Journey to Year 1,000,000,000 Ch. 11

Journey to the Year 1,000,000,000

By Gary L.M. Martin

Chapter 11

[Note: This is a Science Fiction story with some erotic scenes. It is not a story with erotic scenes in every chapter. Some chapters have incredible sex scenes, but many others have none.]

They approached one of the edges of the cube, and what they saw amazed them. The side of the cube they were on was flat grasslands. Just over the edge on the other side was a raging ocean. Some of the waves lapped over onto the grasslands, just over the edge of the cube.

"This is incredible," said McCrae. From their perspective, they could see the ocean, on the "downward" side of the cube, the giant waves coming "up" towards them to their side of the cube. When the waves hit, some of the splashed water landed on their side of the cube, the grasslands, which was directly perpendicular to the ocean. "What keeps all that water on the down side of the cube?"

"Up and down is a relative perspective, Doctor McCrae," said Mandar. "If you were on the water plane, you would consider that up, and our position downwards. But there are powerful forces which keep the biospheres separate and intact."

"Gravity?"

"If you like. It is not entirely similar, and it is of course artificial in nature."

"Michael! Have you ever seen anything like it?" McCrae asked, staring at the waves below them.

"No."

Jennifer.

They soon reached the first corner, a confluence of three separate cube surfaces: water, desert, and grasslands. They saw United perched at the peak, looking down (or up?) at them.

Taylor let Alex Stone lead the battle. For once he didn't participate, acting like an observer. It went the same as before: squids were blown up, and several men were stunned. The only difference is what the United said to them. This time they said "Give us your love! Show us your loving nature!" which was ironic, given that Taylor's men were blasting them to pieces.

When it was over, Tammad went over to the peak. It was treacherous going, as the area to walk on got smaller and smaller.

"Careful, don't fall off," said Tammad.

As Taylor walked to the tip, he saw a horizon of ocean in one direction, a horizon of desert in another, and a horizon of grasslands on the third surface. It was truly remarkable. And then Tammad was reaching down and twisting the very tip of the cube.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to access it," said Tammad, shaking his head as the tip would not budge. "This is not it. It must be one of the other tips of the cube."

********

To get to the next corner of the cube, they walked along the edge of the border between the grasslands and the desert.

Taylor walked in silence.

Jennifer.

"Screaning ability?" Doctor McCrae said, as he talked to Tammad.

"We have developed other senses," said Tammad.

"What kind of senses?" McCrae asked.

"It is hard to explain," said Tammad.

"You're not trying very hard," said McCrae.

"It is difficult to find the words, Doctor McCrae. How do you explain sight to a blind man who has never seen?"

"With more persistence than you, apparently," said McCrae.

Tammad thought for a long moment. "It is not a sensory organ as you know it, like your eyes or your ears. It has become a component of the neurons in our brains. As our neurons became more independent, more self aware, they became able to sense farther, in different modalities. We can sense... things about the nature of the universe."

"What kind of things?"

Tammad opened his mouth, closed it, and opened it again. "I am sorry. I am not an Explainer. The United can screan far better than we can. Perhaps you will have an opportunity to ask them."

"Yeah, well, I'm looking forward to that," said McCrae.

********

They reached the second peak, and dispatched the United, who once again implored them to "Show us your love!". Tammad went and tried to twist the second peak, and failed. He turned and shook his head.

They started walking to the third peak. They walked along the third edge, the border between the grasslands and a jungle environment. They had the predictable battle when they got to the third peak, with the same predictable results. Tammad twisted the peak and shook his head again.

********

By the time they had gotten to the fourth peak, dispatched the squids, and discovered that it, too, was not the right one, they felt tired. They had marched nearly a dozen miles and fought four battles. They decided to pitch their tents and rest. Tomorrow they would have to leave the grasslands to get to the other four corners. Looking down the next side, Taylor saw mountains, dotted with caves.

Jennifer.

He ate dinner quickly and retired to his tent. He didn't want to talk to anyone, or see anyone.

And then Captain Audrey Spaulding came into his tent, after the others had gone to bed, and this time he didn't resist. This time he needed her, as he took her in his arms.

"I wanted her. I always wanted her," said Taylor, his eyes streaming with tears.

"I know," said Audrey, hugging and kissing him.

"I knew I could never have her, and yet, this makes it so final!" he whispered with intensity.

"I know, my love. Let it all out," she said. Audrey didn't seem the least bit upset that Taylor was talking about a different woman while she was making love to him.

Even as Taylor blubbered on, Audrey slowly removed his clothing, and then his own. Taylor cried softly, hoping his voice would not carry to the other tents.

"I miss her, Audrey, I miss her so terribly, as much as Pam," he said, tears streaming down his cheeks. He was crying! He hadn't cried in years. Survey Service Captains weren't supposed to cry. But Taylor couldn't control himself.

"I know, I know," she said. She raised a teat, and put it to his mouth. "Suck on this, dear."

Taylor took her teat in his hand and sucked on it. Immediately he became calmer in one way, but more excited in another.

Audrey ran her hands over his naked body, setting in one place. "You poor frail men. You have urges, you have needs, but you can never seem to find someone to satisfy them." Her hand started to work rapidly. "Maybe you just never found the right woman." He felt her hand stroking him, making him hard. "Maybe you just needed to find someone who could want you like you wanted her."

In moments Taylor felt himself becoming hard, and desperately in need. He was aware of the naked, attractive woman above him. Audrey pulled her nipple out of his mouth, and it came out with a pop. "Tell me, Michael. Do you want me? Do you?"

Her lips were just above him. He reached up and kissed her. She felt plush and soft and so very good. He grinded his lips desperately against her. After a while she pulled back, and looked at him with a mysterious expression. "Tell me, Michael. Tell me you want me!"

"Yes! Yes I do!" Taylor cried. He was so hard he hurt; he desperately needed release; he wanted to be inside her, rubbing against her, until all the pain and anguish was burned away.

"Oooooh," said Audrey, smiling broadly as her heavy breasts hung over him. "I feel your lust. It feels so good, Michael, so very good!"

Taylor flipped her over so that she was on the bottom, and got between her legs. He wanted her more than anything.

"What are you doing, Michael?" Audrey asked.

"I... I...." Suddenly, Taylor felt himself losing confidence. Had he misunderstood?

"No Michael," said Audrey. She flipped him over again. "I will be on top!" She mounted him, effecting his entry into her.

He gasped as he entered her, penetrating her smoothly.

"It's a Captain's prerogative," Audrey said, as she started to move easily on his shaft, up and down, up and down. "I have a higher permanent rank, so I get to be on top, Mister." She smiled and winked even as she made love to him.

Taylor could only enjoy the sensation and watch it play out; it was happening exactly like in his vision.

As Taylor felt himself enter her, he watched Audrey go up and down, her heavy breasts bouncing with every push, the bun on top of her head looking like a thick, short, penis, moving up and down, up and down, symbolizing the movement deep inside of her....

Taylor felt the head of his organ roughly stimulated. He wouldn't last much longer. Her wetness permeated him, entering his slit at the very tip. Somehow, even as he prepared to fill her with his special liquid, he felt like she was filling him with liquid of her own. Taylor thrusted harder and harder, and reached an edge, like the edge of the cube, and fell over it-

"Jennifer!" he whispered as he emptied himself into Audrey, pulsing once, twice, three, four, five times. It felt so good. All the pain and anguish drained out of him. But at the same time, he felt totally ashamed.

"Audrey, I'm so embarrassed...."

"Shhhh," she said, even as she dismounted him and lay in his arms.

"Audrey-"

"It's all right, dear," she said.

"Did you-"

"I got everything I needed," she assured him.

Taylor looked wonderingly at her, but then he started to feel a warm, almost burning sensation, start at the tip of his penis, going up into his shaft.

"Ah!"

"What is it, Michael?"

"I... I don't know." The warm feeling started to go up into his belly. Into his chest. "I... I feel something."

Audrey looked at him.

Even as he felt the heat inside of him, changing him, he felt cold at the same time, and started to shudder. "I... get Doctor McCrae."

"We don't need him," said Audrey.

"Get Doctor McCrae," said Taylor starting to sit up.

Audrey pushed him back down. "You'll be fine in a moment."

The cold shudders were getting more violent now.

"Audrey-"

"Shhhh," she said again. She slid her lips over his to silence him. She pinned him down with her strong arms.

Taylor's body continued to shudder. It felt like his body was going to fly apart.

And then, and then....

He felt normal.

Audrey sensed it too and released him. "How do you feel now?"

Taylor started to breathe more easily. "Fine... I guess. What happened to me?"

"Nothing," said Audrey. "It was probably just a little indigestion from dinner."

He had more questions, but Audrey hugged and kissed him. "Rest now, Michael, rest. You'll need your strength for tomorrow."

********

When Taylor woke up the next morning, Audrey was gone. She must have returned to her own tent at some point in the night, to help him save face with the crew. Taylor appreciated that.

They had a brief meal before resuming their trek. "How are you... coping... Michael?" Doctor McCrae asked him.

"Better, I think," said Taylor, giving McCrae a narrow look. Did he know what he and Audrey had been up to the night before?

"We all felt her loss, Michael," said McCrae.

"Yes.. we did," said Taylor. Only now he didn't feel anything. Taylor was numb. It was as if a thin plastic film covered him from head to toe, insulating him from all feeling. Why did he feel that way? He felt guilty for not feeling more regret about Jennifer.

As they walked, Taylor noticed the environment changing. The mountainous side of the cube now generated weird halos and unusual partial rainbows. Taylor's vision, which had been clear, was now a bit blurry.

"What are those?" Taylor asked.

"What are what?"

Taylor pointed to one of the partial rainbows.

"You mean that hill?"

McCrae obviously didn't see them.

********

Audrey was walking with him again, smiling and exchanging small talk. But Taylor sensed something else, something behind the smiles. Audrey seemed worried about something. What it was that worried her he couldn't tell, but she was definitely uneasy. Something had happened that shouldn't have happened, or something didn't happen that should have. But Taylor couldn't sense what that was, or even how he knew it was so.

Alex Stone walked next to him for a while. "Captain, I never talked with you about Jennifer."

Taylor gave him a warning glance. Alex Stone was the last person he wanted to talk with about Jennifer.

"She was an incredible woman, Captain," he said.

"Yes, she was," Taylor agreed, in a cool tone.

"I... I know you and her had ups and downs... but I know she cared for you deeply," said Alex.

"Yes," said Taylor, nodding slightly.

"Can I ask you a personal question?"

Taylor gave him a hard stare."All right."

"Do you love her more now that she's gone?"

Taylor looked at the expectant face of Alex Stone to his left, and the equally expectant face of Audrey Spaulding on his right.

Why is he asking me this?

"I'd rather not talk about Jennifer right now," he said quietly.

********

The fifth corner wasn't the right one either. Neither was the sixth.

"I'm telling you, Captain, it's going to be the last one. It always is," said Doctor McCrae.

"There are two more corners, Doctor McCrae," said Tammad. "There is a fifty percent chance that it will be the next one."

"In a pig's eye," said McCrae.

Doctor McCrae was right. When they reached the seventh peak, after battling the small garrison of squids, Tammad twisted the top, and nothing happened.

So they walked to the eighth and final corner of the cube. As they walked, Taylor felt a change in his body. He blinked. His vision, which had been blurry since this morning, started to clear.

And he was seeing different things now. He looked at Tammad, and saw a glowing yellow halo around him. He looked at Tammad's men, and saw the same thing. He looked at Doctor McCrae, and saw nothing unusual. He looked at Ensign Torrence, and he looked normal too.

Then he looked at Alex Stone, and saw the same glowing yellow halo.

"Is something wrong, Michael?" Audrey asked.

Taylor looked at her concerned face, framed by the yellow halo, and shook his head. "No, nothing is wrong. Nothing at all."

********

When they reached the last corner, they had their final battle with the United. One more time Taylor heard them screech "Show us your love!" in his head, before they were blown to pieces.

After the United were eliminated, Tammad went up to the peak. He reached down to the corner of the cube and tried to twist it. Nothing happened.

"Don't tell me," said Doctor McCrae.

Tammad reached down and tried to twist it again. It didn't move.

"Please don't tell me."

Tammad looked embarrassed. "Perhaps... perhaps I should have twisted one of the other corners harder."

"Are you telling me after walking through all fifty sides of this cube, that we have to go back and start all over again because you have weak arm muscles?" said McCrae.

Tammad bent down to try it again. He twisted and turned....

"Doctor McCrae, the cube only has six sides, not fifty," said Mandar.

"I don't care if it has 125! We're not going to start all over again, are we? Michael, tell them-"

Suddenly, they felt the ground shake underneath them. They fell to their knees. The ground... it was moving. It felt like it was moving upwards.

The side of the cube they were on lifted upwards, like the lid of a box, coming up to a 45 degree angle above where it was before. The side started to retract, and, seeing their danger, the crew rapidly ran to the edge, ready to flee to another surface if their side disappeared entirely.

It almost did. It retracted almost completely, stopping a hundred feet before the edge. When it stoppe, they looked down, and saw a gleaming shiny mass, deep inside the cube.

"Kratonium," said Tammad simply.

********

"It was just like opening a box? A giant box?"

"Yes, Victor," said Taylor, sitting back in his chair in his command office on the Judicator. "We called the shuttle and had them take us in. We have all the elements we need now."

"So what now, Michael. Do we attack their main base?" Victor asked.

"We can try," said Taylor. He punched up a holographic map. "This, I'm told, is Corta."

Corta was a ruined world.

It was an artificially created planetoid, a big one, nearly 4000 miles in diameter, placed into orbit between the Earth and Mars. At one time, millions of people lived there.

No longer.

The United had cracked it open.

A third of the planet was missing. It was as if someone had sliced out a third of a ball, with a very jagged knife. They could see now to the very core of the planet, which had a fiery liquid core, at least 12,000 degrees. The flaming core was framed by the jagged rocks of miles of the interior of the planet. One of the edges that had been ripped out of the planet abutted a large ocean. Ocean water spilled down into the crack, drawn towards the center of the planet. When it came into contact with the molten steel, it created enormous heads of superhot steam.

"Incredible," said Victor, watching the holo of the planet with a giant piece of it ripped open, and the ocean draining into the center of the planet. "How did it happen?"

"Tammad said the United did it."

"Why?"

"We don't know," said Taylor. "But their base is inside one edge of the crack, about a third of the way in, about 700 miles towards the center of the planet."

"Why would someone build a base a third of the way inside the core of a ripped up planet?"

"Again, we don't know," said Taylor. "All we do know is that we now have the elements to pierce their defensive shield. It's like a door code. The presence of the elements will let us pass. According to Tammad."

"According to Tammad," Victor repeated. He said nothing for a long moment. "You know, Michael we haven't talked about Jennifer."

"There's nothing to say," said Taylor, getting up from his chair abruptly. He looked out the window behind his desk.

"I think there's a lot to say," said Victor. "She was beloved by the crew, Michael. You didn't have the monopoly on that."

"I know," said Taylor, staring at the stars.

"She was smart, she was excellent, and she was one of the Survey Service's finest."

"The very finest," said Taylor, his hands balling into fists.

Victor looked at him. "Are you sure you're all right, Michael?"

Taylor looked at his friend for a long moment. "I'm fine, Victor," he said finally. "Let's... let's get back to planning this mission."

"So you're going to go through with this?" Victor asked, indicating the holo of Corta.

"We're going to do what we came here to do. We're going to go in and shut down the time corridor device," said Taylor. "Long range sensors have pinpointed a large monolith at their main base, which Tammad says control it. We will either destroy it, or shut it down completely."

"So we're going to go along with Tammad's plan?"

"To the letter," said Taylor.

Victor gave him a skeptical look. "Michael?"

And then finally, Taylor gave a small smile. "At least, that's what we want Tammad to believe."

********

The night before they were to launch the assault on Corta, Taylor drifted into an uneasy sleep. He dreamed of many things. But his last dream was of Jennifer. He was making love to her.

Finally!

Taylor moved between her legs, so happy to be inside of her. She looked up at him and smiled. "You've been waiting for this a long time, haven't you, Michael?" she said.

"Yes," he said. Taylor smoothly slid his penis in and out of her. It felt wonderful. He looked at her round melons. Finally, he could feel them. He squeezed one of them and broke into a triumphant smile.

"So finally you have me, Captain. Yours. Completely conquered," said Jennifer, with a grin. But then her grin turned nasty. "Think of all the men who had me, Michael." Every time he thrusted into her, she said a name.