A Murder - A Maker

"Please," I whispered in surrender. The gleam in his eyes was matched by a thrilled rush within me at being so easily bent to his will. He rewarded me instantly, two fingers slipping between my labia and spearing into me with no regard for comfort. It was nearly overwhelming and I stiffened with a low grunt, my captured arm straining, hand balling into a fist. The wave of contentment that followed suppressed the discomfort, and though the tented jumpsuit confining his hand provided little mobility he began to push and pull with those digits, drawing unrestrained moans from my lips. I pulled my free hand up, fingers threading into my hair to curl near my scalp as he continued. A sudden, stiff thrust deeper than the others caused me to jerk, head turning away, and he seized the opportunity to dip lower and bite at the taut side of my neck. His thumb found my clitoris, teasing it relentlessly as his fingers coaxed me further onward, and suddenly the demanding pressures were too much to resist and I let out a raw cry. My knees clamped together fitfully as I convulsed but I could not trap his hand. He kept his thumb firm against my clitoris but no longer teased it, instead focusing on the fingers that relentlessly pressed in and curled back, dragging at the inner walls of my sex and forced my climax on to more intense levels.

When at last it dwindled I panted for breath, coated in a sheen of sweat. The captain pushed himself upright, fingers dragging from me and slipping from beneath the jumpsuit as he took to his knees. I wearily called my focus from an indistinct point on the ceiling down to scan him. He had obviously recovered from his own orgasm, cock standing erect. He turned his attention to my jumpsuit, finally setting about tugging it lower. I grimaced as he yanked the fabric over my hips, then blinked in realization that he didn't seem interested in bothering with it much further beyond that. The garment was half-rolled in on itself, bunched halfway down my thighs and effectively pinning my legs together. He hooked at the back of my knees and pulled my legs up, nearly folding me over before positioning himself above me. He leaned down, my calves resting past his right shoulder, and positioned the head of his member against my sex before heavily planting his hands on the bed to either side of me. A single, forceful thrust put his hips to the bottoms of my thighs.

His earlier orgasm granted him an astonishing degree of stamina once inside of me. If mine had been a sign of my will being subjugated to his, now he set about crumbling every last semblance of resolve I still held. He was forceful but did not rush, each thrust jarring me beneath him. The unrelenting demands of his body atop mine, so soon after my orgasm, left me in a dizzying state of distress and arousal.

"Please," I begged him, cutting off after the first word to clamp back a groan. "Too much. I need-"

His hand pressed down on me, palm half-resting on my collarbone, half pressuring my throat. The sudden strain on my breathing cut me off shortly, another forceful drive of his hips into mine sending a surge of ecstasy up my spine. As his fingers dug into the curve between shoulder and neck, thumb wrapped around the other side, he said,

"You need to come again."

And I did. The command, the threatening pressure on my throat, the hard shaft driving relentlessly inside of me all forced me over the edge again and I cried out as I came, hands twisting up for purchase on his forearm. This time my orgasm was hard and short, the pleasure hitting like a blow before evaporating, and he ducked his head low to possess my mouth in a kiss as it faded. I could scarcely think but I began to loathe his fortitude as he continued for several minutes more, my body trembling at the wash of too-sensitive feelings, but soon he began to grunt quietly and I felt his seed pump inside me.

Hours later he lay supine on the bed, breathing steadily, and I lay beside him half on my back, head propped against his shoulder and his hand winding around me to rest possessively near the bottom of my ribs. I knew that in the interim he had stripped my jumpsuit the rest of the way off, doing away with his clothing before settling in, but my recollection was hazy and I had drifted off nearly as soon as he had finished arranging me.

I felt better composed after the brief respite, still weary but collected. I sensed he was awake, too, and wondered if he had slept. The captain stirred, thumb dragging over my side, and asked,

"The thing you said on the ship. Why is it that one such as you would want to kill Tremain Voss?"

I didn't give an immediate answer. The question had caught me by surprise, and so I lay quietly, studying the far wall. I knew it likely didn't matter much to him what answer I gave but I felt an instinct to give an honest reply, to trust him. My head lolled to one side, lips thinning as the clouds of resentment and anger I felt took a more cohesive shape.

"It's not just him I want to kill, sir. Him most, but the company too. I want to stop any more..." My mouth twisted sourly as I trailed off. "Any other slaves from being made."

"Why?"

"I can't... I can't change what I am. I was cultivated and shaped and made to fill a certain role. But stopping that fate from weighing on on others is the next best thing."

"A burdened martyr, then?" the captain asked dryly. "Does what you are sting so much?"

I squirmed around to face him, an elbow propping me up from the bed, its companion resting more lightly across his chest. His features were handsome and sharp, I thought, and this close there was a near-indistinct cast of light from my eyes upon his jaw. I felt a small pang of desire, though it was dampened by the conversation.

"I hate what I am, sir," I answered, frustration rising.

"No. You do not."

My head jerked back, eyes widening at his casual denial. Anger spurred to life and I bristled, even as a voice whispered, my voice whispered, in the back of my head that he was right. I clamped down on that traitorous element, head rearing further back.

"I do," I tersely insisted. "You don't-"

I blinked, cutting off as he grabbed my wrist. The grip wasn't painful, and he reached down with his other hand to pull me further up along his frame.

"You adapt to the situations you find yourself in," the captain informed me. "You do it better than most anyone could. It is not simply a shouldering of burdens, no. I have seen the pleasure you take from any role assigned to you. Even now." My breath had tightened only slightly at the grip, but when his other hand lightly grazed at the apex of my thighs I startled in more pronounced fashion, hips jerking higher and eyes widening in surprise. His hand rode out the half-hearted escape, possessive in its boldness yet, for the moment, remaining noninvasive.

"Do your thoughts not turn to pleasure?" he asked, sharp gaze dragging up from my hips to slowly, critically make their way toward my face. The examination of my bare form was so intent that it, more than the hand at my groin, made my breath catch in my throat when he matched my gaze. "Do you not seek to satisfy those who use you?

There was an impatient edge to the roll of my hips down on his palm, and when he finally slid his fingers between my labia and pressed them deep into my sex I welcomed their return with a shudder.

"That doesn't-" I started, faltering as his hand stilled. "That doesn't mean I welcome it." His fingers still weren't moving. Uttering a near-inaudible growl I rocked up higher, then sank down upon the stiffened pair of digits and into a wash of pleasure. He wanted this display, and he would get it. The thought of how I looked brought a familiar press of shame and lust; I was arguing, and failing, against my own nature even as I succumbed to his will and fucked myself on his fingers. "It's..."

"It is you." The captain's expression was drawn now, hooded brows lending a menacing quality to his intent study of my body. Half-reclining beneath me, he was suffused with the presence of a hunter, seeming every bit a predatory feline in his languid arrogance. I bit my lip and squeezed my eyes shut, stifling a groan as I felt his thumb tease at my clitoris, already exposed and sensitive. Suddenly he caught my hip in his free hand, overpowering the rhythm I had adopted and suspending me at the peak of my motions. The sudden loss of his fingers within me seconds later triggered a low sound of loss within my throat, but before I could speak I was being pulled down and I felt his rigid, hard member pressing up into me.

Shuddering, I leaned forward to plant my hand against the center of his chest and renewed grinding myself up and down upon him with quiet urgency. A corner of my mind bridled at the wash pleasure that suffused every part of me, and even as I shuddered again I whispered,

"I don't want to be a tool."

"But you are," he replied, husky need obvious in his voice even if he clamped down upon it in every other regard.

"Yes." The admission broke me, reservations battered away in a rush of satisfaction. The pleasure built higher, then crested in a strong wave that crashed over me and drew a raw cry from my throat. My hand peeled away from his chest, dragging lower as I straightened and then arched, head lifting toward the ceiling. I felt his seed pump into me and ground my hips down against his, panting after a few final pumps of my frame atop him. My shoulders slumped, head dipping. I gasped for breath and resented the deep-seated gratification I now basked in.

His hand slipped to my jaw, tipping my head up a few degrees. I opened my eyes, watching him silently.

"You have no resolve," he told me, "but you have fire. Maybe you will be more." His hand fell away from my chin, curled knuckles tracing down my throat in an affectionate gesture that didn't match the neutral scrutiny on his face. "We will be raiding again. You will not come, but it is important to be capable of defense should it be needed. The crew will begin your training tomorrow."

***

I woke again some hours later and slipped back to my quarters without disturbing the captain. I am not often given to insecurity and melodrama yet the intensity of my engagement with the man had exacerbated all the difficulties wrapped in my recent experiences, and so I curled up against my knees at the end of my bed and thought. There is peace in solitude when you adopt the desires of others without even realizing it. I wrapped my arms around my shins, letting my splintered guard lower.

The captain's words had unsettled me. I knew that I didn't want to be merely a pliant form to be shaped by the desires of others, but his words and my own actions had proven that, ultimately, I was and I relished it. Even the brutality of Essar had been met with a certain measure of gratification, a sense of fulfillment when I was the target of his violence.

The desperation passed, and gradually I felt convictions settle within me. I had a core identity, even if it could be impressed upon and altered to fit the desires of others. This change, unplanned or not, offered me a better chance of turning resentment into action than my previous station ever had. Whatever would come of my journey with these pirates was out of my control, and I would be stronger for it in the end.

As I had struggled internally my breathing had quickened and I now realized my arms were aching from how hard I gripped my shins. I let my head drop, forehead resting against my knees, and felt the growing lassitude that burgeoned from my calm pull me into sleep.

***

Training was exhilarating and absolutely brutal. I cut an attractive figure, I knew, and moving gracefully was thoroughly ingrained within me, but I was not in any way powerful.

The stocky woman with close-shorn red hair who seemed the de facto expert at close quarter combat on the ship, on the other hand, seemed capable of putting the legends of Hercules to shame. She likely didn't have an ounce of fat on her body, and I learned quickly enough that she also seemed to lack so much as a shred of compassion in her soul. She drove me relentlessly.

It had taken scant little time for humanity to realize the ships they had designed were sufficiently complex that firearms had a near-guarantee to damage something important to the vessel in the process of dispatching or protecting its occupants. Physical combat found new life in space. I am certain a variety of styles flourished between the planets, but the method I learned aboard the raider ship was fluid and vicious, designed for narrow corridors and small compartments.

Training began with cardio exercises that progressively became more difficult as my endurance grew, paired with a variety of strikes and blows I was tasked with committing to muscle memory. It is part of my nature to be mindful and I was genuinely enthusiastic about a new outlet of activity aboard the ship, so I took to the lessons quickly. Though she had been derisive of my conditioning at the start of our lessons, I think I surprised my instructor with how quickly I was able to repeat what she demonstrated. She hid it well, though, and only ever demanded more of me. Soon we were practicing with thin knives and longer ceramic swords.

My life settled into comfortable shifts. My duties aboard the ship continued, mostly comprised of cleaning or being a spare hand for whoever needed help with their own work, my combat training occurred daily, and soon I had another daily commitment. Shortly after they had begun, the influx of sexual demands from crew members had died out. At first I had thought they would be constant, but soon I realized that they had been out of curiosity, a desire to experience a prized attendant, and after that had been satisfied their interest in that area waned. This left my working hours and those left open considerably less hassled, and in the latter I began to spend time on the observation deck.

It was there that I struck up a friendship with the bearded crewman I had met soon after being brought aboard. He had never come to test the rumors of attendants in person, and it turned out that he too spent a fair amount of his free time on the observation deck, sometimes reading from a datapad and sometimes regarding the stars. He explained our course to me, that we were arcing out toward the asteroid belt in order to meet with a number of mining stations, then pressing beyond to Saturn before circling back toward the more densely-habited space between Mercury and Mars. I learned, too, that the ship engaged in an opportunistic mix of legal and illegal operations, pursuing whatever course the captain set and taking whatever path was most profitable in the short term.

When we were a week from our first port of call since my acquisition, the instructor decided it was time to move from training drills to live sparring exercises. I knew that she was grudgingly impressed with the commitment I had demonstrated and the speed at which I'd been demonstrating a proficiency in the routines, so her decision left me feeling proud. She spirited crewmember after crewmember away from their regular duties to test my skills before returning to their usual duties, and each fight shook my confidence.

I am not very strong, but I am quick and have superb coordination - my instructor saw these qualities early so she focused on teaching me to maintain spacing, to keep from getting trapped in contests that would see me overwhelmed, and I learned those mandates (I thought) to perfection. Bur now, in these duels, everything I did was too slow. It wasn't a marked difference but it kept me from getting the edge on my opponents, and if I managed to keep an opponent's blade from striking me I was invariably outmaneuvered, forced back into tighter quarters and beaten. By the fourth bout I was red-faced and humiliated, a sick ball of nausea in my gut. I hadn't expected perfection or to win every contest, but I knew I should have been capable of more than... This.

It became clear a few seconds after the door closed behind the last combatant that my instructor had no plans on calling down another, so I turned to her and began,

"I don't know what's going on. I-"

"Quiet." The scorn in her tone made me bite my tongue. She prowled forward, launching a ceramic blade in a lazy spin toward me, and I instinctively reached up to grab the hilt. She was unarmed but her intent was clear. Jaw tensing, I broadened my stance and then stepped forward, swinging the blade at her in a diagonal arc. Just as I committed to the blow, I realized that I was too close. She slid forward expertly and reached up, hand clamping around one of my wrists to trap the blade overhead. Her other arm reached forward to grip my shoulder and she wrenched me forward into her rising knee. The blow hit my gut and went up into my diaphragm, making my eyes water. I grunted and reeled as she shoved me back.

"Fight," she sneered. "Was it all a game? A plaything learning principles it could never put to use?"

Her derision and the accusation in her words made the pain an almost welcome penance, but defiance also sparked to life within me. I blinked my eyes clear and straightened, breathing strained. Stepping forward, I flicked out the blade in a quicker blow, a probe more than anything else. She leaned to the side and flowed around it, advancing. I danced back. When she advanced again I lunged instead, whipping the blade forward in a blur. This time rather than evade she brought one arm up, letting the sword connect in full strength against her forearm. My eyes widened in shock, and without missing a beat she reached forward, finger clenching around my hand on the sword's hilt, and yanked me forward. Thrown off balance, I stumbled forward and into her shoulder, only for her to forcibly spin me around and wrench one arm up behind my shoulder blades. I yelped at the grinding in my shoulder, rising onto the balls of my feet in desperation.

As I was frozen in that pose, stretching in a failed attempt to escape the pain radiating from the locked joints in my arm, I felt her breath wash over one ear. "Pitiful," she condemned. Suddenly my feet were swept from under me and the grip on my arm vanished. I lost the sword to her somehow on the way down. As I struggled to push up onto my hands and knees there was a loud crack of something slapping down across my back, accompanied by a light sting, then a sudden rush of agony that stole my breath. I bit back a scream and almost gave in right then, but I dimly made out another invective cast down upon me. When her booted feet came into vision, stepping around from my side to stand in front of me, I pushed forward and up, reaching out to grab hold of her knee and twist her to the ground. A blur of white ceramic intercepted the attempt, the sword's flat viciously slamming into the back of my palm. I cried out and recoiled back, hunching down before a booted foot caught me in the shoulder and sent me sprawling on my side. She whipped the blade down again, lashing at my thigh and jolting me back into motion even with the surge of pain and humiliating desire. I crawled back onto my knees, began to push up, and wilted beneath the sudden rain of blows she cast down upon my back.

"I'm sorry!" I let out around a choked sob, trembling at the strikes. By the third or fourth hit I had given up trying to retaliate or escape, instead burying my sweat-soaked face into the crook of my elbow and straightening out my back in unspoken obedience. Each wave of agony and residual burn felt like absolution.

I don't know exactly when she stopped lashing me with the sword. The throbbing burn from the blows radiated warmth through my body, and I slowly became more cognizant of a hand gently combing through my hair. I realized I was crying, too, amidst barely intelligible apologies. Calloused fingertips grazed my skin as she uncovered my ear and the side of my face, before planting a light kiss against my cheek, far more chaste than I would have liked.