by Olivia Myers
"I don't know what I'm asking. It's just that I haven't even seen you in your real skin. I mean scales. I mean—I don't know anything about Resstessians—there's hardly any information about them—you—anywhere."
"You want to know what I am? You really want to know?" He was abruptly leaning over her, his breath warm on her face, his eyes fierce. "You want to know what life was like on Resstessa? How the sun's dying and our skins had to evolve with almost no ultraviolet, how no photosynthesis means our guts can't digest plants? How we make our air through the sweat and blood of slave labor powering machines that ultimately make the problem worse? You want to know how one man takes twenty wives and how almost none of their brood survives, anyway, because we aren't the big predators on the planet? Does that make you happy?"
"It sounds horrible. I can see why you came to live on Jax-9."
"There are a few of us here. And other planets. As soon as we can, we get away. But most places won't take us."
"How come I've never seen you in my nightclub?"
His face closed up. "I'm through answering questions. Now it's my turn to ask you questions. Like how could you not know you were sending me nude visses? And why is it I can I smell your wet, hungry cunt from doyeens away? Why did you wear that damn Resstessian skin tonight? Is it a thing with you? Does it get you hot, to screw us? Do your nipples always point like that at alien men? Poor thing, human beings are boring, aren't they? Answer my question, Larissa. Does it turn you on to fuck other species?"
Now he was pinching her nipples, softly twisting them, and his mouth attached, suckling. He nuzzled up to cheek, his breath searing her so she flinched.
"I can smell you. I could practically smell you the first time you vissed. Do you have any idea what that does to me?" He nuzzled her throat, and Larissa shuddered, overwhelmed by him, his awful words, the tangle of emotions inside her.
"You seem to hate me," she managed. "None of that's true. I just want you, you stupid clod. I've never even looked at an alien that way before. And it's not your scales and stuff like that. It's your damn voice."
He went stiff, as though her words had given him a jolt. Then he abruptly collapsed on her. Groaning now, he was moving all over her, thrusting through his clothes, and his weight was utterly what she needed. She wrapped her legs and arms around him and moved with him, her world centered on that bulge that thrust against her but not where she needed it.
"Please, Vector...do it...I need...help me..."
But he couldn't, because just then he gave a muffled shout and something hot jetted against her belly. She jerked with shock. The force of his spray was primal. She smelled what a distant part of her brain told her had to be his semen, exotic, fragrant and animal.
"Damn. Damn. Damn." He lay there for a minute, breathing sharply, then swiftly lifted himself off her.
Wow. He hadn't been kidding. He had come right through his clothes. Through the flajec. There was a surprisingly small wet spot right where his cock was. How...?
But she didn't really care right now. She scrambled into a sitting position. "Where are you going? Vector?"
He was back soon holding a towel, wiping her up almost roughly. Getting every last trace of it. She tried to smile. "Well, thanks, that's pretty thorough, but I really don't mind," she said brightly. "I mean, that's part of...."
"You would. It would burn you if it stayed on too long. I used all my tubes. I wasn't paying attention."
"All your what?"
He swore. "Never mind. You're going home. Now. Or else I'm going to keep you here all night and do that again and again."
"But why can't you take me? I want you inside me, Vector." She cleared her throat. "You seem...I mean, don't you want to be inside me?"
"Wearing flaj?" he said sarcastically. "It doesn't work like that. That's one thing that—no. Not going to try."
"You won't take off your flaj?"
He shook his head.
"Damn you," she said. "All right. Just do that, then. What you just did. Again and again, like you said. But," she glanced down at her body, at her flushed skin and swollen breasts and her splayed thighs, which must tell of her arousal better than anything, although from what he'd said, he was perfectly capable of smelling it. "I'm kind of in pain here—I mean, it's a good pain, but, oh, stars, Vector, I ache. Could you maybe touch me too, so I can...?"
He stared at her, and this time she swore he was the one entranced. Then he broke the connection, and Larissa feared he'd tell her to get her clothes on and go....
***
He didn't.
He kept her that night, and he was with her the next, and the next, and the next, so that all the nights blurred together. It was a surreal time. Sometimes they went to his place, sometimes hers. Sometimes they ate out. Sometimes they walked the city, hand in hand. Real human with fake human.
He told her about what it was like to grow up on Resstessa. She told him about what it was like to grow up with parents who indulged her in everything. And while they talked, she secretly tried to make him smile. A real smile. It didn't work. She wondered if he even could. Maybe he didn't have the right muscles.
Most of the time they spent in bed.
"What are we going to do tomorrow?" she asked him lazily one night, her hand stroking his chest. She couldn't think of it as his naked chest, even though he was completely stripped of his clothes and she could feel the warmth of his body. How could she, when she knew very well that this very nicely muscled, handsomely proportioned, sexily endowed if overlong human body was not really him?
The stubborn man. He still wouldn't relent. Not once had he taken off his flajec skin. Not once had he really fucked her the way she wanted desperately to be fucked.
"Nothing," he said abruptly, his skin tensing under her palm. It took a moment to remember her question.
She smiled. "You want to stay in? I was thinking maybe we could go to the nightclub. Do you like to dance? I'd love to dance with you, Vector. There, I really think you could take off your flajec and feel safe...if you wanted to."
The chill in his voice stayed her hand. "I mean we're not doing anything tomorrow."
She sighed. He needed more time. "I guess I could live with staying in."
"You've forgotten," he said flatly. "I thought so. Tomorrow my leave is over, Larissa. I'm on mission again."
She froze. She had forgotten all about it. All about his being a Cogent and working off-planet for six months at a time. It was like she'd been living on another planet.
She blushed. "I don't know where my head is. You told me. It's on your bioplay. Yes, I knew. I guess I thought...or actually, I didn't think." Be honest with yourself. Did you really want to think about how he was bound to leave?
Now she did. And they weren't good thoughts.
She looked at him with her heart in her eyes.
He frowned. "I'll be back."
"In six months."
"Yes."
"And during that time?"
"I'll call when I can. It'll have to be vocplays. But don't expect a lot. Things are complicated."
"What about...women?"
"What about them?"
She wanted to smack him. "When you're gone, will you see other women?"
"Probably. Just as you'll see other men."
Was he crazy? Did he really think anybody else would do? Maybe he had a point, though. Now that her body had been awakened from its too-long hibernation, she didn't know how she'd survive one night, let alone hundreds of them, without male company.
But the thought of seeing anybody but him just made her shudder. "I don't want to," she said honestly. "It's you I want. Only you."
He didn't answer.
Suddenly she had a sinking feeling in her gut. "You're not coming back, are you?"
"To Jax-9? Sure, I'm coming back."
"But not to me. That's why you never...that's why you haven't..."
He was out of bed and baring his teeth. "That's right. Because this whole thing is
doomed."
She drew in a sharp breath. "Because I'm not Resstessian."
"Don't get me wrong. You've been fun, Larissa. But I don't have time for fun. So date all the men you want while I'm gone. I recommend you stick with humans—you're not really cut out for mixed relationships, are you? I certainly will take as many women as I want. When I get back, I may look you up—or not. As for those vocplays, don't wait up for them, okay?"
And that was the last she saw of him.
***
"Well, well, well. If my eyes don't lie, it's you, Lady. Where've you been?"
Larissa nodded gravely at Floyd. She wasn't surprised by his astonishment. Her presence at the nightclub had diminished almost to nothing lately. Partly that was due to her chronic glumness since Vector had stormed out of her life so long ago. But part of it was Floyd, himself, and the increasingly tense climate here at the Wytrium.
In the last several months, normal activity all around the city seemed to have frozen to a near-standstill as the region was wrapped up in a frantic kind of tension. Violence, mostly originating with activities of the Anti-Mix Brigade, was breaking out in pockets all over the city. An alien was shot in a courtroom; a school that taught mostly aliens was burned to the ground. The media was blasting reports of anti-alien sentiment all over town, and the import and sale of flajecs was going through the roof.
Here at the nightclub, Floyd had been acting happy for once. He no longer made any effort to hide his contempt for aliens, and it had been all she could do to pacify the staff, who complained of his rudeness to the non-human patrons.
One night, with her consent, a representative from the pro-alien activist group delivered some brochures to display on the Wytrium's ceiling. Floyd erased them all and then posted a pro-AMB poster in its place. A riot broke out at the club, and she had to come in to troubleshoot.
Since then, she'd been coming in every night simply to keep the peace.
If she weren't otherwise so depressed, she knew she'd have gone further than just hiring a few extra security guards by now. Much as she hated to do it, Floyd had to go. So did several other waitservers and one chef. They weren't doing their jobs and they were making the place impossible for her customers. The only reason she was here tonight was to get the unpleasant task of firing Floyd and the others behind her.
"I need to talk to you, Floyd," she said now.
"Anytime," he said, chuckling. "Been interesting around here lately, hasn't it? Looks like all them foreigners are getting their due, huh? Much fewer around here lately, have you noticed?"
"That's because they're wearing flaj," she said, rolling her eyes. "There are still just as many. It's just that it's not safe for aliens anymore, haven't you noticed?" And you're a big part of the reason why. Why do you and the others have to fear people who seem different from you?
That damn Resstessian Vector Ferhan most of all...
"Whatever happened to that good-lookin' young fancy fellow I saw you with a while back? You and he seemed to be so hot for each other. It's time you settled down with a nice man, Miss Larissa."
Her mind went blank. Who was he talking about? She hadn't dated anyone regularly since Vector. And certainly not any human.
What she had done was launch herself on a flurry of dates with the very people Floyd despised—aliens. That first month after Vector left, she'd gone through every alien listed in The Gallery within a five-doyeen radius. She'd kissed so many strange mouths, walked hand-in-tentacle with so many intelligent but ugly creatures, and dined with so many gut-turning exotic appetites that she could no longer call herself an alien virgin, even though she'd never managed to go so far as to have sex with any of them.
It had been pure rebellion on her part. Whatever she'd been trying to prove, though, she failed. She hadn't enjoyed any of the dates. And not just because they were weird.
Some were very nice. Even attractive. Not really very strange at all.
But they weren't Vector. Vector, who'd no doubt take her failure to make love with an alien as proof of his point, that she wasn't cut out for a mixed relationship. If he even knew about it, which of course he didn't, because he hadn't once contacted her the whole time he was gone. The bastard.
Bitterness does not become you, she told herself sadly.
And then the lights went out and the music around them died.
In the sudden crashing silence and darkness, Larissa's heart stopped. Oh, no. She had a feeling—
Pressure explosions rang out. People screamed. Crashes were heard, and soft thumps followed. She knew that sound. That was the sound of people on airskayts colliding and falling. The emergency softpad popped from below, but she didn't know if it was in time to catch the fallen safely. All the power was out, even the backup. No lights visible except the tiny dim organic ones on the ceiling and the railing lining every room of the Wytrium, making it look like the sky at night.
Even as she called security and the authorities, she knew it was futile. She could hear the panic around her, the shouts, the curses, the cries.
"It's the AMB!"
"Someone call the Cogents!"
Once again, Larissa tried doing exactly that; if they could get here, she was confident they could stop this. As expected, the call didn't get through. She wouldn't be surprised if the whole city was lit up with this tonight.
She tried to calm people down, but that was impossible without lights and with the explosions still happening. Where was security? This was madness. Too close for comfort, another pressure explosion shook her and slammed her against a door.
From too far away came a voice... "They're shutting you down, Miss Larissa."
That voice should have been next to her, but it came from over by the rail. "Floyd? Is that you?" she called.
"Had to tell 'em," came his soft croak. She struggled upright and moved quickly towards the voice, wincing when her leg finally bumped something soft. A body.
"Who? Tell me who, Floyd!"
"The Anti-Mix. Brigade. Not right, all these aliens usin' our services, eatin' our food, mixin' with humans, specially their youngsters....had to give 'em codes...rooms...had to help 'em. Didn't want to hurt you. You shouldn't have opened this nightclub. The gates should never have fallen. Don't know what this world is coming to...."
His voice died. Larissa did not want to think about what that meant. Her throat tightening, she calculated the chances that he hadn't been fatally hurt by that blast and didn't like her sums. Pressure blasts were more of a disruption than a weapon, but to the old and frail they were deadly.
The lights went on then, and Larissa flinched. The light was dazzling. As her eyes adjusted, she caught sight of faces she knew, and bodies—most of them moving, thank the stars. At her feet, Floyd wasn't moving, just as she'd feared.
But the far more disturbing sight was the huge number of black-suited, hooded figures running about, their weapons at the ready.
The AMB. So many of them. And then there was no time to think. Something hit her on the hip and grabbed her, and she was yanked off her feet. She felt herself upturned, her arms flailing. It was terrifying. She craned her neck and saw a black hood. The arm around her waist was garbed in black.
"No!" she yelled and tried to twist down far enough to grab the figure's foot. If she could just get...yes! She got it! But her hand slipped away as her captor shifted her to a different angle.
The high-pitched zip of his artillery whizzed by her ear. The heat from his weapon was terrible. It seemed to burn through her clothes. She yanked her arms and legs and every part of her that she could move, determined not to make it easy for this bastard.
She'd almost lost hope of being released when she felt herself flying through the air. For a moment she thought the power had resumed and they were moving on airskayts—but no. She fell, fell...
...and landed with a thump on the softpad. Even after she landed it felt like she was continuing to fall as it did its job of absorbing the impact. She'd forgotten about the bounce
; as it came, the grabby fabric hooked to the tiny loops in her bodysuit to keep her from shooting right back up. It tore a gaping hole in the side of her suit, but that was the least of her worries.
She looked around wildly. There was no sign of the figure that had grabbed her down here, so she knew it was still on the ledges. There was still nobody airskayting, so no air power; the lights had to be backup. Who had turned it on? The AMB? Black-suited figures ran at the rails all around. But something made a leap of hope jump in her heart. A flash of red. Another flash. Red flashes all around.
The Cogents.
Cautiously she got to her feet. The others that had fallen around her were less ambitious. They were groaning and yelling. Someone pulled her down, and she was thankful, because it probably wasn't a good idea to stick her neck out right now.
The Cogents were here. And now it wasn't a raid—it was a battle.
While the fighting went on, Larissa started herding everyone who'd fallen onto the softpad over to the sides. She wanted them as far under the ledge floors as possible, to get them out of the way of the action. It wasn't easy. Many were injured and their clothes were hooked to the softpad. Some of the more able-bodied helped lift the less-able-bodied ones and carry them along. She saw aliens helping humans, humans helping aliens.
She peered up at the rails where she'd been standing and saw Floyd's body. Someone was picking up the body, and Larissa knew she'd been right. The old man had been killed in the explosion caused by his own heroes. She shook her head.
With the Cogents invading, it took only a short time, shockingly short actually, for the masked black-suited raiders to be taken down.
Soon she saw the reason for the efficiency of the operation. One of their numbers had turned on the others. While the AMBs tried to elude the red figures, the one black-garbed figure kept slipping behind the others and stunning them with pressure darts. She didn't know what made her think it, maybe the size of the figure, but she'd bet anything it was the raider who'd grabbed her and dropped her.
