“Hal has been keeping me entertained with tales of your past conquests.” Oh, shit. “You certainly got around.”
My irritation with Hal for his indiscretion was moderated by Gemma’s reaction, which was to find the whole business rather amusing. “Erm… yeah. I became quite popular.” At her request, Hal had shown her a few minutes of several different clips, all of them involving me fucking somebody. There was one with the three Science Ministry girls, and my getting a blow-job in the back of the car on the way to the Institute. There was the orgy at the concert, of course, and numerous examples of Falik and I either in bed, or elsewhere in our apartment. The Raptor sucking me off. Even a short clip of me licking out Aldara on Holdrian, curtailed only by the cameraman falling off whatever ledge he had been perched on. I could see the funny side, but few girls enjoyed the idea of their partner having ‘gotten around’ to quite this extent.
“Hal explained how exotic and desirable you seemed. Some things never change”, she quipped, giving me a warm hug and a tender kiss. “What’s the plan for today, then?”
I smiled knowingly at her. It was still dark outside, not even 3am yet, but we were both rested and ready to start the day. “Well, we’ve got a couple of things to do, and we need to get started. Did you check on Brunel and Wright out in the garage?”
They had just about finished by the time I got there, having finished breakfast and spent a few minutes playing with Gemma on the sofa. She whimpered slightly when I told her to be patient, that today was busy and we had to get cracking. Following me to the garage, she said, “I got really turned on watching those movies… hope you don’t mind”. I didn’t. In fact, I was enormously relieved.
The little construction robots had made a spherical, glass submersible with an airlock underneath. There were a couple of controls, some air tanks distributed around the circumference of the sphere at mid-level, and a simple five-blade propeller unit at the back. A black module was slung under the sphere itself, and it seemed icy cold. The robots were just putting the finishing touches to the pair of seats which fit snugly within the sphere.
“What’s this for?”, Gemma wanted to know.
“You’ll see. We’ve got to get moving. Hal, are the Relocation transponders in place?”
“Yes, I have a good signal from both. Our range is currently 74.3 miles. Beyond that, accuracy is degraded. There is sufficient signal at the lake to transport the sub from point to point. They were made to resemble rusty tin cans and our drone dropped them both in the more remote parts of fields”, he added, obviously proud of himself.
“And the fuel?”
Forager and Brunel had also been busy with another small project, and six tanks of liquid hydrogen were installed in a coolant unit underneath the sub.
“How about Operation Cunning Plan?”
Hal let out a little chuckle. “All set. You may proceed when ready.”
We needed a few more minutes. “Gemma, come back into the living room and let me talk you through the plan. You need to understand this, too.” I laid it out, explaining for a few minutes to a startled, excited Gemma. We packed a few things into my rucksack, went over the plan one more time, and climbed into the sphere. It was cosy, with just room for the two couches and our gear, more of which was stored in the module below.
“So what exactly is Relocation?”, she asked, while I powered up the sub’s systems.
“An ingenious form of transport. You remember ‘beaming’ here and there in Star Trek?” She confessed to being a part-time Trekkie, which helped no end in explanations of this kind. “Well, the transponder makes a copy of the contents of the Relocation Field. Right now, that’s the sub an everything in it. There is a Field generator in the equipment module beneath your feet. Once the Field is established, the transponder moves the Field’s contents from its original location to any other location within its range.”
“Can anything go wrong?”
“No”, I said, sounded as authoritative as I could. “Very well-established technology. I’ve used it myself a number of times. Besides, it’s our only way out of our current bind.”
The sub’s systems reported in and were all in the green. “Ready?”, I asked.
“Sure. Beam me up”. We smiled at each other, kissed for a long, loving moment, and then sat back in our seats, strapped in.
“Engage, Hal.”
We arrived with the suddenness I had come to expect of Relocation. I flipped on the sub’s exterior lamps and they illuminated the murk we were now floating in. I rotated the sub, allowing the beams to search in all directions, and gained an idea of the sub in three-dimensional space. We were about 35m down, 240m from the Phoenix. It was 4.14am, so we had another hour until the sun would begin to rise. The Cruiser’s own transponder was providing a beacon, turned on by Hal at the moment of our departure from my garage. Time to get moving.
“You OK?”, I asked Gemma, who was staring out of the large windows at the impenetrable darkness of the water. A small fish darted into, and quickly out of, one of the beams of light. There was a lot of silt in the water, reducing visibility to nearly zero.
“Sure. I’m just under a lake in a submersible”. She turned to me and smiled. “I had kind of expected the weekend to involve more lazy sex, and less aliens and lakes, but I’m cool with it.” I squeezed her hand, and then lay in our course. The sub began descending steadily and we turned 30° left and motored slowly forward. There was no real sensation of travelling, more of floating in the murk. As we passed through 60m, we saw a larger fish swim alongside us for a while and then peel off.
Our lights caught something ahead. It was just a glint, but we were close enough that I knew it to be the Phoenix. Sure enough, as we completed our descent to 110m, the ship revealed herself in the murk. It seemed that every molecule of water was partnered by a molecule of floating mud, hiding almost everything from even our powerful lamps. “How the fuck did those divers ever manage to get a reflection off the ship? You can’t see anything down here.”
We approached steadily, wary of colliding with the hidden Cruiser. Sensing our approach, Hal ordered the ship to rotate 180° so that the hatch, on the Cruiser’s belly, was easier to reach. I aligned the sub neatly with the airlock, allowed her to descend the final meter, and felt the odd thump beneath us as the docking probe slid home and three more jolts as the Cruiser’s hatch locked us into a hard-docking.
“Got it. OK, now the atmosphere in the Phoenix has been equalised to our current pressure. We’ll let that bleed off once we’re airborne. Ready to transfer over?”
I was asking a lot of Gemma, I knew. It had been less than 24 hours since she had first heard the panicked conversation in my living room and begun to piece things together. And here she was, bold as brass, about to climb into an alien spacecraft whose existence was known only to one other person on Earth, and he had spent forty years travelling in it. The weirdness level must be off the charts by now. She was doing great.
I unclipped the hatch and swung it up, revealing the Cruiser’s own inner hatch. The mechanism was smooth and easy to operate, I noted with relief. I pulled the handle and the hatch opened, swung down and gave Gemma her first glimpse inside the Phoenix. Everything looked fine, the cabin lights were on, and the heater made sure the environment was comfortable.
I gave Gemma a quick tour of the ship before requesting an exposure suit from Forager. The thought of leaving her alone in the ship unnerved me somewhat, mostly in case something happened to me outside in the dark water, but this had to be done. I donned the suit, returned to the airlock and allowed it to fill with water once more. Once outside, the sub’s lights kept me straight. I unlatched the first of the hydrogen tanks from the sub’s equipment module and attached it to the refuelling nozzle under the belly of the sub. Each journey required me to haul the tank out, drop down a few meters, locate the nozzle, and attach the tank. It only took a minute for each tank to deposit its hydrogen into the Cruiser’s fuel supply, but it was exhausting wor
k. Finally, I grabbed the Forager, stowed under the sub by its cousins in my garage, and headed back to the airlock. By the time I climbed gratefully back into the warm, well-lit cabin and was given a huge hug by a very relieved Gemma, I was panting heavily.
“Thank God that’s over”, I breathed, waiting for my heart rate to return to normal. “Hal? Go ahead and deploy Operation Cunning Plan. Let’s get out of here.”
I took the pilot’s seat and reacquainted myself with the ship’s computer. Losing no time, and making sure Gemma was strapped in next to me, I ordered the Phoenix to prepare for departure. Her engines came to life, readouts began displaying data, and the ship thrummed with potential. “Ready, babe?”, I asked Gemma. She nodded, with a slightly worried expression on her face. Couldn’t be helped. At least she wasn’t freaking out. I couldn’t have been more impressed.
I brought the throttles forward and the ship responded immediately, scything through the dark water. It would only take a second, I knew, and we would be up and away. Phoenix shot out of the water like a rocket, causing an eruption of steam and spray which was probably visible for miles, and then accelerated into the sky. I pushed the throttles as far as I dared in this thick atmosphere, and within ten seconds we were three miles up and tipping over into our orbital attitude, heading East and leaving Snowdonia behind.
Back in the lake, sub’s equipment module opened up and a large object unfurled, taking up Phoenix’s old position at 110m down. Then, its work done, Hal engaged the Relocation system once more and the sub arrived instantly back in my garage, dripping with muddy lake water.
The darkened hills of Wales gave way to the brighter lights of London, and then the west of Europe, as we climbed through the night sky. In only eighty seconds, we were a hundred and sixty miles above the Earth and had adopted a neat, circular orbit. I shut down the engines to perform standard checks and glanced over at Gemma. She was enraptured, jaw agape, staring at her home planet from space for the very first time. I remembered the sensations of being above Takanli, and the bitter-sweet return to Earth in this very ship. We soon reached the Earth’s day side as we approached central Europe, and Gemma gasped at the beauty of morning sunlight on alpine lakes and snow-capped peaks.
“We can’t stay long, I’m afraid, babe… The Americans probably think we’re a nuclear missile, given how fast we left the surface, if they saw us that is…” That was a fairly major concern, actually. Getting into the atmosphere, accompanied by the burning fragments of a long-passed comet, was kid’s play compared to getting off the Earth unseen. I had hoped no-one was looking for an ICBM launch from Wales. It did sound faintly ridiculous.
I prepared Phoenix for our next burn and chatted with the computer, checking systems and generally catching up. Gemma couldn’t take her eyes off the Earth. We were over India now, progressing East towards east Asia and the Pacific. It was time to move on, I knew, hating the idea of depriving Gemma such a marvellous sight-seeing opportunity. “Don’t worry, babe. We’ll have other chances, and we’re going somewhere just as cool. Ready for the burn?”
“OK. Just promise me I’ll see this again.”
“I promise. We have to come home on Sunday, anyway!”, I chuckled, and warmed up the engines for our first burn. The computer reckons it’s about thirteen hours to our destination, so we’ll have time to chill out after all this madness. How are you doing?”
She was fine, loving it, in fact. The strangeness was beginning to fall away, and wonderment was taking its place. This wasn’t the time for freaking out, but for taking it all in, relaxing and enjoying the show. I gunned the engines and we rocketed out of orbit and up to 0.8% of the speed of light in a few minutes.
Gemma turned to watch the Earth and the Moon disappear behind us as the ship accelerated to our cruise speed. “So where are we going, exactly?”, she asked.
“Don’t worry about that for now. Unbuckle your straps and see what you think about zero-G.” I let her float around the cabin for a while, checking systems and giving final instructions to the computer. “You OK back there?”
“Yeah! This is fun! What’s this fridge for?”
She was pointing at the stasis chamber. “I went to sleep in that thing for forty years. It slows down your heart and all your bodily systems, so you don’t age. Brilliant invention. Takes absolutely ages to wake up, and I was seriously thirsty and hungry, but I wouldn’t spend four decades in deep space any other way.” She admired the chamber with curiosity. “I’m about done setting up our cruise. Want some lunch?”
It was about midday by now anyway, and I was getting hungry. We had ten hours to kill, and food was only the first distraction I had planned. The replicator, to which Gemma was getting more and more accustomed, produced seafood salad and bread so fresh it must have come direct from the oven, commented Gemma.
“Amazing. Think what a difference these would make on Earth. Whatever food you wanted, anytime, made from just water and energy.”
“Not just food”, I reminded her. “Anything of which the ship’s computer has an imprint. For more powerful computers like this one, that means virtually anything in the known Universe.” I turned to call back to the computer, which was organising our stately cruise. “Computer, please produce two Class-J Takanli spacesuits based on our measurements.”
The Forager hummed into life as we finished our salad and began to produce white fabric and metal fittings. Within an hour, the two suits were finished, in parts, and I began putting them together.
“Erm… why do we need these?”, Gemma asked, perplexed. “We’re not going out… there, are we?”
I smiled at her. “Relax. Nothing can go wrong, and this will be the coolest thing you’ve ever done.” I turned once more. “Computer, time to arrival burn?”
“Five hours, eighteen minutes”, was the reply.
“OK, I want you to begin a complex construction sequence with the Forager. I’ve had an idea”, I winked at Gemma. “Computer, get me deep space versions of Forager and Brunel. Fill Forager with water and attach a large fuel pod containing as much water as is practicable. Seal both for Jovian orbital work.”
“On the way”, responded the Computer.
“What’s the plan?”, asked Gemma, clicking together some of the fittings of her suit.
I completed mine and clipped it to the wall next to the stasis chamber. “The biggest problem about space is that it doesn’t contain very much. If you’re a long-distance traveller or explorer, opportunities for refuelling or taking on more water are few and far between. That’s why Hal and I decided to take every opportunity to put in place a deep space infrastructure. We’re going to collect small amounts of hydrogen from Jupiter’s upper atmosphere and store them in huge tanks which will orbit the planet. That way, if anyone is coming though here and needs some gas, it will be on tap.”
Gemma thought for a second. “How is little Brunel going to manage all of that?”
I chuckled. “Well, the harvester machine will have as much water as Phoenix can spare, which means between them they can create machines of almost any size. Hal designed a huge scoop which has its own power source and thrusters, and just orbits Jupiter in an ellipse. On closest approach, the scoop passes through the upper layers of the atmosphere, collects a load of gas, takes it away on its long orbital loop and liquefies all the different gases through fractional distillation. You remember from high school chemistry?”
“Kind of”, she admitted. “Sounds clever”.
“It is”, I beamed. “Hal tells me we can store up to 400 tonnes of hydrogen a year doing this, and that’s just with one machine. The harvester units can produce anything from hydrogen too, so we can spend some of our profit making something else, like an orbiting telescope or whatever.”
Gemma was stunned by the plan. Entirely automated, independent, crafting its own future, we would put in place a sentient manufacturing system to mine the clouds of Jupiter. And there was no way anyone would see it unless they were here.
“
Anyway, if you’re finished with lunch, I thought there was something else we might try.” I must have had a lustful twinkle in my eye.
“Oh, really? What might that be?”
Gemma naked is a wonderful thing. Flowing black hair, gorgeously firm breasts, soft curls that hide her pussy, wonderful proportions. Gemma in zero-G is even better. Her hair floated around her, until she tied it back, and she seemed so free and relaxed, balancing herself between floor and ceiling to allow me to touch her. I caressed her ass, gently squeezed her breasts and tweaked her hardening nipples, and kissed her almost constantly.
Her first zero-G sex was terrific. I held her close and slid rhythmically in and out of her, enjoying the feeling of her pussy lubricating my shaft. We bounced gently off walls and ceiling, maintaining a rough equilibrium, entwined in a bundle of limbs, floating hair and naked skin. I told her about the dangers of my coming outside her body, particularly given the amount of cum I was producing at the moment, and she held me close, keeping me inside her, until I was ready. Our tongues mingled, carrying little erotic, electric shocks throughout our bodies. I held her ass, feeling the pressure of each thrust and reaching under to feel my hardness, moistened by her cunt, as I gave her strokes which filled her.
When I was ready to come, I had Gemma grasp two of the grab handles on the ceiling and held her ass with both hands, pounding into her with my full length. She came just before me, pulses of pleasure rippling through her soft, wet tunnel. I let it happen, building to a wonderful climax and then spurting jet after jet of warm, sticky cum into her juicy cunt. I had pushed very deeply into her, spurting directly into her cervix, so that the sperm wouldn’t drip straight out and into the cabin. We held each other, kissed and stroked one another, until Gemma told me she had to go to the bathroom, lest the cabin become decorated with a new, rather sticky shade of white.
Voyage Page 41
