Chapter 23 Jean
I snap awake, naked and gasping.
For a long second, I can’t remember where I fell asleep. My first thought is of my lonely bedroom back on Earth, then of the far more ostentatious bedchamber aboard the Scarlet Ship.
And then, as I rub the sleep from my eyes, I remember where I really am. Beneath my body, a rough and weathered blanket, its crude fibers soaked with sweat and other things. Above me, nothing but open sky. Ul. Penal colony. My new home.
It is light out now. The urges are gone.
Mostly.
The flames of my desire have burned themselves out in the night, but embers still remain. A ticklish warmth down below my stomach, letting me know that my ordeal is still not over; it’s merely on hiatus.
And the aliens? Where are the aliens? When I fell asleep last night, I was sandwiched protectively between their hard and naked bodies. Now I’m all alone. Panic flares inside me, jolting me to my feet.
“Scythro?” I call. “Ghorak?”
Hands are on me before the last syllable has left my lips.
Elegant hands attached to equally elegant arms, drawing me close against an elegantly muscled body.
The kiss that claims my mouth is gentle yet commanding.
The purring that accompanies it almost takes my legs out from under me.
He smells incredible, like incense and warm suede. He tastes even better.
“Scythro,” I whisper when his lips finally separate from mine, and when he answers me, I hear his raw voice, unfiltered by any translator device: “Zheen.”
I slept all night without my breathing mask, and I feel… good.
I startle briefly as a second pair of hands touch me from behind. Big hands, as gentle as they are rough. A body presses into me, massive and warm. Instinctively, I push back into it with my own.
“Ghorak.”
“Jee’nah.”
He spins me and gathers me against him with a growl.
His kiss lacks Scythro’s sophistication, but he makes up for it with his ferocity, drinking from my lips like a man dying of thirst. His pants are back on, but I can feel the shape of him beneath the fabric, huge and hard.
It is a shape with which I became well-acquainted in the night.
It wasn’t sex, exactly.
Not quite.
Thankfully, the aliens managed to stop just short of that.
If it had been Ghorak alone, that might not have been the case, but Scythro’s purring kept him under control, more or less.
Though we did not technically have sex, we did just about everything else, and we did it a lot.
Between the two of them, Scythro and Ghorak made me come more times than I could count.
And they both did a fair bit of coming themselves. In my mouth. In my hair. All over my skin. The memories make me blush, more from excitement than shame. If the aliens pulled me back down on the blanket right now, we would probably be here all day.
It’s not even dark anymore. It’s daylight. I shouldn’t be feeling this way.
I shouldn’t… but I am.
Thankfully, Ghorak doesn’t do that. Instead, he releases my lips, gives one of my breasts a gentle caress, then gestures toward the longstrider and says something I cannot understand. I grab my breathing mask off the ground, but by the time I put it on, Ghorak is already stumbling away from me.
“He said he’s going to ready us some breakfast,” Scythro explains. “Perhaps you would like to take the opportunity to wash and get dressed.”
Breakfast sounds good. I’m hungry after last night’s workout. A wash sounds nice too. I’m a bit of a mess this morning.
Still, I can’t resist teasing Scythro a little.
“Tired of looking at me?” I ask.
He takes my hand and presses it against the front of his pants. His cock is stone-hard beneath the tight leather.
“What do you think?” he says.
I blush even harder as I recall the way that hard thing felt last night in my hand, in my mouth, between my breasts.
“I’m not tired of looking at you,” he says with a dark smirk. “But I’m worried about what I might do if you don’t put some clothes on. We have a long day’s journey ahead of us, Jean. We can’t spend the first few draleths…”
He lets the sentence trail off and cocks one suggestive brow by way of explanation.
“Good call,” I agree.
I take a waterskin and my bodysuit and head around to the other side of the longstrider, which is still hunkered down on the ground like a living boulder. As I start rinsing the traces of last night from my skin, my thoughts turn to the day ahead.
Ghorak is taking us to the Weedians’ camp. I wonder when we will reach it. He says there’s somebody there who can possibly fix Gerber. If that happens, I’ll finally be able to get in touch with Mel.
Oh God.
Mel.
Suddenly, all the good feelings I’ve been experiencing solidify into a heavy lump of guilt that sinks down into the pit of my stomach. I still have no idea what has happened to Mel. I don’t even know if she’s alive or dead.
And here I am, getting busy with two hot alien dudes.
Shit. Some friend I am.
Then again, none of this is my doing. I never asked to be pumped full of alien breeding drugs.
How is Mel dealing with her urges, I wonder as I zip myself into my bodysuit. Has she encountered some alien guys of her own? And are they as nice as mine? God, I hope so. I really, really hope so.
Back on the other side of the longstrider, Scythro and Ghorak are crouching over some unwrapped bundles of food. It’s the same stuff we had last night. Eggs, biscuits, and slug jerky.
I don’t know where the first two items actually come from, and I’m perfectly happy to keep it that way. Who knows, maybe I’ll even give the jerky another shot.
I’ll just try to forget it’s made from slugs.
I have to take my mask off to eat, which means I have to enjoy my breakfast in silence.
Scythro and Ghorak talk a little. I can’t understand anything they’re saying, but the sound of their alien voices is oddly comforting.
Ghorak’s voice is deep and rumbling, like distant thunder.
Scythro’s is smooth and musical, like the strumming of a guitar.
I feel safe with them. Safe from any external threats that might be lurking around us. And safe too from the internal threat of my own desperate urges.
My blush returns.
I have to remind myself that these guys are criminals. They’re on this planet for a reason. For all I know, they could be murderers. Or rapists. Heck, they’re aliens. They could be convicted of crimes that don’t even exist on Earth.
Just like the source of the food, it’s probably better if I don’t know. So far, they’ve both treated me well, and right now, they’re my best hope for survival on this crazy planet, and my only hope for finding Mel.
That’s good enough for me.
Across the spread of food, Scythro suddenly jerks upright. His tapered ears flex forward, and his expression goes blank. He seems to be listening to something far away.
“Kvatch?” Ghorak asks.
Scythro ignores the question, whatever it means, and sets down his half-eaten strip of jerky. He turns and stares off toward the horizon. His expression grows grim.
“Kvatch?” Ghorak insists.
This time, Scythro answers: “Vrindrith.”
I’m already scrambling for my headgear, but by the time I’ve got it back on, the conversation is over. Ghorak is fumbling urgently through one of the packs. Scythro is standing, looking off into the distance.
“What’s happening?” I ask, making myself sound less worried than I really am.
Scythro presses a finger to his lips, signaling silence.
After a few more seconds, Ghorak finds what he’s looking for—something that looks like a steampunk telescope cobbled together out of various parts of other machines.
He jumps up and starts using it to scan the horizon.
He fiddles with some knobs on the side, and the sections extend as unseen mechanisms whir within.
Yesterday, Scythro told me there isn’t supposed to be any advanced tech here on Ul.
Apparently, there are some exceptions to that rule.
At the moment, however, I’m not too concerned with where the telescope came from. I’m more interested in what Ghorak is seeing through it.
At last, his scanning stops, and he holds the lens focused on a single point in the distance. It occurs to me that his usual drug-induced swaying has vanished. Whatever he sees out there, it seems to have sobered him up.
I know Scythro told me to be quiet, but I can’t stand it anymore.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Thrumwings,” Ghorak answers. “Twelve of ’em… and they’re coming this way.”