The stress of the situation was causing Cym’s higher mental functions to go haywire, and he became increasingly frantic. Smashing random buttons on the machine did nothing, neither did pounding on the window of the sphere helplessly. His knowledge of computers was limited to what he had learned from a bristly librarian a few weeks ago, and it hadn’t prepared him for this.

He had to do something. The boy’s screams were getting weaker, and they kept getting cut off by choking sounds.

Cym slapped himself again. He had to stop reacting and think. He tried to remember what the short man had been doing right before Fourteen started screaming, but all he knew for certain was that he had been poking at one of the computers. With no other options, Cym ran over and began to trash the computer station, hurling the monitors to the floor, ripping out chords and smashing hard drives.

His systematic destruction of the lab was so noisy that it took a moment for him to realize the screaming had stopped. The monitor he was using to beat against a tower fell to the ground with a loud crash and he raced back to the sphere, fearful of what he would find.

It was dark inside now, but it was still sealed tight. Cym could neither see nor sense any movement inside.

A scream of frustration tore from his throat, and he kicked the sphere as hard as he could. There was a hiss, and a crack appeared in the smooth surface of the sphere, revealing a tiny opening.

Huh.

Sometimes violence was the answer. Stupid teen self-help magazines weren’t so helpy after all.

Cym wedged shaking fingers into the crack and heaved, expecting to encounter resistance, but it slid open smoothly.

Small as he was, there wasn’t enough room in the sphere for Cym to fit inside too, but he was able to sit on the rim of the opening and inspect the boy. In the dim light of the pod, Cym could make out Fourteen’s closed eyes and the shallow rise and fall of his chest. Tremors racked his entire body and caused the wires attached to him to tear at his flesh. Cym knew very little about first aid, but he knew leaving Fourteen in the machine was a bad idea. He needed to get him someplace safe.

The wires were the first things that had to go, so he removed them as gently as he could. Some were taped to Fourteen’s skin like electrodes, while others were buried in his flesh. Cym’s stomach rolled as he took them out. Medical stuff was not his strong suit.

When he finally finished—no thanks to his useless, scaredy-cat stomach—Cym pulled Fourteen’s young, lanky body out of the sphere into his lap and held him close. It was good this was a younger version of Fourteen, otherwise Cym wouldn’t have a prayer of moving him. Grown up Fourteen was a wall of densely packed muscle.

“What do I do with you now? How can I keep you safe?” Cym looked at Fourteen’s poor, battered face and stroked his brow.

It was becoming increasingly difficult to remember Cym was in a dream and that the real Fourteen was sleeping safely beside him, especially when his heart was telling him the boy needed him now. Cym had no intention of allowing further harm to come to him, dream or no.

Cym leaned down to press a kiss into Fourteen’s dark hair and whispered, “I will keep you safe. I promise.”

When Cym pulled away, storm-gray eyes opened and looked into his. The room glowed brightly as the walls melted away, and the contents of the room shifted and bent in a dizzying array of colors. Once again, Cym’s stomach decided to be an asshole and let him know how it felt about the situation.

You are a dream stomach, jerkface. You do not get a say in things!

He closed his eyes and held onto Fourteen as tightly as possible. Cym couldn’t keep Fourteen safe if he lost him in the Dreamscape.

When he was able to make out his surroundings again, he was sitting in a field holding a very awake and very adult Fourteen in his lap.

Cym’s first coherent thought was surprise that Fourteen’s sheer mass wasn’t crushing him, and before he was able to finish pondering the concept, he was instantly overwhelmed by the weight of the man on top of him.

Cym squeaked in alarm and began to flail.

Laughing, Fourteen rolled off of him, grabbed Cym by both arms, and hauled him on top of his chest.

Laughing.

What the hell? When Fourteen laughed at Cym’s terrible joke earlier it wasn’t close to what he was doing now. Before, it was like listening to a tin soldier trying to laugh for the first time. This was joyful and unrestrained.

There was no ice in Fourteen’s eyes. The man below him was fully alive and so much more than the man Cym had known so far. His eyes were filled with a mixture of laughter and mischief and Cym couldn’t look away.

What the hell? Cym was still reeling from the traumatic scene they had been whisked away from. How could Fourteen be laughing?

Cym propped himself up on his elbows to give him enough room to see Fourteen’s face. “Are… are you okay?”

“I feel unbelievable right now.” Fourteen stroked the sensitive skin on the inside of Cym’s arms, drawing lazy circles with his fingertips.

Cym’s bare skin tingled with each stroke. It felt like the shapes were sinking into his skin and becoming a part of him. A heady rush of exhilaration ran through him, taking with it the horror of what he’d just witnessed. All he wanted to do now was wallow in the man.

Wow. Did Fourteen know he was the human equivalent to catnip?

Cym didn’t rub all over Fourteen like a cat, but he couldn’t stop the goofy smile from spreading across his face. That was weird… right? Was Cym allowed to be that happy?

People like him weren’t supposed to have good things happen to them. Not that good, anyway.

Ugh. Stupid toxic upbringing. Cym could have good things. Cym deserved all of the good things. In fact, he was going to go find even more good things, gather them up into a big pile, take a picture, and mail it to his stupid family so they’d know what they were missing out on.

Okay, so maybe those teen self-help magazines were a little useful.

Cym laughed softly and shook his head. What was he doing again? Oh right. Sitting on a very good thing. He wiggled experimentally and got a fascinating sound from Fourteen in response.

Yeah… Cym was definitely gay. It only took being on the run from his family and grinding against a super soldier to find out.

Slow down, Cym. Slow down. No humping your soldier to victory until you figure out what’s going on.

Cym took a shaky breath, trying to ignore the sexy, disheveled man underneath him and looked around. “Where are we, do you think? It looks like heaven.”

They were lying on a wide expanse of grass at the top of a cliff overlooking the ocean. The sky was clear, and he could see seagulls flying in a wide circuit near the shore, looking for a meal.

“Home.” Fourteen reached out and stroked Cym’s cheek, his touch gentle but sure. Embers flared in Cym’s belly and his cock stirred, but before he had a chance to react, Fourteen continued speaking. “This was my home a long time ago. I can actually remember some of that time now.” He smiled, and it transformed his face into a work of art.

Cym had never seen anything more beautiful than Fourteen’s smile. It stoked the embers in his belly and caused small flames to lick at his insides. The sensation was marvelous. “Do you know where it is?”

“Massachusetts, near Rockport, I think.” His voice was lazy, and he stretched underneath Cym like a cat in the sun.

The motion snapped Cym’s attention away from Fourteen’s face and back to his sinful body. Gone were his leather jacket and black combat pants, and in their place was a thin, gray T-shirt and an old pair of jeans so worn they felt soft and pliant under Cym’s fingers.

When the muscles in Fourteen’s thigh shifted, Cym realized he had been feeling him up. Again.

Cym jerked his eyes to Fourteen’s face, an apology on his lips, but stopped when he saw a glint of hunger in his eyes. His irises were thin bands of gray now, lost to the black of his pupils. The smile was gone from his face, replaced by something more predatory. The hard line of his cock stiffening against Cym was unmistakable. It was also impossible not to rock against.

Fuck.

It was starting to occur to Cym that their magical surroundings might be causing their social barriers to fuck off. Because at that exact moment, Cym wanted nothing more than to roll around on the ground and get dirty with Fourteen for the rest of the day.

He managed to resist reaching out to run a finger over the six pack peeking out from a gap between Fourteen’s shirt and pants, but when Fourteen pushed Cym over like a toy and reversed their position, pressing that well-muscled body against him, he couldn’t remember why he’d been trying to resist.

Without thinking, Cym wrapped his arms around Fourteen’s neck, intending to claim every inch of the man he could gain access to, when he caught sight of a patch of scars on Fourteen’s arm.

It was enough to break through the sexy fog clouding his brain. The reminder of what Fourteen had suffered cleared Cym’s head enough for his mind to present what he had been so desperate to ignore.