Not Another Hero

by Wendy Rathbone

Armstrong turns onto his stomach and rests his chin on a jeweled fist. (Rings are his favorite ornament.) His perfect backside shines in the sidereal light, copper-brown. “I’ve been trying to figure out who. And well, it has to be Danielle, don’t you think?”

  “Danielle?”

  “She just isn’t the Hero type, Stir. Haven’t you noticed? She’s strange. She’s not playing to the cameras, she doesn’t like multiple sex partners, she’s stuck on her brother, and the most damning peculiarity of all, she’s smart.”

  I shake my head. “She’s no scientist. She’s just disillusioned. With five missions back-to-back, she’s tired. And she likes to act smart but it’s all a performance. I can see right through her.”

  Armstrong shrugs. “I don’t know. Who else could it be?”

  “Well, Drac, maybe,” I say. “Danielle is way protective of him.”

  “Nah.” Armstrong disagrees. “He’s too gorgeous, probably the best looking guy on board. No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “And he’s kinda dumb. I tried to start a conversation with him once and he looked flustered. He couldn’t even use the food dispensers at first. I had to show him.”

  “Yeah, I had a similar experience. He’s the strong and silent type, but kinda dumb, yeah. He was hired because of his looks obviously. It’s his first voyage. He’s just shy and Danielle is showing him the ropes. He’ll come around.”

  “I suppose. Anyway, rumors are just rumors sometimes. Nothing to worry about,” Armstrong says, though the conviction is missing from his deep, usually booming voice.

  “If it’s true,” I say, grasping the end of my bleach-blond ponytail and brushing it across my lips, “what would be the point of putting a scientist on Lacrosse?”

  “To muck it up? Make us look bad?” Armstrong guesses.

  I inhale. My hair smells like sex. I totally need a shower. “Why?”

  He rolls to his side. There’s a damp imprint of his body on the smooth sheet. The starlight tries to absorb it. “I’ve heard the technicians and scientists back home want back in space. Maybe if we fail, they can get public support?”

  “Hmm.” I watch the porthole, the silent, night-woven fields we Heroes love so much. Nothing moves. It’s as if we’re at a standstill and not hurtling six-hundred-twenty-eight million kilometers in eight weeks to the largest planet in our solar system.

  I suddenly have the urge to write bad poetry. Armstrong, whose specialty is drama, will later recite it. Stuff like this is what the public craves. It’s something our scientists seem incapable of giving. Our fans pay well for holos of our months in space. And we treat them to every delicacy, from sex to sculpture to daring acrobatic space-walks. Our lives are a performance. Art.

  Armstrong suggests, “You should check into the background of everyone on board. As captain, you’re the only one with access.”

  That would be real work, something I’m not used to. The script never calls for a real mystery where the loose ends aren’t already figured out and programmed for us. This is supposed to be a straight-forward voyage, filled mainly with sex and traditional psychological tension. Armstrong and I even have a high-charged lover’s quarrel prepared for the return trip.

  But now everything is wrong. With Danielle breaking character and acting smart, even scientific-like, the camaraderie is off-balance. And now if the rumor is true, well, I don’t want to think about the money I’m going to lose when those royalties don’t come. Real life is a bore. No one will buy the recordings of this voyage if we have a real problem to solve.

  “Moon crap,” I sigh.

  Chapter Three

  I delay researching the rumor.

  There are two reasons for my procrastination.

  One: After my hot session with Armstrong, my ratings went up. That’s more money for me. Bottom line: Sales are good. Why fuck with the program if it’s going well?

  Two: I’m not sure I need to know the truth. Or want to know. If I act innocent, even ignorant of what might be going on, none of this falls on me, right?

  Except technically I am the captain. It is my role. And if my behavior deviates from that role, will my acting be called into question?

  We are method actors. We are highly rated because we are good. If our behavior becomes contrived, self-conscious or false, the viewers notice and leave bad reviews. Bad reviews, if you get enough of them, can end a career.

  We are actors, yes, but we must be natural, be ourselves. You can’t pretend to like sex in space. The pleasure has to be somewhat real for you, or you’re fucked.

  I find myself conflicted.

  The only other time this happened was when I thought I might actually be falling in love. That was a long time ago, my second mission. I was newer. Younger. A part of my brain could not help but equate really great sex and all those endorphins with falling in love.

  I’d been extra crew back then on another ship. A low-ranked grunt. John Luke had been my captain. He was older, experienced, and made my mind fly. I had orgasms with him that lasted whole minutes. I craved him. I wanted to stay up nights just fucking him all night long.

  The script called for a love affair without saying who, when or for how long. He took me into that script. He seduced me well, even wined and dined me.

  I spent that voyage in a state of euphoria, and it nearly killed me to find out he did not feel the same. He enjoyed me, of course, but he was a pro and he knew how to keep himself aloof. John Luke did not form attachments. At least not for long.

  He let me down gently. Over time.

  The fans ate it up.

  I even cried. To this day, only John Luke knows my tears weren’t glycerin, but real.

  It took me a few weeks after that voyage to settle. The rush of chemistry I’d felt between us—me and John Luke—subsided. I called myself all kinds of fool and moved on.

  I’ve told no one this, but I still feel twinges to this day when I think of him, when I roll my eyes at my young self for being so naïve, so easily confused. Maybe what I felt was real, but John Luke did not return the real feelings, and so nothing could ever have come of it.

  I protect myself well, now. I’ve learned how to have fun and be careful with my emotions. I learned how to leave all my tenderness at the door, and focus on the physical pleasures. The good times. Even friendship is allowed with me, but only so far.

  This is how I prefer it.

  I am never lonely.

  Or so I tell myself. At any rate, I never lack for attention. That’s for sure.

  *

  I distract myself with other crew. Beautiful bodies. Sweat gleaming in view screen starlight. Hunter with her gold-mesh fashion sense. Shariff with his Caribbean blue eyes. And as much of Armstrong as I can get. He’s so fun and open.

  I’m careful to watch my crew for real attachments, but they’re all professional. Tried and true. Even Danielle, who’s been such a cock-tease, lightens up over the next week or so.

  She goes for the female crew, mostly, and I see it gets her ranking points. She won’t let me at her, but that’s all right. The tension that may or may not exist between us plays well for the script.

  On my part, though I find her yearningly beautiful, it’s her brother’s mystique that plays with my brain. I can’t get the rumor out of my head.

  Is he undercover? What’s his agenda? Will he hurt this mission and all our royalties?

  Every time I try to get close to him, he finds an excuse to be elsewhere. That is, if he even ventures out of his nest.

  For example, today he comes out for a quick meal. I happen to be in the mess hall when he arrives, literally on the coattails of Danielle. By literally, I mean she is wearing a long, diaphanous wrap about a tight purple skinsuit, and it trails in her wake. He walks so close to her the ends of the wrap flutter and caress his shins and thighs.

  His head is up, though, not down like sometimes, and his black hair shines like space itself. It curves about his beautiful face, shadowing and highlighting th
e light bronze contours of his cheeks.

  He’s dressed all in black, as usual. This time his pants are low cut with disturbingly enticing “V’s” below his navel and at the back, exposing half his ass.

  He’s tight everywhere. A vision. Skin, muscle, sinew all long-limbed and flexing. His arms are bare, his tank top black net leaving nothing to the imagination. One beige nipple pokes through a hole in the net, hard.

  We’re used to beautiful bodies in our line of work. If we don’t come by them naturally, we buy them. Of course Drac must be enhanced. So it shouldn’t matter to me. Just another beautiful guy on my crew. I’ll fuck him good and when we return home, the vids will sell like hotcakes.

  So why do I stare more intently? Why does my entire being gravitate toward him? Is it simply the mystery? The rumor?

  But it feels like hot tendrils on the air putting out feelers, probing me, just to be near him. My body heats and chills. Spikes of pleasure zing through my arms, legs, belly, and groin. I’m instantly hard when he’s near.

  Do the others feel it, too?

  I glance around me. Hunter is eating and looking at a vid on her tablet. She doesn’t even look up. Armstrong is making coffee. He does look up, but then he looks at me, one eyebrow raised, and gives me a half-shrug. He’s suspicious, but not hard.

  Just another pretty face. Coming for breakfast.

  Drac glances once at me, then away. He moves around his sister and takes a seat without getting himself any food or drink. He has a tablet in his hand and sets it on the table, immediately turning it on.

  I’m at the end of the table, finishing my scrambled eggs.

  Danielle goes to Armstrong. They talk low, then she takes two cups of coffee back to the table. She sets them down, one right in front of Drac, and looks up at me.

  “Morning, Captain.”

  I nod. “Danielle.” I look at Drac, whose head is bowed now, hair half-covering his face. “Morning, Drac.”

  Drac tilts his head without looking away from his tablet. “Um hum.”

  The script does have general descriptions within it. Drac is arrogant, standoffish. Plus, this is his first mission. He doesn’t have much rank. He is supposedly learning the ropes. His sister is like his mentor. If there is more between them, I haven’t seen the recordings yet.

  But there must be some already on the market, I’m thinking, because he already ranks high and taboo sex, last year's trend on Earth, might maintain a lot of followers. Still, he's brand new. So why would someone who is unknown and stays to themselves (or with only his sister) be so quickly alluring? Even the best don't chart the numbers so quickly.

  And yet he is alluring. Even to me, a seasoned pro.

  “What are you learning about today, Drac?” There must be some conversation. The scene cries for it.

  “Hyper-drives.” His answer comes out in a monotone.

  “Good.”

  “He learns fast,” Danielle puts in.

  “Hope it’s not all work and no play.” I smile. I’m a friendly captain. The kind who loves his crew. In more ways than one.

  “Drac is still getting used to space,” Danielle puts in.

  “Of course.” I nod.

  “He’s not spacesick, is he?” Hunter asks from her place down the long table.

  “No,” Danielle says.

  “Can’t he answer for himself?” she asks.

  Drac sighs, tapping his screen, then glances up but does not look at any one of us. Instead, his eyes roam the ceiling. “I am not spacesick,” he assures us in a firm tone.

  “Well, if you have any problems, we all have pointers. There’s sickbay if things get dicey.”

  “No problems. No spacesickness,” he replies. He blinks, looks to the side and briefly meets my eyes. His are dark and bright. Something alive is behind them. Something excited, nervous, but also kept hidden. I see it briefly. I could flatter myself and think it’s me that he finds me attractive. But I know it’s something else. More. He says, “If I feel any symptoms, I’ll inform you and sickbay at once.”

  “Good.” I keep my voice neutral but my heart is fluttering at that look in his eyes, something grand, exciting. Shining. Like he’s about to pop. This is what the vids are showing the fans back home on Earth. It’s subtle, but you can’t miss it. They are eating it up. But what is it?

  The mystery keeps them watching.

  It keeps me wanting.

  I’m the captain, so I can give orders. Quickly, I come up with one. “I’d like updates on your progress. Meet me in my office this afternoon at two?”

  The corner of Drac’s mouth turns up. This is the most response I’ve seen to any of my inquiries or attempts to start conversations with him since the mission began.

  “You want to talk about hyper-drives?” he asks.

  “Anything you’re learning. I live for progress reports.” I give him my perfect smile and my best flirtatious posturing without looking too overt.

  “I’m sure you do,” he says.

  It’s almost as if he’s patronizing me. Almost. But not quite. Because his look isn’t disgusted, or hostile, or anything like that. It’s more indulgent. As if I am a child.

  Even that feeling turns me on. It’s not weird. I like bossy lovers. It would be more than okay if Drac bossed me around. Naked. In bed.

  “See you then.” I get up, quickly take my plate to the disposal unit, and turn to grab my coffee.

  I look toward Drac, but he’s back to his tablet again, tapping and reading, his hair glowing, his posture perfect, the “V” in the back of his pants showing the upper half of his ass-crack. Taut cheeks on either side. Two dimples accenting the smooth knobs of his lower spine. The shadow in the crack is like a beacon. My cock twitches as if to say, “Home.”

  I’m stupidly infatuated. And he couldn’t care less.

  I think of John Luke. I’m not going to repeat that mistake again, that’s for sure.

  Chapter Four

  Why am I nervous?

  I sit at my clear, plasti-glass desk in my office playing with my lucky coin, an old Earth relic. A gold dollar with the image of Sacagawea on it. I flip it over my fingers back and forth, a magician’s trick I used to practice for hours when I was a plain and lonely kid.

  The viewport to my left shows dark space but I’ve used the screen controls to enhance the image to purples, blues and greens. They whirl at random, as if we are on the outskirts of a quasar.

  Everything in my office is shiny and clean and reflects that light in soft glows: on my desk, against the bulkheads, puddling on the smooth flooring where my plush, black rug ends. I can’t see myself, but I imagine my blond hair is tinted by that light as well, flirts of peacock tint.

  I know I look good. But will Drac think so?

  Just asking myself that question makes me even more nervous. I don’t get insecure about my looks. Ever. I’m made for this job. I love it.

  The coin flips faster across my knuckles, then falls to the floor with a sharp clang and jingles to a rest. I’m staring at it as the buzzer on my door goes off.

  “Enter.”

  Drac walks in, so lean and tall he could look awkward, but he isn’t. He’s perfect. He moves like he’s had ballet lessons, shoulders back, arms at his sides, feet firm on the deck.

  My breath catches in my throat. I swallow hard. He’s a dark-edged beauty and he intimidates me like no one ever has.

  I’m immune to shyness or nerves. Over the years I’ve developed into a goddamn preening narcissist and not ashamed of it. I’m always in a role, and it’s easy. Life is a charm for me. But Drac knocks me right off my pedestal and my mind becomes filled with voices, all my own but saying different things.

  You want him so bad, but what if he’s an ass?

  Rumors say he has eyes only for his sister.

  This is his first flight and rumors of a scientist aboard lean toward him.

  He’s dangerous which will make this fun.

  He’s dangerous which will make this for
ced, contrived.

  The viewers will love you.

  The viewers will hate you because you’ll fuck up and come too fast. Or you will, for the first time in your life, not be able to get it up.

  I had performance anxiety only twice in my life. My first time right after the makeover had me still getting used to this body belonging to me. I fucked a gorgeous crewman on the way to the Moon. I let him have me again and again, in all ways, flushed and open, but I was shaking the whole time and could not maintain an erection.

  I hid it well from the cameras. But Tobi knew and treated me gently when I needed it, soft and slow and sweet. I climbed the charts fast. If the camera adds ten pounds, well, it also shows every vulnerability. If you’re skittish and your eyes flick about, it can show that ten times more than you might be feeling it. My vulnerability, lucky for me, ended up playing great to the audience and I rose fast in the charts and in my roles on future voyages into space.

  The second time I had performance anxiety was when I realized I was in love with John Luke but it was unrequited. I was required to continue to fuck him at least two more times on the way back to Earth after our mission was completed.

  I said I cried. Well, only in private. I did not show my tears to my fans. But my body closed itself off from him. It took all his sexual talents—and he had many—to get me off. Our ratings tanked and I left John Luke with a confused smirk on his face. There had been anger in his steel blue eyes.

  Afterward, I went to my agent and said I needed it to be in all my future contracts that I would never work with John Luke again. When my agent asked me why, I refused to answer. But he obeyed.

  Now Drac stands before me, and those sorts of feelings rise up in me. An anxiety I haven’t felt in years. But I’m the captain, and this is my mission. I tell myself there is no way some upstart, no matter how magnificent, is going to get the best of me.

  Oh, but he’s wearing those same trousers, the ones with the “V” in the front that shows his shaved abdomen almost to the base of his cock. You can see the way the skin begins to dent there, and the curve of his junk begins just at the leather’s edge. His skin is tan, firm. The abdomen taut with flat, hard muscle.