Title: The Sacrifices I Make For You

By JD Sampson

jdsampsn@cox.net

Rated PG-13

Summary: Hannibal warned him not to go out with her. . . . . .



The Sacrifices I Make For You
By JD Sampson

Lying still for a moment, he tried to get his bearings. He seemed to be on hard stone - a sidewalk maybe? No. Too cold. Too damp. Too much texture to be feeling it through the fabric of his sweater . . . which he wasn't wearing.

Skin to stone. Face took a slow, easy breath hoping that it wasn't as bad as it was starting to feel.

The last thing he remembered he was sitting on the couch at Lauren's house, enjoying a full-bodied, red wine. She was talking about the defense attorney she was about to beat at trial and he was busy trying to push Hannibal's voice out of his brain.

'A lawyer! You're seeing a lawyer! As in officer of the COURT? Have you lost your mind?'

Still, this didn't make sense. Lawyers might haul you off to jail but they didn't strap you down to a stone slab in the middle of a dungeon.

Dungeon.

Hell. Now that he could focus the word came instantly to mind. Stone, moss-laden walls, the musty smell and were those manacles hanging from the ceiling?

Oh boy.

One more breath, slow but not so easy this time.

Face lifted his head as best he could in order to get a look at himself.

Oh boy.

Clothes gone. Ankles manacled the to the slab. Wrists in the same predicament above his head, he presumed. Couldn't see them, but he could feel it.

This was bad on so many levels.

"I was beginning to think you might never wake up, you've been out for hours." Lauren's sweet voice came from behind him, out of range of his vision. Her and others from the sound of footsteps on the stone floor.

"You know me, I can sleep standing up if I have to."

As they moved around in front of him, his panic level rose another notch.

There were seven of them, all dressed in hooded, long, black robes. Lauren's hood was down, puddled around her neck. As she took a step toward him, her robe opened slight at the front of her robe revealing a path of creamy, white skin.

Face felt himself rise to the occasion, but he tried to disguise his body's traitorous act with a shiver. "You know it's like thirty degrees in here. Don't you guys believe in central heating?"

"Don't worry," said Lauren. "It will be plenty warm where you're going."

The gang of seven surrounded the slab. Lips murmuring a foreign-tongued chant.

"Okay, let's talk about this for a second."

Lauren reached into the folds of her robe, then drew out a shiny dagger.

"Nice trick. Where were you keeping it?"

Lauren lifted the dagger up toward the sky. "Oh great evil master, there is much to be done. For on the morrow, the man who opposes you will be found innocent and be allowed to resume his work - his fight - against you and your obedient servants. I have tried, great master, to defeat him with the powers of this world but his faith is too strong. O'Malley must be controlled so that others will see the error of his ways."

"O'Malley?" Face's mind raced to catch up. "That's the priest who's on trial for murdering one of his parishioners. That's the case you're prosecuting!" Face didn't know the man, but he had read about the case in the papers. The consensus was that the old priest was innocent of all charges but that he refused to aide in his defense in deference to another lost soul who had admitted to the crime in the sanctity of the confessional booth. "He's innocent, right?"

"Of course he is," Lauren said, losing her 'oh mighty one' chanting tone for a moment. "If he was guilty I wouldn't have to worry about the jury freeing him, would I?" She rolled her eyes. Then rolled her shoulders. Her robe slipped down and off her lithe body.

Damn, he'd been so looking forward to touching that body.

"Oh great evil master," she began again. "If you will aide me so that I may triumph in court tomorrow, I will give you this human sacrifice as a token of my appreciation."

"Sacrifice!" Deep breath - neither slow or easy. "Look, don't you need a virgin for this kind of thing? Because I am SO, not your guy. I mean, I haven't been a virgin since God knows when."

The entire congregation cringed at his choice of words.

"What I'm saying is," Face continued, hopelessly trying to gesture with his bound hands. "Nothing about me is virgin. I mean it. I have heard it, seen it, done it all and then some. Things that would shock you!" Then he took a long, hard look at the shapely, naked body with the knife. "Okay, they probably wouldn't shock YOU, but your average person would be like - whoa - that's kinky. You know what I'm saying? So this whole sacrifice thing is a waste of time. The dark lord is not going to be happy with this. No purity. No virginity. No real morals to speak of. Hell, I'm like already practically sitting at his right hand, if you know what I mean."

The cold, steel of the dagger touched him in one of his less than virginal parts.

"Okay, easy there. No rash decisions. Think this through."

The flat of the blade caressed him. Up. Down. Gliding gently over the tip.

"Lips are usually more my thing, but hey, in for a penny in for a pound, right?" It was all he could do not to struggle. Not that struggling would help and at the moment it might hurt - really hurt. "A deal! Let's make a deal. You like me, right?"

Lauren smiled and he could see that she did.

"Then it would be a real shame to waste me on a simple sacrifice - right? So here's what I'm thinking. I know this guy, sweet as can be. He would be a GREAT sacrifice. The old horny master would just love this guy. Love him. Because he is just the epitome of goodness and innocence and hell, I think he may even still be a virgin. Huh? What do you think?"

"I think you're talking nonsense."

"And I think," came a somewhat Southern voice. "He's talkin' about me."

Face didn't need to see him to know who it was or who was with him. Seconds later robed bodies were flying, colliding with each other and stiff stone walls. One by one, Hannibal and BA took out the followers while Murdock blocked Lauren from her prey.

"She is a pretty one, Face. I'll grant you that." Murdock's right hand shot out, caught Lauren's wrist then forced her to drop the knife. "But she's not too smart. She left a map to this place laying on the table in her apartment."

"I knew I should have let George find his own way!" She cursed.

"Could someone please get me loose?" Face asked, none to patiently.

His teammates exchanged 'not me' glances.

"Very funny. Murdock, come on, be a pal and get me up."

Murdock's eyes roamed south. "Looks like you got up all on your own."

"Yeah," said Hannibal. "And don't they traditionally need a virgin for this sort of thing."

"That's what I said."

"Right," said Murdock, circling the table. "That was just before you offered ME up as a sacrifice."

"It was a stall tactic - that's all. I mean, you're no more a virgin than I am, right?"

Murdock's eyes narrowed as his lips twisted in deep thought.

Apparently deciding he had suffered enough, BA freed Face from his bonds. "Leave it to you to almost get killed on a date."

Face sat, glanced around the room and when he didn't spot his clothes slipped into Lauren's discarded robe. "Hey, cops and MPs I get, but Satanists are kind of low on my watch list."

"Hey Face," Murdock said, "when you say virgin, does that include like, first base and second base or are we strictly talking home run hitter here?"

"Let's find something to tie this bunch up with," Hannibal suggested. "Then we can leave them with a note for the cops."

"Cops," said Murdock. "Mary Sue Gilliam's father was a cop so I was always very careful not to put my hands where they didn't belong. But Georgiana Neely, that was a whole different story. We used to go skinny dipping in the lake by my house, well, not skinny dipping actually, more like chubby dipping, I guess, since we weren't naked which sort of defeats the whole purpose and then there was. . . . "

"Shut up, fool and help me!" BA shouted, his voice echoing off the stone walls.

"Honestly, Face," Hannibal fussed. "You could get in trouble at a Girl Scout Meeting."

Face sighed. He was never going to hear the end of this one.

"When you say virgin. . ." Murdock continued. "Does that include. . . . .."



The end