Out in the Black Ch. 11

This is a book-length work, so not every chapter will involve sex. If you're just looking for a quick wank, this may not be your story.

Thanks for reading!

=====

Two days after Cap tracked me down in the gym, I was ready to show him my results. "Got a minute?" I asked, poking my head through the office door.

"Um," he hummed, drawing it out while he tapped a few more times on his display, "yeah, sure. What's up?" He turned to watch me walk in, giving me a confused look when I set a featureless box near his console. Then his attention was caught by my hands or, more specifically, by what I was wearing on my hands. Admittedly, the wire-studded gloves were the most visually unappealing part of the whole mess, but a guy can only do so many things. I gestured and then nodded my head toward his display. Obeying the unspoken command, Cap gasped.

The screen showed six different views of the ship, but not the views available to any of the remaining cameras. Concentrating hard enough to give myself a headache, I twitched my fingers and maneuvered the camera drones through the ship until they eventually converged on the office. I hit the door panel to let them in and had a moment of vertigo as I saw myself from six slightly different angles. Gritting my teeth, I pushed through and managed to get the cameras equally spaced around the room up near the ceiling before setting them to hover and disengaging the controls.

"Carter Rust, you are a fucking genius!" Cap cried, turning in circles to take in my work. My heart did that twisting-fluttering thing it refused to stop and I took a deep breath to force it to behave. It did feel good to be appreciated, though. "Okay, run me through how it works."

As I gave him the details, the captain asked questions and made comments that sparked ideas for tweaks and additional functionality. Then he said something that stopped me in my tracks. "What do you mean, 'portable'?" I asked. I had imagined that the person operating the cameras would be stationary, set up in a room somewhere with a display. The signals for the drones had enough range it didn't seem necessary for everything else to tag along. Turned out I hadn't fully appreciated how different this project of the captain's was.

"This is guerrilla journalism, Rusty," he explained, a spark of some emotion I couldn't parse in his eyes. "We're not just punching at the big newsfeeds. If - when - we do this, we'll be hitting at governments, longstanding cultural institutions - hell, if we do our jobs well enough, we're going to upset the entire social hierarchy." It kind of sounded like the captain was going a bit nuts, but I had to admit I liked his brand of crazy. He put his hands on my shoulders and stared directly into my eyes. "Rusty, this is all you."

"Of course," I joked. "Who else could throw this together?" I gestured at the cameras that were piled next to the transmitter, the gloves tossed carelessly on top. Those definitely needed an upgrade if they were going to be worn in public.

"No one I know," he responded seriously. True or not, the compliment sent a wave of warmth rushing through me. "But I didn't just mean the cameras. I meant all of it. From my decision to finally suck it up and quit the celebutainment gig to the idea of looking beyond the big newsfeeds, even down to the decision of what to cover. Being with you opened my eyes to, well, a lot of things. Your influence has made me a better person, Carter Rust, and no matter how this whole deal ends up, I will be forever grateful for that."

I'd probably react pretty strongly to anyone saying something like that. That the person doing the talking was a man I wanted down to my bones, well - some people might have the strength to walk away, but I ain't those people. So I kissed him. Hard. It didn't even take him half a second to start kissing me right back. One of the captain's hands was on the back of my head and the other grabbed a fistful of my shirt. He clung to me like he was in vacuum and my lungs were his only source of air. Of course, I didn't have room to talk. Both my hands were on his back, holding him tightly enough to make it clear I wasn't letting go any time soon.

"Downstairs," he gasped when we did actually need to breathe for a second. I slid down the ladder and waited at the bottom, yanking him back to me as soon as his feet touched down. Clothes were stripped off and we tumbled naked onto his bed, touching and kissing as much as we could manage.

"Fuck," I moaned as we lay pressed together on our sides, our dicks trapped between our bodies. "I want you so bad, but I'm barely holding on." I didn't want to own up to it, but I'd only jacked off once since we split. I couldn't explain it, but even when I woke up hard, I just wasn't into it.

"Me too," Matt whispered. "I can't - I just - " He gave up on finishing the thought and claimed my mouth again. He shifted his body and slipped a hand between us. I twitched when his fingers touched my dick, then moaned again when I felt his erection held right against mine. Matt's hand started stroking us together and his hips pumped, rubbing the bottom of his shaft against me. It wasn't the stimulation I craved, but it still felt pretty damn good.

Hovering right on the edge, I was trying so hard not to go over. I wasn't ready for this to end. Then he started moaning my name and I knew I was done for. His dick was pulsing against me and I felt the hot wetness of his first shot right before I cried out and joined him in release. A minute later, he lay there frozen, eyes closed, still breathing hard. I found myself running fingers through his hair and planting soft kisses all over his face. I had missed everything about having this man in bed with me. High on the afterglow, it was hard to remember just why I'd been so set on driving him away.

As reality started to seep back in, I could feel things starting to get weird. Yeah, we were good in bed together, but all the other shit was still there. I'd already been feeling like an ass for kicking Cap in the balls when he was just trying to be nice, then he went and said all that stuff about me making him better. How was I supposed to deal with that? It didn't change nothing: I still didn't want to talk about things best left in the past, open up old wounds. But fuck me if I didn't want him again already, if the thought of going back to sleeping alone didn't feel like I was being gutted.

"It's okay," Matt said, rolling onto his back with a sigh. "You don't have to stick around."

"It's not that - " Except it kind of was exactly that. Staying meant talking. Talking I didn't want to be doing.

"Really, Rusty." His voice was flat and he draped an arm across his face, covering his eyes. "Just go." Fuck. The little voice in my head that sounded an awful lot like Kells told me to suck it up and apologize. I ignored it as I dragged my clothes back on. I knew I was fucking this up without listening to my own brain giving me hell. Didn't matter: I'm the guy I am and Cap's the guy he is and wishing we were different somehow, so stuff worked between us, ain't no good.

Leaving through the office, I grabbed my little science project and hightailed it to my workshop. It wasn't like I didn't have enough to do if this was going to be ready when we hit the Ring. Jotting down notes as I remembered things Cap had suggested, I started working my way through the smaller changes, hoping that keeping my hands busy would shut my brain up. Not that it ever worked before, but there's a first time for everything.

Though I hated to admit it, the sex helped. I'd been jittery, twitchy, for days, and getting rid of some of that extra energy made it easier to concentrate. Fuck me if that didn't make me feel gross. I ain't never been the kind of guy who needed to get laid. Fucking was great, and I took it when I could get it, but I'd gone plenty of quarters without and not had a problem. When I had been smart and not fucking someone on my boat, I hadn't had much choice. Something about having Matt around all the time, breathing the same air, got under my skin. One more in the long list of reasons my policy had been a good idea and breaking it was a terrible one.

I worked late, showered while most of the crew was having dinner, and ate alone after they went to bed. The whole time, I was laying out reasons, one after the other, for why I wasn't going to sleep with the captain again. If I wrote it all down, the con side would have dwarfed the pro. In black and white, going back made no sense. But lists didn't account for things like hormones and whatever chemical dump happened in my brain when I fell asleep with my nose buried in Matt's hair that made me feel like I was floating, lighter than fucking air.

To give my willpower some credit, I did actually hesitate in the doorway when I was leaving the galley. I even stepped out with my left foot first, trying to force the turn I knew I should want. But that was my damn problem right there: I wanted Matthison Carolinas. So my traitorous feet took a right and carried me on down to the door at the end. It opened almost before I was done knocking, but Cap just stood there, looking at me. His face was blank, and even if his eyes looked a bit red, they were dry.

"You're here." He was still talking in that awful, empty voice. "I didn't expect to see you tonight."

"Yeah, well - " I rubbed the back of my neck, suddenly realizing the humiliating possibility that he might not let me in. I'd been so focused on my own wants, my own inner battle, I hadn't stopped to think that he probably had doubts of his own. Well, I never claimed I was the considerate type.

"I can't keep doing this, Rusty." My stomach hit the floor and I swallowed hard. He pinched the bridge of his nose like this whole thing was an irritation. "You let me in, then you avoid me, and then you come to me and then you kick me out. All this hot and cold, back and forth, it's too much."

"I mean, you kicked me out earlier, so - "

"Not the point." He dropped his hand but still wasn't looking at me. Just staring off at something down the corridor. There was a prickly feeling on my neck and I fought the urge to turn around, make sure we weren't being watched. I hadn't meant to have this conversation at all, but definitely not standing in the open on the fucking crew deck.

I didn't know what to say, what to do, to get him to let me in. Hell, I wasn't sure I even still wanted to go in. Here he was, handing me the out I'd been looking for, and I'd be the system's biggest dumbass not to take it. But I ain't ever pretended to be all that smart. So I opened my mouth and turned off the thinking part of my brain and just let whatever wanted out its freedom. And, for a second or two, I was afraid nothing was going to take the chance. Then: "Fuck, Matt. I'm sorry." His head jerked up, surprise all over his face. Probably all over mine, too, come to think of it.

"You've been nothing but patient and nice to me, and I shit all over you for it." Okay. That felt like enough, so I gave my tongue the order to halt. Naturally, it didn't listen. "It's - well, it's hard for me to talk about stuff that happened. But that's no excuse to jump down your throat for asking."

"I appreciate that, Rusty, I really do." Shit. There was definitely a "but" coming. "But it's not just that. You've been acting weird since the video. Sometimes I think you're mad at me, but then you are friendly enough when we talk, but still you're distant. And then we sleep together and I start to think you do want me around, but then you go back to acting like we're almost strangers. What am I supposed to do with that?"

Right. Fuck. I had been so wound up about my episode and what came after that I'd allowed myself to pretty much forget why things had gone so sideways between us to begin with. Refusing to address what he'd said had me not knowing which way was up and tugging him this way and that as I flailed around in panic. Each time I thought I'd come to terms with what a bastard I was, I found out it ran even deeper than I thought.

Even recognizing what a colossal turd I'd been didn't give me the balls to own up to why. Why each time I feared he'd been slipping away, I'd dragged him back, only to have another attack of cowardice in the morning. Why I couldn't bring myself to open my damn mouth and tell him what had me spooked and give us the chance to work through it like adults. Why I'd gone from dreading a repeat of the sentiment to feeling something entirely too much like disappointment when it didn't happen.

I was a mess, top to bottom. By all rights, Cap should have shut his door in my face. Instead, he was standing there, watching me. Waiting. Hoping? Or maybe that was just me. "Matt - " I reached out a hand, smoothed a thumb along his cheekbone. Fuck, he looked so tired. I did that to him. "You're right. I'm a dick. I don't have an excuse. Just know that it was never you." Slight lift of a brow. "All the bullshit, it's my own fucked up head. And I can't tell you I'll be able to figure it out and I'd get it if you told me to fuck off. But I swear it's never been down to me not wanting you."

Gotta say, that had me feeling a hell of a lot more vulnerable than I like. Kind of how I imagine it might be to walk around without your skin, just one big exposed nerve. It sucked. When he didn't say nothing back, I figured that was my answer, so I let my hand drop and went to step away. But he caught my wrist and gave me this crooked smile that set my pulse to pounding in my ears. So maybe he wasn't quite done with me yet.

"Matt. Oh, Matt." I breathed his name over and over again as I entered him later. He gazed down at me as he rode me slowly, everything right there in his eyes. I focused on giving him pleasure every way I knew how. I wanted to hear him crying out my name as he lost control. And with all that had been there between us at his door, spoken and unspoken, some perverse part of me needed to hear it again, ached for him to admit it aware and out loud.

"Rusty - oh fuck - so close," he gasped, panting for breath. Matt groaned in frustration when I stopped and waited for his climax to recede. He wasn't there yet. Later, his eyes were scrunched shut and his mouth wide open as he said "ah" repeatedly, but again I made him hold off.

Pushing him to the edge once more, I thought -- hoped -- he would be close enough to losing it. "Rusty, baby, please," he begged frantically, writhing under me. My eyes burned into him, mutely requesting what I was too afraid to ask for, though I knew there was no way for him to understand. That time he pulled himself back, distracted by whatever he did see.

At some point, after we'd been at it for what felt like hours, we were both lying full length on our sides. I fucked him slowly from behind, holding him close to me with a hand on his chest. He gripped my forearm, fingers of his other hand digging into my hip. Our bodies slid against one another, skin slick with sweat. My balls were starting to ache from repeatedly being denied their release and I imagined his felt the same. His dick was held gently in my fist and I stroked him in time with the motion of my hips. I ran my tongue along the curve of his ear and he shivered. "Matt," I said softly. "Do you remember?"

The way he tensed in my arms was answer enough. It had to be - I couldn't bring myself to torture either one of us any longer. I didn't stop, continuing my steady movement as he gradually relaxed once more. I picked up the pace and his breathing sped up as well. "That's it, baby," I murmured when he started to moan. "Just like that. I want you to come for me. Are you ready?"

"Oh yes," he whimpered. "Oh, yes, right there. Don't stop. Oh fuck."

"Mmm. You like that? That feel good?"

"Rusty, oh god, I love - " he took a few gasping breaths and my heart stopped beating. "I love how you - oh - how you know - oh. Oh!" His balls tightened and his dick jerked in my hand. Matt's ass clutched at me, and a few quick thrusts later, I was exploding inside of him. After I came back to myself, I tried to pull out, but his fingers pushed hard against my leg. "Stay," he whispered. So I did. For a while.

Much later, as he slept, I slipped quietly from the room. I held my clothes bundled in front of me as I made my way back to my quarters. "What is wrong with you?" I asked my reflection. It seemed obvious the answer was a lot.

"You were right," I grumped into my wall display. I sent the message, imagining Kells laughing and doing a victory dance when she received it. She'd bet me 500 grams of premium Hermes coffee that Cap and I would be back in bed together before we got to the station. Climbing into my bunk, I groaned as sore muscles reminded me of the night's activities, and I thought that maybe it had been worth all the shit she was going to send my way.