"Are you okay?" Ron's words were laced with concern, his grip, steady on the wheels.
Cassie's expression was pale with bewilderment, her lips unable to utter a single word.
"Hellooooo! Earth to Cassie?
Say something.."
The words of the Nuclear physicist were muffled by the maelstrom of thoughts clouding her cerebrum.
His every attempt to make her smile was futile.
"Stop the car!" Cassandra's words finally shattered the silence.
"Chill out. We almost home."
"I said, stop the car!" her piercing shrill tormented Ron's mind, altering his undivided concentration.
Instinctively, he pressed his foot against the brake pedal, tightly and the Chrysler Turbine halted with a screech, abruptly.
"What's wrong Cass?" Ron's pretentious innocence betrayed a certain guilt.
"You really expect me to pretend like nothing happened?" Cassandra's interrogations were bluntly merry.
"I've got absolutely no idea what you're talking about," he denied her hidden allegations.
"Don't play dumb with me. I freakin' saw you Ron!" she yelled, gazing into his emerald eyes.
An awkward silence accompanied Cassie's words as Ron's eye twitched, engulfed in guilt.
"Me? Oh.. you mean ghosty guy?
I kinda watched him from the corner while he curtailed the threat," the young quantum physicist stuttered.
"Ghosty Guy? What a dumbass pseudonym!
God, you need help!" Cassie clasped her fingers above her lips in disbelief.
"I swear, that wasn't me."
"Mhmm..? Yet, somehow, the U.F.O. was wearing your hoody?" sarcasm, evident in her intonation.
"Well.. yeah.. he kinda borrowed it," Ron cringed, sarcastically.
"Give me one reason why an alien would borrow your hoody?"
"He was.. kinda cold? You see our climate radiates a certain.."
"Oh shut up, Dummy. When were you going to tell me you got superpowers?" her words interrupted his.
"Superpowers? You must be mistaken, Cassie. If I got superpowers, I'd be robbing a bank, right now.."
"Watch out!" Cassie's shrieks heightened Ron's senses, hitherto, triggering his uncanny reflexes.
An articulated truck experiencing brake failure had exhausted its hydraulics, looming over the bridge.
The heavy duty machine decelerated downhill with a speedometer reading one-twenty on the highway.
As before, everything slowed, frozen to stillness in time.
Ron sighed, placing one hand on Cassie and the other on the dashboard.
The sustained honking of the articulated truck deepened by two octaves, its headlamps, bathing the luxury automobile in a flamboyant golden luminance.
Suddenly, reality snapped back to normalcy as the speeding truck phased through the cyber enhanced Turbine engine.
Cassie screamed atop her voice, overwhelmed with fright.
"Chill, it's gone," he tried to comfort her, but she would not quit freaking out.
"Take me home! Take me home!"
Ron zoomed downtown, phasing through the congested traffic of Ikega, down to Lekki.
....
The steaming kettle bubbled rigorously, the heated kitchen, veiled in a cloudy mist.
Ron stirred the mixture like an elixir, pouring Cassie a hot mug of coffee.
The young Tomboy sat traumatized, wrapped in the blankets of her Bestie.
"It's all in my head, all in my head," she chanted repeatedly, in a frenzy, her voice barely above a whisper.
"Here," Ron passed a scorching mug of coffee to her but she would not receive it, her gaze, riveted to the the seventy inched plus flatscreen, half conscious.
"Mm.. Cappuccino! You're favorite," his powers of persuasion were somehow ineffective.
"Fine, you got me!" Ron conceded. "I wasn't born this way.. not with these abilities, anyway.
"The Xenon Prismara.. was forged from quantum energy and hydrogen nuclei, stabilized by my mini fusion reactor.
I honestly dunno how it detonated.
Bottom line is the quantum energy contained in the molecular star must have reacted with certain arcane chemicals, most likely from a bomb.
Its radiation swept through the city, mutating citizens with the.. xeno nucleotide, altering our D.N.A.s.
There are rumors of this rare, unique gene, believed to be found in every one in a million individuals.
This sounds crazy but according to my research, carriers of the xeno nucleotide trace their origins to alien ancestry.
Apparently, extraterrestrials visited our planet eons ago and.. kinda mixed with human race.
The offspring.. xeno-humans, are born normal until exposed to a sufficient radiation of quantum energy.
You see, this gene gets triggered and instinctively protects its host by awakening the dormant abilities of its alien ancestor.
I woke up in a hospital, unscathed. It all seemed too good to be true.
I mean, the perfect miracles happened nearly two thousand years ago, right?
I felt quite normal, until that.. thingy.. ugh.. Raptor guy shows up.
Turns out he was affected too.
Poor guy! His ancestors must've been dinosaurian.. ish.. Most likely Reptilians.
Could you envision what if feels like getting laid with a dino..?"
"Ron?" Cassie's whispery cadence interrupted his intrusive thoughts.
"I'm sorry but.. it's all my fault, everything.
If only I wasn't obsessed with trynna be Procyon, Annie would still be alive.
A sour gloom engulfed the young quantum scientist, his eyes fixed to the floor.
Cassie's consciousnesses fully returned, reminiscent of a reanimated mummy.
She looked Ron deep in the eye, her hand finding his.
"I think your powers are pretty cool," she cooed.
"Ugh.. really?"
"Well, at least yours didn't come with scales and.. large scutes," Cassie's sarcasms obliterated every inkling of negativity in the room, the duo chuckling humorously.
"I think it's destiny," she added, a smile etched ocross her lips.
"The one time I skip our class party and everyone's got superpowers, now?
I'm definitely the unluckiest girl alive."
Both youngsters giggled in relief but their reverie was short lived as the iconic theme intro, heralding C.N.N.'s breaking news, reverberated through the living room, a memorable melody.
The headlines flashed across the screens, dumbfounding Ron and Cassie.
"U.F.O. SIGHTING IN AFRICA!"
Roxanna Ross, that delicately gorgeous news anchor, dropped the bombshell with a sweet Melodic cadence.
Her eloquence, inspiring, her flawless accent, an obvious giveaway of her British origins.
"Less than twenty four hours after the mysterious school bombing in Lagos, Nigeria, another uncanny phenomenon has unfolded, just a few miles near the infamous crime scene.
Citizens were left perplexed by an enormous.. human shaped dinosaur, ravaging the city this afternoon.
Now, this is where things get interesting:
A mysterious Unidentified Flying Object stunned the anomaly, locked in the most bizarre duel the world has ever seen.
Eventually, the.. U.F.O. prevailed, winning tons of fans over, who have adorned the alien with a nickname:
PHANTOM!
Here's a surveillance footage of the incident on X, going viral, surpassing twenty million views in only a couple of hours."
Ron and Cassie, utterly bewildered by the amateur clips of their encounter with the archosaurian.
They exchanged a brief puzzled gaze, eyes darting back to the screen.
"Here are a few eye witnesses who were left dumbfounded by the scene.
They would share with us a deeper insight into this bizarreness, Roxy said, handing her mic over to the citizens.
The first witness, a tattered Vulcanyzer, mulled;
"Oh boy!
I no sabi that kind thing for my life.
[I've got absolutely no idea what that was].
I just dey like dele, dey smack my chow, naim one kind crocodile, wey big pass my domot show from nowhere.
[I was minding my own business, having lunch when what appeared to be a crocodile, larger than my apartment appeared from nowhere].
E just Dey scatter everything for road, Dey tumble people car, up-side-down like mad.
[It decimated anything in its path, swinging cars over, crazily].
Naim for my koro-koro eye, one kind ghost show, come change am for the crocodile.
[Then suddenly, a ghost manifested before my very eyes, curtailing the anomaly].
Sharp, sharp, e come japa, naim olokpa dem show, pursue all man.
[It had all happened much too quickly before the ghost dissipated. Then came the police with their sirens, beaconing everyone to abandon the crime scene].
Na so me sef take japa.
[I had to leave the scene, as well].
No be juju be that?
[I'm certain this isn't ordinary, it must be an outplay of the supernatural].
Nothing wey anybody wan tell me, that manchi otumokpo strong die."
[I'm convinced that the U.F.O.'s powers are impeccable].
The next witness was a demure damsel, donning a hijab.
She received the mic with frail shy hands.
"It was really astonishing. All my friends abandoned the scene.
They kept calling out my name but I won't listen, steady on my camera.
It looked to be a dinosaur, I won't lie. Like a freaking dinosaur in 2025?
But when Phantom emerged, oh my.. it was unbelievable.
There's no freaking way he's human. Gotta be an extraterrestrial or a ghost.
I'm usually a really doubtful person but henceforth, I'd believe whatever rumors swirl around me.
Who knows? Maybe the money laundering snake actually exists."
Roxanna's rhythmic tone reverberated through the living room again,
"Aliens, living amongst us. Heroes or Villains?
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm your host, Roxy Ross, and this is C.N.N.."
The TV blacked out with a click, Ron, fed up with all the inaccuracies and insinuations.
"Looks like you got a new pseudonym," Cassie words were accompanied by an inspiring smile.
"Phantom!"
It turned out her smile was contagious as Ron soon realized he was grinning too.
For a second, the two were lost in each other's eyes but before they could comprehend what they felt, their lips drew nearer.
Cassie felt butterflies in her belly; she had attempted to curtail her feelings for eons, but every effort was futile.
Finally, their lips met in a gentle soft kiss and for a minute, they relished the nectarean essence of their minty breaths.
Withdrawing their lips with a soft click of tongues, Ron and Cassie could not help surrendering to their innermost passions.
"That was.. weird," she savored Ron's cherry flavored lips in pretentious nausea as though she disliked their first kiss.
"I'm going to bed," she proclaimed, her motions briskly fluid.
"Yeah.. I'mma just.. sleep on the couch," Ron's words were laced with bashfulness.
"Ewww, that's so.."
"Don't you dare say it.."
"Gay!"
They both chuckled as she chased him round the house with childlike playfulness.
Their bond had endured the recesses of time, forged in the crucible of love, trust and mutual respect.
Cassie soon grabbed him by the arm, pinning both hands against the kitchen walls.
And even though he could effortlessly maneuver his way through her ticklish grip and overpower her, he somehow enjoyed her feministic perception of life.
They giggled at her absurdity of posing as a bully and soon, hushed to utter silence, cuddling up like toddlers.
They gazed into each other's eyes, again, their untamable emotions, burning within, consuming them with an infinite passion.
Cassie watched herself strip Ron's shirt off, engulfed by erotic romance.
His shredded granite features only stimulated her even more as she clasped her hands on his cheeks and licked his lips.
Ron swallowed her tongue whole, ripping her shirt apart.
He cupped her gigantic breasts, honking them sensually.
They swapped positions, he placed her on the cedar cabinet, kissing, vigorously.
Unclipping her bra with a soothing blend of serene gentility and masterful swiftness.
Cassie raised her skimpy skirt up with flair, revealing her lustrously thick honey tan thighs.
She pulled his pants down, astonished by the irregular size of his junk as he pulled her underwear down with a finger sliding in her creamy clean shaven gate, simultaneously.
She stroked his beef, her hand miniaturized in contrast to his heaving organ, akin to a great juicy cucumber.
Cassie stuck it in, her melodious moans, intercepted by soft gasps.
Ron grunted, swinging back and forth with gentleness, gradually accelerating the pace until his thrusts turned hardcore.
Her arms, tightly wrapped around his collarbone and his, around her wiggling waist.
Pouncing off the cabinet unto his groin, Ron held Cassie with firm strong hands, pounding her aggressively underneath.
The couple were bound in a stalemate of intense hardcore explicitness, their moans reverberating through the night.