In the Garden of the Gods Ch. 01

All participants in this work of fiction are over the age of 21.

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Dr. Susan Nareese Optenbauher, all one and a half meters of her, stands looking at the sea of huge flowers ahead of her. The blueish green plants around her feet, a typical grass variant found on almost every life supporting planet, end in an almost perfectly straight line. The other side of that line is bare dark brown fertile soil. That very distinct division runs for as far as she could see in both directions. Behind her, tens of thousands of hectares of wide open plains, where the blueish knee high grass is the dominate plant with various other typical and unremarkable plants scattered in the mix.

What stands ahead of her though, is unprecedented. The sea of flowers, seen from orbit is actually as close to a perfect square as possible. A square, almost three and a half kilometers on a side, is one of nine squares that make a grid pattern. Each square is exactly the same distance from each other, just over two kilometers. This grid is one of three on this plain. Plus two more sets of three, one each on the other two smaller continents. There are none, nor any sign of ever being, on the one sub-continent or any of the thousands of islands.

And while that is really fascinating in of itself, the truly remarkable feature is the plants, with their sheer size. The stem is actually quite short in comparison to the size of the flower, only one and a half to three meters tall, with wide flat spade shaped leaves alternating up either side of the half meter thick stem, like a ladder. But the flower heads are humongous. Most of them are a deep blue, however from where Susan stands, she can see a few mixed in that are a deep vibrant purple. Susan also knows, from images taken from orbit, that there are clusters of bright orange. The smallest one she can see standing at the edge of the 'garden' is at least three quarter meter across with petals almost a meter in height. Some of the others are so big she could hold a tea party for six with room to spare. And the pedals must be four meters! They remind her of a cross between a hibiscus and a lotus flower. And they smell wonderful!

Someone went through a lot of work to do this. Problem is, there are no signs of intelligent life on the planet. Or on the other two solid planets in the system. Or on the dozens of moons orbiting any of the the planets of this system. No cities, towns, or even a hamlet. Not a single recognizable habitat, structure or road. Not even the suggestion of worked stone. Or a sign post. Of any kind, anywhere. Just these perfectly square gardens filled with gigantic flowers.

Over the three hours since landing, then setting up, Susan has run every test she could from her position, a meter from the boundary. Scans, soil samples, pollen counts. She even collected two larger than normal samples of the air, compressed and filtered them just to get pollen and scent markers, hoping to be able to replicate the scent as it is quite divine. She happily hums away to herself as she works.

It dawns on her suddenly, there are no insects. No biting pests or flies. Not even the crawling beetle variants that are so common across the dozen or so systems explored by humanity. Puzzled, she walks back over to the shallow hole where the sampler had dug and pokes around. Then she checks all the various sized sample containers. Then the sampler's logs. No bugs. No worms or tunneling life forms of any kind. Strange. She notes this curiosity in her tablet

With the sun reaching it's peak in the sky, Dr. Optenbauher starts packing up all the samples to shuttle back up to the TSF Venture in orbit. She puts in the call to Mike Yvinski, mechanic and security coordinator.

"Hey Mike, almost all packed up. Wanna send Bot over and we'll get this stuff stored?" A few seconds go by. Just as she was going to call again, Mike comes on the line.

"Hey Doc, give me sec. Was just cleaning a fuel valve." She could hear tools being pushed around, then beeps as Mike feeds instructions into a console. "Bot's on his way. Need a hand?"

"No, I think I'm fine. I'm just going to take a few more snaps and set up a sensor just inside the square. Let it run for a few days, see if anything beeps. I'll be in shortly."

"Roger that Doc, see ya in, say 30 minutes?"

"30 to 40."

"Roger that, lunch in a hour."

After taking several more scenic as opposed to scientific snaps with her holographic camera, Susan picks up the tall sensor array and steps onto the bare soil of the unusual square. As she walks, intending to go only a couple of meters, she inhales deeply. The flowery perfume is a lot more concentrated, Susan closes her eyes and just lets it infuse her, it is so... so heavenly. As good a place as any, she sets the sensor array's shaft to the loose soil and pushes it in deep. Once set, she presses the faintly glowing green button before stepping back. As it hums and sets it self up automatically, Susan walks a little deeper into the forest of flowers intending to take a few more holos. Still happily humming away, she loses herself to the scent and walks a few more meters.

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A flashing yellow light catches Ensign Yomato's eye and he turns and frowns. Quickly his fingers fly over the console, bring up menus and graphs and scrolling sensor data.

"Commander? I have something weird here, these readings make no sense."

"What have you got Reiji?" asks Valerie Johansson, ranking officer currently on the bridge of the starship TSF Venture. Looking up from her tablet she also spots the flashing light on Yomato's console. Crossing to the science station, she brings up similar charts and graphs. Eyes narrowed at the almost contradictory information, she ties the main sensors in with a few other others, normally used for measuring nebulae and assorted gaseous clouds. If anything the readings become even more confusing.

"Have you checked for sensor malfunction? Try resetting the secondary array."

"Already have Sir. No difference."

"Can you pinpoint the cause? Looks like... somewhere sunward from our current location? I think."

"Roger that Sir. I'm thinking the same but its difficult to be sure. These readings are all over the place. I have the ship working to see if it can come up with a pattern. Or even work out an average on the distance to... what ever these readings are showing. My best guess, is some kind of erratic energy pulse."

"Keep on it and let me know if anything changes. Or if it starts making any kind of sense. And record everything." Yamoto nods, having already done so.

"Aye Sir."

"Computer, main screen, visual sweep, sunward, 120 degree arc, fore to aft, no magnification." The large screen shows the visual representation of the stars moving. The system's sun enters the frame from the left and within a minute, exits the screen to the right. Johansson ponders for a minute.

"Computer, multiple visual sweeps, sunward, 120 degree arc for an 80 degree hemisphere, fore to aft, 5 times magnification." Still nothing unusual shows on the screen as the sensors continue giving contradicting data.

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Feeling absolutely wonderful, Susan has kicked off her boots and socks, and stands scrunching her bare toes into the loose soil. She hasn't done this since she was a small child at her Grandparents farm and giggles at the sensation. She can't get enough of the wonderful scent from these flowers. Deep into the garden now, there is no breeze to cool her so she sheds her jacket. With a smile she frames a beautiful blue flower in the holo's view screen and snaps a pic. Stepping back to widen the scene she snaps another before stepping back again. Something incredibly soft brushes against her bare shoulder, raising goose bumps across her skin. She suddenly feels even warmer as a tingling wave of pleasure sweeps through her body. She giggles and turns to look. One of the smaller flowers, closer to the ground is right behind her and she has backed into it. This close the heavenly scent is strong and Susan can't help herself as she inhales deeply.

Another sigh and she reaches out to feel the bottom edge of the flower. It is so soft she can barely feel its texture with her fingers. The holo camera drops from her other hand as she stand on her toes to rub her face against the pedal. It feels divine, and she can't get enough of the tingling pleasure even as it makes her body feel warmer still. It is not long before she seems so hot that she sheds her blouse and bra before giggling like a school girl, feeling just a little bit naughty.

Lost in the sensations of the petal against her face and the tingling pleasure it gives her, it takes a minute before she notices the creaking sounds around her. With a happy sigh she stops and looks around; several of the larger, taller plants are slowly, so slowly turning and bending their flower heads down in her direction. Towards the closer of these inviting flowers, she walks, entranced by their beauty, drugged by the lovely scent.

"Such. More... Beautiful. So... Hot. Good. Feel?" Susan inhales deeply again and sways slightly on her feet as if she is drunk. She stands, entranced by the heady scent, head back, eyes closed until something brushes against her face, chest and breasts, leaving behind a very warm slightly sticky fluid. She gasps and shudders as a strong wave of erotic pleasure sweeps her body.

Opening her eyes, an enormous purple pedal is hanging down right in front of her and even as she watches with delight and desire, it is moving back towards her. Susan, already highly aroused and sweating like she has a fever, quickly strips out of her pants even as the petal again brushes across her skin. More sticky fluid, on her hip and up her side and ribs and most of her arm. With a shuddering moan, Susan eagerly steps forward and wraps the petal around her. Pleasure so strong surges through her body and Susan is lost in erotic bliss, moaning and shamelessly rubbing her body against it.

Panting with lust, she doesn't care when another petal wraps around her. Slaved to the overpowering lust inducing pheromones of the flowers coursing through her body she just moans with pleasure as the flower picks her up, tilts back upright and unfurls, rolling her towards it's center. Her sweaty sticky body is lightly coated with pale pollen as she rolls until she bumps into one of the stamen. Like falling snow, fresh bright yellow pollen showers over her. Immediately Susan orgasms as the pollen, like a powerful aphrodisiac, floods her body further with intense erotic sensations, overwhelming Susan's mind until it is gone.

She is lost to desire and lust as she rubs the sticky fluid and pollen into her skin and breasts while she masturbates. She orgasms again and her shuddering body causes even more pollen to fall. Head thrown back, eyes clenched in euphoria, she opens her mouth, screaming her passion with the overwhelming pleasure and heat. Falling pollen lands on her tongue and the honey sweet taste is nothing to the immediate chemical reaction that explodes in Susan's mind like an atom bomb. She orgasms, then again. And again and again.

It is too much and Susan blacks out while her body convulses in orgasmic ecstasy.