"There are things I can't tell you, for your and your mother's safety." He had told Alice that, the night before he disappeared. It was just the same thing John had told her a few moments ago, and she had leapt back into the rabbit hole. She could barely hear what John was shouting beneath her window as she sank into thought. It did nothing to distract her from the tears still stinging her cheeks, however.

'My father had always liked to keep meticulous notes about everything he did, it was his nature, I suppose. But I found none after he got sick. However, what my dad told me seems strange now… My mother had disposed of the notes or hid them, I have always been sure, even with her consistent denial, but I had never understood why. I think the answer is before me now. Whatever it is John is hiding is must be what had been in my father's notes as well,' she figured.

A series of strange occurrences had followed them both. Unknown people appearing to meet them, disappearing and never returning again. That look she had recognized herself more than a week ago, and the strange actions of both of them. Her father locking himself in his study for days on end, and John disappearing. It all seemed too strange and too similar to dismiss the connection.

While she had been thinking of this, John was still shouting outside. Alice had only barely registered what he had said until a few certain words were spoken.

"I still love you," he said. There was a pause, but that was enough. Tears formed in the young woman's eyes once again, and she couldn't bear to hear him any longer. The window was shut a moment later with only a few quick movements, before her strength left her body and she collapsed onto the floor, using the wall beneath her window as her only support. There was nothing to be done. If she could no longer trust him, he had only ever been a shadow of his former self. It became reasonable to lose him again, because she had never really got him back regardless. As terrible as that thought was, it was the only thing that helped her block out the pain. She had already lost far too much in her life, truly abandoning John once again would be too much. A constant reminder of that fact was the ever present thought that she was wrong.

'He's still the same. It was still his voice talking. Those same arms had held me. He had his old jokes, and the exact same strange demeanor. It was still John.' That thought permeated, too hard to counter, and far too painful to accept. That gave her pause. It was almost impossible to disprove, and there was good reason for that. Seemingly, everything was pointing towards John being innocent, or at least as innocent as her father. She was convinced that if he was still the same old John that he would only lie to protect her. Which made dismissing that idea that much harder. Every second she thought about it, the signs all pointed towards him having, though perhaps misguided, noble intentions. She couldn’t think about it, however. Every instinct in her body told her that nothing but more pain or regret was down that path. Sadly, there was no way to stop herself from pondering it now. The silence around her was almost insufferable, and she longed to hear John’s voice again, just to get out of her own head. That would only make the situation worse, Alice knew that, but nonetheless she thought back. He had said he loved her, and she believed him. They had both, for a long time, felt that way and had not told one another. Now, he finally had. Just when she felt she needed to leave him, he said that like he was intending to punch her in the gut. It wasn’t his true goal, of course, but it achieved that effect regardless.

Eventually, there was no way she could take it any longer. A simple look at the drawing John had made and that was now hanging on the wall was the final straw. She broke down there, still sitting on the floor. The sobbing could be heard for hours, until she had managed to fall asleep while back on her bed.

It was a Sunday, the 12th of May. Just after John had woken up. He had spent the last few minutes pondering his current situation. Life cared not for his immediate occupation, however, as it smacked him over the head with the unexpected sound of the phone call. The word that appeared on his phone's screen was just as surprising.

'Alice…' Was the only thing that passed through his mind before he answered.

"I'm sorry John." it was now her time to apologize, it seemed. Her voice was shaky, but seemed to grow steady by the end. "I should take my own advice for once, and trust you too. I don't know what you're hiding from me, or why, but I know you are still the same old person I've always known. That's why I don't care. I love you too, and there's nothing in this world that would make me give that up again. I want to be with you, just as I always have, but I’m not going to prevent myself from doing that due to fear anymore. I’m past that. I hope we’re both past that." She almost sounded relieved after saying that. John was utterly shocked, a thousand different thoughts crossed his mind, but none were as important as the implications of what she said. She believed him, that was the only possible conclusion. "That doesn't mean I don't expect you to tell me eventually. But I do trust you enough to believe there's a reasonable explanation for all this." He couldn't believe any of this. She wouldn't forgive him so easily, that much was obvious.

"Are you serious?" John asked, genuinely flustered. "I was sure you hated my guts "

"If only. I almost wish I could hate you, John." Her tone was a mix of laughter and anger. "But, I am still angry at you."

"Justifiably so. I didn't want to drag you into this, and I still don't, but I should have told you something. I was an idiot, just like I always am." He paused for a moment. "Let's just say I got a new lease on life, it was the reason I approached you back then, but it's got me involved with some dangerous people, and I'm worried that if I tell you too much they could go after you as well." John attempted to explain as vaguely as possible, hoping that much would not endanger her.

"What?!? Are you involved in something illegal, John?" Alice responded, quite angrily.

"No, no, nothing like that. But it is dangerous," he quickly stammered out.

"Fine… I trust you." The doubt in her voice was almost palpable. "I'm coming up." John soon heard the doorbell ring, and rushed to see who was there. His parents had already opened the door to find Alice there.

"She's here to do the assignment," he quickly explained, grabbing her arm gently and pulling her towards the stairs while doing so.

"So, you pulled the same trick on me," he said jokingly when they got to his chaotic room.

"Seemed fitting…" There was a pause as they both enjoyed the other's presence again, holding on to each other's hand for dear life. They sat down on John’s bed, which was the tidiest place in the room. The sheets had been changed while he was away, so they were somewhat orderly. The varied assortment of things usually strewn about it were currently stuffed into his various wardrobes, cabinets, or placed under the bed as well. John, in an attempt to distract himself, had done that late the previous night.

Eventually, John spoke up again, reminded of his true objective the previous night.

"So… I guess we're dating now, officially?" His tone was uncertain, he had no idea where to go from here.

"Yeah… Maybe we should tell people," Alice suggested, seemingly just as unsure about that.

"I think that might be a bit hasty. Let's be honest, neither of us knows what this usually entails." That much was true, they both felt a bit of relief at their problems being spoken out loud. Alice laughed.

"You're right. But we have to do something."

"Do we really? I think we can do that at our own pace, nobody knows we're dating after all, right?"

"Yeah, I haven't told anyone at least." She looked at John fiercely.

"What are you looking at me for," he said, chuckling. "No, I didn't tell anybody."

"Good, then I'll see you tomorrow." She began to stand up. John gave her a strange look before she continued. "Consider yourself lucky you're getting away with this much. I'm still mad at you." His expression turned completely sour. Alice couldn't keep a straight face, however, and broke into a light chuckle soon after. "I see why you enjoy teasing me like that, it's fun." With that, she gave him a peck on the lips and left.

The next week was both entirely unusual and completely normal to John. It passed with nothing supernatural occuring at all, though that did not mean it was mundane. It seemed to John that this was his last chance to have a normal life, and so he tried dedicating almost all of it to Alice. For that reason, their relationship had returned to its normal course, or at least as normal it was for the two of them. They had gone on a few more dates, this time to ordinary destinations. Cafes, a movie and the like. They continued enjoying their time together. As friends, mostly, although occasionally as something more. Even if they hadn’t realized it, their love from the outside seemed far more platonic, kisses were had in public, but they admitted nothing more. Until eventually, the situation had reached a breaking point.

John had felt the impact of his time away in a lot of ways, but most of them were encountered immediately. The question of his libido, however, snuck up on him. The whisper of his figurative devil of lust had gotten progressively stronger, and Alice responded in like. It had progressed from their kissing extending to makeout sessions to what truly amounted to foreplay was occurring almost every time they met. Fondling and groping each had become somewhat common, but nonetheless, nothing more had happened. That was until the last night before John had to go back to the Gateway. The same excuse sold to his parents did not work for Alice, she knew far better. Because of that, he explained that he would be going for a training regiment of sorts, and that he assumed he would be gone for some time. It was after they had spent most of the day together, when they arrived at her house, that Alice made her move.

“I think it’s about time we do this,” she announced, pulling John into her room. At first, he was confused.

“Do what?” Immediately as he said that, he understood, and he felt utterly stupid for even asking. Alice only shot him a grin, she knew he realized then.

Her room was just like the last time he had seen it, far too nerdy to be considered normal for a girl’s room. Just as his was, it was utterly filled with various collections of her interests. Some medical books sat on her bookshelf, and various video games and consoles were neatly ordered on one side of the room. Near and on the bed were various plushies, various anime characters, only some of which John recognized, and a few animals. He noticed one more thing as well, something he recognized was hanging on the darkly coloured wall. The drawing he had made was there. Alice drew back John’s attention with a kiss. That soon escalated, their lips parted and their tongues intertwined a moment later. For a single second, that was all John focused on. Her warm lips touching his, their tongues engaged in a passionate dance eventually, however, the situation escalated.

Their embrace grew closer by the second, but Alice made the first real move. Gently, she pulled John onto the bed. In that moment, some instinct triggered inside him, he knew what to do, even if he hadn’t done it before. He backed from their embrace in order to remove the only thing now separating them, their clothes. However, Alice seemed to be working on that already, as she was tugging at his pants, so he moved to work on her clothes instead. Her hand seemed intent on brushing against his crotch while doing so, whether on purpose or not, John did not know. It was a pleasant feeling that drew a slight gasp from him and surprised him anew every time. Leaning forward again, he grabbed her shirt, a white blouse she had worn that day, from behind and attempted to pull it up. As his hands moved downwards they moved to her ass cheeks slightly, teasing them with a squeeze in response to her earlier movements. This time it was her turn to be surprised, though her reaction was a slight moan instead. Her hands moved up in order to allow him to lift her shirt nonetheless soon after, before returning to his pants. His pants were soon freed from his body and thrown across the room, and her shirt suffered a similar fate.

Having succeeded in their first step, the both of them moved on. John’s shirt was soon removed by Alice, revealing his lanky body had began taking on a more toned form. John, faced with only her bra between him and her perky breasts, sprung to action as well and attempted to unclasp it. While he struggled to do so, he admired her now more exposed body. Her pale skin was as flawless as he could have imagined, and her breasts seemed to be just the right size as well, slightly bigger than a handful. Eager to test this, he discovered they were just the right combination of soft and firm as well with a slight squeeze before returning to his attempt to free them from her bra. He finally managed to do so a moment later, and his eyes locked on her breasts as the bra fell away from her body. The first thing he noticed were her nipples, they were not what he expected, being small, pink and now also extremely rigid. Due to being exposed to the cold air or due to the situation itself, John did not know, but he had a working theory.

As soon as he had finished, Alice seemed to move on the bed. She maneuvered to get on top of him as her head moved down towards his crotch as her own nether regions moved towards him. It seemed to him obvious at that point what she was looking to do, and John was willing to go through with it. As he attempted to remove the blue jeans that covered her own legs, his own underwear was removed. The simple pair of boxers dropped to reveal his penis, now luckily erect. For a few moments, John was far too focused on his own attempts to notice anything at all had happened. It was only when he felt her tongue suddenly lick it that he became aware of what was happening. That, however, only increased his pace. Her pants flew off just as his did a few moments before and he was left to contend only with her panties. They were quite obviously soaked. Also increasing her pace, Alice began going down on him more passionately. Taking his dick into her mouth and sucking it lightly before letting it go again repeatedly, as if beckoning him to hurry up. That was a request he would happily grant. Her panties dropped onto the bed a moment later, revealing her pussy. It was glistening far more than John thought possible, so much so in fact that John almost mistook its lighter pink color for a neon pink. Regardless, his task was now before him, and as enthusiastically as Alice had taken to it, John began.

It wasn't long before he was already lapping at her folds as she did much the same to his dick. The sensations were still foreign, but nothing if not pleasant on both accounts. The juices now flowing out of her consistently were almost sweet, though mostly tasteless. Nonetheless, John enjoyed it. Mostly because of Alice’s repeated moans from his actions, which reverberated quite pleasantly across his dick as she went down on him as well. Alice on the other hand, seemed almost solely focused on her own ministrations. His dick was now firmly placed in her mouth as she slowly moved across it, licking and sucking at it all the while. She was obviously untrained, but nonetheless she was doing so as passionately as she could. Soon, this affected John as well. He felt everything on his mind washing away as he sunk deeper into pleasure. His pace soon increased as well, and he delved into it as much as he could. Flicking her clit and delving back into her folds by some primal instinct. It didn’t take long for the both of them to be moaning rapidly, and it was quite obvious neither of them would last much longer. And indeed, they did not. Soon afterwards they both reached climax. Alice’s whole body seemed to spasm for a few seconds before settling down. As she did, John had his own orgasm. However, she was unflinching in keeping her mouth around his dick. For what exact reason, John was not sure. But as his cum seemed to flow into her mouth, she swallowed it slowly. A few moments later, she fell from on top of him and back onto the bed.

“That was great. I really needed that. We both really needed that, I think. Plus, I heard cum was much worse than it is. Doesn’t taste nearly as salty or bitter as I thought.” Alice smiled at John. She had something on her cheek, but John’s mind was still trying to process the whole situation.

“I… I don’t know what to say... Since when did you become the confident one around here?” he asked, jokingly. Almost trying to distract his mind with any other topic.

“Just couldn’t take sitting around doing nothing anymore. You know I’ve always been better at taking things into my own hands.” Her response carried a much more serious tone.

“Well, what do we do now?” he asked, still unsure of how to handle what had happened.

“How about we get some sleep. I think we both need it,” Alice said, and John agreed.