The Dream Catchers

Green

Ryker had draped himself over the big sofa, his bright blue eyes flashing mischievously as he was watching the scene in front of him. 

He'd already finished his whisky and lit another cigarette.

Degei, the hypnotically colourful snake had wrapped around his hand. Its red, black and bright blue scales glinting in the candle lights. 

The place was not he usually frequented, but a change was not a bad thing once in a while. 

"He's very..." the girl sitting next to him said, a glass in her hand, pointing at Degei.

"Mesmerising?" Ryker provided.

"Mmm, " she purred "almost as much as his owner. " 

She leaned closer to him and licked his neck.

 She was wearing a black corset and fishnets. 

Nothing else. 

Her perfume was so strong, he resisted the urge to pull back. 

Ryker's eyes followed the movements of the naked man on the floor, the way the red-haired woman standing up in front of him took her long gown off and straddled him. 

Degei slowly slid away from Ryker's hand and moved towards the floor. 

The snake travelled up. 

It moved slowly from the woman's leg up to her waist. 

The red- haired woman began rocking. 

At first the movement was controlled, but the more Degei was tightening its hold around the woman, the more frantic the woman's movements became. 

It didn't take her long to start losing herself into it. 

She kept moaning, until she cried out and dug her long fingernails in the man's back, leaving deep scratches. 

There, I'm bored now. Ryker  thought and exhaled. "it never lasts for long, anyway. "

"Enough, Degei. " he said, "We should go." 

"Are you leaving." 

The girl next to him pleaded. 

He'd completely forgtten about her. 

She took  Ryker's hand in her own and said 

"But the fun's just beginning." 

He turned and watched her. She slowly traced her tongue over the tip of his fingers, then she took one in her mouth and sucked on it. 

He pulled away "Not now, Fionna."

"Why?" 

God, he hated then they became this whiny. 

He took a mental note to never call her again. 

"I'll see you around." He got up, his snake loosened its hold from around the woman and followed her owner. 

He finished his glass and placed it on the table.

 One of the men, who was standing at the entrance of the dungeon locked his eyes with his as Ryker approached. 

He was big- much bigger than Ryker, dressed entirely in leather. He outstretched his hand, palm up. A slow smile spread on Ryker's face and the man nodded. 

Ryker took one last drag from his cigarette and put it off in the man's palm, the entire time neither of them looking away. 

The bigger man bowed his head and Ryker whispered in his ear "Call me sometime, yeah?"

The other man only nodded, without saying anything. 

"Very good." Ryker said."I see you've been trained very well." 

The whole night may not have been in vain, after all, he mused. He liked pets who were trained well and liked pain. 

On top of that, the man was huge. 

Ryker's favorite combination.

"You f*****g suck, shithead." He heard the girl shouting from the couch "One day you'll get it, I swear. One day you'll meet someone you can't have!!!"

Ryker didn't even spare her a glance and kept tracing the man's muscles with his eyes. 

"And my name's not Fionna! " She kept shouting. " I hope you rot in hell!" 

She threw her glass at him and Ryker only said "Yeah, already there. "

He paused until Degei crawled back up his hand and left, making sure he'd remembered the man's name.  

                                                            ****

She felt the cold water dripping from her wet hair. 

Streams trickling down her back.

 Then lower. Black. Dark. Cold. The air smelled of something rotting, the stench somewhere she could not place. 

"I can't find him." She said flatly. 

"I'm sorry." The man whispered. "Isn't there another way?" 

He turned to the older man, standing at the other end of the room. He only shook his head. 

Of course. 

The old geezer would never let her out of this. 

Never. 

"f**k you." She hissed, piercing him with her dark green eyes. 

She kept tugging at the restraints, wrapped tightly around her hands. 

"I'm going to f*****g kill you once I'm out if this." She hissed and tried to at least loosen the straps, but the chair she was sitting on only creaked. 

She was almost immobile, but she knew what she looked like. She saw it in the man's eyes. They was he was looking at her. 

Intimidating. 

She was scary even, despite her small frame. 

She knew any attempts to get out of this were in vain, her hands had already began getting numb up till the elbows. 

"f*****g shithead, stop this."

"Ignore her." the other man said.

"I'm going to rip you apart and feed you to my dogs."

The younger man looked around helplessly again. 

She somehow felt sad for him. He was forced to do this, probably. Or got paid really well. 

In any case- he had no choice but to continue doing the job. 

"She's always like that." the man said. "Don't mind her."

"Don't mind her? But she's in pain."

"Of course she is." The older man said evenly. 

"Uhhh..." 

"She's agreed to this, remember?"

The younger man paused, glancing back at her. 

"Yes, Sir." He said, still hesitant.

"God, just do it, or I will." the older man instructed. 

"Yeah, just do it., " she said, letting go of any will to fight, or get herself out of this. "The faster, the better. "

He increased the power then. 

She felt the wave pass thought her body. At fist it was only an echo of tingling, almost unnoticeable because she'd already lost sensitivity in her limbs. 

After that it became stronger. 

Then there was only the pain. 

She screamed and everything turned white.

                                                                   ****

Candice  looked up and saw the sun's rays piercing through the leaves of the trees.

Most of them were already yellow, others still green.

They began slowly falling, the way things seemed to be happening slower in a dream sometimes. She couldn't feel them falling all over her, but it looked so real she almost could say what it was like when they brushed her skin.

The way that kiss had been.

She squinted her eyes once the light became way too bright and looked around.

Candice was in the middle of a brightly lit forest. It smelled like pines and the air was fresh just like after rain. She saw the webs spiders had knitted between the trees and the water drops at the edges of leaves, glinting at the sunlight.

Then she heard steps, coming from somewhere behind her and she turned. Nothing.

Fear began taking over again, the way it had that time at the lake.

Her heart began beating so fast, she felt like it would beak its cage. She closed her eyes and reminded herself she had to breathe.

Next thing she felt were two hands covering her eyes from behind. 

Candice stiffened suddenly, the fear growing stronger. 

She tried to pull away, but it was like an invisible power was keeping her where she was. 

She felt the person behind her lean closer, she could swear she felt his warmth and scent- when his deep voice whispered in her ear.

"Wait for me."

She shivered. 

And then the touch was gone. 

She turned around, but there was nothing.

 No one. 

Just like last time. 

She ran her hands through her hair, still feeling the breath of the spoken words by the stranger on her neck.

"Damn it," she muttered. "What's this."

She looked around and almost shouted "Who the hell are you?"

Silence. 

"I asked who the hell are you?"

Her voice broke the silence, but the only reply that reacher her ears was the echo of her own voice.

Candice he closed back her eyes and focused on getting out of the dream, or whatever that might have been. 

****

On the next day she was sitting with Eadan and Mia in the library, studying. They'd been going through everything for a while now, but Candice couldn't gather the thoughts in her head.

She looked between Eadan and Mia who seemed to be actually focused on what they were reading. She hesitated whether to take her phone out and check random stuff when Eadan said, without looking away from his book.

"Stop fidgeting and tell us what's up."

Mia looked at him questioningly. Then at Candice.

"Uhh...what happened?"

"I don't know, but she's not here since morning."

Candice sat at the edge of her chair and looked around. It was almost empty. Besides, the library wasn't a favorite spot of mist highschoolers, so probably no one could hear them anyway.

"Have you..."

"Most likely not, but go on."

Eadan said and they laughed.

"So...Have you ever done something in a dream you don't understand? "

Eadan crossed his arms and leaned in the chair.

"Most of the time I have no idea what I'm doing."

"Not like that. I mean..." She adjusted her chair. "Not what decision to make about the situation or the person, but when you do something and you don't know why you did it."

"It's normally us who have to control the events. I mean, ideally."

"Has something happened?" Mia asked, worried.

"No, just...I recently end up in dreams where nothing bad happens.On the contrary."

"You guys only enter nightmares, right?"

" Well, yeah. There's no point in saving someone who has fun." Eadan said.

"Yeah, tell that to your cousin." Candice joked. 

"Fair enough, Ryker's a different matter. So you're saying you are in dreams where everything's fine?"

"Mhm"

"Then what about the person because of whom you're in there?"

She didn't mention anything about him. Or what he had done. 

"He's fine too."

Eadan furrowed a brow.

"Then what do you do?"

"Nothing."

She said quickly, trying not to make her nervousness too obvious. Or blush, which would be terrible.

"and that's why I'm confused. " she finished.

"It's never happened before?" Mia asked.

They both shook their heads.

"Never. It's...kind of strange. "

"More than strange. 

"Okay. I can ask Lazar, if you want?"

"Yeah. He might be able to help. "

"Cool."

"Thanks, Ead. "

"You know, " Mia said, "I still can't get used to you calling your dad by his first name." 

"He's fine, makes him feel younger. " Candice gave him a alook and eadan waved a hand "Nevermind. But yeah, I'll see what he can do."

"Uh, guys." Mia said and quickly looked down at her notebook . 

"What? "

" He's here"

"Who's here?" Candice asked and looked around. Mia pulled her hand and said. 

"No, don't look around like that."

"Who's that?" Eadan said quietly. The three of them leaned over the table and Mia whispered

"Keith is here, he's talking to Miss Rae."

"Keith?" Eadan stole a look at the guy who was talking to their teacher not far from where they were sitting. 

Candice looked up too and saw him. 

Keith was the captain of the school's basketball team and there wasn't a single girl who didn't like him. Except for Mia, of course. 

And maybe Candice herself.

 But she wasn't sure. 

And definitely didn't want to think about him. 

He was tall, a cool taper-cut always nicely done on his blond hair, making his gray eyes stand out even more. 

Candice was almost sure what everyone noticed first were the dimples, though. Which were now super sexy, because he was still smiling at whatever their teacher was saying, slightly bending forward the way all tall people did when they spoke to someone half their size. 

"Damn, he's cute. " Candice muttered and her friends snickered . "Sorry, did I just say that out loud?

"Shhhh...he's coming. " Mia warned. The three of them pretended to be very deeply into reading their textbooks when Keith suddenly showed up at their table. 

"Hey Candice."

 He said and placed his palms on their table. She looked up, trying to look undisturbed. 

"Yeah, hey ...Sorry, I don't know...?"

"Keith," he said and Eadan snorted. 

Keith didn't register and of it and continued. "I was wondering if you'd want to hang out sometime after school?"

Candice sent a silent, quick prayer to her friends not to say anything on behalf of her and said .

"I'm quite busy these days. You know how it is."

Eadan and Mia turned to look at her but she ignored the super pointed looks her friends were giving her.. 

"Right, uh yeas, I guess. " Keith said and pulled back. "Ok, cool. "

"okay, keith. "

"The offer stands, though. For whenever you aren't that busy. "

Candice only nodded. 

"I'll see you around, then. Bye, guys. " 

"Bye " Mia said and added immediately after Keith was out of hearing range 

"Are you insane?"

"Tough question, " Eadan muttered. " But anyway- he seems cool?"

"He is." Mia said and turned to Candice  " Why did you refuse? And since when is, like, the hottest guy here asking you out?"

"I thought Ryker was the hottest guy at school?" Candice said. 

"Don't evade the question. And we don't count non-humans."

"Oh, ok. Then maybe the hottest guy should be..."

"Candice!" her friends said together. 

"Okay, okay. Guys. Nothing's happened. " Candice picked up her pen and turned it a few times in her hands " We've been talking."

"Since when?"

"Just a few weeks.."

"And you didn't tell us?" Mia asked. 

"It's nothing special. I swear. It's mostly him talking. He probably got tired of dating the Barbie dolls."

"You think?" Eadan asked and Candice shrugged. 

"Maybe, I don't know. We talk about random things. Anyway, nothing can happen."

Eadan and Mia exchanged a look and Mia said, quiet. 

"Is it because of what you do? He doesn't have to know, right?"

"No, it's not that, just...I don't know if he's really just looking for someone to spend time with when he's bored. "

"You can't know until you actually spend time with him, he may not be that bad, actually." Eadan said. "And that's coming from me. " 

Candice laughed "We'll see, I'm trying not to think too much about it."

"But promise us you'll at least not delete his number, or block him from everywhere the way you usually do?" Mia asked. 

"Okay I won't. At least not for now."

"Mean." Her friends said.

 Candice looked up at the time. "Okay, I need to go. I'll have to be at home earlier today, I'll see you tomorrow. "

She turned to Eadan in particular "Maybe?"

"Depends how tonight turns out."

"You can't skip forever, Eadan." Mia said.

"Yeah. But i guess it's fine, even if I repeat the year?"

"I'm not graduating from this school without either of you." Candice was pointing at the two "Are we clear?"

"Sure. Clear. " Eadan said. "Unless Mia decides to run away with Jamie and be the new hunter's wife in the woods."

They laughed. 

"I'm sure my brother can wait till it's necessary." Mia was blushing up to her ears, so she hid her face in her small hands "You are terrible, I hate you both." 

"We love you too. " 

Candice hugged her friend and after a while, they left for their homes. 

She hadn't deleted Keith's number. maybe she really could keep it. For a few days, at least.