Vine

With a squelch the vine in her vagina eased out, leaving her feeling an ache of emptiness, and for a few seconds it continued pumping its cum out in short but voluminous bursts that covered her belly and breasts. The vine in her ass squirted one last arc of cum at her crotch as it slipped out and away. The vine in her mouth slithered between her breasts as it departed, leaving a trail of cum as it went.

And then all the vines were gone, returning to the jungle. Doors banged open and voices shouted as the crew tried to understand what had happened. Carter was too tired, too uncaring to move beyond blinking her eyes at the pain of the sudden light in her cabin. They crowded round her when they discovered her, momentarily too startled by the sight of her naked and soaked in cum to think of how she would feel about them staring at her.

*

Captain Darling chased them all out. 'Give the lady some privacy, people,' he said quietly. Closing the door behind them, he tried to make himself leave too. Far from being appalled at what had happened to Ensign Carter, he was thrilled beyond measure. The smell of sex, of raw animal pleasure blended with the fruity sweetness of the Vine, was making him dizzy with hunger. His cock tented the soft, grey fabric of his pyjamas, the precum making a dark and spreading stain.

He dared to look at her, at the beautiful young woman whose skin glistened wetly with sweat and splashes of pearly white cum. She tried to close her legs, tried to sit, but the effort was too great and she collapsed back onto cum-soaked sheets. For a moment Darling wrestled with the impulse to claim her too, to add his own cum to the stream that oozed afresh from her pussy, but that wasn't what he really wanted, what he truly needed.

'It's okay, Ensign,' he said. 'Don't get up. Don't be ashamed.' He knelt beside her. Took her hand to squeeze it reassuringly. Get up, he told himself. Leave now. It's not too late.

But it was. His lips were on her belly, kissing her, his tongue caressing her navel, scooping out a mouthful of cum, a soup rich in all the nutrients he needed to complete his transformation.

Darling paused - not because of Carter's whimpered complaint but because of the strangeness of that thought. He didn't question that he was transforming, that he needed the ambrosia that filled his mouth, but it was strange that he knew it and didn't question it. Shaking his head to clear it of such irrelevancies, he licked her belly clean and worked his way around and between her breasts, and soon Carter's protests stopped. She watched him dreamily for a while, then drifted off to sleep, leaving him to wash her clean with his mouth like a cat might lick her kitten clean.

Later, positioned between her legs with her pussy in front of his face, the smell of it so raw, so delicious, he had a sudden memory of Carter peeing at the base of a tree, and of Grant watching her and then masturbating with his nose to the ground. Chuckling, Darling sucked Carter's clit and licked around it for a while, making her moan quietly in her sleep, and then he delved deep into her vagina with a tongue longer than it had ever been before.

*

Lieutenant Commander Jasmina Basara couldn't get the image of Carter's ravished body out of her mind. She was unused to sexual imagery and generally tried to avoid it, and she preferred stories of romantic heroines where the sex was left to the reader's imagination. She liked to imagine the sex as intimate and passionate, the lovers exposing their hearts and their love and of course their flaws and weaknesses. And of course it was neat and quiet and respectful.

In her past relationships - not including that brief, illicit affair with her then boyfriend's sister, which had certainly been passionate but had also been wildly uncontrolled - she had tried to create that romantic ideal of intimacy and respect that she craved. Her family was very traditional, disapproving of her career choice, and she wanted to be able to bring home one day a man they would approve of, clean, educated, responsible, a figure of authority, and yet one who would give her the freedom to pursue her career.

Because she loved flying a starship. She loved being in space. She told her family that being amongst the stars brought her closer to God, to Allah, not in a literal sense but one of communion. The silence was so profound, none of the intrusions of civilisation, one could almost touch the divine.

For nearly two hours she had been trapped in her cabin, her body electrified by the muffled moans and cries of ecstasy from the neighbouring cabin, from Ensign Carter. It was impossible to escape, impossible to sleep. Basara was both terrified and excited, her nipples hard, her clit itching to be touched, and to her shame she yielded to that demand, driving herself to orgasm with her fingers as she listened with her ear pressed to the wall.

And then the force that held the doors shut was gone, and Basara saw Carter's hideously defiled body, semen dripping from ass and vagina that were bruised red, like angry mouths. Semen everywhere. Basara hated semen. It was messy. It was conveniently missing from all her fantasies. Carter looked like something out of the worst, sleaziest porn. She looked like she had been gang-raped.

And Basara had just masturbated while listening through the wall. It made her sick.

'Give the lady some privacy, people,' Darling had said, closing the door. The others - all men and incapable of understanding just how vulnerable she felt - had wandered towards the kitchen, whispering excitedly, laughing even. Basara headed for the Bridge, not wanting to share her thoughts, and desperately in need of answers.

The Archimedes had been torn apart by the crash landing. The main power and engines had been in the tail and were lost beyond hope. Communications too. The plumbing and emergency power worked still, but reserves of water were low and all non-essential systems had been switched off, including corridor lights unfortunately.

The security cameras were still functioning, however. Basara called up the recordings for the past two hours and watched in astonishment as hundreds of vines slithered out of the trees and swarmed around the ship, slipping inside through holes and cracks in the broken hull, burrowing into the heart of the ship. There was no camera to see what had happened to Carter, but it was clear that it was the vines that had sought her out and attacked her.

Vines had crept out of the forest and ravished Ensign Carter, penetrating her in every way they could, filling her with their semen. Basara was on the point of panic. Did the same fate await them all? Was she next?

She turned on all the ship's few remaining exterior lights and set the cameras to watching the forest. There was no movement amongst the trees. She fell asleep there eventually, reassured by the stillness of the forest.

She dreamed of the vines. She dreamed that the forest swallowed the ship, its tentacles pouring through the hull. She dreamed that the vines trapped her arms above her head and spread her legs wide and plunged into her mouth and into her vagina and into her ass and spat semen into her and over her and -

Basara awoke with a scream, her heart pounding, her clit pulsing with a confusing but familiar need. She checked the camera views. It was still dark outside, but the forest was calm and quiet. She was still safe.

'Why are you wasting what little power we have left on lighting the forest, Basara?'

Basara almost screamed again. Captain Darling was in the doorway behind her. 'The vines, sir. What if they come back?'

'If they do, you won't be able to stop them.' He smiled as though this was supposed to reassure. 'I don't think the Vine will be back tonight.'

The captain was not in uniform. He was in a dark blue silk dressing gown, and Basara's eyes were drawn suddenly to the outline of Darling's cock where it pressed against the delicate fabric. It was erect, and of significant size, and when she managed to drag her eyes away from it, to see his expression, his desire for her was clear.

For a moment she forgot all about the vines. She thought about all those stories she'd read of a junior officer falling in love with her dashing captain, and she wondered if this was what it was like. She sat gripped with indecision. Her head told her that she was a fool, that the captain all but thrusting his erect cock in her face was grossly inappropriate. Her heart stirred at the hope she had finally found the romantic hero her family would adore as much as she did - not that she had previously thought much of the captain, but there was something about him tonight, a maturity and confidence she hadn't seen before. Her clit's pulsing itch intensified, stirring the hunger that had kept her awake so much of the night, and the captain's hard cock looked very much like a promise of satisfaction.

'Take your clothes off, Basara,' he said.

She gulped. Had he really said that? She glanced around nervously. 'I think I'll be going to bed now, sir.'

Darling crossed the room to stand in front of her and bent down, his arms on the arms of the chair, caging her in. 'Are you refusing a direct order, Lieutenant Commander Basara?' he whispered in her ear. His lips were on her neck, a most severe invasion of personal space, but she didn't care. She was melting under his touch.

Almost as if it had a mind of its own, her hand reached to caress his hardness through the soft silk of his gown. It was big, certainly bigger than any of her past lovers' cocks, and she loved the feel of it through the smooth fabric. 'Take your clothes off, Basara,' he repeated, and this time she nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

Darling helped her to her feet, and as she pulled her tunic off over her head he fell to his knees, tugging her trousers down to her ankles as he did. In her haste to leave her cabin earlier she had neglected to put on underwear. As easily as that she was naked, and his mouth was between her thighs, kissing and licking her labia and sucking her clit between his lips. She grabbed him by his thick hair, intending to push him away but instead she pulled him tight against her as his tongue pushed into her vagina, exploring and caressing the folds. She was surprised by just how long and thick his tongue was, but the feel of it was extraordinary.

'What if someone comes in?' Basara whispered, glancing at the open door. She had forgotten just how much the fear of discovery excited her. This was what had made her affair with Ana, her one and only lesbian lover, so thrilling. It was dangerous and destructive, but the sex was amazing and addictive. Once she had even made love to Ana while her boyfriend, Ana's brother, was asleep in the next room.

Darling stood, letting his gown fall to the floor, and pulled her close. His erection pressed into her belly as he kissed her, his lips and cheeks wet with evidence of her readiness for him. This wasn't how it went in her romantic fade-to-black fantasies. This was how it was with Ana, dangerous, stupid and ultimately messy.

She made one last effort to stop herself. 'I don't have any protection.'

'Neither do I. Do you want me to stop?'

Almost she said yes. Almost she pushed him away. But her need to feel him inside her was too great to be denied. 'No,' she said. 'But if I get pregnant, you're staying home with the kids.'

Darling laughed. 'It's a deal.' Turning her around, he bent her over the console and positioned for entry.

Basara had one moment's panic that he would be too big for her, but then that enormous head thrust inside, and despite the pain of being stretched wider than ever before, she knew the rest would fit very well.

And it did fit, very well indeed.

*

Carter awoke with a start and sat up clutching the sheets to conceal her nakedness. She was in a strange bed in a strange cabin - or not so strange, really, since it was a cabin similar to her own, but larger. As memories of the previous night flooded back to her, her heart hammered in her chest and she struggled to breathe, and she clutched so tightly at the sheets she could feel the cotton tearing.

But she was alive, and apart from the inevitable soreness of her ravishment she seemed uninjured. And she was clean. Her last memory was of the captain licking her breasts clean of the vines' cum, but she felt cleaner than that. As if he had washed her with soap and water afterwards before carrying her here to his cabin to sleep in fresh, clean sheets.

The captain had licked her clean! Who did something like that? Carter didn't know which was worse, that the crew had heard her cries of pleasure and seen her left naked and covered in the creature's cum, or that Captain Darling had licked it all off. Just how intimate had he been with her while she slept.

And yet, he had cleaned her, and cared for her, and had even left clean clothes - a long dress she had brought with her on the off chance she might need it for some diplomatic function. It certainly wasn't uniform. And he hadn't brought any underwear or shoes, but that wasn't immediately a problem.

She tried not to think of the vines themselves. Thinking of the vines stirred a desire in her that she wasn't ready to face yet.

Deciding suddenly that there was no point hiding in the cabin - she would have to face them all eventually - Carter dressed and checked her face and hair in the mirror for any evidence of what had happened. Her curls were a mess, and she straightened them out as well as she could, but she was clean.

Her eyes, which were normally a pale green, had changed into an intense emerald green. She avoided looking at them, for they seemed to suggest that her ordeal was far from over.

There was no one outside the cabin, no one waiting for her. In fact, there was no one on the ship at all. Carter stepped outside into broad daylight, the sun almost directly overhead. The touch of soft earth against her feet reminded her belatedly that she was without shoes and underwear, but it felt right to her.

Lieutenant Commander Basara, who usually strived to look severe and professional, had let her hair down for once, and between the long dark tresses and the natural sunlight her Arabic beauty was breathtaking. Carter remembered her shocked expression as she stood in the doorway the night before, and from the way she blushed furiously now it was clear she was thinking of it. 'Ensign,' she said, her voice catching. 'H-How are you?'

Carter thought about it for a few seconds. 'I feel well, sir.' In truth she was a little sore in places, but she wasn't about to admit that. Otherwise she felt amazing, more alive than ever. She had walked in the jungle the day before, but she hadn't really seen it, not like this, not so full of colour, not so vibrant with life and energy. At once young and ancient beyond measure.

'Wow,' she breathed, and walked into it.

'Wait!' Basara shouted. 'Ensign Carter, stop!' Carter ignored the orders, but hands grabbed her from behind and held her still. 'Please, just wait for the captain. He'll be here in a minute.'

Carter nodded. 'Okay.' The man had licked her clean. She wanted to know why.

*

'It's okay, Jasmina. I'll take it from here.'

'Yes, sir,' she said, and released Carter. Darling studied his second-in-command for a moment, wondering how exactly she felt about him now. And about Carter. Clearly she was confused by what was going on with Carter, but it was more than that. There was a hesitancy, an agitation, to her movements. As if she were afraid of Carter and yet reluctant to let her go.

Darling took Carter's hand and let her lead him through the trees until they were out of sight and hearing of the ship. 'I feel I know you,' she said, looking at him with those startling emerald eyes. 'I mean, of course you're my captain, but I feel suddenly as if I've known you far longer than two weeks.'

Darling nodded. 'We are both transformed by this world, and it is transformed by us. I am still John Darling, starship captain, and you are still Louise Carter, my ensign, but I am also Grack, last of the Erdri, and you...' He paused, uncertain how to say it. 'You have been claimed by the Vine. And not merely in a sexual way. What happened to you last night was no one night stand between human and monster. The Vine is the lord of the jungle and last night it claimed you as its bride.'

Carter nodded. 'I should be upset, but I'm not. I feel like I have woken up from a long and very confusing dream. But I can't remember anything else. Everything just feels so familiar to me. The Erdri... Flying creatures? Like giant bats?'

'Yes.'

'I would love to be able to fly. With my own wings, I mean.'

'When the wind is right, there's such joy in it.' Darling sighed. It was a joy he would never know again, but there were compensations. 'In all my life, and in all the histories of my people, the Erdri, never has the Vine done what it did to you. It has always been peaceful, except when the jungle is threatened, and then it is a terrifying killer. It killed Lieutenant Grant.'

Her eyes widened in surprise. 'Why?'

'I think the crash hurt it. It was angry and Eric was the unlucky victim. Serves him right, I suppose, for spying on you instead of following orders.' Carter's cheeks flushed bright red. 'But it didn't just kill him. It absorbed him. I think the Vine has inherited Eric's lusts and his obsession over you.'

'It's not finished with me, is it?'

'I don't think so, no. But I don't think it will harm you. I also think that if it weren't for you then none of us would be safe from the Vine.'

*

Basara rounded the others up. With Grant missing presumed dead and Carter gone weird, they were down to a crew of five, including the captain and herself. The Archimedes, as a fast scout and skirmish ship, had had a crew of seven, all commissioned officers. Basara had served in the past on large naval vessels, but promotion opportunities there were rare, and there was little of the joy and freedom and sense of oneness with the universe she felt on the Archimedes.

'We have water for maybe two days,' she told them. 'Food supplies are good for a month, but power reserves are low. We'll be down to emergency lights only tonight. Unless a rescue party arrives today - and don't get your hopes up about that - we will need to look for food and water in there.'

She pointed at the jungle. 'We have already lost one person in there, and what's left of the ship is no protection against the thing that raped Carter last night.' She sighed. 'What I'm trying to say is: We can't stay here.

'Lieutenant Dmitriev and I have checked the results of Carter's analysis.' Grigory Dmitriev was the ship's Medic and Science Officer. The rumour was he had once been a brilliant scientist, but had ruffled so many feathers he had had to flee into space - and resented being there. He wore a perpetually sour expression and Basara found him difficult to work with. His right arm had been injured in the crash and was in restraints now for protection. 'The water is drinkable, and it looks like the vegetation is compatible with our digestive system, so we can survive away from the ship, so long as we're careful.'

Lieutenant Ericsson, the third of Archimedes' three pilots, scowled at her. 'Where's the captain? What does he think?'

'Captain Darling is talking with Ensign Carter and will be back shortly. He thinks we should leave here as soon as possible.'

'And go where, exactly?'

Basara had never much liked Ericsson, and liked him even less now. His piloting skills were exceptional, but he was one of those men who clearly resented women in authority. It didn't help that his youthful good looks and his Nordic blond hair and blue eyes made him so popular with young women hoping to catch themselves a starship officer. He was used to having his way with women.