by Tripp Ellis
I could get used to this.
The first thing I was going to do when I got back home was get a neural ring and connect. If this was the only way I could regain my mobility, I was going to spend as much time in the virtual space as possible—despite the dangers.
Evelyn seemed amused. She watched my newfound bliss. My smile was from ear to ear.
“You know, we don’t have to have sex. We can run an athletic simulation, if you want?”
“I’m down with whatever you want to do?”
She thought about this for a moment. “I meant it when I said you were cute. Let’s have a little fun.” She had a lustful glint in her eyes. Evelyn swiped up and a menu appeared, hovering in the air.
I wasn’t going to argue with her decision.
“So, you have a lot of options,” Evelyn said. “You can change my hair color, my eye color, you can make my tits bigger, if you like.”
“No. I think you look great. I don’t want to change a thing.”
“Really? Most guys want to change something.”
“I’m not most guys.”
Evelyn smiled.
“You can also change your physical attributes, or pick a different avatar completely.”
“You mean, I don’t have to be me?”
“You can be anything you want. You can be more muscular. You can have a bigger dick.”
“That’s kind of up to you, isn’t it? Do I need a bigger dick?” I asked the question with confidence. I never had a problem with size before. I wasn’t pornstar big, but I had never had any complaints.
Evelyn grabbed my crotch, sizing me up. “I think this will work.”
I arched a slightly insecure eyebrow at her. “You think?”
She flashed a reassuring smile. “I think it’s just perfect. If it’s up to me, don’t change a thing.”
My cocksure grin returned.
“So, this program was custom designed for Galaxy Girls. There is a bit of gamification in the simulation. Based on performance, and how well you satisfy my desires, you can earn experience points, increase stamina, charisma, and level up. Earning more experience points can unlock achievement bonuses—threesomes, discounts on future sessions, orgasm replays.”
“Orgasm replays? You mean, like, multiple orgasms?”
Evelyn winked. “See how the other side lives.”
“Sweet!”
I pressed a virtual button that hovered on the menu grid and accepted my default avatar. It was an identical replication of my normal self, minus the disability. It was compiled from my own self-image, along with a scan of my physical appearance made by the neural rings. They were embedded with cameras and had mapped the VIP room, and its occupants.
The simulation displayed a list of stats for my avatar:
Level 1: Virgin
Charisma: 1
Stamina: 1
Skill: 1
Experience: 0
My face crinkled up with disappointment. “Hey, I’m not a virgin.”
“In here you are.”
“Only 1 charisma point?”
“It’s the default.”
“I’ve got way more charisma than 1 point.”
“You’ve got to earn it in here,” Evelyn said with a naughty smile.
“How many experience points do you have?”
“I’m not telling,” she said with a coy grin.
“What level are you?”
“Level 10: Goddess. Of course.” Her smile was adorable.
I reluctantly accepted my lowly status. I was determined to prove my worth.
“Where do you want to do this?”
“I’ve been on deployment for seven months. Just about anywhere will do.”
Evelyn swiped through a number of options, and the virtual scenery changed with each selection. The first option was a plush rug by a roaring fire in a cozy cabin. The next scene was in the bedroom of a luxury high-rise overlooking Manhattan. Floor-to-ceiling windows offered a stunning view of the city lights. Evelyn swiped again, and we found ourselves in a stunning villa that opened to a private beach. Turquoise waves crashed against white sand. White sheer curtains fluttered in the warm breeze.
“This place looks as good as any,” I said.
“I agree.”
Evelyn exited out of the menu, and all indications that this was a simulation vanished. It was just as if we were actually at the location. I couldn’t really tell a difference.
Evelyn slid her lace panties over her sumptuous hips. They dropped down her thighs and pooled at her ankles. She stepped out of them and slid closer to me.
She planted a fat kiss on my lips and began to undress me. It felt just as real as the kiss she had given me a few moments earlier.
She took my hand and pulled me onto the bed. Her smooth skin and supple curves felt amazing. My hands traced every curve of her body. We devoured each other, consumed by passion. It was hot, sweaty, and utterly mind blowing.
I could definitely get used to this virtual thing.
18
Congratulations. You’ve leveled up!
Level 2: Average Joe
Charisma: 2
Stamina: 3
Skill: 3
Experience: 150
Coming back to the real world sucked. I peeled off the neural ring and found myself back in the VIP room on the bed next to Evelyn. I hadn’t really noticed how much better the virtual world felt until I came back. All the little nagging aches and pains returned. My body felt heavy and lethargic. Moving had been so effortless and free in the virtual world. I didn’t want it to end.
Even though the experience hadn’t been real, I still had that post sex high. Endorphins rushed through my body. I looked at Evelyn’s blissful face. She looked like she was feeling as good as I was. “That was pretty amazing.”
“I’ll say. You are a talented boy.”
“I’m sure you say that to all your customers.”
She thought about that for a moment. “Maybe. But, I actually mean it this time.”
“We should do that again.”
“We should,” she said. Her eyes smoldered at me.
I frowned. “I can’t stay. I’ve got to get back to the Mercy.”
Evelyn made a pouty face. “When are you coming back to Gemini station?”
I shrugged. “Maybe never. They’re putting me on a transport ship back to Earth. I’m getting discharged.”
“That’s a bummer. But I’m certainly glad we got to know one another.” She kissed me again.
We got dressed and made our way back down to the club and waited for Mad Dog. Evelyn flagged the waitress down and wrote her number on a cocktail napkin. “Just in case you ever find yourself back on Gemini station. Even if you don’t, you should call me sometime. We can always hook up over the network.” She had a lascivious glint in her eyes.
She gave me one last kiss and sauntered away into the club. I was probably never going to see her again, but I would never forget her.
A few minutes later, Mad Dog descended the steps of the VIP area with a broad smile. Chardonnay clung to his arm. They said their goodbyes and we moseyed out of the club.
“So, how was it?” Mad Dog asked.
“A-maz-ing!”
“And to think, you didn’t want to go to Galaxy Girls.”
“Hey, that was when I had a girlfriend. How was I to know she was going to dump me?”
“You should be thankful she dumped you. That brunette was smoking hot.”
There was no arguing that. I could still smell Evelyn’s perfume, and see her face when I closed my eyes. She was going to occupy my dreams for the foreseeable future. I was definitely going to connect with her again.
“Just don’t get too used to this,” Mad Dog said. “Those neural rings can fry your brain with too much use.”
“Nonsense”
“I’m telling you, it’s true.”
I shrugged it off. An experience like that was worth killing a few brain cells.
Knuckles picked us up on the flight deck and zipped us back to the Mercy. That’s when the good times ended.
As soon as we set foot on the flight deck an angry pit bull of a man snarled at us. Spit flew from his lips as the master chief yelled. “Where the hell have you two dirtbags been?”
Mad Dog and I exchanged a wary glance.
The master chief was a big, barrel chested man whose head disappeared into his shoulders. His stocky build sat atop short thin legs.
Mad Dog stammered, “We were on a humanitarian mission to provide aid and comfort to—”
“Cut the shit, Sergeant Dean!” his ferocious gaze burned into us. He looked like he could tear us apart with his bare hands, then gnaw on our carcasses. “ You want an Article 86? I can make that happen. You’ll both be busted down to privates, spend a month in the brig, and forfeit three months pay. How does that sound?”
“It doesn’t sound very good, Master Chief,” Mad Dog said.
The master chief’s eyes blazed into mine. He stood nose-to-nose with me. I could smell the coffee on his breath. He needed a mint, but I wasn’t about to tell him that. “And don’t think because you’re getting discharged and shipping out tomorrow that you’re going to get off easy. I can keep you here another month. The disability benefits of a private aren’t near as much as that of a sergeant. Have I made myself clear?”
“Crystal, Master Chief.”
His venomous eyes surveyed the two of us. “ I’m going to ask you one more time, and you boys better be straight with me. Where the hell have you been?”
“Galaxy Girls, Master Chief,” I stammered.
He was silent for a long moment.
The last thing I needed was to get busted down in rank and have my disability benefits cut. I was going to have a hard time making ends meet once I got out of the service as it was.
19
So, how was it?” the master chief asked after what seemed like an eternity. He still had a lethal scowl on his face. It was hard to tell from the tone of his question, but it seemed like any answer we gave was going to be wrong.
“Fucking awesome, Master Chief,” Mad Dog finally said.
I guess he figured go big or go home. If we were going to have our lives ruined again, might as well be cavalier about it.
There was another long, unbearable silence. My heart was pounding in my chest. I felt like a little kid that had been sent to the principal’s office.
“Hope is my favorite girl there,” he said.
Mad Dog and I breathed a sigh of relief.
“Given the level of dedication you’ve shown to the Corps, and the sacrifice you boys have made, I’m going to let this incident slide.” He paused. “And the next time you organize a trip to Galaxy Girls, I want in on it. That’s a direct order.” An almost imperceptible grin tugged at his lips.
“Yes, Master Chief,” we both said in unison.
“Now get out of here.”
We strolled off the flight deck before he changed his mind. Just as we were about to hit the exit, the master chief shouted at me. “Archer! I see you got approval for the brace.”
I spun around and smiled at him. “Yes, Master Chief. Just lucky the paperwork came through so fast.”
“Indeed,” he said with a knowing glance.
I found myself back on the flight deck in the morning, ready to board a Nighthawk that would take me to the USS Constellation. It was a long range transport that would take me back to Earth.
Mad Dog was about to hop on another Nighthawk and rejoin his platoon. We clasped hands and gave each other a bro-hug.
“Take care of yourself out there,” I said. “You’re not going to have me to save your ass next time.”
“I know. I’ll never be able to repay you for what you did.”
“You don’t have to. Just make it back in one piece. Otherwise, why the hell did I save you the first time?”
“We’re definitely partying when I get back to the world,” Mad Dog said.
“Absolutely.”
I watched him run across the flight deck and disappear into the fuselage of the Nighthawk. I climbed aboard mine and buckled into my seat.
Nobody had said anything about the exoskeleton. Though, I’m pretty sure it was common knowledge that we had stolen it. I was ready to get off the Mercy and start the long journey back to Earth, but I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sadness about leaving. Sort of like how kidnap victims bond with their captors. I had somehow become a part of the Mercy. Or, maybe, the Mercy had become a part of me. I was leaving a chunk of my soul behind. In truth, it was still down there in the jungle somewhere, along with my ability to walk unassisted.
The fuselage doors sealed, and moments later the Nighthawk lifted from the deck and glided into space. Through the side window, I caught a glimpse of Kronos as we headed toward the USS Constellation. It looked peaceful and majestic. It was anything but.
Still, I was going to miss my unit. I was going to miss the sense of purpose and the thrill of combat. Anyone who says combat isn’t a thrill is lying. It’s an adrenaline rush like no other. It’s almost an addiction. A sick, deadly addiction. But an addiction nonetheless. No other adrenaline high will do. Not bungee jumping. Not skydiving. Not swimming with sharks.
The minute a bullet snaps past your ear, it’s on. The rush of endorphins, the accelerated heart rate, the sense of impending death. Every second and every decision counts. The downtime between missions seemed to drag on forever. The boredom was almost unbearable at times. It got so that we would all crave enemy contact. Something to break up the monotony.
They say that meth addicts experience an endorphin rush so powerful that it burns out their axons and neurons, leaving them unable to feel any kind of pleasure without the drug. Eventually, over time, not even the drug will do. I think it’s similar for combat veterans. How can anything in civilian life ever compare to the sensation of fighting for your life alongside a band of brothers?
I guess I was about to find out.
20
Even with an FTL drive, the journey home was going to take six months. That was a long time in a cryo-pod. The dreams seemed like they would go on forever. You couldn’t escape them. And God forbid you had a nightmare—it could last for months. As I slept snug in my cryo-tube, it took me a moment to realize the buzzing alarm wasn’t part of my dream.
The Constellation was 600 feet long and weighed 2700 tons. Powered by two Hughes & Kessler Q-Core reactors, the ship was capable of reaching the farthest known corners of the galaxy. 200 cryo-pods carried passengers and crew. During stasis, the ship’s limited AI controlled all aspects of the vessel’s functions. It maintained navigation, life-support systems, and controlled and monitored the reactors. Once the destination was programmed in to the ship’s computer, there wasn’t much left for the crew to do. They usually settled into stasis a day after the passengers.
There was a single polycarbonate viewport in the cryo-tube. It was the only thing that kept you from feeling like you were sealed into a coffin. A heads-up-display flickered across the smart glass. It kept flashing emergency in red letters.
A calm soothing, automated voice repeated a hideous phrase over and over again. “Warning. Hull breach detected in sections 23, 25, 29, and 31. Ship integrity compromised. Please evacuate immediately.”
It wasn’t exactly my favorite way to be awoken from cryo-sleep. Not normally one to get claustrophobic, that simple, disconcerting phrase repeating in my ear made the cryo-tube seem exceedingly stuffy.
Sweat beaded on my forehead. The vital stats that displayed on the glass portal steadily rose. Pulse, respiration, blood pressure—all elevated.
They jumped even higher when I pressed the emergency chamber release mechanism and nothing happened.
I poked the damn thing over and over again, but the cryo-tube just wouldn’t open.
I felt the ship rumble as another object impacted the hull. The only thing I could think of was that we had stumbled across a rare meteor sho
wer. There were all kinds of perils associated with interstellar travel. A meteoroid the size of a golf ball traveling at 20,000 miles an hour could easily take out an unsuspecting ship. Pierce the reactor core, damage the atmospheric processors, or destroy the thruster and you could find yourself in a bad situation a long, long way from home. We were so far out, it would take months for anyone to come to our rescue.
I pushed against the lid with all my might, but it wouldn’t budge. I strained, grunting and groaning. My face turned red, and the veins in my neck bulged as I strained to open the tube. My fist pounded against the glass, but they just bounced off. The tube was so confined I couldn’t get the leverage I needed.
The pod filled with my panicked screams as I continued to pound at the lid.
I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. Freaking out about the situation wasn’t going to do me any good. I ran my fingertips along the edge of the lid, looking for a manual release to the locking mechanism. I was finally able to unlatch it. I heaved the lid, and it flipped open.
My hands grasped the rim of the pod, and I pulled myself into a seated position. My frantic eyes glanced around the compartment. I was at the aft end of the pod bay. There were two rows of cryo-tubes, a hundred in each row.
None of them were open.
The master control mechanism must have been damaged by the impacts. At the forward end of the compartment, a breech in the hull the size of a baseball sucked atmosphere from the compartment. Wind whistled through the compartment, venting through the narrow gap. It wasn’t going to take long until all the atmosphere in the compartment had vanished.
My exo-brace was in a storage locker next to my cryo-tube. The ship’s crew had placed me in the stasis chamber shortly after we departed. I grabbed my legs and hoisted them over the side of the stasis pod. Then I rolled over the side and lowered myself down to the deck.
I crawled to the storage locker. My hand stretched out to unlatch the locker, but it was just out of reach. I tried to hop up several times and finally unlatched the lock. I flung the door open and pulled the brace onto the deck. I finagled my legs into the device, then activated the exoskeleton.
