by Bailey Dark
“I will have it, and Ilisa and her unit, back. With Ceritha. You’ll see.”
“I know you will. Good luck. Be brave.”
“Be brave.”
I saluted Cartari, then left him in control. Ilisa and the seven others were waiting for me in the courtyard, where the soldier I had sent to get my private speeder had left it. She was a beauty, sure and strong, like the sailboat I had given Ceritha. Just a ship of a different sea. She sailed the sky.
I hopped in and looked at the crew. Ilisa had chosen well. I had trained both her and Laro, and a few of the others. The remainder I knew by reputation. All were Bristola Spec Ops soldiers and of the highest caliber.
“We are going to face hand-to-hand combat when we get there,” I said, certain Ilisa had briefed them already. "We will fire on the ship as much as I deem safe with the ship's guns before we board. Who is skilled in piloting this particular craft?" Four of them raised their hands. I looked at Ilisa. She pointed at a young man called Sasby. "Can you control the guns while you fly, as well? Hover effectively? We will need you to have our backs."
“Yes, Commander.”
“Then I trust my speeder to you for this mission.”
“I’m honored, sir.”
“Keep us safe. Keep our pride. Achieve our goals.”
Sasby stepped into the pilot’s chair, trimmed her up, and launched us into the air.
We whipped a backwards way out of the harbor, to make sure we weren’t hit by any errant projectiles, and swept around the ships from the oceanside, sneaking up on the Endeavor so that we passed lower than the ship’s deck.
There were five pirates on the deck and they were dead with the laser guns before they even knew we were there as we buzzed just over the top of them. Six more ran on deck when they heard the whip of the guns and they were lasered down with the next fly-by before they could telekinetically throw anything at us that struck with any impact.
Sasby hovered over the deck and the seven of us dropped down and he whipped away to hover just off the deck, but with the Endeavor in between the speeder and the other ships. We landed in the darkness and crept quickly across the deck and around the masts, to the Captain’s quarters, Ilisa and Laro slaying he and the First Mate where they conferred, not even knowing they were under attack. The other five of us snuck down the stairs to the lower decks, combing through the few sailors remaining.
I led the way to the bottom armory. Back in the dingy, flickering light, behind the boxes of cannon ammo, grenades, bombs, and other projectiles, I could just make out the shine of metal bars of a cage. Ceritha’s cell…
“Ceritha!” I called, moving slowly, sword extended, throwing knife in my left hand, one of the other soldiers right behind me.
"Axis!" Her bright red hair was a flash of welcome fire in my soul as she leaped up from her wool blanket in the corner to grab the cage bars, no hiding the joy on her face, as she heard my voice. The blanket fell away and revealed a badly ripped and dirty dress, and there was a bruise on her face that made my heart break and my fists clench around my weapons, ready to blast holes through the walls of this ship with anger.
“Are you hurt?” I asked, sheathing my weapons and coming to the cage quickly, searching for a key somewhere near.
“No, no, I’m fine. He just hit me when he knocked me out and my dress got ripped in the struggle. It’s okay. I’m just so, so happy to see you…” Her voice was the sweetest honey in the heights of summer. The most unique snowflake in the depths of winter. The gentlest leaves falling in autumn.
“Commander?” I turned to look at the soldier that had followed me down. In her hand was a slender set of lock picks. I waved my hand in permission and she quickly knelt down to go to work on the lock. In quick time, she had popped the lock and Ceritha was leaping into my arms.
I soothed her hair as she clung to me, her legs wrapped around my waist, fully holding onto me, and I squeezed her tight. The soldier finished a complete scan of the deck, then disappeared back up the way she had come. The ship was silent, just the lapping of the waves outside rocking against the boat.
I found her. I rescued her. She is safe. She is in my arms. I have her back safe. She is mine. My Princess is safe. All I have to do is hold her forever. I just have to keep her safe forever.
“Commander?” Ilisa’s voice interrupted my thoughts.
“Yes, Bravo?”
“I am sorry to interrupt, but I would like permission to take the speeder and take down these other ships in this cove in this manner. At least these other back ships, one at a time. We will be careful about how we do it, so that we don’t trigger an alarm. They are clearly just waiting back here.”
I hesitated. We ran the risk with the strafing. Since it was using laser weapons, they flashed and lit up the night with their light. "Permission granted. Minimize the laser guns due to light attraction. One ship at a time. Report in often. Be brave."
“Confirmed. Thank you.”
I pulled back on Ceritha’s hair to look at her as I gently knelt to the ground with her. We were alone on this massive pirate ship.
I leaned in to kiss her.
All I wanted to do was kiss my Destin.
Sixteen
Ceritha
As Axis lowered us to the floor, he gently pulled back on my hair and I looked into his eyes, mesmerized by the concern I saw there. He had truly been worried about me. I placed my hand on one side of his head and he leaned into it, closing his eyes and breathing out deeply. I could feel all that intense fear, anxiety, relief, and joy, that he had found me. He had found me. I had the same intense emotions flowing into him. We were alone on the ship and I was safe. I am safe.
“Did Rensi give you my message?”
“Yes. I spoke with the firefin.” He smiled and leaned his forehead in to touch mine. A shivering warmth spread from where our skin touched. He gripped my shoulders and massaged his fingers into them, pinpoints of fire against my bare skin. I gripped his back and breathed in the intense flow of our connection.
“Can you feel this, Ceritha?” The telepathic thought pressed into me, as if he were reaching directly into my mind, the thought flowing into me, sinking through my brain, down my throat, permeating through my blood vessels, spreading through my body, reaching into my soul.
I nuzzled my head back and forth against his and nodded, tears springing to my eyes.
“What is this, Axis? What is this feeling?” The warmth spread, sparks lighting up the dark around us as we drifted deeper into each other. Our hands founds each other in the dim flicking fluorescent lighting of the pirate ship armory. The sparks were coming from us.
“You’re my Destin, Ceritha… You’re my soul, my everything. You’re my Destin…”
I rebelled against the words, a spike of desire for the independence I had so solidly held myself to my entire life leaking into my thoughts, pushing back against his impression with a violent shove of Will, but a flood of warm gelatin wrapped around and through my body, spreading and shaking my every cell, as he pressed his body into mine, reached for my lips with his, wound his arms around me, and lay me back onto the deck floor. He exuded his every emotion into my mind, his affection, his joy, his oneness… his love…
I couldn’t deny it. It overwhelmed me and softened my thoughts, softened my lips, made my hands tangle into his hair and my legs rub against his…
I am his Destin.
Axis whispered kisses along my jawline and down my neck, kissing my collarbone and down my breastbone. He pushed aside my dress’s torn neckline to kiss the rise of my breasts, getting ever closer to the nipples, but never quite close enough. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the adoration, the telekinetic hold making my mind a blur of color and sight and smell, like my senses were overwhelmed, too.
I held tightly to his hair as Axis moved down my body, pushing my dress up to reveal my legs and panties. He looked at me for permission, then slowly tugged them downward. His eyes grew wide and he had a sharp intake of breath as
he gently spread my legs wide, settling down in between them, and then flicking his tongue at my clit.
I gasped and nearly reared up to a sitting position.
I settled back down, my hands in his hair, as he sucked in on my clit, long and hard, the tongue worrying it around and around, and I was breathless. One of his hands gripped tightly to my thigh while the other reached up and played with one nipple and then the other. We were a tangle of arms and he was a tangle of tongue and spit and licking and loving to suck on my wet, wet pussy.
He penetrated me with his tongue, sticking his tongue in and lapping at me as deep as he could get, in and out and across the labia, around and around, flicking faster and faster, then slowing, then sucking, driving me mad. My eyelids fluttered.
He brought his hand down and my heart beat even faster, as he gently inserted one, then two fingers into my pussy, curling them up and teasing the g-spot just right. He twirled them around as he thrust in and out, all the while his tongue still playfully flicking at my clit and sucking in and out.
“I want you inside me…” I breathed out.
He paused, just slightly, but kept teasing me. I gasped and moaned again, getting closer to the edge, closer to the climax. I pulled up on his hair and made him look at me, his dark eyes lovely and loving.
“I want you inside me…” My thought was a demand.
“Are you sure?”
“I am… please… Axis… my Commander… my Prince… I want you…”
“I’m yours to command, Ceritha.”
He knelt up and stripped off his shirt, revealing the gorgeous crisscrossing firefin tattoo, then undid his belt buckle. He smiled at me as I involuntarily licked my lips. I blushed a little. Then he turned to take off his boots and pants, turning back to me when he was fully naked, a gorgeous, rippling muscle, divine god of a man.
“Are you sure you’re ready?”
“I am… just go slow with me.”
“I will. And tell me if I’m hurting you.”
Since I had never done this, I didn’t know how deep I would be able to let him get, but he was huge. I couldn’t imagine that I would be able to handle all of him. I had been able to take him deep throat, but I was well practiced in that… This was different…
My heart was beating fast and my fingers were trembling against the straw strewn deck floor. I couldn’t believe I was finally going to let this happen…
I wanted it…
Axis moved back on top of me, playing with my clit with his fingers, revving me back up. I felt like I might purr.
He moved the tip of his huge cock against my clit and I swooned. The size of just the head was daunting. He slowly eased the tip in, looking at me the whole time, his eyes kind, hungry, sincere, desirous.
Then he slowly, slowly, pushed all the way in.
The lights of the ship flickered, ripples of light flickered through our bodies, sparks lit up the room, an echo of our supreme pleasure coursed through our minds into each other, rockets exploded in my mind, my entire body surged with ecstasy as he filled me up, delight ricocheting off the walls of my pussy and pulsing through my veins. I was a ship set free, I was a bird in flight, I was a tiger in her glory.
Axis watched me with a pure smile of joy and desire. His breath had caught as he entered me all the way. “You’re so tight. God, you’re amazing.”
I surged with senseless pride. “Come into me again.”
My Prince pulled out and thrust into me again, again slow, but this time with more pressure at the end. Then again, and again, and again. I was catching the rhythm.
“Kiss me, Axis…”
He leaned down to me and kissed me. I pulled him close, holding him in tight to me, our faces just apart as he thrust in and out. I began to scream as he came in harder and faster. He gripped me tight and I raked my fingernails down his back. Lights pulsed out in little ripple circles from my fingertips on his skin. I could hardly keep my eyes open. He was hitting my g-spot as he moved, a gyrating movement thrust that was driving me wild.
“I’m getting close…”
“Me too…” He gasped the word out loud, kissing my face as he spoke, and then he was pushing back from me and slamming into me harder and harder and I was screaming and gripping at his chest and lights were exploding in my brain and my body was seizing as the orgasm gripped my body. The world turned prismatic, a kaleidoscope rainbow of bizarre transfiguration that I couldn’t define. I tried to blink my eyes, focus my vision on his face, his beautiful, moaning, climaxing, face, as he gripped at my thighs as he came, shaking, sweat-slicked, slamming hard into me, shivering, my own orgasm gripping him so hard…
“Ok…ok…ok…” He gasped.
I was trapped in the aftershocks, my body quivering, quiver after quiver, arching up, clenched down on his cock so hard. He pushed off my stomach and winced as he gingerly slid himself out of me. I breathed hard, trying to release him, still shuddering.
Then he collapsed on me, nuzzling his head onto my chest in between my breasts, hugging my arms, one hand against my face, holding me tight.
I soothed his hair, holding him, in awe, trying to calm the shaking.
I breathed out a shivering sigh. “That was amazing… Are you okay, Axis…?”
He nodded against my chest. “Yes… I’m so wonderful, Ceritha… So wonderful. That was amazing. You’re amazing. Are you okay? Did I hurt you at all?” He pushed up to look at me, true concern on his face, strong arm muscles rippling in the flickering lights.
I brushed at his hair. “No, I’m fine. It was amazing. I am glad that we did that… I wanted you. I want you, Axis. I want you forever. I want to be your Queen.”
“My Destin.”
There was the slightest customary bristle at the idea of being tied to someone so fully, but I quickly calmed it and smiled at him.
“Yes. I will be your Destin.”
Axis tapped his fingers against my breastbone for a moment. “Listen, I know it’s hard for you to give up your independence, but I really want what is best for you and what will be a strong partnership for us. We can make this work, okay? We can be Destins. We can be the best partners. Together. We just have to trust each other.”
“I know… I’m sorry I took out the StarChaser. I’m sorry I disobeyed your order and caused you such trouble.” I sighed. “I know even right now you are needed elsewhere…”
“Yes. I need to get back to my duties…” His look was faraway. Then he shook his head sharply. “The reason the pirates want you is to be able to teach them to telepath to animals. Cowrie said Murex has been missing. It is possible the pirates have him, too. Do you think that’s possible? Have you heard anything about that?”
I shook my head, but my stomach dropped. “I haven’t heard anything about that. I hope that’s not true.”
“Well, I will keep some of my soldiers looking for him. We have plans to take a pirate captive in order to try and find out.”
I nodded, biting my lip, fearful suddenly for my dear friend and scientist comrade. I had just thought he was sulking about being transferred to Farian and off exploring one of the coves. He had been gone for two days, but he often disappeared unexpectedly on Serpul. He was a strange, solitary creature. He had better be okay… I turned back to Axis. “You better get dressed then.”
He looked at his clothes reluctantly, then bit at my nipple. I squealed and pushed him off me. “Come on, Commander. You have a war to lead.”
“Yes, Princess. And I need you beside me.”
“Let’s do it, then.”
We quickly got dressed and then Axis communicated with Ilisa. Axis told me that they had taken two more pirate ships during our lovemaking session. They had also taken a few POWs and were currently interrogating one of them. They would try to find out about Murex and any plan related to the use of ocean animals.
As we started to head up to the top deck, I stopped Axis and grabbed him into one last kiss.
“Be brave, Axis.”
“I
will, Princess Ceritha. I have my Destin to be brave for now.”
I smiled and let him lead me up deck, beaming at his back. I can’t believe it: I am his Destin.
As we burst out into the moonlight of the deck, not only the smiling faces of Axis’s soldiers greeted us but also the glow of the setting moon and the fading stars. Off the bow of the ship, a scarlet firefin spun up into the air and arced back down. Rensi, my first Farian ocean friend and fearless confidante. I wondered if he would be able to help us in the battle that was to come.
“Rensi, can you have your tribe standing by?”
“What do you need us for?” It was amazing how clear the connection with him had become. I believed it was a sign of his confidence in me.
“We are going back to the Bristola main harbor where the battle is taking place. We might need you. Can you please meet us there at dawn?”
“Yes. We will be there.”
Rensi spun up into the air and the Farians watched with awe, perhaps understanding that I was speaking to him. Axis slipped his hand into mine as we watched him go. Then he turned back to his soldiers.
“Where are the POWs, Bravo Ilisa?”
“Tied up on the furthest back ship.”
“Did you find out anything about Murex?”
“He was also captured and has been used to teach Gorgin and a few other pirates how to open themselves to telepath with animals, but it hasn’t been very successful. The animals are very standoffish, as you might imagine.”
“They only opened up to me because I was able to show them examples of me on Serpul with my firefins and dolgons,” I said.
“That is likely true. Our ocean animals have been scarred by mistreatment and by the fear of the blue flu. Plus, we have never been able to communicate with them. These are new waters we are trying to swim.” Ilisa seemed like a very intelligent leader. I liked her right away. I regretted not letting her guard me…
“Well, I just asked Rensi to bring his tribe close to the harbor. Maybe they can help us with the battle. They will be there by dawn.” I looked to the sunrise. It was already starting to lighten over the town and cliffs of Bristola.
