Chapter 5: Feeding Time
The Elm Street Diner smelled of grease, coffee, and chaos. The neon ‘OPEN’ sign buzzed, painting the swirling snow outside in unpredictable red flickers. Inside, it was a portrait of surreal depravity. A heavyset truck driver in nothing but socks and a trucker hat was bent over the counter, vigorously fucking the twenty-something cashier, whose squeals of pleasure were punctuated by the ding of the malfunctioning order bell. Two businessmen, ties hanging from their necks like nooses, were tangled on a vinyl booth, grunting as they took turns fucking each other’s mouths. The short-order cook was visible through the pass-through window, his apron on the floor, masturbating furiously over a sputtering grill as a waitress knelt under the counter, her head bobbing in his lap.
Jan, Amy, Jason, and Yukio stood just inside the door, Godfrey pressed against Jan's. The scene was overwhelming, a symphony of wet flesh and mindless hunger. “Okay,” Jan muttered, her face pale. “Party’s in full swing.”
Vivian was already in the large back booth, as agreed. She looked like a scared rabbit in a war zone. Her vibrant red hair seemed muted, her hands clasped tightly on the table. She flinched as a particularly loud groan echoed from a corner. When she saw Jan, her eyes widened with relief and terror.
Jan slid into the booth opposite her. Amy, Jason, and Yukio formed a loose, nervous perimeter, trying not to stare at the carnage. Godfrey settled under the table with a disapproving hwuff.
“Viv,” Jan said, her voice low and serious, cutting through the din. “We do this the way we practiced. The siphon. You pull from them.” She jerked her thumb at the room. “You channel it to me. I filter it, purify it, and use it. You don’t take a drop for yourself. Understood?”
Vivian nodded, her throat working. “I’m so hungry, Jan. The noise… it’s like a thousand screaming radios.”
“Then let’s turn it down.” Jan reached across the Formica table and took Vivian’s hands. They were ice-cold. Jan closed her eyes, reaching for the core of her own power, the well that was nearly dry. She began the Green Moon syncopation, a rhythmic internal pulse designed to align two practitioners. After a moment, she felt Vivian’s energy—a dark, rippling, hungry thing—shudder into sync.
“Okay, Viv. Now, pull. Gently. From the edges.”
Vivian took a shuddering breath. Her eyes fluttered closed. Subtle tendrils of shadow, invisible to non-magical eyes, seeped from her shoulders, slithering across the diner floor. They connected to the entwined patrons not as physical strings, but as conduits for the raw, chaotic sexual energy the candy produced.
The effect on the room was immediate. The truck driver’s thrusts slowed. The cashier’s squeals became confused murmurs. The businessmen’s grunting lost its frantic edge. The cook paused, looking down at the waitress with a momentary flicker of bewilderment. The intense, compulsive lust was being siphoned away, leaving behind only the bald, awkward reality of public sex.
But the energy had to go somewhere. It flooded into Vivian. Her back arched, a silent gasp on her lips. Her eyes shot open, their normal warm brown now swimming with pools of inky blackness. Her skin flushed deep crimson. “Jan… it’s so much… it’s filthy…”
“Give it to me,” Jan commanded, tightening her grip. “Push it into me. Now.”
The transfer wasn’t gentle. Vivian, fighting her own succubus nature to not gorge on the feast, shoved the torrent of stolen lust into Jan. Jan’s body jolted as if electrocuted. It was unstructured, aggressive, jangling power. It wasn’t pleasure; it was a storm of feral need, a chemical scream. Jan’s own magic, honed by the Green Moon, acted as a filter, straining out the compulsive, magical taint of the candy, wresting the raw energy under her control. But to channel it, to shape it for the cure, she needed a perfect circuit. Skin-to-skin contact wasn’t enough. They needed union.
“Amy, Jason—the booth. Keep everyone back,” Jan gritted out, her voice strained.
Amy and Jason shifted, turning their backs to the booth, creating a living curtain. Yukio watched the room, her face a mask of stunned fascination.
Jan didn’t ask for permission. She released Vivian’s hands, stood, and slid into the booth next to her. Vivian was trembling, vibrating with the foreign energy. Jan cupped her face, forcing her to look at her. “Focus on me, Viv. Just me. We ride it together.” She leaned in and kissed her.
It wasn’t a kiss of passion, but of necessity. Vivian’s lips were fever-hot. As their mouths connected, the circuit solidified. The chaotic energy flowing into Jan stabilized, becoming a roaring river instead of a crashing wave. But stabilizing it meant feeling it, all of it. Jan’s own body responded, a predictable, maddening echo. Heat pooled low in her belly. Her nipples hardened against her thrift-store sweater. Between her legs, she felt a familiar, aching wetness.
She broke the kiss, breathing hard. “We need more. To cure them all.” Her hands went to the button of her jeans. “Stay with me.”
Vivian, her eyes now fully black, pupils consuming the iris, nodded. Her timidity was gone, burned away by the power. A predatory, vampish smile touched her lips. “It’s cleaner when it comes from you,” she whispered, her voice a decadent purr.
Jan kicked off her jeans and panties, shoving them under the table with Godfrey, who sighed. She straddled Vivian’s lap on the vinyl seat. Vivian’s hands, now tipped with faint shadows, gripped Jan’s hips, her nails biting in. Jan reached down between Vivian’s thighs, finding her through her leggings. She was soaked, her heat intense. Jan yanked the fabric aside and positioned herself, lowering onto Vivian’s waiting fingers.
Vivian pushed three fingers inside her in one smooth, deep stroke. Jan threw her head back, a cry tearing from her throat. It wasn’t just the physical penetration. It was the conduit slamming fully open. The stolen lust from the diner patrons—the truck driver’s brutish urge, the cashier’s performative ecstasy, the cook’s lonely release—all of it coursed through Vivian, was filtered through the intimate connection of their joined bodies, and transformed into raw, usable magical power within Jan.
“Fuck, Viv, move,” Jan gasped, riding her hand. Vivian fucked her hard, her thumb grinding circles on Jan’s clit. Jan braced her hands on the back of the booth, her ass rising and falling, each downward plunge accompanied by a wet, slap– ing sound that competed with the dying moans from the rest of the diner.
The power built, a terrifying, glorious pressure in Jan’s core. She could feel it—the signatures of the candy’s spell on each person in the room, like gritty knots in the energy flow. With each thrust of Vivian’s fingers, Jan’s own magic, now supercharged, unraveled one of those knots.
The truck driver pulled out of the cashier with a confused grunt. He looked at his flaccid cock, then at the woman bent over the counter, then at his own naked body. A deep, crimson blush spread from his chest to his forehead. He uttered a strangled, “Oh, my god,” and fumbled for his pants.
One knot undone.
The businessmen fell apart, coughing, wiping their mouths with the backs of their hands, unable to look at each other.
Another.
The cook shoved the waitress away, grabbing his apron to cover himself.
Another.
Jan was close, the dual sensations of a brutal, squelching fuck and a torrent of mystical power driving her to the edge. “All of them, Viv, give me all of it!” she snarled.
Vivian growled, a sound not entirely human. She shifted her angle, driving her fingers deep, curling them. Jan saw stars. Her orgasm hit like a localized earthquake, a massive, concussive release that coincided with the final surge of energy. A pulse of invisible force radiated from their booth. The last dregs of the candy’s magic in the diner shattered.
Silence.
Not true silence, but the absence of sexual noise. It was replaced by the clatter of dishes being dropped, startled gasps, a chorus of bewildered “what the hell?” and the frantic scrambling for scattered clothing.
Jan slumped against Vivian, spent, trembling. Vivian’s eyes had returned to normal, wide and filled with tears of relief and shame. The shadows were gone. Under the table, Godfrey licked Jan’s bare ankle.
Jan slowly, awkwardly, lifted herself off Vivian’s hand, which slid out with a lewd, wet sound. She grabbed a stack of napkins from the dispenser, handing some to Vivian, cleaning herself up with rough, efficient motions. Her magic was no longer a flicker. It was a bonfire in her veins, ready to be shaped.
All around them, people were dressing, faces etched with confusion and dawning horror. They muttered apologies to strangers, avoided eye contact, and hurried for the exit. Within minutes, the diner was empty save for them, the stunned short-order cook peering from the kitchen, and a lone, forgotten plate of congealing fries.
Jan pulled her jeans back on, wincing. She felt powerful, but also scraped raw, used. She looked at Vivian, who was curled into herself, looking small again. “You did good, Viv. You didn’t hurt anyone. You saved them.”
Vivian just nodded, wiping her eyes.
Jason turned around, his face a masterpiece of awkwardness. “So… that worked?”
“Yeah,” Jan said, her voice hoarse. She flexed her fingers, feeling the energy crackle. “It worked. I can feel the cure now. It’s not a trickle. It’s a fucking firehose.” She looked at her friends—Amy’s awestruck stare, Yukio’s raised eyebrow, Jason’s determined nod. “Next stop is the hospital. We’re getting that baby out.”
The hospital corridor was a stark, fluorescent-lit tunnel of antiseptic silence after the diner’s humid roar. Jan’s boots squeaked on the linoleum, a percussive counterpoint to the frantic energy still humming in her veins. Godfrey padded beside her, a solid, warm presence against the sterile chill, while Amy, Jason, Yukio, and Vivian followed close behind, their collective breath held.
They found the room—312—its door slightly ajar. Inside, the scene was a different kind of tension. Casey was propped up on the bed, her face sheened with sweat, baby Rick in her arms, Mike’s hand resting on her back. Dr. Cho, calm and focused, monitored a machine that beeped with steady, relentless urgency. Stacy stood like a sentinel near the head of the bed, her muscular arms crossed, a fitness instructor’s posture repurposed for protection.
In the corner, Irene and Mona sat on two uncomfortable chairs, a gulf of mutual disapproval keeping them apart despite their physical closeness. Nurse Lisa adjusted an IV line, her movements quick and efficient.
“Jan,” Mike breathed, the relief on his face instantly warping into confusion as he took in her disheveled state, the strange crew behind her. “What's going on out there? There was a commotion and then it faded away.”
“No time,” Jan cut him off, her gaze sweeping the room. She could feel it now, a skill honed in the diner’s chaos: the absence of the candy’s taint here. The air was clean of that particular magical filth. “The candy hasn’t reached this floor. Good. We have a—”
The air in the room thickened, then chilled, not with the hospital’s AC but with a sudden, profound sweetness that coated the back of the throat. The scent of spun sugar and decayed fruit bloomed from nowhere. In the space beside the sealed window, where only a moment before there had been empty air, a man coalesced.
He was not tall, and his appearance seemed to shift if you looked directly at him—a tweed suit melting into a garish hawaiian shirt, then a crisp tuxedo, all in the periphery. His face was pleasant, forgettable, save for his eyes, which were the hard, shiny black of licorice drops.
“Well,” the Candy Man said, his voice a cheerful rustle of cellophane wrappers. “What a cozy tableau.”
Dr. Cho froze, her dark eyes narrowing not in fear, but in sharp, clinical assessment. Stacy shifted instantly, placing her body between the entity and the bed, her fists clenched. Nurse Lisa let out a small, choked gasp and stumbled back against the wall.
The Candy Man’s glossy eyes swept the room. They passed over Casey’s straining form, over Mike’s terrified face, with utter disinterest. They lingered on Dr. Cho for a second before dismissing her. “The practitioner is immune,” he mused, almost to himself. “Boring.”
His gaze settled on Stacy. He smiled, a row of perfectly white, perfectly square teeth. From his pocket, he produced a single, glistening purple gumdrop. “For you, my fit friend? A burst of energy. It’s quite tart.”
Stacy didn’t flinch. “I avoid processed sugar,” she said, her voice low and steady, every muscle in her body wire-tight. “Keeps the body clean.”
“Pity.” The candy vanished back into his pocket. He turned next to Nurse Lisa, who trembled violently. He seemed to drink in her fear, his smile widening. He offered a lollipop swirled like a galaxy. She just shook her head, tears streaking her cheeks, unable to speak.
Then he pivoted, his movements unnaturally smooth, to face the two grandmothers. Irene sat ramrod straight, her conservative blouse buttoned to her throat, her hands clasped in her lap so tightly the knuckles were white. Mona fidgeted, her multicolored hair a stark contrast to the drab chair, her gaze darting from the Candy Man to her daughter and back.
He extended his hands. In his right palm lay a piece of amber butterscotch, wrapped in gold foil, smelling of rich butter and nostalgia. In his left, a vibrant green lime hard candy, sharp and promising. He offered the butterscotch to Irene. He offered the lime to Mona.
“For the weary,” he said, his voice now a conspiratorial whisper that slithered through the beep of the heart monitor. “A moment’s distraction from all this… stressful biology. A little treat.”
Irene’s eyes locked on the gold foil. Her rigid posture wavered. A flush crept up her neck. Her lips, usually pressed in a thin line of disapproval, parted slightly. The promise in that candy wasn’t just sweetness; it was a release from a lifetime of tight control, from the fear for her son, from the overwhelming, medical strangeness of this room. Her hand twitched in her lap.
Mona stared at the green candy. It represented everything she’d always preached—boldness, spontaneity, a rejection of the mundane. It was an adventure offered in a single, forbidden bite. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips. Her fingers, adorned with chunky silver rings, uncurled from her knees.
“Mom?!” Mike’s voice was a strangled cry of betrayal, ripped from him as he saw the naked longing on his mother’s face.
“Mona, don’t you dare!” Casey grunted, the command morphing into a groan as a new contraction seized her.
But the women didn’t seem to hear their children. The Candy Man’s smile was a beacon of terrible permission. Irene’s hand began to rise, slowly, trembling, from her lap. Mona leaned forward, just an inch, drawn by the candy’s electric, citrine glow.
The beeping of the heart monitor seemed to grow louder, faster, a frantic drumbeat against the silent, hungry temptation hanging in the sterile air.
The beeping of the heart monitor seemed to grow louder, faster, a frantic drumbeat against the silent, hungry temptation hanging in the sterile air.
Irene’s trembling fingers closed around the butterscotch. Mona snatched the lime candy. The foil tore in unison, a sharp, crinkling sound that cut through the medical hum. They popped the sweets into their mouths.
Jan lunged forward. “Spit it out! Don’t—”
It was too late. Their eyes glazed over, the pupils swallowing the iris in a black, glossy wave identical to the diner patrons’. All the tension, the fear, the bickering—it melted from their faces, replaced by a vacant, serene hunger. They turned to each other, chewing slowly.
“Mom, no,” Mike whispered, but the women didn’t hear him.
Irene stood first, movements fluid and alien. She grabbed the collar of her sensible blouse and ripped, sending buttons pinging across the floor. Her practical beige bra followed, torn off and discarded. Mona let out a giddy, unhinged laugh and yanked her own psychedelic tunic over her head, her full breasts swaying. They fell on each other, a tangle of middle-aged flesh and wiry hair, meeting in a crushing, open-mouthed kiss that was more teeth and tongue than passion.
The Candy Man clapped his hands together once, a sound like breaking peppermint. He winked at Jan, his licorice eyes gleaming with malice. Then his gaze found Vivian, who was shivering behind Jan, still saturated with the diner’s energy. He took a half-step back, his triumphant smirk faltering for a fraction of a second, as if he’d smelled something that didn’t belong in his confectionary world. “Interesting,” he hissed.
Then he was simply gone. The scent of decayed fruit lingered.
On the floor, the grandmothers were a frantic spectacle. Irene had Mona’s nipple between her teeth, biting and sucking with a frantic grunt as her hand shoved down into Mona’s flowing skirt. “So messy,” Irene slurred, her voice thick with a desire she’d never acknowledged. “All this… color. Needs order.”
“Then fucking order me, you tight-assed bitch,” Mona gasped, arching into the biting mouth. She fumbled with Irene’s tailored slacks, yanking them and her panties down to her knees. Irene’s neatly trimmed pubic hair was exposed. Mona didn’t hesitate. She pushed Irene onto her back on the cold linoleum, spread her legs, and buried her face between them with a desperate, starving moan.
Irene’s back bowed off the floor, a raw, guttural scream tearing from her throat—a sound of fifty years of propriety incinerated. “Yes! Lick it! Clean it up!” Her hands fisted in Mona’s multicolored hair, grinding the other woman’s mouth against her cunt. Mona’s tongue worked with a frenzied discipline, lapping at Irene’s clit, fucking into her with a stiff, precise rhythm that was the opposite of her chaotic appearance.
Mike had spun away, his face buried in Casey’s shoulder. Casey stared at the ceiling, her contraction forgotten, her jaw clenched so tight a muscle twitched in her cheek. “I will burn my eyes out later,” she muttered.
Stacy watched, her arms still crossed, a clinical assessment in her gaze. “Honestly? This is healthier than the passive-aggressive shit over the baby’s middle name. At least they’re communicating.”
Mona came first, shuddering against Irene’s thigh as Irene’s commanding fingers found her soaked center and pushed inside, crooking just so. Then Irene followed, bucking under Mona’s relentless mouth, her climax a silent, shaking rupture that left her gasping. They collapsed together, naked, damp, and panting on the hospital floor, limbs intertwined.
Jan was already moving, the power from the diner a live wire in her hands. She knelt beside them, placing a palm on each of their sweaty foreheads. She pushed, not with physical force, but with the clean, Green Moon counter-frequency she’d refined in the booth. The compulsive magic of the candy shattered like spun sugar under a hammer.
Irene and Mona jolted as if slapped. They pushed apart, staring at each other’s naked bodies, then down at their own, with identical expressions of profound, soul-scorching horror.
“What in the name of God—” Irene scrambled back, covering her breasts with one arm, snatching her torn blouse with the other.
“Oh, hell no,” Mona breathed, grabbing her tunic and holding it in front of herself like a shield. They dressed in a frantic, silent scramble, not looking at anyone, their faces flaming. They avoided each other’s eyes entirely.
Mike risked a glance. “Jan. Will they… remember this later?”
Jan stood, wiping her hands on her jeans. She felt drained again, the bonfire of power now a manageable flame. “Probably not. The spell makes people forget. But I’m not sure.” She looked at Jason and Yukio, who had witnessed the diner cleanup. “You guys ate that candy earlier tonight. What do you remember?”
Jason frowned, leaning against the doorframe. “It’s foggy. I remember wanting you, Amy, and Yukio… badly. I remember skin. But the specifics?” He shook his head. “It’s like a drunk night. Glimpses.”
“Same,” Yukio said, her usual bravado subdued. “I remember the feeling. Not the… procedural details.”
As if on cue, Irene finished buttoning her ruined blouse as best she could. She glared at Mona, her dignity a tattered cloak she clutched around her. “Your… lifestyle,” she spat, the word dripping with renewed contempt, “is a bad influence on this environment. All that… unchecked emotion.”
Mona, now in her crumpled tunic, fired back, “Your repressed, Puritan ice-queen routine is what sucks the joy out of everything! No wonder Mike moved to Chicago!”
The familiar bickering resumed, thin and sharp, layered over the profound, unacknowledged horror just beneath. Mike and Casey shared a look over the baby’s head. Their eyes held a private, exhausted relief. The immediate nightmare was over. The deeper strangeness remained.
Jan turned from the grandmothers, her focus shifting to the window, to the snowy city where the Candy Man had vanished. The hospital was clear, but the city wasn’t. She still had work to do. The firehose of power was ready. She met Stacy’s eyes, then Dr. Cho’s. “Okay,” she said, her voice low and steady. “Now we secure this floor. Then we take back the city.”