The Rembrandt Legacy

She took the final step and wound up under the shower. "Program Lily-one," she said and the shower reacted by releasing a rain-like downpour of warm water. She was hairless from the eyebrows down and this close, I could see the fine scaly texture of her skin. One of her hands crawled over her flat, toned stomach and crept between her thighs, spreading her pale blue labia.

"Look, Rem," she purred, barely audible over the pattering of the water. "You can stand there and watch, maybe jack off. Or you could join me. Taste your first Aquarian. Expand your horizon. Fuck, let's have some xenobiological studies. After all, you'd be my first human as well. But if you want to jack off to me..." Her finger made slow, circling motions around her clit, which protruded slightly from her labia. It took a conscious effort to yank my attention away from that mesmerizing display.

I always thought the aliens' promiscuity as shown in their holovid programs was a cliché, but obviously they didn't have the same reservations as most humans had. Or at least this particular alien didn't. At this point, it didn't take much persuasion. In a flash, I had shed the grey coveralls and joined Lily under the shower. She melted against me, the wet, alien goddess, and I hugged her close, running my hands over her back. Her skin felt much rougher than I had anticipated. One of her hands found my raging hard-on and gave it a friendly squeeze.

"Hmmm, I knew you'd come around eventually," she purred against my neck, nibbling at the soft skin.

"What would you have done if I'd told you I was gay?" I asked her, cupping her ass with both hands and kneading her firm cheeks.

"Cried my eyes out." A soft chuckle. "And then I'd asked Vaelia to get a move on so I could watch you suck off our next crew member. Speaking of which... have you ever done it with a Marked One?"

"Not yet. Haven't been drunk enough to."

"Scared of dicks?" Her hand pumped mine. It wouldn't take much to get me off if she kept that up.

"Confused more likely. Hey, listen..."

"I know." She placed my hand on her pussy. Sticky, hot wetness greeted my probing fingers, then she hugged me close with one arm, kissing me furiously. Her tongue slid into my mouth, fiercely dueling with mine. My middle finger effortlessly slid into her and she gasped into my mouth. Her hand on my dick picked up speed, slicked by the amounts of precum dribbling down my shaft. She half-pumped, half-slapped it against her stomach, all the while devouring my mouth without any apparent need to breathe. And much too soon it was over. My knees buckled as I came, shooting what felt like five years worth of cum all over her hand and stomach. Lily broke the kiss and bathed me in a radiant smile.

"Better?"

I gulped down lungfuls of air until I found the strength to reply. "Yeah... but..."

Lily licked my cum off her palm, then she looked up. "Relax, Rembrandt. This was all for you." She melted against me and pecked a playful kiss on my cheek. "I'll get my fill next time. The way I see it, we'll be spending an awful lot of time around each other from now on. And once we're off Waystation 81, you can help me get our next crew member settled in. How about that?"

A delicious spark of anticipation and dread shot through me. She wanted me to have sex with a Marked Zuthrian? With her watching or even participating? What have I gotten myself into?

Lily had an arm around my waist and her gaze never left my face, openly challenging me. But what was I afraid of anyway? I leaned in, cupped her head with my hand and pulled her into a kiss of my own. Lily shivered within my embrace and moaned into my mouth. Our tongues slithered round each other for a heated moment, then she broke the kiss.

"I'll take this as a 'yes' then. Welcome aboard, Rem." Another quick peck to my cheek and Lily slid from my embrace. She pulled a packet of washing lotion from a dispenser and handed it to me. "Mind washing my back? We should be almost out of the Sol system by now."

"No problem. Just your back?"

"I'll take anything you might offer. But if you want to be in the cockpit when we enter the TransNet, I'd suggest you refrain from ambushing me with that nice rod of yours."

She didn't make it easy for me, not one bit. She writhed under my hands and pressed her curves into them every chance she got. Whenever I tried to sneak a grope between her thighs though, she blocked it, placing the offending appendage back onto her stomach or breasts. We got ourselves cleaned up eventually, although by that point I was again hard as a rock.

Lily just smiled as she closed the latches on her suit again. "I told you. More playtime later. See Cosina for your new communicator, then meet me in the cockpit." She used the faucet of the sink to top off her water reservoir, then strode towards the cabin's exit.

"You are one almighty tease, you know that?" I grumbled, standing naked next to the synthesis engine which was humming along as it made a new set of clothes for me.

"Guilty as charged. And I'm not ashamed to confess." She blew me a kiss. "Don't be late. You don't want to miss your first TransNet entry, do you?" The cabin door hissed shut behind her.

The synthesis engine pinged and the lid slid open. Neatly folded, a stack of clothes awaited. Briefs, socks, a sturdy pair of cargo pants with many pockets, an orange tee and a vest, again with loops and pockets for tools. A comfy pair of soft shipboard sneakers.

"Rem?"

The voice out of nowhere made me nearly jump out of my pants. I whirled around, looking for the speaker. There was none.

"Calm down. It's me, Cosina. Ship intercom?"

I groaned. Of course. "Don't tell me you have been watching this whole time."

"Would you be mad if I'd told you I have?"

"Can't leave the new guy alone with the boss, eh?"

"No, just good old-fashioned curiosity on my part. I used the cam built into your desktop workstation to check out that hot bod of yours. Lily can watch out for herself." Cosina cleared her throat. "What I originally wanted to say... your boots are in the work closet outside. Code is 6969."

"Thank you. Mind keeping your head out of my cabin from now on? I've had enough 24/7 surveillance to last me three lifetimes."

A shocked intake of air, then: "Aw, crap. Rem, I'm so sorry."

"Well, now that I have your attention... Lily said you'd give me a new comm?"

"I'll meet you outside your cabin. Just a sec." The intercom went quiet and I stepped out of my cabin, the warm wooden floor under my socks. It felt oddly comforting. Warmth was a luxury back on Titan. They didn't let us freeze to death, but real, comfy warmth? Sighing, I sat down onto the polished wood and let my fingers run over the boards, caressing the grain. Weird, but oddly comforting. I pulled on my sneakers.

A few moments later, I heard quick steps close. Cosina rounded a corner, a sleek black something in her hand. Her subcutaneous circuitry glimmered, the Silician equivalent of a blush.

"Are you alright?" she asked, stopping an arm's length away.

"Yeah, don't mind me. I'm slowly starting to feel like a human being again." I pushed myself off the floor.

Cosina fixed me with a curious look. "But... you are a human, are you not? Or... or are you a Faceless?" She stepped back and her free hand came up. A slender, twenty centimeter long blade hissed from a sheath at her wrist. I took a hasty step back and raised my hands.

"Whoa, hold your horses. I am a human, but it's been quite some time that I felt like one. People use my name here, not an artificial designation. I can have some privacy if I want. That's what I meant."

"Oh." The blade slid back into it's sheath. "I'm not that good with figures of speech yet. Way too imprecise. And what's wrong with designations? Mine is 'Code worker 5198, b-model."

"Quite a mouthful."

"Just what Lily said when she met me for the first time. She dubbed me 'Cosina' instead. Here's your communicator." Cosina handed me the item she had brought. It was an adjustable wrist mount with a glossy, black touchscreen interface mounted to it. The device was built with a curve in it so it hugged my forearm without hindering movement too much. Think a smartphone crossed with an electronic data vault, connected through wireless uplinks with the VRnet. As seemed to be usual with my new crew, this device was of exceptional quality and miles better than the old clamshell burner unit I used to own.

"I've taken the liberty of creating a ship system account under your name," Cosina said. "Cabin settings, key codes, your medical data and financial information are stored in it already. Feel free to customize it as much as you want."

"Thank you. Have we entered the TransNet yet?"

"No." Cosina placed her hand over the control panel next to my door and her fingertips dissolved into thousands of hair-thin feelers. It was a fascinating -- and slightly terrifying -- sight to see a Silician access a computer. I have seen an accomplice of mine do it a hundred times and still I got goosebumps. My fingers didn't turn into filaments, but we both accessed data through our hands.

"We're still a couple thousand kilometers away," Cosina said. She withdrew her feelers and they solidified again.

"Good. See you later, Cosina. And thanks for pointing Lily my way. I really appreciate it."

The Silician nodded my way. "You're welcome. Having you spend most of your life in that facility would have been quite a waste. And it's nice to have another technophile aboard." Her elbow nudged my ribs. "Let's compare notes soon, okay?"

"'Not good with figures of speech' my ass," I chuckled as I pulled a pair of boots from the work closet. They were the nicest mag-lock boots I have ever seen, a far cry from the formless clumps of metal and ballistic plastic I had worn before. I tossed them into my cabin.

"Lily is a good teacher," Cosina said, beaming brightly. "The cockpit is this way. Follow me."

* * * *

So much for expectations. I expected a leather-clad dashboard, cup holders and minimal instrumentation. I expected another scantily clad female alien. And I expected another almost comically oversized room. I was wrong on all three accounts. Well, two and-a-half. The cockpit was just large enough to house two full control stations and their seats. Everything was strictly utilitarian, apart from a sensuously swaying holo-sculpture on Vaelia's console. And the pilot herself wore a white-and-blue high-necked pressure suit -- which stood open to her navel. She had small, firm breasts and the most discreet tattoos I had ever seen on a Zuthrian. Instead of some mythological creature or tribal crest, her pitch-black skin was dotted by what looked like multi-colored specks. It took a moment before my perception clicked into place and I recognized that Vaelia wore a starfield as her adornment of choice. My gaze wandered lower, to her crotch. Minding my manners, I tore my eyes away and looked at her head instead. She wore a headset with a boom mike close to her very red lips. A tiny holo-screen hovered in front of her right eye.

"Hi Rem," Vaelia said, brushing a few strands of her long, white hair out of her gray eyes. "Hop in." She indicated the second seat. "You do know how to fly, don't you?" Her voice had the odd doppler effect of someone using a translator. I wasn't quite sure if she tried to be friendly or not. The synthetic overtones of the translator killed any subtleties.

I slid into the seat next to her and strapped in. The seat moved around and under me, taking my weight and the length of my arms and legs into account and adjusting the distance between itself and the controls. A hectic moment later, I was snug and comfortably ensconced in the secondary pilot's station.

"You know, I do speak Galactic Basic," I said, switching to the trade tongue of the Galactic Community. "Being locked up with alien scum does have its benefits."

"Oh," Vaelia said, tapping her mike. "I just wanted to be polite." Without the synthetic overtones, her voice was dark and sultry, made for moaning. I wondered if she'd ever...

Keep it in your pants, Rem. Just because Lily is a hot little number doesn't mean everyone in her crew is fair game.

Busying myself with the controls took my mind off the sexy pilot. I recognized enough of the dashboard to feel at home. Although the Lumia was obviously in quite another league from the usual buckets I had learned to fly in, there were enough similarities.

"I have... had a Class-B shuttle license and an -- admittedly faked -- freighter permit," I said. "Good enough?"

"I'm more than happy Lily finally found someone else who knows how to use a stick. I'm sick of babysitting the autopilot alone all the time." She shot me a fleeting smile. "And don't worry about the paperwork. Cosina can restore your licenses after I've brought you up to speed. Headset's above you."

"Thank you." I reached up and pulled the device from a resting cradle and put it on. The tiny holoscreen flickered to life in front of my right eye, displaying targeting data directly into my field of view. A set of blue brackets encircled a glittering dot in the distance and guide trails arced towards us. That was leaps and bounds better than the old XYZ displays.

Vaelia's hand brushed my knee, yanking my attention her way. "I'll let you play with the stick if you want," she said, smirking.

"You sure? It's been five years since..."

"My chieftain always said 'Sooner or later you have to stop thinking and grab the scorpion by the stinger'. Relinquishing control now." She tapped a button and the ship jerked. The guide trails turned into rollercoasters and the star field visible on the main screen began to roll to the left. I grabbed my control stick and tried my best to counter-steer. The force feedback going through the stick was phenomenal, giving me enough tell tale signs on how the ship was moving. Compared to the huge, sluggish freighters I had been on previously, this thing handled like an interceptor, with minute adjustments bringing immediate response.

"Hey, don't rock the boat too much," Lily's amused voice purred in my ear. "You're tipping the captain out with the pool water."

"I thought you'd be here, with us," I replied.

"Something came up."

"Don't believe her," Vaelia said, grinning viciously. "The artificial gravity on this tub should keep the water right where it's supposed to be."

"Aww, spoilsport," Lily complained. "No dessert for you, Vael."

"Shut up," Vaelia said, tapping a button on her console. Lily's remark, whatever it was, got cut off. "Rem, the TransNet portal is just a thousand klicks out. Show me what you've got."

"Sure." I took a deep breath. I may never have seen this particular kind of user interface before, but the science behind spatial navigation was universal. X, Y, Z, relative to a point of reference.

Another deep breath. And from one moment to the next, I understood. Trajectory. Speed. Drift. Rotation. And how to counter them. Almost by themselves, my hands and feet danced over the buttons and pedals, aligning the course of the Lumia perfectly with the dot on my heads-up display, which slowly was resolving itself into a tiny ring.

"Bravo," Vaelia said. "Kindly target the Terran warship on heading three-twenty mark one-sixty."

I tapped the corresponding line on the contacts display. "Here you go."

Vaelia cleared her throat. "Terran flight control, this is the Lumia en route to Waystation 81. Request permission to use the portal."

"Lumia, this is the Nakami. You are cleared for TransNet entry. Godspeed."

"Now, take us in. Nice and easy. Lily will throw a fit if we scratch the paint on her baby."

Now I was getting a bit nervous, uncanny understanding of technology or not. Flying through space was one thing. But threading a four-hundred feet wide object through a huge metal ring was quite another. I wiped my suddenly sweaty hand on my pants, then grabbed the stick again. "No pressure, huh?" I quipped between gnashed teeth.

"Listen. I can take over as soon as I see you start to fuck up. So relax a little. Have fun. How often do you think you'll get to drive one of these puppies?" She squeezed my thigh reassuringly.

"No idea. Praecor has planned a training schedule for me already. How long will this trip go, anyway?"

"Waystation 81 is on the 'southern' border of Nor space. About eight days from here. A little more to the left."

I corrected the course. By now the ring had widened to a good three inches on the main screen and the trajectory guide turned from orange to green, indicating a clean run into the middle of it.

To avoid overthinking, I asked: "What's Lily's deal? I mean, she told me about you guys. Bounty hunter Crush, coding whiz Cosina, Mentalist Praecor and you."

"Yes? Go on. What did our fearless pool fanatic say about me?" Vaelia's voice was a silken hum, hiding a distinct edge of steel.

"She called you 'a flawless tactical mind and one hell of a shot'." Dodged a bullet there.

"Close enough. Remind her to add "best pussy eater this side of Vex-III" next time you see her. Up."

I pulled the stick a fraction of an inch towards my navel.

"Lily is a charmer, a fast-talker and a cheat." Vaelia said. "More thrust."

"That's... not very kind."

"I didn't intend to judge. She could coax the mating bowl out from between two frothing Grey without them even realizing it. I haven't seen anything like her ever. She probably got you to drop your pants for her just by looking at you."

"But how..."

"That, my friend, you have to ask her yourself. For all her openly displayed boobs and ass, our fearless boss sure keeps a lot of secrets. But don't fret. You're one of us now and she would never do anything bad to you."

"Are you sure? Or is that one of the stories she told you?"

"I was once much like you. Fresh out of the mines. And once we made it aboard, we ended up in the pool. She treated me like a long-lost lover and I came over and over, her tongue deep within me. When Praecor told me about Lily's... gift, I reacted exactly the same. Paranoia. But I've been with her for the past five years and everything she's done turned out well for us. Good. Keep her steady."

In front of us, the ring filled the whole screen. The data flag attached to it described as at least a thousand feet in diameter, big enough to accommodate even the biggest Nor warships.

"Lumia," came the Nakami's operator over the comm frequencies. "Hold position. The portal is still recharging, at about 98 percent."

I applied enough counter-thrust to stop the Lumia in place. The ship's computers made that as easy as tapping the brakes on a car.

"You still asked me what she-"

"Because I don't want you to get the wrong ideas about me. You have to earn the right to fuck me."

"That's brutally direct."

"The Gravon don't have the monopoly on bluntness," she said, another fleeting smile flashing over her lips. "Once you can beat me in a Circle of Truth, we can talk about... how does she call it? Xenobiological studies."

I shot her a quick side glance. Her whole posture, even halfway laid-back in her seat and her suit open to the navel, radiated confidence. "And who do I talk to for combat training? Crush?"

"Yes. Look. It's opening."

In front of us, a tiny red pinprick of light flared up in the middle of the portal ring. It quickly expanded to fill out the whole ring, tearing what looked to me like a malevolent, lightning-spewing wound into reality. My stick vibrated, indicating that the engines were close to the redline, holding the Lumia in place against a furious maelstrom.

"Punch it," Vaelia ordered. I pushed the throttle forwards and the Lumia shot, like a sleek, wide-winged projectile, into the void behind the portal. Red nothingness glared from the screen, interspersed by strobing lightning strikes.