Chapter 2: Struck down
"-ey!, kid!," a finger snapped in front of his face.
Quill blinked, coming back to himself, trapped cock throbbing in his pants.
"H-huh?"
"I've been calling you for a while now. "
"O-oh. so-so-orry." He stammered.
Quill could barely focus on the man he was apologizing to, his eyes straying to the woman beside him. This close to him, Quill could smell the vanilla of her perfume.
Marcus just smirked knowingly, his voice dripping with condescension.
He tossed a heavy laundry bag onto the counter. "Got some special items in here. Don't ruin them like you did the silk shirts last month, or I'll have your boss put you on the street."
"Is he okay?" the woman asked, her voice a rich, smoky alto with a tiny accent at the end of her words.
She looked at Quill with a mixture of impatience and curiosity.
"He looks like he's about to have a stroke."
"He's just starstruck, babe," Marcus laughed, squeezing her waist and pulling her flush against his side. The hand the brunette wrapped around Marcus in return flexed against Marcus's side, the muscles of her bicep rippling under her tanned skin and distracting him but not enough for him not to hear what he was saying. "People like him don't see women like you unless they're looking at a magazine."
Quill felt the familiar, bitter sting of jealousy. It burned in his gut, hotter than the heat of a thousand Suns.
Because WHY?
Why did a guy like Marcus get a goddess like this? Why did the universe reward the arrogant while he was stuck inhaling detergent and dreaming of such a touch?
"Just… just the bag?" Quill managed to stammer, his voice cracking.
He looked down, desperate to hide the crimson drop of blood that had finally escaped his nostril.
"Yeah. And make it quick. We've got a flight to catch in three hours," Marcus said, turning her toward the door. "Let's go, Yvonne. This place smells awful."
Quill watched them walk out. He watched the way Yvonne's powerful thighs moved under her leggings, the way her soccer ball sized glutes flexed with every step.
As soon as the door clicked shut and he saw them disappear around the corner toward the parking lot, Quill felt his restraint crumble.
He lunged for the bag.
He ripped it open, his breath coming in ragged gasps.
He didn't give a shit as he flinged Marcus's suits out of his way, digging through the expensive fabrics until he found them at the bottom beside a golden watch.
Swallowing, he tugged the material out slowly, letting it unfold in his trembling hands.
Workout Shorts that had Yvonne's name stitched lovingly on the back of it.
They were grey, high-waisted, and still damp from what must have been an intense leg day. They were heavy with her scent.
The scent of her sweat, her effort, her skin.
"Oh god..." Quill whimpered.
He was beyond logic now.
The jealousy and the isolation had pushed him over the edge.
He didn't even go back to his hidden corner.
He stood right there behind the counter, the grey fabric pressed against his face. He could feel the moisture of her workout session against his skin. His hand went to his fly, his fingers fumbling with the button.
He was going to do it.
Right here.
He was going to claim a piece of her for himself, even if it was just a pathetic, lonely fantasy.
He closed his eyes, imagining those powerful biceps wrapping around him, those heavy breasts pressing against his chest, her voice whispering his name instead of Marcus's.
His five inch cock was out, hard and weeping pre-cum, his hand closing around the base with a desperate, frantic grip.
He began to stroke, his movements jagged and rhythmic, his nose buried deep in the crotch of the grey shorts.
Schlick. Schlick. Schlick.
The sound of his own breathing filled his ears.
He was so close. He could see her in his mind's eye, looking down at him with those mahogany eyes—
DING.
The chime of the door was like a gunshot.
Quill froze. Time seemed to liquefy and stretch. He looked up, his glasses sliding down his sweat-slicked nose.
Standing in the doorway was Marcus and Yvonne.
"I forgot my watch in the-"we Marcus started, then stopped.
His face went from confusion to a mask of pure, unadulterated disgust.
"What the hell are you doing!"
But Yvonne's expression was worse.
It was a violent rage.
Her shorts, her private, sweat-stained clothes were pressed against the face of a sniveling, half-naked creep who was currently jerking off in front of her.
"You… you piece of filth!" She roared.
She didn't wait for Marcus to say anything else.
She didn't call the police. She moved with the explosive speed of a professional athlete.
In three strides, she was behind the counter.
Quill didn't even have time to pull up his pants.
He stood there, exposed and pathetic, clutching the shorts like a shield.
"I-I can explain-"
WHAM.
She didn't wait for an explanation, oh no, she threw a professional, textbook-perfect cross at his panicked face.
Her fist, backed by the full weight of her muscular frame and fueled by righteous fury, connected squarely with Quill's jaw.
It felt like being hit by a freight train. Quill's head snapped back. He heard a sickening crack as his jaw dislocated.
His vision exploded into a thousand white stars.
The force of the blow lifted him off his feet. As he fell backward, his heels caught on the edge of the very laundry basket he'd been raiding earlier.
He flailed, his arms windmilling, the grey shorts still clutched in his hand but he couldn't fight gravity.
And he went down like a crashing rocket, his head hitting the sharp, reinforced steel corner of the massive industrial washer.
THUD.
The sound of the back of his head meeting the washer was dull and wet.
Quill didn't feel the pain. Not really. He felt a sudden, overwhelming coldness spreading from the back of his skull.
The bright lights of the shop dimmed, flickering like a dying bulb.
He saw Yvonne's face, not angry anymore, but horrified at the sight of him bleeding out, and Marcus's panicked expression as he reached for his phone with shaky hands.
He didn't want to die..... But like most of the things he wanted, he never got them.
He moaned and with struggle, turned away from the both of them, eyes feeling hot and heavy with grief and sudden exhaustion.
The last thing Quill saw was the grey fabric of the shorts, drifting out of his lifeless fingers and settling on the dirty floor.
Then, there was only blackness.
A heavy, silent void that swallowed the scent of detergent, the sound of the machines, and the pathetic, lonely life of Quill Steven.
He was dead.
And he had died the way he had lived: a pervert, a loser, and a nobody.
But in the darkness, something began to flicker. Not a light, but a voice.
A cold, mechanical pulse that started at the base of his non-existent brain and vibrated through the emptiness.
[COMPATIBILITY CONFIRMED...]
[SOUL TRANSFER INITIATED...]
[TARGET WORLD: SECTOR 4-G "THE GARDEN"...]
[UPDATING PARAMETERS... STATUS: DEGENERATE LOSER...]
[INITIALIZING SYSTEM: WELCOME HOST...]
Quill wanted to scream, but he had no mouth. He wanted to run, but he had no legs.
He was pulled into a vortex of swirling data and static, his old life being stripped away like wet paper, leaving only a core of raw, desperate desire.
'Just once….Why can't I be the one to get the girl?'
The void cracked…then shattered.