The Passenger Ch. 04

Shopboard cabins tend to be fairly soundproof, because privacy is a valuable commodity on small ships like this. But Raz, with his acute sense of smell, would know the score anyway. Not that it mattered, of course, because he couldn't care less.

It had been a long day. Raz has always been good at scrounging all kinds of things on short notice, and he had managed to organize the extra bulk fuel containers in under an hour. We spent most of the day installing them, splicing them into the 'Pride's main fuel system and rigging up an extendable fuel line. Anne had picked up the basics of handling the ship's controls quickly. She still had to rely heavily on the pre-programmed routines in the 'Pride's piloting computer, but both Raz and I felt comfortable that she could handle the small, simple maneuvers we might need.

And now I was in the middle of my own coupling maneuver, aiming the tip of my hard cock between Anne's spread thighs, moving slowly forward until it touched the delicate, pink folds that lay between them, glistening with the slick juices of her arousal. Gently I pushed on, until the round, swollen head pushed her nether lips apart and slipped into the opening between them. She sighed at the contact, and I stifled a moan. The gentle pressure, the slippery friction with which her most sensitive, intimate flesh caressed mine was better than anything else in life I can think of.

There is something special about that feeling of first penetration during a bout of lovemaking. It's like that first sip of hot caffeine in the morning, or the warmth of the first rays of the rising sun, or the start of a holiday... Only much better. It's that single, special moment when all your anticipation suddenly starts to become reality, and reality is even better than you remembered.

"Hmmmmm.... Yes, Harvey, yesss..."

She moaned softly as I continued to invade her most intimate parts, slowly pushing on, a fraction of an inch at a time, and we both felt how the bulbous head my cock parted her inner flesh as it went, deeper and deeper, until I felt the heat of her inner core infuse me.

"Yes..." she sighed. "That feels so good. You stretch me in all the right ways. You fill me so nicely...

She opened her eyes and smiled.

"You make me feel so alive," she said happily.

I nodded.

"I know what you mean. Because I feel the same way, Anne. And it's moments like this, that we need to remember, that we need to hang on to."

She giggled softly.

"I'll hang on. You do the rest."

"Well, if you put it that way... Aye aye, ma'am."

Her smile turned naughty.

"You're supposed to be the captain."

"But not here and now, my loyal crew. This is when you tell me what you want, and I give you exactly what you want, where you want it, when you want it. If I can. Whatever it is."

And with that, I slowly withdrew my cock from her hot, tight, slick depths until the head caught between her pussy lips. Then I reversed and drilled my way back in, slowly but relentlessly. Her slick, wet inner flesh enveloped me like a velvet glove, caressing my head and shaft as I entered her further and further, until her inner heat surrounded all of me.

My cock made soft, sopping sounds as I slowly withdrew, pushed back in, pulled out, pushed in. I made love to her hot, wet pussy with long, slow, deep strokes. She closed her eyes and leaned back, an expression of ecstatic pleasure on her face. She reached down with both hands and began to stroke the stem of her clit, her fingers on either side of it, pulling the hood up and down, exposing the little shiny pink tip. My hands found her lovely breasts, and my fingers caressed the soft skin until they brushed the tips, which swelled and hardened even further under my touch.

She sighed and began to moan softly with every stroke of my cock into her hot center. Gradually her moans grew louder and her chest rose and fell with her quickening breath, her nipples rock-hard under my fingertips and standing out proudly from the smooth, round swell of her glorious breasts.

Suddenly the pace of her fingers on her clit quickened and she let out a long, loud moan, her eyes screwed shut and her face contorted in an expression that might have been pain but wasn't. Her body suddenly grew tense, and I pinched both her nipples. That was just what she needed to push her over the edge, and She shuddered as she came, her pussy gripping my cock as if it never wanted to let go. She cried out as her climax hit her, and I leaned forward to keep her from sliding off the edge of the bunk as her orgasm held her in its grip. I kept thrusting in and out of her, my short, quick strokes keeping in sync with the contractions of her pussy, taking her all the way through her orgasm, intensifying it, prolonging it, maximizing her pleasure.

Eventually she sighed and her body relaxed. I reached out and caressed the full, round curve of her breast, brushing the pebbled nipple in its center. She smiled a silly, lazy smile, and opened her yes.

"Hmmmmm... That was so good," she whispered.

I smiled.

"So why don't we go for another one?"

Her smile was a lazy, happy grin.

"I thought you'd never ask."

She hesitated for a moment.

"It's so strange, Harvey," she continued. "This feels so... So right, so natural. I thought I'd need time to get used to it. I though I'd be clumsy and embarrassed at first. But I'm not. It's like we've been doing this forever."

I fought down a pang of guilt. This was not the time, but deep down I knew Raz was right: I had to tell her. I just didn't know how. So I just smiled and kissed her.

"Don't question it," I said softly. "Just enjoy it."

Slowly I resumed my thrusts into her now sopping wet pussy, and we both giggled at the slurping sounds it made. I moved carefully at first, but soon neither her rising lust nor mine would be denied any longer, and my hardness invaded her softness with all the force, speed and urgency I could muster. She began to moan again, and I felt my own pleasure rise along with hers.

I moved inside her, her slick, hot inner flesh sliding over the most sensitive parts of my cock. Her inner warmth infused me, and I felt her juices run down my balls with every stroke. Her moans told me she was getting close to another orgasm, and I wasn't far behind her, the beginnings of a massive eruption building in my groin.

Suddenly she rolled her head back and let out a loud moan.

"Oh... Oh yes... Oh gods... Oohh! OoooooOOHHH!!!!!"

Once again I felt every muscle in her thighs grow tense. I reached out and put both my hands on her breasts, feeling the smooth, round curves in my palms, their weight pressing into my hands as I lifted them. Then, my cock as deep inside her as it could go, my thumbs and forefingers found her hard nipples and pinched them, and she screamed as the full force of her release hit her.

The sound of her voice, the look on her face, the feeling of her breasts in my hands, her spasming pussy caressing, squeezing and massaging my cock like a velvet vise filled with honey... It was simply too much. There was nothing I could do but to surrender to the pleasure, and with a loud grunt I came with her, the head of my cock exploding deep inside her, filling her insides with bright, blue sparks of sexual energy, and then the fireworks went off, big time, and my cock began to pulse, pumping jet after hot jet of cum into her most intimate depths. I fillled her with what seemed like a quart of cum, and stars danced before my eyes. I dimly heard her cries of ecstasy as another climax ravaged her, right on the heels of the previous one, and a new wave of heat washed out from her inner core into me as we shared that infinitely long, timeless moment of our mutual orgasm.

When the wave finally crashed, smoothly coming to a halt before flowing back into the ocean of pleasure from which it sprang, we were both panting with the effort.

"Wow..." she sighed.

"Uh-huh," I replied.

When I looked down I saw my cum running out of her, mingled with her own juices, white and slightly frothy around my still-hard cock, which was still mostly inside her.

"You really filled me this time, love," she said, following my gaze. "Thank you."

"You're so welcome," I said softly. "And thank you. That was awesome."

We both moaned softly when my softening cock flopped out of her, followed by a thick glob of our combined love juices, clear and white as they ran down between the crack of her buttocks. Anne yawned, and suddenly I felt very tired myself.

We held each other as we lay in the narrow bunk, the wetness between our bodies slowly turning sticky. Gradually her breath slowed and I felt her relax against me before I drifted off as well, the smell of our lovemaking mingling with the fragrance of her hair.

* * *

"Well," I said over the sound of the sublight drive rumbling behind us. "We'll know soon enough if he's made it."

We were in the 'Pride's cabin: me in the pilot seat, Anne next to me. We were accelerating at a normal rate, but the sublight drive had to put out more power because of the double fuel load we carried. While the ship was not overloaded, we were pushing it pretty close to its maximum right now. Being much older than the Slowboat, the sublight drive in the Starman's Pride was also a lot noisier at these high output levels. It resented being put to work like this, and it loudly grumbled in complaint.

It had been a long and worrying day, and while we had done what we could, the rest of it would be down to timing, hope and luck. We had just taken off, and Ursa was shrinking rapidly in our rearview camera. My eyes were glued to the computer display, waiting for the telltale indicator to blink. If all had gone well, Raz should have managed to evade whatever strike team Brax would have had watching the Slowboat, and taken of under maximum emergency thrust. He should be hot on our tail by now... If all had gone well. But I was worried. Although he would have had to reduce thrust soon after takeoff to prevent burning out the sublight drive, he still shouldn't be too far behind us.

Suddenly the computer pinged, and a tiny red rectangle lit up in the upper left corner of the screen. At the same time the ship-to-ship comms came to life, and the Slowboat's recognition code appeared on the display. I let go of a sigh I didn't realize I'd been holding in.

"Raz," I said, keying the comms button. "Please tell me you're okay."

His face appeared on the screen. The image was fuzzy because of the scrambler and the low transmission power we were using. With luck nobody would pick up our ship-to-ship signals.

He smiled his good smile.

"Sorrry. I forrrgot to switch the damn beacon on. Why don't you send me yourrr trrrajectorrry data so we can match up?"

I punched the controls on the panel before me, hit the transmit button. On the display, Raz' tiny image nodded.

"Got it," he said. "We'rrre good. A minorrr courrrse corrrection will do it."

He reached for the control panel and winced. Even with the low resolution of the encrypted commlink I saw that most of his shoulder was burnt. Charred flesh glistened wetly between black patches of scorched fur.

"Gods, Raz! What happened?"

He smiled his bad smile.

"Nothing serrrious. They had a team of heavies staking out the ship, just as we expected. They got me just beforrre I got the airrrlock door closed. It singed my furrr a little."

"Get the medpack," I said. "It's on the bulkhead behind you, just to your right."

He shook his head.

"No. The damn thing will want to stuff me full of pain killerrrs or put me underrr, and I need to fly this crrrate. It can wait until hyperrrspace. I'm fine. It hurrrts a little, that's all."

"Are you sure, Raz?" Anne said. "That looks pretty bad."

"I'm fine, Anne. I'm Gawrran. We can take much morrre than this."

Anne looked dubious.

"If you say so."

"I do say so. Trrrust me. By the way, I have a visual on yourrr sublight exhaust. I'm thrrrottling down to match velocities. Time to link up ourrr nav computerrrs."

I did that, and I felt more than I heard the subtle change in the grumblings coming from the drive section. A sequence of course and thrust corrections scrolled across the display in front of us.

"We'll be matched in less than ten minutes," I said. "I'd better go suit up."

Anne looked at me, her eyes worried.

"Be careful."

"Relax," I said, smiling. "Putting on a pressure suit is not dangerous at all."

"You know what I mean."

"Yes, I do," I said.

I unbuckled myself and got up from the pilot's chair.

"And I'll be careful," I continued. "Will you be alright here?"

"Sure. I don't really need to do anything, really. We set up all the piloting programs before we took off."

"Yes, we did. But this is space..."

"... so we watch it anyway. Yes, captain. I know the drill." She smiled. "You're a good teacher, Harvey."

"And you're a great student, Anne."

"So make sure you come back in one piece, you hear me?" she said.

I nodded.

"I will. As long as I've got you to come back to."

I winked by way of saying goodbye, then I turned and walked to the airlock, where I opened the cabinet where my pressure suit was stored. I had given it a thorough going-over when we had bought it on Ursa early this morning, but this was the first time I put it on. That's not the way I'd have preferred to do it, but we had simply run out of time.

I climbed into the suit and began to close it up around me. I didn't bother connecting the suit's sanitary facilities; I wouldn't be in it long enough to need them. I took my time. While P-suits are designed to be put on very quickly in an emergency, they are so much safer and more comfortable if you slow down and get it right. Once I had donned the suit, I ran through the check list before putting on the suit's helmet. I was almost done when I heard the sublight drive shut down. A few seconds later the intercom clicked.

"Harvey, we're matched," Anne said. "The Slowboat is right beside to us, about a hundred feet away."

I was relieved. Only a hundred feet was a lot better than I had dared hope for. But then, Raz was one hell of a pilot.

"Copy that," I said, addressing the intercom microphone set in the ceiling. "Stand by for suit comms check."

I put on the helmet, locked it in place, checked the seals. The suit smelled of rubber, plastic, volatile solvents and free monomers. On the inside of the helmet, just above the visor plate, a row of small red and yellow lights changed to green one by one.

"Life support checks okay," I said. "How do you read me, Anne?"

"Loud and clear, Harvey."

"Raz?"

"Good copy, Harrrvey," Raz said over the ship-to-ship commlink.

"Right," I said. "Then I guess I'm ready. You too, Raz?"

"Good to go," Raz replied.

"Okay. Stepping into the airlock now."

I checked the airlock indicators, pushed the button, and the inner airlock door slid open. The 'Pride's airlock was small, about three by four feet. Two humans or a single Gawrran would fit, but anything more would be difficult. I stepped into it, trying to keep my nerves under control.

"Shit, I hate this," I said to myself.

Myself snorted. "Really?" he said. "Raz got his ass shot off for you, you ungrateful bastard. So stop whining and man up."

Myself did have a point, so I did as he said. With both hands I gripped the heavy T-bar that was the airlock control and turned it. The inner door slid shut behind me, and the red light on the ceiling came on. I ran through the suit's checklist a second time before I pushed the button that started the airlock cycle. I heard the whining of the air pumps as they spun up, and the pressure gauge started to drop. As the pressure fell, the sound of the pumps became softer, more distant, and my ears popped as the pressure suit expanded around my body, until the life support pack caught up and equalized the pressure. The air inside the suit tasted metallic.

After about a minute the light next to the airlock's pressure gauge changed from red to green. I pushed the big red button, and the floor fell out from under me.

Well, of course it didn't, not really. All that happened was that the artificial gravity inside the airlock switched off. But it did feel like falling, and my reflexes screamed at me, demanded that I found something to hold on to.

I took a deep breath, realized that I was panting, and forced myself to calm down. You're not falling, I told myself. Myself agreed, but he didn't sound as confident as he would have been at other times. But between the two of us we got my breathing under control, and I managed not to panic.

Gods, I hate EV work.

Weightlessness is weird. It feels like you're falling, so your emergency reflexes kick in. You panic, and your fight-or-flight response takes over. You feel the urge to catch yourself to save the squishy sack of meat and bones that is you from splattering everywhere when you hit the ground. Suddenly you're no longer a member of a space-faring species. Instead you're just another primate who has lost his grip on the tree branch and is now plummeting down to the forest floor. It takes a conscious effort to override those primitive impulses. It's not easy, but it can be done. Somehow I managed it.

It took me a few moments to get used to the sensation of being weightless. You're floating, not falling, I kept telling myself. I tried to ignore the weird feeling in my balls and the way my stomach tried to climb out of my throat. Finally I took a deep breath and gripped the handhold next to the button that opened the outer airlock door. I pushed the button, making sure to pull myself forward on the handhold at the same as I did so. The light next to the outer door began to blink.

That's zero gee for you: it's a demonstration of Newton's laws of mechanics more than anything else. You have to hold yourself in place every time you push against something, or you'll end up all over the place. You try to push a button, and as a result you push yourself backwards. You throw something, and you end up propelling yourself into the opposite direction. You try to turn a bolt or a valve, and instead your body starts spinning in the opposite direction and as soon as you let go, you're flung outward and continue in a straight line in whatever direction you were going when you lost your grip. It's tricky, and you've got to be careful if you don't want to end up in an orbit around the nearest planet.

The outer door slid open, and I gently nudged myself out of the airlock. A moment later I was floating in space, with only a few layers of pressure suit material between my one hundred and eighty pounds of impure water and the cold, hard vacuum of space. I felt the vast nothingness pulling on me, trying to suck me in. I tried very hard not to think about the infinite emptiness below my feet. But I knew it was there, and even though I knew I wouldn't fall into it, it scared the hell out of me.

Did I mention how much I hate EV work?

I turned myself until I faced aft and switched on the P-suit's thruster. A soft hand gently pushed against my back and I began to move forward. I turned off the thruster after a few seconds. Easy does it, when you're in zero gee. The key is to take your time, to move carefully, and to do everything in slow motion. Otherwise you're likely to send yourself spinning out of control, ending up who knows where, and you may or may not be able to get back to where you were. If you're not... Well, I'm sure you get the picture.

Or maybe you don't. Most ground-grippers don't understand this sort of thing. You see, as long as you have thrust, you will keep accelerating, and for every second of thrust you will need another second of thrust to slow yourself down when you get to wherever you were going. But without thrust you'll simply coast on, at whatever speed you had when you cut your thruster, because there's nothing to stop you. So you either have to brake yourself with reverse thrust when you reach your point of destination, or you have to hit something big enough to stop you. And when you hit something, you'd better make sure you're doing so at a very low speed, because you're more likely than not to bounce off whatever stopped you. And the object that stopped you will absorb your kinetic energy, and as a result it will begin to move itself. The heavier the object that stops you, the less it will move, but even so, this sort of thing can be enough to push a ship slightly off course.