Down Came a Blackbird
by Barbara Karmazin
Notice: You must be at least 18
years old to read the excerpt due to the nature of the content. Thank you.
Chapter 1
Goddess above!
Minuscule women with gauzy wings gamboled with leprechauns in a field of
flowers. Cait hastily averted her eyes from the holovid ad for the newest VR
game at Tiny’s Emporium. Her face heated up with an embarrassed flush. We’re
nothing like that.
“Do you like it?”
Tiny’s voice said behind her.
She turned around. At
five eight she wasn’t short, not by any means, but Tiny easily topped the six
foot six mark. He towered over her like an onyx giant and unknowingly projected
his need for approval at her. His deep booming voice matched his size. He rubbed
his left hand across his bald scalp. The heavily embossed ring of a Navy SEAL
glinted on his finger.
“It’s interesting,
but...” She noticed his gaze lingering on the random shades of gold, copper,
black and brown of her braided hair. “Tiny...”
“Ma’am.”
She gestured at the
ad. The hard part was finding the right words to critique his efforts in a
tactful manner. After spending two very enjoyable weeks learning the intricacies
of his solar wing VR game, she appreciated the care and intellect he put into
developing his programs.
“If you’re going to
design a semi-accurate VR game about the Sidhe, I think it’ll work better if you
access Celtic history for your template. Forget all that rot about wings and wee
people, cold iron and magic. The Sidhe fought battles with the early Celts and
later intermarried with them.”
“The She?” The puzzled
expression on his face was priceless.
“It’s the Gaelic word
for faerie. It’s spelled S-i-d-h-e, but pronounced Shee,” Cait said patiently.
“You’ve heard of the Banshee, haven’t you?”
Comprehension
brightened Tiny’s face. He pulled his sofscreen out of his pocket and unfolded
it. “Main net,” he said. “Download all references to Celtic history and
folklore to unit 2957 and bill this activity to Tiny’s Emporium, Deck Two,
corridor thirty seven.”
“Insert credit chip,”
the impersonal voice of Sanctuary Station’s Net Center said from his sofscreen’s
commlink. Tiny inserted his credit chip, gave a satisfied nod and held the
screen out for Cait to see the data dump.
“Nauda’s Silver Hand
is a good start.” She pointed at the reference as it scrolled up. “When you
strip away the ‘magic’ elements, it sounds just like a modern prosthetic device.
And here! The stories about the selkie folk and their shape changing sealskins
fit the parameters of deep sea divers’ wet suits.”
Tiny’s emotions
shifted from a defensive curiosity into a sudden flood of eager gratitude. She
took her hand off his arm and stepped back. It wasn’t his fault he was
projecting at her so loudly. He had no idea she was an empath and that touching
someone gave her a clearer link with them.
“Cait?”
She stopped. His voice
was serious. It didn’t sound like he wanted to discuss VR games anymore.
He folded the
sofscreen up. “Now that you’ve learned EVA flight in VR, how’d you like to sign
up for real time classes this afternoon?”
“I can’t.” Genuine
regret colored her words. “I told you already. I’m only here for a vacation. I’m
scheduled to fly back down to Earth on tomorrow’s shuttle.”
“But this is a chance
of a lifetime. A month from today, the mining expedition’s going to the Pot of
Gold. There are still a couple of berths left open for bid. With an EVA flight
certificate and your medical background, you’d be a shoo-in. Two paramedics
bailed out of the expedition when Nowan filed its lawsuit.”
Cait tilted her head
sideways and gave him a hard look. “Is that why the game was so cheap?” she
asked. “Are you using it as a recruiting tool?”
“Hey!” He spread his
thick hands apart. “We’re only asking the high scorers. Kyle and Dushawn are
going to this class. I figured you might be interested too ‘cause your score is
even higher than theirs.”
Cait looked away and
smothered an irritated sigh. Kyle and Dushawn came up on the shuttle with her
last week. Ever since they overheard the customs agent question her visa, they
made it their business to follow her around. It was a very simple explanation.
Her mother had two husbands. That’s why both of them were listed on the visa.
“Well,” Tiny pleaded
with her. “What do you say? Try it. You can stay here a couple of more weeks.”
It certainly sounded
like a lot more fun than going back dirtside to listen to long lectures on the
translocation of genetic factors during meiosis and mitosis. The concentration
of metallic ores in the Pot of Gold supported the theory that the asteroids were
the remains of another planet. It always made her wonder about an
extraterrestrial origin for her people. Especially when she read the old legends
and stripped away the magical aspects.
Cait gnawed at her
lower lip. Her parents were so proud of her qualifying for Harvard’s Pre-med
class. “Sorry, Tiny.”
His shoulders sagged.
“Okay.” He patted his shirt pocket. “There’ll be other expeditions. If you ever
change your mind, I have your VR stats right here with me.”
She shook her head.
Goddess! He tempted her. The best thing to do was to leave before she agreed.
The longer he talked, the more she wanted to go. Empathic sensitivity was a
tricky ability to control. She had to make sure it was something she really
wanted instead of a reaction to what he wanted. Her gaze focused on the skinsuit
draped over her arm. She held it up. “What about this?”
Tiny waved it away. “Keep it.”
She nodded, surprised
by his generosity. When you took into consideration the special catheter and
microfilament neural fibres for direct input to her spinal column, it was well
worth the price she paid for the custom fit. Besides, authentic skinsuits for
EVA solar wings were all the rage dirtside.
Cait dodged a clump of
customers digging through a pile of used EVA suits and walked outside to Deck
Two’s lift. Its doors slid smoothly open as she approached and revealed two
passengers standing inside it already. Was it a plot by the goddess to test her
patience? she thought. It was the only logical way to explain why Kyle and
Dushawn were there.
Their salacious
excitement washed over her as the lift doors slid shut. That didn’t help matters
any. She moved to the back of the lift, put on her best poker face and stared
blankly at the wall. Maybe if she ignored them, they’d leave her alone.
No such luck.
Kyle moved in on her
first. “Your mama has two husbands. How many do you want?” He tried to pinch
her buttocks.
She rolled her eyes
and stepped out of his reach. No use trying to explain things to these idiots.
Her fathers were lucky they found a human woman to love them and accept their
culture. It worked out pretty good for her fathers. The only other Sidhe left
were too closely related for them to partner. Of course, as a physician, her
mother had a unique perspective when she met her two suitors.
“Yeah,” Dushawn
reached out and tried to paw her chest. “How many guys can you handle?”
Cait didn’t want to
deal with them right now. “Back off,”
Identical stupid grins
blossomed on their faces. They moved closer. Then, with their juvenile lust
swirling around her in a red haze, she pushed them against opposite walls. Sidhe
strength came in handy sometimes.
The lift shuddered and
groaned to a stop at Deck Six. “The next time you make a wrong move, there won’t
be any warning. I’ll just kick you in the nuts,” Cait said when the doors
opened.
Both men scrambled
out. Kyle wiped the blood dripping out of his nose onto his shirtsleeve. Cait
rubbed at her forehead. Something didn’t feel right here. She reached
for them with her mind. Their emotions were a confused jumble. They were in a
hurry not to leave her but to go someplace else. Then what Tiny said about the
high scorers in the VR game suddenly clicked into place. They were worried about
being late for this afternoon’s EVA flight class.
The lift door slid
shut. “Deck two, please,” she said. Her hands were shaking.
Those punks were going
out to the Pot of Gold. What if they found what she wanted to find? She’d kick
herself silly if that happened. Especially if they found proof of Sidhe
existence and didn’t even know what they had. A project that important deserved
better than a pair of low class hooligans masquerading as scientific
researchers. She could finish her medical schooling any time she wanted. But she
might only get one chance at something like this.
Tiny was busy
dickering over the price of a couple of used EVA suits when she reentered his
store. He glanced at Cait and nodded. She went over to a pile of scuffed boots
and sorted through them until he finished his transaction.
A hopeful question
filled Tiny’s face while she walked up and laid her hands on his counter. “Sign
me up for that class. Do you have any spare EVA suits for sale that’ll match up
with my skinsuit?”
* * *
An hour and a half
later, Cait shifted her shoulders under the full weight of her EVA gear and
stepped out of the maintenance lift into the unheated storage hold of Deck Six.
It was worth it to feel Kyle’s and Dushawn’s astonishment when they turned
around and saw her walk over and stand in line with them.
Standing there on the
other side of the vast metal cavern of the hold was their instructor. He turned
around and unfurled his wings. Tall and forbidding, he looked like a matte-black
chimera with his bat wings and black visored helmet. Now she knew who provided
the template for the master image in Tiny’s VR game. The opaque visor of his
helmet completed the illusion of inhumanity.
His jet-black boots
clicked against the deck’s metal grid. “My name’s Edelmiro Jesus Santiago de
Arroyo” He tapped his finger at the circle name patch on his right shoulder. It
had jagged lightning bolts stabbing at the word “Indio.” “But I prefer to be
called Indio.”
She liked that. Nice
and easy to remember. She didn’t feel any emotions leaking out from him. She
liked that too. Especially after the incident in the elevator, she’d rather deal
with someone with a mature emotional attitude. Their lessons should proceed
without any distractions.
Indio pointed his
gloved finger at the swollen lip and goose egg that marred Dushawn’s
dark-skinned features. “What happened?”
Indio’s voice sounded
very raspy and guttural to Cait. Was it a deliberate distortion of his suit’s
speaker system? She couldn’t tell. All she knew was that it scrabbled at her
senses like a wounded claw.
“Uh,” Dushawn gulped.
“When we picked up our stuff...” His angry gaze flickered towards Cait. Kyle
shot him a warning glance. “...I tripped and ran into the door, sir.”
Indio turned to the
next victim in the lineup. He tapped the Celtic circle on Kyle’s suit, then
tilted Kyle’s face sideways for a better view of his black eyes and bruised
nose. “And you...?”
Slanting a swift glare
of his own at Cait, Kyle straightened his shoulders and bobbed his head in eager
affirmation of Dushawn’s feeble alibi. “Yes sir! It was a door!”
Indio turned his
helmeted head towards Cait. Even though she couldn’t see through his polarized
faceplate she suspected he was checking her features out for any bruises or
other signs of physical damage.
He leaned closer
to peer at the golden-eyed calico cat on her nametag and read her name out loud.
“Cait, do you have anything to tell me about this door?”
The last thing she
wanted to do was file a sexual harassment claim. Running around the station and
submitting testimony to a panel of holographic legal representatives was not her
idea of fun. Besides, her people avoided publicity the same way they avoided
cold iron before they learned about tetanus shots. She smiled. Mischief danced
at the corners of her mouth. “I have good reflexes, sir.”
His curiosity washed
over her. He reached up with his gloved finger and pushed a loose tendril of
hair behind her ear. She knew he was staring at the random streaks of color
that patterned her hair.
Indio took his hand
away and stepped back. At the same time, his emotional output shut down. “Good.”
He peeled off his glove and held out his right hand. “Stats, please.”
Tension puffed out in
the cold air along with their breath as everyone unsealed their pockets, fished
out their VR disks and handed them over. He walked to the wall, placed his hand
on the palmprint ID and activated the computer. He inserted the first disk into
the slot and studied the results.
He keyed in a series
of commands and they waited for the first set of wings to pop out of the wall
unit. Solar batwings were custom designed with black photoelectric cells painted
directly onto the fabric that powered the wings. Microchips inside the helmets
translated external light sources into visible streams of electromagnetic
energy. A simple walk on the beach would be transformed on the visors into a
kaleidoscope of photons and constantly changing energy patterns.
A light blinked on the
panel beside the computer screen. Indio opened it and removed the first set of
wings. He inserted the second disk in the slot. They waited for this process to
complete for the next two sets of wings.
She watched Indio snap
Kyle’s and Dushawn’s wings into the sockets alongside their air tanks and help
them fasten their helmets. Dushawn’s and Kyle’s wings were one third black.
Her’s were half black.
Cait flexed her arms.
Her wings flexed. It was a curious sensation, like, yet unlike, the sims. Her
back and shoulders tingled while the wings responded to every move, every random
muscle contraction.
A multitude of
fiberoptic filaments embedded in her skinsuit pierced Cait’s spine and provided
direct feedback to and from the wings. They absorbed the energy of the ceiling
lights and resent it to her nervous system as surges of cold fire.
She studied the
endless stream of infrared and magnetic imaging data on her visor and realized
how much she needed to learn. Indio radiated pure power from head to toe.
Dushawn and Kyle radiated uneven blotches and random flares in the data stream
on her visor. She figured her readings were most likely just as erratic and
uncontrolled. Sweat trickled down her spine. Her nose itched.
Indio’s movements were
slow and deliberate as he climbed down the ladder to the emergency exit airlock.
Figuring out how to balance the wings as she climbed down required total
concentration. Energy flashes crackled through her with every move.
Climbing down without
snagging her wings took all her concentration. Kyle and Dushawn followed her.
Indio reached up, activated the controls and sealed the door above their heads.
He positioned them around the exterior airlock at their feet.
The lock irised open.
Air hissed out as a cloud of ice crystals into vacuum outside. Everyone’s suits
inflated automatically, compensating for the pressure differential. Cait
remembered to fold her wings, then slowly climbed outside and clung like a leech
to the handholds spaced around the opening.
It felt like she was
hanging onto the edge of a vast carousel trying to fling her off into the void.
A multitude of stars sailed past. The moon swung by. A few minutes later, the
sun swirled into view and scorched her with the brilliant roar of its wild
energy fields.
The skinsuit reacted
to the blood rushing away from her head and tightened around her arms and legs.
Swallowing the sudden nausea that welled up in her throat, she looked sideways
and watched Indio tuck his feet under himself, then walk toward her. The
vibration of his boot magnets resonated through her insulated gloves.
When he reached for
her, she activated her boot magnets and let him pull her to a standing position.
She straightened up too fast and collided with him. Rock steady, he held on and
waited for her to catch her balance. There they were, hanging upside
down like a pair of
bats. He put his helmet against hers. “Easy now,” he said. “You forgot to switch
your commlink on.”
“Goddess!” She looked
for the switch.
“Down below your chin
on your right side,” he said. “You tap the green one once with your chin for a
local and twice for the emergency channel. The red one shuts it down again.”
“Your voice…” Cait
blurted out, “Why does it sound the way it does?” Hot mortification flooded her
cheeks. Why did I ask him that? It’s none of my business.
Indio’s gloved hands
tightened on her arms. “An old injury,” he said finally. He released her, then
turned to Kyle and Dushawn who dangled from the other side of the airlock.
Cait switched her comm
on and stopped watching them while she sorted out the different electromagnetic
and radiant energy flows superimposed on her visor. Moonlight splashed around
her and eddied into a whirlpool. The solid wind of sunlight crashed over the
edges of the station and sucked the moonlight into a massive current swooping
through the dark void of space. Earthshine flooded the sky.
Space Station
Sanctuary, or Heaven Help Us, as the long term residents called it, looked like
a giant top. Around the spindle’s base, riding on mag-lev rails, was the vast
LazySusan upon which the station rotated. Freight elevators raced up and down
the spokes delivering cargo and passengers to the rim.
East of the sun and
west of the moon was one of the more poetic descriptions of La Grange Point #5.
She wondered how the person who wrote that old fairy tale managed to describe
this exact location so accurately. Was it just a coincidence?
A wave of nausea
slammed into Cait from Dushawn. She turned and watched him sway while he
adjusted to the centrifugal and centripetal forces pushing and pulling at him.
Bad enough she had to fight her own nausea; feeling his quadrupled the
sensation.
She watched Indio make
sure Dushawn’s boots were securely planted on the metal wall. Indio turned
towards Kyle but Kyle didn’t wait. He pushed himself away from the rim with his
arms and pinwheeled away parallel to the station’s curving side.
“Shit!” Indio’s voice
yelled in her helmet over the comm. He hurtled himself after Kyle’s flailing
shape. Twin streams of light flared from Indio’s wrists. He spread his wings.
Kyle’s struggles carried him too close to a solar vane. One of his wings snagged
the vane and fragmented. Kyle spun out into the darkness. Indio swooped after
him. They vanished over the sloping curve of the station.
Cait hesitated. Should
they wait? She switched the comm to local. “Dushawn,” she said.
“Uh...yeah.”
“I think we should
switch on the emergency channel and listen for any signal from Indio. Okay?”
“Yeah.”
They waited. Silence
reigned. She motioned at Dushawn to switch his local commlink on. “Dushawn?”
“Yeah.”
“Should we stay here?”
“Don’t know.” His
response wasn’t very enthusiastic or helpful.
“Maybe they flew too
far down the line and they’re not in range of the relay antennas anymore. I
think we should fly ourselves out away from station interference and try the
emergency channel one more time.”
“Uh sure. That sounds good.”
Taking a deep breath
to steady her racing pulse, Cait focused on the energies surging through her
wings down the fiberoptic filaments into her spine. Cold fire burned through her
as she silently cursed the sims for inadequate emergency training. She activated
the wrist jets. Catheters provided a crucial source of liquid fuel for the tiny
jets.
Out of the corner of
her eye, she saw small spurts of flame sputtering out from Dushawn’s wrists. At
least he was following her example and learning his suit’s capabilities before
leaping out into the energy flows. She checked her visor’s screen. “Dushawn,
did you hear anything from Indio yet?”
“No.”
“Are you ready to go
out and look for them?” Cait unclipped her grappling hook and coiled the line
around her right hand and arm.
Dushawn unclipped his
line. “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”
Bracing herself for
the next blast of energy as the station spun sunwards, she eyeballed the vanes
jutting out at irregular intervals on her projected flight plan. She deactivated
her boot magnets and pushed off onto the crest twisting past the station wall.
Her wings snapped open. Back and shoulder muscles protested the sudden changes
in direction. A tiny stream of urine flowed from her wrist jets.
Twisting and turning
her body and wings like a bodysurfer, she rode the energy wave curving away from
the station. With her arms lifted overhead, she slowed herself down with the
wrist jets. She scudded sideways onto a weaker energy wave, turned and watched
for Dushawn. His efforts were awkward but he kept himself in a straight line and
rode the next wave out to her.
As he realigned
himself beside her, she studied the energy flow of his wings. Looking down at
Sanctuary, she compared the patterns of the vanes while they absorbed and
transferred solar energy into the station’s generators. She hoped Indio managed
to drag Kyle back down on the rim. Trying to find them anywhere else would be
like looking for a needle in a haystack.
She tuned in to the
emergency channel. Nothing. She tabbed the comm back to local. “Dushawn.”
“Yeah.”
“No distress signal.”
“Yeah.”
“Any ideas?”
“No.”
“Maybe they’re unconscious and can’t signal,” she said.
“Maybe.” His voice
lacked enthusiasm. “I could send a distress signal out now.”
At least the energy
streams weren’t so erratic out here. It felt like she was floating. “No,” she
said. “How are we going to give directions for a rescue team if we don’t even
know where they are? We have to search the rim first. Follow me.”
Carefully aiming her
wrist jets, she caught a surge of moonlight. Soft and sweet flowed its energy
into her as she rode the stream around the station and searched. There! A small
disordered jumble spluttered on the right hand side of the upper rim. She wasn’t
sure but it was the closest equivalent she could see of their wings against the
station’s rim. Cupping her wings into the leading edge of a sun wave, she let it
bring her back around to the target area.
Four times she circled
the station until she figured out how to drag the grappling hook and latch it
onto the vane she wanted. It reeled her down to the surface. She skidded
sideways, then remembered to reactivate her boot magnets.
Hand over hand she
walked herself to where Indio and Kyle were lying all tangled up in the coils of
their grappling lines at the base of another vane. Dushawn whirled past. His
grappling hook snagged one of the vanes a couple of hundred yards ahead. It was
going to take him a little while to work his way back down to them. She
unclipped the wire cutters from her belt and went down on her knee and cut the
line around Indio’s arms.
He reached up and
pulled her against him. Their helmets were face to face but his visor was still
totally black. “Kyle’s unconscious,” he said. “My comm’s damaged. I can receive
but I can’t transmit anything.”
Cait nodded. “Should I
send an SOS now?”
“Yes. Tell them to
send an ambulance crew out to Sector Five on the outer rim. Level Two priority
status.”
While she finished
sending out the SOS, Dushawn limped up. Cait motioned him over to press his
helmet to hers and Indio’s. “What happened to you?” she asked.
“Twisted my ankle when
I landed back there.”
“That’s because you
tried to catch up with the rim instead of flying the opposite direction and
meeting the rim,” Indio’s voice informed them.
“Oh...” Cait said in a
very small voice. She’d made the exact same mistake as Dushawn.
“Doesn’t matter,”
Indio continued gruffly. “As long as you didn’t kill yourself, it counts as a
good landing. Now how about cutting me loose?”
Now that Dushawn was
there, it didn’t take long. Five minutes later, they sat down with Kyle’s
unconscious form braced between them and waited for the rescue team.
While they watched the
rescue pod maneuver closer, Indio bumped his helmet against Cait. “My wings are
too damaged for us to fly back and it’s too small to carry all of us. Signal
them and ask them if they can carry one additional passenger.”
“Who?” she asked.
“Dushawn. They need to look at his ankle anyway.”
“All right.” She opened her commlink.
It took a couple more
minutes of consultation and deliberation, but the team finally agreed to fly
Dushawn to sick bay along with Kyle. When Cait stood up and watched the rockets
flare as they flew away Indio tugged her close so they could talk helmet to
helmet again. “You did good out there,” he said softly. “Real good.”
“Thanks. Do you think
Kyle will recover?”
“He’ll be all right.
His vital signs were good.”
They trudged along
side by side in silence. Cait hoped their next training flight would be a little
more sedate.
“Sector Five!” The
sudden burst of sound in her helmet startled her out of her thoughts.
“Y-Yes,” she said.
“Your teammate came to
a little while ago. He’s conscious and aware of his surroundings. He has a
moderate concussion and may experience some short term amnesia.”
“Thanks.”
By the time they
climbed up the ladder to the locker room, Cait was tired and crabby. She
stripped down to her skinsuit.
Her shoulder muscles
cramped. “Ow!” She stumbled forward and leaned against the door of her locker.
Indio’s helmet clanged
down on the floor and rolled next to hers. “Hold still,” he said. His fingers
dug into her back and shoulders and skillfully loosened the knotted muscles.
Reassurance and concern flowed into her from his touch.
Cait stared at the
helmet lying on the floor beside hers. If he wasn’t wearing it then it meant she
could see his face. She turned around to look and gasped. A solid mass of
glistening scar tissue marred the left side of his face. It ran from his scalp
all the way down to the corner of his mouth and left side of his neck. His hair
where there wasn’t any scar tissue was long and black and tied into a thick
braid draped across his right shoulder.
By some miracle, his
eyes were intact. She’d never seen such stark eyes. There was nothing soft about
his eyes. They were beautiful and dark with uncompromising masculinity.
“I know who you are.”
She reached up to his cheek and felt the rough texture of his scars. “My mother
was on the surgical team that...”
He flinched away from
her touch. His shock flared up and seared through her.
She fell against the
locker behind her. He probably thinks I’m a sicko grabbing at his face like
that.
“Gotta go,” she flung
the words over her shoulder and fled into the corridor.
* * *
Her appetite was shot.
She sat in the farthest corner of the cafeteria and stirred the selection of the
day into a featureless brown mush on her plate. Mainday shift came in, ate, and
left while she sat and rummaged through her memories.
Cait was only five
years old when it happened. At that age, she wasn’t old enough to pay attention
to names in the news vids. It was on all the channels. Indio’s grandfather was
leading a protest march against legalized gambling halls on their reservation.
He claimed the criminal elements associated with the gambling concession were
bringing in alcohol and drugs to corrupt their children.
When the pickup truck
zoomed past the crowd and tried to run the old man down, Indio jumped out and
pushed his grandfather aside. The truck pinned Indio against the casino’s wall.
His left arm and leg were crushed. Flames roared up and seared his face before
his grandfather grabbed a fire extinguisher and sprayed foam on him.
Cait’s mother was on
Indio’s surgical repair team. They didn’t amputate because his grandfather told
them it was against their religious beliefs to die with missing body parts.
Instead, they used bone putty, tissue putty, fiberglass tendons, microchip
sensors and synthetic skin and grafted all of it to the few shreds of bone and
muscle they managed to salvage.
His grandfather’s life
savings paid for the surgery. Indio sued the reservation and paid his
grandfather back. Apparently, he chose not to endure the long and tedious
process of repeated plastic surgery and repair on his face and vocal cords.
Ever since then, the
bone and tissue putty were being slowly reabsorbed and replaced by his bone and
tissue. Cait shook her head. She should have remembered who he was. Fifteen
years wasn’t that long ago. The original news vids were probably in the
archives.
When she saw Indio
walk in with the alterday shift, Cait looked around for a discreet exit. There!
She spotted a service panel behind the clump of scientists at table number four.
They waved their arms wildly in the air and while debating quantum space
strings. She figured they drew enough attention to themselves that no one would
notice her leave. With her hand held out behind her back she slipped through the
crowd to the wall and felt for the panel. Indio walked closer. His head turned
as he scanned the crowd.
“Hey! Indio!” Kyle’s
yell distracted him.
Kyle and Dushawn
walked in the main entrance. A white bandage decorated Kyle’s forehead.
When her groping
fingers found the latch, Cait breathed a sigh of relief. She thumbed it open and
escaped. The maintenance corridor twisted around the cafeteria. She turned the
final corner and stopped dead in her tracks. Indio stood in the exit at the end
of the narrow passageway.
He held out his hand.
“Don’t go.”
She didn’t know what to do.
“You did good.”
He wasn’t upset. His
eyes looked warm and friendly. She relaxed under his intent stare.
“Hey! Wait up!” Kyle’s
and Dushawn’s voices echoed down the corridor. Their footsteps clattered to a
stop behind her.
Indio’s hand fell to
his side. His face stiffened into a cold mask when he looked at them. It felt
like an invisible door had just slammed shut between him and Cait.
He said, “In a couple
of days, we have to repair the vanes we damaged in Sector Five.” He turned and
walked away.
“We have to talk,” Kyle said.
“About what?” Cait
backed away. She concentrated on the sound of Kyle’s voice in order to block his
emotions from her.
“About us,” said Dushawn.
“Yeah,” Kyle agreed. “We were total jerks.”
“Back in the lift,” said Dushawn.
We want to apologize,”
said Kyle.
Cait risked a quick
sampling of their emotions. They weren’t sorry. Something funny was going on
here. Rather than drag this out, she decided to just get rid of them as quickly
as possible. “Okay. Apology accepted.”
“Wait a minute.” Kyle
grabbed at her hand and missed. No way was she letting him touch her. “We’re not
finished.”
“Yeah,” said Dushawn.
“Maybe we’re not as radical as Indio.”
“Right.” Kyle jabbed
his thumb towards the spot Indio recently vacated. “You’re only twenty. He’s
thirty-six. That’s way too old for you.”
She tilted her head
and studied them thoughtfully. “How do you know he’s interested?”
Kyle grinned. “Hell,
it’s as plain as the nose on my face the way he checked you out just now.”
“Anyway, we wanted to
make sure you know we’re sorry,” Dushawn said.
“Yeah,” Kyle agreed.
“Even though we acted like jerks, when the chips were down...”
“You didn’t have to do
what you did,” Dushawn added. “You could have called the ambulance crew and let
them search instead.”
“Yeah,” said Kyle. “We
might have run out of air before they found us.”
She waved them off.
“All right. I get the point. We’re friends now. Goodbye.”
Dushawn grabbed Kyle’s
arm and pulled him back. “See you later.”
She waited and made
sure they didn’t return.
“Damn.”
In that crystalline
moment, Cait saw it. She saw the mess she made by reacting emotionally instead
of thinking things through.
Time stood still.
She looked at the
emotional web, the Gordian Knot she’d created. Back. She told herself. Go back to the beginning. What was I feeling? What was I thinking? What did I
do?
She took a deep breath
and let it out slowly. Go back to the beginning. She went on the
lift with Kyle and Dushawn because she didn’t want them to wonder why she
refused to ride with them. They annoyed her with their adolescent sexual
assumptions. She reacted.
Back.
When Indio spoke, she
felt something wrong, out of kilter about him. Her subconscious knew he was
wounded. Her conscious mind knew he was reserved and businesslike. He held tight
control over his emotions. He felt mature and stable. She liked that.
Kyle and Dushawn felt
immature. Their adolescent lusts disgusted her.
Back.
Cait exhaled slowly, then cut further down and exposed the center.
When she looked at
Indio, she opened herself to him. She admired his courage. She wanted to touch
him. He flinched away. All the remorse he felt over rejecting her gesture
poured into her.
His emotions had
gotten all twisted around inside of her. She thought she was the one doing the
rejecting and she ran away filled with his remorse.
“Goddess,” Cait said
to the empty corridor. “I’m an idiot. Everyone was trying to apologize to me
and I kept running away.” She smiled. “I can think and reason. I can choose
what I want to feel and what I want to do.”
She stopped and looked
around again. “And if someone walks in here and sees me talking to myself
they’re gonna lock me in an asylum and throw away the key.” That’s when she
decided to look for Indio.
* * *
Alterday workers ready
to shop and party glutted the concourse. The crowd’s ambiance flooded her for a
couple of seconds. Holovids advertised games of chance, luxury items and porno
shows. Indio leaned against the railing above the concourse.
An empty space
surrounded him. Everyone carefully avoided him; avoided looking at his scars.
Wrapped up in his pride, with his feelings locked up inside, he stood there,
isolated, in the middle of the crowd.
Sharing only the
physical aspects of herself with someone never did appeal to her. Cait had to
admit the intensity that simmered beneath his tight control attracted her. As
long as I don’t make promises I can’t keep, why not ask? He’s well past the
hormonal surges of a younger man. He’ll understand what I’m offering him. I’d
rather experience my first real chance at making love with someone I’m attracted
to on all levels, emotional and physical.
Before she walked
halfway across the concourse, Indio spotted her. He didn’t move a muscle. The
neutral expression on his face didn’t change. He remained totally alert and
focused on her. She felt it. Tension shimmered between them as she
approached him. They stood in a separate region of space and time, just the two
of them.
Cait’s heart thundered
in her ears. Sudden heat seared her face and body. His eyes were dark,
vulnerable pools waiting for her. Her lips went dry. She moistened them with the
tip of her tongue.
His gaze followed that
tiny movement. He straightened up from his slouch.
She said. “I know what
I want right now, today, but tomorrow...”
He moved closer.
“...I can’t promise you tomorrow.”
He pulled her into his
embrace. “I’ll take today.” His raspy voice made her shiver.
His kiss was long and
hard and greedy and very satisfying. He took her by the hand. Everyone was
staring at them. She didn’t care. She knew she wanted to be with him.
Chapter 2
Thick electrical
cables snaked in every direction from the motherboard. Tiny checked his settings
one more time. He didn’t have to link up to the Station’s power grid. The
Emporium had its own private generator for that. The audience was getting
restless and beginning to mill about behind the barrier grid. His computer
screen showed a perfect interface between VR input panel and holographic
display.
It should work. He
downloaded all the data from the Celtic history files Cait showed him this
morning. Correlating that data into new graphics and storylines had taken up
another eight hours of intensive and creative data crunching but it was worth
it. Now he had a truly fantastic game to debut.
He walked over to the
control booth’s window and peered out. Vu Sheng waited patiently in front of the
VR terminal. Fiber optic filaments flowed from the scalp and spine of Vu Sheng’s
skinsuit giving him the appearance of a psychedelic hedgehog.
Tiny raised his fist
and pumped it twice as a go-ahead signal. Vu Sheng grinned, donned his VR masque
and inserted his hands into the sensory gloves. The fiber optic filaments around
Vu Sheng’s skinsuit began to pulse and glow.
Tiny hurried back to
the controls and moved his hands over the keyboard. He flipped the master switch
on. A black matte turtle shell and helmet came down from the ceiling and clicked
into place around Vu Sheng. Telemetry input flashed onto the motherboard’s
screens.
The holographic
display grid in front of Vu Sheng’s terminal blazed into life. Towering granite
monoliths formed an irregular circle on the revolving stage. A few stones lay
toppled in the grass. The center stone had a slight depression worn into its
surface, just the right size for a body to lie down upon it. The audience
surged forward and pressed themselves against the Plexiglas barrier, their faces
transformed with delighted wonder.
He increased the data
flow into the display another increment. Minuscule purplish pink flowers
blossomed between the clumps of grass. The ceiling grid darkened into a midnight
sky. A comet streaked past and scattered a multitude of stars in its wake.
The image of a young
man wearing leather breeches and boots appeared on the holo-stage. The computer
generated avatar had shoulder length black hair and deeply tanned skin. His left
arm and hand were pure silver, linked to his elbow with no discernible gap
between flesh and metal. A silver torc circled the holographic avatar’s neck. A
fantastically detailed blue tattoo covered his chest back and arms with Celtic
circles and knots coiled around with vines and leaves.
Tiny grinned. Vu Sheng
had selected the Silverhand icon for his avatar’s image. Wait ‘til he had an
opportunity to remove his avatar’s clothing during a seduction scene and found
out the tattoo also covered the image’s legs, ass and penis.
A short sword with
worn leather strips wrapped around its hilt appeared in the avatar’s right hand.
The image sheathed the sword at his hip, walked up to the altar stone and laid
his left hand, the silver one, upon the shallow niche in its center. Pale blue
fire arced from his hand into the elaborate traceries of runic symbols incised
into the stone.
Tiny switched on his
microphone. “The Silverhand Game is ready. It’s up to you to learn his powers
and the powers of his allies and enemies. Starting now, for the next twenty-four
hours this promotion gives every user one hour’s free access to the game.
Remember that anyone pushing or shoving today will forfeit his or her access to
the game forever. Use your time wisely. Tomorrow you pay full price.”
He flipped the toggle
for the barrier. It slid down into a recessed niche in the floor. The audience
swarmed the other nineteen available terminals politely, very, very politely.
Tiny watched the motherboard schematics while the new players logged on.
Time to lock the
controls and vacate the booth. With the rest of the Emporium shut down for this
promotion, he didn’t have to hang around anymore. His contract with Station
Security linked his cams directly to theirs. They were duty bound to follow
through on all infractions of the rules.
A long hot shower,
followed by a leisurely dinner should fit the bill for a perfect ending to this
hectic day. Tiny thumbed the control room door open, stepped outside and used
his keycard to lock up.
An adolescent with
straggly hair and pale pitted skin tugged at his sleeve. “Hey Tiny! This is
radical. It’s your best game ever.”
“Thanks. Go ahead and
enjoy yourself. I’m ready to crash.”
“Did you hear about
the smash up with the solar wing flyers this afternoon?”
Tiny grabbed the
youth’s shirt and picked him up. “What smash up?”
A multitude of
freckles stood out against the pale white skin of his hapless victim’s face.
“Was anyone hurt?” If
Indio had screwed up and let Cait get hurt, Tiny didn’t know yet how he was
going to make the man pay, but come hell or high water, he’d pay.
“Two of ‘em went to
the emergency room. I don’t know who. The newsvid didn’t list their names. You
can let me go now.”
Tiny blinked. Lousy
public relations roughing up his customers like this. He released his victim.
“Sorry about that.” He straightened out the kid’s shirt and flicked a scrap of
lint off his shoulder. “I gotta go.”
“Sure thing, man.
Catch you later.” His victim melted back into the crowd.
No use in trying the
public lifts. They would take forever to bring him around the loop of the
station to the emergency room. Tiny pulled out his keycard and accessed the
delivery panel behind the control booth. The panel slid open. He ducked inside
and keyed in instructions for it not to open again until he returned.
Tiny walked down an
aisle of tall shipping canisters. They filled the racks on both walls. He went
straight to the freight lift and pushed at the heavy windowless door. The
hydraulics whined, then kicked in. The door flew open.
He punched in the code
for a straight-line trip down the main axis to the spindle and back up to the
docks where they off loaded hazardous waste from the hospital sector. The heavy
hydraulic doors crashed shut behind him. Tiny wedged himself into the corner and
braced his feet and grabbed onto the take hold bars. Gonna be a rough ride.
The lift alarm clanged
once, slammed sideways and up, then swung around upside down. The ceiling became
the floor. Blood rushed to Tiny’s head. He hung on for dear life while the lift
shot itself down the line. Just when his arms felt like they couldn’t hold on
anymore, the lift gave a hard shove sideways and went totally weightless.
Tiny braced himself.
No sense in relaxing. High g maneuvers were due to cut in within the next thirty
seconds. Cait! He kept thinking. If she was hurt, it was his fault for
talking her into joining Indio’s class. Why oh why did he do that?
The lift gave
another sudden shove in the opposite direction. The floor became the floor
again. Tiny held on and waited. When the lift stopped, it stopped hard and fast.
He just about slammed
into the door before it opened, he ran at it so fast. Yellow sodium lights
blazed down from the cavernous ceiling of the loading docks. He ran past row
after row of shipping canisters all neatly secured in their racks.
Frost covered their
sides. Cold hauler stuff. Bad place to hang around without insulated coveralls
and gloves. These cans could suck the heat from his body in no time. Hypothermia
and frostbite were not conditions he relished.
A door slid open at
the other end. Tiny raced up to it and ran right past the dockers standing
there.
“Hey!” A man yelled at
his back. “This is a restricted area! Who the hell let you in here?”
He kept running. The
metal walkway thrummed under his feet. There! Up ahead! The familiar red X logo
of the emergency room sign gleamed at the end of the corridor.
“Are you sure?” Tiny asked.
“Yes.” The white
haired doctor checked his sofscreen again. His nametag said Dr. Ukensho Kim.
Triple claw marks on both cheeks provided a startling contrast against his
mahogany skin.
Were they tribal
scars? Tiny wondered.
“We treated two young
men for injuries sustained during theie EVA flight. No women.”
“Thanks.” Tiny wanted
to hug the guy but he couldn’t on account of three husky interns holding onto
his arms.
Dr. Kim motioned at
the interns to release Tiny. “A simple call to our patient registration desk
would have secured you this information without all this uproar.” He tapped his
fingernail on the edge of his sofscreen. “This woman you thought might be here,
are you related to her?”
Sheesh! Talk about
making an ass of himself. Maybe he could sign himself up under “Infatuated men
who are too dumb to let the woman know they’re interested” on the Mikail
Stefanovich Show. “She’s a friend.”
Dr. Kim let his
eyebrows scale his forehead.
Yeah. Right. And pigs
can fly. Time to vacate the premises while he had a few scraps of dignity left.
Tiny nodded at the wary clump of interns leaning against the wall and aimed
himself for the exit.
No need to be subtle.
Subtlety had flown out the window way back when he ran into the place yelling
for the doctor in charge of the emergency room.
“Young man...” Dr. Kim
called after him. “You place a high value upon friendship, don’t you?”
“Yeah,” Tiny said over
his shoulder. “I do.” A quick slap of his hand on the preprogrammed exit panel
opened the door. He stepped into the waiting room and let the door close behind
him.
He walked through the
waiting room into the main corridor and spotted a public vid-phone. If he wanted
to be more than “just friends,” the only way that was going to happen would be
if he told Cait how he felt. Asking her out on a date would be a good start.
Tiny punched in a
direct request for her apartment. There was no answer. He thought about paging
her on the public intercom then changed his mind. Bad enough he’d acted like a
lovesick calf in the emergency room, no need to add to it by announcing his
interest to the entire station.
He pulled out his
sofscreen and slaved it to the main data port. Cait’s ID was in his files from
the Emporium. He keyed in a request for the most recent usage of her ID. An
answer scrolled up on the screen, the cafeteria on deck three. Two levels down
and one spoke over. Only fifteen minutes away if he walked. The walk would do
him good. Give him a chance to calm down. Maybe he should bring her down to the
Emporium, show off his Silverhand game and let her try it out for a couple of
hours.
* * *
She wasn’t there. Kyle
and Dushawn were there, though. A nice white bandage decorated Kyle’s forehead.
“What happened to
you?” Tiny knew better than to ask either one of them about Cait’s whereabouts.
“Did you run into a door?”
Kyle flushed bright
red. “Naw,” he said. “I misjudged things my first trip out. I have a slight
concussion.”
Tiny scanned the
cafeteria one more time. “Where’s Indio?”
“I dunno.” Dushawn
shrugged. “He was here but he left.”
“When?”
Kyle waved vaguely at
the crowded concourse. “He was here an hour ago and he left. He didn’t say where
he was going.”
“Thanks.” No use
trying to get any coherent information from these idiots. Tiny walked away.
Where could she be?
Gaudy storefronts lined both levels of the concourse. Shopping, maybe? Women
loved to shop for clothes, didn’t they? Tiny spotted the holographic ad floating
over Jean’s Lingerie, squared his shoulders, and ducked inside.
Eight stores later, he
felt glutted. The idea of walking past yet another aisle of micro minis and
glitzy skintights was enough to get his head spinning. Besides, she usually wore
jeans and t-shirts, nothing fancy. He was wasting his time looking at this
stuff.
He walked up to a
public vid-phones and keyed in Indio’s number. No answer. Where in the hell was
he?
Tiny unfolded his
sofscreen, slaved it to the main data port and keyed in a request for the most
recent usage of Indio’s ID. It showed the Starlight Lounge, his usual hangout.
Tiny keyed in another request for Cait’s ID. Nothing since the cafeteria. He
folded the sofscreen and keyed in the number for Cait’s apartment. No answer.
He stopped and
scratched his head. Where would a twenty-year old woman with time on her hands
go looking for excitement and nightlife? Moonraker’s Row?
* * *
Moonraker’s Row roared
in all its loud and raucous glory. Up and down the station rim, dimly lit bars
advertised their wares. Smoke and mirrors and glitter, like Vegas in its prime
before the weather changed and flash floods washed it away.
Tiny had been in and
out of more bars in one night than he’d ever been in his entire life. He
pictured the distinctive tattoo that spiraled up Cait’s left arm and tried every
tattoo parlor on the row. They had glow in the dark tattoos now. Maybe he’d come
back tomorrow night and order a comet streaking up his arm.
By the time he ducked
into the bar with the strobe lights and smoked mirrors, he had the routine down
pat. Walk up to the bar, lean his back against it and scan the crowd.
There! In the back!
Long multicolored hair flowed down a woman’s back. Two spacers had their arms
wrapped her waist. Tiny’s heart slammed against his rib cage. Oh lord. He wanted
her to turn around. He had to be sure. Were these guys the kind of guys she
liked?
“Hey! If you’re not
gonna drink...” The barkeep’s voice literally snarled behind him. “...stop
hogging space at the bar and get the hell out of here.”
Tiny dug a couple of
credit chips out of his pocket, tossed them on the bar and pointed at the drink
on his left. “Give me one of those.”
It was a pink frothy
mix, cold and wicked. Tiny gulped it down in one swallow and angled himself
sideways so he could keep an eye on the woman standing by the back wall.
The trio turned
around. It wasn’t Cait. The woman’s hair wasn’t streaked all different colors
either. The pulsating strobe lights had tricked his eyes. Out the door he went.
Neon signs invited him inside more bars. His head hurt.
This was stupid. He
might as well give it up and head out to the Starlight Lounge. Maybe Indio knew
where she was.
* *
*
The Shuttle Pilots
band was jamming tonight. Tiny stepped up to the bar. Dean poured him a tall
glass of brandy over ice.
“Thanks.” Tiny tossed
a handful of credit chips on the bar. “Keep the change.” He took a sip. The
brandy went down cold and turned to fire in his throat. Smooth, very smooth. He
leaned over the bar and crooked his finger at Dean. “Did you see Indio here
tonight?”
Dean picked up a rag
and wiped the dark walnut bartop. “Yeah, he came in earlier with a young lady.”
Tiny took a big
swallow of brandy. It hit his stomach like a slug of ice this time. “Really. Who
was she?”
Dean leaned closer. “I
don’t know her name but she was real quality.” He rubbed at the bartop with his
rag and buffed it up nicely. “I’d love to find out who does her hair and have
them do the same dye job on mine. The way she has it streaked all different
colors is fabulous.”
Tiny swallowed the
rest of the brandy. He didn’t even feel it going down. He couldn’t believe this
was happening. He’d been blindsided by his best friend. Indio had never worked
this fast before going after a woman, how dare he do this now! Hell! That took
some nerve! Indio was almost sixteen years older than Cait.
He shoved the empty
glass at Dean “Gimme another drink.”
Dean refilled the
glass and shoved it back at him. Tiny stared at the brandy. What was he going to
do now? Crawl under a rock and pretend he didn’t care.
Whoa! Just because
Indio had one date with Cait didn’t mean he should give up. He still had a
chance. Obviously she liked older men instead of pretty boy studs. The
twelve-year age difference between him and her definitely put Tiny back in the
running.
Indio had the right
idea though. Cait was quality. No low class bars on Moonraker’s Row for her.
Wine her and dine her and show her a good time at the best club on the station,
then, after a couple of dates, make his move on her.
Okay. Tomorrow, he’d
call her and invite her to dinner at the Botanical Gardens. That should be
classy enough for her.
Chapter 3
When Indio told Cait
he’d take tonight, he lied. He wanted more than one night. The way he had it
figured, when the golden ring from life’s carousel falls in your hand, you grab
hold of it and don’t let go because it might never come ‘round your way again.
His first thought to
take her to his room. Hell, he wanted to drag her into the first maintenance
cubby he found and start banging her. But he didn’t. She deserved better. The
implicit trust she showed when she gave him her hand and followed his lead
shocked him. He didn’t want to contemplate her reaction if he betrayed that
trust.
Instead, he took her
to the cross-station lift and said, “Deck One. Starlight Lounge.”
The lift started
moving to the station’s rim. Cait looked down and tugged at her T-shirt. “I’m
not exactly dressed for a night on the town.”
“You look fine,” he
said. “Except ...”
She tilted her head
and smiled. “Except what?”
“Your hair.”
Reaching over her
shoulder, she pulled her thick braid forward and studied it critically. “What’s
wrong? Is it undone?”
He put his hands on
her shoulders and turned her around. “I want to see it loose, that’s all.”
Her hair was the
safest place for his hands at the moment. Lovely, lovely, soft hair it was,
with its wild melange of colors. He undid her braid and combed it out with his
fingers. A long section of her hair tumbled out of his hand and fell across her
breasts. He wondered how she’d react if he slid his hand up her shirt and
stroked her nipples. A clump of passengers stepped inside at the next stop and
stopped him from finding out.
Everyone lined
themselves up facing the front in complete silence like a bunch of robots. He
smiled. That suited him just fine. No uncomfortable stares at the scars on his
face. The lift slid to a stop. He savored the surprise rippling across the
passengers’ faces when their destination scrolled up on the door’s sofscreen.
A few minutes later,
waiting in front of Starlight’s door as it performed a retinal and full body
scan, Cait said, “My fathers are members here, too.”
“Male ID validated,”
the door said. “Female ID not known.”
“Guest privilege
requested,” Indio said, then stepped back for Cait to hold up her wrist. A small
blue laser beam snaked out from the door, circled her wrist twice and imprinted
a twenty-four hour guest ID.
While they walked
inside, he said, “I met your fathers. I worked with them on the original
construction crew.”
She nodded.
He took her by the
hand and led her out to one of the balcony tables above the dance pit. A spacer
club, the entire dance floor contained a window, a window created here in space.
Its size, thickness and purity were impossible to achieve on Earth.
Icicle lights coated
the ceiling. Dancing under the surrealistic stars of the ceiling with the
starlight coming in through the transparent floor was the closest thing they had
to dancing in space.
“Drinks?” he asked.
The automatic privacy shield muted the background noise.
“Non-alcoholic,” Cait
sat down in the chair he pulled out for her and peered at the items scrolling up
on the table’s screen. She reached out and keyed in her selections, cola, salad
with the spiciest Thai dinner on the menu.
The last thing Indio
needed was to have his responses dulled by alcohol. He planned to enjoy her with
his brain and body at full function. He ordered cola and a Tex-Mex combo.
Music soared through
them while they waited for their server. No holovids here: live performers were
part of Starlight’s unique ambiance. Must be oldies night, Indio
decided when The Shuttle Pilots began a sax filled rendition of “When A Man
Loves A Woman”. That song was way before his time. In fact, it was one of his
grandpa’s favorites.
Indio touched the
indigo tattoo spiraling down the length of Cait’s left arm and wrist. “What are
all these little blue lines? Some kind of scan code?”
She grinned. “It’s
Ogham. An archaic Celtic form of writing. My entire genealogy on both sides is
written here.”
“I read the bio you
submitted with your VR stats. It lists two husbands for your mother. Which one’s
your father?”
She arched her
eyebrows. “I know which one’s my biological father, but that’s not important.
What’s important is the relationship they share with my mother...” Her gaze went
cold and irritated. “I honor them by listing both as my fathers on my bio.”
“Ah.” Indio released
her hand and sank back in his seat. He sifted through his memories of when he
worked with her mother’s husbands. One of them, Shiloh was his name, had long
black hair, Native American features and a tattoo like Cait’s on his left arm.
The other one, Nathanial Harker, kept his face hidden under Taureg veils when he
worked on the construction bots.
Hell, Nathanial didn’t
even remove his veil to eat. Indio remembered catching a glimpse of a brown
beard under the veil once when he leaned over to access some stats on a control
panel. Looking at Cait’s features, Indio hazarded a guess as to which one might
be her biological father.
Cait gave him a slow,
measuring look, then said softly, “My twin has black hair.”
Indio nodded. He
remembered seeing a docu-vid about a German prostitute’s paternity case. The DNA
on her fraternal twins tested out as two different biological fathers, one black
and one white. Interesting.
Cait was twenty, he
knew that from her basic stats. Her father might be in his forties, depending on
when he hooked up with her mom. He didn’t want to think about that. It made him
feel very uncomfortable. Talk about robbing the cradle. He shrugged. No way was
he going to let it bother him. “I’m interested in you, not your DNA profile.”
“Good.” She sat back in her chair and relaxed.
The music shifted
tempo. The chords of the newest rave ballad, “Child of the Universe,” floated up
to them. “I am the child of my father and mother and the sea. I am a child of
the legend that is knowledge deep and real...”
Cait looked at him
with an eager expression on her face. Indio smiled and shook his head. “Go
ahead.” He motioned at her to go down to the dance floor without him. “Have
fun.”
Like a sudden burst of
solar wind, she flowed out onto the floor. Her multicolored hair swirled around
her face. She moved right into the song, dipping and diving to the music. “...I
am a child of the mysteries that space and time reveal...”
Moving above the
celestial lightshow that shimmered through the transparent floor beneath their
feet, the sky dancers generated their own special magic. The Shuttle Pilots were
in their element, fused in rapture with their audience. And Cait...
“She’s gorgeous!”
Ruby’s appreciative voice pulled Indio out of his trance. She deftly unloaded a
series of covered plates onto the table.
Indio slanted her an
irritated look. “I don’t remember asking for your opinion.”
“Doesn’t matter,”
Dean, Ruby’s coworker, added from his side of the table. “You brought her here
to show her off. You’re gonna get our opinions whether you like it or not.” He
turned around and watched her spinning around on the dance floor. “Whoa! She
moves like smoke on water.”
“Got yourself some
real quality this time,” Ruby said with a pleased smile as if she’d picked Cait
out herself.
“Yeah,” Indio said.
“Not like the last one. You told me she was bad news.”
“But you didn’t
listen.” Dean struck a languid pose. “Not until she screwed you over.”
Ruby nodded. “Since
then, the only ones I’ve seen with you were porno row entertainers.”
“They were clean.”
How much longer were they going to grill him? “I made each one take a blood test
before I paid any fees.”
“That is a nice girl!”
Illya’s booming voice said behind Indio’s shoulder. “Maybe I dance with her,
too.”
Indio gave him a stare
cold enough to freeze fire. “Keep away from her. This one’s special.”
A hearty punch bounced
off Indio’s shoulder. “Friends always welcome.” Illya leaned closer. With the
feeling of someone waiting for the other shoe to drop, Indio stared at the dance
floor.
“Spasi Nas need crazy
wolf again,” Illya said sotto voce.
Indio shook his head.
When he was young and foolish, with his head filled with dreams, he worked for
Spasi Nas and he helped them nail the coffin lid down on an interplanetary child
porn and prostitution ring. Lobo loco they called him back then.
“Find yourself another
hero.” He had plans for an entirely different kind of undercover work tonight.
Illya’s hand tightened
on his shoulder. “Sabotage threat against Rainbow’s End. We need someone on the
mining team.”
“No.”
“If you change your
mind,” Illya continued smoothly, “you know how to get in touch with us.”
Indio shrugged Illya’s
hand off. “I’m not interested.”
“Her twin’s quality
too.” Dean said when he came back with the colas and placed them on the table.
“I met him last year. Wonderful hands. Her family tends to be bisexual, you know
that, don’t you?” Ruby returned with a cart filled with hot food. Dean moved
briskly around the table and helped Ruby offload the cart’s contents.
Darlene and Parvati
rose from an adjacent table and strolled over. Their eyes checked Cait out with
equally keen interest.
It was getting awfully
crowded here all of a sudden. Parvati turned a brilliant smile on Indio. He
held up his hand and waved her away. “Scat. Don’t even think about it. This is
our first date.”
They slithered over to
him, arm in arm. “All right, darling,” Darlene purred. “But maybe, someday, we
make it a foursome.”
Illya’s beefy paws
descended on their shoulders. “I join, too. Make it threesome, foursome, or
fivesome anytime you want!”
“Nyet!” they said in icy unison.
He backed away with an
apologetic grin on his face and shambled back to his table. Parvati eeled her
dusky body onto Indio’s lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. Darlene leaned
down and the tip of her tongue tickled his ear.
“But...”
“You never asked,” She whispered.
“You’re friends.”
Parvati chuckled.
“Much better than total strangers.” She brushed his lips with a kiss. “That’s
what friends are for. Catch you later.” She wriggled out of his lap and ambled
away with her lover, Darlene.
Cait took her seat at
the table. Ruby and Dean exchanged wicked looks behind her and left.
“Y-you’re not mad,”
Indio managed to say.
She leaned back in her
chair and arched her left eyebrow at him. “Why should that upset me? You’re
sixteen years older than me. I’m sure you’ve collected lots of friends, both
male and female, before you met me. Who am I to say you have to give up your
friends just because you’re with me?
Definitely not one of
his “regular” dates. The complexity of her personality was casting yet another
spell over him. The more he learned, the more he wanted to find out about her.
Feeling like an
adolescent with all the clumsy puppy dog confusion of his first crush, he said,
“Let’s eat.”
She had a hearty
appetite. He always hated it when women picked at their food because they were
afraid of putting on weight. Flying burned up more than enough calories for
anyone, let alone the kind of dancing she’d just done. Good muscle tone, too. He
remembered her shoulders under his hands in the locker room. There was nothing
frail or weak about her.
When Cait excused
herself for a few minutes, Indio seized the opportunity to empty his bladder
too. The sudden glimpse of his face in the men’s room mirror woke him up like a
bucket of ice water. He stood there in a state of total shock for a couple of
seconds. He’d become so comfortable with her he’d forgotten about his scars.
No way was he going to
let this one go.
Leaning against the
wall just outside the rest rooms, he wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans and
waited. When she walked over to him, he took her by the hand and brought her out
to the dance floor. A smoky torch song moaned as he pulled her into his arms.
There was no hesitation in her eyes when his erection pressed against her groin.
“Do you know the story
behind the Shuttle Pilots?” She leaned closer.
He grinned. “The story
of how a New York cop heard them goofing off at the skating rink and hired them
on the spot for the Sanctuary’s Inaugural Ball?”
She laughed. “When
they told him they were shuttle pilots, he thought it was the name of their
group.”
Indio slipped his hand
lower on her back. “And the look on the Space Commissioner’s face when they
walked into the ballroom wearing full dress Space Academy uniforms and started
warming up their instruments.”
She snuggled against
his chest for some serious dancing. It felt wonderful. Wailing sax, deep
throbbing bass guitar and lovesick vocals wrapped themselves all around and
through them.
Giving silent thanks
to the Shuttle Pilots for playing only slow songs, Indio concentrated on the
sensuous grind of Cait’s hips against his.
Halfway through the
sixth song was all he could take. He twisted his hand into Cait’s hair and
tugged her head back. “Let’s go.”
“All right,’ she said,
then lowered her eyes demurely.
His erection pulsed
harder. He was ready to explode.
Truth is, the only
thing Indio remembered seeing was her face until he made it back to the lift and
told it the location of his apartment. His brain was fried. He didn’t give a
damn how many other passengers rode with them, either. He pulled her butt back
against his crotch and kissed her neck until the lift arrived at their
destination.
Every thought of
taking it nice and slow and easy flew out of his head when he pinned her against
the wall. The computer’s sensors noted their presence and automatically
brightened the lights.
“Don’t be afraid.” His
voice sounded even rougher than usual to him.
She traced the thick
scar that ran down his cheek and neck. “I’m not afraid.” She helped him pull her
shirt off. Her breasts were lovely, high-tilted and bouncy with nipples that
hardened under his teeth and tongue. Sweetest tasting tits he’d had in a long
time.
He cupped her chin
with one hand and watched her reaction while he tweaked and pulled her nipples
tighter with his other hand. The pupils in her eyes went huge and black with
desire. She ground her hips against him in a frantic demand for release.
He kissed her again.
He reached for the zipper on his pants and stopped.
She studied his face.
“What’s wrong? Why did you stop?”
“Um.” He cleared his
throat. “Contraceptives.”
“No problem.” She
grinned, reaching for the zipper on her pants and slowly pulling it down. “I
have an implant.”
He unzipped his pants
and dropped them to his ankles while she stepped out of her panties. She kicked
them aside along with her jeans. He had no idea when or how she got rid of her
shoes. At that point in time, he didn’t really care. All he knew was that she
was wide open and ready for him.
He touched her face,
acutely aware of the fact that he hadn’t even finished taking his pants off, let
alone his shoes. His hormones went into overdrive. “Cait?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t know if I can
hold myself back. I might do it too rough for you.”
She smiled, lifted her
leg, wrapped it around his waist and pulled him to her. He slid all the way
inside in one fantastic stroke. He pulled out and slammed into her some more.
Harder and harder,
faster and faster he moved. She came first, holding onto him like he might
escape her grip. When he climaxed, he heard her coming again in one long
continuous moan. She ground herself against him and accepted every last drop of
semen.
He collapsed against
her. Her leg trembled. He pushed her hair away from her face and rubbed his
thumb across her swollen lips. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want it to
sound like he was begging.
She sucked his thumb
into her mouth and he started getting hard all over again. He pulled his thumb
out and watched her smile. “The night’s still young,” she reached up and helped
him pull off his shirt.
Cait pushed him back a
step and went down on her knees. It didn’t take long for him to step out of his
pants and boots.
She reached up and
cupped his testicles. His penis swelled up and pulsed under her touch. She
brushed her lips against the soft tip then sat back on her heels. “Shall we make
love in the bedroom this time?”
Indio held out his
hand. She let him pull her to her feet. He was more than ready to perform his
end of the deal. Anything she wanted, she was going to get from him with no
questions and or hesitation.
He never saw a woman
come so many times in a row. It made him feel like he was the best stud in the
universe. The more she came, the more he wanted to give her.
When she snuggled up
and laid her head in the hollow of his shoulder, his heart was ready to explode
with happiness. He pushed her damp hair away from her face and traced the line
of her cheek and nose with his finger. “Shower?”
She yawned. “In the morning.”
He pulled up the sheet
and covered them with it. “Computer. Lights out.”
The lights went
out. She rolled over and tucked herself against him. His flaccid penis rubbed
against the tight crack of her behind. He had some interesting plans for the
morning shower. Oh yes. By then, he’d be well rested and primed to go a couple
of more rounds with her.
Order Down Came a Blackbird Now!
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Science
Fiction Romance by
