Orbital Academy 16

"We'll need to get you a towel or somesuch to clean up that mess-" He began, but Errisa simply raised her hand and began licking his cum from her fingers. Hunter lapsed into silence, grinning, as his wife carefully slid her tongue across her sticky hand. When it was spotless, she took him by the wrist and slid his finger out of her.

"Don't you want a turn?" Hunter asked.

"While I'm glad I took your mind off of it dear..." Errisa paused to take Hunter's wet finger in her mouth, sucking her own juices from it, "...we have a meeting with General Buramis we must get to." The elevator started moving again, and Errisa bent down to gather her discarded uniform. It might have been his imagination, but Hunter could swear she paused for a moment before straightening again, giving him a final chance to appreciate her round butt and glistening sex.

"Well I'm certainly approaching it with less stress." He chuckled.

***

"General Hunter, glad you could meet with me on such short notice." General Buramis sat on the far end of the giant round table, with Kathryn sitting a few seats down. Her body language was defensive and stiff, and her eyes flicked around the room like a caged animal. They're used to wide open rooms on Minera. Hunter noted. *This is probably the room that will make her feel the most ill at ease, and me the most easy.* Hunter wondered if Kathryn had brought her here for that purpose, to make sure the rugged General was off balance. That kind of consideration was something his Chiefs were good at, and Hunter appreciated that they had that skill.

"I'm not sure what needs to be said in person, General." Hunter settled into his normal seat at the table, opposite from Buramis. Errisa sat on his right, back straight and hands folded in her lap, while Kathryn leaned back in her chair.

"To be honest General Hunter, I'm not here to say anything. Today is supply day, and I want to be at Pivot when we send you the normal minerals shipment."

"Why do you need to be here?" Hunter narrowed his eyes. "You've never needed to be around for them before."

"Mebbe I just feel like it." As the conversation progressed, Buramis seemed more and more at ease, and now she grinned. "Mebbe I felt like lounging in a fancy Pivot room for awhile."

"General Buramis, with all due respect, Orbital Pivot needs more reason than 'I just felt like it'. You can't just come here and not tell us why." Errisa said, but Hunter shook his head. *That's beyond your bounds as a Chief, love. Someone will notice you taking on more authority than you should.* He made a mental note to speak with her about it later. Besides... Hunter looked critically at Buramis.

Buramis wore a comfortable sleeveless outfit of grey instead of her normal uniform of heavy material with its crisp lines diamond-like lines. Her heavy boots were well suited for trudging through mines or on a surface site, but not visiting another Orbital. She wasn't dressed to impress anyone, she was wearing what she found most comfortable. *She's more at home right now than she's been since making General.* Hunter realized.

"She can do exactly that." He spoke before Buramis could reply to Errisa. "She can do whatever the hell she wants, because we need her and she knows it." Errisa looked shocked, but Hunter knew he had said the right thing as a wide grin spread over Buramis' brown face.

"You've got it exactly!" She nodded, leaning back and crossing her legs on the meeting table. "It's like I've said General Hunter, you and me, we don't mince words. We tell it like it is."

"Not ones for games, either of us." Hunter nodded, but he didn't smile back. "So, you'll enjoy lording it over us, but you'll still deliver the minerals and you won't deliver to Techrider or Academy. For that, I'll accept whatever gloating you need to do."

"Glad to hear it."

"And perhaps at some point you'll stop being a child about it."

"Oh I wouldn't count on that General." Buramis' grin grew wider, and she dropped a wink at the three of them.

"We'll arrange a room for you to stay as long as you want." General Hunter rose. "If you need anything else, we can arrange to have someone attend to you-"

"I don't want someone to attend to me, I want her." Buramis pointed to Errisa. Hunter paused for a moment, but before he could speak Errisa gave him a brief nod.

"I would be happy to attend to whatever you need, General Buramis." Errisa pulled a small earpiece from her pocket, sliding it across the table to Buramis. "You can reach me with this, any time during the day. I'm afraid I have a rather unique inability to attend to you during the night."

"That's alright, I'd heard you were a synth." Buramis put the piece in her ear. "Now that that matter is settled, shall we move this party to a control center so we can coordinate a minerals shipment?"

***

"I don't fucking like it." General Hunter was pacing again, long strides making up for the fact that this control room was larger than the one before. At the panels in front of him, ten different technicians adjusted controls to manipulate the incoming data. "Stop the scrabbling." He barked, and the techs stilled. "You all know as well as I do this isn't an instrument problem." Staring up at the screen, he counted again, reading off the ships and destinations, knowing it wouldn't change a thing. He pointed from screen to screen as he identified the small blue blips.

"Parts shipments from Pivot to Minera and Basura. Minerals shipments from Minera to Pivot and Basura. Tech shipments from Techrider to Academy and Basura. Pilot and security transfers from Academy to Techrider and Basura. And..." he ground his teeth "...nine extra ship signals. Heading from Academy to Pivot."

"Perhaps they're sending supplies to Pivot after all?" One of the senior techs suggested timidly.

"Moving too fast to be supply ships. Those are either cruisers or dartstyles." Hunter growled. "Give me the time of all the arrivals."

"At their current vector, the Minera shipment will arrive in twenty minutes sir."

"And the Academy ships?"

"Will arrive at Pivot in ten minutes sir."

"Bastards." Hunter nodded, but there was no venom in his words. He wasn't even surprised; he had been waiting for something like this all day.

"Maybe I'm missing something." General Buramis said innocently. "What exactly does this all mean?"

"It means," General Hunter passed a weary hand through his hair, "that Academy is sending a blockade. They're going to keep our mineral shipments from coming through."