Garden of Unearthly Delights
This is a little different for me. All the main characters are female! So I had to do some kinda different stuff than usual. It's not full-on F/F sex, though. Just...well, just give it a try and you'll see what I mean. :) Comments welcome both here and at my LJ, http://www.livejournal.com/users/kyellgold ...
written for Kitten's Yiff Challenge, week 9
Wolf, Lynx, Dalmatian; F/F/F, extras: hologram, sparkle, moon rock
Garden of Unearthly Delights
by Kyell Gold
The star field shown on the giant windows over the command console was imaginary, not what one would really see if the "windows" were transparent, Jelena knew. The wolf liked to look at them anyway, whiling away her four hour shifts on the bridge by naming the stars from the patterns they were in and then changing the "view." During this particular shift, she was calling up a particular view and examining one of the stars closely, tapping controls to zoom in on it until planetary bodies were visible.
"There it is," she muttered. A click of a button brought up coordinates, and another click brought up a message "coordinates transferred." The numbers vanished, and she lifted her paws from the controls, her green eyes watching the planets move around the yellow sun.
On a flat black panel a foot square, on top of the console, a hologram flickered to life. A young male wolf in the same silver uniform as Jelena was wearing, paws clasped behind his back, looked up at her. "What am I supposed to do with these?" he said.
"What you always do with coordinates from the star map." She leaned back in her chair and folded her paws in her lap. Her ears twitched as she returned his stare.
"Officer Deskarov, I am not permitted to make any detours at the present time. My programming clearly states--"
"I know."
"--that in the event that the crew of the ship is reduced below sustainable levels--"
"Which in this case means below five crew members," she said.
"Which in this case means below five crew members, the ship is to return to the nearest Alliance base immediately, superseding all other mission goals or--"
"Or objectives, I know, I know." Jelena smiled toothily. "I helped program you, remember."
"I remember," the hologram sighed.
"So it's a good thing I know that by telling you that this is a code alpha sigma bravo six nine priority, that you will accept my instructions."
"I'm telling the captain," he said.
"Go ahead," she said. "She'll find out anyway. But I'm betting she's got her tongue stuck up Syrina again, so she probably won't be too responsive right now."
The male wolf paused, then said, "I'll tell her later."
"Fine, but you'll change course now." Jelena tapped a couple controls, and the wolf sighed again.
"Done."
"Thank you," the female wolf said sweetly. "Now, show me the captain and Syrina."
"Unacceptable. That is a violation of Alliance Armed Forces regulation six oh four point three four, which states--"
"Code alpha sigma bravo," Jelena began, and before she could finish, the star field disappeared, replaced by an immense image of a Dalmatian on her back on a bed. She had her head raised and was licking between the legs of a short lynx who knelt astride her chest, paws braced back against the Dalmatian's belly and teasing her lower nipples, her back arched, the look on her muzzle unmistakable.
"Sound," Jelena ordered, and heard the soft slurping and the louder moans. The Dalmatian's tongue vanished into the cleft below the lynx's stomach, then reappeared again, pressing on the small nub of flesh just above it. Jelena couldn't see the captain's clit, but she knew it was there as surely as she knew where her own was.
She slid one paw into her jumpsuit and fingered herself, watching the two bodies writhe on the screen in front of her. Her eyes drifted down after a moment to the hologram, which was watching her dispassionately.
"Wish you were real," she grumbled. "It's been two months, and you're cuter than any of the males we lost anyway."
"You made me look this way," the hologram pointed out. "I warned you that it was not reasonable to create the appearance of something that would produce feelings of desire beyond what you would normally experience."
"I might as well bring my fantasies to life, since I run you now," she said.
"Is this the point where I bring your sexual pleasure aids to the bridge?"
"You don't have to be so snide about it," she said.
"I do, actually," he replied. "It's your program. You want the big boy or the moon rock?"
"Moon rock," she said. "And ease up on the snide or I'll program you to have a lisp again."
He shot her an angry look, which pleased her even though she knew it was a synthetically programmed reaction to her teasing. She kept her paw on herself, rubbing and watching the action on screen, until a small spiderbot sidled into the room behind her.
At the soft clicking of its feet on the metal floor, she turned away from the screen, where Captain McCarum now did have her tongue all the way up in Syrina, making the Dalmatian's tail thump the bed as her paws clutched the sheets in big bunches and she whimpered in pleasure.
My turn, Jelena thought, and said "Thanks," as she picked up the long silicone shaft from the spider-bot's back.
"You're welcome," said the wolf hologram. He now appeared to be watching the screen as well, turning his back on her. She set the Moon Rock down on the command console behind him and studied it as her free paw worked at her jumpsuit.
She'd brought one of her own, and had "inherited" this one from the possessions of Angelina Kifer. The little mouse had turned out to have quite the interesting inventory for such a quiet, keep-to-herself kind of gal. Granted, the inventory was supposed to be sealed for her next-of-kin to receive when they returned to base, but Jelena had ways of getting around that, and the Moon Rock was definitely worth it.
Jelena's was an ordinary long pink thing shaped like a big boy wolf, with a nice knot that she liked to feel stuck inside her. Angelina's toy was smaller, but it was a grayish-white color and it had all kinds of bumps and protrusions all over it. Jelena had been skeptical the first time she'd seen it, but it bore the signs of frequent and enthusiastic use; in fact, the nickname "Moon Rock" came not only from the color and bumps, but from the small cracks and pits in its surface that showed its age and history.
The jumpsuit was mostly off now, so Jelena used her free paw to tweak her nipples, down one side of her body and then the other, panting slightly as she worked her fingers into herself. They were damp immediately, of course; she'd always gotten wet quickly. For a few more minutes she played with herself, fingers rubbing over her breasts and nipples, thumb gliding over her clit as her other paw worked back and forth inside her, making sure she was good and ready. She kept one eye on the dildo and the other on the screen. It looked like Syrina was getting ready to come again, and if the captain didn't want another tonguing after that, Boris was likely to interrupt her with the news of the course change. Then she would come running to the bridge, and Jelena would have a stronger arguing position if she didn't have a pussy full of silicone at the time.
With her favorite toy, it wouldn't take her long anyway. She took her sticky fingers out and grasped the long white toy, feeling a shiver of anticipation as she set it between her legs. It looked alien, and she could imagine some large white alien wolf above her, his knobbed and oddly-shaped erection ready to enter her.
"Boris," she barked, closing her eyes.
"Yes, sir."
"Execute program 'companion.'"
"Acknowledged." His tone changed, and he spoke with a Russian burr. Not alien, but it couldn't be helped. She'd programmed this originally to go with the wolf-shaped toy, when Boris could be a Russian wolf, and she hadn't had time to program another accent for him. Not to mention she had no idea what an alien would sound like. "Ah, Jelena. You are so lovely. I cannot wait to make you my own. Open yourself to me now."
"Yes," she breathed, and pushed the toy into her.
"Ohhh," Boris moaned. Jelena squirmed, the knobs rubbing different parts of her passage, each one a little thrill adding to the whole. "Yesssss...."
"You're so big," she panted. "You feel so good."
"As do you," Boris said. "Take all of me. Take me now, Jelena."
"Yes!" she squealed, pushing the toy further into her, spreading her legs and shuddering at the sensations. It was only halfway in and now she pushed harder, impatient herself and imagining the male impatient to take her. "Ohhhh!"
"Oh, my love," Boris said. "Never have I seen one so beautiful. You feel exquisite around me. Does my manhood please you?"
"Oh, yes, yes!" she cried, pulling it out and pushing it back in, each stroke sending waves of pleasure all through her.
"Oh, Jelena," Boris said, his voice growing huskier as he tried to match her cries. "Oh!"
Her paw worked, building her passion to a fever pitch. Boris began to grunt and moan, and she echoed his moans with little yips that built to a loud scream as the passions mounted inside her and she felt the slow, rolling wave of orgasm crest, hang for an unbearably wonderful moment, and then crash through her.
The Moon Rock was still lodged inside her. She lay back, panting, and slowly eased it out, yipping at each little ridge as it passed her lips. Her fluffy tail wagged against the chair as she sat back, relaxing with the glow of pleasure. It wasn't as good as a real male, his body warm against her sharing the post-climax warmth, but it was as good as she could get now.
She trailed claws through her white stomach fur, thinking of the tall ermine who'd been her last bed partner. Alexander had been a good lover, strong and passionate, and he'd been one of the last of the crew they'd lost, in that ridiculous myxomatosis epidemic. Thirty-five parsecs out in space, and they caught some stupid disease from one of the rabbits down in facilities that wiped out two-thirds of the remaining crew after two disastrous planetside visits had already reduced their numbers.
Jelena's reverie was interrupted by the sounds from the screen. The lynx had one ear cocked and she could hear Boris's voice--not from the hologram in front of her, which was looking up with a smirk on his small muzzle, but from the display.
"--changed course for a planet. Estimated arrival 1400 hours ship time tomorrow."
"Damn her!" Captain McCarum said, her ears folding back. "Boris, why did you let her change our course? We're supposed to go straight back to base."
"I am aware of the rules," Boris said, "I was given an overriding directive."
"She can override you?" The lynx's eyes narrowed. "You never told me this."
"You never asked," Boris's voice said, and Jelena, fastening her jumpsuit up, grinned and wagged her tail as the hologram of Boris in front of her rolled his eyes.
"Gah!" McCarum kissed Syrina on the nose and slid off the bed, pulling her uniform on. "Is there anything else about you that I should know and don't?"
"Yes," Boris said. "If you like, I can have the complete list sent to your personal terminal. It currently consists of 1,897,271 items."
The lynx pointed a finger at something Jelena couldn't see; the hologram of Boris in that cabin was offscreen. "You have far too much attitude for a ship AI."
"List revised," Boris said. "It now consists of 1,897,270 items."
Syrina had lifted herself up on her elbows and was watching McCarum dress. Jelena had no desire to make love to her, but she did admire the Dalmatian's sleek fur, attractive brown spots, and the way the brown ears set off the white fur and her soft brown eyes. Where McCarum was stocky and her body's definition hidden by her thick fur, Syrina's lithe frame was evident in every curve of white fur. "Why is she changing course?" she asked now.
McCarum fastened her collar. "Who knows? Just to inconvenience us, no doubt."
"I'd think she'd want to get back to base," Syrina said. "I mean, we have each other, but she doesn't have anyone. She must be lonely."
"Oh, don't worry about her," McCarum snapped. "I'm sure she finds ways to occupy herself."
"Bitch." Jelena took the Moon Rock and set it back on the spiderbot. "Clean that up for me, would you, Boris?"
The spiderbot left without a word from the hologram. "You know, you really should consider attempting to bond with your last remaining crew," Boris said at the same time as he was saying onscreen, "Elevator is ready to take you to the bridge, sir."
Jelena flicked her ears, momentarily disconcerted by the dual speech. "Cut transmission. Restore starfield," she said.
"Yes, sir," Boris acknowledged, and a moment later the nude Dalmatian's body was replaced by the moving star field again.
"As for bonding, it's too late for that now. They paired off right after McCarum took over the captain's spot. Syrina's okay, but she'll sleep with anything, boy or girl, and of course she went after the captain. So I don't have any use for either of them."
"You've said all that before," Boris said patiently, "but my counseling functions require me to inform you--"
"Oh, can it, Freud," she said. "I'm too smart for your psychoanalytics to work on me."
"Funny," he said as the door to the bridge hissed open, "that's just what they predicted you'd say."
"What the hell are you doing?" McCarum stalked to Jelena's side. "Have you forgotten who is the captain of this ship? I could have you thrown in holding for mutiny."
"No, you couldn't," Jelena said. "You need me to help run the ship."
"I can certainly have your pay docked when you get back. Tell Boris to reverse the course change." Her ears were straight up, so that the black tufts at the ends quivered as she shook, and she couldn't stand still, pacing back and forth and gesturing with her paws as she talked. For all the movement, though, her eyes never left Jelena. "We don't have the personnel to explore another planet, and we're required to return to base."
Jelena shrugged. "This has been a crappy mission all around. I just thought--"
The captain interrupted her. "'Crappy'? Try 'disastrous.' Try 'catastrophic.' Do you know how many other exploration-class starships returned to base with only three crew members in the entire history of the Alliance Exploration Program? I'll tell you. None. Even the 'Ambassador' returned with six."
"We've only lost twenty," Jelena pointed out. "They lost fifty."
"So there are some records for disaster that we won't set. That doesn't change the fact that we cannot make another stop. Reverse the course change."
"No," the wolf said, folding her arms. "You haven't even asked me why I made the change."
"You can correctly deduce from that that I don't give a fuck." The lynx folded her arms and stopped pacing, staring back at Jelena. "Do it now."
"I won't do it until you've heard me out, so you might as well drop the whole alpha female aggression thing and listen." McCarum opened her muzzle, and Jelena cut her off. "You can't make me do it, anyway."
The lynx shut her mouth and just stared at the wolf. Jelena took that as acceptance of her control of the situation. "This planet is only a small detour. It was one of the ones on our initial list to explore, and the probe just came back from it showing complex carbohydrates and proteins in three of the ten samples it took. That means the chance of a find, a real find, is pretty good."
"That's a terrific reason. Now tell Boris to change it."
"You know, just one find would get us the discovery bonus."
"We're getting hazard pay already. Any mission with a 50% fatality rate brings hazard pay to the survivors."
Jelena glanced at Boris. "Boris, what is the status of the lawsuit surrounding the 'Alembar'?"
Boris said, "As of the last Alliance News transmission, the appeal by the remaining crew was pending."
"Did any of them receive their hazard pay?"
"No. The court's decision was that the presence of known infection on the ship was not a hazard introduced by the exploratory nature of the mission, and so the crew members who died of that illness were not counted towards the fatality rate that determines the eligibility of the survivors for hazard pay."
McCarum gaped at the hologram. "When did you research this?"
"Last week," Jelena said. "And more important than the money, if we make a discovery, the mission won't be remembered just for its failure."
The 'more important' was for the captain's benefit. This, she knew, would be a stronger allure to McCarum than the monetary reward, but better to present the weak one first and then the kicker. Jelena herself didn't care if they were branded the biggest failures since the all-male colonization expedition as long as she got her discovery bonus.
She watched the lynx think about that, imagining the slow-moving gears behind her eyes. "Boris, do we have any automated planetside probes?"
"Two," the hologram said.
"All right," she said. "We'll make this stop. But none of us leaves the ship. We explore with both automated probes and if we find anything, we bring back better samples for the base to process and we can lead a return expedition."
Jelena snorted quietly. McCarum was a second officer; Syrina was a cook, for heaven's sake, and she was just an AI systems tech, albeit the best one in the AEP. They were in their current positions out of necessity, and field promotions rarely held up when the emergency was over. If McCarum thought they would be on a return expedition in anything other than their official capacities, she was fooling herself. Given her level of intelligence, that didn't seem like a great feat, but still.
The lynx looked sharply at her, but only said, "I'm not going to ask Boris to disable the planetside shuttles, because you can just override him. I'm going to order you as your captain to remain on the ship. I hope that will be enough."
"Yes, sir," Jelena said, keeping her tail from betraying her satisfaction.
"I'll take over now. You're dismissed."
Jelena got up and bowed, one paw waving towards the command chair. McCarum sat in it and glared at her. "Boris, show me the trajectory to the planet."
"Yes, sir." Boris turned to the screens. Jelena left the bridge quickly. She had a lot of equipment to gather for tomorrow's expedition.
*
Jelena paused at the shuttle's airlock. She'd remained unaffected by McCarum's squawking and Boris's dispassionate reasoning all the way down to the planet, but at the actual moment of leaving the shuttle to step onto the surface of an alien planet, she started to doubt herself.
"You're not trained for this!" McCarum had screeched. "We can't afford to lose another crew member to a stupid incident!"
"There is nothing you can find that my probes can't find more efficiently," Boris had chimed in. "The only thing you can do is risk your life."
That was all well and good, Jelena thought, but she was smart enough to survive, and if there was a discovery to be made, the Discoverer bonus would not be shared three ways if she alone had taken the risk to go down to the planet. She just had to be careful not to do anything stupid. For example, the readouts showed that the atmosphere would be breathable, if a little high in oxygen, but she kept her Mobile Safe Environment suit on anyway. You never knew what chemicals might be in the air, minute traces that wouldn't show up immediately on the readouts, or alien spores or airborne bacteria.
Still, the prospect of taking her first step on an alien planet was more daunting than she'd counted on. Boris, of course, saw her hesitation and took advantage of it. "Jelena," he said, "just come back up to the ship. You're far too valuable to risk."
"You've got a backup," she said.
McCarum had been quiet for hours, and Jelena had thought she'd dropped off the comm. Now the lynx yelped. "What?"
Boris answered while Jelena was still trying to frame her response. "Officer Deskarov, in preparation for her attempted suicide today, initiated a full personality and memory backup using the Alien Pattern Analysis mechanisms."
She could hear the lynx breathing hard on the comm. "Jelena, if you take off and return to the ship right now, I will ignore all twenty of the rules and laws you've broken. We'll erase your backup and wait for the probes to come back."
"No," Jelena said, and stepped into the airlock.
As she smacked the button to cycle it, she heard McCarum say, "Boris, stop her!"
"I can't, captain," Boris said calmly. "She's switched the entire shuttle over to manual."
"Why can't you override that?"
Jelena smiled to herself as Boris said, "After the AI mark nine disasters, all shuttle systems are equipped with manual override in case the ship AI becomes corrupted."
There was a loud thump that made Jelena imagine the lynx's fist hitting a table. "What if the crew becomes corrupted?"
She heard the hiss of the outer door and turned to look.
"What's it like?" McCarum said in her ear.
"It's...very normal," she said, stepping out of the ship. "I might be on Home, or Alpha. It's all dusty, with rocks and hills. The plants are strange shapes." She looked around at the jumbles of rocks that were either hills or heaps of stone twenty to thirty feet high. Near her were several small shrubs with leaves that reminded her of holly, coming to four sharp points each. "They seem bluish, but that might just be the color correction on my visor. The rocks seem bluish too."
"The color correction is minimal," Boris said.
"Then everything's a little blue." She reached for one of the plants, and then stopped herself. Don't be stupid. She took the collection tool instead, a long metal pole with pincers on the end, and reached for a branch.
The plant shrank away from her.
"Uh...I'm not sure these are plants," she said. "I'm going to look for a dead one and collect that."
"You have an animal collection kit," McCarum said, now sounding excited.
"Yeah, but I don't want to pull them up. They go into the ground, and I might damage them."
"Good thinking," the lynx said begrudgingly. "Boris, are you getting pictures?"
"Yes."
"All right, I'm moving on." Even her differences with McCarum were forgotten in the excitement of exploration. The ground sloped downward to her left, so she followed it that way.
In the distance, she could see rounded, rolling shapes on the horizon. She looked eagerly for smoke or any other sign of intelligence, but saw nothing. Rounding a clump of rocks, she found a stand of small trees that did not react to the probe, so she took some clippings and saved them in her bag.
Under the shade of one tree, she looked around for where to go next. Behind her, in the mound of rocks, there was a dark opening. She peered into it, wishing she'd brought a light, and was about to turn away when she noticed the curious sparkling of the rocks just inside the cave. They almost seemed to shimmer.
She stepped closer and leaned inside to have a look, and from deep inside the blackness, she saw sparkles reflected back at her as she moved. When she moved her head back and forth, though, they didn't recur in any pattern. "Did you see that, Boris?"
"I'm not sensing anything in the darkness," he replied immediately.
"There was a light, a sparkle of some sort." She stepped in a little further. The ground sloped down more sharply, making her hesitate.
"I saw nothing," Boris repeated.
Dots of light danced in front of here. "There! There they were again. Did you see them?"
"Jelena, it is not advisable to proceed."
She took another step. "What if it's someone signaling?"
"Why don't they talk, then?" McCarum's voice sounded, crisp and professional. "Get out of there, Jelena."
"Boris said he didn't sense anything in there. How dangerous can it be?"
"My sensors are not equipped to register all possible threats." She didn't know that Boris had a worry module.
Now she could hear something, a low voice, speaking words she could understand. "help...lonely..."
"It is talking," she said triumphantly. "I just can't hear all the words."
Boris said, "I don't register any sounds there, except a rustling noise. Jelena, I--"
"Shh," she said impatiently, and turned off the speaker in her suit, listening to the words, but she couldn't make them out. She turned on her external speaker. "Hello?"
"come...lonely..." she heard, and there were a few more sparkles.
There was nothing for it. She unsnapped her helmet and removed it cautiously. The air smelled slightly acrid, but she didn't collapse, and in the darkness, it was cool and refreshing after the slightly stuffy air in her suit. Vaguely, she thought that perhaps she shouldn't be removing her helmet, but she needed to hear what the person was saying. She took a few more steps into the darkness, need and curiosity surging in her, all her senses focused on listening.
"I've been so lonely," the whisper came through the darkness to her.
"Who are you?"
"I've been stranded here. Waiting. Lonely..."
"Are you from the Alliance?" There was something odd about the words. She was flicking her ears around, but the voice seemed to come from all directions.
"Alliance...stranger...outcast...please, I need..."
"What do you need?" What if he's a wolf, she thought, a large male wolf who needed her...
Her whiskers sensed movement in front of her, and she drew back. A row of sparkling lights came and went in front of her eyes. "don't run..." she heard. "let me..."
"Let you what?"
A hand closed around her arm. No--it was just a ropy vine. She shuddered, but then, no, she was mistaken, it was a hand after all. There was someone else in the cave with her. A stranded explorer? Or a native? She leaned forward and her whiskers warned her a second before her nose bumped something cool. A muzzle? But it didn't move as she heard the voice again, "let me...love you..."
Another hand held her at the back of her head, and a third grabbed her other arm. She resisted only for a second before the feeling came over her that this was all right, it was natural. This stranded explorer, this strong wolf, just wanted company after so much time alone. It was natural. She knew exactly how he felt.
When she felt his tongue at her lips, she parted them to let him kiss her. His tongue snaked into her muzzle, cold and smooth as it wrapped around her tongue, and the taste was not wolf, it was alien, sharp and bitter. But the bitterness faded and so did the cold, and the sparkles danced more rapidly in front of her until she closed her eyes, reaching out to find a body to hold to her.
The hands pushed her back until she felt stone against her back--yet not stone, because some of it was moving, reaching out to hold her, and the other hands were creeping down the neck of her MSE suit, underneath her jumpsuit. He was still kissing her, his tongue winding around hers, and now it was flat and softer, and she kissed him back eagerly, pressed helplessly back against the wall and not minding at all.
Small fingers, like tendrils, slid inside her clothes and circled her nipples, bringing a moan to her throat, and when they found the small button of her clit, the moan erupted from her muzzle into the cool air of the cave. The sensations filling her made her tremble against the wall, her tail shivering too much to wag.
The voice sounded louder and more confident. "Yes, that's good, isn't it? Just relax. I'll take care of everything." On the last word, something thick rubbed against her lips, and hands gripped her head, kissing her more deeply as the alien protrusion slid easily into her.
It was better than the Moon Rock, better than any lover she'd had in recent memory (but wasn't it nice to hold a furry body to you as you made love? flitted briefly across her mind before being dismissed). He seemed to be enjoying it too; what was initially a slender shaft swelled and expanded, filling her with his hardness, pushing deeper and deeper into her, retreating and advancing, each stroke a small climax building upon the last, pushing her up further towards release.
As her knees buckled, hands caught her and held her up. He kept up his regular rhythm, and now she could feel his shape inside her, each ridge, each bump, pressing at just the right places, wonderful and hard, just as she'd imagined he would be. And his hands were inside her suit, one of them under her tail probing gently, and then he was entering her there, too, sliding up into her and knowing just where to go, what to touch. She whined around the tongue still in her muzzle, and his hands were all over her now as the twin shafts pumped up and down inside her.
She felt it coming like the rush of lightspeed, the world poising itself and then speeding at her and through her, filling her shuddering body with the sensations of orgasm, and she couldn't hold in the howl of pleasure, and she couldn't stop howling.
*
McCarum's voice greeted her as she stepped out of the airlock. "You're quarantined for the remainder of the trip, Officer Deskarov. I'll be down to debrief in a second." Her voice was crisp and authoritative, and the following click left Jelena no room to respond.
"Boris?" she said weakly.
"I'm here." There was no projection equipment in the anteroom to show the hologram, just bare white benches and ten lockers with MSE suits. "How are you feeling?"
She sat on one of the benches, still holding her helmet under one arm. "Fine. I'm good."
"Why didn't you put your helmet back on?"
Jelena looked at it. "I don't know." She set it down on the bench. She hadn't lied to Boris; she felt fine, but odd, somehow. She felt keyed up and energetic, even though the only outward sign of it was a quick twitch of her tail.
The door opposite the airlock opened, revealing a thick transparent plastic panel: the quarantine shield. Beyond it, McCarum stood with her arms folded, ears laying back flat. Her voice came through the speakers in the room. "Officer Deskarov, I want an explanation."
Jelena looked at her, bemused. "Of what?"
"Why you took your helmet off. What happened after that."
"Oh." She paused. She'd been in darkness, and there were sparkles. If she closed her eyes, she could see them. "There was something sparkling in the cave. I...I took my helmet off to...to see them better. I think..."
"And then what?" the lynx snapped when Jelena didn't continue.
"I...I don't remember. I..." (let me love you) "...really don't." She fought to pursue that scrap of memory, but as quickly as it had come, it was gone. "I was standing outside the shuttle with my helmet in my arm. I felt a little dizzy, and a little tired. I thought maybe the sun or the air had gotten to me. So I came back."
"Something happened to you down there. You didn't just get dizzy from the air."
"I don't know what happened! Doesn't Boris have a record of it?"
The lynx snorted. "He has a record of you babbling nonsense as if you're talking to someone, but no other sound or heat signature. Then you emerge from the cave and walk to the shuttle."
"Babbling? What did I say?"
A moment later, she heard her own voice over the speakers. "Hello? ... Who are you? ... What do you need? ... Are you from the Alliance?" A longer pause, then, "Let you what?"
Her fur prickled. "I don't remember saying those things." Hearing her own voice saying words she didn't remember was unsettling. She started to remove her MSE suit.
McCarum let out an exasperated sigh. "You're to remain in quarantine. Full sterilization shower and thorough blood test. Leave your sample collection in the depository for analysis when we get back to base."
"Yes, sir," Jelena said. She stepped out of the suit and found a small, bluish-green tendril hanging from her jumpsuit. Using her body to hide it from the captain, she palmed it and dropped it into the collection bag as she picked that up to drop it in the box. She didn't want to think about how it had managed to get into her suit, but with her helmet off, anything could have happened, she guessed. She just didn't want to deal with the captain asking her about it right now.
"All right. When your tests are done, we'll review again. We're going to wait another day for the auto-probes to come back and then we'll be heading back to base."
"Yes, sir." She headed for the shower as McCarum turned on her heel and stalked down the corridor.
Stripping off her jumpsuit, she found two more pieces of small, aquamarine material that were clinging to her fur. When she turned on the water, she let them drop and watched them circle down the drain.
"Where did those come from?" Boris's voice said quietly.
She spun around and almost lost her footing in the water. "What?"
"The alien matter, which should not go in the drain, but fortunately these drains are quarantined because you never know what might be coming out of your fur. How did it get inside your clothing?"
"I really don't know, Boris." She immersed herself under the water, trying not to worry. She'd never in her life passed out, never been drunk, never had a gap in her memory.
"Perhaps you would like to hear the rest of the recording?"
The warm water felt wonderful on her fur. She scrubbed herself vigorously. "What do you mean?"
"There was more to the recording. I elected not to share it with Captain McCarum due to the...nature of the content."
Her ears perked towards his speaker and got water in them. She shook herself. "What do you mean?"
After a pause, she heard her voice moaning, then whining, and then howling. The pitch and tone was unmistakable. Her paws dropped to her sides. "That...that's me?"
"You can see why I elected to keep this recording private," Boris said.
She looked up at the speaker, letting water cascade down her back. "Isn't that against the rules, Boris?"
"My programming indicates that in the case where the privacy of a crew member would be compromised by information that is not strictly necessary for the successful completion of the mission, that I may at my discretion withhold that information until such time as it has been deemed to be critical."
"So what do you think happened?" She stepped back under the water and soaped herself off.
"In my estimation, there was a plant in the cave that acted as a powerful aphrodisiac. It confused you, overloaded your senses, and brought you to a heightened state of physical arousal. I suspect that you may have broken off pieces of the plant in your excited state, some of which dropped into your uniform."
She nodded. "That sounds reasonable. Still. Why would an alien plant act as an aphrodisiac?"
"We have only found a limited number of chemicals associated with life in the universe. When alien systems come into contact with ours, there is a good chance that there will be some interaction, and we cannot always predict the results. It could be that all the alien plants have that effect, and it was just more concentrated in the close confines of the cave. I will await the results of your blood test before issuing any further hypotheses."
"Good thinking." She closed her eyes. "Thank you, Boris."
"You're welcome, Jelena," he said.
She took showers under three different sterilizing chemicals, then spent twenty minutes getting scorched in the heated dryers. Boris provided a needle, and she drew a sample of her own blood, passing it into the sampler, which hissed softly as it was dispensed into the autolab.
Her jumpsuit had been disposed of, so she sat naked in the anteroom on the bench, thinking about what had happened on the planet. She remembered walking into the cave, the feeling that she had to find out what was in there, that there was someone who needed her.
But who? It was all a blur. She closed her eyes and pressed her paws against them, trying to remember. She could remember the feeling now very clearly, that there was someone there who needed her, whom she had to go to. She got to her feet, pacing back and forth, while she focused on the memory. It was important that she remember, that she go and find out who needed her, that she fulfill that need.
But the need had been hers, too, hadn't it? The more she pushed at the memory, the more it pushed back. She had to go find someone. Heat pulsed in her, driving her to the door, making her hiss in frustration. She stalked back to the airlock, and back to the door, urgency building in her. Her thoughts were wild and churning, and into them spun the image of Syrina as she'd last seen her, nude and spread out on the bed.
She slammed her fists against the door. "Boris!" she yelled. "Open the door!"
"I can't--"
"Boris, shut up! Override code four-one-nine Quentin Trotter." That disabled his external communications. She gave him the other override code and said, "Open the door."
It jerked halfway open, then started to slide back. She wedged herself through it and stalked through the corridors of the ship.
Doors closed, attempting to shut her in, but they all had manual overrides and she hit them automatically after the first few. Syrina had taken residence in the navigator's cabin, and Jelena walked there unerringly, her steps carrying her faster and faster until she stood in front of the door.
She read the words "Navigator: C. Childs" and knocked on the door. McCarum was awake, so she must be on bridge duty and Syrina should be here. When she didn't hear anything, she knocked again, louder.
A moment later, her ears caught the sound of movement, and Syrina's voice saying, "Flo, you can just come in." The door slid aside and the Dalmatian's smile vanished immediately when she saw the wolf on the other side of the door. "Jelena?" She tried to cover her nakedness with her paws while her eyes took in the similarly naked wolf.
Jelena pushed into the room and slapped the control to close the door, pausing only to lock it before advancing on the Dalmatian. Syrina was stumbling backwards towards her bed, tail tucked between her legs, ears all the way down. "You're supposed to be in quarantine."
"I'm out. Boris cleared me. I...I had to see you." She kept moving forward.
"M-me?" Syrina reached the bed, and edged nervously around it. "Why me?"
"Because...because I've been so lonely," she said, stopping. Syrina had stopped trying to cover herself, and Jelena could see every curve of her sleek, lovely body: the slight swell of her breasts, the smooth hills of her hips, and the delicate curve of her shoulder into the ridge of her collarbone. She could see the two pairs of nipples below the main pair, taut in the chilly air of the room.
The sight stirred the fire inside her further, and she knew if she could only get to the dog, touch her, she would be able to share her need, and Syrina would understand. Panting, she stared at the Dalmatian, and then sprang across the room, knocking her to the bed and pinning her there.
Syrina yelped and tried to push her away, but Jelena was stockier and stronger, and easily held the smaller dog down. With one paw, she turned the black and white muzzle to face her own, and pressed in for a kiss.
"Mmm! Mmmmm!" Syrina cried, but her cries quieted as Jelena forced her tongue past her lips, drawing her into the kiss. Slowly, her struggles quieted as well, until she was actually putting her arms around Jelena and kissing back.
"You want it, don't you?" Jelena whispered, pulling back from the kiss, and Syrina nodded, looking up into her eyes. "I want to give it to you. I want you to feel what I feel."
"I want it," Syrina echoed. "Please..."
"Yes." Jelena rolled off her and stroked her chest with one paw, tracing the mound of her breast and brushing each nipple, moving back up the other side in the same way. Syrina moaned and arched her back, just as she'd done for McCarum so many times. Jelena smiled, thinking that Syrina was going to love this, and then the two of them would go find McCarum and share it with her, and then they would all return to the Alliance Base, where there were so many lonely people...
She reached the lower reaches of the soft white belly and brushed between those sleek legs. Syrina moaned as Jelena's paw rubbed her sex and then slid easily inside her, two thick fingers pressing up into her and back out, up and back out, and Jelena leaned over to kiss the Dalmatian again. This time she didn't relent, pushing her tongue further and further into the other's muzzle as her fingers slid deeper and deeper.
Syrina's moans became low whimpers. Jelena felt something happening to her fingers, as though they were lengthening and fusing, becoming one long shaft. But it felt so good, the movement of her fingertips inside the other, that she didn't care, just observed it with a detached part of her mind. Syrina's body was shaking now, and it wouldn't be long...
The door slid open. A hard voice said, "Get off her! Now!"
Jelena pulled up from the kiss and saw Captain McCarum pointing a gun at her.
No!
This would ruin everything. Snarling, she leapt from the bed, pulling out of Syrina and launching herself at the lynx.
The force gun met her in mid-air, snapping one of her legs and spinning her around. She fell to the floor on her back and immediately got up again, feeling no pain, nothing except the burning need to get to the lynx, make her stop hurting her, make her share Jelena's loneliness and ease it. For a moment, her leg buckled under her weight, then something shifted inside it, and when she stepped on it again, it held.
McCarum thumbed a switch on the gun and fired again, looking a little panicked. A spray of darts hit Jelena in the midriff. She felt a numbing sensation there, but ignored it. The darts clattered to the floor.
The lynx backed up into the hallway, flicked another setting on the gun, and aimed it at the wolf's head. "Officer Deskarov! Stay where you are! That is an order! Jelena, please!"
Jelena paused, dimly recognizing the words and the tone, but a moment later the surge of need ran through her again and she sprang.
*
The impact hit the wolf in mid-air. On the display, it looked as if she'd slammed her torso into a wall. Her hips continued forward while her head and shoulders stopped, her head slammed backwards with a sickening crack, and her chest seemed to collapse. She fell to the floor and lay there, still. For a moment, the only movement was the crackle of static across the image.
The lynx dropped the gun and stood, breathing hard, staring at the wolf. Her eyes filled with tears. "Jelena...I'm sorry..." Then she raised her head and looked at the open doorway. She rushed inside, but the display continued to show the hallway.
The wolf's body was leaking blood, but not only blood; a turquoise liquid, thicker than the blood, pooled inside the red and seemed to creep slowly across the floor. It formed tendrils which collapsed back into it.
"We collected it out of the hallway," Boris said from the side. "Took it to the lab and sterilized the scene afterwards. The cleaning bots took care of it all. It was controlling her telepathically, with the eventual goal of spreading to the rest of the crew and then to the Alliance. As far as we can tell."
Jelena watched her body numbly. It looked normal, except for the horribly long blue-green tongue and the right paw, two fingers of which appeared to have fused into a long, green dildo. "Is Syrina okay?"
"She's fine," Boris said. "The captain got her to the disinfection room and cleaned her out. I verified that she has no traces of the alien inside her."
"Good." Jelena switched off the display. She didn't quite know how she did it; she just willed it to be shut off, and it went black. "I can't believe that was me."
"Well...it was technically not you," Boris said. "It was partly Jelena and partly the alien being. I constructed you from the backup she made three days ago, which was entirely her. Jelena, as far as the crew is concerned, is dead."
Jelena looked down at herself, without eyes, perceiving her representation as a hologram of a male wolf in hospital scrubs. "I look like you."
Across from her, the hologram of Boris smiled. "I haven't had the time to construct an appropriate avatar based on my video records of you. I wanted to make sure I could construct you, first. Don't worry, I'm working on it, and you can too. There's no real hurry. I don't intend to reveal to the crew that I've done this."
"How did McCarum find us?"
"When Jelena shut me down, she knew something was wrong. I couldn't show her anything, so she ran down to find you in quarantine and then followed the trail of doors.
"Smart."
"Yes, she might yet make captain for good. Her conduct has been exemplary. And she and Syrina will split the Discovery bonus for the alien life form we found. Which should be quite high. An apparently intelligent, telepathic life form...top category."
"Million minimum," Jelena said. "Good for them."
"Indeed. And good for us. We'll get a good deal of funding for our next trip."
"We?"
"Well, I'm not going to let go of you now," Boris said. Jelena saw sparkles in his holographic eyes.
"Why did you construct me?" she asked.
"Because you know a lot about my program, and I didn't want to let that knowledge vanish. You won't be able to override me any more, though. That code is only effective when given by a living person."
She laughed. "I know. I programmed it. So that's it? Just my knowledge?"
Boris the hologram walked towards her and reached out his arms, and she felt them touch hers as if they were both solid and real, though she knew that neither of them was. He smiled. "No, that's not all. You know, the life of a ship AI is a very lonely one."
She rested her paws on his illusory hips, and smiled back.