Don’t Open the Door

Grant doesn’t go to the garage.

He stands at the penthouse window and looks at everything except that door downstairs. Five miles is empty. No owners. No smear. The unreadable one is still east-northeast, same building, same blank where a number should be.

Jose’s on four. Heart going too fast. Last guy in the tower who isn’t Grant.

Mary shoves a mug at her master.

“You sleep at all?”

“No.” He sighs.

“Yeah. Me either. What do you keep seeing?”

“Her eyes. That smile. The teeth. Then the garage just… not having Garret in it.”

“We’re not opening that door today.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

Piper’s in the hall. Brooke. Ashlyn. Tasha from the field, split lip already gone. The hunger didn’t take a day off. They stop at the doorway because he shook his head last night and nobody’s crossed that yet.

“Master,” Piper says. “You said later.”

“Later was before Garret.”

Ashlyn makes a face. She still wants it. They all do. Their hunger doesn’t care that a guy vanished.

Mary points down the hall.

“Kitchen. Go eat. Don’t hover on the bed. He’ll come down.”

They look at Grant and he nods.

“Yes, Mary.” They leave disappointed. Tasha looks at his mouth the whole way to the stairs.

Mary waits.

“We’ve got almost seven hundred people in here and the pantry’s a joke. I’m not trying to be an asshole about toast. I’m saying if you hide in this room all day they’re gonna climb the walls, and we’re gonna be out of rice by Wednesday.”

“Jose first.”

“Yeah. Jose first. Then you look at the food with Leanne before somebody starts hoarding.”

Jose is on the floor with his back against the bed. Grant steps to the girl in the hall on four. “Hi Cindy.” She is startled as he walks up to the door and goes in.

“Could knock.”

“Yeah.” Grant shrugs.

“She back?”

“Not in five miles.”

Jose laughs once. Ugly.

“He went for water. I told him stay on the bus. He said the garage fridge still had bottles. I said two minutes. Then whatever you saw on that map happened and he was just gone. I looked from the door. I know you said not to. Concrete’s clean, boss. No blood. No clothes. Like somebody hit delete.”

“I thought she was only after owners. He wasn’t an owner. It doesn’t make sense.” Grant shakes his head.

“So she does it to whoever’s standing there?”

“Maybe. You and Garret don’t read like those other guys did and you were hiding. I don’t know if that’s why you’re still here.”

Jose rubs his face.

“I’m not going outside. I’m not going in the garage. I’m not driving unless you’re on the bus and we’re leaving. I mean, if that’s ok with you.”

“Fair enough. Probably for the best.”

“She coming back for you?”

Grant sees the smile again.

“Most likely.”

“Then don’t sit in a window. Get bigger. That was the whole point of the field, right?”

“Mary said the same thing.”

“Mary’s right. Go downstairs. Your girls are gonna start eating each other. And I mean that two ways. I heard we’re almost out of food.”

Grant puts a hand on his shoulder. Jose doesn’t lean in. He doesn’t pull off either.

“Leanne will bring a plate. You want somebody here, say so. I’m not giving you a girl, but a guard I can do.”

“I’m ok for now, thanks. If she comes back, no guard besides you would make a difference anyway.”

“Maybe not even me.” Grant says under his breath as he leaves the room and shuts the door.

He then steps to Leanne.

Two is loud and the table looks like a yard sale.

Leanne’s got magazines spread out. Eve’s off the roof for ten minutes and pissed about it. Zoya’s cleaning the shotgun. Olivia’s pistol is getting loaded. Cindy’s counting ammo. The field women are packed along the wall. Tasha in front.

Noor doesn’t look up from the list.

“Six eighty-seven. I’ve got Tasha. The rest of the field names are a mess. They talk over each other.”

“They can wait.”

Leanne slides a rifle over.

“Garage stays shut. Chair in front of it. Bren at the end of the hall. She yells, she doesn’t play hero.”

“Good.” He approves.

“We’re also fucked on food,” Leanne says, casual, like she’s telling him the weather. “Rice is almost gone. Cans are a joke. Water’s okay if nobody’s stupid. Six hundred extra mouths from the last two days and we didn’t bring a grocery store with us.”

“I know.”

“I’m not asking you to raid another store tonight. I’m telling you so you don’t wonder why people are snapping.”

Eve leans on the rifle.

“And the woman?”

“All black. Black eyes, no white. Smile. Teeth I can’t explain. Map can’t hold her. She almost touched me, then she was in our garage.” He keeps it flat. “You see her, you get off the roof and you tell me. Don’t shoot. Don’t talk to her.”

“That’s a shit rule.”

“It’s still the rule.”

Eve looks at him. He nods. She swears and takes it.

“Yes, master.”

The room gets hotter just from him standing there. Nell’s holding a chair like she needs it. Brooke’s looking at his crotch. Piper’s done pretending she cares about the list.

Mary sees it.

“Ten minutes,” she tells them. “Then he walks. Nobody follows him into a room unless he points. We’ve got a hole in the garage and a thing that eats people. You can want him and still do your damn job.”

“Yes, Mary,” some of them mutter. Several almost cry about it.

Grant tips his head at the unit behind Leanne.

Piper and Brooke are moving before he finishes the nod. Ashlyn stays because Mary’s hand finds her wrist. Tasha takes a step. Mary shakes her head.

“You just got here,” Mary says. “You can wait.” Tasha looks at Grant hopefully, but he doesn’t say otherwise.

“Yes, Mary.”

The bedroom door shuts slowly.

Piper’s shirt is off before it finishes. No bra. Medium tits, that mole on the left, pink-brown nipples already hardened. She pulls her shorts down. Bare. The slit’s already shiny. Brooke drops her flannel. Small tits with brown nipples. Dark patch she never shaved. She’s wet enough he can see it.

Brooke hits her knees on the floor and takes him out with both hands. She licks the underside first, slowly, then sinks her mouth down until she gags and stays there anyway, spit running off her chin onto her tits. Piper stands next to her, one hand in Brooke’s hair, the other rubbing her own clit, watching.

“Fuck,” Piper breathes. “Master. Please.”

Grant pulls Brooke off with a wet sound. He puts Piper on her back on the bed and spreads her knees. Dark-blonde slit, inner lips a little darker, clit swollen. He puts his mouth on her. She grabs the cheap headboard and forgets to be quiet. He sucks her clit and works two fingers into her, tight and hot, curling until her hips rise off the mattress. She climaxes on his tongue with her thighs clamped on his ears, saying ‘master’ like she’s desperate for it.

He climbs up and pushes into her in one slide. She’s soaked and still tight. He gives her a second and then he fucks her, deep, the wet slap of it filling the room. Her breasts bounce. Brooke climbs up, straddles Piper’s face, and drops her pussy onto Piper’s mouth. Grant can see Piper’s tongue working Brooke’s slit, see Brooke’s brown nipples pointing, see his cock disappearing into Piper under them.

He pulls out of Piper, grabs Brooke by the hips, and shoves into her from behind. Tighter. Brooke drops to her elbows over Piper and moans into the sheet. Piper twists and puts her mouth on Brooke’s clit while Grant fucks her. Brooke orgasms hard, shaking, pushing back onto him, a broken master into Piper’s stomach.

He explodes in Brooke in long pulses, filling her, his hand pulling her hair toward him. When he pulls out, it runs down her thigh onto the bed.

They stay cuddled together for a handful of minutes. The hunger cools a few degrees. Not as much as they wanted, but enough to think again.

“Jobs,” he says.

“Yes, master.”

They get dressed like it’s the end of the world.

He walks the floors.

Fifteen, Dara says master and doesn’t take it back. Fourteen, a Holt girl bows her head and waits. Nine, June asks if he needs anything and stares at his mouth. Seven, Kate’s still got the stuck door jammed and a pistol now.

Ground floor, Bren’s in a chair with the hatchet, staring at the garage door.

“Anybody try it?”

“No, master. Jose came as far as the corner. I told him to turn around. He did.”

“Good. Don’t open it. Not for water. Not for anything.”

“Yes, master.”

He doesn’t touch the door.

Mary finds him on the stairs.

“Far bank’s still sitting there,” she says. “A lot of women. You’re not going, right?”

“I know.”

“Please say why.”

“Because she looked at me like I was just an item on her to-do list and then she was in our garage. I go back out today I’m asking her to finish it.”

“Good. Also, Leanne wasn’t kidding. We’re gonna be eating crackers and bad decisions in two days. Tonight you stay in. Let them come to the door. Pick or don’t. Don’t stand at the window until your eyes bleed.”

“Jose didn’t want a guard, but we need eyes on him.”

“I’ll sit with him an hour. Not a random girl. Me.” She answered.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me for that.” She glances at him. “Master. Go eat before I get mean about it.” She smirks.

They eat in shifts. Small ones. Leanne watches the cans like a hawk. Noor gets twenty more names and quits. Eve goes back to the roof. Zoya sleeps sitting up. Leanne knocks on four, leaves a plate, leaves.

Grant’s in the penthouse when the smear ticks the edge of five miles.

South. Half a second. Gone.

He’s on his feet so fast Mary’s mug hits the floor.

“What?”

“Her. South edge. She’s gone again.”

Mary’s at the window. Street. Wind. Nothing.

They wait. The smudge doesn’t come back. Bren doesn’t yell.

Ashlyn comes to the door. Tasha behind her, still in a borrowed shirt that’s too big. Mary looks at Grant.

He nods.

They come in. Mary stays this time. She shuts the door and pulls her own shirt off like she’s done being the adult about this part too. No bra. Her tits sit a bit heavy, nipples already tight. She shoves her shorts down. Bare. That familiar slit, already wet.

Ashlyn strips faster. Small Asian tits, pale, hard nipples, a small waist, naturally smooth pussy lips neat and shiny. Tasha hesitates one second and then the shirt’s gone. Darker skin, larger D-cup tits, brown nipples, a strip of hair over a pussy that’s visibly dripping. She looks at him like the field never ended.

“Bed,” Grant says.

Mary pushes him down and climbs onto his face. She drops her pussy onto his mouth and holds the headboard. He licks through her, slowly then not, sucking her clit the way she likes. She swears and rides him. Ashlyn swings a knee over his stomach and wraps her hand around his cock, strokes him, then sinks down on it in one go, extra small and tight, but soaking wet. She takes all of him with a sound she tries to keep in. Tasha kneels next to them, watching, two fingers in herself, other hand on Ashlyn’s tit, pinching.

“Fuck,” Ashlyn whispers. “Master. You feel so biiiiiigggg— fuck!”

She rides him hard. Her tits try to bounce, but don’t move much. Mary finishes on his tongue first, thighs shaking, saying his title into the wood. Ashlyn follows, clenching around him, grinding down. Grant sits up, keeps Ashlyn on his cock, and pulls Tasha in by the back of her hair. She understands. She kisses him, messy, then he tips her sideways so he can get his mouth on her big tits while Ashlyn keeps moving.

He lifts Ashlyn off. She makes a noise. He puts Tasha on her back, spreads her knees, and looks at her for a second — dark wet slit, inner lips puffy, clit standing — then he pushes into her. She gasps and hooks her ankles. He fucks her deep. Mary leans in and rubs Tasha’s clit. Ashlyn sits on Tasha’s mouth facing Grant, and Tasha’s muffled moan vibrates against Ashlyn while Grant pounds into her.

Tasha orgasms with her nails in his arms. He pulls out, dripping, and Mary takes him in her mouth without being asked, tasting Tasha on him and looking up. He lasts until Mary pulls off and says, “Breed me master,” and then he’s on his back and Mary’s sinking onto him, facing him, forehead to his, and he fucks up into her until she shakes apart and he comes hard, filling her, his hands on her ass.

They stay in a cluster of arms and legs. The room smells like sex. The web drops a degree.

Grant opens the five miles because he has to do it.

The smear is back.

Not a tick this time.

South, then a skip that isn’t a line, and she’s east-northeast.

On the unreadable man.

Sitting with him.

Two stains in the same building.

Mary feels him go still.

“What?”

“She’s with him,” Grant says. “The unreadable one. She’s sitting there. They’re in the same place.”

Ashlyn lifts her head. Tasha’s hand tightens on his ribs.

The two points hold.

Then they move.

Together.

Not a skip. A line this time, ugly and slow enough that the map can almost draw it.

Toward campus.

Toward the tower.

Grant is on his feet. Mary’s already grabbing her shirt. The hunger in the room dies like somebody cut a wire.

“Eve,” he says, and he doesn’t shout because he doesn’t have to. “Roof. Stay low. They’re coming.”

“Who?” Eve sends back, already moving.

“Both of them.”

Five miles.

Four.

Three.

The unreadable man still has no number. The woman still has no shape on the map. They come anyway.

Six hundred eighty-seven points hold still in a building that’s almost out of food, with a garage nobody will open, and two things Grant cannot measure walking toward the front door.