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DEEPLY MY SHADOW ANGEL
"Men do not attract that which they want, but that which they are." - James Allen (As A Man Thinketh, 1903)
The more you have to struggle to get into the gear the better it's going to look when it's on. That's what I keep telling myself. I wrestled with the shirt, fighting with a new rubber Polo that I got for tonight's occasion. I took a breather, and two big gulps of the vodka and soda that was sweating near where I was getting my workout. With a little more effort, the shirt finally yielded over my shoulders. Deserving of a reward, I finished my drink and caught myself in the mirror. Not bad. I eyed my 6'4", 180 pound frame. Though not a gym rat, I'd been doing a good job lately. I'm mostly lean muscle, and in all the right places. My arms were constricted a bit under the tight sleeves, but they would get used to the strain. I inhaled deeply. The rubber smelled great, and once it's on and shined it's a second skin that feels like glass. I gave my crotch a grope and then another. I must have known what I was getting myself into, given that a couple gentle tugs got me full hard. Shit. I snapped myself out of it. They would be here in ten minutes.
Two friends were joining me, more out of pity than anything. This wasn't their thing, and I really didn't let on too much that it was mine. So the pretense was that we were going on a lark. Fortunately, Trey and Derek - we all called them T and Der - were always up for a good time. Though I was friends with both, they really didn't know each other. I thought this would be the perfect excuse for a fun night out. Next thing I know, there's my phone going off and I check the screen. It's them waiting on me. Reaching then pulling away then deciding to reach back, I grab a hat and give it a solid pull down over my head to shield my eyes. Keeping the boys waiting a few minutes isn't going to kill them. I pour two shots of Jager and down them quick with a wince. I check my pocket. There's ID, cash, the tickets, and some love skins. Deeper down is a little bottle I can feel pressed against my thigh.
I hopped in the back seat, glad I wasn't driving because I was already buzzing pretty hard. I thanked T for doing the honors. T is shorter than me, but still tall, at maybe 5'11" or 6' and 200 pounds. He's fit as hell, a bit wider in the shoulders than me, with just shorter than shoulder length sandy brown hair and scruff to let you know he's all man if you're ever lucky enough to make out with him. His body was set off by some well placed leather and tight threadbare jeans, frayed to near nothing where it matters, to meet the evening's gear theme. T usually wastes his Saturday nights home on the couch or dicking around on his computer, I assume drooling over porn, since a particularly nasty breakup a year and a half or so ago. I was glad I convinced him to get out of the house.
Der is the shy, quiet one. He's about 5'7" and 150 and the youngest of us. He's always the last to say anything. Lithe and wiry with piercing blue eyes and spiked blond hair, he sports a perpetual mischievous grin. He sits in the passenger seat, bobbing his head to music that isn't there. Der is working a hot skate look. He's wearing Osiris sneakers with the tongue boomed, baggy shorts, a wifebeater, and a visor cocked sideways and backwards. The look was probably even more refined but I couldn't see much more than that from the back seat.
I pull out the tickets for T and Der. T promptly handed me a one-hitter and BAM! I went from feeling good to feeling fan-fucking-tastic. Between fits of coughing, I handed the tickets forward.
"Dude. T. That's some good shit."
"Headband." He turned to me, eyes wide and happy. "Want another?"
"I'd better pace myself. And keep your eyes on the road," I chided. Maybe T's not wasting his Saturday nights; he's wasted Saturday nights. I chuckled to myself, smug with my creativity.
The tickets were made of thick rubber sheet, about two-thirds the size of a dollar bill. On them was screened in silver: "ADMIT 1 VIP. RUB OUT SUMMER 2015. GEAR MANDATORY. DOORS 10PM." They were hand numbered and signed. There was also an address, which T was reading to Siri so that we might find our way there. It wasn't anywhere any of us were familiar with. Of course I had mapped it as soon as I got the passes and all I could tell was that it was a warehouse somewhere outside the city.
Uncharacteristically, Der had something to say. "What the fuck are these?"
I thought back to the first time Derek asked me that. We were at a party I was hosting at my home three years ago. He was there as the acquaintance of a friend. I was headed to restock the wine bar. He was in the back bathroom with the door half open. Hearing some noise, I approached and asked if everything was ok. We were far enough from the party that there was muffled talk and laughter but it might as well have been us alone in the house. I lightly rapped on the door with a knuckle and startled when the door opened. There was Derek, my chrome cock ring in one hand and my most modestly sized silicone dildo hanging limp in the other. The vulgar way he was holding them made it look like he was shrugging. He crinkled his brow, steadying his fucked-up-drunk self against the vanity. "What the fuck are these?" he slurred.
He knew damn well what they were. He wasn't wondering. And his words were dripping with disgust. I paused for a moment, instantly turned on, my heart racing out of my chest. It seemed like two or three minutes but it was probably only that many seconds. I glanced behind me, though it wouldn't have mattered if there had been an audience.
"Pull out your dick," I said, matter of factly.
"Fag."
"I'm not asking you. I'm telling you. Pull out your dick."
What he was holding dropped to the floor, the cock ring making a racket as it bounced around on the tile. I hoped it wouldn't draw any attention. I secretly hoped it might draw some attention. As he fumbled with his button and fly, I hooked my hands into his pockets and yanked down, getting his boxers halfway down too. I shimmied his boxers down the rest of the way and was staring at the most beautifully proportioned cock I've ever had the pleasure to be at eye level with. If I didn't know better, I'd swear he combed his pubes. Now, I usually go from zero to full hard fast so imagine my surprise when this kid just stood there, balls hanging low and dick just as soft and flaccid as can be. I played python with my jaw and stuffed the whole lot in my mouth. I didn't know what I was going to do next, but I was sure I would think of something. He set both hands on the vanity and arched his back slightly, which lifted his shirt a little so I stuck my hand up there and groped at his tight abs, then higher to flick at his nips. Pierced. Both of them.
As he grew, first one ball popped out of my mouth, then out popped the other. I was purposely being abrasive, letting my teeth rake across his silky shaft and forcing the head into the pocket of my cheek instead of down my throat. Every few thrusts I would let my tongue dance a pirouette around the head and dart forcefully into his slit. Soon I was greeted with an occasional tightening contraction that would result in a delicious pearl of slime being squeezed into my mouth. Then another. Then another. This kid tasted like heaven, and heaven was pouring into my mouth like an open tap. I could tell he was getting close and when he came in waves, he caught me only slightly off guard. The first shot coated the back of my throat, and then after he bucked the head out of my mouth, the second crossed my whole face in a thick rope from forehead to chin. I greedily got it back in to suck out the rest. He shuddered as he got sensitive and began to deflate while I concentrated on teasing out as much as he would let me drink.
"That was... That was..."
I wiped some of the cum from my face and shoved the snot coated fingers into my mouth. The rest could stay there to show me as marked territory. "Yeah. I know."
"Will you?" There was a pause. He said more quietly, "Do that again?"
Still on my knees I scolded him, "Fag." and moved to get up.
"No, really. I can. I mean, if you. I can...again."
I pondered the craziness of this for a few moments and decided it was too good an opportunity to pass up. I dove back into battle. This time I braced his legs with my forearms and pressed the palms of my hands into the small of his back. He stiffened. I slammed him forward and forced an assault so deep that I'd be sure to feel it in the morning. I stripped away the abrasiveness this time and focused on pleasing his cock as if it was my entire universe. The whole thing played out like it did a few moments earlier. First the pouring precum, then contractions, followed by my earning another big mouthful of sweet, bitter boyjuice. As he let loose, I dug in with my middle finger and swiped it across his hole, trying to catch as much funk as I could. I'd be wiping that finger under my nose so I could remember him for the rest of the night.
He composed himself, hitching at his pants a few times before managing to hoist them up fully. He stumbled out of the bathroom without a word and ambled like a pinball down the hallway, first running his shoulder into one wall then bouncing across to the other and holding off with his hand. He yelled, still moving generally forward. "Hey. Fag. My friends call me Der. You can call me Derek."
I vowed to try to find a way to spend more time with Derek, and made circumstances work out so that I would be able to, though I hadn't gotten to taste him since. I wonder how much of our encounter he remembers.
"They're tickets"
"From where?"
"I got them at a bar. A guy gave them to me." I lied. But I had been talking to a guy at a bar who told me to check RUB OUT on the web and Tumblr. I bet I've stroked off to that blog a hundred times since I got the tickets last month. As soon as the summer event was announced I paid $250 each for VIP passes. I hoped that even if T and Der couldn't go I could rope some other friends into it.
A mechanical voice let us know we had arrived. "Your destination is on the right."
We parked. There wasn't much around except dark. City lights were well off in the distance. As our eyes adjusted, one warehouse seemed to have more activity than the others and we surmised that was where we were headed.
"T. I'll take another hit of that loud if the offer still stands."
"They should call this shit headfuck not headband. Here you go." He packed and handed me the pipe. I kicked it and my head spun. "These tickets weren't cheap, were they?"
We stumbled to the door. T was the steadiest. Der was still grooving to some song, which at least we could all hear now. Even though it sounded hollow and from afar, it was right on the other side of the door we were standing in front of. There was only a small RUB OUT sign to let us know we were at the right place.
The stud doorman sported a black cap over a highly polished rubber hood with small but well formed holes for eyes and nose and mouth. He wore a shined rubber Polo like mine complemented by elbow length gloves, and skin tight pants tucked into 14 hole boots. All the accents were white including a small but bold "alpha" on the cap where it should have said adidas.
He greeted us gruffly. I admired the view. "Tickets," Alpha demanded. We presented them. "Oh, VIPs. I'm sorry sirs. Is there anything I can do for you?" He meant all of us but seemed to be addressing me directly and deliberately. "Here are your wristbands. Free drinks at any bar for VIPs and there's the lounge too." Alpha looked at me when he mentioned the lounge. "Explore. Have fun."
The door opened and inside was a wall of sound and strobing lights. There were a lot of people - a lot of boys - writhing around. The DJ finessed into some insanely frenetic white label mix and I found myself joining Der in bobbing my head and letting the song rattle around my brain. "Drinks?" T and Der nodded yes so I walked to the bar for three vodkas and soda, which consisted of a few seconds of tipping the bottle of Grey Goose, a brief shhhhht of the soda gun, followed by more delightful pouring. The bartender was dressed exactly like the doorman. In fact he could have been the doorman.
As he squeezed the limes, he asked, "Is there anything I can do for you?" I thanked him. He extended a hand, gloved and slick like his mask, as I reached into my wallet. "VIPs do not tip. We tip VIPs."
The DJ was awesome and so were the sights. I surveyed the scene. The warehouse was broken up into halves. For now at least, we were in the bar half. One bar covered the whole front wall, extending all the way to the entrance. There were two other half bars that divided the space, so there was access from the bar side and the dance floor side. We downed our drinks and watched the action. I went to score another round. "Is there anything I can do for you?" Looking at my wristband I heard him say, "VIPs do not tip. We tip VIPs." It looked like the same bartender as last time but there was really no way to be sure. This time we slammed the drinks faster than the first and I headed back to the bar again.
"Is there anything I can do for you?"
I leaned across the bar and asked, "Were you my bartender before?"
He lightly brushed against the wristband with his gloved index finger and responded, "The only way I am allowed to answer that is VIPs do not tip. We tip VIPs."
There was dancing sure, but there was way more shit than that going on out there. Where there wasn't gear, there was skin and both flashed everywhere. Over in a corner, this jacked sweaty jock wearing football pads and eye black was getting sucked off by three smooth twinks on their knees taking turns swinging on his dripping tool. In the crush of people, hands kept wandering across my crotch. I overheard the flight jacketed skinhead standing next to me tell his neighbor he had to take a piss, so he yanked it out and stuffed it in the other's fly and let loose. The wet started to streak down his leg, the trickle broadening into a giant spot camouflaged by the splotched pattern of his bleachers. There was so much pouring out I could hear it cascade from the cuffs onto the floor beneath his feet over the volume of the music. Shit. If my friends weren't around I'd be down there licking on some boots and lapping that up. Fucking hot.
I shook my head to clear it and made a quick excuse, announcing to T and Der that I had to take a leak. I hoped the walk away, even a brief one, would help me clear my head. I have a psychic, compass-like sense of direction whenever I feel bathroom urgency. I walked down the edge of the dividing bar and found a narrow opening I hadn't noticed before. It couldn't have been wider than a few feet and would have been difficult for more than two people to navigate at once. It was a long hall with brick archways. Alpha stood at the end of the hallway and looked like the bartenders and the first doorman. There was a sign too, and I could just barely see what it said: "RUB OUT Lounge. Decisions at the door are final."
I ducked into what I assumed was the bathroom and I was the only one in there, though it was hard to tell. The entire room was lit by a single, dim, humming red bulb hanging awkwardly from a cord attached to the high ceiling. Throbbing but muted bass filtered in from outside. I found it hard to believe the bathroom was empty with so many people around. Then again, with what was going on out there, maybe no one could be bothered to waste the time. I had just aimed myself at the ice filled trough when I heard the door springs creak. There were two of us in here now.
What walked into the bathroom was a stunning god of a man. Probably 6'7". Black, with a chin strap, wearing a red jersey, red nylon knee-length shorts, and white laced red Nike Airs. I guessed my baller was sporting size 15s or 16s. He stood next to me and lowered the shorts with his thumb to get the access he needed to haul it out. Of course he was commando. I swallowed nervously, then turned to lock eyes. The next thing I knew we locked lips. The kiss was full and sweet, starting off gently probing and quickly progressing to a wrestling match. To equal his height I craned and stood on my toes. I pawed and stroked his impossibly large and still growing cock. I buried my face in his neck and reached higher to huff the oil in his hair. I grabbed two handfuls of dreads and dug my nose and face in deeper to take an even bigger whiff. The smell was as intoxicating as the booze and dope. I was flying. I bent down to tickle the underside of his shaft with my tongue and wrapped my mouth as best I could around the plum sized head.
No time like the present, I thought, reaching into my pocket and grabbing the bottle. I cracked the plastic seal and put the bottle to each nostril, inhaling deeply. Then I did it again. Cue my eyes rolling into the back of my head, more room spinning, and a howling ringing in my ears. Yeah, the head screaming that comes from a big hit of fresh poppers. That was what I needed to swallow the plum deeper down. I handed Baller the bottle and pulled up just long enough to dive into his pits, licking from waist to wrist along his side, then took some time to chew on his nipples. I got this thing where I gnaw on them with my eye teeth then add a light puff of breath to cool them off.
Baller had grabbed his cock by now and was bent over the trough, moaning. He asked me, "Hungry?" I got the idea.
I spun him around and planted my tongue firmly in his crack, poking around until I found my prize. His cheeks were so muscular I thought he might choke off my air if he flexed while I was buried between them. I flicked my tongue in, a little deeper every time, then got some broad strokes from the bottom of his balls to the top of his crack, then a couple of quick pulls straight off Baller's shithole. My efforts were directed at making sure I slurped up every last bit of Baller flavor. I was doing everything I could to help him get off something fierce since it was obvious Baller was way into having his ass ate. He turned, flailing at his meat, and drawled huskily, "Where do you want it?"
"Hunnnh?" I responded, still fully focused on Baller's hole and crack.
"I said, where do you - fuuuuuuuuck," he grabbed me by the ears and slammed his cock home as I choked and gagged. Flooding, flooding, flooding, I swallowed, trying not to spill a drop but not succeeding. There was so much that the extra squeezed out of the corners of my mouth, hanging in strands. After eight or nine spurts, Baller finally eased off. He must have been totally holding me up because when he let go, I collapsed in a heap.
"Get it all, boy." Baller pushed the door open and disappeared.
I took a minute to do as I was told.
When I came back from the bathroom, it looked like T and Der were chatting off to the side of the bar. They were a little closer than they needed to be, even with the music pounding. Though they didn't know each other too well before tonight, they seemed to be getting along great. When I got closer, I saw that T's hand rested coolly on Der's beltline causing his shorts to sag. He leaned in and whispered something to Der, who giggled and moved to whisper something back. Der inhaled a little and T took this as license to slip his entire hand down Der's shorts and move into better position behind him. Der closed his eyes and pursed his lips, slowly rocking back and forth into what I can only guess was T's grip. I felt a thrill build over me. They were going to fuck. A lot. Because of this night. Because of me. I approached my friends, a giant grin on my face.
"Hey man, you made it back. Thanks for bringing us here. We're leaving. You're not." T took control of the situation and laughed at my halfhearted protestations.
"Be good," Der admonished, arching an eyebrow.
"Behave yourself," T added, slipping a pair of condoms into my hand. I already had a few in my wallet but I appreciated the gesture and the added stock.
T turned to Der and pinned him against the wall, taking him with the tip of his tongue from down where his beater met his chest, up his neck and over his chin, across his lips, and all the way up to the tip of his nose. Der's chest heaved and his knees wobbled. He looked ready to melt into the floor. T made the save by planting his hands under Der's armpits to support him and roughly and sloppily open mouth kissed him. I took a deep breath and let the curious aromas of cum, ass, sweat, and coconut from Baller mingle in my sinuses.
Der's head tipped back against the wall and he let T in, whimpering a bit as he did. T pulled away and said, partly to him but mostly to me, "I think it's time to go, don't you? We should leave our boy alone and let him find his fun." Der gave ascent with a couple of quick nods. T grabbed at Der's lower lip with his teeth, then took his arm. They floated together through the crowd toward the door.
I was alone, and finally able to come to terms with the fact that this was what I had wanted all along. I looked skyward and gave silent thanks to Trey and Derek. The steel in my pants pulled me straight back to the magnet in the narrow hallway. Shaking with the anticipation and excitement of the unknown, I made my way past the bathroom and to Alpha at the door. He glanced down at my wristband.
"Is there anything I can do for you?"
"What's the lounge?" I stammered, mustering as much confidence as I could.
I got eyed up and down. After a pause, "Why don't you go in and find out?"
"Can I come back here when I'm done?"
"You won't want to."
His words hit me heavy. Alpha grabbed my hat and slipped on a hood, just like his. I reached up to touch it and my fingertips danced over the slick surface. "Required," he said, reading my mind and answering my question. He sized me up. "You're going to be very popular."
Alpha pushed open the door with one hand and ushered me into the darkness with the other. It reeked of sex and other things. My first two steps into the room took enough time for the door to swing shut and extinguish what little light there was coming in from the outside. The sound of the partiers that couldn't have been more than a hundred feet away was completely absent. From out of the darkness emerged the smacking of skin and rubber against skin and the subtle squeaks of skin and rubber against rubber. Wherever I was, nothing was being said, at least nothing I could hear.
I took a few more tentative steps into the darkness and edged toward the source of the most noise. I hadn't moved far before I bumped into a body. It reached out to draw me closer and I obliged. It became an embrace. We tangled. I felt for breath and gently explored as best I could with my tongue and a hand. I reached and stroked at its head. A mask, as I expected. As one of its hands grazed my chest, it whispered. "You feel like glass."
I reached into my pocket and hit the poppers hard. My partner sensed the poppers and got himself some too. Moments later there were two more, then another, all surrounding and all deeply inhaling from the bottle. I carefully handed it to the first one and traced his body down, where I took up residence. One figured out what I was doing fast and swung his cock around with his hand until it was slapping against my head, then my face so I could find it and guide it down my throat. It rapidly stiffened. I guessed average thickness, nice and straight, and about six or so inches long.
I felt another slapping behind me and turned to take it in. Two was fat and wide but not nearly as long. Three was pencil thin and smelled and tasted deliciously pungent. This dick had already done some fucking tonight. Four was just like One only a half inch or so longer, enough longer that I could tell. Every time I closed my lips on one cock, the other three were beating at my head, begging for attention and entrance. I imagined the four of them, arm over arm in a circle, using me from above. Sometimes I would get lucky in the darkness and enjoy a double.
"We don't have much time," Three hissed, or at least Three's cock was stuffing my neck when I heard it said. How long had I been here? No warning, Three pulled the back of my head close and unloaded, grunting with every shot. His was bitter and foul tasting. Perfect. I licked my lips and around the edge of the mask to make sure I had caught it all.
"Now me." Four put his in and jiggled the base, tapping his index finger against my chin and his thumb against my nose as I sucked and he jerked. God, how a good chin-drumming makes my balls churn. I was rewarded with another mouthful, this one sweeter and thicker, which I savored as much as Three's. I let it linger before letting it slide down my throat.
"Fuck yeah." Two banged his meat against the top of my head and felt for my face, holding it tight against his beercan and letting loose. I rubbed Two's load into me while I massaged his sack.
One pulled me back up and into his arms and laid his cock on top of mine, gripping the two together. We slid against each other, bucking our hips in unison. On the last stroke, he slipped the tip far into my pants and pumped for as long as he could, drenching me with his seed.
Bzzzt. A small bank of fluorescent lights on the far side of the room snapped on with the loud clack of a relay switch. At the same instant, a clanking chain started to raise an industrial garage door near the lights. The crowd began to evaporate. I estimated thirty or forty people, rubbered up, all masked, most moving to get out. I had enough wits about me to know I better get moving too. As I neared the larger mass of people, I was grabbed.
"Where are you going?"
"Leaving."
"I don't think so." It was Alpha. There were others nearby. The clanking chain raising the giant door paused for a few moments during the exodus and groaned as it reversed and the door began to close.
"Is there anything I can do for you?"
"Let me go?"
"It's too late for that. You are chosen."
Alpha, grasping my arm was joined by another, then another, until eight had assembled before me. I wasn't going anywhere. Each had the same height and build. Some had their arms folded, some had them hanging in fists at their sides. Each looked identical. Come to think of it, they really didn't look that much different from me. A bottle was stuck under my nose and I instinctively took a deep breath.
"That's not..." my voice trailed.
"Not everything that comes in a little brown bottle is."
My eyes fluttered and I went to my knees, then to my hands and knees, and then to the ground. In the silence, I watched dizzying spinning sparks and shimmering fire scream from the center to the extremes of my vision then flash back to the center again. The glow dissolved into darkness. In the dream, I was resting comfortably on a table. Slickly veiled figures surrounded me, chattering away though I couldn't quite make out what they were saying. One in particular was close. Very close. Leaning over me. The protective eyes of his gas mask were clouded by beads of condensation. Some streaks of light reflected off a full rubber suit and the thick bands of a harness held together with heavy chrome rings. Mostly he was shadow black. A long ribbed breathing tube coiled over my chest. It wasn't a dream.
"Are you my angel?"
Angel brought his finger to my lips.
"Something like that," he said through the mask.
There was a cold and slippery teasing across my crack and I felt the barest touch at my hole. I tensed and shied away, but the Alpha at each shoulder kept me in place. An Alpha held each of my legs, and two were to each of my sides. Angel stood motionless. The Alphas leaned into my shoulders and slid me all the way down Angel's shaft. Even though they had made him bottom me out, with a tiny twist of my pelvis I think I was able to get even more of Angel inside me. I started to rock up and down but Angel was fixed, his hands on his hips, the eyeholes of the mask windows straight into his soul. No, they weren't windows, and I wasn't seeing Angel's soul. They were mirrors. In the reflection I was seeing my own.
The motions were small but the effects were gigantic. Every time Angel hit deep, the clear bead at the top of my cock grew, until it overflowed in an obscene gush. Angel made a nod toward Alpha at my side who broke rank, turned the brim of his cap backward, slurped up the spill with surgical precision, then returned to his position at attention. Angel had gone from hard to harder, the thickening ridge at the bottom of his shaft the giveaway, but I was still the one being made to make every movement. I could maneuver enough to make sure Angel nicked my prostate on each tiny stroke, radiating a wave of pleasure through my body every time he stabbed me.
One last widening of my ring let me know what was coming. I paused, tensing and flexing with Angel as far inside as I could draw him. I worked the muscles deep in my body to milk him dry. Angel nodded again to Alpha, who repeated his cleaning duties as Angel began to pulse. The spasms were almost imperceptible at first, but soon grew to match the strength and timing of my heartbeat. Though they eventually became less regular, they were no less strong. The final pulse came with a wonderful slamming fuckthrust, delivering deep into to my core everything Angel had spent.
Angel withdrew and Alpha scrambled quickly to clean him off. He crossed his arms and bowed downward, retreating into the darkness. The emptiness was horror. Never had I felt so alive.
Alpha got close to my face and finally spoke. "VIPs do not tip. We tip VIPs. Is there anything I can do for you?"
Now I knew what he meant. Now I knew what I wanted. "Don't stop until I pass out."
The Alphas converged. I felt a tongue and a cock fighting for space in my mouth. A tongue and a cock jockeyed for position against my ass. An Alpha swung his leg over to straddle me and proceeded to use my dick as his seat. Hands groped everywhere else. Hands covered my eyes. Why couldn't we have been designed with more holes?
I first became aware of a small, bright blur in the darkness that began to grow. The light got bigger and brighter but my vision no better. My head was pounding and the slightest move made it pound harder and hurt more. Other parts of me hurt too. My first thought was that I was home in bed but then I noticed my uncomfortable position, lying awkwardly on some half-crushed boxes. Is that the sound of a truck backing up in gravel? What time is it? The sun was blazing, and not low in the sky. Midday? Sunday? Monday? I reached to shield my eyes and felt the hood. Holy fuck. I took it off and tried to stand, wobbling for obvious reasons. I patted myself down to make sure all my parts were where they should be. In my pocket I found a scrap of rubber, about two-thirds the size of a dollar bill. I pulled it out and strained to focus. On it was screened in silver: "ADMIT 1 ALPHA. RUB OUT FALL 2015. GEAR PROVIDED. ARRIVE EARLY."