by Enid Titan
Poppy hadn’t worked so hard at the Academy telepathic practice. Her head ached as she entered the room. She leaned up against the wall, her fingers unconsciously massaging her temple. The sharp and sudden onset of pain distracted her momentarily from the reason she’d come until her mother sat up in bed.
“Poppy? Is that really you?”
Poppy’s chest tightened. So many years had passed since she’d last seen her mother. She was a little girl then. She hadn’t met CJ, hadn’t moved in with Uncle Monty. Daddy was still alive back then.
“Yes.”
Poppy willed herself to move forward, to reach out and touch the frail, sickly woman on the bed, but she couldn’t do it. Her mother’s patchy hair which was once black and thick like her daughter's lay against her skull in dappled clumps. She must have been well cared for. Poppy noticed the healing bruises on her arms and legs as she swung them off the bed and creaked into an unbalanced position on her feet.
She looked twice her age. Prison could do that to a woman.
“I know you’re a ghost,” she said to Poppy, “But come here. Give mama a hug.”
Poppy looked to Chanal for permission, or perhaps an escape. Chanal offered neither with her glance. Poppy inched a single step forward, her stomach threatening to evacuate its minimal contents already. Her mother limped toward her and wrapped her in a hug.
“Princess of darkness wrapped in a night shroud,” she whispered and then pulled away.
“She’s gone, isn’t she,” Poppy whispered.
Chanal pressed her hand to Poppy’s shoulder.
“She’s in and out. It’s a neurological condition from a prison accident.”
Sure. An “accident”.
“Can’t you fix her? You fixed an entire goddamn planet,” Poppy snapped.
She was so angry. What did she expect? Did she expect to meet her mother and then everything would be fine? How utterly stupid and unrealistic. Poppy sniffled and fought back tears.
“It’s nice to see you, mom.”
“Yes. Yes. Tell Poppy not to trust the greys or the blues or the man on the moon.”
“Can I sit with her?” Poppy asked, “Alone?”
“Yes, ChaCha, let me sit with her ghost and bring us some bread and honey… and grass. Lots of grass.”
Chanal bowed awkwardly and vanished through the door. Her mother sat on her cot and patted a lumpy spot next to her.
“The greys saved Earth. The greys took your dad. Oh, sweetheart, how you’ve grown. I know you're only a dream, but at least you're a nice one. The queen with eight eyes lies and lies.”
Her mother rested her head in the crook of Poppy’s neck. She smelled damp and camphorous. Poppy reluctantly put her arm around her. This was her mother now. This woman. Not the mother she remembered. She’d have to accept that.
“You wrote to Uncle Monty, mom. You saved Earth.”
Poppy knew attempting to ground her was futile.
“For now. There are worse threats.”
“I don’t want to talk about threats,” Poppy whispered, “I want to be here. Safe. With you.”
Her mother sat up sharply and grabbed Poppy’s hand, squeezing it and digging her dirty fingernails into Poppy’s flesh until her palm reddened.
“Mom!”
“You are not safe here. The Fengari queen knows it. She knows what’s coming. She wants to prepare you.”
“Mom, you’re hurting me!”
“The Fengari will die.”
“Mom!”
“Sweet little Poppy can’t know… the darkness crouches in the rock and ice and waits for food.”
Poppy snatched her hand away and jolted to her feet.
“I can’t do this!”
“Little Poppy can’t know about the spider’s fangs, she said.”
“I’m going to leave, Mom,” Penelope said stiffly.
The walls of the room towered over Poppy. Her mother’s unsettling, distant eyes bored into her, looking through her not at her.
“An old enemy must become an ally when the cyborgs rise from the asteroid dust.”
“Right,” Poppy said, “I’ll be back. I’ll be here for the entire summer. We’ll talk about it later.”
She rushed out of the room, the wall shutting behind her as her mother emitted a shrill scream.
3
Prophecies
“What the fuck happened to her?”
“Her condition worsened.”
“What was that she said, did any of it make sense?”
“She’s become like Sibyl, only her human brain can’t handle it.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“Language, child.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you think about my language! I want to know what happened to her and I want to go back to Devor!”
Chanal leaned in, lavender eyes sparkling from the dim torchlight in the cave.
“You will fulfill your promise. Then you will return to the ice planet.”
Chanal turned her back on Penelope and led her back to her room. Poppy flopped down in bed, so angry she could scream or smash something. After a few minutes, another Fengari arrived. Her blade teacher. Poppy dragged herself out of bed for her first lesson. There was no sense in resisting her teacher, especially since she didn’t have much else to do. She hadn’t even prepared for her arrival on the moon. By the end of her lesson, Poppy’s mood soured.
Her teacher was kind enough, but his patience and soft-spoken demeanor irritated her more than if he’d been tough and brusque. They repeated the same motions for four hours. Even when Poppy thought she’d perfectly mirrored his smooth motions, he’d calmly say, “You didn’t get it, Penelope. Again.”
Towards the end of the lesson, Poppy convinced herself she was stuck in purgatory, and she’d never get to leave. When she’d been about to turn the blade on herself and make a dramatic proclamation, her teacher said, “The lesson is finished. I’ll take you to see Sibyl and then your mother.”
Poppy didn’t expect a chance to see the queen again so soon. She wasn’t exactly looking forward to the unnerving experience of standing exposed before those eyes. In Sibyl’s throne room, Poppy greeted her with a bow that felt appropriate. Sibyl clucked her teeth.
“We do not engage in such formalities here, child. Rise.”
“Sorry,” Poppy mumbled.
“You saw your mother, I take it.”
“Yes.”
“Have a seat, child. We’ll have tea.”
Poppy would have maintained her disobedience if her legs weren’t wobbling precariously and sore to the bone after her blade lesson.
“You have a good teacher. A bit of patience and the lessons will come easily to you.”
“I mean no disrespect,” Poppy ventured cautiously, “But I don’t know if I wish to have any more lessons. My mother isn’t well. She hardly recognizes me. My time would be much better spent on Devor, honing my telepathic abilities so I can help her.”
Plus, her mother’s warning about not trusting the greys rung in the back of Poppy’s head. She hardly trusted them in the first place. Sibyl smiled.
“Drink your tea.”
Poppy stared down at the cup of tea, which appeared out of thin air.
“I cannot send you back until the end of these six months, child.”
“Why not? Am I a captive?”
“No. I’m afraid we don’t have more than six months.”
Poppy sipped her tea, hoping her silence would probe more details out of Sibyl.
“Your mother has seen what I have seen. No future is certain. There are only possibilities. One possibility appears in my eyes clearer and clearer each day. The Fengari people, the Devoran people, all the people in this sector of the Alpha Quadrant will face an old enemy.”
“Right. What does that have to do with me?”
“The Fengari people are not likely to survive an encounter with this enemy.”
Sibyl shifted to one side of her throne, her eyes blinking even slowe
r than usual.
“You saved an entire planet. No one even knows that you’re here.”
“You know. If you know, and you’ve interfaced with the Devoran temple, the Devorans know too.”
“The Devorans wouldn’t attack this moon.”
“You’re right, they wouldn’t. If we believed they would, Fengar would strike first.”
A chill traveled down Penelope's spine. The idea of intergalactic war seemed far-fetched, even given what she'd seen on Devor. They were peaceful. The Order was an aberration from that peace, not representative of normal Devoran thought and action.
There were those riddles again.
“I know what you fear,” Sibyl continued, “I will allow you to return to your Academy. This year will be a bigger challenge for you that before. I teach you the blade so you can survive so that you can face the challenges to come, and so that when the war comes, you will fight, Penelope.”
A flash of terror crossed Sibyl’s alien face. Aliens across ages, races, and planets shared similar expressions of horror and fear. Raised brows, fidgeting nervous limbs in preparation for the oldest stimulus-response: fight or flight.
“This semester at the Academy will be one test of many. Study well, child.”
“I shall…. when I get back there.”
“Patience. Now you wish for a return, but a return to Devor may not always be so sweet.”
“Thanks for the advice.”
Poppy stiffened, remembering that no matter how kindly this alien queen appeared, she was still effectively a kidnapper, and she’d held information about Poppy’s heritage this whole time without telling her. Sibyl had an agenda of her own.
“Return to your mother, child, and take your studies with Talak seriously. Our physicians may one day heal her. Until then, you mustn’t fear her ramblings. Search for the truth in her prophecies.”
“She’s not prophesizing. She’s nuts,” Poppy grumbled.
“Is there a chance she may be doing a little of both?”
“Thanks for the tea.”
“Carry on, then.”
Poppy hurried out of Sibyl’s throne room to her mother’s side. Her mother slept, so Poppy read a bit of Earth literature to her. Nothing interesting, only what the Fengari procured for her from their bizarre collection. Poppy sat cross-legged at the foot of her mother’s bed and read out loud from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein until her lips numbed and her lids grew heavy.
Chanal accompanied her back to her bedroom, where Poppy fell asleep and dreamed of her three boys…
4
Dream State: F**ked
Jason’s voice echoed faintly.
«Jazad…»
«She can’t hear us,» Castor’s voice followed.
«Where are you?» Poppy whispered.
«Did you hear that?» Ajax’s voice sounded closer than the others.
«Jazad?»
«Jason! I can hear you. Castor! Ajax!»
«If you’d concentrate, this would be easier,» Castor grumbled.
«I am concentrating!» Ajax shot back.
«I’m here!»
Ajax must have finally concentrated because the setting of her dream crystallized around her. Jason’s parents’ flat. They were either in the apartment or dreaming it because of its familiarity.
«Fucking finally,» Castor said.
«Jazad. Can you see us?»
Poppy concentrated, the way she had when she’d focused on the door to her mother’s underground room on Fengar. Look at her, thinking of the damn moon as “Fengar”. Poppy wondered how else the aliens changed her.
«You seem far away.»
Castor nudged Ajax again. Poppy felt the dig in her sides. She and Ajax both yelped.
«We’ve been searching for you for weeks.»
«I know. I was on a ship. I think.»
«Deep space. We didn’t know where you were.»
«We went through hell to find you, jazad.»
«Stop complaining,» Castor grumbled.
«You three seem… irritable.»
«Of course we’re irritable. You’re lightyears away and we’re stuck on a ship.»
«Not Jason’s parents’ flat?»
«No. We just thought this would be easier to dream up.»
«And the mood’s a lot better for—
Castor nudged Ajax before he could finish his sentence.
«Better for what?» Poppy asked.
«Never mind that, jazad. Are you safe?»
«Yes.»
«Good. Do we need to start a rescue mission?»
«No! How the hell would you rescue me anyway?»
«Steal a warship,» Ajax suggested.
«No! We can survive six months…»
«Four months, thirteen days,» Castor corrected her.
Waiting hurt them, Poppy could feel it now, the anguish that settled within them since she’d gone.
«I’m sorry for how I left.»
«You were as surprised as we were, jazad.»
Jason, Castor, and Ajax surrounded her now. Poppy stepped forward into Ajax’s grasp. She ran her hands over the scars on his chest. Devoran dreams felt so real. She’d nearly forgotten just how close she could feel them when they shared dreams. Ajax’s embrace warmed her slowly and Poppy rested her head on his shoulder.
«Don’t hog her,» Cas complained.
Poppy ran her hands through Ajax’s long curls and kissed his cheek. Jason grabbed her from behind and whirled her around so that she rested in his embrace. He’d lost weight, at least Poppy thought he had when she hugged him and felt the bones from his ribs and hips pressing into her. Sometimes else pressed into her too.
She shuddered as the lump in his pants moved against her leg.
«Jason!» she uttered in mock protest.
Jason smirked and kissed her forehead.
«Sorry, jazad.»
There was so much Poppy wanted to ask them. Eight weeks they’d been apart and not a word from them. She’d caught glimpses of them in her dreams, but nothing concrete. They were at sea right now, facing the Devoran sea beasts in the name of furthering scientific discovery. This wasn’t the time for asking. Poppy allowed Cas to hold her next.
He wasted no time once he had her in his arms. Unlike Jason, he hadn’t lost weight at all. He’d gained muscle mass in his abdomen and his abs formed distinct lumps of bulk around his middle and his arms protruded from his Devoran tunic, exposed to the icy sea winds without so much as goosebumps.
Even if they dreamed in the Vortha flat, the sea winds from the boys’ real location occasionally penetrated.
«You’re cold,» Poppy whispered.
«So are you, human,» Castor whispered back, leaning down and kissing her.
He was the least patient today. He ran his hands through Poppy’s black hair, catching tufts of it in his grasp and holding on as he kissed her. His split tongues probed out of his mouth and sucked on her lips as they kissed. Poppy kissed him back, thrusting her tongue between his. He groaned and grabbed her hips tighter, pressing her up against the wall of the flat.
«Really? We’re doing this?»
«We need you, jazad,» Jason breathed.
The tent in his pants stiffened and Ajax fared no better. Their amber eyes glowed with arousal already. Six blue alien dicks ready to plunge into the apex of her thighs… talk about a wet dream.
Castor slipped his hand up Penelope’s nightdress and past the tight white underwear that clung to her milky thighs.
«Fuck’s sake. You’re soaked.»
«It’s been a long time,» Poppy whispered back.
«Far too fucking long,» Cas murmured.
He hiked her up the wall and spread her thighs, pressing his hips between them. His stiff blue dicks sprung from his trousers eager to slip inside her damp sheath. Ajax took one of Poppy’s arms and pinned it against the wall. Jason took the other.
«We’ll hold her down for you, Cas,» Jason said.
Cas nodded, enjoying the idea of
Poppy trapped against the wall and squirming in pleasure as he entered her. He grunted and buried his length between her sopping thighs. Poppy cried out as his first massive cock filled her cunt. The bigger of the two powerful members stretched her so wide that her juices splattered out of her cunt and coated Cas’ blue alien dick.
She squirmed, but Ajax and Jason only held her wrists down harder. Castor grunted and moved between her legs. Poppy cried out and bucked her hips. He slammed into her again, plunging deep into her tightness. Oh fuck. This was too good, feeling his big cock buried inside her sweet tightness after so long. He fucked her to a climax and Poppy could have been satisfied until she felt his second cock probing at her tight second entrance. She gasped and her eyes widened.
Just for a moment, she’d forgotten that each of her lovers had been blessed with two marvelous gigantic cocks. With one cock in her pussy and the second ready to spread her ass apart, Castor leaned in and kissed her hard, slipping the head of his second past her sphincter. Poppy moaned as he buried both inside her, taking both her wet human holes for his pleasure.
«Ohhhhhh…»
She moaned and surges of pleasure from all of them surged through her. Poppy came instantly and Cas pumped inside her harder and harder until his climax where he groaned and slammed his body into hers hard as both his cocks erupted, splattering her pussy and thighs with his milky alien cum.
«My turn…» Jason murmured, sliding his tongue down Poppy’s neck as she wriggled against the wall.
5
Tongues & Bums
Jason took his place between Poppy’s thighs. She spread her legs wider as her juices coated her curvy thighs and Jason released his proud and massive members from his trousers. Jason kissed her with more romance than usual. He pried her lips apart with both his tongues and tasted her before moving his tongue down her neck where tiny suction cups along the length of his long tongue sucked at her flesh. He pressed his hardness against Poppy’s entrance and then pulled away before entering her.
Poppy gasped and squeezed her thighs around his waist to keep him there. Jason leaned in and kissed her.