DECKER: FUTURE TENSE

By Angela Knight

Decker balanced the 300 pound crate a little more securely on his
shoulder. He sure as hell didn't want to drop it; the blood
synthasizer unit the crate contained had set him back a significant
number of credits. "And they call ME a bloodsucker," he muttered
under his breath.

Sighing, he strode up the space bay's crowded length, sidestepping
lengths of fibercable and hurrying dockworkers. Like docks
everywhere, the bay was unbelievably noisy as people labored to get
ships loaded, unloaded, and repaired. Still, Decker was used to the
noise and bustle. In fact, after so long in the icy silence of his
ship, he welcomed it.

The BELA sat on its berthing struts, looking lumpy and tiny next to
the big ships that surrounded it. Decker regarded it with
affectionate pride. It may not have been much to look at, but it was
faster than a bat out of hell. Its tachyon drive engine could have
powered a ship many times its size, so it had speed to burn. That
speed had saved his ass more than once.

Decker triggered his jaw implant and silently ordered the BELA'S
computer to open its forward hatch. The hatch slide up with a hiss,
and he strode through it, then down the ship's tiny corridor toward
the galley.
There wasn't much to the little kitchen -- but then, being a vampire,
he didn't exactly need a lot of room for food preparation. All the
room contained was several empty counters and a bunch of tall,
equally empty food lockers, plus the big galley table he rarely used.

Putting the crate down on one of the counters, Decker dug a cutting
laser out of his shipsuit pocket and set to work getting it open.

He almost had the lid off when his head came up. "You're good," he
said. "I almost didn't know you were here."

"What gave me away?" the woman asked, emerging from one of the empty
food lockers.

"Scented you," Decker replied shortly. And he still could. Salty.
Seductive. Blood and woman. He swallowed.

"That's right. You vamps have noses like houndhunters, don't you? You
ARE a vamp?"

"That's what it says on my license. Look, lady, you're breaking and
entering. What do you want?"

She didn't answer for a moment, instead wandering around the galley,
her hands behind her back. Her blue-black hair was cut in an
asymmetrical style, short as an old style crewcut on one side,
lengthening in a long curve until it swung past her breasts on the
other. And very nice breasts they were too, high and pert under her
black skinsuit. He could plainly see the outline of her nipples.

Synth blood might keep you alive, but it wasn't a woman. It didn't
move under you, didn't moan, didn't wrap you in long legs and white
arms. Decker clenched his jaw to keep his fangs from extending.

"You're a merc, right?" the woman said at last, in her husky
voice. "You work for hire?"

"Doesn't everybody?" Decker asked shortly.

"I want to hire you."

"Fine. My rate is 3,000 cred per five day."

She stopped and looked at him. He could see the desperation, the
fear, in her fine blue eyes. "I don't have that kind of money."

"Then get off my ship," he said, teeth gritted. God, he wanted her so
badly he ached from fangs to nuts. He tried to remember the last time
a woman had given herself to him.

"I need you," she said. "Can't we work something out?"

Decker stared into her wide eyes and wondered what had terrified her
so badly she'd go to a vampire for protection.

Aria looked into the vampire's harsh, handsome face, wondering if he
could hear her heartbeat, wondering if it boomed as loudly in his
ears as it did in her own.

"I don't do charity," Decker said coldly.

She swallowed. "I'm not asking for charity. I'm talking about a
trade." Nervous, she began pacing around the tiny galley. "You don't
have a crew. I'm willing to work off the debt for a time you
specify."

"I don't have a crew because I don't need one," the mercenary said,
his face hard as stone. "This isn't a very big ship, and I've run it
alone for 10 years. I can keep on running it alone for another
hundred."
Aria clenched her fists, frustrated. She'd never thought he'd be so
obsessed with cred, had believed he'd see what she was offering and
take it without question. Licking her lips, she paused beside the
crate, uncomfortably close to his big, threatening body. "Don't you
ever get tired..." Aria paused and took a deep breath. "Of taking it
from a synther?"

She looked up. Decker was watching her with hot eyes. "What's got you
scared enough to fuck a vampire?" She tensed, and couldn't force her
gaze to hold his. He laughed shortly as she looked away.
"I should have known. Another vampire. Who?"

Aria swallowed past the dry lump in her throat. "Tagliar."

Decker's dark brows flew up. "My. You must have pissed the Bragg
Syndicate in a big way, if they're sending their chief hit man after
you."

"Not really," she said, feeling queasy. "He volunteered."

"I can see why," Decker murmured. Aria looked up to find his eyes
fastened hungrily on her breasts. When he realized she was watching,
his face smoothed into impassivity. "What's your connection with
Bragg?"

She lifted her chin. "I stole for them. I'm a net thief." Aria set
her shoulders, wondering if he was going to throw her off his ship
and into Tagliar's waiting arms.

Instead he studied her, interested. "Are you any good?"

She shrugged, remembering the heady delight of breaking into a
computer system, of conquering it, of draining its secrets. "I'm very
good."

"Then why are they giving you to Tagliar?"

"On my last hit, I found a data trail linking Bragg to...something
they don't want known." The attempted murder of a Federation senator,
in fact, arranged to benefit another Federation senator. "It was the
sort of thing very few people knew, even in the Syndicate. When they
realized I must have followed the trail, they decided I shouldn't be
one of those people. Next thing I knew, Tagliar was waiting in my
apartment for me."

It had been the single most terrifying moment of her life.

***

She'd seen Tagliar work before, at a banquet for mid-level Bragg
employees two years before. They'd been in the middle of desert when
the vampire had walked in.

Everyone froze as he circled behind their chairs like a tiger at a
smorgasbord. Aria could hear her own heart beating. Then the vampire
stopped his circling--directly behind her chair. She thought she was
going to be sick.

"It seems," old man Bragg said in his cultured voice, "that we have a
problem with loyalty."

Tagliar grabbed the woman sitting next to Aria, jerked her head back,
and sank his fangs into her throat. The woman screamed, high and
hopeless, clawing at the vampire's massive shoulders, her huge black
eyes fixed on Aria's. Pleading.

Aria could only watch.

Then the woman's screams cut off abruptly, as though Tagliar had
gagged her. Her breath hitched, her face went blank. And she moaned,
once, softly, her body seeming to collapse into bonelessness. She
moaned again as Tagliar fed, and there was something horribly like
pleasure in her eyes. Her hips began to grind upward at the air.
Aria, watching in helpless horror a bare half meter away, realized
that Tagliar had an erection.

Finally, after feeding for almost ten horrible minutes, the vampire
straightened, pulled a knife, and drove it into the woman's heart.

There was hardly any blood at all.

Those ten minutes had haunted Aria's nightmares for years. The horror
was that much deeper for her suspicion that the woman had climaxed
before Tagliar killed her.

This afternoon, Aria had walked into her bedroom to find Tagliar
reclining on her bed. She'd almost passed out on the spot.

His hands were clasped behind his blond head, and his broad, bare
chest seemed to take up most of the bed. The skinsuit trousers he
wore showcased a huge erection. "Finally. I was getting impatient,"
the vampire said in his liquid baritone. "Let's get started, shall
we? I think I can make you come at least twice before you die."

She backed away, blind with fear as he rolled off the bed. As he
advanced on her, she begged for some explanation, and he told her
why.

"Actually, you should be grateful," Tagliar finished as he reached
for her. "They were going to send some clumsy low-level killer, but I
volunteered. It'll be so much more pleasant this way, don't you
think?"

"Fuck you, Tagliar." And she pulled the hand laser she'd carried
since she'd seen him kill the girl. The blast caught him right in his
glowing red eyes.

Then she ran like hell.

***

But Aria had known there was no one on the station that could save
her--except, just possibly, another vampire. So she'd used her
implant to access the primary computer and gotten the name of the
only vampire merc on the space station.

Jim Decker.

He looked like he could take Tagliar. He had the size, the muscle.
The question was, would he do it?
And if he did, would she be any safer with him?


Decker watched the thief look toward him, then away, eyes moving in a
constant nervous skitter. Her blood scent filled his head, a burning
intoxication like fine brandy. The skinsuit coated her body
as though someone had poured wet black paint over her, revealing
nipples and vulva in a display that would have been considered lewd
when he'd been human. "What, exactly, are you asking me to do?" he
asked, knowing he'd do anything at all.

She lifted her chin, her black hair sliding over her shoulders with
the shimmer of blue highlights. "Protect me from Tagliar and take me
with you when you leave the station."

"In exchange for what?"

"My obedience for six months."

"A year."

The thief nodded slowly. "A year."

He moved toward her, watching her fight an obvious desire to back
away. "How much head start did you have on Tagliar?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I blinded him with a hand laser forty-
five minutes ago. A human wouldn't be coming after me until he'd
spent a week in regeneration."

"You probably bought an hour, but not much more. Time enough to seal
the deal." He smiled slowly.

"You want to have your computer draw up a contract?" She took a wary
step backward.

"Not exactly. Come here."

The thief stopped, nostrils flaring. "Why?"

"I'm probably going to have to fight Tagliar for you. I want a taste
of what I'm fighting for."

Aria watched Decker move toward her, lazy and seductive. Unlike
Tagliar, there was nothing menacing mixed with his eroticism, but
still she trembled. Once he got those big hands on her, there'd be no
getting loose. If he decided to drain her, there wasn't a damn thing
she could do to stop him.

The vampire stopped in mid pace, looking annoyed. She realized he'd
read her expression. "Look," Decker said impatiently, "I'm not
Tagliar. In all my 300 years, no woman has ever suffered more than a
little dizziness after a night with me."

She sucked in a shuddering breath. "300 years, huh? You wear it well."

"Come over here and I'll show you just HOW well."

Aria swallowed. Oh, hell. She really had no choice anyway. Tagliar
would be here in fifteen minutes, and she had to make damn sure
Decker wouldn't give her to him. She took an unsteady step toward
him, then another. And another.

His arms closed around her, as warm as any human's. She shivered a
bit. Her eyes flew to his mouth, lowering toward her, and
instinctively she pulled back.

"Kiss me," he murmured.

Gingerly she stretched her neck upward until her lips collided with
his. They were surprisingly warm, soft, undemanding. Decker's hand
came up behind her head when she would have pulled away, holding her
still as he deepened the kiss. His tongue tasted her mouth, probed at
her teeth until they parted. Entering her mouth, he drew her closer
and began to kiss her with a passion that was reassuringly human.

"See, nothing to be afraid of," he murmured against her mouth. "Just
a man. More or less."

Aria felt the tension drain away, then tighten again as he shifted
his head, kissing the outside corner of her mouth, her cheekbones.
Her jaw. The sensitive flesh under one ear.

Her throat.

Again she would have pulled back, but again he held her immobile in a
gentle vise. His tongue was tracing her pulse, tasting. He moaned.

And bit.

Aria jumped at the burning penetration of his fangs, but Decker had
pulled her up off her feet and bent her back in his arms, and she was
helpless. Instinctively, she brought her legs up, linked them behind
his thighs, and held on tight. He began rocking against her, drawing
deeply on her punctured vein. The burn of his teeth started to fade
into a warm, radiating pleasure.

Decker's cock ground into her crotch, rubbing against her vulva
through the thin skinsuit, just as his hard body pressed into hers.
She gasped once with the first bloom of desire. He moaned again,
still drinking.

Aria's desire spiraled, growing with each rippling thrust of his body
against hers. She ground her hips up against his, suddenly resenting
the fabric that separated her from his hard prick. She wanted him in
her, now. She wanted to feel his clever hands on her nipples. She
wanted...

He caught her breast with one hand, grabbing the erect nub between
thumb and forefinger, pulling it, rolling it, each movement stoking
her desire into lust. Aria strained upward against him, rubbing her
vulva along the frustrating length she couldn't reach. "God, Decker,"
she groaned. "Fuck me!"

Jerking his head away from her throat -- causing a ripple of pain in
the process as his fangs left her skin -- Decker carried her to the
mess table and lowered her to its hard, cold surface. His big hands
grabbed the straps of her skinsuit and pulled, yanking the fabric
down to reveal her naked breasts. He jerked it further, but it hit
the rise of her hips and hung there. "How do you get this damn thing
off?"

Hurriedly, she reached between her thighs and found the seal. Ripped
it open.

Decker had the seal of his own suit half-way down when a voice spoke
through their computer implants. "Are you fucking my prey in there,
Decker?"

Decker lifted his head, snarling. The thief's sweet blood filled his
mouth, and her hot little cunt waited for him, and now that asshole
Tagliar wanted to play games. "Go away, cocksucker. I'm busy."

"I'll just bet you are. Jesus, she didn't waste any time, did she?
Who'd've thought she'd go running to another vampire after the panic
I put her in..."

"Yeah, well, you underestimated me, didn't you?" the thief said
through her implant, the mental voice still communicating her
rage. "And just how ARE your eyes, Tagliar?"

"Better off than yours, once I dig them out of your head. Send the
bitch out, Decker. We've got business."

"Sorry, Tagliar, you're gonna have to look elsewhere for lunch. She's
mine, and I'm keeping her."

"Somehow I'm not surprised. You always did have a quixotic streak.
Okay, zip your dick and choose your weapons. I want to finish you so
the little slut and I can take up where we left off."

Decker sealed his ship suit with a quick, brutal slap of his fingers,
then headed for the BELA's bridge--and her weapons' locker. He was
distantly aware of the thief hurrying at his heals, pulling her
skinsuit in place. Ignoring her, he stalked through the bridge door,
ordering the BELA's computer to open the locker for him.

"Jesus," the thief said, peering in at the assortment of rifles,
needliers, and lasers revealed when the wall panel slid back. "You
believe in being prepared, don't you?"

He handed her a pistol. "In case the bastard's better than I think he
is." Reaching back in, he grabbed another weapon for himself.

"A wooden knife? You're going to fight that fang-faced psycho with a
wooden knife?"

Decker, heading for the door, paused and looked at her. "You sound
almost concerned."

She looked uncomfortable. "Yeah, well, I'm a born sucker. Shouldn't
you take something else? Like one of these rifles? A blaster canon? A
pocket thermo nuke?"

He grinned at her. "Believe it or not, the knife's more likely to
kill him. Besides, it's tradition."

"TRADITION?"

"Yeah. Vampires are great believers in tradition." Then he headed
toward the airlock for his duel with Tagliar.

***

It took Aria almost three minutes to get the BELA'S computer to show
her a display of the area surrounding the ship. By then, the fight
had already started.
Stripped to the waist, the vampires circled, each armed with one of
the long wooden knives and wearing identical vicious expressions. It
was amazing, Aria thought, what a pair of inch-long fangs did to
enhance a snarl.

Then Tagliar lunged. There was a quick flurry of motion Aria didn't
even see clearly, and they started circling again. It took her a
moment to realize that Tagliar had somehow acquired a foot-long
slash along his forearm.

Another blurring attack and riposte. This time, Decker was the one
left bleeding. God, they were fast.

Except for the speed, though, they were conducting the fight like any
two humans who hated each other's guts. Aria, who'd heard all sorts
of wild tales about vampire duels, began to relax slightly. A curse,
a quick grapple, then Tagliar rolled away and bounded to his feet.
Looking directly into Decker's eyes, he licked the bloody point of
his knife.

Decker stiffened, narrowing his eyes. Deliberately, he tongued the
blood from his own blade.

Ugh, Aria thought. What the hell was that all about? Another weird
vampire tradition? She waited for the fight to go on.

Instead they stood frozen, Tagliar still licking his knife in the
manner of a man savoring an ice cream cone.

"What IS this?" Aria grumbled.

One long minute went by. Decker slowly coiled into a crouch.

Tagliar stopped sucking his knife. A low growl rumbled, she couldn't
tell from whom.

And they were a snarling mass on the deck. Aria blinked. She hadn't
even seen the leap that carried them together.

The fight that followed was one of the most chilling things she had
ever seen. There was nothing remotely human about it; the vampires
seemed to have turned into wolves, forgetting knives in order
to rip at one another with fangs and clawing hands. Blood sprayed the
deck, and the air was full of an inhuman growling. Aria, watching,
felt the hair creep on the back of her neck.

Then she saw the net camera floating in mid air over the writhing
fighters. "Well, we just picked up a billion witnesses," she
muttered, knowing the star net would probably pick up the duel to run
in its evening broadcast.

She blinked, realizing that Decker had gained ascendency while she'd
been distracted. He was crouching over Tagliar, who was clawing
weakly at him. And Decker was holding the knife raised....

"NO!" Aria howled into the computer's pickup. "Decker, the cameras!
If you kill him in front of the cameras, they'll fry you! Decker!"

Aria held her breath as Decker looked up, breathing hard, a rivulet
of blood winding from his mouth and down his throat. He snarled and
plunged the knife downward. Tagliar howled.

"SHIT! Decker, you stupid..." Aria began, and then realized Decker
hadn't driven the knife into his enemy's chest after all. Instead it
was buried in Tagliar's belly, which probably hurt like hell but
wouldn't necessarily kill a vampire.

Decker got up without a backward glance and walked off toward BELA'S
airlock, which obligingly opened.

Aria buried her head in her hands and shuddered. She didn't want to
see anything like THAT again anytime soon, that was for sure.

For a long moment, she sat unmoving in the BELA's pilot's chair.
Decker had evidently headed for the ship's head; she could hear the
shower running through the bulkhead. Interesting that he had an old-
fashioned water bath, which most people considered a waste of
resources. Then again, if he'd been around 300 years, he probably
wouldn't like chem mists... What an inane line of thought, Aria
decided impatiently.

Before she could find another one, Decker walked, stark naked, onto
the bridge. His eyes were insanely bright, and he had a truly
impressive erection. His smile revealed fangs that hadn't looked
nearly so threatening half an hour before.

Aria came up out of her chair so fast she almost fell on her
face. "Uh, hi!" She winced as her voice broke. Swallowing, she tried
again. "You really took care of that bastard Tagliar. Remind me not
to piss you off."

"Glad I could help." She could have sworn his eyes were actually
glowing. "Now, where were we..?" He moved toward her, fluid and
predatory.

"Are you..uh...Are you all right? You look a little ... funny." She
retreated behind the pilots chair.

He never broke his steady stride. "Oh, I'm fine. Just got a mouthful
of Tagliar's blood, that's all. We tend to go a little nuts when we
taste one another. Hormones or something."

"Oh, REALLY?" She backed hastily away from the chair, retreating
along the curve of the bridge wall. "Wonder why that is? Has anybody
done any studies?"

Decker stopped, a flicker of amusement breaking through the hot light
in his eyes. "Look, I'm not going to hurt you. I'm horny, that's all.
Nothing to worry about." He grinned wickedly. "If it makes you feel
any better, you can do the sucking this time."

The little thief huddled against the back wall a moment, her eyes
huge. "Uh...sure. Be glad to." She edged toward him. Decker held
himself still with difficulty; he badly wanted to grab her and sink
his fangs into her throbbing white throat. But he didn't trust
himself, so he held his fists clenched at his sides and waited with
rapidly eroding patience.

A couple of feet away, the thief dropped to her knees and crawled the
last pace or so. He knew she did it to keep out of easy range of his
fangs, but it still struck him as a submissive gesture. In his
present wild mood, he enjoyed the symbolism. He set his feet a little
further apart. The thief moved between them and cautiously reached
for his ready cock.

Decker grabbed a fistful of her hair, grinning when she looked up at
him wildly. But he said nothing, instead guiding her head toward his
prick. She opened her soft mouth and took him in.

Throwing back his head, Decker hissed through his fangs as she
engulfed him in wet heat and tongue, small white teeth scraping
lightly over his aching flesh. Instinctively, he grabbed the back of
her head with his other hand and began to hunch against her. It was
the sort of thing he'd never have done sober, but with Tagliar's
blood burning his mouth, he was prone toward almost anything. But the
thief took every impatient inch of him, sucking sweetly, swirling her
tongue around the head of his shaft when he pulled back, shifting her
head to accept him deeper when he thrust.

Decker braced his legs and shivered at the delicious sensations,
watching as the thief knelt there, driving him slowly to orgasm.

Aria shivered, swirling her tongue around the vampire's velvet prick.
He was thrusting against her with long strokes, an act which would
normally have been uncomfortable. Yet now it felt strangely exciting.
Incredibly exciting, in fact.

Aria had given her share of blow jobs over the years, with emotions
that ranged from pleasant enjoyment to outright resentment and
boredom. Never had she felt such erotic heat from the act. Her
nipples tingled, and she could feel her arousal streaming through her
vagina.

Dimly, she wondered if the vampire was doing something to her, using
the psychic abilities his kind were said to possess. But whatever he
was doing, however he was doing it, she loved every
minute.

Delicately, Aria scraped her teeth against the head of Decker's cock,
glorying in his shudder. How good his hard prick felt in her
mouth...but how much better it would feel in her creamy pussy.
Widening her jaws, she took him in deeper, then deeper, until her
nose brushed the wiry hair of his groin.

Suddenly he jerked free. Aria, half hypnotized, moaned a protest and
reached for him, but his big hands closed over her forearms. She felt
herself being lifted, tossed over the broad, thickly padded arm of
the pilot's chair.

And a massive cock rammed into her hungry cunt from behind. Aria
gasped as the vampire began to fuck her, fast and hard, grinding his
hips against her ass. She groaned and lifted her butt to deepen the
luscious penetration, pulling her legs further apart.

Decker rode her hard, filling her with stroke after hot stroke as the
tension of orgasm coiled tighter and tighter. She whimpered,
helpless, feeling as though she were caught in a hurricane, sensation
blasting along her nerves until her thighs began to spasm, her back
arcing like a salmon.

Just in that instant, Decker bent over her and bit deeply into her
throat. The hard, rippling sensations as he drank blended with her
orgasm, spurring it. She came, impaled on the vampire's cock and
fangs, and knew no experience had ever been sweeter.

***

She awoke much later, lying in a huge bed with seductive sheets.

Decker was sitting on the mattress beside her, holding a tray piled
with food. "I thought you'd be hungry," he explained, putting the
tray down on the night stand.

She smiled, narrow-eyed. "The question is, are YOU hungry?"

He looked uncomfortable. "Not right now. I'm afraid I got a little
over-enthused earlier. Had to put you in regeneration to build your
blood back up."

Deliberately, Aria arched her back, thrusting her breasts upward. Her
nipples were hard points under the thin sheet; she saw Decker's eyes
lock on them. "Well, I'm feeling perfectly healthy now."

He swallowed. "Really?"

She pulled the sheet down. "Really."

As the vampire bent his head to taste her eager nipples, Aria smiled.


THE END