Honey Hive
Harry Heyoka
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2012 Harry Heyoka
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This is a work of fiction; all characters, locales (except the real asteroid Ceres), incidents, and situations are figments of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to reality is coincidental, and maybe a little spooky.
Honey Hive
Copyright 2011 by Harry Heyoka
1: Honey Dream
Derk knew he was dreaming. Alliance forces almost never boarded Hive ships or habs, generally preferring to annihilate them with missile or beam attacks from afar. Nonetheless Derk led an elite assault team, blasting their way into a Hive mother ship in a raid to capture a live Queen.
They met fierce but ineffective resistance from hordes of Workers using makeshift weapons and mob attacks. Derk's commandoes, force-armored and bearing the deadliest arms the 33rd century could provide, mowed them down like the little girls they were – gene-modified human females kept in prepubescence by the Queen's pheromones.
Hive Warriors were another matter altogether. Well armed and superbly trained, some few had once been main-line humans before being captured or recruited and turned into Soldiers. Most were mature but sexless daughters of the Hive lines first created in the Solar System over a thousand years ago, gene-modified and nano-augmented to be among the deadliest fighters in the known Spiral.
Derk knew his team must fight through any number of Warriors to reach the Queen, with luck not too many. This wasn't a very big mother ship, and it was far from the main war zones.
The team was clearing Workers from a large chamber when the first Warriors appeared, firing weapons that seemed to turn the air between them and their targets into giant whirling blender blades. Bits of Workers in the line of fire flew in all directions, but the raiders' force-armor held up nicely. Derk concentrated his team's fire, a few dozen Soldiers were reduced to atomic components, and the room was clear.
The curved far wall had to be an inner hull, probably force-armored itself. A semi-circular door there looked very stout. “That isn't the Queen's chamber,” Derk's telepath informed him. “Soldiers' quarters, Sir.”
“Can opener, Joans,” Derk ordered. One of his fighters nodded, pointing a bulky device toward the door. She fired, and in a small fraction of a second several things happened.
Six objects like large suction darts shot across the room to stick on and around the door. A force beam lit the door's center. A force-armored projectile hit that bull’s-eye and passed through. A very peculiar sort of explosion occurred out of sight beyond the door. Then the darts warped themselves through multiple dimensions, disappearing and taking the door and part of the wall with them.
The warhead's effect was like that of the Hive's blender-guns, but less localized. Derk's crew saw red rain falling behind where the door had been, and charged through the opening with guns blazing. They met withering fire from automated weapons in the gore-spattered chamber's far wall. A few raiders, including the telepath, were immobilized – but still alive and protected by their force-armor, Derk hoped. He gestured to Joans, who made a new hole where the robotic guns had been, and Derk led the way through it.
Derk followed the path of greatest resistance, thinking that should be the way to the Queen. They met more Warriors and robotic defenses, taking losses all the way.
At last Derk and a handful of his men won through to an opulent waiting room, and faced a normal-sized but force-shielded door. “That has to be the Queen's chambers,” Joans said.
Derk nodded. “Make that door go away. The rest of you, guard our rear if you want to live to collect your bounty.” The can opener spat darts. The door and part of the wall vanished into multidimensional space-time.
Derk strode through the new opening, motioning Joans to follow. The waxen floor and walls looked like a giant honeycomb, though no Hives really stored honey that way. Soon the amber décor gave way to walls covered with flowering vines and a floor carpeted with living green grass. Though smells could never penetrate force-armor, the scents of honeysuckle and almond filled Derk's head.
Before him was a roomy waxen bath occupied by a fine-boned woman whose features and short black hair reminded him of someone. “Welcome, Commander,” she said in a tonal tongue which his suit translated into Englic.
She stood up in her bath. Warm liquid, too thick to be water, slid and dripped from her voluptuous nude body. Derk guessed it might be almond oil. “It's time to surrender,” he told her.
“Then I surrender to you,” she smiled, stepping out of the bath. Facing him, still dripping oil, she said, “You have defeated my Warriors, and so your seed shall spawn the next generation.”
Derk noticed that he too was naked now, but that didn't trouble him. Hive-bred humans were radically specialized, and Queens were not fighters. She was her Hive's sole female breeder, producing vast numbers of fertilized ova to be carefully modified, then nurtured by ectogenesis in wombmen, living artificial wombs grown from human tissues.
The Queen's dark nipples rose with her breath, swelling as the smiled and reached calmly for his crotch. The intense feel of her oily hand started him; it felt too real to be part of his dream.
He stirred, growing tumescent, and reluctantly raised his eyelids. He saw that he was supine in bed, cover-less. Megan knelt beside him, gentling stroking him with an oily hand. She wore her favorite honeysuckle perfume, her collar, and her special high heels linked by a precisely measured cord. Her smiling face looked remarkably like his dream's Hive Queen. “Good morning, Master,” she cooed.
Derk looked at the clock, then back at his almost-naked wife. “You've been a bad girl, haven't you.”
“Oh!” she said as if surprised and abashed, but this was a game she liked to play. “Yes, Master,” she pouted. “I woke you five minutes early, didn't I. Will you punish me?” Her grip tightened, but her hand's rhythm didn't falter.
“You bet your sweet ass. Assume the position,” he said gruffly.
“As you wish, Master,” she sighed, feigning reluctance. She rose up on her knees, looking into his eyes and making a show of wiping almond oil from her hands all over her breasts. Her dark nipples swelled, glistening.
“Too slow,” he growled. “Your punishment will be doubled. Move!”
“Yes, Master,” she whimpered, scrambling off the foot of the bed to stand facing him, feet together. Bending forward, still staring into his half-lidded eyes, she put her hands on the bed to support her upper body. “I'm ready, Master,” she sighed.
He rose from the bed and stood close behind her, strong hands caressing her upturned cheeks and relishing what was to come. In this position her high heels put her vulva at just the right height. After her spanking, the cord between her heels would let her spread her feet exactly enough to put her anus – already oiled – at the same height.
“Five minutes early,” he said. “Five swats on each cheek. Doubled.” He lifted his palms from her cheeks and rubbed them together, smiling.
Hardly so much later as it seemed in his dream, Derk awoke still trembling with the intensity of his release. Wishing Megan were really there with him, he sighed, rolled out of his hotel bed, and walked to the toilet.
Removing his headband and dropping his shorts into the cycler, he stepped into the shower and urinated as hot water sprayed down over him. For perhaps the hundredth time he silently thanked his wife for the best “alarm clock” he'd ever had. “Just don't get too attached to it,” she'd warned teasingly. “I'll be waking you personally once you get back.” Megan did indeed like to wake him in her collar and special heels now and then, though not often enough to suit Derk.
The multi-sensory device relied on the same nano-implant interface that let him link intimately with his ship and other items of galactic technology. She had given it to him before he had left Port Geode for this one-year ice jockeying contract in the Jons System, hoping he'd find other women less interesting if simulations fulfilled his fantasies each morning. It was working so far.
Not that there were many available women in Spasski or the rest of this still-raw system, beside overworked and overpriced professionals. Like most men he was tempted at times, but Derk took his monogamous vows seriously.
Fading memories of his earlier, natural dream lingered in his mind, though less clearly than those of his around-the-world wakeup call. He had let himself sleep late after bar hopping and a new adventure feelie set in the last major Hive War, two centuries ago. Recent Hive activity had sparked popular interest in that old conflict.
Derk shook water from his curly black hair as the warm air of the dry-cycle rushed around him. He would be meeting Jax, his second, for brunch soon, and hoped the young man had found an assignment for them.
2: Virgins Abroad
A null-ball game was on the big vid in the bar when the twins walked in. They were petite, with straight pixie-cut dark hair, almond-shaped brown eyes, olive complexions, and fine-boned faces. The sparse clientèle, mostly men, paid them little attention despite their identical good looks. It was morning in Spasski-Jons habitat, and the bar's customers seemed intent on the game, their breakfasts, or their own conversations. A few sat alone, communing with their comps.
The pair took an empty table, were welcomed and offered menus by the table vid, and ordered oolong tea. A small robot rolled over, delivered their tea service, and scooted away. Euterpe poured and both women sipped, assessing their surroundings.
“So this is the big bad universe full of horny men, huh. Can't say I'm impressed, so far,” Clio said. The big vid interrupted the game for commercial messages, and a couple of patrons got up to walk toward the restrooms. One glanced at them, grinning over his shoulder.
“It’s our first glimpse of one small corner of it,” Euterpe answered mildly. “At least there are men here.” There had been no men, of course, aboard the jump-drive liner that had brought them and their cohorts to the Jons System. “And that one is cute.” She glanced at a fair-skinned redhead at the bar, and her sister followed her gaze.
“True,” Clio acknowledged with a smile. “He might be worth talking to, at least.”
The big vid's display shifted again, this time to a sultry female announcer. “This is Cara Mia with a local news update. All you lonely guys, and gals so inclined, take heart! The interstellar liner Silver Sylph, out of Amazonia, docked at Spasski Hab last night. Along with Amazonian wines, herbs, art works and pharmaceuticals, Sylph is taking hundreds of recent graduates of Amazonia University on their Wander-year, and we are their first port of call en route to the Million Suns.” The scene cut to an external view of the liner's docking, then to a contingent of excited young women on the spaceport’s concourse.
“She's talking about us,” Euterpe pointed out.
“Now I know you're excited about that,” the newswoman went on with a wink, “but mind your manners and act like gentlemen, guys. Some of these young women may never have met a man before -- there are none on Amazonia -- so go easy on them, please! You don't want to scare any future female immigrants away from our lovely habitat, do you?”
“Spaz Hab,” someone snorted, “testosterone pit of the Mist.”
3: Not Your Typical Amazons
Jeral Jax worked the night shift aboard ship, and liked to sleep mornings even in port. He was up early today, for him, preparing for a lunch meeting with his captain. Sitting on a stool at his hotel’s dining room bar, he sipped coffee and worked his comp, logged into the dispatch site of his ship's owner, Spasski-Jons Volatiles.
Even half-awake as he looked up available ice runs, he couldn't fail to notice the pretty twins in pastel silk shifts, sipping tea at a table nearby. Curvy but trim, chatting softly in accented Englic, they were animated and wide-eyed, as if this cheap spaceport hotel were a novelty. He was tempted to approach them, but knew Captain Patters would be waiting for his report.
Jeral smiled at them, then refocused his attention on his comp, tuning out the vid’s noise. Still his peripheral vision caught the women glancing at him and muttering to each other. The one in the blue dress shook prettily with a musical laugh.
Distracted but set on not disappointing Derk Patters, Jeral sat a bit straighter and tried to concentrate on the dispatch listings. Soon a promising assignment caught his eye and he spoke to the comp. “Jax, S-J D47, applying for the highlighted mission.”
“That mission's availability and your ship's qualification are confirmed, Mister Jax,” the comp answered louder than Jeral expected. “Estimated departure is within 49 hours; your captain's confirmation is required within 8 hours, please.”
“No problem,” he answered. “Captain Patters will confirm this afternoon, I'm sure.”
“Thank you, Mister Jax. We will hold the mission for S-J D47 until 18:30 today, pending that confirmation.”
Jeral logged off before uttering a hearty “Yes!” Smiling broadly, he turned his head toward the identical cuties. They looked back with matching little smiles. “Top of the morning to you, ladies,” he added, toasting them with his coffee.
“Good morning, Mister Jax,” they answered in sweet unison. The one in blue went on, “You're celebrating, yes? Please excuse us – we couldn't help overhearing – but we're celebrating too. May we please buy you a drink?”
Smiling even wider, Jeral stood and approached with his cup. “I confess I would enjoy another coffee, with brandy this time, thank you very much.”
The twin in green rose, pulling out a chair. “Do join us then, please.” Grinning, he sat between them. “I'm sorry,” she said as she sat back down. “My forward sister failed to introduce us. I'm Clio d'Artemis, and her name is Euterpe.”
“Thank you Clio, Euterpe, and please call me Jeral. It is a true pleasure to meet you. I guess you know I just landed a nice contract. May I ask what you two are celebrating?”
“Our graduation, Jeral,” both said, and Euterpe continued, “from Amazonia University. We've just begun our Wander-year.”
Jeral wondered how lucky he could get today. Wander-year travelers were notoriously adventurous. If this was their first stop away from their remote home world, these two might be unwilling virgins eager to learn the ways of the wide galaxy. “That's wonderful,” he assured them. “But I must say you don't match the Amazon stereotype.” In his mind's eye, accustomed to popular vid adventures, he couldn't help picturing graying, leather-clad man-haters astride sneering horses.
“Few of us do, Jeral,” Clio answered gently. “It's hard for us to believe what nonsense they put in vids and feelies. But of course, we won't hold that against you.”
“I do appreciate that,” he smiled, and decided to go out on a limb. “And if I were to say that you both have very beautiful bodies, would you hold them against me?”
“Only if you want us to,” said Euterpe, looking into his green eyes.
“We thought you might never ask,” Clio added softly, and both leaned toward him.
Close between the two, Jeral felt nearly overwhelmed with desire. Their identical faces were as perfectly proportioned as their bodies, and their dark eyes drank him in thirstily. He smelled no perfume, but their subtle natural scents enticed him. Their very voices resonated palpably within him, making his pants grow tight even before a feminine hand came to rest on each of his thighs.
“How could I not?” he asked rhetorically, all thought of his lunch meeting gone from his head. “I have a room here...”
“And we would love to see it, after coffee and brandy,” Euterpe said. “I'm ordering two for us as well. There are so many things we want to try.”
Over brandied coffees, Jeral did his best to make small talk, asking the twins about Amazonia and their university studies. Clio said she had a BS in physics with a minor in astrogation, and hoped to captain her own ship some day. Euterpe had majored in psychology, with a minor in galactic history, and wanted to see and write about as many of the Spiral's realms as she could.
They spoke of their middle-class parents – two mothers, of course – and asked him about his own family. He talked about his home habitat, O'Donal in the New Eire System – planet-less like the Jons System – and his Eiric and Englic speaking relatives there.
He hardly-heard the bar vid's galactic news report, or its sketchy accounts of skirmishes around the Vedic Mist. The Hives, social-insect-like human cultures, were on the move again after lying low for generations. At least one major Hive seemed to be probing this very cluster, but to date no Hive ships had been sighted in this part of the Mist.
“I'm very glad it did, of course,” Jeral said, “but why did your ship stop here?”
“It's the war,” Clio explained. “Some of the usual routes through the Mist may not be safe right now. Also, I understand Silver Sylph has some cargo for Spasski Habitat.”
Euterpe asked about his job, and Jeral told them of the small comet he and Derk would be nudging toward where its volatiles would be harvested. “That reminds me, I have to meet the captain for lunch, but his hotel is just across the way. Would you care to accompany me?”
“Yes, please,” Clio smiled.
“But not until we've seen your room,” Euterpe added. “Shall we?” Clio was already fingering the tabletop comp to pay their tab.
The way things moved as the sisters walked on either side of him convinced Jeral that neither wore much beneath her clingy shift. In the lift they clung to him too, nuzzling familiarly. His hands roamed freely, corroborating his conviction. Clio sighed and Euterpe giggled as each of his hands slid up under fabric to squeeze a firm warm cheek.
As the elevator slowed for his floor, Euterpe said, “As you may suspect, Jeral, we are hardly naïve about sex.”
“But as you might also think,” Clio added as the lift's door opened, “neither of us has ever had a man.”
Grinning wordlessly, he led them to his room and waved a hand to open the door. Once inside they stood close, facing him, and Euterpe asked, “Will you teach us how to please you?”
“Please, Jeral?” added Clio. “We want so much to learn how to give you pleasure.”
“I'm truly honored to oblige you,” he answered, achingly stiff and hardly believing his luck. “But that may take more than one lesson, my beauties.”
“Then we are at your disposal,” Euterpe said, “for the next two days anyway.”
“So how may we best please you now?” asked Clio. Both sisters gazed up at him, wide-eyed.
Jeral thought hard for about two seconds. He really did have to meet the captain soon, and he wanted these virgins as hot for him as he was for them now.
“Undress me, and kneel at my feet,” he said. “Your first lesson will be Fellatio 101. We'll do lesson two after lunch.”
4: Honey Pod
Derk picked at what remained of his ono almandine brunch, all synthetic on his budget but about as good as the real thing. Scowling at his empty cup, he ordered another coffee. Jax was late, and hadn't yet returned his call.
His executive officer, relief pilot, and entire crew, Jeral was a good man even if he took life less than seriously. Aboard ship the two got along and worked well together; but after weeks in space they gladly parted ways in port.
Derk liked to attend Spasski's green-space football matches, sometimes joining a pickup game. He swam almost daily, caught new vids and feelies, and generally unwound. His young Second indulged in the bar music scene and loved pursuing local women, scarce as they were.
Derk missed the years when Megan had been his Second, even after their twins were birthed. Having toddlers underfoot on a small ship had been challenging, but relieved the tedium of moving frozen volatiles through space to growing habitats. Once Jeni and Jimi were old enough for more extensive socialization and schooling, the couple had agreed to settle in Port Geode.
He and Meg were Free Port League citizens, respectively from Port Megastra and Puerto San Pedro in the Million Suns Cluster, and wanted their children raised in the FPL's freewheeling galactic culture. The Free Port in the thriving Geodesic Cluster was only weeks away, by wormhole and jump-drive, from their Million Suns relatives, and equally close by jump-drive alone to rapidly developing systems in the Vedic Mist Cluster.
He didn't regret taking this job. It was paying for a nice private home. Sporadic Hive activity in the cluster was worrisome, but the Mist was an astronomically big place. Developing the Jons System, one of hundreds throughout the nebula's millions of cubic light-years, might help the Mist Federation fight off Hive invaders, if it ever came to widespread war.
Still Derk missed his little family, and wondered where Jeral might be.
“You look lonely.” Her accented voice broke his reverie, and he looked at the tall buxom woman standing by his seat at the bar. Auburn haired, she was dressed in soft brown boots and pants that looked like real leather, under a soft green tunic. “Would you care to join us?”
“Us?” He followed her glance at a table where two more youthful women, similarly clad, sat holding hands.
“My podners and me,” she said. “You aren't dike-shy, are you?”
“Not at all,” he assured her. “I'm expecting someone, though.”
“Someone jealous?”
Derk laughed. “Hardly, Miz. My Second, on business.”
“Second-in-command? You're a ship's captain, then?” Her blue eyes widened with unfeigned interest.
“Captain Derk Patters, Spasski-Jons D47,” he answered, warming to the idea of feminine company. “And you are…?”
“Janis de Brigid.” she said, pronouncing the surname deh breed, “passing on Silver Sylph out of Amazonia. We've just started our Wander-year, and we'd love to meet a real space captain. There's room for your Second, too, when se gets here. Won't you join us for a drink?”
“Se's a he,” Derk smiled, knowing from vids that Amazonians used the inter-sex pronouns rhyming with see and here when referring to persons of unknown gender. He'd heard of their podnership institution, a pod being a closely held corporation, group marriage, or both. This might be interesting, and he was stuck here anyway till Jax showed up or answered his call. “It's early for me, but why not?”
5: Ball Game Beeline
Jeral strode into Derk's hotel's dining room with a smile on his face and a twin on each arm, but didn't see the captain-pilot at his usual place at the bar. Looking around, he noticed the three young women dressed more suitably for a planetary surface than for a climate-controlled habitat.
Then he recognized his boss's laugh. Seated facing the women with his back to Jeral, Derk seemed to be enjoying himself. “Oho,” Jax said, steering the sisters toward the empty chairs at that long table. “It may be that my captain isn't so thoroughly married as I thought.”
The tall woman acknowledged their approach, smiling and nodding, and Patters followed her glance over his shoulder. “Yo, Cap'm,” his Second said heartily. “Permission to come aboard?”
“There you are, at last. Sit down and meet Janis, Leia and Freya. My Second, Jeral Jax. I already ate, Jer … but I see you've been busy.”
“In more ways than one,” Jax smiled, seating himself between the twins. “I met Clio and Euterpe at breakfast. I gather that you ladies know each other.”
“Of course,” Clio answered just as Euterpe said, “We're podners.”
“But duty came first,” Jeral continued. “I found us a good run, Derk. You'll want to check it out, and confirm this afternoon.”
“You might have sent me a message, or answered my call.”
“Sorry, boss. It's on hold for you at S-J. I was about to message you, when these two distracted me. And when you called I was … preoccupied, sorry. I hustled over here as soon as I could.”
Derk was already linking to the S-J site, taking in the contract's terms. “A long, hard run,” he said, “but I like the fees. Spasski-Jons dispatch, this is Captain Patters of D47, confirming acceptance of your offer.” Silently he sent his encrypted password. Then, “We'll lift the day after tomorrow, return in six or seven weeks. Thanks for spotting that one, Jer!”
“Just doing my job, Derk. I could use a drink, though.”
“Time for another bottle, then, on me,” he said. “The same, ladies?”
“That one was nice, Derk,” Janis replied. “But let's try another this time.”
“Miz de Brigid's family owns vineyards and a winery on Amazonia. Some of their exports are in Silver Sylph's hold.”
“And I'm touring,” Janis said, sizing up the Second, “in part, to size up the competition. What would you recommend?”
Gazing back at her languidly, Jeral had a few ideas. “As to wines, have you tried any New Ethiopian chardonnays?”
“No,” she said as her podners shook their heads. “Are they very good?”
“Oh yeah,” Derk nodded, opening the wine list. He ordered one he could just afford, considering the company and the occasion. This was still a business lunch, technically.
There was more small talk as they waited for the wine and more glasses, which the sommelier brought personally. Se lauded the vintage as se poured.
“To new ventures, and to friends old and new,” Jeral toasted, and seven glasses rose to meet lips. Then there were smiles, an “m-m-m” and an “ah” or two.
“That is first rate,” Janis judged.
“Just one of the many galactic splendors awaiting you, Miz de Brigid,” Jeral teased. “I am pleased to be of service.” Clio and Euterpe snickered at that and tweaked his ribs.
Janis focused on Derk. “Thank you very much, for this wine as well as your friendly welcome.”
“Don't mention it, please. It's the least I can do for such pleasant visitors.”
“Might your hospitality extend to showing us around Spasski? If you're free, that is.”
Derk considered over another sip. The five young women wore identical, braided silver rings, but it was clear that not all of them were dedicated lesbians, and all were attractive. At least three of them already knew he was happily monogamous, and the other two had attached themselves to Jeral.
Deciding that her proposition was innocent enough, he nodded. “Certainly, I'd be honored. All I had planned for this afternoon was a trip to the football pitches. I'd be glad to show you what sights there are to see.”
“Is there a match today?” asked brown-hair Leia with obvious interest.
“I'm not sure,” Derk told her. “If not, I'd thought I might find a pick-up game. Are you a fan?”
“We're players!” black-braided Freya enthused. “Janis was captain of our intramural team.”
“In fact, we brought our gear with us from the ship,” Janis added. “The port-of-call menu said Spasski has good, active pitches.”
“If it's active pitches you're wanting, you've come to the right place,” Jeral grinned. The twins rolled their eyes.
Derk gave him a look too, and then said, “I'd love to escort you all, and play a game if we can.”
“Thank you again,” Janis smiled. “I do hope we can. Are we all game, podners?”
“Why don't you three go with Captain Patters,” Clio said. “Euterpe and I have another engagement with Mister Jax after lunch.”
Jeral ordered food for the twins and himself as all seven of them enjoyed the chardonnay. Once the wine was gone, Derk agreed to meet Freya, Leia and Janis at their suite upstairs after fetching his own shoes and pads.
A few minutes later, in khaki shorts and tee shirt, he approached their door. It opened before he could ring. Janis called, “Come in, Derk, and set down your bag. We're not quite ready.”
“Sure, no rush,” he answered. The door closed behind him as he dropped his gear and looked around. Janis, now clad just in shorts and halter of forest green silk, was seated in a chair facing him. Behind her stood Freya, similarly dressed in black silk, plus kneepads. She was braiding up Janis's hair.
“Please make yourself comfortable,” Freya suggested. “Leia is still getting dressed.” Derk settled into another chair.
“What about these?” Leia's voice came through an open door, followed by herself. The short haired brunette held a garment in each hand. “The pink?” she asked, draping a halter in front of her. “Or the white?” Pulling the pink fabric aside, she replaced it with white silk. Otherwise all she wore were silver kneepads.
Janis turned to her with a cool look. “You're embarrassing the captain,” she said sternly.
Leia looked abashed but didn't move. Freya laughed, “He doesn't look embarrassed to me.”
Derk's brown skin would hide any but the deepest blush. He shifted in his seat as he assured them, “No, not at all. Few Free Porters are prudes...”
Janis ignored him, scolding her podners. “Then you're teasing him, Leia, and Freya, you're encouraging her. You think that's fun?”
“Well...” began Leia.
“Yeah!” answered Freya.
Janis took a deep breath and exhaled, standing to her full height. “Then I'll show you fun. At my feet! On hands and knees!”
Speechless, Derk stared as both rushed to obey, “Yes, Podmistress” blurting from their lips.
“I'm so sorry, Derk,” Janis told him over her submissive podners. “They've violated our customs, and I must discipline them. I do hope you don't mind.” Not trusting his own tongue, he shook his head “no.”
“Thank you, again,” she said. “Your generous tolerance is truly appreciated. Isn't it, you sluts!”
“Yes, Podmistress,” Leia said meekly.
“Oh yes, Podmistress, Freya said lustily.
Janis bent down, pushing Freya's shorts down to her knees, then stood and turned to a chest of drawers. “Thank you, Podmistress,” Freya cooed with her head down, watching Derk through the gap between her thighs.
None of them wore perfume, but Derk felt intoxicated by the scents of young womanhood. He was sure Freya and now Leia too were admiring the swelling bulge in his shorts. He couldn't help ogling the bare bottoms facing him, noticing that their carpets matched their respective drapes. He wondered about Janis's carpet as she bent over to rummage through a drawer.
“Where did my paddle go?”
“Bottom drawer, Podmistress,” Leia simpered, and Freya chuckled. “On the right,” Leia added.
6: All Wet
Derk brooded beside the pool, trying not to watch the swimmers. Sun lamps lit the sparkling water from above and below, illuminating all who played in it. Swimsuits were permitted but not customary, and the podners were observing local customs.
He fell like a cheating, dirty old man. And he would feel like a liar, too, until he could muster the courage to message Megan and confess his lapse.
He sipped whiskey and water, though he didn't need it. He was still light headed with sexual afterglow and, amazingly, fresh lust. Leia surfaced from a shallow dive to breaststroke at the surface, her pale butt still aglow from her paddling, and Derk's libido stirred anew.
It had been a memorable afternoon. He would never forget the sight of Leia and Freya as they came on all fours, at their mistress's command but so eagerly, to ease his discomfort at watching their punishment. He would certainly remember how they had fulfilled that mission.
They and he had wound up on an over sized bed, with Freya panting and thrusting back up at him while Leia's hands and tongue worked magic behind him. Finally Janis had joined them there, lifting Derk's sweaty head to kiss his mouth gently. As her tongue had touched his, his entire central nervous system had erupted with incredible, obliterating ecstasy.
The next he remembered, Jeral Jax had been grinning at him as Derk came to himself surrounded by four solicitous young women. Janis, still clothed, stood by supervising, and things got twice as interesting. Eventually, Janis had ordered the six-some off the bed, into showers, and down to the pool.
The clean cool water delighted the women, accustomed to cold rivers and lakes. Derk, after a quick dip, had climbed out to order a drink.
He sipped it again, wondering what had got into him. Fantasies and feelies were one thing, and Meg had never felt threatened when he socialized or even flirted with other women. But this…
He took another swig, shook his head, and took another. He wanted to dive back in, grab Leia or whichever slippery minx he could catch, and do her dolphin style, if he could recall how dolphins were supposed to do it.
Instead he put down his empty glass and stood, wrapping a thick towel around his waist. Seeing him rise, Janis swam over with Jeral following her.
“We're thinking of challenging those oglers to water polo,” she called. “What do you think, Derk?”
“I think I'm too old, and need a nap,” he answered her. Jeral feigned choking on a mouthful of water. “Jax, I'll call you tomorrow at noon about lift preparations. Answer it.” He turned toward the dressing rooms.
“Aye, Captain,” Jeral laughed. “And sure, I'll do my best to show our visitors the rest of the sights.”
7: DeFlora Heaven
S-J D47, a heavy mining tug that never entered atmosphere, hung cradled “above” Spasski Hab's stony surface, stern to the veils and stars of the Mist. Tens of other S-J tugs rested in the vacuum around her, among dozens of docking cradles anchored in the fused-rock field.
From Derk's perspective, standing on her stern-most deck, DeFlora Heaven hung many meters below the cylindrical habitat. The hab's spin provided centrifugal force of just over one gee at this “altitude” or distance from the spin axis, in the outward direction; so the rest of the universe was down, not up. Not that Derk noticed, working in the windowless hold.
The company owned the ship, but she was his responsibility. He had worked aboard similar craft off and on since his teen years in the Million Suns, and knew most of what there was to know about running and maintaining their critical systems.
He had started very early. A nearly sleepless night alone hadn't allowed his usual pleasant awakening. Memories of yesterday's orgiastic afternoon, along with recurring fantasies of more to come, still disturbed him; but working helped keep those thoughts at bay.
He had already gone through most of his checklist, testing everything that could be tested while the ship was docked. Now he was taking physical inventory, making sure that everything he and Jax would need was aboard and secured properly.
Spasski-Jons Corporation did not scrimp on provisions for the crew of two, stocking enough to keep them healthy for two years or more – an ample safety margin for in-system missions of a few months at most. That policy, a contractual obligation, was reassuring; but Derk's and Jeral's lives, not the company's, were on the line, and Derk would never assume the maintenance staff hadn't screwed something up. He had just over 24 hours left to catch errors or omissions and get them fixed.
Feeling a little shaky, Derk noticed that it was almost noon, time to call Jeral and break for lunch. He stepped into DeFlora's central lift shaft, initiating the call as he rose toward the quarterdeck. He needed no headband or handset to interface with ship's systems while aboard.
“'Lo, Cap'm,” Jax answered immediately, sounding like he had a mouthful of food. “W'a'sup?”
“Everything else looks good, but I’m still checking stores. I'll message you to deal with any deficiencies, so don't get too preoccupied.” Coming out of the lift shaft toward the little galley, Derk herd Jeral swallow.
“Aye, Captain, on call at your disposal, sure, till launch tomorrow,” Jeral said. His Eiric lilt tinted his Englic more deeply than usual, as if he'd already been drinking. “And wouldn't it be lovely, sir, to bring the podners aboard for a tour? You wouldn't believe what Euterpe and Leia can do in a kitchen.”
Awkward silence prevailed for the few seconds Derk took to suppress an angry retort. “Have your fun, Jeral, but sober up now, and stay that way. I’ll expect your Eiric ass on board by oh nine hundred, unless I call you sooner.”
“My arse is Eirish, though sure my tongue is Eiric … sir. But on my word, you'll have it your way.”
8: Dee Tour
“This isn't the way to the Sylph's docking area,” Janis pointed out as Jeral led them to a spacious lift.
“Sure, it is not,” he agreed. “The docks at the ends of this can are reserved for bigger ships, easier to accommodate in the micro-gravity near the spin axis. Smaller ships can be handled in full gee, so they're cradled around the hab's outer shell.”
Their descent didn't take long, and the five followed him to a security gate. The S-J agent there was one whose face and name Jeral knew. He also knew that her work shift would end soon. “Top of the evening, Miz Kapoor,” he smiled. “I thought I should give my friends a little tour of D47, before she drops into the starry deep. Is Captain Patters aboard her?”
Identifying him, she checked. “No, Mister Jax,” she said in what he thought an overly professional tone despite her soft Hindic accent. “That makes it your call, as her executive officer.” The gate slid aside.
“Thank you, dear… but don't be jealous, now. I'll be back in a month or two, and then perhaps we can go dancing.”
“I don't think so. Have a good evening, Mister Jax. Enjoy your tug tour, ladies.”
Curtly brushed off, Jeral just smiled and led the podners through. Soon they reached the umbilical portal for D47, and he silently linked with it. The portal opened into a cylindrical cabin barely large enough for the six of them.
Close by him as the airtight lift cab descended, Euterpe said, “I hope your ship is roomier than this.”
Jeral welcomed close quarters with the five women, but assured her, “To be sure. This is just our port-side foyer, you might say.”
Soon the crowded cabin mated with D47's cargo lock, and they stepped into her hold. “Welcome aboard DeFlora Heaven, everyone. This isn't her most congenial chamber, but...”
“The Floor of Heaven?” asked Clio.
“Feels that way sometimes, out in the deep,” Jeral said, “but a prior captain called her DeFlora – 'Dee' for short...”
“For D47,” the twins said together.
“Just so,” Jeral grinned. “And Derk likes the name as well, and so it is. Now if you'll follow me, I'll show you her bridge and quarterdeck.”
“Is it just me,” Freya asked, “or have we all gained a few kilograms?”
“Temporarily, we have indeed,” Jax said. “It's the centrifugal effect from the hab's spin. I can activate grav compensation if you like.”
“Zero gee might be fun for awhile,” Euterpe said with a suggestive look.
“It can be, truly,” he grinned, “though it takes time getting used to it. We'll be a bit lighter anyway, above. Shall we?” Leading the way, he stopped at the lift shaft and opened its door.
“No acrophobias among you, I hope? Good,” he said, stepping into midair in the meter-wide shaft. “I've set the system to lift each of us to the bridge, first off. It won't let anyone fall. Follow me, ladies!” He rose out of sight, unsupported by anything visible.
“After you, Podmistress,” Freya said. Janis stepped in and rose away, followed by her podners. One by one, they emerged near the center of a room shaped like a fat lens, some six meters in diameter and about three from bowl-shaped floor to domed ceiling. Derk sat in one of two pilot seats near the lift shaft, whose top was a meter shy of the dome's center.
“This is where I work twelve hours a day. Would you like to see outside?” The room went dark, as the entire domed ceiling seemed to disappear, revealing the upper part of the docking cradle around the ship and the habitat's surface above them. Other cradles and ships, along with stars and nebular wisps, were visible all around. Someone gasped.
“Dee has no windows, of course,” Jeral said, “but we can have real-time views in any part of the spectrum here … in any direction, or all of them, at will.” The curved floor went invisible too. There were more gasps and an “Oh!” as the veils and stars of this part of the Vedic Mist were revealed beneath their feet, slowly moving across their field of view with the hab's rotation.
“Now I know why you call it the deep,” Janis said quietly. “It's bottomless … beautiful … and terrifying.”
“It is all that, and more,” Jeral agreed. A stifled sob came from someone behind him, and he shut off the view through the deck. “But I think you will find DeFlora's quarterdeck, with its homey amenities, more comfortable. Are we ready to see it, then?”
9: True Confusion
The lunch Derk had warmed that day in DeFlora's gallery had been uninteresting, and he'd eaten just a few bites. Finishing the inventory had proved just as boring; everything was in the place, quantity, and condition it was supposed to be. There'd been no reason to call his Second, or to stay aboard the tug any longer, especially knowing he'd be stuck there for several weeks after another day.
Of all the attractions Spasski Habitat had to offer, only the pod of Amazonians held any interest for him now, and he was determined to avoid them. Holed up in his hotel room, he tried to compose a message to his wife.
First he tried just talking it out. That recording, a few minutes of his face and voice, sounded lame and pleading when he played it back. He tried again at more length, breaking down in tears halfway through it but forging on. On playback, he realized he'd said more than was prudent about how irresistibly attractive the young women were. Thinking Megan wouldn't take that well at all, he erased that message too.
He decided instead to go with a text message, rationalizing that even a very long one would cost less than any vid to send across 1500 light-years to Port Geode. Using his internal nanoware, he could just think, and words would pour into a file that he could edit later.
Derk was no writer though, even with cybernetic assistance. After a few hours all he had was a disjointed mess that would take Meg hours to read, if she bothered to finish after seeing the heart of his confession. He closed the file and encrypted it, deciding to take a break before making another attempt.
He considered a swim, a trip to the pitches, taking in a new vid. None of those seemed worth doing. Wondering what might help pull him out of his funk, he had a vision, vivid as visceral memory, of Janis's kiss transporting him to ecstatic bliss.
The pod's rooms were a few floors away, in this very hotel. He walked toward his door, but stopped himself before opening it.
Had Janis or her podners drugged him somehow? Derk wasn't sure how they could have done that, and he had no reason to think them inclined to such criminality.
Like many Free Porters and most galactic businesspeople, his internal lie detection software ran continuously unless he turned it off. It wouldn't catch a falsehood that the speaker actually believed; but if any of the podners had told him a conscious lie, he would have known at once. The detector wasn't infallible, but few people could beat it without memory-safing, extensive neural modifications, or other extreme measures.
The podners seemed to be what they claimed to be, though man-friendlier than the Amazons in any documentary or semi-realistic vid he had seen. He supposed he could chalk that up to Wander-year adventurousness.
Nevertheless, Derk linked to the starport's registry for the data on Silver Sylph. The file corroborated her Amazonian registration. False-flag ships were not unheard of, he knew, but he couldn't believe anyone would resort to such an elaborate ruse just to seduce him.
The podners were cute, smart, and curious about the half of the human species banned from their home world. Derk could hardly blame them for that. He felt like an old fool, trying to rationalize his own reckless indiscretion.
Whiskey seemed mildly interesting now, but he shouldn't drink before tomorrow's launch. Beside wines and liquors from around the Spiral, the hotel's bar also offered a selection of fine cannabis products. He rarely smoked, but thought some hashish might restore his interest in something other than a young woman's kiss. Like food. Or at least it might let him sleep.
10: Close Quarters
For a small ship, D47's quarterdeck was almost luxurious, taking up nearly the full diameter of her midsection. Its common area featured a small, well equipped galley with a breakfast bar, a dining and gaming area with seating for six, and a tiny but sophisticated exercise room. Its two cabins, soundproofed since captain-pilot and pilot-crew worked opposite shifts, had private baths.
“Captain's quarters are locked, of course,” Derk announced as he opened his own door. Holding Euterpe's hand, he stepped in and the others followed. “But my home is yours, my lovely podners.”
Euterpe giggled, then blushed. Clio blushed too, but looked at him seriously. “She thinks that sounded like a proposal.”
“Did it now?” Jeral thought fast, if not particularly well. “I didn't think a man could join an Amazonian pod.”
“Of course not,” Clio said.
“At home,” Euterpe added.
“I love your décor,” Leia said, drawing attention to the surrounding suite. Beyond the roomy bed, big sofa, beanbag chairs, occasional tables and Wiccan altar, invisible walls displayed a temperate rain forest valley bottom, lit by yellow-green light through the treetops overhead. A chuckling creek flowed nearby, and some small birds chirped and flitted in the distance.
“Thank you,” Jeral said. “It's a recording from a favorite place of mine in O'Donal. The rising ground, east and west, is the shell's curvature; see how the farthest trees slant a bit toward us?”
“I don't think we're on Amazonia anymore, Janis,” Freya said archly.
“Is that really your altar?” the auburn haired woman asked.
Jeral was too befuddled to lie fluently, and knew it. “I confess, I'm hardly religious, but yes, Janis… my family follows the Old Ways.”
A little later, Jeral was even gladder that he had chosen the forest scene before opening his door. The women had been happy to commune silently during the ten-minute twilight, the twins snuggling with him on his blanket-less bed. Finally just a few lines of sparks winked through the treetops.
Jeral had heard whispering from the couch, and a bit later quiet lovemaking there. Clio and Euterpe, noticing his attention to those sounds, had silently taken matters into their own hands.
Now he lay happily between them in a queerly extended afterglow, hearing only their breathing beside him over the virtual stream's soft babble. He was elated to think that the pod might actually make him a provisional podner.
“We love you,” Clio had whispered, on her own and her twin's behalf, after darkness came. “Freya and Leia think you're hot, and like you a lot. And Janis likes you too.” He knew enough, and had been just coherent enough, to talk religion with the Podmistress, even making her laugh at a pagan joke she hadn't heard before.
“We could never take you back to Amazonia,” Euterpe had sighed, “or aboard Silver Sylph. But elsewhere, Amazonian law doesn’t apply.”
Jeral had the impression that Janis might never bed any man; but if she were open to his sharing her podners, he could certainly live with that. His ego and penis both swelled at the thought.