ElyriasEcstasy (17 page)

She was not self-conscious about her scars around him. Gator
already knew about them, the marks on her upper left arm and across her
abdomen.

Finally she stepped up onto the white supporting slab, gazed
down into the filled tub, then lifted a leg over the side and slid herself
wholly down into that luscious, hot water.

She came up spluttering happily. Her multicolored hair was
now plastered about her skull. The chill left her body immediately. She reached
for the soap. It released a wondrous floral scent when she dipped it into the
water and started lathering herself. Her slick hands moved over her breasts,
nipples growing hard. She peered through the veiling steam, expecting that
Gator was still watching her—
wanting
him to see her now.

He
was
watching. He was staring rapturously at her,
with a heartbreaking longing in those dark eyes. Arvra wondered remotely if
he’d always felt this way about her. He’d never given any indication during the
times they had worked together. Then again, that was business.

She even dared to wonder if he had chiseled out this
magnificent bathtub with her in mind all along. But that was too conceited a
thought, and she shook it off. She continued soaping herself.

“Gator?”

He grunted an acknowledgment, still staring.

“Want to get in with me?” The thought sent a surprisingly
powerful thrill through her.

He could only nod.

It was her turn to watch him strip. She knew him to be a
strong man. She halfway expected a burly, graceless body, ugly with muscle. But
he was a well-proportioned specimen, with powerful but not grotesquely swollen
pectoral muscles, firm abdominals. He was a bit shy about lowering his
trousers, which Arvra found oddly delightful as she continued to ogle him.

Finally he stood nude. He allowed her the same chance to
view him as she’d given him. His legs were solid columns. His ass was as
chiseled as this tub she sat in. His cock, thick and dangling, was framed by a
tangle of dark pubic curls. Already it was hardening.

She saw what she took for a birthmark on his right hip.
After a second she realized it was a tattoo, one which sort of curled in on
itself. It was red and looked like it might be a symbol of some sort, though
she didn’t recognize it.

Arvra shifted as he came up to the tub’s edge and gently
dropped a leg into the water, cloudy now with bubbles. The water level rose as
he lowered himself fully. As large as the bathtub was, they couldn’t sit in it
together without touching. There was a cheerful little scuffle as they settled
their legs, Gator’s brawnier ones closing around Arvra’s thinner limbs. They
faced each other. She could see his nervousness on his unshaven, rugged
features, even now.

She smiled at him. The heat and luxury made her feel dreamy.
She picked up the hunk of soap—this stuff was expensive; where had he gotten
it?—and leaning forward, started to lather his broad chest. Her fingers trailed
across the nipples capping his pectorals. Gator shivered.

“You want me to stop?” she asked.

“No.”

He reached for her now. He had big hands and he fairly
covered her shoulders with them. The fingers tightened and she felt the
strength of him communicated through that grip. His thumb ran along her
collarbone.

After a little while, when this seemed to be all he meant to
do, Arvra said, “You can touch my tits. I want you to, you know.”

Black eyes alight, he laid his hands on her breasts. He
squeezed, and it was her turn to shudder with pleasure. “I’ve…” he murmured,
voice suddenly thick in his throat, “I’ve dreamed about this. I’ve wanted to
touch you for so long.”

Her hand moved downward, onto the muscle-buttressed expanse
of his midriff. “How come you didn’t ever say anything? You and me, we’ve known
each other a long time.”

He continued to caress her breasts, catching and releasing
her nipples between his fingers. “Well, we were working together. You know, no
time for play. I thought it would be inappropriate.” He shrugged. “‘Sides, I
didn’t figure you’d ever thought about me that way.”

She hadn’t, it was true. But there was no need to point out
the fact. The blissful liquid warmth worked its way into her, deeper and
deeper, unlocking sore muscles and joints. That lengthy bus ride receded to a
vague, unimportant memory. She was only here. It was only
now
.

Her hand found Gator’s swelling shaft. Her slick fingers
closed around it.

His whole body jerked, violently enough that water slopped
over the side. She wondered distantly how long it had been since he’d last
gotten laid, decided immediately that it wasn’t any of her damn business.

She liked how he felt in her hand. His girth was impressive.
She could feel the pulse of him. She slid her hand down along the shaft, below
the soap-hazed level of the water. Her fingertips toyed with his balls, the
fleshy pouches big and lax in the hot water. She traced the seam bisecting his
sac then palmed each ball in turn, applying the gentlest pressure.

He shifted again, this time more deliberately. Arvra sucked
in a breath as he reached down into the water, thick blunt fingers grazing
across the sensitive inner flesh of her thigh, moving, seeking. She gasped
again, more sharply, as she felt the first tentative probing of her cleft.

“Finger me,” she said. It touched a memory, reverberating
faintly somewhere in her head, of Urna telling her to finger herself while he
watched. Had that happened only last night? Might as well have been last year.

Gator’s fingers entered her. His touch was delicate,
skillful. One slippery knuckle grazed her clit. The fingers slid between her
lips. Pleasure roiled inside her, out of all proportion perhaps to the
simplicity and utility of this carnal contact. Even so, excitement rose with
dismaying speed, buoying her along.

She grasped Gator’s cock as though it were a branch over a
rushing river that had caught her. Working her whole arm, she started pumping
his shaft. His fingers, two of them, delved deeper into her. She was wriggling
against the delicious intrusion, moaning, climbing through the octaves. Her
voice echoing from the walls. Water splashed against the tub’s sides.

Desperately she used two hands on Gator, finding that his
sizable cock had room for both. She pistoned his meat furiously, hearing his
own cries, lower pitched but just as frantically excited.

“So
good
—” The words slid in among the animal sounds
he was making. His fingers were jabbing in and out of her now.

“Yeah!” she agreed. “Good—good—good!”

She squirmed, riding those digits for all she was worth. Her
ass quivered on the smooth floor of the tub. Gator flicked a thumb over her
clit, hitting it just right, and the pleasure swelled within her, readying for
its final lunge.

Her grip on his cock was fearsome. She put her shoulders
into the effort, muscles flexing up and down her back. She jerked that
fantastic organ, feeling its already rigid length surge with an ultimate
hardness, a fierce, final engorging. Its throbbing quickened in her hands. Heat
swam in her eyes.

Pearly jets leaped up between them just as the frenzied
finish overtook her, a writhing, seething orgasm that lashed its way through
her body. Gator’s cock continued to pulse, the spurts slowing gradually.

After a time, he sank back in the tub, fingers sliding free
of her clasping passage. She released his softening but still thick shaft and
slumped limply against her end of the great stony vessel. The warm water
settled. The flowery scent of the soap soothed the air.

Arvra felt good. Better than good. Her eyes drifted open,
beheld the male slouching opposite her, a dazed look on his face. It occurred
to her only now that they hadn’t even kissed yet.

“This bath was a great idea,” she said softly.

He pulled his lax facial muscles into a smile. Wonder
gleamed in his dark eyes.

She let the gentle silence linger a moment. Then, tone
shifting, she said, “I want to go on another raid. I want to go into the Unsafe
and grab everything useful we can lay our hands on. I want to bring it back and
see that it gets distributed to people who need it. Even if Frank never knows
it, his work’ll be carried on.”

It was more than that, though, and she knew it. This was
rebellion, some latent surge of it. This was a “fuck you” to the Guard, to the
Lux, to the whole evil system that kept a few wealthy and everybody else
wanting or suffering. She’d taken too much. Been pushed too far.

Gator lifted his head. He stared across at her solemnly.
After a moment, he said, “Just tell me when you want to go.”

Chapter Nine

“Excuse me. Miss Virge Temple?”

A sudden coldness took an icy-knuckled grip on her and she
halted in mid-step. The sky was twilit. Minutes ago she had sent home her
assistants and closed up the lab. In the course of the workday she had snuck
around the side of the brick building with a ladder and wrenched that vent back
into place. She’d strained her shoulder doing so. Cursing, she wished she’d
gotten Bongo to do it, but she had instantly reconsidered. After all, he’d done
a lot for her just recently.

How many people did she know who would’ve taken care of Urna
like he had, smuggling the wayward Weapon back to her house? Granted, Bongo was
used to defying the law. But this was something a hell of a lot more serious
than running off idiotic pamphlets.

Virge turned, drawing a steadying breath. Damn the Guard.
Damn Aphael Chav. Couldn’t she just be left alone—like for the rest of her
life?

It was indeed a Guard member who’d called her name. He was
approaching along the street, riding a rickety-looking trike. The contraption
had bad shock absorbers and he bounced around atop it in a comical manner.

Virge, however, didn’t crack a smile. Any appearance by any
one of the Guard meant trouble. Especially now. Were they already on to her?
Did they know about Urna? Damn it, how
stupid
she’d been—

As the three-wheeled open-air vehicle pulled up to the curb
alongside her, it belatedly occurred to Virge that this uniformed man had said
“Excuse me” to her. The Guard had never talked to her like that before.

Maybe she ought to try returning the politeness, see what
happened. “I am Miss Temple,” she pronounced. “How may I help you?”

The Guard lifted goggles off his eyes. He had dirt on his
young, freckled face where the lenses hadn’t covered. How far had he traveled?
Virge didn’t recognize him as belonging to the local garrison, which didn’t
mean much. Personnel got rotated through on a regular, and sometimes irregular,
basis.

The young man reached behind him and flipped open a small
cargo case attached the trike’s rear. He poked around inside then snatched up a
blue envelope. “This is for you.”

Virge, nonplussed, reached for it, but the Guard held onto
it and fixed her with a dire stare that he couldn’t quite pull off. “When
you’re done reading this, burn it. Don’t show it to anyone else. Don’t reveal
to anybody else its contents.” He leaned a few inches closer to her, for
emphasis apparently. “You understand?”

More bewildered than before, and much more intrigued, Virge
said solemnly, “I do.”

He put the envelope in her hand, replaced his goggles and
went zipping away down the street, bouncing about on his trike’s saddle. Virge
gazed after him a moment. He’d probably gone to her lab first, found it closed,
then made for her home when he’d spotted her on the street. Must’ve seen a
photo of her or had a decent description. Good thing. She didn’t want any Guard
calling at her house. Such a visit would never be welcome, naturally, but
now
…

With a quick tear, she opened the blue envelope. It held a
single sheet of cheap folded paper. On it was a hasty-looking scrawl.

Toplux ordered search of all pharmaceutical labs in 30
mi. radius. Got anything you don’t want found?

—N. D.

She shuddered. She resumed walking, picking up her pace. A
warning. Her puppy dog Interrogator lover had sent her a warning of impending
Guard action. No doubt a huge breach of security. He had taken a risk, for her.
Since when had men been so willing to make sacrifices on her behalf?

Virge was grateful for Nick Daphral’s effort. Obviously he
knew that her laboratory fell within the search zone and he’d sent out that
messenger, calling in who knew what favors. Nick, maybe, had thought she was
doing some illegal chemical work on the side, perhaps whipping up batches of
street drugs for sale.

That wasn’t the problem. Virge had always been more
interested in providing decent supplies of medicine for people rather than
cooking up stuff to get them high. Cures were better than distractions, she’d
decided long ago.

However, if the Guard conducted a thorough search of her
lab, it might prove to be something more than a massive inconvenience. They
might—if the investigators were smart enough—figure out that some of her drugs
were missing, those earmarked for the Shadowflash/Weapon division. Where had they
gone? She could concoct an excuse, certainly. But, again, what if the Guard
conducting the search were unusually intelligent? They could decide to inspect
her home. In fact, there was a very real risk that they might do that anyway.

Virge Temple hurried along, her mind ticking furiously. She
had some very serious decisions to make and not much time in which to make
them.

* * * * *

The delightful thing about altering one’s behavior after so
long, Rune discovered, was that
no
body knew how to react. And so, it
seemed, he could do pretty much anything he wanted. Within some semblance of
reason, at least.

This evening, for instance, he decided to dine at the Guard
mess hall. This necessitated leaving the military compound, crossing through a
zone dominated by the Lux fortress of the Citadel proper, and entering without
any authorization whatsoever the Guard complex. It was quite a hike but he
managed it. No sentries denied him passage. Even Guards within their own
headquarters unlocked card-coded doors for him, similar to ones at the military
compound. Rune barely had to break stride the entire way.

This might be perceived as payback. In fact, he was counting
on that. The Toplux had sent a
Guard
to escort him to Urna’s quarters,
bucking normal military protocol. It might be expected that Rune would try to
even things out.

He had no imminent missions. He was a Shadowflash without
his Weapon and therefore, in the eyes of the military command, he was of
minimal use. Very well. The officers didn’t even want to let him resume his
winged solo search for Urna, deeming it a waste of time and fuel considering
how massive an area such a search would now have to encompass. So be it. Rune
had studied the walls in Urna’s quarters, just as the Toplux had personally
commanded. He had reported his “findings” as ordered to the entire division, an
exercise no doubt meant as a punishment by the Toplux. Rune had withstood it,
not letting the humiliation affect him. He had recited random phrases from the
scrawl of writing on Urna’s walls, concluding that no clue whatsoever was there
to indicate the Weapon’s motives or current whereabouts.

That was the truth. Those scribbles were no help. But Rune
himself wasn’t helpless.

They had trained him in the stern, military tradition. He
knew discipline, obedience. But he was also quite capable of independent
thought and action, of improvisation and craftiness. He meant to put such
talents to use.

His presence at the large busy mess was causing a stir. He
knew of the supposed rivalry between the Guard and their military counterparts
but had never given it any heed, judging it a childish competitiveness. Heads
turned in the hall. Eyes widened at the sight at his uniform, went wider still
when one, then another, of the dining Guard recognized him. He was the most
famous of Shadowflashes, after all. He heard his name murmured repeatedly.
Rune.
Rune.

Celebrity. This, then, must be what it felt like. He
permitted a mild smile to crease his lips.

Taking up a tray, he went to collect his meal. None of the
servers questioned his being here. They simply dished out whatever he asked
for. The smells were appetizing, he had to admit. Quite a variety of foods. He
still had an hour before he needed his evening drug doses. He meant to be back
in his quarters by that time. Perhaps no one had even noticed that he’d gone.
Unlikely. The only reason he had gotten away with this venture was that nobody
had expected it of him. Not Rune. Rune the dutiful. Rune the fastidious. Rune
who followed all the rules.

Not tonight, however. Of course, it would have been a very
different scenario had he made a run for the fence surrounding the Citadel
grounds, like Urna had done.

Rune surveyed the cavernous dining hall. Dozens and dozens
of Guard members were eating, scattered over many tables. He hadn’t come here
on a whim but with purpose. Finding what he sought, he made his way to a
particular table where only a single occupant was dining.

She was poring over a crumpled sheaf of papers as she
absently forked up her food. Her black uniform lacked the silver rings about
the upper left arm. Instead the cuff of her right sleeve bore two brass tabs.

Rune sat directly opposite. She didn’t look up, head
remaining bent over her work. Of her face he couldn’t see much more than her
furrowed brow. She had soft pale-blonde hair, worn in a severe Guard cut. Her
shoulders were tensely bunched.

He was patient. He started in on his dinner. Vegetables, a
meaty stew, warm bread, all of it sprinkled with spices and augmented with
supplementary flavors he barely recognized, but which enhanced the meal
noticeably. Definitely better food than what he was used to. Perhaps the Guard
had cause to think themselves superior to the military—at least in a culinary
sense.

The thought actually provoked a laugh from him. Or the best
approximation of one he could manage, which was little more than a low grating
chuckle.

“Are you laughing at me?” This, suddenly and sharply, from
across the table. The blonde head lifted. Blue eyes shot him a glare. Then
abruptly her face—comely, young—went still.

Rune dipped bread into the savory stew, chewed a bite.
Smiled. After a time, he said, “No. I wasn’t laughing at you.”

“You’re…” He could see her trying to deny the evidence of
her eyes. It was just too fantastic that he, of all people, should be sitting
across from her. But she finally shook her head and finished, “You’re Rune.
What’re you doing here?”

“Having dinner.” He managed to give the words a droll lilt.
Urna often spoke sarcastically, with wit, with flair. He would simply imitate
his lover’s manner.

She visibly absorbed her surprise and appraised him frankly.
“I can see that. I had always thought the Weapons and Shadowflashes had their
own cafeteria.”

“I’m on a little adventure tonight.”

“Really now?”

“Oh yes.”

He gave her what he hoped was a poignant look. Seduction was
hardly his forte. The women he’d had were all brought to his quarters for the
specific purpose of intercourse. There were never any preliminaries. No
negotiations. A strange ripple of anxiety moved through him, which was
ridiculous. He had gone into the Unsafe, faced untold horrors, assisted Urna in
the slaying of hundreds and hundreds of Passengers. Not directly, granted—but
still.

She responded with another furrowing of her brow. She really
was rather attractive, with winsome features.

“What are you busy with?” Rune indicated the papers.

She looked down at the crumpled sheets. “Reports. I have to
summarize them. Problem is, half the officers who write them are functionally
illiterate. So that means I have to—” Abruptly she caught herself, bit her lip.
“I shouldn’t be saying this.”

“Who am I going to tell?”

She regarded him a moment. “No one, I suppose.” Again she
shook her head, but for the first time a smile appeared on her face. “I can’t
for the life of me imagine why you’re here.”

Rune felt the advantage he had. She was uncertain, while at
the same time interested in him. She did, however, have the edge over him in
one respect. “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Marny. Marny Vilst.”

It wasn’t how a soldier would give her name. She was
imparting something personal.

“Marny,” he said, purring the name. “That’s lovely. Tell me,
Marny—you’re here working during your meal break. If you were to, say, instead
come somewhere with me, would anyone notice?”

Her smile deepened, a mischievous curl appearing at one
corner. She understood his meaning. Good. His only other option had been to
spell out what he wanted in frank terms, which she might have regarded as
off-putting. Or at least unromantic.

Rune had had his fill of the tasty food. He stood from the
table. Marny hastily gathered her papers. As the two of them left the mess hall
together, Rune saw that plenty of people
did
notice. But nobody lifted a
hand to stop them. Nobody at all.

* * * * *

The craving was starting to eat at him once more. Actually,
it was nearing its full-blown crisis point again, just like it had before, on
the road, when he’d been forced to gobble down his whole stash of pills in a
short period of time. That had been quite an unnerving experience. It had felt
like death itself was coming to claim him.

This time, though, he had some diversion. Bongo had told him
stories about the so-called Farsafe, that oasis of clear sky and paradisiacal
living located on the opposite side of the planet. Elyria, the blond-haired
radical declared, had
two
Safes. Two like-sized areas over which the
Black Ship did not hover. And that other Safe, the Farsafe, wasn’t ruled by the
Lux. It wasn’t under the sway of technology, of a system of oppressive
government that meted out electrical power only as it saw fit, often for its
own selfish ends.

The Farsafe was purest freedom. It was utopia.

Visions of the place had consumed Urna since he’d first
heard Bongo’s tales. When he closed his eyes he could absolutely picture the
site. It was green and sunny, and water flowed and plants flourished. Animals
thrived. People—yes, there were other people living there, right now!—existed
in peace. The repressive ways of the Lux were unknown. They had no Guard
keeping order. These citizens of the Farsafe policed themselves. They all acted
for the greater good. No crime. No persecution.