Outcast

by Alex Douglas

  Everyone laughed, and Lan smiled to himself. Even he had visited Vix's place, not that any of the others knew. And it had been very pleasant indeed. He'd remembered the kindness of Maki the very first time he'd been there with Prez and Doc, so bewildered and scared it made him laugh to remember it. He had been prepared to give her some money toward her departure from the brothel, but Vix had informed him that Maki's man had finally turned up with some sob story about an ex-wife and a laser disemboweller, and they had left the port together some weeks previously.

  Then the cooking android arrived with some bowls of Azari nut porridge and there was no more talking for a while. It was one of the biggest improvements on the previous ship, Lan reflected, savoring the sweet taste of the milk and the crunchy texture of the nuts. The new android could make food that tasted almost like the real thing.

  "Thought I'd find you degenerates here."

  "Prez!" Flack exclaimed. "Man, you missed all the action."

  Prez gave Lan a shy smile and sat down beside him. He looked well rested, happy, and his mind was calm as far as Lan could tell. He smelled faintly of chemicals from the shower, and his black hair was sculpted into a spiky and irregular style. It looked as if he'd been cutting it himself. "Action?"

  "Vix's," Vaxel said, his mouth full of porridge. "New menu, apparently."

  "I might try it myself, next time," Glitch said, shooting a look at him and sighing. "I never get any."

  Flack laughed. "Well, as they say on Andra, if you don't have the gees, you don't get the whees."

  Prez looked around and grinned. "Everyone ready for our holiday?"

  Lan swallowed a huge gulp of porridge and wiped his eyes as it scorched its way into his stomach. "I have done considerable research into the blue planet," he managed to say, fanning his mouth. "It has been loaded into your Tablets. They have similar but primitive devices there, used for reading literature. You will be able to use them unnoticed."

  "I've seen your research," Prez said. "We could spend the rest of our lives reading it. Great job, of course. Think you could condense it a little? What are the risks?"

  "Aside from the fact that there is no approved list of vaccinations for that planet, you will need appropriate documentation, if you are apprehended by any law enforcement officials. I have taken the liberty of forging some... passports. I believe that their computer systems can easily be breached, both remotely from the Outcast II and from your Tablets. It will therefore be relatively simple to make yourselves... legal."

  "Lovely," Prez said. "Anything else?"

  "All of you should be able to blend in easily. However, your eye color--" He looked at Prez, "--is Akilian. If anyone draws attention to it, you may say that you are wearing..." He paused, trying to remember the alien words. "Contact lenses. You should also be aware that your vocabulary and pronunciation may have diverged from the original language spoken in the country you wish to visit. In the event of misunderstandings you may tell them that you are... European. That should divert any suspicions."

  "Well, if those are the only things you'd assess as risks," Prez said, rubbing his hands. "Then we're good to go!"

  Lan raised a warning finger. "If any of you should fall ill or have an accident, you must return to the ship immediately. Medical professionals will not be so easily fooled. And I have also secured medical personnel for this trip, as a precaution."

  "Doc's coming too?"

  "Doc is coming. He will board in the morning when he has finished his administrative work."

  Prez leapt up from the table and started dancing around, letting out big whoops of excitement. "Come on, people!" he said, his eyes shining. "We're going to the blue planet! What do you think about that! A real adventure at last!" Then he hugged Lan and kissed him all over his face, leaving smears of porridge on top of the little blue blushes. Lan felt his brain light up with the searing light of Prez's happiness, and his heart pounded blissfully.

  As Prez bounded out of the room, Glitch stroked Lan's face and smiled. "It's so sweet, the way you go all blue when he touches you. I wish I had an Aldorian man."

  "Anything is possible in space," Lan said, and -- remembering to look different at last -- gave her a grin.

  ***

  On the last night before the Outcast II reached the edge of Andran space, Prez left Flack at the controls and buzzed Lan's quarters. It was late; his body was tired, but his mind was racing. Thinking about the blue planet and the people who lived there and the songs the original abductees had sung to keep their spirits up in the compounds at night. They were all long gone, but children they never knew they had lived on, children who were going...home.

  Lan opened his door, blinking sleepily. "Is there a problem?"

  Prez looked at his naked body and smiled. "You're a sight for sore eyes."

  "I do not understand. Your eyes are sore?"

  "It's an old saying from... somewhere." Prez stepped into the room and the door swished shut behind him. The room was dark, lit only by the time display on Lan's bedside console. It was fresh inside, set on a cool temperature with just a faint scent of shower chemicals and the flowering honey-smelling plant Lan had brought from Aldor. He felt oddly nervous, looking at Lan standing in the dark with the glow of the figures edging his body in a pale green light.

  He remembered how Lan had looked, skeletal and dying on his bed, and grabbed him in a sudden rush of feeling. "Thank you," he whispered, smoothing his palms against Lan's back.

  Lan's arms wrapped around him in a strong grip. "What for?"

  "Everything. I'm sorry I've been so preoccupied."

  The faint touch of Lan's fingertips on the back of his neck sent a shiver through his body. Then Lan released him and took his hands in his. "It is a pleasure for me to be with you, whether you are preoccupied or not." They touched foreheads for a moment and Prez's mind swam suddenly with an intense feeling that made his whole body light up as if hot baba juice had just been poured into his veins.

  "What was that?"

  "Perhaps you are beginning to understand," Lan said. He stroked a finger down the side of Prez's face, down his neck, dipping into the little hollow at the base where a faint pulse was beginning to beat harder.

  "Oh God, Lan," Prez murmured, carried away by the feeling of arousal spreading over his skin, like a forest fire started by one match. When Lan kissed him there, the hot wet feeling made his knees go weak, and he buried his fingers in Lan's thick hair, trying to catch a breath because it felt as if his lungs were shrinking in his chest. Backing away for a second, he yanked his jacket off and let it fall to the floor. Then the shirt; his fingers were shaking so much he could hardly undo the buttons. He cupped Lan's face in his hands for a second then kissed him, pressing his body against Lan's. The feeling of skin on skin was wonderful. Lan sucked gently on his lower lip for a second, and then Prez kissed him again, harder this time, touching his tongue against Lan's and wondering why the hell he hadn't just thrown caution to the wind and tried it ages before.

  They crashed together onto the bed, and Prez rolled over so that he was straddling Lan's body. He put his palms on Lan's stomach and slid them up to his shoulders, up his neck, pulling himself forward so he could get more of those hot kisses. Then Lan paused, breathing heavily. "This situation would improve if you removed your trousers," he said. "The material is... chafing."

  Prez sat up. "Ruin the romance, why don't you," he grumbled good-naturedly, yanking off his remaining clothes.

  "It was not my intention to ruin anything," Lan said. "I am... inexperienced at this form of encounter."

  "Me too." Prez snuggled up beside him and threw an arm over his chest. As he said it, he realized how true it was. Paying for sex meant no effort to please was ever required on his part. It had been a long, long time since he'd had a partner who actually liked him, and he felt the touch of nerves in his belly, just for a moment.

  "Well," Lan said, stroking his finger against the orchid tattoo. "It is a matter that will require careful
research."

  Prez pressed his palm against Lan's chest. "Where's your heart?"

  "Here." Lan took his hand and guided it down to the center of his torso, where Prez felt the thumping pulse...and something else. The tip of Lan's cock was resting against the back of his hand, spreading moisture against his skin. He lifted his hand and licked it off. It was a sweet taste, like the juice of aska fruit in summer. He slid down Lan's body and licked again at the source, then sucked it into his mouth as Lan's body stretched under his hands. It was as if Lan's cock was a living thing, the way it twitched and moved in his mouth, throbbing with the beat of his heart.

  "Mmm," Prez said and massaged it with his hand for a second, stroking Lan's balls with the other. "I could do this all day." Then he stretched his lips down the thick shaft as far as he could and swallowed, humming to himself, ignoring the heat of his almost painful erection that trailed against the sheet, focusing on making Lan make those faint little noises that were driving him crazy.

  Lan's body was starting to tremble, his hands grabbing at the sheets. "I would have no objections..." he gasped, "if you were to do that."

  Prez laughed around his mouthful of cock, sensing that Lan was pretty close to the end. He felt Lan's fingers in his hair, the involuntary twitches in the muscles of his thighs, and sped his motion, sucking harder and faster, slicking a finger with saliva and circling it around Lan's asshole, then pushing it inside, not knowing if he'd find what he was looking for, being unfamiliar with Aldorian anatomy... but his finger touched against something that sent Lan's pelvis arching off the bed and volleys of hot liquid into his throat. He didn't know if the scream was in his head or his ears because just for a split second he felt a spike of arousal in his mind and groin, so intense that he could hear music crashing inside his skull. Almost without any warning his own climax hit and his vision went white for a second as he was lost in sensation, delicious pulses that faded in intensity until he collapsed into the puddles of his own ejaculate, barely able to move.

  The music faded and the darkness crept back into his vision, and he dragged his tingling body back up and rested against Lan's heaving chest, hauling breaths of air into his lungs as the delicious afterglow spread around his body like liquid sugar. Lan's skin was covered in a faint sheen of sweat. He reached for Prez's hands and kissed his fingertips, then pulled him close.

  "What was that?" Prez asked, when he could talk again.

  Lan's fingers tangled idly in his hair. "I was intending to ask you the same question," he said. "What did you touch? It was...aah. I lack the vocabulary to articulate it."

  "You know all the features of the AutoNav system but not your own anatomy?" Prez smiled and spread his hand out over Lan's heart, feeling the beats start to slow. He ran his tongue around his lips and rested his head on Lan's shoulder.

  "Mm." Lan sounded sleepy. "I will look at a diagram in the morning."

  "Is that your language? The music?"

  "I do not know how it sounds to you. It is not music. It is my mind, my feelings. Most pleasure is in the mind. But you are not a telepath. You will have to make do with my body."

  Prez was silent for a while, smiling in the darkness. Feeling the warm body beside him, not going anywhere. No money to hand over, quibbling about torn bed sheets, mind racing ahead to what needed doing on the ship. It was nice. More than nice, it was... perfect. "I think," he said eventually, "I can make do just fine."

  Then he realized that Lan had fallen asleep. He smiled to himself and pulled the covers up around them and snuggled in close. There would be plenty of time for more research.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The blue planet. For so long it had been just an idea, a place where the first abductees had once lived, a place talked of in stories and songs. Prez had been very young when the last of the originals had died, from a disease caused by some harmless microbes in the water. Their bodies had withstood the experiments of the Doctors in the sterile labs, but once out in the compounds, it was living on Akilia that had killed them in the end.

  Without hope of ever seeing their homes again, they'd kept the memories alive in stories and songs, and it was one of those songs that came back to Prez then, as he and the others sat on the beach, feeling the heat of the sun on their skin, breathing in the salt smell of the sea and unfamiliar dishes being cooked nearby, and listening to the people all around them.

  He hummed the tune and Vaxel joined in, and they looked at each other, and Prez knew that the others were just as overwhelmed as he was.

  Lan had been able to work miracles from his station on board the Outcast II, making reservations in a hotel right in the middle of a place called Miami South Beach, finding a suitable location to hide the shuttle and securing some currency that Prez realized could keep them living in luxury for a good few months. The sand was white, the sea a sparkling blue, and there was barely a space to sit close to the water. There were bodies everywhere. Prez had to force himself to remember that these weren't ku-tah, but just... people. And so many of them. He stared at a man whose skin was the color of burnt baba beans, striding over to a garbage receptacle with a bag in his hand, his buttocks on display with a string disappearing down his crack and barely holding the material in front around his considerable package.

  "This is fucking weird," Flack said. "No one's looking at us."

  "Look what that man's wearing."

  Flack peered over, shielding his eyes with his hand. "Oh man. Call that wearing? Looks more like dissection to me. Think I'd look good in something like that?"

  "No!"

  "I don't know about you," Glitch said, examining her legs. "But I'm getting burnt. Let's get a drink."

  "That's the best idea I've ever heard." Flack rubbed his hands together.

  They wandered along the promenade, staring at the tanned bodies of the passers-by, the extreme variety of hairstyles and skin colors, the flip-flop sandals that seemed very common. Prez's feet were roasting inside his boots, and sweat was running down his back, soaking into his shirt. "I don't know what century Lan researched, but our clothes are all wrong."

  Glitch smiled and slipped off the ankle-length smock she'd been wearing to reveal a tiny two-piece swimsuit decorated with artificial Belaari fruits. "That's better." She adjusted the wide-brimmed straw hat she'd bought in the hotel lobby and struck a flirty pose.

  "You go, girl!" a passing man shouted, grinning, sticking his thumbs in the air.

  "Okay, that's one of us who doesn't look like they're dressed for a polar region," Prez said. "Come on, that bar looks cool inside. I'm boiling alive here."

  The bar was called CoCo @ Sobe, and had tables and chairs outside under large, colored umbrellas. Inside, the walls were pale blue and adorned with some paintings of trees with a bunch of long leaves fanning out above what looked like hairy brown nuts growing at the top of the tall, thin trunk.

  "Hey," Flack nudged Prez. "A testicle tree, you'd like that."

  Prez laughed and threw an arm around Flack's shoulders. They sat at a booth far away from the open front, under a machine that blew out a cool breeze. There were some posters on the wall, all showing variants on a theme; white faces with sharp incisors, green faced monsters with pointed ears, people with scars and bolts on either side of their necks. A menu sat propped up on the table beside some shakers. Prez had discovered that they contained salt and pepper, after sprinkling them liberally onto his breakfast pancakes and almost making himself sick.

  A couple of men sat at a nearby table, sipping blue drinks with little umbrellas in. Flack pointed over at the blue drinks. "I'll have two of those," he said when the waiter came over. He was a tall, thin man dressed in a crisp white shirt with a funny-looking tie at his neck, dark skin the same tone as Vaxel's and a huge dimpled grin that he flashed all around the table.

  "Two Blue Lagoons? Coming right up!"

  "Me too," Vaxel said.

  Glitch looked at the menu and then at the waiter. "What do you recommend?"

  "Ho
ney, everyone comes here for the CoCo Special. How about it? You guys look like you're from out of town. Welcome to Miami!"

  "Specials for everyone then," Prez said. "And two of those blue things for me too. Can you recommend any place to buy nice clothes?"

  The waiter whistled. "That's a lot of drinks! You guys got something to celebrate? Anyway sure, there's a few stores nearby, I'll just draw you a map. You want designer or something for a smaller budget?"

  "Anything."

  One of the men from the other table got up and put some coins into a machine at the wall, then sat down again. He was wearing a T-shirt with some words scrawled across the top of a drawing of a beach. The little people in the picture weren't wearing any clothes. The cold air from the machine was drying the sweat on Prez's back and making him shiver, but it was nice after the scorching heat outside. He watched the pen move in the waiter's hand and spread his hands out on the table. Same. It was the oddest feeling.

  The waiter finished his drawing and passed the slip of paper across the table. "There," he said. "Ask for Sophia. She has an eye for style, and you sure could use some of that around here! But you know tonight's the biggest costume party in town?" He gestured at the posters on the wall. "Anything goes, supernatural, alien, Disney... make up your own, but it'll be a blast!"

  "Alien?" Glitch gasped, and Prez kicked her under the table. Then music started pumping out of the machine, and they gaped at each other for a second.

  "The King!"

  "This is the most surreal moment of my life," Flack said, watching Glitch hauling Vaxel up to dance, squealing and clapping. The rubber fruit bounced on her costume as she wiggled her ass in time to the familiar song. Vaxel got right into the music, eyes closed, ass jerking from side to side, pumping his fists in front of him as if he was beating an exercise bag.

  "It's crap not being able to read," Kris moaned.