Dalton, Tymber - Bightmares [Deep Space Mission Corps 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (11 page)

Emi didn’t understand the jump engine. Quantum physics wasn’t her forte. It wasn’t even in the same universe as her interests and intellectual strong points. Her specialty involved the human body, mind, and psyche. As the jump commenced, Emi didn’t sense anything physically out of the ordinary, even when she looked through the front vid screens, which had replaced the now-shuttered front ports.

Mentally, however, she felt a sudden crawling of her skin, her nerves on edge. She’d also felt it on their journey to Mars. The short jump they’d made on the way to Mars from Earth had lasted briefly and carried them over halfway to their destination, giving her a blessedly short period of the nasty feeling.

“I can’t get used to that feeling, or the way the vid screen looks.”

“You will,” Ford assured her. “You come back in ten minutes, that vid screen will look totally different. It’s all part of the effect. It can’t keep up with it real-time. It periodically refreshes.”

“In all the vids I’ve watched, you see a blur of stars.”

“That’s Hollywood for you. You would see that if the front plates were down and you looked out the port. In real life, we don’t dare jump without the armor plates and full energy shields in place. Too much risk.”

Aaron confirmed all was well with the other ships before he stood and stretched. “Caph, you take first watch. I’ll take second. Ford, you can take third.”

“What about me?” Emi asked.

“Not right now. You’re not familiar enough with the jump system. If we were under normal power, yes, I would let you take one.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?”

“Is that a loaded question or what?” Caph teased as he took over the command chair, stealing a kiss from Emi along the way.

* * * *

Emi spent a lot of time working in the hydro lab. She enjoyed it, found it soothing. Not only practical, ensuring they always had at least a little something fresh in their daily diet, but a mental exercise allowing her to ignore the creepy crawlies the jump engine gave her.

Being on the
Tamora Bight
turned out to be an easy adjustment. Unlike her sim session, where she’d had a mini-meltdown over accumulated stress, she’d managed to keep her spirits up.

And her men.

Caph joined her down in the hydro lab one morning to help her assemble a second tomato table, as she’d dubbed it, even though she used the trellising setup for other viny plants as well.

“Jesus, babe!” He stared at the flourishing plants in awe, this being his first visit to the lab since before they left Mars. “This is beautiful!”

She puffed up with pride. “Like it?”

“Yeah!” He walked through the various tables, his fingers gently brushing against some of the plants. “You’re bound and determined to make sure we eat good, aren’t you?”

“Hey, gotta take care of my big guy.”

He grinned and pulled her into his arms. “Oh, baby, you talk like that, I’ll have something for you to take care of, all right.”

She felt his cock stiffen through his pants, and she wiggled her hips against him. “Seems like you’ve already got something for me to take care of.” Her big buddy. Even in the middle of their most passionate times, his fierce gentleness could melt her. Caph never brooded, unlike Aaron, and to a lesser extent, Ford. He wore his heart and his emotions on his sleeve. Caph was her big, sexy, well-endowed teddy bear. Not just with her, but with the other two men as well.

“I can’t help it if you guys make me horny.”

She jumped up and wrapped her legs around him as his hands caught her ass. “Didn’t say I was complaining, sweetie. Have I ever complained?”

He kissed her, his hands massaging her butt as he rocked his hips against her. “No, baby, never. I still can’t believe how lucky we are you picked us.”

“I picked you twice. In the sim and then in real life. You think I’m
giving you guys up, think again. I told you, you’re stuck with me for life.”

He carried her over to the chair pushed under the small desk she kept there. Kicking it away from the desk, he turned and sat, his hands moving to the waistband of her sweats. “Let’s get these off, babe. I’ll give you something I know you want.”

With a sultry grin, she stood, kicked her shoes off, and pulled her sweats and underwear down. It was too cool to take off her sweatshirt. While she did that, he unfastened his uniform trousers and pulled them down his hips, exposing his stiff cock.

She felt heat pooling deep inside her as she leaned in and kissed the thick, engorged head of his cock. It twitched.

“Don’t tease me, babe,” he begged. “Please.”

She straddled his lap again, her pussy more than slick and ready to slide him deep inside her. “I’m not going to tease my big guy.”

He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her. She felt enveloped by his large body as he let her set the pace, adjusting her angle until she found that sweet spot she desperately craved with him.

So far, only Caph had managed to get her off just like this. He loved sitting back and letting her use his body for her pleasure, content to wait and watch and enjoy her sliding and rocking on his cock.

“That’s it, babe,” he whispered. “I know what you want.”

She closed her eyes and let her senses reach for him, basking in his love, his passion, enjoying the warmth of his mental embrace. His thick member spread her open, stroking nerve endings deep inside her, her swollen nub getting just the right amount of touch on every downstroke. It slowly built within her, never as strong as climaxes other ways, but always sweeter because of the way she achieved it. That, and she loved the pride that always puffed Caph’s ego when it happened.

“Ride my cock, Emi,” he gently encouraged. “Jesus, you’re so beautiful.”

She felt beautiful. She braced her hands on his arms as he held her hips, helping her, letting her lead, matching her rhythm until she felt that warm rush inside her.

“That’s it, baby. Take it from me.”

She threw her head back and gasped as the wave crashed over her, her muscles grabbing at his cock, tightening around him.

After a moment he took control, his grip clamping down on her hips as he thrust into her. She leaned forward and kissed him, sucking his tongue into her mouth and triggering his deep moans. She felt him explode, physically and mentally, his juices rushing into her as his love flooded her mind.

Gasping for breath, he pulled her tight against his chest. “Oh, baby.” He nuzzled the top of her head. “Gods, you have no idea what you do to me.”

She felt a lazy smile crease her face. “Actually, yeah, I do. Class two empath, remember?” She cuddled in his arms, not wanting to move, wishing they were in their bed.

He chuckled, the deep rumble vibrating through her body as his hands caressed her back. “How about tonight you and me take a trip to the sim room? A little desert sunset action. Ford and Aaron are going to run systems tests after dinner, so they’ll be busy.” He nuzzled her throat with hot lips. “They already said they don’t mind us having a little alone time.” They both enjoyed reliving their picnic, something that happened first in the sim, then reenacted in real life. And relived more than once in the ship’s sim room.

She shivered, with anticipation, not chill. “I think you just read my mind, baby.”

* * * *

Four weeks of mostly mind-numbing boredom later, Emi and Donna had practically memorized all the information they had on the Aroykin colony during the jump. The colony’s last regular status report to the DSMC was received three Earth weeks before their distress call arrived. Since then, nothing from the colony. All attempts to contact them had failed.

For safety reasons, they emerged from their jump just outside the solar system. Emi listened to the inter-ship chatter between the three crews as they disengaged the tractor beam systems and the navigation computers quickly updated their maps.

With relief, she felt her unease dissolve as the jump engine powered down. While she’d gotten used to the unsettled feeling over the past few weeks, her body relaxed, her senses loosening as she enjoyed the calm flowing through her.

Aaron had been designated lead captain for this mission by the DSMC. He immediately tried to hail the colony. “Aroykin Colony, this is DSMC vessel
Tamora Bight
hailing. Please respond. Over.” He waited, then repeated the message, recorded it, and set it to auto-hail over all possible frequencies.

It would take them three days at top non-jump speed to reach the colony. They transmitted their status to the DSMC, receiving a trans-light response the next day. Backup forces from the ISNC were on the way to help but wouldn’t arrive for several Earth days.

Emi busied herself double-checking her supplies one last time and familiarizing herself with their locations. Of the three vessels, the
Bight
had the largest and best-equipped sick bay, but the
Braynow Gaston
had more lab facilities, able to run more complex testing much faster than she could. As the three ships settled into orbit around the planet, locking into a position relative to the colony, they had still not received a reply from below.

Emi sat at the scanners and compared the readings to the records she had. “I’m showing human life forms.” She tweaked the settings. “Can’t tell for sure, but in approximately the same numbers we should be seeing.”

Aaron’s businesslike frown bothered her. He’d slipped into full captain mode, which made it harder to read him. He reached over and activated the com link. “Hey, Rob, it’s Aaron.” The captains had dropped the formalities over the weeks, making it easier to work together.

“Yeah, go ahead.”

“You’re further back in orbit than we are. Can you lock onto their com satellite?”

“Hold on, let me check.” He came back a moment later. “Yeah, we need to shift orbit a bit. Why?”

“Can you pull it in and take a look at it? See if there’s anything wrong with it? Or at least dump its memory into your computer and see if we can retrieve the whole message?”

“Sure. Give us an hour.”

Aaron sat back and stared at the front vid screens. The planet looked remarkably similar to Earth, only with more land mass, two gigantic continents surrounded by a freshwater ocean. If plans for its development succeeded, it could provide a lot of food for this section of the galaxy. The planet’s life forms hadn’t evolved to intelligent humanoids yet. The highest apex predators were reptiles similar to dinosaurs, but none larger than a big dog. Mammals were limited to birdlike animals and small, rodent-like creatures, and the oceans teemed with a variety of sea life suitable for human consumption.

The area settled had been picked for a variety of reasons, including climate, soil, and commonality of habitat. The DSMC wanted to balance sound ecological practices with their need to expansively develop the planet and didn’t want to wipe out any native species if they could possibly avoid it.

“What are you thinking?” she asked him.

“I don’t want us to go down there without knowing as much as we can first.”

“Well, they’re not dead. At least, most of them aren’t.”

“Yet.”

“That’s a creepy thought. We need to get down there.” The doctor in her wanted to be on the way down there ASAP, worried lives might be lost because of the delay.

“We can’t walk in there without knowing what’s going on.”

“What about an unmanned drone?”

“I want to see what Rob comes up with first.”

It felt like a long wait. The com link whistled when Rob hailed them less than an hour later.

“We got it. The same message the DSMC received, and it cut off in the same place. There’s nothing wrong with the satellite. Whatever happened went down at ground level, during transmission. I had it ping back and didn’t receive a response from its base.”