sunset, fine cuisine, the passionate embrace of a man…”
“Not going to work.” Yasmin interrupts with a wry smile. “I’m afraid
I’m immune to your charms. But don’t take it personally,” she glances across
at Vanessa, “She’s more my type. But in any case, you’re wasting your
breath. I’m not stupid enough to cross Grimm. You two are testament to the
perils of that. The man holds a grudge.”
At that moment, Grimm steps through the door and strides across the
warehouse towards you.
“Any last words Trent.” He grins, brandishing a large knife, the blade
catching the light as he advances towards you.
“Just two.” You reply defiantly. “Fuck. You.”
“Don’t do this Grimm.” Vanessa implores him, panic in her voice.
“Don’t kill him!”
“Don’t worry.” Grimm grins humourlessly at her. “I’m not a sadistic
man. Much as I’m tempted, I won’t make him suffer.” He turns back to you,
his smile twisting into a scowl. “For old times’ sake.” He thrusts the blade
deep into your chest and you cry out in agony, your mouth filling with blood.
As you breathe your last, painful, gurgling breath, you hear Vanessa’s cries
of anguish as she watches you die.
THE END
Go back a few moments and rethink your actions
“But not all dreams come true!” You yell, cracking the beer glass over Grimm’s head. He reels away and you follow up with a gut punch before
grabbing Vanessa and running for the door. You emerge into the daylight
and hurriedly head back towards the turbo lift.
“Who the fuck was that?” Vanessa asks, running beside you.
“An old accomplice from before we met.” You tell her. “Our
partnership didn’t end on good terms.”
“Obviously.” She replies, glancing over her shoulder. “Doesn’t look like
he’s alone.” You follow her gaze, noticing a band of cutthroats in hot pursuit.
Shoot them
Try to outrun them
Try to hide
You run around a corner and as soon as you are out of your pursuers’
line of sight, you drag Vanessa into the entrance of one of the many lavish
though overpriced retail establishments lining the streets. You step through
the door of the boutique, finding yourself amongst racks of fine evening
wear.
“May I help you sir?” A prissy sales assistant asks, her eyes looking you
up and down before gazing at you with obvious contempt.
“Maybe later.” You grin wolfishly with a raised eyebrow. She gasps in
disgust and storms away. Vanessa shakes her head at you and you turn your
attention to the street outside. You duck back as your pursuers appear,
glancing about them, one, a particularly savage looking Proxian looks right at
the boutique. You are sure he is staring right at you and your hand tightens
on your blaster, but after a moment he turns and races down the street
after the rest of Grimm’s cohorts. Vanessa’s expression mirrors your own as
you breathe a sigh of relief. You blow the glowering sales assistant a kiss as
you leave and cautiously make your way through the crowded streets
towards the turbo lifts.
You approach the domed terminus building for the turbo lifts, pleased
with yourself for giving Grimm’s men the slip.
“You are a lucky son of a bitch.” Vanessa tells you, picking up on your
conceitedness.
“I like to think of it as intelligent decision making.” You retort proudly
as you enter the terminus and walk towards one of the huge turbo lifts
which is filling with people. Vanessa suddenly yanks you sideways by the
arm.
“Grimm’s men.” She hisses, dragging you behind a pillar. You glance
out from behind the pillar and sure enough, you can see a few familiar faces
picketed across the turbo lifts, eyes searching the faces in the crowd as they
board. “What now?”
Try to slip past them
Double back out of the terminus and find another way back to Hector’s
hanger
“We’ll be spotted.” You tell Vanessa. “Let’s get out of here and find another way.” Vanessa nods her agreement and you walk towards the
terminus exit. As you step through the door, you notice the huge frame of
Grimm waiting for you.
“Hello again old friend.” He grins, his men sidling up behind you and
relieving you both of your blasters. As he walks towards you, Grimm’s single
eye glares malevolently at you.
“No need for violence.” You tell him, holding up your hands.
“No need,” He agrees, “But when has that ever stopped me?” He grins
before savagely smashing his forehead into your face. You drop to your
knees, tasting blood before everything goes black.
Continue
“Keep going!” You tell Vanessa. “We can make it to the turbo lift before they catch us.” She nods and you quicken your pace, pushing your
way through the tourists milling about in the street while glancing back at
your pursuers. Ahead, you can see the domed building which forms the
terminus for the group of turbo lifts.
“Nearly there!” You breathe a sigh of relief and glance over your
shoulder. As you do, you lose your footing, stumbling and hitting the ground
hard. You wince, clutching your twisted ankle.
“Shit!” You curse, as Vanessa helps you back to your feet, but you can
only hobble towards the dome of the turbo lift terminus.
“So near, but so far, eh Trent?” Grimm sneers as his cohorts surround
you, snatching your blasters.
“No need for violence.” You grin, holding up your hands.
“No need,” He agrees, “But when has that ever stopped me?” He grins
before savagely smashing his forehead into your face. You drop to your
knees, tasting blood before everything goes black.
Continue
“Take them out.” You tell Vanessa, drawing your blaster and opening fire. Weapons fire echoes in the crowded streets as tourists scream and run
for cover. You pick off three of your pursuers before the rest regroup and
return fire. Vanessa drags you into cover behind a fountain which crumbles
around you as it is peppered by the bandits. You both try to pick off the
remaining pursuers, but they have also found cover and you find yourselves
in a Mexican stand-off.
“This was a great idea.” Vanessa tells you sourly. “Now what?” At that
moment a police flyer drops out of the sky and hovers above you, emitting a
high pitched klaxon which forces you to cover your ears. The sound seems to
have a soporific effect and you feel yourself losing consciousness.
You awake a few hours later, finding yourself in a cramped holding
cell. You climb down from your bunk to find the bunk below occupied. The
bulky man stirs, groaning as he sits up. His single eye fixes on you, widening
in recognition.
“Sometimes dreams do come true.” Grimm grins, cracking his knuckles
as he gets to his feet and advances towards you.
THE END
Go back a few moments and rethink your actions
“Follow my lead.” You tell Vanessa, spotting a group on a guided tour.
As they pass the pillar, you step out and work your way into the m
iddle of
the throng. The tour guide, a permanently smiling Eridanian woman, leads
them into one of the turbo lifts and you cast a sideways glance at one of
Grimm’s men, his eyes scanning the crowd. As the doors close, his eyes
meet yours and widen in recognition.
“Shit.” You hiss at Vanessa. “We’ve been made.” The doors close and
the lift begins its descent, but you know they will be hot on your heels in the next turbo lift.
Continue
“Didn’t expect you back so soon.” Hector calls out from the top of a ladder at the back of the Eclipse as you race towards him.
“All done?” You ask hopefully, panting and clutching at the stitch in
your side.
“Afraid not my friend.” He replies sadly as he secures the Eclipse’s
hyperspace coil housing. “It needs replacing.”
“It’ll have to do for now.” You tell him, glancing over your shoulder
and ushering Vanessa up the boarding ramp.
“You in trouble Trent?” Hector asks, his scaly forehead wrinkling with
concern.
“No more than usual.” You grin. “Ran into some old friends. Thought
we gave them the slip, but I think they’re hot on our heels.”
“Then go!” Hector tells you, clambering down the ladder. “I’ll try and
hold them up if I can.”
“Thanks Hector.” You nod. “You’re a good friend.”
“You might want to tell your beautiful co-pilot that.” He grins ruefully. “Now
get out of here!”
Moments later, you take off, accelerating out of the hanger and
banking tightly, steering straight towards the sea below you. You pull back,
trying to arc your trajectory to keep your speed as high as possible without
plunging into the depths.
“Too fast!” Vanessa hisses as the churning azure surface of the ocean
rushes towards you.
“Trust me!” You reply with more confidence than you feel. The waves
loom ever closer and your eyes widen in horror as you realise you may have
miscalculated. You wince and brace yourself, waiting for the bone breaking
impact before the rippling waves streak by and you can see the sky again.
“Told you.” You tell Vanessa nonchalantly, throwing her a cocky smile,
before surreptitiously breathing a sigh of relief. As you accelerate upwards,
Vanessa studies the control panel in front of her.
“Looks like our friends aren’t giving up that easily.” She tells you.
“Three signals following our trajectory and closing fast.” You nod grimly,
trying to coax every last bit of power and speed out of the aging freighter.
Once you are clear of the atmosphere, you can jump into hyperspace and
they can’t follow you. It just remains to be seen whether you can get out of
the atmosphere before they blow you out of the sky or whether the hyperspace coil will even work. A flurry of cannon fire strafes to one side,
narrowly missing you. A second burst follows and the hull creaks in protest
as you take a couple of hits. As you grit your teeth, waiting for the coup de
gras, the red haze of the outer atmosphere suddenly clears to reveal the
starry depths of space.
“Hyperspace would be good.” Vanessa tells you, panic in her voice.
You stab the hyperspace button and the inky black of space is replaced by
the swirling crimson vortex of hyperspace. This time, there is no hiding your
obvious relief.
“I need to find a new line of work.” Vanessa glares at you before her
temper cools and she glances at the display before her. “What are we going
to do about the hyperspace coil? It’s not going to last forever.”
Continue
“We’ll stay put.” You tell Hector.
“Fine.” He replies, before gesturing down to the far end of the hanger.
“You know where my office is, help yourself to refreshments.”
Several hours later, you pace up and down in the untidy office in the
corner of the hanger. Vanessa has gone into standby mode and sits
completely inanimate in the corner looking disconcertingly like a shop
mannequin or a corpse. The door suddenly slides open and Hector steps
through it, wiping his hands with an oily rag. You kick Vanessa, who
immediately comes back to life, getting to her feet.
“Not good news.” He grimaces. “The coil needs replacing. As you
know, the engines on that crate are museum pieces, so spares are not easy
to come by.”
“Any idea where we can find one?” You ask.
“Your best bet is the scrapyard a few islands west of here.” He shrugs.
“You can’t miss it. It’s piled high with rusting wrecks.”
“Great.” You reply. “Is that our only option?”
“Yeah, unless you want to keep going with the one you’ve got and
hope for the best?”
Go to the scrapyard
Resume your journey and hope the coil holds out
“Thanks Hector.” You tell him. “We’ll try the scrapyard.”
“Sorry I couldn’t help you this time.” He says ruefully. “Still, always a
pleasure to see you my dear.” He adds to Vanessa. She glowers at him and
follows you back to the Eclipse.
You taxi out of Hector’s hanger and take off, weaving through the
floating islands as you head west. Within minutes, you find the scrapyard
island. As Hector told you, you couldn’t really miss it. The island is perhaps
three miles in diameter, but is absolutely covered in corroded hulks of
various shapes and sizes. As you come in to land, a rusting wing breaks away
from a section of fuselage which sits precariously on the edge, the wing
section dropping several hundred metres to splash into the sea below. You
fly low over the wrecks before coming in to land in a dusty bowl in the
centre of the island.
You descend the boarding ramp, clouds of reddish dust kicked up
during the landing settling all around you.
“This has got to be a low point even for us.” Vanessa grumbles,
following close behind. “Coming to this shithole scrapyard to fix our crappy
ship.”
“Needs must.” You shrug, bristling slightly at the insult to the Eclipse.
“Just think of that pay-out when we reach Omega Station.” She snorts
derisively in response.
You head towards what might have once been the mid-section of a
bulk freighter, the cylindrical section of hull torn apart at each end and hull plates missing in several places with the corroding superstructure visible
beneath. An access hatch, now permanently open with ‘OFFICE’ painted
above it in a rough scrawl beckons. You step through the door and find a
female Eridanian, wearing a flimsy purple dress sitting behind an untidy
desk.
“Welcome.” She smiles rising from behind the desk. “My name’s
Xanlya. What can I do for you?” Though reptilian, her body is humanoid in
shape with slender legs, wide hips, a narrow waist and full breasts. Despite
her scaly features and hairless head, with her high cheekbones and elfin
features, you find her strangely attractive.
“We’ve got a faulty hyperspace coil.” You tell her. “We’re after a replacement if you have one?” Xanlya’s yellow eyes glance over your
shoulder, through the door at your ship.
“A T600
Freighter.” She murmurs, frowning, deep in thought before
brightening. “Haven’t seen one of those in years. Your lucky day. We’ve got
a T600 hyperspace engine just across the landing pad. Yours for just ten
thousand credits.”
“It’s not worth that new.” Vanessa gasps. “You thieving…” You put up
a hand, silencing her.
“Does seem expensive.” You reply, flashing her a smile. “Three
thousand seems a fair price.”
“You seem to be under the impression this is a negotiation and we’ll
meet somewhere in the middle.” Xanlya smiles humourlessly. “It’s not. Ten
thousand. Take it or leave it.”
“We only have five thousand.” You sigh.
“That’s very sad.” Xanlya frowns. “I guess you’re leaving it then.
Unless…”
“Unless?” You ask suspiciously. Xanlya steps out from behind her desk
and saunters towards you.
“It’s a lonely existence here.” She purrs, her scaly lips curling into a
smile. “I might be persuaded to part with my precious hyperspace coil for
the pleasure of your company for a couple of hours.” She runs a scaly hand
over your chest.
“Needs must.” Vanessa echoes your earlier statement, a smile playing
on her lips. “I’ll see you back at the ship after you’ve finished entertaining
the creature from the black lagoon.”
“I meant both of you my dear.” Xanlya smiles mischievously. Vanessa’s
mouth drops open and you stifle a chuckle. It is not often she’s left
speechless.
“You mind if I consult with my colleague a moment?” You ask,
stepping outside and gesturing for Vanessa to follow.
“What do you think?” You ask her.
“You know me,” She shrugs, “I’m pretty open minded. Of course, if
you didn’t want to fuck the lizard woman, she’s here on her own. We could
always just take it by force? The only other option we have is to keep going
with the coil we’ve got and hope for the best.”
Partake in a threesome with Vanessa and Xanlya
Lure of the Sirens: A Sci Fi Choose Your Own Erotic Story Page 28