He is waiting in the parking lot, in the fading light of the dying sun. The soft light bouncing off his black silk hair. He leans against the hood of a late model Mercedes. Dressed in a soft gray linen shirt and black slacks, standing like time has no meaning. The light of the world bending in towards him. A gravity well from which escape is impossible.

Embracing his pull, I stalk towards Michael. Hips swaying, one foot in front of the other, I sinously move towards him. I stop two feet away, not quite in reach.

“I’ll be honest. I came here to see you. I have no real desire to hang out with anyone else tonight,” I state, having finally found my courage.

That’s good,” he replied, “I didn’t invite anyone else.”

I felt something deep in me tighten. A lust like I have seldom known washed away all reason. I stepped in to him.
Arms encircling his body, one hand pressing into his back and the other drifting down to cup the velvet muscle of his ass. Looking into his eyes, I kissed him. His lips soft and agile under my own. His tongue flits into my opened mouth, caressing my tongue. Making promises I dared not hope for.

Reluctantly, I pull back. Still breathing with Michaels breathe, I whisper “Your place?”

He purrs and I preen.
He, looking at me
I am frozen in place
By his flashing green eyes
He hesitates not a moment having drunk me down. His hands slide up my waist. His right hand pressing firmly on the small of my back. Pulling me closer until I’m skin to skin, heat bleeding through the thin veneer of cloth that seperates us. His fingers on his left hand trail up my spine ending in his hand at the back of my neck. Not controlling but the hint of it. Enough to make me shudder with need.

“Can I get by?” Michael says, faint smile playing over his lips.

“What? Oh, sure, sorry. I’m in your way.”
I press back against the cubicle wall, harsh material scratching against me.

Michael slips by, his hand brushing mine. Unintentionally?

Turning back to me, Michael says, “A bunch of us are going out after work. You should come.”

I think, Great, then I can be awkward in front of other people.

“That sounds like fun, send me the info.”

The faint scent of sandalwood and heat, lingers in the air.

I bit my lip, not quite sure how to do this. I paced in the empty break room, the faint smell of burnt popcorn that seeps into the cheap plastic, all around.

“I’ll walk up to him. I’ll walk up and tell him how I feel. I’ll walk in and just say… What will I say? You can’t even get it out to yourself let alone in front of him. What is so hard? It’s the 21st century, just walk up and ask.”

I’ve done this before. When I was in high school I remember pacing in the parking lot across the street from a girls house. I paced there for an hour.

“I’m not that scared boy anymore right? He’s sitting there just down the hall. He seemed interested… He’s interested, right?”

Steeling my heart, I turned the corner of the break room and out into the hallway.

“I’ve been looking for you,” voice purring from Michaels throat.

My vision narrowed in making me feel like I was trapped. Fight or flight, but I froze, like a doe scenting a predator.

“Well, you found me, ” I said lamely.

10 years on and they still don’t understand it.  Paranormal sciences they call it.  Come on people, can’t we just call it magic and be done? The Jerusalem Knights call it subetheric particle manipulation and quantum entanglement.  Maybe what they do is some kind of super science, but what Simon Crow did?  No devices, just a man and his Will? I don’t think so. It was magic pure and simple.  When I saw that beam of sickly green lance scintillating into that ship I thought it was the military deploying some kind of experimental laser, like the Death Star or something.  But then I heard it.  I know the recordings don’t have any sound but I know what I heard.  It was screaming.  Not a terrified scream like you hear in horror movies.  No, this was like if that demon thing from those movies,  you know, with the little guy walking somewhere and the wizard. Anyway like a creature of flame and earth, terrible and strange were having it’s guts ripped out. All deep and filled with pain, just building up until I passed out. No I didn’t faint, it was like turning off a light.  One minute this horrible mind wrenching sound then Nothing.  It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes later when I snapped awake.  The ship had crashed into 2 halves and part of the city was on fire.  Science didn’t do that. We threw everything we had at those ships, not a dent.  One mental patient in a swamp, and down goes the invader.  Magic is the only answer.
– Transcript from First person account of the Incursion.  *editors note: transcript edited to remove profanity*

We dropped out of the sky, in the middle of the day.  Our journey was harrowing but we made it.  Through fire and abyssal cold,  we fought through.  And we saw them there,  Scurrying about like an overturned anthill.  To stop them from the thing they would do.  The thing they had done over and over,  which had caused the death of so many world’s.  We laid waste to their cities,  slaughtered them like the monsters they were.  Until they unleashed the weapons we knew they had,  until they awoke the powers and revealed themselves.  We lost a hundred thousand heroes that day.  As the enemy rejoiced in their ‘trumph’, we began the real war. 

You ever want a minute of quiet.  A moment of stillness,  everything fading to a background hum.  Then falling away until even that is silent.  To just be for a while.  Without ambition, need or desire.  I experienced that once.  I was a year out of high school,  it was autumn.  I was walking down the street away from a class I was skipping to catch a bus.  It was what I call a stolen day.  You tell no one.  Any obligation,  you walk away from.  For one day you persue a journey.  Without a net.  No means of contacting anyone.  I used to do that alot.  And this particular day was like those.  But as I walked,  a breeze flowed by.  Soft, tentative like your first kiss.  And I looked up,  shifting wisp thin clouds skimming across the sky,  the sun pouring down warmth.  The world slowed, then stopped.  A perfect crystalline moment,  it stretched, then was gone.  Not a snapping back,  but as if it had never been.