All the King's Horses Pt. 05

Box'noxia (Trade Planet), Sector 98-A, Neutral Space

The Milky Way Galaxy

2398

Tiff scowled at the ugly, hissing puddle of goo and spikes that had chosen to lay in the middle of the only road she could walk down.

"What is that?" She asked.

"A g'nok," Bryce said, nodding slowly. "Centurions love em."

G'noks were not as cute as Tiffany had hoped -- and just as Sebastian had promised, they were absolutely everywhere on the streets of the primary city of the trade planet that the colonizers had named Sn'Gar. It had originally been called Box'noxia by the locals. Said locals looked less than pleased with the change in who was the top dog around here: They were clustered in alleyways, sitting in open doorways in the shanty houses that sprawled around the glittering skyscrapers that made up the center of the trade city.

The Centurions seemed almost proud of how shitty the Kor, the natives, had things. They had planted a road right through the middle of the slums, with huge electrified fences and watchtowers. The towers were manned by star elves with heavy duty looking rifles. Most of them were bored -- but a few aimed their rifles down at the Kor with malicious eagerness. Tiff could almost smell their eagerness to have a reason to shoot.

The Kor were all pretty skinny looking, with pasty gray-brown skin that sagged off their bones. They had three arms -- two on the sides, with one of them emerging from their chest and terminating in a small grasping claw. Their eyes looked empty and witness. Most of them were drinking from small bulbs of plastic -- filled with glowing green liquid. Tiff shuddered as she carefully stepped over the hissing g'nok.

"Why are they so..." Tiff paused. "You know. They look like my uncle after he had too much of the 'shut the fuck up and stop asking questions Tiff' juice."

Bryant's ears were pinned back against his head and his nose was wrinkled in distaste. "It's a drug -- they're all malnourished because their food is crap and they have no healthcare." He shook his head. "Centurion bastards."

"Not so loud," Bruce said, walking ahead of them. If Bryant's nose was wrinkled up, Tiff tried to not imagine what Bruce's nose was feeling right. He was a full on fuckmothering werewolf, walking through Slumsville, Spacetopia. Tiff's own Hunter enhanced senses were all screaming at her: Desolation. Despair. Death.

"What's a Centurion again?" Tiff asked as they finally emerged from the slums and started to walk through the parts of the city that were made to sell things to astros and spacers from across the neutral zone. In a single glance along the boulevard, Tiff saw more aliens doing more alien things than she had ever expected she would in her entire life. Which, admittedly, was zero and never before last week. So. Still. She saw a quarter of people who looked like hunched over armadillos, with heavy armor plating on their backs and four stubby arms which they used to manipulate things while they stood on heavily braced, tree-trunk like legs. Their tails -- broad and flat -- slapped the ground in unison. They were haggling over a gun bigger than her entire torso with a tall, gray skinned...woman? wearing a shapeless gown of glittering silver.

There were ants. Literally, giant ants, walking along as if they were the most normal thing in the world. They were surrounded by a haze of shimmering black spheres, which warbled and chirruped in a dozen languages. Some of the ants were carrying tall, robed figures with sleek rifles on their backs, who looked down at her as their mounts (friends?) stomped by. But then her attention was drawn by a star elf reaching out with what was unmistakably a clove of garlic, clutched in his hand, a crucifix in the other. "Vampire supplies, young miss?" He called out. "Buy it for fifty UC, and you'll never fear a vampire again! Vampire supplies!"

"No thanks, I'm good!" Tiff said, holding up her hand and backing away. Bryant caught her arm and ushered her away.

"Centurions are one of the major imperial powers," he whispered. "They're the star elves that refused to join the Federation. They didn't want to give up conquering planets. Or the colosseum."

"Colosseum? Like in Rome?" Tiff asked.

"Do you think they called themselves Centurions?" Bryant asked as they stepped past the stalls and into a large open air plaza. A massive screen dominated one of the skyscrapers. On it, two warriors were facing off against one another. One of them was one of those huge armadillo guys, though he was missing two of his arms -- making him look more human, if you ignored the stumps. He was holding a massive battleaxe in his arm, while across from him, a space elf with a pair of buzzing daggers darted backwards. She had short cropped black hair and dark black eyes and she was dressed in a mesh top and fishnet leggings and that was it for her battle armor.

"And it looks -- yes! Shadowknife has baited The Tower!" An excited voice boomed from the speakers as the armadillo looking gladiator swung his battle ax over handed, smashing it down into the ground. Shadowknife sprang over him, slamming her knife between one of his armor plates and jerking it free, spraying green blood into the air. Cheers filled the air.

"Holy fuckballs..." Tiff whispered as music blared from the speaker. It was really fucking familiar music too. Her brow furrowed. "...is that..." She cocked her head.

"It's an ancient Earth melody, yeah," Bruce said, pausing to turn back and face her and Bryce. The other marines were fanning out through the crowd, acting like a normal independent crew, doing normal crew things. "The Capellans asked for our entire Alpha Site storage copy. In the interests of peaceful interactions between us and a then unknown alien race, we agreed. It's all media, nothing like state secrets. And so, that's why you can buy merch based off human properties across-"

"Is that a fucking Darth Vader action fucking figure?" Tiff blurted out, walking over to a tacky kiosk that was manned by a floating bag of shimmering gas contained in a glistening, membranous cal. Tentacles floated below the gas bag and they flared with an inner light as a calm voice spoke from it.

"You can buy any number of Agents of Empire action figures you wish at my kiosk human," the gas-bag said. "They are all in their original packaging."

Tiff picked the plastic package up, turning it around, and read aloud: "Tevan Mok is a cybernetically augmented..." She narrowed her eyes. The race name of the Star Elves, as it transpired, was written out as a fifteen character long collection of symbols that she was fairly certain would literally require her to rip her tongue out to pronounce. "Star Elf..." She muttered. "Who loyally serves the just Emperor to hunt down the terrorists responsible for destroying the Den'Bok Defense Station, including his wicked son, Luuke Starkiller, that's some fucking bullshit!"

"I think it's kind of funny," Bryant admitted, walking over and picking up an action figure -- it was a snarling, brown haired lady who definitely reminded Tiff of a certain actress she knew. "Leeya the Terror Republican."

"Oh, sure, she's a Republican, meh mhe meh..." Tiff threw the Darth Vader knockoff back onto the table, scowling at the gas-bag. "I should sue. I'm the only capitalist left in the whole Federation, ergo, I own Star Wars, you piece of...you...what are you?"

"She's new," Bryant said, hurriedly, taking Tiff's arm and gently guiding her back to Bruce, who was shaking his head slightly. He leaned forward, whispering to Tiff.

"Chill, Tiff."

"Fine. Chilled. Chilled to the max. But doesn't it honk you guys off? They're stealing human...art...stuff and art...fucking it!" She flung up her hands. "When I was in high school, it was all, don't copy that floppy this and that..." She shook her head as Bruce and Bryce took her arms and guided her away from the stalls while, up on the screen, the armadillo sank to the ground in defeat. Tiff tried to kick a g'nok in her irritation, but like a human cat, the spiky sphere of blobby mucus was a lot faster than she expected.

***

Tidal Force -- the club that the Capellan was staying at -- was located near the beaches. Here, all signs of the Kor were carefully eradicated. It might have gotten in the way of people's enjoyment of the silvery white expanse of perfect sand -- which positively glowed under the pale blue white light of the sun. The water that roared and crashed against the sand smelled strongly of salt -- enough to tingle memories of going to Florida during family vacation. Back before...well, everything. Tiff looked out at the sea, and at the beaches, and at the sunbathing aliens who were enjoying the beach, and shook her head slowly.

"You'd think aliens wouldn't enjoy beaches," she whispered.

"Beaches are a common geographic feature," Bryce said, grinning. "Life tends to evolve on planets with water. Water has beaches. People tend to use water to ship things -- the physics of boats are the same on almost every planet. Ergo. Beaches." He shrugged. "It's no more crazy than most of us being bipedal and biocular."

"Right..." Tiff tore her eyes from the beaches and checked out the club. It looked like a ring of steel metal jutting up and out of the water -- approachable by a wooden pier built out above the waves. Tiff put her hands on her hips. "How are we going to handle the fact that we're none of us Rokea?" She looked at Bryce's blank face. "Weresharks, bro. Garou are werewolves, Rokea are weresharks, does no one learn this shit anymore?"

Bruce grinned. "I got it. But don't worry, I brought something along that should help." He pulled out a small pill, holding it out to her. "The Blues developed it -- it's a gill pill."

"Gill pill...does it make me-" Tiff started.

"Nah," Bruce said, shaking his head. "It just adjusts the cell membranes in your lungs so they can draw oxygen from water for an hour." Tiff took the pill and eyed it -- it was a small, flexible blue orb, which made her narrow her eyes.

"That sounds really fucking dangerous," she said.

"Your lungs will still be able to process air, don't worry," Bruce said, popping his pill.

"No, I mean, it's fucking with my lungs," Tiff said, then popped the pill. It went down her throat without her having to swallow -- almost like it was pushed down her throat by its own power. She put her hand to her throat and almost tried to cough and hack it up. "Oh, wait, fuck, transformation immunity!" She closed her eyes, focusing hard as she tried to keep her body from rejection the transformation. A burning sensation started in her lungs -- then faded. She opened her eyes, slowly. "Did it work?"

Bryce took her hand in his -- the silky smoothness of his dark fingers sending a goosebumps wave up her arm. He held her wrist out and then pressed his handheld phone to it, before holding the phone up, nodding. "Yup, it worked," he said.

"Noyce!" Tiff pumped her fist. "Lets go take a dive."

She started forward, her boots clunking and thumping on the

Bryce popped his pill and followed after, sparing a single glance for Bruce. Bruce grinned back at her.

The two walked past the sign that Tiff had ignored.

No Clothing Allowed.

***

The circular disk that Tiff had seen from the shore was, up close, actually a hollow depression. Some water slipped over the edges, leaving it damp and glistening, but the interior was mostly unflooded. There was a circular set of stairs, ringing around the depression until it reached a door, where a pair of aliens that looked a bit like bottle-nose dolphins if given bow flexes and bulking powder for several months had been crammed into a pair of suits and given sunglasses. The suits were alien and the sunglasses were oddly angular, but the general picture of them was so familiar it actually made Tiff a little grumpy.

"You couldn't have worn, like, rings around your ankles or something?" she asked, narrowing her eyes as she looked them up and down.

The two dolphin aliens looked her over from behind their sunglasses. "Human?" The dolphin on the right asked.

"Nooo, I'm a vampire," Tiff said, standing directly in the sunlight.

"Funny," the dolphin alien to the left said.

"Dress code says no clothes," the dolphin alien on the right said.

"So, strip, or get lost, human," the dolphin alien on the left said.

Tiff stood, gaping at them. Then she laughed. "Oh, har har har, very funny. Get the human to get her...jibbly wibblies out and- ahhhhh!" She turned at the sound of footsteps. She snapped her head back forward to not look at Bryce, who was naked, and Bruce, who was very naked. The two men were chatting casually as they walked down the stairs. The picosecond of a glance that Tiff had spared them had been enough to impress upon her that Bryce's exotic red and black coloration extended allll over his lithe body, and that Bruce was covered in bright scars and had belly muscles that went on for miles and was just the most hunky fucking guy she had ever met. Her cheeks burned as she stammered.

"Bribe? Bribes still work, right? Bribe bribe arino!"

The two dolphin-aliens laughed. The one on the right grinned at her. "We're paid a huge amount by the owner to keep weapons and guns out of his club. That means none of your fancy human tricks. No gadgets. No gizmos. No replicators." He snarled.

"If I had a frigging replicator, I'd-" Tiff closed her eyes. She blushed. "Fine. It's the 24^th century. Nudity taboos are stupid and smell bad." She started to fiddle with the buttons on her top.

"Do you want to guard the front-" Bruce started.

"I. Got. This." Tiff said, undoing button after button. Soon, her top was off. Then her pants. Then she stood there in her bra and her panties, looking at the two dolphin aliens. Their complete lack of giving a single isolated fuck about her dress or lack there of did give her a tiny smidge more confidence. They were aliens! They wouldn't care about her booty. She reached back, undoing her bra, then sliding her panties down. She wriggled free, then spread her arms. "Tda!"

"Damn," Bryce whispered.

"What?" She turned and saw that his Gal'Sem dick was as bright blue as his tongue. She blushed and looked away. "Nothing!"

"...I'm the one whose supposed to say nothing," Bryce said -- while Bruce reached over and took hold of of the edge of Bryce's masker and cranked at a dial there, which clicked and ratcheted. When she glanced back, Bryce was no longer sporting quite the same impressive amount of hardware. She blushed as Bryce whispered. "Thanks, Bruce."

"Don't mention it," he rumbled, then smacked Bryce's shoulder as the two dolphin aliens opened the door and Tiff walked straight into a wall of water. She hadn't realized the faint distortion in the air had been water and stepping through it made her choke on her own breath. Water gushed down her throat and she stumbled in slow motion through the water, blinking away confusion as her lungs accepted the water and she felt the same rush of oxygen that she got after holding her breath for a while. Her heart hammered and she leaned against the wall, trying to get used to this feeling.

Bruce and Bryce had entered with considerably more aplomb, but even Bruce had to stop and put his hand to his chest. But she saw the same effect on him as she was feeling now -- the brain just forgot about air. She wasn't sure if it was the pill or her human brain's relentless ability to get used to anything. Either way, she was breathing water now. She grinned and gave Bryce a thumbs up. Bryce thumbs up back at her, then spoke. His words came out warbly and distorted. "You haven't seen nothing yet."

The three of them walked -- in a bouncing, floaty way -- through the water and came to a door that opened to a flight of stairs leading down into the Tidal Force itself. The floor was lit cubes of glowing sand, shifting and sliding in time with the throbbing music that pulsed through the water in an almost visible wave of sonic distortions. It carried into her ears, into her bones, and it massaged Tiff's muscles -- making her feet almost like she was floating in a comforting blanket of sensual massaging. There was a bar, serving glowing...no...not a bar. It was more like a food table, because the glimmering sentient octopus looking guy behind the counter was handing out glowing sea slugs. Some of them had large spikes, and as she watched, two dolphin looking aliens picked them up and slammed them, spike first, into the sides of their necks, before they went back to the dance floor. The dance was three dimensional and swirling, with aliens darting hither and thither and yon.

The music was being provided by a DJ -- another one of those octopi, working hard on a keyboard that looked like it was mostly made of bone and mollusk shell -- and a singing female dolphin alien. She lacked the long bottle nose of the male types, and had a kind of wavy, kelp like hair. Her nose was flush to her face and slitted and she had sharp, razor teeth. And something about the midnight black of her eyes caught Tiff's eyes and made her feel...weird.

Maybe it was the music.

Yeah, it was the music, definitely the music. She was crooning in a language Tiff didn't know -- but her Hunter's instinct could hear the same seductive cadences a vampire might have used. Come. Come to me. Fall into my eyes. Let me nuzzle your neck. Bare your throat to me. The dark promises that made you want the plunge at the end. She looked away from the dancer -- who she had noticed, was not dressed. At all. No one here was, and she was beginning to notice that under the clothes...all aliens were, in some way, quite fuckable.

"Where's the Capellan?" She whispered, her voice coming out as a string of bubbles.

"Lets fan out and find him," Bruce said. "If anything happens, make for the exit. And keep an eye out for trouble."

Bryce nodded and Tiff gave a nervous thumbs up. Water flowed past her naked body and she saw a few aliens checking her out -- which made her blush. She tried to move with a confident grace, kicking away from the stairs and pumping her legs to sail through the water. She floated down before the bar, swinging down and settling before the octopus tender. "Sup," she said, her mouth bubbling and frothing. The bartender's skin flared and glowed with luminescent patches and a collar wrapped around the base of its massive, fluted body flickered.

"A surfacer? Don't see many of you here unless you're coming to spawn," he said. "What can I get you? Adam? Bluegill? Fish?"

"I don't have any credits," Tiff said, grinning. "At least, I left it all in my pants, upstairs." She blushed, aware she was sticking her rump out. She stood up and tried to look as if she wasn't covering her breasts with her arms while she covered her breasts with her arms.

"We bill you as you go," the octopus said. "Besides. You look like a spacer that just came in from a hard trip."

"Hooo boy you can fuckeray that say again!" Tiff said. "Fine! Hit me up for some...A...Adam?"

"All right, one genetic re-sequencing coming up," the octopus said.

"Bluegill! I mean! Bluegill!" Tiff said, nodding as the octopus turned back to her, holding a wriggling, pincered, six limbed creature that twitched and writhed in his tentacled grasp. Tiff blinked at it. "That's a Bluegill?"

"You let it crawl into your ear-"

"Fish! I'd like some fish!" Tiff said.

"Humans...I didn't know humans were so picky," the octopus said, turning away from her and jamming the bluegill back into its bottle. He tapped at a curved nautalis shell which glowed to life. Tiff spent a few seconds being incredibly confused until a shockingly cold hand closed around her shoulder. She tensed and ready to slam her elbow backwards into someone's sternum -- then only stopped when she realized that a sleek, blue skinned alien woman had stepped up beside her. She was short and covered with shimmering tattoos that almost hurt Tiff's eyes to look at. She, unlike Tiff, had gills, and when she grinned, she had sharp, sharp, sharp teeth.