ALIEN STORY–10
Written by Juxian Tang
So, we put Iver to the autodoc to test it. And after the heavy lid of the machine slid over him there was nothing to do any more. Whether the thing was doing its work, or killing him, or just stalling – it had to take hours until we could get the results.
Yes, I had to be in a state while waiting – but strangely, I felt the greatest flow of relieve spreading through me, so sweeping that it weakened my limbs and swooned my head. The autodoc was tampered. It had to be. I believed in it so full-heatedly that I didn’t see anything irrational in my certainty. Okay, but it was so easy for them to spoil it – why wouldn’t they have done it?
“Inanna Great Mother,” I whispered aloud knowing that the Darloxians didn’t listen to me. And even if they heard they would think I pray for the autodoc to be valid. They were discussing human technologies, however, and Neaf turned to me and patted my shoulder.
“Don’t hurt yourself, brother. We’ll call you.”
I went to my room and there was nothing that could stop me – and, really, I didn’t feel like stopping from anything, I was anxious to prolong the feeling – the stupefying state of everything going right and every wrong thing that was done and happened – corrected.
Well, not so simple it was. The last thing before I inhaled my stuff – White Dove my pusher called it – and the first thing when I came round – I saw again the bullet from my gun entering Iver's body. His flesh ripped and blood fountaining and when he fell on the floor then for some seconds he sort of crawled – sure, it was convulsive motions – but it looked like to me as if he wanted to drag himself away from us, as if he wanted to be in some other place to die.
No, he was not the first man I shot at and killed. Only I guess it was never like this – that he stood in front of me naked and so ravaged that there was no live place on his body and it was me who had done it to him. I tortured him so much that I made him want to die. I never tortured no one before.
After the effect of the drug assuaged I returned to the crew quarters. For a couple of hours more I sat with my friends chatting and drinking tea or something and then Soyii appeared to hail us. And we came up to the autodoc and it was open and Iver lay there and he was alive.
He still was stoned – and his face was really marble – void of any expression, smooth and bluish-white and with his lips pressed so tightly that they were only a thin colorless line. His eye-lids were not lowered quite closely and I could see his whites between these long arrow-like lashes.
There was no blood on Iver's body any more – I barely could believe that I made him shed it. There was a neat two-inch dark pink scar instead, as if drawn with an ink-pen. So neat that I felt like touching if to check if it was real, if I would sense it under my fingers. The autodoc worked with his welts where the Darloxians had stung him, too. Another scar, longer and somehow more roughly looking, was going right across his nipple. And I saw the tiniest, almost imperceptible trace in the corner of his mouth.
If not these marks, I thought, he could look the same as he was the day before. When I undressed him to let my Darloxians have their pleasure.
“It works!” Neaf exclaimed in an amused voice.
“This human device is fine,” Hurlock commented jovially.
“Well done, Chthri!” Soyii congratulated me. I turned to my friends and in a moment I got into their embraces, with almost every tentacle pushing me, wrapping around my shoulders, pulling me closer to them.
“I knew it would be all right,” I saw Neaf’s broad approving smile and smiled back.
I didn’t know what I felt. I looked at Iver – at the steady fluctuations of his chest – and I didn’t know what to feel. Everything I could find in my head – every thought and phrase – was matching only one layout – with him being dead. Dispose the body, I could hear my voice. Or – well, guys, the worst is here, we’ll have to find the programmer. I knew I could pronounce it – I was preparing myself to tell it. Nothing was necessary now. And instead of necessary things I found only some weird dull ache inside.
“Now we have an occasion to celebrate,” Wagr suggested hilariously.
“I think I’ll better go and try to contact the outsiders,” Neaf switched to his usual efficient manner in no time at all.
Others didn’t leave. Wagr and Soyii were chatting brightly in Darloxian and Hurlock I saw approaching the autodoc again. He butted Iver's body with his tentacle casually, pushing at his side, almost flipping him over. It didn’t matter, I thought suddenly, he couldn’t feel it. Hurlock glanced at me fleetly.
“What’s now?” his voice was harshly modulated as usual, sometimes difficult to comprehend even for me. I let his question hang.
Iver lay flat in my bed motionless for almost two hours more. At first I walked around and then I just sat in the bottom part on the bunk feeling his narrow feet almost pressed to my hip. I watched him.
So fuckin’ funny it was that he turned out to be so beautiful! I mean, what a strange coincidence – I never too no hostages as far as to our ship – and this first one I had was the prettiest male I’ve ever met – and I never lusted for females!
The thought that he could have been dead by now came again to me, annoying like metal taste in my mouth. Yeah, he could. Not healed at all, with his body still looking like a mess of injuries – I really never saw anything like this before. I don’t know how it could be that I felt anything but sickness looking at him – and yet he was making me so horny that I didn’t care what I was doing, still less what I was doing to him. Was it the reason why I wanted him to die?
Well, now he was not so much destroyed. And once again I felt the urge to touch him, to run my fingers over his body to check if he was really back and whole, and here with me. I put my palms round his delicate ankles. They were so cold that it burnt under my skin. I touched his hands – they were pliant and icy.
“Iver, you are freezing,” I whispered pulling a blanket over him.
Some more minutes passed before he started moving. I felt it at once. At first it was still unconscious, he just thrashed a little, pushing me with his feet slightly. I glanced at his face – it was not placid no more – with the frown between his thin dark brows. His lips curved – and he closed his eyes shut – to open them at the next moment.
I apprehended it to happen – but when he did look at me I understood his sight was still too clouded, he simply didn’t register what he saw, better to say, he didn’t see. His mouth worked painfully, as if he tried to moisture his lips and his tongue was too dry for it.
I brought a cup of water to him. And when he drank it his eyes were getting clarified – unavoidably. Then he pushed me.
It was a feeble push and if I was intended to stay it would be easy for me – but I stepped back. I splashed a little water on the floor and on myself and it made me chuckle. My laughter abated quickly when I saw his face.
“You…” staring at me, with his eyes completely sober, Iver whispered. He peered at me – as if he couldn’t discern me clearly – but it was not so, of course. “You… Darren…”
“I am,” I answered curtly. He really didn’t need my confirmation. With his eyes like two narrow slits and his teeth glistening between his half-parted lips he was absorbing me – and I saw the first fit of shivering that shook him. His voice when he spoke again was not shaking – but, maybe, it was too feeble to display any emotions.
“You killed me…” he paused. His brows slid together – as if it was not right. Then he found correct verbalization. “I thought you killed me.”
“Yeah, I shot,” I showed him my hands – as amiably as I could. I was not sure if he paid attention to my words or to my gestures, even though he watched me fixedly. He couldn’t get control of his face – I saw little cramps distorting it.
“You did it,” he repeated. “I remember,” I saw him pressing his palms to where my bullet hit him – as if he felt it tearing him again. Then his face changed once more. He kicked the blanket down. His eyes were wild when he looked at the place on his belly where there was no blood any more. He gasped once and I drew my breath in, too.
“It’s gone!” I couldn’t figure out his emotion when he said it. He didn’t give me time to acknowledge. “You mended me. Oh, sure! Your autodoc…” he stopped abruptly. His fingers wandered on his scar. I bit my lips. He started again. “It is in order, right?”
How darn him could he know it? I didn’t remember – did I mention the autodoc in his presence? I had to. I couldn’t believe that he guessed so right so soon.
“Iver…” I tried to say something, I didn’t think of what exactly. He didn’t let me. The expression on his face – it made me flinch.
“Congratulations,” he said quietly.
His eyes became dull. He shuddered again and wrapped his arms around himself – as if he was very cold – and he turned on his side away from me, with his knees crouched. His lids sank down. There was no pain on his face, merely tiredness. He didn’t make any noise; his body rocked tiny, as if he was cradling himself.
“Iver,” I said again.
I stood at the back of my bed, clasping it tightly and watched him. He was reeling mutely. When in a while I heard his voice again – it was very small. And he didn’t speak to me. He muttered something under his nose – I couldn’t catch a word but somehow I doubted that it was a prayer. He was raving.
“Iver, stop it.”
He ignored my words. I stepped closer to him, not knowing if I going to strike him or to put a caress on him.
“Shut up. Shut up, you fuckin’ sicky.”
He didn’t answer. I felt my voice rising. I was going to shout at him – and I use my will to make myself sound flatly.
“Don’t make a show for me. I don’t buy it. I don’t believe you, shitty liar. You didn’t want to die. You tried to take me in. Nobody wants to die. It is good to be alive. Come on! Tell me! Tell me you want to die again!” I stopped abruptly. “Don’t even you dare to tell me it. You don’t know anything about death.”
I knew it was not true, of course. He was dead.
I towered over him now – and he still didn’t tilt his face to me. He was in shivering. I felt two equal desires - to grasp his matted hair and slam his head against the metal post of my bed – or to put my hand on his hunched shoulder.
“Fuck you, stupid scum,” I cursed. I was sure that he didn’t hear me. But he did. And oddly it made him glance at me. “You know what? You could be cold right now. I could throw your body to the outer space. Do you think it would be better?”
“Yes,” I heard his voice, hoarse with the feelings he tried to overwhelm. I set a smile on my lips but he hardly noticed it. He looked right in my eyes.
“No,” I said firmly. I glanced at the cup half-full of water still in my hand. “Shit. Am I arguing with you?”
He continued to look straight at me. I plashed the water into his face. He didn’t look aside. Then he said very tranquilly:
“What’s now?”
This question… With some creepy feeling I recalled Hurlock asking it only a couple hours ago. I had ignored him. I could ignore Iver, too, why not? Only I didn’t feel like.
Very slowly I sat down on the bed at his side. He didn’t shrink away from me, neither he revealed any other emotions. He just waited for my answer.
“And what do you think will be now?” I asked carefully, reaching my hand to his cheek. I was prepared for him to quiver under my touch. He didn’t. For a moment he refrained, perhaps wondering if I asked for real. He didn’t have much to lose answering, anyway.
“You will let your Darloxian friends fuck me again,” he said tonelessly.
I was fingering his soft hair. I stopped for a while and then started once more. He didn’t register my hand – at least it seemed so.
“Shall I?” I asked at last. He didn’t answer – but really, it was me who had to answer. I forced myself to speak and I couldn’t. I sighed. “We are going to sell the autodoc soonest,” I said eventually. “We won’t be able to stuff you there again… and you will need it if my friends fuck you, you see. I don’t know. I don’t believe you want to die – though you said it to me and you say it again. So, I’d, maybe, better not allow them to put their dicks inside you... At least, as long as you behave yourself and do not make me mad,” I added quickly. “Clear?” I plucked at him shortly. “Clear, shitty boy?”
I couldn’t figure out what was the emotion in his huge golden-black eyes staring at me. If there was joy it was not substantial.
“Yes, Darren, sir,” he said. I patted his cheek, settling more comfortably near to him. Iver recoiled, giving me place, and I used it to lie down, putting my boots on the bed, too. There was not much space here – but I didn’t mind. I turned on my side to face him – and he lay docilely, without saying a word. He must have felt feeble after the surgery. But there was something more then feebleness in his pliancy.
The blanket – as he pulled in down – was covering only his privates now – and he didn’t try to adjust it. I took his face between my fingers and thumb.
“Kiss me, hear?” I directed his jaw, closing my face to his at the same time. He gave in without hesitation. For a moment I saw his tender lips parting – and then they touched my own lips and I felt the taste and wetness of his mouth. Despite myself I smiled into this kiss – but the next second I didn’t smile any more, flabbergasted with the sensation of his soft warm tongue sliding inside my mouth. Some part of my mind registered what it was: I told him to kiss me – and he did it exactly. I didn’t kiss him but he deep-kissed me, cruising his tongue in my mouth, intertwining it with my own tongue. I was breathless suddenly.
His thin tentative digits touched my hand. I probably dug my fingers too tough into his skin and he tried to release my grip. I let him go. I started groping his smooth hair instead – and I felt him touching my upper arm while he was still lapping on my tongue.
It was flame going down through my body from our pressed lips. With every his lick I felt something clenching in my chest sending resonant waves of dizziness. I realized about having hard-on when I hurt myself pressing the erected organ too tightly to his thigh-bone. My skin was smoldering. What I really wanted – I knew it terribly clear – was to drive all my body into his, to drown myself in him, to clench with him inseparably.
He withdrew his mouth. It was good as well – I gasped for air. My face was twitching – I smiled and crooked at the same time. Iver’s palm slithered without pressure upon my arm.
“Sweet whore,” I whispered tightly. I didn’t know what I was going to do – to grasp him and squeeze him until I hurt him – or to fling him on the floor. It ached in my chest so much.
“Darren,” a sudden soft voice hailed me through the intercom breaking the spell. It was going from outside of the door. Neaf. “Darren, I don’t bother you?”
I skipped down from the bed, checking swiftly my clothes. It was in order though demonstrating clearly my arousal. I pushed the button to open the door.
“I was afraid I woke you up,” my brother stepped inside carefully, gazing around. There was a mellow curious expression on his face.
“No,” I smiled to him. “Not at all, my Neaf.”
“Ouch, you are already tinkering with the human toy,” he remarked.
I shrugged. I moved back to the bed. There was no place to sit for Neaf – but he didn’t care. He stopped at the foot of the bed and looked at Iver intently. He seemed thoughtful.
“He already looks rather lively,” he said contemplatingly, raising two of his tentacles under the place where his chin had to be.
“Why not?”
“Yes,” he mused aloud. “The autodoc does its work. And – you know, brother, humans only seem to be frail species. They are extremely recoverable. I remember you – I wouldn’t bet any Darloxian would recover – and you did.”
“That’s right.”
I moved my shoulder sharply. I didn’t like to recall it – however, I didn’t need to recall. Neaf went on looking at Iver. I couldn’t see Iver's eyes, half-covered with his lashes, but I could see his face getting pale.
“This scar doesn’t spoil its looks,” Neaf informed. I saw his tentacle reaching and tapping on Iver's belly. He didn’t press it, just groped. Iver sucked his breath in. His belly fell. But it was not enough, of course, to escape. “Neither does this one,” Neaf pointed at his nipple.
“Probably,” I forced a little laughter out of myself.
“Oh, sure,” Neaf answered absent-mindedly. “They said the autodoc sew him around his rear hole, too.”
Yes, and it mended his smashed insides, I thought. Neaf didn’t wait for me to reply. One his tentacle tugged the blanket down from Iver and other two seized his ankles and forced him up and wide swiftly. He dragged him a little over the bed.
“Well, it is shut again,” Neaf commented calmly, poking with his tentacle. “As if we never penetrated him. Hurlock says it gives us a lot of opportunities.”
I never stopped grinning for a moment. Neaf paused and then I said it:
“Tell Hurlock I am not going to use the autodoc again. Tell him I don’t permit to tear the human.”
“As you like it,” at the next moment Neaf dropped Iver’s legs abruptly. “By the way,” then he turned to me and I stepped closer. “I didn’t get the answer from the outsiders.”
I hemmed. It was not weird, of course, taking into account it was only several hours since we sent a message for them – but it was the captain of the mutants who insisted he was in a hurry.
“I’ll check it every hour,” Neaf promised.
“Anyway, if they are going to be out of touch tomorrow morning – there is no much choice.”
“He was firmly intended to buy and he liked the price.”
“I don’t worry,” I said. “It is not the thing that we won’t be able to get off our hands.”
“By all means, Darren,” Neaf agreed. There was some pause in his words. Then he said reluctantly. “Jose left his signal.”
With some sickening feeling I heard this name. He was my provider, Jose, and somehow I was a kind of embarrassed to hear about him – the same as I didn’t like to hear about everything that was connected with the White Dove – but meanwhile it was always swirling somewhere in my mind.
“What does he want?”
“I don’t know…” Neaf seemed hesitant; he didn’t mean he didn’t know, of course. “He asks if we are going to buy anything in the nearest future.”
“Wow!” I laughed almost light-hearted. “He got bird-news that I earned some credits?”
“Actually…” Neaf doubted again. “Are you sure you have enough of the thing?”
This question made me gape. We didn’t usually discuss these things with the Darloxians, including my brother. Sometimes I even forgot that they knew about it, that it was one of them – I didn’t remember which – who presented me this stuff as strong and clear – some years ago.
“Yeah, I have,” I drawled. I was checking in my mind what I really had in my phial. Fifteen dose. Maybe, twenty. From month to two months of use.
“Jose is going to retire. The business grew too dangerous for him, you know, with these UTI. He says he sells his last delivery and then he is out.”
“Oh,” I said smiling wryly. “Some are able to get out.”
But it was not what I really thought about. Well, Jose was not the last pusher of the Empire – and I was sure there were others who had the stuff – even if it was rare. And still…
“We will find another source,” Neaf said echoing my own thoughts. I thought that in the beginning, when I used it once a week and even more seldom – just when I felt especially low – I wouldn’t give a second thought to the idea that I had to spend a while without it. But now I was not so sure.
Neaf looked at me waiting, without any impatience on his benign face.
“You decide, brother,” he said.
“Well,” I made another attempt, “we don’t know if we would have money from the mutants – and when. It’s a bit unreasonable to buy now, huh?”
The stuff cost exorbitantly. Well, the Alazanians who extracted it risked their lives. Neaf spoke. His voice was pure velvet – so tender – and when he only started I knew what he would say:
“Whatever you need, brother, you’ll have. Don’t upset yourself.”
Was I afraid to stay empty? I realized suddenly I was. Ouch! As any fuckin’ deranged addict. I giggled. I didn’t like this realization. But still less I would like it if I wouldn’t be able to find anything in my phial in my pocket.
Neaf left saying he would contact Jose without lingering any more and I closed the door behind him. The room was quiet. I turned around after a little pause and saw Iver still and silent on the bed. He lay exactly where Neaf left him – just turned to his side and crouched tighter. His eyes were following me.
Now his irises were almost light in their brown color – but no help for me in reading their expression – and after a second I was not sure I wanted to read it. You are my little human pet, I thought, you know it. I looked at his gentle mouth that kissed me only quarter an hour ago. I knew I could sit down near to him and he would kiss me again. Not because he wanted to. But I promised him not to let my friends screw him – and I kept my promise.
There was something creepy cold spreading inside me. I narrowed my eyes.
“Iver!” a little more coldness penetrated me when I watched his face getting wary. “Lie on you back.”
He obeyed. For a moment he looked at me trying to figure out what was waiting for him. I walked closer.
“You’d better be good for me, Iver,” I said unhurriedly, measuring his flat body with my eyes. “Or I will be bad for you. You can believe it.”
The End of Part 10
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