Spooktober—October 2022 (Supernatural Horror/Orgasm Denial)

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#1 of Spooktober 2022

Oh, boy! This turned out to be something. When I started discovery-writing ("pantsing") this Halloween story, I had no idea I'd end up with "The Tower." With that in mind, note that this 4700-word story has moments of grisly violence and noncon sexual situations. If that's not your cup of tea, I totally understand--you're more than welcome to pass. More of my typical content will show up in the coming days, weeks, months, years, etc., and you're invited to stick around for that. In particular, I got some fantastic Kinktober entries lined up.

Anastasia is dared to confront a childhood fear. What follows is a back-bending, hair-raising romp through The Tower.


Anastasia squeaked and squirmed away from her friend's probing finger, her wing claw threatening to poke one of his eyes out. "Quit it!"

"Anya, you're a walking cliche. A vampire? Again?"

She ran her fingers through his disheveled hair--a wig meant to be reminiscent of Beetlejuice but that came across more as the comb over of a mad scientist with a bad case of alopecia. "Denny, what even is this? It's like soggy AstroTurf."

Denny scowled. "I will have you know, the suit is a lot more appealing."

"A Beetlejuice suit? Dude, with this janky-ass wig and those stripes, everyone's gonna think you're an escaped inmate or something."

"Better than a bat who can't think past the vampire trope." Denny tickled one of her fangs.

Anastasia brushed his doggy paw aside. "Fine, whatever. Tell you what--ditch those rags, I'll look for something else, too." She strutted into one of the other aisles, curvy hips going back and forth. "I'm gonna be the life of the party; you know that."

"Pft." Denny crouched. He grabbed a generic serial killer mask off the shelf and shook his head disapprovingly. "Look who's acting all cocky. The same girl who was too chickenshit as a kid to go anywhere near The Tower. You know? When we went trick-or-treating."

"That was years ago!" said Anastasia as she angled a fake reporter's microphone in her hand, admiring how professional it made her feel. "And they're just campfire stories. Nobody except little kids take it seriously."

"Mhm. You still haven't explained why you never went near the place." Denny winced as he plucked the hideous hairpiece off.

"Parents didn't let me." She tried on a lanyard with a fake PRESS badge dangling from its end. "You know how my dad is."

"Well, old gal, your parents aren't the boss of you anymore, are they? Bet you're still too much of a wuss to go there."

Anastasia stormed back into Denny's aisle, wings partially extended in playful anger, fingers still wrapped around the prop dynamic omni mic. "Wuss? You got some nerve!"

He studied her from head to toe. "What I have, Anya, is a friend who's half-vampire bat, half-Ron Burgundy."

She shoved the microphone into his face. "Tell me, Mr. Doggo, how is it that you manage to be such a fuckwit?"

Denny adjusted his Hannibal Lecter mask and spoke solemnly in a faux British accent. "Mr. Doggo will grant an exclusive interview provided Her Royal Batness coughs up proof that her arse was at The Tower before the party tomorrow night."

"And what does li'l ol' me get in return? Hm?" She fluttered her eyelashes.

He swiveled the mask so only his snout stuck out. "Party perks. You'll get to have the last slice of pizza."

The two fist bumped. "You're on."


"Stop fuckin' calling us already!"

"But I need to know if the legends are true!" said the tinny female voice that came out the receiver. "That house was abandoned for years until your crew moved in. We could come for an interview, I--"

The lion let out a noise that was half-snarl and all rage. "Listen to me, you dumb bitch! The place was never haunted 'cause ghosts don't exist!" He slammed the phone down so hard its internal bell chimed, the ting reverberating throughout the dark hallways of what locals called, amidst hushed whispers, The Tower.

Donathan huffed. He stomped past the barrels of cooked meth and bags of yellowed crack cocaine and stormed up to his office. There, he summoned his two felid henchmen--Matt and Victor.

"We need to ramp up security around here," he said, pacing back and forth, predatory, subdued growls interspersed with his words. "That dumb broad from the news agency keeps calling." Donathan paused and stood between the puma and the tiger. The silk carpet under his massive feet was ripped to shreds. "I wish she'd stop flashing her pussy for the shmucks at the phone company. It's the third time we've changed numbers this month."

"Uh, yeah, boss! You gots it! We'll show her!" said Victor the puma. "She show up around here, uh, it's curtains for her!"

"NO!" roared Donathan, holding up a paw as big as a ham. "We must uphold the teachings of Quiwizan. Nonviolence is always the answer."

Matt tutted. "That's all fine, boss. But if this reporter lady, she shows up, what do we do with her?"

"I just want you to teach her a lesson so she'll think twice about paying this place a visit again." Donathan sat behind his desk and steepled his fingers together. "I'm sure you two'll think of something."


Anastasia stood in front of the ramshackle manor, her hair styled into the smooth locks of a sweet young thing straight out of a journalism bachelor's degree, fake omni microphone in hand. Her wing claws twitched nervously as she took stock of The Tower.

When the original owners turned up dead in the bedroom while the place was still being built, contractors pulled out before the place's second chimney could be completed; the first one, a brick and mortar masonry job that jutted out into the sky like a chipped, jagged tooth, gave the ruins their unofficial moniker.

Two peculiar figures flanked the entrance on either side--nude demonesses of some kind, Anastasia figured, with their lithe backs arched, their membranous back wings spread. From their pose, from the way their heads faced the heavens, the wrought-iron succubi radiated triumph.

Gotta show Denny. I'll be in and out in a few minutes, just gotta take a few pics, thought Anastasia. She marched past the bent pickets of the rusty gate, glancing all the while at her feet, at the path that led from the front gate to the porch--gravel and rotten weeds covered every square inch of the yard between the fence and the dilapidated house except for the narrow strip she found herself on. Huh, weird.

She peered through one of the windows. Nothing.

Anastasia sighed, her toes curling and spreading as she psyched herself up. "You can do this. In and out." She grabbed the doorknob and turned with all the energy she could muster, which wasn't a lot.

To her surprise, the door creaked open. She stumbled in.

To her shock, she wasn't alone.

"Welcome, bitch. We've been expecting you."

Anastasia screamed, but after a few seconds of thrashing, kicking and wing flapping, the chemical-soaked rag won.


"I told you, boss will kill us if we lay a finger on her." Matt yanked the needle out of Victor's paw. "Ever since he started following that weirdo cult dude on PawTube, he's become this hippy-ass nonviolence freak."

"Aw." Victor shook his head and looked back at the girl--Anastasia was still out cold, stark naked, strapped down spreadeagled on her back to some waist-height bondage table the feline duo had managed to jerry-build. "But boss'll never know. We were just gonna poke holes through her wings. You can't tell 'cause the hole's real small, but it hurts real bad!"

"We can't risk it. Hell, boss gets a load of the shitty job we did tying her up, we'll be the ones getting poked with that needle!"

Victor powered up a back massager and rubbed it into his biceps. "Relax, Mattie. She ain't going nowhere with her arms and legs all tied up. Not like there's anything else you gotta do." He winced as he looked for the sore spot on his back. "I hurt all over like a son of a bitch from dragging her all the way down here. Don't think I'm doing more rope crap today."

Matt and Victor turned and stared at the nude girl as her chest rose and sank, her perky tits quivering in the fluorescent light of the basement.

"So what do we do?" asked Victor.

Matt eyed Victor's vibrator. He smirked as Anastasia's eyes stirred beneath closed lids. "I got it."


"No! No! NO! Please, you got the wrong person!" Anastasia's thighs clenched and her toes gnarled something bad. "Please! For the love of whatever it is you believe in! For the love of whatever you don't believe in!" She hyperventilated and stared down at her crotch, past her impossibly swollen nipples; big fat drops of sweat snaked down her breasts, her red face, her curvy torso. "Are, are you two monsters?! I can't take it! Please, I can't!"

"Nah, Tits," said Matt. "Just a couple of bad guys having some fun." He tickled under her chin.

"Haha! 'Tits.' I like that!" Victor chimed in, sticking his tongue out. "Consider yourself lucky, Tits. Mattie here talked me outta poking your cute li'l wings with a needle. I was gonna heat it up, too!"

"Oh, God, please! It's been hours! You want me to say I'm that bitch from the news agency? Fine! I'm her! I'll say whatever you want!" Anastasia clenched her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut. "Whatever you want!"

Victor chuckled--he took delight in making the girl beg and squirm. "Hours? Nah, Tits, just a couple. And we're just getting started!"

"Gotta say," crooned Matt, twirling one of her whiskers between his fingers, "you're a natural, Vic. I think Tits finds it excruciating! Don't you, Tits?"

"It's too much! Please! It's unbearable!" Anastasia's hands squeezed into tight fists around her thumbs; the knuckles cracked. "I, I'll do anything! I mean it!"

"Oh, is that right? Anything?" said Matt with a gleam in his eye. "Well, Tits, how's about you square the circle for us?"

"No, no, no," she muttered. "What? No! That's, that isn't possible!" She took a couple of deep breaths. "That isn't fair! Please, this has gotta be against the Geneva Convention! I'm going insane here! Mercy!"

"Geneva Convention? We ain't in Sweden, Tits," said Victor with a snarl.

"More like Geneva Suggestion, right, Vic?" Matt ugly laughed and grabbed hold of Anastasia's breasts. "Nope. No mercy for you. Have any idea how many times I was taking a cat nap, I go down to pick up the phone, and you start talking my ear off about doing some interview?" He twirled the rock-hard studs of flesh between two fingers. "Like my friend said, you're in luck 'cause our boss mellowed out and became this hippy-dippy beatnik." He leaned close, licked her face, and purred. "But if it were up to me, I'd pull your claws out and then slash through those wings of yours with the dullest, rustiest knife I got."

"You can do that! I'll suck both of you off too! You guys like anal? You can do whatever you want, but please, for the love of anything that you hold dear in life," screamed Anastasia, "just make me CUM!" The bat girl strained against her makeshift restraints, her butt shifting left and right as Victor tapped her engorged clit with the back massager, refusing to settle it in place so that she could have her orgasm. "Please, please, _please!_It's torture! I'm begging you! I can't take it!"

"Say, Vic," said Matt. "Since Donathan pussied out, I was gonna say ol' Tits here got off easy, but that can't be right 'cause she ain't getting off anytime soon!"

The cruel cats laughed in unison, their chuckles raspy from years of cheap whiskey abuse.


Another couple hours passed. The basement reeked of cat sweat and breath. Of bat tears and pussy juice.

Victor ran the business end of the massager up and down her glistening, engorged pussy lips. "So you're not gonna tell us the name of your editor, huh?" he asked, whiskers twitching in sadistic amusement as he circled around her vulva, carefully grazing the hood but cruelly avoiding the hypersensitive, pearl-shaped bundle of nerves within. "Same little snatch you used to get our number, isn't it?"

"I don't have an editor!" squealed Anastasia. A salty tear ran down her temple. "Please! God! I'm _begging_you! This is just horrible!" She gulped and angled her hips, desperately trying to get the powerful vibrations on her clit. "Please! You gotta believe me!"

"Enough funny business!" Matt said. "I've had enough of your bullshit, Tits. I don't know how you've managed to make it this far, but it doesn't matter." He grabbed hold of her chin and twisted her neck so they faced each other; he stared into her wet, hazel eyes. "Out with it. You wanna cum real bad, huh? Well, not only will you not get to have fun, but it'll be bad! Real bad, Tits!"

"You heard the man! Spill the beans!" Victor nudged her clit just once--but that was all it took.

Anastasia gasped and thrust her butt. Her breasts followed suit, bouncing left and right. "Yes, yes! NO! No, no, no! Please, please, please, hold it there! I'll do anything! Touch me right there!"

"Last warning, Tits, or else you'll be sorry!" said Matt. "We're gonna ruin it!"

The bat's head jerked off the table, the cords in her neck visible. "WHAT?"

Victor nodded. "What's worse than no orgasm, Tits? That's right--a ruined one!"

Her clit quivered. "NO!" Anastasia's feverish eyes went back and forth between the terrible two. "You can't! Please,anything but that!"

"We don't have to!" said Matt, obnoxious vibrato on the last word. "You just gotta tell us where you work. Who your boss is."

"OK! Fine." The desperate girl's tits shuddered as Victor missed her bud by a fraction of a millimeter. "The Foxworth Press. My boss, he's, uh, the assistant editor. Jared McCullin."

"Oh, Tits." Matt twirled her nipples, her nice brown nipples, between sinewy, claw-tipped fingers. "Guess you must be a time traveler. 'Cause The Foxworth Press closed a couple months ago."

"Hah! I remember that. Boss scared the crap outta them with that one letter to the editor." Victor circled her nub, making her belly dance. "Naughty Tits. We give you one last chance, and you lie to us?"

"I, I'm sorry!" Anastasia sobbed. Big, fat tears rolled down her cheeks. "I told you, I'm not a journalist, I'm just a dumb bat that showed up here because my friend dared me!" She sniffled.

"I heard enough!" proclaimed Matt. He looked up and locked eyes with his callous partner in crime, who was standing on the other side of the table. "Let's show Tits how we do business 'round these parts!"

Anastasia shook her head frantically. "NO! Guys, please, please, please! You don't have to do this!"

Victor pushed the vibrator into her sex, into her hungry, desperate clit. "Wanna cum, Tits?" taunted the puma.

"YES!" That's exactly what the bat wanted. "Please, please, please, pretty please, don't take it off! Mmmm, so goooood!" She arched her feet and pointed her toes. "Don't ruin it!" Anastasia squeaked.

"Tits, that's something you shoulda thought of before becoming a lyin', stinkin' whore." The tiger signaled to Victor by flashing both eyebrows up. "Pay attention--second she starts, take it off."

"I know, dummy," retorted Victor. "I'm a master at making people suffer."

Anastasia figured she'd beg and grovel one last time. Maybe they'd pity her. Maybe they'd believe her. Maybe they'd forgive her for lying. "I--" But her voice stuck in her throat. She shuddered--goosebumps traveled up her body. After hours of torturous denial, after hours of humiliating supplication, of warm tears and stringy snot, an orgasm like no other threatened to rob her of the little sanity she had left. Her face flushed crimson.

"Poor Tits. She's right on the edge," said Matt. "I almost feel bad!"

With nothing to keep her company but her thrumming heart, her burning sex, her throbbing nipples, and the overpowered back massager, Anastasia, with a shrill inhale, crossed the point of no return.

"Now, Vic! Take it o--"

WHOOSH!

That first rush of exquisite rapture washed over Anastasia, and her beautiful, terrifying wings, compelled by the ineffable pleasure, spread out from under her--razor-sharp claws sliced through felid flesh.

Matt coughed, the sides of his mouth drooling blood, and he sank to the floor, a large gash across his stomach.

Victor resembled a botched taxidermy job, frozen stiff in shock, eyes bugging out; his massive paw trembled as he wedged the vibrator against the bat girl's swollen cunny. At his feet, the puma's gore-laced cock and balls lay in a gooey mess on the chipped concrete floor.

Anastasia, a red haze of ectoplasm surrounding her, screamed long and hard, back arched, dark purple wings--all nine feet, from tip to tip--stretched to their full span. "UGH, FUCK, YESSSSSS!" Her blood-splattered wing claws, her goose pimples-spotted skin, her clenching pussy and butthole, her throbbing nipples, her curved torso, her twerking hips, the lock of wavy hair stuck to the side of her face, her curled toes, her delicately closed eyes--every single square inch of her body was ravaged by sheer, obscene orgasm.

"YES, _YES! SO GOOOOOOD!_MMMMMMMMMGH!" Still in the middle of an orgasm that blissfully refused to let up, the bat belle bit her lip and threw her sweat-drenched head back to grind her clit, her poor clit that had been begging for release moments ago, against the juddering vibrator, determined to make up for every single one of Matt's taunts and threats, every single one of Victor's sadistic taps, nudges, and fleeting grazes.

The crimson mist pushed into her through her cunny. Anastasia opened her eyes; they flashed black and disappeared into the back of her head as pussy juice squirted out of her contracting, soaked gash, a healthy dollop drizzling down her taint and twitching asshole.

Her back straightened out. The membranes of her wings slowly lost tension. "Ugh! Ugh! Fuck." Soft grunts and moans took the place of feral, throat-shredding yells. "Mmm! Shit!" Anastasia's glistening body quaked in tandem with the abating bursts of ecstasy, her breasts juddering. "Aw, yeah!"

Anastasia's pink pussy puckered up one last time, and she squealed in relief. Victor finally collapsed, just as she finished cumming, taking the massager down with him. He landed in a sloppy pool of his own blood and severed genitals, stiff as a board, dead as a doornail. Her wings, half-retracted, hung off the sides of the table. "Fffffffffffffffffuck. . . That was so good . . ."

After only a few minutes, she took a deep breath and strained. With her tongue sticking out and her shoulder blade pistoning under her sweaty fur, the butt naked bat angled her wings up and made short work of the hemp rope. She sat up and looked at her feet. Shit._The ropes around her ankles were too far away for her wings. Anastasia clenched her teeth and tugged till the ache, the pain, registered. _No, there's gotta be another way.

A low-pitched snarl made her ears pivot. A pair of bloody tiger paws, the pointy claws extended, emerged from behind the foot of the table. "You worthless cunt," said the hoarse rasp. Matt. He was still alive.

Anastasia's eyes went wide in horror. She kicked at the menacing hands, and Matt's massive paws squeezed shut--around the haphazardly tied loops of hemp. The bat pushed and pulled, and the tiger's pointy claws ripped through the rope. Still taking shaky breaths, Anastasia pivoted on her ass and hopped off the table, barely missing Victor's emasculated corpse.

"You should have seen the look on your face," said Matt as he leaned against a leg of the table, cradling his spilling guts. "All 'cause we wouldn't let you cum. Dirty slut."

The massager, swimming in a pool of puma blood, powered down, short-circuited; Anastasia strutted towards the dying big cat, recent sexual pleasure affording her a jovial spring in her step. "And look at my face now. All 'cause I did cum!" She squatted in front of Matt and spread her legs. "Gotta hand it to you and your dead friend." The bat scooped up some of her own pussy juice and licked it off the tip of her finger. "I had no idea anyone could orgasm that hard."

"So you got off easy," rasped Matt, a stream of blood leaking out of his nostril.

"Well, I definitely got off." Anastasia smiled and shivered, remembering the indescribable ecstasy. "Can't say you boys made it easy, though."

Matt coughed. Dark blood spilled out of his maw. "So what happens now, Tits?"

"I think you know, Mattie."

Before Matt could decide whether to beg for his life or thank her, Anastasia's wing claw, sharp as an obsidian knife and caked with his own dried blood, put an end to his suffering.

She sashayed to the set of stairs leading out of the basement, her naked body radiating post-orgasmic afterglow as Matt lay there, dead, blood pouring out of the massive gash that went from ear to ear, lifeless eyes fixed on her round ass.

?

Even as a local drug kingpin, Donathan had little issue with Quiwizan's strict adherence to nonviolence. It was one of the other tenets of the faith that he struggled with.

"Remember, self-control is important for energy balance," crooned the otter, dressed in loose yoga clothes.

Donathan, sitting at his laptop behind his mahogany desk, covered from head to toe in sweat, clenched his fists.

"What's the point of a few seconds of pleasure if your essence is out of whack?"

The lion snarled to himself, ignoring the massive lump between his legs that threatened to rip through his cotton blend pants.

"Fluid retention is the key to a happy life."

He'd occasionally given in--cursed Quiwizan's existence, tugged his trousers down and shot a load big enough to populate an entire galaxy of lions.

The last time he lost control was three months ago.

Too caught up in the agony of denial, Donathan was oblivious to the naked bat girl's bare feet padding on fine, plush carpet.

To her soft giggle.

To the chloroform-drenched dishrag wedged against his panting maw.


"But seminal retention's so good for you," said Anastasia, hand wrapped around Donathan's engorged cock. "You heard what Quiwizan said."

"NO!" The outstretched naked lion bucked and thrashed, hands twisting against the tight coils of rope. "You have to make me cum! I don't care about that dumb otter!"

She kissed the tip of his cock. His pre stretched from his piss slit to her plump lips. "Do I have to? Your friends downstairs didn't seem to consider orgasms very important."

Donathan shuddered. "I told you! They can go overboard sometimes. I was the one who told them to be nonviolent. They had to get creative." He flexed his powerful thigh muscles to try and get some friction against Anastasia's palm.

"Regardless, we don't need to worry about them anymore." She used her other hand to tease the horribly sensitive cockhead. "As long as you get rid of them. Bodies smell real bad after a few days, you know."

"You worthless bitch," snarled Donathan. "I oughta hack those wings off." He gulped and flexed his huge toes. "Tit for tat. You have any idea how long I've known those two?"

"You leave my precious little wings alone, now." She jerked his erection, wings twitching behind her in satisfaction. "Whatever happened to nonviolence? Huh? Forgetting the teachings of glorious master Quiwizan?"

"Shit! Don't stop!" said Donathan, eyes wide. "We can talk about this later! I really need to cum so bad! Please!" His torso strained, and a four-pack peeped through his sweaty coat. "It's been months!"

Anastasia rolled her eyes up to the side, as if in thought. "Tell you what, Donnie. There's way too many of you sociopathic criminal types around, so I figure the gene pool could use a little cleaning." She stroked harder and stared into the lion's bulging eyes. "I'll let you ejaculate as long as I can make sure you don't go around impregnating anyone, m'kay? No fucking, no sperm banks, nada."

"Yes! YES!" Donathan's butt thrust into Anastasia's handjob. "You have my word! Anything! Just make me cum!"

She cooed. Her pussy lips, still a healthy satisfied pink, twitched. "Aw, gonna have your orgasm, Donnie? Screw Quiwizan, yeah? Who needs some dumb PawTube hippy?" Up and down went her hand.

"KEEP GOING! KEEP FUCKIN' GOING!" The massive felid's entire body clenched--tendons jutted through matted, sweaty fur; his mane frizzed out; the three-seater couch under him trembled.

"There it is! There it is!" Anastasia laughed out loud as Donathan's cock jerked and his ballsack pulled in.

Donathan threw his head back and roared so loud the office windows rattled.

But not in pleasure.

"What's wrong, Donnie?" Anastasia had both hands on his thighs; his poor cock, aimlessly shooting all over the room with no stimulation, throbbed and twitched. "Doesn't it feel good? It's coming out, isn't it?"

"NO! YOU GODDAMN BITCH! DON'T STOP STROKING!" Donathan's jaw tendons flexed as he gnashed his teeth. "DON'T RUIN IT!"

"Don't ruin it? Hm, where have I heard that before?" The lion's massive load, three months in the making, sprayed out of him like water from an out-of-control firehose. "Oh, that's right. Too bad your kitty buddies never got around to doing that." She slapped one of his meaty thighs. "I quite enjoyed it, I have to say."

"Wait--" Donathan groaned, staring at Anastasia with a withering glare. "Wait till I get my paws on you, you miserable bitch." His cock shuddered one last time, and a pathetic drizzle of cum mixed with pre snaked its way down his shaft.

"Sure thing, Donnie. First, we gotta keep our promises." A bit of cum had landed on one of her wing claws--she flicked it off and gave it a lick.

"What promises? You didn't give me a proper orgasm, bitch!" snapped the lion.

"That wasn't the deal. What I said was I'd let you ejaculate, and it sure looks like you did!" She giggled and motioned all around. Sure enough, Donathan's office desk, his luxurious rug, his collection of ancient books . . . nothing was spared. "Let's see here."

"What are you doing?" The veins in Donathan's neck stood out. "You crazy bitch! Get away from me!"

"Like I said, I'm just keeping my end of the deal! We promised I'd make sure you don't go around impregnating anyone." In one hand, she clutched Donathan's balls. "A lady's gotta keep her word, right?" In the other, she grasped one of her wing claws like a surgeon would a scalpel.

"No! WHAT? GOD, NO! PLEASE!" The lion screamed and thrust his hips.

Anastasia narrowed her eyes, looking for the best incision spot. "Oh, relax, you big baby! I gotta be somewhere in a bit, so chill and let me do this."

"YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO THIS! DON'T, PLEASE!"

Razor-sharp keratin found sensitive skin and nerves.

"AARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGH!"


Anastasia twirled the microphone as if it were a baton, strutting into the packed living room. Revelers in Halloween costumes--vampires with fangs that resembled tusks, mummies with yellowed bandages, figures with glow-in-the-dark jack-o'-lantern masks--pirouetted in synch with the flashing lights, compelled by booze, Molly, or, as it was for most of them, both.

She marched up to the dog sporting the Hannibal Lecter mask and tapped him on the back of the head with the prop mic.

Denny turned. "Anya! Where the fuck you been? I've tried calling you a couple times," he said, voice a monotonous buzz as it competed with the ear-shattering bass.

"Well, I got tied up," she said and giggled at her own wit.

He held up a floppy, oily wedge topped with cheap pepperoni. "See? Kept my word. But never mind that. The Tower." He crossed his arms. "Did you go there? Pics, or it didn't happen."

"I got something better." She raised her left hand.

"Anya, what the fuck--" Denny's jaw dropped behind the grill of the mask as the cold pizza fell from his clammy paw.

She clutched, in her fist, a fuzzy, wrinkled sack. A gooey red liquid dripped from it and spotted the floor.

"Don't you like it?" The distorted voice didn't come from her, but from everywhere--the partygoers had all stopped, mid-dance, bodies unnaturally contorted. Their heads, obscured by hackeneyed Halloween fixtures, faced Denny.

"What the hell is going here?" rasped the dog, taking a step back, eyes going back and forth between the frozen revelers.

Anastasia's eyes turned pitch-black.