Blazer gasped and sat back. The absurdity of that hit them both like a wall. They both had to stifle a laugh. She’d been on low-level antibiotics since the mission to prevent mastitis after the impacts. The mix of emotions played on her and all she could manage to say was “You idiot,” through tear-drenched eyes.
“But I thought you pumped before we inserted.”
“I did. But these still produce,” she said motioning towards her breasts, feeling them engorge again. “When we ingressed, it had been long enough that they were ready to go again, and they leaked a little.”
Blazer smacked his own head in exasperation. “How could I have been so stupid?”
“Good question.”
He leaned back against his bed, shaking his head. “How do we deal with this?”
Marda shook her head and tapped her breasts. “I never thought this would be an issue. Maybe if we reprogrammed my suit’s sensors…”
“No. This is on me. I need to be able to recognize…”
Marda gave him a sidelong look, the one she knew would shut him up and get him to see reason.
“Okay. I’ll have a talk with myself and figure this out. Then I’ll talk with Gokhead about suit recalibrations.” Desperate to change the subject, he motioned towards the rest of the medical bay and the curtained-off areas where the less critical patients waited. “How about everyone else?”
“Don’t try to change the subject,” she said sitting down beside him.
He laid a hand on her thigh. “We’ll figure this out. How’s Chrisvian?”
She’d accept that subject change, for now. “He’s good. He wants to see you.”
“When can I see him?”
“Soon. I need to run a few more tests, then I’ll bring him in. But we need to figure this out. If I’m going to continue with the team then I need to know that your head will be on straight. I don’t want to lose you because…”
Blazer held up a hand. “Can we discuss that later? I’m not up to that yet.”
“Yes, but it needs to happen before one, or both of us, makes a mistake we can’t come back from.”
Main Concourse
The boredom of quarantine and their temporary grounding had Gavit about ready to tear open bulkheads. He wanted nothing more than to get space around him again, even if it was just a dull patrol mission. Anything would do, to get his mind off the fact that they’d nearly lost Blazer. “Matt, please tell me you got us a mission?”
Walking beside him down the main concourse, Matt shook his head. “No can do brother. Standing orders - no flights for at least seven more cycles unless there’s an emergency.”
“Frag it! This is why I hate station duty. Too many blasted protocols.”
“What’s the matter Gavit? The Sled not leave you fulfilled?” Chris asked, Bichard in tow with his new pet, a tiny crystalline insect that hummed whenever he petted it just right.
Gavit hated the sound. The pitch was all wrong to his ears, and the melody was something that he couldn’t get out of his head. He smirked back at her. “Flying a Sled’s like masturbating. It’s fun while you’re doing it, but you don’t brag about it to your friends.”
Bichard’s horrid screech of a laugh echoed back and Chris just rolled her eyes at the comment. “I hear the opposite from most Sled operators. They love the wind in their faces. They say flying a fighter is too much like safe sex, not enough sensation.”
Gavit had to laugh at that one. “True enough. But I’d rather have safe sex and push the limits of sensation and endurance than never get past the foreplay.”
“Do you two need some alone time?” Matt asked.
Gavit didn’t even feel like telling Matt to shut up, and looked over at Chris. He could tell she didn’t either. With a smirk, she nodded to Gavit and they said it together. “Shut up Matt!”
The four of them all shared a good laugh at that, attracted the attention of several passers-by. When Gavit looked up he found the crowds parting. A quartet of burly, goat-faced, Otlian private security guards appeared, shoving people out of the way with their four arms. “What the…?”
“Who’s the VIP?” Matt asked.
As if in answer, the crowd thinned enough to reveal Tris Falain. Gavit stood straight up in response, and pulled the creases out of his uniform. Tris looked right at him and smiled bright enough to drown out the simulated daylight of the overhead panels. “Gavit!” she called out and ran towards him, the guards in her wake.
Chris and the others stood back. Gavit expected little in return for rescuing Tris, perhaps a thank you or some mention of it in her memoirs. He stood in complete surprise when she leapt into his arms and kissed him. The feel and taste of her lips was intoxicating, a sweet nectar he hadn’t tasted in ages.
He’d never admit it but, aside from a single woman when they’d first arrived on the station, he’d been celibate. He couldn’t explain why, but amorous pursuits of random partners just didn’t hold the sway it had had before. He allowed himself to succumb to the embrace. He wrapped his arms around her and continued her kiss, drinking in the moment. He couldn’t care less about the scene they were making.
Chris’ familiar disapproving grunt pulled him back however and he broke the embrace. He stared into Tris’ exquisite brown eyes. Her chest heaved with excitement. “A pleasure, Miss Falain. I don’t usually get thanked so well for a rescue.”
She smiled back at him; it was endearing with a certain sly cockiness. “My pleasure Gavit Markus, but I’m not done yet.” She slid a thin strip of plasticard into his hand. Gavit recognized the feel of it, a key card. “I’ve been looking all over the station for you, been wanting a way to thank you properly.”
Gavit was about to pull out the key card and look at it when Tris shook her head. He palmed it into his pocket instead. “What exactly did you have in mind?” he asked with a sly wink and a smile.
“Dinner, maybe more, if my handlers will let me go,” she said motioning towards the four Otlians and a slight, little rat-faced, Nerzain man behind her. “That’s my agent and the bodyguards he hired,” she explained before turning towards them. “Not that I need protection here!”
The little man scurried up, his nose twitching like a quartz. “Tris, please. You can’t make a scene like this. There are cameras everywhere,” he motioned towards several hovering cameras filming the scene.
Gavit covered his face immediately and keyed his micomm.
Without warning the hovering cameras began to fall to the deck. Tris just stood there in shock as beings of various races ran about to collect the drones. “What happened?”
Gavit smiled down at her, appreciating the view into her open top. “We’re Spec Ops. Special permissions are needed to image us. One of my squadmates just set up a media blackout zone around us.”
Tris’ smile widened and she jiggled with excitement. “Then I sure picked the right man.” She leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek. Her agent looked on with disapproval. She whispered into Gavit’s ear, her breath sending shivers down his spine. “Meet me at that room in five hects. It’s under a different name.”
Tris’s agent tapped her shoulder, pulling her away. “Come now, please. We’re scheduled to go live with the studio shortly. I can’t believe you’d risk your career like this.”
“It’ll be fine. We’ll just shoot the rest of the movie here once Eberian is all healed up, or is recast,” she replied nonchalantly and slipped from Gavit’s arms.
The soft feel of her dress lingered in his hands for a moment as he watched her disappear back into the crowd. Matt, Chris, and Bichard closed back in as he pulled the keycard from his pocket. He stared at it for a long moment. It was to one of the station’s seedier boarding establishments, one that asked few questions, and charged by the hect. The message was clear. She wanted time away from her world, to go places she might never go. He knew all the right joints for that.<
br />
Chris nudged him and he pocketed the key card. “What a little pain in the ass. I’m surprised she didn’t try and parade you in front of the cameras for a press conference. And the way she spoke about Eberian.”
Gavit shook his head. “No. That isn’t what she wants at all. She wants to be rescued again, but from her life, even if it’s only for a little while.”
Sub-concourse Five, Section Six, Coliboa’s Trona Stand
Gavit knew that people would call him crazy that he hadn’t just waited in the hotel room for Tris. Her intentions had been clear enough. But that wasn’t his way. He wanted to give her pleasure outside of the boudoir first. Plus, he wouldn’t be caught dead in that infection nest, not before torching it. He’d show her a good time, take her out to play in the station’s lower carnival where no one cared who you were. During one of his jaunts down here, he’d sworn he’d seen the station commander in bondage gear, engaged in a public orgy.
People milled about between the numerous shops and booths in various stages of chemical inebriation. He just waited for Tris beneath the tree beside Coliboa’s stand, a pair of saucer-shaped tronas and drinks beside him. He watched the crowd and homed in on a single woman weaving through it. She wore a close-drawn hood and avoided eye contact with everyone, a pair of thick shaded specs poking through. Gavit couldn’t help but smile. The costume hid her face, but not her gait. While in quarantine, he’d caught up on Tris’ body of work and she’d done nothing to mask that dancer’s trot.
She plopped down beside Gavit. Still masking her face from the crowd, she looked up at him. The smile was the last thing he needed to betray her identity. “I had no idea this place was down here. It reminds me of the carnivals back home.”
“That was the idea,” Gavit replied and held up a trona to her. “I heard you liked these.”
Her eyes lit up as she pulled away her spectacles. “I do! But I can’t, I shouldn’t…” She just stared at the inviting meat-, vegetable- and cheese-filled card-thin crust.
“No one will know. I swear. No one else saw through your disguise,” he said, motioning to the crowd.
She started to look taken aback then seized the delicious crust from his hands and bit into it. Oil and bits of green appeared at her lips and she smiled. It wasn’t anything forced or practiced, it was genuine - the real Tris. “Oh, my gods, this is delicious. I haven’t had something this good in ages.”
Gavit smiled and picked up his own. “Coliboa is a master,” he said before taking a bite. “Best damn thing about being stationed here,” he called out. The chef held up a spatula in victory.
After they’d finished their quick meals, Gavit took Tris’ hand and led her into the cacophony of sound and light that encompassed Section Six’s carnival. Games and performers lined the streets, entertaining the crowds as the shops drained their accounts of any credits they cared to spend. Gavit revelled in Tris’ reactions, but would shuffle her away from any shop as soon as anyone cast even a glimmer of recognition.
It wasn’t long before Gavit realized that word of her presence had gotten out. Camera drones began to show up as the hects wore on. Gavit almost tripped over more than one as his personal media blackout zone downed them. That wouldn't stop anyone with unnetworked or implanted cameras. The threat of discovery growing, Gavit guided Tris away, towards one of the nearby emergency shelters.
“Where are we?”
Gavit inspected the hatch, found its registry number, and pulled up its access code on his micomm. “Emergency shelter. All spec ops personnel have unfettered access to these during non-emergencies for training and inspections. There's no way that the camera jocks back there will find us here.” He keyed in the code and the hatch cycled open. The air inside was stale, a good sign that no one had been there in a long while. He took a quick look to be sure and waved Tris in. He made one last look outside, ensuring that no one had seen them, and closed the hatch.
The lights flickered to life automatically. Every puff of air produced wisps of ice, Gavit had forgotten that these pods were warmed only by conductive heat from the surrounding area when not in use. Tris stood there shivering so Gavit took her in his arms as the vents kicked on, blowing hot air in. The space was otherwise spartan. Bunks, four-high, lined the walls, and ran in two more rows down the center of the chamber. At the end a refresher station with a meal prep area waited. While still a survival shelter, it looked more comfortable than the one he and the rest of the squadron had taken refuge in during training. “Sorry it’s so cold.”
Tris snuggled in close to Gavit and he gladly shared his body heat with her. “It’s fine,” she replied, nuzzling his neck. She then eyed the beds. “Nicer than the place I found at least. Am I about to become a notch on your bedpost?”
Gavit smiled down at her. “Or am I the notch on yours?”
She kissed him hard enough to knock him back against the hatch. “I’ve wanted you ever since I saw your racing all those annura ago.”
Gavit smiled and pushed her back against one of the racks of bunks. “I could tell. Too bad I was taken at the time,” he replied between kisses.
“And now?” she asked rubbing his crotch.
He shuddered with delight and stared deep into her eyes, seeing the lust there ready to burst. “I’m all yours,” he replied, tore her blouse open and dove into her supple breasts.
UCSB Date: 1005.084
Command Tower, C&C Internment Facility, Planet Fotan
Who are the real prisoners here? Commander Benjamin Decko wondered as he left his new office. This was by no means the kind of assignment he’d ever seen himself taking. Though only the commander of an Armond Class Heavy Corvette before this, he’d distinguished himself during the Gorvian campaign. He’d thought that his next assignment would be the command of a cruiser or destroyer but such was not the case. His old ship still waited on the landing platform; offloading prisoners that had just been delivered.
He should have realized this was coming. Ever since the ending of that campaign a year earlier, his corvette had served as little more than a prison barge. He hadn’t seen combat at all in that time. Instead, he and his crew had ferried prisoners around the frontlines of the Federation, and to this wretched place in particular.
He considered making a break for his old ship before its departure, but he knew that wouldn’t do him any good. His old XO now commanded the corvette and had orders to join the Barker’s battle group.
He longed for that ship as he descended the lift down into the prison complex. The clean, orderly plasteel bulkheads called to him, not these rough, pockmarked, steelcrete walls. The surfaces of the cell blocks were further marred by crude lettering the prisoners had scrawled into them. He’d said goodbye to his efficient and courteous engineering crew, and in contrast his welcome by the foul-mouthed under-bred laborers that maintained this place hadn’t even registered on any scale of professionalism. The reports he’d read so far had indicated that they didn’t consider schedules as even rough guidelines. They were nothing but meaningless numbers and letters tossed into the ether.
Then there was his command staff. His previous crew were all bright academy and learning-center graduates. Now, he found himself commanding “men” who had risen through the prison ranks by keeping prisoners in line by any means necessary. After less than a week here, he’d felt like the real prisoner. The first draft of his reassignment request waited back on his computer, at least for now.
He exited the lift at the landing deck. The sight of the two men that greeted him represented the perfect showcase of his change in life and status. To his left, his new aide LT-JG Greg Carroll. He was one of the few officers in this place and by far was the worst example of the title he’d ever met. His record spoke of a young man, from a high-borne and well-placed family no less, who’d led a life of excess and debauchery. It had ended up placing him at the bottom of his academy class, barely graduating. During and after that he’d earned numerous reprimands, and it had cost him at least three c
hances at promotion. He had one more chance before he’d be kicked out of the service or demoted and sent to a frontline infantry unit.
The young fighter pilot beside him, Lieutenant Anthony Nerant, was the complete opposite. In spite of his origin and learning-center education, he would love to bring that young man on as his aide or even second-in-command. That would serve as an unfit punishment for such a stellar officer, one raised to be a fighter pilot. The young man had a promising career laid out before him, assuming he survived his high-risk position. When he left, escorting Commander Decko’s old ship away, he’d take the last vestige of his old life with him.
His khaki uniform unkempt and covered in stains, Carroll accepted a commpad from Nerant. The latter’s olive drab flight suit was so clean that it looked like it had just come straight from a replimat by comparison. The look on Carroll’s face spoke volumes about his confusion in regards to what he was reading on the commpad. Commander Decko felt certain that the man might be inebriated, but at least he was upright and breathing.
Nearing them, Commander Decko reached out and took the commpad. “What’s this?”
Lieutenant Nerant snapped to attention and pointed out the top line of the document. “Just the last prisoner transfer and cargo orders, sir. Once these are signed, we can take off.”
Commander Decko read over the document. It was all there, just as he remembered it when he’d filled out the initial receipt. All the prisoners had been transferred to their cells, and the new equipment had been placed in storage or staged for installation. On any other trip it would have been his old XO or cargo loadmaster handling this commpad. He knew why they’d handed it to LT Nerant though. They wouldn’t be able to bear seeing him here in this disgraceful position. He signed the document and handed it back to Nerant. “Very well LT. Safe flight to you and your flight group. Take good care of my ship.”
The Lieutenant accepted the commpad and snapped off a smart salute that the Commander returned. “Thank you, sir. We will at that.”
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