Heiresses of Russ 2015

by Jean Roberta

  I didn’t want to know what she saw in me. I couldn’t have borne the knowledge that it was false. I silenced her with the kiss we’d been discussing.

  Six months of isolation, unfathomable distances, dark purposes—all of it faded beside the revelation of Mechelle’s lips. They were dry and a little chapped from the artificial atmosphere, but they were also warm, firm and soft. Her upper lip formed a bow shape, and I was exquisitely aware of the two curves of it and the point in the center where they came together.

  We pressed our mouths together chastely at first, our lips pillowing each other and sticking together slightly. My breathing seemed far too loud in my ears, but could not drown the soft sounds of us coming together, parting and coming together again.

  My throat caught on wild confessions I wished to make. I did the only thing I could to hold them back—I opened my mouth to kiss her more passionately. When she met me with equal ardor, I sobbed into her. She transformed my desperation into cries of ecstasy.

  Together we came unmoored from everything I had previously known. Our tangled bodies floated aimlessly through the center of her quarters, propelled in one direction or another when we accidentally nudged her furniture as we kissed.

  My stomach flipped and I lost my sense of direction entirely. It would have been a terrible sensation except for Mechelle’s arms and body against mine, holding me, showing me how to exist as a center of life amid emptiness. I needed her not only for pleasure but also for purpose. I wanted to be closer to her, to hold and be held ever more tightly.

  We released our clothes to float as they would. I orbited her as a moon to a majestic planet, always facing her, drinking in the world of sights her body had to offer, bathing her in reflected light.

  Her touch was divine fire. It amazed me that her fingers left behind no traces on my skin, for I felt the force of a brand from even her lightest strokes.

  Where on Earth I might have reached first for her breast or sought her cunt impatiently, sex also seemed different so very many miles from everything most of humanity has ever known. I found myself barely concerned with erogenous zones or getting off. What I wanted now were pulse points. I pressed my lips to every spot I could find where I felt her heart beating—just above her ankles, the inside of each wrist, the sides of her neck, her chest just above her left breast and, finally, her inner thigh, so close to her pussy that her fur brushed my cheek.

  What I needed was her heat, her breath, her salt, her wet. Between her legs, her blood moved beneath my lips, her cunt radiated scent and her pubic hair left traces of moisture on my skin. I turned to kiss her clit—a holy kiss, an act of reverence. My eyes had fallen closed. By kissing Mechelle’s sex, I was also kissing humanity itself, the root of life, the primal drives we never quite understand.

  Then she gave a delighted laugh. “It’s been literally years since I felt a woman there,” she said. I smiled against her pussy and turned my kiss into a teasing lick. She rewarded me with a throaty gasp, and the galaxies outside receded from my consciousness. I was making love not to humanity or to all women but to her, to Mechelle Wharton, and that mattered as much as the universality of the experience did.

  In the nonexistent gravity of the ship, I found it just as easy to push her away as to pull her close. I pulled my hands from her hips because I wanted to put my fingers inside her, but at the next flick of my tongue she began to drift away from me. Mechelle wriggled, catching the back of my neck with the crook of her knee. I wrapped my left arm around her thigh to hold us together, then sucked gently at her labia as I slipped my first finger into her clenching wetness.

  She moaned, then moved in a way that sent us into a slow, head-over-heels tumble. “I want you, too.”

  I’d always preferred to focus. I’d never liked the rush and pressure of two lovers trying to pleasure each other at the same time. “We’ve got hours,” I wanted to say. “We’ve got all of whatever counts as night out here.”

  Before I could tear myself away from her long enough to speak, she climbed down my body. The change of position forced me to release her thigh, to allow her sex to rotate around my finger, to shift so I could find her again with my tongue.

  She parted my labia gently, as if she knew how sensitive I already was. Nevertheless, I convulsed at the intimate touch. I wailed helplessly, going boneless in her grasp, unable to continue tasting her while her fingers entered me. I was dizzy, on the verge of spasm, my orgasm an alien force that threatened to take me over.

  Then the scent of her cunt became an anchor point, a way to hold onto my sanity, and I buried my face between her legs. This was no competition. I made no attempt to lick her to orgasm before she induced that condition in me. Instead, I ate her because otherwise I could not have endured her thrusting fingers, her searching tongue. I drank her juices as if they were strength itself.

  There was nothing hurried about the way we touched each other. We fell together at the speed of deep space, infinitely fast and infinitely slow at the same time. My head spun. Everything besides her body faded away. I cared nothing for gravity or time or either of my missions. I possessed no goals—not even the urge for pleasure.

  I would have breathed her scent forever, or probed her body for as long as she allowed. I kept my legs spread for her, the idea of hiding any part of me unthinkable in the midst of the heat of our intimacy.

  Mechelle’s thumb sank into my cunt, and her wet first finger slid back to my asshole. I sighed into her pussy. My sensitive ring of muscle fluttered under her touch. Relaxing there had never been easy for me, but she licked me patiently until an orgasm began to flower. It grew from the base of my stomach, out toward her face. My cunt clenched around her thumb, then went soft and pliant. Her first finger slipped into my ass.

  I shivered as I took her in, the nature of my orgasm changing under her manipulation. My pleasure sharpened and lengthened as she pressed gently in and out of my ass. She held the very essence of me between her thumb and first finger. Having opened to her there, I knew I would eventually open to her in every possible way.

  I could imagine myself spreading my legs for her fist. I could imagine myself whispering every dark truth of my mission into the shell of her ear.

  My cry was born of surrender and defeat, but it rang with ecstatic force. When her voice echoed mine, I heard no gloating victory—only desperate pleasure.

  •

  “Do the bacteria worry you? That neurotoxin they produce—I heard it’s supposed to be deadly eventually and very painful for a long time first.”

  Mechelle and I held each other in the center of her quarters, pressed against each other like twins in a womb. The possibility of further lovemaking still hung in the air, so neither of us had bothered to reach for our clothes. We had stopped to rest, though, and I at least was aware of unspoken things that could no longer remain so.

  “We’ve got a good containment protocol,” she said. “Yes, they produce a chemical that’s harmful to us, but they’re also the first alien life form identified by the human race. They’re scientifically important. There are so many questions we want to answer with them. We’ve started by trying to determine what they share in common with Earth-based life forms—we’ve been calling them bacteria, but there’s a way that even that word presumes kinship with the life we already know. We eventually want to do the equivalent of sequencing their genome, once we’ve determined that the procedures we typically use will produce scientifically valid results for them. All that is worth some careful handling.”

  “Do you get news out here? Have you heard about the terrorist group that promised to seize your ship and take the bacteria?”

  Mechelle laughed, shaking her head. “Oh, there are some things about Earth that I haven’t missed.”

  I set my jaw. “Let me tell you a few more things like that.”

  I told her everything. To her credit, she never once pulled away from me or showed any sign of disgust. She was like the Madonna, receiving my kiss, my prayers and my c
onfession without judgment.

  When I had finished, she brushed her fingers over my scalp where my hair would have been. “What are you going to do now?”

  I tilted my head back to look at her. She had asked in the tone of an honest question, as if she had no particular stake in what I decided. “What do you want me to do?”

  Mechelle sighed. “Something that doesn’t force me to make a hard choice.” There was an edge of steel to that. I knew that for all her compassion, Captain Wharton possessed a mathematical mind, and she was no pushover. If I threatened her crew—or the precious bacteria—she would do what had to be done, even if it caused her pain.

  For me, however, the choice didn’t seem hard anymore. Those qualities I’d been tested for—loyalty, strength of character, ability to endure isolation and all the rest—weren’t gone, they’d just shifted to serve a different purpose than the one Earth had assigned to me.

  “I can destroy the bullet I came in and my comms. I can make a convincing-looking explosion. If you shift our coordinates even a little and don’t let them know you did, they’d never find us.” Poetry never came easily to me. Those practical concerns were my best attempt, my words of love.

  She smiled. I knew she’d understood what I’d left unsaid. I closed my eyes and rested my head against her chest. It was hard to believe we’d just committed to living out our lives in the midst of the vacuum—my heart felt so full, and the light behind my eyes seemed so bright.

  •

  Final

  Escape

  Stacia Seaman

  It was a bitterly cold night in Detroit. The wind had picked up and the snow started falling as soon as the sun went down. Laima had no plans for New Year’s Eve—all she wanted to do was make some money to buy something to eat, then find a place to stay warm, stay dry. She wore almost everything she owned: T-shirt, sweatshirt, the old woolen navy pea coat she’d found at a thrift shop, faded jeans. Her tattered boots, taped with duct tape, were scant protection against the slick, icy pavement. She paused to tuck her tangled hair, once so thick and lustrous, into her tattered beanie.

  The street was deserted, lined with the burnt-out shells of houses—testament to the thousands of residents who’d abandoned the city when its economy collapsed. This area was so different from the suburban neighborhood where Laima had grown up, with its green, tree-lined streets and large cookie-cutter homes, the brand new American cars in the driveways. It wasn’t safe to go into most of these houses; though they were dark, that didn’t mean they were empty, and the people inside weren’t usually friendly.

  Snow was starting to accumulate, on the grass, on the pavement, and the cold had driven everyone indoors. Laima couldn’t see another soul on the street. Alone, hungry, and miserable, she shivered as she continued walking. On a night like this, she wanted coffee with sugar. And maybe some soup or, if they had it tonight, chili. There was a diner a few streets down—it was open twenty-four hours, but perhaps not on New Year’s Eve.

  But if she didn’t make some money first, she wouldn’t eat anything. She had put together more kits yesterday, so she had plenty: Baggies, each with a new syringe, a bottle cap, a cotton ball, and an alcohol pad, that she sold for a dollar each to other addicts. If she sold five, she’d have dinner.

  Laima bowed her head against the wind and started down a small side street. She took in the boarded-up windows of the houses; usually there were signs of life in at least a couple of them, but not tonight. It was cold, it was dark, and anyone who had a warm place to stay was unlikely to venture out. She knew better than to knock on any doors. On the street people knew her and bought kits from her; on a night like tonight, though, with no one around, they’d think nothing of taking her kits, her stash… She didn’t allow the thought to continue.

  With every step she took on the way to the diner, her hopes continued to dim. Not only did she not encounter any other homeless addicts who might buy some works, but she didn’t see anyone who might be a diner patron, someone she’d be able to hit up for a dollar or two. Finally Laima reached the diner. It was silent, deserted, almost eerily dark without the garish neon that usually lit up the entire block. A handwritten sign in the door informed her that she’d arrived during the only twenty-four hours of the year the diner was closed, but they would reopen the next day at noon, “a Football Free Zone!”

  With tears running down her cheeks, Laima crossed the street, then walked down a ways to where two buildings overlapped, forming a sheltered corner. One of the buildings jutted out just far enough to block the wind, and the sidewalk there was dry and free of snow. She sat, drawing her knees up to her chest, and tried to think of what to do next.

  Laima fingered the balloons in her pocket. Nothing in her stomach, nowhere to warm up, no one to talk to. She pulled out one of the balloons, then carefully zipped her pocket closed. Turning her back to the street so nobody could see her, she prepared a dose.

  She shivered as she pulled her arm out of her coat, but quickly felt the rush of warmth once she’d finished giving herself the injection.

  She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the brick. Her feet were finally warm, as though she were sitting in front of the fireplace in her parents’ living room, wearing thick woolen socks and sitting under the old plaid blanket they kept draped over the back of the sofa. Her cat, Zemi, lay curled on her lap, purring. Laima sank her fingers into Zemi’s thick fur, rubbing her back, scratching behind her ears. That last day before the holiday break, in school, she’d sneaked a look at Emilia during biology class. Emilia had smiled at her, shyly, and it was all Laima could do to keep her hands folded on her desk and not reach across to link her fingers with Emilia’s. She sighed happily and continued to pet Zemi. In the background she heard the preparations for the holiday meal. New Year’s Eve in her family was a joyous occasion—tradition held that the year would continue the way it had started, so everyone wanted to be happy, singing and talking and enjoying each other’s company. How long had it been since she’d enjoyed her father’s company? How long since she’d been welcome at her family home? How long since she’d seen Emilia?

  The fire vanished; Zemi’s purrs faded into the darkness. The warmth had worn off. The cold seeped into her toes through her cracked boots. Once again chilled, Laima curled up against the brick wall of the building behind her. She slipped her hand into her pocket and fingered the balloons. It was too soon, she knew, but she had felt so good. For that one moment, everything had been good again.

  She prepared another dose, then injected it. As she leaned back against the building behind her, the brick wall in front of her began to waver—from solid to translucent, then it vanished completely.

  As she looked into the room beyond, she saw a family. Her family. There she was, a young girl with long, wavy dark hair that tumbled down her back as she ran from her father, screaming with laughter, clutching a new toy she’d received as a Christmas present. The dining room table was laden with food for their holiday meal; the smells made her mouth water, her stomach rumble.

  And there, sitting in the comfortable chair closest to the fire, there was her močiutė, her father’s mother, the person who knew and understood her best in the world. Even as Laima watched, the view changed: her grandmother’s wrinkles deepened, her shoulders bent under the weight of her years. And there was Laima, a year ago, at her feet, her grandmother’s hand gently stroking Laima’s hair as she told her stories of Laima’s senelis, her father’s father, who had died before Laima was born. She smiled and pulled Laima close as Laima told her about Emilia. Beautiful Emilia, with her golden hair and her caramel-colored eyes, her sweet sweet kisses and her poet’s soul. Laima told her grandmother about their days together at the DIA, how Emilia loved the modern American artists while Laima herself preferred the Europeans. They would go to Europe one day, Laima said, her and Emilia, and see more art, more museums, visit the village where Laima’s močiutė and senelis had met and fallen in love. Love, Laima’s grandmother sig
hed, love was such a gift to see shining in her Laima’s eyes. Would Emilia be coming to share in the New Year’s Eve celebration?

  Through the invisible wall, Laima saw herself smile, the glow of happiness that Emilia would finally meet her grandmother. Saw herself pulling out her phone, sending a text message. Moments later she was greeting Emilia, inviting her into the house, hanging up her coat. Taking her by the hand, Laima led her to the chair by the fire and introduced her to her grandmother, watching them exchange holiday greetings. In this glimpse into the past, Laima saw herself full of contentment that the two people she loved most in the world were here, with her, on the most important night of the year. What joy the new year would bring! Then, after Emilia bundled up to return to her own home for her family’s holiday meal, the two girls stole a kiss under the mistletoe.

  Laima closed her eyes as she remembered; she could still hear her father’s roar, feel his hands on her arms as he tore her away from Emilia. Hear Emilia’s sobs as she turned and ran out the front door.

  Laima still felt the sting of her father’s hand, the burning imprint of his palm on her cheek.

  Hot tears on her cheeks brought her back to the present. Behind her the wall was cold and hard. This time she didn’t hesitate. She shot up a third time, needing the warmth of the past to help her cope with the frigid loneliness of this New Year’s Eve.

  This time the warmth drifted down over her. Looking up, she saw a Christmas tree; the trunk was in the corner beside her, and she was sheltered in its branches. It was the most magnificent tree she’d ever seen. The boughs danced with sparkling lights and colorful ornaments. Some had photographs of Laima, her parents, her močiutė… Last year Emilia had given Laima a special gift, an ornament with a picture of the two girls together, which she’d wrapped in tissue and told Laima to put away for the future, when they would celebrate together. She’d had to watch as her father, over the protests of his wife and his mother, had broken the ornament into bits and told Laima to leave his house and never return. She’d barely had time to stuff some clothes into her backpack before he’d slammed the door in her face—“You’ve disgraced us all”—and she’d stumbled out into the cold. Her grandmother had beckoned her to the back of the house, where she’d pressed a roll of bills into Laima’s hand and hugged her close.