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spin.
    “Yari?” I asked, trying to pronounce it
correctly. “Kind of like Tasha Yar from Star Trek? But with an
‘eee’ sound at the end?”
    She smiled at me. She was incredibly
beautiful. I felt like her bright, searching eyes could see right
through me. “Yes...Yari, Y-A-R-I,” she spelled out. It rhymes with
Atari.” She smiled.
    As creeped out as I was, I smiled, too.
“Wow! You made an old-school game reference. I’m impressed.”
    “Oh, you have no idea how old school I am.
Way older school than your Star Trek reference would indicate that
you are.” She grinned, then flicked her gaze over to Atticai, who
was still staring at me.
    “The freakishly tall scary fellow here is
Atticai.” She nodded toward the driver. “You already know Wyatt.
And in the passenger seat is Hector. Hector likes to smile a lot
and doesn’t say much.”
    I nodded and tried to smile at everyone. I
guessed introductions were in order, considering I was being
kidnapped. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.
    Wyatt suddenly turned the van hard to the
right and hit the brakes. “We’re here.”
    Atticai leaped into motion, his long limbs
unfurling in a blink like some weird alien life form awakened from
a space travel stasis slumber. He threw open the bay door, and he
and Lena jumped out. I slowly followed with my bandage around my
wrist and no doubt, a damn big hickey on my neck, compliments of
Wyatt.
    The Flatlands was a giant gravel parking lot
that was surrounded by trees. We were obviously in the heart of the
San Bernardino Mountains. The sky was lit up by stars that you just
couldn’t see in the city, due to light pollution. There were
several trucks and cars parked throughout the gravel area. Beyond
the cars were fires and voices that belonged to many dark-clad
figures. It appeared to be a giant party, a rave of some sort,
except that everyone was dressed in black.
    A freak convention, I thought. Of epic goth
proportions.
    There were bonfires everywhere and the
sounds of old-school Suicidal Tendencies blaring. A quick scan and
guestimate told me that there were at least a hundred or so of
these “emo” characters in the gathering. I shivered, deprived of
blood and still pretty shocky.
    I was led over to one of the bonfires.
Atticai still had his arm around Lena. He was still giving off this
protective vibe when it came to her. It was surreal, to say the
least.
    Anyway, as we walked up, there was no doubt
who was the alpha male in this group. A swath opened for him in the
pressing crowd of black-clad bizarros, and he walked down the
middle of it like a freaking king at his coronation. Everyone
seemed to turn and watch him. I stopped at the edge of the fire
with Yari and watched as Atticai took off his trench coat and then
his T-shirt. He was pretty ripped. He was damn pale, granted, but
the dude had some serious game in the abs department. His stomach
looked as if it was carved out of alabaster by Michelangelo
himself. No wonder Lena liked this guy. Even though he was a
colossal freak, he was a man among pale, skinny boys in this
adoring crowd. As he turned his back to me, I saw that he had a
pretty strange tattoo covering the upper half of his back. It was,
in fact, writing. Big, black Old English font letters spelled out
the acronym, “C.O.N.”
    Okay, whatever.
    One of the guys at the party walked up to
Atticai and handed him a wooden jug that looked like something out
of 1800s. Atticai grabbed the jug and immediately jumped on the
hood of one of the trucks and took a long drink from whatever was
in the container.
    He shuddered briefly then turned and looked
straight at me. “Hey, Josiah! Want a swig?”
    “What is it?” I asked from the other side of
the fire.
    “A little of everything. Tastes like shit,
but that’s not the point.”
    I was about to ask what the point was, but I
decided I didn’t want to know. It was probably laced with
God-knows-what. Whatever it was, I know I didn’t want it in my
body. Not