by Meg Ripley
"What do you mean the stars will go out?" she asked frantically.
"Where is the ship?" Tyrok asked without answering her question.
"It's on the other side of that hill," she said, pointing in the direction of the hill on the border of the village. "You didn't answer me."
Tyrok started toward the hill, his jaw set with determination.
"You thought that Star Lords were fairy tales so you probably didn't know that our ships are not the same as others."
"What do you mean?"
"My ship carries extraordinary power. It literally has within it the ability to extinguish the actual stars just as quickly as I created the little ones in your bedroom. Without the stars, everything in this universe will die."
"I still don't understand."
By this point they were cresting the hill and Tyrok was staring down at the crashed ship. Alexis followed his gaze and gasped. Ahead of them the ship looked nearly perfect, the warped, twisted mass of metal now a sleek, shimmering ship.
"Thank god it's still here," he muttered. "The creature inside that ship, the one that was controlling me, has been repairing it since the day of the crash. It knows that if it can get the ship operational again, it will have the ability to control the universe."
"But if it could do that on its own, why was it controlling you?"
"I know how to operate the ship and as long as it was controlling me, it was also controlling my capabilities. We have to stop it before it figures out how to operate the ship."
"How are we going to do that?" Alexis asked, struggling to keep up with him as he ran down the side of the hill and pushed toward the ship.
"We have to kill it."
"You don't have any weapons," Alexis said, pointing out that Tyrok had run from the house in only his pants and shoes.
"I don't need weapons. When I said that without the stars everything in the universe would die, that wasn't completely correct. Everything but those creatures. They detest sunlight and will die if exposed to it for more than a few seconds. To them, even the tiniest of stars is just a sun waiting to happen."
Alexis suddenly remembered the tentacle slithering out of the wrecked ship and then recoiling quickly into the darkness.
"How are we going to get it outside?" she asked.
"I'm going to lure it."
"No!" she protested, "It has already had control over you before. I'm not going to let that happen again. I'm going in."
"No, you aren't," he said, trying to pull her back.
"It is my sworn duty as the medic of this mission to protect everyone within the colony, and for the last week and a half now, that includes you."
"You would protect anyone in the colony this way?" he asked uncertainly.
Alexis stood on her toes to kiss him.
"Absolutely not." She took a breath and started for the repair ship door, pausing most of the way there to toss the messenger pad from her wrist back to Tyrok, "If anything happens, call my father. His name is James."
She turned back to the ship and approached the door. Her hand trembled as she rested it on the lever to the door and pushed it open. The door slid toward her a few inches and Alexis leaned forward to check inside. Everything was calm and quiet so she took a step forward. Suddenly she heard a screeching sound from within the ship and felt something thick and strong wrap around her waist. She screamed as the black tentacle dragged her inside. Behind her, Tyrok was shouting her name.
Alexis thrashed against the tentacle, pushing down on it as hard as she could trying to free herself from its grasp. It dragged her down the main hallway, slamming her against the walls as it slithered across the floor. She managed to catch herself on a metal guide bar on one wall, slowing the tentacle enough that she could hear the faint sound of her father's voice coming into the ship.
A moment later the tentacle yanked her forward again, painfully pulling her away from the bar. It was dragging her toward the emergency control room where she found Tyrok and she felt terror building in her stomach as she thought of what it may have planned for her. Suddenly she saw a flash of movement beside her and heard a screech as the tentacle tightened around her to the point that she couldn't breathe.
Darkness was building around her and she turned her head to see Tyrok digging a large spade into the tentacle. A look of fury on his face, he withdrew the tool and slammed it back down into the creature. Alexis could hear James shouting in the background and just as everything went completely dark, her body slipped from the tentacle's grip and crumpled to the cold metal floor.
****
"Come on, Alexis. Open your eyes."
She heard Tyrok's voice whispering to her as if it was coming through water toward her. It waivered slightly and she felt the soft, soothing touch of his hand brushing her cheek. She wanted to respond to him but it felt like her own voice was out of her reach.
"Listen to me," he whispered again, "Focus on my voice and come back to me."
Alexis fought against the sinking feeling that kept her away from Tyrok and felt the fog lifting. She turned her head slowly from side to side and heard a murmur escape her lips.
"Tyrok," she whispered, finally able to find her voice.
Her eyes fluttered open and Tyrok's beautiful face, worry etched into the gorgeous features, came gradually into focus. He leaned down and kissed her gently. The touch of his lips broke through the fog and she lifted her head to press harder into his kiss. Tyrok tucked his hand beneath her head to support it and deepened the kiss, opening his mouth over hers and dipping his tongue inside.
Alexis welcomed the kiss, looping her arm around his neck to give herself leverage so she could crush her body against his. He groaned into her mouth and pulled her up further. She complied with his strength, allowing him to lead her so that she knelt in the middle of the bed, him mirroring her position in front of her so that their bodies touched from their knees to their chests.
Not breaking their kiss, Alexis smoothed her hands down over Tyrok's shoulders. She reveled in the feeling of his warm skin and strong, hard muscles beneath her palms. He returned her touch, slipping his hands beneath her shirt and pulling it up, taking his mouth from hers only long enough to remove it and toss it aside. She hadn't put her bra back on before they returned to the ship and when she tucked back into his arms her nipples grazed his chest.
Alexis whimpered at the sensation that shot through her stomach and into the apex of her thighs. Seeming to take her sound as an invitation, Tyrok steadied himself with his hands on her hips and ducked his head down to capture one of her hard peaks between his teeth. He bit just hard enough to create a tiny, pleasurable shock of pain, then followed the bite with the soothing coil of his tongue around her nipple.
Her hand came to the back of his head to hold him in place, but Tyrok seemed to have other plans. He pulled his mouth away from her breast, moved it to the other one to flick his tongue quickly across that nipple, and then touched it to her stomach. Alexis arched back to offer him better access to her skin and closed her eyes to savor the delicious feeling of him kissing and licking his way slowly toward the button on the front of her pants.
By the time the tip of his tongue slipped beneath her waistband to tease the curve of her hipbone, Alexis was panting and gripping his shoulders for stability. Tyrok straightened back up on his knees and pulled her closer. She felt the pressure of his erection pushing into her belly and bit her lip, her hips making tiny, involuntary movements against his. He kissed her deeply, drawing her bottom lip into his mouth and sucking on it softly. Finally he brought his mouth to her ear.
"Now?" he whispered and Alexis remembered how she had stopped him the last time they were in her bed together.
Unable to speak over her labored breath, Alexis nodded. Tyrok wrapped an arm around her hips and swept her off of her knees, lowering her down onto her back on the mattress. He stretched his body along hers and she parted her thighs, drawing her knees up beside his hips so he could settle closer against
her. Slowing their pace, he rocked his hips against hers and kissed her languidly. She tilted her face up to him to offer her mouth completely and felt his hand slip between them again to release the button on her pants and draw the zipper down.
A moment later she was naked before him again, but this time her shyness was overshadowed by her intense desire for him. Sitting back on his knees, Tyrok unfastened his own pants and pushed them off so that they finally had nothing between them. Still moving slowly, he slid back on the bed so he could lower his mouth between her legs.
Alexis cried out as his tongue swept across her, focusing in on the taut, swollen spot he had teased with his fingers before. He paused briefly as if to let her calm down, then continued, using just the tip of his tongue to trace circles through her folds and coax her toward the edge. His hands went beneath her hips, filling with her flesh as he tilted her pelvis up against his mouth. She writhed on the bed, mewling sounds tumbling from between her lips as he continued his blissful torment.
His masterful licks had brought her right to the edge and when his tongue delved inside her, the sensations crashed together in a dizzying, all-consuming climax. She was still riding the waves of tremors that rippled through her body when he moved up and the hard, thick length of his shaft replaced his tongue. He entered her in one smooth movement and her hips lifted to meet him.
Tyrok groaned as he filled her and began moving his hips in long, deep strokes. Alexis gasped at the feeling of him gliding against her and lifted her head to catch his mouth in a kiss. His pace quickened and his thrusts became more urgent. Each hard, intense stroke brought a cry from her lips and Alexis parted her thighs further to accept more of the sensation. Deep, animal grunts poured from his throat as he drove himself into her again and again, his eyes staring into hers. As she gazed at him she realized that what she thought were shimmering blue streaks were actually shooting stars suspended across the honey-colored background.
Her body contracted around him again, the rapid spasms of her muscles milking him until his head fell back and he roared. She could feel him spilling into her, pulsing in time with her tremors. As his muscles relaxed, Tyrok lowered himself down onto her, tucking his sweaty head into the dip between her shoulder and neck. He kissed her gently, his panting breaths rippling across her skin as they both cooled and calmed.
Alexis smiled and let her eyes drift closed. She would ask about the ship tomorrow. For now, all that mattered was the stunning man in her arms and his heartbeat against her chest. She knew that from that moment on she had one less thing to miss about home.
Chosen Alien Gene: Banek’s Quest
Banek took a moment to look at himself in the mirror he had positioned just beside the door of his laboratory, making sure that his appearance was as it should be. Before he had arrived on planet Earth, Banek had done extensive research into the best methods of gathering participants for his study. While most of his colleagues on the vessel had spent the voyage absorbing information about the mechanics of human mating—particularly as it applied to female sexuality and reproduction—Banek had been intrigued by the human concept of romance.
It was a concept that didn’t quite exist among Banek’s own people, the Khateen. On Khatanar, mating was a very, very different process. While his people possessed a latent empathy—an ability to read emotions in others with whom they were bonded—courtship and romance were strange phenomena.
As a result, Banek had devoted most of the time on his voyage investigating those particular aspects of human sexuality. While his colleagues had tracked down information about physical means, developing theories for testing, coming up with hypotheses about whether or not orgasm was required for conception, and arguing cases that seemed to indicate that in certain settings, more than two partners seemed to be required, Banek had consumed anything and everything he could get his hands on in regards to understanding this so-called romance.
It seemed to him that this strange mystique was part and parcel of human sexuality, particularly for females. Initial investigations into human male sexuality suggested that it was much more straightforward: males seemed able to inseminate women at will, almost. But in order to convince a human woman to accept, Banek thought, as he read books and watched films that humans had produced on the subject, males had to use gestures and behaviors geared specifically towards communicating their ability as mates. While his colleagues had debated various ways to convince human women to participate in their studies, Banek had—almost from the beginning—decided that the best method to ensure that a woman would agree to work with him would be to romance her.
Once he had come to this conclusion, Banek had spent the rest of his time on the voyage to Earth researching how best to conform to the expectations that human women would have in a romantic partner. He had grown his hair out of the usual close-cropped style that his people adopted when in space, and had reviewed the physical traits of romantic males extensively. Banek knew that the most important thing for him—and for all of the scientists participating in the extraordinary study—was to blend in with the humans. Khateen technology allowed them to keep in touch with the skeleton crew manning the ship, keeping it out of the range of human detection, and in certain ways, they were able to disguise their inhuman skin color and eye color. But Banek wanted more than to simply blend in with the societies of the planet he was on; he wanted to present himself as a potential romantic partner.
There seemed to be one archetype of human romance whose looks Banek could hope to duplicate with a reasonable amount of success; he had seen the human man, named Fabio, on multiple covers of romance books—as well as in other media that humans produced. It seemed that even when the man was past the point of ready reproductive viability, he continued to be a figure of female desire. Because of the greater gravity of Khatanar, Banek and his fellow researchers were larger, more heavily muscled, than the human males; in that sense, it would be easy to mimic the physical traits of the one called Fabio.
Clothing was more difficult for Banek; there were so many varied styles associated with human romance, and he had gathered from his research that some of the romantic media took place in bygone times—different eras of human society. He had taken the human money his superiors had given him and invested in a variety of romantic costumes: Banek had purchased clothing consistent with what he knew to be called a “cowboy,” as well as a “Lord,” with a few pieces that were less easily defined as a type.
As he prepared to leave his laboratory and temporary home, Banek looked over his outfit intently, comparing it against the norms that he had absorbed from books and films. He had left his long, dark hair flowing, though the brush of it against his shoulders was still something that he couldn’t quite get used to. His broad, muscled chest was on display in a loose shirt, the first three buttons open. A pair of tight jeans—and Banek had wondered more than once how any human male could be comfortable in the constricting garment—accentuated his muscled legs, and a pair of boots covered his feet. Banek debated whether or not to include the leather jacket he had purchased; but the planet was much warmer than his own—and it was the season that humans called summer, making it even warmer in the area he had chosen for his base. He decided against it.
In the weeks since Banek had established his base on the planet, he had not found a great deal of success in attracting a subject. Some of his other colleagues had reported back already, finding preliminary success with human women and putting forth some new ideas about female sexuality. Banek had absorbed some of the information that his fellow scientists had come up with, but he was eager to test his own theories. He had met with one of his colleagues the week before; Hanket had managed to find a subject to work with, and the woman had given him a wealth of information—namely that women were capable of climaxing many, many times in the course of a sexual interlude. Hanket had laughed the Khateen way, saying, “It’s very, very gratifying to test how many times she can achieve climax in a single session,” he had told Banek.
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****
Banek made his way towards the bar he had planned to patronize that evening in order to seek out a willing human woman for experimentation, considering the problems he had encountered thus far. Some of the women he had met over the weeks he had been on the planet seemed to be interested in him romantically at first—but somehow, he had not managed to convince any of them to follow through. I’ll have to refine my techniques, he thought as he walked along the sidewalk, barely taking in his surroundings. He had become a “regular” at the bar—Banek had been careful to tip well every time he ordered a beverage, and to be patient with the bartenders, waiting until they had served others without complaining. There was one woman at the bar that he had seen a few times—but always, it seemed, she was with someone else, usually a group of friends.
She was tall and slim, with dark hair and green eyes, and there was something about her that drew Banek’s gaze again and again. He had not been able to understand the feeling that came over him whenever he saw her—it was foreign to any experience he’d ever had. But the sound of her voice, the way that she moved, made Banek wish again and again that he could gather the courage to speak with her, to use his well-studied behaviors and mannerisms to convince her to participate in his experiments. While he had refreshed his studies on the subject of how romantic males approached a woman in a group, he was no closer to understanding how to perform the correct way than he had been before.
Banek stepped through the door of the bar called Vagabond, looking around. It was early in the evening; there were only a few people scattered around, listening to the music and nursing beer or cocktails, talking in small knots of two or three people. “Banek!” the man behind the bar called out, and Banek raised his hand, nodding his head to acknowledge the greeting. He told himself that he would find a subject that evening—whether it was the woman he had been interested in or not.