by Olivia Myers
More of those dark animal noises emitted from his throat, and she suddenly became aware of a hard thing stabbing against her abdomen. His member, she guessed. If her instincts were right, that thing was far, far bigger than she'd ever expect a human man's cock to be, and her sex tightened instinctively around his fingers in fear. Now that could hurt her.
But she didn't have time to think about that. The band of his arm was suddenly squeezing her midsection, and she could not get the air out to tell him. Instinctively she let go with her arms. When he grabbed for her, she sucked in a breath and grabbed her chance.
"Too hard," she gasped. "I can't breathe—when you hold me that hard—round the middle. That's where my air is."
He stilled. "Right," he said hoarsely. Then he swung around and she found herself perched on the bathroom sink.
The next few minutes were insane. Water seeped through her clothes and she kept falling back into the basin and bumping her elbows. But she hardly noticed; this was all about those long fingers slathering her flesh with her own juices and pumping her until she was mindless. It was about that rock-hard body thrusting against her, searing hot even through his clothes, and most of all it was about his voice, sounding out the anguished lust of some otherworldly beast.
She came with a small scream. Right when a knock came at the bathroom door.
"You okay in there? Hello? Anyone in there?" More knocks. The door rattled.
The shock was awful, but it wasn't shock making Larissa's body jerk. "Vector! Did—you—lock it?" Unfortunately, between one thing and another, she didn't really hear anything he said until the delicious spasms had stopped.
"Why didn't you stop your orgasm, woman?" His voice, his body—everything about him had transformed. He sounded utterly sane and fully in control. "We've got to get out of here. This can't reach the news. You want this on visplays all over the city before morning? No? Good. You got suddenly sick. You have a stomach bug. I'm helping you. Got the story?"
Wildly, she looked at him, none of his words making any sense. She focused on the—to her—most important part. "Stop my orgasm?"
As for him, damn him, his lust seemed to have truly gone as though he'd simply stripped it off like a flajec. How?
"I can't stop it when it happens," she argued. "Don't tell me Resstessians have some kind of super orgasmic control. That's crazy. You couldn't stop it. You said, yourself—"
"But all Resstessian women can—never mind. Get dressed, and let me do the talking. You're coming home with me."
***
She felt like she was in the middle of a dream. But this was all too real.
It seemed that dating Vector involved one major embarrassment after another. What was disturbing was that somehow that didn't matter right now.
She was in his unit. It wasn't quite the hole in the wall she'd expected, but it certainly wasn't fancy. A typical one-room unit in a typical sectioned housing tower. Regular furniture. A surprising lack of personal items.
She was on his bed, because...well, he'd put here there. He'd pretty much swept her in his arms and airskayted her to his place, then stripped off her clothes and laid her on the bed.
No offering of drinks. No small talk. Just standing there breathing hard and hovering over her, studying her head-to-toe with that endless, unwavering stare that didn't give her time to think twice about this—if she'd even thought about it the first time. As for that look...she was under no illusions that he didn't know what he was doing. He was deliberately controlling her. She swallowed and said, "Will you please look away or tone it down or something? I can't look anywhere else when you do that thing with your eyes."
He blinked. "Right. I forget."
She glanced down to where she expected his cock to be. He was still dressed in human clothes, masked by flajec skin. But there it was, that bulge, unmistakable, and...impossible. Way, way too much bulge. There was no way on Jax-9 this would work.
What were these Resstessians? She was beginning to see why he'd been so reluctant to meet a human woman. Before things went much further, she had to know more. She blurted out the thought uppermost in her mind. "Vector, can Resstessian women really control their orgasms?"
He answered tersely. "They have complete control over their sex organs. It's for making the eggs they lay."
"Making—you mean making babies? Oh," as he shook his head. "Then..." She stopped. If she went on with this, she would get scared off the idea of sex with an alien.
But some things she had to know. Risk-taking she might be, but not reckless with a death wish.
"Are you cold or warm-blooded?" she demanded.
He hesitated. "Warm." Then added, "Mostly."
"Herbivorous? Or carnivorous?"
"You saw me eat meat."
"Do you have claws?"
"You don't need to know that."
Her eyes widened. "Yes, I do."
He was stony.
"Okay, how many eggs do Resstessian females lay?"
He scowled. "They're women, not 'females.' About a dozen at a time. And yes, they all hatch. Do you have to know all this now?"
"Where do they...I mean, how do they..."
"You're not going to get pregnant when I fuck you, if that's what you're asking," he said crudely.
"I don't know what I'm asking. It's just that I haven't even seen you in your real skin. I mean scales. I mean—I don't know anything about Resstessians—there's hardly any information about them—you—anywhere."
"You want to know what I am? You really want to know?" He was abruptly leaning over her, his breath warm on her face, his eyes fierce. "You want to know what life was like on Resstessa? How the sun's dying and our skins had to evolve with almost no ultraviolet, how no photosynthesis means our guts can't digest plants? How we make our air through the sweat and blood of slave labor powering machines that ultimately make the problem worse? You want to know how one man takes twenty wives and how almost none of their brood survives, anyway, because we aren't the big predators on the planet? Does that make you happy?"
"It sounds horrible. I can see why you came to live on Jax-9."
"There are a few of us here. And other planets. As soon as we can, we get away. But most places won't take us."
"How come I've never seen you in my nightclub?"
His face closed up. "I'm through answering questions. Now it's my turn to ask you questions. Like how could you not know you were sending me nude visses? And why is it I can I smell your wet, hungry cunt from doyeens away? Why did you wear that damn Resstessian skin tonight? Is it a thing with you? Does it get you hot, to screw us? Do your nipples always point like that at alien men? Poor thing, human beings are boring, aren't they? Answer my question, Larissa. Does it turn you on to fuck other species?"
Now he was pinching her nipples, softly twisting them, and his mouth attached, suckling. He nuzzled up to cheek, his breath searing her so she flinched.
"I can smell you. I could practically smell you the first time you vissed. Do you have any idea what that does to me?" He nuzzled her throat, and Larissa shuddered, overwhelmed by him, his awful words, the tangle of emotions inside her.
"You seem to hate me," she managed. "None of that's true. I just want you, you stupid clod. I've never even looked at an alien that way before. And it's not your scales and stuff like that. It's your damn voice."
He went stiff, as though her words had given him a jolt. Then he abruptly collapsed on her. Groaning now, he was moving all over her, thrusting through his clothes, and his weight was utterly what she needed. She wrapped her legs and arms around him and moved with him, her world centered on that bulge that thrust against her but not where she needed it.
"Please, Vector...do it...I need...help me..."
But he couldn't, because just then he gave a muffled shout and something hot jetted against her belly. She jerked with shock. The force of his spray was primal. She smelled what a distant part of her brain told her had to be his semen, exotic, fragrant and animal.
"Damn. Damn. Damn." He lay there for a minute, breathing sharply, then swiftly lifted himself off her.
Wow. He hadn't been kidding. He had come right through his clothes. Through the flajec. There was a surprisingly small wet spot right where his cock was. How...?
But she didn't really care right now. She scrambled into a sitting position. "Where are you going? Vector?"
He was back soon holding a towel, wiping her up almost roughly. Getting every last trace of it. She tried to smile. "Well, thanks, that's pretty thorough, but I really don't mind," she said brightly. "I mean, that's part of...."
"You would. It would burn you if it stayed on too long. I used all my tubes. I wasn't paying attention."
"All your what?"
He swore. "Never mind. You're going home. Now. Or else I'm going to keep you here all night and do that again and again."
"But why can't you take me? I want you inside me, Vector." She cleared her throat. "You seem...I mean, don't you want to be inside me?"
"Wearing flaj?" he said sarcastically. "It doesn't work like that. That's one thing that—no. Not going to try."
"You won't take off your flaj?"
He shook his head.
"Damn you," she said. "All right. Just do that, then. What you just did. Again and again, like you said. But," she glanced down at her body, at her flushed skin and swollen breasts and her splayed thighs, which must tell of her arousal better than anything, although from what he'd said, he was perfectly capable of smelling it. "I'm kind of in pain here—I mean, it's a good pain, but, oh, stars, Vector, I ache. Could you maybe touch me too, so I can...?"
He stared at her, and this time she swore he was the one entranced. Then he broke the connection, and Larissa feared he'd tell her to get her clothes on and go....
***
He didn't.
He kept her that night, and he was with her the next, and the next, and the next, so that all the nights blurred together. It was a surreal time. Sometimes they went to his place, sometimes hers. Sometimes they ate out. Sometimes they walked the city, hand in hand. Real human with fake human.
He told her about what it was like to grow up on Resstessa. She told him about what it was like to grow up with parents who indulged her in everything. And while they talked, she secretly tried to make him smile. A real smile. It didn't work. She wondered if he even could. Maybe he didn't have the right muscles.
Most of the time they spent in bed.
"What are we going to do tomorrow?" she asked him lazily one night, her hand stroking his chest. She couldn't think of it as his naked chest, even though he was completely stripped of his clothes and she could feel the warmth of his body. How could she, when she knew very well that this very nicely muscled, handsomely proportioned, sexily endowed if overlong human body was not really him?
The stubborn man. He still wouldn't relent. Not once had he taken off his flajec skin. Not once had he really fucked her the way she wanted desperately to be fucked.
"Nothing," he said abruptly, his skin tensing under her palm. It took a moment to remember her question.
She smiled. "You want to stay in? I was thinking maybe we could go to the nightclub. Do you like to dance? I'd love to dance with you, Vector. There, I really think you could take off your flajec and feel safe...if you wanted to."
The chill in his voice stayed her hand. "I mean we're not doing anything tomorrow."
She sighed. He needed more time. "I guess I could live with staying in."
"You've forgotten," he said flatly. "I thought so. Tomorrow my leave is over, Larissa. I'm on mission again."
She froze. She had forgotten all about it. All about his being a Cogent and working off-planet for six months at a time. It was like she'd been living on another planet.
She blushed. "I don't know where my head is. You told me. It's on your bioplay. Yes, I knew. I guess I thought...or actually, I didn't think." Be honest with yourself. Did you really want to think about how he was bound to leave?
Now she did. And they weren't good thoughts.
She looked at him with her heart in her eyes.
He frowned. "I'll be back."
"In six months."
"Yes."
"And during that time?"
"I'll call when I can. It'll have to be vocplays. But don't expect a lot. Things are complicated."
"What about...women?"
"What about them?"
She wanted to smack him. "When you're gone, will you see other women?"
"Probably. Just as you'll see other men."
Was he crazy? Did he really think anybody else would do? Maybe he had a point, though. Now that her body had been awakened from its too-long hibernation, she didn't know how she'd survive one night, let alone hundreds of them, without male company.
But the thought of seeing anybody but him just made her shudder. "I don't want to," she said honestly. "It's you I want. Only you."
He didn't answer.
Suddenly she had a sinking feeling in her gut. "You're not coming back, are you?"
"To Jax-9? Sure, I'm coming back."
"But not to me. That's why you never...that's why you haven't..."
He was out of bed and baring his teeth. "That's right. Because this whole thing is doomed."
She drew in a sharp breath. "Because I'm not Resstessian."
"Don't get me wrong. You've been fun, Larissa. But I don't have time for fun. So date all the men you want while I'm gone. I recommend you stick with humans—you're not really cut out for mixed relationships, are you? I certainly will take as many women as I want. When I get back, I may look you up—or not. As for those vocplays, don't wait up for them, okay?"
And that was the last she saw of him.
***
"Well, well, well. If my eyes don't lie, it's you, Lady. Where've you been?"
Larissa nodded gravely at Floyd. She wasn't surprised by his astonishment. Her presence at the nightclub had diminished almost to nothing lately. Partly that was due to her chronic glumness since Vector had stormed out of her life so long ago. But part of it was Floyd, himself, and the increasingly tense climate here at the Wytrium.
In the last several months, normal activity all around the city seemed to have frozen to a near-standstill as the region was wrapped up in a frantic kind of tension. Violence, mostly originating with activities of the Anti-Mix Brigade, was breaking out in pockets all over the city. An alien was shot in a courtroom; a school that taught mostly aliens was burned to the ground. The media was blasting reports of anti-alien sentiment all over town, and the import and sale of flajecs was going through the roof.
Here at the nightclub, Floyd had been acting happy for once. He no longer made any effort to hide his contempt for aliens, and it had been all she could do to pacify the staff, who complained of his rudeness to the non-human patrons.
One night, with her consent, a representative from the pro-alien activist group delivered some brochures to display on the Wytrium's ceiling. Floyd erased them all and then posted a pro-AMB poster in its place. A riot broke out at the club, and she had to come in to troubleshoot.
Since then, she'd been coming in every night simply to keep the peace.
If she weren't otherwise so depressed, she knew she'd have gone further than just hiring a few extra security guards by now. Much as she hated to do it, Floyd had to go. So did several other waitservers and one chef. They weren't doing their jobs and they were making the place impossible for her customers. The only reason she was here tonight was to get the unpleasant task of firing Floyd and the others behind her.
"I need to talk to you, Floyd," she said now.
"Anytime," he said, chuckling. "Been interesting around here lately, hasn't it? Looks like all them foreigners are getting their due, huh? Much fewer around here lately, have you noticed?"
"That's because they're wearing flaj," she said, rolling her eyes. "There are still just as many. It's just that it's not safe for aliens anymore, haven't you noticed?"
And you're a big part of the reason why. Why do you and the others have to fear people who seem different from you?
That damn Resstessian Vector Ferhan most of all...
"Whatever happened to that good-lookin' young fancy fellow I saw you with a while back? You and he seemed to be so hot for each other. It's time you settled down with a nice man, Miss Larissa."
Her mind went blank. Who was he talking about? She hadn't dated anyone regularly since Vector. And certainly not any human.
What she had done was launch herself on a flurry of dates with the very people Floyd despised—aliens. That first month after Vector left, she'd gone through every alien listed in The Gallery within a five-doyeen radius. She'd kissed so many strange mouths, walked hand-in-tentacle with so many intelligent but ugly creatures, and dined with so many gut-turning exotic appetites that she could no longer call herself an alien virgin, even though she'd never managed to go so far as to have sex with any of them.
It had been pure rebellion on her part. Whatever she'd been trying to prove, though, she failed. She hadn't enjoyed any of the dates. And not just because they were weird.
Some were very nice. Even attractive. Not really very strange at all.
But they weren't Vector. Vector, who'd no doubt take her failure to make love with an alien as proof of his point, that she wasn't cut out for a mixed relationship. If he even knew about it, which of course he didn't, because he hadn't once contacted her the whole time he was gone. The bastard.
Bitterness does not become you, she told herself sadly.
And then the lights went out and the music around them died.
In the sudden crashing silence and darkness, Larissa's heart stopped. Oh, no. She had a feeling—
Pressure explosions rang out. People screamed. Crashes were heard, and soft thumps followed. She knew that sound. That was the sound of people on airskayts colliding and falling. The emergency softpad popped from below, but she didn't know if it was in time to catch the fallen safely. All the power was out, even the backup. No lights visible except the tiny dim organic ones on the ceiling and the railing lining every room of the Wytrium, making it look like the sky at night.
