Specimen 231

"Then why am I bound to this table?" she asks with a displeased rumble, her tail slowly lifting and prodding at the latches of her straps.

"You attacked me," he points out, gesturing politely towards her.

Her body arches and writhes, though after a quick series of keystrokes on his part, the straps simultaneously tighten, especially around her ribs and her throat. Her flesh, despite having suffered tank atrophy, is still hard and fit, the straining straps only pushing down into her skin slightly as she struggles. The creature snarls past bared, sharp teeth, writhing in earnest. "You fired a weapon at me, Janus!"

The man faces her for a few moments, considering her point of view. She glares at him and stills, seething, watching him. Slowly he turns his head back towards the console, his fingers typing in another sequence. Just as quickly as the straps had snapped into tightness, they now fall loose, resting on her body only until she slowly sits up on the table, cautiously plucking away each one.

"You are correct" he says at last, moving away from the examination table altogether, turning his back on her.

The creature moves down from the table to the floor in silence, her body tense as she crawls on all fours, stalking him. Almost casually he types a brief sequence into his wrist computer, and the creature suddenly collapses, howling in pain and curling into a ball.

Janus turns slowly towards her, the vision of her agony writhing and contorting as it's reflected in his faceplate. She grips at her head and screams while his serene, mechanical voice explains "When you were unconscious, I installed an obedience chip. Do not try to remove it - the microsutures will disconnect your cranial nerves if you do. You will die."

"PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!" she cries desperately, her darkly-nailed hands gripping at her head in torment as her tail lashes heavily on the laminate flooring.

By nearly all appearances he seems unmoved by her suffering, though his fingers hover over his keypad as he says "If you attack me, I will cause you pain. If you try to escape, I will cause you pain. If you disobey me, I will cause you pain. Do you understand?"

The shaking creature wails "yeeeeeeesssssss!" slightly slurring the words with disorientation.

Janus's head tilts downward in assent, and his fingers finally press in the sequence, bringing a sudden end to her misery. While she lies there, gasping and shivering, the man asks, "Do you have an individual name?"

"No..." she grunts, remaining on the floor, not daring to make any movements or startle him. "I am a drone. The Mothers do not give drones names."

"How should I address you?" Janus asks, his voice uncannily polite despite the looming threat of nearly unendurable pain.

Reluctantly, the creature's orange eyes open and turn up to briefly look at the masked man before dropping away, her savagery beaten nearly out of her for the time being. "Nalatine will suffice. I am the only Nalatine on this vessel now."

"That is acceptable. Are you hungry, Nalatine?" The man's fingers slowly move away from the keypad, though as she sits up and snarls at him, his fingers fly back to the keys, making her cower and look down.

"Yes, I am hungry, Janus," she mumbles, cowed.

From the corner of her eyes, she looks up at him in humiliation, to see him incline his head. "I will find you nourishment. Come with me... and remember what I said about obedience."

Nalatine gets to her feet, rubbing at her arm. "Yes, Janus. As you wish."

The pair leave the medical bay, and while Janus doesn't appear to turn his head in her direction, Nalatine guesses that she is being watched regardless. Her footsteps are silent, taken on the balls of her feet, whereas his are loud and distinct. After the passage of ten minutes, Janus suddenly asks "Nalatine, are you cold?"

She shakes her head. "No. Drones do not need clothing."

"I do not know very much about your species. Inform me of them."

Nalatine narrows her eyes. "We are..." she pauses, then frowns, looking at her reflection. The image of her body, tamed and atrophied, makes her feel keenly how alone she is, and how lost. "We were well-known throughout our sector of the galaxy. We are four genders - Fathers, Mothers, and then the drones, male and female. We drones cannot be Mothers or Fathers - we were bred to work any number of jobs and carry out a variety of tasks."

"Drones are specialized?"

She nods, her tail flowing behind her, help aloft a few inches from the floor. "Yes, though various faction heads have different views on what is appropriate." Janus nods slowly in consideration, and she continues "My faction desired soldiers. I am one such, designed for scouting and, if need be, assassination."

After a lengthy pause, Janus says "You are well-suited to such pursuits."

"Is that why you detanked me, Janus? Do you wish to have someone killed?" As the minutes pass, Nalatine has calmed down, sensing that the masked man won't abuse the obedience chip he's installed.

"No."

Nalatine narrows her orange eyes and looks down at the floor, her frame growing tense even as they continue to walk. "The Guild purchased the other five drones. They were all female-drones."

"I have no personal experience with the Guild..." he offers, turning his mask slightly towards her "...if that's what you mean. I do not know why they were purchased, nor to what use they had been put."

His steps come to a halt. Nalatine is so lost in thought that she only notices some three meters from where he'd stopped. She turns to look at him, then notices the door he's gesturing to. "Your quarters, for the time being" he announces.

She cautiously approaches, looking into the four meter by four meter room and seeing that it's outfitted spartanly to the extreme, holding just a small shower unit towards the back. Smooth, durable white surfaces gleam in the glow of fluorescent, recessed lighting set along the seams between the floor and the walls. Her black body is reflected in the panels, her feet padding soundlessly on the cool carbonate black flooring.

Noting her confusion at the lack of any furniture, Janus takes a step in and turns on the console set into the wall. Nalatine walks over and looks, noting several options in varying colors, all labeled with cyphers in a language she doesn't understand.

Janus turns his mask to her, his fingers lingering over the touch screen. "I believe this sequence is for a desk..." he muses, touching the glowing rectangle. Nalatine turns to see a panel lift up at waist height from the wall, and a small, padded cylindrical stool lifts up from the floor to serve as a seat. Janus presses it again, and the desk and stool sink back into the wall and floor, respectively. Her eyes turn to him, and he moves away. "Experiment with it, and you will soon find what you require."

"Do you not know this language?" she calls after him as he leaves.

For a moment, Janus pauses in the hallway, his upright, prim bearing almost like that of a dancer or an aristocrat. "I don't need to know it to pilot this ship."

Nalatine lingers by the door as he walks further down the hallway, the sound of his boots easy to track. She listens to them for a few moments, then turns her eyes to the console, finding the symbol for the door and taps it, shutting herself inside.

Chapter 3

For the next few days, as measured by the Terran calendar, Janus and Nalatine coexist without incident. After this initial period of good behavior, she is given permission to leave her quarters unaccompanied and explore the ship at her discretion. The obedience chip that Janus had installed functions also as a tracker, and so he knows at all times where she is.

Either due to the threat of pain or her innate drive to obey, Nalatine shows no more inclination towards violence. There are limits to her technical capability - she has not been trained to code, nor has she been trained in skilled electrical maintenance - but she is willing to assist with physical repairs, crawling up into tight spaces to apply adhesive patches to leaking pipes, tighten fixtures, and so on. While this isn't the reason Janus had detanked her, he finds that having an assistant is useful.

After one of these maintenance forays, Nalatine crawls back out of the ceiling grate, using her dewclaws to hang upside down as she moves the entry panel back in place. Janus observes as she drops back down to the floor, landing on all fours before pushing up to her feet again. "The repair is finished, Janus. What other tasks are there to do?"

For a moment, the masked man turns his head slightly to the side, his fingers moving fast over the keypad on his wrist. So far as Nalatine can imagine, he is seeing information within the faceplate of his helmet. Not once has he taken it off while she has been in his presence. "There are no more tasks for today" he finally says, turning the mask back towards her.

She nods, swiping away some of the gray dust that's settled on her skin. "Very well. I am going to bathe, then eat."

"I will join you."

She tenses, her orange eyes looking directly at his mask, before he himself stiffens, quickly saying "No, not like that. I only wish to join you for your meal."

Nalatine's tail lashes in agitation, her lips forming a line. "As you wish. Shall I meet you in the cafeteria?"

"Yes. I will await you there."

The two part ways, and Nalatine returns to her quarters, feeling unsettled. The shower helps to soothe her nerves, but her flesh is still sensitive and feels warmer to her fingers than usual. While examining herself, her fingertips slide over her forearm, where several small gray and white speckles are beginning to appear on her black skin, no larger than freckles.

"No... no no no" she hisses nervously, and when she checks her other arm she notices the same spots. Desperately she tries to rub away the speckles with water, hoping that they are flecks of dust, but of course they are not. Her fingers shakily scrub at her skin, her muscles more substantial due to proper activity and nutrition over the last few days. With a groan of frustration, she presses her forehead to the brushed steel wall of the shower unit, sliding her fingertips down her fit body thoughtlessly.

Her touch glides over the slender curves of her waist and hips, feeling the slight channels of her cut musculature beneath her smooth, utterly black skin. Slowly her eyes close, the sensation of her own caress making her breathe a little heavier, her heart beating harder. Nalatine's mouth opens gently, her teeth just visible, the points of her fangs wet as water sluices down her nose and over her full, tingling lips to then drip down her chin to the drain at her feet. The warm water trickles over her tongue, and every so often she has to spit it out, the sensation making her spine dip and tail lift in reflex, and just then her touch slides down over her hairless sex, hidden between her thighs. The electric jolt at the moment when her fingers touch her genitals makes her gasp, her tail lashing and back arching sharply as she grits her teeth.

Immediately she pulls her hand away and finishes her shower, toweling off and paying special care not to rub too hard between her thighs. Since her detanking she has gone without clothing, but now she elects to wear a pair of baggy black workman's pants and a snug neoprene shirt in black, with sleeves long enough to reach down to the dewclaws on her wrists.

When she walks into the clinical, brightly-lit cafeteria, Janus is waiting there, sitting at one of the tables. There is no plate or cup set before him, though his fingers dance over his keypad, the readout within his mask keeping him occupied. She walks over to the table and knows when he notices her, because his fingers halt over his wrist.

"You are wearing clothes, Nalatine" his serene voice muses aloud.

Her voice is thick and distracted as she mutters "Yes."

There is a pause, and he asks, "Are you feeling well?"

It's at this point that her compulsion to tell the truth is a hindrance for her, and she grits her teeth behind her lips. "I am... hungry." It isn't a lie, but it isn't quite the answer she knows he's looking for.

After a few seconds he turns his mask and gestures to a machine set flatly into the wall. "That is a food processor, much like the one in your room."

Nalatine nods and makes her way to it, her step a little quicker than necessary. By now she's figured out how to request cooked meat, or at least a protein substitute that tastes similar enough. While she waits, she can see Janus's reflection in the console's surface. Her body is, physiologically speaking, nearly identical to his, save for the tail and the talons and fangs, and so the sight of him, slender, his arms so fit, whipcord muscles rippling as he quickly taps out commands to his keypad... Nalatine swallows, feeling her face grow hot. The ding to announce her meal's readiness startles her, and her tail tip lashes. A breath helps to settle her racing pulse, and she gingerly takes her tray over to the table and sits across from him.

"I do not believe that you are well," Janus mentions, his mask faced oriented slightly to the left and down as he keeps typing on his keypad, "but I cannot find a disease list for the Nalatine."

"Drones do not succumb to disease" she grumbles, prodding at the slice of brown and red substance on her plate. A small dish of gravy has been provided, and she pours this over the rubbery slab, finally committing to cutting off a piece and eating it. It tastes better than it looks, and so she centers her gaze on his moving fingers, rather than the food itself.

"You are succumbing to something, Nalatine. Tell me what is wrong with you." His mask is turned toward her now, and she swallows nervously as he adds "Please do not make me force you to tell me. This time has been going better than expected."

She sets down her cutlery, the synthetic meat sitting poorly in her stomach. "I am... in season," she finally admits.

Janus's head tilts slightly. "But you had said that drones are sterile."

"Yes, we are. But some of us have not been stripped of the desire to attempt breeding." Apologetically she adds "Perhaps it was left in our genes to give us an extra edge. Perhaps it was just amusing to watch us become so agitated."

Janus's fingers lace politely before him on the table. "One would think such drives would be a distraction."

Once again Nalatine sets to eating her meat, and she mutters "They are. I wish this did not happen." She sullenly chews and swallows, then murmurs "I don't wish to be an imposition. I am very sorry." Despite her best intentions, the sensations of the meal flare in her awareness. The saltiness of the gravy, and the way the synthetic meat crushes between her teeth. Her lips tingle as she takes a sip from her water glass, and the feeling of swallowing down her drink is distracting. Any interaction with fluid is distracting, and the harder she tries to ignore it, the more ferociously it dominates her awareness.

"There is no need to apologize. I did not expect this situation, but then, I did not expect to have to shoot you either. And we have surpassed that slight faux-pas together. I am certain we can overcome this as well." With no response from Nalatine, other than her intense focus on her plate, he adds after a moment "Is there any remedy or therapy that might ease this process for you?"

"Being mounted, or just attending to myself." It's clear that she hates saying such things, but she feels compelled to answer. Even speaking of such therapies aloud makes her skin ripple with desire, and her thighs press together, her hips tense, as if trying to fight against the urge to crawl up onto the table and demand attention from him.

"Am I in danger?" Janus asks, catching her by surprise.

When she looks up at him quickly, a spread of gray and white speckles appear on her inky black cheek bones, creating almost a starfield beneath her orange eyes. Had he read her thoughts? "No, Janus. I would not harm you now." Her nerves weaken her will power to fight against her body, and she swallows, sliding her hands away from her plate to press her palms flatly on the table.

The mask inclines, and he tilts his head again. "Is this why you are now wearing clothes?"

Nalatine swallows and nods. "It is... a safeguard, to ensure proper behavior." Even now her hips shift in her seat, and her toes curl, unseen, beneath the table, at the feel of the material against her sensitive hidden flesh. "I may touch myself without realizing it."

The rest of the meal is spent in silence, both parties feeling disinclined to speak further.

Some hours later, Janus is in his quarters. The layout is similar to Nalatine's, but larger, with a secondary and tertiary room devoted to computer systems hooked up to the cabling in the ship. It's with this setup that he pilots the vessel, charts its course, and keeps an eye on various engine and life support functions. The furniture and appliances are all out, folded up and out from the floors and walls, and sometimes down from the ceilings. It leaves his quarters somewhat cramped, but it's nothing that his typically precise steps can't get around.

Right now, Janus is in his sleeping quarters. His slender frame is sitting on the bed, reclined against a stack of pillows and a wall. His tunic has been removed, and his slender chest, dotted here and there with scars, breathes slowly, dusky nipples tight and hard. Slowly is right hand moves within his pseudo leather slacks, which have been unfastened to allow him more room to touch himself.

Upon a screen pulled out from the wall is the feed from a hidden camera set up in Nalatine's quarters. Ethical questions aside, the angle gives a good view over the shower stall and the bed, the latter of which she has summoned out from the wall. Unlike his messy quarters, hers are pristine, the sheets of her bed typically pulled crisp and tight around the mattress pad.

Yet today her black body, naked save for the loose cargo pants, rests on the thin foam mattress, the sheets around her crumpled from movement. She squirms and writhes slowly, her body undulating as if guided by a slow, lazy tide. Her back arches as the fingers of both her hands touch, rub, and finger at her desperately needy genitals, the sight of such contact hidden by the pants themselves. The movement of her hands can be seen beneath the fabric, their quick, expert flicks and caresses making it clear that she is hard at work. Her breathing is deep, her chest rising and falling visibly, shaking now and again just as her hips jerk and her thighs tense once in a while. The flash of white teeth past her curled black lips can be seen as she groans, and she tilts her head back further into the spill of her long, black hair, gasping as she grows close.

Janus's mask reflects the video feed of her invaded privacy, his hand pulling out his erection from his pants to stroke it faster. The muscles of his right arm quiver, his fingers tight around his shaft as he observes her pleasuring herself for the third time today. He had only watched the first time he'd noticed her masturbating on that camera feed, fascinated with how her body, so human and so not, writhed and moved, her flesh so sensitive even to her own touch. The second time he'd given in and rubbed at his erection through his clothing, though he hadn't brought himself to completion.

For hours he's been tormenting himself, knowing she'd have to see to herself again. And for hours he's allowed himself more and more, until at last, this time, he jerks quickly at his own cock, his chest heaving, his breath heavy, forcing the respirators of his mask to work overtime, the aeration tubes quivering with every intense exhalation. When he comes at last, just after she does, his seed splashes over his hairless chest, the splattered milkiness trickling over the little circular scars there. Droplets of melted and healed flesh, more numerous near his collar bone and neck, are bespeckled with droplets of his spunk, which shiver as his skin twitches and shudders.