What Happens in Orbit Pt. 01

[She's not gonna make it to our planet like this.]

[I know. But what the hell do we do?]

[I have an idea.]

The Officer kneeled next to the bed, stroking Cora's hair. "Hey." She rolled to face him, still a giddy mess from earlier. "Hiiiiii!" He shook his head and pulled out a cloth to wipe her face. "Are you okay?" When he pulled the cloth away, she was already asleep.

[Shit.]

When Cora woke up, her throat was sore. And her jaw. Her brain was too foggy to fully process what had happened. She found another water bottle and realized the tablet had a long message left on it.

<WE HAVE TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH. THE SCIENTIST SEVERELY OVERDOSED YOU ON THAT MEDICINE. YOU'VE BEEN PUT INTO A CONDITION THAT COULD BE DANGEROUS IF LEFT LONG ENOUGH. HOWEVER, THERE'S ONLY ONE WAY WE CAN HELP. PLEASE TALK TO ONE OF US FOR THE PLAN.>

This is fucked up. Cora sat up and walked to the door. Already, her blood pressure was rising. The door slid open easily. Outside, in the main area of the ship, the Engineer was sitting at his station, watching the screen before him. Cora walked up behind him, remembering how his fingers felt inside her. The Officer sat next to him and turned around to face her. "Cora. Are you ready?"

She shook her head. "No. I have a quick question."

The Officer tilted his head. "Oh?"

"What, and I cannot stress this enough, the fuck?"

Confused, he turned to the Engineer, who shrugged. "I don't know what you mean?"

"Okay, so." Cora took a deep breath. "Your home planet develops this stuff. Clearly invests a lot of resources into these missions."

The Officer nodded.

"This medicine is clearly not some run-of-the-mill stuff. I feel like my hormones are being fucked with. I'm having goddamn joint pain. I'm no doctor but I know that I'm being used as a lab rat. As far as I can tell, none of you actually knows what it does. And that idiot was giving it to me every single time he got impatient."

The Engineer said something to the Officer in their language. He sighed.

"Okay," he relented. "I'll be honest. We don't really understand what this stuff does. We were sent to test it on various species. It shouldn't be having this rapid effect on you, though, because Ray is only dosing you with the smallest possible amount. Like, maybe ten percent of the effective dose from our preliminary trials. He spent weeks on the dosage calculations."

Cora had been trying to be positive, but this made her chest hurt. She was indeed a lab rat. She'd tried not to think about the truth of the situation, that she was either going to die here or be taken back to- to what, exactly? She didn't want to know the answer.

"Go ahead with the plan, then."

"Okay. Here's the plan."

Cora shimmied up into a chair next to him, listening as well as she could. "So Ray, our Scientist, technically leads this expedition. He has the authority and the connections. He has also worked so much for the past... three years of your time, that he's had to use something called heat suppressants. Mind you, it's technically illegal to use them for more than... maybe three months of your time. Males start to have issues. Especially if you have to suddenly go off of them because they go missing."

The Engineer held up a bottle of pills and shook it.

"Tonight, when the night cycle comes on, I'll have him come to your quarters. And we'll block the door behind him. After that, the both of you won't have to worry about anything. Especially not him, since he's a member of the royal family." Cora didn't like feeling responsible for their mistakes. Nobody asked her if she even wanted to go through with this half-cocked plan. But she didn't speak up again.

Cora was waiting in her quarters. Her vision had gone slightly red, her eyes bloodshot. Her irises started to emit a faint glow after a while, which was definitely a bad sign. Maybe she was radioactive now. Every breeze against her skin set off a crackling sensation across her body. She'd taken off her clothes and put them and the blanket in a corner. It was all too much right now. The lights dimmed and the door slammed open. Ray was unceremoniously thrown in, snarling as he hit the opposite wall. He looked to be the same as Cora, eyes bloodshot and slightly glowing. And he smelled really good. As he staggered to his feet, he looked at Cora and tried to straighten up. "What is going on here?" She leaned back onto the bed, keeping her thighs pressed together. "You tell me, Ray." He took a step back, his breath becoming shallow. "Oh, no." He ran for the door, trying to open it, shouting in their language.

Cora watched him begin to panic, feeling guilty. "Ray. Come sit down with me. You're gonna hurt yourself." He huffed a sigh and sat down next to her. "Tell me what is happening." He kept his gaze on the other side of the room. His tone was thin and unpleasant. "And why don't you have your clothes on?"

Cora let out a weak, breathy laugh before inching closer to him. Before he could react, she hopped up and straddled his lap. "I thought you wanted to know when I was ready?" He froze completely, his eyes locked on hers. She grabbed one of his hands and guided it between her legs. "I mean, you can feel it, right?" As his fingers met her clit, she let out an involuntary moan. "Ray," She whined. "Your medicine made me like this. You have to help me." He growled, having completely lost the polite tone that she was used to. It made her pulse quicken. His finger traced a hesitant circle around her swollen clit. "I can't. I have to bring you back." His stubbornness started to irritate her. Cora was so riled up, she felt like she'd die without something inside her. His other hands were resting on her waist and one was on her hip. She leaned forward, pressing her lips against his neck. They all had these thin ridges along their throats. It looked sensitive. Judging by his reaction, it was. Making her way up to his ear, she quietly moaned. He'd gone completely stiff and with every exhale, he growled. But what excited Cora the most, was that he was shaking like a leaf. "It's okay if you don't want to," Her free hand finally found the clasp for his belt and pants. "We don't have to." When her hand wrapped around his shaft, he closed his eyes. "Just feel it, though." She lowered herself against his member, slowly moving her hips back and forth. His nails dug into her skin, his fourth hand seizing one of her thighs. Completely unlike anything she'd heard before, he whimpered. "We aren't supposed to-" Cora sighed. "Okay, we won't! Can't have you getting in trouble with your aunt." As she said this, the tip was pressing into her opening. It was almost too much for her. She angled her hips and let it press in, just a little. "But you know it'd feel so good," she whined into his ear. Without warning, he seized her by the throat and slammed her into the bed. In one fluid motion, he had her pinned down by her wrists and her throat. "Do you," he snarled in her ear, "want to get me killed?" As aroused as she was, Cora felt no fear.

"You wouldn't be killed."

"You don't know that. You don't know anything."

Cora ignored him, spreading her legs. His free hand pressed against her opening before he slipped a finger inside. "I know you need it," she whispered.

He growled again, letting his fangs graze her throat. "You should be scared right now."

Cora laughed. He was threatening her, but his fingers hadn't stopped moving inside her. It felt so good, but she couldn't help feeling annoyed. "Really? That's pathetic. You can't handle the consequences of your own actions, so you threaten me?" She was pushing her luck. He probably could kill her. "Everyone on this ship knows that you have nothing to worry about. Besides," she continued. "You're only gonna get worse and they won't let you out until you fix it." He definitely was getting worse. His grip had tightened considerably and his eyes were losing focus. Actually, there was a chance that he didn't hear anything she said. "Um... Ray?" His eyes snapped up to meet hers. They'd become much darker. "We have a saying that means that you're at a point where avoiding the consequences isn't worth the suffering." He narrowed his eyes, but didn't respond. The silence was becoming too tense. "It's called, um, 'fuck it', and you say it before you do the thing." He shook his head, sitting back. He was still shaking.

"No. I'm supposed to be, hmm. What do you call it when you're-" he paused, lacing his fingers together, like he was demonstrating something. "Forming a union with another? Like, that's the only being you plan to spend your remaining existence with? I can't do that to he-"

The door slammed open and the Officer poked his head in, looking bewildered and rather angry. He'd heard. It slowly started to occur to her that Ray was describing being engaged to someone. "Shit," sighed Cora, completely losing motivation. "In that case, get off of me." He pulled his hands away, relieved. "Are- are you sure? Because, well, if nobody tells anyone, it theoretically should be fine! Even though, if I were to be caught, I'd be ruining a strategic union." Clearly being sarcastic, he looked over at his officer. "It could work!" Instead of getting a response, his missing bottle of suppressants hit him square in the face.

The Officer buried his face in all four of his hands. Ignoring his expedition leader, he picked Cora up.

She was far too exhausted to react. This was all exhausting. And something told her she wouldn't be going home any time soon.

The Officer turned to leave. He carried the limp, slightly sticky human into a room about the size of her quarters. There was a large glass bowl with two drains in the bottom. Like a fancy bathtub. He pressed a button on the wall and it started to fill, probably from one of the drains. He pulled a small container from a nearby shelf, and shook some white powder into a free hand. When he sprinkled it into the water, it foamed. As he set Cora down into the water, her eyes stung. Now I'm crying. Great. She didn't even have the energy to be embarrassed. The water was warm and smelled good, like grass. Cora, however, was miserable. "I don't feel any better." She sniffled. He sighed. "I know. I'm sorry. I had no idea he had a mate already." He took her hands in his, scrubbing the mess off them. "That whole plan would have gone just fine, with maybe a 50/50 chance of you ending up carrying. But it would have saved you the suffering. We can find another way." He worked his way up her arms and down her torso. If Cora weren't so tired, she'd be aroused again. But the gentle circles of the washcloth were lulling her to sleep. "Also," he spoke quietly as he scrubbed in tiny circles down her thighs, "I've figured out something. Some of our words, including my name, have a close phonetic match for your language." Curious, Cora looked up at him. She struggled to keep her eyes open. He pulled her out of the bath and wrapped her in what was definitely a stolen hotel bath towel. "That's how Ray came up with his name for you. How do you feel about calling me Mar?" She smiled, already half asleep. "That's good. That's a good name."

Cora woke up to the sound of someone yelling. Not a human, of course. The lights were already on, with a banana and two cooked sausage patties on a glass plate awaiting her. The patties had scorch marks on them, which meant they were cooked on a hot surface and not in some alien microwave. That's nice.

Her head felt clearer today. She ate, listening to the yelling. It seemed to be arguing, a back-and-forth of two different melodies. She recognized the neurotic tones of Ray, guessing that he was arguing with the Officer, Mar. The Engineer didn't seem like the arguing type. He kept to himself, constantly working on the ship.

Huh. The sausage patties tasted odd, definitely not a brand she'd had before. The last time she ate some weird food from them, she was stuck in her little bathroom for two hours. It was the size of an airplane bathroom and she had to climb a ladder above her bed to get to it. It had a sink and a mirror, and the more Cora thought about it, the more she worried that they'd stolen a prefab restroom from somewhere.

The yelling seemed to have stopped, so Cora peeked out into the central area. Only Ray was out there. "Hey, Ray?" He jumped, then relaxed. "Oh, human. What do you need?" She stepped outside her room, closing the door behind her. "I had a question. Where do you get the food you feed me from? I know it isn't synthesized, for the most part." He brightened at this. "Good observation! I get it delivered."

Cora deadpanned. "To," she stuttered, her head starting to hurt a little. "To space?"

Ray laughed. "No! No, I have your 'Wal-Mart' deliver it to your apartment, then we simply transport it up here! We've started trying to taper you off, though, because soon we'll be leaving orbit and can't do that anymore."

Cora didn't want to think about any of that too hard. It raised too many questions, like, whose card he was charging, what did her neighbors think, and so on. She decided to give him a small list, with things like soap and rice. For her emotional health. Ray seemed pleased with this request.

"Of course! You're an esteemed guest, which my officer reminded me of earlier." He paused, rubbing his head. "Also, just to make sure we don't have any more trouble, I've made a ship rule that no one is allowed to touch you! Just to make sure, of course." Ray seemed nervous. The rule seemed... arbitrary.

"Is that what the yelling was about?"

He huffed a sigh. "Yes, there were some differences of opinion." His tone was firm, so Cora didn't push the subject. Instead, she returned to her room. Her phone, which died sometime yesterday, was plugged into the wall. The Engineer must have snuck in at some point. She picked it up, pressing the power button. 100% charged. He'd probably come in late last night and put in what was definitely an outlet.

As she was reading, the food monitor buzzed. Ray popped his head in. "You need to take that. The withdrawals are worse than the side effects." It was another syringe. Cora missed having Mar give it to her. It was awkward to do it herself. She returned to her reading, lazily sipping at it. The taste made her feel sick and gave her shivers. This sucks.

A rattling woke Cora before the ship's lights had come back on. In the dim light, she realized that the recess in her wall was open. The back plate had been removed, and a hand was placing a plate of food.

"That has to be difficult."

The plate froze.

"It's okay, go ahead."

The hand dropped the plate and quickly closed the opening.

Why bother? Cora had a feeling that this wasn't how their mission was supposed to go. As she chewed on the odd sausage patties, she theorized. I think, she told herself, that they were supposed to keep their distance from the start. These guys are probably really similar to humans and just couldn't. Maybe all of them were like that? It didn't make sense to find sentient, consenting species only to treat them like rescued wildlife. Ah. Cora was thinking too much, and it was making her head hurt. And there was still the problem of her condition. She felt like pure shit today, the whole-body tingling making it impossible to focus on anything. Her resting heart rate was too high. It all felt wrong. The fake-food-synthesizer beeped, dropping a syringe. Well, at least it made something.

Feeling bored, Cora poked her head out. The three were sitting in the common area, pointedly ignoring each other. "Hey," she started. "If I refused to take this, would someone have to hold me down?"

They all looked up at her, concerned.

Ray tried to answer. "Well, yes, bu-"

She cut him off, remaining expressionless. "And force it down my throat?"

The Engineer snickered. Mar had turned away.

Hesitant, Ray nodded. "I- well, yes, we would. But-"

"That's hot." Cora grinned and ducked back into her room. She wouldn't do it today, of course, but it was definitely an option if she got too touch-starved.

As she swallowed the contents of the syringe, something bad happened. Cora couldn't tell what it was, but it felt bad. The sense of wrongness she felt in her body increased exponentially. It wasn't anxiety. She felt rabid, if that were possible. The hair on her arms stood on end and the room spun. Sitting down, Cora took a few calming breaths. This did not help. Laying down didn't do much, either. For what felt like hours, Cora did her best to ignore the overwhelming sensations. Until an unfamiliar tone distracted her. It was the small tablet from the Officer. It had a warning message. Translated, it said SUBJECT DATA NOT FOUND.

Ray opened the door, looking irritated. "Now, Miss Human, don't start being difficult just because-" He gently pulled her hair away from the monitor patch on her neck, clearly surprised to find it still there. "Oh. Hm."

She felt like this was not a good sign. "What's wrong?"

"I'm not sure." He called out and the Engineer appeared. They had a quick exchange, with a lot of shrugging from the smaller fellow. In the end, he simply stepped forward and rubbed at the patch like it was an uncooperative sticker. The tone sounded again.

"That's... huh." Ray stopped himself, turning to his colleague instead.

The Engineer shrugged again and began to peel the monitor off. He left the room and came back with another, applying it the same as before. The icon on his tablet turned green.

"There we are. Thank you." Ray grabbed the Engineer by one of his arms and pulled him out of the room. The door shut, leaving Cora alone and unsettled.