IGO: Sudden Snow (3 page)

He swept his hand in the direction where
The Inquiry
sat tethered to the docking bay. The cargo doors remained shut tight, and Darryl swore beneath his breath. He should’ve already contacted Commander Taylor. The scientist had him addled.

With a mental reprimand to be more diligent, Darryl pressed the button on his earpiece and said, “Commander Taylor. I’ve secured the package. Ready to deliver.”

“Did you just refer to me as a package?” Dr. Moore asked, her eyes narrowing to slits. Her arms followed suit, crossing over her attractive breasts and covering them from Darryl’s view. Despite this, he spied those round globes rising and falling as the doctor’s breathing increased. “I’ll have you know that I am a person, not some errant misplaced item.”

No, ma’am, you’re most certainly not some misplaced item. You’re much too sexy for such a lousy label. But I’ve got an item I’d like to lose inside of your velvety softness
.

Darryl bit the inside of his cheeks to keep the words from coming out of his mouth. As he coughed out yet another clammy knot of awkwardness, the doors opened wide like a ravenous mouth -- its tongue stood erect in a smoke gray uniform, Commander Taylor.

With his arms casually by his sides, the commander smiled. “Dr. Cricket Moore,” he said. “Welcome to
The Inquiry
. Please come aboard. We have to make haste. Unfortunately, Director Wang has activated the outpost’s defense. He and I couldn’t agree on terms.”

He said it so calmly that Darryl thought he’d invited the doctor for tea, but once the words registered, he grabbed the woman’s upper arm and dragged her inside the cargo bay.

“Let go of me!”

Darryl released her once, smacking his hand against the doors’ release. As they closed behind him, he hastened his steps to the still waiting commander.

The commander grinned at Darryl as one would a son or younger sibling. “And I sent you to get her because of your calm manner.”

“What? Oh, yes sir!” Darryl panted, his heart hammering in his chest. They had to get out of the bay and into space before Wang started firing at them.
The Inquiry
wasn’t a combat vessel. “May I report to security and tactical? We must get going, sir.”

With his eyes twinkling in amusement Darryl didn’t quite understand, Commander Taylor answered, “Absolutely, Sergeant Snow. There’s no other spot I’d rather you be.”

“Thank you, sir!” Darryl rushed out in a mashed string of words as he raced to the lift. “Horseshoe!”

Even as he began to consider which defensive maneuvers to employ, in the back of his mind, a silhouette of the lovely Dr. Cricket Moore danced seductively and from time to time flashed into the smooth, cocoa flesh before his more immediate thoughts sent her back to shadow again.

Chapter 2

Cricket remained motionless a breath inside her new quarters, her heart continuing its swift gallop. Her attention was drawn to a three-foot wide plasma screen embedded inside the wall’s surface. With a press of her fingers, she would gain easy access to databases, music, video and gaming -- in a word, entertainment both real and simulated. To the door’s immediate left, a single bed and IGO standard-issue linens awaited her attention. Though sparse, the quarters met the expectations of a soldier who required moving at a moment’s notice. A life she hadn’t lived in five long years.

Not that she’d put down roots at Io. The sole difference between her quarters on the post and this new one was that her quarters had hardcopy volcanic images and her notes tacked all over the walls.

She dropped her backpack onto the bed and plopped down beside it. Cricket buried her face in her hands as the tide she’d held at bay since Director Wang’s call rushed up from inside. A call from the director of an outpost instead of a comm from her project leader. None of this was IGO standard protocol. Wong had said it had come from an IGO officer. But who?

Classified rank 37 was only three levels below the IGO President’s office. Something wasn’t right. No one that high up cared about her little science experiment, Ganor, a simple investigation into the volcanoes on Europa.

Once her locked and compressed emotions were freed, she couldn’t reel them in again. Before long, her huge guffaws melted into hysterical crying. Her life had been watered down to a sack full of things and a few portable drives. Mobile. Transitive.

Halting her tears, she shoved those emotions back to the locked section of her heart. Wiping her damp cheeks, she got up and went to the sliver of floor-to-ceiling elongated glass on either side of the central wall. Scattered stars lit up the surrounding dark like diamonds cast carelessly onto plush ebony velvet. She loved the view. Space comforted her and humbled her each time she took in its spectacular expanse. Dwarfed by its enormity, Cricket had discovered long ago that words were sorely inadequate to describe it or the feelings wrought from its beauty.

The outpost rotated slowly. Like a planet it deceived one into thinking it was stationary. A floating gray steel ballerina, frozen in a swirl, arms in a circle, spinning in the black sea of space, the outpost was very much active. It had been her home, if she could call it that. But no longer.

She couldn’t even say she missed it. It was familiar, but not a place where her roots reached deep. To be honest, the post was more continuous office than home. When she thought of home, images of a housing container, complete with a husband, a pet, and maybe a well-manicured lawn came rushing forward. Not a seven-hundred-square-foot box onboard an IGO space station.

Things had changed so suddenly Cricket couldn’t quite believe it. She had a hard time trying to wrap her head around it. Numb, she briskly rubbed her arms. What would happen to the other scientists? Ganor?

She sighed. Aggravated with the direction her thoughts had taken, Cricket abruptly changed her focus. Too long she’d been skimming on engaging her life to its fullest, and now her entire life had been cast into the fray. She’d been kicked off her project on Io and arrested.
Sergeant Snow could make me feel alive again. He’s got a lightning rod packaged for me. I bet he’d set every single icy block in my belly to jelly
.

The roguish hunk pushed her long dormant buttons. She hadn’t been struck by anyone like him in years. Several long years, if she allowed herself to think about it for more than a brief moment, had gone by without so much as a kiss.

At that moment, the spacecraft shuddered and she spilled to the floor. Bathed in the battle mode’s scarlet warning blare, she struggled to her feet and held onto the bed’s footboard for stability.

“Warning, battle red. Warning, battle red. Engage safety protocol Delta 5019-Zebra.”

Cricket grimaced and went to the media center. At once she keyed in her IGO login and called up the outer visuals. Her fingers danced over the touch sensitive screen which, like a well choreographed partner, flickered accordingly. Displays dashed on and hastily vanished as she sped through the options. She managed to keep her balance as the spacecraft lurched ferociously. No doubt the pilot had engaged defensive maneuvers, and the commanding crew had it all under control.

Once she was logged in, the outside visual feed flickered once and the shower of fired laser blasts from the post lit up the sky. The streams whisked by as the spacecraft danced and tumbled, flipped and skidded by them. Poor imagery gave the feed a grainy distorted quality. She could barely make out the circular sphere of the outpost; its gray titanium flesh eerily bespeckled by static. It grew smaller as the distance increased between them. Static continued to rip through the video, bathing the screen in frosted white before winking back into feeble and fluttering imagery.

Staring at the streaming shots and the whirling maneuvering outside, Cricket shook her head in disbelief. Wang wanted her so badly that he risked his own men and those innocents onboard
The Inquiry
. Project Ganor hadn’t been a large, commercial or economic item for the IGO. A small grant-funded project with a lofty, long-term goal, to be sure, but it was obtainable -- in fifty years. The research she had couldn’t be worth this much effort and possible loss of human life.

As she thought about the commanding crew, her mind at once clicked on Sergeant Snow. It was most certain that the handsome officer had been staring at her. When making her way back to the docking bay, she had felt his hazel eyes on her back… lower back --
ahem
, her ass -- and it had prickled a rush of heat across her body. Her nipples remained tingling long after Sergeant Snow darted through the cargo bay to his station.

When he had grabbed her arm and dragged her into the cargo bay, she’d wanted his hands off of her at once. His touch had ignited something inside of her, something she didn’t want to feel or even acknowledge. Each of his fingers had sent shivers through her very core, setting her entire libido into overdrive. Further contact would’ve led to inexcusable actions, like her stripping him from his uniform and sucking him into her being. She hadn’t been touched by anyone with passion or emotion in years. Sim partners didn’t qualify as actual human contact.

Get a grip, Cricket. He’s an officer. All IGO males think they’re the solar system’s semen vessels for females. This Sergeant Snow isn’t any different
.

“Dr. Moore?” a voice erupted from her quarters’ speakers.

“Yes,” she answered, pulling herself from the budding fantasy starring the handsome Snow.

The slightly hoarse voice said, “This is Sergeant Snow. Are you safe?”

I wonder how he got the scar.

“Doctor?”

“Oh, yes, yes, I-I’m settling in. Thank you.”

Silence.

“Please secure yourself and your belongings. Snow out.”

Cricket frowned at the blinking green light as it switched to scarlet. He’d disconnected the comm.

Not a very forthcoming fellow, but perhaps he had a lot to do up front. What had Commander Taylor said? There’s no place he’d rather have Sergeant Snow than at tactical and security. She nodded as if he could see her. Yes, he had other responsibilities than babysitting a discarded scientist.

She cringed at the label’s accuracy.

As the spacecraft’s ride smoothed out and settled down, she felt it leap forward as the pilot engaged the warp drive. Soaring across space, she knew they were out of Wang’s reach for a while, though not forever.

Sighing as she set about getting the room at least livable, Cricket pondered who would’ve fired her from her project -- if anyone. What to believe? Her hands seemed to move of their own accord as they yanked scratchy ivory linen over the foam mattress. Idly, she fluffed up the pillow and removed her limited belongings from her backpack. A sonic toothbrush, civilian clothing, and another pair of boots. Back at the plasma screen, she clicked through the room décor files and settled on a waterfront theme. At once, holographic splashes of ocean, beach and sun covered the quarters, turning it into a seaside landscape complete with seagull calls and the strong smell of salt on the air piped in by hidden olfactory streams.

The mundane tasks failed to stem the rising thirst warming the triangle between her legs. She shoved the ever growing throbbing to the side, but ignoring the rousing sensations grew more difficult as the boring work dwindled. Giving in to her swelling hunger, Cricket made her way to the media center again. With each step, her desire threatened to explode into full-bodied lust, unlike anything she’d felt since her early twenties.

What in the name of Mars is wrong with me? He isn’t even that handsome. But still that wretched scar beneath his eye and the stony visage of seriousness fail to mar his appeal.

Sure
, said a voice from within.
That tingling in your breasts and the dampness in your panties shouts something to the contrary
.

“Shut up,” she whispered aloud, throat dry at the raw honesty in those words.

Her inner voice wouldn’t be silenced so easily. Acting in concert, her mind conjured reflections of Sergeant Snow, his brisk walk, the hint of musk and spice around his lean body, and the burning vigor which energized her when in close proximity to him. And the fire begged to be quenched. Cricket punched up simulation and holographic programs. The program presented her with a list of stress relievers, most of them exercise based. But there were some of a more erotic nature.

“Hologram program. Good enough to feed my need,” she said.

She slid her finger across the cobalt strip and the console below the screen ejected softly out of its shelving. Gently, she guided a sleek jelly-like substance out of its protective sleeve. Shaped in thick phallic form, the jelly substance hardened in the warm air. She scrolled through the various entertainment programs. In seconds she’d found the many adult play themes.

She held the jelly substance with a deepening sadness. Surprisingly silent, her inner sexuality didn’t offer up an opinion about her choice. Hologram programs could transform her diminutive quarters into wherever and whatever she could imagine. Moreover, when coupled with a sim program, it could create whomever she desired. A simulated version of the roguish Sergeant Snow would lack the electrical fire the real man commanded.

The funny thing was, she wanted the reality breathing fast and hot against her ear as he fed his length deep inside her. Moreover, she craved that electrical fire crackling across her, setting all points of her body at attention.

I’ve just met him. He -- he’s a complete stranger. This is ridiculous
.

“I, I can’t…” With hands trembling, she guided the azure glob back into its sleeve.

The loss of the Ganor project, my purpose, has thrown me into an emotional meltdown. I -- I must rest, get some sleep. Tomorrow, I’ll approach it with a clear mind. I’ll even get Commander Taylor to tell me what the hell’s going on with Bob and everyone else on the project. Something’s not right
.

Hugging herself, Cricket closed her eyes and swallowed the tears attempting to overpower her best defenses. Panic threatened to snatch her into its embrace. She couldn’t lose control.