Calla noticed the smell, first, though she only realized she was noticing it long after she’d began breathing it in.

She looked over at the Highwayman sleeping beside her. She’d insisted she take a watch, and though he refused at first – he was a stubborn git, wasn’t he? – eventually, begrudgingly he’d agreed he would have to sleep sometime.

Gods, his cock was so fucking hard. And that was from the smell, of course; the rich, arousing scent of the Indigo things was now permeating the little corner of the catacombs they’d made camp in. Calla took a deep breath, letting that sharp, sickly-sweet aroma linger in her nose. She smiled as she savored it. She was just as aroused as the Highwayman was. She squeezed her thighs together, allowing herself a moment – just a moment, just one – to enjoy the little whisper of pleasure between her legs.

She was going to need to wake him up, now, so they could get out of there. Calla had no desire – well, that wasn’t quite true, was it? – to get wrapped up in that sluglike creature’s embrace. It was dangerous to even think about how it would feel to have that shuddering, sloughing thing slip around her body, to curl itself around her. It made no sense to sit there and fantasize about being trapped within its quivering embrace, helplessly having orgasm after shuddering orgasm overpower her thoughts, and make it impossible for her to remember why she ever wanted to deny herself such ecstasy.

It made no sense at all, but when the Indigo thing came around the corner, its amorphous, iridescent weight crawling across the floor, Calla found it increasingly difficult to care.

Her eyes glazed over as she watched it approach. Its body undulated in waves, pushing itself toward her with a gentle, yet somehow implacable, slowness. Calla wondered if this was the same thing that the watchwoman had surrendered to, or another one – and if so, was the watchwoman inside of it? Was she fully encased within its slimy form, every sense stripped from her until nothing but pleasure remained?

Would, Calla wondered, it be like a never-ending orgasm? Would it be even better?

Such an idea seemed impossible; but then again, the Indigo thing was impossible as well. Calla was awestruck by its power. It was so slow, so … helpless, somehow, that it was difficult to think of the creature as a threat at all.

She wondered if Elena was with one of these things right now. Calla had never met the Lady, but had seen her from afar, always surrounded by guards… perhaps she was surrounded by the Indigo things now, instead. Perhaps she was their willing, drooling plaything, down here somewhere in the dark. Calla sighed as she imagined it. The Lady’s porcelain flesh coated in warm, thick slime, nipples hard, legs splayed wide, quietly moaning as things slithered across her and squirmed inside of her, and swelling just so, so that every inch of her that was capable of feeling pleasure would be accommodated…

The thing in front of Calla was drawing closer, now. She wondered what it would feel like to have it reach her, to slip over her foot and inch its way, ever so slowly and deliberately up her thigh. Of course, it would be utterly foolish to let that happen – the sight of the drooling, blank-faced husk that had once been a member of the town watch had been proof enough of that. She really should wake up the Highwayman so they could leave.

Then again, if it caught her, and she couldn’t escape…

Calla was surprised to find herself disappointed by how slowly the thing moved. If it were swift, or clever, she might not have had the chance to escape, might have been taken by the Indigo thing, and been captured before she realized it. As it was, it would probably take the thing another twenty minutes or so just to reach her.

And that, she considered, meant she didn’t need to wake the Highwayman just yet.

She still had some time to watch how its body shimmered with fascinating, alien hues. She could fantasize about the inhuman pleasures its victims would be subjected to for days, perhaps weeks on end, before they finally joined with the Indigo. Which, of course, Calla would never let happen to her… no matter how wickedly delicious the thought of it was. If she had to choose how she would die, someday, this would certainly be the best way to go.

Someday… but not today.

No, she didn’t want to die – not today, and not anytime soon, Calla reminded herself as she slipped her fingers beneath her pants and began gently teasing her surprisingly wet clit. Well, it wasn’t that surprising, she thought as her breath grew heavier and the thing crept ever so slowly closer. She couldn’t remember having been so aroused in her life.

A dark thrill blossomed in Calla’s mind as she considered what she was doing; this was no fantasy. She really was fucking herself senseless, helpless before the power of this eldritch abomination. Calla was succumbing to the Indigo, and she had never wanted anything more in her life.

Her fingers were working faster and more insistently inside her, almost as if they had a mind of their own, as she rocked her hips into them. Gods, she had never felt this good before, had never thought it possible to feel so much pleasure! Calla moaned, and quickly bit her lips to stifle it; she didn’t want to wake the Highwayman. He had already saved her from these things once; the thought that he would have to save her again was too embarrassing to contemplate. She mustn’t wake him up.

No, it was far more important to sit there and watch the thing ooze across the floors, to savor the moment. Glancing back at the Highwayman once more to confirm he was still asleep, she lifted her hips from the floor, tugged her pants down her thighs to her ankles, and kicked them off into the darkness. The stone floor was cold against her bare buttocks, but Calla barely noticed as she returned to her masturbation.

And still it came closer, now dangerously so, pausing but a few feet away from Calla’s legs. The foul, muculent thing had no eyes, nor anything that resembled a head, and yet she somehow knew it was taking her measure. Its powerful aroma was making her giddy and deliciously dizzy; she felt as though she were unraveling from within, laying bare to the Indigo thing her darkest, most decadent needs. And inviting it to sate them.

Calla spread her naked legs wide, presenting her pussy to the Indigo thing. It quivered for a moment before slowly extending a sinuous pseudopod, its tip ridiculously bulbous and glistening, from its mass. The protrusion seemed almost hesitant – like a nervous lover, Calla thought – as it swayed back and forth. She clenched around her fingers as orgasm pulsed through her body, but it wasn’t enough.

Mindlessly, she continued sliding her fingers over and inside herself as she sat there, trembling, drooling, unable and unwilling to look away from the scintillating colors that slid over the thing’s glistening form. The pseudopod’s head began to separate into hundreds of tiny filaments. They writhed and whipped about, a clear, thick ichor dripping from their ends.

A sense of dread began to gnaw at her. Calla realized, through her erotic haze, that she had let this go on for too long. She tried to tell herself that now, perhaps, she should stop… but her thoughts were simply too small, and too far away now, for her to act upon them. She felt like she was outside of her own body, watching what was happening to her with a sort of detached curiosity.

Then the Indigo thing lashed out at her with incredible speed, the hundred segmented tendrils of its pseudopod connecting with her naked thigh and latching on to it.

When she came the second time, it felt like someone had pushed her off a cliff.

The third time was like crashing into an ocean of euphoria.

And Calla sank down, down into impossible depths both exhilarating, and terrifying. Indigo stars exploded in her eyes; she was drowning, and she was flying, she was a cup overflowing with pleasure and still the Indigo kept pouring into her, relentlessly, overwhelmingly, unforgivingly. She slumped down to the floor, moaning, knowing only that this was the end, and hungry for more of it.