39. Ursa #3
A small Alzhon pilgrim ship with painted blue fins.
The sight makes my throat tighten.
Gnash notices because he notices everything when it comes to me.
“What is it?”
I rest one hand against the viewport glass. It is cool beneath my palm, faintly vibrating with distant docking maneuvers. “When I was twelve, after Horus IV, people kept telling me life would go on.”
His expression shifts with quiet attention.
“I hated that,” I continue. “It sounded obscene. Life goes on. As if continuing was automatic. As if survival didn’t require someone to pick up pieces that still had blood on them and figure out where they belonged.”
Beyond the glass, a freighter turns slowly toward its assigned dock. Its running lights blink green.
“I think I understand the phrase a little differently now,” I say. “Life doesn’t go on by itself. People make it go on. They reopen stalls. They rebuild corridors. They argue over freight fees. They launch networks with terrible furniture and ethically complicated donors.”
“I am not ethically complicated.”
“You are a walking ethics exam with bone spurs.”
“That is fair.”
I look up at him. “You helped make this possible.”
He turns his gaze toward the ships. “So did you.”
“We had help.”
“Yes.”
“Even from people we disliked.”
“An unfortunate diplomatic development.”
I smile.
He places one massive hand over mine against the glass. His warmth covers my knuckles, steady and real.
“I once thought purpose meant being the only thing standing between danger and my people,” he says. “It was a narrow purpose, but I understood it.”
“And now?”
“Now I think purpose may be building something that does not require me to stand in front of everyone forever.”
That nearly undoes me.
I turn toward him fully. The promenade continues around us, full of voices and cargo sleds and the ordinary chaos of recovery, but the bond draws the moment inward until the world becomes him, me, and the future neither of us expected to survive long enough to consider.
“That sounds like peace,” I say.
His mouth curves faintly. “Peace sounds suspiciously like maintenance.”
“It is maintenance.”
“Then I will require staff.”
“You have staff.”
“They are irritating.”
“All staff are irritating. That is how you know they’re not slaves.”
He laughs, and the sound rolls through me warm and deep.
We continue walking until we reach the end of the promenade, where the view opens toward the Badlands.
The nebula clouds glow beyond the station in bands of violet, copper, and deep blue, beautiful and dangerous as ever.
The region is still scarred. The politics remain fragile.
The Accord will be tested. Powerful people will attempt to hide things again because power has a repetitive imagination.
But the lanes are open.
The station is rebuilding.
Open Signal is broadcasting.
Gnash is no longer living only to punish the past.
I am no longer living only to prove I survived it.
He stands beside me, his hand wrapped around mine, and for once neither of us is preparing to run toward an alarm.
“I need to tell you something,” I say.
His expression turns wary. “That phrase has often preceded trouble.”
“This is good trouble.”
“I distrust the category.”
“I’m staying.”
He goes still.
I continue before the silence can become fear. “I’ll travel when stories require it. I’ll build bureaus where we need them. I’ll yell at politicians across multiple systems and probably get sued by impressive people. But this is home base now.”
His hand tightens slightly around mine.
“Guyver?”
“You.”
The word leaves me quietly, but it changes his face completely.
For a male who has faced fleets without flinching, Gnash looks almost undone by one small sentence. His crimson eyes soften, and the bond between us warms until my chest feels full of light.
“I have no objection,” he says.
My laugh comes out shaky. “That is your response?”
“If I answer too strongly, you will accuse me of being possessive.”
“I might.”
“I am learning caution.”
“You are learning loopholes.”
“Also useful.”
I step closer, and he lowers his head until his forehead rests gently against mine. Around us, cargo sleds hum past, workers shout, and ships arrive through trade lanes that only weeks ago carried fire. The future does not arrive clean. It arrives patched, noisy, bruised, and demanding help.
That feels right.
“I love you,” I whisper.
His eyes close. “I love you too, little reporter.”
“Founder and chief editor.”
“Little founder and chief editor.”
“You are pushing your luck.”
“I have always enjoyed danger.”
I smile against him.
The last light of the Badlands spills across the viewport and paints us in colors that once meant threat. Now they look like a horizon. Not safe, maybe. Not simple. But open.
Together, Gnash and are at the edge of everything we almost lost and everything we have chosen to build.
He has found purpose beyond revenge, leadership beyond fear, and strength beyond violence.
I have found purpose beyond survival, truth beyond ambition, and a love that does not make me smaller.
Around us, Guyver Station hums with trade, work, argument, grief, laughter, and the stubborn music of people refusing to let catastrophe have the final word.
The galaxy will still lie.
We will still answer.
I do not feel like the girl recording the end of the world. I feel like a woman helping build what comes after.
And later that night, Gnash sets out to make me feel like a woman, period. His woman specifically.
We barely make it into the door of our shared quarters when his hands are all over me.
“Gnash!” I say, my tone sharp even though a smile has crept onto my face. “I have to finish these reports.”
“They must wait,” he growls, grabbing the compad out of my hand and tossing it onto a side table. I barely have time to gasp at his audacity before his mouth is on my neck as he embraces me from behind.
“Gnash,” I say again, but this time my tone is much softer. “I’ve been working all day, I’m sweaty--”
His hand claps over my mouth, covering half of my face. My confused grunt becomes a deep, guttural moan as his hot mouth leaves little fires in a trail from my shoulder to my neck. Then I feel his big tongue not just licking, but tasting, and my knees grow weak.
Gnash’s hand covers the entirety of my left breast, fingers adroitly finding the nipple beneath the fabric of my top. My hips move as of their own accord, grinding into the growing hardness below his abdomen.
His hand comes away from my mouth at last, finding my zipper and sliding it down to my waist. I arch back into him, my breaths coming faster and harder. Every inch of me feels alive, electric with desire for his touch.
The bond doesn’t just beat, it pulses between us now, magnifying the real connections we’ve built. Tonight isn’t about proving anything to anyone. It’s about Gnash giving me what I want, and me trying to do the same for him.
Gnash jerks my garment open, and then slides his hands onto my bare breasts. The feel of his warm, luxurious skin contrasts with the sharp bone spurs, creating a unique sensation. I know he could hurt me, but I also know he won’t. Not more than I want him to, at any rate.
As if guessing my thoughts, his licking, kissing mouth suddenly clamps down on my shoulder with a bite. I gasp at the sudden, sharp pain, as he pushes it just to the edge of breaking the skin.
The tingle in my clit becomes an insistent throb. I grind against him now, abandoning all pretense and giving in to my desires.
“Gnash, please,” I rasp as my body shudders under his touch. “I need you, now.”
With a roar, he releases me from his bite, but not his grip. Gnash yanks my jumpsuit down to my knees, baring my flesh to his eyes, his hands, and his mouth. I struggle to get my legs out of it but he seizes me in his arms and lifts me into the air with two handfuls of my bottom for support.
I shake off the garment at last, just in time for him to plant my back against the wall and fumble out his cock. His movements are urgent, his needs have made him shake and tremble with pent up desire.
Our eyes meet and I almost cum just from the look in his red gaze. The look that says he’s letting all of his primal desires loose, and I’m the only one deserving of them.
My mouth flies open as his cock stretches and fills me.
The flexible spurs on his crown undulate, and throb with the beat of his heart.
I wrap my legs around his waist and move my body in concert with his own.
Our gazes meet again and we connect on every level.
The bond enhances the connection, and I can see how I look through his eyes, how much he treasures moments like this one.
How much he treasures me.
No matter what happens with the trade agreements and the stupid centuries war, I know I can always rely on Gnash to do right by me. And I’ll move heaven and earth to make sure I do right by him.
Then my pussy spasms as he unleashes his load deep inside of me. I bite his shoulder and scream as pleasure wracks my form, shooting through me again and again. Maybe his seed will take root. I would love to see what kind of baby we would make…
Gnash sweeps me onto the bed as my limp body trembles. I can barely see through the climactic bliss, shuddering and groaning through another aftershock as he lays down beside me and spoons his huge body around my own.
“My girl,” he pants softly into my ear. “Mine.”
“Yours,” I whisper, snuggling into him. He’s right.
Those reports can wait.