Light Leech (Toothsucker #3)

1. Couples Therapy

Chapter one

Couples Therapy

Naoma screamed.

I tried the door once before burning my Bite reserve and busting the lock. It might have been unlocked and the struggle my human error, but I was not willing to take the risk.

If my companionship was a danger to her, I had to repay the reciprocal tenfold.

Any hope of a reprieve following our time in Arabasia was a delusion. The few days we had since arriving back in the Republic were enough of a grace period as we returned to undeserved torture.

Perhaps it was deserved. We were vile beings adjacent to cannibals, but that did not include Naoma.

She should have been exempt. Recalling her reveal of the serpent-woman-spirit that followed her, perhaps she wasn’t exempt.

Still, she didn’t eat teeth. Whatever was happening to her was undeserved as far as I was concerned.

I burst into the therapeutic chamber. Strapped down to a chair, Naoma faced me.

I didn’t have to ask if restraint was part of her consent for treatment.

There shouldn’t have been a thorough consent in the first place.

She had chosen the lowest form of therapy, despite the modern innovations that allow therapists to look into their patient’s cognitive makeup.

She had asked for a simple conversation to preface a potential memory recall treatment if she felt like the therapist was trustworthy.

Based on my observations thus far, this was yet another question that need not be asked.

She opened her mouth, but any words were cut off as the thing that had been her therapist injected metallic tentacles into the back of her head.

The skin that had been the man’s flesh split and flayed out like a flower for metallic probes that were far too reminiscent of cuttlefish tentacles for comfort.

“Halt,” the therapist said. His hands–still human in appearance–held Naoma’s shoulders while the tentacles continued their work. Had they not been toying with one of the most fragile components of the human body, I would have pounced on him and torn him into flesh and metal fragments.

Naoma’s frightened eyes rolled back into her skull.

It took everything for me to choose logic over rage and not attack the therapist.

“Good,” he said.

“What do you want?”

“You to leave. Let me do my work.”

“Who do you work for? Who are you selling her data to?”

“Come on, Petya. You’re not that naive.”

Zhu what the zeg is going on?

The ghost swine did not answer, though I felt his presence near.

It took every ounce of will for me to not scream at him. One misstep could end her. “Please. Let her go, and we’ll talk.”

“Would you like to offer yourself in her place?”

I hesitated. Before I could decide, Naoma’s eyes glowed white. The light was not from her sclera, but from something deep within. Not a machine, but a spirit. Her brows tensed and her mouth turned from its agape and vulnerable shape to an angered cry.

The therapist shrieked, his voice a mixture of man and mechanism.

Naoma cried out, cathartic rage expelling the therapist from her head as if she was too hot to touch.

She looked at me, the glow fading from her eyes, then she ran to my side.

I had questions aplenty but could not sit to discuss them while the therapist stared at me. He had collected himself, though not without the occasional twitch. His mouth had not reformed and the metallic tentacles moved, hungry for another feeding.

My Bite reserve was low. As far as I could tell, his flayed mouth possessed no real teeth.

He did not speak nor did he move from his hunched stance.

I spared Naoma a glance, relieved to see that she stood at my side but feared what that thing had done to her.

My focus on her wavered. It was not that I wanted to look at the horrific therapist, but I found myself longing for his gaze. It was not a desire birthed from defense or my survival instincts, but a genuine need to meet his eyes. To watch those metallic tentacles and understand their dance.

Two thought streams warred in my mind. One for survival, screaming that this was a repeat of the Cuttles. The other told me that need was not the same desire. The Cuttles called for love, obeisance, and devotion. This called for my attention, brief though it was, to cast my mind elsewhere.

I was at home. I had a home. Not an apartment, but a home owned by the wealthy of myth.

I sat with a book in my hand, one of the thick ones I wanted to have the time for, looking up to the person in the chair across from me. White light lit the room. I was content without the vanity of violet or even blue.

“Is everything alright?” she asked. Seeing her face, recognition dispelled my amnesia. This was my wife. Zeg, this was Naoma. She held an infant in her arms. When the child started to cry, she rocked it back into a blissful sleep. Not it. She.

Syla. That was her name. I knew it because I gave it to her.

“Pet?” Naoma asked. She was older though far from wrinkled. Her hair was black. Any makeup she had was free of light. She wore a red robe, free of any electronics or light.

“Yeah,” I said, laughing in relief. Zeg, what did I do to deserve this life?

The years played through my mind. Our wedding. Traveling together. The word “Gongtide” came to my mind, yet it carried no meaning.

Remnants of a barbaric hunger tickled the back of my mind, yet the need to feed had diminished. Why did this hunger leave an ache that could never be satiated?

A boy ran into the room and up to his mother. “Devóne,” she said, “did you finish your–”

“Not yet, Moooom.” He dragged out his complaint, stopping when we locked eyes. “What’s wrong, Dad?”

He was five. Memories of his birth raced through my mind. Naoma had chosen a natural birth. She wore white on that day.

Still no memories of light.

There never was physical light.

“Your dad’s just tired from work, right, Pet?”

I laughed, trying to dispel the tension. “Just trying to work as hard as your mom.”

Naoma scowled at me, though it was a playful gesture. “Handling these two isn’t the same as what you do.”

And that is? I couldn’t recall. I tried to ponder it, but my son spoke to cut off my cognitive trail.

“Is dinner ready?”

“Almost,” Naoma replied.

“What is it?”

“Can’t you smell it?”

My boy shook his head.

“Teeth just like–” She stopped and I felt like time rewound to correct a mistake. “Soup just like you asked for.”

Something was wrong.

“Devóne,” I said.

My son turned to me. “Yeah, Dad?”

Devóne. That name resonated deep within my memory, yet its ties to my life were beyond my reach. Where had I gotten that name? Why had I given it to my son?

Devóne shrugged, seeing that I was not going to answer him, and walked towards the kitchen.

Devóne. Boyband. Teeth. These ideas pulled memories that felt forbidden as if the world was trying to convince me that they were false, despite my personal assurance.

A voice spoke to the deepest part of my conscience. “This is your reality.”

“No.”

My son turned to look at me, confusion coloring his face. I had but a moment to glimpse him before a metallic tentacle, pulsing with black aura, wrapped around his waist and cut him in two with a rapid constriction.

Naoma screamed. I didn’t know how to react. Nevertheless, I ran to her side.

“Petya!” she cried as multiple smaller tentacles wrapped around her face.

I reached out, ready to pull them apart, but they sliced my love’s face into pieces.

Brain, eyes, and bones fell onto Syla, who screamed without her mother to hold her.

I reached for my child, holding her, but could not lift her. My wife’s remains were too enticing.

A tentacle wrapped around Syla, then another. I did not care to touch them, only to pick up Naoma’s bloody, perfect teeth, and put them into my mouth. I screamed, bawling as I chewed. The imp within me savored the crunch and pop of each tooth as my conscience screamed for an end to my suffering.

I picked up the rest of my wife’s teeth, chewing them and longing for more as the tentacles split my infant into gory fragments.

I have no humanity and I must scream.