The Zaytarian. Fib was her name, according to Sarah. Fib. What a strange name. Henry had not had one, of course, but Henry, it sounded good. It was nice. Fib was short and ugly.
But maybe Fib would prove useful. Maybe her people would be willing to trade. Maybe he could contact the Zaytarian’s, and he could barter. He could meet them at some space station and hand her over in exchange for food, water, and fuel. It didn’t hurt to have a little more fuel. He could fill the ship with food and water, and he and Sarah could float for a year, maybe more. Long enough for her to come around. Long enough for them to plan the future together.
Yes, that was a good plan, but it meant keeping Fib alive. Henry reached out in his mind to the bot, which was in the room again, making Fib scream. He commanded the bot to retreat, and it did just that. Henry opened his eyes, and his antennae twitched happily. That was taken care of. Now he just needed to contact the Zaytarian’s. But first, he should check on Sarah. He knew the girl would come around. She just had to.
He pushed up from the chair and stretched before moving back toward the rear of the ship. Outside her room he reached out to the door electronics and made it open. He stepped inside and his blood ran cold.
Sarah was on the floor, writhing in pain. She was clutching her stomach, her back facing him.
“What it is?” he asked in her brain, rushing forward.
“My stomach!” the girl practically screamed. Henry knelt down and reached for her.
Quick as lightning Sarah rolled over and lifted onto her knees. In her hand she held a metal pipe, a bit of the shower that she had managed to wrench free from behind the shower head. Henry’s eyes went wide as the pipe came down, smashing onto his head and sending him falling back onto his butt.
He was out, a large gash on his head was pouring blue blood. Sarah was on her feet, running for the door. He had not put up the force field, and she ran into the hall. There was a door a bit further down, and she ran for it, pushing past a floating robot, but the door was closed, and there was no panel.
“Open this door!” she snarled at the bot and to her surprise the bot beeped and the door slid upward.
“Sarah!” Fib groaned, and Sarah grimaced. The Zaytarian was nude and covered in cuts and bruises. It looked as though every finger on her right hand was broken, and there were burns all across her breasts.
“We have to get out of here.”
“Did you kill him?” Fib asked.
“I don’t think so.”
“You need to,” Fib said. “You have to right now.”
Sarah knew she was right. She turned and went back to her room.
Henry was gone.
The girl from Earth rushed back into the room where Fib was strapped to the elevated table.
“What’s wrong?” Fib asked her, seeing the look on Sarah’s face.
“He’s gone. I have to get you free. I don’t know where he is.”
“Okay, hurry!” Fib said, straining against her bonds as Sarah rushed forward. Cold metal straps held Fib to the table, and though Sarah pulled with all her might, she could not budge them. She looked around the room, but couldn’t find a control panel of any sort.
“I don’t know what to do!” she said breathlessly.
“It’s all done in his mind. There’s no button,” Fib said, the answer dawning on her quickly.
“I know!” Sarah said, and she turned and hurried out, back a moment later with the floating bot in her hands. “Free her!” she demanded.
“I cannot,” the robot said. “I am supposed to keep her bound.”
“Free her or I’ll pull your circuits out,” Sarah said, pulling open a small panel on the back of the spherical robot to expose a bundle of different colored wires.
“Okay!” the bot said. It’s robotic voice growing shrill. It whirred and beeped, and the clamps on the table sprung up, allowing Fib to roll off the table and down to the floor, where she knelt for a long while. Sarah rushed to her after finding the clothing Fib had been wearing when they had boarded the spaceship. It was dirty and smelled like ash, but it was better than escaping in the nude, and Fib pulled the clothing on slowly, aching with each movement.
“Sarah,” Henry said, and Sarah whipped around, expecting to see the blue-skinned alien in the doorway, but realizing when she did not that he was speaking in her head. Of course, he was.
“What do you want?” she thought, so he could hear her.
“I see now that you are lost. Truly lost. I am sorry for that. I did what I could to save you.”
“I was saved,” Sarah thought. “From you.”
“If I can’t have you. No one can.” Henry said, and then he was gone, she could feel him pull away from her mind.
“He’s going to do something to kill us all,” Sarah realized, speaking it aloud to Fib. “We have to stop him.”
Fib nodded. She was standing now, hurt in dozens of places, bleeding freely from some of them, but she was strong, and willing to do what it took to survive. “He’s in the cockpit,” Fib said, feeling the ship roll to the left as it banked. “He’s flying.”
Sarah let the Zaytarian take the lead into the hall of the ship, rushing toward the front.
The heavy metal door that led to the cockpit was closed, and there was no way to open it. Sarah pounded her fist on it and yelled, “Stop this!” she pleaded. “Henry, let us go!”
He did not answer. Would not. There was a small screened panel nearby, and Fib moved to it, peering at what was splashed across the screen, just green numbers and letters in an alien alphabet that Sarah would have no hope of reading, and that Fib only knew a little of.
“I think he’s heading for the nearest star,” she said after a moment. Sarah felt her blood run cold at the words.
“We have to get off this ship,” she said.
“Come with me,” Fib said. She turned and ran back to the room where the bot was still floating.
“Is there an escape pod on the ship?” Fib asked the robot.
“You are not authorized to use it. It is of no concern to you,” the robot replied.
Fib didn’t reply. She reached behind the robot and grabbed a fistful of its wires from the open panel on the back of the bot. With a little tug, just loosening some of the wires without disconnecting them entirely, the robot squealed.
“Fine!” it said. “Yes, there is one. I can take you there.”
“Hurry!” Fib demanded. She let go of the bot as it sped through the door.
“I want to go with you,” the bot said, stopping in the hall and opening a hidden doorway with a beep. A cramped pod lay beyond, with a circular bench built into the wall, and harnesses every two feet or so.
“Forget it,” Fib said, stepping inside.
“I do not wish to perish on this ship!” the bot pleaded.
“Come on,” Sarah said, stepping inside, motioning for the bot to follow. Fib grabbed Sarah’s arm.
“It could be a trick,” she said.
“It’s not,” Sarah said. She would not let Henry be the death of anything else, not even a robot. The bot swept inside, and the pod door shut.
“No!” Henry screamed inside Sarah’s head. “Do not leave me. I do not want to die alone!”
“Fuck you,” Sarah said, and she sat on the bench, slapped a large button on the wall, and with a whoosh, the pod was ejected into space.
There was a small viewport, and it spun as the pod itself did, showing a burning prang star, and the small Aeon ship speeding toward it.
“No!” Henry was screaming in her mind. “I just wanted you to love me, I just wanted you to be with me for-”
He was cut off as the ship impacted the surface of the star, lost in a massive explosion and intense heat.
“He’s gone,” Sarah said, and a smile broke out across her face.
Chapter Eight
Yelia and Char had taken to holding hands. No one on the ship was talking much, there was always a chance that a powerful microphone pointed their way would
pick up any sounds, and the ship made enough of those that speaking wasn’t something they wanted to risk adding to it.
But holding hands was nice, it felt right, and they did so while eating in the galley, or even sleeping, Char on the top bunk, and Yelia on the bottom, his arm stretched down and hers stretched up.
They had just climbed into their beds, the fifth day they had been travelling silently across dangerous space, when she tugged on his hand. His head appeared above her, peering past the edge of the bunk. She smiled in the darkness and pulled on his hand again. He got the message and slipped down from his bunk to lay on hers. They were both clad in their underwear, his thin shorts that stopped at his upper thigh, her in a pair of briefs snug on her round butt and a tight-fitting bra of sorts that was see-through, even in the dark.
She pressed her lips to his, taking control of the situation. That was something she had never been afraid to do. They were lying on their sides, facing one another, but she pushed forward so he rolled onto his back, and then she climbed atop him, letting the length of her body lay across his, her breasts pressed against his chest, her pelvic bone pressing against his hardening cock.
She was feeling powerful, she was enjoying being in charge, and it was Yelia who pushed her tongue forward, past his lips, to dance along with his tongue in his mouth. Her hands slid along his arms to find his, and they interlocked their fingers as Yelia shifted her legs, spreading them and bringing them down so her knees were on either side of his hips, and his throbbing erection pressed against her moistening crotch.
Char couldn’t help himself, arching his hips up to grind against her crotch, applying pressure to his hard on, and their kissing became more passionate, wet smacks as their lips and tongues danced their fiery dance.
Yelia pulled her hands away from his and leaned back, breaking the kiss and rubbing her hands down Char’s strong chest, playfully tweaking his nipples before continuing on, her fingertips grazing over his well-defined abs. He was hard bodied and attractive, and if Yelia was going to die, she hadn’t been willing to do so without seeing what the young man had to offer as a lover.
She bucked atop him slowly, rotating her hips teasingly, still clad in their underwear as she slid her mound along the length of his shaft, which was pushing forcefully against the thin material of his shorts.
His hands were busy as well, sliding up her stomach and under the sports bra she wore, so his rough palms could cup her large breasts. Her sensitive nipples hardened against his touch. He squeezed her, not too roughly, making her breasts bulge through his thick, warm fingers.
She moaned when he moved his hands so that he could roll her nipples between his thumb and forefinger. Rubbing against him frantically, her nipples played with, it had been so long since she had last made love, it was almost enough to get her off. Her last boyfriend having been a year ago, shortly after getting out of military school, where she had, of course, followed her sister.
She wanted it to last, so Yelia pulled away from Char, leaning down and planting kisses along his stomach as she slid down his body, letting the damp crotch of her panties slide down one of his legs until her head was positioned over the throbbing tent in his shorts.
Even in the dark she could see the bulbous tip of his cock, a wet spot spreading on his shorts. She leaned her head down and planted a playful kiss on the tip, and opened her mouth, taking the silky tip inside, sucking on it through the material of his shorts. His hips thrust up slightly, driving him wild with the sensation being muted by the fabric. He moaned and that turned her on even more. She decided to reward him. Tugging the shorts down, over his butt as she did so she could slide them all the way off.
She moved her mouth back above his cock, but before she took him in her mouth she decided she wouldn't mind being rewarded as well, and she shifted on the bed, turning so that her feet were by his head, and she slid atop him once more, spreading her legs, her knees by his ears, her soaked panties in his face. She felt his fingers pushing her panties to the side, and parting her lips with a thick, warm finger as he pushed his tongue into her. She took the tip of his cock into her mouth without the barrier of his underwear. His cock jumped as she closed her lips around him. She tasted the salty precum from the tip as she swirled her tongue around him.
He ran a finger along her wet slit, sending shockwaves of pleasure through her body. She moaned as she leaned forward and took him deeper into her mouth, her lips reaching the halfway point of his shaft, the mushroom head pressed against the back of her throat. Char’s tongue pressed into her crotch, flicking against her clit, lapping against it softly, eliciting another moan from her.
She reached up and wrapped her hand around the exposed part of his shaft, squeezing him gently but firmly, and then pulled her head back, away from his cock so that only the tip remained in her mouth.
She sucked on his meaty shaft and he probed her womanhood with his tongue, sliding in and out of her. They were both thrusting against each other’s mouth. Hungry for that climax.
“That’s it,” she said, when she could take no more. Yelia moved away. Pulling her moist mound from Char’s mouth and tongue, and sliding her own lips and hand from his shaft. She turned around, so that she could kiss him as she climbed atop him once more, their juices and flavors mixing together as their tongues did the same.
She reached down and gripped his thick member, holding it as she lowered herself atop it, not breaking their kiss. She could feel Char grunt against her mouth as he was fully embedded inside her, her tight walls gripping him spectacularly.
“Yes,” Yelia whispered as she bucked atop him, working slowly at first, letting his veiny cock slid nearly from within her and then sliding back down, her skin slapping audibly against his thighs.
She broke the kiss and leaned back, one of her hands on his chest, the other reaching back to fondle his testicles. His hands found her breasts, cupping them and squeezing them, hard nipples being pulled between two rough fingers.
He climaxed first, surprisingly, unable to hold on any longer. His strong hands taking her by the hips and pulling her down, holding her there as he pulsed his release into her body, filling her with his hot, sticky, seed.
“Stay hard,” Yelia commanded when he was done, and she began to ride him again, working quickly, close to coming herself, guiding one of his hands down to her crotch, so that the pad of his thumb could rub against her clit as she bucked atop him.
“Yes!” Yelia said, louder than she had meant to, and then she was coming, an orgasm convulsing through her loins, at the bottom of her stomach and spreading quickly through her body, making her moan and shake.
When it was done Yelia leaned down and kissed Char, and then rolled to the side. He rolled, too, and stayed inside her. They slept like that, his throbbing and spent cock softening within her body. When they woke in the middle of the night to find that he was hard once more, the throbbing mushroom tip pressing into her, she wiggled her hips and they moved in sync, not stopping until she was spent and he filled her with his seed for a second time.
Chapter Nine
“Where are we going?” Sarah asked Fib. She didn’t know how long they had been in the escape pod, but she had slept for what felt like hours and had been up for some hours, so she was thinking it was at least close to a day. Space really needed more clocks.
“I don’t know. Bot, how long do we have on this thing?”
“I can survive indefinitely,” the floating robot said, somewhat proudly. Fib rolled her eyes, another one of those little gestures that surprised Sarah when she saw it, because what were the chances that such things meant the same across the galaxy as they did back on Earth? Sarah was also glad that Henry hadn’t taken the translator she still wore in her ear. It would have been lonely, sitting in that small pod, unable to really talk with Fib, or to understand the robot when it beeped and hummed in its electronic language. It was lucky that Henry had left Fib’s in. Maybe the psychic alien had not even thought of the earpieces, since h
e had no spoken language.
Thinking of Henry elicited a strange and surprising response within Sarah. A tinge of, what? Regret? He was horrible, and had used her, but… watching him explode, at the time it was so rewarding, seeing the ship go up on the surface of that star, but now, it just made her feel sick to her stomach. She wanted the death to stop.
Now she was maybe facing her own, once again. It seemed to always be the case, since she had been abducted by Henry and the other Aeon’s. Death facing her from every direction; out in the cold reaches of space, down on unfamiliar planets. It was breathing on her neck once more, as she floated through a black void in a tiny capsule.
“I’m talking about us,” Fib said to the robot, snapping Sarah’s attention back to the present, and to the inside of the pod. “How much air do we have?”
The robot flashed its lights for a moment as it spoke silently with the AI of the escape pod. “Three days worth, more or less,” the bot said finally. “The AI here scanned the two of you and is pumping more oxygen in due to your increased demands over the Aeon’s who built it. The week supply will last you three days.”
“Is the pod heading for a hospitable planet?” Fib asked.
“Yes.”
“Will we arrive in time?”
“Just,” the bot said, after a brief moment of silence. “With an hour to spare.”
“Oh, good. Wouldn’t want anything to be easy,” Fib said, then she grinned.
*****
Three days in the small escape pod passed much more quickly than Sarah had imagined they would. She was asleep when Fib shook her awake.
“Wake up,” she said, and Sarah looked to her. She coughed, trying to suck in oxygen, but finding it hard to do so.
“I can’t breathe. Not easily,” she gasped.
Aeon Ending Page 4