“This not exactly the way to get me to forget about my body,” she laughed. “Every time I look at your cock, my pussy gets wetter and my clit gets harder.”
“Sorry!” Zed joined her laughter. “You have that effect on me. But let me see what I can do.” He closed his eyes, turning inward. His form seemed to shimmer. The effect was gone so quickly that Christine wondered if she had imagined it. In any case, his penis deflated until it flopped, limp and innocent, across her ribcage. “Is that better?”
“Better? Well, it’s certainly less distracting!”
“Alyn, turn off the lights.” The room grew dim. The control panel in the kitchen area provided the only illumination. Zed’s face hovering above her was wreathed in shadow.
He cupped his hands in front of his chest, about six inches apart, as though he were holding a ball the size of a grapefruit. “Relax. Take deep, slow breaths,” he told her. “Focus on the space between my palms.”
Christine struggled to let go of the arousal that was raising her pulse rate and making her pant. She closed her eyes for a moment to centre herself, then followed Zed’s instructions. Initially she saw nothing but Zed’s burnished muscles through the gap between his hands. Before long, though, she noticed that the empty space was occupied by a faint glow. The light brightened gradually and congealed into three luminous strands that twined together, rotating at a stately pace in an ascending spiral. The filaments were born near his wrists, coiled upward and disappeared at his fingertips, in a smooth, endless flow.
“Concentrate on the light,” Zed murmured. “Follow the light.”
The slow-moving helix fascinated her. Her eyes traced its path as it emerged out of nowhere, rose and vanished. At first the streaks of brightness appeared pure white, but as she focused she noticed tiny flecks of colour: amethyst in one, gold in another, ruby in the third. Like jewel dust the motes danced in the beams until they reached the upper limit and winked out of existence.
She could feel Alyn’s presence, off to her left, and could sense his concern. She knew Zed was watching her with those piercing jet eyes. Willing herself not to look at them, she trained her full attention on the hypnotic pillar of light. She dove into it, circling endlessly upward, spiralling into non-existence at the apex then regenerating at the base.
Christine forgot the two men. There was only the light, swirling, pulsing, drawing her ever deeper. The light rippled through her like pure water. The strands curled around her like laughter. Golden flames licked at her flesh without burning. Fingers of brightness soothed and teased her, kindling shimmers of delight.
“Christine!” Her name was a bolt of radiance, arrowing through the glow. “We are here with you.” It was true—their auras mingled with hers. Sparkling ribbons of silver and copper wreathed her presence, a crimson crystal beating in the velvet darkness. She knew them—Zed and Alyn, her attentive, untiring lovers—but now she saw how their gorgeous man-shapes were mere shells. Their full glory would have blinded her, if she had eyes. In her present state, unfettered by the limitations of her poor human senses, she saw them as they truly were: perfect, ageless, unutterably beautiful.
“I did it,” she said, or thought, or sang. Pride twined purple through the rainbow emotions that swirled around them. “Now I understand.” In their shared universe of flickering luminescence, she reached out to draw them closer.
“Lover,” came a bell-like song she recognised as Alyn. “Now we can truly be together.” His caress woke fireworks. Without a body, she felt the pleasure everywhere. It was searing heat, aching fullness, marvellous tension, buoyant joy.
“Darling.” Zed was a rich chord arcing through her, a rain of sparks that made her tingle and glow. He brought wetness, tightness, electric twinges that burned through her. The sensations recalled physical responses despite her disembodiment, except for their overwhelming intensity. She swelled and throbbed with need, wanting her lovers closer, inside her somehow, though she didn’t know how this could be possible. Before she could voice her desire, she felt their energy encircle and penetrate hers. Multi-hued pleasure exploded in her consciousness.
“Touch us,” Alyn sang, winding through her, drilling into her core.
“Open us,” Zed hummed, flowering incandescent at her centre. “Your mind is limitless.”
She reached into the luminous emptiness and allowed her thoughts to mesh with theirs. Now she thrilled with their sensations and emotions as well as her own. The connection should have been shocking, but somehow it felt completely natural. Alyn’s shy hunger and Zed’s raw lust seasoned her own arousal. The pleasure that shivered through them as she danced in their minds rocked her senses as well. Delight reflected back and forth. Each of them mirrored and amplified the others’ ecstasy.
Below these present-focused elements, Christine caught echoes of the aliens’ age-old pain and loneliness. She gathered Alyn and Zed into her self, singing liquid songs of comfort. Love wove its way into their shared tapestry of feeling, gleaming pure white among the lustrous strands of scarlet, emerald, turquoise and amber.
Peace, someone sang. Power, rang another voice. Pleasure, called a third. Their perfect harmony swelled. They twined together, spiralling upward, so intimately joined that none could say where one of them ended and the next began.
Christine sensed the shift this time. The universe burst open, drenching them in the brilliance of a million suns. Unutterable joy surged through her—and Zed, and Alyn. Their climax was hers as well. Their coming released energy. Hers absorbed it. She felt the exquisite pleasure of their emptying along with the deep satisfaction of being filled. That incandescent instant burned away the last traces of separateness and fused the three of them into one being—a bodiless embodiment of pure light.
They floated in a nurturing void. Sorrow, pain, doubt, all had been stripped away. All that remained was love.
* * * *
Stars. Christine returned to individual awareness to find herself surrounded by a million points of light. Were they in fact really stars? Instead of the mostly colourless sparks she was used to, these bodies blazed red, violet, orange, even blue, against the black backdrop. What else could they be, though? One of them seemed quite close, a glowing yellow ball off to her right. When she focused her attention on it, she could see planets orbiting the star, at least half a dozen of them.
Where was she? And where were her lovers? In the aftermath of their shared bliss, she felt little anxiety. All would be well. She trusted that she’d find them.
She returned her consideration to the nearest sun. Somehow it exerted a powerful attraction. All at once she was there, a mote of consciousness hovering within the solar system itself. She pushed aside the question of mechanism. She’d figure it out later.
One of the planets swung close enough for her to catch glimpses of the surface through intermittent clouds. The familiar shapes of the continents tugged at her memory for a moment before the truth hit her. Earth. She was hanging in space, a being of pure mind, looking at her home planet. Meanwhile, her body lay abandoned in a tiny space ship billions of miles away.
She had done it, without intending to. She had twisted space and travelled faster than light, just as Zed and Alyn had described. But how? And how was she going to get back to them, and to her body?
She turned her gaze inwards, away from the vision of Earth. Intuition as well as training told her there were other dimensions. She probed and tested the fabric of space time, finding whorls and wrinkles. Which ones were passages to other parts of the universe, though? Was it possible to create the necessary conduits as needed?
Christine brought up images of the equations she knew so intimately, the ones with which she had struggled for so many years with so little success. Immediately she saw transpositions and reductions she’d never noticed before. Perhaps material bodies blunted the intelligence as well as the senses. What was it Zed had told her? Take matter out of the equation and everything became simple.
She flicked mentally at the symbols,
tumbling them into a new arrangement. Amazement flooded her, followed by triumph. There it was—crystal clear and astonishingly easy, at least if you happened to be a being of energy.
Imagine where you wanted to go, and you’d be there. That’s what the equations told her. Hard to believe and yet so sensible. Energy organised and animated matter. Consciousness added the ability to materialise objects—that was the secret behind Zed’s and Alyn’s physical bodies. An act of deliberate imagination was an act of creation, for pure intelligence. There was no movement, actually. Mathematically speaking, you were disassembling and reassembling the universe around you.
Some part of her must have been thinking about Earth during that transcendent instant of union with Alyn and Zed. Without fully intending it, she had arrived at the threshold of her old home. To return to her body, she needed to summon a clear image of the Archimedes, and of her lovers.
Alyn. Zed. Her coupling with them as an energy being had been incredible, but she still craved their physical bodies. She remembered Alyn’s silky skin, his dancer’s build, his pale, smooth cock like a pillar of ivory. She added Zed to her mental picture, stocky and powerful, black curls tumbling over his brow, black eyes challenging her, bronzed erection jutting from his groin like some massive tree branch. Arousal clearly was more than physical. The more details she added, the more excited she became. Finally she pictured her vacant form, lying on the mess hall table, awaiting her return.
There was no sensation of motion. She simply found herself on the Archimedes, hovering near the ceiling of the dining chamber and gazing down at her own body. She’s pretty, Christine thought. She has lovely chestnut hair.
Then an irresistible force claimed her, sucking her downward. She slammed into her material body and blacked out.
Chapter Seven
A siren rang in Christine’s ears. She tried to ignore it. She was so tired—she just wanted to sleep a bit longer. The persistent whine refused to go away. With a sigh, she forced her eyes open.
The alarm wailed in the long-short-short pattern that meant emergency. The mess hall was mostly dark, but a red beacon flashed in the corner. Christine sniffed the air. It smelt stale and she thought she detected a hint of smoke.
She swung herself off of the table, noting that every muscle ached. The room was empty. Where were Alyn and Zed?
“Report ship’s status,” she called, loud enough to be heard above the alarm. There was no answer. Then she remembered. She’d switched off the computer’s voice functions.
She clambered up to the bridge. There was no sign of her lovers. The viewport was still open, offering an unchanging view of star-strewn space. Heedless of her nakedness, Christine punched in the code to reactivate the ship’s communication capabilities.
“Report ship’s status,” she demanded, her voice shrill with anxiety.
“Serious hull breach in section B-7,” the computer replied, calm and mechanical as always. “Bulkheads have been sealed to slow atmospheric loss.”
“Oh shit,” Christine muttered.
“Electrical fire in port engine now extinguished. Engine shut down to avoid radiation leakage. Major fracture detected in tail structure…”
“What? What happened? Did something hit us?”
“No collision detected.” The ship paused for a second or two, as if to allow her to interrupt again. “Estimate that tail section will separate in one to three hours. Additional fractures detected in sections C-2, C-5 and D-4. Recommend immediate evacuation.”
Christine sank into the pilot’s seat, overwhelmed. Evacuation? To where? The ship had an escape shuttle, but it was intended for use in the vicinity of a planet, not in deep space.
What was she going to do? And what had happened to Alyn and Zed?
As if summoned by her desperate thoughts, the aliens appeared on the control deck, Alyn to the left of her, Zed to the right. She rushed into Alyn’s embrace. He stroked her hair, holding her tight. After a moment of self-indulgent surrender, she pushed him away.
“What’s going on? Where were you?” she demanded.
“Checking the damage from the outside,” said Zed.
“But why…? Did something happen while—while we were making love?”
Alyn shook his head, his face grave. “No—not then…” He seemed too upset to continue.
“Then when? Please, tell me!”
“Our best guess is that this is a delayed effect,” Zed answered, stumbling over his words. “The stresses of the initial collision—when we emerged at the same space-time coordinates as your ship and then your ship was whisked through hyperspace—as I said before, I was surprised there had been so little damage…”
He looked thoroughly unhappy. Sympathy and concern drowned Christine’s anger. She took him in her arms, planting soft kisses on his lips and brow. “Oh, Zed! You couldn’t help it.”
Alyn came up behind her, pressing his lean form into her back and sandwiching her between them. “We are responsible nevertheless,” he murmured. Christine noticed that, for once, he was not erect.
“Oh, my darlings…” She clung to them, feeling safe even though she knew, intellectually, that her life was ticking away. The warmth of their skin against hers, the firmness of their muscles, their earthy scent—it was sweet, regardless of what came after. She would have been glad to have them take her, there on the floor of the bridge. She wanted to spend her last hours joined with the men she loved.
It was clear, though, that sex was the last thing on their minds. Finally, she released them. They sat in a triangle, gazing at each other in silence.
A thud shook the bridge. “What was that?” Christine cried.
“Microwave antenna three has separated from the ship,” the computer intoned. Sure enough, they could see a hunk of debris tumbling off into space to the left of the ship. “New breach in hull at section F-2. Bulkhead sealed.”
Alyn rose from his seat. “We don’t have long, Christine. We’ve got to decide what to do.”
“Do? What can we do?” Christine scanned their grim faces. “Do you have a plan?”
“We see two possibilities.” Zed took her hands in his. “It’s up to you.”
“Really? There’s hope? What are you thinking?”
“We could put you in the shuttle and send you back to Earth,” said Alyn.
“But—the range of the shuttle…”
“We’d send you through hyperspace.”
“How? You told me that transporting matter at faster-than-light speeds requires vast amounts of energy. We don’t have any kind of fuel that can generate that kind of power.”
“We are creatures of energy, sweet,” Zed said. “We’ll be the ‘fuel’.”
Christine was silent, contemplating this. “You’d be consumed,” she said finally. “You’d cease to exist.”
Alyn nodded, a sad smile lighting his face. “That is true. But you would live. To us, that is more important, especially when it is we who are to blame for the destruction of your ship and the death of your friends.”
“No. I won’t allow it. I don’t want to live if you two die.” She grabbed their hands. “I never believed I’d find someone—someone to complete me the way you do. I never dreamed of meeting one soulmate, let alone two! The thought of losing that, losing you…no! Definitely not. What is the other possibility?”
“Well,” said Zed. “You could abandon your physical body, the way we did ours. Join us in our travels through the universe. Become pure light, as we are.”
“Abandon my body?” Christine remembered the intensity of her experience as an energy being, but the details were fuzzy, veiled by the limitations of flesh. She recalled her moment of insight, when she’d solved the space-time equations, but not the solution itself.
She had been willing to risk the separation in order to connect with Alyn and Zed on a higher level, but that had been temporary. She had expected to return to the physical plane. Now they were suggesting she make the separation permanent.
She cast her eyes down over her body—neat breasts tipped with taut pink nipples, flat stomach and lean thighs, the triangle of chestnut curls at the apex. Her body had served her well. Was she ready to let it go? Would she still be Christine Clarkson, without this body? If not, who would she be?
This body was doomed, though. Even if the ship were not tearing itself apart, how long would she live, out here in space? Indeed, even if she’d never left Earth, this body would not have lasted more than a century at best.
They were offering virtual immortality. Even more important, they were offering her love. How could she possibly hesitate?
“Yes,” she told them, gazing into their eyes and hoping she sounded brave. “That’s the only solution. But how…?”
“Lie back in the chair. Let us pleasure you. We’ll give you an orgasm so intense you’ll fly free, the way you did before. Once your spirit separates from your flesh, we’ll whisk you away from the ship.”
A sound of tortured metal reached their ears. “Rear robot arm…” the computer began.
“I don’t want to know,” Christine snapped, stabbing at the switch. The mechanical voice fell silent. “Let’s do it,” she urged. “Now!”
She settled into Sven’s seat, arranging herself as comfortably as possible. With a grin, Zed flipped a lever until the back reclined. He leaned over to brush his lips over hers. His dusky cock reared up from the thicket at his groin, ready to fuck her so hard he’d drive her soul from her body. The sight—and the thought—made her instantly wet.
It was Alyn who began, though, kneeling between her splayed thighs and tonguing her throbbing clit. He poured his energy into her. Pure electricity arced through her flesh. She groaned and arched up, grinding her pussy against his face. In response, Alyn grasped her hips and burrowed deeper. He probed and sucked until she shuddered and burst, coming in great spasms.
The world flickered as pleasure poured through her. Something tugged at her insides, like a trapped animal trying to break free. But matter held her fast. Alyn continued to lick her as the trembling faded, and she started to climb again.
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