by Lydia Hope
Simon’s clawed hand gently scraped the inside of her thighs, and he touched the backs of his fingers against the moist curls at her core. She spread her legs shamelessly, granting him access. She didn’t care if his nails drew blood; she’d take the pain with the pleasure. Casting a glance at his face, she saw that sexual desire turned his eyes into a lovely sea of unadulterated black, brilliant and deep. The neatly arranged tattoos at the base of his neck were pulsating rapidly, letting her know that more than two of his hearts were engaged.
The sight made her free-fall deeper into the bottomless pit of suffocating pleasure. She’d never experienced lust so all-consuming.
“You’re making me burn,” she sounded almost accusing.
In response, he gently rubbed the pads of his fingers back and forth along her slit. She was so close, if only he applied more pressure.
He stopped, and her eyes flew open, her body teetering on the verge of release.
“Simon,” she breathed his name.
“I am not human, Gemma. I want you to be aware of that. Now. At this moment.”
With a sinking feeling, she realized he was addressing his inability to complete the sexual act like he knew she expected it to be completed.
“I know what you are. It doesn’t matter. What you can’t do doesn’t matter.”
He went still over her and a funny expression briefly flashed across his impassive features.
“How many times do I have to tell you? Never assume,” he said in a dark accented whisper that sent shivers along her spine.
Before she had a chance to process his meaning, he settled between her splayed thighs, heavy and blatantly male in his bulky, wide-shouldered shape, and gripped her head, forcing her to submit to another rough kiss. She welcomed it, aware that the span of his fingers was wide enough to hold her entire head in the palm of his one hand.
Without warning, she felt pressure down there as he filled her, stretching her tissues almost to capacity.
How? How?? The question left a blazing trail in her head before dissolving into wisps of smoke as the sensations of such utter completion swamped Gemma that she cried out.
“Am I hurting you?” Simon’s voice was pure gravel, and she guessed rather than understood his garbled accent.
He started to withdraw.
“No!” Panicked, she clutched his lower back, forcing him still. He was stretching her too tight. There was too much of him, all at once, with no warning, but if that was what it took to have him, she wanted it to hurt. She gloried in this magical fullness.
He uttered something, a low rumble of it vibrating through her chest where they touched. His heavy braid fell on her upturned face and slid off her cheek, sensual because it was his, and because her skin was burning up. Imprisoning her hands above her head, he pulled almost all the way out - only to slam back into her. She cried out. Her legs moved restlessly against the mattress. He pulled out and filled her again, setting up a rhythm, and she became disoriented.
Nothing prepared her for this raw, painful intimacy. He was everywhere, his taste inside her mouth, her nose full of his delicious musky scent, her slick entrance accepting the girth of his alien body that was setting her on fire. At that moment, he owned her. It was terrifying, and she didn’t want it to end.
He rammed home, sparing her none of his power, winding the nerves in her core tighter and tighter, until they detonated. She screamed, and the world temporarily went black as a shock after shock made her body convulse and writhe under him in crippling ecstasy.
When she could breathe again, it was over. She couldn't tell if he’d found his release, presuming Rix operated in this way. He had withdrawn from her body and was gently cradling her head, letting her catch her breath. He kissed her lips, reverently this time. No teeth, no tongue.
“Rest,” he whispered against her mouth.
Unable to resist the pull of exhaustion, Gemma slept, her dreams strange, floating, and erotic.
When she awoke again, it was dark outside, and the compressor thing was gone from the floor. So was Simon.
Panic rose.
“Simon?”
He stepped into her line of vision. “I’m here.”
She sat up in relief and winced.
In a surge, he came to the bed but didn’t get in with her.
“Are you badly hurt?” His long flexible fingers feathered gentle touches on her inner thighs, tickling and arousing.
“I’m fine, Simon. Truly.” She caught his hands in hers. “I’m just unused…”
He nodded in understanding. “I am sorry,” he said quietly.
“It’s nothing. I’m better already.”
He didn’t buy it. “You were so tight. I found out too late.”
“I guess your, ah, surprise appearance was larger than expected,” she tried to joke the issue away. She knew now the feeling of being well and truly used.
He responded in all seriousness. “When will you learn the lesson, Gemma? Never assume.”
“But I’ve seen you! All of you. There was no empirical evidence you’re equipped, much less hung. You gave me not one weeny hint.”
She dropped her gaze to Simon’s crotch now covered by pants, picturing nothing but the smooth juncture of his thighs marred only by a small pocket of folded skin. She knew now what a decoy it was.
“Rix males’ reproductive equipment is similar to other males’,” he explained, “except it’s internal when not in use.”
“That’s so misleading,” she complained. “Why did you never tell me?”
“You never asked.”
She gave him an incredulous look. “Did you expect me to casually inquire if you had a penis?”
“Did you expect me to inform you that, by the way, I had one?”
She laughed and shook her head. “Oh, Simon. Why are you not like everybody else?”
“It’s the others that are built wrong,” he said with a touch of sullenness.
Gemma drew him down for a kiss, and he gave her what she craved until she fell on the bed replete and drunk on the sight and smell and taste of him.
The next time she resurfaced from sex-induced sleep, Gemma became aware of a nasty smell. Seriously off-putting, it seemed to be everywhere.
“What is this smell?” she asked Simon distractedly.
“Sewage.”
“Eww. Do we have plumbing problems?”
“This place sits atop the City’s sewers,” he explained. “The fermentation processes do smell, but they produce heat. That is why it’s so warm. You like it warm, yes?”
“It’s gross.”
He didn’t react. He never did when she said something too obvious or stupid.
She groped around the bed, collecting her sheet about her. “Are there lights? Electricity?”
“I ran a line to power tools but not the lights. The guy this place belongs to never used any.”
“What guy? Do we have a landlord?”
A slight hesitation. “Sort of.”
Gemma didn’t press. The last few weeks taught her to be grateful for the comforts she could get and ask no questions.
Shrouded in a bedsheet, she used the bathroom and ate another can of pears. Afterward, she started to unenthusiastically sort through her soiled and ruined clothes while Simon loitered around with no apparent function except watching her.
The dilemma of her winter wardrobe needed to be solved soon, or she’d be stuck above the sewers until springtime. She decided to wash her coat for she couldn't stand the smell of it. But washing clothes wrapped in bed linens would be uncomfortable. Even walking around the room caused her to stumble.
“Are there pants and a shirt I could borrow?” she finally asked Simon.
“There are clothes on the other side of the room, behind the curtain. There is more food, too, in case you want something different.”
“Really?” She couldn't believe her luck. “And it’s okay for me to eat some?”
“It’s all yours.”
&
nbsp; “Are you sure the landlord wouldn’t mind?”
“He wouldn't,” he said with confidence.
Excited, Gemma hiked up the sheet and headed toward the curtain. Yanking it aside, she beheld a room full of so much stuff it could rival Alladin’s treasure cove. Clothes, canned and dried food, electronic gadgets, weapons - an unimaginable variety of everything was gathered in this one place. Shelves upon shelves lined the walls sagging under the weight of goods, and piles of items were heaped on the floor. A large cast-iron safe stood in the alcove guarding, presumably, money and other valuables.
Mouth gaping in awe, she turned in a circle… and gave a loud squeak of fright. A huge Tana-Tana alien was sitting in a chair by the window.
“I… didn’t know you were here,” Gemma addressed him, her heart thumping against her ribs. Why did Simon not mention that someone else was present behind the curtain? “How do you do?”
Tana-Tana didn’t respond and continued immobile. Gemma tightened the sheet around her and stepped closer, mindful of the clutter and aware that Simon was behind her.
“I would like to thank you for your hospitality…” She gasped, the words dying on her lips when she saw why the alien couldn’t hear her.
Whirling, she grasped Simon’s hand. “Simon, he’s… dead!”
“He is.”
Gemma eyeballed the cracked back of Tana-Tana’s head. “Someone killed him!”
“Hmm.”
“Oh my God! We should help him! Let’s do chest compressions, quick, it can revive him.”
“Let’s not revive him.”
“Help me lay him down.”
“It won’t work. I’m afraid his condition is permanent.”
Gemma slowly raised her eyes to his. “He’s the landlord, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“You killed him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His fine eyebrows did their twitchy thing. “He snored.”
“How can you joke about killing a… Tana-Tana person! And I thought you only hated humans,” she wailed.
“I don’t hate all humans. And it wasn’t a matter of hate, Gemma. You, humans, attach emotions to everything. I killed him because I needed to take over this place.”
“This is so cruel.”
He looked at her, impassive.
“Can we at least bury him?
It was the first time Gemma observed Simon wince.
“Not yet.” Seeing her expression, he hastened to add, “He’s sitting here for a reason. He needs to be seen from the street as if he still lives.”
“What? Why?” She sounded shrill to her own ears, but the idea of going about her daily business with a dead body behind the curtain was nothing short of aberrant.
“This place belonged to him,” Simon was saying. “It’s an illegal pawnshop and black market trade post. You can get anything here, for a price. I killed him to get his business, to obtain some items that are hard to come by. But the customers are skittish. Some will watch the place for days before approaching. I can’t risk them disappearing because the old owner is suddenly nowhere to be found. There are things I can’t find on my own. At least not fast.”
Gemma’s heart was still beating erratically. The body was making her twitchy. “What things?”
“Come with me. I’ll show you.”
Turning her back to the Tana-Tana but painfully aware of his silent presence behind her, Gemma gingerly picked what clothes she needed out of a dusty pile on the floor. Reminding herself that beggars weren’t choosers, she tried not to think of who the garments may have belonged to, and what happened to the previous owners.
Quietly, they went out into the gathering dusk, and she followed Simon as they made their way deeper into the junkyard. Gemma stayed close to him, his big body and a big gun tucked into his waistband giving her a measure of confidence. The place had always given her heebie-jeebies. She had never imagined breaching the perimeter and walking among the carcasses of old machinery. It was eerie. Dead.
Simon expertly navigated around obstructions until they reached a circular area within which once-powerful shuttles lay in eternal repose, cockpits stripped bare of all instruments, and doorless hatches gaping like empty eye sockets of skulls.
Simon stopped, and Gemma stopped with him.
Turning to face her, he said quietly, “You know I want to leave Earth and go home.”
Gemma sucked in a breath. She’d always known it, but hearing him say it packed quite a blow.
Had she been so naive as to secretly hope that he’d stay with her in the City and make his life here? Without a place to live, without any means of support, constantly looking over his shoulder for Dr. Delano?
Her shoulders slumped. “You want to go home. I understand.”
“You’re coming with me.”
She blinked. “To Enzomora?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve never been there,” the inane words fell out of her mouth.
“I know.” He didn’t sound amused. He sounded serious. “It will be a good place for you.”
“But I… will be the only human among Rix. And I’ve only met one of you in my entire life.”
“You will adapt. You’ll be accepted.”
Gemma didn’t know what to say. Enzomora? It sounded awfully far away. She wasn’t sure on what side of the Universe the planet was located.
“I can’t stay here,” Simon quietly explained. “Sooner or later, Dr. Delano will hunt me down. And you can’t survive without me.”
“If you feel responsible for me, Simon, please, don’t. I’ll find another job. I’ll find a way to survive.”
“Let me put it another way. I don’t want you to have to survive. Not without me.”
They stood there looking at each other until Gemma dropped her gaze. He moved then, taking several steps away, giving her space.
“We will use this to get away,” he pointed at a clunky cylindrical form that leaned drunkenly against a pile of rusted rubble.
Gemma squinted in the dull evening light to make sense of the contraption. “What is it?”
“A ship.”
The “ship,” to her, looked like an enlarged janitorial bucket from the prison. If one had unencumbered imagination augmented by smoking high-quality contraband dope, it was possible to envision it take flight.
“No way.”
Simon gave her what she interpreted as a condescending look. “It’s in a workable condition. I was very lucky to find it.”
“It looks nothing like a spaceship.” The ones she had seen from a distance at the docks, although of variable formations, were all sleek and designed for light-speed. How something resembling an early prototype for a sweeper could leave the ground, much less tear out of an atmosphere, she couldn't fathom. If Simon was serious about going off in this contraption, he must have grossly exaggerated his experience with the intergalactic flight.
“It looks old.” She knew she sounded dubious.
“It is,” Simon acknowledged.
“It’s probably broken.”
“It does need some work.”
Filled with uncertainty, Gemma approached the contraption and inspected a faded inscription on its side: BUTAN.
“Is it what it was called?”
Simon wasn’t interested in the name. “Probably. I can’t read your language. It wasn’t originally a human ship. I figure it was stolen.”
“Maybe it was a gift,” Gemma felt compelled to defend her fellow humans.
“It’s obvious humans attempted to modify this craft to fit their physical characteristics. They couldn't make it work. It doesn't sound like a gift.”
“Are you assuming?”
His lip twitched like he wanted to smile. “Some. It’s a ship made by Pfau. Pfau no longer exist as a nation, after their planet lost its air shield because of a virus that infected the water streams.” His tone was matter-of-fact.
Gemma shivered. “This is so scary. One day y
ou have your home, and the next - it’s gone.”
Simon shrugged. “They all died. That made it easy for them in the long run. After the word spread of their demise, everyone who could space-travel descended on their planet to raid their infrastructure and loot their goods. I can almost guarantee you this Butan was part of some enterprising human’s bounty. Pfau's inventions were genius but very unique, and only a few other races know how to work them. Humans don’t.”
“And you do?”
“I do. This ship uses a technology known as ‘phantom crystals’ to power boosters for propulsion. Effective but volatile, and the compounds used in the crystal powder are not available on Earth.”
She gaped at him. “How do you know so much about old alien ships?”
“It was part of my training.”
“You were an engineer?”
“I was a pilot. Engineers build new ships. I can only fix the existing ones.”
“But it’s not even Rix technology!”
Oh, those fine eyebrows of his. They were designed purely for conveying superiority with one twitch. “Any ship. Any technology.”
Suddenly, it hit Gemma: he was serious. This was a real spaceship. He honestly planned to take it to space.
Okay, she was willing to go to Enzomora with him. But in this?
Her uncertainty changed into dread, and she grappled for an excuse to abandon Butan where it lay.
“You said we can’t get phantom crystals here. There goes that plan.”
“There is enough residue in the boosters to propel it in space.” Evidently, Simon had crawled all over the ship to investigate. “Not enough to fly us to Enzomora, but enough to get to the closest route where Rix patrol.”
She gave up the pretense. “Simon, even if this thing can fly - which you haven’t convinced me it can - how do you see it lifting off from the junkyard?”
He looked pensive for a moment. “I may have an idea about the liftoff.” Suddenly, he leaned down and kissed her on the mouth, setting off a buoyant kind of pleasure within her. “Trust me, it can be done. The real question is, are you ready to go away with me?”
