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Little Lost Fox: The Prequel II
by The Spike and Te It wasn't an unfamiliar sensation, but he'd never felt it
last this long. Always the broil or the freeze would come
the thought made him nuzzle mindlessly at Skinner's
shoulderand leave him finely tuned for salvage, battles
of his own.
But this just went on and on.
And Alex could not stop his reflexes, could not stop
tensing for the extreme that never came. And each release
left him sleepier. And then would come the repair center.
It wasn't that Alex thought he had any real chance of
avoiding it, even if he stayed awakeSkinner would do
what he wanted, that was what had been agreed. But sleeping
would mean missing this.
Each heartbeat sent wave after wave of indefinable feeling
through his body, catching on where he had been bruised,
wounded, or fucked and reminding every part of him, every
cell, of what had been done.
When he woke, all of that would be gone until Skinner
decided to do it again. And that was what made it hard
to breathe sometimes. Skinner could pull him back from
anywhere he went, but Skinner wasn't always there.
Skinner often found him as strange as Alex himself found
this new existence. Alex knew it.
But the strangeness went away when Skinner was inside him
and digging to get further, closer. Then Alex could see
him following where Alex led, the leash coiling Skinner to
him, not him to Skinner. And it was sweet, and he knew one
day Skinner wouldn't remember to pull back, and that
thought could make him hard as stone.
But...
Skinner knew more paths than Alex had ever heard of,
dreamed of. And that was a frightening thing, and so
needful.
"Skinner."
And interrupting the storytalk of runes and luck or
some suchearned him a bite. Sometimes Alex wondered
just what Skinner was training him for.
"Yes, Alex?"
"I want your promise."
"What promise?" And sleepy murmur slipped easily into
calculation, suspicion. So many reasons to need this.
"You will not leave me... untouched when you are finished
with me."
Skinner rolled off. The blood had dried between them and
Alex's chest wound tried to hold on to the other man. The
feeling made Alex want to learn more words for perfect. And
then Skinner's hand was molded to one side of his face,
thumb settled over his cheekbone. A smaller weight that
was no less blanketing.
"When I am done, I will kill you."
Some tension Alex had barely been aware of released at the
words and he felt the ground disappear from beneath him.
Sleep was suddenly chasing him far faster than he'd thought
possible since long before he became a person.
Skinner leaned in closer. Alex could smell his blood on
the other man's breath and his eyelids were so damned
heavy.
"I'll even make sure you're awake for it. I promise."
And Alex let Skinner's promise push him down into sleep.
Jeffrey wasn't sure why he'd ever thought he had a choice
about who he was.
Two days here, just two short days and he could already
feel how it would be if he didn't get out, once and for
all. His father came home with him every night now, and
there was no denying the thrill the man's obvious pride
gave him.
And he took meals with Jeffrey and his mother. It was a
reminder of what he'd never really had, yes. But it was a
promise, too.
His father may have banked on the fact that he had no
options, but... But. The man was genuinely happy to
have taken his son fully into "the fold." It all made a
terribly understandable kind of sense.
Of course his parents had been distant his entire life.
They knew exactly how a young man with a Federation
education would see the Workand it was always
capitalizedand didn't want to get too attached, lest
Jeffrey not grow into the right sort of man.
He wondered what it meant that he was accepted back so
readily. Was his rebellion so inconsequentially small?
If so, maybe he would have come back anyway, Skinner or no.
Or maybe they were just deluded. Loved their son too much
to see his true feelings. And what did it make him to
reject his parents' love?
Or maybe this was all one, long test of Byzantine
proportions. His father had built a deluxe holosuite, and
he was the only real person here. After all, if he kept a
secret like the Barns for so many years, what else could he
do? That one hurt the mind.
Best to think what he'd been thinking all along. That he'd
grown up willfully stupid, that he was paying for it now.
And that the only way to redeem himself was to send the
codes to Skinner. It had been ludicrously easy to get
them. Security personnel were just more nameless servants,
after all.
One look at the crest on his crisp, clean tunic and all the
information Skinner could possibly want was at his
fingertips. So easy.
Too easy.
The thought woke him up enough that the letters and numbers
scrolling down his screen became real again. The history,
the statistics of every part of the Work. Worlds, species,
money, names...
So very, very easy. He looked up and found Quirabi staring
at him. Nothing new, she always stared.
He found himself smiling, mouthing the word "soon."
Saw it work into her gaze, make it flare into something
like human interest for the first time.
If this was a test, that would surely be the transmission
of a signal to Them.
As would his fast, easy upload of the information, all of
it, into his wristcom.
The walls did not fade into a grid, the world did not
disappear.
All right.
Tonight, away from the inward-searching cameras of the
Barns, he would make his call. Send everything,
everything.
And then he would wait.
The way Jeffrey saw it, he could either come out into the
real world again and be summarily executed, or he could get
free.
The screaming thing wanted to point out that there were
alternatives, but he was growing accustomed to kicking it
silent. There were two ways this could go. Only two.
And either way he won.
Walter's hands ran the console one last time and the Rose
of Sharon kicked softly once and began to rise.
Walter liked watching his hands move like thatwithout
his volition, usually without his attention. Losing
himself in the act of piloting Sharon was as close as he
ever got to machinehood. And in the final rise before a
raid Walter could almost feel himself honed and focused to
the task of blade. Could be Skinner then, cutting away
the rot to let the clean bones bleach.
No fear and no regrets, only the calm understanding that he
and his purpose were one and would be fulfilled.
Not this time, though.
No question of why or wherefore of the hooks that held him
in his flesh . One had been set almost two months back on
a red desert world where screaming death lurked below the
silent sands. A hook made of strangeness and blood and sex
that bordered on the numinous; a new religion compelling
enough to snag the soul of a man who could not bear to
believe. The other...
The other was...slimmer. New. Thin and bright as a
curved needle that should have been easy to pluck from his
hide. Hardly a hook at all, but...that laugh had felt so
good. And what had been offered in those eyes.
Something warmer and more...human...than worship.
More dangerous too, and yet he knew without a doubt he
would not attack one millisecond before the 72 hours were
up.
Which was close, now. He checked his chron again without
needing to. He could feel those standard seconds ticking
by like drops of sweat. Like tiny tears. He scowled at
the sentimentality of the imagery, but if he had learned
one thing it was that his feelings might be channeled,
caged, but they could never be denied.
Sharon was a powerhouse and they had already risen from the
blue of sky to the indigo of troposphere. Skinner kept
the orbit low and tight. He'd not get many runs at it
one of the reasons he'd waited until the very last minutes
of the allotted timebefore someone noticed that the
cargo ship from dock 16 had not completed its departure.
Not long nowbut long enough, he thought with a certain
wry bitternessfor the brooding and regrets to spread
like poison in the wine, fill his head.
Not yet, he told himself. Not yet. Not while Sharon
still thrummed strong and healthy beneath his hands. Not
while Alex still breathed slow and steady in the med-unit
coffin. (And another regret to add to the list: he'd
promised Alex he would be awake to know his death).
Not while he still hadn't seen Jeffrey's torn and bleeding
corpse or heard news of his death. Not until the very
end.
But the green loveliness of Kronos continued to burr by far
below. Once, twice, three times and the fourth orbit
completed without a crackle of static or flicker on the
monitor and the chron ticked over silently: 06:48, 06:47,
06:46. Down to the crunch then. Without the codes his
best bet was to suicide dive the facility. A ship the
size of Sharon falling from the sky could do a awful lot of
damage, even with the built in safeguards that would
prevent a warp core breech on impact. And if those
safeguards were...removed.
Two minutes of leeway to begin the climb and dive and
Skinner finally allowed his mind to begin its checklist of
things undone and promises unkept and pleasures left
untasted until far too late. And armed the timer on the
self- destruct.
Dinner had run long, of course. Time rolled by, and by,
and by and the wine was excellent, and his mother never
looked so radiant as when she smiled, and conversation with
both of his parents touched music as easily as it did
politics and he could stay.
He could.
The wristcom was heavy on his skin. His arm seemed too
thin, too pale for the thing. Over the past several hours
it had grown huge and insectile, heavy with illicit
information and, perhaps, his own soul.
Skinner wanted to burn everything to slag, everything.
Jeffrey was not so young that he thought the Spender
compound would be spared. The Barns weren't even two klicks
away...
And whatever his parents were,
They love me...
the servants were certainly innocent. The valets, the
maids, the cooks... Everyone would die, whether they
deserved it or not. For some goddamn stranger's cause.
Who was he to judge anyway?
The closest Jeffrey had ever come to violence was the
simple self-defense classes his father had made him take as
a child. He'd never touched a person in anger, and yet with
just a few taps into his com he'd be condemning dozens to a
quick death, fire from the sky.
Or he could wait just another sixty seconds and... stay.
There were fresh parna in a bowl on his night table. Syrup
and cream to the side. They would be cooling, refreshing.
They would be gone before Jeffrey realized he'd eaten more
than three, four slices. The scent filled the air with a
perfume he'd once lapped off the throat of a Rakshani girl
in the dusty silence of an afternoon sleepcycle.
He knew she worked in a textile plant just five klicks to
the south now. She probably wouldn't survive, either.
Forty seconds, sweet syrup on his lip.
His father had held him by the chin today, asked him if he
knew how long he'd waited to have his son by his side. The
Work was vital, but family was something else altogether.
Thirty-five seconds, and he knew the cream would be thick
and decadently addictive on his tongue. The cream was from
only the finest of brood clawa, and it could not be found
off Kronos.
He would never taste it again.
Jeffrey brought the small bowl to his lips and drank it
down, far faster than he'd ever consumed it before. An
image of himself as a child, lapping the cream up like an
animal, rose in his mind. One male servant had seen him do
it. He could not have been more than sixteen, but to
Jeffrey he'd been a man.
And Jeffrey had learned to enjoy a man's touch.
Fifteen seconds.
Would any world be so lovely as Kronos?
Ten.
How would it be on the day Quirabi's eyes lost their hope
when she looked at him? Would he care?
Five.
Jeffrey squeezed his eyes shut and punched in the code that
would upload everything to Skinner's ship computer...
security codes first, bold and damning.
...and when he opened them, he was falling neatly into the
co-pilot's chair on the Rose of Sharon, and onscreen
something very small and bright was hurtling toward his
world, but the ship was banking hard and
"Brace yourself."
He whipped his head around and saw Skinner grimly settled
into his own chair, let his body do the same.
A heartbeat and they were into warp, and while it wasn't
precisely a new sensation it was unfamiliar.
Long before he thought moving around would result in
anything but immediate, graphic death Skinner stood,
stretched, and came to squat by Jeffrey's chair.
"You cut it close."
"You didn't leave without me..." And it wasn't what he'd
meant to say, but it would do.
Skinner brushed his face, and then looked down at his
thumb. Jeffrey looked too, and noticed that he'd been less
than neat with the cream. Skinner grunted, brushed away the
small drop over Jeffrey's lip with a brand of impersonal
gentleness. Jeffrey licked it off before he could think
about, and then simply sat within the small, dark circle of
Skinner's gaze.
"Do you need a sedative?"
"Yes. Yes I do."
Another grunt and then Skinner was hauling him up and
leading him off the bridge, toward whatever it was he'd
chosen over home and family.
Walter released the myoflex cables and the heavy weights
melted back into the wall. The exercise bench squirmed
under his naked back and assumed the next shape in the
workout program. Leg presses. Walter grunted against
the weight as he extended muscles he hadn't worked for a
week. He'd set a hard rhythm todaypushing himself.
Sweat already streaming from his chest, arms, legs. The
room redolent. He felt...good.
Still riding the triumph of Kronos. The satisfaction of
vengeance delivered. The joyyes, joyat having kept
both Alex and Jeffrey alive and whole. As whole as they
get, the dour inner voice reminded him. But even the
encroachment of the coming low couldn't dull the sense that
right here and now, his life was a right and useful thing.
He even thought he knew why.
Two men under him. He had a command again. All he'd
left, cast off with the Federationall he'd catalogued
as lost, and he hadn't ever realized before the fundamental
need he had for this.
Not the power. Or not so much the power, as the
company. The responsibility. Well, something like that.
He was sure a Federation counselor would find some multi-
syllable term for the condition. All his conditions.
If they'd only known... It made him laugh out loud.
"Share the joke?" a soft voice asked from beside the hatch.
He hadn't heard young Jeff come in and marveled once again
at how quietly the boy could move.
Walter made a sound low in his throat that could have been
dismissal, could have been the last of his laughter.
"I'm not a nice man," he said.
Spender blinked surprise at that. Sputtered a laugh of
his own. Just a little one, but it reminded Walter just
how far away from laughter Jeffrey had been since he'd
crawled out from under the sedative's shade. He'd
looked...ill. Greenish in the low ship's light. So
quiet he might have been erasing his presence as he went,
leaving rooms emptier then if he'd never been there at all.
Sometimes, like now, he seemed to follow Walter around like
a hesitant ghost, appearing a short while after Walter had
settled himself somewhere and hovering just at the edges of
his attention, willing to be drawn into conversation, but
rarely initiating conversation of his own. The rest of the
time he apparently spent in the infirmary, not abusing the
med-unit as Walter first had feared, but simply sitting in
there, reading, playing vids. or staring blankly at his
comm bracelet as though he expecting an urgent message that
was long overdue.
"You want to work out?" Walter asked.
Jeffrey didn't respond immediately, simply stared at him
for several long moments. The bench gave a low shudder,
reminding him that it was past time to move on to the next
set of exercises.
Long, shuddering breath. "I'm used to running, swimming...
I haven't done much more than that."
"I can tell."
It made Jeffrey blush, a brief flash of color over his
sallow cheeks. The boy abruptly looked made up for
business. Walter had a few ugly moments when he couldn't
remember why he hadn't simply taken the boy once they'd been
safely in deep space.
Something about time to acclimate, the need to be sure Alex
wasn't feeling any residual effects from his Walter- induced
identity crisis.
No Starfleet captain would ever be in a situation quite
like this one, the poor, sorry bastards.
"I... I'd like to learn."
Ripped out of his thoughts again, and Jeffrey was just a
few important millimeters closer. The boy was a temptation
in too many different ways. Walter would have to be very
careful not to fuck this up.
"I think you should stay with something... familiar for a
while."
That earned him an entirely humorless snort. Walter
wondered, briefly, how much about Kronos Jeffrey hadn't
said. But Jeffrey didn't give him time to ask.
"Computer, bike."
And there appeared Walter's own favorite. Proper
positioning was key on a stationary, and there were any
number of programmable designs perfect for keeping
everything at just the right angle, just the right flex.
This wasn't one of them. It was simple, grey, and
administered one to four low grade shocks if you began to
slack off before the allotted time. Far more of Walter's
life than he cared to think about was explicitly designed
for maximum stimulation. The thought he might grow numb to
this, everything else was never welcome.
Not that his lack of enthusiasm for it ever stopped it from
coming, but it wouldn't do to let up about something like
that
"You spend a lot of time alone, don't you?"
The reflex to punish the boy for prying died hard, but
quickly. "I did."
A purely speculative look that Walter met equably, and then
Jeffrey was climbing on and gingerly adjusting himself for
the maximized workout. He only missed his positioning
once, but the four shocks he received probably made it feel
like a bit more than that.
Walter could almost feel the hairs on the boy's nape rise,
but Jeffrey only yelped once. Walter couldn't keep from
chuckling.
"You're right. You aren't a very nice man, are you?"
Which only made him laugh harder.
"Bastard." But there was humor in Jeffrey's voice.
"Computer, level one, please." And then he paused. "That
wasn't level one, was it?"
"I could just let you find out..."
"Ah, a sadist, too. It's good to know who I signed on
with."
Just a little too serious that time. Damn. "It's level
one."
Jeffrey looked back over his shoulder, was promptly shocked
for it, but shuddered it off. The scent of ozone mingled
with Walter's own sweat. Familiar, comforting, better with
someone else in here... Alex chose to do his own strange,
brutalizing workouts alone. Usually after Walter had fallen
asleep...
"I trust you, you know."
Jeffrey's tone had a lot more anger in it than the words
perhaps warranted. But it was better than invisibility.
"I know."
He nodded, turned back into proper position. Got one more
shock for not listening to the other one fast enough.
Laughed shortly through his own yelp.
And Walter went back to his workout.
They exercised in silence for a while. Well, mostly
silence. After twenty minutes of a punishing pace Jeffrey's
yelps came a little faster. Walter could smell his sweat in
the air, too, and let himself drift for a while in the
shamelessly unsubtle atmosphere of suggestion for a while.
Every breath made his own pain uniquely worth it, as
though he was truly exerting himself just to make Jeffrey
make those sounds. He was going to have to decide just
when he'd let himself have the boy, if only to be able to
have a definite time period for ignore all that smooth,
unscarred baby-skin.
Teach Alex how to enjoy it for himself, perhaps turn that
vaguely cannibalistic look in his eyes when Jeffrey was
around to something more healthy.
Or, at the very least, more entertaining. And how had
Jeffrey been entertaining himself... hmm.
"Why the infirmary?"
The sudden question made the boy jerk a bit, just enough
for another shock. "I'm going to blame you if I start to
get used to this, Skinner." Low, nearly breathless voice.
"There are worse things."
Jeffrey turned slowly, deliberately. The obviously
conscious movement earned him at least three shocks. The
bike was an excitable disciplinarian sometimes. And Walter
could see every painful jolt in the boy's eyes. And every
tremble.
Walter didn't even try to hide his growing erection. But
he also didn't let himself get too distracted, even by the
discovery of Jeffrey's heretofore unknown streak of ruthless
treachery. Christos, he was a lucky man.
"The longer you go without turning, the more shocks you
get."
"True. Computer, remove bike."
He landed on his toes and one hand, the move losing some of
its grace in the boy's obvious fatigue, but none of its
attraction. And then Jeffrey stood, took off his shirt, and
used it to wipe the sweat from his face and chest. Too
pale, lean almost to the point of incipient famine, but
still muscled and male.
Walter wanted those nipples between his teeth, and Jeffrey
was making it abundantly clear that he was more than
willing to oblige. Walter shook himself internally.
"The infirmary?"
Jeffrey smiled wryly. "Clearly, I don't make a very good
whore."
Yet another intriguing line of questioning that would
almost certainly lead to the boy bent over his bench and
moaning Walter's name. He schooled his face to
implacability, and, for perhaps the thousandth time, gave
thanks that his face lent itself so well to such things.
Jeffrey sighed then, showed signs of being tempted into a
pout. Walter was reasonably sure he'd never learn to do
that here.
"Well?"
"It's the only place on this ship your 'wraith isn't likely
to go."
"I thought so. He has a name, you know."
"All right, it's the only place Alex isn't likely to go.
What race is he, anyway? Assuming he's organic at all."
Walter chuckled. "Silicon-based creatures rarely look at
carbon-based creatures the way Alex looks at you." Jeffrey
eyed him skeptically. "Well, silicon creatures don't kill
us for food, in any case. The scanners insist he's human."
"Have you checked for viruses recently?"
"I can understand how Alex might be disturbing, but he's a
member of this crew. And so are you. I expect you to...
get along."
Jeffrey snorted. "I'll be sure to remind him of that when
he's gnawing on my femur."
Walter cheerfully ignored that. "I think he could teach
you some useful moves..."
"I think you could, too."
Blindsided. Point to the boy. Had to reward things like
that, had to. Walter sat up, snatched Jeffrey's shirt away
and used it to wipe the worst of his own sweat away. Handed
it back to the boy. The hungry look in his eyes certainly
matched his physique.
"Tonight, my quarters."
Jeffrey nodded, swallowed. What had he ever done to
deserve two boys he couldn't just let himself use, use up
in just a few mindless thrusts on whatever surface was
available. Care, everything around him deserved care.
Walter's days hadn't felt so full in... in a long time.
And then Jeffrey was moving, coming to a moderately shaky
stand before turning to go. Walter watched him walk away
until the door shut behind him, idly wondered what Alex
would make of such a muskily needful Jeffrey.
One quick, rough fuck against the wall of the engine room
on the day the repair center had released himand he had
learned from that that Skinner's cock could be as simple a
thing as a thumb or his own hand and still be goodbut
after that, nothing.
And the smell of rut had begun to permeate the ship.
Alex tested the air cautiously, nostrils twitching
letting the tip of his tongue rest quiet on his lower lip.
A strange thing scenting on the Rose of Sharon.
The air itself was flavorless, but the scents it carried
seemed to pop out from it to graze his senses unblended.
Harsh, heady, dangerous scents. Poisons and plastics and
aldehydes so rich they sometimes made him gag. Ozone and
oxygen. The juices and offgasses of subtle machinery.
Music. Like Skinner had begun to teach him. Like the
sounds of space. All of it came together like the fluid,
winding strands of song.
Underlaying all was Skinner, a scent that was a world in
itself. A smell that made Alex ache to make a thing to
show how right it felt. What a thing that would beto
make a song of Skinner's smell, to play it back for Skinner
himself so he could know it, like he'd understood about the
sounds. The thought pulled at him. To complex, too rich
for a pup like himself to worry. Someday maybe, when he
was old and his legs were shattered and he could only
bellycrawl from bed to shithole in his den he would turn
inside and meditate on Skinner's smell. Until then he
would just breathe it, taste it, follow where it led.
Today it led to the gym.
He followed it down the long narrow corridor, nose
wrinkling as he passed the infirmary. The new thing
this Jeffrey Spender thing that Skinner had brought on
boardwas making a nest there. Laying down its own
scent strong and thick as if preparing to build a real den.
Alex stopped by the infirmary door, considered that. The
scent of the Jeffrey was not...unpleasing. A male scent,
not Skinner-rich, butAlex licked his lips, gathered
tiny tracesspicy. Sharp.
A little sweet.
It stirred him. And what to make of that? The thing was
Skinner's. But Skinner's, how? Like he was Skinner's
and like the ship was Skinner'sinviolate, not to be
touched or changed by himself or anyone else without
permission? Or was the Jeffrey thing like the sonic shower
or food from the replicator, something to be used with
respect, but freely nonetheless?
He'd asked Skinner, but Skinner had only chuckled.
"Ask him that yourself, boy," he'd said and gone back to
repairing a patch of gently sparking circuitry under the
recyc unit.
He hadn't yet. If Skinner wouldn't order it one way or
another, Alex was tempted to leave Jeffrey in the category
of the curved knife. A thing surely to be forbidden to his
hand were it known to what uses he wanted to put it, but
until that day perhaps a thing to goad him, to make him
hard and even run featherlight across his cock and dream...
For a moment Alex allowed himself the pleasure of his
thoughts. Leaning back against the wall, fingers coaxing
out the firming heat in his groin. Too long without, but
his own hand gave him nothing but release and release was
the least part of what he sought.
It was the hunt itself he craved. And what he did with
his prey when he caught itwell, he didn't have to plan
that part.
And if he did the wrong thing, Skinner's justice would
scour him clean.
He gave himself a hard squeeze then, to quell the growing
heat. Jeffrey was no vicious burrowing skalak that
required razor sharp senses to pursue, but he had a knack,
Alex had noted, for being hard to find.
And he moved as silent as heat rising off the sands.
Alex flared his nostrils again, closed his eyes to focus on
the twisting strands of scent. Old and new around the den
and...changing...when it intersected Skinner's musk. That
stirred something else in Alex, some bone deep growl.
Because Skinner's scent changed too, becamesofter; the
salt of sweat, not blood.
And it filled him with unease. The Jeffrey thing was
soft, and soft was dangerous. Alex turned without pushing
off the wall until his belly rested against the warm plastic
of the inner hull. He reached out one hand to claw the
door. A gesture only. His clawless fingers left only
harmless smudges that wouldn't scare a chiz'a.
But he would know the mark was there. And soon, soon
enough, the Jeffrey thing would know it too. Alex
straightened then, and sprang up to grasp the hatch that led
to the access tubes above the ceiling. It opened at his
touch and one quick flick of his agile body and he was up
and out of sight. And the tubes would take him anywhere
on the ship, silently. Invisibly as wind. The Jeffery
thing would never know what hit it until Alex compelled it
to open its eyes and see.
Jeffrey walked out into the corridor on shaky legs.
He could put it down to exhaustion, he knew. Or residual
spasms from the shocks. Or maybe leftover trauma from ki
don't please don't think don't... He managed to hold
the rest of that thought back at least. But he couldn't
deny the real reason for his trembling limbs. The
screaming thing wouldn't let him.
He wondered when it had decided that Skinner's cock was to
be his only salvation...
yes, yes, the screaming thing gibbered. tonight
he's going to fuck you fuck you yes... And his balls
pulled in like fists clenched tight between his legs.
Sharp breath in and he knew he wasn't going to make it 'til
tonight. Oh, gods, gods. What a thing to have given
himself to. No, not a thing. A man. Skinner was a man -
- charismatic as a star gone nova in his gruff and silent
wayand just as blinding, searing, maybe. But he was a
man. Not a nice man...he chuckled again at that, but
warm. Powerful. And when Skinner looked at him, Jeffrey
felt uniquely seen. Sometimes that alone was too much
to bear. Certainly too much for his poor aching cock,
battering at the confines of his loose fatigues.
Definitely not going to make it until tonight. A shower
and some self-relief would do it, but the shower was in the
head and the head was just off Skinner's quarters and the
'wraithAlexwas more likely to be there than
anywhere.
And he had little real knowledge of the rest of the ship
beyond the gym, the bridge, the tiny galley with its single
replicatoreverything that came from which tasted
curiously of the Tlosian spice, cerisine. Which left the
infirmary. His hidey hole. His home. The atmosphere
fell a little short of romance, though. Perhaps Skinner
would let him put up wall tapestries in there, drape the
biobeds with burnished silks...light scented candles in the
Petrie dishes...
At least move one comfortable chair in there. Skinner
could joke about his potential to end up on Alex's dinner
tray, but Skinner hadn't been looked at with such feral
hunger. Oh, hell, maybe he had and liked the thought.
[And the cold thing, which seemed intent on driving him
utterly fetal with his fears asked him, for the thousandth
time what exactly he thought he was doing here with these
two mad and homicidal creatures and whatever made him think
he was meant to survive?]
At that thought, he stopped and looked around.
Something... He could almost feel hot breath on the nape
of his neck. Skitters of fear icing his nerves and a
definite rush of blood into his cock that left him panting.
But the corridor was empty. Jeffrey frowned. And what
the hell corridor was it, anyway. Rose of Sharon was
not a huge ship, but she was large enough and compact
enough to have a small maze of corridors and branchings.
And he hadn't really been watching where he was walking...
Closer to the engines, that was certain. He could feel
the heavy throb and draw of the warp core containment field
through the walls and floor. He'd gone down then. Down
and...aft, if that was the right word.
The narrow, rounded corridor stretched surprisingly far in
either direction. Distantly spaced lights shone through
plastic tabs and long stretches of bundled pipe on ceiling
and walls, casting odd, angular shadows on the catwalk
grate that was the floor.
He had passed no hatchways, no doors. There were
indentations of shadow in the curved walls farther down that
might be further branches, might be exits to the upper
floors. Another twinge of fear, something stuttering
through his chest and he whirled this time.
Confronted only throbbing silence. Shadows. His mouth
was dry, heart hammering. Spooked. Totally spooked and
Jeffrey suddenly didn't care how foolish it would look: his
hand went to his left wrist. And remembered even as flesh
touched flesh that he had left the comm bracelet on the
floor of the gym.
Damnation. A hundred violent deaths to the imp of his
vanity and the demon of his lust. And this was not the
wine cellar of his family's home on Kronos gone don't
think... and this was not the mistghosts of his
imagination.
He was breathing hard now, panting like a blethin run to
ground.
"I know you're there," he called out.
Nothing. Silence mocked him. His own harsh breathing
and the soft rustle of his clothes. Dry throat and still-
hard cock and anger rising, mingling with the fear.
"Well, come on," he snarled, pleased to hear at least a
little bravado in his voice even if it was cracked along
its spine.
A sound. A heavy thud from somewhere in the engine room
beyond the wall and Jeffrey jumped a foot into the air.
Landed poised for flight, for ambush, for whatever teeth and
claws were about to descend. And nothing still. Nothing.
Oh gods, maybe this was imagination. Maybe some huge
joke. Perhaps Skinner and the 'wraith were sitting
together on the bridge laughing uproariously at the
'Dancing Jeffrey' show on the inboard monitors. He
straightened, pulled his shirt to order, ran a hand through
his hair.
And turned.
He felt it, barely: strike, strike, strike and he was
pinned against the wallno pain, no blood but paralyzed,
not breathing. Blinked. There was a hand pressed hard
into the center of his chest and hot sweet breath against
his face. And eyes like hot green nebulae, the 'wraith's
eyes, on him, not a handswidth from his own.
Easy to stalk, easy to be feared, easy to catch... Alex
pinned the Jeffrey thing to the wall with his body and
breathed deep. So much here. Jeffrey's fear, its musk, its
rage...
He hadn't even really touched it yet but it writhed against
him, pushed and struggled and... "You would fight me?"
"You think I'm going to roll over and let you kill me,
Alex?"
Alex couldn't keep himself from leaning in to taste the
anger. "You don't believe me worthy of killing you?"
"Ah. Your idea of a favor. Suits you."
Calm, low voice. But the Jeffrey thing's heart was beating
faster, and there was new sweat on his throat. Alex let
his cock drive up against Jeffrey's, caught the moan with
his mouth. Everything, he was going to take everything it
had within himself and crush it
"Fuck. This is what you want, Alex? Wanna fuck me?"
Use you, take you, kill you... Alex caught himself
heartbeats away from tearing the thing's throat out and just
breathed. "How do you belong to Skinner? What is your
property status?"
"Belong? Wha"
Alex bit down and thrust again, feeling the Jeffrey thing's
yell fly past his ear this time. The Jeffrey thing gave
off echoes of his presence like wetplanet people sweated,
only maddeningly vague. A taste too thin for even Alex to
catch sometimes if the distance was too far.
Alex had thought only his people could do that, and Jeffrey
was certainly no kin to him. "Why do you call me Alex?"
"That isn't your name?"
He could listen to the Jeffrey thing pant all day... Alex
pushed in a little closer, regretfully leaving the smooth,
nearly unmarked expanse of its throat for the ear. "It is
how Skinner knows me."
"I could keep referring to you as 'it,' 'that thing,' and
'watchwraith' if you prefer."
Shocked moment of samenessunfair! Alex pulled back to
stare, found himself frustrated by another pair of dark,
mutie eyes. If the Jeffrey thing's feelings didn't rise
from its pores like a newthing's, Alex would have nothing
to see, know.
"Are you a newthing? What is this 'watchwraith'. Not
another species?"
"I think I liked you better when you were just hunting me
for more interesting food."
Alex struck fast, biting at the tender flesh behind
Jeffrey's ear until he tasted its blood. Sharper, thinner
than he was accustomed to. Perhaps it was all the anger?
Alex sucked until the blood stopped flowing, feeling the
Jeffrey thing's wrists twist in his grip high above their
heads.
The Jeffrey thing's cock was hard against his own, its
breathing even harsher. Alex wondered if it hurt yet, if
it would surrender to Alex without more persuasion simply
because each lungful of air burned more than the last.
"Answer me."
"I have 28 turns. 23 standard."
Older than Alex, yet still so soft and smooth... He knew
the Jeffrey thing would have no scars at all. No one had
owned him, never tried very hard, not even himself. Alex
squeezed the wristbones a little harder. If the Jeffrey
thing was so unworthy, why did Skinner wish to keep it?
Touch it, leave his salt and scent all over its
coverings... "And the watchwraith?"
"A program. A simulation designed to keep children and
thieves away from your possessions. Scare the children,
stun the criminals"
Alex pulled back again. "It can tell the difference
between a newthing and a thief?"
The Jeffrey thing smiled, not the airy thing Alex had seen
him flash so many times, heedless of his own projections,
but something sharper. If Alex were to hold one of
Skinner's blades against, both shines would share a quality
of rightness. Could dark eyes see more?
"No, Alex. There were dead children in every heavily
populated 'port city in the galaxy, and putting the 'wraith
programs on lower settings just made it easy for thousands
of non-Fed ships to be looted. Murderously unsafe or a
useless expense, either way the programs are outlawed on
most self-respecting planets. No one uses them anymore but
fools or criminals."
Alex felt something start to boil within him, saw the edges
of his vision darken. "You would speak of Skinner as such
a thing?"
More sweat, acrid with fear, growing exhaustion. Alex
growled.
"Well, you're not really a watchwraith, are you? You're
flesh and blood, you can make decisions..."
"You cannot soothe me."
"Would you really use up all your chances to hurt me,
terrorize me in one shot?"
And Jeffrey rolled against him, little teasing movements
that made Alex thrust several times. Lust was beginning to
override fear and anger again... but what was it with these
not- kin and possibility? They did not take everything
they could get the first time. They were all like the
sandgazers, people who would sit unarmed and loose-limbed
beside a pile of still-sealed rations, content with nothing
but sun and cutting sand.
Honestly surprised to come out of the trance and find
themselves with nothing.
Most sandgazers didn't live very long. And yet, and yet...
Skinner was no sandgazer, and Skinner showed him with every
touch why he was still alive. Refused to let him regret it.
And now the Jeffrey thing was offering even more of himself
than Alex had rightfully taken, solely to be allowed to
live.
"Why do you love this existence so much? Don't you want
more?"
Alex was being studied again, more obviously and
aggressively than the Jeffrey thing had done before. "What
more? I know what's here, and I want it. I... I haven't
tasted Skinner enough."
"Skinner is fine, tastes like power my own blood"
"I won't try to take him from you, Alex..."
"I have his promise."
Jeffrey nodded slowly, still studying him. "See? No need
to kill and/or maim me."
Another disturbing thought. "You would resist Skinner's
will?" Not that he'd been very good himself, but the
Jeffrey thing had no right no right
"Do you have any idea how... strange you are, Alex?"
"Hah!" Alex made the laughing sound he'd learned from
Skinner meant: you think you know things, pup. Laughter.
Now that was strangeness. Skinner's laugh made him want
to cover the man's mouth with his mouth to keep his
selfness from puffing out with his breath. And the
Jeffrey-thingit spoke in laughter like a language, a
high-harmonic to his words, saying exactly the opposite
sometimes.
Not that it was laughing now. A little desperation
beginning to show in the sag of muscles. It was losing
strength rapidly, its energy bled away in fruitless
struggles and anger and in talk. And because all the
while its cock had stayed hard. Grown harder. Its dark
strange eyes were fluttering closed, springing open.
Intoxicated by too much adrenaline, burned to ash. Almost
time.
"Alex..." the Jeffrey-thing said. Breathed. Shaking its
head, and then letting it fall forward softly to rest
against Alex's own. "Alex, please...one way or another.
Please. Don't make me wait..."
The touch of damp, hot flesh against his forehead, wet
spring of curls. Alex breathed deep. Rich, rich mix - -
the sweetening tangs of dying anger, mortal fear; the hot
iron of need from within; a new, sharper need that tasted
like himself... He turned his head against the sweatslick
skin so he could run his nose along the smooth side of
Jeffrey's face.
Breathed in again, the same and more: sweat, exertion, the
acrid bite of the infirmary; the taste of Skinner's salt
thick hand upon the flesh. His nose grazed Jeffrey's ear
and the body beneath his gave a soft, sobbing gasp and
pressed against him. Yes.
The head against his head nuzzled at him, tongue and lips
tasting him. Yes. Good. Yes. Almost and soon.
"Do not move," he said into the Jeffrey's ear.
"Even if I could..." the Jeffrey breathed, but it wasn't
argument. All fight was gone. Gone. Unbelievable, that
a creature that clung to life as hard as this one could at
the same time give it up at just a touch. A breath. A
word. But there it was. He let go of Jeffrey's wrists
and the hands stayed raised and pressed against the wall.
And had to breathe again, inhale that scent. Faint breath
of yeast at the crease of neck and shoulder, and number
uncounted, it bared its throat to him at just his touch.
Oh surely Skinner could not intend for this to be for him.
And yet he had not forbade... Alex let his teeth graze
the jumping artery below the skin. But no, he knew,
already he'd learned too much to simply take. That was
for Skinner to decide.
Or Jeffrey. And he breathed again, and used his tongue to
find...maybe. Was it there? That rarest scent, the
willing sacrifice... Something. Faint. But maybe,
maybe. But not enough to know. And with that
understanding came certainty: he was too young to know
this. He had not learned enough. This was not his gift
to take today. Not the Jeffrey thing's life. But the
rest?
He pulled his mouth away. Soft whimper of complaint but
he moved down fast then, pressed his nose into the soft,
pungent moss of Jeffrey's armpit. Breathed deeply and
growled low because the gland there sent one message, strong
and clear: sex sex sex and now and he couldn't resist a
bite of that tender, salty flesh. The Jeffrey-thing
cried out, arched into him.
"Please..."
And down again, folding to one knee, hands steadying the
pliant creature's hips.
Soft, silky fabric under his fingers and his nose lingered
at the indentation of the navel, reveled in the sharpness
there, the hardness of narrow hips and the maddening scent
rising under his chin.
He could feel the brush of the creature's cock against the
base of his throat. Wet heat. Slowly he lowered his
head. Sniffed... delicately.
"Gods, Alex," hoarse voice crackled overhead. "If all
you're going to do is smell me, kill me now."
The words filled Alex's senses, but he recognized the tone
as: no, I mean the opposite of what I say. Or something
like that. And it didn't matter. He was past the
questions, past the worry. The Jeffrey creature had shown
himself to be worth...further study. And the buzzing
scent in his nose was making him quite mad. He mouthed
the soaked fabric, pressed his tongue against the firm,
resistant line of heat.
The Jeffrey-creature made a sound, strained to press
against his face. He soaked up the sharp and musk and
need upon his tongue, closed his teeth around the head and
sucked.
"Oh gods and flying monsters...take it, take it,
please..." Harsh, insistent. It sounded like himself in
Skinner's mouth.
Was this how Skinner felt then? Like a man who has
swallowed a swelling bubble that stretches at his chest,
his throat, his cock? This powerful? He sucked again
cruelly hard and felt the first glazed wetness gush
strongly in his own groin. The Jeffrey thing was shaking
like a leaf, its hips jerking jerking against his palms.
And used his fingers to flip down the waistband, drawers,
yank them down revealing a cock like a jut of stone,
purpled and wet and so taut the skin must surely tear. Oh
and the smell, the rich and salty musk pulled a groan from
his own lips. His mouth watered, tongue lashed out to
curl around that head.
And he could no longer wait or savor, his own need driving
him to slide his mouth over it, swallow the fleshy shaft
mouthful by mouthful. Slippery salt around the inside of
his mouth and Alex knew his was the weakness of a newthing
suckling the nipple of its crËche but he could not stop.
And nor could Jeffrey. Hands in his hair, coursing waves
of heat across his scalp. There would be punishment for
that, there had to be, but oh he'd make it good. And he
let the creature move his head, opened himself to the
impalement driven by those battering hips because the
Jeffrey-thing was growling: "take it...give
you...every...fucking...take it take it take it..." and
every word was like a sliding grasp upon his cock.
He could leave the Jeffrey-thing like this for hours, he
thought. Fucking his mouth like stormwind slamming a torn
doorseal against a den but never able to break it off. It
was a thing he'd do someday, but not today. His own needs
had gotten their head and he was as caught up in their
grasp as the other was in his and there had been so much
he'd been denied these last three days. And with that
thought he slid his hands around the Jeffrey's hard and
narrow ass, plunged two fingers hard and deep.
And Jeffrey howled and howled, thrusting hard and wild even
as he shot, even as the warm ocean salt of him filled
Alex's throat and he swallowed and felt the fire roaring
through his veins.
Oh this. He'd missed this, Alex had. Forgotten how
fine and plain it was. Skinner was god and sand and light
and love and end combined but this. This salt and meat
and the taste of a young man's thick surrender in his mouth
and the simple blinding roar of his own pleasure, earned
and without debt.
This was something that could bind a man to life.
"Skinner."
"Mm-hmm?"
Alex frowned a little more than was his usual. "I was with
Jeffrey."
Walter made a note to check that there remained three
living and reasonably healthy creatures on board, just to
be sure. "Did you ask him your questions?"
"Some of them..." Alex looked absent for a moment. "He
gave... interesting answers."
"He's an interesting boy."
"He is older than me."
"You're an interesting boy, too."
"Will I be a boy for so long?"
Walter wondered when questions like that would start giving
him headaches. It seemed like they should, but at this
point... Well, hadn't he gone to space for the newness, the
difference? All those years ago... "I don't know, Alex."
Alex simply nodded. Perhaps that was a hard question on
his own world, or perhaps he was just accustomed to the
ways of Walter's knowledge being... different and new.
"Are you bothered?"
"Why do you want him?"
Walter smiled. "He's interesting and attractive."
"Do you find him... beautiful?"
Walter took a moment to study the boy in the center of his
quarters. Alex wasconsciously or unconsciously
mimicking the "at ease" position. It simply wasn't possible
that a position that left the chest so vulnerable would be
familiar on his hellhole of a home planet.
"I don't know him well enough to know if he's beautiful,
yet."
"But you took him in anyway?"
"I took you."
"You... didn't know me?"
The impulse to laugh at that, to ask how he could have
known him was a difficult one to check. Another side to
the puzzle. Alex was the sort of thing a Vulcan would build
solely to torture himself into further heights of cognitive
perfection. Walter didn't have a clue as to why Alex would
think Walter had had a real reason to pick him up....
Perhaps predestination was too cruel a belief to hold on
Pax.
In any case, when cunning failed with Alex, there was only
honesty. "I took a chance. If I didn't care for you I
could always have killed you later."
"Killing the unworthy... this is something that comes up
again and again with you, Skinner. And the Jeffrey thing."
"Life isn't always the punishment."
"I am working on learning that."
"I know. Come here."
Alex did so, slid himself up along Walter's body until his
head shared the small, battered pillow. He smelled like
sex, presumably Jeffrey's. Walter idly considered
installing "security" cameras, or maybe just casually
ordering Alex to bring Jeffrey into view whenever Alex felt
like molesting him.
He was never going to get anything done again.
Walter kissed him softly, indulging himself a little. To
his surprise Alex opened his mouth and immediately relaxed
into it. It would, perhaps, be slightly more comforting if
his new crew were just a little less zealous about
adapting to his every whim, foible.
But Walter couldn't bring himself to object, either. He
ran his hand down and cupped the heavy heat waiting for him
behind just oneknowing Alexlayer of fabric.
Already a little damp. "You liked Jeffrey, didn't you?"
"I want more."
"You'll have it."
Alex shuddered, bucked into his hand and then simply ground
himself mercilessly. Walter's palm tingled. It truly had
been years since anyone had made him feel like more than
simple cock and weapon. He knew Alex would be scandalized
and perhaps a little ashamed if he voiced the sentiment,
though, so he simply pulled away a little. Settled into the
comfortable hollow of his throat and began a concentrated
attack.
And then pushed the boy's hips down until he could unfasten
his pants. Walter gave Alex's cock a ruthless squeeze and
nearly battened on his pale throat when he felt the moan on
his tongue. A beautiful boy, and very simply his. Perhaps
he should offer to brand him at some point.... But it
would have to be a very precise design.
He would consider it sometime after he'd taken tonight's,
this moment's fill of metal and hopeful violence, of the
silken cock in his fist that seemed almost obscenely like
his own. Everything about the boy should be strange, or at
least only like those parts of himself he'd never known.
But he wasn't so strange in Walter's arms, in his fist,
between his teeth... perhaps the blood was Alex's way of
justifying the connection? Though the boy didn't seem to
need one. Arching and writhing and crying so freely. Was
Jeffrey outside his door right now? Was he listening?
Perhaps he wouldn't know whose place to wish for. Unlikely
for today, tonight.... But someday.
Walter pulled back and knelt, looking down at his marvelous
possession. While he watched, Alex pulled one knee up and
resettled into a new, dirtier sprawl. Walter licked his
lips, considered attacking the tight, dark pucker with his
tongue. Alex had probably never felt that before.
His mind reeled at the thought of his wilder, lost Alex.
But it wouldn't really be fair to subject the boy to such
ruthless tenderness when Walter hadn't really planned to
spend the time required to balance his indulgence with
Alex's own.
Maddeningly logical that resetting his compass to a
morality he didn't much care for would be so difficult.
He gave the boy's cock a solid backhand, watched seemingly
every muscle flex and release in a small wave. Dove in to
take it deep, providing only wet heat and suction for
several moments of desperation he could taste, then
uncovered his lower teeth before pulling off.
"Skinner"
Oh he was close, so close. What to do? Another bite?
Vicious pinch? The knife he'd left on the bedside table?
And when would Alex take it as his own? Something else to
encourage... sometime after Walter could be sure there'd
be no more self-Patterning. Or perhaps Alex was just
waiting until he felt Walter trusted him or or
He looked down to discover he'd been kneading the boy's
lower chest and belly, occasionally skipping down to the
sparsely haired thighs. A three-knuckle sized splotch was
making his already dark cock darker. Encourage more blood
to rush there, make the cock harder, the experience more
intense...
There was a base logic to pain sometimes, a comforting
state of existence he could gladly share with Alex. A
matching set... Walter went for the other side, a forehand
blow this time. The sound of flesh on fleshtoo loud
and brutal to be sex but sex just the samewas something
to be eagerly sought. As was Alex's wail, and his thrust
into empty air that presaged his orgasm.
Heavy spurt onto his own belly and chest. The boy could
make three days look like two weeks. Surely there hadn't
been that much rutting on Pax? So much to learn still.
Walter felt wonderfully young. Would Alex have such a fine
gift for himself in fifteen years?
Walter ran his fingers through the hot splatters of come,
finding the subtly humped surface of the scar he'd left the
boy by touch. If he kept getting sentimental that way Alex
would be a ridged thing in less than a year. Walter knew he
was far too shallow to want that. He would have to find a
way around the urge before too much more time had passed.
"Skinner... so good..."
He grunted at that, lacking anything else appropriate to
vocalize. Settled back against the tapestry covered metal
footboard. Watched Alex breathe.
He would stay here for a while.
It had taken a solid half-hour for Jeffrey to force himself
off the floor. One second he was shooting what felt like
his soul down the throat of the prettiest animal he'd ever
seen, the next he was on the floor, alone, with his cock
out.
Alex had gone without a single acknowledgment. He knew it
was ridiculous to expect sentimentality from either of the
other members of his "crew," and he didn't, not really.
But it would've been appreciated if Alex had, perhaps,
mentioned whether or not Jeffrey would still have to watch
his back around him.
Hmm.
Well, watch his back for weapons used solely to hurt. Or
something.
At present, Jeffrey had his back to the wall. A position
that was becoming familiar, if not precisely comfortable.
Maybe Skinner would fuck him against a wall tonight, help
him build still more positive associations to erase the
mental image of himself offering his own throat for Alex
to assault.
The man had sharpened caninesnot savagely done, just a
subtle honing. You wouldn't notice if he wasn't smiling in
your face. Or gnawing on your throat.
But oh it felt so good... Not just the sensationsmen
and women alike had left their marks on his neck. The
pleasure of that was undeniable, rational and... pure?
Perhaps simply more pure than this, not that that task
was particularly difficult.... Jeffrey couldn't lie to
himself, not on this. Yes, he'd loved the suction. Yes,
he'd loved the scrape of those teeth over his sensitized
flesh. Yes, Alex's lips were surprisingly, addictively
soft.
But to be so far toward the edge, to grind against a man
you could not wholly convince yourself was not truly an
animal... Perverse, thrilling. And when he had
surrendered, laid his head against Alex's own like a baby
seeking contact and intimacy beyond the nipple.... He had
meant it, through every part of him.
Jeffrey did not consider himself suicidal, per se. He had,
after all, spent a large amount of time and energy
struggling to save his soul.
But then, most of that had involved risking his body far
beyond prior acceptable levels.
Perhaps, far beneath where his consciousness could reach,
there lurked some strange morality. Near-Guaranteed
Suicide is better than Doing Wronga concept he had often
sneered at during many, many children's holosor perhaps
just something along the lines of Everything Can Be OK So
Long As You're Still Yourself In The Morning.
But what happens after enough mornings have passed that you
can no longer remember who you were supposed to be? Not
that he'd known before. There should be some sort of
mandatory course about figuring out your own identity and
learning how to stick with it.
That thought died quickly in the sudden flash of billions
of children growing up to be the petulant brats they
decided they were when they were nine or so. Still,
though... Jeffrey was reasonably sure he'd never been a
brat. It just hadn't been an option, what with not having
parents around to act up in front of. And with the
servants that all seemed to know him.
What he wanted. What he needed. What he deserved.
Jeffrey shivered, felt the stirrings of new arousal. No,
old arousal. Old and dirty and... and it hadn't stopped
it from feeling good, making him moan, making him come.
Nothing stopped anything about Jeffrey's willing abuse until
that unfortunate accident in Barn 8 when he was sixteen.
Accident. Well, in light of recent events and discoveries,
the use of that word would be somewhat disingenuous, now
wouldn't it?
Had his father known? If so, how long had he known? Had
Jeffrey been... watched?
Jeffrey pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes and
pushed. The images were replaced by the nova bursts of
stars close and far, the imprint on trillions of hominids,
the order to search the skies...
Or maybe he was just punishing himself for getting harder.
He didn't know how long he'd spent in this place, but he
did know the hum of the engines wasn't doing anything to
improve his thought processes. He was rank. He needed a
shower.
Maybe Alex wouldn't be there....
Whether Alex was there or not turned out to be a moot
point. The door to Skinner's quarters was closed and
wouldn't open to his touch.
Disappointed, a faint sickly exhaustion dragging at his
heels, alternately heavy and light like a mistuned gravity
generator, Jeffrey turned away and trudged back down the
corridor to his erstwhile quarters.
Not even enough energy to towel himself off and he ordered
off the lights, threw himself into the cushioned coffin of
the med-unit. He checked the shim he'd stuck in between
the hinges so the lid couldn't close on him accidentally,
pulled a corner of the coverlet he dragged in there the
night before over his shoulders and fell so quickly into
sleep he hardly had time to let go of waking.
The strangeness of his days followed him into his dreams
and gave them a weirdly linear feel. He was chased or
chasing, knowing himself to be part animal, springing,
leaping. Pursuing some terrified creature through the
house, pursued by servants, by nameless dreads and coming
to rest, shivering and panting, in his father's study.
His father was in there talking with another man, whose
broad feet were set wide apart. Their words were
meaningless sounds to him, and although the man was
familiar, low to the ground as Jeffrey was in his animal
form, he could not see his face. Jeffrey dragged himself
across the floor, came to rest at his father's feet. Soon
found himself being stroked by handshis father's hands
and thinking, sadly: "Father I am not this beast."
But his father set a bowl of cream before him and he
plunged his face in hungrily, lapping and lapping like a
cat and when he looked up, cream dripping off his lips and
chin, all the curtains were on fire, and flames licked
hungrily around the cuffs and collar of his father's coat.
He woke abruptly in the dark with such a deep sense of
dread and guilt weighing in his belly that for a long while
he thought he would be sick.
He sat up, shaky limbed, light-headed, still feeling his
limbs contracted into an animal crouch.
Sick, not just in his body but in his mind, his soul. He
ached. His stupid cock was half-hard. Dreaming of his
father's murdermy murder I killed him killed them
all.. and his body shed no tears, only slutted after
nothing but the touch of a man's hand.
He ran his hands through his sweat-stiff hair, curls fisted
in his grasp: "What is wrong with me...?" he snarled
through gritted teeth.
"Serum blood sugar has fallen below optimum levels," said a
calm, female voice.
Jeffrey blinked. Blinked again. Not more than a second
for the sense of it to come. He was sitting in the med-
unit after all. But still...
"Are you telling me..." he hiccuped, a short voiceless,
stutter that bubbled up atop wild laughter. "Are you
telling me I'm h-hungry?"
"That if I..." laughter rising. "I'll f-feel better if
I...if I eat something?" Laughter squeezed his empty gut,
shook him hard.
"You are also hysterical," said the computer. "A sedative
is available."
Jeffrey was laughing so hard now he couldn't answer at all,
but did manage to drag himself out of the coffin, one hand
clutched around his aching middle, staggering across the
floor.
"You require further assistance," the med-unit chimed at
him as he staggered to the door. Oh, definitely, he
thought. You know your stuff. He was still howling as
the door whooshed open at his careless slap. As he
stepped into the quiet hallway. The sight of Walter
Skinner and his pet Alex, faces turned in his direction
with identical blank, surprised expressions nearly killed
him.
"S'as'all right," he managed to wheeze, backing away from
the both of them. "Just out to lu- to lunch..." and he
turned and whoop-staggered hilarity down the corridor to
the galley without waiting for reply.
He sobered a little in the galley, the hysterics shuddering
down to the occasional snort and giggle at the bowl of
ceresine-flavored hava soup in front of him. The med-unit
had been right about that anyway. Well, right about all
of it, really. He was hysterical. He did need help,
whatever help there was for...whatever the hell he'd turned
out to be. But here and now, on this ship, in this
company, it was crazy to think he could be anything
but...well...crazy.
And so what if his body wanted no part of what he'd done?
How to expect it to resist the pull of these two men who
offered it release from guilt, from shame, from want. That
was how they lived, wasn't it? They'd honed the skill of
living in the flesh. Of acting and forgetting and paying
no price for what was done. What he'd done was right in
their universe. Or no, it wasn't right or wrong, it
simply was. The consequence of action that had to be
taken. But then that implied a value on the action after
all...ah hell... He didn't know. He no longer wanted to
possess a mind at all. Maybe he'd get Alex to do him a
head injury, render him insensible to anything but the
constant ache in his groin and its release.
And a slow sweet rush burled outward from his very center
to tingle warmth through all his limbs.
Skinner's quarters. Tonight.
Oh, he could lose himself in Skinner, no question there.
Enough man there to wipe all of Kronos from his skies. If
only he could stay within the blinding circle of Skinner's
light he would be fine. He wouldn't have to know about
anything else at all.
It had only taken a few minutes to heal Alex's bruises, but
it really shouldn't have taken even that long. Walter was
distracted. Jeffrey's scent was all over the room,
something he'd been forced to notice when Alex attempted to
use the excuse of breaking the seal of another's den to
keep himself out of the infirmary.
It wasn't the most comforting thought that Alex was
willing and able to adapt and use new brands of reasoning
so easily, but it was... good. Sometimes it was too easy
to forget the innate challenge of the boy. It wasn't one
he ever wanted to solve, after all.
Walter had hazarded a few guesses about Alex's culture, and
demanded to know whether or not Jeffrey had brought his
first kill back to the den, or even fought for it in the
first place. It earned him a brief scowl, but it also made
Alex proffer his arm willingly for hauling.
It occurred to Walter that he'd been doing a lot of hauling
lately, and he briefly entertained the thought of attaching
wheels to Jeffrey's and Alex's feet to make it easier on
himself. Which explained why he'd been so surprised by
Jeffrey's shambling, giggling exit from the infirmary.
Perhaps he was getting too accustomed to relaxing. In any
case, the computer was still speaking rather insistently at
Jeffrey's retreating back, and Walter knew it would start
yelling, sealing off corridors if it wasn't interrupted.
He'd programmed it himself, after all. Anything to make it
easier to get himself healthy should he ever return to the
ship wounded and delirious.
He spoke in the "shut up" code and reflected, not for the
first time, that he sincerely hoped he'd be able to forget
the code should he ever need the computer's Mama function
himself. Walter then asked what Jeffrey's symptoms were,
and was given a long list of technobabble that eventually
added up to "exhaustion, low blood sugar, and incipient
mental breakdown."
None of which was truly surprising, but it did give Walter
pause. How much of Jeffrey's obvious desire to make
himself fit into all aspects of ship lifeincluding
Walter's own bedwas the boy's simple scrabbling for
solidity of any sort?
Just because Walter didn't intend to use him, then drop him
in the nearest 'port city didn't make it any less wrong for
him to take advantage of a Jeffrey in this state. Did it?
At which point he caught sight of Alex on what was,
apparently, Jeffrey's chosen biobed. He was rubbing
himself, practically grinding himself into the thin
mattress, tongue occasionally darting out to lap.
"What...?"
Alex ignored him for several more moments, and Walter found
himself easing his stance to watch more comfortably. Alex
was a beautiful boy, there was no way around that. Walter
resolved to find out just who had taught him to move like
water. And then Alex was flipping over, settling himself in
that grimly expectant pose Walter had come to know as
"ready to be repaired."
"What was that about, Alex?"
"You said this was an unclaimed den."
Walter couldn't hold back a small chuckle. "Please try not
to challenge Jeffrey to a death-match for it."
"You stopped me from killing him."
It was spoken like an accusation, and Walter raised his
eyebrow.
"I would not go against your wishes, Skinner."
And there was anger there, and real hurt. Apparently, the
idea of whim just didn't exist on Pax. Walter resisted the
urge to rub the back of his own neck and simply walked close
to Alex. "I did not understand."
"You do now?"
"I think so."
And the brief storm passed to return to Walter Alex's
strange brand of sunshine. It seemed off the edge of the
visible spectrum somehow, the sort that would light on bone
and tooth and miss the subtleties of curve and flesh. It
was beautiful, just the same.
Walter wondered if Alex had set some time limit for Walter
to correct/explain his flaws as they came up. Before
forty-five seconds and all was well. After that would be a
whole separate issue. Or something. He ran his thumb over
Alex's cheek and stayed there for a moment, drinking the boy
in.
A full shot of Tyrellian "water" would, if survived, make a
human numb to most other liquors, and could make taste buds
require several reconstructive operations to make them
function properly again. Drinking it was considered the
first step to a truly spectacular suicide in some circles,
and Walter had avoided it. With Alex, though...
Perhaps the best reason to have and keep Jeffrey was to
provide those intermittent doses of normality. It would be
far too easy to lose all of himself in Alex, perhaps killing
them both in a fit of exultant lust.
Too easy. He could see the Rose of Sharon now, adrift
for Christos knew how many years, inhabited by nothing but
their own carved corpses. He laughed darkly to himself.
Maybe for Alex's birthday.
And then he'd finally gotten out the regenerator and ran it
over the boy's as- close-to-flaccid-as-it-was-ever- likely-
to-get cock, checked for other bruising, fingered the
tooth/knife marks on Alex's neck, caught the boy's purr in a
brief kiss, continued to check for other bruising, and
found none.
The boy would remain unmarked until the next time Walter
took him. At which point Alex nuzzled his chest and then
faded out of the room. Walter wondered when he'd find out
where, precisely, Alex's den was.
Alex would remain unmarked if that instapromise thing was
valid for Pattern- driven self-mutilation as well. It
probably was. It would almost have to be. Walter had met
very few people who actively considered themselves to be
complex on more than one or two points.
And most of them had needed killing even more than Alex
wanted it. No, he could trust Alex on whatever promises
he'd sworn the boy to, and he could trust him to avoid
clinginess, too.
Though he wasn't altogether happy about that, it did
leave him the time and energy for Jeffrey. Alex's brand of
jealousy was the most livable sort Walter had ever seen.
Not even jealousy, really. More like a sort of directed
curiosity. It had been a good decision to leave Jeffrey
open for the sharing.
Walter knew Alex would go against all natural inclination
until he understoodor thought he understoodwhat
Jeffrey's appeal was to Skinner. And then he would mold his
own needs and wishes to match, and Jeffrey wouldn't stand a
chance. Jeffrey would be another T'losian spice on Alex's
palate, something new and strange to acquire.
It probably wasn't precisely right to look forward to the
day Alex found Jeffrey as beautiful as Walter himself did,
knowing that Alex's beliefs about how to treat beauty were
so different than his own, but...
But Jeffrey needed to have more people prove to him that he
was beautiful. Yes. That would help to make him... feel
better.
He barely resisted the urge to throw the tricorder against
the wall. There was no possible way to rationalize the use
of rationalizations. He's killed people for less. No,
he wanted the boy, and, sometimes even more than that, he
wanted Alex to have the boy.
Just to see how and whether Jeffrey would change, lose the
stiffness, laugh more naturally... It disturbed Walter
that he hadn't really recognized the jagged edge in the
boy's laugh for what it was sooner, that the sound of any
laughter had been so intoxicating as to render Walter as
blind to the subtleties as Alex.
He needed them both here, and relatively healthy and happy.
If only so they could both remind him of all the violence,
all the care, all the personal interaction Walter's brain
seemed programmed to forget at the slightest provocation.
He was still a young man, hardly into his prime, he would
not let himself become old and confused by the novelty and
marvel of having other organic creatures onboard his ship.
In his home.
He would grow stronger from his association with both of
them, and he would not let either of them break, no matter
what the temptation.
The rest of the daycycle passed in relative peace. Alex
and Jeffrey both having evidently gone to ground, Walter's
resolution to acclimate himself to company seemed ironic at
best. The ship felt unnaturally quiet, empty. More like
his old home than it had in months. Not an unpleasant
situation, particularly since it was a temporary one.
Left to his own devices Walter settled back into an easy,
well-practiced rhythm of fiddling with the ships' systems,
studying reports of Federation activity and scanning the
void for the sound of corruption growing.
Nothing came of it, but he was used to that. Space was
big and he was very, very small. Always had been, didn't
pay to sweat it. Something would come, it always did.
Later he repped himself a meal of prote and root vegetables
and ate it in front of the viewscreen on the bridge, with a
bottle of real Romulan ale.
The ale warmed him and buzzed away some of the sharper
edges of his thoughts. No matter what its drawbacks, this
was the life he had chosen for himself and he knew better
than most how many worse ways there were to live. By the
time he had showered and ordered his quarters to his liking
he was in a fine mood, relaxed without being sleepy;
satisfied with the days work. Looking forward, he
realized, as the doorchime sounded at the appointed hour,
to spending time alone with this 'Jeffrey-creature'to
becoming better acquainted with this boy/man both so unlike
himself and so familiar at the same time.
"Come," he said and as the door slid open he felt a smile
already tugging at his mouth. Anticipation, just for its
own sake and there was Jeffrey, looking...well. Smelling
clean, curls combed and a little damp, dressed in what
Walter recognized to be one of his own discarded tunics,
but altered somehow to fit the smaller, slenderer frame.
"I hope you don't mind," Jeffrey said. "I ran it through
the material replicator. I kept the pattern in the buffer
though, I can put it back the way it was."
"Keep it," Skinner said. "It suits you."
Jeffrey's pleased, relieved grin reminded Skinner that it
had not been just a lie. The boy did need a
little...encouragement.
"Drink?" Skinner asked.
"Definitely," Jeffrey answered. Skinner was already
pouring the spirits into two small, stone cups which he
held in the fingers of one hand.
He held them out to the boy who took one of the cups, let
his hand brush warmly against Skinner's hand. Yes.
Definitely something sparking there.
Let it spark, Walter thought. He was enjoying the sheer
novelty of an encounter with...preamble. Been so long
since he'd seduced. Not that Alex's constant furnace blaze
was any less whelming for simply being there at any given
moment.
But having two spices to choose from did nothing but
enhance the prospect of the meal.
He watched as Jeffrey turned the liquid in the cup, sniffed
like a connoisseur.
Tasted.
Watched the flush suffuse the soft features of the boy's
face.
The sparkle in his eyes as he glanced up. "Dangerous
stuff..." Jeffrey said.
"Very," said Skinner. He downed his own shot. Smiled as
it burned a diamond line down to his belly, spread.
There was a pause, comfortable, slowly gaining weight. "I
went to your quarters..."
"Yes...?" Skinner asked, intrigued.
"Well, it was rather uneventful. Your door was locked.
The Computer mentioned you were here... it sounded
vaguely... smug."
Skinner cocked his head at the boy, wondering. Jeffrey
presented himself at times as this innocent. Not a
pretense exactly, but it clearly meant something. To be
so coy when he was already hard, his eyes dark with lust
that wasn't innocent at all.
"What do you want to know?" he asked, bluntly. Not
unfriendly.
Walter watched the boy swallow, flush a little more. If he
asked something along the lines of "what are you going to
do to me," Walter was just going to have to take him right
here. "Alex. Tell me about Alex."
Walter couldn't help but laugh at that. And god he knew
in his gut what a right thing it had been to bring the
'Jeffrey-creature' on board.
"Come here," he said, extending his hand.
Jeffrey looked up from under lashes, not quite so lush as
Alex's but charming enough, and laid his fingers across
Skinner's upturned palm. Warm, soft fingers. Bitten
nails newly evened. So much newness to explore. He led
Jeffrey to the viewport in the outhull wall.
Centered him before the screen, himself standing close
enough to Jeffrey's back to feel their mingled heat and
reached across the boy's shoulder to the keypad control.
Stars blurred and shimmered, reconfigured themselves into
new constellations.
"There," Skinner said, pointing to one tiny cluster of
diamond pinpricks in the velvet field.
"That's...where he comes from?" Jeffrey ventured. Their
cheeks were only inches apart and Skinner felt the boy
turning in toward him, heard him breathe deep as if to
capture Skinner's scent.
"Where I found him," Skinner said, he touched the control
pad again and the screen jumped to a planetary scale.
Round curve of planet hung against the black, striated bands
of dried-blood red.
Still leaning close, Skinner felt Jeffrey's body brush
against him, pull away. Heard the dryness in the boy's
mouth as he swallowed. "A desert world..." Jeffrey said.
"Now," said Skinner. "Colonization on Pax wasn't quite so
smooth as it was on Kronos."
"You're telling me the Federation did this?" Jeffrey's
voice was so low it was almost a whisper.
"They called it a miscalculation," Skinner said.
"I know why you're telling me this," said Jeffrey, leaning
farther away. "You want me to think that what I did was
right."
"That's not my business," Skinner said, giving him his
distance. "And you asked. Or was there something else
about Alex you wanted to know?"
Skinner felt Jeffrey stiffen slightly. Then relax. He
could almost feel the rueful smile spread across the boy's
mobile face.
"You're very good at this," Jeffrey said. He felt the boy
lean back into him, mold himself to Skinner's body from
shoulder to heel. He responded by taking Jeffrey's
weight, wrapping his arms around him in a low and loose
embrace.
"I am," Skinner buzzed in Jeffrey's ear.
He felt the boy's hips buck reflexively against him and the
pressure sent a warming surge through him again.
His lips were still by the boy's ear and he took the
opportunity to mouth the tender cartilage, nip sharply at
the lobe and then swipe slow and wet around the delicately
carved whorls. The press of his tongue against the deeper
channel evoked a shuddering gasp from the boy. A
voiceless cry:
"Skinner..."
"I've got you boy," Skinner said, gently. "I won't let
you fall."
He turned the boy around without breaking the circle of his
embrace. That flushed face looking up at him, still
traces of that smile that would not be smothered, but the
eyes so vulnerable. Dark eyes that held no secrets, lips
barely parted. Walter lowered his mouth upon that mouth.
Met softness with softness of his own.
Oh, Jeffrey tasted sweet, all right. His eyes fluttering
closed fanned Walter's cheek but then his hands came up
under Walter's to clasp his back, pull him close and Jeffrey
was kissing him, hungrier than anything he'd expected or
imagined from the boy.
It pulled a low groan from somewhere deep inside him and he
cupped the boy's ass, pulled him in to grind their hips
together.
Firm and hot. And Jeffrey's mouth was innocent and not
innocent at the same time. Plunder me, it begged with
lips and tongue and nipping teeth and Walter willingly
plundered.
Took what he wanted, gave what he gavethe hot, thick
sweep of his tongue in Jeffrey's mouth made the boy moan
hungrily; wet, open-mouthed kisses along the boy's jaw and
down the taut curve of his neck brought a hiss. Brief
copper tasteWalter pulled back long enough to look,
found bruises there and he recognized the spacing of
Alex's teethmarks scratched into the biteand Jeffrey
pressed insistently against him, hand riding up his back to
try to push Walter's head back down.
And Walter might have counseled patience, teased a little
longer, but something about Jeffrey's hunger was resonating
through him like the long, slow tolling of a bell. It
called up hungers of his own, not for blood or mastery but
for something which he had no name for anymore. He
wanted...this. Now. Took the boy's mouth with his own
again, one hand sliding up the boy's back to unfasten the
tunic's simple catch. It parted at his touch.
The boy said: "Ohh..." into his mouth and Walter swallowed
the sound and breath as he slipped the tunic off the boy's
shoulders. Such silk under Walter's handsJeffrey's
skin was petal soft over firm, lean muscle and Skinner
wished vainly for a second mouth to never break the kiss,
but he had to taste that fine, fine skin.
Walter bent to press his lips to the exquisite curve of
shoulder and felt warm lips fasten on his own neck, fingers
trace the shape of muscles of his flexing back.
Walter hummed his pleasure, arched a little into the touch.
And felt the boy's cock twitch against his own. Innocent
and not innocent. Somewhere young Jeffrey had learned to
enjoy giving pleasure as much as taking it.
But you'll have to just take it, for now, boy," Walter
thought. I'm of a mind to pleasure you without
restraint tonight.
He pushed the hanging tunic down Jeffrey's body, taking in
the firm pecs; small pink peaks of nipples; soft curls of
chest hair arrowing to straightness down the belly. The
definition of a casual athlete's musculatureneither
whipcord and sinew like Alex's, nor heavy and defined as his
own. Jeffrey's angles were rounded, smoothed like hand-
shaped clay.
Walter ran his palms across the flesh, gently catching at
the boy's nipples with his thumbs.
And then slid one hand around Jeffrey's naked back again,
pulled him close to bring a nipple to his mouth for a brief
experimental suck.
Took the boy's weight on his arm as Jeffrey's knees
wobbled. Jeffrey's head falling back and the boy laughed
again. Not wild. A light, rolling laugh.
Just...pleased, maybe. Pleasured.
And Walter couldn't resist, had to have that honey on his
lips again and brought his head up to take Jeffrey's mouth
again. So good. His free hand still roaming caught the
catch of Jeffrey's pants, flipped that open too. Pants and
tunic falling, puddling at their feet. Jeffrey slipped
the deckslips off of his own accord and the boy was
abruptly, wonderfully naked in Walter's arms.
Walter pulled back again to look at what he'd wrought.
Jeffrey's mobile face was rouged with his arousal, bright
eyes heavy lidded, that generous mouth moist and curving up
at the corners. His long, lean body angled away from
Walter, loose and hipshot, cock rampant.
Nice cock, Walter thought. Of a size. Firm and sweet
looking, dusky pink and glistening at the slit.
Nestled inWalter's hand roamed down to tangle gently
soft black curls.
"See anything you like?" Jeffrey's voice, brimming with
the wry humor Walter was beginning to expect and breathless
with unconcealed desire at the same time, gave him another
surge of pleasure. He looked up, caught the bright, brown
gaze with his own.
"Yes."
Lust scorched the edges of Jeffrey's careless smile and he
swallowed.
"Let me undress you?" he asked. Walter nodded.
And was rewarded for his forbearance. Jeffrey was
thorough but efficientsatisfying only the sharp edges of
his curiosity, never lingering too long. Well, almost
never.
"You've seen one before..?" Walter asked dryly.
Jeffrey looked up, almost startled from the kneeling pose
he'd held for almost a full minute.
"I thought I had," he said, blinking, wide- eyed. And
Skinner threw back his head and roared with honest
laughter.
"Come here," he said and pulled Jeffrey to his feet. He
caught him up in both arms, kissed him, turned them both to
bring Jeffrey up against the flickering flame wall. Edged
weapons framed them, but the wall itself was only soft and
warm.
Kissing and consuming like the slow flickering flames
themselves. And still his hunger grew, slow and rolling
warm like a wave as Jeffrey's mouth laid claims on him, as
Jeffrey's hands mapped out the territory of his body, as
Jeffrey's cock painted his belly with short, blunt strokes.
So long since such simple contact had made him want like
this that when Jeffrey wrapped a long, lean leg around his
hip, Walter knew he couldn't wait any longer than he had,
had to take the boy now and completely. Reached for the
oil he'd set on the low table nearbynot bannet oil, but
sklaerslick and fragrant and fine as liquid pearl.
Just the thought of sliding into that firm, sweet flesh
flesh that he ached to taste, to savor, to plumb with mouth
and thumbs and cock at oncebrought his breath hard and
fast, and he tipped the bottle into his palm, brought his
dripping hand to slick himself.
Slick the willing heat against which he writhed.
"I have to take you, boy," he said harshly and Jeffrey
whimpered, head slammed back against the wall, turned to
the side and nodded, fiercely.
Then cried out, an unmistakable bleat of need, as Skinner
pressed a blunt finger into him and up...
Fucked him slowly like that, Jeffrey opening to his finger
like a flower, head rolling against the wall and crying out
to the rhythm of his strokes.
Walter, shaking from his need, knowing he would hurt the
boy some and that would be all right but wanting to make
the hurt easy, kind. Sweet. And there were words now,
or bits of words breathed into Jeffrey's cries.
"Now..." and "please" and "Now..." and Walter could wait
not a second longer. He positioned himself at the boy's
entrance, oil running down his thighs and scooped Jeffrey's
other leg up, bracing him against the wall, sliding a hand
around to take the remainder of his weight.
Jeffrey locked his ankles around Walter's waist and reached
out to steady himself on Walter's shoulders. Their eyes
met.
"Don't look away," Walter said.
Jeffrey's eyelids furled a bit but he didn't break the
contact, neither of them moved, so Walter got to see it all
as gravity and oil worked the boy down onto his ready cock.
So slowneither of them thrusting yet for just this one
long glide and Walter drank in the
pleasure/pain/pleasure/pain flickering across Jeffrey's open
face. And the sensation, that hot slick ring of heat
descending, enfolding him, the boy's weight a satisfying
strain to the muscles of his back and legsa heat so
gentle it was hard to understand how it was searing all the
flesh off Walter's bones...
Then the last stretch cable of resistance gave and Jeffrey
sank down, seatedsheathing him in molten pressure to
the hilt. Walter rolled his head against his neck to
stop himself from going over right then and there.
He felt soft strong fingers grasping at his shoulder,
sliding up to clasp behind his neck. Jeffrey's eyes at
closed. Lips parted. Skinner felt like a dreamer running
through air thick as syrup. He neededneededto get
to those lips, needed to thrust and roll his hips, pull
Jeffrey up and to him. Did it, feeling the stretch of the
other man's tendons, hearing his deeply guttural moan.
But, ohhh... Mouth on mouth and the join was like the
closing of a circuit.
Meat and muscle sparked to motion and Walter angled out and
thrust, thrust... seeing sparks behind his eyes, sweat and
oil lubricating all his moving parts...
And the hot, burn of pleasure sizzling up and down his back
from heels to crown, like the pulse and surge of a warp
core unbound by fields of force. He was moving, moving in
toward something, each piston stroke driving forth a muffled
cry from Jeffrey's mouth into his own; each swallowed cry
tripping over another thrust. Jeffrey in his arms like a
babe but his cries were a young man's cries and he need was
like a small sun, drawing Skinner in and in and
the burn ignited somewhere deep inside his core, spread up
and out to all his limbs. He was pounding into Jeffrey
now, pounding him against the wall with the force of his
thrusts and somewhere the burn must have caught the boy up
too because there was a sudden twist and spasm in the legs
wrapped 'round his waist, a brief explosion of slick wet
heat between them and a voiceless scream that could have
been his name...
And then he came.
Alex, nestled in the ventilation shaft, watched Skinner and
Jeffrey slide awkwardly down to the floor. Jeffrey still
had his neck thrown back... the strange... boy... seemed
to exist in a constant state of invitation, and yet Skinner
had not marked him much at all. His own mark stood out in
stark relief even though Jeffrey was still flushed.
Did that mean Skinner intended Jeffrey to be his? Of course
Alex would shareAlex was rather pleased to see Skinner
spend some of his gentleness on Jeffreybut if Jeffrey
was truly his, did that mean his dreams of eventually
leading him to a willing slaughter would eventually come
true?
He felt a surge shoot to his cock and settle there,
abruptly making him aware that he was hard, aching for
touch. He could slip out, scratch at Skinner's door. But
was this time supposed to be private? Were his forays
through the guts of Skinner's ship wrong somehow?
There were times when Skinner's body clearly said: "I will
be alone," and that was that. Alex would fade back
elsewhere. Press himself to the walls of the engine room,
feel the thrum throughout his body. Listen to some of the
audios Skinner had given to him and look for the patterns.
Alex didn't know how he'd spent his whole life up until
Skinner had taken him unaware of how.... everywhere
patterns were.
Within the body and without, mechanical or organic. It was
some strange kinship of flesh to metal that Skinner might
understand better than himself. Perhaps the sands of his
home had simply been too large and obliterating for other
patterns to be supported. Or perhaps if he had not failed
so young, he might have lived long enough to understand.
No matter how freely the blood ran in his veins, he knew he
was dead to all who had known him back home. The borya
would've made sure of it. He would never be called a man
there, he would never be given to a mother, he would never
have the honor of fathering a child. Perhaps he might have
sired a healthy daughter, and added glory and wealth to all
Pax.
Never now. And it was his own fault, to be sure, but
sometimes each breath felt like a mockery to all he had
been. Skinner was... so much, but Skinner would probably
never truly understand.
The blasphemy made him burn, but his thoughts would not
stop.
Skinner wished him to be someone elseno he wished to
add onto Alex's core, complicate his very being with things
he never would've seen, never would've known. Scandalized
his flesh with tongue instead of teeth. Skinner would still
have been a man on Pax, there was no question of that in
Alex's mind, but...
Would he even want to be?
Skinner didn't seem to appreciate the parity of bone as
much as other men Alex had known. He always wanted more,
in a way that seemed decadent and dangerous to Alex's mind.
Even now he was leaning over to kiss and caress Jeffrey so
softly... and Jeffrey was moaning into his touch. No
lashing writhe of need, this, just... Just something Alex
did not think he could ever feel.
Would Skinner decide he liked Jeffrey's brand of surrender
better? Would Alex grow sick of this... softening change
and slit his own throat? A shameful death, to be sure, but
his life was criminal in so many ways from what he'd known.
Perhaps he didn't deserve better.
But he'd be going against Skinner's wishes, and Skinner was
the closest thing he was likely to know the truly
sandborne...
Still, though, what if Skinner wasn't close enough?
Alex spared one more look at the people sprawled below,
marveled at how brown Skinner's flesh was against
Jeffrey's own pale pink. Had Jeffrey's world been dark?
And then he was shimmying silently back through the shaft,
a little desperate to return to the small, cool space he
called his own. It was a small juncture between curving
tubes, and Skinner had casually provided several items of
old clothing when Alex had asked. It made for a hard, yet
pleasing nest. Small and as closed off as anything on the
ship seemed to be.
Though perhaps it wasn't a good idea to surround himself
with Skinner's scent while he thought. Alex froze
momentarily, tried to think of another place to go, but
everything else seemed so exposed... He did not want to
give either man the opportunity to read his treacherous
thoughts.
His "den," it would be, then, and perhaps the steadying,
intoxicating smell of Skinner would not harm him.
Jeffrey lay on his back on Walter Skinner's bed and
listened.
He felt more peaceful than he had for...months, really.
Maybe ever. Not the numb and jagged peace of total
exhaustion that he'd managed here and there, either. This
was something different. A slow and steady calm,
requiring neither questions nor answers, as though after
his long wild flight across the void he had somehow come to
rest with his ear next to the pumping heart of the entire
universe.
He smiled at thatmore likely was just the diastolic
throb of post-coital bliss, but still. Just lying where
he lay, on the firm, warm bed; wedged comfortably against
Skinner's naked heat he felt connected to some larger
rhythm. He could hear it, feel itthe subsonic thrum
of the warp drive fields, the low steady rumble of
Skinner's snores all seemed to resonate within a web of
invisible force lines drawn in the immense emptiness
between the stars.
It seemed reassuring in itself, somehow, a pattern that
wasn't fixed, that only existed in the relationships
between its points and formed itself anew whenever a point
moved, or changed or
Jeffrey frowned. The thought had turned vaguely
disturbing and his pulped and satiated brain refused to
follow it. He didn't want to follow it, didn't really
want to know or think. All that would come back soon
enough, along with questions he didn't want answered, like
where were they heading now and what had frantically
scrabbled across the ceiling while he and Skinner lay
entwined.
He wanted nothing more right now than this. Lying,
listening, letting the universe turn around him as it
would. And though no-one was there to record it, the
gentle smile he wore stayed with him, even as he drifted
down into sleep.
|
Disclaimer:X-Files characters belong
to Chris Carter and Fox, Trek stuff
belongs to Gene Roddenberry and
Paramount, the cool mix belongs to
Anna and we are just very happy kids
playing in someone else's sandbox.
Thanks to you all and no
infringement is intended nor profit
made.
Spoilers: sort of, for Anna's "Little Lost Fox" but not really Rating: NC-17 for a lots of kinky sex, blood, bloodplay violence, intrigue, sociopathy, alien mindsets, pain, self-mutilation, hysterical giggling, intergalactic politics, dark beauty and a very strange variety of love. Summary: XF AU. A prequel to Little Lost Fox by A. Leigh Anne Childe, which is to say it is X-Files characters in a somewhat Trek-ish universe. Notes: Te and Spike wrote this in a blur some time back and then it kind of got lost in the various shuffles of our personal lives and it's been sitting on my hard drive ever since. Thanks: to Anna, for permission and Nonie for being the first to stare the monster in the face. Oct 99 - May 00 Disclaimer: X-Files characters belong to Chris Carter and Fox, Trek stuff belongs to Gene Roddenberry and Paramount, the cool mix belongs to Anna and we are just very happy kids playing in someone else's sandbox. Thanks to you all and no infringement is intended nor profit made. ***WARNING*** this piece is really really disturbing, dark and bloody and perverse. Even our friends looked at us funny afterward. Consider yourself warned. |
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