NSYNC and the House of Dark Challenges By Mega-Nick Copyright February 14, 2001
The obligatory disclaimer: I have no clue as to the sexual preferences of anybody in this story. This story is fiction and if you don't believe it, get a life! If you are underage according to the community standards of where you live then you shouldn't be at the Nifty Archives at all, and you certainly shouldn't be reading this story. The author takes no responsibility for the actions of the irresponsible.
Dedication: the entire story is dedicated to Jay aka SuperJoey at the Nifty Boybands Chat Room. He is also the character of Cubby in the story. This fourth part of the story is dedicated to my good friend, inspiration, and now collaborator on another story, Kat aka roadrunner, at the Nifty Boy Bands Chat. Because of the dedication, this part may be a little creepier than usual.
Acknowledgements: special thanks to Schuyler, Kyle, Kat, Mike E, Jeff, Shell, Colleen, Nsyncgrrl, Sprout, Danni, Becca, Marie, Jordan and most of all SuperJoey, Roro, Zak, and that loving couple, Dennis and Eric, and of course all the guys at the Nifty and IRC chats for their warm welcome and wonderful friendships and kindnesses.
All comments and quality constructive criticism will be greatly appreciated.
Who knows? If you're real sweet you might make a friend for life! You can reach me at mega_nick@hotmail.com
Part Four Friday Morning 3:30 AM Nick's Mom's House The Storm
A frightening wind roared out of the southwest, the rain poured down in rivers, the lightning flickered from cloud to cloud and often from the clouds to the ground. Wall clouds began to form to the Southwest of the Metroplex and moved northeast. Deafening thunder broke almost continually overhead. Occasionally huge super bolts of lightning lit up the sky like noon on a bright day. The malevolent energy of the storm gave a bizarre kind of comfort to the Creature. His eyes glowed a hellish looking greenish orange. A smile rippled across his face and showed the goo dripping from his fang-like teeth. He inhaled the aroma of fear and death that lurked in the heart of the storm. He gathered his strength, focused the fury of his hatred and lashed out with his evil energy to merge with the energy of the storm. He projected his mental and emotional venom across the now very short distance between himself and the Loving One...
He was trapped and there was no place to run, no place to escape and nothing calmed the raging panic in his mind. Sweat poured out of every pore in his body. He felt hot and cold by turns. He was afraid and the fear choked him like a murderer at his throat. Something huge, spiny, fanged and clawed, and yet walking upright like a man reached out of the darkness of his dreams and snarled at him with a hissing more like a snake than human speech. It hates me, he thought amidst the other terrifying thoughts clogging and tormenting his brain. What is this thing? Why does it hate me? What did I ever do to it? He convulsed with revulsion and somehow also a sense of pity. He turned and ran through the trees with the lightning and the storm crashing around him.
Sing! Sing for your life, he thought. As he ran he began to sing. The songs slowly took effect as he ran and ran and ran on for what seemed like hours. Every other step he took, he looked over his shoulder to see if the Creature was still behind him. All he could see by the light of the lightning bolts was a vague image of something unspeakable. It laughed and snarled and smacked its lips. The hissing voice always just over his shoulder and a foul breath beat on his ears and his nostrils like hammers. He panicked. His singing was snapped off as the scream rose in his throat.
Justin woke up with the bellowing of his screams dying in the room around him. He was pounding his fist into the mattress beside his pillow. The sweat soaked sheets clung with icy fingers to his skin. He looked around the guest room he was given. The familiar/unfamiliarity of a room he had only slept in maybe a half a dozen times confounded his senses for a moment.
He had thought he'd seen trees and something chasing him, but in the back of his mind he was looking at a broken passenger jet, and the rain sweeping across the concrete of the DFW International Airport. A connection clicked deep in his subconscious-a thought that would not surface for two days to come registered somewhere in the farthest reaches of his deep memory.
Nick woke with a feeling of bewilderment gripping around his chest and crushing in on his ribs. Somewhere in the house he heard somebody scream. One moment later he was out of bed and running naked down the hall to the guest room where Justin slept. Cubby raced after him a moment later, dressed in a bathrobe and carrying another one. Nick crashed into Justin's room when the last scream died.
Nick and Cubby found him with his fist raised high above his head ready to strike out at whatever phantom showed its visage. Justin looked whiter than the sheets that clung to the thin form of his body. His face, lit by the flashes of lightning from the three large windows in the room, showed panic and his eyes flashed with the wildness of a trapped animal. Cubby put Nick's robe around his shoulders and the pair walked over to the bed and sat beside their friend.
"The plane broke." He said. "The plane fell out of the sky and it broke. The pilot died. I'm alive because that pilot gave his life to save mine, and all the others."
"You're alright now, Justin. Quiet now. You had a bad dream. It's over."
Nick spoke slowly and calmly as he reached up to touch Justin's right shoulder.
Justin looked gratefully at his two friends who'd come in his moment of need. Somehow he knew it would take him a long time to get over his experience with the plane crash, but for now he was just happy that he had friends to care for him and comfort him. So many people depended on him. It was nice to have friends like Nick and Jay that he could count on.
Now he also began to doubt his own sanity. The nightmare disturbed him more than he could explain to himself, and more than he could understand. Shadows crossed his face from the incessant flickering of the lightning from the windows in the room. The storm seemed worse now. It brought his thoughts back to the dream of the Creature chasing him in the woods. Again, deep in the farthest recesses of his mind the circumstances of the plane crash, and the nightmare came together, but Justin was hopelessly unaware of the connection, and cost for this would come at with a heavy price tag in the days to come.
Tears streamed down his face. Now Cubby also reached out to touch Justin's other shoulder opposite the one Nick gripped. Justin looked deep into those startling and beautiful eyes that the older boi was now world famous for. He reached up and touched Cubby's cheek surprised to feel the wetness of tears streaming from those beautiful eyes. Justin thought to himself how compassionate Nick's lover was. In his heart he felt the uncomfortable sensation of jealousy for what his two friends shared between them. His hand began to tremble against Cubby's cheek, and he jerked it away in shame.
He looked again into those eyes he knew so well. He tried to speak, but the words wouldn't form in his mind, and a heavy weight lay hard and hot on his tongue. He collapsed into a fit of sobbing.
"Justin? Justin what is it? It's me, Jay. I'm your friend. I've known you for a long time now."
"I don't know what's wrong Cubby. I had this dream. I was in the woods. Something dreadful straight out of Dante's Inferno chased me. I wasn't just a dream; it was like a terrible intimacy with something inside me that wanted to eat its way out. I'm afraid, and I think I'm going mad."
"Oh Justin honey. Come here." Cubby spoke with more tenderness than even Nick was accustomed to hear. He gathered Justin into his arms and cradled his head on his shoulder. "Nick, would you run downstairs and get us some hot tea, please?"
Nick merely nodded, and took off for the kitchen downstairs. On his way down the hall to the stairwell he bumped into a very groggy and sleepy-eyed Joey who seemed not to even notice. Joey tried to walk on, but Nick stopped him. The younger man suddenly realized that Joey was sleepwalking. His eyes were wide open, but Joey was obviously fast asleep. What the hell was going on here Nick thought? Justin screaming himself awake from a nightmare, and now Joey walking in his sleep were twin weirdnesses that left Nick in a state of intense confusion. He remembered the events from earlier in the evening with himself passing out and the monster storm outside and the plane crash and now these things in the late hours of the night smashed through his mind all together. It was as if his home and his friends were under attack.
He grabbed Joey by the shoulders and shook him. Joey blinked his eyes, yawned and then suddenly came back into consciousness.
"What the fuck..."
Nick put on a practiced smile so that Joey wouldn't worry.
"It's ok Joey. You were sleepwalking."
"Hunh? I don't understand."
"Sleepwalking, as in walking in your sleep. Don't worry about it. The tiger does it sometimes too. It's ok. Hey, I'm going to go make some hot tea. Come with me and you can give me a hand."
"What time is it?" Joey asked and yawned again.
"Almost four in the morning by now, I guess."
"Geez!"
"Come along Superman. We both need something hot to drink."
"Alright. Nick? Is something wrong? I mean it's weird enough I was walking in my sleep, but you look worried behind that concrete smile you have locked in place."
"You always could think fast on your feet. Justin had a bad dream and woke Cubby and me. He told me to go get some hot tea for the three of us. Since you're up now, I might as well make it tea for four."
"Justin had a nightmare? That's strange. He always sleeps so soundly." Joey said.
Downstairs in the kitchen Nick went to the pantry and selected packets of green jasmine tea. Joey grabbed four cups and saucers from the cabinet and a small serving tray. Nick put packets in each of the four cups and held them one at a time under the boiling water server faucet. He added sugar, picked up the tray, and nodded at Joey to follow him back upstairs.
They walked into the room and found Justin and Cubby talking quietly. Nick served the hot tea to all of them. Justin stroked the back of Nick's hand as he took his cup to show his love, affection and gratitude. He had a dreadful look in his eyes that really bothered Nick, but he didn't want to say anything in front of the others. Cubby was afraid, but he hid it well from the others except for Nick whom he couldn't hide anything from. Joey merely looked sleepy, but he was also concerned about Justin's well being.
After the boys finished their tea, Cubby offered to take the dishes downstairs. Nick gave him a look of thanks. Joey yawned and asked if there was anything he could do for Justin before he went back to bed. Justin shook his head no. Joey reached over and hugged Justin around the neck, and then left to go back to bed.
"Justin, you should come and sleep with Cubby and I. You'll be more comfortable and you'll feel a lot better if you're with us for the rest of the night."
"Alright. As long as you're sure I won't be in the way."
"I'm sure. Both of us would love to have you, and you know there's lots of room for company in my bed."
"Nicholas?"
"Uh oh. What have I done wrong? Nobody calls me Nicholas unless they're mad at me, or upset about something."
"Silly boi. No I'm not mad or upset with you. I just wanted to tell you how grateful I am for your friendship and hospitality. I felt that Nicholas would feel a little more intimate."
"You're an absolute sweetheart, Justin. Did you know that?"
"Not really. I hear it all the time, but I don't believe it. If it was true then I'd be somebody's sweetheart, but as you can see, I'm all alone."
"What about Britney?"
"What about her? She's a friend, but I'm gay and I don't have a man. I so want to be somebody's boi. I'm all alone. I wish I had a boifriend that that I could turn to and who would look out for me and be there for me at times like this. I need somebody special in my life that I can trust and love and be somebody special for whoever he is. Isn't there somebody out there somewhere who could love me? Have I done something bad in my life? Am I not good enough to deserve to be some great guy's boi? Isn't there anybody who can love me, and that I can love and honor and cherish?"
"Oh Justin honey, of course there is. You just haven't found him yet."
"Nicholas, I'm afraid I won't ever find him."
Cubby came back to the room. He stood quietly in the door and watched the scene before him. He felt his heart go out to Justin as he listened to him pour his heart and guts out to Nick. Cubby wanted to help find somebody for Justin and the wheels in his mind turned and turned. He had to help his friend. He knew what it was like to be alone and unwanted. He'd felt that way for most of his life until that fateful evening when Nick decided to throw the rule book away and risk everything to come into that chat room and look for somebody to love him too. He understood exactly what Justin was going through, and he resolved right then to do whatever he could to help his friend, no matter what it cost.
"Justin, you need to get some sleep. Chris will be here in a few hours and then we're off on the adventure I promised you guys. At least you won't have to worry about Lance when Chris arrives."
"I never worry about Lance. I'm jealous of the love he and Chrissy share, but I never worry about him. In many ways, Lance is the strongest one of us all. He may seem vulnerable, but he does that so others will look after him and not focus on their own problems or worries or fears."
"You know I've suspected him of that for a long time now." Nick said with rueful grin on his face.
"Joey's the same way sometimes, but like you, he sees things that other people don't see. I don't understand it. You and Cubby have the same gifts. You're psychic or gifted with second sight, or something. I just hope that you never get hurt by it, and I hope the same for the others too."
"You don't have to worry about me getting hurt." Cubby spoke up from the doorway.
"How long have you been standing there, Jay?" Justin asked as he looked up to see the smiling little guy who seemed part wolf cub and part elf and part tough guy all at the same time.
"Long enough."
"Hey Cubby. I invited Justin to spend the rest of the night with us. I hope you don't mind."
"Of course not. I was going to suggest the same thing."
Nick and Justin stood and walked over to the door and the three young men headed back down the hall to Nick's room. Cubby offered to sleep in the middle because he knew that Nick had to sleep on the edge of the bed, and he didn't want Justin to feel uncomfortable. He turned out the light and climbed over Justin into the middle of huge bed he shared with Nick. He lay on his back and put one arm around his lover's neck and the other one around Justin. They all fell asleep in seconds.
Deep in the secret lair of the old house, the Creature snarled and spat in hate. There was too much love in the air for his taste. The Loving One now slept in the arms of two of the psychics. The Creature couldn't get at him for the moment, but he knew all he had to do was bide his time and in a few hours the Loving One and his friends would be here where he could get at them and little if anything could protect them. He rubbed his hands together and smacked his lips in anticipation of the feast to come. If these sickly sweet boys thought they'd suffered so far, then they had a monstrous surprise in store for them. The Creature laughed with a mad, sickening, hissing laugh more like the rage of a viper instead of a laugh. If one thing was certain, this would be their last night of peace, and perhaps their last night of life and love and happiness, and all the things the Creature hated. If the Loving One thought he'd suffered a bad dream, then the one called Justin was a sniveling coward and a fool. What the Creature prepared now for that one was much more just a mere nightmare.
To be continued...