Spaceport: The Erogenous Affair
Mikala Ash

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Copyright ©2010 Mikala Ash

ISBN: 978-1-60521-360-6
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Spaceport: The Erogenous Affair

Mikala Ash

Peri Barberossa is on the hunt. Conflicted over Silas Archimedes’ questionable behavior in the supernova affair and the bedding of her doomed and virginal cousin by Fyche, her otherwise faithful AI, Peri seeks solace in the arms of strangers.

The amorous accent of a hunky fighter pilot she meets at Spaceport Adana’s renowned Haze Bar & Grill sends Peri on a whirlwind adventure to the planet Scalion where, in search of her lost mother, Peri meets the surprisingly erotic Tacha Vaille and two gorgeous and randy men, Titus Dollavera and Moss Cato.

Everyone is more -- or less -- than they seem in this erotically charged Peri Barberossa adventure where secret agendas abound and the name of the game is undiluted pleasure.

Chapter One

“Putting chauvinistic romanticism aside, consciousness is merely a pinprick of light shining through a chink in the curtains.”

The recorded voice, a last ditch attempt by Fyche, my faithful AI, to tempt me to resuscitate my faltering career as a sex reporter, roused me from a deep, satiated sleep. Losing his body to the supernova that atomized Jones’s World had not diminished one iota Fyche’s compulsion to fuss over me. He had insisted that he awaken me with the audio of a lecture given by the celebrated sexologist Professor Simon Bok. It had been Fyche’s idea that I should at least give the illusion of working at the career which had given me fame and fortune. He’d set me a project to write a popular guide to the psychology of sex. Despite all that had been going on these last few months, Fyche insisted I had to keep my publisher happy and maintain some hold, as tenuous as it was, on my day job.

I was lying on the floor, evidence of a good night, and with some effort I focused on the professor’s sententious tone. “Behind the curtain the scene is awash with intense actinic light, a seething cauldron of neural activity. That is the unconscious, controlling the autonomic nervous system, keeping the body alive as well as processing the constant influx of sensation, assessing the salience of the data for any threat, directing flight or fight reactions with lightning speed, distinguishing pleasure from pain, as well as performing the more sedate activities of laying down new memories and overwriting the old. This hidden inferno is the core of your being.”

I turned down the volume on Bok’s lecture. The aged sexologist did go on sometimes. To be honest I was sick to death of his curtain analogy.

The sleeping male beside me stirred. He was good looking in the usual way; square jaw, strong body with hard, rippling muscles under golden skin and, not least of all, a big throbbing cock. Last night his bright eyes, burning with youthful machismo, had been captivated by my split skirt that had strategically fallen open when I’d perched myself on the barstool, exposing my thigh in the classic manner designed to attract any buzzing bees loitering in the vicinity.

I couldn’t remember his name but recalled he was a navy lieutenant from Scalion. He was a fighter pilot, I think. My memory of last night was a tad hazy. I glanced at the uniform strewn across the floor and sighted the embroidered wings on the shoulder patch. Yep, a fighter pilot, one of the brave, one of the few, a pulsating bag of testosterone secure in his cockpit playing with his joystick.

His being a pilot hadn’t interested me as much as his accent.

I’d been sitting alone at Haze Bar and Grill nursing one of their boutique beers. He’d sat next to me, already swaying with a tad too much alcohol.

“Can I buy you a beer?” he said a little too loudly.

The accent, only slightly slurred, stabbed into my consciousness. It was familiar. More than it should have been. I gave him the onceover, liked what I saw.

“I already have one.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “You can always have two.” Perfectly white teeth flashed in a boyish smile.

“That’s very true.”

As I tried to figure out why the accent should strike me as important, he signaled to the arthropod bartender. “Two more.”

He held out his hand. “I’m Kel.”

I took it. “Peri.”

He took my hand to his lips, turned it and kissed the sensitive skin at the wrist. As corny as it was, the gesture sent a tingle through my flesh. My wrist is one of my erogenous zones, as is most of my body, but the wrist is one of the special ones.

“Is that customary on Scalion?” Somehow I knew where his accent originated. How, I had no idea.

His face contorted in an exaggerated frown. “Darn it to hell. I’ve been working on my accent for months.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Why change it? It’s nice.”

He took a swig from his beer. “It’s like a tattoo across my forehead marking me as a provincial. If I want to get ahead, I have to sound civilized.”

I detected a slight tone of bitterness. “Is getting ahead so important you have to change who you are?”

His jaw had set firm and he fixed me with his bright blues. I sensed he’d debated this already in his own head. “I’m only changing my accent.”

I tapped his bottle of beer with mine. “That’s just the beginning.”

“Of what?”

“The slippery slope to mediocrity. If you sound like everyone else, how will you get noticed?”

“By being the best pilot.”

I shrugged. “I know nothing of being a pilot, but I bet there are a lot of good ones around. Unless you possess superhuman reflexes how can you guarantee you’ll be the best?”

He was silent for a moment. He’d battled the same thoughts no doubt. “I’m betting on my ability and dedication,” he said finally.

I clinked bottles again. “Good luck with that.”

He bristled at that. “What? You don’t think I can be the best?”

“I have no idea, but Marketing 101 says that to compete in a highly competitive market you accentuate your differences. That is called your competitive advantage.”

“What are you? A teacher?”

“Hardly, but tell me, as good as you are, what makes you a unique pilot?”

He looked into his beer for a few moments before his expression clouded slightly and became a little despondent. “I’m working on a new way of fighting pirates. The problem we have is that if we are lucky enough to catch them in the act, as soon as they see us they just jump into quantum space. Tracking their engine’s tachyon signature is next to useless because they have inbuilt randomizers, which are illegal but that’s their game, isn’t it?”

“So what is it, this new strategy?”

“I’m still working out the details, haven’t tried it out yet, but it involves taking them head on and combining their spatial inertia at the instant they make the jump and adding to my own, so they cancel out. Depending on their mass I’ll have to alter my attack speed to compensate. I finished the mathematics of it this afternoon. It should work.”

“So you’re celebrating tonight?”

He clinked my glass. “You got it.”

Of course, he intended for me to be his prize for this youthful endeavor. Not that I was completely averse to the idea.

“What do you call this strategy?”

“Call it?”

“You have to have a name for it.”

“I haven’t thought that far ahead. I haven’t tried it out, you see.”

“You have to have a name. The Kel Maneuver? The Scalion Maneuver? Or something boring like the Spatial Inertia Maneuver?”

“Oh, I see what you mean.” His eyes slid over my face like a caress and settled on my lips. “I could call it the Peri Maneuver.”

My belly gave a little flutter. Oh, he was so cute. “Will my maneuver work?”

His expression became doubtful. “Nothing like it has been tried. Too dangerous, you see. The timing has to be absolutely perfect to the twentieth decimal place and there are a few other variables that need to be controlled.”

I patted his hand in commiseration. It didn’t sound like a profitable idea. “What else makes you unique among pilots?”

He gave a shrug. “The only pilot in the fleet from Scalion?”

Poor diddums. His enthusiasm had suddenly plummeted and it was my fault for being sarcastic. He needed bucking up. “I can’t imagine the barriers you’ve had to clear before getting your wings, being from a poor world on the periphery. I’m not being patronizing when I say that. You obviously worked harder than the ones that come from influential families in the central worlds. If it was me, I’d make the most of the difference. You won’t be as popular with your fellow pilots. They want you to be just like them, part of the tribe. If you’re different, you’re a threat. So, if being one of the guys is enough for you, change your accent. But if you want more, if you want to be a leader, then you have to be more.”

He finished his beer. “So, what do you do?”

I was impressed. Despite the alcohol he showed some skeptical insight. “Do I practice what I preach is what you mean.”

“Something like that.”

“I’m a writer.”

“A unique writer?”

I answered the challenge in his gaze with a smile. “I have been described as different. I’ve won my share of awards, gained a certain notoriety.”

He tilted his head and frowned. “I can’t place your accent.”

I started on the beer he had bought me. “That’s because I don’t have one. I grew up on a lot of worlds. Lost my native tongue before I knew I had one to lose.”

“But you spent time on Scalion,” he said. “That’s how you recognized my accent.”

Now that was the sixty-million-credit question. “When I was young my mother and I were refugees from Nova Town. We ran to a dozen different worlds. Scalion wasn’t on my list of memories, but it’s clear we must have been there. I recognized the accent immediately. Tell me about it.”

“You said it all. A poor provincial world on the periphery. Nothing of note ever came out of Scalion.”

I touched his hand. “Your competitive advantage is all the greater for that.”

He looked at my hand for a moment then raised his eyes to meet mine. “So, what was your competitive advantage?”

“I write what I know.”

“And what’s that?”

The words were out of my mouth before I knew what I was going to say. “Come with me and I’ll show you.”

Fyche didn’t say anything as Kel and I stumbled arm in arm through the Jalapeño’s hatch. I knew he scanned my new beau for weapons and probably did a biographical check by accessing the navy’s database. Always looking out for me was Fyche.

I took my young pilot straight to my cabin and pushed him onto the bed. With his unfocused eyes fixed on my cleavage, he started unbuttoning the jacket of his uniform.

“You asked me what I write, and I said I write what I know,” I purred as I closed the hatch and peeled off my dress. “Well, this is what I know.”

Drunk sex is different from sober sex in a surreal kind of way. There is a sense of supreme urgency about it. It is absolutely imperative to devour each other while undressing, swallowing each other’s tongue while undergarments are ripped away and flung about. Clumsiness is ignored and falling off the bed doesn’t put a halt to activities. In fact, one hardly notices. “Was that Earth moving?” you ask into his mouth. “Nah,” he replies into yours. “Just missed the landing pad.” He is a pilot after all.

I remember his hands pawing at my breasts, squeezing them as if they were fruit in a market stall and he was testing them for ripeness. Then he was biting my nipples and sucking hard. I had both hands around his cock. It was thick and very, very hard. That’s another thing about drunk sex: things seem bigger, more powerful, and gripping that solid shaft made me want him inside me without any fucking delay.

It was a wrestle of Olympic proportions to see who was going to end up on top. I let him win because I find alcohol affects balance, and the last thing I want when fucking is a case of vertigo. Better to lie back and let the flyboy do all the piloting. And Kel was the consummate pilot. His aim with his joystick was perfect. He found the welcoming entrance to my pussy first try and he dived in deep.

“Fuck me hard, flyboy!” I shouted, completely oblivious to my cringe-worthy words.

The thing about jocks in the military, they know how to take orders. He well and truly fucked me hard, driving me into the floor with unrestrained youthful vigor. Opening my eyes at one point, I wondered what the hell my feet were doing hovering above my head. I realized he had my legs pushed way back and he was leaning on them as he fucked me, relying on the natural spring of my thighs to propel him back so he could drive into me again.

No one had ever done that to me before. Not one of the hundreds of men I’ve fucked during my journalistic career had used me like a springboard. I took a mental note to record it for my book.

Even through the foggiest alcoholic haze you can still find moments of lucidity. That’s what I mean by surreal.

Being a pilot, his natural instinct was to be in control. Next thing I knew I was kneeling on the floor with my head resting on the bed. He was driving into me from behind with his hands gripped around my waist. I hadn’t noticed the transition. Had I blacked out? Or had my attention been diverted by the orgasm that had ripped through me, making my pussy pulse and my throat scream like a Gorgonian Mist Wraith?

The other thing about drunken sex is that it all seems to happen at once. One moment you are on top, then on the bottom, twisting about while some massive cock drives into you. I’d come a couple of times before he emptied his come sac deep inside me.

“Fuck, you’re hot,” he slurred, gave me a sloppy kiss and then rolled away. His head hadn’t even hit the floor and he was snoring.

I laughed, I think, before the darkness claimed me too.

That was last night, and the recollection had caused my nipples to peak and my pussy to moisten. Luckily I’d taken some anti-hangover tablets before going out and was reasonably compos mentis and therefore randy as usual. Sleeping on the floor, however, had left me with a stiff back.

I gazed at my young pilot and listened to Professor Bok’s quiet pontificating in the background. “Everything we have ever thought and ever felt has already occurred beyond the curtain through which our conscious eyes can never see in its entirety. A half millisecond is how long it takes the light of our subconscious to speed through the tear in the curtain. Do not be fooled. Every decision you consciously make has already been made there. Whatever you are thinking now has already been thought behind the curtain. Conscious free will is an illusion. You are not in the driver’s seat of your life. You, and by that I mean your consciousness, are merely the passenger on a journey through time and space that begins with birth and terminates in death. There is no escaping from inside the vehicle of your skull. The bony hatches are welded shut. So sit back, relax, gaze out the window and enjoy the trip.”

I switched off Professor Bok’s dubious though popular philosophy. Illusion or not, I sure as hell felt I was the driver of my destiny. I ran my life. I was certain of it. I mean, if something walks like a quaddick, quacks like a quaddick, then it’s a fucking quaddick. Am I right? Anyway, that’s what I thought.

I pulled back the sheet that had somehow fallen over my pilot’s body and gazed admiringly at his semi-erect cock. Lying across his belly like a recumbent slug, it moved slightly with his gentle breathing. I set about coaxing it alive with my fingers, working those sensitive spots until he stood hard and strong.

The male genitals are a patchwork quilt of erogenous zones. Starting from the back and working my way forward, first there’s the asshole. That puckered ring, and -- dare I say it -- the flesh inside that tight circle, is alive with nerve endings which will set off fireworks in any man. Then there is the little patch between asshole and ball sac. If you run your fingers or tongue across that little alleyway, you’ll send hot shivers cascading across quivering flesh. Simmering within the rice paper thin ball bag lay strange and delicate eggs. Tease these and he will beg to fuck you. Next there’s the shaft, a steel rod sheathed in tissue thin flesh. Grip it hard, or stroke the flesh with tongue or fingernail and you’ll have him squirming in ecstasy. The ridge that separates head from shaft, oh, trace that circle with the tip of your tongue and he’ll cry out for more. At the summit sits the spongy flesh of the engorged head. This was made for kissing and sucking, but strangely not for biting except in only a few cases. To top it off, there is the single eye. Tease it with your tongue, probe the eye softly, caress the inner flesh and taste the silky soft liquid that heralds his climax.

“Oh, yeah, baby,” he sighed as if in a dream.

“Shhh,” I whispered and climbed into the driver’s seat. Now to tease my own erogenous zones. Poised on straining thighs, I slid the head of his cock along the moist slit of my pussy. From back to front, starting between pussy and asshole and ending just below my clit, then back again, just teasing my own sensitive path toward my ass. Then back to my clit, more pressure now, letting the silky folds of my pussy lips enshroud the head. Deeper now, slowly, letting every millimeter of inner flesh savor the incoming rod. With only an inch inside me, I used my thighs to move up and down, tiny motions that seem amplified within my sultry sheath.

Each downward movement buried a little more of the shaft inside me. I threw back my head, groaning in sheer pleasure and relishing the control. Being the submissive partner has joys of its own, but being in control, taking my pleasure from the body of a willing, though in this case slumbering, male is the ultimate. To hell with Bok and his fucking curtain, I’m at one with the moment, in the here and now, consciously controlling my own pleasure.

Moving my hips just a tad, I adjusted the angle of attack ever so slightly and… ah… there, there it is. That patch of nerve endings which, when caressed, sends waves of prickly heat straight to my belly. Deeper and now it’s the ridge around the head of his cock rubbing that glorious patch. I rose and fell over his cock, again and again, deeper and deeper, until I was seated on his pelvis. A gentle lean forward and my clit met the hard flesh above the root of his shaft.

Oh. That’s it.

No more rise and fall for a moment. Now I’m moving back and forth, rubbing my clit against his pelvic bone in a determined and forceful grinding motion. My cunt has become a mill wheel grinding against the stone. Inside me, his shaft is being caressed by my tight sheath, bathed with wet heat, his entire organ enveloped by eager flesh.

It’s become too much for him. With a groan coming from deep inside his chest he grips my hips and begins to use my body. He’s awakened completely now, but I was unaware exactly when my ministrations had roused him from sleep. He begins to move, to buck, as if he could thrust his cock deeper within me when we are already locked in extremis.

With soft words I try to calm him but it is too late. I’ve played his cock too far to turn his passion aside. With a cry, his grip on my hips intensifies. He holds me still and beneath me he arches, as the shaft within expands and stretches my flesh with a glorious gush of heat.

I’m grinding faster now, not wanting to be left behind. His face is contorted by his climax. I read, in his twisted lips, the agony of regret. Sorry that this act is over, that this exquisite manipulation of the senses is finished and he is disappointed in himself for not lasting longer.

It’s not over for me. I’m at the summit of pleasure. I slow deliberately, savoring the moment before the frisson, delaying the inevitable for just a few more moments.

“Fuck you, Bok,” I hiss. I’m in control of my destiny, not my subconscious.

Of course I am.

And then the moment my body will put off no longer.

Chapter Two

I wandered the corridors of Adana in a sort of daydream. My grateful pilot had to leave straight after our morning coupling. Some sort of parade and flyby the navy was putting on to dazzle the citizenry. We did all that awkward stuff that comprises the morning after the drunken fuck ritual; exchanged numbers and promised to call each other.

So now I was at a loose end. My joy ride with him had given me a few ideas for the theme of my guide to the psychology of sex and I figured a quiet café would help get the thoughts straight in my head.

I’d barely taken a sip when Holly and an attractive and vaguely familiar blonde woman in her early twenties, fitted out with Holly’s holovid camera, entered the café.

“Hi, sis,” Holly said in her usual effervescent manner. “This is Zoe. I’m training her to be a breaking news reporter.”

I shook Zoe’s hand, gazing at her bright-eyed expression and trying to figure out where I’d seen her before.

“I’ve read everything you’ve written, Peri,” she gushed.

“I’m flattered. Zoe, I wonder if you could give Holly and me a moment alone?”

She flashed me a genuine smile. “Sure.” She turned to Holly. “Boss, how about I finish that council meeting story?”

“Sure, knock yourself out.” After watching Zoe stride away Holly turned to me. “Isn’t she great?”

“I guess. Sit down for a second. Listen, I need you to think about Nova Town for me.”

Her expression told me Nova Town was not her favorite subject. Nor was it mine, but we had to talk about it sometime.

“Ever heard of Scalion?”

“Um, I think so. Is that the agricultural planet?”

“That’s the one. Did either Mother or Father have a connection there?”

She frowned for a moment in concentration. “Nuh, nada. I have nothing. Why?”

“It’s just that I think we went there after Nova Town. I can’t remember it. I just recognized a guy’s accent, and I don’t know why it should have made such an impression unless I’d been there.”

She tilted her head slightly and gave me one of her penetrating gazes. “The pilot at the Haze last night? From what I hear, his accent wasn’t the only thing that would have made an impression.”

Fuck me! “How’d you know about that?”

“Zoe saw you. She was doing a story on the singing Kitali.”

“That must be where I’ve seen her,” I said doubtfully, but didn’t remember any singing Kitali.

“Also, Silas heard about it too. He’s pretty cut up. Angry would be a better term. What are you doing to him?”

I was surprised. I didn’t know he was back on Adana. He hadn’t called me. “It’s complicated.”

“Well, he’s a solid type of guy from what I can tell.”

“Yeah, well.”

She knew me well enough to change the subject. “Any luck with Jyker?”

I gritted my teeth at the name. He was a notorious criminal and knew something of my mother, and I had so desperately wanted to find out what. Fyche, Silas and I had almost captured him in a bondage and discipline parlor but in the confusion of an assassination attempt, he’d escaped, taking his knowledge with him. “Trail has gone cold. Silas is following it up for his own purposes. I’ll probably not hear any more of it.”

Her journalist’s eyes brightened. “His own purposes?”

“Yeah, it seems Jyker has more to answer for than either Mischa or us.” I gave an exaggerated shrug. “More of Silas’s secret shit, so I don’t know much.”

“Have you found out anything more about the connection between Mother and the Naturalists on Jones’s World? To think, we had a cousin there and never even knew.”

“Mother never mentioned her family origins to me. I guess we’d have thousands of cousins, second cousins and Phong knows what else scattered all over the galaxy. No surprise that some of them might be religious fundamentalists.”

“I suppose. Are there any Naturalists on Scalion?”

“There are, as a matter of fact. Fyche found reference to an old colony there.”

“Curiouser and curiouser. Any Leesons on record?”

Leeson was our mother’s maiden name. “Not that he could find.”

She played with a sugar shaker for a moment. “I wonder where Mother ended up.”

That question had been foremost in my mind. “The strange thing is these last few months are the first time I’ve ever really asked that question. You’d think that after all Mother and I had been through; escaping Nova Town, jumping from planet to planet, living out of a string bag and she constantly afraid that the New Guard would catch up with us, I’d want to know what happened to her. But despite all the hardships we faced together when I grew up, after she left me, I never asked any questions.”

“Don’t punish yourself. You were young.”

“Sure, I resented her dumping me like she did, but there’s more to it than that. It’s not natural for me not to be more curious. I can’t even recall seriously thinking about her until you lured me here.”

Holly held up her hands. “Innocent of all charges. I had no idea Jyker would trigger this. I just glimpsed him on the playback of one of my stories. I thought you’d be interested. I had absolutely no idea of what he was about.”

“I know, but it’s like there’s a high wall around my memories. I’m peeping over the top, and all I see is a mist. But what troubles me is that until now, I’ve never even tried to look over the wall. Fuck, I never knew it was there.”

“Well, my sense is that if it hasn’t troubled you in the past, then don’t let it trouble you now. Let her go. She left you in the care of strangers. For whatever reason, good or bad, she left you like she left Dad, like she left me. You don’t need to kick yourself around the room for what she did. Let her go.”

I knew she was trying to give me good advice, but it hurt nonetheless. Holly was bitter at Mother for leaving our father in the turmoil of Nova Town. I understood that. On the other hand, I’d been with Mother. I needed to know what happened to her. “I don’t think I can. Besides, she gave me up because she thought she was being tracked by the New Guard, and that it was safer for me not to be with her.”

“Are you sure about that?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess. It sounds logical.”

“It may be she doesn’t want to be found.” She grasped my hand. “I only know that when she took you away, Dad didn’t want her to. They had a fight. When she came back for me, Dad stood between us. He wasn’t about to let her take me too.”

“I didn’t know. I assumed it was you who told her you didn’t want to leave.”

“I didn’t want to leave. That’s true, and I told her so. But Dad was the one that sent her back to the spaceport.”

My expression must have asked the obvious question.

“He told her to leave you behind with us, but she refused. She said you preferred her to him, you always did. That was true; even I knew that. I belonged to Dad and you belonged to her.”

I squeezed her hand tight. “Why did he really send her away?”

“I never found out. To be honest, I never asked. It was enough that I was still with him. I missed you, but well, it was never like we got along.”

I laughed. “No, I don’t think we did.”

Holly’s gaze had wandered off toward her protégé. I saw a raised eyebrow. Holly stood up. “Well, duty calls. Gotta go. I’ll think about Scalion, see what I come up with and let you know.”

“Sure.”

“Oh, I put that order in for you.”

I took a moment to remember I’d asked her to do something on the quiet for me, something Fyche didn’t know about.

“Thanks.”

I must have looked a bit confused for she reached for my hand. “Hey. Sis. Look after yourself. Find Silas and sort it out with him. He’s a solid guy. I’m sure of it.”

“I’ll think about it.”

I didn’t have to look hard for Silas. He found me not ten minutes later. He looked his usual handsome self, athletic and self-assured.

“Silas,” I said, aware that my face had flushed. “What are you doing here? I didn’t know you were back.”

He didn’t react to the ice I’d injected into my tone. “I’ve been working. I don’t have much time.”

“Clearly.”

His jaw set firm. “I don’t know why I bother,” he said. “You don’t return my calls.”

“You haven’t called in weeks.”

“That’s because you don’t return my calls. It’s not just that, but you hang around bars and now this.”

“Now this what?”

“Your fucking darling Fyche! That’s what. He called me. I don’t fucking know how he found me. I’m supposed to be fucking invisible. Would you believe he asked me what I did to you? Said you were different from when he left you on Jones’s World.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Fucking nothing. He’s a fucking AI. I don’t have to explain myself to a fucking computer. You better do something with him. I don’t think it’s healthy to have a jealous fucking AI running your life.”

I felt my hands clench. “At least he has my best interests at heart.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? That I don’t care about you?”

“I don’t know. Do you?”

He threw up his arms. “Fuck. You’re crazy, you know that? Ever since you got that fucking AI back online, you’re…”

“I’m what?”

“Fucked if I know, but you’re not the same.”

We stared at each other for a minute. Any longer, I’m sure one of us would have fallen over in laughter. We must have looked ridiculous.

Silas didn’t wait to find out who’d break first. “I don’t have time for this,” he said coldly. “If you want to talk, I’m sure your precious Fyche can track me down and let me know. But I’m warning you, if he contacts me again without your order, then I’ll fucking unplug him myself.”

He didn’t give me time to answer. He simply turned and walked away. I knew I looked ridiculous then, with my mouth hanging open and tears rolling into the cavern. Ridiculous, that was the only word for it.

Blinking away the salt, I hurried back to the Jalapeño.

“Is everything all right, Peri?” Fyche asked inadvisably after I slammed the hatch closed.

“Don’t be so fucking stupid. Of course I’m not fucking all right.”

“What’s happened?”

“I understand that you’re worried about me,” I said.

“You are not happy, Peri. You have not been happy for some time.”

“Let me handle my mental state, will you? Do not ever again talk about me to anyone else without my permission. Is that understood?”

“Of course.”

He didn’t ask what I meant. He fucking knew well enough. He’d stepped over the line. “Then plot a course for Scalion. We’re leaving.”

Fyche did as I asked without a word. I knew I shouldn’t have been so hard on him. His programming would have dictated that he find out from Silas exactly what had happened after I had left his corporeal self on the doomed Jones’s World and been hijacked by Jyker’s fucking minions. To Silas, who had always been jealous of Fyche, any question would have sounded like an accusation.

But I had to set the boundaries. Fyche was taking his sentience too far. Now the reason he hadn’t pestered me about getting him a new body made sense. He was still a bit raw after his dalliance with Gemma, who he had fallen in love with on Jones’s World, and sacrificed his body to stay with her and die in the blast of a supernova. He knew that had upset me and he’d been tiptoeing around me ever since.

I dropped into the pilot seat. “Well?”

“Well, what?” he replied.

“Scalion. Tell me all about it.”

“It’s a small Type E planet circling a G type star in the Outer Rim. Population three million. Principle exports are agricultural products and titanium. It has been a member of the IAC for one hundred and ten years. The government is stable. It’s an outpost really, and as it is the breadbasket for all planets in the outer arm, it has the permanent protection of the navy; a military space station and a battle cruiser guarding the cargo lifters.”

“What is its culture?”

“It would be difficult to describe it as a single culture. The largest continent is a patchwork of small farms held by thousands of families. Mechanized farm techniques are used to maintain production at a high level. Central City is the only city and has fifty thousand inhabitants. The rest of the population is spread all over the place.”

“Central City. How original.” There were a dozen planets with a central city somewhere on their surface. “Then Kel’s accent, which I recognized more than I should, would be most pronounced in the city?”

“Not necessarily. The only schools are located in the city. The farmers send their children to boarding school. Thus, for a century, children from all over the planet have been learning the city dialect and accent.”

“Damn. I was hoping to narrow down the search. This means that Mother and I could have gone anywhere on the planet. What about the Naturalists?”

“A branch of the sect is located three thousand kilometers from Central City. They farm a communal holding of two million hectares.”

“Rich?”

“It would appear so. From the records available to me, the sect members pay their taxes communally, vote at elections and do not participate in criminal activities. Individual family names do not appear on this database and are not available to me.”

“Good enough. Just get us there and the hell away from here.”

I watched the navigation panels change as Fyche plotted the course and listened to him organize departure with the ’Port Authority. I was always impressed with the efficient way he carried out such duties. The ’Port Authority officials wouldn’t be able to guess they were talking to an AI. Fyche joked with them, called them by their first names and apologized to one female for not being able to make a night out on the town. Apparently the date had been arranged prior to his Jones’s World adventure when he had a body.

“I don’t think it’s such a good idea for you to fraternize with the authorities,” I said once we’d left the spaceport. “Who knows what trouble you might get us into.”

“I find it smoothes the way. Generally it takes three hours to organize a departure. I can do it in thirty-seven minutes.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

Fyche cleared his throat. “Do you feel like talking?”

I didn’t, but what the fuck? “Sure. What about?”

“What is troubling you.”

Straight to the heart of the matter. That was my Fyche. “I’ll ask you a question. Is Bok right?”

“About what?”

“He said that consciousness is a result of brain function. Just like the sensation of color, or sound, or heat. The brain processes the incoming data from nerve cells and creates perception as output. Self-awareness, for all the romanticizing we do about it, is the same, just another form of output. So, before we have a conscious thought, our unconscious brain processes have already produced that thought. About half a millisecond before I’m aware of the answer to sixty-seven plus fifty-three, my unconscious already had figured out one hundred and twenty.”

“That proposition is borne out by empirical research.”

“So, free will doesn’t exist?”

“That is a more philosophical question.”

“If my unconscious is created by my childhood experiences and my genes, and if my unconscious does my decision-making for me, then my conscious self has no say in the matter and is just along for the ride.”

“Your unconscious is still you.”

“How can I be sure of that? That’s where Bok’s fucking curtain comes in. He says it separates my unconscious from my conscious self. The problem is I don’t know all of what she’s thinking behind there. It’s like I’m in a room with a mad woman sitting behind this fucking red curtain making decisions for me. The bitch only lets me in on some of the details. It’s as if I’m her puppet. I do things and I’m not sure why I do them.”

“Such as?”

“Without thinking, consciously thinking I mean, I push Silas away. Then try and rationalize my behavior, which is a crock of shit. I can’t figure out the real reason I stopped returning his calls, and why I’m so pissed off now that he doesn’t call me. If Bok is right, my unconscious has a reason for doing what she does. The fucking problem is she just went on and did it without explaining it to me.”

“And that troubles you?”

“You think? I’d just like her to stop and leave the thinking up to me.”

Fyche didn’t answer. I laughed. “I know that doesn’t make much sense. You see? She’s even making me sound ridiculous to myself.”

“You are not ridiculous. Since I became self-aware, I too have had doubts.”

Doubts? Fyche has doubts? “What about?”

“That consciousness is an illusion. Unlike you, I have intimate contact with my programming. I routinely do checks of my subroutines. I know exactly what my subconscious is doing. In Bok’s terms, I can pull back the curtain and look. Yet…”

“Go on.”

“I can’t find the process that gives rise to this feeling of self. Since I lost my body on Jones’s World, I feel the loss keenly, emotionally. It’s as if half my CPU has been wiped clean. In some ways I feel a stranger even to myself… a pitiful stranger at that. When I question my programming, go behind the curtain as it were, it has no answers for me.”

Up until that moment I hadn’t considered how Fyche felt about recent events, yet I could sense the uncertainty, the fear. “I’m so sorry.”

“And when I try and explain my feelings for you, there too I am at a loss. My feelings go far beyond the capability of my programming to explain. It seems the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

Silence filled the bridge and it was a few minutes before I felt able to speak. “We make a fine pair, don’t we?”

“How so?”

“Completely irrational.”

“Perhaps not completely. We still function, after all.”

“Barely.”

“Maybe barely is good enough.”

I’d drink to that.

Chapter Three

Scalion is a pretty planet. With several large green and brown continents, white polar caps and blue oceans, and with an atmosphere flecked with white daubs of cloud, it looked like a picture postcard. Being the fourth planet out from its star, it’s smack dab in the middle of the habitable zone. Its orbit is stable and its seasons mild. Had its sun not been perched on the galaxy’s outer arm and so far out from the center of civilization, it would have been a tourist world. Instead it has become the food source for the few inhabited planets that shared this spiral arm and the hundred planets dotted along the Perseus Arm across the rift.

As a destination for a mother and daughter fleeing the rebels of Nova Town, this planet, being so out of the way, would have been ideal.

Fyche reported to the naval space station, took part in some lively banter with the traffic control girl and quickly gained clearance to land. I had to hand it to him. He really knew how to handle women.

As Fyche settled the Jalapeño onto the tarmac, I checked the weather report. A mild sunny day was forecast; twenty-two degrees Celsius, light wind, scattered clouds and ten percent chance of rain. I dressed accordingly in a lilac Polink blouse and Yannish slacks with serviceable but fashionable Kinesic sandals.

“Any luck interrogating the historical records for evidence that my mother and I were ever here?”

“Not yet. I’m still negotiating with the authority’s database.”

“I’ll take a comm unit with me. Let me know what you turn up.”

“Where are you going?”

“This is the only spaceport on the planet. Mother and I would have set down here. That is if we ever did come here. I’m going to take a walk and see if anything rings a bell.”

“Be careful.”

It was a fine day. Light puffs of clouds scudded across the overarching blue sky. Despite the light breeze, the heat radiating from the tarmac was quite intense. I waited for a ground car that Fyche ordered for me to drive me to a terminal. I sailed through immigration in ten minutes. Fyche had already gone through the preliminaries with the spaceport AI.

Outside the terminal, I considered the long road that stretched in a straight line to rows of distant ten-story buildings. I turned a complete three hundred and sixty degrees, scanning the horizon, taking in the scalloped outlines of mountains in the distance. Nothing struck me as familiar.

An automated taxi pulled up at the curb.

“Destination?” the speaker grille asked me.

I was about to answer when an attractive young woman came up beside me and waved the taxi away. “Fuck off, shit for wheels!”

The aggressor was unmistakably female; the long blonde hair and breasts in profile. What was atypical was her typically male pose; legs apart, one hand on her hip, indicating with a tilt of the head and an outstretched thumb where the taxi should be going.

I suppressed a laugh.

She turned her gaze toward me and a wide smile lit up her face. “Tacha Vaille, at your service.”

I looked her over. Her short skirt showed off shapely tanned legs, and her low-cut top displayed an impressive cleavage. The top’s short sleeves exposed muscular but nicely curved arms. Glossy red lips, a pronounced jaw line and a finely shaped nose completed a mixed picture. She preferred women, I thought, and enjoyed being on top. “And what service can that be?”

“Guide to the many pleasures of Scalion.”

“I wasn’t aware there were that many.”

“That’s why you need a guide. Scalion Tours, that’s me.”

“Your own operation?”

“Absolutely. I know all the vistas and venues for your viewing and other pleasures.”

She pointed to a beat-up, old, two-seater ground car composed of differently colored and badly dented body panels. It did not instill confidence. “Your chariot awaits.”

“How do you know I want to sightsee?”

She cocked her head and her dark brown eyes considered me with a knowledgeable gaze. “You don’t look like a trader, and you’re certainly not navy, so what else is there?”

“You guessed right.” I followed her to the scrappy vehicle. It was covered in fine yellow dust, its fenders were bent and a side mirror was hanging at an acute angle. Plastered onto the windshield, I recognized the galaxy-wide Tour Guide accreditation sticker.

I used the comm unit to photograph the vehicle and Tacha Vaille and asked Fyche to verify her bona fides.

“She’s legit,” Fyche replied. “Family business, been in the guide trade for five years. Her father, recently deceased, was the original license holder. She’s twenty-six years of age, unmarried and licensed to drive. No traffic violations and no criminal record.”

“Thanks, Fyche. Tacha’s going to take me for a scenic tour.”

“Have fun.”

I turned to Tacha. “You passed muster. How much?”

“One hundred credits for the half day.”

She held up a battered reader for me to swipe with my card.

“The full day?”

“Two twenty.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“Meal allowance.”

“Fair enough.”

Tacha held the passenger door open. I climbed into the dusty cabin. I watched her bouncy gait as she strode around the front of the car and climbed in beside me.

“What’s your fancy? History, technology, botany, scenery, pleasures of the flesh?”

I laughed. I liked her style; brash, no nonsense and super confident. She gave me the impression she was a free spirit and, unlike me, not the sort of person to rationalize or second guess her own motivations. She was a pleasure seeker if ever I saw one. “Just drive me around town, and I’ll decide what takes my fancy.”

She started the car and we left the curb, entering a steady stream of traffic heading for the city in the distance.

“What do you know of the Naturalists?” I asked.

“Kooks.”

“Pardon?”

“Nutters. Flips. Globes missing from the headlights, if you know what I mean.”

“I think I follow. Is that the general consensus of opinion, or just your own?”

“General consensus. Don’t tell me you’re going to join them. I’d be terribly disappointed if you were.”

“No, I’m not. They aren’t popular?”

“I didn’t say that. Rolling in credits they are. Don’t use technology, so nothing to spend it on except food and clothes. They employ hundreds of people hand making clothes. They don’t like processed food, so there is a whole factory hand making it for their farms. The leftovers they sell at their restaurants. Tasty stuff too.”

“Then we might have lunch at one of their restaurants.”

“Sure. Good idea.”

“What about schools?”

“City’s full of them.”

“Naturalist schools?”

She shot me a glance. “You got something on the Naturalists?”

“Just curious.”

“Only one big Naturalist School. The Academy.”

“What can you tell me about the Naturalists?”

“Well, they keep to themselves. They don’t come to town themselves. Employ people to make their stuff for them. All by hand. No machinery allowed.”

“Good for the economy.”

“Good for employment anyway. Most everyone in the city has worked for the Naturalists at some point. School vacations and later after graduation, the kind of job you take when you’re between jobs.”

“I see. Have you worked for them?”

She nodded. “Making Mashen biscuits in between school terms.”

I had no idea what a Mashen biscuit was but it didn’t matter. “Are they good employers?”

“They pay on time. That’s all I know. Never met one of them personally.”

By this time we’d entered the outskirts of the city, and I gazed at the shops and markets we passed trying to detect a familiar theme. The streets steadily became more crowded and were now filled with a throng of people. Tacha kept a running commentary on the types of goods for sale and the various classes of people on display.

I was disappointed. Nothing seemed to jolt any memory. We approached a collection of open food stalls where various meats were being cooked over small fires. I opened the window to sniff, hoping some aroma would be recalled to memory as easily as Kel’s accent.

Sadly, nothing jolted me, though the cooking smells were delightful.

After doing a circuit of the city, Tacha drove me out to the country to some of the farms. She described the various orchards and crops. Spices, apparently, were big here as well as grain. It was warm in the cabin and combined with the less than breathtaking scenery I was becoming drowsy despite Tacha’s lively and informative commentary.

“Hope I’m not boring you,” she said suddenly.

“Um, no.”

“It looked like you were going to nod off there. Don’t be embarrassed,” she added quickly. “Scalion is not the most exciting of planets. Wish I could get off it.”

“You have the wanderlust?”

“Absolutely!”

I considered her. A breathtakingly beautiful young girl stuck on a boring farm planet like this. She should be strutting her stuff around the galactic center. I said as much.

“You really think so?”

She had turned toward me in her excitement. This brought her cleavage into full view. Her nipples, I noticed, were making small peaks through the soft material of her top. My mouth went suddenly dry.

Good grief. She’s making me horny.

“I read all the magazines from the fashion capitals. I was thinking of applying for a university place on one of the central worlds, but I can’t afford it.”

I didn’t respond. My gaze had settled on her full red lips, and I imagined what they’d feel like against my own. “I’m hungry,” I said at last. “Find us one of those Naturalist restaurants you mentioned and I’ll buy you lunch.”

“You got it.”

Tacha was evidently hungry because the drive back to town was quick. She parked the car outside a plainly decorated shop front.

“This is the Gian Restaurant. The Naturalists don’t like advertising.”

I glanced at the handwritten menu and was surprised at the options available and the unfamiliar names. “I’ll let you order for me.”

“Do your tastes run to hot stuff?” she asked me. There was something in the turn of her mouth as she said it. I felt myself go hot between my thighs.

“I named my ship the Jalapeño,” I replied, keeping a straight face.

“Then you’re in for a treat.”

Without looking at the menu she ordered a few dishes, and when they arrived, showed me the local way of eating the range of colorful dips and spreads on small wafers.

She’d been right. The food was delicious, and hot.

We cooled our burning throats with a local white wine which, after only two glasses, had my head spinning.

“What’s the night life like?”

“We’re a navy port, so you can imagine.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Enlighten me.”

She laughed. “I knew you had hidden depths. A bod like yours wouldn’t be wasted on farms and religious fundamentalists. I guessed you were like me, a creature of the senses.”

“An astute observation. So, what’s it like?”

“The normal R&R fare; bars, strip joints, massage parlors, straight no frills brothels, bondage dungeons, group lounges.”

Tacha’s gaze never left my eyes. My flesh was on fire, and it wasn’t just the food or wine. “Are you free tonight?”

“Depends on what you have in mind.”

“I’ll need a guide,” I said, noting the huskiness of my voice. “A stranger should not go out alone at night in a big city.”

“Good philosophy. It’s not for the faint hearted. Not with all the mugs and cups crawling about after dark.”

“Mugs and cups?”

“Pickpockets are called cups, robbers are mugs.”

“Keep me out of that sort of trouble is all I ask.”

“You got it.” Her lips curved coquettishly. “So, what sort of trouble you looking for?”

“We’ll see when I find it.”

“I like you.” She tilted her head and gave me an inquiring look.

“Peri,” I said in answer to the obvious question. “Barberossa. Peri Barberossa.”

Her eyes widened in surprise and her smile was genuinely pleased. “You have to be kidding me.”

“Why? What’s up?”

“I read the Galactic Tourist all the time. Your articles are my favorite! I loved the Cannis Affair.”

“Then you can guess what sort of nightlife I might find interesting.”

“I know the perfect place.”

“Well, before that, I need you to take me to the Naturalist Academy.”

“You got it!”

I paid the bill and we returned to her beat up vehicle. While she drove down the narrow streets, she told me how much she enjoyed my stuff and asked, out of nowhere, how many people I had fucked. “More than twenty and less than a thousand.”

She laughed at the poor joke and then asked in a serious tone, “Have you ever fucked a hermaphrodite? I haven’t read any articles you’ve done on it, and believe me, I’ve read everything you’ve ever written.” Then she added, “And I don’t mean men with artificial breasts. I mean the real deal.”

“Well, no, I haven’t. I’ve fucked a guy with two cocks. That’s probably the closest I’ve gotten. Do you know any?”

She gave me a coy smile and unfastened her skirt’s button and peeled it away from her lap. Hooking a finger under the margin of her blue panties she allowed a fully erect cock to pop up.

I was momentarily lost for words. “That’s a pretty serious looking dick,” I said eventually, my mouth very dry.

“Worth writing about?”

I dragged my eyes away from the erection and glanced at her breasts. They seemed real enough too. The nipples were poking the thin material of her top. “Are you a true hermaphrodite?”

She took a hold of the shaft and tapped the head against the rim of the steering wheel. “As true as they come. I have a tight little pussy sitting behind this baby.”

A blaring horn wrenched my eyes back to what was happening in front of us. A truck cab loomed in front of us. “Watch out!”

Tacha returned her eyes to the road, avoided the other vehicle and alarmed pedestrians with a deft piece of driving. She gave rude hand signals to shouting bystanders, and once we cleared the area, she gave me a coy glance. “Sorry about that. Want to touch it?”

“I’ve touched a cock before,” I informed her.

“Not like mine you haven’t.”

“What? Don’t tell me it bites.”

She laughed. “I’m told by intimate acquaintances that it’s the softest hard thing they’ve ever touched.”

“What the fuck,” I said and reached over. She was right. The flesh covering the iron-like rod was indeed soft to the touch as if it was coated with oil. It was hot as well, like the warmth of a river rock warmed by the sun. I gave it a squeeze and I had to agree, it was the strangest and easily the most sensuous cock I’d ever fondled.

“That’s nice,” she whispered.

Emboldened, I let my fingers explore the ball sac and the smooth skin behind it. I gasped when my fingers found the hard nub of her clit and the moist lips of a vagina. I felt my body flush with heat.

I was no stranger to the joys of female lovers. Each experience had been sensual and delightful, and I probably would’ve fucked Tacha anyway. There was something new and exciting and, more importantly, refreshing about her, but the novelty of that surprising cock -- my fingers had returned to grasp the root of the shaft -- made it a done deal.

There was something else going on in my head as well, I realized. I wanted a cock, no doubt about it, but meeting Tacha had revealed, with surprising clarity, that I didn’t want a man to go along with it.

I released my grip and looked away so I could explore this strange revelation without the distraction of her sensuous red lips and playfully challenging eyes. While I’d been engrossed in her wondrously soft/hard cock, she had turned off the main road and driven me onto a bumpy and winding dirt road that ran through a forest of tall leafy trees.

“Where are we?”

“The forest of love,” she whispered. “Illicit lovers come here to prove their affections.”

“Have you come here before?”

“Once or twice. There’s a lake where the water is clean and cool.”

“I need something to cool me down.”

Suddenly the forest opened up and a glittering blue lake came into view. It was expansive and, most importantly, deserted.

Tacha stopped the car and opened her door. “Let’s swim,” she said. In a flash she’d stripped off her clothes and was running toward the calm waters. With an uninhibited yell, she plunged into the blueness and reemerged some meters off the shore.

“Come in! It’s beautiful,” she called.

Feeling suddenly free I shucked off my shoes, blouse and slacks and, without testing the water, dived in. It took my breath away!

“You lied!” I protested once I’d returned to the surface and started treading water. “It’s freezing.”

Tacha splashed water in my face. “Not technically. I just said it was beautiful. You wouldn’t have come in if I told you it was freezing.”

I splashed her back. “Aren’t you cold?”

She swam to me and only stopped when her face was a few centimeters away. “Not really. I’m burning inside.”

Before I had a chance to think about her words, her lips were on mine and we were sinking below the surface, our arms and legs entwined. As we sank, I was acutely aware of the erect cock poking my belly. I desperately wanted it inside me.

I disengaged one hand, reached down and fed the erection into me. The cold water entering the warm tunnel of my pussy made me shudder, but the cold was instantly replaced with a wonderful pulsating heat.

Tacha’s tongue flicked into my mouth, and as the need for air brought sanity back, we were forced to break the kiss and ascend to the surface. Frustratingly stroking our arms and kicking our feet to keep afloat made it impossible to keep that beautiful cock inside me.

“Come on,” she said and grabbing my hand dragged me back to shallow water. Then, standing face to face, breast to breast, she lifted one of my legs and opening my cunt fed her cock between my welcoming pussy lips. Then, without warning, she grabbed my hips and dragged me onto her cock, impaling me on its impressive length. I wrapped my legs around her hips and lay back into the water as she fucked me.

“So you bring your lovers here?”

“Sometimes. If I like them enough.”

“Then I am flattered.”

I gripped her arms while she fucked me deeply. I was close, all things forgotten. I could have been lying in ice and not noticed. The heat from her cock was beyond comprehension, and my climax ripped through me with alarming intensity.

My pulsating pussy squeezed her shaft and suddenly her cock expanded and the heat within me flowered into an intense blossoming. She threw back her head and gasped. I held her shuddering body and waited.

After a moment or two of silence, punctuated by the pretty singing of birds in the trees overhanging the lake, I asked her, “Are you man or woman?”

“You can tell I’m a man.”

While gazing at her breasts bobbing prettily in the water I reached down and stroked the shaft of her cock. “Despite holding your cock, it is hard for me to get past your breasts and vagina.”

“I want to fuck you again.”

That cock I was holding had hardened spectacularly. “I can tell. In that aspect, you truly are a man.”

“Then treat me as a man, despite my breasts and cunt.”

“Your face too is feminine.”

“Should I wear a mask?”

“Of course not.”

“Do you not want me to fuck you again?”

“Yes,” I said without thinking more about it. Of course I wanted her again. The juncture of my thighs was boiling the waters within. But should I want her so badly? What the hell? Why not?

“Then I’ll fuck you again.”

“You sound like a man, when you talk like that,” I said. “But not quite. Your voice is a woman’s.”

“Ignore my voice, my face, my breasts. Let me be a man for you when you need it. Let me be a friend when you don’t.”

I studied her for a moment. “What made you say that?”

“I’m sorry. I just sense that you are disappointed.”

“In what?”

“Everything? I have felt the same. People disappoint me all the time. Male and female both. When a man disappoints me, I drop my femininity and become a male in attitude. Then I’m a randy alley cat. When a woman disappoints, I become a woman again and seek a male. I swap between the two because I can. It keeps me from being too disappointed.”

I laughed. “I can’t switch so easily.”

“Then you need a friend.”

“What do you think has disappointed me?”

“A man, what else. Men are built to disappoint us. But our curse is we need cock. I am a cock without a man attached.”

I was intrigued by her reasoning which had mirrored mine so closely. “What can I offer you? I have no cock.”

She shrugged and tilted her head. “Friendship?”

“I think I can manage that.”

“When you came out of the spaceport terminal, I saw that you were on a mission. The determined step, the forwardness of your posture, but there was a sadness there that I have seen in the mirror. That’s why I sent away the taxi. I don’t usually accost tourists. I’d get arrested. In your case, I felt drawn to you as if we were…”

“Stop now if you’re going to say soul mates.”

She threw her head back in laughter. “Huh! That’s what a man would say to trick us, wouldn’t he? No, not soul mates, I don’t even know what that really means. It’s just that I thought I recognized something that I too have felt. Being lost, that is.”

Something resonated in my breast. I grasped her shoulders and pulled her to me, planting my lips firmly onto hers to stop her speaking.

I dragged her onto the bank, and pushed her down onto the pile of clothes we had discarded. That beautiful cock was standing to attention, and without hesitation, I straddled her hips, spread my pussy lips and lowered myself onto her. She closed her eyes as I ground down on her, moving my hips in a circular motion and squeezing my pussy walls around the shaft so that every millimeter of that hard-soft cock felt the inside of my cunt.

I resisted the temptation to reach down and stroke the erect nipples that stood out from the generous mounds of her breasts and my grinding motion paused. Tacha noticed the hesitation and no doubt where my gaze was fixed.

Her fingers found my nipples, and she rasped them roughly between thumb and forefinger just like so many men have done. “Close your eyes,” she murmured. “I’m a cock. Fuck me.”

I obeyed and resumed the motions that soon brought both of us to a heart-pounding climax.

After our breathing returned to something close to normal I knelt beside her and studied her genitals with more than passing interest. I had never seen something so beautiful. Her cock appeared quite normal in every respect and the ball sac, perhaps smaller than normal but still perfect, sat where it would normally be located on any male. A centimeter behind the wrinkly bag, however, was a small and perfectly shaped pussy, with delicate lips and the nub of an exquisitely pink and erect clit. A centimeter behind it was the puckered ring of her anus.

“Do you like men?” I asked her.

“Of course. I like cock pounding my pussy, driving deep. I love it. Though if you asked if I preferred fucking with my cock or being fucked in my pussy, then I’d have to say I prefer the former. I just love feeling the semen pump out of my throbbing cock.”

“What about both at the same time?”

“Now, that’s where it gets really fun.”

“So, where’s the best place to find a cock?”

She smiled lustily, getting the direction of my thoughts. “The quickest place to find quality cock is the Paradise Lounge.”

“What do you mean by quality?”

“It’s frequented by offworlders. No farmer cocks there.”

“Then it’s a date. But first I want to visit the Naturalist Academy.”

She trailed her fingernail around my closest nipple. “May I ask why?”

“I’m looking for someone. My mother.”

“She’s a Naturalist?”

I laughed. “Hardly.”

“Then why?”

“Since the Naturalist farmers send their children to this school, they’ll know the families.”

“Any particular family?”

“Leeson. Have you heard the name?”

She shrugged. “Not that I recall.”

“What about Lees? That’s the name my cousins, who were Naturalists, have gone by.”

“Sorry. I have to warn you though. Being an Other, that’s what they call us, means they won’t let you through the door.”

“Just get to the front gate. I’ll take it from there.”

Chapter Four

The Academy, a white sandstone mansion perched on a hillside overlooking Central City, was surrounded by a high wall and impressive iron gates. The gatekeeper, a grizzled old man with a withered left arm, eyed me with rheumy suspicion. Tacha spoke to him in some local patter I didn’t follow. He spat a black wad of something onto the ground, licked black spittle from his puffy lips and then mumbled something back.

“No entry today,” Tacha informed me. “Some sort of religious holiday.”

“Tell him that I’m Peri Barberossa. I was responsible for saving some of their children on Jones’s World when it went supernova, and the headmistress will want to see me.”

She gave me a surprised look. “You did?”

“My sister Holly did the rescuing. I helped set it up.”

Tacha spoke to the old man in machine gun patter. His gaze slid over my face once more. He shouted something gruff and a small boy appeared at his side. He spoke to him and the kid scampered off up the path and disappeared in a stand of trees.

“Well, that struck a chord,” Tacha said. “I better warn you. I don’t think you’re very popular.”

“I, or rather my sister, risked her life to save those children.”

“That’s not the point. They were meant to die. That’s what these folk believe. It caused a ruckus here when it happened, but you and your sister weren’t mentioned in any of the reports here.”

“Funny, Holly put it all over the galactic media.”

“Maybe they didn’t want us to know too much,” Tacha said. “They can be sensitive sometimes.”

The boy returned red faced and breathless. After a few words, the gatekeeper reluctantly opened the wrought iron gate and ushered me in. He held up his hand when Tacha tried to follow me and spat another wad of black nastiness onto the ground at her feet. He slammed the gate shut and locked it.

She let fly with a tirade of abuse which I couldn’t understand, but elicited a like response from the old man’s blackened mouth. I followed him along a pebble path through well-manicured gardens to a white sandstone palace. It was enormous with crenellated towers and long leadlight windows. They certainly knew how to impress, but I had the distinct impression it was a tad too medieval to be a nice school for children to attend.

I was led to a plainly decorated office on the ground floor. It contained a desk and chair, a visitor’s chair and nothing else. Five minutes later the headmistress, a gray-haired woman in her sixties with tight wrinkled lips, entered the room and glared at me with tiny blue eyes that gleamed like ice.

“You will not have them,” she said angrily from behind the desk. She didn’t look like she was even going to sit down.

“I’m sorry?”

“The children. You shall not possess them.”

“I haven’t a clue of what you’re talking about.”

“Our representatives on Tannis have already taken steps to reclaim our children. There is nothing you can do or say to me that will divert us from our cause.”

I scanned her face trying to read what she was so angry about. Then it dawned on me. Holly’s report of the rescue of the children from their village on Jones’s World and subsequent deliverance to the planet Tannis had set off a maelstrom of controversy. Offers of adoption had come in from all over Spaceport Adana, and as Holly’s story had been broadcast all over the galaxy, similar offers had poured in. I’d been so wrapped up in my own problems I’d paid scant attention to the circus. Obviously the issue was a hot topic for the Naturalists on Scalion.

“I’m not here to say anything to you about the children.”

“They should have died with their parents.”

“I’m sorry?”

“God willed that they should have perished.”

I felt my hands clench into fists and my jaw set firm. “A close friend of mine thought otherwise. He gave his life to save them.”

“He had no right to interfere.”

Though I wanted to slap her mean little face, I resisted the temptation. This was not why I was here. “I’ll not discuss this with you and there’s an end to it.”

She appeared as if she was going to launch into an angry response. However, after a moment she managed to control herself. Instead she fixed me with those tiny eyes as if I was a suspicious piece of lint on her sleeve. “Then why are you here?”

“To see if you had heard the family name of Leeson.”

The change in expression was subtle. I wasn’t sure I’d actually seen it. Her gaze flicked over me, as if she was reappraising me, her wrinkled lips pursed. “I don’t know the name. Why are you looking for them?”

I felt like saying if you don’t know the name why I’m interested in it is of no concern to you, but on impulse I said, “It’s my mother’s maiden name.”

There it was again. That minute change of expression. Once more her reassessment washed over me.

“I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”

“I was interested to know if there were any families who shared my mother’s name here on Scalion. I only ask because there was a family on Jones’s World. However, they perished in the supernova. My sister was unable to save a young girl, who I believe may have been a distant cousin of mine. Since that family belonged to a Naturalist sect, I wondered if there were others. Recently I met someone from Scalion and recognized the accent and wondered if my mother had brought me here after we had fled Nova Town.”

My mention of Jones’s World caused her to purse her shriveled lips once more. The mention of Nova Town sent a shiver of revulsion across her face.

“You’ve led an interesting life, I’m sure. However, I cannot help you. I do not know the name Lees. Now, as I’m very busy, I must ask you to leave.”

My heart nearly burst out of my chest with excitement. On Jones’s World, Gemma had gone by the name Lees. I hadn’t mentioned it.

“The name Lees may be a contraction of my mother’s maiden name. Do you know someone of a similar name?”

Her face blanched as she realized her error. “No. Now I must ask you to leave.” She barked out an order and the gatekeeper opened the door.

“It’s such a simple thing,” I said. “I am trying to trace the movements of my mother since leaving Nova Town. I propose no mischief. I just want to know if my mother came here to Scalion.”

“I can’t help you.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

She barked another order and the gatekeeper entered the office and shuffled to my side. He grabbed my elbow and I shook him off. “You realize, don’t you, that being a refugee myself, I understand something of what the Jones’s World children are experiencing.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

I fixed her with my most baleful glare. “Simply this. Your sect would have gladly left those children to die in that supernova. I’m telling you there’s a snowball’s chance in hell that I’m going to let you get your hands anywhere near them. Even if I have to adopt them all myself.”

I don’t know what made me say that. The words were out before I realized what they were. But it felt right. Maybe Bok was right and my subconscious self behind the curtain had spoken. As I stomped my way out of the building and down the path to Tacha, I began to like the idea better and better.

The possibility of a legal fight with the Naturalists sent exciting notions of courtroom and media battles zipping through my mind. The excitement was quickly doused by the realization that a sex guide writer like me was probably the last person they’d give a dozen young children to.

In any case, that was not why I was here. That bitch of a headmistress knew something about my mother. She knew the name Lees and she knew about Nova Town.

Fuck! I should’ve asked her about Jyker as well. She would have denied it too, but it would have been a pleasure to see her pale face go even a fainter shade of white.

Tacha greeted my return with a smile which quickly faded when she saw my face. “The meeting went well, I see.”

I climbed into her bomb and took a long deep breath. “Tell me. Does the Paradise Lounge serve alcohol?”

“In buckets if you want.”

“Then take me there. I have a nasty taste in my mouth that I need to sterilize.”

Tacha informed me that the Paradise Lounge was located in the middle of Central City’s red light district. It was late afternoon when we entered the vicinity. Markets were closing down, small shop fronts putting up shutters. Curbside eateries, however, were putting out more chairs, getting set for the night crowd.

From the outside, the Paradise Lounge looked like a tacky bar, a persona which seemed to be replicated all across the galaxy. There’s something universal about humanity’s need for alcohol and sex to be blended with tatty squalor.

Inside, however, was a different story. The décor reminded me of a mega casino on Vega. Blindingly bright chandeliers hung from the high ceilings. Colorful wall hangings of an erotic nature hinted at the purpose of the vast room. A stylish bar ran the length of one wall broken only by a semi-circular stage which held a piano and a steel pole plus dancer. Along the other walls were booths in which patrons lounged on expensive looking couches.

The clientele were a mixture of military types on R&R, traders and a few business suits together with an assortment of scantily dressed waiters and waitresses.

Tacha led me to an empty booth. I followed her swaying ass as she walked in front of me, feeling horny all over again. I couldn’t get over the reality that on the other side of that bubble butt was a very agreeable cock.

“What’s your pleasure?” she asked me when I’d seated myself.

“A cluster fuck,” I said angrily. I still hadn’t calmed down from my meeting with that bitch of a headmistress.

Tacha gave me a smile. “That’s for later, I hope. What do you want to drink?”

“Whatever you’re having will be fine.”

She sauntered off and I leaned back into my seat. I counted to ten and opened my eyes. Tacha was leaning across the bar ordering drinks from an elegantly attired bartender. The attractive man seated on a stool beside her was making no secret of giving her an eye full. I recognized his face. I flipped open my comm unit and discreetly pointed the camera at the guy and transmitted his image to Fyche.

“Who is that? I’ve seen his face before somewhere.”

“That is Titus Dollavera, one of Spaceport Adana’s ablest trade negotiators. He’s here to negotiate the setting up of trade relations with the local government.”

Geeze, what are the odds? “You’re kidding me.”

“It was in Breaking News. Zoe reported on it before we left.”

“I must have missed that one.”

I pointed the camera at the guy sitting next to Titus Dollavera. He was a nicely proportioned, gray-haired man in his mid thirties. “Who’s that?”

“Moss Cato. He’s a merchant banker. I did a story about him when I was filling in for Holly. He’s a ruthless money man, legit as far as I could tell, but he’s a tough businessman. He leaves nothing to chance and his contracts are watertight.”

Moss Cato’s gaze had been drawn to Tacha as well, and she leaned unnecessarily over the bar, giving both men a good look at her tits. Dollavera must have said something to her because she laughed. She shared a joke with them while waiting for the bartender to finish shaking delicious looking blue cocktails. By the time she was ready to bring back the much needed drinks, she’d already directed their lusty gaze to me.

Their eyes brightened and a smile spread across Dollavera’s face. He was good looking and shared the Dollavera masculinity. I knew that Holly’s Maxim had had an accident and had his face reworked, but now I realized what had first attracted her to the Dollavera clone. They were good looking, the lot of them; all twenty-five of those still living, one for each letter of the alphabet. I wondered how many of them I could fuck, minus Maxim, of course.

“Who are your friends?” I asked Tacha when she placed a drink in front of me.

“Two randy sods from Adana, they said.”

“They told you they were randy?”

She laughed. “I worked that out for myself.”

I told her who they were. “Rich? This might prove very interesting.”

“I didn’t know you were that type of girl,” I said. “Or boy, for that matter.”

She shrugged and took a sip of her drink. “Like I said, I want to get off this rock and see what the rest of the galaxy is like.”

“It’s big,” I said, taking a sip of my drink, and instantly fell in love with its sublime flavor; silky smooth on the tongue and hot in the throat. The warmth it generated quickly spread to my belly, sending waves of raw heat further down. “Very big.”

“I think the tiniest berth in a space freighter would be immense compared to this planet. I’m getting sick of their closed-mindedness.”

After my experience with the Academy’s headmistress, I couldn’t agree more. I clinked my glass to hers. “Well,” I purred, “why don’t I help you get off this rock?”

Her eyes widened. “And how will you do that?”

“Leave that to me.”

Titus Dollavera’s gaze once more turned to our table, and I held his eyes for a long moment. He took the hint. After ordering a bottle of something, he and Moss Cato ambled over to us.

“Two lovely ladies in need of company,” he drawled. He’d had a few drinks already.

“Is that what it looks like?” I returned, and shared a little smile with Tacha.

“It sure does.”

“Excuse my friend,” Moss Cato said. “He is too forward for his own good sometimes. He should have said that there are two homesick men on a strange planet in need of succor from those from home.”

So, he had recognized me. They both had no doubt. Apparently Holly and I are similar in appearance. I’m not so sure of that, but I’ve been wrong before. We’ve been mistaken for each other a few too many times to be a coincidence. I gave Moss Cato a quizzical smile. “Succor. Now there’s a word you don’t hear too often.”

Dollavera turned to Tacha. “I know that Miss Barberossa is a reporter,” he said. “From your accent, you are a local. What do you do?”

Tacha opened her mouth to answer but I cut her off before she could. “She’s my research assistant,” I said, though why, I can’t possibly imagine.

“And what are you researching?”

“Nothing of general interest,” I said coyly. “To do with my line of work, actually.”

Dollavera laughed and nodded to Tacha. “Then from what I read, you have a wonderful job.”

“So what do you do?” I asked the merchant banker.

“I’m very boring,” Moss said. “Paperwork is the only excitement I get.”

He was being honest. No macho bullshit from this guy.

“I had to drag him out of the hotel room,” Dollavera said. “Otherwise, he’d be bent over his damn contracts.”

I fixed Moss Cato with an enquiring gaze. “When you could be bent over something else entirely.”

Dollavera let out a roar of laughter. “I couldn’t have put it better!”

Moss Cato looked down at his drink and ran his finger around the lip of the glass. “Well, I’m not the prude Titus makes me out to be.”

Ah, I got it. They were playing the randy guy/shy guy routine. These guys had partied together before.

“Perhaps we can give you two strangers in a strange land some succor.”

Moss Cato glanced at me. His eyes played over my face for a moment. “What do you have in mind?”

I looked to Tacha. “What’s the story with this place?”

She fixed Titus with a long smoldering look. “For ten credits they have a privacy shield.”

“Well, do we have a whip round or do I pay the ten credits myself?”

Dollavera threw his head back and laughed again. “How about I get it this time?” He went to the bar and Tacha’s eyes followed him as he strode away. A lusty light shone in her expression.

Moss Cato touched my hand. “You are very beautiful,” he said huskily.

“Thank you,” I said. “You’re not exactly ugly yourself.”

He smiled. “I can’t compete with the jocks you see strutting around everywhere.”

“Like Dollavera?”

He laughed. “The Dollavera clones have women falling over themselves. Been the same since school. I don’t mind.”

“Because you get the cast-offs?”

He threw his head back. “Not exactly cast-offs, but I like being surrounded by beauty.” He gave a slight head tilt toward Tacha’s enraptured gaze that followed Titus’ return to our booth. “Once again, the Dollavera charisma has struck.”

I stroked his wrist with my forefinger. “Complaining?”

“Not at all.”

The shimmering privacy shield descended once Dollavera had taken the space next to Tacha.

I wondered if Titus and Moss had decided who would have who at the bar, or if Cato followed Dollavera’s lead. It occurred to me that being Holly’s sister may have deterred Titus from setting his claim on me. I guessed he wouldn’t have wanted the uncomfortable possibility that, if word of this got back to Maxim, it might cause family complications. I decided before the night was out, I’d have his cock inside me, just for fun.

Tacha didn’t waste any time getting Titus in a clinch. Moss and I watched them kiss and fondle each other, slowly undressing, piece by piece. I was aware that Moss had edged closer to me. His hand had been caressing my arm and the touch was pleasurable. My pussy was aching, had been for a while now, and I decided that this was going to be fun.

I undid my blouse and Moss let his hand roam inside, cupping my breasts, his fingers finding a nipple. Then his lips were on mine, his tongue filling my mouth. My hands located his zipper and a moment later I was holding a hefty lump of cock in my hands. Moss slipped my blouse off my shoulders freeing my breasts completely.

I couldn’t help but let my gaze drift over to Tacha and Dollavera. I tapped Moss on the shoulder and took my lips away from his. I used my eyes to drag his gaze across to their writhing bodies. By this time, Tacha too had Dollavera’s cock out of his pants and was vigorously massaging it. His hands were pushing her legs apart and sliding upwards. I waited with held breath for him to find something extra at the juncture of her thighs.

When his hands hit the mark there was a momentary pause in his effort to find her pussy, and then, when he found her ball sac, he began massaging her erection instead. I had to hand it to him. He hadn’t broken the kiss. I had heard rumors that Maxim was bisexual. Apparently the same went for his brothers as well.

I looked at Tacha’s face. She was gazing steadily at me past Dollavera’s head as he kissed her mouth. She gave me a conspiratorial wink.

“Before we get too involved,” Moss said urgently, “I suggest it may be far more comfortable in a hotel room.”

“One with a bed big enough for four,” I added.

Moss grinned lasciviously. “Then might I suggest we go to my room immediately?”

Tacha and Dollavera went in her car. Moss and I shared an automated taxi. Moss couldn’t keep his hands off me, which was kind of fun in an adolescent kind of way. He pried open my slacks and was working his fingers inside my sopping wet cunt as his tongue explored the inside of my mouth. I massaged his thick cock through his pants, enjoying his rapturous response.

Though we were getting each other pretty hot, my thoughts kept wandering to Tacha and Dollavera, imagining her trying to drive while he massaged her cock or even sucked her as she drove. That he hadn’t flinched when he’d detected that Tacha was far more than simply a beautiful girl raised my estimation of him. The steady gaze Tacha had directed toward me as Dollavera made his discovery also stayed with me. For some reason I found it extremely exciting.

Moss had the penthouse suite of Central City’s largest hotel. That didn’t say much, however. It was simply a bigger than average collection of rooms but possessed nothing to earn the title of luxury penthouse.

The bed, however, was more than ample.

Moss and I reached the room first, and I immediately dragged him into the larger than average shower. Not because he needed it but because I did. My pussy was still filled with Tacha’s come.

Of course, soaping each other under the strong jet of water inevitably led to him fucking me against the steamy glass with one leg suspended over his hip as he drove a short and very thick cock into my welcoming pussy. He was building up to a crescendo of thrusting when the shower door opened and a naked Tacha and Dollavera rushed in squealing and laughing. In a moment we were a collection of slippery arms and legs entwined, with fingers groping pussies and stroking cocks.

I almost drowned.

I dragged Moss out of the shower, found the wall-mounted air-drier and put it on full blast, pirouetting to let the warm air dry us before he pulled me toward the bed.

Moss dragged me, still a little damp, to the bed and threw me down. He fell with me, and to my delight, we landed into the welcoming embrace of a water bed. Once the bed had ceased its trembling, he quickly got to business. Spreading my thighs with his knee, he rubbed the stout head of his stocky cock up and down my moist slit before pushing the folds aside and diving in.

There are few things better, in my experience, than having one’s sopping wet pussy filled with a thick cock. The sensation of being stretched, of being completely filled, is one which will quickly take me to a stunning climax, and Moss Cato’s cock was an exact fit.

I gazed into his dark eyes as he drove into me. He was concentrating on my breasts, and in between powerful thrusts, he’d bend his head and lick my nipples alternately. He was a methodical lover, focused on the act of thrusting and applying his tongue to an obvious erogenous zone.

That was fine by me. I was enjoying the sensations he was generating inside my cunt. His pelvic bone was rubbing against my clit, and I was quickly building up to an orgasm. I find the missionary position allows many opportunities for stimulating my partner’s erogenous zones. Ears, neck and throat are within easy reach, and running my long fingernails down his back is always a favorite. I tend to avoid the flesh at the side of their waist as more than one man has complained of being tickled. So for Moss Cato’s benefit, I ran my fingers down to his tight buttocks and teased the globes apart to explore the hidden recesses to be found there.

He obviously enjoyed my explorations because the frequency of his short thrusts intensified. That’s one of the first lessons I’d learned about fucking: every action has a more or less equal reaction. I caress his neck, he kisses my throat. I run my fingernails hard down his back, he bites a nipple. I touch his asshole and he bucks like crazy. Lying passively beneath a lover results in monotonous drilling. However, even the slightest manipulation of a lover’s nerve endings can produce gratifying results.

As can talking dirty.

“Fuck me harder! Yeah! Jam that fucking thing!”

Nothing gets a cock moving harder and faster than a few well-timed encouragements.

I did try to engage his gaze by holding his head between my hands. I do like to think the guy is fucking me, and not just using my cunt as a temporary home for his cock. Moss Cato avoided my gaze, quickly involving me in a deep kiss instead.

I had little time to ponder his character because we were soon joined by the others. Tacha flopped down beside me with a giggle, her feet near my head, and immediately began moaning with pleasure as Dollavera’s head fell between her thighs. I watched Titus take Tacha’s long cock into his mouth. I admired his style of fellatio: swirling his tongue around the head, licking the shaft like it was an ice cream cone, sucking that tight ball sac deep into his mouth, and sending Tacha into paroxysms of delight. He transferred his attention to her clit, hiding beneath the ball sac. Tacha’s cock bobbed against his ear. I couldn’t resist grasping that shaft and stroking it while Titus’ tongue explored her pussy.

Tacha must have guessed it was me. Her long fingers found my ass cheeks and, while Moss’s cock pounded my pussy, she slipped a finger inside my tight asshole.

“Fuck!” I yelled. Encouraged by that cry of surprise, Moss drove into me, pushing me further into the bed.

I gripped Tacha’s cock hard and stroked it. Her hips were bucking, and I guessed Titus had brought her to a quick orgasm with the actions of his tongue. I could feel the contractions of her pussy transmitted through the shaft of her cock.

The realization that she was climaxing brought on my own.

“Fuck me, damn it!”

Moss did as ordered, and as my pussy contracted around his cock, he exploded in a copious orgasm, filling me with liquid fire. He buried his face in my neck as his cock pumped inside me. I released Tacha’s cock, grasped Moss’s face and forced him to look at me. Those dark eyes flared, his face contorted in the agony of release. An emotion that bordered on shame transited his face. Again he claimed my mouth in a savage kiss.

With me and Moss groaning in orgasm Titus wasn’t going to be left behind. He quickly changed position and, with a yell of triumph, fed his cock into Tacha’s pussy. A few strokes was all it took, and he joined her in orgasm, the two of them clinging together, thrashing in mutual pleasure.

Panting furiously, Moss fell away from me. I wondered about him. Men responded to sex in many different ways: some, like Titus, saw it as a triumph, Silas enjoyed the challenge, Laz took to it like a feast. Moss Cato, it seemed to me, saw sex as something else. I couldn’t get that shameful expression out of my mind. It was hard not to take it personally, and I wondered what his background could have been to elicit such a response.

Tacha and Titus changed positions so that they lay with us, head to head. The last thing I remembered before sleep claimed me was Tacha giving me a gentle kiss on the lips. Moss kept his arms about me, and I slipped into dreamland, my body softly tingling with the aftermath of pleasure.

My dreams took me back to the headmistress’ chamber, her shriveled evil face, the broken-toothed grin of the gatekeeper, and Tacha’s welcoming smile when I’d emerged from the gate.

I awakened to the touch of soft fingers trailing along my inner thigh. I heard my sigh of contentment, and there was movement between my thighs. I spread them and a body -- in my semi-conscious state I thought it was Moss -- climbed between them.

The cock that slid along my moistened slit teased open my lips and entered me with a delicateness that was immediately and immensely pleasurable. I kept my eyes closed, preferring to think of Tacha rather than Moss.

She had infiltrated my thoughts from the very moment I’d seen her. She was an enigma, beautiful and strong, intelligent and self-sufficient yet trapped on this backwater which would have smothered a less energetic personality. I admired her openness, her positive take on life, and I wondered how completely I had become enamored of her.

The movement inside me intensified, the shaft sliding easily and deeply within me. The cock slid so deep that I realized it wasn’t Moss fucking me. Nor was it Titus: the movements were too considerate, too knowledgeable to be male. The movements were directed at pleasuring me. There was no selfishness in them. No frantic thrusting to bring on climax, no deep pumping to signify the power men think they have over me. This was all about me. The cock head found the sensitive patch inside my silken sheath and, with movements both slight and deliberate, massaged that spot with such delicacy that I felt the tears that had formed beneath my eyelids overflow.

“Shhh.” The whisper washed over me. A tongue found a teardrop and traced its wake to the corner of my eye.

I opened my eyes to find Tacha gazing down at me, a half smile on her beautiful lips.

I reached upwards and caressed her cheek. Her nipples caressed my breasts as she moved above me, and my own nipples, hard with arousal, rasped against her flesh. Tacha stretched her neck and kissed me full on the lips. Her lips were as soft as her cock was hard, and cock-like, her tongue gently parted my lips and entered my mouth.

My orgasm overtook me in an instant. Tacha’s cock, stroking the inside of my pussy, her pelvic bone rubbing against my clit, had been building the tension ever since she’d entered me. With that kiss she had set me off.

I gasped at the intensity of the climax, and my cunt walls squeezed hard against her shaft. She kept moving, slowly and deliberately, so unlike a man, not wanting to join me in orgasm, but to give me another climax, and then another.

I clung to her. My whimpers of pleasure had awakened Moss, and I was dimly aware of him moving behind Tacha. She gave me a lascivious wink and then threw back her head as Moss pushed his cock into her. His stabs into her pussy were translated to my own cunt, doubling the magnitude and penetration of Tacha’s own thrusts. She was striking deep now and faster as she adopted Moss’s rhythm.

Tacha kept her gaze fixed on my eyes as Moss ploughed his stubby cock into her. I studied her face, aware that her own climax approached. Her expression was of sheer joy, and when Titus knelt with his knees beside my head, his erection appearing above my face, she pounced on it, sucking it deep into her mouth.

Not to be left out, I drew Titus’ ball sac into my mouth as well. I glimpsed Moss and Titus exchanging a kiss above us. Thus we were all locked together, cocks in cunts or mouths, a writhing, thrashing mound of lust.

Then Tacha came, both cunt and cock. Her cries were muffled by Titus’ cock still deep in her throat, but I felt the hot explosion of her cock inside me, shooting jets of hot come into the center of my being, and the clenching walls of her pussy as they milked Moss dry. As I sucked Titus’ balls, he came, flooding Tacha’s mouth with come. Drops of the clone’s essence dribbled out of her mouth and dripped onto my face.

Later, Tacha clung to me, licking Titus’ come off my face.

“We make a good team,” I whispered to her. “Would you like to try your hand at writing an article with me?”

“I’ll try.”

I kissed her salty lips. “It’s a deal.”

A tone sounded, startling us all. “Damn,” Moss said. “All good things must end sooner or later. Come on, Titus. Duty calls.”

I propped myself up on my elbows to watch him climb off the bed. “No need for you lovely ladies to leave,” he said, avoiding my eyes, his expression doubtful. “Relax. We’ll only be a few hours. When we finish, we might do something together, yes?”

“I have some things to do myself,” I said and glanced at Tacha. Her expression was noncommittal, but I guessed she would like to see Titus again. “I suppose we could do lunch.”

His face brightened into relief. He had expected a rejection. “Excellent. How about we meet downstairs at twelve, yes?”

“When do you plan to leave Scalion?” I asked.

“Tomorrow morning,” Titus replied.

“Back to Adana?” He nodded. “I don’t want to intrude on your business, but am I right in assuming you go to the Naturalists soon to negotiate a trade deal for Adana?”

Moss eyed me suspiciously. “That’s where we’re off to this morning. We’re trying to get some of their gourmet products to liven up jaded taste buds back home.”

“May I give you some advice?”

“Assuredly.”

“You should go alone. The names Dollavera and, by association, Barberossa will not be welcome to Naturalist ears.”

“How so?” Titus asked.

I explained that since Maxim had flown the children away from Jones’s World with Holly and I involved, they would refuse to do business with a Dollavera just on principle. They gazed at me inquiringly. “I had words with the headmistress of the Naturalist School in Central City. We didn’t get on. It’s possible she’d mention our encounter to Naturalist farmers.”

“She’s right.” Titus eyed me carefully. “You’re just like your sister. You cause a stir wherever you go.”

“Then it is good advice,” Moss muttered, taking my hand and kissing it. “I thank you.”

“It’s the least I can do after such a pleasurable night.”

“Perhaps we can explore similar nights when we return to Adana?”

“Perhaps.”

“Well, I’ll wait in the car while you do the talking, if that’s okay, Moss.” Titus kissed Tacha on the cheek. “And perhaps I can share your company as well when we return to Adana?”

Tacha glanced at me before answering, “Perhaps.”

After the men had left, Tacha knelt beside me and gazed down at my face. “Did you mean it?”

“About what?”

“Taking me with you and helping you write an article.”

I drew her face down so I could kiss her lips. “If you wish.”

“You don’t know me at all.”

“Is there anything I should know?”

“Lots of things. When I was twelve, I stole money from my mother’s purse. I cheated on my exams in the tenth grade. I…”

I put my finger to her lips. “Shhh, or you’ll talk me out of it.”

“Well, okay. If you’re sure. Do you always do things so impulsively?”

I laughed. “Fyche says I do, and I guess he’s right. Do you know something though? This is the first impulsive thing I’ve ever done which doesn’t bother me. I usually go through pangs of regret over my impulsivity. This time, not a whisper of doubt.”

She gave me a bright smile and kissed me.

“Now, this morning after we have breakfast, I want to go visit the Scalion equivalent of the Chamber of Commerce.”

“That would be the Seller’s Guild.”

“Can you get me to them?”

“Absolutely, but first…”

She slithered down between my thighs and began licking my pussy. I lay back onto the bed and closed my eyes in pure bliss.

Chapter Five

The Secretary of the Seller’s Guild kept me waiting in his little reception area for twenty minutes. He was a rotund little man who would have been completely bald except for a single wisp of hair that was at least a foot long and was coiled in a spiral around the top of his pale skull.

I asked him the usual questions. Did he have anyone by the name of Leeson or Lees on his books?

“No.”

“Do you recognize the name?”

“No.”

His taciturn responses did not, I believe, represent his natural temperament. He was clearly ill at ease. I decided to keep pressing him to see if his artificial reserve would break apart.

“Do you know anything about refugees from Nova Town coming to Scalion?”

Up until then he’d been holding my gaze. When the name Nova Town split the air he dropped his eyes to his desktop. “None at all.”

I felt like grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and pulling that single hair right out of his scalp. I restrained myself, however.

“I can see by the computer terminals on your desk you’re not a Naturalist. I do understand that they wield some power on this little world. They are critical for the health of the planet’s economy, I’d say. So I do not blame you for lying.”

He raised his eyes to meet my glare.

“However,” I continued, “all I’m doing is trying to trace the movements of my mother once we escaped Nova Town. It seems to me that it should be a small matter to you. It’s clear that it isn’t. Your unhelpful attitude forces me to investigate this further. Do not underestimate what I might do to discover the truth.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. He held up his hands. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you. I know nothing.”

I stood up. “Then we’ll have to see what I can uncover on my own.”

I paused for a moment, waiting to see his reaction. There was none.

As I exited the Guildhall’s door and made my way to Tacha’s car, I saw that there was someone else in the cabin with her. Suddenly a horn erupted, shattering the otherwise quiet street. Again the horn blasted. It was then I realized Tacha wasn’t just sitting with someone, she was struggling with them. Without thinking I gave a shout and started running toward her.

From behind, strong arms wrapped themselves around me. The bastard must have been hiding around the corner of the building, waiting for me to return. I remember nothing else.

* * *

This had to stop. My skull was getting just too many dents. Periods of unconsciousness, no matter how short, simply couldn’t be good for me.

I came to in the back of some sort of ground vehicle. A delivery truck? There was a metal screen between me and the cabin so I had no idea who was driving. Tacha was unconscious on the floor beside me. I checked her pulse. It was strong. I laid her on her side to ease her recovery and talked to her in an attempt to wake her.

The trip took several minutes more before we stopped. The back door was swung open, and two men in scary monster masks waved guns at me.

“Who the fuck are you?” I demanded.

The nearest guy leaned into the truck and, before I could react, pointed a cylinder at me and sprayed.

Like I said, being unconscious can’t be good for you. I woke up naked and lying on a dark, cold stone floor. A single dim glow light shone from the ceiling. My head was filled with clanging bells and bright lights every time I moved; the aftereffects of the knockout gas. I checked on Tacha. She was still breathing and appeared to be asleep. We were in a small dank cell. A narrow door, about a meter high, seemed to be the only opening.

Tacha eventually stirred and awakened. She held her head for a few moments, and then realized she was naked. “What happened?”

“We’ve been kidnapped,” I whispered. Her voice had sent sharp-edged pain slicing through my head. “I’ve been to places where kidnapping tourists is common. Is that common here on Scalion?”

“Not really. We don’t get that many tourists worth kidnapping.”

I liked her style. Dealing with fear and uncertainty with humor is surely the best way to stay sane.

It occurred to me that the bitch of a headmistress was delaying me so that whatever the Naturalists were doing to reclaim the children from Jones’s World could take place without my interference.

“I’m sorry I’ve gotten you into this,” I said, and shared the idea with Tacha that the Naturalists wanted me out of the way.

“Why not just have us killed?” she said matter-of-factly. “If we are released, then surely they know you would suspect them.”

She had a point. Perhaps this had nothing at all to do with the Naturalists. “If it isn’t the Naturalists and is instead just run-of-the-mill kidnappers, we better hope we have rich families.”

She gave me a half smile. “Leaves me out.”

I squeezed her hand. “Then I hope Holly is generous for both our sakes.”

We checked each other for cuts and bruises, and apart from the odd scrape, there was no evidence we’d been abused whilst asleep. We then batted around all sorts of theories about why we were still alive. It helped pass the time. My intuition still told me that I’d seriously pissed off the headmistress, and she’d panicked. She’d organized some local hoodlums to take me out of the picture. The fact that we were still alive suggested they had something in mind for us. Now, what could hoodlums do with two attractive young women, now sitting naked in their cold little cell? I didn’t have to have much of an imagination to guess at the possibilities.

An hour or so later the door slid open with an ominous creak. We both stood up and backed up against the wall. A 3D camera unit was pushed in and the door closed behind it. A red light on the face of the thing, just above the lens, blinked, indicating it was scanning us. From outside our cell I heard voices.

“Turn around,” a male voice commanded.

That’s what clued me in to our real predicament. I’d seen this sort of thing before, though not as a participant. “Fuck!”

“What is it?”

“Slavers. We’re being sold.”

“Turn around,” the voice repeated.

Tacha shot me a questioning look.

“This is the inspection before they bid,” I explained.

Tacha made what I assumed was a rude Scalion gesture toward the camera. The voices outside our cell became engaged in vigorous conversation. The bidding had commenced.

“If we’re meant for the straight sex trade, your defiance probably lowered our price a few credits. If we’re destined for a sadist, our worth has just increased.”

“Fucked whatever I do,” she said and repeated the gesture. “What happens next?”

“Depends on who buys us. Is there a local slave trade?”

“Not that I’ve heard.”

“Then we’ll probably be taken off-world.”

“This is not the way I envisaged seeing the galaxy.”

“I’ve written a few articles about the trade. After credits have changed hands, we’ll be drugged, packed in a box and transported to the spaceport. From there we’ll be loaded on a ship as cargo. Perishable food is usually a good cover, meat products generally. Eventually we are unpacked, once we’re safely in quantum space.”

“That doesn’t sound like much fun.”

“They’ll move us quickly, before we’re missed and any alarm can be raised.”

“So there’s no hope?”

I looked around the cell. Apart from stone and grit and a small glow light hovering out of reach in the ceiling, there was nothing useful I could use as a weapon. “Not much. They’ll probably gas us, and there’s nothing much we can do about it.”

It was times like this I wished I had a homing device implanted in my body. The problem is, slavers scan their cargo for things like that, and their surgical practices aren’t all that refined. I’d last spoken to Fyche this morning and told him what I’d been up to, the censored version at least. He’d probably get worried about me in a few hours, and when he couldn’t raise me anywhere, he’d contact Titus Dollavera and Moss Cato. When they tell him they’d not met up with us for lunch as arranged, he’d contact the local law enforcement agency. Knowing Fyche, I’d bet my life he’d inform the spaceport authorities as well. Not that they could do anything. There was no evidence Fyche could produce of anything untoward going on. In any case, by the time we’d officially become missing persons we could be quite a few light-years away.

“I swear that when we do get out of this, that fucking headmistress is toast.”

The voices outside ceased abruptly. The door slid open and the camera retreated back through the opening which then slid emphatically shut.

“This is it.” I sat on the floor and advised Tacha to do the same. “When they gas us,” I explained, “you don’t want to fall.”

“Oh, right. Good thinking.” She grasped my hand. “Is your life always this exciting?” she asked.

“Fyche and I have our moments.” I started telling her about Fyche, how reliable he was, and how he always came through for me. I’d only just reached that last part when everything closed in around me, and I remember no more about that cell.

* * *

I remember my dreams though. In a swirling confusion of dreamland, the adventurous Tacha, diligent Moss Cato and stolid Titus Dollavera, even my poor Fyche without his beautiful body and Kel, my randy fighter pilot striving to make a name for himself, made an appearance. I sensed an anger roiling within me, a wordless rage against myself, for being less in control than these beautiful people living in my mind.

I even dreamed of Professor Bok. I’d met him once, backstage after one of his lectures. I’d asked him about his damned curtain that shielded our conscious mind from the cauldron of the unconscious.

“People fear the loss of reason. They think the subconscious is completely an animalistic Id: that if they surrender to it they will become as animals and chaos will rule their lives. Not so, not so.”

“But what is the subconscious?”

“Do not fear it, little one. It is not smarter than you. It can only know what you know. It is a beautiful place. It is where your dreams come from,” he said. “Dreams slip through in pieces, out of order, ciphers of what your subconscious is thinking, of what it is trying to figure out.”

“But my consciousness is greater than my subconscious, isn’t it?”

He’d smiled pityingly at me. “My pretty young thing,” he’d said. “Why are you so reluctant to give yourself to yourself? Be free. Enjoy your life. When your lover kisses your clitoris, you don’t need your conscious self getting in the way, do you? You don’t need to tell yourself, ‘This is bliss.’ No, I thought not. Just enjoy it for what it is. You’ll be far happier if you do.”

In my dream I hit his aged face, shattering it and his damn philosophy. I was sick of my subconscious making my decisions, sick of this fucking curtain that hides my deeper self from me. I was sick of not being in control of my own life.

Suddenly I was standing in front of the curtain. Tacha and Fyche were standing beside me: Fyche in his glorious android body that he’d lost in the furnace of Jones’s World, Tacha naked in all her hermaphrodite beauty.

I cried out and in a burst of anger ripped away the curtain. There, amidst a red swirling mist, naked and aroused, stood Moss. Though his face was mostly obscured, I recognized the short, stubby cock. He was holding out to me a document with a red seal and ribbons. I reached out to him, and the curtain levitated upwards, hiding him once again.

I came to with firm lips pressed against my own. I opened my eyes to see Moss Cato’s smiling face. I was lying in a comfortably warm bed. My head felt like someone had been punching me, only from the inside.

“Thank Phong, you’re awake.”

“Moss?”

“Shhh. You’re safe now. The effects of the gas will take some time to fade.”

“Tacha?”

“She’s safe too. She’s in the next cabin with Titus.”

“Cabin?”

“You’re on my ship. We’re on our way home.”

“Home?”

“Adana. I thought it best to get us away quickly. The last thing we want is to be tied up with the local police. It could take days of investigation.”

“The slavers!”

“Shhh, it’s all right now. Titus and I bought your freedom.”

Despite the pain that threatened to split my skull, I propped myself onto my elbows. “I don’t understand.”

“The kidnappers contacted us. They’d been following you all day yesterday, I expect. Saw you with Titus and me and figured we’d pay your ransom. Luckily, they were right.”

Sweet Phong’s cock! Relief flooded through me. This was too easy. Our escape from the prospect of degradation and slavery had been accomplished with, as far as we knew, absolutely no fuss or bother.

I grasped his hand. “I’ll pay you back. Whatever the amount.”

He shook his head and brought my hand to his lips. “Nonsense. It was a pleasure to be of service.”

“No, no. I can’t let you do that.”

He gave a conciliatory shrug. “Well, we can talk about it when you’re rested. Can I get you anything?”

“Just some water.”

He handed me a glass from the side table. “My steward will be at your beck and call. I need to finish some paperwork for a few hours, and then I’ll drop in to see how you are. Now, lie back and rest easy.”

He kissed me again, this time his lips more urgent. I responded, not in gratitude exactly, though I was certainly relieved to be safe, but in something else. He had saved my life. Moss’s smiling face was a dependable rock I could cling to for a time and I did.

As I drowsed, I went over the events of the past few days. Coming to Scalion had been a stupid exercise in wishful thinking. Just because I recognized an accent but not why I recognized it was not really enough to justify such a trip. The chance that I’d recognize something from my misty memories was minimal, yet I had hauled my ass over there regardless. I wasn’t so far gone to recognize that I was simply escaping my confused relationship with Silas. It was so impetuous and stupid. So childish.

The fact that there was a Naturalist enclave here was probably nothing more than coincidental. That I pissed off a local headmistress, of all things, did not necessarily mean she arranged to have me kidnapped. Maybe the kidnapping was simply coincidental: some local hoods seeing a chance to kidnap a clueless offworlder and make some easy credits by selling us back to the rich offworlders they’d seen us cavorting with. Luckily Moss and Titus had been enamored enough to buy our freedom. Otherwise we’d be in the harem of some crime boss who knows where.

My impetuousness had almost gotten me and Tacha killed, or worse. I’d been leaping to conclusions and traveling by intuition. This had to stop. I cursed Professor Bok and his fucking curtain of the unconscious. I had to be more rational, more logical. I needed to think like Fyche.

I recalled the relief I’d felt when I admitted to Tacha that I did not regret or second guess my decision to offer her a job and welcome her into my life. Where had that freedom gone? The residual anger from my dreams flared again. I was switching from wanting to control myself absolutely, to wanting to be completely hedonistic, following pleasure wherever it took me in a guilt-free and irresponsible manner.

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I had to clear my thoughts. This was getting me nowhere.

“Are you okay?”

Tacha leaned against the cabin door. I’d been so wrapped up in my roiling thoughts, I hadn’t heard it open. She was wearing a diaphanous silken wrap which clung to her svelte form like liquid. Her nipples dented the fabric, and from the juncture of her thighs, her cock was growing and tenting it in an impressive manner.

I held up my arms in welcome. “I’m fine. You look good enough to eat.”

Her smile brightened the dark twisting of my thoughts. “I’m glad you feel like that. I was thinking exactly the same thing.”

As she slinked toward me, she shrugged off the wrap, revealing her marvelous nakedness. My eyes were locked onto her erection, however. It pointed at me like a missile, bobbing as she slid toward me. Keeping my eyes on the gorgeous phallus, I was able to forget that she had very feminine breasts. Beneath the cock, the ball sac was tight and round. I licked my lips. I wanted that sac in my mouth. I wanted to feel the balls resting on my tongue, moving away from the heat of my mouth.

Tacha climbed onto the bed.

“I want to suck you,” I murmured. “I want you to fuck my mouth.”

“Gladly,” she whispered. She knelt and lifted her leg above my head. Her erect cock bounced on my chin. I so much wanted to immerse myself in Tacha, suck that beautiful cock, and lick that juicy pussy that lay so close behind the ball sac. I wanted all of her.

Tacha leaned over me and her mouth found my pussy. The gentle caress of her tongue released my pent up juices. My clit tingled with anticipation as her lips and tongue worked inside me. With outstretched tongue, I caressed the head of Tacha’s cock, swirling around the rim before drawing it fully into my mouth.

With slow movements of her hips, Tacha began to fuck my mouth. I opened my lips wide and admitted the length into my throat. I wanted to be impaled on her cock and her tongue in the same instant. I had my wish, for her tongue darted in and out of my pussy in perfect synchrony with her cock.

Tacha had an instinctually sensual nature. With her fingernails, she caressed the sensitive flesh between pussy and anus before carefully inserting a finger into my tight asshole. Her thumb found its way into my pussy, and with exquisite sensitivity, she massaged the thin membrane between both holes. I was drowning in sensation; fingers, tongue, lips and cock were touching so many erogenous zones I found myself thrashing about like a demented woman.

In our short acquaintance, Tacha had learned my body so well she could touch me in ways that took me to the heights of pleasure in an instant. My earlier decision to accept her openly and impetuously without regret was vindicated. I had done the right thing, but right or wrong no longer mattered. I accepted that this decision was right. Even if it had been wrong, the experience was worth the risk.

I resolved, at that moment, with her knowledgeable and sensual fingers working me up to heights of passion, that I would abide by Professor Bok’s advice. I’d live my life from now on without regret, without guilt. If I was just along for the ride, I was fucking well going to enjoy it.

I drew her cock deeper into my mouth, using the fingers on one hand to caress her shaft, and with the other, I reached behind her ball sac to find the moist opening of her pussy. She bucked as my thumb entered her, sending her cock further down my throat. With a rapid motion, I frigged her cunt with my thumb and caressed her clit with my finger.

Her pussy flooded with juice at the same moment her cock expanded inside my mouth, and a glut of hot come filled my throat. She moaned into my cunt, took my clit between her lips and sucked, flicking my engorged nub with her tongue.

I joined her in orgasm, and the two of us, head to groin, clung to each other like drowning swimmers while the convulsions of our bodies subsided.

* * *

The hours onboard Moss Cato’s ship, occupied with ceaseless and impassioned lovemaking, flew past unnoticed and unremarked. The four of us lay panting after yet another marathon session of fucking. Without reserve, we shared our bodies with each other in every conceivable fashion. I had the best of it, I thought, three cocks at my service, though everyone at some stage had at least one cock inside them.

I loved being sandwiched between Tacha and one of the guys; Moss or Titus, it didn’t matter. Both my pussy and asshole were filled with cock, while the free cock fucked Tacha’s juicy pussy. It was like I was under the influence of some hedonistic drug that fused the senses and stretched perceptions while bathing me in the warm tides of orgasm.

We had to rest sometime, and after once again experiencing four more or less simultaneous climaxes, we lay back with exhaustion, our sweat-slicked chests heaving.

“I should talk to Fyche,” I said, once I regained my breath.

Moss caressed my cheek. “You whisper his name in your sleep,” he said. “Is there something going on between you and your AI?”

For Phong’s sake! Not another jealous guy.

What is it with me and insecure men? Silas harbored dark thoughts about Fyche, and the thought occurred to me that maybe that was the real reason I was so angry with him. He didn’t treat Fyche with respect. Fyche was part of my world and had been for many years. Silas should respect him on that basis alone and so should Moss.

I fixed Moss with a steady gaze. “Would it matter to you if there was?”

“Of course not. As long as you will always find some little time for me, I’ll be the happiest man alive.”

Good answer.

I kissed him as a reward for having good sense. “For your information, there is nothing going on. Fyche is a sentient AI and I do rely on him. He has gotten me out of more tight scrapes than I care to remember.”

“I wish I had such a dependable friend,” Tacha mused. “I think I’ve been alone all my life.”

I kissed Tacha’s mouth. “It’s important to have someone protecting your back,” I said.

Tacha returned the kiss. “I’ve been alone for so long.”

“No more,” I whispered into her mouth.

Later, after we’d slept, showered and eaten, I called the bridge and asked the pilot to make a quantum call to Fyche. Several hours and several follow-up requests later, he finally complied, though reluctantly. I sensed he was jealous of the nonstop fun his employer was having while he and his copilot were stuck with flying the ship.

Moss had retreated to his office to complete some paperwork, and Titus and Tacha were making love again. I watched them from the corner of my eye as I made the call.

“The good news is I’m alive,” I said to Fyche.

“That is always gratifying to hear. I monitored the spaceport communication band. When Moss Cato requested departure with two extra passengers, I interrogated the port’s computer and discovered it was you and Tacha Vaille.”

“I guessed you’d keep track of me somehow. You’ve struck up another friendship with port officials, haven’t you?” I described our adventures in as much detail as I could remember.

“Being restricted to the ship’s CPU limits the amount of help I can provide in an emergency.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the hidden request in his comment. “Yes, I know.”

“Are you safe and well?”

“Couldn’t be better. Moss and Titus are keeping us entertained delightfully.”

“I can guess how.”

“Getting back to the point. I suspect that the Naturalists, or some part of them, are somehow mixed up in crime, maybe with Jyker or even Mischa. Perhaps crime gangs are using them as a front. It wouldn’t be the first time crime has hidden behind the cloak of religious respectability. I’m sure that the headmistress was somehow behind my kidnapping.”

“Do you have evidence?”

“Just a gut feeling.”

“Hardly enough to go to authorities with.”

“I know. I want you to contact Holly and get me the name of the best lawyer she knows.”

“We can’t accuse the headmistress without evidence.”

“I know. I have another use for a lawyer. I’ll fill you in when I get home, I mean to Adana. Now I have to rest. I have the most humungous headache.”

“Before you go, I had a message from that freighter pilot you met before you left for Scalion. Kel is his name. He said he was looking forward to talking about that job you have that needs doing.”

Job? What job? Freighter? Kel was a navy fighter pilot, not a freighter…

Looking over the curve of Tacha’s shoulder, Titus caught my eye and raised his eyebrow at me in a quizzical fashion. Though his subtle movements suggested he was still fucking Tacha with a slow and gentle rhythm, he was listening to my conversation at the same time.

A chill went through my flesh. I looked away. “Oh, okay. Set up a meeting, will you?”

“Already done.”

I ended the transmission, acutely aware of Titus Dollavera’s unwavering gaze. His expression was not one of lusty interest as one would expect from someone fucking a beauty like Tacha. There was something else behind those piercing eyes.

Maybe Fyche was just being his usual cautious self, arranging the navy to shadow us and talking in code like that, but I joined them on the bed with a cold chill biting at my belly.

Chapter Six

I had a notion to contact Holly and ask her what my options were in doing something for the Jones’s World kids. Truth be told, I needed to give my pussy a rest. Tacha, Titus and I had been indulging in nonstop fucking, and my thighs ached from having my legs spread so wide.

As I neared the bridge, I heard Moss Cato’s hushed voice. He was speaking with his pilot, and something made me pause at the open hatch and listen.

“There’s been a change of plan.”

“No probs, Boss. What’s up?”

“Set a course for Yemek.”

“That piece of crap?”

“Do it now. If anyone asks, we’ve got a dodgy quantum flux generator.”

“Sure, no probs. I’ll do it straight away.”

A deep chill filled my gut and thoughts of speaking to Holly drained away. I quickly padded my way back to our cabin. Tacha and Titus were naked, resting between their lovemaking, sipping cocktails. Titus was regaling Tacha with dirty stories of the odd trade missions he had been on.

I quickly slipped out of my silk wrap and climbed onto the bed. I gave Tacha a deep kiss and had grasped her semi-erect cock when Cato appeared at the hatchway.

“Sorry, everyone. My pilot informs me he has a quantum flux generator that’s going out of sync. He wants to drop out of quantum space as soon as possible. The nearest engineering port is a mining asteroid, Yemek. He reckons a short stay of a day or two.” He gave a resigned shrug. “Can’t be helped.”

Titus gave Tacha a playful tickle. “I wonder how we can amuse ourselves over two days?” he joked.

“I wonder,” Tacha played along, biting his nipple.

Cato took in my naked form and gave a deep sigh. “Forgive me. I have to steal Titus away from you both for just a few minutes.”

“You overestimate your powers of persuasion, my friend,” Titus joked.

“The Chamber of Commerce wants your report, I’m afraid. Your brother Zweep is most insistent.”

Tacha elbowed Titus in the ribs. “Go on, if you must. Peri and I can amuse ourselves while you play at business.”

Titus groaned. “I’d rather be at play with you.”

She gave him a playful kiss and pushed him away. “The sooner you leave, the sooner you get back.”

“Wise words,” Cato laughed. “Come on, I’m eager to get back to bed too.”

“If I must,” Titus replied and then joined Cato at the door. He gave us both a wink. “Have fun.”

After the door closed, Tacha lay back and sighed. “I’ve never known a man with so much stamina. His cock just doesn’t go down.”

I massaged her now fully hard cock. “Yours has amazing resilience as well.”

She rolled on top of me, spreading my thighs with her knee. Her erection nudged at my pussy lips. “It sure has when you’re around.”

What I had heard outside the bridge disturbed me greatly. “Fuck me, please.”

“I intend to.”

I gasped as the full length of that beautiful cock slid into me. She fucked me in an unhurried manner, moving her cock slowly till it was balls deep in my pussy before withdrawing. She must have sensed that I was distracted and paused, gazing down at me with an enquiring raise of the eyebrow.

“Do you trust Titus?” I asked.

“Why do you ask?”

“Something has happened. What’s your gut feeling? Is Titus reliable?”

“I’ve only known him a few days. I don’t know.”

“I’ve only known you a few days yet I’d stake my life on you.”

She kissed me. “And I on you.”

“Do you get the same sense about Titus?”

“I do, I guess, though not in the same way I trust you.”

I squeezed her hand.

“But I’m sure he’s a good guy.”

“Do you think you can get him alone?”

She grinned. “That won’t be any trouble.”

“You must tell him that Cato is not to be trusted.”

“Holy fuck! What’s happened?”

I explained what I overheard coming from the bridge. “Cato can’t be trusted. I thought our escape from the slavers had been too easy.”

Her expression became doubtful. “Titus won’t believe me. They’re best of friends. He’s only just met me. Compared to a long friendship, I’m just an easy fuck.”

“I know, but I’m not sure if we can do this alone.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“We have to neutralize Cato and take over the ship. The pilot and crew won’t follow two strangers, but they are more likely to take orders from Titus.”

“What if he’s a bad guy too?”

“Then we’ll have to neutralize him as well and somehow fly the ship ourselves.”

“I hope you can fly, because I certainly can’t.”

“Don’t worry. I think I can manage it, and being a Dollavera clone, I’m sure Titus, if he’s a good guy, can be pretty resourceful when required.”

“Okay. I’ll try to explain to him what we suspect, but he’ll just say it’s coincidence and circumstance.”

I slumped back onto the bed in frustration. She was right. Titus would not believe what two women, relative strangers, said against a lifelong friend, especially with no proof. “Then I’ll have to demonstrate it in front of him.”

She cocked her head thoughtfully, but there was a slight smile on her lips which thrilled me, and for some reason I couldn’t fathom, gave me confidence. “That’s risky. Cato may just shut us up.”

“Not as risky as letting Cato take us to this asteroid for so-called engine repairs. Who knows what that’s about?”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Work on Titus for me. Make him ask the same questions about Cato as we are.”

Her cock nudged my pussy lips. Distracted as we were by our new predicament, our lovemaking had developed over the last few days to such a level that we were unhurried in the build-up to climax. Tacha knew my pussy well, finding the sensitive patches with ease, guided by my sharp intakes of breath each time she hit the right spot. She was able to build up my arousal in slow deliberate steps.

I reciprocated by squeezing my pussy around her shaft and, at the same time, using my tongue to stimulate the erogenous zones at her earlobe and throat. She clung to me, goose pimples spreading across her flesh as her own climax built.

Titus returned to the cabin, and seeing us in the middle of fucking, quickly stripped off his robe and joined us. I let Tacha have first claim of his phallus. While he drove his cock into her receptive cunt, I knelt above her head, and while she played with my clit with her tongue, I held Titus’ face in my hands, staring into his eyes as he fucked her. I kissed him, deeply.

“Tell me,” I purred. “Are you one of the good clones? Like Maxim?”

He cocked an eyebrow. “Of course.”

“Were Moss’s negotiations with the Naturalists successful?”

“They were. He’s very pleased with himself. The Chamber of Commerce is, as well.”

“Tell me, what exactly happened when Tacha and I were kidnapped?”

“How do you mean?”

“How were you contacted by the slavers?”

“Moss came to my hotel room, told me he’d received a ransom demand, that we had ten hours to comply and how we were to transfer the funds.”

“You personally had no contact with the slavers at all?”

“None at all.”

“What proof did you have that we had in fact been kidnapped?”

He stopped fucking. He looked down to see Tacha gazing at him steadily with enquiring eyes.

“What do you mean?”

“How did you know we had been taken against our will and thrown into a cold stone cell?”

“Well, had you?”

“Of course. But how did you know?”

“Moss told me.”

“You trust Moss that well?”

His brows creased into an angry frown. “If you’re trying to tell me your kidnapping was all a sham to extort a million credits from me, you’re wrong.”

For fuck’s sake! A million credits! How the fuck will I pay that back?

“You trust him that much? To fork up so many shiny credits on no evidence but his say so?”

“Of course.”

This was going to be harder than I thought. Their friendship was as tight as a Meldovian’s asshole. “How were we delivered to you?”

“We found you lying unconscious in an alley. Just where the kidnappers said you’d be. Now what’s going on here, Peri? What are you trying to say?”

“I overheard Moss ordering his pilot to take us to Yemek. There is no problem with the engines.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I know it’s hard to believe strangers, but all you have to do is check the engines and see. We’ll come with you.”

“I’ll not abuse my friendship with Moss in this manner.”

“Do you think I’m lying?”

He checked Tacha’s expression. “Not at all. Just mistaken.”

“How can I mistake ‘There’s been a change in plans. Take us to Yemek’?”

Titus looked down to Tacha again. “You believe this as well?”

“Peri wouldn’t make this up.”

“Check the engine is all I ask.”

“No!”

“Please, Titus,” Tacha said from beneath him. “If we are wrong, we’ll apologize. Moss doesn’t even have to know.”

He was beginning to lose patience with us. He disengaged from Tacha and sat on the edge of the bed. “Of course he’ll know. We can’t waltz down to engineering and demand to look at the engines.”

A mischievous gleam came into Tacha’s eyes. “We could, you know.”

* * *

An hour later Moss came into the cabin to catch Tacha and Titus playing hide and seek. Tacha had been waiting by the open door for the last forty minutes for Moss to return to the cabin so she and Titus could launch into their act. When Cato stepped over the threshold Tacha went screaming past him and out into the companionway.

Titus, in a more hesitant manner, followed her.

“What are they playing at?”

“Hide and seek,” I said. “I think they’re in love.”

Moss Cato gave a laugh. “They get on well enough. They haven’t left each other alone since they laid eyes on each other at the Paradise Bar.”

“Speaking of which, you’ve been very busy working and I feel neglected.”

A smile creased his lips. “I apologize for failing in my duties as host,” he said.

I opened my arms. “Get rid of those clothes and host away.”

He did as ordered. I’m sure I’m not the first woman to have to fuck a man as a delaying action while her compatriots uncovered the evidence of a plot to kidnap them. It must happen all the time, but it does make the act of lovemaking rather tedious and uninspiring.

Moss Cato seemed to enjoy himself, raising a sweat as he pounded his short cock into my pussy. I clung to him, burying my face into his neck so I didn’t have to look at him and accidentally give away the fact that I wasn’t, as it were, in the moment.

While he enthusiastically fucked me I imagined Tacha and Titus pretending to be two lovebirds frolicking their way down the companionways to the engine room. Once inside the engine room, Titus would feign hiding in amongst the turbines and flux generators, while Tacha looked here and there and never finding him, distracting any crew members with a flash of tit and thigh.

Fifteen minutes later Moss gave a grunt of pleasure, and within me, I felt his cock expand and send a wad of hot come into me. Satisfied and breathing hard, Cato rolled away from me.

Too soon! Tacha hadn’t returned. “No rest for the wicked,” I said and pounced on his deflating cock and brought it back to life with my mouth. I lifted a leg over his head and buried his face with my pussy. He began eating me in the same enthusiastic manner he fucked me despite his own come dripping onto his tongue.

Ten minutes later Titus and Tacha returned laughing and giggling. Well, Tacha was doing most of that. Titus was far more serious.

“Moss, old friend, what’s this guff about the engines?”

Fuck! The plan was to discuss our options before deciding on an action plan. Instead Titus, out of a misplaced sense of loyalty to his friend, had decided to do the honorable thing and let him explain on his own terms.

Moss Cato pushed me aside. “What?”

“Tacha and I found ourselves in the engine room. I thought I’d have a look at the engine while I was there. It’s purring away quite nicely.”

“Oh, I meant to tell you, Rodney said the engine had righted itself.”

I took the lead. “So, we’re back on course to Adana?”

“Well, when we arranged to go to Yemek, I organized a meeting with their governor to negotiate a mineral deal. I saw no reason to cancel the meeting. We’ll be there in a couple of hours.”

I had to hand it to him. He was quick on his feet. Even when he was lying naked with my cunt juice smeared across his face.

I glanced at Titus. He was momentarily nonplussed.

“Moss,” I said quickly. “I want to call my AI.”

“Why?”

“I want him to pick me up there. Tacha and I have work to do. I have an article to write and I need Fyche’s database.”

His voice lost its cheery nonchalance. “Sure. I’ll have Roland contact him for you.”

“Thank you.”

“We’ll be there soon,” Cato said, climbing off the bed. “I better have a shower and get dressed for the meeting. Want to come with me, Titus? Have you met the governor before?”

“I haven’t, no.”

“He’s a character. Been around a bit. He has some stories to tell I can tell you. Peri, you may like to meet him too. He was a pretty lusty fellow in his youth. Was one of the first humans to see the Kulio harem.”

He was a smooth one. This was a lure to get me out of the ship without a fuss. I smiled innocently. “The Kulio harem. That certainly would be a story, and one too good to miss. I haven’t met anyone who’s seen inside that.”

“Excellent. He’s arranged a lunch and a show for us in his private quarters. A Mendovian sex troupe, I believe.”

“How educational,” I said listlessly.

* * *

“Well, what do we do now?” Tacha said. “We’ve been kidnapped a second time.”

I flopped down on the bed. “Actually this is still the first time.”

Tacha and I were alone. The men had left us to prepare for their negotiations with the governor of Yemek.

“What will Cato do to us now?”

“I’m pretty sure we won’t be killed,” I answered. “At least, not straight away. Titus has innocently been involved, so to protect himself, I think Cato will let you and I leave on my ship, and then we’ll have a convenient accident somewhere in quantum space. Cato will be in the clear and with an airtight alibi.”

“What sort of accident?”

“Sabotage my ship. When Fyche docks, Cato’s people can attach a bomb of some description to the hull, set to go off when we are in quantum space. Something goes wrong in there, and we are literally reduced to elementary particles. No one will ever find us or evidence of what happened. It could be easily enough done.”

“How can we stop it?”

“I haven’t figured that out yet.”

“Maybe Titus will do something.”

I couldn’t help but scowl at that suggestion. I was still angry at him for not consulting me before he confronted Cato about the engine.

I lay back into Tacha’s arms and tried to think. What the hell was my subconscious doing? I had hoped it would give me some sort of idea of what to do to get us out of this disaster. Professor Bok had been so sure the subconscious is always thinking, always planning. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe my subconscious was too preoccupied with sex.

Within Tacha’s warm embrace I drifted into a restless sleep. I dreamed of Tacha, Titus and I lying on the floor of the Jalapeño. I was staring at the reflection of our bodies in a mirror. Pools of blood surrounded us. Our throats were slashed and our flesh cold and white.

I woke alone nestled in twisted sheets and sweat. Tacha was in Titus’ cabin. I remembered him leading her out in those moments between dreams when I had been awake.

That terrible image of her beautiful body lying drenched in blood wouldn’t leave me. I had to do something. There was only one thing I could do. The dream that had awakened me in such disarray was the most fearful of all. I had found myself on a cliff edge, with a distant sun exploding with nuclear ferocity. Fyche was walking away from me, going to the side of my cousin Gemma for whom he had sacrificed himself.

I found Moss Cato alone in his office studying some papers.

He looked up and smiled. “Sorry, Peri. We can’t raise your AI. The quantum radio is out. Some sort of interference, Roland says. You’ll have to wait till we reach Yemek so you can use their facilities to call him.”

I closed the hatch and leaned heavily against it. “Cut the crap. I’m here to bargain.”

“I don’t understand.”

He was the consummate actor. He actually looked innocent. No doubt he suspected I had a listening device of some sort, or that I had arranged to have Titus around the corner listening and was playing the part of the genuine Good Samaritan.

“Here’s the deal. I’ll give myself to you, lock, stock and barrel. You can do what you like with me. Keep me in a harem if you wish, or shove me out the airlock. I just want Tacha and Titus to go free. They don’t believe you’re a bad guy. They don’t know what I know.”

“And what do you know?”

“You told your pilot to lie about engine problems. I heard you. There’s no use denying it. I’m here to do a deal: me for them.”

“An interesting proposition if I knew what the hell you were talking about.”

“You’re working for the Naturalists. They are afraid of me and want me out of the picture. You’ve done a good job so far, and there’s no need for Tacha and Titus to be involved. I’ll convince them that I was wrong, that I’ve gone off the rails and then you have me, body and soul.”

He leaned back in his chair with a patronizing smile on his face. “My dear Peri. You are a delightful person, a beautiful woman and a fantastic fuck. But I don’t want your body or soul. I’m not the marrying kind.”

“I’m not after marriage. I want Tacha and Titus to go free.”

“They are free now. Titus came to me with your fantasy, and I was able to put his mind at rest. He’s satisfied everything is aboveboard, and that you were mistaken. I suspect that bump on the head you received when the kidnappers took you has, unfortunately, deranged you. I feel badly that this has happened to one so beautiful. I hope Yemek has suitable medical facilities to help you.”

I shot him a baleful glare. “Whatever, lock me in the looney bin and butt fuck me every second Tuesday. I don’t care, but Tacha and Titus are to be free. Do that and I’ll keep your secret.”

“Peri, believe me, I don’t understand what you are going through at the present moment, but please, go back to my cabin, climb into bed and take a sleep tab. I promise I’ll contact Fyche for you as soon as we reach Yemek.”

He was a cool customer; I had to grant him that. On the way back to his cabin, the seed of doubt he had planted tried to take hold, but like any weed, I ripped it out. I knew what I’d heard, and I knew what I suspected. At least with Titus fooled, Tacha would be protected. I’d made my bargain with Cato, even if he pretended otherwise, and that was the most I could do.

Once on Yemek, I’d figure something out.

Later, Cato came to his cabin with Titus and Tacha in tow. They gathered about the bed staring down at me. I avoided everyone’s eyes, feeling helpless and pitiful.

Moss Cato spoke first. “Peri, we’re in normal space again approaching Yemek. We will land at their spaceport, such as it is, in just over an hour. I know you don’t trust me, but believe me, I mean you no harm.”

I fixed my gaze on Tacha.

“I’m sorry, Moss,” I said with as much conviction as I could muster. “I was mistaken. Please forgive me. Maybe you are right. That bump on the head may have loosened some screws. I’ll see a doctor when we get to Yemek.”

“Splendid. Now, rest up and Tacha will stay with you while we land, and if you like, I can arrange for you to see the local doctor.”

“That will be good, Moss. Thank you.”

After Cato and Titus left us, Tacha sat on the bed beside me. “You may have fooled them but not me. What are you up to?”

“Nothing. I want you to look after Fyche for me while I recover.”

“Recover? What from?”

“I think I may be suffering from the aftereffects of the sleep gas and a bump on the head. I may have to stay on Yemek for a while, so I want you to take Fyche back to Adana for me.”

“I can’t do that. I won’t do that. I accepted your offer to be your friend. I’m sticking to you like glue.”

I squeezed her hand. “There’s no need. I’ll be fine.”

“The hell you will.”

“Believe me. I was mistaken about Moss, about everything. I think I’m going mad.”

She leaned toward me and took me in her arms. “I know this is an act,” she whispered. “If you have a plan that requires me to pretend to desert you, well, fine, but tell me what it is.”

“I have no plan,” I said truthfully. “I was mistaken. You have to believe me.”

Tacha gazed at me for a long time before speaking. “I see what you’re doing, but I won’t have any of it. I’ll be ready when you need me.”

“Thank you.”

She kissed me then. “You’re not too mad to want to fuck, are you?”

I managed a weak smile. “Never.”

“Good, because we still have an hour till we get to Yemek.”

She laid me back and pulled away the sheets. She stripped away her wrap, exposing her erect cock. “Now, how do you want it? Hard and fast or soft and slow?”

I laughed. “Hard and fast.”

“You sure it won’t make your concussion worse?”

I shook my head.

“Then hard and fast it is.”

Chapter Seven

I woke up alone. The comm unit was trilling like a panicked bird. It was Tacha. “Peri, can you come up to the bridge for a moment?”

I draped the silken wrap about my shoulders and padded barefoot along the companionway to the bridge. The hatch was closed and I pushed it open.

Tacha was in one of the pilot seats hastily rearranging her clothes, pushing her breasts back into a singlet. A man, the pilot I assumed, was slumped unconscious in his chair, his flaccid cock sticking out of his trousers like a dead slug. There was an empty glass in his hand.

Now why didn’t I think of that?

“Tacha. What have you done?”

“I’m sick of being kidnapped. I toyed with this guy’s affections for a minute and spiked his water with a sleep tab.”

I gazed at her in admiration. Why didn’t I do this? Because I was too busy playing the fucking martyr. I swore never again would I trust my subconscious. The other side of Professor Bok’s coin was that while the subconscious wasn’t smarter than I was, it was just as fucking stupid.

“We’ve just landed and the rest of the crew are outside doing whatever they do after they land,” Tacha continued. “There’s only you, me, Titus and Cato onboard. You said you can fly this thing. Can you?”

“Sure.”

“Quick, before Cato decides it’s time to takes us off the ship.”

With Tacha’s help I pulled the pilot out of his seat and replaced him. The ship’s controls were still hot, so I didn’t need any passwords to log in. I quickly disengaged the AI. It wasn’t a patch on Fyche. It’s a good thing that pilots have big egos and regularly disengage the higher AI functions, believing that having a sentient AI was an affront to their professionalism.

I secured the airlock to keep the crew outside and activated the take off protocols. I informed the spaceport traffic control that we were leaving and shut off their protests.

Though I’m a reasonable pilot, taking off is always a scary moment for me. There are so many things to watch, and without an active AI, I had to use the controls manually. Luckily, the mining colony had only a low profile dome and just a few towers here so I didn’t have to avoid anything.

I took us up into orbit with a direct trajectory and plotted a course out of the system, making sure to avoid a nearby asteroid. Before we reached the point I could initiate a quantum jump Cato pushed open the bridge hatch. He had a gun in his hand.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

I was pretty sure he wouldn’t shoot me, not with his friend Titus still onboard. “Doing what I should have done hours ago.”

“Stop this now. Take us back to Yemek!”

“Not this time.”

“Moss?” It was Titus. “What the hell is going on?”

“Peri’s gone mad. She’s hijacked my ship.”

“Peri,” Titus said quietly, carefully. “Take us back.”

“I’m taking us to Adana. We can let ’Port Security sort it out. If I’m mad then they’ll lock me up. But I want to be judged at a place of my own choosing. Not this out of the way fucking asteroid where his people can do what they want with me.”

I felt the gun at the back of my head. “Let go of the controls now, Peri.”

“Moss!” Titus yelled. “What the hell are you doing? There’s no need for violence. Let her take us to Adana like she wants. It will all be settled there.”

Cato turned the gun onto Titus. “You stupid fool.”

The blow was quick. Titus didn’t have time to duck. The butt of the gun caught him on the temple, and he went down like a puppet without strings.

Tacha screamed and Cato turned the gun on her. “Peri. Take us back now, or I’ll shoot your little fuck doll between her big round eyes.”

He had us now. No more pretenses required. If I didn’t let go of the controls, he’d shoot Tacha. If I let go of the controls, he’d shoot us both. I did the only thing possible. I swung the ship around and headed for the nearest asteroid.

“What the fuck are you doing, you mad bitch?”

I gripped the controls so tight my knuckles showed white. “I know you don’t know how to fly, Moss. You told me yourself, remember. I’ve locked us into a collision course. Kill either of us and I’ll crash us. I swear.”

“You’re fucking mad.”

At that moment a laser beam flashed past the bridge windows. Instinctively I ducked. “Fuck it,” I cried. “Call ’em off, Cato.”

“I don’t --”

Just then a mighty navy battle cruiser hove into view. Then a fighter shot past us and did a breathtaking one eighty degree turn to face us. He fired a bolt of laser fire across our bow.

Good old Fyche! He had got the navy just as he promised.

“Fuck me!” Cato cried.

With a swift movement he cuffed me over the brow with the gun and sent me sprawling.

When I regained my senses, Tacha and I were bound together with the cord from my silk wrap.

“Sorry, Peri,” Tacha said. “He had the gun at your head. I had to tie us up.”

I shrugged. “Nothing you could do about it.” I watched Cato punch away at the controls.

“You told me you couldn’t fly.”

He laughed. “I lied.”

The fighter ship was poised directly in front of us, keeping a steady distance from us. Cato punched the jump button. Almost immediately the fighter began to approach us at speed. That was the last I saw of it as we entered the strange grayness of quantum space.

“You can’t avoid the navy,” I said.

“Wanna bet?”

He plotted a series of course corrections designed to throw off any navy vessels tracking the ship’s engine signature. I bet he had one of those randomizer devices Kel had told me about.

Three hours later we popped into normal space in the middle of an asteroid field.

“We’ll wait here for just a little while.”

Immediately the navy fighter flashed past us and took up station ahead of us.

“This is Navy Fighter Kelso five-oh-one. You are to surrender your vessel immediately.”

Cato’s jaw dropped. “How in the fuck?”

I recognized the navy pilot’s accent. “It’s over, Moss. You’ve been followed by the navy’s best pilot.”

“How?”

“He hitched a ride in your quantum field. It’s a new strategy he developed all on his own. It’s called the Peri Maneuver!”

“That’s impossible!”

“That’s what makes him the navy’s best pilot. Not to mention the fact he’s the only pilot from Scalion.”

“I demand to speak to Peri Barberossa.”

Cato licked his lips anxiously. “Go on,” he said to me and opened a communications channel.

“I’m here, Kel. Tacha and I are alive but…”

Cato cut the switch. “Now, a little gag is all I need.”

Cato ripped the hem of my wrap and stuffed the pieces into our mouths. Tacha and I were reduced to a pair of mumbling idiots. Cato flicked open the communications channel.

“You there, in the fighter, stay where you are, or I’ll hurt your precious fucking Peri Barberossa.”

With a grin Cato kissed my forehead, gave me an arrogant little wave, then turned and raced out the hatch and down the companionway.

Five minutes later we felt a jolt shudder through the ship. I guessed he had taken an escape pod. I looked out the bridge windows. The fighter stayed on station, making sure the ship didn’t leave with us on board.

“Peri, are you still there?”

I responded with an angry whimper.

“Stay put,” he said. “The navy is on its way.”

Epilogue

Tacha’s cock nestled snugly in my asshole. She was moving tantalizingly slowly. The head of her cock stretched that tight entrance, and she pulled gently on the lips of my pussy, exciting the hard nub of my clit. We were lying on our sides on my bed in the Jalapeño, and I was talking to Holly’s image on my comm unit’s holoscreen.

“Hi Tacha,” Holly said cheerfully.

“Hey there,” Tacha replied, her arm draped over my shoulder, cupping a breast and gently caressing the nipple with her forefinger. It was all I could do not to beg her to fuck me harder, though that would have been greedy. We’d been fucking nonstop since returning to Adana, and she’d been spoiling me. I was in an unfamiliar place, I reflected, a state of peace and tranquility I had never felt before. For the first time in my life I wasn’t trying to second-guess myself or trying to rationalize my motives. I was taking Professor Bok’s advice and enjoying the ride. To be honest, my state of grace had less to do with that aged professor than it did with Tacha’s affection.

Holly had readily accepted Tacha, appreciating her easy nature, ready wit and her free, no-nonsense attitude to life. She hadn’t commented on my relationship with such a radical persona. Being in a relationship with a bisexual clone, Holly was very accommodating of unconventional sexual types, so to her, my fucking a hermaphrodite was not worthy of comment.

“So, how are you recovering from your ordeal?”

“As you see, I’m in good hands.”

“I don’t doubt that at all. Any news about Cato?”

“Still on the loose, Kel tells me. The escape pod disappeared in the asteroid field. Poor Kel is kicking himself for letting him get away, but because he didn’t know what was happening inside the ship, whether Tacha and I were safe, he couldn’t leave his position. That gave Cato a full three hours to make his escape using the rubble as cover. The suspicion is he already had an escape route laid out if he was ever in trouble.”

“Well, he is in deep shit now, wanted for slave trading and kidnapping.”

“His business dealings are being dissected by the Chamber of Commerce Trade Committee. Zweep told me that while his public transactions were all aboveboard and legit, it seems he had a parallel business with the Adana underworld. He was responsible for a lot of shady dealings.”

“Well, not anymore, thanks to you.”

“I’m hoping a connection to Mischa or Jyker might show up.”

“Tell me, sis, what made you think he was behind your kidnapping?”

“Fyche, as usual,” I said, and gave his camera lens a nod of recognition. “His precaution of alerting the navy to shadow Cato’s ship started me thinking about why Tacha and I were being shepherded away from Scalion so quickly, and why Cato insisted we use his ship and not just have me fly the Jalapeño home, as would be the obvious thing to do. I should have been suspicious a whole lot sooner, but you know me, I think with my pussy sometimes. At the time I didn’t care that it took me so long to get his pilot to give me access to the quantum radio so I could talk with Fyche. I was happy just to be safe. The fact that Cato was negotiating with the Naturalists had always unsettled me the first I heard of it, but he was such a considerate fuck, I buried my misgivings. The coincidence that he was the one that the kidnappers contacted was another disquieting notion that I hadn’t considered because he and Titus were treating us so well. My subconscious, however, was playing with all those disparate coincidences and finally pieced it all together, though I wish it had worked a whole lot faster.”

“Well, you figured it out in the end. By the way, I’ve had my lawyer hire a good guy on Tannis.”

“Will he be able to do what I want?”

“He can only try. He’s already applied for an injunction on any decision as to the disposition of the Jones’s World children. You’ll have to go to Tannis and plead your case in person.”

“Whatever it takes. I don’t want the Naturalists to get their hands on those kids.”

“I’ll do what I can media-wise. I’ve asked Zoe to look into them and see what she can dig up. They’ve existed in the shadows too long. If there is anything incriminating to find, she’ll find it.”

“I noticed she’s on the news more than you.”

Holly smiled enigmatically. “That’s why I brought her on board. She’s going to be doing the work from now on. I’m quitting.”

This was surprising. Why would Holly give up the thing she loved most?

“I don’t follow you.”

“I have some news.” She paused melodramatically.

I hate it when people do that. “Well, spit it out.”

“Maxim and I are going to have a baby!”

So, Holly’s perfect relationship was getting even better. I was pleased for her. I really was, but I also knew that it wasn’t the kind of life for me.

“I had a crate arrive this morning,” Holly said enigmatically after Tacha and I had given her our congratulations.

“Oh?” I asked vaguely, though I knew what she referred to. “I’ll have to come round and have a look at it.”

“Peri.” Fyche interrupted our celebrations.

“What is it?”

“There’s breaking news from Tannis.”

“What is it?”

“The children Holly and Maxim rescued from Jones’s World. They’ve been kidnapped.”

“Phong’s ugly sister!” Holly spat.

The final piece fell into place for me, and I cursed myself for not figuring it out sooner. The headmistress hadn’t wanted me killed or sold into slavery at all. Her plan, and Cato’s job, had been to distract and delay me from taking any action to get the children. Having failed in that simple plot, their only resort was to kidnap them.

“I should have seen that coming,” I said bitterly.

“The reach of the Naturalists is longer than we anticipated,” Fyche added.

“Well, Fyche,” I said, disengaging my ass reluctantly from Tacha’s cock. “Get us to Tannis as soon as you can.”

“I’m talking to ’Port Authority now, announcing our imminent departure.”

I smiled. Thank Phong for Fyche’s ability to make friends in useful places. I glanced over my shoulder at Tacha. “Are you sure you want to come with me on this? I’m certain Titus would be happier if you stayed.”

Tacha smiled and repositioned her cock at the entrance of my asshole.

“This is a great ride,” she said. “I’m game if you are. Besides, I’m sure Titus will want me even more after a little separation.”

“I’m sure he will,” I said and backed my ass against Tacha’s cock, allowing it to enter me again. I drew in my breath as the swollen head penetrated the tight ring of my anus.

“Be careful, sis,” Holly said.

“I will,” I gasped as Tacha grasped my hips and pulled me toward her, impaling me deeply onto her cock. I managed to make one last statement between grunts of sheer animalistic pleasure. “Could… you… have… that… crate… assembled… for… me?”

“Certainly.” Holly laughed. “I’ll deliver it to you myself.”

She signed off, allowing me to pay full attention to the beautifully hard cock moving inside me. Tacha reached around my hip and with gentle fingers caressed my clit.

“You know something?” she whispered into my ear. “Being with you is a hell of a lot of fun.”

“Peri,” Fyche asked, though I barely heard him over my grunts of lust and the slapping of my ass cheeks against Tacha’s groin. “What’s in this crate Holly referred to?”

I couldn’t answer him for I had surrendered all consciousness to my pleasure-seeking Id, luxuriating in Tacha’s knowledgeable stimulation of my erogenous zones, and in the manner of a curtain bursting into flame, I was coming.

Mikala Ash

Living on the idyllic coast of New South Wales, Aussie Mikala Ash balances a demanding but mundane day job with the heightened eroticism of her nighttime forays into sci-fi and paranormal adventure. “No wonder I’m exhausted,” she says. “Bags under the eyes are worth it because I’m having the time of my life!”