Afterburn Chapter One: Warming Up

Story by PuppyBat on SoFurry

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This is the first chapter in a romance/erotica series I have been developing. I'm excited to see it play out, as I don't normally write romance or science fiction.


Afterburn

Chapter One: Warming Up

It was only recently that I came to the realization that my childhood was quiet and that the country was a quiet place to grow up. Since moving into the big city, I had been having trouble sleeping, and two months into living in my apartment the sleeping pills were beginning to have a weakened effect on me. I kept telling myself that I would get used to the noise, and in time, it would become normal, but the constant sound of traffic and the hustle of the city was a solid wave of sound that could probably rouse me from a deep, deep, death.

But I had my new job to look forward too, so I got my half asleep ass out of bed anyway.

I got out of my bed, taking the few steps to the opposite end of my apartment where the bathroom was. I suppose it was a standard sized apartment but it felt small, and cramped. My legs were used to running in open fields. My entire family had grown up in open fields, from my father's side of the family, hyenas who roamed the savannahs, and my mother's side, horses that roamed the country side. Which means I was a hybrid, but I got all of my father's good looks, I was practically 99% Hyena. I think the term Horsyena might have been thrown around in my youth, but I always found it easier to just tell people I was a hyena and leave my horse ancestry as a surprise.

As I dressed myself for work, in a dress shirt and tie, I worked around the natural problem that was the 1% horse. On a normal day, I'd be displaying my legs in a pair of boxers and loose shorts, but when it came to work I had to find a way to make an obvious bulge from an oversize horse package look not so obvious. I achieved this with a small pair of briefs and tight dress slacks that, in all honestly, were cut just right to still show off my legs. Since I was a skinny and short hyena, my horse appendage had been extra obvious growing up. Interestingly enough, it wasn't really a selling point when looking for potential mates.

Personal problems aside, I still looked really good in a shirt and tie.

Fluffing a tuft of hair at the front of my mane between my ears, I grinned a large sharp toothed grin in the mirror while adjusting my tie. "Looking good Tyler." I winked a corny wink, and stepped out of my closet sized bathroom, snagging my messenger bag on the way out the door.

After pushing through the busy city to the light rail, I found a seat that wasn't sticky and sat back, bag in my lap. As people wandered in, I tried to avoid eye contact. Public transportation wasn't really my thing, but it beat having to walk, or trying to drive into work with the state of traffic in the city. Since the company I worked for owned the light rail, the biggest perk of riding it was that my stop was actually inside the building. Once everyone had taken their seats, the light rail lurched forward, and I stared out the window across the aisle from me. It was quick moving brick for a moment, that broke into buildings zipping by.

I glanced around the car, looking at the people, pausing on a rather buff older tiger. He was standing, instead of sitting, holding onto a rail and looking at his phone, and his muscles were nearly busting out of his white shirt. I could see the shape of his pecs, and could see his nipples under the thin fabric he wore. He glanced up, and I immediately glanced away, looking around. My mind drifted, thinking about that tiger's paws wrapped around me, feeling his whiskers tickling my neck.

A popping sound alerted me to an ongoing stiffening in my trousers. The zipper in front of my pants had began to unzip under the pressure, which, when mother nature has given you junk disproportionate to your body, is, sadly, a common occurrence. Quickly, I covered my lap with my bag, closed my eyes and took a deep breath, opening my eyes to stare out the window again, reciting math problems in my head. The rapidly moving buildings outside the window broke as the light rail carried us over water.

Suddenly I could see the entire city skyline, with the building I was heading for towering above all the rest. Large red letters loomed over the rest of the city reading "Smolder Industries". They were the top manufacturers of engines for space travel, and had been the first corporation to launch a space station into orbit. A space station that they had only improved upon since, expanding it out so that an entire engineering staff could live comfortably along with their families.

My job in the company was to check the math on the propulsion engines for errors, and correct them. It was boring, but that's what I get for falling in love with space as a kid and becoming a physics major. I actually hoped to one day work on designing the engines, but that was a long ways off.

As the light rail slowed to a stop, I slung my bag over my shoulder and filed out alongside everyone else going to work at Smolder. The light rail station inside the Smolder building was a huge cavernous affair with a crystal chandelier hovering above an entrance hub at the bottom of a large set of stairs and escalators. Smolder did a lot more than space travel, the chandelier, which hovered untethered to everything, was just one of the innovations the company had produced. Personally, hover technology made me uncomfortable, and the idea that the light rail I just was on would be converted into a hover rail in the next five years made me uneasy. So to that end, I walked around the hover chandelier and got onto an escalator.

At the top was a smaller lobby with a security desk and elevators. As I skirted past the security desk I smiled at Sandra. She was a panther that was usually running the desk on the days I worked. "Hey Tyler." She smiled back, giving me a gentle wave. "Looking good today." I also think she might have a crush on me, occasionally our lunches would sync up and we'd sit together in the company cafeteria. I was sure though, that women weren't for me.

"Thanks," I said, responding to her rather quickly as I walked by, my brain scrambling to come up with a response. "See you at lunch!" I said cheerily, while internally screaming and climbing into an open elevator. "Fourteenth floor please." I told the man near the door quietly, feeling my sins crawling on my back. I should have returned the compliment, but I didn't. Her fur did look quite lush today, maybe I should have said something? But that would have given her the idea that I might return her crush. Was there even a crush?

As soon as the elevator hit my floor, I bolted, eyes locked on the floor as I rushed down the hall to my department. Someone saying, "Tyler!" In a gruff tone brought my attention back upwards. It was my boss, Mr. Jones, a portly walrus that always seemed to wear pants that were a size too small. He seemed nervous, and was hanging onto the door to his office like it was a life raft. "We have a guest in our department today." He huffed, "I need you to triple check those numbers you looked over last week. Make sure they're absolutely top notch... I uh..." He trailed off and coughed into a large webbed hand.

I took the pause to throw out a question. "Who is it?"

He cleared his throat. "Mr. Smolder."

The blood drained from my ears and cheeks. "Dallas Smolder? The president and founder of Smolder Industries?"

"Yeah," Mr. Jones audibly gulped, "God himself is inspecting our department today."

"Wonderful." I said stiffly, shuffling past my boss.

My brain was swimming, trying to remember if I had made any changes to the equations for the new engine last week. A single variable was stuck in my head, and I couldn't remember if I had altered it or considered it but found it to be accurate. My shuffling turned into a fast walk. I had to get to my computer before anyone had a chance to check my work.

I entered the main office, and slowed to a stop. Across the room, past the rows of cubicles, was Mr. Smolder. Dallas Smolder. A large black wolf with broad set shoulders, and very serious golden eyes. His very presence sent a chill down my spine. I had only seen him once before at a company event a month or two back, and the sight of him made me weak in the knees. Dallas Smolder was only 46, had built this company from the ground up, and a few years ago he was in an accident. How I heard it, is that he was up in the space station when an experimental weapon he had been working on for the government had exploded, taking most of the right half of his body. That probably wasn't how the accident occurred though, I'd probably heard at list six other more improbable stories, but the results were startling.

His right hand was a robotic prosthetic, as was probably that half of his body, but all I'd ever seen was the hand. Most people, if they were to get a prosthetic, the metal limb was coated in a silicone base that was then colored the same as their skin color. Fake hair follicles would then be implanted into the silicone to simulate fur. Half the time, you really couldn't tell the difference, but Dallas Smolder had taken a different approach. No fur, just silicone, and the silicone wasn't colored. It was perfectly clear showing off the wicked looking metal appendage beneath. No doubt it was an tactic to turn an already frighteningly powerful man even more intimidating.

I was staring at him, frozen. He seemed to be listening to a report being given by one of my coworkers. Even across the room, I could make out the shape of his jawline. Strong and powerful. I swear I could see the muscles under his suit. He seemed bored and uninterested in whatever he was listening too. Then he glanced up at me.

My breath lodged itself in my throat and I averted my gaze, my feet finding themselves moving quickly towards my cubicle. I slammed myself in my desk chair, dropping my bag wherever it landed, and scrambled to enter my computers password. I needed to find the document and check that variable quickly. "Shit." I muttered, missing my click and opening the wrong document. I tapped my fingers furious as I waited for the program to open up completely so that I could close it again.

"Finally." I breath a sigh of relief, opening the correct file.

"Are you the young Mr. Finch?" The voice was deep and caused my hear to skip a beat. I slowly turned my head. Dallas Smolder was standing at the entrance to my cubicle.

"Yes sir." I said meekly.

He stepped towards me and my breathing turned shallow. I could smell something in the air around him. It wasn't the scent of cologne or body wash, it was a natural scent that enveloped my senses. I couldn't help but imagine this... Near immaculate man, grabbing me, holding me against my desk and kissing me. Instead, as he got closer, I pulled myself deeper under my desk so that he couldn't see the building stiffness in my pants.

He placed his robotic hand on the back of my chair and leaned over me, casting me in a wave of his scent. "I see you already have what I wanted to talk to you about open." His breath was hot against my cheek, and I thanked my parents for the darker orange fur that was hopefully doing well to hide how flushed my face was.

"Uh..." I trailed for a moment, "Yes!" I said rather loudly, covering up the sound of my pants zipper moving down a few notches.

"Well, I do like your enthusiasm." He smiled. "However I wanted to talk about the variable you changed in my equation."

_His_equation. He wrote this. The master of space travel wrote the entire basis for an engine, and I changed the variable in one of the equations in it.

"I, I, I'm- Sorry!" I raised my voice again, my zipper moving once more. I was terrified that I was about to get fired, and yet the terror mixed with his breath against me when he spoke was just making me more excited. The fantasy in my head of him kissing me and escalated to his hands running over my body.

"It's fine." He said with a chuckle, amused by my stress. He placed his left paw on my shoulder, and my zipper popped again. I didn't cover it up. I didn't say anything, but the silence after was suffocating. He carried on, like he didn't hear it. "You did break it though."

"I can change it back!" I said quickly.

He gently squeezed my shoulder as he said, "It's actually alright." His own deep voice covering up my zipper moving again. "Your mishap actually inspired me with a new concept." His prosthetic hand landed on my other shoulder, and I could feel my dick straining against briefs, open air breathing through the stretched and straining fabric and tickling the head of my cock. He pushed back on my chair, leaning me back. My hands were plastered in a death grip on my desk. He leaned in close, and I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, he could see my sizable dick poking out of my fly. "We're going to discuss your mishap over lunch in my office today. I look forward to see you there."

His grip disappeared and my shoulders felt cold without his hands against them. I couldn't even turn towards him, I could only hear him walking away from the cubicle. Instead of reciting math problems to dispel my erection, all I could think about was his prosthetic around my dick, and his tongue in my mouth. And I would be having lunch with him today. Wonderful.